Dinosaur Boy

by Cory Putman Oakes

  Sylvie looked momentarily startled, and I understood why. This was the first time Elliot had ever put his foot down to her. In fact, it was the first time I had seen him put his foot down to anybody in a long time.

  Elliot pointed a finger in her direction. “You’re not the only one who has been doing some thinking,” he said. “You know what I’ve been thinking about? How those kids tortured me last year. And why? Because I got tall. I didn’t want to be tall. I didn’t ask to be tall. I just am.”

  Elliot slammed the basketball down at his feet. Sylvie and I both jumped. The ball bounced three times, then rolled behind him. He ignored it.

  “They acted like I had committed some sort of horrible crime, even though it had nothing to do with them. You saw it, Sawyer!”

  “I did,” I admitted. I had. It was true. And yet…

  “And this year they turned right around and did the same thing to you!” Elliot continued. “They made you into a ring toss game! They told you, to your face, that you belong in a zoo instead of a school. And now you’re willing to risk getting in all sorts of trouble to rescue them? We could end up getting shipped to Jupiter right along with them. Or at least, I could. I’m not a hybrid, like the two of you. Have either of you thought of that?”

  I sighed and looked down at my feet. It was true, all of it. It was. And yet…

  “Elliot,” Sylvie spoke up. “Principal Mathis wants to kidnap them. To send them to another planet, where they’ll never see their families again. I know they made you miserable, and I’ve seen them do the same to Sawyer. But do you really think they deserve what they’re about to get?”

  “If it was us in there,” Elliot pressed her. “If it was you, me, and Sawyer, do you think Allan would lift a finger to help us? No way! He’d probably volunteer to stand guard to make sure Principal Mathis got away with it!”

  “We don’t know that,” Sylvie argued.

  “I do,” Elliot told her. “And don’t try to tell me you know humans better than I do. You’re only half human. You’ve only been on Earth for like a month. You don’t get it.”

  “I’m only half human too,” I piped up. “Does that mean I don’t get it?”

  “You’re different,” Elliot sniffed, glaring at Sylvie.

  “How?” I demanded. “How am I different?”

  “You grew up here,” Elliot growled. “You know those kids. You know they’re never going to change. Once they’re done making fun of you, they’ll move on to some other kid. Then another kid, then another one, and so on. They don’t deserve to be saved.”

  “Maybe not,” I agreed. “But I’m going to do it anyway.”

  I took a step, one that brought me away from Elliot and closer to Sylvie. Sylvie gave me a grateful half-smile.

  Elliot’s face fell.

  “Come with us,” I implored him.

  He shook his head and bent to pick up his basketball.

  “I’m staying here. If you end up as somebody’s pet on Jupiter, don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

  Good Boys (and Girls)

  As Sylvie and I raced for the portables, the bell signaling the beginning of first period rang behind us. We both picked up the pace. Ms. Filch usually took attendance in the first few minutes of class. Once she discovered we were missing, we wouldn’t have much time before people came looking for us.

  I wasn’t sure if Elliot would even try to cover for us.

  “Don’t worry about Elliot,” Sylvie said, jogging alongside me. “If we do end up on Jupiter, at least someone will know where we went!”

  “We need a plan,” I said, trying to black out all thoughts of Elliot and Jupiter. “How are we going to get everyone out of the portable?”

  “I don’t know.” Sylvie shrugged and held the key up purposefully. “We’ll have to see what happens once we get inside. Maybe they’ll just follow us out!”

  I remembered the blank expression on Brad’s face when I had seen him through the window. Something told me that it wasn’t going to be that easy.

  We reached the portable, and I immediately went around back to peek through the window. I believed Sylvie, of course. But I was still relieved to see for myself that all my former classmates were there, running the obstacle course just as they had been the other day.

  When Brad ran by, I started counting.

  1 bully, 2 bully, 3 bully…

  “Why does their hair look all funny?” Sylvie asked, looking through the window as well.

  4 bully, 5 bully, 6 bully, 7 bully…

  “I don’t know,” I said impatiently. Honestly, that was such a girl thing to worry about at a time like this.

  8 bully, 9 bully, 10 bully…

  “I’m serious,” she said. “It’s like all weird and spiky.”

  11 bully, 12 bully…and then Brad came back around.

  Wait. What? Brad had been bully #1.

  “Sawyer,” Sylvie said haughtily. “Are you even lis—”

  “There’s only twelve!” I exclaimed. “Twelve kids! Allan and Cici were supposed to make thirteen!”

  “You must have counted wrong,” Sylvie said, pulling out her notebook and opening to the first page. She counted quickly down her column of names. “Thirteen kids have been expelled. You must have just missed one.”

  I bit my lip. I was almost positive I hadn’t missed anybody. But they had been running and jumping over things, so maybe Sylvie was right…

  Anyway, that really didn’t matter right now.

  “Let’s go,” I said, tugging on the hood of her sweatshirt and gesturing for her to follow me back around to the front door. My hands were starting to shake. Something was going to happen when we opened that portable door. I wasn’t sure exactly what, but it was definitely going to be—

  “Ow!”

  I gulped down a roar as I rounded the corner and ran right smack into a green Ducks jersey.

  Elliot staggered backward and steadied himself by grabbing onto the side of the portable.

  “What are you doing here?” Sylvie demanded.

  Elliot shrugged, looking sheepish.

  “When you weren’t there for attendance, I told Ms. Filch you were both home sick. And then I figured as long as I was going to lie for you, I might as well help you. So here I am.”

  He held up the hall pass.

  “I said I felt sick too, and I needed to go see the nurse. It’ll be a while before Ms. Filch figures out I never made it there.”

  I was so glad to see him, I felt like hugging him.

  But Sylvie beat me to it. She threw herself at Elliot, wrapping her orange-sweatshirted arms around his middle.

  Elliot suffered through the hug, rolling his eyes at me as he did.

  “Being the good guy really sucks, doesn’t it?” I remarked.

  “Totally,” he said. But he was smiling.

  We kept our eyes peeled for Principal Mathis, or anybody else, as we crept up to the door of the portable. But there was no one in sight. With luck Ms. Filch wouldn’t be able to sort out our various excuses for being absent until the end of the period. That should give us plenty of time to get our classmates out of the portable and safely to…

  Where, exactly?

  As Sylvie slipped on the janitor’s oversized gloves, I realized we hadn’t thought about what we were going to do once we had everyone out of the portable. Call the police? They’d have to believe us then, wouldn’t they?

  I guess we’d cross that bridge once we came to it.

  Sylvie took a deep breath and shoved the metal key into the lock. There were no sparks this time, and the lock gave a sharp click as it opened. Sylvie opened the door triumphantly and let us all inside.

  The front windows were boarded up, so there was not enough light to see anything. But then there was a hissing sound. Several hissing sounds. A puff of air hit my face
, and there was a sickeningly sweet smell that made my nose wrinkle in disgust.

  A crushing weight hit me as Elliot collapsed against my right side. I tried to hold him up and push him back onto his feet, but it was like trying to stand up a giant, wet noodle.

  Then I was falling. And my eyes were closing. I let go of Elliot and we both toppled to the floor. I landed on top of a lump that was probably Sylvie. Then everything started spinning and went dark.

  • • •

  “Ridiculous. Absolutely, positively ridiculous.”

  I blinked. It was dark all around me, but I could see a thin line of light. And that seemed to be where the complaining was coming from.

  “No respect for my time at all. I would expect this from a human. But a Jupiterian? They are supposed to be the ones with manners. Honestly!”

  After a couple more blinks, I was reasonably sure the light was coming from underneath a door. The complainer was on the other side of the door.

  And where was I? It felt small. Even though I couldn’t see much, it had that closed-in feeling, like the walls were just inches away from me on all sides. I reached out a hand to check, only to discover that my hands were stuck behind me. I was tied up! My legs seemed to be tied up, too, because I couldn’t move them very much.

  “Hey!” I yelled. At least my mouth wasn’t covered. “What’s going on?”

  The door opened immediately, spilling light into my prison. It was small. Nothing more than a closet, crammed full of art supplies. Several easels and a stack of construction paper had been shoved aside to make room on the floor for me. And for Sylvie, who lay blinking beside me.

  We were both tied up with jump ropes.

  Principal Mathis stood in front of us. At least, she was dressed like Principal Mathis. And she had Principal Mathis’s poofy hair. And her glasses. But her human mask was missing.

  Her face was the same shape as a human face. Her eyes, mouth, and nose were all in the right places. But her eyes were almost perfectly round, like quarters, behind her thick glasses. Her mouth was just a tiny line, and her ears were human-shaped but pressed flat against the sides of her head. Her skin looked smoother than human skin. And slightly pinker. I couldn’t see her antennae, but they were probably still hidden in her tall hair. I wondered if she used clips, like Sylvie did.

  Principal Mathis’s tiny Martian lips curled up into a smile. Then she looked back over her shoulder at the clock on the wall.

  “Eight forty-five a.m.,” she said to herself, reading the clock. “Thirty minutes. Well, that’s not too bad for just two sprays.”

  “What?” I asked, finally noticing that Principal Mathis was holding an aerosol can. It was the Good Boy spray, the stuff I had found in the cabinet the night we had broken into her office. I had assumed it was something for pets, but that was before I knew she considered humans to be pets…

  “What is that stuff ?” I asked.

  There were probably more pressing questions I should have asked. Why are we tied up? and Where is Elliot? both came to mind, but all I could really focus on at that moment was the spray can.

  Principal Mathis held up the can so I could see it better.

  “This, Sawyer, is a valuable behavioral tool. Humans can be so stubborn, so unwilling to obey new masters. At least at first. I never place a pet with a new family without giving them a free can.”

  “What does it do?” I asked. Mostly because I had the feeling it had just been used on me.

  “One puff in the face results in a calm, obedient human. When used properly, in conjunction with positive behavioral reinforcement, I find that it can help smooth over the adjustment period when a pet is introduced into a new home.”

  “‘Good Boy’?” Sylvie read the label, and snorted. “I’m not a boy.”

  Principal Mathis waved her off.

  “There’s also a line of pink Good Girl sprays, for female pets. But the formulation is the same. Only the packaging is different. For marketing purposes, of course.”

  Sylvie sniffed, not bothering to respond. Principal Mathis continued. “The sprays are also excellent for training purposes. I’ve been using it here with great success.”

  She moved to the side of the doorframe so that Sylvie and I could see behind her. She gestured to a fan in the corner of the room, up near the ceiling. Beside the fan was a can of Good Boy spray that had been rigged to spray every couple of seconds. The fan panned slowly from side to side, spreading the spray over the heads of the kids on the obstacle course below.

  I was so focused on the fan that it took me a few seconds to realize that there was a new runner on the course.

  Even from my place sprawled on the floor of the closet, it was easy to make out Elliot’s lanky form swinging across the monkey bars.

  “Elliot!” I yelled, struggling to sit up. “ELLLLLIIIIIIOOOOOTTTTT!”

  “He can hear you,” Principal Mathis assured me. “But he’s been told not to respond. Like I said, the Good Boy spray results in near total obedience. Fascinating stuff, isn’t it?”

  “If it’s so great, why didn’t it work on us?” Sylvie demanded. “Sawyer and I aren’t running your stupid obstacle course right now.”

  Principal Mathis held up the can again, and this time I noticed a familiar picture just underneath the Good Boy brand name. It was the two twisted ladders, the red one and the green one, from the Amalgam Labs movie. And underneath, there was a lot of fine print I couldn’t read from where I was sitting.

  “One puff produces compliance. That’s all I used on Elliot. Two or more puffs in the face results in unconsciousness, which is what I did to you and Sawyer. I advise my clients to use multiple puffs sparingly, as it tends to interfere with the bonding process. As a general rule, I use two puffs only as a last resort, usually when a pet’s behavior has created a safety concern.”

  She set the can down on the floor and bent down, so that she was looking us both right in the face.

  “And let me be frank. Your recent behavior has created a serious safety concern.”

  “We’re not pets,” I told her, trying in vain to free my hands. Unfortunately, the jump ropes were quite strong and were doing their job well.

  “Oh, I agree.” Principal Mathis nodded, setting down the can and standing back up again. “I rarely place hybrids anymore. I’ve found them to be too dangerous. Hybrids are a lucrative market, but there’s far too much liability for my taste.”

  I looked uneasily at Sylvie. My dinosaur parts marked me as an obvious hybrid. But besides Elliot and me, everyone believed Sylvie was fully human. Or so we had thought…

  “How did you know?” Sylvie asked Mathis.

  Our principal rolled her eyes. “Oh, please, my dear. Your hair alone practically screams Martian. I’m shocked the Martian Council is letting you run around on Earth with your Martian-ness so poorly concealed. Especially given who your father is. I can’t imagine how he can be allowing this.”

  “Your father?” I asked Sylvie. “I thought he was a restaurateur?”

  “Among other things,” Sylvie mumbled, glaring up at Principal Mathis.

  She smiled in response and gathered up her purse.

  “Fortunately, you will not be my problem for much longer. My client is running a little late, but they should be here to pick up their shipment within the hour.”

  “The Jupiterians?” I asked, alarmed. “They’re coming here?”

  “Yes. Soon. And after that, I will be free to move on.”

  She pulled what looked like a handful of skin out of her purse. She removed her thick glasses and turned away for a moment.

  “You just go from school to school, pretending to be a principal and stealing kids?” I asked incredulously. “How could you?”

  Principal Mathis turned back toward me. Now that she was wearing her human face, I forgot for a moment that she was a Marti
an. A crazy Martian, at that. All I could see now was the person who had promised me she would help me. The person I thought had been on my side.

  And for a second, I think Principal Mathis remembered that person too. Her face softened, and she looked at me the way she had looked at me across the principal’s desk when I had first met her.

  “I never take the good ones, Sawyer. Only the troublemakers. The ones who make school miserable for everybody else. There were a lot of them here. Usually, I have to go to two or three schools to fill an order as large as this one. Think of it as a cleansing. You may not realize it now, but what I have done here will only enhance your educational experience.”

  Her soft face melted, and her eyes became steely once more behind her enormous glasses.

  “Of course, I am breaking the rules just a little bit today. I need thirteen to fill this order. As of this morning, I was one short. But my clients are eager to take possession of their shipment, and fortunately number thirteen fell into my lap just now.”

  I shook my head.

  “You might need a lesson in math, Principal Mathis. You had thirteen last night,” I argued. “Counting Allan and Cici, you expelled thirteen kids.”

  “Yes, I expelled thirteen. But one boy turned down my invitation to Camp Remorse.”

  My mind was racing. That would explain why I had counted only twelve. But who was missing? I wracked my brain. Who hadn’t I seen on the obstacle course?

  In my head, I ran through the list of expelled students. Gary, Brad, Mary, Nora, and Vivian had been expelled in the Purge. Jeremy and Emma, the next day. Then Justin and Gabrielle, for throwing food at me in the cafeteria. Then Sam, for hanging the sign on my chair. I had definitely seen all of them on the obstacle course. Who was I missing?

  The answer came to me suddenly: Parker.

  It had been his disappearance that had caused us to go searching in the first place, but had we actually seen Parker in the portable, or had we just assumed he was there because all of the other kids were there? What had happened to Parker?

  And more importantly, if Principal Mathis only had twelve…