The Anti-Alien Patrol all rushed toward Pandora and the hovercraft.

Cat was holding her bow and arrow with the water balloon on the tip. She took aim, pulled her arm back, and the arrow went soaring through the air, straight for the back of Pandora’s head. Pandora ducked just in the nick of time, and the arrow hit the playground slide. Only it wasn’t water that was in the balloon. It was some yellow-brownish stuff. I didn’t even want to think about what that was.

Then Myra used the Toilet Paper Launcher, and a roll of toilet paper shot into the air. It started unwinding all over the place and dropped down directly over Pandora. She banked the hovercraft to the right to avoid it and started weaving between the swings.

Go, Pandora!

Just then I noticed that a couple of kids on the Anti-Alien Patrol had shoved something in their mouths and were chewing like mad.

Bubble Blasters! A few good hits from one of those things, and my hovercraft would be toast!

“STOP!” I screamed.

Just when it seemed like it couldn’t get any worse, I spotted Boris rubbing something between his hands. Then he picked up his shirt and put it in his belly button and pointed his belly at Pandora.

Oh no! He had preheated a Belly Button Popper!

I heard the tssssss sound and the popper, covered with Boris’s belly-button hair, came shooting at Pandora. I ran toward her, waving my arms.

“Duck, duck!” I shouted. But when I turned around I saw that the popper was now headed directly for me! I was paralyzed with fear as I watched the furry missile coming closer, closer, CLOSER—

Then, woooooosh—there was a rush of air as Pandora swooped in beside me. Grabbing me by my waist, she pulled me onto the hovercraft a second before the popper would have clocked me in the head and off we sped.

“Look!” Boris screamed. “The alien has Otis! That thing will take him back to the mother ship and do weird experiments on him!”

“Come on, guys, we have to save him!” Perry shouted.

“It’s okay, everyone!” I cried out to them. “It’s just Pan—” but before I could finish, Cat had let one of her arrows fly. It hit me on my shoulder and the yellow-brownish gunk splattered all over me and Pandora.

To my horror, Pandora licked it off her arm.

“Yummers, honey-mustard dressing,” she said.

“Sorry, Otis!” Cat screamed.

I glanced backward. The entire Anti-Alien Patrol was charging at us, their yellow jackets flapping like mad.

Yellow jackets.

Then I remembered Potted Plant Guy’s curse:

You will be attacked by a swarm of angry yellow jackets.

“Pandora!” I cried. “Put the hovercraft on Deep-Pile Carpet speed!”

I grabbed Pandora around her waist and she hit the switch.

The hovercraft lurched forward so fast we both almost toppled backward. Then it took off. Man, that hovercraft was cooking! We were whipping across the playground at top speed. Cat’s arrows were splattering all around us and the sky was filled with unraveling toilet paper rolls.

Up ahead I could see some of the kids stuffing gum into their Bubble Blasters.

“Quick, Pandora,” I cried, “head for the log tunnel!”

Pandora swerved around and aimed for the opening of the tunnel made to look like a long wooden log. It would be a tight fit. An inch to the right or the left and we wouldn’t make it. But Pandora had really good aim. We zipped right into the tunnel no problem, just as the Bubble Blasters started shooting bubble gum at us. We could hear the gum hitting against the outside of the tunnel. Ping!! Ping-ping! Ping-ping! Ping-ping-ping-ping!

Then it got quiet. They must be out of gum, I thought. They’d be chewing those gum bricks right about now, ready to reload. If we hurried, we could zoom right out of the playground and be safe and sound back in Tidwell Towers. Julius would make everyone drop their anti-alien gear. And I would defeat Sid Frackas.

That was the plan, anyway.

Unfortunately Boris was waiting at the other end of the tunnel. And he was aiming his belly button right at us.

The force of that hairball knocked Pandora and me right off the hovercraft. We landed in a pile by the sand pit. The hovercraft flew a few feet more before getting tangled in the swings.

That’s when Sid saw his chance.

“Smash the flying saucer so the alien can’t escape again!” he cried.

The Anti-Alien Patrol rushed in and surrounded the hovercraft. Before I could stop it, I heard the sound of Legos crashing and then the stomp, stomp, stomp of sneakers on a vacuum cleaner motor.