__________
Atomik Lad sat up as Nuklear Man flumped into the Danger: Driver’s Seat.
“Get rid of the refried beans?”
“Sort of.”
“Sort of?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.” His eye twitched.
“We’d better get going. They, I mean, Rachel’s expecting us.”
“How many times do they have to fry the beans? Ever hear of ordering reheated pizza?”
“Maybe I should drive, you’re too emotional.”
“Oh no you don’t.” He turned the ignition and was greeted by the beautiful melody of internal combustion. “We’ve got to make up for lost time.”
“We do?”
“Yep, we can’t afford to let your inexperience behind the wheel delay us any more than it already has.”
“We’re not that late, really. We could take it kinda slow, like under seventy?”
“No. This time I’ll have to drive
fast
.”
“
This
time? Bu—GHAK!” The sidekick was thrust back in his seat as the Nukemobile rocketed down the streets of Metroville.
__________
Vroom.
The University of Metroville surrounded them in a beautiful display of why the phrases “civil engineer” and “haphazard guesswork” are the same in the more enlightened languages of the cosmos. The entire campus was crisscrossed with narrow, winding roads that went nowhere and were usually clogged with too many students.
“Geez, what’s with all these speed bumps?”
“Those are pedestrians, Nuke!” Atomik Lad screamed.
“Six of one, two dozen of the other.”
“Argh!” Atomik Lad grunted as he yanked the steering wheel to avoid ramming any more innocents. Luckily college students are spry and used to dodging cars on campus.
“Oh, you’re such a wuss.”
“Look, Wayne Hall is right up ahead. Just park here, it’ll keep the casualty rate down.”
“Oh fine. You and that death toll thing.” He rocketed the car through an intersection via the turn lanes in a maneuver that any Hollywood stunt man would call “impossibly ludicrous.” With the all too familiar sound of screeching tires and the stench of burnt rubber, the Danger: Nukemobile came to a stop.
Cars swerved slowly to avoid the pair. Traffic here didn’t flow, it lumbered.
“Watch where you’re driving!” Nuklear Man yelled. “Where did these people learn to drive, a correspondence school from the back of a matchbox?”
“You’re parked in the middle of the road again,” Atomik Lad said. His patience had gone out for a long walk a good distance from any road.
“Ah. Yes, well—”
“Pull off to the side and stop in one of those little areas outlined in white. They are called parking spaces.”
“Stupid conformity.” Nuklear Man complied, but in doing so he took up two spaces just to stick it to The Man.
Atomik Lad rubbed his eyes to wring the exhaustion out of them. “I can’t believe it’s only ten in the morning,” he grumbled. He got out of the car carefully. He was convinced that the car would collapse or explode when he shut the door. He watched movies, he knew the score. When it didn’t, he turned to Nuklear Man. “I’ll be back in five minutes. Don’t do anything you’d think of doing.”
“So I should eat these fully congealed refried beans?”
“God, no. You’d be better off guzzling gasoline.”
“Mmm, rocket fuel.”
“Just don’t do anything or the beach trip is off.”
“Eep!” Nuklear Man wrapped his arms around himself and grabbed the back of his seat. “Don’t worry, Sparky. Even the mighty Fenris wolf could not break these shackles!” He nodded to his arms.
“Right.” Atomik Lad shook his head to free his mind from Nuklear Man’s “Logic” and jogged to the nearby Wayne Hall. “I’ve got to get out more, that almost made sense.”
__________
A short, stocky man wearing a pig mask, a woman in a tabby cat outfit, a walking mass of stone, a mountain of flesh, a man with eyes that glowed purple, a man with countless watches strapped up and down his arms, and a sneaky figure sticking to the shadows walked down the sidewalk. They were all dressed in horribly clashing Hawaiian shirts, shorts, sandals, and loud sunglasses.
“You think these disguises’ll work, boss?” Granite asked his smaller purple-themed companion.
“Well certainly not if you refer to them as ‘disguises’ and call me ‘boss’ in broad daylight. Now hush up and be inconspicuous.”
“It is now 10:05 and 55 seconds, 56 seconds.”
“I’m hungry,” Lord Obese moaned.
“Big surprise,” El Puerko groaned.
“10:06 and 2 seconds, 10:06 and 3 seconds.”
Blazer scanned the street as inconspicuously as he could. It would’ve made them look even
more
conspicuous if they hadn’t already reached the maximum level conspicuousness possible on the mortal plane. “All right, we’ll rob that doughnut shop with the yellow car parked in front of it. We can use the leftovers in the victory party we’ll have after we ruin Nuklear Man’s little beach get-together. MUWA HAHAHAHA!”
“I still think that’s awfully mean of us,” Granite commented.
“10:06 and 19 seconds.”
Blazer slapped his hand against his face. “Never mind. Let’s go!” They charged down the sidewalk and into the doughnut shop. One minute later its door and most of the front wall was destroyed when Lord Obese finally caught up and walked through it.
__________
Nuklear Man surveyed his surroundings from his self-bear hugging position in the Danger: Driver’s Seat. He spotted a Hawaiian-shirted pack roaming the streets. “Hmm. Those don’t look like college students. They look more like ne’er-do-wells. Or, in common parlance of the Heroic trade, villains! Must. Break. Free!” he grunted while trying to pry himself from his own grip. “Too. Invincible!
Herg!”
He was his own unstoppable force and immoveable object.
__________
Atomik Lad paced outside Wayne Hall. The usual intra-campus traffic talked back and forth with itself as students milled all over the grounds like ants.
“Hiya, Sparky.”
He looked up as Rachel descended the stairs that led up to Wayne Hall’s entrance. “Oh, Rachel. Hi,” was the only response he could muster. Her shirt, tied into a knot at the bottom and showing off her shapely stomach, was more than enough to halt all but the most basic mental functions in the sidekick. Her shorts scrambled what was left into some kind of gooey soup. The rest was overkill. Like using nuclear warheads in a knife fight.
“You all right?” she asked. “You look like a starving man just offered a Triple Quarter Pounder.”
“Er, yes. You, I. Er, didn’t have a chance to grab breakfast this morning. Had trouble getting Nuke out of bed.”
She walked down the stairs, a backpack slung across her shoulders. “That’s so funny. Must be fascinating to live with him.”
“Yeah, fascinating.”
“I was getting a little worried, actually. The news said some maniac was terrorizing the roads of Metroville. I thought you might be out saving the city again.”
“Um, you could say that. Anyway, we should get back. Trouble has a way of tackling Nuke every eleven seconds or so.”
“Certainly, Mr. Sparky.” She mock saluted and they walked back to the Nukemobile side-by-side talking about anything.
__________
Blazer was a heap of desperation or depression, he couldn’t decide which exactly, and he was beginning to suspect it was both. “Just
decide
all ready!”
“But they all look so tasty,” Lord Obese whined.
“Then take them all!”
“That’ll be awfully expensive,” Granite noted.
A feral growl escaped Blazer’s lips.
“Yeah, I’ve only got eight bucks,” Zeeroks said, emptying out her pockets.
“The sinister ninja, Okenshi, terror of the night, does not carry money when he is on the prowl.”
“Why do you narrate yourself in the third person?”
“Okenshi shall not answer your petty question, for he is one with the night and beyond such concerns!”
“I’ve only got pesos on me, oink.”
“We’re
robbing
this place!” Blazer shouted. “Theft, burglary,
stealing
. You take what you want regardless of price. That’s the whole concept of thievery! Understand? Take all the donuts, let’s just get going!”
Lord Obese looked over the Wall of Doughnuts. “But I’ve got to watch my weight.”
Blazer clawed at his face. “Why me?”
__________
Nuklear Man’s face showed all the strain one would associate with pushing a mountain a little to the left. “Have to. Save. Doughnut shop!”
The seven villains dashed outside with ease thanks to the entirely missing storefront. Each villain carried two nondescript sacks bulging with pastries. “All right, guys,” Blazer began. His gaze wandered to the yellow car. Any previous train of thought was instantly derailed.
“Herg! Can’t. Let villains. Escape with. Purloined pastries!”
“Que es? Oink.”
They gathered around Nuklear Man. “What’s he supposed to be?” Granite asked, scratching his stony head.
“10:13 and 37 seconds, 38 sec—”
“Shut up!”
“But it’s all I’ve got,” Chronotor whimpered.
“Okenshi, the Death that strikes at midnight, thinks this is Nuklear Man, the Hero of heroes.”
“What’s he doing, crushing himself to death?” Zeeroks asked. Her cat ears flipped in annoyance.
“Hey, bozo!” Blazer taunted. “Why don’t you just let go?”
Nuklear Man paused. With bomb squad-like caution he released his grip of the seat. “Oh. Oh yeah.”
“Well, we were going to wait until you got to the beach, but since fate has deemed that we meet now, we will dispense with you right here!” Blazer announced in true villain style.
All those hours in front of the mirror were worth it!
Nuklear Man looked them over. “So who are you guys? The Heinous Hawaiians?”
“For your information, we’re the Socially Mal—”
“No you don’t, I’ll have none of that,” Blazer interrupted. “That’s how we lost those other two last time. You can just call us ‘Your Worst Nightmare!’”
“That’s not terribly original.”
“How about ‘The Anti-Nuklear Coalition’?”
“Not again.” Blazer cupped his face in his hands and tried not to weep.
“Or ‘Okenshi’s Black Legion of Shadow Death.’”
“But, Okenshi, you’re the only one wearing black.”
“Okenshi had a hard time finding a black Hawaiian shirt. But no task is too great and no quarry is too cunning for the prowess of Okenshi.”
“How about ‘The Carbon Rods,’” Chronotor offered.
The rest of the villains gave each other quizzical glances.
“You know, because they stop fission reactions, and that’s nuclear and he’s ‘Nuklear’ Man so—”
“Shut up!”
“Hey!” Nuklear Man stood in his seat. “You’re villains, aren’t you?”
“Hungry villains,” Lord Obese said as he gulped down the last of the doughnuts. He shook the empty sacks. “They’re empty, yet my eternal hunger still screams into my soul—the blackest midnight of a thousand—”
“Shut
up!”
“Sorry.”
“Still hungry, eh?” Nuklear Man’s mind raced like a Model-T. “How about some refried beans?”
“Congealed?” Lord Obese asked.
“Completely.”
“Fork it over, puny man.”
“If you say so.” Nuklear Man tossed the small container of beans to the Rotund Raider.
Lord Obese ate it out of the air, container and all. “My hunger burns still!”
“That ain’t the only thing that’s gonna be burnin’,” Nuklear Man muttered.
Lord Obese’s organs rumbled, including the ones that had nothing to do with digestion. A sound bellowed from his stomach. It was not unlike rabid elephants stampeding across a field of geese. His face twisted grotesquely, like every muscle wanted to leave the others. His limbs quaked with a sudden weakness. His gut roared in protest like oppressed colonists.
“Uh, Obese? You feelin’ okay?” Zeeroks asked, tugging on the fat man’s Hawaiian muu-muu.
He began to teeter.
“Run for the hills!” Chronotor screamed. The villains scrambled. “He’ll fall in exactly—”
WHUMP
“—one...second.”
Nuklear Man’s cape was blast back by the gust of air from Lord Obese’s impact. The last time Earth was hit with something like that it killed the dinosaurs.
Nuklear Man took the opportunity to bask in a righteous Heroic pose.
“Put some clothes on, you freak!” Someone yelled from across the street.
“What is
that?”
Rachel asked, pointing at the heap of moo-moo covered flesh ahead of her and Atomik Lad. Limbs poked out from under it at unusual angles.
Atomik Lad shifted her backpack on his shoulder. He saw Nuklear Man’s Danger: Pose of Triumph. “This time, I don’t
want
to know.”
“That’s probably for the best,” she said.
“Ready to go, Nuke?” Atomik Lad asked as they approached the Danger: Nukemobile.
“Gimme a second,” he said, still basking. “Two, three, and done.” He hopped down into the driver’s seat. “Let’s roll!”
“Uh, maybe I should drive. Y’know, for practice.”
“I dunno. You kept grabbing the wheel. We were all over the road. Luckily I’m good enough to overcome your incompetence and saved the day like at least a billion times. Again.”
Rachel giggled.
“Ugh. Well, if I was driving, you could talk to our lovely guest, Rachel.”
“Hello, hello,” the Hero said in his most suave voice. Strangely enough, it was among the least suave voices Rachel had ever heard. “Come here often, or do you wait until—”
“Nuke, be polite.”
“You two should take this act on the road.”
“Yeah. The act,” Atomik Lad grumbled. “C’mon, Nuke, what’dya say? I’ll be extra careful, just like you.”
“I don’t think you’re quite ready. Besides, I’m such a good driver, I can woo her with my countless Heroic exploits and still keep us on the road.”
“Nuke, I really think I should drive.”
“Oh what’s the harm, John? He’s Nuklear Man, we couldn’t be safer, right?”
“I like her, Sparky. She pays attention to the propaganda.”
“It’s called ‘Public relations,’ Nuke. There’s a difference.”