Stinky Space Race

by Tim Collins

  The sea creature waddled across the sand. The other Harry held his communicator above it.

  I sprinted over, trying not to tread in any piles of sea-creature poo that were lying around on the sand.

  I could see it. The tiny hair on the end of the communicator was fluttering in the breeze.

  It blew up in the air. In just a couple of seconds, it would fall on the sea creature and change humanity forever.

  But I wasn’t close enough. I was going to have to jump.

  As I was flying through the air I wondered what would happen if I caught the hair but squashed the sea creature. Would the whole human race turn out as flat as pancakes?

  Or would I wipe us out altogether?

  Luckily, I didn’t have to find out. I grasped the hair and crashed to the ground just next to the creature.

  It looked at me in confusion. So did ‘me’. The other me, I mean.

  Come to think of it, I was pretty confused too.

  I remembered what Harry had said about not talking to myself, so I stayed quiet. I felt quite rude, but I was only being rude to myself. I’m sure I didn’t mind.

  I raced back across the beach with the hair clasped in my hand, and jumped into the spacebin.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  The lid of the spacebin opened, and we climbed out.

  We walked around the corner into the playground. A teacher was standing with his back to us. He turned round …

  AAARRGHHH! It was one of the Mr Watkins creatures!

  My heart sank. What had gone wrong? Why hadn’t we wiped them out?

  A little further on, some little kids were playing.

  They turned around …

  Phew! They were normal.

  I looked around the playground.

  None of the pupils had shiny bald heads or thick moustaches.

  It wasn’t a Mr Watkins clone I’d seen. It was the actual Mr Watkins.

  The ONLY Mr Watkins.

  I looked back at Mr Watkins and smiled. It was the first time I’d ever been pleased to see him.

  It was only when I sat down for my afternoon lesson that I realized how exhausted I was.

  Although we’d only been missing for a few seconds, our adventure had lasted hours. And I’d gone a whole night without sleeping.

  My chances of staying awake were zero.

  Luckily, Mr Watkins closed the blinds and put a DVD on, so I flopped forward and drifted off to sleep …

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  The next few days were blissfully normal. I was still bored senseless by Mr Watkins, but I was so relieved there was only one of him, I didn’t really mind.

  I was just thinking about our spacebin adventure when the lights on Harry’s communicator flashed.

  I ran after Harry and caught up with him as he was walking out into the playground.