The Bare Bum Gang and the Holy Grail (4 page)

Now that the tower block was going to be demolished, the whole area was basically a giant building site with cranes and wrecking balls and dumper trucks and piles of building materials.

We all stood and looked at it now, staring through the wire fence that surrounded the site. The wasteland was as brown and grey as an old man’s teeth, and the tower reached into the sky like a bony witch’s finger. It had been sunny when we’d all set out, but now the sky was dark and gloomy. Even Rude Word looked depressed. Normally, when he was in a new place, he’d make a point of weeing on everything (and everyone), but
now
he just made a whining sound, and hugged my leg. I don’t suppose I was the only one wishing he (or she, in Jennifer’s case) was back at home lying in front of the telly watching cartoons.

‘Let’s get this done,’ I said, trying to sound more hopeful than I felt.

‘Have you got a plan?’ Noah asked.

‘Of course,’ I replied. ‘But first let’s do an equipment check.’

I made everyone unload what was in their packs. Jenny had a hairbrush (useful, she explained, in close hand-to-hand combat), some lip salve (cherry flavour), and a spare thingy for tying her hair up. Jamie had a sausage roll and a scotch egg which he said were dual function – you could eat them, or throw them at your attackers. The Moan had a pack of Top Trump cards (‘In case we get bored,’ he said), and Noah had his full expedition-grade medical kit.

I had the best gear. I’d brought my new multi-tool, which I’d got for my birthday.
It
was really clever, and had lots of useful gadgets hidden away in it, such as: some scissors; a thing for getting stones out of horses’ hooves; a magnifying glass; a hammer; some pliers and a (very small) saw – useful for sawing (very small) twigs in half. I also had some string (only my second-best string, in case I lost it), some matches with the heads dipped in melted wax to keep
them
dry, a harmonica (to play in prison if we got captured), my pen torch, a tube of toothpaste (you can use it to dissolve the bars on prison windows, plus it’s good for brushing your teeth with) and, best of all, my German U-boat Captain’s binoculars. I knew they were German U-boat Captain’s binoculars because that’s what the man in the market said when he sold them to my dad. I suppose you could argue that they were evil binoculars, because U-boats used to sink our ships in the war, but you can’t really blame the binoculars for that.

Anyway, they were probably the best binoculars in the world, so I didn’t mind if they were a little bit evil, say ten to fifteen per cent. It’s only when things get to be twenty-five to fifty per cent evil that you should throw them away.

We put our things back in our packs and I led the way along the road to the main gate into the wasteland. Like I said, there was a high fence all around the site.
The
bottom part of the fence was just ordinary wire, but the top part was razor wire, which is like barbed wire, but more deadly. It’s designed to rip your guts open so your insides, including your liver, kidneys, intestines, stomach, etc., etc., all fall out if you try to climb over it, which I think should be against the law
and
illegal.

The gate was usually locked up with a chain, so you couldn’t just push it open. However, it was lower than the fence and, most importantly, there wasn’t any razor wire on top to slice your guts open. The top of it was level with my head.

‘What now?’ asked The Moan.

‘We go over,’ I replied. ‘Give me a leg up, Jamie.’

Jamie was as strong as an ox. Well, a small ox. A baby one. But that’s still quite strong, compared to, say, a newt or a rabbit. Without complaining he knelt on all fours and let me climb on his back. It was still a long way up to the top of the gate,
but
I managed to swing one leg over.

At exactly that moment, a loud voice rang out.

‘Oi! You! What do you think you’re playing at?’

And with the voice there came a terrifying growling and snarling, as if a Hound of Hell had been loosed upon us.

Jamie collapsed, leaving me dangling with one leg on each side of the gate, which, I can tell you, was not very comfortable.

But that was the least of my problems.

Chapter Five

THE GATEKEEPER

I LOOKED UP
and saw a man striding towards me. He was dressed like an SS Stormtrooper with a black uniform and a black helmet and big black boots and he was waving a long black truncheon and he looked about as mean as a velociraptor with toothache. He had a badge on his black jacket with a picture of a mailed fist (which isn’t actually a fist you post through the mail, but a fist covered in chain mail).

It wasn’t the man who’d done the snarling, but the gigantic dog straining at the leash he was holding.

The man had emerged from a little hut with the words GROUP 9 SECURITY written on it, along with a bigger version of the mailed fist from the badge.

I hadn’t realized the building site was controlled by Group 9. Group 9 Security were infamous, which is the bad version of famous. It was well known that if they caught you messing about where you shouldn’t be, whether on a building site like this, or a car park, or if you were being naughty in the shopping centre, they’d give you a great big kick up the bum and then take you to the police, who’d put you straight in jail and throw away the key.

The Group 9 dogs were even more infamous. It was said that they were given torn-up boys’ trousers mixed in with their dog meat to train them to bite you on the bum. It worked like this:
Yum yum yum
(that is the dog thinking, by the way),
this is nice dog meat – not sure about these bits of trouser, though – but wait, let me think . . . I suppose that
means
that nice dog meat like this lives inside trousers, so all I have to do to get as much nice dog meat as I like is to chew up whoever is wearing trousers, especially if it is a small boy
.

This dog was even uglier than Rude Word, as well as being much bigger. He was dragging the Group 9 Security man as if he was a little child. The dog’s lips were curled back, showing his huge fangs, which looked like this:

It was the kind of dog cave men would have used to help them hunt woolly mammoths, woolly rhinoceroses, woolly giant bears, woolly giant killer sheep, etc., etc.

Being a mammoth-eating dog’s dinner was not how I wanted to die. I tried to
get
down off the gate, but it was really hard to swing my leg back over. Jenny was screaming at me, and Noah and The Moan pulled and tugged, which just made things worse. The dog was getting closer and closer, along with the Group 9 man and his nasty truncheon. In the end I just sort of fell off – luckily onto the outside, or I’d have been gobbled up for sure.

The dog threw itself at the fence, barking like a mad thing.

‘Down, down,’ the man yelled, yanking at the leash.

I looked for Rude Word. He was hiding behind Noah, who was hiding behind The Moan, who was hiding behind Jenny, who was hiding behind Jamie. Jamie had his eyes shut, which he believed made him invisible.

‘Can’t you kids read?’ the man shouted.

‘Yes, we can read,’ I replied, ‘including Jamie, as long as there aren’t any big words.’

‘Read that then,’ he growled, pointing with his truncheon to a big sign that said:

PRIVATE PROPERTY

TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED

‘Got that? It’s dangerous here. There’re hazards. Building sites aren’t playgrounds. Now clear off.’

‘Actually,’ I replied calmly, ‘we’re on the street, which belongs to everyone.’

‘Don’t you cheek me, you little hooligan. You were climbing over this gate, and don’t deny it. And you can thank your lucky stars you never made it, because this dog here hasn’t had its dinner yet.’

So, it was true! They really were trained to eat little boys! I gulped.

‘I was just trying to get my stick,’ I said.

‘What stick?’

I looked around. ‘That one,’ I said, with relief, pointing to a knobbly twig on the other side of the fence.

Now, I like sticks. Not as much as Jamie, but I like them. They’re one of the best things for playing with when you haven’t got any real toys. And the great thing about a stick is that if you break it in half, you haven’t got a broken stick, but two sticks. Cool, eh? Try that with a machine gun or a bazooka.

The Group 9 guy went and picked up the stick. He came back and held it out to me, over the top of the gate. As I was about to take it, he whipped it away and dangled it in front of his dog. The hellhound’s eyes lit up, and it clamped down on the poor stick with its deadly jaws and mashed it to bits in seconds. Then it ate the shreds.

Without another word the guard turned round and went back to his little hut, dragging the dog with him. Just as they were disappearing, Rude Word came out of hiding and gave one feeble bark, but when the Group 9 dog turned for a last snarl, he whimpered and hid behind Noah again.

Chapter Six

THE TUNNEL OF DOOM OR DEATH OR SOMETHING

‘I NEVER WANT
to see that thing again,’ said Noah, still trembling slightly. ‘I mean, what kind of dog was it anyway? It didn’t look like any species I’ve ever seen before.’