by Seth Jacob
Insight’s telekinetic bubble burst. We broke formation the instant her field crumbled under the weight of all that power, and we scattered to avoid Mistress Gorgon’s blue inferno. Insight shot into the air glowing with a purple telekinetic aura that saved her from the fire gnawing at her entire body. Mr. Mercurial snapped like a rubber band into spindly, silver tendrils that coiled throughout the room and wrapped around dozens of those goddamn ooze spraying Goons. Joe Metal’s armor encased him in a force field that just barely held as he dove out of the way of the fire. And me? I sprung up into the air and was instantly pounded in the head by The Immaterial Man’s smoggy fist.
I was flung across the room and onto the second floor where I bounced like a stone skipping across water until I crashed into a glass case containing Beyond Man’s original costume. His blue cape fell over my face and shards of glass shred through my costume and lacerated my skin. As soon as I got to my feet and pulled that heavy blue shroud off of my head, I saw three out of four of The Abnormalite’s fists tearing at me like pink cinder blocks launched out of a catapult.
I ducked and The Abnormalite punched craters in the wall that Beyond Man’s original costume used to guard, and I ran. I ran as fast as I could past Queen Quantum’s Cosmic Crown displayed in a little glass box that shattered as one of Master Boson’s nuclear blasts just narrowly missed me. I ran through an aisle of Doc Hyper’s aerodynamic friction proof running boots, each of them flopping to the floor as armadillodrones bumped into their platforms while they skittered after me with humming buzzsaws and sparking tasers, and I heard The Abnormalite’s plodding steps somewhere behind me making the entire second floor tremble like it was being rocked by an earthquake.
All I could think was keep moving, got to keep moving, and I made it to the railing of the second floor where I was about to leap across the main hall, anything to get some distance between me and the pink skinned horror that was The Abnormalite. I put one foot on the metal railing to propel myself off of it, and I had a fraction of a second to witness the battle below.
It was a clusterfuck of indescribable proportions. There was a blue bonfire growing on the floor of the museum. There was a kaleidoscope of multicolored energy blasts flying in every direction and piercing billowing clouds of smoke before causing miniature explosions wherever they connected. There were battalions of henchmen, Goons and Henchasaurs and Harpies and Ninjatoms and the Reptilian Guard and even Captain Haiku’s Syllabullies, and they charged together on the burning marble floors and screamed with one voice like they were storming the beaches of Normandy. It was sheer chaos, and I had no idea if my teammates were alive or dead.
I pushed off of the railing and flew into the air with nothing even resembling a plan, and The Whimsy fired up from the floor of the main hall and collided with me. We tumbled together through the blinding smoke filling the museum, just me and the first supervillain I ever fought immersed in a gray smokey limbo, and then we plummeted out of the smoke cloud and back down onto the second floor. I got to my feet, out of breath and dripping blood from the deep cuts carved into me by glass that used to encase Beyond Man’s original costume, and again, I ran. I ran right into The Abnormalite’s pink fist.
I lost consciousness for an eternity of a full second, and when I woke up, I was sailing through the air like a baseball that The Abnormalite had just hit out of the stadium. I flailed my arms and legs in a useless attempt to control my descent, and I smashed through the observation window of the Superb 6 satellite dangling from the ceiling of the museum. I landed on my back on a round table with a big blue and silver S6 symbol on it and skidded across it, grinding even more glass into my body before I slid to a stop. The anarchy of the battle below was muted inside that space station, and it was like I had been punched into a quiet, quaint memory of the 60’s space age. The inside of the satellite was all smooth, curved surfaces and chrome, like the Mad Men offices mixed with the Star Trek bridge.
I crawled across broken glass to the edge of the table. I staggered off of it and lurched towards the nearest control panel, which was an endless array of metal switches and knobs and dials, and I just started pushing things. I ran my hands all over the panel and frantically flicked switches and jammed buttons and twisted dials, just hoping that one of them was some kind of emergency signal that was still functional and would get the attention of the Superb 6, but there were no blinking lights, there were no readings on the dead, dust caked computer screens. I was on my own, and no help was on the way.
And then came the laughter, that squealing laughter of The Immaterial Man as he seeped in through the seams of the once air tight satellite. Sickly green gas trickled into the room from every direction, and before I could even think about bolting, The Immaterial Man’s hand was at my throat like a vise crushing my larynx. His eyes, those burning rubies floating in his foggy head, they bored into mine as he choked the life out of me.
“No more running, Spectacle. You gave us a run for our money, you really did. I’m having more fun than I’ve had in years, but enough’s enough. It’s over, kid,” The Immaterial Man said, and he carried me by my throat to the shattered observation window. He held me out of the window and over the seven story drop from the satellite to the main hall floor.
“Say hi to your pops for me,” The Immaterial Man said in between shrill giggles. I couldn’t breathe or talk, but I did the one thing I could do. I spit in his face. It flew right through his intangible forehead, and then he dropped me.
“I got you,” Mr. Mercurial said as he caught me in one of his silvery hands that was expanded into the shape of a big metallic catcher’s mitt. He caught me after I fell at least four stories. He was standing dozens of feet tall on stretched out stilt legs, the fingers of his other hand were elongated into five silver ropes, each of which were whipping all around the room and knocking down henchmen so fast that he was actually making a dent in their numbers. Despite everything, he still had that huge smile on his shiny face.
The Immaterial Man spilled down at Mr. Mercurial from the Superb 6 satellite like a pale green waterfall. Mr. Mercurial teetered on his silver stilt legs as the current of his gaseous body surged around him, and I was knocked out of his hand. I was bounced close enough to the fourth floor that I was able to grab the railing and pull myself up.
Mr. Mercurial and The Immaterial Man became a terrible yin-yang of flowing liquid metal and raging green gas, swirling around each other and attacking in ways that only shapeshifters can. The Immaterial Man was a hail storm of fuming fists striking out at Mr. Mercurial, who was a frothing, boiling multitude of balloons trying and failing to contain the raging green tempest, and that was just the first of many morphing, rapid fire reactions and adaptations which hurt my eyes to look at. And throughout it all, The Immaterial Man’s sharp laughter punctured the air.
I wrenched myself away from their hypnotic fight, and I continued my strategy of running like hell when I was faced with a sign. It said, “Tools of the Trade.” I realized that this floor showcased crimefighting equipment, and I darted into the exhibit to grab something, anything that could help us fight back. Just as I entered a section of the floor dedicated entirely to utility belts, Captain Haiku swung over the railing on a grappling hook rope like he was boarding an enemy ship and planted himself in front of me.
“Avast, Spectacle!
I always knew that I’d win.
That I’d destroy—”
I coldcocked him before he could get out the last syllable of his haiku, and I stepped over his unconscious body and into a hallway of utility belts. Every kind of utility belt was mounted on the wall in glass frames. I grabbed the first frame I came to which contained Supra’s utility belt, and I bashed it against the wall. Her sleek utility belt composed of interlocking compartments fell out of the frame, and that’s when I heard her.
“Oh, Spectacle…Spectaaacccleeee…” Mistress Gorgon called out in a sing song voice. I tried to ignore her while I clicked open the compartments of Supra’s utilit
y belt, and stuffed pellet flash bang grenades, smoke bombs, tranquilizer darts, and titanium hand cuffs into my jacket pockets.
“There you are, sweetheart,” Mistress Gorgon said as she turned a corner and saw me with a fistful of flash bang grenades and Supra’s emptied out utility belt at my feet.
“Sweetheart this,” I said, and I chucked the flash bang grenades at the nest of snakes writhing on Mistress Gorgon’s head. They bounced off of her like useless marbles, and she smiled.
“Spectacle…come on. This is a museum. Did you really think they’d have live ammo in here?” Mistress Gorgon strutted towards me, her serpents unhinged their jaws, and they let loose multiple streams of burning blue death.
I jumped away from her and took cover behind a suit of Anhur’s bronze Egyptian armor, but I wasn’t fast enough. Flesh sizzled on my left shin. I patted out the flames clawing up my leg as blue fire curled around Anhur’s suit of armor, and I pulled the titanium handcuffs out of my pocket. Anhur’s Breastplate of Ra melted and dripped molten metal with Mistress Gorgon’s fire raging all around it. It wouldn’t withstand the fire for much longer.
I sprung straight up and over Anhur’s drooping armor, over the sweltering heat of Mistress Gorgon’s fiery wrath, and I landed behind her. She whirled around with those wriggling black snakes still vomiting blue fire, I slapped the titanium handcuffs on her wrist and skipped out of the way before she could burn me alive.
“Honey, please. Don’t insult me,” she said, and now blue fire was spreading all throughout the fourth floor as those squirming serpents sprayed flame everywhere. Utility belts fell off the wall as their frames were consumed by fire. A cabinet of grappling hooks lit up and their neatly displayed nylon ropes burned like candle wicks. I kept moving, leaping and dodging and dancing around the displays until the entire floor was burning up and there was nowhere left to run, and Mistress Gorgon slinked through the fire towards me, her eyes glowing white like spotlights.
“You should’ve taken the money,” she said, and I felt her supra-stone solidifying around my badly burned leg and weighing me down. Her snakes hissed and flicked their forked tongues like they were anticipating a delightful mouse dessert. She was moving in for the kill, and I knew it.
I sprinted at her as fast as I could. I pushed myself through the fire devouring the entire floor, my leg was getting heavier and heavier as her supra-stone advanced up around my knee, I ignored it and kept driving at her with everything I had, and I snatched her handcuffed wrist. I yanked her arm down to her leg and handcuffed her wrist to her opposite ankle, leaving her body contorted and bent over. She toppled onto the burning carpet, straining to rip the titanium chains binding her arm to her leg, and I shuffled back against the railing with half of my burnt leg covered in supra-stone like I was wearing a concrete cast.
“This is a joke, Spectacle…you’re already dead. You can’t beat us all you stupid fuck,” Mistress Gorgon seethed at me, and really, I couldn’t argue with her. The fourth floor was almost completely on fire, and I let myself fall back over the railing.
I plunged towards the main floor, watching the fourth floor rise away from me and go up in flames, and I heard a voice in my head.
“Go limp,” Insight telepathically whispered to me.
My body began to glow with a weak purple light as the marble floor rushed at me, I started to fall slower than I should have but not nearly slow enough, not slow enough to make the ground look like anything other than a giant wall racing towards me, Brace yourself, Insight murmured in between my ears, and I slammed into the scorched marble floor so hard that the supra-stone on my leg smashed into splinters.
Shards of supra-stone stabbed my leg as I got to my feet. Insight was next to me telekinetically tossing back incoming herds of henchmen like rag dolls, but there were countless waves of them closing in on us, and there were ten more thugs for every one she threw back. Joe Metal was screaming as henchmen dogpiled on him and he fought to shake them off his armor, his exoskeleton torn like tissue paper all over and its damaged hydraulics system groaning with his every move.
“We have to use their numbers against them,” I thought to Insight as I grabbed a Ninjatom swinging a pair of irradiated nunchuks at me, and chucked him into the mob of henchmen, knocking a bunch of them over like bowling pins.
She nodded to me while keeping the hordes of henchmen at bay with radiating bursts of purple telekinesis. I glanced up and saw Dragon General gliding towards me with his scaly wings outstretched, and above him I saw Mr. Mercurial and The Immaterial Man swirling all around the Superb 6 satellite in a blob of morphing, contorting green gas and silver fluid.
“Patch my thoughts into Mr. Mercurial’s head,” I thought to Insight as Dragon General swooped down at me, the razor sharp talons on his bare feet soaring right at my face.
I stumbled out of his way, but I still felt those bone claws clipping my shoulder and tearing into my skin. Dragon General flew straight into a cluster of his own Reptilian Guard, and they broke his fall along with more than a few of their bones. Dragon General didn’t waste any time worrying about his snake skinned henchmen, and he slashed at me with his talon tipped fingers. I jumped back out of the way of his swiping claws, grabbed a nearby Goon by his hazmat suit and held him in front of me, and Dragon General accidentally hacked at the high pressure tank of goo strapped to his back. The tank erupted purple goo from the gashes Dragon General just sliced into it, I aimed the Goon’s back at him and the mobs of henchmen, and drenched them in globs of purple sedative gunk.
Dragon General and a mass of henchmen passed out…but as they fell away from us onto a bed of purple goo, they revealed a wall to wall legion of henchmen still standing and marching toward us. Professor Dinosaur, flanked by his Henchasaurs, smirked as his rival Dragon General took a nap. Mistress Gorgon jumped down from the fourth floor and landed on her feet like the fall was nothing, and she waved at me with a broken titanium handcuff chain dangling from her slender wrist. The Abnormalite kicked henchmen out of his way as he stomped towards us with Anhur’s spear grasped in all four of his hands. Fire was spreading from the fourth floor and climbing up the walls. You could hear the building creaking and straining under the pressure as its support structure began to break down. Henchmen stepped over the unconscious bodies of the few villains my teammates had taken down, like Dragon General, Armadillotron, and the poor, feeble Lacrosse Assassin. Behind them all, The Punster stood by the entrance of the museum, leaning against the big metal door frame and smiling at me like he was having the time of his life.
“Bring down the satellite, Mr. Mercurial,” I thought.
Insight cast a weak bubble of telekinetic energy around us, and we both looked up. Through her dim purple field, we saw Mr. Mercurial’s amorphous, silver body mingled with The Immaterial Man’s raging green clouds. Metallic tendrils lashed out at the wires suspending the Superb 6 satellite. Two snapped, then a third, a shudder ran through the building as the several tons of metal above us jerked hard on the ceiling, all the supervillains and henchmen stopped closing in around us and they looked up too, I saw through the purple tint of Insight’s field that The Punster’s smile had faded, and then it fell.
Supervillains and henchmen scattered in every direction. There wasn’t even a pretense of teamwork anymore. It was every man for himself. Henchmen pushed and shoved and knocked each other to the ground and trampled over the fallen to get out of the way of the massive satellite. It dropped from the ceiling, spinning in the air like a giant blue and silver top, and Insight clenched her eyes shut and poured every last bit of telekinetic power into the purple bubble surrounding us. It glowed so intensely that I couldn’t even see the falling satellite anymore. All I could see was blinding purple light, and I closed my eyes too. There was a thunderous crash, it was so loud that I couldn’t hear my own screaming, and it seemed to go on forever, like the whole world was tearing itself apart around us.
Finally, silence. I opened my eyes, and Insight, both eyes bloodshot
with ruptured blood vessels, let her telekinetic field drop. We were standing in a clean, empty circle of marble…but outside of that circle was a field of metal and plastic, of broken solar panels and crumbled satellite walls and crushed spacecraft modules, of a silly space age dream gone to shit and dismantled all around us in a soup of rubble.
Everything stopped. My ears were ringing. I couldn’t hear it, but I could see the trembling, convulsing walls of the museum, and I knew that the whole place was coming down. I stepped out into the field of debris that coated the floor of the main hall, crunching metal and plastic under my shoes, and I looked for The Punster. Most of the henchmen got out from under the falling satellite and they were scrambling out of the museum entrance, but not all of them were so lucky. A Goon wandered by me clutching a bleeding stump where his hand used to be, his white hazmat suit spattered red with blood. There were mounds of wreckage that stood taller than the rest. I knew that henchmen and supervillains were buried beneath them. I couldn’t see The Punster anywhere.
Mr. Mercurial drizzled down to me in a mist of silver, and when he had reformed his glistening body, he could barely stand. He slumped towards me, and I slung his arm around my shoulder.
Joe Metal was shouting something at me and gesturing towards the exit of the museum. I couldn’t hear him. I limped towards the exit with Mr. Mercurial hobbling next to me. Insight and Joe were ahead of us and forcing the last of the henchmen through the door and out of our way.