Jesse had no such reluctance to cause physical harm and seemed to be doing rather well, all things considered. There were quite a few groaning sailors lying on the deck around him, at any rate. Captain Jed Saltworthy, meanwhile, was marching about the deck, bellowing for his men to ‘ready the bait!’ It certainly looked as if Jeremiah East was going to be stuffed into a net and hung out for Gloria sometime soon. Lex would have liked to watch the show but there was no time for dawdling when there was a round to be won.
From the crow’s nest, he assessed his situation. The force field was so close that he could have stuck his hand through it. In fact, if he shimmied up the mast just a little further then he would emerge into the sea. That would get him off the ship and away from the batty captain but it wouldn’t win him the round since it seemed that the Gods expected them to find their own way to the surface, which presented something of a problem when you were so many fathoms under water. The sea above was pitch black? Lex couldn’t see even a glimmer of light from above. They were on the seabed, after all. There was no way he would be able to make a swim for it. Once again, Lex cursed his loss of the enchanter’s hats.
But then he glanced back down and, in the gloom, he noticed the thick seaweed-covered chains. There must have been six or seven of them? thick, strong, impressive-looking things all ending in an anchor. They were holding the ship to the seabed.
Of course! The ship was full of air pockets. The force field in place over the deck of the ship was itself a giant air pocket. Without the chains holding it down, the ship would simply float up to the surface! That had to be it. If Lex couldn’t leave the ship then he would have to get the ship itself to take him back up to the surface. All he had to do was find a way of releasing the chains. He was just starting to devise a scheme for doing so when a movement out in the dark water beyond caught his eye. He looked. Then he looked again to make sure he wasn’t imagining it. He wasn’t.
From Lex’s vantage point he had a perfect view of the gigantic octopus that was Gloria coming straight at the ship like a bull going for a red rag. It was the most horrific sight Lex had ever seen before in his life. She was coming so fast that he had only seconds in which to brace himself for impact before the huge monster crashed into the side of the ship. The chains all along that side were ripped out and the ship rocked wildly. Everyone on the deck went flying. Lex, despite his best efforts to hang on, was thrown from the crow’s nest but managed to get a grip on the netting about fifteen feet above the deck, although the rope burnt his hands horribly.
Gloria was not at all happy. Her awful tentacles? thick as tree trunks? punched through the force field and curled around the deck until she had the ship in a death grip. She looked just like the little octopuses Lex had already seen, except for the fact that she was about a hundred times their size. And the terrible squealing sound she was making was about one hundred times louder.
Everyone on the deck was shouting and running around, trying to avoid Gloria’s deadly, thrashing tentacles as the ship, recovering from the first shock of impact, now rocked the other way. The anchor chains on the other side were all ripped out in the process and, suddenly, the ship began to rise.
Lex grinned despite himself. That horrible monster was doing his work for him! They’d reach the surface in no time. Assuming Gloria didn’t crush the ship first, of course.
‘Fire the cannons!’ the captain roared, below.
Lex watched as a cannon was lit and, a moment later, there was an explosion and a cannon ball ripped through the water in a trail of bubbles. It missed Gloria by a mile, of course. She was, after all, entwined around the ship, her tentacles thrashing about all over the deck. The only way a cannon ball would hit her would be if she was positioned right in front of the cannon itself.
Lex tore his eyes away and tried not to think about the octopus. He couldn’t let Gloria distract him. And he most certainly did not want Jeremiah noticing his reaction to the octopus and realising that he had a phobia of them. Where was Jeremiah, anyway…?
Lex thought about it too late. He couldn’t pick out any players in the chaos below but, just as it occurred to him to wonder where Jeremiah was, a hand gripped his ankle. He looked down and saw Jeremiah clinging to the nets, glaring up at him.
‘Give me the medallion!’ he shouted above the din.
Lex offered a choice expletive in response and kicked out viciously with his foot, but Jeremiah held fast and then yanked down hard. Under ordinary circumstances, Lex might have been able to hang on but the rope burn his hands had suffered meant that he instinctively let go as soon as the nets began to cut into his already-raw palms. Fifteen feet was higher than Lex cared to fall. He flailed desperately at the ropes but was stopped in his descent by Jeremiah grabbing his shirt. In another moment the nobleman had whipped the medallion from around Lex’s neck and let him go again, plainly intending to drop him to the deck like a sack of potatoes. But he wasn’t counting on Lex shooting out his arm to grab Jeremiah’s wrist and, when he fell, Lex took the nobleman with him.
They crashed to the deck together, all the breath knocked out of them when they hit the boards, and the medallion flew out of Jeremiah’s hand to skitter along the deck amongst the feet of the running sailors. Lex and Jeremiah both twisted round where they lay to stare after it but, already, it had disappeared from their sight. Air bubbles were shooting up around the ship and the sea was getting lighter by the second. They would burst through to the surface at any moment and now, all because of Jeremiah, Lex no longer had the medallion. It was all he could do not to scratch the nobleman’s blasted eyes out.
Shoving Jeremiah aside, Lex leapt to his feet and hurried away in the direction the medallion had gone. It was extremely difficult moving about the deck now because the sailors had got spears from somewhere and were trying to stab them into Gloria’s tentacles like they were skewering meat on a kebab. They weren’t having much success because the tentacles were too thick and strong, and the spears just seemed to bounce right off them. All they seemed to be achieving was to make Gloria even angrier than she already was.
Lex pushed on, avoiding spears and tentacles, and keeping his eyes glued to the floor in desperate search of the faintest glimmer of gold, but he could see nothing beyond scuffling shoes and the more-than-occasional smear of blood. Until a pair of cowboy boots came into view and a voice said, ‘Looking for this, kid?’
Lex looked up and a wide grin spread across his face at the sight of Jesse, standing there holding the medallion. Apart from the fact that he stood on a sunken ship’s deck rather than a desert, Jesse looked the very epitome of a character from the Western novels Lex had read. His clothes were in disarray, with more than the occasional rip and tear, his hair was a mess, there was a long cut down one side of his face and? most importantly of all? he still had his hat and he was grinning from ear to ear.
‘I take it back,’ the cowboy said. ‘This Gaming thing is fun! Don’t know why I never tried my hand at it before!’
A sailor suddenly lurched up behind Jesse with a spear but, before Lex could even shout a warning, Jesse threw his elbow back without even so much as turning around and caught the man right on the chin. This caused him to bite his tongue and he dropped the spear and staggered off with both hands clasped to his mouth. Lex practically swelled with pride. Picking Jesse as his companion had been a stroke of genius on his part. With Lex’s quick mind and Jesse’s superb brawling skills? never mind all the rascally dishonesty they had between them? they made the perfect, perfect team.
The next time I play in a Game,’ Lex said, ‘you have got to be my companion again!’