Free Superpowers by Alex Cliff Page B

stones around the arched entrance. At the same time the stones in front of Hercules’ face crumbled. It was Juno’s way of adding to his misery. He could look at his powers but not reach them. However, the boys could and every day Max or Finlay chose one of these superpowers to help them with their task. But those twenty minutes were all they had before the powers disappeared. There were three superpowers left – incredible-agility, deadly accuracy and courage.
    Finlay was silent for a moment. ‘I know,’ he said at last. ‘Let’s tell your mum that I left my jumper there yesterday and need to get it back. We can run up there, get the superpowerand get back in time to go to this dumb house. I’ll come round now.’
    â€˜OK!’ Max replied. ‘See you in a few minutes!’
    He shoved the ball in his pocket and hurried into the kitchen. ‘Mum, Fin left his jumper at the castle yesterday and he’s got to go and get it. Can I go with him?’
    To his relief, his mum nodded. ‘All right, but don’t be long. Auntie Carol is coming here at nine-thirty with the girls.’
    Max groaned inwardly. He’d been so busy thinking about how he and Finlay would do the task that he’d forgotten his mum had said his Auntie Carol and cousin Zoë and her friend Michelle were coming too. Zoë was thirteen years old. She was always making outshe was really grown up and looking down her nose at him.
Still
, he thought, pushing thoughts of Zoë from his mind,
right now I have more important things to worry about – like choosing a superpower for the day!
    â€˜I can’t believe we’ve got to go to some ancient house,’ Finlay said as they ran down the road together a few minutes later. ‘I hope our plan works and we can get back soon to kill these man-eating birds! I wonder what they’re going to be like?’
    Max thought about the creatures Juno had conjured for them to face so far. They had all been terrifying
and
incredibly dangerous. He and Finlay had the scars to prove it. Every dayone or other of them had been wounded. Max looked down at his two scars – both were in the shape of the superpower he had used for each task. They still hurt. Was he going to get wounded again that day? Or maybe worse…
    â€˜Look at this,’ Finlay said, distracting Max from his worrying thoughts. Finlay pulled a red penknife out of his pocket. ‘My dad got it free at the garage with some petrol and gave it to me. The knife bit is really small and blunt but there are some other good things on it like a tin-opener and a corkscrew. I thought it might come in useful today.’
    â€˜Um … how exactly?’ Max said, not seeing exactly how a corkscrew ortin-opener could help them kill a flock of man-eating birds.
    â€˜Well, you never know,’ Finlay said. ‘It’s got a screwdriver …’
    â€˜Great, so if they’re robotic birds we can take them apart!’ Max shook his head. ‘Get real, Fin! What use is a screwdriver against man-eating birds?’
    â€˜Well, maybe the screwdriver isn’t much use,’ Finlay admitted, ‘but there’s this!’ He flicked out a strange-looking gadget. ‘My sister says it’s for taking stones out of horses’ feet.’
    â€˜Hey, cool! So when the birds are about to eat us we can ask them if they want a stone taking out of their feet,’ Max said. ‘Fin!’
    â€˜Oh, all right.’ Finlay shoved the
    penknife back in his pocket defensively. ‘I just thought it might help.’
    â€˜What we need is a giant bird-eating cat,’ Max said with feeling. ‘Not a penknife!’
    They ran up the path towards the ruined castle. ‘So are you still going to choose accuracy as the superpower today?’ Finlay asked. They’d talked about it the night before.
    Max nodded. Being deadly accurate would be really cool, he’d be