Chapter 5 (Part 1)

“Are you sure about this?” Violet uttered uncertainly. “Yup, I am absolutely sure about this,” I replied confidently. Violet stared at me as if I was a mutter. “You said that you had a brilliant plan and I expected it to be wacky knowing you but what are you thinking?” Violet shrieked at me. I waved my hand calmly, “It will work. Trust me.” I had worked out all the possibilities and was almost certain that the plan would work brilliantly.
“Are you two done squabbling?” Derek queried, stifling a yawn. “If we aren’t going to be on the road in five minutes, I am going home,” Richard complained as he twirled the car keys around his finger.
“You heard them, let’s go!” I exclaimed and lugged open the car door, settling myself comfortably in the backseat. “I have a bad feeling about this,” Violet muttered audibly before she plopped into the comfortable synthetic seats of the Mercedes Benz. “Who’s driving?” she implored. “Who do you think? Richard of course,” I answered without hesitation. Violet glared at me as if she going to eat me up.
“But Richard is underage! Not to mention a driving license! We could get into trouble. Perhaps Derek could do the driving. In the dark, people could mistake him for an adult. He does have the built and the size,” Violet preached.
“That’s the point. We are supposed to get into trouble. And Richard was the only one who knew how to drive expertly. Or so he says,” I explained casually. “I do know how to drive expertly,” Richard scoffed from the front, “Can we go now?” I nodded as rock music blared from the speakers and the familiar tingling sensations of the vibrating engine travelled down my spine.
Before Violet could spit out another word, we were already on the road, singing to our hearts content, or more like screaming in fear. As soon as we had left the parking lot, we banged into the lamp post and nearly crash into a tree. I swept a glimpse at Violet’s face. She looked as if she was about to explode. “Richard!!!”Violet shrieked, “Are you sure you know how to drive?”
“It was just a minor blip,” Richard reasoned, “I have got everything under control.” Yah, as soon as he finished that sentenced, the car veered off the road and was sent spiralling towards the kerb. Terrific control of the car he has. Realising that the situation wasn’t pretty, Derek tugged at the wheel, pulling us back on the road. I heaved a sigh of relief. But not for long, the next thing we knew, we were heading straight for a stretch of stationary cars. “Richard! Hit the brakes!” Violet hollered. “I know! I’m trying!” Richard complained as he pulled the steering wheel and stepped on the accelerator.
“No, Richard that is the accelerator ahhhh!” Derek pointed out in between panic squeals. Richard’s face was pallid, obviously thunderstruck on what to do.
“Bye bye mummy, bye bye daddy,” Derek sniffed as he braced himself for the sickening thud. “Ahhhhh!!!” Violet and I shrieked, facing the doors of eternal doom.

Chapter 4

Life without Brian for a day sure was peaceful, I have to admit that even our form teacher Mr. Lim seemed relieved. Well, that was the problem, no one wanted to find Brian. In fact, some people were even harbouring thoughts of leaving Brian kidnapped. That was bad. Lugging myself towards the school bus, I took ravenous gulps from my strangely appetizing chicken bun. I hadn’t eaten since this morning and I was definitely famished. Back on the bus, my bus friends were quarrelling over some Anime character as the bus took off with the noisy ‘fish market’ in it.
“Aunty! Someone is eating chicken bun!” an obnoxious Primary Five boy yowled as I was prepared to take another bite. To heck with the boys. Can’t they see that I am famished and need to eat something least I faint? Guess they aren’t so compassionate. But that was the least of my worries. Arikei and Koir were in the midst of creating another bus war. By accident, Koir had licked Arikei’s finger and was desperately trying to rub the saliva off on Sienna’s T- shirt.
“Aunty!” Sienna screamed as the bus aunty whipped her head around in annoyment. “What is it now?” she spat in Chinese. Sienna crouched over to my shoulder, pushing me towards the window. Unprepared, I licked the glass wall, scowling and all. The very next thing I knew, Sienna had removed her shoes and was trying to retaliate if Koir was to do a sudden ‘attack’. The battle took a turn temporarily, the next minute, I was facing the wall, staring at a lady who shot me a ‘are you nuts’ look. Well, it’s time I participated as well. But apparently taking Sienna’s file as a shield wasn’t very erm… threatening. In the very next minute, I found myself staring intently at the soles of a pair of shoes. Yucks. Did I mention that I have yet to finish my lunch?
The bus had stopped to allow some pupils to alight but we were still at it. Some how, I had managed to shake off the pair of shoes and shield myself from being pulverised by a pair of stinky trailers. The bus engine went into a full roar and the bus had barely moved an inch when it braked setting off an overwhelming commotion at the back.
“My shoe!” Sienna cried as she lunged forward to grab it.
“My chicke…” I tried to yell as I banged into the metal pole, leaving my chicken bun to fall onto the floor. Good thing it had a plastic wrapper, that bun caused me a dollar!
“Koir! Get off my knee,” Arikei whined with a disgruntled look. Koir just stared at the front with a dazed look. Just then I realised that everyone else on the bus looked thunderstruck as well.
“I hate to break the silence but… What happened?” I recited my catchphrase. Koir turned around with anxiety written all over her face. “Haven’t you noticed? A sports car hit us!”
All of a sudden, shoes and chicken buns flying all over the place didn’t seem like a problem. “Was anyone hurt?” I enquired as Sienna wore her shoe. “Well, no one except for the bus aunty, she slipped and bruised herself,” Christine replied.
“Could you just get off my knee?” Arikei moaned desperately trying to get up. “Oh,” Koir realised with a laugh and fell back on the chair. “One thing’s for sure, the sports car uncle doesn’t seem too pleased,” Koir exclaimed with a shrug. I got up and pressed my nose against the window on the left side.
A black sports Honda car had collided with our school bus’s front rear. Its window had been smashed into smithereens and it was very fortunate that no one was seated at the passenger seat. A middle aged man got out from the car and stormed over towards our bus. He wore a grey T- shirt, matched with a pair of beige Bermudas. The first word I could think of to describe him was… short. And a little bit of a pot belly. Hey, I have my reasons okay? Firstly, he looks short, like around 1.5 to 1.6 metres; secondly, he really was on the plump side, or at least plumper than one of my classmates from TAF club. (If you read it the other way round, it would be read as fat, with a lot of emphasis. No offence to those TAF members though.)
From the look of Mr. Pot Belly’s face, high chance he wasn’t here to apologize. His face was flushed as red as a cooked prawn and his mouth was arched into a scowl. Scary. “That guy is giving me the creeps,” Sienna whispered, cowering in fright. “I don’t think he’s here to apologize either,” I added. Koir, Arikei and Sienna shot me a scowl. “What?” I blabbered as the others shook their head from side to side despondently.
Meanwhile, a heated argument had started between the bus driver and Mr. Pot Belly. My life sure is interesting. First, I get roped into gangster catching organisations, then, I get involved in a mini car –bump –bus accident, which by the way includes a grumpy and unreasonable Mr. Pot Belly. This is so not my day.
“Pose, Jennison,” Koir chirped, waving her arms frantically. I glanced ahead; Mr. Pot Belly was taking photographs of the vehicles that had collided. Trust Koir to come up with such wacky ideas during car ‘accidents’. Of course, the bus uncle didn’t step down, grabbing his phone, he took photos of the ‘accident’ as well.
“Forget posing, lets just write down the car plate number,” Sienna suggested as Airkei whipped out her handphone and recorded the number down. “G… 4… 4… 1… 2… C” she muttered as her fingers stretched to key in the numbers.
“It’s no wonder he is so unlucky,” I blurted out. “Why?” Sienna queried. “His car plate number has so many 4s and one C. In Cantonese, the number four means die. Obviously he is unlucky,” I reasoned. Sienna nodded her head knowingly.
“Ai yah, not fun already,” another Primary Five boy sighed audibly. “Why?” I beseeched. “They just exchanged phone numbers and the Honda car driver just drove off,” he explained. “I was hoping the police would come, I want to be on National television,” Koir whined. “Yah lor,” I muttered sadly.
Out of the blue, an idea thwacked me in the head. National television. Oh why hadn’t I thought of it before? My eyeballs rolled around in their sockets in excitement, I could feel adrenalin surge through my body. This idea was so crazy, it might just work! A smile rose from the corner of my lips. A plan had formed in my head.
“Are you alright Jennison? Why are you smiling all of a sudden?” Sienna implored. “Oh nothing, I was just thinking about a mean joke I saw on TV,” I replied. Yup, tonight, I am going to put this plan into action. And hopefully, get on TV.

Chapter 3 (Part 2)

“I wonder how we are going to explain this situation to anybody,” Violet proclaimed. “Well, just tell them what Jian Ming told us. If not, get Jian Ming to tell them,” I offered. “I wasn’t talking about that sotong! I was talking about Brian’s parents,” Violet barked. “Just say that it was a kidnapping case,” I said, “Besides, it’s the professor who is going to do the explaining. Anyway, who cares about Brian?”
“His parents, duh!” Jian Ming and Violet hollered. “Ok, besides his parents?” I enquired. Silence pitched in. “Nobody right? I mean once everyone hears about this, it won’t have any negative impact on them right?” I added. Violet hesitated for a moment and nodded her head with agreement, “It definitely makes sense.”
“Hey! What took you guys so long, ahhh! Wh… wh… what happened to you!” Lin Fang exclaimed in sheer terror upon catching a glimpse of Jian Ming. “Got involved in kidnapping case, this was the result,” Jian Ming explained. Lin Fang looked around and questioned, “Where is Brian then?” “He got sucked down the toilet bowl,” I replied. “Just kidding, he was carried away in the van” I quickly added upon seeing Lin Fang’s bamboozled expression.
“You mean… he was Kidnapped!” Lin Fang proclaimed. “Yup,” we answered in synchrony. “That is the… Best Damn News Ever! Yeah!” Lin Fang cried out as her face brightened up and threw a punch into the air.
“Hello? Brian’s the least of our problems here! My parents will get a heart attack if they saw me in this condition!” Jian Ming hollered. “I’ve got a suggestion! Put on some make up to cover up those bruises!” I suggested enthusiastically. Jian Ming, Violet and Ling Fang stared at me with gawking expressions and groaned, “Forget it!”
“At least I gave a suggestion,” I grumbled to myself. “Well, can we head back to the ideal lab first? The others are waiting for us,” Lin Fang pointed out. “Sure,” Violet replied as we made a dash for the ideal lab.
“Ahhh! Monster!” Jamie shrieked as Jian Ming stepped into the room. “Perhaps I should consider putting on a mask,” grumbled Jian Ming as he ambled towards a chair. “What happened?” she queried as everyone gathered round to listen. “Brian and Jian Ming were involved in a case of kidnap and Brian was kidnapped,” Violet responded. Instantly, a spontaneous cheer went up from the back, girls and boys alike.
“See, I told you they weren’t bothered,” I smirked. Violet just shot me a ‘now’s not the time for your boring jokes’ kind of look.
“Since everybody is here, let’s go home already!” Dorothy exclaimed as everybody rushed for the door shovelling each other out of the way in an attempt to get out of the school first. “Hold on! There is a message from the professor saying that we have to stay back today a little while later to find Brian,” Richard declared, waving a crisp piece of paper in his hands.
“How did he know about it?” Jun Wei whined. “Well, I told him about it,” uttered Jian Ming. “If you weren’t my good friend I would have threw this chair at you,” Andrew spat. “I had nobody to report this to,” Jian Ming protested.
Cursing ourselves for such bad luck, we trudged out of the room and filed out of the school gates.
Oh bother, why did we have to be the d**n class who gets the special ‘Go Home Late’ treatment? Well kids out there, here’s a word of caution. If you ever thing that being a hero is cool and fun, think again. I would rather be buried in a good book by Rick Riordan anytime on my comfy couch than soaking in sweat salts under the blistering hot sun. You get the picture, it isn’t pretty unless you consider a human hotdog sweet. Besides that, you still have to schedule time for homework, revision, studying, etc…
Next time, if you ever see a man with a white sleazy beard, run as fast as your limbs can carry you cause you are going to regret it real badly if you don’t.