Lazer Suzan
The Stoner with Superpowers
A radioactive banana slug scoots up next to an ashtray full of weed.
Then he uses his googly-eye tentacles like little hands. Cuz he doesn’t have any.
He plucks a sticky nug from the tray, sets it in front of him… then hump-dissolved it through his oozy undercarriage. That’s how he takes his edibles.
SLUG: I know what you’re thinking. Another superhero story? Haven’t we seen it all by now? Every city wrecked by every type of generic villain, then some outdated dork in spandex swoops in to save the day…
…only to deliver a toothless message that belongs in a Sprite commercial.
Here’s the problem: superheroes don’t hit like they used to because they’re not actually fighting the problems of our time.
But this tale hits different… because it’s about a dysfunctional family.
And buddy… everybody’s got one of those.
The Powers Family is my adopted family.
They have superpowers… but I wouldn’t call ’em heroes.
A few decades ago, a real superhero family from my galaxy went into witness protection here on Earth. And they couldn’t stop themselves from sampling the sweet meats of your species… so a new crop of ‘half-breed heroes’ sprouted up.
Now there are Powers family units all over the globe.
They inbred, then spread like the Rothschilds, but instead of starting banks, they started nuclear-family crimefighting units.
But now there’s a supply-and-demand issue: we got more heroes than villains.
The ‘heroes’ started inventing problems to justify their existence. Like your CIA.
My Powers clan is from a little American city called, Millville.
Somewhere in the upper-southern-central part of the Midwest. But more east than west. Don’t ask me to explain your geography—your planet named an ocean “The Pacific” and then filled it with sharks and tsunamis.
Anyways… our family unit looks like this:
There’s Phil Powers. A physically indestructible mailman who has daily emotional breakdowns. Loves fascist cop movies from the ’90s and cooking up Alex Jones-level conspiracies with all of that mail that he steals from neighbors. Don’t get him started on the mole people.
There’s momma bear: Patty Powers. A pre-K teacher who can read minds—so she drinks gallons of 7-Eleven wine to drown out all of the inner voices. Beautiful on glass one. Petty on glass three. And listen to me, my friend… her ‘holding it in all day at school mom farts’ can be Chernobyl-level events.
There’s a shithead older brother: Brad. B-Rad. He can clone himself… but each generation gets exponentially dumber. He pimps them out to minimum wage jobs, then sits at home blaming ‘chicks and libs’ for all of society’s problems. He claims he started the ‘retardmaxxing’ trend online but no one believes him.
The dorky middle bro: Jeremy. A med school kid who can heal anyone with his touch, but every time he uses his powers, it gives him horrible pimples. So he’s a total germaphobe who’d rather live inside a sterile Metaverse. This kid could go the Einstein or Dahmer route. Depends on him finding a cure for his adult acne.
And then there’s Suzan…. aka….
My best bud. Full-time barista. Part-time junior college student.
She can melt a motherfucker with red-hot laser eyes… but she’s not about that crime-fighting life. Never has been. Never will be.
Because she’s got me and all we really want to do is smoke lots and lots of weed.
Your planet’s greatest gift to bipeds: a vibrational litmus test that helps you sort the doers from the duuuuuders.
Offering weed is the best repellant for the hordes of stressed-out cogs who think doing more with your life somehow makes the world a better place.
Trust me. Getting high and making unsellable art projects with friends is how The Great Creator intended us to live.
I know, because I’m a time-traveling gastropod from another galaxy.
On my planet I had a more official name and rank, but here? I just go by Slug.
As for me, think Alf and some Splinter. I like to get high and watch alley cats fuck while humping some taquitos but I also was sent here to be a guide.
See I come from a long line of radioactive leopard slugs designed to decompose nuclear radiation. You don’t need my species’ backstory yet. Believe that.
But would you believe me if I told you this era on Earth is the best of times?
I know some stuff about your planet’s trajectory that would make you hug a tree, call your grandma and immediately delete TikTok.
But we’ll get to the end-of-the-world-type-shit later.
This tale starts with Suzan’s first adult baby step toward unlocking her powers.
Because when there are no villains to fight… heroes turn on each other.
And that opens the door for the big bads to return. That’s why I was sent here. I think. The wormholes fucked my memory a little fuzzy. But I do know whats coming to Earth in a few years.
Anyways, this all kicked off when me and Sooz got caught buying nugs from one of her brother’s clones.
A few years ago, Brad ran away to become a weed dealer and budding villain.
With no one else to fight in Millville, the family became obsessed with bringing Bradley to ‘justice.’ Not arrested but on house arrest. Permanently.
Here’s the long & winding tale of how a little stoner with a big heart saved us all.
CHAPTER 1: The Drug Bust
It was just another boring day in Millville.
But we were stuck three levels under a Craftsman home.
Inside the family command center… turned into an interrogation room.
BOOM!
Phil Powers slammed an evidence bag full of delicious nugs onto the metal table.
Suzan and I stared down at our recently purchased now confiscated weed.
Patty Powers loomed above Suzan, eyebrow raised—third eye open—ready to pounce on a lie.
Jeremy, that little greasy carrot stick, slid into view, all oily and smug.
PHIL: The time for truth is now! How many times have you smoked marijuana, Suzan? Don’t lie. Your mother knows all.
PATTY (so bored): She’s just singing the ‘My Humps’ song over and over again. But she doesn’t know the lyrics. It’s mostly gibberish in there.
JEREMY: She’s built a firewall, Mother. I could take a hair sample and run tests. Get a rough estimate of her usage.
Suzan gulped. I retreated deeper into the folds of her hoodie.
SUZAN: Wait. Just—hold on.
Phil leaned back, beefy forearms crossed over his bloated frog belly.
Phil: Do you know what this will do to our family’s reputation? We’re trying to get our arrest numbers up so we can get reassigned to a higher-threat area. Do you want to stay in Millville your whole life? Fading into obscurity while other Powers units take down cartels and syndicates?
This time it was Suzan’s turn to slam the interrogation table. Her eyes flared red. But she hit her hand a little too hard.
SUZAN: Owww. Fuck that hurt. Yes!
Phil, Patty, Jeremy stepped back, bracing for a wild lazer tantrum.
SUZAN (CONT’D): That’s exactly what I want. I want to do nothing. Why would anyone want to work more to get more work… just so they can get even more work after that? There’s no more crime to fight! Hooray! You put everyone in jail before I got my first period. Why do we always need more, more, more?!
Phil shook of the imager of his daughter’s period as his wife nodded her head.
PATTY: Well. Refreshing to hear you tell the truth for once.
SUZAN: You know why I smoke weed, Mom? Because when I’m really high… you can’t read my mind. And that’s better for both of us. I’m being a team player here. I smoke so you don’t have to drink so much!
Patty’s face twitched ever so slightly. Because it was annoyingly… accurate.
PHIL: The lies about your red eyes—all those late nights you said you were doing ‘target practice’ out in the woods—
SUZAN: Yeah, dad. Sorry. I was getting high and doing nothing.
PHIL: Doing… nothing?
SUZAN: Yes. That’s what you do when you get high. It’s incredible. You should try it. This whole entire fucked up family should stop this bullshit interrogation right now and get high with me.
That’s when I decided to chime in and support my best bud.
SLUG: For me it’s medicinal. Glaucoma. When your eyes are basically… tentacles…
PHIL: Shut it, Slug. I’ll get to you later. I don’t know if I’m still buying this time-travel mullarky. All you’ve done is enable my daughter’s degenerate lifestyle.
SLUG: Cap. Allow me to roll up a nice fatty bombatty, whole fam invited of course, then I can explain how Suzan has been progressing with her training.
PHIL: I’m not smoking my son’s weed with my daughter!
Phil paced around the table, building up steam.
PHIL (CONT’D): You’re not thinking this through, Suzan. What if you got arrested buying drugs? Booked. Processed. Criminal record. Or… Or… I don’t know… what if you got involved in some kind of child molesting scandal—they’d have your fingerprints and law enforcement would be able to identify you immediately!
Suzan stared up at her raging father, not sure if he was fucking with her.
Then she remembered that she wasn’t high and he was always dead serious.
Then she couldn’t hold it in and stated laughing uncontrollably.
SUZAN: What the hell—dad?!
Patty and Jeremy cracked, too. That set Phil off to the highest levels of dad rage.
PHIL: Are you high right now? Are all of you high?!
SUZAN: Dad. Come on. If I was involved in a kid-touching scandal, I think our family would have bigger problems than my fingerprints!
JEREMY: Father. Please, stop watching CSI: Miami. It’s not helping.
Phil’s embarrassment shifted to rage. The lights flickered as he pulled energy from every electronic device in the room.
He gripped the edge of the table to harness all of it…
REEEECH! Phil folded the metal table like a piece of cardboard and hurled it into his mole man conspiracy corkboard, right through drywall, and straight into his ‘poop closet’ that was stacked with detective novels and Navy Seal memoirs.
The toilet shattered. Water shot out from the wall.
Then Phil deflated—instantly—and turned back into a sobbing teddy bear.
PHIL: No! I’m not losing another child to drugs! Over my indestructible body! You’re grounded, Suzan. And the day after you pass a drug test, you’re coming to work with me as my assistant mailman.
JEREMY: Mailperson.
Phil stormed off to go gorge himself on discount salami. That was his great reset. See, after his second mailtruck DUI, he had to quit drinking, so the only vices he had left were sleeping meds and his beloved panini press. Watching a grown man cry and make a panini is something I never wish to see again.
JEREMY: Can’t wait to see you in fecal colored socks.
SUZAN: Why can’t you just say poo, like a normal person?
With the rest of the family distracted, I decided to make my move. I jumped off Suzan’s shoulder and snuck toward the bag of weed on the ground. But right when I reached the goods, Patty’s telekinesis lifted the bag into the air.
And me along with it.
She floated me up to her sex-starved hazel eyes then flicked me away like a booger. When I landed, I saw our weed bag float into a locked safe, stuffed with shelves of Brad’s confiscated goods.
So much weed it hurt to look at. They had been busting Brad’s clones for weeks.
PATTY: I’m making chicken piccata for dinner…. while I clean this mess up.
Patty headed upstairs as cleaning supplies and tools floated out the closet and went to work on their own. Then that lil ginger muff, Jeremy, backpedaled away from us, pretending to smoke a joint.
JEREMY: Look at me. I’m soooo high. It’s so fun wasting my brain cells.
Suzan squinted and shot a tiny laser blast that burned his white Crocs.
JEREMY: No lazers in the house!
SUZAN: Fuck off, dweeble dick!
LATER THAT NIGHT IN SUZAN’S BEDROOM
Suzan collapsed on her bed. I crawled out of the hoodie and sat on her chest.
SLUG: This is bad, Suzan. Very bad.
SUZAN: I know. Can you imagine walking around in the sun for eight hours a day? Delivering rich lady catalogs?
SLUG: No. We have no backup stash.
SUZAN: What about the back-up-back-up stash that I hid from you?
SLUG: I found that, too, when you were taking a long poop yesterday.
SUZAN: This is not Sluglife. This is… Shitlife.
SLUG: Maybe I can squeeze an emergency tar out of my neck-rectum, then we could smoke a dab of it and come up with a better plan?
SUZAN: Aren’t you like… radioactive? Could that turn me into one of those bald commercial kids?
SLUG: No clue. Never had to smoke my own shit before. Yet here we are.
Suzan groaned. She thought about kicking her headboard, but decided it was going to be too much work.
SUZAN: Fine. But I don’t remember where we hid the bong.
Like magic, the closet door swung open—telekinetically—and ejected a stream of crusty black jeans and thrift store t-shirts. Then a glass bong floated into view.
SUZAN: Mom! Stay out of my room—and my head!
The bong wagged ‘no-no-no’ in the air, then flew away to the evidence locker.
In drifted an appetizer platter with hummus, carrots and a sticky note.
SUZAN (READING): Good time to start a new diet. Love, Mom.
Suzan groaned while I humped-dissolved some hummus in silent protest.
SUZAN: Who the fuck has their life together at nineteen?
I slid off the plate, left a trail of bean paste behind me, and stood tall on her chest.
SUZAN: Oh shit, full posture on me? That serious?
SLUG: Ahem. As your intergalactic, time-traveling guardian… I have something important to tell you.
SUZAN: The destiny talk?! Can we save that until I’m, like… twenty-five? At least.
SLUG: No, Suzan. The world will need you. One day. But right now… it definitely does not. Right now we need to find a way to lazer through that weed safe.
SUZAN: And then what?
SLUG: Then… we’ll be in a better headspace to discuss the bigger picture.
LATER… AROUND MIDNIGHT. MAYBE. SUZAN AND I DON’T TRUST CLOCKS, BUT I SNUCK OUT TO WATCH THE POWERS FAMILY GO THROUGH THEIR BEDTIME RITUALS.
Phil took four ZZZQuils with his nightly glass of chocolate milk.
Patty moved to the spare bedroom to avoid the sound of Phil’s snoring, then ordered three sets of yellow kitchen gloves to fill themselves up with warm water, cover themselves in oil and give her a happy ending massage.
I should not have watched this private ritual in it’s entirety… but I also had to make sure she was asleep. And to be perfectly honest, the woman was gifted with a beautiful set of front buckets. You would have done that same thing.
Jeremy fell asleep with his Oculus on, listening to a nice Korean woman read Dr. Seuss to pet otters in baby bonnets.
After everyone was asleep, we snuck down the hidden stairwell and into the HQ.
The halogens flickered on, revealing a spotless command center—Patty had made it perfect again. As Suzan hid near the safe and scanned for security cameras, my tentacles tingled. Something was here.
VOICE: Boo!
Suzan jumped so high she simultaneously farted and shot out a lazer blast.
She whipped around to see her older brother, Brad, laughing in the shadows.
BRAD: You trying to beat me to my stash?
SUZAN: Dude. Mom and Dad were on a stakeout. Watching your dealer clones. I got arrested by my own fucking family.
BRAD: I left the minute I turned eighteen. What’s taking you so long?
SUZAN: Yo, can I crash with you for a bit?
BRAD: Hell no. You’ve got powers. Use ’em.
SUZAN: How do you make money with lazer eyes?
BRAD: Longe range sniper. Spotter for private military contractors. I don’t know. Start a Coachella and do light shows. Go buzz the back hair off of Greek men.
Suzan clocked the safe-cracking tools in his hands. She stepped closer, eyes glowing red.
SUZAN: You can’t open that safe, can you?
I watched Brad stare down at his tools, then up at Suzan’s eyes.
BRAD: I’ll give you one ounce. That’s it.
SLUG: Fair deal, Sooz. Let’s toke.
SUZAN: Half.
BRAD: Absolutely not.
SUZAN: Half… or I go upstairs and wake up Mom and Dad.
Brad grabbed her by the shoulders, suddenly very serious.
BRAD: You need to grow up, Suzan. The world chews up kind alt girls like you, breaks them down, then rebuilds them into perfect little capitalist cogs.
SUZAN: Dude. I just want to go thrifting and make songs about wearing dead guys’ clothes. I’m the only family member with like actually achievable dreams. Why can’t I have them?
I watched the hardness in Brad melt. He’d been away so long planning gladiator matches with his clones that he forgot about his sweet, simple, and totally weed strapped little sister.
BRAD: If you come with me, they’ll never stop looking for us. I need more time to set myself up for some big moves. It already looks bad on them that I went rogue.
Suzan blinked—realizing something-major-pieces of the puzzle coming together.
SUZAN: Whoa. Oh, man. Your decisions put like way more pressure on my life. That’s why they’re so psycho with me. Whoa. That makes so much sense now.
BRAD: Seriously? Seriously, Suzan? You’re just now putting that together?
SLUG: It’s been addressed. Just not… with so many words or with such accuracy.
Brad studied me in the dark, concocting some horrible fart-dick-brain idea.
BRAD: Open the safe, take half… and I’ll give you some cash and a squad of clones to help you escape to another country. Use my boys to set yourself up with a little passive income. But I get Slug for six months as my personal advisor.
SUZAN: What?! No. Six months is like…right now… to one of the other months next year?!
BRAD: That’s the price. After six months, we meet up for an exchange. I get my minions back and you get Slug back.
SUZAN: Dude—come on. Slug’s been my ride or die since I was twelve.
BRAD: Big moves. Big sacrifices. What’s it gonna be, Slaze? Saturday nights listening to Dad’s police scanner…or a life with no alarm clocks?
Suzan flinched. It was the kill shot. There was not a hard fiber of hate in her squishy body, but this young woman deeply despised alarm clocks. They were akin to an arch rival. Suzan side-eyed me on her shoulder.
SUZAN: Slug. Bro. I gotta do it. Set up in Vancouver maybe? Weeds legal there.
Brad plopped a welding mask over his big blockhead.
BRAD: Pops has DUI’s, so he can’t drive into Canada to come find you. Mom hates flying because she gets vertigo. It’s a solid choice.
SLUG: Suzan, I will gladly do a semester abroad with Bradley if you both stop yapping and get our weed back immediately.
Suzan nodded to Slug, surged up her eyes and lazered into the metal safe. Sparks flew out as molten metal dripped away.
BRAD: Gonna make us some back up just in case.
Brad stood in his welder’s helmet and started flexing like Arnold in Pumping Iron. The energy around Brad’s body started to vibrate and hum.
SUZAN: I know you can make them without flexing.
Brad flexed in an Atlas Pose and a Brad Clone popped out of his vibrational aura. The Brad Clone opened his eyes to see his maker for the first time and was instantly greeted with a hard slap to the face.
BRAD (CONT’D): I am your lord and master. Go be a lookout.
BRAD CLONE: Yes, Master Brad.
As Suzan kept lazering away, The Clone lumbered off to be our lookout.
SLUG: So if that clone clones himself….or itself… how far down can it go before they’re unusable?
BRAD: Farthest I’ve gone is twelve gen. The clone of an eleventh clone. I keep that one on a leash in a tool shed and he just beats off all day and bangs his head into the wall.
SUZAN: That’s so metal.
We didn’t hear the lock inside the safe melt and drop down, so Suzan kept lazing into holes in the metal until the sweet aroma of burning sensimilla poured out.
SUZAN: Jackpot!
I scooted from my shoulder perch to Suzan’s snoz, so I could partake in some much needed relief, but then Brad shoved us both out of the way and crammed his sniffer into the hole.
A playful bout of quiet grabass ensued. Both of them fighting over a dank hole to sniff, which on my planet is a beloved pastime.
BRAD: Sluglife!
Brad tossed Suzan a wad of cash and placed me in the fold between his ear and head. Right on a volcanic ridge of unwashed blackheads. Delicious. Like expired onion-chive cream cheese. I made a note to remember to visit the garden of clogged pores on Brad’s nose after he feel asleep tonight. Late night snacks.
SUZAN: Wait, dude. I need to say goodbye.
BRAD: No time. We gotta go.
THWACK! The second most sickening sound of my entire life vibrated through my skin sensors.
Brad’s lookout clone was mind-thrown so hard into a metal pillar that his limbs detached from his torso and kept sliding down the polished concrete floor.
This disgusting assault of noises was second only to the time when Suzan accidentally ran over a family of raccoons in a Del Taco parking lot. The tiny claws on the wheel wells still haunts my dreams.
But Brad’s clone died with a quick grunt.
When we looked up from the smoking weed safe, Phil, Patty and Jeremy were suited and booted in their crime-fighting uniforms, ready for a showdown.
SLUG: It’s a trap!
I screamed. Just like the other google eyed guy from Star Wars.
PHIL: Get your dirty-drug-dealing hands off my daughter.
BRAD: You been practicing that one in the mirror?
Phil pulled power from the electronics, but Patty narrowed her eyes and turned off the fuse box with her mind. The room dropped into darkness.
Emergency lights kicked in with a red glow.
PATTY: Bradley, hon. Can we settle this over a meal? I’ll make sloppy joes.
Brad’s jaw tightened—tempted, for half a second. Then he stiffened.
BRAD: I’ve been to my last family dinner. Suzan’s with me now.
Bradley pointed to the cash in Suzan’s hands before she could hide it.
PHIL: Over my indestructible body.
BRAD: That your new catchphrase, old man?
Phil, Patty and Jeremy fanned out to surround them while Brad vibrated and did some quick body builder poses to pop out some new clones.
From Brad’s shoulder, I saw my little companion having more thoughts than she probably has had this entire year, shaking her hands and stomping her feet like she had to pee, potential choices creating a multiverse of timelines in her head.
Five Brad clones popped out of his body and surrounded us like secret service.
Suzan looked up at me, fully aware of this decisive moment and completely paralyzed with indecision.
She was no longer a kid, but she wasn’t really an adult yet. She had one half-assed foot planted in the family business, doing the bare minimum to keep her parents at bay, while the other foot reached for Brad, her only lifeline to freedom.
And she was not sober, but not totally high because we only got a few good sniffs of the weed safe.
JEREMY: Sealing exits. Depressurizing to get rid of marijuana smoke.
Jeremy raised his tablet to seal the exits, but Patty beat him to it.
She mind-activated the Powers HQ emergency protocol: air pressure vents hissed, alarms went off and metal shutters dropped over every door, sealing the room airtight and closing every escape route.
JEREMY: Mother. We talked about this. I have to be in charge of some things.
PATTY: It’s just faster my way, honey.
PHIL: Bradley. My son. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Phil, Patty and Jeremy surrounded us.
Brad clicked like he was calling a dog and five of his clones attacked at once.
Two of the clones tackled Phil and mounted him with some bad-bro-jitsu moves.
Two more clones rushed Patty. Right before they reached her, her eyes rolled into her head and she took control of their brains. The clones stopped, grabbed each other by the shoulders and then repeatedly head butted each other.
The last clone chased Jeremy around like a silly game of duck-duck-cucklord.
Jeremy avoided a swipe, then tapped the Clone’s face with his finger.
JEREMY: Acne Vulgaris!
Jeremy shouted like one of those silly British shits from the kid wizard movies.
Tangerine-sized pimples and milky puss boils sprouted up all over the clone’s head as he raised his hands to his face to press them back down.
But the pimples expanded and exploded. Custard-filled landmines that took off giant chunks of head flesh with them.The Clone dropped dead to the floor, oozing all shades of goo from his wiffle balled head.
Brad whipped out a new batch of clones and used them as battering rams on the main door, one by one lowering their heads into a meat missile and snapping their necks to put a new dent in the metal. A pile of dead clones grew.
Suzan looked down at the cash in her hand, then back up to the carnage.
Her older brother maniacally laughed and spewed out clones at an alarming rate. He was overwhelming his family with sheer numbers.
Her father screamed in agony while being held down by a frat pack of Brad minions who were taking turns teabagging him.
Patty, that beautiful but frayed vixen, tried to multi-task everywhere.
Two more clones shoved Jeremy into a trash can so he couldn’t touch them, but he started slicing his way out with doctor’s scalpel.
BANG! Another clone ran into the metal door and created a small opening.
BRAD: Easy work, Slaze. You ready for a new life?
From Brad’s shoulder, I watched Suzan struggle through a wave of powerlessness, looking so helpless and confused, trying to convince herself that selfishness was the right move. Now, I really try to stay out of her way for the most part. I know where her story goes, but it must appear as if she has free will. Her rise to power must be real. Genuine.
SUZAN: Yeah. I’m ready.
But sometimes a budding superhero needs a little divine intervention.
We moved to the door where Brad pulled on it to rip it open…
SLUG (quietly): Suzan!
SUZAN: Huh?
I pointed one tentacle at the weed safe, then rolled both of my eyes together like atoms colliding, then circled them back out, making the explosion sound with my mouth. But Suzan did not catch my drift.
SLUG (loud whisper): Safe. Hot box! Lazers!
SUZAN: Ohhhhhhhh…. shit. Yeah. But… why?
SLUG: Bring them to our level of consciousness. You can fix this mess.
As Brad’s Clones wrestled Patty down and put the welder’s helmet on to keep her mind-control powers contained, Suzan charged up. Way the fuck up.
I don’t know what went through her head, but she had plenty of repressed and angry memories to pull from.
The time in seventh grade when Trevor Dunlop called her a ‘chubby buttslut.’
That time when the cool senior girls made plans to smoke weed with Suzan, then never showed to The CVS parking lot because they thought it was funny.
And the only time Suzan had her heart broken by a super sad weeabo boy who worked at Hot Topic before he killed himself by eating a bowl of Advil PM.
For months Suzan was so broken… wait. No. That kid didn’t kill himself. He just moved to Indianapolis…. but…point being…there was so much pain to pull from, so many years of being nice to everyone yet never truly accepted by anyone.
Suzan arched her back werewolf style to gather in more power. Her eyes glowed bright red, then they shifted across the color spectrum from red to orange to yellow to light green and finally settled on an alien green.
SUZAN (eyeing her own green aura): Whoa…trippy.
SLUG: Stay focused. Do it now.
Suzan aimed at the safe and sent a beautiful green beam through the metal door, exploding the metal safe and vaporizing the confiscated weed.
A violent shockwave ripped through the airtight room, knocking the rest of the fam unconscious and frying every electronic device in their HQ.
I fell from Bradley’s shoulder as he slapped down to the concrete floor. Out cold. Only my radioactive skin glowed in the dark.
As I shook my tentacles out, I heard footsteps approach.
Gentle fingers picked me up and placed me back where I belong. On her shoulder.
Suzan coughed through the lingering fog of weed smoke. Then we both inhaled.
SUZAN: What was that?! My lazer rainbow shit? I always thought it was just red.
SLUG (inhaling): Your first step toward understanding your power.
One by one, the Powers family stirred to life. They sucked for air and coughed uncontrollably—trapped in an air-sealed, hot box of their own design.
SUZAN: Now what?
I inhaled again, then shrugged.
SLUG: Snacks will be in order soon. After that… I have no idea.
Suzan and I head-butt high-fived in the dark. Her temple to my tentacle.
SUZAN: Fuck it. Sluglife.
END OF CHAPTER 1, DWEEBLE DICKS!
WRITER’S NOTE: This idea was gifted to me by my younger sister. She used to trim weed plants while smoking a banana slug pipe. Then she got high and went to a Chinese food restaurant where they have Lazy Suzan spinning tables. “Who the fuck is this Suzan lady and why is she so lazy?” Then it was a hop-skip and a jump to Lazer Suzan: The Stoner with Superpowers. Thanks, duder.
Here’s a Lazer Suzan song my sis whipped up for shits and gigs.
Character designs by my brother from another mother, Conor Buckley.