Toad Rage - Morris Gleitzman [23]
Then he saw what was happening to Goliath.
Goliath was hopping from side to side on the rock, dodging blows from the kookaburra mascot, who'd taken off his kookaburra head and was trying to bash Goliath with the big plastic beak. The rock, which was also made of plastic, was splintering under the blows. Goliath's poison glands were bulging with fury.
“No,” Limpy yelled at Goliath. “Don't.”
He threw himself at his cousin and they both tumbled off the rock and crashed down onto the running track.
Goliath yelped with surprise and pain.
“What are you doing?” he protested. “You're supposed to be on my side.”
“The security guards have got guns,” panted Limpy. “They'll use them if you fire first.”
Goliath sighed. “Spoilsport!” he muttered.
As Limpy dragged himself out from under the complaining Goliath, he saw that the boots of the nearest security guard were getting very close.
Slightly closer, but only just, was the entrance to a stormwater drain.
“Hop for it!” yelled Limpy.
He pushed Goliath toward the drain, and together they scrambled into it with the dust from the security guards' boots stinging their backs.
“Let me spray the mongrels,” panted Goliath. “Please. Just a quick one up their trouser legs.”
“No,” said Limpy. “Keep moving.”
But after they'd splashed along the drain only a short distance, Limpy suddenly couldn't keep moving himself. Suddenly his body felt too heavy with despair to take another step.
“If you're stopping, I'm stopping,” said Goliath, sitting down heavily in the trickle of water.
Limpy hardly noticed.
All he could hear was the distant sound of the jeering humans in the stadium.
Millions of humans, all thinking him and Goliath and Mum and Dad and Charm were ugly and revolting. Mum with her kind smile and beautiful yellow eyes. Dad with his sense of humor and the funny tricks he could do with mucus. Charm with her gorgeous warty eyelids and her loving nature and the cute way the corners of her mouth crinkled when she was eating a mouse.
I was the only one who could save them, thought Limpy miserably, and I've failed.
Even now, huge trucks could be thundering down the wrong side of the highway, aiming straight for them.
And station wagons towing huge caravans.
And buses full of fat toddlers.
Limpy wished his eyes could do that wet thing that humans' eyes did. It seemed to help them when they were full of misery and despair.
All he could do was sit there, aching.
“Pssst.”
Limpy looked up, thinking Goliath's poison was leaking.
It wasn't.
A large slug was beckoning to them from farther along the drain.
“Move yourselves,” said the slug. “You're too close to the drain entrance. They could get you with chemical sprays.”
Dully, Limpy realized the slug was right.
“Follow me,” said the slug.
They followed it.
After they'd all traveled along the drain for a while, and turned off into another drain, Goliath cleared his throat.
“Is it true,” he asked the slug, “that you blokes sleep in your own snot?”
Normally Limpy would have told Goliath off and apologized to the slug, but right now he just didn't care.
The slug sighed.
“Do you mind?” it said to Goliath. “I'm feeling a bit emotionally fragile myself at the moment. You cane toads aren't the only ones having a bad week.”
“Sorry,” said Goliath.
Limpy frowned at the slug.
“What do you mean,” he said, “we're not the only ones?”
“You'll see,” said the slug.
While the three of them trudged through the maze of drains, Limpy peered into the gloom and wondered what the slug had meant by “you'll see.”
He didn't really care because nothing mattered now that Charm and the others were doomed, but at least being curious kept his mind off the pain of thinking about them.
Sort of.
Except he couldn't see anything but drains.
Then they turned a corner and Limpy realized they were approaching what looked like a wider section of drain. An eerie light flickered from above.
“Where are we?” Limpy asked the slug.
“This section of drain runs under a pub,” replied the slug. “That's a place where humans drink beer