On the Outside: A Daniel Collins Story

[The Izzack]

Today we will learn about the humble origins of the shortstack musclegoblin that everyone knows and loves: the Big Fellow himself, Daniel Collins! Now, you too can see that our beloved Daniel wasn't always the fight loving wildcard he is today!

This is actually Lepa posting under Izzack's name, but everything below is Izzack's writing. He's been slowly working on this over the past few weeks/months, and I'm very excited he's finally ready to share it! I'm just borrowing his robe so I can touch up some formatting at his request. Please enjoy and note that there is some swearing a bit later on!

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Tough as Nails

Daniel leaped from the top of the skyscraper. He felt the wind around him, and embraced it. He relished every part of the fall. The lurching feeling in his stomach, the fight to remain conscious, even how his cheeks seemed to pull painfully to the sides. This was the feeling of freedom. Freedom was risky, it was painful at times, but it was always worth it.

He knew where he was aiming, of course. He had needed to adjust his fall a little bit, but this was going to be his best entrance yet. This guy had managed to take out two pretty popular heroes, and was making quite the clean getaway. Poor sap didn’t know what was about to hit him.

Daniel pulled up from his fall just a little bit, righting himself in midair so that he landed on the man with his elbow instead of just slamming into him. He forced the criminal to the ground, all while appearing to be lounging. His victim exploded in a cloud of money from his bags he had been holding, and by the time it cleared, Daniel was surrounded.

“Daniel! Daniel! Daniel! Daniel!” The crowd cheered, and Daniel basked in the recognition.

“Please, ladies and gentlemen, there will be plenty of time for autographs! Just form a line around me!” he promised, and the cheering swelled. Suddenly, his phone rang. “Sorry, I’m gonna have to take this!” he picked up the phone, and his mother’s shrill voice pierced him.

“You’re going to be late, Daniel! Wake up!”

Daniel refused to open his eyes for a short while, in piteous defiance to the harsh shock of reality. When he finally cracked an eyelid open, he looked at his alarm clock. A half hour before he had to be awake. A half hour before he had to be awake for his job that he would leave for two hours from now.

“Don’t expect me to call in sick for you Daniel. Do you know what I went through to get you this job? You only have 5 mandated sick days in a year, and…" Daniel tuned her out. It was easier to be aloof than to be a disappointment. He got up, and the pitch of his mother’s words changed, but the substance remained the same. Daniel was somehow managing to fumble a mailroom job.

A mailroom job whose position had been opened specifically because of his mother’s influence at the company.

The whole situation was absurd, of course, but that didn’t take the sting out of her words. Yes, much better to just ignore it. He pushed her out of his room and began to get ready. His clothes had been picked out for him already, as always. A suit rested on the back of his door. It was rather fancy attire for a job where a button up was all that was really asked of him. He had told his mother about this, but the most that he had been able to convince her of is that he didn’t need the suit jacket.

Well, it was his dad that convinced her of that.

As he left his room, he saw the man himself, laughing at the breakfast table. He wore his knee brace today. He always wore it before it rained. Daniel swore that he could be a weatherman on that knee alone, and he’d be the most trustworthy in the entire state. He wore the brace because of an old hockey injury, which he seemed to view as some badge of honor.

“Hey champ, you’re up early!” his dad said, a slight twinkle in his eye telling him that his dad knew exactly why that was. “Must be a big day!”

“Yep.” Daniel offered, “They say I might actually work any day now!” he smiled as his dad laughed. At least he could make someone happy, even if his dad always seemed a little disheartened that Daniel hadn’t followed in his footsteps. Nevermind whose fault that was.

The rest of the morning went by without comment. Not from him at least. He didn’t like drawing that much attention to himself, even among his parents. Sometimes he felt as though he was going to crack under the pressure they piled up on top of him.

That was going to change soon, though. He had secretly bought a ticket to Aster City for this weekend. His uncle Manny had bought it, actually, but Daniel had given him the money from the little bit of his wages that he had asked his supervisor to pay him in cash. It was good to have a source of money that his mother didn’t have an eye on.

Whatever, that didn’t matter. Come this weekend, he was going to be in the big city, visiting his uncle, and letting loose for once. His uncle didn’t question his choices, or give him those occasional sad looks. His uncle accepted him for who he was, though he certainly encouraged his more…wild habits. There were few better ways to blow off steam than this weekend would prove.

He nearly bolted out of the door when it was time to go. In fact, the only thing that stopped him was knowing that it didn’t really matter how fast he left - he would still have to wait for his mom to drive him to work.

[The Izzack]

Just Another Day

Work had gone by at a snail’s pace. It turned out, when freedom loomed over you, you couldn’t help but count the seconds. It was always more of the same; Daniel had almost nothing to do, and he couldn’t goof off, or word would get back to his mother. The few reliefs he had in his work day were when people needed to move something heavy. Then Daniel got to shine bright as day, moving things that several people struggled with with ease. He liked to be useful, especially when he could do what others couldn’t. It was not much, but he liked to use his powers to play office hero.

By the end of the day, he had walked the same stretch of floor about ten thousand times, and he practically dashed to punch out. “Have a good day, a pleasant weekend, a good night, all of that nonsense!” he called out as he ran out the door. He had told his mother that he was going to take a walk after work, so she didn’t need to pick him up right away. And he was taking a walk, alright: straight into a taxi for the airport. His flight couldn’t come soon enough, if it would get him to Aster City any sooner, he’d drive the taxi himself.

The trip was full of firsts for Daniel. First taxi ride, first time being downtown, first time in an airport, first time experiencing airplane food -what was the deal with that?- and first time stepping out into an unknown city. To say that he was overawed would be an understatement on par with “the Titanic was a bummer”. He felt a brief stab of panic when he thought about his parents reacting to him not being home, but he forced it down. Things were going to be alright. There was no reason to panic yet.

He stepped outside, and gazed up at the majesty of Aster City. Skyscrapers that put the downtown of his home to shame, noticeably more vagrants, and definitely air that could only be described as “powerful”.

This felt good. This felt right. All he had to do now was find the police station uncle Manny worked at, and get this weekend started! He pulled out the directions Manny had given him that he copied down the week before. They were cryptic to say the least, but he felt as though he would be able to decipher them. He raised the sheet of paper into the air, and he wanted to shout out to the heavens, to proclaim his arrival, and to warn Aster City of the mayhem that he would bring it, but he just couldn’t. He yanked down the paper nearly as soon as he had raised it.

Daniel had a mighty task in front of him. He had to surprise a police officer who was eagerly awaiting his arrival, in his own police station, in broad daylight.

No big deal at all.

[The Izzack]

Nothing Bad Ever Happens to Me

Daniel was experiencing so many new things during his trip away from home. Just now, he was learning that blood inside his mouth had a notably different taste than blood from, say, a nose bleed.

The man in front of Daniel punched him again, and he learned how it felt to be knocked silly. He almost laughed, thinking about what his mom would think, God, what his mom would do if she knew that her son was being mugged. He did chuckle a little when he thought about her setting an itinerary for him for the court case of these thugs.

“The FUCK you laughing at?” the flame haired man shouted. He moved so close, their faces almost touched. “You wanna fuckin’ die, bro? They wouldn’t even look for you here.” He threatened. His beady eyes screamed anger at being mocked, and Daniel shrank back.

The thought of fighting back never even crossed his mind. He believed the threat without question, and he didn’t resist as he was beaten by the man and his friends. The only release he had was when he lost consciousness.

Some time later, he woke up to find that he had been quite expertly robbed. In Aster City, even the criminals were above and beyond what could be expected from home. At least, he assumed they were. He almost laughed again, but the pain in his ribs warned that he probably shouldn’t. He checked his pockets to see what, if anything, had been left, and found a whole lot of nothing at all. His wallet, his return flight ticket, hell, even his hotel receipt had been taken from him. He probably could contact the hotel and they’d understand, but that left an even bigger problem.

Daniel didn’t know where he was. He had had a map on him, sure, but apparently the gang had been lost, too, because they took it off of him when he was asleep.

Oh, no, no they hadn’t. Daniel noticed something floating in a puddle nearby. It looked a whole lot like a map, if it was torn up into pieces, and waterlogged. Well, at least he had closure. He sighed as he stood up. He should at least get out of this area, or who knew what other assholes would jump him? He approached the lip of the alley, and found a bustling city, uncaring to the plight of a mugged man.

That didn’t bother Daniel. At least, he pretended it didn’t. He was on his own, and it was as scary as it was liberating. He stepped from the alley, and walked in a direction, hoping for a lucky break to balance this decidedly unlucky turn of events. He didn’t have to walk long before he found a park. Well, it was as good a place as any to rest and recuperate after his setback.

He sat down on a bench, and tried to collect his thoughts. He was a couple hundred miles from home, he had no money, he had no proof of identity, and he had no way of leaving the city, short of walking.

Man, when it was all laid out like that, it made Daniel’s situation seem dire. Better to ignore that and try to figure out what to do next. He definitely had to get into contact with his uncle, but it was getting dark. He had to figure out what he was going to do. Well, at least he had nothing left to steal. He found a quiet place, next to a pond, and he hunkered down there.

He would try to figure this all out in the morning.

[The Izzack]

It Only Makes Me Laugh

Daniel’s long awaited weekend ended up being spent hiding out in the park. He had tried to find the police station Uncle Manny worked at, but had no real luck. He had tried to ask for directions, but a decade of sheltered life, along with his first experience with strangers being a mugging, had quite the adverse effect on his ability to talk with just anybody he saw.

His stomach grumbled, and he was surprised by it. He hadn’t expected the sound to be so like what he heard in cartoons. It was bizarre. “Don’t worry, bud. We’ll get you fed. Soon, I promise.” he said comfortingly, rubbing a hand against his belly. He was lying, of course. A grave sin against all of stomachkind. Still, a lie felt better than the truth right about now.

He thought briefly, in his misery, about what his mom would have said, if he had just told her about his plans to visit Aster City, and he couldn’t help but chuckle at the idea that she would tell him that this exact scenario would be the consequences.

Did that mean she was right to be so overbearing? Daniel gave the thought a whole three minutes of thought.

...No, not really.

Daniel loved his mom, but she would have said that, not because it was true, but because it would be the most efficient way to dissuade Daniel from taking this trip. Daniel found himself silly, but he couldn’t help but think that this trip, even with how it immediately turned out, was overall a benefit to his life.

The bruises, scratches, and hunger proved that he was alive, and the fact that his parents would aggressively protect him from those same maladies proved that he was in control of his own destiny.

With this burst of optimism, he crawled from his little resting spot, and made another attempt. He wandered farther than he had before, hoping to find a familiar face farther outside his comfort zone, and so he did.

Too bad that face belonged to the man who had mugged him. He was walking with his buddies in front of Daniel when they noticed each other. Daniel froze.

“Shit, if it isn’t my new punching bag. Well, boys? What do you think he has on him this time?” He said, nudging his friends in the ribs. With a chorus of laughter, the trio advanced on Daniel.

Daniel broke out of his stupor quickly, and his first reaction was to flee. What would this guy do, if he found out that Daniel had nothing left to lose?

...Wait a minute.

Daniel had nothing left to lose.

His fear quickly turned to an almost desperate anger. He had never fought before, but he had his strength, and he could rely on his emotion to get him through this. How dare this…this fucker do this to him!? It was all his fault! His hunger, his sleeping outside, this whole weekend had been ruined because this asshat decided to get a few kicks out of Daniel. No more, no way!

With a desperate yell, Daniel struck at one of the thug’s cronies when he neared. The strength of his punch sent the man flying, until he collided with a nearby dumpster. Daniel hardly noticed the other’s wary looks as he lunged, grabbing the leader as the other man fled.

Daniel slammed the man into the ground, and the resulting grunt only fed into his destructive fury. He pounced, and began thrashing the mugger. Who knows how far he would have gone; Daniel only stopped when he felt a hand on his shoulder.

“Well, kid, seems like you’ve done enough damage. I’m gonna need you to come with me.” A deep voice said from behind him. Daniel spun to find a police officer. His heart sank. His rage almost immediately drained away, replaced with a severe sense of dread.

“Y-you don’t understand! He mugged me, first! I was just defending myself, and, and I-” he stammered, his mind reeling at both what he had done, and the consequences he thought he was about to face.

The officer held up a hand to silence Daniel. His face was stern, and his mirrored sunglasses reflected a terrified kid. “I know this idiot. Maruun. I don’t doubt he started this." The officer glanced towards the thug, then back at Daniel. “...Still. I’m gonna need you to come with me.” His voice betrayed no compassion, and Daniel couldn’t help but begin to cry.

He got into the back of the officer's police car, and sobbed, terrified and overwhelmed. He took it all back. His mom was right after all. He wasn’t ready to face the real world. The real world was full of terrifying gangsters, and stone cold cops. He would be fine being a sheltered kid in a mailroom. Why was he so stupid as to want something more...?

The squad car pulled up to a station, and the officer, Reagan, by his badge, let Daniel out. He walked into the building, head hung low from his utter shame.

“Woah! Holy shit! Daniel!” A familiar voice called out from the front desk. “I’ve been lookin’ all over for ya!”

Daniel looked up, stunned as he locked eyes with his uncle Manny.

“Woah, man! You came just in time! Your mom’s callin’ again! I’m so glad you’re here, I don’t think she was buying the whole ‘he’s tired from the flight’ shtick anymore!” Manny picked up the phone at the desk, and hit a few keys, taking Daniel’s mother off of hold. He held the receiver out to Daniel.

Something inside of Daniel broke as the scene played out before him. This whole trip, the rollercoaster of emotions it had taken him on, the questioning of his place in the world.

All of it could have been avoided if he had simply gotten mugged in a place where Reagan could have seen.

Daniel began to laugh. A quiet chuckle at first, but soon it grew to a deep belly laugh. He found that he loved this stupid city.

He grabbed the phone. “Hey! Yeah, mom, I’m doin’ juuuuuust fine! I love it here!” He beamed. “Actually, I think I’m gonna stay for a bit longer! Manny can tell you more! I love ya! Miss ya! See ya!” He gave an underhand toss of the receiver back to his uncle, and did a little jig over towards the cells, waving over Reagan as he went.

He heard his uncle struggle to come up with an excuse for Daniel’s wild declaration, something about meeting a girl out here, and becoming smitten. Maybe he should try that! He almost felt bad for Manny, but he stopped himself. Aster City was a place of change. A place of violent, drastic, and dramatic turbulence, and all you could do was hang on tight, and let the winds move you where they did.

He had tried to fight that. He had tried to remain the scared little sheltered brat, and Aster City had punished him. He felt so silly about that. He had the chance to be who he was meant to be, and he had resisted. Well, no more.

He was about to become a whole lot more fun.