The Quarry Keys
A story for children aged 4 - 9
by
Su Laws Baccino

‘Goodnight. Sleep tight.’ Oliver waited until the door was shut. He watched as his Mum’s shadow went from under the door, leaving a strip of light skating on the polished floorboards. Throwing the duvet off, he jumped to the end of the top bunk and pulled back the thick curtain. Bright light travelled from wall to wall in leaps and starts; and then vanished.

‘What’s that?’ screamed Jessica, his sister.

‘Sshhh! Come up here. Quick.’ Oliver did a tip over off the top bunk, and, standing beneath her, helped push his sister up the ladder. He didn’t want her to spoil the fun. He punched the air karate style.

‘I don’t like being up here,’ said Jessica hanging on to the bars.

‘Stop being a wuss,’ Oliver wound the sheet round his head like a turban.

Jessica laughed and knelt forward to look out of the window.

‘Don’t do that silly! You’ll fall!’

‘Don’t be nasty … just because it’s your birthday … I’ll be ten soon.’

‘In three years … that’s aaaaages away, and when you’re ten I’ll be thirteen, you’ll always be behind,’ crowed Oliver, hanging from the bunk like a monkey.

‘What is that?’ snivelled Jessica, covering her nose and mouth with her hands.

‘I don’t know. It’s outside.’ Oliver pushed his hand into the next beam, creating a monster-like shadow that filled the room and then dived towards Jessica. Her lower lip began to quiver.

‘Oh don’t cry, stupid! It was only me,’ Jessica could be a baby sometimes; it was embarrassing when his friends came to stay, ‘Perhaps it’s cosmic?’

Oliver watched as Jessica’s nose peeked slowly from under the duvet, ‘What’s cosmic?’ she asked; he wasn’t surprised, girls were a bit dippy. But he liked his school-friend, Farah, she was intelligent and grown up, and her family came from Iran; and she wore brilliant clothes. Jessica’s friends, Iram and Evrim, weren’t bad either; they were Turkish, and their Dad owned a kebab takeaway.

‘Oliver, look …!’

‘Ooh, what are they?’ exclaimed Oliver. In the beam he could see miniature shapes … circles, triangles, squares.

‘They’re walking across the wall!’

‘Oh, don’t be an idiot!’

‘Spiderman does.’

‘Shut up! You’re daft!’ Oliver hissed, lying on his back, walking his feet up the wall, imitating Jessica in a squeaky voice, ‘Spiderman does.’

Jessica began to cry.

‘Drama Queen!’ But even Oliver was a little scared.

In the next rush of light Oliver followed the light across the bedroom; he pounced, stabbing at the wall, but he couldn’t catch the shimmering shapes. Jessica copied him, gasping excitedly each time she thought she’d got one.

‘They’re warm, Oliver! Try!’

‘Don’t be silly, how can they be?’ Oliver tried his hand at touching the figures, ‘Ouch, you’re right, they’re hot.’

Jessica shivered, ‘I’m cold.’

‘Sshh. Be quiet. They’ll come up and spoil our fun and then you’ll never know what those things are on the wall.’ Oliver slid down the ladder head first, and threw his fleece up to Jessica, ‘Don’t be a wimp. Here, wrap yourself up in that.’

‘They’re on the sheets! Ooh …’ yelled Jessica, ‘they’re everywhere, like shiny ants,’ Jessica’s fair curls bobbed up and down as the light shone in again; and then, when it went dark again, she felt something in her hand. It was hard and smooth.

‘Don’t do that! That hurts!’ rang out in a high-pitched shriek.

‘I’m not doing anything. I’m not touching you,’ snapped Oliver.

‘I didn’t say anything,’ screamed Jessica, ‘‘I’ve got one. It’s in my hand!’

‘How … you don’t even know what they are!’ Sometimes Oliver thought his sister was thick, but girls were different; except Farah of course, she was special.

‘See!’

Sure enough there was one struggling to free itself from her hand. Oliver looked in astonishment, but the room went dark again; then in the next burst of light the small figure reappeared on Jessica’s shoulder.

‘That’s better, she was squashing me,’ said the strange little man brushing himself down, ‘I have to be careful when it goes dark because I could burn out.’

‘Crumbs, what are you?’ asked Oliver.

‘I’m a Quarrie key. I’ve come from Quarantine.’

‘Where’s that?’

‘It’s a special zone where they lock up all the bad viruses that have been scanned out of computers … the ones that can’t be deleted.’ As he spoke, the Quarrie key jumped up and down, backwards and forwards, in and out of a green aura that surrounded him. ‘It’s supposed to stop us worming our way onto other programmes and into more computer installations. But we’re all too clever and we often wriggle out; they’ll never stop us because once we get into Quarantine we start multiplying … they don’t know that yet!’ Quarrie key cackled loudly, whirling round and round.

As the light flowed in again, Jessica laughed and pointed to the small clusters of toasted crumbs dancing in her bed, ‘Look, they’re everywhere!’

The Quarrie key’s tinny laugh rang out, ‘We die in the dark … unless that is, we can find a friendly human, like you … the viruses feel at home with you … they’ll want to stay with you.’

Oliver watched as the tiny black spots crowded Jessica’s legs creating a crazy paving, a web like pattern. He giggled, they were funny little things; then, before he could stop her, Jessica shouted, ‘Mummeeeeee come and look!’

‘Sssshhhh Jessica. Don’t call them up here!’

Daddy appeared quickly at the door, ‘Jessica?’

‘I think she was dreaming, Daddy,’ said Oliver.

‘You don’t need these open, the lighthouse will keep you awake,’ said Daddy, crossing the room and pulling the curtain tight. ‘Now please go to sleep. We’re busy, there’s something wrong with the computer, it looks like it’s picked up a virus or something.’

Oliver and Jessica giggled; from downstairs they could hear the Quarrie key’s unmistakable scoffing.

I can’t wait to tell Farah, she’ll never believe me, thought Oliver as he turned over to sleep.

The End

©  Su Laws Baccino 2006

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Category: Children's Stories