Tales of Worrow Volume II

by Darren Worrow

  “Yes father,” replied the superhero with great honour and respect.

  The ghostly image of the father turned his head to notice Gen. She stood back a pace and stared at him. It spoke again, “I see you have found the love of a human, this is good El-Kay; it will give you great power, strength and admiration from the humans.”

  Remarkableman quivered slightly, “no, father,” he spoke so gallantly, “she is but a friend, you see I am here to inform you that I have no desires for members of the opposite sex…”

  The ghostly image jerked his head back with a frown, “you mean you have no sexual desire towards these beings?” he asked of his son.

  “Well, yes,” he confessed, “I do, but just not for the female form….”

  The ghost thought hard about this and then spoke, “you mean to tell me you are a shirt-lifter?”

  “Well…….”

  “A bummer boy, an iron hoof, a woofter?” he jumped further towards Remarkableman with his finger pointing.

  “Well, yes father but I ermmm…”

  The image was now furious and he shouted with an angry passion, “You dirty little shit! You fucking weirdo, what the fuck has got into you? My son, my only son; a woofter, a gay-boy, a shirt-lifting Jessie! Get the fuck out of this cave right now boy and never return!”

  Remarkableman fell to his knees in tears, Gen grabbed hold of him as the ghostly image went to strike him and she pulled him away. They hurried out of the alcove to the final shouts of his father, “You ain’t no son of mine, you hear that? You dirty little……..”

  9.

  Soaring over the Atlantic Ocean at supersonic speeds Gen was tucked underneath Remarkableman’s cloak, holding onto his over-exaggerated bicep and his bulging ribcage. When suddenly he could hear the sound of Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding out for a hero.” Gen sighed and flicked on her phone, “Matthew, what is it, now is not really a good time….”

  “It’s Dave; he’s dumped me whaaaaa!” came the muffled reply.

  “Don’t worry Matthew, I have a date for you, you remember that guy who was at…..”

  “The superhero, oh yummy!” the voice yelped in a high-pitched squeal.

  They landed over a dusty turnpike in the Badlands of New Jersey where Remarkableman took a look at her phone. Gen thought he would question the date, he was still uneasy about the whole prospect of coming out of the closet. “I should warn you that not all people will accept you as a gay man, even though the politics have changed a lot of people still have their backward views,” she explained.

  “Don’t worry about that at the moment, have you got your free-gees thing going?” he asked.

  Gen looked at him surprised, “you mean my 3G, yeah, it’s working now,” she pointed out.

  “I need it!” he commanded.

  “Oh,” she laughed at him, “I thought you said you didn’t need it!”

  “Just humour me Gen,” he replied.

  “That is all I have been doing,” she sarcastically remarked handing him the smart-phone.

  He tried to look professional for the few moments that preceded him throwing the gadget back at her and asking her for a map of New York showing the location of the building that they met. She did this then he asked if she could get a map of the city in 1939 and as he suspected the warehouse where he was zapped by the Violet Avenger was torn down in 1985 to make way for the building they were in when they met. “This means,” he told her, “that the time machine transports through time but not by location…..quick show me that photo of the arrest, you know the one with the President in the background.”

  She searched and found the article from the fanboy site. Gen turned the phone to face Remarkableman who scanned the image, “look,” he gladly gestured, “in the background, Bob’s Bagel Store on 32nd Street, if this is the location of the Violet Avengers hideout in 1939, who is to say that he changed it since that day? I mean if he came here via the time transporter he would………”

  “He would rematerialize in this time at the same location!” finished Gen with a smile.

  “Come on we need to check it out, hold onto me again!” She did as she was told, wanting to protest about the fact she could run nearly as fast as he could fly but hey, he liked to think he was in control of the situation. She was now more abiding to his ways; this was his conditioning from the era he live in, not his fault; his downfall but not his fault.

  Gen held tight taking in the view of the approaching city skyline with its huge skyscrapers and they landed at the site of the old bagel store on 32nd Street. Now though it was a McDonalds. “What are the McDonalds doing here?” he asked, “I thought their restaurant was in San Bernardino, California…”

  “I think they have expanded since then,” remarked Gen as she pointed to a drain cover, “the photo shows them climbing out of the drain cover, his hideout must be underground.”

  Just then a newspaper vendor shouted, “read all about it, read all about it: The President has been kidnapped, I repeat the President has been kidnapped!”

  Remarkableman struck up a mighty pose with onlookers almost bursting into tears of laughter, “Do not fear America, Remarkableman is on the case!”

  “For Christ’s sake,” groaned Gen, hiding under the drain cover seemed like a good idea, “come on bozo!”

  Under the drain was a huge sewage system and as soon as they got down there and closed the cover Remarkableman took out his trusty torch, banged it on his leg and switched it on, “damn thing!” he said and Gen just smiled at him, handing him her spare infra-red visor. He put it on and was amazed, “see,” she said, “what was you saying about modern technology?”

  “My trusty torch was fine until the batteries run out,” he pointed out soberly.

  Gen tapped into her phone, “base this is agent Gen-etic A here…”

  A voice came from her phone, “Gen-etic, you are suspended until further notice. Q recommends that you hand yourself and the fugitive in at once!”

  “Negative commander, I am on the trail of the kidnapped President, need back up right away!” she ordered, “I am turning my sat-nav back on, please advise of any anomalies in the area, I want heat sources within a half mile radius.”

  “For hells sake,” demanded the voice, “you better have a good explanation for this!”

  “Trust me commander, just give the data I need, we will rescue the President!” she announced while Remarkableman stood amazed, running his hand past his visor with a look of awe.

  “We?” questioned the commander, “identify your unit immediately.”

  “Well, commander, it’s me and my friend Remarkableman!” she said, doubtful of her positive tone as she looked embarrassingly at her partner waving his hand in front of his face.

  “You mean to tell me that bozo in the yellow suit, for fucks sake Gen, if you mess…..”

  “No messing Commander, we have the capability, Remarkableman is…. Well, he is, well, remarkable I suppose!”

  The voice continued after a heavy sigh and what sounded like the palm of a hand slapping a perspiring forehead, “Right Agent Gen, we have a lock on two sources of heat, both large enough to be human. 3.356 degrees left, 14.876 degrees down. Target confirmed as .7 south-southeast, be sure to get the right man! I am downloading a map of the sewage system for 32nd Street and then I can guide you in.”

  “I think it is this way!” claimed Remarkableman, pointing in a random direction.

  “Shut up!” whispered Gen.

  “Gen, make no attack on the subject until I send the order, we are sending in reinforcements,” ordered the Commander.

  “That will not be nessa……”

  “That is an ORDER Gen-etic!”

  Gen sighed, “come on bozo, let’s get this sucker, I have the coordinates locked in, just follow my lead, you can do that can’t you?”

  10.

  Remarkableman stood aghast at the scene inside the main sewage duct underneath 32nd Street for there stood his archenemy as bold as daylight, t
hough it was dark save a few candles lit for his assistance in terrorising his captive, the President of the USA. Mr Obama was tied with shackle and chain to the cold redbrick wall, ankle-deep in the dirty sewage water; he was squirming and muttering something along the lines of “you’ll never get away with this, do you know who I am?”

  “But of course,” snickered the Violet Avenger, “you will be the kingpin to my time travel escapade for many years ago you would have been but a worker and you will learn, when I take you back to my time that things are not as they would……..” Suddenly his chain of thought was broken; he heard something behind him and swished his bulbous purple head around to see what it was.

  Creeping into the light and flipping up their infra-red visors two people stood before the super-villain and caused him an evil smirk, “well, well, if it isn’t my old foe Remarkableman; it would seem I got my premonitions for world apocalypse slightly short of a few decades. I hope you are enjoying the year 2014 Remarkableman, for it will be your last ha-ha-ha!”

  “Your game is up Violet Avenger, release the President at once!” demanded the brave superhero with a threatening point of his finger.

  “Oh, ha-ha, you and who’s army….opps,” he replied suddenly noticing the attractive young female by his side, “I see you have a sidekick, a girl wonder indeed, hello pretty one, what is your name?”

  Gen stood affront of the two men and gave a stern and cold hard stare at the Avenger, “In 2014 we do not pass the time of day with criminal minds, we do not banter and we do not pull wisecracks; we get on with the job and despatch a sharp needle of pain into our adversaries!”

  She pulled her laser cannon from her sleeve and Remarkableman pulled her back, “not yet,” he casually informed her, “we have a witty repartee to confabulate, it is all part of being a superhero!”

  “Not in our time,” she demanded, pulled his arm away and began heading towards the Violet Avenger with a look of anger boiling in her eyes. She raised the laser protruding from her sleeve but the Avenger just giggled and produced his time travel gun, “see you in the 1930s young lady, where you will be but an honest and loyal housewife- ha-ha-ha!”

  As he stated this his gun produced a ray of purple which stopped around her body, then span out to form a dome around both the Avenger and the President. She gasped for air as he giggled out loud but suddenly she found a burst of magnificent energy and flew above him firing her laser beam into his skull. He screamed in pain and fell to his knees. As he dropped his weapon the dome ceased and all went back to the dimly lit sewer’s candles.

  The President thanked them for a job well done as she wrapped the Avenger tightly in wire. She turned to order Remarkableman to help her untie the President, “Ok bozo; that is how it’s done 2014 style, now, help me……..”

  She stood there shocked; Remarkableman was gone, vanished into thin air.

  11.

  The President helped Gen tug the tied up Avenger to the ladder leading back up to 32nd Street, “What happened to your friend?” he asked her.

  “I don’t know, I guess the Avenger’s ray sent him back to 1939. It is probably for the best, he would never have fitted in in our time.” Gen felt that this was a lie though, Remarkableman had tried so hard to adjust to life in 2014, he really wanted to understand all the changes be it technology or just cultural and most of all, he confessed to a sexual preference which would be far better living in the modern era with. He turned out to be not such a bad person after all, he formed a bond of friendship with Gen and she had never really bonded with anyone before, choosing to live a life of anonymity due to her employment.

  Together they pulled the man to the top of the ladder and with a mighty thrust of her arms she raised the drain cover and peeked out onto the street. She was stunned, the air was different, a smog like no other she had ever seen rested in the city, the high rise modern buildings could not be seen but the whole feel of the place was different. They hoisted the tied up bundle on the street and both came to the surface. Then a vintage car, a Ford Model 48 sped past the road and a man stopped at the edge of the manhole. He wore a suit with short well-presented hair, slicked to one side parting. He also wore a thin moustache. Gen looked at the road as another vintage car sped past, then he looked at the man. Her mind began to race ahead, “are you, are you Russell Stamm?” she asked him.

  “Yes, how could you…..” he stammered in surprise.

  “What is happening Gen-etic?” asked the President as he scrambled to his feet and looked concerned as to their whereabouts, “what the……”

  “We are in 1939 Mr President,” she explained, “look, Mr Stamm,” she now addressed the man, “I haven’t much time, you have to believe me. We are from the year 2014, ok? I am a super-heroine, a female superhero and this is the President of the USA. This is the super-villain The Violet Avenger and we have captured him. We need you to tell the world that…..”

  Before she could get the time to finish what she had said a crowd had gathered around the scene and began to ask Russell what was going on. Gen knew she could not be seen, a female superhero would be too much for them to take in and so she quickly apologised to the President and zapped off on a wire to the highest building and out of sight.

  The president tried to back down the man-hole as the crowds began shouting, “A negro, in the sewer!” A photographer took a picture of the scene just before he covered himself up and again and the police arrived to arrest the Avenger. People were confused, asking questions but Russell just wandered off deep in thought, “well,” he muttered to himself, “a woman superhero…..she vanished so quickly, like she was invisible or something…….”

  12.

  The sewer went suddenly dark and although he could not see instinct told him he was now totally alone. He moved his visor down to check that he was correct and when he confirmed that he was a small tear trickled down and sat in the rubber strip of his screen.

  He knew what had happened, the Avenger had zapped the president and Gen back with him to 1939. He came back down the sewer and did not even jump or act surprised when an army of men covered in black rubber suits and armed with machine guns professionally leapt down the man-hole and gathered around him, ordering him to stay still.

  Remarkableman could have easily ricocheted any bullets fired and/or taken out all the men himself but he just did not feel like it. He held his head low as they demanded to know what he had done with the President and the Agent Gen-etic, as if he would really hurt them.

  Two hours of gloom past until Remarkableman was sitting in a NYPD interview room with his head held low. A chief of police was looking at him over his glasses with a frown of disbelief. The psychiatrist looked perplexed, trying to untangle the statements of time travel and super-heroics that sprouted from the man’s mouth.

  The chief of police went for another bought of interrogation until the point where Remarkableman thought he was going to crack. He had never experienced mental exhaustion until now, the constant questions about who he was, where he came from and what he had done with the President continued relentlessly. Just when Remarkableman thought he could take no more and considered giving a false confession that he killed the President the door opened on its jar and a police officer requested a quick word with the chief. Seconds felt like weeks as the men talked outside and then they strode in again, the chief wore a different expression. Another man followed, the President of the USA, as bold and bright as he ever was. The police officers backed off as the President said hello to Remarkableman.

  The President would not answer the superhero’s many questions; he merely led him to his large black limousine and helped him in. The car whipped him round to the outskirts of the city where they stopped at a large house. The President waved him goodbye and his bodyguards assisted Remarkableman through the vast corridors of the building. It smelt strange, of over-boiled vegetables and sick. Remarkableman did not like it here one bit, old people wandered the corridors or else just sat in chairs staring out of the
windows.

  The worn out superhero was taken to a small room, a wrinkled old woman sat in a chair, “hello bozo,” she uttered and Remarkableman looked stunned, he recognised that voice even if it was older and rougher. His eyes lit up as he scanned the old lady’s features, it was her; it really was. “Have you got the hang of the internet yet, posted any pictures of cute cats?” she laughed.

  “How, how did the President get back?” he asked her.

  “Oh, ha-ha, I thought that would be your first question. There was a little bit of power left in the Avenger’s time travel ray gun, I snuck back into the sewer and blasted him with it then I left the city altogether. I left it for a long time…”

  Remarkableman overcame his fear of the moment and he approached her and held her bony old hand, “why did you not use the ray on yourself and return?”

  “Why? I thought about all the things you said, the 1940s was a much happier time to live. I was bored with living this life of orders, political killings and painstaking hours of training but I was genetically created for this sole purpose. I could have never gotten out of it unless I stayed in the 1940s, no internet, no petty health and safety regulations. I met a man, settled down and had children, I raised a wonderful family Remarkableman; the best years of my life I spent cooking and washing clothes by hand, I spent giving love to my family and that is more rewarding than anything I could have accomplished here in this time,” she giggled as the memories come flooding back to her. “It is good to see you again after so many years…..” she tilted her glasses onto the tip of her nose, “come closer; my eyes aren’t so good; I want to get a better look at you.”