Steve's Dreams: Steve and the Sabretooth Tiger E-Book

Dan Anthony

• Herausgeber: Firefly Press Ltd
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Serie: Steve's Dreams
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 94

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2014

Beschreibung

It's the summer holidays, but for nine-year-old Steve life in his home town is full of hidden menace. He believes he must protect his family from a dangerous, unpredictable world. But he can't solve all the problems on his own. He's just not quite big enough.

Leseprobe

Contents

Prelims

1. Something Lurks

2. 29th July

3. The Sarsaparilla Kid

4. Two People Survive

5. The Dentist

6. The Library Of Dreams

7. Mount Gneargh

8. Flesheaters

9. The Follower

10. The Cat

11. The Misty Swamps

12. Slasher

13. Paperwork

Postscript

Copyright

Also in the Dragonfly series from Firefly

Steve’sDreams

Steve and the Sabretooth Tiger

Steve’s Dreams

Steve and the Sabretooth Tiger

by

Dan Anthony

illustrated by Huw Aaron

1

Something Lurks

Life is really dangerous. They don’t tell you in school and they try not to mention it at home. It’s like a secret grown-ups think children can’t cope with. Everyone tells me I worry too much, but I think maybe they’re the ones who are pretending. Life is too scary for grown-ups.

I remember the package arriving. It was made of brown cardboard, half envelope, half box – the sort of thing they use when you buy stuff online. But this was from the library. I know that because on the outside, in big black letters, it said: FROM THE LIBRARY.I know it was for me because then it said: FOR STEVE. When Mum showed it to me she raised one eyebrow, as if I owed them money or I’d lost one of their books or something.

I didn’t open it. I knew Ihadn’t ordered any books. It was a trick. I’ve got a nose for trouble, and that parcel was full of it. I left it on the kitchen table and nobody said any more about it.

It stayed there for a long time. Sometimes it got covered with other things: magazines, packets of cereal, bottles of nail varnish, sugar, salt and pepper. But every now and again it would make its way to the top of the pile, as if to say, ‘Look at me.’

‘Open me.’

I live in a town called Pendown just outside a big city. My part is the Oliphant Circles Estate. Oliphant Circles is a long, round road that twists in on itself – like the swirl on a snail’s shell. People from Pendown and Oliphant Circles stay in Oliphant Circles and Pendown. They go round and round.

In school the teachers are always telling us how good it is to live in a ‘new town’. But it doesn’t look very new. It’s a lot older than me and I’m already nine. My mum was born in Pendown and she’s definitely not new. Newport, the city we’re closest to, doesn’t have ships and it isn’t new either. Nothing is what it says.

Don’t get me wrong. I like it here. We’ve got supermarkets, McDonalds, a motorway and a multiplex cinema. There’s even a small railway station. I keep my eyes open around Oliphant Circles. I want to help people. They don’t realise that wherever you go around here, something lurks.

On the morning of 29th July I opened my eyes quickly, like I always do, and checked for danger. I looked up through the skylight over my bunk. I scanned the sky for unusual signs: missile trails, asteroid flashes, the telltale zap lines of alien war beams. I always do this. Usually the coast is clear.

Today all I could make outwas a few seagulls floating in the blue sky like tiny faraway kites. It was going to be a hot day. Most people think sunny days are great. But too much solar radiation is bad news. My advice is simple – if it’s a nice day, don’t go out without an umbrella.

I have the top bunk. My brother Kyled sleeps on the one below. He’s five. He’s not allowed up here because he keeps jumping off. I’m responsible. I know that if I have a bad nightmare, I could jump up, fall off the bed and crash to the floor. So I sleep on the wall side.

I like to lie up here and watch the stars, or the clouds, or the trees on the hills that surround my town. If anybody has a go at Pendown, I’ll be the first to know.

2

29th July

In the holidays, things are pretty chilled in my house. My sisters, Miffany and Jaydee, don’t usually get up in the mornings. They’re fifteen. They’re twins. They can do whatever they want.

It was ten past nine when Iwalked into the kitchen to get my cereal and feed Groucho. Everybody was there: Jaydee, Miffany, Kyled, Mum and, on Skype, Dad.

‘Sorry,’ said Dad, ‘I’m losing the connec…’

I saw his face on the screen. Then the screen flickered and the connection went. Everybody turned on me.

‘Steve!’ chorused my sisters. ‘You lost Dad.’

‘I never did anything,’ I said. ‘I didn’t know we had him in the first place.’

‘I thought you were asleep,’ said Mum.

‘I’m never asleep,’ I said. ‘Somebody’s got to be on the lookout.’ I pointed at my sisters. ‘They’re the ones who sleep all the time.’

Jaydee yawned. She was dressed in a Dalmatian onesie and she had long, straight blonde hair; Miffany was a tiger with curly red hair. They’re very un-identical twins.

‘Did you spot any incoming missiles, Steve?’ asked Jaydee, ruffling my hair.

‘I think we’re OK for today,’ Isaid.

‘Intruders? Burglars? Spies?’ asked Miffany. She always liked listening to what I’d found.

‘I thought we’d been captured by kidnappers in the night,’ I said, ‘but it turned out to be a dream.’

Miff bent down and whispered inmy ear. She had a message from Dad. She said she’d told him I was doing my checks. He said that he was glad there was someone around who could see the bigger picture. He told her to tell me not to worry for being late.

Jaydee moved towards the kitchen door.

‘Come on, Miff, we’re outta here.’

They took their bowls of cereal and slid out of the kitchen back up to their room to watch TV.

‘Do you remember what day it is?’ said Mum quietly as I started putting food in Groucho’s bowl.

‘It’s 29th July,’ I said gloomily. I’d been thinking about it for ages. At four thirty I had my Appointment.

‘Then why didn’t you come down earlier?’ she asked, cupping her ‘Best Mum in the World’ mug with both hands. ‘For Dad’s birthday?’

I stopped filling the bowl. I knew there was another reason why 29th July was important.

My dad works in the oil industry. He’s hardly ever at home. He goes to Mexico, Scotland, Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan, Kazakhstan. He says, ‘if it’s got a “Stan” in it, that’s where I am.’ His name is Stan, by the way.

‘Sorry,’ I said.

After feedingGroucho I took some toast and sat down at the table. I looked at the package, the one from the library. It was on its way back to the top of the pile again.

Mum sipped her coffee and put some more cereal in Kyled’s bowl. He scowled at me. Jaydee and Miffany are great, they share things with me, they don’t mind me borrowing their computers or watching their TV and they always like to know what level of alert we’re on. But Kyled’s not like that. He doesn’t share.

‘Mum,’ said Kyled, ‘did Dad run away when he saw Steve?’

‘Of course not,’ said Mum as she filled Kyled’s bowl right to the top. ‘He’s such a big bonny boy,’ she said. ‘Eat up, Kyled.’

Kyled glared at me as he spooned the new bowlful into his mouth. His bright blue eyes caught the sunlight flashing in through the kitchen windows. I’d been monitoring Kyled’s rapid growth rate over the past two years. He was already the biggest boy in the infant school and he was strong too. He was becoming a monster-boy.

‘Steve kept me awake last night,’ said Kyled.

Mum sipped her tea.

‘He kept tossing and turning and screaming out loud,’ said Kyled.

‘Shut up, Kyled,’ I said.

‘Nooo, Aaaargh. Nooooo. Aaaargh. All night long,’ said Kyled.

‘Is this right?’ asked Mum. She rested the palm of her hand on my forehead. I felt foolish.

‘He’s talking rubbish,’ I said, ‘just like he always does. He’s a rubbish-talker, that Kyled.’

Kyled licked his bowl, just like Groucho, who, in case you are wondering, is our dog. A small, brown Yorkshire terrier.

‘Screamed all night like a little baby,’ shouted Kyled, jumping down from his chair at the kitchen table. ‘Waaa, waaa, waaa.’

‘Kyled, why don’t you go out into the garden and play on the trampoline,’ said Mum. ‘I’ll count the bounces.’

‘Nice one,’ said Kyled and he rushed out into the garden.

I kept an eye on Mum as she watched Kyled. She started to count, ‘One, two, three…’

‘I wasn’t trying to keep Kyled awake,’ I said, reassuringly. ‘It was just a dream.’

‘Why don’t you go outside and enjoy yourself too, Steve? It’s a lovely morning,’ she said. ‘And try not to worry so much. Most things turn out all right in the end.’

‘Outside?’ I looked through the kitchen window at the blue sky above Kyled’s bouncing head. ‘Can I borrow your umbrella?’

Mum ignored me. She must have lost her brolly.

‘… eleven, twelve, thirteen…’

As she counted the bounces, Mum picked a magazine off the pile of stuff at the end of the table.

I saw it again. Those big black letters: ‘FROM THE LIBRARY. FOR STEVE.’ The parcel had come back to the surface.

I reached out and touched it. Perhaps today was the day I would open it.

Mum stood by the kitchen window half watching Kyled bounce as she flicked through the pages of the magazine.

‘… thirty-three, thirty-four, thirty-five…’

I turned the package over in my hands. It felt explosive. Perhaps if I opened it there would be an almighty Kerbooom!! Goodbye Steve. Hello invasion force sweeping through Oliphant Circles. That was a strong possibility. But there were other people who wanted me out of the picture. Spies don’t like me because I’m always trying to spot them. Alien invaders have to keep clear of my patch of sky because I’m always checking for them.

‘… forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine…’

On the other hand – maybe thepackage was from someone who needed help.

‘Why don’t you go and play football?’ asked Mum as she counted and read the magazine. Mum always says she’s very good at multi-tasking.

‘Go out and play, Steve. Please,’ she added, ‘we’ve got to go at twelve.’

Twelve?! I thought that my Appointment was at four thirty. Suddenly my time had been cut by half. That was when I realised I had nothing to lose. If I wanted to find out what was in the package, I needed to look right now.

I ripped the cardboard.

Mum turned and watched. She stopped counting.

‘It’s about time you opened that,’ she said, ‘I checked at the library. We haven’t ordered anything.’

‘As if this was sent by a real librarian,’ I muttered as I stuck my hand in. I felt something soft. I closed my eyes tight and pulled it out.

Nothing exploded.

I opened my eyes.