The next morning, The sun began to rise and the warmth of summer streamed into the portholes of the airship hanging in the the sky over the sleepy little burg. Sportacus was sleeping peacefully, when Tara rolled over next to him and wrapped her arms around him. She rubbed his chest and down his abdomen, before kissing his shoulder and whispering,
"Hey Sportacus!" Sportacus snapped his eyes open and sprang up into a sitting position, only to find once again, he was alone and it had all been a dream. He sat in bed a moment, hanging his head in his hands,
"I can't stop thinking about her..." He looked to the clock, "And I overslept! What am I going to do?"
"What are we going to do about Sportacus? My mom told me that she saw him ran into a lamp post yesterday!" said Trixie as the Kids all sat in the park.
"I know! And some people have been seeing him tripping all over the place and looking positively silly!" said Stingy.
"And he's always trying to act like nothing happened and he goes on. Something's not right." Pixel said with a shake of his head. Sitting on the bench, Stephanie said,
"I know. But unless he asks for help I don't think we should interfere."
"Inter...Interfere? If friends see their friends acting weird, they step in before something is really wrong! That's what Sportacus would do!" Ziggy objected. Seeing the ladder bringing Sportacus down, Stephanie pointed and said,
"Look! There's Sportacus now!"
"He looks like he just flipped out of bed! Do you think he overslept?" asked Trixie.
"I think we should talk to Uncle Milford. He's at Miss Busybody's house hanging a painting." Stephanie said leading the way. They found the two adults in Miss Busybody's living room, with the Major holding up a colorful abstract painting. He kept moving a little back and forth as Miss Busybody scrutinized the placement and said,
"Noo...a little more to the right I think...no no! Too far! Now it's too far the other way!"
"Miss Busybody, I don't mean to sound impatient, but...we've been doing this for twenty eight minutes." interrupted the Mayor.
"Well Major I'm just trying to find the perfect spot so that when I show the painting to all of my friends they'll be green with envy!" laughed Bessie. The Mayor sighed,
"Very well then." Stephanie walked in followed by the other children and asked her uncle,
"Uncle Milford, Miss Busybody, can we talk to you for a minute?"
"Can it wait dear? We're busy with something." Bessie asked gently.
"No it can't. We're worried about Sportacus." Stephanie said.
"Sportacus! What's wrong? Did he accidentally have sugar and has lost his energy?" asked the Mayor in concern.
"No...but...he's been tripping and being very clumsy lately." Trixie said.
"Oh yes! I've noticed that too, Mayor!" said Bessie. Putting the painting down, the Mayor replied,
"Alright everyone, calm down. Now tell me everything from the beginning."
"Well I guess it all started yesterday when Tara moved in." said Pixel.
"Oh yes! Of course, Tara...who's Tara?" asked the Major.
"She's the artist who moved in down the street. Lovely girl!" Bessie told him.
"Yeah, we were all watching her move in and Sportacus was trying to get us to stop being nosy, when Tara pulled up on her motorcycle. Right after she took off her helmet, Sportacus fell out of the tree and into a bush!" Ziggy said excitingly.
"Really?" exclaimed the Mayor.
"Really..." said Bessie in curiosity.
"Yeah and when we introduced ourselves to Tara, Sportacus was all nervous and he was looking at Tara funny." Stingy said.
"Interesting...tell me children...Did Sportacus ask Tara if she was married?" said Bessie.
"Yeah! How did you know?" asked Stephanie as the other kids nodded.
"Yes...how did you know Miss Busybody?" asked the Mayor clueless. Bessie smiled,
"Just a hunch! Go on children."
"Well...then we all offered to help Tara, but Sportacus was busy so he said goodbye, but then he tripped over a wall!" said Pixel.
"At first we thought it was a joke, but everybody has been talking about how he keeps running into things and tripping." Trixie said.
"It's true Mr. Mayor. I saw it yesterday when Sportacus ran into a lamppost." said Bessie.
"My my my! I wonder what could be troubling the poor boy! I hope it's not another pair of remote control boots!" said the Mayor.
"Don't you know Uncle?" asked Stephanie.
"Well...uh...I...not really no..." muttered the Mayor. Bessie smiled,
"I think I do..."
"You do?" exclaimed the Mayor and the Kids. Bessie nodded,
"Call it...Woman's intuition...but I do believe Sportacus 10 is smitten with Tara Trueheart." The Mayor gasped and Ziggy asked,
"What's...smit-ten...mean?"
"Well...it's a feeling grownups get when they...like like...another person..." Milford looked to Bessie's face, "They think about that person all the time...how...nice they are...how...beautiful they are...how they leave a little peppermint stick in his coffee every morning before he starts off to run the city...ah...uh...hypothetically speaking of course." finished the Mayor flustered. Bessie nodded obliviously and declared,
"In other words children...Sportacus is falling in love!"
"LOVE!" chorused the Kids in shock. Watching through an open window through a pair of binoculars, Robbie Rotten exclaimed,
"LOVE! That big blue elf is in love?...BLECK! YECK! YUCKY! FOOEY!" Then a slow, evil grin spread onto Robbie's face, darkening it, "Perfect...I know just what to do...HA HA HA HA HA! I'M A GENIUS! Opp!" He recovered from his shouting, hoping no one heard him, before sneaking back down to his lair.
Tara went towards the mailbox, a rolled up letter in one hand, a booklet titled, "WELCOME TO LAZYTOWN! EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW BUT WERE AFRAID TO ASK". She skipped ahead of the chapters about the history of Lazytown and the Mayor's ten page life story to read the chapter 'WHEN YOU NEED A HERO'. She read aloud,
"When in the case of extreme emergency, Sportacus 10 will be alerted to your distress when his emblem crystal blinks...Cool beans...If however, on the occasion where you just need his help for matters of lesser importance, simply write him a quick note, place it in his special post shoot by the town mailbox, pull the lever and it will shoot up into the sky to his airship.' Sounds simple enough." She tucked the booklet under her arm and placed the letter in the capsule. She put the capsule in place and then pulled the lever, watching in awe as it shot up into the sky.
It went up, up, up to the airship where it popped up out of the floor of the ship. Seeing mail had come in, Sportacus twirled around twice on his overhead swing, did three back flips and then caught the letter with ease near his table.
"I got mail!" he proclaimed opening it. His face turned blank upon seeing who it was from, "From Tara!" he backed into a chair and accidentally sat down, "...Whoa...sigh...now I'm even being a klutz in my own ship...Well...I don't care! Tara asked for my help and she will certainly get it!" And with that, he tossed the letter aside and jumped up into the air, twirling 360 degrees to where the crank for the fins was, turned it, and then doing three front flips, he landed in his console. He began to pedal towards Tara's house with lightning speed.
Down on the ground, Tara was applying makeup and brushing her hair really quick in front of her entrance way vanity, praying that she could use this opportunity to it's fullest. Back up in the air, Sportacus slowed the airship above Tara's house and then flipped out of his seat yelling,
"Sky chaser!" A pod-like device with pedals dropped from the bottom of the airship as Sportacus yelled out again,
"Door!" A door opened up and lowered itself on the side of the ship as with three more leaps and flips Sportacus jumped off the door like a diving board and did a short free fall until he caught up with the Sky chaser and started to pedal down to the ground. Tara peeked out the window and smiled seeing the superhero coming in for a landing. She went back to the mirror and adjusted her chest a little just as Sportacus landed, somersaulting his way over to the front door and ringing the doorbell. Tara picked up a bottle of perfume and sprayed behind her neck and wrists and once down her shirt front for good measure, before tucking the bottle behind her back and opening the door with a friendly smile,
"Sportacus! Hi. I'm glad you could come!" Sportacus hesitated but for a second before smiling and replying,
"No problem. I'm always happy to help!"
"Won't you come in?" she asked stepping aside. Sportacus ducked his head to let himself in the door, allowing Tara to reflect on how wonderfully tall he was. Sportacus took the moment to look around her house and release a nervous breath he was holding as Tara continued, "I hope I'm not asking too much to just have you move around my furniture. But movers are never patient enough to wait for a woman to make up her mind!"
"Oh no I completely understand. So...where should we start?" asked Sportacus. Going over to a red club chair, Tara said as she began to pick up one end,
"Well I'd like this chair to go over in that corner by the win..." She was interrupted by Sportacus lifting the chair out of her arms with ease and holding it up with only one hand, "...dow..." She finished amazed at his strength. Sportacus pointed and asked,
"Over there?" Tara nodded meekly as Sportacus walked across the room to put the chair down. I may like him because he's cute...I may want to date him because he's helpful...but man give me two minutes alone with that body of his! Tara thought to herself wickedly. Then with a sly grin she realized she had more than two minutes.