At first, Dot couldn’t see what the funny lumpy shape was, coming out from the wall. It was covered in brown, knobbly stuff – bit like the way a Picnic bar is covered in milk chocolate.
Only this didn’t look good to eat, not at all! It just looked horrible.
Dot clenched her fists and gritted her teeth. With Mr Fruity watching her, she just WAS NOT going to look scared.
SSSSQUELSCH… OOHHHHH… AAAHHHH… SSSSQUELSCH…
The groaning, slithering noise was getting louder and the lumpy, bumpy shape was getting bigger. Then, suddenly so that that they all jumped:
POP POP POPPPPP!
“YUK!” went Mr Mouse, who was peeping out from under the shoulder of Dot’s T-shirt.
The knobbly covering all over the shape had split open, shattering so that a kind of shower of brown knobbly bits had fallen all round them – and on them. Dot brushed the bits off frantically.
But she didn’t have time to worry about that – because there was Drindel Zildith – The Day of 23!
He was tall and thin with a big beaky nose, and a curly beard on the tip of his chin. His eyes were huge and a very dark green – shaded by long curly grey hair on his forehead and down the sides of his face.
Dot had hardly had time to notice him before – but he looked like the sort of man who knows all sorts of things and loves telling people about them – like your most favourite teacher.
But he was looking terrible – as if he was scared, and in pain.
“Here’s your boy then!” sneered Mr Fruity, picking a piece of the brown stuff from his ratty cloak and putting it in his mouth. YUKKERAMA!! “Doesn’t look such clever-clogs now - does he?”
Poor Drindel. Just like before when they’d see him on Cruncher’s video at Phargon, he seemed to be stuck – as if he was covered in invisible cling-film. His mouth was moving, but no sound was coming out. His arms were tight by his sides, and his legs were stiffly pushed together, as if he was in the Army and standing to attention on parade. His eyes went from side to side looking at them.
And his cloak – his moving picture cloak – looked worse than ever. The underwater scenes of dolphins and whales that should be moving like a film were stuck… and it was as if even those still pictures were fading away.
“BARKKKK! What have you done to him?” growled Wizzie. “It’s so cruel!”
“Yeah?” said Mr Fruity, with a snigger. “Think that’s bad? Try this!”
He reached out towards Drindel – who shrank away from him – and tore a strip of “cling-film” away from the Zildith’s mouth.
“Now then, Dribble” he said, getting Drindel’s name wrong on purpose - what a nerk! “What Day are you? Eh?”
Drindel’s mouth moved – very slowly. But just a hoarse gasp came out. He ran his tongue round his lips, which seemed to be terribly dry. Again Dot felt the anger rising inside her. Just keep calm, she told herself. Just keep calm. Our turn will come – I don’t know how but it WILL! And then…!
“Pardon?” said Mr Fruity, sticking one horrible pinky-grey cyber rat ear close to Drindel’s mouth. “Didn’t quite catch that, Mr Dribble! Speak up!”
Drindel took a deep breath and made a huge effort. “The Day of… the Day of… ”
“Come on, come on!”
“Twenty… no, thirty… no… it is twenty… ”
To her horror, Dot realized DRINDEL COULDN’T REMEMBER WHAT DAY HE WAS IN PHARGON!
And if he didn’t remember… then he couldn’t take care of all the data for that day coming into Phargon. And then… none of the other information could cross over that day. It would be like that wide, wide river with no bridge over it and no way of getting to the other side.
And then Phargon would die – even if they got Drindel Zildith back.
But then all those thoughts went out of Dot’s mind. Because something really terrible happened. As she looked at Drindel’s face – she couldn’t stop watching – a tear formed in the corner of one of his eyes, and slowly rolled down his cheek. It looked strange, because it was flattened by the “cling-film” or whatever it was that was covering his face, so it rolled down all across his cheek.
It was so sad to see someone like Drindel crying. It just felt all wrong.
Even Mr Fruity seemed to be a bit affected by it. For once he didn’t sneer at his prisoner.
“That’s it then” he said. “He’s losing his memory. And what use is a Zildith without his memory, eh? No use at all. And precious Phargon’s on the way out!”
He leaned in towards Dot once more. She felt a tickly scrabbling on her shoulder as Mr Mouse hid again, but Wiz stood between her and the King of the cyber rats, teeth drawn back in a snarl.
Mr Fruity ignored him.
“But there’s one thing can get his memory back” he said, one scaly claw held up. “Or two, rather.”
He paused, then stood back, still staring straight at Dot.
“The Children of the Casement. Bring ‘em here – now!”
But Mr Fruity had no need to ask!
