How to Properly Dispose of Planet Earth

by Paul Noth

  I realized that Walking Stick was explaining the concept of tag-team partnership to the court. I wanted to yell out: “It’s just a wrestling match! It’s a game! That doesn’t make us partners in real life!”

  Luckily for Ack Gubbins, I resisted this urge and kept my mouth shut.

  Now the orb cut to higher-definition holographic footage from some outdoor event on the Imperial Planet.

  A multitude of spectators lined floating boulevards for a parade honoring the Emperor. The camera drifted along over spectacular floats, marching bands, kicklines, streamer-dancers, acrobats—the works.

  The Emperor and Empress watched from atop a high colorful pyramid. As the camera moved closer, I saw the pyramid was more of a ziggurat formed of carpeted stairways leading up from street level.

  Upon the flat triangle of its apex, the Emperor and Empress sat on crystal thrones while beautiful alien servants attended to their every whim.

  The royal couple smiled slightly and looked down at the festivities.

  Then their eyes popped open in surprise as a lightning bolt from above struck carpet only yards away from them.

  At first it seemed like a magic trick, perhaps part of the spectacle, as a figure leaped up from the lightning’s black scorch mark.

  But this creature wasn’t part of the parade.

  It was Grandma, running toward the Emperor.

  She wore her spangly flamenco catsuit. Her head was bare, her face fully visible to all as she lifted the Emperor out of his throne.

  Hoisting him over her head, she body-slammed him to the carpet.

  She kicked her leg high in front of her as she elbow-dropped onto the Emperor’s midsection.

  An enormous gasp came up from the crowd.

  As I wondered where his bodyguards were, the camera cut to many of them running up the steps from places around the ziggurat.

  Now it cut back to Grandma slapping her hand forward and backward across the Emperor’s wobbling nose. The beautiful alien guards were no help. They had all fallen on their faces and were yodeling.

  But now the Empress attacked, leaping from her throne and swinging a crystal goblet.

  Grandma caught her by the arm, took hold of her skirts, and swung the Empress around in circles as though giving a child an “airplane ride.”

  When Grandma let go, the Empress took a fast bounce and went rolling down the stairs like a log.

  The Emperor charged furiously at Grandma.

  Catching the peak of his head in one hand, she held him back where his swinging arms were too short to reach her.

  Her other hand reached in and clutched the opening in his fancy robe. She pulled hard, spinning him out of it completely.

  The dizzy Emperor found himself naked except for a pair of frilly underpants, which Grandma promptly yanked down around his ankles.

  The Emperor screamed and tried to cover himself.

  Either this footage was partly censored or the Emperor’s private parts looked like a grid of blurry squares.

  As he reached down to pull up his underpants, Grandma kicked him in the butt.

  He leaped forward, clutching his rear and howling.

  When he bent back down for his underpants, Grandma kicked him in the butt again.

  This happened so many more times that I would have thought it was a looped piece of footage if not for all the clear variations in the ways that the Emperor bent down for his underpants and the ways that Grandma kicked him in the butt.

  Finally, the Imperial Guard reached the top of the steps.

  Seeing them, Grandma shoved the Emperor to the ground and made a vertical gesture with her hand.

  In a bolt of reverse lightning, she vanished into the sky.

  As the hologram faded and lights came back up, everyone in the courtroom was wailing and moaning over what they had just seen.

  They beat their heads with their fists. Several rent their garments and poured ashes on their faces. I had only ever heard about that happening in Romanian Bible stories.

  I felt that I should be showing outward signs of disapproval too. But all I could think to do was shake my head and frown sternly.

  This only served to remind everyone of my presence. They started screaming and growling and chirping at me again, ignoring the bug-eyed judge’s calls for order.

  Something wet struck me in the head—a splatting, aromatic substance that I could only hope was someone’s uneaten lunch.

  Something harder hit me in the shoulder.

  The judge barked orders at the guards, who lifted me out of the dock and carried me through the howling courtroom.

  I shut my eyes as a rain of unknown objects pelted my body.

  When I dared open them again, the guards were carrying me down the long white corridor.

  Then they whooshed open the door of my cell and flung me inside.

  CHAPTER 29

  BLOOD ROOM

  “Oh, ack, thank you, Happy Conklin,” said Ack, bright orange with joy. “You kept all the protocols. Ack. Very good, ack. Very good indeed.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Your head’s safe. I wish I could say the same for my own. They’re all really mad at me back there. I don’t think that the verdict’s going to go my way.”

  “Verdict?” said Ack. “Ack, you’re far past the verdict. You were tried in absentia, ack, and found guilty of high treason against, ack, the Galactic Empire. Today, ack, was just your formal sentencing.”

  “I’m already guilty?” I said. “What’s the usual punishment for that? High treason against the Empire?”

  “Death, ack, by the most painful means possible,” he said. “Ack, of course you’ll be interrogated first, ack, tortured, ack, and publicly debased.”

  “Oh Doamne,” I said, praying. “Oh God … They can’t torture me! What good will it do? I don’t know anything! I’m an idiot. I have no idea what my grandma’s doing or why.”

  “Even so. Ack. How can they, ack, determine the most painful way for you to die, ack, if they don’t explore the possibilities? It’s the law.”

  “Oh Doamne,” I said.

  “Soon, ack, they will come and take you, ack, to the Blood Room. Ack. Thank you again for following the protocol. Ack.”

  I stumbled away and collapsed beside the white wall.

  I was done talking to Ack Gubbins.

  I was done saying anything except Romanian prayers.

  Before I knew it, Gummy and Nutrageous had returned to collect me.

  This time they took me in the other direction down the white hall.

  “Oh Doamne,” I kept saying.

  The Blood Room wasn’t red like I had expected.

  It was muddy black and configured like a hollow pyramid.

  The shape seemed to radiate the evil energy of the room’s purpose. It looked big enough to accommodate victims far larger than myself.

  As they strapped me down onto a table, I realized the murky walls might be covered in blood after all. The dried blood of who knows what kinds of beings, over who knows how many eons.

  Now I noticed all the long, rusty instruments hanging on the walls. Huge, heavy, spiked, unspeakable things. Scanning the rows of torture devices, I heard myself scream.

  He had been standing there unseen, watching me since I had entered.

  Star Chamberlain, the torturer.

  One motion from his hand and the guards turned and walked out, closing us into total darkness.

  A harsh spotlight came on over my head.

  The torturer’s face floated in from the gloom.

  Upon a horizontal bench, he unrolled a satchel of metal instruments far smaller than those hanging on the wall.

  These looked more like tools from a dentist’s office.

  His long fingers moved through the air above them. He selected one—a green, oddly shaped thing with two large circular transparencies.

  Lifting these up, the torturer fitted them onto his own face like a pair of glasses.

  I didn’t recognize them as P
erfect-O-Specs until he flicked the switch.

  His misshapen skull re-formed into two buns of white hair.

  His horrific jaw became a smile of well-kept human teeth.

  Then she stood there, beaming down at me.

  “Grandma?”

  “Hello, Happy Junior,” she said. “Welcome to our new kingdom.”

  I gasped for air.

  “Glad to see me?” she said. “You should be. Sorry it has to be in this vile room. For now, it’s the only place that we can have any privacy.”

  “What are you doing, Grandma?” I breathed. “Why did you attack the Emperor? He’s going to kill us and destroy the Earth.”

  “ ‘Attack’ him?” she said. “If I had attacked him, he’d be a corpse. I merely exposed him. He holds on to power by pretending to be a god. Now that I’ve shown him for the buffoon he truly is, his reign has started to crumble. So that ours may commence.”

  “They’re going to kill us,” I said, “and destroy the Earth.”

  “Thanks to you,” she said, “the Earth is safe, though only for the next few hours. But all the same, nicely done.”

  “You are so crazy, Grandma,” I said. “Disguising yourself? In this place, where everyone’s after you? How long do you think you can keep that up? I mean, what did you do with the real torturer guy?”

  “I killed him,” she said. “What? Oh, boo-hoo, poor torturer guy. We are going to make this galaxy a far better place for trillions and trillions of beings, Happy Junior.”

  “No, you are,” I said. “Not me. I’m out. Do you hear me, Grandma? I am out!”

  “No, partner …,” she said.

  Reaching, she gently tagged my hand.

  “You are IN.”

  BLOOMSBURY CHILDREN’S BOOKS

  Bloomsbury Publishing Inc., part of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018

  BLOOMSBURY, BLOOMSBURY CHILDREN’S BOOKS, and the Diana logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  First published in the United States of America in January 2019 by Bloomsbury Children’s Books

  Text and illustrations copyright © 2019 by Paul Noth

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

  Bloomsbury books may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at specialmarkets@macmillan.com

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Noth, Paul, author, illustrator.

  Title: How to properly dispose of Planet Earth / by Paul Noth.

  Description: New York : Bloomsbury, 2019. | Sequel to: How to sell your family to the aliens.

  Summary: With Squeep’s help, Hap Conklin, eleven, faces his fear of talking to the new girl at school but also opens a black hole and uncovers information about his grandmother’s next evil plan.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2018024639 (print) | LCCN 2018030283 (e-book)

  ISBN 978-1-68119-659-6 (hardcover) • ISBN 978-1-68119-660-2 (e-book)

  Subjects: | CYAC: Middle schools—Fiction. | Schools—Fiction. | Family Life—Fiction. |

  Lizards as pets—Fiction. | Grandmothers—Fiction. | Science fiction. | Humorous stories.

  Classification: LCC PZ7.1.N66 Hop 2019 (print) | LCC PZ7.1.N66 (e-book) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2018024639

  To find out more about our authors and books visit www.bloomsbury.com and sign up for our newsletters.