There were hundreds of them.
Miss Smilie stood at the front of the hall, her shadow, which was ten times her size, looming over us from the giant screen.
‘I have a wonderful announcement,’ she said. ‘On the last day before half term, we will be holding a special assembly to celebrate the achievements of PALS. All of your parents will be invited to attend so they can see for themselves the improvements that have been made in attendance levels, test results and behaviour.’
She grinned so hard that I swear I could see her shadow grinning too.
The PALS pals beamed at each other. The normal kids looked down and said nothing. A few weeks ago there would have been groans and rolling eyes, but things had changed and everyone knew it.
Jess’s eyes met mine and I knew exactly what she was thinking: first the PALpod delivery and now the assembly. It couldn’t be a coincidence.
In spite of the odd tricky moment, I’d always assumed that Jess and I would find a way to stop Miss Smilie. After all, the good guys always find a way to beat the baddies – everyone knows that. But for the first time, I felt like it was slipping away from us. We still didn’t know exactly how Smilie was blueberrying the kids, or how we could stop her. And we only had just over a week until the assembly. We were running out of time.
We spent break and lunchtime going over everything again and again. What had we missed? What else could we do? There must be a way.
When I sat down for afternoon PALS, everything seemed normal – blinds down, lights dimmed, the big screen set up at the front with the usual images projected on it. But when the music came on, it wasn’t the normal music. It came on so loudly that it made me really jump, and everyone else too from what I could see. And it wasn’t the gentle PALS tunes, it was electric-guitar rock music with shouty singing over the top. It had swears and everything. How had this happened?
A few kids started quietly sniggering as Miss Smilie stormed to the front of the hall. I put my hand over my mouth to cover up my massive smile. But then I noticed the PALS pals.
Every kid wearing school uniform was freaking out.
They had all turned pale and wide-eyed. They all looked upset. Some of them put their hands over their ears and manically shook their heads while others banged their heads into their hands, hard. They rubbed and scratched at their skin and some wrapped their arms around their bellies and groaned. It was super weird.
But then the music stopped.
‘EVERYBODY BACK TO YOUR CLASSROOMS! NOW!’ Miss Smilie screamed down the hall.
I stood up and started walking towards the door, taking one last look over my shoulder at Smilie.
She was standing at the front of the hall by her laptop, her back to the room, her hands by her side with her fists clenched. From the back she looked completely still, but I was pretty sure that was just to hide the fact that she was about to Hulk out.
‘Alex Sparrow and Jessica Lawler, you will remain behind,’ she said, without turning round.
Gulp. Why do people always assume that I’m responsible when someone’s done something naughty? I know I quite often am responsible, but this time it was totally not me.
‘Will the last person to leave the room, please shut the door?’ she called out.
Everyone shuffled out of the room in silence, some of them shooting us ‘I-bet-you’re-pooing-your-pants’ looks. In a minute, the hall was empty, and the bang of the closing door echoed around the room.
‘I suppose you’re pleased with yourselves,’ she said, as she started x-ing out of the windows she had open on her computer.
‘Was it you?’ Jess mouthed behind her back.
I shook my head.
Smilie stayed silent, her face hidden, her fingers clicking on her mousepad.
Jess raised both eyebrows and pouted at me.
I made an annoyed gesture with my hands and gave her the stink-eye.
‘Really?’ she mouthed.
‘Honest!’ I mouthed back, pointing at her nose and doing a long, exaggerated sniff. No stink equals no lie. Even she couldn’t argue with that.
Still Smilie didn’t turn round or speak. It was chilling.
‘Who?’ Jess mouthed.
I shrugged.
‘Ooh,’ Jess mouthed, pulling a hairband off her wrist and using it to tie her hair up in a messy knot on her head.
‘What you doing?’ I mouthed back, pointing my fingers at my head and twiddling them round in the crazy circles.
Jess made mouths out of her hands, wobbling her head around so that bits of her hair started falling down while mouthing ‘Blah, blah, blah.’
‘Oh!’ I nodded, making finger glasses and holding them up to my eyes. ‘You think it was The Prof?’ I mouthed.
Jess shrugged a maybe.
I shook my head. ‘Don’t think so,’ I mouthed. ‘Too risky.’
Miss Smilie still wasn’t saying anything. Clearly about to Hulk out.
Jess pointed at Smilie’s back and lifted her hands, palms up, with a questioning look on her face.
‘Roaaaaar,’ I mouthed, slow-motion stomping, messing up my hair and pulling at my clothes, pretending to rip them off. A button popped off my shirt and dropped onto the floor. ‘Oh, bums,’ I said out loud. ‘Mum’s going to kill me later.’
‘Not if I kill you first,’ Miss Smilie said, with a sinister little psychopath laugh. She finally turned around.
Her face wasn’t green. I was a bit disappointed.
‘Do you think I’m annoyed by this stunt, Alex?’ she said, taking a couple of steps towards us.
‘Er, yes?’
‘I’m not.’
‘Really, Miss? You seem a bit wound up.’
‘Practical jokes played by silly little boys don’t bother me.’ She moved closer.
‘How do you know it was a boy that did it?’ I said. ‘Bit sexist, Miss.’
‘This has your name written all over it.’
‘I don’t know how because it wasn’t me.’
‘It wasn’t him!’ Jess shouted.
‘Well, you would say that, wouldn’t you, Jessica?’ Smilie snarled, still prowling towards us. ‘You two have been joined at the hip lately. I can’t decide if it’s nauseatingly sweet or just very suspicious.’
‘She’s not my girlfriend or anything, Miss,’ I piped in quickly.
Jess snorted.
‘Partners in crime, then?’ Miss Smilie said, looking from me, to Jess and back again.
We both backed away.
‘You can’t just assume it was us,’ Jess said. ‘You have no proof. And you can’t keep us in here. Let us go or I’ll report you.’
‘It will be my word against yours. You have no proof either, Jessica,’ Smilie smiled.
‘Other than the recording of this conversation that I’ve been making on my phone, you mean?’ Jess wiggled her iPhone at Miss Smilie.
And that’s when stuff really went cray-cray.
Smilie stormed across the room like a rampaging elephant, dressed in purple sportswear.
Me and Jess backed quickly away until we reached the corner of the room. There was nowhere left to go. We stood side by side as she thundered towards us.
What we needed was some kind of force field, but unfortunately The Professor had only given me a farting ear and not the kind of proper superpower that would actually have been helpful in a dangerous situation.
Smilie’s arm lashed out at Jess, making her flinch. (Not me, obviously, I am a highly trained agent and was well prepared for her attack, like a coiled snake with one eye open.) She swatted the phone out of Jess’s hand and it hit the floor with a crunch.
‘Oops,’ Smilie smiled.
Jess stomped her boot down hard on Smilie’s perfectly clean pink trainer, leaving a large black smear all over it. ‘Oops,’ she smiled back. She ran over to where her phone lay on the floor.
Smilie was angrier than I’d ever seen her, and if there’s one thing I’ve learnt about using my power it’s that it works be
st when people are wound up.
I looked at Miss Smilie. ‘What’s your problem with the music, anyway?’
‘I have no problem with any music, but it is against school rules to play unauthorised music on the premises.’
‘Since when?’
‘Since the school started working towards a better future.’
‘But why?’
‘Because it upsets the atmosphere of tranquility which is vital for creating optimum learning conditions.’
‘Are you sure it isn’t because it makes some of the kids unwell?’
She gave me the gobbler look again. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Lie.
‘I’m talking about how when the rock music played instead of the PALS music, it made some of the kids, certain kids, act a bit weird. You know, shaking, crying, rubbing their stomachs… Was the music making them ill?’
‘Of course not, ridiculous child.’
Lie.
Jess sniffed and looked from me to Smilie.
‘There has been a virus circulating the school,’ Smilie said. ‘Any children looking unwell are no doubt suffering the symptoms of it.’
Lie.
‘It’s a nasty bug. You must know – you and Jessica were suffering from it just the other day.’
‘So if I was to play all those kids a load of rock music, for a longer time, say for five or ten minutes, it wouldn’t make them ill?’
‘No. Of course not.’
Lie.
‘Maybe tomorrow whoever changed the music – a.k.a. NOT ME – should change the video clip to something more exciting, let’s say Star Wars, for example. Or might that get those kids feeling all “virusy” again? Hmm?’
‘No. No. NO! Nobody will be tampering with the PALS resources again, because you and Miss Lawler are going to be dealt with once and for all, in the PALS suite. Now!’
How the heck were we going to get out of this? Jess looked at the door and started tapping at her phone. Who the heck was she going to call? I didn’t think the police would believe us and I was pretty sure she didn’t have The Avengers on speed dial.
‘This is outrageously unfair!’ I said, stalling, thinking, hoping for a way out. ‘How can you punish us without proof?’
I don’t need proof if I get a confession,’ she said, coming so close to me that the zip of her tracksuit was brushing against my jumper. She leaned over me, putting a hand against the wall on either side of my head. I couldn’t move. ‘Things will be much better for you, Alex Sparrow, if you just tell the truth.’
‘He is telling the truth,’ Jess shouted. ‘Trust me, we’d know all about it if he wasn’t.’
Miss Smilie moved her face in closer, so that we were nose to nose, her breath blowing right onto my skin. Funny how something warm can give you the shivers. And by funny, I mean not funny at all and actually very creepy. I could basically hear her seething.
‘Confess,’ she hissed at me.
‘Let me think about it for a moment…’ I said. ‘Er, no.’
‘Then maybe I’ll have to find another way to make you co-operate.’
A bit of her spit went in my eye.
‘Gross,’ Jess said.
‘By spitting at me, Miss?’ I said. ‘I’m pretty sure that is unauthorised teacher behaviour. I’m going to have to run it by the Head, my mum and dad and maybe the local authorities, I’m afraid.’
I met Jess’s gaze and nodded towards the door, telling her to run for it and save herself, but she shook her head.
‘Run it by whoever you like, Alex. People will laugh at you. They’ll put it down to the delusions of a silly, attention-seeking child. A letter will be going out to the whole school this afternoon, warning parents about the virus. Nobody will believe a word you say.’
‘Whatevs, Miss. By the way, you’ve got a bit of lipstick on your teeth. You might want to pop to the toilets and sort yourself out.’
‘Impudent boy!’ she screamed, slamming her hands against the wall by my ears.
‘Calm down, Miss, doesn’t PALS stand for “Peace And Love, Son”?’
‘PALS stands for Positive Aspirational Life Skills, as you know. Skills that you are sorely missing.’
I was just about to tell her I’d be making a detailed statement about her outrageous actions and sending them to Ofsted, and one of those ‘no-win-no-fees’ lawyers from the TV, but I hesitated. Miss Smilie had just lied. She said ‘PALS stands for Positive Aspirational Life Skills’, and my ear buzzed. I forgot my confusion when the door to the hall opened, and Darth Daver walked in.
‘It was me, Miss Smilie, I changed the music. I’ve already told the Head and he sent me here to report to you. Alex and Jess had nothing to do with it. He said to send them back to class and give me whatever punishment seems appropriate.’
‘Dave, no! What are you doing?’ Jess looked terrified.
Miss Smilie let go of my hand and turned to Darth Daver. She seemed torn between reluctance to let me and Jess go and excitement at getting her hands on Darth Daver.
‘Alex and Jessica, get back to your classrooms. I’ll deal with your friend.’
We hesitated. We couldn’t leave him. How could we leave him?
‘Alex and Jessica, get out of my sight or I’ll take all three of you to the PALS suite, regardless of what the Head says.’
‘You guys should go.’ Darth Daver turned to Jess and me. ‘It isn’t fair for you to get punished for something you didn’t do.’ With his back to Miss Smilie, Darth Daver held his hand out to Jess. As she took it, he gave us the bravest, saddest smile I’ve ever seen and silently mouthed two words: ‘Trust me.’
Miss Smilie was practically dribbling at the thought of getting Darth Daver back to her lair. I guess he was probably a prime target for her, with his long hair, one fingernail painted black and in his dark mufti clothes; he was different from everybody else. I used to think he was weird and scummy, but he was the sweetest guy in the world, one of my best friends and the last person I wanted to see being turned into another boring blueberry.
‘OUT, NOW!’ Miss Smilie screamed.
Darth Daver let go of Jess’s hand and nodded. She turned and pulled me towards the hall doors and out into the corridor, tears pouring down her cheeks. I had never seen Jess cry before. She didn’t really seem the crying type. It was awful.
‘What is up with you and him? Always doing The Right Thing – it’s so flipping frustrating! We have to go back. We have to stop it!’ I said.
‘No. He asked me to trust him. And he gave me this.’ Jess opened her hand to show me a folded-up piece of paper. It was a note from Darth Daver.
We locked ourselves in a boy’s toilet cubicle, opened the piece of paper and while Jess sobbed, I read.
Jess and Alex,
I don’t have much time to write this, so I hope it makes sense.
It doesn’t take a genius to realise that there’s some bad stuff going on in this school. Things have been weird for a while now, but when I saw all the PALS kids wearing uniform this morning, I knew it had gone too far. I had to do something to show we’re not all mindless clones yet, so I hacked into the computer system and switched Smilie’s PALS music.
I’m handing myself in because I’m responsible for what happened and should be the one who gets punished. I’m also handing myself in because I can’t let you guys end up like the others. Whatever’s going on around here, something tells me that you two know more about it than anyone else, and that you have to be the ones to fix everything.
I get the feeling I’m not going to be the same after my detention with Miss Smilie, so I’ll leave you with the only thing I have that might help – her computer password: xxmontyxx
Please don’t worry about me, just take that control freak down.
You’re my best friends, I know you’ll find a way.
Dave x
17
We Hit The Bottom
Darth Daver was excluded for the rest of the day, so Jess
and I didn’t see him until the following morning. As we waited at the gate, Jess couldn’t keep still. She paced back and forth and bit her lip. Her eyes were red and puffy. He hadn’t replied to her texts so we knew it was going to be bad. We knew, but somehow we weren’t prepared at all.
Darth Daver was the tallest kid in school, so we saw him coming from a long way off. Even from a distance, he looked like a different boy.
‘They cut his hair!’ Jess said, her eyes filling with tears.
‘It’s so … short,’ I was shocked. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen his whole face before.’
Darth Daver was really shy, so he had always hidden behind his long hair. He was also self-conscious about his height, so he usually hunched over a bit, almost as if he was trying to make himself smaller.
‘He’s walking weird. Why is he walking like that?’ Jess was getting more upset by the second.
‘He’s just standing up straight, Jess.’ I tried to reassure her.
‘He’s not even trying to cover his hands.’ She was sobbing now. ‘I always tell him not to cover them because he shouldn’t be ashamed of his skin condition, but he never listens.’
‘Then at least he’s not embarrassed by it anymore. I guess that’s kind of a good thing?’ I was trying to help but it wasn’t working.
‘Where’s his schoolbag that we decorated together with lyrics from our favourite songs? Where are his shoes that he scuffed when he tried to kick that football last week and fell over instead? It’s like everything that made him Dave is gone. There’s nothing good about any of this. Nothing!’
Darth Daver walked towards us, smiling that awful PALS smile, and when he reached me and Jess, he just carried on walking past without so much as looking at us.
It was heartbreaking.
I wanted to make Jess feel better but I didn’t know what to say, so I put my arm around her and we walked to the school door in silence. Her face was streaked with glistening lines from her tears, and every now and then she choked as she tried to hold back another sob. She looked smaller and sort of broken.
Alex Sparrow and the Really Big Stink Page 11