I need to act quickly. It won’t take that van-copter long to get to the zoo, and then Oscar will be in all sorts of trouble. I walk back to the far edge of the building, turn to face the tree and start running. The closer I get to the edge of the building, the less I want to do this ... but as I reach the gutter I leap into the air and stretch my arms out. The next thing I Know, I’m crashing into the tree and clutching onto a thick, leafy branch.
As it wobbles up and down, birds screech angrily at me. One of them even tries to peck me, and I shoo it away. I climb down, branch by branch, and soon reach the top of a brick wall. By then, my hands are covered in scratches, but it’s a huge relief to feel something solid beneath my feet. I leap from the wall down to the ground and take a few seconds to catch my breath.
Just then I realise I’ve lost my cloak - it’s now dangling from the top of the tree. I feel terrible, but there’s no time to climb back up to get it. I’ll have to make it up to Hannah, somehow.
Without Oscar, I have no map to help me get to the zoo. It’s a strange feeling to have to use my own brain for once! At least I do know one thing – the nearest zip-coaster station is on the same line as the Bluggsville Zoo.
From here, I can see a zip-coaster zipping high above the nearby buildings. I run along Sebble Street, following the zip-coaster track, and just a few minutes later I reach the station.
I only have to wait 20 seconds for the next zipcoaster to roll onto the platform. I strap myself into a seat, and in a matter of seconds we’re twisting and turning through the sky above the city buildings. I look down at the Records Office. From up here I can see three people in long white coats, running around the outside of the building. Harvey Higgle seems to be climbing a ladder to the roof. I can’t help but smile and imagine how angry they all are at the moment. But as the journey continues, my head fills with questions: What did they mean by ‘space dog’? What on Earth is a cosmic collar? And why do they seem to care so much about finding it?
The moment the zip-coaster stops, I jump out and run towards the zoo gates. I’ve timed it perfectly - the van-copter has only just landed on the zoo’s helipad. Two zookeepers stand at the edge of the helipad, wriggling in excitement. A laserfence stops me from running up to them, but I can clearly see the van-copter from this side of it.
The driver opens the van-copter’s back hatch and Oscar jumps out. He’s looking exactly like himself again, except for the black button still stuck on his snout. He’s obviously chewed the costume off on the way. Hannah won’t be happy at all ... but I’ll have to worry about that later.
As Oscar scratches his nose on the helipad, the zookeepers look at each other in confusion. They don’t seem particularly interested in Oscar. In fact, two of them start arguing with the driver, blaming him for losing the precious labrador. When they eventually calm down, one of the zookeepers switches the electricity off to let Oscar pass through the laser-fence.
I run straight over towards him. As soon as he sees me he runs in my direction and leaps up into my arms. ‘Well that was lucky,’ I say to him. ‘Let’s get out of here before something else goes wrong!’
Oscar nods. But then I notice his head tilting up towards the sky behind me. I turn around and see an air-cab descending through the orange smog. In the driver’s seat, there’s someone who looks an awful lot like Harvey Higgle.
I grab hold of Oscar and drop to the ground, rolling us both across the gravel until we’re hidden under a thick shrub by the zoo gates. I don’t dare move a muscle as the air-cab lands and its doors swing open. From under the shrub all I can see are wheels and feet, but I can hear every word they say.
‘Where’s that labrador?’ Harvey yells.
Someone in the distance tells him there’s been a mistake - that the dog in the van-copter was a common beagle-bot.
‘We’ve been tricked!’ Harvey yells at his helpers. ‘But now there’s no doubt at all - those shadies are in the hunt for the Cosmic Collar. They must have Sandy’s old microchip. There’s no other way they could bring up those details on our scanner.’
I look at Oscar and see his eyes widening. I know we’re both thinking the same thing — that tiny chip is leading us into some kind of cosmic treasure hunt. If only we knew what we were hunting!
Harvey asks the zookeeper if any cloak-wearing shadies have been seen nearby. He grunts and splutters when he gets no for an answer.
Grumbling and grouching, Harvey and his helpers climb back into the air-cab and take off. As soon as it’s safe, Oscar and I roll out from under the shrub and swipe off the dirt and leaves we’ve collected all over ourselves.
‘Quick, Oscar,’ I say. ‘A Splinternet search on Cosmic Collar!''
Once again, all we get is a frowning monkey.
‘This is all too strange,’ I say to him. ‘Let’s get back to the storeroom and see what Jessie thinks about it all.’
Half an hour later, we’re home. The moment we tumble in through our secret air-vent pipe we run straight into Jessie’s workshop. She’s still there, even though it’s getting dark. She looks up from her microscope and gives us a wave.
‘Hey Jessie,’ I yell. ‘Does the name Gemma Hirabashi mean anything to you?’
‘Of course,’ she replies. ‘You haven’t heard of her?’
‘Well, not until today.’
‘Gemma Hirabashi was incredibly famous in the 2020s. She and her dog Sandy were the first human-canine team to fly to the moon and back.’
My heart starts pounding at a thousand beats per second. ‘Keep talking!’
‘After that, they joined the first mission to Mars, where they helped set up a permanent settlement and lived happily ever after.’
‘Wow!’
‘Sandy was definitely the most famous space dog of the 21st century.’
‘And ... she wore something called the Cosmic Collar, didn’t she?’
Jessie looks at me with a puzzled frown. ‘How did you know that?’
‘Because . I just discovered her old address. Maybe the Cosmic Collar could still be there?’
‘That’s unlikely, but I suppose it’s possible. She only wore the Cosmic Collar on her moon trip, and it went missing soon after. Space travel fanatics have been trying to find it for centuries. So has the Museum, I might add! It’s the most mysterious missing artefact in the history of space travel. In fact, wait there a moment!’
Jessie goes out into the storeroom and runs to a filing cabinet on the west wall. We watch from the doorway as she opens its middle drawer and slides out a large piece of ... paper, I think. She hurries back towards us, and lays it down on her desk.
‘I need to handle this very carefully. Twenty-first century paper is extremely fragile, as you well know.’
It’s a poster, sealed in clear plastic. It doesn’t look very interesting until Jessie turns it over. It seems to be an old-fashioned ‘Missing’ poster, asking for help to find a lost dog collar!
MISSING
Electrical dog collar
Worn to the moon by celebrity space dog, Sandy, this priceless moon memento was last seen on the front porch of 66 Polley Wolley Way on 4 January, 2024. No security camera footage is available, due to a muddy paw print on the nearest CCTV camera. Police ask any witnesses to come forward.
Generous Reward Offered!
Attached to the bottom of the poster is a photo of Sandy, wearing the collar and not looking very happy about it.
‘So, that generous reward ... Do you have any idea how much they were offering?’ I ask Jessie.
‘Back then, the government was offering $900,000 for it.’
‘So, I guess it’s worth a lot more than that today?’
‘Squillions more!’
‘No wonder the people at the Records Office don’t want us to find it before they do. They want those squillions all for themselves.’
Jessie’s face seems to glow. ‘Wow. If you managed to find the Cosmic Collar, it’d be the biggest catch for the Museum in centuries. We could build
a whole new display room and share it with the world.’
‘But, I don’t see the words Cosmic Collar on the poster. Where did that name come from?’
‘That was just a nickname that caught on over the years. As each decade passed, more and more people joined the hunt for the collar. It became a legend. Some people even began to believe the collar had magical powers!’
‘Do you know much about Sandy’s life - before she became a resident on Mars?’
‘I don’t remember many details, but ... come with me!’
Oscar and I follow Jessie back out into the storeroom, to a glassed-in bookshelf at the furthest wall. She opens the glass panel on the left side and reaches in for a very old, yellowed book, sealed in a plastic pouch.
‘Have a flick through this,’ she says.
I open the seal of the pouch and very carefully slide the book out. The cover is faded, but I can just read the title: Space Dogs of the 21st Century. There’s a very familiar golden retriever on the front cover. I turn to the Contents page and see that Sandy has her very own chapter, starting on page 48.
‘Listen to this, Oscar,’ I say, reading the first line. ‘Sandy Hirabashi, born in Bluggsville South-West on 8 May 2021, holds a very special place in the history of space dogs ...’
By the time I’ve read the whole chapter out loud, we’ve all learned that Sandy had one brother and two sisters, and that she was the star of her puppy school. She came to the attention of the Bluggsville Space Agency when she won a doggy skateboarding competition at the age of two. Within six months, she’d been sent to the International Space Station, and impressed the crew so much with her stationsteering skills that they offered her the chance to be the first dog to fly to the moon. The Agency designed her a special collar to transmit her flight details back to Earth ... and the rest is very long-lost history!
‘I hope that explains why the Cosmic Collar is still so important to so many people,’ says Jessie. ‘I’d love to see it too, if it still exists.’
‘Well,’ I say, ‘if it’s still down there somewhere, we’ll be bringing it back for the Museum, I promise. Let’s go back down now, Oscar!’
‘Er, Max, it’s nearly 8.30 pm,’ says Jessie. ‘Why don’t you have some sleep before you go back down to ground level?’
Oscar seems to agree. He whimpers and points at his battery read-out. It’s already down to 13 per cent. I think I’d better recharge him, and recharge myselfwith some sleep — ifl can switch my thoughts off after all the day’s excitement!
CHAPTER 5
The Pet-filled Pyramid
Somehow, I do switch my thoughts off - very quickly. By the time I’ve changed into my pyjamas, I’m suddenly feeling very snoozy. I drift off into Sleepyland the moment my head hits the pillow.
When I wake, I feel strangely dizzy, and my right arm feels oddly sore. I realise it’s because I’ve been sleeping on Sandy’s ID chip all night. There’s a tiny rice-shaped dent in the skin above my elbow. It’s very lucky I haven’t crushed it.
At 7.58 am I unplug Oscar from his charger and switch him on. He sits up and rubs his eyes. ‘Ready to find the Cosmic Collar?’ I ask him.
He nods and gives me a thumbs-up, before pointing at his oil pouch.
‘Sorry, Oscar! I forgot your oil change, and your grease block. You definitely deserve them.’
Before we leave, I make good on both promises. It puts Oscar in a very chirpy mood as we make our way to the air-vent pipe!
We take an aircell down to the ground, and as soon as we step out onto the street, I ask Oscar to project up another map to help us find 66 Polley Wolley Way. Luckily, Sandy’s old home seems to be within walking distance.
We turn left into Roobens Road, right into Harreeba Way, and left into Jabbley Boulevard. And then, we see it - a shiny brick building, shaped like a pyramid. It seems to have a blue peak of sparkling solar panels.
‘Wow,’ I say to Oscar. ‘Sandy must’ve been very well paid for her moon mission!’
I notice a sign in front of the main entrance. Moving closer, I realise that a few things have changed since Sandy lived here. The sign says: Bluggsville North-East Robo-dog Pound, established 2412.
As we approach the doorway, I’m sure I can hear the sound of howling hyper-hounds. Oscar slows right down and his ears droop.
‘This is terrible,’ I say to him. ‘Imagine if Sandy knew her old home had been bulldozed and replaced with a robo-dog pound.’
We both know what happens to robo-dogs in these kinds of places. They’re harvested for spare parts and used to repair rich people’s dogs. It’s absolutely terrible. We look each other in the eye.
‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Oscar?’
Oscar nods.
‘Good to know. Let’s get those electro-pups out of there. And ifwe happen to find a squillion-dollar dog collar along the way - even better!’
We walk around the pyramid, looking for a window or another entrance. We eventually find a window at the back, but it’s halfway up the pyramid. The tiles that cover the building are all so slippery there’s no way we can climb up on our own.
‘Any ideas, Oscar?’ I ask.
Oscar winks and suddenly disappears around the nearest street corner. I follow him across the road and into Diane Degano’s Department Store.
‘Where are you taking me?’ I ask. ‘We don’t really have time to go shopping today.’
We pass through the clothing section and the robotic plants, before Oscar leads me into the corridor towards the restrooms. This is all a bit strange - robo-dogs generally don’t need to make use of restrooms! It turns out that isn’t his plan. He runs straight past the restrooms, halts outside the maintenance room door and taps on it with his paw. Nobody opens, but it doesn’t appear to be locked. Oscar nudges the door open with his nose and darts in.
‘Oscar!’ I yelp. ‘What are you doing?’
A moment later, he strolls back out with two old-fashioned toilet plungers in his mouth.
‘Yuck!’ I cry. ‘What do you plan to do with those?’
Oscar lets go of one of the plungers and proceeds to press the other one against the wall. Immediately, its rubber spreads out like a suction pad and sticks to the wall tiles.
‘Why did I ever doubt you?’ I say to him. ‘You’ve just found us a way to get up to that window!’
Strangely enough, no one seems bothered by the sight of Oscar and me walking out of the shop with two old plungers. It feels like stealing, but we’ll make sure we return them when we’re done.
Two minutes later, back at the pyramid, I grab a plunger and stick it onto one of the tiles. Then, placing the other one slightly higher, I grab hold of them both and drag myself up the sloping building with Oscar clinging to my back. It isn’t exactly easy, and it’s extremely slow, but I manage to pull the lower plunger off the tiles and re-stick it above me, slowly sliding myself and Oscar up the slippery wall like a four-legged spider.
The window would have to be about 30 metres above ground. At this rate, we’ll reach it in about 500 years!
Just as we reach halfway, I hear a voice from below. ‘Hey, you! What are you doing up there?’
I glance downward and see a woman in a security uniform, pointing up at us.
‘Oh, hi!’ I yell. ‘We’re just polishing the tiles. Didn’t anyone tell you we were doing this today?’
The guard looks confused. ‘No, nobody mentioned tile-cleaning at our meeting this morning. I’ll have to check with my supervisor.’
While the guard goes off to check up on us, I try to spider-climb a bit faster. Before she comes back, we make it to the window and tumble through with our very handy pair of plungers.
We seem to have dropped into some kind of control room. It’s full of screens, buttons and multi-coloured control panels. On most of the screens, I see sad-looking robo-dogs. Some of them are sitting silently in laser cages. Others have their heads up in the air, howling. I see a little tear in the corner of Oscar’s eye. He mus
t really be upset - beagle-bots don’t even have tear ducts in their eyes.
‘I’m sorry, Oscar,’ I say. ‘I know it’s hard to see this, but we need to stay strong. We’re their only hope.’
Oscar nods and points to the door. Just beside the handle is a map that shows the layout of the entire building. We rush over and look at it closely. The pryamid seems to have six floors that get smaller towards the top. The lower four floors, including this one, are full of robo-dogs. The fifth floor seems to be an office, and the small space at the very top seems to be the power centre that feeds the whole building with electricity. There doesn’t seem to be a secret dog-collar chamber on the map, but I suppose that’s to be expected.
‘Okay,’ I say to Oscar, ‘if we’re going to set these dogs free, we’ll have to get to the sixth floor. Maybe there’s some way we can interrupt the flow of electricity that powers the laser cages?’
We exit the room and find ourselves in a concrete stairwell. Oscar leads the way, leaping up several steps with each bound. The staircase twists and turns as we pass the fifth floor and soon enough, we find ourselves behind a door with a big number six painted on it. I give it a gentle tap and wait to see if anyone’s inside. Nobody answers.
‘What have we got to lose?’ I say to Oscar. ‘Let’s just go in and see what we can do.’
The door isn’t locked, but the moment I push it forward, a squealing alarm sound nearly explodes my eardrums.
‘I don’t think we have long,’ I say to Oscar. ‘Let’s shut this place down!’
Unfortunately, I have no idea what any of the controls in this room are meant to do. The room is a lot like the control room down on level 4 — full of panels with coloured lights - but it also has six large batteries, propped up against the walls. A thick wire leads up to the ceiling from each battery.
‘Any ideas, Oscar?’ I ask.
He responds with a blank face.
I do some thinking aloud. ‘If electricity flows down into these batteries, I wonder what would happen if they sent a surge of electricity back up to the solar panels?’
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