Heroes of the Dustbin

by Tyler Whitesides

  “There,” he said. “Problem solved.”

  Spencer gave him a disapproving glare as he gestured to the remaining soapsuds floating in V’s mug of soda.

  “There’s more,” Spencer said quietly.

  “You mean, every tiny bubble is a camera?”

  Spencer didn’t know if they were all active. But based on what he and Daisy had seen in the Witches’ sink, he didn’t doubt it.

  “We can’t just pop all the soapsuds,” Daisy explained. “We have to dry up every ounce of liquid or the suds could reform.”

  Spencer picked up the ceramic mug, careful not to spill any of the foamy suds down the side. Daisy opened the door for him and he carried it down the hallway to the kitchen.

  There was a pot of water coming to a boil on the stove and a package of pasta laid out beside it, but no one was around. Spencer assumed that the Auran chef preparing dinner must have stepped out for a moment.

  Spencer crossed to the sink and carefully poured the root beer and soapsuds down the drain. He turned on the faucet, letting water flush the surveillance suds deeper into the pipes. Then he tore off a paper towel and carefully dried the sink and V’s mug.

  “There,” he said. “Now we can talk in privacy.”

  It was a simple thing to dispose of the Witches’ surveillance. If Spencer had known about the suds before, the Witches wouldn’t have their wands and V’s death might have been avoided.

  “What do we have to talk about?” Dez asked. Discussion clearly wasn’t really his thing.

  “We need to make a plan to find the Glopified scissors,” Spencer said, guiding his companions out of the kitchen.

  By the time they arrived back at the conference room, Rho and Marv were waiting at the round table.

  “Everything all right?” Rho asked.

  “We had to take care of some soapsuds,” Spencer said, placing V’s dry mug on the table.

  “Somebody’s been drinking suds?” Marv asked.

  “The Witches were watching us,” Spencer said. “They use soapsuds like surveillance cameras.”

  To demonstrate what he was talking about, Spencer reached into his belt pouch and carefully slid out the jar of suds he’d stolen from the Witches’ sink. He placed it on the table, and Marv picked it up.

  “Those suds show the BEM prison where the Rebels are being held,” Spencer explained. “I haven’t had a chance to study them, but some of our friends and family are there.” He glanced nervously at Daisy, but she didn’t seem to suspect that he was also talking about her parents. She still thought they were safe at home with Bookworm.

  Marv grunted as he examined the suds curiously. Then he set the jar on the table once more. “You’ve been busy,” he observed.

  “Yeah,” Dez cut in. “Not all of us got to go play games with the old fogies.”

  “Speaking of games . . .” Daisy said. “How was Bingo?”

  “Lucky,” answered Marv. “Won blackout.”

  “Were the prizes good?”

  In answer to her question, Marv placed a carton on the table. “Won this vintage toilet-bowl cleaner.”

  “Man,” Dez laughed. “You got ripped off.”

  “Silver Swiffers claim it’s a one-of-a-kind,” Marv said, shrugging. “Carton’s about a quarter full.”

  “What’s it supposed to do?” Spencer asked.

  “Made in 1962,” said the janitor, reading the label off the carton. It had several holes in the top for shaking the deodorizing powder into the toilet bowl. “Silver Swiffers said it works like Toxite attractant. Shake a bit into the toilet and the little monsters come from all over the school. Once they climb inside the bowl to enjoy the powder . . .” Marv made the sound of a gunshot with his mouth. “Like shooting fish in a barrel.”

  “Why don’t they Glopify it anymore?” Spencer asked. It sounded like a useful item to draw all the Toxites into one place.

  “It could be like the Vortex vacuum bags,” Rho said. “Perhaps only that specific brand of powdered toilet cleaner from 1962 Glopified properly.”

  “Dunno,” Marv said, holding up the carton. “Just don’t make it like they used to.”

  “I still think you got ripped off,” Dez pointed out. “The grand prize was toilet-bowl cleaner.”

  Marv nodded in what seemed to be partial agreement. “I was hoping for the scissors.”

  “We know where they are,” Daisy said, excitement in her voice.

  “The scissors are lost somewhere in the landfill,” Spencer explained.

  “That’ll take a lot of searching,” Marv said. “We could use a garbologist about now.”

  Daisy nodded. “If Bernard were here, he’d tell us that we have to become one with the garbage. In order to find the trash, you have to become the trash.”

  “Philosophy for garbologists,” Marv muttered.

  “It’s actually a pretty good idea,” Spencer said.

  “I think it’s dumb,” said Dez. “How are we supposed to become the trash?”

  “We’re not,” Spencer answered. “We’re going to find someone who already is.”

  Chapter 20

  “He’s different from the others.”

  Spencer was taking charge. He had a plan, sort of. Rho was going along with it, even though she clearly expressed her opinion that it wouldn’t work.

  Marv had stayed back at the Auran building to study the jar of soapsuds Spencer had stolen from the Witches. Dez had also been left behind, though not by his choice. The Sweeper boy had gone to the pantry in search of a late-night snack when Spencer, Daisy, and Rho quietly slipped away.

  V’s dying words had revealed that the scissors were lost in the landfill, but churning through that much garbage would be worse than searching for a needle in a haystack. The ancient scissors might be buried under acres of rotting garbage. Not even the Spade could uncover something that long-lost.

  They needed a way to quickly scour the trash, checking under every bag and bucket. They needed someone with a close connection to the garbage, someone who was one with the trash.

  They needed a Thingamajunk.

  “I don’t understand,” Daisy said, trying to keep pace with Spencer and Rho as they moved farther away from the Auran building. The moon was only a sliver overhead, and it was easy to stumble in the darkened heaps of trash.

  “Why don’t we just ask Bookworm?” Daisy asked again.

  “He’s too far away,” Spencer said, wondering how long his flimsy lie would hold up.

  “But we left Gia’s garbage truck in my driveway,” Daisy went on. “Can’t we just jump through and talk to him?”

  Spencer grunted in frustration. “It’s not that simple,” he said, dismissing her request again. He felt guilty when he caught Rho’s eye. She knew that Bookworm was ruined, his garbage head cloven in two.

  “This isn’t going to work,” Rho said quietly. “We’ve tried a dozen times since Daisy tamed Bookworm. The other Thingamajunks aren’t like him. He was . . . special.”

  Spencer stopped at the top of a garbage mound. “Well, it has to work this time,” he said, slipping a backpack from his sweaty shoulders. “We need the garbage on our side, or we’ll never find those scissors.”

  He reached into the backpack and withdrew a glass bottle. He’d taken it from a weapons stash in the Auran building. It wouldn’t do much good against other people, but it had a special use for Thingamajunks.

  The bottle’s lid was twisted tightly, but Spencer still held it delicately like it might spill. The contents looked vile. They were an organic mash of rotting vegetables, putrid chunks of meat, and wet, moldy bread.

  “You didn’t tell me we were having a picnic,” Daisy said. Then she saw the disgusting bottle in Spencer’s hand. “Never mind.” She drew back. “I’m not hungry.”

  “This isn’t for us,” Spencer said. “It’s for the Thingamajunks.” It was a stink bomb, similar to the kind Aryl had used to spur a Thingamajunk stampede in the Valley of Tires. This bottle was small, and
Spencer hoped it would attract only a single garbage creature.

  “You have a gift?” Rho asked, as Spencer lifted the bottle to throw it. He nodded, resolute in his decision to tame another Thingamajunk. Then he pitched the stink bomb down the hill.

  The bottle spun through the air before crashing into the bent frame of a discarded bicycle. The glass shattered, and the rotten mixture splattered across the debris below.

  It was silent for a moment. A warm draft of wind carried the stench of the stink bomb to Spencer’s nose, causing him to gag before pinching his nostrils shut.

  “That makes Bernard’s socks smell good in comparison,” Daisy said, her voice higher pitched from plugging her nose.

  “You’ve smelled Bernard’s socks?” Spencer asked.

  Daisy shrugged. “I lost a bet.”

  “Quiet!” Rho whispered. She was the only one not plugging her nose. Spencer supposed that living a few centuries in a landfill had probably numbed Rho’s sense of smell.

  The Auran girl was pointing down the slope of garbage, where Spencer glimpsed the slightest movement in the darkness. It seemed like nothing more than a ripple through the trash, like a snake cutting through tall grass.

  The bent bicycle exploded as a Thingamajunk erupted from the garbage, devouring any scrap that was tainted by the stink bomb.

  Spencer’s flashlight kicked on, and the bright beam instantly highlighted the hungry beast at the bottom of the hill. “Hey!” he called. “Still hungry?”

  In two thundering leaps, the Thingamajunk summited the mound, landing with tremendous force between Spencer and Daisy. The trash displaced under the creature’s heavy feet, causing a shock wave that brought Spencer to his knees.

  The flashlight rolled out of his hand, but the magical beam of light clung to the trash figure, illuminating its patchwork features.

  Its head was a patterned couch cushion. The fabric was ripped on both sides, and the dirty stuffing jutted out like tufts of white hair on an old man’s head. Atop the cushion was a pile of rotting potatoes, sprouting tubers from the spots that weren’t soft and black.

  Bits of the broken bicycle now comprised the body. Crooked spokes formed a rib cage, and the pedals served as hands. The rest of the body was mainly grocery bags, with a broom handle sticking out by the shoulder and a smashed-up vacuum cleaner for a leg. The bike bell was hooked on the Thingamajunk’s elbow, and when it raised an arm to strike Spencer, the bell gave a cheerful ding!

  “Back down, you cheap pile of scrap metal!” Rho’s sudden outburst of trash-talk caused the Thingamajunk to hesitate, its arm lingering above Spencer’s head. “You got stuffing in your ears? Get going!”

  Technically, the Thingamajunk didn’t have ears. But its couch-cushion head did have plenty of stuffing. “Wait,” Spencer hissed at her. “You’re going to scare it away.”

  It was obvious that Rho had more to say to the Thingamajunk, but she bit her tongue and let Spencer make his attempt at taming it.

  He held out a hand. “It’s all right, big fella. We’re not going to hurt you.” The Thingamajunk seemed to snort, its entire body illuminated by the fallen magical flashlight.

  “I brought you something,” Spencer said, digging in the open backpack at his feet. “Something special just for you.” He held out the object. “It’s a gift.”

  It was V’s ceramic mug, empty and dry, leaving no chance for the soapsud cameras to re-form. Now the mug dangled by its handle from Spencer’s fingertips, a simple offering of friendship to the angry Thingamajunk.

  “You’re trying to tame it with that?” Daisy said, peeking out from behind the garbage figure.

  “You did it with an old retainer,” Spencer pointed out. He wiggled the mug enticingly before the Thingamajunk. “Take it,” he coaxed. “Let’s be friends.”

  The creature grunted, and a bit of cushion stuffing shook loose from its head. It reached out its hands, the two bicycle pedals carefully gripping the fragile mug.

  “Good,” Spencer urged, sliding his fingers out of the handle. “Friends?”

  The Thingamajunk lifted the mug to what appeared to be eye level. It stared at the gift for one still moment. Then it brought its pedal hands together, smashing the ceramic mug into tiny shards.

  The trash monster bellowed, and its vacuum-cleaner leg kicked out, knocking into Spencer’s chest with such force that he went careening down the slope. If it hadn’t been for the protection of his Glopified coveralls, the kick probably would have broken some ribs.

  Lowering its head, the Thingamajunk plowed into Daisy, leapt clear over Rho, and landed at Spencer’s feet. He scrambled to get away, knocking the Thingamajunk’s hands aside with a plunger from his belt.

  “I don’t think it worked!” Daisy called as the Thingamajunk pursued Spencer back up the mound of trash.

  “I don’t understand!” Spencer gasped, ducking under a swinging pedal. “My gift was way better than Daisy’s.”

  “Hey!” she objected. “Bookworm loved my gift!”

  “I know, but why?” Spencer said. “What’s so special about a pink retainer?”

  “It was special to Daisy,” said Rho. “It was a gift from Bernard’s collection, and that made it meaningful.”

  “The mug was meaningful!” Spencer yelled. He’d reached his companions once more, and Rho threw a blast of vac dust to hold back the pursuing Thingamajunk.

  “I told you this wouldn’t work,” Rho said, positioning herself to gain a tactical advantage against the downhill Thingamajunk. “We tried it after you left.”

  “Maybe we just need a better gift,” Spencer said.

  The Thingamajunk dropped into a heap of trash, escaping the vac dust suction that kept it rooted. It reappeared directly beneath Spencer, forming a new body from the surrounding trash as its couch-cushion head launched the boy into the air. Its arms reached out, catching Spencer as he fell and slamming him against the ground.

  “Drop him!” Rho yelled. “Put him down, you soggy lump of disgustingness!”

  The trash-talk took effect immediately, and the Thingamajunk stopped, dangling Spencer upside down by one foot.

  “Let me give this a try,” Daisy said, stepping forward. She cleared her throat and attempted to tame the Thingamajunk much as she had won over Bookworm several months ago.

  “Listen up, Couchpotato!” It moved its gaze toward her, the pile of rotten potatoes shifting atop the couch cushion. “I’ve got something for you,” she said. “And it means a lot to me.” As she spoke, Daisy reached up and unclasped the necklace she was wearing. “My grandma gave me this when I turned eight. If you behave, I’ll let you wear it. As a token of our friendship.”

  In one swift movement, the Thingamajunk dropped Spencer on his head and swiped the necklace from Daisy’s grasp.

  “Hey!” she shouted. But a second kick sent Daisy into a painful tumble. The Thingamajunk reared back and made a sound that could only be interpreted as a mocking laugh. Then the creature kicked up a pile of trash and disappeared into the landfill.

  “What just happened?” Spencer asked, squinting out into the darkness.

  “Couchpotato just stole my necklace!” Daisy said, rolling over to sit with a huff amidst the debris.

  “That was a nice thing you tried,” Rho said, placing a comforting hand on Daisy’s shoulder. “A little while back, Shirley offered a music box that she’d kept for over two hundred years. Doesn’t get much more sentimental than that.”

  “What happened to the music box?” Spencer asked.

  “The Thingamajunk smashed it to splinters,” answered Rho.

  “Maybe he didn’t like the song it played,” Daisy suggested.

  “They don’t care about gifts or kindness,” said Rho. “They’re just mindless heaps of junk.”

  “Not Bookworm,” Daisy said. “He’s different from the others.” She clenched her fists. “Bookworm is going to be so mad when I tell him that Couchpotato stole my necklace!”

  Once more, Rho gave Spenc
er a meaningful glance, and he knew that the truth had to come out. Rho took her cue and slipped quickly down the garbage mound, leaving Spencer and Daisy alone.

  “Daisy,” Spencer said. “There’s something I have to tell you.”

  Chapter 21

  “That’s a big wad.”

  Daisy looked at Spencer, her big eyes already a bit watery from the recent theft of her favorite necklace.

  “When we stopped by your house,” Spencer began, picking his words carefully, “we found a note from General Clean.”

  Daisy furrowed her eyebrows. “What did it say?”

  “He found out, Daisy,” Spencer said. “I don’t know how, but he discovered that your parents were in on the secret.”

  She stood up abruptly. “We have to warn them!” There was panic in her voice. “Clean might be on his way to—”

  “It’s too late,” Spencer cut her off. “General Clean got your parents at the same time he took mine.”

  Daisy took a step away from him, a single tear slipping down her cheek. “You knew?” she whispered. “And you didn’t tell me?”

  “Your parents are going to be fine. They’re imprisoned with the other Rebels,” he said. “I saw them in the soapsuds we stole.”

  “Why didn’t you show me?”

  “I didn’t want to upset you,” Spencer tried to justify. Now every reason he had given himself seemed weak. He should have been honest with her from the start. “I just wanted to rescue them and get your parents home so you never had to worry that they were missing.”

  Daisy swallowed hard. “You can’t fix everything, Spencer.”

  He lowered his head in shame. “I know. And there’s more.”

  “More what?” Daisy asked.

  “Bad news.” Spencer took a deep breath. “We found part of Bookworm’s head. It was in the trash can, stuffed under the left side of the sink. I don’t know what happened to him, but without the lunchbox, he’s lifeless. I’m so sorry, Daisy. Bookworm is . . .”

  Daisy’s grin cut Spencer off midsentence. Her nerves seemed to relax, and she clapped her hands together.