Akiko and the Great Wall of Trudd Read Online Free Page B

o - k a a a y ?”
    Suddenly everything looked very fuzzy, and I felt as if my whole body were spinning. For some reason I found myself doing the very worst possible thing I could have done at that moment. I turned my head and looked straight down.
    All I could see was a big yellow blur in place of Mr. Beeba, and there, miles below him, a strangely beautiful cloud of green.

    One by one I watched my fingers let go of the wall.
    “ ’K i i i k o h h h,” I heard Spuckler’s voice, but it sounded as if he were calling from the top of a mountain. “N o o o o o o o o o o o o o . . .”
    I felt my body tumbling through space for a second or two before suddenly being yanked very roughly. Then everything went black.

When I opened my eyes the world was upside down.
    My face felt very warm, and my arms were dangling above my head. Or
below
my head, rather. You see, Spuckler’s safety measures had succeeded: I was now hanging upside down, with my feet all tangled up in the rope. I was about ten feet below Mr. Beeba and Spuckler, who were both holding on to the wall with one hand and pulling on the rope with the other.
    “C’mon, Beebs!” I heard Spuckler say. “Put some muscle into it!” Together they were drawing me back up the wall, inch by inch.
    “I’m trying, trying!” Mr. Beeba replied with a grunt.
    “Hold on, guys,” I said feebly. “I’ll try to get my legs untangled.”
    I wasn’t feeling so dizzy anymore, but my face was burning hot with all the blood that had rushed to my head.
    “Don’t move, ’Kiko,” Spuckler said urgently. “We’ll getcher feet untangled in a second. First let’s try’n getcha turned the right way around.”
    Spuckler was stretching his arm down to get hold of my leg, but I was still a few inches out of reach. He pulled a little harder on the rope to bring me farther up the wall.
    BBRRRRRRUMMMMM!
    There was a horrible crumbling sound, and all at once the section of the wall Spuckler was holding on to completely gave way. A million bits of rock and sand came pouring down, and Spuckler scrambled desperately not to fall.

    But it was no use.
    With one final clawing motion of his arm, Spuckler completely lost balance and fell helplessly through the air. I watched in disbelief as he rocketed down past me, the coil of rope connecting the two of us going from taut to loose in a split second. Then the rope snapped around my ankles as the full weight of Spuckler’s body yanked down on it. Fortunately my blue jeans were thick enough to protect me from what would have been a
really
nasty rope burn!
    Now the climbing order was completely reversed: Spuckler was on the bottom, I was in the middle, and Mr. Beeba was on top, holding on to the wall with all his might. For a terrible second or two, poor Mr. Beeba was forced to support the weight of all three of us!

Mr. Beeba wheezed and groaned but somehow managed to hold on.
    Luckily, Spuckler got his bearings quite quickly, and in a flash he was back on the wall. Mr. Beeba exhaled loudly as he was relieved of Spuckler’s weight.
    “Thanks for holdin’ on there, Beebs,” Spuckler said with a nervous chuckle. “If you’da let go, it woulda been curtains for all of us!”
    “Yes, well.” Mr. Beeba said proudly while he gasped for air, “I’ll let you know when I think of a good way for you to repay me!”
    Spuckler helped me get right-side-up again. And not a moment too soon: my head felt as if it were about to pop! He also found a nearby ledge where we could all lean back and rest a little. Then he called Gax, who crawled toward us on his suction-cup legs like some kind of strange robotic insect.
    “ YES, SIR? ” Gax asked obediently.
    “How much weight can you support with those li’l suction thingies of yours?”
    “ I’M AFRAID YOU’VE BECOME A BIT TOO HEAVY FOR ME IN RECENT YEARS, SIR, ” Gax replied, anticipating his master’s plan.
    “Okay, forget about me,” Spuckler continued with a