Superdown

"We interrupt our program to bring you the following news: Another bank robbery was thwarted just a few minutes ago at Charlton East Bank in Metroplace City, by our very own resident superhero, Captain Crash. Besides the fact that the robbers held hostages at gunpoint, double C once again managed to save the day, without any casualties. The bank robbers to be, have been hand-delivered to the police by Captain Crash himself, who once again proved to be a shining beac..."

Howard Nettlebaum scoffed, as he switched off the radio and pressed down on the gas pedal of his beat-up AMC Gremlin. If it wasn't for that whole mess in the first place, we wouldn't have been late for work. Cursing under his breath, he managed to run a light, and finally park his car in the first available spot he could find. He took a quick glance at the golden statue of Captain Crash that stood across the street from his office building, and looked away as if offended by its presence.

He entered the office 20 minutes late, and holding his briefcase under his armpit, he quietly slipped into his cubicle unnoticed, taking advantage of the fact that everyone was concentrating on the small TV screen, where the news bulletin about Captain Crash's latest achievement was displayed.

His co-workers broke into an explosion of cheers and applauding as if they were vicariously living through Captain Crash; as if any one of these stupid idiots had raised as much as a finger to help. No, that cocky, toothy-grinned do-gooder had stopped that bank robbery all by himself, and yet every single person in this cesspool of a city, Howard had noticed, felt entitled to bask in Captain Crash's glory, as if it were their own.

Captain Crash, Metroplace City's own "Champion of the world" burst into the scene about 5 years ago, when the Super-Villain Dr. Deathbringer used his Exonic Magna-ray to hurl an asteroid the size of Texas towards Earth. The devastation would have been complete. All life on Earth would cease to exist, and Dr. Deathbringer, from his secret hideout in the moon, would remake humanity in his image. Literally. He had his clone machine already warming up.

Scientists from all over the world were trying to find a solution to the predicament in the very little time they had, but nothing seemed to work. So when the great ball of flaming metal appeared ripping through the sky, hurling itself towards Metroplace City at ridiculous speeds, the world braced itself for extinction.

But through the despair of imminent annihilation, a glimmer of hope rose, as a blurry object was spotted flying up towards the incarnation of Armageddon which was the asteroid.

Witnesses at first, thought that it was some kind of rocket, in a last-ditch effort to blow up the star-rock of doom, but there was no explosion, no impact of any kind. Instead, the asteroid seemed to be slowing down, and eventually, it reversed its course, heading back to the vast space from whence it came.

The general confusion that followed, was mixed with sighs of relief, that humanity would live to see another day. Answers came shortly after, when Dr. Deathbringer, yanked from his lunar hideout, was delivered to the authorities, by the blond hero who had just saved mankind. During the interviews with the witnesses who had seen his heroic deed as it happened, someone colorfully described the hero as "a captain steering the meteor away before it could crash into the city and kill everybody". The media then dubbed him "Captain Crash", and the moniker stuck.

ACME Industries, a scientific organization that mostly catered to the armed forces, created a special suit to replace his homemade one, bearing the insignia of a flaming rock (which Howard always thought looked more like the sun than a flaming asteroid) to commemorate his first recorded heroic action.

Since then, he had saved not only the city but the entire world on countless occasions. He had become a rock-star among the citizens of the world, and especially the ones of his hometown of Metroplace City. Merchandise bearing his image never got old, comic books about his adventures were abundant, films, songs, documentaries, you name it. Captain Crash was the shit.