NERDS: National Espionage, Rescue, and Defense Society

A man Jackson immediately recognized as Dr. Munoz approached. “You are late. Set up and get started.”

Ruby nodded and turned to her group. She said quietly. “Let’s sing a few songs, and then Flinch and Braceface will approach him.”

“I get to do something?”

Ruby nodded. “I don’t think you could screw up an interview with a witness. OK, let’s give these people a show.”

“Again, I don’t sing. I don’t dance,” Jackson said, but he was pushed onto the stage anyway.

Flinch stepped up to a microphone. “Buenos dias, everyone. We want to wish Ms. Elizabeth a feliz cumpleanos. We are Del Loco. Before we get started, we have a special present for Elizabeth.”

A young girl stepped forward and Flinch set the guinea pig into her eager hands. She squealed with delight as a gaggle of her friends surrounded her. They each took turns petting the nervous creature.

“We hope you have a good time, and feel free to dance,” Flinch continued.

Suddenly, a song blasted through the speakers. Jackson turned to find the team moving in a complex dance sequence. They were bouncing and hopping around like trained dancers while he stood on the stage like a dumb ape.

“Dance,” Heathcliff said as he nudged him.

“I told you I can’t dance,” he cried.

“Just listen to my instructions,” Matilda said, her voice ringing in his head.

“Left foot step to the right, now lunge, turn to the right and jump!” Jackson followed the best he could, which seemed to quell the anger of a group of young girls staring at him from the crowd.

“Spin on the right foot, spin again, pull back and thrust. That’s it. OK, let’s drive these kids into a frenzy. Braceface, grab that mic and sing.”

Jackson looked at the others. “I don’t sing.” His voice bellowed out over the crowd. A moment later a burrito came flying out of the audience and hit him in the leg. Before things could get ugly, Flinch snatched the microphone and took over the song.

Everyone was dancing and singing and, best of all, completely fooled. Dr. Munoz and his daughter whirled across the dance floor doing a lively two-step. They looked as if they were having the time of their lives.

“Del Loco” played several songs before Ruby kicked Jackson in the shin.

“What was that for?” he groaned as he did a complicated swivel step.

“Look at your watch,” she said.

Jackson eyed the watch. There was a flashing screen that read ACTIVATE GUINEA PIG. He pushed the button and the little screen was replaced with a video camera image. He could see dozens of little girls staring up at him and then realized he was seeing what the guinea pig was seeing. A moment later he watched as the girls squealed and the guinea pig made an escape. In no time at all it had scurried out of the backyard and into the house. Watching its point of view, Jackson saw it weave in and out of the crowd of busy caterers as it went from one room to the next.

Jackson continued his dancing and singing for several more songs, though his focus on the watch made him slam into Matilda during a tricky spin move. He accidentally kicked Heathcliff in the rear end, but finally the furry little camera stumbled into a room filled with file cabinets.

“That has to be it,” Jackson said to himself. The watch flashed a button that said TARGET LOCK and he pushed it. At once a schematic of the house appeared, then a turn-for-turn map to the guinea pig’s location.

Jackson and Flinch stepped offstage and hurried into the house. They found the guinea pig sniffing at a desk chair in a lonely room that overlooked the backyard and the party below. The room must have had twenty file cabinets in it, stacked up to the ceiling.

“This will take forever.” Jackson groaned. “We don’t even know what we’re looking for.”

“We better get started, bro,” Flinch said. He tried to open a drawer but it was locked. He gave the knob on his chest a slight turn and then yanked at the drawer handle so that its lock busted. Then he did the same for Jackson’s drawer. They sorted through files filled with bizarre mathematical equations and strange schematics, but none of them had Dr. Jigsaw’s name on them or seemed to have anything to do with continents.

From downstairs Jackson could hear his teammates replaying a song they had already performed. In his head, Ruby’s angry voice demanded they hurry.

“This is hopeless,” Flinch said.

“Shouldn’t you two be on stage?” a voice said behind them. The boys spun around and found Dr. Munoz standing in the doorway.

“We’re not with the band. We’re with NERDS,” Flinch said.

“You’re nerds?”

“Not nerds. NERDS. The National Espionage, Rescue, and Defense Society.”

“But you’re kids. You can’t be older than ten!” Dr. Munoz cried.

“Actually, we’re eleven.”

“The government sends eleven-year-olds for this kind of work now?” Munoz said, shaking his head.

“Sir, we know you contacted the FBI about Dr. Jigsaw. We also know you have schematics for his invention,” Flinch said. “It would be a great help to us—and to the world—to have them.”

Jackson watched the man’s face turn cold. “You’re putting my family in danger.”

“We’re trying to help you,” Jackson said. “If we can’t stop that wacko, who knows where Los Angeles will be on the map tomorrow. Give us the schematics. You will be saving millions of i

Munoz shuddered. “Jigsaw will have me killed. The guy is certifiable! I worked with him for a decade. He was always odd, but as time went by he got worse. When he proposed his continent project to the board of directors, they laughed at him. He threatened the head of the program with a letter opener and was arrested. Scientists really need to stop laughing at one another—we’re all very sensitive. Long story short, Jigsaw was fired the next day. I had to pack up his things, which I took over to his apartment. The entire floor was covered in this massive jigsaw puzzle. I don’t think he knew I was there. He kept muttering to himself that he would never give up.”

“Give up what?” Flinch asked.

“The reunification of the continents,” Munoz said. “There’s this theory that all of the seven continents—North and South America, Asia, Europe, Australia, Africa, and Antarctica— were once one giant continent. Scientists call it Pangaea. They think that shifts in tectonic plates caused it to break apart and drift to where the continents are now—but it’s not my field. Jigsaw, however, was obsessed with it. He believed that all the world’s problems could be solved if we just put all the pieces back together. He thought we should all be living next to each other again. I tried to explain what a nightmare putting them back together would be. Nearly every coastal city would be destroyed when the continental shelves slammed into one another. Millions of people would die. Moving land masses that large would create a tidal wave that would kill millions more. The natural paths of sea and wildlife would be devastated and wipe out a great deal of our food supply. Not to mention that his fundamental theory was flawed. Even if you could slide them together all nice and neat, people wouldn’t get along any better. There are plenty of countries that neighbor one another now that have been at war for a thousand years. Jigsaw wouldn’t hear it. He said the world needed to be put back the way it was meant to be.”

Jackson glanced out the window. The doctor’s daughter was in the yard. She was blindfolded and carrying a long stick. She swung it wildly at a piñata hanging directly above her.

“If he’s so dangerous, you have to give us the schematics,” Flinch begged. “If Jigsaw intends to use his invention, we need to know everything we can about it.”

Munoz nodded in surrender. “Let me get them for you.”

As Munoz rifled through a file cabinet, Jackson watched the party. The little girl had still not hit the piñata, though she had nailed quite a number of her friends. Finally, she was nudged as close to the piñata as humanly possible. She swung like a maniac and smacked two children, a caterer, a piñata deliveryman, and her own grandmother before she managed to bludgeon open the side of the piñata. A wave of wounded children rushed forward in hopes of snatching the candy in its belly, but something odd happened. The piñata, which was shaped like a horse, righted itself. Its two white eyes suddenly glowed red, and rockets popped out of its side. It took to the air and circled the crowd.