Rivals

by Katrina Kahler

  “Oh yes!” I said, flipping the cover back up. A long metal ladder led down. “Let’s go!” I said.

  Frank and I slid down the ladder into a brightly colored, well-lit metal hallway.

  “Man, I never knew sewers were so pretty!” Frank gushed.

  “This is not an average sewer,” I said.

  “How do you know?” Frank asked. “It’s the only one we’ve looked at. They could all be cool and high tech like this.”

  I decided not to argue. I just kept moving along the hallway.

  A small round drone popped out of the floor in front of us. It looked like a miniature blue and silver spacecraft with a green eye. “Halt!” the drone ordered.

  “Do you think all sewers have these drones?” Frank asked.

  “Pretty sure they don’t,” I replied.

  “Halt!” the drone demanded once more. Red dots appeared on Frank’s chest and also my own. “I will zap you!” the drone said. “You are not trolls. This is a troll or client only zone.”

  “Then we are clients,” I said.

  “Yeah cool clients,” Frank said.

  "Then you will know the clients’ password," the drone stated. "The trolls give all clients a password to pass."

  “Hey, that’s why they are called passwords!” Frank said.

  The drone buzzed up and down in front of us. “Password!” It ordered.

  “I will smash you!” I warned.

  “No! Invalid password. There are no numbers in it!” the drone insisted.

  Grabbing the drone with my right hand, I pulled it toward me. I started squeezing.

  “Invalid!! Invalid!! Invalid!!” the drone shouted.

  I squashed the drone into a tiny crumpled ball. I tossed it over my shoulder. The drone hit the floor and sighed, “Close enough, you may pass.”

  Frank and I reached a thick metal door. The door had a numeric lock on it. “Another password!” Frank said.

  “No problem!” I said.

  Smacking the middle of the door with the palm of my hand, the door jarred open. Frank and I walked into a long room. The room was filled with little trolls all sitting at computer screens. There was also a ping-pong table and a giant pot of coffee. The trolls were all typing away. They didn’t seem to notice Frank and me.

  “I think we found them!” Frank said proudly.

  “Good job, bro,” I whispered.

  “How are we going to get their attention?” Frank asked. “They seem focused on their work.”

  “I’ll get their attention!” I told him. I held my arms out and inhaled. I concentrated on bringing the energy from the walls into my body. Currents started shooting from the computers and into my hands. I crackled and sizzled with electricity. It tickled. All the computers in the room went blank. Each of the trolls stopped typing and turned to me.

  “Hey! What gives?” a little troll with long blue hair said.

  “Oh, it's the vampire tiger,” another little troll with long green hair called out.

  “This could be really bad,” a troll with long orange hair said.

  A slightly taller troll with long blue hair and a tweed detective suit leaped up from his or her seat and walked towards me. “Get out!” the little troll ordered. “This is our home and place of business!”

  I crossed my arms. “Nope!”

  The blue haired troll stopped in his tracks. “Well, I tried guys,” he told the other trolls.

  “Wait, you trolls live here?” I asked.

  The blue hair troll nodded. “Yes, we love our work.”

  “Where do you sleep?” Frank asked.

  “At our desks, they are quite comfy!” he insisted.

  “Where do you go to the bathroom?” Frank asked.

  “We have bottles that we….”

  “TMI! TMI! TMI!” I shouted. “Too Much Information!”

  “Right,” the blue-haired troll said. “But you did ask.”

  “Why are you trolling my friend?” I asked.

  “Because!” the blue-haired troll said. The other trolls all nodded in agreement.

  “I need more info,” I said.

  “How much do you want to pay for it?” the blue-haired troll asked.

  I walked over and picked him up by his tweed-checked jacket. “I don’t want to pay for it.”

  “Hmm, I see you are a tough customer!” the troll said. "We do have an 800 number you can register a complaint with. You will receive an answer in 6 to 8 weeks."

  “I want to know who paid you to troll my friend!” I demanded.

  "Sorry, we are bound by troll-client privilege," the troll insisted. "And you can use your vampire voice on us but our brains are so weirdly wired from staring at computers all day we are hard to control!"

  I showed the troll my fangs. “You know I could drain you of energy like I did to your computers!”

  Frank tapped me on the shoulder. “Ah, sis, why don’t you offer to trade with them? You turn their computers back on if they tell you who paid them to troll.”

  The blue troll pointed at Frank. “Now that large young man has a brain for business. We will take that deal!”

  “Would you believe I’ve never taken a business class?” Frank said.

  I dropped the troll to the floor. I pointed at him and ordered, “Talk!”

  “I am talking, we have been talking,” the troll said.

  “Tell me who paid you or I will shut you down for good!” I said.

  “You can’t shut us down for good!” a pink haired troll said. “We serve a purpose!”

  “What purpose?” I asked.

  “We give people a common cause. Something to unite against,” the troll said. “There’s no organization likes us!”

  “I believe that,” Frank said.

  I had to admit they might have had a point. “Just do us all a favor and tell me!” I said.

  The blue-haired troll took a step back. “You are scary! I’ll admit to that.” He paused. “But the lady vampire who hired us is even scarier! She turned poor Harry into a newt just because he said, and I quote, you look great for your age…”

  “That sounds like something Grandma Jasmine would do,” Frank said.

  “Oh no!” I groaned. “It’s Grandma Jasmine! It has to be!”

  Looking at the blue-haired troll I pointed and demanded, “Tell me if it was her!”

  “I don’t want Jasmine to turn me into a newt because I’ve told you she was the one!” the blue-haired troll said. He threw his hands over his mouth. “I am such a newt…”

  The little troll started shrinking. His hair blended into his skin. His arms became long legs. His butt grew a blue tail. Soon a blue lizard stood before us.

  Grandma Jasmine appeared. “Silly newt!” she said.

  All the other trolls locked their eyes on their screens and resumed typing...even though their screens had no power.

  I exhaled to allow the electrical energy I had absorbed flow out of me and back into the building. The computers all buzzed on.

  “Grandma Jasmine, you are the one behind those terrible rumors about Ruby!” I said.

  “Guilty as charged. I wanted to bring out the best in you and look at how I succeeded….that energy trick was awesome,” Grandma Jasmine said.

  “But why attack my friend?” I asked.

  “I didn’t attack her, I just had the trolls start nasty rumors about her. I know the girl is strong for a human and would take it better than you,” Grandma Jasmine said, not feeling guilty at all.

  “Grandma, you had no right to drag Ruby into this!” I insisted.

  “I’m a grandma, I can do whatever I think will help to make my granddaughter better!” she insisted.

  “No, no, no!” I stomped my foot. “Ruby is totally innocent here. You had no right!”

  Grandma Thorn appeared. “Admit it, Jasmine the girl is right!”

  “I am a super powerful vampire. I don’t have to admit to anything!” Grandma Jasmine said.

  Grandma Thorn glared at her
. “I know you don’t HAVE to, but you should want to! You made the girl’s life miserable. You almost broke up her friendship.”

  “She can always make new friends,” Grandma Jasmine said. “Especially with her powers. Everybody would be her friend if she wanted.”

  “Grandma Jasmine, I only want true friends. Friends who want to be my friends. Not people I force to be my friends.”

  “Those are minions,” Grandma Thorn said.

  "Minions are great. Thanks to minions I've never ever had to do my own laundry or cut my own toenails. I could even get them to follow me into the bathroom and…"

  “I have enough information!” I shouted.

  “Temper, dear,” Grandma Jasmine smiled.

  “You had no right to mess with my friend!” I said.

  “Fine, I shouldn’t have messed with your friend,” Grandma Jasmine admitted. “I did feel a little guilty playing with the little human like that. She is kind of nice. Unlike that Sasha girl…she’s a mean one!” She smiled. “But I do love her potential.”

  “No, no, no! Please tell me you didn’t!” I told Grandma Jasmine.

  “I thought you could use a worthy foe!” Grandma Jasmine said. “Her ancestors actually tried to recruit me into their organization a century or so ago. I told them I don’t play with others. I just play with others’ minds. I think it's so funny that their secret group still sticks around. Sure, they have different bosses and funding now, but they are still trying to control us. Silly fools."

  “Are there non-silly fools?” Frank asked.

  “Lovely point, my boy,” Grandma Jasmine said.

  “Why, Grandma Jasmine, why?” I questioned.

  Grandma Jasmine rolled her eyes. “A grandma doesn’t need a reason to make her favorite granddaughter better.” She took a breath. “But if you insist, I thought it would help you to be a better person. You now have an opponent who is worthy of you.”

  “Now you’re telling me you chose a girl who doesn’t like me and who has hypnotic ability as well as being connected to a super-secret organization, then you turned her into an even stronger person?” I frowned.

  Grandma Jasmine nodded. “Yes, nice summary dear,” she said.

  “You know she has most of the school under her control now?” I said.

  Grandma Jasmine giggled. “I’m not surprised. Human minds are so easy to play with.” She smiled at me. “But I have faith in you!”

  “How do I beat her?” I asked.

  Grandma Jasmine grinned. “That’s up to you to discover!” She threw her arms to her side and disappeared in a puff of smoke.

  Looking at Grandma Thorn, I asked. “Do you have any idea?”

  “Sorry honey, but I too have faith in you!”

  Nina Note: Great! Can my life get any worse! My Grandma Jasmine turned the person in the world who likes me the least into perhaps the most powerful human mind on Earth. Now, I had to figure out a way to stop her without really hurting her. Though for stealing Jimmy from me, I was tempted to hurt her a little. At least I knew Jimmy didn't leave me for Sasha while under his own power. That did make me feel better. I also knew that once I stopped Sasha, I would feel MUCH better!

  Grandma Jasmine was being such a pain!

  Chapter 13: School Showdown

  Now that I knew who was behind the rumors and Sasha’s new power, I raced back to the school. Frank ran beside me, trying to keep up.

  “Slow down, sis,” he pleaded. “I can’t move that fast!”

  “I’m not even moving at top speed!” I told him. “I’m trying to think of a plan.”

  “Yeah, a plan would be a good idea,” Frank said. “Can Sasha influence you with her mind?”

  I slowed down. “I’m afraid so. She can’t completely make me act like a chicken or bark like a dog, but she still has an effect on me. I have to keep my mind strong and concentrate on her!” I told Frank.

  “Check!” he said.

  He flexed his muscles a bit. “I’ll stop Bear,” he told me.

  “That would be helpful!” I told him.

  Truthfully, I didn’t know if Frank could stop Bear. Sure, Frank was a powerhouse and a gifted fighter, but Bear would do anything to win.

  “You know, bro, Bear is pretty fierce!” I told him.

  Frank pounded a fist into his hand. “I can be too when defending the people who I love!”

  Yeah, I could see why so many girls went gaga over Frank. The kid really had a heart. I just hoped heart combined with muscle would be enough to stop the fury of a controlled werebear. I guessed I’d see soon enough.

  My phone buzzed in my pocket. Picking it up, I noticed it was a call from Mumford. Mumford had never called me before. I didn’t even think he knew my number. I figured I’d better answer it.

  “Hello?” I said.

  “Yes, Ms. Nina, I understand that through Gomer's sources, plus through sources of my own, there is some trouble at the school."

  “Sure is Mumford, Sasha now has super hypnotic power and wants to take over,” I said.

  “Confirmed, please hold,” Mumford said.

  The face of Sasha's mom, Elena appeared on my phone. "I understand there is a problem with my daughter," Elena said.

  “That is an understatement!” I told her.

  Elena stared at me through the phone. “My daughter is formidable, but she should not be a match for you. Unless she has somehow been vastly upgraded.”

  I felt that was a funny way to refer to her daughter. But the statement was accurate. “Yes, my grandma might have improved her some, a lot…”

  “Ah, Jasmine always liked to tinker,” Elena said.

  “So, my grandma and you HAVE had contact in the past?” I asked.

  Elena nodded. “We recruited your grandma many years ago but she proved to be...how can I say this…unable to respond well to being critiqued.”

  “Yeah, that describes her!” I said.

  “I don’t think we can trust any vamp!” I heard Jimmy’s mom’s voice in the background. She leaned over Elena’s shoulder and asked. “How is my boy?”

  I shook my head. “He’s also under Sasha’s influence,” I said.

  Jimmy’s mom frowned. “I never thought I’d say this...vamp, we need your help.”

  “Yeah, I know, and I’m planning on stopping her,” I said. “I guess Mumford thinks you might be able to help.”

  Elena bit her lip. “I ordered my daughter to leave you alone, but apparently she’s not as good at taking orders as I had hoped.”

  “I figured that part out,” I said.

  “Sasha likes to be the best, but she has a confidence problem. If you can make her doubt herself, you might be able to stop her,” Elena told me.

  "Ah, could you maybe send reinforcements to help?” Frank asked.

  “We’ve started the paperwork to get people there. We should have approval within,” Elena looked at her watch, “twelve hours.”

  I sighed. “Hopefully we will have the situation under control by then.”

  “Let’s hope!” Elena said, “Still, if not, help will be on the way.”

  I put my phone back into my pocket. We hurried towards the school.

  “Well, at least there’s a backup plan,” Frank said.

  Ruby raced up to us the second we walked into the school.

  “Ms. Anna and the cheerleader dancers are back under Sasha’s command. Aunt Mika was trying to hold them off while I went to find you guys.” Ruby panted. She smiled. “And seeing you’re back, I guess that means you found the trolls.”

  “We did. It was my Grandma Jasmine who put them up to trolling you. She also made Sasha super-powered," I said.

  “Oh, that makes sense,” Ruby said.

  “It does?” I wasn’t so sure.

  Ruby nodded. “Yeah, in your Grandma Jasmine’s weird logic, she probably thinks she’s doing this for your own good…to test you, to make you stronger. And to stand up for your friend.”

  “Wow, Ruby, for a sweet girl you sure th
ink a lot like an age-old vampire,” I told her with a smile on my face.

  Ruby pointed down the hallway. Coming our way, we saw Principal Peters, Ms. Anna, her cheerleader dance squad, Bear, Jimmy, and Sasha.

  “I sent the rest of school home!” Sasha shouted to me. “So we can settle this personally!”

  “She has a weird concept of personally,” Frank said.

  “Please,” Sasha laughed. “I don’t go anywhere without my top minions!”

  Frank curled his hands into fists. “I’ve got Bear!” he said. I’d never seen my brother glare before. He was really angry. I hoped he could channel his anger to make him even stronger.

  “Ah, okay, now,” Ruby said slowly. “That means Nina has to take on the rest?”

  I smiled at her. “Nope, we have a third team member here?”

  Ruby looked over her shoulder. “Who is it, the invisible man?”

  “Nah, he’s a coward,” Frank replied.

  Pointing at Ruby, I said. “It’s you. After all, you are a black belt.”

  “Ruby nodded. "I am, but I can't take on all these people. My forms are great but I'm not really a fighter. Not for real."

  I walked over and put my hand on her shoulder. "I can make you faster and stronger...like my grandma did to Sasha."

  “Really?” Ruby asked, looking at me strangely.

  “Yes, really…I think,” I told her. “I’m not sure it will work but I am sure I can do it without melting you or anything!” I tried to reassure her.

  Ruby looked at the group steadily coming towards us.

  “Do it!” she said.

  I put both my hands on Ruby’s shoulders. I concentrated not on giving her my energy but finding her energy. I took a breath, then another breath. I could feel the energy powering through Ruby’s body. I focused on turning this energy up; unleashing its full potential. I started to tingle. I grinned, knowing it was working. Well, at least I thought it was working.

  "Are you done?" Ruby asked as the group drew closer.

  “I think so,” I said.

  Ruby leaped ten feet into the air, doing a somersault. Then she landed on two feet and charged at the group of minions.

  “Looks like it worked!” Frank called back.