Bug Guy forgot all about his job and his truck. He yanked his safety glasses off his head. “What in the blazes?” He took a few hesitant steps down the road. “Is that a—?”

“A dragon!” Victoria said, pushing Ben out of her way. “I knew it!” She took off at a full sprint.

“Hey, little girl!” Bug Guy called. “Maybe you shouldn’t get too close!” But he didn’t heed his own advice. He hurried after Victoria. “The other bug guys ain’t gonna believe this.”

A fire hydrant cracked open as Metalmouth’s tail whacked it, releasing a geyser of water.

“I can’t believe this is happening,” Ben said.

“It was the only way to get rid of Victoria and Bug Guy.” Pearl jumped into the driver’s seat. She touched the key. She’d never driven anything before, not even a lawn mower, because her family didn’t have a lawn. “I don’t know what to do. Ben!”

He snapped out of it. “I’ve only driven cars in video games,” he told her as he hurried toward the truck.

“Then you can drive this one.” She wasn’t sure that was true, but it was worth a try. Persuading Ben to do things that made him uncomfortable had become one of her best skills.

“But it’s against the law.” He started wringing his hands. “Ten-year-olds aren’t supposed to drive.”

“Ten-year-olds aren’t supposed to do a lot of things, but look at us. We’re amazing!” She hoped the pep talk was working.

Ben hesitated. “We could get into huge trouble. And I thought—”

“Yeah, I know. I said I’m sick of being called a troublemaker, but I don’t care anymore. The fairies need our help, and that’s way more important than what people call me.”

Up the street, the tennis ball had rolled into a gutter, and Metalmouth was trying to fish it out with one of his long claws. Victoria and Bug Guy were still mesmerized. Pearl smacked the steering wheel. “There’s no time to argue. As soon as he gets the ball, Metalmouth will run back here, and we won’t be able to get away. Come on! Drive!”

She scooted across the bench seat. Ben climbed in and shut the door. Then, his hand trembling, he turned the key. The truck rumbled to life. Pearl glanced through the back window. The fairies were still flying around inside the canister. Ben seized the gearshift. “I can’t believe I’m doing this. Hold on.” He pushed the gear. The truck rolled forward and bumped right into the welcome sign.

“You have to go backward,” Pearl told him.

“I know I have to go backward,” he fumed. “I just don’t know how.”

“Maybe there’s a button,” she suggested. They looked at the dashboard. She fiddled with every knob and switch she could find. A spray of water coated the windshield. The wipers began to swoosh. The headlights flashed. The radio blared a country song. “Where is it?”

The driver’s side door opened, and a voice said, “Scoot over.”

“Mr. Tabby!” both Pearl and Ben cried as they made room for Dr. Woo’s assistant.

“We’re so glad to see you,” Pearl said. She wanted to hug him. “We’re trying to get the fairies to the hospital, but we don’t know how to drive. And we have to go before Bug Guy notices we’re taking his truck.”

“I am well aware of the situation.” Mr. Tabby turned off the radio, the wipers, and the headlights. “Seat belts,” he instructed.

Pearl thought this was odd, considering that Mr. Tabby hadn’t been concerned about seat belts while traveling between dimensions in the Portal. But she didn’t argue. As soon as she and Ben were securely strapped in place, Mr. Tabby grabbed the gearshift. The truck backed away from the welcome sign. Ben groaned. The word nicest was dented.

“Mrs. Mulberry isn’t going to like that,” he said.

Mr. Tabby shifted again and drove the truck over the sidewalk and onto Main Street. Up at the other end, Metalmouth had finally collected his tennis ball. He wagged his tail, hitting a lamppost so hard it toppled over. Victoria and Bug Guy didn’t take their eyes off the dragon, so neither noticed that the truck was on the move.

Metalmouth, however, did notice. He looked down the street. Pearl reached her hand out the truck’s window and waved. Seeing that his fetch partners were leaving, Metalmouth took to the sky, but his escape wasn’t quick enough. Mrs. Mulberry stepped out of the Dollar Store, pointed, and screamed.

“Uh-oh,” Pearl said.

Ben’s knuckles went white as he gripped the dashboard. Mr. Tabby made a sharp turn onto Fir Street, leaving tire marks in the road. He might have been half cat, but he could handle the truck like a race car driver. Pearl’s stomach lurched as the truck flew over a pothole. The poor fairies didn’t even have seat belts!

They drove past the church and the closed gas station, then made a right onto Maple Street. Down the windy road they sped, leaving the town behind.

Pearl remembered the first time she and Ben walked the tree-lined street together, carrying a dragon hatchling in a cookie tin. Ever since, they’d walked there on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings. Those had been some of the best mornings of her life.

As the hospital came into view, a large shadow passed overhead. Metalmouth soared gracefully over the lawn, then landed on the hospital’s roof.

“The gate’s open,” Ben said with surprise. It was never open. Mr. Tabby kept it secured with a padlock, and he was the only one who carried the key. “Did you forget to close it?” Ben asked. He’d gotten in trouble for not locking the hospital’s front door.

“I do not forget such things,” Mr. Tabby said with a low growl. “I left it open as a time-saving measure.”

Pearl wondered if this was true. Perhaps the doctor’s assistant wasn’t as perfect as he appeared.

Mr. Tabby drove up the gravel driveway and stopped abruptly in front of the entrance. They all scrambled out. While Ben unwound the vacuum hose, Mr. Tabby started inching it up the hospital’s exterior wall, past the second, third, and fourth floors. Then past the fifth. “Wait,” Ben said. “Don’t you want to put them in the Fairy Lounge?”

“They are going to the tenth floor,” Mr. Tabby said. “The rest of the fairies are waiting there.”

“To the Portal?” Pearl was confused. “You’re going to send them back? But how can you do that if Maximus is still in the Imaginary World? Won’t he try to capture them? Doesn’t he need their dust?”

Mr. Tabby ignored her questions. He stood on the tiptoes of his polished shoes, stretching his entire body as he continued to push the vacuum hose higher and higher. Pearl climbed onto the tailgate. The fairies seemed wobbly, but they’d survived the crazy drive. When the hose reached the tenth floor, a window opened and a pair of furry hands emerged and grabbed the hose, pulling the nozzle inside.

“Now,” Mr. Tabby told Pearl. She pressed the relocation button.

The Vacuumator’s engine hummed, and then a whoosh sounded. The fairies swirled into a clump and were sucked out of the canister. In a matter of moments, the clump made its way up the tube and through the tenth-floor window. Mission accomplished! A furry hand reached out and waved. The vacuum tube tumbled to the ground.

Pearl pressed the off button. She threw her arms around Ben. “We did it!” she said. “We saved the fairies!”

“I’m so glad Mr. Tabby knows how to drive,” Ben said with a grin. But the joyful moment burst like a bubble as a police siren rose in the distance. “Uh-oh. I wonder if your aunt is looking for a stolen truck. Or a dragon. Or both!”

“Follow me,” Mr. Tabby instructed. He didn’t bother to move the truck or lock the front gate. Nor did he bother to bolt the hospital’s front door after they’d all run inside.

Why is he forgetting all his rules? Pearl wondered as Mr. Tabby led them straight to the back stairwell. A bad feeling took hold of Pearl. Something big was about to happen. Ben frowned, looking equally worried as they followed Mr. Tabby to the tenth floor.

And when they stepped into the Portal room, the very thing Pearl was worried about—the worst thing that could possibly happen that summer—came true.