Into the Dorkness

by John Kloepfer

  “Hey, Warner,” Tara said. “What happened to your backpack?”

  Warner groaned as he realized he’d left it back in the robotics lab trailer. He slapped his forehead with the palm of his hand. “Ugh! I always do that!”

  “We had, like, almost our entire arsenal of weapons in that bag!” TJ groaned.

  “Whatever,” Warner said defensively. “All that stuff was out of power anyway.”

  “Except for the de-atomizer ray,” Tara sniped.

  “Come on, we’ll figure it out later,” Kevin said. “Let’s go.”

  Kevin stepped through the doors after Warner. Once inside, a wave of sweltering heat struck the four of them. Kevin glanced around the field house. Roving clusters of teenage girls gathered in one great hectic, chaotic, sweaty mass that filled up the entire gym.

  Even with the daylight coming through the skylights, the gym was dim from the blackout that Mim had caused a few hours earlier when he ate all the telephone and power lines and devoured the nearby cell phone towers. Kevin recalled the sick feeling he got when he realized they were disconnected from the outside world.

  Inside the gymnasium, a big industrial-sized electric fan sat idle by the doorway, powerless to stir the muggy air.

  At least two hundred girls milled around chit-chatting, fanning each other with magazines, and juggling soccer balls on their knees.

  They all wore cleats with knee-high socks over shin guards, mesh shorts, and T-shirts with the sleeves rolled up. Some of the girls sat on the floor braiding each other’s hair. A few others lay on their backs, sprawled out, barely able to take the heat.

  Walking through the groups of campers, a trio of junior counselors, maybe eighteen years old, tried to settle everyone down.

  “Okay, everybody chill!” a tall blond girl wearing a pair of Umbros and Adidas cleats yelled to the rest of the camp through a megaphone. Her voice echoed off the walls of the indoor athletic complex.

  A voice called out from the throng of tweenaged soccer campers: “How are we supposed to chill when it’s, like, a hundred degrees in here?”

  “A little heat never killed anyone,” yelled the girl with the megaphone.

  Not true, Kevin thought, a bit shocked at the level of misinformation being dispensed here. People died from heatstroke all the time because they weren’t careful.

  “Everybody pipe down and listen up!” the megaphone girl blurted through the speaker. The soccer campers stopped what they were doing and took seats on the hardwood floor. The chatter quieted down to a dull mumble.

  The blond girl with the megaphone waited for complete silence before she started to talk. “Coach Jones and some of the other counselors went over to the science camp across the lake to see if the geek squad knows anything about what happened to the electricity and the wireless internet connection.”

  “Ahem.” Kevin cleared his throat nervously. “Excuse me. . . .” He could feel his blood throbbing to the beat of his pulse. His face flushed a bright beet-red color that most likely clashed with his orange hair. Megaphone Girl swiveled her head toward Kevin, Warner, Tara, and TJ, who were now the only ones still standing.

  “Can we help you?” she asked.

  Kevin and the gang stood awkwardly amid the sea of soccer camp girls.

  “My name’s K-Kevin,” he stuttered. “And we’re from Northwest Horizons.”

  “Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

  “It’s the science camp across the lake, sweetie,” Tara said sassily, cocking her head to one side with a little bit of an attitude. “You know, the one with all the smart people who are going to run the world one day?”

  “Oh, you guys are nerdcampers?” said the girl with the megaphone. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place?” She then turned to Tara. “And don’t call me sweetie, sweetie. . . .”

  Tara crossed her arms defiantly and twisted her face into a scrunched-up stink-eye.

  “Okay, so are you guys going to fix the internet or what?” One of Megaphone Girl’s sidekicks shot them an impatient look and held up her smartphone. “My boyfriend is probably trying to text me right now.”

  “You guys have to listen up,” Kevin said. “The internet is the least of our worries right now!”

  “Yeah,” TJ said. “A bunch of really bad aliens who want to take over the world just landed in our backyard.”

  The all-girls camp was quiet for a moment, then everyone burst out with a rip-roar of laughter.

  “Seriously, you guys need to listen to us,” Warner said. “It’s not safe here!”

  “Do you really expect us to believe that there are aliens out there right now?” the megaphone blared at them.

  “Fine, you want us to prove it?” Kevin said, reaching into his bag. He held Klyk up for everyone to see. “I give you Klyk!”

  But their little alien pal was stiff as a board, not moving a muscle.

  The gaggle of soccer girls started to giggle.

  “Aw, that’s so adorable,” one of the girls said. “He thinks the toy’s real!”

  “Klyk, what are you doing?” Kevin said out of the corner of his mouth. “Say something.”

  Staying as still as could be, Klyk flicked his eyes and gazed at Kevin, then whispered, “What do you suspect would happen if these girls actually thought the world was being taken over by aliens?”

  “I don’t know,” Kevin said. “Help us kick alien butt?”

  “That’s kind of what they’re good at,” TJ said. “I’m sure butts are just as easy to kick as soccer balls . . . maybe even easier.”

  “Wrong,” Klyk said. “They’re going to flip out and cause a rumpus of unwanted attention. . . .”

  “Did you just use the word ‘rumpus’?” Warner looked puzzled.

  “He’s right, Kev,” said Tara. “I’m not so sure this group is mentally prepared for the fact that life exists on other planets. We’re wasting our time here.”

  A little bit agitated, Kevin tossed Klyk in the backpack.

  “Hey! What are you—” Klyk shouted as Kevin zipped up the pocket, muffling his miniature alien friend’s protest.

  “You’re just a toy, remember?” he said. “You’re not supposed to talk.”

  Kevin watched as Megaphone Girl turned back to the rest of the camp, forgetting about them completely and moving along with their daily soccer routine. “Come on, ladies! Everybody line up in your assigned groups. We’re not going to let a little blackout stop us from doing our stations, are we? On the double, ladies, let’s go!”

  As the soccer campers rose from the floor and exited the field house, Kevin, Warner, TJ, and Tara were left in the middle of the gym.

  Kevin hung his head, crestfallen, as they all walked out of the gym. What were they supposed to do now? They couldn’t just waltz back to camp and fight off all those Kamilions. That wasn’t going to work. No, Kevin was quite sure they had to be much sneakier about it than that. They didn’t have enough information to solve the problem. It was like one of those multiple-choice questions you couldn’t know the answer to.

  The lone clippity-clop of someone’s soccer cleats echoed down the hall behind them. They all spun around as one of the soccer campers caught up to them and stopped.

  Her hair was bright red and curly. She had sparkly green eyes and a face full of freckles. A multicolored goalie jersey clung to her torso, and a pair of black mesh shorts hung down past her kneecaps. Kevin guessed she could probably do at least forty push-ups without breaking a sweat.

  Kevin found himself a little jittery. He got nervous talking to almost any girl—aside from Tara, of course, but she was cool—and this particular one looked like she could manhandle the four of them with no problem whatsoever.

  Kevin stepped forward and stuck out his hand, and she clasped it with a firm grip. “I’m Kevin Brewer,” he said to her, and gestured to his friends. “And this is Warner. That’s Tara. And that’s TJ.”

  “Sup.” She nodded at the gang. “I’m Marcy.”

 
; “Hey, Marcy,” Warner, Tara, and TJ all said in unison.

  “Okay,” said Marcy. She seemed a little frazzled, out of sorts, like something was weighing on her mind. “Will one of you please tell me I’m not completely crazy?”

  “I mean, we just met,” TJ said. “For all we know, you might be totally bonkers.”

  “I’ve seen some weird stuff going on the past few days,” she said. “I tried to report it to the head counselors, but they told me I was probably just suffering from heatstroke.” Marcy paused for a beat. “But it wasn’t heatstroke.”

  “What kind of stuff have you seen?” Warner asked.

  “Down by the lake the other night I saw some nasty-looking octo-spiderpus thing. I thought my mind was playing tricks on me. But then the next day I saw some little purple fuzzy guy when I was on a nature hike between scrimmages, and I knew it had to be aliens. They look exactly like the characters in this Max Greyson comic book I have.”

  Just then, Klyk unzipped Kevin’s bag, climbed out, and perched on his shoulder. “You’re not imagining things, Marcy. Everything you’ve seen is real.”

  Marcy pointed at Klyk with an awestruck look on her face. “That thing’s talking! What is that thing?”

  “It’s not a thing,” TJ explained. “It’s a him. He’s an alien space cop and his name is Klyk.”

  “It’s so cool!” Marcy said. “He’s so little.”

  “Wait a second.” Warner stopped Marcy. “What did you just say about Max Greyson?”

  “I’m only, like, his number one fan,” she said.

  “But what comic did you see Mim and the arachnopod in?” said Warner. “They haven’t been part of the series.”

  Her eyes narrowed and she gave the group a once-over. “I have something to show you guys. Come with me.”

  Kevin and his friends hustled after Marcy across the practice field. She led them to the main housing cabin, a longhouse-style building. The four of them filed inside and followed Marcy down the alley between two rows of bunk beds. The interior of the cabin was set up like a military barracks. The beds were all perfectly made and everything was exceedingly tidy. Someone was running a tight ship.

  “The girl back there said your coaches were heading toward our camp—do you remember how long ago they left?” Kevin glanced out the window to scope the campgrounds for any alien threats.

  “Not that long,” she said, checking the clock on the wall. “Maybe, like, half an hour ago?”

  “Maybe they got hit by the freeze-ray bomb,” TJ offered up a hypothesis.

  “Maybe . . . ,” Kevin said, biting his bottom lip in thought.

  “What do you mean, freeze-ray bomb?” Marcy said, stopping in front of one of the bunk beds. “Are they okay?”

  “We don’t know yet,” Warner said. “They could be absolutely fine, they could be freeze-rayed, or they could be having their insides turned into their outsides.”

  “Is that supposed to make me feel better?” Marcy scowled at Warner.

  “Marcy, don’t listen to him. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Kevin said. “They’re fine, I’m sure. Now, what were you going to show us?”

  “Oh, that’s right!” Marcy said. “I almost forgot.”

  Kevin, Warner, Tara, and TJ stood in a semicircle around Marcy as she knelt down and slid out a cardboard box from beneath the bed frame. “Here we go,” Marcy said, and opened the file box to reveal a twin stack of sci-fi and fantasy books.

  “Whoa, you got a Brainstorm #1?” Warner said, picking up a comic book out of the box. “Mine’s all beat-up, but this one is mint condition!”

  “I know, and I intend to keep it that way,” said Marcy nervously. “So please be careful.”

  “What did you say you wanted to show us, Marcy?” Tara said.

  “This,” she said, sifting through the box and producing a comic titled The Wrath of Mim. “It’s where I recognized Mim and the arachnopod from.”

  “Huh?” Warner’s eyes lit up. “Let me see that!” He nearly ripped it out of Marcy’s hand he was so excited. “How do I not know about this?”

  “It’s a special-edition, limited-release issue I got through the Brainstorm fan club.”

  “I didn’t even know there was a fan club!” Warner said. His jaw dropped at this never-before-seen issue.

  “Oh, you should totally join,” said Marcy. “It’s awesome! You get all kinds of stuff for free: T-shirts, trading cards, action figures, and of course special editions.”

  Kevin, Tara, and TJ leaned over Warner’s shoulder as he flipped to page one of The Wrath of Mim. The comic began with a picture of a futuristic city on a distant planet. The next panel showed Mim on the outskirts of the alien metropolis during one of his crazed states of mass consumption. The third panel illustrated the city, reduced to rubble, after being decimated by their former “friend,” the purple planet-eater.

  On the next page the comic revealed Mim licking his chops on the now-barren planet. The only thing left was an arachnopod. Kevin recognized the creature as Mim’s pet, Poobah, who they had taken down earlier that day. The illustration showed Mim trying to eat the alien, but as soon as he got close, Poobah sprayed him with a dark, inky spittle that made Mim gag. “YUCK!” A little thought bubble appeared over Mim’s cartoon head on the next panel. “I don’t feel good. This creature is poison. . . . I will make him my guard pet instead.” The following page showed Mim taking the arachnopod in as his pet.

  Kevin looked up at Marcy. “No wonder the galactascope worked!” he said. “Everything in the comic book is turning out to be real!”

  “You know how crazy that sounds, don’t you?” Marcy said, raising an eyebrow.

  “You’d be surprised what our last few days have been like,” Tara said.

  “We need more information than this,” Klyk said from his perch on Kevin’s shoulder. “Mim and Poobah are old news.”

  “Have you ever read anything about a couple of aliens named Zouric and Nuzz?” TJ asked Marcy.

  The soccer goalie looked at the ceiling and scratched her temple, thinking for a moment. “Nope, not ringing any bells.”

  “We have to find out what’s really going on,” Kevin said.

  “If only we could talk to Max Greyson in person . . . ,” Tara said. “I mean, if he knew all about Mim, maybe he would know about Zouric and Nuzz, too.”

  “That would be awesome,” Warner said. “But fair warning, guys—don’t be offended when Max and I become best friends, okay?”

  “Well, then, why don’t you just go to his house?” Marcy said.

  “Nobody even knows where he lives,” Warner said. “He’s very secretive about his private life.”

  “Not that secretive.” Marcy pulled out an envelope stuck between the pages of one of the comic books. “Max Greyson lives in Colorado. I have his address. I wrote him a fan letter once a couple of years ago and he wrote me back. See?”

  She handed Kevin the envelope with the address written on it.

  “How are we supposed to get to Colorado?” TJ asked.

  “We still have my space cruiser,” Klyk said. “It has the invisibility shield on. They probably don’t even know it’s there. . . . If we can get to the ship, it can take us anywhere on Earth pretty quickly.”

  “How fast does your spaceship travel?” Kevin asked.

  “About a mile per second,” Klyk told them.

  “Okay, we’re about a thousand miles away from Denver.” Kevin did some quick math in his head. “That means we can make it there in 16.6667 minutes.”

  “And we can use my ship’s communication system to request backup,” Klyk added. “Call in the cavalry and wait for reinforcements.”

  “How are we going to find your ship?” Kevin asked the mini-alien.

  Klyk tapped the side of his head where the robotic eyepiece was embedded into his skull. “I can see the ship with my biotech. I can lead the way. . . .”

  “Then that’s that,” Warner said. “We have to get to Klyk’
s ship if we’re going to have any chance at beating Zouric and Nuzz.”

  “You mean we have to go back into the alien freak zone?” Tara asked.

  “I don’t think we have a choice,” TJ said. “Do you?”

  “There’s just one other thing,” said Klyk. “One of you is going to have to fly the ship. I’m a little too little right now, but I can guide you through it.”

  “I call driver’s seat,” Warner said quickly, jumping at the thought of getting behind the controls of a real alien spaceship.

  “Then let’s get out of here,” Kevin said. “If we’re going to throw a kink in Zouric and Nuzz’s plans, then every second’s going to count.”

  “I don’t know what you guys are talking about, but do you mind if I come along?” Marcy asked. “This all sounds really awesome.”

  “Of course,” Kevin said. “We need all the help we can get!”

  As they were getting ready to leave, a pair of footsteps clomped outside the cabin and someone knocked on the door with a rap-a-tap-tap.

  “Who is it?” Marcy asked, creeping across the cabin. She peered through a crack in the wooden door, then turned around and whispered to Kevin and the gang, “It’s my counselor. . . .”

  The counselor’s voice resounded behind the door. “Kevin Brewer, Warner Reed, Tara Swift, and TJ Boyd must be located.”

  “Hold on one sec,” Marcy said, and gave Kevin a strange look. “That’s weird. She’s asking for you guys.”

  “Why would she know who we are?” TJ asked.

  “She wouldn’t,” said Tara.

  The counselor banged on the door again, only this time much, much harder.

  “Just a minute,” Marcy said, trying to stall.

  “Unsatisfactory,” the counselor said in a robotic voice. “All campers must report for processing immediately.”

  “That’s weird,” said Marcy. “She doesn’t sound like herself. . . .”

  “What was she saying about processing?” TJ asked.

  “Maybe that’s what Zouric and Nuzz were talking about,” Tara said. “What if they’re using some kind of mind control or something. . . .”