A new Superhero Story - Part 1

The city dark and full of dusk. Light post’s broken down, sparkling. They have certainly seen better days. The streets cluttered with trash and hopelessness. A gas station lit up at night, being robbed. The caretaker’s inside, shivering in fear of a man, dressed in a strawberry suit holding a gun to his head. His costume bright red and a little worn. On his head sat a red hat with green leaves sprouting from the top, his face covered in red makeup, and his legs covered with black pants. He is fully dedicated to his act. The strawberry man says to him: “Hands up! This is a strobbery!!”. The caretaker getting the key and unlocking the cash register, a young man in a green shirt and blonde hair tackles the strawberry. “GAH!” they both go. The strawberry, not understanding what just happend, drops the gun and looks around, but only sees the floor. Suddenly his arms are pulled behind his head and he begins to kick and move as much as possible. The blonde holding him down with all his might, the previously shaken up caretaker now holding a shotgun to them both. Without much thought, the blonde young man lets go and the strawberry makes a dash for it. BANG the shotgun went and missed him.

“You let him go!” The caretaker yells at the blonde man. “Well of course I did, you had a shotgun on us, you didn’t say nothin, just cocked ‘yer gun and stood there!” he responds. “Well.. I.. I uh… well nevermind that, he didn't get the money.” Shotgun Caretaker says back defensively. “You’re right about that but now you have to fix ‘yer window.” Blondey replies. They stood there in silence, awaiting something to happen. “Well I’m uh, gonna get goin now. I don’t really want that magazine anymore..” Blondey says opening the shattered door. The shotgun caretaker standing there, rethinking his life choices. His knees weak, armpits sweaty, head slumped, got the regretty.

Blondey walks in the opposite direction as the strawberry man, making his way home. Walking down the street in his 64 heelys, checking the time, rockin and rollen. His hair waving in the non-existent wind, his silver eyes sparkling in the full hearted darkness, the music playing in his ears, keeping him upbeat. He rolls down the hill and gets to a trashy van, he enters the house it sits in front of. Walking in he’s confronted with the smells of dweeb and old pizza. Though he is quite used to these smells so he continues to the kitchen for a late night snack. Everything covered in trash, and broken pieces of furniture. “Ah, the life of a college student” he says with a smile on his face and a bag of chips he managed to find in the dirty pantry. “Hey Van-Man! I’m back but I didn’t get anything.” He says scratching his head. He gets no response but that’s pretty usual. He decides not to check in on the van-man and heads to bed.

Walking up the broken and chipped stairs he nearly slips, but shrugs it off. He gets to his room, the door ripped in half, doorknob dented, he plops onto his bed and chugs the rest of his chips. Throwing the wrapper in the trash can and then putting his arms behind his head, laying down and drifting off to sleep.

Hello World

Waking from a relaxing 12 hours of sleep, blondey sits up, looks to the mirror and says “Good morning Dwayne, how are you? Damn you look bad, shower won’t ya?” Dwanye smacks his buttocks and walks to his bathroom, in his underpants. He threw them off during the hot night. He walks into a small room with a shower, sink and a toilet. Of which all of them are chipped and broken. He stares into the mirror, looks at the sides of his face, all with a smile. “Yeah this’ll do, yeah… yeah..” He strips off his pantaloons and gets into the shower, turning on and then washing himself. After a couple of seconds of wash he begins to sing “Super freak, she a super freak” to himself. After 30 minutes of unnecessary singing, boasting and sexual movement, he gets out and grabs his towel. Drying himself he begins to dance. He grabs his toothbrush, and sings into it. Superfreaks again. He then grabs both ends of his towel and puts it at his bottom and shakes his lower end to the imaginary beat.

After dancing and mooning himself in the mirror, he walks to his room, naked, and gets to a suitcase on the floor. Opening it, it reveals some clothing. He grabs a shirt, pants and underwear. Putting them all on, the Van-Man walks in on him. “You got mail.” Throwing it onto Dwayne’s bed, Dwayne looks over and smiles. “Thanks Van-Man. Are you going grocery shopping today or should I?” He asks. “No, you should go.” Van-Man replies, staring directly at Dwanye’s penis. “Okay I’ll go after class then.” Dwanye responds, pulling up his underwear and pants. “I’ll be in my fortress if you need me.” Van-Man says to him pointing backwards. After a moment of awkward silence he leaves Dwanye to his privacy. Dwayne thinks to himself how wonderful his roommate is. Remembering the “fortress” Van-Man referenced, he pictures the room. It’s completely covered in posters of anime women. He has a very large desk with three monitors, a good PC and a anime plushie in his gaming chair. Van-Man ‘donates’ a lot of his money to a woman online in hopes of getting her. Of course we all know disabled men with an anime girl fixation isn’t going to get any, at least not legally, wink wink.

Dwayne returns to reality and decides it’s time to run to school. Dashing and jumping down the steps and yells “Van-Man I’m using your van!” He gets into the seemingly broken down van, starts it and is off to class. With the radio on he taps his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat. “We interrupt this regularly scheduled broadcast to inform you of the severe thunderstorms heading towards Meto-Opilis. Crime rate is lowering by 10% in 20 years. And now back to your regularly scheduled broadcast.” Switching back to the radio it explodes and electrocutes Dwanye. “Well shit, no more tunes. Oh well…” After 10 minutes of sad silence Dwanye gets to campus, parks the van and dashes to his class. Of which he is only a minute late.

He gets to the door, slams it open, runs down a hall and to the left, past a fountain, a couple making, and then makes it! He takes a deep breath and walks in quietly. He got to a seat that wasn’t yet taken and pulls out his books and papers. He listens to his professor and writes down everything he can.

After 6 hours of the professor teaching his subjects, he and his students finish up for the day. A few older people get up and talk to the professor for more conversation. While Dwanye puts his stuff together, a younger girl watches him. A girl that looked too young to be a college student. But Dwanye didn’t notice. He packed all of his stuff and headed to the van. The young girl followed him, Dwayne not noticing.

He got into the van, tossed his stuff to the side and checked his side mirrors. He then sees there was a girl hiding behind a trash bin. He thought that maybe the girl had a crush on him, so he thought nothing of it. He starts the van and heads to the grocery store. He attempts to turn on the radio, but then remembers why it looks so charcoaly and broken.

He passes a couple of old, abandoned buildings, a bunch of homeless people attempting to keep warm. He pulls into the grocery store parking lot and parks. He grabs his wallet and gets out of the van, and then locks it. He walks into the grocery store, grabs a cart and begins his shopping spree. Weaving in and out of the isles, grabbing things he only really needs and then heads to the checkout area. He puts all his stuff on the conveyor belt, and then awkwardly stands there, waiting for everything to be ready to go. The cashier was a man with gothic attire and attitude. They both stay quiet and to themselves. Suddenly, a song quite familiar with Dwayne, that he sung this morning, comes onto the radio. “Heck yeah this is my song!” He yells loudly and begins to dance. The gothic young boy smiles a little and begins to sway slightly. Dwayne sings to the music, and gets pretty loud. “She a freak! M-m-m-m-m-m yeah! A super freak!” He sings, making a scene in the grocery store. People stare and smile, wishing they could feel the way he did. A couple of older people walk over to him and dance with him. Then others joined in and danced their hearts out.

The song ends and Dwayne realises just how many people joined him and gets a great big smile. “Aw guys! That was great! We should start a dancing club!” He says with laughter. “Yeah lets do it!” One says jokingly. Everyone catches their breath and gets back to their carts and checks out. Several of the dances wave and say goodbye to everyone, and a couple give Dwayne a bit of money. They had noticed he had gotten everything that was the cheapest. “Bless your young heart, take care.” The elderly woman says to him, and her husband smiles at him. “W-wow guys, I.. I don’t know what to say. T-Thank you, thank you very much!” He says stammering to such kindness.

The elderly couple walk away with their groceries and get into their car and are off. Dwayne thinks to himself how there are still good people out there, that aren’t dressed in strawberry suits.

He gets to the van and packs it with what he has. Takes the cart back inside and returns to the van. He then notices in the corner of his eye the same girl from before. Though with a better look he can tell she’s quite young. He tries to not think of it as stalking and goes on his way home.

After getting home he unloads the van and stores away all the groceries. He stretches and lets out a loud groan. “What a day!” He says to himself. He puts his hands on his hips, feeling proud of himself. He feels a drop of sweat roll down his chest and decides to throw his shirt off. He used his shirt to damp his body and then goes to his room. He gets to his room and flops onto the bed. With all of his energy gone he falls asleep. A peaceful sleep.

He opens his eyes to nothing. He sits in a void and he tries to stand, but he can’t. The darkness overwhelming him, he begins to feel scared. Trying to stand up on whatever he was sitting on, he begins to fall. Falling and falling, endlessly. He screams and screams. “Help me, help me please!!” He yells to anybody that can hear him. “Please” He whimpers. Falling for what feels like forever, he lands on something. BWAAM.

He wakes up. In his bedroom. Blinking sporadically. He rubs his eyes. “H-hello?” He says questioning his surroundings. “Was just a dream,” He says to himself. He sits up and feels his stomach rumble. He thinks to himself how he hasn’t eaten all day. So he heads to the kitchen. He walks down the steps, forgetting that some are missing and falls down, straight onto his face. “OW….. f-ing…. hecking.. Flame retardant…” He says upsettingly, but then chuckles. After Petering his knee, he gets up and swings open the fridge. He grabbed a glass of milk and then heated up some pasta. “M-m-m… This’ll be good.” He says licking his lips.

He goes over to a ruined, light green couch with tares all over. He sits and puts his plate and glass on a broken coffee table. He grabs a shotty remote and clicks. It powers up an old, shattered TV, and the news pops on. “Breaking news! A man in a Strawberry suit has been caught on footage attempting a gas station robbery. When he was about to get the money from the caretaker, a hero in green tackles him! Though the “Strawberry-Man'' got away. As for the identity of the Strawberry-Man, film makers for a children's TV show, “The Fruit GroupTM'', has said that the Strawberry suit has been stolen. And the actor for The Strawberry has no idea what happend to it. Dwayne chuckles and skips channels. After switching for a minute he finds a show, called The Fruit GroupTM. He laughs at the coincidence and begins to eat his food. AFter a minute of the banana and apple conversing about something, it flips to a scene with the strawberry. It was not only the exact suit, but also the same person, just without the red makeup on. He thinks to himself about how he should go to the police about things, but he wanted to be a hero again. So he daydreamed about becoming a superhero and taking down “criminal scum.”

After eating his dinner and cringely watching the kid show, he decides he’s had enough. “Time to washy washy.” He says to himself, walking over to the kitchen with his empty plate and glass. He rinses them in the sink, and then dries them. Putting them away he looked down and remembered he wasn’t wearing a shirt. He shrugs it off and swaggily walks to the bathroom.

Stripping off his clothes and getting into the shower, he thinks to himself about the nightmare he had earlier. He rinses off, but not noticing time flying by as he sadly mopes, 45 minutes go by and he gets out. Standing on a towel on the floor, he reaches for a towel hanging on the door. He drips water all over the floor but doesn’t notice. He dries off, and goes into his room. He hangs his towel on his broken bedroom door and then gets some blankets from his side table. He crawls into bed, covering himself as much as possible. He dozes off to sleep once more.

Who is the Strawberry-Man?

Waking up from a somewhat long nap, Dwayne gets out of bed and stretches. After getting dressed, he goes to the kitchen to get something to eat. He finds a pretzel and warms it up. He then takes his meal to the living room. Walking into the living room he notices something is off. He put his food down on a sturdy enough shelf, and walks over to the couch. He gets to the end of the couch and finds a lump. He walks to the coffee table and stands in front of the TV. At the other side of the lump was the head of the young girl he saw at his class yesterday. He takes a better look. The young girl had smooth, caramel skin. Her nose on the bigger side of the scale. Her hair is in a pixie haircut style, and it’s multicolored. A mixture of cool and warm colors.

After staring at the young girl, he slowly creeps over and whispers “Hey! What are you doing here, and who are you?!” He gets no response, so he decides to just say it with his normal tone “Hey… umm.. Hey! You’re in my house kid!” SHe startles awake and looks at Dwayne confusingly. “Dwayne? Oh yeah I’m in your house… this is awkward.. Um.. hi…” She says stammering and looking around. “Yeah uh hi. One, how do you know my name, two why did you follow me home, and three, how could this not be awkward?” She stares at him and thinks to herself, trying to find an excuse for her actions. “Look, I um.. I needed a place, so I watched different people to see if they were trustworthy or not, if they could be kind enough to let me stay with them. It took a while, but when I found you, I immediately got a feeling that you would be a good choice. That if I had to beg for a place to stay, that you would help me.” Dwayne blinks and thinks to himself. “Look, this place doesn’t belong to me, it belongs to someone else who lives here. Honestly I would let you stay as long as you found yourself a job and helped pay for your keep…. Hmm.. I can talk to him when he wakes up, but you’re going to have to do your part. Got it?” He says to her, comfortably but sternly. Her eyes widen and fill with tears. She grows a smile on her face. “Thank you, thank you very much Dwayne!” She says to him getting up and hugging him. He hugs her back but says to her “I cannot promise you that you can stay here, I still have to talk to Van-Man.” A couple seconds go by where she releases her grasp and looks at him questionably. “Van-Man?” She asks. “The guy who owns this place. I call him Van-Man because he’s got a van, and lets me drive it to school, work and the grocery store.” The girl blinks and looks confused. “Ricochet is my name.” She says changing the subject. “That’s a neat name, I’d introduce myself but you already know it haha.” He replies. “There’s a bed upstairs you can sleep in until I talk to Van-Man. It’s my bed so don’t break it or anything. But yeah sleep there for a little while.” He says pointing up the steps. “Okay, thanks. I’ll be sure not to break anything.” She replies with a giggle.

She walks up the steps and yawns. She makes sure not to trip on the broken step and flops onto his bed. She curls up and quickly falls asleep. Meanwhile, Dwayne sits on the couch and eats his breakfast. A few moments go by, car horns begin to blare and then lights flash. He thinks nothing of it and continues eating. After his last bite he hears a metal trash can begin pushed over and startles him. Getting up to see what the commotion was, Van-Man busts open his door and says : “Want a spike canberry?” Jumping and then catching himself on the wall, Dwayne says to him “Dude! Hell yeah I want a spike canberry!” He takes it from Van-Man’s hand opens it, and hears that satisfying “fwipashhh” sound and chugs it down. Van-Man closes his door and returns to sleep in his gaming chair.