by Lee Bacon
“What?” I said. “What’s going on?”
My parents exchanged a long look. When Dad turned back to me, he said, “Maybe it’s better if you come up to the lab with us. We have something to show you.”
They led me up the stairs with heavy footsteps and slouched shoulders. Dad cast a weary-eyed glance back at me, then pushed open the lab door.
My last visit to the lab had been six months before, and that hadn’t gone so well. One of my mom’s zombies had mistaken me for its afternoon snack, and I’d barely made it out alive. Ever since, I’d avoided the lab entirely.
Fortunately, Mom had moved the zombies down to the basement a few months back. There were a few suspicious-looking houseplants growing under a sun-lamp in one corner, but they didn’t seem to have the same grudge against me that Micus did. At least, not yet.
The lab always seemed to be in a state of well-organized chaos. To my left was a bookshelf, stacked with instruction manuals, textbooks on particle physics and biology, sealed glass jars containing toxic chemicals, VexaCorp catalogs. A pair of my dad’s old goggles acted as a bookend. A steel table stretched across the center of the room. Its surface was scattered with glass test tubes half full of green and blue liquid. Against the wall to my right was a chalkboard, covered with obscure markings and dense equations.
I followed my parents past all this toward a glass case that was perched on top of a drafting table at the far end of the room.
“You might want to stand back,” Dad said as he peered through the glass.
I wasn’t sure what I had to worry about. The case was about the size of a shoe box and looked empty. But I didn’t want to take any chances. I’d spent enough time around my parents to know that just because you couldn’t see something didn’t mean it couldn’t hurt you.
I stepped away from the case. “Is this far enough?”
Dad looked back at me. “Probably.”
Just to be safe, I took another step backward.
Dad opened the top drawer of a filing cabinet, reached inside, and removed a small black device that fit into the palm of his hand.
“I invented this little gadget here to render a magnified image of objects far too small to be seen with average eyesight,” he said.
“This way your father can show me the things that normally only he can see,” Mom added.
“So it’s a microscope?”
“It’s much more than a microscope,” Dad said, sounding a little defensive. “This device allows the user to create a 3-D image of the magnified object and then analyze it from every conceivable angle. And you can fit it into your pocket!”
“Your father is hoping VexaCorp will buy the design from him,” Mom told me.
“The Dreadoscope,” he said, staring into space as if imagining the name on a sign. “That’s what I’m planning to call it. But there’s no telling what will happen now that Phineas Vex is gone.”
The memory caused the color to drain from Dad’s face. He went silent for a moment before turning back to the glass case. Flipping a switch on the drafting table caused the top of the case to slide open. Leaning forward, Dad peered inside. He lowered the Dreadoscope into the case, carefully bringing it to rest on the bottom. When he pressed a small button on the left side of the device, an image appeared on the monitor. It looked like a silver egg with a nozzle jutting out of the front end.
“You mean to tell me that this is inside that glass box?”
“Exactly,” Mom said. “Except on a much smaller scale.”
Suddenly I realized why my dad had warned me to stand away from the glass case. It wasn’t for my own safety. It was for the safety of what was inside.
“What is it?”
“Remember the smoke creatures?” Dad asked.
“You mean those unstoppable monsters that attacked a convention hall full of supervillains? No, I’d completely forgotten.”
Ignoring my sarcasm, Dad pointed to the image on the monitor. “This is a very tiny part of the smoke creature.”
“But—how?”
“The creature isn’t made of smoke at all,” Dad said. “It’s actually a dense anthropomorphic composite of remote-programmed nano-beings.”
“Oh, that clears it up.” I rolled my eyes.
“What your father’s trying to say,” Mom explained, “is that the smoke creatures are formed by millions of tiny flying robots. Just like this one here.” She nodded toward the silver egg. “Each of these robots is microscopic. Much too small to be seen by the human eye. That’s why we can only observe it with a micro—”
Dad gave her a sharp look.
“I mean, Dreadoscope,” Mom said. “If we zoom in a little, you’ll see that there’s something printed here.”
She pointed to a spot on the robot’s side. It didn’t look like anything more than a smudge, but when Mom clicked the zoom button, I saw that it was something else. A logo.
Z
Walking Smoke™
“What does the Z stand for?” I asked.
“We don’t know,” Dad said. “But whoever designed this must have an unbelievable amount of money and resources in order to create such sophisticated technology.”
“They were able to manufacture millions of these things,” Mom said, glancing at the image of the robot. “And when they group together, they create a kind of—”
“Swarm,” Dad said, shivering. “Like insects, they swarm together—so close to one another that it creates the illusion of one being. A cloud, in this case. Programmed to look and move like a human.”
“We’re talking about nanotechnology on a scale that nobody’s ever seen before,” Mom said.
“And what happens when the cloud—er, the nano-beings … when it eats someone?” I glanced nervously from my mom to my dad. “Does that person die?”
“Not as far as we can tell,” Dad said. “When the nano-beings group around a person, they lose their humanlike shape. They create a portal. First they surround their victim. Then each of them fires off a concentrated energy beam from the nozzle on the front end.”
“Each of these beams is far too small to be seen by the naked eye,” Mom continued. “But when they’re all focused on the same object, working at the same time, it looks like—”
“Lightning,” I said under my breath.
A memory flickered through my mind. Phineas Vex, surrounded by the smoke, absorbed by a dark cloud. A burst of light had filled the dark space. Like lightning.
And then he was gone.
“Each energy beam is able to break apart and transport a single molecule,” Mom said. “Millions of these nano-beings means millions of energy beams. The person in the center of all this is broken apart into distinct molecules, then transported, piece by piece, somewhere else. And then these molecules are reassembled in a new place. In other words, the person is teleported.”
“So how did you get this thing?” I pointed to the image of the nano-being on the computer.
“Actually, we have you to thank for that.” Dad smiled at me.
“Me? How?”
“You remember throwing that charred piece of tofu at the smoke creature?”
I nodded. That wasn’t the kind of thing you forgot easily.
“Well, after the tofu spontaneously combusted, it still maintained some of its characteristic sticky texture. When you launched it at the smoke creature, a few of the nano-beings got stuck in the lump of burned tofu.”
“As we were escaping from the convention hall, your father noticed the tofu—and what was embedded in it,” Mom explained.
I remembered the chaos of the convention hall. Burning booths, rampaging smoke creatures. And the way Dad had suddenly stopped to pluck something out of the wreckage. With his superpowered eyesight, he’d spotted the nano-beings stuck in the tofu.
“When we got back home, your father and I deactivated one of the nano-beings and put it into this box to study it,” Mom said. “Inside its circuitry, there’s a chip programmed with the tracking c
oordinates. If we could access that chip, we could trace where all the villains have been transported.”
I felt a glimmer of hope. “Then you could find who’s doing this!”
Dad sighed. “Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. Whoever designed this really knew what they were doing. The chip is lodged in a protective titanium casing. In order to access the chip, you have to break the casing. But if you break the casing, you’ll destroy the chip.”
“So that’s it, then? There’s nothing you can do to stop these things?” The smoke creatures were still out there. They could attack again at any time.
I stared into the glass box. It looked empty, but it could destroy my family.
Mom’s voice shattered the silence. “There is one way we might be able to access the chip,” she said. “A chemical compound known as zenoplyric acid. It’s extremely dangerous.”
“We tried to steal a cargo of it two years ago, but Captain Justice had to get in the way.” Dad glared angrily at the drafting table. “He nearly broke my ankle that time, the big jerk.”
“Anyway,” Mom went on, “a small amount of zenoplyric acid could dissolve the titanium casing around the chip—”
“Without destroying the chip itself—”
“Allowing us to track where the supervillains are being transported to.”
“But you said this stuff was dangerous,” I said.
“Extremely dangerous,” Dad pointed out. “However, there is a location on the outskirts of town that has a few vials of zenoplyric acid on hand. ChemiCo Labs. Of course, they keep it under tight security. Armed guards, surveillance cameras. That kind of thing.”
“So then … how are you going to get it?”
“Oh, we’ll think of something,” Dad said, a familiar gleam flashing in his eyes. “We always do.”
13
Superheroes don’t hang out with supervillains. And when they do, someone usually gets hurt.
“Wanna go to the home ec room with me?” Milton asked as we stepped out into the courtyard after lunch the next day. “A reliable source tells me there might be some reject cookies from second period lying around.”
I shrugged, staring down at a crack in the sidewalk.
“What’s up with you?” Milton asked. “It’s like you’re in another world today. You can’t stay focused for more than— Oooh, check it out.” He pointed. “There’s Sophie.”
Sophie was sitting on a concrete step, eating her lunch from a brown paper sack. The instant I saw her, I made up my mind. I was going to spend the rest of my life avoiding her. Supervillains and superheroes didn’t hang out with each other. And the same went for their kids.
“You’re still planning to work on the project with us, right?” Milton asked. “Chilled Grease Diner after school, baby.”
I’d completely forgotten that was today. It was going to be tough spending the rest of my life avoiding Sophie.
“Maybe we can do it some other time,” I said. Like never.
“Uh … curly fries?” Milton prompted. “Besides, our presentation is next week. If we put it off any longer, we won’t finish it.”
There was no way I could tell Milton the truth, that Sophie’s dad and my parents tried to kill each other on a regular basis, which made it kind of impossible for us to be friends. I had to find another way out of the group. And I had an idea.
I got to seventh period early. The room was empty except for Ms. McGirt. Her hair looked like a fluffy white cloud, and her eyes blinked up at me from behind her glasses as I approached her desk.
“Can I speak with you about something, Ms. McGirt?” I asked.
“Of course, young lady,” she said.
Her eyesight must’ve been worse than I’d thought. At least, I hoped it was.
“It’s me, Joshua,” I said. “I was wondering … could I switch groups? Or maybe just work alone?”
Ms. McGirt gave me a long, blank stare. “I’m afraid we won’t be covering the Emancipation Proclamation for another three weeks, dear.”
“Uh … okay.” This was turning out to be more difficult than I’d thought. “But—”
“If you’d like to read ahead, most of the information about Abraham Lincoln can be found in chapter eight of your textbook.”
I made a few more attempts, but Ms. McGirt only responded by reciting Civil War facts and complimenting me on my makeup. Finally, I gave up and took my seat.
All throughout class, whenever Sophie looked in my direction, I buried my nose in my book. After the bell rang, she pulled me aside on the way to the Chilled Grease Diner. “What’s going on?” she asked. “Why are you avoiding me?”
“I’m not avoiding you,” I said, looking away.
“Oh, right.” I could practically hear her rolling her eyes. “Does this have something to do with”—she lowered her voice—“my dad? I thought I could trust you.”
Milton turned to glance back at us. “What’re you guys talking about?”
“Nothing!” we both said at the same time.
Milton didn’t look convinced, but he let it drop. For the next couple of minutes, we walked in silence. Halfway through the parking lot, I felt an odd rumbling beneath my feet.
“What was that?” Milton asked.
“It felt like an earthquake,” I said.
“It wasn’t an earthquake,” Sophie said. “It was … something else.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Sophie ignored me. She reached into her pocket, pulled out a cell phone, and punched a few buttons.
“If you know what’s going on, you should tell us,” I said to Sophie. “And who did you just call?”
“I didn’t call anyone. I sent out a help signal. Now let’s get out of here.”
There were a lot more questions rushing around in my brain, but I had to jog to keep up with Sophie and Milton. At the next intersection, the ground began to shake again, harder this time. I grabbed hold of a traffic sign to keep from falling over.
“What is that?” I asked.
Sophie gave me an annoyed look. “Whatever it is that’s moving around down there, it’s about to attack us.”
“Attack us? Why?”
“It just happens sometimes. It’s a part of having a dad who is—” Her eyes moved to Milton. Then she looked back at me. “Anyway, I’m sure you wouldn’t understand.”
“I might.”
“Oh, really? If you’re so understanding, then why are you acting so weird?”
Milton was staring at us like we were speaking another language.
“Maybe I’m acting weird,” I began, “because my situation is similar to your situation—but in a totally different way.”
Now Milton and Sophie both looked lost. The ground shook. A fire hydrant on the other side of the street exploded, sending water up into the air like a geyser.
“What are you trying to say?” Sophie asked, the cell phone clutched in her hand.
I shook my head. I’d already said too much.
“Guys?” Milton pointed a quivering finger. “Something’s coming out of the ground over there.”
Sophie and I turned to look. A crack had formed in the middle of the intersection, like a spiderweb growing wider. Concrete crumbled and rose upward in huge blocks. A car honked and crashed into a telephone pole.
Whatever it was that had been moving around beneath us was now rising above the earth.
A silvery metallic leg broke through the concrete. Another leg emerged an instant later—then another. I watched, my heart beating furiously, as the thing pulled itself out of the hole in the street like an insect climbing out of the ground. Except this insect was the size of a golf cart, with shiny silver skin and glowing red eyes. A familiar logo was printed on one side:
Z
Firebottomed Romper™
A sickening realization crossed my mind. Whoever was controlling these things had also created the smoke creatures.
“ ‘Firebottomed’?” Milton said. “What do you
think that means?”
Before anyone could reply, the robot let out a long electronic scream. Flames shot out of its backside.
“I guess that explains it!” Milton cried.
The robotic insect let out another shriek and turned to look at us with its glowing red eyes.
“We should probably run,” Sophie said.
“Good idea,” I said, breaking into a jog.
We took off across the parking lot toward the football field.
“So let me see if I can get this straight,” Milton said, gasping as we sprinted across the stretch of concrete. “That robot bug has spears for feet and blades for teeth, and it shoots fire out of its butt?”
“That sounds about right,” I huffed.
“It must be after me,” Sophie said.
“I’m not so sure about that,” I said.
Sophie’s feet pounded the pavement. “What are you talking about?”
This thing was connected to those smoke creatures. Meaning it was here because of my parents. But if I told Sophie any of this, I’d have to tell her who my parents really were. And at the moment, we had enough problems.
“On second thought,” I said between deep breaths, “I bet you’re right. They probably are here to kill you.”
For some reason, this didn’t seem to make her feel any better.
The earth shook again. A second later, the concrete around our feet broke open, sending Sophie tumbling to the ground.
My chest kicked with fear. There was another Romper right below us. And it was climbing to the surface.
One spindly silver leg rose up out of the hole where Sophie had just been standing. The leg landed on the ground with a sharp thud, inches from Sophie’s arm.
She scrambled, trying to get to her feet, but the concrete was swaying like a wave. The robotic leg rose into the air, light reflecting off the tip of the dagger. It was pointed right at Sophie’s chest.
Lunging forward just as the leg began to drop, I collided with it before the sharp tip could reach Sophie. A burst of energy flooded my veins, traveling the length of my arms and through my hands.
BOOM!
