Larryboy blushed beneath his mask. “Aw, gee Vicki, it was nothing.”
“It was much more than nothing! It was Larry the Janitor who did nothing! I’m very disappointed in him. He left me all alone with that monster!”
Vicki’s words stung. “But Vicki, don’t be so hard on Larry. He did—”
“What? He didn’t do anything to help me. But you—you were incredibly brave!”
Larryboy was speechless. He didn’t know what to say. Larryboy was a success. But Larry the Janitor was a failure in Vicki’s eyes.
CHAPTER 6
SLAVES TO FEAR
Leaving Larryboy to ponder his predicament, we now go deep below the streets of Bumblyburg. All kinds of supervillains had built their secret lairs beneath the city, including the onion-headed master criminal of all time, Awful Alvin.
Alvin’s lair had it all—built-in shark pools, piranha tanks, and a dining-room table with a trapdoor beneath every chair. In fact, Alvin’s lair was so amazing that it had even appeared on the cover of the magazine Better Lairs and Gardens.
Awful Alvin was in an awfully good mood. He was singing karaoke to the song “B-Burg, B-Burg, What an Abominable Town.” He was also dancing around the lair with his partner in crime, Lampy—a sidekick who happened to be … well … a lamp.
“My plan is working flawlessly,” Alvin cackled as he tap-danced on top of his coffee table. “I have created the perfect monster, and now everyone in Bumblyburg is too scared to take out the trash! What do you think of that, Lampy?”
Lampy didn’t answer. Lamps don’t usually have much to say.
“Dance with me, Lampy!” Alvin shouted as he twirled Lampy into the next room, where a television studio had been set up. Hundreds of TV sets filled one huge wall, each of them showing pictures of different garbage cans in town.
“I’ve struck fear in the lives of the citizens of Bumblyburg! When I make people afraid, I have them in my power!” Alvin explained as he wheeled a television camera into the room for Lampy to see. “And when I have people in my power, they’ll do anything I tell them to do! They’re slaves to their fear! And that makes them slaves to me! HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!”
Alvin set Lampy in front of the television camera and dabbed some makeup on the lampshade.
“Today, you’re going to be a TV star, Lampy!” Alvin shouted with diabolical glee. “I’d like you to announce my evil plan to all of Bumblyburg—on prime-time TV. I’ve even made some cue cards for you!”
Alvin held up the cards, upon which he had scribbled, in crayon, the words that Lampy was to read. Then Awful Alvin turned on the television camera, counted down from five, and pointed at Lampy.
“You’re on, Lampy! Lights! Camera! Villainy!”
CHAPTER 7
AND NOW A WORD FROM OUR BLACKMAILERS …
Meanwhile, Larryboy sipped iced tea as he watched his favorite television show.
“That Jethro just cracks me up,” Larryboy said to his butler, Archie, who also happened to be an amazing inventor and high-tech wiz.
“I’m pleased to hear that, Master Larry,” said Archie, who sat nearby. “However, I couldn’t help but notice that you’re not laughing out loud and iced tea isn’t shooting out of your nose, like it normally does when you watch that show.”
There was a long pause.
“You’re right, Archie,” Larryboy said, spinning around to face his friend. “I admit it.
I’m still bothered by what Vicki said to me last night. She said she was very disappointed in Larry the Janitor! She thinks I’m afraid!”
“Well, you did say she saw you run into the bushes,” Archie observed.
“Then maybe I should tell her that Larry the Janitor and Larryboy are the same person. I’m afraid that if I don’t, she’ll never talk to Larry the Janitor again!”
Archie quickly turned to face Larryboy. “Tell her your secret identity? I would not advise that, Master Larry.”
“But I’m afraid that–”
“You’re just going to have to deal with it. You’re going to have to–”
Suddenly, Larryboy’s show vanished from the TV. In its place, the silent image of a lamp popped onto the screen. But it wasn’t just any old lamp.
“Hey look, Archie!” said Larryboy. “It’s Lampy! What’s he doing on TV?”
“That’s most unusual,” Archie agreed, pulling up his seat next to Larryboy. “Lampy is usually rather shy.”
Larryboy and Archie sat in the darkened cave, watching the image of Lampy. But there was no sound.
“Nothing’s happening,” Larryboy whispered to Archie. “Why isn’t there any sound?”
At that instant, Awful Alvin appeared on the screen and shouted, “Turn on the closed captioning! The closed captioning!”
“Oh. Right. Closed captioning,” Larryboy said, pointing his remote at the television. By pushing the closed-captioning button, the following words could be seen, being scrolled along the bottom of the screen:
People of Bumblyburg, be afraid. Be very afraid. Awful Alvin has created the most fearsome creature to ever appear in a garbage can (even scarier than used tissue)! I speak, of course, of the Abominable Trashman.
The Abominable Trashman will continue to terrify your city unless you become his slaves. And as his slaves, you must do certain things for him … or else!
1. Get rid of all real, rubber, or plush chickens (any pictures of them, too).
2. Throw away all polyester pants.
3. Every night, stand outside the house, wearing a lampshade on your head while holding a bright light. Anyone who does not obey these rules will receive a visit from the Abominable Trashman! Be afraid. Be very afraid! HA-HA-HA-HA!
We now return you to your regularly scheduled program.
Lampy vanished from the screen in a storm of static.
“I don’t like the looks of this,” said Larryboy. “I really enjoy my polyester leisure suit.”
“Those are certainly strange demands,” said Archie. “But look here, Master Larry. I think I may have discovered something.”
Larryboy looked over Archie’s shoulder at the computer screen. “What are those squiggly red lines crisscrossing your map of Bumblyburg?”
“They’re underground tunnels,” Archie explained. “And the tunnels run to every house in Bumblyburg. If my calculations are correct, I believe the tunnels are connected to the new garbage cans that have been sprouting up all around town.”
“You mean … ?”
“Yes! That’s how the monster is appearing in garbage cans everywhere. The monster crawls through the tunnels and jumps out of the cans!”
“You mean … ?”
“Yes! The only way we’ll be able to stop the monster is if you drop into one of the trash cans, crawl through the tunnels, and track down the creature!”
“You mean … ?”
“Yes! That means you’re going to have to conquer your fear of small, enclosed spaces.”
Larryboy gulped. He hated tight spaces. In fact, that’s one of the main reasons why Larryboy was terrified of using the secret pneumatic Larrytube transporter–a tube that could carry him from the newspaper office to the Larrycave in the blink of an eye.
Larryboy was afraid. He was very afraid.
CHAPTER 8
A SECRET-IDENTITY CRISIS
The next morning, when Larry the Janitor arrived at the Daily Bumble, he saw Vicki working at her desk. This was his chance to make things right with her. But Vicki left right away, as if she were trying to avoid him.
Larry didn’t track her down until the end of the day, when he found her at the water cooler.
“Vicki, you don’t understand what happened the other night,” Larry said, desperately.
“I understand perfectly. You got frightened and left me in the clutches of a monster. What else is there to say?”
“But there’s another side of me that’s very brave,” Larry insisted. “You just don’t know it.” Vicki shook her head sadly and sighed. T
hen, as she hopped away, she said over her shoulder, “I’ve got photos to take, Larry. Maybe we can talk later.”
There had to be something that Larry could do to prove to Vicki that he wasn’t a complete chicken. If only he could tell her that he was Larryboy. If only he could tell her that the reason he ran away was to change into his superhero costume!
It was so tempting… . Maybe he could tell her… . maybe … just maybe …
He decided to do it.
Before he could change his mind, Larry yanked a piece of paper from Bob’s desk and scribbled it all down. In the note, he told Vicki that he was Larryboy. He was that hero of Bumblyburg! He was the one who battled the Abominable Trashman.
Trying not to think about what he was doing, Larry sealed the envelope, stuck the letter on Vicki’s desk, and then dashed outside.
Larry felt good about what he had done … for about two minutes. But with every step he took closer to home, a different question popped into his mind.
What if Vicki tells her friends? What if Vicki reveals my secret in a news story? And what will happen if every villain learns my secret identity?
Suddenly, Larry came to a dead stop. His eyes bugged out. “What have I done?”
Wheeling around, Larry tore back to the newspaper. He had to get that letter back! He just had to!
He sprinted up five flights of stairs, burst into the newsroom, knocked over Bob the Tomato, and sent papers flying everywhere. He scrambled to Vicki’s cubicle and dove toward her desk. Where was it? Where was it?
The letter was gone … and so was Vicki.
His secret was out.
CHAPTER 9
THE SUBSTITUTE MONSTER
That night, Larryboy crept into his weekly Superhero 101 class at Bumblyburg Community College—the only class in the world for vegetables with powers far beyond those of normal Veggies. He was afraid that his classmates would somehow learn that he had broken one of the biggest superhero rules: never give away your secret identity.
So, with worries eating away at him, today’s lesson was quite fitting: “How Superheroes Battle Fear.”
Unfortunately, the class professor, the wise and wonderful Bok Choy, was gone that evening.
When the superheroes arrived, they found a message scrawled on the blackboard: “Bok Choy cannot make it tonight. Your substitute teacher will be Miss Eville.” (It also looked like someone had written and then erased “HA-HA-HA-HA”.)
“I don’t like the looks of this,” Larryboy whispered to Lemon Twist, the superhero girl in the seat next to him. “Where’s our substitute?”
There was absolutely no sign of the substitute teacher—just an empty chair at the front of the room.
“I was a substitute teacher once,” said the Scarlet Tomato, “at a junior high. Talk about scary. I would never have survived all those spitballs without my superpowers.”
“I’ve never heard of Miss Eville,” griped Electro-Melon, a hulking fruit with anger-management problems.
Five minutes passed. Still no sign of the teacher.
“I say we call it a night,” suggested Larryboy, gathering up his Superhero Handbook.
But before he could rise from his seat, the classroom door slammed shut and locked—all by itself. Then the windows came sliding down and the lights went out, plunging the room into darkness. There was no escape.
A lot of superhero hearts suddenly began to beat superfast.
“I knew I should have taken Superhero Cape Crocheting 101 this semester,” said Larryboy.
Panic was rising fast. And then the garbage can near the front of the room began to shake, rattle, and roll.
“It’s the Abominable Trashman!”
The fear was so thick that you could cut it with a knife. You could even scoop it with a spoon, flip it with a spatula, or pick it up with chopsticks.
“Hold it, you guys!” Larryboy shouted. “We’re superheroes! We can’t be pushed around by one little garbage monster!”
“Good point.”
“Hadn’t thought about that.”
So the superheroes did what every superhero does in a sticky situation. They used their superpowers. Electro-Melon fired up his electrical field. Lemon Twist unleashed her tornado powers. And Larryboy launched his plunger ears.
“OK class, that’s enough. Settle down now,” came a calm voice by the door. The lights flicked back on, and there stood Bok Choy.
“Bok Choy! We thought you couldn’t make it.”
“So sorry,” said Bok Choy. “There was never really going to be a substitute teacher. Instead, I was giving you a pop quiz. But first let me thank the Invisible Carrot Twins for their help.”
Two invisible carrot superheroes slowly materialized in front of the classroom and bowed. They were the ones who had closed the door and windows and made the garbage can rattle.
“How many of you felt fear just now?” asked Bok Choy.
At first, no one answered.
“It’s OK to admit it.”
“Well … I guess I did say that I wished I had taken Superhero Cape Crocheting,” Larryboy admitted, a little embarrassed.
“It’s OK to feel fear,” Bok Choy said. “Being brave doesn’t mean that you never feel fearful. When you’re faced by a villain with the power to squash you flat, who wouldn’t be afraid?” Bok Choy went on to explain that what makes people brave is how they respond to fear. Do they let fear control them? Do they make wrong decisions when they’re afraid? Or do they continue to do the right thing, even when they’re scared?
Bok Choy asked the class to open their Superhero Handbooks to Section 19, Paragraph 34, Line 4. The handbook said: “I looked to theLORD, and he answered me. He saved me from everything I was afraid of.”
“God will give you brave hearts, even when you’re scared silly,” said Bok Choy, walking over to the windows. “Look! The people of Bumblyburg have been scared into extreme silliness.”
Through the windows, the entire class could see Bumblyburg citizens dumping garbage into their yards because they were too afraid to take it to their trash cans. They could also see people standing outside of their houses with lampshades on their heads while holding bright lights—just as Awful Alvin had ordered.
Like obedient slaves, people did everything Alvin told them to do. They frantically tore pictures of chickens out of their cookbooks and threw them out with the garbage, along with every piece of polyester clothing. Anyone who didn’t obey was paid a visit by the Abominable Trashman.
“Fear is taking over the city,” said Bok Choy. “It must be stopped.”
CHAPTER 10
ROCKET-BOY
“Are you sure this thing is going to work?” Larryboy asked Archie the next day.
“Well … I haven’t ironed out all of the kinks in the Larrysled,” said Archie. “But we have no choice but to act now.” “Kinks? I don’t like the sound of kinks.” The Larrysled was a slick, purple sled with supersuction wheels—perfect for rolling through tunnels at incredibly high speeds. A large rocket was attached to each side.
“If Bob were doing this, we’d call it a Bobsled,” Archie joked. But Larryboy was too nervous to laugh. Archie had also created what looked like an astronaut’s space helmet for Larryboy. A little, green, tree-shaped air freshener dangled inside the plastic helmet (important for anyone submerged in week-old glop).
Larryboy waddled over to the garbage can behind the Larrycave—a portal into Awful Alvin’s network of tunnels. Then he pushed the orange button on his sled, and the two rockets fired up.
“Well … I guess this is it, Archie old friend,” he said, staring into the open garbage can. Larryboy felt like he was about to dive into the intestines of a giant worm. “Tight spaces,” he said, woozy with fear. “Why do these tunnels have to be such tight spaces?”
“Remember, Larryboy, God will give you a brave heart to do what’s right, even when you’re scared silly.”
With the flaming Larrysled in his clutches, Larryboy and the rocket-sled te
etered on the edge of the garbage can—like someone too afraid to jump off of the diving board. “Are you sure that Lemon Twist isn’t interested in this job?”
“You can do it, Master Larry,” said Archie, running down the to-do list on his clipboard. Unfortunately, as Archie looked down at his clipboard, he wasn’t watching where he was going. He bumped smack into the back of the Larrysled.
BOINKK!
“AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
That was Larryboy screaming, in case you hadn’t already guessed.
The caped cucumber was knocked forward, fell belly-down on his Larrysled, and tumbled into the bottomless can of disgusting yuck, moldering muck, and decaying gluck.
“Oops,” said Archie, staring into the hole at the bottom of the garbage can. “My bad.”
Riding the Larrysled, Larryboy roared through a tunnel of rubbish and rot. With blinding speed, he tore through piles of broken toys, decaying food, plastic wrappers, and half-eaten candy bars.
“Are you all right, Larryboy?” came Archie’s voice over a radio built into the helmet.
“I’m OK, Archie. But things are pretty gross down here!”
Larryboy zipped like a purple bullet through the tunnels beneath Bumblyburg. Around and around and around and around he raced, as if he were on a never-ending roller-coaster ride. Some of the tunnels were packed with garbage, which smacked against Larryboy’s plastic helmet like bugs on a windshield. But other tunnels were clear sailing and completely free of trash.
“Archie! How do I steer this thing?”
“Use the joystick!” Archie yelled.
“But I’m feeling no joy!” Larryboy yelled, pushing the stick to the right. The Larrysled made a screaming right turn down a new tunnel.
“New problem, Archie.”
“What’s that, Master Larry?”
“This tunnel has a dead end—emphasis on the word dead. How do I stop this thing?”
There was silence for what seemed like forever. “OK, now I remember what that kink in the sled is.”
LarryBoy and the Abominable Trashman! Page 2
