Squirrelman - Sins of the Past 100
Previously on Squirrelman - Sins of the Past:
Having survived the machinations of a madman bent of world domination, the fiendish plot of the traitor within their midst, the loss of friends and teammates, and a sudden, unexpected, and unwelcome return to his original alternity, Squirrelman faces his biggest challenge yet - surviving his own wedding...
Starring!
Matt Mattheson ......... as Squirrelman
Kimmy Sinclair-Mattheson ................ as Ragdoll
Rick Duncan ........................... as Ace
Lisa Dumont ................... as Physique
Anna Kimble ................. as Darklight
Stephanie Cooke ............. as Blue Jay
Jay Allen ........................ as Red Bolt
Hank Scott .................. as Powerband
Wayne Masters ... as Midnight Avenger
Kyle Drake ........... as Troubleshooter
Jackson Archer ............ as Moonbow
Cricket ............................... as herself
Max Mattheson ....... as Captain Hero
Missy Mattheson ........ as Squirrelgrrl
Rob Ross ....................... as Ultraman
Rosie Ross ................as Ultrawoman
Ryan Ross .......................as Ultraboy
Rory Ross ....................... as Ultragirl
Melody Johnson .............. as Decibelle
Kathryn Hardy.......... as Nightwoman
Guest starring!
Reed Sterling ....................... as Doc
Julia Sterling ................... as herself
Joe Sterling ....... as SuperTwin Red
Jerry Sterling .... as SuperTwin Blue
Jeannie Sterling .............. as Zephyr
Carmine DaCosta ....... as Forerunner
Curt Connor ......... as Livin' Lightnin'
Molly O'Malley ........... as Glory Gal
Cassandra Kent .............. as Princess
Chrissy Fenton ................. as Fantasy
Alexandra Spelling ................ as Hex
Courtney Anderson ........... as Glitter
Juan Juarez ........................ as Resize
Andrew Carson ............. as Go-Getter
Jane Smith ......................... as Quique
Ronnie Schuler .......... as Monkeysee
Donnie Schuler ........... as Monkeydo
Ulysses Kent ................ as Majestic
Athena Kent ........ as Lady Majestic
Holly Weintraub ....... as Holly Ween
Father James Grayson ............ as Blue Ghost
Jude Azael ........................ as himself
Michael Chaney ........... as Nightwolf
Alicia Spelling .................. as herself
Andrea Spelling ................ as herself
Althea Spelling ................. as herself
Joseph White Eagle .......... as Totem
We arrive at St. Luke's with plenty of time to spare. Minutes, even. Naturally, Kimmy's late, but that's okay, because it gives me time for my panic attack when I see the church.
Nothing's changed. It's still an abandoned church. Boarded-up windows, chain link gate on the door, spray-painted graffiti all over the Neo-Gothic stone architecture.
Must have showed on my lack of poker face, because Doc, Stretch and Rick all say, "Matt, calm down-"
And then - I shit you not - the clouds part.
Let me say that again.
The clouds part.
The clouds that keep Weirdsville in a perpetual near-twilight gloom. They part.
Sunlight streams down, bright golden rays of autumn morning, and when it touches St. Luke's, the church is restored.
Maybe restored isn't the right word for it. I doubt the church ever looked this good. It's like the church returns to the best memories of what it used to look like.
If I didn't believe in powers, I'd say it was a miracle.
The front doors open and a priest steps out of the church. It takes me a second to recognize him, because he's not gaunt and glowing blue and translucently floating in midair.
We walk up to him and Doc says, "I suppose calling you Blue Ghost would be inaccurate at the moment."
"People called me Father Jim," he answers, smiling. His voice isn't that creepy echoey not-quite-synced to his lips, either - it's rich and not too deep, full of joy and love. We shake hands - firm grip, warm flesh. I'm a little too emotional to say anything.
Guests start arriving. My cousin and uncle from California. Some of the employees from Mister Accountant. A couple of Kimmy's friends from the firm she worked for. The Crimefighters' League, of course, all wearing their League jackets. TeenSupreme, the Weirdsville Nine, the Sterling Squad. Majestic and Lady Majestic, a few others from Team Title. Anyone comes looking for a fight is going to find it, let me tell you.
Two people show up, who I invited but who I didn't expect to show. Detective Knight and Officer Jimenez of the Action City Police Department, in their dress blues-and-whites.
"Aren't you dead?" Knight asks me.
"No body, no death."
"Yeah, that's what I figured."
We shake hands.
Jimenez looks uncomfortably out of place, until I offer him my hand. He looks at it for a second, then takes it.
"Jimenez."
"Squirrelly."
"Call me Matt."
"George."
"Thanks for coming."
"The invitation was a little obscure. And unsigned."
"I knew you'd figure it out, though."
"Yeah."
"George... thanks. For everything."
"I don't know what you mean, Matt."
But he knows, and I know. And he knows I know, and I know... well, you get the picture. I shake his hand again, wave them both inside where most the guests are wearing uniforms of different styles and colours, but a very similar purpose.
Rick and Stretch come up to me. Rick says, "They're on their way. Two minutes, son. If you're gonna run, now's the time."
"Which would only delay my extremely unpleasant death. Yours, however, would be lingering, for even suggesting that."
Stretch grins, give Rick an I-told-you look. "Fair enough. Let's get you married, then."
Rick and I head into the church, take up our positions at the altar, where Father Jim, Max and Doc are chatting.
My tux is a classic cut, black, with tails. Because, come on. No one was surprised when I said I wanted tails. Pale grey cummerbund and bow tie.
I don't know anything about dresses. The only thing Kimmy told me is, it's ivory, not white - though I couldn't tell you the difference if Squidface Calamari was holding me over a vat of acid.
The music changes. Missy walks the aisle, Anna's next, then Kimmy's friend Maria and finally Lisa, their hair done up with tiny blue and white flowers and ribbons and stuff. All in pale grey.
Then Kimmy. I can't breathe. My heart's pounding so hard I can't hear anything. Her dress has a long, wide skirt. The top is strapless - and, I find out later, almost backless, don't ask me how she kept it on - showing off her shoulders and neck. A thin band of diamonds around her throat. Bouquet of blue and white and some kind of pale lilac flowers that are almost grey. Her hair swept up, with the same flowers as the bridesmaids, veil hanging down her back. She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen in my life. I can't take my eyes off of her. She can't take her eyes off of me, either, so that's a happy coincidence. It's not until much later I realize that Majestic - Ulysses - escorted her down the aisle.
Next thing I know, she's right next to me. She looks like she wants to say something, but then Father Jim starts.
"Dearly beloved..."
I don't really hear what he's saying. Kimmy's looking at me. I'm looking at her. I'm too nervous to say anything. Father Jim breaks the spell when he touches my shoulder and murmurs, "The vows...?"
"Right," I say, then I take a deep breath. "Kimmy... I love you more than I ever believed possible. You're... you're everything, to me. I would cross mountains and oceans and dimensions and alternities to be with you. I would give up everything I knew to be with you. You challenge me, support me, thrill me, excite me... love me. You make me want to make the world a better place. Spending the rest of our lives together is something I can hardly believe I'm lucky enough to get to do. But I do believe. In you. In me. In us. Together."
Father Jim leans in and says, "Kimmy?"
"Matt... All my life I've found it hard to trust, hard to love. It came so easily to everyone I knew, but not to me. Until you. Your heart, your soul, the person who you are... You showed me how to love, how to trust. I trust you, Matt. I trust you so deeply. I trust you with my life. I trust you with my love. I know you'll never betray me, never betray us. You're my lover, my best friend, my partner, my teammate, my leader. The father of our children. I love you."
From over Kimmy's shoulder, I hear Lisa sniffling. Tears well up in my eyes, I see the same in Kimmy's. That's all we need, the whole wedding party crying. And I see Kimmy's face telling me she's thinking the same thing.
Father Jim talks us through the rest of the ceremony, the exchange of rings - I nearly kill Stretch for pretending to have misplaced the ring - all that. The kiss. Long and slow and applauded. Our friends, our family, assembled to see us united. When Father Jim introduces us to the congregation as "Mr. Mattheson and Mrs. Sinclair-Mattheson" I look at Kimmy and ask, "Missus?"
"Nice to know I can still surprise you," she smirks, then kisses me again.
Lisa's doing that thing women do, looking up and fanning her face to keep from crying, but Missy doesn't care, tears are just spilling down her cheeks. I shake hands with Stretch and Rick and Max and Doc, get kisses from Lisa and Anna and Maria and Missy. Kimmy's hugged by everyone in the wedding party. Father Jim works us through the paperwork, with Doc's help.
The reception is held at the Citadel, of course. No sense taking unnecessary chances, and their security is the best. Getting clearance for all the wait staff was part of the Kents' gift to us - no one wanted some criminals getting any bright ideas, sneaking in disguised.
Photos takes about an hour. Thank God someone had the brilliant idea to send out flutes of champagne, because Kimmy and I were both willing to kill for something to drink.
Then the Grand Entrance into the reception hall, and the reception line. We kept the wedding small, but there were still over two hundred people, what with all the 'and guests' we got RSVP'd. I don't remember anything anyone said.
It's all a bit of a blur, really. I'm not sure about what sequence events take place, but I'm pretty sure Stretch's speech as Best man comes before Kimmy's and my first dance, so I'll start there.
Stretch gets up and taps his fork against his glass. Melody does something so that the one tap grows louder and longer until everyone is paying attention, and so that Stretch doesn't need a mike for everyone to hear him perfectly fine. She's handy that way.
"When Matt told me he was seeing someone new, I was amazed. I mean, he hadn't had a steady girlfriend since college. Of course, I didn't know at the time that he was leading two lives."
That gets a chuckle from everyone.
"Still, he told me about this woman he'd met, how great she was, all that stuff you hear at the beginning of a relationship. I didn't know how he was finding the time to date her, since he always had 'last minute business meetings' - usually after the newsfeeds had reported some madman bent on world domination, or a fiendish plot having been unveiled, or a crime spree, that sort of thing."
More laughter. He knows his audience, I'll give him that.
"And then for a while there, I thought he might have found another woman. Maybe he was running around on the new girlfriend with some other woman. Of course I didn't know at the time that she was also leading two lives - and his two lives were seeing her two lives. Talk about stamina - that's when I began to suspect he might have super powers - you know what I mean."
Big laugh. Kimmy grins at me. I take her hand and kiss it.
"When I finally met Kimmy, I knew she was right for Matt. They complemented each other. And they both had these crazy schedules, so I knew it was meant to be."
Applause. Kimmy and I kiss.
"And then Matt finally told me about his other life, and naturally I'd heard the rumours about Squirrelman and Ragdoll, so two and two equalling four made it pretty easy to finally figure it all out. But this isn't about two and two equalling four - this is about two lives and two lives equalling one life - a life together. So join me, please, in toasting the couple - to Matt and Kimmy, one life together."
"One life together!" everyone toasts. Kimmy and I kiss, then we get up and go to Stretch. I hug him, the bastard, making me get all choked up. Kimmy kisses him.
That's right, that's when we dance. Kimmy and I go out on the dance floor, hand in hand, the music started - 'No Mask Can Hide Our Love' by Jon Bon Jovi. Not my first choice, but Kimmy was pretty convincing, and after listening to it a few times it grew on me. We start dancing, eyes on each other. Nothing else exists, nothing else matters.
At one point in the song, I recognize the tune, and laugh.
Kimmy raises an eyebrow. "What's so funny?"
"Back home, this song was called 'Bed of Roses'. It's funny. In both alternities, Bon Jovi exists. But no John Cougar Mellancamp. Guns N Roses, but no Def Leppard. No Jackson Five, so no Michael Jackson. I could make a killing if I could remember the lyrics to 'Thriller'. Elvis, of course, but here he really was cloned by aliens."
"Matt?"
"Yeah?"
"You're babbling."
"And you said, 'Back home.'"
"Yeah."
"You are home."
"I know."
She kisses me. I kiss her.
We're joined on the dance floor. Doc and Julia. Majestic and Lady Majestic - Ulysses and Athena, I suppose I should really get used to calling them that, since they're family, sort of, now. Princess and Joe. Lisa and Jerry. Rick and Anna. Stretch and his wife. Missy and Ryan. Max and Jeannie. Hex and Holly. Rob and Rosie. Wayne and Kathryn. Stephanie and Kyle. Curt and Melody. Cricket and Rory with the Monkeysee-Monkeydo twins. And weirdest of all, Molly and Jackson.
"Why is that weird?" Kimmy asks me.
"She's from the super-future loaded down with gadgets so advanced even Reed Sterling can't reverse-engineer them, he uses ancient martial techniques and one of humanity's oldest weapons."
"They're just dancing, Matt."
"Well, you know Molly."
"Yes. She knows what she likes, and goes for it. Everything else is superfluous."
I grin at her. "I know what I like."
"I know what you like, too, but that comes later."
"And then you come later."
"Not if I have anything to say about it."
"Oh?"
"I'll come sooner rather than later."
"Ah, okay. I can get behind that."
"And you will."
Later, I'm talking with Doc and Ulysses. I mention the weirdness about how certain singers are common to multiple alternities.
"That's because of Gardner's Third Uncertainty, of course," Doc says.
"Oh?"
"Which, as you know, states that any sufficiently pervasive concept will be repeated across the multiverse, unless of course it doesn't."
"You say 'as you know' so that I don't feel stupid for having forgotten it, don't you?"
Ulysses smirks. "They don't call him the World's Smartest Man because he's such a snappy dresser."
Doc laughs along with us. "Holy socks. You wouldn't believe the grief I get from Jeannie about the Sterlingsuits."
We look out across the dance floor where Jeannie and Max are slow-dancing, laughing and chatting.
Doc smiles at me. "My daughter. Your son."
Ulysses grins at him. "My daughter, your son."
I nod at them both. "My daughter, Rob's son. These cross-chronautical romances never work out."
"They'll learn. And they might even be the exceptions to the rule."
"And even if they aren't, well..."
"Doc?"
"Reed?"
"Our children. They're the future. Our hopes and dreams lie within them. Our hopes for the future redeem the sins of our past."
I put my hand on his shoulder, knowing he's thinking about Doc Steele and his sister, about Kosmos Konstantinopoulos and all the lost time they might have shared as brothers.
Curt gets trashed and starts singing some of his old hits from back when he was a rock star, with Melody providing a full band. Cricket and Rory have a few too many glasses of wine and Missy spends part of the night holding their hair as they puke, then she disappears with Ryan for a half hour I'm not happy about. Carmine and Max, surprisingly, spend a lot of time talking about combat - Carmine was in World War II, Max is a starfighter pilot from the future, but soldiers are soldiers no matter what era they're from. Stretch spends time with Athena, talking about Team Title's finances - networking, even at my wedding. And best of all, no unexpected crashers.
I make a speech.
"Kimmy and I want to thank you all for sharing this day with us, for being here. There are some people who couldn't be here..."
I see Father Jim at the back of the hall. Next to him, a glowing golden goddess materializes - Katie, or Superia, or whatever she'll be calling herself. She leans in to whisper something to Father Jim, who nods, almost sadly, then fades into the gaunt, translucent Blue Ghost. His cape fades into view, flapping in an unseen wind, and when it settles, I see them. Phenom and Rapunzel, Dragon and Mole, even Doc Steele. Trevor gives me a grin and a thumb's up. Jessie blows a kiss. Mike just grins, somehow happy and sort of dirty, and Mole give a melodramatic bow. Augustus just nods at me, proud and sad and at peace all at once. Then they fade away, even Blue Ghost and Katie.
"Matt?"
I turn to Kimmy.
"Sorry," I say to our guests, not caring who sees the tears spill down my cheeks. "I was going to say, there are some people who couldn't be here. But they are here. They'll always be with us, in spirit. So I'd ask you all to lift your glasses up... To absent friends, who aren't really absent."
We toast. The party starts up again, people dancing and drinking and having fun. Celebrating life and love and joy. 'Celebrate' by Kool & the Gang is played, and everyone dances - Gardner's Third Uncertainty hard at work.
Kimmy and I make our getaway when things are in full swing. We've got a ship to catch.
Our honeymoon is the Kents' other gift to us - two weeks on a cruise hovership in the Caribbean, away from it all. The ship, the Jewel of the Stars, hovers down low, near the ocean during the day, then rises into the air at night, just above the clouds, so that it's always a starlit night. It's a honeymoon cruise, too, so everyone else is celebrating their honeymoons, just like us.
Of course, as free of incident as the wedding and reception were, we couldn't expect the honeymoon to be smooth sailing. And to be honest, Kimmy and I would have been bored and miserable if something hadn't happened.
Something being Skyhook Mendoza and his dreaded band of Sky Pirates, naturally.
Ship's security tries but fails. Kimmy being the woman I love packed our suits - Ragdoll and Squirrelman dramatically returning from the grave - and we take care of the Sky Pirates pretty easily. Not so easily it's boring, but you know.
So we've wrapped things up pretty neatly and security is storing the pirates in the dining hall as a makeshift brig, and calling in the Caribbean Guard to haul away Mendoza's hover-ship.
I say to Kimmy, "Thank God for that, I was getting bored."
"Yeah, me too."
"Because now that we're in our suits, we can really spice up our sex life."
Kimmy, grinning, pushes me away, playfully. I could have avoided it but I played along instead, and backed into the railing that runs around the deck.
Well, the railing must have been damaged in the firefight with the pirates, because it breaks under my weight, and just like that...
Suddenly I'm falling.