Flash Virus: Episode One (6 page)

They all looked the same to me.
 

Captain Albino looked at that cell phone, studying it - like he was trying to figure out what it really was.
 

Then that cell phone started ringing again.
 

Here Comes Santa Claus.
 

Only this time the Black Mask’s fish bowl screens were flashing along with the music.
 

Here comes Santa Claus, here comes Santa Claus.
 

Captain Albino smiled like he had just found a free coupon for all of the tapioca and bleached white bread that he could eat.
 

Then he looked at me.
 

“I think this is for you,” he said, holding the cell phone out in my direction.
 

Answer the phone.
 

The Black Masks both loomed over me.
 

The stormtrooper soldiers crowded in a little closer.
 

I just stood there – frozen stuck with fear.
 

Here comes Santa Claus.
 

“Why don’t you answer it?” Captain Albino asked. “It’s ringing.”
 

Good question.
 

It is for you.
 

Too bad I didn’t have an answer worth listening to.
 

“No sir,” was all I said.
 

Then he put the cell phone in my hand.
 

“This is for you.”
 

It rang again.
 

And I started to put the cell phone up to my ear.
 

The cell phone in my hand rang again – just before I almost put it up to my ear and answered.
 

What in blue blazes was I thinking?
 

I don’t know how he’d done it but old Captain Albino had almost had me hypnotized into doing exactly what he told me to.
 

I’m talking deer-in-the-headlights-dumb.
 

So I lowered the phone.
 

I kept my eyes focused away from it.
 

Away from Captain Albino, too.
 

I opened my mouth and swallowed in as much air as I could manage.
 

The phone rang again.
 

“Why don’t you answer that?” Captain Albino repeated. “Surely you’re not afraid of a tiny little cell phone?”
 

“Not me,” I said, using those two words to swallow down another mouthful of air. “Cell phones don’t scare me one bit at all.”
 

Another swallow.
 

Another ring.
 

I looked down at the cell phone and then I smiled just a little – like I was thinking about answering it.
 

“Briar!” Jemmy protested.
 

Captain Albino smiled back at me - like I had just given him the nicest present in the world.
 

“Master Briar,” he said. “So good to know your name.”
 

Nice one, Jemmy.
 

The phone rang again.
 

I threw the cell phone directly at Captain Albino’s feet. It bounced and it skittered and spun a little and then came to a halt.
 

“Probably just a telemarketer,” I said. “somebody wanting me to do a survey on how many times I swallow air before I have to burp.”
 

And then I swallowed that last bit of air before forcing my lungs and stomach to perform that double-flip maneuver that I had practiced so long in my bathroom at home – and I burped just as loudly as I could – directly into Captain Albino’s face.
 

His skin tone turned a paler shade of white. I could see the corner of one eye twitched just a little and his lips thinned out and tightened.
 

I guess nobody likes being burped at, face first.
 

“That wasn’t very nice of you, Master Briar.” Captain Albino said.
 

I was getting awfully tired of hearing my name coming out of Captain Albino’s mouth.
 

“I’m just feeling a little pressured, is all.” I explained. “Things get all pent up and they have to burst loose is all.”
 

I would have given a million dollars to fart, right then and there.
 

“And why is that?” Captain Albino asked.
 

“I don’t know,” I replied. “It might have something to do with all of those assault rifles that your stormtrooper soldiers are carrying around with them. That’s awfully heavy armament for entering a high school, don’t you think – or are you expecting a surprise pop quiz?”
 

Captain Albino gave me a look like he thought that I actually had discretely farted and he didn’t like the smell of it one bit at all.
 

“These men aren’t with me,” he carefully explained. “They don’t work for me. They’re assisting me, is all. I’m with the government. You boys know what the government is, don’t you? We’re doing a study, is all – and your school is going to help us with it.”
 

I took a quick look at Principal Feltspur.
 

Principal Feltspur was smiling but it was the kind of smile that said that he didn’t particularly care for the taste of something that he was chewing on behind that smile.
 

Old Man Jenkins was just standing there and staring at his feet.
 

The two of them looked like they knew some sort of a secret story and were ashamed to play even the slightest part in the telling of it.
 

“That’s funny,” Jemmy said. “I don’t remember any letter being sent home to my Mom and Dad. Maybe I ought to go home first and ask them if they give permission for me to take part in an important government study.”
 

Some of the other kids heard what Jemmy had said and they were starting to nod and talk amongst themselves.
 

Which is always dangerous – as far as adults are concerned.
 

“Quiet,” Captain Albino said.
 

Quiet, quiet, quiet
the Black Masks echoed.
 

And suddenly everybody was.
 

Except me.
 

“I think Jemmy is right,” I said. “We ought to go on home.”
 

Captain Albino’s half-of-a-smile almost slid off of his face and fell on the floor.
 

I had the feeling that half-of-a-smile might have crawled away or maybe bit somebody on the ankle after it had fallen on the floor.
 

“Oh, I don’t think that going home is really necessary,” Captain Albino said. “There’s no need for it at all.”
 

I figured that.
 

“Well maybe I feel the need,” I replied. “Maybe I’m figuring on going home for a hot lunch as well. Mom is making macaroni and cheese and I think she’s even figuring on throwing in some hot dog wieners. I’d sure hate to miss out on that.”
 

The half-smile stayed put but Captain Albino’s pale cold eyes frosted over.
 

“Sergeant?” he softly called out to one of the stormtrooper soldiers.
 

I don’t know how that stormtrooper heard old Captain Albino, what with him wearing those big industrial-sized headphones like he was – but the stormtrooper sergeant turned smartly, like a dog at the sound of a rattling food dish.
 

He turned like he knew what he was doing but I was pretty certain that he was almost as afraid of Captain Albino as I was.
 

“Yes sir?”
 

“I think we can safely contain these students in the gymnasium, don’t you?”
 

That was the word that he used.
 

Contained - like we were nothing more than a buzz full of fireflies jammed into an emptied out pickle jar.
 

Contain. Contain. Contain.
 

“Yes sir.”
 

Captain Albino turned and fixed me with a stare that made me feel a little like a bug under a microscope lens awaiting dissection. He came just as close to a smile as I had seen his lips move since he had first stepped into our classroom.
 

Maybe practice made perfect.
 

“Lunch is cancelled,” Captain Albino said. “I’m afraid I’ve made other plans for you children.”
 

He looked me over like he was sizing me up for his mother’s favorite pot roast recipe.
 

Assuming he even had a mother.
 

“Fine,” I said. “I wasn’t that hungry anyway.”
 

I really was hungry – but I wasn’t going to let him know that.
 

It was the principal of the thing.
 

Have I ever told you just how much I absolutely HATED to go to gym class?
 

I mean, take a look at me. I’m stringy in all of the wrong places. My elbows don’t seem to be connected to my hands – so that every time I try and catch a basketball or a baseball or a football my hands go in the wrong direction that I intended them to.
 

At least that’s what I tell myself.
 

It’s a whole lot easier than just admitting that I am an absolute and total kind of anti-athletic klutz.
 

Being escorted to the gymnasium by a small platoon of stormtroopers didn’t help my mood much at all. The only good thing was that there were more of us kids than there were of the stormtroopers – which meant that they had to spread out – about one for every six or eight students - which meant that there was about ten or twelve feet from me and any of the stormtroopers who were marching us into the gymnasium.
 

Did you follow all that or do I need to wait for you to read that paragraph over one more time?
 

“Do you think he really meant it about cancelling lunch?” Jemmy asked.
 

Jemmy was a big fan of lunch. For a little guy he could eat an awful lot. I know that he was more worried about missing out on a meal than he might have been worried about death-by-terrorists – but right now I figured that I didn’t have any more time to waste on keeping Jemmy company.
 

“I’m not sticking around here to find out,” I said.
 

Just as we turned the corner in the hall I pushed the kid in front of me. He fell forward against the kid in front of him and we all got tangled up – like a centipede tripping over a row of toppling dominoes.
 

So I bolted for it.
 

“HEY!” One of the stormtrooper soldiers shouted out.
 

I didn’t stop to hey him back.
 

I just took off running for the lunch hall, which had about three or four doors that I figured I could get to.
 

The way I figured it one of those three or four doors was bound to take me to where I exactly needed to go.
 

So I ran into the lunch room and hit the side door into the kitchen.
 

The door swung open.
 

Mrs. Mabel was working in the kitchen.
 

She was a big heavy woman that looked as if she might have had a couple of gallons worth of cave troll blood pumping through her circulatory system. Her main distinguishing features were a head full of iron gray hair with a chin that could have served double-duty as a snowplow – and a hair net that I swore was growing into her scalp.
 

I thought for about half of a second about asking her for help but she had troubles enough of her own. I counted three of the stormtrooper soldiers standing there and watching her cook.
 

One of the stormtroopers had his assault rifle sort of half-pointed at her.
 

Another half dozen stormtrooper soldiers stood outside of the kitchen – either keeping watch or maybe waiting for lunch.
 

One of them looked up and saw me standing there.
 

“Hey!” he said.
 

Maybe they practice that too. Maybe they practiced saying hey, right after they practice pushing kids around and smiling and doing their push-ups, sit-ups and jumping jacks.
 

“Sorry,” I said. “I made a mistake.”
 

I ran out the first door I could get to and headed directly for the nearest exit.
 

I figured if I could just get to the school yard it was big enough for me to avoid being recaptured. I could clamber over the fence a whole lot faster than a stormtrooper soldier in full military gear. About the only thing that could stop my flight at all was if they shot me.
 

Only they wouldn’t shoot a kid.
 

Would they?
 

Only there were more stormtroopers standing at each of the exits so I turned and headed the other way, just as fast as my feet could manage to carry me.
 

Two more of Captain Albino’s stormtroopers “heyed’ me. I still didn’t bother heying them back on account of I didn’t think they would hear me with those big headphones covering their ears.
 

I just kept on running. I kept my arms pumping like I was trying to win a gold medal in track and field. My sneakers were slapping loudly against the tile floor of the school hallway and I was absolutely certain that they could hear me coming from miles away.
 

By now I’d got myself completely turned around.
 

I know that sounds stupid. I’d been going to this school for three years and you think that I could run through it blindfolded – and I probably could – but I had never tried to run through it while being chased by a squad of armed stormtroopers.