Casper Candlewacks in the Attack of the Brainiacs! (14 page)

Nothing.

“Morning, Casper,” yawned Lamp.

“Is it?” Casper's head throbbed when he opened his eyes, so he closed them again. The cellar light had stayed on since Jean-Claude left and with no window, it was impossible to keep track of time.

“Well, it's breakfast time, and breakfast happens in the morning, so it must be morning.”

“If you say so.” Casper had hardly slept last night, much like the night before. This dress made his skin all itchy, he was desperate for the toilet and his mind just couldn't switch off. He lay there, wide awake, watching the ceiling, alert as a full-time coffee taster. All the time Casper was imprisoned in this cellar, Jean-Claude was carrying out his evil plans, whatever they were, and he couldn't do a thing. He'd also remembered in the night about Teresa Louncher, who was most likely still stuck in that locker at school.
Not that we're any better off than her
, he thought.

“I really need a wee.” Lamp rose from his sleeping corner with bleary eyes and hair like a sooty porcupine. “What's for breakfast, then?”

“Eggs or peaches, peaches or eggs. It's all we've got.”

Lamp grabbed two eggs with a sigh and cracked one open on his knee. The first he slurped down in one, and the second he licked slowly like an ice cream.

If Casper had anything in that cellar, it was time. Time and eggs. But mostly time. And in that time he'd rolled the facts over and over in his head so many times, they'd jumbled up like Julius's sock-and-batteries drawer. There were Frenchmen and brainiacs and omelettes and Brewsters, restaurants and stink bombs and egg piles and roosters. (That last one's not strictly true, but ‘hens' doesn't rhyme with ‘Brewsters'.)

The question remained – why had everyone suddenly added the word ‘million' to the end of their IQ? Surely it wasn't a coincidence? The chance of a whole village of idiots suddenly
turning into geniuses was about as likely as winning the lottery while getting hit by an asteroid and a bolt of lightning and being swept into the air by a freak tornado, flying once round the world on the back of a talking cow and landing in your bed with a cowboy hat on.

But the mere fact of the village getting brainier didn't bother Casper in itself. What worried him was what the villagers' new brains were being used for. The food they grew, the drinks they brewed, the machines they built… Jean-Claude was reaping the benefits. And that was the thing that kept Casper wide awake long into what he guessed was the night. However he looked at it, this whole mess came tumbling back to Jean-Claude D'Escargot. Whatever was going on, the grubby little Frenchman couldn't
not
be involved.

But that's the point where Casper had each time hit a brick wall. Jean-Claude was a world-class culinary critic; he lived, breathed and (most importantly) ate food. He'd drunk every wine in the Loire Valley and could identify any cheese from six hundred paces. So why would a man of such status go to the effort of turning a whole village into brainiacs, wait for them to make food-related discoveries, poach the results and palm them off as his own? Unless…

“No…” Casper chuckled to himself, “don't be an idiot.”

“I wasn't!” Lamp was crushing eggshells together in an effort to make a black hole.

“It'd be ridiculous, but…” Casper jumped to his feet. “It makes perfect sense!”

Lamp tossed his eggshells over one shoulder,
his interest finally sparked. “What are you on about, Casper?”

“Seems so obvious now…
Jean-Claude can't cook!
”

Lamp snorted. “Don't be silly. I've eaten his food. It's good. Speshally the omlits.”

“But those are
your
omelettes, Lamp, from
your
omelette gun.”

“Are they?” Lamp squinted. “Oh yeah. But he serves loads of other things. French fries and croissants, and this red stuff with chunky bits.”

“But those are all made with your machines! With food stolen from the villagers. Didn't you see his kitchen? I'll bet Jean-Claude's never picked up a knife in his life.”

“But if he can't cook, then why's he starting a restaurant?”

“For revenge against my dad, Lamp. But he can't do it by himself. You see, Jean-Claude's spent his entire life criticising other people's food, without taking one moment to learn how hard it really is to actually cook it. And that's where you come in.”

Lamp looked at the door. “But I'm already here.”

“No, I mean… how can I put this?” Casper was, both literally and figuratively, treading on eggshells here. “How often do you normally know the answer to a question?”

“I don't know the answer to that question,” said Lamp.

“Right, well, it's not very often.”

“Ooh, I knew that!” Lamp cried, slapping his thigh.

“But then, more recently, you've known everything. And I mean
everything.
‘The Pi Song', tidal patterns in Vietnam, how to read Russian, for goodness' sake. All that boring knowledge isn't really yours.”

Lamp frowned and tapped his head like a squirrel taps a nut. “Well, then, how did it get here?”

“This'll sound mad, Lamp, and I'm sorry,” Casper continued, “but I think Jean-Claude's planted it there. I don't know how he's done it, but you've changed. You and everyone else in this village.”

“Not you, though.”

“No, not me. And not my family or Anemonie Blight, either. Whatever Jean-Claude's done, it hasn't worked on us. But why are we different?
What marks us out from the rest of the village?”

As he racked his brain, Casper's mind touched on something Anemonie had said in the classroom, her eyes squinting scornfully.
As if I'd eat your swill… I'll get my servants to cook my dinner.
Casper gasped, “That's right! Anemonie never ate at
Bistro D'Escargot
. I almost did, but the omelette never touched my lips, and Mum, Dad and Cuddles definitely haven't. We're the only ones who haven't eaten Jean-Claude's food!” Casper clapped his hands victoriously. “So that's what's making you clever! His food!”

“But, but” – Lamp scratched his head furiously – “you're wrong.”

“Sorry, Lamp, I'm not.” Casper was excited now, pacing round the room on the tips of his toes. “The food has made you clever and now
you're inventing at five times your normal speed. Jean-Claude tricked you and now he's got your inventions. Same goes for all the villagers; all they needed to do was to eat his food on Monday, and they did.”

Lamp's face was squished and red. “No, I mean you're wrong. The restaurant opened on Monday night, yes, but geography was Monday morning. I'd not eaten none of Jean-Claude's food, but I still got full marks, remember?”

“Oh…” Lamp's logic felt like a punch to the stomach.

“Maybe my brain just grew. My mum said I was a late bloomer, but I didn't understand because that's about flowers. Now I get what she meant.”

“But you're not a brainiac! You can't be.”

Lamp's face dropped.

“Oh no, I didn't mean—”

“It's OK. I'm stupid.” He turned to face the wall and mumbled, “Three hundred and sixty-seven bricks.”

“Lamp, you know I don't mean that. There's just a difference between being a brainiac and being a genius. You're a genius, Lamp. All your inventions, they shouldn't work by normal logic – sometimes they shouldn't even work by
your
logic – and yet they still do. Nobody else could create them but you. But this brainy stuff, that's new. That's
not you.
” Casper wished the air were less stuffy, that his dress would stop itching, so that just for one second he could think straight. “We need to get out of here.”

Lamp shook his head. “Not possible. The door's locked.”

The boys sat down.

Lamp had an egg.

Lamp had another egg.

Lamp had another egg.

Lamp wet himself.

Hours passed.

Casper searched the walls for loose bricks, but he only found tight ones.

Lamp tried to prise the door open with a hydraulic jack made of wine bottles and frothed egg white, but that just ended up with a big puddle of wine and a sticky door. “It's no use,” huffed Lamp, “we'll just have to save the day first and escape later.

There was a knock at the door.

Lamp screamed.

“Someone in there?” shouted a muffled voice.

“Yes! I'm Casper Candlewacks and the screaming one is Lamp Flannigan.” Casper could feel his voice shaking. “Who's that?”

“Casp? It's Dad.”

“Dad!” A rush of excitement spread through Casper's bones. “He's come to save us!”

“Can I come in?”

“I really hope so. It's locked on our side.”

The bolt clicked, the door creaked open and Julius's face appeared from behind it. “Casper! Oh, thank goodness, you're OK.”

Casper rushed forward to hug his dad, something he saved only for special occasions (mainly because Julius only showered before special occasions). “Thought you'd never come. I thought we were stuck down here, Dad.”

“I've been looking all over for you,” he grinned,
the relief etched on his face. “I was beginning to think Jean-Claude had cooked you or something.”

Casper laughed and gave his dad another hug. “Still raw, thank goodness. What kept you?”

Julius's face went stony. “Jean-Claude's got me beaten and he knows it. Last night he served food so good the customers wouldn't leave. He's been protecting his kitchen in advance of this evening.

“Then, how'd you get down here?”

“Well, he's gone now.”

“Gone where?”

Julius tutted. “Don't ask silly questions. Come on, there's no time.” And with that he was already trotting back up the creaky wooden stairs.

Uh-oh. There was that rumbly feeling again. It had only been breakfast a minute ago. Why was there no time?

“Can I bring some eggs for the journey?” asked Lamp, looking around hungrily.

Casper yanked Lamp by the arm and dragged him moaning out of the room, not one shaving of an amoeba sorry to be leaving.

“You're not going to like this…” Julius was already upstairs in Jean-Claude's kitchen, but Casper and Lamp were hot on his heels.

“All the machines? Yeah, we've seen th—Oh.” Casper's mouth dried up. The machines were, in many ways, not there any more. What replaced them was perhaps more terrifying – eggs.
More
eggs. There were eggs on the floor, eggs on every shelf, eggs filling the basin and eggs caught in spiders' webs in dusty corners. There were more eggs in that kitchen than the entire prized egg collection of Egbert Von Egglestein, a
man with strange hobbies and terrible wind.

“Three thousand, six hundred and fifty-five,” breathed Lamp. “That's a new record!” He tried to set off a party popper, but realised he'd left them all at home.

“But where are they all coming from?” frowned Casper.

As if to answer that question, two familiar hens picked their way out from a shadowed corner across the eggy floor. Their feathers were threadbare and they had thick leather collars round their tiny necks, but there was no mistaking their grand red wattles and rusty feathers.

“Mavis? Bessie? My girls?”

Lamp's lip quivered.

Mavis clucked the saddest cluck Casper had ever heard.

“It's OK, girlies,” said Lamp. “I'll get those collars off.” He crunched across the eggs, but the hens cowered away from his hands, back towards the shadows.

“What's wrong? It's me, remember? Old cousin Lamp?”

Bessie popped out an egg and clucked apologetically. Mavis cawed and popped one out as well.

Mavis and Bessie. Here. Laying eggs. But that means…
Casper's jaw dropped as the answers to his questions plopped into his head like eggs plopping out of a chicken.

“Boys, we're wasting time.” Julius was hopping up and down by the door. “You've got to come outside.”

“It's the chickens!” gasped Casper. “It's the
chickens and their eggs!”

Julius shook his head. “Right, but I do need you outside, Casp. It's a bit of an emergency.”

“Free omelette for every customer and they all turn clever. Lamp eats more eggs than anyone and he's the biggest genius this side of Einstein!”

“But we've gone through this,” said Lamp. “I was getting brainy
before
the bistro opened.”

“But you were eating omelettes on Monday morning!” Casper clicked his fingers. “Omelettes from those hens.”

Lamp looked from Casper's pointing finger to Mavis and Bessie, and then back to Casper's finger. “You don't think… all these eggs…”

Mavis laid three eggs in one plop.

“But they've hardly been laying any eggs at all,” objected Lamp.

“That's what we thought. I'll bet they've laid as many as usual, only Jean-Claude's been stealing them. I saw him steal all sorts of things on Tuesday. Would've been easy to pop over and nick a dozen eggs each day. Soon he'd have, well, this many.”