Game Over, Pete Watson

by Joe Schreiber

“Stink face gorilla nugget?” Callie said.

  “Yeah. I think it means . . .” I paused. “There’s going to be some kind of attack at the convention center today at four o’clock.” I started to hand him back the phone. “We have to go.”

  “Wait,” Wesley said. “There’s more.”

  “More?” I said.

  He nodded at the iPhone. “More.”

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE]

  Oh Yes, There’s More

  From somewhere offscreen I heard Squid saying something to me. I couldn’t really make out what it was.

  “Squid told you to take off your shirt,” Wesley said.

  When I looked at the screen, things had, uh, changed.

  I hit STOP, or I thought I did, but the touchscreen must not have been working, because the video kept playing. My face burned and my ears felt so hot that I thought they were going to explode.

  “I didn’t . . . I mean . . . I wasn’t . . .” I started to try to climb out of the car and realized that we were driving sixty miles an hour down the freeway.

  “What are you doing?” Callie said, reaching back between the two front seats to grab me. “Are you crazy?”

  My arm felt warm where she touched me. Then I realized something had changed in her face. Her cheeks were red and her eyes were shining like she might start crying. I’d never seen her like that before.

  “Just keep watching,” she said.

  “What am I doing now?”

  “Uh, Squid told you to climb up on a chair,” Wesley said.

  “Let me guess,” I said. “Squid told me to crow like a rooster?”

  “Actually,” Wesley said, “he told you to bark like a dog. Apparently you think dogs say cock-a-doodle-doo. We’ll work on that later.”

  I tried to shrink back farther into my seat. I was thinking maybe I could throw the iPhone out the window and nobody would know. “Are we done with this yet?”

  Callie shook her head. “No,” she said. “Listen.”

  And Nabeel’s camera came back in for a close-up, as I heard my own hypnotized voice come out of the speaker again.

  Callie and Wesley were both staring at the iPhone in my hand.

  Wesley and Callie both got really quiet. Now I understood why Callie hadn’t been anywhere when I woke up.

  “We didn’t believe you about Dad,” Callie said. “But we went to find the Bug Man anyway, just to be sure.”

  “How did you find the Bug Man?” I asked.

  “We Googled him,” Callie said. “Got his address and drove over. And that’s when we found out . . . it was true.”

  “He wasn’t going for ice cream,” Wesley said softly. “He was never going out for ice cream.”

  “I’m really sorry,” I said. We drove along without talking for what felt like a long time. I wished that I could think of something to say, but I couldn’t see Callie’s face in the rearview mirror, and Wesley was just sitting there.

  Finally Callie’s eyes flicked up to the mirror. They looked glassy and blank. She started to slow down.

  “Oh no,” she said.

  “What?”

  Behind the car, blue police lights were starting to swirl.

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR]

  Hail to the Chief

  Callie pulled over to the side of the road. I looked back expecting to see a police car, but what I saw instead was a big black SUV with a blue bubble flashing on top of it. There were two more just like it pulling up behind that one. A guy in a dark suit and sunglasses got out and walked over to Callie’s car, staring in at me.

  “Actually,” I said, “my name’s Pete Watson.”

  The guy touched the little microphone plugged into his ear. He said something I couldn’t hear. There was a long pause; then he looked back at me again.

  “Uh-huh,” I said.

  “Come with me.” It wasn’t a question. “There’s someone who wants to see you.”

  I glanced at Wesley and Callie.

  “We’re his friends,” Wesley said. “Where he goes, we go.”

  The man stared at him. “Stay in the car.”

  Wesley gulped. “Yes, sir.”

  I got out and followed the man in the black suit to the last SUV in the row of vehicles parked behind Callie’s purple car. I figured if these were the same guys that Mr. Midwood had hired to kidnap Dad and put him into the CommandRoid to break the code, then it didn’t matter if I tried to run from them or not. I wouldn’t make it far on foot anyway.

  The guy in the black suit opened the back door of the SUV and pointed for me to get inside.

  There was another man waiting for me in there.

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE]

  The Presidential String Theory

  My first thought was that the president had very small hands.

  Then I thought, Can he tell that I’m thinking that?

  Then I thought, Don’t be stupid. The president can’t read minds.

  But what if he could? What if—

  I stared at him. How did he know that I was thinking that?

  And that was when the president leaned right in close to me.

  “Wait a second,” I said. “What do you mean, was? Is he . . . ?”

  “He’s trapped inside the CommandRoid with all our country’s greatest secrets,” the president said. “And we need you to get him out.”

  “Why me?” I asked, but I guess I already knew.

  “You’ve got the code inside your head,” the president said. He looked at his watch. “We’ve got one hour to rescue your father.”

  “What happens in an hour?”

  “What?” The president scowled. “You don’t know about the virus?”

  “No, sir.”

  “Mr. Midwood doesn’t want to crack the CIA’s database. He wants to destroy it completely.”

  “How?”

  “That’s why Mr. Midwood hired the Bug Man,” the president said. “To put a virus in the system. Why do you think he’s called the Bug Man?”

  “I thought maybe it was because he drove around with a giant bug on top of his car,” I said.

  The president just looked at me for a long moment. “Maybe we’d better find someone else.”

  I looked back at Callie’s car up ahead and thought about her and Wesley, and my dad, trapped inside the system. They needed my help. I wasn’t used to having anybody count on me for anything, but I realized that maybe this is how it feels when you’re suddenly asked to do something that you’ve never done before.

  “No,” I said. “I can do it.”

  The president raised his eyebrows. “Are you sure?” He didn’t look convinced. “Midwood and the Bug Man already have your father’s CommandRoid. How are you going to access the data before the virus gets loose in the system?”

  “Sir,” I said, “all my life my parents have been telling me that video games aren’t worthwhile”—I swallowed—“and that I’m not worthwhile. Well, today I have a chance to change all that.”

  The president frowned. “Your parents tell you that you’re not worthwhile?”

  “Well, not exactly,” I said. “But they don’t let me play video games as much as I want to.”

  “Ah.” The president smiled. “I understand.”

  “You do?”

  “Oh, yes.” The president turned and gazed off into the distance. “When I was a boy, we didn’t have much, but I had a piece of string. And boy, I tell you, I would play with that string all day if you let me. My parents would say, ‘Put that string away! You’ll never be president if you keep playing with a piece of string all day!’ But do you know what?” He reached down into his pocket and held out his hand.

  I looked at it. “Is that the same piece of string?”

  “Of course not,” he said. “What sort of idiot walks around with a fifty-year-old piece of string in his pocket?”

  “I don’t know, sir.”

  “Ah, well.” He seemed to remember where he was, and slapped me on the leg. It kind of hurt. “You’re a ve
ry brave boy, Sanchez.”

  “Watson, sir.”

  “Right.” The president nodded thoughtfully off into the distance. “Do you own a watch, son?”

  “Sir?”

  “Every boy needs a watch. Take mine.”

  He took off the watch and gave it to me. I looked down at the bright red blinking display.

  “It’s in countdown mode,” the president said. “I find it’s useful in these types of situations.”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “My pleasure,” he said. “And Godspeed, Sanchez.”

  “Watson, sir.”

  But he was already turning away.

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX]

  The Cockroach in the Mirror

  I got out of the car and walked back to where Wesley and Callie were waiting for me.

  “Who was that?” Callie asked.

  “The president.”

  “Of what?”

  “The United States.”

  She stared at me long enough that I could count her eyelashes, twenty-six on each side. “What did he want?”

  “He asked us to save it.” That wasn’t exactly true, but I needed something with some oomph to get us motivated. “Let’s go.”

  “Where?”

  “The City Convention Center.” I checked the watch that the president had given me. “And we’re running out of time.”

  Callie hit the gas, steering through traffic and tearing through yellow lights at all the intersections. That was when I saw the van with the giant cockroach on top coming into our rearview mirror.

  “Look out!” I shouted. “It’s him!”

  The Bug Man came up so close behind us that I could see Mr. Midwood in the passenger seat.

  “Hang on,” Callie said. “This is going to get bumpy.”

  Okay. So car chases are cool in video games and movies, but I don’t know how you’re supposed to describe them in a book. In fact, just thinking about sitting there reading some description of two cars chasing each other around is putting me to sleep.

  So instead we’re going to do something that’s much more fun than a car chase.

  I call this mini chapter . . .

  Lame Jokes with Pete and Wesley

  That was when it all came back to me: the sticky note that had ruined everything! Just then—screech!

  Callie hit the brakes and we all jerked forward in our seats.

  “What are you doing?” I shouted. “We’re nowhere near the convention center and we’re running out of time!”

  “I can’t go any further.” She pointed at the street in front of us. “Check it out.”

  I stared out the windshield, and my stomach dropped. At the intersection up ahead, a row of police cars with their lights flashing had formed a roadblock. The cops weren’t letting anybody through.

  “Throw it in reverse! Turn around!”

  Callie shook her head. “I can’t,” she said, glancing in the rearview mirror. “Look.”

  I turned around. The Bug Man’s van was pulled up right behind us with its front bumper touching the back of Callie’s purple car, blocking us in. I could see Mr. Midwood and Stanley the Bug Man sitting there with big grins on their faces. There was no way out.

  Meanwhile, two cops from the roadblock were heading our way, and they didn’t look happy.

  “Okay,” I said, “let me do the talking.”

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN]

  Armed and Dangerous

  The two cops who came over to the car looked like Muppets. Not the big-name familiar characters, but the ones you see singing in the background in the big musical numbers. One of them had a bald, melon-shaped head with a horseshoe of black hair wrapped around the sides, and the other had a long, skinny head with a tuft of red hair standing straight up.

  “Is there a problem, Officer?” I asked.

  Both cops ignored me, and the red-haired one turned his attention to Callie. “This street is closed off,” he said. “We’re looking for a group of terrorists disguised as . . .”

  He stopped and stared at me, then glanced over at his partner, who was busy writing down the license plate number of Callie’s car. Both cops whispered back and forth, and when the red-haired cop turned his attention back to me, he didn’t look like a Muppet anymore. He looked like a cop who was going to toss me in jail and throw away the key until I was old enough to need an artificial hip.

  “You,” he said, pointing at me. “Step out of the car. And keep your hands where I can see them.”

  “What’s the problem?” Callie asked. “Pete didn’t do anything.”

  “Out of the car, now.”

  Climbing out, I tried not to freak. It wasn’t easy. In fact, it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do. It didn’t help that Callie was gripping the steering wheel hard enough to make her knuckles go white, and Wesley looked like he was about to wet his pants. I tried not to think about the countdown on the watch, but I couldn’t help looking at it anyway.

  Less than forty-five minutes left. Whose idea was it to waste time on all those lame jokes?

  The red-haired cop turned to his partner. “Is this the guy?”

  “Looks like it.” The other cop reached into his pocket and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. From where I stood I could read the words ARMED AND DANGEROUS.

  Underneath it was a picture.

  It was a picture of me.

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT]

  Smile, Stupid

  It wasn’t a very good picture. It was my school photo from last year. They’d taken it right after gym class, and I was still sweaty, and my shirt was unbuttoned one button too far. I had a dumb, crooked grin on my face like I’d been hit on the head by a fly ball. The photographer was the same guy who’d come to take our pictures every year, and the school must have gotten him at a discount, because he was pretty bad. To the girls he always said, “Hello, beautiful,” and to the guys he always said, “Smile, stupid.”

  I wasn’t smiling now.

  “Pete Watson,” the red-haired cop said, “turn around and put your hands behind your head. You’ve got the right to remain silent.”

  “Wait a second,” I said, “what did I do?”

  “There’s a warrant out for your arrest. Stealing government secrets. Making terroristic threats. And that’s just for starters.”

  “That’s crazy!” I felt one of them pulling on my hand, turning my wrist so they could see what was strapped to it.

  “Fancy timepiece you’ve got there, Sonny Jim,” the red-haired cop said. “Where’d you get it?”

  “The president gave it to me,” I said.

  “The president of what? The committee for oversize wristwatches?”

  “The United States.”

  The cops exchanged a glance. “Right,” the melon-headed one snorted. “You’re in enough trouble without the wisenheimer comments, don’t you think?”

  “Wait a second—it’s in stopwatch mode,” the red-haired cop said. “What’s it counting down to?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You’re a terrible liar, kid, anybody ever tell you that?” They started pulling me toward their cruiser, and I heard somebody clear their throat behind me.

  “Excuse me, officers. Perhaps I can be of assistance?”

  Both of them stopped. Mr. Midwood was standing there, holding out a laminated ID badge with his name on it, stamped with a holographic image of an eagle. It looked pretty official.

  “Agent Brian Midwood,” he said, in an authoritative voice. “Homeland Security.”

  The cops looked at the badge, and then at me. “We were under the impression that this was a police matter.”

  “It’s a federal matter now,” Mr. Midwood said. “We’ll take it from here.” Then he glanced at me, and his voice was low, almost a growl. “Get back in the car. Now.”

  I got in the back next to Wesley. Mr. Midwood got in the front seat next to his daughter. Callie stared at her father, but he didn’t even look at her.

&nb
sp; “Drive,” he said.

  [CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE]

  One Killion Dollars

  Callie didn’t drive. Not yet, anyway. Wesley stared at his father.

  “Wow, do you really work for Homeland Security?” he said. “Do they let you carry a gun and stuff?”

  “Don’t be stupid,” I said, which probably wasn’t very nice because (a) Wesley was my best friend and (b) this was his father we were talking about, but I was pretty upset. “That badge is as fake as he is. In fact, I bet he’s probably the one who sent in that picture of me to the police saying I was some kind of terrorist, so they’d catch up to us before we got to the convention center.” I turned to Mr. Midwood. “Right?”

  “You’re a bright boy, Pete Watson,” Mr. Midwood said. “Anybody ever tell you that?”

  “Every now and then,” I said, which was kind of a lie, but at this point I didn’t see how it mattered. I nodded at Wesley and Callie. “Go ahead and tell them.”

  “Tell them what?”

  “How you’re planning to expose the identity of all of America’s undercover agents and publicly humiliate the president and use that virus that you hired the Bug Man to put into the CIA’s database to take over the world.”

  Callie stared at her dad. “Is that true?”

  “I said drive.” Mr. Midwood glared at his daughter. “It’s a verb.”

  “Is it true?”

  Finally Mr. Midwood shook his head. “No,” he said. “It’s not true. Not exactly.”

  “Then why are you doing this?”

  “Why does anybody do anything?” Mr. Midwood shrugged. “For money.”