Lizard Loopy by Ali Sparkes Page A

last week I was the High Lord of Rifflescape and they were Elven Frogsprites—and I melted their heads.”
    Josh sighed and shook his head. “You’re beyond help,” he said. “There’s no way you’ll ever be safe as an alligator.”
    Back in their garden, Josh shoved Danny down by the jungle gym and called to Piddle, their dog. As Piddle (named after a habit he had when stressed) trotted over, Josh picked him up,plonked his small furry black and white body into Danny’s excitable lap and said, “SIT!”
    â€œBoth of you!” he added, as Danny and Piddle tried to spring up again. They both sat, and one of them let his tongue hang out sideways.

    â€œI’m serious, Danny!” Josh went on. He gazed across the top of the fence toward Petty Potts’s back garden. Deep within its overgrown weeds and brambles stood a small, ordinary-looking wooden shed. And deep within the shed stood a small, ordinary looking door. And beyond the door nothing was ordinary ever again.
    â€œLet me just remind you of a few things,” Josh said, trying to sound like their dad. “Only a few weeks ago, we were shivering in terror about thatplace.” He jabbed his finger across the far side of the fence. “Since then we’ve been nearly eaten too many times to remember! And weren’t YOU the one who once said we would NEVER go back there again? Not EVER!”
    â€œYeah, well,” Danny said, playing with Piddle’s floppy ears and looking just a little bit less excitable. “That was to start with. I was freaked out. I mean, it’s not every day your grumpy old next-door neighbor suddenly turns out to be a genius scientist and changes you into a spider.”
    Josh clambered up the climbing frame and perched on the top two bars. He stared at the roof of the ordinary shed and bit his lip. The truth was, he was very nearly as excited as Danny this time. He couldn’t
wait
to try out Petty Potts’s brand new S.W.I.T.C.H. spray. REPTOSWITCH! Even the name was exciting. And what it stood for. Reptile . . . Serum Which Instigates Total Cellular Hijack. He would LOVE to be a reptile for half an hour . . . BUT . . .
    Josh shook his head and took a deep breath. “Danny—let’s just do a checklist about howthe other S.W.I.T.C.H.ings have worked out, shall we?” He counted across his fingers. “ONE. SpiderSWITCH. Nearly squished by Jenny’s sandal, washed down the drain, me nearly swallowed by a toad. TWO. HouseflySWITCH. Both of us nearly swatted into bluebottle jam, you wrapped up in a spider’s web, me trapped in a giant booger—”
    â€œYeah, yeah, I know,” sighed Danny. And he did know. He was usually, in fact, the more likely of the two of them to say no to any dealings with Petty Potts. For a start, while Freaky Little Bug Geek Josh loved them, Danny HATED all kinds of creepy-crawlies. He had been terrified of his own legs the whole time he was a spider. But . . . BUT . . . now that Petty had the full secret formula to make REPTOSWITCH, things were different.
    There weren’t nearly as many predators after reptiles, were there? They were higher up the food chain!
    â€œTHREE!” Josh went on. “GrasshopperSWITCH. Nearly splatted by a math book, nearly chewed up by a cat . . . FOUR! AntSWITCH. Turned into zombie Ant Queen-serving machines and nearlyburnt alive. FIVE! Crane FlySWITCH. Almost eaten by Piddle! Nearly vacuumed to death . . . do I need to go on?”
    Danny shrugged. “No. You don’t. Being creepy-crawlies was 95 percent pure terror! Although the grasshopper jumping was pretty cool . . . and the housefly aerobatics . . .”
    â€œAnd the great diving beetle bit . . .” Josh couldn’t help smiling as he remembered. “Being able to swim under water
and
fly!”
    â€œBeing a frog at summer camp was cool too . . . apart from you—” Danny stared into Piddle’s