Free Magnus Fin and the Moonlight Mission by Janis Mackay

around him, twisting him in a spinning vortex, its force sucking him down. Magnus Fin was in a whirlpool. It pulled at him and spun him. Everything was a blur. Booming sounds near deafened him. The brilliant light near blinded him. His lungs felt fit to burst. He floundered with his arms and legs, helpless in this tube of whirling water. Had he jumped straight into a sea storm?
    Just when he was sure he would faint, the churning, spinning and whirling motions ceased. He was thrown forward by a tidal force. One more booming sound and instantly the water calmed. Everything grew still and quiet. Eerily quiet. Or had Magnus Fin gone deaf?
    Fin ventured forward. His arms trembled but he managed slowly to swim. He glanced above. He glanced below. With the silver beam of his torch eye-lights he scanned the dark seawater. What strange world wasthis? No swaying arms of seaweed moved. No fish swam. No crab was here to guide him. Nothing!
    Nothing, that was, except for a few slow swaying seals, sleeping peacefully. Thankful he wasn’t alone, Fin nudged the seals, but try as he might, and he did, nothing would wake them. Confused, Fin left them to their dreams and swam on through the dark silent water.
    After a few strokes he bumped against something. Feeling forward, his hands came up against what felt like metal. Panicking, he swam back, but only a few strokes. Again he met the same resistance. Where was he? Frantic now, he swam up. He swam down. He swam to the sides again, kicking his legs furiously through the water. Then he stopped and slumped against the wall. There was nowhere to go. He was in some kind of container, a sunken ship perhaps. And unless he was mistaken, there was no way out.
    He wanted to scream for help. But he’d only been under the water for minutes, seconds even. He couldn’t call for Aquella already, surely? He wanted to protect her, and he wanted her to think he was brave and strong.
    What about Tarkin then? Hadn’t Tarkin’s thoughts come to him and told him to jump? Perhaps he really was close by somewhere in a boat. Tarkin had lost his voice – but now, just maybe, he had discovered thought transmission.
    Fin concentrated hard on Tarkin. He tried to picture him. Then he tried to send his thoughts towards him: HELP ME! I’m stuck in a sunken ship. Oh help!
    But after a few seconds the thoughts bounced back: HELP ME! I’m stuck in a sunken ship . Fin groaned. Theship, or whatever it was, was sound proof – and thought proof. Oh help!
    Magnus Fin didn’t cry very often. But he cried then, and floated helplessly round and round in the silent prison filled with briny water, a few blissfully unconscious seals and his own salt tears.

Chapter 17
    Tarkin was glad that the village hall was surrounded by pine trees. So even if Frank did step outside for some fresh air he wouldn’t see his fishing boat churning across the moonlit ocean. When Tarkin cut the engine and let the boat drift on the smooth sea he caught snatches of music on the wind. He grinned. If only his dad could see him now. He couldn’t believe how easy it had been to steer the boat out of the harbour, and now, how well he was managing. He was probably a natural born seafarer. Hadn’t his dad spent a couple of years in the United States Marine Corp? Seafaring was in the blood.
    Tarkin, with his hand gently on the rudder, let the boat drift, trying more or less to keep the rock where Fin jumped off in his sight. The full moon flooded the beach, the coast and the sea with a pale silvery glow.
    Tarkin checked his watch. It was one of those watches that lit up. Magnus Fin, so his watch informed him, had been gone all of one minute. From what Fin had told him, a minute on land could feel like a day underwater – so in sea time, Fin had been gone a long time. Tarkin scanned his torch across the water but there was no sign of him, so Tarkin tore the wrapper off a toffee and ate it.
    Maybe it was the toffee, though more probably theswell that