Submersion, Transformation | conversations at nighttime
Fighting villains and supervillains and arch-supervillains from ruling was draining at best, and mentally degenerating in most cases.
A man settles into the water, feeling the stream rise up from the surface and caress in his face. His chest, slipped from the constrains of his tight overcoat and shirt, rippled beneath the iridescent soap-bubbles. Everything hung limp. His eyes were half closed. But all along his hands clenched the sides of the the tub like iron clamps: tendons writhing, knuckles bulging, muscles taut and alert. He was proud. He was defiant. He was true.
Inside that dreamy steaminess, Hero thought about work. Fighting villains and supervillains and arch-supervillains from ruling was draining at best, and mentally degenerating in most cases. He knew of many strapping fellows with hearts full of righteousness who grew mad after their first contracts. The academy training couldn’t save them from the rules of the street. At this he drew a deep breath, and blew bubbles into the surface of the water. No, the streets are much wilder, much…clearer than anything else he’d experienced — almost as if that grey line separating darkness from light was finally lifted, so that all were flashes of opposite design, and there were no in-betweens. From gangsters to masterminds, brutes to weasels, they were undoubtably and utterly evil. Having said that, of course, Hero did not have to worry when he’d be forced to smash their heads in, or drop them from high places, or send them on one-way journeys to the Near-Earth Orbit.
But every once in a few nights, sitting in his bath, the saviour of the city would feel something vital snap in his chest. Not anything serious, mind you, for Hero knew just how well his regeneration abilities were. It was something that made him pull at his hair and double-latch the windows and avoid press coverage. Even the thought of it was almost unbearable. Hero closed his eyes, and plunged beneath the water.
Hero remembered what those villains had said to him, but he did not budge for slander. His fingers slipped away from the rims. Hero remembered what he said to the villains. Well, at least what he said before he got rid of them in one way or another. He allowed his fingers to slip away from the edges. In the comfort of that warm bubble, Hero felt all his broken bits jungle inside of him like that bag of empty cans he told himself that he’d get rid of eventually. He asked the water around him: what made a monster? The water, being water, said nothing. He asked again in a louder voice, but was nearly suffocated by the sudden influx of liquids. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, heroes weren’t waterproof.
What if? He argued. What if all along it was he who did the wrong? Hero thrashed uncomfortably at the thought. The water splashed in the tub: laughing at the sterotypical identity-crisis which so affected their ‘guest’. It was then when the warmth became unbearable, and the embrace of the water turned into a torrent of violence as he desperately rubbed at his hands to clean off the blood between his nails. He scrambled from the tub in a frenzy. He lay panting on the tiles of his mansion bathroom.
When Hero had gained enough sense to sit up again, he noticed the winkles on his fingers which reminded him of that mutant scientist he fought a few hours ago. Yes, he thought to himself: monsters are people who spent too much time underwater.
But the time for philosophy was over: he had superhero business to attend to. As the door clicked shut, the water gurgled in delight. The winkles were only the beginning, it seemed to say, the transformation is far from complete.
