Body Switchers from Outer Space (6 page)

Trying to copy Chad-Two's movements, I grabbed the bars and swung up. It took me three tries to get my feet to touch the ceiling. I hoped that didn't make Chad-Two suspicious.

I nervously let go of the bars. I figured I would fall on my head any minute. But the boots felt as if they were welded to the ceiling.

I started to feel dizzy. I wondered if I would ever be able to sleep in a position like this.

But I didn't want to fall asleep. I needed to stay awake so I could try to escape.

“What's the matter with you, anyway?” Chad-Two grumbled.

“I feel sick,” I said. That was no lie!

“You act sick, but it's not any illness I've seen before!”

“Maybe I caught something at school.”

“Not a chance. Not after all those vaccinations we had when we first got these bodies!”

When they first got these bodies? Oh, man! What do they
really
look like? Maybe they have six eyes and two heads and eight long arms! I shuddered at the thought of them in their true form.

“If you caught anything at school, it was a bad attitude! We should never have let you do this week! Except I couldn't have taken that math test.”

So both Chads
did
go to school? And nobody noticed the difference? Wow. I still couldn't figure out why there were two of them. But it's not like I could ask Chad-Two!

“And your observations are better,” Chad-Two continued. “But now I know why. You
like
those horrible, slimy humans! And to tell you the truth, it's beginning to give me the creeps!”

I was giving
him
the creeps?

“You have to stop hanging around with humans.” Chad-Two went on lecturing. “One of them might find out the truth! And you know what will happen to you if you let one of the humans get too close. We won't have any choice.” Chad-Two's voice lowered ominously. “You know what we'll have to do with you—
mind tailoring.”

M
ind tailoring?
Oh, man! What was that? It sure didn't sound like anything good!

And mind-tailoring was something they did to
each other
for just getting close to a human.

“You remember Zoink from back home?” Chad-Two asked. “Well, after he explored the Quarex galaxy, they mind tailored him—and now he has no memories. No brain at all. He just sits in his pod with that blank look on his face. You don't want to end up like Zoink, do you, Chad-One?”

I gulped. “No. I don't.”

“Good,” Chad-Two said. “Then remember that story the next time you feel like hanging out with those slimy humans.”

I couldn't believe it. If the aliens did things like this to each other, they were sure to do horrible things to me if they discovered what I really was.

My heart started pounding in my ears.

I had to get out of this house!

But I didn't even know how to get off the ceiling!

I had a terrible thought. What if they already knew I was human? They lured me into hanging upside-down. I'm trapped. Now they could do anything they wanted to me!

“I'm watching you,” Chad-Two warned. “You'd better clean up your act soon! Shut your door and go to sleep.”

Even if I could get down off the ceiling, I couldn't sneak out now. Chad-Two was still awake. If he caught me trying to sneak out, I'd be mind tailored for sure. I had to pretend I was going to sleep.

But first I had to figure out how to get my door shut. I stared at the three touch pads near my hand. One of them was green, like the other door controls I'd used before. On a hunch, I touched it.

Bingo. The door to the closet whooshed shut and disappeared.

I was in total darkness, hanging upside down from the ceiling like a trapped fly.

In a house full of aliens!

Great. Just what I had in mind for the weekend.

The darkness wasn't quite total. The three touch pads glowed.

My Chad act was probably still working. Since I followed Chad-Two's orders, maybe now he'd leave me alone.

I couldn't imagine falling asleep with so much on my mind, and I wanted to stay awake and figure out what to do next. But a weird fizzing started in my head, and I conked out.

*   *   *

My eyes popped open.
Why is it still dark?
I reached for my alarm clock to see what time it was.

I noticed three floating bubbles of color off to my right.
What are those things?
I wondered.

Then I realized I was hanging upside-down from the ceiling. That
really
didn't seem right!

In a heart-sickening rush, it all came back to me.

I wasn't Will. I was in Chad's body.

Only there were two Chads.

I was hanging upside down in a house full of aliens with sitcom damage and scary food!

And they were threatening me with mind tailoring! They said they'd take away my memories! That I'd have no brain at all!

I had only been awake for two minutes, and already I was shaking and sweating from fear! I had to do something, quick!

I touched the oval pink pad on the wall. Instantly my feet let go of the ceiling and I crashed to the floor.

Well, I had figured out how to get down off the ceiling!

The room was so small I didn't fit on the floor. I ended up on my back with my legs stretched up the wall.

For a minute I felt just like my clumsy old Will self.

I must have fallen onto a touch pad, because when I landed a pale blue light came on.

I looked around and discovered some other touch pads. Maybe one of them opened a window! Maybe I could sneak out that way!

I scrambled around and stood up. These weren't the touch pads that glowed in the dark. I was just reaching to touch a dark purple pad and see what it did when a hollow thunking sound came from the door.

“What's with you?” Chad-Two yelled from the other side of the door. “It's time for breakfast! Why aren't you up?” He knocked again.

I pressed the green touch pad and the door opened. I stepped out into the pink windowless round area.

Chad-Two was already out of his boots, and he was wearing different clothes.

I wondered where he had gotten them, but I couldn't search around now. Chad would know where his own closet was! Chad-Two stood in the pink room, watching my every move.
Better to keep on these clothes and worry about changing later.

I slipped off my sleep boots and put my hightops back on. Then I followed Chad-Two downstairs.

The dining room table was already set. I guess breakfast wasn't one of the Chads' chores.

I peered into the bowl at my place. It was filled with dried-up nuggets shaped like starfish. They floated in blue milk, and smelled salty and rotten.

Mom and Dad were already seated at the table. Dad was reading the newspaper upside-down. Aliens made mistakes, too, I guess. Mom wore another frilly pink knee-length dress with a puffy skirt, an apron, and that dopey smile.

I glanced down at the bowl. At least these starfish things weren't looking back at me!

I was starving by this time, so when I took my place at the table, I shoved a big spoonful into my mouth.

Mistake!

It was much worse than it looked. Like biting into totally salty, greasy, rotten cat food treats with crunchy bones in them!

And what was worse—the cereal stabbed like needles in my mouth!

I couldn't spew them all over the table. This could be Chad's favorite dish.

I drank something yellow and milky that was in the glass at my place. It tasted like hot glue! I thought it would help the cereal go down, but it just coated my tongue and made my throat close up.

I looked at Mom. Smiling. Dad. Behind his upside-down newspaper. Chad-Two. Wolfing down that poisonous cereal. Happy campers.

I couldn't take it. I leaped up and ran!

I bolted from the house, not even closing the front door behind me. I didn't want them to catch up with me!

I had to get home. I had to get Chad to switch back
right now!
I couldn't eat that food. I couldn't stay in a house full of aliens. I couldn't wait around for them to tailor my mind!

I was so hungry I could hardly think. I needed some food!

I darted into the Stop 'n Shop.

I bought Twinkies and a Coke. Real food! Then I crossed the street to the park by the high school and collapsed onto a bench.

I tore open the Twinkies package and crammed a whole one into my mouth. I love the way they squish!

A second later I was gagging! It tasted like chalk. Dry chalk! It sucked all the spit out of my mouth and made me cough!

I spat it out.

My mouth was so dry from the chalky Twinkies, I chugged half the Coke.

The Coke tasted like gasoline!

My stomach hurt. I started sweating. I felt dizzy and sick.

I had to get home—fast!

I shook a little when I got up from the bench. My legs kind of wobbled as I tried to make it to my house.
Will's
house.

I had to stop and rest a lot. I was feeling sicker and sicker. My stomach hurt, my muscles ached, and I was sweating so much my shirt was wet through.

I tried to run. I tried to walk. Then I couldn't do anything but sit down. Right on the curb.

“What have you done?” somebody yelled.

I looked up. Chad-Two!

“That's it!” he bellowed. “You're coming home with me!”

I felt so sick, my head was spinning. But I still knew exactly what Chad-Two had planned.

He was going to mind-tailor me!

C
had-Two yelled at me all the way home. He was really mad. For one thing, he practically had to carry me. I was sweating and freezing and then sweating again. I couldn't stand up by myself. Way too rubber-kneed!

He told me I was an idiot to eat Earth food.

“No wonder you're sick!” Chad-Two shouted. “Everything on this planet is poisonous to us, even in these bodies! How could you forget?”

I hung on to his shoulders and tried to get my feet to walk. It didn't work very well.

I wondered if I would die from eating Twinkies!

Chad-Two dragged me up the porch and into the
front room of the aliens' house. He dropped me onto the couch.

“Don't move,” he ordered before going into the next room.

He came back a minute later, carrying a bowl.

“Eat some of these skwoos,” he instructed, plopping a handful of live bugs into my shaking hand. They looked like giant cockroaches, only they had more legs.

I didn't much care what I did now, I felt so terrible! I couldn't feel any sicker than I already did!

I shoved the squirming bugs into my mouth and chewed.

I couldn't believe it! They tasted like beef jerky. One of my favorite foods in the world. It was horrible the way their legs moved in my mouth, but they tasted so good, I ate them all.

A couple of minutes later I felt a little better.

“You are such a spidunk!” Chad-Two said. “Maybe this poisonous food is what's messing up your mind. Take this box of skwoos with you, and take this pinter, too.”

He gave me two small boxes, a pink one and a brown one. Each had a little black touch pad on it.

“Put them in your pocket,” he said. “If you eat any more local food by mistake, take two skwoos right away, and then a pinch of pinter. Can you remember that?”

I nodded and put the boxes in my pocket.

He glared at me. “Earth food! What were you thinking? This place—these
people
—have warped your mind. We're not here to make friends. Have you forgotten that?”

“No,” I mumbled.

“Well, make sure you
don't
forget!” he snapped.

Chad-Two led me to the sleep chamber. I flipped upside-down and closed my eyes. That strange, fizzling sensation came over me.

As soon as I'm feeling better,
I thought,
I'm going to find a way out. Just as soon as I'm better.