The Great Powers Outage (3 page)

“Ah say, sir, you are no gentleman,” Colonel Corncob sputtered as the Big Bouncer hurtled toward him. If he thought words could stop the rubbery hero, he was mistaken. BB smacked into him and sent the ear of corn flying—minus another half dozen kernels from his body.

The guy with the onion head was making a serious attempt to use his power, but Windbag had learned his lesson and stood safely out of range.

“Cry. Cry! CRY!” the shallot shrieked hysterically.

“Watch this!” Stench elbowed me as his dad took an enormous breath.

On cue, Windbag exhaled with such incredible force that the onion-headed guy was blown head over heels into the accumulating pile of vegetables.

“Now that's what I call onion breath,” my father said stiffly, following the script. “There's only one item this tasteless salad is lacking.”

With that, each of the four New New Crusaders grabbed a different one of the Great Garbanzo's limbs. When they had a firm hold, they began swinging him back and forth.

“Is dis da end of da Great Garbanzo?” the giant chickpea asked dramatically at the height of one of the swings.

“One . . . two . . . three,” the New New Crusaders chanted in unison before releasing the Great Garbanzo into the air.

“Brace my fall, boys,” I heard him say to his horrified team members as he flew toward them. They tried to scatter, but he got there too fast and crushed them beneath him.

With the medley of “criminal” vegetables practically pureed, my father turned to the crowd that had assembled behind us.

“Vegetables just can't compare to the power of Maximizer Brand snack cakes,” he said dramatically.

Stench and I immediately started clapping but quickly realized we were the only ones doing so. We turned around in surprise. There had been at least two hundred people here in the parking lot of the Mighty Mart when the performance began, but now there was no one to be seen. The crowd had vanished.

“Where is everyone?” my dad asked with alarm. “They're missing the debut of the New New Crusaders as the official spokesteam for Maximizer snack cakes.”

“Maximizer
Brand
snack cakes,” corrected an irritated Great Garbanzo as he got off his groaning comrades. “How many times does I needs to remind youse dat we always has to say “brand”? It prevents us from infringin' on da manufacturer of shoe lifts wit da same name.”

“Look.” Stench pointed. “The crowd has moved to the far side of the parking lot.”

Sure enough, something else
had
caught the eye of the crowd—something even more exciting than a group of villainous vegetables. Even from where we were standing there was no mistaking who it was—Superopolis's greatest (self-proclaimed) superhero—the Amazing Indestructo.

CHAPTER TWO

New and Improved?

The look of annoyance in my father's eyes couldn't have been plainer. His team's big debut had been spoiled by the Amazing Indestructo. The Great Garbanzo was even more peeved.

“Let me at dat so-and-so,” he cursed. “If he's here to push his own line a snack cakes at da expense a mine, I'll break botha his legs and den his arms just ta make soiten he gets da message.”

“But, boss,” said the guy in the broccoli suit, “he's indestructible.”

“I'll shows youse indestructible,” he said as he barged past the broccoli, knocking him to the ground.

My dad and his teammates hesitated for a moment but then followed the fuming legume. After all, he was their new boss. The Great Garbanzo was the owner of the Maximizer Brand Snack Cake Company. Stench and I went along, too.

LI'L HERO'S HANDBOOK

PEOPLE

NAME:
Great Garbanzo, The.
POWER:
High in protein.
LIMITATIONS:
Low in flavor.
CAREER:
When his line of hummus breakfast products failed miserably, the dispirited Garbanzo abandoned all his strongly held beliefs on healthy eating and started the Maximizer Brand Snack Cake Company. It was an immediate success.
CLASSIFICATION:
A sugary triumph has only led to a sour disposition.

As we walked across the parking lot the throng continued to grow. AI's ability to draw a crowd went far beyond that of the New New Crusaders', and he stood silently, basking in the admiration, atop a makeshift stage that had been built for this appearance. Lined up behind him were six of the ten members of the League of Ultimate Goodness: the Crimson Creampuff; Featherweight; Moleman; the Human Compass; Cap'n Blowhole; and my personal favorite, Whistlin' Dixie.

As soon as Dixie started whistling the Amazing Indestructo theme song—perfectly in tune, of course—the crowd quieted to a low murmur. AI waited a moment or two longer and then began to speak.

“I know that you, the good citizens of Superopolis, expect nothing but the finest when it comes to products bearing the Amazing Indestructo name,” he began in a serious tone. “I take great pride in the restraint I've shown throughout my career in not releasing just any old merchandise for the sake of a quick buck.”

A mocking snort erupted from deep inside me. People nearby turned and glared, but my dad gave me an approving pat on the shoulder.

“Which is why,” AI continued, oblivious to my editorial outburst, “I am proud to announce that, after more than a decade in development, Indestructo

Industries has produced a potato chip worthy of the Amazing Indestructo name!”

I think he was expecting a massive roar of approval from the crowd, but all he got was a stunned silence. He plowed ahead anyway.

“Superopolis, I'm proud to present to you the Amazing Indestructo's Amazing Pseudo-Chips!”

We all watched in astonishment as four enormous cylinders rose from each corner of the stage. They were designed to look like canisters of AI's Amazing PseudoChips, and each bore the tagline “Every Chip as Perfect as Him!” No one in the crowd had ever seen anything like this before—with the exception of me.

Less than a week earlier, I had not only gotten a sneak peek at these odd looking potato chips that stacked in a can, I even used the can as a component in the fully functional time machine I created as a science fair project. I should have known it was only a matter of time before the Amazing Indestructo attempted to launch them as a new product line. But even he faced an enormous hurdle in making them a success.

“Potato chips?” I heard someone mutter. “Why would we buy any chips other than Dr. Telomere's?”

Similar comments were filtering through the crowd when the tops of the four enormous canisters exploded and potato chips—make that
Pseudo
-Chips—began raining down on the startled spectators. People frantically tried catching the crispy projectiles, and those who were successful popped them into their mouths. Meanwhile, the members of the League of Ultimate Goodness had moved to the forefront to perform their individual parts in this crass, commercial enterprise.

“There's only one direction to follow for true potato chip–like flavor, and that's to AI's Amazing PseudoChips,” proclaimed the Human Compass.

“They're plum gar-un-teed to leave ya whistlin' fer more,” Whistlin' Dixie said, tipping her rhinestone-studded cowgirl hat.

Featherweight stepped forward and raised a finger as if he were about to speak, but then a stiff wind caught him and whipped him into the air.

“They're as light and crispy as . . . ,” I think I heard him say before the breeze whisked him—and whatever his analogy was going to be—out of earshot. His teammates carried on without missing a beat.

“Aaargh, mateys!” agreed Cap'n Blowhole as a plume of water shot out of the top of his head. “Discovering Pseudo-Chips is like finding buried treasure . . . except you'll find them aboveground . . . and they're not really made out of gold.”

“Regular, boring chips contain only potatoes, oil, and salt,” the Crimson Creampuff informed the audience. “But the Amazing Indestructo's Amazing Pseudo-Chips contain dozens of ingredients, most of which are unpronounceable!”

“They have an earthy flavor . . . like something that's just been dug from the ground,” announced Moleman, as everyone on the stage, including AI, turned and glared at him. “I meant that as a compliment,” he added meekly.

But the crowd was having none of it. We had spent a lifetime eating Dr. Telomere's potato chips, and anything else seemed like heresy. I couldn't help but smile at the thought that I was witnessing a monumental financial defeat for the Amazing Indestructo. He had finally pushed his luck one chip too far.

He realized it, too. In a panic, he turned to another figure on the stage who I hadn't noticed until now. It was an older man dressed all in red, and AI ushered him up to the microphone.

“And here to speak about yet another of the tremendous benefits of AI's Pseudo-Chips is our official spokesman, Comrade Crunch.”

There was something about the intensity of this silver-haired old man that made the crowd go silent. He strode purposefully to the microphone, and his gaze washed over us. For a moment it felt like his eyes had focused on me, and me alone. Instinctively I knew that every person standing here had experienced the same sensation. Then he began to speak.