PING!
I suddenly realized what Fangs had been doing. “You kept them talking while the rope burned through!” I exclaimed.
“Exactly,” said Fangs. “Not only did Disgusto reveal his stinker of a plan, but he and Milly won’t be too far away by the time we get out of this.”
We continued to move our bodies, swinging wider and wider with each thrust.
“Now we know why Disgusto was at the dentist’s surgery when we arrived there,” I said. “He was trying to get his tooth back in case it fell into the wrong hands. But Nicolas Sizer had already given it to Zed.”
“But why?” asked Fangs. “Why would Sizer give Disgusto’s tooth to a zombie?”
“My guess is that Disgusto wanted to know how much his teeth would be worth on the black market after he’d turned them to gold – so he told Sizer to give the tooth to Zed to find out. But by the time Zed had got to Turkey, the plan had changed. Disgusto had turned his bum gold and learned about the stomach agitator, so he must have asked Zed to pick up the mushrooms instead.”
PING!
We were swinging almost from wall to wall now, and there wasn’t much left of the rope above the candle. We just had to hope that when it finally gave way, we weren’t directly over the—
SNAP!
Fangs and I plummeted. We landed with a thump just centimetres from the edge of the pool. I used my sharp werewolf claws to cut through the ropes that still bound us.
Fangs smiled at the piranha fish. “So sorry not to be joining you for dinner.”
We ran for the door and then followed the corridor as it led us through the casino kitchens and out into the cool night air. We were just in time to see the Great Disgusto and Milly roaring away on a motorbike.
“Get to the limo!” barked Fangs – but when we got to the car we saw that the tyres had been slashed.
“How far away is the nearest MP1 garage?” Fangs asked.
“Too far,” I replied.
“Then we’ve lost them!”
“Not necessarily.” After opening the boot of the car, I pulled out the rocket-powered skateboard that Cube had given us.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” said Fangs.
“We don’t have an option. Now get on!”
There’s a reason why the streets of Monaco are used for the annual Formula One Grand Prix race – the corners are tight, the straight sections are short and there’s danger waiting at every turn. I would imagine, however, that the course is infinitely more comfortable and a lot safer behind the wheel of a racing car than it is on a bit of wood with four tiny wheels and an engine fuelled by the same stuff they use for space missions.
I clung onto Fangs as tightly as I could as he leaned left, then right, then left again, weaving between cars and dodging pedestrians. “I can see them up ahead,” he shouted.
“Can we catch them?”
“I think so. They’re heading out of the city, so they’ll have to slow down to navigate the narrow mountain roads.”
“Are we going to slow down as well?”
“Not a chance!”
The road began to rise as we left the town, but the skateboard’s rocket engine made easy work of the climb. Before long, we were chasing the Great Disgusto along moonlit roads with a cliff-face on one side and a sheer drop on the other.
We were steadily gaining on them. I could see Milly’s red hair billowing out behind her in the wind and hear Disgusto’s curses as he watched our progress in his mirror.
Eventually, we pulled alongside the motorbike. “Disgusto!” Fangs yelled, his voice barely carrying over the noise of the two engines. “I’m placing you under arrest for—”
Disgusto punched Fangs square in the jaw, causing the skateboard to swerve violently towards the deadly drop beyond the road.
Fangs was forced to take evasive action and, leaning hard to his left, he took us along a smaller unpaved path that rose parallel to the main track. My teeth juddered as the rocket motor powered us over the uneven ground. This must have been the original mountain pass before the level of traffic became too heavy for it. Looking down, I could see Disgusto and Milly speeding along the newer road below.
“Hold on tight!” called Fangs. “I’ve got an idea.”
Ahead of us were the ruins of an old wooden bridge. The entire middle section of it had fallen away. “You’re not thinking of—”
“I sure am, Puppy!”
I screwed my eyes shut just as we blasted up onto the bridge and shot out into empty air. Everything seemed to move in slow motion as we sailed through the moonlight, spinning head over heels.
We landed, skateboard wheels clattering, on the far side of the bridge and, turning hard right, found ourselves back on the new road. In front of us was a single headlight. We had landed in front of the motorbike – and we were hurtling straight towards it! The Great Disgusto pulled my boss’s sunglasses from his pocket and put them on. He was ready for this deadly game of chicken.
The gap between us shrank and the motorbike’s headlight grew larger as we continued on our collision course.
Then, at the last moment, Disgusto jerked the motorbike to one side. As he shot past on our right, Fangs whipped out a hand to snatch the sunglasses from Disgusto’s face. He missed, and his fingers became entangled in Milly O’Naire’s flaming red hair instead.
She was pulled off the back of the motorbike and crashed onto the grassy bank at the side of the road. Fangs, his fingers still wrapped in her tresses, was pulled off balance, and both he and I tumbled from the skateboard. The board flew out from beneath us and rocketed off the side of the mountain, the flames from its engine lighting up the night sky as it exploded.
The tail-light of Disgusto’s motorbike disappeared round a bend. I howled with frustration.
“Are you OK?” asked Fangs.
I nodded. “Just annoyed that we let the Great Disgusto escape!”
“We’ll find him,” Fangs assured me, pulling Milly to her feet. “Miss O’Naire is going to tell us exactly where he’s going.”
“I won’t tell you a thing!” she spat.
“Oh, I think I can persuade you to part with the information.” Fangs smiled. Then he pressed his lips to hers and kissed her long and hard.
When Milly was finally allowed up for breath, her eyes were blazing. “OK,” she gasped, turning to me. “I’ll tell you whatever you like. Just so long as he never does that again!”
I grinned. Sometimes my boss is the best.
Saturday 1522 hours: El Puertito, Tenerife
Fangs cut the motorboat’s engine and everything suddenly became quiet. Only the soft, rhythmic splash of water against the side of the boat broke the silence. We had arrived at a quiet bay along the coast from one of Tenerife’s holiday resorts.
“This is it,” I said, checking my laptop. The GPS read EL PUERTITO BAY.
“El what?” asked Fangs, peering over my shoulder.
“El Puertito,” I said. “And that, over there, should be the Great Disgusto’s secret hideout.” I pointed to a small, seemingly deserted island in the middle distance. Milly O’Naire, who was now in jail, awaiting trial for her part in the recent robberies, had given us the precise location of Disgusto’s lair in return for a single prison cell and my promise that I wouldn’t let Fangs visit her.
“I wish I had my sunglasses,” Fangs moaned, glancing up at the scorching sun.
When I first met my boss, I had been amazed that he could survive out in the daylight. Vampires normally shrivel up to nothing if they go out after dawn. But then I learned that Cube had invented little black pills that contained the “essence of midnight” and so long as Fangs took one every day, he was safe in the sun.
We climbed into our wetsuits – which isn’t as easy as it sounds when you’re covered in thick fur and have a tail. Still, it wasn’t long before we each had a tank of air strapped to our back and goggles pulled down over our eyes. We sat on the side of the boat and then, on Fangs’s cue, tumbled backwa
rds into the water.
I’m always amazed at how calm and relaxed I feel when I’m scuba diving. As I swam past shoals of brightly coloured fish, I felt the tension of the last few days begin to melt away – until Fangs nudged me and pointed to a figure swimming towards us.
At first, I thought we’d found a lost wind-up bath toy. The figure’s tiny legs were pumping hard, propelling it through the water like a miniature torpedo. But then I spotted the medallions hanging around its neck and realized it was Hip Hop!
With Nicolas Sizer lost in a Peruvian jungle and both Zed and Milly O’Naire behind bars, the Great Disgusto was running out of henchmen. Hip Hop may have been a small assassin, but that didn’t mean getting past him would be a simple task – especially as he was holding what looked like a water pistol.
Fangs kicked his legs, aiming to get to the mini villain before he could shoot. Hip Hop’s finger tightened on the trigger – but Fangs reached him just in time to pull his hand away. He twisted the gnome’s wrist back, so that he couldn’t shoot.
Hip Hop struggled. He thrashed from side to side, his heavy medallions churning up the water around him. Then one of Hip Hop’s chains got caught in my boss’s airline, wrenching it from his mouth.
Fangs spun round, desperate to locate his oxygen supply. But the only way he would be able to reach his secondary air supply was to release Hip Hop – which would give the gnome every opportunity to aim and fire his gun.
I darted forward, pulling my mouthpiece from between my own teeth and jamming it into my boss’s mouth. Fangs took a deep gulp of air and threw me a look of gratitude. At the same moment, he accidentally released his grip on Hip Hop—
Hip Hop fired his pistol.
The gun spat out an orange net with lead weights tied to each corner. As the weights spun through the water, they spread the net apart, wrapping Fangs and me in a fine mesh and dragging us down to the seabed. We both just managed to recover our mouthpieces before we crashed onto the rocks below. My foot got lodged in a wooden cage used by local fishermen to catch lobsters.
And Hip Hop wasn’t finished with us yet. Taking a sharp stone from the seabed, he made a tiny cut in the tip of one of my paws. A plume of red blood began to spiral upwards. It turned to a crimson mist as it mixed with the water. Almost immediately, I spotted a dark shape looming in the distance. Then another – and another.
Sharks!
After giving us a final wicked smile, Hip Hop swam away – leaving us trapped in the net, surrounded by sharks and coated in my blood. We were an underwater packed lunch!
The sharks swam closer and closer. I pulled a knife from my utility belt and began to slice a hole in the thick netting while Fangs drank as much of the bloody water as he could.
Then one of the sharks attacked. It lunged forward, its mouth open wide and its razor-sharp teeth bared for the kill.
But it hadn’t banked on meeting a vampire coming in the other direction. I cut a slit in the net for Fangs and he kicked upwards, spinning over in the water to bite the shark as hard as he could on its nose.
I’m not sure whether sharks are known for their vast array of facial expressions, but this one went from surprise, through anger, to sheer terror in a matter of seconds. It had found itself a tasty meal – but a meal with even sharper teeth than its own. Turning tail, it rocketed away through the water, closely followed by its companions.
After tearing away the rest of the net, I gave Fangs a thumbs-up. He was clamping his respirator back between his teeth. He pointed to the tiny figure swimming away from us and then drew a harpoon from the holster on his back.
For a moment I was worried that Fangs would actually shoot the gnome – he normally abhors the use of guns – but my fears were unfounded. Instead, Fangs fired the harpoon at the seabed, slicing through the rope holding a lobster net in place. The net floated upwards and caught Hip Hop as he swam. He bobbed up to the surface.
Fangs slid the harpoon back into its sheath and turned to give me a high five. We were beginning to swim in the direction of the shore when Fangs spotted one final globule of my blood. After removing his air supply again, he gulped down the red liquid, then licked the tips of his glimmering white fangs. I was suddenly very glad that we were on the same side!
Saturday 1600 hours: El Puertito, Tenerife
We scrambled out of the water, shrugging off our scuba gear. “Do you think Hip Hop will be OK?” I asked, glancing back to where the furious gnome was shouting rhyming obscenities at us from his floating prison.
“He looks perfectly comfortable to me,” said Fangs, stripping off his wetsuit. “Certainly more comfortable than whoever lives in there.” He pointed further along the beach to a crudely built hut made from tree branches and dead grass.
“There’s someone standing on guard outside,” I hissed. “And I think he’s seen us.” I pulled a pair of binoculars from my utility belt and peered at the figure.
“Is it Disgusto?” asked Fangs.
I shook my head and handed the binoculars over. “I think you’d better take a look for yourself.”
I climbed out of my wetsuit as Fangs was studying the figure. “What the…?” he muttered. “Come on, we need to get a better look at this.”
We jogged along the beach to the hut. Its “guard” turned out to be a scarecrow dressed in a ragged pinstripe suit. Two large branches had been lashed together to form the body, and a melon, on which was drawn a scowling face with a large, handlebar moustache, was the head.
“Who’s that supposed to be?” asked Fangs.
“If we weren’t hundreds of miles from home, I’d say it was Sir Hugh Jands.”
“The prime minister?” said Fangs. “Then who’s that?” He pointed to another scarecrow.
“Could be the German chancellor,” I suggested. “The seaweed looks a bit like her hairstyle.”
“Well, this one just looks ridiculous!” said Fangs, striding over to a scarecrow dressed all in black. Two sharp twigs protruded from its sneering mouth and a plastic bin liner flapped from its shoulders like a cape. “I mean, who in the world looks anything like that?”
“It’s you, you sabre-toothed idiot!” roared the Great Disgusto, stepping out of the ramshackle shelter.
“Rubbish!” said Fangs. “It looks nothing like me.”
“Then try this…” Disgusto pulled Fangs’s sunglasses from his pocket and angrily pushed them onto the melon head.
Fangs took a step back and studied the scarecrow’s new look. “OK,” he admitted. “Now I can see a bit of a resemblance – but what are these things for?”
The Great Disgusto grinned wickedly. “Target practice…” He spun round, hitched up the back of his robes to reveal his golden bum and farted. A searing green flame shot out from his behind and engulfed the vampire scarecrow, melting it to a puddle of stinking goo in just a few seconds.
“As you can see,” said Disgusto, dropping his robes back down, “I’ve made a few adjustments to my stomach agitator – with rather impressive results!”
Fangs and I stared at the hissing pool of green goo in horror. It seemed that Disgusto now had the power to destroy people with his guffs, rather than just knock them out. My boss, however, had other more pressing concerns.
“My sunglasses!” he cried, fishing in the gloop to rescue his beloved glasses, which had been reduced to nothing more than a lump of metal and glass. “You’ll pay for this, Disgusto!”
“We shall see,” said the Great Disgusto. “For now, though, let us relax over some light refreshments. I would ask Hip Hop to bring us some drinks, but he appears to be a little caught up at the moment.”
I glanced at the beach hut. “That’s your secret lair?”
“Hey – you wouldn’t believe how much it costs to buy enough missiles to threaten the entire world,” snapped Disgusto. “There wasn’t much left over to build a more permanent base. Not until I organize a few more robberies, at least.”
“There won’t be any more robberies,” said Fangs.
“Or any missile attacks. It ends, here and now.”
“Yes – for you!” spat the Great Disgusto, and from his cloak he produced two glasses of the green stomach agitator. “Fangs Enigma – I challenge you to a duel.”
Fangs stood still, the warm breeze ruffling his cape out behind him. “A duel?”
Disgusto nodded. “We each down a draught of stomach agitator, then march ten paces and fart!”
Fangs’s face remained blank. “You realize that with the refinements you’ve made to your potion, one of us will not survive?”
The Great Disgusto’s eyes twinkled with excitement. “That is the plan.”
“Challenge accepted.” Fangs took the glass and raised the pungent drink to his lips.
I grabbed his arm. “You can’t do this,” I hissed. “I don’t know what the new ingredient in the stomach agitator is yet. One mouthful of that stuff could kill you!”
“Trust me,” whispered Fangs. He waited until the Great Disgusto was looking the other way and then tipped the contents of his glass onto the ground. The liquid hissed and spat. Fangs quickly scattered sand over the puddle with his shoe to hide it.
“Well, that’s something,” I said with relief, “but it still doesn’t mean you can match Disgusto in a bottom duel.”
Fangs lifted his shirt and pulled up the waistband of his underwear. “I’m wearing these…” His boxer shorts were covered in pictures of tiny red chilli peppers.
“The chilli underpants Cube gave you!” I gasped. “Do you really think they’ll give your bottom burp enough of a blast to beat Disgusto?”
“When you’re ready, Agent Enigma,” the Great Disgusto barked, clutching at his belly. “My agitator is beginning to churn. So if you’ve got the stomach to go through with this…”
“Bring it on, Disgusto,” snarled Fangs. “You may have magic in your guts, but I’ve got justice in mine!”
Operation: Golden Bum Page 5