Bumageddon: The Final Pongflict (7 page)

‘What do we do now?' said Eleanor.

‘I don't know,' said Ned.

‘Ned, I think it's time to put Robobum back in control of herself,' said Zack. ‘Maybe she will have had time to figure out what to do.'

‘Can't hurt,' said Ned, throwing the switch back to automatic.

‘Hello, I am Robobum,' said Robobum, crackling back to life. ‘Fully riveted reinforced steel cheeks. Turbo-assisted jet repulsion units. Nuclear wart-head equipped. Matter transport assisted entry and exit. Inside and outside voice options. Onboard tea- and coffee-making facilities. And I am self-wiping!'

‘Robobum!' said Ned. ‘I know! I built you, remember? It's Ned! Ned Smelly!'

‘I know who you are,' said Robobum. ‘You turned me off. Don't do that again.'

‘Sorry,' said Ned. ‘But you've got to help us. We're being attacked by two tyrannosore-arses. What should we do?'

‘Leave them to me,' announced Robobum. ‘Meanwhile, I advise you to abandon ship immediately! It's going to get rough. Too rough for passengers. I'll pick you up later.'

Zack, Ned, Eleanor and Zack's bum didn't argue. They assembled in the teleportation tube and beamed
themselves clear of Robobum only moments before the two tyrannosore-arses closed in.

‘Ned!' said Robobum, in her loudest outside voice. ‘You forgot this!'

Robobum beamed Ned's copy of
What Bumosaur is That?
into his hand.

‘Thanks, Robobum!' cried Ned. ‘Be careful!'

‘Do not concern yourself about me,' she said. ‘I am Robobum. Fully riveted reinforced steel cheeks. Turbo-assisted jet repulsion units. Nuclear wart-head equipped. Matter transport assisted entry and exit. Inside and outside voice options. Onboard tea- and coffee-making facilities. And I am self-wiping! I am perfectly capable of handling myself.'

‘Come on, Ned,' said Eleanor, trying to drag him away from Robobum.

‘But they're going to destroy her!' said Ned. ‘My baby!'

‘They'll destroy us if we don't find a place to hide,' said Eleanor, grabbing Ned and dragging him into the thick undergrowth.

T
he bum-fighters fought their way through the shaded semi-tropical undergrowth. Zack wiped
his sweating brow and marvelled at the difference that 585 million years can make. The Earth had come alive. There were bumnut-tree forests in place of grey sludge. Giant mutant blowflies droned around their heads. Enormous red stinkants lumbered in single file across the forest floor. And, of course, terrifying bumosaurs ruled the planet.

As they hacked against thick vines and even thicker spider webs, the bum-fighters could hear Robobum preparing to do battle with the tyrannosore-arses.

‘I must warn you,' said Robobum, ‘I have fully riveted reinforced steel cheeks. Turbo-assisted jet repulsion units . . .'

There was a loud tyrannosore-arse howl.

A sickening metallic crunch.

And then . . . silence.

Zack glanced back at Ned.

Ned looked at Zack.

‘Nuclear wart-head equipped,' said a voice. ‘Matter transport assisted entry and exit. Inside and outside voice options. Onboard tea- and coffee-making . . .'

The bum-fighters grinned with relief. But not for long.

There was another howl.

Followed by another crunch.

Silence.

And then . . .

‘. . . and I am self-wiping!'

A third crunch.

And a fourth.

And a fifth.

Ned put his hands over his ears. ‘Robobum!' he cried. ‘My Robobum!'

‘Come on, Ned,' said Eleanor, putting her arm around his shoulders. ‘We have to look after ourselves now. It's what Robobum would want.'

Zack, who was leading, pushed his way into a rectangular clearing that was about the size of a soccer pitch.

‘Hey!' said his bum, trying to brighten the mood. ‘Anyone for soccer?'

‘We don't have a ball,' said Ned.

‘We could use Zack's bum,' said Eleanor.

‘Not funny!' said Zack's bum.

They were halfway across the clearing when Zack screamed.

‘Shut up!' said Eleanor. ‘Do you want the tyrannosore-arses to hear us?'

‘No,' said Zack. ‘But . . .'

‘But what?' said Eleanor.

Zack was speechless.

He could only point.

Charging towards them was a huge armoured bum with three cheeks. Each cheek had a large wart in its centre.

And each wart was sharpened to a deadly point.

‘Oh no,' said Ned, looking from his guidebook to the bumosaur and then back to the book. ‘A tricerabutt!'

‘We can see that!' said Zack's bum. ‘How do you stop it?'

‘You can't,' said Ned, consulting his book. ‘It says here that nothing can stop a charging tricerabutt.'

They all stared helplessly at the triple-cheeked beast as it lumbered towards them, picking up speed as it came.

Zack gulped.

In the space of a single morning they'd been giant-brown-blobbified, travelled millions of years into the past, been involved in a wild bum chase, travelled millions of years into the future and been attacked by not one, but
two
tyrannosore-arses. They needed a tricerabutt attack like they needed a hole in the head . . . or
three
holes, as was a very real possibility in this situation.

‘Gee,' said Zack. ‘The Cretaceous is a really fun place. We should come here more often.'

‘We'll be lucky to get out alive,' said Eleanor.

The tricerabutt snorted as it ran.

The stink made Zack feel faint.

The bum-fighters were in trouble.

Big trouble.

Bad trouble.

Triple trouble.

They didn't have time to run back to where they'd come from. The jungle was too dense. And running forwards was out of the question.

Then Zack had an idea.

‘Stand back, everyone,' he said.

‘What are you going to do?' said Zack's bum, backing away with Ned and Eleanor.

Zack pulled what was left of his bum-fighter's certificate out of his bum-fighting belt and, using the two top corners, held it out to his side, matador-style.

‘Be careful, Zack!' said his bum.

‘ “Careful” is my middle name,' said Zack.

‘No, it's not,' said his bum. ‘It's Henry!'

‘Shut up!' said Zack.

Zack Henry Freeman took a deep breath and focused. ‘You want a piece of me?' he said to the charging tricerabutt. ‘Come and get it!'

T
he tricerabutt needed no encouragement.

It was already halfway across the clearing.

Zack had barely fluttered the sheet of paper in his hand and stepped nimbly to one side before the triple-cheeked brute charged past him, snorting great clouds of methane.

‘Bravo!' yelled Zack's bum.

‘Olé!' said Zack, feeling slightly dizzy from the double dose of noxious fumes issuing forth from between the tricerabutt's three cheeks.

The tricerabutt smashed uselessly into the undergrowth at the other end of the clearing. It pulled itself out, turned to face Zack and began charging again.

‘Olé, again!' said Zack, jumping out of the way at the last moment as the beast charged past him.

‘Good going, Zack,' said Eleanor.

But Zack was not feeling well. He was desperately trying to fight the methane fog that was starting to cloud his thinking.

The tricerabutt turned once again and lowered its cheeks so that its three deadly warts were pointing directly at Zack.

It pawed the ground and began its run.

Zack tried to concentrate. With great difficulty. To his alarm he saw not one, but
three
separate tricerabutts coming at him. He waved his certificate first at one, then the other, and then the third.

‘Zack!' yelled his bum, who had figured out that Zack was suffering methane-induced triple vision. ‘Close one eye!'

But, although this was excellent advice, Zack was too far gone to understand—or even to hear—what his bum was saying to him. He doubled over in a violent coughing fit.

‘Zack!' yelled his bum. ‘Get up! It's coming!'

But Zack was coughing too hard to hear his bum's warning. Or the thundering of the tricerabutt's hooves.

Zack's bum ran to Zack and tried to pull him out of the way. But Zack, now on his knees, was too heavy for the small bum to move.

The tricerabutt, sensing a kill, lowered its mighty wart-horns close to the ground as it closed in on its helpless quarry.

‘Leave me,' spluttered Zack. ‘Save yourself while there's still time!'

‘Not on your life!' said his bum, taking the certificate from Zack's hand. ‘It's one for all and all for one! Got a match?'

Z
ack's bum jumped on top of Zack, pulled a match from his bum-fighting belt and lit one corner of the certificate.

‘Hey!' protested Zack. ‘That's my certificate!'

‘It's mine, too!' said his bum, waving the certificate at the tricerabutt, which, despite its superior size and wart-horn power, screeched in terror at the sight of the naked flame.

The tricerabutt was running too fast to stop, however, and the best it could do was to swerve—a move which sent it sliding head-on towards the trunk of a particularly thick bumnut tree.

WHAM!

It hit the tree with such force that all three of its wart-horns lodged deeply into the trunk.

Zack's bum screamed in pain and dropped the burning paper.

Zack quickly stomped on the flames and put what was left of the certificate back into his belt.

He looked at the tricerabutt. It was scraping the ground with its foot, snorting and desperately trying to pull its wart-horns out of the tree.

‘Well done!' Zack said to his bum.

‘Always happy to help,' said Zack's bum. ‘Now, let's get out of here!'

‘With pleasure,' said Zack, scooping up his bum
and running to catch up with Eleanor and Ned, who were at the edge of the clearing trying to find a way into the dense undergrowth.

‘This is hopeless,' said Eleanor, pushing against a thick curtain of vines. ‘There's no way in.'

‘Psst!' said a voice a few metres away. ‘In here!'

Eleanor looked at Zack. ‘Did you say something?' she said.

‘No,' said Zack. ‘I thought you did.'

‘It wasn't me,' said Eleanor, turning to Ned. ‘Was it you?'

‘Not me,' said Ned. ‘I thought it was Zack's bum.'

‘Nope,' said Zack's bum, pointing to a tangled thicket of bum creeper. ‘It came from in there. Whoever—or whatever—it is, I think it wants us to go in.'

‘Well, what are we waiting for?' said Eleanor. ‘Anything's gotta be better than staying here.'

‘I don't know,' said Ned. ‘Seems kind of risky.' But at that moment the tricerabutt succeeded in pulling its horns out of the tree-trunk. It turned on the helpless bum-fighters and, seeing they were without flame, began another charge. ‘Then, again,' said Ned, ‘maybe it's worth a shot.'

They hacked their way in.

Just in time.

Zack felt the tip of one of the tricerabutt's sharp warts brush his foot as he scrambled into the jungle's undergrowth behind the others.

Z
ack pushed his way through the undergrowth into an old hollow bumnut-tree log.

It was dark and wet and mushy. He could feel the moisture seeping through his clothes. But at least it was safe.

And it was definitely a lot better than being torn to pieces by tyrannosore-arses or skewered on the end of a tricerabutt's horn.

As Zack's eyes adjusted to the darkness he saw a small bum, not unlike his own, standing in front of him. It looked like it had been living rough. Its dirty skin was caked in mud, scratches and scars.

‘You idiots!' the bum said. ‘What were you doing out there? This is a dangerous place!'

‘We know,' said Zack. ‘But we didn't have much choice. Our craft was attacked by tyrannosore-arses. We had to make a run for it.'

‘You have a craft?' said the bum, brightly. ‘One that could take us out of here?'

‘We
had
a craft,' said Eleanor. ‘We're not sure if we still do. She wasn't doing too well last time we saw her.'

‘Oh,' said the bum, its cheeks sagging with obvious disappointment. ‘Never mind. It's good to have your company at least. Even if you were stupid enough to come to this awful place.'

‘We're not stupid,' said Zack's bum, eyeing the new bum suspiciously. ‘And we're not idiots, either.'

‘Then what are you doing here?' said the bum.

‘What are
you
doing here? That's the question,' said Zack's bum.

‘It wasn't my choice,' said the bum. ‘I'll tell you that much! I was sucked into a brown hole.'

‘You mean you're not a bumosaur?' said Zack's bum.

The small bum was taken aback. ‘That's the kind of dumb question I'd expect from a
head.
Do I
look
like a bumosaur?' it demanded.

‘Um, no, not really,' said Zack's bum. ‘I guess I just thought . . .'

‘Well you thought wrong,' said the bum. ‘Bumosaurs are big, dumb and ugly. I, on the other hand, am small, smart and even though I say so myself, quite cute.'

‘And very argumentative,' said Zack's bum. ‘Don't forget that.'

‘You started it,' said the bum.

‘No, I didn't,' said Zack's bum.

‘You asked a stupid question,' said the bum.

‘I didn't think it was
that
stupid,' said Zack's bum. ‘And, besides, that's not the same as starting an argument.'

‘As good as,' said the bum.