THE SPANKER WHAMMO
Freddy got to the basement first. He looked down at the purple blob lying on the floor in front of him. “Wally, are you okay?”
Wally slowly rose on thick, quivering ankles.
“How do people walk in these itsy-bitsy thingie-wingies?” complained Wally about the ladies’ shoes he wore. “My tootsies are like hamburger.” Wally suddenly got a strange look on his face. “Hamburger! I am soooo hungry.”
The other Fries caught up.
“Wally,” said Theodore in his deep, scholarly voice, “you really need to become more proficient in navigating with that particular style of footwear.”
“Theodore,” complained Wally, “I’m sort of busy trying to figure out how to walk in these dumb shoes, okay?”
“What’s that?” squeaked Ziggy, pointing at the spot where Wally had hit the wall.
“Lookslikeaholewithsomethingbehindit,” mumbled Curly, examining the break.
Everyone crowded around Curly, but it was too dark in the hole to see anything.
“I’ll go get a flashlight,” Freddy said. Moments later he returned and shone a light in the hole.
“Wow,” exclaimed Wally.
Si said, “It looks like a passageway. I bet at the end of it there’ll be a pot of gold and nothing but good times.”
“I’m sure there’re monsters in there just waiting to eat us,” Meese whined. “Black holes are never good for you. That’s why they’re dark and scary.”
Freddy peered through the opening. “There is a passageway. I wonder where it goes?”
“Well, the aperture is too diminutive for us to proceed,” opined Theodore.
“Yeah, and the hole’s too little to get through,” added Wally, scratching his head.
Theodore looked at the big purple Fry and sighed. “That’s what I just said.”
“Wecouldtrytomaketheholebigger,” mumbled Curly.
“I’m not sure my dad would like that,” cautioned Freddy.
“COMING THROUGH,” roared Wally, who had morphed into a giant purple bowling ball and was rolling right at them.
Freddy and the other Fries jumped out of the way just in time. Wally hit the wall and broke right through it, disappearing into the darkness.
“Wally!” Theodore cried out as the others peered through the new, very large hole. “Did you suffer bodily impairment?”
Wally yelled back, “Nope, but you oughta see the huge boo-boo on my butt.”
Following Freddy, Howie and the Fries cautiously entered the secret passageway.
“Wow,” said Freddy as he shone the light around. “It looks like something inside a medieval castle in Europe.”
“But the Burger Castle’s not very old, is it?” asked Theodore.
“I didn’t think so,” said Freddy. “Before we bought it and turned it into a restaurant, it was a Laundromat. I thought those owners had built it, but maybe not.”
They found Wally rubbing his very large behind.
“Are you okay, Wally?” asked Howie.
“I’m cool, little dude. Lucky I didn’t hit my head and mess up my big brain.”
“Yeah, lucky,” said Ziggy as they continued down the windy passageway.
Theodore, who, unlike Wally, had two large computer chips for his brain, said, “I calculate that the direction of this tunnel is running north by northeast at precisely forty-five degrees.”
“Wait a minute,” exclaimed Freddy. “That means it’s headed toward the Patty Cakes restaurant.”
Wally rubbed his huge hands together and sniffed the air. “Yummy. I thought I could smell all that grease frying.”
Ziggy grabbed Freddy’s pants leg. “Uh, Freddy, can we get out of here now? It’s sort of, well, spooky down here.”
Wally reached down and picked up the little yellow Fry and put him on his broad shoulders. “Not to worry, little papoosie, nothing’s gonna get you while big Wally’s around.”
Just then they heard a loud squeaking noise from the direction they were headed.
“AAAAAHHHHH!”
Freddy was knocked down and lost the flashlight, which went out, plunging them into darkness.
“Ouch!” cried out Ziggy amid lots of scuffling.
Curly mumbled, “Wouldwhoeveritisplease-getoffme?”
Si said, “Boy, I’ve always wondered what it felt like to be smashed to a pulp.”
“We’re all going to die, and I’m first in line,” yelped Meese.
Freddy finally found the flashlight and turned it back on.
“Wally!” he said in a scolding tone.
The purple Fry had jumped on top of Howie and the other Fries while still holding Ziggy on his shoulders, causing Ziggy to hit his head on the ceiling.
Wally looked sheepish as he climbed down. “I went up there for a better look.”
“Come on, guys,” said Freddy. “We need to see where this passageway goes.”
They cautiously moved along until they reached a doorway.
“Go ahead and open it,” said Si. “I bet there’s a million bucks just waiting on the other side for us to grab.”
“No,” said Meese frantically, “that’s where the monsters are, I’m telling you.”
Theodore was examining the door. “It appears to be locked.”
Freddy pulled a small device from his pocket.
“Is that a new invention?” asked Howie.
Freddy nodded. “The Wriggle-Jiggle. It’ll take care of that lock.” The Wriggle-Jiggle was a coiled piece of copper wire attached to a small power pack. Freddy put it in the lock, turned on the power, and the wire wound in and around the lock tumblers, pushing them to their open position. They heard a loud click, and the door swung open.
“Pretty cool, Freddy,” said Si.
“Thanks. I use it to get into my sister’s room and mess things up.”
Carefully making their way through the door, they headed down a short hallway. Here, the passageway seemed to come to a dead end, until Curly pointed up and mumbled, “Lookslikeatrapdoor-intheceiling.”
Freddy stood on Wally’s shoulders and slowly pushed against the door. To his surprise, it opened a few inches. Freddy peered through the crevice and gasped. He was staring directly into the office of Stewie Spanker, the owner of Patty Cakes.
Stewie Spanker was so porky that he could barely fit in the chair behind his enormous desk. He was wearing a pink jumpsuit emblazoned with the Patty Cakes logo, and a plastic hat in the shape of a triple-decker hamburger and huge slice of pink cake — and he didn’t look very happy.
Then Freddy noticed Stewie wasn’t alone. Standing to the side of the desk was Stewie’s son, Adam, who looked like a smaller version of his father.
“I still can’t believe the Funkies won the float competition,” Adam was saying.
“Don’t remind me,” roared Stewie Spanker. “I spent a ton of money having that float built. And we’ve lost lots of customers to those wackos. Who in the world would’ve thought people would actually eat food that was good for them? And like it!” He pointed a plump finger at his son. “Now we have to get back at them for that. You’re smart, Adam. You can think of a way, can’t you?”
While not a very bright boy, Adam had a certain talent for coming up with ways to cause trouble. “I’ll think of something, Pop, and when I do” — he smacked a beefy hand into a thick palm — “Whammo! No more Funkhousers to bug us.”
“I knew I raised you right,” said his father, smiling.
“I’ll report back here tomorrow at the same time with my plan,” said Adam. “Hey, what was that?” he said suddenly, looking around.
Ziggy had sneezed and the sound had carried into the office. Freddy quickly lowered the trapdoor and they all held their breath. A long minute passed and then Freddy eased the trapdoor up a fraction of an inch and peered through.
He saw Adam leaving the office. Breathing a sigh of relief, Freddy lowered the door and got off Wally’s shoulders.
“So what’d you hear, Freddio?” asked Si.
Freddy quickly told the gang about the Spankers’ scheme.
“So we simply return tomorrow at the same time and we’ll discern all the details of his nefarious plan,” said Theodore.
“We can’t do that,” said Wally. “We have to be here listening to the yucky stuff they’re going to do to us.”
Ziggy exclaimed, “That’s what he just said, Wally!”
“Okay, guys,” said Freddy, “tomorrow we’ll be back. Once we hear their plan, we’ll be ready to beat them at their own game.”
“Uh, Freddy,” said Howie, “every time we get mixed up with the Spankers, bad things tend to happen. Like, to us.”
“Don’t worry,” Freddy said confidently as they walked back through the door. “It’ll be different this time.”
But halfway down the hallway Freddy stopped suddenly.
“I don’t remember there being another door here,” he said, pointing at a small black door across from them.
Freddy tried the doorknob, but it was locked. He pulled out his Wriggle-Jiggle, yet before he could insert it in the lock, the door swung open.
“YEOW!” said Wally as he jumped on top of Theodore, flattening the blue Fry.
“Ho-how di-did that ha-hap-pen?” Freddy stammered.
There was a flash of light, and the next thing they knew, they were running for their lives. They raced down the hallway, through the hole, into the basement of the Burger Castle, up the steps, out the front doors, across the drawbridge, and onto the street.
Stopping to catch his breath, Freddy’s mind was whirling so fast he could barely understand what he was thinking. As his head cleared, Freddy was sure of one thing. There had been a man down there, dressed in what looked to be clothes from a very long time ago. He had looked right at Freddy. His mouth was open and he seemed to be trying to say something, but all that came out was one long moan.
And that wasn’t all.
The man had lights flashing all around him. And he had been hovering at least two feet OFF the ground!
