Copyright © 2017 by Michael K. Gibson
Published by
Amber Cove Publishing
PO Box 9605
Chesapeake, VA 23321
Cover design by Raffaele Marinetti
Visit his online gallery at http://www.raffaelemarinetti.it/
Cover lettering by Michael K. Gibson
Book design by Jim Bernheimer
All rights reserved.
This is a work of fiction. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review.
Visit the author’s website at www.mkgibson.com
First Publication: November 2017
Dedication and Acknowledgments
I continue to be amazed and humbled that I get to live my dream by writing. A massive and heartfelt “Thank you” to the people who continue to read and support me. As always, I thank my wife and editor Valerie. Without her support and skills, my books would be nothing more than an incoherent string of jokes, off-topic narratives, and poorly constructed sentences. To my son Jack . . . man, you’re too young to be reading this. I love you, “Rabbit.” To my publisher, Jim Bernheimer, you continue to take chances on me. Thank you, brother.
Now, I sadly must give equal time to the star of the Shadowmaster Series, Jackson Blackwell. You’ve been warned.
- MK Gibson
Greetings simpletons,
You know what the best part about being me is? Well, not being you, for starters. Aside from that, having vast wealth, power, and influence are totes cool. I’d say you should try it, but come on . . . you’re you. Plus, as I am a fictional being, I get to say things Gibby can’t. So, I would like to dedicate my second recorded adventure to a few choice people out there. Ahem . . .
- To the “Unknown Author” who called my first adventure “vulgar”: Thou shouldst fornicate with thyself. (See, I can be fuckin’ classy when I need to be.)
- To “Daffy”: While I appreciate your attempt to read Book 1, to your trying to ignore a few grammar mistakes which have “become an overriding annoyance in today's writing” I say: Well lah-di-dah, look at you. I hope you get a nosebleed from your soapbox.
- To “Jimmy Junior”: Man, aren’t you a hate-filled little goblin? I’d make fun of you, but apparently life already has. Sorry about your buyer’s remorse … but thanks for the money!
- To “Uneven Effort”: Are . . . are you dense? Pointing out mistakes and then making them is why it’s funny. Almost as if I’m not as smart as I think I am? Almost, dare I say, as if I’m in a comedy book? Wocka wocka?
- To “Daddy-O”: Far-fetched, you say? Poor characters, you say? Idiotic twists and turns? The story makes one want to shoot themselves in the head for listening to it?! Oh, “Daddy-O,” where did the bad man touch you? There’s this thing called Prozac. Look into it. Peace be with you.
- To “Only Got Halfway Through”: Where’s your chutzpah? At least “Meh” had the sticktoitiveness to gut my tale out. Sure, he also gave me a two-star rating, but at least he finished. Slacker.
- To “Imagination But Poorly Executed”: A unique character in a generic fantasy setting going through the cliché moments of the world was the point. Do you also say “Man, this water is wet, what gives?”
- To “Not Publishable Material”: HA! Well, joke’s on you! No, seriously, I totally make fun of you during the prologue.
And finally, to all the rest of you snarky would-be critics: I dare you to try to create something in your lives. Other than the abject failure and misery you already excrete.
Shadowmaster . . . out!
- JJ Blackwell
Foreword
Pre-Prologue
Prologue
Chapter One
Where I Counsel Cthulhu, Procrastinate, and Entertain the Thought of Killing Dr. Phil
Chapter Two
Where I Endure Couples Therapy, Pick the Wrong Time to Drink Scotch, and Further the Plot
Chapter Three
Where I Re-Introduce Myself, Suffer SUV Trauma, and Juggle a Three-Way Conversation
Chapter Four
Where I Scold A Faded Beauty and Ponder the Aerodynamic Impracticality of Giant Wieners and Big Boobs
Chapter Four and a Half
Where My Naming Application Hits a Slight Hiccup
Chapter Five
Where I Restate My Code, Announce My Presence to the World, and Kill a Few Heroes
Where I Make An Impression
Chapter Six
Where I Set Up Shop, Vomit Forth Some Good-Natured Misogyny, and Make a Bet
Chapter Seven
Where I Fume About App Functionality, Pitch a TV Cancellation, and Meet a Man Named Wendell
Chapter Eight
Where I Make a Deal and Stand Aside for Proper Parenting Lessons
Chapter Nine
Where I Break in My New Assistant and Ponder the Repercussions for Black Coffee Drinkers
Chapter Ten
Where I Address Supervillains, Mock Higher Education, and Bring People Together
Chapter Eleven
Where I Reminisce About Childhood Lessons, Assemble a Ruling Body, and Drop the Mic
Chapter Twelve
Where I Defeat a Caped Crusader Via Paperwork and Have an Argument
Chapter Thirteen
Where I Confront Rich Heroes, Toast My Success, and Exploit the Help
Chapter Fourteen
Where I Compare Combat to Sex, Mock White Guilt, and Perform a Callback
Chapter Fourteen and a Half
Where I Do So Love Being Me
Chapter Fifteen
Where I Nakedly Resurrect Disco, Confront My Assistant, and Pass Out
Chapter Sixteen
Where I Awake in a New Land, Empower Women, and Gain a New Disciple
Chapter Seventeen
Where I Search for my Missing Minions, Find My Least Favorite, and Mock NASCAR
Chapter Eighteen
Where I Am Rebooted, Explain Pegging, and Get into a Pissing Match
Chapter Nineteen
Where I Turn Down an Advance, People Watch, Shit on the Last Sixty Years of American History, and Appreciate Fine Art
Chapter Twenty
Where I Talk, Smoke, and Let Blue Balls Get the Best of Me
Chapter Twenty and a Half
Where I Do Not Care for Your Judgy Eyes
Chapter Twenty-One
Where I Joyfully Wallow In Post-Coital Fluids, Chat with Lydia, and End the World
Chapter Twenty-Two
Where I Snub Sophia, Interrupt Origins, and Scare an Elderly Couple
Chapter Twenty-Three
Where I Am Exhausted, Discover a LARPer Among Us, and Plan for a War
Chapter Twenty-Four
Where It Feels Like Deja Vu All Over Again
Chapter Twenty-Five
Where I Bring Villains to Heel, Do Something I’ve Wanted To Do Since 2008, and Equate Psychosis with the Muppets
Chapter Twenty-Six
Where I Serve Refreshments, Squash a Bug, Debate Architecture, and Throw Shade at Purple
Chapter Twenty-Six and a Half
Where the Joke’s on You
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Where I Teach You a Thing or Two
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Where I Anger a Djinn, Mock Counterculture, and Flick My Own Nutsack
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Where I Foil a Hit Squad, Reveal the Truth About James Bond, and J
ump off a Building
Chapter Thirty
Where I am Rescued, Escape, and Offer Boston Back to the British
Chapter Thirty-One
Where the War is about to Begin, The Teams Arrive, and I Play More Killer 70’s Music
Chapter Thirty-One and a Half
Where I Reveal My Real Powers and Explain the Facts of Life
Chapter Thirty-Two
Where Reality Rules, Comedy Abounds, and Romance Blossoms
Chapter Thirty-Three
Where I Take a Victory Lap, Build a Throne, and Get Arrested
Chapter Thirty-Four
Where I Meet My Enemy and Things Do NOT Go My Way for Once
Chapter Thirty-Five
Where Randolph Blackwell Rises as the New Shadow Master . . . WTF???
Chapter Thirty-Six
Where I Am Alive and Well, Monologue to Randy, and Tell Him, Indirectly, to Eat a Dick
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Where I Discuss the Consequences of Gravity and an Ill-Timed Monologue
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Where I Reap the Rewards of Justice, Ponder the Reality that People May Not Like Me, and Receive a Message
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Where I Take the Plunge, Experience a Miracle, and Get Bamboozled
Epilogue
Where I Reveal Consequences and Surprises and Get My First Review
About the Author
Foreword
Foreword
Where I thank everyone for being faithful audiobook listeners
Greetings, audiobook Listeners! I have had the pleasure of narrating these fantastic adventures that you are now listening to on your way home from work, walking the dog, or at the gym. And I want to thank you for--
Wait. This isn’t the audiobook? And this foreword won’t even be in the audiobook? Well what the fuck?
So not only did Gibson not offer to pay me anything for writing this, those who do pay for the version I narrate won’t even hear this? What kind of shit is that?
Oh, I know what it is. It’s all you ebook readers. Those of you who carry your Kindle around and have 300 books that you are never going to read loaded onto it. And worse, you probably waited until the book was 99 cents or some bargain basement price because “why should I pay full price for an ebook when I don’t get a physical copy?” Yeah, genius, because the cost of the book is only about the paper it’s printed on. It has NOTHING to do with the time and resources it took to actually write and edit the book. And do you know how much a cover costs? A lot! Well, maybe not the cover for Villains Rule because that was the biggest What-The-Fuck-Am-I-Reading cover that the artist clearly phoned in. Maybe, just MAYBE, if you forked over more than .99 cents for a book, authors could afford better covers. Maybe skip that $5 calorie bomb Starbucks latte and support a writer?
And if you tell me that you pirated this version, I swear to god, I’m going to punch a baby.
Oh but maybe you’re reading this in paperback. Oh well goody for you, you archaic dinosaur. Kill a tree, much? Or is it because you like the smell? What a load. Who the hell buys a book for the smell? If you want to smell things that are old and musty, go to an 80s hair metal band and intercept some middle-aged person’s underwear that he or she attempted to fling on the stage. Take a big whiff. There’s some good old fashioned, vintage reminiscence for you.
So thank you, audiobook listeners. You are the true readers (and yes, it *is* reading, fuckyouverymuch). The connoisseurs of a fine performance, the appreciators of the two mediums joined together in perfection. But since no audiobook listeners will actually hear this, then never mind.
The rest of you can bite me.
Jeffrey Kafer, Audiobook Narrator
Pre-Prologue
(A “pre-prologue,” you ask? Yes. In the last book I had two prologues and a few clods got mad. Tough. It’s a thing now. So stop groaning and embrace it. Embrace it as rich politicians embrace poor people to win elections.)
I looked at the simple idiots sitting across from my expensive, glossy black desk. The fools before me were lower than low. Scum, really. Wretched, base creatures. Their only “gift,” if one could call it that, was their burning need to string together barely cogent thoughts.
Their unquenchable desire to express stilted ideas in passable prose should have been beaten out of them by parents who didn’t make a huge production about every minor accomplishment.
These fools should have been told that their ideas were as dumb as they themselves were unlovable. Yet on they went, scribbling down their dumb ideas. They were little better than the fans who read their miserable dreck.
They, dear readers, were authors.
Well, let’s call them “writers,” shall we? “Authors” denotes a sense of class, and let’s be frank, they don’t have any.
Gods above and below, it pained me to look at the sad, bespectacled bastards with their notebooks, their crumpled papers, their wasted hours of world building, and the stink of those desperate for acceptance.
And as much as it pained me to admit, I needed their help.
I cleared my throat and addressed the idea-monkeys.
“I need ideas for a sequel,” I explained.
“Why?” one of the writers asked. “Your first recorded adventure wasn’t that good.”
I leveled my gaze at the writer, Pips or Flips—I didn’t really know his name, or care enough to remember it. Writers aren’t really people worth knowing. They’re like prostitutes with laptops, begging for your digital pleasure. They’ll write whatever you want to hear, provided you pay them.
Ignoring Blips, I continued. “For some reason, ‘people’—and I use that term in the loosest sense—are requesting a continuation of the Shadow Master’s tale.”
“Well, what kind of sequel? Perhaps a gritty reboot?” another writer asked.
Don’t bother asking his name. Time won’t remember him, so neither will I. Indie writers are all the same. Stamping two initials and a last name on a Deviant Art-designed cover does not compel history to remember them. Nor the niche bullshit they try and peddle.
But at least it wasn’t the bland drudge the Big 5 kept pumping out.
“I need a theme,” I said, standing from my desk. I walked about my office, examining the strange and exotic objects I’d collected from across the known realms and dimensions. “Something which is a suitable follow-up to my last adventure. Not some bullshit gritty reboot.”
“More of the same, then?” asked one of the writers.
“What do you mean?” I asked her.
“Most sequels are just inflated versions of the first. The same plot, but with more antagonists. Basically more of the same, but bigger. You should just do that.”
She had blue hair, with half her head shaved, and thick black glasses. Of course she did. There was a time in my youth when, if you met someone with that look, you asked what cool punk band they liked. Now the look has been co-opted by those people. You know, the people who get mad when you call Rey from The Force Awakens a “Mary Sue.”
She was. Deal with it.
“I don’t want ‘the same but bigger,’ I told her. “This needs to be something special. Something to prove the first book wasn’t a fluke.”
“Your previous recorded adventure did mostly well with the markets,” she said, scrolling through her phone. “Well, except from this one guy . . . ‘Cal’? He only rated it one star and called it ‘unpublishable.’ Huh, that’s not even a word. And this ‘unknown author’ gave you two stars, calling your story ‘vulgar’. This other guy called you ‘boring’.”
I rolled my eyes. I was many things, but boring was not one of them.
“Cal is most likely a Harry Potter forum troll. I’d like to see him destroyed, but life itself has already punished poor, pathetic ‘Cal’ and his Dark Potter posts.”
“And the unknown author who called you vulgar?” she asked.
“Fuck the repressed bastard.” I smiled. “More and more sci
ence points to higher intelligence in those who profane.”
“What about time travel?” asked another writer. “You could do a time-travel story! You know, helping villains throughout time. That’d be cool.”
I pulled a Colt 1911 from my hip, the one gifted to me by a yellow-eyed demon, and shot the writer through his stupid horn-rimmed glasses. The rest of the writers all screamed as blood and brains sprayed across my office floor. As I turned to face them, they all dove for cover.
“Time travel?!” I yelled to the cowering little worms. “Time travel ruins everything! Paradoxes, inconsistency, and bullshit alternate timelines—and that’s just the Star Trek reboots. Once introduced into almost every series, time travel is the kiss of death. ‘Hold the door,’ what ridiculous crap.”
“What about—”
I spun and aimed the gun at the writer who spoke. “I DARE you to say Back to the Future. Go on, I dare you.”
“Sorry.”
“That being said, helping villains throughout time is interesting. Someone jot that down as a possible spin-off. Hmm . . . Villains Academy,” I said, pondering the idea. “You know, that could work. But for another time. For now, think of something people may want to read for this adventure.”
“B-but, you killed Gary!” a writer pleaded.
“I don’t want to do another fantasy realm experience,” I said, ignoring the ruckus. Picking up one of my black cigarettes with silver tips, I lit it off a burning copy of my two-book contract.
“I need to explore. Stretch my legs as a master villain. Do you plebes understand that? Obviously you can just slap ‘villain’ on pretty much any title and the moronic populace will buy it. Tell a joke or two while tossing out pop-culture references and you’ll get four-star ratings galore, regardless of the book’s actual literary value.”
“Gary,” the blue-haired writer whispered. “Despite being part of the patriarchy, you deserved better.”
“Oh, will you sorry-excuse-for-would-be-novelists please shut up?! I’m trying to plan a strong follow-up.”