And there he was – Cursor the Cat, back to the rescue! There was  no mistaking the sleek black figure with the yellow eyes, coolly moving across the Search Zone landscape. As usual, he seemed to have come from nowhere: and as usual, he was back in charge in an instant.

Blackshanks let out a nervous, angry squawk. “CRAAACCCK!” he went, ruffling his glossy black feathers. “Who asked you to get involved? We’ve got business to conclude here! You can stay out of it!”

Cursor pretended to jump at the sound of Blackshanks’ voice. Then, very slowly – like a leopard in a wildlife film Dot had once seen on TV – he padded softly over to where Blackshanks was standing on the Search Zone port. He stopped and lay down curled up beside it and started to clean himself – just like Macduff, the cat from next door to the Coms. Only MUCH bigger of course!

Lick lick he went. Brush brush with his rough cat’s tongue, till his coat was sleeker and glossier than ever. But all the time his fierce yellow eyes were fixed on Blackshanks.

The canary / crow didn’t like this a bit. He went up and down on top of the Search Zone port, muttering angrily to himself.

Finally he couldn’t stand it any longer. “Clear off!” he said. “Go and do your dry cleaning somewhere else, blooming cat!”

Cursor’s paw began to tap. Dot remembered that. It usually meant something was about to happen – something the bad guys wouldn’t like AT ALL!

“Cursor the Cat – that’s my name

Top dude here, in the software game

Data Protection - that’s my aim

Dissing Inverters’ – that’s no pain!”

Then - ZVIISSH! Cursor’s paw moved so fast you could hardly see it. Blackshanks certainly didn’t, or he’d have flown off. But it was too late – he was pinned to the floor by one mighty paw, while with the other Cursor continued his lazy licking and grooming.

The big cat gave a final lick to his glossy coat, and then looked down at the crow / canary struggling under his paw. He grinned – a big, lazy Cursor grin. And rapped on!

“Now you gonna deal – do the right thing?

You wanna get back your Inverter’s wings?

Let the mouse go first – yo’ better begin

Or down you go - Recycle Bin!”

Blackshanks stopped struggling and his beak dropped open. “You wouldn’t!” he said – and Dot could hear the fear in his voice from where she was standing. In Net world the Recycle Bin was the end of you!

“Yup!” went Cursor. “It’d be my pleasure!”

Blackshanks lay still. Then he gave in. “All right!” he muttered. “I’ll do it! But you’d better keep your side of the deal, moggie!” The last word ended with a squeak as Cursor curled his paw even harder round the nasty little Information Inverter. His yellow eyes narrowed to slits. “I keep my deals – unlike some!” he hissed. “Now, do it!”

“OK, OK!” gasped Blackshanks, struggling for breath. “You know what to do Adrienne! It’s a double pack Zipflash Inversion. You can change him with that damn toy of yours if you go into BackMagic Custom Drive III. Do it on the Advanced Options folder. Just… hurry up!”

Adrienne brought out her scanner again and hit the ‘Enter’ button. The light from her screen flashed across her face as she scrolled to the right programme. Then she looked up. “And ze password?”

“Mickey!” gasped Blackshanks. “Hurry up!”

“Mickey… mouse…very unoriginal, once more!” said Adrienne, picking up her scanner again.

In went the password. Then Adrienne pointed the scanner at the sunflower seed with Mr Mouse in it, and clicked a button which made the little umbrella-like thing on top of the scanner whirl round – slowly at first, but then faster and faster and faster.

At first, nothing happened. Then, the seed began to quiver and shake. Then a kind of gold and red mist started to grow around it like steam out of a kettle – so much that after a second or two you couldn’t see the seed at all. Then –

BLIPPP!

And there was Mr Mouse, back to his normal size and perfectly all right – you could tell that because he started complaining immediately!

“How long does it take, for goodness sake?” he groaned. “I feel like I’ve been in that darn seed for a year. I got a crease in me the size of a jumbo jet. Two jumbo jets. Where in heck were you all… what were you… ”

Then he saw Cursor and, with a squeak, ran over to Dot and buried himself in his favourite hiding place under the shoulder bit of her T-shirt.

Dot laughed. It was such a relief that Mr Mouse was back and not a seed any more, she didn’t mind the scratchy tickling one bit! Adrienne was grinning too, and waving her big bushy tail like a flag up behind her back.

But just then:

“This bird’s been one heap of trouble –

Whaddya say – we let him go bobble?”