Atomik Lad shook his head. “Hey Nuke, are you going to stay in uniform the whole time?”
He struck a pose. “But what if villainousness were to suddenly discover our unsuspecting selves? We’d be entirely at their mercy! Heroing is one half eternal vigilance, one half style, and one half righteous cleansing might.”
“You couldn’t battle these hypothetical villains in a swimsuit?” Rachel asked.
“A swimsuit?” Nuklear Man cringed at the thought like a proper Victorian lady when confronted with the possibility of showing an ankle in public. “Do you have any idea how stupid I’d look? Sheesh.” He straightened his golden spandex and made sure his cape was free to flap in the cool breeze.
She held back a laugh. “Er, right. What was I thinking?”
“But Nuke, how do you expect the ‘honeys’ to go crazy over your ‘killer bod’ if you don’t show it off?”
The Hero considered this train of logic like a cabbage comprehending the more complex aspects of faster than light theory. “You lost me.”
“Part of the beach going experience is soaking up some sun,” Rachel explained.
Nuklear Man crossed his arms, “Hmmphf. Lousy overrated dayball.”
Mighty Metallic Magno Man walked past the scene with an empty plate and cup on the way to the snack table. “Yo, Nuke. Nice party,” he said in passing. An entourage of bikini-clad women swooned after him.
Atomik Lad nudged the Hero’s shin, “Hey, Nuke. You all right?”
Nuklear Man glowed with Jealous Plazma like a halogen bulb. “Grrr... uh, what?” He switched off the light show, “I’m not jealous!” he snapped for no discernible reason.
Rachel and Atomik Lad traded glances. “Um,” was their consensus. “You know, you could probably get some attention if you showed a little skin, Big Guy.”
“I get plenty of attention!” Had the universe been a slightly more dramatic place, tumbleweed would have bounced by.
As it was, Angus took its place. He clomped irritably through the scene while kicking up his weight in sand with every step. “Blasted sand!” he cursed. “It’s all soo, soo...” he quivered with anger, “SANDY!” Satisfied with his astute observation, the Surly Scot walked back to his Iron: Beach Blanket with a plate full of pizza.
“Hold on, ladies,” MMMM’s voice trailed from the snack stand, “There’s no need to crowd me, there’s enough pizza to go around.”
Rachel and Atomik Lad had to shield their eyes from Nuklear Man. “Nuke, turn down the dimmer switch.”
“I’ll show that overgrown, egotistical Testosterone Titan!” Nuklear Man grabbed his classy spandex at his electron-orbited “N” symbol and struck a defiant pose. His cape took its cue and turned the Impressive Level up to Critical Mass. With a single yank his entire outfit was rent from his sculptured body leaving nothing to cover it...
“Oh my,” Rachel blurted.
“Hail to the king, baby.”
...except his Danger: Swimsuit.
Mighty Metallic Magno Man walked by with several pieces of pizza and a refilled cup. “Hey, Nuke. Nice trunks.”
Here’s my chance, the Hero told himself. Where? he asked. Right there, idiot. Hurry or you’ll miss it! He hopped between MMMM and the girls.
“Out of the way, loser!” one groupie snapped and pushed him to the side.
“All right.” He flexed and posed like a bodybuilder. He pointed off to the left more to point out his bicep than any direction. “Should I go over there?” He shifted the whole works to the right. “Or there?”
They starred at him unimpressed. “Why don’t you take a long walk off a short pier, jerk?” another offered.
“Anything for you lovely ladies,” the Hero gave his winning smile-wink-fingergun-point-thing and shot into the air in search of a pier.
__________
“Would you like some more suntan lotion, Mighty Metallic Magno Man?”
“Oh ladies!” Someone sounding remarkably like Nuklear Man called from a distance.
“Naw, I’m fine for now. And call me Norman.”
They cooed.
“Yoohoo, honeys! Your knight in Plazma Armor is waaaaaaaiiiiiiiting!”
The Tungsten Titan tilted his head. “You girls hear something?”
Far to their right, Nuklear Man floated about ten feet from a pier.
“Norman, will you make the weirdo go away?”
“Oh, you mean Nuke? He’s just goofin’ around.”
Hmm, the Hero thought, maybe I haven’t taken a long enough walk. A golden streak blazed across the ocean. Two columns of water were tossed into the air as he carved a churning path with his wake. He stopped. Looking back, Nuklear Man saw nothing but water and settling mist. “Lousy curvature of the Earth,” he muttered. “Anyway, I bet they think I’m completely dreamy now. It’s just a matter of time before they come out here and beg to oil me up.” He floated several feet above the ocean’s surface and reclined in midair with a smile.
__________
Lotion. Squeeze. Into hand. Can’t. Too. Beautiful.
“C’mon, Sparky, what’s taking so long?” Rachel teased. “I thought you’d jump at the chance to put your hands on me.”
The suntan lotion bottle’s entire contents splurt themselves onto Atomik Lad’s hand in accordance with the Laws of Comedy.
“Er. Well, that’s never happened before.”
“That’s okay, don’t worry. We’ve got all day.”
__________
Angus had been eyeing the ocean with contempt since he finished his contemptuous pizza. He held no actual contempt for the ocean itself. This, of course, generated a considerable amount of contempt in Angus for the ocean. “Bah! Lookit them laddies surfin’ out there.” There were no laddies and no surfin’. “‘Oooh, we be surfin’ an’ havin’ a wonderful time, lah-dee-dah. What’s that, Angus? Ye want to do some surfin’ with us, eh? Oh, no, ye be too short fer surfin’ folk. Why don’t ye go an’ sit in the wee kiddies’ pool, ye squat freak!’ Bah! Ah’ll show ‘em who’s too short for the blasted ocean!”
He dug his small feet into the hot sand, gritted his teeth, and tossed his menacing Iron: Battle Helm to the ground. “DWARF-A-PULT!” he bellowed to the heavens. His Bagpipe Thrusters flared to life and propelled the diminutive Angus in the general vicinity of the ocean. The horrible thrusters sounded like, well like bagpipes, as they needed no more colorful a simile to portray their unholy screeching.
At the peak of Angus’s launch, beyond the view of the beach, he pushed a small button on his collar. His Iron: Battlesuit transformed into an Iron: Swimsuit. His frazzled red beard nearly reached his bare knees. But then, they weren’t all that far from his chin, so it’s not terribly impressive. “Ah’m king o’ the world!” He slapped his small hands over his mouth and made sure no one had heard him. “Er, Ah means, YYYYEEEEEARGHBLBLBLBLE!”
__________
Nuklear Man hovered over the murky blue-green waves. His stamina at maintaining impressive poses—and this time without a cape mind you—never ceased to amaze him.
Neither did Scotch Tape. But we’ll not linger on that.
“Yep, those beach babes couldn’t possibly be more wooed by yours truly,” he told himself.
__________
“Hey, I wonder where Nuke is,” Mighty Metallic Magno Man said. “He’s missing his own party.”
“Nuke who?” the girls asked.
“Ah well, he can take care of himself.”
__________
Nuklear Man’s keen eyes scanned the horizon. “Ah ha! That must be the first of my betrothed maidens now.” Then his slightly less keen ears kicked in. His face contorted with confusion. It was in familiar territory. “That poor beach nymph. Her banshee-like wails of torment from being so far from her Nuklear Love Monkey are grating across mine ears like, um.” It was so loud he could barely hear his own narration. “…Like bagpipes?”
“King o’—er—YYYYEEEEEARGHBLBLBLBLE!”
“WAH!”
&nbs
p; In a tumult of limbs and beard, the ill-matched pair tumbled into the sea below.
Ripples.
Stillness.
Bubbles.
Nuklear Man, like a phoenix, except for the fire or ashes or shape changing or any similarity to ornithological phenomenon other than a certain talent for flight, rose from the churning ocean. He dried his hair in a flash of Plazma. “Whew, that was close. Thought I’d have to style it again.”
Angus surfaced. His tiny limbs flailed and failed to keep him afloat. “Gasp! Ye overrated pretty boy—gag—don’t just stand there floatin’, save me!”
Nuklear Man shuddered. “Yowza. Hours of not being in my godly presence has reduced this vixen of the dunes to a gnarled, hairy, belligerent, bearded, ill-bathed, foul-mouthed Scotsman!”
“Ah ain’t no vixen, ye haggis-brained, donkey-bitin’ son of a French whore—glurble cough—It’s me, Angus, and Ah’m drownin’!”
“Well, what’dya want me to do about it?”
“Save me!”
“But my hair’ll get wet again. It could get ruined.”
“Ah don’t bloody care about ye damned hair!”
“That’s what separates us from the animals, Angus. Priorities. And good grooming habits.”
“When Ah gets outta these damned waters, Ah’m gonna take that blasted smug smile o’ yours and rip it out through ye—splash burble—gasp, and then, with just the handle, ‘cause that way it’ll hurt more, I’m gonna tear ye a new—gurgle sploosh. Blurble.”
“See Angus? You just calm down and ride the wave and everything will turn up roses in the end.”
__________
Angus, due to a quirk of density and his Iron: Swimsuit, sank. A constant stream of bubbles bubbled their way to the briny surface as Angus cursed with such beauty and precision that it would have made even the most stalwart among us break into tears. He watched the bubbles as they rose. He took this as nothing less than the bubbles partaking in a bit fancy-boy showing off in regards to their buoyancy.
Nothing enraged Angus like fancy-boy showing off.
Except for surfers.
And the water.
And sinking.
Sinking? He’d be damned if he was going to let some force of nature stop him. He shook with rage and spite. More bubbles rose to the surface in what Angus took to be a direct insult.
“WUB-A-BULB!” The Surly Scot rocketed from the bleak depths. His Bagpipe Thrusters took on a muted quality underwater, though nearly every aquatic creature in hearing distance agreed it was the worst sound to invade their waters for a hundred million years.
Nearly every aquatic creature because there was a slight minority that disagreed with this consensus. One particular creature of the sea to be exact. A single crustacean. To it, the wretched mutation of sound was a beautiful, lilting piece of eloquence. It was sublime. It was invigorating. It had that come hither quality.
It was a mating call.
__________
Within the ruins of a once mighty structure, since weak structures tend to go straight to dust without bothering with the intermediate “ruins” stage, a monstrous computer panel with hundreds of unmarked buttons hummed in a darkness abated only by the huge screen attached to it. “The End of Nuklear Man: Plan B” was blinking in the display’s upper right hand corner A checklist took up the majority of the monitor. Each item had a small repeating animation next to it.
“Step 1: Launch Evil: Geo-synchronous Satellite with Defusionizing Ray. Complete.” A cartoony rocket shot into space and jettisoned a satellite that hung over the Earth.
“Step 2: Lock on to Nuklear Clod. Scanning...” An unflattering caricature of Nuklear Man dumbly evaded a pair of persistent crosshairs.
“Step 3: Press The Button.” A devilish and sexy representation of Dr. Menace, her eyes wide with excitement, madly pushed a button with alternating speed-blurred hands.
“Step 4: Celebrate Death of Nuklear Buffoon with Global Orgy of Destruction and Chaos.” A globe was dotted with skulls and crossbones, mushroom clouds, fire, and sad faces.
“Oh, Nuklear Moron, you’ve defeated me many timez in the past. I shall make certain you do not have the opportunity to do zo again.” She pressed a series of anonymous buttons on her huge computer panel. A windowpane filled with hundreds of numbers and arcane symbols appeared on her oversized computer screen. “You see,” she told no one in particular, as is the wont of any archfiend. “In our last encounter, I was able to acquire enough information about the nature of your powers to find a way to counteract them using my Negaflux Field technology!” She scanned the windowpane’s myriad notes and formulae. “With but one blast of my Defusionizing Ray, I shall render all nuclear activity within that blundering body of yourz null and void—therefore destroying any opposition to my world domination!” She leaned back in thought for a moment. She held back a maniacal cackle. It wasn’t quite time for one just yet. However, she was past due referring to herself in the third person. “Nothing can defeat Dr. Menace!”
__________
“Hmm,” Nuklear Man said in his practiced impression of the kind of person who always seemed to be on top of things. “Wonder where Angus went.”
The sea under Nuklear Man bubbled.
He looked.
It churned.
He pursed his lips.
It belched Angus and the sounds of bagpipes as they forced water and fish from their bowels.
The Hero beamed. “Hey, Angus, I was just—”
“About ta eat a fistful o’ iron!” PUNCH! “Ye empty-headed,” KICK! “Sack o’ haggis!” HEADBUTT!
Angus’s upward thrust faded. He flapped his stubby arms to stay aloft. It succeeded only in making him look more absurd. The Surly Scot took in a huge breath and anticipated the icy waters’ embrace.
“Oh no you don’t, Gravity.” Nuklear Man palmed Angus by his head like a basketball. “Gotcha.”
The sea below bubbled at them.
Then the sea all around them bubbled.
“You made it angry,” Nuklear Man said.
The sea growled viciously at them.
“Maybe we should sacrifice a virgin to it,” Angus suggested.
They looked at each other nervously.
“Er, where ever would we find one?”
“Feh, Ah wouldn’t know one if Ah saw ‘im,” Angus said with a masculine sniff and Iron: Swimsuit adjustment.
The water bellowed at them.
“You’ve been down there. Is it supposed to do that?”
The waters broke. A green-blue carapace hundreds of feet wide surfaced. It was covered in gnarled barnacles, knots, spikes, seaweed, flopping fish, and an unpleasant smell. The wide beast shifted its enormous girth and turned its front end upward, revealing its huge footjaws which were poised just under the pair of Heroes who were, at this point, pathetically clutching one another. Its gargantuan maw opened wide enough to swallow a city bus whole. Sideways. The creature took a deep breath and howled its wet, gurgling scream like the tortured deaths of a potato sack full of babies being beaten to death with another potato sack full of babies.
Nuklear Man wished he could spontaneously evolve the ability to turn his ears off at will. No such luck.
“That’s a pretty catchy tune, actually,” Angus mumbled to himself as the force of the roar pushed them up a foot in the air.
The thing submerged. They watched as it cruised just under the waves like a shark-torpedo.
“It’s going to the beach!” Nuklear Man said.
“Someone ought to save those innocent laddies!”
Nuklear Man, full of resolve, steeled his features like an invincible god of war. “Right. I’ll go look for him. Yoing!”
Nuklear Man’s feet pedaled uselessly in the air. Angus held him back by the cape.
“Ghk!” Nuklear Man said. “Aww, c’mon. Just this once? That thing’s scary. Plus, how are you able to hold on to me like this?”
“Git!” The Surly Scot spun like a top and tossed h
is Nuklear Discus toward the shore while hanging on to his cape for the ride.
“Okay, seriously, how’d you do that?”
The somewhat Heroic pair soared right over the sea monster. “We’re falling!” Nuklear Man squealed in terror as gravity took control. “It’ll eat us dead!”
“Fly, ye blasted horse’s knickers!” Angus hollered as he climbed up Nuklear Man’s cape.
He complied and they raced past the sea monster. Nuklear Man’s velocity kicked up another rooster tail of water. “Wait. Horse’s what?”
“Never ye mind, just fly!”
__________
Atomik Lad and Rachel had wandered to the pier. They walked under it, swaying with their gait and talking about anything in the way people who are obviously attracted to each other do when they don’t know what to say to keep the other person from going away.
“So, handsome,” Rachel said. “When’re you going to introduce me to your parents?” Atomik Lad stopped short. Rachel joined his change in momentum. “John?” she asked.
He blinked at the wet sand at his feet. “They. My parents. They’re um, dead.”
Rachel clasped her hands around his wrists. “Oh, I’m so sorry, I didn’t know—”
“Don’t be sorry, it’s not like it was your fault.” He clenched his fists. “I’m fine. It was a long time ago, I was just a kid. It was an accident. It had to happen to somebody, I guess. Besides, Nuke took me in after that and I’ve been taking care of him ever since.”
“Oh, he’s not so bad.”
“That’s what I keep telling myself.”
She put a hand on his shoulder and kissed his cheek softly. “I am sorry though,” she whispered too close to his face.
Atomik Lad realized his hands were around Rachel’s waist, and hers were locked somewhere behind his head. Closer now. Hearts beating. Eyes closed. The organic aroma of breath and saltwater. Sparks or fireworks just like everyone said. Red sparks?
“Rachel!” He pushed her like a semi-truck was blindly hurtling toward her. She stumbled back a few steps and fell onto her backside in the moist sand. Startled, she looked up at Atomik Lad.
Nuklear Age Page 17