A Fairly Interesting Week
DJ Daniels
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2011 DJ Daniels
http://zombiejungle.wordpress.com
Smashwords Edition, License Notes
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Table of Contents
I have built the most awesome transportation machine in the world. This is an undisputable fact. Admittedly, it’s built around my old bike, but you can’t really tell anymore. I’ve added lots of stuff. Stuff I found in the garage, by the side of the road, scrounged from Dad, whatever. And pretty much I built it by myself although Dad did help out with some things. But only the stuff that he knows about, because there’s a lot this machine can do that nobody knows about. Especially, not Dad. More especially, not Mum.
The most awesome transportation machine in the world. Undisputable fact.
Pity nobody else has quite evolved to this way of thinking yet. Josh Hodgkison calls it the nerd mobile. Frankly, I should be flattered as this is pretty sophisticated use of language for Josh. But, well, you know. He just doesn’t get it. So now, it’s never seen in daylight hours. Which is fine, I’ve added lights. Really cool ones I ordered online from California and which pretty much took up all my savings. But they’re worth it. That’s what my paper delivery job’s for after all.
The bit of the bike Dad got involved in is the delivery system. We’ve attached a kind of a cart at the back of the bike for the papers. Pretty basic in itself but we devised a scoop, lift and throw (SLT) mechanism which I can activate while I’m peddling. Took me a while to get my accuracy up. Like when to initiate SLT, but now I’ve got it down pat. Newspaper delivery is a walk in the park. Only on wheels.
I’ve been searching for the right name for the machine and the list so far is:
The Most Awesome Machine which is MAM or
Awesomest Transportation Machine which is ATM.
Otherwise I could go more traditional, say
Rad & Bad or
Killer Wheels.
My brother suggested
Mutant Zombie Slayer and
Death Ray Exterminator.
But I fight for peace, not for war. Anyway, any zombies that I find while I’m out are just fine with me.
It’s not exactly a killing machine, anyway. Just a truly awesome means of transportation + SLT + inbuilt listening devices + food storage + special effects And, this is the best and most secret bit:
The capacity to graffiti.
If Josh Hodgkison knew about that he’d have a different opinion.
But then he’d use it for evil. I only use it for good – to protest wrongs and injustices. And there are a lot.
No-one at all knows about this. My own non-patented invention. Top Secret, etc. I can actually sit on the bike and graffiti away and nobody can tell I’m doing anything. Well, except for writing appearing on the wall in front of me.
I’m allowed out at night now under the guise of my newspaper delivery round and that’s when I draw attention to any injustices that have been particularly annoying me over the week. No acts of random violence. Just peaceful protest. I am meant to take Bluey, our dog, but frankly he’s not really up to covert action. What kind of injustices do I bring to the public’s attention, you ask?
Recent example:
Man across the road who insists on watering his concrete drive. Even on non-hose-using days.
Very conveniently, his front gate has two concrete pillars on either side. Sometimes he even waters the top of these if a leaf has fallen on them.
On one I wrote: waste water. On the other: waste our future.
Cool, huh. Well, maybe not the best slogan, but I think my point was made.
Actually, I think of myself as a kind of eco-activist, but I’m up for injustices of all kinds.
My pet hates:
Environmental vandals (obviously)
Angry dogs
Josh Hodgkison
Daylight saving. (not so much for itself, just for the effect it has on undercover activities)
There is one problem with all of this only-at-night bike use. I have to walk to school. Which is not too bad, I suppose, depending on who you meet. Most days I time my walk to coincide with when Sam leaves home. He only lives a couple of houses down the street so that works out pretty well and I’ve persuaded him not to ride his bike to school either. Under much protest. At the end of our street we take a strategic detour to avoid Josh Hodgkison and his evil buds. And this takes us past Anna’s house and usually she waits for us and walks along with us. Don’t know why. Talking the whole time. But she’s OK. In a girl sort of way.
****
This morning we had a narrow escape from Josh H (as he will be known from now on) He and a couple of “friends” had decided to ride their bikes. I can’t say to school because basically they were going round in circles and at no point were these circles were they significantly closer to school.
‘This is why we should ride bikes,’ hissed Sam. ‘We could get away from them.’
‘Then they’d just follow us the whole time.’
Anna was up ahead and I had an idea.
‘Hey, Anna, I forgot my lunch, do you think your Mum’d give me something?’ Anna looked more than a little surprised. ‘Well, Dan, can’t have you starving, I suppose. Come in.’
I hate it when she’s sarcastic like this, but I had to get them inside. Of course, my lunch was in my bag.
Once we were inside, I dug around and “discovered” my lunch box.
‘Oh, yeah, it was there all along. Sorry.’
‘Well as long as you’ve got something, that’s OK,’ said Anna’s Mum. You can always take something more if you like. Anna will show you. I’ve got to get ready for work.’
Just as I hoped.
Anna and Sam were staring at me like I’d totally lost it.
‘Look, by now Deadhead Josh will have decided that we’re going to try and escape out the back lane of your house. But if we just wait a bit, we can go out the normal way and get to school before they do.’
Sam looked impressed. ‘The double fake.’
‘You can’t keep hiding from him,’ said Anna. ‘You’ve got to stand up to him.’
‘Yeah and get my head punched in,’ I muttered.
‘He’s best avoided,’ said Sam.
We walked to school. No incident. But it didn’t feel right. If it had been just Sam and me we would have been rejoicing in our sneaky victory. But Anna had spoilt it somehow. Not that she was right.
I managed to avoid both Anna and Josh all day at school. Mr R is letting us build robots in science class this term and we can go in at lunch time if we want. Which is pretty good. Sam and me are making something pretty impressive, but you’ve got to put in the hours if you want to get it just right. Which we do.
We are determined that our robot is going to be something out of the box. In fact, it’s pretty special right now. We’ve had a few design tips from Anna’s Dad and it’s pretty easy to mix and match from some of the basic kits. That’s what the other kids are doing. And, don’t get me wrong, they’re pretty cool robots, but been there, done that. We want something special. AND we’re hoping to enter in the RoboCup Challenge. I’m pretty sure RoboRescue is the one we’ll go for. Which is not only cool but means you can build in all sorts of different features. Dance is just lame and I think is pretty much for girls and little kids. I mean some of the kids in the robots group are really just putting things together out of junk. I guess they look pretty interesting (take that any way you like) but they’re definitely not functional. RoboSoccer is cool but super competitive. We’re not quite in that league yet. Our Rescuebot is sure to be awesome. And we like the challenge.
In the rescue challenge there’s a victim which is just an aluminium can with rice in it to make it a bit heavier. The can is somewhere on a rescue field which has obstacles like bridges or quicksand or chemical spills. And you have to get it out, so you have to be able to move the can somehow and obviously the better you can do this, the better you’ll do. There are dead ends too and roundabouts so your robot has to be able to manoeuvre pretty well. And each game only goes for 120 seconds so there’s no time to muck around. And you’re not allowed to get in the way of the other team. We’re trying to persuade Mr R to get us a rescue field so we can practise and decide which level we want to enter. It also makes a difference as to how big your robot can be, so it’s pretty important to get it right. Basically, I think we should go for the premier rescue, but, of course, there’s more chance of winning the junior rescue. Do we go for the glory of winning or just design a really cool robot? That’s the question. No consensus yet.
Wanted to work on it after school actually, but Mr R told us we had to go home. Most people had left by the time we’d tracked him down and failed to convince him. We avoided the girls at netball practice and walked around the long way by the back of the canteen.
And that’s when we made our shocking discovery. Sam and I were kicking a football around as we walked and Sam kicked it hard and high right into the back canteen door.
The door opened.
Figuring someone was still there we ran up, ready to say sorry and get our ball back. No-one was around. Looking at the door it was pretty obvious the lock had been forced open.
No prizes for guessing who’d done that.
I went in to look for the ball and it wasn’t hard to tell that stuff had been taken. There were packets on the floor and it looked like someone had tried to break open the till. Went over just to have a look and see what the damage was.
‘Let’s not hang around,’ said Sam. ‘Everyone will think it was us.’
Too late.
Who’s in there?’ Unmistakable voice of the Principal, Mr Henderson.
‘Oh, hi, Mr Henderson, the door was open and our ball went in and someone’s been in here and stolen stuff,’ rambled Sam.
‘Someone?’
‘Well, we don’t know who it was. But it wasn’t us.’
‘It wasn’t you.’
Sam is never going to make a defence lawyer.
Mr Henderson sent his gaze around the canteen. The mess was pretty bad. We stood there looking pretty guilty.
‘This is your ball then, I suppose.’
‘Yes, Mr Henderson,’ said Sam quietly.
‘Look boys, I want to check your bags. That way we can make absolutely sure you’re in the clear.’
Mr Henderson was playing it straight, I suppose. And who could blame him. Sam and I put our bags up on the counter and took everything out.
‘Those notes should have gone home last week,’ remarked Mr Henderson. There was plenty of old, mouldy stuff, but nothing incriminating. ‘OK, well it looks like you’re not the culprits. Unless you’ve already stashed it?’
‘Oh, no, no, we just found it like this,’ said Sam.
‘You’re pretty late going home.’
‘We were talking to Mr R,’ I said.
‘About robotics,’ stammered Sam. He really wasn’t proving to be very cool under pressure.
‘No idea who did this then?’
‘Well,’ started Sam.
‘No, we don’t know,’ I interrupted. No point having the deadhead targetting us more than he already does.
‘OK, well let me know if you think of anything,’ said Mr Henderson. He gave us one of his scary principal looks and we left. As quickly as dignity would allow.
Or quicker.