The Case of the Exploding Brains

by Rachel Hamilton

  “I borrowed it and no one asked for it back,” Mum replies as if that explains everything.

  “You didn’t consider handing it in?”

  “I didn’t know who to trust. I did consider giving it to the milkman, but he didn’t seem to want it.”

  “So you decided to trust Dad?” Holly asks. “The least trustworthy of the lot.”

  “Don’t talk about your father like that,” Mum says. “He’s not a bad man. Well, not a really bad man. He hasn’t killed anyone yet.”

  Holly snorts. “Oh, well, that’s all right then.”

  “He was very helpful about the brain ray. He said it would be safe at the Science Museum if I wrapped it in silver foil and made it part of the space display.”

  “Seriously?”

  “It worked, didn’t it?” Mum says. “It’s been there for over a month.”

  “How did you put it there without setting off the sensor?”

  Mum pushes herself up from the sofa, pretends to trip, giggles foolishly and talks to an imaginary museum guard. “Ooops. Clumsy old me. I must have leaned too far over the barrier. So sorry, I didn’t mean to set off that noisy sensor.”

  I can see how the security guards would believe she’d made a harmless mistake.

  “You went to all that trouble for Dad?”

  “No. For all of us. I couldn’t bring myself to destroy your father’s invention but I didn’t want it in the house. The museum seemed the safest place.”

  “Except it wasn’t.”

  Mum crashes back down on to the sofa. “Yes, there is that.”

  “So, what do we do now?” I ask.

  “Find it,” Mum says simply, returning her attention to daytime TV.

  20

  Lost Toys

  Days Left to Save the Earth: 9

  ‘Find it’? Easy to say, but where to start? It feels odd to be investigating without our third head. Porter’s been missing for two whole days. If it was term time we’d at least see him at school, but the holidays have started so he could be anywhere. It’s yet another thing to worry about and we’re in danger of losing focus. The brain ray can’t be our main concern; neither can Porter. Not when we only have nine days left to find the missing Moon(ish) Rock and save the Earth from lunar loonies and exploding brains.

  Speaking of loonies, Holly is prancing around the living room in her designer sunglasses, which arrived this morning, less than forty-eight hours after she called the Lost Property Muppet to say they were missing.

  “I should ring and thank him.”

  “Wouldn’t bother,” I grunt. “He was rude.”

  “Not to me.” Holly skips to the telephone.

  I have no interest in what the Lost Property Muppet has to say, but I tune in when Holly asks, “Why? What’s wrong with them?”

  I move closer. “What’s wrong with who?”

  “Security guys from ‘Exploring Space’,” Holly mouths.

  “What is wrong with them?”

  Holly covers the bottom of her phone. “They’re in intensive care. It may be Space Rock related. One guard was so sick in front of a school tour group yesterday that the kids fled the building, terrified by all those news reports into thinking that his head was about to blow up. My Lost Property friend is complaining they left their toys behind.”

  I nod. Then I stop nodding. What kind of kid takes a toy on a school trip? And if they’re that crazy about their toy, they’re not going to leave it behind just because of a bit of projectile vomiting, are they?

  I grab the phone. “Did any of these toys look like a space gun? Kind of plastic and turquoise-coloured?”

  “Oh. It’s you,” Lost Property Muppet says without enthusiasm.

  “Can you just answer the question?”

  Holly snatches the phone back. “Sorry about my sister . . .”

  “Oi! Don’t apologise for me.” I’m getting fed up with ‘nice’ Holly.

  “ . . . But we are interested in turquoise space gun toys.” Holly flutters her eyelashes. At the phone! I mean, seriously? “I know it’s a silly question, but did anyone hand in something like that?” She raises her eyebrows. “They did?”

  “Fibonacci! Is this guy completely stupid? I asked him about brain rays the other day. Why didn’t he call us?”

  Holly covers the phone speaker and glares at me. “You. Are. Not. Helping.” She removes her hand and continues all nicey nicey. “I don’t suppose we could pop in and see it? What . . . ? You’ve already sent it to someone?” She kicks the wall.

  That’s more like it. Bye bye Mrs Nice Holly.

  “Address,” I hiss. “We need the address he sent it to.”

  Holly grabs a pen and my New Scientist magazine. “He’s not just going to give me someone’s address for no reason,” she hisses back.

  “Then come up with a reason. Fast. And don’t even think of writing on my magazine.”

  Holly scowls, but starts talking. “You’ve already sent it? Well, that’s a relief. My aunt must have called you after our cousin lost his toy space gun. Can I check the address you’ve sent it to, just to make sure? Ah. You want me to give you her address so you can see if it’s the same?” Holly gives a high-pitched laugh and then grabs my arm and mouths, “Help!”

  I start thinking. If we believe the brain ray was posted to Ms Grimm and we think Porter’s with her, then she can’t be far away.

  “Ask if it’s in Lindon,” I whisper.

  “Lindon?” Holly says to Lost Property Muppet. “Did my aunt ask you to send it to her Lindon address? . . . She did? Brilliant!”

  I cough.

  Holly gives me an apologetic grimace. “I mean, yes, of course, that makes sense. You want the road name? Um, did she give you her Castle Road address? She didn’t. Then it must have been the other house. The one on . . . um . . . Bla– . . . no, Dar– . . . no, Arl– . . . Albion Road? Yes, that’s what I was saying. Because that’s where she lives. At number . . . t – f – s – seven you say? Yes. 7 Albion Road. That’ll be it. Thank you very much.”

  If my suspicions are right, Ms Grimm bought this new place after her rooms at LOSERS were damaged in the fire. She’d have needed somewhere to hide from the police while they investigated the kidnapping and brainwashing accusations against her.

  “Right. Let’s call PC Eric,” Holly says.

  “Porter will hate us for doing it,” I point out. “We should try and get more proof first.”

  Holly nods “Yes, you’re right. Time to check out 7 Albion Road.”

  “What?” I stare at her in alarm. “That’s not what I meant!”

  “Well it should have been. It’s a great idea. Come on.”

  Uh-oh.

  21

  7 Albion Road

  Days Left to Save the Earth: 8

  It’s just after midnight and the moon is huge. Wispy clouds form freaky moon-fingers that point down at 7 Albion Road. The scene looks like a spooky screenshot from a horror movie. The shot they play the dur-duh-dur-duh-dur-duh music over, warning you to flee while you still can. The shot they show just before all the bad stuff happens.

  And in the corner of this shot, Holly and I lurk behind a large skip, planning our break-in.

  My heart slams against my ribs as something leaps from among the rubbish in the skip. “Cat,” I tell myself, “It’s just a cat.” But that doesn’t stop my heart beating out, “Monster! Axe murderer! Zombie!”

  I glare at Holly, who looks barely human in the darkness. “Remind me why I let you talk me into this.”

  “Because you know we have to find the brain ray.” Holly strokes the zombie-cat, which hisses at me threateningly. “We don’t know who Ms Grimm will use it on next.”

  “Us!” I say. “That’s who she’ll use it on next if she finds us here. US! Unless that scary cat gets us first.” I can’t meet the cat’s evil gaze so I look up at the house. Black windows stare back, murky and malevolent.

  “I want to go home,” I whimper.

  “Pull
yourself together! We only have eight days left to save the world from exploding brains!” Holly waves her hand for emphasis, accidentally dislodging the zombie-cat, which miaows angrily and stalks off in search of superior prey. “As well as being dangerous in its own right, the brain ray is our best lead to the Space Rock. We have to find it.”

  “Why can’t we just ask Ms Grimm if she’s got it?” I say.

  “Because villains lie,” Holly pulls a ‘dur’ face. “It’s part of the job description. Now, move it.”

  I glance at the house. “How can we be sure she’s out?”

  “Because we saw her drive away and we didn’t see her drive back,” Holly answers. “Stop being a baby.”

  “I’m not being a baby. I’m being a law-abiding citizen. If we can’t ask Ms Grimm, why can’t we ask Porter?”

  “Because he’s not here to ask, is he?” Holly kicks the skip. “I’m fed up with this whole ‘missing’ thing. I don’t know whether to worry about him or hate him for joining the dark side.”

  “You can’t hate him. He’s Porter.”

  Holly doesn’t hear my protest because she’s darting across the road to press the doorbell. She runs back and we wait a couple of minutes. No answer.

  “There,” she says. “Satisfied?”

  “Not really.”

  Holly points towards a gate on the right-hand side of the house. “That’s our way in. You can’t see from here but it’s open a crack. Come on.”

  When I show no sign of ‘coming on’, Holly drags me to the gate and pushes it open to reveal a perfectly landscaped garden. Even the shed is painted and polished. The straight lines of the lawn remind me of Dad’s love of stripy grass and make me feel calmer. I let Holly pull me towards the back porch.

  “We can work on the lock here without being seen by the houses on either side,” she says.

  It’s all very well to be able to work on the lock, but it doesn’t look like we’ll ever be able to open it.

  “This is a job for Porter,” I say when Holly starts kicking the door.

  “Porter probably already has a key. I bet he’s been in league with his mother all along.” Holly kicks the door again and glares at the lock. “Grrr. I give up.”

  Unfortunately, Holly never gives up for long. Two minutes later she’s running round the side of the house, calling over her shoulder, “Bet the windows are easier to unlock than the door.”

  As Holly is swallowed by darkness, a torch shines from a neighbouring window. The spotlight flicks from side to side, scanning the garden. Doors slam and voices carry over the fence. I can’t make out what they’re saying but they’re heading this way. I race across the lawn and ram my shoulder against the door of the garden shed. It rebounds slightly but shows no sign of opening. I run at it again and again. I’m groaning in pain before it occurs to me I haven’t tried the handle.

  Ha. The handle turns and the door swings opens.

  Feeling like an injured idiot, I nurse my arm and try not to breathe too deeply. Despite its perfect exterior, the inside of the shed smells of rust and mouldy feet. Tugging my T-shirt up to cover my nose and mouth, I pull the door closed and peer through a crack in the wood.

  Two torches enter through the side gate.

  Galileo! I’m trapped like a bug in a bathtub. The wall behind the shed is over two metres high. Even if I wasn’t a PE-avoiding climbing-disaster, there’s no way I could scale it without being seen. Holly’s in a better position: if she moves fast, she can escape back the way we came. I close my eyes and decide my best option is to pretend I’m invisible.

  “Hello? Anyone in here?” One of the torches has a deep male voice.

  Probably shouldn’t answer that.

  Torchlight filters into the shed through the cracks in the walls. I dive behind a lawn mower. This is it. The end.

  The handle of the door turns slowly. The hinges creak . . .

  “Miiiiaaaaaaoooooooowwwwwwwwwww.”

  The caterwaul is followed by a high-pitched scream and the crash of a torch hitting the ground. One of the lights goes out.

  “What the heck was that?” Deep Voice yells.

  “Flying jungle cat!” Female Voice fades as she runs from the shed. “Coming right at me. Huge, it was. Huge!”

  “Don’t be a drama queen.” Deep Voice is still close. “It was probably more scared than you were.”

  “Then it’ll need cat-therapy,” Faded Female Voice retorts from somewhere over by the house. “Unless it’s already dropped dead from heart failure. I’m not hanging around here to be savaged by wild animals.” There’s a clatter of heels, another crash, and a scream.

  Deep Voice mutters something about “attention seekers” and “imaginary animals”, but he doesn’t hang around either.

  I breathe a heavy sigh, which morphs into a yelp of horror as the shed door swings open . . .

  “Pythagoras, Holly! You scared me half to death. You want to be careful out there. There’s some feral cat flying about, attacking people.”

  “Yeah. About that . . .”

  I stare at her. “You didn’t . . . No . . . You didn’t throw the cat?”

  Holly nods in shame. “I hate myself. But you were about to get caught and when it leaped into my arms it was a sort of automatic reaction. I didn’t mean to do it! It all happened so fast. Poor kitty!”

  I should be reporting my sister to the RSPCA, but I can see the cat prowling by the hedge, looking offended but unharmed. And if it wasn’t for Holly and her, er, cat-apult, I’d be under citizen’s arrest right now, waiting for the police to arrive. My knees lose the power to hold me upright and I collapse on to the mower, shaking my head and murmuring, “Cat-astrophe.”

  Holly recovers enough to punch my arm, which still hurts from my attacks on the shed. Ow!

  What next? The sensible thing would be to sit here for a while and convince the Voices there’s nothing to worry about except a crazy cat, but all I can think is, ‘Escape! Run away!’

  Holly has other plans. “We can still get into the house and look for the brain ray.”

  “Are you mad?”

  “Probably. I managed to get one of the windows open while you were having fun in the shed. Come, see.”

  She drags me over flowerbeds planted with skin-flaying bushes and rams me through the window as if I’m mincemeat and she’s a sausage-maker. Groaning, I stumble through the moonlit kitchen, crashing into an overstuffed bin before lurching into the hallway.

  “Arggghhh!” I wail as a figure appears out of nowhere at the end of the hall.

  It’s a terrifying sight, with outstretched arms, wide eyes and bared teeth. Clumsy with panic, I trip and the figure lunges straight for me.

  “Get back,” I scream at Holly. “Save yourself.”

  Holly’s laughing too much to move. “Mirror,” she splutters between giggles.

  Mirror? Copernicus! She’s right. I’ve been terrorised by my own reflection. I try to laugh, but I sound like a cat in a bucket of water.

  Holly starts searching the house. I can’t focus. I keep thinking I can hear something, but everything seems quiet and calm. Until. Suddenly. It’s. Not.

  A key turns in the lock.

  Fibonacci! The Voices are back and they’re coming through the front door. No time to escape through the kitchen window. No place to hide in the hallway. No time to get up the stairs. With a superhuman surge of speed, I make it to the living room a second before the front door swings open. I stop to catch my breath – and panic. Where are the large, overstuffed sofas that would conceal a herd of elephants (and, more importantly, me)? What’s with all this slimline, modern furniture? It wouldn’t hide a skinny ninja.

  I look around the room in horror. I’m doomed.

  22

  It’s Curtains For Me

  Footsteps approach. I fling myself behind the curtains, aware I’m now visible to anyone in the garden. The material clings to me and I’m convinced the Voices will spot the black velvet me-statue the minute they en
ter the room.

  “Do you think they’ve gone?” Deep Voice is disturbingly close.

  “If they were ever here,” Female Voice replies. “Come on. It’s one o’clock in the morning. I want to go to bed. I don’t understand what we’re doing here.”

  “I told you. I saw a light on. We should check the house, just to be certain.” Deep Voice is taking no chances.

  I swallow a scream as they twitch the curtain.

  Bang! Kerrrrrang! Sounds like a pan smashing again kitchen tiles.

  The Voices disappear in the direction of the noise.

  I peer between the curtains and see Holly standing in the doorway, beckoning me towards the stairs. I shake my head violently.

  “I’m going back out to check the garden again,” Deep Voice declares from the kitchen.

  Archimedes! I’ll be framed in the window if he goes out there. Stuck for other options, I dart towards Holly and follow her across the hallway and up the stairs.

  “Why are we going up?” I hiss. “Surely we should be going out.”

  “They locked the door behind them,” Holly hisses back. “Besides, we haven’t searched up here. We have to find that brain ray.”

  “Bonkers,” I mutter. “You are stark, raving bonkers.”

  Taking a deep breath, I race with Holly across the wide, exposed landing between the stairs and the first bedroom door. She pushes the door and shoots me a triumphant grin when she spots the bedroom’s wastepaper bin.

  “This . . .” – she bends to pull out a sheet of brown paper – “ . . . is the packaging paper they used for my sunglasses. And look, there’s a sender’s stamp from the Science Museum. The brain ray must be here somewhere. Maybe the Space Rock too?”

  We search the wardrobes, the drawers, under the bed (shuddering at the sight of the turquoise duvet). We look everywhere we can think of, taking care to put things back the way we found them. Holly even perches on the edge of the en-suite bath and stretches up to push the ceiling panels out the way. Nothing.

  “This is stupid.” I sulk. “There’s nothing here.”