Chronicle VII
Charles Masters, a wealthy and high-powered man in Big City, flashed all the lights in the city off and back on ten times. This was the only way to get Duperman’s attention. Nine times, he ain’t coming. In the Cloud Corridor, where all the skyscrapers connected at their penthouses, Charles stood in a shimmering gray suit, smiling genuinely at the fast arrival of Duperman.
“Hello, Charles…” Duperman bowed politely at his host, “...hello Big City.” he bowed cordially at the 360 view of the metropolis. “What’s going on?” He asked curiously, clearly ready for anything.
“D, first of all, thank you for getting here so quickly.”
“Mmhmm.” Duperman nodded.
“The reason you are here, as I’m sure you’re aware, is to solve a bigger problem than I can myself.”
“Oooh.”
“There are beings gathering above the Earth who call themselves gods. In reality, I’m told they are the Imagine Dragons of their galaxy.”
“Ouch.”
“I need you to-” Charles was cut off by Duperman’s exit through the skylight.
Duperman returned with a purple head of an octopus-looking alien. He smirked at Charles, “Problem solved?”
“Uh, no, no, not solved. I don’t know what that is. Where’d you find that thing?”
“Oh no.” Duperman again exited through the skylight. He returned and showed Charles his phone, which had on it an image of the head of the alien poorly stuck back on and Duperman giving a thumbs up with an arm around it.
Charles stared at the hero for a moment and then resumed his explanation. “I’m not asking you to kill anyone. I have no way of communicating with them. Please, go up and reason with them. They’ve been seen readying some sort of global attack.”
“I’m great at communicating. After hair-care, I’d say it’s my top skill.”
“Yes, yes. Please, go.” Charles sighed.
Duperman sped out of the skylight and into the cosmos, searching for the ‘gathering’ Charles spoke of. As he flew, he remembered the destruction of his planet and his exacting vengeance. It haunted him ever since.
A ship in the distance was surrounded by silver humanoid beings, all standing very stiff, their bodies all oriented differently. Some stood with their feet on the bottom of the small ship, some stood sideways on the wall and some straight up and down. Duperman approached them at a friendly pace, with both hands up to signal peace. He reached them and started to grab them by the shoulders and position them all to be upright. They shared confused looks with each other, but did not retaliate.
“Hello.” Duperman greeted the aliens. “Oh, sorry…” He remembered to speak in their language, something he often forgot to consider. “Hello.”
The aliens spoke by making different angles with their limbs and midsections, which Duperman enjoyed. “Hello, we are the last of the Nubo race. Is this your planet?”
“Uhhhh, yes! What are you doing here?”
“So we’re here for all the humans.”
“Oh, good! Yeah, there’s so many. Are you going to give them like cures for diseases and advanced tech or something?”
“Sorry I wasn’t clear, we’re here to eat all the humans.”
“Ohhhhh.”
“Is that okay?”
“Listen, I was really considering just taking you all out when you just said that, but I was told to just reason with you.”
“We want to eat all the humans.”
“I don’t want you to.”
“We still want to.”
“Well, reasoning didn’t work.”
“Wait.” one of the aliens bent forward at a 90 degree angle. “Maybe you can talk to our leader.”
“Um, okay. Do they want to eat all the humans too?”
“Definitely.”
“Hmm. Okay.”
To the mothership all the aliens escorted Duperman. He was reminded of the Galactic Coalition ship he destroyed many years prior. The pain of that memory soured his mood, lowering this group’s chance of survival.
Duperman approached a slightly larger silver humanoid who was in a hole halfway in the floor of the ship. He picked up the big alien and set it down on the floor at the same level as him and stepped backwards.
“Twice now you guys are doing weird things.”
The larger silver alien - still much smaller than Duperman - bent in many directions to get a word across. “Hungry.”
“Hungry?” Duperman copied the motions, adding an extra hand flip for the question mark. “You cannot eat all the humans.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?” He flipped his hand again.
“I can tell you’re very powerful. Why would I risk my life to eat all the humans when I could eat all the Lopians?” A hologram projected in the center of the room displaying a planet identical to Earth with a population counter in the billions.
“Fuck this.”
Duperman flew forward and grabbed the neck of the leader with one hand. He crumpled up the silver being and pressed it to his head like a beer can. From his forehead, a burst of light and energy exploded the being, leaving no trace of it.
The other Nubo in the room turned to flee, but their only method of movement was slow bending and straightening. Duperman held a hand out towards them and they flew towards him. He moved his hand and dodged them, allowing the speed of his telekinetic pull to squash them against the wall behind him, which also destroyed the ship’s power source.
Duperman exited the mothership and held it in one hand. He turned around a few times, searching for an empty path to launch it so that it wouldn’t crash anywhere. With a thrust, he released it into the void and descended back to Earth. A hidden survivor aboard screamed with quick, furious bending motion, “YOU’VE NOT SEEN THE LAST OF THE NUBO!”
“Did you reason with them?” Charles asked.
“Of course.”
“Good. Thanks, as always, D-man.” He thanked the hero, who went for a fist bump the moment Charles turned around. He played it off by flying fist forward out of the room.
Duperman started heading out of Big City when he heard screams and screeching. He checked a street where the noise was coming from and noticed a large purple creature rolling through the city. He knew something must have set Wumpus off. To the street he went to see if he could help calm her down.
Feeling fellowship with a couple heroes who were already on it, he got close and congratulated them, “Great job, team.”