"You're a genius," Plasma Girl said with admiration. I couldn't help it-I blushed almost as brightly as Halogen Boy.

With Hal and a full sippy cup, we went from pack to pack and aisle to aisle, avoiding lots of packs that were filled with duplicates. We found some packs that had a card we needed, but if the other card was one we already owned, we'd skip it and move on. By the time we got to checkout lane nine, we had nineteen packs with thirty eight of the forty cards we still needed. By this time, though, we had attracted some unwanted attention.

Mr. Mister was waiting in lane ten. He watched us suspiciously as I picked up the first pack and set it in Hal's hand. It wasn't like we were doing anything illegal, so I tried to ignore him and told Hal to light up. Like most of the packs we were finding now, it had two duplicates. I could feel a fine mist settling down on my shoulders as I handed Hal the next pack. Mr. Mister was clearly annoyed, mostly because he couldn't think of any technical reason to throw us out of the store. I just turned to him and shrugged. He always seems annoyed about something. Maybe it's because he has a c.r.a.ppy power. But, come on, give me a break. I don't have any any power, but I still try to be a nice person. power, but I still try to be a nice person.

[image]

As Hal's hand lit up I saw a card with a character named Meteor Boy on it.

"Who is Meteor Boy?" I said aloud. The rest of the team just shook their heads, confused. This was very strange, but there was no time to discuss it. The mist gathering around the store manager's head made him look all steamed up-which, of course, he was. The card sharing the pack was an AI image that none of us could remember seeing before.

"Okay, guys, I think we have 'em all!" I said quickly.

"Well, then," Mr. Mister said, with a look on his face that reminded me of the short-lived disastrous pickle-flavored potato chips that Dr. Telomere's had released last year, "if you're going to buy those, I suggest you do so and stop clogging my checkout lanes."

We did exactly that, and were soon back at our headquarters. As Plasma Girl got her tea party ready, we unwrapped the twenty packs and spread them out on the table. Of course we didn't expect any surprises, but we got one anyway. The AI card in the final pack we had bought was identical to one of the ones we had found earlier that morning. With Mr. Mister hovering over us we had rushed into making a mistake. We only had sixty-three cards. One was still missing.

CHAPTER SIX.

The Mystery of Meteor Boy

That night at home, all I could think about was the one card we were missing. The most frustrating part was that I didn't even know who was pictured on it. Normally, I would have guessed it was another Amazing Indestructo. But so far the deck had had thirty-two of them-exactly half the total. It only seemed logical for that to be all of them. That meant that the missing card was either a member of the League of Ultimate Goodness or one of AI's villains.

Now it would also seem logical for the remaining thirty-two cards to be divided into sixteen heroes and sixteen villains. I knew fifteen we had were members of LUG, and another fifteen were villains. And then there was Meteor Boy. Was he a hero or a villain? Young villains were unusual but not unheard-of. In fact, there were some creeps in my cla.s.s who I'd bet were well on their way to becoming villains.

I pulled out my copy of the Li'l Hero's Handbook Li'l Hero's Handbook and looked up Meteor Boy. Sure enough, there was a listing with the same picture as the card. and looked up Meteor Boy. Sure enough, there was a listing with the same picture as the card.

One mission? Missing in action? So why would this kid have gotten his own trading card? When Dad came up to tuck me in, I decided to pick his brain.

"Time for bed, OB," he said.

"Okay, Dad." The night air had cooled my room quite a bit. With a shiver, I got my AI pajamas from my dresser drawer.

Dad pulled back the covers on my bed and ran his hands back and forth across the sheet. "Okay, hero, it's all set."

"Dad?" I asked as I crawled under the sheets, where it was now warm and toasty.

"What is it, OB?"

"Have you ever heard of Meteor Boy?"

Dad paused a moment, and I could instantly tell by the look on his face that he had.

"Yes," he said finally. "I haven't heard that name in quite a while-almost twenty-five years, in fact."

"Who is he?"

"Well, he first came on the scene when I was a teenager. He was younger than I was, though, as you'd guess by the name Meteor Boy. At the time, all the major superheroes were going through a phase where it was trendy to take on young kids as sidekicks. A hero would look for a kid about your age who had a power that was similar to, or complemented, his own power."

[image]

NAME: Meteor Boy. Meteor Boy. POWER: POWER: The ability to fly really, really fast. The ability to fly really, really fast. LIMITATIONS: LIMITATIONS: But not fast enough. But not fast enough. CAREER: CAREER: Meteor Boy performed only one known mission. Meteor Boy performed only one known mission. CLa.s.sIFICATION: CLa.s.sIFICATION: Missing in action. Missing in action.

"What do you mean, Dad?" I asked.

"For instance, there was a hero, who is gone now, called the Zephyr."

"I know about him!" I responded, remembering the card for him that we had found as part of our morning haul. "He's one of the original members of the League of Ultimate Goodness."

"Exactly," my father continued. "He was able to control the winds and manipulate them to do whatever he liked. He had a sidekick named Funnel Boy, who could spin himself into a funnel cloud. The two made a pretty good team."

"I get it," I said. The idea sounded pretty cool to me.

"Of course, this was about when the Amazing Indestructo became such a star," my father added.

"Wow! Tell me about that!" Of course I knew everything about AI, but I was always eager to hear it again.

"Well, AI was just starting to [image]

make a name for himself, but he already considered himself the city's most powerful hero. Naturally, he thought he should also have a sidekick."

"Naturally," I agreed, instantly thinking how awesome it would be to have that role. I also wondered why I had never heard about this.

"And, of course," my father continued, "he thought his sidekick should be the most powerful of all sidekicks.

That's when he discovered Meteor Boy."

"Tell me about him," I asked.

"When he met AI, he wasn't much older than you are now. But he already had an incredible power. He could streak through the skies with the speed of a meteor. As you know, there aren't a lot of heroes who can travel through the air, and those who do have a tremendous advantage."

"That's why AI uses a jet pack," I volunteered.

"That's right," my dad agreed. "So he knew an impressive ability when he saw it. Meteor Boy was still young, though, and he hadn't really mastered his power yet."

"What a great power to have," I said, wide-eyed. Personally, I'd be thrilled to have any power at all. Dad caught my change of mood right away.

"Be careful what you wish for," he said. "Things didn't turn out well for Meteor Boy."

"What happened?" I asked, even though I wasn't sure I wanted to hear the answer.

"He just wasn't ready. The Amazing Indestructo was a rookie, too. He took Meteor Boy into a situation that was too big for both of them. Back then, Professor Brain-Drain was fully active and by far the worst of the supervillains, and AI wanted to start right at the top. Of course, AI was indestructible. The problem was that Meteor Boy wasn't."

"So ... ?" I couldn't finish the sentence.

"Let's just say no one knows exactly what happened to him," my father concluded.

"That's what it says in my handbook, too," I confirmed. "But he was a hero, right?"

"Oh, yes, but in a way that no one had counted on. It was his example that made everyone recognize the incredible danger they were putting these young kids into. Shortly after the incident with Meteor Boy, kids went back to being kids, and adult superheroes went back to fighting crime on their own."

Dad leaned over to kiss my forehead and then stood up.

"I know it's tempting to get out there and start doing everything you can as soon as you can," he said as he clicked off the light, "but don't pa.s.s up the opportunity to enjoy being a kid, too."

As the door closed, I stared silently into the darkness of my room. I heard what my father had said, but to be perfectly honest all I could think about was what it would be like to be the Amazing Indestructo's sidekick. I couldn't imagine anything cooler! But who was I kidding? AI would never pick a sidekick with no power whatsoever. And if a kid with such an incredible power couldn't handle teaming with AI, then what chance would I have? I know Dad didn't mean it that way, but it sure managed to depress me.

The only good news was that in the information about Meteor Boy, I had also found the answer to my main question. I knew who was on the missing card.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

Less Is More

The next day, I walked into cla.s.s before the bell rang and ducked when I saw Cannonball and Lobster Boy with erasers in their hands (or claws, in the case of Lobster Boy). They were waiting to throw them at whoever came through the door, but when they saw it was me, they stopped themselves at the last second. Cannonball has never gotten any nicer to me over the last five years, but he knows better than to pick on me.

The kid who came in after me wasn't so lucky. It was the Spore, and as he stepped into the room, two erasers smacked him right in the face, raising a cloud of mold spores and chalk dust. Well, it could have been worse. He had only been hit by the two erasers Cannonball had thrown. In his excitement, Lobster Boy ended up snapping his erasers in half with his claws, producing a second cloud of chalk dust around his own head. Then, before any of the dust could settle to the ground, in walked the Human Sponge. The cloud of mold and chalk wafting around the Spore was absorbed into her before she even knew what was happening.

"Ewww, that is so disgusting," she complained. "Somebody wring my head."

"Gladly!" I heard Cannonball say gleefully as I made my way to my desk.

The rest of my teammates were already at their desks. They were still racking their brains trying to figure out the person on the missing card.

"I say that it's the Mimic, who got kicked out of the League of Ultimate Goodness ten years ago for doing AI impersonations behind his back," insisted Tadpole.

"No, he's too obscure," Plasma Girl disagreed, only half paying attention as she painted her nails with a glittery silver polish that matched her costume. "It's probably just another pose of AI."

"What about the Weatherman?" Stench suggested. "He was a LUG for a little while. I never could figure out why they didn't keep him. I mean, the guy can manipulate the weather! What more could they want?!"

"We could ask Puddle Boy," Hal suggested.

Stench turned toward Puddle Boy, who sat two rows over, near the wall.

"Hey, Puddle Boy," hollered Stench, "did they put your dad's picture in the new set of AI Collector Cards?"

Much to the Weatherman's constant embarra.s.sment, his son's only power was the ability to create puddles beneath his feet. Even now, the pressure of having to answer a question was causing one to form. The Human Sponge, who was on her way to her desk after having her head wrung out by Cannonball, warily avoided it, while the Banshee, who sat behind Puddle Boy, let out a piercing scream as she scooted her desk away.

"No," he answered self-consciously as the wail subsided. "They called and asked him if they could, but he threatened to sue them if they did. Then he said a whole bunch of words that I don't think I should repeat. I don't think my dad likes AI very much."

"Well, that'th out," said Tadpole. His tongue was wrapped around a pencil he was sharpening halfway across the room. "We might ath well jutht keep looking."

"You sound just like Melonhead." Plasma Girl giggled.

"Who thoundth like me?"

We all turned to see Melonhead come into the room. This kid had a head that literally looked like a melon. I don't mean it was green or anything, but it was bald, shaped like a melon, and had wavy lines running down the sides of his face like the markings on a watermelon. And every time he spoke he spit seeds all over the place. Despite having a power that's almost worse than having no power, he had more self-confidence than anyone else in our cla.s.s. In a way I sort of envied him ... at least when he wasn't annoying the living daylights out of me.

"Oh, nothing," Plasma Girl said. "We were just discussing the AI Collector Card series."

"Aren't they amathing!" he spit. "I've already athembled forty-theven cards!"

"We've got all but one of them," Halogen Boy volunteered.

"Well, if you thtick to it, you thould be able to catth up," Melonhead responded, completely ignoring the fact that we were already way ahead of him. "Perthaveranthe, that'th my motto," he added as he took his seat in front of Tadpole.

[image]

"Don't think about it," Plasma Girl said to Halogen Boy, who was racking his brain to figure out how Melonhead could be doing better than us. "We still need only one card."

"Yeah," agreed Tadpole. "We just have to go out and look for it."

"You're partly right," I finally spoke up. "We will keep looking. But I also happen to know what we're looking for!"

"You do?" Halogen Boy said. He lit up with excitement.

"Of course he does," said Plasma Girl, not even looking up as she blew on her nails to dry them. "Go ahead and tell us, O Boy."

First I told them what I had learned about Meteor Boy. They were all as surprised as I had been.

"Wow! That would be so cool, fighting alongside AI," Halogen Boy said dreamily.

"Are you nuts?" said Tadpole. "Didn't you hear what happened to Meteor Boy?"

I was a little annoyed at Tadpole for snapping at Hal. It isn't Hal's fault that he's a little slow. He just needed a moment to think about it and, sure enough, his excitement, as well as his glow, faded noticeably.