Goop Soup

by David Lubar

  That evening, two dozen glowing caterpillars spelled out a message on my window to meet Mr. Murphy down the street at the local park. I couldn’t wait to thank him. I just hoped that I didn’t completely fail at my training again.

  10

  Act Naturally

  You totally saved me today,” I said.

  “We have to protect our assets,” Mr. Murphy said. “As much as RABID would love to capture anyone from BUM, they’d be especially thrilled to get their hands on someone like you.”

  “But I have another appointment for tomorrow. My mom’s not going to take the river road again. I think she’d drive over a pile of boulders to keep me from missing a second appointment.”

  “There are other ways to delay things,” Mr. Murphy said. “We just need to keep you away from the doctor until Monday. We’ll have the heart simulator perfected by then.”

  “You’re not sticking that thing in me,” I said. “No way.”

  “We’ll talk about that later,” Mr. Murphy said. “Right now, we have some urgent training.”

  “Urgent?”

  He nodded. “We finally got the break we’ve been waiting for, thanks to you.”

  “Me? What did I do?”

  “When you mentioned that goop in your water, it got me thinking. This is just the sort of thing RABID would be involved in. We did some checking, looked for certain types of activity in the area, and everything started to come together.”

  “So is RABID in East Craven?” I really hated the idea that they’d come to my town. And I especially hated thinking that they were the ones who’d been messing with the water supply. I’d do whatever it took to get rid of them.

  “They’re working on creating chaos in East Craven, but their staging base wouldn’t be here. They aren’t going to set up in the middle of the target area. But they’ll be fairly close. I’m pretty sure I know where they are, and I know the identity of the leader of this mission. I have the information we need to infiltrate RABID’s staging base.”

  “Where are they?”

  “You’ll find out soon enough. For now, nobody knows but me.” He gave me a smug smile. “But let’s get back to work. Before we do anything else, we have to be sure you can carry off your role.”

  “You can count on me.” I pictured myself slipping into a secret fortress. But, in the scene, my heroic spy morphed from stealthy secret agent to stumbling zombie, and a hundred bad guys rushed out. Alarms sounded. Security doors clanged shut. I’d failed.

  At least it only happened in my mind. I hoped there wouldn’t be any locks or codes to deal with.

  “What do I have to do?”

  Mr. Murphy stood up and pointed at the ground. “Lie down and act dead.”

  “What?” It’s not like I had to act. I was dead—pretty much.

  “Trust me—this is crucial for the mission. You need to act totally dead. No talking. No moving. No peeking. Until I tell you to get up, don’t move a muscle. No matter what.”

  That didn’t sound anywhere near as cool as slipping into a fortress. But at least it was something I could do. I sprawled out on the ground, letting my whole body flop. I even opened my mouth and let my tongue hang out.

  “Nathan,” Mr. Murphy said. “This isn’t a school play. Stop overacting. Put your tongue back where it belongs, and close your mouth. I asked you to play dead, not stupid.”

  “Sticks and stones may break my bones,” I said.

  “Everything breaks your bones. You’re as fragile as uncooked pasta. Now please stop being so sensitive, and go back to being dead.”

  “You aren’t very nice.”

  “Drop dead.” At least he said it with a smile.

  I closed my eyes.

  “Remember,” Mr. Murphy said. “Stay that way no matter what.”

  I heard him walk away. Now what? Was I supposed to stay in the park all night? I didn’t see how that would get me ready for a spy mission. A moment later, I heard footsteps running toward me. Then I heard a man’s voice.

  “Hey—are you okay?” Someone shook my shoulder.

  Oh, no. The guy thought I was really dead. I opened my eyes, sat up, and started making excuses. “I’m fine. I was playing a game with my friends.” I pointed toward some trees. “They’re hiding over there. It’s a cool game. It’s called ‘hide and sleep.’ Yeah, that’s it. They hide. I sleep.”

  The guy stared at me for a moment, then looked over at Mr. Murphy. “Did you explain things?” he asked.

  Mr. Murphy nodded. “I did. I guess I have to explain them again. Perhaps I should use smaller words, though none come to mind.” He turned toward me. “Nathan. What part of ‘play dead’ did you fail to understand?”

  “But I thought—”

  He held up a hand. “The dead don’t think. They don’t talk or move, either. Let’s try again.”

  “Okay.” I closed my eyes and flopped back down. I’d messed up once, but now I was going to play dead no matter what.

  I heard the guy again. “Kid. Hey—are you hurt?” He shook my shoulder. I stayed dead.

  I felt hands pressing on my chest. Someone lifted me. I was being carried. I stayed limp and kept my eyes closed. This was easy.

  Doors slammed. I heard sirens. We started to move. I had a sudden fear that this was all a trick to take me somewhere and put in the fake heart. It wouldn’t even have to be in a hospital. They could slice me open anywhere.

  I opened one eye a tiny bit to peek around.

  “No peeking!” Mr. Murphy said.

  I closed my eyes hard.

  “Stop scrunching your eyes,” Mr. Murphy said.

  The van slid around a corner. I felt the cart move. “Whoa.” I grabbed the sides.

  “Nathan . . . ,” Mr. Murphy said.

  “Sorry.”

  We drove for a while longer. I kept as still as I could, but it turned out playing dead is a lot harder than being dead. Finally, I heard Mr. Murphy say, “That’s enough for now, Nathan.”

  I opened my eyes all the way. I wasn’t in an ambulance. I was in the back of a van, lying on a cart. A small stereo next to me played siren sounds. There were two other people in the van with Mr. Murphy, and a driver up front. I think I’d seen all of them in the hallways at BUM.

  I sat up and looked out the window. We were back at the park. “What was that all about?”

  “We had to make sure you could remain dead no matter what happened,” Mr. Murphy said. “It looks like we’ll have to find a different plan.”

  “No, you won’t. I can do this. I just need to practice.”

  “There’s not enough time,” Mr. Murphy said. “I’m going to have to figure out some other way to get into RABID’s staging base.”

  “I’m a real fast learner,” I said.

  Mr. Murphy turned to the van driver. “Go ahead back. I’ll walk. I have some things I need to figure out.”

  He got out. I followed him. Right after that, the van drove off.

  “What’s so important about playing dead, anyhow?” I asked.

  “Sorry—I can’t tell you. We work on a need-to-know basis,” Mr. Murphy said. “You don’t need to know that.”

  “But—”

  “Good night, Nathan.”

  As he turned away, I said, “Hey—I’ve been practicing following. I’m getting better at it. I figured out all I really have to do is—”

  “Nathan, one thing you need to learn is to accept your limitations. There are some things you just won’t be good at.”

  “I’m good at following. Really. And I can get good at playing dead. Let me try again.”

  “Not now. I have to make preparations. This is a disaster.” He pulled a phone out of his pocket. “It’s my fault for assuming you were ready.”

  “I thought you didn’t trust phones.”

  “It’s an emergency,” he said as he slid the phone open. “And this is a secure phone. It has encryption circuitry. It has anti-eavesdropping functionality.” He frowned. “Apparently, it also h
as a dead battery.”

  At least I could help him there. I reached into my pocket. “Use mine.”

  “No, thank you.” He shook his phone hard.

  “That won’t help,” I said. “It’s not a bottle of ketchup.”

  “Are you an expert on phones?” he asked.

  “I’m a kid. That makes me an expert on phones and games.” I held up my phone. “See—full battery. Come on, use it.”

  “What’s a fifth-grader doing with his own phone?”

  “All the kids have them,” I said. Except Mookie. But I wasn’t going to start telling him the names of my friends.

  “It’s not secure,” he said.

  “But it’s an emergency. Right?” I really wanted to help.

  He sighed and took the phone. “We need to separate immediately. It’s dangerous enough for me to call BUM on this phone. It would be disastrous if we stayed together. I’m expendable. You’re not. Though I hope you prove to be more valuable in the future. This isn’t the Bureau of Useless Misadventures.”

  “I’m not useless.”

  “We’ll see.” Mr. Murphy walked away.

  I’d totally let him down. He felt I wasn’t any good at being a spy. I needed to prove he was wrong.

  I decided to follow him.

  11

  Follow the Leader

  I waited until Mr. Murphy was half a block ahead of me. Then, with one eye on my feet and one eye on his back, I started following him. If I could trail a master spy without being noticed, that would prove how good I was.

  He talked on the phone as he walked, trying to assemble a team to go after RABID. Even though he kept his voice low, I could hear most of it. That was another of my zombie skills. Living people have blood rushing through their heads, making noise. I don’t, so I can hear better. He never looked back. He never even slowed down.

  This was great. After six blocks, I decided I’d sneak up right behind him and then shout, “Boo!” That way, he’d always remember I had awesome following skills. And it would be sort of fun to make him jump. He acted like he was the coolest guy in the world, and that I was nothing but a kid who had to be told what to do. After this, he’d have to respect me.

  I sped up, but still kept an eye on where I was stepping. We were only two blocks from the museum. Mr. Murphy closed the phone and put it in his pocket. A second later, I saw a van cruising down the street. It wasn’t the same one from before. That one had been green. This one was black. It pulled up next to Mr. Murphy. Maybe he was getting a ride.

  I guess I wouldn’t have a chance to sneak up and startle him. But I could still run over and prove that I was good at following. We’d gone all those blocks without him noticing me.

  Before I could move, the door slid open. Mr. Murphy spun around. Two men leaped out and grabbed him. They dragged him to the van and tossed him inside. Then they jumped in and slammed the door.

  I realized I’d just seen Mr. Murphy get kidnapped right in front of me. Maybe RABID had found him before he was able to find them. I tried to read the license plate. It was splattered with mud.

  I had to tell someone from BUM. I ran to the Museum of Tile and Grout. The door was locked. I rattled it. If only I’d learned how to pick locks, I could have gotten in. But I’d failed at all my spy lessons. There was no way I was getting inside the museum tonight.

  There had to be some way to get a message to BUM. Even if I had my phone, I didn’t have a number for them. I ran home and went to the computer. The first time Mr. Murphy contacted me, it had been while I was playing Vampyre Stalker. I logged in and looked around for Peter Plowshare—that’s the player name he used. He was there, right where I’d last seen him. But he was just standing with his head bowed down. That meant nobody was playing him right now.

  It didn’t matter. I still had to try to get through. I started typing a message in the text box. “P.M. has been captured. I don’t know what to do.” I hit ENTER.

  There was no reply.

  I thought about calling the police. Maybe I’d do that if I couldn’t get into BUM tomorrow. They had to be open during the day. Someone there would know what to do.

  I got dressed earlier than usual. Even so, Dad was already gone. “I have to get to school for a project,” I told Mom as soon as she came downstairs. I had a bowl in front of me with a splash of milk and a few soggy pieces of cereal. “I got breakfast for myself.”

  “Do you want a ride?” Mom asked.

  “No, thanks.” I grabbed my backpack, then headed out. But instead of walking to school, I ran to the museum and yanked on the door handle.

  The door wasn’t locked. I almost fell on my butt as it pulled open.

  The place was empty. Really empty.

  There was nothing inside. No furniture. No paintings on the wall. Even the carpet was gone. It was like someone had removed all signs that BUM ever existed. I walked over to the elevator door. It didn’t open. There wasn’t any button to press.

  There was nothing left for me to do here. This was a dead end.

  12

  Say Aha!

  I left the museum and headed to school. I couldn’t believe how quickly everything had gone from fun spy games to total disaster. Maybe I was better off without BUM. But someone had to stop RABID from messing with my town.

  After I told Abigail about Mr. Murphy, she said, “There’s nothing you can do about that right now. Let’s deal with one thing at a time. There has to be some way to mimic a heartbeat.”

  “I hope so. I really don’t want to end up on the front cover of some sort of magazine for doctors.” I could just see Dr. Scrivella trying to listen to my heart. I wondered how long he’d search for a beat before he realized something was wrong.

  I looked over at Mookie. He was shouting into his iClotz. “Mook-Mook-Mookie! Mookie-Mookie-Moo!” Then he hit the switch, and his voice played back. He looped it and cranked the volume up and down. “Just call me DJ MookieMook.”

  “Will you stop that!” Abigail yelled at him. “It is so annoying, I can’t think.”

  “You’re just saying that because you don’t have one,” Mookie said. Then he pushed the record button again and said, “Abigail, Blabigail.”

  “That’s so obnoxious,” she said. “That’s—” Then her eyes went wide. “—the answer!”

  “What?” I asked.

  “It’s so simple. Why didn’t I see it before?”

  “See what?” I asked.

  “We’ll record a heartbeat,” she said. “I’ll rig up a stethoscope and make the recording. Then you can swallow the player. When your doctor listens to your chest, he’ll hear the heartbeat.”

  “Swallow the player?” Mookie and I both shouted.

  “Sure,” Abigail said. “Don’t worry. We’ll tie it to a string around one of your teeth, and lower it to the right spot. You can swallow it before you go into the examining room. Just set the playback so it repeats.”

  She snatched the player out of Mookie’s hands.

  “Hey—that’s mine,” he said.

  “Nathan needs it more than you,” Abigail told him.

  He looked like he was going to complain, but then he shrugged, grabbed the ends of his jacket, and ran around playing MookieHawk.

  I felt the gumballs in my pocket, and the rubber ball. Temperature and pulse. Add in a heartbeat, and I was as good as alive. Maybe I could get through my exam. “Thanks,” I said. “This is great.”

  “You don’t look very happy.”

  “I was supposed to have an important mission—a real spy mission. Now, it’s not going to happen. Who knows what the bad guys will be able to do? Mr. Murphy thinks they’re behind the goop in the water.”

  “Maybe it can still happen,” Abigail said. “What do you know?”

  “I don’t know anything,” I said. “Just that I was supposed to play dead.” As the words left my lips, I realized they wouldn’t be able to resist making smart comments.

  Abigail nodded and said, “That would definitely be w
ithin your current skill set.”

  Mookie laughed as he ran around us in a circle. “Wow, that’s like asking me to play hungry.”

  “But it doesn’t tell us anything,” I said.

  “It tells us a lot,” Abigail said.

  “Like what?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” she said.

  “You know what’s really funny?” Mookie asked.

  “What?”

  “You have to act dead for BUM and alive for your doctor.”

  “If it was the other way around, things would be perfect,” I said. But at least I had a chance to fool my doctor.

  “No goop in the soup,” Mookie said at lunch. He lifted his spoon to show nothing but little pieces of sausage.

  “That’s even more disgusting,” Denali said.

  “How could you even take a chance?” Ferdinand asked. “There could have been goop in it.”

  “I like soup,” Mookie said.

  “Last night, when we were washing our dog, some goop came out of the faucet,” Denali said.

  “I saw some right before I went to bed,” Ferdinand said. “I’m not ever going to shower again. I’m not even going to drink water anymore.”

  “It’s definitely a problem,” Adam said.

  “It’s nothing to worry about,” Denali said. “I’m actually happy about it, because it stains clothing.”

  I could understand why she felt that way. Her parents had a dry-cleaning shop. I wasn’t sure how I felt. The goop was nasty and stinky, but there didn’t seem to be a lot of it. Besides, unlike Ferdinand, I really could stay away from water.

  By the end of the day, Abigail had whipped up a stethoscope from parts she found around the school, and recorded Mookie’s heartbeat. Since I once saw her make a telescope out of two lenses and a cardboard tube, I didn’t even bother asking her how she rigged up a stethoscope. I was just happy to have a heartbeat on the iClotz. Abigail had done her job. The rest was up to me.

  That afternoon, Mom gave me an even bigger chocolate bar—Abigail would be happy about that—and drove me to my appointment. We got there without any trouble. I guess with Mr. Murphy kidnapped, nobody had made plans to stop my appointment.