Revenge of the Tiki Men! (3 page)

“The laboratory is straight ahead in the big room,” Mike said. “It's where all the research and stuff happens. Where they find the answers to scientific questions.”

“That sure sounds good,” said Liz, rushing ahead. “Answers to questions. Because I sure have lots of questions.”

But when the kids entered the vast laboratory, things didn't look good.

The first thing they saw was Mr. and Mrs. Mazur scribbling lots of words all over a large chalkboard. Actually, they were scribbling one word lots of times.

The word was—
Help!

“Uh-oh,” Liz said, turning to Mike and making a face. “Something tells me your parents are still working on the answers.”

Mr. and Mrs. Mazur waved cheerfully and kept scribbling. Behind them—
nnnnng!
—a huge complicated piece of machinery was whirring and chugging in a back corner of the laboratory.

Next to the machine stood Liz's father, Kramer Duffey. He was dressed in a leather jacket and field pants. A bullwhip hung on his belt, and a length of rope was coiled on his shoulder.

“Cool!” Mike whispered. “His outfit is so great.”

Liz ran over. “Dad, giant Tiki heads are coming up everywhere! And there's a weird guy named Buddy Kool—”

“With a K!” Mike added. “He's doing weird stuff, and whenever he snaps his fingers—”

“These guys dressed like walking plants start to pound their huge sticks—” added Holly.

“They're called Mango Men,” Jeff cut in, “and they dance and flap these big floppy leaves—”

“And then the Tiki men's weird eyes go real bright and silver,” said Sean, “and that's when the jungle happens and—”

Mr. Duffey looked from Liz to Mike to Holly to Jeff to Sean and back again while he listened. When they were done, he shook his head slowly in silence. He looked over at Mr. and Mrs. Mazur, who had stopped writing on the board.

“It's exactly like the old legend!” he said.

Mr. Mazur nodded and pushed his glasses up his nose. “Actually, yes.” He rolled a nib of chalk between his fingers. “Quite strange, too, this jungle effect. For, in fact, Grover's Mill was a dense tropical jungle centuries ago.”

“Centuries ago,” said Mr. Duffey. “That's the past.”

“At that time,” Mrs. Mazur continued, “the town was completely surrounded by water. All that's left of that ocean is Lake Lake.”

Liz stood there, stunned. She narrowed her eyes. “Uh … the old legend? What old legend?”

“Oh, you know,” said her father. “The one that says that giant Tiki men would pop up everywhere one day and make our town a jungle.”

“No,” said Liz. “No, I didn't know.”

Mr. Duffey looked shocked. He turned to Mr. and Mrs. Mazur. They shrugged. “Oops!” Mr. Duffey said. “I guess we forgot to tell you kids. But no one ever thought it would really happen! I mean, wouldn't that be just a little
weird?”

Ching!
The big machine suddenly stopped making noises and spat out a little strip of paper. “Ah!” said Mr. Duffey, his face brightening.

“But the Tiki men will go away, right?” asked Mike.

His parents shrugged. “Sorry, son,” his mother said. “We can't remember that part.”

Liz started to pace the giant room. “Let me get this straight. We don't really know why the Tiki men came up from under the ground?”

“That's right,” Mr. Duffey nodded.

“But we have to stop them?” Liz said.

“That's the easy part!” he replied. “And all because of this!” Mr. Duffey held up the little strip of paper that had come from the big machine.

Mike frowned at the paper. “What do we do, fold it really tight and hit them with it?”

Mr. Duffey shook his head. “No, that wouldn't work. Using this big fancy device we have located the famous
Tiki Key,
the ancient stone tablet with all the answers! It'll tell us everything we need to know to stop these big old stone heads.”

Liz looked at the sheet of paper her father held. “And where is this incredible Tiki Key?”

“Actually, that is where science steps in.” Mr. Mazur flipped over the chalkboard to reveal a map of Grover's Mill. He took the paper from Liz's father and drew an X on the map.

“I knew it,” Liz gasped. “The baseball field!”

“It's buried in one of the caves under the field,” Mr. Duffey said. “All we have to do is leave here, hack through the jungle, get to the ball field, find the right hole, climb in, dig up the stone, bring it up, dust it off, read what it says, translate it, do what it says, and the Tiki men should be a thing of the past.”

“That's all, huh?” Liz muttered.

“Actually, the Tiki men
are
a thing of the past, ha, ha,” Mr. Mazur said. “That's a little, ah, science joke.”

“But you're sure this will work?” Mike asked.

Mr. Duffey shrugged. “If it doesn't, it's the end of civilization as we know it.”

Thurrrlp!
All of a sudden, they could hear vines and shrubs and trees slithering up the sides of the building.

“The jungle is getting closer!” Jeff said. “The vines are all around us!”

KA—RRRRUNCH!

Instantly, the massive double doors of the museum burst into splinters!

And the jungle poured in!

6

The Deep Dark Pit

THURRRLP!
The jungle took over the laboratory in an instant. Long slithery vines barreled across the floor, instantly trapping Mr. Duffey and Mr. and Mrs. Mazur against the back wall. “Ouch!” they cried.

“Dad!” Liz cried out, running to her father.

“No! You kids get out of here,” he yelled back. “Find the you-know-what and stop the you-know-who! Here!” He threw his climbing rope to Mike. “Save our town!”

“Come on!” Liz called to her friends. “We're the only hope!”

But Jeff and Sean bumped into each other, trying to be first to the back door.

“Ooof! Some hope we are!” Jeff muttered, as thick vines quickly swirled around him and pinned him against the chalkboard next to Sean.

Holly dived past, but a giant flower closed on her legs, holding her down. “Holy Zabajaba!” she cried. “This is crazy!”

Within seconds they were all trapped.

“Save yourselves!” Sean yelled bravely to Mike and Liz, swinging his bat. “But if you don't come back for us, we'll never play baseball with you again! Now go!”

Liz looked at Mike. Mike looked at Liz. There didn't seem to be any choice.

“We're out of here!” Mike said, pulling Liz by the arm and slipping out the back door. “But we'll be back, you can count on it!”

“Please, no more math!” Sean mumbled.

Liz and Mike skittered along a narrow hallway and out the rear door of the museum into the thickening jungle. They ran for a long time.

“Wait up,” Mike murmured, slowing to catch his breath. “I think we're lost.”

“We're not lost,” Liz snorted, looking into the dense greenery and trying to feel brave. “I just don't know where we are.”

Mike gave her a look. “Isn't that the same—”

“Shhh!” she hissed. “I hear something.”

Mike crouched next to her. “Pounding?”

“No,” Liz whispered, “singing.”

With a little grass shack for an office,
And a bamboo desk for two,
We could learn what goofing off is
Like, just me and you.

Liz pulled aside a thick wall of vines and peeked through. “It's … Mr. Bell! Uh, hello, sir!”

Mr. Leonard Bell, principal of W. Reid Elementary School, always wore a suit. Now he was dressed in a grass suit, with a grass necklace around his neck. Assistant principal Miss Lieberman was dressed the same. They were pushing their way through the thick jungle.

“Ahem! Children!” boomed the principal, resting his hands on his hips. “Have either of you two young students seen my house?”

“What color is it, sir?” asked Liz, trying to be helpful.

“Green,” the principal answered.

Mike looked at Liz, then beyond her at the thick green growth all around. “Sorry, tough color. But can you tell us where school is from here?”

“We need to get there fast,” Liz added.

Mr. Bell brightened. “Ah, excellent. Good to see your enthusiasm for your school. It is, after all, only another seventy-two and one-quarter days until we reopen.”

“Our school is one-eighth of a mile in that direction,” said Miss Lieberman, pointing up ahead. “Between the twelve-and-a-half-foot waterfall and the one-third-acre alligator swamp.”

The principal beamed. “Ah, the wonder of fractions! A summer math program would be a splendid way to spend the summer, hmm? Well, let us go, Miss Lieberman. Much to do!”

In a moment Principal Bell and Miss Lieberman were gone.

“Our school is between a waterfall and a swamp?” Liz breathed. “Mike, this is really getting me down.”

They pushed on, right into a crowd of shouting people.

“My husband is stuck in those branches!” screamed one woman, rushing through the trees. She pointed up to a man wearing a barbecue apron. “And he's so afraid of heights!”

“Put me down!” the man screamed. He swatted a long vine with a burger spatula.

“I found my car,” cried another man, jingling his keys wildly. “But where's my garage?”

“Why must I have Tiki men in my town?” shrieked Mr. Sweeney, the janitor of W. Reid Elementary.

A moment later the crowd rushed by and the jungle grew quiet once again.

“Come on,” Mike said. “We're not far now.”

They were out of breath when they finally reached the school baseball field.

The field was totally overgrown and full of open pits and caves. The giant Tiki man stood tall and silent over what used to be home plate.

“It's like some weird jungle adventure movie,” Mike said, breathing hard.

“Except that you can leave a movie.” Liz sighed. “I don't know if we'll ever get out of this one, Mike. I mean, the way things are going, this could be our last adventure.”

“Never say that!” Mike looked at her. “It'll take more than big stone heads and guys with sticks to stop us. Even though I have to admit this is pretty much the strangest day I've had for a long time.”

“Yeah. Non-weird, it's definitely not.” Liz cracked a smile as she pulled out the strip of paper the machine at the lab had spat out. She stepped over to a hole near third base. It was dark. Liz couldn't see the bottom, but she felt as if the pit was calling to her. “Mike, I think this is where the Tiki Key is buried.”

“What if we can't read the message?” Mike said.

“Well, we have to try,” Liz said. Looking down into the pit, her head felt light. Her stomach did flips. The deep dark pit was very deep and very dark.

“You know how I hate deep dark holes,” she reminded Mike. “And I really don't want to get stuck down there. But having your town turn into a jungle is beyond weird. We have to stop all this craziness.”

“Before it stops us,” Mike said as he uncoiled her father's rope.

Liz tied one end around her waist. “My dad says archaeology is a science that helps you keep both feet firmly on the ground!”

Liz's two feet left the ground as Mike lowered her into the pit. She swallowed hard.

Errrk!
She dangled lower and lower on the rope.

The pit got narrower as she descended.

Her elbows scraped the sides.

“I really really hate this!” Liz yelled.

7

Trapped, Captured, Caught!

“T
he things I do for my town!” Liz shouted up to Mike. Finally, she reached the bottom of the pit and started to scrape around in the dirt.

Tap-tap!
“Hey, there
is
something here. Something flat and smooth.” Liz scraped some more.

“The Tiki Key?” asked Mike. “Does it tell us what to do?”

“I don't know yet,” Liz yelled back. “Wait, yes. It's got markings all over it. I've got it! Hoist me up!”

“We're saved!” cried Mike, as he quickly pulled Liz back to the surface. “Yahoo!”

At the top of the pit, Liz dusted herself and Mike dusted the strange flat stone.

“Wait a minute, you can't read any of this stuff,” Mike complained. “It's just a bunch of wavy lines.”

Liz examined the stone then flipped it over. “Maybe this picture will give us a clue. A big triangle shape with a spiral over it. What could it mean?”

“Hey, your dad's the archaeologist,” Mike said, crouching next to her.

Liz traced the lines on the stone. “It looks like a map. This line goes from the ball field to the top of Main Street. And then it goes to my house. Exactly where the Tiki men have been popping up. They're making a triangle around the town.”

“But what do they want?” Mike asked.

Liz was quiet for a moment. “They want Grover's Mill! They want it like it used to be. The past, the jungle, everything. They want it back!”

Mike thought about it. “So it's true. When the Mango Maniacs pound the ground with their sticks and do their crazy dance, the Tiki men pop up.”

Liz nodded. “Remember how I pounded home plate this morning? That's what started all this. It's like some kind of ancient knock-knock.”

“Only not so funny,” Mike said.

“Right,” Liz said, looking at the stone again. “And the Tiki men have weird ancient powers in their eyes that can turn things back into a jungle. Back to the way they were centuries ago.”

“That's the past,” Mike said with a smile.

Liz nodded. “They made the jungle come back. Why? Because they want to live here again.”

Mike was silent as he took in what Liz said.

She, too, wondered what it meant to go back to the beginning of time. A total jungle world. Green everywhere. Her least favorite color. She turned the stone over. “We need to find out what these words mean. Maybe we can bring our town back to normal, I mean … well, you know what I mean.”