Flying Fergus 7

  Contents

  Title Page

  Meet Fergus and his friends …

  Meet Princess Lily and her friends …

  Hercules’ Show-offs

  A Chance for Charlie

  Absolute Beginners

  Machine Madness

  Nervous Wrecks

  Team Trial Trauma

  The Palace Pedallers

  The Wreck-it Run

  Three Cheers for Charlie

  About Chris Hoy

  About Joanna Nadin and Clare Elsom

  Copyright

  Meet Fergus

  and his friends …

  Fergus

  Chimp

  Grandpa Herc

  Daisy

  Jambo Patterson

  Mum

  Mikey McLeod

  Minnie McLeod

  Wesley Wallace

  Calamity Coogan

  Dermot Eggs

  Charlie Campbell

  Sorcha

  Choppy Wallace

  Belinda Bruce

  … and see where they live

  Meet Princess Lily

  and her friends …

  Princess Lily

  Hector Hamilton

  Unlucky Luke

  Percy the Pretty Useless

  Demelza

  Douglas

  Dimmock

  Prince Waldorf

  King Woebegot

  Queen Woebegot

  Prince Derek

  Hounds of Horribleness

  Knights of No Nonsense

  Scary Mary

  … and explore Nevermore

  Hercules’ Show-offs

  Fergus Hamilton was an ordinary nine-year-old boy. He liked his best friend Daisy (even when she was correcting him on bicycle facts). He liked his teammates Calamity and Minnie (especially when Calamity crashed spectacularly or Minnie pulled off an amazing alleyoop). He even liked his former arch-nemesis Wesley Wallace (except when he was showing off, which was still at least once a day).

  He didn’t much like his Deputy Head, Mr Minto, (because he was always telling Fergus that brains were more important than bicycles).

  Or Belinda’s dad, Brian Bruce the Biscuit Baron, he thought Belinda was better than all the rest of the team put together).

  And he absolutely did not like Miss Briggs from number fourteen (because she insisted his dog Chimp had done a poo in her garden, when everyone knows it was Mrs MacCafferty’s cat, Carol).

  Yes, he was ordinary in almost every way, except one. Because, for a small boy, Fergus Hamilton had an extraordinarily big imagination.

  Some days he imagined he was King of the World and would invent laws to ban broccoli and being mean, and give everyone free cake on a Tuesday.

  Some days he imagined he was King of Nevermore, the parallel universe where his dad lived, and would make cycling a national sport, and put his friend Princess Lily in charge of picking teams, instead of her dad, King Woebegot, who barely even believed cycling should exist.

  And some days he imagined he was just king of their flat on Napier Street and could stop his mum and her fiancé Jambo talking about weddings all the time, stop Grandpa cutting his toenails on the sofa, and stop Chimp trying to lick the clippings.

  But this morning Fergus was imagining the Hercules’ Hopefuls standing on the winners’ podium at the Internationals, the trophy held high in his own hands amidst the cheers of the adoring crowd, including his hero, Steve “Spokes” Sullivan.

  It wasn’t even one of his craziest daydreams. His team and Wallace’s Winners had made it to the next stage of the competition, and now that they’d got over their squabbling and accepted that they had to race together, they stood a really good chance of taking the prize.

  “And here he is, ‘Flying’ Fergus Hamilton himself, who has single-handedly led his team to this incredible triumph,” the commentator yelled in his head, as he skidded to a halt past the finish line at track practice. “And just listen to the crowd go wild …”

  “I doubt it,” said Grandpa with a sigh.

  Oops. Fergus gulped. He hadn’t realised he was shouting out loud. Still, it was true though, wasn’t it?

  But the look on Grandpa’s face suggested otherwise. “Fergie, I hate to say it, but you’re two seconds down on your last lap, and ten down on your time for the Nationals.”

  Fergus frowned. “The clock’s wrong,” he said. “It’s got to be.”

  Choppy Wallace held out his own stopwatch. “Two clocks can’t be wrong,” he said.

  Fergus felt his pride plummet and his stomach sink. He’d been so sure he was heading for glory.

  “Don’t feel too bad, sonny,” Grandpa patted him on the shoulder. “It’s not just you. Everyone’s down.”

  “I don’t know what’s got into them,” Choppy despaired, staring at the rest of the team still dawdling round the track.

  “Too big for their boots, that’s what,” said Grandpa. “I’ve seen it before. They win one race and think everything is in the bag, a done deal.”

  “It should be,” insisted Choppy, “with my boy in the line-up.”

  “Well, it’s not,” said Grandpa. “And if they carry on like this, they’re going to find out the hard way, including Wesley.”

  Choppy’s face reddened. “I’ll not have my Wesley brought down by … lazybones and – and show-offs!”

  Ha! Fergus said (but definitely to himself this time), Wesley’s the biggest show-off of all. As if to prove it, Wesley chose that very moment to fly across the finish line waving both hands in the air, then promptly lost his balance and crashed into Calamity, who smashed into Daisy, who fell on top of Minnie and Mikey, who toppled onto Dermot, who was eating a biscuit and got a piece of pink wafer stuck in his throat and had to have his back smacked by Belinda, who was used to biscuit-based injuries.

  “It’s not just them,” said Grandpa, shaking his head. “It’s us too. The coaching’s got to change.”

  Choppy’s already scarlet face darkened. “Change? Oh, I see what you’re up to. You want to get rid of me, eh?” “Och, no,” insisted Grandpa. But Choppy was too angry to listen. “Well, if you don’t like my methods, maybe you should quit!” he exploded.

  Fergus flinched. He’d thought the two coaches had settled their differences in the highlands, too. But clearly old rivalries died hard.

  Grandpa held steady, though. “No one’s quitting. In fact, the opposite. I think we need someone else to get them back on track. Some fresh ideas, maybe. A deputy coach, if you like.”

  “I thought you were the deputy,” said Choppy, puffing himself up.

  “But – but –” spluttered Daisy. Fergus felt words bursting out of his mouth too – that Grandpa wasn’t deputy, he was the best, and should be head coach – but Grandpa raised an eyebrow in warning to the pair of them.

  “Leave it to me,” was all he said, turning back to Choppy. “I’ll come up with someone.”

  But by teatime the best Grandpa had managed was his old racing buddy Chick Gordon, only he’d moved to Aberdeen, and Kenny Hegarty who’d once coached the Falkirk Flyers, only he’d moved to Australia.

  “What about Malky McGovern from the council?” asked Jambo. “He likes a bike ride of a Sunday, and he’s a big supporter of the squad.”

  Grandpa laughed. “A slow spin around Carnoustie Common’s not quite what I had in mind. Besides, I know Malky was a big help with the cinder track, but I’m not sure he’d be much of a coach.”

  “Or you could try Fergie’s deputy head,” suggested Jambo, as he served up the sausages. “He’ll know a thing or two about keeping kids in line.”

  “Mr Minto?” yelped Fergus, shooing away Chimp, who was desperately trying to snaffle a sausage. “He hates bicycles. And me.”
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br />   “Now that’s not totally true,” Mum said, as she lifted her plate so Jambo could spoon another dollop of mash on. “But he is a stickler, and I’m not sure he’d get on with Choppy.”

  “So who?” asked Fergus, exasperated.

  “I’ve an idea,” said Mum, squeezing sauce onto her sausages in one practised move.

  Grandpa looked up. “Who?” he asked.

  “Yes, who?” echoed Jambo. “We’re all ears.”

  But Mum just looked mysterious as she speared her sausage with a fork. “You’ll see,” she said. “Just leave it to me.”

  Fergus lay in bed that night wondering what, exactly, Mum was up to. She knew a lot of things, especially about being a nurse – how to fix broken arms, and what your heart rate should be, and which bacteria were good ones and which were bad – but as far as he was aware, she wasn’t a world expert on bikes, and besides, she didn’t know any cyclists except for him and the team. Unless …

  He turned to Chimp, who was chewing a shoe. “Do you think Mum might be a long lost friend of Spokes Sullivan?” he said hopefully.

  Chimp, who was still feeling hard done by over the lack of sausages, let go of the shoe, then dropped his head down on his paws with a harumphing sigh.

  At that, Fergus’s hopes dropped too. “My thoughts exactly,” he said. “And besides, we don’t even need a new coach. We’re absolutely fine just as we are.”

  But as he pulled the duvet tight, and remembered the arguments, and how slow they were all going, he wondered if that was really true.

  A Chance for Charlie

  “I reckon it’s Betty Burton,” said Daisy, sucking on a liquorice stick as the gang sat trackside, waiting for the grown-ups to show.

  “A woman?” demanded Wesley. “Don’t be daft.”

  “Who’s being daft?” said Fergus indignantly. “She’s won more races than you’ve had hot dinners.”

  “I doubt it,” said Wesley. “Anyway, it’s more likely to be Legs McPhee.”

  “Yeah, Legs,” repeated Dermot.

  “It had better not be,” said Fergus, feeling a cold shiver along his spine as he remembered the awful way Legs had deliberately swerved into Spokes to take gold at the Olympics.

  “Well, we’re about to find out,” said Mikey, nodding his head towards Grandpa and Choppy who were hurrying across the track, followed by someone else. Someone who didn’t look like Spokes Sullivan, or any cycle coaches Fergus had ever heard of.

  “Who’s that?” hissed Minnie.

  “Well, it’s not Legs McPhee, that’s for sure,” said Wesley. “Unless he’s taken to using a wheelchair.”

  “Legs McPhee’s a man,” pointed out Calamity. “And she most certainly isn’t.”

  Fergus looked hard at the woman wheeling towards them, with “Girls Rule” emblazoned on her sweatshirt.

  “Well she’s got that right,” said Daisy, grinning. “So she’s not Betty Burton, but she’s still a she. Though I have no idea who.”

  Fergus shook his head. “Nor me,” he admitted. “Mum wouldn’t tell me anything at breakfast – just said it would be a surprise.”

  “Well it’s that all right,” said Wesley. “Though not the good kind. I bet she’s never ridden a bike in her life.”

  “You don’t know anything about her,” whispered Daisy. “Give her a chance.”

  “Give who a chance?” said the woman, pulling up in front of them.

  “Me?”

  Fergus could feel his face redden Even though he hadn’t said anything bad, he’d not told Wesley to shut up either.

  “It’s all right,” said the woman, her stern face dissolving into a wide smile. “Nothing I’m not used to. Now, I suppose you’re wondering who I am.”

  Fergus and the others nodded silently.

  “My name’s Charlotte Campbell,” she said. “But my friends – and enemies – call me Charlie.”

  Charlie Campbell … Fergus did recognise that name, and from the telly too. But not from bikes, from …

  “Basketball!” he blurted. “You were on the women’s team in the Paralympics!”

  “Not just on it,” Grandpa pointed out. “Charlie captained it.”

  “So why aren’t you coaching them?” asked Wesley, bitterly.

  “Oh, I am,” said Charlie, laughing. “Which is why we’ve already qualified for next year’s Worlds. But our season doesn’t start for a couple of months, so when my favourite nurse Jeanie said her son’s cycling squad needed a bit of tough love, I said I’d give it a go.”

  Tough love, Fergus thought to himself. That didn’t sound great. And there was something else bothering him too. And clearly bothering the others.

  “I don’t mean to be rude,” Daisy began, “but bikes and basketball aren’t really the same thing.”

  “That’s what I said,” agreed Choppy, glaring at Grandpa. “Not the same thing at all.”

  “That’s okay,” Charlie replied, smiling again at Daisy. “If I were you, I’d be asking questions too, but, like I pointed out to the lovely Choppy here, fitness and focus are the same whatever sport you’re playing.”

  Lovely Choppy! Fergus grinned. He could feel himself warming to this woman. And yes, bikes and basketballs were different, but she was right, all teams needed to band together, to push themselves and each other, and to focus on the final goal. And they’d not been managing much of that lately, despite their newfound friendship in the mountains. So maybe, just maybe, Charlie could be the golden ticket to glory after all. With that seed of hope glowing inside him, Fergus picked up his bike and wheeled it straight to the start line. He was ready for whatever Charlie threw at them, even if that was tough love.

  Absolute Beginners

  “Yoga?” yelled Wesley. “You have got to be joking!”

  “Yoga?” spluttered Calamity. “With my legs? I don’t think so.”

  “Yoga?” Fergus repeated. That wasn’t what he’d had in mind when he’d said to himself he was ready for anything. He must have heard it wrong, surely.

  “No, you didn’t hear me wrong,” Charlie said, as if she could see straight into Fergus’s head, making his cheeks flush pink again. “Bikes are banned for now, it’s your brains and bodies we’re going to concentrate on. So come back inside, the lot of you. No dilly-dallying, we’ve got the Internationals to win.”

  The squad turned to Choppy and Grandpa, waiting for one of them to say something – anything. Surely Choppy would put a stop to this? Get them back on their bikes at least? But for once Choppy was lost for words, and all Grandpa could say was, “You heard the lady, off you go.”

  “‘Coach’, if you don’t mind,” Charlie corrected.

  “Aye, you’re right,” agreed Grandpa grinning. “Coach Campbell it is.”

  Confused, but still determined to give Charlie a chance, Fergus locked his bike in the store along with the others, and then led the squad towards the changing rooms: Belinda and Daisy dejected, Minnie and Mikey muttering to each other, and Calamity concentrating on not tripping over Dermot and Wesley, who were pushing each other into the walls as they went. The only one who seemed happy with the arrangement was Chimp, who sat snug on Charlie’s lap, cadging a lift.

  “At least it’ll be easy,” Minnie whispered as they laid out their mats and sat cross-legged, just as Charlie had told them to.

  “Easy peasy,” Mikey agreed.

  “We’ll probably fall asleep,” Wesley scoffed.

  “Shhhh,” whispered Fergus, although he quietly wondered if they might be right. Just how hard could yoga be?

  “Owwww,” Fergus found himself complaining five minutes later as he tried to bend his legs into the lotus position.

  “Double owwww!” wailed Wesley who was stuck in a downward dog.

  “Ooops,” cried Calamity as he toppled over from his tree pose straight on top of Dermot, who was still struggling to work out which leg was his left one.

  Charlie tried hard to stifle a giggle. “Not so easy peasy now, is it?” she said.
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  “Keep at it, though, you’re not doing too badly for absolute beginners.”

  “But we’re not beginners,” said Wesley, as Choppy helped haul him into an upright position. “We’re champions.”

  “Champions,” agreed Dermot, who had given up on guessing which leg was which and was focusing on not being flattened again.

  “You were champions,” corrected Charlie. “And I’m not knocking that; winning the Nationals was an amazing achievement, and you should be proud. But pride comes before a fall. And we want to avoid that, don’t we?”

  “I s’pose,” admitted Wesley.

  “And I’ve done enough of that already,” sighed Calamity.

  “Definitely,” Fergus said, winning himself a wink from Grandpa.

  “Good,” said Charlie. “So you want to be going into your next race not sitting on your laurels but chasing your dream, hungry for it.”

  “And yoga’s supposed to teach them that?” demanded Choppy.

  “Yoga gives them focus,” said Charlie. “And it helps to build strength and stamina too.”

  “And flexibility,” added Grandpa, joining in. “Come on, Choppy, give it a go!”

  “Oh, very well, if I must.” Choppy bent over to touch his toes. “Oh,” he said in surprise as he found himself unable to get further than halfway.