The Invasion

by Katrina Kahler

  “They just aren’t normal!” Zeke said as we landed. “And believe me, I know not normal! I live not normal!”

  MAC beeped on my arm. “What’s up, MAC?”

  “Super Clone, literally,” MAC told me.

  Looking up, I saw Adam, AKA Super Clone, flying in. I said, “Up in the sky, it’s not a bird, it’s not a plane, it’s…”

  “My buddy, Super Clone!” Zeke yelled, pointing up at the sky and following Adam down with his finger.

  Adam landed. Zeke ran up to him and jumped into his arms. “Adam I’ve missed you!”

  “You just saw me at breakfast this morning!” Adam said.

  “Yeah, but that was hours ago!” Zeke said. “I’m just glad to have you with us.”

  Adam placed Zeke gently on the ground. I couldn’t help noticing how good Adam looked dressed as Super Clone.

  He looked at me. “Super Teen.”

  “Super Clone!” I replied.

  “Will you two call me Super Zombie?” Zeke asked.

  “No!” Adam and I said at once. I admit that I said it much firmer and louder.

  “Fair enough,” Zeke said. “How about Above Average Zombie?”

  I shook my head. “Still no!”

  “I’ll consider it!” Adam said. The guy was really patient with Zeke. After all, they were BFFs.

  Marie and Lori came rushing over to us. “What do we do?” Marie asked.

  “Yeah,” Lori said, punching her fist into her hand. “I love kicking bad guys but these are just mutant caterpillars doing what giant caterpillars do.”

  “Has anyone seen Tanya?” I asked. “We could use her time-slowing ability here?”

  Marie and Lori both shook their heads. Though Zeke spoke up, “She said she’s working with her little sister, who she aged to be her same age sister, to teach her how to control her power.”

  Dear Diary: Time control powers are freaky and hard to…well…hard to control. A couple of the BMS Scientists and Hana (my dad’s robotic GF), think if I concentrate, I too could control time. But truthfully, I’m not sure if I want to. At my age, playing with time could prove to be difficult and possibly dangerous.

  “MAC, can you contact Tanya and tell her we could really use her assistance here?” I asked.

  Silence.

  “MAC?” I prompted

  “Well I could, but I would prefer not to,” MAC said. “Truth be told…I am kind of more than a little afraid of Tanya.”

  Jason flew over to us. “Hey, guys,” he said, pointing to the giant caterpillars eating the corn. “The problem is over there.”

  “We’re just trying to get Tanya here to help,” I told Jason.

  Jason shook his head. “Not right now. She’s working with Kayla, and Kayla is able to do a whole lot more damage than these giant insects,” Jason said. “But these bugs can still do a lot of harm, hence the reason I think we should stop them.”

  I saw Hana using her jetpack to fly down to the scene. She landed next to two female scientists. “Doctor Megan, Doctor Jodi, what’s going on here?” Hana asked them.

  The two scientists looked at their scanners. “These creatures appear to be average caterpillars that have grown and sprouted wings before becoming butterflies.”

  “Maybe we can ask that cool Piper kid to talk to the caterpillars and convince them to leave?” Adam suggested.

  “So you read about her in my notes?” I asked.

  “Of course!” Adam said with a smile.

  “My sister, Ellie Mae, can teleport to her and bring her here!” Adam said boldly.

  “That would be a good idea,” Jason said. “Except… I’ve studied Piper’s powers and they only work on birds, reptiles and mammals, not bugs or insects.”

  Jason’s expression turned to a frown. I noticed Jason try to stop himself from smiling. Yep, the two most important boys in my life got along pretty well but they still competed with each other from time to time. Jason didn’t have Adam’s raw super powers but he had brains, and he really knew how to apply them.

  “Okay people, what’s going on here?” I heard the familiar voice of my mom’s boyfriend, ace TV reporter, Oscar Oranga. Oscar, of course, was being followed by a camera crew. He had a microphone in his hand. “Super Teen, do you have any idea what’s going on here with these munching menaces?”

  “Ah, we’re trying to figure it out…” I said.

  Hana bounded over, standing between Oscar, the cameras and me. “The team from BMS Labs, along with the scientists at Future Now, are trying to get to the bottom of this.”

  “Does that imply one of your giant labs is behind this?” Oscar asked.

  “No, of course not!” Hana said. “As official spokes-android for BMS labs, I can tell you we certainly had nothing to do with this! We, at BMS labs, and our sister team at Future Now Labs, are concerned scientists trying to find answers.” In her firm hypnotic voice, Hana added, “You can turn off your cameras now and go back to chasing movie stars. There is nothing to see here!”

  Oscar bowed. “Fair enough.” He turned to his camera crew. “Let’s boogie team, nothing to see here.”

  They lowered their cameras and walked away. Normally, I don’t appreciate Hana using her powers like that, but this time I wasn’t going to argue. We had enough to worry about right now without the press being involved.

  “Okay, then, what do we do?” Adam asked.

  “We pick up the caterpillars and take them somewhere where they can eat grass and not corn…” I said.

  Lori frowned at me. “How do we do that?”

  “The old-fashioned way. We pick them up and carry them away!”

  My team looked at me. Like seriously.

  “Those of us who can fly will do it!” I explained.

  “Phew, those things are icky. I’m so glad I can’t fly,” Lori said.

  “I’m actually glad too,” Marie said. “Sorry, but my molecule changing powers won't be much help…”

  “No problem,” I said to her. I pointed at the corn. “Flying team, let’s fly!”

  Jason put his hand on my arm. “Actually, I have another idea! One where Marie really can help.”

  “Okay, I’m listening,” I replied.

  “Fly Marie to a field east of here. It’s a field that is covered only in grass. Doctor Jodi, Doctor Megan and I have been working on a scent to attract these flying caterpillars. We only have a little,” he pulled a small vial out of his pocket and showed it to us. “But I’m betting Marie can change the coating of the grass to match this scent. Then the caterpillars will be drawn there.”

  “That does sound like a sound plan,” Adam said.

  The rest of the team nodded in agreement. I looked at Marie. “Are you ready to fly?”

  She smiled. “I am! Just glad I can help.”

  I picked Marie up and lifted off into the air. Hana, Jason, Adam, and Zeke joined us in flight.

  “Let’s hope this works!” Marie said.

  “Oh, it will,” Jason remarked confidently. “I did the math and math doesn’t lie! Math is our faithful friend! Like a dog that doesn’t bark. Well, I guess math can bark in bits!” Jason laughed, making a joke that pretty much only he got.

  “Funny!” Hana said.

  Okay, the android found it funny too.

  “Ha! I get it!” Zeke said.

  I looked at Adam.

  “I doubt that he really got it,” Adam whispered to me.

  Yes, Jason could be a big geek, but I kind of liked that about him. He was never afraid to be himself. Plus, he always had my back!

  Jason pointed down, “That’s the test field! Let’s set down and get started!”

  Dear Diary: Man, this is weird. Somebody somewhere is hacking nature. I don’t like it. I’m not too confident about our fix, either. Using man-made and Marie-made attractants to lure the giant flying caterpillars of destruction away, may not be the best alternative. But I guess it beats hurting the critters. At least, I hope it doesn’t hurt them.

  T
hough it’s nice to be working side by side with Adam and Jason. I really like hanging out with them both. Well, maybe not at the same time, but that feels kind of neat too. I kind of have to admit that I enjoy watching them compete with each other around me. Yeah, I am a superhero but I’m also a kid and a human. I like to note, superhuman is still human. That’s part of the trick about being super…balancing the super with the human. The human always makes it tempting to use the superpowers in ways that might be selfish. I have to work on that all the time.

  More Beastie Bugs

  We landed in the field. It was a nice field as far as fields go, but nothing special, which was fine. I guess the field’s strong point was that it was close to BMS labs. This would make it easier for the scientists to study these flying caterpillars of destruction. Or FCODs as Jason called them.

  When I put Marie down on the ground, she touched some strands of grass with her hand. “I feel bad that I have to transform this amazing grass!” Marie said.

  Jason pulled out the vial of flying caterpillar destruction attractant. “You don’t have to change the entire grass, just the molecules coating the outside of the grass…”

  Marie tilted her head. “Easier said than done…”

  “Most things are!” Zeke said. “Except saying the alphabet backward, that's really tricky…”

  Adam patted Zeke on the back. Zeke smiled. Man, they were an odd duo…so opposite. I could only guess that they complimented each other. Yeah, that had to be it. That’s part of what I liked about Adam…he was way understanding. But, back to the matter at hand…all eyes turned to Marie.

  Jason gave her the vial of caterpillar attractant. Marie opened the vial. She stuck her finger into the vial. She waved her hand over the patch of grass.

  “Did it work?” Adam asked.

  “Yes,” Zeke said.

  “How do you know, bud?” Adam asked.

  Zeke pointed to his nose. “I can smell the difference!”

  “It’s funny,” Jason said. “Even though parts of Zeke’s brain aren’t as active as parts of a normal brain, the parts that are active are very sensitive. In particular, his smell receptors…they’re active and very accurate.”

  “That’s true,” Zeke said proudly. “I always know who farts. Especially when it’s me!”

  Adam patted him on the back. “Good job, buddy.”

  “You must be so proud…” I told Zeke.

  “Okay,” Jason said, moving on. “Now that Marie has duplicated the compound and spread it over the field, we need to get the scent to the other fields.”

  “Super Teen and I can handle that!” Adam said boldly. “We can use superwaves to push the scent towards the farms!”

  I figured Adam was right. We could do this. We moved to the side of the field. Marie, Adam, and Zeke stood behind us to avoid being blown away by accident. That would have been awkward.

  “Let’s lift our arms on the count of one and lower them on two!” I said.

  “Check!” Adam said.

  “I hope they’ve both used their super deodorant!” Zeke whispered. “Of course, if they didn’t, they’ll just knock out the flying buggies. And that would work too. Of course, they’d also KO all the people there. That might not be so cool!”

  “We’ll be okay!” I said. “One!” Adam and I lifted our arms. “Two!” We lowered our arms creating a super breeze. We repeated the process a couple more times.

  “Is it working?” I asked.

  Jason pointed to the sky. Looking up, we saw it was filled with flying caterpillars all heading our way!

  “I’d say that’s a yes!” Jason said.

  “Good teamwork, team!” I said.

  “Great teamwork!” Marie said.

  “I’m proud of us!” Zeke said. “And I didn’t do anything! But I am great at cheering. Go us! Go us! Ra! Ra! Siss! Boom! Ha!”

  “I don’t think you did that right…” Jason told Zeke.

  “There is no right or wrong, just cheering,” Zeke insisted.

  The giant flying caterpillars descended on the field. They started gulping down the grass. All we could hear was CHOMP, CHOMP, CHOMP, CHOMP, CHOMP…

  The air vibrated with the sound of chomping. Suddenly, the chomping stopped. The flying caterpillars dropped to the ground. The chomping sound was replaced by snoring ZZZZZZ sounds.

  “Now that was unexpected,” Jason said.

  “Did I mess up when I created the attractant?” Marie asked.

  “No, if anything, you made it too good!” Jason said. “They just got really hungry.”

  Popping sounds filled the air.

  “What the heck is that?” Zeke asked. “It sounds like popcorn. Is it popcorn?”

  “I don’t think it’s popcorn!” Adam said.

  “It’s not popcorn…” Jason said. “I’m actually a little worried about what I think it is…”

  “How do you know it’s not popcorn?” Zeke asked. “Because now I want popcorn!”

  We saw a bunch of wings. Beautiful colored wings in various shades of blue emerged from the field. The wings started to flap. Hundreds of giant butterflies rose up from the field.

  “They transformed into butterflies,” Jason said.

  “Very big butterflies…” Marie said.

  “Pretty, but I still want popcorn!” Zeke said with his arms crossed. “I like it really burnt…”

  The butterflies flapped their wings; we could feel the force of the flapping.

  “Man, that’s strong…” Marie said.

  “Should we follow them?” I asked.

  “Well, butterflies aren’t nearly as destructive as caterpillars!” Jason commented. “But I still think we should!”

  “Maybe we can get some insight into what is behind this!” Adam suggested.

  Jason nodded. “Agreed!”

  I kind of liked it when the two guys I liked got along. Yeah, I was complicated.

  Pointing my arm in classic superhero style, I flew up into the air. Adam, Jason, and Zeke followed me. Marie stayed on the ground since she couldn’t fly. It made sense.

  Nearing the mass of flying giant butterflies, we felt the force of their wings.

  “Man, these things are strong!” Jason said.

  “But pretty,” Zeke said. “Though I still want popcorn!” he added.

  Just as we got close to the swarm of butterflies, they all opened their wings at once. Black smoke or oil or smoking oil sprayed out at us, coating us in gook that somehow managed to be sticky and slippery at the same time.

  We might have been super, but we still needed to see and breathe air.

  The four of us crashed to the ground. Adam and I being pretty darn invulnerable took the fall without much damage. Jason, being covered in armor didn’t get hurt either. Zeke landed on his head.

  “Ouch!” he said. “Luckily I don’t use that very much!”

  Fighting off the urge to cough and or barf, Adam and I spun at super speed, tossing off the black, icky, goo. Once we were free, we used our super breath to blow the goo off Jason and Zeke.

  “Thanks!” Zeke said. “And your breath is quite pleasant!” he added.

  Glancing upwards, we saw that the swarm of giant butterflies had disappeared.

  “Where’d they go?” I asked Marie. Thankfully, she hadn’t been coated in sticky oil.

  “They just kind of disappeared!” Marie said. “It’s like they can teleport.”

  “So they spout oil like octopi and can teleport,” Zeke said, surprising me that he knew about octopi and oil. “I don’t think those things are normal!”

  Jason bent down and collected some of the oil. He stuck it in a test tube. “At least we have some of this as well as some caterpillar skins to run tests on. That should give us some information!” he said all scientist like. “Let’s get to BMS labs and check it out!”

  “Agreed!” I gave him a firm nod.

  Dear Diary: Yep, this is weird. Super giant butterflies that shoot oil and seem to be able to teleport, jus
t aren’t right. Not sure if they are a danger but based on what they did as caterpillars, I know this isn’t a good thing. Nope, not at all. Plus, even if these things are harmless in butterfly form (they sure were pretty), they will still most likely lay eggs and create more and more super flying and hungry caterpillars. We have to get to the bottom of this. This can’t be a natural thing. The question is, is it supernatural, science that has gone berserk, or something else.

  As weird and annoying as the butterflies (and Zeke) are, I really enjoy working with both Adam and Jason. Man, I like both of those guys a lot. I mean, Jason… I’ve known him forever, and he’s always been there for me. He’s my BFF. I can talk to him about anything, except of course about my feelings towards him. Those are off-limits, at least for now.

  As for Adam, I like him too. He’s strong and smart and always wants to do the right thing. He’s different, like me. He knows the ups and downs of being super. Life isn’t all candy and roses when you’re super. You have to be careful of your every move. Heck, one bad fart and you can drop a city block. Doing that is hard to live down. Saying “oops, my bad…” doesn’t cover it. Plus, Adam is even nice to Zeke. Man, that can’t be easy.

  Wow! I definitely like two guys! Two amazing guys. I guess there are worse problems to have. Like, for instance, giant butterflies and flying caterpillars. I probably should deal with those things before worrying about my emotions and feelings for the two boys in my life. After all, once I find who changed the butterflies, I can pound them. There are times when pounding is good. Pounding is easier than thinking about my feelings.

  To distract myself, I’ll think about beings, instead. I need to find out who could have created these beastie bugs. I guess a good place to start would be with people who can create such weird creatures. My wannabe arch nemesis (yes, I have one, sort of), is Paula. She’s super smart and longs to be a supervillain. She is also rich so she could do something like this.