*WRITER'S NOTE: Read Untold Tales #345, or at least the last part, before you read this story because this story take place after it*

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Goth Haven.

Out in the harbor there is small island & on that island is a lighthouse, one that was named in memoriam for a now almost forgotten super hero. One that who died defending the City from an alien invasion back in the '50's. It's almost ironic that current keeper of the lighthouse, Fred Harris, also happens to be a super hero: the one known as Ham-Boy. At times he has wondered if one day that his name will also be forgotten like so many of those from the past generations.

Fred is standing on the balcony at the top of the lighthouse, He is wearing a robe, it's undone & flapping in the slight breeze. One could see under the robe is a dark blue pair of shorts & a T-Shirt with CrazySugarFreakBoy's smiling face on it. The shirt is a neon green, CSFB!'s head is surrounded in neon yellow & neon orange circles. Scattered around the shirt are smiley face like those of the Wired Wonder's costume. Fred's dark brown hair was all messed up. He hasn't combed it this morning, most of it's down except for a few pieces that made a few little wings of hair that stuck up randomly on his head. On his feet he wore a pair of dress socks, no particular reason other then that what he was wearing yesterday & he had worn them to bed.

He likes to come out on the balcony in the early morning before he has to head off to either of his job, school or off into battle. The Balcony is his thinking spot. For up there, he can see almost all of downtown Goth Haven & the entire waterfront. If he walks around to the other side, he can see the whole harbor & just on the horizon he can almost make out Parody Island. On a clear night he can see just make out the light from their lighthouse.

As he gazes off in that direction he's thought about all that has happened recently. It all started with the Carnifex's Diner. Going into it, He felt like something was wrong & that something bad was going to happen. He was right & still weeks later is still not exactly sure what happened. It was pretty much all a blur to him & some aspects are still a bit hazy. He barely remembers how the fight broke out. He wasn't sure he was going to make it out a alive & sadly a few people didn't. These thoughts & other have plagued him since: Why did he survive while others' lost their lives or powers?

He needed to get away from those thoughts so after hanging out at the mansion & feeling pretty useless: he returned home. He needed to do something to get his mind of these thoughts: He found it at the Jet Starscream Experience.

After this, when Mr. Visionary wanted to talk to him. He wasn't sure about what but since he wasn't his student anymore. He thought that it might be some lingering Junior business. They meet at his his work, He felt sort of odd about being in costume there but that's where Mr. Visionary wanted to meet.

What he wanted to talk about was him joining the main team, The Lair Legion. During that conversation, because of what happened a few days earlier, He & Mr. Visionary were thrown into a battle with a bunch of Villains wanting him dead. After they narrowly escaping death with a little help from some of the Legionaires, Mr. Visionary asked again if he wanted to join the team. Fred didn't have answer for him then & still didn't.

He thinks back to before he joined the Juniors which like now wasn't sure if he should accept that offer either. He partly excepted the offer because he was bullied into it by his mom & his best friend, Betty. He wasn't sure why the team would have wanted him. Sure, he made a name for himself in Iowa's super hero community but that's only because he seemed like one of the most competent of the lot which was kind of funny since he also happened to be one of the youngest. Yes, his hometown did make devote a whole museum to his heroic persona but he didn't feel he was anything truly special. The only other museum in town was on devoted to a giant ball of Lint. He was just a kid with a slightly odd powers set that felt he could do some good. He feels that he has done that over the last couple of years. Nothing special, just a guy who has done good with what he has.

Joining the Juniors was the right move in retrospect since he mostly would have quit being Ham-Boy all together if he hadn't. It gave him purpose, direction. Something he didn't really have now that he graduated from the program. Since then, he was in a sort of holding pattern since He still spent most of his time in costume with them.

But now that a number of the Juniors were relocating from the Lighthouse to Parrodipolis University maybe it was time that he also moved on. But to join the main team? Wasn't that the purpose of the Juniors: To one day move up to the main team?

Fred was still unsure even though he had moved out to Goth Haven, the big city he had heard about in stories from his Grandfather growing up. He still felt like like the kid from Piney Oaks, Iowa. When he started out, the Lair Legion were people he looked up too. At night, he dreamed of one long far off day where he would meet such Heroes as Fin Fang Foom, The Dark Knight (maybe not him he always kind of scared Fred), spiffy, Nats, CrazySugarFreakBoy!, Goldeneyed, Trickshot, Ziles, Sorceress, Hatman, Dancer, Lisa Waltz (maybe not her either, she also kind of scared Fred but for other reasons), ManMan, De Brown Streak & Visionary. Now He has met a number of them & worked side by side with them a few times. The most resent being the fight with Carnifex.

Now he has the chance to go be one of them & he's not sure if he should except the offer. Why did they want him?

He knows that the offer of membership is something that just isn't given out freely. He also knows that this offer most likely has a cut off date. He would discuss this with his mom but she & his step-father are out trekking across the Republic of Spango. He's tried calling the phone numbers for a few of the places she said they'd be at & none of the calls seem to be getting through. He's e-mailed a few times but hasn't gotten any response. Fred would have talked to Betty but she's also out, He's not exactly sure where. She gave a vague reason for her trip, said something about her cousin. Fred had talked to his Grandfather but all he said was to do it & wasn't really going to hear any of Fred's reasons to not to.

Fred could try to bring this up to his fellow Juniors but is not sure how well that would go. He's never been all that great at talking with them. He has felt that they are his friends but doesn't know much about them & hasn't really told them much about him. He's sometimes felt lost in the team. Would he get lost once more as part of the Lair Legion given he'd most likely be the least experienced one & youngest on the team.

Fred looks down at his watch & if he doesn't leave in the next few minutes he's going to be late for Work. He hastily hurries down from the tower to his room to get changed. He's dressed in a green flannel shirt, it's buttoned up but not tuck the shirt into his pants. He also has a pair of tan cargo pants on. On his feet are some tennis shoes. Fred grabs his coat & heads down into the basement. Down to the Meat Locker, the secret headquarters for Ham-Boy & where he's keeps his scooter, the vehicle he uses both in & out of costume.

As he enters the room, he flips on the light & he looks the room over. It's was sort of a monument to all that he has done as Ham-Boy. As he heads down the stairs to the his scooter, he passes a few framed pictures & newspapers clippings his Mom has framed for him. They were of some of the earliest outings, the outings that had told him that he just might be able to do this. Once down on the floor, He past by other mementos of the past. There were items from past encounters with such foes as The Disgruntles, E.C.O.L.I., Baron Wasteland, Timeline, Cliché & To-Fu among others. He thought about his rogues' gallery & guess that he must have been doing something right to have so many people want to oppose him. Fred got on his scooter, put on his helmet & started on the long ride through the tunnel to the mainland. In that dimly light tube, he thought about how many time he'd driven through it off to a call to action.

He exits the tunnel in a rarely used alleyway & headed off for the city's limits to the megastore known as Wally-World. Once there he drove past rows & rows of cars to parked outside the half dark navy blue & half light grey concrete building. It had a thin red line separating the two colors going across the building. Fred locked up his scooter near the front entrance & walked inside.

Once there, was waved at by a man dressed in a pair of black slacks, black patten leather shoes, a white long sleeve button down shirt, white Mickey Mouse like gloves, a red bow tie & a blue vest. On his head was the round foam neon yellow smiley face.

"Hey Fred." the greeter said somewhat muffled.

"Hey Steve." Fred replied as he made he way back to the time clock.

As he walks through the store, he sees the remains of the fight that took place there just a few short days ago. He notices that they have yet to fix the holes in the roof but have covered them some blue tarps from the camping department. Before he gets to the back room to drop off his stuff & start his work day, he passes by the electronic department & see the wall of TVs' which are all on the fritz. Some are just a blank blue screen where others have the transmission reception fade in & out.

Once getting to the back, he dropped off his coat in the employee locker room & put on his own blue vest which had a plastic name tag pinned to it. He made he way to the time clock. He punched in & as he turned around he was confronted by one of the Assistant Store Managers.

"Harris."

"Yes?"

"Your late. Again."

"Sorry. There was a traffic pile up on the Ebert Expressway & Route 666 interchange."

It sounded like they were about to say something but didn't, just turned & walked away.

Fred made his way over to his "department", a small sound proof booth just on the other side of the west wall of the Electronics department. It was time to start another day as Fred Harris, In-Store DJ. He opens the door to the booth, inside was was the night DJ Shawn & the sounds of Air Supply could be heard.

"Hey Fred. Today's announcements are over there." Shawn said pointing to a clipboard with a small pile of papers clipped to it in the corner.

"We got a music update last night. It's a bunch of junk with like a good song every so often." He said as held up one of the cartridges the Stores' sound system uses.

"Ok. Anything else?"

"No. Not really. The sound system, like everything else electronic in the store is a hit or miss. I was told it's being worked on. No word when it's be beck up to what we've considering normal. How's everything with you?"

"Fine." Fred said somewhat down trodden.

"It doesn't sound fine."

"Well…." Fred started & then stopped to think of how much to say.

"Awhile ago, I was part of… this group who is connected with this other larger group. Ok?"

"yeah."

"Now I've been asked to join this other larger group."

"So what's the problem?"

"I'm not sure I should or not."

"So, what's wrong? Do you like these people?" Shawn asked as he tidied up a bit & made sure the change over between cartridges was seamless.

"Yeah. But I'm not sure if I'm worthy to be with them."

Shawn laughed a bit, then said. "They asked you, right?"

"yes."

"Then they feel your worthy enough to join their ranks. So, I say go for it. Because if you don't you'll spend the rest of your life wishing you did." Shawn said with a smile & left the booth.

They waved goodbye to each other. Fred closed the door to the booth & sat down. He thinks about what Shawn said & he knows what his answer is going to be. Fred reaches in his pants' pocket & pulls out his Legion communicator card.

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TO BE CONTINUED….

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FOOTNOTE:

Where are Issues 1 through 6? Little over half a decade ago, Ham-Boy had his own series & it got to Issue 6 before I abandoned it for other stuff. Well, I did do a "Half Issue" which used elements from Issues 1 & 2 so there are technically there were 7 issues before I abandoned the series but since I only numbered up to 6: This is issue 7. Anyways, I thought that since Ham-Boy was going be a more high profile character, I'd bring back his series. This story is a sort of reintroduction of sorts to Ham-Boy & his cast of characters. The people mentioned here are not all of them. More will be seen and/or mentioned in forth coming issues. Now how many more Issues will there be? It all depends on what story ideas I have. We should at least see another 6 issues.

I don't think he's the youngest legionnaire by very far since Liu Xi joined, though. I guess he could ask her why she joined if he's still concerned after he signs up - she would just tell him that she got in trouble so often, she felt like she had no choice.

Especially when it involves joining a team that employs Flapjack. Nice to see he's made the right choice, if not the smart one!

Fred will continue to do both jobs as he has for years. It's just been brought up much.

As for "better insurance": I'm not sure what benefits there are for being a Legionnaire.




Fred wasn't worried about being the youngest one on the team. He's been Ham-Boy for years, he started when he was pre-teen & has been legally an Adult for a few years so youth has never been a problem. What he was dealing with here was if he thought he was worthy enough. He was sort of doubting his power set & if they'd be useful in the types of battles the Legion get into. Sure, he had been out in battle situations with the Legion but that was a junior member. Excepting the offer to join the time, he'd get not only all the benefits of being a Legionnaire but all the problems of being a Legionnaire (This was partly seen in UT #345, pt. 8)

Yeah. But Fred has something other new Legionnaires haven't always had: previous experience with Flapjack (doubt to Fred involvement with the Juniors).




He was always going to make the "right" choice but I thought that his thinking behind the choice needed to be shown somehow.