Wright moaned, “Oh, dude, you gotta be kidding. Is he just going to stay there?”

Arthur pressed a button on his watch to make it glow and reported from the rancid darkness, “There are still twenty minutes of recess. Great. Just awesome.”

“It was supposed to be safe again,” Park grumbled, his voice muffled as he held his jacket over his nose and mouth. “Well, now what? We gotta force this time to go by.”

“Twenty questions?” Arthur suggested.

“Oh, yeah, I totally want to play that while trapped in a pitch-black dumpster.”

“What else are we gonna do? I Spy?”

After a long, exasperated moan, Park replied, “Animal, vegetable, or mineral?”

• •

As Ms. Porter wrote ‘Bring a Parent to School Week’ on the blackboard and talked about how adults spent their days at a place called work, Sadie turned to the boys with something of a repulsed expression and remarked, “You guys really stink.”

There were similar reactions across the classroom, with students holding their noses around Park, Wright, and especially the concentration of Wessy and his friends. A few kids had even moved their desks away from the offenders by a few inches, as if it would help. Jace had never expected to smell like literal hot garbage at school.

“Yup…” Wessy replied nonchalantly and leaned back in his seat. “It’s a thankless job, keeping The Dump open for the next generation—but worth the fight.”

“Zach’s gotta have another talk with the owner,” Jared said after scraping off some more of the unidentifiable substance on the bottom of his shoe with a pencil. “If The Dump is gonna reopen and survive, it’s going to need some extra security.”

“If it’s so important to you, why not just take care of Mr. Drake?” Sadie asked.

“What, like, tie him up and put him on a bus out of town?” Arthur wondered.

“I’m kidding, obviously. Has it really been that bad having no garbage heap recently? It gets you guys back out on the playground.”

“I wonder if he’d take a bribe, though…” Colin mused. “To look the other way.”

“Hey, can we talk real for a sec and not fantasy?” Wessy asked the others. “You all remember that we’re having our big strategy meeting at my place after school, right?”

“Yeah, sure,” Sadie replied. “But you’re going to take a shower first, right?”

Millie suddenly interjected, “You could just hose him down.”

That got a laugh from Ash, but Wessy looked unamused and continued, “I found us our eighth squad mate, and I need you all to meet, er, them and then talk shop.”

“Ooo, big mystery, huh?” Jared said. “Is it someone from this class?”

“W-well, actually… Nah, just wait and find out. It’ll be a surprise. Yeah…”

The others quickly gave up on trying to coerce an answer out of him, and Wessy gave Jace a bit of a nervous grin before turning his attention back to Ms. Porter.

“So each day next week, we get to meet some parents!” she concluded her line of reasoning for the pointless yet standard class event Jace lived through once before. “And on the subject of growing up… a few of you may need to start using deodorant.”

• •

“Hi, everyone!” Wessy’s mom welcomed them as they filed into her house, trying not to comment about the smell they tracked in. “Making some little plans, right?”

“Mom, it’s an important strategy session!” he corrected her.

“Oh, right, right. You and your water gun games. Hm, as long as it’s exercise and team work. And hello, Sadie! I don’t get to see you too often. How’s your mom doing?”

“Just fine, thanks for asking,” she replied politely.

“Mom, um, that ‘special guest’ I told you about hasn’t arrived yet, right?”

She smiled and closed the front door. “No, dear. I’ll send them up when they do. Oh, and I already put snacks up there for you and your friends.”

“T-thanks, Mom…” Wessy then murmured, “Do you have to be so nice?”

As they traversed the stairs up to Wessy’s room, Zach asked from right behind him, “Why do you gotta be so secretive about this, dude?”

“He’s probably just embarrassed about this new team-mate,” Sadie replied.

“Am… am not!” Wessy argued. “I just like surprises, that’s all. Big reveals.”

His mom had indeed laid out a plethora of snacks, including Capri Suns and Hi-C’s to drink, with Handi-Snacks and chocolate Koala Yummies as the food. Once Jace was done looking at the options, his eyes went to Sadie, who was studying all of the toys in Wessy’s collection that been piled up on top of his entertainment center. This was the first time he had seen her in his room, and apparently, such visits were rare.

“Ya know, Wes, you really should get rid of some of this stuff,” Sadie suggested. “Do you really need to show off all these Happy Meal toys, for example? Some of these I remember back from the 80s… And what’s with the empty M&M candy dispenser?”

“Ugh, Sadie, you promised not to judge me last time you were up here!”

“Yeah, you know he likes to be surrounded by his… stuff,” Colin reminded her.

“I can’t believe you guys still have sleep overs up here. Where do you all sleep? Do you gotta cram together really close? It’s a cool room, but not very big…”

“It’s getting tougher when it’s all of us, actually,” Zach replied. “Wonder why.”

“Um, Zach, maybe because you’re not all eight anymore. You’re growing.”

“Quiet, everyone,” Jared said. “Someone’s coming up the stairs.”

Arthur replied after a yawn, “So, we finally get to see the mystery boy.”

“Is it Wright? Did you get Wright on our team, Wes? Or…” Jared trailed off.

Celeste was standing in the doorway, her eyes darting around Wessy’s room. All the boys except for Jace and Wes looked shocked, but Sadie quickly took on a grin.

Jared was the first to respond verbally with, “What the absolute crap, Wes?”

“Yeah, hello to you, too,” Celeste replied and closed the door behind her.

“You have to be joking,” Zach muttered. “Seriously…”

“Come on, guys,” Sadie said and walked over to Celeste. “I think Wes made a brave and mature choice inviting her. Come to think of it… when we go to the arcade with Ash sometimes, Cel’ is pretty good at the light gun games…”

“Hear me out, guys,” Wessy exclaimed. He then reluctantly added to her defense, “What Sadie just called her—Cel—that’s a name that’s all over the arcades, sometimes even above Gavin and Vanni’s best scores. I noticed it a while back, and, you know, I wanted to give her a chance, so I rang her up and…”

Arthur, who had been looking at Wessy’s Virtual Boy that was already gathering dust, said with a laugh, “You have her number? Aw, do you want a moment together?”

“What? N-no! Our moms are just old friends, remember? Her house’s number is in my mom’s phonebook thing… But, seriously, she can shoot.”

Zach scratched his head and grumbled, “Ah, I don’t know, man… You and Celeste can get so weird when you’re together, and who says being good with a light gun means she’ll be good at shooting in real life, or working on a team?”

“Okay, first of all, she gets weird around me. I’m just fine.”

After she glared at Wessy for a moment, Celeste uncrossed her arms and grabbed her slingshot. Just to prove a point, she pulled a penny out of her pocket, loaded up the sling, and shot the coin to impressively remove the hat off of Wessy’s Alan Grant action figure that stood among his Jurassic Park toy collection on his desk.

“Good enough shot for ya?” she asked Zach.

“You’re a girl version of Bart Simpson, big deal,” Jared scoffed.

“Bev from It helped kill Pennywise with a slingshot…” Colin reminded him.

“You and your monster clowns, Colin. We don’t even use slingshots.”

“But there’s no rule against it,” Sadie argued.

Celeste sheathed her weapon and continued, “Give me a sidearm water pistol and a bunch of little water balloons, and I won’t disappoint you.”

Jared wasn’t finished yet. “But, Wes, these games are much more than just aiming and firing. She’s probably never even done a block-wide water shooter. How’s she going to help the team? Does she even know the rules?”

“I’ll give her a crash course, okay?” Sadie groaned. “Lay off, J.”

“Maybe he’s just still mad about that kickball game,” Celeste said, and smiled once she saw his look of surprise. “Yeah. Word reached Miller about that.”

“Guys,” Wessy spoke over the others before things could escalate. “Celeste can actually give us something really good: a battlefield advantage. We agreed with the other team that we wouldn’t scout out the arena before the game, to make it more interesting, but Celeste here used to live on that block, before she moved for first grade.”

“So?” Zach said with a shrug. “Jason lives there, too.”

Celeste sighed, grabbed a Capri Sun pouch, and punctured its bottom with the straw like a pro. Once she had downed about half its contents, she explained what was up, “Yeah, but he just moved there and doesn’t know his way around. When I was a kid on that block, I ran around it inside and out. I could get into pretty much anyone’s backyard, I made my own short cuts, I climbed trees and fences. I made that place my giant playground. Got yelled at by some adults, too, but they could never catch me. It’s barely changed since then. I can draw up a map of all the secrets, let you get the jump on those seventh-graders, give you the best spot to make your flag fort. So. Good enough?”

Zach pushed down his shades and stared. “Holy crap, what kinda kindergartener were you?” He looked at the others, adding, “I dunno, guys. I think she deserves a shot.”

Celeste finished her drink and crumpled up the pouch. “And I’m not staying behind to guard the stupid flag. Wanna take a vote, then? Who doesn’t want me in?”

The kids eyeballed one another, with only Jared half-way raising his hand before quickly dropping it again. Sadie grinned and gave her friend a friendly back slap. Once the deal was sealed, Tiger came meandering into the room. As one of Celeste’s old canine friends, he contently let her get in close and ruffle up his shaggy hair a bit.

“Man, no offense…” Jared muttered. “But I just don’t get ‘tough’ girls.”

“Aw,” Sadie replied. “Should we all wear bows and pretty dresses, J? Still, even I have my limits… You guys need to do something about that smell before we talk strats.”

Celeste looked up from her dog-petting spot on the floor to ask, “What smell?”