Vladimir's life flashed before his eyes as he fell from the net. Many hours of ranting in internet chat rooms and many throws of multi-sided dice flew by in a split second. Finally he caught up to the present moment and discovered he was still mid-drop. He was facing upward as he fell and he could see the rest of the team starting to tumble after him. He reached his hand out but they were too far away to touch. He braced himself for the hot and searing liquid pain he expected to splatter on his back any moment now. Suddenly he came to an abrupt stop. It occurred to him he was still all in one piece. Then he realized he had gotten wedged in the trap door opening. The rest of the team bounced off of him and rolled to the side onto safe ground.
"Looks like my giant ass just saved the day," Vladimir said. "Someone want to help get me out of here?"
Marvin grabbed him by the hand and yanked him loose. "Looks like your plan to kill us failed, Dr. Magnus. And now you're going to have to face the combined might of the Disruptors! I wouldn't want to be you right now."
Dr. Magnus let out a shrill hiss and flung the knife at them.
Ninja Frank tried to block it with his katana sword but missed it entirely. Instead he accidentally sliced off the tip of Steve's right ear.
"Ow, man! Why do you keep injuring me?" Steve shouted. "Me, of all people! I always supported your ninja hobby while everyone else said you were a huge weirdo. You would think that would make me off limits to being on the receiving end of ninja weapons, but no."
The knife in the meantime had buried itself in Marvin's chest. His enhanced invulnerability protected him from sustaining too much harm, but it still stung like the dickens. "All right, Doc. Now you went and made me mad. That was a bad idea because I might not be very good at a lot of things, but I'm really good at destroying stuff. And you brought us into your lab where it looks like there's a whole bunch of valuable equipment and expensive science stuff. And they're all about to get majorly destroyed. Just like I'm going to destroy your face!"
Marvin yanked the knife out of his chest and threw it back at Dr. Magnus. It missed him by inches but hit a computer screen and caused it to shatter. Then Marvin grabbed a nearby table covered in various pieces of hardware and flung the whole thing at the platform.
Dr. Magnus leaped off the side of the platform just before the table hit one of the control panels. It exploded in a shower of sparks and set a neighboring control panel on fire. He managed to hide somewhere amidst the confusion.
"Meth Girl!" Marvin shouted. "Use your tracking skills to locate him. Everyone else, start breaking stuff!"
"This is the coolest thing I've ever done in my life," Steve said as he grabbed a bunch of beakers off a nearby table and smashed them on the ground.
"Eh, it's all right," Vladimir said. "It doesn't compare to the time my 150th level paladin defeated the Tomb of Horrors on his very first attempt. I was the lone survivor in my campaign and have rightfully become a D&D legend among my peers. Heck, a couple people in my party were killed before they even made it into the entrance, but I persevered and prevailed against all odds. Next to that, this is a cakewalk. Let me tell you, Dr. Magnus has got nothing on the demilich Acererak."
"Jeez, dude. All you talk about is Dungeons & Dragons. Do you ever do anything else?"
"All kinds of stuff," Vladimir said. "I also play Magic: The Gathering, not to mention a wide variety of computer games, board games, and tabletop rpgs. I'm also an avid LARPer. I won first prize in a Star Wars trivia contest and I'm one of the world's foremost experts on Lord of the Rings. I can talk Star Trek with you if you want, but I must warn you I'm only fluent in Klingon, Cardassian, and a little bit of Romulan. If you want to converse in Ferengi or Bajoran, I don't know what to tell you. And you guys still need to come see my band play sometime. As you can see I have a wide variety of interests. What do you do all day? Sit around and smoke marijuana?"
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Super Screwup (ONC 2022)
HumorMegafantastic Man is the greatest superhero on Earth. His little brother Marvin is decidedly not. It's tough living in the shadow of greatness, and although Marvin possesses some super powers of his own, things just never seem to work out quite ri...
