Charlie had set up petitions and had protested against everything Jones Industries made and sold. But, the townspeople were already too far gone to be reached. They had been blinded by Jones’s charismatic ways and the wealth he brought them. Charlie Thompson was labeled a crazy old coot by the people, and his claims against Jones were systematically dismissed.
That’s why he turned to the children. Children, honest and real children, have no basis for money. They don’t understand its importance and they don’t need it. Charlie knew this and knew if he could find one kid, that special kid within the crowd who would help him fight for his cause, he could turn this town back around.
That kid turned out to be Kyle.
One day, about two years ago, Kyle and Samantha had happened into Spring Road Toys to get a few supplies. It was unmistakable from the first time Charlie saw Kyle that he would be the one. The way Kyle carried himself, the way he instinctively helped Samantha and the other children do the simplest of tasks without praise—Charlie Thompson saw in Kyle the qualities he was looking for.
Their first meeting was a spring day when Kyle was in third grade. He stopped by Spring Road Toys alone one day. Mr. Thompson approached the small boy. They talked for awhile and then Charlie started telling him the tales of the old Elmcrest before the rise of Jones.
Kyle was fascinated by these tales. Hours suddenly flew by, and the two talked all night. Charlie then told him there was a way to get back to those times, a way in which Kyle could help.
Although he wasn’t named Kid Combat yet, Kyle had already been busy with his friend Samantha starting to fight back. The missions were small and mostly centered around Lincoln Elementary, but Kyle knew that to eradicate the evil from Elmcrest, he would eventually have to deal with Jones.
Those early missions with Samantha seemed so trivial now. They had fought for things at Lincoln like not eliminating lunchtime and keeping the cost of lunches down so the kids could keep more of their allowances for themselves. They even saved the playground set in front of the school from being demolished to install a bigger parking lot for teachers and guests.
Kyle thought about telling Charlie what he and Samantha had been doing. It was a big gamble. He discussed this with his friend Samantha for several days. Each day, though, Kyle continued to meet with Charlie and learned more and more about the old days of Elmcrest, about the evil that Jones had done, and more about Charlie. Finally, one day, Kyle told Charlie about him and Samantha.
Charlie was surprised and impressed. “It now makes perfect sense,” Kyle remembered Charlie saying. “Fate has brought you here. It is fate that we work together.”
From there on out, Charlie and Kyle became allies. He would train the young boy in many fields, including electronics, computers, and science. He taught him languages and arts to help define his character. He taught Kyle to be quick on his feet and trust his instincts.
On those earlier missions, it was just Kyle going out and reporting back to Mr. Thompson. It was around the time when Kyle had a dozen missions under his belt that he earned his nickname from the town.
The Elmcrest Press was the one responsible for giving Kyle the name “Kid Combat.” Kyle used the Elmcrest paper as a sounding board for his missions against Jones. Almost daily, he would drop off newsletters and folders full of information against Jones on their office doorsteps. They contained files on how Jones did his business practices, pictures of Jones doing sleazy deals, and transcripts from Jones Industries.
Kyle would go late at night, as not to be seen. He always wore a hoodie and dark jeans to conceal his identity. He would ride his bike downtown to the offices of Elmcrest Press. Without even stopping, he would heave a yellow manila envelope at the main door. Most days he would hit the door dead on.
He would sign each envelope the same way: SAVE MY TOWN. STOP JONES.—A KID.
The press ran a weekly story under the headline “Kid Combats Jones.” The paper decided to run the article as if a kid had written it, and most articles featured crudely drawn pictures of Jones and his men. They were stick figure forms done in crayon and looked very cartoonish. It might have been why so many people dismissed the articles.
The paper ran these for weeks and months as Kyle continued to drop off letters. Eventually the title was shortened to just a bullet headline: KID COMBAT.
One day, right after the fight for Maple Forest between Jones and the city, when an envelope, very similar to the ones that showed up on the doorsteps of Elmcrest Press was delivered to a judge in a courtroom, the weekly Kid Combat column in the Elmcrest Press stopped.
Once Jones linked the two together, Elmcrest Press went under the new management of Jones Industries. Once he was in control of the paper, the first thing Jones did was kill the Kid Combat column.
Once Kyle and Mr. Thompson lost their voice in the town, it didn’t take long for the two to figure out that more help was needed. That’s when they brought Samantha in and formed SOCKs. From there, the organization grew to stand at six members.
Mr. Thompson funded everything for the members of SOCKs, but in true Kid Combat fashion, took none of the credit. The only members of SOCKs that knew about Mr. Thompson were Kid and Samantha. None of the other boys knew of Mr. Thompson, and he preferred it that way. He would have preferred that Samantha didn’t know either, but Kid convinced Charlie to let her in. Since Kid trusted her with his life, Charlie knew it was the right thing.
Charlie, Kid Combat, and the rest of SOCKs carried out mission after mission in secrecy. Little by little they tried to free their town of their greatest ill, Phillip Arthur Jones. Over time, Charlie became less involved in the day-to-day operations, like the missions when Samantha was kidnapped by Jones, or even the mission a few days prior involving the Science Museum. He was more of a mentor now, someone Kid went to for advice and help. Today was one of those days.
The two old friends made it down the old wooden stairs of Mr. Thompson’s basement. The uneven and unfinished stairs that led down into the dark basement fit the rest of the room perfectly. As Kid hit the bottom of the stairs and the cold cement slab, Mr. Thompson pulled the chain to light a single bulb that hung from the rafters. The bulb danced around as it sprung to life and made a clicking sound as it hit the chain with every move.
The room was splashed with light. It revealed a bunch of work benches buried by thousands of papers, a small junkyard of electrical parts, and enough wire to run electricity for half the town. There were two stools at one of the work benches, and Charlie and Kid walked over and sat at them. Mr. Thompson was the first to speak.
“So, what’s up, Kid?” he said in a thoughtful manner.
“I’m worried,” Kid said, not too sure of himself.
“Worried?” inquired Mr. Thompson. “About the store?”
“Yeah, that,” answered Kid. “We can’t lose the store.”
“We won’t. I’m sure of it,” Mr. Thompson reassured Kid.
“How could you be so sure?” Kid asked abruptly. “And why did you wait so long to tell me about your threats?”
“I didn’t want you to worry about me. You needed to focus on your missions and getting Jones,” Mr. Thompson said. “If you heard about the curator, you would have dropped everything and come to help me.”
“As I should have. The store is in ruins. I mean, we all know the curator is behind it, but I don’t see how we can pin this on him. Not without any evidence.”
There was a pause as Kid got up and walked about ten feet away. His head hung low and a fragile Kid Combat was exposed. “I’m afraid he might have us beat.”
“Kid,” Mr. Thompson said softly. The young boy turned around to face him. “Come over here and sit back down.” Kid, disgruntled, turned and walked back over and took a seat on the stool. Mr. Thompson continued.
“My boy, don’t beat yourself up. Everything is not as bad as it seems. And quit doubting yourself. You are an amazing child. Look at all you have accomplished. Look at all you and your team have
done. You have gone well beyond my expectations for any of this. You have built up a team that is better than I could have dreamed. You have brought back hope to me. Hope for this town. You have taken Jones down a few notches, and I know we can take him down even more.”
“Yeah, but …” Kid interrupted.
“No “buts.” Look at what you have done with The Playground. That place is amazing. And it was all your idea. I would never have come up with that. And you will come up with something for this, Kid Combat,” Mr. Thompson said and lifted Kid Combat’s fallen chin up. “I have faith in you. You will come up with something.”
Kid Combat paused for a moment, then looked up. “That reminds me—Samantha is having problems digging the trenches to Pepper Creek. She says with her tools and man power, it would take forever to reach the banks of the creek. I don’t know if the PCAV’s will be useful or not anymore.”
Mr. Thompson looked at Kid in amazement. “You see, this is why you were born to be Kid Combat. Even when you are down, you still are thinking of other people. You truly are amazing.”
Mr. Thompson paused as he mulled over Kid’s dilemma. “Don’t worry about the tunnels, KC. I still have some connections in this town. I will get my men on it. I will have them start at the banks of Pepper Creek and dig within ten feet of your perimeter. We’ll say it’s for electrical work for the park. Samantha should be able to knock out the rest in only a few hours. Good enough?”
“Good enough,” Kyle responded. “Well, now that that’s solved, I better get to work on that curator.”
Chapter Nine:
Roller In Trouble
6:00 pm
While Kid Combat was at the Thompsons’ house, Roller was on the other side of town. He was just down the street from Spring Road Toys, making what lately had become his weekly visit to It’s So Easy Computer Shop. He had gone there to buy up old electronic devices, fix them, and use them at The Playground or on missions.
As he whizzed down the sidewalk in his modified chair, Roller didn’t feel right. He almost felt as if he was being watched. He approached the store cautiously, and with one last glance over his shoulder, he disappeared into the alcove leading into It’s So Easy.
Off in the distance, across the street, and concealed behind a young elm tree, a boy in blue watched Roller’s every move. He stood there wearing sunglasses, his head partially covered by his hoodie, and took pictures of Roller.
Minutes later, Roller appeared from inside the store and made his way back down Spring Road. Heavily modified by himself, and now Gears, his chair went close to twenty miles per hour. That made it easy for him to get from place to place. Today, Roller was weighed down by a few electronics he had picked up at It’s So Easy, but the chair was still easily cruising down the sidewalk. Across the street, and keeping a safe distance, the boy in blue whirled along on his modified trek. Keeping always a half a block of distance, the boy in blue tracked Roller’s every move.
Roller flew down the sidewalk. He approached Fairview Drive, the street that led into the heart of Maple Forest and back to Roller’s final destination, The Playground. Right behind him, the mysterious boy in blue followed.
Minutes went by as Roller made his way down the paths and back into the clearing where the baseball field and the secret entrance into The Playground lay. Roller, still feeling uneasy, made a dash for the tree line in centerfield. Still behind him, the boy in blue paused, hid behind a tree, and produced a pair of binoculars.
Roller coasted up to the trees in centerfield and stopped. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something wasn’t right. He looked around for what seemed to be the hundredth time and still saw nothing.
“I must be getting paranoid,” Roller said out loud to himself, and with one final look around, he entered the tree line. Upon seeing this, the mysterious boy in blue took out a digital camera and started taking pictures of the boy entering the trees. Roller made a terrible mistake that day. He should have trusted his gut.
Roller made his way through the honeycomb of tree limbs that had been modified to accommodate his wheelchair. A few branches were cleared, and others had been actually sawed off. Still more had been placed on hinges that were controlled by a panel on Roller’s wheelchair. This allowed the entrance to be concealed to the naked eye yet remain accessible for the boy. As he approached, Roller hit a button on his chair, and a few of the branches bent in not so natural ways, allowing him access to the disk-shaped elevator leading down into The Playground.
The actual entrance into The Playground was modified too. It still was a round shape, but the hole was enlarged and a platform had been added so Roller could wheel his way onto it and then descend. Another modification to the secret compartment within the tree allowed Roller to type in a predetermined eight-digit code from his chair that would open up the secret entrance.
Roller completed all these steps and descended into The Playground.
Still waiting far off in the tree line of Maple Forest, the boy in blue sat. He waited for ten minutes for Roller to reappear from the tree line, but he never did. The boy waited thirty minutes, and Roller never once came out of the trees. The boy in blue started to get suspicious. What would a boy in a wheelchair be doing in a small clump of trees for so long?
An hour went by, and still nothing. The sun by this time was starting to set, and it became dusk. With a small hint of darkness to aid him, the boy in blue left his hiding spot behind the tree and approached the set of trees in centerfield.
Down below, the only two people at The Playground at this time were Roller and Gears. They both sat within Main Computer Lab 1, working on separate projects concerning the Spring Road Toys case.
Gears was looking up details on the two boys and trying to find out as much information on them as he could. He was also waiting for the twins to show up with Ace’s cell phone.
Roller, on the other hand, was piecing together electronic parts from the devices he had picked up at It’s So Easy. He was engrossed in his work, and his earlier paranoia had started to fade away.
Outside, the boy in blue reached the tree line. He peered into the darkness and the maze of branches and looked for Roller. He crept, almost on his tiptoes, into the trees. Within seconds it became obvious that Roller was nowhere to be seen. The boy made his way in further and examined very suspiciously every detail he could see, but there was nothing out of the ordinary.
Kid and his crew spent countless hours making sure there was no way anyone could make out the entrance to the secret base. Every detail was checked and then checked again, and then Kid came back and checked them again. It was secure. But the boy in blue knew something was going on here. A boy in a wheelchair just doesn’t enter a segment of trees and then vanish into thin air.
The boy in blue continued to look for any sign of something out of the ordinary, but he never found one. Kid had taken another risk in order to keep this place a secret and ensure that no one would find anything—there was no external surveillance. Only infrared was monitored by a secret satellite dish installed on a neighboring house. Those sensors, however, were only checked upon exiting.
The boy in blue, frustrated for now, gave up his search and retreated out of the tree line. The boys inside of The Playground continued on with their work, never knowing how close they had come to being exposed.
Chapter Ten:
Learning the Truth
8:00 pm
It was nighttime in Elmcrest when Kid Combat made his way back to The Playground. He walked through his park, which had grown dark in the evening hours. On his way, he was in deep thought on how to catch Alfred E. Scott and the two boys, Ace and Tommy. For the life of him, he still couldn’t think of a plan.
He crossed the baseball field, and with a quick glance around, disappeared into the tree line. He rode the cylinder disk down, punched in his usual access code, and entered the main room of The Playground.
By this time, the entire SOCKs team was back and working on various projects. Kid cros
sed through the main room, and Samantha was the first person he saw. She was working in Research Lab B on her computer. Kid walked up to her and asked what she was doing.
“I’m going through all these bogus Kid Combat reports. Seems like there is a new one everyday now,” Samantha said.
For several weeks, copycat Kid Combats had been springing up throughout the neighborhood. All of them tried to imitate Kid Combat, and most of them claimed to be the real Kid Combat. The news loved reporting on these children, the new batch of “heroes” in the neighborhood.
Samantha, though, was less impressed with them. She saw them as a distraction and a very big risk to the SOCKs organization. The damage they could cause could bring the whole alliance down, just by bad reputation alone. Samantha was very frustrated by the time Kid got to her.
“I mean, really, what do these people think they are doing? They’re pathetic,” she continued.
“I know Sam, but …” Kid started. Samantha wasn’t done with her rant.
“I mean, come on. Some of these are so ridiculous. Here, look at this one,” Samantha said, clicking on a file on her computer. “He calls himself ‘The Child Conqueror.’ Isn’t that the exact opposite of what he was trying for?”
“But …” Kid tried again. It still wasn’t his turn.
“And he isn’t even the worst one,” Sam concluded. She opened more files on her laptop. Kid tried to keep up. “Here’s ‘The Katchy Kid.’ And ‘Kid Fabulous.’ Oh, don’t forget about ‘Little Warrior.’ But, finally, someone had the nerve to call himself ‘Eric, the Evacuator of Evil from Elmcrest.’” Samantha sat back and took a breath. “’The Evacuator of Evil.’ What does that even mean?”
“But …” Kid tried one last time. His frustration started to turn and he found the situation comical.
“But what?” Samantha said, finally looking up from her computer screen. She was still not amused. Kid stood there with a puzzled look on his face.
The Adventures of Kid Combat Volume Two: The Heist of Spring Road Toys Page 7