“You’ve lost, He-Man!” Skeletor laughed, his jawbone rattling like a gate hanging from its last hinge. “I’ve got you now!”
Well, technically, Beast Man had him. With the bullwhip. Again. That was pretty much Beast Man’s move. That and beating his chest and jumping around a lot.
“I’m sorry, Skeletor. I couldn’t hear you over Beast Man’s mouth-breathing.” He-Man shifted his shoulders, preparing for the action to come. “Were you saying something?”
Beast Man looked up. “Huh?” He caught his breath and conspicuously exhaled through his nose. “Hey…”
He had wrapped He-Man up in the whip – what? – twenty times before? It was at least in the high-teens. And every time, He-Man just flexed his muscles and got out. I mean, he was the Most Powerful Man in the Universe, for Goddess’s sake. A whip? Pfft. Please. As they say, doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result is madness. But, really, it’s pretty much the definition of stupidity, too. And if there was one word that summed up Beast Man, that was it.
He-Man looked over at him. He was holding the handle of the whip with just his left hand. He-Man couldn’t remember if Beast Man was right-handed or left-handed. Of course, he also had opposable thumbs on his feet and could hold things with them, too, so that might have been a moot point. Or opposable toes. Or whatever. He-Man wasn’t really up on his simian anatomy. But either way, Beast Man was just barely holding the whip. Instead, his attention was mostly absorbed by the finger with which he had just extracted something from his ear. He sniffed at it without even trying to be subtle.
“Pluhbluhbluhbpay attentionblblblb, Bluhbluhbluhbeast Man,” burbled a voice from He-Man’s left. Mer-Man raised his trident, ready to help Beast Man. At least he seemed to remember how this routine usually played out; you can’t be too stupid and still be king of Atlantis. Or wherever. Mer-Man lowered himself into a crouch and shifted his scaly feet to get better traction. For some reason, he always seemed to be standing in a puddle. He-Man tried not to get distracted by thinking about why.
Apparently, Skeletor was still prattling on. “There is no escape from Tombstone Mountain, He-Man. This is a place of death! It all ends here!”
“Maybe for you, fiend,” He-Man replied, immediately thinking that had sounded better in his head. There was a bit of a lull, and Skeletor looked at him as if he expected something more. “Maybe for you,” He-Man said again, this time with less enthusiasm.
It occurred to him that there was certainly that chance. The chance that his time would run out. The possibility that Skeletor was right. He could barely comprehend it: The End. Either up here or on the rocks below. Maybe Skeletor would finally conjure some magick He-Man couldn’t overcome. Already, he had his battle axe and shield locked under an invisible force field. Or, so Skeletor had said, at least. It occurred to He-Man that he should probably test that out. He’d feel really stupid if it was just a lie.
“Bah! Enough!” Skeletor finally snapped, literally, his jaw making a nauseating popping sound. As he raised his rams-head staff, blue lightning bolts reached up from it to meet others from the sky. He-Man squinted in the light.
He never talked about it, but to be honest, the idea of death terrified him. Or, it did in the rare moments that he let himself think about it. He-Man wondered if they would ever even find his body up here. What would they put in his grave? Maybe they could round up Faker He-Man. Touch up the blue skin. Cover up the machine bits. That might have to do. If it came to that.
Just as he had so many times before, He-Man thrust his arms out to the side, jerking Beast Man’s whip from his hands. He turned, raising a fist to block the ape’s slashing claws and countering with a punch to the stomach. As Beast Man doubled over, He-Man grasped his rubbery head between his hands and pressed. The air hissed out as Beast Man’s head flattened like a piece of Bubble Yum.
“Aaaaaiiiiiiieeee!” escaped from what was left of his mouth as he stumbled over the edge of the cliff, flounder-like head first.
“Jack! Shhhh!”
The giant jumped at his mother’s voice, startled, losing his grip and bringing Beast Man’s slow-motion plummet to a sudden end with a painful-looking bounce off of the base of the cliff.
“We can hear you at the graveside. You’ve got to keep it down, or I’m not going to let you do this.”
“Sorry,” Jack mumbled. He picked up Beast Man and put him back on Tombstone Mountain. Beast Man made a faint sucking sound as his head began to return to its usual shape.
“The service will be over soon and we’ll go. Okay, Sweetie?”
Jack nodded, and the lady giant turned, working her way between the granite cliffs back to the others gathered under the tent in the distance. He watched for a moment, listening as a voice carried over on the breeze. Then he returned his attention to He-Man, who kicked Beast Man in the ribs, sending him off the edge again.
