Falcon smiled. “Max,” he said. “You’re something.”
“You got that right. I’m vast. I contain, like—multitudes!”
“Attention, boys and girls,” said Mrs. Redflint. “We have two announcements. First, Mr. Hake has finally finished running your information through the Reidentification program—no easy task since you all come from so many different places! But at last we have your new names and identities and all about who you’re going to be from now on.”
Max looked at Falcon. “Dude,” he said.
Mr. Hake turned to address the students. “All righty, then,” he said. “As you all know, you’ll all be reentering the world of humans as soon as you graduate from the Upper School. All of you except Lincoln Pugh, of course! He’s in the dungeon, hanging upside down. Boohoo for Lincoln Pugh! But the rest of us are on our way to Happy! What we have for each of you now is your new name, which we’d like you to start using, so that by the time you graduate from the Upper School, it’ll feel like it was your name all along. In some cases we have some new hobbies and characteristics for you too! Anyway, all the information is here in your new Reidentification Fun Profile I’ll be handing out right now. For instance—Mortia Moulder—are you here? From now on, your name is Violet! Violet Humperdink. Hi, Violet! Everyone say, ‘Hi, Violet!’”
The students said, “Hi, Violet!” as Mr. Hake handed Mortia a folder with a bright pink cover. It also had a yellow smiley face in its center. “And you like puppies and jumping rope!”
“I do?” said Mortia, or Violet, or whoever she was now.
“Yes,” said Mr. Hake. “You do! Lucky you! Lucky Violet Humperdink!”
“Wait,” said Mortia. “It says here my favorite food is bacon!”
“It is, Violet,” said Mr. Hake. “You’re crazy about bacon!”
“I’m not crazy about bacon,” said Mortia. “I’m vegan!”
“Not anymore,” said Mr. Hake cheerfully. “And who’s next? Ah! Mr. Parsons. From now on, your name is Gus.”
“Gus?” said Max.
“Gus Horkheimer. Hi, Gus!”
Everyone said, “Hi Gus!”
“Let me see. Oh, look, here’s the former Merideath Venacava. Look! Good news! Now she’s Pinky Quacken-bush! Hi, Pinky!”
“Pinky?” said Merideath.
“And Timothy Sparkbolt, you’re going to be called Alfalfa.”
“Alfalfa?” said Sparkbolt. “Alfalfa bad!”
“No, no, Alfalfa good. Your name is Alfalfa Schmucker! Hi, Alfalfa!”
“Alfalfa?” grumbled Sparkbolt, taking his folder from Mr. Hake.
“Who’s next?” said Mr. Hake. “Ah, Miss Ankh-hoptet! We’re going to call you Madison Hallowell. Hello, Madison!”
“Ssss,” said Ankh-hoptet.
“Falcon Quinn,” said Mr. Hake. “Oh, you’ll like this. Tony Cucarillo.”
“Tony?” said Falcon.
“Tony Cucarillo. Hi, Tony!”
“Hi, Tony,” said everyone in the room. There was a low-level roar building in the room now, as the names and file folders were handed out and the students examined their new identities.
“It says I like exercise,” said Max, or Gus Horkheimer, as he was known now. “Dude!”
“Alfalfa,” said Sparkbolt. “Alfalfa BAD.”
“All right, then,” said Mrs. Redflint. “I know you’re all going to have a lot of fun in the next couple of days trying on your new identities. We’re going to make the next two days a grace period—so any little slip-ups will be forgiven. But starting on the third morning, if you use the wrong name, or refuse to answer to your new name, you’ll get an unhappiness star. The day after, two unhappiness stars. And so on. It’s a real incentive! So let’s all get with the program, and begin work on our new, shiny, good selves.”
“Dude,” whispered Max to Weems. “Whad’ya get?”
“Chad,” said Weems, stunned. “I’m Chad.”
“Also tonight,” said Mrs. Redflint, “we’re handing out your beanies. Each one imprinted with your new name! Violet?”
Mortia didn’t look at her at first. Then Mrs. Redflint said it more forcefully. “Violet Humperdink?”
“What?” said Mortia, or Violet, as Mrs. Redflint came over to her, reached into a large satchel, and put a beanie on her head. The beanie was sewn together with alternating pink and orange triangles. At the top of the beanie was a propeller, its paddles swinging around freely. The name VIOLET was stitched onto the beanie with sequins.
“Wow,” said Mortia, or Violet. “It’s, uh—awesome!”
Next Mrs. Redflint put a beanie on Merideath. “Ah, Miss Venacava. Your new name is Pinky! Isn’t it wonderful? Pinky!”
“I’m not wearing this,” growled Merideath. “I’m not!”
“But of course you are!”
“My father never wore any beanie,” said Merideath. “My father would have chosen the dungeon over this!”
Max leaned toward Falcon. “Who’s her father?” he said. Falcon shrugged.
“But the count loved his beanie,” said Mrs. Redflint. “He adored it!”
Merideath grumbled, then took off her beanie with one hand and looked at it with resentment. With one finger she spun the propeller around and around disconsolately.
“Ah, here’s yours, Gus,” said Mrs. Redflint, putting a beanie on Max’s head.
“Gus?” said Max.
“Yes, Gus. And—Beyoncé,” she continued, putting a beanie on Pearl’s head. “And Madison.” She crowned Ankh-hoptet. “And Tony Cucarillo.” She beanied Falcon. Round and round she went, slapping the pink and orange beanies with the propellers onto the heads of the students.
“And Alfalfa,” said Mrs. Redflint, putting a beanie on top of Sparkbolt’s head. “Look at you,” she said. “So distinguished!”
“Rrrrrr,” said Sparkbolt, and suddenly he stood up and roared. “Beanie BAD! ALFALFA BAD! SCHOOL BELONG DEAD! DEAD! MUST—DESTROY! DESTROY!”
And with this, Sparkbolt ripped off his beanie and lunged for Mrs. Redflint. As he grabbed her by the neck and shook her, Mr. Hake transformed once more into the Terrible Kraken, and his horrible tentacles wrapped around Sparkbolt’s body. As Sparkbolt was drawn once again into the yawning maw of the Kraken’s hideous mouth, Sparkbolt grabbed two plates of lima-bean mush and, in a single swinging movement, jammed these into Mr. Hake’s gigantic, squidlike eyes. The Kraken was blinded for a moment, just long enough for Sparkbolt to escape from its tentacles. Mrs. Redflint, meanwhile, blew a blast of red fire toward him, and Sparkbolt screamed as he began to burn. But even as the boy’s head burst into flame, he ran toward Mrs. Redflint and threw her forcefully into the air, so that she sailed over everyone’s heads and landed, unexpectedly, in one of the basketball hoops on the wall.
Sparkbolt, his head still burning, ran toward the kitchen, grabbed a huge container of chocolate milk, and poured it over his head, extinguishing the blaze Mrs. Redflint had set. “Fire BAD!” Sparkbolt shouted. “FIRE BAD!”
Mr. Hake, still in the form of the Terrible Kraken, wriggled toward Sparkbolt, but even as he approached, Sparkbolt was grabbing students’ dinner trays and throwing plates of succotash and lima-bean pizza and lima-bean tacos at him. The plates smashed against the Kraken’s writhing body, leaving impact craters of green spatter. Then Mr. Hake reached forward with his tentacles, once more got his sucker disks on the boy, and pulled him toward his disgusting mouth. Max picked up his tray and threw it at Mr. Hake. A second later Pearl did the same thing, and so did Ankh-hoptet and Weems and Destynee and Falcon. Now all the students were joining in. Mrs. Redflint, upside down in a basketball hoop overhead, breathed several bursts of fire, but she couldn’t get herself loose. It was a complete melee. Falcon had been in food fights before, but he’d never seen anything like this. It was total food revolution, in a cafeteria chockablock with mutants.
Suddenly the door to the cafeteria swung open and Reverend Thorax, the giant praying mantis, wriggled into the room. The flying lima b
eans meant nothing to him as he skittered over to where Sparkbolt and Mr. Hake were struggling. Reverend Thorax picked up the Frankenstein with his pale green claws, then hauled Sparkbolt out of the room. The door swung closed, and they vanished.
At this moment Mrs. Redflint got herself loose from the basketball hoop, and she fell onto the floor with a loud plop. Mr. Hake’s tentacles withdrew into his body, and then he was standing there once more in human form, not a hair out of place.
“You ungrateful things,” screeched Mrs. Redflint. “All this work! Giving you nice new names, and beanies too! Decorated in the school colors, and adorned with a festive, nonfunctional propeller to add style to your appearances! And how do you react? By throwing food on the floor, by attacking each other, by encouraging the revolt of Alfalfa Schmucker against his protectors and benefactors! Never, never in my career have I witnessed such an outrage!”
“All students are advanced to nineteen unhappiness stars!” said Mr. Hake. “All students! One star away from the dungeon! Do you know what happens in the dungeon? You hang upside down, all day long! Yes, that’s what you do!”
He smiled. “Use of new names and identities will begin immediately. Beanies will be worn! Oh yes, beanies will be worn.” He sighed. “Now, then. Who wants cake?”
It was clear enough: no one wanted cake. But as the plates appeared before them, one by one the defeated monsters began to dig into the pieces of cake with their forks. As the sad, thwarted young monsters ate their cake, the propellers on their beanies began to rotate, slowly at first, then with more speed.
Later, as they all filed out of the cafeteria, Falcon saw that there was something sitting on the table where Sparkbolt had been eating. Drawing closer, he saw that it was a composition binder, and on its front, its owner had written, “Poetry Book of Rhyming Poems. By Timothy Sparkbolt.”
As he passed the table, Falcon reached out and put the binder under one arm. When and if Sparkbolt got out of the dungeon, he might have all kinds of poems in him, still waiting to be written. Falcon thought he would want the book.
“Mr. Quinn,” said a voice, and Falcon turned to see the dragon lady standing next to Mr. Hake, Dr. Medulla, Algol, and the moth man. “If you’ll come with us, please.”
“I can’t go with you right now, actually,” said Falcon. “I have to—”
Mr. Hake transformed into the Terrible Kraken and wrapped a tentacle around Falcon’s arms, pinning them to his body.
Falcon was just about to call out to his friends for help when Mr. Hake wrapped a tentacle around his mouth. Falcon yelled, but his voice was wholly absorbed by the muffling tentacles of the Terrible Kraken.
“It comes,” said the moth man.
17
A BEAM OF BLUE LIGHT
“Señorita Destynee,” cried Pearl. “You must reconsider!”
“It’s Kennedy,” said Destynee. “And I’m not going. Period.”
“Weems is gonna be ticked,” said Jonny, throwing his guitar and his comics into a duffel bag. “You know that, right?”
“I know it,” said Destynee.
“Señorita Destynee,” said Pearl. “You gave your word. Your sacred honor!”
“I gave my word to save Falcon,” said Destynee. “That’s why I said it. But I don’t want to go,” said Destynee. “Okay? I don’t want to go!”
“But señorita,” said Pearl, “this is our only hope of remaining the things we are!”
“It’s Kennedy,” she said. “And staying here, and learning how to be human? That’s my only hope.”
“Pearl,” said Megan, stuffing the last of her clothes in her backpack and tossing it onto the parlor sofa. “Let it go. It’s her choice.”
“But why would this one choose to—”
“Because,” said Megan, wavering slightly, “she doesn’t like the thing she’s turning into.”
“You wouldn’t either,” said Destynee tearfully, “if the thing you were turning into was a giant slug.”
Pearl looked pained. “There is beauty in all things,” she said, “even in the slug of the earth.” She paused, as if to consider her own words. “But it is for each of us to choose her fate. You have chosen yours. I shall carry your memory in my heart at all times.”
“Your heart,” said Destynee in a dreamy voice; then she looked around the room. “Where is Falcon, anyway?”
Jonny slung his duffel bag over his shoulder and put his mirror shades on. “He was right behind me,” he said. “He’s coming.”
They went to the tower door and looked down the stairs.
Megan began to flicker in and out. “Falcon?” she called out in a voice that rumbled like a distant storm. “Falcon?”
Falcon, tied to a chair in the Wellness Center, tried to yell, but his voice could not carry very far through the heavy, muffling gag that Algol had tied around his mouth. As Falcon struggled, the hunchback attended to a large table full of potions and scientific equipment. In the center of the floor was a large circular structure that resembled an inflatable kiddie pool. A bright, silvery liquid shimmered in its depths.
Algol picked up a potion. “I should ’av suggested we shrink you with me shrinkin’ potion,” he said. “But per’aps the gargoylization is best. You’re makin’ a contribution to science in any case! That’s the way I’d think about it, all philosophical-like.”
“Mr. Algol,” said Dr. Medulla, coming into the room. “That will be enough.”
“If you say it’s enough, it’ll ’av to be enough, won’t it. Mr. Algol isn’t the one ’oo decides, no, not ’im. ’E’s all warped and twisty.”
“Is the calcifier working?” Dr. Medulla looked at the pool of silvery liquid.
“Like a charm.”
“Very well, then,” said Dr. Medulla.
“No small thing, gettin’ it out of storage, and all restored to proper workin’ order in a twinklin’, is it? It’s a bit of a scientific miracle, you might say. I’m sure all the ’igh and mighty are all very grateful to Mr. Algol for all ’e’s done!”
“Mr. Algol,” said Dr. Medulla. “Are you disgruntled in some way with your situation?”
“Me?” said Algol, twitching and scampering. “Oh no, I’m as gruntled as a fella might ’av any cause to be. Workin’ for ones so superior to ’imself!”
Dr. Medulla looked at Algol for a long moment. Then he cleared his throat. “Well, let’s get going, then.”
“Aye, we’ll start things right up,” said Algol. “We’ll start things right now!”
Algol turned upon Dr. Medulla suddenly and grabbed him by the throat.
Then he shoved the doctor backward with tremendous force, and the man staggered and wheeled and tipped over, stumbling over the lip of the calcifier on the floor and landing, a moment later, in its depths. There was a sound like aahh—woosh, and then Dr. Medulla turned gray and was frozen in place like a statue, his arms still reaching out toward Algol.
“Aha!” Algol cried, and turned to Falcon with a grin. “’E’s not so ’igh and mighty anymore, is ’e? Course we’ll ’av to tell ’em all it was you, Falcon Quinn, ’oo pushed ’im in. And they’ll believe me, too, when I tell ’em. They’re always so quick to believe, the ’igh and mighty. So quick they are, right up to the moment when I does away wif—every las’ one of ’em!”
He looked at Falcon with pride. “Oh, you’re surprised by Mr. Algol, aren’t you? Now, don’t you worry, I’m no blood-swizzlin’, monster-stabbin’ guardian, not like you, Mr. Quinn. But I do believe that what’s fair is fair, and that people ought to be treated equal-like. And those what do a disservice to the crippled—the ’orribly, pitifully deformed!—like meself, ought to pay for their actions. Oh yes, dearly they’ll pay—every last one of ’em!” He rubbed his hands together in exaltation and scampered around in front of Falcon for a few moments.
“But first, let’s make ourselves another statue, yes. I think we shall. Mr. Falcon Qwinnzy today will join ol’ Weezy up by the gates of the Upper School. And if any o�
�� your frens, the guardians, come to ask what’s become of our li’l fren the spy, we’ll point right up to your statue and say, ‘There ’e is. We made a monument out of ’im. A monument to filth, and deception, and slime!’”
Algol untied Falcon from the chair and led him by a rope over to the pool. “Anythin’ you’d like to say, now that you’re on your way to the quarry? Any regrets?”
Falcon shouted beneath the gag, screamed with anger and rage. The boy’s left eye began to burn black.
“Now, don’t start up with the eye, not now. It’s all too late for that. Good-bye, Falcon Quinn! Good-bye!”
“Let him go,” said a voice, and Falcon looked over to see Jonny Frankenstein standing in the doorway, “you idiot.”
“‘Oo’s an eejit?” said Algol. “Jonny Frankenstein, the next to go, is not in any position to be calling names. It’s Jonny Frankenstein ’oo’s next, yes ’e is! It’s Jonny Frankenstein ’oo—”
But Jonny raised his two hands, and blue bolts of lightning burst from his palms and enveloped Algol completely. For a few seconds Jonny just stood there, his face consumed with rage, the lightning bolts twisting and flickering from him—and then, just as quickly, the lightning stopped, and Algol’s eyes rolled around in his head. A moment later the hunchback fell onto the floor.
Jonny staggered against the door frame, as if the creation of this electrical storm had both angered and exhausted him. Falcon watched as the boy paused and tried to regain his composure. Jonny stood there, half collapsed against the door, until at last he took a deep breath and stood up straight.
“Come on,” said Jonny, untying Falcon’s gag. “Let’s get out of here.”
“What was that?” said Falcon. “You can make electricity?”
“Yeah,” said Jonny. “It’s just this thing I can do.”
“You’re full of surprises, Jonny,” said Falcon, as they rushed out of the Wellness Center.
Falcon Quinn and the Black Mirror Page 18
