A Normil Day

Rick Normil

So, Brook Park.

It's a suburb, an upper-middle-class place. Decent spot to raise kids, if you listen to the real estate pitch. There are greenbelts and neighborhood playgrounds and big back yards to play in. There's also at least one long strip of cleared land with high-tension power lines running through it. Adam Stitch was at the edge of one of those, clutching his forehead with his left hand.

Because of that, he didn't notice Guardian until it was almost too late and there was a pickup truck flying towards his head. He could have taken the hit, of course—this is Stitch we're talking about—although it would have hurt him, slowed him down. But he heard it coming, and bounded clear, and his surge of pure, ecstatic rage on seeing Guardian—

Well, that's who Stitch is, isn't it? He leapt into the air, half a football field high, drawing back his spiked-ball fist and bellowing wordlessly. He was going to crush Guardian, hurt Guardian, punch twist kick pound pummel mutilate—

Guardian dodged, of course. Grabbed Stitch by the foot as he went past and swung him like a hammer toss, winding up to throw him into the power lines. Stitch, showing uncommon presence of mind, triggered the spiked ball on his hand and shot it directly into Guardian's face.

Guardian yelled and dropped him, putting his hands up to his dented mask. Stitch managed, barely, to loop the ball and chain around Guardian's legs as he fell and reeled himself up, teeth bared in fury. Guardian spun in place, unwinding the chain and letting him fall again.

It wasn't going to end there, of course, and Guardian knew it. He dove after Stitch. Hit him as he fell, driving him into the ground, leaving a crater like a humanoid meteorite. And he followed up on his advantage, punching Stitch, punching him again, pummeling him as he lay there fighting for breath.

Of course, he had to be leaning over Stitch to do any of that, so Stitch brought his knee up.

Some expressions look the same on Extraordinaries and baseliners alike. Ow my junk is one of them.

Stitch punched Guardian, sending him backwards into a pine tree. They were on the edge of the long clearing, at about the same place they'd started. The truck was smoking a few yards away; the only thing still functional was (of course) the alarm, which was hollering ooop ooop ooop at disorienting volume. Guardian, taking advantage of the landscape, ripped a tree up by the roots and hurled it at Stitch.

Stitch smashed it to splinters and charged at him, straight through the cloud of pulverized wood. He hadn't counted on Guardian having the same idea, flying like a battering ram right behind the tree. Guardian smashed into Stitch, and Stitch was knocked over, propelled backwards, away from the trees and toward the power lines, plowing a long, long divot in the ground.

Guardian was on him before he could stand. "You shouldn't even exist!" he snarled, driving his fist into Stitch's gut. He put his knee on Stitch's right arm, preventing him from using the mace, and started pounding on Stitch's face in earnest. "You were created to kill me, and you failed! Again and again and again!" He leaned forward, showing teeth. "Shouldn't you kill yourself? Doesn't that mean you should just die?"

Stitch, uninterested in the rhetoric, head-butted him and pulled himself free.

"You—goddamn—miserable—" Guardian's helmet was more than a little dented, now.

Stitch, atypically, turned and ran heavily away from his arch nemesis. Towards the power lines, which was a noticeably poor move—but then, Stitch has never been particularly renowned for his brains. Guardian flew at him, rammed him, and hit him, propelling him all the way to the base of the power lines. The steel deformed where Stitch impacted.

And then Guardian grabbed him, flew him upward, and drove him through the high-tension lines. For a moment, both bodies must have been outlined by lightning-bright sparks. Stitch howled in agony. Guardian let him fall.

It took a long, long moment for Stitch to hit the ground. When he did, it was like being body-slammed by a freight train. Still—because there wasn't anything else to do, because the alternative wasn't worth thinking about—Stitch managed a raspy, shaking breath and started hauling himself along the ground. His morningstar-hand was no good at it and his other hand hurt as if every bone had been broken, but he moved, inch by inch. Towards the base of the power line. Had to get there. No choice.

Guardian floated down beside him, hanging in the air like an angel, looking at Stitch as if he was a mutilated worm. "Are you scared? Are you trying to run away?"

Stitch kept crawling.

"I am going to kill you, you know," Guardian confided.

The base of the power line. A sparking cable lay not far away, and Guardian could have used that to kill Stitch right then. He didn't bother. "Don't you have any last words?" he went on, moving in front of Stitch's pathetic figure. "I was looking forward to your famous rhetoric. 'Kill G-g-guardian! Make G-g-guardian die!'" The imitated stutter came out high and mocking.

Stitch clawed at the ground with his good hand. A dug-up patch of earth, almost invisible in the darkness.

"And instead," Guardian said, "you go down without saying a thing? That doesn't seem like you, Stitch." He stomped on Stitch's hand, making the zombie gasp in pain—driving his fingers forcibly into the ground.

"It's not norm—" Guardian began. The button beneath the soil clicked.

Ah, what the hell. There are some puns a man shouldn't have to pass up. I grinned, not caring that the expression hurt like hell with me wearing Stitch's tenderized face. "Actually?"

The green glow of centrone radiation poured out of the ground, out of the generator that I'd buried there, bright enough to outline every grain of dirt. Guardian screamed, a high-pitched, childish sound with no dignity whatsoever.

"I'm perfectly Normil," I finished, as Guardian thudded to his knees.

Also, I'd won.

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Author's Note: When I first wrote this story, I wrote it in comic book form, intending to get someone to make a webcomic out of it.  I wrote this fight scene out in script form, and I think it made it one of the stronger fights I've ever written.  Let me know what you think in the comments!  Oh, and if you enjoyed this chapter, please vote on it.