Weirdness and Wendip (Book 1)

Dogfight

Dipper's point of view. Chapter dedicated to Nigel. Nigel you're the best.

The sting ray glided gracefully through the air, its wings slowly moving up and down barely twice a minute. The bubble continued to rise higher and higher into the sky as we moved closer towards it. We were travelling close to the ground perhaps one hundred metres above it. Below us the patchwork fields of crazy colours flashed by. I turned to Wendy.

"Wendy, just in case we don't make it through this I'd just like you to know that..." Wendy interrupted me before I could finish.

"I know Dipper, but we're going to make it through this dude we've come this far already." We were squished up quite tight on the manta ray so the other two could hear. Bill started laughing at our exchange, for some reason he always seemed to find my awkwardness with Wendy incredibly amusing. 

"Shut up Bill!" We shouted in unison. I felt me cheeks heat up and could see Wendy was also feeling the same way. She was beet red and had pulled her trapper down as far over her head as she could. This only made her more attractive to me. Ford tried to alleviate the tension. 

"Wendy, Dipper, Bill concentrate please we're still not out of this mess." Bill composed himself from his laughing fit.

"Remember Fordsy, you've got to keep your end of the deal." I knew Ford wasn't going to keep good on the deal but we weren't risking anything. Bill couldn't touch us in the real world. Ford replied.

"Of course Bill, no hard feelings. You've been incredibly helpful to us." We were almost directly under the bubble at this point when suddenly the manta ray spoke up.

"Attention everyone, we've got a couple of sharks chasing us." I looked behind us in the direction that Stephanie was facing, she was right, I could see perhaps ten sharks of various species gaining ground on us quickly. Their features became more an more prominent as they closed in, fins, hammerheads and riders on the back of several of the sharks. The riders of the sharks were human in shape but not human in colour, their bodies were a deep purple colour and they carried spear like weaponry. I shivered at the menacing sight. Bill let out a whale like moan and before I knew it several smaller manta rays had joined us from seemingly nowhere. Bill shrugged and looked at me.

"Just a distraction for our pursuers." He said. I watched in horror as a couple of the sharks peeled off from the main group and gave chase to the smaller mantas. One of them was quickly caught and ripped up before our very eyes in a shower of fish parts. It was a grisly site and fish entrails fell to the ground. Ford withdrew his H.V.F.A quickly assembled the device and loaded up another of the blue pellets and aimed at the nearest shark. I wrapped my arms around Ford to try and steady him for when he fired as the back of the manta was quite slippery. Ford fired and almost immediately a huge blue tumour formed on the sharks skin, it weighed down the shark causing it to fall back to earth. There were now only five sharks behind of us, four had become distracted whilst the fifth Ford had shot down.

"Great shot Ford." I whooped. Below us, I glimpsed an explosion as the shark hit the ground. Ford winced. 

We slowly spiralled upwards towards the bubble, gradually gaining height with the sharks gaining on us all the while. I looked at Wendy, she was in her element, she'd already withdrew her axe in preparation for a close range fight. Two sharks drew up on either side of our manta and the riders appeared to ready their weapons. Stephanie shouted to us.

"Brace yourselves, evasive manoeuvres." The manta bobbed down violently, I held Wendy and the side of the ray. The sharks followed the complicated move expertly and pulled alongside again. Stephanie shouted again. "Call me when they throw." One of the riders braced to throw his spear and threw it with a tremendous amount of strength. 

"Now." Me and Wendy screamed. The manta dropped down dramatically and I felt my stomach rise up inside me. The spear flew through the air and struck the other shark square in the side. The shark spiralled out of control towards us, all life gone from its eyes. With a grunt Stephanie barrel rolled away from the shark, causing Bill to whoop with joy. Wendy lost her grip momentarily but I just about managed to grab her in time. I looked behind us, the dead shark had taken out one of the others on the way down leaving us and three sharks still in pursuit.

All of a sudden we were in the maelstrom surrounding the bubble, and one of the sharks was buffeted by the debris behind us causing it to fall back and retreat. The two remaining sharks flew above us and their riders jumped down and tried to aim to land on our manta. One of the riders missed and fell, whilst the other landed perfectly and pointed his spear towards us. With a sigh Ford aimed the H.V.F.A at him and pulled the trigger, the purple man fell backwards off the manta and into the swirling cloud of random objects. Suddenly we were in the clear and the bubble loomed large above us. Ford took a deep breath.

"Well, I'm glad that's all over. Let's get out of this place."

The membrane of the bubble pulsated as if awaiting our return.