10 Awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga!

CHAPTER TEN Awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga awooga! Ever since she read about the Raving Raven, Sharon the ex- Party Crow had been all a-fluster. 'How could I forget about Wyld Hilda?' she muttered to herself. 'I have been a fool.' She wandered through Grimwood as if seeing it for the first time. Usually, she was surrounded by a cloud of glitter, party poppers and disco lights. But now she saw it all clearly. It was mainly sticks, mud and grass. She shuddered. It was much nicer to look at with all the glitter and party poppers and disco lights. The thought started flashing on and off in her head again, like a massive neon sign: BUILD IT

'How do I call them?' whispered Sharon, looking up at the grey sky. She was standing at the bottom of a hill, with the Magic Tower at the top of it. It was where Sharon usually lived with her best friend, Pamela the eagle. A nest of wires, mobile phones and electronics, the birds also liked to broadcast their weekly radio show from there. But today, there was no sign of Pamela. Wiggy the badger was happily tootling around in his Jeep when he spotted Sharon standing at the bottom of the Magic Tower. 'Oh fabulous! Nice to see Shazza up and about,' he said to himself. Then he called out 'What-ho!' But Sharon didn't hear him. She seemed to be deep in thought. He watched as Sharon then began to fly shakily up to the very top of the Magic Tower. I wonder what she's up to? thought Wiggy. Oh well, probably nothing very important. I'll just pop the car radio on for no reason whatsoever. Wiggy's radio blasted out a very loud song about chicken nuggets. 'Argh! Oh, I hate it when Jeremy's been in the car, he always changes the radio station.' He fiddled about with the controls a bit until the display read Grimwood Radio. There was no music, just a fuzzy, broken sound. Then suddenly, a squawk. It was Sharon. 'PAMELA, DO YOU READ ME? ALERT ALERT. PARTY CROW NEEDS ASSISTANCE. COME BACK TO GRIMWOOD, REPEAT, COME BACK TO GRIMWOOD. OVER AND OUT.'

'Oooh, crumbs!' said Wiggy. 'How exciting. A distress call! But will Pamela hear it?' He listened to Sharon calling for Pamela for a few more minutes before getting bored and tuning into Twinklenuts Smooth, which was secretly his favourite radio station. I love listening to Radio. Woodhouse says it happens. Wonderful documentaries, you know? Many others in Grimwood heard Sharon's call. Anoushka heard it. Pat and Martin heard it. Who? The squirrels! Do keep up. Ingrid heard it and rolled her eyes, because as far as she was concerned Sharon was making a BIG FUSS and just needed to buck up and get on with things. 'After all, that is what I had to do in Hollywood,' she said. 'When I was overlooked for the part of lead duck in SuperDuck

III: The Quackening, did you see me weep? Did you see me take to my bed in sadness and defeat? No, you did not!' Sir Charles nodded. 'The film was a terrible bore without you in it, darling,' he said, hoping Ingrid would never find out that it was, in fact, his fave movie ever. Titus and Frank also heard Sharon's call. 'Oh, I do hope Pamela comes back from whatever wild mission she's on,' said Titus, putting the finishing touches to a rather pretty lemon meringue pie. 'Ooh, who's that for?' asked Frank, nodding hopefully at the fancy dessert. 'It is for Nancy and Rufus, so don't get any ideas,' scolded Titus. 'They've been working ever so hard on their boat and I thought they deserved a treat. And DON'T look at me like that, you know full well I baked you an entire tray of gingerbread mice just this morning.' 'Ach, all right, all right, keep yer hooves on,' hooted Frank. Later, Titus trotted through the trees, carefully balancing the lemon meringue pie on his antlers. It wibbled and wobbled this way and that, making Titus squeal every time he had to hop over a tree root or clamber across a rock. Of course, he could have just carried it with his hooves, but sometimes Titus was silly.

Nancy and Rufus had done a super-duper job on the narrowboat. Rufus was kneeling next to it with a pot of red paint, carefully applying small brush strokes to the wood. 'Oh, it's just wonderful!' said Titus. Rufus chuckled. 'Perfect timing, Titus,' he said. 'We're going to try and get the stove going so we can make our first pot of tea.'

Nancy had been clanking about inside the boat and poked her snout out. It was covered in soot, but she had a huge grin on her face. 'Stove's working!' she said. 'All right, Titus. What do you think?' Titus blinked back big fat tears. 'I think,' he sniffled, 'that I have never seen you looking so happy. Not even when you knocked out the entire Twinklenuts treebonk team in one go.' Nancy rolled her eyes but kept smiling. 'I reckon we'll be able to launch her in a few days,' said Rufus. 'Was thinking I might take her down to the Crystal Lake. It's big enough that I won't be in anyone's way.' 'In… in Twinklenuts?!' cried Titus. 'Why so far away? You wouldn't be in Grimwood any more!' Rufus fiddled with his neckerchief. 'Well… I'm just not sure where else there is to go. I mean, the swamp is too swampy, and there's no way Ingrid will let me keep the boat on the Small Pond…' 'She might!' squeaked Titus. 'Her quack is worse than her bite, you know. Leave it with me. And in the meantime, please enjoy this lemon meringue pie. I'm going to have to go now, you've made me all over-emotional. Farewell!' Titus turned on his hoof and marched back to his caravan. 'He's a complicated character, eh?' said Rufus, dunking a spoon into the pudding. 'Well, he's got a point,' said Nancy. 'You… you've only just got here, Rufus. You're not going to leave us again, are you?'