“Oh, man,” Joe said under his breath. He turned and dived out of the kitchen. There was an explosion of white smoke behind him. “Tear gas!” he shouted at Charlie. “Get up the stairs!”

“What about Grandma Rose?” Charlie asked as Joe pulled him up from the ground.

“I’ll take care of it,” Joe said. He leaned down and scooped her up, slinging her over his shoulder. She was a little heavier than he had expected, but his adrenaline was pumping hard, and he knew he’d have no trouble getting her up the stairs. “Go, go, go!” he said to Charlie, shooing him toward the staircase.

White smoke rippled toward them, and Joe’s eyes felt the sting. Charlie hopped up the stairs two at a time, Joe following closely behind. They reached the landing and raced into Charlie’s bedroom. Joe laid his passenger on Charlie’s bed and ripped the blanket out from under her. He turned and shut the door, stuffing the blanket into the crevice between the door and the floor. “Do you have any tape?” he asked Charlie.

“I’ve got duct tape,” Charlie responded. “I use it to build stuff.”

“No time to show me your duct-tape robots, kid. Get me whatever you’ve got, and hurry,” Joe said, snapping his fingers. He could see a few trickles of white fog sneaking through the cracks in the door.

Charlie fumbled through the drawers of his desk in search of the silver roll of tape. “I know it’s here somewhere!” he said, dumping an entire drawerful on the floor. Marbles that looked like bloodshot eyes, rainbow-colored paper clips, dull-pointed pencils, batteries, gears, and a thousand other things went spilling everywhere. But no duct tape.

“Hurry!” shouted Joe.

“What’s going on?” Grandma Rose asked, sitting up on the bed.

Joe and Charlie stared at her, frozen for an instant by the shock of Grandma Rose’s awakening.

“I said hurry!”

“I’m trying!”

“Would someone please tell me what all the screaming is about?”

“Found it!” Charlie pronounced, standing with a scant roll of duct tape in his hands.

“Throw it here!”

Joe caught the tape and began plastering the gap around the door, sealing off the tear gas. The roll ran out as he got a quarter of the way down the right side. “I need more!”

Charlie dug around some more, finally coming up with a long broadsword made entirely out of duct tape. “This is all I’ve got,” he said, obviously reluctant to give it up.

“I need it.”

“Are you sure?”

Joe yanked it from his hands. He began ripping it to shreds.

“That took me a week to make. It’s based on the exact dimensions of Excalibur.”

“Kid, I’ll buy you a real sword if we get through this alive!” Joe said, taking the strips of tape and pressing them over the gap.

“You promise?”