Vaudevillain

Dr. Zlo swung around on his rocket shoes and attempted to bean the hero with his cane. Matt-att blocked the strike, absorbing all the energy in the blow. The streamer swiped with his right hand to try and catch Dr. Zlo but missed by millimeters. The villain twisted around and fired his monocle, but Matt-att had already brought his hand over to block the blow.

"Stop defending!" yelled Dr. Zlo.

"What's wrong? Can't take what I'm dishing out?" Matt emphasized the taunt by disintegrating more of the doorframe.

Dr. Zlo stopped his momentum, swinging his boots to bring him into an upright hover. Periodically, the villain would have to deactivate the rocket boots to keep from flying away. As he bobbed in the air, Dr. Zlo stopped to think. It was obvious this hero was goading him. The hero wanted him to enter melee range so that strange hand could disintegrate him.

The villain scoffed. As if he would fall into such an obvious trap. No, Dr. Zlo was a criminal mastermind, and while he might fail because he made overcomplicated schemes, a simple ruse like this wouldn't catch him off guard. He switched over to the smokescreen in his cane. It was time to give this hero an explosive surprise.

The villain dropped to the ground, "I see your plan, you amateur. You want to lure me into your range, breaking my stuff if I don't comply."

Matt-att smirked, "It's working, isn't it?" He crushed a bit more of the wood in the door.

"I'll admit, a simple plan can work. But there's no class, no pizazz. Where's the twist? No, this plan is much too mundane."

"I've learned the simple things work on trolls like you," Matt-att said. "None of you are very bright after all."

The streamer had expected to see Dr. Zlo fly off the handle. In his experience, trolls lost composure when their plan didn't work out. But Dr. Zlo did nothing of the sort. Instead, the villain sighed.

"Oh, to be called a troll!" Dr. Zlo placed a hand on his chest in pain. "My magnificent plans, all detailed and highly sophisticated, and you call them the work of a troll."

Dr. Zlo pointed his cane, "How dare you, sir! I am a villain of class!" With that exclamation, the villain fired his smokescreen.

Matt-att reacted by bringing his hand up. Smoke connected with the shield, stopping as it connected. But that didn't stop the rest of the smoke from encircling the hero. Under the cover of smoke, Dr. Zlo unpinned two of his button grenades and tossed them in front, activating his rocket shoes to escape the blast.

But Matt-att hadn't gained as many followers as he had by being bad at gaming. Once the streamer realized it was a smokescreen, he backed up into the mansion with his shield up and ready. That would ensure he created a chokepoint between him and the door, preventing Dr. Zlo from surprising him. Still, he didn't expect the two explosions that rocked the front of the mansion, shattering the windows and splintering the front porch.

"What the f*ck!" Screamed the streamer. The force of the explosion stopped dead in front of him, but the small blast of heat following took out a bit of health.

"Did you just f*cking destroy your own base!" Matt-att yelled.

"And you're still alive! Stop doing that. It's very annoying!"

"Alright, fine! Let's play hardball." Matt-att crouched down, keeping his left hand up in the direction of the doorway. He slammed his other hand down onto the mansion wall. "If you don't come in here, I'm destroying your entire mansion!"

"You're bluffing!"

"Oh, big mistake, f*cker." Matt-att activated his power, expending as much energy as he could. His ability triggered, breaking the wood down into sawdust. The effect traveled alongside the house, connecting with the floor and ceiling. The furniture inside the rooms above fell, and the ground dissolved under Matt's feet. He deactivated his power and jumped away, but he knew this amount of destruction would cause the villain to react.

The streamer's eyes caught a glimpse of the stairs leading downward. With an evil grin unbefitting of a hero, Matt rushed down. He could find a safe corner and bring the whole house down before the villain could reach him. He rushed down, "Better come fight me! Or I'll take out the rest of your base!" A small white mouse scurried by, unnoticed.

Dr. Zlo watched the destruction as he bobbed in the air, "Unacceptable!"

With those words, the villain flew. He didn't rush into the mansion but made his way back to the mothership's tractor beam. Once under, Dr. Zlo activated his communicator, "Someone bring me in!"

The tractor beam activated, pulling him back inside. Riptide's voice crackled over the communicator, "Dude, he's wrecking our sh*t!"

"And we shall wreck him in turn! Bring the mothership in close and aim the lasers!"

"But all the factories," Sweet Dream said.

"I shall destroy them before the hero gets his hands on them. If only I had thought to build a self-destruct device inside of them! I shall endeavor to do so from now on!"

"Alright, bringing us over," Sweet Dream answered. She directed the mothership to descend over the crumbling mansion.

Down in the basement, Matt had crouched down next to the bar with his shield held high. He switched his power on, crumbling the bar around him. The destruction raced up the mansion and, to Matt's surprise, started eating a hole into the floor.

The streamer stopped and looked down, "Well, chat, I think we just found a secret lair."

Below him was a jumble of discarded boxes and other junk. Matt jumped down, using the trash to buffer his fall. The underground room was empty save for a random assortment of consumer goods.

"What the sh*t? All he has is junk. Whatever, it's all coming down anyway."

Matt-att activated his power in the corner again. He wasn't about to take chances with Dr. Zlo. The troll was surprisingly tricky. Matt-att got the impression that this wasn't the only base the villain had. Otherwise, why would it be so empty?

Up in the air, Sweet Dream activated the lasers and aimed them a bit away from the mansion. The first few shots impacted the dirt.

"Uh, what are you doing?" Riptide asked.

"My hatbots are still in there. I'm scaring the ones on the pigeons away so they don't get destroyed. I'm not about to have those cute little things die if I can help it."

The villainess fired off a couple more shots, spooking the rest of the pigeons away. That done, she directed all the lasers at the mansion and fired. Beams of energy rained down like arrows from god, destroying the roof and sinking into the estate.

Matt-att felt the tremor before seeing it. He knew it; this wasn't the villain's main base at all. Instead, it was a trap designed to lure others when they came to retaliate. He confirmed it in his head when the beams of energy rained down.

"Chat, I don't think this guy is your average troll," Matt-att said. He squeezed into the corner a little tighter and stopped his power. There was no need to waste energy when Dr. Zlo destroyed his own base.

"I think this guy is a master or something. His secret lair doesn't have anything in it, and he barely had any defenses either. I think he used it to lure people in and take them out. He doesn't lose anything if he fails, and if we beat him, we can't break any of his stuff."

A small bit of respect begrudgingly shoved its way into Matt-att's voice, "I'm a bit impressed."

The chat agreed, many pointing out how difficult it would be to keep a ruse like that going. Others pointed out he might be getting help from other players as well.

"I think we're going to need a few upgrades for this build before we take this guy on again," Matt-att said. "We're not going to die to his attack, but he won't stick around either. I'll need to find a ranged option, get a few mobility items. H*ll, if I'm going to do that, I might as well start a guild."

A chance laser impacted against the shield, dissipating as it hit.

"Yeah," Matt continued, "I'm going to need a guild. If we're going to deal with a guild of trolls, we'll need our own, won't we? I gotta call up Ixzay."

_____________________________________________

John had planned to go in after Matt-att but scrapped the idea when the giant spaceship appeared overhead. He stared over at the mothership raining laser fire down onto the mansion below. That was bad. Really bad. That meant Dylan succeeded in his heist. Somehow, his friend had gotten past all the defenses and gotten the spaceship. Either Vert was worse at game balance then John thought or his friend had gotten extremely lucky.

John cursed to himself. He knew he hadn't been thinking clearly when he contacted that streamer. But Dylan was just so passive about everything. Back in high school, it had always been John to drag Dylan away from board gamers when they forced him into games he didn't want to play. Dylan then brought that passivity into online gaming, and John had to look out for him there too.

Dylan had always laughed at the rage-filled comments he got, but John knew they bothered him. He knew this because comments like that bothered John, so there was no way it wouldn't disturb others. That was why John looked out for Dylan by telling him the correct way to play the game. That way, his friend wouldn't have to deal with the hate.

John cursed again. He hadn't been thinking clearly at all. If he had been, he would've realized that the mothership could be a new base. Which meant Dylan was right; they didn't need to focus so hard on base building.

"F*ck," John cursed aloud.

But it was okay, his mind rationalized. It wasn't like Dylan knew he'd contacted the streamer. And with the mansion destroyed, the missing factories wouldn't matter. John could ditch them later and join back in with his friend. He could apologize and lead Dylan down a safer path.

Yeah, apologizing sounded good. John would wait a bit after the fight to message. Dylan would take him back, and the two could go back to gaming together.

All the tension built inside John slowly drained away as he solidified his new plan. His chances weren't ruined just yet.

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