There was Vivien.
She was pushing a giant nose.
It was about three metres tall and made of metal.
It had vast nostrils.
And wheels.
‘You’re pushing a giant nose,’ I said to Vivien as she pushed the giant nose up to where I had stopped.
‘Yes,’ said Vivien. ‘It’s a Nose Cannon. It shoots baby proboscis scorpions.’
‘You’ve weaponised the proboscis scorpion,’ said Hils as she arrived, panting, next to the nose. ‘Outstanding.’
‘You’ve weaponised the proboscis scorpion’ is the army way of saying, ‘You’ve taken a really dangerous insect and made it even more dangerous by making it so you can fire it out of a cannon. A cannon shaped like a nose.’
Vivien reappearing after having disappeared and then reappeared and then disappeared again was very confusing.
I felt like my brain was turning to hummus without anyone needing to rip off my arms (or legs) to do it.
‘Why are you pushing a giant Nose Cannon?’ I said. ‘Where have you been? Why are you back? Why can’t I think of any more questions to ask you even though I have tons of questions I want to ask you?’
Vivien dropped the nose backwards so the vast nostrils were pointing at the oncoming Exterminator.
She opened a small panel in the side of the Nose Cannon.
‘Arming Nose Cannon,’ she said, flicking two switches. ‘Prepare to fire.’
The Exterminator twirled his huge mallet over his head and threw it at the Nose Cannon.
‘Fire!’ said Vivien as she pressed a large red button.
The Nose Cannon fired just as the huge mallet hit the two vast nostrils and jammed into them.
The Nose Cannon did not like having a huge mallet jammed into its nostrils. It shuddered, made a really, very, super unhappy coughing sound and then exploded, sending millions of baby proboscis scorpions flying up into the air.
‘WHAT JUST HAPPENED?’ said Pavaroachi. ‘HAVE I BEEN KILLED?’
‘Hush now, Big Lucy. It’s all goin’ to be peachy,’ said Sister Roachetta, sounding a lot like she didn’t think it was all going to be peachy.
‘I KNEW IT,’ said Pavaroachi. ‘I AM GOING TO DIE. NO LONGER WILL MY VOICE THRILL MILLIONS.’
Pavaroachi started to cry.
‘Hold me?’ he said.
‘I’ll hold you, Big Lucy,’ said Sister Roachetta. ‘I’ll sing away those tears, child.’
The explosion had knocked Vivien to the ground, where she was struggling to get up.
‘Go, go,’ said Vivien weakly. ‘Get out of here.’
‘Ordinance!?’ shouted Hils.
We didn’t have any ordinance left.
No Back Blackboard Brain Breaker.
No Stinky Sandstorm.
No Doom Balloons.
No Party Pie Pack of Pain.
No!
Wait!
We did have ordinance left.
A sort of ordinance.
I thrust my hand in my pocket. It was filled with soggy used-to-be-frozen peas. But right in the middle of the soggy used-to-be-frozen peas was a small, hard lump of still-frozen peas.
The Exterminator was almost on top of us.
‘Hils!’ I said as I threw her the small lump of frozen peas. ‘Ordinance!’
She caught them, jumped forward and shoved the frozen peas straight up the Exterminator’s nose.
He was really, very, super shocked by this and because of that he took a big, quick breath in and snorted a whole lot of frozen peas further up his nose. (I have never snorted a whole lot of frozen peas up into my nose but I could tell from the Exterminator’s reaction that it wasn’t a great thing to do.)
His arms were flailing about as he desperately tried to de-snort the peas.
‘Get Pavaroachi and the Sister back to the caravan,’ said Hils. ‘If I can’t defeat the Exterminator . . . if he comes after you . . . there’s an emergency plan in the letterbox.’
Hils dodged a flailing arm and jumped onto the Exterminator’s back and started wrestling with him. I grabbed Pavaroachi and Sister Roachetta and ran as fast as I could towards the caravan.