Hot Dog and Bob: Adventure 4 (4 page)

“They don’t call me a superhero for nothin’!” Hot Dog said, pushing one of his secret bun buttons. “Say good-bye, Mr. G., “ ‘cause you, my friend, are goin’ down!”

The good thing was that Hot Dog’s bun button worked, and gallons of yellow mustard squirted out. The bad thing was that he totally missed his target! The mustard flew right by Mr. G. and smothered one of his floating eggs instead. The egg (and the person inside it) came crashing down to the ground.

“Oops!” said Hot Dog.

“Oops is right!” I said. “Hot Dog, you have to unstick our feet so we can help whoever’s in that smashed-up egg!”

“This should do the trick!” said Hot Dog.

He pushed another bun button, and sauerkraut shot out all over our feet!

“Yuck! That stuff stinks!” I said. “Couldn’t you have picked some less disgusting topping?”

“Nope,” Hot Dog said, lifting up a foot. “Sauerkraut’s the ticket, partner. You see, on Dogzalot we make this stuff with special vinegar that’s so strong the acid in it will dissolve darn near anything ya got!”

The chemistry lesson was interesting, but I had other things on my mind. I pulled my feet out of the goo and ran over to the broken egg.

“Hey, loser!” said the person in the egg. “Hurry up and get me outta here!”

“Oh, no!” I whined to Hot Dog. “Of all the kids in my whole class, you had to pick this one to shoot down?”

I know it sounds like a jerky thing to say, but the guy on the ground, the guy who called me a loser—that guy was Barfalot, the dirty, rotten bully who totally has it out for me!

“Bob, I can’t move!” Barfalot moaned. “Please, I beg of you! Help me out here! Give me a hand!”

But when I reached out to help him, he just splashed mustard in my face and laughed like a maniac.

“Ha, ha! What a sucker!” he snorted. “That was great! Man, you’re such an idiot!”

“You wanna know what I think, pal?” said Hot Dog. “I think somebody oughta teach you some manners! That’s what I think!”

“Oh, yeah?” said Barfalot. “I’d like to see ya try!”

“Oh, yeah?” said Hot Dog.

“Yeah!” said Barfalot.

With all of the action down on the ground, we’d forgotten all about the action up in the air.

“Um, I could be wrong,” I said, “but I’m pretty sure manners are the last thing we need to worry about right now.”

Mr. G. and his floating eggs had almost reached the giant hole in the ceiling. If they made it through the opening and out into space, we’d never see them again!

“I’ll deal with you later,” Hot Dog told Barfalot. “Right now I’ve got bigger fish to fry!”

Barfalot didn’t say a thing. He usually had Pigburt and Slugburt (his brainless bodyguard brothers) to back him up. But seeing as they were stuck in eggs, they couldn’t really help him out too much. Besides, I could tell by the look on Barfalot’s face that he was pretty busy just trying to figure out what Hot Dog would want with fried fish anyway.

Hot Dog flew all over the place, and so did his hands. Watching him push all his bun
buttons was like watching a master musician play the piano. Ketchup, onions, pickle relish and sesame seeds squirted out as he flew. I don’t know why the goopy mixture stuck together to form a temporary ceiling. But I do know that the huge opening was filled just in time!

Mr. G. and his egg prisoners floated up to Hot Dog’s homemade ceiling and stuck there just like flies on flypaper.

Hot Dog dusted off his tiny hands, smoothed out his cape and said, “Well, Mr. G., I guess playtime’s over!”

I’ve had a lot of surprises lately but nothing like the one that came next.

Barfalot grabbed a rope from a pile of junk in the corner and shouted, “Hey, Mr. G., catch this, and I’ll yank ya down!”

All those times we thought Barfalot was ditching class he must have been training for the rodeo, ‘cause he threw that rope exactly like a champion cowboy throws his lasso. Mr. G. caught it on the first try and was down in a flash.

“Hi, I’m Barfalot, and you’re the coolest guy I’ve ever met!” Barfalot said, shaking Mr. G.’s hand. “Can I be your friend and play fun games with you forever and ever and ever?”

Mr. G. was so happy he looked like he was going to cry. He put his big, scaly arm around Barfalot and said,

He snapped his fingers, and all the other eggs came crashing down.

“Ouch! That smarts!” said Felicia.

“Whoa!” said Marco. “That was a totally radical wipeout!”

“Where am I?” asked Danny and a bunch of other kids.

Everybody was moaning and groaning from the fall, but they all seemed amazingly okay. They were sore and confused—but alive. I was glad my classmates were all right—even Pigburt and Slugburt, who just kept saying, “Cool ride! Can we do it again?”

“Hey, buddy!” Hot Dog called from across the room, “I think you’d better come over here.”

He didn’t have to say another word. I knew something had happened to Clementine, and I knew it wasn’t good.

“NOOOO!!!” I wailed when I saw Clementine. She wasn’t moving at all. She was just lying there. She wasn’t even breathing.

“She can’t be … !” I said.

Hot Dog put his hand gently on top of mine and looked right into my eyes.

“Sometimes these things happen, partner,” he said, shaking his head. “Sometimes bad things happen to good people.”

“Come on, Clementine. You’re too young to die!” I cried. “Please, Clem! Quit kidding around and wake up! Wait, I know! I’ll make you a deal.
You be okay, and I’ll eat ten of those disgusting sandwiches that you’re always begging me to try at lunch! Here, I’ll even write it down so you know I mean it!”

I dumped out my pockets and found an old candy wrapper and a chewed-up pencil. Here’s what I wrote:

I, Bob, hereby promise to eat ten entire disgusting sandwiches made by Clementine, if she promises not to die.

Looking back on it now, I’m sure I could have come up with a better deal than that. Looking back on it now, I
really
wish I had. But for some reason Clementine’s creative lunchtime concoctions were the only things I could think of. I folded my promise, stuck it in her pocket and prayed.