Hot Dog and Bob: Adventure 1 (3 page)

I know this whole thing sounds impossible, but it’s true. My sweet old teacher had turned into an evil mutant alien pizza person faster than you could say “hold the anchovies.” It was like watching a seriously scary horror movie, only there was pizza instead of popcorn, and the movie was real!

Cheese Face (formerly known as Miss Lamphead) planted her big, round body right in front of the classroom door. There was no escape.

Cheese Face pointed her long, cheesy finger and—ZAP!—the entire row of kids next to the door turned into walking, talking (and, I hate to admit it, but kind of delicious-looking) kid-size pizza slices with hands and feet and faces. The rest of the class totally freaked out. Everyone started screaming.

The icky mutant pizza monster laughed.

“Just a few million more pizza-slice soldiers to follow my every command and I will rule the world!”

I leaned down and whispered into my lunch box. “Um, Hot Dog, I think I might have just figured out what your mission is.”

“Like I said,” Hot Dog whispered back. “If the Big Bun says you got big trouble, then believe you me, you got big trouble!”

Cheese Face pointed at the desks by the hamster cage, and a bunch more kids turned into pizza soldiers.

Just then I heard a
squeak-squeak
sound coming from the pet corner. I looked over and realized that no one, not even a hamster, was safe from this evil alien’s pizza magic. Our
class pet, Esmeralda, was now a bite-size slice of pizza with whiskers and a tail.

The pizza-slice kids were walking around like cheesy zombies. Everyone else raced to the back of our classroom, away from Cheese Face. Everyone except Barfalot.

“Hey! No fair!” whined Barfalot, who was still his regular annoying self. “How come
they
get to be pizza soldiers and
I
don’t? I’d be better at taking over the world than those stupid jerks
any
day!”

Cheese Face slowly turned her weird, drippy body to face Barfalot. “You are the whiniest, brattiest, rudest little creature I’ve met on this worthless planet so far,” she said in a low, creepy voice. Then she smiled. “I like it! I’m going to make you the general of my army.
I
will boss
you
around, and
you
will boss
them
around.”

And with one point of Cheese Face’s famous finger, my least favorite person in this entire world became my very worst nightmare:
General
Barfalot, uniform, tomato sauce and all.

“Oh, goody gumdrops,” said Clementine. “Not only do I get to become an unattractive food item, I also get to be bossed around by a dork with the IQ of a freckle’s freckle.”

Clementine was right. Seeing sweet old Miss Lamphead transformed into a mutant pizza was bad. Watching my friends turn into pizza-slice zombies was even worse. But having to follow Barfalot’s orders, now
that
was going too far.

“I don’t want to tell you how to do your job or anything,” I whispered into my lunch box.
“But isn’t this the part where you’re supposed to come in?”

“It’s all in the timing,” said Hot Dog. “Just watch and learn, kid. Just watch and learn.”

“Hey, you! Late Boy!” Cheese Face belched. “Wanna tell the rest of the class why you’re talking to a lunch box?”

“N-n-n-no th-thank you,” I stuttered.

“OPEN IT!” she shouted.

Now I know I’d only known Hot Dog since lunchtime, but a guy has to protect his
partner, right? I mean I couldn’t let down the Big Bun, could I?

“No!” I said. “I won’t!”

“Then I’ll open it myself!” Cheese Face said, snatching the lunch box out of my hands.

And that’s when things got really,
really
interesting.

My lunch box exploded open, and Hot Dog flew into the air. “This pizza party’s over!” he announced, just like a real superhero.

“Who’s the flying weenie?” asked Marco.

“That’s no flying weenie,” I said. “That’s my partner, Hot Dog. He’s going to save us!”

“Ohhh-kaaay,” said Clementine. “But if
he’s
our only chance, I’m not exactly getting my hopes up.”

Cheese Face tried to zap Hot Dog. But Hot Dog kept flying around the classroom, doing triple flips and fancy loops. Cheese Face missed every time.

“Whoa! Awesome tricks!” said Marco. “Somebody get that little dude a skateboard!”

“Okay, back me up here, partner,” Hot Dog called down to me.

“What do I do?” I called back.

“You’re the one with the memory,” said Hot Dog. “Just remember the plan!”

“What plan?” I panicked. “You never told me the plan!”

“Are you sure?” said Hot Dog. “I could have sworn I told you the plan.”

“Believe me,” I said. “You never told me the plan!”

“Oops! My mistake!” Hot Dog said, zipping around Cheese Face’s drippy, grabbing hands. “Now let’s see—what was the plan again?”

Clementine rolled her eyes and gave me this look. It was a this-flying-weenie-is-off-his-rocker-and-we’re-doomed-for-sure kind of a look.

I wished that when the Big Bun was up there on Dogzalot choosing a superhero hot dog to save our planet, she had picked one
who still had a memory and didn’t
need
a partner. But no such luck.

Just then Hot Dog said, “I remember now! The plan is Combo Number Five!”

“GOTCHA!” Cheese Face cried. She had Hot Dog trapped in one hand. The other hand was busy zapping the remaining kids into pizza-slice soldiers.

Finally she turned to Clementine, Marco and me.

“Twenty-four down and three to go!” She laughed and pointed straight at us. Hot Dog struggled to free himself from her grip, but it was no use.

I held my breath, closed my eyes and waited. When I opened my eyes, Marco was pizza. But for some reason, Clementine and I were still people! Luckily, Cheese Face was too busy celebrating her victory with her zombie pizza army to notice that Clementine and I hadn’t been zapped into pizza soldiers, too. We crawled behind a bookcase to hide.

“How come we’re not pizza?” whispered Clementine.

“I don’t know,” I whispered back. “Maybe being Hot Dog’s partner and Hot Dog’s partner’s friend makes us immune to Cheese Face’s zapping or something.”

“I just hope we live long enough to find out the answer,” said Clementine.

“Today Miss Lamphead’s class, tomorrow the world!” Cheese Face belched, holding Hot Dog high in the air like a trophy.

“Today Miss Lamphead’s class, tomorrow the world!” repeated the pizza-slice army.

“I don’t think so!” Hot Dog said. He’d managed to free one arm, reach inside his bun and push a hidden button. A gigantic glob of spicy mustard squirted right up Cheese Face’s nose. “RRRRRAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!” Cheese Face screamed, flinging Hot Dog through the air.

I watched helplessly as my poor little partner sailed across the room. He slammed into the blackboard with a splat.

“NO-OOOO!!!” I wailed. “YOU KILLED MY PARTNER!!!”