Excerpt

4
The Secret Alliance

Tommy showed up shortly before lunch. Mom was working in the kitchen, Dad was outside grilling pork chops, and Mary was playing in the back yard. I knew we wouldn’t be disturbed for a while. I took Tommy up to my room and locked the door behind us.

“Aliens!” I blurted. “I saw aliens in the woods last night!”

“Cool,” Tommy replied with a cheesy grin. “What did they look like? Were they all slimy like the ones in the movie we just saw?”

I could tell Tommy wasn’t taking me very seriously. I pulled the boots and the controller out from under the bed. His smile disappeared and his jaw dropped.

“Who gave you those? I didn’t see you get those at your birthday party.”

“Nobody gave them to me, Tommy,” I said. “The aliens left them behind. This controller makes these boots fly! I saw aliens flying with these boots, but I don’t know how they work yet.”

I handed the controller to Tom. He looked at it and then looked at me with squinty eyes. His cheesy grin reappeared.

“Alright, J.T.” he said. “Seriously though, where did you get this stuff?”

“I’m dead serious,” I said. I grabbed the controller, pushed the same button I had pushed before to get the locator screen, and the boots started blinking again. I showed the controller to Tommy. His eyes widened.

“Wow, this is pretty cool,” Tommy said. “I want a pair of these. Where did you get them?”

“You’re impossible,” I replied. “Let me start at the beginning, then.”

I peered out the window at the woods beyond the fence and began telling him the story. Before I could get to the part about Mellonhead growling, a familiar hissing sound stopped me cold. I turned around, and to my surprise, I saw Tommy standing in the boots, which were shrinking around his feet! When they stopped hissing, he smiled and proceeded to stomp around in them.

“These boots are unbelievable!” Tommy exclaimed. “They fit perfectly. How in the world do they work? They seem pretty high-tech, Johnny.”

I didn’t know what to say or do. Tommy obviously didn’t believe they were alien boots, and I had no idea how to get them off him. I grabbed the controller from him. It had gone back to the screen with all the buttons.

I looked him in the eye and shook my head. His smile disappeared. He finally started to freak.

“Are you serious about these being alien boots?!” Tommy shouted.

“I tried to tell you,” I said.

“I’m getting out of here before they show up, J.T.,” he said as he frantically tried to pull the boots from his feet.

“I don’t know how to get them off you,” I said. “Who are you afraid of showing up? The aliens?”

“Aliens?” Tommy said. “No, I’m talking about the Feds!” He continued rolling around on the floor, tugging at the boots.

“Do you think the government would take the boots away?” I asked.

“Yeah, and me along with them!” he said. “I’ll spend the rest of my life at Area 51, locked up in some laboratory where they’ll cut the boots right off me if they have to with my feet still in them!”

“Calm down,” I said. “We’ll figure it out.”

“Do you have any idea how to get these things off?” Tommy snapped. “They’re not going to be a secret much longer if I can’t get them off!”

“I’m not sure,” I answered.

“Let me see that controller,” Tommy said. “There has to be a button to release these boots.”

“You can look, but don’t touch any buttons!” I demanded as I carefully handed it to him.

“It looks like the controller could fit right on a guy’s arm,” Tommy replied, setting it down on his left wrist.

Suddenly, a yellow light blinked on the controller’s screen, and with a sound like duct tape being pulled from its roll, two black straps shot out from under it and wrapped around Tommy’s arm.

“Ahhh! Get it off me!” Tommy shrieked as he helplessly pulled at it.

“Oh, burgers and fries!” I yelled, trying to grab Tommy’s shaking arm. “Whatever you do, DON’T touch any buttons!”

I pulled at the straps, but they wouldn’t give. The straps had come out of two slots underneath the controller, wrapped around, and went back into two other slots. The strap material was strange. It seemed flexible, yet strong, like rubber metal or something. It was completely weird!

I grabbed a pair of scissors from my desk drawer and tried to cut the straps. The scissors couldn’t even put a scratch in them. The straps were like steel bands. It was obvious that we wouldn’t be able to cut them off.

I looked at all the symbols on the controller’s screen and pondered which one might un-strap it from Tommy’s arm. Guessing the wrong button could be disastrous. There was no telling what would happen...