"Wow!" said Mr Mouse. "What the heck is this?"
Poolbear gave a big wave of his arm, just missing Dot as the big floppy sleeve of his coat with the moving pictures of polar bears on it brushed over her bunches. All the bears slid towards a hole in the ice where they were standing, trying not to fall in the water on the film on the coat.
"THIS" said Poolbear proudly "is today's Extrapolation Extraordinary!"
"Dan dan dan DAAAAAAAAA!" went Snaffkins' two wheels again.
They had come to another large clearing in the book forest - but this one was very different.
It was like a huge theatre, full of hundreds and hundreds of people waiting for a big show to start!
It reminded Dot of the time she'd made a special trip to London, to see an a-mazing show called 'The Woman in White' - all about a lady who was tricked into marrying someone, so her bad guy husband could take all her money!
That was in a theatre in London's West End, which had rows and rows of seats for everyone to sit in, round in big circles. Dot and her Mum and Dad had got seats really high up - it felt like the stage was a long way away, but you could still see and hear everything.
Well, what she could see now was the same, except it was out in the open - all still inside the great black mountain of Phargon, of course - and the lights weren't for the stage, they were from dozens of fluffy gold and pink clouds that floated high above them.
There seemed to be hundreds and hundreds of seats - and each one had a Zildith sitting in it.
You could tell that was who they were - because they all had the same strange cloaks on, with moving pictures going across them. There were too many to count, but there were some coats with fishes floating along, some with beautiful trees waving in the breeze, even one with a steam train going round and round too.
"I like that one!" said Wiz, pointing with his paw. It was showing a cat being chased round and round a garden. The lady Zildith wearing it had frizzy grey hair, a blue and silver eye patch and a hat with a peacock feather in it. She was waving her hands about and talking very loudly to the Zildith next to her, who was wearing a bright red turban and had a long beard and twirly whiskers.
In fact, everyone was talking - it was like Assembly at her school before Mrs Rudman came in. All the hundreds of voices came together to make a huge kind of buzzing noise.
No-one paid any attention to them at all.
Dot peered down from up on top of Snaffkins. "So... it's a kind of big meeting, is it?" she said.
"Oh yes!" said Poolbear. "A very important one too!"
Dot couldn't help wondering what her Dad would have thought of it - he always hates meetings at Doggydo's, you see, because they go on and on and ON and never seem to decide anything and he gets terrible bored and has terrible trouble staying awake. He always says the more people there are a meeting, the longer it takes and the less gets done! She giggled to herself as she wondered what he would have thought of the Extrapolation Extraordinary.
"Look!" said Wiz suddenly. "There's Cambor!"
And sure enough, over on the other side of the big theatre, was the tall dark figure of Cambor. He waved and frowned and tapped his wrist - which seemed to have the same kind of watch on it as Poolbear's.
"Oh dear!" said Poolbear, chewing his lip. "He HATES me being late! Still, we just made it! Seat time, Snaffkins!"
And with a little bounce, the penny-farthing bike lifted into the air and swooped down past the rows and rows of Zildiths towards where Cambor was sitting. Again, no-one paid them the slightest attention.
Mind you, that wasn't surprising as no-one looked at another couple of late arrivals either - one of them riding of the back of a giant bumble bee, and the other sitting inside a huge plastic banana with six red wheels and a little funnel letting out puffs of steam and going "Toot toot!"!
They had just settled down next to Cambor, who was still shaking his head and tut-tutting about how late they were, when suddenly the light from the clouds changed - it went down to s sort of golden dimness.
And then a very loud voice spoke, as if from out of nowhere.
"Hear me now!" it thundered. "HEAR - ME - NOW!"
