Danny Danger and the Space Twister

by Adam Frost

“You too,” said Mia, pointing at Eric. “Where’s my present?”

  “I – er—” began Eric.

  “I haven’t had one single ruddy present!” said Mia. “What’s the matter with me? Do I smell? Do I have scary eyes? An annoying laugh? A screechy voice?”

  “Well, yeah,” said Eric, “but that’s not why we didn’t get you a present.”

  Before Mia could grab Eric by the throat, Danny explained everything. “You’re angry, aren’t you?” he said at the end.

  “Of course I’m angry,” said Mia.

  “I knew you’d be angry,” said Danny.

  “What did you expect me to be? Pleased? Bored? Not fussed one way or the other? Last time you lost the remote, you nearly got yourself – and the rest of us – killed.”

  “Well, if it hadn’t been your stupid birthday, I’d never have left the house in the first place!” shouted Danny.

  “You could have just remembered like a normal person and got me a present the day before!”

  Eric’s mother appeared again. “Oh hello, you two,” she said to Danny and Mia. “Listen, Eric, we’ve got to get inside. Something’s gone very wrong with the world. If you want Mia and Danny to come with you, that’s fine. But we’ve got to go. Now.”

  Eric, Danny and Mia were suddenly aware of everyone else on the high street getting into cars or walking quickly back to their houses. Shopkeepers were speedily winding up awnings and pulling down shutters. It was as if they were fast forwarding time all by themselves.

  Danny, Eric and Mia walked back to Eric’s house in silence, all of them brooding, all of them trying to work out what to do.

  Eric’s mother left them in Eric’s room, saying, “Don’t move until I work out what’s going on.”

  She closed the bedroom door. For a few seconds, Eric, Danny and Mia remained silent. Then Danny and Mia started talking at once.

  “I don’t understand how this man with a scar wasn’t affected by the remote,” said Mia.

  “Why didn’t Uncle Charlie warn me? Why didn’t Uncle Charlie stop him?” said Danny.

  Eric was peering out the window.

  “The fun’s not over yet,” he said. “Take a look at Mrs Macready’s front garden.”

  Danny and Mia came to the window. They looked at the house next to theirs. In the front garden, instead of the silver-haired old lady that lived there, they saw a huge man in dark glasses silently trimming the hedge.

  “There too!” whispered Mia.

  They looked at the house on the other side of theirs. Instead of Mr or Mrs Singh, they saw another huge man in dark glasses, also trimming the hedge.

  “I don’t get it,” said Danny. “What are they doing there?”

  “Well, they’re not gardeners,” said Eric. “That one on the left is holding the shears upside down.”

  “But I haven’t got the remote any more,” said Danny. “And if the man with the scar wanted to finish me off, why didn’t he do it when he took the remote?”

  Both of the men stopped trimming the hedge and stared up the street.

  “I think I get it,” said Mia.

  A postman was walking along the pavement with a parcel under his arm.

  “Look at the package, Danny,” said Mia.

  Danny squinted at the parcel and saw that it was covered with stamps of all shapes, colours and sizes. He started thinking. Uncle Charlie had originally sent Danny his cosmic remote in a parcel like that. Uncle Charlie worked for an organisation called EUREKA! that looked after incredible inventions. He travelled the world, making sure that new gadgets didn’t fall into the hands of bad people. Sometimes EUREKA! loaned these gadgets out to people who really needed them. Danny, with his rotten parents and awful teacher, had needed the cosmic remote to rewind and pause and fast forward his way out of trouble.

  So, Danny thought, what could Uncle Charlie be sending him now? What Danny needed – what he needed more than ever – was his cosmic remote. But that was gone; that couldn’t be in the box.

  Danny was brought back to the present by a nudge from Mia. The two men were putting their shears down and stepping on to the pavement. They walked up to the postman and stood either side of him. There was a scuffle which ended with the postman being thrown into Mrs Macready’s hedge. One of the huge men was now holding the parcel. He dropped it on the floor and stamped on it several times, until it was nothing but wires and brown dust. Then, for some reason, he looked over at Eric’s house.

  Eric, Danny and Mia ducked down behind the window ledge.

  “He saw us, he saw us, he saw us,” muttered Eric.

  A few seconds passed and Mia put her head up. The two huge men were walking off down the street. She said, “They’re going,” and slumped back down again. Then she turned to Danny. “So Uncle Charlie must have sent you another gadget. He knows the remote’s been stolen.”

  “Shame those men just smashed it up,” said Eric. “I wonder what it was. Maybe a laser gun? Or a teleporter? Or a mind-control helmet?”

  Danny was thinking. He looked up at Mia and Eric and said quietly, “We must have beaten the man with the scar.”

  “What do you mean?” asked Mia.

  “We must have used whatever was in that box to beat him. Or almost beat him,” said Danny.

  “How do you work that out?” asked Mia.

  “Think about it. How would he know that Uncle Charlie was sending me a gadget? And why would he care?”

  Mia frowned and shook her head. “You’ve lost me.”

  “In the future, we must have used that gadget. We must have used it in a battle with the man with the scar. And he must have stopped us in the nick of time. Then he pressed Rewind to make sure we never got the gadget in the first place.”

  “Blimey, yeah,” said Eric. “So he rewinds time to this exact point to intercept the parcel on its way to your house and sends those men to destroy it. To make sure you never open it.” Eric paused and then added, “I wonder how much time he had to rewind. I wonder what we did.”

  Mia was looking out of the window and thinking.

  “So you’re saying we’ve beaten this guy once already,” she said.

  Danny nodded. “In a future that doesn’t exist any more.”

  “And now we have to beat him again,” said Mia.

  Danny nodded. “In this future.”

  “Only this time round we haven’t got the amazing gadget?”

  Danny nodded. “Now we’ve got absolutely nothing.”

  “Well,” said Mia flatly, “this is turning out to be a truly excellent birthday.”

  Half an hour had passed, and Danny, Mia and Eric were still sitting in Eric’s bedroom, not saying much, not doing much – just thinking.

  “I wonder what he’s doing with the remote now,” said Eric. “Maybe we should go downstairs and watch the news?”

  “Can’t you get the internet on that?” asked Mia, pointing at a box and a monitor.

  “No, that’s a ZOMBA megadrive,” said Eric. “It’s just for games. The computer’s downstairs.”

  “For heaven’s sake,” sighed Mia. “Why can’t you just have one computer? That does everything?”

  “Well,” said Eric. “It’s all about different chipsets doing different jobs. With a console, you want the graphics card to be—”

  “All right, all right!” exclaimed Mia. “I don’t actually want to know!”

  “If we could work out how he did it,” said Danny, “if we could make ourselves immune from the remote too, then we’d have a chance of beating him.”

  “Brilliant!” said Mia. “We should be able to work that out in about – er – fifty years.”

  Danny was about to reply when there was a knock at the window. They all turned round and saw Danny and Mia’s uncle smiling at them. He was hanging from a luminous white cable.

  “Uncle Charlie!” cried Mia and Danny.

  Eric ran over and hitched up the window.

  Uncle Charlie put one foot on the windowsill and then swu
ng himself into the room. The cable vanished and he slipped two small white objects into his pocket.

  “I thought I’d find you here,” he said. “Nice room, Eric. Is that a ZOMBA megadrive?”

  The children all started talking at once.

  “How did he take my remote?” asked Danny.

  “What was in the parcel?” asked Mia.

  “Yeah, it’s the ten gigabyte version with wireless controllers,” said Eric.

  “OK, OK, look,” said Uncle Charlie. “Let me tell you what I know. Then ask me any questions at the end.”

  Danny nodded. Mia pursed her lips.

  “Danny’s remote was stolen by the Space Twister,” began Uncle Charlie. He pulled a photo out of his pocket and showed it to them. “Six feet tall. Twenty-nine years old. Usually well dressed. Nasty temper. Strange sense of humour.”

  Danny recognised the long dark hair, the scar down the middle of the face and the jewels glinting in the teeth. He felt another wave of misery as he remembered how easily he had given up his remote to this man.

  “Since he stole Danny’s remote, the Space Twister has been using it to rob banks, steal planes and generally wreak havoc.”

  Something beeped in Uncle Charlie’s pocket. He pulled out a small black phone and glanced at it. “For example, it looks like he’s just stolen the Mona Lisa and replaced it with a photo of a cat dressed as Elvis.”

  Uncle Charlie sniggered. “Sorry,” he added quickly. “Not funny.”

  “But how did he take my remote?” cried Danny. “I’d paused time.”

  “Well, we’re not sure,” replied Uncle Charlie, “but we think he can twist space.”

  “Yeah,” said Mia, frowning, “I got that from the name, but what does it mean?”

  “It means he can twist himself out of time,” said Uncle Charlie. “We know he’s been trying to do it for years. To stop himself from getting older. To make himself immortal. At first, he was experimenting with giant magnets, trying to pull the earth backwards. Impossible, of course. But then about a year ago, he started endurance training — slowing down his heartbeat and metabolism. Last autumn, at midnight, when the clocks went back, we believe he managed to get halfway out.”

  “Halfway?” repeated Mia.

  “Yes, half his body was out of time. Danny, it’s like when you press Pause on your remote. Half of his body had stepped into that place. The trouble was, the other half hadn’t. And time was still moving. It nearly pulled him apart. That’s why he’s got that scar.”

  Danny and Mia shuddered.

  Eric said, “Ouch.”

  “It runs all the way down the centre of his body,” said Uncle Charlie. “From that moment, we think he gave up on space-twisting and tried to find other ways of stopping time. Which is why he stole the remote.”

  “But he can’t have given up on space twisting,” said Danny. “He must have done it. He must have got all the way out. Or he couldn’t have stolen my remote.”

  “Maybe,” said Uncle Charlie. “The thing is, we’ve looked at all our monitors and charts. There’s been no major energy distortions this month. Nothing to suggest he pulled himself all the way out of time. But you’re right. He must have done. We just don’t know how. Or when. Or why we didn’t notice.”

  “Great,” growled Mia.

  “Basically, we got caught out on this one,” said Uncle Charlie. “We should have taken the Space Twister more seriously. We should have warned Danny he might come for the remote. So look, if you want to call me a dingbat or clip me round the ear, do it now.”

  Danny mumbled, “It’s OK.”

  Mia said, “Dingbat. Nincompoop.”

  Uncle Charlie waited another couple of seconds then continued to speak. “Right, now that’s out of the way, it’s time for action. We have to find a way to get Danny’s remote back. Or build another one. We’re lost while the Space Twister has control over time.”

  “Is that what was in the parcel?” asked Eric. “Another remote?”

  “What parcel?” asked Uncle Charlie.

  “The one you just sent us,” said Mia.

  “These two huge men in dark glasses came along and squashed it,” said Eric.

  “Oh? Oh!” exclaimed Uncle Charlie. “No, no, that was your birthday present, Mia. A TN50X. You remember Eric’s robot, Magnus? It was like that but with artificial intelligence.”

  “Cool!” said Eric.

  “Right,” said Mia. “Uncle Charlie, I don’t even like robots.”

  “Don’t you?” said Uncle Charlie. “Ah, OK. Well, good job they squashed it, then. But hang on, that’s interesting. The two huge men in dark glasses could be the Space Twister’s goons. He must have known about the parcel and rewound time to intercept it.”

  “That’s what I said!” exclaimed Danny.

  “Which means he thought what was in the parcel was important. I wonder what we did with it?”

  “But wasn’t it just a toy? How could it have helped us?” asked Danny.

  “It seems unlikely, I have to admit,” said Uncle Charlie. He looked at Mia, who was scowling. “Maybe Mia threw it at his head. But listen, the main thing to focus on is the fact that we must’ve had him on the ropes once before. And that means we can do it again – and beat him this time. Only my latest plan doesn’t involve any robots.”

  Uncle Charlie ran over to the window. “Come on, there’s no time to lose. We’ve got to get back to EUREKA! headquarters.”

  “Er,” said Mia, “the door’s that way.”

  “No, no, we’ll be using sky ropes,” said Uncle Charlie.

  “What are they?” asked Danny.

  “They’re how I got here,” said his uncle. “You know how every EUREKA! agent has their own gadget? Well, these are mine. They’re the future of public transport.”

  He pulled two small white arrowheads out of his pocket. They had two large buttons on the side.

  Danny and Mia ran across to join their uncle at the window, but Eric hung back.

  “Hang on, hang on,” said Eric. “I can’t just disappear without telling my mum. Not with all these disasters happening.”

  “Hmm, yes, good point,” said Uncle Charlie, rummaging around in his coat pocket and pulling out a piece of paper. “Leave this for your mum. It’s a standard EUREKA! letter. Guaranteed to set her mind at rest.”

  Eric took the piece of paper and glanced at its contents. It read:

  Eric shrugged and said, “Fair enough.”

  Uncle Charlie stepped on to the windowsill and pressed a button on the side of one of the white arrowheads. A thick beam of light shot out of the end.

  “Right, this is how we’ll do this,” he said. “Eric, you hold on to my left arm. Danny, you hold on to my right arm. Mia, you hang on to my back.”

  “We what?” said Mia.

  “It’s perfectly safe,” added Uncle Charlie.

  The three children looked at each other and then scrambled out of the window. Eric glanced up at the thick white tube that Uncle Charlie was hanging on to. It stretched up into the sky and out of sight.

  “Hang on,” said Uncle Charlie.

  He pressed a button on the side of the white cable and the four of them were pulled up into the sky at immense speed. Within two seconds, they could see the whole of their town; within four seconds, they could see the fields and forests that surrounded it. After about ten seconds, Uncle Charlie slid the button upwards and they stopped moving.

  “Sky ropes are a bit like tape measures,” he said. “They can be wound up or wound out. I just wound this one up. That’s why we shot upwards.”

  He squinted at another cloud.

  “The other thing to say is travelling by sky rope is also a bit like swinging through the jungle on vines. And just like swinging through the jungle, you need two vines to get anywhere.”

  He pulled out the second white arrowhead.

  “I’m going to aim this second sky rope at that cloud over there. When the arrowhead hits, it should react with the w
ater vapour and become a solid block of matter, enough to support up to nine people. Then we’ll hang on to that one and retract this one. Takes a while to get used to, so hold tight.”

  Danny, Mia and Eric hadn’t heard a word of what Uncle Charlie had just said. Mia was staring at her feet, Danny was staring at the ground below, Eric was looking up at the cloud they were hanging from.

  Uncle Charlie pressed the button on the other sky rope and a white cable shot across the sky and latched on to the next cloud along. At the same time, he held down the button on the first sky rope so that it shrank back to nothing – just an arrowhead.

  They swung through the sky, getting faster and faster. As the cable swung out to its furthest point, Charlie aimed at the next cloud and fired out another length of sky rope. They swung on this cloud, then Charlie aimed again, and they swung from the next one. For a while, the clouds got further apart, and they swung lower and longer and slower. Then the clouds got thicker, and the wind picked up, and they swung in loops and zigzags, riding the sudden gusts.

  “The clouds over there are moving fast, and moving east,” said Uncle Charlie. “We can ride one of them the rest of the way.”

  He swung them towards a thick band of swiftly moving cloud. He latched on to the thickest, fastest, lowest cloud and just swung back and forth on it. The sky rope acted like a pendulum, moving slower and slower until it finally stopped. Now it was just the movement of the cloud that pulled them through the sky, towing them slowly eastwards.

  Danny, Mia and Eric had got more used to travelling by sky rope now. They were looking into the distance and grinning.

  “What do you do when there aren’t any clouds?” asked Eric.

  “Get the bus,” said Uncle Charlie with a shrug.

  A flock of birds appeared just below their feet, keeping pace with them as they moved further east.

  “Hang on, I’ve got to time this right,” said Uncle Charlie.

  He slid the sky rope button down and the cable started to get longer, sending them towards the earth at a swift pace.

  “Uncle Charlie, this feels dangerous!” shouted Danny, as the wind roared in his ears.