EB stood before a large whiteboard inside the factory that made his world-famous Easter eggs. He tapped at his furry cheek with one of his multi-colored dry erase pens. “I need to make something extra special this year. Caramel, peanut butter, and malted milk are delicious, but they aren’t exciting enough. I need a flavor that makes everyone scream ‘WOW’ when they bite into it.”
He tipped his head nervously to one side, glancing at a cardboard cut-out of Director Nova placed as if standing on the opposite side of a long steel table. “Yes, I know if they scream when they bite into it, they’re going to spit out the candy in their mouth out all over the place. That’s why I make my eggs big enough for several bites. Now, keep quiet unless you have an idea for a new flavor. Now, where was I?”
“NO, Chase,” EB suddenly turned his head to a second cut-out, this one of Chase. She was suggestively sitting in a chair next to an office desk, her pose nearly identical to a cross-legged Sharron Stone in Basic Instinct. “I haven’t had too much coffee, thank you very much. The two of you don’t understand the pressure I am under thanks to the Nestle and the Cadbury companies. They’re nipping at my heels, always trying to steal my brand identity. You don’t get that I have to stay the best in the business. I’m the Easter Bunny because everyone LOVES the Easter Bunny. If I lose that public opinion…”
The cardboard cut-outs remained silent, which seemed to ease EB’s mind. “OK. Now you understand. Thank you!”
Turning back to the whiteboard, EB used the pen in his hand to scribble down a few unintelligible symbols. “I’ve lost my train of thought. I didn’t want to have to fall back on this, but I guess I have no choice.”
EB hopped over to a cabinet and pulled it away from the wall, revealing a hidden electronic panel. After entering in few numbers, a loud pop echoed in the room as the wall retracted and slid into a hidden cubby. A bright light shown down from inside the hidden chamber and struck a large white case with a bold red circle bisected by an equally red line drawn through it. “I know it’s supposed to be off limits, using stuff we brought from back home here, but all the others but Santa have left Earth, and he’s too busy to know if I’m being bad or good? It’s not like other Mythics ever made it onto that list of his…”
Pulling out the case into the main part of the room, EB then opened it. A ghastly green light highlighted EB’s white fur and bloodshot eyes, which grew wider and crazier the more the container opened.
“Oh, yes. This will do. This will do very nicely. Very nicely, indeed. My eggs will become more sought after than ever. They will be--,” EB licked his lips, revealing a row of tiny sharp teeth behind his two large overgrown ones that typically showed from his mouth,” -- most marvelous…”
MM00MM00MM00MM “You’ve gotten a package,” Mom shouted up the stairway to my bedroom.
“I’ll be down in a second,” I shouted back to her. Shouting was ok as long as it didn’t involve physical fighting or harsh words in our household. If either of those two rules were broken, then our home wasn’t anywhere you wanted to be. It didn’t happen often, especially the fighting part, but tempers did occasionally flare up, most recently after the events in Pretoria. Mom and I butted heads more than once over my recent activities as a BADGE operative, even if it was only as a probationary member.
“Don’t take too long,” she replied. “I don’t think it will last long once your father sees it.”
I looked up from my homework, my curiosity piqued. Why would Dad have any interest in one of my packages? I’d ordered some stuff online recently, but nothing out of the ordinary. As long as I wasn’t ordering plutonium or HGH, my parents were cool with me having privacy about buying things. “Who is it from?”
“Come find out for yourself if you want to know,” Mom said, her voice fading as she must have been moving away from the landing of the staircase. “I think someone has a secret admirer.”
I closed my history textbook, tugged at my Cyndi Lauper t-shirt to straighten it after I stood up, and headed downstairs. I’d sort of started listening to classic 80s rock and loved Cyndi’s vibe. If there were ever a Madam Marvelous cartoon, I’d hope that Girls Just Want to Have Fun would be its theme song.
Racing down the stairs, my footfalls like a stampede of elephants without me having to shapeshift, I searched the archways into the living room and kitchen for my parents. I didn’t see either of them, so I glanced down the hallway behind me that lead deeper into the house and saw that they were actually outside the patio door in the back yard. I hurried to the door to join them.
“It’s nice out, isn’t it Kitt’n,” Dad said as he stretched in the mid-day sunlight. “How’s the homework going? Studying anything interesting?”
I closed the door behind me as I stepped out on our homes small wooden deck. “Not really. The world before superheroes was kinda dull.”
“Just because people couldn’t fly or shoot lasers out of their eyes doesn’t mean the world didn’t have its dangers,” Dad said as he bit into a large chocolate egg wrapped in gold foil. “This is so good. Why didn’t we have candy like this when I was a kid?”
Mom nodded as she licked the edge of her mouth free of the egg’s filling that had clung to her upper lip. “It’s delicious. I can’t quite make out the flavor, though? Is it hazelnut?”
“Where’s my package?” I asked, not seeing it anywhere nearby.
“We hid it,” Dad said after taking another bite. “Your mom and I were talking, and we realized you’ve never been on an Easter Egg hunt. We thought it would be fun for you.
“So, you hid my package in the back yard? What’s the point of that? I’ll just change into a hound dog and follow your scent.”
“No,” Mom said while shaking her head. “No powers. Do it like an average kid. Use your eyes. I remember having so much fun doing these as a kid.”
“Where did the chocolate come from?” I asked while stepping to the edge of the patio, trying to see where they hid the egg. “You said the package was for me.”
“There were three of them, one addressed to each of us,” Dad replied as he licked his fingertips, his egg gone from sight. “I think everyone in the neighborhood got some. They were in special white baskets at the front doors of all the neighbors.”
I could see EB being generous enough to give eggs away to everyone. Santa may get the credit for middle-of-the-night deliveries all around the world, but the Easter Bunny did more than his fair share by giving out sweet confections to all, and he didn’t use a checklist, either. All kids got stuff from him, not just the good ones. He could be a lot to handle, but his enthusiastic heart was always in the right place. As much as my parents were enjoying their eggs, I couldn’t help but be eager to find mine. I walked down the three steps from the patio to the lawn and began searching.
The next few minutes was a combination of my parents taunting me with “You’re getting colder” or “Ohhh, getting warmer”. They were taking a particular delight at making me go this way and that across our backyard. I humored them a bit by running around aimlessly for a bit, but my curiosity about the taste of the delicious holiday treat grew. Would it be raspberry cream? Almond milk? Dragon fruit?
Finally, I spotted a glint of gold inside the hole of an unused birdfeeder. I ran over as my parents cheered and claimed my prize. I pulled out the egg and read the message printed on the wrapper.
The One – The Only – Easter Egg of Many Colors
I ripped off the foil and exposed an egg that looked like no other. The chocolate was so dark in hue that it began to faintly swirl with the colors of a rainbow on the surface of the egg, kind of like the way light catches in spilled oil on driveway. An aroma of sweet chocolate kissed by roses filled my nostrils, making my mouth instantaneously water. I bit into the egg with just enough pressure to crack the shell, wanting to taste the chocolate casing first before diving into the creamy filling waiting inside.
It was indescribably delicious. Sweet but mildly bitter with dark chocolate and espresso, with a hint of mint. I closed my eyes and savored the flavors.
“How do you like it so far?” an excited voice asked. EB’s voice. What was he doing in my back yard?
My eyes snapping open, I searched the back yard for him. I had a secret identity and a family to protect. He couldn’t be seen here. But there he was, standing plain as day before me with an eager look in his black eyes and his paws crossed one over the other with anticipation. “EB. You can’t be here. This isn’t—”
“Oh, don’t worry, Madam Marvelous,” he said as I cringed. EB’s inability to keep his mouth shut was well known. “Only you can see me. I’m not really here. Well, I am, in a way, but my body isn’t.”
“Who are you talking to?” Mom asked from the patio deck.
I looked over at her. She didn’t seem to even notice the oversized rabbit standing on his hind legs next to me. “Can’t you see him?”
“See who?” Mom asked, her head perking in that way only a mother’s can when they get the impression something might be wrong.
“I’m only in your head, silly. I’m a neural clone of myself,” EB said, waving at my parents on the patio while hopping up and down repeatedly. “See. I don’t exist to them. Only you. I’m your new sidekick.”
“The Easter Bunny.” I held up my egg to show her that I’d found it. Last thing I needed was for her to know I had something talking to me inside my brain. “I was telling him thank you for the gift.”
“It’s good, isn’t it.” She smiled, her attentive edge dulling a bit. “Where does he come up with those flavors. I swear I could taste bacon in mine.”
“I’m going to go for a walk now that I’m outside. OK?”
“Sure, dinner isn’t for a few more hours, sweetie,” she said as she stepped beside my dad and slipped herself under his waiting arm. “I’m going to see if I can talk this guy into getting the grill going.”
I waved at them, as did EB, and headed out the gate into our front yard. Several flowering trees scented the air, most strongly a deep purple lilac tree that grew beneath my parent’s bedroom window. “OK. You put something in my egg that makes me hallucinate you?”
“No!” EB looked shocked. “I used some specially created nanites to upload my personality into your brain. Don’t worry. The nanites are bio-degradable and will leave nothing in your body to worry about.”
“Except you,” I said. “Why me?”
“I didn’t do it for just you. I did it for all heroes. You all work so hard, I thought you could each use a special friend to help support and cheer you on. Like I do for Director Nova. Then I realized nobody could be a better friend to each of you than me, so viola!”
Being friends with several telepaths, I knew I could talk ‘in my head’ with my new companion without moving my lips. I headed south toward a special alley I knew I could use and be unobserved by my neighbors. “Don’t you think you should have asked or warned us first before uploading yourself into our heads?”
“Why?” EB hopped alongside of me, sniffing at my neighbor’s tulips as we passed them. “You would think a flower named tulips would be more attractive. I mean, you know, two lips are made for kissing.” He started to laugh heartily at his own joke.
“You’ve been hanging around Quark, haven’t you?”
“What makes you say that?” My mental EB looked at me with a look of complete innocence on his furry face.
I made it into the tiny alleyway a couple of houses down from my parents and pulled out my BADGE communicator, calling one of the few people I thought might know how to help me. “Ms. Fae? Hello, are you there?”
“
Yes,” she replied. “
Let me guess. You got a special delivery today.”
“Yeah,” I said, certain I was hearing frustration in her voice.
“Are you talking to Krystal?” EB asked. “HI KRYSTAL!!!”
I winced. Apparently, neural clones shouting in your ear sounds just like a real person doing it. “Hey. I thought you said nobody else could hear you.”
“Well, Krystal’s special. I thought she might be able to since she is all smart and mental,” EB said. “You know she’s pregnant, right? I can’t wait to shower her baby with all sorts of candy. I know all the best candies to give babies. Ask her how she liked my special egg.”
“
I’m aware of the situation,” Ms. Fae said from her end of the line. “
Just about every hero has been calling either me or Director Nova. EB, of course, isn’t answering his comms unit.”
“Do you think something happened to him,” I asked.
“
Something’s about to happen to him once I get ahold of him,” Ms. Fae said with agitation. “
NO, EB, I’m not going to ask her over for tea and no, I’m not going to ask her how she liked your special egg.”
I stifled a laugh, hearing that. Apparently, no matter who’s head EB was inside of, he still had a one-track mind. “He wanted to know the same of you.”
“
I swear, if my daughter’s terrible twos are anything like having EB constantly in my ear…” Ms. Fae said, her voice trailing off. “
I’ve got to start figuring out how to get this neural clone under control before every hero goes mad. I’ll let you know when I find something out.”
I leaned my back against a slat of a fence beside a large dumpster in the alley. Frequently, I used this spot to change into different animals so I could leave the neighborhood unobserved, but today it made for a nice hideaway.
“You don’t need to hide from me,” EB said as his mental image chased after a butterfly in the spring air. “I’m your new forever friend. I’ll never leave you. I’m like dousing your life in awesomesauce.”
“Gee, thanks,” I said. “Is there any way I can turn you off if I want some privacy, like if I have to go to the bathroom?”
“Of course not. I’ll be right there next to you, holding your hand to make sure you don’t strain anything. You know, over a quarter-million accidents happen on the toilet every year.” EB squatted before me as he groomed himself.
A panicked scream came from one of my neighbor’s yards. I bolted up and rushed around the corner of the fence to see what happened. Mrs. Corker stood in her sundress just outside her front door, her skin as blue as, well, a blueberry. Her husband followed her out of the house, his flesh a bright, pastel yellow. Each of them had one of EB’s Easter eggs in their hands.
“Oh, that wasn’t supposed to happen. I must have used a little bit too much pigmentium,” EB said from beside me. “It’s what I used to give my eggs such vibrant colors.”
“Will it hurt them?” I asked, my eyes glued to the shifting colors on my neighbor’s bodies. Patterns of swirls and striped moved in kaleidoscopes of colors across their arms, legs, and faces.
“Purely decorational,” EB said, but the panic on Mr. Corker’s face left me thinking EB might be wrong. “They’ll be like living mood rings for the next few days. Maybe a month or two at the most.”
I used the camera on my phone to send Ms. Fae this new information. BADGE was going to have its hands full if this happened to many others. “Oh, my goodness. What about Mom and Dad?”
“You’re Mom would look great in peach,” EB commented as I raced home.
MM00MM00MM00MMLater that evening, I settled into my bed, ready for sleep. My parents reacted fairly calmly to the bright colors that swept over their skin after I told them what had happened. Mom even got pretty good at controlling the shifts and choosing her patterns. As I went to my bedroom, I even overheard her commenting to my father about something about making herself look like an Orion dancer from Star Trek for him. It must have been a character from the original series, so I didn’t know what she meant by the comment, but my father seemed to like the idea.
EB talked incessantly all evening, but I could filter him out while talking with my parents at the dinner table. As I ate my slice of Easter ham, he commented on different recipes for glazes she could have used that would have tasted better. Later on, as we watched TV together, all he could talk about was how he could have been a Hollywood star like Arx with his own line of Easter Bunny themed movies.
I turned out my light, ready to get some sleep, as EB sat on the chair at my desk next to the bed. “
Go to sleep, go to sleep, little hero. Close your eyes, have sweet dreams, there are villains to fight tomorrow, but for now you need rest. Go to sleep—” “I’m trying to, but your singing isn’t helping.” I said, hitting my pillow enough to make a large dent in it so I could bury my face in it and block my view of him. Once all I could see what blackness, he appeared as if walking onto the stage of my mind’s eye.
“What am I supposed to do while you’re asleep? Do you want me to just sit her and do NOTHING? That’s no fun.”
“Play hopscotch. Dance. Do whatever,” I’d fallen asleep to the TV several times, so I knew I could block EB out enough to sleep, as long as he was quiet about what he was doing. “Just keep the talking down to a minimum.”
“You got it partner,” EB said. He took a deep breath and sat down in a yoga-like pose. “Get your rest. You’ve got a big day tomorrow. And the day after that. And the day after that. And the day after that—”
“EB!”
“Commencing project, Keep Quiet, in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 ½, 1 ¼, 1 1/8…”
11PM “So, Santa and I and the other Mythics really liked being on Earth, but your people were all so silly back then. They used to use pig’s stomachs as balls to play this game called…”
2AM “You know, as a shapeshifter, you can look like anything, right? Can you make yourself look like Chase? That would be, like, so totally cool. She’s my friend, but I’d like to be friends with benefits with her, if you know what I mean…”
3AM “You know, I bet if you dreamed about Chase right now, I could interact with her. Could you do that for me? Put the two of us in the tropics, somewhere in the Caribbean, maybe…”
4AM “So, when you have the chocolate over the double boiler melted to a milky-smooth consistency, you want to add your sugar and rosewater…
5AM “If you did dream of Chase, could you make her a little bit bigger in some areas. No, no, she IS perfect, but you can still polish a diamond, right. There’s nothing wrong with improving something when you both can enjoy it…”
6AM “Rabbits have this notoriety to them for rapidly reproducing. That’s the one thing I don’t get. I’ve been a rabbit for centuries now and I’ve never gotten the tail—”
“
SHUT UP!! I ONLY LOOK like an adult when I’m Madam Marvelous. I’m still a little girl in real life! My gosh, I don’t want to hear about that!!!”
MM00MM00MM00MMThe next day, just before school started, Eggie, my electric grandmother/bodyguard from BADGE was at the front door. She wore her traditional Mrs. Doubtfire outfit, woolen gray skirt, lavender sweater with an amethyst broach, white frilly shirt, but she carried an old-fashioned black doctor’s bag. “Hello, poppets. I’m here with the cure.”
“Hi, Eggie,” I said as I rubbed my eyes. I don’t remember sleeping one wink last night, as EB talked CONSTANTLY the entire night. “Did Ms. Fae send you?”
“Why yes she did dearie,” Eggie said as she walked in. I closed the door behind her and together we met my parents in the kitchen. My father, a rosy-pink hue, had and unusually satisfied look on his face, like the proverbial cat having eaten the canary. “Good MORNING, family.”
“What is it I heard you say about a cure? Changing colors is fun and all, but I can’t go to work like this,” Mom said, her skin a sky blue this morning.
“I like it.” Dad said with a wide smile. “Smurfette, can I have more coffee? It would be just Smurfy if you could.”
Mom rolled her eyes at him but kept a warm smile on her face as she swatted at him with the kitchen towel. “I hear things have been pretty chaotic with all this. Hospitals getting all sorts of people coming in thinking they are jaundiced. The news says that several heroes have checked themselves into psychiatric wards, fearing they might harm themselves.”
“Why would heroes be doing that?” EB said with shock in his voice. “I’m there helping them. Something must be attacking their minds. You better call Director Nova and warm him. Tell him I’m here to help him. I wonder if he ate my egg this time? He say’s he doesn’t like sweets, but I just haven’t found the right one yet. Maybe one with prunes.”
I continued to ignore my mental sidekick. “Can I get that cure please? What is it?”
Eggie opened her bag and brought out a small vial and some syringes. “It turns out that an old remedy works quite well to clear out the nanites EB used as well as the pigmentium. It’s called penicillin.”
