ISSUE 1- Enter the G
A/N- I guess I should start with how this all came about. In the Year of our Lord 2003, I attended Box Hill TAFE (Which is the Australian ecquivalent of college) I made a group of friends, Ken, Cathy, Joel, and Nikki. Now we started the designs of the G-Squad, With me and Ken at the helm. Which is basically, comic book characters based on ourselves. With Ken's permission, I'm temporarily putting up the first issue in novelized form to get some public introspection. We would like to get it published, but alas, we don't know anyone who can draw. Another note, if anyone reads this story and likes it, and can draw. We'd be most appreciative if you could send us some concept sketches, MORE CHAPTERS COMING, AND MORE CHARACTERS!
Chapter 1- Origin of the Ultra Ego.
All of the great legends and stories of our world start with an innocuous event, so too does ours. You would probably think me mad if I were to say that these events were true, but then, who is to judge? Believe it or not, I will recount this story as true as I can remember.
Ken Castle was just a young boy when the artist known as M.C Hammer was at the height of his popularity. Being an avid fan, his room was filled with memorabilia and posters, cheap and mass produced. Many a day he would jump around listening to Hammer Time playing as loud as the bulky cassette player would go.
It was in this time that the artist was touring Australia. As fate would have it, his tour passed through Adelaide, a concert was the talk of the quiet suburb in which Ken's family lived, as it was held just a few streets away.
Ken's pleas did not fall on deaf ears. His mother and father purchased premium tickets, the smile that showed on Ken's face when he was told had made his mothers and fathers year.
They had to admit though; they had a good time themselves. M.C Hammer certainly knew how to get an audience pumped. At the close Ken was absolutely hyperactive, and his father bent down and whispered into his ear.
"How would you like to meet him in person"
At this question, Ken's eyes lightened up.
"Oh! Can I dad? Can I really"
As fate would have it, Barry Castle had a few friends who were roadies on the show. It was no problem for him to talk to them and take young Ken back stage.
Holding tightly onto his father's hand, Ken was lead around the stage, where he talked to a tired looking man wearing all black. They shook hands and Barry kept on leading Ken through a few wooden doors until they came upon a near white room, with mirrors against one wall and THE M.C Hammer sitting on a couch, with a towel around his neck and a bottle of French mountain water in his hand.
He looked up at Barry, a little startled, with a questioning gaze.
"I think," said Barry, "that this is perhaps your most determined fan in all of Adelaide. I think you might be sick of your own songs if you lived at our house"
M.C Hammer, being a good showman and performer, never had too little time for his fans. So he laughed out loud.
"Ha, I don't know about that." He said in good humour. "I think I'm past that"
Both Barry and M.C Hammer laughed, the joke was beyond Ken.
But M.C Hammer stood up and walked up to Ken.
"What's your name man?" He asked.
Ken, being awed and a little shy, responded with a "K-ken"
M.C Hammer smiled, and felt more empathy with this kid than with any other fan. He walked to his wardrobe and opened a secret compartment at the back. He procured a metal box, like a little safe, with a keypad on the top. He typed in a four number code and the top popped open, from inside he withdrew a wooden box with metal bracing keeping it shut, kept closed by a large padlock. He stared at the box for a second, and glanced at Ken.
"Little man, can you keep a secret?" He asked.
Ken simply nodded, not really understanding what was going on. He looked up at his father who looked just as perplexed.
The performer took a gold chain from around his neck and used a fingernail to open up the golden dollar symbol. It was hollow except for a small key. He then took the key out and unlocked the padlock, allowing the metal bracings to fall to the ground.
He then walked to Ken and got on one knee, eye to eye with the child.
"I want you to take this, and look after it. If it wasn't for this, I'd be nothing. I've already got more than any man would want, so I don't need it. So never lose it. 'Cos it could be the best thing that ever happened with you."
Ken looked down at the wooden box, and dared not open it here. Being a child he was much more sensitive to these things. But there was something great inside that box.
That was the same year that M.C Hammer's career inexplicably disappeared.
He returned home that night. But was far too tired to open the box. And his father said, "Whatever he gave you, it's yours. I won't take it or look at it." Although when Ken was fast asleep he had snuck into the room making sure it wasn't anything he didn't want his son taking part in. After glancing in the box, he felt satisfied and never look for it again.
The next day when Ken returned from school, he had the box on his mind all day, but every time he approached, he had that same feeling of prominence, and slowly withdrew.
But that night, he had the box with him when he lay in the bed, and slowly opened it. The inside of the box was lined with purple velvet. Slotted into a slit in the centre was a gold block, perfectly polished, Ken's face was reflected in its yellow splendour. He slowly freed it from its container. It was a rectangle of gold, with strange lettering, maybe another language, on the top. And on the bottom were three circular loops.
It was a ring, not a regular ring, but a three-finger ring. Designed to sit on the three middle fingers on a hand. Ken clutched it in his hand and smiled quietly. He repeated this process every night after.
Many years passed since then. Every night he clutched the three-finger ring in his bed. Ken had become an adult. His body expanded, and he strolled around his high school in his twelfth year uniform that did little to hide his bulky shape. But it wasn't a bother for him. He was very confident, and as an in-joke between him and his friends, they called him the Ultra Ego. Because of his well endowed ego. It was a well-known fact around the people that knew him. He was so full of confidence that you just forget his physicality.
It was in this year it happened. He had never so much as suspected for instant. He had never given thought to where his personality came from, it just seemed a natural evolution from his childhood. But now he knew better.
It was a project, one of those silly "human development" classes that were becoming popular in schools lately. Class members were to do a speech on their greatest motivations in life. What the project really was about was your favourite celebrity and why.
Ken had not forgotten his child hood, and nor did he forget his child hood hero. As a testament, and a confidence boost to talk in front of the class, he brought the three-finger ring out of his room for the first time. Now in front of a group of bored students, he fingered it in his pocket.
"Hammer was a fucking pussy!" Called out Jay Guvarrez in the front row. And before Ken could stop, the ring was on his hand. He leapt forward and backhand slapped the imbecile in the forehead. It didn't seem like much of a whack, but it knocked him out of the chair and into the person sitting next to him.
There was a sudden gasp and silence. Jay was sitting on the ground; if he had opened his eyes he probably would've seen yellow birds circling his head. But there imprinted on his forehead was the meaning of the arcane lettering of the ring. Stamped into his skin were the words "ME BITCH"
Ken looked around at the class; they were all staring at him. He felt so powerful, he could take them all on, But why should he? They were all students, little kids. He simply strutted through them and walked out of the classroom. He felt so cool and powerful; he walked through the door, and then realized he didn't know where he was heading. Cool as a cucumber, he strolled down the corridor and into the bathroom, and saw a total stranger in the mirror.
There was some semblance to Ken, but his stomach had shrunk, and his chest had grown. His upper arms were thicker, and his legs were thinner. It was also his clothes. His school tie had disappeared, and the top two buttons were undone, showing a gold chain. He slowly took the ring off and deposited it back in his pocket. He looked back in the mirror and Ken had returned, so had the scrappy tie around his neck.
The door breezed open and for a second he felt a rush of fear that his teacher had come in. He was himself once more.
This phenomenon was kept as his own secret. After all, who would believe him let alone understand? The teacher had given him a suspension and tried to make him hand in what he thought were brass knuckles, but Ken had made the teacher believe he was so shaken by the ordeal that he threw them out. But this secret was not his own to keep after he was involved in a fire.