by Gary Urey
I picked my Mardi Gras mask off the floor and pulled it over my nose. “This is the only mask I need. Besides, I want to smell their fear when we come to destroy them.”
Vivian handed me the last jar of cayenne and led us down the hallway. Two guards tried to stop us near the nurse’s office, but I quickly put them away with a peppery sneeze.
A sharp pain sliced inside my right nostril. I reached up, rubbed my nose, and felt something warm and wet.
Blood.
“You have a nosebleed,” Vivian said, a look of concern washing across her face. I knew right away it was from the cayenne pepper. The stuff must have been eating away the lining of my nasal passages.
“I’m fine,” I said. “We have to keep moving.”
Down the hall, outside the Pumping Floor, I heard Buggingham’s voice. “There’s nothing wrong here,” she said. “Hurry, let’s get back to the interrogation.”
“Follow me,” Vivian whispered. “I found what we need to put those poop slurpers out of commission forever.”
We dashed through the cafeteria, heading to the teachers’ lounge. The room was exactly as I remembered it, from the air-purification unit to the one-hundred-and-seventy-five-inch CCTV security monitor. Next to the air-purification unit was a vending machine stuffed with soda.
“Grab as many cans of soda as you can carry,” Vivian instructed. “We’re going to dump them into the computers that control the flow of SPOIL. Sugar water and motherboards don’t mix.”
“But the sign says it costs a dollar a can,” Jimmy said. “We don’t have any money.”
“Teachers don’t have to pay for soda,” Vivian said. “It’s written in their teaching contract.”
“Then I want to be a teacher when I grow up!” Mumps gushed.
We pushed the vending machine buttons. Out flew can after free can of soda—orange-flavored, grape, lemon, lime, cherry, cream, root beer.
“They set up the computers in the gym equipment storage room,” Vivian said. “That’s right next to the Pumping Floor. The door is heavily guarded and locked at all times.”
“How do we get inside?” Jimmy asked.
“Leave that up to me,” I said. “You guys wait here. When you hear me sneeze and things start exploding, that’s your cue to rush into the computer room and drown those babies.”
“There’s only one jar of cayenne pepper left,” Vivian said. “What if you run out?”
I stepped over to the window and looked out. It was dark, but I knew from memory what was there—the kickball diamond, the playground, soccer field, basketball court, parking lot—places that were now infected with ECU’s greedy disease.
“I won’t run out,” I said. “And even if I do, my nose will shrivel up and rot before I allow Muzzle and his minions to pollute our town.”
I raced out of the room straight into the stinky rump of the beast.
29
THE DOWNWARD SPIRAL
The stinky rump of the beast was a crater-sized hole in the center of our gym floor.
I tilted back the jar of cayenne pepper, inhaled deeply, and nearly passed out on the floor. The pain was excruciating. It felt like my nose was on fire. Drops of blood soaked the front of my Super Schnoz costume, but I had to keep moving.
It didn’t take long for me to find trouble.
Buggingham and Muzzle had discovered our escape and sent out an alert. I was a marked nose. Every ECU employee on school grounds was on the lookout for me and my friends. Four rifle-toting guards confronted me in front of my old classroom.
“Ah…choo!” I fired, sending out a lethal, bloody snotball that knocked the guards off their feet.
More of the enemy raced in my direction. I sneezed my way closer to the Pumping Floor; each pepper-spiced booger bomb was like a razor blade ripping the inside of my nose. Guards collapsed to the left and right of me, others went sailing through the gym doors and into the parking lot. I checked my ammo—only two tablespoons left. I was saving those for Buggingham and Muzzle.
By the time I made it to the Pumping Floor, the rest of Muzzle’s men had abandoned the operation. At the mere sight of my nose, they dropped their weapons and high-tailed it off school grounds.
The only thing left to do was to figure out a way to get the gym floor back in place and seal the Gates of Smell.
But Muzzle had other plans.
A girl’s frightened voice screamed out from behind me. I turned and saw the aging polluter with Vivian in his grasp. I reached for the last of my cayenne pepper. Muzzle rushed toward the Gates of Smell, tugging Vivian along with him. When he got to the edge of the pit, he dangled her over the side.
“One sniff closer, Super Schnoz, and the girl dives into the stinky abyss!” Muzzle screamed at me.
I stopped dead in my tracks. He had me. There was no way I would ever risk Vivian’s life—even if it meant going to school all summer.
“You’re a fool, my nosy friend!” Muzzle cackled. “Did you really think you could stop me? Now, I want you to raise your nose in the air and back slowly away from the Pumping Floor.”
I hesitated, not knowing what to do.
“Do it!” Muzzle hollered. “Or the girl goes into the pit!”
The sound of a helicopter’s rotating wings blasted my ears. The noise was so loud I could barely make out Muzzle’s words. I turned and saw an attack helicopter piloted by Buggingham hovering outside the gym doors. A rope ladder lowered to the ground.
“Back away,” Muzzle warned.
I did as he ordered, moving slowly toward the far end of the gym.
“Hurry, Milton!” I heard Buggingham shout through the whine of the helicopter.
A computer voice rang out from an intercom system, “Building will detonate in three minutes and fifty-five seconds.”
“What was that?” I shouted.
Muzzle cackled and dangled Vivian farther over the pit. “Did you really think you could defeat me, Super Schnoz? We have programmed the computers to self-detonate in exactly four minutes. This whole school will blow to smithereens. SPOIL will spew everywhere and flood the streets of Denmark. And guess what? My company will be back to clean it up just like in Russia!”
Muzzle flung Vivian with all his might, sending her on a downward spiral into the Gates of Smell.
30
FREEFALL
Muzzle ran to the dangling rope ladder, grabbed hold, and lifted off with his accomplice into the night sky. I raced to the pit, plunging nose first into the Gates of Smell.
My stomach heaved into my throat. My cape whipped around my face, temporarily blinding me. When I could finally see, I glimpsed Vivian just ahead, free-falling toward the nastiest, smelliest, gooiest, most foul substance the world has ever known.
With a flight trick I learned from watching a documentary about red-tailed hawks, I pinned my arms to my sides, positioned my body at an angle, and dove at breakneck speed. I didn’t know how far the Gates of Smell spiraled into the earth’s core, but I knew my friend was a goner if she fell directly into a pocket of greasy SPOIL.
“Help me, Schnoz!” I heard Vivian scream in the darkness.
I was close, very close. A flame shot out from the side of the pit, illuminating the gloom. There she was, a few feet from me. I reached out. Our fingers touched. I clamped down harder, grabbed her elbow, and pulled her into my chest. She clung to me like a frightened baby chimp.
“We’re going to die,” Vivian whimpered.
I knew from reading ECU’s Top-Secret Report that SPOIL had the consistency of quicksand. If Vivian and I landed in it, we’d drown for sure. I tried inflating my nostrils to float us to the surface, but the pain was too much. Every time I took a deep breath, the scabs forming inside my nose burst open. Blood and mucus dripped from my nose like a leaky faucet. My super schnoz was useless.
The bottom of the hole lay below us just a few hundred feet away. The Gates of Smell was more hideous than I had ever imagined. Bubbling, crackling, oozing, ancient poop, the smell wa
s almost too much even for my well-seasoned honker.
The cayenne. Another sniff would probably kill me, but I had no choice. It was our only chance.
I managed to twist off the lid and inhale the last two tablespoons of pepper. A stab of skull-splitting pain sliced through my nasal cavity.
“Owww!” I cried out. The sting was so intense it felt like someone had just smacked me in the face with a concrete block.
I sneezed with all my might. Snot mixed with blood and boogers blasted from my wounded nose. The mucus splashed into the pit of SPOIL. The goop fizzed and smoked, gurgling like a fire-breathing dragon ready to swallow us whole.
“What’s happening?” Vivian asked.
“It’s some weird chemical reaction between my snot and SPOIL!” I said. “Brace for impact!”
Just as we were about to plunge into SPOIL, a huge air bubble the size of a swimming pool formed on its surface. We collided against the bubble and it popped, releasing a rush of disgusting, stinky, poopy air. The rush of foul wind inflated my nostrils like two balloons. The pain made me cry out in agony, but I didn’t care. Vivian and I were drifting upward on a breeze of old dinosaur poop!
We blasted from the pit so high we nearly hit the gym roof. Everything was soaked with SPOIL, but we didn’t care. We were smelly but safe. It was such a thrill to be on solid ground, I nearly forgot about Muzzle’s plan to blow up the school and flood SPOIL into our town.
Fortunately, Jimmy, Mumps, and TJ were right on task.
As Vivian and I sat there soaked in slimy SPOIL, the Not-Right Brothers went to work. They peeled open can after can of sugary soda and poured the contents over ECU’s main computer. The computer voice from the intercom counted down the moment of detonation.
Twenty…nineteen…eighteen…seventeen…sixteen…
“Hurry, you guys!” I pleaded. “We’re running out of time!”
“We’re going as fast as we can!” Jimmy yelled back.
The remaining seconds flew past like the flick of a booger. The boys had soaked the entire computer system. So much that they were standing ankle-high in a puddle of pop.
Five…four…three…two…one…
I lowered my head, shielded Vivian with my cape, and awaited the explosion.
The only thing that blew up was the computer system.
“We did it,” Vivian said, exhausted from her ordeal. “We saved the town.”
Jimmy cracked open a can of soda and took a huge swig. “And we saved summer vacation,” he added.
31
SUMMER VACATION
An announcement came over the PA system as we sat in Mrs. Field’s room, cleaning out our desks. It was Principal Cyrano, wishing us a fun and safe summer vacation.
“This has certainly been a challenging year for all of us,” The principal said. “After all the problems we had in school with the odor and our first environmental cleaning company quitting and leaving us with a huge mess, we should all be very proud of our patience. And we only had to be in school until June twenty-fourth!”
The kids in Mrs. Field’s class cheered and pumped their fists in the air.
“ECU didn’t quit,” Jimmy said to me. “We kicked them out.”
“It stinks that only the five of us know the truth,” Mumps said.
“We’re heroes,” TJ added. “Our faces should be plastered all over the news. The principal should pin us with medals. Marvel should make a comic book about us—Super Schnoz and the Not-Right Brothers!”
“Don’t forget me,” Vivian said, clipping a purple hair extension to her ponytail. “I’m the brains of this operation.”
“Sorry,” TJ said. “Super Schnoz, the Not-Right Brothers, and Vivian.”
Some recognition sounded good to me. Kids had been teasing me about my honker since nursery school. It was about time they saw the real me. I was no longer just a kid with a big nose ripe for mockery. I had a mission—to fight evil and boldly smell where no kid has smelled before!
“I vote we tell everybody,” Jimmy said. “Schnoz, put on your costume and fly over the school. After that, rip up the gym floor and show everyone the Gates of Smell. Then the world will know the real story about ECU.”
Vivian snatched my backpack away before I could grab the cape and Mardi Gras mask. “You guys can’t be serious,” she said. “I thought you were just joking around.”
“It’s no joke,” Mumps said. “We deserve some credit.”
“And a medal from Principal Cyrano,” TJ chimed in.
“If you breathe one word of Super Schnoz’s true identity or what happened inside this school, not only are our lives in danger but also the lives of our friends and family.”
“Don’t be a drama queen,” Jimmy said.
“Was I being a drama queen when Muzzle threw me into the Gates of Smell? I’d be dead right now if it wasn’t for Schnoz.”
We all grew silent. The lure of fame and fortune was strong, but deep down I knew we had to keep everything a secret.
“Vivian’s right,” I said. “Muzzle and Buggingham are still on the loose. They’ve seen our faces. If we start blabbing, they’ll know our names too.”
“And they’ll know exactly where to find us,” Vivian added. “ECU will be out for revenge.”
The Not-Right Brothers reluctantly gave in and we vowed to keep my identity and our operation top secret.
When the end-of-school buzzer rang, I cleaned out my locker and said my good-byes. Vivian was off to guitar camp, TJ to Camp Noogiewagga, Mumps to Cape Cod, and Jimmy to Mt. Washington with his dad.
I hopped on my bike and pedaled toward the outskirts of town. My smell tour was already behind and I wanted to get sniffing. My first stop was the town dump. It was a potpourri of scents. But when I got there, nothing seemed to excite me. Rotting garbage, smoldering car tires, and decaying rat carcasses held little fascination after inhaling the odors locked inside the Gates of Smell.
In the distance, I heard the familiar whine of helicopter wings. It may have been Muzzle and Buggingham coming back for more or it may have been the local TV news helicopter.
I reached inside my backpack, threw on my Super Schnoz cape and Mardi Gras mask, and took a big whiff of cayenne pepper.
With one nostril open for trouble, I wasn’t about to take any chances.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Text copyright © 2013 by Gary Urey
Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Ethan Long
978-1-4804-4958-9
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