Meteor Soldiers - Episode Zero

Somewhere in a wide alleyway, where corrugated warehouse walls reflected light from the midnight moon, obscured history was being made. Echoes of clashing weapons saturated the air as the Green Pirate fought for his life. He was now familiar with this strain. And hatred. And fear. Regardless, he kept his ground against the monster, well aware that every stroke of his pirate sabre helped direct the flow of Earth’s fate.

         His current opponent - the being which threatened to erase his life - owned a bent mouth full of flesh-shredding teeth, like two rows of ivory icicles. Its beady black eyes portrayed only enough intelligence to know how to kill, and possibly enough to know how to enjoy it. Though without a nose, two wide nostrils centred its face of boiled skin, and atop its bald head sat a wreath of colourful flowers. The deformed head of the Half-Arsed Hippy - as it was named - was connected to a body that widened as it descended, ending in one large bulbous cheek of flesh. Two chubby legs extended from its naked frontal buttock, and each of the beast’s hands clasped a sawn-off sunflower. Though these two plants looked harmless, Green Pirate knew the sharp-edged petals could cut steel, as was the source of his dread.

         “Braaagh!” screeched the monster into his face as sword clashed with flower. “I’ll destroy you! I’ll also protest animal cruelty to the bitter end while ignoring basic human suffering!”

         Green Pirate ground his teeth as he evaded the enemy’s blows. If this was meant to be satire, it came with all the subtlety of being slapped in the face with a wet fish; a wet fish that Half-Arsed Hippy would’ve eaten, since eating fish somehow didn’t discredit his zealous vegetarianism. Before the fiend could gain dominance over the pirate, a figure sprung from behind them. The hippy turned just in time to block Maroon Viking’s battleaxe.

         Finally, reinforcements, thought Green Pirate as he watched on.

         Though weighty, Maroon Viking didn’t have the stamina of his comrades, and Green Pirate saw that he was already struggling. The head of his axe was scissored between the monster’s two flowers, and his chubby knees were already buckling from the tree-hugger’s might.

         “Gaaahahahaaaa! Prepare to die, human! I’ll continue to criticise people’s ethics without physically achieving anything until the end of time!”

         Not if I can help it... Green Pirate charged the hippy from behind. Just before Maroon Viking fell to his doom, Pirate swiped his sabre horizontally into his foe’s neck. The monster’s disconnected head was launched skywards by a geyser of green gunk spewing from its neck-stump. Before the head could even land, the body crumpled into a heap. The Half-Arsed Hippy was no more.

         “Yeeeeeah!” roared the Viking, leaning over the corpse and making theatrical gangsta rap hand gestures. “You got Decapitat’d! Munch on our collective arse fart, hombre!”

         “Glad you showed up when you did,” said Green Pirate through his mask.

         “If anything, you saved me,” said the Viking. “Nice kill, Green.”

         “Thanks Red.”

         “It’s Maroon,” the man stressed. “There’s a difference. And if lipstick manufacturers are anything to go by, it’s a difference worth paying sixty dollars for.”

         “Uhhh, sure...” said Green. “So how are the others going?”

         “I’m sure they’re alright. Yellow and Purple are ganging up on that other monster, Madam Quief. I’m pretty sure Blue is handling The Trendy Tool.”

         “You mean that giant, sentient screwdriver with Crocs and an emo fringe that makes Twitter updates via iPhone?”

         “The very same,” replied Maroon.

         A buzz sounded from Green’s wrist gadget, prompting an examination. The small LED screen read ORDER 17-34 - ITERATION 680. While Green knew that this was just sci-fi jargon to make his mission look more imposingly complicated that it actually was, the upper case writing of ‘ORDER’ and ‘ITERATION’ looked scary. Also, the message was blinking, meaning shit was going down.

         “We’re needed back at base,” he said.

         “They’d better let me sleep,” said Maroon. “I only got fourteen hours last night.” At that, the two headed for the mouth of the alley.

         It was inconceivable that only a few months ago, Green Pirate thought the world was safe. Back then, his biggest concern was that continued use of the word “chillax” would drive someone to blow up a bus full of children. Since that time, he and his team had been forced to battle one preposterous villain after another, with names such as Sirius Sharthard, Pseudocidal Blogwhinger, and Stoeger Gibbs: The Man Who Has A Gun Where His Face Should Be. Each new monster threatened to wipe out the planet’s very thin line of defence. Civilisation was being punched at, and Green Pirate was taking the full brunt.

         Though part of him longed to return to his pleasant abyss of boner jokes and worthless flame war victories, this war had mutated him; first into a victim, then into a victimised warrior. His story, as an acoustic guitar-playing douchebag would say, went a little something like this...