Before I know it, I’m dangling from the bumper by my arms! All I can do is hang on with every bit of strength I can muster, and hope someone in the bus needs to get off soon!

  It feels like an eternity, but eventually the bus plummets toward the ground. It slows a few feet above the road, and touches down gently. We tumble across the footpath as an elderly man steps out from the front door.

  “Yikes!” I say to Oscar. “I think we’ll take it on foot from here, don’t you?”

  Oscar nods and wipes his brow with a paw.

  By now, we’re on the very edge of Bluggsville. According to the GPS unit, we’re supposed to turn left in 60 feet. The strange thing is, there’s no street to turn left onto. It’s just a big patch of dusty, empty land, with a few old brick buildings in the distance. “Oh well,” I say to Oscar, “we’ve come this far. There’s no point stopping now.”

  We turn left where the GPS unit tells us to. On the screen, there’s now a road stretching far off into the distance. As we walk along, I scuff the dust with my foot and see the remnants of a footpath. It’s just enough to convince me that the GPS unit still knows what it’s talking about!

  “Still a half a mile to go,” I say to Oscar. “It doesn’t seem like there’ll be much to look at.”

  Just then, Oscar lets out a little squeak and points a paw at the top of the GPS unit. I realize he’s trying to tell me something about the battery – it’s already down to 32 percent!

  “Yikes!” I yelp. “Wherever we’re going, we’d better get there quickly!”

  We double our speed and ten minutes later we find ourselves approaching a brick building that looks like a repair garage for hover-cars. There’s a small sign above its front door: Bluggsville Art Gallery Warehouse, Dorsey Memorial Wing.

  It seems like a strange place for an art warehouse, but I suppose they’ve got to keep their spare paintings somewhere! I look down at the GPS unit. It tells us we’re now only 150 feet from its previous owner’s home. There’s definitely no house there anymore. All I can see is an old utility pole and some tall, weedy strands of grass.

  “We may as well go and have a look around there anyway,” I say to Oscar. “Maybe there’ll be some ancient ruins in the grass.”

  My hopes fade as we walk on and the GPS unit tells us we’ve reached our destination. All we find is a patch of dusty grass and a rusty old mailbox on the ground. It’s very disappointing after everything we’ve been through to get here. There’s a number on the mailbox – 230 – and a name: Aretha Dorsey. Neither of them mean anything to Oscar or me.

  “Nothing to see here,” I groan. “We may as well just go back the way we came.”

  At that very moment, Oscar’s ears prick up and his eyes triple in size. He seems to be looking at something behind me. I turn around and see that a van-copter has suddenly parked outside the warehouse. Three people, dressed in black from head to toe, climb out of it and gather in front of the warehouse door. In perfect sync, they take laser pens out of their pockets and aim them at the door.

  They’ve obviously done this before – their beams meet at exactly the same point, and they guide them over the door until they’ve lasered a big, round hole in it. One by one, they tumble through it.

  “I … kind of don’t think they’re meant to be doing that,” I say to Oscar.

  He nods slowly.

  “So, what should we do?”

  Oscar points a paw toward the warehouse and nods again, slowly.

  “You’re right. We can’t stand by while criminals sneak away with Bluggsville’s art treasures. But how do we … ?”

  Without any warning, Oscar starts crawling toward the warehouse, through a patch of dead grass. I do the same, but not nearly as smoothly. The grass tickles my face, and suddenly I need to sneeze! I have to squeeze my nose with one hand until we reach the edge of the patch. And then, I sneeze so hard, birds on top of the warehouse screech and flap away. Oscar looks back at me with terror on his face.

  “Sorry!” I whisper. “This grass is getting up my sniffer.”

  I look over toward the warehouse. We’re only one bald patch of ground away from the door. This time, I lead the way. “Follow me, Oscar!” I whisper.

  Oscar’s ears prick up as I stand and run toward the van-copter. A moment later, he bounds over and joins me. The second he arrives, we hear voices … getting closer and louder.

  I look down and see Oscar taking shelter behind my legs. The moment I look back up, the three men step backward through the hole in the warehouse door, carrying a heavy, round piece of metal, about three feet wide.

  Suddenly, we need to be invisible, but there’s nowhere to hide – except for one very dangerous place! It’s our only option. I lift up the back hatch of the van-copter and dive into the storage compartment. Oscar leaps in behind me.

  The first thing I see is a black plastic sheet, crumpled on the floor. We climb under it, not a second too soon. The moment we’re fully covered, we hear the hatch open up and feel something very cold and heavy being placed on top of us.

  “Quick. Let’s get out of here before the security-bots turn up,” says a gruff voice.

  “My turn to drive!” says another voice, and Oscar suddenly twitches. It’s a very familiar voice … but surely it can’t be who I think it is.

  Just then, we hear the hatch slam down and the engine roaring to life. I grab onto Oscar as the vehicle lifts up off the ground and zips forward like a dart.

  CHAPTER 5

  A Big Holo-hop

  Down under our plastic sheet, I can hear muffled voices from the front of the van-copter. Ever so slowly, we push the mysterious heavy thing aside, peel back the sheet, and look around the vehicle. It’s mostly empty, apart from a few shelves with wrapped bundles strapped onto them. We can’t see through to the driver’s compartment. Hopefully that means they can’t see us either!

  As we untangle ourselves from the plastic, we see what they laid down on top of us – the same metal thing we saw them taking from the warehouse. It looks like a concrete drain lid, but there’s something intriguing about it – a small control panel on one of its edges. At the top of the panel there’s an engraved brand name logo: Holo-sculp.

  “Any idea what that means?” I whisper to Oscar.

  Oscar shakes his head, but before I have another moment to think about it, he taps the on button on the panel. Suddenly we’re bathed in light, with a strange-looking man standing above us!

  I hear myself screaming, until Oscar shuts my mouth with both of his front paws. When he lets go, I take a deep breath and look up at the man.

  “I’m sorry,” I squeak. “Don’t hurt us. We’re only here by accident!”

  The man completely ignores me.

  Looking more closely at him, I realize he’s not entirely solid. I can see the wall of the van through one of his hands! He unravels a scroll of paper and starts reading from it. “Hear ye, hear ye! On this 18th day of February, 1897, I proudly proclaim the formation of the City of Bluggs-burger-ville!”

  I look down at Oscar. “Bluggs-burger-ville?”

  He opens his eyes wide and nods slowly at me, as if I’m the only person on Earth who doesn’t know Bluggsville’s original name.

  “Wow,” I say, “I’m glad someone decided to shorten it!”

  I look back up at the man. He’s now rolling up the scroll. It’s only now that I notice what he’s wearing – a long red coat, a pirate-style hat, and black boots. He has a thick brown mustache and mutton-chop sideburns. There’s a shiny bugle hooked to his belt, and he’s wearing a brass name badge. As soon as I read it, my mind does a somersault.

  Derek Boodelberg-Chan.

  I may not know much about Bluggsville’s history, but everyone knows who Derek Boodelberg-Chan was – Bluggsville’s first mayor. He must have died about 500 years ago, but here he is, sharing the back of a van-copter with me and Oscar! He grabs the bugle from his belt and lifts it to his mouth. He’s just about to blow into it when Oscar leaps over me and hits the Holo-sculp’s off button. The mayor disappears just before he blasts our ears off – and the thieves’ ears too.

  “This … Holo-sculp thing belongs to the people of Bluggsville,” I say to Oscar. “We can’t let these thieves get away with this.”

  Oscar nods again, and taps the machine back on.

  “Oscar, what are you doing?!”

  The moment Oscar switches him back on, the mayor appears in the air again, performing exactly the same actions and saying the same words. This time, however, Oscar hits the volume button before he gets his first sentence out. As the mayor goes quiet, Oscar points at the control panel.

  I tap the menu on the little screen and see a list of names. I recognize most of them – Betty Bonetti, Cheryl Wu, Albert Singh, and Bernie Bolanos. They’re all well-known figures in the history of Bluggsville.

  I tap on the name Cheryl Wu, and a moment later she’s standing above us, quietly delivering a speech about the importance of solar power. She’s wearing a green dress with big puffy shoulders, and has her hair up in a bun. There’s now some text on the control panel: Environmental Award Speech, Bluggsville City Hall, March 7, 1989.

  “Wow,” I say to Oscar, “this is pretty cool. Who needs real statues when you’ve got one of these?” Just then, I notice some words engraved into the side of the Holo-sculp: © Aretha Dorsey, 2022.

  “This is incredible!” I say to Oscar. “Aretha Dorsey must have invented this thing … and our GPS unit must have belonged to her!”

  The Holo-sculp is obviously much older than it looks, and probably much more valuable too. I wish there was a way we could return it to the warehouse, but all we can do is dig ourselves back under the plastic sheet and stay as quiet as possible.

  We spend another 15 minutes huddled under there, before we feel the engine slowing and the vehicle descending. It comes to a bumpy landing, and we soon hear voices approaching. Before long, someone opens the back hatch. I lie there like a statue and try not to breathe.

  “We’ll have to take it through the front door,” says a voice. “There’s another van-copter in the loading bay at the moment.”

  “A beautiful specimen, isn’t it?” says someone else. “It’s the only one Dorsey made before she retired. It must be worth a fortune.”

  A moment later, we feel the weight of the Holo-sculp lifting off us, and hear the hatch slamming down. We wait a few seconds before dragging the plastic sheet back and looking around. Through the back window I can see the same three people carrying the Holo-sculp toward another old building.

  Now, they’ve all uncovered their faces, and I realize I wasn’t wrong about the familiar voice. Grunting as he steps backward with the Holo-sculp, it’s our old enemy, Captain Selby of the Unclaimed Urchins Recapture Squad. He’s been trying to drag me back to the Skyburb 7 Home for Unclaimed Urchins for the last two years. This is quite a surprise. I knew he was mean, but I didn’t know he was a thief as well!

  When we’re sure they can’t see us, we leap out of the van-copter. I quietly close the hatch behind us and look around. We’re now in a much more built-up area. On both sides of the street, we see old buildings, probably built back in the 23rd century – maybe even older!

  We watch on as Selby scans his tongue on a scanning pad and the door of the old building slides open. They drag the Holo-sculp inside and the door slides shut behind them.

  “Any idea where we are?” I say to Oscar.

  Oscar tries to project a map into the air above his back, but all we get is an empty green square. A message appears at the top of it: Weak signal – try again later. We must be too far from the Bluggsville Splinternet Center to get a clear signal.

  “So … what do we do now?” I ask him. “Well, I guess we could hitch a ride back,” I say to Oscar, “but I don’t think we can go home without putting those crooks behind laser-bars, can we?”

  Oscar shakes his head and lifts a paw for a high-five.

  “Excellent! Now, all we need is a plan!”

  We run to the other side of the street and rest in the shade outside a techno-toyshop. From there we can see the thieves’ building, but hopefully they can’t see us.

  “So,” I say to Oscar, “somehow we need to get in there, rescue the Holo-sculp, drag it back to the city, and deliver those thieves to the police. Any ideas?”

  Oscar tilts his head and turns both of his front paws upward.

  At that very moment, I feel a hand on my shoulder and jump so high I nearly hit the awning above us. I turn around and see a very familiar face.

  “Max! I knew it was you! You look a bit lost – although, you always did look a bit lost at school!” “Lily?” I gasp. “Lily Mareeba?”

  “That’s me,” she says. “I’m glad you still remember my full name.”

  “But … the people back at the Home told me you’d …”

  “I know, I know. They told everyone I’d been arrested and sent to a real prison. They didn’t want you all to know I escaped and that they weren’t clever enough to catch me. Which makes me wonder, how come you’re here and not there?”

  “Well, actually, I escaped about three months after you did!”

  “Nice work, Max! You must be smarter than you look!”

  “Er, thanks, Lily.”

  Lily gives me a high five and asks us to join her for a milkshake at the Shake-arium next door. As we go through the door, I hear the van-copter lifting off outside.

  We sit down and Lily orders the shakes. While we wait, we share the stories of our escapes. As far as we know, we’re the only two people who’ve ever done it without being recaptured.

  “We’re both quite clever, aren’t we,” she says. “But what on Earth brings you here? It’s a great place to hide, but there’s not much to do around here.”

  “Believe it or not, we accidentally hitched a ride here with some Holo-sculp thieves.”

  “Some what?”

  “Some suspiciously dressed people who stole an old machine that projects holographic sculptures of famous people into the air.”

  Lily laughs. “I see.”

  “And we figured we’d find a way to steal it back, now that we’re here. Wherever here is.”

  “Here is the beautifully boring town of Binglewood. Welcome to you both.”

  “Thanks.” I look around at the empty street. “I can see why you’d come here to be forgotten about.”

  “Those thieves must be thinking the same thing.”

  “I think you could be right.”

  “So … do you know where they took this … Holo-sculp thing?” Lily asks.

  “Well, actually, yeah. See that building just over the road? Right there.”

  “That’s funny,” says Lily. “I’ve been keeping my eye on that place for a while. I’ve seen some strange-looking people going in and out.”

  “Well, how about we go and have a look around?” “That sounds like fun!”

  Oscar seems more eager than either of us. He trots out the door before we’ve even paid for our milkshakes.

  “Sorry, Lily,” I say. “My pockets are a bit empty at the moment.”

  “That’s okay, you can buy me a milkshake the next time we bump into each other in the middle of nowhere.”

  “That’s a deal! Thanks, Lily.”

  We follow Lily across the road. It’s nice to cross a main street without having to dodge hover-traffic. As we approach the building, I see a sign above its door: Jerry’z Ice Creamz. Strangely, though, I can’t see too much evidence of frozen treats. All the blinds are drawn and the front door seems very much locked.

  “Come with me,” says Lily. “Let’s take a look around the back.”

  There’s an alley running down each side of the building. We take the one on the left, and soon find ourselves peering over an old wooden fence into a concrete loading bay. The van-copter we arrived in is now parked there, its propeller blades still revolving slowly.

  “Can you see any way in?” I ask Lily.

  “How about that window … up there?”

  I look all the way up to the top of the building and see one open window, with curtains flapping in the wind.

  “That’s a nice idea,” I say to Lily, “but how do we get up there?”

  Lily rolls her eyes at me. “Come on, Max, didn’t you learn anything up on Skyburb 7?”

  I probably learned a few things up there, but I’ve tried hard to forget most of them.

  “Don’t you remember when they taught us to climb down the sides of the Skyburbs? They wanted us to polish them so they’d look nicer from the ground.”

  “Hmm,” I reply. “I think I must’ve slept through that lesson.”

  “It’s just as well I stayed awake. And I’ve still got the anti-gravity gloves they gave us that day. They’ve helped me make some narrow escapes from the Recapture Squad.”

  “Wow, I’d better get a pair of those too!”

  Lily reaches into her pocket and drags out a pair of metallic purple gloves. “I’ll go up first,” she says, “and then I’ll throw them down to you.”

  “And then I’ll throw them down to you!” I say to Oscar.

  “See you up there,” says Lily.

  “Oh, and, there’s one more thing I should probably tell you.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Captain Selby from the Recapture Squad – he’s one of the thieves!”

  “Really?” says Lily. “In that case, let’s not waste any more time!”

  Before we know it, Lily’s climbing the brick wall with the gloves. She slides up the wall as if it’s made of ice, and tumbles headfirst through the window. A few seconds later, she drops the gloves down toward us.

  Before I start climbing, I figure Oscar should probably go first, in case he needs help. I slide the gloves over his two front paws and lift him onto the wall. He slides up as easily as Lily did, and soon tumbles through the window behind her.

 

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