The Wedding

It was actually a very nice wedding. Very classy. And everyone was on their best behavior. Judy totally cried.

I didn't. Captain Visigoth is a liar.

Awkwardness aside, it was kinda cool seeing all my exes. I'd sorta been out of contact the past few years with most of them. They're doing pretty good. Judy seemed a little intimidated, especially by Lock and Load. Or as she's muttering to herself, "The Improbably Busty Twins". She doesn't have anything to worry about, though. Dating those two was one of those things that only seemed like a good idea when I was heavily intoxicated. For one thing, those cybernetics never come off. Not even the guns. Honestly, same with Dionaea, though, obiovusly, for different reasons. Never date someone who is half plant. Trust me on this.

None of my family showed up, thank god.

And did anyone know that Jack Knife came out of the closet? I totally didn't until he showed up to the wedding with a dude. Good for him. Though apparently Lord Grim fired him as a henchman when he found out. Good riddance, if you ask me. Lord Grim is such a tool.

To continue bizarre trends, Mechanor gave me a blueberry pie. Dude makes a seriously excellent pie.

After the wedding, however, the party got a little wild. And by that I mean the American Steel Memorial Pier was demolished. Quizzer was smart enough not to show up--there's not much he could have done, what with a solid dozen fairly powerful supervillains in the area, not to even mention Dina Might's family.

All in all, it went a lot better than I'd expected it would have. Alright! Time for me to get some villainy started!

Urgh

I have gotten so many emails from angsty teens ever since I mentioned Hatchet was my sister.

I'm not sure when my sister became some sort of goth/emo icon. But if you met her in real life, she would not talk to you about the "beauty of death" or the "agony of life". She would just kill you. Seriously. 'Serial killer' doesn't even really cover it, because a serial killer usually has more of a motive than "I have a pointy object. I should totally kill someone with it. That would rule."

And for the last time, she is NOT the Angel of Death. She just ate him and gained his powers. So she's more like a nephilim.

No more emails about Eliza! Seriously guys. My inbox, she can't take it.

Wedding Preparation

Just got back from the rehearsal dinner. "La Bien Vida" is, technically, still standing. But only technically.

On Thursday afternoon, I got a knock on the surface elevator door. When I answered, there was a scrawny young woman with dirty blonde hair, torn blue jeans and a tank top. Her greeting was to punch me in the chest. To give you some idea how strong Dina Might is, I had to patch an exterior wall in my lair. And I still have a bruise.

She didn't mean any malice by this. In fact, after she dragged in a suitcase and watched me weld a plate into the wall, she commented on my ability to take a hit. I asked her not to punch my girlfriend, and she clapped me on the shoulder and laughed loudly.

Anyway, CV showed up a little while after with an armful of suitcases and bags. Most of them looked to be Dina's.

I'm gonna point out that Dina Might is significantly stronger than CV. See anything wrong with this picture?

I was also confused by why they were here rather than a hotel. Or, more accurately, I was suspicious as to why they were here rather than a motel. My suspicions were answered when CV said, "Thanks for letting us stay here over the weekend Big C."

I wanted to say, "Oh Hell No." But frankly, I was worried I wouldn't have a base left if Dina found out Visigoth hadn't cleared it with me and there was a domestic squabble.

After their stuff was settled, I introduced them to Judy. It went about as well as expected.

CV: Daaaamn Big C, she's got a nice....
Dina: *punches CV in the kindeys.*
CV: *doubles over in pain*
Dina: *extends hand* Hi hon, I'm Dina.
Judy: *power armored-knee to CV's face* I'm Judy. Nice arm.

I had my misgivings about CV getting married, but I think Dina might actually be able to keep him in line.

It hasn't all been fun times of seriously injuring Cappy, though. Apparently he couldn't think of anyone to invite to his side so he invited, like, all of my supervillainous ex girlfriends (Fallout, Dionaea, both Lock and Load, and Icicle). And my brother and sister. And Jack Knife and Mechanor, who I don't really have a problem with, but they round out the list.

Of course, I punched him for inviting my exes. And then I told Judy. And then she punched him, with her June Bug armor on.

Judy's excited about meeting my family. They probably won't show, though. I've gotten confirmation Eliza's alive, but she's locked up in St. Toluca's. And C. J. 's probably in some backwater third world country, either getting stoned out of his gourd or razing it to the ground. Or both. If he isn't dead.

The wedding's tomorrow. I'm pretty sure it's not going to go well. But at least I'll probably get to see CV get beaten to a pulp some more. That ought to be fun.

What Happened With Nuke, Anyway?

Quizzer fought Nuke. The first time, Nuke kinda kicked his ass and nearly destroyed downtown in the process.

The second time, Quizzer broke Nuke's containment suit and tossed him into the lake. And a being made of fire that has been flooded is not a happy one.

After Nuke pulled himself together, he and Quizzer fought a third time. Only this time, he used me as bait.

I'm not entirely sure how he got me to agree to this. I so regret giving him my cell phone number. Anyway, Nuke went straight for me and threw large amounts of atomic flame at me, screaming something about the "spawn of evil". It was like being Godzilla's breath mint while Godzilla's also eating a street preacher.

Of course, all that really did was make my eyes glow brighter and my limbs a little stiff. While he was distracted, Quizzer and the Brannigan folks trapped him in an energy-based containment cell, which was then shipped off to St. Toluca's Home for the Criminally Insane and Superpowered, cursing us all the the while and promising revenge.

So, that'll be fun. I so don't have time to worry about that, though.

Because it became August Ninth without me noticing. Captain Visigoth is sleeping on my couch with Dina Might on his oversized chest. The wedding is Sunday evening.

More on that when I stop tearing my hair out from stress.

My Family

All that's happened has got me thinking about my family.

This is never a good thing.

My mother killed herself at the height of American Steel's career. My sister is a serial killer. My brother is a junkie merc. I don't know if either of them is alive right now.

Yeah. American Steel, Protector of the American Family, couldn't keep his own from going to hell. What a shock.

Now you see why I left my father to die in a pit in the bowels of the earth while I gave his murderer a proper burial? He did everything he could for every other person on the planet with his "mission", but he ignored us. Mom just couldn't take it.

Way to go Dad. Your eldest is Doctor Cataclysm, and your baby twins are superpowered psycho Hatchet and equally unstable Overdose.

This is why I don't want Judy to meet my family. Can you blame me?

Yeah, I know. I'm one to talk about people having "Daddy issues". Sorry Fallout.

Story Time

Okay, I've been getting questions about Nuke, here and on my email account, so I guess it's time for a little story. I'm hesitant to tell it, since it's as much about my father's origins as it is my mentor's and Nuke's, but here goes.

Once upon a time, there was a scientist named Jonah Stevens. He worked in Arkady Industries' experimental lab in Vineyard, Illinois in the 70's and early 80's. His specialty was nuclear reactors, and he was instrumental in the synthesis an experimental isotope originally found in a crashed meteorite that produced much stronger fission energy than comparable amounts of the same material.

Now, in the same laboratory, a wretched little man named Doctor Niles Benton was beginning a process that would irradiate ceramic-coated steel in a way that would make it nearly unbreakable. Unbeknownst to his colleagues, Doctor Benton had stolen this technique from a former mentor and friend, whose face and body he had scarred heavily in an attempt to kill his mentor and take this procedure for his own. That friend was Doctor Calvin Lisme.

Doctor Lisme, once he had recovered from the botched assassination attempt, covered his face and body in duranium, the new steel, armor, and determined to ruin his former protege in revenge. First, he released data to the patent office and every major industrial company in America about duranium, effectively making it open source and ruining Benton's attempt to get rich off it himself. Then, Doctor Lisme, now calling himself "Doctor Cataclysm", locked Benton in the Arkady lab late at night, locked the area down, and set the experimental new reactor to overload, thus killing Benton and erasing any evidence he had ever invented Duranium.

However, two people were also trapped in the lab. One was Doctor Stevens. The other, Conner Ferrian. Conner was a security guard at the time, trying to support his teenaged delinquent son and younger twins. That teenaged delinquint, by the way, was me. Conner had seen Doctor Cataclysm in the duranium infusion room and had investigated, only to be locked in and the creation cycle put on automatic.

Doctor Stevens had been knocked unconcious by my predecessor at ground zero, the reactor chamber. He woke up with just enough time to selflessly seal himself into the reactor, in an attempt to also seal the inevitable explosion in with him. When he told the story, Nuke claimed his last thoughts were of his wife and his infant daughter.

When the fallout cleared and the duranium infusion cycle were finished, instead of two corpses, two super-humans were born.

By some twisted miracle, either of genetics or shear force of will, Conner Ferrian survived the infusion process--only he had become a man made of duranium. Super strong and nearly invulnerable, he praised Jesus (I'm so not kidding) for this second chance to do something with his life, and decided to become super-hero American Steel. Only two other people have survived this process, and I didn't even have the whole enchilada done on me. That other one's Red Steel, his Russian counterpart.

Jonah was far less lucky.

To say Jonah Stevens survived the explosion would be a stretch. You see, Jonah was a latent psychic, around 5.0, ten times the normal person. When faced with his mortality, Jonah focused his mind inward, even as radioactive fire burned away his flesh and bones and meat. In that split second after the bottled radioactive explosion faded, Dr. Stevens was no longer a man. "He" was a man-shaped pillar of radioactive fire, held together only by shear force of will.

Stevens tried to return home, but his family did not recognize him. They feared him, and in the frustration of his furiously strained mind, he detonated in a tiny atomic blast. His wife died instantly, but his daughter survived. She's the supervillain Fallout, by the way. She and I dated briefly. It didn't work out. She has hella daddy issues.

Anyway, American Steel's first act as a superhero was to stop the rampaging Stevens from burning Arkady to the ground. Then the newly christened Nuke built himself a containment suit and started his career of revenge and insanity. He was a regular villain for Steel after that, though he also tangled with Miss Atom and the Mississippi Grizzly regularly, the first due to overlapping themes and the second due to location. He was even in the Corrosive Company, that anti-Steel league that the Doc put together. This lasted until American Steel told Nuke that the first Doc was responsible for the explosion that had ended Nuke's life.

The fight after that was supposed death #5 for the Doc, as the CC's headquarters was nuked by Nuke at the climax. God bless emergency bomb shelters.

And here I am. Steel's son and the Doc's protege. More on what happened last week later.

EMP

Sorry about no update. Nuke set off an EMP during his fight with Quizzer last week and knocked out half the city, including my internet.

More later, I have to work the kinks out of a few more things before I have luxury to post. I hate EMPs.