by Steve Cole
“Captain Teggs,” he hissed, “my guards have now surrounded your ship. They will take you and Doctor Herdlip to the royal palace. No one else.”
Gipsy frowned. “Why can’t the rest of us come?”
“Two are easier to protect than many,” Griffen growled. “I have already lost enough troops because of you!” The screen went blank.
“He’s got a point, Gipsy.” Teggs sighed. “Call Herdlip and tell him to meet me at the main doors in five minutes.” As Teggs bounced over to the lift, he saw that Gipsy looked worried. “It’s all right, I’ll take good care of him.”
She managed a small smile. “And yourself, please!”
Five minutes later, Teggs was standing by the Sauropod’s main doors. Herdlip stood nervously beside him. He was holding a large suitcase full of medical supplies, and gulped when Teggs opened the main doors.
Night had fallen on Baronia. Three yellow moons hung in a sky the colour of old scabs. The gardens were grotty and overgrown, and the smell of sewage filled Teggs’s nostrils as he gazed at King Jeck’s palace. It was like something out of a horror film – a huge castle littered with spooky towers and turrets. Blood-red ivy climbed the crumbling walls.
“Move!” grunted Griffen, and four of his baryonyx guards bundled Teggs and Herdlip towards the nightmarish building.
“Is King Jeck ready for his medicine?” asked Herdlip nervously.
“No.” Griffen opened a big bronze door in the palace wall and pushed the plant-eaters inside. “He is sleeping. His orders were that he must not be disturbed.”
Teggs frowned. “I thought he needed treatment at once?”
“No one may question King Jeck,” growled Griffen, leading them down a dark, winding corridor, lit by flickering candles. “However, I have prepared bedrooms here for you both, so you can treat him the moment he wakes.”
“How lovely,” muttered Herdlip.
The astrosaurs and their guards walked in uneasy silence through the gloomy stone passageways. They passed a very large, smelly kitchen and climbed up and down several sets of slimy steps before they finally stopped outside two rusty red doors in the wall. Griffen pushed and each one opened with a noisy squeak of their hinges.
“Stay in your rooms and lock the doors,” he told the two plant-eaters. “A guard will wait outside. You will be woken when His Majesty is ready.”
“Not exactly the five-star Ferns Hotel,” Teggs muttered. The rooms were full of cobwebs and earwigs and half-chewed bones. A grimy window overlooked the tangled gardens. A bed of damp straw lay in the corner beside a very large and mucky toilet. “Er, which room would you like, Doctor Herdlip?”
But the sellosaurus simply stepped inside the nearest room and slammed the door behind him. Teggs heard heavy bolts being drawn across, and shrugged. “OK – good night to you too!”
Griffen and three of the guards stamped away without another word. The remaining baryonyx eyed Teggs coldly. Teggs winked at him, yawned and went inside. “I’m so tired I could fall asleep in a skonk-skuggler’s armpit!” he declared, curling up on the damp floor. “Mind you, even a skonk-skuggler’s bottom would smell better than this dump . . .”
Despite the stink, Teggs was soon asleep. But he didn’t stay that way for long. Minutes later, the sound of a terrifying roar outside woke him with a start.
“I don’t think much of the royal alarm clocks!” said Teggs, rubbing his sleepy eyes. He quickly ran outside – and found the guard sprawled asleep on the floor with a rusty red door on top of him. “Hmm. Either baryonyx guards like very uncomfortable bed covers, or . . .” Teggs spun round and, sure enough, found that Dr Herdlip’s door had been torn off its hinges! Bottles, beakers and test tubes lay broken on the floor. The window was smashed and the bed had been torn apart and shoved down the toilet. But Herdlip himself was nowhere to be seen.
He had vanished!
Chapter Four
MONSTER ON THE LOOSE
“Sound the alarm!” Teggs cried, shaking the guard. “Fetch Griffen!”
“What hit me?” groaned the baryonyx guard.
“That’s what I have to find out,” said Teggs, grimly. While the guard stumbled off to alert Captain Griffen, Teggs charged along the corridor in search of Herdlip.
As he skidded down the slimy steps he heard a commotion from the smelly kitchens up ahead. He peered in, and gasped – the place had been trashed! A fridge lay upside down. The walls were splattered with squashed fish. A panic-stricken baryonyx in a chef’s hat was prancing about with a large rolling pin. Two more cooks were struggling out from under a huge overturned table.
“What happened?” Teggs demanded.
“I’ve never seen anything like it!” cried the chef, wide-eyed with shock. “A huge monster just barged in!”
Teggs frowned. “A monster?”
The chef nodded. “It tore open the fridge, chomped down a ton of meat, threw a table at my slaves—”
“And chucked raw fish everywhere,” Teggs interrupted. “Yes, I can see.”
“Actually, the fish was already there,” the chef informed him. “It’s an air freshener – some of my meals stink!”
Teggs rolled his eyes. “Did you get a good look at this monster? Was it carrying a sellosaurus under one arm, by any chance?”
“I didn’t see it clearly,” the baryonyx confessed. “I was trying to hide in a cupboard.” He frowned. “Hey, what’s a plant-eater doing around here anyway?”
“Staying off the menu!” said Teggs firmly. “Bye!” He sprinted back out of the kitchens and down the winding passages until he reached a crossroads. “Which way did this monster go?” he muttered.
Then he heard a faint, muffled voice calling from somewhere up ahead, “Help! Help me!”
“I’m coming!” Teggs shouted, dashing off again into the gloom. But as he turned a corner he tripped over something large and scaly. “OOF!”
“Captain Teggs?” came a familiar twittering voice. “Is that you?”
“Doctor Herdlip?” Teggs struggled up. To his surprise and delight – there was the little sellosaurus, sitting in a daze in the middle of the passage. “What happened? Are you all right?”
Herdlip rubbed his head dizzily. “The answer to both questions is, ‘I’m not entirely sure’!”
Suddenly, footsteps sounded behind them. It was Griffen, looking puzzled and angry. “I warned you to stay in your rooms.”
“Doctor Herdlip didn’t have much choice!” Teggs retorted. “A monster broke into his room and kidnapped him.”
“The guard only saw a door flying towards him,” Griffen growled. “But the king’s chef was raving about a monster when I passed the kitchens—”
“Help!” came the same distant cry as before.
“Come on, Griffen,” said Teggs, dashing onwards down the passage. “Perhaps we’ll see the monster for ourselves!” He came to a door and threw it open to reveal a gloomy storeroom. Three baryonyx were inside, wrestling with a small, struggling figure bundled up in a heavy red blanket.
“Help!” the figure croaked again. But the biggest baryonyx whacked it with his tail, and it stopped moving.
Griffen barged past Teggs and addressed the biggest baryonyx. “What’s going on, Sergeant Donkle?” He frowned at the figure hidden beneath the blanket. “Have you caught the monster?”
“Monster?” Donkle frowned. “No, sir, this is a thief – one of Prince Poota’s lot. He was trying to pinch some weapons, probably wanted to use them against King Jeck.”
“Aha!” Griffen nodded knowingly. “This so-called monster was a trick to distract us while the thief did his work. Which means Poota’s rabble have got into the palace.” He scowled. “Take that traitor to the dungeon, Donkle, then organize a search.”
“But be careful,” Teggs added. “Whoever snatched Doctor Herdlip is incredibly powerful.”
Just then, Herdlip himself waddled up, clutching a pen and paper. “Captain Teggs, that m-m-monster thing smashed all my medical supplies,�
� he cried. “I-I will need more.” He held out a piece of paper. “Please fetch these things from your ship at once.”
“All this?” Teggs stared at the scrawls on the paper in surprise. “It would take three dinosaurs to carry that lot!”
“I cannot spare any guards,” said Griffen gruffly. “They are all needed to search the palace.”
“No problemo!” Teggs pulled out his communicator and winked at Dr Herdlip. “I know just the three dinosaurs we need . . .”
Thirty minutes later, as dawn broke slowly over Baronia, Iggy, Arx and Gipsy staggered up to the palace with boxes of lotions, potions and pills. Teggs and Griffen met them at the door.
“Nice pad,” said Iggy, looking round. “Not!”
Griffen glared at him. “I did not ask you to come here,” he rasped. “You stay in this palace at your own risk.” With that he stomped off, his long blue nose in the air. Gipsy made a rude face behind his back.
Arx could barely hold up the heavy crate he was carrying. “Why does Doctor Herdlip need so many chemicals, Captain? He’s used up all our medical supplies!”
“I don’t know,” Teggs admitted, taking a box from Gipsy. “I’ll explain what’s been happening on the way in . . .”
By the time Teggs had told his story, the astrosaurs had reached the wreck of Herdlip’s room. Gipsy, Iggy and Arx shivered when they saw what the monster had done. Herdlip himself was shut away inside Teggs’s old room, with two baryonyx guarding the door. They stepped grumpily aside as Teggs approached.
“Doctor Herdlip?” Teggs called. “We’ve brought your supplies.”
Herdlip threw open the door. “Bring them inside,” he ordered. “Quickly! Immediately! Now!”
Iggy frowned. “All right, keep your scales on.”
Arx shot him a look. “Doctor Herdlip is under a lot of strain, Iggy.” He put down his own crate beside Teggs’s and Gipsy’s. “He’s got to mix his cure for Ribchomper’s Mump-Bumps again from scratch.”
“Eh? What?” Herdlip was already busily sorting through the boxes. “Really, I can’t concentrate with you all hovering. Please go away!”
Frowning, the astrosaurs did as he asked. Herdlip slammed the door after them, and the baryonyx guards stepped back into place.
“Not even a thank you,” fumed Gipsy.
“Never mind him,” said Teggs. “I want to know where that monster went. I hate unsolved mysteries.”
Arx nodded. “I’d like to know how Poota’s agents smuggled the monster into the palace without anyone seeing.”
“Why don’t you ask the thief caught in the storeroom?” Gipsy suggested. “He must know something.”
“Too late,” snarled Griffen, charging up the passage towards them with Donkle and a dozen guards. “I’ve just been to question that traitor myself. But he has vanished into thin air – just like that monster of yours. The dungeon is empty!”
“What?” Teggs frowned. “How?”
“There is only one explanation.” Donkle’s eyes narrowed. “You plant-eaters helped him escape!”
“That’s ridiculous!” Gipsy spluttered. “We’ve only been here a few minutes.”
“Don’t try to trick me!” Griffen bellowed. He turned to Teggs, “You and Herdlip smashed up the room and the cure for King Jeck, didn’t you? Then you blamed it on this ridiculous made-up creature.”
“That’s not true!” Teggs protested.
“And while my guards were busy hunting something that didn’t exist, your friends sneakily set free our prisoner.” Griffen bared his broken teeth. “I think you are all agents of Poota!”
“What a load of poo-ta!” Iggy shouted back.
Teggs nodded. “We came here in peace—”
“But you will leave here in pieces!” hissed Griffen. “Get them, guards!”
The astrosaurs braced themselves as the drooling gang of carnivores closed in . . .
Chapter Five
THE KING AND THE CURE
“Come on, guys,” Teggs told the guards calmly. “I know you’re all fed up, but please – don’t do something we might regret!”
Griffen’s troops made disgusting, slobbery noises as they advanced on the astrosaurs. Arx lowered his head ready to charge, and Iggy and Gipsy struck dino-judo poses. Teggs flexed his powerful tail and prepared to fight.
But suddenly, a small, skinny baryonyx came running up to Griffen, out of breath. “It is I, the king’s slave,” he panted. “I bring a vital message from the royal bedchamber!”
“Wait,” Griffen told his guards, and they reluctantly obeyed as he turned to the newcomer. “Is the king awake?”
The skinny baryonyx nodded sadly. “I hardly recognized him this morning. So lumpy and bumpy, he can barely speak . . .”
“Sounds like he’s reached the final stages of the Carnivore Curse,” said Arx. “At his age, he can’t last much longer.”
“He needs the cure.” Teggs looked at Griffen. “I promise you, the only reason we’re here is to help your king.”
Suddenly, Herdlip burst out of his room clutching his battered white case. “Did somebody say the king was awake?” He looked pale, blinking in alarm at the slobbering crowd of baryonyx. “I-I have just this moment mixed up a fresh batch of the cure.”
“That was quick.” Donkle stared at him suspiciously. “How do we know it isn’t poison?”
“Why would we come all this way to poison a dying dinosaur?” Arx retorted.
“Very well,” said Griffen slowly. “You may treat the king.”
“At last!” Herdlip whispered. “The historic moment has arrived . . .”
“And if we do cure him, Griffen,” said Teggs, “I want your promise that we can all leave Baronia unchewed!”
“Very well,” Griffen grumbled. “Teggs, Herdlip, come with me. Donkle, lock up the others. I will question them later.”
Donkle saluted. “In the meantime I’ll keep searching for the escaped prisoner.”
“See you soon,” Teggs called to his crew as he and Herdlip were marched away by Griffen and the slave.
Donkle shoved Iggy, Arx and Gipsy into Herdlip’s room and shut the door. The air smelled sharp and smoky, even with the window open. Bubbling beakers and foaming test tubes had been jammed into cracks in the floor or clamped into metal stands.
“This place looks like a mad-scientist’s lab,” said Iggy. “But I must say, old Herdlip is a fast worker, isn’t he? I can’t believe how quickly he whipped up a new cure for the Mump-Bumps!”
“Neither can I,” said Arx gravely. “I read the secret files on his cure while we were stuck on the Sauropod. It would take at least a couple of hours to concoct – and he wouldn’t need half these chemicals.”
“Then . . . what does he need them for?” wondered Gipsy.
They looked at each other. But not one of them could think of the answer.
Teggs followed Griffen, Herdlip and the king’s slave to the royal bedchamber. Herdlip trembled as he waddled along. I’m not surprised he’s nervous, thought Teggs.
Soon, they reached some golden double doors. The slave banged a gong that stood beside them. “Your Majesty!” he squeaked. “The plant-eaters are here to make you well again!”
“Mmm-rrrrhb-nn’omp,” came a muffled growl from within.
The doors slid open to reveal a grand room filled with ancient furniture, dimly lit by a dozen small candles. A whiff of mouldy pies and dirty pants filled the smoky air. But Teggs’s eyes were quickly drawn to the big bed in the middle of the floor. The baryonyx king lay there, barely visible beneath a pile of blankets and hot-water bottles – three of which were perched on his head in place of a crown!
“Bow down to King Jeck,” hissed Griffen. Teggs and Herdlip did as he asked.
“I have brought the cure for your ills,” said Herdlip, holding up his white case.
“Gllph-rrhb,” said King Jeck.
Herdlip took out a small pillbox and a flask full of pink liquid. “Take the two tablets and wash them down wit
h this special herbal drink, Your Majesty.” The doctor’s hands shook as he laid the offerings on the king’s bed. “I guarantee that you will soon be feeling like a new dinosaur!”
“Urp,” the king croaked, and turned his back on them all.
“King Jeck would like you to leave,” the slave declared.
Griffen bowed so low his nose scraped the floor, then he retreated from the room. Herdlip waddled after him and Teggs followed quickly, glad of the fresher air once the golden doors slid shut.
“Is it always so dark and smoky in there?” Teggs wondered.
Griffen shook his head sadly. “King Jeck has truly changed. How long before he recovers?”
“Ooh, not long.” Herdlip smiled faintly. “Give it a couple of days and you won’t believe the change in him.”
“Well,” grunted Griffen. “Until I see it for myself and find out more about this monster, you plant-eaters will stay here as my prisoners.”
“Eh?” Herdlip looked alarmed. “Oh!”
“Perhaps it’s just as well.” Teggs patted him on the back. “After all, we’ve only just brought all those chemicals and medicines here!”
“Oh, yes,” Herdlip muttered. “Yes, I have many experiments to perform. Urgent experiments . . .”
Soon, they reached Herdlip’s room. The moment the door was unlocked, Iggy, Gipsy and Arx bounded outside, full of questions about what had happened. While Teggs tried to answer them, Herdlip quietly slipped inside and bolted the door. “Silence, plant-eaters!” roared Griffen. “It is my questions you must answer . . . in the dungeon! I intend to find out all you know about Poota’s plans and his missing agent.”
“That won’t take long,” said Gipsy. “Because we don’t know anything!”
“But if Donkle had only questioned that prisoner instead of clobbering him, we would all know a lot more!” said Teggs crossly. “Such as, where is the monster that kidnapped Doctor Herdlip right now—”
Behind him, the wall suddenly exploded in a storm of flying stone and dust. The two baryonyx guards were hurled against Arx and Iggy, who in turn crashed into Griffen and Gipsy.
Only Teggs was left standing – he barely felt the bits of brickwork bouncing off his skin. He was too busy staring in horror at the colossal carnivore-creature climbing out through the hole in the wall. It was green and powerful with a spiky head and enormous slavering jaws. Six stone-shredding claws poked out of each hand. Raw hunger burned in the beast’s piercing red eyes as it loomed over him . . .