Doom Patrol #0 - The Song of Love Prologue

In a dark basement, shrouded by shadow and cold, stands a lowly criminal mastermind. He once stood tall; once proud. He was notorious – one no one dared cross. But those days are gone. Now he stands a shadow of the man – no, not a man, the thing – he once was. His casing gathers dust, his glass bowl coated in a thin layer of grime, and in the week since last he went outside, vast networks of cobwebs have risen around him like clothes lines across the Venice canals. Which is strange, since no spiders live down here. He doesn’t speak unless spoken to. He doesn’t sleep, he can’t sleep. His shame, like the shadows, shrouds him.

 

He is the Brain. And once, that name meant something.

 

He is pulled from his meditative state by the muffled sound of footsteps from above. To the side of him from the dark corner comes a forlorn grunt, and into view shuffles a great lumbering beast of knotted dark hair, body odour and self-pity. He tugs his pants up around his waist – the only item of clothing on his body – and joins his master.

 

These used to be too small, he thinks to himself.

 

Mallah: She’s coming.

 

Mallah looks tentatively toward the only door in the basement – a heavy slab of chromed metal resting at the top of a creaky flight of wooden stairs. He looks back to his master but says nothing, his eyes drifting over to the wall covered in carved tally marks. He sighs.

 

Brain: Oui. Play your part.

 

The footsteps stop in front of the door and the sound of a heavy set of keys turning fills the dank silence. Light pours into the room as the door slowly swings open. Mallah shields his eyes with one arm, and throws the other across the Brain’s dome. As his sight gradually returns, he sees her frail old figure stood atop the stairs.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: Good morning gentlemen!

 

Madame Pamplemousse is a strange one. She’s mysterious in all the ways grapefruits aren’t. She certainly appears relatively normal, anyway. To any passer-by she would seem frightfully average, just another delicate old woman with paper-thin skin stretched over a skeletal frame like canvas over tent poles. With soft grey hair hanging in curls around her tight face and receded eyes that, despite their age, shine brighter than they have any right to. And deep dimples that, as she speaks, form in the corners of her mouth like canyons from decades of incessant smiling, with a thin row of mangled old teeth peeking out from her narrow dry lips.

 

Thankfully she never gets any passers-by. Which is fortunate, because Madame Pamplemousse is most certainly not normal. But if I told you why I’d be spoiling the fun now, wouldn’t I?

 

For a brief moment there is silence. Then, almost on cue, the Brain comes alive.

 

Brain: Good morning, Madame! What a most splendid day it is today, non? Not that we see much of it down ‘ere, ‘ey Mallah?

 

Mallah hesitates.

 

Brain: I said: ‘Ey Mallah?

 

Mallah: Oh ah, no. No we don’t! We don’t see it, because we are down ‘ere, aren’t we master? In this most wonderful basement!

 

Brain: Oui!

 

Madame Pamplemousse burst out into hysterical laughter, and so too does Brain, albeit slightly less sincere.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: Oh, you boys! So funny. ‘Ow lucky I am to ‘ave such pleasant ‘ouseguests!

 

Brain: Laugh Mallah.

 

Mallah: Ah ha ha! Ah ha! Ah ha ha ha!

 

Brain: And ‘ow lucky we are to ‘ave such a pleasant ‘ost, non?

 

Madame Pamplemousse blushes and bats away his flattery.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: So kind, monsieur Brain. I think someone knows what time it is, ‘ey?

 

Brain: Oha ha, I certainly do.

 

Madame Pamplemousse steps back from the door and gestures towards the hallway.

 

Brain: Pick me up Mallah!

 

Mallah quickly sweeps the cobwebs off his master and gathers him in his thick arms. As they ascend the stairs, Madame Pamplemousse turns to them.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: Do excuse the mess, my loves. Little Pierre ‘ad some friends over for a play date, didn’t you Little Pierre?

 

As if summoned from thin air, a small, ugly frog of a boy with dull eyes and a bowl haircut appears to the side of Mallah and walks with them.

 

Little Pierre: Play.

 

Mallah flinches at the sight of him and tries his best not to drop his master.

 

Mallah: Didn’t know you ‘ad any friends, Little Pierre.

 

Brain: Mallah!

 

Madame Pamplemousse: What was that, my love?

 

Brain: Nothing!

 

If he still had eyes they would be daggers. Mallah knows and promptly shuts up.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: You were making funny face masks, weren’t you my little sugarpip?

 

Little Pierre: Play.

 

Madame Pamplemousse chuckles and grins disdainfully as they walk into the kitchen.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: ‘ere we are.

 

She reaches for a key hung on a rack above the fridge and takes it over to a wooden door on the other side of the room. Little Pierre stares at Mallah with those dull, unblinking eyes, and Mallah stares nervously back.

 

Mallah: ‘E’s looking right at me, master.

 

Brain: Shut up. ‘E’s only a child you fool.

 

Mallah: But master!

 

Brain: Silence!

 

A glob of saliva drips from Little Pierre’s mouth as Madame Pamplemousse opens the door and turns to them.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: You know the rules. Thirty minutes outside, stay where I can see you. Any funny business and I do not ‘esitate to call… you know who. This is a punishment, not a ‘oliday camp, non?

 

Brain/Mallah: Oui, Madame Pamplemousse.

 

Madame Pamplemousse: Marvellous. ‘Ave fun. Little Pierre, darling, with me now.

 

She takes Little Pierre by the hand and wanders out of the kitchen, his dull eyes still fixed on Mallah. Mallah adjusts his grip on Brain and the pair head out the back door and onto the porch. He sets his master next to a little wooden bench with all the grace of a reversing dump truck, and sighs as he sits. They silently stare out into the horizon for a few moments, before Mallah turns to look over his shoulder.

 

Mallah: She’s gone.

 

If he could express emotion, thinks the Brain, Madame Pamplemousse would not fall for this rouse one second longer.

 

Brain: We ‘ave to get out of ‘ere.

 

Mallah says nothing, just staring out into the distance. And they continue to stare, staring into nothingness – quite literally – into the barren white void of nothingness surrounding the house. There’s no horizon. There’s no sky. No light; no dark. Just the house. The bench. And a pair of criminal masterminds.

 

 

 

Done