The Nerdy Dozen

by Jeff Miller

  “Hey!” Neil shouted. “Can you help us out? We stepped on some booby trap and ended up here!”

  “Shhh!” Trevor nudged Neil in the ribs. “This thing could be his!”

  Oh no . . . Trevor might actually be right, Neil thought. Neil looked down at the boy, who, smiling lazily, was taking sips from a coconut in his hand. He wore sunglasses, a dirty white captain’s hat over his mess of dark hair, and khaki shorts with a thick leather belt, held by a gold clasp. He was shirtless, and his shoulders and arms looked strong, probably from tree climbing.

  The boy looked up at them a bit longer, then tipped his hat and slowly started to climb the ladder to the tree house made of bamboo, straw, and trees without their bark.

  “Hey!” Neil called out. “What do you want from us?” The boy didn’t respond and eventually reached the thick wooden platform suspended high above the ground. He walked into the house without looking back.

  “Help! Help us!” Trevor shouted while trying to squeeze an arm through a small opening in the netting, but he quickly gave up. “Jones! Jones!”

  Neil rolled his eyes. They were too far away from the beach for their voices to carry. He scoured the net for a point of weakness that they could use to escape, but there was nothing. Trevor was still yelling, his voice beginning to rasp.

  “Save your energy, Trevor. I don’t think they can hear us,” Neil said.

  “I’ll use my energy however I want to,” Trevor snapped.

  Neil had tried his best with Trevor, but now that they were smashed together in a vine-woven net, he couldn’t let Trevor get away with his jerky comments anymore.

  “Listen,” Neil said. “I know you don’t like me, man, and the feeling is mutual, but we’re in this together, for better or worse. Look around—we’re stuck in a freaking net, and you’re acting like you always do. I know how you are during games.”

  “What does that mean?” Trevor asked, turning his net-squeezed face away from Neil.

  “You only look out for yourself!” Neil thought of how Trevor had flown in the simulator, how he had climbed up Neil on the Decider.

  “Because why bother with the rest of you when I know I’m better?”

  “You’re wrong,” said Neil.

  “I’m wrong? I feel sorry for you, Ashley. You always pair up with losers like Sam and Biggs when you could be so much more. Why do you think you’re still second in the standings? If you stopped playing team games with all the mediocre gamers, you might have a chance. You’re actually pretty good. But you’re letting them hold you back.”

  “Watch it,” Neil snapped. Trevor could insult him all he wanted, but he refused to let him bad-mouth his friends.

  “You know you’re better than them. Admit it.”

  Before Neil could respond, a rustling sound came from inside the tree house and he turned to look. Through the lone window, he saw something flicker, and then he heard the distinct buzz of a tube television.

  “Trevor, look!” Neil exclaimed, pointing a finger. Trevor arched backward to see. The small television in the tree house was playing Wheel of Fortune, one of Neil’s favorite shows. The boy inside plopped down on a wooden chair and began to watch as white spaces for letters lit up the screen.

  Neil thought furiously. Every morning before school for the last three years, he’d watched the show while being force-fed oatmeal by his mother. He could guess every puzzle with no more than two or three letters provided and knew what kind of spinning finesse was required to land on the $2,500 space.

  Neil leaned forward in the net as a jubilant woman named Sherry shouted “L!”

  “THE LEGEND OF SLEEPY HOLLOW!” Neil proclaimed before all the Ls even lit up the board. The boy inside looked surprised and glanced over at Neil and Trevor, then turned up the volume. He watched as Sherry bought more vowels than necessary and then promptly went bankrupt. A truck driver named Thad solved the puzzle, needing five more letters than Neil.

  The same continued with the next round, with Neil shouting out “UMBRELLA STAND AND DELIVER!” The boy turned again, possibly impressed with Neil’s Wheel prowess.

  As the final round neared and a botanist named Cecilia hoped to leave in a Hyundai or something, Neil had an idea.

  “Hey!” he shouted. “I get this puzzle before you, and you let us down. If not, we stay in the net. Sound fair?”

  The boy didn’t respond but was intently watching Cecilia guess if the final puzzle, a “thing,” contained W, X, F, or Y.

  Truly awful choices, Cecilia, Neil thought.

  With only _ _ S_ _ _ _N to work with, Neil’s mind scrambled to fill in the spaces. As seconds ticked by, it finally clicked.

  “OBSIDIAN!” Neil shouted with a satisfied grin. He heard the boy in the tree house holler the same answer a second later, and he watched Cecilia recoil as her time ran out, frowning at a shimmery envelope worth $30,000.

  The boy flipped off the television screen and slowly walked outside to the creaky wooden deck. He reached up to a vine in front of his house and pulled, sending Neil and Trevor to the ground in a clump. Then he grabbed a second vine and promptly did a looping swing to land next to Trevor and Neil, who were now scrabbling with the net, searching for an opening. The boy’s bare feet hit the ground lightly, leaving graceful footprints in the spongy, moss-covered dirt.

  “I’m glad to see the adjustments worked. Last time they got away,” said the boy.

  Last time? They? Neil thought it best to ask as few questions as possible. Just being out of the net was a step in the right direction, and he didn’t want to press his luck.

  “Um, hi. I’m Neil,” he began. “And this is—”

  “Kenny. Kenny Boseswich,” Trevor said, cutting Neil off. He held out his hand for a handshake.

  “Sorry about that,” said the boy. “The surf doesn’t break that well over on this side of the chain. You must be pretty lost if you’re on this island.”

  “Yeah, we just sort of dropped in,” Neil said. “Maybe you could show us around?” Neil thought if he returned to Jones with some reconnaissance information as well as their gear, it might help get him out of hot water.

  “Sure,” the boy said with a shrug as he spun away quickly and started into the wilderness. “Least I can do for the capturing thing. I’m Weo, by the way.”

  Neil followed Weo as Trevor hung back. The three stepped over dark soil, at times walking on the tops of roots that trickled out from trees in every direction.

  “If we can get to high enough ground, I bet we can see where that Chameleon is,” Trevor whispered from the corner of his mouth. “It’s gotta be on one of these islands.”

  “I doubt it. It’s invisible,” Neil reminded him as he followed Weo. “But yeah, maybe we can get an idea.”

  Weo cut through the jungle instinctively, moving much faster than Neil and Trevor had on their own. Occasionally he paused and touched the rough exterior of a palm tree or giant leaf with the tips of his fingers. Neil did the same, wondering if doing so would reveal jungle secrets.

  They soon reached the base of the small crater that Trevor had almost crashed their jet into earlier. The lush jungle plants gave way to glossy black rocks of all sizes, reflecting back the intense sun. Weo scooped down to pick up two fallen coconuts and cracked open the tops on a large volcanic rock. He handed one each to Trevor and Neil. At first they hesitated, but after the first sip, they drank greedily. The liquid inside was smooth and refreshing.

  “Wow, that was great. Thanks,” Neil said, wiping his mouth. Neil mentally added fresh coconut to the list of things he enjoyed drinking, which so far only included chocolate milk: extra chocolate, less milk.

  The three traipsed up the small rocky incline and soon looked out over the beautiful scenery. To the right was the largest island, white-capped waves lapping at its shore. Two surfers sat on foam boards a distance out, waiting to time their ride in. Small, makeshift buildings dotted the coastline.

  To the left, and closer, was the third island, only sl
ightly larger than the one they were currently standing on. Shards of black volcanic rock jutted from the ocean, and a thin ring of trees lined the outside. At its center, a giant modern gray building surrounded by a metal fence sat firmly planted in the otherwise rugged surroundings. A new-looking suspension bridge connected that island to the bigger island, leaving the small island that Neil was on completely secluded.

  “So, what do you call this place?” Neil asked, shielding his eyes from the sun. Weo gave a short laugh.

  “Well, there’s the main island,” Weo said, pointing to the biggest one. “The old top-secret surf spot. Unreal waves. I guess some people call it Brosiah Bay now,” Weo explained.

  “Brosiah Bay?” Trevor asked.

  “Goofy, I know. It’s a surf term, sort of. But now lots of nonsurfers live there, too.”

  “Cool,” Neil responded. “And that other island. With all the rocks and that building. What’s that?”

  Weo’s tone quickly changed. “That . . . that island is the . . . Well, it belongs to . . . Let’s just say it’s best to leave the billionaire alone.”

  Billionaire? Neil gasped. That’s unreal—a private island. I bet the floors are made of precious metals, and there’s a video arcade, which is just off the bowling alley, next to a hangar full of motorcycles and jets . . . just like the missing . . . “Chameleon!” Neil said aloud. Weo turned his attention to Neil.

  “Really? Where? I haven’t seen those on my island before.”

  “Oh, yeah. Just found one. Tre—Kenny . . . ah, Ghostswitch . . . I’ve found our sample chameleon,” Neil said, doing a pretty awful job of playing it cool. “We can return back to the gear for sampling purposes.”

  Trevor met Neil’s gaze in understanding. “Yeeeah . . . ,” Trevor said slowly. “We should get back.”

  “Can I see it?”

  “Well, Weo, great meetin’ ya and all, but we’ve got important scientist stuff to attend to. That’s what we are; I forgot to tell you. Scientists. Surf-loving scientists. Obviously the chameleon is camouflaged on my friend’s body here, so we can’t disturb it. That’s the first rule of surf science!” Neil said, slapping Weo on the back.

  “Yeah, what he said,” Trevor blurted. “Any chance you can lead us back to our gear?”

  Weo narrowed his eyes but simply nodded and turned back around, clambering down the path on the tough soles of his bare feet. Neil hated lying, especially to someone who had just released him from a net, but they needed to go tell Jones about the billionaire’s island. And Weo had put them up in that tree anyway.

  “There’s the gear,” Trevor said as he saw their pile of bags in the same clearing as before. He scurried ahead, making sure to step well over Weo’s trip wire.

  After helping position the bags on Neil’s and Trevor’s flimsy shoulders, Weo quickly gave them directions to the beach, with a wide variety of landmarks to search for. They all had weird names, like “snake mountain” and “dung beetle waterslide.”

  “Thanks, Weo.” Neil adjusted the black duffel bag of gear on his scrawny right shoulder and started after Trevor. He’d taken only a few steps when Weo called after him.

  “Hey, Neil? This tree house and everything? Let’s keep it our secret. But if you run into any of the ostriches, to get them to chill out, make a sound like . . . what’s the word? Like you’re choking on a sandwich that you made with too much peanut butter!” Weo shouted, climbing the ladder back up to his tree fort.

  Neil nodded and plodded ahead, following Weo’s bizarre instructions. He made a left at the first tree shaped like a Y and then a right at the “old man’s face rock,” and by the time he had walked too far to go back, he realized that he had absolutely no idea what that ostrich noise would sound like.

  NEIL FELL INTO A SORT OF GALLOP, BALANCING THE cumbersome bag on his hips while hop-running. He tried to keep his eyes on Trevor but at times just looked for the imprints of his thick government-issued shoes. The footprints led through leaves and crawling roots, back to the beach and their group of soldiers.

  By the time he reached the edge of the forest, Neil saw from a distance that the Chameleon was nearly free of sand.

  “Lord Jones, your soot-colored, burlap-sacked textiles have arrived,” said Riley, pointing toward Neil and Trevor. Jones’s head popped up from the opposite side of the Chameleon, the late-afternoon sun reflecting on his forehead. He looked like some kind of sand-dwelling creature crawling out of a newly dug tunnel. By the noticeable amount of sweat drenching him, Neil thought it was safe to assume that Jones had done most of the work.

  “Oh, thanks for really hustling with everything, gentlemen.” Jones moaned, spitting out sand. “I’ve enjoyed digging us out with Spineyard here while Starshine over there took it easy.”

  “Again, ’tis not me name. I am but a humble swineherd, and at your service, my most revered Jones,” said Riley. “And we are sentinels on lookout, a very necessary outpost indeed.”

  “Never mind,” Jones said brusquely. “Fortunately the radios with Lopez and Wells still work, and the others are setting up a base camp. They’re at an old, abandoned farm on the bigger island. Now that you’re back, we can get moving.”

  Neil and Trevor returned the dropped gear to the fighter, trying to avoid eye contact with Jones. Neil wanted to tell the major what he’d found out about the billionaire’s island, but he could see that this was not the time. Biggs and Riley then hopped in, sand flying off their clothes and shoes.

  “Oh, come on, not in the interior!” Jones yelled. “Were you raised by longshoremen?”

  “No, wolves. Remember?” Biggs said sheepishly.

  Everyone mumbled apologies and quickly buckled in as the cockpit sealed shut. Biggs typed something into the invisibility command, and soon the plane was clad in its invisible facade.

  “Good-bye, weird-smells island,” Biggs said with a smile. “Not sure what kind of animal droppings you smell like, but I swear to you now, I will re-create it for television. Even if it takes all my free time. That is a promise.”

  Trevor lifted the craft up and out of its embankment, whirling up sand on the beach below. Neil heard the high-pitched buzz of the invisible exterior, and behind that, so faint it almost wasn’t audible, a slight whir he hadn’t heard earlier.

  “Humidity makes these thrusters a little noisy,” Jones said. “Grunsten, take us up slowly. We’ll head to the southeast corner of the other island. You should hopefully see the barn where our team has taken shelter. On our mark, they’ll open the back doors, and we can idle in unnoticed.”

  “Roger that,” Trevor replied.

  The invisible fighter glided across the water, tracing the edge of what Weo had called Brosiah Bay. Waves lapped below them, and wormlike ribbons of sandbars twisted in and out of the water. Trevor soon cut over the land, which was dotted with symmetrical plants, all in uniform rows.

  “Hmm. Looks to be pineapples,” Jones said.

  “These apples of pine, O Jones—they grow from the loam beneath our feet?” Riley asked.

  “Pineapples grow from the ground, if that’s what you’re asking in whatever accent and language that is. Now, Grunsten, you see that barn ahead? That’s our destination,” Jones said. Trevor steered toward an ancient, decrepit barn, its browned and splintering slats all leaning at an eighty-degree angle.

  Steering wide of the farmer’s house at the opposite end of the plot of land, Trevor landed the Chameleon softly on the ground and crept in silently between the open barn doors, like a battle-ready Prius. He slowed the jet to a stop and pressed the button to open the cockpit, which unlatched with a pleasing whoosh.

  As Neil disembarked, he glanced over at Wells and Lopez, who were standing at attention while the rest of the crew sat transfixed, watching a documentary on historical obstacle courses being displayed on the exterior of one of the other Chameleons. That was definitely one of the coolest perks of the jet’s video-camouflaging technology, Neil thought. A few kids from the other planes lay underneath
the belly of the fighter, taking in a film many times their size.

  Neil looked up from the underside of the plane to see Sam, watching from the auxiliary seat in the open cockpit.

  “Hey, Sam,” Neil said, moving closer as she climbed down from the jet.

  “Neil,” Sam said, her voice just above a whisper. “Everything okay? You were gone for a while.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Neil said, feeling his ears grow red. “Just your classic net inci—”

  “All right, soldiers,” Jones said, interrupting Neil and the movie everyone was enjoying. “Wells, Lopez, and I are headed for recon and to see if we can get our communication to the aircraft carrier restored. We think whatever knocked it out in the air is still keeping a signal from getting to us. All of you just stay here. Only rule is nobody leaves the barn. Period.”

  Neil realized this was his chance to make sure Jones at least heard his intelligence on the islands. “Major Jones, before you leave, you should—”

  “Save it for later, Andertol. I need you, especially after last time, to just not touch anything.”

  Jones turned and slipped out through the swaying back doors. Wells and Lopez followed, silent as ever. The doors shut, and then they were gone.

  “Do those guys ever talk?” Trevor asked.

  “Wells and Lopez? Now that I think about it, hardly at all,” Jason 1 said. Sam and Corinne turned in to form a circle, both of them nodding in agreement.

  “Yeah, we’re actually wondering if it’s a competition between them to see who can talk less. Or if they’re just cyborgs,” said Corinne, who spoke with a nasally confidence.

  “Wells is a robot for sure. I don’t think he’s even said a word to us,” Sam said. “And I watched him do three hundred push-ups in a row, which I’m pretty sure can’t be done by a human.”