1.
It was halfway through the semester and Jason Whyte sat at his desk twirling his pencil in his fingers. He stared absent mindedly out the window as he waited for science class to start. Professor Garrett came in to the room and started handing back yesterday's test papers.
He came to Jason's paper he paused and shook his head.
"I just can't understand it," he mused
"What, Mr. Garrett?" asked Jason
"How someone can spend as much time daydreaming as you seem to and still get straight A's." replied Mr. Garrett as he plopped down Jason's test paper revealing a perfect score.
Jason shrugged modestly, secretly though he and his parents suspected that this was one of the reasons he loved being a detective so much. School and tests didn't challenge him that much, solving mysteries was the perfect challenge for his mind.
As Mr. Garrett moved on up the aisle, Jason realized he was getting a dirty look from Grant Beckman a linebacker on the football team. Jason rolled his eyes. He wasn't surprised by the reaction. Every time anybody did anything better than Grant, he took it personally, like he thought that they were deliberately trying to show him up!
Jason knew, however, that with him it was more than that. Grant was Ashley Lake's boyfriend and he tended to be the jealous type. It was no secret to Jason that Grant did not like his friendship with Ashley. And right now, Ashley was smiling at him.
Jason and Ashley had been friends ever since Jason proved her father had been sent to jail for a crime he didn't commit.
"Congratulations on acing the mid-terms, Jace," Ashley said
"Thanks, Ashe." Smiled Jason. Grant looked like he was about to take a bite out of his desk.
Just then professor Garrett cleared his throat. The students straightened up and class began.
Just when Jason thought he couldn't get any more dirty looks from Grant, Professor Garrett fanned the flames by making Ashley Jason's lab partner for the rest of the semester.
"Hey, she's always been my lab partner!" Grant cried, jumping to his feet.
Mr. Garrett folded his arms over his chest and looked unimpressed by Grant's outburst.
"Mr. Beckman," he said, "I took the liberty of looking at your GPA last night and I can safely say that if you bomb one more test like you did this last one, you will be off the football team! Also, each person's performance in lab affects their lab partner's grade. Miss Lake is a bright student and she shouldn't have to suffer a bad grade just because you're lazy!"
Grant huffed and threw himself back down into his seat looking like a pouting five-year-old.
His scowl got even darker as the class progressed and Ashley and Jason worked together like they had been doing it for years. While he was assigned to partner with the only student in the room lazier than he was.
"You know, your boyfriend doesn't like me much," Jason whispered to Ashley as he used an eye dropper to add a little of the chemical it contained to the solution they were making.
"I know," said Ashley, "he doesn't exactly make that a secret."
"He hasn't tried doing anything to me yet, thank goodness," said Jason
"That's because he's too afraid of losing me to risk it!" replied Ashley
Jason and Ashley passed their assignment with flying colors. The solution they made glowed under a black light just like it was supposed to. Grant's solution exploded before he and his partner were done mixing it and covered the ceiling and the back wall with dark green slime!
"And that's what happens when neither lab partner actually read the assignment all the way through," said Jason shaking his head
The rest of the school day past uneventfully. The sun moved through the sky and evening came.
Jason's parents were out on their date night, Joules his sister was at a friend's house and Jason was on his way to pick up the pizza he had ordered for his supper. He teleported downtown and rematerialized in an alleyway couple doors down from his favorite pizza place.
Stepping out of the Alley and turning left he started down the street toward Antonio's pizzeria. Just as he passed the Bottlecap a small shop where they sold those, so called, 'designer sodas', the front door of the place open and Ashley came staggering out.
No sooner was she out the door, than she completely lost her balance. Jason barely caught her before she fell. The glass bottle of blue liquid she was holding wasn't so lucky. It hit the pavement and shattered into a thousand pieces.
Something was very wrong. Ashley was acting like she was half out of it. when she looked up into Jason's eyes and recognized him, she had a moment of lucidity.
"Jason," she gasped, "Feel…weird…dizzy…flashing lights!" then she passed out.
Before Jason could make heads or tails out of what she said, Grant came out the door. the first thing he saw was Jason holding an Ashley in his arms. Jason could swear Grant's blue eyes turned green right then and there.
"Hey what do you think your doing with my girlfriend?!" he growled
"Knock it off!" snapped Jason getting irritated by Grant's jealously, "Can't you see that something is wrong with her?!"
It was then that Grant finally noticed that Ashley was unconscious.
"What happened?" he asked concerned
"I don't know," said Jason, "She walked out the door, almost fell, and murmured something about flashing lights and feeling dizzy."
Jason motioned toward the broken glass fragments on the sidewalk
"She was holding that when she came out," he said, "Any idea what it was?"
"It was a bottle of the new soda flavor called Blue Ice they just got in a couple days ago," replied Grant, "she wanted to try it, it's been all the rage at school. I can't have any because I'm in training."
Jason handed Ashley to grant.
"Take her home," he said, "I'm going to check out this Blue Ice business."
Grant nodded and carried Ashley off in the direction of her home. Jason turned toward the bottlecap only to find that the shades were pulled and the closed sign was on the door.
A suspicious look passed across his face. His eyes went back to the glass fragments at his feet.
Bending down he pulled a plastic bag out of his jacket pocket. As a detective he had gotten in the habit of carrying them with him.
Opening the bag, he gathered up as many of the bottle fragments as he could find. Then sticking the bag in his pocket, he went to get his pizza.
After he got home and washed up. He helped himself to a slice of pizza. Between bites he spread the glass fragments out on the table in the room that served as his office. then with a pair of tweezers he began to piece together the fragments that still had bits of the label on them.
An hour and four slices of pizza later he finally had enough of the bottle together to read the bottom of the label. And what he read sent a chill down his spine.
It read: Morton Snacks Inc. Willow Creek, Va.
When Jason saw the words Willow Creek, immediately his friends in the Saddle Club flashed before his mind's eye. And something else too. He couldn't count the number of times Stevie had pulled glass bottles of those fancy sodas out of the fridge for everybody, not to mention how many of those soda's were sold at JB's!
Jason came out of his memories and jumped to his feet!
"I've got to get to Willow Creek!"
To Be Continued…Please Review!