Strange Things Start to Happen

Strange Things Start to Happen is the second chapter of the Wombles One.

Orinoco woke up with a start. “Where did Tobermory and Bungo go?” he mumbled to himself. He sniffed the air and smelt food. Tasty food. Chocolate Ice Cream to be precise. He followed the scent, and suddenly realised he wasn’t on the common anymore. He was standing outside Fortune & Bason! He looked around, rather worried. He didn’t know the way back!

Wellington poked his head round the door. “Can I come in?” he asked. “No.” replied Bungo’s muffled voice. “Are you perfectly alright?” asked Wellington. “No.” said Bungo again. “What’s the matter?” “Nevermind.” “Um, ok…” “Are you going to go away?” Wellington didn’t answer, and walked off looking rather confused. Suddenly Shansi appeared in front of him. “AAAGGGHHH!” screamed Wellington. “Where did you come from?”  “I came from there.” She pointed to the door of Orinoco’s room. “What were you doing in there?” “I was taking this lemonade to him, but he already had some.” “Why were you taking lemonade to him?” Shansi didn’t answer, blushed, and fainted. “Um… ok…” said Wellington.

Suddenly there was loud rumble. Wellington and Shansi rushed out to see what had made it. They got there just in time to see something like the Silver Womble but black with fins and fire coming out of the back. Driving it was some womble that look like Tobermory dressed up with another womble who looked like Tomsk dressed up next to him.

“Tobermory?” said Wellington. “Tomsk?” said Shansi. “I’m Wombat!” replied Tobermory “and this is the Womble Wonder! Atomic womblies to power!”  Tomsk continued the silliness “wombles to speed!” then the Wombatmobile raced out of the burrow straight towards Cousin Botany. He had just setup a wombat trap. Botany saw the Wombatmobile and ran. Straight into his trap. Wombat raced past underneath and Botany lay in the nets hanging from a tree.

Orinoco, who was trying to get back to burrow, now found that he was in Scotland. He knew because he could see (and hear) Cairngorm, the Macwomble the Terrible coming up to him, playing the bagpipes. “Hello young womble!” said Cairngorm. “What’re you doing here?” “I’m lost.” Replied Orinoco. “Well then,” said Cairngorm. “I’ll take you back home. I might stay for a few days as well.”  “Well… I…” said Orinoco. “Oh, alright.”

MacWomble ushered Orinoco to a trolley with a balloon attached. Orinoco was worried because there seemed to be nothing to fill the balloon. “Ach don’t you worry young womble! It’s powered by the pipes!” Orinoco was horrified as MacWomble attached his bagpipes to the balloon and played with all his might. MacWomble played pipe tunes all the way to Wimbledon Common. He made such a racket that the whole burrow came out to see what was happening.

Great Uncle Bulgaria shouted over the bagpipes at Bungo. “Murderer! You are under house arrest! Get back in! Silly sort of womble aren’t you?” Bungo was about to obey when a big black noisy car raced by him. A sort of super womble pulled him in.

“Who are you?” asked Bungo. “I’m Womble Wonder and you are innocent!” said Tomsk. “Hello young womble, I’m Wombat!” said Tobermory as he raced the Wombatmobile away from the common.

Meanwhile MacWomble had landed. He played his pipes for the womble crowd making Great Uncle Bulgaria forget about Bungo. Whilst Orinoco popped into the kitchen to munch everything with everyone else outside.

Peter was thinking about when he had seen Orinoco. He was thinking that it couldn’t possibly have been a badger. It was too big, the wrong colour, and it wore a hat and scarf. Suddenly he came up with a sneaky plan. “I’ll catch that creature, stuff it, and put it in my own museum.” He said to himself. Then he thought of something that would block that plan. He wasn’t exactly allowed to hunt on the common, because it was a public place. Then an idea sprung into his mind. What if he bought it? Then he could do whatever he wanted to on it.

He did buy it, but he had to sign a contract first. He was about to put his name down, then stopped and thought. After thinking, he put his wife on it too. It read: Mr & Mrs Peel.

Cairngorm stopped playing the bagpipes, and asked, “Why did those two take young Bungo in their car?” Great Uncle Bulgaria suddenly remembered about that, and chased after the Wombatmobile. But he was stopped in his tracks by a human being. “Why are you running?” she asked. “Oh, just getting some exercise.” Replied Great Uncle Bulgaria. “Oh, ok then.” Said the human being, and walked home. She was greeted by her husband, Peter. “Hello Emma!” he said. “You’ll never guess what I did today!” “That’s probably true.” Replied Emma. “What did you do?” “We now own Wimbledon Common!”  Emma fainted.

Peter took out a strange gun that looked like a toy. He loaded a dart into it then fired at Emma. After reloading he headed towards the place where the weird talking badger with a hat and scarf disappeared. As he headed towards the bushes that hid the burrow entrance he was nearly run over by a large black car. The car raced past. Inside were three shocked wombles. They had so nearly revealed the burrow to a human.

As they talked about the narrow escape Tobermory screeched the Wombatmobile to a sudden halt. There was woman on the common looking confused. Bungo asked who she was. “I, I don’t know” she said confused. Tomsk poked his head out. “Mmm best come with us”  She did as he said and got into the Wombatmobile. They took the long way round. Bungo hopped out just before they went into the burrow through the back entrance. Bungo didn’t want to be under house arrest so he went to find the human.

He did. Peter was waiting and fired a dart into Bungo. He went to run away but stopped. “Hmm” he thought “What was I going to do?”. Peter then bagged him and headed back to his house with Bungo.

Creak… The main door of the burrow opened slowly. The shadowy figure of another womble stepped inside, and walked into Orinoco’s bedroom. There was screaming coming from inside. Suddenly it stopped, and the shadowy figure left the burrow, carrying in something with spots of red on it. No one noticed them at all. Just as they left Shansi went into Orinoco’s bedroom to bring him a lemonade. Then she hollered loudly. Very loudly. So loudly that everyone in the burrow rushed to see what was the matter. They looked and saw none other than Orinoco with a knife in his chest. Great Uncle Bulgaria glared at Shansi. “You are the only one who has been in this room lately! You are under house arrest with Bungo on suspicion of murder! Hang on, where actually is Bungo?” he said.

Shansi was in tears. She wasn’t thinking and ran straight to the hall to escape. Although actually she ran into a woman who looked confused. “Hello who are you?” asked the woman. “Shansi Womble and you are?”  The woman looked more confused. “I, I don’t know but I think I must be called something womble because you are “. Emma paused then carried on “and you look a bit like the funny people in the black car. So maybe call me womble for now?”

“OK Womble” said Shansi and finally escaped from the burrow. A dart hit her and a man put her in a bag. The man tried to look innocent but got stopped by a classy looking window cleaner in a bowler hat. “Don’t move!” said the window cleaner pointing a pistol at Peter. He didn’t because the window cleaner sprayed him with hypnotic gas.