Sidekicks (2 page)

Okay, it’s Pumpkin Pete, but hey, we take what we can, right?

What surprise attack would make the League of Big Justice turn to me and Beatrice for help? What could possibly defeat them?

Nothing. That’s why my palms were getting so sweaty.

We slapped our hands on the FingerPrintronic. After our prints gave a positive ID, a laser shot out from the wall and scanned our retinas for a positive match.

I could hear the door to the League of Big Justice Inner Sanctum of Justice slide open. I turned and ran directly into the wall. It happens every time. That laser eye scan is like ten grandmas taking pictures with flashbulbs five inches from your face. The big, glowing red spots usually last for two minutes.

Beatrice and I, still half-blind, shuffled into the Inner Sanctum of Justice.

“Hey! Great to see you! You’re looking swell.”

It was Charisma Kid. Even if I was completely blind, I could tell his voice: the voice of honor, the voice of courage, the voice that went with the confidence of a really great smile. “We need your help, Speedy.”

Oh ...my... gosh! Did he just say my code name? Charisma Kid — the Charisma Kid — knows who I am!

“Yessir! Speedy! That’s —”

“No time for chitchat, rookie!” Charisma cut in. “Are you ready to fight the forces of evil?”

The forces of evil? Oh man! If I thought fighting evil was cool, fighting the forces of
anything
was, like, the ultimate!

“Yessir!” Beatrice and I both enthused back.

The red spots in my eyes began to fade and I could vaguely see CK’s (that’s what his friends called him) face. I think it’s okay for me to call him CK. I
am
one of the inner circle.

“Here,” he said, slapping something spongy in my hand. “You’ll need this!”

“Shouldn’t we wait a few seconds until Beatrice and I can see better?” I asked, worried about battling the forces of evil with a big red spot in the middle of its face.

“Wait? Wait!?” CK exploded with near disgust. “Evil never sleeps in.”

Wow. He
was
the coolest.

“I’m a little worried,” Beatrice whispered to me as we ran after CK. “I left my Scrabble tiles back at the Clubhouse.”

“Befuddle them with some palindromes,” I replied.

We burst through some double doors, the three of us, like a trio of horsemen sweeping onto the battlefield carrying the bright waving standards of hope — hope we carried in our hearts and in our hands like a ... sponge?

I looked into my own hand and that’s what I saw. A sponge, slightly soapy.

“Go get ’em!” Captain Haggis called out from a long dinner table, piled with half-eaten food and dessert bowls.

Beatrice and I followed Captain Haggis’s pointing finger through a second set of double doors, and there I saw it: the Mount Everest of dishes. The Grand Canyon of grime. The Any-Other-Really-Really-Big-Thing of crusty plates.

“Don’t turn your back on that grease!” Charisma Kid chuckled as he left the kitchen and went back to the dining room. “It’s a real killer.”

Beatrice sighed, picked up a scouring pad, and started scrubbing. “I’ll wash. You dry.”

I threw the sponge onto the ground and fumed. Today I realized two things. One: Sometimes being a sidekick really stinks. Two: Charisma Kid is a jerk.

Chapter Two

Evil Never Sleeps In — Part II

“I don’t know, Guy,” Miles said, his cheek full of baloney. “CK is the coolest.”

“First of all, the snob only lets his friends call him CK,” I corrected. “And secondly, he’s a jerk. I’m telling you. After I finished the dishes, he totally started calling me Spuddy even though he knew my name was Speedy.”

“Maybe it was a secret code and you missed the cue.”

“Yeah. A secret jerk code.”

Miles and I have been best friends since the second grade, when I made milk shoot out his nose. We always hang out together at school and when I’m not sidekicking. He’s a little chubby, which he says is just baby fat, and has brown hair. He’s the only one besides my parents who knows my secret identity.

Not that I want to keep it a secret. Man, if it were up to me, I’d be standing on the top of the school auditorium screaming, “Look at me! Look at me! I’m a superhero sidekick!” until my throat was sore.

Too bad I have parents, huh?

“We don’t want some supervillain blowing up our house because you foiled his plan to rule the world, young man,” my dad had chastised me when I first became a sidekick.

“What will the neighbors say?” my mom had lamented. “It’s bad enough your brother’s a florist.”

I guess I should be happy that they even let me be a sidekick at all. But what else can you do when you wake up one day and your son can run 92.7 miles per hour?

Miles swallowed the last bite of his sandwich and the lunch bell rang. We threw away our trash and headed off to algebra class. It’s not like I wanted to take algebra. Heck, I’d rather be in home ec. At least then I would’ve gotten free food.

It was my sidekick sponsor’s idea.

“You never know,” Pumpkin Pete had enthused when I picked my freshman classes. “One day algebra may just save my life.”

“What about
my
life?” I had questioned.

“Oh yeah. Yours too, Spuddy.”

“Speedy.”

“Whatever.”

The first thing you did once you became a sidekick was to get a sponsor. All the new sidekicks who had met the rigorous admission standards of the Sidekick Clubhouse — and by “rigorous standards” I mean the check cleared — lined up in a row facing the handful of superheroes who, for reasons that most of us didn’t want to know and the insurance company wouldn’t let them tell, didn’t have a sidekick.

Then, and this is where the real scientific part came in, they picked us like they were picking players for their basketball team.

“Uh... that tall guy.”

“I pick ... the one in glasses.”

“Let’s see? Do you complain? Whine? No? I’ll take you.”

“Would you be willing to sacrifice your life to save mine?” Pumpkin Pete had asked me as he walked down the line.

“Uh...I guess,” I replied, not really sure.

“I get this one!” Pete shouted.

Pete is about six-foot-five, with long arms and a thin, lanky body. And, in case you couldn’t guess by the name, his head is a pumpkin.

“
I’ve
got all the powers of a pumpkin,” he proudly bragged to me just moments after he picked me.

I’m still trying to figure out what that means.

I sit in algebra class next to Prudence Cane.

Don’tcha just love that name? I do.
And
her eyes, her smile, her hair, her smell, and even the way she pretends not to know I exist.

If super beauty were a power, Prudence would be the
Titanic
of gorgeousness. Wait. The
Titanic
sank, didn’t it? Okay, she’s the
Titanic
before it sank. But thinner. And without the smokestacks.

“Hey, Prudence,” I said as I leaned over her desk.

She blew a bubble with her gum and stared at me over the pink edge. “Hey, Gary.”

“Guy.”

“Whatever.” She turned her back to me.

Stupid! Stupid! Stupid! I should’ve just said my name was Gary! I mean it’s just a name, not like I was attached to that “Guy” name anyway.

“Guy? Guy?” Miles asked. “What are you doing?”

“Shut up. My name’s Gary.”

This is what really kills me about keeping my powers secret. If I just told her the truth, just once, that I could win every track event, be the best basketball player in the school, score a touchdown every time I touch a football, she’d love me. She’d think I was as awesome as I thought she was.

Instead, I was sitting in algebra class wishing my name was Gary.

Maybe if I used my powers a little and stuff. Y’know, nothing really big, but just enough to be more popular. Would that be such a bad thing? I once read that with great power comes great responsibility. My power’s not
that
great, so do I really have to be
that
responsible?

The good thing was, now that I’d totally embarrassed myself in front of Prudence, I didn’t think my life could get any worse.

“Class,” Mr. Lang, the algebra teacher, said, “I’d like to introduce a new student to you. He’s just transferred from Crystal City Junior High School and will be with us for the rest of the year. Everybody say hello to...”

No. Please. Not him. Not now.
Did I say my life couldn’t get any worse? I was right. It couldn’t get worse, but it could get terribly, terribly worse by, like, a hundred times.

“. . . Mandrake Steel.”

There he stood in front of the class. Tall. Handsome. Muscles. Great hair. And all the power and confidence of a really great smile.

“Do you know who that is?” I asked Miles.

“Yeah, Gary. The teacher just said his name was Manbake Style or something. Who cares?”

I looked around the classroom. The girls were already writing love notes.

I leaned closer to Miles and whispered into his ear, “Also known as Charisma Kid.”

“No way!” Miles erupted.

I smacked his shoulder and pulled him back down into his chair.

“Dude, I just violated every rule, bylaw, dictum, regulation, promise, and suggestion of being a sidekick. I don’t need you blabbing it to the world. There’s a reason they’re called
secret
identities!”

“Apparently, not to you,” Miles said sarcastically.

“. . . and I just want you all to know how excited I am to call Clearwater High my new home!” Charisma Kid finished.

Sure, no one else in the room knew he was Charisma Kid, but they didn’t need to. I mean, they call him
Charisma
Kid for a reason.

I heard some girl titter. I turned around to see who the unfortunate soul was. Prudence Cane not only tittered but practically
swooned
when Charisma Kid flashed a toothy grin her way and winked.

Charisma Kid made his way down the aisle and as he passed me, he cracked a small smile. “Good to see you again, Spuddy.”

“His name is Gary,” Miles defended.

Charisma Kid sat behind Prudence.

“This is so cool,” Miles said, leaning closer to me. “Maybe he’ll let me sit at the same table at lunch. Or maybe even sit
next
to him! I’ve always wanted to meet a sidekick!”

“
I’m
a sidekick!” I whispered in a sharp tone.

“Yeah. To a pumpkin.”

“Didn’t you listen to
anything
I said? Haven’t you been paying attention?” I hissed under my breath.

“What? What?” Miles defended. “I
told
him to call you Gary.”

I dropped my head onto my desk with a defeated thud.

“Okay, class,” Mr. Lang began, “let’s review the Pythagorean theorem — yes, Mandrake?”

Charisma Kid raised his hand and waved it over his head. “I don’t mean to interrupt, sir, but I just wanted to tell you what a striking tie you’re wearing.”

“Do you really think?” Mr. Lang asked, looking down at his tie. “I wasn’t really sure...I mean when I picked it out at the store...Do you really think?”

“Absolutely. In fact, if you teach half as well as you pick ties, I’m in for quite an amazing learning experience.”

Mr. Lang stopped for a moment, possibly feeling more handsome than he ever had in his life, and popped open his algebra book with renewed zeal.

“Was that the sweetest thing, or what?” Prudence Cane said to no one in particular.

With those eight words, no, wait. Seven. Uh... yeah... seven words, I realized I was in for the fight of my life. One where I was helpless to use my powers, and at stake was something more precious to me than the safety of the world.

Prudence Cane.

Chapter Three

Evil Is Bad

“Sssh!” Earlobe Lad hissed at me and covered his enormous ears.

“I didn’t say anything,” I whispered back.

“No. But the blinking. The blinking is driving...me...insane!”

I sat in my chair doing my best to not blink. It was always like this when I was on monitor duty with Earlobe Lad. His oversized ears and super-hearing made him hypersensitive to even the tiniest noises. The fact he had short hair only seemed to make his ears that much larger. His costume was green with a large ear on the chest.