Sweet Justice

Now, I know what you’re probably thinking. You’re probably thinking ‘how important does this prick have to be to have a bomb strapped to him?’ Turns out not very. In the years between my first crime and marching into that bank, I’d done a few jobs that had mixed results. Especially when other superheroes came onto the scene. I broke my super-cherry when I teamed up with this small-time hustler named Cream Puff. I was nineteen, he was twenty-five. We had a decent dynamic. He hated me for my hair, immediately. That’s fine. I hated him for having effeminate powers and for wearing a white fur coat in the middle of the Californian summer. 

Ironically, we were doing a bank job. By this point I’d leveled up my game. I cut open the top of a ski mask so that my hair would stick out, immediately marking me as something beyond normal people so they’d take my threats seriously. Cream Puff did it by turning one of the guards into a steaming pile of hot whipped cream. 

“Anybody else who’s looking to walk tough is getting the cream treatment,” said Cream Puff, or at least, that’s what I remember him saying. 

That’s when I spotted her. I didn’t quite know what I was looking at. She looked like the girl from Gatchaman, but with a peppermint theme instead of a bird theme. Next thing I know, I’ve caught a candy cane baton to the teeth and I’m on the floor picking them up. I look up and I see she’s playing with Cream Puff. She’s dodging, she’s weaving through the floor. Then she ends things by kicking him in the chest. I could see the wind getting knocked out of him. I didn’t get up. I wanted to go to jail and see a dentist in that order if possible. What I didn’t predict was that this would present a reoccurring problem in my life. Quickly, the superheroes of Caramel Valley kind of realized that I was a weak link and they’d seek me out to threaten me and make me into a snitch. Now, if I was any other man. I would have stood up for myself. I would have told Sugar Buzz to go fuck themselves and I would have sent Mystery Mint packing. I’m not though, I’m soft. I got hit once and decided that I didn’t like it, so sue me. 

The big downside of that is being a snitch makes you wildly unpopular with your friends who regularly commit crimes. So, about a week ago, I was minding my own business. I was walking down Troost with a delicious gyro in my hand and I was having a great time. That’s when someone (Cream Puff) slipped a black bag over my head and dragged me screaming into the back of a white panel van. I think he might have punched the hell out of me because I blacked out and woke up with my eye swollen shut and seated in front of L.I Scream herself. 

She’s the writer of those books. Y’know the ones. You see them on Audible and Goodreads and bestseller lists, but they’re not the greatest of bestsellers. If you ask me, they’re a step above Amish Romance novels, but that’s only because they have lesbian sex in them. If you’re a literate guy like me, you know that lesbian sex is classy when it’s in novels and movies. That’s why people like Blue is the Warmest Colour. What you don’t know about the great L.I Scream is that she’s one of us. She was a kid who got mutated by the Avery candy company. It’s not in her official bio or anything. What you also don’t know is that she’s the biggest criminal fixer in Caramel Valley. Second only to her ex-wife. 

“Worms,” said L.I Scream. “You’ve been fucking up, my man. How are we to fix that?” 

Now, I was a little concussed from being punched into unconsciousness, so I spat up a little. I felt a hand on me and I looked up to see Cream Puff whipping away the little bit of throw up on my chin.

“Jesus Christ," said L.I Scream. “Puff, can you burn him a bit too.” 

Cream Puff pressed his thumb against my temple and started converting a patch of my pink skin into boiling evaporated milk. I screamed loud as fuck. Once he was done, his hands were off of me and I had a white burn mark on the side of my head. 

“I don’t know what you want me to say, ma’am,” I said, trying to sound respectful. “Shit’s just fucking crazy. I don’t control when they come to me.” 

“Worms, Wormy,” said L.I Scream. “You and I both know that’s bullshit. That’s a stinking pile of it. You’re saving your own pretty in pink skin. Fortunately for you, I’m the charitable type. I just need you to do a little job for me and all will be forgiven.” 

Naturally, I didn’t want to get burned again so I jumped at the opportunity. She had Cream Puff haul me into another room and had my chest fitted with a bomb. A bomb vest that had a bunch of wires and blinking lights and all sorts of scary crap attached to it. That’s when I was thrown out of the van and frog marched into the bank. A smile on my face. 

“Everyone be calm, I don’t want anyone to die. Just empty those registers and everything’s going to be okay,” I said, lying through my teeth. 

A guard trained his pistol on me and I responded by drowning him in gummy worms that spontaneously formed in his throat and mouth. I’m a reasonable person. I’m a thief. But then I became a murderer. Before that I was just an accessory to murder. I figure it evens out because it was either me or him. The other guards keyed in that I wasn’t playing and they put their guns on the ground. 

That’s when he showed up. Another freak that I’m not a fan of. Probably because we’re both pink. I don’t know who he is personally, I just know that Fairy Floss is a tyrant. Superpower is the ability to “weave” cotton candy and light into hard objects. Flies around with his dinky bug wings which gross me out. 

“This is a big job for you, Worms. Did you cook it up all by yourself?” laughed Fairy Floss (unserious prick). 

“Take a step back!” I shouted. “I don’t know what the yield of this thing is. I’ll take out this whole fucking place!” 

Fairy Floss flew down and wove this ball of pink light and cotton candy around us with him inside with me. We flew upwards and out of a hole in the bank that he must have made without me noticing. 

“I’ll try to fly us out of the range of your masters and their controls,” said Fairy Floss. “Then we can work on disarming it.” 

For as much shit as I give the guy, he usually handled me with ‘kid gloves’ sort of like Taff used to. He didn’t break my fucking teeth like his best bud, Mystery Mint. He formed these tools, like a scalpel and pliers of pink light and set to work cutting the vest off of me without blowing us both away. Once he was satisfied and my pants were sufficiently pissed, he threw the bomb away and I watched it explode over the city, raining nonsense all over it. 

“Jesus fuck!” I shouted. “That could have been me!” 

A rocket launch wasn’t unusual for Caramel Valley. If anything, it had become increasingly common with the integration of the super-powered into society. On the edge, right where the county line divided Caramel Valley from the civilized world rested the launch platform and at a temporary bunker nearby were all of Taff’s friends, loved ones, and to a lesser extent, the higher ups of Caramel Valley society: Mayor Nwadiewe was there, as was the “administration consultant” Ellen Yu, and her evil ex-wife, L.I Scream, the acclaimed erotica novelist.

Cheng and Fenton were there as well, they stood outside the bunker. Cheng was armed with his camera and was snapping shots of the rocketship. Taff called it the Astraea. The elastic superhero elongated his body and used it like a pole vaulting rod to get from the high point on the rocket and down to the ground to see the two of them again. 

“I want to remember the both of you for as long as I live,” said Taff. “However long that might be.” 

He ran his thumb along their lips before slowly lowering his hands. 

“I love you,” said both Cheng and Fenton simultaneously. 

Taff smiled and returned to the ship. His body stretched into the shape of a little biplane and he soared upwards toward the top of the rocketship again. He wasn’t ready to be knocked out of the sky by a big, meaty fist! Flesh met taffy and went flying and soon the source emerged: It was Jam Pack. 

“Thought you could fuck off to space without giving me my good byes, Kieron?” asked Jam Pack.

Taff assumed a humanish form as he began his descent. His arm wrapped around Jam Pack’s leg and together they both began to fall. Two titans slamming their fists into one another. 

Jam Pack seized Taff by the scruff of his neck and muttered “Sugar Slide by two!”

Taff felt for all of five seconds as though his body was melting and perhaps it was. In one second, they were soaring through the air and the next they were back on top of the rocket. Taff slammed Jam Pack against the side and held him in place with a wall of taffy that extended out from his hand, holding the muscle bound murderer in place. 

“I’ve had enough of this, Pak,” said Taff as he climbed into the rocketship, the door remained open so he could have his giant taffy hand resting outside. “We’re good for launch.” 

The countdown couldn’t have gone faster. South along the base of the rocketship, engines ignited with incredible fire, sending shockwaves throughout all of Caramel Valley and the surrounding areas. The rocketship climbed and climbed and Jam Pack on the side of the ship screamed until he was no longer able to. Once they shot past the exosphere and into open space, Taff climbed out of the rocket and looked at his dying enemy. 

Because sound doesn’t travel in a place without oxygen, Taff had to mouth, “I told you that I’ve had enough. Go home, Jin Pak. I forgive you.” 

Taff pressed his lips against Jam Pack’s and released him, using his body like a slingshot with Jam Pack as the ball bearing. The violent supervillain became a ball of fire as he slammed into the earth like a miniature meteorite. 

Taff had never been to an orgy before. That much is obvious from his squeaky clean public persona. Granted, one shouldn’t assume that orgies are evil nor that the people who participate in them are likewise. For example, this orgy was being held by the members of the Sugared Guild. The head of the sugared guild was Shanae “Mystery Mint” Bedivere. Between Mystery Mint’s legs was a veritable titan, the hard candy skinned powerhouse, Angela “Jawbreaker” Kline, who was very adept with her tongue as she slid it along the fine folds of Mystery Mint’s sex. 

When Jawbreaker finished with her task, she stood up and used her favorite toy on Mystery Mint. It was a seven-inch long jelly dildo attached to a reinforced harness so it didn’t break when she put it on. 

On the opposite side of the room in the trailer the Sugared Guild called home the speedster Zephyr “Sugar Buzz” Nash was on their knees sucking off Lawrence “Fairy Floss” Rune. The bright pink magical hero kept thrusting in and out of the speedster’s mouth, working them like a fleshlight. 

And all in the middle stood Taff. Moments prior, he’d just told the Sugared Guild that they were going to have his apartment and lab when he went to space and they decided to celebrate with an orgy. Taff wasn’t unfamiliar with group sex, but being surrounded by it was kind of daunting in the extreme. He felt a bit like he was intruding on them. They were his friends, sure, but he wasn’t sure he was that close of friends with them. 

He received a tap on the shoulder and jumped a bit when he was faced by a face he was familiar with. The villainess is known only as Licorice Whip. Normally, she wore black leather and literal black licorice fabric, but instead she stood beside the superhero wearing only a black corset and panties. 

“Struggling with where to start?” she asked. 

“What are you doing here?” asked Taff, who was admittedly struggling because on the one hand, he had an erection the size of a souvenir baseball bat and on the other hand, Licorice Whip was evil and he was used to fighting her and not seeing her wearing that little clothing. 

“Mint invited me, we’re close like that, hefty,” said Licorice Whip. 

“Admittedly, I am kind of struggling here,” said Taff. “It feels a bit like I'm seeing something I’m not supposed to.” 

“Poor baby,” cooed Licorice Whip. “Let’s start with Buzz and Floss, they’re fun after a fashion.” 

Licorice Whip grabbed Taff’s length and used it like a leash as she walked him over to the speedster who was steadily being throatfucked by their best friend. What’s a bit of a blowie between best buds?

“Hey Floss, room for one more?” asked Licorice Whip, lifting the rock hard length of Taff and waggling it from side to side. 

Fairy Floss pulled his considerably average length out of Sugar Buzz’s mouth with a loud pop. 

“More the merrier!” declared Fairy Floss as he stroked his saliva slicked cock.

Taff idly wondered if Sugar Buzz also had slight elastic superpowers as they effortlessly slid his imposing blue length down their throat. Sugar Buzz took the spit slicked length of Fairy Floss in their hand and Taff watched with amazement as their individual fingers started to vibrate at impossible speed. 

Fairy Floss made a low and hungry groan as individual spots on their cock were teased by the vibrating fingertips. Even more so when they started to slide along the length at impossible speed. 

“Holy shit, Zeph,” whined Fairy Floss. “That’s it!” 

Taff was getting lost in the sauce as Sugar Buzz bobbed up and down on his length. He didn’t notice that Jawbreaker had made her approach. 

“Hey there,” said Jawbreaker as she grabbed a handful of Taff’s considerably fat ass. “Looking to be filled, champ?” 

Taff enthusiastically nodded and just as easily, the length of Jawbreaker’s toy slid inside him. He could feel the pressure of it as she bucked her hips to the rhythm of a thrash metal song, pounding him in and out in opposing synch with Sugar Buzz. He barely wondered where Licorice Whip was, but he then noticed out of the corner of his eye that she and Mint had started fucking on the Sugar Guild’s red couch that they found in the garbage. 

The way the news always told it was like this: sometime in the year 1990-whatever, a candy factory in a shitkicker town called Avery sent parcels of candy all around the continent, if not the world. Not just candy as specific as that is; ice creams, cough drops, cough syrup even. The Avery Candy Company had the market cornered on stuff made with sugar and nonsense. That was until it was discovered during that year in the 90s that there was something fucked up about the candy. Some little quirk of the chemistry made it an impossible health hazard. 

For me, I was three years old, sitting in the back of my dad’s Buick snacking on these gummy worms, y’know the ones. The kind that are bright, primary colors and covered with that grainy crap that makes them taste sour. This is my earliest and clearest memory. I was in the backseat while my folks were bitching back and forth about nothing when I felt my tongue start to get numb. Being three years old, I didn’t think anything about it. I stopped being able to taste the candy as worm after worm was crushed beneath my teeth. I didn’t notice it at the time, but I’d bitten off part of my tongue while eating them. I could feel warm liquid going down my throat and always the candy. I look up from the little baggy of goodies and catch my mom’s eyes in the mirror and she starts screaming. My skin had become bright pink and my hair (which was a blonde bowlcut at the time) had become these long strands of rainbow colored locks, a bunch of them, clustered on the top of my head. That’s right, I ended up with permanent white guy dreadlocks. Don’t rub it in, okay?

Now, you’ll have to forgive my mom and dad because they immediately started freaking the fuck out. As you would when your kid turns pink and has blood dripping out of his mouth. My mom, god bless her, thought I was choking on the candy and scrambled into the back while my dad struggled to keep us on the road. Ultimately, we ended up landing in a ditch and by God, did he throw a bitch fit about it.

I wasn’t alone in this, about ⅓ of the population that we know of across Canada, Mexico, and the good ol’ U.S.A developed mutations as a result of contact with tainted candy. For me, the mutation was rather down to earth. My skin became a kind of hardened sugar-leather, my blood was syrup, and my hair…well that’s a bit obvious. What I would find out later, after the doctors checked me out was that I could generate gummy worms, as stupid as that sounds. I found that my body required me to consume a lot to  make up for what I generated, though. So, food bills growing up were outrageous on days where I’d produce these gummies from my hands and feed them to the local kids. That was kind of my first racket, selling candy that I made. Until my dad shut that shit down.

“We don’t know if this will spread!” I remember him shouting at me, five years old after he caught me.

As far as I know, it didn’t spread. It’s not like a disease. I grew up in a decentish trailer park on the outskirts of Caramel Valley so I grew up with a lot of people. People who were tainted by the candy and those who weren’t. I never saw anybody spontaneously turn like I did as a result of anything I did. I don’t know the science or the magic behind it, I’m not a doctor or a theologian. 

I wouldn’t be involved in serious crime until I was sixteen. This isn’t a kind of story where things are pretty despite the sugary shine over everything. By this point, we had guys like Taff rolling around stopping big crimes that would happen as a result of people gaining superpowers. But, they never focused on the small shit. I robbed a gas station using my buddy Nate as a hostage. I wore an old ski-mask and I had wrapped my scrawny pink arm around his neck and hauled his ass inside a place called Saul’s End Station. The guy behind the counter looked more confused than terrified. I had my fingers pointed at his head like I was holding a gun. 

“Listen,” I said. “Empty the register or this guy fucking dies!” 

“What?” asked the guy behind the register. 

“I’m a sugar freak,” I said. “If you don’t empty that register. I’m going to fill this man’s throat with gummy worms and he’ll suffocate. Then I’m coming after you!” 

“Prove it,” said the guy, calling my bluff immediately. 

I had to look Nate in the eyes and then we all watched as gummy worms started flooding his mouth, swelling it up and causing my bud to turn blue in the face. He was pulling on my arm and squeezing to try and let me know that this wasn’t funny. But I didn’t quite care at the moment. I wanted that bag, you understand.

“Oh shit, oh fuck!” shouted the guy behind the register. 

He emptied the register as quickly as he could and tossed the money in one of those paper bags Winos use to hide their liquor. 

“Don’t even think about calling the cops, because I’ll know. I can read your mind and I know where you live!” I shouted, lying out of my ass because everybody knows psychic powers are a myth. 

I dragged Nate out of the store and he coughed up the worms and we took off in a dead sprint to his car up the hill. He was pissed with me, but we made it out of there with roughly eight-hundred in cash. Not a bad day. Probably one of the better days from my criminal career if I’m being honest. 

In life, her name was Helena Bolt. In death, she was known as Black Phantom. She fancied that in life, in the time where she came from, the playing field was level. She’d load her six-gun with a handful of slugs, stroll onto a train,  and liberate those fine folks of their valuables. Practically everybody was armed all the same. That was fair. It was fair when she got her skull blown open by some trigger happy lawman’s rifle, too. He got the drop on her when she wasn’t paying attention. 

Death realigned the playing field. The modern world was full of cameras and high-speed railcars. Who better to rob anything involving any of those than a ghost? That was Jam Pack’s mindset. He had stolen Black Phantom’s spirit-gem from Doctor Ortega, rendering her effectively his partner in this escapade. 

Chances are, you’ve run into a man like Jam Pack in the past. He’s like a lot of the world, a man mutated by candy. The thing is, it didn’t affect him in a way you’d imagine. It turned his blood into liquified raspberry jam and gave him an insane craving for the dual pleasures of flesh and sugar. He found relief from it as a killer for hire who, when times were tough as they are all over, would scrape together some cash by performing horrifying crimes.

Black Phantom emerged from the blackened crystal and stuck a spectral revolver in some train rider’s face. 

“Nothin’ personal, lovely,” said Black Phantom. “Just obliged to do whatever the big man says.” 

“Damn right,” said Jam Pack as the pair rolled down the aisle of the carriage. “Now, I want everyone to put your money and cellphones in the bag. Anyone who fails to comply will be killed and eaten.” 

“Did you skip lunch, Jam?” asked a voice from the ceiling. 

Taff’s semi-solid body squeezed through the grates in a vent and plopped on the ground in front of Jam Pack and Black Phantom. It didn’t take long for him to reform into his humanoid shape. 

Jam Pack drew a pistol that was roughly the size of a cat and shot Taff right in the face. The round stuck in his face, leaving an indent that was in turn roughly the size of an orange. 

“That’s rather rude,” said Taff. 

Taff’s hand extended outward and his fingers became long tendrils, wrapping around Jam Pack’s body and digging through the myriad of pouches along his body until he found his prize: Black Phantom’s spirit-gem.

“Oh fuck everything about this,” muttered Jam Pack. “Sugarglide by one.” 

The air around Jam Pack’s body became fuzzy like the static on an old CRT television. This left only a mass of clothes, belts, and pouches ensnared in Taff’s tenta-fingers.

---

Taff summoned Black Phantom out of her spirit-gem on the roof of Golden State Building. Right on his private landing pad. She appeared in a cloud of black smoke, looking for all the world like a blonde woman in a tight green shirt, black pants, and a bullet belt. A look that went out of style 150 years prior. 

“Thanks for getting me out of that lunatic’s pouch,” said Black Phantom. She took a turn around and looked at the helipad. “I kinda figured you’d return me to Doctor Ortega or leave me locked up in some kinda prison.” 

“I think the last thing you need is prison, Helena,” said Taff.

Black Phantom laughed at that. “Don’t try to butter me up, handsome. I ain’t that easy. Spill, what’s so different now?” 

“What’s different is I’m giving you the spirit-gem,” said Taff. 

He extended his hand and offered the shard of blackened crystal to the ghost who snatched it out of his hand. 

“I don’t exactly have real pockets anymore, what do you expect me to do with it?” asked Black Phantom. 

Taff smiled a soft, sad little smile. “I want you to treat it like the city, Helena. I leave it entirely in your hands. You’ll do what’s right.” 

“You’re talkin’ like you’re goin’ someplace else,” said Black Phantom.

“That’s because I am. I take it you didn’t hear the news. I’m leaving the planet,” said Taff. 

Black Phantom looked at the superhero and blinked. She was consciousness, loose and free floating in the air, and her mind was struggling to come to terms with it. 

“That’s bullshit,” said Black Phantom.

“What?” asked Taff.

“Well you can’t just up and leave. What am I going to do for fun when you’re gone?” asked Black Phantom. 

“Caramel Valley has been your home your entire life and afterlife, Helena. You won’t be bored, I promise,” said Taff. 

“I’m not about to fuck around with that Mystery Mint dipshit,” said Black Phantom. “Her brain’s like one’a them russian dolls.” 

“Nobody said anything like that, where did that come from?” asked Taff. 

“Well…Shit, are you that dense, Taff?” asked Black Phantom. “If I was gonna fuck anybody it’d be you…Granted, I’m not sure how to on account’a bein’ a ghost.” 

Taff rested his thumb and forefinger on his chin and considered it for a moment. “Helena. I think I might be able to perform that for you. May I see your spirit-gem?” 

The ghost handed her spirit-gem to the superhero and he stabbed himself in the chest with it, allowing the solid piece of crystal to sink deeper into where there should have been a sternum. Black Phantom could taste again, she found. The air around her tasted like strawberry syrup. Her spectral form vanished from before Taff and she found that she was looking out through his eyes. 

“This feels weird,” said both Taff and Black Phantom simultaneously. “I’ve never possessed a fella before…Let alone like this. This body is so different.” 

The composite Taff-Black Phantom reached down to their crotch and watched with amazement as the body formed a spiraled length. “Oooh, it’s even got two colors to it.” 

Sophie Fenton bit down hard enough on the pen to snap the end between her teeth, spilling blue ink down her lower lip and onto the collar of her white dress shirt. She made a harsh wince as the ink stained her tongue, but it wasn’t bad enough for it to automatically dart out and dab at the stain on her lip. 

“Son of a bitch,” muttered Fenton, pulling wet wipes out of her purse and scrubbing at herself. 

“It’s never going to come out,” said Oliver Cheng who sat beside her in one of the uncomfortable blue plastic chairs. “She’s going to think you have herpes.” 

“I can’t get herpes, dumbass,” snapped Fenton. 

They were the only two journalists in the Caramel Valley Herald’s office in the early morning hours and they were specifically requested to meet with chief editor Pam Goss. Pam’s secretary and part time lover, Lukas ignored the both of them. The door slid open and Goss stood before both of them. Goss was easily six-feet even. She had the build of a linebacker and everyone in the office was pretty sure that if pushed to it, she could effortlessly murder every single one of them with an empty coffee mug. And she didn’t even have superpowers, which was the scary thing. Total baseline human. She was dressed in a pinstripe collared shirt, suspenders, and black trousers, an outfit that made her look more like a mobster than the editor of a metropolitan newspaper in the year 2026. It also had the effect of making both Cheng and Fenton feel underdressed in their t-shirts and jeans. 

“Cheng, Fenton!” barked Goss. “My office, now.” 

“As if she didn’t text us and tell us to come here,” muttered Fenton. 

The pair of journalists filed into the office of Goss. The wall behind her desk was full of not only framed newspapers, but photographs. Mostly photographs of Goss with various lizards. Monitor lizards, komodo dragons, bigass iguanas, and horned toads. The woman liked her lizards and that only served to make her more powerful. 

“Listen,” said Goss, taking a cigar out of her desk and pinching it between her teeth. She did not light it. “Word is that Doctor Kieron Riggs is making a large announcement to the public. But, he wants to soft launch it, so to speak. He’s requested to speak with the two of you.” 

“Of course, Taff’s special little guys,” said Cheng, smirking. 

“Weird fucking way to put it, but sure,” said Goss. “You two know the address, jet off there around twelve-ish.” 

---

They wouldn’t make the appointment on time. They filed into the back of an aerial taxi cab that would take them to the 34th floor of the Gold State Building. On the way they watched a few of the other heroes of Caramel Valley. They watched the insane action-detective, Mystery Mint fend off a group of armored robots with a pair of candy cane striped tonfa. All while overhead Fairy Floss trapped their controller in a prison made out of semi-real pink twine. 

“I’m kind of surprised he isn’t on the scene,” said Cheng. “This seems like a problem he could handle in a few seconds.” 

“It’s probably good for the others to get the exercise, wouldn’t want them getting flabby,” said Fenton. 

Eventually, they arrived on the Gold State Building’s aero pad and made their familiar walk towards the lab of Doctor Kieron Riggs, better known to the world as Taff. Between the pair of them, they could rattle off a list of Taff’s powers and feats. He was functionally invincible, he could stretch and mold his body, turn translucent, things like that, and all while having a body composed entirely out of color changing saltwater taffy. He was a part of that spectacular one-third of the world population who found themselves mutated by tainted candy from the Mitchell Hills Candy Factory in Avery, Missouri. 

The inside of the lab wasn’t the typical sterile white like that of a hospital or one of the many industrial scientific labs throughout the city. It was a sensory paradise that smelled like a sugar mill, along one of the walls was a mass of digital television monitors, on a table was a handful of drones in various states of repair/disrepair, and on the far wall was a gigantic two-tone impressionistic portrait of Riggs himself. Riggs was a handsome man, despite being made out of taffy. In his default state, his skin was blue with a white swirl like a saltwater taffy and he captured this portrait with his strong jawline, but he wasn’t dressed how either of them had seen him before. In the portrait, he wore a turtleneck sweater. They supposed it was some kind of ego thing, longing for the person he was before the mutation kicked in and turned him into a candy-person. 

At the center of the lab, in a blue pleather desk chair was a ball. A ball of blue and white spiraled taffy. Gradually, it took on a kind of pinkish flesh tone and started to unfurl into the shape of Taff, wearing a facsimile of a t-shirt and jeans like the two journalists who stood before him. He was relatively skinny in his “human” form which Cheng decidedly didn’t like. He also had a slight sheen that wasn’t like that of most humans. 

“Hello, how are the two of you? Would you like anything?” asked Taff. 

“Maybe ummm…Let’s talk to Taff,” said Cheng. 

“Right, right, my apologies,” said Taff. 

His skin changed color, resorting to the light azure of a delicious sugary treat. Spots where there would be the outline of arteries and wrinkles in the skin became threaded with eggshell white. He also became bulkier and taller in addition to that. The clearest sort of demarcation of his heightened being came from the white spiral in his chest. 

“Better?” asked Taff. 

“Very much so,” said Fenton. 

It wasn’t as though either of them were lying. They both had a bit of a preference for the more heroic and confident form that Taff took on when he wasn’t being Doctor Riggs. 

“How do you want to do this?” asked Fenton. “We understand that you have some kind of announcement, so this won’t be a traditional interview.” 

“Yeah,” said Taff. “Let’s not do it in the lab. It’s too impersonal here, I think. Is that weird to say?” 

“I don’t think it’s weird at all, Taff,” said Cheng. 

Taff smiled at this and for a moment, it looked as though it was more genuine than the canned sort of toothy grin he gave to them when there was a public to look upon him. 

The trio retreated into a smaller office space. It was less ostentatious and more spartan than the labspace. There was a desk nestled into a corner with a chair and a laptop. Taff pulled out a pair of fold out chairs that were nestled between the desk and the wall. 

“I hope these aren’t uncomfortable, guys,” said Taff, setting them up for the journalists. 

“I’m sure we’ll be fine, bud,” said Fenton. 

Taff rested in the desk chair, his hands on his powerful blue thighs. He had a kind of downcast expression on like he was having trouble plucking the right words out of the air. 

“I want to start by apologizing to both of you,” said Taff. “For the past eight years, I haven’t been honest with either of you and you both deserve the truth.” 

“What is the truth, Taff?” asked Fenton. 

“My real name isn’t Kieron Riggs. It never was. The real Doctor Riggs was killed and eaten by Jam Pack eight years ago,” explained Taff. 

Cheng’s eyes darted towards the door, Fenton’s gaze followed his and they both considered taking a mad dash for the door, but this was big stuff. This completely upended everything they thought they’d known about Taff and they had to press on. 

“So, who are you?” asked Fenton. 

“In truth, I’m nobody. I’m not like the other candy-humans. Mostly in the sense that I was never human to begin with. I started life as an experiment Doctor Riggs was performing on a mound of taffy from Avery, imbuing it with artificial life. I was saved from the same fate as the real Doctor Riggs because Jam Pack believed me to be inert.” 

“Why are you telling us this now?” asked Cheng. 

“Because I care about the two of you…and I’m leaving,” said Taff. 

“What do you mean you’re leaving? Leaving for where?” asked Fenton. 

“I’ve been running experiments on myself for the last few months. My ulta-taffy body is able to survive in the harsh vacuum of space. I intend to spend the next few months wrapping things up and then I intend to fly up to the stars and report my findings back to earth as I venture past the solar system,” explained Taff. 

“But…That’s just not fair. You drop this bombshell on us and then you fuck off to space? How is that fair to anybody? How can you leave all of us defenseless?” asked Fenton.

“You’re hardly defenseless,” said Taff. “The Sugared Guild is more than capable of handling things. They’ll keep Caramel Valley and the world in order. I believe in them,” said Taff. “I believe in you two as well. You two will be alright without me.” 

Fenton readjusted her afrotextured hair with her fingers. In truth, she wasn’t so much angry but experiencing a harsh mix of emotions. “So that’s it, you’re just going to callously leave all of us?” 

“It’s hardly callous, Sophie,” said Taff. “Oliver, you’ve been quiet as well.” 

“I just…” began Cheng. “I just don’t buy it. I mean, you went through that weird phase where you’d trick us with false identities and space missions in the past, what’s different now?” 

“What’s different is this isn’t a trick. I’m not possessed by a fifth dimensional entity or a parasite from space,” said Taff. “This is real. I’m going to lead humanity to its ultimate destiny among the stars, Oliver.” 

Taff stood and walked over to Cheng. His hand fell and lightly caressed the photojournalist’s head and the man who wasn’t made out of candy found himself melting into the light touch. Taff’s thumb traced along Cheng’s lips before tipping inside, lightly making Oliver Cheng suck on his thumb. 

Fenton watched and she couldn’t help but to feel jealous of the attention that he was getting from Taff. He was both of their’s. For now, at least. Fenton repositioned her chair and stood on it before pulling Taff into a hungry kiss. Taff’s tongue and thumb had different flavor profiles to them, shockingly. His hands had a heavier salt content and tasted like blue raspberry, while his tongue was darker and tasted kind of like artificial strawberry and creme. 

The pair of journalists started to undress and Taff reverted his body to more closely resemble that of a naked man. His swirled ‘logo’ vanished and his pecs now had prominent, dark purple nipples. Then there was the matter of the superhero’s cock: It was roughly seven inches in length and swirled white and blue from base to tip. Kind of like a candy cane, but the journalists knew that it didn’t taste anything like a candy cane. 

Cheng and Fenton attacked the length with a barrage of kisses from parallel sides of him. This made the elastic superhero moan harshly. He rested his considerably large hands on their heads for support, waiting until his length was slick and only lightly sticky with saliva. 

Cheng stood up, away from Taff’s cock and walked over to the desk, clearing everything off into a mess on the floor. That was followed by Fenton laying down on the desk, ready for him. The superhero grabbed her legs for support and guided his length along her dripping sex. Cheng, though, returned to a crouching position behind Taff and buried his face between his blue buttcheeks. This tongue circled the blue starfish of his pseudo-asshole, licking and curling within to drive Taff wild as he thrust his length deep into Fenton. If the rest of his body tasted a bit like blueberry candy, Taff’s asshole had the special factor of tasting like rich watermelon taffy. It was Cheng’s turn now to be serviced though. Taff was versatile like that, he could manage two partners at once. Cheng spit in his hand and ran it along the length of his serviceable six inch cock before working it into the superhero’s tight ass. 

It was amazing how effortlessly Taff worked both of them. Inside his taffy based body, he stroked and milked Cheng while his taffy cock snaked inside Fenton, pressing against her g-spot with each thrust while he used his thumb to circle and flick at her clit. 

“Goddamn it!” squealed Fenton. “I’m so close!~”

“That’s it, cum for me,” muttered Taff. “I want to feel both of you cum for me.”