The Return of Meteor Boy? Read online

  Soaked and hairy, he got to his feet and began cursing at us. But he was out of ammunition and had no choice but to stalk off and find more.

  “Did you happen to notice that despite the fact that he weighs a lot more than the balloons, they all hit the ground at the same time he did?” I pointed out. “The science of falling objects could make an interesting project, too.”

  “Umm, that’s really great, O Boy,” Stench said. “Whatever that means. But we have to get out of here while we have the chance. When Fuzz gets this mad, there’s no telling what he might try.”

  None of us were going to argue as one by one we climbed down the ladder.

  “What do we do now?” Hal asked nervously as we assembled on the ground.

  “I know where Fuzz Boy would never think to look for us,” I proposed.

  “Where would that be?” Plasma Girl asked suspiciously.

  “Why Indestructo Industries, of course,” I turned to depart without even looking at them. “We’re going to make a call on the Amazing Indestructo.”

  “Here we go again,” Tadpole said as he rolled his eyes.

  “Unless of course you want to wait for Fuzz Boy to return,” I shouted over my shoulder. Seconds later the rest of my teammates had caught up with me.

  It didn’t take long to get to the entrance of AI’s corporate headquarters, and I led us right up the main sidewalk, beneath the enormous AI statue that stood before the building, and into the lobby. I wasn’t at all surprised to see that we weren’t the only ones to show up here today. There were kids everywhere.

  “What is going on here?” Plasma Girl asked in disbelief.

  “These,” I announced with a wave of my hand, “are the potential Meteor Boys of tomorrow.”

  I may have exaggerated the case, since there were dozens of girls, at least ten men ranging in ages from twenty to eighty, two dogs, and even one goat. Although I think the goat may have wandered in by mistake. But mostly there were boys of every shape, size, and color. And every one of them was determined to be the new Meteor Boy. I was equally determined that they would not be.

  “Stench”—I tipped my head to him—“if you wouldn’t mind.”

  A look of embarrassment spread across his face as I took a deep breath and held it. Plasma Girl, Hal, and Tadpole did likewise. There was so much noise in the lobby that I don’t know if Stench’s contribution was silent or noisy. But as soon as I saw the horrific expressions on the faces of wannabe Meteor Boys right around him, I knew it had been deadly.

  Screams erupted in the area surrounding Stench and began spreading slowly outward like a vague rumor. The slowness at which it traveled only confirmed its hideous strength. Soon, kids who hadn’t even caught a whiff of it yet were being shoved from the building by those who had and were trying to escape. The doors on opposite sides of the lobby were flung open as the evacuation of the building turned into a stampede. In a matter of moments it was over, and the five of us were left by ourselves in the lobby. Stench reached for the aerosol cans that were attached to the sides of his pants legs and grabbed one in each hand. He immediately began spraying the deodorizer all around him. With a sense of relief, we all gasped for breath.

  Even where he had sprayed, we could still smell what he had dealt, and it wasn’t pretty. His deodorizer was powerful, though, and the lobby was soon habitable again.

  “Lock the doors on that side,” I instructed Tadpole. “I’ll get them over here.”

  “Now that we’ve gotten rid of everyone, what’s the plan?” Stench asked, still a little abashed by the reaction so many people had had to him.

  “The plan is that if no one auditions to play the part, maybe we can kill this whole tasteless idea,” I announced.

  “But that will only work if you get rid of every possible contestant,” Tadpole said.

  “Who else is there?” I responded.

  “Thuffering Thethame! It’th thtinkier out here than it ith in the bathroom.”

  The smug look fell off my face like a car off a cliff as I turned around to see Melonhead stroll out of the lobby bathroom.

  “Tho where’th everyone elthe?” he asked with surprise. “Don’t tell me I thcared them off! I mean, I know they didn’t have a chanth, but theriouthly, they thould have at leatht tried.”

  “This is why we couldn’t meet today?!” I pointed at him accusingly. “So you could try out for Meteor Boy?!”

  He rolled his eyes and let out an exasperated sigh.

  “Of courth, thilly. I wath thimply trying to thpare your feelingth,” he explained amid an explosion of melon seeds. “Being powerleth, of courth, I knew you didn’t thtand a chanth of being chothen ath Meteor Boy.”

  “And you do?!!” I shouted as my temper got the better of me. I couldn’t help it. I get enough pity from people I like. To get it splattered at me in a stream of watermelon seeds from Melonhead was more than I could handle. “Your head looks like a watermelon!!”

  “Pith poth,” he said, dismissing my statement of fact. “I can’t help it if I’m a thoo-in for the part.”

  “What’s a thoo-in?” Hal asked.

  My plan was falling apart. Letting Melonhead play Meteor Boy would be the ultimate insult to his memory.

  “I’ve got to figure out how to prevent this,” I said to myself, glancing nervously at the elevator bank where a car had just arrived. As the doors parted, out rolled a living legend.

  “Bee Lady!” I heard Plasma Girl gasp in excitement.

  We had run into the Bee Lady the last time we were at Indestructo Industries, less than a week earlier. She seemed to be in charge of product development for the Amazing Indestructo. In her day, though, she had been one of the founding members of the League of Ultimate Goodness and the first true female superhero. At least that’s what the history books said about her. And the pictures always showed a young, slim woman in a yellow-and-black-striped leotard, unlike this picture of her in the Li’l Hero’s Handbook.

  That’s odd, I thought. The book had a typo. They had mistakenly deleted “Ultimate” from the league’s name. I had a sudden memory of having heard the team referred to that way once before, but I couldn’t think when, so I shook the thought from my head.

  Unfortunately, the years had not been kind to the Bee Lady. This was evident the second her scooter cart puttered out of the elevator, straining under the weight it carried. Now, she may have weighed under three hundred pounds, barely, but the problem was she still dressed in the same leotard that she had worn when

  LI’L HERO’S HANDBOOK

  PEOPLE

  NAME: Bee Lady, The. POWER: The ability to control bees. LIMITATIONS: The Bee Lady has overcome every limitation society has placed on her. Unfortunately this also extends to her diet. CAREER: One of the original members of the League of Goodness. CLASSIFICATION: As the first professional female superhero, the Bee Lady put the sting on crime, as well as on the male egos of her day. 90 she was young. It wasn’t a pretty sight. And she spoke with a rasp that could only have come from a lifetime of unfiltered cigarettes.

  “Hiya, kids,” she greeted us with a smile as she put an unlit cigarette in her mouth. “Are you all here for the Meteor Boy tryouts?”

  Then it hit me. The only way to avoid the disaster of Melonhead playing Meteor Boy was for someone else to win the part.

  “Just me.” I raised my hand to the complete surprise of my friends.

  “Hmm.” She gave me a considering look. “Yeah, I can see it,” she added with a wink.

  “I’m audithioning, too.” Melonhead butted in, knocking me away from the Bee Lady.

  “You’re kidding me, right, kid?” she rasped.

  “Yeth, it’th thilly, ithn’t it?” He smirked his seedy smirk. “That they’d even make me go through the ektherthize when the rethultth are already obviouth.”

  “They sure are.” She coughed in agreement, but not in the way I think Melonhead meant. “So what about the rest of you?”

  Plasma Girl had been standing
there all atwitter ever since the Bee Lady had emerged from the elevator.

  “Oh, Bee Lady,” she answered bashfully, “we’re just here to give our friend O Boy some encouragement. Have I mentioned what an honor it is to meet you?”

  “That’s nice, sweetie,” she replied as if she had gotten sick of hearing statements like that over thirty years ago. “How would you and your friends who aren’t trying out like to come with me to the eighth floor to help with some test marketing?”

  “We’d be honored,” she answered for the whole team.

  “Wait a minute,” Tadpole interjected. “You don’t expect us to test a bunch of girly toys, do you?”

  Stench nodded his head. Hal might have also, but he was busy warily watching two bees that had begun hovering around his sippy cup.

  “Don’t worry, boys,” she hacked. “I think you’ll like it. Just let me have a quick puff out in the parking lot and then we’ll head up.”

  She put her foot to the accelerator and proceeded to putter her cart smack into one of the doors we had locked. Amid her muttering curses about a clean air act, my friends went to Bee Lady’s aid, unlocking the door and escorting her out to the parking lot. I was about to assist, too, but then I heard a piercing whistle behind me. I turned to find Whistlin’ Dixie standing in the doorway of the elevator with a clipboard in her hand.

  “Howdy, li’l buckaroos,” she announced. “Sure’n if ah can’t say ah weren’t expectin’ more contestants, but that don’t make no nevermind. The Meteor Boy auditions are ready to begin.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The Makings of a Hero

  “Ah sure as shootin’ was expectin’ more li’l hopefuls than this!” Whistlin’ Dixie commented as she looked once more around the deserted lobby. “Ah was plum sure we’d get ourselfs hunerts a contestants.”

  “I think I thcared them away,” Melonhead said with a spatter of melon juice. “I thuppothe it’th pretty eathy to thee why.”

  For the first time, Dixie took a close look at Melonhead and her eyes widened in alarm. Glancing back at me, a look of relief broke across her face.

  “Say thar, li’l feller, ain’t you the boy that AI rescuedfrom the clutches o’ that thar evil Perfesser BrainDrain jes the other day?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I responded politely, deciding not to point out that she herself had had to sweet-talk AI into flying my dad out to Professor Brain-Drain’s blimp where I was being held captive.

  “A’ course we all know who deserves the credit,” she said with a wink.

  Whistlin’ Dixie whistled pleasantly to herself as the elevator climbed its way to the top floor of Indestructo Industries headquarters.

  “Who’s judging the contest?” I asked Dixie, secretly hoping that it might be her. I had the sense that she might not be anywhere near as inept as most of the members of the league.

  “Thar’ll be three judges,” she answered, “Major Bummer, Mannequin, and yers truly.”

  I was happy that she would be one of the judges, but the other two worried me. Major Bummer always seemed so depressed; you could never tell which way he would swing on any issue. Mannequin I didn’t know that much about. Sure, I knew she was a member of the league, but she rarely fought alongside the team. In fact the only time she ever appeared with them was at events and photo opportunities, where she always stood alongside AI, helping him look good.

  And that was something she was great at! After all, she was Superopolis’s most successful supermodel. Of course all models are technically “super” since this is Superopolis, but of them all, none was more famous than Mannequin. In case you’re wondering, she got her name from her ability to remove her arms, hands, legs, and head as needed. It can be an unnerving (and in many ways useless) sort of power, but she knew how to make the most of it. Her judging ability, however, was an open question.

  LI’L HERO’S HANDBOOK

  PEOPLE

  NAME: Mannequin. POWER: The ability to detach her arms, hands, feet, legs, and head. LIMITATIONS: A tendency to scatter herself across too many projects at once. CAREER: Superopolis’s most successful supermodel, and member of the League of Ultimate Goodness. CLASSIFICATION: She’s fabulous and she knows it.

  Then the elevator came to a stop, jolting me from my thoughts. The doors opened, and Whistlin’ Dixie escorted us out and then into a large room. Waiting for us were Major Bummer and Mannequin.

  “Since you two youngsters’ll be our only contestants,” Dixie began, “let’s start by gettin’ yer names.”

  “I’m Melonhead,” Melonhead splattered.

  “My name is Ordinary Boy.”

  “Zis eez eet?” Mannequin said with obvious disgust. “I vas told zat I vould be choosing from zee cream of zee crop of Zuperopolis youth.”

  “I wasn’t expecting anything better,” grumped Major Bummer.

  “You never do,” shot back Mannequin.

  “Now, now, y’all,” said Whistlin’ Dixie, “let’s give ’em a chance. Mannequin, why don’t ya get the ball rollin’.”

  “Very vell,” she said snootily. “Let us begin.”

  She looked from me to Melonhead, and I noticed her nostrils flare in alarm. Her eyes quickly returned to me.

  “You,” she said, indicating me. “Zhere eez nussing zhat eez more important zan how von enterz a room. Leave and zen return, showing me how you vould do it.”

  Turning, I headed for the door, planning my strategy as I went. Stepping out of the room, I paused for dramatic effect, then swung the door back open. Standing straight, chest out, shoulders back, I stuck my nose in the air as I made a beeline straight for Mannequin. I strode slowly but confidently, tilting my head disdainfully one way and then the other as if on a fashion runway. Until I got to Mannequin—where my eyes stopped searching as if I had finally found someone worthy. I extended my right hand, palm up. When she presented her own right hand to me, palm down, I knew I had succeeded. Of course it was a little freaky that she had actually removed her right hand from her wrist and was handing it to me with her left, but I knew that if I flinched, I could ruin everything. So, as if it were the most normal thing in the world, I grasped her disembodied hand gently and gave it a gentlemanly kiss. As she took her hand back from me, she was at first silent. A little nervous, I looked up expectantly.

  “Charming!” she finally said as if she were expelling the entire contents of her lungs in one deep, throaty breath. “Abzolutely charming.”

  Smiling, I stepped back, taking my place alongside Melonhead. “Your turn,” I whispered smugly.

  Taking my bait he turned and marched toward the door without even waiting to see if he was going to be asked to do the same thing. It was exactly what I counted on. No sooner had the door slammed shut than it reopened and Melonhead walked suavely back into the room—well, at least his version of suavely. I think he was trying to recreate my side-to-side dismissive tilt of the head, but since he had no neck, it looked more like half an orange twisting itself on a juicer. Continuing on, in a manner not dissimilar to an egg leading a marching band, he proudly came to a stop before Mannequin. With an aghast look on her face she tentatively stretched out her hand, this time still attached to her wrist. With all the subtlety of a chainsaw, Melonhead grabbed it, pulling it loose from her wrist. He planted a big, juicy, slobbery, seed-filled kiss on it before handing it back. As with me, she was silent at first. But that was where the similarity ended.

  “Zis child eez disgusting!” she hollered as her left hand held up her right, coated in melon juice and seeds.

  Before either of the other judges could respond, she stood up from the table and stormed out of the room, holding her sticky right hand as far from her body as she could.

  “Well, now,” Whistlin’ Dixie finally commented, “Ah’m sure’n she’ll be jes fine after havin’ a chance to rinse her hand. In the meantime, let’s keep things a-movin’. Major, you go next.”

  “If I must.” He sighed, shifting his enormous rear end on the seat of his groani
ng folding chair. “My question will be the same to both of you. What is the most depressing aspect of your life? You go first, Casabahead.”

  “It’th Melonhead, thir. Firtht, let me jutht thay that there’th nothing more deprething than being a thtep ahead of one’th peerth. You’re rethented ath a rethult of it and alwayth made to wear your thuperiority ath if it were thome kind of a curth—”

  “That’s enough,” Major Bummer interrupted. “I see where you’re headed. Rather than waste time I could otherwise use contemplating my own unfulfilled promise, let me hear the response of the other contestant.”

  I had no idea what Major Bummer was hoping to hear for an answer. That’s one of the problems with depressive, paranoid schizophrenics. They’re sometimes difficult to read accurately. Lacking any surety, I decided to go with that old faithful—tell the truth.

  “I have no superpower in a society where one’s superpower defines who you are. I sometimes find that depressing.”

  Major Bummer stared at me cryptically for a moment before commenting. “Thanks for keeping it short, kid.”

  Just then, Mannequin strode back into the room in the same manner as I had for my demonstration. Her right hand was once again attached, as well as cleaned of watermelon juice and seeds. She took her seat at the table as Whistlin’ Dixie asked a question of her own.

  “Well now, ah sure as shootin’ can see why you two li’l cowpokes would like to take on the hee-roic role of Meteor Boy,” she began. “But ah’m wonderin’ if y’all understan’ what you might be gettin’ yerselves inta. So answer this: Tell me everthing y’all know about Meteor Boy.”

  There was an audible gasp from Major Bummer and Mannequin.

  “You go first, Melonhead.”

  From the atypical silence that followed Dixie’s question, I could tell that Melonhead was stumped.And why wouldn’t he be? Prior to a week ago, I had never heard of Meteor Boy either. The Amazing Indestructo had done a thorough job of covering up the existence of his ill-fated sidekick. As far as Melonhead knew, Meteor Boy was a brand-new made-up character.