Chapter Six
The world around Andy froze, and then disappeared. There was brief darkness before a million images of memories past and present assaulted him. Everything he’d ever seen and every thought he’d ever had, ran through his head at a speed he could barely comprehend. Andy started to panic when the images slowed and were replaced by a feeling of falling.
Then… Noise and smell.
The noise and smell of engines. Fear was keeping his eyes closed, but his other senses were in overdrive.
“What was that?”
Andy listened for a few seconds and heard heavy rain and thunder followed by a sudden jolt and a drop. He was thinking hard, trying to bring his mind under control.
“I’m in something moving,” he thought. “But what?”
He struggled to suppress his fear.
“Come on Andy; open your eyes have a look. It can’t be real, so it can’t hurt you.”
Andy took a couple of deep breaths then forced himself to look. He was in a plane. The noise was from the engines on either side of him roaring, it seemed, in protest at having to fight their way through the blackest, darkest, nastiest clouds he’d ever seen. The rain wasn’t just lashing the windscreen around him; it seemed to be trying to beat its way in.
“Either I’m in a dream or some clown has managed to somehow slip me into that ‘Big & Fast’ machine.”
Andy looked down at his arms and saw he still had the diary in his hand. He reached up and touched his chest and felt the Talisman hanging there. It still felt warm and alive; like it did when he picked it up in the museum.
“I can’t be in that machine,” he thought. “If I were I’d be seeing bogus arms holding animated controls, not my own arms. It must be a dream.”
Andy had a look around the cockpit where he was sitting. He reached out and touched its side. It was cold and damp. His mind was functioning better; processing what he was seeing and touching.
“If I was in the ‘Big and Fast’ machine, I’d just be waving my hands in mid-air and not touching anything, because what I’m seeing would just be computer graphics. But I can feel this. It’s cold and damp. I hope I’m not in bed dreaming because if I am, this cold and damp spells bad news.”
Andy began to take note of his surroundings in greater detail. There was an instrument panel in front of him with about a dozen gauges and dials which he didn’t understand. Ahead of that, a man was sitting with his back to Andy.
The man was obviously the pilot. Andy could see he was struggling to control the plane and that he was under a great deal of stress. He was swearing and cursing; using a lot of the words that Andy knew, but there were others that were entirely new to him. Andy strained to hear.
“Bad... weather forecast. Lost in this ... storm for ... hours, no … idea where I am. Low on ... fuel, Should be near ... Sumatra by now. Twenty two … hours without sleep. Need to find somewhere to put down soon or I’m really going to be right in the ...”
“That’s strange,” thought Andy. “I’ve never heard some of those words before and yet here they are in my dream. Well, I’ve had enough of this. I’m going to pinch myself and wake up.”
Before he could do it, the plane literally stopped in mid air and then dropped like a stone. Andy, and everything else that was loose in the cockpit, shot into the air. He smashed his head into the clear plastic window of the canopy before crashing down into his seat. Yelling in pain he felt his forehead. Blood was trickling through his fingers.
“Where the bloody blues blazes did you come from?!” an angry voice yelled at him.
Andy looked up through his bloodied fingers and saw the pilot looking over his shoulder glaring at him in stunned surprise. Andy just stared back, because this pilot looked exactly like the wax figure in the museum display
“Now the mannequin is talking to me,” he thought. “Surely I’m dreaming.’
“I said, where did you come from? How long have you been there and how did you manage to get into the back of my aircraft without me noticing?” yelled the pilot over the noise.
Andy said nothing. He didn’t know what to say to a previously lifeless wax figure who was now piloting a previously fake aircraft through what appeared to be a very real storm. He just sat there, motionless, with his mouth agape, staring at the pilot. Water dripped on his head where he’d broken the canopy above him.
“Well? Come on boy,” said the pilot. “Speak up! I haven’t got time to waste on you. We’re in the midst of the worst storm I’ve ever flown into; we’re lost, we’re low on fuel and we are flying far too low for my liking. So stop staring at me like a gormless fool and answer my questions!”
Andy was lost for words. He looked at this man and then looked down at the diary in his hand. His other hand was covered in sticky blood and his head was very sore where he’d cut it. He could feel the Talisman’s weight on the cord around his neck.
He looked up again and was about to speak when he caught the view in front of the airplane. There were huge waves in front of them.
“Shouldn’t it be sky and not the sea?” he thought to himself.
Then he realized. They were diving straight toward the ocean! He threw his arm up and pointed to the ocean in front of them.
“Look out!” he yelled. ”The sea is in front of you!”
The pilot looked confused for half a second, then his eyes went wide as Andy’s frightened yell hit home. He spun round and grabbed the controls. Pushing his feet hard against the rudder pedals, he pulled back on the control column with all the strength he could find in his tired body.
As the aircraft started to pull out of its dive Andy felt himself being pushed into his seat harder and harder until his head felt heavy. He’d seen this in the movies. The force of the plane pulling out of the dive was draining the blood out of his head and making his vision blur. He hoped the pilot was doing better than him.
Just as he thought he’d pass out all together the plane levelled off and the forces on his body relented. His vision started to return, which in normal circumstances would have been a good thing, but on this occasion Andy wasn’t so sure.
They were speeding just a few feet above the ocean. Andy’s heart almost stopped when a huge wave loomed at them. He thought they’d surely smash straight into this wall of water when the pilot yanked back on the control column and the plane skipped across the crest of the monster wave.
Andy was about to breathe a sigh of relief but didn’t get the chance. No sooner had the wave disappeared than an island started whipping by underneath There was a smart crack as one of the wings took the top off a tree. Andy craned to look past the pilot’s head but couldn’t see.
“Brace for crash!” the pilot yelled.
Andy looked around in panic. He didn’t have his seat belts on and had no time to buckle them up anyway. There was only the instrument panel in front of him to push against.
“Better than nothing,” he thought as he dropped the diary to grab the panel with both hands.
As soon as the thought entered his mind, the plane, the pilot and the storm were gone. The pulling feeling returned, but it was subtly different, like he was going in the opposite direction.
Then it was all replaced by dim lights and a cold hard floor. Andy opened his eyes and found himself lying on the museum floor.
“Here he is, Sir,” said a voice nearby.
“Anderson! You had better have a good excuse for this, boy! Look at the mess you’ve made!”
Andy recognized the voice and his heart sank. The Screaming Skull was bearing down upon him, his face purple with rage. Andy sat up and looked around. It was a mess alright. The velvet ropes and their chrome metal stands that had been across the front of the display were strewn around him.
Andy’s head hurt. He put his hand up to it. He felt something warm and sticky. Blood!
“How can that be?” he thought. “How can I cut my head open in a dream?”
“Anderson! Are you ignoring me boy?”
<
br /> The Skull was right in front of him now.
“Steady on there, Mr Watson,” said another voice. “Can’t you see the boy is hurt?”
“Thank God. It’s Mr Brown,” thought Andy.
Mr Brown squatted down in front of Andy.
“Tried to get a closer look at the exhibit and tripped over these ropes did we?”
Andy nodded meekly. Mr Brown waved two fingers in front of Andy’s face.
“How many fingers am I holding up?”
“Two,” said Andy.
“Good lad,” replied Mr Brown. “No real harm done, but you’ll need some attention for that gash I think.”
He put an arm around Andy’s back and helped him up.
“Come now, Anderson, we’ll get you some help. Can you assist, Mr Watson?"
Mr Brown’s intervention had left Mr Watson speechless. He had no choice but to put his arm around Andy and help Mr Brown. To do anything else would look foolish.
“Grace!” called Mr Brown. “Don’t just stand there with your finger up your nose, boy. Fix those stands and ropes up. And you, Miller, don’t smirk at Grace. I’ve seen you knuckle deep in your own nasal cavity as well. Go and help Grace, and then meet us outside.”
The two teachers helped Andy out of the hall of aviation while Grace and Miller cleaned up his mess.
Outside the museum, a car was pulling away from the curb. Inside the car the old man had taken off his hat and was pulling off his gloves. The car was warm and the old man was glad to be back in it.
“How did it go Sir?” asked the driver.
“Very good I think John.”
“Do you think it will work?”
“I hope so,” the old man replied. “Or history will keep going round and round in circles.”