Rodney Carlson was an average, unassuming microbiologist studying whipworm when, as a result of a co-worker's careless mistake, the specimen Rodney was studying inexplicably turned radioactive and jumped into his eye in a really gross chain of events that you kind of had to be there to see, but trust me, it was totally gross. Anyway, it made him into a hero who uses a parasite-like ability to feed and survive on a host. With these powers, he contributes nothing to the host's survival and hopes to one day fight crime as the STUPENDOUS CAPTAIN PARASITE!
"Rod...I just...I can't do that. I'll lose my job, man. I mean, I'm barely hanging by a thread here now."
To be perfectly honest about it, Andy Putnam hadn't seen his old friend Rod Carlson since high school. And, well, this wasn't the best time for him to show back up.
Andy had lost his job as a security guard at Cantwell Chemical three months ago after he had naively given several barrels of nitroglycerin to an Arab man who showed up at the front gate.
As it turned out, the man he gave the barrels to was indeed the courier who had been hired to take the barrels over to Method Labs for experimental use on a set of Hispanic immigrants, but, I mean, the guy was an Arab. So... I mean...
Anyway, in the aftermath, Andy had hit some more road bumps – his girlfriend left him for a lawyer (a family services lawyer, but a lawyer is a lawyer), his dog had gotten hit by a UPS truck that someone had genuinely hired to run over his dog, and his parents told him that he was somehow half gopher.
It had been a tough few months.
So now, here was Rod, making trouble at his new job. Frankly, he didn't remember Rod being this way at all. He just...wouldn't stop.
"Look, man -- I just -- I can't give away any free Cinnabons, okay?"
Andy was trying to be assertive without being a dick.
"One day I ate a bunch of these that had been sitting out for a while and they docked the price out of my pay. These guys here are not cool, alright?”
Rod made an effort go with the strongest argument he could muster.
"Dude."
Little known to Andy, Rod had actually been living in the mall for about three weeks now. Rod spent most of his evenings hiding in a trash can until the security guards went home for the night. Then he would sneak behind the Chick-Fil-A counter and sleep for a few hours until the fat girl who always opened the place showed up about 20 minutes late.
He subsisted on the nugget pieces he could fish out of the top of the trash cans and pieces of waffle fry he could get children to give him out of their kids' meals. His bargaining strategy: Offer the kid a quarter and a Hot Wheels car from the dollar store if he can have the fries. Then, eat the fries in one gulp before the child could answer. Finally, slyly don't give the kid anything and crawl away.
During the day, Rod would spend a lot of his time rubbing against towels in the Sears housewares department, wallowing in the moisture of the mall fountain and trying to steal the shoes off people walking by in mid-stride. He also tried to sit in a tray full of Schezwan chicken at the Angry Wok once, claiming that he was trying to reproduce asexually. He was quickly banned from the restaurant, where a picture of him remains behind the counter to this day.
Rod pressed his point to Andy.
"Dude, come on."
Andy kind of felt bad for the guy. They hadn't really been great friends in high school, but they used to joke around sometimes, talk about class, that kind of thing. And Rod had stood up for him that one time that everyone thought that Andy had bitten off Chrissy Hyman's finger in Mr. Pauca's physics class.
It was just one Cinnabon, right? It couldn't hurt that much.
"Well, Rod...I guess it couldn't – Hey, what are you wearing?"
Rod looked down for a second like he had forgotten what he had put on some four months ago.
"Oh. That's my superhero costume."
Andy was confused.
"Wha – Superhero costume? Are...are you okay, Rod?"
Rod took offense.
"Am I okay? Am I okay? I'm better than okay, Mr. Cinnabon Team Member Andy Putwell,” Rod said, frustrated. "I'm Captain Parasite, pal. Crime fighter."
"It's Putnam," Andy corrected.
"What?" Rod asked, completely thrown off his train of thought. "What's Putnam?"
"Nothing. So...you fight crime, then? You...uh...you don't seem to be fighting crime now."
"Well, I would be if I had a motherfucking Cinnabon!" Rod exclaimed so that Andy's manager, the a-little-too-aptly-named Mr. Kareem E. Frosting, could hear.
"Okay, okay," Andy decided that he'd better concede. He handed over the pastry. "Here. Just...just go somewhere else now. Please."
Rod eyed the Cinnabon like it was a gold brick. With it seemingly having met his approval, he turned his scrutiny toward Andy, who was frantically shooting glances back and forth between the front counter the back room. He knew it was only going to be seconds before Mr. Frosting came out to fire his ass and, like, make him dip his genitals in a big vat of those godawful frozen drinks or something equally horrific.
Finally, after what seemed like years, Rod nodded his head and turned to go.
"Okay. See you around, Andy."
Andy breathed a sigh of relief. But the respite didn't last for long. He turned slowly to see Mr. Frosting standing directly behind him, towering, with a tub full of Chillata. He motioned for Andy to unzip.
Andy gulped.
Rod sat on one of the benches underneath the big mall skylight, chomping on his Cinnabon and trying to slowly move closer to the elderly woman sitting next to him so he could siphon off some of her body heat.
He thought aloud.
"Well, what's next for the unstoppable Captain Parasite? Hmmm. Hey! I bet the mattress store'll let me sleep there for, like an hour if I tell them I have Lou Gehrig's disease or something."
This was truly a great plan.
"Score!"
And so began another adventure.
