The Grabbem Getaway

by Adrian C. Bott

  The mansion looked like it was beside a lake, but it wasn’t. What looked like a lake at first sight was actually the most enormous swimming pool in the world. Hundreds of people worked every night to keep it clean, but only three people ever got to swim in it, and it was so big they only ever swam around in one tiny corner, which made the whole thing completely pointless. Those three people were Mr Grabbem, his wife and their horrible son, Gus Junior.

  The sun shone bright. All the Grabbems grumbled. They hated the outdoors, but they believed all rich people were expected to sit outside in the sun by their enormous swimming pools every day, whether they liked it or not. So that was what they did.

  At this moment, Mr Grabbem and his wife were sitting in deckchairs and Gus Grabbem was jumping up and down.

  ‘I don’t want any stupid breakfast, I want my robot back!’ yelled Gus.

  ‘You’ll get it back,’ snapped Mr Grabbem. ‘I just sent two of my top people out to fetch it.’

  Mr Grabbem was rich. He was so rich he sometimes wiped his bottom with money, just because he could. Outside the house were a hundred rubbish skips full of the toys he’d bought for Gus, which had all been broken the same day.

  Right now Mr Grabbem was wearing beach shorts and sunglasses and bright red sunburn, which made his bad mood even worse.

  ‘I want it back now!’ yelled Gus. ‘It’s not fair. I never even got to fly around in it!’

  Gus, who was thirteen, was wearing a bunny suit covered in splashes of red paint. This was because he was pretending to be something called Roadkill Rabbit from one of his nasty horror comics.

  ‘Oh, precious, you didn’t really want to do something so dangerous, did you?’ said Mrs Grabbem, whose skin was a very odd orange colour from too much fake tan. ‘Go sit in your racing car instead. Where’s your racing car?’

  ‘Drove it into a tree,’ said Gus.

  ‘The BEAST project ain’t dangerous, Shona,’ said Mr Grabbem irritably. ‘The whole point of the flamin’ robot suit was to keep young Gus safe while he blows stuff up for the company.’

  ‘Kaboom,’ shouted Gus. ‘Whoosh. Vreeeow.’

  If there was one thing Gus Grabbem Junior loved, it was smashing stuff up. Or burning it. Or slicing it up with chainsaws.

  Mr Grabbem had become rich by getting minerals and oil and gems out of the ground, and most of the time that meant getting rid of what was in his way. He cut down forests, blasted open hills and blew up mountains, which made Gus jealous because he wanted to do that sort of thing.

  So Mr Grabbem had asked his scientists to make a special armoured robot suit for Gus, with dozens of weapons built into it. But the suit had disappeared that very morning.

  Mr Grabbem’s mobile rang. It was the size of a postage stamp and had cost ten thousand dollars. Because it was so small and fiddly, he nearly dropped it in the pool when answering it.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘This is Alpha One. We have located BEAST,’ said a crackly voice. ‘Attempting recovery now.’

  ‘About flamin’ time. Get that robot back here on the double. And if it won’t come – blow it to pieces.’

  ‘Sir, are you sure? It cost so much …’

  ‘I don’t pay you to think. Do as you’re told.’ Mr Grabbem angrily hung up the phone and lost his grip on it. It fell in the pool. He shrugged and went indoors to order an even smaller, more expensive phone.

  Meanwhile, deep below the mansion, below the factory floors and the rooms full of science equipment, there was a tunnel where hardly anyone ever went. At the end of the tunnel, under a flickery light, was a room where nobody at all ever went.

  Except for one man.

  His real name was Cedric Bunk, but he called himself Agent Omega. Although he worked for Grabbem Industries, he hated everything about them. He was determined to smash them from the inside.

  Right now he was sitting at a computer, talking to Axel and his mother via holographic projection.

  ‘Listen carefully. There are two Grabbem fighter craft closing in on your location. They are armed with rapid-fire, high-explosive missiles. You have only two options. One is to surrender.’

  ‘What’s the other?’ said Axel.

  ‘Fight, of course.’

  ‘Erm … are you sure?’ Axel fingered his glasses nervously. ‘I’ve only fought Tankinators and stuff before. You do know they’re not real, right?’

  ‘Your gaming skills will be more useful than you think,’ Agent Omega said urgently. ‘In fact –’

  ‘I can’t believe I’m hearing this!’ Axel’s mother yelled. ‘What do you mean, fight? How can he fight them? He’s only twelve!’

  Agent Omega noticed a blinking light on his computer. He had just a few moments left before the Grabbem security systems detected what he was doing.

  ‘BEAST is powerful, but he’s helpless without a pilot. That’s where you come in, Axel. You’ll have to get inside BEAST and fly him into battle. It’s your only chance!’

  ‘No,’ said Nedra.

  ‘But Mum …’

  She pointed a furious finger at Agent Omega. ‘How dare you? This is my son. I won’t have you putting him in danger.’

  BEAST looked up at the ceiling. He was trembling, as if he expected something bad to come crashing through it.

  Axel made up his mind. ‘Tell me what I need to know,’ he said.

  ‘I’ve only got a few seconds left before they detect me,’ said Agent Omega, ‘so listen carefully. BEAST has a tracking device buried deep inside of him.’

  ‘Got it,’ said Axel.

  ‘Grabbem will be able to track him anywhere, for as long as he remains above ground. The only way to stop them …’

  Agent Omega’s image vanished suddenly, like a candle flame being blown out.

  ‘I guess they detected him,’ said Axel hollowly.

  BEAST lowered his head back down, looked at Axel and blinked, like he was waking up from a nap.

  Axel’s mum took a deep breath. ‘BEAST, I’m sorry, but I need you to leave. Right now. Go as far away from the house as you can.’

  ‘No,’ Axel yelled, but BEAST had already begun to trudge out of the room and down the stairs. He looked sadly over his shoulder.

  Nedra grabbed Axel’s arm. ‘Let him go.’

  ‘But he’s in trouble!’

  ‘You heard what that Omega man said. Grabbem can track him anywhere. Don’t you see? If he stays here, it’ll be us who are in trouble. Ever since your dad disappeared … ’

  From overhead came a distant roaring sound like a low-flying plane. Axel expected it to pass, but it grew steadily louder.

  ‘That’s them,’ he said. ‘They’re coming.’

  BEAST was carefully opening the front door and squeezing himself through it.

  Axel pulled out of his mother’s grasp and ran after him. ‘Wait,’ he yelled.

  ‘Axel,’ his mum screamed. ‘I’m warning you! Get back inside right now …’

  Axel caught up with the robot outside the house. He pulled at the transparent panel on BEAST’s chest, hoping it would open. It did. The clear panel lifted easily out of the way.

  Before Nedra could catch up, Axel had clambered inside the soft hollow. His hands found the controls and a harness slipped easily over his chest.

  The canopy slid shut in front of him and the view through the transparent panel suddenly went blurry, as if they were going through a car wash. Lights flickered before Axel’s eyes, and the message OPTIC SCAN COMPLETE appeared and vanished. The view snapped back into perfect focus. And then:

  ‘Oh, man,’ Axel breathed.

  It was like stepping into a new world.

  Wherever he looked, the view was magnified. He could see everything.

  Every leaf on every tree stood out in perfect detail. He concentrated his attention on one leaf, and the view zoomed in as if BEAST had read his mind. He stared at the grit on the drive until it looked like boulders. Reality had become high-definition.

  But he wasn’t just se
eing the world. BEAST’s senses were reading the world, too. Wherever he looked, tiny letters made of light told him what everything he could see was made of. The longer he focused on something, the more information appeared.

  Axel stared at a tree branch, reading the information that scrolled past. He learnt it was an elm, thirty years old, slightly unhealthy because of car exhaust, damaged in a storm once but doing fine now. An image of the tree’s DNA appeared, a corkscrew spiral turning round and round.

  As well as telling Axel what everything around was made of, the writing also showed what BEAST could do with it. The front door was WOOD (BREAKABLE), the ground was EARTH (DIGGABLE). Nedra’s car, parked at the top of the drive, could be EASILY LIFTED.

  I could pick up my mum’s car right now, Axel thought giddily. And probably throw it into the air and catch it, too. He felt superhuman.

  Axel took a few steps. He held one of BEAST’s arms up in front of his face and wiggled the thick robot fingers. This was incredible. He had total control.

  ‘BEAST, I think I can do this. Let’s get moving,’ he said.

  Nedra came running out of the house, tears in her eyes. ‘Why are you so stubborn? Just like your dad. I can’t lose you too!’

  ‘I’ve got to stop them, Mum.’ Axel’s voice sounded strange coming out of BEAST’s speakers.

  She hung her head. ‘Just promise me you’ll look after each other, okay?’

  ‘I PROMISE,’ said BEAST.

  ‘Me too,’ said Axel.

  Nedra’s long black hair blew in the wind. She looked up. Two tiny specks had appeared in the sky.

  ‘Good luck, mate,’ she said hoarsely. ‘I love you.’

  Agent Omega had said Axel should fly BEAST into battle. ‘BEAST?’ Axel said. ‘Take us up.’

  What happened next was like stepping into a supermarket lift, pressing the button for the top floor expecting a gentle ride up, and then being fired from a cannon.

  Axel yelled as BEAST rocketed upwards. His innards felt like they were being forced down into his feet. ‘Whoaaaaaaa!’

  After a few seconds, he looked down. Trails of white exhaust were spiralling from BEAST’s feet.

  Below them was a view of his hometown he’d only ever seen before on Google Maps. The roads were just a pale grey crisscross of lines from up here. There was the little cluster of shops, and there was the town hall, shaped like a big T. He could even see the green playing fields at the school.

  ‘This is amazing,’ he breathed.

  ‘YOUR HEART RATE IS EXTREMELY FAST,’ warned BEAST.

  Axel reminded himself they weren’t there to sightsee. ‘Okay. Where are the Grabbem craft Agent Omega told us about?’

  BEAST popped up a display. It showed two attack ships swerving and coasting through the sky. They looked like flat crabs, each one equipped with a strong pair of mechanical pincers. They skimmed through the clouds like stones skipped across the water, except much deadlier.

  ‘How long till they reach us?’

  ‘TEN SECONDS,’ said BEAST.

  ‘What?’

  ‘CORRECTION. NINE SECONDS. CORRECTION. EIGHT SECONDS …’

  ‘Give me manual flight control,’ Axel said desperately.

  ‘OKAY.’ Something like a balloon swelled up under Axel’s left hand. ‘WOULD YOU LIKE TO CONSULT THE FLIGHT CONTROL INSTRUCTION BOOK?’

  ‘There isn’t time. Just let me fly!’

  Axel squeezed the balloon-thing hard. The sudden thooom of acceleration nearly drove his head into his neck. He let go.

  ‘That’s the throttle, then,’ he gasped. ‘Now how do I steer – a-ha!’ Under his right hand was a rolling ball that moved a set of crosshairs in his field of view.

  Guessing that he could choose his direction with one hand and his speed with the other, Axel tried aiming at the horizon and giving the throttle a gentler squeeze.

  He went thundering through the sky like an armoured missile. Clouds swept past. The skyline shook as air resistance buffeted them.

  ‘So far, so good,’ Axel gasped. ‘I can do this.’

  Meanwhile, the two Grabbem pilots were confused.

  ‘What do we do now?’ said the first pilot, Alpha One.

  ‘We go after him, duh,’ said the second pilot, Alpha Gold.

  The pilots had argued earlier about which of them should be Alpha One and which had to be Alpha Two. Alpha One had eventually won because he was oldest, upon which Alpha Two had changed his name to Alpha Gold.

  Alpha One had said that wasn’t allowed because it was meant to be numbers, and Alpha Gold had replied that he didn’t care, he could be colours if he wanted. Alpha One had shouted that it wasn’t fair because Alpha Gold sounded even cooler than Alpha One. Alpha Gold had said ha ha ha, he was stuck with it now.

  ‘In pursuit!’ said Alpha One. He fired his thrusters and tore through the clouds after BEAST.

  ‘Also in pursuit!’ said Alpha Gold.

  He went to fire his own thrusters and accidentally fired a missile instead. It streaked through the air and off into the distance.

  ‘Watch what you’re doing!’ screamed Alpha One.

  Up ahead, Axel saw the missile whizz past.

  ‘Oh, no,’ he said. ‘BEAST, I don’t think they’re trying to capture you anymore. They’re trying to blow us up!’

  ‘BEAST IS SCARED,’ said BEAST.

  ‘Don’t worry, BEAST,’ said Axel, though his own heart was pounding. ‘We’re going to make it through this together. Trust me.’

  ‘YOU ARE BEAST’S PILOT, AXEL. OF COURSE BEAST TRUSTS YOU,’ said BEAST.

  The two Grabbem ships were right on their tail.

  Time to stand and fight, thought Axel. I’m a gamer. I’ve been in situations like this a thousand times. I just have to trust my skills.

  Luckily, they were high above the ground and pretty far from the nearest town, so they could have a fight without any bystanders getting hurt.

  ‘Let’s do this. BEAST, what are you armed with?’ he asked.

  ‘ARMED?’

  Axel blinked. ‘Weapons. What weapons have you got?’

  ‘NONE.’

  Axel’s heart felt like it had just fallen out of his body. Suddenly he didn’t feel like the luckiest kid in the world, piloting an amazing robot through the clouds. He felt like a small boy trapped in what might as well be a rocket-powered fridge.

  ‘No weapons at all?’ he yelled.

  ‘OFFENSIVE CAPABILITIES ARE AVAILABLE IN MY OTHER FORMS. YOU WILL NEED APPS TO ACCESS THEM.’

  Apps?

  Before Axel could figure out what on earth BEAST was talking about, there was a red flash from behind and a whooshing, hissing noise. A blaring alarm went off inside BEAST’s head.

  A message box lit up: missile locked on.

  Axel reacted instantly, without pausing to think. He threw BEAST into a power dive, aiming for the ground.

  A camera view of the oncoming missile appeared in the corner of his vision, shaking around wildly.

  The surface beneath them was brownish green and uneven-looking. It was the tops of trees, bumpy with leaves. They were flying down towards a huge stretch of forest.

  Axel swerved hard to the left, hoping the missile wouldn’t be able to turn as quickly as BEAST. It came around in a whooshing loop and was right back on their trail again.

  ‘Can’t shake him,’ Axel muttered through clenched teeth. ‘Can you go any faster?’

  ‘NOT IN THIS FORM,’ said BEAST, sounding gloomy.

  ‘So what are you waiting for? Change form!’

  ‘ALTERNATE FORMS ARE AVAILABLE, BUT YOU WILL NEED APPS TO ACCESS THEM.’

  ‘And I don’t have any flippin’ apps,’ Axel finished. ‘Fine. I get it.’

  He wove in a series of wild S-bends, just clipping the tops of the forest trees. The missile followed, getting closer every second, never slowing.

  It was going to blow them out of the sky, and there was nothing Axel could do about it. Without these all-important apps it seeme
d BEAST was helpless. Why hadn’t Agent Omega warned him? He knew this would be a crazy risk …

  ‘A crazy risk,’ Axel breathed.

  He raised BEAST’s fists in front of him, superhero-style, and deliberately flew down into the green forest.

  Breaking through the forest canopy was like being attacked by mad wood goblins. Branches battered him like clubs. Sticks thwacked across BEAST’s head. Leaves whipped into his face. Axel yelled out loud. BEAST went out of control, flailing and tumbling.

  The world spun around and around sickeningly. Axel grabbed the controls and forced BEAST back into a straight, level flight path. They were now flying only a few feet above the forest floor, and they were volleying in between thick tree trunks that rushed past like the pillars of motorway bridges. There was only a tiny amount of space to squeeze through.

  A broad oak loomed up, right in their path. They were flying so fast that Axel barely had time to swerve out of the way. If he’d hit the tree, they would have been crushed to a pulp.

  The missile locked on box began flashing a brilliant red.

  ‘Okay,’ Axel said, ‘it’s still coming. I just hope this works.’

  He weaved in and out of the trees, looking for one that would suit what he had in mind. There, up ahead, was a tall tree that looked ideal. He powered towards it, the missile only centimetres behind.

  The tree loomed large in his vision.

  Axel pulled BEAST up, racing along the entire length of the tree, skimming the trunk. Below them, the missile tilted to follow – but not fast enough. It hit the tree.

  An astonishing fireball blossomed beneath them. Next second, the shockwave hit, throwing them further into the air. With a long, sad groan, the tree slowly toppled and crashed down.

  ‘Oh, man,’ gasped Axel. ‘We did it. We got away.’

  ‘TREE DIDN’T,’ said BEAST in a voice of deep sorrow.

  ‘I’m sorry about the tree,’ Axel said. He hoped BEAST knew he meant it.

  BEAST said nothing.

  Axel checked the scanners to see where the Grabbem ships had got to. They were hovering high above, and now they were starting to move again.