- Since I've already started on the second draft to Old School Evil 2, I'm hoping to have it complete and ready for publication by the end of the year. Yes, the first Old School Evil took 2 years to complete from the very first word I put down on paper, but since then, I've learned a lot about the editing process, so I think I can streamline it a bit to get the book ready. I've also got a critique group and more feedback networks now, so I can start making progress immediately, instead of in small patches like the first book.
- I'm expanding my posting schedule on the blog. Originally I was doing the Villains Retrospects on Mondays (or Tuesdays if it's a holiday) and randomly posting stuff on Thursdays if I had anything to say. I'm going to add scheduled posts on Wednesdays and Fridays. Wrap-up Wednesdays will be posting any progress I'm making in any field of Old School Evil - writing, art, publishing, etc. Flashback Fridays will be posting info about the fictional cartoons that are set in the Old School Evil universe. I've already posted a bit about the Hurricanines but I'll be posting more in-depth stuff about the cartoons and the villains in them.
- I've hinted before about something big after the Villain Retrospects are completed, but I'm ready to share. I'm planning to run all the villains I've gone over into a tournament - the Bad Guy Beatdown! Thirty-two rounds of villain-on-villain violence, trying to determine the best and baddest bad guy ever! I'll be going over detailed analyses of each of their abilities and exploits and using that to do the most realistic fights as possible. Plus, it'll be a great chance to share more writing!
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| I call it the Sereni-Bee. |
- I'm not sure how far I'll get into it this year, but I'm hoping to at least get the first prototype toy produced. I'm planning to model out a figure with Blender (the same program I modeled Lead Tentacle and the Force Bolter) and have it printed at Shapeways. I've printed a few things through them, a few static figures and a couple of Transformers accessories, and I've got high hopes of making an articulated figure based on one of the Flashback Friday cartoons.
- One final thing I'm planning to do for Old School Evil this year is building a full website instead of just the blog. Though the blog is serving it's purpose now, I'd love to legitimatize Old School Evil with its own address and a more professional look.
I'm super excited for what's coming down the pipeline. And it's fitting to share with you all the good news in my 50th post. It's hard to believe I've made it this far without sharing more of my story, so to celebrate, I'm sharing the first chapter to Old School Evil. If you've made it this far, thank you so much for taking the time to read this, and I hope you enjoy!
CHAPTER ONE
MAX
I sat hunched over my
plate of high-fiber, low-sodium, no taste food at the Hidden Brook Retirement
and Assisted Living Community, imagining all the ways I could murder my fellow residents.
At the table to my left, Delores Twill whined about her grandchildren to no one
in particular; I conjured the schematics to my tornado generator and pictured
her whipping in a whirlwind. Across the table from her, Chris Coppersmith
complained about his medication to a disinterested orderly; I fantasized
teleporting him into the sun with my portal device. Behind me, Princess Connie,
that blind simpleton, threatened to sue the facility if she didn’t get the
batteries in her hearing aids changed. My mind glimmered with the thought of
crushing her in the robotic claws of my power-suit. My smile grew with each
envisioned death; my heart beat harder as more of these geriatrics fell before
my genius.
And
just like every other day I’d been stuck in this hellhole, I remembered each
and every one of those devices destroyed back in my prime. All of them reduced
to wadded up blueprints on my workbench, adorned with the radioactive wolf head
insignia of my design that had through constant defeat grown into a badge of
shame. I sighed, pushing those tattered designs out of my head and focused
again on Connie, the steel claws squeezing around her throat, until –
“Gladys
again,” Silas said. “God, I hate that fucking bitch.”
I jerked out of my daydream and found myself sitting
at a table with two people I couldn’t believe I called my friends. Which --
when I thought about it -- was less a vote for them and more a vote against
everyone else. When did they show up and how long have they seen my
murder-fueled grin?
Phil set down his spoon and wiped the milk from his
patchy mustache. He looked prepared for another argument. “What’s your problem
with her? She makes the best pancakes.”
“I don’t give a shit about your flapjacks.” Silas
pointed at Phil’s drink. “It’s that milk right there. And Max’s OJ. Why can’t
she fill the cup up all the way?”
“What does it matter?” Phil picked up his own glass
and twirled it around in his hand. Indeed, after just one drink, the glass
looked almost empty. “If you want more milk, you can always go get another
glass.”
“That’s not the point!” Silas shouted, attracting
attention from a few of the other residents sitting around us.
Phil hung his head low and covered his face with his
hand.
“I shouldn’t have to ask for more milk. I should be
trusted to not spill my drink. Do they think I’m a hundred years old?”
I dropped my head back and sighed. “Will you two
ever shut up? Every day it’s like this. You’re giving me a migraine!” I rubbed
my temples. I could feel the muscles over my ears tightening like a vise.
“What’s up with you, Max?” Silas asked. “Forget to
take your shithead pills this morning?”
I groaned. I had already gone over this with the
doctor. I didn’t feel like trying to explain it to these idiots as well. “They
don’t work.”
“Have you tried doubling your dosage?” Phil pushed
again. “It worked for me and my tension headaches.” He tapped a finger to his
balding dome.
Tension
headaches. Seriously?
“I’ve tried getting the doc to change them, but you know they never listen.” I
stretched my neck clockwise then counter-clockwise, the muscles and vertebrae
cracking and grinding. It never helped, but it had become habit by now. I just
imagined cutting my head off and burrs spilling out from my veins. I glared at
the others. “Just shut up or find another table.”
I picked at the runny eggs on my plate, the yolk
spilling out and coating my soggy bacon in bright yellow slush. You’d think
they hired these cooks right out of elementary school. What I wouldn’t give for
an Eggs Benedict. I watched Phil shovel his oatmeal into his mouth, pour some
more imitation syrup into it, and keep shoveling. He might as well eat it with
a trowel.
Silas dropped his fork onto his plate, drawing
another couple of glances from everyone else around us. He wiped a hand over
his shiny head. Unlike Phil, and most of the other men around here, Silas
shaved his head bald instead of waiting for old age to do it for him. At least
he didn’t have that ridiculous mohawk he used to wear. “I gotta get out of
here,” he said with the urgency of someone about to vomit.
“Then go outside,” Phil said between gulps. A bit of
slobbery oats popped out of his mouth and clung to his bottom lip.
I almost gagged.
“That’s not what I mean. We’ve been here for years
now and I can’t handle it any longer. This place is an absolute hole.” He
shoved his plate out from in front of him.
“You say that every other week,” I growled at him,
feeling that vise on my brow tighten enough that I thought my eyes would pop
out of their sockets.
He pointed a crooked finger at me. “Fuck that, Max.
You feel the same way, I can see it in your eyes. You’re just as sick of this
place as I am, being told when to eat, when to sleep, when to take a fucking
shit. We can’t keep living like this. We used to rule this world, now we’re
stuck here at the mercy of a bunch of candy-stripers.”
We
used to rule this world. It jammed itself into my brain and
I felt the vice loosen just a bit. Enough for the wheels to start turning
again.
Phil leaned forward and grimaced. “Silas, you gotta
keep it down. Angela’s right over there.” He jerked his head to his left at a
portly Hispanic nurse staring at us.
“Dude, I don’t care if you got a wrinkled boner for
her. She can lick my asshole.”
I sneered. Silas always had a way with words that
made me want to wire his jaw shut.
Phil grimaced. “If you don’t shut up, she’ll tell
Doc Michaels and he’ll slip a sedative into your pudding. He did it to Kelly
Tremmel for a week last time he bitched about the crew. And it’ll be even worse
for you if Dr. Silvan hears.” He hooked his thumb at the drooling mess Billy Batsweat.
Every time I saw him sitting there, I shuddered. Though, I wouldn’t mind if it
happened to these two sometimes.
Silas groaned. “Fine. But I mean it. I gotta get out
of here.” He shook his head and hung it low. “I miss my old life.”
We all sat quiet for another moment. Who here didn’t
miss that? This is where old lives came to die. And then the new lives died
here too. I hated to admit it, but Silas started winning me over with his
weekly gripe. Of course, I was already formulating a plan, having watched the
maintenance staff repairing a window on the far side of the room before I slipped
into my usual murderous thoughts. I always had a plan brewing in the rare case
someone screws up and leaves me an opening, however small. But I could always
use a helping hand getting out. “So are you just bitching or are you actually
proposing something?”
He sat for a few seconds looking at me then dropped
his chin into his hands. “Just bitching, I guess.”
“Typical.” I eyed the window again.
Silas scoffed, “Hey, I may hate this place, but at
least I ain’t on the streets.”
MANNY
I stood in line at the
shelter with my tray, just waiting to see what slop they tried passing off as
food. I knew this stuff was all donations and they had to feed hundreds of us
off it, but fuck, this stuff grossed me out. I couldn’t even force myself to
eat that ‘hot dog’ they served yesterday. “Looks like soup today,” the stinky
guy next to me muttered. He had to be talking to himself or that tiny guy he
thinks lives in his beard. He stunk so bad I thought my nose hairs were
burning. Sometimes I hated having a nose this strong. Who am I kidding? I always hated having this nose.
I got to the front of the line and held out my tray
on which the living mummy behind the counter placed a bowl. She filled it with
some murky water and a couple chunks of chicken. Soup, sure, let’s call it that. She smiled at me and I nodded back.
Her eyes lit up for an instant. Probably the most gratitude she’d seen here all
day. I proceeded down the line and amassed a flimsy slice of bread, an apple
with a chunk sliced off it, and a half pint of skim milk two days past the
expiration date. Why did I even bother coming here?
I found an empty table outside on the edge of the
patio and sat down. The table see-sawed on the concrete. A stiff wind blew
through the air and I felt every hair on my arms jump to life. I slurped down
my luke-warm soup in two gulps, chugged my milk just as fast, and wadded up the
slice of bread and stuffed it into my mouth. Upon examination, the apple was
seventy-five percent brown splotches. Apparently they didn’t cut off as much
mold as they should have. I tossed it behind me on the gravel and watched
someone sneak back there to pick it up. He took a bite and dropped it back on
the ground, munching on as much of the brown spots as his rotting teeth
allowed.
I got up from my table and walked across the gravel
lot then slipped through the open gate. I may have been willing to come here to
get a free dinner but I wasn’t about to sleep here. I tried it once and woke up
in the middle of the night with some crazy dude peeing on the bedpost a few
inches from my face. He just kept going once I woke up. I took off before they
were able to kick him out. Of course, I saw him get in the next night. He can
pee on someone else’s head; I’d rather sleep on train tracks than risk that
again. I walked across town, feeling the blisters on my feet rub against the
worn holes in my shoes.
A gust of wind nearly threw me on my face. I
stumbled to the left, just in time to see a wild fir branch whip by me. I
ducked behind a wall at the rear entrance of a small hardware store and waited
out the gale. I hated the hurricane-strength wind that blew through here in the
winter. “I really need to find a better travel agent,” I said, patting my
jacket’s breast pocket. I felt every contour of the action figure through the
thin padding. I needed to find a better coat, too.
“It ain’t too bad, Manny,” it answered in a deep
voice that happened to come from my mouth, “You just need to find a better…” I
trailed off for a few moments, searching for the right word. “Cranny!”
Roadblock would have been proud of that one. I waited until the wind died down
a little and scrambled towards the east side of town.
After an hour and a half in the frigid wind, I made
it to my hidden camp just before another bout of wind tried taking off my head.
Have I told you how much I hated the wind yet? The stakes holding down the tarp
on the bank of the river were in the same place I left this this morning. Thank
God no one took my makeshift bed as free real estate again. I chased off an
elderly homeless couple last week who felt like my camp made the perfect
make-out spot. So many liver spots.
I sat down on the tarp and unslung my backpack. It
felt heavier every day, even though I found less stuff every time I opened it.
I ruffled through it and pulled out a beat up Pringles can. Oh, how I wished
there were actually chips inside. I took off the lid and spilled out its
contents: a travel toothbrush, a squeezed-empty tube of toothpaste, and a comb
with a broken handle. I struggled to get some more toothpaste out but barely
got any on the bristles. I dipped the toothbrush into the river and scrubbed my
teeth. I put the stuff back in my can and replaced it into my bag. I looked in
and sighed. I pulled out the coarse wool blanket and a second woven one. I
wrapped myself up in both of them and tried going to sleep.
Another day down. Couldn’t wait for tomorrow.
It turned out I
didn’t get to.
I woke up to a growling so loud I thought I was
being mauled to death. It took a few moments before I realized I wasn’t under
some rabid animal attack, but at the mercy of a wild beast stalking through my
digestive track. Apparently, old chicken in water just didn’t cut it as a meal.
I squirmed out of my makeshift sleeping bag and stumbled down to the river bed.
I dipped my hands in the freezing water and splashed some into my face. Instant
wake-up, better than coffee. I swiped my stubbly beard dry and rung the water
from the long hair that always hung in my face. It may have made me look like a
metal-head (I prefer classical music) but it kept the cold off my neck. It
didn’t much work when wet however, so I balled it up and stuffed it under my
stocking cap.
I sniffed around, so glad not to be surrounded by
foul, crazy people. I picked out the brisk scent of running water and the usual
burning stink that wafted off the Purina plant during the early morning hours.
I sorted through the dry bark of bare trees and the dusty odor of old poops
turning to earth. All the normal smells I wake up to every morning.
There had to be something more for it to wake me up.
I closed my eyes and inhaled long and slow. I caught a scent of something gamey
to the east and followed the river bed a few dozen yards. I heard splashing
ahead of me. My stomach growled again as I spied a young raccoon washing its
hands in the water.
I kept telling myself the growling came from my
stomach, but I knew that was only a half-truth. I hadn’t felt that other part
of me in a long while, a surprise considering how hungry I’ve been for so long.
I guess it finally snapped.
But it’s not happening tonight. I kicked and
scratched and yanked it back under control, panting in the freezing night air.
It succumbed, but I couldn’t keep it at bay for long if I kept watching a
potential meal play in the river. I tossed a rock at the little guy, who
scurried away.
I refused to spend the rest of the night picking
raccoon out of my teeth.
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