Dance of the Deadly Dinosaurs

by Jackie French

  Yesterday sidled closer to Boo and rested her hand on his head. She understands, thought Boo. She knows how hard it is to just stand here, silent, with Mum so close.

  Mum’s eyes passed over Boo again with no sign of recognition. ‘What would you like, Your Majesty? A big carton for you and smaller ones for each of your party?’

  One of the poodlesaurs stuck its nose in her mixing bowl, then looked up eagerly, its nose covered in what looked like chocolate sauce. Boo sniffed. No, crushed beetle, he thought vaguely. Mum makes the best crushed beetle…

  Mum laughed and brushed the beetle off the dinosaur’s pink nose. ‘The topping is supposed to go on top of the ice cream, you silly poodle. I think you all need extra large bowls.’ She turned to Wattalotta Mussells. ‘Nine massive bowls of the Best Ice Cream in the Universes, Lottie. With sprinkles on top.’

  ‘None for me,’ said BAD hastily. ‘I’m on a diet.’

  ‘Are you sure, Your BADness?’ Mum still smiled happily.

  All this time he’d been imagining Mum tortured, screaming in pain, desperate to escape. And all along she’d been here, making ice cream, smiling that too-happy smile. He’d finally found her—and she didn’t recognise him.

  ‘Me like zombie ice cream, if you haves it.’ Mug’s rumble interrupted his thoughts.

  ‘Ahem,’ Queen Splendifera gave a polite cough. ‘My guard is joking, of course. Zombie ice cream? What a silly idea. What do you think, small poodle?’ Princess Princess bent down to Boo and unclipped his lead. ‘Do you think the iddle puppy dog could eat a whole big bowl of ice cream? Boo!’ she added in a hiss. ‘Is that your mum?’

  Boo nodded. ‘She must be hypnotised,’ he whispered, trying not to move his jaws.

  Princess Princess kept her face in its ‘Sweet Queen Speaking to Dumb Poodle’ look. ‘Den he can have his ice cweam! Can’t you, puppy wuppy? We’ll eat the ice cream then grab her,’ Princess Princess whispered. ‘Pass it on.’

  She stood up again. ‘I’ll be almost sorry to see this little poodle eaten by the Greedle,’ she added to BAD. ‘He is so cute sometimes! But the dear Greedle’s pleasure will make up for it. Thank you,’ she added with regal charm, as Mum passed her a heaped bowl of ice cream.

  ‘I don’t think poodles like ice cream,’ warned Yesterday softly. ‘Especially these big ones.’

  ‘Everyone likes this ice cream,’ said Mum.

  Boo watched as the poodlesaurs took the ice-cream bowls in their tiny hands. Massive stuck his nose in his, then sneezed. The other poodlesaurs gathered round. ‘Groawrrr!’ Roary shrieked delightedly. Suddenly the air was filled with the sound of slurping dinosaurs.

  It’s the Best Ice Cream in the Universes, thought Boo, pride warring with despair. A tear slipped down his nose. Even dinosaurs love it.

  Why had he never thought that Mum might be still hypnotised? And how could they break the spell? Even the Greedle couldn’t break it now. The Greedle was no more.

  Mum put another giant bowl of ice cream down on the counter and shone her strange smile at him. ‘A nice big bowl for the smallest poodle of them all.’

  Boo blinked away his tears. He stood up on his hind legs and began to lick.

  The familiar taste almost made him cry again. It was so good, cold and creamy and wonderful, with every lick a different taste spreading across his tongue.

  For a second he hoped Mum might take the chance to whisper to him, like Princess Princess had, that she was only pretending to be hypnotised. But even though his head was just a few centimetres from hers she ignored him as he slurped up the ice cream in his bowl.

  ‘Mmm,’ said Queen Splendifera, spooning up her ice cream faster than Boo had ever seen her eat anything before. ‘This really is the Best Ice Cream in the Universes.’

  Mum nodded. ‘I have improved the recipe lately,’ she said proudly. ‘The Greedle inspired me.’ Her smile grew even wider. ‘He is such a wonderful master, isn’t he?’

  ‘Wonderful,’ echoed BAD, her big donkey smile even wider than Mum’s.

  ‘Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful,’ echoed the unseen creatures in the other stalls, tents and caravans.

  Boo shivered. How many bogeys were there nearby? he wondered. He lifted up his nose and sniffed. He could smell Mum…and liquorice donkey…and dinosaur. There was Mug’s mouldy scent and Yesterday’s not-mouldy one. I could smell out Yesterday’s scent no matter how many people were around, he thought. And thousands of marvellous food odours, of course. All the stolen delicacies from all the universes the Greedle had destroyed, just so it could be the only one with the best food.

  But there were no bogey scents at all.

  Impossible, he thought. He’d heard the bogeys. He’d seen bogeys out in the fields.

  And then he realised. His heartbeat sped up in a spurt of anxiety. BAD smelt like liquorice allsorts…The other bogeys must smell like food too. Delicious scents of fruitcake and strawberries and ice cream and chilled watermelon.

  Exactly how many bogeys were nearby?

  The sooner they got out of here, the better—even if they had to truss Mum up and get the poodlesaurs to carry her. And Lottie Mussells, too, he thought as he lapped unhappily at his big dish of ice cream. He could never face Dr Mussells if they left Lottie behind.

  Somehow, someone at the school must know how to unhypnotise people. Maybe Graunt Doom could help.

  Boo rolled the ice cream over his tongue again. It was different, he admitted. He wouldn’t quite admit it was better than the ice cream Mum made before—or better than the ice cream he made, either. But it definitely wasn’t quite the recipe they’d been using all these years.

  Queen Splendifera sighed as she scraped out the last creamy dregs from her bowl. ‘I’ve never, ever eaten anything as good as that! And I’ve had stuffed gryphon, mince pies, baked turkey, spaghetti and gold dust, asparagus salad, fresh bread and butter and sun-warmed apricots ever since I was a baby. And all the ice-cold cherries I want to eat, too.’

  ‘It gooooooddd,’ rumbled Mug.

  Yesterday said nothing, just gazed at the ice-cream churn as though she’d like to eat another hundred bowls-full. So did her poodlesaurs.

  ‘Greeek,’ began Massive, moving closer to the stall. ‘Gree—’

  Oops, thought Boo. Yesterday had better stop them before the dinosaurs, er poodles, helped themselves…

  Time to grab Mum and Lottie, then run!

  ‘Ye—’ he began. But only a squeak came out.

  He tried to move his mouth again. His tongue was stuck halfway out, still dripping drool after his ice cream. But his lips wouldn’t move.

  Nothing will move, thought Boo desperately.

  What had happened?

  It was the way he’d felt the first time, in Sleepy Whiskers, and when the Greedle’s hypnosis had frozen him back at the school. Only this was worse. He had been able to move then if he used every ounce of willpower. He could feel his heart racing, and he was pretty sure all his other organs were still working too, but his every muscle was utterly immovable.

  No…no matter what, he couldn’t move at all.

  Dimly, out of the corner of his eye, he could see Massive frozen as the big dinosaur reached towards the counter. He could see Yesterday stopped mid-word, Princess Princess holding her spoon, and Mug’s hand lifted towards his armour.

  All of them motionless.

  ‘Well.’ Mum rubbed her hands happily, then untied her apron. ‘I think that’s done it.’ She shared a smile with BAD. ‘Eight frozen Heroes. Did they really think they’d get through the Ghastly Otherwhen without being recognised? I could smell them as soon as they arrived! The darling Greedle will be pleased. I think I’ve frozen them all as completely as a Rat Surprise.’

  BAD nodded, her donkey teeth white in her grin. ‘They’re frozen stiffer than even the Hypnopuses could manage! Hypnosis may hypnotise brains. But your new ice cream freezes the body. Once you’ve frozen something, dear ice-cream maker, it stays frizzed.’

  Mum smiled
that strange, gay smile again. ‘Thank you! It is so wonderful to be able to do anything, anything at all for the glorious Greedle!’

  Mum, thought Boo. Mum, what have you done?

  Mum was a bogey!

  HOW TO COOK A HERO

  Take one Hero. An old and tough Hero is best simmered in chicken stock with a little lemon juice, oregano, onions and crushed slug powder to tenderise it. Serve with mashed potatoes or fresh bread to sop up the juices. A young Hero is nicest stuffed with apples and walnuts. Roast for an hour and a half. Your Hero is cooked when the arm, paw or tentacle comes away easily when you tug it. Serve with cherry sauce and sprinkle with finely chopped fried baby elephants.

  FROM RECIPES TO DIE FOR BY THE G G (GREAT, GLORIOUS) GREEDLE

  31

  The Attack of the Killer Menu

  Zombie pizza, thought Boo hopefully. Any moment now Mug’s zombie pizza was going to fly through the air and knock out BAD and Mum. Though he wasn’t quite sure how that would help—knocking Mum or BAD out wouldn’t unfreeze him and the others, after all.

  Maybe Mug would throw some zombie spaghetti, he decided; that could tie the bogeys up till they promised to release the Heroic company.

  Even his eyeballs were frozen. He could only look straight ahead. And no matter how hard he stared he still couldn‘t see a flash of shadow that meant zombie spaghetti was about to be involved in their rescue.

  Not just the Best Ice Cream in the Universes, he thought bitterly, but the most powerful too. He and his friends had been able to force their way out of the Greedle‘s traps. But they couldn‘t get out of Mum‘s.

  ‘Where will you take the Heroes?’ Mum‘s voice was still entirely bright and happy.

  ‘Down to the dungeons till the Greedle is ready to eat them. The Greedle loves a nice roast Hero. The one with the blonde hair looks delicious. I‘d better call up some bogeys to carry them though. Those poodles are big. Except for this one, of course.’ BAD flicked a hoof at Boo.

  ‘Mangy little thing,’ Mum agreed. ‘I wouldn‘t even bother stuffing it. It‘s sure to be tough. I never did like dogs—I‘m more of a cat person. I suppose I could use it to make Poodle and Potato Hero soup.‘

  Soup! thought Boo, torn between anguish and anger. You can‘t make soup out of your own son! And what did she mean, ‘cat person‘? Didn‘t she remember she was a werewolf? Come on, Hero, he told himself. Time to change your Cunning Plan, just like Dr Mussells said. There has to be a way out of this! Except Dr Mussells had also said they’d never succeed. And if the Greedle had turned even Lottie Mussells into a bogey, what chance had Boojum Bark?

  ‘Yum,’ said Lottie, as though she knew Boo was thinking about her. ‘I hope the Greedle lets us have the scraps again. Especially if he serves them with cherry sauce and chopped fried baby elephant.’

  ‘Only the Greedle would have the genius to add chopped fried baby elephant to a dish of roast Heroes,’ agreed Mum.

  He wanted to howl! He wanted to cry out to Mum, to try to wake her from her trance. But all he could do was listen. And think, he told himself. Think Boo. Think! There has to be a Hero skill you can use to get out of this! A werewolf Hero skill, one the bogeys had never expected.

  Widdling? But what on? He couldn’t howl. He could hardly even smell. Which only left the last doggie skill of all…

  Sudden hope surged through him. Could he manage it?

  If his heart was still beating, perhaps his digestion was still going. And that meant he could reverse it. If he could get rid of the ice cream then maybe he’d be able to move…

  He had to concentrate! Focus!

  He couldn’t do it. No matter how hard he strained he couldn’t get the message to his stomach.

  BAD giggled. ‘It’s so much fun when creatures are frozen solid. Look!’ She lashed out with her hoof and caught Massive in the tummy. The big dinosaur fell, clonk, onto the grass. BAD grinned. She kicked out with both legs now.

  Ow! Agony burst across Boo’s side as the hooves hit his flesh, sending him tumbling over as well. Something shifted inside him—the ice cream, melted and sloshing around in his belly. Now he could feel his stomach, he could tell it what to do.

  His doggie tum took over.

  Bluurrrk! BAD stepped back as the contents of Boo’s stomach splurted across the clearing.

  ‘That horrid dog!’ shrieked Mum.

  You’re a wolf, Mum! thought Boo with one part of his brain. The other was busy trying to move again. The ice cream was out, dripping from BAD’s coat, Mug’s armour and even Queen Splendifera’s dress. Why couldn’t he move?

  Then all at once he could.

  Boo growled. He crouched low, his eyes flashing from BAD to Lottie to Mum. His legs still felt stiff from the after-effects of the ice cream. One against three…but he couldn’t hurt Mum. He couldn’t, no matter what she’d done! And Lottie was a Level 20 Hero, and BAD…those hooves were hard.

  How could Boojum Bark defeat a Level 20 Hero, his mum, and a mad bad donkey?

  Suddenly his mind replayed Yesterday’s words. One of us will die.

  Would it be him? But if he died now his friends would die as well. All of us, thought Boo, still growling, hoping that the cold would vanish from his paws and jaws before he had to leap, wondering who was going to attack him first and how.

  ‘Squeak!’

  Was he imagining it? Boo pricked up his ears—they must still have been half frozen, for they wouldn’t prick up all the way. But even half-pricked ears could hear the high tones of the mouse.

  ‘Squeak! Squeak! Squeak! Squeak!’

  ‘No!’ he barked. ‘This is no time for mouse Heroics! BAD can swat you with one flick of her hoof! What can one mouse do—’

  Amazement washed over him, like a bucket of doggie shampoo. There wasn’t just one mouse galloping over the lawn in the frozen Heroes’ direction. There were five wriggling mouse-type creatures, three almost-rats, heaps of sheep and one fluffy ginger and white kitten, with long whiskers and a twitching tail and…flamethrowers?

  Squeak had gone to get the Menu!

  Was Squeak about to zap Mum with a flamethrower? No! he thought. I haven’t come all this way just to have Mum incinerated by my own mouse!

  He had to stop him…

  But no! The flamethrowers weren’t directed at Mum and BAD at all. They were pointed at Mug…and Yesterday…and Princess Princess…and the poodlesaurs…and him!

  Had the breeze turned Squeak into a bogey too?

  ‘No! No! Nnnoooo!’ he yapped. ‘You silly squeaker! Flamethrowers melt ice…but they’ll burn us too. We’ll be roast poodles after all…and we haven’t even been stuffed! Nnnnnooooooooooo…Aaaaarrrrwk!’

  All at once the world was lost in a wash of flame—red flickers that swept across his body, and white light that burnt out any sight of the world. He didn’t even have time for a last glimpse of Mum…of Yesterday…of Mug…Goodbye, everyone! Goodbye, world, he thought, as his paws began to…

  Prickle?

  Boo twitched a paw. It wasn’t burnt! The flames had worked! The last bits of ice had unfrozen in his paws. He could wrinkle his nose too…though some instinct told him not to breathe too deeply. He could prick his ears up all the way—

  The flame vanished. And he could move easily, despite a faint smell of burnt fur.

  ‘Squeak!’ he barked. ‘How did you know that a flamethrower would melt us but not burn us? Where did you even find flamethrowers in the Ghastly Otherwhen?’

  ‘Squeak,’ said Squeak reproachfully. ‘Squeak squeak squeak…’

  Yesterday took a gasping breath. ‘He says,’ she translated, ‘that the flamethrowers were part of his Cunning Plan. He snuck into the library one night and…’

  ‘Squeak squeak, squeak squeak…’

  ‘And then he—’

  ‘Yesterday,’ said Boo quietly. ‘I don’t think we have time for a full explanation…’

  Yesterday looked around. ‘Oh,’ she said.

  Monsters surrounded them. All
the bogeys he hadn’t smelt before, the bogeys from the fields, the factories, and from the stalls and caravans, even, he thought, some from the village. Zurms and roaches, octopuses and oozing slugs, bogeys with two heads or with tentacles, bogeys that slimed or crawled, bogeys above that flapped or flew or fluttered. All

  with weapons—either inbuilt or spears or swords or knives. Bogeys with insane, happy smiles.

  Even Mum held a spear now. And Mum, too, was still smiling that fixed smile.

  Mum, the bogey.

  ‘R—right,’ croaked Princess Princess. Boo glanced at her. She was pale but resolute. ‘Here’s the new Plan!’

  ‘It Cunning one?’ rumbled Mug hopefully.

  Princess Princess closed her eyes for a second. ‘No. But it’s the best Plan that I have.’

  She sounds different, thought Boo. Scared, terrified perhaps. But this time Princess Princess isn’t going to run away.

  He had thought she looked Heroic before, flashing and dashing at the School for Heroes. But Princess Princess had never looked more Heroic than now, pale and shaking and wrenching at her skirts. They fell off in a golden heap at her feet. Underneath she wore a pair of gold brocade shorts. Her hand trembled. She rested it on her waist to still it.

  ‘I’m going to Zoom!,’ she said quietly, never taking her eyes off the looming bogeys even as she reached into the pack Mug had been carrying and pulled out a coil of rope. It was the thinnest rope Boo had ever seen, as fine as one of Princess Princess’s hairs. But it looked as tough as steel. ‘I’m going to try to tie them up—’

  ‘There are too many…’ growled Boo.

  Princess Princess smiled. It was a smile of friendship. It’s the first time she’s ever smiled at me like that, thought Boo. Maybe it’s the first time she’s ever used that smile at all.

  ‘Then I’ll just have to tie up as many as I can. You and Mug keep the other bogeys busy—whatever Hero skills you’ve got, use them. Yesterday—help with the fighting, but try to grab Boo’s mum and Lottie if you can get to them. Your dinosaurs can carry them. Then run. Don’t wait for us—we’ll try to catch you up. Just get to the wormhole and escape. Go for it!’ Princess Princess screamed, as a pair of harpies soared down towards them, their fangs peering out of their smiles.