#12: Argh! Ye Matey!

The S.S. Brick was docked at Oahu, where Doctor Captain Commander Steven the Brick had apparently been competing in the hula-hooping championship again Hannah. How a brick managed to rotate its nonexistent hips to keep the hoop aloft was beyond me, but apparently he’d gotten second to Hannah.

As guests aboard a Naval vessel, we were forced to do chores along with the sailors. This included swabbing the deck, kitchen duty, and other undesirable tasks. I tried to tell the Captain I was dying and that should have exempted me from chores, but apparently that wasn’t an excuse to personified inanimate objects.

We told Steve the Brick all about our struggles with the Praying Mantis Baby and how Fumblegate had told us it was in a cave on a remote island somewhere near Hawaii. He thought he might know of the perfect island. We immediately set sail toward the island.

“Ah, sailing,” Hannah said about three days later, over a plate of rations. “Being aboard a ship reminds me of my days with Captain Blarneshmesh.”

“Oh yeah, I forgot you come from the future,” Jon replied. He seemed happy to be a part of the adventure.

Despite the fact my saxophone and armor were already polished, I was doing so once again to pass the time. Mitch was constantly seasick and secluded to his cabin below-deck. Apparently being an intergalactic warrior didn’t prevent a bad case of the collywobbles.

Suddenly, there was a boom of the canon and the entire ship rocked. Hannah, Mitch and I rushed up to the command center of the ship. The Captain sat near a microphone and was busily giving commands over the intercom. Sailors of all ranks were hurriedly pressing buttons.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Pirates!” growled the Captain. “Quick! Fire the rockets!”

“Pirates? From where?” Hannah inquired.

“By the looks of it – Somalia. Though, it does appear they’ve commandeered the Black Pearl.”

“Davy Jones Locker!” Mitch cursed.

“Wait! I have a plan,” Hannah said. Hastily, she told it to us and a few minutes later, the sailors had hooked the two ships together and prepared several ropes for us to swing aboard ship on. Admittedly, I felt pretty cool swinging onto a pirate ship in my fancy, Fire Nation armor. My feet hit the deck and I whipped out my saxophone, prepared to blast away. Immediately, pirates surrounded us, yar-yee-matey-ing, baring their soiled teeth and brandishing swords and single-shot pistols.

To my amazement, Hannah began performing the Charleston while saying, “Parlay! We wish to speak to your captain!”

One of the pirates turned around and shouted, “キャプテンを取りに行く!” (Watashi wa kyaputen o mitsukeru tsumoridesu)

Hannah, Mitch, Jon, Doctor Captain Commander Steve the Brick and I did a double take.

Jon leaned toward me and muttered, “Did that pirate just speak Chinese?”

“I think it was Japanese,” Mitch replied hoarsely.

My stomach heaved sickeningly as I realized that those weren’t standard, pirate swords, but samurai swords. I gripped my saxophone a little closer and said, “They’re ninja pirates!”

“キャプテンねえ!” a pirate shouted. (Kyaputen nē!)

The ninja pirates parted to form a small aisle to walk through and in it appeared the captain, who happened to be none other than Gizmo. She wore a hat similar to Captain Barbossa’s.

“Ninja pirates! Take them below-deck. They’re now our prisoners!”

#11: Another Plan

Gizmo and the Praying Mantis Baby disappeared, the rest of the army with them, leaving Hogwarts in a state of disarray. Students worked silently on reconstructing the castle. We stood in Fumblegate’s office. While Nearly-Headless Nick was consulting me on death, Mitch and Fumblegate were speaking in hushed tones. Mitch held the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone in his hand. It was a perfect sphere, glossy black and within the blackness floated an infinite amount of swirling galaxies.

“It seems the Praying Mantis Baby has the ability to apparate,” Fumblegate said gravelly.

“I thought no one could apparate within the walls of the castle,” Jon said.

“Well…” Fumblegate shuffled uneasily on his feet. “I took those protective wards down. I have family in Maui that I like to visit. Anyhow, since the Praying Mantis Baby is underage, we were able to track them. They landed somewhere near the Hawaiian Islands.”

“We must go there at once!” Mitch decided dramatically.

“You can get close through the floo network. I have a contact near Pearl Harbor that will help you.”

Mitch shook Fumblegate’s hand and said, “Thank you. I guess we won’t need this anymore.” He tried to hand the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone back to Fumblegate.

“No, you keep it,” Fumblegate replied. He glanced sideways at me before adding, “You might need it.”

Nodding his head, Mitch pocketed the stone once again and called, “Alyssa! It’s time to go?”

“No, no – see after the bright light there’s a chorus of southern gospel singers. Of course, that’s where I turned back - can’t be a ghost if you stay,” Nick explained brightly. “Really, dying’s not so bad.”

“Thanks Nick,” I said as I got up to leave. “Good luck with the headless hunt.”

Mitch, Jon and I waved goodbye to Mrs. Stone We couldn’t keep Mrs. Stone. After all, none of us were wizards and she wouldn’t stay imperiused forever. She mumbled something about missing us in her sack of children. We followed Fumblegate to the fireplace in the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher’s office where we stepped, one-by-one through. I went last.

Once the green flames dissipated, I found myself in the captain’s room of a large naval vessel (as a part of the Fire Nation, I was familiar with the navy). Sailors were stationed all around us, large, automatic guns in their hands. However, one particularly decorated soldier held a brick. The brick had numerous medals pinned to it and a fancy hat with a grand feather.

Oddly enough, Hannah was standing next to the brick.

“I’m Doctor Captain Commander Steve the Brick. Welcome aboard my ship.”

#10: Thunder Orca

I woke up slowly, Jon waving a Chinese fan in front of my face. “Agh!” I groaned, rubbing my head. “What happened?”

“You just found out you’re going to slowly die,” Mitch told me, “unless you hand over the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone.”

Yeah, that sounded just about right. Still, I paled considerably at the thought. Die or betray the world? That was a harsh ultimatum. My head whirled and I fainted again.

This time they woke me with a bucket of water. I jerked upright and spit a fountain of water from my mouth, coughing slightly. I realized that the bucket hadn’t been needed (Jon was a water/firebender). No one had moved since I had passed out. Slowly, I regained my feet, though still a little woozy.

“You’re not going to faint again are you?” Gizmo asked exasperatedly. “You’re worse than Frodo was in the first book!”

“I think I’m good,” I assured her.

“All right. It’s decision time. Hand over the stone or die a slow painful death.”

As much as I didn’t want the praying mantis babies to take over the world, dying slowly and painfully sounded even worse. I opened my mouth to give my answer but at that moment, the great stone ceiling above us collapsed in a flood of water. Jon quickly bent a bubble of air around us to prevent us from drowning. Thunder Orca burst in from the ceiling and gave a great wail:

“WOOOSHFLSADFGBNCVNOOAERFJRJGUHASNDPICYA#%W*)#)T&Q@jng!”

“He says he’s going to electrocute them!” Mitch cried.

“You speak whale?”

“Anyone can speak Thunder Orca!”

Thunder Orca gave another wail, emitting an immense electrical shock. One great bolt came zigzagging our way. Before it could hit us, I jumped, holding out two fingers. In slow motion, I took in the electricity and, using my firebending, shot it toward Gizmo.

“There’s my answer!” I shouted as Thunder Orca took us out of the castle and into the Black Lake.

#9: Wrath of the Gummy

I nearly fainted but I was sure if I had fainted the Praying Mantis Baby would have eaten me. The single most shocking thing I could have heard and it had to be that the Praying Mantis Baby had an older sister. I have to say – it was not something I was expected.

Mitch was shuddering as though he’d eaten five warheads at once, his face just as pinched. Hannah was shaking her head and hugging herself, muttering, “No – no, it can’t be.” under her breath.

“Wait,” I said, feeling nauseous. “How does that even work?”

“Well, see – we’re more like step-siblings,” Gizmo explained. “We have the same mother.”

“Sofya from Crime and Punishment is your mother?”

“What? No, my mom’s name is [redacted].” (You cannot know!)

I stuttered in confusion.

“Listen,” Gizmo began, taking advantage of our bewilderment. “I just need the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone–”

At that moment, Hannah’s shoe began ringing. “Hold that thought,” she said, holding up a finger. She slipped off her shoe and pressed it to her ear. “Hello?” A pause as a garbled voice spoke through the shoe. “Gasp! No way! I’ve been – no way! All right, I’m on my way!”

Mitch and I looked at her inquisitively.

“I’ve got to go to Hawaii. I’ve been selected to compete in the Hula-Hooping World Championship!”

Before we knew it, Hannah left via the floo network. She sent Jon and Mrs. Stone to fill in for her during this epic show down. Meanwhile, Gizmo and her little brother hadn’t moved and the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone remained hidden.

“All right!” Jon said, smacking his fist into his hand. “Let the show down begin!”

Mitch and I looked at each other, a silent understanding passing between us.

“Wait, Jon – Gizmo was explaining stuff,” I said. “The rules are we gotta wait for them to explain before we attack.”

“But I want to hit someone with my sack of children!” Mrs. Stone said, whirling her sack hopefully.

I shook my head and she moped behind us.

Gizmo jumped back in. “My brother needs the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone. Otherwise, he’ll die.”

“Sounds good to me,” I said.

“No, that can’t happen! See he’s the only one that can control the army – without him the praying mantis babies would wreak havoc on the world!”

“They already are,” Mitch said.

Gizmo growled in frustration. She glanced around the catacomb, perhaps in hopes of finding something to convince us. She growled again before saying hastily, “All right! I didn’t want to have to play this card! Alyssa! Remember that gummy you ate? It was poisoned and I have the antidote. Unless you have over the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone, you’re going to die a slow painful death!”

Okay – this time I fainted.

#8: Chillin' Underground

Five hours, a meal, and one magic lesson later, Hannah, Mitch and I found ourselves entrapped in a tomb, lying in wait for the Praying Mantis Baby to come try to steal the Theoretical Physicists’ Stone.

While the castle above had been warmed and lit by fires and kept dry by vigilant house elves (despite all of Hermione’s efforts, they still worked for the school), the catacombs below were quite the opposite: dark, damp, and freezing. Niter covered the corners of the ceiling. I was starting to feel like this would end up like the Cask of Amontillado.

“Guys, I think this is a trap,” I muttered. We must have already been down there for hours.

“Okay, why would they release us from one trap just to stick us in another?” Hannah asked irritably.

“They’re mean?”

She ignored me and said, “I believe Fumblegate. Mrs. Stone is imperiused and the praying mantis baby is coming for the stone. That’s all I need.”

“I agree,” Mitch said. “The force is with us.”

I grumbled something incoherent and dropped it. I contented myself with trying to teach Mitch how to perform the “Dance of the Dragon” (as seen in episode 53 of Avatar: the Last Airbender, “Firebending Masters”).

An hour later, Hannah’s laptop made an alert noise. Hannah exclaimed, “Holy Mullet of Thor!”

‘What?” Mitch and I asked.

“Jon’s back at base!”

We quickly alerted Fumblegate and he sent an imperiused Mrs. Stone to Siberia to retrieve Jon via the floo network. Just as Mrs. Stone disappeared in the fireplace, the castle came under attack. From the catacombs, we could hear a great rumbling as spells were cast and praying mantis babies laid siege. Distantly, I heard a cry of “Charge!” as Professor McGonagall led the desk in a stampede.

In all the chaos, I pondered, it would be easy to slip through.

Hannah, Mitch and I remained in the catacombs, waiting. Stone crumbled on our heads from the battle above. Finally, something burst through the open hatch at the top and scuttled down the walls.

Immediately, the three of us lurched to our feet and donned our weapons. Mitch’s light saber provided the only light. A single pair of yellow eyes glowed at us, yet we heard two sets of feet.

“Show yourselves!” I demanded, lighting my hand on fire as a warning.

“Bugs!” the Praying Mantis Baby cried as it scuttled into the light.

Accompanying it was none other than Gizmo. The sight of her instantly had rage burning in us, making the fire in my hand erupt into a near inferno.

“You traitor!” Mitch cried.

Hannah crackled with electricity.

Gizmo held up her hands in surrender, but took no steps closer. I figured she wasn’t the real threat here, so I shifted my anger down and to the left.

“So we meet again,” I said, eyeing the Praying Mantis Baby. “I haven’t forgotten about the last time! You humiliated me – sent me home in defeat. Well, not again! This time we end this!”

“Wait guys! I can explain!” Gizmo exclaimed.

“The time for explanations has ended!” Mitch yelled, whirling his saber threateningly.

“The praying mantis baby is my brother.”

#7: The Theoretical Physicists' Stone

“Wait,” I said slowly. “I thought you were dead.”

Hannah, Mitch, and I were following Dumbledore through the castle. It was just as I imagined while reading the books – great stone walls, statues of armor everywhere, and plenty of moving pictures. I could barely take it all in. I was rather confused after popping out of a sack of children and finding myself at a magical castle.

“What?” Dumbledore said, his eyebrows rising over the half-moon spectacles. “Who do you think I am?”

“… Dumbledore?”

“No, no! My dear confused children,” replied apparently not Dumbledore. “That was my predecessor. I’m Professor Fumblegate.”

Hannah and I looked at each other skeptically while Mitch was sensing a disturbance in the force. Before I could comment on it, I spotted a giant mural and gasped. I grabbed Hannah’s arm and pointed excitedly.

“Hannah it’s the fruit mural! Quick! Let’s tickle the pear! I’m starving!” I hurried over to the mural and began searching for the pear. Unfortunately, I soon discovered I was too short to reach the pear and sulked dejectedly back to the group.

“Curse that JK Rowling,” grumbled Fumblegate, “revealing all of our secrets. I ought to turn her into a Chihuahua!”

“That’d be the richest Chihuahua in the world,” Mitch commented. “Anyway, you need us to guard the Philosopher’s Stone?”

“Did I say Philosopher?” Fumblegate asked. “I meant TPS.”

“What’s that?”

“Physicists created it to unleash all the secrets of the universe but now the Praying Mantis Baby wishes to use it to aid in its regeneration.”

“Regeneration?” Hannah asked, nearly knocking over a statue of armor while gawking at the flying buttresses.

“That is how it created the army. It had Mrs. Stone repeatedly cut it in half so more praying mantis babies could form, but now it’s reached its limit. If it were to be cut again it would not regenerate for some time,” Fumblegate explained. “It seeks the TPS to discover how to infinitely regenerate.”

“We must destroy it!” I said. “It’s too dangerous to have in existence.”

Sighing, Fumblegate said, “It cannot be created nor destroyed – as is the law. It was merely discovered.”

“Then we shall guard it with our lives,” Hannah declared.

#6: Being in a Sack of Children

So being in a sack of children wasn’t fun. Not only were the sophomores crying obnoxiously, but someone’s elbow was in my ribcage, my saxophone reed was broken, and whomever’s foot was near my face needed a pedicure. This wasn’t exactly my entire of a “good time”.

“All right! I’ve had enough!” I declared after about an hour in the sack. I forced my way to the bottom of the sack, not caring that elbow one too many faces on the way. “I’m blasting a hole in this thing!”

“No! You can’t!” Hannah shouted irritably from somewhere amid the sophomores. I caught sight of her foot twitching. “Remember what Gizmo said? Demon scorpion child spit is fire proof!”

Things weren’t fire-proof. They were fire resistant. I figured if I resisted the net harder than it resisted fire, it could work. I only managed to singe the nearest sophomore’s eyebrows clean off. I growled in exasperation and yelled, “Well, Ms. All-Mighty Child of Zeus! You blast a hole in it!”

“I can’t!” she replied irritably. “The net conducts electricity. We’ll all die.”

“Mitch?” I asked, looking for him.

“On it,” he called from the other side of the net.

He whipped out his light saber. I heard the trademark buzzing noise, something that sounded like a cat getting its tail stepped on, and a curse of: “Great nacho cheese! It must be Xenon gas resistant as well! My saber won’t hurt it!”

The sophomores continued to wail woefully.

“Do you know where we are?” Hannah asked.

“No, I don’t have x-ray vision.” I said peevishly.

“What are we going to do?” Hannah continued, oblivious to the worsening mood of the sack. “We’re stuck in a sack of children being taken somewhere by an evil creative writing teacher and the praying mantis babies could be anywhere.”

“That lousy, no-good Gizmo!” I grumbled. “We should have never trusted her. She set us up!”

“Whenever I see her again – POW! Right in the kissa!” Hannah declared. Everyone in the bag received a mild electric shock.

“Violence is not the answer,” Mitch said faintly.

“SHUT UP!” Hannah and I shouted.

Suddenly, we hit the ground hard. All of the sophomores landed on top of us. The sack opened in a burst of light and Mrs. Stone peered at us. Another person was there as well – an old dude with moon-shaped spectacles and a glorious beard.

“Welcome to Hogwarts,” Dumbledore said. “We need you to guard the Philosopher’s Stone.”

#4: Hannah Wants to YOLO

Demon scorpion child of the corn spit smelled pretty bad – that was all I had to say. Yet, Gizmo wove that stuff into an awesome net without any nose plugs. The stuff was so noxious smelling I was afraid to firebend in case I would blow up the entire place.

Gizmo’s lair was pretty posh, reminiscent of Austin Power’s penthouse. It was like a fried chicken dinner with all the fixings. There were plenty of rooms for us to sleep in, with pelts of different animals laid out on them, a dance-floor complete with a disco ball, and a kitchen staffed by renowned chef, Bobby Flay.

While the net was being woven, Hannah was having a nice conversation with Jon on Facebook. It was good to know he’d survived. How he had managed to waterbend a computer with WiFi was beyond me. Mitch was practicing his Jedi moves by jumping around the demon scorpion children of the corn lair like an acrobat, looking like Yoda battling Count Dooku.

On the other hand, I didn’t know what to do with myself. I had already polished my uniform and saxophone, tried to chat of a demon scorpion child (I wound up dodging the things tail), and I even went to help Gizmo with the net. Without anything else to do, I began coming up with a plan.

“Guys,” I said when we gathered for dinner. “We need to find the leader of the army.”

“But the net isn’t finished,” Hannah said.

“And what do you mean ‘leader’?” Mitch asked, putting air-quotes around the last word.

“I mean the original praying mantis baby.”

I spread out a map of Russia on the table and began explaining my plan.

The next day, we donned our gear and set out, looking for the jail in Siberia where the praying mantis baby had been conceived. Now I really wished Siberia was a town and not a region – it would have been simpler that way. Somehow, we managed to find the town, Bodaybo. We began our investigation by knocking on doors to ask the locals some questions. No one answered until a small, kindly old man did. He invited us into his house.

“Have you lived in Bodaybo for a while?” Hannah asked an elderly man as we sat down at a small table in his house.

The man nodded. “Yes, yes. I am the town doctor.”

“Oh then you must have delivered a lot of babies!” I noted, growing excited.

“A… a few,” he replied charily. “Bodaybo isn’t a very – how do you say? – hip town. Not many youngsters.”

“Well, you must know of a specific birth we’re talking about,” Hannah began, unaware of the change in the old man’s demeanor. “You must have been there when the praying mantis baby was born.”

The old man slammed his fist down on the table. “You get out of my house right now!”

We didn’t need to be told twice. Hannah, Mitch and I rushed out of his house, the old man following us with his cane. Once outside, the old man shouted, “They want to know about the baby! Kill them!”

Apparently, the townspeople weren’t as aloof and isolated as we thought they had been. As soon as they heard the old man’s shout, they stormed from their houses, carrying pitchforks and torches.

“Great cheesecake fritter!” Mitch exclaimed, as they chased us.

“You guys go!” Hannah shouted, producing her golden spear and raising it to the sky. “The child of Zeus has got this!”

We didn’t have time to argue about it as a great bolt of lightning struck the ground before the townspeople. The dazzling light temporarily blinded everyone in a hundred yard radius. Mitch and I stumbled over each other, still trying to flee. The townspeople, however, were only dazed. Hannah – exhausted from summoning the lightning – could not get out of the way before the townspeople overtook her.

“Hannah!” I yelled, knowing she must have been dead. I skidded to a halt and started to get my saxophone in working order. “Come on! We have to save her!”

“Wait for it,” Mitch said, holding up a finger.

“You know what Mitch?! Don’t be the it in wait for it!” I cried, enraged he wasn’t going to help me. “I’m not going to lose Hannah like I did Jon!”

Mitch just shook his head, sticking his hands in his sleeves like all Jedis did when  they weren’t in a hurry. I ignored him and began charging back toward the mass of townspeople.

“Get back you crazy Russians!” I bellowed, whacking a farmer over the head with my sax.

Hannah popped out of the mass and said, “I’m not dead!”

I stopped dead in my tracks. “What the–?”

“See, Hannah wants to YOLO, but she’s immortal,” Mitch explained.

“But… what?” I stuttered, befuddled.

“No time to explain!” Hannah called as she broke free of the Russians. “Let’s go!”

#3: The Technical Genius

After the failure trying to lure the praying mantis babies to us with a praying mantis daddy carcass and watching Jon be captured by our enemies, Hannah, Mitch and I escaped back to our base. In the middle of the Aral Sea, it was praying mantis baby-proof (babies can’t swim). We started coming up with a new plan, though we were feeling pretty down on ourselves.

Some heroes we were.

“We should just send all those babies to Tartartus,” Hannah grumbled, gripping her spear tightly. “If only Hera hadn’t cursed me!”

“If only the Avatar wasn’t frozen in a block of ice somewhere,” I sighed.

“If only all the other Jedis were in a galaxy far far away,” Mitch cried, shaking his fists in the air.

We all sighed heavily. It appeared as though we wouldn’t be getting any help. Sullenly, we delved into silence, struggling to think of our next move. What I really craved at the moment, was a bit of Criminal Minds to remind me there were worse evils than praying mantis babies…

“I’ve got it!” I declared suddenly.

The other two heroes looked up dejectedly.

I explained, “We make a TV and lure the babies there by showing a marathon of the Wiggles!”

“We don’t have TVs anymore. It’s too cold for them to function,” Hannah said blandly.

“Then we bring in a technical genius!”

The next day, we went to the lands of Mörön, Mongolia to see about the one named Gizmo. I had heard of her back in the Fire Nation. She was wanted by some of the freshman back home for various black-market dealings.

Her lair was guarded by demon scorpion children of the corn – volatile things, with large tails protruding from behind them and claws for hands. Gizmo only fed them corn, but what they really craved was beef. We presented gifts of electrocuted beef to sate their slobbering hunger.

With the demon scorpion children distracted, Hannah, Mitch and I made our way into the underground layer. We came to an open room, with other, less primordial scorpion children standing guard in tight leather clothing. A single large, executive office chair sat before a roaring fire.

“Oh mighty Gizmo!” I said, addressing the back of a fancy office chair. “We need your help. The praying mantis baby army grows by the day!”

The chair swiveled around, revealing a girl wearing strange sunglasses. She held her hands together before her face in a brooding manor.

“Before I help you with anything,” she said, “I must test you. Here I have two gummies. One will take you back to the Fire Nation and you’ll forget all about the army. The other will show just you how deep the praying mantis baby cave goes. Choose wisely.”

On a small side table, sat two gummies indeed. One was shaped like the Fire Nation emblem, the other, like a praying mantis. I didn’t hesitate. I took the praying mantis baby gummy. It tasted like cherries.

Gizmo grinned menacingly. “What can I do for you?”

I was still chewing the gummy, so Hannah answered, “Can you build us a TV that can survive the cold?”

“What do I look like? A technical genius?” she asked, incredulous. “I can’t build TVs but I can make you a net made from the strongest fibers.”

“Fibers of what?” Mitch asked.

“Scorpion child spit.”

#2 The Trojan Horse

“Okay, just get into the carcass. I’ll call the praying mantis babies,” I told Jon.

I had gotten the idea of luring the praying mantis babies to us with a giant praying mantis carcass from Mitch’s fun factoid. I figured they would naturally be attracted to the smell of decaying praying mantis daddy and come from all over. Hannah added her idea of making the carcass like a Trojan horse to make it an ambush. I was all for using a freshman from Dub P to be in the carcass, but Jon Wagner volunteered. He was eager to prove that water-bending was just as cool as fire-bending was.

Jon nodded and stepped into the large, green, and rather smelly carcass.

“All right, when you hear the babies start to feed, bust out Achilles style,” Hannah instructed. “We’ll be close by to help.”

“I got this,” Jon said.

I hoped so. He was the only water-bending trombone in existence. It would be a shame to lose him to the war.

We closed the carcass and locked Jon in. Mitch, Hannah and I crept away to a group of bushes nearby to wait. It was daylight now and we knew the babies would only come to feed at night. However, thanks to Global-Cooling, night wasn’t very far away.

Darkness descended and the three of us crouched together, shivering. I couldn’t heat my armor fast enough to keep the frost off it. Mitch had disappeared in his cloak. I had to help Hannah keep warm in her Greek armor. My hands felt as though they had been chopped off they were so cold and it was becoming difficult to fire-bend.

It was time to call the praying mantis babies. Warming my hands up with some fire, I began clapping my fingers together to make sharp clicking noises. Hopefully, the sound of praying mantis babies would lure more of them to the carcass than just the smell alone would.

“I sense a disturbance in the force,” Mitch muttered ominously.

Hannah and I glanced at each other nervously. I gripped my saxophone tightly and Hannah readjusted her shield. From the darkness, hundreds of luminescent, yellow eyes emerged. The sounds of tiny, pincer-like feet scuffling across the snow covered land surrounded us.

Then, an eerie, “Moo” sang from somewhere in the blackness.

Hannah went rigid, dropping her Celestial bronze javelin. “No!” she muttered. “Not now!”

“What is it?” I asked, preparing my saxophone to fire.

“Nothing,” she said. “I’ll take care of it.”

Before Mitch or I could stop her, she pitch up her javelin and bolted out of the bushes toward that ghostly moo. I stood, about to shout after her, but I saw that the praying mantis babies were nearly upon the carcass.

“We should start moving,” I suggested.

Mitch shook his head. “The time is not yet right. We should–” He faltered and cried, “Holy pineapple salad!”

I heard a loud crashing coming from behind us. I shot to my feet, arming my saxophone with fire just in time to see Jon burst out of the carcass. He water-bent the twenty nearest babies into blocks of ice.

“Take that!” he yelled, water-whipping several more babies.

More swarmed him as a raging ocean he could not bend. Mitch and I darted from the bushes.

I played a D on my saxophone, incinerating the nearest babies into ashes. “D is for death!” I shouted, blasting some more with fire-punches. This was going a lot better than the last time I fought a praying mantis baby. I put my saxophone to my lips and started playing Danza Finale in cut-time. The babies had no chance.

Mitch brought out his light-saber with its patented buzzing sound and began whirling it around in a swirl of green light. Babies fell all around him, though I never clearly saw Mitch strike them once.

Jon wailed. Praying mantis babies crawled up his arms and legs, preventing him from bending. Soon, they enveloped him completely. No matter how many babies Mitch or I defeated, twice as many were replacing them. The babies carried Jon away on a wave of writhing green limbs.

I fought with renewed vigor, trying my best to catch up to Jon, but there were so many praying mantis babies surrounding us. The world was alight in the yellow reflection of their eyes.

“We must retreat and regroup back at base. We’ll get another chance to fight them!” Mitch bellowed over the cackling of the babies.

“What about Jon?” I shouted back. “No marching band member left behind!”

“Jon is lost!”

Unwillingly, I changed my tactic and started fighting my way out of the mass. Hannah reappeared. She sprang into the center of the trouble, using her demi-godly powers over the wind to avoid the praying mantis babies. Lightly, she landed next to me and batted the nearest baby away. It sailed over the other babies, squealing.

“Why do you smell like electrocuted beef?” I shouted.

“Tell you later!” she called back. “Right now I need you to duck!”

Mitch and I hit the ground right as a large bolt of lightning shot down from the sky and incinerated a line of praying mantis babies. Immediately afterwards, we were up and sprinting down the gap between the startled babies. Mitch and I were half carrying Hannah – the drain from the lightning had her on the verge of passing out. We didn’t slow down until we were back to base.

#1: Coming Up With a Plan

Three days after I joined the APMBS, Hannah, Mitch and I were eating lunch around a table at our base located on an island in the middle of the Aral Sea. Praying mantis babies could not swim so we figured we would be safe there as long as one didn’t get on our boat. We still had yet to come up with a plan.

I didn’t enjoy being back in Russia where I experienced my greatest humiliation, but at least the base had a heating system.

“The praying mantis baby army is based somewhere in Russia. The radioactivity is a natural magnet to them,” Hannah said quietly. She pointed at a map set out on the table. “Siberia is where the original praying mantis baby is from.”

“That should be easy then. We’ll go to Siberia, ask the locals about it, find it, and then kill it,” I suggested.

Hannah and Mitch looked at me strangely, as if I were the one that came from a galaxy far far away or was a child of a Greek god.

“Alyssa, Siberia is an entire region in Russia – not just one town,” Hannah said.

“Oh.” The realization hit me hard and I sunk despondently in my chair. Silently, I cursed myself for being so dumb. I needed to redeem myself quickly. “I’ve fought the praying mantis baby,” I muttered, thinking of that night in Siberia (which wasn’t a town). “I don’t see how we can defeat it.”

“It does seem impossible, but we must believe in ourselves,” Mitch said, clutching his fist powerfully in the air.

I rolled my eyes and continued eating.

“I’ve heard rumors that the original praying mantis baby ate its parents,” Hannah mumbled distractedly while studying the map.

I nearly spewed my Flame-e-oh! Instant Noodles all over the table. “That’s disgusting!” I said, gagging.

“Well, praying mantis females – as in the actual bugs – will kill the male after mating and use its carcass to lay the eggs. Then the baby praying mantises use the father as nutrients to grow,” Mitch explained nonchalantly. I wondered if spouting random Biology facts was a part of having “Jedi wisdom”.

Suddenly, an idea struck me and I set down my noodles.

“I need to go make some phone calls,” I said.

“Wait!” Hannah shouted, grabbing my arm before I could leave. “No phone calls – Iris-message them! Praying mantis babies know when we call people.” She pressed a large, golden drachma into my hand.

“All right,” I said, shrugging. “I’ll be back.”

The Origin: Part 3: Crime and Punishment

Timothy got himself a lawyer by the name of Harvey Henlopper from Harper-Harper-and Henlopper Associates. Harvey was an honest man, perhaps the only honest lawyer in the universe. However, his honesty was the downfall of Timothy.

Harvey’s main point in the case was that Mrs. Wyn was “a mean, mean woman that tortured students” as much as Timothy had “tortured her.” Whatever the case, Timothy was sent to Siberia for his crimes.

Timothy didn’t mind Siberia. The milk was sour, but he had plenty of time to think to himself, and the only TV show available was reruns of COPS. Guards heard him late at night whistling the theme to himself and then muttering, “Wha-cha gonna do?” so intensely the newest guard wet himself. Timothy felt no one else quite understood the complexity of the show.

The television wasn’t the only reason Timothy was happy in his new home. He’d met a girl by the name of Sofya Semynovna. She had originally come to visit Raskolnikov – a dirty murderer with no personality – but she was quickly taken in by Timothy’s singing and natural charm. Call it a hazard of the world’s oldest profession, but she was quickly seduced.

For nine months, Sofya did not return. Timothy did not know what to expect, but he was preoccupied with prison life for Morgan Freeman had turned up and things had begun to feel like the Shawshank Redemption. Not saying that Timothy was with Andy’s possy, but he saw them around.

While Timothy was drinking beer on the top of the roof one evening, Sofya was busy having her baby. For three days, she had labored, trying to push the thing out without success. Finally, with the greatest effort, it came.

“It’s a boy,” the doctor said as he wrapped it in blankets to shield it from the frigid Siberian air. Then he paused and frowned, adding, “I think.”

Anxiety turned Sofya’s blood to ice. “What? What is it?”

The doctor didn’t answer.

Flustered, she demanded, “Hand me my baby!”

Hesitantly, the doctor did. Out from the blankets poked two little arms, very plump. But they were bright green, hard, and shiny. There were no hands at the ends, just razor-like pincers. The baby wasn’t crying either, though Sofya could hear its raspy breath from within the blankets. Two eyes shone through the shadows, bright yellow and without pupils.

“It’s a praying mantis baby!” Sofya shrieked as the realization hit her.

In response to hearing its mother’s voice, the praying mantis baby opened its mouth, revealing a full set of razor sharp teeth, webbed with sticky, acidic saliva. “Bugs!” it cried with hungry fervor. Its eyes darted around, looking for prey. Impatiently, it wiggling out from the blankets and began parading about the room, scuffling the floor with its four legs and two arms.

Sofya watched in horror.

The doctor determined it was a result of the radiation in Siberia. One thing he knew for sure, however, was that the baby had to go. He sent in the best, but all of them failed and perished. In the end, the praying mantis baby killed the doctor, Sofya and Timothy. It ran away to hide in a cave somewhere. No one dared searched for it since.

The End – or is it?

The Origin: Part 2: On the Run

Carefully, he kept his parents out of the basement the rest of the night. The next morning he went to school, smiling to himself when they had a substitute in English class. He heard kids talking about Mrs. Wyn’s sudden disappearance. No one was quite unhappy about it, but there were rumors. Timothy listened hungrily to some of his peers while walking from lunch.

“Someone’s done her in. There’s no way she’d miss Spelling Test Wednesday.”

“Whoever did it, I’ll kiss them.”

“I heard the police were already on it.”

Timothy paled. He knew he’d hidden the car well enough, but would the police find something that would lead to him? Had he dropped something criminalizing anywhere?

Anxiety rose in him, tying his throat in a knot and making his heart turned to lead. One thing he knew for sure: he had to get out. Now.

Timothy peeled from the crowds and burst through the nearest door. He sprinted across the empty track field and into the forest. From all of the cop shows he’d watched, he knew several ways to survive in the forest, at least for a few days. He just needed enough time to think of a plan and then he’d go from there.

A thought suddenly occurred to him, sending his flight to a screeching halt. Ever since he was a boy, he couldn’t go in the woods – not since the bees stung him… there.

Oh no. Timothy had had Taco Bell for lunch. He knew in a matter of hours the most primordial of urges would be upon him, and nothing made him clench more than the sight of trees. There were a lot of trees around him.

In a state of pure panic, Timothy staggered through the forest, hunched over and thinking of anything but that. The sun was beginning to set. He had to find someplace fast. Then, through a break in the trees, he saw it – a giant mansion, its light glimmering in the darkening sky like a beacon of hope.

Timothy pried open the nearest window and – what luck! – he tumbled into a bathroom. However, as soon as his feet touched the tiled floor, alarms started blaring.

The jig was up.

For a moment, Timothy stood, awestruck at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. Then his stomach demanded his attention. He figured if the police were coming, they might as well take him when he was empty. He wasn’t sure if going in a jail cell would be any better than going by a tree.

The police found Timothy in a stinky bathroom, smiling from the relief. Near the same time, they found Mrs. Wyn in Timothy’s basement, muttering, “Good… good…” over and over again in a state of trauma.

The Origin: Part 1: Timothy and Mrs. Wyn

Perhaps if everyone understood how the poor thing had come about, perhaps if everyone knew the story of it, it could finally be defeated. Thus far though, the creature escapes all reality, delving into the world of legends and myths. One thing is for sure though: it had to come from somewhere.

 

The origin began with young Timothy.

 

Timothy worked part time at a diary farm. His family was poor. They lived off milk and Oreos and their TV was only a black and white 30 inch box.

 

Despite how disheartened his predicament made him feel, he had his own glorious dreams of becoming a private detective one day, but he wasn’t a scholar. He was barely scraping by school as it was. Still, whenever he was not struggling through English homework, he was studying up, watching all the cop shows, his favorite being Criminal Minds. He had watched every episode, staying up late into the night to accomplish it.

 

Maybe if he worked hard enough, he could get into the nearest police academy.

 

The problem was his English teacher was determined to make him fail.

 

Mrs. Wyn must have grown up wanting to be an English teacher. Her desk sported a sticker saying, “Grammar Nazi” and another saying, “Death to all who do good” with “good” crossed out by a red line.

 

Every week, her class would sweat over the dreaded GRAMMAR TEST that Mrs. Wyn wrote every week herself. During the test, Mrs. Wyn would walk around, hovering over her students like a vulture waiting for its prey to shrivel up and die. Her eyes were beady little things in a desiccated face, hungry for failure.

 

Suddenly, she swooped down on Timothy and snatched up his test.

 

“Tsk, tsk, tsk,” she crooned. “‘My mother and me went to the market.’”

 

The class giggled.

 

“Did you Timothy?” she demanded. “Did me go?”

 

“I – I don’t know,” Timothy stuttered.

 

“How do you think you did on this test?”

 

Timothy cleared his throat. “Pretty – pretty good.”

 

“Good!” Mrs. Wyn shrieked, apoplectic with rage and her beady eyes bugging out. “It’s well Timothy! You can’t do evil on a test, and neither can you do good! F minus!”

 

At first, Timothy didn’t know how to react. He sat there in a daze with his mouth wide open. His face felt hot and the tears were coming. He couldn’t let his classmates see him cry.

 

Panicking, his hand shot into the air.

 

Mrs. Wyn, who had been peeking at another’s test, glanced at him and raised an eyebrow. “Yes?”

 

“Can I go do the bathroom?” Timothy asked in a small voice.

 

“I don’t know, can you?”

 

He swallowed hard. “May I go to the bathroom?”

 

“Yes, yes,” Mrs. Wyn replied, waving him away dismissively. “Get out of my sight.”

 

Timothy streaked out of the room, almost breaking down before he could even reach the door. Blinded by tears, he scrambled into the nearest bathroom and locked himself in a stall to cry. He remained there for the rest of the day, hating school, hating life, and especially hating Mrs. Wyn.

 

She has to pay, Timothy thought, antipathy burning in him like live coals beneath a fire.

 

By the time the final bell rang, Timothy had made up his mind and his eyes were quite dry. He molded into the students exiting the classrooms and made his way to the parking lot. There, he waited beneath the protection of the trees close to Mrs. Wyn’s car. Everyone knew which one it was. The word “Good!” had long ago been stained into the side by shaving cream.

 

Mrs. Wyn walked out to her car fifteen minutes later, her arms weighed down with papers to grade, her eyes distracted by an especially horrible essay. Timothy, silent as night, snuck up behind her and whacked her over the head with his exceedingly heavy literature book.

 

Mrs. Wyn was no heavier than a cow, and Timothy had manhandled plenty of those at work. He managed to shove her into the back seat of the car. He found the keys tucked into the pocket of her pea coat.

 

With his expression hard and set, Timothy drove home, ignoring the continual moaning from the backseat. It was a good thing his parents worked so late in the day; it took Timothy the better part of an hour to drag Mrs. Wyn down into the basement, get her into a chair and secure her with duct tape. He had to hit her over the head a few more times to keep her docile before he was done.

 

Timothy waited in a dark corner, flipping idly through channels. None of his favorite shows would be on until that night.

 

Eventually, Mrs. Wyn started awake, groaning from the pain in her head. She blinked in the darkness, confusion apparent from the furrow of her brow.

 

“Who – What –Where?” she stammered. She caught sight of Timothy in the corner. “Timothy? Where am I? What’s going on?”

 

Timothy, his expression menacing, stood slowly and walked around to the back of the chair where his teacher could not see him. Mrs. Wyn was trembling.

 

“You’re going to watch trash TV,” Timothy explained, his tone dark. He pointed over her shoulder at Jerry Springer playing on the small, black and white screen. “You’re going to hear all of their grammatical mistakes, and there’ll be no way to correct them.”

 

“What?” Mrs. Wyn yelped. “No! No please! I – I’ll do anything. Anything!”

 

Timothy had already walked out of the room.