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Trouble in Trickletown

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Chapter 14

A Journey to Remember

Willey’s departure from the Chaseboard Challenge had left him approaching Blue Street Station, but this was no ordinary station! 
This was a station to the stars.
Blue Street Space Station had been built near the top of Blue Street to allow the Fuddles to travel into space.  It was one of Willey’s favourite places and one day he hoped to have a space pod all of his own.


“You must visit Old Man Moon and his Sack of Secrets,” the Orange Envelope had said.
Well this was exactly where they were going – and the space pod sitting on the launch pad was waiting to take them there.
“Jump aboard, Willey!” shouted Teabags, his finger hovering over a large green button.  “Strap yourself in and I will get this thing ready for take-off.”
Teabags looked at all the instruments flickering in front of him.  The Wiggle Fish Control Globe was activated.  And there was nothing telling him they should not take off, so when they were both good and ready, he pressed the large green button.

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“Jump aboard, Willey!” shouted Teabags, his finger hovering over a large green button.  “Strap yourself in and I will get this thing ready for take-off.”

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“Old Man Moon here we come!” declared Teabags, releasing a head of steam from the end of his spout.  His lid was beginning to rattle.
“Have you ever flown one of these before?” enquired Willey, as the space pod zoomed into orbit.
Teabags did not reply – he was too busy fiddling with the controls.
After two near misses with a satellite and a brush with a bright shooting star, Willey concluded that Teabags hadn’t.  So he took hold of the controls himself, and just in time! The troublesome Comet, called Climaticus, whizzed past the cockpit, sending the space pod spinning off in a different direction.
“WARNING!  WARNING!  WARNING!”  A red light flashed across the centre of the control panel.  “UNAUTHORISED SPACE PODS APPROACHING.”
Willey looked at the radar indicator and sure enough there were three more space pods following close behind.
“WARP DRIVE: EMERGENCY SYSTEMS ACTIVATED,” announced the control panel.  Willey just followed the on-screen instructions as the space pod took evasive action.  However, there was nothing anyone could do.  Someone had programmed the space pods to follow each other on their missions, so wherever the leading pod went the others could only follow.

“IMMINENT COLLISION!
PREPARE FOR EMERGENCY LANDING!”
S N A P !    T W A N G !    C R A C K !

The space pod tangled itself in Old Man Moon’s beard and it was followed very swiftly by a Whiz, a Whoosh and a Swoosh as the three other space pods followed in close pursuit.
“FIRE IN THE ENGINES!” shouted Teabags, and sure enough a bright orange glow could be seen outside the window.
“OLD MAN MOON IS ON FIRE! ACTIVATE THE EXTINGUISHERS!”  but it was far too late for that, the flames had set light to his beard and the smoke was drifting up his nose.
”Ah ... Ahhh ... Ahhhh ... C H O O O ...!
Old Man Moon sneezed, and the space pods shot like rockets out of his beard.  Even the Comet Climaticus was thrown out of orbit.  As the space pods hurtled through space, they were heading for the one thing that might stop them.  A small orange planet – Planet Fuddle.
“RE-CALCULATING CURRENT DESTINATION,” said the control panel, as they skimmed the icy waves of an Orange Ocean and then ploughed into the frosty trees of a Flooded Forest.
It had not been the most comfortable of rides, but eventually they came to a stop.
“JOURNEY TIME: FOURTEEN MINUTES – DISTANCE TRAVELLED: TEN MILLION WIGGLES – LOCATION: PLANET FUDDLE,” concluded the control panel, before lowering the revs of the engine and switching off.
It had been less than twenty minutes since Willey left the Chaseboard Challenge, yet now he was floating in a space pod, in the middle of a slushy orange lake, on a strange, but not so distant planet called Fuddle.  And what’s more, he could see a large wooden galleon heading straight for them!

Ding-Ding!  Ding-Ding!  Ding-Ding!

Alarm bells started to ring in the Flooded Forest; HMS Rattle was afloat and her captain was sounding the alarm.
“All hands on deck!  Hoist the mainsail!  Anchors aweigh!”
The bow wave swept the pods aside as the ship sailed past and then drifted back into the mist as curiously and swiftly as it had arrived.
It was Willey who first broke the silence.  “I wonder what happened to the others,” he said, fiddling with the buttons on the radar, but the signal was no longer working.
Teabags tried the radio: “Calling all space pods ... Calling all space pods. Is anyone out there, receiving me? Over.”
Willey and Teabags waited, but there was no reply.
Teabags tried again: “Attention all space pods, is anyone in need of assistance? Over.”
The radio crackled and then came a response that neither of them expected: “Hearing you loud and clear.  Yeah, we’re cool out here, but where in the heavens did all those space pods happen to come from? Over.”
This was not a voice that either of them recognised, so Teabags called again:
“Please identify yourself and confirm your current position.  Over.”
Teabags waited for an answer ...

“Hi, this is Dude, dude, and we are the Pie-Rat Gang from the Sleeping Planet.  You have just released our galleon from the Flooded Forest and we are anchored off the rocks in Biscuit Bay.  Over.”
“The Pie-Rats!” said Teabags, quickly turning off the radio.  “The notorious Pie-Rat Gang from the Sleeping Planet!”  Knicky-Knacky had told him many stories about them and none were good!
There was a very loud knock on the space pod door.
Willey and the Talking Teapot froze to the spot.  If this was the Pie-Rat Gang, they were both in trouble.  The knock on the door came again, but this time it was followed by a voice that Willey knew.
“Let me in, Willey!  Quick!  The trees are chasing me!”
The knocking got even louder, before Willey managed to open the door.  It was Eddy, Willey’s best friend.  He was petrified, freezing and fortunately on his own.
“How on earth did you manage to follow us? And who is in the other two space pods?”  Willey asked.  Because if Eddy had managed to follow them, there could be literally anyone from Trickletown hiding out there! 
“A Time-Line,” replied Eddy. “That is how I managed to follow you.  I grabbed a hand full from the box in the A to Z Alley, as I escaped from Mr Got-a-Lott in the Got-a-Lott Museum. 
“Then when everyone was watching the Trickletown Valleys’ Games the next morning, I crept into Blue Street Town Hall and watched to see where you were heading on the Trickletown Time Model.
“The Talking Teapot was at blue Street Station, so I guessed you might be heading towards the space pods.
“As to who else might have followed us! I have no idea!  Other than I did have the feeling someone was watching me, from among the shadows, in Blue Street Town Hall.” 

It was strange to think that only a short while ago, Willey had gazed up at the Moon from his bedroom window and seen the two distinctive eyes peering back at him.
He had travelled through Time; beneath a circus tent; to a place where “Adventures Begin and Dreams Come True” – but everything seemed to have gone wrong.  The magical Million Wiggle Fish Pond had been locked beneath the surface of Trickletown.  The magnificent Knick-Knack Tree was being held prisoner by the Mists of Time, and the Fuddles were all losing their memories thanks to Willey’s mum and dad and their mysterious ‘memory-loss’ spray.
Willey had been sent on an adventure to find the Hour Glass Key and the Rainbow Fish, but his journey to Old Man Moon had been a disaster.  Now the night was drawing in and he was floating in a space pod among the terrifying trees in a Flooded Forest, on a small orange planet called Fuddle – and between him and the rest of his adventure stood the notorious Pie-Rat Gang and their galleon – HMS Rattle.

“Well that was a journey to remember,” said Teabags, breathing a sigh of relief.  
Unfortunately neither Teabags nor Willey had noticed the dangerous trees approaching their space pod.

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Willey took hold of the controls for himself, and just in time, as the troublesome Comet, called Climaticus, whizzed past the cockpit.

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As the space pods hurtled through space, they were heading for the one thing that might stop them.  A small orange planet – Planet Fuddle.

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Alarm bells started to ring in the Flooded Forest; HMS Rattle was afloat and her captain was sounding the alarm.

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“The Pie-Rats!” said Teabags, quickly turning off the radio.  “The notorious Pie-Rat Gang from the Sleeping Planet!”  Knicky-Knacky had told him many stories about them and none were good!

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Willey had been sent on an adventure to find the Hour Glass Key and the Rainbow Fish, but his journey to Old Man Moon had been a disaster.  Now he was floating in a space pod among the terrifying trees in a Flooded Forest, on a small orange planet called Fuddle.

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