But then she hardly had time to do that anyway. There was more than enough to look at, as soon as Cruncher crashed out of the wormhole in the side of the cave and screeched to a halt (nearly throwing Dot off!)

The cave was lit by bare light bulbs hanging from the ceiling. All around the sides were benches and tables, like the ones you see in pubs. Very like the ones you see in the grottiest pubs, in fact – with empty beer bottles and cans and old crisp packets lying everywhere, and ashtrays overflowing with cigarette and cigar ends.

Every table had a group of cyber rats on it, shouting, laughing their sneery laughs, belching, banging their ratty hands on the tables, even fighting – one seemed to be trying to strangle one of his drinking partners while all the others at the table pointed and fell about laughing.

The cave stretched as far as the eye could see, full of the smelly rats and their bikes - and bits of bikes, with their riders working on them, surrounded by pools of oil and old nuts and bolts and bits of engines.

Hanging from the walls was all sorts of stuff: old leather jackets and battered helmets, bike chains and handlebars, pictures of cyber rats posing with their bikes, and lots of headlines cut out of newspapers – all VERY bad news. Like:

It said:

Wizzie just couldn’t stop himself. He’d nipped in and bitten Cruncher hard – right on his bum! (Yuk!)

The cyber rats next to them – who were having a raging argument about who was the dirtiest – stopped shouting at each other and roared with laughter as Cruncher hopped about rubbing his backside in agony.

“You stupid MUTT!” yelled the cyber rat, grapping a baseball bat from one of the bags on the side of his bike, and lifting it over his head.

Dot jumped in front of Wiz, who was backing away, teeth bared, tail down, snarling for all he was worth (and wishing he could rinse his mouth out!)

“Get away!” she said fiercely. “Leave him alone, or I’ll - ”

“You’ll WHAT?” shouted Cruncher, gripping his bat even harder.

“She’ll throw you over her shoulder like a bag of potatoes, that’s what!”

It was Mr Mouse, (who else??) in his fiercest pose, one hand on hip, one pointing, sharp little claws gripping Dot’s shoulder (ow!) “She can do karate, you know! Back off!”

Er, no she can’t actually. But you have to admit it did sound good!

Cruncher’s answer was to bring his baseball bat crashing down towards Wiz, who jumped out of the way just in time. A thick cloud of dust and muck came up as his bat missed and hit the floor.

“Nyaa! Missed!” jeered the cyber rats round Cruncher.

Cruncher lifted his bat again. Dot put her hands up to save herself and Wiz – she couldn’t get away, there was a big crowd of rats behind her now, all watching, she couldn’t get through. But then:

“CRUNCHER, you stupid berk! LEAVE it!”