The Ultra Violent Death Ray

"We have the bastard right where we want him!"

For 22 years the heroic Lance McBoastful had been a thorn in the evil Dr. Vanquish's side. But now, after all their battles, Dr. Vanquish finally had his arch nemesis exactly where he wanted him, trapped under the rubble of his downed mechanical dragon, staring up at the face of death that was Dr. Vanquish's floating ship.

"Turn on the intercom!" Vanquish yelled to a henchman.

"Coms on sir. Volume at maximum."

"Do you hear me, Lance. Please tell me those eardrums on your pretty little head haven't burst."

Lance looked up through the blood in his eyes, shielded his face against the bright flood lights of the ship and tried to give Dr. Vanquish the finger.

"Ha! Moron! Your middle finger is missing. Torn off during my masterfully choreographed attack. But at least I know you can hear me. I want to savor this. I want you to know the last thing you heard before my ultra violent death ray penetrated your perfect skull was my grating voice announcing with authority..."

"Hey Vanquish, can we hurry this up? It's getting boring and I'm pretty sure I'm bleeding out here. If you don't kill me soon you'll miss your chance."

"How dare you interrupt me during my moment of triumph. Very well then old friend, I shall give you a parting gift of death for all of our years together. Henchman, fire up my all new ultra violent death ray."

The Henchman worked his fingers over the keyboard with precision while a busy control room full of evil came to a sudden standstill to watch the demise of a man they had been at war with for decades.

"Uh, sir, it says you need to reset your password."

Dr. Vanguish dropped his fist from a pose of triumph and furrowed his brow. "Wait, what?"

"The program says you have to reset your password to fire the death ray."

"Ultra violent death ray, moron."

"Sorry sir, the ultra violent death ray."

"I don't remember making one. Can you create a new one?"

"I'll need your email."

"Oh crap, I don't remember which one I was using when I bought all of this stuff. That was like, 15 shitty years ago."

"It's not your current email?"

"No, that one is much more menacing. [email protected]. The ones I had back then were full of spam. I signed up for way too many...sites. Just sites."

"Well do you remember them?"

"No. Tell the truth I think a couple of them are defunct websites now. And even if they existed I couldn't remember the passwords to those either."

"You never auto saved them or used a backup?"

"Oh, sure, I love just having access to all of my private things laying around where anyone can find them. You try having the government and freaking superheroes looking for anything incriminating to arrest you on."

"Sorry sir."

"Look, just try...daisy24."

"Sir?"

"It was an old girlfriend. We met after college."

"Didn't work."

"Did you capitalize Daisy?"

"No sir."

"Good. You weren't supposed to."

"The password hint is REMEMBER TIJUANA."

"Huh, that was a vacation I vaguely remember. You know what they say, if you remember Tijuana you weren't really there."

"Anything you'd like me to try, sir?"

"Hmm. Oh...oh my god."

"What, sir."

Dr. Vanquish mouthed something in his direction.

"I'm sorry, I didn't catch that."

A barely audible whisper followed.

"Sir?"

A furious Dr. Vanquish began to shout. "I said herpes69! Try herpes69!"

A snicker ran through the crowd of scientists behind him. Dr. Vanquish pushed a button on his console and the entire section burst into flames.

"Anyone else want to crack wise? I had recently been dumped, I wanted to get away for a while. Some friends dragged me down there and I hooked up with this girl. A couple weeks later I bought this ship and rededicated myself to evil. As I was setting things up I felt an itch down there and I wanted to remind myself not to do anything like that again."

Laughter suddenly burst over the intercom.

"Henchman, what the hell is that?"

"Lance McBoastful, sir."

"You left the intercom on?" Dr. Vanquish aimed his wrist lazer at the Henchman and fired, leaving a gaping hole through his chest. The voice of Lance came over the intercom again.

"Oh, this is fantastic. Thank you for this moment. I'm totally counting this as a victory even in death."

"Oh no you don't! You will not rob me of this. I've waited too long for vengeance."

He moved to the firing console and input the password. Nothing happened. He looked around, then palmed his face.

"Freaking idiot henchman hit the caps lock when he died."

He tried again and the ultra violent death ray began to power up.

"This is it, Lance! Hear that sound? That's the humming of your doom! That is my name becoming terror in your heart! That's..."

One of the other Henchmen spoke up. "Sir, we're not getting any vitals."

Dr. Vanquish looked upon the screen and saw his nemesis laying lifeless upon the ground, a large smile on his face.

"No! Noooooo! I won't allow this. I won't...you can't escape me like this. Not...not like this."

"Sir, we could still fire. The ultra violent death ray is ready."

"Oh, what's the point."

Dr. Vanquish sulked down the hall toward his room. The door closed and the crew could briefly hear him wheeping.

"What should we do?"

"Forget him, I want to see that thing fire!"

They all snickered as they entered the password one more time.