Chapter Thirteen

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“Watch out!”

Before he had a chance to gulp again Remy felt thundering all around him. “Oh no, another earthquake,” he said. “Under a doorway!”

“No! Quick! This way!” called Lewis and dragged Remy and Eyepod behind a giant twisted tree.

“Whoa,” the breath hissed out of Remy as he peered through the branches.

“Yep.” Lewis’s eyes were wide. Plasma screen wide.

“Are they―?” asked Eyepod.

“―Yep.” Lewis didn’t move.

The thundering faded and the dust from a herd of woolly mammoths settled around them. Remy looked at Lewis and grinned. “Cool.” But before a matching smile had a chance to get comfortable on Lewis’s face his jaw dropped. “Run!” he yelled and sprinted for a strange looking building with an open door.

“GRAAAWL-MWARRRRR!”

Big teeth, big claws, big trouble. Trusting that Eyepod and the fairies were looking after themselves, Remy took off after Lewis as a huge dinosaur charged into view. The sharp yellow spines on its back made a clacking noise as it ran and in the leathery mash of its face, two red eyes swivelled madly. But worse, when he chanced a look over his shoulder, Remy saw a mouth of massive teeth dripping with the blood of some slower animal and claws almost as long as his school ruler. Running like the wind seemed a bit slow and Remy picked up his pace.

“What the… how the…?” he panted after he’d thrown himself through the dark doorway and Lewis had slammed the door shut. Then with his breath returning he managed, “A Dinosaur?”

“Looked liked an Allosaurus to me,” said Umm and Remy jumped as the intergalactic fairy stepped out of the gloom.

“How did you beat us?” said Lewis as Too Cool and Eyepod stepped forward too.

“Rematteriser,” said Umm. “Good for short distance travel emergencies.”

“You could have said something! I thought my heart was going to burst. I don’t think I’ve ever run that fast,” said Remy. Umm just shrugged and flicked a switch. Remy’s eyes bulged. “No way.”

In front of them stretched a long glittering tunnel. Crystal tubes hung from the ceiling, spreading light which bounced and reflected off itself so that instead of a nice even glow, the room seemed to dance with light. One side of the room was transparent and looked out over a vast valley of green trees and dusty mountains. Two suns were setting and a purple haze made everything look unreal. “That looks like a painting,” said Remy. “Or not,” he decided as another herd of woolly mammoths thundered past, closely followed by a hovercraft.

“Oh dear,” said Too Cool.

“Oh dear? This is awesome,” said Remy.

“Yes,” said Umm. “Far too awesome. I think we’ve ended up on Awe. I heard they were doing experiments with intragravitational light bending. Pretty. Useful technology too, but they’re not exactly friendly folk.” He stared again at the light pinging around the tunnel. “We must be in about 3629.”

“The year 3629?” said Lewis.

“Or 3628. But this looks like they’re at the final light stages so I’d say 3629.”

“And the dinosaurs?”

“Hmm, yes, I didn’t think they were into genetic experiments,” said Umm.

“They weren’t,” said Too Cool. “It’ll be the time spaghetti.”

“Ah yes,” agreed Umm. “That break in the un-timer. Yep, time spaghetti.”

“Hang on,” said Lewis. “Did you say that dinosaur was an Allosaurus?”

“Yep, and I think I saw an Eudimorphodon just above your heads. Lucky we weren’t near the sea or he might have had a go at you. Nasty thing an Eudimorphodon bite.”

Lewis looked between the two fairies and then glanced at the mermaid in the corner.

“I don’t think they’re making it up,” said Eyepod.

Lewis swallowed a few times. Opened his mouth to talk, then swallowed again.

Remy looked at Eyepod to translate Lewis’s obviously troubled thoughts. “Seems those dinos shouldn’t be anywhere near each other,” she said.

“Not even close!” Lewis finally spoke up. “Allosaurus are from the Jurassic period but Eudimorphodon are from the Upper Tirassic and Woolly Mammoths were around when humans were on earth. That’s a spread of… its millions, hundreds of millions of years out of order.”

“Time spaghetti,” said Too Cool.

“Not good for you to think about it too hard,” said Umm and pointed a finger at Lewis.

A strange smile spread across Lewis’s face and he drooped as if someone had flicked his awake-switch off.

“Lewis? Lewis! What did you do to him?” said Remy.

“Just gave him a little calm.”

“Well give him some uncalm. He knows more about dinosaurs than anyone else at my whole school. We might need him.”

“He’ll be fine.” Umm smiled apologetically through his moustache. “But he needs to relax or his heart might actually explode. Nasty, makes you bleed from the eyes.”

“Ah, bigger problem.” Too Cool was looking out the wall of the tunnel. “Gorillas at six o’clock and… yes… that looks like a Zaxxon 21 port. Oh dear.”

“Eyepod, keep an eye on Lewis,” said Remy as Zaxxon 21 registered a distant alarm bell. He tried to think. “Zaxxon 21. That sounds familiar.”

“Intergalactic fuel of choice,” said Umm. “Twenty two millitonkies to the gallon. Good for hovercraft.”

“Zaxxon 21… Spaceship… Giles and Miranda… Fix… Oh no,” said Remy.

“Oh dear,” said Too Cool.

“Stop saying oh dear!” said Remy.

“Sorry. Just that it looks like they’ve fixed their half of the un-timer. Probably headed back to your planet with that flagon of fuel they just stole.”

Remy looked at the half an un-timer he still had in his hand. “Mum!” he said.

“Should be okay,” said Umm. “If it really is 3629 the Awe will have developed un-timer technology. Should be able to get a new one.”

“Be nice, don’t you think? Bit more sparkly with the intragravitational effects they’re bound to have installed,” said Too Cool.

“Oi!” said Remy. “Who cares about sparkly bits? We have to stop them! We have to get back first to make sure we save my mum from dying in the earthquake!”

“Ahem.” Eyepod tapped him on the shoulder.

“What now!” yelled Remy.

“Not my fault,” said Eyepod. “But I just thought you should know not to drink the water.”

“What?”

“I thought a little drink might cheer up Lewis, so I… well… probably not a good idea,” said Eyepod.

“No,” said Too Cool. “Intragravitationalised water’s not ideal if you’ve just had some calm.”

Remy groaned. He was almost too tired to ask. To tired, too confused, too mind-bendingly overawed by Awe and the whole intergalactic experience. But he asked anyway. “Not ideal for what?”

Umm pointed at Lewis. “Not ideal for travel.”

A large leathery tail curled at Lewis’s feet. A large, green and gold, heavy dinosaur tail, which seemed to have sprouted from just above the waist band of Lewis’s shorts.

 

 

 

- Illustration by Deborah Hinde