Captain Awesome to the Rescue!
“Where’s my Captain Awesome cape?” Eugene grumbled as he searched his closet. He tossed clothes back over his head, covering a stack of Super Dude comic books.



Psssst! Want to know a secret? It’s the most hugest, gigantist, enormondoist secret ever. The boy looking for his cape is not just eight-year-old Eugene McGillicudy, son of Ned and Betsy, and brother to his little sister, Molly. He’s also the superhero known as Captain Awesome!

Say it out loud:



Eugene came up with that name himself. That’s one of the cool things about being a superhero. You get to pick your own name. And if you’re making up your own superhero name, it shouldn’t be something lame like “Captain Just Okay.” It should be mighty, like . . . Captain Awesome! MI-TEE!



Eugene plopped on the pile of clothes and crossed his arms. Next time, I’ll remember to follow Superhero Rule number one: Never let your mom pack your superhero stuff when you’re moving to a new town. I bet Super Dude’s mom never lost his cape.

Wait! You’ve never heard of Super Dude?! He’s only THE coolest, bravest, heroist superhero of all time, and the one responsible for Eugene becoming Captain Awesome.

It all started the day Eugene’s dad gave him his copy of Super Dude No. 1. Sure, it might’ve looked like he was just giving Eugene the comic so he wouldn’t tell his mother who ate the last of the chocolate-chocolate chip ice cream, but Eugene knew what his dad was secretly telling him: Since he’s too busy with work and dad-stuff like mowing lawns and telling Eugene to keep his elbows off the dinner table, and eating the last of his mom’s chocolate-chocolate chip ice cream, it was up to Eugene to save the world from now on!



Eugene and his family had just moved to a new town called Sunnyview for his dad’s job —he worked for Cherry Computers. (“Cherry’s on Top!”)

“Eugene!” his mom called from downstairs. “Can you please come down when you get a chance? I want to talk to you about school.”



Oh, great! First she loses my cape and now she wants to talk about school! Eugene looked at the calendar on his wall. And tomorrow’s my first day.

Hooray.

BY HOORAY I REALLY MEAN BARF! I DON’T WANT TO GO TO A NEW SCHOOL!

Eugene fell backward into his clothes pile and covered his head with his pajamas.

Things were really getting desperate! First his cape was missing, and now school talk?! Yuck! Could today get any worse?!



Eugene leaped to his feet and struck a superhero pose. “Miff ivnent da mime poo burry abut barf—” Eugene stopped and yanked the pajamas off his face. “This isn’t the time to worry about BARF and new schools,” Eugene said and punched his hand into his palm. “I need to find my cape or Captain Awesome won’t be able to protect Sunnyview from the evil doings of bad guys like Queen Stinkypants, Baron Von Booger, or Dr. Spinach. Letting the bad guys win is worse than homework . . . on a weekend!”



Evildoers all over Sunnyview had better beware, because Captain Awesome was going to ferret them out just like a, well, a ferret ferrets stuff, except he’ll be wearing a superhero outfit and he won’t have a furry tail.

Captain Awesome will give bad guys his famous one-two punch and tell them to change their ways and become good guys . . . or . . . he’ll . . . tell their parents.

And if you think the Captain Awesome one-two punch sounds scary, you should see a super-villain’s angry parents. Bad guys hate to lose, but they hate being grounded even more!

But instead of fighting evil this morning, Eugene was digging through all the boxes in his new bedroom looking for his superhero cape.

“I’ll bet Super Dude never had days like this.” Eugene sighed.



And that’s when Eugene heard it! The evil “Goo!” and “Gaaah!” of his archenemy . . . Queen Stinkypants from Planet Baby!