4 The Submarine

4 The Submarine Once the hissing noise had stopped, Dad opened the round hatch and ushered everyone through. This room was quite different to the others— longer and narrower, with a retro feel to it, like the interior of a spaceship on a 1960s TV show. Most of the room was nickel- plated and festooned with visible rivets, gleaming pipework and round gauges with needles that turned very slowly. The children looked around with shiny, curious eyes. 'How cool,' said Little-Bit as she surveyed the tube-shaped interior. 'It reminds me of being on the London Underground, except that the windows are smaller and there aren't as many copies of the Evening Standard strewn across the floor.' 'Hang on, is that water?' said Peanut, looking out through

one of the portholes that lined each side of the room. 'Are we in a submarine?' 'We certainly are, lassie,' replied Woodhouse. 'Us rats usually prefer to flee sinking ships, so it always feels strange to be getting into one voluntarily.' 'Are we in the Rainbow Lake?' asked Rockwell. 'Look at all the different colours!' Sure enough, the vessel's interior was bathed in the kaleidoscope of undulating light that was coming in through the windows. Every porthole provided a different-coloured view. The Rainbow Lake was the magical body of water that surrounded the Spire in the very centre of Chroma. Everybody who swam in it was imbued with an amazing sense of creativity. It was said that all of the great artists throughout history had, at some point, swum in the lake before going on to produce their wonderful works of art. It was widely regarded as the hub of all the world's creativity.

'Not exactly,' said Dad, replying to Rockwell. 'But you're very close. We are in the Rainbow Lake's cleaning channel. He pointed out several large propellor-shaped devices attached to the outside of the submarine. 'You see those filter wheels? They clean the water and help with colour correction.' 'I think I remember someone mentioning colour correction at some point,' said Peanut. 'But why does the water need to be cleaned? I thought it was magical. 'It does have many magical properties, yes, but in order to remain potent, the water needs to be in tip-top condition, Dad explained. 'That's why it's regularly circulated through

these channels and carefully treated so that it's always perfect. At least, that's what should happen. The truth is that the cleaning programme hasn't been operating for a long time. As you can see, most of the equipment is pretty neglected and much of the water is now stagnant. The children looked through the window and, sure enough, some of the filter wheels on the side of the sub were rusty. A few even had blades missing. Peanut noticed another submarine resting on its side on the channel bed, dented and dirty. 'Despite its current condition, I'm always surprised at how beautiful the rainbow water is,' said Dad as he gazed at the slowly moving, constantly shape-shifting pockets of colour outside the vessel. 'It's like being inside the most beautiful lava lamp ever. And I can't tell you how wonderful it is to be sharing a bit of this beauty with you all, even if the circumstances aren't ideal. I've been looking at this on my own for so long. The bright colours always reminded me of you, Peanut.'

She smiled. Dad smiled back, then looked up towards the surface of the water. All that being said, the levels are getting really low now. It's worrying. On the plus side, the fact that nobody's monitoring the channels means that we can use them to travel around the city without being seen. 'Is the water from the Rainbow Lake taken all around Chroma?' asked Peanut. 'Not all around Chroma, just the south-western part of it. The dirty water is diverted from the Rainbow Lake and funnelled south, down a long, straight underground waterway, to the outskirts of the city. That's where we are now— the cleaning station just outside of Modernia. It's then pumped clockwise around the perimeter of Chroma until it reaches the station on the outskirts of the Green Valleys, at which point it turns and heads east along another channel until, eventually, it re-joins the lake. By then, it's usually all sparkly and fully colour-corrected.

'Ingenious,' said Little-Bit. 'So the water is cleaned by the various filtering systems, one of which is a fleet of submarines just like this one?' 'Yes,' replied Dad. And because it's a constant process, all of the water in the lake is perfect all of the time. At least it would be if the system was operating properly.' 'How did it get to be in such a terrible state?' asked Rockwell. 'It has been totally neglected since Mr White became mayor,' said Dad. ' Let's just say maintaining the colour quality of the Rainbow Lake so that it remains a creative resource has not been high on his priority list. Fortunately, I was able to get this submarine working again— 67 was a big help in that regard, of course. Rockwell glanced over at the robot, who didn't return his gaze. ' Anyway, we'd better get a shift on,' said Dad. He walked to the opposite end of the submarine and took a seat behind two large joysticks, a busy-looking control panel and an enormous periscope. He pressed a few buttons, flicked a couple of switches and then turned a silver ignition key. The engines immediately fired, creating an explosion of tiny bubbles in the water surrounding the vessel. Peanut gazed at them through the window. They echoed the nervous bubbles of energy she could feel in her tummy.