Captain Courage Vs a Band of Misfits PV Closed

The boys looked really really ridiculous. She was not entirely sure how the preppy one carried all of those pillows onto the inflatable giraffe that he rode to the floating dock. She tried to stifle a laugh but it was incredibly difficult, her expression shadowed at least by her hood a thin smile emerged that she fought to keep at bay. The weird other one had smeared some mud on his face that was likely already dried and likely cracking coupled with his inventive use of belts and socks. If nothing else, these two got A's for theatrics. 

She would help them onto the dock if they needed it, liberating the tired, slightly sagging giraffe raft they rode in. Try to save some of his pillows, even if they were soggy that just added some extra heft when the boy hurled them at Hugh. It might even be more effective than the bucket of water balloons she had prepped to slow him down. Once on the dock, it would be obvious that the figure in the chair was nothing more than an effigy.  Just some bright, feminine clothes that she of course stole from one of her roommates drawers, everything she owned had a peculiar and signature appearance.  

Jurgen seemed to get the idea, chuck the rock back at the shore so that Galton could retrieve the rope and pull the vessel to the water's edge. With a pull of the rope the tired giraffe would scrape the bottom of the lake. Galton would hop onto the giraffe and pull himself to the dock. It was not a large space to share, the size of a small bedroom maybe. Once Galton crawled onto the platform Erin would find the rope and retrieve the anchor stone and then chuck the stone further into the lake away from shore. Indeed, Hugh was not going to ride an inflatable giraffe as he gallantly came to save this dummy figure of some random nondescript girl, an astonishingly accurate description of his actual girlfriend.

Erin had some difficulty finding words when he got a closer look at both of them. This was a terrible plan. Even more terrible than her usual plan of using her actual fists to pummel someone. That was usually effective, she was physically stronger than most boys her age and size. Hugh was an exception, she presumed he was years older, not younger and he was significantly larger. Little did she know that he was younger and probably not significantly stronger than her if he was stronger than her at all, he was just heavier. "You uh... look... uh..." she needed to think of the right word for this now. "Terrifying?" Her voice inflected slightly higher at the end, she was lying, not that lies bothered her because they usually came so naturally but nothing was easy, not since the crones. 

"OK," she needed to focus here. "When Lowe, I mean Hugh... I mean uh Captain Courage gets here," she really could not come up with a cornier name. "We tell him we got his girlfriend and that she will get dumped in the lake if he does not give us what he wants... information about our evil allies who have gone missing." Yeah, she was bullshitting a meta parallel here, "We want to know what prison they are in so that we can break the rest of them out." 

Erin was a rather sane young woman for the most part. She just had a singular delusion, it was not grounded in pure fantasy, she was just wrong. Dead wrong. She believed that students were disappearing. She was not wrong, they actually were. She believed that the Professors and Prefects were aware. They did not seem to be, but that was more a reflection of benign neglect and indifferent rather than malevolent intentions and actions on their part. She however believed that they not only knew but potentially participated in the circumstances that surrounded the disappearances of many of her peers. She had tried to alert people, but nobody listed. Hugh was a stand out of course, not because he was a big guy, that was more an after thought really. He stood out because he just ignored what she said, rambled on about being a knight making no sense. 

It was him, he was the bad guy!

Most of his pillows were soaked. It made them especially heavy to try and lift. With a mighty heave because super villains are strong and need no help from women, Jürgen lifted the sum of soggy pillows, some of the ink drawn hearts ran a bit but the idea was still there, onto the platform. Jürgen rolled onto the platform and returned the stone to Dirt Danger's shore and waited for his newest friend to paddle to their secret villain hide out. 

Erin explained the plan, seemed pretty much flawless. "I will slow him down with my love bombs," Jürgen announced with some pride in the fact that he had developed a signature weapon -- an armful of pillows stolen liberated from the boy's dorm. He found one of the dry pillows, the heart he drew on its face still intact. 

"But what do we do once he gets into our super secret base?" He already knew, he would have to fight the giant super hero. He tested his pillows. the wet ones were a bit heavy, they would hurt too much. He would pick up each of the soggy pillows and hold it against his chest and give it a good squeeze to evacuate the water. The pillows looked small, thin and sad, still moist and burdened with water but they were lighter. He did not want to hurt the big guy, just win.

He turned to Galton "-- want some of my love bombs or some of her..." what sort of evil devices are those? "Her evil throwy things?" He was really bad with names but he was not going to let his ally in evil take on the hero unarmed. He might be a bad guy but he was not a bad guy.

Hugh--

I know you know more than you claimed. I will get what I want to know from you. I kidnapped your girlfriend. You can find us by the lake. I will be waiting.

The dark and murky green eyes darted across the paper once mpre as his brow furrowed itself in confusion. Who the bloody hell wrote this? And who was meant to be "his girlfriend"? Ana had no clue either as she had been standing right next to him when he received the letter. In fact she had become quite irritated at the note the moment she had skimmed it over. With a rather red head she had gone through an entire littany of how it must have been Aurelia again setting her up. The girl's reaction had caused Hugh to smile a little, for which he received a well-deserved punch to the arm.

Nevertheless true to his knighthood, he had begun to make his way to the lake. Perhaps they meant Nico or someone like that. Hugh did not have that many friends. And no official girlfriend.. His mind had no trouble fidning its way back to Ana at the mental note of a having a girlfriend. Causing the boy to turn a little red on the cheeks as he braved the gradual descent towards the lake.

What he would come to face was not near anything he would have expected. Three wackos floating in the middle of the surface dressed in what seemed a whole other outfit than anyone's regular school uniform. Was that a person strapped to a chair? He could have sworn to recognise the candy kid over there, no clue who the slender other dude was and the third figure was cloaked. He eyed the note one more time before speaking up.

"Uhm... Oi! You three nugheads! Did you send me this?" He waved the piece of paper around to see if they'd react to it. He had no clue what kind of a bizarre adventure these three- four? Students were on to, but he guessed they were having some fun?

As Galton waited for their pray to enter the scene his mind was filled with images of what lurked down bellow. The dark blue water seemed to hypnotize the boy, causing his mind to wade through depths, alone and unprotected. It was almost a siren song, calling him into the water, yet he knew it would be a fatal time, if he truly tried to answer the song.

His party mates voices were drowned out by his fixation on the water. The weight of his costume quickly became apparent to him. How much would these leather belts drag him under? Why was Dirt Danger currently surrounded by water? Seemed like the last place you'd guess the villain to be found.

And then, like that, the depth ceased it's call, it seemed another, more familiar voice was calling to him. It was Hugh, or Captain Courage as he was currently in this game, yelling towards the dastardly bunch. He was happy he had finally come, the game would be over soon, and he could get his feet onto some actual solid footing.

Galton called out "HEY! Hug- I mean Captain Courage! How are you? Ready to play?!" He screamed at the top of his lungs. Then he broke out into a maniacally laugh. "MWAHAHAHAHAH! YOU FOOL! WE HAVE YOUR BELOVED GIRLFRIEND HERE!" He pointed to the dummy tied to a chair. He was impressed with how evil he sounded, he was truly getting into the spirit it seemed.

Hugh was finally there, she could tell because he towered over the other students, even those in their senior year. Big guys have their size, weight and relative strength to their advantage. Erin was abnormally strong, it was nothing supernatural, rather the product of actual effort but she well-knew that her strength would be if it was not already eclipsed by the former Prefect in no time. It was a logical truth that she would have to come to terms with. She was playing it safe with him, Lowe was somehow associated with those student disappearances. There was this prideful part of her that thought she could take him down independently, she was a practiced brawler. However, there was a logical portion of her great simian brain that concluded that victory was less than assured on someone that was nearly twice her size. Perhaps not in height, but she weighed 101 pounds (46 kg) and Hugh... unless he developed an eating disorder, was never going to see that weight again in his lifetime. 

It was a strange, the baby-faced (look at his avatar) giant (look at his race) that had become Erin's temporary nemesis. They had only had one conversation, if one would consider a brief exchange of words in the abandoned bathroom as a 'conversation.' It was during that interaction that she decided he was if not in on the disappearances, he was complacent. 

"Uhm... Oi! You three nugheads! Did you send me this?"

He waved about a bit of paper. Message delivered. The only thing that moved faster than the speed of light was gossip.

"HEY! Hug- I mean Captain Courage! How are you? Ready to play?!" 

...and the only thing more vast and limitless than the universe was human stupidity as Galton just demonstrated. Erin slapped herself in the forehead with the palm of her hand. "Stay in character at least," Erin hissed.

"MWAHAHAHAHAH! YOU FOOL! WE HAVE YOUR BELOVED GIRLFRIEND HERE!"

Better. She internally cringed all the same. 

"-- want some of my love bombs or some of her..." 

The other idiot called out.

 "Her evil throwy things?

Death might have been kinder for her. "Yeah, face us Hugh," Erin agreed with lacking enthusiasm in her voice. He did not seem to be believing any of this, shame because it would have been a more exciting, predictable scenario. Well, onto plan B. "Or disappoint your nemesis's." Guilt was likely not going to work on Hugh, she just needed a segue.

The short, weird one (as opposed to the other short weird one) seemed to know Hugh. Looked like she had a victim readied for her. With an open palm she would push Hess and try to knock him into the water. If she was successful, she would attempt to grab Galton from behind. "Face me or your friend gets it!" Hugh might not know Erin but undoubtedly he knew of her. Erin was not one to bullshit.