The Prickly Battle

Prong gushed. With a crusty wing, she tickled the beard on Bab’s chin as if it were a chubby baby. A soft white hand sprouted from the beard and clutched the tip of Prong’s wing. Bab could feel it jiggling – the beard was silently laughing!
“Congratulations, Prong,” Bab said. “And congratulations to you, Scaler. I guess that makes you a beard aunt.”
He ran his fingers through his new beard. “Gee, it’s a lot softer than the old one. Any idea why it’s white?”
“I planted the hairs in my lucky cotton pot,” Prong said, proudly puffing out her decayed chest.
“I suppose some essence of the Egyptian cotton seeped into the beard hair,” Bab figured, “and now the beard’s kinda cottony. But it’s still powerful enough to link our worlds together again. We can see each other! Give us another hug, you two.”
Prong and Scaler paused. “We’d love to,” Prong honked, “except . . .”
“Sorry, dude,” Scaler finished. “We forgot how bad you humans smell.”
Bab shrugged. “Oh well, that proves one difference between the old Beard and this cotton one.”
The mummies looked bewildered.
“You don’t have to follow my commands,” Bab explained. “I just told you to give me a hug, and you plain disobeyed.”
“Perhaps the Cotton Beard is kinder,” Prong guessed. “Mama’s so proud of you, my gentle beard baby!”
Bab frowned at the smoking city in the distance. “Come on. There’s trouble in Mumphis. Beard, turn into a scooter so we can get there pronto!”
Fuppa-foop!
The white fluffball morphed into what looked like a scooter made of little clouds. The front of the scooter was attached to Bab’s chin by a thick cotton string.
“Woohoo, it works!” cried Bab. “It changes shape just like the original!”
He leaped onto the fluffy scooter.
Fomp!
His feet sagged down to the ground. It felt like he’d jumped onto a floppy bed sheet.
“Okay, maybe it’s a little softer.”
Scaler and Prong jumped on behind Bab. The super-soft scooter started forwards, humping along the sand like a fluffy caterpillar.
“And a little slower,” Bab observed. “Pick up the pace, Beard. I don’t like the look of that crumbling city one bit, and I want to fix it before Mum gets back.”
As they neared Mumphis, Bab felt a chill despite the intense desert heat. There was something different about the hundreds of stone animal heads atop the city walls.
Squinting, he realised they’d all been remodelled – into the head of the Unpharaoh.

Bab and his friends arrived to find Mumphis overrun with cactus jackals.
They looked just like the hideous Jackal Mummies they’d once been, only now their bandages were green and studded with nasty spikes.
Some had hijacked shops and offices, even setting a few alight. Four cactus jackals had taken over the Mumphis police station and squeezed into the falcons’ police hats and tight shorts. Further along the street, through the windows of Salon Nile, Bab saw a cactus jackal relaxing on a bed. Three others tried to apply creams to him as a beauty treatment, but hurt their paws on his spikes. The pain only made them giggle insanely.
Other cactus jackals simply scurried about the streets. The buildings shook with the sound of snarling and yapping and snapping.
GRRRR! GRRUFF-GRRROWGLGL! went the cactus jackals.
“Okay, so who dug up the dog plants?” Scaler muttered.
“What’s more,” Bab said, “where are the Animal Mummies?”
He ushered Scaler and Prong behind a crumbling statue outside the Ra Ra Cafe. They crouched and hid.
Bab fiddled with his Cotton Beard, thinking. “Maybe the Animal Mummies are hiding somewhere. Can you carry us up high, Prong, so we can have a good look?”
Prong obliged by flapping up to the sky, hoiking Bab and Scaler in one talon each.
“Look out, Scaler!” Bab cried.
A cactus jackal had spotted them. It leaped up with a snarl and seized Scaler’s fantail in its spiky jaws. Prong flapped higher, now carrying three dangling passengers.
“Beard,” commanded Bab. “Form some pliers and pry open that cactus jackal’s jaws!”
Shuppa-shhwush!
The Cotton Beard morphed into a big pair of white, fluffy pliers. The Beard Pliers gently grasped the cactus jackal’s lower jaw, but to no effect.
GRRROWGLGL! growled the jackal, biting Scaler even harder.
“Good job, Pharaoh,” said Scaler drily. “The softest, fluffiest pliers ever made. That’s really gonna open up this hard, spiky dude. Don’t try anything else, I’ll just pat these soft pliers till he rips my tail clean off.”
I need to think differently with this soft Beard, Bab realised. His mind reeled as Prong flew over the burning, broken city.
“Beard, turn into a lovely fluffy dustburger!” he commanded.
Shhwush! The Beard became exactly that. It floated beside the cactus jackal, tantalising him.
“Check out that dustburger, jackal,” Bab shouted. “You must be hungry after all that time buried in the sand like a weed, yeah?”
The jackal’s eager eyes fixed onto the flying cotton burger. Green drool erupted over his spiky lips. Unable to resist, he released Scaler’s fantail and went to chomp the fluffy treat instead.
GRROWWWWEEEE! he squealed as he plummeted to the city far below. Bab winced as he saw the cactus jackal smash through the roof of Chase’s gym.
“That gym always needed an indoor plant,” said Scaler with relief.
Prong dropped Bab and Scaler on top of the Pyramid. Its pointy tip seemed to have been blasted off, leaving a large flat area to stand on.
Bab scanned Mumphis for any sign of the Animal Mummies. His eye caught some movement, but it was only a posse of cactus jackals. They scampered along a deserted street, using their spiky paws to chip graffiti into the walls of the Souk:
“There,” honked Prong. “Our mummies are over there.”
She was pointing a crusty wing to the east. Bab’s breath caught in his throat as he realised Prong wasn’t pointing at anything inside Mumphis. She was pointing outside the city, to the desert beyond.
“No way,” Bab whispered.
A vast mass of wonky, misshapen figures was heading away over the dunes.
They’ve all left, Bab realised. The Animal Mummies are marching off into the desert.


Bab