Rat Trap

By Michael J. Daley

Rat and Jeff are back and still aboard the space station—but with suspicious scientists and robots around every corner, Rat is in danger again

Rat barely escaped the wrath of the researchers aboard the space station last time around. Thanks to her best friend, Jeff, she has managed to stay safe and out of sight. When Jeff learns that he and his parents will be taking the shuttle back to Earth, he’s thrilled. But the scientists—Jeff’s parents included—want to get rid of Rat for good.
 
After a couple of serious close calls, Jeff starts to fear for the safety of his rodent friend. But can he outsmart a team that is bent on hunting Rat down? This science fiction adventure story is a must for young readers. 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Open Road Media
• Release date: Aug 26, 2014
• ISBN: 9781497637283

Michael J. Daley

Michael J. Daley’s career as an author has been inspired by a lifelong love of science, spaceships, and science fiction. He writes his stories on a solar-powered laptop in a five-foot-square tower room. This keeps him well acquainted with the cramped conditions in spaceships! When not traveling among the stars, Daley lives in Westminster, Vermont, with his wife, children’s author Jessie Haas. 

Book preview

CHAPTER ONE

A GOOD ROUTINE

Still dead?

Rat turned from the computer screen just as the boy sat up in bed. His eyes were half closed with sleep. His hair spiked in all directions.

Checking, Rat signed. The boy would not go for food if he did not know. Rat did not blame him. She was afraid of Nanny, too.

Thump, thump went two bare feet. The boy crossed the room to stand beside her. His bare arm brushed against her. She sidled a step away from that touch. Even though the boy’s touch was different from the scientists’—nicer—she was still not used to it. Rat was used to living alone, not in a room on a space station with a human boy!

Rat pressed RUN, and the spy program started up, tapping into the security camera in the workshop. The screen showed a low, wide workbench covered with bits of Nanny, some of them still crusted with dried liverwurst. To the right of the pile of parts, the shiny black body of the robot stood on tiny wheels. The body was about the size of an industrial vacuum cleaner, but sleek, like a jet-scooter helmet. From a socket in the side, a thin, steely arm stuck out, knobby at the joints and ending in a pincer-like gripper. At the far left of the bench rested Nanny’s frisbee-shaped head with its one round eye. Once that eye had glowed green with Nanny’s electronic intelligence. Not anymore.

Cables of twisted wire snaked from the head to a row of computers on the wall, all working to try to bring Nanny back. Rat and the boy did not want them to succeed. Sometimes Rat wished she could sneak into the workshop and bite through those cables to make sure Nanny never came back.

But chewing wires had started all the trouble before and doing it again would let them know Rat was still alive. She was supposed to be dead. Killed by Nanny. That’s what the boy had told them.

But Nanny was the dead one.

Rat liked it that way.

That gripper arm wasn’t on yesterday, the boy said, yawning.

Rat’s nose twitched as his morning breath washed over her. It carried a whiff of fear. Nanny’s gripper arms had hurt the boy, but not as badly as the sniffer’s vicious bear-trap jaws had hurt Rat’s leg.

Rat typed and her words wrote over the image: THE EYE IS STILL DARK. THAT IS ALL THAT MATTERS.

The boy reached for the joystick. He zoomed in on the head. You’re right, Rat.

Satisfied, the boy went to the bathroom. Rat used the toilet now, too. It was necessary. The space station’s waste reclaimers counted poop. Every bit of food Rat ate had to be accounted for.

Water gushed, splattering with a harsh sound against the shower stall. Strange way to bathe, getting wet all over. But Rat guessed humans had to. The boy couldn’t even scratch the back of his head with his own foot! He’d never be able to wash between his toes.

After his shower, the boy would get breakfast. Her mouth began to water. Would he bring bacon, all wrinkly brown and crisp?

Rat groomed her whiskers. Bacon would be nice.

Next came playtime in the Zero-G room. Rat would rather study, but the boy could not sit still so early in the day. So they played tag or z-ball. Of course, the exercise was good for Rat, too. It kept her fit, except for the broken leg. But studying was very important—more important!—because the space shuttle would be coming a whole week earlier than scheduled. It docked with the space station in three days, four hours, and twenty-six minutes. The shuttle would take the boy home. Back to Earth. Rat would go with him—smuggled. That’s why they needed to study. They had to figure out the best way to do that.

The boy did not like to study. He’d rather play games. It did not take Rat long to figure out how to make the boy study. In the lab, the scientists had shaped Rat’s behavior with reward and punishment. Now Rat used rewards like z-ball and chess—after study time—to train the boy.

She had never had to use punishment.

The boy came back into the room dressed in his shiny silver jump suit. He put on his Velcro booties, then opened the laundry drawer under his bed about six inches. This was part of their routine, readying Rat’s hideaway in case someone came to the room while the boy was gone.

See you in a minute, he said and—scritch-rip, scritch-rip—went out the door.

Rat waited for the sound from the Velcro booties to fade, then she opened her Space Shuttle Escape Pods Operation Manual study file on the computer. Rat needed this private study time. The boy must not find out about the escape pods. He talked of taking her home with him to live with the mother and the father. In New York City. In an apartment. She had looked these things up. She had seen pictures. A city full of millions of people! A towering building full of thousands! That’s where the boy wanted her to live.

It made him happy, this plan.

Rat let him think she agreed, because a happy boy was a controllable boy.

CHAPTER TWO

STUFF

Rrrriiiiipppp.

The Velcro boots peeled off the carpet as Jeff walked slowly toward the science section and his parents’ lab. It was part of the routine. By showing up every day, he hoped to keep them from coming to his room—to keep Rat a secret. A silly precaution, because they weren’t very likely to visit him. It was crunch time for the Project. All the data Mom collected during solar maximum needed to be analyzed before the shuttle arrived.

Mom believed the sun was about to enter a phase of reduced energy output. No other solar model predicted that. If the data proved Mom’s theory right, then the Global Cooling Initiative being planned to reverse global warming on Earth would be a disaster. The human-made cooling plus the cooler sun would bring on the deepest ice age ever, one people might not survive.

Scritch-rip, scritch-rip, scritch-rip.

Jeff trailed a finger along one of the color-coded pipes that lined the wall. A purple one, like Rat. Though he would never say that to Rat. She was very particular about her coat. It was really a certain shade of lavender, with white cuffs covering the paws. So Jeff kept purple thoughts to himself.

Rip, rip, rip.

Bump, bump, bump.

His forefinger rode over the brackets holding the pipe to the wall. What was this pipe for? Jeff didn’t know. He didn’t care. Rat would know. Now that she had free access to his computer, Rat had learned tons of stuff about the space station. But what did it matter? In three days, four hours, and some minutes—Rat knew exactly—a space shuttle was arriving to take them home!

Home. That’s all Jeff used to think about from the first day he and his parents had arrived here: getting home. He was the only kid on the space station. He was bored, and Nanny was horrible, and his parents were totally lost in the Project, just like all the other researchers. Then he found Rat, and everything changed. Now he had someone to talk to and play games with, and he was even learning sign language!

Sometimes he wished he could tell someone about Rat, to share the wonder of this amazing new friend. Then other times, most times, he wanted to keep Rat all to himself. Secret.

That’s what Rat wanted, anyway, and that’s what he had promised to do.

Bumpripbumpripbumprip.

The pulse of his finger over the brackets reminded him of rattling the iron railings in front of fancy apartments in the city, and before he knew it, Jeff was running—his favorite thing! He hardly noticed. It was easy for him to run on the space station. Everyone else thought walking was hard enough, because of the spin that created the artificial gravity. The spin played tricks on the inner ear. Ruined your balance …

Jeffrey! Mom’s voice burst like a thunderclap.

He staggered. Came up hard against the wall like a hockey player slammed against the boards. The color-coded piping swirled. He grabbed a handhold.

Mom stood in the door of her lab in bright yellow pj’s. She was short, thin, and looked as delicate as a canary. But Mom was sharp as a hawk.

You—you—scared me.

Better me than the captain. Mom grabbed him into a strong hug. Oh, Jeff, isn’t it wonderful? A shuttle! Home!

Jeff nodded, his cheek slipping against the soft flannel. The crush of her hug felt wonderful.

Look at you. Mom held him at arms length. You’re puffing like an air compressor. Come get a drink and cool off.

"Look at you! Jeff countered. The dark circles under her eyes were black as smudges of soot. Hurry up and save the world. You need a vacation."

Don’t I know it. Mom made a tiny space between thumb and forefinger. I’m this close.

Stepping into the lab was like walking into the heart of the sun. The walls and ceiling were covered with poster-sized sunspot images. The dark sunspots covered the sun’s fiery surface with feathered patterns like frost ferns on a window. And each sunspot was unique, like a snowflake.

They were beautiful.

Jeff could see that now, thanks to Rat.

Before, Jeff saw only black holes sucking up his parents’ attention. Now he had three posters in his own room. Rat loved to look at them. She had told him about how sunshine touched her once, by accident, in a scientist’s office. Its glow and warmth set her on the path to freedom, a daring escape from the lab that landed her on the space station.

With a clatter, Mom moved a stack of dirty dishes out of the sink. She was messy, like Jeff. There were papers on the floor. Every flat surface was piled with printouts and reference books. You never cleaned up after Mom. She had a geographic memory and stored everything in her drop file.

A little like Rat, actually.

Mom handed him the water. I happened to glance at your study log. Impressive. I was sure you’d goof off with Nanny on the blink.

Jeff shrugged. What could he say? You can thank Rat for that?

I really appreciate how independent you’ve been lately. I know it’s hard for you. I hoped we’d have more time, but with the shuttle coming early …

"I know, there’s twice the