Archvillain by Barry Lyga Read Free Book Online Page A

under him and he went sprawling in the dirt and grass. The ball spun away and rolled out of bounds.
    “Foul!” Mr. Rogers cried. “Foul on Camden!”
    Kyle spat out grass and pushed himself up to his knees. What had happened?
    “Whiz gee!” Mike said, standing over Kyle. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to trip you.” He held out a hand to help Kyle up.
    Kyle ignored it, standing on his own. “It’s not ‘whiz gee.’ It’s — oh, never mind.” He brushed past Mike, shouldering him out of the way.
    “Hey.” Mike grabbed Kyle’s wrist, and Kyle felt the incredible strength in those fingers. He forced himself not to spin around and show Mike his own strength.
    “I really am sorry,” Mike whispered, pulling Kyle in close. “But you were about to kick the ball and hit the goalie in the head, and the way he was standing, he would have slammed his head on the goalpost.”
    Kyle had never been this close to Mighty Mike. Up close, it was truly amazing how utterly
human
the space alien appeared. Whatever process he (or it?) had used to create this human body, it was a good one.
    “That wouldn’t have happened,” Kyle told him. He had planned on hooking the ball so that it would sailright past the goalie, but Mike couldn’t know that. “Just stay out of my way, got it?”
    Mike released Kyle’s wrist but did not move. “I won’t let people get hurt.”
    “Camden!” Mr. Rogers shouted. “Get your rear in gear! Take your foul shot!”
    Kyle jogged to the sideline and lined up his shot. He could easily kick the ball to a teammate who was open to take a shot on goal.
    But he kept looking slightly upfield. Mike stood ready. Kyle knew exactly what was about to happen — he would kick the ball to his teammate, and Mighty Mike would either intercept it or block the goal shot.
    No way. Kyle wasn’t going to let Mike humiliate him again.
    He ran to the ball as if he were going to kick it downfield, but — at the last possible second — he pretended to stumble. He lashed out with his right foot and kicked the ball as hard as he could without making it explode,
up
field. Right at Mighty Mike.
    “Oops!” he called out as the ball smashed into Mike’s face and blew up.
    “Whoa!” someone called, and an excited babble rose on the field. “Did you see that?”
    “Whiz gee!” Kyle said. “I’m sorry. I must have slipped.”
    Mr. Rogers quickly called the game a tie. Mike, of course, wasn’t the least bit hurt.
    As the teams headed for the locker room, Kyle looked over his shoulder. Mike was lingering on the field, picking up the pieces of the ruptured soccer ball.
That’ll teach you to trip me and make me look like a fool,
Kyle thought.

CHAPTER
NINE
    Kyle’s revenge was sweet but short-lived. Every day, it was something or another from Mike. If he wasn’t disrupting class by leaving all the time to perform some kind of good deed, he was slowing things down by asking idiotic questions. In history class, he just couldn’t understand why the United States ended World War II by dropping atomic bombs on Japan.
    “If everyone wanted the war to be over, why didn’t they just stop fighting?” he asked.
    “It’s not that simple,” Miss Hall said.
    “But if the Japanese wanted it over and the Americans wanted it over, why didn’t they just stop?”
    In math class, he got “pi” confused with “pie” and couldn’t understand why they were talking about baking. In English, he thought “irony” meant a story could rust. In science, he was just hopeless.
    Kyle was already bored enough in school. Having everything dumbed down for the moron from Planet Brainless was just making things worse.
    As the week wore on, Kyle became increasingly annoyed by Mighty Mike. One morning, his parents turned on the TV and who should be there? Who should be sitting on the set of the
Today
show, acting as if he had been born to sit there?
    Who else?
    “Well, gosh, Mr. Lauer,” Mike said, gazing earnestly into the