John pulled the small craft within sight of the island and shut off the engine. He motioned to Ed who pulled the plug on the boat’s floor. Water began seeping in, causing the boat to start sinking. John put on his mouthpiece, adjusted his goggles, and rolled into the water. Ed splashed in a second after him.

I hate this, John thought. He usually did this sort of thing in a large group, but not this time. The rest of the team were either away on other assignments (involving lots of scantily clad women) or on vacation (also involving lots of scantily clad women). Lucky bastards, he thought. John was not pleased that he got stuck with a gun-happy novice. Ed probably hadn’t even saved the world once, he thought.

John and Ed had gotten one of the tougher assignments. They were to infiltrate the notorious (well, kind of notorious) Doctor Diamond’s secret island stronghold and destroy his doomsday device. The stronghold was on one of the many tiny islands off the West Coast of the United States and was only found through several weeks of satellite sweeps and some good luck. The government was going to send some jets and battleships to vaporize the island, but feared backlash from the environmentalists—not to mention the animal rights’ activists. Doctor Diamond knew this—he was a shrewd one all right. That’s why the government was secretly sending spies to destroy the complex. And just in time too, as intelligence reports indicated Doctor Diamond’s device was almost ready. To do what was anybody’s guess, but it was rumored that he planned to blow up the western half of the United States. Not that it was the good half, but still.

After emerging from the water and stumbling onto the beach, John and Ed removed their wet suits and unpacked their supplies. John cringed as Ed unpacked weapon after weapon. John never believed much in weapons as he only carried a handgun and used his martial arts abilities. He always trained heavily in the martial arts because he felt that was the best weapon—you could never be unarmed. Assuming that you weren’t literally un-armed, John would (try to) joke. He was trying to work on his quips to get assigned to more of the missions involving tuxedoes and scantily clad women.

Ed put away his grenades.

“Ready yet, Ed?” John said sarcastically. Ed slung his sawed-off shotgun.

“In a sec,” Ed replied, missing John’s tone as he slung his submachine gun.

The two stashed the wet suits behind some bushes, slogged through the beach, and carefully made their way through the foliage alongside a crude dirt path. Clank, clank, clank... John paused, put a hand up, and quickly looked around. Ed stopped. John walked again, with Ed following. Clank, clank, clank... John stopped again, whirled around, and glared at Ed. Ed quickly stopped—clink, clank.

“Will you please do something about all that noise you’re making!” John hissed.

“Right, sorry, guess I’m just a little nervous,” Ed replied, shifting the submachine gun to his right shoulder.

After moving noiselessly (except for John’s mumbling about Ed) through the foliage, John spotted a pair of guards walking ahead of them. John motioned to Ed who stopped and nodded. The two caught up, leapt out, and attacked the guards from behind, John grappling the left guard’s neck until he fell unconscious and Ed smashing the right guard in the back of the head with his sawed-off shotgun. They removed the guards’ clothing, bound the guards’ hands and feet behind their backs, and hid the bodies behind some nearby bushes. With that done they tried on the clothes - white jumpsuits - which were a perfect fit. The two switched backpacks as well, transferring their equipment and weaponry in the process. John was pretty pleased. They looked just like the two guards they had beat up, except for the hair. That would be a problem, John realized. Ed turned to face John.

“Um, John?”

“Yes?”

“Do you think all the guards here are bald?”

“Mm, hope not,” John said, trying to ignore the question. It’s not that John had anything against bald people, he just didn’t want to have to be one for another 20 or 30 years when it no longer mattered.

Moving along, this time on the dirt path and all too happy to ignore the hair issue, they came upon what looked like an entrance to a large, domed underground facility. Two guards, both bald, were doing their jobs, namely guarding the entrance.

“Hey you two, what’s with the hair?” the left guard said, raising his rifle. The right guard followed the other’s lead and menacingly brandished his weapon.

“Um, hmm, well, well it seems that Doctor Diamond, hmm, how shall I put this, well, you see, we’re new here, because of the aah, approaching hour of the um, destruction,” stammered John.

“Yeah, right, destruction, ha-ha, well we’re new here because Doctor Doom is expecting mm, infiltrators and wanted to beef-up security and I guess, well, we’d like to know where to go for a, um, haircut,” added Ed, “Yes, that’s it, a haircut.”

“Yeah, that’s right, take us to your barber, ha-ha,” quipped John.

“Hmm...Well, that makes sense. Take the elevator down to B-wing and somebody there’ll take care of you,” the left guard flatly stated, lowering his gun.

“Yeah, and you better hurry. Doctor Diamond doesn’t like anyone having hair where he doesn’t,“ the right guard warned while inputting a code into a control panel next to the door.

”You mean just the head, right?“ smiled John.

The right guard laughed in such a way that made John quickly lose his smile and wish he never asked.

The door shushed open.

John and Ed entered and the door shushed shut. The well-lit metallic corridor went straight or to the left or right.

“I should’ve blasted them,” Ed said, “There’s no way that they believed that crazy story.”

“Why not?” asserted John, “They’re just pawns. I’m, I mean we’re, the expert spies here, not them. Good thinking backing there.”

“Yeah, but for haircuts?”

John shrugged it off - he had been through situations like that many times before - and began heading towards the right. Ed followed closely by his side in true guard formation.

John made sure that they weren’t being followed as they took many twists and turns within the complex, noticing very little activity in the hallways. They passed many doors, but none looked promising. The real action must be down below, John thought. They reached an elevator and John pressed the button.

“Hey, guys!” a voice behind the two boomed, “I just remembered that they moved the...”

Ed smashed the guy in the nose with the butt of his submachine gun. Then, in the same instant, with the guard bent over holding his bloody nose, he smashed him in the back of the head, making him unconscious.

“What the Hell did you do that for!  That was just one of the idiots from the entrance,” scolded John.

“Sorry, I panicked.” 

The elevator bonged and then opened.

“Well, help me move the body. There aren’t any bushes here so we’ll have to find something else.”

Ed nudged John. “Look,” he said pointing to a garbage chute, “What do you say we take out the trash?”

“Now you’re thinking.” John liked the idea, he had done it himself many times before, but was a little irritated that Ed thought of such a clever quip. He just hoped that there wasn’t someone down there sorting out the recyclables. The elevator bonged and then closed.

The two wiped up the blood, bound the guard’s hands and feet and tossed him down the chute. John pressed the button, the elevator bonged, and then opened. They went in. The doors slid shut.

The elevator was small with a row of buttons labeled MAIN through D next to the door and what looked like a card access slot. There was something bothering John about the buttons, but he ignored the feeling. Ed pressed the D-button and the elevator whirred smoothly into action. A...B...C..whoop, whoop, whoop. The elevator stopped.

“What happened?” Ed yelled above the whooping klaxon.

“The good Doctor must be environmentally conscious.”

John pressed the OPEN button and the doors slid apart. Six heavily armed guards came barreling down the hallway towards the elevator, which was about halfway below C-level. John quickly pressed the CLOSE button and the doors slid shut. Bullets slammed into the elevator doors, causing indentations.

“If they press the button out there, we’re in big trouble, Ed.”

Ed, acknowledging this, took out his shotgun (John took cover as best he could), and blew apart the control box.

“That should hold them for a while.”

“Yeah, but we’re not going anywhere either. Try to blow a hole in the floor.”

More shots riddled the elevator door and then stopped. Ed aimed his shotgun at the floor, but couldn’t do enough damage to make a big enough hole. The klaxon continued to sound.

John began jumping up and down, shaking the elevator. The sounds of metal being pried were heard outside the elevator. Ed started jumping too.

“Jump harder,” John yelled.

The whole elevator began shaking violently.

“I think it’s coming, Jo...” There was a loud crash and with one lucky (or unlucky) jump, Ed burst through the floor. As John leapt down after him, the doors flew open.

While John was falling he noticed the bottom was a little farther down than he guessed. When he hit, he immediately went into an expert roll, which absorbed some, but not all of the shock. He noticed Ed pull out his submachine gun and start firing up towards the hole, where the guards were already trying to climb down. The guards scrambled back up and yelled something at each other. The klaxon stopped.

John quickly looked around and saw a service ladder to their right. He told John to cover him while he climbed up the ladder. As he looked up he noticed two doors, not one. So there was a level just below D, he thought, just what I’ve been looking for.

“Hey, Ed, I found something, come on up.”

“O.K., but I think I twisted my ankle,” Ed said, selectively shooting into the hole.

Several whizzing sounds were heard and canisters hit the bottom where Ed was getting up. Pinkish gas started to seep out.

“Ed, it’s knockout gas, get up here now.”

John pulled his portable facemask from his backpack and expertly slipped it on while climbing up the ladder with his free hand. Ed quickly pulled his mask out, slipped it on, and awkwardly started up the ladder. The smoke began to rise.

As John reached the doors below D-level, he tried to pull them apart, but couldn’t. He noticed some type of valve to his left and began turning it. The doors started to spread apart. The gas began rising more, making it difficult to see. John vaulted in the narrow opening and was faced with a metallic hall much like the other metallic halls he had seen. This time, there was only one way to go--straight. This must be it, he thought. John waited for Ed to finish trading shots with the guards and then stumble next to him. Ed reached into the elevator shaft and blew off the valve with his shotgun, and then the two spies, with great effort, pushed the doors shut. Ed then blasted the elevator control panel.

“Well, it looks like this is it,” John said, motioning towards the door at the far end of the hall.

“It’s a little quiet, isn’t it?”

“Yeah, maybe we got lucky and they still think we’re at the bottom of the elevator shaft.”

The door at the far end of the hall slid open and four armed guards came out. John looked at Ed who smiled and opened fire with his submachine gun. John pulled out his handgun and began firing. Bullets hit just above and below the two spies, ending up missing them entirely. Ed gunned down the three on the left and John blew away the one on the right. A klaxon, this time louder and with a message blared, “INTRUDER ALERT - Doomsday sector breached.”

“Come on,” John yelled.

They made their way down the hall and slipped through the door. When they entered, about 50 bald, heavily armed guards had their weapons pointed in their direction. John and Ed immediately dropped theirs. Two guards came rushing up and removed their portable face masks, tie-on ankle knives, and backpacks, then straddled John and Ed from behind.

John looked around and saw that they were in a large, square room with a very high ceiling. Towards the center was a fenced-in area that contained a large machine with various lights and dials that emitted a low frequency hum. Some type of control panel was next to the fence.

The klaxon stopped.

John noticed the crowd of guards begin to part, letting a short, bald, fat man through. The man was dressed in a white suit with diamond cuff links, a diamond tie-clip on his white tie, and a large diamond ring on the chubby right index finger of his stubby hand, which he was using to stroke a large, bald, white cat with a diamond collar, who was cradled in his left arm.

“Allow me to introduce myself,” the fat man said.

“No need,” John answered confidently, “I know who you are...Doctor Diamond!”

The crowd of guards collectively gasped.

“You’re very perceptive,” Doctor Diamond said, raising an eyebrow, “I could use someone like you. Too bad you’ll have to die.”

“We’re not afraid of death, Doctor Diamond,” Ed stated defiantly.

“You’re not? Well then, I’m going to drag out the experience.”

John gave Ed a sharp look.

“I bet you’re wondering how I got my name gentlemen.”

“Mm, no, not really. I was more interested in your evil plan,” stated John.

“You see, I own diamond mines all over the world and have become fabulously wealthy. However, with this wealth comes a certain boredom. So I decided to take over the world. That turned out to be too expensive, so I decided to just be a really bad guy. Hence, I took the name Doctor Diamond to allude to how I acquired my wealth and strike fear into the hearts of do-gooders everywhere.”

Doctor Diamond stroked and nuzzled the cat who purred contentedly.

“But what of your evil plan?” asserted John, giving a token struggle to the guy holding him back.

“My evil plan. Heh-heh. It’s really quite good actually. Since you’ll be dead I see no harm in telling you,” Doctor Diamond stated, then paused.

“Well?” John demanded. He never liked waiting too long for this part.

“O.K. O.K. Well, you see, as a child, my parents would drive the whole family cross-country. We lived in Virginia and would end up in Washington, Nevada, New Mexico, California, you name it. The trip was uncomfortable, long, and dreadfully boring. You would think that we would find some relief when we reached one of our many destinations, but no. It was even more boring where we would stay. I couldn’t wait to take the dreadful trip back just so I could be less bored.”

“So? That sounds pretty normal,” Ed shrugged.

“Yes, but don’t you see? By destroying the western half of the United States I will never have to think about those dreadful memories again.”

“Well, that’s logical,” John sleepily stated, starting to nod off and wanting to get to the good part, ”So how does your doomsday device work?”

“You’re asking an awful lot of questions for someone who is going to die. Very well.” 

Doctor Diamond walked over to the control desk just outside the fenced-in area.

“You see, I just press this button here,” Doctor Diamond explained, pressing the button and causing the machine to hum louder, “and my little (actually quite big) machine here sends complex commands to various orbiting satellites that will then send complex commands to various missile silos causing them to take aim at various strategic points in the western half of the United States, entirely obliterating it.”

“You fiend,” cried Ed.

“Yeah, how did you figure out how to override the orbiting satellites’ command structure,” wondered John.

Doctor Diamond walked back over, ignored the question (probably because he didn’t know the answer), and said, “It’s all really complex and my device will be self destructing in about ten minutes, so I think it’s time I packed and took my leave. Guard!”

A guard strolled over to the control panel, pressed a button, and a view screen slid slowly up from the floor. Then, on the wall next to John and Ed, several pairs of restraining devices came out, seemingly affording whoever was held in them an excellent view of the screen. A chair (?) was also placed near the shackles by another guard.

“Now, you will suffer by watching your precious western United States get obliterated,” chuckled Doctor Diamond. The cat purred.

“I’ve had worse,” John said defiantly.

“And then my machine will self-destruct, destroying you and the island with it.”

“Yeah so,” John yawned.

“But first,” continued Doctor Diamond, “I’ll have my guards remove your hair.”

John felt the terror rise in him like never before. Ed was already screaming.

“You’ll pay for this Doctor Diamond,” John spat.

“Yes, I already have. This business is quite expensive, you know. And there’s very little profit in blowing things up. Good day gentlemen.”

Doctor Diamond walked away, taking most of the guards with him, apparently leaving through some type of door that the machine blocked from view. Two guards each wrestled John and Ed to the shackles, locked them in, and then rubbed white creme on their hair.

“What is this stuff?” moaned Ed.

“It’s a special depilatory,” stated one of the guards.

“Have you no souls?” asked John, already feeling the depilatory tingle.

“Hey, look, the pay is good and we have health benefits. So we take part in blowing this or that up and killing a few people, what’s the big deal?” stated the guard closest to John.

“What kind of benefits?” Ed wondered. John gave Ed another sharp glance.

The closest guard to Ed turned to the guard closest to John and yelled, “Make sure these guys stay put until the place blows up, O.K.?  And this time, no nodding off!” 

The guard closest to John bobbed his head in acknowledgment of the order and sat down, straddling his rifle. All the guards but the one sitting, left.

“What are we going to do?” Ed whispered to John while struggling with the hand and ankle shackles.

“Don’t worry. And stop struggling, you’re making too much noise.”

John noticed the guard starting to drop off. Ed took the hint and stopped thrashing about.

After a few minutes, the guard was sound asleep.

“Hey, w..” Ed started.

“Shut up and do what I do,” John whispered.

John, using his head, rubbed the creme on his hand, wrist, and the shackle. Ed did the same. Eventually, through a combination of creme, hair, and the loss of a few layers of skin, they each slipped a hand through the shackles. The view screen lit up as satellite after satellite was being overridden.

“FIVE MINUTES TO DESTRUCTION. ALL IMPORTANT PERSONNEL PLEASE EVACUATE THE ISLAND,” the female voice on the loudspeaker stated.

The guard popped his head up, suddenly awake, and said, “I’m up. I’m u... ”

The guard noticed the two formerly captive spies remove the last of their ankle shackles. The guard, while getting ready to fire, was suddenly kicked in the face by John and rendered unconscious.

“I’m going to look for our stuff,” Ed stated.

“O.K., I’ll go find Doctor Diamond’s escape craft.”

Ed limped to the other side of the room and John headed for the door hidden from view behind the machine.

As John approached the door he noticed that it was large and metallic, with no handle of any kind. A control panel was next to it with a series of numbers from 0 to 9. John gave a well-placed, destructive kick to the control panel. “I was always good with numbers,” John quipped.

The door swished open, revealing a short hallway and a ladder leading up. He ran down the hallway and started climbing the ladder.

As John neared the top, he came to some type of trap door and pushed it up slightly—just enough to see out without the trap door being too noticeably raised. After doing so, he also heard some voices.

“Is everything ready?” Doctor Diamond’s voice asked.

“Yes, sir,” a deep voice responded.

“WARNING, TWO MINUTES TO DESTRUCTION. ALL IMPORTANT PERSONNEL MUST LEAVE THE ISLAND AT THIS TIME,” the loudspeaker voice boomed.

“Do you have the remote control?”

“Yeah, what’s it for?”

“I can’t initiate the final launch and destruct sequence until I’m far enough away from the island.” 

“Huh?”

“The remote control will only activate when my machine is ready and we’re far enough away from the island.”

“Oh, I understand,” the deep voice said quietly, probably not understanding.

John flung the trap door open and leapt out. He saw several large, round chutes—two of which contained some type of special watercraft. Doctor Diamond was getting into the larger of the two ships.

“Stop, Doctor Diamond!” John ordered.

“You!” Doctor Diamond seemed stunned. “Francis, deal with him and then join up with us in the small craft.”

“Yes sir,” Francis’ deep voice boomed.

Francis was a large man of about six feet five inches and probably over 300 pounds. His most striking feature however was his oddly shaped, bald head. Francis entered into an aggressive stance, obviously well versed in the martial arts.

This was the type of moment John lived for. A true test of his martial arts abilities. John matched the big man’s stance and prepared for a climactic struggle that could end only one way—with John the victor. John’s adrenaline flowed and he prepared to leap at Francis and deliver a devastating spinning ki...BOOM!

John turned around and saw Ed holding his sawed-off shotgun. BOOM!  Francis was no more.

“I found our stuff,” Ed said brightly, throwing John his equipment.

“I can see that,” John sighed, disappointed.

“ONE MINUTE TO DESTRUCTION,” the loudspeaker voice said.

The two quickly equipped themselves and entered Francis’ escape craft. There were two seats in the aerodynamically designed craft.

Once John closed the hatch, the ship was quickly sucked into the chute and shot out into the water at unbelievable speed. The tiny craft surfaced and skimmed along.

John, knowing a little about this type of craft, took over the controls. The radar indicated a blip, moving slower than their craft, not too far ahead.

The ship’s radio crackled to life, “Hurry up Francis, we haven’t got all day.”

“Yes sir,” John’s best (not so good) Francis voice responded.

John and Ed’s craft quickly settled alongside Doctor Diamond’s, which was similarly shaped, but about twice as big. The two crafts came to a stop and both hatches opened. John leapt out and into Doctor Diamond’s ship. Ed struggled - what with his limp and all those guns (he had taken one of the guard’s rifles too) - as closely behind as possible.

As John fell in, he quickly leapt towards Doctor Diamond and grabbed the remote control, struggling with the obese madman. While struggling, John noticed that two of the other three seats were occupied by scrawny, wild-haired (if they weren’t bald) scientist-types, too scared to do anything.

“Let go,” Doctor Diamond howled.

“Make me,” John answered back.

“You, driver, get this... ,” Doctor Diamond struggled with John, “...get this craft moving—a few more feet and (struggle) and it’ll activate the missiles.”

“Yes, sir,” the puny driver responded.

“Not so fast,” Ed said, blowing a big hole in the control panel with his shotgun.

John struggled with Doctor Diamond more and finally wrestled the control device free after smashing him in the nose. John forgot one thing though—the cat. The large, white cat flashed its claws and slashed John’s already tender hand, making the device fly up and out of the hatch. There was a splash as the device hit the water.

Everyone in the room was deathly quiet as they waited for some type of explosion—none came. Doctor Diamond seized the moment, stepped on John, grabbed the cat, and knocked over Ed, as he (surprisingly) dexterously moved from his ship—closed the hatch—and entered the other craft. By the time Ed opened the hatch (he had depilatory in his eyes) and John got back to his feet (he was stepped on by a 350-pound man), the other ship, with Doctor Diamond, was gone.

“I can’t believe he got away,” Ed sighed, “I didn’t even get to use my grenades.”

“Well, you can put those away for next time,” assured John, who was beginning to get a little uncomfortable with the way Ed was looking at his left over munitions. “Keep these guys covered while I contact somebody to pick us up and sweep the island.”