Zombie Bums from Uranus (20 page)

With a steely look in her eye she climbed the ladder, released the hatch door and went outside.

As Judi climbed onto the roof, she gasped with sheer terror at being so close to the Great White Bum. She remembered her mentor and teacher, Silas Sterne, once telling her that to control his fear he used to remember this simple fact: ‘The largest dinosaur that ever walked the Earth had a brain the size of a peanut—the largest bum has even less.'

Still, it was a daunting sight and the stench emanating from it made her feel nauseated and lightheaded.

But no less courageous.

‘Prepare to die!' she announced, lifting the heavy gun up onto her shoulder, squinting against the Great White Bum's brightness.

But the Great White Bum just laughed.

The gale of gas blew the 370TZ Constipator out of Judi's hand, over the edge of the bum-mobile and down into the brown sludge of Uranus.

Judy looked at her empty hands in disbelief.

‘Didn't they teach you anything in school?' said the Great White Bum. ‘I am the GREAT WHITE BUM . . . indestructible and immortal!'

Judi smiled bravely. ‘And didn't they teach you anything in school about personal hygiene?' she said. ‘You don't look that great or white to me. Look at yourself! You're sad, pathetic, filthy, and you're missing most of the skin from your right cheek.'

‘Nobody insults the Great White Bum!' it announced angrily.

‘Wrong!' said Judi. ‘I just did.'

‘I meant nobody insults the Great White Bum . . . and lives!' it said.

‘Wrong again,' said Judi, searching the pockets of her spacesuit for her perfume bomb. ‘My son shot a harpoon into you . . . and he's still alive!'

The Great White Bum visibly brightened. So much so that Judi had to shield her eyes.

‘Not for much longer,' it said. ‘But now I feel refreshed and revived by the methane. First I will kill you, and then I'm going to return to Earth to kill your son and take over the world. Any last words?'

Judi, still searching for the perfume bomb, desperately tried to play for time.

‘You'll never succeed,' she said. ‘You're too late! The Earth has been invaded by zombie bums created by your collision with this planet!'

‘What wonderful news!' said the Great White Bum, brightening again. ‘That was, of course, exactly my plan. By now my Uranusian zombie bums will have had plenty of time to buminate the earth and I can now return and take over. So it's all worked out rather well, don't you think?'

‘Not so fast, Fatso,' said James Freeman, appearing on top of the bum-mobile, a bum-gun in his hands.

‘Ah!' said the Great White Bum. ‘Zack Freeman's father, I presume?'

James nodded.

‘This must be my lucky day!' said the Great White Bum. ‘It started off badly, but it's turned out surprisingly well.'

‘Well, it just took a turn for the worse!' said James Freeman, pulling the trigger of a series 9000 nail-gun.

But the Great White Bum just laughed as the nails bounced off it. ‘Stop it,' it said. ‘That tickles.'

James threw down the nail-gun in disgust and put up his fists. ‘Come and fight like a man!' he said.

‘But I'm not a man,' said the Great White Bum. ‘I'm a bum!'

‘And a very smelly one,' said James.

‘Thanks,' said the Great White Bum as it puffed itself up and prepared to gas the tiny figures standing on the nose of their bum-mobile. ‘It's very kind of you to say so but flattery will get you nowhere. And now . . . YOU DIE!'

‘No,' said Judi, her fingers closing on the perfume bomb. ‘You do.'

Judi pulled the pin of the perfume bomb, counted silently to three and threw it at the Great White Bum.

But as she did so, the Great White Bum let fly with the most deadly poisonous blast of gas it had ever discharged in its entire life.

There was an enormous explosion as the putrid gas and the fragrant perfume collided . . . and then silence.

Z
ack and his bum hokeyed.

Zack and his bum pokeyed.

Zack and his bum hokey-pokeyed down what was left of the main street, on to the road that led out of Mabeltown and towards the Maggotorium, leading a vast conga-line of hokey-pokeying zombie bums.

‘You do the hokey pokey and you turn around . . .' sang Zack at the top of his voice. The zombie bums all turned around. ‘And that's what it's all about!' Zack clapped his hands twice and the zombie bums all did the same . . . all the way back down the line.

‘I'm sick of the hokey pokey!' said Zack's bum, as they launched into the beginning of the whole song and dance again.

‘We can't stop now,' whispered Zack. ‘If we do they could turn on us. We'll end up zombie-bummified quicker than you can say “zombie-bummification”.'

Zack began the next verse, ignoring his bum's loud sigh.

They hokeyed.

They pokeyed.

They turned around—all the while gaining scores of fresh zombie bums as they abandoned their hosts to join in the dance.

As Zack hokey-pokeyed up towards the entrance to the Maggotorium he saw Gran, Eleanor, the Forker and the Flicker forming a guard of honour beside the bum-mobile.

Eleanor smiled at Zack. ‘I didn't know you could dance,' she said.

‘Just the hokey pokey,' shrugged Zack, self-consciously.

‘Nice footwork, soldiers,' said Gran.

‘Good going, Zack!' yelled the Flicker,

‘See? I told you it would work!' said the Forker, raising his fork high in the air.

‘Your “instructions” were wrong,' said Zack's bum. ‘They almost got me killed!'

‘Nobody's perfect,' said the Forker.

‘You're right about that,' said Zack's bum, lifting its leg and burping as it hokey-pokeyed past the Forker.

The Forker, gagging and choking, waved his fork at Zack's bum.

Meanwhile Zack had reached the manhole that led down to the Maggotorium and was lowering himself
down the ladder, hokey-pokeying all the while—which is no mean feat when you're trying to climb down a ladder. Zack's bum hokey-pokeyed quickly down after him.

The hokey-pokeying zombie bums followed obediently. They, however, were too big and clumsy to climb down ladders and do the hokey pokey at the same time. Most of the zombie bums ended up plummeting downwards and bouncing all over the Maggotorium like beachballs.

‘What do we do now?' said Zack's bum, trying to shield itself from the zombie bums crashing down all around them.

‘Get as far away from the ladder as possible and just keep doing the hokey pokey!' said Zack. ‘If we stop doing it then they'll stop doing it and then we'll
really
be in trouble.'

Zack and his bum hokey-pokeyed as far into the Maggotorium as the dim light allowed.

Sure enough, despite the shock of the fall, the bruised and dazed zombie bums continued to be mesmerised by the hokey pokey.

‘I'm
really
sick of the hokey pokey now,' said Zack's bum as it and Zack danced in front of the hokey-pokeying army of zombie bums. ‘How much longer do we have to do this?'

‘Not much longer,' said Zack, turning around searching in the gloom for the Mutant Maggot Lord's army of giant mutant maggots. ‘We're just waiting for the mutant maggots.'

Zack's bum looked behind them into the gloom. ‘Where are they, anyway?'

‘Good question,' said Eleanor, hokey-pokeying her way through the zombie bums with the Forker, the Flicker and the Pincher up to where Zack and his bum were dancing. ‘And where's the Mutant Maggot Lord? I knew we shouldn't have trusted him. It's a trick! He's led us all into another trap! The only feast around here is going to be us, and meanwhile, with the zombie bums safely tucked away down here he'll take over the world with his mutated maggots. How could we all have been so dumb?'

‘You can't help it,' said a haughty voice from the darkness behind them. ‘You are only humans after all, aren't they, Maurice?'

‘Oh yes, Master, that is unfortunately so,' said Maurice.

The Prince and Maurice shuffled forward, eyeing the zombie bums nervously.

‘Where are the mutant maggots, you little punks?' said the Flicker.

‘Language!' said Gran.

‘And where is the great Mutant Maggot Lord?' said the Flicker. ‘He said he'd be here.'

‘And I am,' said the Mutant Maggot Lord, dragging his rag-covered form out of the darkness towards them. ‘What a pity I can't join in your little dance. It looks like such fun.'

‘We've kept our part of the deal,' said Zack, ignoring the Mutant Maggot Lord's sarcasm. ‘Now you keep yours.'

‘But of course!' said the Mutant Maggot Lord. ‘I simply took the precaution of keeping my mutant maggot army hidden. I didn't want the feasting to
start before
all
of the zombie bums were inside.'

The Mutant Maggot Lord clicked his fingers.

Zack shivered as the Maggotorium filled with the eerie sound of thousands of mutant maggots dragging themselves across the Maggotorium floor.

‘Ah, my lovely girls and boys,' whispered the Mutant Maggot Lord. ‘I have a wonderful surprise for you.'

Zack watched as the mutant maggots formed a huge white wall in front of the zombie bums.

‘Block the exit!' said the Mutant Maggot Lord to the Prince and Maurice. ‘Nobody . . . no zombie bum—and no mutant maggot—leaves until this is over.'

‘I'll just be going then, shall I?' said Zack's bum. ‘After all, I don't technically fit into any of those categories and . . .'

‘Shut up,' said the Mutant Maggot Lord.

‘Language!' said Gran.

‘I beg your pardon,' said the Mutant Maggot Lord. ‘Now shut up and keep dancing.'

The tone of the Mutant Maggot Lord's voice alarmed Zack. He looked up over his shoulder. The maggots rose high above him. One dribbled a long sticky strand of saliva onto his shoulder.

‘Gross!' said Zack. ‘Maggot-spit!'

‘Let the feast begin!' commanded the Mutant Maggot Lord.

Zack, his bum and the other bum-fighters dived for cover behind the two closest concrete pillars as the white wave of maggots advanced towards the helplessly hokey-pokeying zombie bums.

Zack closed his eyes. He'd seen the mutant maggots in action back in the bumcano, and it hadn't been pretty. The zombie bums didn't stand a chance.

But when Zack opened his eyes again, he saw to his surprise, that the mutant maggots hadn't eaten a single zombie bum.

‘What are you waiting for, my darlings?' yelled the Mutant Maggot Lord. ‘Eat to your heart's content!'

But the mutant maggots would not start eating. They shrank from the zombie bums, who, slowly waking from the spell of the hokey-pokey were now advancing on the maggots.

‘What's happening, Kisser?' said Eleanor. ‘You said your mutant maggots would eat them! If they don't hurry up they're going to be zombie-bummified and then we'll all be in for it.'