Creeper on the Case

by Greyson Mann

  We even played hide-and-seek. When it was my turn to hide, I snuck under the kitchen table. BIG mistake. There were chunks of rotten flesh EVERYWHERE. But when I looked up, you know what I saw?

  Leggy. In a freshly spun COBWEB.

  Turns out Leggy was hiding under the table, too. Let me just tell you, I have NEVER been more excited to see a cobweb in my life.

  I sprang into action. See, I brought something with me to capture that web. It took some genius planning ahead of time. I knew I’d need a way to bring that web home WITHOUT touching it. (My skin itches just thinking about touching that web.)

  So I packed the biggest, best web catcher I could think of—the floor plan of Mob Middle School. It’s perfect! It’s big enough to fit the whole web, but I can roll it up small enough to stick in my backpack.

  Leggy wasn’t thrilled with my plan. He didn’t exactly want to move out of the way and let me tear down his web. But then I got an idea. I happen to know that Leggy likes rotten flesh. (I guess when you’re raised in a zombie house, you have to eat SOMETHING.)

  So I used my foot to nudge some slimy flesh nuggets out from under the table. It wasn’t easy, let me tell you. I wanted to hurl more than once. But I managed to make this whole trail of chunks leading toward the living room. And Leggy took the bait.

  As soon as he was gone, I scooped up that web with my map. Then I rolled it up, carefully as I could, and started to sneak out of the house.

  But Zoe busted me. “I found you!” she said. So I had to play a whole other round of hide-and-seek, pretending like I didn’t see her hiding in the EXACT same spot under the table. A creeper’s gotta do what a creeper’s gotta do, right?

  Anyway, I finally got out of there and back home. And now it’s time to figure out Phase 2 of my master plan. I got the web out of Ziggy’s house. But how am I going to get it INTO the library? Man, a detective’s work is never done.

  I’m gonna have to sleep on this one. There are only a few hours of daylight left, and all that spider-chasing at Ziggy’s wore me out. Now if only I could get Zoe’s nursery rhymes out of my head …

  DAY 16: SUNDAY

  I can think of lots of GREAT ways to wake up, like when …

  • you jump out of bed, thinking it’s time to go to school, but then you realize it’s the weekend. Ahh …

  • you wake up to moonlight streaming through your window.

  • you wake up from the perfect dream, where you’re a famous rapper taking a bow after a sold-out show …

  But you know what’s NOT a good way to wake up? With your sister Chloe staring at you, her green mug two inches away from your face. That’s pretty much a daymare.

  Anyway, she woke me up tonight because she was hearing things in her closet again. STRANGE things.

  I pretty much slept-walked into her room. A creep can’t do his best work on two hours of sleep. But I gotta say, when I got into Chloe’s closet, I woke right up.

  The tapping noise was louder now. And Chloe showed me a tiny crack in her wall—with a prick of light shining through. From WHAT? A torch? Lava? Fire?

  That’s when Chloe said she thinks her closet might back up to a PORTAL—the kind you can’t see until you activate it. The kind that leads to the Nether. Or even to THE END. “And you know what you find if you go through the End Portal?” she said.

  I did. Going through an End Portal means meeting up with the deadliest mob of all—the Ender Dragon. I started picturing that fierce dragon in my mind, and at that exact moment, I heard a loud scraping noise—like a giant dragon claw scratching against stone.

  Well, I’m not gonna lie—I jumped so high, I nearly hit my head on Chloe’s ceiling. I got OUT of that closet pronto.

  Was Chloe scared too, or was she just trying to freak me out? I couldn’t tell.

  But now I’m back in my own room, and all I can think about is Room 117. Because after seeing what I saw in Chloe’s closet, I’m starting to wonder. Is the doorway in the library MORE than just a door?

  Could it maybe, possibly … be a portal too?

  DAY 18: TUESDAY

  You know, I knew Sam was in over his head. But after what happened last night at school, I’m starting to think I’M in trouble, too.

  At first, everything went according to plan. I woke up early, grabbed my backpack (with the map and Leggy’s cobweb inside), and headed off to school. Ziggy was going to meet me there.

  I didn’t love that idea at first. I’m kind of a loner when it comes to my detective work. But then I remembered how good Ziggy is at spying on villagers, and I started thinking he’d make a good lookout guy—you know, the one who watches for teachers or other mobs to creep up on us when we’re planting our trap.

  So I got to school and waited for Ziggy in the moonlight. Then we crept inside. There weren’t any students there yet—just the zombie janitors. PERFECT, right?

  The library was dark, and we decided to keep it that way. Ziggy planted himself in the doorway, and I crept toward the painting that hangs between the bookshelves. I was so nervous, I could hear my heart pounding in my ears. I swear, I could almost hear that creepy music that plays in movies, too—right before someone gets ATTACKED.

  “Stay cool,” I kept telling myself, imagining that Eddy Enderman was there. “Be cool, dude.”

  And I was. Until I got to the painting—the secret doorway to Room 117. Because here’s the thing: The library was empty, but Room 117 WASN’T. Weird flashes of light spilled out around the edges of the door.

  That’s when I knew: Room 117 MUST be a portal. But a portal to WHERE?

  When Ziggy groaned at me to hurry up, I kicked it up a notch. I unrolled the map, held it up to the doorway, and gave the edges a good press—just to make sure the cobweb stuck. But some of the web stuck to the map. And some of the web stuck to ME. (YUCK!)

  There wasn’t enough web left in the doorway to trap a mob—not a big one, anyway. And that web SURE wasn’t going to trap a monster. I could picture the Ender Dragon tearing its way right through that web with its sharp claws. Easy-peasy.

  Pretty much all a creeper could hope for was that there was enough cobweb left to give me a few clues. Like, if I came back later and saw the cobweb had been broken, I’d KNOW that a mob—or monster—passed through. And if I saw pieces of cobweb stuck on some mob’s face or clothes, I’d know WHO had come through the door to Room 117.

  So I zipped up my backpack and got out of the library before anyone could bust me and Ziggy. And the rest of the night?

  Well, that was pure torture. The WAITING was killing me. And it didn’t help when Ziggy almost let our whole plan slip out at lunchtime.

  He was really yawny—like my sister Cammy gets when she needs a nap. When Willow asked him if he’d please stop yawning and keep his mouth closed while he chews, he said he couldn’t help it. He said, “Me and Gerald got up early to—”

  Well, he would have finished that sentence if I hadn’t kicked him under the table.

  A chunk of sandwich flew out of his mouth, and then he shut right up. “Sorry,” he said to me.

  But now it was out there. I had to think fast. “We got up early to … um, spy on villagers,” I said.

  “Without ME?” said Sam. He looked like he was going to start blubbering, which I thought was pretty rude considering HE was the one who had pretty much abandoned ME this semester. Didn’t that slime know I was doing all of this top-secret stuff to try to help him?

  Anyway, I couldn’t worry about that because I had just spotted Mrs. Collins in the lunchroom, which meant I could finally sneak off to the library and check our trap. I told Sam that I had to run to the restroom—that the mystery meat from the cafeteria was messing with me. But instead, I raced to the library.

  I could barely breathe, let me tell you. Especially when I lifted up that painting of the potted plants and saw that … THE COBWEB WAS BROKEN. Someone had come out that door! A mob who probably had a face full of cobwebs by now. And all I had to do was spot him or her. Geral
d Creeper Jr. was on the case.

  But I was so focused on spotting that cobweb that I totally forgot something else: I had a newspaper article to write—by the end of the school night. Which came MUCH faster than I thought it would.

  I was sitting in the newspaper staff meeting wondering how I was going to get out of this mess. I mean, I wasn’t exactly rocking the newspaper reporting thing. My first two articles had been a bust. And article three? I hadn’t written a single word. I mean, I’d been kind of busy lately, you know?

  But as I was wracking my genius brain, trying to come up with an excuse, I spotted something. Something white and sticky—dangling from Mrs. Collins’s hair. A COBWEB.

  A gazillion thoughts exploded in my head. What was Mrs. Collins doing in Room 117? Had she passed through a portal? Had she taken Sam with her?

  That was when she busted me. “Gerald,” she said, “what are you staring at, dear?”

  I thought fast, like usual. I told Mrs. Collins that I was admiring her glasses. But I hadn’t really thought that one through, because next thing I knew, Mrs. Collins was letting me borrow those glasses. And telling me which shop at the Mob Mall sold them. And the whole time I’m wearing those glasses with the little chain around my neck, Emma Enderman was busting a gut laughing at me.

  NOT my best moment, let me tell you.

  But I couldn’t be worried about my reputation when I’d pretty much just cracked the case of Room 117. Or at least cracked it partway open.

  When Mrs. Collins asked if I’d finished my article, I pushed her glasses up on my nose and told her that I had NOT. But that I was really close to getting it done. And that it was quite an important story—that I was SURE it would be worth her wait if she’d give me just a tiny extension.

  Which she did. Which was kind of a miracle.

  Then, as I followed Whisper Witch out the door, Mrs. Collins called me back. UH-OH. My heart started doing that THUD-THUD thing again. Did she KNOW I was on to her? I couldn’t tell.

  I tried to play it cool as she crept closer to me. And CLOSER. I nearly blew out of my creeper skin. What did she want from me???

  “My glasses,” she finally said.

  OH. Phew.

  Then she said I seemed kind of jumpy lately. She said maybe I should STOP reading detective novels—that Sherlock Bones was kind of making my imagination run wild. She said I should try something different, like this book called FRANKEN-SLIME.

  “It’s about a scientist who creates a monster slime in his science lab,” she said. “No clues. No culprits. No magnifying glasses or mysteries.”

  “So no FUN?” is what I wanted to say. But I took the book. Now that I knew Mrs. Collins had something to do with Room 117, I wanted to get out of that library as fast as I could.

  When I got home this morning, I propped the book up on my desk. It REALLY didn’t look like my kind of book, but I thought Sticky might enjoy looking at the picture of Franken-Slime. (The squid’s gotta get kind of bored in that aquarium, you know?)

  Then I got to thinking … Maybe Mrs. Collins gave me that book for a reason. Maybe she’s trying to send me a MESSAGE. Grown-ups do that kind of thing—especially SNEAKY grown-ups. And I’m starting to see that Mrs. Collins isn’t the sweet old creeper she seems to be …

  So I’ve decided to start reading FRANKEN-SLIME. If Mrs. Collins is trying to tell me something, I’m ALL ears.

  DAY 20: THURSDAY

  Okay, if Mrs. Collins thought that reading FRANKEN-SLIME would make me LESS jumpy, she’s had a few too many rotten potatoes or something. That book does NOT make for sweet dreams, let me tell you. I finished it this morning, and I didn’t sleep a wink after that.

  It’s about this scientist named Victor Frankenslime who works in a lab. He does all these experiments and ends up creating something. What does he create? (Drum roll here …) A SLIME!

  Yup, he creates a slime like SAM. But it’s not a REAL slime. No, sirree. It’s more like a MONSTER.

  So if Mrs. Collins was trying to send me a message, I’ve got it, loud and clear. There’s only one thing I can DEDUCE from all the clues I’ve uncovered. Let’s just recap them here, shall we?

  You don’t have to be a genius to put it all together, right? I mean, it all adds up!

  MRS. COLLINS HAS BEEN DOING EXPERIMENTS ON SAM!!!

  Oh, man. This is WAY worse than I thought. Way, WAY worse.

  But I am NOT going to leave my best friend hanging on this one. I’m going to figure out EXACTLY what Mrs. Collins has been doing to him, and I’m going to put a STOP to it. That librarian is messing with the WRONG slime!

  DAY 21: FRIDAY

  You know, I’m a creeper who doesn’t like to ask for help. (I mean, except for when I had to bring in Ziggy to make that sticky trap.) But I got to thinking this Sam situation might be too big for me, you know? Like maybe I should talk to Mom and Dad about it—bring in some backup on this one.

  So at dinner last night, I tried to bring it up. When I saw that Mom had her sweater on backward and could barely keep her eyes open, I knew she wouldn’t be much help. (This author thing is really bringing her down.) But I figured DAD could give me some good advice, right?

  Well, I gotta say, Dad was looking kind of frazzled too. See, he’s been doing the cooking since Mom started writing, and it’s really not one of Dad’s best skills. When he said we were having leftover STEW for breakfast, I almost wished I were sitting at Ziggy Zombie’s breakfast table. (I mean, I don’t care for rotten-flesh sausages, but his mom makes a pretty tasty fried egg.)

  Anyway, I told Dad I was worried about Sam. I said something was going on with him—that he might be spending too much time “studying.” Well, that didn’t work at all. See, parents don’t really think there’s such a thing as “too much studying.”

  So I tried something different. I said Sam was acting like he had some HUGE secret. But Dad didn’t pick up on that hint either. Maybe it was because Cammy wouldn’t eat her leftover stew and was threatening to explode.

  Anyway, I finally had to just come out and say it: “Dad, I think Mrs. Collins has been running experiments on Sam in a secret room off the library.”

  Well, THAT got his attention. And Mom’s too. Chloe burst out laughing, Cate cracked a smile, and Cammy even held off on blowing up for a moment, which I appreciated.

  Then Dad cleared his throat and gave me the classic parent line: “Gerald, I find that hard to believe.”

  But the thing about Dad is, he usually backs me up—eventually. He said I was a good friend to be worried about Sam, and that maybe I should invite Sam for a sleepover this weekend so that Dad could see for himself how Sam was doing.

  I thought that was a GREAT idea. But Mom sure didn’t. Her eyes got all wild, and she said we couldn’t POSSIBLY host a sleepover when she had only NINE more days to finish her mystery.

  “Yeah, how’s that working out for you?” I asked. It shot out of my mouth like a rocket before I could shut the thing down.

  Well, Mom didn’t appreciate my tone of voice. She said she could use a little more support around here. She actually looked like she was going to cry.

  But what about SAM??? I wanted to holler.

  That’s when Dad suggested that maybe I have a sleepover at Sam’s house, and that he’d be happy to call Sam’s parents and arrange it. So that was that. Mom settled down, Cammy ate her stew, and I went back to my room.

  Now I’m trying to figure out what kind of detective work I can do at Sam’s house this weekend. If Sam won’t tell me what’s going on in Room 117, are there OTHER ways I can find out?

  There’s gonna have to be. This may be my toughest detective work yet. But I am NOT going to let that sorry slime down.

  DAY 22: SATURDAY

  So I went to Sam’s for a sleepover this morning. And I learned everything I need to know. EVERYTHING.

  At first, Sam seemed normal. I mean, when I showed up, he was out on his trampoline. Sam’s a bouncy guy, and he’s got the biggest, best tramp yo
u’ve ever seen. I got on there with him, and I watched his every move. He seemed all jolly and happy—same old slime.

  But as soon as we went inside, I KNEW something was up. Sam’s bedroom is usually a slimy mess. But you know what? There wasn’t a book or slimeball out of place. Sam said he was keeping it tidy to “help him study more.”

  There it was again—the studying thing. He had this whole desk set up with books in a neat little pile and a torch lamp. But that wasn’t the WEIRDEST thing that I saw at Sam’s. Nope, that came next.

  See, there’s nothing Sam loves more than his cat, Moo. Usually when I’m at his house, I have to witness these disgusting love sessions. Sam gets all smoochy with Moo, or shares his food with her, or picks her up and dances with her.

  Anyway, when Moo wound her way into the bedroom and started rubbing up against Sam, I figured he’d scoop her up and give her a big wet smooch. But he didn’t. He bounced backward. HUH?

  Then Sam’s mom hurried in and shooed Moo out—toward the bedroom that belongs to Sam’s little brothers. “Go play with the boys,” Mrs. Slime said to Moo. “Don’t bother Sam.”