Chapter Two:
Mr. Dr. Two-Brains
Becky jumped when she saw her arch-nemesis sitting in the teacher's chair, but luckily he didn't seem to recognize her. He disinterestedly picked up the shiny apple on his desk and tossed it away, replacing it with a wedge of Swiss cheese.
"Dr. Two-Brains?" she blurted. "But I just arrested—I mean, I heard Wordgirl just arrested you this morning!" Then to herself she muttered, "So this is what you were up to."
"You're right, she did—news travels fast. But thanks to the generosity of the city," Two-Brains didn't bother to conceal his sarcasm here, "I've been given another chance to live an honest life; and, with me being the brilliant scientist I am, teaching seemed to be just the right avenue for my talents."
"Oh, please," chimed Tobey McCallister with an arrogant laugh, impatiently drumming his fingers on his desk. "Your 'brilliance' couldn't light up the inside of a paper bag. I find it ridiculous that a real genius such as myself is expected to take orders from a half-rate villain all day."
"H-half-rate villain!"
"That's right," added Victoria Best, who, along with Tobey, was seated in the front row. "This is a complete waste of my time. I'm already the best villain in town, so there's absolutely nothing Mr. No-Brains could possibly teach me."
"Hey, that's Dr. No-Brains to you! Wait, I mean—"
Tobey rolled his eyes, ignoring the doctor. "Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say the best villain, Victoria."
"I'm sorry what did you say, Theodore McCallister the nerd?" Victoria sneered, laughing triumphantly. "Did I mention I'm also the best at calling people names?"
Tobey pulled out his remote.
"Stop, stop, stop!" Dr. Two-Brains and Becky shouted simultaneously. Two-Brains pinched the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "How are both of those brats in this class?"
"Bad luck," Becky said. "Trust me."
"Mr. Dr. Two-Brains," piped up a shy voice from the back of the room. "May I use the restroom?"
"No!" he snapped.
Becky stepped between him and the rest of the students. "What are you planning, Dr. Two-Brains?"
"An educational lesson, now everyone be quiet! I'm the teacher now, so you have to listen to me whether you like it or not. Starting with you," he paused to check the seating chart, "Becky Botsford. You're. Late." As he said the last two words he dramatically ticked off the tardy box next to her name on the attendance sheet. Becky flinched; that was her third tardy this week. "You can either take a seat at your desk, or I can arrange for a new one at the principal's office."
The whole class gasped and Becky felt her face start to redden. She stormed to her seat between Tobey and Victoria, slumping down in her chair as she tried not to hear the snickers coming from either side of her.
"Hey, this is kind of fun!" Two-Brains said. He cleared his throat and tried to look authoritative. "Your regular teacher, Mr. What's-his-face, left me a schedule to follow. And according to this," he waved a piece of paper in his hand. "You kids are supposed to read silently for half an hour. So, what're you waiting for? Get to it!"
Becky begrudgingly pulled out her copy of Lester's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary and flipped to the B section, but kept a watchful eye on Two-Brains.
"And while you all are doing that, I'm just going to…prepare. Your lesson, that is. On the chalkboard. With this chalk." He pulled a piece of white chalk from his pocket, and Becky's ears perked up. Was her super hearing picking up the sound of something beeping? She couldn't make out where it was coming from because it was so faint.
A piece of crumpled paper tumbled onto her desk, and Becky opened it.
"I think he's up to something. –Scoops" Another paper ball bounced by her foot and she unfolded that one too. "Keep an eye on him. –Still Scoops" Becky turned around to look at him; Scoops gave her an enthusiastic thumbs up. She returned the gesture halfheartedly and glanced back at Two-Brains. He was drawing some kind of diagram on the chalkboard, but was very precise about it, using a ruler to measure out the length of the lines. He took out a protractor to make sure the angles were accurate.
Nothing seemed to set off any red flags, so Becky let herself get distracted by the definitions in front of her. Already, she was in a better mood. Maybe today would be tough, but she could get through it.
BAM! The classroom door burst open. Two-Brains jumped, accidentally drawing a stray line that screeched loudly across the board. A man in a green jacket ran in waving his arms frantically.
"Heeeeeelp! Someone's trying to rob the bank! Wait, is this the police station?"
"No." Violet said nicely. "This is a classroom. The police station is just down the street."
"Oh, okay." He disappeared, his footsteps echoing down the hall as he screamed, "Heeeeeelp!"
Becky closed her dictionary and raised her hand.
"Dr. Two-Brains! May I go grab my, uh, bookmark from my locker?"
He scowled at his diagram on the whiteboard, hastily erasing the mistake he made.
"I don't care, just go!"
"Mr. Dr. Two-Brains, may I use the restr—"
"No!"
"Ohhh."
Becky rushed into the hallway and touched her chest—in a flash of light, she transformed to Wordgirl. She would have to leave Bob behind; it would take too long to get him out of class now that he had been moved up a year.
"Word up!"
The bank doors had been propped open by whoever was trying to rob it. She flew through the doorway and landed in the center of the lobby, getting into her battle stance. Two thugs were holding up the counter. The teller looked quite bored as she held her hands in the air defensively.
"Stop right there—wait a minute, what are you two doing here?"
Standing at the counter were none other than Dr. Two-Brains' henchmen. They whipped around and pointed their ray guns at her. Charlie quickly hid something behind his back.
"Oh, hi Wordgirl!" said the shorter one with the hat. "Boy, this is exciting, isn't it Charlie? It's like we're real top-tier supervillains!"
"What are you guys doing?" Wordgirl asked, relaxing her stance. "Dr. Two-Brains said that you guys were taking the day off."
"Oh we are, Wordgirl. Since our boss is busy substitute teaching today, we decided it would be fun to try to copy him. You know, see what it feels like!"
"So you guys are trying to emulate him!" Seeing the blank looks on the henchmen's faces, she added, "It means to imitate someone or try to act like them."
"Yeah, we thought we should try to emulate him, right Charlie?"
Charlie shook his head "No," but took a subtle elbow to the ribs and suddenly started nodding.
"Hmm, I guess you're telling the truth—Dr. Two-Brains can't teach a class and rob a bank at the same time." Especially since I was there, she thought.
"We're not just robbing the bank, Wordgirl, we're going to turn all the money in the vault to cheese!
"You're welcome to try, henchmen, but even the two of you are no match for me!" She zipped forward, planning to grab the ray guns first and then swing back to tie them up with the nearby belt barriers. But with unnatural accuracy and a surprisingly strategic shot, Charlie fired his ray at a beam in the ceiling just above Wordgirl and a pile of rubble collapsed on top of her, trapping her underneath. Wildly disoriented, Wordgirl managed to crawl her way out of the slabs of concrete and ceiling tiles, still a little dizzy as she got to her feet. Her heart sank as she looked around at the empty lobby. They were already gone! The money may be safe now, but they were undoubtedly going to be back, and that meant having to come up with more excuses to leave class. If Becky managed to make it through the day without a single demerit or trip to the principal's office, she promised to never be late for school again.
Although the henchmen had said Two-Brains didn't have anything to do with this crime, she thought it would still be a good idea to verify with the villain himself. After taking care of the mess and making sure the bank teller was okay, she raced back to campus and flew straight into the classroom, landing on Two-Brains' desk.
"Wordgirl!" Tobey exclaimed. Victoria booed. Some people in the class clapped. Scoops snapped a quick picture, the flash lighting up the room for an instant. Two-Brains didn't seem surprised to see her at all.
"Hello again, Wordgirl," Two-Brains said. "I hope you don't plan on interrupting me for too long, I do have a class to teach."
"I can see that. Did you know that your henchmen just attempted to turn all the money in the bank to cheese?"
"Why, I'm shocked! I thought that those two were—"
"Taking the day off?"
"Well I was going to say totally incompetent, but that's also true. What does this have to do with me? I hope you're not thinking of accusing me of helping them, Wordgirl. I can't be in two places at once, can I?"
"Nice try, but I think you're plenty capable of organizing a crime in advance."
"But why would I bother, when I would just be risking having my henchmen botch up the whole thing?"
"Okay then, maybe you're delegating tasks to them from here!"
"Ask anyone of these students, Wordgirl. I've been so busy with teaching them a lesson about the process of cheese-making that I couldn't possibly have time to simultaneously coordinate a bank heist."
Wordgirl turned around as Violet said, "He's right, Wordgirl. He hasn't mentioned anything about a bank this entire time."
"But," Tobey interjected, "If you feel the need to see for yourself, there's an empty seat right here." He motioned eagerly to the seat next to him—Becky's seat. Wordgirl ignored him.
"Listen Two-Brains—"
"No, you listen, Wordgirl. Your interruption is interfering with the education of these young students! I'm surprised you would care so little about their futures." He looked at the clock. "Now, I'm about to mark one particular student absent for leaving class for so long, so—"
"What's that? Is that a crime in progress I hear? Got to go!" Wordgirl said, all in one breath. A moment later, Becky strolled innocently into the room, a strong breeze following her and rustling the papers on Two-Brains' desk.
"Wow, did I just see Wordgirl leave? Boy, it's too bad I missed her." She sat down in her seat, trying to keep her breath steady from the rushed flight just now.
"I'm glad you were able to find your way back to class, Becky." Two-Brains said, folding his arms suspiciously. He sniffed the air.
"Hold on, do you smell like… sour milk?" he asked.
"Who, me?" Becky forced a nervous titter. "No, no. That was just my lunch. I dropped it in my locker. Which is just outside." Becky laughed awkwardly again, but exchanged worried looks with both Scoops and Violet. Two-Brains shrugged and sat back down in his chair, putting his feet up on the desk. He twirled the piece of chalk in his hand.
Was that the sound of beeping again? Where was that coming from? Becky squinted at the diagram on the chalkboard. It looked suspiciously like a floor plan, but she didn't know much about cheese-making. It could just as easily be a giant, elaborate vat.
"As I was saying before we were so rudely interrupted, if you were to start making cheese, the first step would be to sterilize your equipment. To review, the germ I just indicated on this diagram here could easily be wiped out by, let's say, a current of hot water directed just over its head."
Wait a minute… Connecting the chalkboard diagram to her recent encounter with the henchmen, Becky suddenly recognized the maneuver Charlie had pulled when he fired the ray gun above her head. If she was represented by the 'germ,' then whenever Two-Brains makes a mark on the chalkboard, his henchmen somehow receive the instruction! His cover as a substitute teacher must be to have an airtight alibi— his plan was clear as day now. Two-Brains really was orchestrating the crime at the bank!
Now that she figured out his plan, all Becky had to do was stay behind when the rest of the class went to lunch, search his desk for whatever gadget he was using to send the chalkboard writing to his henchmen, and somehow destroy it! With his only method of communication disabled, the henchmen wouldn't know how to fight her or finish the crime, and she could change to Wordgirl and arrest all three of them! Becky sat at the edge of her seat, impatiently waiting for the last few minutes until lunch to pass.
Tobey yawned loudly. "With all due respect, Doctor, I've read casserole recipes more interesting than this. Unless you were intentionally trying to be monotonous?"
"Quiet, you."
"Um," said a student in the back of the class. "What does monotonous mean?"
"I can handle this." Becky said, perking up. "To be monotonous means to be really boring and dull. If you have to sit through a long and pointless lecture, you might even fall asleep because it was so—"
Dr. Two-Brains rolled his eyes. "Yeah, yeah, we get it. Jeez, you sound just like— " Two-Brains suddenly took his feet off the desk, sitting up straight and looking directly at Becky. The corner of his mouth twitched as he suppressed an evil grin.
"Oh."