Untitled 2

by David Baddiel

  Morris still looked like a shaven gorilla.

  “You’re late,” said Isla.

  “So are you!” said Ellie.

  “Yes, but we’re fashionably late,” said Isla.

  “What does that even mean?” said Ellie.

  “It means that we’re late,” said Isla, coming closer to her, “but we look great.”

  “Morris doesn’t,” said Fred.

  “That’s true, I don’t,” said Morris.

  “Shut up,” said Isla. “Even you, Morris, who looks like a shaven gorilla, look better than these two. Especially you, Ellie. Jeans, V-neck jumper and glasses. Like always. Couldn’t you have tried wearing something nice for the party? Couldn’t you have asked Mum or Dad for some fashion advice? Oh no, you couldn’t, could you? Because your mum’s a telly addict and your dad’s fat as a house!”

  “That’s true, they are,” said Morris.

  “Shut up!” said Fred.

  The front door began to open.

  “Oh well,” said Isla, “I suppose that just means Rashid will only have eyes for one of us. As usual.”

  As she finished speaking, Isla turned away from Fred and Ellie and turned her face on: which means she stopped sneering and gave a big, bright, toothy smile to the person opening the door – who was, indeed, Rashid.

  “Hello, Rashid!” she said.

  “Hello, Isla. Hello, Morris,” said Rashid. “And hey! Fred!”

  “Hi, Rashid,” said Fred.

  “And … who are you?” said Rashid, looking beyond Fred.

  “I’m … Ellie,” said Ellie. “I’m in your class at school.”

  “… Ellie?” said Rashid. “Wow. You look … different.”

  Everyone turned towards Ellie. And indeed she did. She looked like Snow White and Princess Fionafn1 and Joy from Inside Out and all the other cartoon and video-game heroines rolled into one (and yet, still, somehow, like Ellie). Her hair curled softly round her face, even more like a shampoo advert than Isla’s. Her dress was black and gold. And on her feet, shining up and reflecting the lights of the party inside, she was wearing the spangliest silver slippers.

  Everyone who had turned to look at her couldn’t stop staring. She looked amazing.

  “When …” said Isla, who was really staring, “how … when … did you change your … outfit? And … everything else about you …?”

  Ellie shrugged, spreading her palms, and revealing one other item of clothing: a black bracelet on her right wrist. Which Isla noticed, although she didn’t notice Fred putting the Controller back into his coat pocket.

  “That was amazing! Did you see Isla’s face? And everyone else’s when I walked in? How everyone took more notice of me than they ever have before?”

  Fred nodded, although he was starting to get a little worried about Ellie, who had been talking like this ever since they’d left the party.

  “And I danced! I never dance! But I just felt like it!”

  She whirled round, her hair whirling round with her. Fred stood back against the wall of the playroom and watched her for a moment. He was happy she was happy, but he was also a bit troubled.

  “OK … what about Rashid?”

  Ellie stopped in her tracks. “What about him?”

  “Did you talk to him?”

  Ellie looked down at her hands, spreading them out, examining her fingernails, which were long and painted red. “For a little while.”

  “So … do you think he liked … your new look?”

  Ellie looked up at Fred like he was mad. “Well, of course he did!”

  “So what did he say?”

  “He didn’t say anything about it. He’s a boy. He’s eleven! But …” said Ellie, looking at herself in the mirror and posing, like celebrities do for pictures at a film premiere, with one leg pushed out and a hand on her hip, “… he must have done!”

  “Anyway, I’d better change you back to normal now,” said Fred, picking up the Controller, which was lying on the table under the TV screen.

  “No!” said Ellie, still looking at herself. “I want to stay like this!”

  Fred frowned. “Stay … for how long?”

  “I don’t know. I like it. Forever?”

  “Ever?”

  “Well …” said Ellie. “Yes. Why not?”

  Fred looked at her. He didn’t actually know the answer to that question. One thing he wanted to say was: Because you’re my twin. And, even though we’re not identical, we’re supposed to look, and be, similar. And now you’re not looking, or being, similar. I’m not sure who you’re being at the moment.

  That’s what he wanted to say. But it felt a bit sad and rubbish. And besides, it was all his fault, as he’d done the changing, he’d invented Cinderellie. He was her stylist.

  So instead he just looked down at the Controller. On which the blue light was doing something strange.

  “What’s going on?” said Fred.

  “What do you mean?” said Ellie, still looking at herself in the mirror.

  “The Controller. It’s doing something weird …”

  That finally made Ellie turn. She looked down at the Controller. Its blue light was flashing. Not pulsing any more. But flashing. Quickly.

  She looked down at her bracelet. It was flashing too.

  “What does this mean?” she said.

  “I don’t know,” said Fred.

  Ellie picked up the Controller. She shook it. She turned it upside down.

  “Does it mean the power’s running out?”

  “It might.”

  “But how do we charge it up? Or change the battery?”

  “I don’t know. If you remember, that’s what I said when you asked me that when it first arrived.”

  Ellie turned it round. The shiny metal plate reflected her new blonde hair and big eyes and larger lips. But there were no screws on it and no arrows: nothing to suggest that you could take it off and see batteries lined up snugly underneath.

  “Well … what are we going to do?” she said.

  Fred thought for a second. “We could go online and find the Mystery Man?”

  “Great idea!”

  They rushed into the kitchen, in search of the family laptop. It was a bugbear of Fred and Ellie’s that the Stones only had one computer and that, most of the time, no one knew where it was. However, this time it was obvious: in Eric Stone’s right hand, playing a YouTube clip of Jamie Oliver making a bacon sandwich.

  “… now officially, a great sarnie has BROWN sauce,” Jamie was saying, “but I think ketchup with just a dash of Tabasco makes a …”

  “Dad!” said Ellie. “What are you doing?”

  Eric Stone looked round. In his left hand he was holding a packet of bacon as big as Thor’s hammer, if indeed Thor’s hammer had been made out of cured ham.

  He also had four or five frying pans piled up on the stove with various bottles of condiments: brown and red sauce, mayonnaise, mustard, piccalilli and a jar of Indian pickle that no one knew the name of and everyone had been too frightened to open up until this point. He was wearing a chef’s hat and a large apron straining at its back knot. It was a novelty apron that Janine had got him last Christmas, which had on the front a photograph of a man’s stomach, but not Eric Stone’s stomach: a model’s stomach, with a six-pack.

  “I’m just checking the recipe …” he said.

  “The recipe?” said Fred. “Bacon. Bread. Sauce. That’s it.”

  “Aaah, but you see, Jamie – he’s got a whole new way with bacon, bread and sauce … Ellie, what are you doing?!”

  “I’m taking the laptop away! The screen’s already got splattered with bacon fat!” said Ellie, moving back towards the playroom.

  “Bring that back here!”

  “No!” said Ellie.

  “… and if you rub the bread into the pan afterwards,” said Jamie, “you get a …”

  “What did he say? WHAT DID HE SAY?” shouted Eric. But it was too late. Ellie had clicked off the screen. Eric pu
t his head in his hands. Which was a mistake as he was still holding the Thor hammer of bacon.

  “It’s not here!” said Ellie twenty minutes later. “I’ve searched everywhere!”

  She had. They’d googled everything: Controller, Mystery Man, Man of Mystery, nerd-obsessed balding grown-up with little sunglasses who gets upset when you ask him questions … Nothing.

  They stared at the screen. Suddenly a Skype-like sound started coming out of it. Bing bong bing bing.

  “Oh!” said Ellie. “Maybe this is him! Maybe he’s found us!”

  “Yes!” said Fred, accepting the call. A window opened up on the screen. There didn’t appear to be anyone there, just a blank wall and an empty chair.

  “Hello!” said a voice.

  “Hello!” said another voice.

  “Who is it?” said Ellie.

  “It’s us!” said the first voice as its owner – Stirling – repositioned the webcam so that he could be seen clambering up on to a chair.

  “Sorry,” said the second voice – Scarlet, obviously – “but sometimes we’re too small for Mum’s webcam.” She clambered up too, smiling and waving.

  “Is she there?” said Fred. “I thought you weren’t allowed to use the computer unsupervised.”

  “She was just in here,” said Scarlet. “She said we could use it to look for some Christmas pressies.”

  “So you’re going to search for something on Amazon?” said Ellie.

  Stirling and Scarlet looked at each other and burst out laughing. “Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!” they said.

  “I think not, Grandma!” said Stirling. “The state-of-the-art site for the up-to-the-minute shopper these days is, of course …”

  “Pret-a-Pick-n-Mix?” said Scarlet. “Mammamammon? Shopjock? PayUsPlease? Londis.Com? BuyStuff?”

  “All fabulous, Scarlet, but the one we’re going to use is …”

  “Look, I don’t care,” said Ellie. “We’ve got a problem. And now you’re here it strikes me that you two iBabies might be able to help us with it.”

  So then Fred and Ellie – after making them promise that they wouldn’t tell anyone else about it ever, ever, ever – told Scarlet and Stirling all about the Controller.fn1And about how they couldn’t now make contact with the Mystery Man, or even find any reference to him anywhere on the internet.

  The iBabies thought for a while. Then Scarlet said: “Maybe … maybe he only appears on the laptop at school. The old one?”

  “OMG, that antique!” said Stirling. “It’s so like our school not to have an iDesk, or a TechHammer, or a PixSonic 250. But yes, I bet Scarlet’s right! It’s so old maybe it was built by, like, a medieval wizard or something!”

  Ellie frowned. “Isn’t the internet just a big thing that’s the same on all computers?” she said. “If he’s on that one, he should be on this one.”

  “Yes,” said Scarlet. “But most video-game controllers don’t control people.”

  There was no doubt this was true. Ellie turned to Fred, with a what do you think? face. He did a the iBabies might be right shrug.

  But, before they could carry on the conversation, Scarlet and Stirling’s mum and stepdad appeared behind them.

  “Oy! I never said you could use that to Skype someone!” said their mum, who was blonde and had a Scottish accent.

  “Yes, that is right,” said their stepdad, Mr Bodzharov, who had very thick black hair, a moustache and an Eastern European accent. “I have warned you. You know I will have to punish you if you disobey your mother.”

  “Please don’t cut our hair again like they do in the Old Country!” said Scarlet.

  “What?” said Mr Bodzharov. “That is not a punishment! That is a reward! No, I meant no more pocket money.”

  “Actually, it’s not Skype, Mother,” said Stirling. “It’s FaceFace, which uses a whole different system—”

  Scarlet and Stirling’s mum switched off the link. Ellie and Fred laughed. And then Fred said: “So maybe, first thing Monday morning, we go to the computer room and—”

  “No! I think we should go now!” said Ellie.

  “Now?”

  “Yes! We need to know what’s happening!”

  “But it’s Saturday. The school will be locked up!”

  Ellie nodded and held up the Controller. “I’m pretty sure this has still got enough charge to deal with that …”

  The Skype – sorry, FaceFace – bing-bong started up again. Fred sighed. Ellie shook her head. She clicked on ACCEPT.

  “Hello!” said Scarlet’s voice, whispering.

  “Hello!” said Stirling’s voice, also whispering.

  “What is it, iBabies?” said Ellie.

  “We had an idea,” said Scarlet, “after Mum and Mr Bodzharov went out of the room!”

  “Yes, we thought that you could go to the school over the weekend, even though it’s locked up, and use the Controller to maybe …”

  “Yes, we’ve already had that idea,” said Fred. “We’re going later today.”

  “Oh,” said Scarlet.

  “Oh,” said Stirling.

  There was a short pause.

  “Can we come?” said the iBabies together.

  “No,” said Fred.

  “No,” said Ellie.

  “Why not?” said Scarlet.

  “Because you’re iBabies,” said Ellie.

  “Yes. And you call your stepdad Mr Bodzharov,” said Fred, clicking on END CALL.

  By the time they arrived at the school gates, it was getting dark. Ellie said to Fred: “Hold your hand out.”

  “Minecraft?” said Fred.

  “Minecraft,” said Ellie. She pressed the ruby button of the Controller. Suddenly a rectangular object, made out of blocks, appeared in Fred’s hand. It was brown with yellow at the end. It lit up.

  “A torch!” said Fred.

  “Give it here,” said Ellie. She angled it towards Fred, to light up what they needed to do next. Fred held out his hand. Ellie pressed the gold button. A stone tool, like a shovel or a hoe, appeared between his fingers.

  Fred immediately started digging.

  Ellie moved backwards to avoid the spray of dirt and dust. But not for long as Fred had very quickly – in about six big blocks of concrete, which flew out behind him – dug a tunnel under the gates and appeared on the other side. Ellie followed him. The walls he had dug were remarkably square and neat.

  She came out on the school side.

  “Hold on a minute,” said Fred. He vanished back inside the tunnel. From the other side of the gates, Ellie watched as he threw each block down the hole, to fill it in.

  “Don’t want anyone falling down that,” Fred said through the gates. “Or seeing what we’ve done.”

  “Yes, but now you’re on the wrong side again.”

  Fred nodded. “Float me over.”

  Ellie tutted. But she pressed the diamond button, and moved the control stick, and next thing you know Fred was gliding into the air, as if in slow motion, up and over the school gates and down again, to land gracefully next to Ellie on the other side.

  “That was fun!” he said.

  “You’re wasting the battery,” she said.

  “We don’t even know if it has a battery.”

  “It’s not flashing like that for nothing,” said Ellie, gesturing at the Controller.

  They had to dig another tunnel to get into the building itself. Then they found that the door to the computer room was locked.

  But Ellie had an idea. She clicked on the Controller and Fred held out his hands: a wooden plank appeared in them. Then another and another. Fred arranged the planks against the wall of the computer room to form another door. Which wasn’t locked.

  They went in. Inside, the laptop was sitting on the table, exactly where they’d left it. (Not a lot of people used the school computer room.) It was displaying its screensaver, which was a photo of a smiling Mr Fawcett at the school gates with a group of children of all different ethnic backgrounds. The twins sa
t down in front of it. They glanced at each other, nervously.

  “If we can’t find him on this one …” said Fred.

  “I know,” said Ellie.

  She clicked on the computer. The screensaver vanished and there, in exactly the same room as before, wearing exactly the same clothes, was the Mystery Man.

  “Oh! Well! Thank the Lord!” he said. “I thought you were never coming back!”

  “What?” said Ellie. “Do you mean you’ve been there the whole time?”

  “Yes! You’re meant to shut the computer down when you’ve finished using it! It’s basic environmental good sense!”

  “So … you’ve stayed sitting there for weeks to teach us a lesson about how to help save the environment?” said Ellie.

  The Mystery Man, who had been looking flustered anyway, looked even more flustered. He looked Premium Edition Flustered.

  “I’ve told you before, you’re not allowed to ask me questions! Just like I’m not allowed to ask them questions! Questions like, ‘Why do I have to sit here all the time if silly school children don’t shut the computer down?’ or ‘Can’t I just go home for a bit?’ or ‘Can I at least go to the toilet?’ Oh no.”

  “Who’s them?” said Fred.

  “NO MORE QUESTIONS!!!”

  “Actually, Mystery Man, can we just ask one more question?” said Ellie.

  “NO!”

  “Just one! About the Controller?”

  “NO!”

  Ellie shook her head and her mouth tightened a little, which, Fred knew, meant she was going to get tough.

  “If you don’t let us ask this question … we won’t shut the computer down when we leave … again,” she said.

  The Mystery Man opened his mouth, possibly to shout “NO!” again – we’ll never know because he then shut it. He opened it again and shut it again. In fact, this happened four times before he said: “OK. One question.”

  Ellie held up the Controller. Fred held up his bracelet.