by Sam Rhodes
“Simon!” cried Ricky.
“It’s OK!” called Simon, waving from across the street. He waved a little box. “Remote control.”
The Long Arm statue teetered precariously.
“How fitting!” cackled Mrs Schofield. “When all this is over, I’ll melt that thing down and use the metal to make a new statue. Guess what it will be?”
“A soaring angel?” said Ricky.
“No, guess again.”
“A piece of conceptual art representing the futility of existence?”
“Try again.”
“One of those big reflective balls that make your reflection squishy?”
Mrs Schofield snarled as she climbed out of the tank. “You’re making fun of me, aren’t you?”
“Maybe,” said Ricky. “Might it be a statue of a long-necked woman?”
“Yes!” said Mrs Schofield. “Now, Long Arm. Let’s find out who will rule this town!”
And so they had a … Great. Big. Fight.
The whole town took shelter as Long Arm and Long Neck did battle. Buildings fell, roads cracked apart, windows smashed, and the busker who performed out-of-tune Desert Penguins songs even stopped playing.
And at the end of it all…
“You’re listening to Wolvesley FM where we guarantee to make your ears smile. But today, there are no guarantees. Because, listeners, I bring you grave news. Long Arm has met his match. He lies defeated in the streets of Wolvesley, beneath the statue we erected to honour him. He can barely lift his arm, and we can hardly bear to watch…”
Ricky looked up to see Mrs Schofield towering over him.
“Mum, don’t!” said Spencer, but she didn’t listen.
“I knew it would end like this,” she said, leaning close.
“There’s only room for one long-limbed super-being in Wolvesley. And that super-being is…”
“Out of my way,” said a voice. “Out of my way!”
Ricky saw a man running up the street, seemingly oblivious to the destruction all around.
It was Mr Pinkerton.
Mr Pinkerton slowed down. He looked at Long Arm, then his eyes followed the long, looping coils of Mrs Schofield’s neck. His jaw dropped, and his knees wobbled. Then he clutched his stomach. “No, no, no…” he said. “Not now.”
He began to take short panting breaths, but he knew it was a losing battle.
He crossed his legs, and spun around three times, but each second that passed he knew he couldn’t hold it in.
And then it happened.
On the other side of the world, it registered as merely a tremor, but in Wolvesley the trump that detonated from Mr Pinkerton’s bottom measured 4.3 on the Richter Scale. It dented the road surface and shattered windows at forty paces. People dived for cover.
And the thing about hot air is, it rises.
So at ground level, the citizens of Wolvesley were spared. Not so Mrs Schofield.
As the green gases rose in a miasma around her, she tried not to breathe. But Mr Pinkerton’s trump was of such potency that even the world’s most advanced biohazard suit would not have saved her.
In short, she got a lungful.
Her eyes narrowed, and her head tottered. She gasped and wretched and choked. Spasms shook her neck from top to bottom. And then, like a mighty tree, she collapsed.
And all of Wolvesley cheered. Apart from Elliot the dog. He did a little wee against the remaining leg of the Long Arm statue.
“Don’t mind me,” said Elliot.
CHAPTER 10
A DISAPPOINTING ENDING
“Welcome to The Wolvesley Hour. I’m Sammy Sammerson, and I’m glad to back in the studio after an eventful day. Our town is saved, and the villain known as Long Neck is in custody where she belongs. Goodnight, Wolvesley, and sleep tight…
…
What, we’ve got another fifty-nine
minutes? OK – let’s just put up a picture of Long Arm.”
In the Mitre household, Scarlett was sitting in the living room with her mum and dad.
“Switch it over!” said her dad. “Britain’s Got Flatulence is on the other channel.”
Mrs Mitre changed the channel, just in time to see a man in a crumpled suit walking on to the stage. His shoulders sagged, and he dragged his feet.
“Hi,” said the head judge. “Tell us your name and what you do.”
The man looked up nervously. “I’m Mr Pinkerton and I’m a teacher at Wolvesley Primary School.”
“Thanks,” said the host. “When you’re ready.”
Mr Pinkerton took a deep breath, then closed his eyes. The audience fell into silence.
After a few seconds, the head judge began tapping his foot.
Mr Pinkerton began to sweat.
“This is going to be massive, I reckon,” said Ricky’s mum. “Ricky says he trumps all the time at school!”
A tiny whisper came from the vicinity of Mr Pinkerton’s bottom.
One audience member clapped. Once. (It was Mr Pinkerton’s mum.)
“This guy’s a joker,” said Ricky’s dad.
The judges didn’t look impressed.
“Don’t give up the teaching just yet,” said one.
“Thanks for coming,” said another, “but I’ve heard a mouse trump louder than that.”
Mr Pinkerton stalked off the stage.
In Wolvesley Prison, all the prisoners crowded around the TV laughed. All except one.
She was watching the TV, but she was sitting in her cell at the other end of prison.
Mrs Schofield was serving thirty years for crimes against animals, trying to form a dictatorship and speeding. But she had no intention of spending thirty years behind bars.
She cracked her knuckles, ground her teeth and did 1000 push-ups.
But most of all she thought about Ricky Mitre.
“Outwitted by a schoolboy!” she growled. “Well, you may have won this battle, Long Arm, but I will rise again…”
And in Ricky’s bedroom, he and Simon were playing Barry the Hedgehog while Elliot lay stretched out on the floor.
“Did you get all the animals back to their original state?” asked Ricky.
“Almost,” said Simon. “It was simple really – just reversed the polarity on the sequencing machine, sending a stream of ionized particles through the accelerator. Of course, I had to invent a new form of genetic modelling in order to do so.”
“I have no idea what you’ve just said,” replied Ricky. “I had a text from Spencer yesterday.”
“How is he?” said Simon.
“Well, considering his mum is an evil criminal mastermind, he’s doing OK. He’s staying with his Aunty Kath down in Devon.”
“That’s good to hear,” said Simon.
“It’s good to have everything back to normal,” said Ricky. And he stroked Elliot’s head.
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First published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd, 2016
This electronic edition published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd, 2016
Text copyright © Sam Nixon and Mark Rhodes, 2016
Illustrations copyright © Aleksei Bitskoff, 2016
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eISBN 978 1407 16672 8
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