The Phredde Collection (34 page)

So we landed. Well, not so much
landed
as went PLUNK!

‘I don’t know what’s wrong with it!’ said Phredde worriedly, picking herself up off the flying carpet then inspecting herself for bruises. ‘I tried to PING us to wherever the buses are and the carpet just dropped out of the sky!’

‘Mmmph,’ I said, then spat out the mouthful of…well, it wasn’t grass. Green stuff, anyway.
Wet,
soggy, slimy, green stuff. And we were sitting in the middle of it—as what had looked like green grass from above slowly sank around us and smelly black mud oozed up instead. ‘Yuk!’ I muttered, as I tried to scrape black ooze off my tracksuit. ‘Hey, Phredde, PING me clean, will you?’

‘I’m not sure my PING is working properly,’ said Phredde uncertainly.

‘Hey, this stuff is cool!’ yelled Bruce, leaping up froggy fashion and landing
splonk
! so he splashed even more mud onto me.

‘Yeah, but you’re a frog,’ I said, squelching to my feet. I hoiked up the flying carpet before it sank into the bog.

‘I think there’s a dry patch over there,’ said Mrs Olsen. ‘Ooh, that was…interesting!’ she added. She gazed around. ‘I wonder where the Big Koala Wildlife Park entrance gate is?’

‘Dunno,’ I said. ‘Bruce, stop splashing like that!’ I began to trudge over to the knoll Mrs Olsen had pointed out, still dragging the carpet behind me.

It wasn’t much of a knoll, just a sort of bump in the general sludge. I looked around. Green sludge and more sludge, and at the edge of the sludge there were tree ferns and what looked like pine trees and maybe some banana trees except they didn’t have bananas on them—well, they weren’t gum trees, and they weren’t rose bushes or Phaeryland lollipop trees, which covers just about all the trees I can identify.

And the air was hot too, and humid, which it hadn’t been when we left school.

Mrs Olsen looked worried. ‘I can’t see the buses anywhere,’ she said. ‘And there should be a kiosk and picnic tables and a souvenir shop too…It all looks bigger than I expected and—and slimier.’

‘Well, I think this Wildlife Park is cool,’ said Phredde. ‘I wonder if we’ll see any more monsters.’

I shuddered. ‘I hope not!’

‘They won’t be real,’ said Phredde comfortingly. ‘That one looked real!’

‘It was probably radio-controlled. Or computerised or maybe even a hologram or something,’ said Bruce
vaguely. He’s more interested in flies and mozzies than computers. ‘Look, why don’t we just go that way?’ He pointed a froggy hand. ‘We’re sure to get to a path or something.’

I gazed around. All I could see was one thousand shades of green, except where we’d landed and it was oozing black mud—and the sky, which had clouded over and was a sort of blank grey above us.

‘Good idea,’ said Mrs Olsen briskly. She looked at her watch. ‘Even if we have got here first, the buses should arrive soon. We don’t want everyone to have to wait for us. Quick march everyone!’

‘Why can’t we use the flying carpet?’ I asked.

We all looked at the flying carpet. The wet and muddy flying carpet. ‘Flying carpets can’t fly if they’re wet and muddy,’ said Phredde helpfully. ‘We need to wash it and let it dry out. Maybe there’ll be a tap at the kiosk.’ ‘Sure to be,’ said Mrs Olsen.

I shouldered the flying carpet and my school bag. We started walking. Well, okay, Mrs Olsen and I walked, Phredde flew, and Bruce hopped. Or squelched, anyway.

Squelch, squelch, squelch…‘Excuse me, Mrs Olsen,’ I said.

‘Yes, Prudence?’

‘How big is the Big Koala Park?’

Mrs Olsen thought for a few seconds. ‘About twenty hectares,’ she said.

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘Er, Mrs Olsen?’ ‘Yes?’

‘How big is twenty hectares?’

‘Oh, about from here to that stand of trees…Oh,’ said Mrs Olsen, looking round, ‘it does seem a bit bigger than twenty hectares, doesn’t it?’

‘There’s probably lots of vacant land around the park,’ said Bruce, landing happily in a deeper-than-usual pool of mud. ‘We’ll get to the proper park soon. Hey, these gnats are delicious.’

‘Don’t eat in class,’ said Mrs Olsen automatically.

‘But we’re not in class, we’re on an excursion.’

‘Well, don’t eat till you’re told you can,’ she retorted sternly. I looked at her. Mrs Olsen is usually a pretty cool teacher, but she was starting to look…stressed…

Squelch, squelch, squelch.

The clouds thickened above us. The air thickened around us too. It smelt like the rubbish bins at school after a hot weekend and one thousand curried-egg sandwiches. The air grew damper and damper till finally…

‘It’s raining,’ said Phredde dismally. Phaeries hate the rain. It makes their wings droop.

‘You can perch on my shoulder if you like,’ I offered.

‘Thanks,’ said Phredde gratefully, grabbing hold of my hair and hauling herself on board. ‘How far do you think we’ve got to go?’

‘Not far, surely,’ said Mrs Olsen. ‘Oh, I wish I’d brought an umbrella…’

‘No worries,’ said Phredde.

PING
! Nothing happened.

Phredde looked more concerned than ever. ‘I can’t understand what’s wrong!’ she cried. PING!

A giant umbrella hovered above us. I mean it was BIG. It just hung in the air like the magic carpet, except unlike the carpet the umbrella wasn’t zooming anywhere.

‘See?’ I said. ‘Your PING works fine!’ ‘No, it didn’t,’ said Phredde crossly. ‘That was Bruce.’ ‘I didn’t want you getting wet,’ said Bruce to me kindly.

I gave him my best smile. ‘Thanks, Bruce. That’s---’

‘Your hair looks like bits of string when it’s wet,’ he added.

I put my smile away.

‘I think it’s time we all had a little rest,’ said Mrs Olsen. ‘Then maybe Bruce can PING us back to the park entrance.’

I felt a bit miffed that I hadn’t come up with that idea earlier. ‘Good idea,’ I said, just so I didn’t look jealous. ‘Bruce, could you PING up some chairs?’

‘Sure,’ said Bruce. PING!

Suddenly a set of white plastic chairs and a plastic table settled under the umbrella in front of us.

‘Great,’ I said. I hauled my bag up onto the table and got out my banana yoghurt and the little plastic spoon to eat it with. Phredde hauled her gryphon roll out of her invisible carry bag, while Mrs Olsen uncapped her thermos flask and poured something I didn’t want to look at too closely into its cup.

‘Can I zap some insects now?’ asked Bruce hungrily.

Mrs Olsen took a big swig of the bl…, er, red stuff. She sighed happily and took another gulp.

‘Yes, Bruce,’ she said.

‘Great,’ said Bruce. ‘These are the biggest mozzies I’ve ever eaten!’ He gulped one happily. ‘They taste sort of different too,’ he added. ‘Maybe because they’ve been feeding on koalas.’

I looked around. I suddenly realised there’d been a real koala shortage all the time we’d been in the Big
Koala Wildlife Park…mozzies, gnats, swamp, a beast with fangs. But no koalas. Not even any gum trees for koalas to sit in and eat gum leaves…‘Um,’ I said.

‘What is it, Prudence?’ asked Mrs Olsen, dabbing at a red stain on her top lip with her handkerchief.

‘Don’t you think it’s sort of weird that we haven’t seen any koalas yet?’

‘They’re probably in another part of the park,’ said Phredde.

‘Or asleep,’ said Bruce, zapping something with six legs and four wings flapping round my neck. He peered over to the next lot of trees. ‘Anyway, that looks like a koala over there!’

I followed his gaze. ‘Are you sure?’ I asked doubtfully. ‘That doesn’t look like a gum tree to me.’

‘There are lots of sorts of gum trees,’ said Bruce airily.

‘Over six hundred,’ said Mrs Olsen schoolteacherishly, putting the lid back on her thermos and dabbing her fangs with her handkerchief.

I peered over at the tree. ‘I didn’t think koalas were as big as that,’ I objected. ‘I thought they were sort of fluffy, or at least furry…’

Suddenly the koala unfolded its wings. It gave a savage squarkkkk!!! and flapped towards us. ‘…And I didn’t think they had teeth like that either!’ I yelled. ‘Bruce! Phredde! Do something!’

P…i…ing! tried Phredde.

PING! went Bruce.

The koala—or whatever else it had been—disappeared.

We sat on our plastic chairs in the drizzle and stared at the swamp.

‘You know, I don’t think we’re at the Big Koala Wildlife Park,’ I said.

‘Why not?’ Phredde flapped over to my shoulder to get a better view.

‘’Cause koalas are small and cute and fluffy,’ said Bruce, happily splashing over to us, ‘and that flying thing was big and sort of lacking in the cute department and all leathery.’

‘I reckon Phredde went too fast,’ I said. ‘We’ve gone too far.’

‘Um…maybe,’ admitted Phredde.

‘Oh, dear.’ Mrs Olsen looked really worried. ‘I do hope the rest of the class is alright! I really should be there to make sure everything goes smoothly.’

I gazed around the swamp. I reckoned the others were fine! After all, they had the buses to keep dry in.
Not to mention a cafe
and
a souvenir stall
and
cute little cuddly koalas. While all we had was…

‘Here comes another one,’ said Bruce, as an even bigger flapping beast eyed us hungrily.

PING!

The beast disappeared.

‘Okay,’ I said. ‘First of all, we need to find out where we are!’

‘No worries!’ Bruce stopped splashing and looked smug.

PING!

Suddenly a small black box appeared in Bruce’s froggy hand.

‘What’s that?’ demanded Phredde.

‘That,’ said Bruce proudly, ‘is a GPS device. A global positioning satellite device. It’ll tell us exactly where we are.’

‘How?’ asked Phredde.

‘Well, er, the box contacts the satellites above us and um…well, anyway, I just press this button here…’ Bruce frowned. ‘That’s strange. It doesn’t say anything.’

‘Maybe you PINGed up a dud box,’ I suggested.

‘Maybe,’ said Bruce.

PING!

Another box arrived. Bruce pressed the buttons again and peered at the screen. ‘Still nothing,’ he said, surprised.

‘Huh!’ snorted Phredde.

Bruce thought for a minute. ‘Got it!’ he said triumphantly.

PIIIINNNNGGGG!!!!

‘What the---’ exclaimed Mrs Olsen.

Thump
! and suddenly there was a laptop computer and a box of CDs on the plastic table.

A bigger
thump
! and there was Miss Richards, our school librarian, sprawled in the mud in front of us.

‘Oooff,’ said Miss Richards.

Bruce grinned proudly. ‘There you are!’ he said. ‘When in doubt, ask a librarian! And I brought her laptop computer and CDs and things just to make sure she had everything she might need.’

‘What…what happened?’ began Miss Richards. Suddenly she leapt to her feet. ‘Hai!’ she shouted, her hands chopping all round us in a dangerous-looking manner.

‘Er, Miss Richards,’ I began.

Miss Richards raised her leg for a karate kick. (Miss Richards spends all her spare time studying martial arts. She says it’s a very useful skill for a librarian, especially when the books start getting stroppy before they’ve been fed.) ‘Oh, it’s you, Prudence,’ she said, lowering her leg again, ‘and Phredde and Bruce and…’ She blinked. ‘What’s going on?’ she asked.

Mrs Olsen cleared her throat. ‘I’m not sure,’ she said. ‘We were following the buses to the Big Koala Wildlife Park but somehow we seem to have got lost.’

‘And a giant beast tried to eat us and Bruce’s GPS thing won’t work so he PINGed you here instead,’ I added.

‘Oh,’ said Miss Richards. She looked a bit stunned, but librarians get used to new situations pretty quickly, especially if they’re martial-arts experts.

‘So what…’
splosh
…‘we need…’
splash
…‘to know,’ said Bruce, ‘is where…’
sploosh
!

Suddenly he gave an even bigger
sploosh
and disappeared into the mud. Three seconds later he was
back again. ‘This place is sooo great!’ he yelled, dog-, er, frog-paddling towards us. ‘Why don’t we…arrrk!!!!’ ‘Bruce!’ shrieked Mrs Olsen.

‘Hai!’ yelled Miss Richards, but her karate kick was too late. The…the…THING with long gummy lips and lots of tiny teeth and a flat head and
loooonnngg
body had disappeared, taking Bruce with it down into the depths of the swamp.

I suppose if most girls saw their boyfriend (well, Bruce isn’t exactly my boyfriend—he is, after all, a frog—but you know what I mean) disappear down into a swamp with a THING’s fangs around him she’d get upset. But after all, Bruce is a phaery so I just waited for him to PING his way back up again.

Nothing happened.

I peered down into the swamp. A few bubbles plopped up to the surface. ‘Bruce!’ I shrieked.

Another bubble rose up in the mud. ‘Ploop!’ it said, and vanished.

‘Phredde!’ I shouted. ‘Do something! Save him!’

PING
!

PING
!

PING
!

‘I’m trying,’ panted Phredde. ‘But my PING won’t PING properly!’

‘Well, get it PINGing again!’ I shouted. ‘Or Bruce will be digested!’

PING
!

PING
!

PING
!!!!

‘I’m coming, Bruce!’ I screamed. I jumped into the mud just as the beast rose up—which meant
I landed on its back. It was a narrow slippery sort of back too.

The beast went ‘Gloooooomph!’ from the shock of having all those kilos of me land on it (I must ask Phredde not to PING my banana splits with extra nuts and chocolate sauce so they don’t make me too fat) and its mouth opened and spat Bruce out—bleeerrt!—up onto the knoll by our table.

‘Hai!’ began Miss Richards, aiming her right foot, but before she could karate kick it into next Tuesday the beast disappeared back down into the mud.

Bruce gulped three times and spat out a mouthful of swamp. He looked a bit out of breath, but all in one piece—four froggy legs, two froggy eyes—‘What was THAT?’ he panted.

Miss Richards frowned. ‘I think…’ she began. She opened her laptop. There was a whir as it booted up, then she slid in one of the CDs and began to punch in commands. ‘Yep,’ she said. ‘Got it! That was a paracyclotosaurus, and those,’ she gestured at the banana trees, ‘are cycads, and those are club mosses, and those are ginkgoes.’

Splash! The paracyclotosaurus bobbed up again. All we could see were its eyes and upper lip, but there was a LOT of lip and those eyes were staring at us hungrily.

‘Er, Miss Richards,’ I said.

‘Yes?’

‘Why does the Big Koala Wildlife Park have a paracyclotosaurus?’

Miss Richards blinked. ‘Well, it doesn’t,’ she said. ‘Paracyclotosaurus lived about 220 million years ago.’

‘220
million
…years ago?’

‘That’s right. In the Triassic. That’s right at the beginning of the age of reptiles. You know, dinosaurs.’

‘So we’re 220 m-million years ago too?’ stuttered Phredde.

‘Yes,’ said Miss Richards. She waved at the club moss and cycads. ‘And this is what the world looked like back then.’

‘In the past?’ said Phredde, just to make sure. ‘That’s right,’ said Miss Richards. ‘A long way in the past.’

‘Oh,’ said Phredde in a very small voice. ‘I suppose…maybe…I sort of PING!ed us accidentally into the past when I was trying to make the carpet go faster. Maybe we went
so
fast that we went back in time…’

That’s when the paracyclotosaurus jumped out at us.