Otis and Olympia stood under an umbrella in the afternoon's light drizzle on the doorstep of a small suburban home. They rang the doorbell again. No answer.

"So..." Otis considered. "We're sure this is where this... comic book drawer..."

"They prefer artist," Olympia corrected.

"We all do. Is this where this 'Bobby McCall' person lives?"

Olympia checked the data on her smartwatch. "This is the address we have..."

He rang the doorbell yet again. Still no answer.

"Maybe he's not home," Olympia suggested. "Or maybe he's..."

"HAH!" cried a voice from behind them.

The two agents turned to find an exotic-looking woman with a topknot, a cloak, a steel bikini, a tattoo, and a malicious gleam in her eye standing on the front lawn. A neighbor lady walking her dog looked over, sighed, rolled her eyes, and continued on her way.

"So! This is the fearsome Odd Squad!" the warrior woman sneered. "Children! Babes! Mere infants! Nothing against the might of... Barbarianette!"

Drawing a sword from a scabbard hanging loosely on her hip, she advanced on a bewildered Otis and Olympia. Pausing, she waved her blade back and forth as if trying to decide which one to attack first.

"Fah! I shall decapitate thee both with one stroke of my sword like a cookmaid beheading a chicken! I shall... YAAH!"

She tripped and fell, her sword slipping out of her hand. Olympia ran down and grabbed it while Otis warily approached her, trying to help her up.

"What strange witchcraft is this?" the woman spat, brushing Otis away and attempting to get to her feet. She flopped back over again. "I cannot stand up! What have you two little goblins done to me?"

Olympia looked at her feet. "Um, you're wearing stiletto-heeled go-go boots."

Barbarianette made another attempt to get up. Her ankle twisted and she fell again. Otis offered her his arm again. Again, she brushed it away.

"Look," Olympia explained. "It's raining. The ground's wet and slippery. Trying to walk in boots like that..."

Barbarianette sniffed. "I have always been sure of foot before! This is..."

She slipped and belly-flopped on the ground.

"You're not inside a comic book being drawn by some creepy guy with a kinky boot fetish!" Olympia tried to explain. "You're in the real world! Physical laws apply!"

Barbarianette stared up at them, grinding her teeth. "You shall pay for this!" She managed to get to a kneeling position. "I shall grind your splintered skulls beneath my heel when I... Ohhh!"

Her foot slipped again.

"Yeah..." Olympia nodded. "Yeah. Definitely some guy with a fetish..."

Otis sighed. "Are you sure this book is for KIDS?"

"Used to be," Olympia sighed. "Call Owen and have him send someone to pick her up." She watched Barbarianette flop over again. "Literally. I'll go check on Mister McCall!"

Dragging the sword behind her, she opened the unlocked front door and went in the house.

#

A universe away, the Odd Squad Mobile Unit plus Otto, Olive, and The Little O were riding through the skies in a flying transparent pirate ship with the superheroes of The Shmumber Squad: Shmumberman, Shmumbermaid, Shmumbra, Doctor Darkendire, The Bullet, Quetzal, and The Green Shmumber. They were struggling to explain the situation to the last two heroes listed, who'd just joined them on their mission. Doctor Darkendire stood in the shadows drawing his cloak around himself while the others talked.

"So... In your universe, we're all... comic book heroes?" Quetzal pondered. "That's rather hard to believe..."

"Look, you got costumes, you have powers, you fight villains..." Omar pointed out. "What else would you be?"

"Odd Squad agents?" Osmerelda grinned mischievously.

"I know it sounds crazy, but it's true!" Otto added. "We've visited your world before!"

"Aye!" Shmumberman nodded. "And I was in theirs! A strange, uncanny place but it had its charms..."

"Wait!" The Green Shmumber looked at them. "This... Other Earth..." He looked over their outfits. "You're allied with the heroine 'Ms. O', aren't you?"

"She's The Big O now, but yeah!" Little O said. "She spends her vacation over here sometimes fighting evildoers."

Green Shmumber pondered. "I always wondered where she came from..."

"I always wondered how she could fly over here," Otto pondered. "She said it was just something she picked up."

He looked around, smiling.

"Hey, I wonder if WE can..."

He went running toward the ship's railing to dive off. Olive reached over, grabbed him by the coat, and dragged him back.

"We are simply cartoon characters in your world?" The Quetzal sighed. "That is rather... disheartening..."

"We understand," Orla assured her. "We are told there is a reality out there where we are characters on a childrens' show that teaches mathematics."

Quetzal turned to her, adjusting her bright green feathered helmet. "You seem rather calm about it."

"We have cried all the tears we had within ourselves to shed," Orla shrugged. "Now we simply comfort ourselves with the knowledge we are providing a service to children the world over..."

"Yeah! Then there are the fanfics!" Omar smiled. "My ol' buddy Oswald has all kinds of problems with those! Why, there's this one where he..."

"WE DON'T NEED TO TALK ABOUT THAT RIGHT NOW, THANK YOU!" Oswald shouted across the deck. Then he resumed talking on his badge phone. "Uh-huh? Yeah. Thanks. Bye."

He hung up his phone and clipped it back on his uniform.

"That was Orchid. She said the villains' hideout is in a volcano on an island somewhere."

"Uncanny!" gasped Shmumbermaid. "How does she know this?"

"She's reading this story in a comic on our world!" Oswald smiled, turned, and looked up. "Everybody wave!"

Orchid's giant face appeared above them. The entire group waved, the agents enthusiastically, the heroes with some bewilderment.

Out in the Odd Squad world, Orchid waved back.

The Bullet stared up at Orchid's face until the sky reappeared. "How did... How...?"

"It's Odd Squad," Osmerelda explained. "As we often say, the more questions you ask, the less sense it makes!"

Or 'Quo Plura Quaeras, Eo Minus Sensum Freit," Oswald said a bit smugly. "We have it embossed on our Official Library-Museum Person tie-pins." He held his tie-pin up so they could see.

Otto cocked his head. "What does that mean?"

Orla sighed. "The more questions you ask, the less sense it makes."

"I know that," Otto continued. "But what does it mean?"

Oswald took over. "Y'mean in a translation sense or an existential sense?"

"No time for that now!" Olive held up a hand. "We still have a problem to solve!"

"True," Shmumbra nodded sagely. "We know the villains' lair is in a volcano on an island..."

Little O picked up the thought. "But which volcano on what island?"

A familiar voice was heard overhead. "Perhaps I can help!"

The Odd Squad Mobile Unit van flew over their heads, descending to land on the deck of Shmumbermaid's transparent pirate ship.

"A... A talking car?" Green Shmumber exclaimed in shock.

"I beg your pardon!" Van Computer sniffed. "I am a computer-operated van! You may call me Van Computer."

"Van computer!" Omar smiled. "Hey, we'd almost forgotten about you!"

"Hello, everyone! I became bored waiting in The Shmumber Sanctum. So I came to find you, using the tracking devices in your uniforms! I believe I may be able to help you find the volcano you seek!"

"You very well may!" Orla took charge of the situation. "Van Computer! Show us all the possible volcanos the villains may be using as headquarters!"

The side door of the van slid open to reveal the monitor descending, with images flickering on the screen.

"Showing volcanos on isolated islands around the world..."

Pictures of volcanos and islands began cycling across the television screen, one after the other.

"There are so many..." Oswald whined. "This is gonna be like looking for a needle in a haystack!"

Olive considered. "Do we have any other clues that might help us narrow it..."

A picture came up of a volcano with an enormous bas relief of a giant, fanged skull carved on its face. Dinosaurs could be seen prowling the forest below.

"Just a hunch," Omar commented. "But I'd say that's probably it..."

#

And within the villains' secret headquarters, The Somnambulist bolted upright from his couch. "They're coming!"

Nihilass turned to him. "Who? Odd Squad? The Shmumber Squad?"

"All of them!" The precognitive super-criminal shouted. "They've banded together! They've located our secret base and they're on their way to stop us!"

"Let them come!" Barrabas growled. "We shall crush them with our combined power!"

"Well... Maybe..." Johnny Bailwick sighed. "But you're all villains. And this is a comic book. Good always triumphs over evil. That's the Comics Code, after all..."

"That doesn't matter!" Nihilass hissed. "Not any more!"

Brice sat in his chair over to one side looking lost. Then he held his teddy bear up to one ear.

"Mister Brian says you should probably send someone to deal with them before they get here!"

"Good idea, good idea!" Johnny Bailwick's head bobbed. "I like you! When Kevin came up with the idea, I thought it was dumb, but you really worked out! What book are you in?"

Before Brice could answer, Nihilass stepped in. "In a moment, sir! First, let's take care of business. Professor Echidna!"

A hideous serpentine creature made even more grotesque by its vague resemblance to a woman lurched forward.

"My experiments with the local fauna have proven most interesting..." the barely human thing gurgled in an almost indecipherable voice, the quills on her back rising and falling. "They should be most effective against our guests..."

"Excellent, excellent!" Nihilass exulted.

The Hoodoo Hypnotist shook his head. "I still don't understand why this island has dinosaurs living on it anyway..."

"That was one of The Clockmaster's old plots..." Vitriol explained. "It was forgotten about when they switched writers..."

"But NOW... Now we can use the dinosaurs for a plot of our own!" Doctor Malevolence cackled. rolling into the room. "Nihilass! The dimensional gate is almost done! All it needs is a few preliminary tests! Such as, perhaps sending some of our larger and hungrier pets through to the Odd Squad headquarters..."

"Perfect!" Nihilass crowed. "Do it! Echidna, you send a few flying nightmares to tackle the heroes!"

"Of course," Professor Echidna slunk away, leaving a wet, slimy trail behind her. "Of course..."

"And now..." Nihilass smiled cruelly. "Now we shall see if Good always triumphs over Evil..."

#

"Oh, it was horrible!" Bobby McCall whined as Olympia led him into the Odd Squad interrogation room. "Barbarianette was real, she was really, really real, and she wouldn't let me touch her boobs..."

"Um, sir?" Otis coughed. "This is Odd Squad headquarters. You're surrounded by children."

Bobby McCall started. "Oh! Oh, I'm sorry. I mean... She wouldn't let me touch her breasts..."

Olympia winced. "It seems they sent Barbarianette with a phony script they wanted him to draw." She produced the script and a few pages of comics art from behind her back. "Fortunately, we interrupted before he got too far..."

She handed Otis a page of artwork. Otis squinted at it. "Is that a squirrel?"

"That's a building!" Bobby insisted.

"I looked through the script," Olympia went on. "Everything's happening the way it says so far! But then there's a scene where the villains kill everyone with an anti-matter bomb and take over the world!" She sighed. "Fortunately, we haven't gotten to that part of the story yet."

"And we never will!" Oona popped out of the interrogation room to grab Bobby. "Not if we have anything to say about it!"

They led him through the interrogation room, which was crowded with comics pros. Bobby sat down next to Tahilia Jeffries.

"Well!" He smiled at her. "Fancy meeting you here..."

"I've got the restraining order in my pocket, Bob."

He changed chairs.

Wendy Breise was wandering about handing out Belgian cookies she'd received from her porch. Devlin Whittier was trying to talk Owen into buying some original artwork while Deborah Weiss-West sat looking ostentatiously bored. She accepted one of Wendy's cookies, though. Amstead Heath was explaining to a bewildered tube operator how he was completely indifferent to race and color and thus his stories only had Caucasians because he didn't see any need to have anyone else. Other comics folks milled about, ignoring the veggie tray Oscar had provided and munching on Belgian cookies.

Oscar was trying to keep order. "GUYS! GUYS!" He waved his arms about to get the comics people's attention. "We brought you all here to save the Multiverse!"

"Not to mention our friends," added Olympia. "Orchid, what's going on in the comic right now?"

"See for yourself, Sherman!" Orchid handed her the comic.

#

"I've found the island!" Shmumbra announced to the others on the ship, the fingers of one hand pressed to her temple. "It's only a short distance away!"

"Wait!" Shmumberman struck a pose. "I see something with my Shmumberscopic vision!"

Oswald produced a pair of binoculars and looked where Shmumberman indicated.

"Oh... gosh..." Oswald lowered the binoculars, his face ashen . "What ARE those things?"

"I suspect they started life as pterosaurs..." Shmumbermaid explained. "I sense Professor Echidna's hand in this... If she still has hands..."

#

Tamara Jeffries made a face. "Ugh! The Crystal Ship? That is SO lame! Why does she even HAVE that?"

#

"HEY!" Omar shouted. "WHAT'S HAPPENING?"

The flying pirate ship disappeared out from under them. The heroes who could fly did their best to grab the heroes who could not. This included all the Odd Squad agents, who found themselves in freefall far above the ocean.

"Never fear, Odd Squad!" The Queztal spread her wings. "I'll carry you all to safety!"

#

"Man, Quetzal's just dumb!" Bobby McCall complained. "I hate drawing her! Why can't she have a GOOD costume?"

#

The agents double-taked as Quetzal suddenly appeared in a thong bikini and lace-up stiletto heeled pumps. She shook her flowing, rainbow-colored hair and struck poses, totally ignoring the still-falling Odd Squad agents.

Otto gaped as the heroine's semi-clad breasts expanded in size. "I... Huh?"

Shmumbra caught him in her claws, having transformed to harpy form. "Never fear, friend Otto! I shall..."

#

"So... Shmumbra..." Amstead Heath squinted. "She's the telepathic mermaid chick, right?"

#

Shmumbra's wings and claws disappeared and she found herself back in mermaid form. She plummeted toward the ocean, Otto beside her.

#

"Why is Doctor Darkendire even in the Shmumber Squad?" Wendy Breise shook her head. "He's a lone wolf! It's all wrong for him!"

#

Doctor Darkendire disappeared. At that point, everyone was almost relieved. One less falling person to rescue.

"Don't worry, guys!" The Green Shmumber grabbed a handful of arrows from his quiver. "These rocket arrows should carry you all to safety!"

#

"Ugh, The Green Shmumber's so gimmicky!" Delvin Whittier sniffed. "All those arrows! It's just ridiculous!"

#

The Green Shmumber's hand was now empty. They all continued falling.

#

"GUYS!" Olympia shouted at the comics people. "Stop it! You keep changing the Shmumber Squad before they do anything!"

"We're trying, dear," Deborah Weiss-West sniffed. "We're improving the story. Honestly. Some people just don't appreciate good writing! Those characters are so dismal and outdated! We should just start over again from scratch!"

#

The entire Shmumber Squad vanished.

The mutated pterosaurs came into sight, screeching hideously.

#

"Oh, those are cool!" Bobby McCall exclaimed. "Those are so totally cool!"

"Oh, yeah!" Wendy Breise nodded. "They could be a LOT bigger, though..."

#

The mutant pterosaurs swelled in size as they circled the helplessly plummeting Odd Squad agents.

#

TO BE CONTINUED...