The MatchmanThe clouds lowered in over a world at sleep. At four o'clock in the morning, any city looks like a vertical cemetery. Some eyes keep watch while other eyes stay closed.
Across the river the piles of metal rusted in the poisoned swamps. Traffic on the major arteries was but a murmur that sang to the sky. Slate blue clouds obscured the orange light of the lamps glaring up from below, turning everything the color of baby aspirin.
Hundreds of feet below the surface of the earth in the secret bunker headquarters of the B.L.A.H. Corporation, Doctor Dejection and Discordia were making their plans for the coming day.
"It is of dubious value," said Dr. Dejection shortly. His agitated floating had punctuated their entire conversation.
"Says you," Discordia responded sweetly through an evil grin. Her golden skin reflected the dim illumination of the room onto the ceiling like water or a haze of heat. Behind her featureless eyes lay nothing save deserts of emotional catastrophe. She toyed with her apple as though it was something she meant to eat -- when the truth was that it had already eaten her, and to the core.
She lolled in her comfortable chair as she continued. "Rilly, Dr. D., the plan is foolproof. All's I need is, like, a couple of Anticupids on loan from yer stockpile and the deed is, like, done. You know Matchman can't resist me. I'm going to make him an offer he can't refuse and then, like, proceed to get biblical on his butt."
Dr. Dejection remained skeptical. "Discordia, our history of offensives against the VALentine Complex Team has been rather dismal of late. Failure upon failure -- many of them your own, I should hasten to add -- have brought our morale here to an all-time low. What makes you think that dropping a blue whale on Matchman will do the trick?"
Discordia's simper lit up the room; if it had been a sound, it would have had a resonant echo. "Doc," she said, "It's just about the only thing we haven't tried yet."
Scott Suffix was dreaming of an impossibly sweet and domesticated Discordia when his clock began talking to him. He sat up and groaned irritably with fatigue as it issued its instructions.
"Rise and shine, my boy," Sergeant Striker's voice said from the clock with evident glee. "It's only five in the morning. Plenty of time to get your beauty rest."
"It's easy for you to be chipper," said Scott as he climbed out of bed. "You haven't needed to sleep since the accident that turned you into a life-sized matchstick man."
"Yeah, but working the night desk still stinks on ice," replied the grizzled tones of the hoary combat veteran that was the organizational genius of VALentine Complex. "Well, to business. We've got a situation developing at the Museum of Natural History over on the West Side. Apparently there's been a break-in. We have reason to believe that your little sweetheart might be involved."
"If you mean Discordia, just say it," said Scott. "Look, I've told you a thousand times, Sergeant -- I am not in love with her. It would be unprofessional of me."
"The course of true love never did run smooth," chuckled the voice from the clock. "I been around a long time, Scott. I seen 'em come and go. I read it in you the first time I saw you two fighting."
"I'm headed for the Museum," said Scott abruptly. He energized his Matchman powers and assumed his super-hero appearance in a flash. "Matchman out," he said as he slapped off his clock and then leapt through the window.
The Museum of Natural History was a crawling web of shadows. Matchman stalked bravely through the corridors of pre-dawn shadow, searching for the golden gleam that would announce his adversary. As he approached the entrance to one of the largest exhibit galleries, her glow flared directly in front of him. Discordia was standing directly before the entrance, with her golden apple in her hand. She blazed forth with all of the raw energy of insincerity. He stopped, facing her.
"Discordia," he said, "Not again. When will you learn that it is futile to go against the path of justice and decency? People are put here to help each other, to bathe each other in mutual regard and esteem. Not to harm each other for their own selfish ends. Now put down that apple and come with me."
His speech wasn't going to work, and they both knew it. They had been through this discussion many times before, on a variety of occasions.
"Come on, Matchy," Discordia cooed. "You know that, like, I could no sooner voluntarily put down this golden apple of mine than you could put down yer, like, attitude. There are no right or wrong choices to make in life. There is only the choice between what is, like, boring and what is, you know, interesting. Order and peace are boring -- everyone knows that\! Discord is interesting. Discord brings conflict. Without conflict there's no story, without a story there's no narrative, without a narrative there's, like, no entertainment, and without entertainment the world would sink into, like, terminal boredom. Maybe you should reconsider exactly who the bad guy is here, y'know?"
"Surrender to me, Discordia\!" Matchman shouted as he lunged forward. But she had already turned and run, laughing, into the gloom of the exhibit hall behind her. Dutifully he followed her, intent on capturing her in the name of order.
"Like, O.K., hit it, kids\!" Discordia yelled as Matchman pursued her across the floor of the exhibit hall. High above, a flight of Anticupids recognized their signal and severed the chains that held the giant stuffed blue whale to the room's ceiling. Matchman barely had a chance to look upward before several tons of taxidermy were upon him with the speed of a freight train. The sound of the impact turned the entire Museum into a resonating drum.
Later, back in the B.L.A.H. headquarters bunker, Dr. Dejection asked her how it went. "Like, the whole thing belly-flopped," was all Discordia would say. The Anticupids fluttered around and tried to look ignorant about the whole affair.
Matchman arrived at VALentine Complex later that same morning. Sergeant Striker noticed his battered appearance as he walked past his desk. "How was your breakfast date?" he asked.
Matchman turned. "We had a whale of a good time," he said, and kept walking.