Cats in the Crater Read online

  “Heel, Lucky,” she called, and the lizard trotted over to her side, swishing its long tail as it went. I leaned over Geeky Girl and helped her yank her foot free. Then she crawled to Boris. His eyes rolled around a bit but then fixed on hers.

  “You OK?” she asked him. He shook his head but then flap ped up to a low branch on a nearby palm tree.

  We walked toward Madame Mako.

  “Is that little bird your evil sidekick?” she said to Geeky Girl.

  “That’s Boris,” she said.

  “It is useful to have a pet sidekick sometimes to intimidate your enemies.” She looked Boris up and down. “I’m not sure the budgie is the best choice for you, but we can work on this,” she said. “And this is Lucky, my evil Komodo dragon.”

  Boris fluffed his feathers and totally taunted the dragon. Lucky snapped but Madame Mako tugged on his chain and he lay down by her feet. Fang was wriggling in my pocket, trying to get free. I couldn’t risk anyone seeing her, though.

  Madam Mako’s lips tilted slightly up so that it looked like her face was trying to smile. “I am so glad I came to see you.”

  “You came to judge the contest at camp,” Geeky Girl said.

  “I came to see my promising evil grand-daughter,” Madame Mako said.

  She turned to me. “So who is this? Your henchman?”

  “My henchman?” Geeky Girl laughed. “No way. This is Mark. He’s at the camp too, but we also know each other from home.” She looked at me. “Kinda,” she added.

  “Yeah, I’m an evil scientist too. I really admire your work, Madam Mako…” I held out my hand.

  Madame Mako looked at me like she was considering feeding me to the death lizard and then thought that would be too messy. Instead, she said, “I wasn’t talking to you, I was talking about you. Learn the difference.”

  “Ummm … yes … umm, I mean … will do” was all I could say as I let my hand drop to my side.

  OK, I admit, I was totally burned by Madame Mako. I would expect nothing less. She was like evil royalty, and I had to earn her respect. But I was standing right near her and I had saved her granddaughter’s life and, OK, she thought I was a henchman, but at least I was on her radar. By the end of this week, she was going to be crowning me Evil Emperor of the Week. I was just picturing her letting me drive the volcano island as part of the prize when she clapped her hands and brought me out of the dream. Then she turned again to Geeky Girl. “Follow me. We better get started,” Madame Mako said. She whistled again and Lucky padded along next to her on his gold chain. Geeky Girl and I followed her across the bridge to the camp.

  All the counselors and campers bowed and curtsied as she passed. Some of them kept curtsying for Geeky Girl too. This was insane. Geeky Girl had joined the evil royal family!

  Every single one of them stopped bowing as soon as I passed. Which was annoying, but fair enough, I guess. I wasn’t royal yet, but I was determined to be emperor before the end of the week.

  Madame Mako approached the front of the crowd. She held up her hand and silence fell.

  “I am pleased to be here at…” She paused. Geeky Girl whispered in her ear, “at Camp Mwhaaa-haa-ha-a-watha.” She did not look pleased, but I think she has a general resting “not that impressed with anything” face.

  “Obviously, I invented the first evil lair. Your task for this week is to come up with an innovative design for an evil lair, complete with ways of keeping it hidden and possible traps,” she said.

  “Um, no snake pits for the traps, OK?” I said, my skin still crawling from the first test of the summer.

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh,” Igor added.

  “Oh yeah, and please no bears either, OK?” I translated.

  “And no skunks or squirrels,” Sanj said. “In fact, maybe we could agree on animal-free traps?”

  “Silence.” Madame Mako glared in our direction. “That is your task. Begin.” She went back to her not-impressed face, and if it was possible, it looked even less impressed than before.

  4

  Kirsty stepped forward and welcomed Madame Mako to the camp and announced that there would be a luau in her honor that evening. The campers would all learn a traditional Tahitian dance and they would present her with their plans for their evil lairs.

  I turned to Geeky Girl and whispered, “I can help you come up with an epically cool lair plan if you want to impress your grandma. We could work together on it. We make a pretty evil team, right?”

  “I don’t think I want to be on an evil team,” Geeky Girl said.

  I couldn’t tell if she meant she didn’t want to be on an evil team or that she didn’t want to be on a team or if actually she’d decided she just really didn’t want to be on a team with me, evil or otherwise. I was figuring it out when Madame Mako interrupted.

  “Good,” she said, turning to face us, “you don’t need a team to succeed. You need to be strong and independent to lead an evil empire. That is not a team job. Who can quote for me from Madame Mako’s Evil Words of Wisdom about this subject?” She turned to the campers.

  Diablo spoke first. “Trust no one but yourself.”

  “Good,” she said.

  “When you stand at the top, you stand alone,” Dustin said.

  “Henchmen are helpful, but friends are a hindrance,” Goth Girl shouted out.

  “Very good.” Madame Mako almost smiled. “What is your name?” she asked.

  “Ezmirelda,” Goth Girl answered. “With a Z. But people that actually know me call me Ez. There aren’t many of those.”

  I heard Phillipe whisper to Trevor, “I never actually knew her name and was a little afraid to ask.”

  I looked over at Igor and Geeky Girl. “That is way more evil than Glenda,” I said.

  “Way more evil than Mark,” Geeky Girl answered.

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh,” Igor said.

  “Umm, I think he said, ‘Always be one step ahead of your opponent or have chess pieces that explode at will.’ Is that right?” I said.

  “Unfortunately … yes,” Madame Mako said. “I had just invented some exploding chess pieces, and the publisher thought the quote would help the sales. I thought that one would be cut for the second edition. Never mind.

  “The point is that you have to be strong in yourself to succeed. This task is to be completed on your own. No teams. No collaboration,” she said, and turned to walk back to the island. “Granddaughter, I shall see you this evening. Work hard.”

  As she walked across the bridge, all the eyes in the camp turned to Geeky Girl.

  People kept coming up to her. “OMG, you are soooo totally evil. I should have known,” one girl said.

  “You are so lucky to have a grandmother like that.”

  Trevor even came up to Geeky Girl, and said, “I could see the evil light in you ze whole time. I vas only so hard on you so you vould vork hard as your grandmother says.”

  “So now Geeky Girl is the evilest kid in camp?” I turned to Igor. “It’s like an upside-down world.”

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh,” he said.

  “No, I don’t think she looks like she’s enjoying it either. How could she not love all this evil attention?” I shook my head. “Let’s get her out of here.”

  Igor nodded.

  “She’s too busy to talk to you now.” I pushed past some people with pieces of paper, wanting autographs.

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh,” Igor echoed, and cleared a path for her to walk.

  Kirsty stepped in front of us and blocked our way. She stared me down and I stepped aside so she could whisper something to Geeky Girl and hand her a piece of paper.

  When we got back to Geeky Girl’s tent, she flopped onto the bed.

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh?” Igor asked.

  “Kirsty gave me her résumé to pass on to Madame … Grandmother,” she said. “Apparently her contract is up at the end of the summer and she wanted me to put in a good word for her about a job.”

  “Unbelie
vable,” I said.

  “I know,” she said. “Kirsty Katastrophe is asking me to help her get a better evil job?”

  “No, I mean, it’s unbelievable. You are sooo lucky,” I said. “She is the best grandma ever! You are related to the biggest evil celebrity on the planet!”

  “I don’t feel related to her,” she said. “I don’t know her, and she doesn’t know me. And she didn’t like Boris. I mean, who could not like Boris?”

  As Boris flew through the tent flap and fluttered down to Geeky Girl’s shoulder, Fang leaped out of my pocket and pounced. Boris was too fast and flew out of reach again in a flutter of feathers.

  “I don’t think she would like Fang either,” Geeky Girl said.

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh,” Igor added.

  “Yeah, I agree. Boris just doesn’t have the same strong evil vibe that Fang has,” I said.

  “What?” she said.

  “Hey, Fang is fierce and intimidating and strikes fear into the heart of anyone who sees her,” I said.

  Then I looked over to see Fang rolling onto her back while Geeky Girl tickled her tummy with one of Boris’s fallen feathers.

  “She is truly terrifying.” Geeky Girl smirked.

  “Fang, you are letting the evil side down,” I said, shaking my head. “So, what are you gonna do for your lair? Sanj and I came up with some great lair plans before camp.”

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh?” Igor asked.

  “I think he’ll either do the ‘constantly moving untraceable by radar evil lair option A or B,’” I said.

  “Urgh, urgh?” Igor asked.

  “Option A is a prototype teleporting lair that is slightly out of phase with current space and time. Option B is on the back of a giant evil elephant.” I paused. “Sanj has always really wanted a giant evil elephant.”

  “Urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh, urgh,” Igor said.

  “Oh, I like that plan. Take over an abandoned sunken ship and build your lair there. Shark guards and everything. Cool,” I said. “What are you going to do, Geeky Girl?”

  “I’ve thought about converting a bunch of old disused space satellites that are orbiting the Earth into a recycled space station. So I guess I could just call it an evil lair,” she said.

  “With laser defenses and, like, a satellite-enhanced cloaking system too, I suppose,” I added.

  “Um, yeah, maybe,” she said. “And you?”

  “I have the best plan.” I smiled. “It’s an evil lair inside someone else’s evil lair.”

  “What?” she said. “You mean take over someone else’s lair?”

  “No, run a completely secret lair inside someone else’s lair. Unknown to them. It’s protected by all their defenses and hidden by all their anti-lair detection devices, but it’s known only to me. And the best bit is it’s cheap to run too. The other evil guy will be paying all the electricity and laser bills already. And if he bugs me or I just need more room, then I can always take over his evil lair from within.”

  “Urgh.” Igor nodded and patted me on the back.

  “Yeah, it is genius. We better go and get ready for the luau tonight,” I said, scooping up Fang.

  “We have Tahitian dance practice before,” Geeky Girl said, and slumped back onto the bed.

  “See you there,” I said as we left.

  “Urgh.” Igor waved.

  “We’ll try to scare away some of the fans outside your tent as we go,” I said. “This should be fun…”

  As I opened Geeky Girl’s tent flap I shouted, “He’s been infected by the bite of the jelly-brain tick and his brain has turned to jelly! Watch out!”

  Then Igor burst out of the tent and flailed around, and shouted “Urghy, urghy, urghy!”

  Campers ran screaming.

  It was good.

  “See ya later!” I shouted back to Geeky Girl as Igor and I walked back to our tent with him yelling “Urghy!” occasionally at people as we passed.

  5

  When Igor and I arrived at dance practice the drums were booming, Kirsty was trying to teach everyone some kind of weird kicking move and Geeky Girl was nowhere to be seen.

  Kirsty shouted to us, “You two! You’re late!”

  “Um, sorry,” I lied, but I was actually thinking that I wished I had been late enough to miss this whole thing.

  The drumbeat was fast and furious, and the movements kept changing. I mean, I am not a bad dancer. I can move. My grandmother once made me learn the polka so I could dance with her at my cousin’s wedding, and I totally rocked that polka. Grandma had to see her chiropractor after the wedding, but she said she’d had a good time. Anyway, the point is, I’m OK at this dancing thing, but my feet and my hips just didn’t get Tahitian dancing. Compared to Igor, though, I was Fred Astaire (who I totally know is the dancing tuxedo guy from movies my grandma watches).

  Geeky Girl finally slumped into the rehearsal. She stood at the back, but Kirsty called her up to demonstrate something. “Your grandmother sent over this special grass skirt for you to wear tonight,” she said, handing Geeky Girl the skirt.

  It was just like earlier. Everyone had these fake smiles on their faces when they talked to Geeky Girl. I had a real smile on my face from watching Igor trying to dance, so the only one without a smile was Geeky Girl. She should be happy as a kitten with string, but she looked like someone had just stepped on her new grass skirt. That’s when I stepped on her new grass skirt.

  “Ouch. Hey, watch it, Mark,” she grumbled.

  “Sorry, I can’t get the hang of this dance,” I said. “You look like your budgie died. Snap out of it. I know that this dance practice thing is pretty pathetic.” I looked around and caught a glimpse of Sanj attempting to shake his hips in a way that I never need to see again. “OK, this dance thing is super pathetic, but there’s a luau party tonight with your epic evil gran. You could at least smile about that.”

  “I guess,” she said, still not smiling at all. “I gotta go work on my lair design. I’ll see you tonight,” she said, and snuck out of the dancing.

  * * *

  Pretty soon night fell and the torches were lit. The luau was set up, we all had on Tahitian leis and Madame Mako sat at the head of a big bamboo table.

  As we all assembled, the counselors got up to make a couple of announcements and to get things started.

  Trevor spoke first, “Ve are pleased to velcome Madame Mako here to camp, and she is looking forvard to seeing your evil lair designs. Just some announcements. First, zere has been a report of something called jelly-brain ticks in the area, so be careful.”

  Igor and I did a quiet low five.

  “Second, I vant to remind you zat we will continue to do regular illegal-pet inspections. Pets zat are hibernating still count as pets. Zey are still illegal.

  “Zird, just a reminder zat ze loser of zis week’s contest vill be sent home in ze Canoe of Shame (assuming zey survive, zat is).

  “And fourth, I just vanted to say how particularly evil our little star camper Geeky Girl is looking zis evening.”

  Geeky Girl was just sneaking in the back, wearing her normal, really-not-evil-at-all T-shirt and jeans but with an even-less-evil grass skirt over the top of it.

  Igor waved and pointed to the seat next to us that we had saved for her.

  All eyes turned and looked at Geeky Girl as Madame Mako motioned for her to come and sit by her side at the table. Geeky Girl took the long walk with the whole camp staring at her every grassy swish on her way to the table.

  I looked over at her, caught her eye and did a little mock royal hand wave. After all, she was totally evil royalty. Now I just had to get Madame Mako to realize that although I’m not related to her, I am totally an unrecognized evil genius waiting to be discovered. I mimed putting on a crown and smiled. Geeky Girl rolled her eyes and slumped into her seat.

  Madame Mako clapped her hands and the music started.

  One by one, we all got up and presented our evil lair plans to Madame Mako.

  I th
ink she liked mine. Although she still had her “not impressed with anything” face on. She did say, “I like the way you plan for betrayal.” Which was creepy but pretty positive, right?

  As Sanj got up to do his presentation, I whispered, “Option A or Option B?”

  He turned. “A hybrid of the two.” He smiled.

  “So, my evil lair,” he said to Madame Mako, showing her his design plans, “would be a constantly moving lair that would be impossible to detect. It would be camouflaged by a prototype teleportation field that kept it slightly out of sync with our current time and space, and it would be on the back of a giant evil elephant.”

  Then she smiled. She actually smiled. She smiled at Sanj’s design? And at the elephant?

  Bob and Diablo both had really cool lairs planned. I was actually impressed. Diablo’s was shaped like a giant wrestling ring and was guarded by evil costumed professional wrestlers. And Bob’s was an evil lair disguised as a tour bus for a heavy metal group that was called “Evil Lair.” How cool is that?

  Soon everyone had presented their plans and the Tahitian dancing began. We had practiced for what seemed like hours, and I could just not get it. Geeky Girl was OK. Igor was very good at the stomping, but I’m pretty sure that he is built without hips. He just kinda hinges at the waist. There is literally no side-to-side movement possible. But he can do the stomping.

  Looking at the dancing, Madame Mako’s face went from “not impressed” to “seriously in pain at being made to sit through this.” She looked like she was about to get up to leave when Dustin and Goth Girl, or Ezmirelda, took to the stage. They were amazing.