Mechanical laughter boomed round the room as the robot loomed over me, its red eyes burning like lasers. This was it – the end. I knew I shouldn’t have tried to attack it… All I’d done was make the robot angry.
“Now!” said Robin. “Hold down L2, press X and roll!”
“But that—”
The robot reared up and raised its razor-sharp pincers.
“Master, I highly recommend that you do as I suggest quite soon – preferably before that rather large mechanical spider bites your head off!”
I frantically stabbed the controls as instructed, then watched as my on-screen avatar ducked and rolled between the giant robot’s legs and out the other side.
“Now turn and aim at its weak spot,” said Robin.
This time I followed his advice without hesitation.
The massive metal spider howled with rage as my arrows pierced its soft underbelly. Its lethal steel pincers snapped at the air for a few seconds, then its body exploded into a trillion pieces of molten metal.
Finally the screen flashed up the message I’d been waiting weeks to see:
“Yes!” I jumped up from my bed and punched the air. On-screen, Ali’s avatar joined me in a victory dance. “Congratulations, Master Just Jake,” said Robin, his voice bubbling slightly as though he was talking underwater.
“We couldn’t have done it without your help!”
Robin had spent the last HOUR guiding me and Ali through the final level of Revenge of the Robots.
“Those mechanical insects were very badly behaved,” he said. “It made me rather ashamed to be a robot!”
“You’re different,” I told him. “You’re nothing like the robots in the game.”
“Thank you, Master Just Jake!” Robin did that twitchy-beard smile of his. “If I can be of no more service, I should go and check on Miss Jess.”
When he stood up, a trickle of water ran down from the robot’s ear. Robin had leaked all the way home from the party, but other than that he seemed none the worse for his accidental swim.
It was me and Jess who felt different. When we’d got back from the sports centre, we’d expected Robin to start dishing out chores or insisting we did some fun yet educational activity with him. Instead he’d said we could do whatever we wanted. We liked this ‘new’ relaxed version of Robin.
It should have been a clue, a warning – but we ignored it.
“NOOOOOOO!”
At first I thought the scream was part of my game, then I realized it had come from outside.
The second cry – “JAAAKE!” – confirmed it.
Jess and Robin were playing football in the garden. Having been banned for two matches, my sister was desperate for any chance to play, even if it was only a kick-about.
Normally I would have ignored her, but there was something in that shriek that made me think I should at least check.
When I opened the back door, Digby shot past me into the house like he’d been fired from a cannon. For some reason he was dripping wet. It took a few seconds for my eyes to make sense of what I was seeing.
Dad’s greenhouse was missing half its glass and the tomato plants inside looked like they’d exploded. I could see my sister’s football lying in the middle of the mess, so it didn’t take a genius to work out what had happened.
But that didn’t explain why Robin and Jess appeared to be playing tug-of-war with the hosepipe. I ducked as a snake of high-pressure water swept over my head and drummed against the kitchen window.
“HELP ME!” shouted Jess. “He’s gone crazy!”
I ran towards her, but my sister screamed at me to “TURN OFF THE TAP!”
“Oh, yeah! Good idea!”
Robin got very upset when the water stopped. He started going on about how the tomatoes needed watering. His voice was all jerky, and he kept repeating the same words over and over.
“What’s wrong with him?!” I said. “What did you do?”
“ME? Nothing! One minute he was fine – then he just booted the football into the greenhouse!” My sister wiped strands of wet hair away from her face. “He said the plants needed watering and turned on the hose! But then he started to water Mum’s PAINTINGS of Dad’s tomatoes, rather than THE ACTUAL TOMATOES themselves!”
“Mum’s PAINTINGS!”
Our mum spent her days cleaning offices, answering phones and serving drinks in a pub, but in her heart she was an artist. When Mum wasn’t working, she spent as much time as she could in her shed at the bottom of the garden, painting.
In all the excitement I hadn’t noticed that the door to Mum’s shed was open. A newly formed river was flowing out across the lawn, with Mum’s pictures floating on the surface like brightly decorated rafts.
The robot was pointing at them. “Tomatoes need a regular – regular supply of water – water,” he said in his soggy, stuttering voice. “Irregular supply – will cause – cause problems. Water problems. Must water – the tomatoes. Tomatoes. Water. Water, everywhere, but not a drop to drink…”
“Water must have got into his circuits when he fell in the swimming pool!” I said.
“Duh!” said Jess, fighting to keep Robin away from the tap. “But what are we going to DO about it, genius? What if he decides the rest of the house needs watering, too? I don’t know how much longer I can hold him!”