Star League 5 (5 page)

I glance behind me at the shed's enormous double doors. ‘Hey, Connor, can you rip one of those things off its hinges?'

‘You bet!' He runs over and grips one of the doors with his clawed hands. The muscles in his arms bulge until they look like they're about to burst through his skin. Then he rips the door clean off the door frame.

‘Great!' I yell. ‘Now lay it flat on the floor.'

Connor positions the big sheet of metal and I back towards it, followed by the snarling pack of dogs, cats, and everything in between. My foot clangs against the metal sheet as I step onto it, but the animals don't stop, and soon they're all positioned on the enormous door.

‘Sam! I need your help!' He runs over and I tell him my plan. ‘I need you to create an electric force field around the metal sheet but not enough to hurt the animals!'

Sam looks confused at first, then he realises what I plan to do. He bends down and touches the edge of the metal, and I feel a low hum of electricity ripple through the door.

Unfortunately the animals feel it too, and they start to panic. The bull terrier leaps forward to attack me and knocks me to the ground. I raise my hands up to push him away, but he's much too strong for me. He inches closer and closer until his face is right in front of mine. His sharp teeth snap as he tries to bite me, and I look up into his eyes, which are full of anger.

‘Please don't hurt me,' I whisper. ‘I don't want to hurt you.'

The dog lunges forward as my strength gives out. But instead of sharp teeth, I feel a warm pink
tongue slurp against my face. The bull terrier licks me furiously, and though it's pretty sloppy I don't mind a bit because I know my plan worked. The electricity Sam sent through the metal has scrambled the transmitters in the collars, and now they're no longer getting the brainwashing signal.

‘Sorry, human girl, I didn't hurt you, did I?' barks the bull terrier. ‘I don't know what happened! The last thing I remember is playing with my friend, Lana, and then I was here!'

‘Your name's not Scrapper, is it?'

The bull terrier wags his tail. ‘How'd you know?'

‘Don't worry, Scrapper, some bad people tried to kidnap you, but you're safe now. And I think there's someone who wants to see you!'

Lana, the little grey and white cat, runs over to greet her friend. The two miaow and bark at each other in excitement.

The other animals are also milling around in
confusion. They've got a million questions to ask.

‘Where am I?'

‘How'd I get here?'

‘Why don't I remember anything?'

‘Where's my dinner?'

‘Don't worry, I'll explain everything in a minute,' I say over the chorus of barks, miaows, squeaks, grunts and hisses. Then I look up and realise that a new group of guards have come to replace the defeated ones, and the Star League are hugely outnumbered. ‘Right now, though, it's time to get a little revenge. Who wants to give me a hand?'

‘ME!' comes the thundering cry of all the animals answering at once. We surge towards the guards. At the sight of our small army, most of them turn and run, but one stubborn guard stands his ground.

‘Scrapper, you know what to do!' I say.

The bull terrier lunges forward and latches his
teeth onto the guard's pants. Now the guard starts to look a bit nervous.

‘Relax,' I say. ‘Scrapper won't hurt you if you answer our questions.'

The guard nods quickly, his skin as white as a sheet.

‘Right, question number one: where can we find Aunt Petunia?'

Half an hour later we're sneaking towards Aunt Petunia's secret clifftop mansion. The guard blabbed about everything: how Aunt Petunia had paid them to kidnap creatures and fit them with the collars so she could have her very own army of animals. We turned him over to the police, who also promised to return all the animals to their owners. Now we're on our way to catch the real criminal: Aunt Petunia.

We head up the steep driveway and make our way through the front gates. So far I haven't seen much security, probably because Aunt Petunia never expected to have her nice-old-lady act blown. Well, she's going to be in for one big surprise!

We sneak into the house through a downstairs
window and start exploring the mansion. Most of the rooms are empty, but then I freeze as I hear a very familiar voice that can only belong to one person: Aunt Petunia. I peer around the corner and sure enough she's in one of the back rooms. It's arranged like the television set I saw back at the studio with TV cameras pointed towards her, though it doesn't look like they're filming yet.

‘It's almost time, Sweetpea. The Super Transmitter is getting a clear signal. Then all those horrible animals will be ours!'

The gorilla just stands there silently.

‘Psst! Hey!' The voice behind me almost makes me jump out of my skin. I spin around and my eyes fall upon a small metal cage. I bend down to peer inside and discover that it holds a green iguana.

‘Fluffy?' I ask.

‘That's me all right, who's asking?'

‘I'm Leigh, and this is Chu. The others are Jay,
Connor, Roger, Asuka and Sam. Your owner, Dr Fred, sent us to rescue you.' I keep my voice low in case Aunt Petunia hears us from the next room.

Fluffy looks down at the floor of his cage with what I imagine is a sad look for an iguana. ‘You might not want to rescue me after you find out what I've done.'

‘I'm sure it can't be that bad,' says Chu reassuringly, but that just makes Fluffy look even more glum.

‘I took Dr Fred's Super Transmitter and gave it to Aunt Petunia. I've ruined everything!' he wails.

‘Don't worry, Fluffy, we'd pretty much figured that out already. Besides, it wasn't you, it was the collar making you do it.'

Fluffy straightens up. ‘Really? Come to think of it, I did feel a lot better when she took my collar off. Hey, it wasn't my fault!'

‘We can't figure out what she wants with the Super Transmitter, though,' I say.

‘Oh, that's easy!' says Fluffy. ‘I overheard her
telling that big gorilla her plan. She's going to use the Super Transmitter to broadcast the same signal that's in the Le Nice Pets Collars across the whole world. Then she won't need the collars at all. She'll be able to control every single animal from her mansion and use them to do her dirty work.'

I feel the blood drain from my face. I quickly explain to the others what Fluffy has told me, and they look just as worried.

‘We've got to get the Super Transmitter back!' says Jay.

‘Do you know where it is?' I ask Fluffy.

‘Yeah, it's attached to the ceiling above the TV cameras. It gets better reception up there.'

We all peer around the corner where Aunt Petunia is still preparing. We look up and spot the Super Transmitter, a small black box, taped to the ceiling.

‘How are we going to get up there?' asks Connor.

‘I don't think even I could sneak up there
without her noticing,' says Asuka.

Jay nods. ‘We need someone smaller.'

I know exactly who he means. ‘Chu? Do you think you can do it?' He nods his furry head, then leaps into the room without a word. I hold my breath as he scrambles up the walls towards the Super Transmitter. I'm worried that at any moment the big gorilla is going to spot him, but finally Chu's hands close over the Super Transmitter.

‘Ah! The preparations are finally complete,' says Aunt Petunia, who still hasn't noticed Chu. ‘Going live in three … two … one … ACTION!'

The Super Transmitter in Chu's hand starts to buzz with a sound that sets my teeth on edge. The buzzing quickly fades, but I know something is still wrong. I look up at Chu's eyes, which are completely blank, and he opens his mouth to speak.

‘I must obey Aunt Petunia! I must obey Aunt Petunia!'

‘Chu, no!' The words are out of my mouth before I can stop them. I can't believe my best friend is under the control of that horrible old woman! I glance up, but it doesn't seem like Aunt Petunia has noticed either Chu or me. She's too busy adjusting the controls on the TV cameras.

‘Good evening, sweeties!' she beams brightly. ‘It's me, Aunt Petunia, your favourite animal trainer and I'm being broadcast live around the entire world thanks to my new toy, the Super Transmitter!' She rubs her hands together and cackles, dropping the nice act.

‘By now you'll all be noticing your pets are acting a little strange. That's because they're all under my control – every last animal in the world!
Don't believe me? See for yourselves!'

Aunt Petunia aims a remote at a screen behind her, and what seems to be live footage of a security camera blinks on.

‘Hey, I recognise that place!' I say. ‘It's the zoo!'

Row after row of animals in cages are going crazy, throwing themselves against the bars. Their trainers rush out, clearly desperate to stop the animals from hurting themselves but unsure how to help them. Some of the animals start to break free from their enclosures and chase after the trainers.

The camera feed switches to another scene of pets breaking through the glass in a pet shop and turning on the customers. The scene changes again, and this time we're treated to the sight of people running from their homes with their pet cats and dogs snapping at their heels.

Aunt Petunia lets out a peal of laughter. ‘Ah, absolute chaos! Now your animals will respond only to me. Thank you for tuning in to the last ever
episode of
Le Nice Pets
! But don't worry, you'll be seeing a lot more of your favourite Aunt Petunia in my new role as ruler of the world!'

She switches off the cameras, and as the screens go blank she finally notices Chu carrying the Super Transmitter.

‘Hello, little monkey, what have you got there? My Super Transmitter? What a bad monkey! You weren't trying to bring it back to your meddling friends, were you?' I watch in dismay as Chu nods. ‘And where are your horrible little friends right now?' Chu raises his paw and points right at us. Aunt Petunia looks in our direction. ‘I've got you now!' she says with a nasty grin.

Sweetpea the gorilla lumbers towards us. We turn to run but freeze on the spot as we realise that another very large animal has crept up behind us, blocking our way. She stands up on her hind legs and lets out a tremendous bellow.

‘B-B-BEAR!' stammers Roger.

‘I'd like to introduce you pesky kids to my new pet, Beryl,' says Aunt Petunia. ‘I stole her from the zoo. She was quite ferocious until I managed to fit her with one of my Le Nice Pets Collars.' Sure enough, Beryl has a bright orange collar around her neck.

‘You'd better not try anything stupid, or you'll have Beryl to answer to,' warns Aunt Petunia.

‘What do we do?' whispers Asuka.

‘If we all attack at once we might be able to get away,' says Connor.

‘No!' I say. ‘The bear doesn't know what she's doing. And besides, we can't leave Chu behind with that horrible woman!'

‘Leigh's right,' says Jay. ‘We'll just have to do what she says for now.'

Beryl herds us back towards a large cage next to the stage. We all pile inside and Sweetpea slams the door shut. In here we've got no choice but to watch as Aunt Petunia uses the animals of the world to
carry out her evil schemes.

‘Listen up!' She says, speaking into a microphone. ‘My first order is for all the rats and mice that live in banks. I want you to chew through the electrical wires to release the locks on the safes. That way I'll have more money than I can ever spend! And to all of the pets that belong to the world leaders, keep your owners inside. Don't let them leave their houses!'

Aunt Petunia is so busy giving her orders that she's forgotten something – Chu is still holding the Super Transmitter. A tiny spark of hope ignites in my chest. If I can get Chu to hand the transmitter over to me, I might be able to fix all this. But how am I supposed to do that when he's being controlled by Aunt Petunia's signal?

I close my eyes and concentrate on talking to Chu using my animancer powers.

‘Chu, can you hear me?'

Chu looks at me but his eyes are blank, and I
know he's still being controlled. But I won't give up yet.

‘Chu, it's me, Leigh, your best friend! Remember how we met? Your whole family had been taken by poachers in the jungle, and you were just a baby, lost and alone. I found you when I was playing by the river, talking to the crocodiles. They were going to eat you, but I convinced them to let you go, and you came to live with me. I became your family! Remember? You'd never want to help someone like Aunt Petunia!'

Chu blinks, but I can't tell if I'm getting through.

‘Please, Chu, try to remember who you really are!'