Once he was dressed he made his way back to his room to collect his wallet and rest for a few minutes. After he was done, he left the house through the front door, and climbed the gates of his mansion, "Master Stanley!" One of the gardeners yelled at him. "In that silly get up again at 5 in the morning! Not to mention you're climbing the gates! Just open the gates like everyone else!"
"This is for training purposes!" Stanley yelled down at him. The gardener swiped his hand at him. "Do whatever, I guess."
He left without anyone else noticing him leave somehow. He would then make his way to the Crimson Village train station, which he took as an opportunity to get his daily cardio in and ran 5 miles to get to the station. He took the earliest train possible to Heaven's Kitchen. The train came at 5:30 AM, and the ride over to Heaven's Kitchen was going to take an hour. Stanley loved taking the early train as it allowed him to play his favorite album and relax before going on his vigilante patrol route.
As the train arrived he took his seat on the chairs of the train that pointed inward. He loved looking forward in a relaxed position to see the beautiful landscape that was Candle City. The beautiful parks that were slightly trashed, the river that cut through Crimson Village (that was slightly toxic), the tall glass buildings, and the absolute gorgeous asphalt highways that cut through the mountains and forests of Candle City.
Besides the view, the best thing about the early train was the absolute lack of people on it. "If I was going to deal with people for the rest of my day, this moment of silence, save for the hoots and puffs and metallic hootnannies of the train; was the moment I needed after escaping that hell hole that was my house."
"And you did this everyday," Dr. Thomas responded. "What made this day different from the others?"
Crimson Village and Heaven's Kitchen had 23 stops between each other. Which each was about 3 minutes away from each other. On the 20th stop while Stanley had his earphones in listening to "Good Old-Fashioned Lover Boy" by Queen. Two young adult males, of about 6 feet in height, entered the same train car as Stanley. Both of them wore an oversized jersey of some major athlete, baggy jeans and a crimson colored Japanese Oni mask. One of them held a camcorder with a microphone attached to the top of it. The one who didn't have a camera, brandished a gun in front of the camera then moved to the middle of the train car.
He walked past Stanley, and screamed out some sort of demonic war cry. Stanley ignored it, and continued jamming out to his music while slightly listening in to what he was about to say. "What's good y'all. It is your boy, back in the ville! Doing some villiany," the cameraman walked closer to the self-proclaimed villain. "Now I gatta say, y'all really put your all in that last video. We reached over a million views and 200 thousand likes! Can we reach 5 likes on this video! Anyway, thank you all for following me on my 30 days as a villain challenge. Now I gatta say, waking up real early to be a hater was stressful. And that's why this video is sponsored by Nordic VPN. Are you tired of the opps and cops looking at all your information while you're trying to browse an underground villain store? Are you scared that your illegal package might be delivered by a federal agent. Use my link in the description down below for a 30 day, hehe get it, 30 day free trial on Nordic VPN. Now let's get to today's daily villainy acts." The villain clapped.
The camera man took a step back, "That was a good take," he lowered the camera.
"Really? After doing a Nordic VPN sponsor for the 30th time, I hope it was fucking good." The villain made his way to Stanley, he stood in front of him and took a deep breath. "Start recording Alex."
The cameraman lifted the camera up, and began recording. "Yo cowboy," the villain screamed. "Watch ya listening to some country," he questioned with a southern accent.
Stanley took out his earphones, paused his music, brought down his bandana from his face to reveal a smile to the villain, and responded with a clear voice, "I'm actually listening to Queen. Have you heard of the band?"
"Heh. I hate Queen!" The villain lifted up his gun. Pointed it at Stanley, then suddenly the gun began deforming and shifting it's position to encompass the villain's hand. It transformed into silver steel gauntlets and as it happened Stanley made note of it. However he failed to react to the fact that the villain had swung his arm back, and launched an attack onto Stanley's face. he directed the punch to launch Stanley out of his seat and to the left of him. While Stanley flew through the air, the villain rejoiced, "That's the Hater Punch for you baby!" The villain ran up to the camera and screamed, "I hate what you love! That's real villainy stuff, merch, link in bio, in the description below. And while you're down there, make sure you hit that like button, subscribe and hit that notification bell for the next time I show off my oddity."
"So this kid, came up to you, unprovoked and punched you," Dr. Thomas asked Stanley who was shaking his head.
"Yeah, pretty much. Like what kind of dickhead does that. He called himself The Hater. Yeah, I always knew that there was a new trend on social media to be some kind of villain. Like at first it started with the Silent Murderer. You're a therapist so I don't expect you to know much about internet stuff, but anyway, the Silent Murderer was this myth of a villain. He started killing about a decade ago, one of those creepy pastas. He had an impossible oddity, to kill anyway from any distance without any trace of the killing or himself."
"Stanley, that kind of oddity does not exist in this world. If it were authorities would have handled it already."
"Yeah, I know- but this whole being a villain for internet fame. It really rubbed me the wrong way. Whatever happened to the golden days of wanting to be a hero to save the day, become merchandise. You know, classic hero shit. I used to read the Damien comics all the time."
"Even if you hated Derrick Damien?"
Stanley blinked and groaned as he started getting up from being launched into a pole on the train car. He cracked his back and knuckles and looked at the huge dent that was made from the impact. He sighed and brushed off some dust on his outfit. The Hater, started doing stretches, looked back at the camera and winked. He turned to Stanley then said, "I am The Hater!" He stretched out his arms and froze for 10 seconds while nodding his head, "What's your name I need it for the versus title card," he said after the 10 seconds were up.
"My name is Mr. Morale."
The Hater laughed, then couched a bit, "I'm The Hater! And this is."
Mr. Morale VS. The Hater
Almost on cue, Stanley's music app played the next song in the shuffled queue. From his earphones, Stanley could hear the beat of Queen's "Don't Stop Me Now", he smiled, and watched The Hater for any movements. He thought, "if his oddity requires some kind of activation I would have probably saw it earlier. Judging by the speed at which he could attack me he doesn't have any cooldown period for using his oddity. He can essentially instantly switch from the gun to the gauntlets. Could he do the reverse?"
The Hater's oddity was called Metallic Recombobulation, he had the ability to transform a piece of metal into a metal object of the same material that he had once held before. Despite him using the ability to form a gun, he never actually had any bullets for the gun. He used it for an intimidation tactic. Stanley assumed he had a loaded weapon.
"Whatever he is about to do, I can't let him use his oddity," his thoughts continued as the song continued to play. "Queen's right, I do feel alive right now," Mr. Morale said confusing The Hater.
"Alright cowboy," The Hater made a finger gun using the hand with the steel gauntlet and extended it forward. Mr. Morale instantly took a running start and dashed over to The Hater. The Hater jumped back, but not enough. Mr. Morale grabbed The Hater's arm, noticed his gauntlet was deforming, wrapped his arm around The Hater's arm, then broke it. While The Hater screamed, Mr. Morale twisted his body to the side, then threw a gut punch. Followed by a punch to the bottom of his chin, then a chop to his diaphragm. He let The Hater go, took a step back, smiled, then kicked him in his temple.
"Yee-haw! Partner," Mr. Morale said as The Hater fell to the floor of the train, gasping and wheezing for air.
"Dave! Why the fuck would you do that," the cameraman said to Mr. Morale who started putting his earphones back in.
"That was just self-defense. Don't let me catch y'all actually doing crimes." Mr. Morale replied while setting himself back in his original seating position.
The cameraman rushed to The Hater's side, he checked for a pulse, then set the camera down, "What are you some kind of vigilante, let me see some actual hero ID." Mr. Morale did not respond, "I'll call the cops for unauthorized use of an unidentified oddity."
"Woah, using some buzzwords you heard on the internet. Get lost before I report your dumbass channel," Mr. Morale brought his mask back over his mouth. As he did the train announcer on the loud speakers said, "Now arriving at Eelton Avenue." When the train stopped, the cameraman picked up his friend and camera, then rushed out of the train, "We'll never forget this Mr. Morale!"
"Yeah, I'm a rocket ship, on my way to Mars. On a collision course." Stanley sang while the cameraman declared his revenge.