“Chapter 6


“Farewell Wipeout. You rode the big one, and you blew it. You’re shark bait now.”
Wipeout’s body was wrapped up in a sheet and strapped down to his surfboard. After a moment’s silence, Surf City gave it a push and sent it drifting further out to sea where it bobbed about waiting to be discovered by something hungry. It was the traditional farewell for surfers who would surf no more.

As the rest of the team paddled their boards back towards the shore Coach Robsson turned to his team’s captain.
“That was a great send off.”
“Only what he deserved”, replied Surf City.
“So how is it we didn’t do this for Walk Don’t Run after the last match?”
Surf City laughed.
“Walk Don’t Run was a loser. No one really liked him, what with all his doom and gloom talk. We only let him into the team ‘cos he has a couple of real cute sisters.”
“And a way neat Woody”, added Surfin Safari.
“Woody?” asked Robsson.
Surfin Safari explained.
“A Woody’s a chariot we take to the beach. We get in the Woody with our girls and drive to the beach. Park the Woody and take the boards to the beach. Get off the beach, get in the water, get on the board, get onto the curl, shoot the curl, get off the curl, get onto the wave, get off the wave, get onto the beach, get off the beach, get out of the Woody, then we go home and sing our song.”
Coach Robsson stared at him, speechless.
Surf City smiled.
“It’s a ballad.”

Despite Wipeout’s death the elves were in particularly good form, having just won their second match against the powerful chaos team, Dead End Union. And not just won, but won 5-1. The whole team had come together for once and everything had clicked. Ride the Wild Surf had been particularly impressive, scoring four of the five touchdowns and even causing a casualty along the way.

Dead End Union had tried again and again to get something going on offence, but the gods of chaos were clearly having a fickle day and were granting no favours. Things could well have turned ugly, but the killing of Wipeout seemed to sate their bloodlust for long enough for the elves to finish the match and beat a hasty retreat to the beach.

So a good win for the elves at last, but the squad was looking a bit thin. Coach Robsson decided he needed to pick up a few new players over the coming weeks, especially a second catcher in case Ride the Wild Surf took a tumble, but this, along with a few other team issues were low down on his list of priorities. For now, he was more concerned by the fact that he was heading towards the beach on a surf board and between him and the safety of the sand were some mighty big waves.
“Oh well”, he said, climbing up onto the narrow strip of wood. “Cowabunga!”

”