Flying Fergus 7 Read online

  “Keep stretching,” Charlie told him. “All of you. You’re never going to get it first time. Stop looking at what others are doing and focus on what you can achieve.”

  Fergus remembered what Grandpa always used to say to him: “Just when you think you’ve got nothing left, dig deep for a final push.” Go on, he told himself, you can do it. And focusing as hard as he could he pulled his legs until they rested on top of each other, feeling muscles he didn’t even know he had getting a workout for the first time. And feeling more than a little satisfaction, too.

  “See?” said Charlie, who had wheeled next to him. “Good, isn’t it, getting out of your comfort zone?”

  “Aye.” Fergus nodded.

  “Yes, yes,” said Choppy, standing up swiftly. “This is all very well, but the squad needs to be racing; they need to find their fighting spirit.”

  “And they will,” assured Charlie. “They will.”

  “But when?” whined Wesley. “I want my bike back!”

  “Just as soon as you can all do a tree for a minute without falling over.” Charlie winked.

  Wesley rolled his eyes. “I’ll be back on the track in ten minutes then.”

  “Tomorrow more like.” Daisy laughed.

  “This time, next week,” Fergus trumped her, though he couldn’t keep the air of gloom out of his voice. After all, what was the point of training for a bike race without a bike?

  Fergus wasn’t far wrong. It was four days before they found out just what Charlie had in store – four days in which they’d learned to sit for five minutes in the lotus position, practised push-ups until they could do twenty without pausing, and whizzed round in wheelbarrows without dropping each other once.

  “I think you’re ready now,” Charlie announced, as Calamity managed to cross the room without tripping over his own feet or getting tangled in Minnie’s.

  “Ready for what?” Fergus asked eagerly. He’d actually quite enjoyed all the yoga, not that he let on to Wesley, but he was itching to get in the saddle again; to feel the wind in his face as he pedalled for all he was worth – to feel like he was flying.

  “For this!” Charlie announced, as Grandpa unfurled an enormous poster.

  “The Wreck-it Run,” read Fergus out loud. “Are you serious?”

  “The what-now?” asked Belinda.

  Wesley pulled a face. “Is that even a race?”

  “Aye,” Fergus said. “It’s a race, all right. But not with bikes.” He felt his tummy flip as he remembered Mum telling Jambo to put something in the paper a few weeks ago: a charity race to raise money for the hospital, with a celebrity who was supposed to open it. Now it was beginning to make sense how Mum knew Charlie. Sort of.

  “With what then?” demanded Daisy.

  Fergus looked at Charlie, who nodded at him to go ahead. “With … with machines,” he managed finally. “With home-made machines.”

  The squad was silent for a moment as they took that in.

  “But …” began Belinda, “what sort of machines are we talking about?”

  “That’s the best bit,” said Charlie enthusiastically. “You can build anything you want.”

  “Oooh. Like my dad’s motorised golf cart?” suggested Belinda, eyes wide in excitement.

  “Not exactly.” Charlie smiled. “No motors. That’s the beauty of it. Plus you do it in pairs – one sitting in the vehicle steering, one pushing – and, best of all, it has to be built from everyday objects.”

  “Like recycling?” asked Calamity.

  “Exactly,” said Grandpa. “Make do and mend, you know my motto.”

  “I don’t see why we can’t just cycle,” muttered Choppy. “Or buy go-karts. At least then we’d know we were going to win.”

  “Because,” said Charlie, “that’s not the point. The point is that it’s something everyone has a real chance of winning. The point is to raise money for the hospital. The point is –”

  “To take us out of our comfort zones,” Fergus interrupted.

  “Bingo,” Charlie said. “It’s time to think outside the box.”

  Machine Madness

  The squad assembled in the yard at the back of Grandpa’s shop, Hercules’ Hand-Me-Downs. Here were wooden pallets, old wheels, and odd bits of scrap from who knows what.

  Choppy looked round with a sneer. “Scrap metal and junk,” he said. “Is that what we’ve come to?”

  Wesley turned up his nose, too.

  “What’s the matter?” asked Daisy. “Worried about rust on your new top?”

  “Or a spider wriggling up your sleeve?” questioned Calamity.

  Fergus smiled: his lot loved this place – they were always in here fine-tuning and fixing their bikes – but Wesley was used to Wallace’s Wheels with its brand-new Sullivan Swifts and box-fresh bike parts.

  “Och, there’ll be a spider or two, and you’ll probably want to pop on an old top,” Grandpa said. “But there’s nothing to worry about.”

  “Nothing to worry about?” blustered Wesley. “We’ve got to build things from this junk! With our – our bare hands!”

  “Isn’t it exciting?” Charlie smiled. “Right, first things first: you’ll need to team up in pairs.”

  Fergus looked at Daisy quickly. The Wreck-it Run was going to be a massive challenge, but at the very least he wanted his best friend by his side, that was for sure.

  Daisy grinned back. “Team?” she said.

  “Team!” he agreed, then, relieved, glanced round the room to see Wesley paired up with Dermot, Belinda with Minnie, and Calamity with Mikey.

  “Grand,” said Charlie. “That means Herc and Choppy, you get to go together.”

  “Me?” demanded Choppy. “You’ve got to be joking.”

  “Us?” asked Grandpa. “Och, I’m not sure.”

  “Listen to the pair of you!,” said Charlie. “There’ll be all ages and all abilities entering. Herc, if you’re worried about having enough power to push, Choppy can do that and you can steer.”

  Grandpa thought for a moment.

  “Go on,” Fergus encouraged him. He knew that however much Grandpa loved to coach, he missed the buzz of racing since his knees had started giving him trouble. But he could steer – he could steer for Scotland!

  “Yeah, go on, Dad,” agreed Wesley for once. “You’re always moaning about how you could do everything better. Now’s your chance.”

  “Aye, maybe we should,” Grandpa said, turning to Choppy with a grin and a glint in his eye. “What do you say? With you as the power, me as the steering. I may be an ageing tiger, but I’m still a tiger after all.”

  “I– I –” stammered Choppy.

  “Grand!” exclaimed Charlie. “That’s settled then. Next job: design your machine.”

  “How do we do that?” asked Minnie.

  “Take a look around,” said Charlie, “and grab whatever takes your fancy. Just bear in mind it needs to be sturdy and stable and speedy.”

  “And no motors,” added Daisy, one eye always on the rules.

  “Herc, you can help with the building bit, can’t you?” said Charlie, seeing the concern on the squad’s faces – Wesley’s in particular.

  “Of course,” Grandpa confirmed. “But the design is down to you lot. So get your thinking caps on.”

  Fergus and Daisy gazed around them, taking in the bits and bobs and odds and ends.

  “I like the look of those,” said Daisy, nodding at a set of old pram wheels with proper treaded tyres.

  “Nice,” said Fergus, reaching up to pull them off the shelf. “Oh. There’s only three, though.”

  “So?” said Daisy. “We have one in front and two at the back.”

  “Like a trike?” asked Fergus.

  “Exactly,” said Daisy. “It’ll be beast! Nice and light, but easy to steer and stable too.”

  “Brilliotic!” Fergus agreed. Charlie’s ideas may be off the wall but they were also way more fun than he’d thought … almost worth having his bike in lock-down for. “H
ow about this for the body?” he asked, pointing at a red plastic sledge. “There’s room for one of us on board – and even Chimp too!”

  “I’m not sure he’ll be interested,” said Daisy.

  Fergus looked over at Chimp and frowned. His faithful friend had barely left Charlie’s lap all week except to come home for tea, and even then he’d whined.

  “Och, he’ll get bored when she runs out of dog biscuits,” Daisy said, seeing Fergus’s face fall. “Come on,we’ve got tonnes of work to do.”

  “Suppose,” Fergus said. “You’re probably right.”

  “Probably?” Daisy said with a smile. “I’m ALWAYS right. At least most of the time.”

  Fergus smiled back. Yes, whatever Chimp was up to, and Charlie, this Wreck-it Run was at least going to be fun.

  It took two days, three changes of design and several splinters, but, by Sunday afternoon, Daisy and Fergus – as well as the rest of the squad – had built their magnificent machines.

  Wesley and Dermot’s was made from old car panels, and spray-painted jet black with a flame design down the side. “She’s called The Invincible,” announced Wesley.

  “Is that so?” asked Charlie. “Well, let’s take your word for it.”

  Minnie and Belinda’s was long and low, with a glass visor for wind protection. “It’s from a washing machine,” Minnie said proudly, and Charlie nodded in approval.

  “Nice,” said Grandpa. “We’ve got washing machine bearings too, and a bit of a lawnmower!”

  “Washing machines, lawnmowers,” grumbled Choppy. “I never thought I’d see the day.”

  “Ours is a bit … rickety,” admitted Calamity as he and Mikey stood back to let Charlie inspect their work.

  “Maybe so,” agreed Charlie, “but you’ve got pedal power as well as someone pushing, so as long as it lasts the race, you’re in with a brilliant chance.”

  Pedals! Fergus cursed himself for not thinking of that – he was a cyclist after all. Now what hope did he and Daisy have on an old sledge, even with the greased axles and steering wheel Grandpa had helped them attach? He felt his heart sink as Charlie came to check it over.

  But Charlie seemed to think differently. “Not bad,” she said, giving it the once over. “Not bad at all.”

  “Really?” asked Fergus. “You’re not just saying that?”

  “I never lie,” said Charlie. “No point telling someone they’re better than they are or have more chance than they do. That’s the road to disappointment.”

  “But we’ve not got pedals,” said Fergus. “Or car panels. And it’s not as sleek as Minnie and Belinda’s either.”

  “But we’ve got great steering,” said Daisy, pulling a face at Fergus.

  “You have,” said Charlie. “And it’s sturdy too. So stop worrying about what others have got, and focus on your own plus points. Play to your strengths!”

  Fergus felt guilt whoosh through him like a bucket of cold water on embers as he remembered Spokes’s motto: “Believe in yourself, and others will follow.”

  “We will,” he promised quickly. “Won’t we, Daisy?”

  “I always do,” Daisy said with a wink. “So when can we test run them?”

  “No time like the present,” Charlie replied. “What do you say, gang?”

  “Let’s do it!” Fergus whooped. He was fired up and ready to rumble. So he and Daisy might not have the best bearings or extra pedals, but they’d worked hard on their machine, and with Daisy’s precision steering and his leg power, they were in with a shot.

  Weren’t they?

  Nervous Wrecks

  “Quit pushing,” whined Wesley, as the teams jostled on the start line. “You’ll snap our wing mirror!”

  “There’s no room,” complained Calamity, untangling his foot from one of Belinda’s spokes.

  “Stop moaning, the lot of you!” ordered Charlie. “You can’t expect this to be easy. This is a Wreck-it Run, things are going to get … a little messy. So, safety checks, please.”

  Fergus made sure his helmet was fastened and his knee-pads were tight. Better safe than sorry, as Daisy’s mum was fond of saying, and right now, looking at the crazy contraptions lining up alongside him, he couldn’t agree more. As it was, Mrs Devlin had only agreed to let Daisy race because the Wreck-it Run was being held in the grounds of the hospital, so emergency help was at hand.

  “Okay, on your marks …” Charlie cried, “Get set … GO!”

  Fergus pushed with all his might and felt the machine lurch forward so hard he almost plunged to the floor. It was lighter than he’d imagined, but less precise, too, even with Daisy’s expert steering. But as his feet pounded the tarmac, he felt himself fall into a rhythm and felt Daisy get to grips with the turns, and soon they were taking the corners without swerving off course, or slamming into the others.

  Sadly, the same couldn’t be said of everyone. Before they’d even made it down the back straight, Calamity and Mikey had hit the side barriers, Minnie and Belinda had spun a doughnut and careered onto the grass and as for Wesley and Dermot, they were still arguing over which was the brake and which was the horn.

  Then, as Fergus and Daisy turned onto the final straight, they found themselves face to face with Grandpa and Choppy who were struggling with steering and had managed to do half the lap backwards instead.

  “Slow down!” yelled Daisy.

  “I’m trying!” cried Fergus.

  But try as he might, he couldn’t pull up in time and instead the pair slammed into the other machine with a sickening CRUNCH!

  “I’m so sorry,” Fergus apologised, feeling tears well in his eyes at the thought of hurting Grandpa or Daisy or even Choppy.

  “Hey, hey,” Grandpa comforted. “No harm done. Well, nothing that can’t be fixed with glue or nails, anyway.”

  Fergus surveyed the damage – Grandpa was right, it was just dents, and a wobbly wheel or two.

  “And it is a Wreck-it Run,” Charlie pointed out. “Crashing is half the fun.”

  “Exactly,” said Daisy, climbing out happily. “That was BEAST!”

  “It’s BANANAS,” insisted Wesley, crossly. “How has this got anything to do with Internationals?”

  “Yeah, how?” demanded Dermot.

  “I don’t even think I know which way is forward anymore,” muttered Minnie, as she staggered dizzily around.

  “Resilience,” said Charlie. “That’s what this is teaching you. Flexibility, too. And maybe even … fun?”

  But back in the changing rooms, fun was the last thing on anyone’s mind.

  “We need to take a stand,” insisted Wesley. “Show them who’s in charge.”

  “Charlie’s in charge,” said Daisy. “And I like her.”

  “That’s just because she said you had decent steering,” Wesley sneered.

  “No it’s not,” Daisy snapped back. “She’s got loads of good ideas. And Fergus agrees with me. Don’t you, Fergus?”

  Fergus pretended he hadn’t heard. He liked Charlie a lot, but Wesley had a point: even if it was only the machines that got bruised and battered, how did that help them win the Internationals? And she’d not even been letting them near their bikes – she said she had reasons but he couldn’t work out what on earth they were.

  “We should go on strike,” suggested Mikey.

  “Until what?” asked Minnie.

  “Until we get a better coach,” said Wesley.

  “But who?” barked Belinda. “Charlie was the only person anyone could come up with.”

  An idea flashed into Fergus’s head, bright as a lightbulb. There was someone – someone he knew cared about the squad, someone who knew about bikes, someone who’d won cycling championships himself.

  His dad, Hector Hamilton.

  Fergus would have to persuade him to come back from Nevermore, but it couldn’t be harder than anything Charlie had got them to do.

  Could it?

  “Where are you off to?” asked Daisy, as Fergus sidled towards the door.<
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  “Nowhere,” he said quickly. “Well, I just need to pop out. There’s … something I need to do.”

  “Now?” Daisy said. “Really?”

  Fergus shrugged. “See you back here tomorrow?”

  Daisy shook her head. “Bonkers,” she said. “Okay, tomorrow it is.”

  Fergus took a deep breath. Maybe he was bonkers. But if it could sort the team spirit out, it was worth a try.

  Holding on to that thought, he slipped out the door to bust his bike out of lockdown.

  Grandpa kept the key to the store in the pocket of his jacket, which hung on the back of office door. Getting the key had been the easy part, as the coaches were all still trackside. But persuading Chimp to come with him was proving much, much harder. All his dog wanted to do these days was sit on Charlie’s lap. Or so it seemed.

  “Come on, boy,” Fergus called for the third time.

  Chimp finally cocked an ear and opened an eye, but thought better of whatever it was and went back to having his tummy tickled as Charlie and Grandpa talked tactics.

  “Chimp,” Fergus tried again, more loudly.

  But the dog was having none of it.

  “Fine,” he said. “Guess I’m on my own then.” And he left him there while he headed to the bike store.

  As he unlocked the store door and then his bike, he felt his heart hammering. He wasn’t supposed to ride at all. This was going against Charlie – and Grandpa. And, what if he couldn’t get to Nevermore without Chimp anyway? What if it wasn’t just backpedalling that did it – what if Chimp was the secret ingredient?

  But he had no choice, Fergus told himself. The squad needed him, and he’d do anything to help them. So slick as a snake and quiet as a mouse he wheeled his bike out to the car park.

  Sitting in the saddle, he tightened his helmet, and took a deep breath. “I can do this,” he said aloud. “I have to do this.”