Read Online We Dine With Cannibals by C. Alexander London - Free Book Online Page A

up smacking him in the face.
    â€œOuch,” he said.
    â€œYour own fault.”
    Oliver rubbed his cheek where she’d hit him. “It worked, didn’t it?” He pointed at the TV screen.
    W ELCOME TO T ABLET 2.0 , the TV screen read. T HE COMPLETE CATALOG OF THE G REAT L IBRARY OF A LEXANDRIA.
    This was the souvenir their mother had given them the last time she left them, back in Tibet. It wasn’t a T-shirt and it wasn’t a knickknack or bric-a-brac or a tchotchke. It wasn’t a fanged spirit mask of the Liberian chimpanzee devil.
    It was a universal remote control that could access the complete catalog of the Lost Library of Alexandria—every book and scroll and mysterious treasure that had been hidden there since the library was founded over two thousand years ago. Right on the TV screen.
    They had only opened it once before they had gone off to South America with Sir Edmund, but their mother had told them that the catalog would help them. They’d need it to find the Lost Library and she gave it to them to keep it safe. It also worked on any TV, which was a plus.
    â€œSo what do we look for?” Celia asked.
    Oliver typed in the letters for “El Dorado” and pressed enter. A little cartoon man in a toga appeared and tapped its foot while the request was processed.
    Suddenly, the toga man frowned and a message appeared on the screen.
    A CCESS D ENIED.
    Oliver frowned and pressed some other buttons. The message repeated itself.
    A CCESS D ENIED. A CCESS D ENIED. A CCESS D ENIED.
    â€œWhat?” Oliver wondered aloud. “It’s broken.”
    He pressed more buttons. Suddenly the screen went dark. After a second, Corey Brandt appeared again, standing at the base of a giant tree.
    â€œSo remember,” he said. “If you want to battle the giant redwoods, you’ll need nerves of steel, eyes like lasers, and a copy of
The Celebrity Adventurist
companion photo book, on sale this spring.”
    He winked at the camera and it cut to the credits.
    Oliver and Celia stared at their TV.
    â€œWell,” Celia said at last. “So much for the catalog.”
    â€œI guess.” Oliver couldn’t hide his disappointment.
    â€œWhatever,” said Celia. She couldn’t hide her happiness. No more catalog in their remote meant that maybe there was no more destiny, nothing they could do to find the Lost Library. Maybe they could just be normal for a little while.“There’s a bright side,” she told Oliver to try to cheer him up.
    â€œWhat’s that?”
    â€œWe’ll get cable TV tomorrow.”
    Oliver smiled. He could argue with his sister about a lot of things, but never about cable television.

11
WE GET SCHOOLED

    IT WAS THE MOST STRANGE and terrifying thing Oliver and Celia had ever seen.
    Although they had endured many terrors in their eleven years and they had seen many strange things, from giant yetis to psychic yaks, nothing compared to what they saw before them at this moment.
    Children screamed.
    Furniture tumbled.
    Paper flew through the air.
    A
miasma
—which is what Wally the Word Worm might call a really stinky smell—of sweat and perfume filled the air. A
cacophony
—which is what Wally the Word Worm might call a lot of noise—shook the walls. Children of all different shapes and sizes darted from place to place like nervous lizards.
    This was Mr. McNulty’s homeroom five minutes before the start of the first day of sixth grade.
    When Mr. McNulty—whose name was written on the blackboard—saw Oliver and Celia standing frozen in the classroom doorway, he waved them in.
    â€œDon’t be afraid!” He smiled. He was a big man, built like a football player, and his smile took over most of his very wide face. “We thrive on creative chaos here!” He stood up on his chair, which creaked under his weight. “It is my pedagogical approach!”
    â€œPedagogical?”