Oliver Fibbs and the Giant Boy-Munching Bugs

by Steve Hartley

  ‘BORING,’ I said.

  We locked up, put the key back under the pot and walked back to the front gate feeling really disappointed.

  Just then I heard Algy’s horrified yell from his bedroom.

  ‘Nooooooooooooo! I can’t lose! I HATE losing!’

  I turned to Peaches.

  ‘DABMAN one, Dr Devious nil!’

  Algy forgave me for messing up his chess game when I said I would turn him into a UBANGI DEVIL BUG.

  ‘I want to take some photos of you to show the kids at school,’ I explained. ‘But they’ll have to be BLURRY, just like the ones you took of Dad.’

  Algy wore a black T-shirt, a pair of black tights we ‘borrowed’ from Mum and hairy hands with long, bloody claws from his Halloween MONSTER suit. I covered his face with a creepy wooden animal mask that Dad had brought back from one of his visits to Africa, and finished the costume off with one of Miss Wilkins’s Viking helmets from school, to make it look like he had scary devil horns on his head.

  ‘Thanks, Ollie,’ said Algy as I helped him put on the hairy hands.

  ‘What for?’

  ‘For letting me dress up and be silly with you this week.’ His shoulders drooped. ‘All I usually do is play chess and read maths books. I hardly ever get to be silly.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘It must be hard being a genius.’

  ‘It is!’ replied Algy. ‘Right now, I’m supposed to be writing an essay on economic instability models, and revising for my university exams.’

  ‘I’m supposed to be practising my BALLOON modelling for the KIDS CAN DO TALENT SHOW at school,’ I told him.

  My brother grinned. ‘But being a UBANGI DEVIL BUG is much more fun!’

  We pulled the curtains closed to make my bedroom as dark as possible. Algy wiggled his hairy claws next to his face, and growled. ‘Grrrrrrrr!’

  ‘Oooo, scary!’ I laughed.

  We managed to get a couple of photos that were really good. They were FUZZY and full of shadows, but there really could have been a giant DEVIL BUG on the loose in my room!

  The next morning, I hurried into the classroom and pinned the best shot above Bobby Bragg’s photo of me and my . A few of my classmates crowded round to get a look at it.

  ‘What’s that, Ollie?’ said Millie Dangerfield.

  ‘It’s the DEVIL BUG that’s bitten all my family,’ I replied. ‘I managed to get this picture of it last night when it crept out of the shadows to feed on my blood.’

  Millie gasped. ‘Has DABMAN managed to stop the SHOW-OFF from spreading the bugs around? I don’t want to get HORRIBOBOLOUS .’

  ‘Well, Millie,’ I began. ‘We went back to the through the wormhole, and Captain Common Sense managed to solve the riddle to open the temple door . . .’

  ‘I know another saying,’ called out Bobby Bragg. ‘Not true! Not true! Your nose will go bright blue!’

  ‘Don’t be silly, Bobby,’ said Peaches as she joined the growing crowd of children gawping at my photograph.

  ‘Go on, Oliver,’ urged Jamie Ryder. ‘What happened next?’

  ‘The door rumbled and creaked open,’ I told the class. ‘We stared down a long, dark tunnel.’

  ‘Suddenly, I heard something moving in the shadows ahead of us. The light from my torch searched the blackness, and my blood in my veins . . .’

  ‘I wish it would,’ muttered Bobby Bragg.

  I paused, trying to imagine the next scene. Then I remembered Toby’s frog-breeding experiment. WHAT IF . . . ?

  ‘Hey, just a minute, Fibbs . . .’ said Toby, but I carried on quickly.

  ‘The walls and floor of the tunnel were covered in creepers,’ I said.

  ‘What’s the biggest creeper in the ?’ called Bobby Bragg.

  ‘Oliver Fibbs!’ answered Toby Hadron, and they high-fived and burst out laughing.

  ‘Anyway,’ I continued, ignoring them both, ‘we crept through the tunnel, doing deeper into the Temple of Stikki Ikki. I didn’t see the trap we were walking into. We found the Boffin’s laboratory, but the SAS GANG had gone. There was a note pinned to the door.’

  Millie Dangerfield gave a terrified squeal, and I was about to go on when Miss Wilkins came into the classroom. Everyone scattered to their places. I glanced across at Millie. She nibbled nervously at a fingernail, and when she answered her name at registration her voice came out as a quivering squeak.

  ‘Miss, Ollie says that the SHOW-OFF’s going to release UBANGI DEVIL BUGS in school and infect us all with HORRIBOBOLOUS !’ she wailed.

  ‘Millie, it’s just a story,’ sighed Miss Wilkins.

  ‘But he showed us a picture!’ cried Millie, pointing at the notice board. ‘It’s horrible!’

  ‘Oliver!’ snapped Miss Wilkins. ‘Playtime detention today, and lose ten points.’

  She walked over to the notice board, removed my photograph and put it in the drawer of her desk. ‘Right,’ she said. ‘Let’s get on with seeing some more KIDS CAN DO acts. Oliver, I think it’s about time you showed us what you can do.’

  I went cold. ‘What . . . you mean, do it now, miss?’

  ‘Yes, now.’

  ‘But I still need more practice.’

  ‘I don’t expect it to be perfect.’

  ‘But I’ve got no BALLOONS. I need BALLOONS!’

  Miss Wilkins rummaged in the craft cupboard and handed me a packet of BALLOONS.

  Nooooooooooooooo!

  Just like in Mission to Mars, when was locked inside the Mars Discovery rocket with five seconds to blast-off, there was no escape. As I stood at the front of the class, puffing into the first BALLOON, Bobby Bragg had already started laughing.

  My act was hopeless.

  My BALLOON sausage dog looked like a squashed chicken.

  My BALLOON daffodil looked like a Brussels sprout.

  My BALLOON crown looked like a pizza.

  The other shapes I tried burst before they looked like anything.

  Then I had an idea. Heart battering in my chest, I fumbled in the packet for a long, floppy, green BALLOON, blew it up and tied the knot in the end.

  I held up my creation for everyone to see, and announced, ‘A western smooth green snake!’

  Next, I inflated a thin, straight, black BALLOON.

  ‘A black mamba,’ I said.

  Peaches’s jaw dropped in embarrassment. There was no way she could help me out this time.

  As the terrible silence hung in the room, I quickly blew up a wavy red BALLOON. My hands were sweaty. I tried to tie a knot, but my fingers couldn’t grip the tight, rubbery end, and it slipped from my grasp. With a , rasping whine, the BALLOON shot into the air, curling and spinning and diving around the classroom. After a few seconds, the rubber rocket rose gracefully towards the ceiling, then ran out of PUFF. It hung in space for a heartbeat, then dropped with a spluttering, floppy gasp on to Miss Wilkins’s head.

  ‘Er . . . an African aerobatic asp?’ I suggested.

  The huge explosion of laughter was so loud it was almost painful.

  When Constanza came to pick me up after school (twenty-one minutes late – ‘My boyfriend telephones me from Italia! Romantico!’), Miss Wilkins still looked cross as she spoke to her. I caught a few words, as usual: ‘too far’, ‘terrified’, ‘pathetic’ and ‘biceps’.

  ‘Mamma mia, you make a little girl cry!’ said Constanza as we drove home.

  ‘My BALLOON act was so bad I made everyone cry,’ I replied.

  I was DOOMED.

  Constanza took pity on me, and didn’t tell Mum and Dad about the Millie Dangerfield incident. It saved me from being GROUNDED for a trillion years, and would have spoiled the good mood my family were in. The was finally done, and they were all wide awake and looking forward to getting back to normal again.

  Before dinner, we had a ceremonial dumping of the Green Soup. As we gathered around the dustbin, Dad opened the lid, and pronounced, ‘I hereby declare that cauliflower-and-cabbage soup be banned forever from the Templeton Tibbs h
ouse!’

  The lump of sticky, solidified soup slid from the saucepan with a sickly SUCKING sound, and dropped with a thud into the bin.

  ‘Hooray!’ we cheered. (I hadn’t eaten any, but I was glad to get rid of the PONG.)

  Dinner was a feast of all Constanza’s specials: pizza, meatballs and spaghetti Bolognese, finished off with slabs of sticky chocolate cake.

  The twins giggled and made ballet jokes.

  ‘I’ll be the Sugarplump Fairy,’ said Emma, shovelling cake into her mouth.

  ‘I’ll be Burping Beauty,’ said Gemma with a hiccup.

  ‘Hey, Oliver,’ said Mum. ‘What do you do when a budgie gets sick?’

  This was a bit random. I glanced at the others, but they just grinned. ‘I don’t know,’ I replied. ‘What do you do when a budgie gets sick?’

  ‘Give it tweet-ment!’

  Everyone with laughter. I was too shocked to laugh.

  ‘Mum,’ I gasped. ‘You told a joke. You never tell jokes.’

  ‘I do today,’ she replied.

  ‘I know a good one too,’ said Dad.

  I couldn’t believe it. Dad never, ever tells jokes.

  ‘Why did Algy take a ruler to bed with him?’ he asked.

  I held my breath, waiting for the punchline.

  ‘To see how long he slept!’

  Everybody laughed. I joined in this time, as more jokes flew around the table. It was just like the end of jOKEBOOK OF DOOM, when the comedian Stan Dupp tries to kill the government by making them chuckle to death.

  Poor Constanza sat shaking her head as we fell about laughing. ‘I no understand,’ she said.

  After dinner, we played games (Mum cheated at snakes and ladders!), watched a funny film on TV and had hot chocolate and Snik-Snaks for supper. Algy burped the national anthem, and we all went happily to bed. My family’s good mood was more than – it was !

  Even though I was banned from telling FIBS, and my score was minus eleven, I went to school the next morning feeling great. Then I met Millie Dangerfield in the cloakroom.

  She saw me and turned her back.

  ‘Miss says you made it all up,’ she said quietly, hanging up her coat, but still not looking at me. ‘She said the photo was a fake, and you haven’t got a DEVIL BUG on the loose at home.’

  ‘It’s not on the loose,’ I said. ‘It’s in a matchbox.’

  Just then I heard Bobby Bragg behind me. ‘Liar! Liar! Pants on fire!’ he chanted.

  At last Millie looked at me. ‘I don’t believe you either.’

  ‘I’ll bring it in tomorrow and show you, if you like.’

  Millie pushed past me and went into the classroom.

  I stared at Bobby. ‘I’ll show you I’m not a liar.’

  ‘Can’t wait, Fibbs,’ he smirked, and sauntered away.

  There was one problem with this plan: Algy.

  The DEVIL BUG had become his pet.

  He talked to it.

  He stroked it.

  He’d even given it a name: Derek.

  I knew he wouldn’t be happy letting me take the bug in to school.

  After their short period of fun, my family had gone back to normal again: at dinner that evening, Dad droned on about the skyscraper he was designing; Mum said she couldn’t wait to get back to her brain operations; Algy described a new killer defensive move he’d invented for his chess matches; and the twins ballet-babbled on to each other about their ‘aplomb in the arabesque’ (whatever that is).

  No more jokes; no more fun.

  I tackled my little brother about borrowing his pet bug at bedtime.

  ‘Please,’ I begged. ‘If you hadn’t been such an realistic DEVIL BUG, I wouldn’t be in this mess. Just let me borrow Derek for a day. Pleeeeeeease.’

  ‘Derek likes me to sing to him after lunch,’ he said. ‘Will you do that?’

  ‘Promise.’

  ‘And you’ll keep him warm, and not let him out of his box?’

  ‘Cross my heart.’

  ‘OK,’ said Algy, handing me the matchbox. ‘But if anything happens to him . . .’

  ‘Nothing will happen to him. I’ll open the box, show Bobby and Millie, then close the box. End of story.’

  The next morning, I saw Bobby Bragg in the playground, showing some younger kids the karate exhibition he was going to perform for the KIDS CAN DO auditions.

  ‘Here’s your proof,’ I said, taking the matchbox from my bag and opening it.

  Bobby peered at the tiny red insect. ‘It’s only a beetle,’ he snorted, but I could tell he wasn’t certain.

  ‘It’s a UBANGI DEVIL BUG,’ I said, holding the box closer to his face.

  Bobby stepped back. ‘It’s only a beetle,’ he repeated, but walked away quickly.

  I spotted Millie Dangerfield, just making her way into school with Peaches. Miss Wilkins was talking to them, so I’d have to wait until lunchtime. I put the matchbox back in my bag, and went into class.

  The morning dragged by as we watched the SAS KIDS do their Super And Special acts. Jamie Ryder performed some tricks on his BMX bike, then Hattie Hurley did her usual cheerleader-spelling show. She was wearing a special suit that Toby Hadron had invented. It lit up in different colours with each letter she spelled out.

  And I got to see Peaches’s act, at last: peanut-juggling. The idea was to keep three peanuts in the air, then finish the act by catching each one in her mouth. The nuts zinged here and there like tiny bullets, making the kids on the front table duck and dive for cover. When Peaches finally did manage to juggle, she missed her mouth with every nut.

  I have to say, her act was just as bad as mine. Bobby Bragg nudged Toby Hadron and sniggered quietly as Peaches hurried red-faced back to her chair.

  Miss Wilkins smiled at her. ‘It needs a bit more work, Peaches,’ she said. ‘You’ll have to practise hard over the weekend. You too, Oliver.’

  At last, the lunchtime bell rang. I found Millie skipping in the playground, and took her to one side.

  ‘Look,’ I said, slowly pushing open the matchbox. ‘I’ve brought Derek the DEVIL BUG to show you.’

  Millie looked horrified, and began to back away, but then frowned and peeked inside.

  ‘That’s not funny,’ she said, and strode away.

  I looked inside the box.

  It was empty.

  Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!

  My eyes darted around the playground, as though I might see Derek zooming down the slide, or swinging on the monkey bars. But all I saw was Bobby Bragg grinning at me over his shoulder, as he talked to Toby and Hattie.

  No.

  He wouldn’t.

  Would he?

  I had a rotten weekend. Algy wouldn’t speak to me because I’d lost Derek, and I couldn’t stop thinking about the talent show. Each night I had the same bad dream, just like in Nightmare Nightmare, when the malevolent mastermind, Mountebank Morpheus, uses B.D.P. (Bad Dream Power) to drive people mad.

  My dream went like this: I was performing my act on live TV . . .

  During the day, I practised and practised, but no matter what I did, the BALLOON wouldn’t bend or stretch into the right shapes.

  As I arrived at school on Monday morning, I knew straight away that something was wrong. Normally the street outside would be packed with kids and parents milling around, chatting and checking lunchboxes. Today it was empty.

  Peaches stood just outside the main door, with Miss Wilkins and our headteacher, Mrs Broadhead.

  ‘What a disaster!’ the headteacher was saying to Miss Wilkins. ‘Everyone’s got . I’ve had one phone call after another this morning from parents telling me their children won’t be in school today.’

  ‘We seem to be the only ones who haven’t caught it,’ said Miss Wilkins.

  ‘How could this have happened?’ wondered Mrs Broadhead.

  ‘The DEVIL BUG escaped on Friday,’ I whispered to Peaches. ‘I brought it in to show Millie, and I think Bobby Bragg let it loose.’

&nb
sp; ‘What?’ she hissed. ‘You brought the DEVIL BUG to school?’

  ‘Derek hadn’t had a proper feed for days,’ I told her. ‘He’d have been starving. He must have thought it was his birthday: a whole school to chew on!’

  ‘I know why the DEVIL BUG didn’t bite me,’ said Peaches. ‘I started wearing BUG-BE-GONE insect repellent because I was going round to your house. You know . . . just in case.’

  ‘Does this mean the KIDS CAN DO auditions are cancelled?’ I asked Mrs Broadhead hopefully.

  ‘I haven’t had time to tell Symon Cowbell not to come,’ she replied. ‘He’ll be here any minute.’

  Right on cue, a red van with the Radio Cowbell logo on the side swung through the school gates and pulled up alongside us. As the DJ climbed from the driver’s seat, I noticed the message printed across the front of his T-shirt:

  He frowned as he glanced around at the empty playground. ‘Have I come to the right school?’

  ‘Yes, we’ve been expecting you,’ said the headteacher.

  ‘Have I come on the wrong day?’

  ‘No, today’s the day,’ replied Miss Wilkins.

  ‘Then where is everybody?’

  I raised my hand. ‘They’re all at home with , sir.’

  ‘But don’t worry,’ said my teacher. ‘The talent show can go ahead – we still have Oliver and Peaches here.’

  ‘What?’ we cried.

  Symon Cowbell stared at me and Peaches as if we were two from SEWER SWARM.

  ‘Well, I hope you’re really Super And Special,’ he said, ‘because one of you will have to represent your school and perform at the KIDS CAN DO Festival.’

  ‘How about some tea and biscuits while the children get ready to perform?’ suggested Mrs Broadhead, guiding the DJ towards the hall.

  ‘I wish the bug had bitten me too,’ said Peaches miserably. ‘Even would be better than this.’