Bob, Hobbes, Socrates, Galaxoid, Nebular, Andy, and Sherman ran up the stairs to the dungeons.

When they came to Calvin's cell, they, oops…alien.

That is, everybody screeched to a stop in front of the grinning stupid alien. His name was Dave.

"This area's restricted!" he said, trying to sound smart. "No admit…"

He stopped, and his eyes blanked out.

"No admit……admiter, admitty, admatter…uhh…"

"Admittance?" Hobbes asked.

Dave's face burst into grin.

"Yeah! That's it! No adimty-once allowed!"

"Yeah, but," Galaxoid began, "Calvin's in there, we're not, and we're supposed to be saving the kid."

"NOBODY IS ALLOWED!" Dave yelled. "I'm not even allowed in! If you can believe that!"

"Actually, I'm not having a hard time doing so," Socrates said.

"But if ya like," Dave said, "we can sit around here and play cards! Who likes Go Fish!"

There was a long throbbing moment of silence.

Everybody stared at Dave, the little simpleton.

Andy and Sherman exchanged glances.

Bob rolled his eyes. He wasn't scared of the aliens anymore, but he was sure as heck annoyed.

"You have got to be kidding me," Hobbes sighed.

Suddenly, Socrates' eyes burst open, and a grin spread across his face.

He grabbed the hypercube away from Hobbes, and started rooting through it.

He whipped out a……hmmm……a vacuum cleaner.

Dave stared.

"What's that?" he asked.

"A special bathing device," Socrates replied. "It's specially designed to suck the dirt off of you! Wanna play?"

Dave rolled his compound eyes around.

"Well, I'll need to think about…YES!"

Dave grabbed the vacuum and looked at the nozzle.

"How do you turn it on?" he asked, sticking the nozzle on his head.

"Like this."

Socrates stepped on the ON button, and with a loud WHIR, Dave was sucked up into the canister.

"Wow!" he screamed from inside. "That was TWICE as much fun as you said it would be."

"Well, I try," Socrates replied, and he walked away.

"ALRIGHT!" Hobbes said. "Good work, Socrates!"

"Yup," Socrates said. "I'm going to have to keep a list of all this stuff I'm going to have to try on Calvin."

With Dave taken care of, everyone burst into the cell room.

Well, let's say that Hobbes, Socrates, Bob, Galaxoid, Nebular and Andy burst in. It was impossible for Sherman to burst in. It was impossible for him to come in at all without Andy's hand.

Calvin glared at them.

"Well, it's about time! I've been waiting a full one minute! Who has that kind of time? Get me out of here!"

"Calvin! You're alive!" Socrates yelled, throwing his arms outward. "And you're as cheerful as ever!"

Hobbes walked over to the steel bars.

"Are there any keys?" he asked.

"Of course, you furball! If there weren't nobody could've locked me in!"

There was a moment of silence.

"So where's the key?" Socrates asked.

"What, did you expect Rupert to tell me?" Calvin screamed.

"Well, usually the prisoner knows where the key is!" Socrates spat.

"Oh, well excuse me for originality!" Calvin shot.

"Well if we can't get you out, we might as well just leave you there!" Socrates yelled.

"Are you enjoying your conversation?" Hobbes asked.

"Actually, yes we are," Calvin said.

Hobbes rolled his eyes, and held up his claws.

He stuck his claw into the lock and moved it around for a few seconds. Then, there was a click, and the door opened.

Calvin walked out.

"Hobbes, this has been a running gag in our adventures for a while now," he said. "Would you just explain to the good people how you do that?"

"Fine, fine. See the edge this claw?"

Everyone looked at the claw Hobbes had used.

"Hey, there are little notches on the end," said Andy.

"Right, they act like a key," said Hobbes.

"Well, thanks for solving that mystery," said Sherman.

"OK," Calvin said, taking out a notepad. He licked his finger, and turned the page. "This is the twenty-seventh time I've escaped and caused Rupert and Retro to loose much patience, sanity, and mouth foam."

"What do we do now?" Hobbes asked.

"Well, I've been going to the space jets," Calvin said.

"Yeah, that's gotten you far," Socrates said, rolling his eyes.

At that very moment, and at the worst of times, Rupert, Earl, Retro, and the entire alien crew all came into the dungeon.

They stared at Hobbes, Socrates, Galaxoid, Nebular, Andy and Sherman. They stared at Calvin. They stared at Bob.

There was a long moment of silence.

"Well, this wasn't expected," Socrates said.

"Bob?" Retro asked calmly.

"Yes, sir?"

"Were you helping him escape?"

"Well, not as much as I could be," Bob said.

"What do you mean by that?"

"Uhhh…"

"ARE YOU HELPING THEM!" Rupert, Earl, and Retro screamed.

"Yes," Bob said timidly.

"How can you do that!" Earl demanded. "You're supposed to be a villain sidekick! And you're scared of a fly! Why, if Calvin had done as much as given you the slightest threat then you'd turn over to the nabby-paddy goody-goody side!"

Rupert, Earl, and Retro exchanged glances.

"Oh for crying out loud," muttered Retro. "I knew I should've chosen the big guy with the beard."

"YES, SIR!" Calvin announced suddenly. "Mr. Bob has turned to the side of justice and truth!"

"Cal-vin!" Hobbes muttered. "Shut u-u-u-u-p."

Calvin went on, as if he hadn't heard Hobbes. "And soon, you'll all join the side of righteous so forth!"

"Ca-a-a-a-a-a-a-alvin," Socrates whispered. "Shut it!"

"The side of tranquitery and all that other nonsense."

"CALVIN!" Hobbes hissed. "Shut up!"

"And furthermore, your mothers were all a bunch of ugly toads! So there!"

There was a long moment of silence.

All eyes stared at Calvin.

Calvin gave everyone a tough grin.

"So what do you have to say about that?"

"What are we going to do with him?" Retro asked, scratching his head. "He is driving me insane."

Retro, Earl, and Rupert glared down at Calvin with terrible anger.

Suddenly, a wide evil grin spread across Rupert's face.

"I have an idea," he said darkly.

"That doesn't sound promising," Hobbes said.

"What is it?" Retro asked.

"It's a custom on our planet that whenever a planet leader is captured, we gather together deadly space monsters and set them out to eat them."

"Of course, the janitors hate it," Earl said. "But we don't really care about that."

Calvin gave Rupert and Earl triumphant grins.

"DO YOUR WORST!" he screamed. "WE BEAT YOUR STUPID SPACE MONSTERS LAST TIME, AND WE CAN DO IT, AGAIN! SO HA!"

Hobbes, Socrates, Andy, Sherman, Bob, Galaxoid, and Nebular all slapped their foreheads. This kid was going to get them all removed from the planet. Not in a good way.

Rupert gave Calvin a sweet smile.

"Oh, I plan on doing my worst, Calvin," he said. "This time, I will show you no mercy."

"He never really did in the first place," Zack the alien whispered.

"Shut up," Earl spat.


And so, they landed their spaceship on Zok and went over to The Torture Place on the other side of their town.

"Welcome to the Torture Place," a dull voiced alien muttered, staring at the people in front of him with bored eyes. "Today's special is The Complete First and Second Seasons of The Backyardigans on VVV. Also see our new release in Space Monsters: the Vacation Slider. Guaranteed to show you the slides from his vacation over and over and over and over."

Calvin and Hobbes exchanged glances.

"We want to see the Space Monsters," Retro said.

"For best service, please take a number."

"What?" Retro demanded. "There's nobody else in this store!"

"Please take a number," the alien said.

Retro grumbled, and ripped a piece of paper off of the slide.

He stared at it.

"What is it?" Jay asked.

"5,849,596," Retro read.

"Number four?" the alien asked. "Calling number four. Last call for number four. Number five? Calling number five. Last call for number five. Number six?"

"This could take some time," Calvin said. "I wish I had brought my comic book."

Many hours went by.

Then, some time the next day, the alien finally called, "Number 5,849,596? Calling number 5,849,596."

Retro, Earl and Rupert's eyes popped open. Calvin, Hobbes, Andy, Sherman, Socrates, Bob, Galaxoid and Nebular stopped playing cards. Earl's crew…well, didn't do much of anything, actually. They weren't paying attention.

"Last call for number 5,849,596," the alien said.

"We're 5,849,596!" Rupert screamed, rushing up to the desk.

"Welcome to the Torture Place," the alien said. "Here, you are Doctor Frankenstein, and I'm Igor."

"Looks like Igor, too," Calvin commented.

"How may I torture your buddies, here?" the alien asked.

"We're looking for Space Monsters," Rupert said. "Deadly ones! Ones that have a taste for humans, tigers, aliens without arms, and rats."

"HAMSTERS!" Sherman screamed.

"Please follow me to the Space Monster cages," the alien manager said, with no change in tone or expression.

He lead the aliens, Retro, Bob, Calvin, Hobbes, Socrates, Andy, Sherman and so on into a long hallway with glass chambers on the walls.

"What can I interest you in today?" he asked.

Rupert handed Retro a list of names.

Retro stared at them, then read them down.

"We need some Spacers, Tornaduses, and Clawracks," he said, having no idea what any of these things were.

"Certainly," the alien said. "That'll be four sandlumbs, please."

Earl handed the manager a couple of yellow dollar bills.

"We will have your order ready in a moment. Please wait."

The alien walked off.

"We have to battle giant aliens for our freedom?" asked Andy.

"That sure as heck won't be a children's fable anytime soon," said Socrates.

Calvin turned to Zack the alien.

"What're Tornaduses?" he asked.

Zack stared at Calvin.

"I'll take weird creature for 500, please," he said finally.

Calvin's eyes rolled into the back of his head.


Soon, everyone, good and bad, stood in the middle of the arena.

"IN THIS CORNER," shouted the alien announcer, "PLAYING FOR PLANET EETHA…WE GIVE YOU HIPPS, THE SECOND-IN-COMAND POTENTATE! SOCKS, THE PRANK-KING! ANDREW, THE QUIET ONE! SHARON, THE GENIUS RAT! AND GALAXY AND NEPTUNE, THE LIMBLESS ALIEN PILOTS!"

Everyone looked over at Calvin and Hobbes.

"Don't bother correcting him," said Calvin. "He's either being funny, or he can't read."

"Yeah, and he has to yell everything too," said Hobbes.

"Hey, wait!" said Bob. "Why didn't he mention me and Calvin?"

"Oh, that's quite simple," said Rupert slyly.

Suddenly, several tentacles from the aliens shot out and grabbed Calvin and Bob.

"Hey!" shouted Calvin. "What gives!"

Calvin and Bob were immediately tossed into a cage.

"Let me outta here!" Calvin demanded. "I'm supposed to be out there where the action is! Not trapped in here with an adult crybaby."

"You're one to talk, Mr. Loudmouth," Bob retorted.

Rupert then noticed Hobbes was still holding Calvin's hypercube. He snatched it.

"I'll take that!"

"Hey!" shouted Hobbes.

"Sorry, but in this game, there is a rule: you can't use anything created by the Earth leader."

"I'M NOT THE EARTH LEADER!" Calvin shouted.

Earl sighed. "You'd think he'd give up by now, huh?" he grinned at Retro.

Retro chuckled nervously, and decided not to pay attention.

Rupert turned around.

"Earl, keep an eye on this," he said. "Make sure no one but either you or Retro touches it."

"You bet, boss," said Earl, and he was about to hide when Retro noticed it.

"You know, I'm hungry, and I haven't had any Earth food in ages. Mind if I have see if he packed snacks in there?" he asked.

"Yeah, go ahead."

Earl gave Retro the hypercube, and Retro started to root around for something to eat.

Just then, Jack the alien came rushing over.

"Ooh! Ooh! When I was on Earth, I had something called a hot dog! See if there's any in there?" Jack shouted.

Retro stared at him, and then he began to start rooting the hypercube until he managed to find some hot dogs and hand them to Jack.

"Thank yew!" Jack said, and he took the food away.

Rupert ignored them.


Hobbes, Socrates, Andy, Sherman, Galaxoid and Nebular all stood in the arena.

Socrates was holding a piece of paper.

"…and I'll leave my Atomic Soaker to you, Andy. May you soak everyone from up to fifteen feet away with fairness."

"Whatever," sighed Andy.

Hobbes spotted the Alien Janitor.

"Hey, Mr. Mop, what's up?" he asked.

"I hate this tradition," grunted the janitor. "Me and all the other janitors hate cleaning up after those monsters. And they got the worst kinds."

"What did they get?" asked Hobbes. "Are they anything like the last monster we fought?"

Janitor took out a sheet of paper.

"Actually, you've got three different kinds of monsters on here," he said.

"Can I see that?" Hobbes asked.

"Go ahead. All I can do is watch helplessly as you and your pals are torn to pieces."

Hobbes gulped as he took the piece of paper.

"Okay, gang. This is what we're up against: Spacers, Tornaduses, and Clawracks."

"What do they do?" asked Andy.

"It doesn't say."

"We know," said Nebular.

"Right," said Galaxoid. "Spacers are flying things that eat all the time. They would be able to suck anything into their mouths, and gobble it down."

"Tornaduses," added Nebular, "are things that if they twirl around, they can make tornados. And they could be able to do some kind of sonic scream to stun its prey."

"Clawracks would be creatures that can run EXTREMELY fast, and extend three inch long talons out of their fingers," finished Galaxoid.

"Do you know if they have any weaknesses?" asked Socrates.

"I'm afraid we don't," said Galaxoid. "We're on our own."

Suddenly, they heard a lot of loud stomping.

Everyone's eyes shifted towards the other end of the arena.

The Spacers had two legs, and gigantic round black bodies.

The Tornaduses had two very long legs, and their bodies were shaped like funnels. Their mouths were extremely large.

The Clawracks were the most frightening. They were brownish and had black eyes. They had giant feet that sprouted out from a basketball shaped body, and had long sharp claws.

"Whoa…," said Calvin.

"LET THE TOURNAMENT BEGIN!" shouted the announcer.

Hobbes glanced back up at Calvin.

"Friends to the end?" Calvin asked.

Hobbes grinned.

"You better believe it," he said proudly.