Dude.
Night.
Ghetto.
Garbage. Everywhere. Murky light bouncing off rusted shopping carts, cigarette butts, condom wrappers. Like tinsel on turds.
All around, punks are preening, louses are leer-ing, slicksters are sneering.
And mangy mutts are meandering. With those stooped backs, like they watched a nature show on hyenas—how these mutts would have seen nature shows, Dude has no clue.
What Dude does know is that the only reason he hasn’t already been taken down by this cadre of cannibals and canines is the cold. In your bones cold. In the marrow of your bones cold. In the cells in the marrow of your bones cold.
No one wants to be out tonight. Unless they have somewhere to go.
Dude has somewhere to go.
And like this mucus membrane of a metropolis isn’t miserable enough, the address on his sweaty, crumpled sheet has him walking down—what else?—a dark alley. Of cracked asphalt, crumbled walls and cat piss.
And one dark oak door that looks as out of place as caviar on a Big Mac.
Dude walks to it. Pounds it.
From the other side, a muffled growl. “Speak.”
“I got a note.”
“Password, brain surgeon.”
“Brain surgeon?” Like these morons didn’t slip him the note. “Oh, it’s like that?”
“It is … like that,” the voice says, deadpan as an armadillo on ambien.
“Branded. Okay, brain surgeon?”
Door opens. Dude follows the password clown. African American. Forties. Big. Hulk big. But not gym big, farm big. Midwest-beef-eating, hay-bailing big. But no farmer here. Sporting a suit as pristine as a preacher’s on Easter.
Yet the clothes can’t mask the fact that the slog-ging rhino dude here could give two shits—about whether Dude follows him, whether it’s worth the effort to walk wherever they’re walking, whether the building collapses on them both.
But this building ain’t collapsing. Teak floor, terra cotta ceiling, exclusive artwork and sculptures from names that Dude kind of remembers from that art appreciation course he took in college to meet women.
Dude wondering, where does a rhino in a suit get the coin for this place? And why spend so much of it in this rigor mortis neighborhood?
“I am Braindrainer,” he says.
“Braindrainer? Hell kind of a name is—”
“It is time to proceed with the indoctrination.”
“Indoctrination? To what?”
Braindrainer opens a door festooned with friezes of gargoyles, golems and ghouls.
To a fucking ballroom. Only one spotlight is on, hitting a folding chair on the dance floor facing the stage. From the light spill of the spot, Dude can only see legs on stage.
Eight legs, four people. Dude, math wiz that he is.
“Sit,” Braindrainer says, then jumps on stage to become the fifth pair of legs.
“Hell yeah, I’ll sit. And I won’t move till I get an-swers.” Dude sits, leans back, splays his legs, and crosses his hands behind his head.
Dead silence.
Dude ain’t gonna break it. He knows the speak-first-and-lose game. No way he’s going to lose. Not to them. Hell, they’re the ones who—
“Someone slipped a note into my …” Damn, Dude always sucked at this game.
“Tell us something we don’t know,” says a wom-an with a purring voice that’s either bored or flirty—Dude hoping for the latter.
“How about we start with you mystic wonders telling me who you are.”
“People who also got a noooooote,” the flirty woman holds the vowel like Andra Day at her bluesy best.
“Why we wait? Vamos!” a Spanish woman barks. Older. Angry, like she’s enjoying this shit about as much as Dude is.
“This meeting of excommunicated mutants is now in order,” says Braindrainer, in his going-through-the-motions voice.
Dude laughs. “You’ve got to be—”
Braindrainer walks forward. Snaps his fingers. Light floods the room. Dude shields his eyes. “My words drain the brains of God-fearing Ameri-cans, turning them into zombie terrorists.”
Dude smiles. “O…kay. I’m in an insane asylum for rich folk.”
“Helllllllooooooo,” says the sexy/bored voice, which belongs to a vision. Asian, or part Asian, woman. Pale, delicate skin that seems ephemer-al. Greenish blue eyes like a warm Bermuda lagoon—which Dude would gladly frolic in. “Eye-Spy here. One look into my mesmerizing eyes, and God-fearing Americans turn into terrorist zombies.”
As a man of mixed race (black dad, white mom), Dude was intrigued.
As a man, Dude was smitten (hell, those eyes).
Another guy stands up. “I’m, uh … well I’m called HellHoofer.” A white guy who’s a Don Knotts doppelgänger. Skinny, scared and shaky, like a guy tiptoeing through his own little earthquake. “The power of Hellhoofer’s stomping feet pulverize every God-fearing American within thirty-two miles.”
Dude chuckles. “Great disguise, because you look like a water bug on diet pills.”
Spanish woman stands up. Fifties. Leopard skin faux fur coat. Fluorescent red lipstick. And the hair. A giraffe-neck high sculpture of glistening silver, locked down with perfect ski launch slopes. “I am Coif-Killer.”
Dude thinking, helmet head hair makes a perfect mutant weapon.
“Like a Triceratops trouncing a T-Rex, I put my head into ram mode and pulverize God fearing Americans into protein powder.”
Dude makes a mental note: steer clear of that one.
“And your power?” BrainDrainer asks Dude.
“My power?”
“Yes.”
“My power is shit.”
“Ah, super-powered fecal matter,” from Brain-Drain, with others giving respectful ooohs and aaahs.
“Wait, what?” Dude asks.
CoifKiller flashes a carnivorous smile. “A super-powered shit es fuerte!”
“I don’t have super powered shit. I have shit powers. As in, nada, zip, zilch.”
“But your powers got you excommunicated,” from BrainDrainer.
“Outed,” from EyeSpy.
“Alienated,” CoifKiller jumps in. “So stop wasting our time and tell us—”
“I’m telling you. I got nothing.”
“Well, they’re claiming something,” VoKill says.
“Or you wouldn’t be here,” Hell Hoofer adds.
“What are they claiming?” EyeSpy asks.
“What they’re claiming is bullshit.” Dude sighs and lets out a deep breath as his shoulders sag. “They say my terrorist social media skills can snatch the souls of God fearing Americans.”
HellHoofer pondering, “Then we’ll call you …”
EyeSpy jumping in. “Web … ageddon.”
“What?” Dude asks.
“Webageddon!” HellHoofer says, into it.
“Me gusta,” CoifKiller also into it.
Dude’s eye twitches. “No way—”
“Webageddon,” EyeSpy purrs.
“Webageddon,” SatanScribe laughs.
“Stop calling me that.”
“The man with super shit,” HellHoofer adds.
“Drop that shit shit,” Dude, now known as Weba-geddon says.
CoifKillers raises her arm, like the Pope holding mass from his balcony on Easter
Morning. “La mierda superior.”
“For the last time—”
StanScribe announces. “Welcome the newest member of Mutants Anonymous … Webageddon.”
Applause from the others.
Dude—now officially Webageddon—is befud-dled. “What the hell is going on, and why am I—”
“Don’t worry, you get used to it,” EyeSpy reas-sures him.
“Used to what?” Dude-now-Webageddon asks. “I mean, shit, the mad king pulls his bullshit coup, and all I did was blast him on social media.”
“Then he blasted back,” HellHoofer responds.
“Cyber-bombed your mutant ass,” CoifKiller adds.
Webageddon sags, deflated like a five-day-old open house balloon in a ghetto. “Cost me my job, my car, my apartment. Hell, I’m even black-listed from my favorite coffee shop.”
“Par for the mutant course,” EyeSpy says.
“Mad king making America human again,” Sa-tanScribe says.
“I never knew knew mutants were a thing,” We-bageddon says.
“Till you became one of us,” HellHoofer re-sponds.
Webageddon puts his head in his hands. “What’s it going to take for you people—mutants—whatever, to understand? I don’t—”
“Have any powers?” the mutants ask in unison.
“Like any of us do?” VoKill asks rhetorically.
“Wait. What?”
The mutants break into laughter. SatanScribe tries to squeeze out words between laughs. “Did you … actually think …”
CoifKiller laughs. “El es loco,”
“He actually believed that comic book shit!” VoK-ill shouts between guffaws, which revs up the laughter even more.
When it finally dies down, Webageddon asks, “So you’re—”
HellHoofer interrupts “Punk-ass humans,”.
“Same as you,” EyeSpy adds.
“Till we also got branded on social media,” VoKill says.
“That’s crazy! Who could even scheme up shit like this?”
Chapter 2
SIX MONTHS EARLIER.
The mad king and his three closest advisors were in the situation room of the White House. Sur-rounded by monitors of all sizes, they watched the onslaught of demonstrations and riots against the king.
As he watched, the mad king—a short, paunchy, bald man with wild tufts of hair sprouting on all sides of his head—was … well, this level of kingly rage often resulted in beaucoup additions to his shrunken head collection.
After all the infinite and unmatched wisdom the king had bestowed upon these peasants, they were protesting him. Him! That’s no different than protesting God. “Oh, they’ll pay for this,” he growled.
“Of course they will, your regency,” Minion one said, cooly, clearly, conclusively. His real name was Robert Balock, but the king couldn’t re-member names. Hell, it was a feat that the king even knew the definition of minion. “We’ll start by hacking into their social media accounts.”
Decked out in a bespoke suit and an ascot (yes, a fucking ascot), Robert—privileged, spoiled, arrogant—fought hard to be designated as number one minion. Of course, the mad king had no clue who was who, and the other minions could give two shits about the minion pecking order (since no one with a shred of self-respect wanted to be called a minion in the first place).
“We’ll launch a f-f-full—albeit illegal—investigation into every p-p-protester,” Minion two stuttered. She was a twenties something who who was once vigorous, athletic and ebullient. But after six months as the communications advisor for the king, she looked like Olive Oyl on Ritalin. Oh yeah, and the newly acquired stut-ter from over exposure to the king, which was any exposure at all.
“I know: we’ll launch an investigation!” Minion three said.
“D-didn’t I just say that?” Minion two asked, rhe-torically. “I just said that!”
“Yep. She did,” Minion one confirmed, always eager to stoke a fire between lesser minions.
“Oops, sorry. Then let’s hack into their social media accounts.” And that, in a nutshell, summarized the mantra of minion three: steal now, apologize later—if you get caught, move the fuck on to the next idea worth stealing.
Minion three was a career political operative with a perpetual sweat sheen and what was either a smarmy smile or a perpetual grimace from the gas he emitted freely and frequently. With his propensity to partake in pastries per-petually, he was big in all the wrong places. Soft where guys shouldn’t be that soft at his age, which was late thirties.
“Such lower minion thinking,” minion one said, knowing he had to control the king by giving him more of what he asked for. “Perk it up, plant call girls.”
“And boys,” minion three added.
“Not enough!” the king said.
“My thinking exactly, your regency,” minion three oozed with sycophantic slime. At the thought of slime, he got hungry and reached for the cookie crumbs in his pocket.
“We’ll leak rumors about o-o-opioid orgies,” min-ion two suggested.
“Tack on terrorist tortures,” minion one added. “Huh, an alluring alliteration that tickles the tongue.”
“These people aren’t alliterate,” the king re-sponded. “They’re the smart ones who know how to read.”
Minion one gave a condescending smile. “Your royalty, not illiterate. Alliteration. When words have the same consonant.”
“Did you just accuse me of not knowing the American language?”
“Certainly seems that way, your eminence,” min-ion three smelled blood—which, of course, made him even hungrier.
“I’ll deal with you later,” Mad King said to minion one. “And if any of you want to leave this room in one piece, I better see more than this pansy-ass shit.”
The minions responded in perfect harmony. “Yes, your eminence,”
“Don’t you understand? These people somehow don’t worship me.”
Since minion two preferred to experience life outside of this room again, she asked, “How could any human not worship you, sir?”
“That’s it!” The king jumped up from his throne. “Our shock-and-awe attack: they’re not human.”
“Love it!” minion three squealed.
Minion one cleared his throat. Time to regain control of these idiots advising an idiot. “So the not-human attack … is a metaphor about their lost humanity due to their disrespect—”
“No!” the King interrupted. “They’re. Not. Hu-man.”
“Not … human?” minion two asked.
“Not human! Like that documentary I saw on Fox.” King grabbed the remote and unmuted the movie playing on monitor two, X-Men: Apoca-lypse. “See? They’ve already been outed. Why are we so late to the party?”
“Sir, that’s not Fox. And it’s not a documentary,” minion one said.
“It’s, um, F-F-FX,” minion two said timidly, know-ing that enlightening the King was like break dancing in poison ivy.
“I love those X-Men movies!” minion three gushed.
“Right. A movie. Not. Real,” minion one said.
“On a movie s-s-station,” minion two added.
“Called FX, not Fox.” minion one hated teaming up with lesser minions but knew it was the only chance get through to the moron king.
“Fox, FX: both have an F and an X,” king said.
“Close enough!” minion three said.
Minion one tried once more. “But your regen-cy—”
“They reported, I decided, done.”
“So … you want us to—”
“Tell the world that anyone who doesn’t worship me is a terrorist mutant.”
“No way we can sell that,” minion one said, which was followed by gasps from the other minions.
No one contradicted the king. Or no one who was ever seen again.
“Wait, let me get this right,” King said, in an eeri-ly calm, inquisitive voice. “The regal, royal me presents a plan, and a pissant peon protests it?”
For the first time in his pampered life, minion one learned the meaning of fear, which was manifesting in a bladder about to burst. “Oh no, your royal regency. Protest? No protest.”
“Definitely sounded like a protest,” minion three smiled, throwing another log on the fire.
King hit a button on his intercom. “A peon needs reprogramming.”
“Wait! I get it! Mutants! They’re all mutants!”
Two bouncers and a doctor holding a hypodermic needle entered the room. The bouncers lifted minion one off the ground, as the doctor inserted a syringe into his neck. Minion one screamed, gasped and collapsed. The bouncers carried him out. Minion two stifled a shriek, while Minion three’s stomach growled (violence always made him hungry).
“So young for a heart attack,” King said. “Make sure you write in the release that it was caused by these stressful protests. And that we offer our thoughts and prayers.”
“Y-y-yes, oh royal one,” minion two stammered.
Any other constructive criticisms?’”
“You’ve come up with a brilliant plan, king, as always,” minion three said.
“Then sell it!” King said, as he turned up the sound on X-Men: Apocalypse, and pulled out a box of popcorn.
Chapter 3
THE PRESENT
Dude—now Webageddon—paces.“Got to be something we can do.”
“Nada,” from CoifKiller.
“Zip,” from HellHoofer.
“Zilch,” from EyeSpy.
“Then we’ll have a press conference and show we have no powers.”
“Mad King’s crack team already beat us to the punch,” HellHoofer responds. “They say we can turn our powers on or off at will.”
“No way people believe—”
“It’s the mad king,” EyeSpy interrupts.
“He says it, los pollos buy it,” CoifKiller adds.
“The public can’t be that stupid to—”
Braindrainer laughs. “Never underestimate the power of idiocracy.”
“No, this is—”
“Mad king has won,” BrainDrainer says.
“Deal with it,” HellHoofer adds.
Webageddon quickens his pace, rolls his shoul-ders like a boxer entering the ring. “No way I’m—”
“Might help to know you’re now rich,” EyeSpy says, cheerfully.
“Anyone here listening?” Webageddon asks. “I. Lost. Everything,”
“But you found the mum-the-mutants fund,” Eye-Spy says.
“The …?”
BrainDrainer explains, “A secret slush fund from the regime.”
“Why the hell would the mad king—”
“Is price for our loyalty,” CoifKiller says.
“A bottomless petty cash drawer,” HellHoofer says.
“Keeps us compliant with the mutant registration act,” VoKill adds.
“So the mad king can brag that he’s the only deal maker who can prevent a mutant world war,” BrainDrainer says.
Webageddon stops pacing and stares at them. “You let him get away with that?”
EyeSpy giggles. “Well, If we’re going to be alien-ated mutants …”
“Might as well be rich alienated mutants,” Hell-Hoofer chuckles.
CoifKiller flaunts her mucho bling: nine bracelets, four necklaces and eight earrings that sparkled like a disco ball on turbo drive. “Muy, muy ca-ro.”
Webageddon’s shoulders sag as he sighs. Smiles sadly and shakes his head. “Fuck happened to you?”
“King happened to us,” from BrainDrainer.
“Where’s your spirit?”
“Exhumed,” from VoKill.
“Your balls?”
“Expunged,” from HellHoofer.
“Your fire?”
“Extinguished,” from EyeSpy.
Webageddon launches his chair across the floor. “Not anymore! Because we are mutants, motherfuckers!”
HellHoofer smiles sarcastically at the others. “Here we go.”
“We fight back!”
“Um, duh?” EyeSpy asks.
“Like we haven’t tried that,” HellHoofer says.
“A million different ways,” BrainDrainer says.
“Law suits, press conferences, PR firms,” CoifKiller adds.
Webageddon paces now, but with purpose. “You went at it wrong. Tried to regain your ‘human’ status. And I’m saying, we’re mutants. Time to sell it.”
“Sell it?” EyeSpy asks.
“Embrace it, worship it, and yes, sell it,”
CoifKiller considers this. “Sell it … Esta bueno. Muy bueno.”
“Time to flame on!”
Chapter 4
A MONTH LATER.
The ‘mutants’ are sitting in a panel interview at the hot network followed regularly by the king himself, Pravdamerica. Interviewing them is the network’s top personality, Sam Stones.
Stones had cut his teeth as a celebrity gossip show host, made a PR coup of going through a weekend online MBA program (one of his flunk-ies did the work for him—only reason flunkies are on the planet).
He then parlayed the weight of his online degree (thanks, flunky) to get a shot at “hard” news, which was just hot gossip about politicians instead of celebrities. And Sam, being a Master’s degree holder (thanks again, flunky), quickly realized that to keep his personal elevator heading in the right direction, he needed to jump on the king’s bandwagon. That meant an endless attack against the king’s endless enemies.
Grisly, grim and grouchy, Sam had practiced his perpetual scowl for years. The results spoke for themselves—Sam’s furrowed brow, bushy eye-brows and downturned razor-thin lips made feel-good, can’t-we-all-just-get-along guests often leave a puddle before Sam uttered a word.
So when the sad sack, loser ‘mutants’ actually called his show and asked for an appearance? Hell, that was like a blood asking a crip for direc-tions.
The red broadcast light goes on, and Sam con-fronts the ‘mutants’. His only concern is that he doesn’t salivate on his $900 Sherpa silk tie. “Our all-knowing supreme leader has called you … things … the greatest threat to God-fearing Americans. Your feeble attempt at a response?”
Webageddon smiles like the pope giving a bene-diction. “Well, Sam, while we mutants may occasionally have differences with the eminence, we actually have a lot in common.”
“Like your type could have anything in common with a visionary. Go ahead, humor me.”
“Like his highness, we believe that everyone should be free,” SatanScribe says.
Sam Stones had been warned by ophthalmolo-gists that his renowned bulging eye rolls at responses could cause migraines, but how could he resist? “Blah—”
HellHoofer’s recites his line, “To live—”
Sam’s eyes keep rolling. “Blah—”
Webageddon speaks loudly and slowly. “E…tern…al…ly.”
“Blah— … Wait, what?”
With her brilliant bling blazing in the lights, CoifKiller looks like the Good Witch From the North. “We should all be libre to—”
“In America, we speak American,” Sam never misses an opportunity to pander to his core audience of GFAs (the crew’s shorthand for God Fearing Americans, since uttering the full phrase was now like fingernails on a blackboard).
CoifKiller smiles in her bling radiance. “Free to—”
Sam cuts her off. Turns to Webageddon. “You just said, live eternally. Don’t deny it.”
“Why would I deny it?”
“Because last time I checked, eternal is, like, for-ever.”
“And ever,” EyeSpy purrs, leaving Sam wondering if he could afford another sexual harassment settlement so close after the last five.
“Amen,” HellHoofer finishes the phrase.
“You dare to blaspheme on America’s most wholesome show?” Sam asks.
“He’s just saying—we’re all saying—that, of course, eternal life means living forever,” BrainDrainer says condescendingly.
“That’s the most ridiculous—”
Webageddon interrupts. “So your visionary lead-er has not chosen to bestowed you with it?”
“No one can do that,” Sam says. “Other than …” Sam points to the sky and puts on his carefully choreographed pious face—a big winner with his large evangelical audience.
SatanScribe does a perfect imitation of Sam’s sky pointing, pious puss. “Actually, HE handles the afterlife department.”
“We work aqui y ahora,” CoifKiller said.
“Can someone call ICE?” Sam asks offstage.
CoifKiller snorts and lowers her head into batter-ing position, but Webageddon places a calming hand on her shoulder. “What she means is that our department focuses on eternal life for the here and now.”
“Is what I said,” CoifKiller smiles or snarls. No one wants to find out.
Sam thinking, better keep an eye on the angry helmet-haired one. “If you think I’m going to buy your alternate facts, you’re—”
EyeSpy interrupts, as scripted. “Huh.”
HellHoofer delivers his line. “We just assumed the vaunted leader had shared with—”
“The leader doesn’t share fake news fairy tales,” Sam says, preparing for his famous crescendo finish—a go-to ratings rocket. It starts with him waving his fists in a very bad imitation of a tai chi master. Comical in its own right since Sam was on the downside of seventy, a nitroglycerin pill away from heart failure, and a Twinkie away from a diabetes coma. But this being show business, reality has no place here.
Sam furrows his brows like a constipated shar pei to deliver his patented crescendo. Gives his hairy eyebrow glare to the mutants. Then turns to the camera. “Now get off my set, or a parting gift you’ll get!”
At this point, his desiccated guests are supposed to cower and slink off the set.
But not these mutants.
They sit there calmly. Smiling. Quiet.
Now Sam is quiet, having never gone beyond his verbal crescendo before.
That means, total quiet.
That means, dead air.
That means, dead show.
For the first time since getting his ass kicked in high school by that kid in a wheel chair, Sam is dumbfounded.
And speechless.
Him.
The king of cantankerous.
The regent of rants.
On empty.
Dead air still dead.
Director yelling into his ear piece, “Attack, at-tack, attack!”
But Sam has nothing. Like when Sam sat in the high school principal’s office with a broken jaw from that wheelchair kid’s unexpectedly amaz-ing uppercut.
Director again in Sam’s earpiece. “Yell! Scream! Attack!”
Still nothing.
Until Webageddon breaks the dead air, thereby saving Sam Stones’ ass. “Maybe it will help if we prove it.”
He pulls out an old X-Men comic book and shows the cover to the camera.
Sam is awestruck. “Is that—”
“Our mutant family, fifty years ago,” HellHoofer beams.
“Who are starring in comics and movies right now,” EyeSpy adds.
HellHoofer flexes his muscles (kind of pathetic since he has none but it gets the point across). “Haven’t aged a day.”
“No cambiar,” CoifKiller smoothes her impreg-nable helmet hair.
“Ever,” BrainDrainer emphasizes.
“I’ve seen your type in comic books and movies for as long as …” Sam stares at the comic book, slack jawed. But then the old Sam returns. “Wait a minute: this is obviously a self-published prank!”
Webageddon gently takes the comic book back and points to the seal in the top corner. He then brings the seal close to the camera. “There’s Mount Rushmore, there are the stars above, and there’s the official comic book seal. You can’t fake any of them.”
For the first time in forty-five years, the muscles around Sam’s glaring eyes relax. The corners of his mouth strain upward—is that an actual smile? “Then this eternal life thing is …”
“Real?” CoifKiller finishes Sam’s question.
“As real as us sitting here,” BrainDrainer says.
Sam looks at the liver spots on his hands. Pinches his eight chins. Rubs his bald head. A chance to start again? “So you’re saying you … can turn back the clock?”
“Well, no,” HellHoofer answered.
“No one can regressar in time,” CoifKiller says.
“Again with the Spanish?” Sam asks, but without his customary bite.
“Webageddon clarifies. “You can’t go back in time. What’s gone is gone.”
Sam’s eyebrows return to their downward com-bat position.
“But we can stop time right where it is,” EyeSpy says.
“So this present …” HellHoofer adds.
“Can be your eternal present,” EyeSpy finishes in her breathy, there’s-still-a-lot-of-fun-to-be-had voice.
Does Sam actually feel … optimistic? “How come I never heard of this eternal stuff before?”
HellHoofer tees it up. “Well …”
BrainDrainer takes the warmup swing. “Not that we would ever disparage our visionary ruler …”
EyeSpy extends a flawless backswing. “But he ei-ther missed a little detail called immortality …”
And Webageddon hits it out of the park. “Or he’s holding out on you.”
Sam stares at the mutants. Pauses. But not with the unprecedented dead air from before. No, this is Sam’s patented “silence before the storm” routine, which is always followed by a Sam revelation.
After silently counting to five (that’s as long as his elderly audience can possibly wait without potential health issues arising), Sam imparts his wis-dom. “I now believe these mutants may have gotten a bad rap.”
The mutants collectively smile. And Sam once again feels that upward pressure at the corners of his mouth.
The producer runs in with a phone. “It’s the su-preme leader.”
Sam thinks about the king holding out on him. Forgetting that the real power is on this side of that camera. The camera that Sam Stones owns. “Tell him I’m busy.”
The producer is dumbfounded. He stumbles off stage, knowing the fate of messengers who dare to bring bad news to the king.
Sam turns to the mutants. “How quickly can I go immortal?”
Chapter 5
SIX MONTHS LATER.
King, in his palace with the two remaining minions. Undergoing their daily briefing, which is basically watching Sam’s Rants.
Used to be the high point of King’s day.
Now?
Now it’s a daily dose of root canal. With Stones at the drill. “That’s right, our ‘visionary leader’ has been out-visioned by these loquacious, lovable mutants, and their gift of eternal life.”
Sam chuckles, “The king holding out on his loyal minions? Who wouldda thunk it?”
King shuts the TV and throws the remote. The minions shudder—they’ve never seen king not watching TV. Oh shit.
“N.. n…no way that’s true, sir.” minion two squeals.
“True? You think anyone gives a shit about true? Hell, I invented mutants!”
“I … I … I totally understand, sir. It’s j…j…just that—”
“We’re in emergency mode and you think I have time for stuttering?” King says as he presses his alarm.
“N … n … no. I never stutter outside y-y-your of-fice.”
“Buh-buh-buh-bye,” minion three beams, thrilled to be the last minion standing as the goons carry the screaming minion two from the room.
King turns to minion three. “You want to keep your head somewhere near your neck, figure out how to get my flock back.”
For the first time in forever, minion three stops thinking about eating. But the moment passes, and he daydreams of diving into a pool of fried Oreos, which is how he discovers his first—and last—original idea. “I’ve got it: you’ve discov-ered that fried Oreos are good for you.”
The Mad King stares at him, then presses the alarm.
Minion three almost loses his appetite, “A ‘Let Them Eat Oreos’ holiday?”
As the secret service goons drag him out, minion three thinks that hell probably has excellent devil’s food cake. See? There’s an upside to every-thing.
In the room by himself, king realizes the only thing he should listen to is his gut. And from said gut comes his most powerful return salvo.
Chapter 6
A DAY LATER.
Mutants, sprawled in their palatial headquarters that is now buzzing with servants, security guards, caterers, bartenders and a carefully monitored group of groupies, wannabes and aco-lytes.
They’re watching their favorite show, Sam’s Rants.
From the TV: “In a forced, feckless and feeble foray into forging a semblance of stature, the former king has declared that all who vote for him will live even longer than eternally. Well, this eternally living mutant fan isn’t buying it.”
SatanScribe turns to Webageddon. “How long you think we can keep up this eternal life charade?”
“Long as we want.”
“But what happens when everyone starts dying from old age?” EyeSpy asks.
“At that point, we’ll be dying right along with them.”
“And those who die before old age?” HellHoofer asks.
“We’ll … brand them underground king followers who therefore forfeited their powers.”
“Till then, we live like kings,” EyeSpy says, with a special smile for Webageddon.
“Ariba!” CoifKiller screams, as she rings a bell. A servant enters to touch up her majestic mane, while a second servant feeds her grapes.
They turn back to Sam’s Rants, which has cut to highlights of the king trying to deliver his eternal-plus speech over a cacophony of boos. “No, really. God told me that anyone who returns to my flock gets seven virgins daily, endless all-you-can-eat buffets and a millennium of mani-pedies.”
The mutants laugh.
“Mas grapes!” CoifKiller screams, and servants rush to feed her.
THE END
by 
Mark Bellusci
Latest posts by Mark Bellusci (see all)
- X-Communicated - November 20, 2020
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