# 12 Millie Milkweed, Mermaid!

So not much has happened around here lately - unless you count Mrs. Carruthers, our old neighbor, screeching about seeing Miss Direcque, the town librarian, riding a broomstick above Meteor Park (yeah, Pluto tends to overdo the outer space references) a couple of weeks ago. She swears that when Miss Direcque saw her, she actually cackled.
Weird.
So anyway, Millie Milkweed (swear to God that's her real name), who's in my Honors Physics class, was acting kind of strange in class yesterday. I don't usually pay attention to strange things in my classes, given that the majority of kids in my school...actually...in the whole town, are by definition wacky.
Millie is no exception.
I was busy trying to figure out the assignment Mr. Stratum had just given us, when I noticed out the corner of my eye that Millie was acting kind of bizarre. I would have ignored it, except for the fact that Zach Zanto commented on it.
"What's with her?" he hissed, raising one silvery-blond eyebrow.
I glanced over at Millie. If Zach, who I KNOW is an alien (though I haven't been able to prove it yet), thinks Millie is weird, then Man, she's got to be behaving even weirder than usual.
I paid attention.
Zach was right. Millie was fidgeting from side to side, and I swear she was rustling. I don't mean her clothes were rustling. I mean SHE was rustling, like dry leaves on a windy day.
Can't be, I thought, and turned back to my work. I noticed Zach was staring at her unblinking with those bizarre otherworldly eyes of his.
"Hey Man, we gotta finish this by the end of class," I whispered.
"Already done," he said, not taking his eyes off Millie.
I shrugged. Whatever. And got back to my work.
At least  I tried to. Between Millie's rustling, which was steadily getting worse, and Zach's freaky staring, I couldn't concentrate. Giving up, I threw my pen down and turned to Millie.
"Psssst! Hey Millie?"
I know she heard me, but she acted like she didn't. Her fidgeting was getting worse. By now most of the class was staring at her.
"Millie?" I said again, a little louder this time. I glanced quickly at Mr. Stratum, but he was busy writing some formulas on the board.
She froze. I mean literally froze. Her body stopped in mid-shift, her eyes locked in place, and she looked as if she were holding her breath.
I leaned over and shook her arm. It felt crepey, like Christmas tissue paper.  Creeped out, I snatched it away.
She turned slowly toward me and I felt the hairs on the back of my neck stand out like an angry porcupine.  She opened her mouth to speak, but the only thing that came out was a long sigh, like the sound of the ocean on a quiet day.  You know, that whooshing sound the sea makes?
"Millie!" I said again, "Are-are you all right? You look...um...kinda...I dunno..."
She got slowly to her feet. "Wa...ter," she whispered, in a voice as dry and dessicated as a corn husk.
"There-there's a drinking fountain down the hall," I said, wondering why it was that every weirdo in Pluto ends up in my classes.
She gave me a weak smile and turned toward the door. We all turned to watch her leave. She hobbled slowly toward the door, each step worse than the one before. By the time she reached the door, she was dragging her right foot behind her.
I made a snap decision and raised my hand. "Sir? Mr. Stratum?"
He turned from the blackboard. "What is it Mr. Beaker?"
"I think Millie Milkweed needs help Sir. May I go after her?"
Mr. Stratum looked in surprise at Millie's empty desk. He nodded. "Go ahead. Escort her to the infirmary, but make sure you come right back."
"Yes sir." I sprang up and galloped out the door. Millie was nowhere in sight. I wandered the halls for a while, but couldn't see her anywhere. I ran to the infirmary, but the only sick person there was Deadeye Danny.
He was sitting on one of the bunks, drinking something that looked like a beetroot smoothie, but when he caught me staring at him, he stopped and slowly lowered the glass. He smiled at me, his pure white  teeth glistening in the ray of sunshine filtering in through the blinds. Jeez, his incisors were long, or was I just imagining that?
"Hey Beaker," he said. "How goes it?"
"Fine, fine," I said, nodding. "I'm fine. Just fine." Could I have been any more of a Dork? "Er...how are you?"
Danny's grin widened, allowing me a clearer view of his teeth. Those incisors WERE sharp;  and long. They were way longer than they needed to be.
"I'm good," he said, raising his glass to me. "Just peachy." He took another long swig and smacked his lips. "Ahhh, that's good." Then he frowned at me. "What are you doing out of class Beaker? Don't you know it's not wise to wander the halls by yourself?"
"Yeah...um...yeah," I said. I cleared my throat. "Actually, I'm looking for Millie Milkweed. She...uh...she hasn't been by here, has she?" That's not her you're drinking out of that glass, I thought. Pleae tell me it's not.
"She did come by here, but I suggested she try the Whirlpool tub in the girls' locker room."
I stared at him. "Pardon?"
He smiled and swigged the rest of his drink down. When it was empty, he set it down with a satisfying thump. Satisfying on his part, that is. Me, I was still trying to figure out what he said.
He glanced up at me and slowly got to his feet. "You still here?" he said. "I suggest you beat a hasty retreat to the girls' locker room and check on Millie."
I didn't wait to point out that boys weren't allowed in the girls' locker room. I turned and did what he said, beat a hasty retreat toward the locker rooms. Our new gym and the boys and girls locker room were brand new, with everything an athlete could want in them, including therapy tubs with those jets in them for sore muscles. The money was donated by old man Centennus, who lived alone way up on Echo Hill. He was the town gajillionaire and was always donating money for something new for the town. He was weird as heck, but nobody complained because he did so much for Pluto.
When I got to the locker rooms, there was nobody around. I checked the gym. Nothing. I waited, hoping some girl would come by that I could ask to please go in and check on Millie.
After five minutes, I decided maybe I ought to get back to class before Mr. Stratum foisted more homework on me for goofing around. I was halfway back to class when I heard a squelching sound behind me. I turned to see Millie walking up--scratch that--she was skipping toward me as if she hadn't a care in the world.
I stared at her. She smiled at me, looking all pretty and shiny, like a brand new penny.
"Hi Rodney," she said, linking her arm through mine. "What are you doing out of class?"
"I was...I was..." The squelching sound continued as we walked. I stopped and looked at her feet. Her shoes were soaking wet. As a matter of fact, she was wet all over, and my arm which was linked thorugh hers, was getting pretty wet too.
"Millie, what the heck--"
She glanced down. "Oh this? It's nothing. One of the faucets in the bathroom sprayed me. No big deal."
She was lying. I mean, you don't get soaked like that, from head to foot, just from a leaky faucet. She looked like she dove, head first, into a pool of water.
Or a bathtub. Wait! What was it Deadeye Danny said? Something about telling her there was a tub in the locker rooms?
"Come on," she said, tugging at me. "We don't want to get yelled at."
I let her lead me back to class.
"Tell me Rodney," she said, looking out the windows as we walked, "Do you believe in mermaids?"

# 11 Zach Zanto, Space Cadet

Zach Zanto! Have you ever heard a cooler name? Ever? I haven't. Far as I'm concerned, a guy with a name like that is destined to be cool.

No one really knows anything about Zach, which isn't saying much since this is after all Pluto, Washington. Weird is normal here, so no one asks a whole lot of questions. It's the greatest place in the world to live, especially if you or your family don't fit that whole Brady Bunch persona. (That's my new word...persona). Anyway, no one really remembers when Zach started school here. A bunch of us tried to figure it out one day during recess, but no one could actually remember Zach's first day. I mean one day he wasn't there, and the next day he was. We just can't figure out when. Weird huh?

I got to know him a little better this semester since he sits next to me in Honors Physics. There's only nine of us in the class, so our teacher, Mr. Stratum (yep! That's his real name), has us all sit in a semi-circle facing his chair. Zach sits to my left, and Millie Milkweed sits on my right side. You know the funny thing about Millie, and I don't mean funny ha-ha, I mean funny strange? She...oh...never mind! That's another story. Back to Zach, like I said, he sits next to me now, and at first I never noticed anything weird about him...at least...no weirder than usual. Then things started happening.

I started paying more attention to Zach when I noticed his silvery blonde hair making a crackling sound.You know that staticky kind of sound you get on the radio in your mom or dad's car when you're trying to get a decent station and they don't have satellite radio? It's annoying, like a bunch of angry bees getting ready to charge you. Well, that's the sound that was coming from Zach's hair. At first I thought he had one of those old-fashioned radio headsets with him, but when I looked closer to see if he was wearing ear buds, I realized his hair was moving. Yeah, you heard me! I said his hair was moving. At first I figured maybe the wind was ruffling his hair, right? I mean, how else would someone's hair move? Then it slowly dawned on me that the windows were shut tight because it was the middle of winter. There was no wind! What the hey, Man?

I stared at Zach, or rather, Zach's hair, moving around his head, making that strange buzzing sound, and I must have looked pretty freaked out because Mr. Stratum asked me in a very loud voice if I was all right. I didn't answer because I didn't know he was talking to me, and anyway, I seemed to have swallowed my tongue.

"Mr. Beaker!" Mr. Stratum barked, making me jump.

I blinked, looking around. "Yessir?"

"Please tell the class what you find so fascinating about Mr. Zanto's hair?"

"Wh-what?" I croaked, knowing my face was turning tomato-red.

"You've been staring at Mr. Zanto's hair for a full five minutes. Please enlighten the rest of the class as to why."

I swallowed, wishing I could dive under my chair and have it gobble me whole. "I just...I just..I mean..I don't..." I stammered. Oh brother, could I sound any more of a loser? I mean, what was I supposed to say? Zach's hair is ALIVE! Check it out!

"As I suspected, you haven't paid any attention to the problem we're discussing. Since I can only assume you already know the answer, perhaps you'll be good enough to share it with us."

I stared at the jumble of numbers and equations in front of me, trying to make some sense of it, but a part of me was acutely aware of Zach's grey eyes on me, watching me closely. I don't know how, but I felt like I saw something I wasn't supposed to and that Zach was far from happy about it. A cold shiver went down my spine, and it took all of my will power not to leap up and run screaming from the room.

I must have muttered the correct answer because Mr. Stratum grunted and moved on with the class. I let out a big gust of air and before I could stop myself, I glanced over at Zach. He was still watching me closely...only...and I swear on my great-grandma's grave this is true -- his eyes turned from a dark grey to the same color as his hair.

That cold shiver I felt earlier? It washed over me like a cold shower as I stared into those unearthly silvery eyes. I struggled to remember. Were his eyes always that color and just looked darker depending on what angle you saw him from? Maybe he normally wore darker clothes that made his eyes seem greyer than they are? No! Staring at him then, unable to tear my gaze away, I knew, I just knew that his eyes had changed. And there was something else that convinced me I was right. Zach was smiling at me as if he knew I knew.

And it was the kind of smile that froze you in your tracks.

As soon as class was over, I grabbed my books and hurtled out of the room as if a hungry bear were after me. I didn't even wait for Mr. Stratum to hand out the homework assignment. I hightailed it to the cafeteria, bursting to tell Fatty and Wiggy and the other guys about what I saw, but as I turned the corner that led to the cafeteria I skidded to a stop.

There, right in front of me, was Zach. And he wasn't even breathing hard.

"How--?" I croaked.

He shrugged, smiling that same knowing smile again. "I took a short cut."

I shook my head. "A shortcut? But...there isn't one from the Physics Lab. What--"

He laughed, cutting me off. "Obviously there is Beaker. How else would you explain how I beat you here?"

He had me there. "I guess you're right," I said, but I wasn't convinced. To paraphrase my favorite detective of all time, the great Sherlock Holmes, something was amiss here. "Um...did you want something?" I asked, hoping it wasn't my head.

He held out his hand. "Here. You ran out so fast you forgot your homework."

I took the paper he held out to me, wondering if maybe I overreacted a smidge. "Oh...yeah...thanks. Um...Zach?"

His eyes drilled into mine. "Yes Beaker?"

"Your eyes...um..."

His smile widened, making my legs quake. "They're...uh...kind of silver..."

"And?"

"Well...I...uh...I could have sworn they were grey before..."

He stared at me a moment before answering. "Before what Beaker?" he said, so softly I barely heard him.

"Be..before class," I stammered, feeling like an idiot.

He didn't say anything, just continued to stare at me. Then he took one step closer to me and looked me eye to eye. "This is my true eye color Beaker," he said in that same soft, but somehow menacing tone. "In fact, we all have the same eye color where I come from."

I swallowed. "Wh...wh...where do you come from?" I asked, terrified of what his answer might be, but desperately needing to know.

He didn't say anything. Instead he glanced out of the window and pointed up at the sky with one long index finger. I was suddenly reminded of ET and thought that maybe his finger was going to light up or something. I held my breath and waited.

His strange, silvery eyes turned back to me. "Come over to my house some night when the sky is clear and I'll show you," he said. Then he turned and walked into the cafeteria, whistling the theme from "2001: A Space Odyssey."

# 10 : Will The Real Fart-Face Freddy Please Stand Up!

So, Freddy Jacoby's dad is a Geneticist, which, best I can figure, is a doctor who fools around with your genes and stuff. According to my dad, who by the way, is a pretty cool scientist, Dr. Jacoby's supposed to be this genius-type guy who's done amazing things to change the world, but you'd never know it by looking at Freddy.

Freddy's nickname is "Fart-Face Freddy," on account of how he's always burping and belching up a storm all freaking day long. Mom says burping is rude, and Dad says it's because it's like an upside-down fart, which is how Freddy got his nickname. I'm not sure who started it, only that he's been Fart-Face Freddy for as long as I've known him, which is actually not that long. He and his dad moved to Pluto about six months ago, as if things here weren't weird enough.

It's not like nobody likes Freddy. He's a pretty regular guy for the most part. It's his dad who's downright loopy and gives everyone the willies. Here's a for instance: Freddy missed school for a couple of days on account of he had the flu, so our homeroom teacher, Miss Regus, got some homework together for him from the other teachers and asked Fatty and me to take it to him after school since it was on our way home. Neither of us really wanted to go to Dr. J's house -- there's always weird sounds coming from his basement and sometimes even smoke billowing out the basement windows -- but we didn't want to say no to Miss Regus. She kind of looks like Angelina Jolie from a distance.

So there we are, standing outside Freddy's house, staring at the front door. As usual, all kinds of high-pitched, squeaky sounds are coming from the basement, and this time the house even shakes slightly. Fatty and I look at each other and decide to do "Rock, Paper, Scissors" to see who got to go up to the front door and ring the bell.

Why the heck did I do Rock? Paper always covers Rock. Always. When it comes to R/P/S I am the worst person in the world to play it. I always lose. Which is how come I'm standing at Dr. J's front door, trying to get up the nerve to press the doorbell. Before I can talk myself into it, the door is yanked open and Dr. J. himself is standing there, staring at me with those "mad scientist" glasses of his, which make his eyes look like they were ten times too big for his face. His black hair is streaked with grey and standing straight up, like he stuck his fingers into a socket and got a big ol' electric charge. He looks exactly like what you'd expect from a mad scientist, even though he's really a Geneticist. Like my gran-gran always says, "Six of one; half a dozen of the other."

"Hi...er...hi, Dr. J-Jacoby." Geez Louise, is that girly voice really mine?

He peers at me, then at Fatty quaking behind me. "Felicitations Boys," he booms, making me jump. Fatty lets out a little yelp.

"Uh...sir?"

"Hello...welcome," he says, thrusting his hand out. I stare at it, feeling all gurgly inside, like I'm going to barf. His hand's got something green and jelly-like dripping from it. What the hey?

"Is...is...is..." I stammer.

"Spit it out, Son," Dr. J. barks, and I jump again. His voice sounds like a foghorn.

"We have Fart...I mean...Freddy's homework," Fatty stammers from behind me.

Dr. J. claps his hands, making the green stuff on them fly off in different directions. I close my eyes, praying none of it lands on me. I don't want to metamorphize into some big, green, alien glob.

"Come in! Come in!" he yells, hauling me in by my hoodie, and yanking Fatty by the arm. "Freddy will be delighted to see you. It hasn't been much fun for him the last two days, what with the fever and vomiting and diarrhea, you know?"

We nod, and I'm pretty sure Fatty is as ready to blow chunks as I am. "Yessir," I mumble. "Um, is he okay now? Maybe we should just leave this with--"

"Nonsense! Nonsense!" the good doctor yells, grabbing us both by our hoodies and shoving us ahead of him up the stairs. "Go on up. First door on your left."

We almost trip in our hurry to get away from him, and burst into Freddy's room without even knocking. Freddy, who's propped up in bed reading a bunch of comic books, almost jumps out of his pjs.

"Geez! You guys almost gave me a heart attack," he croaks, then starts to cough like he's going to hack up a lung. We wait until he finishes, then I hold out the homework packet.

"Miss Regus sent this for you," I say. "Merry Christmas."

Freddy peers at the folder in my hands, then groans. "Homework? You gotta be kidding me?" He looks so upset I feel sorry for him.

"Want some company?" I say, before I can stop myself.

"Freddy's face lights up like fireworks on the 4th., and I'm glad I said it. Ignoring the look on Fatty's face, I mosey on up to Freddy's bed and plop down near his feet. "So watcha been doin' the last two days?"

Freddy's face scrunches up like a squeezed sponge. "Mostly barfing my guts out, but it's not so bad. Dad got me a bunch of my favorite comic books, plus all the soda I can drink. And I get to stay in bed all day and watch as much TV as I want."

"Wow!" Fatty says, finally finding his voice. "You get to watch TV all day, and read comic books? Way cool!"

Freddy grins. "Yeah, my dad's pretty cool."

That isn't exactly the word that pops into my head when I think of Freddy's dad, but okay. I mean he's the guy's dad, right? Speaking of which, I figure this is the perfect time to find out more about the weirdness that is Freddy's dad. "Say, what's your dad working on?" I say as casually as possible. "I mean, his hands were covered in some green goop when he answered the door. What gives?"

Freddy rolls his eyes. "Who knows? I mean Dad's always working on something or other."

"So what's a Gene...uh...?" Fatty asks.

"Geneticist?" Freddy offers.

"Yeah, that. What's he do exactly?"

Freddy shrugs. "Oh, you know? Gene-splicing. Cloning. That kind of thing," he mumbles, thumbing through the homework packet. "Man, look at all the math," he groans.

But Fatty is clearly fixated on the subject of Freddy's dad. "Cloning?" he croaks, glancing over his shoulder like he expects to see Dr. J. standing there with a scalpel, ready to gouge some skin out of him. "Uh, Rod? We gotta go. My mom's gonna be wondering where I am."

Yeah, right. "Fine," I say, rolling my eyes. "See you at school tomorrow Freddy?"

"Maybe," he says. "Depends on whether I get this homework done in time."

As we're leaving, Freddy calls out, "Oh, by the way, don't forget to say hi to Seymour."

"Okay," I say, as I close the door behind me.

"Who's Seymour?" Fatty asks as we make our way back downstairs.

"Beats me. Maybe he's got a cat."

As we reach the bottom step, the door to the basement opens...AND FREDDY SAUNTERS OUT!

"Oh! Hey guys," he says, grinning and walking up to us.

"It's a clone," Fatty yells, and for a second we both just stand there staring at the dead-ringer for Freddy coming toward us.

The Freddy clone frowns at us. "What?" he says, and that does it.

Before anyone else can say anything, Fatty and I are out the door, screaming our lungs out. We don't stop until we've run about a half mile, when Fatty collapses to the ground, out of breath.

"It's...a...a..." he croaks weakly.

"...A freakin' Freddy clone," I finish for him, doubled over, panting. "Oh snap! Freddy's dad's like some kind of Frankenstein."

"None of us are safe," Fatty wheezes, getting to his feet. "Come on. We gotta tell Barney."

Barney is Fatty's older brother, and a cop. He's in the family room, watching "Cops," and almost falls off the couch when Fatty and I run in screaming his name. When we tell him what we saw, Barney looks skeptical, but promises to check it out. He grabs his keys and tells us to stay put until he gets back.

While we're waiting for Barney, I call Mom to tell her where I am, then Fatty and I grab a snack and we watch an "X-Files" rerun. It seems like forever before Barney returns, but finally the front door opens and Barney comes in. Fatty and I jump up, ready to hear all about the cloned army of Freddys in Dr. J.'s basement lab.

"Well?" we say together.

In response, Barney strides up to us, and smacks us both upside the head.

"Ouch," I yell.

"What was that for, you jerk?" Fatty screams at him.

"For sending me up to the Jacobys for nothing," Barney says.

"You mean you didn't see Freddy's clone?" I ask.

"No," Barney says, finishing off the rest of my sandwich. "But I did meet Seymour, his twin brother who lives with their mother in New Orleans. When he heard Freddy was sick, he came up for a visit."

Twin brother! Fatty and I look at each other. Hey, it's not our fault that we thought Seymour was a clone, right? I mean, no one, not even Freddy, told us that he had an identical twin brother who lived with their mom in New Orleans.

You would have thought the same. Right? Am I right? I mean, come on...this is Pluto!

# 9 : Who's your Daddy, Mummy?

Halloween is finally here. Excellent! I mean if there's one thing that Pluto, Washington does better than any place else on earth, it's Halloween. Figures right? After all, this is Freaksville revisited.

Anyway, Fatty, Wiley, Cody, Marion, Wiggy and me decide to Trick-or-Treat together before the big Halloween party at my house afterwards. The whole class is invited, even Deadeye Danny and Felix, whose ankle mended practically overnight after his accident last week. We all decided pretty early on what costumes we were gonna wear, which is pretty important since no one wants to be caught dead wearing what someone else is. Fatty is going as Thor, the Thunder God from the Avengers comic book, Wiley is going as a big, green lizard, Cody is going as a mad scientist, Marion is going as a werewolf (big surprise there), Wiggy is going as a Mummy, and I'm going as Spock, the Vulcan from the old TV series, Star Trek. Most of my friends have no idea who he is, but my dad, who is a physicist, loves the show, so we watch the DVDs all the time. I'm really excited about my costume, since my mom made me a blue Star Trek Science Officer costume just like Spock's, and bought me an official pair of Spock ears and a Phaser. Only the Phaser can't really zap anyone, which is too bad.

So we all meet up at the Crossroads, where four streets converge, since it's the halfway point for all of us. Everyone looks pretty cool in their costumes, except for Wiley, who looks more like a big green pickle than a lizard.  He's not happy about the way it turned out, so he's kind of in a bad mood. Anyway, we're all standing there, waiting for Wiggy to turn up, and he's late as usual, and we're getting pretty bummed, when Fatty sees him on Constellation Way.

"Hey, Wiggy. Hurry up man! Al the good candy'll be gone by the time we start," Fatty yells.

Wiggy, who was lumbering down the street, really playing up the whole Mummy walk, turns toward us and straggles over, dragging part of his bandage costume behind him. He looks great! If I didn't know it was him under there, I might've gotten spooked.

"Okay, we're all here. Let's go," Cody yells, and we all start toward Elm Street, with Wiggy bringing up the rear. We're all so eager to get started, we don't even wait for him to catch up.

Trick-or-Treating is one of the best things ever invented by man. I mean, think about it? Getting dressed up in a fun costume on the spookiest night of the year, and going right up to people's houses, ringing their doorbell and holding your bag open for them to drop candy into it while you yell, "Trick or Treat?" Is that the best racket ever or what?

So we're Trick-or-Treating for a while, when I notice that Wiggy doesn't have his bag with him. "Dude, where's your bag of candy?" I say, and he looks at me and makes a weird moaning sound. Uh Oh! "Guys?" I yell at the others. "Wait up! I think Wiggy ate all his candy and has a stomach ache."

"Are you gonna throw up?" Fatty says, taking a step back.

Wiggy moans again. We all look at each other, then back at Wiggy.

"He doesn't look so good," Marion says, then raises his head and sniffs the air.  "And he smells kinda funky. Wiggy, you need a shower, Dude."

Wiggy moans again and kind of staggers toward us. I start to get a little worried. "Hey guys, you don't think he ate some bad candy, do you?"

Marion looks at me, his big, shaggy fake werewolf eyebrows drawing together in a big ol' frown. "What? You mean like poisoned candy?" he says.

"No! I yell. "That's not what I meant, but thanks for putting that out there." I look at Wiggy again as he's shuffling around, looking like he's going to keel over any minute.

"Poisoned? Oh crap!" Fatty yells, his eyes bulging like they're ready to pop out of his skull. The effect makes him look like one messed-up Thunder God.

"Nobody said anything about poison," I yell back, but by this time we're all pretty freaked out.

"I vote we go back to Rod's house," Marion says. "His mom's a doctor. She'll know what to do."

"Good idea," Wiley chimes in, nodding so hard, his lizard head wobbles back and forth. "Besides the others'll start arriving soon."

"Never mind the others," I yell, grabbing one of Wiggy's bandaged arms and pulling him behind me. "C'mon. Let's get home before he throws up."

"Or dies," Wiley adds, running behind me with his lizard head in his arms.

"Shut up," Marion hisses, looking so fierce in his werewolf getup that Wiley clamps his mouth shut and runs ahead, leading the way.

At my house, we all burst in talking at once, making the twins scream, and my mom almost have a heart attack.

"Rodney!" she snaps. "Don't do that again. You boys almost gave me a heart attack." (See? That's how I know she almost had one).

As soon as we explain what's happened to Wiggy, Mom takes charge. "Good Heavens," she says, peering at him closely. "You do look a tad green under those grubby bandages, Willard (that's his real name. Do you blame him for preferring Wiggy?). Come on, I'll help you get them off and we'll take a closer look at you."

Just as she reaches for him, the front doorbell rings. "I'll get it," I say. "It's probably some of the kids for the party."

I yank the front door open.

And almost pee my pants.

Wiggy is standing out there, grinning at me. "Hey Dude!" he says. "Sorry I missed Trick-or-Treating. Had to help my dad change a couple of tires on the pickup. How'd it go? You gonna share?"

I stare at him. I open my mouth to say something...anything...but nothing comes out.

Wiggy frowns at me. "Hey, you okay? What's up? You're not mad, are you? I couldn't help it, okay? My dad needed my help."

"Rodney?" Mom calls out. "Who is it? My goodness, Willard, your mom must have bought out all the bandages in the pharmacy. I can't believe how you're covered in them."

I turn slowly toward Mom and fake-Wiggy, my heart pounding like it's gonna jump outta my chest and take off. "It's...it's...it's.." I croak.

Everyone turns toward me. Unable to continue, I step aside.

For a second nobody says anything, then as one, they turn to look at fake-Wiggy wrapped in bandages, then back at real Wiggy dressed in a really bad Mummy costume, which is actually just toilet paper wrapped around him, and which has already unraveled on his head.

"Willard?" Mom says uncertainly, turning from him to the Mummy standing next to her, which is, by the way, still moaning. "Then...then who's this?"

For another second no one moves or says a word.

Then Wiley and Cody scream together, and make a beeline for the door, knocking over both Wiggy and me as they hightail it out of my house.

"It's a real Mummy," Fatty screams, and falls over Klingon, my dog, who's whining and running in circles around Fatty's legs.

By this time, Mom has a huge handful of bandages in her hands, and the top half of a decrepit looking head is revealed and these eerie, hollow eye sockets are staring at her.

"Oh...dear," Mom whispers, and I think she's going to faint. I run over to catch her just as she starts to sink to the floor, the bandages falling from her hands. Just as Marion and I catch her, the Mummy grabs the bandages and lumbers toward the bay window in the family room. Both the twins are holding each other and screaming, huddled on the couch, but the Mummy ignores them. He reaches the window and in one lightning-fast move, jumps right through it onto the front yard. By now we're all pretty petrified and scream together in stereo, and I'm pretty sure there wasn't a dry pair of underwear anywhere in the room at that moment.

We all run toward the window and peer out, and there he is, lumbering down the street, looking spooky and otherworldly in the glow of the lamp posts. His moans come floating back to us on the night air.

"Man," says Wiggy. "I've never seen any guy get that mad at having someone else wear the same costume as him. Talk about an over-reaction!"

Hey, nobody ever said Wiggy was the sharpest tool in the shed.

# 8 : Do cat people get hair balls?

So there's this kid in my class who's an amazing athlete. And when I say amazing, I mean out-of-this-world-how-the-heck-does-he-do-it-amazing! The guy is so coordinated he could probably balance his entire weight on a dime propped on its side.

Felix Fine has only been at Planet Nine Elementary for two months, but already he's the best athlete in the school. He can run faster than anyone (except for Marion Dorsey when the moon is full), jump higher and throw farther, and can do it all without even breaking a sweat. The guy is like a superhero. Which is why it's so awesome that I got picked to partner up with him for our Social Studies project. I've been trying to make friends with Felix since he started at the school, but it hasn't been easy. He doesn't talk at all unless the teacher picks on him to answer a question, and even then he talks in this quiet, soft voice barely above a whisper. Some of the kids like Cody Tyler think he's kind of strange.   Cody is the kid whose head expands like a big blue balloon when he smells some kind of flower, so who is he to talk? Anyway, I think Felix is way cool, so I was pumped about going over to his house after school today to work on our project. Maybe he'd teach me how to do that jump shot of his so I could land some baskets like he does. He makes a basket every time he gets the ball. Every time. Some day Felix'll be playing for a pro basketball team and we'll all be saying we knew him when. How cool is that?

So anyway, I get to Felix's house and his mother lets me in. She's thin like Felix and walks like him, so softly that I didn't hear her footsteps. Her eyes are wide and curve up at the edges, but what I notice 
most are the color. They're bright green, just like Felix's, and they kind of glow as they stare at me. I don't know what to say, so I stammer.

"Hi...uh...Miss...Mrs....um...Fine. I'm here for my homework....I mean...Felix's homework. No, that's not right. I mean---"

"---I know what you mean young man. Felix is expecting you. He's up in his room. You may go on up. Second door on the left."

She steps aside to let me in, then kind of glides down the hall. As I start to head up, she turns and says, "Would you like a glass of milk? It's full fat."

Weird! "Uh...no thanks," I say and watch her as she walks away. It's uncanny. Her footsteps don't make a sound. I feel a little weirded out, but clump up the stairs feeling like a charging rhino. I try to make as little noise as possible just because there's not a sound in the whole house, but the stairs creak and groan no matter how quiet I try to be.

At Felix's bedroom door I pause. I raise my hand to knock, but before I can the door opens and Felix is standing there looking at me with those strange green eyes he inherited from his mom.

"Hi!" I say, a little too loudly, wishing with all my heart that Fatty and Wiley were here with me. Maybe then I wouldn't feel so creeped out.

Felix inclines his head. "Rodney. Please come in."

I step into his room and my jaw drops open. The walls of his room are plastered with pictures of cats. I mean they're everywhere! And I don't mean kitty cats either. I mean gigantic lions, tigers, cheetah, leopards, jaguars, panthers, cougars, bob cats. In fact, every kind of feline known to man, and even a few that I'm pretty sure haven't been discovered yet. And there weren't just posters. There were statues everywhere.

"Wow!" was all I could manage. "You...er...you really like cats, huh?" I lean over to look at a shiny black stone statue of a cat.

"That's Bastet," Felix says from behind me. At the sound of his voice I jump. I didn't expect him to slink up behind me so quickly.

"Who?"

"She's a Cat-Goddess from Ancient Egypt." He gestures around his room. "All these statues are of her."

"Why?" I say.

He looks puzzled. His green eyes glitter in the darkness of his room. "Why what?"

I shrug. "Why do you have so many statues of a dead goddess from Ancient Egypt?" Seems like a reasonable question, right?

Wrong!

"She's not dead," he hisses, his eyes flashing now. "Bastet lives, but in a world of non-believers." His head whips around, and I stumble back. "She is closer than you think," he says softly. "And soon her full power will be restored to her, and when that happens those who mock her will pay."

Time to leave.

"I see...o-kay. Um...listen, maybe we should put off working on the paper until tomorrow, huh? I...I just remembered my mom has some chores she wants me to do. We...er..we could meet at the town library and work on it there."

Silence.

I clear my throat. "So, wh-what do you say?"

"If that's what you want."

Whew! "Great! That's great." I can't seem to stop nodding. "So, I guess I'll leave now then. I mean, those chores won't do themselves, you know?" I start toward the door. "See you at school tomorrow," I say, turning to look at him.

Man, I wish I hadn't turned. Felix is crouched on the window ledge, staring at me with those bright green eyes. "Tomorrow then," he says softly, and before I can yell or stop him or do anything he leaps out the window. At first I'm frozen in shock, then when I hear a yowl from the ground below I run over to the window. Felix is nowhere in sight, but my bike is on lying on its side and a black cat is sitting beside it licking its right front paw.

I turn and run down, wondering what the heck happened to Felix. Ahead of me, Mrs. Fine is at the door, moving faster than I've ever seen a grownup move. By the time I run outside, she's scooped up the kitty and is cradling it in her arms, whispering in its ear.

"What happened to Felix?" I say, panting.

"I'm sure he's fine," she says, her attention focused on the cat in her arms that is clearly in pain, judging from the sounds its making.

"What happened to the cat?' I ask.

""It seems he...it...collided with your bike when it landed," she whispers.

"Landed from where?" I glance up and the only window I see is in Felix's bedroom directly above us.

"And where's Felix?" I glance around but there's no one else there except for the two of us and the squirming cat.

She looks up at me then. "It's getting dark," she say softly. "You'd better get home. Your mother will worry." She glides to the front door, the cat in her arms.

"What are you going to do?" I say, wondering what the heck is going on here.

"I'm going to bandage his injured hand," she says, holding the cat's right front paw very gently in her hand. "Goodnight young man."

The front door closes behind her and I'm left standing alone outside, thinking this is a pretty weird day, even by Plutonian standards.

The next day at school during gym class I see Felix sitting on the bleachers. "I wonder why he's not dressed for gym?" I say.

"Oh, didn't you hear?" Fatty says to me, bouncing a basketball off my head. "He hurt his right hand yesterday and has to wait until it heals."

# 7 : Sing It Loud, Sing It Strong!

Chemistry is one of my favorite subjects, which makes Tuesday and Thursday two of my favorite days of the week. On Tuesday I have Chemistry class, where we learn all about the Periodic Table of Elements, and how everything in the world, whether it's a rock or an animal or a person, contains a chemical composition. On Thursday, it's even more fun. It's Lab Day! I tell you, people, nothing but nothing is more fun than mixing together a bunch of chemicals and waiting to see what happens. Which reminds me of the time Deepak Desai, this really smart kid from India, who spoke kind of in a singsong way, but nobody cared 'cos he was so freakily smart, anyway, he mixed up a combination of chemicals that affected all of us in the room in a really weird way.

I mean really weird.

As soon as Deepak added the final chemical to his beaker, something bizarre started to happen. The mixture started foaming and bubbling, and a green smoke came out that slowly curled over the whole room. For the longest time we all just stared at it. I thought it was the coolest thing I'd seen since Marion Dorsey took off on all fours with the softball in his mouth during our night game against the Thundering Typhoons.

Then Mr. Kellogg, our science teacher, who's actually a pretty cool guy, started barking orders for us to evacuate the room until the green smoke cleared. Of course none of us moved. We were all too busy watching the smoke curl over our heads. It wasn't until it started to slowly descend that we got a little nervous. Mr. K. opened his mouth to yell at us again, only his yell came out like a song. No kidding!

We all turned to stare at him as he sang at the top of his lungs for us to leave the room in an orderly fashion. Some of the kids started snickering, some snorted, but most of us just stared at him as if he'd lost his mind. Shelley McElroy opened her mouth to ask him if he was okay, but she started singing too. It was too good to be true. There they were, teacher and student, both singing at the top of their lungs, and by the look on their faces, they were as shocked as the rest of us.

We couldn't help it. We all burst out laughing as Shelley screeched in her horrible soprano voice that something was wrong, and what was happening, and Mr. K. warbled back in his falsetto that he had no idea, but please try not to panic, and everyone else keep their mouths shut and march in single file to the nurse's office.

It was then that Susie Lyons started to cry, only her cries came out like a long, loud screech that started high then went low then back up then down, like she was some crazed opera singer. She ran for the door, her hands against her mouth, and it jump-started everyone else in the room. We all took off for the door, our hands pressed tightly against our mouths as we tried to stifle our guffaws. Mr. K sang out for us to proceed in an orderly fashion, which made it even harder not to laugh out loud.

At Nurse Crimshaw's office, it was mass hysteria. Anyone who opened their mouth started yodeling their brains off, and soon half the class sounded as if they were in a Broadway musical - a really, really bad one. Fatty, Wiley and I knew better. We just stood in the corner and watched the whole show. It was the best day we'd had at school in a long time.

Things got even better. By the time the chaos died down, the nurse's office was filled with the class, the principal, Mrs. Watson, the vice-principal, Mrs. Humphry, Coach Mayfield and a couple of Emergency Medical Technicians, who pulled up to the school in an ambulance with their sirens blaring. It was excellent!!

About fifteen minutes later, everything started to return to normal. Mr. K's voice started to sound more like talking than singing and the girls' crying and even some of the boys' started to sound more like regular bawling instead of the continuous warbling shooting out of their mouths. Turns out, the mixture Deepak had concocted had done something to everyone's vocal chords for a short time, so whenever someone opened their mouths to speak, they started singing. Imagine that!

Chemistry Lab was pretty quiet after that. Mr. K. monitors Deepak pretty closely now to make sure he doesn't come up with another weird concoction. I think he's afraid that the next one might have him dancing and twirling around the room like a prima ballerina. He'd never live that down!

Deepak took everything that happened in stride. When we asked him what happened after he had to go see Mrs. Watson in her office, Deepak shrugged and said that she and Mr. Kellogg decided they couldn't really punish him since what had happened was an accident. "Probably best for them to keep believing that," he added. Then he smiled at us and winked.