The Octonauts and the Random Role Reversal

Chapter Seven

It only took a few minutes to reach the chasm, Dashi still feeling rather odd being at the front of the Gup A, with Tweak taking the co-pilot's seat as they led the way to the huge crack in the bare rock up ahead.

Shellington was wobbly in their fastest Gup, but with Tweak keeping a warning eye on him he managed not to lean on the turbo button, drive backwards or crash, in any order. Yet, at any case.

The fish who had asked for their help swam in front of the Gups, exchanging quiet conversation that the Gup microphones couldn't quite make out. They halted at the very edge of the chasm - what turned out to be a narrow rift, getting wider, deeper and quite considerably darker below the surface. It was long and arcing, split into two main sections of trench, looking like a strange sort of smile.

"Is this it?" Peso asked nervously, looking out of the Gup A's side window with big eyes.

"This is it," a squid called back.

"We don't want to go any further," her friend confessed, backing away. "We don't live down there - we just heard the roaring."

"That's okay," Dashi reassured them. "We'll take it from here."

"Thanks!" they chorused, retreating to the rocks and almost instantly disappearing into various cracks to hide away.

The captain exchanged a nervous glance with her crewmates. "Let's do this," she breathed.

Shellington hadn't meant to lead the way, but with a tremor of his paw on the steering wheel, the Gup B shot forward and down, narrowly avoiding clipping its tail on the jagged edge of the chasm.

The Octonauts gathered beside their bobbing Gups once they were all below the rocky surface. The chasm was a lot larger than it looked from above, with grey, rocky walls covered with slimy algae and barnacles, extending deep below so it was impossible to see all the way down. It was dark, only lit by filtering light from the ocean above, as well as the headlights of the Gups.

 "The walls are making really strange noises," Peso noticed, placing a tentative flipper on the rock, almost imagining he could feel a vibration there.

"Where is everyone?" Shellington wondered, staying as far away from the grinning Gup B as possible now he was out of the driver's seat.

"That's a good question," Barnacles said. "Maybe they got spooked by the strange noises as well?"

"Maybe..." Dashi replied slowly. They stayed quiet as they all listened out for the odd creaking, as loud as a pod of moaning whales.

"Who are you?"

"Huh?" The new captain spun, as did the rest of the crew, in installments. A couple of dolphins were bobbing near them in the trench, both seeming to be trying to nudge each other forward, without much success. The bolder one, who she assumed had been the one who had spoken, ended up in front, looking worried.

"What seems to be the problem?" Dashi asked authoritatively, trying to sound as confident as she wished she felt.

The dolphins exchanged glances. "Can't you hear it?" the bolder one demanded.

"We can hear something," the captain agreed. "But we don't know what it is. You see, some fish were scared of the noises and called us here. We are the Octonauts!"

She did a quick circle of the crew, shadowed by the younger creature. "Well, it's nice to see some new folks this deep down for a change. We don't usually venture this far, but Dolly here hurt her tail a while ago and at first this seemed like a safe place to rest without having to swim away from sharks. I'm Debby, by the way."

"It's certainly nice to meet you, Dolly and Debby," Dashi smiled cautiously. "But what changed? What are those noises?"

As if on cue, a giant grumble sounded, seeming to come from all around them, echoing off the cavernous walls and bouncing deep down the trench.

"It sounds like an earthquake, but there's no tremors," Shellington pointed out.

The shyer dolphin pushed her nose out in front of her friend, a rare moment of confidence. "The chasm, it's closing!" she squeaked.

"Jumping jellyfish!" blurted Shellington, before putting a paw over his mouth, remembering his role change. "I mean... shiver me jellyfish...?"

The rest of the sleep-deprived crew took a moment to process this. "Riiight," the captain replied slowly, wishing she was back in bed.

"Can trenches close?" Tweak wondered.

"You're the scientist," Barnacles reminded her.

"Yes. Yes I am," she replied haltingly.

Shellington was obviously itching to give an explanation. If dolphins could shrug, they would have done as the new biologist looked askance at them.

As Shellington looked about ready to burst, Tweak brightened in realisation. "Plate tectonics," she announced. "I do remember some things from geography lessons back at school. There are plates under the ocean that are always shifting, and that can cause earthquakes and tremors - and also trenches to open and close!"

She glanced at Shellington. "Right?" she checked in an undertone.

The sea otter shrugged good-naturedly. "What do I know? I'm not the ship's scientist."

"But it is quite rare," Barnacles continued. "And we haven't dealt with anything like this before."

"And this is more than just a few loud noises," Shellington said. "This could be really dangerous for anyone living in this chasm."

The two dolphins were still looking hopefully at the floating Octonauts. "Can you do anything about the awful noises?" the older one pleaded. "We had so much space in our little den a few days ago, and every day it's seemed to halve. It's getting quite cramped."

"I can imagine," Tweak agreed.

"This is our home, but the walls keep moving so fast and it's dangerous to stay here any longer."

"We can definitely try to sort this out," promised Dashi.

The two dolphins smiled nervously, looking urgent to swim away and hide somewhere. "Thank you, Octonauts," Debby said, beckoning her friend with a fin. Dolly bobbed gratefully at the crew and then shot away after her friend into the darkness out of sight.

Once they had vanished, the crew stared around the trench. Their Gups hovered in the largest space, but it was a large, narrow chasm and it was difficult to see any further than a few metres away in this dark.

"We need to do a complete sweep of the chasm to make sure there are no creatures in danger or have been trapped," Dashi asserted. "There's likely to be some narrow places here, and they look to be narrowing all the time."

Peso stared hard at the chasm wall. "It doesn't seem to be moving."

"Plates only move very slowly, Peso," Shellington pointed out. "But when it's unstable like this, it could slip and shut at any moment."

"We should be safe in the area we're in now. It's too wide to close completely," Tweak calculated.

They shared glances before looking down, deeper into the chasm. Peso hid a gulp. It was really very dark, and split into lots of tiny caves and cracks. Any of which could be concealing creatures who need to be evacuated as soon as possible. 

Dashi  twisted her paws together. "We'll need to split up," she decided. "We'll search this area for any creatures and evacuate them, while Tweak and Peso, can you head over to the other end and start warning anyone who's living that side?"

The two new scientist figures looked at each other uncertainly and nodded. "Sure thing, Dashi," Tweak replied.

"It's too dangerous to go in there if the walls are really moving as quickly as that," Barnacles warned. "We can't predict it."

Dashi took a deep breath. "It's too dangerous not to."