BURR: Dear Steven—
STEVEN: Dear Burr—
BURR: I was wondering
what you would think about reuniting to help fight the aliens.
STEVEN: I’m worried
you’re going to want to reunite to fight the aliens.
BURR: We had such a wonderful
time together.
STEVEN: I feel it
would be a mistake.
BURR: With my ability
to stretch and contort my body—
STEVEN: With your
weird rubber arms and that thing you do with your neck—
BURR: And you with
your superspeed—
STEVEN: Plus, I’ve
given up running. I mostly amble now,
although sometimes I mosey.
BURR: We don’t have
to hide anymore. The government wants
heroes out in the open.
STEVEN: I like my
privacy. Sometimes I dress up like a
clown for no reason. Getting older has
done odd things to me.
BURR: And why stop at
aliens? We can take on criminals.
STEVEN: And who’s to
say it would stop at aliens? They’d probably
make us fight criminals too.
BURR: We can make a
real difference in the world.
STEVEN: The world is
beyond saving. Personally, I’m siding
with the aliens. Let ‘em blow us
up. Things can’t get much worse anyway.
BURR: You were always
so positive. Always ready to look on the
bright side of things.
STEVEN: I hope you’re
still the cynical jerk you were back when we were young. I feel like I could appreciate you now.
BURR: Doing yoga has
really changed me. Well, that, and all
the money I inherited when my uncle died.
He invented K-Cups, you know.
STEVEN: God we were
stupid back then. Running around with
capes and masks—
BURR: Remember how
good I looked in a cape? Capes are the shit,
man. They really are.
STEVEN: Sitting on
rooftops, looking for trouble—
BURR: Out at all
hours of the night, lurking in the shadows to strike fear in the hearts of the
morally bankrupt—
STEVEN: That time I
got food poisoning and threw up on that bank robber.
BURR: That time you
got food poisoning and threw up that bank robber.
STEVEN: I don’t want
to revisit that, Burr. Let’s leave well
enough alone, all right?
BURR: I think about
it all the time—those days, those nights—the years just out of reach—
STEVEN: Sure, my life
isn’t all that exciting now, aside from the skydiving lessons and amateur
boxing league I started in my backyard on Tuesdays—
BURR: Do you ever lay
awake at night and think ‘God we were so much fun?’
STEVEN: Do you ever
lay awake at night and think ‘God, were we idiots?’
BURR: My wife thinks I’m
crazy.
STEVEN: How’s your
wife? I always liked Sharon.
BURR: She says my
days of being a vigilante are over.
STEVEN: She used to
make that wonderful onion dip. Does she
still make that?
BURR: She says if I
join up to fight the aliens, she’ll leave me.
Do you believe that?
STEVEN: I never got
married after Linda left me. I do have a
parrot that yells obscenities at me from time to time, and that’s about as much
of a wife as I can handle.
BURR: I’m just so
bored, Steve.
STEVEN: I’m so happy,
Burr. I really am. And I’m miserable. And I’m happy being miserable. It’s a weird phenomenon.
BURR: I wake up in
the middle of the night panicking—but I don’t know why. My wife thinks I’m apprehensive about the
aliens, but it’s not that. It’s the fear
of sitting by and watching other people fly by me—capes in the wind, fists out,
ready to do something—ready to participate—
STEVEN: I can sit by
a window and say whatever it’s gonna to be, it’s gonna be. Let the kids go fight, it’s their fight
anyway. Why save a planet I’m only going
to be on for a little while longer anyway?
I realize I’m not quite dead, but in the grand scheme of humanity’s
history, I’m a blip. We’re all blips.
BURR: Sharon sent me
to the supermarket to buy water. Stock
up on water, she said. Why, I felt like
saying, so we can survive? That’s
it? Just survive. I don’t want to just survive. I want to…I want to…
STEVEN: You should
stock up on water, Burr. Water and
canned goods. And probably guns
too. I have a ton of guns—oh a ton of
guns, what a phrase—and you can have one or two if you want. I don’t run from things anymore. I face ‘em head on and say ‘You wanna tango,
boss?’ That’s more my style these days. But as long as you stay off my property, I
got no problem with you.
BURR: I got a ball
off the roof today using my powers. My
son was so embarrassed. ‘Come on, Dad,’
he said, ‘You’re being weird.’ I’m
weird. I always thought I was cool, but
I guess I’m just—
STEVEN: Weird, isn’t
it? For years we thought we had to be
ashamed of who we were, and now, we’re hot tickets. We’re in demand.
BURR: I might just do
it, Steve. I might just take off in the
middle of the night. Go to DC. Sign up.
See what happens.
STEVEN: I might just
go into the bunker I built in my basement and not come out again. I have jerky and girly mags down there. What else do I need?
BURR: If I do, I hope
I run into you out there. Maybe we can
fight alongside each other on the battlefield.
STEVEN: If I do, best
of luck to you, Burr. And tell Sharon I
sure do miss that dip.
BURR: All the Best.
STEVEN: All the Best.
BURR: Ps. You always were my best friend.
STEVEN: Ps. You still me twenty bucks.
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