Out on the open road, SpongeBob and Patrick were speeding along the highway.

"Come on, Pat. One more time," said SpongeBob.

Patrick stood up and started to imitate the bartender from the Thug Tug.

"We're on a bubble-blower hunt, and don't think we don't know how to weed 'em out."

SpongeBob and Patrick both started hysterically laughing. Meanwhile the scenery around them began to change. They were passing piles of skulls and bones, but neither noticed.

"Weed 'em out!" cried SpongeBob.

"What a jerk!" yelled Patrick.

"How about when he was all like, 'Well, looks like we've got ourselves a double bubble-blowing baby,'" said SpongeBob.

"And the were like, 'It wasn't us! It wasn't us!'" added Patrick.

They continued to laugh and laugh until the car started to shake violently.

SpongeBob stopped laughing. "The road's getting kind of bumpy here."

They made it over the bumpy bones and were back on a smooth road.

"You know, SpongeBob," said Patrick, "there's a lesson to be learned from all this."

"What's that, Patrick?"

"A double bubble-blowing baby doesn't belong out here...in man's country."

"Yeah...wait!" cried SpongeBob. "We blew that bubble. Doesn't that make us the double bubble-blowing baby?"

They both stared off in the distance, as if they were contemplating what SpongeBob had just said, when Patrick spotted an ice-cream stand.

"Look!" cried Patrick. "Free ice cream!"

SpongeBob turned off the main road and pulled up next to the ice-cream stand.

"Oh, boy!" exclaimed SpongeBob. He jumped out of the car and into a pile of bones and kept walking toward the ice cream.

Patrick looked around at the pile of bones. "Wait a minute...Wait a minute!" cried Patrick. "SpongeBob!"

"What?"

"Make mine a chocolate!" said Patrick.

SpongeBob approached the old lady in the ice-cream stand.

"Two, please."

"Certainly," she said.

A few minutes later the old woman handed them two big sloppy sundaes.

"You kids enjoy," she told them.

"We're men, lady, but thanks," said SpongeBob. Then he turned to Patrick. "Okay, let's go - hey!"

SpongeBob tried to leave the ice-cream hut, but the old lady wouldn't let go of his ice cream! SpongeBob began to tug and pull, but he was stuck as if his hands were glued there.

Suddenly the ground began to rumble.

SpongeBob struggled to get away, even as the walls of the ice-cream stand fell. The old lady started to look less and less like an old lady.

"What kind of old lady are you?" cried SpongeBob.

Just then her wig and glasses fell off. And SpongeBob felt himself being lifted off the ground.

"Ewwwwwww!" he screamed.

Snapping fangs and two bulging eyes broke out of the ground - followed by a monstrous Frog Fish. The "old lady" was just part of the monster's tongue! This was a trap!

"AAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHH!" screamed SpongeBob.

Finally he let go of the ice cream.

SpongeBob bounced off a fang and fell into the Patty Wagon. Luckily, Patrick backed up just in time.

"Did you get the ice cream?" asked Patrick.

"Step on it, Patrick!" SpongeBob yelled.

Steel-belted pickles spun in the dirt, and the Patty Wagon raced away. SpongeBob, clinging to the dashboard (the Wagon was a convertible - no roof), looked over his shoulder.

The Frog Fish was gaining on them! SpongeBob let out a bloodcurdling scream,

"AAAAAAGGGGGGHHHHHH!"

The hungry, fanged mouth was about to swallow the Patty Wagon! The old lady popped out of the monster's mouth.

"Come on, kiddies," she cackled. "Have some ice cream."

Patrick and SpongeBob screamed some more.

"I'll let you pet Mr. Whiskers," the old lady said.

A little phony cat poked out of the Frog Fish's mouth and meowed.

"Jump for it, Patrick!" SpongeBob cried.

They both leaped from the Patty Wagon - just as it flew over the edge of a cliff. The jaws of the Frog Fish snapped shut, swallowing the Patty Wagon. The monster smiled and made a yummy noise.

Suddenly the Frog Fish realized it had leaped out over the deep trench - with nothing to hold it up.

And then things got even worse for the Frog Fish.

SpongeBob and Patrick watched as a humongous leaping serpent hopped out of the trench and swallowed the Frog Fish whole, like it was a tiny gold fish.

SpongeBob and Patrick just stood there staring into the abyss.

"Well, we lost our car again," said SpongeBob.

"Never mind the car," said Patrick. "Where is the road?"

Patrick's voice echoed across the trench. "Road...road...road...road..."

"There's the road," said SpongeBob, "on the other side of this deep, dark, dangerous, monster-infested trench."

A nasty roar floated up from below.

"Hey, SpongeBob, look!" said Patrick. "I found the way down."

Patrick began to step onto the stairs that went right down into the trench.

Patrick looked into the darkness. More growls and snarls rose from the pit.

"Well," said Patrick, trying to sound cheerful, "we're not gonna get the crown standing here. On to Shell City, right, SpongeBob?"

But SpongeBob had turned around. With his shoulders slumped, and a frown on his face, he was walking away.

"SpongeBob?" cried Patrick. "Hey, where are you going?"

"I'm going home, Patrick."

Patrick was surprised. "But what about Mr. Krabs?"

"What about us?" said SpongeBob. "We'll never survive in that trench. We're just...kids."

"We're not kids," insisted Patrick.

"Open your eyes, Patrick!" SpongeBob cried. "We blow bubbles. We eat ice cream! We worship a dancing peanut, for cripe's sake! We don't belong out here!"

"We do not worship him," said Patrick.

SpongeBob pulled down Patrick's shorts. The starfish was wearing Goofy Goober undies.

"Patrick," SpongeBob said sternly, "you have been wearing the same Goofy Goober Peanut Party underpants for three years straight. What do you call that?"

"Worship!" Patrick sobbed, shorts still down around his ankles. "You're right, SpongeBob. We are kids."

Patrick tried to run home, but he tripped over his shorts.

"Pull your pants up, Patrick," SpongeBob told him. "We're going home."

"But you can't go home," said a familiar voice.

Patrick looked up and saw-

"Mindy!"

He struggled to pull up his pants, but it didn't work. They just fell down again.

"How much did you hear?" asked SpongeBob.

"I head enough," replied Mindy.

"Did you see my underwear?" Patrick asked as he prepared to pull up his pants again.

"Look, you guys. You may be kids, but you're the only ones left who can get that crown," said Mindy.

"What are you talking about?" asked SpongeBob.

"Things have gotten a lot worse since you left Bikini Bottom," Mindy said as she opened a clam-shaped mirror that doubled as a spy camera. "Or should I say...Planktopolis!"

She showed them in her mirror what had become of their hometown. Plankton laughed diabolically as he forced a whole bucket-headed army of mind-numbed slaves to build a huge monument in his honor.

"Work harder! Work harder!" Plankton cried, snapping a whip.

SpongeBob watched this scene in horror.

"Oh, my gosh, it's true!" cried SpongeBob. "Everyone I know is a slave!

"Mrs. Puff! Squidward!" he cried.

The he gasped. "Gary!"

"Meow Plankton," murmured Gary.

"Why doesn't King Neptune stop this?" SpongeBob asked.

Mindy sighed. "My father is too distracted by his bald spot to help anyone."

She closed her compact and faced them. "So you see, you guys have got to get to Shell City. The entire fate of Bikini Bottom rests in your hands."

SpongeBob pleaded, "But...but we're just-"

"Hey, it doesn't matter if you're kids. And what's so wrong with being a kid, anyway? Kids rule! You don't need to be a man to do this. You just gotta believe in yourself!" cried Mindy.

"I believe-," cried SpongeBob, throwing his fist in the air.

"That's the spirit!" exclaimed Mindy.

"I believe that Mr. Krabs is a gonerrrrrrrrr!" finished SpongeBob as he burst into tears.

Patrick started crying too. "And don't forget our homeland," he added, sniffling.

"Come on, guys," said Mindy.

But SpongeBob and Patrick were inconsolable. They both collapsed to the ground in hysterics.

*S*S*

Meanwhile, back at the Thug Tug, a motorcycle pulled up with a roar and a cloud of sand. Sitting in the saddle was Dennis, the really big scary dude.

He scanned the area, looking for clues, and he found one: The remnants of popped bubbles were lying in the parking lot.

"Hmmm," he grunted, "looks like they left this here." He picked up the bottle and blew a bubble.

"Hey," yelled Victor from the Thug Tug's doorway, "you may not know it, cowboy, but we've got a rule around here about blowing bubbles."

Victor snapped his fingers and a dozen thug fish appeared. Every one of them was spoiling for a fight.

The thugs surrounded Dennis, and Victor walked right up to him. "The rules say that all bubble blowers will be punished."

But Dennis picked up Victor and sent him flying all the way back to the Thug Tug.

Dennis tipped his cowboy hat and sped away on his motorcycle, hot on SpongeBob's trail.

*S*S*

By this time SpongeBob and Patrick were cradling each other - and still crying. Mindy watched them cry, unsure what to do.

"Oh, boy. Hmmm...Think, Mindy, think," she mumbled to herself.

Finally an idea came to mind. "Well, I guess you're right. A couple of kids could never survive this journey," she said.

SpongeBob and Patrick just looked at each other and started crying again.

"That's why I'll just have to turn you into men," said Mindy.

Suddenly smiles spread across their faces, and the boys stopped crying and began jumping up and down.

"You can do that? How?" asked SpongeBob.

"With my mermaid magic," said Mindy.

"Did you hear that, Pat?" SpongeBob said, excited. "She'll use her mermaid magic to turn us into men!"

"Hooray!" cried SpongeBob and Patrick. "We're going to be men! We're going to be men!"

"Now, let's get started," said Mindy. "Close your eyes."

They did.

"Are we men yet?" asked SpongeBob impatiently.

"Not yet," said Mindy as she gathered some seaweed strands.

"What do we do, Mindy?" asked Patrick.

"Ummm...spin around three times," she instructed.

They did.

"I think it's working," said SpongeBob.

"Good...now keep your eyes shut."

As she talked she bundled the seaweed together.

"The mermaid's magic," said Mindy. "With my one tail fin, I command the two of you to turn into men."

She placed a bundle of seaweed on SpongeBob's face, then on Patrick's. The seaweed looked just like bushy mustaches.

"Open your eyes!" she told them.

They did.

"Goodness gracious, Patrick!" cried SpongeBob, pointing to Patrick's face. "You have a mustache!"

"So do you!" said Patrick.

They marveled at their new mustaches!

"Okay," said Mindy, snapping them back to reality. "Now that you're men, can you make it to Shell City?"

But SpongeBob and Patrick were still in mustache heaven.

"Guys!" she called.

"Eh?" said SpongeBob, still twirling his mustache.

"I said, now that you're men, can you make it to Shell City?"

"Heck year," SpongeBob told her.

"And are men afraid of anything?" asked Mindy.

"Heck no!" cried SpongeBob and Patrick.

"And why is that?" she asked.

SpongeBob and Patrick pumped their fists in the air. "Because we're invincible!" they shouted.

Then SpongeBob and Patrick raced to the cliff's edge and jumped!

"I never said that!" Mindy cried.

But it was too late.

She ran to the trench and looked in. They'd already been swallowed up by the darkness. But she could hear them cheering all the way down.