Hugh J. O'Donnell

He was always the ‘black sheep’ of the family, but he’d always done his best. He tried to be the son his father wanted, but he wasn’t like his four brothers.
One night, he just couldn’t take it anymore. After another huge argument, he left home. Father had stood in the entryway, cursing his name and telling him never to return.
When the others became famous, he told himself he wasn’t jealous. He was proud of his brothers’ success. He’d forged his own path through life.
But sometimes he wondered if they missed him, Bosch, the Teenage Mutant Pirate Turtle

The old knight stared a the painting for a long time.
“Do you like it?” The duke, who had commissioned the piece, asked. It showed his glorious victory against a ravening two-headed dragon.
In paint, the battle was scrubbed clean. He charged at a mighty beast breathing great gouts of flame. The reality was a quagmire of mud and blood. He had lost his horse hours before, and the dragon had been a stitched together monstrosity lashing out in pain.
He hated it. But a knight wasn’t what you were. It was what you did. He smiled. “It’s beautiful.”

“Come on, five more reps. You can do it!” The trainer said. Her client struggled, even though the dumbbells only weighed five pounds.
“I don’t get it,” he panted. “Why couldn’t you just give me super-strong arms when you did the brain transplant?”
The clients always asked this, even though they were thoroughly briefed before the procedure.”This isn’t just about muscle strength. Your brain needs to learn how to use your new body and build your new connections.”
“But it’s so difficult with these tiny arms!”
“You’re the one that wanted to become a T-Rex. Get pumping!”

The family went camping at Mount Moose that summer. They couldn’t actually camp on the protected site itself, but they found a campground overlooking the famous natural feature.
While Papa and the older kids set up the tents, Mama walked the youngest over to the viewing area.
“Mommy, that moose is huge!” said Clara, age eight.
“Don’t be silly, darling. It’s just a funny shaped mountain. Those are just trees and rocks. But it does look like a moose if you use your imagination.”
Mama couldn’t see it, but the forest guardian, The Great Moose, winked one giant, bouldery eye.

“Don’t think you’ve won,” the sorcerer cackled. “You haven’t seen my final form!” And before the heroes eyes, he began a startling transformation.
“Is that it?” The hero asked when he was done. “I though you would be bigger.”
“Conservation of mass,” the sorcerer said. “A smaller form is actually more powerful.”
“What is it, some kind of squirrel? You’re almost cute.”
“Yes, well, the thing about that is,” The sorcerer said, and then opened his mouth to expel a deadly breath weapon. The hero was instantly vaporized.
It may not have been intimidating, but it got the job done.

He was granted immortality in his twenty-ninth year. Ageless, he drifted through the centuries.
Detached from the rest of humanity, he watched empires rise, blossom, decay into corruption and collapse again, leaving nothing but ruins behind.
He travelled the world many times over. He witnessed the heights of culture and the depths of human suffering. He moved from town to town, sometimes staying in one place for a dozen years or two before disappearing and starting again.
And at the start of every new life, after each new reinvention, he said to himself, “This time, I’ll write that novel.”

“This isn’t the mission I expected,” the astronaut said. Around him, technicians checked his suit and their equipment. “All this is…” He waved a white-mittened hand around the room.
The commander handed him his helmet. “We get the mission that’s in front of us,” she said. “Our duty to is explore, wherever humanity needs us to.”
Helmet secured, he gave the thumbs up. The techs took their positions and began chanting. They lit their black candles, and the air in front of him wavered, clouded, and became a glossy black portal.
“Capcom,” he said, “We are go for exploration.”

He was known for his huge and eccentric hairstyles, even as he grew older, streaking his gray with fabulous colors and sculpting it into fantastic shapes.
He did all the work himself, with the assistance of a myriad of styling tools and a room full of mirrors he designed himself.
He began styling his hair into fanciful animals. One day he’d tease his hair into the shape of an adorable panda. The next a majestic lion’s mane. Then he would dye his ‘do into elaborate tiger stripes.
Everyone was delighted, until someone touched his hair without warning and got bitten.