“Do I really have to?”

“Yes!” chorused all the other TricTrucTrackers. “Come on, Eldy! Tell our friends! It's a great story!”

Eldenbeam sighed - a deep, long sigh.

“It was all such a LONG time ago” he said. “Oh well... if you insist... ”

And this was Eldenbeam's tale - of the Magic Malarkerette and the Finding of the Food Mountain.

“When you're a young TricTrucTracker” he said “You have to leave your family to go on your first TrucTrack all on your own. Of course, my ma and pa did all they could to teach me the 99 Laws - which state what a TricTrucTracker may and may not do when searching networld - and the Pathways of Find, all the ways in which the really difficult searches that we take on may be worked through.”

He paused. As if remembering something he didn’t want to.

“But there comes a time – if you want to become truly part of TricTrucTrackerdom - when you must leave your Trucklepad, your home, and strike out on your own. Your task then is to find a Lost One - a net-creature who has lost all cyberpaths - and bring it home. Once you have done that, you have entered the First Calling, and you may begin your life as a TricTrucTracker - but only as a Cadet Finder.”

He sighed again.

“I felt so lonely when I left my ma and pa, and saw our Trucklepad fly away into the far distance, getting smaller and smaller till it was just a pinprick in the net-sky, and then - nothing. I watched and watched till my eyes ached, but they were gone. Part of the test, you see, is whether you can find your way back to your Trucklepad to place your first Lost One in the Record of Recovery, which you can only do from your home... ”

“What’s your home like? How big is it? Does it have a garden?” asked Wizard, putting his head on one side in that way he does when he’s really interested.

Eldenbeam gave the inquisitive Cavalier King Charles a small smile.

“Well, a Trucklepad is as big – or as small - as we want it to be. That’s so that TricTrucTracker families can go wherever they want – because we’re always searching, there is so much that’s lost in Networld.”

“Too true!” murmured Walpurgis, and Carmeramalita nodded her beaky head gravely.

“It’s always been that way” Eldenbeam went on “because the realworld computers you have to use, don’t take enough care to help realworld people keep hold of what they want to keep. And find it when it’s lost.”

Now it was Dot’s turn to nod. She remembered her Dad’s despair when a big presentation he was writing for an exhibition just vanished from the computer at home. Not even their computer whizz Zapotek could find it that time. Dad had had to do it ALL again!

“That’s where we come in” Eldenbeam continued. “Some people say that Luxin systems are better than Macrohard systems, or the other way round, but the truth is that you realworld people are being let down. Still, it means we can do what we love – search-finding!”

Walpurgis looked round at the Tracmapper again. Green, purple, black - green, purple, black.

“Still sidelined!” he said wearily.

SWOOSH-swoosh, went the huge Encorathon they were waiting to enter, its strange reflections of Lucia glinting on its mirrored side as it turned.

“You say – your Trucklepad ‘ome is as beeg or as leettle as you desire” said Fromage, twirling his whiskers. “Comment est-ce…?” *

“Well, we are cyber-creatures, we can change any way we wish” replied Eldenbeam. “Just as Lucia changed that portal we came through, so we could fit. So it is with TricTrucTrackers – in order that we can search anywhere in networld. Trucklepods are a bit like your realworld caravans – everything you need inside the pod. But if we wish, we can cyberthink more space… even outside space for playing and resting – green fields, mountains, anything!”

“Wow, great!” said Dot. The Trucklepad sounded like a great home! “So if I were you… I could cyberthink Swanley Park and there it would be, outside my door…?”

“Exactly!” said Eldenbeam.

“Great walks!” laughed Wiz.

“Toot-TOOOT!” went the little train, sounding impatient as it came out of the Food Mountain again.

“Time to eat!” said Katzilow, rubbing his paws together.

“And then Eldy can tell you how all that - ” he flapped a paw at the little train with its menus “happened because of a crazy mistake!”



* “Comment est-ce?” – “How is that?”