by Tony Abbott
Danger Guys Blast Off
Tony Abbott
illustrated by Joanne Scribner
With love for Jane,
who started all this kid stuff
ONE
Ping!
That’s how it all started.
My best friend, Zeek, and I were in my backyard. We were building rockets out of plastic soda bottles. That was my idea.
Then we were going to shoot them off with air from my bike pump. That was my idea, too.
I’m always thinking up things to do. Zeek says my brain is on overdrive. That’s why he calls me Noodle.
Zeek is incredible. He loves adventure just like I do. And he’s also the best all-around sports star in my class.
With my brains and his muscle, we make a great team. We do everything together.
Anyway, there we were. I was just going to customize my rocket with some junk I had collected—a mirror, a hand buzzer, a paper clip, and a fat rubber band.
Then Zeek jumped up. “Noodle, do you hear that?”
“Hear what?”
“It sounded like, I don’t know, ping!”
I listened. “Yeah,” I said. “Ping. It’s pretty far away.”
“But, Noodle, I know that sound. It’s the sound you make when you hit that thing with a huge hammer and the thing goes up and hits the bell and you win something.” Zeek looked at me as if I should understand. “You know.”
It took me a minute. “Do you mean like a Test-Your-Strength game at a carnival?”
Then it hit me. We stared at each other. We both jumped up.
“The Mayville carnival! Now till Tuesday! Rides! ROCKET RIDES!”
In a flash we were at the Mayville carnival. It had just opened for the day. Strings of white lights surrounded the park. Hundreds of people were there already.
In one corner a rock band on a wooden stage was playing loud music. In another corner were all the pizza and hamburger booths.
In the middle were dozens of rides swooping up and around like crazy. Whip-Dip, Sling Shot, Free-Fall. Kids were screaming their lungs out. Moms and dads were in shock.
“Excellent,” I said. Then I spotted the Belgian waffle booth. “Whoa, Zeekie. First we eat, then we ride.”
But Zeek was already gone. I didn’t see him anywhere. I was about to call out for him when I heard that sound again.
Ping!
No way, I thought. Zeek is a whiz at sports, but even high school kids can’t hit that bell.
Then I heard it again. Ping!
I whirled around. There was Zeek, running back from the Test-Your-Strength game. He was smiling and holding up his prize.
“Noodle, look. A Fizz Blaster 2000!”
It was pretty neat, all right. A super-long-range, heavy-duty squirt gun with a sleek green barrel and two monster water tanks on the sides.
“Cool,” I said.
“Yeah,” he said. “I love these things. I’m sure it will come in handy.” He looked at me and grinned. “If you know what I mean.”
I grinned back at him. Sure I knew what he meant. Ever since our adventure with underground treasure thieves, we’ve been known officially as the Danger Guys, two buddies who get into pretty amazing adventures. There’s nothing we can’t handle. And we can always use great equipment.
Zeek slung the Blaster over his shoulder, nudged me, and pointed. I turned to look.
Incredible!
It was like a scene from an old space movie. A whole battalion of rockets was coming in slowly for a landing.
First came a bright red one with lightning streaks painted on the sides. Next to it was a green capsule with yellow lights blinking from front to back.
But best of all was a sleek purple triangle with green fins and a silver nose. It looked superfast, just rocking there, empty and waiting for us to get in.
“The waffles can wait,” I said. “That rocket’s got our name on it.”
But before we could move, a funny guy in a long white coat and wild hair rushed up the stairs and plunked himself down in the purple rocket.
“It’s mine,” he said to us, with a weird smile. Then he wrinkled his nose and shut his eyes. And sneezed. “Aaa-choo!”
The attendant came right over and said, “Sorry, mister, only kids can go on this ride.”
The guy in the white coat didn’t like that. He started sneezing again. But finally he got out. “Have a rotten ride, boys,” he said as he passed us. Then he sneezed again. About eight times!
“Wow,” I said. “Strange guy. He looks familiar, though, doesn’t he?”
Before I knew it, Zeek had strapped me in next to him in the purple rocket. Then we started our trip to the top of the ride.
“Now, Zeek,” I said. “Don’t get me wrong. I love rocket rides. Only I don’t want to hear any funny noises, okay? My dad says you can always tell when something’s going to go wrong with the car just by listening for the funny noises.”
Rrrrrrrrr!
“Like that. What was that?”
Rrrrrrrrr. Ping, ping, ping!
“No problem, Nood. Somebody else must have hit the bell.”
“Uh … I don’t think so, Zeek. That was us.”
All of a sudden the rocket began to jiggle. The back end wagged back and forth. The nose twisted up and down.
“Hey,” I yelled. “None of the other rockets are doing this.”
Then—CRACK! CLUNK! PING!—the rocket jerked completely around and bounced up.
That’s when everything went blurry.
And the rocket broke loose.
TWO
I looked at Zeek. He looked at me. Our mouths were open, but nothing came out.
Then—vooom!—our rocket plunged straight for the ground.
That’s when our mouths started working.
“HELLLP!”
“Get us out of here!”
We zoomed straight at the rock band. Everyone screamed and scattered.
“Hey!” I cried. “Everybody’s running away.”
“No kidding, Noodle. They don’t want to be under us when we crash!”
The ground rushed up at us. So this was it. The end of the Danger Guys. I gave Zeek my last thumbs-up. He gave me one, too.
But just as we were about to blast into the drum set, the nose of the rocket tipped up. We went flying out through the cymbals and made a quick bounce over the bandshell.
“Whoa! Are we dead yet?” Zeek yelled.
“Not yet,” I gasped. “But stay tuned!” We shot under the big food tent where hundreds of people were sitting munching away. They saw us and started to run.
“Noodle,” Zeek yelled out. “Can’t you control this thing?”
I jammed down all the switches on the control panel. I pulled the big stick in front of me.
“What are you doing that for? That stuff doesn’t work!”
“I know that. But what do you want me to do, stick my arms out and grab something?” I gave him a look.
The rocket did a fast loop, bounced off a picnic table, and shot toward the hamburger grill. A guy was flipping burgers high and letting them land on the hot grill. I could see the flames rising up.
“Shift your weight! We’ve got to veer out of the way!”
We leaned to one side, but I guess we leaned too far. We did a quick half-twirl. Instantly we were flying upside down through a stack of hot dog buns. I caught one and took a bite.
“Hungry?” I said, as we roared out of the tent. But Zeek wasn’t laughing. He was down under the control panel.
I looked up. Straight ahead were the spokes of the giant Ferris wheel. They were turning fast.
“Zeek, we’ll be sliced to ribbons!”
Vooom! The rocket made a sharp turn to the left and loop
ed around the wheel.
“Whoa, Zeek! That wasn’t luck. Something must be controlling this thing!”
Then Zeek sat up with a little black box in his hand. “Noodle, look. A radio.”
I looked at it. “Yeah, but it’s not the kind you talk into. Zeek, that’s a radio-controller box.”
“You mean …”
“Yep, this rocket is being radio controlled. Someone is—” That was all I could say.
The rocket suddenly jerked up over a bunch of kids buying cotton candy, leaped the fence around the carnival, and took off high over Mayville.
THREE
We cartwheeled over the library. Then we corkscrewed around the town hall dome about ten times. Finally we were jerked backward in our seats and we sailed up over Main Street.
Zeek wasn’t happy. He looked sick. “Yeah, Noodle, I know. Cool ride. Good view. Great adventure. Terrific. But something basic here. Just how are we going to get down?”
Good question. We didn’t have to wait long for the answer. A couple of seconds later the rocket swooped low and circled over a big brick building.
“Hey, Mayville School,” I said. “We’re being pulled down to it. We’re going to land.”
Suddenly, the silver nose of the rocket dipped. Zeek grabbed my arm. “We’re going to crash, you mean!”
We dropped straight down. The rocket hit the ground and skidded across the school parking lot toward the playground wall. Sparks sprayed up into our faces.
“We’re not going to make it!”
Zeek was right. The rocket hit the wall fast and flipped over about a dozen times. On the third flip Zeek went flying into the jungle gym.
I hung on for another five flips and then took off screaming into the tire swing.
The rocket jolted up one last time and bounced over the mound at the edge of the playground. It stopped dead on the other side.
Then everything was quiet. Well, almost everything.
“Ohhh!” Someone was moaning. I looked at Zeek. I thought, How does he make that sound with his mouth closed? But when he started to talk I knew it wasn’t him.
“Ohhh!”
Yeah, it was me. I was getting dizzy spinning on that tire. I was going to be sick. But Zeek ran over and pulled me off.
“I feel like human mush!” I said.
“We’d feel worse if we weren’t wearing our Danger Guy jackets,” Zeek said.
It was true. In these jackets you feel just about indestructible. Especially since our moms had put official Danger Guy patches on the shoulders.
Zeek grabbed his Fizz Blaster 2000 and stumbled over to the water fountain to fill it.
But when we looked out over the ridge at where the rocket had stopped, there was—nothing! No rocket! Nowhere!
“Wait a minute,” I said. “There was a rocket here just a few minutes ago. The question is, Where did it go?”
Zeek knelt down and looked closely at the grass. “Noodle, look at these lines in the ground.”
We picked up sticks and started scraping. Soon we had scraped out a big square area, about the size of a garage door.
“What do you think it is, Nood?”
Before I could answer, the big square patch of ground started to move.
“Stand back!” I yelled. We both watched as the ground slid open in front of us. Then it stopped opening.
“It’s a hatch,” I whispered. “And there’s a ladder down the side. Let’s go in.”
Zeek held my arm. I could tell he didn’t like the idea.
“Noodle, I don’t like the idea. A secret room hidden under the ground? No way. We have to call the principal, or maybe the police.”
“Sure,” I said. “Later. But that rocket is down there. And somebody just took us on a pretty wild ride. We’ve got to find out what it’s all about.”
I dangled my foot into the darkness and felt for the first rung of the ladder. “Besides, we’re a team, remember?” I gave him the thumbs-up.
Zeek broke into a smile. He gave me one, too. Then he tightened the strap on the Fizz Blaster 2000, zipped up his jacket, and put his foot on the ladder. “Okay, buddy, lead on.”
Down we went. The ladder must have gone about twenty feet deep. The smell was creepy, like a doctor’s office.
Finally I could see the floor just below me.
“Bingo,” I whispered. “Wherever it is, we’re here.”
I was being so quiet.
I was going so slowly.
Then I set my foot down on the floor. And the whole world exploded.
FOUR
ZAAAP!
A sharp blast of blue light shot across the room, nearly piercing my ear.
Wham! The hatch slammed shut.
Fwiiing! Another blue beam shot out from the other side of the room.
Then another. And another.
“Crossfire!” Zeek yelped.
“Laser crossfire!” I cried. “Dive, or we’re french fries!”
We both dived together. We slid down on our backs under the crossfire. Blasts of blue light hissed and spat deadly rays all around us.
Zaaap! Jing! Ssst!
“Now what, Noodle?”
I looked all around. We couldn’t move. “Sorry, Zeekie. I’ve got only one idea and it’s a bad one. I thought it over and it won’t work. No way. I’ve got to think of something else.”
Fwing! A beam blasted the floor near Zeek’s head.
“What?” cried Zeek. “What wouldn’t work? Maybe it would work. Maybe it would!”
Zzziiing!
I squeezed my hand into my jacket pocket and felt around. Got it! I pulled out the mirror I had stuffed in there that morning.
“Okay.” I said. “The idea is to slip this mirror into the crossfire without zapping myself. Then it might send one of those death beams bouncing back to where it came from. You know, light bounces.”
“Yeah, I remember,” Zeek gasped. “Just like Mr. Vazny showed us in science class. That was cool!”
“Right. If it works. And if I don’t turn myself into a fish stick.”
“Just do it, Noodle. Or get the ketchup for both of us. I think I smell my sneakers burning!”
“Okay, here goes.” Carefully I raised the mirror up into the crossfire.
One inch the wrong way and I was finished. Closer … Closer …
Zzzooop! A deadly blue beam slammed into the mirror and was zapped back right to where it came from.
KA-POW! Sparks burst out like fireworks from both walls. The whole room popped like a flash bulb on a camera. Suddenly, the laser beams fizzled and went dead.
I looked over at Zeek. He looked over at me.
“Yes!” he cried, punching the air with his fist. “Noodle, you’re a genius. You did it, smart guy!”
I smiled. “Yeah, sometimes it helps to have an idea or two. And a pocketful of junk.”
“Right,” said Zeek. “But now playtime is over. When you were doing your mirror trick, I saw a door. It’s over this way.”
Of course the door was locked.
Zeek started kicking and pounding on it.
Then I noticed something.
“Wait a second, pal. Maybe we’re going about this the wrong way. You see this buzzer here? Maybe if we ring it the door will open.”
Zeek shook his head. “Oh, sure. And maybe it’ll open right into my kitchen and my mom will be waiting with lunch for us.” He shook his head again. “No way.”
“Yeah, I guess you’re right.” But I hit the buzzer anyway and the door jerked open. We tumbled through.
But it wasn’t Zeek’s kitchen. It was a long room. And instead of a floor there were stairs.
So we didn’t walk right out like Zeek said we would. We crashed down the stairs over each other and landed in a heap.
At the bottom we sat up. We were sitting on a couch. A soft couch. With soft armrests and cushions.
“All right!” I said to Zeek. “This is okay, no?”
I started to give him a high-five when—<
br />
Clamp! Instantly a wide metal strap swung around from the side of the couch and pinned down my arm.
“Hey!”
Clamp! My other arm was trapped.
I looked over at Zeek. Clamp! Clamp! He was strapped down, too.
“Not okay, Noodle. Huh-uh. Not okay at all.”
Suddenly, a sound crackled from all around us. It sounded like a school announcement system being turned on. It was going to be loud.
Then a voice boomed in our ears.
“Welcome!” it said. “Welcome to my … Aaa-CHOO!”
FIVE
“The sneezer!” I cried. “I can’t believe it. The guy from the carnival! The guy with the white coat! The guy who—”
“I know, I know,” said Zeek. “The guy who—”
“Aaa-choo. AAA-choo. AAA-CHOO!”
Each sneeze boomed over the announcement system like a nuclear explosion.
“Yuck!” cried Zeek. He closed his eyes and turned his face away from the noise.
Then the man in the white coat stepped out from the shadows at the far end of the room. Yeah, it was him. The same crazy hair. The same wild look on his face.
“Welcome, Mr. Newton and Mr. Pilinsky.”
“Noodle, this is weird,” Zeek whispered. “How does he know our names?”
“I’m trying to figure that out,” I muttered under my breath.
I looked at the man. He was strange, all right. But something about him was very familiar. “Zeek, I know that face. I mean, even before the carnival. Doesn’t he look like someone we know? I’m sure I know him, but—”
“STOP WHISPERING!” the man shouted. “I won’t have whispering in my cla—I mean, in my laboratory!”
“Mr. Vazny!” I shouted. “Zeek! That’s it! It’s Mr. Vazny, our science teacher! It’s him. I know it! It’s—”
“SILENCE!” yelled the man in white. Then he stopped. His expression turned from a snarl to a smile. A weird smile.
“Call me … Morbius,” he said quietly.
“But … you’re … I mean … you’re Mr. Vazny, our science teacher, aren’t you? Sir? We haven’t seen you around lately. Sir.”
His eyes flashed another angry look. Then he smiled again. “I … used to be Mr. Vazny. Now I am Dr. Morbius. Scientist!” He raised his hand and spoke over his shoulder. “Lights, please, Primus.”
