Villain of the Weak
Mark A Davis
106
On the floor of a rusting foundry, Grandpa Anarchy fought a giant purple larva. The size of a horse, the creature was fat with short clawed appendages below its head. It dripped ichor. Grandpa, dressed in his usual gray suit and fedora, kept the creature at bey with a steel rod.
"Grandpa!" his sidekick called out. The boy, known as Kid Tuesday and dressed in a generic blue spandex outfit, wielded another steel bar.
Light drifted down from windows high overhead. The ceiling of the massive building was a latticework of steel. Hovering in midair was a young man in a form-fitting suit of dark blue. Glowing silver mathematical symbols and formulae drifted over the surface of the outfit. A holographic computer keyboard floated nearby.
"Careful, Grandpa," said Kid Calculus conversationally. "That's an Aefrgiri Demon Grub that I found it on Frueliv in the Earth-1037 dimension. Its ichor is quite corrosive."
Grandpa swung the steel bar into the creature's side. It was like punching jello. He dodged as the creature lunged. He turned and tossed his bar like a spear. It buried itself in the creature's side.
The grub burbled in pain.
"Where's your buddies, Kid Calculus?" Grandpa snarled.
"Who, the League of Former Sidekicks?" The hovering villain shrugged. "Who knows? I've left those losers behind. They'll never amount to anything, I see that now. I'm on to bigger and better things. I am your new breakout villain, Grandpa -- your new arch nemesis!"
"You?" Grandpa lifted a much longer steel rod and charged, impaling the grub again. It screamed and writhed in pain. With his own bar, Kid Tuesday delivered a final blow. "You ain't my nemesis, that's....."
"Carnival Act?" interrupted Kid Calculus. "He's dead, I hear. That means there's an opening."
Kid Calculus tapped the floating keypad. A dimensional doorway appeared, from which erupted a giant black bird with a silver beak. It stood over a meter tall. It spotted Grandpa, screeched and charged.
"Grandpa!" yelled Kid Tuesday.
"Yes, I see it!" Grandpa replied.
"The Razor-Beaked Streogantu Bird," Kid Calculus said as Grandpa desperately ducked behind rusting machinery. "Mind the claws, they're as sharp as knives."
"Kid," Grandpa yelled, "no former sidekick of mine will ever be my nemesis!" He produced a gun and fired several shots, striking the bird in the head. The creature stumbled and collapsed on the foundry floor. Black feathers flew everywhere.
"I was fighting crime when your granddad was in diapers!" Grandpa added. "You're eighty years too young to be my arch!"
"You don't get to choose!" Kid Calculus exclaimed. "I am your arch villain because nobody hates you more than me! You are my obsession, Grandpa Anarchy! I will be the one to destroy you!"
He tapped the holographic keyboard again. Another dimensional door opened.
Grandpa sighed as another creature emerged. This one was a a mobile plant, with tentacle-like vines that slithered across the floor like snakes.
"Grandpa!" yelled Kid Tuesday.
"Carnivorous Iuscara Weed of Bluoatune," said Kid Calculus. "Semi-sentient, though there's no brain or organs for you to shoot or impale. Good luck with this one."
"Jumping Jehosephat!" Grandpa exclaimed. "How many of these things have you got?"
"Oh," said the villain, "you have no idea. I've waited a long time for this, Grandpa. I've been preparing for years for this day. I've even been working out lately -- notice the muscles? I've studied judo and taekwando. I'm a much better fighter than I once was."
Grandpa ran across the warehouse floor. He paused to gather wood. "Why don't you come down here and fight if you're so good at it?" he yelled. "Let me see what you've got!"
"There's no need," Kid Calculus replied. "In any battle with you, my greatest asset is my brain."
"Well, I hate to break it to you," said Grandpa Anarchy, "but a lot of people want to destroy me. That don't make you original, and it don't make you my arch."
Kid Tuesday produced a lighter. In moments he had a flame going. Grandpa shoved a makeshift torch into the flames.
"All right, Kid," Grandpa said. "Let's smoke some weed."
As the two set the plant on fire, Kid Calculus yelled, "I'm different, Grandpa! I'm your most persistent threat!"
"No, Kid, you're not. You really aren't," said Grandpa. The plant was on fire now, twisting in silent pain. "For instance, did you know that Death Medal has kidnapped me five times in the last month? He's trying to destroy the world, never mind that he's so bad at it. The point is, he's really good at beating me in a fight. But is he my arch-nemesis?"
"I've never even heard of the man," said Kid Calculus.
"My point exactly!" Grandpa exclaimed. "Though you'd know if you'd met him -- he's got a flaming skull for a head. But he's not my arch, not by a long shot.
"What about Baron Climate Change? I fight him all the time. He's a very tough customer, got those soot monsters as henchmen. Let me tell you punching smoke and particle-filled air ain't easy. But my arch? For all that he claims to be bringing about the end of the earth, he's really not even a major threat.
"Sgt. Payback? The man has been trying to kill me for seventy years, all over a few pancakes. How does your obsession compare to that? He thinks I ruined his life. I think he's annoying. Hard to consider him my arch when he's never done anything to me.
"See, arching is a two-way street. With Carnival Act, it was personal -- he hated me, and I hated him. He killed thousands of people. He killed my sidekick. But I wasn't allowed to kill him. I fought him for some sixty years. You got a long way to go before you come close to that."
The carnivorous plant was now nothing but ash. Kid Calculus stared down at the hero and his sidekick. "Very well," he said. "Shall I kill your sidekick then?"
Grandpa glanced at Kid Tuesday. He shrugged. "He's been on the job five hours," said Grandpa. "Hard to get very attached in that short of time."
"Grandpa," said the sidekick in a disappointed tone.
"But keep trying, Kid," Grandpa continued. "Maybe you'll get there one day."
Kid Calculus tapped his holographic keypad. Another dimensional doorway opened up -- but this time, it opened beneath the feet of Grandpa Anarchy and Kid Tuesday.
They fell into it. They landed on hot sand, beneath a red sky.
Kid Calculus floated down to peer through the doorway, which hovered in the sky twenty feet above them. "I think," he said, "that I'm going to leave you here, on an alien world in an alien dimension. This, by the way, is the Freaanope desert, on a world known as Uiploria. Those hairy insects on the horizon? Those are Freaanope Arachnids, and they're quite venomous. You'll be lucky to survive an hour here, let alone find your way back to Earth.
"Tell me, Grandpa," said Kid Calculus, "can any of your other foes do this?"
The dimensional doorway winked out of existence.
"Grandpa!" Kid Tuesday exclaimed. Giant arachnids scurried towards them.
"Well, crap," said Grandpa. He glanced up at the sky and yelled, "Don't think I haven't been abandoned on Uiploria before, neither! I ain't impressed! You wanna be my arch, try being more original, you hear me?"
FINI
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