In the home of Mr. and Mrs. Krantz, Binky and Sue Ellen gripped each other's hands tenderly as they watched a TV broadcast of the movie To Kill a Mockingbird.
"Jem! Dill!" said Scout to her young friends. "There's an angry mob gathering at the courthouse. Let's hurry on over there and see what happens!"
As he watched the three children race down the streets of Depression-era Macon, Georgia, Binky shook his head incredulously. "I can't believe how much freedom those kids have," he remarked.
"Yeah," added Sue Ellen. "If I was their mom, I wouldn't let them run halfway across town in the middle of the night to watch a lynching, at least not alone."
They heard the kitchen phone ring. "Are you gonna answer that?" asked Binky.
"Naw," replied the cat girl. "I have adoptive parents to do that for me." And gosh knows where my real parents are now, she thought bitterly. In the other reality we were all together, and I had everything I could want—good food, nice clothes, a hot boyfriend, and a planet to rule. I'd give anything to go back there.
Mrs. Krantz stepped hurriedly into the den, clutching a cordless receiver in her hand. "Sue Ellen? Binky?" she called out urgently.
"For the last time, it's just Sue, Mom," complained Sue.
"It's Muffy," the moose woman informed them. "She was coming back from a trip to Crown City, and somebody tried to run her off the road."
Binky's hair stood on end. Sue's curls straightened a little.
"Omigosh, are you serious?" said Binky in disbelief.
"Are you serious?" said Mrs. Krantz into the phone. "Yes, she's serious," she reported to Sue and Binky.
"This I've got to hear about," said Sue, rising to her feet. "Mom, Binky and I are going to Muffy's place in the dark without reflective clothing or adult supervision."
"That's fine, dear," said Mrs. Krantz. "Just be back by morning, okaaaay?"
Muffy, still defiantly wearing her optical fiber dress, made call after call on her mobile phone, inviting friends to listen to her harrowing tale. "I know I've been a snot lately, but it would sure be nice to have you visit, Francine," she said.
"I wish I could," the other girl replied, "but I have to help my mom and dad fix a hole in the ceiling, before our upstairs neighbors come home and fall through it."
"Sounds like a pretty big hole," said Muffy. "What happened?"
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you," was Francine's response.
After hanging up, Muffy used her phone's speed-dial feature to contact her one-time classmate, Mavis Cutler. After a few rings she heard a weak, bashful girl's voice utter, "Hello?"
"Mavis, it's me, Muffy," she said eagerly. "I know we haven't talked in a while, but something totally scary happened to me today, and if you come over, I'll tell you all about it."
There was a short silence on the line. "I…I'm sorry, Muffy," said Mavis in a tone apparently devoid of hope. "I can't come."
"You can't?" said Muffy curiously. "Why not?"
"I just can't," was all Mavis could reply. "Goodbye, Muffy."
A few beeps signaled the end of the call. She sounds miserable, thought Muffy. Maybe there was a death in her family. I'll follow up on it later. Hey…I've got voice mail!
She hastily pressed a button to bring up her messages. A menacing and very familiar voice said to her, "Is your dress worth more to you than your life?"
Chilled to the bone, she exclaimed, "Who are you?"
"End of message," uttered the ever-helpful female computer voice.
Muffy felt tendrils of pure fear grasping at her insides, and fought the urge to hurl the phone away from her. "Daddy! Daddy!" she almost screamed.
Seconds later Mr. Crosswire rushed in, wearing a green sweater. "What's wrong, Muffin?" he inquired.
"He called me again!" cried the nearly-hysterical monkey girl. "It was the same man…the man who was driving the other car! He asked me if my dress is worth more than my life!"
She noticed a slight pallor in her father's visage, followed soon after by an angry redness. "That bastard," he grumbled, mostly to himself. "Nobody threatens my little girl. I'll show him what his life's worth!"
Muffy briefly probed her cell phone's many buttons. "Daddy, how do I delete the message without having to listen to it again?" she asked earnestly. "Or do I have to get a new phone?" Mr. Crosswire, pacing about and cursing quietly, seemed to not hear her query.
Shortly her friends began to file in—first George, then Sue and Binky, with Beat, Arthur, and D.W. coming close behind. The Crosswire condo turned into a buzzing hive of questions: "What did the driver look like?" "How much will it cost to fix Bailey's car?" "How fast was he going?" "What do you think will happen on Heroes?"
"I'm just happy to still be alive," said Muffy to her companions. "This near-death drama has helped me to better appreciate the simple things in my life, like…er, ah…my hair, and stuff."
"We're glad you're alive too," said Beat. "However, I suggest you seriously ponder the question of whether keeping your space dress is worth the danger to your life."
Muffy glared peevishly at the rabbit-aardvark girl. "What would you have me do, hand it over to that awful Mr. Gelt? I'd rather die! Painlessly."
"Whatever you do, don't let it fall into his hands," George warned her. "There can be one reason, and one reason alone, why he wants the dress so badly—so he can make copies of it, and sell them to all the girls in America, and secretly record their shopping habits through electronic means. With that knowledge at his disposal, there'll be nothing to stop him from seizing control of the world's economy!"
"Oh, puh-leeze," said Sue mockingly. "You are such a nerd, George. Do you mind if I call you Nerdgren from now on?"
The moose boy shrugged. "Sure, go ahead."
Beat stared in shock at the cat girl. "What's happened to you?" she asked. "Ever since you got together with Binky, you've been so disagreeable…so rude."
Sue only smirked at her. "Well, she's not herself," Binky explained. "In fact, she's an anti-Sue from a parallel universe where the Yordilians conquered Earth—that's what she told me, anyway."
"Cool," said D.W. with a grin. "Can we call her Auntie Sue?"
In another room, Mr. Crosswire pulled off his sweater and lowered himself onto the king-size mattress where his wife lay, waiting for her hair to dry. Looking up from the romance novel in her hands, she inquired, "How are you doing, Ed?"
He shook his head dolefully. "As well as might be expected," he answered, "seeing that my daughter's respect for me is built on a web of deceit."
To be continued