by Maren Smith
How people like that got henchmen, Ommin couldn’t begin to guess. He could barely get friends.
“Oh my God,” cried an exuberantly familiar voice. “Did you see him destroy that building? Excuse me… pardon me please…”
Ommin turned just as Jim thrust his way past the police line holding back the growing crowd. They recoiled from him as only folks who didn’t want to get wet and who weren’t sure of said liquid would, and Jim came running to meet him.
“How the hell did they get news crews here so fast?” Ommin snapped. “It was on TV within seconds of the explosion.”
“Actually, he was on camera yelling for you for about ten minutes before he blew it up,” Jim said.
“He also called it in before he got started,” a nearby cop replied.
“Egomaniacal asshole,” Ommin retorted.
“Master Blaster,” Jim said, instantly adopting his grumpy tone. “Isn’t that a character from the Mad Max movie? What a joke!”
Said the guy who called himself Liquidman.
Thought the guy known as Sharkman.
“None of us gets added points for originality,” Ommin said.
“We definitely need to up our game in regards to costumes, too,” Jim added. “Do you think he made that himself? They’re all matchy-matchy, and everything.” He brightened. “I could get a sewing machine!”
“I will spank you,” Ommin snapped. Knowing he might actually do it too in his current mood, he left Jim and his giant puppy-dog eyes standing there, and headed toward the maniac.
“Where are you, Sharkman, you cowardly—”
“Oh, keep your matchy-matchy shirt on,” Ommin bellowed back. “I’m coming already.”
In retrospect, he probably should have waited. Master Blaster whipped around on his rubble pile and both hands lit up in flames. Stopping where he was, Ommin almost took a step back.
Behind him, however, Jim came bounding forward. “Wait for me!”
Master Blaster approached as far as the crown of the rubble pile would allow. So the news cameras could see him easily and record everything, Ommin noted.
“At last,” the villain breathed, his soft voice still booming.
“Is he wearing a microphone?” Jim whispered.
Apparently. It wasn’t until he started looking, however, that Ommin spotted a few carefully placed speaker systems.
“He is,” Jim said, surprise giving way to excitement. “Look! Look up by his mouth. It’s like a Bluetooth attachment. We really have to up our game. We’ve got to go to Best Buy!”
Oh, for—
“What do you want?” Ommin had to shout to be heard over the crackling of the fire and the low murmurs of the gathering crowd, not to mention the thirty or so feet that still separated him from Master Blaster.
“For the longest time,” Master Blaster said, “I thought I was the only one. The only one with powers that elevated me high above the rest of the mortal scum who inhabit this middling city. Nay, the whole of this middling, unexceptional world.”
“Middling?” Ommin echoed. “Nay? Who the hell are you and why are you talking this way?”
“He’s monologuing,” Jim softly supplied.
Ommin glanced at him. “What?”
“Monologuing?” Jim looked back just as surprised. “It’s how supervillains reveal their backstory and the reason behind their dastardly dare-doing. What, you never read a comic book?”
Glaring, Ommin’s annoyance grew with damn near every word. From the both of them.
“Oh, well,” Jim laughed. “Now we have to go to the comic book store, too. You and me, bud. We are up for one hell of a Saturday.”
“Once,” Master Blaster gleefully drawled, “I was where you are now—lost and confused in the mire of mediocrity—”
Ommin’s temper erupted. “I don’t care! I’m not doing this with you! Not now, not ever. You want to talk to me, you come down off that rock pile and talk to me like a normal human being. Until then, I’ve got nothing to say to you.”
He rounded on the henchman, both of who backed up a nervous step, their grip on Britney’s bound arms tightening.
“Let go of—” Ommin stopped himself before he said something as stupidly iconic as ‘the girl.’ He also stopped himself before he said something even more stupid like, ‘my girlfriend.’ This wasn’t high school. Also, she hadn’t yet changed her Facebook status to reflect her being in any kind of relationship. He knew, because he’d found her on social media during his morning break, although he hadn’t yet worked up the courage to friend her. He’d get to that, probably just as soon as he got her out of this mess.
“The girl,” Jim whispered, as if he thought Ommin had gotten stage fright and forgotten his lines.
“Britney,” Ommin snapped stubbornly.
“Who the hell is Britney?” Master Blaster asked, then looked to his henchmen in feigned surprise. “Oh, you mean the girl.”
“I’m not doing this,” Ommin announced again, and started toward them. Were he wearing a shirt with sleeves, he’d have rolled them up.
And Master Blaster would have burned them off as he leapt atop a slightly larger rock on his rubble pile, struck another dynamic pose and shot a massive fireball from his fists. The fireball hit the pavement directly in front of Ommin, blowing his hair back and damn near singeing off his eyebrows. The flames died back to nothing almost immediately, but the blast had left a pot hole in the concrete that hadn’t been there seconds before.
Ommin backed up, falling in line with Jim again.
“Whoa,” Jim said, impressed. “Now that’s a superpower.”
“I think we need to go to Plan B,” Ommin said.
“What’s Plan B?”
Good question. Glancing from Britney to Master Blaster, who threw back his head and laughed like a lunatic for the benefit of the awestruck crowd, he looked to the pothole and then decided. “I’ll go after the girl”—he’d hate himself for using that term later—“you go after the villain.”
Jim blinked, eyebrows arching. “What?”
“Water cancels fire.”
“It also evaporates, turns to steam and dies. Horribly. Screaming all the way. I went camping once,” Jim told him, and then started opening up his pants. “Look.”
Ommin had to grab his hands to stop him. “No! Just… no.” No way in hell was he going to get caught on camera looking down Jim’s pants.
“I’ve got a scar. S’mores tragedy, 2002. You don’t even want to know.”
“Button up, buttercup, or we stick with Plan B, and I don’t even try to think of a Plan C. Plus, if that shows up on the evening news, there will be no comics on this Saturday or any other.”
Glancing at the crowd of recording cell phones behind them, Jim buttoned up. “What are we going to do?”
“I’m thinking.”
“You’re going to die,” Master Blaster gleefully informed them. “I have waited years for an archnemesis worthy of my time and attention. It has been so long, but when I saw your footage on the news, I knew my time had come at last. Even if you are only a sharkman”—he sneered—“beggars cannot be too choosy. Where’s the fun in that?”
“Rush him,” Jim whispered.
“I burn too,” Ommin replied. “Horribly. Screaming all the way.”
“But… your sharkskin is tougher than your skin-skin…”
“Do you see any ocean water around here?”
“Oo!” Jim brightened. “Excuse us!” He darted forward, motioning for a time-out with his hands. “Can we relocate this to the beach and start over?”
Striking another pose, Master Blaster shot an even bigger fireball at him and Ommin barely yanked Jim back before it struck the ground exactly where he’d been standing. He spun around, getting his broad back between the showering sparks and Jim. Hot rocks peppered him, searing his skin.
“Plan D,” he hissed through the pain.
“Oh my God,” Jim said, over the oohs of the watching crowd. “That is one gru
mpy dude.”
Suddenly the crowd erupted into cheers, and it wasn’t because of anything he was doing. Dropping Jim, Ommin snapped around just as Britney slipped the last of her bonds. She yanked out of the grasp of one henchman, slammed her elbow into his midriff and doubled him over onto the ground as neatly as folded laundry.
“Hi-yah!” she yelled, grabbing the other by his own arm and flipping him. “Five years Ju Jitsu,” she spat as he landed on his back and wallowed there in grimacing agony.
She was glorious in her fury. He’d never seen a woman look so perfect, so upset, or so take-charge in her anger.
“You asshole!” she bellowed up at Master Blaster, who straightened in surprise as she kicked the first henchman in the face, knocking him off his knees and into unconsciousness on the pavement.
“I grabbed the wrong archnemesis,” Master Blaster marveled as she picked up a rock and threw it at him. It missed by yards. It may as well have been by miles.
“What did you do with my car?” she shouted, grabbing another rock.
Abandoning Ommin, the villain strode across the top of his rubble pile toward her. Arms out flung, laughing, he taunted in microphone-enhanced stereo, “Come at me, little Britney! Come and meet your fate!”
“No!” Ommin shouted, but she’d already flung the second rock.
Her aim was better this time. Master Blaster had to duck to keep from being hit, but in true theatrical style, he turned his duck into a twirl, slammed out his arms and shot another ball of blazing yellow fire.
“No!” Ommin screamed, breaking into a run, but Master Blaster’s aim was a hell of a lot better than hers was.
The fireball hit Britney square in the chest, knocking her flying backwards. Before his eyes, she landed amongst the unforgiving rubble at the base of the building pile and lay still.
Ommin’s gut-wrenching scream went viral within the hour and would play on repeat over the news and social media networks for weeks to come, but he couldn’t have cared less in that moment. He ran to her, cracking both knees against the pavement in his haste to extinguish the residual flames burning away her clothes.
He barely felt Jim fall beside him.
“Britney.” Ommin grabbed her up against him, rocking her, patting at her face. Desperate to find a pulse and so shattered in that instant that he couldn’t begin to remember where to check for one. “Britney!”
“Seems as if I must wait for a suitable opponent a while longer,” Master Blaster chortled into his headset microphone.
Cradling her to his chest, Ommin snapped. Everything before his burning eyes turned instantly and irrevocably red.
“Oh my God,” Jim said suddenly. “Oh my God, I’ve got it!”
Britney’s eyes weren’t moving. No part of her was moving. He couldn’t even tell if she was breathing or not when Ommin, as gently as he could, lay her down.
“Wait!” Jim grabbed his arm, but Ommin shook him off.
He stood with fists clenched and the sound of Master Blaster’s amplified laughter ringing in his ears.
“Ommin!” Jim shouted.
“What?” he snapped back.
“I’m not a superhero,” Jim said excitedly.
He was so far beyond caring, he couldn’t even begin to make sense of why that should be important.
“I’m not a villain either,” Jim continued, eyes wide and thrilled, as if that should mean something too. “I’m a sidekick!”
Grabbing his upper arms, Ommin would have shook him and shouted, “Like I fucking care!” But just as he opened his mouth, Jim grabbed him back and threw himself at Ommin with all his might. They collided and Jim popped like a damn water balloon all over again.
“Yeeeaaaggghh!” Ommin roared, spitting bits of Liquidman out before he accidentally swallowed him. Again. Unprepared as he was for any of this, he almost didn’t feel the prickling, stinging pain of his skin morphing under the saline-infused spray of Jim raining down all over him.
He got bigger.
He got broader.
His skin turned thicker, rougher as the toothy, sandpaper texture of his inner shark took over and the fins sprouted out the backs of his arms and all down his spine.
“Holy shit,” Master Blaster said, the speakers radiating his near comical surprise.
“Holy shit is right, bitch,” Ommin growled, and the crowd went completely wild as he tore up the crumbling side of that destroyed building after the man who’d hurt his Britney.
Master Blaster tripped on a rock in his haste to strike another pose. His startled fireball went wide, knocking the windows out of a neighboring building and sending glass raining down everywhere, but Ommin didn’t care. He got his hands on that lunatic before he could recover and ripped the headset right off him. The idiot was even wearing a mask. He tore that off too, lifting him straight off his feet as he shook him.
“You want a goddamn archnemesis?” he snarled. “You’ve got one now.”
Turning, he flung Master Blaster off the rubble pile onto the concrete below.
“Take that maniac to jail!” he bellowed to the police, who were already swarming to grab him before the injured villain could recover enough to summon another fireball. He was immediately hooded, and then swaddled in a fire-retardant blanket.
The cheers of the watching, filming audience were deafening, but all Ommin cared about was where the hell the ambulance was. The paramedics hung back only until the police had Master Blaster and his henchmen in cuffs. By the time they reached Britney though, the watery drops of Jim, still trying to reassemble himself, had crawled over her, soothing the burns that reddened her neck and chest.
She still wasn’t moving. Ommin knew, because he was right there with her, watching as they loaded her up into the back of a waiting ambulance that he was too big in his shark form to fit into. Because, of course he was.
“I swear I wasn’t trying to feel up your girlfriend,” Jim said. The first words he managed once he was human and dressed again.
Ommin nodded. He knew that, but he couldn’t take his eyes off the ambulance, with lights flashing and sirens wailing, driving off without him.
News cameras, reporters, paparazzi and ordinary people on cell phones were everywhere, happily filming his devastation.
Cops were everywhere too, trying to keep back the hordes of onlookers and people trying to swipe bits of broken building as souvenirs.
“How can we ever thank you, Sharkman?” one smiling officer said, coming up to shake his hand, of all things. Just as if he’d done something remarkable.
Ommin had nothing to say. He was the biggest man in the vicinity and he’d never felt so small or so helpless in his life.
Someone touched his shoulder.
He looked down at Jim, who managed a small smile for his benefit and then who looked around at the gathering officers and asked, “Can someone please give us a ride to the hospital?”
Epilogue
“But I have a concussion!” Britney wailed, standing in the corner of her own living room with her hands behind her head. She stomped her foot and bounced a little, biting off her protests with a whine that would have been adorable if she hadn’t just yesterday been lying unmoving on the street.
Fortunately, that was yesterday. Today was better.
Unpacking the U-Haul currently parked in her driveway by himself, Ommin put the box he was carrying down on the small stack piled up in her hallway and walked over to her corner.
“What did you say?” he calmly asked, his mouth so close to her ear that he could have kissed her.
Sniffling once, in a far more contrite tone, she corrected herself, “I said, I’ll never again throw rocks at a guy who throws fireballs.”
“That’s right.” Ommin swatted her, hard, so she’d remember it.
“This isn’t exactly fair, you know,” said Jim, standing in another corner with his hands behind his head.
Tsking, Ommin walked over to him next. “What did you say?” he pointedly asked, not at all tem
pted to kiss his ear.
After only a brief silence, also contritely, Jim said, “No more throwing myself on you when your mouth is open.”
Ommin nodded. He started to walk away, then thought about it. What the hell. He swatted Jim too.
“But I saved the day!” Jim whined, bouncing once.
Ommin swatted him again, harder.
That stopped the whining. It stopped the bouncing too.
“That’s better.” Daddy discipline dispensed, he went back out to get the last two boxes.
All the things he owned in the world had barely filled half the U-Haul and had taken no more than four hours to pack once he’d made the decision. It was a decision that hadn’t been at all hard to make from Britney’s hospital bedside with the doctor standing over her, telling her how lucky she was to only have a bump on the head and a few very minor second-degree burns.
“He has a very hard hand,” Ommin heard Jim saying as he made the last trip into the house.
“You have no idea,” Britney commiserated.
“No talking in the corner,” Ommin reminded them both, and made his way to the kitchen to make sandwiches for lunch. Because that was what Daddies did when they had Littles.
Daddy Sharks did it too. They made sandwiches, planned trips to the comic book store on weekends, and even grudgingly agreed to make a stop at the fabric store, but only because it was Britney who’d asked. He was pretty sure she was in league with Jim on that one.
It would be a cold day in hell before he put on a super suit, especially if it was made of spandex.
Still, he could make some concessions. Later today, in fact, he would be making a trip to Walmart for either a bucket or a kiddie pool. He wasn’t sure which Jim might prefer to sleep in. After that, they would visit the local Build-A-Bear where already TV advertisements declared they were pulling out last summer’s backstock of shark stuffies in Superman capes.
He wasn’t going to wear a cape, either, but he was going to buy a shark for Britney. So she could have a Daddy Shark to hug while he was out—as Jim put it—fighting crime.
Like Batman, apparently. Only with a far less impressive utility belt. Mostly because he didn’t have one.