Prologue: Sam Preston

(Editors Note: I keept the last bit in as it’s always lovely to see a bit of self deprication from such a talented writer!)

PROLOGUE

This tale is neither Truth nor False, Fact or Fiction. It simply is…

Imagine in your mind right now, Earth is above you. Picture it in your mind, where every country is laid out, where every ocean dives down millions of miles to the bottom. Imagine it three times as big as what Earth is. Just multiply it’s size quickly. Now take the countries, and turn it to water. Turn the greens and browns of the land into a green ocean. Turn the previous ocean into the greens and brown of the land. Can you imagine it? Well, you can see Neptal, the otherside of Earth. Every planet has a door in the ground, a small door that has to be found before opened. This door leads from our world to Neptal; Neptal was God’s original vision of Earth, Neptal was Plan A, and after he was done, God didn’t think it was Good. In fact, he thought it was Rubbish. So due to this, instead of keeping it, he put it to one side, and made another one, which was only slightly better than the previous one, but by that time God wanted to get onto making penis’. So he took Earth, and Neptal inside, as it’s Otherside, and placed it into the cauldron, hanging around, which was the Solar System.

At the moment I am telling you the background story, but in telling you how the World started and all the important parts, I am turning into a bit of a rambler, so I’m going to jump ahead to the story.

In the oceans, there lived a fish. Now every fish down there appears to look the same, apart from the “Leapers”, children who contract a fish virus and turn into a silly, excited danger to everyone. To combat this, the High Council decided to send them to a distant colony and leave them be. They would eventually decide to give it the name of –The Lands Of The Leapers. Later on they would grow to regret that, but that’s jumping ahead. Living the oceans, the fish we are looking for, is called Sally. Now yes, Sally is a girls name but when he was born, his parents had been drunk and were so out of it they just decided to name Sally after the Fish Nurse. Now, Sally, as do all fish, look like piranhas. Big, fearsome piranhas that would bite your head off. The truth is that they’re all born natural cowards, and only some can be bothered to change. Also, because they live in the deepest darkest regions of the oceans, they have to wear sea goggles to see. Also, due to the fact that all the oceans are separated, water tubes were created to take you from one Water Colony to the other. This is just going to seem like worthless information, but remember it for later.

Sally lives with his parents in a 2-room cave, His mother is called Goldie, and his father is called Silver Streak, and was born a captive along with his wife. They originally lived in a prison called Jamie’s Fish Tank, on the Unknown Counties. They escaped after 3 years imprisonment, by choking on their wet bread and falling unconscious. Of course, the Warden didn’t know that and flushed them down the Water Tube, nicknamed the John, down into the Oceans, where they set up home and had Sally. They were once going to tell Sally or about how he was born, but he asked them to stop when they got to the part about the chewing gum.

Sally works for the Mafia Dons, who own the whole of Ruskie, the ocean Sally lived in. The Mafia Dons lives revolve around two things, exporting Wet Bread around the oceans, and searching for the Mystical Sea Lions Cup. Wet Bread is a natural fish delicacy that was once sold at high prices legally for years and was the most desired meal in the Oceans. Unfortunately, it was so desired that there would be killings every day over it. Hit And Swims were to an all time high. There was no choice but to stop selling. Luckily enough, there were the kind Mafia Dons to continue selling at rocket high prices. Sally works as a carrier, whose job it was to collect the Wet Bread and deposit around the colony. It helped that he wasn’t the only one as Ruskie was huge. In fact, the Mafia Dons hired over a million fish in the colonies to deposit the wet bread around and had the great talent of picking so many with the ability to find there way around with ease. It helped that they went around on sea horses that had the ability of sonar search as well, but the Mafia Dons don’t know about that. The Mystical Sea Cup, well all would be revealed soon.

Sally had a crush on Marie, a model. Modelling is an underground Danger SCD (Sea Device) that shows Female Fish (or Male Fish, depending on your taste or lack of) thrashing around seductively on the surface of the ocean. The only problem is that you have to do it for 5 sea-minutes (300 human minutes) before you can stop, or anybody about catches you. It would most likely usually be the second. And usually it would be by a Bejeezah, an invisible tree-dweller that scoops people (or other) off the ground (or water) to have for Lunch. Never Breakfast because they would get indigestion eating something so big so early. Lunch is quite a rare occasion though because they only eat it once they’ve filled up their cauldron, which is the size of an Olympic-sized swimming pool (This is why they pick fat people up a lot), and once they’ve found their bottle of barbeque sauce, which gives it the nice bit of flavour they need. Marie had been lucky so far in that this was her first act coming up, and she would probably only do 1 sea-minute (60 human minutes) due to her father. This is where Sally runs into a problem, for her dad is the boss of the Mafia Dons, the Leading Fishman, Don Fisheone. He’s a recluse, as unrecognisable as Bill Medley and as scary as Hannibal Lector crossbred with the T-Rex from Jurassic Park. And there’s also the fact that half of the Hit And Swims in the past three years have involved fishes in love with Marie. Fortunately for Sally, he had the good luck of being in the right place at the right time………

Sally was sat in the fifth Fishicle, gently humming to himself when it happened. The sound of the cave stone was rolled over and some fish swam in. Sally stood there, and slowly closed the stone to the Fishicle and stayed very quiet. All he could was slight mutterings down the hall, and he swam gently up to the top of the stone to overlook into the toilet. There, stood in front of a giant mirror, was the big cheese himself, Don Fisheone. He was alone apart from one assistant, of which he had many. Don Fisheone was picking a spot absentmindedly, while bemoaning to his assistant.

“I’ve had enough. It’s so boring on this colony. The Oceans are good but are all the same now. It’s practically all a mold of itself. I can’t even remember the last time I really enjoyed myself.”

“Yesterday, at the restaurant party for Marie, Sir, when you won the ‘Who Can Eat The Most Peppers In A Minute Contest” in 3 minutes. You were cheating of course, what with nobody else to play, but the enjoyment on your face was worth it.”

“Yes, Yes, but I meant having the freedom for anything, just being able to wake up and it’s already an adventure, just a change.” Don Fisheone swam around the room, and then stopped in a dead heat. “Of course! I’ve been so stupid. I’ll go on land.

“Land, Sir!?”

“Yes, Feeves, Land. It’s so obvious a policefish would have realised! Yes, plan the moving day.”

“Sir, there’s just the slight problem of a lack of lungs to contend with.”

“Always got to ruin it somehow, hey Feeves? Fine then, how do we get around that problem, then?”

“Well Sir, there is one thing we could do. There was rumour recently that, IT had been sighted. It exists, Sir and is out there waiting for us.”

“What is?”

Sally felt himself draw nearer over the stone in an attempt to hear this valuable information.

“The Mystical Sea Lions Cup, Sir”

“Of course. Of course. Of course. I should have known. And obviously there’s one around. Do you know what, you can get it if you’re so certain it exists and can be found, and once more, you can leave tonight to search for it and don’t come back until you find it.”

“But sir…”

“And furthermore, if you get it, I’ll even give you my daughter’s hand in marriage then.”

“I’ll get packing Sir.”

Feeves left the room, leaving just Don Fisheone to follow and an excited Sally in the Fishicle. Sally was so excited he was fit to burst. Thankfully he was in the Fishicle. He went toilet, and swam out the Fishicle and out the room and all the way home. Well, obviously he didn’t swim all the way home; he was too lazy for that. He swam outside the fishicles, then floundered the next 200 yards with a stitch in his fin, and then ran up the stairs, oohing and aahing all the way. He packed his wallet, which was thrown in the sea by An Unknown Creature, so really it’s more like a Bergen Bag for him, and set off out the house and down the road as quick as his little fins could take him. Hr got to the bottom of the street, paused and breathed in the air. He put a fin forward, and was about to step into the Oceans, when he stopped. He thought to himself quickly, made a decision. ”Where the blistering barnacles is the Mystical Sea Lions Cup anyway!?”

TO BE CONTINUED……

WE HOPE……

DEPENDS IF THIS GET’S PUBLISHED OR NOT…….

THE END……

UNLESS WE DO GET PUBLISHED.