Hamstersaurus Rex vs. the Cutepocalypse Read online

  With a deafening roar, Hamstersaurus Rex somersaulted out of my backpack and landed between the Snuzzle and me. The little guy was ready to defend me at any cost!

  “DESTWOY,” repeated the Snuzzle.

  At the same instant, Hamstersaurus Rex and the Snuzzle charged. They smashed into each other with a horrendous crunching clang. The Snuzzle bit down on Hammie’s leg with its mechanical mouth. Meanwhile Hammie clawed at the thing with his back feet, stripping away clumps of fake fur and revealing plastic and metal underneath.

  “Mr. Lomax!” I yelled. “I think your Snuzzle might be, um, defective?”

  There was no response.

  CRASH! Hammie and the Snuzzle, still locked in mortal combat, had toppled the divider between aisle six and aisle seven. Dozens of Debbie Future dolls went flying everywhere. With his powerful dino-jaws, Hammy chomped right through Snuzzle’s rubbery left ear. Sparks shot out of the hole in its head. The Snuzzle picked up a die-cast metal fire truck and bashed Hamstersaurus Rex across the face with it, knocking him woozy. Hammie staggered.

  I heard a furious squeak from my open backpack. It was Stompy, peeking out, her tiny eyes filled with rage.

  “No, Stompy!” I said. “Your dad’s got this! Stay in the backpack!”

  “DESTWOY,” said the Snuzzle as it leaped into the air and landed on Hammie’s back. “DESTWOY . . . DESTWOY . . . DESTWOY . . .” It jumped up and down on his limp body, pummeling him into the linoleum. It was starting to look like maybe Hamstersaurus Rex didn’t, in fact, have this.

  “Gooboo, stop!” I yelled. “I . . . voice command you! Leave him alone!”

  The Snuzzle paid me no attention. Fine, so much for that feature. On the box it also showed that the Snuzzle had an “on/off” switch hidden under a flap on its back. I ducked in and somehow managed to flick the switch on the first try. Nothing happened. The switch didn’t work. What the heck? Meanwhile, the Snuzzle was still using Hamstersaurus Rex as a trampoline.

  I looked around for a weapon. Foam pool noodle? No. Plastic samurai sword? No. Pretend pizza cutter? No! Turns out a toy store isn’t the easiest place to arm yourself to fight an evil robot. I grabbed my best option—a jumbo plush banana wearing a beret—and swung it with all my strength. The banana blow sent it clattering across the toy store floor. All right!

  The Snuzzle was back on its feet in an instant. It picked up a Max Stomper: Arctic Detective action figure and hurled it at me. I just managed to duck, but the toy almost took my head off! The Snuzzle grabbed another Max Stomper.

  Just then—plink—a tiny shape kicked the Snuzzle from behind. It was Stompy, snarling and baring her teeth in a pretty good impression of her dad. She kicked the Snuzzle again. Slowly the Snuzzle’s head turned 180 degrees with a grinding mechanical creak.

  “DESTWOY,” it said.

  RRRRRROOOOOARRRR! With a terrifying roar that set off several car alarms outside, Hamstersaurus Rex hit the Snuzzle like a freight train. The Snuzzle pinwheeled through the air, ricocheted off a light fixture, and made a faint crashing sound somewhere on the opposite end of the toy store.

  “Wow! That was a super dino mega-attack the likes of which I’ve never seen before!” I said. “Power level unlocked!”

  But Hamstersaurus Rex didn’t look triumphant or even angry. He looked scared. He clutched Stompy close to him as his eyes darted around, wary of danger.

  I ran down the aisle to see what had happened to the Snuzzle. From what I could tell, it had flown all the way to the front near the register and . . .

  “Oh no,” I said.

  The Gamehouser APEX 720-X3 with Seven-Game Bundle box had been flattened like an accordion by the impact. But where was the Snuzzle?

  Slowly, I peered over the counter. Lying in a pile of dust and loose toys on the floor was Gooboo. After the battle, the cute little creature was quite a gruesome sight: half its face had been ripped off, exposing the bare metal beneath. Smoke curled from its empty left eye socket. The eye itself was dangling from a few wires. The Snuzzle wasn’t moving.

  “I was in the bathroom for five minutes!”

  I turned to see Mr. Lomax. His mouth was hanging open. There were dolls and action figures everywhere, toppled aisles, and broken display racks.

  “Mr. Lomax!” I said. “A toy went nuts and tried to kill us!”

  “Us?” said Mr. Lomax.

  “Me and Ham— Doesn’t matter,” I said. “Anyway, it’s right here. It’s called a Snuzzle!”

  “Snuzzle?” said Mr. Lomax. “Impossible!”

  “Please!” I cried. “Just look!” I pointed behind the counter right to where the Snuzzle wasn’t.

  Mr. Lomax moaned as he took in more of the destruction. “You turned that Gamehouser APEX 720-X3 with Seven-Game Bundle into a piece of modern art,” he said, burying his face in his hands. “And not the kind I like, with the soup cans!”

  “Wait. No,” I said, looking around desperately. “The Snuzzle’s got to be here.”

  From the corner of my eye, I saw the store’s front door swing closed as if someone or something had just exited.

  “There!” I cried. “Gooboo is getting away!” I started to run but Mr. Lomax caught me by the sleeve.

  “Oh no you don’t, son,” said Mr. Lomax. “You’re not going anywhere. A crime has been committed here.”

  “What?” I said. “But I didn’t do this. That Snuzzle has a major malfunction. On the box it should say ‘Ages Never and Up’!”

  “Maybe technically you didn’t do this,” said Mr. Lomax. “But your weird little hamsters did!”

  He pointed down at what was left of aisle seven. There stood Hamstersaurus Rex, with Stompy, Chompy, Hatshepsut, and Cartimandua behind him.

  “I see you’ve raised an army of them now, bent on my destruction!” he said. “Revenge for telling you not to steal mints!”

  “Okay, that’s a tad dramatic,” I said. “Don’t you have security cameras or something? Can we just go to the tape?”

  Once Mr. Lomax was confident that my “army of evil hamsters” were properly restrained (i.e., back in my backpack), we did go to the tape. The store security cameras were linked to the old computer Mr. Lomax had by the register. But thanks to the ancient system—with its grainy low-res cameras pointed at odd angles—the video simply looked like Hamstersaurus Rex trashed the place for no reason.

  “This footage is terrible,” I said. “My UltraLite SmartShot can record at twice the resolution of these antiques you’re using—”

  “First you smash up my store, then you insult my security cameras! Such disrespect,” said Mr. Lomax, shaking his head. “Son, I am now going to call the appropriate authorities, and you and your hamster vandal gang will face the full judgment of the law.” He reached for the phone on his desk.

  “Wait!” I said. It was bad enough when Hamstersaurus Rex had to tangle with Maple Bluffs Animal Control, but I had no desire for the real police to get involved. “Mr. Lomax, I promise I’ll make this right!”

  He paused.

  “I’ll help you clean up the store,” I said. “See, look at this.” I picked up a stuffed armadillo and put it back on the rack.

  “Oh wow, thanks so much, Mr. Good Samaritan,” said Mr. Lomax. “But that’s not enough. Look at all the stuff your attack hamster broke.” Mr. Lomax gestured to the toy carnage. “I can’t run an unprofitable toy store when all my inventory has been destroyed.”

  “Well, maybe I could pay you back . . . somehow,” I said. “Like maybe I could work here part-time, after school?”

  “You think I want to spend more time with you?” said Mr. Lomax. “Read the room, son!”

  I winced. “Then I’ll just get you the money. But the thing is . . . I kind of blew my birthday cash two weeks ago. On an oversized slingshot.”

  “Did you purchase it here?” said Mr. Lomax. He pointed to a whole aisle of oversized slingshots.

  “No,” I said quietly. “Online.”

  “The indignities never end,” said Mr. L
omax, shaking his head.

  “In my defense, it was three dollars cheaper,” I mumbled.

  “That’s it,” said Mr. Lomax. “You obviously have no conscience, and now I really am calling the cops!” He grabbed the phone and started to dial. “Enjoy jail!”

  “I’ll pay you back,” I cried. “I promise!”

  He slowly put the receiver back down. “You have two weeks,” said Mr. Lomax. “And I want it in writing.” He pushed a pad of paper and a pen in my direction.

  I sighed and wrote out the following sentence, as dictated by Mr. Lomax: “I, Sam Gibbs, promise to pay Tenth Street Toys back for all the toys that got broken.” I signed it and handed it back to him. It wasn’t fair. But when you’re a kid, turns out a lot of things aren’t.

  “Okay then,” said Mr. Lomax. “That three dollars you saved by not supporting local businesses can be your first down payment on the $627.14 you owe me.” He held out his hand.

  “Six hundred dollars?” I said with a gasp. I felt like I might throw up, or faint, or both, a couple of times.

  “No. Not six hundred dollars,” said Mr. Lomax. “Six hundred twenty-seven dollars and fourteen cents: $499.99 for the Gamehouser APEX 720-X3 with Seven-Game Bundle, $55.56 for the eight broken Debbie Future dolls, $61.98 for the two smashed Bathtime Blitzers RC Submarines with Realistic Periscope Action, and last but not least, $9.61 for the Max Stomper: Arctic Detective action figure that you somehow managed to embed in the ceiling!”

  He pointed up. Sure enough, Max Stomper’s muscular legs protruded from a hole above us.

  “Oh,” said Mr. Lomax. “And one fifty for the mints.”

  “But there’s no realistic way I can come up with that kind of money,” I said. “I’m a child. I don’t have a job. The only time I get money is birthdays and major holidays. And even if it was my birthday, I usually only get forty dollars from my grandparents. At that rate, I’ll be twenty-eight before I can pay you back.”

  “Interesting,” said Mr. Lomax. “This contract you just signed says you have two weeks. Now let’s see that three bucks, kid.”

  I reached into my pocket and started counting out coins. . . .

  “And that’s when I gave him $2.89 in change,” I said.

  “Awesome,” said Dylan.

  Hamstersaurus Rex squinted at her.

  “How is that awesome?” I said. “Were you even listening?”

  “Huh? No,” said Dylan. “I was talking about Drew’s sweater. I think it’s awesome. And also totally rad.”

  I gritted my teeth. “Those are synonyms.”

  Indeed, Dylan and Drew McCoy had changed into their matching sweaters before the party as promised. They were yellow with little turquoise whales all over them.

  “Ever wonder who came up with sleeves?” said Drew, ignoring me as he admired his own. “I bet they’re superrich.”

  Dylan nodded.

  I tried not to make a face. “Anyway, guys, long story short: I apparently owe Tenth Street Toys over six hundred dollars and there’s also a deadly malfunctioning toy on the loose. So much for closing out sixth grade without any more drama.”

  “It’s a tragedy,” said Martha.

  “Thank you,” I said. “Finally, a little sympathy.”

  “I’m not talking about you fighting the Snuzzle,” said Martha. “I’m talking about this.” She held up a sheet of paper full of numbers in columns. “I swung by the office to give Principal Truitt her birthday card—”

  “Of course,” said Dylan.

  “—and I learned my official grade point average is 3.99.”

  “Okay,” I said, confused. “That’s . . . good?”

  “No, it isn’t!” said Martha.

  “It isn’t?” I said. “Well, who cares?”

  “I cares!” said Martha. She suddenly cupped both hands over her mouth. “For the first time in my life I just made a grammatical mistake. Oh no. Everything I’ve worked for, it’s starting to spiral out of control.”

  “Martha, how could you possibly have less than 4.0?” said Dylan. “Grades are like your disc golf.”

  “I don’t know!” said Martha, grabbing Dylan by the sweater. “It must be a clerical error. But I’ve already talked to Principal Truitt, and the superintendent, and the governor’s office, and nobody can give me a straight answer!”

  “Calm down,” I said. “Don’t they just toss out all our middle school grades when we go to high school anyway?”

  Martha glared at me. “How dare you, Sam,” she said. “How dare you.”

  “Look, I see that you’re pretty upset,” I said, “but just to reiterate: a fuzzy superstrong cyborg literally tried to murder me.”

  “Sounds like it could be huge,” said Serena Sandoval, who was twirling a lock of her now-green hair while she checked her phone. After her article blew up, she persuaded her dad to get her one. Now she was always checking it.

  “That’s what I’m trying to tell you guys!” I said.

  “Sam, do you think a blog post about this could be described as ‘shareable content’?” said Serena, now taking notes in her notes app.

  “Uh. I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe? Yeah, maybe you could use your blog to, like, help investigate! I know you’ve been looking to do a follow-up to the SmilesCorp story and it’s been a few—”

  “I know how long it’s been!” said Serena, with a touch of panic in her voice. “I’m pursuing a number of angles. Running down various leads. Journalism takes time. Things are really coming together. Anyway, what I need is a story that really engages the reader, and people like to share videos. Is there video?”

  “Well, the quality of the store’s security footage was bad,” I said. “You couldn’t tell what was going on. All choppy and pixelated.”

  “Hmm,” said Serena. “No video. Not great. Maybe we could get by on the strength of a snappy yet slightly misleading headline?”

  “What do you mean?” I said.

  “This Little Boy Walked into a Toy Store Hoping for a Miracle. You’ll Never Believe What Happened Next,” said Serena.

  “I wasn’t hoping for a miracle,” I said. “And I’m not—I’m slightly shorter than the average American male sixth grader. You can check the stats on that!”

  “You’re a shrimp,” said Beefer, walking toward us in his rumpled oversized suit. He stuffed a piece of cake into his mouth.

  “Beefer, it’s your special day,” I said, gritting my teeth. “So I’m not going to hit you with a sick comeback about which sea creature you happen to resemble. Mazel tov, buddy.”

  “Probably an awesome shark with sunglasses on,” said Beefer, shoveling more cake into his mouth. The ceremonial part of the bar mitzvah was over and now it was time for the party. The only problem: Dylan, Martha, Serena, Drew, and I were the only ones who showed up! It was a pretty grim celebration. Beefer scanned his empty backyard, festooned with decorations, DJ blaring music. His eyes fell on Drew. “So who invited this guy?”

  “I did,” said Dylan, crossing her arms. “And right now he’s making up sixteen percent of your total guests. So be nice.”

  “’Sup?” said Drew.

  “Dude, I feel like I know you,” said Beefer.

  “Yeah. We went to school together for five and a half years,” said Drew.

  “Is your name . . . Marcus?” said Beefer.

  “No,” said Drew.

  Beefer shrugged. “Agree to disagree,” he said. “Thank you for coming, Martha. It was very infusible of you, m’lady.”

  “You’re welcome, Beefer,” said Martha, still scowling at her transcript. “I wish I could have fun, but I’m too busy fretting.”

  “Cool, cool,” said Beefer.

  “You mind if I film this party for a blog post about sad parties?” asked Serena. She started shooting video of a partially deflated balloon on her smartphone.

  “Don’t do that!” said Beefer. “Things are really going to pick up when my friend Tony gets here. And he’s going to bring his friend . .
. Tony! You’ll see! They’re real!”

  “Wow,” said Serena, filming him. “That was really poignant.”

  “Sam, can I talk to you for a second?” said Beefer, under his breath.

  “Actually,” I said, “I was about to check out that make-your-own-taco station—”

  “Sam needs to go to the bathroom. Very urgent,” said Beefer, grabbing me by the elbow and yanking me to my feet. “We’ll be back soon. You guys continue to have the greatest time of your lives.”

  Martha was still frowning at her grades. Dylan and Drew were admiring each other’s sweaters. Serena was checking her phone.

  Beefer pulled me behind a large boxwood bush. “Sam, this party is a flop and it’s all your fault,” he said.

  “What?” I said. “How could this possibly be my fault?”

  “I don’t know!” said Beefer. “That’s just kind of my go-to when something bad happens! How come I don’t have any friends?”

  “You have . . . your pet boakeet,” I said.

  “Michael Perkins is the greatest and most loyal companion a guy could ask for and he makes your weird gerbil look like a real dud. No offense,” said Beefer. “But I’m talking about human friends.”

  “I don’t know, man,” I said. “Maybe because most of your life you’ve been a violent goon?”

  “Am not a goon! I’ll smash you!” said Beefer, and he slugged me in the arm.

  “Ow,” I said.

  “Sorry, my reflexes kicked in,” said Beefer. “Please, Sam, you have to help me. I can’t bear having another bar mitzvah where nobody shows up.”

  “Wait, don’t you only get the one?” I said.

  “Do I?” said Beefer. He waved his fists at the sky and started to wail: “Oh nooooooo!”

  “Look,” I said. “I don’t even know what you want from me.”

  “I need you to tell me how to be popular like you,” said Beefer. “And since you very rudely didn’t bring me a gift, you owe me this.”

  “Ugh,” I said. “First, I didn’t get you a gift because an evil toy attacked me!”

  “Yeah right,” said Beefer. “I’ve used that excuse a million times.”