Sequel to Superdude and the Amazing Heroes, Superdude’s Revenge is funny, fast-paced, and action packed.
SUPERDUDE’S REVENGE
After ants took over the world, they built large dirt mounds in honor of the defeat of Superdude and his friends. Unfortunately, there were a lot of humans, particularly young males, that liked to stomp on the mounds and poke them with sticks. The ants were not getting the respect they deserved. mmm, their leader, was furious.
Eventually the ants came up with a solution: they would bite anyone who destroyed their beautiful mounds. The mound-stompers significantly decreased.
Superdude and his friends, Cheeseman, Toothpick, the Communicator, Mindreader, and Wings, had been retired for about a year. They were former superheroes. Each posessed a special power. Superdude, who was the leader because he was actually related to Superman (Superdude is Superman’s barber’s dog walker’s nephew’s sister’s best friend’s third cousin twice removed), could breathe underwater (as long as he wasn’t wet), turn invisible (as long as no one’s looking at him), and could stay up as late as he wanted without ever getting tired (as long as he went to bed before 8 pm every night). Cheeseman could melt cheese with his hands. Nothing else. Just cheese. But before you laugh, let me point out that while it takes you hours to melt cheese with your hands, Cheeseman can do it at a remarkable speed. It may not be particularly useful for most situations, but it probably is for at least ONE!
Toothpick could summon a toothpick out of thin air once every two months. Pretty impressive, eh? Correct—it is not! The Communicator could speak any language—as long as he had learned it first. He had learned one whole language—English!
Mindreader could read anyone’s mind—as long as they were thinking about dumpsters. Only dumpsters. No exceptions. She is quite a useful member of the team. And Wings could fly as high as she wanted, as long as she was in a plane. She does not know how to pilot a plane. That’s the pilot’s job. (This is a secret. Her friends do not know.)
The group used to keep the world safe, but after trying to defeat a terrifying mob of twenty-six tickle ants, they gave up.
One day, the heroes were having pre-dinner post-lunch afternoon snack #2. There was a large banquet laid out before them. The six of them were innocently eating their feast when a group of ants approached them.
“We have come with a proposal,” the ant in the lead said. “We will help you defeat the other ants. In return, you will help us become the leaders of the ants. Oh, and you must agree, or you will be severely punished.”
Superdude yawned. “Hi.”
The ant stared. “Did you hear a word I just said?”
“Meh,” Wings said. “Twenty-two-seventy-five.”
“What is that supposed to mean?” another ant demanded. “That’s not even correct math! It is fifty-three-eighty-seven, for your information.”
“Wait, who are you guys?” Toothpick said. “Aren’t ants supposed to be our enemies? Or maybe you’re our retired enemies, since we’re not superheroes anymore. Did you retire?”
“NO!” snapped the first ant. “I am !!!.”
“Well, Exclamation point exclamation point exclamation point, I—” Mindreader began.
The ant interrupted her. “NO! That is not how you pronounce it! It is !!!.”
“Exclamation point exclamation point exclamation point,” Mindreader affirmed.
!!! huffed. “Regardless of the pronounciation, the other ants kicked us out because they couldn’t pronounce our names. We all are named after punctuations.”
“If this whole thing is about pronounciations, what was the ‘regardless’ all about?” Cheeseman asked. “I think maybe it should be ‘regarding’. Or ‘Bob’. I’m not good with grammar.”
Superdude interrupted him. “I am Superdude. This is Cheeseman, Mindreader, Wings, Toothpick, and the Communicator. What are your names?”
One ant stepped forward. “I am @@@.”
Another waved its hand. “I am {{{, and this is my twin brother }}}.”
“Uh…” Superdude said. “So is that ‘left curly bracket left curly bracket left curly bracket’ and ‘right curly bracket right curly bracket right curly bracket’?”
{{{ (or was it }}}?) sighed. “Alas, if it were only that simple. It is ‘{{{‘ and ‘}}}’.
The Communicator waved his hands wildly. “Never mind! We do not need introductions! Jhwehdjejdoodoodooflptigaborsnop!”
“What does that mean?” @@@ whispered to Mindreader.
“No one knows,” she replied mysteriously. “Not even the Communicator.”
Another ant stepped forward. “Attention, please, superheroes! Will you accept our offer, or must we annihilate you?”
“What’s your name?” Wings asked, attempting to be friendly.
“^^^”, the ant answered.
“How do you even pronounce that?” Wings said.
“Ask my mother.”
“What’s her name?”
^^^ shrugged. “I do not know. Anyway, you may call me ‘Emoticon’ for short.”
“Thank you,” Wings said. “I’m honored.”
“Of course,” Emoticon said graciously.
Superdude seemed to think for a moment. “Very well. We shall joineth you—if you will alloweth us to finisheth our afternoon snack in peace first.”
“Why are you talking so fancy?” Mindreader said. “You sound like some retrieval prince. Also, it’s pre-dinner post-lunch afternoon snack number two.”
“Medieval prince,” the Communicator corrected her.
“If you insist,” said !!!. “You may finish your… PDPLASN2.”
“BOMBS?” Mindreader cried.
“It’s a Latin hymn,” said a snarky ant named ???.
“Acronym,” the Communicator informed him.
“What-ever,” snorted ???.
!!! raised his tiny ant hand fist to the sky. “We are… the Punctuantions!”
“And?” Wings prompted.
“Pets,” !!! said.
“We are NOT—” Mindreader started.
Toothpick interrupted her. “But we kind of are, right? They were here first. Doesn’t that make us sort of their pets?”
“Obviously,” ??? snorted.
“Well, it does not matter!” Superdude announced. “We must begin our battle! To me, heroes!”
“Will you pleeeeeease stop talking like that?” Mindreader begged. “It’s getting on my nerves.”
“Yes, talk like this instead: Iuhafeoeiuwnhuxfnewi!” the Communicator said helpfully.
“….please don’t,” Mindreader said.
“ENOUGH!” !!! suddenly yelled. “Everyone follow me!”
The six superheroes and two-hundred twenty-seven ants all marched after !!!.
“Hey, I just realized something!” Cheeseman said. “We outnumber the bad ants! We have… uh… two hundred twenty eight plus six is, um… a lot, and twenty-six is… less!”
“Wow, I wish I had your math skills,” Toothpick said enviously.
Another ant, …, hurried up beside the heroes. “Don’t be so sure about that,” she said. “There are more of them now.”
“How could that be possible?” Mindreader scoffed. “Their names are things like mmm and qqq and ddd. If there are only twenty-six letters in the alphabet, how could there be more?”
“No, there’s forty-eight letters in the alphabet,” Wings argued.
… rolled her tiny little ant eyes. “There are definitely more of them. We met one named yth.”
“They’re MIXING LETTERS OF THE ALPHABET now?” Mindreader cried. “What will happen next—one hundred becomes an officially recognized number in the English language?”
“Probably,” Toothpick said mournfully. “Then there will be one hundred ants.”
“Actually, if they keep up this naming system of names with only three random letters, we won’t have any more than 17,576 ants,” Wings said confidently. “I’m sure we can defeat them.”
“Yeah!” Cheeseman said. “I finally figured out the math problem! Two-hundred-twenty-eight plus six, also known as a lot, equals negative seventy-two! We outnumber them four billion to one!”
… glared at them. “When was your brain removed?”
“Yesterday,” Cheeseman said.
“Yeah, he was at the brain donation center all day!” Mindreader said. “When he got home he immediately ate five bags of potato chips and then fell asleep! And started drooling!”
“Is a brain donation center a real thing?” … demanded.
“By the way, your name sounds like you’re just perpetually waiting,” Wings told her.
“I know,” … said. “That is the pride of my life.”
“Why?” Mindreader whispered.
… blinked. “Um, call me Ellipsis.”
“Halt!” called a voice from up ahead. “Stay where you are!”
“Huh?” Wings poked her head around a bunch of ant bodies.
“It’s fff!” Cheeseman exclaimed. “mmm must have promoted him!”
fff was wearing a tiny, navy blue guard uniform. !!! stopped the ants and turned to face him.
“Let us pass,” he said in a commanding voice.
“Never!” fff cackled evilly. “If you want to see our leader mmm, you must first face… the Pit of Doom!”
“Pit of Doom?” Mindreader said. “So we probably go sit in a hole and play rock paper scissors, right?”
fff marched the ants and heroes to a huge pit. He then turned and grabbed a molecule-sized knife from the wall.
“Choose your weapons!” he commanded.
The ants all began to take weapons. Superdude shrugged at his friends. “Nah, we have our superpowers already.”
The ants began to file down into the hole.
fff waved his knife. “Since your side has two-hundred thirty-four, I shall choose two-hundred-thirty-three more ants to fight for me!”
He began calling random ant names. “ddd! ujh! lll! etc!”
As soon as everyant was in the pit, each team lined up behind the line in the middle.
“Three… two… one… GO!” fff charged at !!!, brandishing his knife.
“Ohhhhh,” Mindreader said. “You meant actual doom.”
I will knock that infernal purple human into that dumpster! a nearby ant thought.
Mindreader heard him and whirled out of the way. She plopped to the ground, squishing several of her ant adversaries, who all ran out of the pit screaming.
The two sides continued to fight. The superheroes began sitting on piles of ants, who all ran out screaming until fff alone was left to fight.
“Surrender!” !!! cried at him.
fff stared for a moment, then yanked a tiny white flag out of his ant pocket and began waving it around.
The Communicator nodded, impressed. “That’s some pretty good surrendering right there.”
“Bring us to your leader,” !!! hissed at fff.
Suddenly ddd ran up. “That’s me! I’m the leader! Not mmm!”
“No, you’re not!” fff yelled at her.
“Shhh!” ddd whispered. “I’m trying to trick them!”
“We can hear you,” Emoticon told her flatly.
“Oh…” ddd said.
“They have defeated us,” fff said sadly. “But they cannot defeat… zzz!”
“zzz?” Mindreader said. “Is he asleep? Sounds awesome. Can we have a nap too?”
“Not yet,” fff said with a smirk.
* * *
When fff had left the room, the heroes turned to face zzz. The Punctuantions had gone to raid the ant treasury. Rumor had it that mmm’s treasury had more delicious picnic food than even a BASKET.
zzz lifted his tiny ant head high. “To see mmm, you must first make me fall asleep! To do so, you must bore me with all the most useless, boring facts you know!”
“Boring useless facts?” Wings wailed. “But we don’t ever study! We just sit around being awesome!”
“Hm,” Superdude said. “Let’s see. Did you know that oranges are actually PURPLE?”
“I said FACTS, not OPINIONS,” said zzz.
“Is that actually an opinion?” Mindreader whispered.
Cheeseman raised his hand. “Did you know that extra-sharp cheese is actually sharper than mild?”
zzz nodded, impressed. “That is pretty boring.”
The Communicator nodded. “I have one! To say that you are going to “lay” down is not correct grammar, as “lay” is used to refer to placing an object down and requires a direct object when used in a sentence. “Lie” is actually the correct verb for this sentence, because it means to recline—for example: “I am going to my room to lie down”, and “I lay the pancake on the plate”. We often use the word which sounds right to us, but that does not mean it is grammatically correct.”
zzz was beginning to doze off.
“This is his favorite lecture,” Mindreader commented.
“Yeesh,” Ellipsis whispered.
“How about: “you can’t pick your friends and you can’t pick your nose, but you can pick your friend’s nose”?” Toothpick suggested.
“I’m pretty sure you got that backwards, buddy,” Cheeseman said, patting him on the back.
“Look!” the Communicator gasped. “zzz is almost asleep! We just have to tell him one more useless fact!”
“I’ll do one,” Wings said confidently. “At its core, aerodynamics is the study of how air flows around objects and the resulting forces generated by that interaction. Whether it’s a massive airliner, a Formula 1 car, or a simple kite, the same physical laws apply. To understand how things move through the air, we must look at the four competing forces that act on a body in flight: lift: the upward force that overcomes gravity. It is primarily generated by pressure differences across the surfaces of a wing. Weight: the downward force pulling the object toward Earth. Thrust: the forward force (often from an engine or propeller) that moves the object through the air. And drag: the resistance force that opposes thrust, caused by air friction and pressure differences. We often explain lift through two complementary lenses…”
Wings’s completely useless facts about aerodynamics were interrupted by a loud “ZZZZZZZZZZZZ”. Not just zzz but everyone had fallen asleep.
Wings scratched her head. “Whoops.”
She took a deep breath and screamed at the top of her lungs. The glass of the window shattered, bouncing off everyone’s heads and waking them all up.
Cheeseman yawned. “Hey! Did we defeat the ants yet?”
“No,” Toothpick said sadly. “We still have the part where we must spear them with toothpicks.”
“Grooooooss,” Mindreader complained.
Superdude (he had been the last to wake up) launched himself into the air with a dramatic whip of his rainbow cape. “TO ME, HEROES!”
Wings narrowed her eyes disapprovingly. “You said that on page three. You can’t say the same thing twice.”
“But it was in CAPS LOCK this time,” the Communicator insisted.
Mindreader peered at the door. “Hey, look! The door’s not being guarded! We can just walk right in!”
zzz jumped up. “Oh, no, you can’t!” he announced triumphantly. “I woke up from all that screaming too!”
He launched himself at Wings, but since ants can’t jump, he tripped over one of the toothpicks Toothpick had apparently been littering everywhere and flew out the window. “ARRRRGGHHH!”
The Communicator glared after him. “The correct word is AHHHHHH!”
“I saved the day!” Toothpick said happily.
“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Superdude said dismissively. “Time to see what’s behind that door!”
The second he opened it, a tiny voice called, “ME!”
mmm stood with his miniature hands on his hips. “Thought you could defeat me, “superheroes”? Well, think again!”
“Hmm,” Superdude said. “Hmmmmm.”
The other superheroes all went, “Hmmmmmmmmm.”
“What on EARTH are you doing?” mmm demanded.
“We’re thinking again,” Mindreader said. “You told us to.”
“ARRRGH!” mmm shouted. “I didn’t mean LITERALLY!”
The Communicator gave him a satisfied nod. “That was correct usage of ARRRGH!”
“Well,” Superdude said, “I’ve thought again and I’m pretty sure we can defeat you. But thanks for asking.”
mmm’s face turned red. “WHAT?”
Toothpick thought a minute, then crouched down and whispered, “Boo.”
mmm screamed in terror and took off running.
“Now did I save the day?” Toothpick said hopefully.
“I guess so,” Superdude said grudgingly. “I mean, maybe a little bit. But it was like 99% me.”
“Yes,” Cheeseman said seriously. “Superdude handled all the dramatic monologue, Toothpick. All YOU did was just defeat the bad guy.”
“Oh,” Toothpick said sadly.
Mindreader yawned. “Can we go home now? I haven’t had a nap in like, two years, and I am SO HUNGRY.”
“Didn’t you just take a nap?” Wings said incredulously. “I mean, when I told everyone about aerodynamics and then you all fell asleep?”
“Yeah, TWO YEARS AGO,” Mindreader said grumpily.
“More like two minutes,” the Communicator said.
Suddenly they all heard a tiny pattering. The heroes braced themselves to attack.
!!! burst into the room with his army of two hundred twenty-seven Punctuantions. “Have we won?”
“Yeah!” Wings said. “mmm took off running and we’ll probably never see him again!”
“BO HO HO HO HO!” Suddenly mmm burst into the room with—Wings quickly counted—17,574 other ants (zzz was still at the bottom of the building because the heroes (with the aid of a toothpick) flung him out the window on page eight).
“Oh, no,” !!! muttered.
“RUN!” Superdude bellowed. The tiny little ants all began to chase after them.
There was for some reason a plane sitting on the ground. The superheroes all leaped into it and Mindreader called, “Wings, quick! Fly us to safety!”
Wings gulped. As mentioned previously, she did not actually know how to fly a plane. She was not a pilot.
But her friends were in danger!
She raced to the cockpit and jumped into the front seat. Gripping the steering wheel, she whispered, “I can do this.”
“I CAN DO THIS!”
Wings pushed the steering lever forward courageously. She narrowly missed the tree in front of her and then immediately crashed into a dumpster. The plane promptly burst into flames. Wings was ejected from the pilot’s seat.
She rushed to the back. Her friends were not there. “NO! Superdude! Cheeseman! Toothpick! The Communicator! MINDREADER!”
“Yeah?” Superdude clambered up behind her, flanked closely by the other four heroes.
“YOU SURVIVED!” Wings cried in elation.
“We found some slushies in the back of the plane and got brain freezes, so we all fell out before the plane started,” Cheeseman said. “But we probably would have been fine anyway, because brain freezes are a known defensive mechanism against planes starting dumpster fires.”
“Really?” Toothpick said in wonder. “I didn’t know that.”
“Well, DUH,” Ellipsis said. “It’s not a real fact.”
“Right,” agreed Emoticon.
mmm and his 17,566 other ants (zzz had rejoined the ant army) marched up. “You haven’t defeated us yet!” mmm yelled. “We’ll never give up!”
Superdude thought for a moment, then reached over and snatched a picnic basket from an innocent bystander (drawing a loud “HEY!”). “If you give up now, I’ll give you this picnic basket full of food.”
mmm stared at the basket like it was full of gold. Drool began to pour out of his tiny little mouth.
“FINE!” he cried. “But HAND it over!”
Superdude gave him the picnic basket. With all of the 17,566 other ants helping, mmm joyously carried the picnic basket off into the sunset (well, really the normal sun, because it was half past noon).
!!! happily took his throne and ruled justly over his Punctuantions. Superdude and his friends finally got to return to their normal lives.
And everyone was happy. (We think.)
THE END
Moral of the story: If you team up a bunch of superheroes with 228 ants, however, they totally won’t lose.