EDITS [14/11/18]: Cleared up a lot of grammar and spelling errors.

Chapter 1

The Eleventh Birthday

BUZZ, BUZZ, BUZZ, BUZZ

"Ummmm, Buzz cola agghhhh!" Homer drooled in his sleep, the high pitched buzz still kept coming as he rolled over in his bed still not waking up.

"Homer, turn your alarm off!" came a female voice into his subconscious it was Marge Simpson his wife. But he didn't pay any attention, he was thinking about a cool Buzz cola on a hot summers day. The taste of a cool cola on a dry tongue. What would be better then Buzz cola on a summers day? Beer he decided, a cool beer, Duff beer.

"Ummmm, Duff beer, Agghhhh!" he drooled again.

Marge could stand the sound of the alarm no longer. She reached over her large husband and tried to turn it off, but Homers massive form meant she couldn't get past him. She was about to resign herself to get out of bed and walk around to shut it off when an idea came to her.

"Homer" she said softly in his ear "there's a cup cake on your clock just waiting to be eaten."

"Ummmm, Cup Cake, Aggghhh!" he was drooling again.

"Chocolate, with whipped cream" she added almost seductively.

With surprising speed for someone who's asleep Homer rolled over, reached out to get his cup cake, which wasn't really there, and hit the alarm clock which stopped buzzing as soon as he hit it. But Homer didn't stop there, he opened his mouth and shovelled the alarm clock inside and bit down on it and immediately had an electric shock flow through his body. He convulsed and what little hair he had stood on end. The two strands of hair in particular at the top of his head now had an electrical current passing between them.

Panicking Marge leapt out of bed went over to his clock and pulled out the power cable and Homers spasms stopped. He now just lay there nibbling on the alarm clock.

"Hmm, chocolate cupcake with whipped cream and electric filling, Aggghhh" he was still asleep and drooling again.

Marge gently moaned at Homers unbreakable sleep and decided it was probably time to get up anyway. It only took her a couple of seconds to get dressed in her usual attire of a long green dress with a red pearl necklace and red high heeled shoes. She looked in the mirror and checked her hair was in place. It was tall, blue and bushy and it rose into the air a good few feet above her head.

She left Homer to his sleep, she couldn't remember why Homer set his alarm for seven in the morning when on weekends he usually hibernates until ten or eleven when lunch is served.

Marge went down stairs and she listened for anyone else moving around in their bedrooms. She couldn't hear anyone so she had a good head start to get breakfast ready before the kids woke up.

Homer and Marge had three kids. One, their youngest was Maggie a baby girl of about two years of age.

Their second oldest was Lisa, a young, bright girl who always got A+'s in her school work and was incredibly intelligent even though she was eight years old. Yet despite her intellect and maturity she still had a childish side to her.

Their eldest and first born was an unruly boy called Bart. Always getting into trouble at school for disrupting lessons and classes. He liked to play pranks on his friends, and Lisa as well. But Marge often had hope Bart would mature at some point, and today might be the start of it because today was Bart's eleventh birth day.

It was odd though because it seemed as if Bart should be much older for some reason. There was just this feeling in the back of her head that Bart should've been eleven long ago, but she didn't dwell on it.

They had set up a surprise party for Bart for the afternoon. His ant Patty and Selma would be there along with Milhouse one of Bart's friends, Grandpa Simpson, Homers father, and a few other of Bart's friends from school, Martin and… who else was there? Nelson… she couldn't think of all the others but they were all invited.

Their main problem was getting Bart out of the house. A problem that had to fall on Lisa because Marge and Homer would be busy with everything else. Lisa had suggested she take Bart to a museum, but they both knew that would never happen, whatever it was they needed to keep Bart occupied so he wouldn't come home early.

Milhouse, Bart's best friend was going to go with them just so they could keep him occupied. Though Lisa for some reason almost changed her mind when Milhouse was mentioned. It was probably best Milhouse went with them because Lisa wouldn't be able to hold Barts attention for very long by herself.

Milhouse was going to take Bart and Lisa on a bike ride into the woods where they would be preoccupied.

There suddenly came a loud thud from above the living room as if something heavy had been dropped to the floor, and a loud moan of "D'oh!" came. Homer had finally gotten up and by the sound of it fallen out of bed.

Bart's eyes lazily opened, he didn't want to get up now, why did this stupid head of his decide to wake him up now? He was just having a dream, what was it? He couldn't remember, but it was great. At least he didn't have to get up now he could just wait to go back to sleep.

But something was nagging him at the back of his head telling him to wake up. What for? He asked himself. Breakfast won't be ready, Homer will still be hibernating for the weekend. The Krusty the Clown show wasn't on until between 9 and 10 now, he could count a list of reasons why he didn't want to get up but there was still something nagging him at the back of his head.

What day was it? He thought for a moment. It was Friday yesterday, he only knew that because School was over now until Monday came which made this… Saturday. A small voice in his head said 'Happy Birthday to you,' but he continued to sleep until the meaning of those words came into focus.

Birthday? It was his birthday! That's why he wanted to wake up! Birthdays meant a party, cake and best of all, presents! His eyes snapped open and he looked at the ceiling excitedly, birthdays were the best days, before Christmas.

He knew exactly what he was going to do today. First he was going to have breakfast while opening his presents, he had looked forward to this day because it was the only day he knew he was going to get a chance of getting the new Radioactive man action figure set with Fallout boy, a glowing radioactive barrel, the Radiation Mobile plus accessories, before Christmas.

He and Milhouse would then ride their bikes into the woods. Milhouse had suggested they look at the damage caused by the destruction of that giant wooden beaver dam from the previous night. They'd take a few fire crackers just in case the opportunity arose to have a laugh.

He opened his eyes again and got up out of bed. His bedroom was covered in posters of Krusty the Clown and Radioactive man. Toys and clothes littered his floor which he had to step over to get to a chest of draws for fresh clothes. His usual red T shirt, blue shorts and blue shoes were all he needed.

He checked himself in the mirror to see if his spiky blond hair was still pointy before flinging the door open and running outside, but stopped short when he nearly ran into Lisa, his nerdy sister.

"Hey Bart, happy Birthday!" she said. Why was she up already? He wondered. What time was it really? He was sure it was only eight o'clock, or something like that.

Lisa was a little shorter then Bart, about an inch or so. She was also younger then him by only two years. She wore a red dress which had points at the bottom, a white pearl necklace around her neck and sandals which matched the colour of her dress. Similar clothes to what their mom wore. Lisa's hair was blond and spiked out of her head in all directions, unlike Barts which was spiked upwards.

"Hey Lisa" he said, unenthusiastically turning around to close the door to his bed room. If his mom found out the state it was in she'd nag him for a week.

He walked quickly down the stairs followed by Lisa, they could hear upstairs loud regular thuds. This was the sound their dad made when he was trying to squeeze into his pair of blue pants and hopped up and down when he tried to force his fat backside into them.

They entered the kitchen and saw his mom working at the sink cleaning pots. Bart climbed into a chair and sat down. Already laid out on the table was a white bowl, a spoon, a carton of milk and a box of Krusty-o's. He picked up the box and began tipping the Krusty-o's into his bowl.

"How's my little birthday boy" came his moms voice as she knelt down to hug him. Bart struggled to break the hug and push her away. "Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you" she began singing.

"MOM!" he complained trying to wriggle free. His annoyance only grew when he looked over at Lisa who was also singing along with her mother, only she wasn't doing it to wish him a happy birthday, more just to mock his situation. When his mom did finally let him go he picked up the milk and poured it into his cereal.

Lisa was preparing her own breakfast, a cereal that had something to do with ponies or donkeys or something girly like that. He often wondered how a dweeb like her could be related to someone cool like him.

"And what are you two going to do today?" came Marge's voice as she continued to do her chores.

"I'm going to view the damage done to the Springfield Giant Beaver dam" said Lisa "and the damage its doing to the environment. I'm going to write about how wrong it was to destroy it!" she said almost with a passion and a hint of anger. Lisa always was a bit of an eco freak.

"I'm going to check out the damage the dams doing to the river. Millhouse said he saw something cool there the other night"

"That's nice kids" she said still working on her tasks.

As Bart finished his cereal he thought it would be pretty funny if he loaded his spoon with Krusty-o's and lobbed them at Lisa, and so he did.

"Bart!" yelled Lisa as the wet O shaped cereal fell on her face.

"What?" Bart asked innocently, as Lisa wiped the O's off her face. But when she wasn't looking and his mom had gone out of the room, -hopefully to get him his presents- he reloaded and launched his air to dweeb projectiles.

"BART STOP IT!" Lisa screamed

Bart laughed almost hysterically but stopped immediately as Lisa got out of her seat and walked menacingly towards Bart.

"Hey, hey, it's my birthday remember!" he said leaping off his chair and moving away "You can't hurt me on my birthday, I'm indestructible until the stroke of midnight, OW!" he yelled as something flew through the air and slammed into his forehead. Lisa had thrown the remote control to the TV into his face, the impact didn't leave a lasting impression but a lump did start to form.

They heard foot steps from their mom coming back into the kitchen. Before she could see anything Lisa had leapt back into her chair and sat as if nothing had happened and Bart got back just in time as she came through the door.

To Bart's surprise his mom wasn't carrying any presents, just the mail which she put down on the table. Bart picked up the pile and ruffled through it looking for a birthday card or two. He found two, one from Millhouse who left him a dollar in the card. He didn't really care about the card, just the money that was in it. The other was from Grandpa Simpson, but you could tell it wasn't really from him because for one it said 'To Homer' crossed out and 'To Bart' written above it. This was obviously the same card Homer got from Grandpa last year and Grandpa took it back when Homer's birthday was over and decided to reuse it. In the bottom corner it said 'no money, be grateful you're getting a card, with to days postage prices I can't afford to give out dollars like that! In my day you were lucky to get a card, toilet paper is all we ever got on our birthdays and…

Bart closed the card he didn't really like listening to Grandpa's one sided conversations so he wasn't going to sit down and read one.

Marge then dropped quite a few letters onto the table in front of him which she had pulled out from her tall hair. More birthday cards "Here you go my special little guy"

"Mom, stop it!" he said as he opened another card. No money and it was from ant Patty and Selma, his two least favourite ants. Another was from his mom and dad who each gave him two dollars.

Another was from his Mom's mom who gave him another dollar, that made six. The next one he could tell immediately who it was from, since it mentioned the words brother on the front. Opening the card it was 'lots of love from Maggie and Lisa' written in Lisa's impossibly neat handwriting. At least she put in two dollars, one from Maggie the other from Lisa.

He got cards from school friends and the others he only received because they were friends of his parents. There was even one from Flanders, their religious neighbour and the card itself looked very Christian but didn't contain any money. If Flanders could afford to throw money away to worship a god he would never get to see until the day he died he could afford to give him one dollar for every 365 days Bart thought.

After he got through all the cards he wanted the big things now, his presents. He asked where they were and his mom detached herself from whatever it was she was doing and brought them to him. It was a small pile but his friends would probably bring more.

He knew all along about the so called 'surprise party' that was going on tonight. Millhouse was pretty lousy at keeping secrets, if it wasn't for the dam blowing up yesterday he probably would've stayed in all day until the party.

One really small present was from Patty and Selma who got him a pair of socks and nail clippers just like last year, and like last year the socks were going to be too small for him. He brought a larger looking present closer to him. His hopes of the Radioactive Man set crept into his mind but when he looked at the label he saw it was from Lisa and Maggie.

Disappointment filled his mind. He imagined Lisa got him some sort of book or something remotely educational. But he got a surprise when he peeled away wrapping paper and found himself facing the picture of a skateboard. It said on the box it had something called, 'stronger grip tape' and 'revolutionary design in the rotation trucks and bearings' as well as loads of words Bart didn't really know the meaning of. Either way he assumed it meant it was better then his old one.

"Hey" is all he could say through the surprise in his mind. "Umm…Thanks Lisa"

"You're welcome birthday boy" she said in a half sweet half mocking tone which Bart didn't like. It wasn't what he most wanted but it was a great gift at least.

Those which followed weren't so. No present from grandpa except a bottle of whisky or brandy or something like that. grandpa always used to say "my father always let me drink whisky at his age, never did me no harm." The only problem was that his mom didn't agree so the night before, Bart knew, Homer would've drunk the entire bottle.

The next few were video games from his parents. But not one of these things was the one thing he wanted most. He guessed he'd just have to wait until the party that night. He'd waited 2 months, what's another few hours? He thought to himself. He could spend the morning practicing on his new skateboard.

The hours just seemed to fly past in Homers mind. Whether at work or not it always flew past, especially when he was watching something on TV which he did when he came home from work that day. Only Marge kept insisting he help prepare Barts birthday party.

"Marge the boys eleven" he moaned "His life's over let him live out the rest of it with socks and shaving cream."

Marge still moaned at him until Homer got up. Marge wanted him to set up a table with food on it. But when she saw how Homer was looking at the food longingly she quickly changed her mind, that and when he said "Alright Marge, but if they get eaten it's your own fault." Told her this decision was probably for the best. Instead she let Homer do as he pleased confident she'd get through the chores faster if he didn't help her. She stilled loved him but sometimes he just made things difficult.

This was fine by Homer, being able to do what he liked was just how he liked to live life. He now lay in his hammock in the back garden which was tied to two trees. He had a beer on his stomach and was fast a sleep. If this wasn't the life he didn't know what was.

As he slept he thought about the world, mostly about how better the world would be if everything was made of chocolate like it was in Germany. The land of chocolate, how he wanted to visit Germany. First they were fighting in the second world war now they make it up to the world by building things out of chocolate. What apology works better then some chocolates? That's what he usually does when he falls out with Marge, he buys her a box of chocolates. Though he eats nearly all of them so he always provided a back up plan of flowers, they smelled pleasant but they didn't taste good.

God created all things so why create something which smelled so good and tasted so awful? He wondered. Another thing why do they have to go to church every week for one hour and listen to a boring man read a book? He had a bible and he'd read it… some of it. Actually he just watched the Greatest Story Ever Told which was pretty much the same thing.

"Homer" came Marges voice snapping him out of his philosophical discussion he was having with his brain. That wasn't a good sign and he knew it. When it did that he knew it wanted more beer. "Homer, where did you put Bart's other presents?"

He didn't open his eyes, Bart's other presents? What did he do with them? He tried to remember, they were usually in the basement where no one looked. Patty and Selma's presents to Bart were down there with his. It's the only place he put them and the only place the kids never looked because Patty and Selma always bought them toe nail cutters. Though once they bought Homer a girdle which he knew they only got to annoy him, so he threw it away, it wasn't even worth keeping.

But what about the other presents he'd bought Bart? Lets see now, he bought it two days ago. He was standing in line at the Toy-Mania, a new shop which sold nothing but toys. He remembered what Bart wanted, something called the Radio man set or something.

Now lets see, he remembered parking up he got out of the car walked up to the shop walked in and walked around for a bit looking for this Radio thingy when he noticed an unattended trolley and couldn't resist taking it and running as fast as he could before lifting his feet off the ground and climbing in like a bumper car. The trolley had collapsed as soon as he got inside, which was a bit of a downer. He wasn't hurt but the woman who was using the trolley was annoyed. There was nothing in it but apparently her baby, who was in the child seat.

The store clerks immediately threw him out and he had completely forgotten why he was in there. Now he remembered what he was in for, he was in to get the stupid figure and he didn't get it.

He didn't get it?

His eyes snapped open. He didn't get it and the following day he forgot as well! Marge was standing by the back door waiting for him to answer, "Umm, uh oh" he said to himself, thinking quickly he said "I err left them at Moes" he fibbed "so he wouldn't find them" Marge look suspiciously at him. Homer quickly got out of his hammock.

"I'll just go to Moes and pick them up." He said as he gently walked and half crept out of the backyard gate to his car. Once beyond the gate he broke into a run, wrenched open the door of his car and climbed inside, slamming the door shut and started the engine.

"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god" he kept saying over and over as he took the gear leaver and put the car in reverse and sped out of the drive nearly running over Flanders while trying to back out.

"OH GOD...!" Flanders cried as he fell backwards from the near miss "...BLESS HIM!" he added quickly to his curse.

Homer then put his car in drive and sped off. He needed to get to Toy-Mania and get that toy before Bart got back, it was now 5pm so he had plenty of time and the shop didn't close until 6pm. This was the worst day this week. He'd forgotten Bart's birthday present. If he didn't get him one Marge would be annoyed. Plus he remembered how Lisa was when he didn't get what she wanted for her birth day last year. What would Bart be like. Above all the worst thing of all today was he had the chance to run Flanders over but missed by a whisker.

The Springfield River was a sorry sight. The destruction of the Giant Beaver dam is going to have untold effects for the river and the wildlife swimming in it. Lisa looked over the rail into the river which was now a murky brown colour while Bart and Milhouse were a few feet away with a stick poking at a dead fish they'd found near the bank. That was the 'cool thing' Milhouse had found, well it was keeping Bart occupied at least.

Milhouse was the same height as Bart but his face was slightly more rounded. His hair was blue in colour and was side parted. He wore glasses so thick they magnified his beady eyes to three or four times their actual size. Above his eyes were a set of big blue bushy eye brows that noticeably bobbed up and down as he spoke.

"Look at it" Lisa said to no one in particular "This is probably now the most polluted river in the world." Actually she could think of one other river in particular she knew about that was also very dirty but at least fish still survived in the river Thames.

She felt sorry for all the fish in there that had to live through the torment people put them through. Even the ducks were having trouble finding food in the river.

A duck settled on the waters edge and dipped its head down to look for fish when a massive six eyed fish came up with its jaws held open and swallowed the duck in one gulp.

She sighed defeated. She couldn't be there to protest against the destruction of the dam, she had to be in school when it came she doubted if her actions would've had any effect. The rich always won out in this world and if they couldn't get their own way legally then they buy and bribe and manipulate their way through until they got what they want.

Large bits of wood floated by, all of them were rotting and covered in the green muck from the power plant.

She turned to look at Bart as he continued to poke the dead fish as if expecting it to transform into something else, or give one final gasp of life. Small things amused small minds she mused.

A strange piece of wood caught her eye as it floated down the bank. It was shorter then the other pieces of wood and wasn't covered in muck, it also had a strange shape which made it look more like a boat then a simple slab of wood. Beavers never used large pieces like that to build a dam it's usually smaller pieces and sticks which were easier to carry. But then again the Great Dam itself had been made from large logs.

She took a stick from a tree that was obviously dying from the pollution in the river and tried to hook the piece of wood and bring it closer to her. It was coming, it came to the bank and she knelt down to pick it up and brought it out of the water. Suddenly all around it several eyes opened and stared right at her. She yelped as she dropped the mutation back into the river and it swam away.

"Cool!" came Bart's voice as he fished something else out of the river. It was covered in gunk and slime but there was no mistaking what it was, a stick of dynamite. Lisa knew full well that a dynamite truck had exploded yesterday rather then the dam because of her fathers mixing up the dynamite sticks. Which meant those that were actually placed in the dam never exploded, and now Bart had hold of one.

"Bart!" Lisa cried "Put that back, its dynamite its dangerous."

"Cool" Bart said making sure to draw out the 'oo' in cool. "Forget cherry bombs Milhouse, we should put this down the school toilets."

"Bart, it's dangerous it could kill someone!" Lisa complained.

"Danger is our middle names" said Milhouse in a feeble attempt to sound cool and confident to impress Lisa. He always had a crush on her, though Lisa would like a boyfriend she admitted she wasn't that desperate.

"Why do you have to ruin everything that's good?" Bart said holding the stick up in the air, but in the next second it was gone.

"I'll take that!" said the voice of a chubby man, Bart spun around to see who it was that just took his new found dangerous possession. It was Police Chief Clancy Wiggum, a large man as fat as Homer only with a chubbier face. He also had a head of blue hair which was mostly hidden under the police cap on his head.

"You should know better, Bart" the chief knew Bart well, having to return him home in his squad car a couple of times. He smacked the stick in his hands as he said "This stuff can be highly dangerous and shouldn't be mishandled."

With that he started starching his back with it and sighing with relief. "Oh, oh! OH! OH MAN! that's better, I thought I'd never be able to get that damn itch"

Wiggum then took a closer look at the stick at both ends before sighing "No detonators," he said "It's pretty much harmless"

"Then can I have it back?" Bart said quickly.

"No can do boy, this baby may not have a detonator but these days you kids can find out stuff on the internet. You can figure out stuff like how to pick locks, how to illegally download video's and how to find out who the Stig is." He said banging the stick in his hands like it was a nightstick. "You kids might find out how to detonate it so it's safer if I put it back where it came from." With one great throw the stick landed back in the river with a 'splash.'

"Chief" Lisa said, "Shouldn't you take that stick to be detonated by the bomb squad or something?"

"Oh, little kids think they know everything" Wiggum said patronisingly ruffling Lisa's hair "Without a detonator it's safe"

BANG!

The stick had just inadvertently exploded sending a spray of water up into the air and now it rained down on all four of them.

To Be Continued...