I mumbled an apology. Moles were as tricky to understand as girls, although marginally more squeaky.
We’d done our best to sneak past the cameras on this deck, and I was pretty confident we’d avoided detection. “OK, the sue-dunham may well be planning something like Lara says, but at least we have the element of surprise.”
Lara knocked on the classroom door.
“Lara!”
She winced. “Sorry, force of habit.” With an apologetic shrug, she strode into the classroom.
At first glance it looked like a regular computer class, except that instead of rows of schoolchildren writing code to make an electromechanical claw pick up a LEGO, the desks were filled with sue-dunham operators wearing clumpy headphones, plotting to take over the earth. They sat stiffly in front of banks of floating monitors that displayed scenes from their invasion preparations. Fingers danced over screens as they swiftly edited footage before beaming it back to their home world and out to the conquered zombie audiences. A constant background noise of communications chatter filled the air. It was a smooth operation, practiced and perfected over the course of a thousand seasons.
From my position I could see several screens. On one an alien pilot, helmet tucked under her arm, gave an interview in front of her assault ship. Another displayed a ceremonial party of sue-dunham preparing an empty glass case in the Hall of Remotes, no doubt readying it for their next conquest: us.
At the front of the classroom, the Overlord sat in her command chair, overseeing the invasion on a giant tactical map that filled the wall. In one corner of the map, the countdown clicked toward zero hour. Less than thirty minutes remained.
The Overlord spotted us, and an expression of surprise and dismay slid across her face. She gripped the arms of her chair and slowly stood up. “You! But how did you . . . ? What about the . . . ? And the . . . ? Not to mention . . .”
She hadn’t expected us to get this far. Her shields were down—nothing could stop us from completing our mission now. We marched toward her. It was strange, given that I was in the command room of an alien mother ship, but with Lara and Serge by my side, I’d never felt safer.
“It’s over, Overlord,” I said. “You’re canceled.” Now that’s a quip, I thought to myself.
“No, stay back! Keep away from me.” She slapped a button on the arm of the chair, activating a communicator, and in a shaky voice said into it, “Abort the invasion! Prepare my escape shuttle immediately!”
This was awesome. We’d won! I wanted my moment of triumph to stretch out forever.
But that’s the problem with triumphs: they only come in moments.
The Overlord lifted her head, and a snigger burst from her lips. “I’m sorry, I can’t keep this up any longer.” Her shoulders heaved with laughter.
I was confused. What was so funny? We’d vanquished all of her best henchmen and scared her into abandoning the invasion.
Hadn’t we?
The giant map rippled and dissolved, revealing another section of the classroom behind it that until this moment had been hidden from sight. Rows of seats stretched into the distance, each occupied by a sue-dunham. They began to clap.
“What is this?” I asked over the applause. “What’s going on?”
“Sadly, I cannot take credit for the idea,” said the Overlord. “No, that must go to a mind even more devious than mine. So it is with great pleasure that I introduce this season’s special guest star.” A spotlight picked out a figure ambling along the aisle that divided the seated audience. “Mr. Christopher Talbot!”
“What a shocker,” said Lara.
Christopher Talbot strolled through the audience, acknowledging their applause, shaking hands. He arrived at the command chair where we were gathered.
“What about our fragile alliance?” I whispered.
“I warned you not to trust me,” he said.
“But you don’t have to do this,” I implored him. “You can be the hero. You’ve got a superpower. You’re the Energizer!”
“Ah, yes, my nickel hydride charge,” he said bitterly. “I worked it out. I possess the power equivalent of thirty-six golf cart batteries from 1990. Hardly Superman, is it?” He looked me in the eye. “I want you to know, Luke, it’s nothing personal. It is with Chase, however.” He tapped the command chair, and the Overlord looked up. “You will remember to vaporize the local branch, won’t you?”
“Chase?” I said. “The bank?”
“Wouldn’t give me that small business loan I needed,” he explained. “I can’t even afford the lease on my comic book store anymore. I’m going to have to close up shop. Not that it matters now. Thanks to my new friends here, I shall soon be the supreme ruler of Bavaria!”
“You’re a traitor to the human race,” spat Lara.
“Perhaps, but one who will shortly have all the zwetschgenkuchen he can eat.” He paused. “It’s a short-crust pie—”
“Covered with pitted zwetschge,” I finished sadly.
“You remember,” he said, and I was sure I detected a note of regret. I was angry and confused. I’d expected the double cross, but not until we’d defeated the sue-dunham together. “How could you do this?”
“It was very simple,” he said. “Remember the commando on Main Street?” I nodded dumbly. “I was outgunned. I knew I couldn’t win, so I played the old ‘take me to your leader’ card. Or, in this case, conference-call me with your leader. You see, once you’d informed me that the invasion was a TV show, I had a proposition I wanted to put to the alien high command.”
The Overlord interrupted. “And what a great pitch. Trust me, I should know. I’ve heard ’em all.” She gave Christopher Talbot a salute, and turned to me. “Your former associate persuaded me to delay the takeover of Earth just long enough to give you time to round up your plucky friends and mount a do-or-die mission to thwart my invasion.”
That made no sense. “But why? What could you possibly gain?”
A smile wriggled onto the Overlord’s lips. “Agents of S.C.A.R.F.,” she said, sweeping an arm toward the seated aliens. “Filmed live in front of a studio audience.” More applause rolled out like waves. “And may I say, you were terrific.” She clicked her remote control, and one of the floating screens appeared.
A recording began to play. It showed me, Lara, and Serge battling our way through the mother ship. The footage was slickly edited, and scored with music that somehow made us look foolish instead of heroic. The studio audience bellowed with laughter. We looked like real chumps.
The multitude of cameras that lined the alien vessel had caught every humiliating second of our ridiculous adventure, from every angle. What at the time had felt to me like a life-or-death mission was revealed to be a series of comedy sketches.
And we were the punch line.
“Remarkable performances,” said the Overlord, studying the film. “Such commitment to the role. You truly believe you’re going to save the world. Of course, that’s what makes it so funny.”
“No,” I mumbled. “This can’t be happening.” But it was. The feeling I’d had deep in my bones that we were invincible popped like a soap bubble.
“And that’s just the preview,” said the Overlord. “Wait till you see the finished film. Sidesplitting. I’m planning to show it to the defeated people of Earth, immediately after the invasion. They’ll need a laugh.” She leaned toward me. “Especially after all the pain and destruction I am about to unleash on your lovely blue planet.” With that, she signaled to the guards. “Take them away.”
“Not so fast.” Lara stepped forward. “While you were distracted by all that gloating, I was executing our master plan.” Cupping her hands to her mouth, she squeaked three times. I recognized the accent.
It was Mole.
“Right now,” said Lara, “the Wraith is burrowing into your master control desk, ripping apart your fiber-optic ca—”<
br />
The Overlord flopped back into her chair, raised a palm to her mouth, and affected a bored yawn.
Lara bristled at the interruption. “Hey, I’m explaining how we just defeated you here.”
The Overlord pointed over Lara’s head. We all turned to look. One of the sue-dunham operators held a small box with a tiny barred window on one side. The Wraith peered out, his paws wrapped around the bars.
“Burrowing mammals,” said the Overlord. “Season four hundred and twelve.” Her lip curled into a snarl. “As I was saying, take them away.”
Planet Earth Is Blue, and There’s Nothing I Can Do
The Overlord had barely finished issuing her order when an alarm began to blare.
One of the sue-dunham operators glanced up from what looked like some kind of radar display. She blew a series of anxious whistles.
The Overlord quickly rose to her feet. “What do you mean Star Guy is approaching?”
The radar operator gestured to a fast-moving blip on her display.
The Overlord raised a fist. “Open fire. All weapons!”
You might think after a command like that, there would be a whole lot of exciting laser-gun noises and the boom of photon torpedoes. In reality, it was pretty boring. We all twiddled our thumbs and looked around as various automated weapon systems attempted to down my brother in the silent vacuum of space.
Another of the sue-dunham whistled an update.
“In the air lock? He can’t be!” said the Overlord. “Send a detachment of guards to—”
But she was too late. The classroom door burst off its hinges as Star Guy flew inside. He landed in what was now his usual fashion, one knee resting on the floor, cape fluttering behind him, head bent.
There was an excited squeak from the imprisoned Wraith. I didn’t need a translation to understand that the mole was thrilled at the arrival of Earth’s superhero savior. He wasn’t the only one.
Zack slowly lifted his masked face. “Step . . . step . . .” he stuttered. He seemed to be struggling for breath.
The Overlord’s alarm gave way to an expression of doubt, and she motioned to her guards. Warily, they took a pace toward my brother.
“Step . . . y’know, away from them,” said Zack, waving a droopy finger at us. “Or feel the full might of Sta . . . ACHOO!” His forehead was slick with sweat, and his nose dripped like a faucet after my dad’s tried to fix it. “I need to lie down.” He flopped onto the floor and, shivering, pulled his cape around him like a blanket. “All that flying really took it out of me,” he moaned. “Has anyone got some Theraflu?”
Star Guy wasn’t saving the world today.
Scarcely had a smile reached the corners of the Overlord’s mouth when the classroom resounded with a terrible creak of straining metal, and the deck of the mother ship tilted alarmingly.
The command chair, which was on wheels, rolled across the floor, rapidly picking up speed before crashing into a cluster of guards, causing one of them to drop the Wraith. Already off balance, they fell like bowling pins. The alien audience tipped out of their seats with a collective yell, while the Overlord and Christopher Talbot sprawled on the floor in a heap like a pair of tangled shoelaces. With a cry, the four of us pitched across the room.
“What’s happening?” asked Lara, clinging to a desk.
“My guess is someone’s tampering with the ship’s stabilizers,” I said, hanging on beside her.
“But who?” said Serge.
“Who cares!” This was our chance to escape. “Come on, help me with Zack,” I said. Serge and I each took an arm and headed for the door.
Lara grabbed the Wraith’s prison cage. “Right behind you.”
As we hauled Zack off, he lifted his head and looked around blearily. “Oh, this is bad. The alien mother ship looks to me exactly like an ICT classroom.” He groaned. “I must be sicker than I thought.”
I was getting used to my new shoes and managed to keep my balance on the listing deck as we stumbled out into the corridor.
A lone figure blocked our path. A bandanna obscured the lower half of her face, and her hair was tied up in an efficient ponytail. Slung across her back was what appeared to be a bow improvised from a length of plastic pipe and a taut wire, and tied around her waist was a belt filled with arrows fashioned from plumbing materials and some kind of alien chicken feathers. She moved almost silently on sneakers wrapped in strips of cloth.
Beside me I heard Lara gasp with recognition.
“Cara?” I ventured. The last time I’d seen her, she was the sue-dunham’s prisoner. Somehow she had escaped. Gone was the girl next door, and in her place now stood a fierce warrior.
Zack was in the throes of a fever, but even through his confusion he recognized his dream girl. I could tell because behind his mask he was making that stupid drooling face.
“Careful,” said Serge. “How do we know she is not another Cara-borg?”
Cara pulled down her bandanna and fixed her gaze on Zack. “Star Guy,” she breathed. “I knew you’d come.” She took a step toward him. “I could kiss you!” She paused. “But I won’t, of course, because I have a boyfriend.”
“It’s definitely the real Cara,” whispered Lara happily.
Zack let out a sigh of disappointment.
I gestured to the tilting deck. “You did this?”
Cara nodded curtly. With a whir of compensating thrusters, the ship began to level out. “But it won’t be long before they’re shipshape again,” said Cara. “Then this place will be crawling with search parties. Follow me.” She led us along corridors I didn’t know existed, taking us on clever shortcuts through classrooms, confident in every step. It was clear that school held no fears for Cara.
As we hurried to keep up with her, I turned to Zack. “So you saw the alien trailer?” He shook his head. “Then you heard the Overlord’s message?”
He looked puzzled. “What are you talking about? I didn’t see anything, and my ears are so full of orange gunk, everything sounds like it’s twenty thousand leagues underwater.”
It was my turn to be confused. “So what are you doing here?”
“Tylenol. But I can’t take any more for another four hours.”
“Not how—I want to know why you came. I didn’t think you believed my story about the invasion.”
“I didn’t. Not until today in my bedroom.” Sweat poured down his face. He looked terrible. “Just before you left, you compared me to Aquaman.”
“So?”
“You gave me a compliment, Luke.” He swallowed. “I knew it really had to be the end of the world.”
We reached our destination in the art department a few minutes later.
“We’ll be safe in here,” Cara said, holding open the door to the art storeroom. “The aliens don’t know about this place.”
We squeezed in among shelves filled with art supplies. I was just thinking that the storeroom felt even smaller than I remembered when Cara marched to the back wall and lifted it to one side, revealing a hidden compartment.
The wall was fake; several large squares of cardboard had been stuck together and painted over to look uncannily like a shelf laden with paints and art paper.
“You did this?” I asked.
“We’re doing trompe l’oeil with Miss Chapleo this semester,” Cara explained. She surveyed her work with a critical eye. “Though I’m not happy with the jam jars.”
Serge nodded in sympathy. “It is the transparent quality of the glass that makes them difficult to capture.”
More than her artistic skills, I was intrigued at Cara’s transformation from ordinary teenage girl to Green Arrow. “Last time I saw you, you were a prisoner,” I said. “What happened?”
She unhooked the bow from her back, swung it over one shoulder, and leaned on the end. “As soon as I found out Star Guy wasn’t flying t
o my rescue, I decided to take matters into my own hands and rescue myself. It hasn’t been easy. Escaping from detention, finding a place to hole up, designing and implementing a false wall, fashioning a weapon from everyday items.” She ran a hand over one feathered arrow. “Although the hardest part was catching the chickens.”
For the first time I had an inkling of what my brother saw in this girl. I felt an inexplicable urge to show her my comic collection.
Cara clapped me on the back. “You came back for me, kid, just like you promised. And with Star Guy.”
“Hello? I’m here too,” Lara piped up, raising a hand like she was in class. “Dark Flutter to the rescue.”
“Oh, yeah,” said Cara. “Didn’t see you there, Dark Flutter.”
Lara gave a huff of irritation.
“And may I express my eternal gratitude also,” said Serge. “Thank you for swooping in to save us.”
“I can swoop too,” said Lara quietly.
“We don’t have much time,” I said. “What’s the plan?”
“Well, I’ve raided the command bridge a few times, messed with their flight controls, hit the kitchens too—put salt in their pudding. They didn’t like that. But it’s all been low-level disruption. Until now.” Cara grinned. “Now that you’re here, Star Guy, we can take down this mother ship.”
Zack stirred briefly from his fever. “You’re amazing,” he cooed to Cara. “Ah-may-zing. And not at all robot-y.”
“Is he OK?” said Cara.
“He has a cold,” I explained. “It’s made him lose all his superpowers.”
“A cold did that?”
“An evil alien cold,” I said, seeing the disappointment in her face.
“So you’re not here to foil the invasion?” she said, addressing Zack.
“The invasion? The inva—? Yes! Of course.” He slapped a fist into his palm. “Those Martians don’t know what’s about to hit them. Martians. Martians. Martians. Martians. Y’know, if you repeat it enough, it loses all meaning. Meaning. Meaning. Meaning. Meaning.” Suddenly, his eyes widened and he croaked, “Nemesis is coming!”
My Gym Teacher Is an Alien Overlord Page 15