Mr. Epitome had found the remains of his Epitome Express airship outside of Ritopli. The hero salvaged pieces of the wreckage and brought them to the American forces headquartered in Lebask. Now, minutes before he was to face the approaching army of his enemy, Emperor Scorpion, the Exemplary Man was struggling to make something from the debris.
It wasn’t going well. Epitome’s inventive genius was in retention and recall, not adaptation. If someone told him how to jerry-rig an ElectroMagnetic Pulse Cannon from cannibalized parts the job would take only moments, but to come up with the schematics on his own was beyond his area of expertise. Especially since he hadn’t slept in eleven days and his enhanced senses were beginning to activate on their own. To suddenly have your vision increase its magnification by 50000X was disconcerting, so much so that when Captain Josephine Simon pulled back the tent flap and entered Epitome was genuinely surprised to see her.
“How’s it going?” the strictly symbolic super heroine known as Jingo Belle was in combat greens. Her Colt Desert Eagle sidearm looked ridiculously large on her slim hip.
Epitome grunted and rendered the bazooka-sized device into a crumpled wad.
“Sorry.”
“Not your fault, Tish.”
“Um, it’s Jo.”
“What did I say?”
“You called me Tish,” the young woman tried to get a good look into Epitome’s eyes, but he wasn’t obliging.
The costumed man shook his head, “I’m thinking about too many things at once. Huh. I’ve never even called Tish Tish,” he said in a tone that implied the soldier should understand what he was talking about.
Captain Simon had seen a lot of the characteristics of battle fatigue the past 12 hours, and recognized the signs of them here, “Epitome, I think maybe you should reconsider your plan to attack the strike force.”
“I’m fine. It’s nothing. Your scent threw me off, that’s all,” he replied, which confused Jingo Belle even more.
“Mr. Epitome, I don’t understand Sybian.”
The man of might ignored her, choosing instead to repack his tools in their appropriate pouches on his costume.
If Jingo Belle were the woman of action her handlers had intended her to be, she would have coshed the haggard but defiant man for his own sake. But her sometimes spandex-wearing persona did not come with the requisite abilities to back up such a thought. So she tried reason one more time:
“We need to go talk to Colonel Weir. You’re in no shape for this.”
“I don’t need to think straight, Jingo Belle. Just hit what I’m aiming at,” he hefted his impenitrium sword and prepared to stride past her.
“I could order you to stop.”
“Sorry, can’t hear you. The radio transmissions from the comm center are bleeding through.”
“Epitome-”
But he was gone.
*****
Unskar Kufadalla, the Emperor Scorpion, knew he was being used. Factor X was spending a considerable amount of his own coin to finance the Emperor’s army. The Sybian assumed that meant X anticipated some say in how the desert nation would be run once the Americans were driven out. He would humor him, to a point.
The armored tyrant flew his “skypion” platform in the middle of the invasion force, flanked by battle-suited soldiers and giant, arachnid-shaped robots. They were less than 2 miles from Lebask. His sensors had already picked up the American troops amassing on the city’s outskirts. He knew the super agent Mr. Epitome was there as well. It would not be long before the true battle, the one that all parties had been hoping for since the day Emperor Scorpion wantonly killed 2,000 U.S. citizens, began.
*****
Eptiome’s attack plan was simple: he would strike first, going after the enemy head on. Then Glory would charge the column from the rear, forcing them to redirect their attention. The duo would retreat before coming back to strike again at whatever weak points the army presented them with. To stop their march and allow the bombers from the approaching British aircraft carrier to finish off the exposed enemy would make the point.
Factor X wished to show the world that America was weak and could be challenged. Mr. Epitome would remind the old Soviet how that line of thinking was, is, and would always be, ridicuously flawed.
*****
Another of the scorpion tanks lost its stinger and rear set of legs with one slash of the Man of Might’s sword. When the machine staggered backward from the attack Epitome positioned himself under its abdomen and with a flex of his arm tossed the 50 ton weapon onto a nearby personnel carrier. The score of foot soldiers scurried clear of the impact, but before they could fire their plasma rifles the Paragon of Power was among them, shattering their armor with jabs from his fists, feet, knees, and elbows. Another scorpion tank let loose with a barrage of heavy caliber machine gun fire from the turrets placed in its pincers. The bullets lacked the punch to do any serious damage, but their impact brought pain. The robot’s stinger arched down to fire a blast of energy at the hero. Epitome dodged it, and leapt onto the tank, slicing it to pieces as another came to its rescue. This one attempted to grab the hero but like the others missed. Mr. Epitome drove the sword through the machine’s head, then kicked it with enough force to crumple its front half.
A squad of soldiers opened fire. The blasts from their rifles hit with surprising power. One managed a lucky shot on Epitome’s sword hand, disarming him. Another scorpion tank skittered into the melee, its tail striking downward with the force of a pile driver. The Star Spangled Splendor grabbed the appendage and pulled, ripping it off and flinging it at a cluster of Kufadalla’s men.
The scorpion scooped up the hero with its claw and squeezed. Epitome felt pain shoot through his ribs before tearing himself free and flattening what was left of the robot with his fists.
An exceptionally large soldier charged. Mr. Epitome swung an arm back and struck a blow to the side of his helmet. The faceplate and most of the torso shattered, revealing another of Factor X’s surprises for the hero.
A noxious odor filled the air, driving Epitome backwards. The soldier grabbed Mr. Epitome’s wrist and held it fast.
“Happy to see me, asswipe?” Musk Ox asked, before hammering his free fist into his enemy’s stomach.
*****
Glory was having her own problems. She had been waiting nearly half a day to attack those who had killed her fellow Americans, and it was hard for her to follow the plan. The most powerful Border collie on the planet wanted to charge, past the insignificant men and machines that made up the army’s rear guard and deal with the group’s ringleader, the Emperor himself. But her job was to attack and withdraw, then loop around to strike again. It might be good strategy, but it was also unrewarding.
Then her enhanced hearing picked up a sound she had never heard before: Mr. Epitome bellowing in pain. Deciding it was time to ignore the plan and help her friend, Glory began a mad charge through the Scorpion’s army.
*****
Mr. Epitome threw another shattered robo-scorpion at Musk Ox, who swatted it aside with contemptuous ease.
“That makes six so far. Have you figured out yet your little hissy fit isn’t going to stop me?” the Low Evolutionary’s greatest creation gloated.
The Paragon of Power tried to run around his old foe to reclaim his dropped weapon, the impenitrium sword, but Musk Ox drove both his fists into the earth with enough force to topple every figure standing within 50 yards.
Epitome was on his feet in time to be attacked again, this time by a bolt of raw energy. Emperor Scorpion wheeled down from the sky on his flying platform and struck the American with a gauntleted fist. It was enough to draw blood.
The hero kicked at his attacker’s vehicle, smashing it and sending the Emperor tumbling. Musk Ox used the distraction to move into range, his poisonous pheromones playing havoc with Mr. Epitome’s respiratory and immune systems. As he struggled to keep breathing Musk Ox pounced, getting Epitome in a full nelson and lifting him from the earth.
“Hold him still!” Emperor Scorpion howled.
“He’s not going anywhere, Bugsy,” the hirsute villain said.
The armored despot charged up his wrist-mounted blasters and shot Epitome square in the face.
*****
A crowd of men had gathered to watch their enemy get was coming to him. Emperor Scorpion and Musk Ox took turns. They had managed to break Epitome’s nose and jaw and dislocated both shoulders. Ox was using his cloven feet to crush the man’s ribs when the Scorpion’s armor picked up the oncoming attack of Glory the Super Dog.
“Epitome’s animal is headed this way!” He told his underling.
“So?” Musk Ox kicked the prone hero again, “It’s good as dead. Hear that, Mr. Epitome, I’m going to get your little dog too!”
Glory bounded over the ring of enemy soldiers and bit down hard on Musk Ox’s neck. With tremendous will she fought the deadly poison seeping into every pore of her body.
“Get off me, bitch!” Musk Ox clamped down on the Mutt of Might’s back and tried to her pry her free. The dog wouldn’t let go.
As Epitome crawled to his knees Emperor Scorpion backhanded him. His armor’s stinger, a long cybernetic cable, uncoiled from behind the villain’s head and struck one of the Exemplary Man’s open wounds. He could feel something being injected into his already weakened body.
“It’s synthetically enhanced Necrotising Fasciitis [flesh eating bacteria],” a woman’s voice spoke directly into his mind, “courtesy of the late, unlamented Doctor Yossarian. Even your dead foes will have a hand in destroying you, Mr. Epitome.”
The woman’s appearance seemed to indicate she had passed on as well. She materialized from nowhere, her long white hair flowing in a spectral breeze. Her form was slight and opaque, and she was apparently nude. With a gesture she tore Glory from the bleeding Musk Ox and telekinetically hurled her to the horizon.
“This is what we are going to do to you: while my thralls beat you to death I’m going to work my way through your ego’s defenses and plunder your brain of all its secrets. That knowledge, sold to the right people, should be more than enough to get us back into the black. Then we’ll decapitate you and see what Headcase will be willing to pay for your slightly damaged pate. Just like the Inuit, we will profit from every piece of you.”
The oblivious Musk Ox and Emperor Scorpion went back to work on the dying superhero. The woman kept speaking into Epitome’s tattered thoughts, “Lastly, we’re going to take one of your plans for our own. The incarcerated polymath you’ve been attempting to turn will be, but not in the way you’d like. When we finish showing the Idiom the true nature of your machinations she will be working for us.”
Epitome’s defiance struck back at the Russian telepath with surprising force, “None of that will happen. You’ll never get into my mind. I’ll crush my head rather than let you give it to that monster Tuppett. And Letitia Gahagan will never work for Factor X and whoever you are.”
“We’ll see,” the Mind’s Eye promised, and began to concentrate on taking Mr. Epitome apart, memory by memory.
End of Part One.
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