My Worst Frenemy

by Marcus Emerson

  I took the corner too fast slammed into the wall. The science lab was only a few doors down, and it was open. The two ninjas were already inside.

  Wyatt passed me, slowing down as he got to the door. I pushed through the pain and caught up with him.

  We were just in time … to watch the red ninja dropkick our robot, sending parts flying in all directions.

  I dropped to my knees. ‘Nooooooooo!’

  ‘You’re just a poser!’ Wyatt shouted. He was just as upset about our robot as I was. ‘Just some kid pretending to be the leader of my ninja clan! If you’re gonna steal my clan out from under me, don’t hide behind your mask! Show me your face, you coward!’

  The red ninja stood up straight, and then he did exactly as Wyatt asked. He took off his mask.

  Wyatt’s knees almost gave out, but he managed to keep himself up. I choked out a gasp.

  It was Carlyle, the pirate. Wyatt’s cousin.

  Carlyle’s yellow cape swished out, and I saw that it wasn’t just a cape. It was a pirate flag with a picture of a skull.

  Wyatt’s face grew red with anger. He didn’t seem as surprised as I was.

  ‘Figures it was you,’ he said calmly. ‘Can’t get any kids into your little pirate club, so you just take my ninja clan instead. Weak, dude. Weak.’

  ‘Ye lost control of yer crew long ago, mate!’ Carlyle said.

  ‘Why are you still talking like that?’ I said as I got to my feet. ‘Are you a pirate or a ninja?’

  ‘I be a ninja pirate, ye pox-faced kraken!’ Carlyle said, squeezing one eye shut.

  ‘That’s not even a thing!’ I said.

  ‘It is now, ye parrot-lovin’ sea bass,’ Carlyle said.

  I put my hands up. ‘Ugh, enough with the pirate insults. I get it.’

  Wyatt stepped forward. ‘I didn’t lose control of anything, you backstabber. You took my ninjas from me! And then you made them steal my mask!’

  ‘Aye,’ Carlyle said. ‘You were lame as a leader, cousin. There was so much more ye coulda done with yer ninjas, but ye never did.’

  ‘Like sell a bunch of t-shirts?’ Wyatt said.

  Carlyle laughed. ‘D’ye really think this has got to do with merchandise, cousin?’

  In that moment of awkward silence, my brain connected the dots.

  ‘You’re jealous,’ I said to Carlyle. ‘That’s what this is, isn’t it? Wyatt’s ninja clan is bigger than your pirate crew, and now you’re taking what he’s built.’

  ‘Keep yer mouth shut,’ Carlyle said.

  ‘You snuck your way into my ninja clan,’ Wyatt said, catching on. ‘And staged a mutiny against me …’

  ‘Yer only now realising that?’ Carlyle said.

  ‘Yes!’ Wyatt shouted.

  I watched them shout it out at each other. The pirates at Buchanan School had grown weak. Instead of building them back up, Carlyle took the red ninjas. Wyatt was bound to find out sooner or later, and being Wyatt, he wasn’t going to take it well.

  The whole thing had gone from a simple ninja clan takeover to something much bigger …

  A battle between two cousins.

  And somehow, I had got stuck in the middle of it.

  Whoops.

  And then, believe it or not, things got even more twisted up …

  ‘Yer at yer wits end, cousin. Give yerself up, and I’ll keep ye from walkin’ the plank,’ Carlyle said.

  ‘Walk what plank?’ Wyatt huffed. ‘You know what, you’re such a poser that I’m not even surprised it was you this whole time!’

  ‘No?’ Carlyle said. ‘How’s this for a surprise?’

  The green ninja leader untied their mask, and pulled it off their head.

  It was Olive.

  Wyatt actually was shocked this time. His bottom lip quivered. ‘Babe …?’

  ‘I was gonna break up with ya,’ Olive said. ‘But then ya went and got yourself on Chase’s team.’

  ‘Made it too easy to spy on yer robot,’ Carlyle said.

  At that moment, Team Cooper stepped through the doors behind us. They stopped, staring at the bizarre scene that was in front of them. Naomi was the only one from the team who wasn’t there.

  I couldn’t even imagine how it looked to Zoe. There we were, Wyatt and I, standing over our destroyed robot. Carlyle and Olive wearing ninja costumes and no masks.

  A cloud of chalk dust burst around Carlyle and Olive, and they were gone. I had no idea how they left the room because the only way out was through the door that Team Cooper was standing in.

  Zoe stared at the pieces of the robot we all worked so hard to build.

  The rest of my friends looked like life had just slapped them across the face.

  Zoe glared at me. ‘What did you do?’

  ‘I didn’t do anything!’ I said defensively. ‘You saw who did it!’

  ‘No!’ Zoe shouted. ‘This is all because of you and your little ninja game! You killed our project with this stupid secret you have! You’ve gone too far this time!’

  ‘But I—’

  ‘Neh!’ Zoe snipped. It was her way of making me keep my mouth shut. ‘I know what I saw. I saw you and Wyatt and Carlyle and Olive, but you know what? I don’t blame them! I blame you! If you didn’t run around the school pretending to be a ninja, we’d still have a shot at winning tomorrow! You know how important this is to me! You know Dr Tenderfoot is a big deal to me!’

  I opened my mouth to speak, but Zoe shut me down with another ‘Neh!’

  ‘You vouched for Wyatt!’ Zoe said.

  Team Cooper nodded from behind Zoe.

  ‘And Wyatt vouched for Olive!’ Zoe said. ‘Okay, so Olive and Carlyle are working together? Too bad she was hanging out on our side of the room all week!’

  ‘She was a spy,’ I said under my breath.

  ‘What normal kid can say that seriously?’ Zoe said. ‘I know I can’t! I can’t go around talking about ninjas and pirates and spies without sounding absolutely ridiculous!’

  Zoe’s chest was heaving up and down.

  ‘And you,’ she said, looking at Wyatt. ‘Of course Carlyle did this! Of course Olive did this! Of course you’re the one behind it all! I guess we’re all just paying the price for trusting someone we shouldn’t have!’

  Wyatt started to talk, but Slug cut him off.

  ‘Dude,’ Slug said. ‘Was this your plan the whole time?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Faith added. ‘Were you playing us?’

  ‘Of course he was! It’s so obvi!’ Brayden said.

  Wyatt didn’t bother saying anything else. He pushed his way through the team and walked out the door.

  And then the rest of my team left the room, one after the other, in total silence, until I was alone.

  Everything happened so fast that I was still in shock. Leaning my back against the wall, I slid down until I was sitting on the floor. In just twenty short minutes, everything had gone from absolutely great to absolutely awful.

  The broken parts of Hup-Hup were spread across the floor in front of me.

  I’d made mistakes and messed things up in the past, but this time felt different. It felt worse.

  Much, much worse.

  I was in a funk. I could barely even bring myself to clean up the mess that Carlyle made when he booted Hup-Hup across the room. My phone buzzed in my front pocket. I pulled it out and read the message. It was from Zoe.

  my dads gonna be here any minute

  She sounded mad, that’s for sure.

  Bits of Hup-Hup were still scattered across the floor, but I was beat. Cleaning could wait until tomorrow morning.

  I grabbed my book bag, pulled one of the straps over my shoulder, and headed down to the lobby.

  The rest of Team Cooper was already gone. Zoe was alone on a bench outside, staring into space. She was slouching, which was weird for her. She always nagged me about my poor posture.

  The air felt colder than normal. It bit at my cheeks the second I stepped outside.

  I didn’t say anything
when I sat next to her.

  She sighed. But not the kind of sigh that was like, ‘look at me’. She was sad.

  ‘Zoe,’ I finally said. ‘I’m really sorry.’

  She took a deep breath. ‘I know,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I mean, I’m really, really sorry.’

  Zoe looked at me. ‘I know you are,’ she said. ‘But it’s just a robot. There are worse things happening in the world.’

  ‘But it’s a big deal to you,’ I said. ‘I know I let you down with, y’know … my ninja stuff.’

  ‘Why do you still do it?’ Zoe asked. ‘Why do you play that game?’

  Zoe knew it was more than a game to me.

  ‘If you didn’t do any of that,’ Zoe continued, ‘you wouldn’t have any problems.’

  ‘I don’t know why I do it,’ I said, but the truth was I knew exactly why.

  There were a lot of bad eggs at this school, and if there wasn’t someone there to keep them in line, the balance would shift in their favour. I had to be that someone.

  But I couldn’t tell Zoe that.

  ‘I know I shouldn’t have trusted Wyatt,’ I said.

  Zoe tilted her head back and groaned. ‘I can’t believe I’m about to say this but …While I was waiting, I saw Wyatt leave through one of the side doors. He didn’t look happy, like, at all. His face kept twitching. It looked like he was really beating himself up about Hup-Hup.’

  ‘Really …’ I said.

  Zoe nodded. ‘Mmhmm. If he was in on it, then why wasn’t he with Carlyle or Olive? He had the look of a boy who had been burned by his best friends. I really don’t think Wyatt is to blame this time.’

  I was mad at Wyatt, but I felt the same way that Zoe did.

  Yes, he’s one of the bad eggs. Yes, he’s been a rusty nail stuck in my big toe since the first week of school. And yes, his plans were always cranked to eleven on the evil-villain scale.

  But Wyatt wasn’t the one who destroyed our robot. That was Carlyle and Olive.

  If I really wanted to be fair to Wyatt, I had to admit he was probably innocent, no matter his past.

  Zoe’s dad pulled into the parking lot.

  ‘I’ll figure out how to make this right,’ I said.

  Zoe smiled. ‘I know you will,’ she said. ‘You always do.’

  With less than a day until the competition, I had no idea how I could fix any of the mess I had created.

  To be honest, it was starting to look like my life would be a lot easier if I just gave up and let Carlyle’s team win.

  I was heading for the science lab when I noticed that the door was propped open. Someone had got there before me, which wasn’t a big surprise since it was the day of the robot competition.

  What was surprising was that it was Wyatt.

  He sat on a backwards chair the way he always did. On the floor in front of him were the shattered parts of our robot, spread out like he was trying to figure out how to put it back together.

  When he saw me, he nodded.

  ‘What’re you doing?’ I asked.

  ‘What’s it look like?’ Wyatt said.

  ‘It looks like you’re trying to fix the robot.’

  ‘Because that’s what I’m doing.’

  I didn’t know what to say. Should I have brought up Carlyle? Olive?

  ‘What do you think?’ I asked, taking the seat next to his. ‘Is Hup-Hup done for?’

  Wyatt shrugged. ‘I don’t even know where to start. I had to set it out like this so I could see what it’s supposed to look like, but all I see are random parts.’

  ‘Let’s just sweep it into the bin then,’ I said. ‘We’ll clean it up and throw in the towel.’

  ‘No!’ Wyatt said angrily. ‘I will not let Carlyle steamroll right through me.’

  ‘I think he already did,’ I said.

  ‘Dude,’ Wyatt said, sitting up. ‘I’m not gonna roll over and die like that. Carlyle, my cousin, burned me. Olive, my girlfriend, burned me. My ninjas … burned me. I’ve got no one, but I’m not defeated and I’m not giving up.’

  I had watched Team Cooper put the robot together all week, and the way Wyatt set everything out made it easy for me to figure out how to put Hup-Hup back together.

  I knelt down and started putting the pieces back in their place. Wyatt helped when he could, but it was mostly pointing at parts and asking if I needed them.

  Even though Carlyle had kicked our robot, the damage wasn’t as bad as I thought. Most of the parts clicked back into their spot. Sure, he might’ve been an ugly version of what it used to be, but at least it wasn’t a shattered mess anymore.

  Wyatt and I looked back and forth between Hup-Hup and the many extra parts we had leftover.

  ‘Those things were in the first version of the robot?’ Wyatt asked.

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘But not this version. Hope they weren’t important.’

  ‘Guess we’ll find out,’ Wyatt said.

  Pushing all the spare parts aside, I reached under the robot and flipped the switch to turn it on.

  Hup-Hup didn’t move. Something buzzed quietly, but the light bulb on top didn’t even flicker.

  ‘C’mon, man,’ I said, flipping the switch back and forth.

  ‘Maybe those extra parts were important,’ Wyatt said, glancing at the pile of parts.

  ‘What’d you do that first day it didn’t work?’ I asked, looking at the battery pack.

  ‘Oh, the battery wasn’t connecting properly,’ Wyatt said. ‘I just made sure it connected. Push the battery down hard. If that’s the problem again, it should fix it.’

  I took Wyatt’s advice and pushed against the battery. I held my thumb in place and switched it on again, but nothing happened except for the quiet buzz.

  I followed the wires from the battery pack to the small motor at the shoulder, and then studied the gears to see if something was just stuck.

  Finally, I admitted, ‘I have no idea what I’m looking at.’

  ‘Step aside, rookie,’ Wyatt said. He stared at the machine for a moment before saying, ‘Yeah, I got nothing.’

  ‘The problem’s probably with your wires,’ someone said from behind one of the hanging sheets.

  Wyatt and I looked at each other, surprised.

  ‘Uh, hello?’ I said.

  ‘Hi,’ the voice replied.

  ‘Um, how long have you been there?’

  ‘The whole time.’

  ‘You didn’t hear anything we—’

  ‘I heard every word you said. Carlyle, Olive, ninjas.’

  ‘It’s Dante,’ Wyatt mouthed.

  Dante peeked out from behind his sheet. ‘I don’t care about any of that.’

  Wyatt and I weren’t sure what to say.

  Dante pointed at Hup-Hup. ‘If it’s not your battery pack, it’s probably your wires. I heard it buzzing, so it’s trying to work.’

  ‘Ummmm,’ I said, pinching the plastic-coated wires between my fingers. They felt a little loose, but I really didn’t know how they were supposed to feel.

  Dante could tell. ‘Look where the wires hook into the gearbox at the top,’ he said. ‘What’s it look like?’

  Following the wires with my fingers, I found the spot Dante was talking about. The plastic on each of the wires was peeled back, probably from when Carlyle booted it. The thin copper wires underneath were shredded, barely making contact with the gearbox.

  ‘They’re about to fall off,’ I said turning to where Dante’s voice had come from, but he was already hovering over my shoulder.

  ‘See that?’ Dante said, pointing at the frayed end of the wires. ‘The robot’s buzzing because there’s some power, but it’s not getting enough to work properly. All ya gotta do is …’ Dante trailed off as he pinched the frayed wires. He rolled his fingers back and forth to get the wires to stay in place. ‘Try it now.’

  I flipped the switch. Hup-Hup jumped to life, raising his arm while his hand spun in circles. The light from the bulb was so bright it almost blin
ded me.

  ‘Nice!’ I said, excited.

  It was ugly and sloppily put back together, but our robot was working again.

  ‘Thanks, dude,’ I said, looking back at his side of the room. ‘You know what you’re doing with this stuff, so … what happened over there with your robot?’

  Dante pressed his lips to the side. ‘Robotics is kind of a hobby for me. I love working on stuff like this, but … I get frustrated when things don’t work. I mean, I was already frustrated ’cause nobody wanted to be on my team, but y’know, whatever, I guess.’

  I felt bad for him as he walked back to his corner of the science lab.

  ‘There are a ton of things robots can do,’ Dante said. ‘I was trying to make mine do too much.’

  ‘Bummer,’ Wyatt said in a way that sounded like he didn’t care.

  ‘No biggie,’ Dante said. ‘Good luck with your robot. You only have Carlyle to worry about. I completely trashed my robot so I’m out.’

  Hup-Hup kept waving, like he was saying goodbye to Dante. The hairs on my arm stood on end. Dante helped fix our robot, which meant we didn’t have to sit back and let Carlyle win. There was still a chance. School didn’t start for another twenty minutes. With that much time, I could grab some breakfast in the cafeteria … or I could keep working on Hup-Hup.

  ‘Dante!’ I called out.

  He spun around. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘What else could you do with this thing?’ I asked.

  Dante smiled. He started rattling off a list of little things we could add to the gears to make the robot do even more.

  While Dante was talking, Wyatt leaned closer to me. ‘We have our team,’ he whispered.

  I looked Wyatt in the eye. ‘Be like water, bro.’

  The muscles in Wyatt’s jaw twitched. He wasn’t happy with it, but he didn’t have a choice. I was the team leader. And Dante was now on Team Cooper.

  Dante and I carried Hup-Hup down the stairs carefully. We had covered it with one of the sheets so nobody could see it before the competition.

  Wyatt went to the library to make sure we had a spot up the front. But I reckon he just didn’t feel like helping. He wasn’t happy that Dante was part of the team, but I didn’t care. Dante had been having problems all week, and I don’t even know why it took me that long to come up with the idea of him joining Team Cooper. All this junk with the red and green ninjas had been more of a distraction than I thought.