The small pink bum wiped a tear from its cheek.
‘So, what did you do then?’ Zack asked the bum gently.
‘I kept looking,’ it said. ‘I wandered the solar system searching for her. I would have kept searching, too, but I got sucked into the brown hole and deposited here, with no way of getting back. But to tell you the truth, I’m not sure I’d want to go back, even if I could. I can be lonely here just as well as there. Besides, I’m not sure I’d recognise my owner now even if I did see her again. She was a little girl, then—she’d be quite grown up by now.’
The bum fell silent.
The fire glowed low.
Something screeched in the distance.
It was the saddest story that Zack had ever heard.
Ned and Eleanor were both wiping their eyes.
Even Zack’s bum was choked up. ‘Do you have a tissue, Zack?’ it whispered.
‘Sure,’ said Zack, pulling a tissue from his pocket and handing it to his bum.
‘I hope you find your owner some day,’ said Zack.
The bum shrugged. ‘Thanks,’ it said. ‘You’re nice. You don’t need a spare, do you?’
Zack’s bum bristled. ‘No, he’s pretty right for the moment, thanks,’ it said.
‘You’re lucky to have an owner like him,’ said the bum.
‘True,’ said Zack’s bum. ‘But he’s even luckier to have a bum like me.’
Zack glanced at Eleanor. She seemed even sadder than before.
‘We’d better get some sleep,’ said the bum. ‘We have a lot of ground to cover tomorrow.’
‘Sleep?’ said Zack’s bum. ‘With tyrannosore-arses, tricerabutts, giant stinkants and poopasaurs out there . . . I’m not going to sleep a wink.’
‘Good!’ said their guide. ‘Then you’re on guard duty. Keep the fire burning and whatever you do, don’t fall asleep. Understand?’
‘There’s not much chance of that,’ said Zack’s bum.
‘What, not much chance of you understanding or not much chance of you falling asleep?’ said their guide.
‘Ha ha, very funny,’ said Zack’s bum. ‘Goodnight.’
Zack, Ned and Eleanor hunkered down on their bumnut-leaf beds and were asleep within minutes.
Five minutes later the guide bum dozed off.
And, five minutes after that, so did Zack’s bum.
CHAPTER 37
STINKANT-NAPPED
It was dark when Zack awoke.
He blinked a few times and tried to remember where he was. He had been so tired that he hardly even remembered falling asleep. One moment he’d been studying Eleanor’s sad face across the smoke of the campfire and the next moment . . . well . . . now he was lying in pitch darkness.
He shut his eyes tightly and opened them again.
He’d had a dream, he remembered that much.
A crazy dream.
He’d dreamed that the fire had gone out and that a gigantic red stinkant had picked him up in its pincers and carried him off to an underground stinkant nest.
As Zack remembered his dream it seemed so vivid that he could actually hear the scuttling and digging noises the stinkants made. And he could smell the dank earth of the underground nest and feel stinkant juice on his hands.
Where was the fire? he wondered.
As they’d been setting up camp the previous evening their guide bum had been at great pains to point out the importance of fire in protecting them from the night-time predators of the prehistoric world. But now the fire was completely out.
He looked up.
Before he’d gone to sleep there’d been a stunning canopy of stars above them.
Now there was nothing.
No fire.
No stars.
No sky.
What was going on?
Zack became aware of a pain around his waist. A dull, aching pain. The sort of pain that you might have felt if you’d been picked up by, say, a pair of giant stinkant pincers . . .
Oh no, thought Zack. ‘Eleanor?’ he said. ‘Are you awake?’
‘Zack?’ said Eleanor groggily. ‘What happened to the fire?’
‘I’m afraid I’ve got some bad news,’ said Zack.
‘What now?’ said Eleanor.
‘I think we’ve been stinkant-napped,’ said Zack. ‘We may be in great danger.’
The scuttling sounds grew louder. Whatever was making them was definitely coming closer.
‘Have you got a match?’ said Zack.
‘Yeah,’ said Eleanor. ‘Hang on.’
Eleanor struck the match.
‘Uh-oh,’ said Eleanor as the tiny yellow glow confirmed Zack’s worst fears. ‘I think you’re right.’
Zack nodded as he looked around. They were in an underground chamber with rough-hewn rock walls. Just the two of them. His bum was missing.
So was Ned.
And so was their guide.
‘How do we get out of here?’ said Eleanor, striking another match.
‘Same way we got in, I guess,’ said Zack.
‘And how was that?’ said Eleanor.
‘I don’t know,’ said Zack. ‘I was asleep. Sort of.’
‘Ouch,’ said Eleanor. The match she was holding had burnt down to her fingertips. She pulled another one from the pack, struck it and peered into the darkness.
‘What’s that?’ she said.
‘What?’ said Zack.
‘On the wall over there—it looks like writing,’ said Eleanor. ‘I’m going to go and see what it says.’
‘I’m coming with you,’ said Zack, who was getting a little creeped out by the darkness and the scuttling sounds.
The two bum-fighters tripped and stumbled their way across the rocky floor to the far wall of the cave.
At the rock-face Eleanor lit a match and leaned in close.
They were words all right.
Words smeared onto the wall in a wet, glistening paste.
Zack began reading aloud: ‘ “WARNING! THE GREAT WHITE BUM IS . . . ” ’
His voice faltered as he recognised the words.
‘That’s the warning Ned saw!’ said Eleanor. ‘Only these words aren’t millions of years old. They’re fresh!’
The match in Eleanor’s hand went out.
‘They might be fresh,’ said Zack. ‘But we’re still too late.’
Suddenly Zack was blinded by a torch light shone directly into his eyes.
‘You’re not too late yet, soldier!’ said a voice. ‘But you certainly took your time.’
Although Zack couldn’t see a thing, he had no trouble identifying the voice.
‘Gran!’ he said. ‘Is that you?’
CHAPTER 38
GRAN
‘Of course it’s me!’ said Gran.
‘And me!’ said the Forker.
‘And me!’ said the Flicker.
‘But didn’t you . . . don’t you all . . . die here?’ said Zack, struggling with the complications of time travel.
‘First I’ve heard about it,’ said Gran. ‘Unless you know something that I don’t.’
Zack gulped . . . and quickly shook his head.
‘Pincher,’ said Eleanor, changing the subject, ‘it’s great to see you, but can you turn that torch away—it hurts!’
‘Sorry,’ said Gran, lowering her torch.
‘Where are we?’ said Zack.
‘We’re in a stinkant nest,’ said Gran. ‘Where do you think? Ferocious darn critters. A lot bigger than the ones back in my day. I mean, the ones to come in my day . . . when I’m born, that is. Darn this time travel! It does my head in!’
‘Look, it’s simple,’ said the Forker. ‘We’ve been over it and over it and over it! You were born in the future. Then you came back here to the past. But just because you are in the past doesn’t mean that you weren’t born in the future—it just means that you haven’t been born in the future yet—not technically anyway—even though you were because how could you be here if you weren’t? Understand?’
‘You weren’t born in the future!’ said the Forker. ‘For goodness sakes!’
‘Language!’ said Gran.
‘ “Goodness” is not a swear word!’ said the Forker.
‘No, but I don’t like the tone of your voice,’ said Gran. ‘I’ll thank you to remember your manners.’
‘Sorry,’ said the Forker. ‘All I was trying to say was that you weren’t born in the future.’
‘But you told me I was,’ said Gran.
‘What he means,’ said the Flicker helpfully, ‘is that you were born in the future, but when you were born the future wasn’t the future. It was the present. Not the present present, of course. The future present. But nevertheless, the present in which no past or future exists. Where the confusion comes in is that from where we stand at the moment that present is our future. Get it?’
‘So I was born in . . . the present?’ said Gran.
‘Yes, the future present,’ said the Flicker triumphantly. ‘Which is now in our past, of course.’
‘So I was born in our past future present,’ said Gran. ‘Now I’m even more confused than ever!’
‘It doesn’t matter!’ said Eleanor, impatiently.
‘It may not matter to you, young lady,’ said Gran, ‘but my birth matters a great deal to me!’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Eleanor. ‘Your birth matters a great deal to me, too, it’s just that we’re running out of time. When did you last see the Great White Bum?’
‘We were spat out of the brown hole right behind him,’ said Gran, ‘straight into the middle of a crowd of giant mutant zombie blowflies. Luckily they concealed our arrival and we were able to hide. We heard him talking to himself—ranting and raving about how he was going to get revenge and send the Great White Bumosaurs back through the brown hole to Bumageddonise the future Earth. We tracked him for as far as we could but then we got chased by an enormous hairy bum.’
‘It was horrible,’ said the Flicker. ‘Took every towel I had to keep it at bay.’
‘And every fork on my belt!’ said the Forker.
‘Yes,’ nodded Gran. ‘It gave us a run for our money. But by the time we’d given it the shake we’d lost the Great White Bum’s trail.’
‘We were trying to find the Great White Bum again when we were surrounded by stinkants,’ said the Forker. ‘They brought us here. We tried to escape but there were just too many of them. Then we had the idea of killing a stinkant and using its blood as paint to send you a warning about Bumageddon.’
‘But how did you know we would see your message?’ said Zack. ‘It was deep underground in the Great Windy Desert. Ned Smelly only found it by sheer accident.’
‘ “Accident” is just another word for fate, Zack,’ said Gran, suddenly reminding Zack of a witch in the dim gloom of the cave. ‘Don’t you remember telling what the Blind Bum-feeler predicted? She said that you will free not just the world, but the entire univarse from the scourge of bums past, present AND future!’
The words struck Zack like a triple lightning bolt. ‘I know that’s what she said,’ said Zack slowly. ‘But what does “past, present and future” mean, exactly?’
‘Oh that’s easy,’ said the Flicker. ‘Let me explain . . .’
‘No!’ said Eleanor. ‘Not now. Something’s coming. Play dead! And switch off the torch!’
CHAPTER 39
REUNITED
The bum-fighters dropped to the ground.
They could hear scuffling and shouting coming from the passage outside.
‘Put me down!’ yelled a shrill voice. ‘Put me down!’
Zack smiled. ‘That’s my bum!’ he said.
‘Shhh!’ hissed Eleanor.
‘Wait until my owner finds out about this!’ Zack’s bum said. ‘He’ll tear this nest apart looking for me. And when he finds me he’ll rip you to pieces!’
Zack heard a loud thud.
And then another.
‘Ouch!’ said his bum.
‘Oof!’ said a voice that Zack recognised as Ned’s.
The bum-fighters listened as the scuttling receded back up the passage.
‘You can run, but you can’t hide!’ yelled Zack’s bum fiercely. ‘You’ll be sorry you ever messed with Zack Freeman’s bum!’
‘Steady on there,’ said Ned. ‘I hate to be a party pooper, but a typical stinkant colony can consist of up to 200,000 stinkants and can have anywhere between 10,000 and 20,000 food and egg chambers. Even if we could locate Zack and Eleanor—which is highly unlikely—it wouldn’t be enough. It would take a small army of bum-fighters to fight our way out of here.’
‘Which is exactly what we have, soldier!’ said Gran, flicking her torch on.
‘Mrs Freeman?’ said Ned, picking himself up off the cave floor and throwing his arms around her. ‘Am I glad to see you!’
‘How are you, Ned?’ she said. ‘I haven’t seen you since you were a boy. And now look at you!’
‘Yeah,’ said Ned. ‘Come a long way, haven’t I? Stuck in a stinkant nest in 65 million years BC.’
‘Your mother would be proud,’ said Gran. ‘Meet the Flicker and the Forker!’
The bum-fighters shook hands.
‘Pleased to meet you,’ said the Flicker.
‘We’ve heard a lot about you,’ said the Forker.
‘And I’ve heard a great deal about you!’ said Ned. He noticed Eleanor and Zack. ‘There you are! Good to see you both!’
‘Zack!’ said Zack’s bum, jumping into Zack’s arms.
‘Where’s our guide?’ asked Eleanor.
‘We don’t know,’ said Ned. ‘Not with us. I take it it’s not with you?’
‘No,’ said Eleanor. ‘I hope it’s all right.’
‘Hmmph,’ said Zack’s bum. ‘I’m sure it is.’
‘What makes you say that?’ said Eleanor, studying Zack’s bum quizzically.
‘Don’t you get it?’ said Zack’s bum. ‘It doublecrossed us.’
‘Doublecrossed us?’ said Eleanor. ‘What do you mean?’
‘It was obviously working for the stinkants all along. If I ever see that thing again I’ll kill it!’
‘That’s highly unlikely,’ said Ned. ‘This place is like a maze. Took me a week to map the whole nest comprehensively. Even if you did know where it was, you’d be stinkant-meat long before you’d be able to locate it and kill it.’
‘You’ve been here before?’ said the Flicker.
‘Yes,’ said Ned. ‘This is where I found your warning.’
‘Do you still have the map?’ said the Flicker hopefully.
‘No,’ said Ned. ‘Not on me. It’s in . . .’
‘Shh!’ said Eleanor. ‘Listen!’
The scuttling in the passage outside the holding cave was getting louder.
And somewhere, far above them, they could hear the sound of muffled explosions.
CHAPTER 40
STOMP!
‘Robobum!’ said Ned, his eyes shining.
‘We don’t know that for sure,’ said Eleanor.
‘It’s got to be!’ said Ned.
‘But even if it is Robobum, how will she find us?’ said Zack. ‘You said yourself there are at least 10,000 separate chambers.’
‘Heat sensors,’ said Ned.
‘Yes, but how did she know we were in the stinkant nest in the first place?’ said Zack’s bum.
‘That, I don’t know,’ said Ned, frowning.
The explosions were getting louder. Smoke and acrid fumes filled the air.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Gran. ‘We’ll take care of it.’
‘Yeah!’ said the Flicker, cracking a rolled-up tea towel in front of him. ‘This “Robobum” will regret the day it ever messed with me.’
‘You mean us,’ said the Forker, brandishing a large barbeque fork in his hand like a Japanese ninja sword.
‘No,’ said Ned. ‘You don’t understand! Robobum is our friend,
not an enemy. I built her. She’s a state-of-the-art bum-fighting machine in the shape of a Great White Bum!’
‘Well, good for you, Ned!’ said Gran. ‘You always were a bit of a tinkerer.’
‘A bum-fighting robot!’ said the Flicker, letting his towel fall to his side. ‘Now that I’d like to see!’
‘Sounds like we soon will,’ said the Forker, re-holstering his fork.
The scuttling sound of the stinkants was getting louder. Zack could feel the earth trembling all around them. Robobum was not so much navigating the passages of the nest as completely destroying them.
As the glare of daylight lit up the passage outside their cave, a river of stinkants surged past the opening. A lethal river of shiny red and black abdomens, thoraxes, legs and razor-sharp jaws. All rushing to attack Robobum.
The smell was horrible, and not helped by the fact that Robobum was incinerating her attackers as she made her way towards the cave holding the bum-fighters.
Huge hissing blasts of flaming insect repellent and thick acrid smoke filled the air. As Robobum came closer, the river of stinkants began to back up and then flow into the cave chamber.
‘Everybody against the wall!’ commanded Gran, as Robobum made a dramatic entrance.
The front line of stinkants reared back, snapping their jaws and squirting jets of foul-smelling juice at Robobum.
‘Stand clear, please,’ said Robobum in a calm and authoritative tone. ‘Stand clear.’
But the stinkants did not stand clear. If anything, they redoubled their efforts.
‘You were warned,’ explained Robobum matter-of-factly. ‘Have it your way!’
CHAPTER 41
ESCAPE?
Zack hoped Robobum wasn’t about to blast the stinkants with a burst of flaming insect repellent.
She was too close.
Everyone in the chamber would be incinerated.
But Robobum had obviously already taken that into consideration.
Instead of using fire she simply started stomping.
The stinkants in the front line didn’t stand a chance.
Robobum’s powerful feet smashed through their tough armour, sending their putrid payloads of hot sticky stinkant juice splattering all over the chamber.
Bumageddon: The Final Pongflict Page 7