Robotic Rumble Read online

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR & ILLUSTRATOR

  COPYRIGHT PAGE

  The house where Axel and his mother, Nedra, lived was already fairly small, so when Aunt Vicki and the five cousins came for one of their summer visits, it was like living in a mouse’s sock drawer.

  Axel perched on the arm of the couch. He had to.

  The rest of the couch was taken up with a fight between the sticky-faced twins, Sara and Hunter, who were yelling and struggling over Axel’s single games controller.

  Out in the back garden, shaggy-haired Kyle was striding back and forth shouting into his phone: ‘Dave is out of the band. I mean it, Steve. He’s out this time and that’s final!’

  Little Milo was temporarily imprisoned beneath a large upturned laundry basket for his own safety and Amali was dancing on the upstairs landing, singing her way through her musical theatre collection. Axel didn’t dislike Wicked, Matilda or Aladdin but he had heard them all a few too many times this week.

  Axel looked gloomily out of the front window at Aunt Vicki’s campervan parked in the driveway. That was where the cousins were supposed to sleep, but somehow they all migrated indoors before the visit was over, every single time. Having kids sleeping all over the place made it impossible for him to sneak through the house after dark.

  I haven’t been able to check on BEAST in days, he thought. I hope he’s okay.

  BEAST, Axel’s best friend, was a shape-shifting robot who lived in a secret den beneath the back garden. Together Axel and BEAST went on missions against Grabbem Industries, the evil mega-corporation. Grabbem wanted to secretly plunder Earth’s resources and didn’t care how much destruction they caused.

  Kyle didn’t know it, but he was stomping around above BEAST’s head this very moment. If Axel pressed the remote-control switch in his pocket, the metal doors hidden beneath the lawn would open and cousin Kyle would suddenly find himself falling into the secret den.

  There was another way into the den: a curtained-off hole in the cellar wall. Axel wasn’t too worried about any of the cousins finding it. Nobody ever went down to the cellar, except to do the laundry or fetch something from the chest freezer.

  ‘It’s my turrrrn!’ screamed Sara. Axel winced as the sticks on his beloved games controller were tugged and twisted.

  ‘Why don’t we all play something else?’ he said. ‘Or we could all go for, um, a walk or something? Outside?’

  ‘I WANT TO PLAY DIGGY BLOCKS!’ bawled Hunter. ‘I HADN’T FINISHED BUILDING MY TOILET CASTLE!’

  Axel buried his head in his hands. He didn’t even want to know what a ‘toilet castle’ was.

  From upstairs came only silence for a moment. Then a voice sang out: ‘Naaaaaaaants ingonYAma bagithi Babaaaa!’

  Amali had reached the Lion King soundtrack. Yesterday Axel had found her leaning over the balcony railing, solemnly lifting one of Axel’s old teddies over her head.

  Kyle swore down the phone and then shot a glance at Axel through the window. The message was clear: You didn’t hear that.

  Axel scowled at him. For a sweet second he imagined pressing the control switch, just to see the look on Kyle’s face as he fell through the lawn.

  ‘I want to play zombies!’ Sara squealed.

  ‘DIGGY BLOCKS!’ screeched Hunter. His screeches had gone beyond chalk-on-a-blackboard noises and now sounded like a pterodactyl playing the violin.

  Axel wondered, in a vague kind of way, if his cousin’s voices could get any screechier. And if so, which one’s head would explode first?

  Minding the twins was a headache, but it was better than being in the kitchen, where his mum and Aunty Vicki were talking about his dad. Axel didn’t want to hear Aunty Vicki talk about ‘moving on’ or ‘accepting reality’. He knew, just like his mum knew, that Matt Brayburn was still alive out there somewhere … and that one day, he would come home.

  In his mind, Axel left the screaming and the chaos behind and followed his memory back to the day his father had gone missing.

  Matt Brayburn had gone to pick up some takeaway dinner and had never come back. They had found his car upside-down beside the road, without a scratch on it. It hadn’t rolled or crashed. It was just upside down …

  Amali came flying down the stairs, her long hair streaming behind her like a goth-black comet trail. ‘Axel? Where’s Milo?’

  Axel looked at the toppled-over laundry basket. There was no sign of Milo.

  ‘Oh no. He got out!’

  The kitchen door flew open. ‘Milo’s gone?’ gasped Aunty Vicki. ‘Weren’t you supposed to be watching him?’

  Axel desperately looked around the room. Milo wasn’t hiding behind the TV or mountaineering on the couch. Amali would have seen him if he’d gone upstairs. The glass sliding door to the garden was closed. That only left …

  Axel’s eyes widened in horror as he saw the cellar door standing ajar.

  From the cellar came a piercing squeal – not of fright, but of joy …

  ‘WOBOT!’

  ‘Axel!’ hissed Nedra.

  ‘Wait, Milo! Mummy’s coming!’ shouted Aunty Vicki.

  She lunged for the cellar door, but Axel got there first. He ran down the steps.

  There, under a bare light bulb, with the pulled-back curtain in his hand and a huge grin on his face, was Milo.

  ‘Mummy, look! I found a weally big WOBOT!’ Milo shouted. ‘He’s ’normous! I want to play wiv him!’

  Axel could see all the way through to the secret den. BEAST was cowering right at the back, his eyes flickering apologetically.

  ‘He’s found one of Axel’s old toys, I think,’ said Aunty Vicki from the top of the stairs. ‘Some sort of robot.’

  ‘Toy robot? I want it!’ yelled Hunter.

  ‘No, me!’ yelled Sara.

  ‘Iss NOT a toy,’ Milo shouted, and stamped his foot. ‘Iss a BIG wobot. I maked him happy. I want to plaaaay wiv him.’

  BEAST looked at Axel in a pleading way. Axel noticed that BEAST had a smile drawn on his face, in what looked like red crayon.

  ‘What’s going on down there?’ asked Aunty Vicki suspiciously.

  She started down the cellar steps.

  With one swift motion, Axel grabbed Milo with one hand and tugged the curtain closed with the other. He lifted his little cousin up and gave him a hug. An idea had popped into his brain.

  ‘Come on. Let’s go and tell everyone about the big robot.’

  ‘Yay!’ said Milo.

  Aunty Vicki and the cousins all looked on with curious faces as Axel came back through the cellar door holding Milo in his arms.

  ‘We’ve got something amazing to share with you. You all have to keep it top secret. There’s a giant robot in the cellar,’ he told them in a whisper. ‘It’s black and green, and its eyes light up.’

  ‘Yess!’ said Milo happily.

  Kyle rolled his eyes and went back outside.

  Aunty Vicki gave Axel a slow, understanding smile. ‘Well! Aren’t you lucky to have a giant robot! Does he have a death ray?’

  ‘Oh, no,’ said Axel. ‘He doesn’t want to hurt anyone. He’s a nice robot, isn’t he, Milo?’

  ‘I fink he must be,’ Milo said thoughtfully.

  Hunter and Sara looked disgusted. ‘It’s just a stupid game they’re playing,’ Sara said. ‘There’s no robot.’ She flung herself back on the couch.

  Vicki took Milo back from Axel’s arms and kissed his head. ‘He’s really good with the little on
es, isn’t he, Neds?’ she said to her sister. ‘He’s got Milo entranced!’

  ‘Yeah, Axel’s always had a brilliant imagination,’ said Nedra. She and Axel shared a that-was-too-close look.

  ‘He’ll make a great dad one day, eh?’ said Vicki. ‘Got a girlfriend yet, Ax?’

  ‘I don’t think Axel’s dating decisions are any of our business,’ said Nedra, her jaw tight.

  Axel’s phone pinged.

  ‘Excuse me,’ he said, relieved to get away from the conversation.

  Out in the front garden he saw who had messaged him and his heart lurched. It was Agent Omega, his undercover friend at Grabbem Industries.

  Axel. Need U + BST 2 get 2 Foxley Woods right away. Will explain l8r.

  Omega

  P.S. Can U learn how to read Japanese in the next 10 mins?

  Foxley Woods was a spooky little scrap of woodland just outside of town. It was the kind of place where only teenagers and lost hikers ever went. Using GOPHER, BEAST’s tunnelling underground form, Axel reached it in minutes.

  They burst up from the ground into a wide clearing. Overhead, the sky was growing dark, and the thick tree cover made the clearing even darker. There wasn’t another human being in sight.

  Axel’s neck hair prickled with anticipation.

  A ghostly green light appeared, shining between the trees. Something big was out there, and it was coming their way. Axel held his breath as he watched it come into view.

  It was a craft of some kind, shaped like a white ball with round windows in its sides, and with dozens of drooping metal tentacles hanging down from underneath.

  It hovered in eerie silence and then drifted towards them like a jellyfish. As it came closer, Axel realised it was big enough to swallow BEAST whole.

  ‘What is that?’ he whispered.

  ‘I CANNOT MOVE,’ said BEAST. ‘UNKNOWN CRAFT IS TAKING OVER MY CIRCUITS!’

  Axel grabbed the controls and tried to pull BEAST back, away from the oncoming apparition. But the robot wouldn’t budge … and now the hovering ball-thing started rising above them, like a balloon. Axel saw there was a hole in the bottom of it, among the tentacles.

  ‘Stay calm,’ said a voice over BEAST’s communicator. ‘This is all part of the standard docking procedure.’

  ‘Agent Omega!’ Axel said in relief. ‘Is that you in there?’

  The ball-craft descended slowly, then stopped, hovering above them. Tentacles latched on to BEAST’s limbs. Next moment, all of his energy levels began to rise.

  ‘OOH,’ BEAST said happily. ‘THAT TICKLES.’

  As they were drawn up into the ship, Axel saw Agent Omega standing by a guardrail, waving at him.

  ‘Welcome on board,’ said Agent Omega. ‘Hope I didn’t alarm you just now.’

  The opening beneath them hissed shut. BEAST’s chest panel popped open by itself. Agent Omega reached out a hand to Axel and helped him onto the walkway. The craft was small, but its entire inner surface was covered with screens, readouts and technical gadgetry.

  ‘This beauty is called the MOT-BOL,’ Omega said. ‘Not much of a name, I know. It stands for Mobile Observation, Tactics and Battle Optimisation Laboratory. I’ve borrowed it from Grabbem.’

  ‘Borrowed?’ Axel laughed.

  ‘On a permanent basis,’ said Omega with a grin. ‘The MOT-BOL is an experimental mobile repair and prep craft for shifters like BEAST here. We can use it to take him places, recharge his power cells, and even repair him if he gets damaged.’

  Axel couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Agent Omega this happy. ‘So you’ll be coming with us on missions now? Won’t Grabbem get suspicious if you’re gone for too long?’

  ‘I’m on extended leave,’ said Omega, grinning even wider. ‘According to Grabbem’s computers, which I wouldn’t dream of hacking, I’ve gone down with the Manticorian flu. Highly contagious.’

  He tapped on a keyboard built into the wall. A blue light lit up with a ping and a compartment opened with a puff of super-cold vapour. Inside were two cans of fizzy drink. He passed one to Axel and took the other himself.

  ‘We can use the MOT-BOL to deploy BEAST anywhere in the world,’ he explained. ‘You won’t need to use SHARKOS and SKYHAWK as much now, and you’ll have a bolthole to retreat to when you’re on missions.’

  ‘Meatball,’ said Axel thoughtfully.

  ‘Say what?’

  ‘It’s round. It has all that metal spaghetti underneath. It’s not a MOT-BOL, it’s a Meatball!’

  Agent Omega stroked his chin. ‘Meatball. I like it.’

  ‘So,’ said Axel, sipping his drink, ‘why did you ask me to learn to read Japanese? I didn’t, by the way.’

  ‘Because we’re going to Japan.’ Agent Omega’s smile vanished. He slowly pushed a lever, and the Meatball hummed up into the sky. ‘To a place where no living person has set foot in years. They call it Ghost Island.’

  Agent Omega folded a panel down from the wall and motioned for Axel to do the same. The panel turned into a padded seat. Axel boggled at how neatly everything fit away inside the Meatball. There was probably a dining table in here somewhere. Complete with an eighteen-piece dinner set.

  ‘Get comfortable,’ Omega said. ‘I’m going to tell you a story.’

  ‘ARE THERE GHOSTS IN IT?’ asked BEAST, with a tiny quiver in his voice.

  ‘We’ll come to that. Once upon a time, a brilliant scientist called Doctor Minamoto invented an experimental reactor, the Phoenix. It turned matter into energy. Though it was no bigger than this drink can, it was so crazy-effective it could turn one grain of rice into enough electricity to power a city for a week.’

  Axel said, ‘Whoa. I bet Grabbem would love to get their hands on that.’

  ‘Them and me both! However, the Phoenix had one big problem. It was unstable, and it was hungry. The more energy it produced, the more it wanted. If it was left running, it would soon start to suck in everything around it and turn that into energy, too. The result … boom.’

  ‘BIG BOOM,’ echoed Axel.

  ‘Exactly. So the Phoenix Reactor was sealed in a vault and buried deep underground in a secret location.’

  Agent Omega drew Axel’s attention to a screen across from them. It showed a lonely looking island in the middle of a grey sea.

  ‘Zoom in,’ commanded Omega.

  The view suddenly showed a deserted city, stretching out into the distance. Towering, empty buildings overlooked silent streets. There were cars in the streets, but none of them moved. The city seemed frozen in time.

  ‘Ghost Island used to be a mining station. A city grew above the ground, where thousands of workers and their families lived. But then it was abandoned,’ said Agent Omega. ‘The official reason was some kind of radiation leak, but people soon started to tell other stories. Like the one about the ghostly monster.’

  ‘CAN AGENT OMEGA TELL US A DIFFERENT STORY, PLEASE?’ said BEAST. His ear-antennae drooped and he looked scared.

  ‘Sorry, BEAST. We need to hear this,’ said Axel.

  Agent Omega went on: ‘Apparently the mines were dug too deep and they disturbed some kind of radioactive dragon-ghost-monster-thing, and that’s why everyone bailed. Now, I think that story’s faker than a rubber chicken. They made it up just to scare people away. Because …’

  ‘Because Ghost Island is where the Phoenix Reactor is buried!’ yelled Axel.

  Agent Omega nodded. ‘Just a few hours ago I decoded an email from Gus Grabbem Senior himself, the big cheese at Grabbem Industries. Their spies have found out that Doctor Minamoto buried the Phoenix somewhere on – or under – Ghost Island. They’re going to try to steal it.’

  ‘And we need to get to the reactor before Grabbem do,’ Axel finished. ‘Got it. You think you can handle this mission, BEAST?’

  ‘I SUPPOSE,’ said BEAST, without much enthusiasm.

  Agent Omega clapped his hands and rubbed them together. ‘Now we’re talking. We’ll be at Ghost Island in twenty minutes. Just enough tim
e for me to fit BEAST with a detector that will guide you to the Phoenix Reactor. And there’s one other thing, of course.’

  ‘What other thing?’ asked Axel.

  ‘New apps,’ said Agent Omega. ‘Five brand-new forms for you and BEAST to use. And I think you’re going to love ’em.’

  He pulled a thick cable down from the MOT-BOL’s curved ceiling and plugged it into the back of BEAST’s neck. BEAST’s eyes went wobbly as a flood of data suddenly poured into his system.

  ‘Much quicker to do it this way,’ said Omega.

  As they travelled, Omega explained what the new apps were. ELASTO would give BEAST the power to stretch out his arms and legs, as if he were made of chewing gum. (‘I’m not sure how far BEAST can stretch,’ warned Omega, ‘so don’t overdo it.’) ARACHNON was a spider form, which could climb up vertical surfaces with ease and shoot web-lines to use as grappling ropes or entangle enemies. It would use up much less energy than flying all the time. SWARMER was a fast-moving missile launcher, capable of firing dozens of micromissiles – ‘like regular missiles, only smaller’ – with pinpoint accuracy. GALAHAD was a fighting form like OGRE, except GALAHAD equipped one of BEAST’s arms with a shield and the other with a sword.

  ‘Isn’t that a bit, er, medieval?’ Axel asked doubtfully.

  ‘That shield will bounce energy beams right back, and that sword will open up a tank like a can of beans,’ pointed out Agent Omega. ‘Now, here’s your last app: BLINKER. Best not to use this one except in a real emergency. It’s highly experimental. Can you guess what it does?’

  ‘Blinks?’ Axel guessed.

  ‘Cute. Blinking is what Grabbem scientists call short-range teleporting. You’ll be able to disappear and reappear anywhere within thirty metres.’

  ‘Whoa!’

  ‘Impressive, I know. Just don’t teleport into anything solid, like a wall. That could be messy.’

  The hum from the MOT-BOL’s engines died down to silence.

  ‘We’re here,’ said Omega. ‘Welcome to Ghost Island.’

  Axel climbed back into BEAST and braced himself for whatever would come next.

  ‘I’ll hide the Meatball above the clouds,’ said Agent Omega. ‘Be careful. Grabbem are probably here already, and they may be expecting you …’