1-2 Punch: Stinkfly and Cannonbolt
Page 3
Staring at the book, Hex lost all interest in Ben, Gwen, and the others. He floated away from them toward the wall and then rammed into it, headfirst, with a loud BANG!
Hex looked up, rubbed the tip of his nose, cursed, and muttered a spell. Then he floated through the wall of the dining hall like a ghost.
As soon as Hex left the room, his freezing spell wore off. Grandpa Max looked at the spoon he had dropped on the table. Ben’s hand completed its slap atop the Omnitrix.
TIME IN!
BEN WAS NOW CANNONBOLT ONCE AGAIN.
“He’s going to rule the world,” said Gwen.
“Not if I stop him first,” said Cannonbolt. The alien flexed his muscles and rolled himself into a large ball. He barreled across the floor toward where Hex had floated.
“Ben, the door is that way!” cried Gwen, but it was too late. Cannonbolt burst through the wall of the dining hall, the wood splintering and the windows shattering.
“Um, sorry about that,” said Cannonbolt.
Hex floated away, too interested in the Book of Salem to pay attention to anything else. But as Cannonbolt rumbled closer and closer, the villain turned around.
Hex had just enough time to react. He swooped to his left as Cannonbolt careened past him. Cannonbolt kept rolling, bowling through the walls of a small barn.
“Sorry,” said Cannonbolt.
Cannonbolt twisted around and raced toward Hex once more. The villain dashed to his right.
Cannonbolt rolled over a fence.
“Sorry.”
Cannonbolt changed directions again. This time, Hex flew up and out of the way. Cannonbolt rolled over a statue.
“Sorry,” said Cannonbolt. He kept rolling and rolling over things. “And sorry, and sorry . . .”
Hex muttered a spell. Flames sparked from his fingertips. As he had done before, flaming laser beams flew toward Cannonbolt. “My Bolts of Destruction will destroy you!”
BING! BOUNCE! CRZZZZZNG!
Like before, the lasers bounced off Cannonbolt’s nearly indestructible armor. The beams flattened signs, ignited trees, and blew holes through building walls.
CRASH! SMASH! BANG!
Cannonbolt stopped rolling and scanned all the damage around him. “Sorry about all that, too.”
Grandpa Max and Gwen watched from behind a large tree. “Good thing they were planning on demolishing this place in a few days anyway,” said Grandpa Max.
“Looks like Ben’s doing the job for them,” said Gwen.
“Enough!” cried Hex, floating high into the air. He held the book of spells in front of him. “I will now chant the magic spell that will force everyone to obey me! You will all soon be mindless zombies, helpless to do anything but follow my every word.”
“Stop him, Ben!” yelled Gwen.
Cannonbolt rolled himself into a ball, but Hex was already chanting the words. “Incandesto imbecilo chowder-embrio!”
The sky around Hex rippled with energy. Hex seemed to grow larger. An energy field of bright violet surrounded him and pumped in and out like a heartbeat.
Gwen could barely look. “I don’t want to be a mindless zombie,” she sobbed.
“It could be worse,” said Grandpa Max.
“How?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe it couldn’t be worse.”
ZZZOOOOMM!!
A ripple of energy shot out from Hex, a jet stream of pulsing light hurtling toward Gwen and Grandpa Max.
“Noooo!” cried Cannonbolt as he rolled toward Gwen and Grandpa Max. The ripple grew closer. Cannonbolt rolled faster.
Ripple. Roll. Ripple. Roll.
Gwen and Grandpa Max screamed.
The ripple and roll met at the same time. The energy field bounced off Cannonbolt’s armor. It rebounded back, back, back. And directly into Hex.
KAPLOOZZZ!
Cannonbolt stopped rolling. Gwen and Grandpa Max stopped yelling. All was silent as Hex’s eyes spun in circles. The sorcerer’s legs and arms shook. His body slowly sank to earth.
“What just happened?” asked a very confused Cannonbolt.
“I think Hex just cast a spell for him to blindly follow . . . himself?” guessed Grandpa Max.
“I will obey,” mumbled Hex. “I will follow.” Still muttering softly, Hex drifted away, his eyes spinning and his mind a zombielike cloud.
TIME OUT! CANNONBOLT TURNED BACK INTO BEN.
He continued to watch Hex. “I think he’ll be talking to himself for a while,” Ben guessed.
“We should destroy that book,” said Grandpa Max. Hex had dropped the Book of Salem when he floated away. Gwen reached down and picked it up. She tossed it into a small fire that blazed nearby, the only thing left of a small food stand that Cannonbolt had rolled over.
“Sorry about that,” said Ben.
As soon as the book touched the flames, a large spark flew high into the sky. The book turned to charcoaled ash.
John, the village elder, clasped Ben on the shoulder.
“Huzzah! You saved us again! We shall always be indebted to you, young sir. As long as Salem Town is around, you will always be welcome here.”
Ben looked around. Most of the buildings were either completely destroyed or heavily damaged. The buildings that weren’t destroyed were falling apart anyway. The men from the bulldozer and earthmovers walked over. Their eyes were no longer glazed. Hex’s spell had worn off.
“Do you mind if we finish destroying this place?” asked the driver of one of the earthmovers. “Most of the work was done by that armor-plated alien guy and the scary fellow in the skeleton paint, anyway.”
“It shouldn’t take us very long,” added one of the other men.
John frowned and nodded. “Go ahead.” To Ben he said, “Well, you would have been welcome here, if there was a here anymore.”
Minutes later, Ben, Gwen, and Grandpa Max walked out of the park that used to be Salem Town. Bulldozers and earthmovers razed the few buildings that were left.
Before they reached the Rust Bucket, Gwen gave her grandfather a big kiss on the cheek. “I’m sorry this place wasn’t as awesome as you remembered, Grandpa.”
“Thanks, Gwen,” said Grandpa Max, giving her a big hug.
“But I’ve got a lot of new memories of this place I’ll always cherish.”
“Do you mean memories of me defeating Hex?” asked Ben.
“Actually, I was talking about memories of that apple pie,” said Grandpa Max, patting his stomach. “That was really good.”
“That’s my favorite memory of this place, too,” said Gwen, licking her lips.
Ben frowned and then shrugged. “Actually, I think my favorite memory is the chocolate cake,” he admitted.
THE END
About the Authors
Wrigley Stuart has written several licensed book titles for Cartoon Network.
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