Project ROWDY 19 (Patreon)

Sunlight sheared through the skylights like it had somewhere to be, adding even more light to the already fluorescently bright mall that was the Towne Center. Everything was shining; tile, clothes, and smiles too. A huge mall in Virginia only about a hundred miles from the Pentagon, it was the kind of place people came when they had nothing to do but waste time and money.

Case in point…

Butch strutted out of the Hype Haus store like he’d mugged a mannequin. A green bomber jacket that was more giant than oversized swallowed up his frame, zippers clinking like loose change, and the collar popped like he thought it came with a license to kill. The Green Rowdyruff struck a pose dead in the walkway—one heel forward, arms wide like a wrestler.

“Tell me the B-Dog doesn’t look sick,” he said, dead serious.

Brick, leaned into a steel support pillar across from the storefront, barely flicked his eyes up from the crowd. New red snapback pulled low, hoodie half-zipped over a shirt he didn’t pick, he clicked his tonge as he gave Butch a once-over.

“The B-Dog?” He didn’t even have it in him to critize the jacket. He knew that way would be the path of a fight he didn’t feel like right now. Today was their required off-day. They got one a week and most of the time the Boys hadn’t bothered to do anything with it, Boomer reading comics or shadowing Donald, Butch hitting the training room or going to the prison area to make fun of the villains in lockup, or Brick doing his usual thing; which was either science, videogames, or research.

Boomer darted out behind them in a rush, surprisingly at human speed this time and without being reminded, his new neon blue sneakers screaming against the tile. Despite his restraint, his feet hit the ground weird when he was this excited, almost like he didn’t know how not to bounce and barely holding back his strength while doing so. Brick eaised an eyebrow slightly at the sight of a pair of blue headphones around his neck blasting what sounded like some kind of horrible indie pop music.

With them being elevated to the Global Defense Agency’s first responders while the GDA was putting together a new Guardians of the Globe, Cecil had given them their first official paychecks in the form of black cards with a vertical strip in each of their colors. Every month, the things would get a stipend of two-hundred thousand dollars… which Brick was pretty sure was enough for stuf… right?

“Tax-free,” Cecil had said, a smile on his face as if he was telling a joke. Not one that Brick understood. He was twelve, what did he know about taxes? Super-science was at least easier to get, why pay someone because you made money?

Brick pulled a face as Boomer neared him and the music hit his ears. AJR, Boomer? He barely held himself back from shaking his head at his little brother’s lack of taste. Really?

“Yo! Watch this!” He pretty much broke out into a tap-dance, if one could call it that, shoes lighting up like a rave with the LED’s inside them twinkling Boomer’s favorite color. “They blink! Like—every step! They blink! That’s crazy, right?”

Brick exhaled through his nose. “Those are for little kids.”

Boomer froze, mouth open. He blinked, then tilted his head. “I mean… we’re literally twelve?”

“Speak for yourself,” Butch cut in, puffing his chest out and dragging his hand down his nonexistent beard. “I’m emotionally seventeen.”

“You cried during that dog movie yesterday.”

“Shut up. That was artistic trauma.”

Brick raised both eyebrows this time. “Lemme guess, it had themes and such.”

Boomer snorted, nearly tripping over himself trying to moonwalk. It didn’t work on mall tile.

Butch grabbed the back of his collar and yanked him upright. “Tryna die in public?”

Boomer grinned. “Tryna dance, bro.”

Brick tuned most of it out. He’d already clocked seven people staring, two whispering. One mom tugged her kid a little tighter by the wrist when Boomer spun past her too fast. It wasn’t full recognition. Just that tickle behind the eyes. That almost.

One more month and the viral clips would start again. Then they’d have to start wearing wigs or whatever to avoid people coming up to them all day. Brick had seen what fame did to some of these heroes, like Fight Force or the Noble family. His brothers were already enough of a hassle, and he didn’t need them turning into child stars too.

He adjusted his cap. “Arcade. Now.”

Boomer blinked. “But we just got—”

Brick turned. “I said, Now.”

The command snapped through the noise like a thrown punch. Butch fell in line first, bomber flaring behind him. Boomer hustled to catch up, lights on his sneakers still blinking, too fast and too loud and too much.

Somewhere behind them, a little girl asked her mom if those were superheroes.

The mom didn’t answer.

Brick didn’t look back. “Besides, you guys like video games.”

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

The arcade reeked of spilled soda, melted plasticL, kid sweat; all of that and more mixed with the raw stench of low-grade chemical haze from claw machines and fried circuits, every machine in this place humming like it was about to explode. Flashing lights clawed at people’s eyes for attention, LED and strobe both, and somehow went ignored in the chaos of everything else. Speakers coughed 8-bit shrieks that tangled themselves up with distant screaming—some of it game-based, some of it not.

As much as he liked video games, Brick hated it. The place was too loud and too bright, and not in the good way like in a real messy fight. There was a thing as too many twitchy hands, open mouths, sweaty little mortals buzzing past and bumping into him without paying attention like they weren’t made of cotton candy.

He had no idea how the Girls had gotten through kindergarten without accidentally making their graduating class a bloodbath the first week in or something. Maybe adults are right, he thought, still frowning. Girls probably are more careful. In all fairness, the first thing the Boys did when they were born was beat up their dad, so it wasn’t impossible that was true.

Butch was already deep in some button-mashing bloodbath, thumbs moving fast enough to blur, game screen throwing up seizure-grade strobe as some digital gladiator got his skull caved in again. “Sixty-four hit combo, bitch,” Butch muttered, flexing like he was on stage. The teen next to him just stood there blinking like his brain had blue-screened.

“You can’t do that,” the guy stammered.

All Butch did was smirk back, all sharp teeth and twitchy confidence, with his tongue halfway out like it was a bunch of the time. “Then get gud.”

Boomer was… somewhere else. Of course. The blond Rowdyruff did like to go off on adventures.

It only too a fraction of a second but Brick clocked him across the floor, already neck-deep in a skee-ball apocalypse. Ticket ribbons trailed behind him like entrails. An arcade worker hovered nearby, trying to pretend like he wasn’t panicking.

“I just—kept rolling them right? That’s how it’s supposed to work, isn’t it?” Boomer asked, eyes too wide, fingers twitching. He pointed right at the worker like both he and the machine were in a conspiracy against him. “They gave me balls, I threw balls.” Blue eyes narrowed almost viciously for a split-second but it was enough to make the other man flinch anyway. “That’s the game.”

The clerk stared at the tower of perfect scores. “Yeah but… every shot?”

“’cus I got rhythm!” Boomer chirped, irritation and potential violence forgotten all of a sudden, which was just… classic Boomer. “And my depth perception’s crazy good. Wanna see? Toss me the rock and I’ll hit a mosquito at four hundred feet.”

“No… no basketballs,” Brick hissed to himself, none of his brothers focusing their hearing to pay attention.

Too little and definitely too late.

Butch had abandoned his console and was now swaggering over to the arcade hoops setup with a plan from the look on his face. One of those half-court deals with a rack of slightly-smaller basketballs perfect for kids and a ful lane. He picked up a ball, looked at it like it owed him money, and then crouched.

“Butch—” Brick shouted over the crowd.

“Gonna break the high score,” Butch shouted back, without looking over.

“Do not—”

He jumped. 

Not a kid-jump. Not a casual hop. 

A Butch jump. 

The kind that blew air from vents, rattled every token dispenser on the wall, and sent a teenager in a Pac-Man hoodie ducking like a bomb had gone off. He dunked with enough force to rattle the backboard out of its bracket. It cracked like thunder and, as Brick expected, the entire net assembly collapsed backward with a hollow clong, taking a chunk of the wall with it..

“Oops,” He was still mid-air when the word left Butch’s mouth, the Green Rowdyruff shrugging his shoulders at the same time, before he dropped to the ground in a classic superhero landing.

Brick closed his eyes. “You absolute—”

Someone screamed. Someone else clapped. A little girl shrieked in excitement. Three phones were already out.

Boomer wandered over, holding a fistful of tickets like a bouquet. “That backboard?” he asked, peering at the damage. “Yeah. That’s gonna be a write-off.”

A guy in khakis with a Playhouse Manager badge power-walked toward them. From the conflicted look on his face, he was half-angry and also half-praying Butch wouldn’t vaporize him on accident.

“Here’s what you’re gonna do,” Brick said, walking up and cutting the guy off before he could either make his way over to Butch or get a word in. Brick fished the GDA-issued business card out of his pocket, and handed it over like he had done this a hundred times before. “Just send the invoice to that address. And… sorry. My brother gets… competitive.”

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

“You see why you gotta listen to me?” he muttered, not looking at either of them. His voice barely broke out of the crowd noise.

Butch walked like a guy who thought rules were optional, and for guys like them, they usually were. Arms behind his head, brand-new ugly-looking bomber jacket creaking with every shift of muscle and step he made, the Green Rowdyruff walked like he was untouchable. “Eeeeeehh,” he said, stretching the word out like gum stuck to the bottom of his shoe, opening up his mouth in a lazy yawn at the same time. “We paid for the damage. What’s the big deal?”

“We?” Brick raised an eyebrow. “… Yeah, I’m gonna have Cecil take it outta your allowance.”

Butch stopped mid-stride, eyes going wide. “What? No. Bro, that’s not fair.”

Brick didn’t answer. That was the answer.

Boomer was already veering off, eyes snagging on a splash of color like a cat chasing a laser pointer. Or in this case, a neon sign.

Brick’s eyes rose higher, Boomer’s eagerness suddenly making sense. Comic book store, he nodded. Of course.

His red eyes dropped back down to see Boomer dart in like the floor was lava behind him.

“Whoa,” came the immediate gasp. “They got comics about actual heroes here.”

Brick followed slower with Butch behind him, already scanning the layout and floor plan. Floor-to-ceiling racks. Displays arranged with just enough chaos to feel deliberate. Almost for the first time since they landed, he saw a place with colors that looked as bright as what felt like home.

“Science Dog?” Butch held up a cover with a furry muscular terrier in a t-shirt punching a robot. “He’s got comics too? I thought he only had the show?”

The clerk—a mid-twenties guy in a worn hoodie, graphic tee, and that slightly nasal voice that tagged him as either a superfan or someone too underpaid to fake it—perked up. “Of course the greatest animal-human hybrid techno-detective is also in print and the screen. Seance Dog’s his brother if you want the spookier stuff.”

Butch blinked, like he wasn’t sure if he was being punked. “Yeah… I heard of the Seance Dog comics. Not my thing.”

Boomer was already sitting on the floor with a Seance Dog issue, laughing at something only he could see, his legs kicking as he read.

“Got any Guardians of the Globe?” Brick asked, eyes still tracking the shelves. “Any Unstoppable Omni-Man’s?”

The clerk squinted. “Nah, little man. All those sold right out after the news of the Guardians dying and the Omni-Mans all flew off the shelves right after his speech at the funeral.” He shook his head. “Collectors and scalpers are demons like that.”

Brick recalibrated. “Too bad.”

“If you don’t mind not getting any of the real-life heroes,” the clerk continued, still trying to make a sale. “You’d probably like Ironblood and Red Shift then. Team books. Or Cyber-Samurai Zero. Solo, real gritty.”

Butch flipped through a copy of Atomic Rex, cover art all claws and muscles and radiation. “Yo. This dude fights aliens with laser breath?”

“Atomic Rex is fire,” the clerk said. “Movie drops next summer.”

Boomer half-yelled from the floor. “He has a jetpack tail!”

Brick gathered a few issues carefully, prioritizing covers with clean layouts, low numbering, recurring names. He didn’t like messy continuity.

“You guys got good taste,” the clerk said, and now he was watching them, really watching them. The tone shifted. “First-timers?”

“We’re… new to the scene,” Brick said.

Boomer’s voice cut in too fast. “We’re the Rowdy—”

“Mojo brothers,” Brick said, over him, clean and flat.

“Huh…” the comic book guy nodded slowly. “I could have sworn I’d seen you before.”

Butch didn’t skip a beat. “People say we got one of those faces.”

The clerk frowned, like he almost had it.

“Just moved here, actually. We move a lot.” Brick said again, lighter now as he purposely dropped his shoulders. “Military brats, you know. Our dad’s up at the Pentagon.” Disarm. Deflect.

“Well hey, welcome to the neighborhood,” the clerk said, nodding toward the counter. “Take your pick of the store. For everything on the other side of the desk, first comic’s free.”

Brick nodded. “Thanks,” he said, a smile coming in a little more earnest than usual. “I… we appreciate it.”

Without anything of his own to add other than sheer twitchy impatience, Butch just tossed Atomic Rex #1 onto the counter like he was running late for something that wasn’t just loitering in the mall. “Ring me up, chief.”

—–

The mall food court buzzed like a nest as the boys settled in to enjoy themselves. Brick sat low in the corner booth, boxed in by noise, posture rigid, red hoodie sleeves rolled to the elbows like he’d have to move any second. Table loaded down with grease-stained bags and half-unwrapped burgers, slices of pizza half-slid from their boxes, fries scattered like shrapnel.

Butch tore into a slice with his mouth open, Atomic Rex propped against a milkshake cup. He talked with his face full. “Yo, this dude just bodied a tank. Like, punched it.”

“…You punched a tank a couple weeks ago, an alien tank.” Brick didn’t look up. The panel in his Red Shift comic glinted under overheads, but he hadn’t turned the page in a minute. “Hell, you did it when you were six, Butchy.”

“Yeah, but I didn’t pose on it after. Rex got style.”

Brick wasn’t sure how to respond to his brother’s selective memory when a large chunk of what they did as villains was posing menacingly, but he didn’t feel like wasting an hour on that.

Boomer, attempting to give himself another sugar high/brain freeze mega-combo, was halfway into his sixth blue slushie as he slurped down the mystery-flavored drink from a cup at least the size of his head like it owed him money. Coming up for air a second later, he said his peace. “Science Dog solved the whole mystery in, like, two pages. He’s smart like you, Brick. Except with a better name.”

Brick hummed, a barely audible sound, as he finally flipped the page.

“Ya think they got the Powerpuff comics here too?” Boomer cut in again, his usual out-of-nowhere questions coming fast and hard. “Y’know, cus they had them back home.”

Brick didn’t blink. As dumb as it may have sounded, it wasn’t out of the realm of possibility. From what Mojo had told him before, whether due to dimensional bleed or minor psychic abiities or even just the fact that the multiverse was infinite, it wasn’t unheard of for non-existent people or places to appear in “fiction” in a specific universe. “Not to my knowledge. Nothing came up.”

Butch, without looking up, mumbled, “Who cares. They were just dumb girls anyaway.” He shoved more fries into his mouth as if his brothers didn’t know exactly how cute he thought Buttercup was when she was angry.

Boomer looked down, the blond fidgeting with his straw. “It’s just that I had the dream again last night.”

Brick didn’t raise an eyebrow. I heard you, yeah.

“The one with Bubbles.”

Who else?

“Been a month of these dumb-ass dreams, man,” Butch grunted. “Let it go.” Then, fast, he turned to face Brick. “You still messing with that dimensional breach math crap?”

Brick’s thumb hovered over the comic page crease. “Still checking theories, same as I told Cecil.”

Boomer perked up quick, voice thin and too bright. “But we’re not leaving, right? I mean, not unless we wanna?”

Brick glanced up and met Boomer’s eyes before locking onto Butch’s next. “We vote. That hasn’t changed.”

And that was enough. For now.

Then the buzz changed—all three of their watches vibrating in sync with a soft triple beep. Without wasting a second, Brick tapped his.

Cecil’s voice crackled through, calm with a knife under it. “Boys, we’ve got seismic anomalies spiking north of Spotsylvania. Unknown entities. Radiating enough heat to light up three satellites.”

Butch was already grinning. “Hell yeah. Finally.”

“Local units are clearing civilians. You’ve got a green light. Full containment priority.”

“Send coordinates,” Brick said, already standing. His tray barely disturbed, only half-touched.

“Transmitting. They’re moving northeast. About fifty, fifty-five miles an hour.”

Brick nodded once. “We’ll be there in fifteen.”

Normally, when people said that, they meant minutes.

Fifteen seconds was a bit much, but there was no harm in giving themselves some leeway in case they got lost.

Their bags and trash abandoned, they moved like a switch flipped, Boomer still slurping his slushie, smiling again like nothing broke five minutes ago.

Brick was already calculating vectors. “Butch, forward assault. Boomer, low recon. I’ll direct from above.”

Boomer buzzed with leftover excitement as he tossed his empty slushie cup into a trashcan as they ran out towards the mall entrances. “What if they’re like the lava demons from Seance Dog number forty-seven? You think they melt buildings?”

Butch shoved past a couple of teenagers, a grin on his face. “Pfft. That arc was trash. Magma Mutants from Science Dog’s season two were way cooler.”

Brick had liked the aliens from Stellar Dog 3 more than both, but he wasn’t saying that. He just breathed out through his nose, a smirk clear on his face despite himself.

“Let’s find out.”

—–

A small chunk of Virginia’s countryside was cracked wide open, dirt and grass still smoldering around a massive hole. Rolling hills were torn apart like paper, an open wound in the ground a threat to anyone near. Heat shimmered off the fissure like the air itself was trying to crawl away from what had risen out of it.

Twelve of them, at least. Maybe more, probably more.

It was hard to count them through the steam and radiating heat distortion, whether from the ground or the air. Their bodies looked like cooling asphalt—black crust over blazing orange seams, like something pretending to be rock but failing at it. Every step left slag behind as rees wilted from the heat, while the grass didn’t even get the chance.

They weren’t fast, not moving much faster than cars as they ran at full tilt towards the nearest source of humans. But they weren’t stopping either.

Three sonic booms split the sky as Team Trinity slowed enough to be seen, just entering Spotsylvania airspace.

Brick maintained his usual dead-center slightly elevated position, Boomer to the left and below, and the greenest of them all flanking hard on the right, triangle formation holding despite the wind shear. “Ugh,” Butch let out a groan, “why’s it stink like someone took a fat dump in a volcano?

Boomer’s voice crackled over the comms, too loud in Brick’s ear: “Ohmygodohmygodohmygod, are those actually magma demons? Like from Seance Dog? Because I swear—”

“I don’t care if they’re demons or mutants. They’re hot,” Butch cut in, laughing. “That’s all I need.”

Brick zoomed in, his vision telling him all he needed to know as he spotted a town a hair under five miles out with nothing more than a few cops more used to demolishing donuts than defending the peace. A school bus on the main road was stuck behind evac traffic, too. Not fast enough.

A helicopter dipped into view, blades chopping at the heat. Brick didn’t need to look to know it was a news crew. He’d gotten used to their nosy butts over the last couple months. “Intercept. Now.”

They dropped like missiles.

Dust peeled off the ground as they landed—impact craters barely formed before the heat melted the edges. Brick’s boots sunk slightly into the scorched soil. He adjusted his gloves, eyes locked on the frontmost creature as it turned.

Nine feet tall, maybe a solid ten, with seams glowing like lava under pressure, the thing’s eyes were just pits, glowing pits of heat and rock.

“HEY ROCKFACE,” Butch shouted, he mocked from above, tongue out and eyes hungry for something to hit. “YOU LOST?”

The lead one rumbled forward. When it spoke, the air vibrated, deep and slow. “SURFACE FLESH. REMOVE YOURSELVES.”

Boomer squinted, eyes flicking wide. “Wait, they talk human? Why do they sound like broken Transformers?”

That wasn’t a question Brick could answer so he didn’t bother. Instead, he directed his words towards the magma monsters. “You’re moving toward civilians. This is your one and only warning.”

“We ARE THE CORE’S CHILDREN. THIS SURFACE—”

Butch slammed a fist into his other palm, a visible and audible shockwave erupting from the impact. “Yeah, yeah. Claim the earth, take our world, whatever. Heard it before. You glowing pieces of Play-Doh done monologuing yet?”

Brick’s eyes narrowed as he decided it was go time. “Trinity?”

“Yeah, big bro?/Yeah, big bro?”

“let’s smash some rocks.”