8. Confrontation
Previously, Professor Irreconcilable Differences had fired the Kaboominator directly at Meg Atomic! Will she survive? Before we find out, we return to Captain Happily Married and Super Soccer Mom and their terribly serious argument, already in progress!
“Just listen to me, you lunkhead!” Super Soccer Mom snapped. “I didn’t call off the Mayday on you, I don’t know who did call off the Mayday on you, and I don’t know why you think I would unless it’s a shapeshifter and you know good and well there aren’t any shapeshifter villains this side of the International Date Line!”
“Now hold on,” Captain Happily Married returned. “I may be without my Extra-Matrimonial Senses, but that doesn’t even make sense under normal conditions! If it wasn’t you, and it wasn’t a shapeshifter villain, then who in the heck-”
They froze. The same thought had just hit both of them like the proverbial ton of bricks. “The Scarlet Shapeshifter. She played me. Distracting us.”
“Sunflower attacked me before that,” Captain Happily Married followed up. “They’re connected. They’re working together!”
“Working for someone,” Super Soccer Mom said, her mind racing. “Someone who’s got the Kaboominator. Someone who wanted to take out your powers and get us split apart. Why? Because after you the next most powerful person in the city is-”
“Meg!”
Meg saw the Professor diving for cover, realized in that instant what was really happening, and reacted as best she could. She had almost no time to work the variables and create a perfect defense scenario; what she had, in fact, was 2.17 seconds. Most people, when faced with a superweapon firing upon them and given 2.17 seconds to react, would only have the ability to yelp, “Oh cr-” before being vaporized into happy little gaseous clouds. Meg Atomic, however, managed to redirect the graviton pulse which she had been working up to fire at Professor Irreconcilable Differences and throw it at the Kaboominator instead. The two blasts met each other. There was a city-block shattering kaboom.
Professor Irreconcilable Differences struggled out from beneath a pile of rubble and saw Meg Atomic lying unconscious on the ground. Windows up and down the block were shattered, cars wrenched and tossed about like toys, fire hydrants shattered. She checked quickly: Meg didn’t seem to have died yet.
“Hm,” the Professor said. “A pity. I had an entire speech prepared and it doesn’t see that I’ll be able to deliver it to an appreciate audience. You won’t know, you see, how I manipulated Sunflower and the Scarlet Shapeshifter into taking down your parents, the measures I went to so I could liberate the Kaboominator and break the Sacred Kneecap so your father would lose his powers. The real shame, of course, is that you will never know why. You will probably assume that I was some old girlfriend of the Captain’s who did all this out of broken-hearted revenge because he chose Tasha over me. Perhaps you’ll think I have a personal connection to Sunflower or Commander Shadow, and that is why I chose to work with them, or they with me. But no no no, ma sœur, none of that is true at all. The reason, the true motivation for all this, was that I am-”
“YOU THERE!” the voice of Captain Happily Married boomed out loud across the city block.
Professor Irreconcilable Differences snapped around. “Impossible!”
“You think a mere argument could take us down?" the Captain said, cape flying dramatically in the wind. “You should’ve been there the day I changed the thermostat!”
“It was bad,” Super Soccer Mom said. “I had to put on a sweater.”
“But,” spluttered the Professor, “Your powers!”
“Yeah, he got his superpowers from the Relic, the Sacred Kneecap of St. Gengulphus, and when this is over we’re going to get that patched up, but here’s the thing you forgot,” Super Soccer Mom said. “Where did the Relic get the power in the first place?”
“What?” the Professor said.
Captain Happily Married smiled. Seymour opened a hatch and tossed out a cylindrical-shaped object, which smacked nicely into his palm. “The one thing even mightier than Justice!”
The Professor rolled her eyes. “This is getting tiresome; you can’t have your powers back no matter how much you talk, I know you cannot, because I broke the Relic that gave them to you!”
“No,” Super Soccer Mom said, “The power doesn’t come from the Relic. You missed the point. It’s about the guy the Kneecap belonged to. It’s about the love.”
“Indeed,” Captain Happily Married said, “Now, let’s get you to the church on time!”
“What?” said the Professor, and that was the last thing she said before a unity candle thudded into her head with deadly accuracy.
“We need to work on your lines, dear,” Super Soccer Mom said. “Right, you get the Kaboominator, I’ll get Meg.”
“Right!” the Captain agreed, and shot away into the sky after the helicopter. The pilot flying it had no powers whatsoever, and when he saw the fully powered Captain flying at him he panicked and promptly surrendered. Meg Atomic stirred to consciousness shortly thereafter, Seymour called in first-responder teams to check the area for any injured and assess damages, and so the day was saved once again.
Almost.
Everyone, including Meg Atomic herself, had forgotten about Peter A. Hawkins, Special Agent of D.E.R.P.
Thank you for reading! For prior episodes and other stories in the world of Edison City, check out the Edison City Index below. Stay tuned for next week as the adventure continues!
Damn, your staging and timing are impressive.