...when a brown blur and a blue blur bounced out of nowhere and caught him right above the flames. "What happened? I swore I was..." Gregor looked down and gasped. "My word! You're not...you can't be...!"

"Pay no attention to us, your Majesty; we're just pigments of your imagination," Tummi said quickly, trying not to make eye contact with the king.

"Gummi bears!? But...you're not supposed to be real...!" Gregor was stunned.

"Yeah, we get that a lot," Gruffi said, resignation on his face that the king would have found out their existence eventually, "Take him over here, Tummi."

The two bears bounced him over to the base of the nearest parapet. "Father, are you are all right!?" Calla rushed down the stairs and all but threw herself into his arms.

"Yes I am, Calla, and wouldn't you know it, it looks like Gummi bears are real after all!" her father pointed excitedly to Gruffi and Tummi.

"I know...I mean," she shuffled about uncomfortably, "Cavin and I have known for some time, Father. The bears asked us to keep it a secret."

"We can't take chances, after what happened to our ancestors all those years ago," Gruffi told the monarch.

"Well, if you are real, then as long as I'm king, you'll have..."

"Heads up!" Tummi suddenly shouted, pointing upwards. For the Carpy King was diving towards them with claws extended...

...only to be intercepted by a small pink blur wearing red. "You're not harming the king, you overgrown chicken!" it roared, pounding on the Carpy King's head.

"Yes, the Crimson Avenger has arrived to save the day as well!" Gregor declared, "Have you Gummis ever seen...what is it?"

It was Gruffi's turn to look shocked. "I can't believe it!" he rubbed his eyes in disbelief, "CUBBI'S the Crimson Avenger!?"

"Surprised, huh?" Tummi remarked, then quickly slapped his hands over his mouth, realizing he'd said too much. "So you've known all along!?" Gruffi fixed him with a glare, "When were you and Cubbi going to get around to telling the rest of us!?"

"Um..." Tummi stammered for an explanation, but was bailed out by a loud crashing sound by the gate. "Sire, that monster's just about to break through!" Sir Tuxford came rushing around the corner, "We'll need every...!"

He dropped his sword in shock at the sight of Gruffi and Tummi. "Is that...are they...really...?" he stammered, his eyes wide.

"Gummi bears are real, Sir Tuxford!" Gregor told him in delight, "They just saved me now, and I'll bet it was them who turned the tide of battle-Cavin," he greeted the page, coming down the stairs with everyone else, "So you've known that Gummi bears were real all this time?"

"Um," Cavin's eyes shot towards Calla, who gave him a nod that it was all right to admit it now, "Yes, sir, I have. And..."

"HONEY!" came Wooster's hungry shout from around the corner, followed by the pounding of his footsteps. "As I was saying, Sire, that behemoth's in here; what do we do now!?" Sir Tuxford frantically asked his king.

"Oh, Wooster's not a threat, as long as he has honey," Pooh called from behind them. "Have you found the right spell yet?" he asked Zummi, still shuffling through his spell pages.

"Huh? Oh, oh yeah, I think this one'll do it...I hope," Zummi pulled one out of the stack. "Here we go...I think: Flickup, drickup, stickup!" he declared. Sure enough, a gigantic honey pot, filled to the brim, appeared in the middle of the courtyard. "Amazing!" Gregor applauded, "Actual Gummi magic! I wouldn't have believed it if...!"

"Hide, Sire!" Sir Tuxford pulled him to safety behind a stone wall (the Gummis following as well, seeing other knights running towards the courtyard). Wooster stomped into view moments later. "HONEY!" he roared again.

"Right down here, Wooster," Pooh called up, pointing to the pot, "All the honey you could want for the moment."

"POOH BEAR!" a smile crossed Wooster's face. He picked Pooh up in one hand and the honey pot in another, "POOH BEAR HAVE MORE HONEY TO SHARE WITH WOOSTER?"

"Of course, Wooster, it's all yours," Pooh chuckled, "All you have to do is turn around and go back to the Hundred Acre Wood, and its yours."

"You fool, don't listen to him!" the Carpy King, ignoring Cubbi's pounding on his head with his wooden sword, flew right into Wooster's face, "It's a trick! He's in league with the Gummi bears! Destroy him, then destroy this castle!"

"POOH BEAR WOOSTER'S FRIEND! YOU DON'T TALK THAT WAY TO WOOSTER ABOUT HIM!" Wooster grabbed the Carpy King, plucked Cubbi off him, and deposited him on the ground, then hurled the flying tyrant into the wall. "Get him!" the Carpy King shouted to his troops, who dive bombed Wooster. Wooster, however, set Pooh down, picked up large blocks of stone he'd knocked off the castle, and flung them up at the carpies. "Retreat! Back to Carpy Mountain!" one of them screamed in terror. He and his cohorts started flapping desperately away from the castle, an angry Wooster chasing after them with the honey pot still in hand. "No, come back!" Igthorne shouted after them down in the street, to no avail, "You're supposed to work together to help me on this!"

"CHARGE!" came Sir Tuxford's order from inside the castle. The remaining knights rushed out after him with their weapons drawn. "So, you want to fight, Sir Tuxford?" Igthorne defiantly drew his sword, "You were no match for me in that village, and you'll be no match for me now, especially with the forces I still command even now! Get them, men!" he turned...and his jaw dropped to see no more than three or four ogres left behind him, the others having taken off running from both Wooster and the oncoming knights, disappearing over the drawbridge back towards Drekkmore. "Time to get out of here, Dukey!" a purple ogre among those remaining picked him up and started running after the others. "No, put me down! I can still win this!" Igthorne protested, "We've practically got them beaten anyway, you fools; we just need one more bit of good luck...!"

"Dukey, heads up!" came Toadwart's voice from above. Igthorne looked up just in time to be conked on the head with a rudimentary wooden remote control with a large red button and miles of wires trailing out from it into the distance. "Ah, see, one more spot of good luck, men," he flashed Toadwart, circling above on one remaining carpy, a thumbs up, "Put me down!"

The purple ogre obliged. "All right, stop, all of you!" Igthorne shouted at the oncoming knights, who indeed ground to a halt in the middle of the street, "Just one touch of this button," he put his index finger to it, "and I'll launch all of my rockets and turn Dunwyn and every last one of you to rubble for the next five hundred years!"

"You're bluffing, Igthorne!" Sir Tuxford stepped forward, sword extended forward, "Put the device down and your hands up!"

"One more step, Sir Tuxford, and I push the button!" Igthorne warned him, which did bring his former adjutant to a stop, "You wouldn't want to be responsible for more loss of life than at that village, would you?"

"You can't blame what happened to those poor people on me at all, Igthorne; I may not have stopped you, but I did everything I could to save them!" rage plastered Sir Tuxford's face at the unpleasant memory, "Now this is your last warning...!"

"No, it's yours; you and your men throw down your weapons and worship me as king at once, or...!"

"Never fear, citizens; tis I, the Masked Offender, to save the day!" came the jovial cry from atop the battlement. Everyone, Igthorne included, looked up to see Tigger, now fully clad as the Masked Offender swing down on a rope towards the duke...and miss him completely, crashing hard into the town wall. This, however, did distract Igthorne enough for Roo to hop up from behind and grab the detonator out of his hand. "Give that back, you little rat!" Igthorne raged, grabbing for it.

"Can't catch me!" Roo taunted him, bouncing away from him. Roaring, Igthorne pulled out a bag of swamp gas and tossed it towards the knights, incapacitating them with a large cloud of gas, and gave chase to Roo. Roo, however, was able to stay several feet ahead of him. "Here, momma!" he tossed it to his mother, passing by the other way. Kanga pocketed it in her pouch and bounced in the other direction. "Give that to me!" Igthorne lunged and pulled her down from behind-only to see Sunni hop out of Kanga's pouch with the detonator, down a flask of Gummiberry juice, and bounce away. "Get that bear!" the duke bellowed to his remaining ogres.

The ogres lunged for Sunni, but she bounced well out of their reach. Unfortunately, though, she bounced well within range of the carpy circling overhead, who snatched it out of her hands. "I've got it!" he called down to Igthorne.

"In that case, I'll relieve you of it," Owl flew past and took it out of his claw. "Gopher, here," he tossed it to him on the rooftops, "Kindly destroy this if you can."

"With pleasure, Owl," Gopher hefted a large hammer and reared back to smash the detonator-but Toadwart leaped down and grabbed it away. "Mighty Toadie get detonator!" he pushed Gopher aside and held it up triumphantly for his boss to see.

"But not for long!" Cubbi, still costumed as the Crimson Avenger, swung down on a rope and snatched it away from Toadwart. "The Crimson Avenger strikes again!" he declared out loud. But unfortunately, the path of his rope took him straight into Igthorne's chest below. "Why thank you, I didn't know you bears could be so helpful," the duke snickered, pulling it out of his hands and tossing Cubbi roughly into a nearby haystack. "Behold!" he called to the still coughing knights through the now clearing swamp gas, "Dunwyn's doom, starring all of you!"

His finger jammed down hard on the button. From the western mountains came a sound like thunder. "Those rockets will blast this town and everyone inside it to dust in thirty seconds, and there's nothing anyone can do about it!" Igthorne laughed maniacally, spinning in a triumphant circle. "Not even the Gummi...!"

A cacophony of hoots made him turn in time to be bowled over by swarms of Owl's relatives, onto which the Gummi bears, plus Pooh and his friends, were holding on to, rapidly winging towards the oncoming rockets. "No, you're not going to stop me this time! After them!" he shouted at the carpy above, who picked up Toadwart and carried him after the owls. "You, pick me up!" he shouted to the Carpy King, staggering dazedly into the square from his impact against the castle wall, "We've got to stop them from ruining my victory!"


"Judging by my best calculations, we've got about a minute and ten seconds to destroy every last rocket, or else it's all over!" Gopher shouted out from atop Cousin Dexter's back, his gaze locked on the ten fireballs coming towards the flock of owls.

"And I suppose you know how to do that!?" Gruffi looked unconvinced on Owl's back.

"Simple; just yank out some of the wiring, and it goes off course," Gopher said confidently, hefting his hammer again.

"And my magic ought to do the trick with those we can't get," Zummi declared atop Uncle Torbit.

"Well whatever we do, make it count; we've got just one shot at this!" Rabbit pointed out, nervousness in his eyes at the large prospect of failure for them. "Kessie, if we don't make it, I want you to know, I love you," he told the bluebird next to him on Uncle Robert's shoulders.

"I know, Rabbit," Kessie said with a knowing wink, "After everything you've done for me..."

"OK, hold the mushy stuff; we've got a job to do!" Gruffi cut her off, "Rockets approaching in about thirty seconds; everyone pick one, take some juice, and wreck it as fast as you can!"

"Oh d-d-dear, the duke's still after us!" Piglet exclaimed, pointing worriedly back at the two carpies approaching rapidly from behind, an enraged Igthorne clearly visible on the Carpy King's back.

"Figures," Gruffi shugged in resignation, "You owls try and hold them off till we've got this done, if we can get it done," he shouted to all Owl's relatives, "Everybody ready?"

"No, but might as well do it anyway," Eeyore, held up by four owls, was also looking resigned.

"Three, two, one, jump!" the Gummi bears and Hundred Acre Wood residents downed Gummiberry juice and leaped onto the rockets as they zoomed by, Owl's relatives breaking off to try and hold off Igthorne and the carpies. "Emergency invest hatch...right here!" Gopher spotted the trapdoor on his rocket, wrenched it open with his hammer, and yanked out as many wires as he could manage. With loud zaps and flashes of electricity, his rocket spiraled towards the ground. Gopher leaped to safety on the one next to him. "That's how you do it; do it fast!" he told Tigger and Tummi, standing near the hatch.

"Piece of cheesecake, Gopher; hoo hoo hoo HOOOO!" Tigger bounced down on the hatch to break it open, then bounced back to let Tummi yank out the wiring. The blue bear picked up Gopher and jumped with he and Tigger to the next rocket over, which Owl was sorting through the wires on...

...which the carpy carrying Toadwart now landed on. "Mighty Toadie say surrender now!" the small ogre slid off.

"Too late, pal; we're destroying your fleet," Tummi pointed confidently at other rockets going down and exploding harmlessly in the open fields around them.

"You can't stop them all. Take them for ride!" Toadwart told the carpy, who maliciously started spinning the rocket around in circles. With loud cries, everyone strained to hold on...

...when suddenly, the rocket started slowing. "What happening?" Toadwart was confused, "Rocket not supposed to stop before castle...!"

"Ah, I see what your problem is," Owl was checking the fuel gauge inside the hatch, "Your colleagues didn't fill this one up all the way. It is now out of fuel. Sorry, old boy, this one's not reaching the castle-case in point," he added as the rocket went into a nosedive.

"HELP!" Toadwart started running around in a panic, "Save meek Toadie, Dukey!" he screamed for his boss's aid.

"No need to overreact; to coin a phrase from Mr. Tummi here and his associate, it would not be the Gummi Way to let an innocent perish, even if your heart appears to be as black as it is," Owl casually picked up Toadwart in one talon and Tigger and Tummi in the other, with Gopher climbing up his back, and took flight, as did the other carpy, leaving the empty rocket to explode in the woods below. "I'll still get you!" the carpy swooped towards Owl.

"No you won't. Fitchburger, Ditchburger, Iceberger!" Zummi shouted out an incantation from the nearest rocket that turned the carpy into a penguin. Shrieking, the now carpy/penguin flapped its flippers hard, but could no longer fly, and thus plummeted into the lake below. "I believe that's the place you shall go too," Owl told Toadwart casually, readying him to drop him into the lake as well.

"You still lose; rockets still hitting castle!" Toadwart gloated, pointing at the five remaining rockets bearing down on Dunwyn's walls.

"Zummi, a spell quick!" Tummi begged the purple bear.

"I'm thinking, I'm thinking... got it, and we don't have to jump! Tedsand, quicksand, headsand!" Zummi shouted out a quick spell, that turned every missile into giant ostriches. "Wait, that's not right! Ostriches don't fly!" Rabbit protested, hastily pushing the wires that had turned into feathers back into place when the ostrich glared at him.

"Well, it's not going to blow up the castle anymore, Rabbit, so I won't complain," Eeyore remarked behind him, managing a grin as Owl gently released Toadwart to fall into the lake.

"But look, we missed one, and it's going to hit; Grammi!" Cubbi cried to the orange bear, with Pooh on the one rocket that was still a rocket and still hurtling towards the castle. "Oh bother; this hatch is just not going to open!" Pooh lamented, pulling hard on the door, which was stuck tight.

"Then we've got to do something else in ten seconds; bend the wings!" Grammi bounced to the end of the rocket and frantically tugged on the left tail fin. Sure enough, she succeeded in bending it up, which caused the rocket to veer hard to the right, missing Dunwyn's walls. "That'll buy us some time; now we've got to figure out how to stop this thing permanently," she glanced worriedly up the length of the rocket.

"Perhaps if we found something to put the rocket out with, that would do it," Pooh suggested offhand, "If it were raining, perhaps..."

He got no further, for with a loud thud, a furious Igthorne landed on the rocket. "All right, no more Mr. Nice Duke!" he bellowed, pulling out his own bottle of Gummiberry juice and downing it. "I've had it with you bears ruining everything, and you're not ruining this!"

He jumped hard up and down, trying to force Pooh and Grammi in the air and off the rocket. "You realize of course that this rocket is already well off course?" Pooh gripped the nose cone hard, gesturing at Dunwyn receding in the distance dawn behind them.

"It can go back on course just like this!" Igthorne shoved the tail fin back into its flat position. Immediately the rocket back veering back around. "And it only takes one rocket hitting the right place to make me king!"

"Igthorne you snake, you're not going to get away with this!" Grammi bounced high over him, but suddenly slowed and fell flat on her chest on the rocket. "Out of juice now, are we? Too bad. But there's not room enough for more than one bear on this rocket anymore, so, off you go!" Igthorne picked her up and tossed her off. "Don't bother, she's not worth it!" he called to the ostrich flown by Zummi that was diving down to pick her up. "Either way, it's just you and me, you little fool," he advanced menacingly towards Pooh, drawing his sword, "Nowhere to run, nowhere to hide. I'm finishing somebody off today, and it might as well be you."

"I'm not afraid," Pooh said bravely, "I may be a Gummi bear descendant, after all, and Gummi bear or not, I'm going to be more than a Bear of Very Little Brains in this, my perhaps last moments."

"You're no Gummi bear; you don't have the smarts for it. And like the lady, off you go!" Ighthorne took a mighty swipe at Pooh, who ducked at the last minute. "Hold still, you stupid bear; I want to gut somebody today!" the duke bellowed, jumping up and down again to try and bounce Pooh off the rocket while swinging wildly with his sword. Pooh glanced backwards; the castle was getting very close again. He had to do something fast, or there was no way he'd survive, either way...

And then, amazingly, it hit him. "All right, duke, you've got me; you can gut me," he declared, laying down directly over where the hatch was.

"Good, maybe you're smarter than you seem. Say your prayers!" Igthorne raised the sword high and swiped it down-but Pooh rolled out of the way at the last minute, causing the sword to cut through both the hatch and fuel lines, which sprayed Gummiberry juice everywhere. "What, what's going on!?" Igthorne stammered, stumbling backwards while blinded by the geyser of juice.

"That was you helping me stop this rocket, duke. So on behalf of the Gummi bears, thank you," Pooh quickly drank up as much of the spraying juice as he could muster and, feeling energized, bounced as high in the air off the rocket as he could. With a screech, the circling Carpy King dove towards him from above, but Pooh bounced into him hard, tipping the creature over and sending him falling onto the missile below, which sputtered as its fuel rapidly ran out and went into a nosedive just a few feet from Dunwyn's walls. "No! No! I'm supposed to win! It's not supposed to end like this!" Igthorne screamed as he plunged down with the rocket. "Get up and get me off this thing!" he cried at the Carpy King, clambering onto his back, but it was too late; the rocket hit the ground and exploded, sending a massive fireball-and a screaming Igthorne-flying sky high, until he was ultimately level with the still ascending himself Pooh. "I'll get you for this, bear!" he roared, reaching out to try and strangle him...

...but took a sudden hammer blow to the head from above that knocked him senseless. "Sorry, this is a no strangling zone," Gopher told the duke slyly. Behind him, Zummi and Grammi hauled both the dazed Igthorne and Pooh aboard their ostrich. "Are you all right, Pooh?" the latter asked him.

"Yes, and while it may sound strange to ask, I wouldn't mind doing what I've just done again-in a non-life-threatening situation, of course," Pooh chuckled, "Because it felt good-very, very good."

"Yeah, you did great, Pooh," smiling, Zummi patted him on the shoulder, "Thanks to you," he turned his beam to Dunwyn Castle, shimmering in the rising sun, "Dunwyn is safe."

"Well, we all did it," Pooh was willing to share the honors, "So I think we all should take a bow for it."

"Indeed. OK Zummi, swing this baby around and head for the back of the castle," Grammi directed him, "Let's drop Igthorne off at the dungeon where he belongs."