A Labor of Moles: The Infinite Navel

Sunday, February 19, 2006

The Infinite Navel

When I was young

I had a recurring
dream I'd grow up to be Captain Infinitron and lead an assorted band of plucky guys named the Super Secret Society of Amazing Super Heroes. We'd have all the usual stuff like secret handshakes, decoder rings, cars with gadgets and all sorts of super powers like the ability to super-freeze or super-thaw, mind control, x-ray vision through an

y substance, except oddly enough toast, strength, stretchiness, climbing, diving, swimming, invisibility, and super etc., but most importantly the ability to fly, or at the very least hover like Hummingbird Man.

We'd each have a particular Achilles heel known only to the reader and every single one of our arch nemesis and of course we'd have secret identities masked only by sensible eyewear.
We'd work as ace reporters, milkmen, accountants, ditch diggers or idle playboys raised by butlers whose devotion borders on the creepy a

nd of course we'd have the obligatory cast of companions named Connie, Biff, and a dorky sidekick named Kenny, Jimmy or anything that ends in a "y" who serves as comic foil during our endless adventures.
First and foremost we'd fight octopuses of every stripe. Why? For whatever reason left unsaid octopuses indisputably want us dead. Flying octopuses, space octopuses, invisible octopuses, femme fatalle octopuses, and even mad scientist octopuses because everybody knows octopuses have it in for us in general and anything with

tentacles is bad, very bad.
Besides we can't let them steal our women. Even dancing around the whole idea of interspecies breeding the notion our Betty's and Jane's would be caught dead sucking face with an octopus voluntarily is entirely revolting.
Pretty much there isn't a billionth of a second that passes where some octopus isn't dreaming up yet

another malevolent scheme for Captain Infinitron to foil and he's the one who "gosh darn it-not again" drops everything to do it.
One thing we won't have is a girl join the Super Secret Society of Amazing Super Heroes and I'll tell you why.
It isn't because gals can't make a dandy super heroine either, no sir-ee Bob anytime you slip a super breasted gal in a gleaming gold bra and a sequined Speedo it's a good thing but it's the same reason you do

n't let them in your tree fort.
Pretty soon your super pals would be falling all over themselves to impress super gal and octopuses would pretty much have a field day while we suck in our super guts every time she walks by.
Or we'd spend all day super bragging about whose e

yes shoot a death ray furthest, or even worse one of us would marry her and spend the rest of his life complaining about her super nagging or not being able to go defeat Megatronic Octopus and the Venusian Slime Ray that night because "Sorry Super Guys it's my turn to change t

he diapers on Chrono-baby."
Oh sure, the rest of us would breathe a super sigh of relief and think hoo-boy he's super whipped but who needs that cluttering up our adventures?
We'd also battle bald evil scientists with gigantic foreheads who want to destroy, enslave, or mutate planet earth for no better reason than that's their day job.
We'

d also rescue buckets of damsels in distress from every terror imaginable because if there's one thing a woman does well its scream, faint and fall into the clutches of a mad genius over and over and over again.
I know what you're thinking. What about the other super guys?
Well they're pretty much B-list super guys as far as I'm concerned.
I mean come on, a guy who dresses as a bat with no actual powers?
Or a guy that swells to enormous size, turns green and spends the rest of the day swattin

g bullets shot at him by the army for no better reason than he's big and green?What about Superman?
Well it says plenty about your lack of self-confidence when you take a name like that.
I mean who wouldn't be conflicted being rejected b

y your parents and not being allowed to blow up on Jor-El like the rest of your classmates?
What was up with the miniature city he kept in a jar in his so called Fortress of Solitude?
Learn to lock the bathroom door like the rest of us if you want to be left alone.
Why the hell doesn't he take one damn minute out of his busy day to un-miniaturize them?
Instead they sit on his table like a complex aquarium.

What kind of life is that?
So here now a lost episode of Captain Infinitron and the Super Secret Society of Amazing Super Heroes as published in July of 1953 by Astounding & Incredible True Science Fiction of Tomorrow Magazine:

Captain Infinitron & the Octopoidians of Venus.
By Mysterian

Sgt. Brock Bluster runs his fingers over the console punching buttons as fast as he can but its no use.
The sleek patrol ship's retro-rockets are helpless against the pitiless effects of the gravi-ray pulling his ship inexorably towards the gaping maw of the enormous Octopoidian vessel.
As his ship slips into the cavernous black

opening he un-holsters his Z-ray blaster and picks up the microphone.
"Mayday-Mayday. This is Sgt. Brock Bluster of the Intergalactic Space League. I'm under attack from an Octopoidian vessel in quadrant nine."
A brittle burst of static is his only response.
"I repeat this is Sgt. Brock Bluster of the Intergalactic Space League..."
The clammy sibilant reptilian voice slithering ou

t of his radio chills him to the very marrow of his bones.
"Yesss Sssgt. Blussster you are in trouble. Our Octo-radio disssrupter hasss completely jammed your callsss for help. Sssurrender or meet your doom."
"Never you eight-tentacled..."
An explosion blasts open the hatch of the tiny compartment and grasping red tentacles spill towards Sgt. Bluster firing his Z-ray blaster.
Zat! Zat! Zat!

Menacing tentacles crackle, roil and sizzle like bacon on a hotplate to no avail.
Then darkness.
The whir-dlee-oop-whir-dlee-oop of the Dictaphone belt being rewound repeatedly broke the spell of the crackly broadcast.
"May

day...Bluster...lactic...
Oct...Quad...Nine."
"You're sure about this
transmission Radio Boy?"
"You bet Captain Infinitron, I was wearing the octo-filter helmet you got me in our last adventure, [see: Captain Infinitron and the Octo-Sirens of Death, A&ITSFTM #37-Jan '53], and even though its faint I think Sgt. Bluster is in terrific danger."
"I think you're onto something" with that

Captain Infinitron's chiseled finger punches the glowing red disc on the panel in front of him.
The high-pitched keening sound pulsing from atop the gleaming chrome and bronze skyscraper of the Super Secret Society of Amazing Super Heroes, located in busy downtown Centralopolis, can only be heard by a
select few who quickly drop
milk pa

ils, shovels,
pencils and tennis rackets
to answer the call.
"Men, we face the very real possibility the Octopoidians have created a spaceship so powerful the Intergalactic Space League's best ships are helpless against it." Captain Infinitron's gaze is returned with looks of grim resolve from the assembled Super Secret Amazing Super Heroes.

"Well I'll be a monkey's uncle on a hot tin roof."
"You said it Mixed Metaphor Man but if we don't find a way to stop them Earth's supply of Mono-Tri-Idium-4 from Pluto will dwindle and space travel will become a thing of the past."
"Not to mention the invasion that would surely follow!"
"

Thanks Obvious Boy. I think we should take the Space Guppy out for a spin and see what happens.
"You mean we should poke around for the Octopoidian Spaceship and then what?"
"Good question Totally Oblivious Man. We're going to find them and poke them in their giant eye."

The Space Guppy, a sleek metallic bullet, slices through the atmosphere into space hurtling towards danger unknown.
At the helm Ensign Insanely Jealous mutters and can barely keep his mind on the task at hand because Mr. Busybody asked him how he was getting alo

ng with his gal, Peggy Pureskin.
"What's eating you, Ensign Jealous?"
"Sorry Captain I just let Mr. Busybody get under my skin."
"Don't you mean you got a bee in your bonnet because Busybody's under your Pureskin, old chap?" Mixed Metaphor Man grins and slaps Ensign Jealous on the shoulder in an attempt to def

use the situation. Ensign Jealous shoots him a venomous look.
"Don't start anything, Mixed Metaphor Man. Ensign Jealous keep us headed in the right direction and save it for the bad guys. Oh and Mr. Busybody mind your own business til we get the

re."
"Easy for you to say" mumbles Mr. Busybody under
his breath.
"I heard that" rejoins The Ear.
"Mind your own beeswax lobe-boy" whispers Mr. Busybody who could bicker under his breath for hours with The Ear.
"Can it fella's" Captain Infinitron looks out the porthole as Earth quickly recedes into the black void of space. He absent-mindedly twists the gold ring around his finger, which holds a generous supply of Infinitron pills the source of his super-

duper powers.
Without those pills he's just meek and mild Herb Smedley, overworked, underpaid society gossip columnist for the Centralopolis Herald.
"Captain I think we might've found them" Mental Ma

n announces, appearing in a dazzling puff of purple, blue, red, and green smoke.
Captain Infinitron and the others waive the smoke away in a series of annoyed gestures.
"You're getting as bad as Gastro-Intestinal Guy with that smoke Mental." complains Mr. Busybody.
"Sorry old chums force of habit. But my kee

n powers of the mind developed by years of training with fakirs in Tibet and India..."
"Do you have a point?"
"Thanks, Obvious Boy" mutters Ensign Jealousy to no one in particular.
"I heard that" says the Ear.
"W

hy yes I do, there they are" Mental Man points out the porthole.
Sure enough the Space Guppy is hurtling towards a dark ominous leviathan.
The Space Guppy lurches once then twice as a gravi-ray locks onto it with bulldog tenacity.
"Butter my toast and pass the ammuni

tion."
"Well said Mixed Metaphor Man. Is there anyway to pull out of that ray Ensign?"
"I'm at full reverse Captain it doesn't seem to be doing any good."
"Might I suggest going forward instead of trying to pull back?" The disembodied voice of the Contr

arian floats through the intercom. "After all I would advance the odd notion were you to build a gravi-ray to ensnare space ships for whatever reason you would devote most of
your efforts towards overcoming resistance."
"By Jove Contrarian you might be onto somet

hing. Why you have to lurk in the cargo hold of the ship while we're up here is a mystery to me."
"Captain Infinitron If you're there then I must be here. It's my thing as it were."
"I see your point" Captain Infinitron grumbles though secretly delighted at the Contrarian's solution to the puzzle of doom. "Ensign fire all thrusters lets see what those Octo

poidians do with a mouthful of full speed ahead."
"Aye-Aye, Captain." Ensign Jealousy pushes the control stick forward.
The Space Guppy leaps forward at terrific speed like a greyhound bolting towards the
finish line.
The needle on the speedometer buries itself past the highest number: mach infin

ity!
The Octopoidians never know what hit them. The combined force of the gravi-ray and the thrusters slingshoot the Space Guppy into the slowly opening mouth of the sinister leviathan and through the rest of the ship in the blink of an eye.
The

Space Guppy blasts out of the tail of giant ship as it explodes in a flaming burst of metal, glass and bits of hissing Octopoids.
"Goodness we went through them like a hot knife to the solar plexus."
"Right again Mixed Metaphor Man, looks like job

well done guys" Captain Infinitron pauses and reflects somberly "we didn't save Sgt. Bluster but we sure as heck saved Earth."
"I wouldn't say that Captain" the Amazing Telep

ort-O shimmers into view holding an unconscious, battered yet still breathing Sgt. Bluster "thought I might sightsee a bit of the ship before you chaps finished your high speed soiree."
Captain Infinitron and the Super Secret Society of Amazing Super Heroes join in a hearty chuckle.
Stay tuned to these pages for the further adventures of Captain Infinitron and the Super Secret Society of Amazing Super Heroes in the next spinetingling installment of:
Captain Infinitron & the Octopoidians of Venus.

// posted by Mysterian @ 5:23 AM