MY BEST FRIEND IS A SECRET AGENT, Book 2: How C.H.I.P. Took a Dive to Dash...

Chapter 25: "Bad Cafeteria Food"

This could be good, I thought, or this could be horrible.

If C.H.I.P. the master baker was good, he'd make all the students a great dessert.

But if C.H.I.P. was still evil . . . I didn't want to think about it!

Just as I was about to follow C.H.I.P. into the school, I noticed that reporter lady, Anastasia O'Neil, shooting everything with her camera crew. "Hero guy or wacky bad guy?" Anastasia asked, doing a live report. "Have the citizens of Vortville been hoodwinked by a shapeshifting supervillain? Is this Swiss Army knife of a man using all his little knives and gadgets for good or for evil?"

Then she spotted me and shoved her microphone in my face. "And here is the boy who knows 'the hero guy' best of all!" She did air quotes for "the hero guy."

Yeah, that hurt.

"I don't know anybody!" I complained, desperate to get away.

"How do you explain why 'the hero guy' is ripping apart our fair city?" Again with the air quotes. Ugh.

"He's not ripping it apart!" I blurted out. "He's saving it! You have no idea the danger we're in!" Finally, I took off into the school building and headed straight for the kitchen. And when I saw kids pouring out of the cafeteria screaming, I realized we were all in big trouble.

C.H.I.P. the master baker must be evil after all!

When I got into the cafeteria, I discovered a massive loaf of bread expanding out of the kitchen and filling up the whole room! Some kids were even smashed against the wall and had to claw their way out the windows.

And one of those kids was Carla Mawhinney! But Carla was stuck and couldn't reach a window.

I had to save her! So I got down on my hands and knees and crawled under all the cafeteria tables, heading for Carla. Then I grabbed a chair and fought back the rampaging, expanding bread like a lion tamer.

Finally, I was able to pull Carla from the sticky mess and help her to a window. And just before she jumped out, she turned to me with amazement in her eyes. "Nort . . . you saved me!"

Oh, how I wanted to stay with Carla and bask in the glow of her awe. She finally saw me as a hero! In her eyes, I was the real hero guy!

But I had more important things to do at that moment. I had to save the city of Vortville . . . from my best friend!

"Hold that thought," I said to Carla. Then I crawled back out under the cafeteria tables and snuck into the kitchen through a side door. And there was C.H.I.P. whipping up a batch of chocolate chip cookies in this huge industrial mixer. He had an evil gleam in his eye, and he was still chanting, "Must . . . destroy . . . Vortville!"

I finally realized the only way to stop evil C.H.I.P. was to simply pull his false tooth right out of his mouth. So I snuck up quietly behind him . . . but then he turned the mixer up to eleven, and the thing started spraying cookie dough all over the place!

I ducked, but not before a wad of cookie dough got me right in the eye. "OW!" It was the chocolate chips that really made it sting.

Suddenly, someone barged into the room with an even crazier look in her eye than C.H.I.P.: Gert von Brugen!

"It's the hero guy!" she screamed, pointing at C.H.I.P. But then she looked confused and asked, "But why's he acting so bananas?"

"I guess he's not the hero guy after all," I said. "Well, bye!" I added while trying to scoot Gert back out of the kitchen.

But then she looked more closely at the laughing C.H.I.P. and noticed a RED SPARK in his mouth. "It's the hero guy all right, and you're controlling him! He's a superandroid, and you're controlling him through something in his mouth!"

I looked at C.H.I.P. and realized that the microthingy on the back of his tooth was in fact sparking. C.H.I.P.'s evilness was causing it to overload!

"IT'S HIS TOOTH!" Gert screamed. "I can see it!" She climbed up onto a counter and leapt right onto C.H.I.P. And with the fire of determination in her eyes, she started yanking at his false tooth!

I was torn over what to do. I wanted to remove C.H.I.P.'s tooth too—but I didn't want Gert to get a hold of it! So I grabbed Gert from behind and tried to pull her off C.H.I.P. But it was no use—she was going to pull out that tooth no matter what.

Finally, Gert yanked the false tooth out of C.H.I.P.'s mouth. She flew backwards at the same time, and I flew with her. We both crashed into a big stack of pots and pans . . .

. . . and the tooth went flying.

Gert scrambled for it, but I think it got lost under the huge loaf of bread out in the cafeteria.

And, at that very same moment, C.H.I.P. turned back into Chip!

He looked around at the disaster of a kitchen and said, "Whoa, check out all the cookie dough!" He grabbed a glob of dough from the wall and shoved it into his mouth. "Mmmm, chocolate-chippy!"

Gert stood up, furious that she couldn't find Chip's tooth. But then she spotted goofy, normal Chip and said, "How'd you get here?"

I said, "Chip was always here."

Suspicious, Gert looked around and asked, "Hey, where's the hero guy?"

"He . . . left!" I said, fumbling for an answer. "He had other hero guy stuff to do."

"Wait a minute . . ." Gert said, "how come Chip's never around when the hero guy is? And the hero guy's never around when Chip is?"

"Bad luck, I guess," I said, again not too convincingly. Then I grabbed Chip's hand and dragged him out of the kitchen into the cafeteria.

Scanning the room in desperation, I finally spotted Chip's false tooth on the cafeteria floor.

I snatched it up before Gert could come out and see it, and Chip and I got out of there fast.

But once we got back outside, I realized our troubles had only just begun because:

A) The C.H.I.P. microthingy had fallen off of Chip's tooth!

B) Water was rushing down the streets!