Hamish X and the Hollow Mountain Read Online Free Page B

forward against the straps that held him upright. His right hand fumbled at the control stick of the helicopter. After two clumsy attempts, his fingers closed on a knob. With what feeble strength he had, he pulled on it, and out of the console a thin cord emerged. Drawing it towards him, he took the knob pinched in his fingers and pressed it to his head, pushing back his hat as he did so. On his forehead, in a place normally hidden by the brim of his fedora, was a black metal socket. He pressed the knob into the socket with a soft click and fell back exhausted in his chair.
    Moments passed. A soft hum filled the cabin. Soon, Mr. Sweet flexed his hands, gingerly raised his arms as if testing their strength. When he was satisfied, he pulled the plug from his head and placed it into a similar socket on the forehead of Mr. Candy.
    Mr. Sweet waited for a few seconds. Suddenly, Mr. Candy tilted his head forward and turned it to look at his fellow agent.
    â€œAuxiliary battery,” Mr. Sweet said simply. Mr. Candy nodded.
    â€œHamish X?”
    Mr. Sweet scanned the horizon. He saw nothing butlowering clouds, the precursor to a major storm. “Gone. A storm is coming. We can do nothing from here.”
    â€œShall we begin searching for him?”
    â€œIndeed. I’ll call for transport.” The agent tapped the side of his skull, tilted his head, and mumbled as if to the empty air, “HQ. Sweet. Two for extraction. Immediate. Here are our coordinates.”

Chapter 3
    The valley below was impossibly green and lush, like a painted rendering of an ideal spring day. Tiny star-shaped Alpine flowers, the type the Swiss call edelweiss, added a delicate sprinkling of white on the lush green turf of the meadow. On all sides the sheer mountains soared, their peaks perpetually white with snow.
    A clutch of rabbits rooted in the grass, nibbling the juicy clumps of stems. Their tiny wet noses sniffed constantly for danger. For a rabbit, life is an endless round of nibbling and sniffing. Enemies are ever present. 12 Foxes prowl the Alpine meadows. Hawks circle overhead. The lynx and the wildcat stalk in a quest to feast on rabbit flesh. The rabbit must always be on the lookout for predators intent on a rabbit supper. And so the rabbits watched out for one another, shouting a warning if danger approached. 13 Theirs is a highly effective survival strategy, considering that rabbits still exist and are found throughout the world.
    Unfortunately, though they were keenly aware of danger from predators, they had no way of preparing themselves for what was about to occur in the next paragraph.

    A huge metal spike plunged down into their midst. The force of the impact drove its point a metre into the earth. The concussion knocked the rabbits off their feet. Even the bravest of them passed out from sheer terror, after first voiding the contents of their stomachs then covering themselves with steaming, semi-digested grass. 14 These little creatures were, indeed, members of the rare species of Alpine Puking Rabbits.
    Little did the panicked rabbits know they were in no danger. 15 All they managed to do in the end was to miss the arrival of the airship that had once been known as The Vulture but was now rechristened the Orphan Queen . The huge metal spike, the airship’s anchor, trailed a long chain that disappeared into the vessel’s undercarriage. The chain grew taut as the weight of the vessel strained against it in the stiff mountain breeze. With much ratcheting and clanking, the chain was slowly reeled in until the airship gently bumped the ground, gouging a furrow in the rich earth.
    The rabbits were usually quite good at spotting danger from the skies, but they had never seen a vessel like the Orphan Queen . From below, the ship appeared to be the same colour as the sky: pale blue with wisps of white cloud. The section of the hull that rested on the grass had already begun to shift to lush green with flashes of colour to