“A promise made under the force of a threat is no promise at all. Ben must choose his own path in life. You must give him his freedom.”
“After he tried to feed me to a lizard?” Amber demanded. Ben wasn’t entirely faultless, either.
Lady Blackpool backed away from Amber a bit, as if she thought that the mouse was dangerous. “Amber, if your magical powers are to be used for good, then they must come from a heart that is pure. We cannot use our powers to blackmail others, or to take away their freedom to make their own choices. ‘Magic cannot be properly controlled or handled by use of force’—that is the great creed of S.W.A.R.M. ‘Instead, if our powers are to be used for good, we must always cast our spells out of compassion—with a heart that is full of gentleness and meekness and love unfeigned.’”
“Uh,” Amber began to say, but words failed her. She couldn’t think of a good argument against the shrew, at least none that Lady Blackpool was likely to entertain. She sounded certain of her course. There was a warning in Lady Blackpool’s voice—a tone of regret and dismissal.
“There can be no other way,” Lady Blackpool said. “If you cling to your evil ways, your heart will darken. You will grow to be like the Ever Shade, and in the end you will either join forces with him and walk in his shadow, or you will become as corrupt as he is—and ultimately challenge him for power.”
Amber thought that Lady Blackpool was crazy. That could never happen to Amber. She shook her head. “I’m not like that!”
“Not yet, perhaps,” Lady Blackpool said. “Let us hope that you never become like that.” She turned away, and Amber stood for a moment, feeling ashamed.
Yet I have to keep Ben, she told herself. I can’t afford to set him free . . .
* * *
It was two hours from sundown when Ben’s parents finally found a road. It was a little blacktop lane, winding among some low hills.
The group had hardly set foot on it when they heard police sirens in the distance—lots of them, coming through the desert toward them, just beyond a hill. The group sat waiting expectantly for the police cars to come. They waited and waited. But the police were coming awfully slowly.
After what seemed like forever, a big-rig truck thundered over the hill. Its tires were all flat. It was riding on its rims, shooting a cloud of sparks in the air. Thirteen police cars were chasing it at maybe ten miles per hour, their sirens wailing and their lights flashing.
The parade of vehicles crawled toward the little group.
“Hey,” Butch said, “I’ve seen chases like this on television! They happen all of the time in California. I wonder who’s driving? Maybe it’s O.J.!”
The police cars kept creeping along. One tried to swerve and accelerate past the truck, but the big rig veered right into it, sending it flying into the ditch. An angry police officer leapt out of the ruined car and fired a shotgun into the back of the truck, opening a gaping hole in the cargo container. Potatoes came bouncing out of the hole.
It was all very thrilling to Amber.
The truck eventually crawled close. Its air horn blew, trumpeting like a charging elephant, and Amber looked into the cab. An enormous red toad drove the truck, grinning like a madman!
The truck drew close and then swerved to hit the group. Everyone leapt across the ditch just as the truck approached, spitting up gravel and hurling hot sparks into the grass.
The evil toad cackled and shouted, “Beware the Toad Warrior!” Then the truck rolled past, and all of the police cars kept chasing it hardly faster than a mouse could run.
The sparks from the truck had set off a tiny fire in the grass, and Butch was still stomping it out when a helicopter came careening over the ridge, heading straight toward them. It hovered overhead while the flocks of flycatchers and bee-eaters scattered from the propellers like leaves fluttering before the front of a storm.
The helicopter touched down, and a couple of cheerful-looking CIA agents jumped out. “Mr. and Mrs. Ravenspell,” one of them said with a phony smile, “I’m glad to see that you’re well. I strongly advise that you come with us for your own safety!”
“Come with you where?” Ben’s mom asked.
“We’ll brief you in the chopper,” he replied, opening his lapel just enough to show his gun in its shoulder holster. Then he stepped aside so that Ben’s mom and dad could pass.
Lady Blackpool halted, refusing to go with the men. “It is not my destiny to hide in safety. I have seen it in a vision. I must go to a place called the Los Angeles Landfill,” the shrew insisted. “Can you take me there?”
The CIA agents looked at her as if they were unsure whether they should be negotiating with a shrew. “We can’t take you folks there,” one said. “They’ve got big trouble brewing there.”
“I know,” Lady Blackpool said. “That’s why I’ve gathered an army.” She nodded toward the huge flock of birds.
An agent studied her and smiled dismissively. “We don’t need the help of a flock of sparrows. The United States of America is not going to let itself be manhandled by a bunch of flies!”
“Magic flies . . .” Lady Blackpool corrected. “And only a fool would underestimate the power of their evil.”
“We’re not underestimating them,” an agent replied. “We know what they’re capable of. The whole state of California has fallen under their sway. We have hooligans drag racing down the streets through hospital zones and pedestrians jaywalking everywhere. We’ve got fat people wearing skimpy bathing suits on the beach. It’s horrible!”
“But we also have our own secret weapon,” the other agent confirmed. “We’ve got Governor Shortzenbeggar!”
“You go and have your governor fight them,” Lady Blackpool said dismissively. “I have a better plan!”
Ben’s father and mother looked torn. They wanted to go on the helicopter, but they didn’t want to leave Lady Blackpool behind.
“I don’t understand,” Butch said to the CIA agents. “Why is it that you two can resist the flies?”
One of the CIA agents reached up and pulled a black plug out of his ear. “IPods,” the agent said. “Just turn up any Souza march, and you can’t hear anything else.”
That comforted Amber. At least the CIA seemed to know what they were doing.
“Come on folks,” one of the men said. “Time’s a wasting. We’re only fifty miles from the landfill. I can drop you off in a safe zone a few miles out. But that’s as close as we’ll go.”
Amber looked to Lady Blackpool; the shrew stood firm. She seemed intent on making her own way. “Come with us,” Amber begged. “They have secret weapons.”
“So does our enemy,” Lady Blackpool said. “I’ll make my own way, thank you. But you can go with them if you wish. The choice is yours . . .”
Ben followed his parents and hopped into the helicopter. Amber didn’t like the idea of hiking through the desert any farther, but she suspected that Lady Blackpool wouldn’t be walking for long. It wouldn’t take much to cast a spell and call some large bird to give her a ride. Now that the humans were leaving, the shrew would be able to travel faster alone.
Hurriedly, Amber raced to the helicopter and jumped in just as the doors closed.
She leapt up on the dashboard and looked out through the tinted bubble of the cockpit to watch Lady Blackpool. Even before the helicopter lifted from the ground, a red-tailed hawk came sweeping out of the sky. It swooped low to the ground, and Lady Blackpool leapt onto its back without the hawk even stopping. Soon Lady Blackpool was borne away, her army of birds flitting along behind as silently as ghosts.
Chapter 16
MUTAGENIC MIRACLES
All that is required for good to triumph over evil is for evil flies to do nothing!
—BELLE Z. BUG
The sun was dropping rapidly at the landfill, descending into a haze of red that lined the western hills. The day was nearing its end.
Belle Z. Bug watched it with her ten thousand eyes, and her heart felt heavy. Trouble was br
ewing, she knew. The humans had stopped bringing their tribute of garbage again. That meant that an attack was imminent.
Somehow the knowledge buoyed her spirits and gave her a little thrill.
But what the humans might try next Belle couldn’t quite guess.
The humans were at a disadvantage. Her flies were everywhere, descending upon the streets of Los Angeles. The news crews were catching it all, sending it over dozens of television channels. Belle could see the images in her mind.
People had begun looting in the merchant districts, and fires roared out of control all across the countryside. She saw images of police officers playing chicken with each other on the freeways.
“Kill the flies!” the reporters were warning on some channels. “The flies are making us do it!”
But other reporters were laughing maniacally and yelling into the cameras, “Save the flies. Flies are our friends!”
Amid such chaos, Belle didn’t see how the humans could put together any kind of organized response to her takeover. Even now, her flies were sweeping across the country, through every state and region. Within the hour, she anticipated that the entire continent of North America would be groveling at her feet.
Well, let them grovel, she thought.
She put a smile on her face and turned to address her adoring fans. Trillions of flies had gathered, and their buzzing filled the air, as constant as the beating of her hearts.
“Are you feeling tired?” she called to them. “Do you need a little lift to get airborne? Then you should try one of my latest products . . .” She waved toward a nearby container of waste from a nuclear reactor. “I call it Atomic Sludge Fudge. One gulp in the morning and you’ll have endless energy all day! There’s no power like nuclear power!”
The flies cheered the news and buzzed approvingly. Belle strode along the prow of her little boat, raising her arms to encourage the cheers.
Now was the moment that she had been waiting for all day. She had been having her research and development team working with various toxic chemicals, mixing them in containers of discarded hair gel. Now she had developed a formula that was just what she needed to keep the humans off balance in the coming battle.
“And for our latest development,” she said, “I’ve got a special treat for our double platinum members! Today only you’re invited to come forward and get a dose of Mutagenic Miracle Grow, made from only the finest-quality mutagens. One dose and you’ll get big results!”
A tiny whitefly stepped forward, beaming proudly. It had the full treatment of Belle’s products—from the fly-liner to carapace color. He was indeed a truly beautiful little whitefly, with sparkling eyes and a perfect complexion.
Belle Z. Bug strode forward with an eyedropper and squeezed out a single droplet of gray-green ooze. It splattered on the fly, and for a moment the tiny thing looked as if it would drown.
Suddenly it began to grow, and grow, and grow—until soon he was a strapping monster of a fly, all glistening white and larger than a hound.
There were gasps of excitement among the crowd. “Look,” someone shouted, “an abominable snow fly!”
“Now,” Belle said gleefully, “if a single drop can do this for a little whitefly, imagine what it can do for a horsefly. Imagine what it could do . . . for you!”
The flies began to cheer wildly, and they surged forward to get a dose of Mutagenic Miracle Grow.
Belle smiled secretively. Now if the humans attacked, they’d find a foe worthy of battle.
Chapter 17
THE TROJAN GARBAGE TRUCK
It is only when we are faced by the most troubling times that we discover who our true friends are!
— LADY BLACKPOOL
Governor Harold Shortzenbeggar slung a rocket launcher over his back, shoved a pair of miniature machine guns into his boots, and hefted his .55 machine gun.
All around him, CIA sharpshooters stood with cans of fly spray poised, squirting any fly that dared get too close. The governor was making his final preparations for his assault on the state’s largest landfill. The smell of fly spray filled the air in a toxic cloud, much like the odor of a Los Angeles freeway.
His iPod was blaring into his ears one of his favorite songs from the band Throat Kultcher:
I am the Trashman,
And I’m takin’ you out tonight!
I’m wagin’ war against human garbage,
And my guns are blazing bright!
He punched the FORWARD button on his iPod and instantly brought up the familiar strains of Queen’s “Another One Bites the Dust.”
He smiled in satisfaction. It was the perfect music to launch an assault with.
“The first rule of battle,” he explained to one of the CIA agents, “is that you should always go into it with the proper inspirational music!”
The governor was standing beside an enormous dump truck. Technicians in the back were setting the timer on the Big Bug Bomb. The governor took some comfort in the knowledge that even if he didn’t make it out of the battle alive, the bomb would detonate, and the casualties among the flies would be devastating.
Once the technicians were done, they grabbed some shovels and covered the bomb with garbage, a tempting mix of horse manure and an assortment of foods one would find at a picnic—potato salad, watermelon, black olives, and the greasiest fried chicken west of the Rockies.
The agents heaped the truck high with garbage and then topped the entire mess off with a maraschino cherry.
The governor was just getting ready to hop into the truck when he spotted a helicopter drawing near.
He waited for it to land and watched as the Ravenspell family leapt out.
“Good to see you,” Governor Shortzenbeggar said to the family. “I’m just getting ready for our assault on the landfill. Care to join me?”
“Uh, no thanks,” Butch Ravenspell said, nervously eyeing the rocket launcher and various machine guns.
“Oh, come on,” the governor begged. “They’re just flies. I could really use your help.” He smiled down at Amber and Ben, who had poked their heads out of Mona’s pocket.
“I’m sorry,” Amber apologized, “but I’m afraid that I won’t be able to come. I’ve used up all of my magic and can’t cast a spell yet for two more days.”
“Oh, what a shame,” the governor said. “Well, I guess I’ll just have to have all the fun blowing them up.” He tossed a grenade launcher on the seat inside the truck and then started to climb in.
“Are you sure all of that is really necessary?” Butch Ravenspell asked. “I mean, why not just wait for a cold spell so that the flies die off?”
“This is a magical fly,” Amber said. “She’ll find some way to protect herself, making her live longer.”
“Yeah,” Governor Shortzenbeggar said. “Besides, Los Angeles doesn’t have cold spells. Lucky for me, I’ve got guns.”
He turned the key in the ignition and began pumping his foot to give the truck some gas.
“Wait a minute,” Amber shouted. “Maybe . . . I guess maybe I should come.”
“You can’t!” Ben objected. “You could die if you cast a spell.”
There was a hissing noise as a couple of CIA agents zapped some infiltrators with fly spray.
“Well, it’s been a whole day since I cast a spell,” Amber said. “I’m thinking maybe I could just cast a really tiny spell—and only if I have to.”
Ben shot back, “We should ask Lady Blackpool.”
“Who’s she?” Governor Shortzenbeggar said.
“She’s a friend,” Amber explained. “She’s a shrew with magic powers—and she’s coming with an army of birds that can eat the flies. Maybe Ben’s right; maybe we should wait for her!”
The governor bent his head in thought. “Hmmm . . . a green solution to the problem. I kind of like the idea. On the other hand, the longer we wait, the more things will go wrong. Right now there is rioting in the streets. I’m afraid that if we wait even for five minutes, the whole state
could go down the toilet.”
Amber gave him a long look, and her little ears seemed to droop. “Okay,” she said. “I guess I’ll come with you!”
“Yay!” the governor said. “We are going to have such fun!”
He scooped up Amber and Ben in his hand and set them on the dashboard of the truck so that they could see.
“Wait a minute!” Mona Ravenspell shouted. “You’re not going without me!”
“Okay,” the governor said, “what kind of weapon would you like: automatic shotgun, or maybe a bazooka?”
“Just give me a flyswatter,” Mona said. “I’ve lived in a dump all my life, and I can swing a flyswatter like a ninja master!”
A CIA agent handed her a pair of flyswatters, one for each hand.
Mona jumped into the front seat and asked, “What’s the plan?”
The governor glanced down, trying to figure out how to work the gears on the truck. “You ever hear of the Trojan horse? Back in ancient times, the Achaeans were trying to take over the city of Troy. They couldn’t break down the walls, so they built a big, hollow horse out of wood, and shoved it up to the city gates, pretending it was a gift. When night came, some warriors hidden inside the horse crept out and opened the city gates, letting in an army.
“My plan is something like that . . . except that I’m using a garbage truck instead of a horse. And instead of warriors, I’m going to sneak in a bomb.”
The governor slammed and locked his door, started up the truck, honked the horn twice so that everyone would get out of his way, then floored the gas and went roaring off into battle.
“I’m sorry that I don’t have iPods for everyone,” he said. So he cranked the truck’s radio up to full power. He found a classical station, one that was playing Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries.”
The road ahead was four lanes wide; it wound through some hills where the dead vegetation had turned brown. The governor shoved the gears up a notch and hit eighty miles per hour. He wanted plenty of speed, just in case the flies had set up a roadblock.
Freaky Fly Day Page 10
