Page 92 of The Sebastian Guarantee
The words had barely passed his sister’s lips when something small hit his back, and he didn’t have to guess what it was. “Tula, we’ve got to make a run for it,” he said as a smattering of baked goods tagged his arm.
“Sebby, they made a robot cookie launcher with a big spatula thing on it,” Tula exclaimed, looking behind them.
A robot cookie launcher with a spatula?
Not wanting to look, but knowing he had to, he peered over his shoulder. His eyes nearly popped out of his head as he observed children dumping boxes of chocolate chip cookies onto precisely what Tula had described: a spatula cookie catapult robot.
“Ready!” a blond girl with braids and a tablet in her hands called.
“Aim!” a little redhead snarled.
“Fire!” a girl with dark pigtails cried.
It was like something out of a dystopian children’s book. If pissed-off twelve-year-old girls weren’t waging a baked goods assault on him, he would have taken a second to appreciate the craftsmanship and innovation it took to design and construct a motorized weapon of cookie warfare. If he’d had more time and Phoebe acknowledged his existence, he would have snapped a pic and texted it to her. She’d love this. But he didn’t have a moment to spare.
“Hold on, Tula! We’re making a break for it,” he exclaimed, lifting his sister into his arms. Thanks to the costume’s tubular design, he had to carry her like he was holding an actual gargantuan hot dog.
Tula giggled as a cookie landed on her hot dog belly. She picked it up and took a bite. “These are great. Thank you, Tech Tweens!”
This wasn’t great! Was his sister insane?
He glanced over his shoulder. There had to be twenty, maybe thirty little girls parading behind the kid with the golden braids. And their robot was no joke. Low to the ground and about the diameter of a hula hoop, with a rake-sized spatula affixed to the top, the metallic machine hummed, chewing up the ground as the group continued their pursuit.
“We’ll head for the pavilion. It’s got stairs. I don’t think the cookie catapult can traverse steps,” he said as cookies pelted the back of his head.
“Direct shot!” a child cried.
The girls cheered like a horde of bloodthirsty mercenaries.
“I’ve got to pick up the pace, Tula. Are you okay?”
“Be careful! I can’t bump around too much. I’ve got something important in my little hot dog pocket. I took it from Daddy’s closet, and I can’t lose it.”
“I’m doing my best, T!” He weaved through a hailstorm of cookie carnage. Chocolate chips and crunchy crumbles rained down on them as they raced past a line of food trucks.
His sister started waving. “Hi, Mr. Hank’s Franks! That’s Phoebe’s friend who has the hot dog food truck.”
Sebastian did a quick check. Tula was right. It was the older guy who’d called to him from the food truck after his first Tech Tweens cookie attack. He grimaced. Bloody hell, what kind of terrible life choices did a person have to make to be attacked not once but twice by children?
Unable to stop and chat, he nodded to the food truck vendor, then set his sights on the pavilion. Scaling the three steps in one leap, he whipped around to assess the situation. His heart was ready to beat itself out of his chest, and he wanted to punch himself in his big stupid head. The pavilion looked out onto a pond. With a body of water on one side and a throng of fuming tweens on the other, they were trapped.
He set Tula down as an unnerving silence set in, laced with only the grinding hum of the robot. It was safe to say their gooses were cooked.
“All-terrain mode on,” golden braids snarled.
Those bloodthirsty tech girls had built one hell of a machine. Four metal rods pushed the contraption up several inches. One by one, the cookie spatula catapult robot negotiated the steps.
“Wow,” Tula breathed.
Wow, was right! He watched in awe as the spectacular weapon of total cookie destruction inched toward them.
“Step away from the big jerk, little hot dog girl. We don’t have any beef with you,” golden braids called.
Tula didn’t budge. “This is Sebastian Cress. He’s not a jerk. He’s my big brother. If he’s going down in a cookie blaze of glory, then so am I.”
At eight years old, his sister was a real badass.
“Suit yourself,” golden braids replied, then flicked her gaze to the tablet. “Ready!”
