Lab Rats in Space Read online

  Contents

  Chapter 1 Time to Wake Up

  Chapter 2 The Naming Game

  Chapter 3 The Professor’s Entertaining Experiment

  Chapter 4 An Efficient Way to Eat

  Chapter 5 Getting Close to Bumface

  Chapter 6 Xanax’s Favourite Number

  Chapter 7 The Endless Corridor

  Chapter 8 Into the Darkness

  Chapter 9 Unauthorised Life Forms

  Chapter 10 Leaking Tummies

  Chapter 11 XL Speaks

  Chapter 12 Life on Board

  Chapter 13 In Training

  Chapter 14 Triumph of the Snotbuster

  Chapter 15 A Testing Time

  Chapter 16 A Change of Plans

  Chapter 17 Books R Us

  Chapter 18 Reality Overload

  Chapter 19 The Professor Lands

  Chapter 20 Meeting an Old Friend

  Chapter 21 The Reign of Chaos

  Chapter 22 Too Much of a Bad Thing

  Chapter 23 On the Way Home

  Copyright

  Chapter 1

  Time to Wake Up

  The first things he could remember were noises. They were all he could remember. Clicking noises.

  Clack, clack.

  Click, click, click.

  They were shoes, he thought, on a hard floor, a hard cold floor. Someone was taking a few steps here, ‘clack-clack, clack-clack,’ and a few more there. They were even, like someone was measuring.

  When he opened his eyes, all he could see was bright light, so he closed them again. He tried to remember where he was. He couldn’t. All he could remember were the clicking heels. That was it—his entire memory—some clicks and a flash of light.

  He opened his eyes again, determined to keep them open and find some more memories. Surely there must be something else he could remember. His parents, he must have some parents, everyone did.

  Nothing.

  In the light he could see thin stripes in front of him. Colours began to appear out of the light between the stripes. The stripes were grey but shiny. Beyond them there was a splodge of pale pink, a bit further along there was a brown lump.

  He screwed his eyes to see better and sat up. He was on the floor. It was smooth and hard. He stared at the grey stripes—they were bars. As he stretched his hands out, he could touch both walls. They were metal. He reached up and touched the ceiling—cold metal too.

  ‘I’m in a cage,’ he said to himself and gripped the bars with his hands. He looked about him, pressing his face to the bars to see as far as possible. All he could see were some cages opposite. They had other beings in them. Inside the one opposite him seemed to be a boy. To his right it looked like a girl, and to the left was a brown furry brick. That was the brown splodge he had seen before.

  The boy opposite him was slumped at the back of his cage. He was about to speak to the boy when the clicking noise grew louder and a face suddenly appeared right in front of him. The face was round with fat cheeks. The lips were so pale and so pinched, her face looked like a bum. Her hair was cropped short and pointed straight upwards. It looked like someone had lifted her off the ground by her hair, sliced it off and set it with permanent hairspray. Her nose looked as if it was squashed flat against a window. She held a clipboard.

  ‘Where am I?’ he asked. She ignored him. He watched as she moved a pen from side to side in front of his face. As his eyes followed the pen, she ticked something on her clipboard.

  ‘What am I doing here?’ he asked again. His voice was croaky. Perhaps she couldn’t understand him.

  ‘What… am… I… doing… here?’ he repeated slowly.

  She clicked her fingers to one side and then the other. His head turned at the sound. She nodded to herself and ticked again.

  ‘Tell me!’ he said loudly.

  ‘Tell me!’ he repeated as she ignored him. He hated her. She was horrible. How could she just ignore him?

  ‘Don’t walk off. Tell me what I’m doing here!’ he shouted and gripped the bars. She clicked out of view.

  ‘Oi Bumface, get back here!’ he yelled after her. The clicking stopped. He heard a few gasps and a giggle from somewhere.

  Bumface walked back to his cage with a puzzled look on her face.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he asked her. He was frightened but he wasn’t going to give up.

  ‘Who are you?’ she asked him. He felt relieved that she had spoken to him. He opened his mouth to speak and then realised he couldn’t answer. He couldn’t remember his own name.

  ‘I… I’m… I don’t know.’ Tears welled up in his eyes and he started to cry. He didn’t even know who he was. Bumface smiled a pinchy smile. That was all she needed to know.

  ‘Tell me what’s happening!’ he shouted, but she ignored him and walked away again.

  ‘They don’t tell you anything,’ the boy opposite spoke from the back of his cage, ‘don’t bother trying.’

  Pleased that someone was talking to him, he reached forward with a hand to wipe the tears from his eyes. He was about to speak to the boy opposite when he noticed that his two hands were holding the bars in front of him.

  If they were holding the cage, what was he wiping his eyes with?

  ‘Argh!’ he screamed as he saw a third hand appearing from behind his head. He stared at the hand and gently touched the fingers. He could feel the touch. He turned around as far as he could and saw an arm reaching from over his back. It was coming out of his body, from his own back, just above his bum.

  ‘No!’ he cried in horror at his third arm. ‘What have they done to me?’

  Chapter 2

  The Naming Game

  As he wiggled his fingers and scratched the back of his head, he discovered he could move his third arm like the other ones. He explored his cage with his new arm. He decided he must be in some sort of laboratory where they did horrible experiments. He wanted to find out about the other people around him.

  ‘What’s your name?’ he asked the boy in the cage opposite. The boy shrugged his shoulders. In the top left-hand corner of his cage there was a metal label stuck to the bars. It said KT-15.

  ‘Your cage says KT-15,’ he pointed at the label with his third hand, ‘you could be called KT.’ The boy shrugged his shoulders again. He looked normal. No extra arms or legs.

  ‘What does my cage say?’ he reached through the bars with an arm and tapped on the label. KT blew some breath up in his hair.

  ‘They don’t like us talking.’

  ‘If you talk too much, you get an injection and then…’ the girl in the cage on KT’s right whispered.

  ‘Please,’ he turned to her, ‘can you see my label?’

  ‘I can’t see it. It’s too far. I can only see the one opposite me. Sorry.’

  ‘Please!’ he pleaded with KT.

  ‘Fine, it’s Z-155, now shut up!’ KT finally said.

  ‘Z-155,’ he thought to himself and wondered what he could be called.

  ‘Hi, I’m Zed,’ he told KT.

  ‘Whatever,’ said KT.

  ‘Hi Zed,’ said the girl, ‘can you see my label?’

  ‘Sshh… Bumface is coming,’ KT said. He pushed himself to the back of his cage but not before Zed saw him smile when he used the name Zed had given Bumface.

  She paced slowly up and down pointing her pinched lips between the bars of each cage and then walked off, satisfied all the subjects were quiet. A dog barked behind her. She turned sharply, took a couple of steps and glowered into its cage. The dog whimpered quietly. Just as the room was silent, a glass smashed in the distance.

  ‘Sorry, nothing serious,’ a grown-up voice called out. Bumface rolled her eyes at her clumsy assistant. As she went to tell him off, her hand slipped into the p
ocket of her white lab coat and felt something, checking it was still there.

  When it was safe, Zed whispered to the girl, ‘Your label says D-33. My name is Zed, what’s yours?’

  She smiled.

  ‘I’m Dee, nice to meet you Zed.’

  ‘What did they do to you?’ he asked. She looked like a normal girl to him with brown hair and freckles. She sat cross-legged with her hands under her legs. She stopped smiling and pulled her hands out.

  ‘Wow!’ said Zed. ‘That’s so cool! You could smash your way out!’

  Her right hand wasn’t a hand at all. It was a hammer.

  ‘I’d rather have a hand,’ she said. Zed felt he’d been rude, but the thought of a hammer hand and all the things you could do with it seemed much better than an arm sticking out of your backside.

  ‘Sorry… does it hurt when you hit things?’

  ‘Don’t think so… look.’ She held out her other arm. It had a hand with fingers and a thumb but her fingernails were like a set of screwdrivers.

  ‘Can’t you unscrew your cage?’ Zed asked.

  ‘There are no screws,’ she answered. ‘The only way the cages open is with the electronic swipe card Bumface keeps in her pocket.’

  ‘What does my label say?’ Zed could hear a girl in the cage next to him and opposite Dee. Dee read out her number.

  ‘It’s M-92,’ said Dee.

  ‘Guess that makes me Emm. Hello everyone!’

  ‘What does Emm look like?’ Zed asked Dee.

  ‘She’s very pretty with blonde hair that always looks neat,’ said Dee. Emm smiled, delighted to find out she was pretty. Soon everyone was telling everybody else what their names were and what their neighbours looked like.

  ‘Hey KT… what did they do to you?’ Zed asked across the way.

  ‘Dunno… I think they haven’t done it yet… or it’s something inside me.’

  Zed told KT to read the label on the cage on his other side.

  ‘It’s J-50,’ KT said.

  ‘So what’s my name then?’ It was a boy’s voice but he sounded like he had a heavy cold.

  ‘Nice to meet you Jay!’ Zed stuck an arm out and round to his neighbour.

  ‘Jay! Great… ah… ah… ah…’

  ‘Oh no!’ KT suddenly pressed himself as far back in his cage as he could and covered his face with his arm.

  Jay continued making the noise.

  ‘Ah… ah… ah…’

  ‘Hold on,’ shouted Dee, ‘and get your hand out of the way!’

  Zed snatched his hand back.

  ‘What’s happening?’

  ‘Arghh… arghh… CHOOO!’

  Jay let out an almighty sneeze and shook the walls of Zed’s cage. Zed saw a wall of snot fly out of Jay’s cage past the bars of KT’s cage and slap onto his legs.

  ‘Gross!’ said Zed.

  ‘Not again,’ moaned KT.

  ‘Sorry KT,’ Jay mumbled through his bunged nose.

  ‘They gave him the biggest honker in the history of the world,’ said Dee.

  ‘Yeah, and I cop it every time he sneezes,’ KT tried to shake snot off his hands.

  ‘That gets it more,’ Zed pointed to the cage more directly opposite Jay. In it was the furry brick with no arms, legs or mouth, just two small black eyes. It hadn’t moved despite a coating of Jay’s snot all over its fur.

  ‘What’s the creature’s label? I can’t see it?’ asked Zed.

  ‘It’s XL-3,’ said Jay. ‘Sorry XL.’

  XL shivered to himself, again.

  ‘OK there XL?’ Zed asked.

  ‘At least this new one had some intelligence,’ XL thought to himself.

  ‘There’s no point talking to him,’ said Jay. ‘He’s just some dumb creature. Poor thing.’

  ‘How do you know it’s a he?’ asked Dee.

  ‘I don’t know,’ answered Jay. ‘XL just sounds like a boy’s name.’

  XL groaned inwardly, ‘Not only can they not hear me, but that fool with the nose thinks I’m deaf and dumb. The shame of it all!’

  Since waking up in the lab, XL had been confused. He could hear his own voice inside his head but noone else could hear him. As he moved his body around, he realised he had no arms or legs. He’d tried opening his mouth and discovered he didn’t have a mouth either. He had managed to shuffle his body along to the edge of the cage and felt his fur brush against the metal but this had taken several hours.

  ‘Clearly, my brain is vastly superior to this body I have,’ he thought. ‘I can only conclude that my brain has been transplanted into this furry lump as part of some horrible experiment.’

  Soon everyone except XL was talking. They had all told their neighbours what their tags said and had made up names for themselves. They had never all spoken at the same time before and Bumface did not know how to stop them.

  ‘She can’t give us all an injection!’ Zed said cheerfully as she click-clacked up and down with her huge needle and syringe trying to work out who should be put to sleep first.

  They all started shouting their names at her.

  ‘I’m Zed!’

  ‘Hi Bumface, I’m Dee.’

  ‘My name’s Emm.’

  ‘Silence!’ shouted Bumface. ‘Silence!’

  The shouting grew louder and everyone began banging on the walls of their cages. Dee was running her hammer up and down her bars making a terrible racket and sending sparks flying off. Zed could even hear birds squawking and an elephant. It sounded like there was a zoo in there. There were people talking too, other grown-ups. Probably more lab assistants, thought Zed.

  In the middle of all the noise, a new sound began.

  Steps… heavier than the previous steps. Each foot thudded down and was followed by a squeak—like shiny rubber being squeezed. It grew louder as one by one the captives fell silent.

  Zed watched as Bumface recognised the noise, turned around and trembled. Her lips disappeared altogether as she swallowed hard.

  ‘They… I… they… I’m sorry. It was him,’ she stammered and pointed to Zed’s cage.

  Chapter 3

  The Professor’s Entertaining Experiment

  The room was silent. Across the way Zed could see KT’s eyes wide open with fright. Someone was there. Someone Zed couldn’t see. The heavy footsteps stopped. Zed felt a shudder run right up his third arm. His fingers shook and his ears winced as the horrible rubber on rubber squeaking came closer to his cage.

  Bumface removed the swipe card from her pocket, swiped the tag on his cage and the bars sank down with a ‘pfft’ noise.

  Zed pressed as far back as he could. A shadow fell on the edge of his cage and a large hand coated in black rubber appeared. It reached into the cage, clamped itself around Zed’s throat and began to pull him forward. Zed clutched at the hand with his two front arms, trying to stop himself from being pulled out, but the hand was too strong.

  He tried to shout but could only make gurgling noises. His third arm reached over his head and hit the black rubber arm but nothing could stop it. He put his legs to the sides of the cage to stop himself from being dragged forward, but it was no use. The hand pulled him slowly but surely out of the cage.

  Suddenly, Zed was terrified of being outside his cage. He saw the person attached to the arm as it lifted him up. Zed’s neck was hurting with the weight of his body hanging from it. He could still breathe, but only just. He could see the other children edging as far back in their cages as they could, terrified they might be next.

  The black arm belonged to a huge man. He was tall with broad shoulders which almost filled the space between the cages. He was clothed entirely in rubber. It was Professor Xanax. He was the owner of the lab. His arms wore long black rubber gloves. On his legs were large black boots which disappeared underneath the bottom of his white shiny lab coat. The coat was buttoned right to the top. His face was pale. His head had not even one hair on it. His eyes were the creepiest blue anyone had ever seen. They were like the iciest ocean on the coldest plan
et in the universe. Zed felt a chill just looking at them.

  Professor Xanax twisted Zed around and examined him. Next to Xanax was a computer screen which sat on its own tray hovering above the ground. Two mechanical arms were attached on either side of the screen. The hands of the arms rested on a keyboard, ready to type. It was Xanax’s Typetor, his personal computer which followed him wherever he went.

  ‘Interesting,’ Xanax said calmly, ‘a third arm is what it took to rouse this rabble. Quite unexpected. Make a note!’

  ‘Yes,’ said Bumface who was cowering as much as the children, ‘immediately.’

  ‘Not you, idiot,’ Xanax thundered as the Typetor made the note on his keyboard. Bumface bowed her head and stepped back further.

  ‘Quite the little monkey,’ he sneered at Zed.

  ‘Set the timer!’ he instructed the Typetor. He began to squeeze Zed’s throat so that he couldn’t breathe at all. Xanax started shaking him, watching his arms wiggle, observing how they reacted to the lack of air in his lungs. As he did, Zed heard a little gasp from Emm’s cage. He glimpsed her peeking from behind her bars, eyes wide with terror.

  Zed’s face grew more and more red. His lungs felt like they would explode. His eyes grew blurry. Just as Zed thought he was going to die, Xanax tossed him back into his cage like a used banana skin. The bars slid up again.

  ‘Experiment over. Test subject survived lack of oxygen for…

  ‘2 minutes, 13 seconds,’ the Typetor responded.

  ‘A worthless experiment, but entertaining nevertheless.’

  He pressed his face to Zed’s cage.

  ‘My next experiment will be far more thorough. Instead of talking, I suggest you save your energy for the ordeal ahead.’

  He twisted his rubbery hands on the cage bars, so the squeak pierced Zed’s ears and travelled down his body.