2

Villains often major or minor in the humanities, so your years of performative experience should work to your advantage.

Time to Sing Something

No, you don't have nearly enough time to warm up. You should probably give a speech instead, an idea that makes you a bit anxious, even with your love of the spotlight.

The fear of public speaking is possibly a primal fear that reaches back to distant early modern human ancestors. The human body is so in tune with its surroundings that it can recognize when something is staring at it. To add fifty-plus pairs of eyes to that number would send the brain into overdrive, recognizing staring as some sort of threat. It explains why when lots of people look at you, you suddenly start wanting to build wheels and set fires to things.

Though that just may be your natural inclination as a villain.

So, now that you have dissected your fear, how do you address the crowd?

A few of the hippies glance in your direction. You catch an amused expression on most of their faces. Perhaps somebody told a joke while you weren't paying attention. Regardless, you have some of their attention, and some of their attention is good enough for you.

Cry Hippie and Let Slip the Dogs of Speeche

After a few descriptions of horrible pain and suffering, you finally have most of the crowd's attention. They look up at you, their eyes glazed over and their mouths hanging open. It is an expression you call the "Affleck Stare." You give them a devilish grin and clear your throat.

Thousands of years from now, the people here will remember this speech. The children and children's children of these hippies, even to the seventh generation, will memorize what you have said here today. By the time you have closed your mouth, you cannot open it again for the thunderous applause. No one before, or since, not even you, will ever wield ethos, pathos, and logos the same way you did at this moment. In one hundred years, this speech will be published in a book that contains the inauguration speeches of the presidents of the United States.

You have won the crowd over so well that when you tell the hippies to let you pass, they clear a path for you. Now, there is nothing between you and the bank. The money is as good as yours. How do you make your way to the bank now?

They like you! They really like you!

You check your watch. Somehow, it is 4:49 PM, even after everything that has happened. How is it that so little time could have passed?

You are barely familiar with Albert Einstein's Theory of Plotativity, but even Einstein would have been bamboozled by how someone could get stuck in traffic, escape a cop, and deal with a bunch of hippies in only nineteen minutes.

Now, to get into the bank. You could always use the automatic doors, but the Night Wolf wouldn't fit in them anyway. Better to just smash through the wall for ease of access to the vault. You tell the henchmen over the intercom to brace themselves, then plow into the side of the bank. Bricks become birds, and a layer of thick dust leaks into the cockpit. You brush sweat off your forehead, then open the driver's side door. You emerge to shocked tellers and customers. They stare up at you in horror. You brandish your shrapnel gun at them.

The gun, one of your more brilliant inventions, shoots cylindrical pieces of metal which bore into the skin and devastate the human body. They can be lethal, potentially, which is why there are three safeties on each shrapnel gun, to prevent any injury or death to any henchmen who try to do those cool cowboy movie gun-spinning tricks.

Yee Haw

You would love to get all up on their faces like that one scary clown at the haunted house you used to go to as a teenager. But a clown robbing a bank would be just ridiculous. And you don't have the time to get in anyone's face. Not only will the bank shut tighter than a costumed hero's underpants in ten minutes, but you must have also set off the bank's silent alarm by now.

With an alarm comes the most annoying costumed hero of all: Matchless Man.

Oh, you don't know? He's only your worst nemesis, the costumed hero who has dedicated his life to making yours a living hell with his goodness.

Matchless Man is a pain. Despite your intelligence, you always feel like when you are beating him at checkers, he reveals that you have been playing chess the whole time. He constantly puts your henchmen in the hospital, leaving you without any good help.

You have scowled at him so hard your face got stuck that way at least twice, but nothing can stop his furious meddling. Once, he made you get on the Channel 3 news and confess that you have a secret postage-stamp reviewing channel on YouTube, when the truth is much more complicated!

But This Time, I Will Get Him

Fortunately, you cooked up a new weapon in the event that Matchless Man showed up. If he tries to throw down with you, he'll be sorry! But enough stalling! Time to get back to the matter at hand!

Smartica, your right-hand henchman, stands at the front of the group of hostages, who now kneel with their hands on their heads. Smartica's blue eyes meet yours. She gives you one of her characteristic half-grins. Then, she tucks a stray gray hair back under her goggles.

"Got them all wrapped up for you," she says. She crosses her arms, making the material of her green and purple uniform squeak. "And the rest of the henchmen are getting your Christmas present now."

Two of your henchmen open the vault. A glowing red button on the inside of the vault says "Super-Vault Control." One henchman presses the button. The button blinks, then powers off.

The problem of the super-vault closing is solved, but now you have a new one: how do you get the money out of the bank?