“I’ll need a bit of time but I can get both,” Bryce said, interested. “I like the plan.”
Adam nodded reluctantly. “It could work. But I hate to hurt the dragon. We were the ones, after all, that invaded her home.”
“And now she wants to destroy our home,” Sally said seriously. “There is a time for quiet diplomacy and there is a time for full-throttle battle, Adam. We have no choice. We have to stop the dragon and we have to stop her now.”
Adam nodded. “I suppose you’re right. But I keep thinking how she mentioned her family.”
“You saw her temper,” Sally said. “If she has a husband then we are doing him a favor by knocking out his wife.”
Adam sighed. “I don’t think he would see it that way.”
* * *
The current of the river was fast. They reached the power plant minutes later. Bryce disappeared, probably to dig up another one of his secret stashes. He wasn’t gone long, and when he did return he had a rifle that looked as if it had been invented in a secret laboratory in the basement of the Pentagon. The bullets were as large as mustard jars. He also brought cans of gold paint and rollers.
“I couldn’t find a spray gun on such short notice,” he said as they rolled up their sleeves and began to paint the rocky ledge, just below the humming power lines.
“I guess you’re not perfect, after all,” Sally said.
“It’s been a while since you thought I was perfect,” Bryce grumbled.
Sally laughed and reached over and painted his right cheek gold.
“Cheer up,” she said. “I’m only hard on you because I know you have potential.”
They had their bait ready in less than thirty minutes. The painted ledge actually did look like—from a distance—a genuine vein of gold. Hiking away from the ledge, they huddled behind a bunch of nearby trees. Bryce carefully began to load his sniper rifle.
“Where did you get such a weapon?” Sally asked.
“That’s classified information,” Bryce muttered.
“I don’t like guns,” Adam said. “Certainly not in the hands of minors. There are laws against such things.”
Bryce gave him a hard stare. “This town is about to be attacked by a fire-breathing dragon and you are lecturing me on gun laws?”
Adam shrugged. “I just don’t like guns. Too many accidents happen around them.”
“Of course you do have a laser pistol in your chest of drawers in your bedroom,” Sally said.
“That’s different,” Adam said defensively. “I only take it out when aliens invade the earth.”
They had laid their trap none too soon. Slatron appeared a few minutes later. The sight of the gold definitely caught her eye, and she swooped down with red fire flaring from her nostrils. Bryce didn’t give the dragon a second to examine the ledge. The moment the beast landed he sprung their trap. Using the laser-guided sight, he took aim at the power lines above the dragon and opened fire.
One of the power lines broke and fell on the dragon.
Slatron howled in agony.
Bryce fired again and again, in quick succession.
Two more sparkling lines landed on the dragon and she rolled onto her side in pain. Apparently her thick scaly hide was no protection from the massive current that was now pouring through its body. Sally’s brilliant plan was working, but even though she had thought it up, Adam saw her turn away with tears in her eyes. The dragon flopped on her back and kicked her legs as if she were suffering from a seizure. Even Bryce dropped his rifle.
“I wish there had been another way,” he said. “But at least its over.”
Adam could not tear his eyes away from the horror. “Yeah,” he said sadly. “It’s over.”
But Adam and Bryce were wrong.
A second dragon suddenly appeared in the sky. It swooped down toward Slatron and the crackling wires. It knocked the wires away from Slatron. Adam and his friends briefly wondered if they were in for another fire fight, but then they saw that the new dragon was carrying Watch and Cindy and Leah on its back. Sally blinked in amazement.
“This is too weird,” she said. “Even for this town.”
The new dragon landed nearby and Cindy, Watch, and Leah climbed off his back and ran toward their friends. Harve went to attend to Slatron, who was already recovering from the electrical shock. Slatron rolled onto her belly and Harve brushed her with his wings. Cindy and Watch were laughing as they walked up. Even Leah was smiling, although she seemed embarrassed to face Bryce.
“I can see you guys have been busy,” Sally said.
Cindy gestured to the laser-assisted rifle and the downed electric wires.
“You don’t look like you’ve been waiting around to be rescued,” Cindy said.
Sally shrugged. “All in a day’s work. But tell us how you got here.”
“Harve brought us,” Cindy said simply.
“Harve?” Bryce said.
“That kid dragon,” Watch said, pointing. “He’s pretty cool. He helped us catch up with Leah and then he bought the crystals back from her with his weekly allowance.”
Sally frowned. “His allowance? What did he give you, Leah?”
Now they knew why Leah was smiling.
She held out handful of beautiful diamonds.
“These,” she said.
Adam had to laugh. “I wish I had an inheritance like that.”
Leah shook her head. “This is no inheritance, and Harve didn’t really buy the crystals from me. I gave them back when I heard how much they meant to his mother. I realized I was way off base taking them. I should never have taken them in the first place.” Leah pointed to Slatron and her son. The electrical wires had been pushed farther away. Mother and child seemed to be doing well. They looked over and waved their wide wings, and Slatron didn’t even appear to be mad anymore. Leah continued, “Harve simply gave me these gems as a favor when he heard I’d lost my father. He said he didn’t want me poor and destitute.”
Sally stared at the gems hungrily. “That Harve sounds like a nice guy. Would he like to do each of us a favor?”
But the gang didn’t let Sally talk to the young dragon.
They were too afraid of angering his mother again.
About the Author
Little is known about Christopher Pike, although he is supposed to be a strange man. It is rumored that he was born in New York but grew up in Los Angeles. He has been seen in Santa Barbara lately, so he probably lives there now. But no one really knows what he looks like, or how old he is. It is possible that he is not a real person, but an eccentric creature visiting from another world. When he is not writing, he sits and stares at the walls of his huge haunted house. A short, ugly troll wanders around him in the dark and whispers scary stories in his ear.
Christopher Pike is one of this planet’s best-selling authors of young adult fiction.
Books by Christopher Pike
Spooksville #1: The Secret Path
Spooksville #2: The Howling Ghost
Spooksville #3: The Haunted Cave
Spooksville #4: Aliens in the Sky
Spooksville #5: The Cold People
Spooksville #6: The Witch’s Revenge
Spooksville #7: The Dark Corner
Spooksville #8: The Little People
Spooksville #9: The Wishing Stone
Spooksville #10: The Wicked Cat
Spooksville #11: The Deadly Past
Spooksville #12: The Hidden Beast
Spooksville #13: Creature in the Teacher
Available from MINSTREL Books
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
A MINSTREL PAPERBACK Original
A Minstrel Book published by
POCKET BOOKS, a division of Simon & Schuster Inc.
1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 1
0020
www.SimonandSchuster.com
Copyright © 1996 by Christopher Pike
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address Pocket Books, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020
ISBN: 0-671-55073-X
ISBN-13: 978-1-4814-1096-0 (eBook)
First Minstrel Books printing September 1996
A MINSTREL BOOK and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster Inc.
SPOOKSVILLE is a trademark of Christopher Pike.
Cover art by Lee MacLeod
Christopher Pike, The Hidden Beast
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