collaborative short story oneshot
For those who may not know her, my friend xanthos_samurai is a brilliant writer and I lovelovelove everything she does. A while ago we decided to do a collaboration, where she would write a story and I would illustrate it. After many, many months of working on this project and endless hours of hard work on both our ends, it's finally complete!
There once was a man who hated everyone. Every day he awoke at 5:40 am (the evilest of hours,) ate his instant oatmeal (the evilest of the breakfast foods,) and rode a bus (the evilest of the public transportations) to his job at an insurance firm (the evilest of the professions). There, he worked long hours in a cramped cubicle in a windowless room, beneath fluorescent lights that buzzed the most evil of buzzes. In the evening he would ride the bus back to his small apartment and seethe.
The man had an evil henchman, or perhaps more like an evil mascot: a rabbit, the evilest of all domestic animals and vilest of all household pets. Having a pet wasn’t his own idea. No, he was not that sort of generous and loving man. The rabbit was, in fact, left over from the remains of a shattered relationship from the man’s slightly less evil days, when his partner had left him and the rabbit in the grubby apartment to seek out better and hunkier dudes elsewhere. Due to sharing space with the super villain and being bombarded with waves of projectile brooding every day, the rabbit became a being of purest malevolence. Its fur was black like the man’s soul, and its eyes burned red with the fires of hell. Its name was Sugar Muffin.
After many years of daily seething, the man developed a remarkable talent. He could compress all the bile and darkness within his shriveled heart into tangible nuggets of pure malice. In time, he learned to fire them from his lips like a spitting cobra. He honed his new skills on weekends, lurking outside of amusement parks, Saturday fairs, and places of joy, firing projectiles of concentrated hate at the colorful balloons carried by small, smiling children. His infamy grew and he came to be known as the Party Popper, the super villainous peddler of tribulation and insurance. He also kicked puppies.
Tales of the misdeeds of the Party Popper and his evil henchman, Sugar Muffin, spread far and wide, but mostly around the neighborhoods of their usual haunts. Many a soccer mom, Christian evangelist, and scruffy bum attempted to thwart his evil plans but all fell before his projectile hatred and his minion’s flailing, scratchy claws.
One weekday evening, the Party Popper was at home watching Fox News (the evilest of the news broadcasts) to gear up for the coming weekend, as Fox News helped him replenish his bile and ire at an accelerated rate, and with that bile and ire he could cause more mayhem and sadness in the hapless youth population. To his moderate surprise, there was a story about him, the Party Popper. Only, it was really less about him, and more a notification that callow youths from various hometowns were beginning adventuring and questing in order to dislodge him from his position of super villain. There was also a short interview with a local historian/fortune teller/curmudgeonly old hermit who spoke briefly of a prophecy, that soon a man with a birthmark shaped like Wyoming would defeat the Party Popper and his evil mascot, Sugar Muffin. This was followed by a commercial for a well-known fast food franchise depicting two middle-aged businessmen sitting in strollers and wailing like infants for pitas. This was followed by another advertisement for Head-On: Apply Directly to the Forehead. The Party Popper’s bile reserves increased exponentially.
For the next several weeks he amplified his efforts of the assault on happiness, firing hate missiles at balloons, children, adorable sparrows, public property, skateboards, lunch foods, punks, acts of kindness, lightrails, bull frogs, loud music, coffee chains, breakfast cereals, orangutans, Nigerian emails, watermelons, playstations, facial piercings, banana peels, dental floss, hydraulic cements, orphans, glaciers, art exhibits, Scotland, mantis shrimp, street performers, commercial airlines, Blu-Ray disks, escalators, Cajun food, surf boards, the Treaty of London, bicycle clubs, Eskimos, piranhas, the ghost of George Carlin, lottery tickets, retirement, sausage links, nutrias, tropical storms, and hobos. His notoriety grew and grew, and soon, none dared to confront him! Surely this will discourage errant adventurers and prophesized heroes, the Party Popper thought.
Much to no one’s surprise, however, it was only a matter of time before his evil deeds caught up to him, and on one fateful day he was accosted by a trio of callow youths: one, an achingly beautiful gothy swordsman, riven by inner tragedy and sporting a highly implausible hair cut; the next, a demure, soft-spoken, buxom young female mage and healing magic specialist who was likely the single remaining survivor of an ancient race, wielding a staff and wearing a mysterious pendant; and finally, a big, tough, angry guy with spiked gloves, tribal tattoos, and a large scar on his face who, deep down, was a total softy. The Party Popper immediately recognized them for what they were: the loathed adventurers.
“Go, Sugar Muffin, my evil minion! Go forth and destroy my enemies!” The Party Popper waved his hand dramatically and Sugar Muffin launched forward, growling a horrible death growl! It slashed at the heroes with its talons and snapped at their faces with its sharp fangs in a fearsome display of deadly rodent rage! The adventurers struck back at the midnight-colored hell beast, and with their combined efforts over several turns managed to deal 87,374,023.8765 HP of damage to the abominable Sugar Muffin. The Party Popper, most of his bile reserves already depleted from his weeks of mayhem, decided to make a strategic retreat. He held down R1 and L1 and managed to escape. The adventurers collected 2382 experience points, -7 gold, and a jade hair clip from Sugar Muffin’s corpse. Triumphant music played from somewhere.
Back in the safety of his apartment, the Party Popper lamented the loss of his loyal servant and henchman. He was sure he would miss the horrible, grunting menace, if only because now it meant he had to work harder at his super villainy since he was without a sidekick to thrust some of the super villain work upon. And with the lack of a small, furry woodland creature in his immediate vicinity, the evilness inside of the Party Popper grew unchecked and became larger and deeper than it had ever been before.
The Party Popper vowed that his next encounter with the adventurers would be their last. He made a concentrated effort to amass as much bile and darkness in his soul as it would take to crush the young heroes. His resolution coincided fortuitously with a mandatory trip to the DMV to renew his driver’s license, where he spent untold hours in the claustrophobic waiting room, surrounded by screaming babies and fat men with comb-overs. In that single afternoon, his hatred for humanity grew to nearly catastrophic levels. He felt ready to take on anything.
The following weekend, he lurked as defiantly as an evil super villain could possibly lurk outside of one of the establishments of amusement where he typically did his lurking. He didn’t have long to wait before the three adventurers appeared before him. The gothy swordsman, obviously the leader of the party, stepped forward while launching on some kind speech about the power of light and friendship. Honestly, the Party Popper couldn’t be arsed to pay much attention until the hero tore off his glove, revealing a peculiar angular birthmark on the back of his hand!
Could it be? The Wyoming-shaped birthmark mark of prophesy! Here before him was his destined foe! The Party Popper seethed his mightiest seethe. He had prepared for this moment, but now that he knew that this was not just any enemy encounter but one of destiny, he felt the strength of renewed vigor and hatred flowing through his veins. He focused all his evil strength into his soul, black as the deepest pit of hell, and felt himself begin to change. Four and a third black wings sprouted from his body. He grew an extra pair of arms. He levitated off the ground in defiance of gravity itself. He had transformed into his ultimate form: Giga Party Popper Prime!
Giga Party Popper Prime inhaled sharply and belched a barrage of projectile loathing. The young adventurers recoiled from his attack and took heavy damage, but retaliated with slashing swords and punching fists while the token female character cast relatively ineffective status spells. The ultra evil super villain and the three young heroes traded attacks for what seemed like forever, and Giga Party Popper Prime began to sag from the effort of battle.
“This is the end for you,” shouted the gothy swordsman, brandishing his absurdly large sword. “I shall take my fated place as victor in this fight!”
“Curse you! Curse you and your Wyoming-shaped birthmark!” growled Giga Party Popper Prime.
“Wyoming? Why no, you fool, my mark is shaped like Colorado!”
Giga Party Popper Prime leaned in for a closer look. Sure enough, it was a Colorado-shaped birthmark. Not Wyoming at all!
“Well,” he said, “it was prophesized that only the man with a Wyoming-shaped birthmark could defeat me. If you’re not that man, then it looks like this fight is not destiny after all.”
“You are the Nearsighted Nuisance, aren’t you?” insisted the gothy swordsman.
“No,” said the evil super villain. “I’m the Party Popper. Actually, I’m Giga Party Popper Prime at the moment.”
“Oh.” said the gothy swordsman.
“..uh.” said the gothy swordsman some more. “It seems that we have been fighting you by mistake! We were actually going after the Nearsighted Nuisance. Sorry to have bothered you!”
“Oh, no problem,” said Giga Party Popper Prime. “It’s an easy mistake to make. I’m sure this sort of thing happens all the time.”
“So, uh, I guess we’ll get out of your way. Sorry about that! Uh, take it easy.”
“Sure. I will. You too.”
Before the adventurers could collect themselves to leave, Giga Party Popper Prime summoned a giant meteor and crushed the trio flat for posterity’s sake. Giga Party Popper Prime collected 346,898 experience points, gained two and a half levels, and learned the attack Spleen Venting Level 3. Triumphant music played from somewhere.
The End.
There once was a man who hated everyone. Every day he awoke at 5:40 am (the evilest of hours,) ate his instant oatmeal (the evilest of the breakfast foods,) and rode a bus (the evilest of the public transportations) to his job at an insurance firm (the evilest of the professions). There, he worked long hours in a cramped cubicle in a windowless room, beneath fluorescent lights that buzzed the most evil of buzzes. In the evening he would ride the bus back to his small apartment and seethe.
The man had an evil henchman, or perhaps more like an evil mascot: a rabbit, the evilest of all domestic animals and vilest of all household pets. Having a pet wasn’t his own idea. No, he was not that sort of generous and loving man. The rabbit was, in fact, left over from the remains of a shattered relationship from the man’s slightly less evil days, when his partner had left him and the rabbit in the grubby apartment to seek out better and hunkier dudes elsewhere. Due to sharing space with the super villain and being bombarded with waves of projectile brooding every day, the rabbit became a being of purest malevolence. Its fur was black like the man’s soul, and its eyes burned red with the fires of hell. Its name was Sugar Muffin.
After many years of daily seething, the man developed a remarkable talent. He could compress all the bile and darkness within his shriveled heart into tangible nuggets of pure malice. In time, he learned to fire them from his lips like a spitting cobra. He honed his new skills on weekends, lurking outside of amusement parks, Saturday fairs, and places of joy, firing projectiles of concentrated hate at the colorful balloons carried by small, smiling children. His infamy grew and he came to be known as the Party Popper, the super villainous peddler of tribulation and insurance. He also kicked puppies.
Tales of the misdeeds of the Party Popper and his evil henchman, Sugar Muffin, spread far and wide, but mostly around the neighborhoods of their usual haunts. Many a soccer mom, Christian evangelist, and scruffy bum attempted to thwart his evil plans but all fell before his projectile hatred and his minion’s flailing, scratchy claws.
One weekday evening, the Party Popper was at home watching Fox News (the evilest of the news broadcasts) to gear up for the coming weekend, as Fox News helped him replenish his bile and ire at an accelerated rate, and with that bile and ire he could cause more mayhem and sadness in the hapless youth population. To his moderate surprise, there was a story about him, the Party Popper. Only, it was really less about him, and more a notification that callow youths from various hometowns were beginning adventuring and questing in order to dislodge him from his position of super villain. There was also a short interview with a local historian/fortune teller/curmudgeonly old hermit who spoke briefly of a prophecy, that soon a man with a birthmark shaped like Wyoming would defeat the Party Popper and his evil mascot, Sugar Muffin. This was followed by a commercial for a well-known fast food franchise depicting two middle-aged businessmen sitting in strollers and wailing like infants for pitas. This was followed by another advertisement for Head-On: Apply Directly to the Forehead. The Party Popper’s bile reserves increased exponentially.
For the next several weeks he amplified his efforts of the assault on happiness, firing hate missiles at balloons, children, adorable sparrows, public property, skateboards, lunch foods, punks, acts of kindness, lightrails, bull frogs, loud music, coffee chains, breakfast cereals, orangutans, Nigerian emails, watermelons, playstations, facial piercings, banana peels, dental floss, hydraulic cements, orphans, glaciers, art exhibits, Scotland, mantis shrimp, street performers, commercial airlines, Blu-Ray disks, escalators, Cajun food, surf boards, the Treaty of London, bicycle clubs, Eskimos, piranhas, the ghost of George Carlin, lottery tickets, retirement, sausage links, nutrias, tropical storms, and hobos. His notoriety grew and grew, and soon, none dared to confront him! Surely this will discourage errant adventurers and prophesized heroes, the Party Popper thought.
Much to no one’s surprise, however, it was only a matter of time before his evil deeds caught up to him, and on one fateful day he was accosted by a trio of callow youths: one, an achingly beautiful gothy swordsman, riven by inner tragedy and sporting a highly implausible hair cut; the next, a demure, soft-spoken, buxom young female mage and healing magic specialist who was likely the single remaining survivor of an ancient race, wielding a staff and wearing a mysterious pendant; and finally, a big, tough, angry guy with spiked gloves, tribal tattoos, and a large scar on his face who, deep down, was a total softy. The Party Popper immediately recognized them for what they were: the loathed adventurers.
“Go, Sugar Muffin, my evil minion! Go forth and destroy my enemies!” The Party Popper waved his hand dramatically and Sugar Muffin launched forward, growling a horrible death growl! It slashed at the heroes with its talons and snapped at their faces with its sharp fangs in a fearsome display of deadly rodent rage! The adventurers struck back at the midnight-colored hell beast, and with their combined efforts over several turns managed to deal 87,374,023.8765 HP of damage to the abominable Sugar Muffin. The Party Popper, most of his bile reserves already depleted from his weeks of mayhem, decided to make a strategic retreat. He held down R1 and L1 and managed to escape. The adventurers collected 2382 experience points, -7 gold, and a jade hair clip from Sugar Muffin’s corpse. Triumphant music played from somewhere.
Back in the safety of his apartment, the Party Popper lamented the loss of his loyal servant and henchman. He was sure he would miss the horrible, grunting menace, if only because now it meant he had to work harder at his super villainy since he was without a sidekick to thrust some of the super villain work upon. And with the lack of a small, furry woodland creature in his immediate vicinity, the evilness inside of the Party Popper grew unchecked and became larger and deeper than it had ever been before.
The Party Popper vowed that his next encounter with the adventurers would be their last. He made a concentrated effort to amass as much bile and darkness in his soul as it would take to crush the young heroes. His resolution coincided fortuitously with a mandatory trip to the DMV to renew his driver’s license, where he spent untold hours in the claustrophobic waiting room, surrounded by screaming babies and fat men with comb-overs. In that single afternoon, his hatred for humanity grew to nearly catastrophic levels. He felt ready to take on anything.
The following weekend, he lurked as defiantly as an evil super villain could possibly lurk outside of one of the establishments of amusement where he typically did his lurking. He didn’t have long to wait before the three adventurers appeared before him. The gothy swordsman, obviously the leader of the party, stepped forward while launching on some kind speech about the power of light and friendship. Honestly, the Party Popper couldn’t be arsed to pay much attention until the hero tore off his glove, revealing a peculiar angular birthmark on the back of his hand!
Could it be? The Wyoming-shaped birthmark mark of prophesy! Here before him was his destined foe! The Party Popper seethed his mightiest seethe. He had prepared for this moment, but now that he knew that this was not just any enemy encounter but one of destiny, he felt the strength of renewed vigor and hatred flowing through his veins. He focused all his evil strength into his soul, black as the deepest pit of hell, and felt himself begin to change. Four and a third black wings sprouted from his body. He grew an extra pair of arms. He levitated off the ground in defiance of gravity itself. He had transformed into his ultimate form: Giga Party Popper Prime!
Giga Party Popper Prime inhaled sharply and belched a barrage of projectile loathing. The young adventurers recoiled from his attack and took heavy damage, but retaliated with slashing swords and punching fists while the token female character cast relatively ineffective status spells. The ultra evil super villain and the three young heroes traded attacks for what seemed like forever, and Giga Party Popper Prime began to sag from the effort of battle.
“This is the end for you,” shouted the gothy swordsman, brandishing his absurdly large sword. “I shall take my fated place as victor in this fight!”
“Curse you! Curse you and your Wyoming-shaped birthmark!” growled Giga Party Popper Prime.
“Wyoming? Why no, you fool, my mark is shaped like Colorado!”
Giga Party Popper Prime leaned in for a closer look. Sure enough, it was a Colorado-shaped birthmark. Not Wyoming at all!
“Well,” he said, “it was prophesized that only the man with a Wyoming-shaped birthmark could defeat me. If you’re not that man, then it looks like this fight is not destiny after all.”
“You are the Nearsighted Nuisance, aren’t you?” insisted the gothy swordsman.
“No,” said the evil super villain. “I’m the Party Popper. Actually, I’m Giga Party Popper Prime at the moment.”
“Oh.” said the gothy swordsman.
“..uh.” said the gothy swordsman some more. “It seems that we have been fighting you by mistake! We were actually going after the Nearsighted Nuisance. Sorry to have bothered you!”
“Oh, no problem,” said Giga Party Popper Prime. “It’s an easy mistake to make. I’m sure this sort of thing happens all the time.”
“So, uh, I guess we’ll get out of your way. Sorry about that! Uh, take it easy.”
“Sure. I will. You too.”
Before the adventurers could collect themselves to leave, Giga Party Popper Prime summoned a giant meteor and crushed the trio flat for posterity’s sake. Giga Party Popper Prime collected 346,898 experience points, gained two and a half levels, and learned the attack Spleen Venting Level 3. Triumphant music played from somewhere.
The End.