The timer on the orbital hyperbomb ticked down to 00:00:59 as Cold in Gardez punched through the shields of the final dropbearship, disabling its warp drive and flinging it down into the atmosphere toward the deep Outback. "You're clear!" he shouted into his radio, ducking as a barrage of Spoon Rays speared through the vacuum near his head.

A jet of liquid metal spurted out from their captured Kangarude fighter, reforming into Horizon as it lanced toward the ticking activator. The figure turned back toward Cold, and his earpiece crackled. "Roger!"

"Don't use that for yes!" Cold shouted back, irritated, as he ripped the legs off a space megaspider. "We've [i]talked[/i] about—"

Horizon flailed his limbs frantically. [i]"Roger!"[/i]

Cold whirled around to see a darkly glowing figure, just in time for Sydney Harbour Bridge to hit him in the face.

[hr]

"Is anyone else beginning to dislike this 'triweekly crime wave' thing?" Fenton shouted, flinging up a barrier of liquid smoke as gunfire chattered toward the beleaguered heroes from Letter J's arm-cannons. "Another Dodger Dimension armada warps in, drawing the Medal Warriors away, and every supervillain in the city sees an opportunity to rampage!"

"It's not triweekly!" Monokeras shouted from inside the Victoria's Secret, ducking a fierce swing from the howling werewolf's bag of stolen vibranium bras.

"That's[i]technically[/i]true[i]if[/i]you[i]allow[/i]yourself[i]to[/i]take[i]rest[/i]breaks," CoffeeMinion vibrated as his blurry form rocketed around the square, snatching falling rubble from over the heads of cowering civilians as Orbiting Kettle's meteor microstrikes exploded around him.  "But[i]these[/i]events[i]do[/i]appear[i]to[/i]occur[i]with[/i]surprising[i]periodicity[/i]."

[i]WHAM![/i] The wolf finally connected, and Monokeras sailed through the store's front window, Lise Eclaire's elemental field catching him right before he slammed into the Present Perfect Memorial Statue. Monokeras rubbed the new dent in his ultra-thick skin and scowled. "No, I mean that 'triweekly' is defined as three times per week."

"Well, then how do you say 'every 21 days'?" Fenton asked, catching his breath as J ducked around a corner to reload.

[b][i]"hemi-semi-tri-moonly,"[/i][/b] a gibbous voice waxed as the chthonic form of Groaning Grey Agony flailed menacing tentacles at the screaming crowd it had driven insane. The monstrosity froze in place as Ranmilia held up a glowing pocket watch and pointed at it, and the nuts bolted before they could get nailed.

"Don't be pedantic—in actual usage 'triweekly' can mean 'every three weeks' even if that's technically wrong," Lise said to Monokeras while she loosed a flame jet at a cackling Posh. It wasn't quite in time to keep him from slipping into his getaway car with a bag of stolen cash, but it [i]did[/i] melt the vehicle's tires, fixing it in place. She grinned. "I think you're still sore that that cute widdle bunny got the best of you."

"Don't even [i]joke[/i] about that," Dubs said, sweat beading on his forehead as he sucked the light away from Fenton to enhance his shadow powers, brightening the area around the remaining villains to help his teammates' targeting. "That rabbit was a [i]demon[/i]. It's a good thing that nondescript Midwestern dad was there with that shovel or we'd have [i]all[/i] met the Great Heroes in the Sky."

An unearthly shriek from beyond the planet punctuated the conversation, and everyone—hero and villain alike—stopped and glanced up into the sky. A glow like a new sun was illuminating the distant horizon, and the entire atmosphere seemed to sing with gathering charge.

It was a wide-eyed Ranmilia who spoke for them all. "The Warriors," he whispered. "D-did they… fail?"

[hr]

Horizon screamed impotently as he smashed two megaspiders together, trying to thrash free of the swarm as the timer ticked to its last seconds. With Roger occupying Cold, he didn't have enough covering fire to reach and disable the device. It was already arming. Beginning to go nova. It was hopeless.

Then his comm crackled.

[smcaps]Uploading joke database,[/smcaps] a hollow voice echoed.

The painful light distorted. Warped. Folded in on itself, and then the bomb was gone, replaced with the deep darkness of space and a tiny metallic form glinting with reflected sunlight.

WriteoffBot beeped. [smcaps]Upload finished. Power levels at[/smcaps] 9.99e99 [smcaps]percent.[/smcaps] 

Then space distorted around it again, and the last thing it said before vanishing was: 

[smcaps]Apotheosis complete.[/smcaps]

[hr]

[center][b]Continued next issue in:[/b]
[i]WRITEOFFTOPIA —THE KILLING !JOKE[/i][/center]

[hr]

[i](AUTHOR'S NOTE: Set in [url=https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B15iqAEV0o0zSzZRMTBMVTI4dm8]WriteoffTopia[/url], which technically as an open worldbuilding project isn't "a work under U.S. copyright". Entered purely as a Writeoffs love-letter; I won't be offended if you bottom-slate it to penalize in-joke submissions.

Apologies to those I couldn't include in 750 words.)[/i]