What We Found in the Sofa and How It Saved the World

by Henry Clark

  I stepped out on the balcony and walked cautiously to the left, keeping as close to the wall as I could. Everybody had their backs to me, and I was barefoot, so the sound of my footsteps, I hoped, wouldn’t attract their attention. I glanced nervously at the countdown clock. It went from 5:58 to 5:57.

  I was about halfway to my goal when Fiona turned, looked my way, and yelped. She immediately slapped her hand to her mouth, but not before Freak turned to see what had startled her. His eyes went wide, and I put a finger to my lips.

  It was too late. Jackal noticed my friends’ reactions and began to turn toward me. I looked around frantically for a hiding place, but I wasn’t even near a door.

  I sat down where I was, pulled my head inside the garbage bag, folded my arms across my chest, and leaned forward. I hoped, from Jackal’s point of view, I would look like a bag of trash waiting to be picked up.

  I held my breath. It was a good thing Alf didn’t use transparent trash bags.

  I heard footsteps approaching.

  I tensed and prepared to burst from the bag like a wild animal jumping out of a Dumpster. I would snarl and claw and be all over my opponent. I almost shouted, “ARRRRRH!” but then I heard the footsteps stop, turn, and go back the way they had come, meaning whoever they belonged to had gotten close enough to be convinced I was an actual bag of garbage. I felt both relieved and insulted.

  I peeked out, and only Freak was still looking my way. He had seen me gassed with mnemocide; he had to be wondering if I had somehow recovered my memory. The real explanation was so much more complicated.

  I scurried along the wall until I got to the door marked HAZMAT SAFETY, and I quickly stepped inside.

  Somebody was already in the room.

  He was sitting at the conference table with his back to me. He didn’t bother to turn around. Instead, he lifted the photo he was looking at, so I could see it over his shoulder. It was a picture of Alf. He pointed at it, and in a very familiar voice, said, “So, is he like you? Is he immune to arsenic? If he is, I can always shoot him between the eyes.”

  I picked up a chair and broke it over his head.

  The most annoying teacher we have at school always uses the phrase “Go ahead, knock yourself out.” I had just done it. The figure in the chair fell on the floor, and it was me.

  I rushed over and knelt down beside him. We were identical. He could have been my twin. Red-haired, gray-eyed, handsome as anything. “I’m so sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to hit me. I mean you. Whoever it was I hit.”

  A loose flap of skin on his scalp trickled a bit of blood. I spit on my fingers and tried to stick the flap back in place. “A couple of stitches will fix that,” I assured him.

  He isn’t me, I kept reminding myself. He was Greeves Stainer, an Indorsian assassin now inhabiting my former body. Edward Disin had apparently revived him so he could assassinate Alf.

  Stainer was wearing a jumpsuit. I unzipped it and pulled him out of it. I ripped the garbage bag off myself and put on the suit. Then I picked up the photo of Alf, pushed my hair back so it looked the way Stainer had combed it, and stepped back out on the balcony.

  This time I didn’t cower along the wall. I strode purposefully over to Edward Disin. Freak’s and Fiona’s faces lit up when they saw me. I waved them away with my hand.

  “Back off, small children,” I said, trying to make my voice sound like Robert De Niro’s in a gangster movie. “I’m an assassin. I don’t have time for kids. I assassinate people. It’s what I do. I’m on a mission. Assassination’s my game. No time for autographs!”

  “Stainer,” said Disin. “You’re just in time.” The countdown clock said 2:09. “The portal is about to open.”

  “Yes, well,” I said. “That’s fine if you’re interested in that kind of thing. Me, I have work to do.” I waved Alf’s photo at him. “I want to get to this guy before he has a chance to escape.”

  “Nothing to worry about there,” said Disin. “One of my agents is holding him at gunpoint.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Then… what do you need me for?”

  “Your target is one of the Royals. You know the code better than anyone. It has to be done either by another Royal or by a compensated member of the guild. Beauceron is neither.”

  “Hey,” I said. “I’m all about the guild. Just issue me a weapon, and I’ll be on my way.”

  “This is hardly the time,” growled Disin, trying to return his attention to the technicians on the cavern floor. He held the walkie-talkie to his lips and said, “Prepare to initiate mind-control module.”

  I caught Fiona scowling at me like I was an amoeba under a microscope. Freak was watching me appraisingly, no doubt trying to decide whether I was me or somebody else. I tried to give them a reassuring wink, but it came out more like a nervous twitch, and it only made them look more confused.

  “I’m itching to do this,” I said to Disin, tugging on his sleeve. It was not, perhaps, what an adult member of an assassin’s guild would have done. “Just give me a gun and I’ll be on my way.”

  Disin turned to Jackal. “Give him your gun.”

  “But—”

  “Just do it! He’s the best in the business and he’s apparently full of adolescent hormones.” Disin glared at me. “The sooner he’s on his way, the better.”

  Jackal pulled her gun from its holster and handed it to me. I must have grabbed it the wrong way because the clip containing the bullets fell out and bounced off my foot. Fiona quickly bent down, picked it up, and handed it to me, saying under her breath, “It is you, isn’t it?”

  I nodded enthusiastically as I fumbled with the clip and repeatedly failed to get it back in the gun.

  “This isn’t the model I’m used to,” I explained to Jackal, who was watching me, goggle-eyed. “You should see me with a bow and arrow.”

  I could tell she was about to pounce on me and take her gun back. I wasn’t fooling her.

  Freak stepped an inch closer to Disin, who had his back to us, but Jervis put a restraining hand on his shoulder. Fiona took advantage of the distraction and stepped behind Jervis. It looked like she was getting ready to tackle him.

  The countdown clock said 1:46.

  Suddenly, the room shook with the force of a tremendous explosion. Tiles and dust from the ceiling cascaded down to the floor. Disin turned around, looking wild-eyed. He spoke into the walkie-talkie, but he couldn’t get a response.

  “Find out what that was!” He pointed at Jackal. When she hesitated, he barked, “Now!”

  Jackal sprinted to the far end of the balcony and disappeared into the stairwell. Jervis let go of Freak, unslung his rifle, and looked around nervously, as if he expected an attack from any direction. Fiona stepped away from him and squinted in the direction of Coyote, who was farther along the balcony adjusting his crash-net remote. I turned the ammo clip over and finally succeeded in snapping it back in the gun.

  The countdown clock said twenty-six seconds.

  Disin twisted something on his walkie-talkie, possibly changing the frequency, and snapped, “Report!” A voice crackled in response.

  “Fifteen seconds to opening!” announced Disin. “Initiate countdown.”

  He walked briskly away from us toward the icy wall, then stopped, leaned over the railing, and studied the wall like a traveler looking down railroad tracks for a train.

  A mechanical voice started intoning the remaining seconds over a loudspeaker. It started with fifteen. The voice sounded like it was in a hurry. I aimed my gun at the countdown clock and pulled the trigger.

  I did it to see if the gun’s safety was on. The gun refused to fire.

  I had no idea how to take the safety off, so anything I did with the gun would be a bluff. This was fine by me. I could never have pointed it at anyone—even Edward Disin—and fired it.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw myself stagger out of HAZMAT SAFETY wearing a shredded garbage bag as a diaper and clutching my head. I staggered off in the wrong direction.
It was so typical of me.

  “TWELVE,” said the mechanical voice.

  I pointed my gun at Jervis. “Drop that rifle over the side,” I said, in my best tough-guy voice. “Drop it or I drill ya.”

  Jervis stared at me in disbelief. When the mechanical voice informed me he had hesitated for longer than a second, I added, “I’m the best in the business and I’m full of adolescent hormones!”

  I don’t know if it was Greeves Stainer’s reputation as an assassin or an adult’s natural fear of adolescent hormones, but Jervis paled and tossed his rifle over the railing. Then he put his hands up.

  Disin continued to wait for his train, bouncing on his feet like he could barely contain his excitement. At the other end of the balcony, Coyote was studying the cavern’s big metal spiderweb, equally oblivious to what had just happened.

  I looked back at Jervis. Jervis looked at me. I knew he was waiting for me to point my gun elsewhere. The moment I did, he’d be on me. I had no idea what to do next.

  Freak did. He shouted at Disin, “Hey! You! You’re not the only one who can pick pockets!” He ran up to Disin and snatched at his coattails. “Look what I’ve got!”

  Disin shot him an annoyed glance. Freak waved the zucchini crayon in his face.

  It wasn’t the real zucchini crayon. It was the fake zucchini crayon Freak had taken from Alf’s cigarette case. Disin slapped his pockets to verify he no longer had the crayon. He was unaware he had lost the real crayon during the balloon flight.

  “SIX,” said the mechanical voice. A warning siren began to wail.

  Fiona started strolling toward Coyote, approaching him slowly, as though he were a woodland creature she didn’t want to alarm.

  Disin brought the walkie-talkie back to his face and started to issue an order. He didn’t finish it.

  “I’ve got it—you don’t! Come and get it, come and get it!” shouted Freak, waving the crayon in the air as he danced backward away from Disin. Freak started whistling like he was calling a dog. “Here, boy! Here, boy! Get the nice crayon!”

  Disin glared at Freak, then returned to the walkie-talkie. But he couldn’t bring himself to speak into it, and he turned back to Freak. He got red in the face and quivered like he might split down the middle. On one side, he obviously wanted to be in command when a project that had been years in the making and involved the fate of the planet Earth reached its most crucial stage. On the other, he needed to get his hands on a dark green crayon.

  The Indorsian genius who had engineered Compulsive Completist Disorder had done a good job. Disin gave a longing look at the cavern’s icy wall—“THREE,” said the mechanical voice—and then he turned and bolted after Freak.

  They ran past me and they ran past Fiona, who was standing only an arm’s length from the totally preoccupied Coyote. I looked at Jervis, shrugged, and chased after them with all the speed my new legs could give me.

  Freak sprinted until he was opposite the door marked CARBOYS. Then he leaned out over the railing and tossed the crayon into the air. Disin got there just in time to catch the crayon as it fell, but it was a few inches beyond his reach. He lunged. The balcony’s top railing, the same one that I had broken the first time we had visited, gave way under his weight.

  Disin caught the crayon. Then he fell to the floor thirty feet below.

  Freak and I looked over the railing. Disin was below us, grimacing, with both of his legs bent at unusual angles. The zucchini crayon was on the floor by his side.

  “ZERO,” said the mechanical voice, like it was keeping score.

  Jervis, who must have been resurrected because of his intense loyalty rather than his acute intelligence, leaped from the balcony to assist his leader. He hit the floor and rolled. He staggered to his feet and limped over to Disin.

  The portal opened.

  The ice wall shattered and shards of ice hurtled through the room like stinging sleet. I turned my face away and felt myself buffeted by a fierce gust of wind. The railing I clung to felt electrified. The icy wind passed, and I looked back at the place where the ice wall had been. It was now a tunnel into nothingness.

  The end of the room was the darkest, blackest night, without any stars, without any moon, and I imagined myself being sucked into it. I must have taken a step toward it, because I suddenly felt Freak’s arms around my chest, holding me back.

  A light appeared in the middle of all the nothing. It rapidly grew in size and then burst blindingly into the room. It was on the front of a huge metal cylinder that came barreling in with the roar of a dozen runaway freight trains. Everything around us shook. It was the troop transport from Indorsia, and it came at us like the hammer of an angry god.

  The transport thundered in like it was on gigantic rollers. It filled the space from side to side, from top to bottom, and its curving hull eclipsed everything else. Through brightly lit portholes, I could see figures in armor moving around inside. The thing was teeming with Indorsian troops.

  I aimed my gun at it. I felt like a mouse pointing a finger at a charging elephant.

  The transport loomed like an avalanche over the spot where Jervis was trying to save Disin.

  He attempted to drag Disin to the side, but Disin kept pulling him toward the crayon. The two of them became aware of a shadow bearing down on them. They both looked up, and then they were lost to view as the transport passed over them.

  Fiona snatched the remote out of Coyote’s hands, dodged his clumsy attempt to grab her, and raced over to us. Coyote was right behind her, but he stopped dead when I swung my arm around and made him my new target.

  The transport collided with the crash net, which expanded like a fishing net catching a killer whale. Its metal cables groaned and screeched, as if it were screaming that this was too much for it. The transport slowed as the net stretched to what had to be its breaking point. I expected the net would be yanked from the walls and send broken fragments flying our way.

  I prepared to duck just as the transport came to a halt. Fiona turned the wheel on the remote all the way to the right.

  I immediately understood what Science Girl was trying to do. I also realized it was our only hope.

  As she turned the wheel, the cables of the crash net tightened. The transport started to inch backward, trembling as its incoming energy got turned against it and it became a gigantic paper clip about to be shot across the room by an enormous rubber band.

  Each of the portholes had a storm trooper looking out at us. Fiona raised her hand and gave them a little bye-bye wave. One trooper waved back. I imagined him being demoted in the near future.

  The transport picked up speed as the slingshot Fiona had created flung it back toward Indorsia. The crash net gave out an earsplitting SPROING! like the world’s biggest spring, and the cylinder was flying back out almost as fast as it had come in. It passed through the portal, its headlight became a taillight, and then it vanished into nothingness.

  With a sound like planets colliding, the portal snapped shut behind it.

  CHAPTER

  28

  Things With a Mind of Their Own

  A rocky wall appeared where the portal had been, and frost immediately began to form on it.

  Fiona and Freak and I looked over the edge of the balcony. We expected to see a bloody streak along the floor where Disin and Jervis had been. I could see a streak, but it wasn’t bloody. It was thin and zucchini green. It told us the fate of the fake crayon, but it didn’t give us a clue as to what had become of Jervis and Disin.

  “Pardon me,” said my voice, coming from behind me. I turned and there I was, still clutching my head and holding up my garbage-bag diaper. “I seem to have somehow injured myself. Is there an infirmary anywhere nearby?”

  Freak and Fiona both jumped at the sight of my double.

  “You have a twin?” Fiona squeaked, sounding the tiniest bit jealous.

  “Not really,” I hastened to explain. “That’s my old body, with a new mind inside it. His name is Greeves Stainer
.”

  “Is it?” said Greeves, sounding astounded. “What an odd name! Is there any place we can get ice cream? My head hurts!” He sounded like he was getting progressively younger with each sentence.

  Fiona looked at his scalp wound.

  “I hit him with a chair,” I confessed.

  “Why?” asked Freak.

  “I didn’t have the sofa.”

  Something warm and furry threaded itself between my ankles. I looked down. Mucus was on my feet. The cat hunched its shoulders and yawned, and Double Six fell on the floor in front of me.

  “It’s quite likely he has amnesia,” said the domino. “A blow on the head so soon after a personality download can frequently cause it.”

  “He’s forgotten he’s an assassin?” I asked.

  “For the time being. Aren’t you going to pick me up?”

  “You’re covered in cat spit.”

  “And you have amniotic fluid in your hair. Your point?”

  I bent down and picked up the domino.

  Fiona turned away from Greeves, held me at arm’s length, and peered into my face.

  “It is you, isn’t it?” she asked.

  “Yeah, it’s me. My mind is in a new body. I’m a little taller and I’ll probably get chicken pox again, but it’s me.”

  “We thought you were dead!” said Fiona, and I was surprised to see a tear run down her cheek.

  “Me? Dead? Don’t be hyperdiculous!”

  Fiona crushed me to her and Freak joined the group hug. After a moment, Greeves hugged me, too. “I don’t know who you are,” he said, “but I like your face.”

  “None of you should move,” said a voice. We turned our heads. Coyote was aiming the same type of water pistol at us that Cockapoo had threatened us with in Underhill House. Being part of a group hug made us a single target. It was an unexpected downside to group hugs.

  Coyote’s finger tensed on the trigger. Before he could pull it, a zucchini-colored blotch appeared on his forehead. He dropped the gun and put his hands out in front of him like he was pressing them against an invisible wall, then tilted his head back, opened his mouth, and tried to scream, but nothing came out. He had been dosed with Hista Mime.