Grembots (eBook)

A Tale of Mischief

Alyssa A. Means (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2021 | 1. Auflage
236 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
978-1-0983-7506-5 (ISBN)

Infos

This is a tale of mischief, a tale of adventure in a satellite above North America, where we meet the little creatures that cause all the mischief on the internet. When your grammar is wrong in a tweet when your spelling has been changed in a text message, it was a grembot, Why do they mess with autocorrect, no one knows it's just what they do.

---

In this tale of mischief, we meet Pat, a brilliant student who is awarded a desperately needed scholarship to attend a university. She excels in all her classes but one, Computer Science. She is the worst, she blows up every computer she touches, and because of the property damage, she may lose her scholarship. To help her Pat's professor gives her a notebook to study from which ultimately sends her to a satellite where she meets a grembot named Rem. Rem has his own troubles of life and deletion, he asks Pat for her help and offers his in return and a friendship grows. Until Pat learns Rem has been lying to her. With their friendship fractured and their fates hanging in the balance, will Pat keep her scholarship, and what will happen to Rem?

Textauszug

One

Spitball

In the second-to-last row, Patricia Parker’s mahogany skin is warmed by the sun as she sits in her favorite class, math. She stares out the window as her teacher explains math problems she has already completed. Pat has known how to do this kind of math since she was six years old, and the outside world is far more interesting than Mrs. Walters’s lesson on solving for x.

Mrs. Walters’s algebra class is overstuffed with students. She enlists the help of a student to change slides on the overhead projector, while she shows how to solve for x.

Pat is daydreaming in front of Damien, a troublemaker with a tight fade. He looks at his friend Kevin, both smiling as they chew on paper balls. Damien picks up a red straw on his desk and puts it to his full lips, takes aim down at Pat’s large springy ebony Afro, and blows. His spitball sticks between her tight ringlets as she stares at clear blue skies, oblivious to the mischief happening behind her. Kevin also takes aim at Pat, but as he prepares to blow, Mrs. Walters turns to the class. Kevin and Damien hide their weapons, snickering behind Pat’s back.

Mrs. Walters asks the class, “Questions?” She waits for her students to reply, but they are silent. “Okay, next we will work on the Pythagorean theorem.”

Plump, kindhearted Mrs. Walters makes an announcement, and Pat perks up. As Pat turns, Kevin launches his spitball, and it slams into the corner of her eye.

“Ouch!” Pat shouts as she pulls the sticky paper off her face. She shakes the ball free, wiping her fingers on her khaki pants, “Yuck.”

Mrs. Walters quickly turns just as Damien puts his straw to his mouth, preparing to blow. She catches him and raises her otherwise kind voice. “Damien! That’s enough, I’ve warned you before. Detention after school.”

Mrs. Walters picks up the trash can and swiftly walks toward Damien. Kevin opens his notebook, covering his arsenal, and swallows the spitball he has been chomping on. Kevin gulps just as she arrives at Damien’s desk. Damien shoots Kevin daggers with his eyes, and he shrugs.

Mrs. Walters holds the can up to Damien, and he reluctantly tosses in the straw. “Come on. The paper balls too,” she orders.

Damien swipes the paper into the can just as the bell rings, letting school out for the day.

Shouting over the students packing up, Mrs. Walters says, “Class, look at the assignment so we can go over our homework in class together tomorrow.” She turns to Damien. “Detention at 3:15pm.”

Kevin runs out of the room. Damien grabs his books and glares at Pat, mouthing the words, I’ll get you later.

As Pat gathers her enormous backpack, Mrs. Walters stops her and looks down into her hair.

“Patricia, you have a ton of gooey paper in your hair,” she says. Mrs. Walters walks back to her desk and puts the small white trash can down. “Come here. Sit down and let me see if I can take some of these nasty spitballs out of your hair.”

Pat takes her backpack to Mrs. Walters’s desk and puts it on the floor next to the old, splintered table. Mrs. Walters pulls out her rolling chair, letting Pat sit.

“Thank you, Mrs. Walters. I didn’t know they did that,” Pat sighs “again.”

“Yes, I noticed you off in your own world. It seems like for the past six weeks, every day you daydream. But you pass my tests, and you pass the other teachers’ tests. You’re a perfect student, and the school year hasn’t even gotten started. It wasn’t until I mentioned new math that you got excited,” Mrs. Walters says as she drops spitballs in the trash. “Are you bored in my class? I’ll bet you already know and understand the Pythagorean theorem.”

“I’m not bored, not really. I love math.”

“And the Pythagorean theorem?” Mrs. Walters asks.

Pat smiles. “Yes, I already know that one.”

“How?”

“I found some old books on the street corner.” Pat’s cocoa-colored eyes sparkle like black diamonds, “I read them all and worked the problems. Oh, I can’t wait till we get to calculus.”

“Patricia, we won’t get to calculus until senior year.”

“That’s what I thought,” Pat says.

“Maybe I could see about moving you to a more advance class.”

“Nah, you’re my favorite teacher,” Pat tells her. “Listening to your slight accent while you teach math is exciting.”

Mrs. Walters laughs, shaking her fingers over the trash can. “I thought I’d lost my southern accent.” She examines Pat’s hair. “I think I got them all.”

Pat stands, fluffing her Afro, then reaching for her backpack says, “Thanks for that.”

“Listen, Patricia, you need to be in a class that challenges you. You can always come and visit me, but you can’t hold yourself back because you like me. I’m going to talk to your counselor today,” Mrs. Walters tells her.

Pat hesitates, but the warm smile from Mrs. Walters changes her mind. “Thank you. I want to learn everything. I want to go to college, get a good job, and help my Mom out.”

“You are spitball free,” Mrs. Walters says, patting her shoulders, “and a wonderful daughter. See you tomorrow.”

Pat walks through Arnold High School, maroon lockers stacked by twos lining both sides of the hallways between old yellow bricked entrances. She opens locker number 281 on the bottom row and gathers the rest of her books into her backpack, which is now so full it is twice the size of her torso. Students are running and walking through the hallway; one pair are shouting at each other.

“I didn’t send you that message, I swear I wanted you to come and hang out this weekend,” one student says.

“You said, ‘don’t come.’ Is this because I’m out?”

“I swear that’s not what I sent you. You’re my best friend.”

“See, look, here’s the text you sent me.” The students’ conversation trails off as they continue down the hallway.

Pat ignores the conversation as she hoists the heavy bag on her back, making her slouch. She closes her locker and heads outside, exiting through wood and glass doors.

On the front lawn of Arnold’s campus, students are at play under the watchful eye of a rotund police officer, not a security guard, an actual police officer. This kind of presence upset most of the parents on their children’s school grounds, but that is another story. As for the officer, his sun-leathered skin makes him look scarier than he should. Pat watches as one of her classmates accidentally runs into the police officer. A dark-skinned boy as beautiful as midnight, running to catch a football, bumps into the officer.

“I’m sorry, sir. I went left when I should’ve gone right,” the boy says with a hesitant laugh.

The cop puts his hand on the top of his nightstick, points the boy in a different direction. With the football in hand, the boy runs back to his friends.

“You okay, bro?”

“I thought he was going to tase me,” the beautiful boy says, running away with his friends.

“Or shoot you,” another friend says.

Pat stays to herself, walking past the exhaust- covered school. Luckily, the police officer pays no attention to her. Pat turns the corner of the building, heading home, and runs into a wall of chests.

“Oh, sorry.” Pat’s eyes grow wide.

Damien, Kevin, and their crew of wannabe thugs are standing in front of her. Damien reaches out and grabs Pat by her backpack. He pulls her to a more secluded spot by the school’s side so the police officer cannot see them. Damien slams Pat up against the wall. The blow does not hurt her because her books are taking the damage.

“I’m gonna throw your books in the river,” Damien says, trying to get her backpack off, “and then you with them.”

A loud voice in the distance shouts, “Leave her alone!”

Pat smiles as Damien releases her.

Everyone looks in the distance at a girl standing like a superhero, her long ribbons of black curls flowing in the breeze, her athletic uniform like a knight’s armor.

“Yo-Yo, TillyMa, looking good.” Damien clicks his teeth.

“Hi,...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 18.6.2021
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Fantasy / Science Fiction ► Science Fiction
• ISBN-10: 1-0983-7506-8 / 1098375068
• ISBN-13: 978-1-0983-7506-5 / 9781098375065