Текст книги "Attack of the BULLIES"

Автор книги: Michael Buckley

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Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 14 страниц)

When you are a supervillain, it is very hard to get respect from the rest of the criminal community if you happen to be cute, and unfortunately, Miss Information was terribly, depressingly adorable. She had big blue eyes, a button nose, tanned skin, and golden hair. She looked like a movie star. Her peers, on the other hand, were covered in ugly scars and had terribly twisted metallic limbs. Some of them had laser eyes or had been disfigured by chemical spills. Professor Zydeco had an alligator head and an accordion frozen in his chest cavity. Miss Information would have loved that! But no luck—she was a beauty. So she was forced to wear a mask that covered her whole head.

The mask had drawbacks.

First, it was very difficult to eat a candy apple while wearing it.

Second, it gave her terrible hat-head.

Third, whenever she called a customer service number and got an automated voice system, it never understood what she was saying. NEVER! She could shout over and over again, but the voice would always say, “I’m sorry. I didn’t catch that. Let’s try again.”

But the mask did have two major pluses. The first was that it scared the living daylights out of everyone who saw it. She’d witnessed people wet their pants or even faint when they met her. That was cool. The second was that she didn’t have to look at herself when she wore it. Her face, as lovely as it was, brought on a wave of confusing memories—or were they hallucinations? She couldn’t be sure sometimes. It seemed as if she had lived several lives all crammed into one. Was the handsome man with the amazing hair real? Who were the superpowered children that appeared in her dreams? Why did she sometimes ache to wear a cardigan sweater? Why did she have to resist the urge to go into libraries and reshelve books? What was the Dewey decimal system? Why was she always “shushing” people? The mask quieted all of her questions. It made her feel sane.

“I bet they’re looking for us, darling,” she said. She turned to her boyfriend, who sat in a chair in the corner of her office. He was wearing a tuxedo and holding a white cane, and might have looked very dapper if he wasn’t a scarecrow with a head made from a stuffed burlap sack. Miss Information had painted a smiley face on the sack and hung a sign from his neck that read ALEX.

She planted a kiss on the scarecrow’s burlap face, then hoisted him over her shoulder. Every step showered loose straw behind her.

She carried Alex into an enormous domed room. The ceiling, which was held aloft by towering pillars, was decorated with intricate ceramic mosaics dedicated to the four branches of evil: raving madmen, world conquerors, firebrand pyromaniacs, and fast-food workers. Below was a room as long and wide as a football field. Hundreds of tables and workstations filled the space, and at each station busy scientists were working feverishly on bizarre inventions: sun-exploding missiles, laser-guided death rays, armies of evil robotic beavers, tidal-wave machines, devices to awaken prehistoric monsters … It was like … a playground of evil! Every time Miss Information entered the room, she couldn’t help but beam with pride. Every detail was built according to her vision—and to think it had all come to her in a dream.

“Miss Information! We’ve had a breakthrough!”

One of her scientists hobbled across the vast room. She didn’t know any of their names, but this one had a ball and chain attached to his leg, which meant he had tried to escape at some point. Miss Information hated when the scientists tried to escape. It really hurt her feelings.

“Oh, yes?” she said. “Which one?”

The scientist removed a folded piece of paper from his pocket and spread it out on a nearby table. It showed a crude drawing of a big circle. Beneath it in neat print were the words talking, flying, and robotic ball.

“Finally!” Miss Information cried. “What took so long?”

The scientist gulped nervously. “We apologize for the delay, but as Dr. Silver remarked, the design was a little vague.”

“Vague? Everything you needed to know is right here on this paper. Where is this Dr. Silver?”

“You had him placed in a cage full of hungry tigers.”

“Oh, that Dr. Silver! Well, that’ll teach him to be a negative Nelly!”

“Actually, the tigers ate him.”

“And now you’re being a negative Nelly!” she said, huffing. “Why can’t you guys be happy? I hired you to work on supercool ideas. This is a dream job for a scientist.”

“Um, actually, you kidnapped all of us and force us to work with threats and … tigers.”

“Listen, I’ve never run a worldwide criminal enterprise before, so you guys are going to have to cut me some slack! There’re going to be some growing pains until I figure it all out. Now, you said you had something to show me?”

He reached into his lab coat and pulled out a silver ball the size of a large tomato. He set it in her hands and pushed a button on its surface. The ball hummed to life. Like magic, it spun like a top and hovered in midair. Purple lights beamed from tiny holes and illuminated the walls and ceiling.

Miss Information turned to her straw boyfriend, who sat in a chair shedding more of his innards onto the floor. “Sweetums! It works.”

She turned back to the orb, dazzled by its lights and sounds. “Happy birthday, Benjy!”

A deep, emotionless voice came from within the orb. “Who is Benjy?”

“You are, silly.” She giggled. “How do you feel?”

“I do not have hands, so I cannot feel anything.”

“No, I don’t mean that literally,” she replied. “I’m asking about what you are experiencing.”

“I do not experience anything. I log and save what I perceive.”

Miss Information frowned and turned to the scientist. “I’m unhappy, Mr. Scientisty-man. I thought Benjy would have more sass.”

“Sass?”

“You know—personality. I thought he’d be snarky,” she said. “This wasn’t how I imagined the robot at all. He needs to have opinions and a sense of humor. This thing is totally boring. No offense, Benjy.”

“I cannot be offended. I am not programmed with emotions.”

“See?” she exclaimed. “Lame!”

“He’s a robot, ma’am, with limited artificial intelligence. What you’re asking for is simply not possible,” the scientist said, his voice shaking.

Miss Information eyed the man disapprovingly. Then she shouted over the din of experiments and chatter, “Does anyone know when the tigers eat lun—”

“But we can fix him!” the scientist cried.

Miss Information turned to her stuffed beau. “Really?” she said as if she were having a conversation. “But I wanted him to be funny. Well, if you think so.”

With a pout in her voice she turned back to the scientist. “Let’s leave Benjy the way he is.” She leaned in to whisper in the terrified man’s ear. “I think Alex is a little jealous about the competition for my attention. You should get to work on the next part of my plan.”

The scientist nodded and forced a smile on his face. “The machine that gives children superpowers?” he whispered back.

“Yes. You got my designs, correct?”

“I have the crayon drawing of the chair that you drew,” he said. “So, yes, I got your designs.”

“Well, chop-chop,” Miss Information said, raising her voice so everyone could hear. “Time’s a-wastin’!”

The scientist darted off as fast as he could with a ball chained to his leg.

“Benjy, welcome to the team. This is Alex, my boyfriend,” Miss Information said, gesturing to the straw man. “He’s a master spy and an international man of danger.”

“That is a scarecrow,” Benjy said matter-of-factly.

Miss Information seized the stuffed man and gave him a hug. “Oh, silly, there must be something wrong with your visual sensors.”

“My sensors are functioning within—”

“No time for chitchat right now, Benjy. I want to show you our evil headquarters.”

Miss Information hoisted the scarecrow onto her back and led the orb through her facility. They passed all manner of space-age vehicles: cars that drove underwater, flying motorcycles, helicopters that ran on maple syrup, mini submarines, and many more. In another room they found weapons: submachine guns, laser pistols, rocket launchers, matter vaporizers—even a flamethrower.

“Look at all my toys, Benjy. We have the most advanced computer and surveillance tech in the world and a full-time staff dedicated to creating one doomsday device after another. And the break room has a juicer! Best of all, we’re hidden several stories below a middle school.”

Benjy spun around and beeped. “Yes, my internal GPS pinpoints our location as beneath the Margreet Zelle Detention Center for the Incorrigible.”

“You are correct. This school houses an army of punks, juvenile delinquents, and bad apples. It’s the biggest collection of bullies in North America. They’re going to be very helpful in my plans to take over the world.”

The orb clicked. “May I ask a question?”

“You betcha.”

“Have you given any thought to the logistical complications of maintaining control over the whole world in the highly unlikely event that you succeed? For instance, how will you effectively manage a planet of over seven billion people, all of whom will be plotting to retake their freedom? How will you juggle the various economic needs of each nation? Do you plan on ruling the world with an iron fist or benevolence? Have you found a solution to the needs of poorer countries, or do you plan on subjecting everyone to slavery and destroying the industrialized world? If it is the latter, have you planned for housing, food, clean water, and access to health care? How will you handle the various religious needs of everyone you rule? How do you maintain a single currency for an extremely divergent people who all have different cultural and economic needs?”

Miss Information blinked.

“You haven’t thought this out, have you?” the orb asked.

“Never mind all that! Let’s get started, shall we?” She stopped at a large screen mounted on the wall and tapped a button on its side. It lit up with the image of a pretty girl no more than twelve years old. She had large mahogany eyes and wore a plaid skirt and a matching sweater with a griffin logo.

“My data bank tells me that this is Tessa Lipton, daughter of the president of the United States,” the orb said.

“I know. We’re going to kidnap her.”

“A second search reveals the criminal penalty for kidnapping the child of a government official is life in prison.”

“Oh, don’t be a party pooper, Benjy,” Miss Information said. “This is going to be superfun!”

To avoid confusion, Ruby had created a chart to ensure that she was never late for school.

6:45

WAKE UP, TURN OFF ALARM CLOCK

6:50

TAKE ALLERGY MEDICINE

6:55

SHOWER

7:05

TOWEL-DRY/ATTEMPT TO DETANGLE KINKY HAIR

7:10

CHECK TIME TO MAKE SURE SCHEDULE IS WORKING

7:15

GIVE UP ON KINKY HAIR, GET DRESSED

7:25

SAY GOOD MORNING TO PARENTS (NOTE: FRANCIS AND SARAH) AND BABY BROTHER (NOAH)

7:27

PET THE DOG (TRUMAN) THEN LET HIM OUT THE BACK DOOR TO DO HIS “BUSINESS”

7:28

PARTICIPATE IN LIGHT CHITCHAT/BONDING WITH FAMILY

7:35

EAT BREAKFAST

7:50

DOUBLE CHECK TIME TO INSURE SCHEDULE IS BEING MAINTAINED

7:55

FLOSS AND BRUSH

8:00

MAKE SECOND ATTEMPT AT DETANGLING HAIR

8:10

SURRENDER TO FUTILITY OF KINKY HAIR, GATHER BELONGINGS

8:15

PUT ON COAT, BOOTS, HAT, MITTENS, AND SCARF (WINTER SCHEDULE)

8:20

MORE CHITCHAT WITH FAMILY; GOOD-BYE HUGS AND KISSES

8:30

DEPART FOR SCHOOL

Unfortunately, her family had a way of smashing her plans with a wrecking ball and then setting them on fire. At 6:55, when she should have been showering, she heard a calamity in the kitchen she could not ignore. Grumbling, she padded through the house and found Sarah burning scrambled eggs while talking on the phone. Francis was attempting to spoon-feed Noah while trying to knot his necktie with his free hand, and Truman, the family terrier, was throwing himself against the back door with a panicked whine.

Ruby sighed and took charge. She let the dog out. Then she turned and took the frying pan from Sarah, replacing it with a container of orange juice, and spinning her toward the glasses already on the table. The eggs were a lost cause—crunchy and black—so Ruby tossed them in the garbage and cracked a half-dozen fresh eggs into a bowl. She lowered the flame on the stove and beat the eggs with a whisk. After pouring them in a frying pan, she stuffed four slices of bread into the toaster with one hand while rinsing a bunch of grapes with the other.

She snatched a roll of paper towels off the counter and went to work cleaning the baby food off Noah and everything else within five yards of him. Ruby took the tie from her father, wrapped it around her own neck, and tied it for him. Then she went back to the eggs for a quick stir, tossed some cheese on them, gave them a flip, and served them onto three plates. When the glasses were full of juice, Ruby guided her mother to her seat, then gave her a butter knife and pointed her toward a fresh stack of toast while she poured coffee into both of her parents’ oversize mugs.

“Did you get any sleep last night?” her father asked her while attempting to insert a spoon full of creamed rice into Noah’s mouth. The little boy’s lips were clamped shut like a vise.

“Just a little tired,” Ruby said. The truth was she was exhausted and felt like she was shuffling around like a zombie. After her mission on the train, she felt that she needed at least a week of solid sleep to recover, but she couldn’t tell her parents about it. Though she felt icky lying to them, she truly believed that keeping them in the dark also kept them safe. “Try the choo-choo trick.”

Francis smiled. “What would we do without you, Ruby?”

“You’d be up to your ears in dirty diapers and the house would be on fire,” Ruby said.

Just then, she let out a terrible sneeze.

“Honey, did you take your allergy medicine?” Sarah asked.

“I’ll take care of it right now,” Ruby said, excusing herself from the table and rushing to the bathroom. She locked the door and squeezed her nose. “Pufferfish here.”

The principal sounded agitated. “Kid, I need you and the team here pronto. We’ve got a national emergency.”

“What’s new? I suppose it’s another insane plot by Ms. Holiday?”

There was an uncomfortable silence on the other end. No one liked to think their biggest enemy had once been one of their best friends.

“Just hurry, and if you happen to have a pleated skirt, bring it with you.”

“A pleated skirt?”

The com-link disconnected.

The principal sounded panicked. Tired as she was, she knew she had to put her morning into high gear. She opened the bathroom door, prepared to race to her room to get dressed, but she was stopped by her mother waiting on the other side.

“I need you home on time tonight, Ruby. No excuses,” Sarah said. “The entire family is coming in two days for our annual Hanukkah and Christmas celebration. Grandma Rose and Grandpa Tom, Grandma Tina and Grandpa Saul, Aunt Delynn, Aunt Denise, Aunt Suzi, Aunt Laura, Aunt Emily, Uncle JJ, Uncle Justin, Uncle Eddie, Uncle Kevin, Uncle Jeff, Uncle Christopher, Uncle John, and all your cousins—Kiah, Kiara, Leaf, Finn, Hayley, Tulia, Siena, Danny, Alex, Charlotte, Kate, and Imogen. We have to get ready.”

Ruby groaned. “All seven thousand of them? They aren’t staying here, are they?”

“Sure, because I’m trying to blow up the house,” her mother said with a laugh. “You know we can’t keep all the Protestants and Jews in the same house for longer than an hour before a holy war starts. Don’t worry—your father booked them into a hotel. But we’re hosting a couple big dinners here and I want this place spick-and-span. I could also use some of your famous organizing skills.”

“You’re trying to distract me from this insane inconvenience with my love of making lists,” Ruby grumbled.

Sarah smiled. “If you want to be in this family, you have to have an appetite for chaos. Come home right after school.”

“Fine, but I have some rules. The little ones have to stay out of my room. They’re like ferrets going through my drawers, pulling things out, and dragging them all over the house,” Ruby said. “I have a system.”

“OK.”

“And I absolutely insist that everyone read the visitors handbook I made for the house, especially the part about how to use the remote control for the television. Remember last year, when Grandpa Saul got his hands on it? Pandemonium.”

“Deal!” Sarah said, throwing her arms around her daughter and hugging her tight.

“Mom! Hugging is supposed to happen at 8:20. You’re messing up the schedule!”

TOP SECRET DOSSIER

CODE NAME: BIGFOOT

REAL NAME: PEGGY GRUNT

YEARS ACTIVE: 1994–99

CURRENT OCCUPATION: FOREST RANGER

HISTORY: PEGGY’S AWKWARD

STAGE, FROM THE AGE OF TEN

UNTIL FOURTEEN, WAS ONE OF

THE WORLD’S MOST DISTURBING.

SHE HAD ARMS THAT HUNG

NEARLY TO HER FEET AND AN

UNFORTUNATE UNDERBITE THAT

RENDERED MUCH OF WHAT SHE

SAID UNINTELLIGIBLE. SHE CAME

TO THE TEAM’S ATTENTION AFTER

SHE WAS CAPTURED BY HUNTERS

WHILE ON A SCHOOL FIELD TRIP

TO COLLECT LEAVES. WHEN THE

HUNTERS TRIED TO SELL HER TO

A CIRCUS, NERDS RESCUED

HER AND OFFERED HER A

PLACE ON THE TEAM. SHE

WAS A FAITHFUL SPY UNTIL

SHE TURNED FIFTEEN AND

SUDDENLY WENT FROM

UGLY DUCKLING TO

SUPERHOT BABE.

UPGRADE: BIGFOOT PRODUCED A

PHEROMONE THAT CAUSED BOYS TO

FALL IN LOVE WITH HER, MAKING

THEM HIGHLY SUGGESTIBLE TO

HER REQUESTS.

The team assembled at the mission desk in the Playground and waited for the principal to arrive. Heathcliff hunkered in the shadows. He knew he was forbidden from taking part in mission briefings, but he just couldn’t help himself. Being a spy was exciting, and it frustrated him that he wasn’t allowed to help. Plus, he wanted to be ready for the day when they invited him back on the team.

“Another mission?” Matilda cried. “This is ridiculous!”

“If Ms. Holiday is behind this one, I’m going to scream,” Duncan said. “We just stopped her from melting the polar ice caps last week!”

“Don’t forget the man-eating plants that attacked Birmingham,” Jackson added.

“And when she poisoned the world’s supply of corn dogs,” Flinch grumbled.

“The earthquake machine was no day in the park, either!” Duncan said.

“They know we’re only twelve years old, right?” Jackson roared.

Heathcliff understood their frustration. The team had been working eighteen-hour days for months, keeping the world from exploding or falling into chaos. They were understaffed and underappreciated.

Ruby stood up and raised a hand to calm everyone. She was a natural-born leader and the team’s spokesperson. Heathcliff and Ruby had knocked heads many times when he was on the team, but he always respected her.

“I’ll handle this,” she said. “The principal will understand. I think that a few staff additions will make a huge difference. We need a gadget tech to teach us the latest stuff coming out of the science team. We need a surveillance expert to go over what’s happening around the world. We need an information specialist and a historian—”

“—and a new Benjamin!” Duncan said.

Ruby nodded. “Yes, a new Benjamin would be helpful, plus a pilot for the School Bus now that the lunch lady is the principal. I don’t feel comfortable flying around in a remote-control rocket.”

“Um, hello?” Jackson said, raising his hand. “I’d be happy to train for that job. I have excellent eye-hand coordination and I look hot in aviator sunglasses.”

“We can’t have a child flying a supersonic jet,” Matilda said.

“Oh, but we can have one jumping out of it to fight robots and mad scientists?”

Just then, the principal walked into the room, and the team turned their anger on him. The five of them were like a pack of angry dogs, yipping and barking at the bewildered man.

“What in the world is wrong with you people?” the principal asked.

“We’re tired!”

“We’re overworked!”

“We’re frustrated!”

“We haven’t been in a classroom in months!”

“The snack machine is out of taffy!”

Everyone looked at Flinch.

“Well, it is,” he said defensively.

Heathcliff knew it was time to act. “Maybe I can help,” he said as he stepped into the light.

The principal frowned. “Listen, Heathcliff, we’re having a team meeting and—”

“Just hear me out, OK?” No one argued, so he continued. “I know how to fix this team. You’re outmatched. Ms. Holiday is springing one world-ending scheme after another on you. Some days you even have to split up, which weakens the team. That’s not how this group is supposed to work. The team is falling apart.”

“Duh!” Matilda said. “Tell us something we don’t know.”

This was more than Matilda had said to him in weeks, and Heathcliff faultered. They thought he was criticizing them. He had to find the right words to win them over.

“You guys are the best of the best,” he said. “I believe Ms. Holiday is intentionally trying to wear you out. Her schemes are outlandish and impractical. You’ve stopped most of them without much effort. They’re not supposed to be hard. They’re supposed to be frequent.”

“No one would know better about end-of-the-world scheming than you,” Jackson said with a chuckle. The others gave him an angry look and he blushed.

Despite Heathcliff’s ravenous hunger for information about his past, he brushed the clue aside. He had to stay focused on his goal. “What I’m saying is, you could use some help, and I think I can be that help. I want back on the team.”

An uncomfortable silence filled the room. It was not the response Heathcliff was hoping for, but he wasn’t giving up.

“You wouldn’t have to train me. I remember all the fighting styles, the code-breaking, even how to free-fall from the School Bus. All you would need to do is put me in the upgrade chair and—”

The principal shook his head. “Heathcliff, you are helping—by manning the communication link.”

Heathcliff frowned. “You could have a monkey do that job. You need another agent. I’m smart and have tons of experience.”

His former friends didn’t have to say no to him. Their faces shouted it from across the room. Why were they so resistant to letting him help? It had to do with the missing year and a half of his life, but what was it?

“I don’t get it. You let Jackson Jones onto the team. He’s got to be the worst person in the world. No offense.”

“None taken,” Jackson said.

“What could I have done that would be worse than the torment he’s been dishing out since kindergarten?”

“For the record, I think I’ve changed,” Jackson mumbled.

“Heathcliff, this isn’t the time for this,” Ruby said. “When things have settled down a little, maybe we can talk—”

“—and until then I’m a prisoner—”

“You are not a prisoner,” the principal interrupted.

“Really? Then I can go home?” he asked, knowing full well the answer would be no.

“Heathcliff, I’ve explained this to you before,” the principal said. “We had to erase your parents’ memory of you.”

“But you haven’t told me why!”

He watched Ruby wrestle with an explanation.

“No one thought you were going to come back,” Matilda said.

“Where did I go?” Heathcliff shouted. He could hear the echo of his anger bounce around the room.

“We’re working on a way to reverse the memory wipe,” the principal said. “Until then, you just have to be patient. What we’re trying to do to your mom and dad has never been done before, and we get only one chance. I assure you it will happen soon, but right now you have to stay here. If you need more books or magazines to keep you occupied, I can—”

Heathcliff threw up his hands. “Books and magazines? No. You know what I need? Some friends!”

He stomped out of the room, desperate to get back to his little cot before he started crying. He felt so useless, so hated, so homesick, and so alone.