Hamstersaurus Rex vs. the Cutepocalypse

by Tom O'Donnell

  “The poison ivy in the side yard looks a little tall,” I said mildly.

  “Wait, this one is my yard?” said Old Man Ohlman, aghast. “I thought mine was that one over there.” He pointed to a well-manicured lawn two houses down. “Well, okay, son, you’re hired.” He gasped. “You know, if this one is my front yard, I’m guessing my backyard is probably gonna be a doozy.”

  True enough, somehow Old Man Ohlman’s backyard was even worse. It looked less like a lawn than a haunted forest. Three-foot weeds stretched from one rickety fence to the other.

  “Yeesh,” said Old Man Ohlman. “Good luck.”

  Hammie Rex and I got to work. Old Man Ohlman had an antique, motorless push mower. It was no use, though. The weeds were too thick. Instead he went inside and came back with a large, rusty pair of scissors. The sun beat down on us as I snipped away and Hammie Rex used his dino-strength to yank weeds, some of which were honestly full-on trees. Old Man Ohlman brought us two ice-cold glasses of “unsweetened lemonade,” which was another way of saying lemon juice. I drank a few sips of mine to be polite but Hammie spat his all over the old patio we had accidentally uncovered. Around four p.m. we thought we made an incredibly important archaeological discovery but it just turned out to be an old garden gnome mummy-wrapped in crabgrass. From the porch, Old Man Ohlman told us his name was “Dwayne” and that he had been banished long ago for disloyalty. By five o’clock we could actually push the lawnmower through the grass, and by six, the yard was looking perfectly clipped—a pure, orderly vision of conscientious suburban lawn care.

  “Now that’s a job well done,” said Old Man Olhlman, beaming. “I see why they selected you as the world’s first child astronaut.”

  “Yep,” I said, panting. I was tired and sweaty and covered in bug bites and thorn pricks. I didn’t have the energy to correct him.

  “Time for your well-deserved payment, young fellow,” said Old Man Ohlman. “Four dollars and twenty-seven cents!”

  “What?” I said. “But we worked for five hours!”

  “Ah, good point; $3.92 ought to do it then,” said Old Man Ohlman. “Let me just grab the old penny jar.” He disappeared and returned with a jar that was the size of a pygmy goat. Old Man Ohlman plunked it down on the ground and started to count out pennies. “I put a penny in this jar every time I don’t swear.” He dropped a penny in and then took it back out. “You know, you two are A-OK,” said Old Man Ohlman. “Unlike that traitorous blackguard Dwayne.” He shot the gnome a dirty look.

  I was too exhausted to even argue. I just held out my hand and watched the pennies slowly (and I do mean slowly) pile up. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Hammie Rex’s whiskers twitch. His ears perked up. The little guy let out a whine.

  “What is it, boy?” I said. “You hear something?”

  “Has Augustine D. Katz, heir to the Katz dog grooming fortune, been kidnapped?” said Old Man Ohlman with a gasp. “To the Ohlman-mobile!”

  Hammie shook his head, then snarled and bounded across Old Man Ohlman’s newly trimmed lawn. He stood beside the rickety backyard fence, making a low growl in the back of his throat. I caught up to him a second later.

  “What’s going on?” I asked. “Is somebody spying on—”

  On the other side of the fence, somebody ran.

  CHAPTER 8

  HAMMIE AND I burst out of Old Man Ohlman’s backyard gate just in time to see someone disappear around the corner of the block. Whoever was spying on us had to be the same person who sent Gooboo the Snuzzle to commit oodles of homicide!

  “Don’t lose them, Hammie!” I cried.

  Hamstersaurus Rex grunted and charged ahead after the mystery figure.

  I caught up to the little guy a block and a half later. He stood at the trunk of a tall elm, growling. I peered up through the leaves. A large shape cowered on a low branch. Sure enough, there was a person up there—Hammie Rex had treed the spy!

  “I’m putting you under Hamster Monitor arrest!” I said. “Come down with your hands up.”

  “Okay!” said the person in the tree. “Wait, what? How am I supposed to do that?”

  “Good point,” I said. “Come down first, using your hands, then put them up afterward. Two-step process. Got it?”

  “Promise me Hamstersaurus Rex won’t eat me!” said the spy.

  “Probably won’t happen,” I said, “but I’m leaving all our options on the table.”

  “Okay, fine.” The shadowy figure dropped out of the tree. It was Cid Wilkins.

  “Hello, Sam,” said Cid with a weak smile.

  “Cid?!” I said.

  “What were you doing back there?”

  “Look, I know that it may have seemed suspicious but it wasn’t!” said Cid. “I promise!”

  Hamstersaurus Rex snarled and snapped his dino-jaws in Cid’s general direction. Cid cringed.

  “Uh-huh,” I said. “So if not ‘suspicious,’ how would you describe peeking through a hole in the fence and then bolting the second we saw you?”

  “Poor social skills?” said Cid. “Look, I live in this neighborhood and I happened to be walking by and I heard Hamstersaurus Rex and I wanted to say hi but . . .”

  “But what?” I said.

  “Well, I don’t know,” said Cid, staring at the ground and shuffling his feet. “I felt kind of intimidated because you’re so cool!”

  “Huh?” I said, looking behind me. “Who are you talking t— Wait, you mean me?”

  “Of course!” said Cid. “You’ve had all these adventures and you can draw really well and you’re super funny!”

  “Hmm,” I said. “Go on.”

  “Dude, you saved your whole school on multiple occasions,” said Cid. “The most important thing I’ve ever saved is some wrapping paper, so it could be used again.” He looked at his shoes. “It never was.”

  “Okay, yes, I did save the school,” I said. “But there’s no reason to feel intimidated because you think I’m . . . how exactly did you put it?”

  “So cool,” said Cid.

  Needless to say, this was the first time I’d ever heard anything like this, and I realized I could get used to it.

  “Right,” I said. “Well, no worries then, Cid. Hammie and I have definitely done our fair share of sneaking. Occasionally past nine-foot-tall squirrels.”

  Cid looked relieved. “Hey, speaking of: as a fan I’ve just got to ask, when Squirrel Kong grew from normal squirrel size to giant squirrel size, how did that not violate the law of conservation of mass?”

  “Uh,” I said. “I guess just add that to the long list of laws Squirrel Kong broke?”

  Cid burst out laughing. “Dude, you’re so hilarious!” he said. “Anyway, I’m really sorry I spooked you two. Don’t hold it against me. I guess I’ll see you at school on Monday, Sam. Bye, Hammie.” Cid gave a nod and started to walk away.

  “Cid, wait,” I said. “What are you up to right now?”

  “Kind of embarrassing,” said Cid. “I’m pretty friendless so I was just heading back to my house to play video games by myself. You’re welcome to join—” He caught himself. “Not that you’d want to do that, necessarily! You are the Sam Gibbs. I’m sure you’ve probably got somewhere really awesome to be right now.”

  “Nope!” I said, probably too quickly. “I mean . . . I like video games.”

  “Neat,” said Cid. “Well, anyway, my house is kind of lame or whatever, so apologies in advance.”

  Cid’s house wasn’t lame. And it wasn’t a house so much as a small castle. Past a heavy-duty security gate set in a tall hedge, there was a three-story mansion surrounded by acres of lush greenery. I’d walked past this block many times and I had no idea this place even existed.

  “Wow, you actually live here?” I said.

  “Yeah,” said Cid, shaking his head. “Sorry about the state of the topiary.” Cid waved to the bushes on the lawn, which had been cut into the shapes of various fantastic animals. “The gardener was out sick this week. That elephant�
��s starting to look more like a woolly mammoth!”

  “Sure, I hate it when that happens to my topiary,” I said.

  Inside, Cid’s house was no less impressive. I followed him through the front door, down a cavernous hallway. It was all paintings and chandeliers and sturdy-looking antique furniture. Most of the furniture at the Gibbs’ residence had a folded and unfolded position.

  “Want a soda?” said Cid, stopping at a sleek-looking stainless steel machine roughly the size of a refrigerator.

  “Sure,” I said. “Anything to get the unsweetened lemonade taste out of my mouth.”

  “What flavor do you want?” said Cid.

  “Uh, I guess orange?” I said. My mom didn’t let me drink soda at all and I was incredulous that some people had more than one type on hand. I guess this really was how the other half lived.

  “Orange?” said Cid. “Sam, you can pick any flavor in the world. Go nuts, man.”

  “Then I’ll take a raspberry and, uh, candy cane,” I said.

  “Now you’re talking!” said Cid. He punched something into the machine’s glowing digital keypad. I heard the sound of ice cubes plinking into a glass and liquid pouring. A few seconds later, the machine beeped and Cid took a tall glass of fizzy pink soda from a compartment in the bottom. He handed it to me. I took a sip.

  “Delicious!” I said. “And kind of weird!”

  Hammie yelped.

  “If it’s not too much trouble, maybe one for the little guy, too,” I said. “It’s easy to focus on how much Hammie loves to eat but, fun fact: he’s often very thirsty, too.”

  “Wow, I feel like I’m really getting the inside scoop on mutant hamsters!” said Cid. “What flavor?”

  “Hmm. Can this thing do chicken parm?” I said.

  “Never tried,” said Cid. “Only one way to find out!” Seconds later, Hammie’s soda was done, too. I wasn’t brave enough to taste it but it certainly smelled like chicken parm. The little guy drained his in a single long slurp and then gave a big toothy grin. It was nice to see Hamstersaurus Rex so relaxed, considering all his recent parental stress.

  “Cid, I can’t believe you have a machine in your house that can mix up any flavor of soda you want in thirty seconds!”

  “Yeah. Sorry it’s so slow,” said Cid, punching in the combination for his own peanut-butter-and-pickle soda. “Maybe we should get the repair guy to come look at it. But he has to fly in from Denmark and it’s a whole thing. Anyway, I figured we could drink them in the indoor skate park?”

  “The what?” I said.

  Sure enough, Cid had not misspoken. His basement had a huge custom-built skate park, complete with ramps and rails and half-pipes. Cid hopped onto his skateboard and showed us a bunch of tricks he’d invented. Pretty soon, Hamstersaurus Rex was out on a board skating around with him (the little guy was a natural!). Cid taught Hammie the “Elevator Pitch,” the “Early Bird Special,” and something he called “Fishing with Dynamite.” Under his patient tutelage, I even managed to pull off a pretty good one-sixteenth-cab before the board shot out from under my feet and I nearly fractured my elbow. Still, just sitting on the edge of the ramp and watching Cid and Hammie Rex do jumps while enjoying a raspberry-and-candy-cane soda was pretty cool.

  After that, we hit up the bowling alley, the climbing wall, and Cid’s personal art studio.

  “Check this out,” said Cid. And he unveiled a painting he had done. It was a masterfully rendered scene of Hamstersaurus Rex, in full medieval armor, wading into battle. “I was really inspired by your Swords of Hamstervalia concept, so I threw a little paint on the canvas. I hope you don’t hate it.”

  It was quite literally the most awesome thing I’d ever seen and I was speechless. Even Hamstersaurus Rex looked awed. His eyes were like saucers.

  “Pretty . . . picture . . . ,” I stammered.

  “You get more vibrant color when you use oils, but I’m still such a noob, I stick to acrylics,” said Cid, squinting at the canvas. “Sorry.”

  We left the studio and headed to Cid’s game room. The floor was littered with awesome toys I’d never even seen before (Flubjubs! Zingo Spinners! You name it!). He even had several old-school arcade machines—Shark Punch, Alien Autopsy: Tournament Edition, and a rare imported copy of Ms. Super Plunger Jr. II: The Pipes, The Pipes Are Calling—and none of them cost any money to play! I’d already died twice in Farmfighter before I noticed the shiny black game console hooked up to a massive plasma screen. Cid sat on a comfy-looking couch nearby holding a controller with an impossible number of buttons.

  “Want to try the Gamehouser APEX 900 Black?” said Cid.

  I nearly did a raspberry-and-candy-cane spit take. “The APEX 900 Black isn’t even supposed to be released for another six months!” I said. “How did you get this, Cid? Are you some sort of criminal?”

  “Nah, I just have one of the prototypes. Sometimes my dad gets products in advance because of his job,” said Cid. “No big deal.”

  “What’s your dad’s job and would he be interested in adopting me?” I said. “Under the circumstances I’m pretty sure my mom would understand.”

  “Oh, he’s, like, an investor, I guess. He made a lot of money investing in those little cardboard thingies that can hold four coffee cups,” said Cid. “Now he just kind of does it for fun.”

  “And as a result, you get free video games half a year before their release date?” I said.

  “Well, sometimes the games have bugs,” said Cid, with a frown.

  “Yeah, that sounds really tough,” I said. “Not sure how you manage.”

  Cid went to the cabinet and came back loaded down with bags of Funchos Flavor-Wedges. Many of their labels were in foreign languages. “Hey, do you think Hammie Rex would like some—”

  Before Cid could finish his sentence, Hamstersaurus Rex did a quadruple somersault and landed at Cid’s feet. His mouth fell open and he started drooling on Cid’s (very stylish) sneakers.

  “Well, the little guy used to have a bit of a problem with that particular snack food item,” I said, reading one of the labels. “But it would be pretty cruel if I didn’t let him at least try Steak Tartare et Escargot Flavor-Wedges.”

  Hammie Rex tore into the bag and began a feeding frenzy.

  “My dad brings international Funchos back for me whenever he travels,” said Cid. “Hey, it just dawned on me. Since SmilesCorp is out of business, I guess they won’t be making them anymore, huh? These could be, like, the last Funchos on earth.”

  Hamstersaurus Rex froze with a look of utter terror on his little face. His whiskers stood on end. His lip quivered. I tried to change the subject as quickly as possible.

  “Anyway, so your dad travels a lot to do his investing, then?” I said, looking around. Since arriving, I hadn’t seen anyone else in the massive house.

  “No, he mostly goes on vacations,” said Cid. “He and my stepmom are on vacation in the Azores right now.”

  “That’s pretty cool,” I said. “Or maybe not. I have no idea where that is.”

  “Me neither,” said Cid, with a shrug. “But after the Azores, they’re planning to pop in here for a day or two before they go spend a couple of weeks on the beach in the Maldives.”

  “Seems like all the best vacation spots are plural,” I said.

  “I guess so,” said Cid. “Hey, you want to play a beta version of Penguin Flinger Quest Lord Adventures? It really expands the universe and mythology of the original game, where you just flung penguins at works of fine art.”

  “Sure thing,” I said. “I just need to hit the bathroom first.”

  “No problem,” said Cid. “It’s down the hall, thirteenth door on the right.”

  I left Cid and Hammie (who had resumed scarfing Funchos; he was now working on a bag of Maple Syrup and Poutine Flavor-Wedges) and stepped out into the hallway. After walking what seemed to be a couple of miles, I finally came to the thirteenth door on the right, only to find a sign that read “DO NOT ENTER” in bold, blac
k letters. Odd. I wondered if I’d counted wrong, but it was too long to walk back and check. Instead I shrugged and turned the knob.

  A pale, red-haired man burst through the door. “What in the blazes are you doing?” he bellowed in a thick Scottish accent. “You’re nae al-lowed in here! Nae allowed!”

  With a wordless scream I turned and fled.

  “You’re nae alloooooooowed!” echoed after me.

  I ran as fast as I could, back down the hallway . . . or, wait, was it a different hallway? Who was that man? Where was I? Did I just pass the same nice vase twice? Too many nice vases!

  “Hey, watch it!” yelped a girl as I nearly flattened her.

  “Whoa! Sorry!” I said, backing up.

  It was Cid’s little sister, Sarah, clutching her laptop.

  “Um, what are you doing in my house?” said Sarah.

  “Looking for the bathroom!” I said. “Is that terrifying Scottish man supposed to be here, too?”

  Sarah rolled her eyes. “That’s just Rupert.”

  “Rupert?”

  “Rupert MacFarquhar. He’s our male nanny,” she said. “Our ‘manny,’ if you will. I won’t. Anyway, he watches us when our dad is on vacation, i.e., always. I wanted them to hire someone else but of course Cid insisted.”

  “Whew. That’s a relief,” I said. “But what’s the deal with the ‘Do Not Enter’ door?”

  “Who cares? I still haven’t even been in every room in this dumb house,” said Sarah. “Nobody ever tells me what’s going on around here or cares what I think!” And with that she burst into tears.

  I had no idea what to do. “Um . . . Hmm . . . Maybe don’t do that?” I said. Not particularly comforting. I stared at the pattern on the carpet. It looked like a very expensive pattern.

  “I miss my old friends!” said Sarah. “This town is the worst!”

  “Okay, Maple Bluffs might seem a little boring but it really isn’t that bad,” I said. “We’ve got a school, which you’ve been to, and a Flipburger, and . . .” My mind was blanking. “Oh, there’s this, uh, really great museum with a lot of fascinating antique dolls . . .”