Taken Over (7 page)

‘Well, as long as I
am
alive, I'm going to follow my orders,' said Boris, as he broke through the forest and stormed across the snowy plain.

‘Hang on!' Saffy called sharply.

Boris stopped and turned around. ‘
What?

' Saffy shook her head and moved quietly back to the cover of the trees. Boris followed.

‘Something's not right,' Saffy said. ‘Listen.'

‘All I can hear is the wind,' Felix whispered.

‘Exactly,' Saffy replied. ‘No noise. No talking, no yelling, no anything. Everyone was supposed to be gathering screechwort and heading back to the assembly hall. The fourth-year crews were going to stand guard outside, but no-one's there. Something's happened. I don't like this. Not one bit.'

Jasper shivered and his eyelids fluttered shut.

COOM ... MING ... KLUSE ... NAAO ... KLUUSSE.

The whispering made Jasper jump. What was it saying? Señor Hermes had taught him how to see the words written down on piece of paper in his head. Jasper concentrated.

COMING CLOSE NOW, CLOSE,
he read.

It sounded like a warning. Or was his monster side
excited
? One thing was for sure – the monsters were close. Where were they? He couldn't see anything. But he could
hear
something. A soft, low buzzing.

Jasper's heart pounded in his chest. He held his breath. And then he saw it.

A Skrinkerscreech was coming their way.

12

The Skrinkerscreech looked like an overgrown, mutated insect. It had huge, hideous nippers and a fanged face. Its plate-sized eyes were like a fly's, divided into hundreds of gleaming sections. Twitching antennae poked out the top of its head – but one of these was twisted, as though the monster had been in a fight. Its body had a hard, shiny casing like a beetle's, which curved around to end in a pointed stinger.

The monster slashed at some leaves with its sharp nippers. It paused, then rose into the air, its wings moving in a blur. A long line of screechwort drifted behind as it made a beeline towards the mansion.

Jasper let out his breath. It hadn't seen them or sensed them. Maybe because its antennae was mangled. They had been lucky.

Felix had his eyes clenched shut. ‘Has it gone?'

‘All clear,' Boris said.

‘That isn't supposed to be happening,' Saffy said uncertainly. ‘The nest should have been built by now. The plan was that as soon as the swarm entered the assembly hall, everyone would jump out and spray the drones with dog drool.'

‘So what is a drone doing gathering screechwort?' Jasper asked.

‘Exactly,' Saffy replied grimly. ‘Something's gone wrong.'

‘At the assembly hall?' Boris checked. Saffy nodded. Boris pulled out a pair of binoculars and held them up. ‘Ah. Ah-ha. Mmmmm, that's what happened.'

Saffy, Felix and Jasper waited.

Boris kept watching. ‘Ewww,' he winced. ‘That's got to be painful.'

‘What?' Saffy hissed. ‘What is going on?'

Boris let the binoculars drop. ‘The students are being held prisoner. By the huge bug-things. The situation does not seem to have gone as planned,' he added, somewhat unnecessarily.

Jasper grabbed the binoculars and peered through the lenses, trying to see into the hall. ‘Oh,' he murmured.

Through the window of the hall, Jasper could see students lying in a large heap on the floor. Two of the older students – presumably the ones Saffy said were guarding the doors – had broken out in blistering hives. It was truly disgusting.

‘By the look of it, most people have fainted,' Jasper relayed.

‘They might be paralysed. The drones will be releasing their fumes,' Felix said thoughtfully.

Jasper put the binoculars down and turned to Felix. ‘Huh? What fumes?'

‘When the queen is ready to lay her eggs, the drones let off fumes,' explained Felix. ‘You know how Stenka said when people are attacked, their burst hives release a fear gas? It's the same kind of gas. It paralyses anything in the vicinity. It's to protect the queen.'

Saffy grabbed the binoculars. ‘They've taken over,' she muttered. ‘We're completely outnumbered. And even if we weren't, it looks like the monsters saw right through our plan anyway.'

‘We'll have to get the teachers,' Felix replied. ‘It's the only way. We can't do anything on our own.' He turned to Boris. ‘Stenka said they'd communicate with the prefects in case of an emergency. Have you got your radio?'

Boris pulled out his radio, and pressed the button on the side.

Eeeoorryyyyyeeeeeccckk!
A high-pitched squeal came from the radio.

‘There's interference from something!' said Boris.

‘Maybe it's these,' said Saffy, pulling out her tin can walkie-talkie out of her pocket.

‘Can't you turn them off?' asked Boris, exasperated.

‘They are off.' Saffy flicked the switch at the bottom of the walkie-talkies. The feedback became louder and more high-pitched.

Boris moved his radio closer to the walkie-talkies. There was a bright spark of light and a loud bang.

‘Ow!' yelped Boris, dropping his radio into the snow. It sizzled and let off steam.

‘Well, you can't expect them to be perfect,' huffed Saffy.

At least the squealing had stopped.

Jasper turned to Felix. ‘Could we just wait it out? I mean, after the Skrinkerscreech have hatched and fed on the screechwort, they'll leave, right?'

‘Who knows?' said Felix. ‘I learnt in my lesson with Stenka that they always lay twenty-three eggs. So there will be twenty-three new monsters that have just hatched, plus the original nineteen monsters. And heaps of food for the hatchlings. They might decide they like it here – especially once they've killed off any other monsters in the area.'

Jasper gulped. ‘We've got to do something.'

‘What does the queen look like?' asked Saffy.

‘Oh, you know,' said Felix. ‘Enormous mutant insect. Freaky eyeballs, nippers that could cut you in half. Like the other one we saw – but bigger. If she hasn't laid yet, she'll have an abdomen full of monster eggs. And she doesn't have a stinger, so she'll be surrounded by drones to protect her.'

Saffy handed Jasper the binoculars. ‘I can't see her, can you?'

Jasper checked out the scene. Saffy was right. The queen was missing. ‘Maybe the monsters didn't use your nest, Saff. Maybe they made another one.'

‘No way,' Saffy scowled. ‘It was perfect.'

Boris was pacing up and down in the snow. ‘Do I protect the students? Or do I deliver them as ordered?' he muttered to himself. ‘They are both orders. But which one is the overriding order? Which one do I follow?' His eyes were darting all over the place. ‘I can't ask my superior, because he doesn't know about monsters ... and ... and –'

‘The first thing we need to do is get you two back to safety,' Felix interrupted. ‘Saffy and I can handle the rest, but you two could get
killed,
so come on. MOVE IT!' he barked.

Jasper had never seen Felix so serious. He suspected any argument from him would just get him karate kicked, so he nodded.

Felix's outburst seemed to convince Boris that, for now, the most important matter was survival. ‘Keep low, and move slowly,' Boris whispered. ‘The enemy will be intent on gathering supplies for their nest. They think they have the whole army captive, so they won't be expecting an ambush.'

‘There are too many of them,' said Felix. ‘We need a better plan.'

‘You're right, Felix,' Saffy said. ‘Let's go to the Reversal Room. That's the safest place. And it's where the teachers are.' She paused. ‘Um, does anyone know where the Reversal Room actually is?'

Felix and Jasper shrugged.

‘Not really,' said Jasper. ‘But I think I know how we can get back into the school. Come on.'

They came to a stop outside the door Jasper had used before. It would take them through the tunnel and back to the bathroom.

‘I thought I was the only one who knew about this tunnel,' said Saffy as she climbed through the door into the tunnel beyond.

Typical,
thought Jasper. But he had to smile. Saffy made it her business to know every exit in the school.

Boris just managed to squeeze himself inside the tunnel. Then Felix and Jasper climbed in behind him, and closed the door.

‘Are you sure about this?' Felix asked as they crawled along the tunnel.

‘What else can we do?' said Jasper. ‘Anyway, if we get attacked, I'm the one who is facing a painful death. All you have to worry about is being covered in hives and looking like a hideous freak.'

They followed the tunnel for ten minutes until they reached the air vent above the bathroom. One by one, they dropped down to the floor below.

Felix took his asthma puffer out of his back pocket and breathed deeply. ‘Thank goodness that's over. Tunnels are creepy.'

There was a muffled scream in the corridor outside the bathroom.

‘But probably not as creepy as whatever's on the other side of that door,' said Jasper.

‘Let's check it out,' said Boris.

Felix pocketed his puffer and grabbed a spare flask of dog drool from his hunt belt. He pressed it into Boris's hands. ‘You might need this,' he said. ‘Even you couldn't squash these insects.'

13

Boris kicked open the door, his dog drool at the ready. Directly outside the bathroom was a ring of drones. They didn't even look up as the door flew off its hinges. Their stingers were pointed at a slumped figure lying in the middle of the circle, and they were intently wiggling closer and closer.

Jasper gasped. ‘Matheson!' he screamed. The drone in front of Jasper looked up, its antennae twitching and its nippers slicing the air. But it kept its stinger trained on Matheson.

‘RUN!' Felix commanded Jasper.

But there was no way Jasper was backing out of this. If it wasn't for him, Matheson would be tucked up safely in the Reversal Room with all the other Whispered kids.

Why didn't he go back when he saw I'd escaped?
Jasper thought.

But he knew already. When Woof raised the alarm, Matheson probably went through the door on the other side of the bathroom trying to save Jasper, and he didn't make it back to safety himself. There was no way Jasper was letting Matheson get stung to death now.

Jasper gave an almighty yell and charged forwards. He was pulled back by Boris, who flung Jasper towards Felix and Saffy. Meanwhile, Boris leapt skywards and sprayed a long arch of dog drool over the drones.

Boris's spray hit half of the monsters full-on. They stumbled around, then froze solid. The other drones appeared to be in some sort of killing trance, ignoring everything but Matheson.

Jasper shook his flask and flung drool over the closest drone. Felix and Saffy threw drool over the other three drones, as Jasper pulled Matheson out of the way.

There was silence. All the drones were frozen.

Saffy checked Matheson over. ‘He seems OK.

Just … unconscious,' she reported.

Felix pulled out his asthma puffer and inhaled deeply. ‘That,' he wheezed, ‘was,' he took another deep puff, ‘close.'

‘Eight down. How many of these things are there, anyway?' Boris asked, inspecting a frozen drone.

‘Er, eighteen. And the queen,' Jasper replied.

‘Great! Eleven more! Well, what are we waiting for?' Boris nodded.

‘I take it you're feeling the buzz, then?' Jasper asked.

‘Wooohooo!' Boris replied, jumping in the air.

‘No, no, no, no, no,' Felix said. ‘We need a plan! A really good one! We don't even know where the queen is. We can't just waltz around and start spraying! And anyway, we need to go past the Species Studies room. I'm almost out of drool.' Felix shook his near-empty flask.

‘Got it!' Saffy beamed.