Astrosaurs 2 Read online

“Just about!” someone said.

  “Good,” said Teggs. “Everyone’s OK. But remember, if we made it through the landing, chances are that King Albu and his egg-snatchers did too.” He hungrily uprooted enormous fern and swallowed it down “And there’s nothing like a really big crash for working an appetite!”

  “Perhaps we should all get eating,” said Arx gravely. “We need to make more fuel for the engines.”

  “Of course,” said Gipsy, wrinkling her nose. “More dung!”

  “It’s a big job,” said Teggs. “Several big jobs, in fact.”

  “Leave it to me and my boys,” smiled Iggy. “We’ll have a good meal while we fix the engines. Then we’ll fill them up for you – no sweat!”

  Teggs saluted him. “I knew I could count on you!”

  Iggy saluted in return, and left the flight deck.

  Gipsy pulled a face. “Well, while Iggy gets to the bottom of things in the engine room, I’ll try to listen in on the oviraptors.”

  “Good idea,” said Teggs. “We might learn what they’re planning.”

  Gipsy’s hands flicked over the controls.

  Suddenly, a spooky wailing sound crackled out of the speakers.

  “What is that?” asked Teggs. “Sounds like a ghost!” said Dippa.

  “Or faulty speakers,” Arx added.

  “I think it sounded like someone in distress,” said Gipsy. She pressed some more buttons. “Yes, I’ve got a fix on the signal now. It’s coming from somewhere outside!”

  “Impossible!” snapped Professor Sog. “How could anyone live in this terrible place?”

  “We’d better find out,” said Teggs. “Because if we can’t get the ship fixed – we’ll be joining them!”

  The crew got ready to go outside. Then they gathered at the ship’s main hatchway.

  Teggs had changed into his battle armour, and Gipsy had slipped on her combat suit. If it came to a fight, they would be ready.

  Gipsy joined Teggs as he stared out onto the strange, dark planet.

  “Do you think we’ll really get out of this mess?” she whispered.

  “We’ve got to, Gipsy,” said Teggs softly. He gave her a crooked smile. “I can’t stop exploring space yet! I haven’t discovered my very own star dragon!”

  “Speaking of discoveries . . .” said Arx, shuffling over. “I wonder what we’ll find out there?”

  “Well, whoever was making that noise, we can find them this,” said Gipsy, tapping gadget on her wrist. “It’s a special tracker. The faster it bleeps, the closer we are.”

  “Why can’t we just hide on the Sauropod until Iggy’s fixed the engines?” asked Dippa.

  Teggs shook his head. “If the oviraptors come aboard, they’ll sniff out the eggs in seconds. Out there in the storm, they’ll find it harder. Besides, Iggy and the boys have some important jobs to do. They mustn’t be put off by a load of rotten reptiles running about.”

  Just then, a flash of lightning lit up the sky. Gipsy thought she caught a glimpse of something moving just outside.

  “We’d better get going,” she said nervously.

  Teggs led the way out onto the surface of the unpleasant planet, through the howling wind and the drenching rain. The ground was smooth and slippery beneath their feet. He had the feeling they were being watched.

  Lightning flashed again. Teggs caught a sudden movement from the comer of his eye. Dark shapes, small and nasty, creeping towards them.

  “Look out!” he yelled, “It’s the oviraptors!”

  “It sure is,” gurgled Goopo.

  “Worst luck for you!” snarled King Albu.

  He snapped his claws and his sons rushed to form a tight circle around the dinosaurs. Teggs saw now that each of them held a ray gun.

  “We’re trapped!” gasped Gipsy.

  Arx lowered his horns. “I could charge them, Captain.”

  “They’d blast you before you got close,” hissed Teggs. “I won’t let them add roast triceratops to their mad menu!”

  “Now then, Captain Teggs,” said King Albu. “You know what I want: eggs!” A dreamy look came into his eyes. “Yes, I said eggs! E-G-G-S. Eggs, eggs, eggs, eggs.”

  He started drooling. “gggggggggggg mmmmmm.”

  One by one, his sons started dribbling too. “Eggggggs,” they echoed.

  But not Prince Shelly. He threw down his gun crossly. “This is silly, Father!” he complained. “Our ship’s lying in pieces! We’re stranded billions of miles from home! And all you care about are a few lousy eggs!”

  “Lousy?” gasped King Albu in shock. “You dare . . . to call eggs . . . lousy?”

  The oviraptors all booed and hissed Prince Shelly.

  And while they were distracted, Teggs struck.

  He lashed out with his armoured tail. Blue sparks shot from the end, and four of the little reptiles were sent flying.

  “Now, Arx!” Teggs cried.

  The triceratops charged at Prince Goopo, who cried out in terror and ran. He screeched so loudly that the others dropped their guns as they scrabbled to block their ears.

  Then Gipsy sprang into action. With a few well-placed jabs, kicks and tail-swipes she flattened five more of the oviraptors.

  But King Albu had grabbed one of the rag guns. He started firing wildly. Bolts of white light sizzled through the air.

  “Run!” cried Teggs as one of the laser beams whistled past his ear.

  Rushing for cover, Arx and Coo went one way while Gipsy and Sog went another. Dippa ran off all by herself, so Teggs chased after her.

  “Just you wait, acorn-brain!” roared King Albu. “I’ll get those eggs yet!”

  “Not if I can help it,” muttered Teggs. He swung his head about wildly, looking for somewhere to hide from the gunfire. But the landscape was smooth and flat on all sides.

  “Look out!” called Dippa.

  Teggs skidded to a stop just in front of a huge gash in the ground. It was too wide to jump over.

  “We’ll have to turn back!” wailed Dippa.

  “We can’t!” said Teggs. As if to prove it, a laser beam whizzed past between them. “There’s only one place we can go now!”

  Teggs was pointing to the crack in the ground. “Down there?” Dippa gulped.

  “Now!” cried Teggs.

  Together, the two dinosaurs leaped into the blackness.

  Chapter Seven

  THE TUNNELS OF FEAR

  Luckily, Teggs and Dippa didn’t have far to fall. They landed with a thump on a small ledge.

  “Did you know this was here?” gasped Dippa.

  “Er . . . of course!” said Teggs quickly.

  Dippa peered over the edge. “How deep is this crack?” she wondered. “And what’s at the bottom of it?”

  A spooky, wailing noise rose up from the darkness. It was the same noise they had heard back on the Sauropod.

  “Who needs Gipsy’s tracker?” said Teggs. “Whatever that thing is, it’s right beneath us!” He explored along the ledge a little further. Soon the winking lights on his battle helmet lit up a jagged gash in the smooth rock beside him. “It’s another crack . . . a sort of passageway! Come on, before the oviraptors find us.”

  “I don’t like scary passageways,” whispered Dippa. “Why don’t we just let King Albu have the eggs?”

  Teggs stared at her. “How can you even think such a thing?” Dippa shrugged. “It would be much easier.”

  “It would be easier, but it would be wrong,” said Teggs sternly. “Those eggs hold the future of your race! Isn’t that worth fighting for?”

  “Fighting ruined our old world,” said Dippa.

  “Fighting is bad”

  “But giving up is bad too, Dippa,” Teggs told her.

  “I know you’re scared. I am too! But you mustn’t throw away your dreams”

  Dippa nodded slowly. “I dream of a new place to call home,” she said. “I dream of having little baby plateosaurus to look after. I dream that one day there will be a whole, happy herd of us on our own planet.”

  “Then fight for those dreams,” Teggs told her.

  Just then, they heard a scuttling sound above them. “This way, boys!” came a familiar, wicked voice. “There’s a ledge! They must have jumped down here!”

  “King Albu!” hissed Teggs. “Quick! Let’s get going!”

  He and Dippa started galloping through the darkness on all fours. The oviraptors soon figured out where they had gone, and gave chase.

  “They’re catching up!” panted Dippa.

  “Keep running!” cried Teggs.

  Then the mysterious, ghostly wail started up again, chilling them to the bone. Teggs and Dippa skidded to a halt, and so did the oviraptor princes. Teggs saw them by the light of his battle helmet, clutching each other in fear.

  “We – we have to go back now, Father!” stammered Shelly.

  “Never!” cried King Albu. “Now, grab those eggs, boys – or I’ll hard-boil you all!”

  Goopo and his brothers slowly advanced on the two herbivores.

  “Get behind me, Dippa,” hissed Teggs. “Maybe I can scare them off.” He flexed his armoured tail, ready to fight. But the passage was too small, and his tail was too big. It whacked against the smooth wall and suddenly, the whole passageway started to shake.

  “Look out, Dippa!” shouted Teggs. “The walls are caving in!”

  “Eeek!” squeaked Goopo. He turned and fled, his brothers close behind. Teggs and Dippa huddled together as big speckled slabs kept on falling. Soon the passage was completely blocked. They were safe from the oviraptors – but now there was no way back to the Sauropod.

  “There’s only one path we can take now,” said Teggs quietly. “But it’ll lead us right to whatever’s been making that terrible noise!”

  Meanwhile, Gipsy and were huddled outside in a howling gale, wishing they were warm and safe back on the Sauropod. Like Teggs and Dippa, they had hidden in one of the great splits in the planet’s surface. But the ledge they were creeping along was very narrow. One slip, and they would fall to their doom.

  “I wonder what caused all these cracks,” said Sog nervously. “If it was an earthquake, where’s all the rubble? There’s not a single loose stone round here!”

  “Maybe it’s special, super-tough rock,” said Gipsy. “That’s why the explorers’ seeds never grew.” Gipsy’s tracker started beeping loudly. “You know, this thing is going crazy. It reckons the source of that signal is . . . everywhere!”

  “Shhh!” gasped the little professor. “I think something’s coming!”

  He was right. Something heavy was creeping along the ledge in the opposite direction – straight towards them.

  “It’s too dark!” hissed Gipsy. “I can’t see what it is!”

  “It’s the thing that made that terrible wailing noise!” cried Sog. “I know it is!”

  He hopped onto Gipsy’s tail and scampered up to her shoulder in fright.

  The footsteps shuffled closer and closer . . .

  Chapter Eight

  THE SECRET OF PLATUS TWO

  “Halt!” squawked Professor Sog bravely. He peered out from behind the crest on Gipsy’s head. “Who goes there?”

  A familiar figure came out of the shadows. “Hello, Gipsy! Professor!”

  “Arx!” squealed Gipsy in delight.

  “And me!” called Coo from somewhere behind him.

  “Thank goodness!” gasped Sog. “So, you hid in the crack too!”

  “There was nowhere else to go,” said Arx. He seemed a little out of breath.

  “I’m glad we’ve found you. There’s something I think you should see.”

  “What is it?” asked Gipsy.

  But Arx was already retracing his footsteps. “The path gets very steep down here. Don’t slip!”

  Gipsy and Sog followed them along the ledge. Arx was right – the path dipped down sharply. Gipsy trod carefully, while Sog slithered down on his bottom.

  The air grew warmer. The ledge grew wider. A soft, thudding noise seemed to echo up from the chasm beside them.

  To Gipsy, it sounded like a huge, heavy heartbeat. Her tracker bleeped so loudly she had to turn it off.

  They crept on for what felt like ages. Then, suddenly, the steep path levelled out. Arx came to a sudden stop.

  “Here we are,” he said. “A hole. I think it stretches down to the very centre of the planet!”

  Gipsy stared down into the hole. This was the source of the heartbeat sound: Ba-DUMP . . . Ba-DUMP . . . Ba-DUMP . . .

  It was like looking into a deep well. Far below, thick yellowy-white liquid sloshed about like runny custard.

  “Keep watching,” Arx murmured.

  Then, just below the slimy surface of the goo . . . something massive moved!

  “What was that?” Gipsy gasped.

  “I think I know,” said Arx. “But if I’m right, we’re in worse trouble than we thought!”

  Even as he spoke, the wall behind them exploded with a mighty crash!

  Coo yelped as bits of the strange, smooth rock flew through the air. Sog hid behind Arx’s head for safety.

  Gipsy whirled around in surprise. “Look!” she cried. A huge hole had appeared in the smooth wall. “Something’s coming out!”

  A familiar orange head poked out of the darkness.

  “Only me!”

  “Captain Teggs!” beamed Gipsy. She quickly saluted. “And Dippa! You gave us a fright!”

  “Sorry about that,” said Teggs. “We were walking through one of the cracks, but it came to a dead end.”

  “So he smashed through the rock with his tail!” added Dippa.

  “Rock, eh?” said Arx. He nudged a fragment of the smooth rock with his horn. “I’m not so sure . . . See how easily this stuff breaks?”

  Teggs looked hurt. “Well, I did give it quite a whack, you know!”

  “I’m sure you did, Captain,” said Arx quickly. “But look at it! So smooth, so brittle. It’s not really like rock at all, is it?”

  Everyone stared at the broken pieces on the ground.

  “You’re right,” said Teggs slowly. “In fact, it looks a lot like . . . eggshell!”

  “Eggshell?” twittered Sog. “But this material covers the whole planet!”

  “I don’t get it,” said Coo. “How can a planet be made from eggshell?”

  “Easy,” said Arx. “Because Platus Two isn’t a planet after all! It’s an egg! A SPECIAL, GIGANTIC, PLANET-SIZED EGG!”

  Everyone stared at him in amazement.

  “Of course!” breathed Teggs. “It makes perfect sense!”

  “Seems crazy to me,” said Dippa.

  “Ah, but things aren’t always as they seem,” said Teggs. “Remember the way the oviraptor ship was hidden inside the meteor? This is the same idea – only there’s something a lot bigger hidden inside this planet!”

  Arx turned to Professor Sog. “I told you Platus Two had grown!” he cried. “It’s probably been getting bigger and bigger for hundreds of years – because the creature inside it has been growing in size too!”

  “But – but eggs don’t grow!” protested Sog.

  “This is no ordinary egg,” said Arx. “Besides, can you imagine laying an egg the size of a planet?”

  “Ouch!” Teggs winced. “That would bring tears to your eyes!

  “So let me get this straight,” said Gipsy excitedly. “The explorers mistook Platus Two for a planet, just like we did. But deep inside it is the biggest baby in the universe – and it’s starting to hatch!”

  “That’s why there are cracks all over the place!” said Teggs. “The thick shell is breaking open!”

  “What about those geysers?” asked Coo. “How can an egg spray molten lava everywhere?”

  “But it’s not molten lava,” Gipsy told him. “It’s just egg white bursting out as the egg starts to hatch!”

  “Well, what about that scary noise?” asked Dippa.

  “Come on,” said Arx, like a stern schoolteacher. “What’s the first thing a baby does when it hatches?”

  “It cries!” Dippa realized. “That’s what we’ve been hearing!”

  They all stared down into the deep, dark hole, where the baby was slowly stirring in its runny yolk.

  “Think how big it must be,” whispered Sog. “Simply enormous! That movement we saw was probably just an eyelash! Or the tip of a whisker!”

  “Uh-oh,” said Gipsy. “I just had an awful thought. If this creature really is ready to hatch, then Platus Two must be close to completely cracking up!”

  “I know how it feels,” sighed Coo.

  “Guys,” said Teggs gravely, “if we can’t get off this egg-world – we’re doomed!”

  “You’re right!” Sog squealed. “We’ll all be flung off into space!”

  “Flung off into space?” said someone behind them. “Ha! That will seem like fun compared to what I’m going to do to you all!”

  Teggs turned to find King Albu creeping along the ledge towards them, his red eyes agleam. The oviraptors had tracked them down!

  “Quick!” Teggs shouted. “Run for it!”

  But then Prince Goopo led his brothers out of the shadows, blocking their way.

  King Albu giggled with glee. “This time, there will be no escape!”

  Chapter Nine

  A STICKY END

  “Listen, you egg-mad maniac!” shouted Teggs. “This whole world is about to break apart! We have to get out of here – and fast. If we work together, maybe we can—”

  “Nope.” King Albu shook his head.

  “I’m not doing a single thing until I’ve eaten those eggs. So nyah!”

  Coo lumbered forwards. “All right then,” he said. “I suppose you’d better have them.”

  “No!” shouted Dippa. “I won’t let you!” She slammed her mighty tail down on the ground in front of Coo.

  Coo froze. Everyone stared at Dippa in amazement – even King Albu.

  “Captain Teggs is right,” she said. “Those eggs are our future, Coo. And the future is worth fighting for.”

  “It is?” Coo blinked in surprise. “Oh. Well, if you really think so . . .”

  Dippa smiled at Teggs. “I know so”

  “You know nothing!” spat King Albu. “Come on! Eggs! Now!”

  But even as he spoke, the ground started to shake. A fountain of steaming hot goo burst from the deep dark hole in the ground.