Hi, I’m Bill, and I discovered a bombacious bug I named Super Buggie. It could be a long story but I’m going to keep it short. I want you to be able to read this for fun and not like it’s homework for school.

My mom tells me that bombacious is not a word. She’s a librarian and knows all about words and books. I admit I made it up. Is that okay with you? I think it fits Super Buggie real well. Here is my story on how I found him.

My sixth grade class went on a field trip all the way to the Arctic. Yeah, we’re from upstate New York so it isn’t quite so far away as if you’re from Florida.

Oh, if my barking dog and my large buzzing bug, that is, Super Buggie, disturb us, forgive me a minute while I calm things down. Right now, at least, the dog is sleeping outside in his doghouse and the bug is sleeping in the attic in his refrigerator.

As I was saying, we flew on Arctic Airlines to the arctic from LaGuardia Airport in New York City on Monday morning – early, before the sun came up. We hurried back late Monday afternoon. Our teacher, Ms. Lavin, says we were supposed to spend another whole day at the Explorer Hotel but, thanks to my discovery, we left early and had much more fun.

When we arrived at the Explorer Hotel, we ate whale meat, or something like it, and most of us wondered what living things kept swirling around in our stomachs. If we had stayed overnight, like Ms. Lavin said, we might have had walrus or polar bear meat for dinner and fish for breakfast, or some other weird animal food, because there aren’t any plants up there. When you’re not used to food like that, and don’t know for sure what it is, well, even spinach would be better.

After we settled down and realized we survived lunch, we rode uphill on dog-sleds to the Great Glacier. It was too big to climb all the way up. They dug out some trails going up the lower part of it. Melting ice on the lower slopes exposed some big rocks.

We were told to line up and walk up a path that led up the hill with a fence of iron pipes and rope. The hill was so steep, if you slipped you could glide on the ice all the way back to the hotel. Some of us thought that was quite a great idea. That would be one of the great slide rides of the century, and kids from all around the world would fly up here for that alone! It would be called the Great Glacier Ride. The only change they would have to make is build a larger hotel and sell hamburgers, hot dogs, and French fries.

As we worked our way along the path, I stopped to look over the edge of the glacier. I could see for hundreds of miles across a vast plain of ice and there was nothing there. I think the view from atop the Empire State Building is much more exciting.

But then, just in front of me over the fence, I saw a real shiny piece of ice in the glacier. It looked like glass. I wiped it clean with my gloved hand. There, deep inside, I saw a dark spot. I remembered reading about mammoths with big tusks frozen in ice since the prehistoric days of dinosaurs. This was unfortunately too small for that, probably a frozen rat or some other small creature. Maybe he got his tongue stuck on the ice and then got covered with more ice after he froze to death.

I showed it to Jeremy and Blain, the two kids on either side of me. We played a game of “What is it?” and I named our game “The Thing Party,” remembering a scary movie I saw called The Thing about an unknown thing found in the Arctic or Antarctica.

Jeremy said it’s a spider with long legs, probably poisonous, and very fast if it gets free. Blain disagreed because we couldn’t see long legs. He said it’s a paw or a tail of some long-dead animal, completely harmless. I said it’s an alien from another planet, a creature unknown to scientists, waiting to be let loose to create havoc everywhere. If we free it from the ice, it will attack cities and nuclear plants. It will fight armies and will destroy everything we know. Then a huge space ship will come to earth and take it back to where it belongs. By now a gaggle of kids had assembled there, each with an opinion about what it is or is not.

Ms. Lavin climbed down the path to see what the commotion was about. She steamed at us with her red face, as much as one can steam in the Arctic. I could almost see the warped, heated air climbing above her hatless head.

“What is that?” she said, pointing at the clear spot of ice that our hands had wiped clean.

“It’s alive,” said Jeremy. “Let’s have it for dinner,” said Blain. “Let’s kill it before it does anything,” said someone else.

“Ms. Lavin, can you tell what it is?” I said.

She leaned over the rope to get a closer look. Only Ms. Lavin was big enough to lean over the rope to get a good close look. She squinted as she examined the evidence.

“SHEESH!” she exclaimed, “It has hair! Children, back up! Back up now!”

Ms. Lavin’s worried face and excited announcement of hair put the girls into a nervous frenzy, screaming frightfully as soon as they heard “hair” come from her mouth. The boys jumped excitedly and dove in past the rope trying to get a closer look to see it.

Ms. Lavin ordered everyone to pull out pens, pencils, or anything else they could find to use as digging tools. She told us we’ll cut out a huge chunk of ice containing the thing so we can slide it down to the airfield near the Explorer Hotel.

“Remember,” she instructed, “that piece of ice will need to stay frozen all the way back to New York, so make it big! We’re not going to leave that thing for the cooks down at the Explorer Hotel!” We knew exactly what she meant. Those chefs at the Hotel would cook anything, hair and all.

When we finally got the chunk of ice down the slope to the airfield near the Hotel, Ms. Lavin insisted that Arctic Airlines leave immediately back to New York. “And turn on the air conditioning,” she ordered, “The children will wear their coats, hats, and mittens all the way home.”

The pilots shook their heads back and forth like she was crazy, not knowing about my discovery and the need to keep it frozen. I overheard one of the pilots say, “Bonkers from Yonkers.” They must have thought we were all bonkers.

We loaded onto the plane. Ms. Lavin had wrapped and tied a piece of canvas around the ice. When workers started to put the ice into the cargo area, she quickly stopped them and made them put the ice into the passenger section with us. She didn’t want anyone else to see what it was and take it.

During the flight on the way back to New York the ice began to melt. We could see the water soak through the canvas and seep into the carpet in the aisle between our seats. The boys laughed and joked about the “thing” escaping and eating us up. The girls screamed and shouted that we must stomp on it with our feet if it melts all the way.

When we arrived at the airport in New York, Ms. Lavin made sure the ice was carefully removed from the plane and put onto a baggage cart. She called some parents and called someone at a science department at the University.

A car full of serious looking people was waiting when we arrived back home. They put the chunk of ice, now only about a square foot in size, in the trunk and left it wide open when they talked to Ms. Lavin. I snuck away to take one last look.

I pulled up the canvas and saw antennae as long as my fingers, bright yellow hair mixed with some red and brown hairs, and round, black eyes about the size of dimes. The oblong body of the “thing” looked about three inches long. I would say, in total, the “thing” looked something like a combination of fly, bee, and Tasmanian devil. And its face, well, thank God it was still frozen. If alive, its razor sharp teeth could chomp your fingers in one bite.

Two days later after class, Ms. Lavin told me the scientists think I found a prehistoric bug. They put it in a freezer in the laboratory and would dissect it soon. When I pleaded with her to let me be there for the dissection, she somehow convinced the University to agree, and three days later I stood with five scientists in the laboratory around a bench watching the ice melt.

When the ice finally melted away, the wet “thing” began to smell like a mixture of sulfur and rotting fish, but more intense. Everyone stepped back, surprised at how quickly the smell overcame us. I could smell it standing thirty feet away. One of the scientists said “OOOOH!” and held her nose. Every one looked totally disgusted and no one got too close.

As they wondered what to do, the “thing” lied on its back dead as a doornail. As it dried, the smell went away. And then, when it had fully dried, it twitched a leg. “It lives!” one of the scientists yelled.

Then it suddenly turned its head in my direction. It looked right at me. The fat hunk of menace floated in the air about three feet above the bench, its wings fluttering too fast to be seen. It looked at me again and sped off making a loud sound unmistakably its own, “BweeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBwee!” and disappeared.

The scientists scattered about the laboratory in a worried hustle looking for the bug. Within a few minutes, one of them yelled from the entry door, “Here! Come here. See this!”

We all went to the metal door. A hole had been eaten in the lower half in one or two bites. The craggy edge of the hole showed it had been chomped away by a toothy monster. I heard more “oooohs” and “ahhhhs” than in a circus audience.

I was actually happy it had escaped. I wanted it to fly back to the Arctic where it belonged. This amazing bug had to get out of here or it would be killed, dissected, and studied. It was better off in the ice, as lifeless as it was, than lying cut open on a scientist’s table.

But, no, that didn’t happen.

On the local six o’clock news a reporter said, “Authorities say that someone raided three supermarkets without signs of forced entry or exit. Whoever it was spilled canned food all over and took the cans. The police are wondering, 'Why would someone empty the canned food and steal the cans?'”

On the next night the same reporter said: “Talking with officials at the University, I learned that they had found a strange bug that lived in the Arctic ice and lost it. It escaped by eating through a metal door. They ask that no one get alarmed because the bug is not believed to eat humans or animals. The police suspect this bug ate the cans that disappeared in the supermarkets last night. The authorities ask everyone to be on the lookout for a bug that makes a loud 'BweeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBwee' sound every time it starts to fly and stinks when it gets wet.”

I was home with my dog, Murgatroid, some days later. How I got such a beast of a dog is a different story for another time. His jowls hang and flap in the wind and he drools buckets of slobber.

Anyway, he whimpered and whined outside his over-sized doghouse like he wanted to come inside out of the rain – but it was not raining. He leaned on his front elbows with his rear-end sticking up, his tail straight up and stiff. I went outside to tell him he looked foolish when the putrid smell of the mischievous menace hit me like a brick wall. The dog couldn’t stand it and who could blame him?

I listened for the distinctive “BweeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBwee” sound and looked everywhere in the sky. I looked again at Murgatroid. He was now pawing the ground, looking at a huge bug flat on its back. It didn’t move. Murgatroid’s slobber had soaked the poor bug through and through.

Remembering how dead it looked when it was wet and smelly in the laboratory, I guessed that the water puts it into a deep sleep. I rolled it over onto my open hand and carried it to the garage. I set it down on the floor and found a hairdryer with an extension cord. When it was plugged in, I put the dryer on slow and pointed it at the bug to dry it. After a minute or two it was dry. Its legs twitched and it suddenly flipped right-side-up.

I jumped back a little startled. He smiled at me. Those teeth were as yellow as most of its hair. He flew up in the air, going “BweeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBeeBwee,” zipping back and forth, stopping to hover in front of me each time it passed, smiling, and zipping back and forth again.

Somehow he found me, the one who saved him from the deep freeze, the one he recognized in the laboratory as soon as he came to. This is the moment I named him Super Buggie and proudly called him the bombacious bug.

My dad owned a small, old refrigerator he stored in the basement. He used it for an apartment he rented before he met my mom and got married. Big enough to carry it, I brought it up the stairs and into the attic. Now the refrigerator is Super Buggie’s home. He ate a little hole in the door so he could fly in and out, and I installed a flapping rubber door so the cold wouldn’t leak too badly.

And now I have two pets, one who eats canned dog food and the other who eats the cans.