It was a nice, breezy day. Of course, when you're in the stony, bone-dry deserts of Antartica, where the cold numbs your soul, a 'breezy' day amounts to sickles of the Grim Reaper forged from the cold of Satan's throne in the lowest circle of Hell ripping through your body and causing your nuts to shrink to the size of cashews. If anyone could even manage to fight their way back to the coastline, they'd have had to have been masochistic enough to sail through the psychotic waves of the Southern Sea and plain batshit insane enough to want to sail out the way they got in. Oh, by the way, that sea surrounds Antartica on every. Motherfucking. Side.
Naturally, since Negative Man was effectively a cross between a mummy and a nuclear reactor, and filled with enough cynicism to sometimes make even Elasti-Girl throw her hands up and storm off on him, he had a decidedly serious case of Cannot Give A Fuck. He simply did not have the fucks to give. If he had one fuck to give, he would bestow it upon his true love instead of a wedding ring. Of course, then he wouldn't be able to give a fuck about her, and their marriage would be doomed. A week later, he'd be crashed on a friend's couch somewhere, bitching at them about how it was too hot if it was in Moosejaw and too cold if it was in Death Valley, just to piss them off and see if they'd throw him out. But, we're getting ahead of ourselves. Right now, he was stuck in Antartica with probably the two members of the Teen Titans he was absolutely least suited to supervising.
Right now, Kole was wearing just a heavy snowsuit and a scarf, periodically tugging the scarf down past the edge of her hood to blow out a puff of frigid vapors and giggle. Her cheeks were pinkening from the cold, but otherwise, she was doing just fine. Meanwhile, Gnaark was climbing up a rock formation to look over the area, grunting and hooting. Little did he know that Antartica was about the same every-damn-where. Ice, snow, penguin, rock, ice, snow, penguin, rock, ice, snow, penguin, ungodly abominations from beyond the stars thirsting to undo the tapestry of creation, rock, ice, snow, penguin. Well, Negative Man had read books about the last part, at least. He seemed to recall. What the fuck? It wasn't as if he'd be too torn up to see the Earth being chewed to bits by squirmy tentacle deities. Despite how mankind had done such a crackerjack job of taking care of their own planet, of course. Besides, Larry Trainor was just enough of a sick fuck that he wouldn't mind seeing a few girls at the tender mercies of wiggly jiggly tendrils in the last moments of existence.
And now Kole was tugging on Negative Man's arm. Good God, he couldn't even contemplate the naughty tentacle apocalypse without being pestered by stupid kids. Ah, well. "Yeah? What do you want?" He looked down at her. Kole looked hurt for a few moments, and to Negative Man's irritation, he could feel a twinge of regret in his chest. She just pointed over at Gnaark and walked away to sit atop a small, windsmoothed boulder. Great, Negative Man thought to himself. Now the only intelligible human on this continent hates me. And considering how the caveman's probably rogering her, it looks like even the unintelligible human is against me. "Isn't this all just fan-tucking-fastic," he muttered to himself. Walking over to stand below the stone formation Gnaark had climbed up, Negative Man tiredly raised his binoculars and peered into the far distance. Despite really having no reason to be, he felt incredibly drained.
Over the years, Negative Man knew he wasn't going to die normally, but could feel particular God-awful sensations of age. Specifically, he was getting tired easily, and for longer. It felt like he didn't have any purpose at all, sometimes. Especially when he hit a close call with using his powers and getting back to his body in time. He sometimes seriously hoped he wouldn't have to live too long - He knew that eventually his radiation would dissipate and he'd effectively die like a normal person. What bothered him was whether he'd even like it in Heaven. If anyone would be enough of a soulless prick to not feel the utmost joy at the Pearly Gates, it would be him. Plus, all of those moments staring at Raven's backside when her cape wasn't obscuring it were going to be certain to come up when God was reviewing Negative Man's life. That wouldn't reflect well on his admittance chances. And then there was the whole thing in college between him and Splash, the female heroine who could turn into water. You've never heard of Splash? Exactly. Negative Man still woke up some nights, screaming. She just Splashed too big, and the dirt was just too absorbant that day.
Regardless, he could finally see what Gnaark had spotted. A huge shape, apparently covered in a fur coat, lumbering towards the group. "You can't be serious. You have to be shitting me." He zoomed his binoculars in, further and further, until the image became clear. "Oh, fuck my life." He lowered his binoculars and shouted up at Gnaark, "You, Gnaark. Gnaark grab Kole. Kole turn into crystal. Gnaark beat up bad guys. Ugga ugga-beat up bad guys-ugga." Gnaark glared down at him. "Just do it, seriously. Each and every one of those guys are a few hundred pounds of Satan, and they're taking us on the express railway to A Major Asskicking." Already having leapt clear from his perch, Gnaark lumbered over to Kole, grunting and grumbling.
Negative Man turned to look back at the approaching enemy. Yep. There were still twenty-odd gorillas, armed to the razor-sharp teeth, charging across the windy wastelands towards them. Crap in a bucket this wasn't going to be pretty. Ducking behind the rock, Negative Man gestured to Gnaark - Already holding Kole as a club. Hand helt flat, Negative Man motioned for Gnaark to duck behind a boulder. Gnaark narrowed his eyes and snorted a couple of times, before complying. Listening carefully, Negative Man waited. He was going to have fun with this. And he knew the perfect thing to say to make it sweeter.
At last, the huge, gun-toting apes were close enough. "Titaaans, Gooo." Forcing down a snicker, Negative Man's duplicate shot out of his back, clear through the rock, and swept through the laser rifles of the enemy front lines. That took care of half of their guns, causing them to explode and detonate the bangoliers of charge-rounds, sending the leading ten toppling back into their comrades. Immediately, Gnaark descended upon them, beating them senseless with Kole's club form. In the meantime, Negative Man's duplicate swiftly flew by, grabbing rifles and crushing them into exploding until the last of the guns were obliderated.
Wasting no time, Negative Man's double reunited with his body, and he took a deep, quiet breath in that moment. Quickly getting to his feet, he loped out to survey the situation. Yes, those were some trashed gorillas. While Negative Man preferred not to work with any of the Titans than his adorkable former teammate Garfield, he had to give it to them: Some of these kids knew how to seriously wreck a villain's shit.
As Kole returned to normal, she took out her communicator. "We're near the designated location, and it's...0600," she said, pausing to read the time on her device. "The enemy knows we're here, but their first wave were easy to beat. Expect us to report in with more info shortly. Kole out." Turning the device off, she made a point of ignoring Negative Man.
From even his scant interactions with this girl, Negative Man knew she'd forgive him. How long that took, that was the question. Considering what a little goody-goody two-shoes she at least seemed to be from previous experience, he probably didn't have to worry.
Soon, they were moving forward again. Negative Man felt so, so tired. He really needed to get more sleep. Loathe as he was to admit it, Elasti-Girl was right - Even he needed sleep.
Just one too many mornings behind, I suppose, he mused to himself.
Forcing down a yawn, he managed to keep in the lead.