46 Stop, in the Name of the Law!

46 Stop, in the Name of the Law!' Peanut, Rockwell and Little-Bit looked out of the window at the changing cityscape. The grimy grit of the fountain-pen flying buttresses and charcoal-drawn geometry of the cafes, theatres and office blocks had given way to cleaner, friendlier-looking buildings made up of thicker outlines and brighter colours. The pavements were still busy, but the people looked different. More cartoonish. Strangely, there were lots of animals, some of which were wearing clothes and walking upright! ' If this is the Strip, then what's that over there?' Little-Bit was pointing to a long line of shiny, glass high-rise buildings

in the distance to their left, running parallel to Main Street. Peanut unfolded the map. 'Hmmm. That must be Superhero Heights.' 'Ooh, that sounds cool. Can we go there please?' 'LB, we have a mission to complete. The sooner we get to the Spire, the sooner we rescue Mr M and Dad. We don't have time for sightseeing. The tram slowed and came to a stop. A large, yellow speech bubble saying 'END OF THE LINE' appeared above their heads as the same words came blaring from the speakers in the ceiling. They got off the tram. ' Right. So where now?' said Rockwell, covering his mouth as he spoke. Peanut looked down the street. They could see the Spire much more clearly now, its razor-sharp tip reaching high

into the blue sky. She could make out lots of small black squares spiralling around the outside of the white, needle-like structure. Windows, she assumed. She wondered if Dad or Mr M was looking out of one of them. Would they be lucky enough to have cells with windows? 'Jonathan Higginbottom told us to head towards the Spire. We're not far away now. Hopefully our Resistance helper will reveal themselves sooner rather than later. They started to walk down Main Street, which had gone down from five lanes of traffic in each direction to two. The pavements were still extremely crowded, and a continuous cloud of speech bubbles floated above the hordes expressing every emotion imaginable. Suddenly, they became aware of a kerfuffle behind them. All four of them turned around to see an enormous, red, spiky speech bubble shoot out through the doorway of a small shop. It said 'STOP! THIEF!' in huge capital letters. It was closely followed through the door by its creator, a squat man wearing half-moon glasses and a purple waistcoat. There was broken glass all over the floor. The man was pointing directly towards them. Seconds later, a small squirrel wearing a black mask and a stripy T-shirt came running towards them carrying a plastic bag full of something shiny. Instinctively, Peanut stuck out her leg to trip him up. As the squirrel was sent sprawling, a gold

tiara flew out of the bag and rotated several times in mid-air before landing perfectly on Rockwell's head. The squirrel sat on the ground for half a second and scowled at Peanut, before springing back to his feet and disappearing into the crowd with his bag. ' There! Him! That boy with the big hair!' shouted the jeweller, pointing directly at Rockwell. 'He has the tiara! Get him!' Rockwell looked totally bemused. ' "Big hair"? Does he mean me?' he said to Peanut. 'How rude!' At that moment, a small police car came hurtling around the corner with four very fat bulldogs in police uniforms inside. As it screeched to a stop at the kerb, a speech bubble came out of the loudspeaker on the vehicle's roof: YOU WITH THE TIORA! STOP, IN THE NAME OF THE LAW!