Camp Alien by Pamela F. Service Read Free Book Online Page A

grand entrance, except that he stepped on his costume and fell on his face. Scott pulled himself to his knees. His face turned from dust-powdered pale to blushred as laughter from the audience rose in a wave. He jumped up, waving his pitchfork menacingly and shouted, “Whoever laughs at the great god shall feel his wrath after the show!”
    The audience quieted. For a moment, Scott’s face blanked as he fumbled for his real lines. I breathed again when he finally turned to us and thundered, “Whoever compares the beauty of a mere mortal to my daughters shall feel the wrath of the great god Neptune!”
    That was our cue to scream and wail and fall on our knees, begging forgiveness. Bessy and Jessy flailed frantically, and not to be outdone, Melanie threw herself on the ground and flopped about like a dying fish.
    Then came a bunch of talk where nobody quite got their lines right, but in the end Neptune agreed he would not send his sea monster, Draco, to destroy the town, if we tied Andromeda to a rock for Draco to eat instead. More screaming and wailing, then everyone ran into the bushes.
    The audience cheered and clapped and started to leave until Scott ran out waving his pitchfork and yelling, “Sit down! There’s more coming!” When some kids groaned, he added, “Shut up! We’ve got special effects!”
    Once they settled down, Andromeda entered slowly followed by the soldiers prodding her with spears. Then came the two wailing servants and the king and queen. Opal and I were dressed in black garbage bags that were supposed to make us look like we were in mourning. I think they made us look like walking garbage bags.
    Andromeda was tied to the cardboard rock. More screaming and wailing, and the two servants did a sad little dance. Very sad, if you ask me. Then we all trooped off except Melanie, who stayed tied to her rock, trying to look scared and beautiful.
    Meanwhile, Scott, crouching behind the bushes, had torn off his Neptune costume and put on aluminum foil armor and a colander helmet to play the part of Perseus. Ramon and Carlosstruggled into their Pegasus costume. (They’d agreed to play the flying horse only if they could be soldiers at the beginning.) Ramon had lost the coin flip and gotten stuck with the role of the horse’s butt. Carlos walked upright, holding the cardboard horse head. Ramon trudged along, bent over with a yarn tail pinned to his rear, while he flapped the cardboard Pegasus wings. Scott walked between them, “riding” Pegasus and trying to look heroic.
    Pretending to not see Melanie, they staggered on stage to hoots of laughter. Scott fumbled through his speech about how he, Perseus, was just coming back from killing the Gorgon, whose glance turned people to stone. “Sounds like our counselors,” some kid yelled. Then Scott got good squeals when he wiggled the snake-covered head at the audience.
    Now came the special effects. Opal had crawled out of the bushes and thrown a bunch of pine needles and sand on the fire to make sparks and to lower the light. Backstage I was making a big deal of waving my gizmo and pretending topress buttons. Then from behind the bushes, we all started moaning, “Oooo, Draco the Sea Monster! Here comes the terrible monster! Andromeda is doomed! Doomed!”
    On cue, Vraj burst out of the bushes. I’ve got to admit, she looked plenty scary. And mad too. I hoped she was just acting. She looked mad enough to eat somebody for making her do this.
    The effect, though, was great! People screamed and cried and cheered. Vraj must have liked that. She made the most of it by running up and down aisles, flailing her claws, and snapping her teeth. Then she bounded back onstage and stalked toward Andromeda. Melanie’s screams were very realistic. For a second I even thought she might run off, bouncing her cardboard rock behind her.
    Vraj was making frightful snarls when Scott snapped out of his shock and