"Absolutely no problem!"
"We can sort this!"
"A quick fix really!"
"Just leave it to us!"
The first squeaky little voice had been joined by lots of other squeaky little voices - dozens in fact! Dot looked around but she couldn't see a thing. Strange!
Wizzie sniffed the air and barked. He looked ready for a chase!
"Wiz!" said Dot in her warning voice. "Oh all right!" said her friend, and lay down with a big sigh.
It was just as well he did, because he wouldn't have known who to chase. Because in the next moment there were meerkats everywhere!
Tall ones, short ones, baby ones, even ones walking hand in hand - there were hundreds of them. And as they pushed their way out of the bushes all around, Dot could see they had hard hats on and something ready to work with - brooms, hammers, planks of wood, ropes - six of them were even pushing a funny machine that looked like an old fashioned crane.
She looked closer. It was a crane!
"Right then!" said the leader (you could tell he was in charge because he had a shiny black and gold hard hat on with the word 'BOSS' on it in silver letters!) "Right then! A treedown eh? Long time since we had one of those, everybody!"
"Ages!"
"Can't remember the last one!"
"Must have been in my dad's time!"
"Way back when!"
The leader held up his hand. "Now Mr Poolbear and Mr Cambor - and honoured guests of Phargon" he took his hard hat off and bowed very politely to Dot and Wizzie and Mr Mouse - "if you'd let us get on, we'll have the poor old thing back up standing in a jiffy! No worries!" He looked hard at the two Zildiths as if to say "Just give me some space!"
Cambor smiled at him. "Very well. Very good, Mr Cantriakis. We have our own work to do anyway!"
He turned to Dot. "Now my dear - I think Poolbear Zildith and I should introduce you to some rather special people here in Phargon. Come along!"
And with that he marched away down one of the paths that led away from the clearing in the book forest where they'd all met, his big cloak with the hissing dragons swaying behind him.
"Hop up!" said Poolbear Zildith, who'd climbed up onto the saddle of Snaffkins, his penny-farthing bike (with a lot of puffing and blowing. It's quite difficult. Just look at that picture.)
He leant down and reached out a hand towards Dot. It looked a long way!
"Er... how do I get up?" she asked nervously.
"Just jump!" said Poolbear Zildith cheerfully. "You'll see!" He pressed a button on Snaffkin's handlebars and a little seat swivelled out from under his saddle, with a sort of "zzzztthhh" sound. He patted it with a fat hand. "You'll be comfy as anything up here. Promise!"
"Oh no!" groaned Mr Mouse. "Not another crazy ride!"
But it seemed rude not to trust Poolbear (especially as he looked so like a very jolly Father Christmas) so Dot tucked Wiz under her arm, reached up to take the Zildith's hand and shut her eyes.
Poolbear chuckled. "Give a little push with your feet!" he said.
Still with her eyes closed, Dot pushed down with her trainers. And it was weird - as if the ground beneath her feet knew what to do. Very gently, it seemed to push her upwards - and next thing she knew, she was sitting next to Poolbear on the little seat (which really was a lot more comfortable than it looked!)
With another "zzzztthhh", a shiny handlebar came out in front of her, and she took hold of it, nice and tightly. Wizzie looked up at her with his big brown eyes and grinned. "Coolio!" he said.
"Not bad!" said Mr Mouse. "Not bad at all!"
"All right everyone?" said Poolbear. "Right then! Off we go!" He looked at his watch. "Got to be quick or we'll be late for the Extrapolation Extarordinary! Bye bye Mr Cantriakis!"
The boss meerkat turned round and waved - his team were already hard at work clearing up the mess left by the fallen book tree, tugging the funny old crane into position and gathering up the thousand of books that had fallen off it.
"Goodbye Mr Poolbear sir!" he went. And, of course, all the others joined in:
"Cheerio!"
"See you later alligator!"
"Hasta la vista, baby!"
"Ta ta for now!"
... and so on and so on, till their squeaky voices faded away as Snaffkins turned a corner on the forest path and the meerkat workforce was lost to sight.
But what in the name of the Net, thought Dot, is an Extrapolation Extraordinary?
She was just about to find out!
