CR—ACK!
My feet left the ground as I jumped in panic at the sharp noise, my heart clattering against my ribs.
“Sorry,” whispered Frasier. “I stepped on a pen. Somebody must have dropped it.”
So much for sneaking quietly. But lucky for us nobody was in the school office. The office was so neat it didn’t look like anybody ever worked there. The desks were cleared and the computers were covered. There was a fine layer of dust over everything.
The back of my neck prickled as if somebody was watching. But I could see there was nobody there. Absolutely nobody. We hurried past the office.
Jessie looked behind her nervously as we headed for the nearest classrooms, our footsteps echoing in the silence. The classroom doors were open.
“It looks like they left in a hurry,” said Jessie, looking around at tipped-over chairs and books and papers scattered on the floor.
“It looks like they were dragged out of here,” said Frasier, hefting his bat, his eyes darting.
The empty blackboards stared at us like blank, mocking eyes.
“Maybe they took the kids to assembly,” Jessie said in a small, hopeful voice.
I didn’t think so but Jessie was right. We had to check everywhere. The assembly room door was closed. No sound came from inside. Frasier reached past me and flung open the door. Clouds of dust swirled up in the empty dimness, making us sneeze.
“Well, now we know they’re not in the school,” said Frasier.
“Yes, but we saw them come,” said Jessie. “And the only ones who left the school were the townspeople with their shovels.”
There was a door at the end of the short hallway next to the assembly room. “I guess we don’t have any choice,” I said, pointing to the door. My stomach felt like it was filled with lead.
A sign on the door read:
BASEMENT ACCESS FORBIDDEN. CUSTODIAN ONLY
Slowly, dragging our feet, we started toward the door. I tried to make my mind go blank so I wouldn’t have to think about what might be waiting for us. We were just outside the door when something crunched.
The sudden sound startled me but it was only something Jessie stepped on. “What’s this?” she asked, stooping to pick it up. “Oh!”
She was holding something out in her palm. It was a little plastic barrette like a first-grader would wear.
Now we knew the kids had come this way. All three of us stared at it for a second, thinking of those terrified little kids being dragged into the basement where tentacled aliens waited for them.
We turned back to the door, totally determined. And totally scared. I reached out for the doorknob, expecting to find it locked. But the door opened at my touch.
We looked down into blackness. Frasier fumbled for his flashlight. When he switched it on, we started down, our pounding hearts loud in the darkness.
Frasier swung the flashlight around but it didn’t penetrate any farther than the bottom of the stairs. We stuck together, taking the steps one at a time. The quiet was so thick I just knew there was something inside it waiting for us.
I strained my ears, trying to hear some sound down below.
Then suddenly the silence shattered with a terrifying noise!
RRRRRRROOOOOOOOAAAAAAARRRRRR! GGGGGRRRRR!
We grabbed at each other as the beast rushed at us up out of the basement, claws scraping the cement floor.
GGGGGGGRRRRRRROOOOOAAAAARRRR!
18
The earsplitting noise drowned out the pounding of my heart. We ran for the top of the stairs. I could feel the breath of the monster on my neck.
But as we tumbled up out of the doorway there was a CLICK! The tremendous noise dropped off and settled into a low rumble.
Frasier started to laugh. Jessie and I looked at each other, feeling foolish. “The furnace!” we all cried at once.
“But why would the furnace come on in the summertime?” asked Jessie as we got to our feet.
“Hot water,” said Frasier, testing his flashlight to make sure it still worked. “Or maybe the aliens like things really warm.”
If that was supposed to be a joke it wasn’t very funny. But we started back down the stairs, feeling even more rattled than we had the first time. The furnace shut down before we reached the bottom and the silence seemed to rush back in, wrapping us like a blanket.
I shivered although the air down here was hot, hotter than outside.
Jessie found a light switch on the wall at the bottom of the stairs and clicked it on. The sudden brightness made us blink. Fluorescent lights sprang on all over the basement.
We froze. Would Mr. Burgess or some of the zombiefied teachers rush out to capture us? We edged back toward the stairs but nothing happened.
“I don’t think there’s anybody down here,” said Frasier. “It’s too quiet. No way you could keep all those kids quiet.”
I shuddered, remembering Billy being dragged away and Mrs. Downey gulping down the room key. I thought there were probably plenty of ways to keep a whole school full of kids totally quiet.
“Come on,” said Jessie. “Let’s look around.”
We passed through a storeroom and the furnace room and some more rooms full of boxes and supplies. The glaring lights made sharp shadows and we jumped every time a pipe gurgled but we didn’t find anything.
“There’s no kids down here,” said Frasier. “Nobody’s been doing any digging. We’re wasting our time.”
He was right, there was no sign of anyone. But I couldn’t shake the feeling that something bad was in the air.
“They have to be somewhere,” said Jessie. “And what about that barrette I found?”
Frasier shrugged. “So some little kid dropped it after assembly. It’s probably been there since last spring.”
Jessie nodded reluctantly. I sighed, feeling defeated. Then suddenly all the hairs on my arms lifted straight up. “Wait!” I cried, dropping to my knees. A shiver passed through me. “Look at this!”
There was a small clod of dirt smeared next to a tall box of paper towels. I spun around, looking for more. “There!”
It was only a little but it was definitely earth. Someone had carefully swept it up. If I hadn’t been staring so intently at the floor I would have missed it.
“Here’s more,” said Jessie.
We followed the faint trail of earth to the far wall of the basement. Wooden crates filled with school supplies were piled high against the wall. Without speaking we started pulling aside the crates.
Almost immediately I smelled earth and something else. A strange, cinnamon-spicy smell that made the blood in my veins turn icy.
Frasier gasped. “I smell aliens,” he said, his voice cracking shrill.
Then Jessie pulled aside a crate and cried out. We stood looking at what was behind it. A large hole in the wall leading into emptiness.
We pulled more crates away and stared in dread and amazement. A tunnel. The basement wall had been hacked through.
Frasier directed the beam of his flashlight into the tunnel. But the darkness swallowed it instantly.
“I think I see something,” said Jessie, darting inside before I could stop her. She disappeared beyond the flashlight beam. Her voice traveled back to us. “We don’t have any choice,” she said, her voice echoing. “We have to follow this tunnel wherever it goes.”
My heart sank even though I already knew she was right.
Frasier’s flashlight beam wavered. “Who says?” he challenged defiantly.
Jessie emerged from the tunnel, a smear of dirt on her cheek, her mouth set. “This does,” she said, sticking out her hand. She was holding a brand-new pencil box, its top cracked and caked with dirt.
“They dragged the kids through this tunnel,” I said bleakly. “Back to Harley Hills. Back to the mothership.”
Jessie nodded. “And we’ve got to save them.”
19
Frasier peered into the tunnel. “All right,” he said, pushing his glasses up his nose. �
�But this time we’re going in prepared.”
He rummaged around in his backpack, coming out with two more flashlights and a compass which he hooked to his belt. He handed me and Jessie a flashlight and hefted his Louisville Slugger. “Let’s go.”
With three flashlights the tunnel should have seemed less scary. But three lights just seemed to make three times the number of moving shadows. None of the beams penetrated very far. It was like the blackness swallowed them.
Under our feet the tunnel was uneven and we kept stumbling into holes and jamming our toes. The darkness closed in behind us.
“Nick,” whispered Jessie. “I can’t see the entrance where we came in. Look behind us. It’s gone.”
I glanced over my shoulder and almost tripped over a rock. It was like looking into a wall of tar. “We must have rounded a bend,” I said, my voice sounding hollow and echoey.
“No,” said Frasier nervously, shining his flashlight onto his compass. “We’re heading straight west. Straight for the Harley Hills. We should still be able to see where we came in.”
“AAAHH!” yelled Frasier suddenly, slapping the back of his head, his light beam whirling crazily.
At the same moment I felt something tickle the back of my neck. Several somethings. Bugs! Spiders! A few of them slipped under my collar and began crawling down my back. Then more. An avalanche of spiders all down my back!
“Ugh!” I flew into a panic, feeling creepy crawlies all over my skin. My flashlight fell to the ground as I pulled at my shirt and struggled to get the things off me.
All around us there was a sound like rain, pitter-patter, as more of the things fell from the tunnel ceiling. “Run!” I yelled, imagining us buried in a mountain of hungry spiders.
“Wait!” Jessie yelled urgently. “Don’t move. Stop!”
I froze in my tracks. Jessie wouldn’t shout like that without a good reason. But Frasier bolted off into the darkness, dancing and jerking and slapping at himself.
“Frasier, stop,” Jessie yelled again. “You’ll make the tunnel cave in. It’s not bugs, it’s dirt. The ceiling is coming down!”
Frasier skidded to a stop. We both realized Jessie was right. It was dirt raining on us, not bugs. My panic turned to cold terror. We could be buried under tons of rock and dirt.
Very slowly and carefully we tiptoed along the tunnel, afraid even to talk. Dirt sifted down around us and over us like mist. I don’t know how long we moved like that, hardly daring to breathe. It seemed like forever. But finally the tunnel seemed to settle.
My heart was slowing to a fast gallop when something soft grabbed my foot, tripping me. As I fell, I tried to shine my light on it. It was brown and nubby and rolled away on stubby arms and legs.
“Oh,” cried Jessie, running to grab it.
Before I could scream a warning she had scooped it up. “Look!”
I felt foolish when I saw it was a kid’s teddy bear, but Jessie wasn’t paying any attention to me. “Now we know for sure they brought the kids through here,” she said fiercely.
“Wow, look at this,” said Frasier wonderingly. He was shining his light on the tunnel walls. The walls looked drippy and weird, like candy that’s melted in the sun.
“This is basalt,” said Frasier, who was a real rock hound. “It’s extremely hard rock. Something melted right through it to make this tunnel. Some kind of laser beam, probably. Something much more powerful than anything made on earth, that’s for sure. I wonder if I could get a piece for my rock collection.”
Frasier fished around in his pack again and brought out a chisel. He went over to the wall and started chipping at it.
“Sssh,” Jessie said suddenly. “Do you hear that?”
There was a faint rising and falling sound, like waves at the ocean crashing against the shore. Or like the thick darkness pressing against my ears.
“I think it’s voices,” said Jessie.
I listened again. She was right. It sounded like a whole crowd of voices jammed together and all speaking, or crying, at the same time.
20
Jessie took off running.
“Jessie, wait,” Frasier called after her. “It’s probably a trap! Wait!”
But Jessie kept going and in seconds all we could see of her was the small dim beam of her flashlight, bobbing in the blackness.
Frasier and I rushed after her. Our flashlights showed swirled and goopy drips of rock, all hardened to gleaming glassiness. Under our feet the tunnel floor was slick and slippery. We slid more than ran. I felt like my feet were flying out from under me at every step.
Then Jessie cried out and her light disappeared. My heart leaped into my mouth. “Jessie!” I yelled, sweeping my light across the tunnel.
“I’m here.” Her voice sounded faint and strange.
“I see her,” Frasier called out. “Jessie, are you all right?”
Skidding, I aimed for Frasier’s light. Jessie was propped up against the tunnel wall, rubbing her head.
“It’s okay,” she said as I slid to a stop. “I was going too fast. Did a header into the wall. I think I broke the flashlight.”
“You won’t be needing it,” said Frasier in a trembling voice. “Look.”
Up ahead there was a faint glow. It seemed to be getting stronger. That noise we’d heard seemed louder, too, and closer.
“Pssshhhhkkkrrrrbblllllrrrrmmmm.”
“I think it really is the other kids we’re hearing,” I said. “It sounds like everybody scared and babbling at the same time.”
“Not to me,” said Frasier. “I think it sounds like thousands of tentacles all rubbing against each other.”
Jessie shuddered and stood up. “We’ve come this far. We have to go see what it is.”
Frasier passed around his canteen. “Who knows when we’ll get another chance?” he commented as he drank, his eyes wide and scared and determined behind his thick lenses.
We moved ahead more cautiously. As we approached the glow we could see it was coming from around a bend in the tunnel. The cinnamon-spicy smell was growing stronger too.
We gripped hands as we rounded the bend, braced for anything, our hearts ratcheting against our ribs.
But the tunnel loomed empty ahead of us. It was wider and the cold gray glow came from everywhere and nowhere. Puddles of melted and newly hardened rock were heaped along the walls like glassy mud.
“Hairy,” said Frasier. “These creepoids don’t fool around. It’s hard to imagine the laser machine that could do this.”
Shadows leaped out from smooth walls where there shouldn’t be any shadows. They made weird shapes on the ceiling of the tunnel, swooping down on us as we passed.
A winding, twisting shadow snaked over Jessie. She shivered and rubbed her hands hard on her jeans. A large, blobby shape drifted down on me. It was icy. My skin felt clammy everywhere it touched.
Frasier ducked away as a long soaring shadow loomed out from the wall. “I feel like they’re looking at us, reporting on us,” he said, shuddering as the shadow passed over him.
“Listen,” cried Jessie. “It’s the kids! You can hear their voices.”
Yes! The noise we’d been hearing now sounded definitely human. We couldn’t make out words but we could hear the high-pitched cries of little kids and the louder yells of bigger kids.
Hope and fear surged in me as we tried to go faster over the slippery floor. The tunnel grew even wider and the creepy sense of being watched grew stronger as the voices got louder and more distinct. My shoulders tightened against the feel of a thousand eyes.
“Help! Let us out! Help!”
We could hear the whole crowd of kids yelling, but where were they? We couldn’t see them.
Then the tunnel widened into a cavern and the spicy smell was so strong it stung my eyes. The melted walls almost seemed to be moving, like a lava flow.
Frasier ran up to the wall, put his hand on it, then snatched it away like it was hot. The print of his hand stayed on the wall.
“Hey,” Frasier yelled, “this cavern is new. The aliens must have just melted it before they brought the kids through. The walls are still warm!”
He touched the wall again, marveling at the feel of melted rock. But I could only think the aliens must be close by if this cavern was just made.
“HELP! HELP US! HELP!”
“They sound like they’re right here,” said Jessie, puzzled, looking all around. “But I can’t see them.”
The cold glow pulsed at us. The voices tugged us forward while the spicy smell made our heads swim. Then suddenly we realized the tunnel had ended.
We were standing in front of a wall. It was a little higher than our chests. By standing on tiptoe we could look over. “Oh, man,” said Frasier. “Dismal.”
Down below us, milling around in a circular area of melted rock, like a high-sided bowl, were all the kids from school.
“How will we ever get them out?” asked Jessie.
I cupped my hands to my mouth to call down to our friends. But before I could yell, I heard a wet, slithering sound behind me and Frasier let out a squawk.
I whirled just in time to see a fat, slimy alien tentacle whip itself around Frasier!
21
The tentacle pulsed with glowing green light. Quick as a snake it wrapped itself around Frasier’s ankles, throwing him off balance.
Jessie and I ran at it, hitting it with our flashlights. It lashed out at us but didn’t let go of Frasier.
A second tentacle slithered toward us out of the tunnel. I jumped out of its way, slashing with my flashlight. But it ignored me, curling around Frasier.
“YIIIIIIIIIEEEEEEE!” yelled Frasier. His glasses were cockeyed and his eyes were bugging out. The baseball bat dangled uselessly from his right hand. He seemed to have forgotten it completely he was so terrified.
“Hit it Frasier!” yelled Jessie, trying to dart in, wielding her flashlight like a club.
The tentacles climbed up Frasier’s legs and wound around his chest. They were going to swallow him whole! One of them wrapped around Frasier’s arm, pinning it to his side. He was completely enclosed!
Brain Stealers Page 4