5 On the Case

5 ON THE CASE THE NEXT DAY AT LUNCH, Harris and Zeke tried to figure out who Zeke's mystery valentine was. "What if you got each girl a gift?" Harris suggested. "That would show that you like them. Then, maybe whoever it is will let you know that she was the one who left the candygram!"

"I like that idea," Zeke said. "I guess I'll give it a try!" Zeke had soccer practice the next day after school. He decided that he would give the first gift to Nancy Nash, his friend on the team. But what should I give her?

Sitting in his room that evening, Zeke used a piece of alien technology. He put a blinking helmet on his head and watched some Mem-Vids from his life on Tragas. The Mem-Vid helmet took actual memories from Zeke's mind and projected them on a screen as videos. As he watched, Zeke realized that as happy as he was living on Earth, there were still times that he missed Tragas.

A Mem-Vid appeared, showing a party on Tragas for his mom's birthday. Zeke watched and smiled as Xad handed Quar a bucket of squiggly, squirmy Tragas zeniworms. "This is perfect!" Quar said in the video. "Zeniworms help keep my tentacles soft." Zeke watched as his mother let the worms crawl all over her tentacles. She smiled with delight.

"That's it!" Zeke cried out loud. "I'll get Nancy a bucket of worms to keep her tenta... I mean hands, smooth. This will be the perfect Valentine's Day gift!"

The next morning before school, Zeke spent an hour in his backyard. He took a large metal bucket and filled it up with every worm he could find crawling in the grass. This is a great idea, Zeke thought. I'm going to give Nancy the worms after soccer practice today. If she's happy about it, then that will prove that she's the one who gave me the valentine!