Work Text:
He couldn’t understand why.
First it was the broken, smashed-up printer that had been left at the scene of the incident. The following day, it was a pair of trashed high heels and what appeared to be flip-flops. A few days later, it was a half-working iPhone, and a smashed iPad! All aforementioned items were included with a puddle of what appeared to be grade-A mayonnaise at each of the scenes of the ‘crime’.
“Just what’s up with this guy? Leaving random bits of broken, every day, useless junk all over the place…” the Cola Crusader muttered as he helped round up the latest batch of “goons” that his arch nemesis, the infamous Major Mayonnaise, had sent his way (yet again). Ever since said ‘Major’ had arrived in the city several months prior, it had been nothing but pile after pile of the sticky condiment being left wherever they’d clash.
Now it had progressed to leaving strange tokens with the goons that came after the Cola Crusader, he knew that their normally-amusing spat (which the media loved to cover) had gone to the ridiculous extremes. He could only sigh, before pressing a finger to the earpiece and then contacting the headquarters. “I’m coming in for a report, wait for me to get there,” before spreading his wings and flying off from the scene as the police drove away.
“You took your time arriving, A—Cola,” a slightly smaller individual addressed the other as he came in for a flashy two-point landing at the top of their headquarters. “Everyone’s waiting for your arrival, you know.”
“Well, Mat—Maple, I’m sorry I took a while getting here, I had to help the cops herd the idiots in… and…this time it’s a jar of Nutella…” he explained as he touched down and willed his wings to recede into his back where they were perfectly hidden, out of sight. “I honestly don’t know what these useless junk items are all about, though…” he grumbled as he followed the Maple Defender down from the roof deck and down into one of the meeting rooms in the Supers’ headquarters.
“You’re late, you sod, you sure took your bloody time,” a decidedly British voice snapped at the last arrival, who entered slightly behind the other. “What happened now?”
“W—ell, this time Major Mayonnaise left a jar of Nutella along with the goons I beat up this time. I don’t know why he loves doing this. I mean, there’s Maple and the others to bother! But why is it me?” he grumbled as he sighed, before sitting down at his spot around the meeting table. Satisfied that everyone else was present, the owner of the British voice then slammed both his hands on the table, effectively bringing all the chattering to a halt.
“Alright, so, after Cola’s belated arrival… we’ve got to discuss the matter of Major Mayonnaise and his underlings getting out of hand. Yet again,” he growled, before rubbing his hands against his temples, relieving the building ache that was forming. “Where he’s getting the goons to send after us, and especially Cola here, I have no idea. But we have to figure out why he’s targeting just Cola, out of everyone here,” he ended with a serious look on his face.
“Seriously, Hatter, even I’m starting to wonder if Mayonnaise-man over here has beef against me. I mean, I’d know him from somewhere if he was familiar, but… well, me and Maple only arrived here half a year ago. So, I don’t know why he’s focusing on me, of all people,” Cola grumbled as he rested his head in his arms while looking at the rest of the occupants at the table.
“Maybe one of us can keep an eye on Cola while he’s at his day job? You know, see if anything’s out of the ordinary?” came the suggestion from Captain Croissant, who as always was chewing on a piece of crescent-shaped bread slathered with butter. “What do you think, Hatter?” he asked the other, who was in the middle of trying to come up with a decent plan.
“You lecherous bread-inhaling amphibian of a twat, you know that the very first rule we have to follow is that we have to keep our super identities a secret! You of all people should know this!” the Hatter Scone all but yelled, stubborn accent coming out even more.
“What? It is merely a suggestion, and since Cola and Maple do not work for the same company, it would help if another one of us could serve as a second pair of eyes… am I right, or am I right?” the other gloated, and while the two dissolved into their usual argument, Cola gave Maple a knowing look.
“You know, b—Maple, I’ll be fine… I’ll try to get this myself…” he muttered, before rolling his eyes at the two who were squabbling loud enough for everyone to hear. It was no secret that Hatter and Croissant had their hands all over each other—at least between the supers assembled in the room. The brothers then sighed, before trying to call order to the room again.
“Now—now, if everyone would pay attention, please!” Maple began, slamming his own hands down on the table. Normally while he was soft-spoken and completely unassuming, he had quite the temper when driven far enough. “Now that we’re quite done arguing… I’m rather certain that Cola here can handle himself just fine. Even if he does have the tendency to be flashy, am I right?” he began, managing to restore some semblance of order to the meeting.
“Alright, so the best thing we can think of… keep your eyes and ears open, Cola. If you see anything strange, inform us right away so we can swoop in and help, okay?” he said to the other, who’d somehow procured a can of soda and had cracked it open with just one finger (and was presently guzzling the damned thing dry of its fizzy content). “Cola! are you even listening to me?!” Maple snapped, and the other had very nearly emptied the can of soda down his front.
“Yeah, yeah, I heard you loud and clear, Maple. Don’t be such a worrywart, I’m a big boy now, I know how to take care of myself,” he retorted with a bit of an irritated lilt before rolling his eyes at the other. “I got this. Let you all know when anything fishy comes up. Now, are we done?”
Superheroes, just like supervillains, had day jobs and secret identities too. Cola’s day job had him as a comedian, and while his own brand of humor was on the rather…idiotic side of things, he knew that making people laugh was just as important as stopping crime.
“…so, I said to my buddy Joe, ‘yo mama so fat, she stepped on a rainbow and made Skittles!’ and he was like, ‘oh hell no, man, ‘yo mama so fat when she wore a yellow raincoat, people yelled ‘Taxi!’ when they saw her’ and then I was like, ‘no, no, no man, yo mama so fat she puts lipstick on with a paint roller!’. So of course, you can imagine what kind of creative… well, good-mannered insults we come up with whenever me an’ Joe meet up and grumble over our lives,” he ended to a round of raucous laughter before bowing as he ended his act.
As he stood up, he quickly scanned the members of the audience, and his heart jumped a little as he saw the snowy-haired male with deep-purple eyes among the crowd, looking at him with this unreadable expression on his face. He couldn’t help but blush slightly at the other man’s presence before he left the stage to make way for the next act—why had that snowy-haired man showed up at every single one of his shows ever since he started his job as a stand-up comedian a few weeks ago?
Come to think of it, those weird piles of junk also started appearing around the same time I started… but nah, that can’t be. I might be overthinking things… he thought to himself as he looked around again—and the other man was gone. Where had he disappeared off to? He then shoved those thoughts to one side as he heard a beeping coming from his watch.
“Oh, crap, not now, really?” he hissed as he quickly ducked into a dark corner of the comedy bar to take the ‘call’.
“You’ve got to be kidding me!”
“I wish I could say yes, but unfortunately, it’s not!”
Both Cola and Maple had been called out to deal with a sudden bank robbery that had erupted in the city’s main financial district, and were flying as fast as possible to the scene of the crime (with Maple hanging onto Cola’s waist as the other flew through the city).
“Major Mayonnaise is at it again, huh? But why’d they send you along with me?!” the Cola Crusader hollered against the rush of the oncoming wind as they hurtled through the air.
“You already know full well why! You need backup! Especially with the increased activity of this… ohh, eww!” the Maple Defender cried out as he felt something splatter all over his foot and looked down to see the masked Major Mayonnaise gloating up at them.
“Cola, drop me! Trust me, I’ll be fine!” the other shouted, and while he hesitated, eventually released the other, before shooting forward to avoid the globs of exploding mayonnaise that were being tossed his way. He then heard a loud, sticky, squishy sound as he banked around to come in for a landing—Maple had landed in a rather sticky puddle of what appeared to be maple syrup, but didn’t pay it no mind.
“Oh, so he has a companion this time around? I never thought the Cola Crusader had friends to rely on,” came the rumbling from Major Mayonnaise, thick foreign accent seeping through his words. “I thought you flew alone, Crusader,” he added as the red, white and blue-clad superhero landed not too far from him, before winding his arms up and charging forward.
“I thought so too, Major Gross-anaise, but I have friends in high places too!” Cola yelled as he came in for a straight right punch, which the villain deftly avoided, before sending a blob of creamy white headed right at the other’s face.
“WHOA!” Cola yelled as he ducked his head down as fast as he could manage—while it had missed most of his face, he could still feel some of it land in his hair. Oh, yuck! “Do you know how disgusting it is to have mayonnaise in your hair?!” he yelled, before swinging his arms around again for a left uppercut—giving the other superhero behind him a nod as he did so.
“Excuse you! Mayonnaise actually keeps my hair soft and silky fresh!” the villain roared back, puffing out his chest and meeting the hero’s incoming fist with his own open palm—and backing away as soon as the other’s hand was coated in extremely sticky mayonnaise. “How dare you insult the source of my powers, you filthy thing!” he added as he sent more white blobs towards the other—right as the almost-invisible Maple Defender began firing off a pool of liquid, oozing maple syrup in an attempt to stop the other from escaping.
Without even blinking, Major Mayonnaise did a backhand gesture, sending several homing blobs of the white, sticky condiment right at where the Maple Defender was standing, and a sudden yelp of surprise rang out as Maple’s near-invisibility shield was foiled… with a face-full of the sticky white stuff.
“You thought you could distract me with your antics, Crusader?! Try again!” he cackled, before whistling loudly and calling out several goons as he prepared to make his escape with the money that had most likely been carted away by now. “You’re so slow, I’m about to make my fabulous escape!” he roared again with glee, before letting a canister explode at his feet, effectively hiding him from sight.
“Oh, not again!” Cola yelled as the area was suddenly full of thick smoke; and several hulking shapes came from said smoke, charging right at him—completely ignoring the Defender who was now thrashing around in a vain attempt to remove the sticky stuff from his face with a muffled scream. The henchmen then proceeded to swarm over the Crusader, trying to bury him under a pile of their own bodies—a classic tactic. However, that would be foiled the moment all of the henchmen went flying as the Cola Crusader peeled himself off the ground, shoving them off him in the process.
He’d very nearly missed the trinkets again, but as the first henchman came in for an attack, he was taken aback—why was this one wearing a yellow raincoat? It wasn’t even raining? The answer became evident a few seconds later as he felt a powerful blow to the back of his head. As he staggered on his feet and tried to keep his balance straight, he could see that his field of vision was currently spinning—what the hell had hit him all of a sudden?!
A few moments later, he heard Maple’s muffled yelling as the henchman that had hit Cola on the back of the head reared back for a second strike—to which Cola spun around and made a grab for the other’s arm before the next hit would clobber him out like a light. Sure, it was no problem, but… why was the raincoat-wearing henchman holding what looked like a punched-out taxi sign?
“What the heck… sure strange choice of a weapon you got there,” the Crusader drawled, disarming the henchman in a few deft movements and pinning him down to the ground. “Maple! Can you catch the other two?!” he hollered, as he tried to keep the goon down. “Seriously, br—Maple, help me!” he hollered as he had some difficulty keeping the goon pinned down to the ground as the other was intent on struggling and breaking free from Cola’s hold.
Unfortunately, the Maple Defender was still flailing around and trying to remove the viscous, sticky glob that had been chucked at his face, and didn’t see that one of the other goons that were trying to prevent the Cola Crusader from chasing Major Mayonnaise down had picked up the fallen ‘Taxi’ sign and had walloped the Crusader so hard to the back of his head, causing him to black out from the force of the impact; as he was still slightly woozy from the first attempt earlier.
“Oww…” Cola Crusader grumbled as he was eventually helped by the Maple Defender sometime later into a sitting position, both heroes having been knocked out by the goons that had been sent to delay their chase for Major Mayonnaise. “Maple, what happened? Why the hell does my head hurt…”
“I don’t know, Cola. When I came to, you were facedown in the street, and… well…” he trailed off, looking at the bevy of junk that had been piled near him. Asides from the very noticeable bent ‘Taxi’ sign that had been used to subdue both superheroes, there was a very used paint roller smeared with mayonnaise, as well as… “No, seriously, he’d waste such good food?!” Cola yelped, seeing several exploded, opened, and obviously trashed bags of suspiciously rainbow-colored Skittles.
It was at this point Cola started thinking, but his suspicion wasn’t enough to make sure of what he had in mind. That, and he didn’t want to just drag some random guy he’d meet in the comedy bar off to jail just because he made a mistaken assumption! I can’t be too certain, I’d better give it a few more days… he thought to himself, only paying half-attention to what Maple was saying until he felt a touch on his shoulder.
“Come on, let’s go back… this is, quite frankly, out of hand at this point,” the red-and-white clad Maple Defender sighed, before helping to pick up the junk items to bring back as evidence to their headquarters.
After Alfred’s performance at the comedy bar where he worked as one of the stand-up comedian acts, he wasn’t expecting his ‘yo mama’ routine would be exceptionally well-received; especially now that he’d started branching out into the food-related side of jokes that existed. What did surprise him, though, was the person who was waiting for him backstage—it was the same snowy-haired individual!
Whoa! How’d he get back here so quickly?! Alfred thought as he looked at one of his ‘regulars’ up and down a few times. Of course, he didn’t realize that at the same time, there was a blush on his face now when he locked onto the stranger’s face.
“H-heh, so I g-guess you liked the… the jokes?” he said, suddenly looking everywhere but at the stranger who’d come by to see him. “I-I don’t know, b-but—” he stammered out, before he felt something getting shoved roughly into his hands; the scent of what he eventually recognized as a bouquet of sunflowers hit his nose. He then looked up to thank his mysterious guest but the man had disappeared.
“Huh, must be too shy to speak up for his own good…” he muttered as he looked at the flowers, before seeing something sticking out. Curiosity got the better of him, and he then plucked it out, flipping the card open with one hand—seeing that there was a name and a number written on them in hastily-scrawled handwriting.
“Ivan, huh…” he said, contemplating the card before heading down to his backstage room to get changed. Is he really that shy, though… wonder why he’s always there watching me… maybe it’s just me? I’d know, because he’s not in the crowd before I get up on stage, and then leaves right after I’m done… he mused to himself.
A few days later, there was another bank heist taking place, and now both Cola and Maple were accompanied by Captain Croissant and the Hatter Scone—thanks to an anonymous tip-off telling the superheroes that it was going to be a rather big heist, with Major Mayonnaise at the helm.
“Maybe this time, we’ll be able to get our hands on him!” the Hatter exclaimed, hanging on for dear life to Captain Croissant’s waist as the other hero came in for a landing. Beside him, Cola willed his wings to disappear, as the Maple Defender then rushed forward, launching extremely sticky spheres of highly-concentrated maple syrup at the thieves who were now piling out of the bank and into one of the armored vehicles parked right in front of the entrance.
“S-stop right there!” Maple tried to yell, although his voice was mostly unheard due to having such a soft tone. “You heard him, hold it right there!” Cola hollered a few moments later as he wound up his arms and then charged forward—only to receive a faceful of mayonnaise, yet again!
“So, Cola comes and brings an entire parade this time, hm?” came the familiar drawling of Major Mayonnaise, who’d come out at the sounds of scuffling. “Well, I’m afraid you won’t be able to corner me, even if you bring an advantage in numbers! Comrades! Launch the traps now!” he continued, before lobbing his own condiment-centric spheres of exploding mayonnaise at the four who were now trying to subdue the crooks who had scattered at their leader’s command.
Without warning, a barrage of exploding chocolate-chip cookies, accompanied with an unidentified substance (which Captain Croissant eventually figured out to be lard) and cakes of all shapes and sizes came hurtling towards the four. While the Maple Defender had gone mostly unnoticed (along with the Cola Crusader, for they had a plan), it was the Hatter Scone who was mostly on the receiving end of the… food barrage.
“Why the bloody hell would you waste perfectly good food, you twat?!” the Hatter yelled, launching his own assortment of…burned, inedible projectiles before walking right into a face-full of cake and having his legs swept out from under him by Major Mayonnaise, no less. “I don’t have time to deal with you, inedible one! I’m here for Cola, and Cola alone!” the Major bellowed, before dropping a solid brick of viscous lard at the Hatter’s feet, and cementing him into place with more mayonnaise.
“Oh, Cola! I’ve come here for you~!” the Major called out, looking around—where had the object of his affection gone off to?! The answer came a few moments later as a red, white and blue-colored streak suddenly appeared from somewhere above the Major, crashing down atop the other and sending the other to the pavement!
“HAH! I got you now!” the Cola Crusader yelled, looking up for a few moments and thanking the Captain, who’d come up with the idea of carrying both Maple and Cola through the air, cloaked under Maple’s special near-invisibility camouflage. While it did leave the Hatter Scone too open for the food-based attacks, the other three were able to launch a surprise attack on the Major, catching the villain off-guard.
“Okay, Major Mayonnaise, what’s the big idea? Where are you getting the idea for attacking us with food? Adding on to that, why’re you looking for me, and me alone?!” the Cola Crusader hollered, pinning the other to the ground and reaching for the villain’s mask in an attempt to reveal the other’s identity. It was a struggle to keep the other pinned down, for the Major had brought up his hand and in several deft moves, completely reversed the situation between the two.
Now that the Cola Crusader was pinned underneath him, the Major then scoffed at the Crusader’s face, before a wave of recognition hit him—why did those eyes look vaguely familiar?! He couldn’t care less for the goons that had already driven off at his command with all the goods that they’d stolen; and before the Crusader could even blink, the Major had whipped his hand behind him and had trapped the incoming Maple Defender and Captain Croissant with the same face-trap of extremely viscous and pliant mayonnaise that covered their faces.
“Did you enjoy the gifts, little one,” the Major hissed into the Crusader’s ear, “…or are you just really that dense?! Think about it, Crusader, think really hard. Use that empty head of yours…” the villain growled, secretly thankful that his full-face mask hid the very evident blush that had crept up on his face at that point.
“W-wait, what gifts are you talking about?!” Cola yelped back as he tried to struggle out of the other’s firm hold and finding that it was absolutely futile.
“Think about it… the Skittles, the lard, the jar of Nutella, the broken printer, the chocolate-chip cookies… or should I also remind you of the broken heels? Or the yellow raincoat, and the Taxi sign? Or the paint roller? Don’t those seem to ring a bell, hm~?” Major continued, voice going so low that he was whispering into Cola’s ear. “Or have you forgotten about the sunflowers you’ve gotten?”
Upon the mention of sunflowers, the Cola Crusader came to a stop, before staring at the faceless Major.
“No. No… no fucking way, no, you can’t be…” the Cola Crusader hissed, realization suddenly hitting him like a deer caught in headlights. “You—you can’t be the—!” he stammered out, before he felt a pair of hands suddenly slam down on his neck as the Major grabbed him in a stranglehold.
“Took you long enough,” the other growled as he looked at the shocked ocean-blue that was now staring at the faceless mask that he was wearing. “Took you long enough to notice that? You really are such a dense head… Alfred.”