The Warrior Sheep Down Under by Christopher Russell

Author:Christopher Russell
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Sourcebooks, Inc.
Published: 2012-01-04T06:00:00+00:00

17

Merino Geyser

Shelly gave Alice a geography lesson as she drove the few miles from Tickler’s Turnpike. “Wanageeki’s one of the few places in the world where the Earth’s crust is so thin that hot water or mud can bubble straight out of cracks in the ground,” she told her proudly. “It’s a natural phenomenon.”

Alice wasn’t interested. She just wanted to get there.

“There are hundreds of baths,” Shelly went on. “They’re built over the bubbling cracks. Some as big as swimming pools, some as small as bath tubs. Some crystal clear, others milky yellow. And some of the best aren’t water at all. They’re the ones full of the hot, plopping mud.”

Alice yawned. “So where do I get my ticket?”

Shelly parked by the Wanageeki Pools Complex. “Right here,” she said.

• • •

On the other side of the little town, the Warrior Sheep had finally picked their way past the bubbling mud pools closest to the lake. The ground had gradually got softer under their hooves and changed from bright red, yellow, and black to green all over.

“Grass!” cried Oxo. “Just when I thought I’d never see it again.”

They all grazed hungrily for a while.

“Tastes of rotten eggs, right,” mumbled Links.

“I mom’t mare,” replied Oxo. “Mi’m marving…”

“Ohmygrass…It won’t make my breath smell, will it?” asked Jaycey, looking up in alarm. “I mean, you never know who you’re going to meet, do you?”

“It’ll only be the fairy godtingy,” muttered Oxo quietly, so that Sal couldn’t hear. “You wait. Half a stomach full and she’ll pop up.”

But she didn’t. And when even Oxo had eaten enough, the sheep wandered on. Every now and then they passed a circle of stony ground on which no grass grew. Some of the circles were surrounded by a low fence.

“Merino Geyser…” Wills read out the words on a sign.

“Merry what, dear?” asked Sal.

“Not merry. Merino.” Wills frowned. “I think a Merino’s a sort of sheep.”

“Dunno,” said Oxo. “But a geyser’s a guy. Everyone knows that.”

“Ooh…So is it pointing the way to some boy sheep?” asked Jaycey. Without waiting for an answer, she trotted off in the direction the sign was pointing. “This needs checking out…” She tossed her head to fluff up her curls. “I bet Down Under guys are much better looking than you two.”

“No chance,” called Oxo.

“Nah, we’s the handsomest global, man,” said Links.

Jaycey wasn’t listening. She slipped under the fence around the circle of rough ground and pirouetted daintily in the center. “And I’m so the prettiest.”

“Jaycey…!” Wills’s cry of alarm came too late.

The earth beneath Jaycey’s hooves was beginning to bubble. She looked down in astonishment. The bubbles got bigger and bigger and suddenly they weren’t bubbles anymore. They were a jet of water, a jet of water that was getting wider and stronger and hotter and…Whoosh!

The geyser burst from the ground right underneath Jaycey. She shot straight up in the air on top of the column of steaming water and stayed there, her legs paddling helplessly, her cries of shock and fear drowned in the almighty roar.

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