Even supervillians still had nightmares.
Balanced on his scooter, the one-eyed cá heo leaned against the railing of the pier and gazed at the ocean. It had been years since he had last set fluke in it. He had forgotten, in his time away, how to take care of himself there.
He heard it. The soft blow of an exhaling dolphin. It was followed bởi another, then two more, then a few others, until a pod of Bottlenoses had surfaced and began to vòng tròn the pier.
He smiled. Lowering himself to the floor of the platform, he reached under the final railing to caress his cetacean brethren. Like all dolphins, he needed the physical reassurance; never would he admit this to anyone, of course, but he still longed for it.
But a closer look at these dolphins caused him to draw his flipper back in disgust. There was something wrong with these dolphins. They were drenched in blood. They were covered in boils and sores. They were disfigured. They had extra fins and flukes where fins and flukes should not have been.
They were mutants.
One mother cá heo swam bởi with her calf. The mother had a small pair of flukes where her blowhole should have been; the bắp chân had three dorsal fins, lined in a row. They smiled at him, sweetly, without malice at all.
“Don’t be afraid,” whistled the mother dolphin, “Twasn’t our fault. Blame the lords of earth. That means bạn aren’t too different after all.”
As dreams often do, this one shifted to another storyline. He was much younger now, and in a large pool. The entire stadium was dark, except for one, single, flaming, plastic hoop. The Ring of ngọn lửa, chữa cháy cast eerie shadows on the walls of the aquatheatre and on the faces of his adoring public. To him, it looked like a scene from the bowels of Hell itself.
The trainer at the sidelines gave him the hand signal again. “Go through the ring!” the signal meant. But he couldn’t. He was afraid. But he didn’t want to disappoint his human! What a dilemma!
He already knew how this dream would end; it was a replay of his memory, of the moment that changed him. Forever.
He gathered his courage and, wanting desparately to please his human, swam towards the fire. It went against every instinct, but he wanted to please his trainer. He leapt; it always seemed time slowed down as he did. He could hear the cheers, feel the heat, he was conquering his fear…
The heat caused a piece of the ring to splinter, breaking off and whacking him in the eye. He screamed as he fell back in the water, the pain, my god, so much blood in the water, my god, my own eyeball is sinking to the bottom of the pool…!
The mother dolphin’s haunting, yet strangely kind, laughter echoed in his mind as he began to faint from shock and sink, losing air fast…drowning…
With a sharp whistle of distress, Dr. Blowhole woke up with a breach. He gasped air greedily as he slowed his swimming from a panicked rush to a calm cruise; good lord Posiedon, what a dream! The mutated dolphins were unsettling in themselves, but then…to relive that horrific moment, when his eye was torn out of its socket…he instinctly felt where his eye should have been. The robotic gadget that replaced it felt surprisingly reassuring.
Being a cetacean of science, Blowhole was not to keen on putting too much emphasis on his dreams. But there was something strange about this one. A nagging at the back of his mind. Namely of the mother dolphin’s words. “Blame the lords of the earth.”
“Doctah Blaowhole!” shouted one of his lobsters; spyhopping, Blowhole glared angrily at the approaching figure. It was one of his newborn soldiers; stupid and unlearned. Red 4253, he believed it was.
“Ah’m sawrry ta weke ya oop,” Red 4253 flinched under the dolphin’s glare, but still shook with excitement like a calf, “buh tha prisner’s heare!”
This brightened Blowhole’s mood quite extensively. “Brilliant!” Blowhole exclaimed, “hand me my scooter! I shall greet her, make her feel quite comfortable indeed.” He smirked; it was about time they had found a way to snatch her away without anyone noticing!
With her here, he could finally take care of a pressing matter that had absolutely nothing to do with the penguins.
It had taken years to perfect movement on land via this scooter, but now he was almost as graceful on land as he was in water. It impressed his enemies to see him like this; this captive would be no exception.
He could hear the hisses and snarls and angry meows before he saw her. She was just as feisty in person as she was on the spy cameras…even though she was still wrapped in kelp, she was still managing to injure several of his best lobsters. She was average size for an Aonyx cinerea; average coloration, too. Nothing striking about her eyes hoặc figure, either. What did that chim cánh cụt see in her?
The con rái cá, rái cá froze at the sight of him, her eyes widening in surprise. “Oh-ho, no,” she spat; she sounded thêm angry than afraid, which surprised the dolphin, “No way, NO WAY. You…you don’t exist! bạn shouldn’t exist, bạn CAN’T exist!”
“Ah, dear Marlene,” Blowhole purred, smiling at her bewilderment, “but I do exist. And I have a great need…for you.”
He threw his head back and cackled as only a megalomaniac cá heo could.
“Oh, cut the dramatics!” Marlene snapped. Her statement caused the entire army of lobsters to gasp in shock: how dare she talk back to their leader?
Blowhole was taken aback, as well. “I…” he stammered, “…I am basking in my glory! How DARE bạn interrupt me?”
Marlene let out an exasperated sigh. “Look, just…just do whatever you’re going to do and let me go home, allright? I don’t have time to deal with a bunch of ‘ooh, look at me, I’m awesome’ nonsense today. I gotta clean out my habitat.”
Blowhole ground his teeth; the con rái cá, rái cá had only been here for five phút (less than that, actually) and he was already quite angry with her. “You won’t be getting back to your habitat anytime soon,” he said, “Because bạn are going to help me retrieve something of mine.”
Marlene rolled her eyes. “Oooh, how fun. Wait, lemme guess…the penguins took an invention of yours and threw it in a locked room, and I’m the only one small enough to squeeze through some hole in the tường and get bạn your thing, right?”
Blowhole smirked. “Not quite. Retrieval, yes…but it is not a room you’ll be entering.” He pressed a button on his scooter; the widescreen ti vi on the tường of his secret lair illuminated, displaying a map of the globe. A section of the map – the area of ocean just off the New York coastline – was highlighted and zoomed in upon. “There is a cave in this squadrant that contains an object made entirely of a highly rare substance: gold.”
“Gold?” Marlene repeated. “Seriously?”
“What’s so hard to believe about it?” Blowhole snapped.
“Well, it’s just so…” Marlene fumbled for the word “…cliché. Why not SILVER or…I dunno…GALLIUM, hoặc something?”
“Sometimes clichés are the most fitting substance for an object,” Blowhole replied, “I don’t know why! Now pay attention! Eyes on the big screen!” He chuffed a bit (a cá heo cough, for any uneducated readers there may be) before continuing. “It is a small vàng statue of a Kogia breviceps: a pygmy sperm whale. This statue holds great personal value to me.”
“Gift from an old girlfriend?” Marlene sneered.
A low, drawn-out sigh of supressed frustration eminating from his Blowhole told Marlene she had hit it right on the mark. Marlene grimaced. “Ohh…I’m…sorry, I guess…”
“She passed away,” Blowhole explained, “Shortly after the incident that caused…” He tapped his metallic eyepiece. “…this.”
Marlene gazed at her feet in sheepish embarrassment. “In that case, I’m sorry. For real.”
“Thank bạn for your sympathy,” Blowhole replied coldly. He turned to face her. “The cave in which this statue resides is all that’s left of one of my earlier bases. Those chim cánh cụt Những người bạn of yours were responsible for destroying it.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Marlene waved it away (or, at least, attempted to; considering she was still bound bởi kelp, this was a rather difficult maneuver), “The penguins are horrible, they crawled up from the bowels of hell, sure. But why are bạn so desperate to get this vàng statue back? Just because it’s your old girlfriend’s thing?”
“Well, partially,” he answered, then tapped the front plate of his scooter. The blue panels slid apart, revealing a small vàng nugget suspended bởi a laser beam. “This scooter of mine runs on gold. This bar has almost been depleted; without a replacement, my scooter will run out of power and I will be confined to the water. And I cannot allow that.”
That made sense to Marlene. She supposed a fellow like him wouldn’t trust his minions to carry out everything strictly bởi his word. But something didn’t seem right, still. “Why does your scooter run on vàng if it’s so rare?”
“Because I’m filthy, stinking rich, is that okay with you?!” Blowhole spat.
Marlene blinked. “Yes,” she said, “but, one last question. What if I say, ‘No, I’m not going to help you?’”
“Simple,” Blowhole replied, “Surely you’ve noticed the cổ áo around your neck?”
Marlene had. Just as the lobsters were tied her up, one had fastened a black cổ áo tightly around her neck. bởi đọc her expression, Blowhole knew that she knew about it.
“That collar,” he explained, “is an explosive. This tag around my flipper –“ He showed her the black band. “—is the remote control. Should bạn refuse to help me, I will not hesitate to activate the bomb. And it would be a shame to cause that adorable con rái cá, rái cá face to explode.”
Marlene’s eyes widened in fright. “Oooo-kay then…” she said, “…uhh…I guess I’ll help bạn go get your goldwhale statue.”
“Brilliant,” Blowhole smiled, “thank bạn for your cooperation.”
“No problem,” Marlene sneered.
Balanced on his scooter, the one-eyed cá heo leaned against the railing of the pier and gazed at the ocean. It had been years since he had last set fluke in it. He had forgotten, in his time away, how to take care of himself there.
He heard it. The soft blow of an exhaling dolphin. It was followed bởi another, then two more, then a few others, until a pod of Bottlenoses had surfaced and began to vòng tròn the pier.
He smiled. Lowering himself to the floor of the platform, he reached under the final railing to caress his cetacean brethren. Like all dolphins, he needed the physical reassurance; never would he admit this to anyone, of course, but he still longed for it.
But a closer look at these dolphins caused him to draw his flipper back in disgust. There was something wrong with these dolphins. They were drenched in blood. They were covered in boils and sores. They were disfigured. They had extra fins and flukes where fins and flukes should not have been.
They were mutants.
One mother cá heo swam bởi with her calf. The mother had a small pair of flukes where her blowhole should have been; the bắp chân had three dorsal fins, lined in a row. They smiled at him, sweetly, without malice at all.
“Don’t be afraid,” whistled the mother dolphin, “Twasn’t our fault. Blame the lords of earth. That means bạn aren’t too different after all.”
As dreams often do, this one shifted to another storyline. He was much younger now, and in a large pool. The entire stadium was dark, except for one, single, flaming, plastic hoop. The Ring of ngọn lửa, chữa cháy cast eerie shadows on the walls of the aquatheatre and on the faces of his adoring public. To him, it looked like a scene from the bowels of Hell itself.
The trainer at the sidelines gave him the hand signal again. “Go through the ring!” the signal meant. But he couldn’t. He was afraid. But he didn’t want to disappoint his human! What a dilemma!
He already knew how this dream would end; it was a replay of his memory, of the moment that changed him. Forever.
He gathered his courage and, wanting desparately to please his human, swam towards the fire. It went against every instinct, but he wanted to please his trainer. He leapt; it always seemed time slowed down as he did. He could hear the cheers, feel the heat, he was conquering his fear…
The heat caused a piece of the ring to splinter, breaking off and whacking him in the eye. He screamed as he fell back in the water, the pain, my god, so much blood in the water, my god, my own eyeball is sinking to the bottom of the pool…!
The mother dolphin’s haunting, yet strangely kind, laughter echoed in his mind as he began to faint from shock and sink, losing air fast…drowning…
With a sharp whistle of distress, Dr. Blowhole woke up with a breach. He gasped air greedily as he slowed his swimming from a panicked rush to a calm cruise; good lord Posiedon, what a dream! The mutated dolphins were unsettling in themselves, but then…to relive that horrific moment, when his eye was torn out of its socket…he instinctly felt where his eye should have been. The robotic gadget that replaced it felt surprisingly reassuring.
Being a cetacean of science, Blowhole was not to keen on putting too much emphasis on his dreams. But there was something strange about this one. A nagging at the back of his mind. Namely of the mother dolphin’s words. “Blame the lords of the earth.”
“Doctah Blaowhole!” shouted one of his lobsters; spyhopping, Blowhole glared angrily at the approaching figure. It was one of his newborn soldiers; stupid and unlearned. Red 4253, he believed it was.
“Ah’m sawrry ta weke ya oop,” Red 4253 flinched under the dolphin’s glare, but still shook with excitement like a calf, “buh tha prisner’s heare!”
This brightened Blowhole’s mood quite extensively. “Brilliant!” Blowhole exclaimed, “hand me my scooter! I shall greet her, make her feel quite comfortable indeed.” He smirked; it was about time they had found a way to snatch her away without anyone noticing!
With her here, he could finally take care of a pressing matter that had absolutely nothing to do with the penguins.
It had taken years to perfect movement on land via this scooter, but now he was almost as graceful on land as he was in water. It impressed his enemies to see him like this; this captive would be no exception.
He could hear the hisses and snarls and angry meows before he saw her. She was just as feisty in person as she was on the spy cameras…even though she was still wrapped in kelp, she was still managing to injure several of his best lobsters. She was average size for an Aonyx cinerea; average coloration, too. Nothing striking about her eyes hoặc figure, either. What did that chim cánh cụt see in her?
The con rái cá, rái cá froze at the sight of him, her eyes widening in surprise. “Oh-ho, no,” she spat; she sounded thêm angry than afraid, which surprised the dolphin, “No way, NO WAY. You…you don’t exist! bạn shouldn’t exist, bạn CAN’T exist!”
“Ah, dear Marlene,” Blowhole purred, smiling at her bewilderment, “but I do exist. And I have a great need…for you.”
He threw his head back and cackled as only a megalomaniac cá heo could.
“Oh, cut the dramatics!” Marlene snapped. Her statement caused the entire army of lobsters to gasp in shock: how dare she talk back to their leader?
Blowhole was taken aback, as well. “I…” he stammered, “…I am basking in my glory! How DARE bạn interrupt me?”
Marlene let out an exasperated sigh. “Look, just…just do whatever you’re going to do and let me go home, allright? I don’t have time to deal with a bunch of ‘ooh, look at me, I’m awesome’ nonsense today. I gotta clean out my habitat.”
Blowhole ground his teeth; the con rái cá, rái cá had only been here for five phút (less than that, actually) and he was already quite angry with her. “You won’t be getting back to your habitat anytime soon,” he said, “Because bạn are going to help me retrieve something of mine.”
Marlene rolled her eyes. “Oooh, how fun. Wait, lemme guess…the penguins took an invention of yours and threw it in a locked room, and I’m the only one small enough to squeeze through some hole in the tường and get bạn your thing, right?”
Blowhole smirked. “Not quite. Retrieval, yes…but it is not a room you’ll be entering.” He pressed a button on his scooter; the widescreen ti vi on the tường of his secret lair illuminated, displaying a map of the globe. A section of the map – the area of ocean just off the New York coastline – was highlighted and zoomed in upon. “There is a cave in this squadrant that contains an object made entirely of a highly rare substance: gold.”
“Gold?” Marlene repeated. “Seriously?”
“What’s so hard to believe about it?” Blowhole snapped.
“Well, it’s just so…” Marlene fumbled for the word “…cliché. Why not SILVER or…I dunno…GALLIUM, hoặc something?”
“Sometimes clichés are the most fitting substance for an object,” Blowhole replied, “I don’t know why! Now pay attention! Eyes on the big screen!” He chuffed a bit (a cá heo cough, for any uneducated readers there may be) before continuing. “It is a small vàng statue of a Kogia breviceps: a pygmy sperm whale. This statue holds great personal value to me.”
“Gift from an old girlfriend?” Marlene sneered.
A low, drawn-out sigh of supressed frustration eminating from his Blowhole told Marlene she had hit it right on the mark. Marlene grimaced. “Ohh…I’m…sorry, I guess…”
“She passed away,” Blowhole explained, “Shortly after the incident that caused…” He tapped his metallic eyepiece. “…this.”
Marlene gazed at her feet in sheepish embarrassment. “In that case, I’m sorry. For real.”
“Thank bạn for your sympathy,” Blowhole replied coldly. He turned to face her. “The cave in which this statue resides is all that’s left of one of my earlier bases. Those chim cánh cụt Những người bạn of yours were responsible for destroying it.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Marlene waved it away (or, at least, attempted to; considering she was still bound bởi kelp, this was a rather difficult maneuver), “The penguins are horrible, they crawled up from the bowels of hell, sure. But why are bạn so desperate to get this vàng statue back? Just because it’s your old girlfriend’s thing?”
“Well, partially,” he answered, then tapped the front plate of his scooter. The blue panels slid apart, revealing a small vàng nugget suspended bởi a laser beam. “This scooter of mine runs on gold. This bar has almost been depleted; without a replacement, my scooter will run out of power and I will be confined to the water. And I cannot allow that.”
That made sense to Marlene. She supposed a fellow like him wouldn’t trust his minions to carry out everything strictly bởi his word. But something didn’t seem right, still. “Why does your scooter run on vàng if it’s so rare?”
“Because I’m filthy, stinking rich, is that okay with you?!” Blowhole spat.
Marlene blinked. “Yes,” she said, “but, one last question. What if I say, ‘No, I’m not going to help you?’”
“Simple,” Blowhole replied, “Surely you’ve noticed the cổ áo around your neck?”
Marlene had. Just as the lobsters were tied her up, one had fastened a black cổ áo tightly around her neck. bởi đọc her expression, Blowhole knew that she knew about it.
“That collar,” he explained, “is an explosive. This tag around my flipper –“ He showed her the black band. “—is the remote control. Should bạn refuse to help me, I will not hesitate to activate the bomb. And it would be a shame to cause that adorable con rái cá, rái cá face to explode.”
Marlene’s eyes widened in fright. “Oooo-kay then…” she said, “…uhh…I guess I’ll help bạn go get your goldwhale statue.”
“Brilliant,” Blowhole smiled, “thank bạn for your cooperation.”
“No problem,” Marlene sneered.
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