Aliens in Disguise Read online

  Also by Clete Barrett Smith

  Aliens on Vacation

  Alien on a Rampage

  Text copyright © 2013 by Clete Barrett Smith

  Illustrations copyright © 2013 by Christian Slade

  Cover design by Tyler Nevins

  Cover illustration © 2013 by Christian Slade

  All rights reserved. Published by Disney • Hyperion Books, an imprint of Disney Book Group. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher. For information address Disney • Hyperion Books, 114 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10011-5690.

  ISBN 978-1-4231-8096-8

  Visit www.disneyhyperionbooks.com

  Contents

  Title Page

  Also by Clete Barrett Smith

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Acknowledgments

  For Logan and Weenz

  (But mostly for Weenz, obviously)

  It was the perfect evening. Picnic blanket. Fried summer food. Coolest girl on the planet beside me.

  Our hilltop spot gave us a panoramic view of Forest Grove. And when the sun disappeared in a blaze of those colors you only find in sunsets, it left the night sky wide open for the fireworks show.

  Splat!

  A gob of warm slime smacked me in the forehead and oozed down my cheek.

  Correction. It was almost the perfect evening.

  At least for a few minutes I had been able to forget that Amy and I were supervising a field trip of rowdy kids from outer space. It was just another one of our weird jobs as employees of Grandma’s Intergalactic Bed & Breakfast.

  “Oh, I do apologize.” Mrs. Crowzen, their teacher—the only other chaperone helping us watch these eight alien delinquents—rushed over, waving a hanky in her spindly claw. She reached down to wipe the slime from my face, but I held up my hands, fending her off. Her body was covered in crunchy exoskeleton plates, kind of like a crab’s, which meant she was pretty clueless about the sensitivity of human skin. The last time she “helped” clean me up, I swear she almost rubbed hard enough to scrape down to the bone.

  “It’s okay, I got it.” I dragged my palm across my cheek and then wiped it on the ground, leaving a bright yellowish-green streak on the grass. It looked like the aftermath of the world’s messiest sneeze.

  “Don’t worry about it, Mrs. Crowzen,” Amy said, giving me a mischievous grin. “David looks much better this way.”

  I scooped more slime off my face and flicked my fingers, splattering Amy with flecks of space goop.

  “Gross!”

  “Hey, you’re the one who wants to study everything about aliens.” I flicked more snotty-drops at her. “I’m just giving you some free samples.” Amy smacked me on the shoulder, hard; then we both burst out laughing.

  Mrs. Crowzen raked her claws along her chest plate in a well-practiced motion, grating against a patch of little bumps to make an unpleasant screeching that instantly got the kids’ attention. “Boys! You get over here this instant!”

  A pair of little aliens shuffled forward, heads bowed. They actually looked pretty humanoid, aside from the antennae and the whole drenched-in-slime thing. As obnoxious as they were, I almost felt bad for these two. Earth’s atmosphere was too humid for their bodies, causing the endless slime excretion. Maybe it was like sweating and it kept them from overheating or something. Whatever the explanation, it didn’t make it any less gross.

  “You two owe our gracious hosts an apology.” The teacher gestured at Amy and me.

  “But it’s not our fault! It feels like I’m walking around in a bowl of glicklespitz soup on this planet.” One of the little aliens held up a hand that was dripping trails of goop.

  “We’re not trying to do any of this. It just happens. Look.” The other one shook his body like a wet dog, and goo droplets sprayed everywhere. Amy and I yanked the blanket over our legs to avoid getting splattered again. It might have passed for an innocent mistake…but I caught the second alien hiding a grin.

  So did Mrs. Crowzen. “Nonsense,” the teacher said, grabbing an antenna on top of each of their heads, twisting them until those little smiles turned into grimaces, and then marching the kids toward the rest of the group. “You have been deliberately throwing clumps of secretion at each other ever since we arrived. And now you have soiled one of our hosts.”

  “Again,” Amy whispered, elbowing me in the ribs and snickering.

  “But we didn’t mean to—”

  “You are going to behave like proper guests on this planet. Sit down and wait for the sky show.” The aliens trudged down the line of blankets to where the other kids sat. “On opposite sides, if you please.” The boys split up and slumped onto the grass on either side of the crowd.

  The otherworldly students were decked out in corny stars-and-stripes-themed paper hats and T-shirts to hide scales and extra limbs and neon skin colors. It worked from a distance, especially in the fading light. But it was far from the perfect disguise. Up close, they basically looked like the most patriotic group of space aliens in the galaxy.

  The PA system crackled to life down in the park. “Happy Fourth of July, Forest Grove,” the mayor’s voice boomed out through the speakers. I’m sure it was really loud down there, a safe distance from our little alien outing, but up on the hill the words were faint. “The fireworks display will start in five minutes.” A cheer drifted up from the crowd.

  I stole a glance at Amy. She was watching the sky, eyes shining with excitement. But if I knew her, she was more interested in the constellations than the pyrotechnics. I scooched a little closer. Maybe I could put my arm around—

  “AAAAAAHHHHHH!” I yelled (no, it was not a scream, thankyouverymuch) as the picnic blanket came to life and jumped onto my lap.

  Amy glanced over. “What are you screaming about?” she said. “It’s just Kanduu.”

  “That wasn’t a scream.” I mentally ditched my plans to get closer to her, and sighed. “Hi, Kanduu.” The kid alien was only about two feet tall and had color-changing skin like a chameleon. Who knows how long he’d been lurking there, blending in with the red-and-white-checkered pattern of the blanket, just waiting to scare me. It had been his favorite activity since arriving on the planet.

  As Kanduu stood on my lap, his skin faded into the color of my old blue jeans. His class was from an inter-solar-system school made up of kids from different planets, so at least he didn’t have the slime problem. Kanduu put his tiny hands on my chest and leaned forward until his squishy nose touched mine. “Greetings, earthling. Take me to your leader.”

  Kanduu fell back on the blanket and rolled around, his laughter a series of honking noises. He’d heard that phrase in an old cartoon during one o
f Amy’s Movie Nights, and he thought it was hilarious. Just like all of his alien classmates. As if such a primitive planet as Earth could actually have leaders.

  “Amy’s the leader around here,” I said, scooping the little guy up and dumping him on Amy’s lap. He cuddled into her arms and blended into her pink sweatshirt until they looked like one being.

  I leaned over and grabbed a fried treat from the basket. The food was still warm—I had stocked up at the snack stands in the park while Amy herded the alien kids.

  Kanduu sniffed the air. “What is that?”

  “This, my friend, is a corn dog.” I raised it by its stick handle. “Pretty much the perfect food.”

  Kanduu’s spongy face scrunched up in disgust.

  “What’s the matter?”

  He gestured down the hill, where little kids were running around with dogs on the edge of the crowd. “Humans eat their pets?”

  “What? No. No, it’s not a real dog. It’s just called that.”

  Kanduu tilted his little head. “So…humans think that sounds tasty? To name foodstuffs after their cute little domesticated life companions?”

  “I guess.” I suppose it did sound a little gross when you thought of it like that.

  He pointed. “And then they impale the ‘dog’ on a piece of wood?”

  I shrugged. “Everything tastes better on a stick. Trust me. It’s an Earth thing.”

  He sniffed again. “My sensors inform me that this dog is a highly processed product made from the questionable parts of several different Earth beasts.” One more sniff. “Nutritional value: dubious at best.”

  “Sure, but it’s a holiday. Food isn’t bad for you if you eat it on a holiday.”

  “Really?”

  “All humans know this. Eating large quantities of unhealthy food is pretty much the basis of all our holiday activities.”

  Kanduu grabbed his little notebook and furiously scribbled some notes. Each night the kids had to write a report on the things they had learned about Earth that day.

  Amy glanced over. “Don’t write that down, Kanduu. He’s teasing you.”

  I dunked the end of the corn dog into a puddle of ketchup on a paper plate.

  “What’s that?” Kanduu asked.

  I was getting tired of defending my planet’s food customs to a judgmental second grader. “Blood,” I said, then made crazy eyes and took a big bite.

  “Eeeewwwwww!” Kanduu ducked his head and peered at me from beneath Amy’s arm.

  I licked the ketchup from the corners of my mouth. “Dog’s blood.”

  “YUCK!” Kanduu covered his eyes and buried himself in Amy’s sweatshirt.

  Amy swatted at my arm. “Stop scaring the poor thing.”

  “Oh, I’m not scared.” Kanduu popped right back up like a prairie dog. “Can I try a bite?”

  Amy rolled her eyes. “I guess boys are boys, no matter what planet they’re from.”

  “You leave our hosts alone now,” Mrs. Crowzen called from her position in the middle of the students behind us.

  “It’s okay,” I said over my shoulder, offering Kanduu a bite. He chewed thoughtfully, looking maybe a little disappointed that it wasn’t totally disgusting.

  Patriotic music blared from the PA speakers as the first firework streaked into the sky. The crowd cheered when it burst into a colorful shower of sparks. And then the show was on, one firework after another, sometimes four or five at the same time, a Boom! echoing a few seconds after each explosion.

  Amy applauded, her face beaming in the rainbow glow. “The Fourth of July show always makes me feel like a little girl again.”

  Huge pinwheels of color filled the sky. Shadows swirled up and down the surrounding trees, making the forest seem alive, like a group of giants enjoying the show. For a small town on the outskirts of Nowhere, Washington, it was actually a pretty impressive display.

  Kanduu hopped onto my lap and tapped my chest. “This is it?” he asked. “This is what we were waiting all evening for?”

  “Yep. Humans think this is pretty cool.” Sometimes it’s hard to impress aliens. Most come to Earth to get away from it all, to “rough it” without any super-advanced technology. The fireworks probably seemed quaint at best. “What’s the matter—not what you were expecting?”

  “It’s not that. I just thought it kind of looked like—” He broke off and scanned the surrounding grass. “Here, let me show you.” Kanduu jumped from my lap—he was so light that the feeling barely registered—and stalked around the blanket.

  “What are you doing?”

  He held a finger up to his mouth hole (he didn’t really have what you could call lips) in the human gesture for Quiet! that Amy had taught him. Then he straightened up and pointed at the ground. “There she is!”

  I squinted, but I only saw a mound of grass. With a closer look, though, I noticed that the mound was shivering all over.

  Kanduu bent down and talked to the lump. “I knew my sensors were detecting you. Come on, get up.”

  The mound arose and unfurled itself into the shape of Kanduu’s little sister, Kandeel. She was even tinier than he was, and her skin mimicked the grass perfectly—not just the color but also the pattern of the individual blades. I could have looked all night and not found her.

  She glanced up at me, then lowered her eyes and scurried back toward her classmates.

  “Wait up,” her brother said, grabbing her by the arm and pulling her back to our blanket. “I want you to show him the beacon.” She resisted, but Kanduu was stronger, and Kandeel’s feet slid across the grass. “You know, the one Mom made us bring.”

  Kandeel eyed me warily, and when they got close she wrenched free of her brother’s grip and hid behind Amy, who was still watching the sky. Amy put her arm around the little girl alien.

  “I don’t know why she likes you so much better,” I muttered.

  “My guess would be your shirt.”

  “What’s wrong with my shirt?”

  “They can probably smell it from their home planet.” Amy wrinkled her nose. “You wear it every day and I bet you haven’t washed it in a week. I can’t believe you didn’t bring more clothes for a two-month stay.”

  I sniffed the shirt. “Come on, it’s not that bad. Besides, it’s okay to wear the same clothes in the summer. The rules are different on vacation.”

  Kanduu scribbled in his notebook.

  “Don’t write that one down, either,” Amy said.

  Kanduu set the notebook aside. “Come on, show us the beacon, Kandeel.” His sister peeked out at us from behind Amy. “Just come here. Right over to the blanket.” Kanduu said it soothingly, beckoning to her. “Please?”

  Kandeel crept forward. The instant her foot hit the blanket, her entire body went red-and-white checks all over. Man, she was even better at that than her brother.

  “Show him the beacon,” Kanduu repeated.

  Kandeel studied me with the look of a small animal frozen by fear. When she finally spoke, her voice was a squeak, nearly drowned out by the popping of the fireworks. “Mom said it’s only for emergencies.”

  “But I just want to show him one time. Come on, it’s way cooler than those fireworks.”

  Like her brother’s, Kandeel’s body was segmented. You know those stacking baby toys that are a series of increasingly smaller circles on a little plastic dowel? The two of them looked sort of like that. She dug her fingers in between two of the segments that made up her torso and withdrew a silver cylinder about the size of a bullet.

  Uh-oh. Off-world tech. I instantly went cold all over. The last time an alien gadget was smuggled here—earlier this summer—it had nearly destroyed the entire planet. I stopped the whole thing from happening by… Well, that’s a story for another time.

  “What is that?” My throat had gone so dry that the words came out in a croak.

  “It’s a beacon. You know, a signal?” Kanduu said.

  “Why don’t you hand that over? Right now, okay?”


  Kandeel shot me a mistrustful look and took a few steps backward. “Our mom gave it to us in case we got lost. So Teacher could find us.” She lowered her eyes, talking to the ground. “It’s our first time on another planet.”

  Kanduu snorted and shook his head in disgust. “Mom worries too much. Give it here.”

  He grabbed for the device, but Kandeel whisked it out of range. The chase was on as he lunged for her and she ran in circles around the blanket.

  Terrified that they were going to set it off—whatever it was; I didn’t know what the word beacon might mean to aliens—I scrambled after them on all fours. But it was already pretty dark, and they had assumed the color of the grass, so it probably looked like I was frantically galloping around the blanket all by myself. The crowd of alien kids pointed and buzzed with space laughter. Not my finest moment.

  “What are you doing?” Amy finally pried her eyes away from the fireworks show.

  “They’ve got a little device of some kind. Looks metalish.”

  Amy’s eyes went wide—it didn’t take her long to remember the doomsday device our former handyman had carried in his coveralls. So she joined me in scampering around the blanket. At least I had some company in looking like a moron.

  Music from the PA system swelled to a crescendo, and the crowd sang along with the part about the bombs bursting in air. The timing of the overhead explosions ramped up, rapid-fire, like a string of enormous firecrackers. We were missing the big finale.

  Kandeel and her brother jumped back onto the blanket and stood out against the night sky in red-and-white checks. Amy and I pounced at the same time and got tangled up.

  “…does that star-spangled banner yet wa—ave…”

  Kanduu grabbed at the silver device. Kandeel spun away, but it slipped out of her fingers and landed on the blanket. I snatched it up—but, man, was it slick. The little thing squirted right out of my fingers and ricocheted off Amy’s forehead.

  “Ow!”

  “…the laaaaand of the free—eee…”

  The four of us froze as we scanned the blanket, searching for the beacon. There! Right in the middle of our little circle. We all dove for it at the same time and ended up in a dog pile.