Kneeling beside the cactus jackal, Cainus dug a hole in the sand. He plucked the black hair from inside his elephant costume, planted it, and covered it over with sand.
Then he sat back on his haunches. “Oh dear. It never occurred to me, but this hair might take ten or twenty years to grow. If it ever grows at all, I mean–”
VORT!
A cloud of solid darkness exploded from the sand and, in an instant, a monstrous hairy tuft grew. It expanded into a black shrub and swallowed up the cactus jackal beside it.
Cainus gaped as the thing jumped out of the sand and hovered in the air. It narrowed itself into a sort of sausage shape, then darted forwards, backwards, and looped around and about. As it moved, wicked spikes sprouted along its length.
Then it headed straight for Cainus.
“Yaargh!” he shrieked as the flying hair-cactus wrapped itself around his neck. Now it was Cainus’s turn to choke, as the thing pulled tight.
SCRAWP!
The thing ripped the head off Cainus’s elephant disguise, revealing his patchy jackal face for all to see.
This spectacle was enough to finally attract the attention of the Animal Mummies. Those nearby stared, aghast, as they recognised their enemy of old.
GROMP.
The hair-cactus planted itself into Cainus’s chin. It hung there, forming a spiky beard.
BLUNGGG!
Two rings materialised around the beard, binding its hairs. Unlike the golden shen rings that had bound the original Pharaoh’s Beard, these rings were dark and smoky-looking.
Cainus sat for a moment, taking stock of what had just happened. He went to stroke his new beard, then yelped as its thorns pricked his paw.
Then he grinned. The crowd of Animal Mummies around him began to grow. Cainus snarled at them.
Celeste the Cat Mummy was among the crowd. Her whiskers bristled. “Mm-wrowww!” she meowed. “Cainus the Jackal!?”
“The very same,” said Cainus, waggling his Beard, “though you shall address me by my proper title – Pharaoh.”
Plomf. Celeste fainted dead away.
Cainus wriggled out of his elephant suit. He pranced to the centre of the town square, his confidence level cranked up to “Pharaoh”.
“This is most pleasing,” he announced to the cowering townsfolk. “After four thousand years, I finally have the respect I deserve. I possess the city I have ached for. Mumphis, you are mine. All mine! The shops, the fashion, the lifestyle! The dreaded Bab Sharkey and his unfashionable T-shirts are gone, and the Pharaoh’s Beard is mine. It’s back, and you Animal Mummies must serve me! Now, bow!”
The Animal Mummies remained still, though many of them trembled in alarm.
“I said bow! Bow before your gorgeous, popular Pharaoh! Bowww nowww!”
Again, the mummies failed to obey. “Perhaps you meant ‘bow-wow’?” suggested Methput the Goat Mummy. “That’s what jackals say, isn’t it?”
Cainus growled. “Perhaps this new beard works differently,” he mused. “No matter! I bet I can still turn it into any shape I desire. Beard, form a magnificent cape, with a high collar and a–”
But before Cainus could complete his command, there was a great WHOOSH-ROSH! The thorny beard ballooned into the shape of a hideous human head with a cobra crown. Black spikes jutted out all over the head, and it turned to regard Cainus.
He choked as he recognised the hairy face. “Your . . . Your Majesty? I think you forgot to mention this bit of your plan.”
“Yessss, Cainussss,” the hairy head hissed. For it was indeed the head of the Unpharaoh – only it was made entirely of black and grey hairs, and bristling with spikes and horns. The only colour in the head was its eyes, which blazed scarlet, and were shaped like the eyes of a serpent. The roots of the hideous beard were still buried in Cainus’s chin.
“And so I return to my city,” said the beard in the Unpharaoh’s unmistakable croak. “I tried to come back as a living mummy. I tried coming back as a giant moth. But this time, there is no Bab Sharkey to stop me. This time, I shall stay forever . . . in the form of the Unpharaoh’s Beard!”
The beard, possessed by the spirit of the Unpharaoh, turned to face the Animal Mummies. She hissed at them and waggled a hairy, spiked tongue. The poor creatures wailed and clapped paws over their eyes to block out the appalling sight.
The Unpharaoh Beard morphed into a spiky paddle. It delivered a series of terrible whacks to the nearest Animal Mummies, who howled in agony. The Beard turned back into the horrid head of the Unpharaoh.
Cainus whimpered. “So, I . . . I don’t get to command the Beard?” he asked, downcast.
“Of course not, Cainus,” the Unpharaoh Beard replied. “But I do. Indeed, it appears I can shape this beard simply by thinking.”
“But I’m wearing it,” Cainus objected. “Why don’t I get to be in charge? It should be me. Me, me, MEEEE!”
Everyone stared at him in silence for a moment.
Cainus gulped. “My apologies,” he continued in a calmer tone. “I felt the most peculiar rush of anger flowing into my head. I think it came through the Beard! I don’t suppose it was your anger, by any chance, Your Angriness?”
“Stop moaning, hound!” the Unpharaoh Beard snapped. “Did you really expect that spare hair you found to grow into a nice, well-behaved Pharaoh’s Beard, exactly like the old one? That hair had been stewing in the very centre of my mummy, you fool. It soaked up the darkest essence of my eternal spirit. This beard is me!”
“I see,” Cainus replied warily. “This beard also soaked up a cactus, by the way. I’m pretty sure he was one of my chief henchmen, poor fellow.”
“A cactus?” The Unpharaoh Beard chuckled. “I thought I was feeling deliciously spiky. Hoo-haaachh, this is a supremely despicable beard, then, worthy of my greatness. But now for the real tessst.”
The hairy Unpharaoh head rose up and bellowed at the cowering crowd. “Animal Mummies! Kneel before your Unpharaoh!”
FLUMP!
As one, the crowd of misshapen mummies fell to their knees. They could not help but obey the ancient power of the Unpharaoh Beard.
“Yesss!” the hairy head hissed at them. “Once again, I am your true Pharaoh. Your number one!”
“Any chance we could have Bab Sharkey back instead?” piped up a cheeky Dog Mummy. The Unpharaoh Beard extended a thorny tendril and smacked his nose.
“Your weak boy is gone. I shall rule this city now,” she declared. “Yet it is not enough. I cannot stop thinking of all the people outside these walls. The ignorant rabble who have not yet acknowledged me as number one. I must be the best in all of Egypt. The best in the entire world. Cainus!”
“Yes, Your Bestness?” fawned the jackal.
“Throughout history, do you know what every emperor has had?”
“Um . . . a comfy pair of slippers with pom-poms on the toes? I’d certainly want those if I were an emperor.”
“An army,” she told him. “And today I command the most fearsome army the world has ever known. An army of Animal Mummies. Now . . . forward march!”
Bab was pacing back and forth in front of the Sharkey Shack.
“What if that wasn’t Prong and Scaler playing with the Beard box?” he asked. “It could have been anyone from the Mumphis world. It could have been Cainus!”
Prof Sharkey had driven off to Cairo for the day to pick up some fresh marshmallows (and a few less important groceries). So Bab was talking to the statue of his dad, the one that he and the Prof had put outside for some fresh air.
Not that the air was too fresh out here – the day was stifling and hot.
“How could I be so careless?” Bab went on. He grabbed his stone father by the shoulders. “Have I just told Cainus how to make another Pharaoh’s Beard?”
The statue stood silent. Bab’s dad had been permanently stuck in stone while in the middle of fixing his short shorts. He looked a bit ridiculous, but he was still Bab’s dad. Bab often talked to the statue, part of him h
oping that his dad could hear him. That one day he might respond.
A fluffy sort of noise came from the desert.
Swish Swish flish.
Bab squinted at the shining dunes. A white ball of fluff was blowing through the air, zigzagging its way towards him.
Is that a bird? Bab wondered. Man, it’s a bad flyer. Hang on. That bird has no wings! I guess that explains the bad flying . . .
The fluffball flew closer. It sailed over the dig site fence and right up to Bab. Intrigued, he reached out to grab it but . . .
FwOOMF!
. . . a sudden gust of hot wind blew it straight into his face. It looked so soft, yet the force of the white tuft planting itself into Bab’s chin sent Bab hurtling backwards. He slammed into the Sharkey Shack wall.
“Whoa!” he cried, peering down at the tuft. “It can’t be. Is . . . is this what I think it is?”
It feels the same on my chin, he thought. But it doesn’t look much like the old Pharaoh’s Beard. It’s white! It looks more like stuffing that fell out of a cushion.
SshhhPUNG!
The white tuft shone like the Egyptian sun, blinding Bab. Two golden shen rings materialised around it. Unlike the original rings, though, these ones were soft and looked sort of . . .
Knitted? Bab thought. They look like tiny woollen scarves.
Bab screwed his eyes up as the blinding light faded. Then he sat bolt upright.
I know that smell!
It was the smell of parmesan cheese.
“DUDE!” bawled a voice.
“FLESH-BOY!” honked another voice.
It was them. Bab’s only friends. His best friends!
Bab’s heart hammered so wildly he thought it would leap out of his chest, like it did that time in the Underworld.
“Prong! Scaler!” Bab roared. “Yes, yes, yes, yes, YES! You did it, you brilliant brainless animals. I knew you’d figure it out! Well, I didn’t know. In fact, I had major doubts you could figure anything out ever, but . . . come here!”
The three friends wrapped each other in a smelly, slightly crunchy monster hug. Prong wept floods of happy tears, soaking Bab’s shirt.
“Man, am I glad to see you both,” Bab told them. “It felt like forever!”
His joy soon evaporated into the desert air. He felt swamped by a thousand worries. “How are things?” he asked. “Are you both okay? How are the other Animal Mummies?”
But before his mummy friends could respond, Bab looked up and saw for himself. Standing among the ancient dunes was Mumphis, city of the Animal Mummies. Only it wasn’t the mighty city he remembered – it was crumbling. Parts of the exterior walls had collapsed, buildings leaned dangerously sideways, and even the giant Pyramid had a large chunk missing from its tip.
Worst of all, black wisps of smoke drifted up from the city, as if parts of Mumphis were on fire.
“What happened to Mumphis?” Bab asked, his voice husky.
Scaler placed an ostrich talon on her friend’s shoulder. “It doesn’t look good, Pharaoh pal. Started to fall apart after you were gone.”
“Mumphis may have depended on the magic of the Pharaoh’s Beard to bind it together,” Bab guessed. “Mum destroyed it, by the way.”
“Your flesh-mum is a strange lady,” honked Prong.
“Mind you,” said Scaler, “from here Mumphis looks even more damaged than when we left to chase that cottonball. The smoke is definitely a new addition.”
“I think the smoke’s very pretty,” Prong replied. She placed a cold wing on Bab’s other shoulder. “Don’t worry, Bab, it’s not all gloom and doom. The city may be falling to bits, and the Animal Mummies might be turning on each other, but I have good news too.”
She turned to look Bab in the eye. “I’m a mummy!”
“Huh?” frowned Bab. “Prong, you’ve always been a mummy. At least, while I’ve known you.”
Scaler rolled her bulbous green eyes. “What our bird friend means to say is, she’s a mother. A Beardmother, if we’re being exact. We figured out your invisible charade so Prong grew that white fluffball that’s now on your chin. It’s Beardo, version two.”
“I’m so proud of my little fluffy-wuffy,” Prong gushed. With a crusty wing, she tickled the beard on Bab’s chin as if it were a chubby baby. A soft white hand sprouted from the beard and clutched the tip of Prong’s wing. Bab could feel it jiggling – the beard was silently laughing!
“Congratulations, Prong,” Bab said. “And congratulations to you, Scaler. I guess that makes you a beard aunt.”
He ran his fingers through his new beard. “Gee, it’s a lot softer than the old one. Any idea why it’s white?”
“I planted the hairs in my lucky cotton pot,” Prong said, proudly puffing out her decayed chest.
“I suppose some essence of the Egyptian cotton seeped into the beard hair,” Bab figured, “and now the beard’s kinda cottony. But it’s still powerful enough to link our worlds together again. We can see each other! Give us another hug, you two.”
Prong and Scaler paused. “We’d love to,” Prong honked, “except . . .”
“Sorry, dude,” Scaler finished. “We forgot how bad you humans smell.”
Bab shrugged. “Oh well, that proves one difference between the old Beard and this cotton one.”
The mummies looked bewildered.
“You don’t have to follow my commands,” Bab explained. “I just told you to give me a hug, and you plain disobeyed.”
“Perhaps the Cotton Beard is kinder,” Prong guessed. “Mama’s so proud of you, my gentle beard baby!”
Bab frowned at the smoking city in the distance. “Come on. There’s trouble in Mumphis. Beard, turn into a scooter so we can get there pronto!”
Fuppa-foop!
The white fluffball morphed into what looked like a scooter made of little clouds. The front of the scooter was attached to Bab’s chin by a thick cotton string.
“Woohoo, it works!” cried Bab. “It changes shape just like the original!”
He leaped onto the fluffy scooter.
Fomp!
His feet sagged down to the ground. It felt like he’d jumped onto a floppy bed sheet.
“Okay, maybe it’s a little softer.”
Scaler and Prong jumped on behind Bab. The super-soft scooter started forwards, humping along the sand like a fluffy caterpillar.
“And a little slower,” Bab observed. “Pick up the pace, Beard. I don’t like the look of that crumbling city one bit, and I want to fix it before Mum gets back.”
As they neared Mumphis, Bab felt a chill despite the intense desert heat. There was something different about the hundreds of stone animal heads atop the city walls.
Squinting, he realised they’d all been remodelled – into the head of the Unpharaoh.
Bab and his friends arrived to find Mumphis overrun with cactus jackals.
They looked just like the hideous Jackal Mummies they’d once been, only now their bandages were green and studded with nasty spikes.
Some had hijacked shops and offices, even setting a few alight. Four cactus jackals had taken over the Mumphis police station and squeezed into the falcons’ police hats and tight shorts. Further along the street, through the windows of Salon Nile, Bab saw a cactus jackal relaxing on a bed. Three others tried to apply creams to him as a beauty treatment, but hurt their paws on his spikes. The pain only made them giggle insanely.
Other cactus jackals simply scurried about the streets. The buildings shook with the sound of snarling and yapping and snapping.
GRRRR! GRRUFF-GRRROWGLGL! went the cactus jackals.
“Okay, so who dug up the dog plants?” Scaler muttered.
“What’s more,” Bab said, “where are the Animal Mummies?”
He ushered Scaler and Prong behind a crumbling statue outside the Ra Ra Cafe. They crouched and hid.
Bab fiddled with his Cotton Beard, thinking. “Maybe the Animal Mummies are hiding somewhere. Can you carry us up high, Prong, so we can have
a good look?”
Prong obliged by flapping up to the sky, hoiking Bab and Scaler in one talon each.
“Look out, Scaler!” Bab cried.
A cactus jackal had spotted them. It leaped up with a snarl and seized Scaler’s fantail in its spiky jaws. Prong flapped higher, now carrying three dangling passengers.
“Beard,” commanded Bab. “Form some pliers and pry open that cactus jackal’s jaws!”
Shuppa-shhwush!
The Cotton Beard morphed into a big pair of white, fluffy pliers. The Beard Pliers gently grasped the cactus jackal’s lower jaw, but to no effect.
GRRROWGLGL! growled the jackal, biting Scaler even harder.
“Good job, Pharaoh,” said Scaler drily. “The softest, fluffiest pliers ever made. That’s really gonna open up this hard, spiky dude. Don’t try anything else, I’ll just pat these soft pliers till he rips my tail clean off.”
I need to think differently with this soft Beard, Bab realised. His mind reeled as Prong flew over the burning, broken city.
“Beard, turn into a lovely fluffy dustburger!” he commanded.
Shhwush! The Beard became exactly that. It floated beside the cactus jackal, tantalising him.
“Check out that dustburger, jackal,” Bab shouted. “You must be hungry after all that time buried in the sand like a weed, yeah?”
The jackal’s eager eyes fixed onto the flying cotton burger. Green drool erupted over his spiky lips. Unable to resist, he released Scaler’s fantail and went to chomp the fluffy treat instead.
GRROWWWWEEEE! he squealed as he plummeted to the city far below. Bab winced as he saw the cactus jackal smash through the roof of Chase’s gym.
“That gym always needed an indoor plant,” said Scaler with relief.
Prong dropped Bab and Scaler on top of the Pyramid. Its pointy tip seemed to have been blasted off, leaving a large flat area to stand on.
Bab scanned Mumphis for any sign of the Animal Mummies. His eye caught some movement, but it was only a posse of cactus jackals. They scampered along a deserted street, using their spiky paws to chip graffiti into the walls of the Souk:
The Prickly Battle Page 3