The 8th Continent (18 page)

EVIE WASN'T SURE WHICH WAS WORSE, THE FACT THAT SHE WAS SURROUNDED BY WINTERPOLE
agents, or that Vesuvia had her dirty hands on the Eden Compound.

Over by the
Roost
, the Winterpole agents Barry and Larry fired a glue cannon at her beloved hovership. A spiderweb of blue glue held the
Roost
in the water. There was no way it could take off.

“Hold still!” Barry cheered, squeezing his glue-cannon trigger like it owed him money.

“Still needs some work,” Larry said, referring to his partner's latest catchphrase.

Evie pleaded with her captor. “Mister Snow, wait. I thought you said that because we're kids we can't be sent to the Prison at the Pole.”

The Winterpole officer looked down his nose at her. “Due to certain circumstances, the director has made an exception, which I will explain in due time.”

Vesuvia glared at all of them. “Don't explain it. Hurry up! Get these criminals out of my sight. I have business to attend to.”

Mister Snow pulled out a tablet and scrolled to the appropriate section of the document on his screen. “Winterpole Statute 19-W3 insists that I read the complete list of infractions before the violator can be taken into custody. Please allow me to start from the beginning.”

“Oh, here we go,” Evie said, rolling her eyes.

Mister Snow began to read. “The accused Richard Lane and the accused Evelyn Lane are guilty of the following infractions. Entering Winterpole Headquarters without the proper permission slip. Requesting a permission slip to enter Winterpole Headquarters without the proper permission slip. Littering in Winterpole Headquarters lobby. Inappropriately hostile communication with a Winterpole officer. Accessing Winterpole mission database without permission. Accessing Winterpole personnel database without permission. Attempting to alter Winterpole personnel database without permission . . .”

Vesuvia stomped her foot. “By the ghost of Chanel, will you hurry up?!”

Mister Snow lowered his eyes at her. “I most certainly will not hurry up, miss. Winterpole Statute 19-W3 insists—”

“Fine, fine!” she said. “Ugh. This is taking forever.”

In reality, it took twenty minutes to complete the list of infractions. During that time, the hot Pacific sun drenched them all in sweat, and the reek from the garbage surrounding the ships made Evie's head spin.

Mister Snow took a deep breath to finish reading the infractions. “The accused Evelyn Lane made a sarcastic comment in reference to the reading of charges. Quote: ‘Oh, here we go.' The accused Evelyn Lane also rolled her eyes. And finally, the crime that will finally allow me to send you to the Prison at the Pole, seventy-two minutes ago, the father of the accused violated his house arrest and exited Lane Mansion.”

Evie and her brother exchanged a glance. Their father exited Lane Mansion? Dad was on the loose?

Mister Snow pointed at Rick and Evie. “Fit these two for squid-cuffs.”

Two Winterpole agents reached into buckets and pulled out a pair of the writhing cyber squids.

Evie didn't care about that. Her father had escaped! That could only mean one thing. She watched the sky.

An enormous flock of birds soared overhead. At the center of the flock was a grand hovership shaped like a bird with outstretched wings.

“Dad!” Evie cheered at the sight of her father's personal supership.

The
Drongo
did a barrel roll, then swooped low over Vesuvia's yacht, upside down. Everyone hit the deck, literally, except for Evie, who stood, cheering happily. As the
Drongo
passed by, she saw into the domed glass cockpit. Her mother sat at Dad's side. She was smiling and waving at her.

So it was true. The deal her mom had made with Winterpole was just another one of Vesuvia's ruses.

While the
Drongo
came around for another pass, Vesuvia and her crew, the Winterpole agents, and Rick stood back up, right in time for the Lane family's bird collection to say an up close and personal hello.

The birds swarmed the deck like a plague of locusts.

Vesuvia screamed. “Ew! Birds are smelly! Yuck! Get them away! Get them out of my hair! Diana, help meeeeeee!”

Mister Snow waved to his agents. “Everyone, get back to the hoverships. Retreat!”

Many of the birds were drawn to the shiny exterior of their old friend 2-Tor, and they perched on his shoulders just like they did back home.

In the chaos, Evie found Rick, who like herself was being ignored for a moment. “Rick! Now's our chance! We have to activate the rain machine.”

“Yes!” Rick cheered. “Eden Compound, here we come!”

They ran across the deck of the yacht to where the rain machine was guarded—or, rather, would have been guarded if a family of parakeets wasn't trying to start a nest in the guard's hair.

Standing on opposite sides of the rain machine, Rick and Evie shared an almost giddy look. “Go on, push it!” Rick said.

“You do it,” Evie said. “You've had to put up with me this whole time.”

“How about together?”

They placed their hands on the plunger's crossbar. Then, together, they pushed down, activating the rain machine and starting the release of the Eden Compound.

Rick and Evie were knocked to the ground as a geyser of iridescent green liquid shot out of the rain machine. It went high, impossibly high, high as the clouds.

The Eden Compound-infused rain came down from the sky in a torrent of what looked like lime soda. It covered everything, the hoverships and the fleet of boats, the birds, the people, and, of course, the garbage.

The effect was immediate. Plastic bags sprouted moss. Warped sheet metal crumbled into dirt. An old Styrofoam ice chest blossomed into a huge flower with white petals.

Evie's heart soared. It worked!

The Eden rain spattered Vesuvia, soaking her beloved pink plastic jacket. The jacket ballooned in size, turned dark brown, and oozed across her skin. Now it was mud.

“Ew! Revolting!” she yelled. She tried to wipe the mud away, but her hand touched something slimy. “YAAGH! GET IT OFF!” she screamed the second she saw what was in her hand. Her mud jacket was crawling with worms and spiders.

Mister Snow and the agents of Winterpole continued their retreat to their hoverships. They started to take off, but when the Eden Compound–infused rain fell on the vehicles, the metal hulls sprouted so much grass they looked like furry flying ducks. The interiors of the hoverships moistened into soil; the electronics twisted into brambles. By the time the ships hit the water, they had completely disintegrated. The Winterpole pilots sat on their mounds of earth in the ocean and cried for help.

Rick pulled Evie to her feet. “We should get off this boat,” he said, and then, as if to reinforce his point, his foot broke through a patch of the deck, which had turned to sand.

They ran to the edge of the boat, which continued to break apart beneath them.

“We have to get back to the
Roost
,” Evie said.

“Do you think that's safe?” Rick asked, looking to her for advice. “I'm worried the
Roost
will break apart like the rest of the hoverships.”

Evie smiled. “Don't forget. The
Roost
is a tree. It's already organic matter, so the Eden Compound won't convert it.”

“Good point,” Rick said. “And lucky for us, that glue net is anything but organic.”

Sure enough, the blue sticky net that had anchored the
Roost
transformed into fresh water before their eyes and trickled away. Unfortunately, their hovership was still a good distance from the yacht. Evie didn't know how they were going to get over there to safety.

“Perhaps I can be of assistance,” 2-Tor said from behind them.

Evie had forgotten about 2-Tor! Her heart sank at the thought of her robot guardian. What had the Eden Compound done to his metal body? She was afraid to look.

But she did. The bright green fluid shimmered on his chest plate. He tilted his beak to the sky and cawed. The Eden Compound put little speckled bumps on every inch of him.

Rick ran to the robot in a frivolous attempt to shield him from the rain. “2-Tor! We have to get you to safety.”

“Do not fret, children. It is all right.” The speckles sprouted. Wet, black feathers emerged like ferns after a rainstorm. His camera eyes turned the glossy yellow of a real crow. His beak changed color. The silver feathers of his wings followed suit. In a few seconds, all of 2-Tor had ceased to be robotic and had become real crow! Only the cracked television screen remained.

“Flying feathers! 2-Tor, you're real! You're a real bird.” Evie jumped up and down like her shoes were made of super-bouncy balls.

2-Tor squawked, “I say! This is quite stimulating. I'm hungry! I have never been hungry before.”

Rick grabbed 2-Tor by his soft feathered wing. “We have sandwiches back on the
Roost
. We should go there now!”

With a quick swipe, 2-Tor snatched the children with his talons and flapped his massive black wings. He blasted into the air on a direct course with the
Roost
, just as the yacht broke apart and everyone on board tumbled into the sea.

In seconds, 2-Tor, Evie, and Rick were aboard their beloved hovership and in the sky.

They flew high above the mayhem. Evie watched out the window as all her dreams came true. Off on the horizon, the rainstorm continued. All the floating garbage converged, forming the rich, natural foundation of her new world. A jewel in the middle of the Pacific. An endless field of rolling green, with rocky outcroppings and white beaches at the shoreline. Evie smiled.

It was her triumph. It was hope for the future. It was the eighth continent.

THOSE STUPID, UGLY LANES
, VESUVIA THOUGHT AS SHE FLOATED ALONE IN THE MIDDLE OF THE OCEAN.
This is all their fault
.

She clung to a floating bag of trash, one of the few to survive the apocalyptic use of the Eden Compound. Vesuvia hated garbage, would not be caught dead near garbage, but unfortunately for her, she hated drowning more, and so she clung like a rat to driftwood. Disgusting. Disgusting.

Her plastic clothes had been completely destroyed by the Eden Compound. Her skin was smeared with dirt, but she retained the slightest bit of modesty thanks to a few soggy green leaves that she wore like a bikini. She tried to look at the bright side. At least she was still better dressed than Evie Lane.

She had hit her head as she fell from her crumbling yacht, got knocked out, and woke up hugging this stinky garbage ball, without another soul as far as she could see. She must have floated clear of the garbage patch and gotten lost. She did not know what had happened to the rest of her fleet or to the Winterpole agents. People were going to pay through their eyeballs for all the money she had lost on this operation. Countless people were missing, but who cared about them? Her fleet was gone. Her beautiful pink fleet.

She did have an idea of what happened to the Lane kids. They had escaped in their tacky hovership with their tacky robot bird and gotten the tacky continent they wanted. She had already thought of twelve ways to steal the eighth continent away from them so that she could make New Miami.

DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!

Vesuvia looked in the direction of the sound. A speck had appeared on the horizon. She squinted, but it was too hard to see.

Minutes passed, and the speck grew into a boat. She recognized it as one of Winterpole's search-and-rescue vessels.

“Over here! Hey! Heeeeey! Help! Pleeease heeeeeeeeelp!!!!” Vesuvia clung to the trash bag with one hand and waved with the other. It was a rescue boat. She was saved!

The boat pulled up in front of her stinky flotation device.

Barry and Larry peered down at her from the deck of the ship. “Well, hey!” Barry said. “It's a girl. What are you doing hanging around out here, miss?”

Someone pushed them aside and glanced down in the water at Vesuvia.
Diana!
Thank good gracious relief. She really was saved.

But then Diana pointed at Vesuvia and said, “That's her, the super-secret CEO of Condo Corp.”

Barry and Larry grabbed a giant fishing net and scooped Vesuvia out of the water. They dumped her on the deck, where the trash bag broke, covering her in soggy coffee grounds and moldy lettuce.

Mister Snow appeared from inside the ship's cabin. “Oh, good. You found her. Hello, again, Miss Piffle. Your friend Miss Maple informed me of your impressive status as Condo Corp's CEO.”

That wretched traitor! Diana had sold her out. She would add that girl to the ISES hate list the first chance she got. At the moment, Vesuvia had bigger fish to fool.

Widening and watering her eyes as best she could, Vesuvia gave Mister Snow her best impression of a little lost bunny. “I don't know what you mean, sir. You must have me confused with my father. He is the CEO of Condo Corp.”

“Nice try,” Mister Snow said. “But Diana told us everything, about how you are secretly running the corporation. We wondered how someone as clumsy as Donald Piffle could be so diabolical. We should have realized someone else was pulling the strings. I suppose you are aware that Condo Corp is the all-time largest violator of Winterpole statutes in history.”

“It's not my fault your stupid statutes don't have a provision for double-decker oceans!” Vesuvia snapped.

Mister Snow nodded to Diana. “Mm. You're right. She does have a temper.”

“I told you,” Diana said quietly.

Turning back to Vesuvia, Mister Snow said, “Don't worry, my dear. You are still young. I promise, with good behavior, you'll be out of the Prison at the Pole in time for your eightieth birthday.”

“My what?! You can't do that!”

Mister Snow raised his eyebrows. “Winterpole Statute UH-33: contradicting a Winterpole officer. That should make it your eighty-first birthday.”

Vesuvia roared, and Diana made the strangest face. It was a bizarre contortion that Vesuvia had never seen her ex–best friend make before, this kind of upturn at the sides of her mouth, and a raising of her cheeks.

Then she realized. Diana was smiling.