The Big Bear Nightmare

by Paul Cooper

  The Big Bear Nightmare

  Pigs CAN fly!

  Kweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!

  When the Alarm Squeal sounds it must be a job for Captain Peter Porker and the PIGS IN PLANES!

  Paul Cooper is from Manchester.

  He now lives in Cambridge with his wife and two daughters.

  Read these high-flying adventures about the Pigs in Planes:

  Pigs in Planes: The Chicken Egg-splosion

  Pigs in Planes: The Shark Bites Back

  Pigs in Planes: The Big Baad Sheep

  Pigs in Planes: The Mega Monkey Mystery

  Pigs in Planes: The Camel’s Hump of Doom

  Pigs in Planes: The Big Bear Nightmare

  The Big Bear Nightmare

  PAUL COOPER

  Illustrated by Trevor Dunton

  PUFFIN

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London wc2r 0rl, England

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada m4p 2y3

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)

  Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia

  (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)

  Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi – 110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand

  (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)

  Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London wc2r 0rl, England

  puffinbooks.com

  First published 2011

  Text copyright © Paul Cooper, 2011

  Illustrations copyright © Trevor Dunton, 2011

  All rights reserved

  The moral right of the author and illustrator has been asserted

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser

  ISBN: 978-0-14-196094-4

  Contents

  MEET THE CREW

  Chapter 1: The Bear Facts

  Chapter 2: The Sound of the Underground

  Chapter 3: Everybody do the Brian!

  Chapter 4: Hairy Bikers

  Chapter 5: Going on a Bear Hunt

  Chapter 6: Hello, Sweetie

  Chapter 7: Piggylocks and the Three Bears

  Chapter 8: Sweet Dreams

  Chapter 9: Biker Bears from Ma’s

  Chapter 10: The Other Highway Code

  Chapter 11: Battle of the Biker Bellies

  Chapter 12: A Sticky End

  Chapter 13: Killer Instinct

  Chapter 14: Everybody do the Brian (Again)!

  Chapter 15: King Bee

  Epilogue

  Crossword

  Word Scramble

  Word Serach

  Answers

  For Paul Shipton, my mentor

  MEET THE CREW

  CHAPTER 1:

  The Bear Facts

  Captain Peter Porker couldn’t help noticing something different about Wing Commander Oinks-Gruntington this morning.

  ‘Er, why’s Peregrine wearing a pink baseball cap that says No. 1 POP PRINCESS?’ he asked Lola Penn.

  The PiPs radio operator grinned. ‘Do you like it? I put it there!’

  ‘It’s a bit small for his huge head,’ said Pete.

  Peregrine let out a long, strange noise – a snore! Pete went closer. ‘He’s asleep!’ he gasped. ‘With one eye open!’

  Lola nodded. ‘Cool, isn’t it? He’s been having trouble falling asleep at night lately, so he’s taken to having naps at his desk. He thinks I don’t notice!’

  Pete crossed his arms and tried to look disapproving. ‘So your reaction is to put silly pink hats on his head?’

  ‘That is so not true!’ huffed Lola. ‘I put silly hats of all different colours on his head. Look!’ She pulled out her mobile phone and began scrolling through the pictures. It looked like the world’s worst hat catalogue.

  ‘And now I can sit back and relax,’ Lola beamed. She picked up the latest copy of her favourite magazine Sizzle!

  Two seconds later there was a BEEP! from the radio.

  ‘WHAT?’ sputtered Peregrine, waking up. ‘Where am I?’

  ‘Morning, Peregrine,’ said Pete.

  Lola grabbed the radio microphone. Now her voice was serious and professional: ‘You have reached the Pigs in Planes emergency service. What are your inter-species rescue needs?’

  The voice on the line was very quiet.

  ‘What’s that?’ said Lola. ‘Something about bears?’ She leaned in closer. ‘Where’ve they gone? You’ll have to speak up, sir – or, indeed, madam.’

  Lola scrunched up her face with effort. ‘What did you say? “Bare bottom”?’

  ‘Must be a prank call,’ huffed Peregrine, ‘like that time someone called and said all the football boots had been stolen on Snake Island!’

  ‘Shhh, Peregrine!’ snapped Lola.

  The caller mumbled a few more words and then the line went dead.

  Pete’s gut instinct was telling him that this might be a genuine call. ‘Why don’t you just check Bear Island online?’ he asked Lola.

  The radio operator jumped on to the computer and quickly pulled up a webcam shot from the capital of Bear Island, Ursalona. It showed the main square in the city centre.

  ‘Well, everything looks nice and peaceful there,’ commented Peregrine.

  But Pete knew better. ‘This is a live shot, and it’s rush hour.’

  Lola understood what he meant. ‘Of course! There should be bears everywhere – going to work, going to the shops. So where are they all?’

  Lola clicked to another webcam set up in a different part of the city. Then she clicked to another, and another. It was the same story for all of them. There didn’t seem to be any bears at all on Bear Island. Whoever the caller had been, it seemed they were right – the bears were gone!

  Peregrine gave a determined nod, still unaware of his pink Pop Princess cap. This was a job for the Pigs in Planes.

  Lola reached out and pressed the Code Pink emergency button. The Alarm Squeal sounded all around the base:

  KWWWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!

  The PiPs were going to Bear Island!

  As the SkyHog jets zoomed north, the team soon learned that Lola couldn’t give any detailed information about the mission. She didn’t know who the caller was, or even what the problem was exactly.

  ‘All we’ve got are the bare facts,’ said Pete over the radio, ‘which is that there don’t seem to be any bears around.’

  ‘Maybe today’s the day the teddy bears have their picnic?’ suggested Curly McHoglet helpfully. Yet to earn his wings, the trainee was still flying with Pete, as usual.

  ‘I wish I could have a picnic,’ chipped in Tammy Snuffles, the PiPs mechanic. ‘I’m starving.’ Luckily, she had stashed a few bags of crisps under her jet’s console … and an apple pie … and a pizza … OK, two pizzas.

  ‘Do we know which part of the island the call came from?’ asked Brian Trotter, the team’s medical officer.

  ‘It came fr
om just north of the capital, Ursalona,’ answered Pete. ‘There’s a place there called “Bear Bottom Farm” – Lola thinks the caller might have been trying to say something about it. But I want to check out the city centre first and see what’s happening – or not happening – there.’

  Soon they were flying over the heavy forests of the island.

  ‘I can see Ursalona up ahead!’ cried Tammy, through a mouthful of crisps.

  Usually it was tricky landing the SkyHogs in a busy city, but Ursalona was not busy today. Its streets were completely empty.

  ‘I can’t see any bears in the streets and I can’t see any traffic on the roads,’ said Tammy, spraying crumbs of pie crust. ‘The place is completely deserted.’

  They landed the jets right in the middle of a huge shopping precinct. All the shops were closed, and there wasn’t a shopper in sight. The PiPs got out of their planes and wandered to the side of a four-lane road that ran past the precinct; it had precisely zero traffic on it.

  ‘Looks like rush hour has ended,’ said Curly.

  ‘Yeah, about three years ago,’ said Tammy, taking a last bite of pizza.

  Brian turned slowly to take in every view of the bearless city around them. ‘Can you hear that?’

  Pete cocked an ear. ‘No.’

  ‘Exactly!’ said the medical officer. ‘There’s no background noise at all – no traffic, no pawsteps, no TVs or radios. What you can’t hear is the sound of complete and utter silence!’

  ‘Do you know what this is a bit like?’ said Curly nervously. ‘That science fiction film The Omega Pig! It’s about the last pig left in the entire world, and he wanders around a deserted city all alone, just like this.’

  ‘And what happens to him?’ asked Tammy.

  Curly blinked. ‘He … er … gets eaten by giant radioactive spiders that live in the sewers.’

  Pete grinned. ‘OK, good safety reminder there – everybody keep away from giant mutant spiders. Thanks for that, Curly.’ The captain pulled a city map from his pocket. ‘We’ll cover more ground if we split up. Tammy? You and Curly, search the city centre. Look for anybody who can tell us what’s going on. Brian, you’re with me – we’re going north of the city, to see if we can track down our mystery caller.’

  Tammy and Curly started towards the city centre. ‘What should we do if we spot someone?’ the young trainee called to Pete.

  The PiPs captain answered over his shoulder. ‘If it’s a bear, ask where everyone else is … If it’s a giant radioactive spider?’ He shrugged. ‘Better run, I suppose.’

  CHAPTER 2:

  The Sound of the Underground

  Tammy and Curly made their way through deserted streets. Tall buildings towered all around them, but still they saw no sign of life. There was no sound but the clack of their trotters on the pavement.

  ‘I don’t like this,’ murmured Tammy. ‘It’s like my cousin Joel … too quiet and creepy.’

  ‘Hey, I bet your voice echoes if you shout,’ said Curly eagerly. He cupped both trotters around his mouth and shouted:

  ‘OINK!’

  ‘OINK!’ bounced back the faint echoing reply.

  Curly grinned. ‘See?’ He shouted again:

  ‘HELLO-OOO!’

  ‘HELLO-OOO!’

  ‘HOW ARE YOUOOOO?’

  ‘OK-AYYYYYY!’

  The two pigs froze.

  ‘That wasn’t an echo,’ gasped Tammy. ‘That was an answer.’

  They charged forward to see where the voice had come from. As they rounded a corner, they could see a small figure moving in the distance. It was hard to tell from this far, but it looked like a little bear cub walking towards to a sign for the city’s Underground system.

  ‘HEY, YOU!’ shouted Tammy.

  The little bear looked up and saw two strange, uniformed pigs in the distance running towards him. He didn’t seem to like this much, and so he pelted down the steps that led below street level.

  ‘WAIT!’ shouted Tammy.

  But it was too late. By the time the two pigs reached the Underground entrance, the only living bear they’d spotted in the entire city so far was gone.

  ‘Shall we radio Pete?’ asked Curly.

  Tammy shook her head. ‘Let’s see if we can find that cub first. Lola said the person on the radio sounded odd – maybe it was a little kid who made the emergency call?’

  The two pigs followed the steps down into the Underground system. The little cub was nowhere to be seen. They continued to follow the tunnel down.

  ‘What’s that noise?’ asked Curly. ‘It’s not your tummy, is it, Tammy?’

  This was a reasonable question – the sound was a strange rumble, and Tammy’s tummy usually produced one of these half an hour or so after her last meal.

  But the mechanic shook her head. ‘That’s not me – I only had a light snack on the flight over.’

  As the PiPs continued along the tunnel, the rumbling became louder. Finally they came to a large entranceway and discovered what was making the noise.

  The entrance led into a huge underground cave. Only the dim light of several EXIT signs saved the place from total darkness. Tammy and Curly stood on a steel walkway and looked out on what appeared to be an underground sea of dark fur. It was bears, hundreds and hundreds of them, all fast asleep. The rumbling noise was the sound of lots and lots of combined snores.

  ‘What’s –’ Curly began, but Tammy clapped a trotter over his snout.

  ‘Shhh!’

  Curly dropped his voice. ‘What’s going on?’

  Tammy waved an arm to indicate the huge cave. ‘There are lots of these caves on Bear Island,’ she explained quietly. ‘It’s where the bears hibernate during the winter …’ She scratched her head. ‘So the bears haven’t disappeared, they’re just all hibernating. But why are they hibernating now? It doesn’t make sense. It isn’t winter – it’s warm outside.’

  ‘No probs,’ said the trainee sunnily. ‘I’ll just wake one of them up and ask what the problem is. Easy-peasy!’ He started down the steel steps to the cave floor.

  Tammy flew after him. ‘Stop!’ she hissed, grabbing his arm just as he reached the bottom step. ‘Didn’t they teach you anything at school? The top three most important safety rules in life are these …’ Tammy counted them off:

  ‘One: Never set off fireworks next door to a dynamite factory.

  ‘Two: Never press a big red button labelled DANGER, DO NOT PRESS.

  ‘And three: Never – ever – attempt to wake up a hibernating bear.’

  ‘Why not?’ Curly blinked innocently.

  ‘Because if you wake a bear up too suddenly,’ said Tammy, ‘there’s a few minutes when it doesn’t know where it is or what’s going on. It can go into a bit of a rage, and trust me – you don’t want to be near a bear in a rage.’

  Curly looked down now at the huge sleeping bear in front of him. Its powerful arms ended in the sharpest-looking claws he’d ever seen. He’d heard that a bear’s claws were sharp enough to slice open a tin of tomatoes. Curly didn’t want to see that – he didn’t even like tomatoes much.

  The two pigs took a careful step backwards on to the staircase. But then they spotted movement on the far side of the cave. It was the same chubby little bear cub. They could see now that he was only a few years old; he wore shorts and carried a stuffed teddy bear toy in one paw. He was pushing at one of the sleeping bears, but it just went on snoozing.

  Not daring to shout out, the pigs could only watch as the cub gave up and started towards one of the exits on the far side. Carefully Tammy and Curly began to thread their way after him through the mass of slumbering bears.

  ‘Don’t step on anyone’s fur,’ whispered Tammy. She risked a quiet ‘Psssst!’ to attract the cub’s attention. ‘PSSST!’

  Finally the cub did look back. It paused just long enough to stick its tongue out at the two pigs, and then it scurried to the exit even faster.

  ‘Come on!’ hissed Tammy. ‘We can’t let him get away!�
�

  Curly sped up. Instantly, he tripped on an outstretched furry leg.

  Luckily, there was something to break his fall – a large sleeping bear. It didn’t wake up, but it swung one gigantic paw over and clamped it around Curly. Still sleeping, the bear hugged the pig closer to it, as if the PiPs trainee was a large stuffed toy or an amusingly shaped hot-water bottle.

  Tammy looked down at them. ‘There’s no time to mess about,’ she whispered urgently. ‘Come on!’

  Curly tried to slide out from under the tree-trunk-sized arm, but the bear just tightened its grip and let out a low growl. Curly wasn’t going anywhere in a hurry.

  CHAPTER 3:

  Everybody do the Brian!

  Pete and Brian landed SkyHog 1 near a large billboard in front of a wire-mesh fence. The picture on it showed a happy bear farmer in bib-overalls and a straw hat. He was holding up a jar of honey next to a smiling bee. The words said BEAR BOTTOM HONEY FARM.

  Pete sniggered, as he set about climbing over the fence.

  ‘Why are you laughing?’ asked Brian.

  ‘Well, it sounds like “bare bottom”, doesn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. And?’

  ‘Well … bare bottoms are funny.’

  ‘Not to me.’ Brian pushed his glasses up his snout and started climbing the fence, too. ‘As a matter of fact, I’ve heard of this place,’ he said. ‘It’s quite interesting, actually – this farm was taken over by the biggest food company on Bear Island, Sweetie Foods. It was in the news because some bears were afraid the company would get rid of the traditional methods of making honey. And so …’

  Pete honestly tried to listen, but sometimes Brian saying the words ‘It’s quite interesting, actually’ acted like an OFF switch on his brain. He watched a little bee pull away from a flower and weave its way through the trees. He could hear a droning sound, and it wasn’t just Brian’s voice.