Volume II: The Heist of Spring Road Toys
Chapter One: Samantha on the Run
Here you will be able to get a sneak peak look at Chapter One to The Heist of Spring Road Toys. The book will be released in October and is still going through the editing phase. Please note that any subject matter is under review and can be changed.
Once we get a final version, we will include artwork and break up the pages like we did for Volume I.
9:00 PM
A surveillance camera omitting a flashing red light circled on its axis. The small white camera lay high in the rafters, five floors up, on the outside of the property. It would be extremely hard for the naked eye to see the device hidden between two pieces of wood.
The camera’s two-inch lens focused far below on one of the rear entrances of the building. As the camera turned and looked around the property, its primary focus was on the grounds nearest the door.
This building had all the usual security measures. In addition to the cameras, there were guards patrolling around the grounds—inside the building and out. They each were assigned a specific section of land to cover and were responsible for anything that happened inside that “sector.”
There were also locks. Every door, every case, and every locker was secured by the toughest and hardest lock to break. Most of these locks kept people out of certain areas, while other locks protected valuables from anyone looking at them.
And then there were the cameras. They looked at every room, every hallway, and every grain of dirt on the property. The proprietor considered the surveillance cameras the main lifeline, the major area of defense. Sure, there were security guards. They walked their predetermined areas, moving their flashlights from right to left, but they mostly killed the time between their coffee breaks, only pretending to look for intruders.
The cameras, however, picked up everything. The valuable items inside the building needed to be protected at all times. Cameras not only picked up live images and fed them back to a central computer, but infrared images, heat stamps, and motion sensors lay hidden in every room, hallway, and entrance.
To break in here cleanly, one would need to disable all these security devices.
The small white camera continued to patrol the rear entrance. It made a small humming noise as it turned. Then, there was a small click. The red light that once shined brightly on the top of the unit went dark. With its final rotation, the small camera stopped moving, and the lens went black.
The main lifeline was disabled.
It wasn’t hard for Samantha to execute her new mission. After all, she and the rest of Kid Combat’s secret organization had planned out every detail.
The entrance point where she would break in was selected for Samantha because it was home to the fewest security cameras. She could hide in the shadows at this entrance, wait for Gears and Roller—who were back at The Playground—to disable the cameras, and scoot in before the guards noticed the cameras were off.
Samantha disabled in a matter of seconds the keypad that safeguarded the entrance to the Science Museum in Elmcrest from this exact type of invasion. A quick unscrewing of the faceplate and a snip of the red wire disabled the security alarm that would sound if this door was opened. She performed the task the same way she had been practicing for weeks at home, alone in her room.
Samantha was moments away from entering. She just needed those cameras off.
She waited impatiently. She was full of nervous energy, as she knew this mission was not going to be easy. She stood there, hiding behind one of the pillars that held up the Science Museum. She huffed. And puffed. Finally, she got the signal.
“All set, Sam. Let’s rock …”
'Bout time, Samantha muttered to herself. She slowly opened the door, crept in, and knew there was one more thing she had to worry about—the guards. To Samantha’s knowledge, the guards were in the same positions predicted by her and Kid’s recent weeks of investigation. They were going about their daily routines, thinking today was just another ordinary day.
Little did they know things were about to change.
 Samantha stood in a large hallway and found herself staring at a laser no more than a few inches away from her face. She heard the hum of the laser as it pulsed and danced in front of her. She paused, feeling almost afraid to move. Samantha knew that if she turned her head quickly, her ponytail would flip up and shine in the light.
The danger of the laser glancing her hair, or even her skin for that matter, didn’t bother Samantha. She knew the beam was harmless. It was merely another of the museum’s security measures to keep out unwanted guests. With a power loss, a battery-powered laser shield activated to thwart attackers. What did worry her, though, was the maze of lasers that lay out in front of her, and the small fact that Samantha would have to make it through that maze without setting off a single one.
“Don’t get too spooked, Sam,” a voice rang out over the communicator that was nestled in her ear.
“And why’s that, Gears?” she whispered. Her voice was low to avoid attracting attention.
“Just take each set of lasers one at a time like we practiced. You’ll do fine.”
Samantha began her work. There were a few techniques she could use to get through the tightly wrapped maze of lasers. Fortunately, the designers of the security system never figured a ten-year-old girl would be one of their foes.
The first few sets of lasers were the easy ones. Samantha belly flopped under them with no real issue. Her small frame barely rose off the ground, yet she still had a few inches of clearance below the light.
The next set was a bit more complicated and required more finesse. Delicately, Samantha balanced on one foot and went up on her tiptoes. She turned her body sideways toward the lasers and held her arms out straight on each side. Carefully, Samantha pivoted on one foot, raised her other leg over a set of lasers, and slid her limb between the beams. Ever so slowly, she put her leg down safely on the other side.
Mom was right, ballet lessons would pay off one day, Samantha said to herself.
Back on flat feet, Samantha bent at the waist and slid her midsection through the same set of lights. Her second leg bent, shifted, and came within a fraction of an inch of the light. Samantha was nothing but focused as she gently and carefully made it through this set of lights.
“How’s she doing?” a voice said from behind Gears back at The Playground. Gears pivoted in his chair to see Kid Combat walking into Main Computer Lab 1. Dressed in his usual three-piece suit, Kid approached and looked at the monitors.
“She’s doing fine, KC,” Gears said, typing away on his keyboard. “She is midway through the lasers right now. Should be on the other side in no time.”
“Is the rover ready?” Kid asked.
“Checked it ten minutes ago, Kid,” Roller said. Sitting to Gears’s right, Roller was the newest addition to the Kid Combat’s group, The Secret Order of Clever Kids, or SOCKs. Roller swung his wheelchair around and faced Kid Combat. “All systems are operational.”
“Good. Patch me through to her,” Kid ordered. Roller spun back around, typed some commands on his keyboard, and responded. “You’re on.”
“Hey, Sam, how’s it going?” asked Kid.
“Little busy right now,” Samantha answered back with a little agitation. Her voice rung hollow throughout Main Computer Lab 1’s speakers. The last, and most challenging, set of lasers lay right in front of her. Distraction was one thing she didn’t need.” Can we have our little chat later, KC? Trying to save the world here …”
“Just get in, get the intel, and get out. I still don’t like this plan of sending one in alone.”
“Well, I wasn’t planning on sightseeing. Besides, I was the only one who could fit through here this easily. I’ll radio you on my way out. Over,” Samantha finished. She rolled her eyes and shook her head back and forth. She knew Kid Combat meant well, but she also didn’t need to be checked up on.
Samantha was now inches away from making it through the last of the security measures that kept her away from her mission. Her body was tired and began to get weak from all the bending and twisting.
She took a deep breath and paused. One more, Samantha thought to herself.
The lasers crossed several times, making a spider web of light. She spied an opening in a small, eight-inch gap near one of the walls. Samantha would have to slide through the narrow opening on her back.
Samantha bent down with a blank stare of concentration on her face. Her eyes fixated on the doorway on the other side of the lasers.
She crouched down, sat on the floor, and outstretched her body. Blindly guiding her hands under the lasers, then her arms, Samantha lay flat on the floor.
She pushed with her feet at first. Slowly, her arms made it under the set of lasers. Samantha tilted her head back and looked at the lasers as they approached her. Her heart raced inside her as, with every push of her feet, the lasers got closer and closer to her face.
Samantha tilted her head back down as the lasers danced right above her head. When the red lights moved across her forehead, Samantha started to sweat. They were closer here than when she practiced this at home.
For a brief second, Samantha had to close her eyes as the red lights came even with them. It hurt to look at the intense beams.
As the laser went across her mouth, neck, and chest, Samantha tucked in her stomach and used her arms to push herself under the lights.
Once her legs and feet made it through, Samantha popped up to her feet.
“Piece of cake,” she said out loud. Back at The Playground, Kid Combat’s secret base that lay deep beneath Maple Forest, the boys were relieved.
“Good work, Sam,” Gears said back to her over her communicator. “On to part two.”
The lights were off in the museum and it was difficult for Samantha to see the dim walls around her. She walked up a flight of stairs to her right and found herself on the second floor of the Science Museum in Elmcrest—doing anything but seeing the exhibits.
She slowly stepped down the dark hallway that separated the two wings of the museum. Wearing all black to blend into the shadows, Samantha crept her way in further. Her footsteps were short and she almost tiptoed as to not cause a sound. Below her, the marble floor reflected the small amount of light that hit it. She was careful to watch where her shadow danced on the floor, making sure it wouldn’t tip off any of the guards. As a precaution, Samantha took out a ski mask from her pocket. As she walked down the hallway, she put it on to conceal her identity.
The museum was full of guards when it was closed, and Samantha didn’t want to alarm a single one of them. After a short time, she made her way to the middle of the museum. Here, the one hallway opened up into an airy foyer.
The inside of the museum was similar in design and shape to the plus symbol used in math. Samantha was smack dab in the middle. The intersection spanned all four floors of the museum and was void of displays. A person standing here could see in every direction and had access to all levels.
Preventing a person from falling off each level were thick marble railings. Samantha made her way to the railing and bent down. From here, she could start her mission.
 Below Samantha, a man stood in the middle of the museum’s first floor foyer, speaking harshly to two boys. A fourth figure, a boy dressed in all blue, exited the room before Samantha could get a good look at him.
From the intelligence that Gears had given her, Samantha knew the man to be Alfred E. Scott, the curator of the museum. He was a mysterious personage, in that none of the town’s people really knew much information about him. From the bio created about him by the members of SOCKs, Samantha knew the following information:
 Alfred Scott was in his late forties. Divorced for many years, he lived alone in the fourth-floor loft of the museum. A well-kept man always wearing a black suit, white shirt, and black bow tie, he had overseen every function of the museum for the better part of a decade. He had no visible scars or tattoos, but he had a thick black mustache and beard. For some unknown reason he always carried a walking cane with him. No apparent physical limitations made a cane necessary. Its presence seemed only to heighten the importance of his appearance.
As Samantha sat behind the marble railing, she waited patiently for the curator to divulge something that would help SOCKs decipher what possible danger this museum posed to the neighboring toy store, Spring Road Toys.
Over the past few weeks, many of the property owners adjacent to the museum had started selling their property. One by one, the businesses closed their doors and sold their land to the curator. The reasons why were never too clear, and Samantha was sent in to find out clues to those details.
Samantha sat idle in her spot and listened to the group below chat for a few minutes. The story on why the owners sold their land became a bit clearer when one of the boys asked what exactly was required of them.
“I’ve been waiting far too long for that old couple to sell their lot to me,” the curator began. He circled around the two boys, trying to intimidate them. “For months I have made them offers to relinquish their land to me, all very fair prices. Yet, nothing. Well, it’s time to show them who they are dealing with.”
The curator made his final circle around the two boys. From Samantha’s angle, she couldn’t make out their faces, but she could tell they were both older, probably sixth- or seventh-graders. Their importance to this assignment was growing. To help identify them later, Samantha needed to get a look at their faces.
As the curator continued to talk, Samantha stood up and slowly slinked her way around the banister to the other side of the square. Keeping her eyes focused on two things at once, Samantha made her way around the first corner, all the while keeping an eye on the three below. The sides of the boys’ faces came into sight, but Samantha wanted the full view.
She made her way around the artifacts and displays and came across to the opposite side of the open area. Hiding behind a scale model of the solar system, Samantha took off her backpack and unzipped a small pocket on the side of it. From it, she produced her digital camera and started taking pictures of the three. She zoomed in tightly on the two boys and got several good shots of their faces. She also got some nice shots of the curator talking to them.
“Say ‘cheese,’ boys,” Samantha muttered to herself as she prepared to take the last shot. Then, from behind her, she heard footsteps walking toward her. It was one of the night guards. Samantha turned her head around to see the flashlight beam streaming back and forth behind her. The guard was in plain sight and she could see his face moving back and forth looking across the museum for any intruders. Little did he know he was about to find one.
Samantha hastily picked up her backpack and flung it over one shoulder. Camera in hand, she proceeded to her left and quickly made her way back to her point of entry. She kept close tabs on the man behind her, looking directly at him as she rounded a corner. That’s when Sam was stopped in her tracks as she came face to face with another night guard. She never saw him until her head hit him square in the belly. Both parties, startled by the sight of one another, froze for a second staring at each other.
“Uh-oh,” Samantha exclaimed as she looked right up at the man’s face through her mask.
“Hey! Who are you?” yelled the man, not expecting to see a young kid looking back at him.
“Let’s keep that a surprise, shall we?” Samantha said as she turned and started to run off. The guard’s hand swiped at Samantha’s arm and caught her briefly. She stumbled, only for a moment, and quickly regained her balance and took off down the hall toward the planetary exhibit. The man quickly followed and unholstered his radio to alert the other guards.
“Security breach! Security breach! Level two. In pursuit,” the guard said as he huffed and puffed after Samantha. Below, the curator heard the call over his radio and looked up at the opening above him. He saw the faint shadow of a small figure run by, followed closely by the guard. The two boys stood beside him and looked up and saw the same thing.
“Follow them!” yelled the curator to the two boys. The boys ran toward the adjacent staircase and ascended to aid in the chase.
Samantha ran down the hall as the planets in the solar system flew by. She was only at Jupiter and needed to get to the far end of the Pluto display. Even though Pluto had been declassified as a “planet,” the curator of the museum held a special fondness for the dwarf planet and refused to take the exhibit down.
Samantha continued down the hallway and looked behind her. She saw the night guards quickly losing ground. They were too out of shape to keep up with a ten-year-old girl. She was, on the other hand, surprised to see the two boys catching up rapidly.
Saturn flew by, and Samantha let out a small chuckle as she passed by Uranus. Neptune was nothing more than a big blue blur as she rounded past the giant planet and made her way toward her final destination, Pluto.
 The small dwarf of ice and rock came into view as Samantha entered the exhibit. All the lights in the small room were off, save the one illuminating the small world. The light reflected off its shiny exterior and made it hard for Samantha to see much else in the room.
She ran straight for the six-foot-high model. Behind it, an access door led out to a small landing platform on the second-floor roof of the museum. From there, Samantha would make her escape from this place.
Down a short hallway, up a flight of ten stairs, and then onto the roof—that was the plan. Simple and efficient, the way most SOCKs plans ran. From there, Samantha was to shimmy down a drainage pipe and run across the parking lot to the set of bushes next to the mailbox where the rover was hidden.
The rover was Gears’s latest project, made with the help of his new right-hand man, Roller. The rover was nothing more than a glorified go-cart. The steel frame was square in shape and big enough to hold one rider. The pieces of steel came from the old hang glider Kid Combat used to escape out of Jones’s mansion a few weeks back. Seemed its flight-worthy days had expired.
The engine had five-horsepower and belonged to Wedge – one half of the set of twins on Kid Combat’s team. Wedge had the engine hidden in his parent’s garage. It was from his “private collection” of “things that could help him go really fast.”. The steering column, wheels, and other parts had come from each of the SOCKs members’ garages and were assembled in Maple Forest in The Playground.
The rover went pretty fast. It would hit thirty miles per hour without much effort. Wedge held the record for fastest test lap around The Playground. He also held the record for most damage done to The Playground on a single lap.
In an effort to save time for Samantha, Roller came up with the idea of outfitting the rover with a remote control device that would allow him or Gears to start the rover remotely from The Playground. This way, if Samantha was in a bind, as she was tonight, she wouldn’t have to waste time starting the rover. She could simply jump on and take off. Roller and Gears had tested that feature several times before tonight’s mission.
Samantha tried to run faster. The boys racing footsteps sounded behind her. They both gained ground at every step of the way. One of the boys made a last-ditch effort to stop the unknown intruder. He dove, head first, and attempted to tackle the small girl. Samantha countered and jumped up in the air. The boy’s hand came close, but it wasn’t close enough. He fell to the floor with a thud and momentarily fell behind in the chase.
His partner tried the same maneuver. He too dove straight at Samantha’s back leg. He made a grunting noise as he hurled himself toward her. Samantha tried the same jump she did with the first boy, but this time she wasn’t as lucky.
Knowing her move, the second boy’s right hand hooked and snagged on the back of Samantha’s ankle, knocking her off balance and sending her crashing to the ground. As Samantha hit the floor in a painful collision, her instincts forced her to outstretch her arms in an effort to catch herself. This caused her to slide for a few feet and in the end she lost her handle on the camera. The small device hit the floor and was sent spiraling across the marble floor. In its final rotation, the camera smacked up against the far wall and shattered to pieces.
As Samantha lifted herself up off the floor, she had no choice. Sam had to leave the camera, its memory card, and all the pictures behind. Being caught would be a far worse situation. Samantha regained her composure and her lead and sprung through the access door behind the small model of Pluto. She raced down the small hallway and opened the door leading onto the roof of the museum.
The wind caught her face. For a moment, Samantha lost her breath and had a hard time talking over her communicator.
“Gears. Roller,” she puffed, “I’m out and I’ve got company!”
Back at The Playground, the two boys feverishly typed away on their keyboards. Two monitors displayed the results of their labor, showing real-time pictures of the town and infrared shots of the museum.
Gears and Roller had been busy over the past few weeks setting up surveillance all around town. When word had come that Spring Road Toys was in jeopardy, they concentrated all their efforts on making sure the square block around the toy store was secure. The two boys continued to type away and bicker back and forth—as usual.
“Hurry up, Gears,” Roller spouted out as he slammed away on his keyboard. “She won’t last long out there by herself!”
“I’m trying!” Gears rang out, not looking up from his keyboard. Moments went by that, to Gears, seemed like forever. “It’s … it’s not responding.”
Roller looked over at Gears, and then he looked at the monitors. “They gotta be right on her tail. Hurry!”
Samantha ran to the far end of the museum’s roof and waited. She then realized that this wasn’t where she was supposed to make her exit. Her heart was pounding, and she began to sweat—too much for her liking. She took off her mask in a fit of frustration and waited for an answer from the boys.
“Gears! What’s going on?” she shouted.
“I told you—it’s not responding to any of the commands!” Gears snapped back.
“You said you checked it?” Kid chimed in.
“I did. We did. Several times,” Gears defended himself to KC.
“She needs to get out of there before they get through that door!” Roller exclaimed.
“Sam, the rover isn’t responding. You’ll have to improvise,” Gears’s voice crackled over her earpiece.
“Improvise? Are you kidding? I’m on a freakin’ roof here! What would you like me to do—fly?” Samantha snapped back at the boys. She was pinned down, and she could hear the two boys pounding on the access door to the roof. The door wouldn’t take too much more before it was broken down. To make matters worse, Samantha could spot flashing lights off in the distance. She could also hear sirens approaching. The curator must have called the police to report an intruder at the museum.
“Great,” Samantha said to herself. Her expression quickly became one of deep frustration as she tried to figure a way out. She surveyed her surroundings. For the life of her, she couldn’t see anything that would help her out of this predicament.
Samantha heard a loud crashing noise behind her. The door that separated her from the two boys split in two. The boys made quick work of what remained and made their way through the door. Samantha began to freak out a bit and ran to the farthest point away from the door. The two boys quickly saw her and ran after her.
Samantha made it all the way to the corner and then realized how trapped she was. The two boys came up from behind her and stopped about ten feet short. Confused on what to do with her, the two boys radioed back to the curator inside.
“Ah, we have her trapped on the roof, sir. What would you like us to do next?” one of the boys said.
“Keep her there. The police will be here soon. We’ll be right up,” the voice said back over the speaker.
“You heard him,” the other boy said. “Don’t try anything funny. We’re bigger than you, and we would hate to hurt you.”
Samantha just stood there facing away from the boys and looked down. It was way too far to jump. There were no drainage pipes, bushes, or even a dumpster down below to break her fall. The situation seemed helpless.
 “Samantha, it’s Roller,” came a voice over her earpiece. “I have an idea, but it’s not the best one I’ve had in my short career here.” That news didn’t exactly fill Samantha with confidence. “I’ve managed to hack into the system that controls the exterior of the museum. Apparently there is a retractable awning right above the first-floor window that you’re above. I think I can get it extended, but I have no idea if it will hold you.”
Samantha stood there and rolled her eyes. She couldn’t believe this mission was turning out like this. First she blew her cover, then she smashed the only evidence she had, and now she had to jump from a second-floor roof onto an awning that might or might not hold her.
“Just do it,” Samantha said back to Roller. Within seconds, the awning started to extend.
“Hey, who are you talking too?” one of the boys asked.
“I would love to stay and talk to you boys, but I gotta jet,” Samantha said. She then proceeded to dive off the roof like she was a high diver at the Olympics. As she fell through the air, Samantha executed a half circle, proceeded to tuck, and waited for impact.
She hit the awning softly. The impact of falling only twenty feet was nowhere near enough force to send the small, thin girl through the awning. She bounced up about three feet, hit the awning again, and rolled off of it. Samantha fell about seven feet down, but she landed on her feet and sprang back up.
She brushed herself off, took a quick look back up to the boys, and bolted down the street. As she ran north through the open section of the parking lot, three police cars drove through the south entrance. With their lights flashing and their sirens blaring, they rolled in and blocked that entrance. By then, Samantha was long gone.
Seconds later, the curator and a boy dressed in all blue emerged onto the roof. They stepped over the broken remains of the roof door. The other two boys hurried over to both of them.
“She got away, sir. She jumped,” one boy said to the curator.
“It’s of no matter. Let her go,” the curator said. “Begin your assignment.”
“Yes, sir,” the two boys said almost in unison. They then ran back into the museum.
 The curator and the boy in blue stood alone for a second. The boy in blue wore a hoodie, along with thick silver sunglasses to conceal his identity. Disgustedly, he shook his head from side to side at the curator.
“He won’t be happy with this,” the boy said to the curator.
“You don’t need to tell him about this, do you?” the curator said back. His voice trembled with fear.
“No, I don’t have to tell him,” the mysterious boy in blue said. He paused for a second. With a smile that could be seen from underneath his disguise, he continued. “I want to tell him.”
The curator’s look of fear quickly vanished and turned into anger. Seeing that response, the boy in blue enjoyed an even bigger smile.
The boy turned and disappeared back into the museum, leaving the curator alone on the roof with his thoughts.
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