Once they had disembarked at LaGuardia Airport, Prunella and Rubella attended to the task of finding a cab. This proved to be easy, as swarms of yellow taxis were constantly running past the exit doors. Rubella caught the attention of a dreadlocked man who was enjoying a cigarette break. "Sir, could you take us to the Times Square Hilton?" she inquired.
"You crazy, mon?" said the man with a heavy accent. "It's like a war dere, wit' people dyin'."
"Yes, I know," said Rubella a bit sheepishly. "You see, I'm a reporter."
"And who dat?" asked the cab driver, pointing at the little girl next to her.
"Uh, she's a junior reporter," was Rubella's reply.
"Eighty dollahs," the driver said glibly.
"I've got it right here," said the rat girl, drawing a wad of bills from her handbag.
Minutes later the girls were belted into the back of the cab, gazing out the windows at the vast and growing cityscape of New York. They had little to say to each other, as neither understood well the destiny that awaited them in Manhattan, or the steps they would have to follow in order to survive.
Prunella broke the silence, but in an odd way. "Testing," she said emotionlessly. "Testing, testing. Gla-hoyven maven."
Rubella turned to her, startled. "Dr. Frink? Is that you?"
"How did you guess?" said Prunella in a robotic tone.
"Well, you did say 'gla-hoyven maven'," said Rubella matter-of-factly.
"I did not," Prunella insisted.
Back in Elwood City, Frink pumped his fist triumphantly. "An unqualified success!" he exclaimed.
"An unqualified success," Rubella heard her sister say.
Sal, overcome by giddiness, rose on the tips of her toes until her mouth was even with Frink's transmitter. "I just peed my pants!" she yelled into the microphone.
"I just peed my pants," Prunella repeated.
"Uh-oh," said Rubella. "Driver, could you pull over somewhere, please?"
Van, now in the peach-colored dress he had worn as a girl, rolled into his living room with an elated grin on his beak. "How did it go?" inquired his sister Odette, who wore shorts and a loose tank top as she worked out to a Brazilian Samba exercise video.
"He bought it!" was Van's exultant reply.
"And here's the check to prove it," said Mr. Cooper, standing behind the boy's wheelchair with a slip in his hand. "Tomorrow, when I go back to Elwood City, I'll deliver it to the Cutlers in person."
"Why can't we keep a little of it?" Odette asked him. "I mean, like, a service charge, or whatever."
"I know it's tempting," said the duck man. "However, I'm doing this not as a lawyer, but as a friend—or at the very least, someone who shares a common enemy with Muffy."
"Gosh, I can't believe what Mr. Crosswire did to her," said Odette, pausing to wipe the sweat from her forehead. "It wouldn't surprise me if she's traumatized for life. Being attacked is scary, no matter who's doing the attacking, because you don't know what's going to happen to you."
"Yes, it was a shameful and cowardly act," said Cooper, "but I've set a plan in motion to ensure he never hurts his daughter again." Looking over at Van, he went on, "And you, my son, have dressed like a girl for the last time."
"Aww, man," said the duck boy, his face downcast.
Block after block, tower after tower, sailed by as the rat girls waited anxiously to arrive at their fateful destination. As the taxi crossed over 30th Street, they began to notice that both the traffic on the streets and the crowds on the sidewalks were beginning to thin down. An even more surprising sight greeted them a few more blocks to the south, where the avenue was practically deserted, except for a few brave souls who were snapping pictures…and the enormous, packed crowd that filled the neighborhood ahead.
The driver stopped his vehicle at the curb. "Dis is as far as I go, mon," he declared. "You on your own now."
"Thank you very much, sir," said Rubella, placing four twenties in the man's palm.
Upon exiting the cab, they discovered that the bustling noise of the mob was even more fearsome than its appearance. It wasn't unlike the sound of a rock concert mixed with a meeting of the Ku Klux Klan, multiplied several thousand times. Again and again they heard shouts of "Death to the unicorns!" and "Bash in their horns!".
Rubella felt her knees weakening as she looked at the scene. "Are you sure you want to do this, Prunie?" she asked her sister.
Prunella showed her an expression of resigned confidence. "She doesn't have a choice," were the words that came from her mouth.
"Go on, then," said her older sister. "I'll stay right here. No way am I gonna become part of that."
Not a nail remained unchewed at the Prufrocks' house, where Frink and the kids witnessed the proceedings courtesy of Frink's device. "Walk forward, slowly," the scientist uttered into the receiver. "Squeeze your way through the mob until you get to the hotel. Take your time, this isn't a race."
As the rat girl marched boldly into the midst of the angry New Yorkers, the image on the screen became a sea of lower backs and rear ends, with an occasional baby carriage. "C'mon, Prunella, you can do it!" said Arthur, clenching his fists.
"Excellent," said Frink proudly. "Just as I predicted, the anti-unicorn hysteria isn't affecting her at all—not visibly, anyhow."
"But she still has a long way to go," remarked George.
"If you estimate the range of the sphere at a mile and a half," said Frink, "the entire journey should take at least forty-five minutes."
"Forty-five minutes of listening to that awful shouting," said Fern, hands over her ears.
"I wish I'd destroyed the sphere when I had the chance," Sue lamented.
Seconds turned into minutes, minutes into longer minutes. Though the scenery never changed, no one dared look away from the TV screen. "There must be millions of them," Alan marveled.
Will Prunella succeed? Will she survive? Find out in the next thrilling chapter!