The Power Potion (10 page)

Cautiously.

Tarantulas are, for the record, speedy runners,
but these were in the presence of other (cannibalistic) spiders and were a little uncertain as to how to negotiate this meal.

“Ay chihuahua!”
Sticky cried (because the hairy monsters were approaching plenty fast enough for him!).

To ward them off, Sticky turned around and dug like a dog, spraying sand in their eight-eyed faces. This, of course, ticked off the tarantulas, causing some of them to rise up on their back legs and produce a hissing sound while showing their fangs.

“Holy moly tacarole!” Sticky whimpered (as he peered at them between his legs).

The situation was, in fact, so dire that Sticky had no time to open the treasure chest, even though he’d reached it. Instead, he escaped the hissing herd of hairy beasties by zippy-toeing around the (little fake) palm trees and scampering into the (little fake) ocean. “Get back, you
freaky
fieras
!” he cried, and began scooping water at them.

Well! If you’re ever on a desert island (little fake or otherwise) and you’re being attacked by a hungry herd of tarantulas, just spray them with water. They will retreat, and you will find your uncovered treasure chest (at least temporarily) unguarded.

Sticky could not believe his luck and wasted no time in getting back to the chest.

His heart was clacking like castanets as he pulled open the lid.

His hopes were sky-high.

But as he peered inside the chest, he discovered that it held only one item:

The 1728 Spanish gold doubloon.

“
Ay caramba
, no!” Sticky cried, for regardless of how cool and shiny a 1728 Spanish gold doubloon might be, it was not worth facing hairy, scary spiders to get to.

But then he noticed a glow coming from around the inside edges of the treasure chest lid.

There was a panel across the lid, and when he released it, he found himself face to face with a single notched coin.

One that glowed brighter than any doubloon.

One that shimmered like a pool of sunshine.

One that had designs on it that were both foreign and mysterious.

It was a single, solitary power ingot, but oh, what a power ingot!

“The Buzzy Bee!” Sticky cried, snatching it up.

Right behind him, however, a hungry tarantula was preparing to pounce.

“Ay caramba!”
Sticky cried, and did a three-legged dart away from the beast, leaping over another to get onto the glass side of the terrarium.

All the spiders suddenly wanted in on the action, clamoring and climbing and (yes) clawing to get over one another to the lizard.

But before they could reach him, Sticky clamped the ingot in his mouth and zippy-toed up the glass wall, across the mesh covering, and out the mesh window, escaping the terrifying tank of tarantulas.

Unfortunately, before Sticky could spend even a moment catching his breath, he heard a sound more terrifying than the hiss of tarantulas.

More frightening than the threat of fierce and fuzzy fangs.

More horrific than a stampeding herd of hairy, scary spiders.

It was the bone-chilling, heart-stopping, knee-knocking voice of Damien Black.

Sticky had no time to think, so he simply reacted. He dived from the terrarium lid to the bookcase, then turbo-toed inside a little tepee formed by a wooden box and a book.

“You boneheaded bozos!” came Damien’s voice as he blasted into the room. “You meat-headed morons! You chowder-brained chumps! I can’t believe I’m having to do all this because you can’t read!”

“Sorry, boss!” came Pablo’s crackly voice.

Now, as you may have already deduced, the Bandito Brothers were not trailing along behind Damien.

They (and their bucktoothed burro, Rosie)
were waiting for him outside the mansion, near the bat cave (which was, in fact, a cave full of bats, as opposed to, say,
another
bat cave that might spring to mind). Damien Black was simply multi-tasking, retrieving some last-minute supplies as he continued his conversation with the Brothers through his walkie-talkie communicator. (The communicator was another Damien contraption, and it had, among other things, a long, spirally antenna, a grid-shaped doohickey, a fan-shaped thingamabob, lots of copper wires, glowing tubes, and
lips
.)

It was because Damien was preoccupied with the communicator (and was in a frothy fury over the Brothers) that he stormed right past the (open) pirate chest and the (open) tarantula terrarium and (without even glancing over his shoulder) revealed the secret entry to his innermost sanctum.

Not even Sticky knew of this cloak-and-dagger
passageway or the secret room to which it led. The room was so hush-hush, in fact, that no one (and I mean no one) had ever been inside it.

(Well, except for the ruthless villain himself, of course.)

Granted, this was most likely due to visitors being a rare (and unwanted) thing at the Black mansion, because the cloak-and-dagger passageway was actually quite ordinary.

Curiously conventional.

Something any mystery reader would immediately point to and say, “Ah-ha! Secret passageway!”

Still. Like so many things in the mansion, it was something Damien took childish delight in having. So (despite his frothy fury) it was with a great and satisfying
whoosh-swoosh
that he pushed through a revolving bookcase.

A revolving bookcase that happened to have Sticky on board.

Well! Sticky was most certainly thinking, “Holy guacamole!” but (for once) he managed to keep his little lizard lips zipped.

(Well, as zipped as lips can be with a power ingot still clamped between them.)

He held his breath and watched (with one sneaky-peeky eye) as Damien flicked on a light. (Something that was quite necessary, as there were no windows whatsoever in this inner sanctum.)

Next, Damien slammed and bammed doors and drawers, stuffing items into the deep, dark pockets of his long black coat. And then, quite suddenly, he stopped slamming and bamming and held completely still.

It was as though he’d heard something.

Smelled something.

Sensed
something.

Slowly, he turned toward the bookcase, his eyes dark, narrow slits, the pointy points of his mustache twitching.

A devilish sneer smeared his face.

But just as Sticky was about to shake into a thousand gecko pieces, Damien swooped down on his heavily carved (and astonishingly detailed) desk and snatched up the funkydoodle phone.

One long, pointy finger pressed into a fossilized shark vertebra and dialed.

Swish, click-click-click-click
.

Swish, click-click-click-click-clack!

Damien dialed the number (which took some time, as the funkydoodle dial was, well, funkydoodle).

Then Damien waited.

One ringy-dingy.

Two.

His left eyebrow was arched high.

His right was crouched low, as if ready to pounce.

And then, out of the cheesy speaker, Sticky could hear,
“Sastimos.”

“Sastimos”
is, in case you’re not already familiar, a Romany greeting. Its basic translation is “to your health,” but it can be used like “hello.”

This word—this single word—caused a demented smile to cross Damien’s already dastardly face.

He did not say hello in return.

(Or, for that matter, wish the person on the other end good health.)

Instead, he (very quietly) put the receiver down and muttered, “Double-dealing gypsy! You think you can pull a fast one on
me
? Well, I’m on my way to teach you a lesson!” His expression dropped to a mere scowl. “I should bring backup,” he muttered, “in case those buffoons botch things up.”

He turned, and suddenly (with another
whoosh-swoosh
) he was in front of the bookcase.

Sticky choked back an “Ay-ay-ay!” as Damien’s hand shot straight for the wooden-box part of his tepee and yanked it from the shelf. The
remaining book fell on Sticky, but as Damien whoosh-swooshed back to his desk, Sticky managed to pull himself to a new (and less painful) hiding place in time to see Damien snap open the wooden box.

The box held a matching pair of percussion-lock dueling pistols (along with a powder flask, rods for cleaning and loading, percussion caps, and a bullet mold).

It was a rare and valuable (not to mention stunning) set of weapons, with gilded muzzles, side plates, and hammers, and the grips were so beautifully carved that the guns looked more like swanky pirate movie props than actual weapons.

They were, however, the real deal.

They shot large, bone-shattering bullets.

Little cannonballs, really.

And although each pistol could fire but one bullet at a time, the guns were highly accurate and had outstanding muzzle velocity and (most
importantly) smooth bores, which made the bullets they fired untraceable.

And they were so much more spiffidy-doo-dah than modern handguns that their size and limitations were, to Damien’s mind, not an issue.

He was, after all, a deadly and merciless shot.

Damien lifted both pistols from their box, then hesitated. One had always sufficed in the past, and he did have a lot of other things to manage.

But there was something about wearing a brace of pistols that made him feel fully loaded.

Fueled for duel.

So Damien cut the moment of hesitation short and proceeded to load and holster both pistols. And then, with another dramatic
whoosh-swoosh
, Damien clicked off the light and exited his inner sanctum through a
second
revolving bookcase, leaving Sticky trapped inside.

Clicking the light back on was not a problem for Sticky.

Admitting he was trapped inside was.

But there were no windows, no vents, no chimney or visible ductwork…and the revolving bookcases were much too heavy for him to push.

“Freaky
frijoles
. Are you serious, man?” he muttered. “I’ve got the Buzzy Bee! I’ve got to get out of here!”

Unfortunately, the Flying ingot (or, if you prefer, the Buzzy Bee) was of no use to Sticky. It was useless without the powerband, and the powerband was useless on Sticky. (Not only was it way too big, but it only seemed to work on humans.)

Besides, what good would flying around a room do?

There was still no way out.

“If only I had the potion,” Sticky grumbled, “I could push through the turning books and
vámonos
!”

Sticky may not have had the Moongaze potion, but there
was
a funkydoodle phone. He didn’t like the looks of it (as a bird claw, taxidermied or not, is a fierce and frightening thing to any lizard), but after realizing he was most definitely trapped, he climbed up Damien’s devilishly carved desk and approached the contraption.

The Sanchezes, of course, had a phone in their apartment.

A regular, plastic, push-button model.

And (having lived inside the apartment awhile now, and having heard it repeated enough) Sticky did know the Sanchezes’ phone number.

And (after witnessing Damien’s use of it) he
recognized that this funkydoodle contraption on the villain’s desk was, indeed, a telephone.

One that needed to be dialed.

And so it was that Sticky wrestled the receiver off the cradle and began making his first phone call.

It was a difficult process.

One full of flubs and blubs and boo-boos.

Time and again the dial got away from him, and time and again he had to start over. It was, indeed, a difficult process, but with each bobble, Sticky grew more determined.

He had to get the Buzzy Bee to Dave.

He just had to!

Meanwhile, Dave (who was done with his afternoon deliveries) was coming home to an empty house.

Now, by “empty,” I do not mean that all the furniture and dishes and appliances had been stolen.

By “empty,” I mean lonely.

There was no “Hey,
señooooor
!”