Dr. Dred is a Shrinker I
Frank had his back to Jess. Vince had organised it so that they could always see her no matter where she was in the room, without looking like they were watching her. In some classrooms, that was impossible. In the art class, though, it was easy. That was the benefit of having tables you sat around rather than behind.
Right now, Vince had the clear line of vision to her.
'This feels kinda creepy,' Howard said. 'Three guys watching a girl's every move.'
Vince pulled a face. 'You think we're overdoing it?'
'Just a bit,' Frank said.
He knew Vince's brain was less primed to notice that watching someone that closely was creepy. After all, vampires were like cats in a way. They watched and stalked their prey before going in for the kill. As long as he didn't start following her, he didn't see a thing wrong with it. But, if he started following her, his vampire brain would instantly categorise her as "food". And that certainly wasn't good.
Vince leaned back in his chair and folded his arms. 'Well, we've gotta keep an eye on her.'
'Keep an eye on, yes, but not stalk her. She's not likely to have a magic outburst in the middle of class,' Howard pointed out. 'We can leave her be for most of the time but, you keep watching her like that, she eventually gonna notice. And it's gonna be creepy for her and awkward for us.'
Vince sighed. 'Well, I guess so.'
:[
The bell rang. Jess, along with the rest of the class, packed up and started filing out.
'Miss Brenton, could I speak with you a moment?' their art teacher asked her as she was pushing her pencils back into her pencil case.
Jess paused. 'Uh…sure.'
For a moment, she thought she saw Vince, Frank, and Howard glance over but they were gone as fast as anyone else. Jess sat back down in her seat. The art teacher stood up and walked over. She slid the door shut. Jess's nerves twisted her stomach. She wondered what on earth Ms. McGowan would want to talk to her about. She couldn't think of a single thing in class today that would have garnered the teacher's attention.
Ms. McGowan returned to stand in front of her desk and face Jess. 'Miss Brenton, I would like to talk to you about what happened last week.'
Jess's gut dropped.
'Are you aware of what happened after Emily Peterson died?' Ms. McGowan asked.
Jess swallowed and answered. 'Those two…came in.'
'That's true,' Ms. McGowan said. 'But are you aware of the fact that you then protected yourself by conjuring a ring of fire around you?'
Jess blinked. 'I'm sorry?'
Ms. McGowan nodded. 'Oh, you weren't.' She lifted a hand and a single flame appeared over her palm. 'I presume, then, that you have never been trained in the art of witchcraft?'
Slowly, Jess shook her head. Her mind shot back to that day. She'd been so focused on Emily, that she had barely noticed anything else. Now that she thought of it, though, she realised that that walking mummy and that bony woman had actually jerked back from her. She'd thought it was the glare on her face when she looked at them. Now, though, she distinctly remembered being surrounded by heat.
She'd lit a ring of fire.
That was what had forced them back.
Jess looked at her art teacher. 'You were the one who pulled me out of the corridor, weren't you?'
'Yes.' Ms McGowan extinguished the flame in her hand. 'And if you have no one to train you in witchcraft, then we need to rectify that.'
'We do?'
'Oh, yes. Witches need to be trained. Magic is wild and volatile if not controlled. It lashes out whenever the witch or warlock has any sort of emotional outburst.'
Jess's mind wandered, but she was pulled back to the present by a crow's call. She looked out the window and saw the one that'd been following her around for the past few days perched outside. She pointed to it. 'Is that why that bird keeps following me around?'
Ms. McGowan looked over at it. 'Oh, yes. That crow is your familiar. Mine is a cat.' At that moment, a ginger tabby cat seemed to pop out of nowhere and hop up onto Ms. McGowan's desk.
'What's the familiar do?' Jess asked.
'Basically a magical assistant, and little more than that.'
Jess couldn't tell where it was coming from but she got a distinct sense of disapproval.
'Well,' Jess said, 'if I need to be trained, then I need to be trained.'
'Excellent. We'll start after school. But, because it's magic, tell your mother you joined the debate club.'
'Debate?'
'Well, witchcraft is still rather philosophical.'
:[
As night took over the city, the Dredgible made its way over a set of train tracks, following an empty freight train. With a laugh, Dr. Dred aimed his latest invention at the train. The rail vehicle got smaller and smaller. OGRE watched from above as the two engineers hopped out and ran for their lives.
Mummy-Man pointed and laughed as he mumbled something out.
Dr. Dred looked over at him. 'Of course it's working, Mummy-Man. My inventions always work!'
A set of magnets was lowered from the bottom of the Dredgible and the train was picked up. Dr. Dred tucked his new device away and led his team across to pick up the train from where it'd been deposited. Dr. Dred grinned nastily as he looked at his prize. Toad eagerly moved over to have a look for himself.
'I never had trains when I was a polliwog, Dr. Dred.' He grabbed for the train. 'May I play with it, huh? May I?'
Dr. Dred yanked it out of his grasp. 'Fool! This no toy!'
Toad looked dejected, even as he ducked out of the way of Dr. Dred's fly swatter.
'This will be used to perpetrate the most infamous crime of my career! We'll make billions. Do you hear me? Billions! Billions!'
He broke into laughter.
:[
Jess climbed up into the attic.
She tugged on the string. The replacement light bulb illuminated the whole room. Much better. She could see clearly now, and that was important now. Jess walked over to the opened box on the table. Back when she'd first looked, nothing in there made sense. Now, she knew exactly what she was looking at.
This is a Witch's Den. Grandma was a witch. That's where I got it.
Jess first climbed up and propped open the hatch. The crow immediately flew in and found a pre-existing perch that Jess didn't notice until that moment. Jess watched it, unsure if it was male or female. 'I've got to find something to call you. I can't just keep up with "the crow". It sounds like a bad horror movie.'
A name suddenly entered her mind.
'Merle?'
The crow fluffed itself up, seeming to preen.
'Okay.' Jess turned back to the box. 'Merle.' She pulled out several instruments that she now recognised as witches wares. That included one Ouija board, a wickedly sharp curved blade that made her pause, some kind of belt, several precious rocks, and a lot of very pretty pieces of jewellery. At the bottom of it all, though, was the most interesting thing.
Jess lifted out a thick tome written in an unknown language.
:[
When Howard opened the paper, his eye was immediately caught. 'Hey! Vince! Frank! Look at this headline in today's paper: Dr. Dred is a Shrinker.'
Vince immediately walked over to have a look. 'I'll buy that. But why would Dr. Dred shrink an empty freight train?'
'Because it was easier to steal that way,' Frank offered as he lifted his weights.
'But why would he steal an empty one?' Vince reiterated.
However, their attention was soon drawn.
'Watch it, Frankie! I'm delivering a bat-o-gram from Big D!'
Vince and Howard spun around. It was Big D's kamikaze bat, but he wasn't normal. He'd been shrunk down to the size of a fly. Obviously, that was what Frank had initially mistaken him for.
'What happened to you?' Vince demanded, pointing.
The bat in question flew over and perched upside down on his finger. 'That Dr. Dred stinker zapped me with his shrinker. That's what! The message is taped to my leg.'
Carefully, far more carefully than he would normally, Vince pulled the little bit of white paper from the miniaturised bat's leg. Unfortunately, it'd been shrunk with him. Vince could tell there was something on it, but he couldn't make heads or tails of it even as the bat flew off. 'I can't read this piece of confetti.' He walked over to the portrait of his uncle. 'We better contact Big D and see what's on his mind.'
Vince pushed the portrait aside and pushed the button framed by the intricate D. The two walls flipped around. Vince walked over and sat in the chair in front of the big screen as it showed Big D's coffin. Something immediately felt like it was wrong. Vince's stomach churned. Frank and Howard came to stand behind him.
'It's us, sir,' Vince said. 'The Drak Pack.'
The coffin lid opened. No Big D. Something was very, very wrong.
'Uh…' Frank said. 'Big D? Sir? Are you there?'
'I'm coming! I'm coming!' At that moment, Big D appeared. But he was only a fraction of his usual size. Vince would say only two inches tall.
'Hey!' Howard exclaimed in surprise. 'It's Little D!'
'Very funny!' Big D remarked. 'Dr. Dred does to me…this, and you make with the jokes!'
Howard quickly backpedalled. 'Oh, uh…I wasn't joking, sir!'
Vince quickly swooped in to save him. 'Gee, uncle. We were just surprised that Dr. Dred got to you too.'
'Trust me.' Big D waved it off. 'So was I. He's been shrinking and stealing trains to use in some huge crime, but he made a special trip to come after me. I'm relatively confident he doesn't know your civilian identities, so I need you boys to go and get his microminituriser and reverse it.'
Vince nodded and stood up. 'Relax, Big D. The Drak Pack will get that microminituriser from him and we'll return you to regular size again.'
With a visible sigh, Big D stood up. 'Do bear in mind, boys, that the only reason you got the best of them last time was because you caught them by surprise.' He turned around and jumped up, catching his coffin lid and yanking it down. Unfortunately, it seemed he didn't let go in time.
Big D yowled in pain.
:[
Toad sat at the train tracks, moving the trains around the tracks. He smiled. 'This is fun.' He glanced over his shoulder. 'Oh, I'm glad Dr. Dred isn't here. I'll make them go faster!' He turned back to the control panel and sped the trains up. As the trains moved faster and faster, Toad giggled in childish delight.
The train whistled blew.
Toad suddenly realised two of the trains were on the same line, and heading right for each other. 'Uh oh! They're gonna crash!' He grabbed the control panel and struggled to stop the trains.
Suddenly Dr. Dred reached over and grabbed the trains before they could collide. 'Toad!'
Toad pulled his head into his collar. 'Bad Toad! Bad Toad!'
Dr. Dred glared at him. 'You little wart factory! We need more freight cars, and you almost wrecked the ones we have!'
'I was only playing with them,' Toad protested.
'They are not for playing!' Dr. Dred snapped.
'What are they for, Dr. Dred?' Vampira asked.
Dr. Dred's move changed dramatically. 'To haul gold! A long, long freight train full of stolen gooollld!'
'But…they are so small,' Fly pointed out.
'That is the beauty of my criminal genius,' Dr. Dred said. 'By thinking small, I shall pull off the biggest crime in history! Come! We shall steal more freight cars and then we shall strike!'
:[
It was Howard's turn to drive. He tried to find some levity in the situation. 'You know, Big D looked kinda cute.' He chuckled. 'Two inches tall.'
'It's no laughing matter, Howard,' Vince quickly reminded him. 'After all, Big D's looked after us since our parents died.'
Howard pressed his lips together and nodded.
'How are we gonna find Dr. Dred?' Frank asked.
'We're not,' Vince said as Howard pulled into the train station parking lot. 'We're gonna let Dr. Dred find us.'
Howard parked. The three boys climbed out of the car and locked it up. It didn't stand out too much so it was doubtful anyone would ask questions before they got back. Vince then led his friends over to the area where all the freight trains were kept. They had done this at night for exactly this reason. The three of them stopped in front of one of the trains.
Vince explains. 'When he steals this train, he gets a crew with it.'
'Ooh!' Howard exclaimed. 'Good thinking, Vince!'
'Where is the crew?' Frank asked.
Vince spread his arms. 'You're looking at us! Okay, guys. Let's board her!'
Howard and Frank looked at each other, unsure, before they followed Vince onto the train.
'You know, this is technically stealing?' Howard asked.
Vince smirked. 'No, we're borrowing. Dred will be stealing.'
:[
'One more train and we'll have all the freight cars we need for our super crime!' Dr. Dred declared.
'Can we shrink one short train, just for me?' Toad pleaded. 'Can we, boss, huh? Can we?'
Dred spun around and swung the fly swatter at Toad, causing the mutant to pull his head in. 'Stop that drivelling and concentrate on your driving!'
Mummy-Man suddenly pointed down and began to garble.
'I see it too, Mummy-Man,' Vampira said.
Dr. Dred rushed to the edge and looked down to see his final freight train. He grabbed his microminituriser. 'Take us down over that train, Toad! Hurry!'
:[
The Drak Pack looked up as the Dredgible flew down to fly overhead.
'I knew Dr. Dred would fall for my trap,' Vince said.
'We're…we're about to be…shrunk?' Frank asked nervously.
'Eh,' Howard remarked. 'Think how easy it'll be to hide when you're only an inch tall.'
'I'm thinking how easy it'll be to get stepped on,' Frank said.
:[
'Ready, aim…shrink!' Dr. Dred fired. The train below them got smaller and smaller and smaller until it was the perfect size.
:[
'A-are we getting smaller?' Frank asked.
Howard cried out in alarm. 'If we're not, the telephone poles are getting bigger!'
:[
'Success!' Dr. Dred cried out. 'Bring it up, Toad!'
'Yes, Dr. Dred!' Toad lowered the magnets and grabbed the train.
:[
'Dr. Dred is falling for my plan hook, line, and sinker!' Vince boasted.
The three boys twisted around and peered out the train window as Dr. Dred reached for the train.
'What do we do now?' Howard hissed. 'Jump out and grab 'em?'
'No,' Vince answered. 'We lie low until we figure out what Dr. Dred is up to.'
'Wouldn't that be easier as the Drak Pack?' Frank asked.
'We better transform now.' Vince was the first. His skin paled, his clothes changed into formal attire, and his canines grew into fangs.
Frank's skin turned green and a bolt erupted from his thick neck. Howard grew fur over his body and his hands, feet, and face all transformed shape. He ground his teeth down shut against the howl that wanted to erupt. Both Drak and Frankie reached over and held his snout closed. It was part of his nature as a wolf-man and it physically hurt to hold it in. But he did it.
'Now,' Dr. Dred said, 'we have enough equipment for the most spectacular crime in history!'
'What is the crime, boss?' Toad asked.
'You'll find out when we get back to Dredquarters!'
:[
Drak took note of the path that was taken to get to Dred's Headquarters – or Dredquarters.
Honestly, with how corny everything about this guy was Drak was amazed anyone could take him seriously. Then again, not everyone could build a device that could literally shrink people and things down to "bite-sized". And the place they went to appeared to be a fully-stocked and self-sufficient evil base.
Then the train was handed to Toad.
'Couple all the freight cars together, Toad, while we make final preparations,' Dred said.
'Yes, boss,' Toad said. 'Gladly, boss!'
Then, of all things, Dr. Dred pulled out a fly swatter and hit Toad with it. 'And don't play with them!'
Drak was, reluctantly, amused.
'Oh, I wouldn't dream of playing with them, Dr. Dred,' Toad said and then waited until the rest of them walked out the door, 'until after you leave the room.'
Seems Toad's weakness was in the old attic. Pertinent information, should Drak ever need to use it.
Drak turned to Frankie and Howler. 'Now here's my plan: I'll try to sneak out and try to find out what Dr. Dred is up to. You two capture Toad, if he discovers you.'
'Capture Toad?' Frankie demanded. 'But he's 100 times bigger than we are.'
'Yeah,' Howler said, 'but we've got him outnumbered Frankie.'
Drak waited until Toad put the train down before he hopped out. Remembering Frank mistaking Big D's kamikaze bat for a fly, Drak quickly transformed into his bat form and flew off, ignoring it as Toad began muttering to himself. Drak was far more concerned with finding his way to Dred and the rest of OGRE.
He just followed his nose.
:[
'All Dr. Dred thinks of is crime,' Toad mused. 'But, all work and no play makes Toad a dull boy, so I'm gonna play.'
The train they were in began to move.
'Just what I've always wanted,' Toad remarked. 'A train set!
Howler cried out in alarm. 'Casey Jones Toad is gonna wreck this train!'
'Let's get off!' Frankie insisted.
'We can't!' Howler cried out. 'It's going too fast! I'm not dead sure being monsters will save us!'
:[
Drak stuck himself to the roof and crouched down to make himself even smaller. He listened to Mummy-Man mumble something. Part of him wondered if, over time, it got easier to understand what the living mummy was saying. OGRE certainly didn't seem to have trouble deciphering what sounded like wordless mumbles and grunts to him.
'Oh, you're right, Mummy-Man,' Dr. Dred said. 'It will be bigger than all my other crimes rolled together.'
Vampira spoke up next. It had been long enough that the vaccine Ruthven gave him was guaranteed to keep him from contracting her affliction. And anything that couldn't handle, his human genes would protect him from. 'But to steal all the gold in Fort Knox, you must be jesting!'
'So,' he murmured, 'Dr. Dred is planning to rob Fort Knox. I wonder how.'
Below him, Dr. Dred picked up a pencil and began. 'Now, here's my evil plan. We start here and—drat!' The tip of the pencil broke and Drak smirked. He watched as Dr. Dred sharpened the pencil again.
Unfortunately, as he was sharpening the pencil, Dred led his eyes drift up.
He froze and then growled. 'Clack! How did you get in here?!'
The rest of OGRE spun around.
'That's Drak!' Drak snapped, unwilling to let them see any sign of weakness.
'Get him!' Dred yelled.
Fly came at him. Unfortunately, Drak wasn't big enough to turn that into an advantage so he first transformed back into his vampire shape. Then he pushed off with his vampiric speed and shot past him too fast for him to register. Fly was spun around instead. Drak came to land on a lamp stand. He looked up as Dred, Vampira, and Mummy-Man charged at him.
'Don't just stand there, you incompetent nincompoops! Capture him!' Dred yelled.
Time to go.
:[
'Faster!' Toad cheered. 'Faster!'
Frankie held on tight to the inside of the driving car. He looked out again as he tried to judge how likely his patchwork monster body was to survive jumping out at this speed. He could probably survive it, and he'd be just fine. Howler was a different matter. Frankie made a worried noise. 'Next time we travel, let's take a plane, Howler!'
Howler cried out in alarm. 'We'll never make that turn at this speed!'
Sure enough, the train jumped the tracks.
