#superfiction

[brian-kenny]

Brian Kenny

“I as in Us” (2023)

oil on canvas

36 x 24 inches

[abronzeagegod]

Your power is wildly, ridiculously mediocre. If you touch someone or something you can see everywhere they've been. Kind of like tracing back their paths through life. Not really super useful in this day and age, but really helpful when it comes to finding things or people.

So when this young villain robbed you, saw your name on the license in your wallet, returned everything with a deep apology and you're fairly certain more money than you had before, well, you grabbed their hand and asked, "What?"

They pulled out of your grip and ran with blind terror back into the night.

But your power was on so you followed the thin yellow trail they left behind to find out where they were from and why they seemed to sprinting to the all night transit station to leave the state.

The villain had just come from an infamous villain bar hidden off one of the lower streets in the city's underground.

You always avoided places like this, just because it wasn't really your vibe. You weren't the type to punch a guy that bumped into you, or stab a person for taking your seat while you went to the bathroom. Also you always felt like this was a place that didn't run on cash but on favors and you don't like owing anyone favors.

Hell, you're very clean cut, you probably wouldn't even be let in.

That's where your assumptions were wrong and it wouldn't be the last time for the rest of the night.

The bouncer, a tall person, an almost literal wall of steel, took one good look at you and moved aside.

"You're just going to let me in?" you ask incredulously.

The bouncer nods. "I've got orders."

"From who?" you say, you don't want to demand an answer because the poor guy was just doing his job and that would be incredibly rude.

"The top."

A non-answer if you've ever heard one.

You frown at the bouncer and walk into the bar.

Everyone gives you plenty of space, which would be super nice if not for the crowded locale.

You trace the lines left by the thief around the bar and eventually stop dead by some kind of cork-board notice system. There were some various super villain things like the bounty on a local tech CEO, a warning about the cops being in certain areas, and a big "OFF LIMITS" sign with a picture of you underneath it.

"WHAT?" you all but yell as you run over to your face, a copy of your headshot on your website.

"Oh hey, I wouldn't take that off if I were you," a nearby villain says as you rip the picture down.

"Why not?" you ask.

The villain gets an actual look at you and says, "Uh. Nevermind. I have to... go... commit.... a... crime.... Goodbye!" and makes a very hurried exit from the bar.

Everyone in the bar seems extremely focused on their drinks, their tables, or their shoes suddenly.

What the hell.

You stop concentrating on your would-be-mugger and start concentrating on tracing back this object. Where did it originate? Who made this?

For the rest of the night you trace things. When you have a job finding things your sleep schedule goes out the window so this was nothing new for you. But it takes you way longer than most cases would.

Poster to the print shop to the order to the lackey who posted the job to the hospital to find said lackey and retracing all their illegal activities until you find out where their lair was. The hardest part was figuring out how to even get into the secret subbasement of a semi-abandoned skyscraper downtown.

it took all of your ingenuity and critical thinking to figure it out, and the sense of joy that you got when you actually got the vault door to open was a high you'd be riding for the rest of the day.

You waltz into the super villain's lair, which is normally a very stupid thing to do, but this has been a very stupid day and it's 5am which is objectively the hour when you do the stupidest things.

Alarms eventually go off and you're facing down a small army of goons with assault rifles.

"Ah ah ah," you chide them as you hold up your headshot. "I'm pretty sure your boss will kill you if you hurt me."

The guns don't fully lower, but neither do they shoot you, so you're going to count this as a win.

No one moves for a second while you wait.

After only a few awkward moments comes in the black suited, caped, monster of the city: Mariana. Named after the Trench and the deepest, darkest, coldest place on earth, and now the most dangerous villain is standing in front of you.

Mariana waves a leather clad hand and the goons all immediately safety their guns and leave with military precision.

"What do you want with me?" you demand. Normally you're not so forthright and demanding, especially with the most dangerous and notorious supervillain in the world but it's 5am. You do stupid stuff at 5am.

Instead of an answer you see Mariana settle into a combat stance a second before you feel something sharp and hot pressed against your spine.

"Ha, my plan worked," came a voice from behind you.

"Sunshadow," Mariana said. "Did you really use this beautiful, talented person as bait to lure me out so you could kill me and take my place at the head of the table?"

The supervillain behind you, who you dimly recognize the voice as your would-be-mugger, laughs. "And you fell right into my trap so brilliantly!"

The hot blade at your spine moves away and is replaced by another blade at your throat as Sunshadow uses you as a shield against Mariana.

However, whatever threats or demands the villain holding you at knife point was going to make were instantly cut short when Mariana was all of a sudden behind Sunshadow. They wrestled him to the ground, snapping the bones in the hand holding the knife and using his own blade against him, slit his throat.

"They never remember that I control illusions," Mariana said as she stood up, face covered in splatters of arterial blood spray from the dead supervillain at her feet.

"JESS?" you yell. Once again your assumptions having gone right out the window.

"Hey, it's been a few years. You look good," the most powerful supervillain in the world and your first (for a lot of things) said.

"You! You!"

"Am notorious supervillain-"

"You've been keeping these weird tabs on me!"

"Yeah? I'm still not over you."

"Have you been following me?"

The villain shrugs. "That's the nice way of putting it. Maybe obsessively stalking might be more appropriate for the circumstances."

"And you've been killing anyone who wrongs me? Is that why my landlord went missing?"

"Oh that fucker is in so many pieces they couldn't find him if they tried and no one is trying too hard."

Jess was a lot for you, back in high school. Best friend. First serious crush. First kiss. First date. First love. First partner.

Things just kind of faded when you both graduated and moved to different phases of life. And now they are here before you, matured into an adult (read: very hot), and the most powerful and feared supervillain in the world.

"You wouldn't happen to be the reason why I could never get any good dates in this city?"

Jess, in all their supervillain power and confidence, blood on their face, "Yes. None of them were worthy of you."

The stalking. The possessiveness. The controlling nature. The violence and murder. This really shouldn't be working on you, but there's something deep in the lizard part of your brain that is so uncomfortably turned on by this.

"Go on."

For the first time since you arrived you see Jess blink.

"Or don't and just take me."

i have a kofi

A young villain tried to mug you, but upon seeing your face, he fled in terror. Upon further investigation, you discover that your high school sweetheart is now the most powerful villain in the world and has you on a list titled “hurt them, and I’ll kill you.”

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

He was, quite simply, a genius.

I first came across his name, and his writing, in Leningrad, in 1984 -- his madly offbeat, dizzyingly accelerated and altogether hilarious short piece, "Night-Sea Journey" (an excerpt from "Lost in the Funhouse"), was in Joe David Bellamy's "Superfiction, Or The American Story Transformed."

Everything else of his was already later, in America for me.

On April 26, 1994 — according to the date of his inscription (“For Misha, from one writer to another, all good wishes”) on my copy of “Once Upon a Time” (“a memoir bottled in a novel and here floated off to whom it may concern”) — I got to guest-teach his graduate writing seminar at Johns Hopkins. It was a remarkably kind and benevolent gesture on his part — and, needless to say, quite a memorable experience for me.

Here, after class, he is reaching into that bag containing — what? cookies? books? Probably the former.

Then he invited me to lunch on campus, during which he did most of the talking -- expounding, for instance, on his thoughts as to why the primarily non-fiction writers tend to have difficulty writing novels -- and me, befittingly, mostly listening.

He had an extraordinarily, almost unnervingly sharp, piercing gaze of his pale blue eyes: a needle, I thought, probing interlocutor's mind.

Rest in Peace, the great John Barth (1931-2024)

[Mikhail Iossel]

+

“The reader! You, dogged, uninsultable, print-oriented bastard, it's you I'm addressing, who else, from inside this monstrous fiction. You've read me this far, then? Even this far? For what discreditable motive? How is it you don't go to a movie, watch TV, stare at a wall, play tennis with a friend, make amorous advances to the person who comes to your mind when I speak of amorous advances? Can nothing surfeit, saturate you, turn you off? Where's your shame?” ― John Barth, Lost in the Funhouse

+

“My dear fellow,' Burlingame said, 'we sit here on a blind rock careening through space; we are all of us rushing headlong to the grave. Think you the worms will care, when anon they make a meal of you, whether you spent your moment sighing wigless in your chamber, or sacked the golden towns of Montezuma? Lookee, the day's nigh spent; 'tis gone careening into time forever. Not a tale's length past we lined our bowels with dinner, and already they growl for more. We are dying men, Ebenezer: i'faith, there's time for naught but bold resolves!” ― John Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor

+

“Self knowledge is always bad news.” ― John Barth, Giles Goat-Boy

[swissforextrading]

Inside the Swiss Pavilion at the 2024 Venice Biennale | Switzerland stars as a superfiction

Swiss-Brazilian artist Guerreiro do Divino Amor leads Switzerland at the 60th Venice Art Biennale. Watch the full video on our YouTube channel to get an exclusive sneak peek at his installation, guided personally by the artist himself. --- swissinfo.ch is the international branch of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation (SBC). Its role is to report on Switzerland and to provide a Swiss perspective on international events. For more articles, interviews and videos visit swissinfo.ch or subscribe to our YouTube channel: Website: http://www.swissinfo.ch Channel: http://www.youtube.com/swissinfovideos Subscribe: http://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=swissinfovideos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXnMgqqNsAs (Source of the original content)

[lpchouinard]

[urhajos]

‘Beautiful Office Life’ by Superfiction

[kirklook]

一生二，二生三😂 . . . #toy #toys #garagekit #superfiction #figure #beijingtoyshow #phoneography #photooftheday #instagood https://www.instagram.com/p/Bnh4-kghZwt/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=epb2ojb5wz83

[le0dav]

GS 칼텍스의 새이름 Energy plus 런칭 언팩행사에 그래피티 라이브 페인팅을 하러 다녀왔습니다. 오늘 받은 @superfiction.sf 의 e+ 한정판 굿즈입니다. 라이브 페인팅 영상은 편집되면 업로드하도록 하겠습니다. 전기차,일반차,전동킥보드 등등 우리가 이동할때 사용하는 모든 것들의 복합 휴식공�� ”e+” #eplus #superfiction #leodav #gs칼텍스 #gs삼방주유소 #복합문화공간 #전기차충전 #언팩 #unpack #자동차 #굿즈 #한정판 #슈퍼픽션 #Energyplus (교보문고 강남점에서) https://www.instagram.com/p/CHuNh4NltsB/?igshid=qw4caqdbncho

[deadbunnys]

"Super Fiction" x @foolsparadisetoys at home! #superfiction #foolsparadise #foolsparadisetoys #arttoy #vinyltoy #designertoy #designerarttoy #vinylarttoy #urbantoy #urbanvinyl #urbanculture #toyart #toystagram #toysofinstagram #alltoysareart #instaart #collectible #limitededition #deadbunnystore7 (at Dead Bunny Store) https://www.instagram.com/p/CHaiSl5HelZ/?igshid=jqfdw830vy71

[nemofu]

[minicheck]

super cute Kitsune fox! 90€

[lordsintacks]

[bearafurnalia]

project:

SCOTT & FREDDY (art)

artist:

SUPERFICTION

subject:

1) [freddy]

2) [freddy]

3) [freddy]

4) [freddy]

5) [freddy]

[fatsuma]

Super Fiction by Fool's Paradise (SEP2020) #superfiction #foolsparadise #fatsuma #vincent #princess #mario #supermario #pulpfiction #awesome #cool #instacool #beautiful #beauty #amazing #love #instalove #fun #art #instagood #collectible #toy #new

[kirklook]

今日，毕 . . . #toy #figures #superfiction #godnight #beijing #photooftheday #phonephotography #instagood

[idnworld]

Superfiction — Seoul, South Korea http://www.idnworld.com/creators/Superfiction