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Alvin had dealt with his own share of giant robots of mass destruction since becoming a superhero — for that matter, he had even built a few in his supervillain days, usually to spice up a boring weekend when regular crime got too slow for his tastes — but the fuzzy mass looming above the shop buildings of downtown Applyburg was the first one he had seen that resembled a blue teddy bear.
"Well, that's certainly the second-strangest thing I've seen in this town," he remarked dryly to his sidekick, Lampy.
Lampy had no time to respond. The teddy bear lifted its heavy arm and swung it right into a building, shattering glass and concrete.
Alvin pulled his hovercraft into such a sharp turn that he was glad he had remembered to strap Lampy into his safety tether before flying off to meet the robot. Bits of building rained onto the street below, nearly striking the stampede of terrified veggies attempting to escape the crumbling structures. Screams echoed down the street; car horns blared into the distance as traffic struggled to move. With all this congestion it would take the APD several minutes to get through, and until then Alvin and his floor-lamp assistant would have to handle this threat on their own..
He pressed a button on the homemade controls of his vehicle. A megaphone emerged from a hatch on the front, and Alvin grabbed the hand-held receiver from off the rod beneath the handlebars.
"I'm giving you just one warning," he announced to whomever was manning the machine. "Surrender now and exit the robot, and we'll go easy on you."
The blue bear's vacant face gave no sign of life inside its hull — was some deranged vegetable inside, or was it merely remote controlled? — but its mouth opened, and what looked like the nozzle of a high-tech cannon extended, aimed directly at Alvin.
"They always do it the hard way," he exhaled and made another violent turn, barely dodging a barrage of gigantic gumballs with enough saccharine to have taken a flyer like Sugar High all the way to the moon.
Alvin sliced his vehicle through the air, trying to get behind the cannon, but the bear swiveled its head, following the craft with a rapid fire. The gumballs struck the building on Alvin's left, leaving deep craters that promised a painful end to any onion superhero (or floor lamp) who got caught in the line of fire.
He gained the opposite roof for cover, trying to buy time while he formulated a plan, but in glancing around his surroundings for ideas, he caught sight of a pink mass that made him do a double take. A pink bear, just as large as the first, strode down 45th Street, decked in a gold crown and a lacy tutu.
"Well, this is turning into a real picnic," he snarked, glancing between the two teddy bears.
Alvin looked over his shoulder to check on Lampy only to see him smiling his placid smile. He faced all their challenges with the same peaceful expression, no matter the difficulty. Alvin admired that about him.
A phone rang in the offices of The Daily Apple, and within seconds a shout exploded over the noise of working reporters: "Giant teddy bear sighted downtown!"
The effect was instantaneous. Veggies snatched up press badges, tape recorders, notepads and cameras, and the charge started for the elevator.
Vicki Cucumber, armed with her camera hanging around her, made a valiant attempt to fling herself right through the doors before they closed, but the packed veggies already inside had not an inch to spare her. Some gave her playful smirks and fake apologies, and the elevator car descended without her. In frustration she punched the elevator button, causing it to light up, but she suspected the car would be busy answering the calls of reporters on the floors below her for several minutes.
"Hey, Vicki!" came a call over the bustling crowd. Nadine Asparagus, Vicki's workplace friend and fellow photojournalist, weaved her way through the complaining veggies to reach her side. Her narrow face had a wide, conspiratorial smile. "Think your best friend is already there?"
"I would not be surprised," she replied, punching the button rapidly before she pivoted away, deciding on taking her chances in the stampede heading down the stairwell.
Vicki and Nadine pushed their way down the hall toward the sign that read EXIT in green letters. They had to work together to get ahead of Joel Brussel and Clyde Strawberry, and they managed to start down the steps without tripping over a pod of French peas.
"Maybe I'll get all the best photographs today," Nadine sang to Vicki, taking advantage of her lithe form to squeeze around several gourds. "Want me to let you take credit for one or two? You know, so that you look good in front of Bob?"
"I'll get my own pictures, Nay," Vicki returned with a smirk. Although good friends, the two thrived on their rivalry, always pushing themselves to outdo the other.
"And if Alvin's already there, then I have the advantage," she reminded Nadine over the echoing din.
"But that's only if you get to him first," replied her friend, and she jumped right onto the banister and slid her way past the vegetables still blocking Vicki's descent.
"Why didn't I think of that first?" Vicki muttered to herself, but there was no room for her to copy Nadine. She continued to push and poke her way down the steps, leaping over smaller fruits and veggies where she could and shoving her way back male celery and potatoes that would not allow a lady to get ahead of them.
The only real danger she encountered was near the third floor landing when a short gourd cut in front of her right as she was mid-hop. She stumbled, twisting to keep her balance, and she found herself landing in the invisible hold of a male, good-looking cucumber who had just opened the stairwell door to watch the cascade of hurrying vegetables.
"Vicki!" he cried, pulling her out of harm's way. "Are you all right?!"
"Never better," she grinned. "The game's afoot!"
He set her on her feet, and she smoothed back her blonde hair, conscious of his concerned eyes scanning for any sign of injury. Although Larry had only been working as a janitor at The Daily Apple for a few months, he had quickly become one of Vicki's favorite work friends, and she found his mix of sarcasm and boyish attentiveness endearing, and his undisguised solicitude toward her could warm her straight through (more so when she was not in a rush to get somewhere).
"Onward!" she quipped, starting to rejoin the throng, but her companion reached for her shoulder and pulled her out of the path of a barreling pumpkin.
"You're going out there? Where all the danger is?"
"That's how I pay the bills, Larry," she replied, trying to maneuver around him. "You're not going to tell me to pass up a paycheck, are you?"
"No, I think you're a very capable woman who is smart enough to keep herself out of trouble," he said. "Just— Just be careful out there, won't you?"
He looked so earnest that she found herself pausing.
"I will, Larry," she said in a low tone, aware of her heart accelerating in a way that had nothing to do with chasing a news story. "Thanks for caring."
"I always got your back, Vicki," he told her, and his large, handsome eyes, which usually held a shade of sarcasm, now looked at her like she was the only woman who mattered in the world.
She had the strangest impulse to give him a parting peck upon the cheek; instead she gave him an appreciative look before a potato pushed their way between them, and she remembered her errand. With a parting word, she spun away and continued down the stairs.
While all the fame-hungry fools sought ways to beat each other to the latest news story, Larry the Cucumber slipped away to his janitor closet which smelled of cleaning chemicals, and he switched on the light. Closing doors turned the roar of voices into an ignorable muffled noise, and he got to his real work. A button on his mop caused the top of the handle to open like an Easter egg, and a palm-sized television screen emerged. (At least Larry presumed it would have been palm-sized if he actually had hands.)
"Alfred, come in," he called with a triumphant grin. "We got a big development going on!"
The screen flicked on, and a miniature image of his asparagus butler appeared.
"I'm listening, Master Lawrence." Although Alfred often spoke to Larry in a dry "I can't believe I'm still working for this idiot" sort of drawl, when it involved their plans for evil and supervillainy, he usually became respectful.
Larry could barely contain his wicked glee. "Alfred, there are giant teddy bears destroying downtown!"
Alfred looked mildly surprised. "Really? Well, that's what happens when hunters aren't allowed to stop overpopulation."
Larry was too thrilled with this development to roll his eyes. "Has the CukeCorp crew been alerted?"
"I'd imagine they would have heard about it by now. Giant teddy bears are somewhat alarming."
"Just check already!"
"Certainly." Alfred typed on the Larry-Computer for several seconds. "Alerted and dispatched, Master Lawrence."
"Good!" Larry allowed himself a satisfied smirk. "Alvin may get to walk away as the hero like usual, but he's not going to get the last word this time. Vicki will see me as something special for a change."
"You'll certainly mop your way into her heart, sir."
"Make your jokes, but this is going to work," he insisted. "If we're going to improve LarryBoy's reputation and destroy Alvin's, then CukeCorp has to win me some public approval before we deliver the finishing blow."
It was a long-term strategy, but Larry the Cucumber could be patient when he really wanted something, and having Vicki fall for him and become his evil empress was worth weathering through every agonizing second it took to get to his happy ending.
"And so you'll convince Miss Vicki you're a good man right before you take over the world and force vegetables to comply with your every whim," drawled Alfred. "I see no flaw in this plan whatsoever."
"I'll deal with that bridge when I come to it," Larry answered stoutly. He knew Alfred disapproved of Vicki as a potential wife for his employer, but Larry was not about to allow the hired help to determine his future happiness. "Now, I'm going to find a way to get out of here and head toward the giant teddy bears."
"Very good, sir," returned Alfred before he muttered: "Giant teddy bears. Why is that only the second-strangest thing that's ever happened to this town?"
Nadine had beaten Vicki to the police barricade on 43rd Street, the closest spot to the action (at least for the present).
"That's going to be tough to get past," Nadine observed with a wry nod toward the stern-faced carrot police officers barring news reporters and journalists from going further.
"There's probably some path they've overlooked," replied Vicki, glancing between the vegetables for any hint of ursine destruction.
Nadine grinned. "I'll take east. You take west."
They pushed their way toward the back of the crowd and parted ways, each wishing the other a good haul of photographs.
"Don't become bear chow!" Vicki called to Nadine over her shoulder.
"And don't let my mother find out what I did today!" she answered.
"Ditto!"
Once Vicki broke free of the crowd, she quickened her pace, scanning for any weak points in the police's sealed-off perimeter. She nearly hopped right past it: an alley with a dead end, but on giving an appraising scan, she found an overlooked path to exploit, and she hurried down.
When Vicki had first started in photojournalism, fire escape ladders terminated a good seven to ten feet above the ground, offering a long drop in an emergency. In recent years, small veggies like peas and cherries petitioned for escapes better suited for their statures, and Mayor Blueberry had signed it into law for downtown buildings to accommodate their tiny occupants.
So then if Vicki were to do a running jump onto the wall and ricochet herself upward, she could fling herself onto the bottom rung of the ladder and pull herself up, which was exactly what she did.
Once she was on the first level, it was child's play to reach the roof and then follow the connected block of buildings and leap over the narrow alley to reach the furthest ledge.
Out in the distance two teddy bears — one blue, one pink — converged on the form of a flying platform manned by a tall figure with a bulb-shaped head and limbs made of green roots. A floor lamp with a hand-drawn face on its white shade stood behind the onion, silent and ever smiling. The onion kept serpentining the vehicle through the air, evading the giant gumball missiles that the teddy bears shot at him.
Vicki's heart leapt to see him in action — a mixture of concern for his safety and admiration for his bravery made her stand straighter. No matter how many times she saw his heroics, whether at a distance or up close, she still stood in amazement to see her good friend facing down danger. It would be easy enough for him to fly away and let someone else handle this — he had no super powers, just an incredible brain and a heart that wanted to rescue people — but Altruistic Alvin was a vegetable of honor and compassion, and he would not leave this fight if he could do anything to help.
She lifted her camera and began to snap pictures.
Alvin had a vague idea to try to keep the bears together as much as possible by giving them a shared target. If they started moving away from each other, they would destroy more in the long run, but if they chased after him, maybe he would be able to limit the collateral damage while he came up with a more effective strategy.
"Note to self, build a 'Lampy tank' and donate it to the APD for future disasters," he muttered. If only he had time to figure out the robots' weaknesses, then he could start taking the offensive, but for the present he had to keep them contained within a general radius.
He had just dodged his twentieth or so gumball when a sudden flash of light erupted on a nearby building, and he turned his head to see a green figure in a pink dress snapping photographs of his flight.
"Should have known she would show up eventually," he told Lampy with an exhale.
He made a quick feint to the right before he swerved the hovercraft around and zipped over to Vicki Cucumber, who lowered her camera with an expression that resembled a child realizing she had been caught breaking the rules.
"Not that I'm not thrilled to see you," he said, trying to maintain a stranglehold on his patience, "but what are you doing here?"
"A girl has to pay rent," she replied with a sheepish smile.
There was no time to engage in a lengthy debate, so he motioned for her to hop on. She grabbed the extra seat belt (which he kept between himself and Lampy) and strapped herself in. Having ridden on his platform several times now, she could do it in seconds, and she grabbed hold of him for extra security as he took to the sky again.
Although he had two destructive bears to contend with, he did not resist calling back to her: "Have you considered a cheaper apartment?"
"In this economy?"
"Or a roommate?"
"I don't trust strangers easily."
"This coming from a woman who hopped on a stranger's hovercraft the first night we met," he pointed out, jerking the handlebar controls to contend with the wind as it picked up.
"That was different."
"Even so, one would think that a sane person would try to find a safer job in this town," he persisted as a gumball barreled past them.
"This isn't that dangerous, Alvin," she answered, adjusting her hold on him. "I could be working at Waffle House."
He would have replied, but he had to jerk the hovercraft out of the way of a falling piece of building, and all of his retorts vanished from his mind while he navigated through the disaster zone. Vicki had the sense not to take photographs while they were fleeing, but she suddenly twisted around to look back at their pursuers.
"Wait," she cried over the wind, "do those bears look familiar to you?"
"I don't make it my business to be on friendly terms with gigantic plush toys," he called back.
"No, no, I have seen that design from somewhere," Vicki insisted. "They look almost like…"
But before she could finish, another gumball cannoned toward them, and Alvin jerked the controls so hard that all three of them — Alvin, Vicki and Lampy — slid across the platform, and they would have toppled over if not for their tethers. Alvin righted the vehicle, scanning the increasingly damaged area for anything useful, and Vicki suddenly tightened her hold on him.
"Alvin! Alvin!" she cried, tugging his cape. "That's Cuddles and Snuggles!"
He looked over his shoulder. "Friends of yours?"
"They're from the old Betsy Broccoli toy line!" she cried. "I had both of them when I was a kid."
Something clicked inside Alvin's mind. "And they were popular back then?"
"Yeah, until Nezzer's Toys phased them out in the 80s," she recalled.
"Then" — Alvin steered the vehicle around — "whoever built the bears has a taste for vintage Nezzer toys, and that narrows it down to only one nostalgia-obsessed super genius."
"Who?"
Alvin would have told her, but the pink bear — was it Cuddles or Snuggles? — swung its arm at them. He backed off, but not too far. He grabbed the mouthpiece for his megaphone again, bringing the hovercraft around to face the pink one. Something that lacy and feminine probably held the female mastermind behind this whole thing.
"Polly Pea!" he called into the receiver. "Polly Pea, I know it's you behind this, so you better surrender now."
The pink bear gazed placidly at him — not unlike Lampy, he privately thought — and then it raised its right arm and attempted to fling it at the hovercraft.
Alvin dodged it and drew back several feet in the air.
He gritted his teeth. "Plan B then."
He shrugged off Vicki's invisible hold and dropped to one knee, opening a hatch on the floor of the hovercraft, which contained an assortment of tools and other items useful for various situations.
"Polly Pea?" repeated Vicki in an undertone. "Like the doll from the Betsy Broccoli line?"
"She's a huge fan, and she's among the top ten of toy-themed villains."
"Never heard of her."
"She's been out of the country for a while to evade Interpol," he explained, "but she was a henchman for many big-time supervillains before she branched out on her own. I met— someone I used to know met her a few times over the years."
He found what he was looking for and stood, holding a Winnie Wallet compact still in its original packaging. Vicki uttered a strained chuckle at the sight.
"You just happened to have that in your super vehicle?" she asked.
Despite the seriousness of the moment, Alvin found himself grinning back. "Do you even know how many supervillains are obsessed with toys? I was able to capture Lemon Twist once by using a Suzy Action Jeep as bait."
He grabbed the mouthpiece again and dangled the toy in front of the bears' face.
"Polly, I'm about to remove this toy from the original packaging," he warned. "Its value is going to plummet, and you won't be able to resell it on the Internet. Opening, opening—-"
"Okay! Okay!" a voice emerged from the pink bear, sounding like it came from a speaker. "No need to get violent, Mr. Hero!"
The pink face split horizontally between the blank eyes to reveal a control room inside the robot. A dainty pea in a tea-party dress sat in the pilot seat, manipulating levers and buttons, and her green face was contorted in a scowl.
Alvin calmly held up the Winnie Wallet compact for her to see. "If you come quietly, you can have it, Polly."
"Don't insult me like you're some big-time hero, newbie," she retorted. "I've worked alongside supervillains who could run circles around you, like Dark Crow and Awful Alvin."
"Got him coffee once, you mean," he snarked to himself, but he quickly continued. "Let's keep this as uncomplicated as possible, Polly. Surrender now before anyone gets hurt."
"Yeah, you!" she shouted back, and she adjusted a few levers, turning the cannon further upwards.
BOOM!
Alvin made a hard left, just in time.
"I gave you a chance," he said under his breath. "You can't say I didn't give you a chance."
Back in his supervillain days Alvin had helped his grandfather, Selfish Simon, create many of the blueprints that they sold to ally criminals, but sometimes (when they knew they could get away with it) they stole plans from other tech-savvy villains and made them deadlier. Alvin had once caught a brief glimpse of one of Polly's blueprints — enough to get the gist of how her robots functioned — and he knew exactly what those machines were capable of and how no ordinary weapons could take them out.
And he also knew a possible way to defeat them, if he could only get it to work.
"God, please help," he prayed softly.
The first order of business was to get both robots in the correct position without Polly suspecting his plan. This proved tricky: he had to zip here, zip there, coaxing the robots into following him without getting himself or his friends flattened by one of the gumballs.
"C'mon," he kept saying under his breath. "C'monnnn…"
He paused as long as he dared above 45th Street, then pretended to flee a little ways as the pink bear came turned down the north end. The blue bear turned onto the south end, slowly advancing.
Needing to stall for time, Alvin tried again with the megaphone.
"This is your last chance, Polly," he called toward the pink bear even as the blue one drew near. "Surrender now."
"I don't take orders from heroes!" she shouted back, and the pink bear's mouth opened wider, allowing for a bigger cannon to take the place of the first one. The blue bear copied the leader.
"Alvin…?" Vicki whispered, tightening her hold on him.
"Trust me," he whispered back before he addressed Polly again. "I'll give you until the count of three! One…"
The bears aimed their cannons.
"Two…"
The cannons made ominous clicking sounds.
"Three!"
Both cannons fired — and Alvin slammed his hand on a button on the controls. The hovercraft shot up like a rocket, and the gumballs zoomed past each other beneath him, striking the opposite bear.
The creaking sound that followed was music to his ears, and Alvin watched with triumph as both toppled backwards, crashing right into the road.
"Timber!" he cheered. He steered the hovercraft toward the pink bear, checking for Polly.
She was still strapped in the pilot seat, clearly stunned but unharmed. The rest was for the police to handle.
After sending up a relieved thank-you, Alvin withdrew a two-way radio from his utility belt and pressed a button that put in touch with his main ally on the APD. "Scooter, you can bring your men in."
"Right, lad!" came Scooter's rich brogue, and in the distance some of the police vehicles, still flashing their lights, began to move.
"Congrats on a successful bear hunt," Scooter added with relieved mirth.
"I'd turn them into rugs, but I don't think they'd fit in my hideout," Alvin returned.
With the police moving in to handle the aftermath, Alvin could now focus on getting Vicki somewhere safe (and maybe afterwards he would indulge in a brief heroic dance of heroism, once everything was quiet). He started to turn around, intending to ask Vicki if she was okay, but his cucumber companion uttered a sudden, relieved sigh and slumped against him, pressing her face against his back.
"Oh, it's over!" she mumbled.
In spite of the adrenaline-fueled fifteen minutes which he had just endured, Alvin found her soft embrace and the sudden waft of her floral perfume to be the things that caught him off guard.
No matter how many times she had faced danger — and Vicki had experienced her own share of it in the news business, even before she met Alvin — nothing prepared her for those brief moments afterwards, when the high emotions fell, and the calm settled back in, and a great weariness came over a person who had been alert mere seconds prior. She took several slow, deep breaths, remembering what her friends on the police force had told her about box breathing helping to lower heart rates, and finally found her composure again.
When her jelly legs felt strong enough to hold her weight, she pushed herself back off Alvin to find that he had already moved the hovercraft several blocks away from the wreckage. Behind them the police and fire department were already tending to the giant robots and any safety hazards in the area.
"That's a lot of damage," Vicki said. "I hope nobody got hurt."
"I'm sure everything will be okay," said Alvin gently. "They would have been calling in the paramedics by now if they had found someone seriously injured."
Vicki scanned the destroyed sections of buildings: gaping holes in walls, ripped off corners of roofs, shattered fragments of glass still clinging to their window frames. She shook off her shock, remembering her job, and snapped a photo.
"Someone is going to have to pay for all that," she remarked in a low tone. "I wonder if the Emperor will do it."
"Oh, you've heard about him?"
"Everyone in the news business has," she answered, focusing her camera on the progress of a team of officers hopping down the street. "When colossal damages from superhero battles are paid by a mysterious benefactor, saving taxpayers and business owners millions of dollars, we news hounds take notice."
All anyone knew about Applyburg's benevolent helper was that he donated money to help the city's collateral damages and signed his notes, "the Emperor of Generosity." Some people dismissed it as an urban legend, but Vicki had seen one of his notes when she had been covering the aftermath of an incident involving The Chemist — Applyburg's other major superhero — and the celery villain, Bubblegum, and she told Alvin this.
"Have you ever met him?" she asked.
"We know a lot of the same people," he answered with a shrug, "but I have yet to actually see him."
"I hope he steps in here," said Vicki with another look. "At least somebody ought there is handling what happens after a major battle."
"Speaking of what happens afterwards," Alvin said, suddenly straightening with a smile in his voice, "here's the cavalry!"
Vicki peeked over the edge of the hovercraft, scanning the street below. All she saw was a few emergency vehicles within the police barricade, a crowd of reporters furiously snapping photos or speaking into microphones, and an old food truck pulling up just beyond them. The police made the reporters move aside to let the truck in, and it drove ten feet into the sealed-off area and parked near a pile of rubble.
"Who?" Vicki finally asked, shooting a dubious look at the truck.
Alvin turned his head, and a mysterious sparkle appeared in his yellow eyes. "C'mon, you'll see."
He might not have been conventionally handsome, but his expressive face could display a wide range of emotions that expressed his kind soul and invited people to trust him or to join him in a moment of fun.
Vicki found herself smiling back. "Sure."
Careful to avoid the line of sight of the reporters, Alvin floated his hovercraft over the rooftops until he found a mostly undamaged alley within the sealed-off radius to park. After he and Vicki unbuckled themselves, Alvin led the way to the street. Lampy stayed where he was, but Alvin did not blame him. Shattered glass always made Lampy nervous, and to allow him to save face in front of Vicki, Alvin called back, "Keep an eye on the hovercraft, Lampy. We'll be back soon."
Lampy smiled placidly in reply, but Alvin thought he was grateful.
They headed back toward the street with the barricade, and as they rounded the corner, three elderly ladies were setting up a folding table off to one side of the food truck and were loading it up with condiments for coffee and sandwiches.
"Here we are," he announced to Vicki. "Some of the most important heroes in Applyburg."
"The people behind those little old ladies?" she guessed flatly.
"Nope," he grinned. "Those little old ladies are the heroes."
She lifted an eyebrow. "You're joking."
"Not at all," he said. "I might not have endured superhero work this long without them. C'mon, I'll introduce you."
He sauntered forward (with Vicki still skeptical), and as they approached, a gourd woman with a gray hair bun and wire glasses on her large nose lifted her head. She broke into a smile and started toward them.
"Alvin, lad!" Her old voice held a pleasant English accent and a motherly warmth. "I wondered when you would be showing up."
"With your cocoa nearby? I wish I had gotten here sooner," he replied before he turned toward his pretty friend. "Vicki, this is Grandma Gourd."
"A pleasure," the older lady said with a nod which Vicki politely returned.
"She and other volunteers from Veggie Valley Chapel come out with cocoa, water bottles and sandwiches for first responders," Alvin explained. "They're an important part of keeping Applyburg's superheroes and civil services on their feet."
"Well, I used to serve sandwiches at Red Cross Canteens during the war," she said modestly, "and I've worked as a cook for many rich families in my time. Guess it makes sense to make myself useful at this stage of my life. Would you like some coffee or cocoa, dearie?"
"But I'm not a first responder," Vicki pointed out.
"Oh, we serve the sidekicks of superheroes too," said Grandma Gourd cheerfully, turning back toward the steps leading into the truck's kitchen.
Vicki shot Alvin a twinkling smile. "Well, in that case…"
Alvin gave her a flat look. "I already have a sidekick, thank you very much."
"Always good to have a spare," she joked, batting her eyes. "I'm sure Lampy won't say a word against me joining the team."
"Lampy doesn't make the decisions, my friend."
"But I was useful today, wasn't I?" she pointed out. "You wouldn't have known that you were fighting Polly Pea if I didn't recognize her peas. I can help you, if you'll let me."
"I'd rather you stay safe."
She lifted her chin. "Has it never occurred to you that the feeling might be mutual?"
Although she still spoke mostly in jest, something in her expression seemed to hold genuine conviction, and that took Alvin aback.
Before he could formulate a response, the sound of approaching vehicles caused them both to turn. A fleet of steel-colored trucks drove through the temporarily opened barricade and wound their way through the wreckage, taking different directions once they reached the street corner.
"The CukeCorp Crisis Clean-Up Crew," Vicki read aloud, peering at the passing logo on the sides of the vans. "Oh, right! CukeCorp sent out an announcement recently that it would be launching a new service to help the city" — and she lifted her camera for a snapshot as the nearest one parked along a patch of untouched sidewalk.
"Makes my job easier," agreed Alvin, watching as burly potatoes and zucchinis in matching blue uniforms emerged from the vans with mops, brooms, shovels, wheelbarrows and other types of cleaning equipment.
"Mmm-hmm," said Vicki, maneuvering around Alvin to get better shots of the crew as they tackled the debris. She straightened and let out a sudden laugh as though she had just remembered something. "Hey, Alvin, with how today's going, wouldn't it be something to get a picture of Lawrence the Cucumber to cap off my film roll?"
"Ah, yes," he smiled knowingly. "Your white whale."
"I prefer the term 'reasonable career goal,'" she replied, her attractive eyes twinkling with fun.
Lawrence the Cucumber was the elusive head of CukeCorp. He rarely went out in public these days, even to attend his company's official functions, and the last clear photo of him that had appeared in a newspaper was from his nineteenth birthday party that an eager member of the paparazzi had obtained seconds before being chased by a pack of guard dogs. For Vicki, to capture a front-page-worthy snapshot of the mysterious millionaire would be the highlight of her extensive portfolio.
"Best of luck with your hunting then, Captain," said Alvin, throwing her a salute.
"I'll be sure to remember you in my victory speech." She tilted her head then, studying him with that look he had seen on her whenever she spotted a potential scoop. "Alvin, as a superhero, don't you have any leads on this guy? Like, haven't you saved him from a burning building or helped him change a tire at least once?"
"If I had, it would hardly be ethical to share it with a member of the paparazzi."
She hopped closer. "So, you do have info?"
"Not at all," he admitted. "I grew up in Lollyhaven, so the Applyburg elite weren't exactly on my radar."
Technically, Grandpa Simon had always handled the who's who stuff of surrounding cities. Although Grandpa had aspirations for world domination like any good villain worth his salt, he was content to respect the territories of his fellow criminals (at least until he knew he could get the upper hand and take their stuff at a later date). Applyburg belonged to the likes of LarryBoy and Bok Choy, making it off limits even to Awful Alvin's destructive whims. ("Bad for business," Grandpa would say whenever Alvin complained about being leashed.)
Vicki let out a little huff that made her look kind of cute. "Well, you can't blame me for asking."
"Actually, I fully support you in your endeavor," he replied with amusement. "I think you'd get into less trouble trying to get a photograph of Mr. Lawrence than chasing after every disaster."
"Less trouble, less glory." She lifted her eyes, which had regained their twinkle. "Nice try, Alvin, but you can't get rid of me that easily."
"Getting rid of you was not on my mind at all, Vicki."
Her smile, painted in that pretty pink lipstick, widened, but before she could reply, someone called out her name, and they both turned to see a male cucumber hopping around the wreckage, waving a mop. Alvin recognized him as the janitor who worked at The Daily Apple, but he had only seen him at a distance before.
Vicki's eyebrows shot up at the sight of her co-worker, and she started toward him.
"Larry?" she cried. "What are you doing here?"
Larry skidded to a halt in front of her and adjusted his cap, giving Vicki a small, conspiratory smirk. "Didn't I tell you about my other job?"
"Oh, this should be good," she chuckled.
"No, I mean it," he insisted, his eyes gleaming. "I'm on the CukeCorp team, as part of the clean-up crew."
"Larry, you hate cleaning," she pointed out with an incredulous grin. "Half our conversations are about you wishing you could quit your job."
"Oh, that's just water-cooler talk," he answered, leaning on his mop, "but why have one dead-end job when you can have two?"
Vicki uttered a soft snort. "Why not?"
"Joking aside," he said, adjusting his hold on the mop, "I think it's about time to give back to my community. Since I can't parade around in spandex yet — no matter how fashionable — I thought I'd start small."
"That's very admirable, Larry."
"So, I've started working with CukeCorp part time," he continued. "With all the crooks trashing the city, you might as well call a guy who knows what he's doing to handle it."
"You sure know how to use a plunger."
He made a confident sniff and shouldered his mop, striking a heroic pose. "Just call me Janitor Boy."
"It has a certain ring to it," she replied with a chuckle before she furrowed her brow. "But you couldn't possibly have known that there was going to be a disaster today. How did you get away from The Daily Apple?"
"Oh, that's easy," he said airily. "Bob said I could leave work early to come do a shift here."
"We're talking about Bob the Tomato, right?" Vicki returned, raising an eyebrow. "He actually let you leave?"
Larry flashed a mischievous grin. "Well, it could have been because I spilled coffee on his desk. He seemed really eager to get me out of the building after that."
Vicki burst into laughter. "Oh, Larry, you're something else!"
Larry tipped his cap. "Happy you noticed."
Her eyes sparkled at him before she glanced at Alvin and seemed to remember he was there. She gave Larry's collar a tug, pulling him toward Alvin.
"Alvin, I want you to meet someone," she beamed. "This is Larry, my friend from work."
Alvin ignored a sinking feeling in his stomach and dipped his head into a congenial nod to the newcomer. "Nice to meet you."
Larry might have given him an appraising look — for half a second — but it was immediately replaced with a broad smile.
"Oh, you probably get this a lot, but I have been waiting a long time to meet you, brother," he said brightly. "Vicki tells me all about your adventures whenever we have a lunch date together."
"Just one or two stories," she corrected.
"Enough to make me want to shake this fella's hand, if I could." Larry swept off his cap and dipped into a little bow toward Alvin. "I am so grateful to the man that keeps this amazing lady safe. She's something special, isn't she?"
"You say the nicest things sometimes, Larry," she laughed.
"And I mean every word of it," he said in a light tone, but he sent her a meaningful look.
Alvin's shoulders tensed, but he smiled and stepped back. "It was nice to meet you, Larry, but I should probably help the police now. Superhero work and all that. See you around, Vicki."
Vicki's expression dimmed slightly. "Well, if you're sure…"
"Oh, we can't keep a superhero from his very important work, Vicki," hummed Larry, "but you can hang around with me while I clean up. Applyburg needs to know how important blue-collared work is in this town."
She nodded, regaining her smile. "Why not? It would give the news story a humanitarian angle."
Larry tipped his hat to Alvin one last time — and for a second his large eyes seemed to hold something like triumph in them — but then he led the way toward a heap of debris, and Vicki kept her camera ready.
Alvin realized his serrated teeth had clenched, but he loosened them and hurried back over to Grandma Gourd's food truck. He told himself it was to make himself useful, but a strange tightness in his chest made it difficult for him to move too far away from Vicki and her guy friend, and he noted that the food truck would allow him an angle to let him keep an eye on them.
Not that it was any of his business, he chided himself.
Grandma Gourd was carrying out an urn of coffee as he approached. She glanced around him, and she broke into a surprise beam.
"As I live and breathe!" she sighed.
"What?" returned Alvin.
She adjusted her glasses, and although she had no eyes, she seemed like she might shed a tear.
"Oh, it's so nice to see that boy so happy," she declared, gazing warmly at something, and Alvin realized it was the two cucumbers engrossed in their conversation.
He forced another smile. "You know Larry?"
"Why, that's Master Larry, my old employers' son!" she explained as she arranged more cookies onto the table. "But most folks around here know him as Lawrence the Cucumber."
Alvin's head snapped around hard enough to make his neck hurt. "That's Lawrence the Cucumber?"
"Unless the lad's changed his name in the past few years" — with a laugh.
"Are you sure?"
"Sure I'm sure!" she chirped fondly. "I used to be a cook at Larry Manor, back before Mr. and Mrs. Cucumber's tragic accident, see. I would know Master Larry anywhere, no matter how big he got. He was always sneaking into the pantry to get a slice of my famous chocolate cake, bless him! Wonder if he would recognize me."
Alvin's stomach suddenly felt like it had a large rock inside it, but he ignored the discomfort. "But he works as a janitor at The Daily Apple. Why would the richest guy in town mop floors?"
"Well, he was always a bit eccentric, even as a little tyke," Grandma Gourd admitted, "but at least it's honest work. Maybe Master Larry is trying to get in touch with his fellow man, and he doesn't want the pressure of everyone asking for money everywhere he goes."
Alvin admitted that maybe some sense: like the king who moved through his domain, incognito.
Grandma Gourd handed him a cup of cocoa and a sandwich, which he accepted even though he had little desire for either, and he decided to find Scooter. He tried to remind himself that he had work to do, but he kept looking over his shoulder at Vicki and Larry. The cucumbers had begun to move further away, with Vicki snapping photos while Larry used a broom to sweep away concrete bits. He struck a lot of heroic poses while he worked, causing Vicki to break into musical laughter which would have lifted Alvin's heart if he had been the source of her merriment.
Vicki's white whale, right in front of her. What would she do once she found out she had gotten her photograph of Lawrence after all?
But it was not any of Alvin's business, now was it?
…So, why couldn't he push it from his mind?
No, no, he had no say in what Vicki did or who caught her attention. She was a grown woman, and Alvin was her friend, so he ought to respect her decision.
…But why was a millionaire working as a janitor? (The dormant impulses of outrage bristled through Alvin at the thought before he could stop them.) For that matter, why was a millionaire working as a janitor at the newspaper where Vicki worked, and where did he get the nerve to look at her that way without telling her the truth first? And why was Vicki looking at him so brightly, and…
And…
And it really was not any of Alvin's business.
Ethically, he could not divulge Larry's true identity to her without Larry's consent, unless it were absolutely necessary, and a reclusive rich man was probably not getting into any sort of trouble that would make it absolutely necessary. Perhaps Larry was waiting to see if he could trust Vicki before he shared his secret.
He no doubt would soon see that she could be trusted, and Vicki would have a proper photograph of him and potentially a rich boyfriend to boot. A millionaire cucumber was safer for a lady to hang around than a former supervillain who was always one step away from having his dark past exposed to the public.
Maybe it was for the best that Vicki hung around Larry and looked at him with those bright eyes. She would get into less danger that way.
Hopefully.
…But why was he a janitor?
Maybe Alvin could look into it.
Maybe he ought to look into it.
For Vicki's sake, of course.
"Alvin, me lad!" came a Scottish brogue, and Alvin looked up to Officer Scooter motioning with a police baton for the onion to join him. "We could use a hand over here — and you sure got two of 'em."
"Now, now. Envy is not unsuitable for a man of the APD, Scooter," he pretended to admonish even as he made a "casual" show of flexing his arms.
"Ach, no need for being a show-off now, lad," his friend pretended to rebuke, shaking the baton at him. "Hands or no hands, I can deal you a good knock on the head like in the old days."
Alvin chuckled, displaying a mirth he did not feel, and, with one last look at the cucumbers, set to work.
By mid-afternoon Vicki's snapshots were developed, and she let Nadine see them on her way to show Bob.
"You wouldn't expect a sarcastic guy like Larry to be so involved," Nadine remarked as she studied Vicki's photographs of their janitor.
"He's full of surprises," she grinned.
She noted with some satisfaction that Nadine's stack of photos were not quite as thick as hers, but Nadine had somehow managed to get a nice shot of Vicki riding on the hovercraft with Alvin and Lampy. Her photographed self looked determined, and Alvin's expression was heroic and dashing. (Lampy's expression was the same as always, of course.)
"I might like a copy of that for my desk," Vicki said, holding it up to the light.
"Some girls get all the breaks," Nadine pretended to sigh, holding her own stack of photographs dramatically against her forehead like she might faint.
"Hey, your turn is coming, Nay. Just not as soon as mine was," Vicki ribbed, getting a laugh out of her friend.
"Well, you won this round, Vick" said Nadine with a little sniff of feigned annoyance, "but just wait until next time!"
"May the best photographer win," replied Vicki with a friendly smirk before she continued to Bob's office with her bounty.
THE END