4 Melting!

Chapter 4 MELTING! meep… "Water Bug more than mile deep now," said Thudd. "Lotsa water press against Water Bug. Water heavy, heavy, heavy! Like big giraffe sitting on every inch of Water Bug." "That's dumb," said Judy. "Giraffes are too big to fit on an inch of anything." Uncle Al interrupted her. "A big giraffe weighs about three thousand pounds," he said. "Three thousand pounds of water are pressing against every inch of the Water Bug. The amount of water that presses against something is called water pressure. "But don't worry about the window," said Uncle Al. "The water pressure will probably hold

it in place." "Probably?" yelled Judy. "'Probably' is not the word you want to hear when you're more than a mile under the ocean!" Uncle Al nodded. "I understand," he said. "But don't worry. I've finished the See Horse and am on my way to find you." The See Horse was a new underwater vehicle that Uncle Al had been working on. Uncle Al rubbed his chin and frowned. "I just hope you're not anywhere near a certain place." "What place is that?" asked Judy. "It's called the Challenger Deep," said Uncle Al. "It's the deepest place in the ocean." meep… "Seven miles deep!" said Thudd. "Could bury tallest mountain there!" "Why is it so deep?" asked Andrew. meep… "Crust of earth always movin'," said Thudd. "New crust get made. Old crust go away. This is place where old crust get dragged inside earth. Crust melt. Get recycled."

Uncle Al nodded. "A dozen astronauts have walked on the moon, but only two people have ever gotten to the bottom of the Challenger Deep. The moon is a safer place!" "Then we'd better get the Water Bug moving again," said Judy, "before we fall into this stupid pit." "Could the Water Bug be out of fuel?" asked Andrew. Uncle Al shook his head. "The Water Bug runs on water," he said. Just then, the living lights of the ocean disappeared. The Water Bug was surrounded by a thick, swirling blackness! "Woofers!" said Andrew. "We're in some weird smoke cloud!" "What did you say?" asked Uncle Al. His eyebrows rose in alarm. Judy and Andrew looked down through the glass floor of the Water Bug. Tall, craggy towers on the ocean floor were spitting out billows of smoke.

"It looks like a witch's castle," Judy said, "with smoking chimneys! How could there be a fire in the ocean?" "Smokey the Bear on a chocolate chip cookie!" said Uncle Al. "Watch out! You guys are sinking into a—" Without warning, the Uncle Al hologram popped like a bubble and disappeared. meep… "Black smoker!" said Thudd.

"Black smoker?" said Judy. "What kind of weird-o thing is that?" meep… "Ocean floor got deep cracks. Hot, hot, hot down there! Two thousand degrees! Water down there get hot, too. Boil up through cracks. Water drag up lotsa black stuff from crust of earth. Look like smoke. Black stuff pile up in big heaps. Make strange chimneys." Judy groaned. "So we've got a Water Bug that's getting squashed, we've got no power, and we're falling into boiling water!" meep… "Boiling water not as hot as water here," said Thudd. "Oh, that's just great!" said Judy. The Water Bug kept sinking through the bubbling smoke. As Andrew squinted through the windshield, he noticed that the glass looked a little… wavy. "Thudd, what's happening to the windshield?" asked Andrew. meep… "Don't want to say," said Thudd. "Why not?" asked Andrew.

meep… "Don't want to scare Drewd and Oody," said Thudd. Andrew shook his head. "I get more scared when I don't know what I'm supposed to be scared about," he said. meep… "Okey-dokey," said Thudd. "Windshield melting."