A low cloud hangs over the city of Glendale, Arizona. The Toronto Maple Leaf reconnaissance drone darts in and out of the cover this cloud provides. The drone is being controlled by Kyle Dubas. Kyle rubs his weary eyes and takes another sip of Joker energy drink. He is sitting on a hotel bed looking through his computer screen at the streets of Glendale, which are quiet at 3 am on a Tuesday.

“Still not seeing any activity, Captain.” Kyle says into his mic.

The Captain replies. “We have to focus.” As captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs, Dion Phaneuf has many responsibilities. He takes them all seriously. None more so than his role as The Captain, the world’s foremost supplier of vigilante, super hero, justice. Flying above the desert city he looks for crime, and as always, Kyle supports Dion in any way he can.

Kyle always has to work harder at this role on the road. In Toronto Kyle is hooked into every grid, controlling the city like a puppet-master. When the team is travelling, Kyle has to use the drones. State of the art surveillance technology can only cover so much hostile territory, and in a quiet city like Glendale, he was really just flying around hoping to get lucky.

“I am going to swing by Glendale High School one more time, then check out the trailer park.” Kyle says with a yawn. “Birth place of Jenny Garth just so you know.”

“You gotta stay sharp.” The Captain says.

“Got something.” There is commotion in the high school parking lot. As Kyle’s drone gets closer, what he thought was a fight turns out to be a beating. “You better get to the high school quick.” Four large men are filling in a fifth prone figure with boots and fists. Dion arrives like a meteor and the four are knocked to the ground from the impact of his landing.

The Captain picks up the beaten man and takes off for the nearest emergency room. He bursts through a wall and lays the victim on the triage nurses desk.“Help.” he says. The nurse is speechless as Dion takes off back through the hole in the wall, racing for the high school.

The four men are back on their feet when The Captain lands, more gently this time. They spread out and two of them pull out knives from their cheap leather coats. They are used to intimidating people and are slow to adapt. A skinny one without a weapon steps forward.

“You done fucked up son. No one gets in the way of the boss’s business. You best fly on up outta here.”

“Dion, somethings not right.” Kyle is getting a very bad feeling. “These guys aren’t surprised by your powers. They don’t look the least bit frightened by you. We have to find out more about this boss of theirs. You have to let them get away.”

“I know.” Dion says.

“Damn right you know.” The thug does not realize Dion is talking to someone else. “Everyone knows this is Ten Eels turf. Now I gots to gut ya for getting in our way.”

The thugs move in to attack. The Captain moves faster. He holds back his strength as he strikes though, not wanting to incapacitate, only motivate. Two are down with split lips  and bloody noses before they can even take a step. The leader pulls out a long knife from behind his back and Dion breaks his hand by accident. Disarmed, the man falls to the ground screaming. The only thug standing turns and runs. The other two help the skinny leader to his feet and take off behind him.

“I’ll follow them.” Kyle says, all thoughts of sleep demolished by the thrill of the chase. The thugs run through the high school grounds and then surprise Kyle by opening a manhole and jumping down below the street. “They are taking to the sewers Dion. Switching to thermal scope.” Kyle activates the drones heat detection sensors which are so finely tuned they can find a target even through meters of concrete and earth.

The thugs traverse about three kilometres of  the underground warren. They are obviously comfortable in the environment because they never slow down and never hesitate at the various turnings they pass. If Kyle wasn’t tracking them biochemically he would have lost them for sure. Finally they stop underneath a large derelict warehouse. Despite the appearance of abandonment, the drone reads the heat signatures of dozens of people inside.

“I am right above their hideout Dion, but I think you better be careful, the place is packed.

“You gotta enjoy every day.” Says The Captain.

Kyle begins to type commands into his keyboard, but not to the reconnaissance drone. Kyle has a special toy designed for when things get messy. Eager to confront the upcoming chaos, The Captain crashes though the roof of the building. He blasts through three floors into the basement and everybody inside begins to converge on the area. Things get confused as the crowd around Dion grows. Kyle can no longer separate individuals from the mass of heat in the basement of the warehouse.

“Whats happening in there?” Kyle can hear the crash and clamour of battle but he cannot tell if Dion is okay. Suddenly several rounds of gunfire go off and Kyle losses all sympathy “Get clear! Sweet Adeline is on her way.” Kyle fears the worst until the familiar figure of The Captain leaps out of the fray and onto the roof of the warehouse.

Sweet Adeline is Kyle’s pet name for the Toronto Maple Leaf attack drone and Kyle takes control of it as it soars down into the warehouse. Adeline is among the most advanced war machines in existence. Her heads-up display captures and enhances images at a rate many times faster than human comprehension. Her twin mounted vulcan cannons spew 50mm death at 700 rounds per second. Kyle addresses the assembled mob through speakers mounted in her nose.

“Run now and you can live. You stay, you die.”

One of the thugs takes a shot that glances off Adeline’s armour plated hide and Kyle opens fire.

On the roof of the building The Captain catches his breath. He almost lost it down there. It wasn’t the mob that nearly ended him, but their leader. Dion has never been confronted with anything to rival his strength on this planet. Not until today. He wants to tell Kyle to pull Adeline out of there, but he is too late.

Adeline devastates the mob. She mows down dozens, filling the air with pink mist. Suddenly, something grey and slimy fills Kyle’s HUD. Adeline fires over twenty-one hundred rounds into it with no effect. As Kyle attempts to back the drone off, his screen goes dark.

“No!” Kyle cries out. “Dion, they wrecked her. What the hell is down there?”

“Work.” Dion answers. He focuses on his opponent with his mind and finds him. Dion has never felt such a malevolent swirl of chaos. Suddenly he is pushed out by his enemies will. Dion is surprised, a physical beast and psychically strong too. A real challenge. A real test.

“You have to be able to do it.” The Captain says to himself.

Dion flies back down into the basement. Waiting for him is a nightmare made out of a man. He stands over seven feet tall, thickly muscled with broad shoulders. He is almost bursting out of the grey suit he is wearing. The tailoring is expensive and shows no sign of being blasted at point blank range by Adeline’s cannons. All this is taken in as background to his grotesque nature. His skin is a slimy looking grey, his lips split in a sickly grin displaying pointed teeth. Wet droplets ooze down constantly off his bald head covering him in a greasy layer of moisture. He stands with arms wide open and his hideous hands make Dion gasp. They are as big as garbage can lids and instead of fingers, his digits are long writhing eel bodies, each ending with a viscous eel head. When he speaks his voice sounds as if he is under water.

“Greetings. I am the mighty Ten Eel. Since you killed my gang I guess you don’t want to be friends.”

The behemoth leaps forward and almost crushes Dion with a double-fisted hammer strike. The Captain narrowly avoids the blow, but as the fist slams down one of the eel heads lashes out and bites him on the thigh. Ten Eel follows up with a kick hard in The Captain’s chest and he crashes into a wall, cracking the building’s foundations. Pain flares through The Captain’s leg. He can feel a venom attempting to destroy his body. He can feel his mighty metabolism absorbing and eliminating the poison. As he stands, his opponent laughs.

“So, you won’t die quick? No problem!” Ten Eel makes a fist with his left hand and sticks his pointer eel out like a pistol at The Captain’s head. It vomits a spurt of green goo which Dion dodges. The goo is an acid which melts the wall behind him. The right pinkie eel spits out three darts which hit The Captain right on the crest of his armour. Even though the darts do no damage Dion can feel the strength behind the projectiles like that of a small calibre rifle.

The Captain goes on the offensive. He flies straight for Ten Eel’s face, putting all his strength into his two fists. His knuckles land squarely, one set over each eye and Dion hears a wet thwack. His momentum stops as though he had run into a sponge mountain and Ten Eel laughs again.

“You are pretty strong, I’ve been hit by trains that didn’t have your punch. Lucky for me you’re not strong enough to get by my SLIME SHIELD!”

Ten Eel lashes out with a roar, missing Dion with a left handed overhead smash, but catching him in the gut with a follow up right hook. As Dion is propelled back by the hit he catches the thumb eel just behind its head. His fingers nearly slip off but Dion tightens his grip, clasping that slippery eel in his titanic grasp. Ten Eel lets out a wail and shakes his hand, smashing Dion repeatedly into the floor and ceiling. The Captain holds on. Even as the other eels on the hand bite at him he tightens his grip. Dion squeezes so hard that the thumb eels head pops off.

Ten Eel screams and lashes out wildly. He hits walls and ceilings and everything except his target. The building is beginning to shake. The Captain zips past Ten Eel and picks up Adeline’s smashed remains, then flies up and out of the building, breaking through floors even as they crumble down onto the villain’s head.

As Kyle watches The Captain emerge from the wreckage with his beloved attack drone, he mouths a silent prayer.

“Dear God and Lord Stanley, thank you for bringing me to Dion and please help Steven Stamkos find his way home.” Turning on his mic he speaks directly into The Captain’s helmet. “I never could pick up the heat signature of that monster. All I saw was you getting knocked all over the place. I doubt that wreck finished him off, but please, can we call it a night? There is a game today.”

“I thought we did a great job.” Dion says, as he makes his weary way back to the hotel.

Kyle is relieved. “Come by my room, I have snacks.”