"No, that makes it sound like we spend most of our time sleeping in front of the TV," my dad said. "We need something daring and original, something that recalls our previous experience while taking us solidly into a bold new future."

He suddenly rose to his feet. "And I think I have it!"

I leaned closer to the door, eager to hear my dad's brainstorm.

"We'll call ourselves"-he paused for dramatic effect-"the New New Crusaders!"

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

What Goes Up ...

I tried not to think about the awful name my dad had given his new team. At school the next morning, my priority was to see that my team's fight was behind us. I ran into Plasma Girl and Tadpole just as I reached the main entrance. Before we could even say good morning, the school bus pulled up and Halogen Boy stepped out.

"Hey, guys." He greeted us as if nothing bad had happened yesterday. "Is the card still safe?"

"Stench isn't here yet," I replied, "but I'm sure it's fine."

"I hope he leaves it at headquarters." Plasma Girl shuddered slightly. "I don't want it causing us any more trouble here at school."

"You're right," Tadpole agreed. "Something as awesomely valuable as that will just tempt someone if we keep showing it off. After all, at best, there's only one other in existence."

"Hey guyth, gueth what I got my handth on?"

Turning around, we all got sprayed with seeds as Melonhead approached us. Normally it would have annoyed us, but this time we were too stunned by what he was holding-a Professor Brain-Drain card identical to our own.

"He stole our card!" Tadpole shouted.

Before anyone could stop him, he had pounced on Melonhead, and they both fell onto the pavement. Tadpole was on top and, I believe, trying to wrap his hands around Melonhead's neck. Of course since Melonhead's neck is actually the widest part of his head, Tadpole wasn't going to get anywhere with that. Nevertheless, Melonhead fought back the best way he knew how, and Tadpole found himself being pummeled with watermelon seeds to such an extent that he had no choice but to back off, shielding his face from the barrage of miniature projectiles.

"Great thethame! Thtop athaulting me," Melon-head sputtered. "Thith ithn't your card, for crimany thaketh!"

"What else could it be," Tadpole hollered as me and Hal restrained him.

"There is is another card, Tadpole," Plasma Girl reminded him. "Maybe Melonhead found it." another card, Tadpole," Plasma Girl reminded him. "Maybe Melonhead found it."

"Egthactly," Melonhead said as he got back on his feet. "Ekthept I didn't find it in a thtore. I bought it from thith weird-looking guy who offered it to me on the thtreet. I paid him twenty dollarth for it."

"Then he he must have stolen it from us!" Tadpole raged as we continued to hold him down. must have stolen it from us!" Tadpole raged as we continued to hold him down.

Just then Stench arrived. He didn't even have time to speak before Tadpole shouted at him.

"Someone stole our card that you were supposed to keep safe!"

"It is safe," Stench said, looking completely confused. "I saw it less than ten minutes ago. It's just where we left it."

"Thee!" Melonhead sprayed a slew of seeds directly into Tadpole's face before picking up his book bag and stomping off. In my opinion Tadpole deserved it. Before we could explain anything to Stench, the school bell rang and we all had to go inside.

Seeing Melonhead with the other card had been somewhat disturbing, but at least it was possible. What we discovered once we got inside the cla.s.sroom was cataclysmically, impossibly disastrous.

"Look what I found," the Spore wheezed as he held up a Professor Brain-Drain card already covered in mildew. "I only had to pay ten dollars for it."

"You're kidding! I paid twenty-five dollars for mine," Cannonball complained, coming in right behind me. Sure enough, he had one, too.

"Mine cost me fifty dollars," wailed Lobster Boy. "Plus my bike."

Just then Transparent Girl came into the room. She had faded away to nothing but a pale outline, with the exception of her brand-new Professor Brain-Drain card.

"Look what I have," she said. "I tried to get it in exchange for my twenty-six AI cards, but the man who sold it to me wouldn't believe that I didn't have any money-partly because he could see the bills in my pocket. I ended up paying everything I had-sixty dollars. But it was worth it."

"Really?" I said, at least getting some small amus.e.m.e.nt out of this catastrophe. "Just look around."

Transparent Girl didn't need to be visible for me to imagine her mouth dropping open at the sight of a cla.s.s full of Professor Brain-Drain cards. Puddle Boy was now displaying his as well.

"I bought three," he informed no one in particular. "The other two are safe in collector bags."

As usual, the room was in an uproar when Miss Marble arrived. It took all her skills to get everyone to sit down in their seats.

"If everyone doesn't calm down, I'll have Princ.i.p.al Doppelganger down here in two seconds flat," she threatened. "Now what's causing the commotion this morning?"

"We've all found Professor Brain-Drain cards," Cannonball announced proudly. "Now we're all rich!"

"Is that so?" Miss Marble said as she gave me a sideways glance. From the look on her face I could tell [image]

she found this development as odd as I did.

"And just what did you pay for yours?" she asked Cannonball.

"Only twenty-five dollars," he said proudly.

The cla.s.s once again erupted as everyone began shouting out how much he or she had paid. I gave a befuddled look to Stench and Plasma Girl, both of whom just shrugged. At that moment the Banshee shrieked that she had paid a hundred dollars for her card. As I wondered where she would have even gotten a hundred dollars, I felt a telltale rigidity running through my body. We had achieved a brand-new record in bad cla.s.s behavior.

"Okay, students," Miss Marble said, rather calmly and patiently considering the situation. "Today you're going to learn why we make children go to school. It is precisely to prevent you from doing the incredibly stupid sort of thing that you all did this morning."

Miss Marble can sometimes be insulting, but today I think she had a point.

"As I said yesterday," she continued, "and as all of you clearly forgot-a.s.suming your brains even absorbed it to begin with ..."

"I absorbed it," volunteered the Human Sponge, whose porous lips allowed her to mumble somewhat despite being frozen.

Miss Marble continued uninterrupted. " ... the value of something depends on how much supply there is compared with the demand for it."

At this moment we all began to unfreeze.

"Let me give you an example that you will all understand," she said gravely. "Yesterday there was lots of demand for a Professor Brain-Drain card and very little supply. That made it valuable. Let's see what the situation is like today."

I knew where this was headed, and it wasn't going to be pretty.

"How many of you have a Professor Brain-Drain card?"

Every hand in the cla.s.s shot up.

"How many of you need a Professor Brain-Drain card?"

I turned around. n.o.body put a hand up. Well, at least not at first. Then I heard some whispering and I turned back to the front to see Halogen Boy holding up his hand.

"I don't have one of my own yet."

"I'll sell you mine for eighty dollars," Transparent Girl offered him, with no sense of shame whatsoever. I had to at least give her credit for figuring out where things were heading.

"Don't even think about it," Plasma Girl hissed at her menacingly.

Miss Marble continued with her lesson. "So, Cannonball, what do you think your card is worth?"

"At least twenty-five dollars," he stated.

"And who would be willing to pay you that for it?"

"Halogen Boy?" he asked hopefully.

"I'll sell Hal mine for twenty dollars," Transparent Girl shouted out in undisguised desperation.

"Thikthteen dollarth, Hal," Melonhead spluttered. "Ith a thteal!"

"I'll sell him mine for ten dollars," huffed the Spore, trying to brush the mold off his card.

"You can have all three of my cards for five dollars," Puddle Boy said with anxiety as the puddle below his desk grew before our eyes. "And I'll even throw in the collector bags."

At this point panic had set in throughout the room.

"I'll sell him mine for a dime!" wailed the Banshee in complete despair. As I plugged my ears, I marveled at how something purchased for one hundred dollars had fallen to a dime in less than an hour.

"I'll sell you mine for a dollar-and a bike," said Lobster Boy not fully grasping his bargaining position.

Halogen Boy fished a dime out of his pocket and handed it to the Banshee, and she transferred her formerly valuable Professor Brain-Drain card to him.

"And that's what happens when supply is greater than demand," Miss Marble concluded with a bit more of a smile on her face than good teaching required.

Everyone in cla.s.s sat in stunned silence, contemplating their now-worthless Professor Brain-Drain cards.

"But don't feel too bad, kids," Miss Marble consoled them. "Most of your parents never learned this lesson either. Just ask them about the stock market."

I didn't think she needed to be quite so smug, but I had to admit it was a lesson in economics that no one was going to forget soon. Meanwhile, I had a more pressing question on my mind. Where had all these cards come from?

CHAPTER TWENTY.

Hot on the Trail

At lunchtime my team got together to discuss something even more important than the sudden explosion of Professor Brain-Drain cards.

"I don't know about the rest of you," I began, "but last night I felt lousy after the fight we had."

"Me, too," admitted Plasma Girl. "And I'm not even sure what the fight was about."

"It was about who would hold on to the card," Tadpole snapped at her, as if that justified things.

"That's a dumb thing to fight over," said Stench.

"But the card is ..." Tadpole's voice trailed off as he noticed us all scowling at him. He wisely decided not to push his point.

"It's not even worth anything," Plasma Girl pointed out. "At least not anymore."

"Is it still safe where we left it?" Halogen Boy asked. With his eyes hidden behind his dark goggles it was never easy to tell exactly what Hal's expression was, but I could tell he was concerned about the success of his idea for hiding (or not hiding) our Professor Brain-Drain card.

"It's safe, Hal. But in the end, the card doesn't really matter," I added. "What matters is our friendship. The Junior Leaguers are a team and we're dedicated to battling all wrongs ... or at least the ones that occur before bedtime and don't interfere with our favorite TV shows. Just because adults squabble all the time, there's no reason for us to behave like that. Are we agreed?"

I stuck out my hand with my palm facing down, rolled my fingers into a fist, but left my thumb pointing out. Plasma Girl did the same, wrapping her fingers around my thumb. Halogen Boy and Stench quickly added to the circle and did likewise. Tadpole paused for only a moment and then wrapped his fist around Stench's thumb and inserted his own thumb into my fist. The circle was complete and we were once again a team.

"Agreed!" we all shouted in unison.

"And are the Junior Leaguers going to let this mystery go unsolved?" I asked.

"Never!" they responded as we unlinked our hands and prepared to do battle.

The problem, of course, was that none of us had a clue what had happened. Someone had obviously managed to create a whole slew of Professor Brain-Drain card duplicates, but how? It was while we were all racking our brains that we suddenly heard Cannonball shout from across the playground.