a bit of the brain or something.” Isis paused, looking at the dirt and rocks. “The alien’s thoughts run through the ground. Maybe Mandeville can take control of those and…” She trailed off. “I don’t know. It’s a stupid idea.”
But it clicked, you know?
“How long would it take us to get out of here?” I asked her.
“A few minutes?”
“Get Mandeville!” I shouted, jumping up.
Isis twisted her fingers together. “I had a fight with him. I don’t know if he will.”
“Try! Please?”
She stood up. “Mandeville?” She looked around blankly.
“Mandeville?” Her eyes widened a bit and she took a step back, then another, grabbing hold of my hand and shoving it with hers into a patch of cold, slimy air.
“Ergh!” Isis’s warm fingers were with mine, but I was also holding a set of bony fingers, the skin peeling off them in mouldy flaps. They belonged to that ghost I’d seen before, a half-man, half-skeleton.
“And now this!” Mandeville was shouting. “Do you think I have nothing else to fill my time than responding to your every call?”
His damp mouldy smell made me retch.
“My feelings exactly!” Mandeville snapped, glaring at me. “You abuse me, then demand my attendance, just as your whims dictate. I am a nothing, yet now you cannot do without me? Perhaps you wish to impress some friends, is that it?”
Isis held my hand tighter. “You talk to him,” she said. “He’s really angry with me.”
I took a breath and gabbled it all out. “There’s this alien from another planet, you know? He’s made out of stone and metals, and he’s trapped under where they’re mining—”
“Yes, yes,” said Mandeville, “I know about the star-beast. I’ve been haunting these environs for many years, did you think I hadn’t noticed it?”
Isis stared at him. “You never said!”
“Why would I? It was hardly relevant to our business, nor likely to come up in general conversation.” Mandeville shrugged. “In fact, I twice tried to inform you that it had extended its appendages – or whatever its limbs should be called – directly beneath the town of Wycombe and into your school. But on the first occasion you would not even countenance my request of a return to seances, and the next time you were too busy unfairly rebuking me to listen.”
“We want you to possess him!” I shouted.
The skeleton turned his scary blue eyes on me. “You want me to what?”
“Possess the alien…” It didn’t sound such a good idea now. “Isis said you can take control of people’s brains, make them do things.”
“Utterly repulsive, when you describe it that way. And what would be the purpose of my efforts?”
“He needs our help – we have to help him get away.”
“Him? Well, by all means let us all risk everything for some wretched monster. Except there is one small problem. I notice it is hiding. Subterranean.” Mandeville tapped his nose. “Possession requires contact, and I have no intention of poking my head into the ground like an ostrich.” The skeleton looked at Isis. “I refuse to degrade myself. Not after the way I have been treated.”
“He’s going to die if we do nothing!” I said.
“I’m dead,” said the skeleton. “It’s not so terrible.”
I turned to Isis. “What can we do? Can you change its mind?”
“I’m not an it, and no she can’t!” snapped Mandeville.
“Angel,” Isis said. “She’s helped me see through solid objects. We did it all the time when I was younger. Maybe together we could search for the alien?” She didn’t sound very sure though. “She might not agree. She kept saying it was too big, and I think she meant the alien. I think she’s scared of it.”
“Please?” I said. “Can you try?”
“Of course,” groaned Mandeville, “bring the child into this.”
Isis ignored him and closed her eyes. “Angel.” And then it was like hearing someone on the phone, half a conversation. “No, it’ll be all right… me and Gray are right here… okay, you can watch Peppa Pig whenever you want…”
She went on in that way, promising and persuading, until at last a see-through little girl appeared in the quarry with us. I could see her because I was already holding Isis’s hand, linked by Mandeville. Angel was grabbing hold of Isis’s leg.
“What he doing here?” she asked, pointing at Mandeville. “He horrid. And stinky.”
“You place your faith in this brat?” he sneered.
“Well you won’t help us!” I said.
“And I notice that the child gets every carrot possible, while I receive only the stick.”
Isis spoke to Angel. “Will you help us