Meanwhile, in the corner, the larvae started crawling out of their eggs. Once they figured out how to walk, they crawled toward Alex. She kicked them away with her boots, but they were relentless. Each egg hosted several larvae, so the number of newborns coming toward her doubled by the second.
“Hurry up!” she yelled at her brother. “I’m about to become alien baby food!”
Conner punched LRRH215 into the Omega GDD keypad and a red light started to flash.
“The Omega GDD will detonate in thirty seconds,” said a calm voice from the device.
“It’s set!” Conner announced, and dashed toward his sister.
“Don’t forget the Blissworm!” Alex said. “We can’t leave it here!”
Conner grunted and then dashed back. The Blissworm was waiting with its hands up like a toddler wanting to be lifted, and Conner scooped it up.
The larvae started leaping on Alex—she had no choice but to shoot them. The blasts echoed through the cavern, and all the polycrabs snapped their heads toward her. Conner quickly thought of a distraction to save his sister. He fired his blaster at the corners of the web behind the queen, and it fell on top of her like a net. The polycrab queen hissed and all her children forgot about their newborn siblings and hurried to help her.
Alex and Conner met in the middle of the cavern and ran for the tunnel in the back. The Blissworm waved good-bye to the polycrabs as they passed them. Alex and Conner entered the tunnel and shot at the ceiling behind them as they ran, causing large chunks of dirt to fall and block the passageway so the polycrabs couldn’t follow them.
The twins ran as fast as their legs could carry them. The Blissworm held on to Conner’s helmet like a jockey clutching the reins of a racehorse. It even slapped Conner’s bottom as if that would make him run faster.
“Cut it out!” he said. “That hurts!”
They only had a few seconds left before the Omega GDD detonated. They saw light ahead and knew they were almost out of the colony. They heard a thunderous explosion erupt behind them and the whole tunnel vibrated. Alex, Conner, and the Blissworm re-surfaced just in time and rolled down the mound. A powerful gamma ray exploded out of the colony’s entrance, vaporizing everything it touched. The purple hills shook and cracked for miles like they had been hit by a powerful earthquake. When the gamma ray dissipated, there was nothing left of the colony but a massive hole in the ground.
With the polycrabs successfully exterminated, Lollipopigust was safe for the BASK-8 to upload. The twins stayed on the ground as they caught their breath.
“From now on, I’m only writing about bunnies,” Conner said, panting.
A spacecraft a teeny bit bigger than the 2999 Moon Jumper Express descended from the sky and landed near the twins. It was black and its shape was similar to the body of a wolf. CLAW-DS was engraved along the side of the spacecraft. Alex and Conner got to their feet as the Cyborg Queen charged out of the CLAW-DS followed by Commander Newters and a handful of Cyborg soldiers.
“Well done, exterminators!” the Cyborg Queen said. “We had a bet going on the BASK-8 that you wouldn’t survive—now I owe my crew a week of double battery privileges!”
The twins could tell she was fully charged because she seemed to be in a much better mood than before. The commander shook the twins’ hands and gave Conner his backpack.
“Excellent work,” Newters said. “I haven’t seen the Cyborg Queen so pleased since the time a constellation was named after her!”
The Cyborg Queen clapped her metal hands and a team of short gray aliens with large heads and eyes ran out of the spacecraft. They carried holographic blueprints, laser measuring tapes, and toolboxes that hovered beside them.
“Who are those guys?” Conner asked.
“Once she was certain you would succeed, Her Majesty had the best architects in the galaxy flown out to immediately start construction on the planet,” Newters said.
The Cyborg Queen rotated and pointed the gray aliens to different parts of the Lollipopigustian surface.
“I think I’ll build the palace right there in the eclipse of the rings so it doesn’t get hot in the summer,” she thought out loud. “And since there’s already a gigantic hole in the ground over there—wish someone had warned me that might happen, but oh well—that’s where I’ll put the gasoline pool.”
The Cyborg Queen rolled over to join the commander and the twins.
“Your Magneticness,” Conner said, “now that we’ve exterminated the polycrabs, may my sister and I borrow your Cyborg army to save our friends?”
“A deal is a deal,” she said. “You may take us to Fairytaletopia whenever you’re ready.”
“Wait, you’re coming with us?” Alex asked.
“Indeed,” the Cyborg Queen said. “They’re going to start building my new residence as soon as we take the planet to my home system—I’m going to need something to do while it’s being constructed. How long is the journey? I must warn you, anything longer than seventy-four seconds makes me irritable.”
“We’re actually going to make a stop in Sycamore Drivious first, but it won’t take long at all,” he said. “In fact, I just remembered I have a transportation device right here.”
Conner reached into his backpack and pulled out his binder of short stories.
“Lovely,” the Cyborg Queen said. She rolled away from the twins and covered her nose. “Friendly word of advice: You might want to change before seeing your friends. You both smell horribly of bug guts.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE APPLE MEETS THE TREE
Emmerich wasn’t getting much sleep. The witches at Dead Man’s Creek stayed up all night like nocturnal animals. They cackled and brewed foul-smelling potions until the sun came up and then rested during the day. Their loud snoring, growling, and mumbling was impossible for Emmerich to sleep through. Like a neglected pet, he wasn’t being fed much, either. So he became weaker the longer he stayed there as the witches’ prisoner.
He thought his exhaustion was starting to play tricks on his mind, because one day at sunrise, after all the witches went to bed, he saw a strange man tiptoeing through the camp toward him. He had pale blue eyes and several scratches along the side of his face. He walked with a limp and his left arm was in a sling.
Emmerich had never seen the man before and had no idea what he was doing there. He circled the tree Emmerich was restrained to and quietly untied the chains.
“Who are you?” Emmerich asked.
The man motioned for him to be silent. “I’m here to rescue you,” the man whispered.
Once he unwrapped the chains around Emmerich’s body, the man offered his good hand and helped the boy to his feet. It was difficult for both of them since the man was injured and Emmerich hadn’t been on his feet for a long time.
The man gestured for Emmerich to follow him, and they snuck into the forest, far away from Dead Man’s Creek.
“Are you hurt?” the man asked, and inspected the boy front to back.
“No,” Emmerich said. “Tired, hungry, and scared—but they didn’t harm me.”
The man reached into his sling and handed Emmerich an apple. The boy was so hungry, he forgot all politeness and immediately started eating it.
“Make sure you chew your food,” the man said with a smile. “Remember what happened to Snow White?”
The Masked Man played the part of a Good Samaritan very well. With just a few kind gestures, he had the little boy convinced he was a hero.
“Thank you for rescuing me,” Emmerich said. “Who are you?”
“You don’t know who I am?” the man asked.
Emmerich shook his head. The two had never been face-to-face before, but the Masked Man needed to be certain his reputation hadn’t found his son first.
“I’m from the Otherworld,” the Masked Man lied. “I’ve come to rescue you and take you back home.”
The little boy was so happy about the prospect of going home, tears came to his eyes and he gave the Mas
ked Man a giant hug. It hurt his broken rib, and the Masked Man pushed Emmerich away.
“I’m sorry,” Emmerich said. “I’ve been away from home for a very long time. My mother must be worried sick about me!”
“Right…” the Masked Man said. “Your mother.”
He paused for a moment to observe his son. The resemblance he shared with Bo Peep was even more striking up close.
“How did you find me?” Emmerich asked.
“Oh,” the Masked Man said, thinking on his feet. “Your friends in the Otherworld sent me.”
“You mean Conner and Alex?” the boy asked.
The Masked Man was shocked that Emmerich knew the names of his niece and nephew. If he didn’t know his own father, how could he possibly know about his cousins?
“Why… yes,” the Masked Man said.
“Are they here?” Emmerich asked.
The little boy looked around the forest excitedly, as if the twins were about to jump out from behind a tree.
“They’re in the Otherworld waiting for us,” the Masked Man said.
“How do you know the twins?” Emmerich asked.
The Masked Man needed to be careful with the information he shared—especially if Emmerich was friends with the twins. If his plan was going to work, he needed his son’s absolute trust.
“Have they ever mentioned their uncle Lloyd?” he asked.
“No,” Emmerich said. “I didn’t even know they had an uncle.”
“Good,” the Masked Man said. “I mean—good for me. Now I get to introduce myself to you. I’m Lloyd Bailey, Alex and Conner’s favorite uncle.”
Emmerich shook the Masked Man’s hand as enthusiastically as if he were meeting a member of his own family.
“It’s wonderful to meet you,” Emmerich said.
“And you as well,” the Masked Man said. “Now, we must hurry out of the woods before the witches realize you’re gone. I’ve just returned from following the witch Morina—she led me to a portal in the Eastern Kingdom that will take us to the Otherworld. We must move very quietly, though; it’s a dangerous time to be traveling through this world.”
The Masked Man led the way and Emmerich followed. Even with an injured leg, the Masked Man moved with so much determination that Emmerich had difficulty keeping up with him. Although his head was filled with a hundred more questions, Emmerich followed the man’s instructions to stay quiet.
They traveled through the forest for miles without making a sound. Suddenly, a loud crunch came from under the Masked Man’s foot. He looked down at the ground and saw he had stepped on a small statue of a bird made from a pale stone. It was an odd thing to find in the middle of the woods.
“Look, there are more!” Emmerich said.
The boy pointed to the treetops above them. The statue under the man’s foot was one of many. The branches were covered with hundreds of stone birds—enough to make an entire flock. Each bird looked terrified, as if it had been frozen while fleeing from a predator.
“What strange decorations,” Emmerich said.
“These aren’t decorations,” the Masked Man said. “They’ve been turned to stone by a terrible monster creeping through the forest. We need to get far away from here as quickly as possible before we’re next!”
Emmerich didn’t need any further explanation. He and the Masked Man hurried through the woods faster than before. But even with a monster loose in the woods, Emmerich was glad to be away from Dead Man’s Creek. Little did the boy know, he would have been better off with the witches than in the Masked Man’s care.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
FULL HOUSE AND FULL HEARTS
The perseverance of the Dolly Llama crew had been put to the test when they entered the Otherworld, but after only one day in the house on Sycamore Drive, the pirates and sailors of “Starboardia” had grown very accustomed to life in the twenty-first century. In fact, they had become a little too comfortable for Charlotte’s taste. The twins’ mother had spent the entire day following pirates and sailors from one room to the next as if she were babysitting fifty toddlers.
Auburn Sally, Admiral Jacobson, Siren Sue, and the navy sailors were spread out in the living room watching television. They shared bowls of popcorn and candy as they watched a program Charlotte didn’t recognize.
“What are you watching?” Charlotte asked.
As if it had cast a spell on them, the men and women never looked away from the screen.
“A very wealthy family with very frivolous problems,” Auburn Sally said. “It’s hard to tell who the parents are, because they all act like spoiled children.”
“And for whatever reason, we can’t stop watching it,” Admiral Jacobson said.
Suddenly, they all jumped at the sound of a blender. Charlotte ran into the kitchen to see what the others had gotten into. She found Too-Much-Rum Ronda pouring a red slushy liquid into mugs for herself, Not-So-Jolly Joan, Catfish Kate, and High-Tide Tabitha.
“Can I help you with something, ladies?” Charlotte asked.
“We couldn’t be better,” Too-Much-Rum Ronda said. “I’ve recently discovered how to create a marvelous concoction called a strawberry daiquiri! It’s a delicious and cold drink that’s so sweet, you can’t even taste the rum! It’s the nectar of the gods, I tell you! Would you like one?”
“No, thank you,” Charlotte said.
Not-So-Jolly Joan, Catfish Kate, and High-Tide Tabitha quickly slurped down their frozen drinks and then held their heads in pain.
“You’ve poisoned us!” Not-So-Jolly Joan yelled.
“My head is going to explode!” Catfish Kate shouted.
“Quick—put us out of our misery!” High-Tide Tabitha said. She tried to hand Charlotte her rifle.
“Ladies, relax,” Charlotte said. “You’re having a brain freeze—it’s what happens when you drink cold beverages too fast. Pace yourselves and it’ll go away.”
A clump of red slush fell and splattered across the counter. Charlotte looked up and saw the kitchen ceiling was covered with strawberry daiquiri.
“What’s all that?” she asked.
“Sorry, that was my first round,” Too-Much-Rum Ronda said. “It took me a couple tries before I mastered the pitcher of spinning blades.”
Before Charlotte had a chance to clean up the mess, she was distracted by a giant splash that came from the second story. She ran up the stairs and dashed into her and Bob’s bathroom.
Winking Wendy and Fish-Lips Lucy were taking a bubble bath in Charlotte’s tub fully clothed. Stinky-Feet Phoebe was sitting on the tank of the toilet with her feet in the bowl. She flushed the toilet and sighed with relief as the rushing water gave her a foot massage. All three pirates had clearly gone through Charlotte’s things, because they wore green beauty masks and were reading romance novels.
“Hello, Charlotte!” Stinky-Feet Phoebe said. “You blokes certainly know how to live! This is by far my favorite invention of the future.”
She patted the side of the toilet happily and flushed it again. Charlotte took a deep breath and slowly let it out. A headache was forming right between her eyes.
“That’s not what the toilet is for, Phoebe,” Charlotte said.
Stinky-Feet Phoebe was shocked. “Then what is its purpose?”
“Human waste,” Charlotte said.
The pirate immediately removed her feet from the toilet bowl and wiped them with a hand towel.
“Then what’s that bucket in the corner with the pedal that opens the lid?” Fish-Lips Lucy asked.
“That’s a trash can,” Charlotte said.
Winking Wendy’s and Fish-Lips Lucy’s faces filled with guilt.
“I wouldn’t look inside it if I were you,” Winking Wendy said.
Before Charlotte could reprimand the women in her bathroom, she caught sight of something out of the corner of her eye. She stepped into her bedroom and saw that the comforter on her bed had been replaced with a large black flag with the skull of a llama on it. Charlotte rushed
to the bedroom window and looked at the pirate ship in the backyard. Big-Booty Bertha was hoisting the lavender bedspread above the Dolly Llama like a new flag. The twins’ mother hurried downstairs and ran out into the backyard.
“Bertha, that’s my comforter!” Charlotte shouted.
“Do you like it?” Big-Booty Bertha asked. “I thought the ship could use a little color. Don’t get me wrong, I like our old flag, but this flag says, ‘Yes, we’re pirates, but we’re also totally in touch with our femininity!’”
Clink-clink! As soon as Charlotte took her first step to climb aboard the ship, she heard a strange sound coming from the side yard. Clink-clink! She inspected the noise and found Pancake-Face Patty playing darts with her nicest silverware.
“Stop that!” Charlotte said, and quickly gathered the utensils. “This is my great-grandmother’s silver! It’s a family heirloom!”
“And fine taste she had,” Pancake-Face Patty said. “They’re very easy to throw. Your great-grandmother must have been quite a bandit!”
Charlotte could feel her blood pressure rising. She went inside and locked herself in the laundry room before she lost her temper. The racket throughout the house was blocked by the sound of the dryer. It was the first peaceful moment Charlotte had had all day. She was so happy to be helpful to her children, but she hadn’t expected that watching the pirates and sailors would be such a chaotic task.
There was a knock on the laundry room door and Charlotte cringed.
“What now?” she asked.
“Charlotte, it’s Bob,” her husband said. “I just got home. Are you all right?”
Charlotte quickly let him in and shut the door before a pirate followed him inside.
“To be honest, I’m losing my mind a little bit,” she confessed. “And these are only the characters from the first story! What am I going to do when Alex and Conner get back from ‘Galaxy Queen’? The house is too small for all these people!”