CCC #91 - Voting Thread

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TommytheHitman

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#1  Edited By TommytheHitman

Hello chaps it's that time again.

For the 91st Character Creation Contest writers were tasked with creating a villain for the much loved yet underappreciated DC superhero Martian Manhunter.

We only had two submissions this time but ah well.

Time for the usual copy and paste.

  • READ the stories, PICK your favorite one, and CAST your VOTE!
  • If you wrote, you should vote! (It's just sporting)
  • No voting for yourself. (Also sporting)
  • Voting ends next Saturday on the 26th of October at 11:59 PM UK Time.
  • Remember: All are welcome to vote, and the winner gets to pick the next contest.

Here are the submissions.

Batkevin74: The Dissolver

Martian Manhunter hit the floor of the Watchtower with a thump, his stomach oozing onto the floor like heated plasticine. Standing behind him was a young man in a green and black costume. His right hand crackled and dripped with greenish energy.

“That jog your memory?”

J’onn tried to stand but the man kicked him in the back. “Where you going?”

“Who are you?” J’onn asked as he tried to reform himself.

“You’re funny! You really don’t know do you?” He said again. “Maybe another blast?”

Another blast flew from his hand. J’onn went intangible, and screamed as the beam hit him in the chest. The Martian warrior collapsed on the floor, flapping like a landed fish as more of his flesh melted off him.

“I had this blast specially made to deal with you, J’onn J’onzz,” the man sneered as he stalked closer. “Cost me a lot, not just money. See you’re like Superman, Plastic Man and Psimon rolled into one plus you can turn invisible! Talk about overpowered!”

-Sleep-

The man stared back into J’onn’s red eyes. “Nice try with the telepathy, J’onn. But I had some implants to reroute and block hypnotic and telepathic commands, again costly. And do you know why?”

-Justice League, this is J’onn. I am currently under attack in...-

“They can’t hear you,” the man stated. “Hypnotic block remember. It’s like a white noise generator, no idea HOW it works but judging by the look on your stupid green face, means it’s working.”

“I don’t know why you’re attacking me,” J’onn said as he slowly floated to his feet.

The man folded his arms. “Really? Here, I’ll take off this domino mask just in case it really does conceal my identity.”

J’onn looked at the Asian man’s face. It was round, no distinguishing marks or tattoos, one that could easily anyone and someone J’onn didn’t know. “I am sorry, I do not know who you are.”

The man fired another blast at the Martian’s feet, the black tiles melting. “About eight years ago you were moonlighting as a police officer in San Diego.”

J’onn nodded recalling his time under the identy of police officer Mike Sherman. “Yes...”

“You arrested a young kid. Threw him in a cell to scare him straight.”

“Harry Hong,” J’onn said quietly. “Seems it didn’t work.”

“You think I’m Harry?” The man fired another blast making J’onn duck for his life, only to have a boot hit him in the face. J’onn morphed his head around the boot and chomped down with a set of sharklike teeth he grew. But suddenly an electric charge surged through the suit jolting J’onn off.

“MY NAME IS HENRY! MY BROTHER WAS HARRY AND YOU KILLED HIM!”

“I didn’t kill your brother,” J’onn panted.

“You had him locked up, you green bastard! And then you vanished! Mike Sherman suddenly ceased to exist. So my brother got STUCK in the prison system! And for what, breaking a car window to jack a stereo?”

“I did not know...”

Henry fired another series of blasts making the hero from Mars flee for his life. “Harry was raped and murdered in prison! Because you decided you didn’t want to be a policeman any more! You dumping that identity caused SO much damage to my family! I spent a small fortune paying the Calculator to track you down! I then upgrading myself so I could stand toe to toe with you. I’m full of wires and potions and things that have twenty letter names. All so I could melt you into a pile of slag to avenge my brother! I am Dissolver! And you’re dead!”

Henry opened up his hands, eyes and mouth and shot forth a quinbeam of energy that bounced harmlessly off the chest of Superman.

“You okay, J’onn?” Superman asked as he actually winced at the barrage bouncing off his chest.

“NOOO!” Harry screamed. “You’re not supposed to be here!”

“What about me?” Laughed Plastic Man as he wrapped him up like a burrito. “Nobody EVER expects me!”

“Get! Off!” Dissolver fired out another electrical surge through his suit send Plastic Man into an epileptic seizure. “I only want the green bastard!”

“Will I do?” Kyle Rayner asked as he created a boxer with his Green Lantern ring to smack Dissolver about the head and stomach.

Dissolver screamed and shot a blast at the large window, shattering it and allowing decompression to occur. The cold claws of space began sucking the air out of the Watchtower. Green Lantern created a giant plug to fill the gap and soon order was restored. Superman picked up Manhunter gingerly and placed him on a gurney that GL created.

“I’ll find Dissolver, get J’onn to sick bay,” Superman ordered. A green tendril tugged on the Kryptonians elbow.

“Don’t...”

“J’onn...” Superman looked down on his fallen comrade.

“I have hurt that young man worse...than he has assaulted me,” J’onn wheezed. “Leave him be.”

Superman frowned in frustration but acquiesced to his friends demand. A slight ping was heard as the teleporters activated meaning J’onn’s attacker had probably escaped.

Henry Hong aka The Dissolver looked up at the sky. “Next time Martian, I won’t waste time talking.”

TommytheHitman - The Killer

The Killer sat on a park bench awaiting his next victim.

He was awaiting her because he knew that at any moment she'd be passing by. He'd been watching her for the past week and by now knew her daily routine arguably better than even she did.

  • At Five minutes past Nine she would wake up in that oak frame bed of hers. She normally took a shower but today she hadn't seemed to be in the mood. That didn't matter though, she was perfect as she was.
  • After making her packed lunch of Strawberry Jam sandwiches she would kiss her cats goodbye and then head off her shift at the local 7/11. This was normally around quarter to Ten.

It was currently Five to Ten, and the Killer smelled her before he saw her.

  • After completing her shift she'd buy takeout and watch old movies while wishing that somebody loved her.

Somebody did.

He looked up almost lazily from the bench and saw her walk right past him wearing a winter coat over her uniform. He sniffed quickly at her blonde hair and caught a whiff of the perfume she doused herself in. Part of him felt shocked that she hadn't noticed his presence, but in truth she didn't know him. This woman had simply no knowledge of his existence... but she would recognize him.

He stood up and took a form that she was familiar with. Nobody noticed, nobody ever did. Then he called her name.

'Daisy!' He yelled in a friendly tone. 'Hey, Daisy!'

She stopped and turned around, surprised that someone actually wanted to talk to her. Her eyes lit up as she recognized the speaker and almost hesitantly she walked over, startled by this invasion of her normal routine.

'Thomas?' She said, smiling in a confused way. The Killer approached her, he too was smiling.

'I thought that was you!' He said. They moved so close together that they were almost touching. 'How've ya been?'

'Fine, Tom.' Her shoulders dropped as she relaxed slightly. 'Yourself?'

'Fine.'

There was a silence that passed, not only between them but one that passed over the whole world. The Killer simply stared at his prey. He was trying to memorize her face.

'Well... listen, Tom. I've gotta go.'

'Can I show you something first?' She seemed reluctant but she didn't say no. He raised a hand up into the air. 'Watch this.' Her eyes followed his hand as it slowly moved forwards. He moved it towards her chest and, for some reason, whatever reason, she couldn't look away. 'Keep watching her.' He told her, and then his hand passed through her skin and crushed her heart.

A shockwave seemed to pass through the area. Passersby, even those who hadn't been looking seemed to notice that something had happened. The victim's body clumped to the ground like a heavy sack of potatoes, her packed lunch clattered on the floor sprawling its contents and the girl's face seemed a frozen portrait of shock.

The Killer left before anyone could scream. He simply smiled, nodded, and faded with the wind.

It was an hour before Detective John Jones arrived at the scene. There had been an Earthquake in the Philippines that had needed search and rescue teams coordinated and he'd been busy. He didn't arrive via car, bus or any other sort of transport however, he simply appeared at the crime scene and the local Police Department had simply grown used to this.

He stepped among his colleagues wearing a coat and fedora ripped straight from a Humphrey Bogart flick but nobody commented on it. Respect had to be earned and during his long career John had definitely done that.

'What've you got for me, boys?' The Detective asked in a tired tone not entirely dissimilar to the sound of gravel.

'I've got your order.' Isaac of the CSI team said as he handed John a box of cookies and a plastic cup of milk. John took them both gladly. 'But we've got ourselves a homicide.'

John sighed and looked at the body. He took a bite of his cookies - careful not to get crumbs on the scene - and knelt over the victim's corpse.

'Look of surprised on the girl's face.' He noted. 'Whatever killed her killed her quick.'

'Heart failure.' Isaac said from somewhere behind. He noticed the annoyed look that flashed on John's face. 'It was definitely murder though. We have a whole goggle of eyewitnesses who saw what happened.'

'What'd they say?'

'They said that Daisy Danvers, age 27, was walking to work when her ex husband Tom Matthews, also 27, flagged her down before she collapsed to the ground. Matthews then vanished into thin air.' He paused. 'Some people said they saw Thomas' hand pass into her chest right before she collapsed.'

John perked up upon hearing that last part. He turned to Isaac and for almost a second his lower lip quivered, an unprecedented event. 'Do... do you think Matthews is a Metahuman?'

'I did. But then a couple officers went round to Matthews' flat. He has an alibi for where he was an hour ago, and what's more his record is completely clean. No signs he'd ever do anything like this to anyone.'

John frowned and looked back at the body, eyes locked on where the heart was supposed to be. 'So we're dealing with a shapeshifter who can pass through walls...'

Then Isaac said what John had been thinking.

'Honestly John I think we're dealing with the Martian Manhunter.'

The Detective dipped a cookie into his milk. 'Somehow I really doubt that.' He admitted.

He left the crime scene soon after that, mind and hands shaking as he ran to the confines of a nearby alleyway. In that alley he flexed his mind and transformed into his true form. Not the heroic figure of the Martian Manhunter but the utterly alien appearance of J'onn J'onzz, the man from Mars. He slumped against the alleywall and breathed heavily, stunned by what he had learned.

'Could it be possible?' He wondered to himself. It wasn't his innocence that he questioned but instead the possibility that another Green Martian had somehow made their way to Earth. Something stirred inside him and he changed forms again, donning his cape and uniform.

He would find an answer himself, and nobody else would die.

Manhunter returned to the scene of the crime, he did so in his invisible form so as to not cause any alarm in the local residents. Using his Martian Vision he scanned the park for any sign of the killer.

Whoever had done this had been very thorough. They'd wiped their DNA from all over the scene leaving almost no trace of their presence, but the Manhunter was experienced in these matters and searched the scene at a microscopic level. He soon found a faint DNA strand that lead him back to the victim's apartment and flew there in a matter of seconds.

The place had been sealed off as a crime scene and barricaded by yellow tape, yet despite this it was seemingly empty. J'onn returned to the visible spectrum in the kitchen.

There was the sound of purring from the kitchen shelf and the Martian found a black and white cat staring up at him, wide, yellow eyes seemingly looking into his soul.

'Hello.'He said, smiling as he reached out to stroke the feline. However he stopped himself suddenly and instead gripped the creature by the throat before lifting it up into the air. A horrible gasping sound escaped the cat's mouth yet before J'onn could even begin to question his decision the creature began to growl and grow, changing shape and color until it bore the naked, skeletal looks of a Green Martian.

J'onn threw the Killer away in disgust leaving the alien in a crumpled heap in the room's corner.

'Don't even think about leaving.'J'onn warned, his eyes glowing bright red as he did so. 'I've shut down the parts of your brain that let you fade and shift so there'll be no escaping.'

The Killer coughed dark green blood onto the kitchen floor. 'How'd you know it was me?'He croaked. J'onn knelt down and tapped the side of the Martian's neck.

'No collar.'Was all he said. The Killer seemed amused by this and chuckled.

'Take it you've read my mind?'

'Yes.'

'Then y'know I've been doing this for centuries.' He smiled and coughed. 'Should've known I'd meet you one day. Do what you're gonna do.'

J'onn nodded sadly. He closed his eyes and with a thought shut down the Killer's mind, leaving his body as nothing more than an empty husk.

It was a few minutes before J'onn left the house. When he did he was carrying the Killer's body in his arms.

Silently he flew into the air and set off for parts unknown.

So let's get voting!

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TommytheHitman

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Fix your voting deadline. ;)

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#4  Edited By TommytheHitman

WriterVotes
Batkevin741. TommytheHitman
TommytheHitman1. Batkevin74. 2. CBishop. 3. Silverspidey.
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batkevin74

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Who to choose? Too many selections. I guess I’ll go with Tommy 😀🤣🤣

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TommytheHitman

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@batkevin74: Thanks Kevin! Tough choice on my end too. :)

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cbishop

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I've gotta be honest guys, I'm not totally in love with either of these.

Batkevin', you've got this angry character that you write. It's always got a different name, but the anger is starting to make them feel the same. I can't call it bad writing, because your stuff is frustratingly always good, even when you phone it in lol. "The Dissolver" is a little bit lackluster of a name, but it functions. I still say you've got one really great story lurking in your brain for that angry character-type. It's probably connected to that evil-Superman-type that you like to write too. I'm just waiting to see you birth it completely. I liked the inclusion of the JLA, and the ultimate outcome of the story.

Tommy', "The Killer" is also lackluster as a name, but for a character that is supposed to be centuries old, it also functions. I liked seeing MM as John Jones, but wasn't sure the move to the alleyway was necessary. Wouldn't he just stay there as John Jones, scan the area with his Martian vision, and then make a reason to leave? *Then* go invisible, turn to MM, and get to the apartment? The other thing I wasn't sure of was following the DNA trail to her apartment. More exciting than what I'm about to suggest, surely, but it's likely she would have had her ID on her- John could have just checked for her address.

All that said, I'm voting for @tommythehitman.

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TommytheHitman

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@cbishop: Thanks Bish. I know what you mean I had to rush this one. Thanks for the vote anyway. :)

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silverspidey

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Voting for TH on this one.

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cbishop

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@cbishop: Thanks Bish. I know what you mean I had to rush this one. Thanks for the vote anyway. :)

It happens. I do it too at times; Wildvine usually catches 'em. lol ;)

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Oh! I won!

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batkevin74

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#13  Edited By cbishop
@tommythehitman said:

Oh! I won!

This is the only thing that stinks about winning back-to-back contests: when you thought long and hard about the previous contest's idea, and now you have to come up with another one. ;)

You just needed a week off, Tommy'? :^D

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TommytheHitman

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@cbishop: I did I’ll come up with something tomorrow.

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@cbishop: I did I’ll come up with something tomorrow.

All good, man. I'm just harassing you. ;)

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They're both good, this is really tough