by Dan Swanson
Rutland, Vermont — late October, 1988:
It’s almost dawn, and I haven’t been able to sleep for more than an hour! Bobby Caswell thought as he squirmed around, trying to find a comfortable position on the lumpy mattress in his cabin at the Secret Sanctuary Lodge and Motor Hotel just outside of Rutland.
I hope there are some new costumes in the Halloween parade tonight that I can adapt for use in my Wonder Weasel book! A junior at the Brookline College of Arts and Design in Boston, Massachusetts, Bobby was majoring in Illustration. His dream job was to work in the comic-book industry like his Uncle Al, who planned to introduce him around at HyperGraphics Comics during the Christmas break. Bobby hoped to have fully produced an issue of Wonder Weasel by that time to showcase his skills.
“Particularly some really hot chicks in tight, skimpy costumes, like Moon Miss!” he exclaimed aloud, with emphasis. Bobby had met Moon Miss while riding on a float in this same parade a couple of years ago. She had been a real looker in a scanty costume who seemed to really like him, at least while he was dressed as Golden Lad. From years of going to comic conventions with Uncle Al, I know just what fanboys like in their comics! And Gloria practically promised I’d find the inspiration I need here today.
Gloria was the proprietor of The Cosmic Shop, a comic-book and curio store located in the basement of the Beacon Street brownstone where she lived. More than a little eccentric, she occasionally had what her customers and friends called “prophelectic fits,” during which she acted as if possessed and spoke cryptic messages about the future. Strangely, those messages always seemed to come true, often in unexpected ways.
Finally giving up on sleep, Bobby sat up and pulled a sheath of brightly colored pages from the portfolio on the nightstand next to the bed. He began leafing through them, trying to decide which Wonder Weasel scene to write, draw, color, letter, and ink next when a brilliant streak flashed across the window and caught his attention.
Wow! That’s no falling star! he thought excitedly. It looks like it’s headed for Bald Mountain! Aloud, he said, “Hey, isn’t this where I came in? Can it really be happening again? It can’t be another spaceship from Offorrer and Dr. Bar-Ko; he said there was only one super-hero on the planet, and everyone else on his world died in the new ice age, anyway. But still — I have to go find out!”
In the summer of 1980, while Bobby, Uncle Al, and Aunt Sue vacationed in Rutland, he had gone off to investigate what he thought was a meteor landing on Bald Mountain. Instead, he discovered a spaceship from the planet Offorrer. Inside, he triggered a computerized recording left by Dr. Bar-Ko of the Energy Institute, and the computer bestowed upon him the awesome alien energy that allowed him to become the super-powered action-hero Thunderbunny. To call upon that power, all he had to do was picture the image of Thunderbunny, and he could will himself to transform.
Besides turning into a giant pink-furred humanoid bunny, which was ridiculous in itself, there was another drawback. To return to his normal form, he had to concentrate on his appearance, which sometimes led to panic when the transformations became more difficult than they should have been. (*)
[(*) Editor’s note: See “The Sound of Thunder,” Charlton Bullseye v2 #6 (March, 1982).]
Bobby had used that power only reluctantly over the following five years. After all, what teenage boy wanted to risk being stuck as a giant rabbit for the rest of his life? That was a real risk Bobby faced every time he called upon that power, especially after losing it during the Crisis on Infinite Earths in August of 1985, when Thunderbunny was killed, leaving Bobby alive but powerless. (*)
[(*) Editor’s note: See The Paragons: Deus Ex Astra, Book 1, Prologue: The Super-Wizard.]
He had missed that power every time he encountered a situation where Thunderbunny could have made a difference. After repeatedly failing to transform for the rest of that year, he had given up hope of ever becoming Thunderbunny again. Eventually, he was too caught up in schoolwork and his burgeoning social life as a college student to even attempt to transform any longer. Now, a little more than three years later, hope surged within him once more. It seemed impossible that history could repeat itself, but wasn’t the first time just as unlikely? Bobby threw on some clothes, rushed to his car, and quickly drove to the parking lot at the base of Bald Mountain. Then, he hurried up the familiar trail as fast as he could.
Just like the last time, he thought excitedly. Nobody else seems to have seen it.
What he didn’t see was another car pulling into the parking lot. An attractive young woman, barely twenty, got out, put on a pack, and pulled some equipment from the trunk. Then, she turned and started determinedly up the trail. Far ahead of her, she saw Bobby, and that increased her determination to follow as quickly as possible, even though she was carrying almost a third of her weight in video equipment. She used a handheld video camera with a pistol grip to capture his posterior far ahead of her, racing up the trail.
“Well, Toots, if anything exciting happens, and you can film it, that should help our grade!” she whispered to herself. “And if it’s just a false alarm, well, there’s always the parade tonight!” Tracy DeBaybe, a junior at Smythe College in nearby Amethyst, Massachusetts, majoring in Cinematography, was doing a field project for her Independent Film-Making elective course.
When the young woman caught sight of him again, Bobby was moving much more slowly. Then he came to a bend in the trail, and whatever he saw must have energized him, because suddenly he was running again. She hustled to the bend, looked around, and immediately opened her equipment bag. She hurriedly pulled out a big camera and tripod and set it up facing along the path, zoomed it in, and started filming. It would record on its own for half an hour. Then she picked up her handheld again and began cautiously approaching the scene she was now filming, being careful to stay out of the field of vision of her big camera.
Bobby moved cautiously across a large clearing, the same one where he had found Dr. Bar-Ko’s spaceship years ago. A long gouge cut diagonally through the clearing, evidence of something that had smashed into the mountainside at high speed. At the far end of the gouge, perhaps one hundred yards from the bend in the path, lay that something, half-buried in a giant mound of earth and rock.
“A spaceship!” Bobby exclaimed, almost awestruck. “It can’t be happening again… but it is!”
Well behind him, hidden in some brush, Tracy avidly recorded the scene. “Not much action so far,” she whispered into the microphone. “Looks like it will probably end up as a documentary rather than an action film.”
There were differences between this scene and the past, though — differences Bobby noticed. Dr. Bar-Ko’s ship had been under computer control and had landed safely, while this ship had crashed. The vessel from Offorrer had been sleek and sophisticated in design, but this one looked primitive. To Bobby, it resembled something straight out of a 1930s sci-fi movie serial — an elongated oval, bulky in front with wings on the almost pointed rear, and fixed-wheeled landing gear smashed against the bottom. What looked like automobile exhaust pipes underneath were also crushed flat. The hull, once smooth and shiny silver, was now dull gray, peeling, pitted, and covered with dents and dings, along with ugly tears likely caused during the recent crash landing. Flames engulfed the back half of the ship, but some kind of foam was spurting out of openings in the hull, quenching the fire.
Bobby slowed even further, feeling obscurely disappointed that this wasn’t another emissary from Offorrer. “Nothing could possibly have lived through that crash!” he muttered, both disappointed and relieved that he wasn’t facing the vanguard of another alien invasion. Just then, something impossible caught his eye — a creature of some sort was climbing out through one of the rips in the hull.
“Zoom in on that thing, Toots!” Tracy whispered to herself, pressing the zoom button on her expensive video camera. Suddenly, she felt as if she were facing the creature from only a few feet away. It was humanoid, but its body was more malleable than a human’s; it stretched and contorted to get through the rip in ways no human body could. Once it emerged, it stood on two feet and looked in her direction, nearly causing her to scream as she realized it must be an ogre.
The creature was humanoid, with two arms, two legs, and a head atop a massive frame. It stood almost eight feet tall, with shoulders nearly half as wide. Naked, it was covered in short, dense hair from the armpits to the ankles, and the revealed skin was a sickly greenish-white. Its angular face was demonic and horrific, resembling a bald Halloween witch mask with a cruelly bent beak nose and a wide oval mouth filled with pointed teeth. Long brows formed a deep, thick black V over deeply sunken eyes that glowed green. The ears were set far back, nearly at the rear curve of the skull, with tips several inches higher than the top of the skull, resembling the horns of a devil. The hairy waist obscured any gender-revealing details, and the long, muscular arms ended in blunt fingers with claws.
Tracy almost broke and ran, but the ogre was focused on Bobby, who was still about a hundred yards away. She squirmed deeper into the brush for concealment while keeping the camera aimed at the ogre.
Bobby stopped, horrified. That thing’s even bigger than Thunderbunny! he thought in awe. And of course, it’s another alien. Bobby had quite a bit of experience dealing with aliens as Thunderbunny, and except for Dr. Bar-Ko, who had actually been a recording, none of it had been good. I wish I’d been more cautious approaching, but who could have guessed that anything could have lived through that crash? Oh, crap! It sees me. It’s coming this way!
The monster moved in lurches and jerks, as if shaky from the crash, but with incredibly long legs, it still moved faster than a human. To Bobby’s shock, it spoke, and not only that but it spoke English — broken English, with a strange accent — in a voice like the rumble of an earthquake or a volcanic eruption. “Tell Ombo where Queen Margot is… before Ombo kills you!”
Bobby turned to run. Ombo leaped, crashing down in front of the terrified young man from almost one hundred yards away. Dirt erupted around his feet, smashing into Bobby, knocking him down and blinding him. Ombo staggered but recovered faster than Bobby, reaching out to grab him by the neck and easily lifting him in front of his face. Hot breath washed over Bobby’s face, burning like acid.
“Tell Ombo where is Queen! Now!” Ombo grabbed Bobby’s shoulder with his other arm, releasing his throat, and continued to dangle him a foot off the ground. “Talk! No…”
“Whack!” A stone struck the ogre square in the back. He was startled but not hurt; he dropped Bobby to the ground and spun around. Tracy stood tall at the bend of the path, fist-sized stones in each hand. “Leave him alone, you monster!!”
“Ombo is monster… girl is meat!” the ogre roared with what might have been a laugh, and he started lumbering forward. Tracy threw both her stones — one hit Ombo in the forehead, the other in the chest, and both bounced off with no effect other than a sound. Ombo laughed again. The girl screamed and ran, and Ombo lumbered off after her. He moved twice as fast as she did.
Bobby’s shoulder was in agony, and he was having trouble breathing. He realized that he might be dying, and that brave girl was going to die, too, just because she’d tried to help him.
“Please, just one more time,” he begged the universe, sobbing. “I have to help her!” He closed his eyes, picturing in his mind’s eye Thunderbunny standing proudly in front of him, watching him expectantly. Unfortunately, the image was quickly shrinking and growing hard to focus on. He dragged his good arm around to the one that wouldn’t move, screaming in agony, raised the good hand over the other, and let it drop, adding all his remaining strength, hopeless but praying.
There was a clapping sound, a clap of thunder that sounded like Fatoom! and the awesome figure of Thunderbunny leaped agilely to his feet where Bobby had been crumpled in agony.
Thunderbunny was a man-shaped rabbit with pink fur, over seven feet tall, wearing a red costume with a white cape, boots, and gloves. His face had the cute features of a hare, with big eyes, a button nose, and buck teeth under tall, flexible ears, but the cute features were twisted in fury. Somehow, despite his second death — despite everything that had happened during the Crisis — Thunderbunny was back. But there was no time to puzzle over the hows and the whys, for he was needed. (*)
[(*) Editor’s note: See The Paragons: Deus Ex Astra, Book 2, Epilogue: Gifts.]
“Ombo! Turn and face me!” he ordered in a voice like a foghorn. “Turn and face Thunderbunny!”