He was a superman.

The warrior alien cockroaches of Xenon 11 closed in around him, their jowls sticky and wet from the blood pores that sat just at the base of their pincers. The superman gritted his teeth and flexed his large muscles, an attempt to show dominance in the face of such horror. They'd emerged from deep in the caves of Shirr-Lon-Rea, a city ancient when old was considered new, and now the superman and the evil were at a standoff.

The earth shook with each step he took, the Xenonians taking the measure of their opponent. This lone human was all that stood between them and the control over the hemisphere, with the second to come in short time. None could stand before their might, as the numerous star systems previously conquered had discovered. Pain and death were all the cockroaches knew, and they wanted nothing but to share this knowledge with everything they encountered. The superman held no emotion as he moved, quick as lightning, into the alien hordes. Green blood, the touch of which burned like acid through even the strongest substance, flew with abandon as he did his heroic duty, protecting the world from things better left unknown.

He was a superman, and by God...this was his duty.

The battle raged for hours, the tattered and torn uniform of the superman holding onto his body by only the barest of threads, his skin blistered and ravaged from the blood of his enemies. They were relentless, an unstoppable wave of death and venom, but he refused to let up, even for an instance. He was all that stood in their way, the only protector of Pacific City that had dared to stand against the hordes. There were others like him, of course, but they proved to be false when the demands for surrender came. Better to serve and live than to fight and die, they'd said. But not the superman...he knew what had to be done.

To the city's surprise, the outcome of the battle was a revelation. The superman stood victorious amidst the destroyed buildings of the city, the still-steaming green caked on his body like a second skin. He had taken everything the Xenonians could throw at him, and still he had triumphed. The people of Pacific City cried tears of divine joy as they emerged from their bunkers, the superman's name whispered on their lips as they stood, wide-eyed, at the barriers of the now finished battle. The superman could only smile, a smile that adults once knew how to make, but had long forgotten. A smile of a child's happiness, displayed on the face of the normally oh-so-stoic hero. He was their hero. He was their superman.

For that one, shining moment...he was their God.

Pacific City. Today.

He shivered in the doorway, the tattered coat he'd found in the dumpster behind the bar providing little warmth in the cold, winter air. "Spare a dollar?" he'd ask to a few of the passersby.

"No, I'm sorry."

No response.

"I just gave my last bit out to that other homeless fellow down the block. My apologies."

"How about getting a job instead, you fucking bum?"

He snorted and spat at the feet of the last speaker. "If I could get a job," he commented as the gentleman rushed off, "then I wouldn't be out here freezing my ass off, now would I?"

He coughed long and hard afterwards, stumbling down the cold streets looking for anything that could give him a reprieve from his existence. "Spare a dollar, man?" he asked the next gentleman passerby, this one dressed black on black, the only spot of color being a deep crimson necktie. He smiled at the question.

"Be my pleasure," he replied with a smirk, his hand opening to reveal four shiny quarters. The homeless man's eyes lit up at the sight. "Oops." The quarters fell from the passerby's hand, a deliberate motion on the gentleman's part. As the homeless man rushed to the ground, desperate to snatch up the silver, he failed to notice the generous stranger moving behind him. Something hard struck the back of the man's neck as he was down on all fours, knocking him senseless.

When he awakened, no more than three or four minutes later, he was lying in an adjacent alleyway. The stranger stood over him, the smile still wiped across his face. "Why'm I all wet?" the homeless man asked as he examined his thoroughly soaked clothes.

The stranger lit a cigarette, allowing his Zippo to flame long after the first draw. "Gasoline."

The homeless man looked up, immediately determining the situation. "Oh."

"Give me a reason not to." The stranger stated.

"I'm...a superman."

"Not good enough, mate," the stranger responded.

He tossed the lighter into the other man's lap.

And laughed.

Anthology Two Presents
Eternal Affairs
Chapter One
"Figure of 8"
By Chris Munn

"Jaysis fucking Christ, what in god's name happened here?" The police that had gathered around the charred body were in a state of disgust, the smell of melted flesh assaulting their senses quite brutally. Detective Constable Jason Jenkins stood directly over the anonymous body, slowly taking a drag on his cigarette as he studied the alley crime scene.

"We got us a problem, sir," one of the officers said, prompting Jenkins to turn his direction back toward the street, "the Feddies are here."

"That's not Federal Police," Jenkins muttered as he watched the three new arrivals come into the alley, "that's the god damn freak show."

An older man led the pack of three, showing no signs of emotional concern as he confidently sauntered up to the detective. His grayed hair was cut close to his head, but was tousled just enough to give an air of unkemptness. His goatee was the same, cut into a moustache-and-beard combination, but the fact that he probably hadn't shaved in days was obvious. "Agent Smith," he introduced himself, flipping out a badge of authority directly in front of Jenkins' face, "Eternal Affairs division. Me and my partners have this under control, so you guys can go on and leave."

"You're a bloody American, aren't you?" Jenkins asked, brushing aside the man's badge.

"This time, yeah, I'm an American," Smith said dismissively as he turned toward the body, "and don't give me no fuckin' attitude, boy. We got carte blanche from Mayor Romanov himself to investigate as we see fit...so it's either our way or the highway, as the saying goes."

"Fuck it, fine," Jenkins said, following up with a loud whistle, "c'mon lads, let's let the so-called specialists clean up this shit."

The three Eternal Affairs officers waited patiently as the police departed, none of them speaking another word until only they remained in the alley.

"I'm still not convinced that your idea was a good one," Anna Romanova said as she stood in front of her office bar, filling a glass of wine, "so keep in mind that if this should blow up in our faces, I'm holding you fully responsible."

She turned around with her drink, resting her backside on the wooden bar top. "I'd have to kill you then, of course."

The mayor's special guest laughed slightly at the woman's threat, an odd sight considering the fact that no emotion came from the face of bone. Doctor Creep sat reclined in one of the office's leather chairs, a Japanese kimono hanging loosely around his skeletal body as he rested, his feet kicked up onto a stool. "You can't kill me, Anna," he said while taking a puff on his oversized cigar, "I'm like Keith Richards and Dick Clark. I'll live forever."

Romanova tried to remain stoic and stern, but the Doctor's charm made her expression turn into a faint smile. "Has it ever occurred to you that I only keep you around because you make me laugh?"

"And here I always thought it was because of the sexual dream scenarios you have about me every night," Creep replied, a cloud of smoke exiting his eye sockets, "but back to the point at hand. I'm happy to see you've given my Eternal Affairs idea a solid start, my lady, and I believe your worries to be completely unfounded. Smith is a good man, one who knows what he's doing."

"Smith?" the woman asked in a harsh tone. "You're saying Deadboy fucking Smith knows what he's doing? He can't even die and get it right, let alone lead a division that could possibly do a lot of damage to this city."

"The science hero is a dying breed, my dear," Creep began as he stood from his seat, the smoke from his cigar forming a bizarre halo around his skull, "no matter what you may think. The history of Pacific City is being murdered, one veteran hero at a time. You may think you have things under control with your New Mages, but take my word on this...you're going to need a lot more than just them."

"Don't you fucking threaten me, Doctor," Romanova said as she finished her glass of wine, "or I'll make your stay in this city a very uncomfortable one."

Creep merely sighed as he moved toward the door to her office. "Do stop by the Gallery sometime, my dear lady," he said before closing the door behind him, "our talks are so infrequent as of late."

"So who is he?" the second Eternal Affairs agent asked as she stood looking over Deadman Smith's shoulder at the burned corpse. Samara Whitlock, all twenty-seven years of her, was a neurotic meltdown waiting to happen. The cigarette dangling between two shaking fingers, the bags under her eyes that marred her otherwise natural beauty, the unkempt black hair that looked like it hadn't seen a brush in years...all of the signs pointed to a woman that needed to take a breath and step away from the edge.

"That's what you're here to find out, Sammy," Smith said as he threw a wink toward the girl. With a heartfelt sigh, Samara reached into her black side-bag and began to dig. A moment later, she produced a headset and a small handheld tape recorder from the bowels of the purse.

"Do I really have to do this?" she asked.

"Much as I'd like to say 'no, you got this job 'cause of your looks'...I can't." Smith answered, stepping back away from the corpse. "So do your thing."

Deciding not to offer another effort of protest, Whitlock depressed the RECORD button with her thumb. The night was ominously still, not a single stray sound heard in the distance as the tape in the recorder wound around its spool. Samara walked around the charred body, her arm stretched forward, allowing the handheld speaker the maximum allowance of reception.

"This is fucking retarded," the third man in the group muttered, digging through his leather jacket for the pack of cigarettes that he knew he'd grabbed before leaving the office. Smith said nothing, displaying his dissatisfaction with his partner with a single silent scowl.

After a few more minutes of recording, Samara clicked off the tape recorder. "You want me to play back now," she asked, brushing her wind-tossed hair back out of her face, "or wait 'til we get back to the office?"

"Here," Smith answered, but placed his hand up to halt the woman's actions, "but not right this minute. Chester, I want a full view of the scene before we get our statement."

"Was wondering if I'd get to do any work tonight," the third agent said with a sigh, giving up his futile search for the missing cigarette pack that evidently wasn't in his coat pocket after all. Pushing his wire-rimmed glasses back up the bridge of his nose, Chester Fagan stepped to the body, his eyes emitting a faint yellow glow that bathed the dark alleyway with an almost angelic incandescence. "Virtual crime scene...starting now."

The wind blew through the streets as the skinless Dr. Creep made his way home. The walk was unnecessary, of course, as he could easily have asked his daughters to pick him up. There was something about being immersed in the city at night, a peaceful ambiance that brought his rabid thoughts to a slow Zen.

The calm before the storm...the eye of the hurricane...insert colorful metaphor here...

Smoothing out the wrinkles in his kimono, the good Doctor took a seat on a bench. A chill had settled into the night, providing a slight rim of frost on his bones. Paying no mind, he stuck a cigarette between his teeth and lit up.

There were times that he missed having flesh, despite the often advantages to being a walking skeleton. No worries about pimples, no wrinkles...just the perfect smooth white of bone. He laughed at how he used to fret and worry, in the time after Carolina Crass infected his immortal body with necrotizing bacteria. 82 years since and still he lived, proving just how immortal he truly was. One of these days he'd have to look Ms. Crass up once again.

Lowering his skull as to allow a look at the ground, he saw a small cockroach running past his foot. Reaching down with a speed and skill that, honestly, one wouldn't expect a skeleton to have, Creep snatched up the insect between bony fingers. After a moment of examination, he increased the pressure, causing the roach to go squish. "If only it had been so easy the first time," he mumbled, looking around impatiently for a place to wipe the insect intestines off his fingers.

Magically, the alleyway had undergone a transformation. The body was now gone, the shadows on the walls showing that the events being played had occurred much earlier in the evening. "I rewound by about 5 hours," Fagan explained, "which, according to the chubby little medical examiner with garlic breath, should be approximately when Mr. Doe here did his Human Torch impression."

The three agents watched intently as the events of the past played before them. After a few brief moments, the tranquil alley scene was broken by the entrance of a man, his face covered in the darkness of shadow, dragging the unconscious form of their victim. "Any way you can focus in on the face?" Smith asked.

Fagan shook his head. "Don't work that way, mate. We can walk 360 degrees around the replay, but the city's collective memory only brings forth what it saw. If he didn't step into the light, there's no way to positively identify."

Falling back into silence, the three watched as the perpetrator posed the body of the victim across the ground. Then, with malicious attention to detail, he produced the can of gasoline and proceeded to soak the victim down. "Guy wasn't fuckin' around, was he?" Chester asked rhetorically.

Eventually, with the sensation of gasoline on skin providing a sufficient stinging sensation, the victim awoke.

"Why'm I all wet?"

"Gasoline."

"Oh."

"Give me a reason not to."

"I'm...a superman."

"Not good enough, mate."

And then the man tossed the cigarette. The victim screamed as his flesh ignited in a burst of flame. Samara had to turn away from the image, a wave of nausea hitting her full force. Smith and Fagan continued to watch a moment longer, as the murderer turned and left the alley. The scene then flickered, the light from Chester's display fading slowly.

"Agent Whitlock," Smith said as he crouched down in front of the charred body, his fingers running across the ground underneath it, "get your gear ready for play back. I think I've found something, but I'm almost afraid to consider what it means..."

Beckoning Chester with a motion of his hand, Smith sighed heavily. "Give me a cigarette," he commanded.

"Uh, seems I kinda left 'em at the office," Fagan admitted, shrugging innocently.

"Check the inside breast pocket," Smith advised. Reluctantly, Chester acquiesced...and, to his surprise, found the pack of smokes to be exactly where his boss said they would be. Placing one in his lips, a spark from his Zippo lit the end. After a draw or two, he removed the stick, placing it between Deadman's waiting fingers.

Smith closed his eyes, his fingers reading over a patch of ground as his mouth breathed words never meant to be spoken. "...ia...ia...zi azag...ia...ia...zi azkak..." After a few repetitive mutterings, Deadman produced the cigarette and, with a downward thrust, stabbed the burning end onto the place on the ground he had previously marked. The flames from the embers arced across the ground, moving beneath the corpse at a blinding speed. After the flames finished their course, a burning outline was displayed before the agents.

"Haven't tried that trick in ages," Smith said as he stood, taking several steps back. Fagan simply scratched his head in confusion.

"It made the number eight," Chester commented, turning his neck to the side in an attempt to get a better look at the pattern.

"A repeating ouroborus," Smith corrected, "the marker of an infinity spell. Essentially, the killer wanted to make any resurrecting of the victim to be impossible. If he came back to life, through either scientific or supernatural means, he'd instantly burst into flames again. Death after death after death...ad infinitum."

An uncomfortable silence hung in the air for several moments after Smith's revelation, with both men light new cigarettes to help deal with the situation. "So," Fagan started, finally breaking the silence, "guess I was right...guy wasn't fuckin' around a bit..."

He'd gone through a whole notebook of paper, and still he continued to draw. The pencil gripped tightly in his hand, he moved it across the paper in a continuing motion of swirls that covered the white space with the dark impression of lead. "It's a pattern loop," he muttered, speaking to no one, "fueled by the souls of the damned. The loop cannot be broken. Severing it will result in chaos, infinity unraveling at the seams. They cannot stop it." He paused. "I am perpetual."

Hunched over the table, with only a single light-bulb providing illumination in the dark, dingy environment, the Ouroborus was manic. "It never ends," he said as he finished another sheet of symbols, immediately reaching for the next blank piece of paper, "I won't let it..."