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Messenger drops it like it's hot...
Mon Jan 29, 2007 at 01:38:21 am EST
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'Sunshine Days' Part Four: Millenial Angst... And after this, there's no going back!
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Sunshine Days

Part Four: Millennial Angst

“A new age is upon us…
Yet the past refuses to rest in its shallow grave.” ~ Immortal Technique

The year is 1999.


Messenger stands alone. To his side, bank-tellers and customers huddle on the ground, cowering behind desks and counter-tops. The only sounds are their muffled sobs and heavy breathing. In front of him, stands a God of thunder clutching his hammer with gargantuan hands, a being made up of the very stars in the night sky and a robotic fallacy of a man who has more circuits than veins.

“You have no idea what you’re doing…” Messenger informs them. “This is your only warning. Let me leave… now!”

“Who are you…?” Dark Hwk asks. “You’re not Messenger…”

“Oh, but I am, Zane. I’m more Messenger than you could ever know. This is my true face. Now, move aside.”

“Nay!” Donar shouts. “It is time that ye go down!”

“Oh?” the Postman asks as he lifts his gun and points it in their direction.

“You know all three of us are invulnerable to bullets. You can’t kill any of us with a gun,” Starseed tells him as he hovers above the floor, unfazed by the weapon.

“Y’know… You’re right,” Messenger concedes. “However…” the Postman points his gun at a trembling bank-teller. “… These people aren’t.”

“You wouldn’t…”

“Wouldn’t I? The ends justify the means. I will take one innocent life… even a hundred…. to save literally tens of thousands. That’s simple math. That’s sacrificing for the greater good. Ya can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs!”

“… please don’t kill me….” the old man whimpers as a wet patch grows on his pants.

“If there’s a shred of Messenger in you, you won’t shoot that man,” Dark-Hwk tells him through metallic vocal chords, and yet sounding more human than Messenger.

“I WILL SHOOT HIM IF YOU DON’T STAND ASIDE NOW!!” Messenger screams back, his gun shaking in his hand.

“No, you won’t.”

They stand fast, not budging from their positions.

Messenger slowly lowers the gun. “Fuh- Fine…” he sighs as he forms a fist. “… Then let’s do this the old fashioned way!” he screams as he swings a fist into Donar’s jaw.


Donar isn’t even fazed by the punch. He merely swats Messenger away with the flick of his hand sending him barreling into one of the desks.

“Are ye insane, postman?! You try to fisticuff a God?! Ye would sooner break your hand!”

Messenger stumbles up wiping a thin streak of blood from his lip. “Yeah… I am insane. Bring it on!”

“You brought this on yourself…” Starseed tells him as he floats into the air and blue electric energy starts building around him. He opens his mouth wide and it resembles a black hole of nothingness, surrounded by the stars on his face. He screams.

“GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!”

Messenger feels the full brunt of this sonic scream and it feels as if his body is being torn into a million little pieces. Every nerve cries in agony as he slams into the wall leaving broken marble in his wake.

He stands up clutching his arm. “Not… good… enough.”

Messenger throws Razor-Letters in Donar’s direction and they’re deflected with his hammer as he spins it wildly.

“Is that all ye have, letter carrier?!”

“No … see if you can dodge this!”

He pulls out an explosive package from his satchel of tricks. A red light flashes on its side and it beeps.

He tosses it towards Dark-Hwk. It skitters by his feet.

“What the…?”

*BOOOM*

“ACKK--!” he shrieks as sparks and shrapnel flies into him sending him shuttling into the glass doors, shattering them upon impact. Although Dark-Hwk had received the brunt of the blast, both Donar and Starseed are tossed to the side of the bank as well. Screams and coughs come from the dense grey cloud of smoke, which obscure the bank.

“That—that maniac!” Starseed shouts as Donar clears the smoke and ash by whipping his hammer in the air.

When the smoke disperses there’s no sign of Messenger.

Several people in the bank are bleeding and covered in soot.

Dark-Hwk is convulsing on the ground.

“Whoa…” Starseed whispers as he looks at his robotic alley. Exposed circuitry is spilling out of his legs like worms crawling out of wet soil. Battery acid sprays forth from his wounds like open arteries.

“MESSENGER… WHERE ART THOU, VILLAIN?!”

“Donar, forget about Messenger…” Starseed tells him as he cradles his robot friend in his arms. “We need to get Dark-Hwk help now or he’s going to die…”



Half a mile away a shadowy figure bounds from rooftop to rooftop….

“Millennia! DAMN YOU, MILLENNIA!” Messenger screams and throws a tantrum like a child as he barrels across the city, cursing the name of the time-God who sent him back to 1999. As it turns out, fixing the course of human history is not as easy as it seems… but there’s still a way to make things right. There’s always a way…

Messenger now knows what he has to do. He has to kill the terrorist mastermind from the cell responsible for the wave of attacks that hit Paradiopolis in the future. He has to kill Ahmed Naseem. Only problem is in 1999 Ahmed is a sixteen year old high-school student and yet to commit a crime.

No one ever said doing the right thing would be easy.



At the Lair Mansion…

… Jarvis wonders what the price of his life is. Are the stakes too high? Is he compromising too much of his own ideals in order to preserve himself. Is a compromised life a life worth saving?

When he became a hero… he knew there would be risks. He knew the inherent danger and he accepted it. And now suddenly his mortality scares him. He feels the sand draining in the hourglass and it scares him.

He stands in the hallway where spiffy and the Messenger of 1999 are being locked up in order for the future Messenger to complete his mission and create a better future. He presses his fingers against the doors. He hears groans and whispers.

“They’re coming to again… I should… I should… No, I can’t.”

“Yes... you can…” a booming, aristocratic voice tells him. “And for the experiment to succeed… you must.”

Jarvis whirls around and looks up at a shrouded figure that towers over him. “Oh my god… I remember you…

… HOODED HOOD?!?”




On the Lair Jet…

“Goddamit… How do you tend to wounds on a robot? How do you give a robot CPR?! He’s dying!” Starseed holds on to Dark-Hwk as the Lair Jet zooms through the sky.

“Aye...” Donar flies through the sky speaking on a communication link. “… the letter-carrier has gone insane…. He slaughtered Energizer and ravaged our steel comrade… Tis’ in grave condition… tis…. leaking brown fluids… my comrade… I will make the letter-carrier pay I swear.”

“…. What?!” Hatman yells back over the comm link. “Get back here as soon as possible… I’ll have NTU work on Dark-Hwk… He’s the only one with the know-how to help him now. ”

“Did ye not hear me?! The postman has been possessed or replaced with a demon! He is no longer human… I looked into his eyes and only saw a dark abyss staring back. Centuries ago… I faced Medusa, hatted-one… and Messenger’s stare turned my insides to stone faster than she ever did. He must die, before he slaughters more of us.”

“Don’t let Dark-Hwk’s life be lost, because your thirst for vengeance overrides your concern for the very comrade you’re avenging. His health is our first and only concern until we’re sure he’ll pull through… then we go after Messenger… and we will bring him down, but…”


“But what, Hatman?”

“ I had NTU swab the doorknobs for DNA, hair that kind of thing to determine who exactly this older Messenger is… it’s a perfect match. This is not some doppleganger or clone or demon, because there would be some subtle genetic drift. There’s not. For all intents and purposes he’s the real thing. We also determined from studying the surveillance stills he’s approximately 7 years and 10 months older. The only question is… what did he do to his younger self… and why is he here?”

“….. Oh my god….” Starseed whispers.

“What is it?” Donar drops his comm. link and glances over at his friend.

“How do you tell if a robot is dead…?” he looks at his trembling cosmic hands, which are covered in battery acid. “…. His lights… they switched off…. the electric humming… it was like he was breathing… and then nothing.”

“Wha- What are you saying?”

“I can’t cry, Donar. Goddamn my eyes… I can’t cry…”




In the suburb of Sheldon…

… A house sits on the top of a grassy hill, where the Naseem family lives. By all accounts they’re a good family, well liked by their neighbors. Mohammed Naseem owns a grocery store where he frequently cuts his customers a break if they’re short a quarter and Jasmine Naseem runs a charity at the local Mosque. Their son, Ahmed, is an honors student at his high school and at the young age of 16 has already been accepted to the college of his choice. Today for the sake of thousands… today to save people yet to die, Ahmed must die. Messenger stands outside their front door with a gun. He isn’t going to kill the boy for what he’s done. He’s killing him for what he will do. One day.

The door creaks as Messenger swings it open. Stepping over the pinewood floor he passes family photos on the wall.

He enters a room with posters of Eminem and Pamela Anderson on the wall and comics on the floor and a boy at a computer.

“Ahmed Naseem…” Messenger asks. With a trembling hand he raises his gun and aims it at the boy. “You don’t know why I’m doing this… You’re still innocent… but one day you will do something horrible and--… and….”

In his mind he hears the explosions again… feels the hot glass splinter into him… feels the heat from the fireballs… hears the cries of help and horror.

“… You have to die. I’m sorry.”

He hears a scream behind him.


“NO, MY SON!”


He turns to see a portly, older man in pajamas holding a revolver and facing him. “GET OUT! THAT’S MY SON!! GO YOU EVIL MAN!! LEAVE OR I WILL SHOOT!!”

The gun in his hand also trembles. Behind him, his wife in her nightgown clutches his shoulder in fear and repeats “my son… my son…” over and over again.

Messenger considers reasoning with him. But what would he say? ‘Your son will one day grow up to be a terrorist mastermind, and he has to die to save countless innocents’? No, he realizes with a heavy heart… there’s only one way this can end.

*BLAM*

The old man slumps against the wall, dead by the time he hits the floor, a bullet hole in his head. The woman shrieks in horror.

Without missing a beat, Messenger turns towards the boy…

*BLAM*

He falls lifeless over his keyboard. Beneath the bloody stain on the computer monitor, Messenger notices the paper he was writing: ‘Why I Want to be a Lair Legionnaire.’

With slumped shoulders, Messenger walks past the woman on the floor screaming and clawing at the carpet.

“… no pain…” he whispers. “…. they felt no pain….”

“…. no pain….”


“…. no pain….”




Lair Mansion…

“Why would you help me?” Jarvis asks.

“I have my reasons…” the Hooded Hood responds. “I am amused watching this debacle, but I cannot allow something like this to continue unchecked. Through his actions, Messenger will end up destroying the Lair Legion… maybe even the continuum of space and time. He will retcon major future events that for the sake of the continuum must be allowed to happen…” Hooded Hood flashes a sinister smile. “…. Besides I’m the only one allowed to retcon around here.”

“But my death…” Jarvis whimpers. “I don’t want to die.”

“Oh, dear, dear Jarvis…” a tarot card slides out of the Hood’s sleeve and he hands it to Jarvis. “For what it’s worth if you were to survive the alien assault slated for some time during the autumn, you would merely get an extra two months of life before Baron Zemo kills you using an ionic disruptor. For you, longetivity…” the card is ‘Death’ “… is just not in the cards.” He walks away…

“But wait are you the 1999 Hooded Hood or the 2007 Hooded Hood…”

“1999? 2007? Those are but arbitrary manmade dates. The Hooded Hood… is just the Hooded Hood…” his voice trails off as he disappears into the shadows.

Jarvis shudders and shakes his head. ‘Gotta do this… Not for myself… Not for Messenger….’ he swings open the door to the office where the 1999 Messenger and spiffy have been kept hostage for the last day. ‘… But for Paradiopolis…


Always for Paradiopolis…’





Meanwhile….

Messenger sits cradled on the roof of a house and rocks back and forth. Finally he stands and lets out a primal scream, his fist raised at the sky…

“WHY HAVE YOU FORSAKEN ME?!?” he screams.

“WHYYYYY?!?”

There is no answer… There never is…


In this moment he realizes this last adventure has already cost him his soul. Now the best he can do is cash it in for all it’s worth.



The Lair-Jet skids to a halt on the tarmac outside the Lair Mansion….


Donar carries the body of Dark-Hwk off the ship. Tears well in his eyes as he holds the android body. He has dined with immortals and Gods alike, and he would trade all their lives in order to revive his friend. But he can’t. The spark of life which inhabited him is gone and nothing’s left except the metallic shell which the sun glistens off of.

He enters the mansion still clutching his friend close to him. Inside he sees Jarvis, Hatman, spiffy, Dark Knight, Lisa, Visionary, Sersi and ... Messenger… watching a news report on TV.

“You…” Donar rasps. He drops Dark-Hwk’s body and it clangs as it hits the floor.

“Messenger… Murderer…. I’ll—I’LL KILL YOU!!!” he leaps at the postman with the bezerker rage that only a God could have. “MURDERER!!”

“NO!!” Jarvis gets between them and holds Donar back with his cosmic enhanced strength. “THIS ISN’T THE ONE!! THIS ISN’T THE ONE!! The Messenger who killed Dark-Hwk… who did all of this… he’s from the future. This is OUR Messenger… This is….”

The words don’t register in Donar’s head as he’s held against the wall. Only the rage. Only the vengeance. He foams at the lips, his face flushed with anger.

“It won’t work. I know Gods… the only thing that will appease him now is Messenger’s death. Doesn’t matter that this is a different one.” Sersi touches his forehead. “Sleep.”

Donar immediately falls into a slumber and collapses next to his dead android friend.

“You’ll want to keep him away from Messenger … until this is all sorted out at least….”

“Jesus…. Zane….” the 1999 Messenger utters as he brushes his hand against Dark-Hwk’s cold helmet. “What kind of monster did I become?”

He glances up at the newscast on television.

“-- We’re back. Continuing where we left off, just hours after executing the super-villain Energizer and wounding several civilians at a bank with a bomb and possibly killing his own team-mate who was seen being carried away from the bloody scene, the vigilante was witnessed breaking into a middle class family’s suburban home. The father, a middle-aged man from Jordan and his son only sixteen were slaughtered while the wife looked on. One of the suspect’s weapons, a so-called Razor Letter was left embedded in the wall.”


“Jesus… no.”


“What are you going to do?” Jarvis asks.


“What I must… For the sake of everyone who might die by his hands… I have to kill him. I have to kill… myself.”



“The days are long and the nights are long… people acting like they lost their soul.” – Fort Minor


To Be Continued

NEXT: Preemption begets quagmires… If I need to sell you on the next chapter, I’m not doing my job. So I’ll say only this… Jarvis, the Lair Legion (circa 1999), the Hooded Hood, Baron Zemo, the Puritan, SPUD… and not one… but TWO Messengers… needless to say the Razor-Letters hit the fan!

‘Sunshine Days Part Five: Quagmire’ is coming soon! And no one is safe. Just ask Dark-Hwk…



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