Speed Demons

by Jasmine Jones

  “Hey!” the photographer shouted.

  But Candace had already hurried away. “Now I’ve got you!” she growled, snapping a photo of Phineas behind the wheel as his car raced past. It came out perfect.

  “Hey—hey, missy,” the photographer said as Candace shoved the camera back into his hands. “Two pictures, two bucks!” He handed her the photo of her grimy self.

  Candace dug into her pocket. “Oh, yeah, uh, I’ve only got a dollar, but, uh, I just want the one.” She kept one photo and pressed the other one into his hand. “You can just tear that other one up, okay?” She smiled as she raced off toward Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro’s house. “I’ve got them now!”

  “And pulling up fast on the inside lane, it’s number forty-two, Team Phineas!” the announcer said.

  “Hey, Ferb,” Phineas said over his walkie-talkie, “do you think we can get any more power? I mean, I know it’s just a battery, but I was thinking . . . uh, Ferb? We’re actually slowing down now.” Number forty-two had just fallen into last place, right behind an antique car that was supposed to be part of a Cars Are So Much Faster Now demonstration at the end of the race. “Ferb? Hello?”

  Suddenly, number forty-two shot forward like a bullet! Wind whipped against Phineas’s face, making his cheeks flap against his teeth. “Oh, yeah! Now that’s what I’m talking about!”

  Ferb nodded as he watched number forty-two shoot past the other cars on the track. He’d hooked up the remote control to a huge battery. It was large enough to power an entire city block.

  “Hey, Ferb,” Isabella said into a red phone, “we should bring Phineas in for a pit stop.”

  Ferb gave her a thumbs-up. The Fireside Girls put out the signal. Phineas’s car screeched to a halt in the pit. “All right, Fireside Girls, let’s move, move, move!” The girls darted around madly, changing tires, pumping gas, checking oil, and testing the hydraulics.

  “That helmet looks so manly,” Isabella told Phineas. She handed him a drink.

  “Thanks,” Phineas said as he slurped his drink.

  “Hit it, Ferb!” Isabella cried. Ferb pressed the POWER button on the remote control, and the car took off. “I’m so proud of you, girls,” Isabella said as the car roared away. “And the bow was a nice touch, Gretchen.”

  Gretchen smiled as the Fireside Girls admired the giant brown bow on top of car number forty-two. It flapped merrily in the breeze as Phineas rounded the track.

  * * *

  Dr. Doofenshmirtz cackled. “Listen to those fools! How about a little demonstration of my deflationary prowess!” He pulled the lever on his giant Deflatanator Ray. A green beam shot toward the racetrack.

  But it missed the racing cars. Instead, it headed into the stands!

  “I got it!” called a guy in the stands as a beach ball bounced his way.

  Zap!

  The ball popped as the ray hit it.

  Whoosh!

  The ball flew out of the stands and landed on the windshield of a race car!

  “Ahhh!” the driver yelled as his car hit a billboard post. With a creak and a groan, the billboard fell onto the track and right near Phineas’s car!

  Car number forty-two turned right, then left, then right. It zoomed around the billboard, then under it.

  “The Team Phineas car is avoiding every obstacle!” the announcer cried. “It’s like he can see the whole darn track at once!”

  “Go, Phineas! Go! Go, Phineas!” Isabella and the Fireside Girls cheered from the pit.

  Of course, Phineas couldn’t see the whole track. But the person driving his car could! Ferb handled the remote control from his perch above the track.

  “Oh, yeah!” Phineas crowed as he sped around the track.

  But the other cars weren’t so lucky. The billboard bent into the shape of a ramp. The other cars couldn’t turn in time. They went up the ramp-shaped billboard and shot into the air. One by one, they crashed around Phineas. Luckily, none of the drivers were hurt.

  Car number forty-two moved around each crash quickly and zoomed over the finish line. Team Phineas had won the race!

  Chapter 4

  Candace pedaled toward Mrs. GarciaShapiro’s house on her pink and purple bicycle. She raced through the front door and handed the photo to her mother. “Well, Mom? What do you think of this?”

  Linda frowned. “You’ve looked better,” she said.

  “Huh?” Candace grabbed the photo. “What do you me—aah!” Candace screamed when she saw the picture of herself covered in soot. A shocked-looking Jeremy was gaping at her in the background. She had grabbed the wrong photo!

  And now Phineas was going to get away with everything—again!

  Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s beady eyes gleamed as he peered down at the wreckage on the speedway. Look at what a single beach ball had done! “Already they fear me! Listen to their screams. Imagine the mayhem once my Deflatanator Ray is fully charged!” he cried. The doctor opened up his machine. Inside, a mouse raced madly on a hamster wheel. He was creating the power for the whole ray! “Run, run like the wind, my little indentured rodent, and I will give you some cheese.” Dr. Doofenshmirtz walked to the refrigerator and peeked inside. “Heh, I know I have some around here somewhere.”

  Perry knew this was his chance. He pulled out his Secret Spy kit. EMERGENCY CHEESE, it read. He skipped the Muenster and Swiss and went straight for the most powerful stuff, “stinky.” Quickly, he loaded it onto a Secret Spy cheese arrow and shot it through one of the glass jar’s airholes.

  The arrow sailed through the blimp and landed in the back of the evil doctor’s pants.

  “There used to be some Roquefort in the back here,” Dr. Doofenshmirtz said as he moved things around in the fridge.

  The scent of stinky cheese wafted over to the mouse. It smelled so tempting. The mouse climbed off his wheel and out of the ray gun. It wanted that cheese! The mouse skittered over and climbed up the doctor’s leg.

  “I don’t—hmm? Ay-ay-ay!” Dr. Doofenshmirtz let out a scream as the mouse wiggled around. “Ayyyyy . . . !”

  The evil doctor’s shrieks shattered Perry’s glass cage! The freed platypus raced toward Dr. Doofenshmirtz. Once in range, Perry flicked his wide, flat tail and whacked the doctor in the face. “Ah!” Dr. Doofenshmirtz staggered backward. He stumbled against the Deflatanator Ray. “Oof!” A green beam shot from the ray. It hit a giant mirror on the back of a truck. The beam reflected off of the mirror and shot back toward the blimp.

  Pop!

  Hiss!

  “Hmm,” Dr. Doofenshmirtz said. “I suppose I should have seen that coming.”

  The blimp exploded like a giant balloon.

  “But, Mom, you’ve got to believe me!” Candace wailed. Her mother sat calmly at the bridge table, looking at her cards. “Wait a minute! I bet it’s still on TV!” Candace ran into Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro’s living room and picked up the remote.

  “That’s good, Candace,” Linda said absently. “Go watch a little TV.”

  “And look at this amazing finish,” the announcer said as car number forty-two raced past the checkered flag.

  There was Phineas—behind the wheel!

  “Mom!” Candace screeched. “Mom! Quick! Come q-q-q-q-quick!”

  With a sigh, Linda got up from her bridge game. “All right, I’m coming.”

  Candace giggled eagerly. This was even better than the photo! Phineas was so busted this time! There he was—and Ferb, too—accepting a giant gold trophy.

  But suddenly, the camera cut to an image of a blimp. It was the Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated blimp, and it was losing air fast.

  “Oh, no!” the announcer cried as the damaged airship sailed toward a tower. “A blimp is about to hit the broadcasting tower! Oh, the—”

  The picture disappeared from the screen as the tower fell. Static hissed from the television.

  Linda walked up to Candace and gazed at the blank TV. “Uh-huh,” she said. She gave her daughter an even look.

  “Meep.” Candace let out
a squeak. It was all she could say.

  Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s blimp was down. But that didn’t mean he was going to give up! He jumped behind the wheel of the nearest race car—number forty-two.

  Phineas, Ferb, and the Fireside Girls watched as the car zoomed off.

  “Hmm,” Phineas said. “Looks like we’re walking.”

  Suddenly, something landed on the hood of Dr. Doofenshmirtz’s car. It was Perry! And he had the car’s remote control!

  Chapter 5

  “‘Why don’t you go back home, Candace?’” Candace muttered to herself, mimicking her mother’s response to being pulled away from her bridge game yet again. Rolling her eyes, she heaved a sigh. “She has no idea.” But at that very moment, Candace looked in the garage and saw something very interesting.

  And that something was—nothing.

  The family car was gone! Of course!

  Candace gasped. “Gotcha!”

  Dr. Doofenshmirtz screamed as Perry steered the car through the streets. With a screech, they turned into a car wash. The doctor leaped out and tried to catch the platypus as water rained down on them.

  A giant buffer whizzed overhead as it descended from the ceiling. Perry ducked, but the doctor was too slow. He got caught in the bristles of the enormous brush.

  Perry sat on the hood of the car as he steered it out of the car wash. He was just deciding his next move when he accidentally stepped on the remote control’s red button.

  The car shot into the air like a rocket!

  It soared high over the city and finally came to a landing . . . right in front of Phineas’s and Ferb’s house!

  * * *

  “Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom! Mom!” Candace was back, pounding on Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro’s front door.

  “Oh, Candace,” Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro said as she appeared at the door. “Hello. I can’t believe you’ve grown so much. It’s unbelievable—”

  But Candace raced right past Mrs. Garcia-Shapiro and into the dining room. “Mom! Mom, you’ve got to see this! It’s about your car!”

  Linda looked up from her cards. “All right,” she said, finally giving in.

  “Come on! Come on! Come on!” Candace said as she practically shoved her mother across the street.

  “Candace, you’re wearing out the heels of my shoes,” Linda said.

  Candace ran to the garage and flung open the door. “See, Mom? Look! Look! I told you!”

  Linda gasped. “But . . . who did this?”

  “Phineas and Ferb!” Candace crowed.

  “You mean . . .”

  Candace nodded eagerly. “Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!” This was the moment she had been waiting for!

  “They . . .”

  “Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh!”

  “They washed my car?”

  “Yes—! No—! What?” Candace blinked. There it was—the family sedan. The numbers and extra exhaust pipes had come off in the car wash. It was gleaming and looked perfect.

  “It’s beautiful!” Linda exclaimed.

  Just then, Phineas and Ferb walked through the front door carrying a giant gold trophy.

  “Hi, Mom,” Phineas called. “We’re home!”

  Linda was still gazing at her clean car. “Hey, boys. I saw what you did today.”

  “Yeah?” Phineas asked as he and Ferb headed to their room to put away the trophy. “How’d you like it?”

  “I loved it!” Linda bustled into the kitchen. “Now, who wants some snacks?”

  “Thanks, Mom,” Phineas said.

  Linda looked over at Candace, who was still staring at the car. Her jaw had dropped open.

  “Honey,” Linda told her, “close your mouth.”

  But Candace couldn’t believe it! Her brother was going to get away with borrowing the car and winning the Swamp-Oil 500!

  Candace narrowed her eyes. This wasn’t over. Not by a long shot.

  Part Two

  Chapter 1

  It was another beautiful summer day. Phineas and Ferb were sitting under a tree in their backyard. “So, Ferb,” Phineas said after a while, “what do you want to do today?”

  Ferb shrugged.

  “What about Perry, what does he want to do?” Phineas asked. He looked down at their pet platypus. Perry was sprawled on the grass with a blank look on his face.

  The platypus made a low clucking sound.

  “Well, he’s a platypus,” Phineas said, half to himself. “They don’t do much.” At least, Perry never seemed to do much. But Phineas couldn’t just lie around all day. He liked to do things. And hanging out under a tree in the backyard wasn’t cutting it. “I, for one, am starting to get bored, and boredom is something up with which I will not put.”

  Phineas leaped to his feet. “The first thing they’re going to ask us when we get back to school is what we did over the summer! I mean, no school for three months. Our lives should be a roller coaster! And I mean a good roller coaster, not like that one we rode at the state fair.”

  Phineas shook his head. That state-fair roller coaster was pathetic. The car had clinked to the top of the incline and then dropped—about six feet.

  “Man, that was lame.” Phineas snorted in disgust. “Why, if I built a roller coaster I would . . .” Suddenly a brilliant idea popped into his mind. “That’s it! I know what we’re going to do today!”

  “Phineas!” Linda called as she walked into the backyard. “Ferb! I’m gonna go pick up a few things. You boys stay out of trouble, okay?”

  “Okay, Mom,” Phineas promised. After his mother left, Phineas turned to Ferb and exclaimed, “We’re going to build a roller coaster!”

  Candace peered out the window. Her mother was going out! That meant she was going to be alone with Phineas and Ferb. Candace hurried out to the driveway. “I’m in charge, right?” she demanded as her mother got into the car.

  “Relax, Candace,” Linda told her. “Nobody has to be in charge.”

  “But what if there’s an emergency?” Candace demanded.

  “Like what?”

  “What, if, uh . . .” Candace racked her brain. There had to be some way for her to be in charge! “What if a satellite falls out of orbit and crashes into the house?”

  “If that happens,” Linda said, “you’re in charge.” She started the car and drove off.

  “Yes!” Candace poked her head through the gate to the backyard. “Mom says I’m in charge,” she told Phineas and Ferb. “Conditionally!”

  Phineas didn’t look up from the blueprints in front of him. “Whatever.”

  Ferb was beside him, working out some calculations. He and Phineas had set up a couple of tables for their project.

  “Wait a minute, what are you doing?” Candace scowled at Phineas’s drafting table. It had a picture of a weird, snaking, bridgelike thing on it.

  “Homework,” Phineas replied.

  Candace frowned, suspicious. “It’s summer!”

  “That’s cool,” Phineas said in a bored voice. “You wait till the last minute, then.”

  “Well, I’m watching you,” Candace warned as she headed into the house. “And I’m in charge . . . conditionally!”

  Just then, the phone rang. Candace picked it up and flopped into her favorite armchair. “Hello? Oh, hi, Stacy,” she said, throwing her legs over the chair’s arm. “No, I can’t go to the mall right now. Mom just went to the store. She left me in charge. Well, you know, conditionally. Oh, if you go, can you see if Jeremy is there? No, no. He’s the cute one that works at Mr. Slushy Burger. Yeah, he totally smiled at me last time I was there. I just about died.”

  Candace turned her back to the glass-sliding door. That’s why she didn’t see Phineas and Ferb as they strolled through the backyard with a ton of roller coaster supplies. Actually, it was more like two tons. They had metal, rivets, wooden boards, concrete—even a few sinks.

  “No, I told you,” Candace babbled on with Stacy. She had no idea that anything unusual was going on behind her out in the yard. “I can’t. I’m watching my brothe
r and stepbrother.” She propped herself onto the chair’s back and twirled the phone cord around her finger. “Yeah, and they never get into trouble ’cause Mom never catches them.” Candace turned upside down and kicked her legs in the air. “One of these days, though, I’m going to see to it that she catches them red-handed.” On the other side of the glass door, Phineas and Ferb walked by with a plastic pink flamingo and a caged lion. The lion let out an enormous roar.

  Candace hopped off her chair and over to the sliding door. “Will you hold it down?” she screeched. “I am trying to use the phone!” She held the receiver back to her mouth as she fell back into the chair and dangled her legs over the arm. “Well, Mom left me in charge, so there’ll be no shenanigans today. What are they doing right now? Why do you ask?” Candace sat straight up. “What do you mean you can see it from your house? See what?”

  Candace rushed outside. “Phineas, what is this?” A giant metal structure stretched taller than the backyard oak. It reached over the fence and into the neighbor’s airspace.

  Phineas smiled at her. “Do you like it?” he asked as Ferb fastened a board to a rail.

  “Ooh, I’m gonna go tell Mom, and when she sees what you are doing, you are going down!” Candace cried. She raced to the garage.

  Phineas turned to Ferb. “We’re going to need a blowtorch and some more peanut butter.” The blowtorch was for the roller coaster rails. The peanut butter was for lunch.

  “Hey, Candace,” Isabella said as she walked up the driveway. “Is Phineas . . .” But Candace was already zooming toward the supermarket on her pink and purple bicycle. “. . . home?” Isabella finished, mumbling to herself. Candace was long gone.

  “Hey, Phineas,” Isabella said as she walked into the backyard.