The Grateful Fred Read online

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  To Mom and Dad

  —G. T.

  For my brother Alex

  —R. M.

  1

  THE SUPERHERO’S LAB

  Superhero Melvin Beederman was in his tree house taking it easy. Well, sort of. At least he wasn’t chasing bad guys. The McNasty Brothers were once again in prison, and so Melvin decided it was time to invent the world’s best-tasting ice cream. After all, it was an unwritten part of the Superhero’s Code to eat snacks when they weren’t saving the world.

  So ice cream it was. And not just any ice cream—pretzel-flavored ice cream. Melvin had converted his tree house, which usually served as his good guy hideout, into a superhero’s laboratory. All around him were sacks of sugar and cartons of milk.

  Let’s see, Melvin said to himself, 68 cups of sugar, 111 cups of milk. That’s 179 cups in all.

  Ah … math. When Melvin wasn’t saving the world or pounding on bad guys, there was always a good math problem just waiting to be solved.

  He mixed up a big batch of pretzel-flavored ice cream and spooned some for his pet, Hugo. Hugo was a rat, but right now he was a guinea pig.

  The rat licked his lips. He twitched his whiskers.

  “Squeakity-squeak squeak?” Melvin asked Hugo. This either meant, “How does it taste?” or possibly, “Does your belly button itch?” Melvin had once been fluent in gerbil, but he wasn’t so sure about rat.

  “Squeak,” the rat said. This either meant, “This is the best ice cream ever,” or “Don’t quit your day job, mister.”

  No problem there. Years ago, Melvin had been plucked from an orphanage and sent to the Superhero Academy. He was now the superhero in charge of Los Angeles. With his superhero assistant, Candace Brinkwater, he kept the peace. No, he wouldn’t be giving up his day job, not as long as his town needed him.

  Melvin looked around his hideout-turned-inventor’s-lab and cleaned up. He wasn’t giving up on pretzel-flavored ice cream, but he had things to do. After cleaning up, he checked his e-mail.

  From: [email protected]

  To: [email protected]

  Dear Melvin,

  We need your help. Someone has been sending us threatening letters. We don’t know who it is. Please come to our concert tonight, just in case.

  Sincerely,

  Fred of The Grateful Fred

  “Holy trouble-is-brewing!” Melvin said. “Someone is out to get The Grateful Fred. I love those guys.”

  Holy trouble-is-brewing, indeed! He did love them. The Grateful Fred was his all-time favorite rock-and-roll band. Melvin had to get going. The e-mail was a cry for help, and the Superhero’s Code told him what to do in such situations. Melvin knew he had to be at the concert. He had to keep the peace. And if he could do it and listen to great tunes, all the better.

  He turned on the TV so Hugo could watch The Adventures of Thunderman, their favorite show. Thunderman and his assistant, Thunder Thighs, were the second-best superheroes Melvin knew.

  “Gotta go, Hugo,” he said as he dove out the window and—

  Crash!

  Melvin hardly ever got off the ground in one try. He stood and tried again. “Up, up, and away.”

  Splat!

  “Up, up, and away.”

  Thud!

  “Up, up, and away.”

  Kabonk!

  Finally he was up and flying—on the fifth try. This was par for the course for Melvin Beederman. At least he was flying.

  Now if only he could learn how to turn off his x-ray vision. He really hated seeing everyone’s underwear. But as he zoomed between the tall buildings of Los Angeles, looking down at the people, that’s what he saw—underwear.

  All over the place. In every shape, color, and size. It was nauseating, really. He had to remind himself not to eat before going to work.

  2

  ROCK AND ROLLER’S CODE: SAY “BABY” AND “YEAH” A LOT

  Melvin zoomed across town, trying to ignore the underwear. He couldn’t wait to hear his favorite band, The Grateful Fred. They had fans all over the world. They were more popular than U2. They had more gold albums than Me3. They rocked harder than Us4.

  The Grateful Fred knew the Rock and Roller’s Code, and this was one of the reasons for their success. Their first album was called Yeah, Yeah, Baby. Their second album was called Baby, Baby, Yeah. And their third was called Baby, Yeah, Baby.

  Yes, the Rock and Roller’s Code was working just fine.

  * * *

  Melvin arrived at the concert just as the first song was starting. He hovered above the crowd, which was going wild, as Fred, the leader of The Grateful Fred, sang their latest hit—“Baby, Yeah, Yeah.”

  Melvin watched the crowd for any sign of foul play. He had a nose for such things. It was his nose that helped him catch the McNasty Brothers, who, as everyone knows, smelled worse than rotting Brussels sprouts.

  Melvin circled above the concert. He saw no sign of danger, no sign that anything bad was about to happen. The Fredheads—this is what the fans called themselves—were too busy having fun to think devious thoughts, let alone sinister ones. And so Melvin relaxed and enjoyed the concert.

  Big mistake!

  Suddenly an explosion ripped through the air—KABOOM! The stage began to collapse. The Fredheads screamed and scattered in all directions.

  “Holy stampede!” Melvin said. “This is terrible.”

  Holy stampede, indeed! It was terrible. The stage crumbled, falling toward the crowd. People were about to be crushed. Melvin shot out of the sky to the rescue. He got there just in time. Just in the nick of time, in fact. He grabbed the stage and held it up until all those near it got clear and The Grateful Fred band members climbed down.

  “How can I ever thank you?” Fred said.

  “Just doing my job,” Melvin replied, which, of course, was part of the Superhero’s Code. And Melvin always kept to the code.

  Fred unstrapped himself from his guitar. “I can’t understand it. Who would do such a thing?”

  “Not sure,” Melvin said. “But I’m going to find out.” He walked behind the stage where no one could see him and took off.

  Or at least he tried to.

  “Up, up, and away.”

  Crash!

  Splat!

  Thud!

  Kabonk!

  Once again, Melvin was up and flying on the fifth try. But he couldn’t think about his flying problems right now. Someone was out to get The Grateful Fred, and he had to find out who. And why.

  He knew he couldn’t solve this one alone. He needed help. He needed his assistant, Candace Brinkwater. The only person ever to score 500 points in a basketball game. The only person to run the hundred-yard dash in three and a half seconds. The only third-grader who could fly.

  3

  HARK!

  Melvin flew between the tall buildings of Los Angeles. The
moon was out and he could see his reflection in the glass. He hovered and flexed, then continued on. Flexing was not part of the Superhero’s Code. It was just a Melvin thing.

  He tumbled to a stop on Candace’s front lawn, then went around back and threw a few pebbles at her bedroom window. He had once seen Romeo do this in the play Romeo and Juliet.

  Candace opened the window and looked out.

  “Hark!” Melvin said.

  “What?”

  “Oh, sorry, wrong story. Candace, I need your help.”

  “You know I can’t save the world after dinnertime,” she said. And it was way beyond dinnertime. Candace was in her pajamas.

  “Get your cape and let’s go,” Melvin said. “If we wait till tomorrow the trail will be cold and we’ll never catch him.”

  “Catch who?”

  “Someone is trying to kill The Grateful Fred!”

  Candace looked shocked. She began to hum the melody of “Baby, Yeah, Yeah.”

  Then she caught herself and said, “I love those guys.”

  “Well, someone doesn’t. We have to find whoever it is before they try it again.”

  “Meet me after school at the library,” Candace said. “Don’t you worry, Melvin Beederman. We’ll catch him, right after we do my math homework.”

  This was their agreement. Melvin helped Candace with math, and she helped him save the world … one bad guy at a time.

  Candace closed the window and disappeared behind the curtains, leaving Melvin alone in the backyard. Should he go off and try to find the bad guy tonight? Melvin thought this over, then shook his head. No, he was part of a team. He’d wait until his partner in uncrime could join him.

  “Up, up, and away.”

  Crash!

  Splat!

  Thud!

  Kabonk!

  Melvin flew home to his tree house. Hugo the rat was there waiting for him. “Squeaker squeakity?” Hugo said.

  “Squeak,” Melvin replied. He didn’t feel like talking. Or squeaking, for that matter.

  4

  JOE THE BAD GUY

  The Grateful Fred may have been one of the best rock-and-roll bands in the world. They may have sold more records than U2, Me3, and Us4 combined. But that didn’t mean everyone in the world loved them.

  In fact, there was one guy who hated them. This was Joe the Bad Guy. He used to be Joe the Okay Guy. Before that he was Joe the Semi-Nice Guy. But now he was just plain Bad. And he was rapidly heading toward Dreadful.

  He hated The Grateful Fred. And now he hated Melvin Beederman.

  “Darn you, Melvin Beederman,” Joe the Bad Guy said. He had placed the bomb beneath the stage at the concert and was now pacing back and forth in his lair. Not hideout—lair.

  Actually, it wasn’t his lair. He had only recently made the jump from Okay Guy to Bad Guy and so he was just renting. He went to Big Al’s Rent-a-Lair and got a deal on a used one. Still, a lair was a lair. And it was a good place to come up with more devious and sinister plans.

  Should he be sinister today or should he be devious? It was a toss-up, really. Joe the Bad Guy couldn’t decide. He had been devious on Monday and Wednesday, and sinister on Tuesday and Thursday. It seemed he could go either way, since now it was Friday.

  All he knew was that he just had to get The Grateful Fred. And if Melvin Beederman got in the way, Joe would get him, too.

  Joe sat down in his lair (it came furnished) and thought about the days when he had been in The Grateful Fred. He had been kicked out by Fred himself, the band’s leader. And now all Joe could think about was getting revenge.

  Fred had kicked him out for one big reason: Joe was a terrible musician. But it wasn’t entirely his fault. He came from a long line of terrible musicians. His dad was terrible. So was his mother. Even his goldfish had no rhythm at all. Joe had once put a tiny drum set in the bottom of the aquarium, and that fish could not keep a beat if his life depended on it. Of course, he couldn’t hold the drumsticks either.

  The more successful The Grateful Fred became, the more Joe hated them. One way or another he’d get his revenge.

  Joe looked out the window of his lair. “One way or another,” he said.

  5

  THE FREDS

  The question was: how to get revenge? He’d already tried once and Melvin Beederman had come to save the day. It was enough to make any bad guy want to throw up.

  What to do? Joe wondered. It was a well-known fact that not only was Melvin Beederman a serious Grateful Fred fan, but he also had brains—noggin power. Joe never made it past sixth grade. How do you beat a smart guy who can bench press a Buick? How do you defeat a guy who can fly? Was it wise to mess with someone who can see your underwear? Joe didn’t have the answers. He just knew he had to try.

  And so he spent the night thinking of his next move. He paced. He drank tons of coffee. He even watched a little of The Adventures of Thunderman. He wasn’t a big fan of Thunderman … or Thunder Thighs. He just wanted to pick up any tips he could. Thunderman was a superhero. How did the bad guys on the show deal with him?

  The answer to Joe’s problem was to get help, of course. If he didn’t have much in the brain department, he’d find someone who did. When morning came, he headed off to see the only guy who could possibly have what he was looking for—Big Al.

  Not only did Big Al rent lairs at Rent-a-Lair, he also sold bad-guy stuff. Big Al’s motto was Serving Southern California’s Bad Guys Since 1985. If anyone could solve Joe’s problem with The Grateful Fred, Al could.

  “I have to get revenge on my enemy, Al. Any suggestions?”

  Al stroked his chin. “Ah … revenge. A worthy cause. Are you sure I can’t interest you in a new lair? Look at this baby, comes with an indoor Jacuzzi.”

  “I already have a lair. What do you have in the way of gadgets? In the destroy-your-enemy department?”

  “We’re having a sale on time bombs. Buy one, get one free.” Al gestured to a large stack of bombs. “They even come in a variety of colors—orange, green, and blue.”

  Joe thought about this. He had already tried a bomb, but Melvin showed up just in the nick of time.

  Joe shook his head. “What else do you have?”

  “Not in the mood to blow someone up, eh?”

  “Not really.”

  “Well, you can always frame him,” Al suggested. “You know, make your enemy look bad, then let the police make his life miserable.”

  Al was too brilliant for words! This was the idea Joe was looking for.

  Al took him into his office and closed the door. He pointed to a box across the room. “The Clone-o-Matic 6000, by Acme.”

  “Acme?” Joe was confused. “The bologna company?”

  “Acme’s into everything. They do more than bologna.”

  Al gave Joe a big discount on the cloning machine. After all, Joe was a faithful customer. And there wasn’t a lot of that going around in the bad-guy community. There also wasn’t a big demand for cloning your enemies.

  Joe could hardly wait to get back to his lair and clone a Fred. Or two.

  6

  MEANWHILE …

  While Joe the Bad Guy was home in his lair making plans to ruin Fred’s life, Melvin Beederman was getting ready to head off to the library to meet with his partner in uncrime, Candace Brinkwater.

  Before he did, he turned on the TV so Hugo the rat could watch The Adventures of Thunderman (and Thunder Thighs) while he was gone.

  “Squeak squeakity,” Melvin said. This either meant, “Have a great day, young rodent,” or “Have you ever thought about taking up the trombone in your spare time?” Rat talk was very difficult sometimes.

  Melvin threw himself out the window. He knew he’d be able to fly on the first try, one of these days.

  This was not one of those days.

  Crash!

  On the fifth try, he was up and flying. As usual. This is getting old, he said to himself as he zoomed across town. Looking down, he saw the people of Los Angeles in
their underwear. That was getting even older.

  Melvin Beederman arrived at the library just as his partner in uncrime did. Candace Brinkwater took out her math book, and the two of them got to work.

  When they finished her math homework, Candace said, “Now, what’s this about The Grateful Fred?”

  “Someone’s out to get them,” Melvin said, quickly looking away as the ancient librarian walked by.

  “What’s wrong?” Candace asked. “You look like you’re about to throw up.”

  “I am. I just saw the librarian’s underwear.”

  Somehow Candace had learned to turn off her x-ray vision. Melvin had not. Candace could also get up in the air on the first try, while Melvin still struggled with it.

  “We need to find out who it is before he strikes again,” Melvin said. “Who knows every bad guy in town?”

  Candace thought this over. “Big Al?”

  “Exactly. He’s been serving Southern California’s bad guys since 1985. If anyone knows something, he does.”

  They went outside and Candace launched herself. Melvin joined her. Or tried to.

  Crash!

  Splat!

  Thud!

  Kabonk!

  On the fifth try he joined her where she had been hovering above the trees. Then they flew off to Big Al’s Rent-a-Lair. Melvin paused only once to flex along the way. When he was on an important mission he kept his flexing to a bare minimum.

  Al was out in front of his store when Melvin and Candace touched down. “Can I interest you in a lair?” Al asked, faking a big smile. He crossed his arms over his enormous belly.

  “We’re good guys,” Melvin said. “Notice the capes and boots.”

  “Call it a hideout then. Every good guy needs a hideout. We even have one with a Jacuzzi.”

  “We’re looking for someone who may be a customer of yours,” Melvin said.