frozen within time

chapter eight

Karl looked stricken.
'Oh no! Poor jess! we left her down there.'

'Who's jess?' Asked Alex and Kristen, at the same moment.

'Oh, how dreadful we've been!' Whimpered holly.
'So selfish and caught up about ourselves that we left her down there, all frozen, on her own!'

'Well, come on then!' KARL propelled her back through the door and soon all four if them were racing down the stairs, slithering through the garden and splashing across the stream to get back to the hatch. It was hugely different from their first trip.

Now, instead of fearful, Alex and Kristen were utterly intrigued by it and thrilled beyond measure that someone else was about to be defrosted, before their very eyes.

Uncle John had been down there for the past fifteen minutes, while they'd been showing Karl and holly their rooms. they found him in a state of absolute rapture.

'It's perfect! Just perfect!' He gasped as soon as they ran into the sitting room. He'd been rifling through some of the supplies boxes. 'It's a 1950s time capsule! Imagine! Untouched for fifty three years, un till today!'

'Yes, yes . . . . Amazing!' Said karl as they all flew past bun and straight through the next door. By the time they reached the torpedos chamber uncle John was right behind them, demanding to know what was going on.

'Come right in,' ordered Karl. 'We have to seal the room again first.' He ignored uncle johns urgent questions in a way of which hugely impressed Alex and Kristen, while he went to the console and punched the red button which Kristen had first hit that morning.

Once again there was the hissing noise, followed by the the mechanic workings noise, and the door locked itself.

'Thats what happened the first time,' Kristen whispered to uncle John. 'We thought we were sealed in like Egyptian mummies, for ever.'

'It has to seal, to equalize the air pressure before the chamber can be opened,' said karl.

'You mean to tell me there's someone else in here?' Gasped uncle John. 'But I looked in them all. The end one is shut, of course, and I couldn't open it, but I could see through the glass----there's nobody else in it!'

Karl went to the first chamber and peered into the glass. he gave a grin and said: 'You didn't look hard enough.' As the hissing noise eased off there was a click and the glass window smoothly rose up, as it must have done for Karl and holly earlier, only Alex and Kristen had been too hysterical to notice. Holly ran to Karl's side and gasped 'Jess! Oh Jesse! Are you all right?' Then karl leaned over, reached right down into the chamber, to were his feet would have lain had he been in it, and pulled something out something sneezed, something sniffles. He took the something from him and cuddled it with a sigh. 'Shes all right! She's waking up!' And she turned to face them, delight over her face. And a puppy in her arms.

'Good Lord!' Said uncle John, while Alex and Kristen just groaned with delight. the puppy was a brown Labrador with liquid eyes and shining fur. Floppy ears, and big paws which dangled sleepily from hollys arms as she hugged it to her. 'A fifty three year old puppy!' Added uncle John. 'Astonishing! Truly astonishing!'

'We only got her a week before we got frozen,' said holly 'We came home from scho and found that father had already frozen her six times. she's actually six months old, but she's spent half that time frozen. So she's only three months really . . . . If you know what I mean.'

'He froze a puppy! How could he?' Said Kristen----even more shocked about the puppy freezing than child freezing.

'Well, it doesn't hurt her,' said karl. 'Any more than it hurts us! Dont make him out to be some kind of monster. he's not. He's a genius!'