Catfish Fishin'
Surrounded by a sandstorm on Titan, Fitz prepares to face off, with Carnage Cosmic. He's Silver Surfer, with the Carnage symbiote in him.
In the sky, Fitz can see the bulk of the planet Saturn. Satellite photos never tell him how beautiful it is, from Titan's surface...
From above, a loud noise approaches. Carnage Cosmic looks up...and retreats away, a bit...
Fitz turns around, and has his breath taken by a humongous arrival. It's Galactus, Devourer of Worlds. With luck, he won't devour Titan while Fitz is still on it.
Crap; Fitz keeps forgetting he's not really on Titan.
Carnage Cosmic seems deterred. He flies away, into space, leaving Fitz and Galactus behind.
All around, the illusion of Titan rolls back; including Galactus. This time, Fitz is in a petting zoo in some small Illinois town. There are goats, and sheep, and rabbits, and a pony, and...
There's an aquarium, with a huge blue catfish inside. In the background, Guthrie Kennard's "Catfish Fishin" plays. Fitz scoffs. He imagines Cyrus is feeling right at home, by now...
Fitz wastes no time. He sighs, and aims his rifle at the catfish tank...
A mermaid, who bears Halle Berry's likeness, swims up to the glass, and intervenes. She treads water, between Fitz's rifle and the catfish.
"Please, don't shoot him," she begs. "He's... He's loaded!"
"Oh yeah?" Fitz reloads the rifle. "With what? Chicago-style pizza?"
"No, bombs! Bombs, he'll go off! Please, point that thing away."
"You sure are protective of him. And seriously, I never made you out for the type who'd impersonate Halle Berry's character in Gothika…"
Two other mermaids appear. They look like Michelle Williams and Kelly Rowland. "Halle Berry" shapeshifts into Beyoncé Knowles. They press against the glass, and beg Fitz not to shoot the catfish.
"Please don't hurt him," they beg. "He's already blue!"
"Yeah, yeah, he's ALWAYS blue. Seriously, don't you ladies have a club to go jumping in?"
They implore him not to shoot the fish. Meanwhile, in the background, the fish keeps swimming, as if unaware of the argument that happens near him...
"You ladies don't sound right," Fitz tells him. "Would you mind begging to me in three-part harmony...like the REAL Destiny's Child would?"
All three ladies hesitate, and look at Fitz, confused...
Here, Fitz takes his shot. The glass shatters, the three mermaids vanish, and Fitz's lower half is soon drenched in a flood, that pours out of that tank.
All around, the illusion rolls away; ALL of it, this time. Fitz looks around. He's back in the Oval Office! Aside from a mess, it looks just the way it did...
All around him, his old shipmates and fellow POWs revert to their usual identities. They too, are wet from the aquarium water.
In the background, the Civil Wars' "Long Time Comin" plays. Outside, a wave passes over Lincoln City, and all of the gay Nazi décor reverts back to its normal, relatively egalitarian, and occasionally NAU-themed, self.
The Marvel/DC characters who guarded the High Pink Castle revert back to their elephantine identities. The High Pink Castle reverts back to the Grey House.
In a corner, Frank's corpse lies. It's headless. Shit; so Cyrus really DID kill him... Oh well; he was getting old enough to do it, anyhow...
The scarf, on the Lincoln Memorial, vanishes. The statue of Jonathan reverts back to a church.
The Whiterobes revert back to their real straight male/lesbian identities. Most of them recover perfectly, without any injuries. Others aren't so lucky.
Most of Fitz's and the other's alternate identities vanish; dead and alive. The various Marvel/DC characters don't vanish; if they were on Cyrus's side, they revert back to their alternate gay male/straight female identities.
Pink Flash looks around, and laments, as he helplessly and hopelessly reverts back to Billy Chambers. His pink uniform becomes an orange one.
Before him, he watches, as his buddy, Reverse-Flash, reverts to Amanda Tanner. Chambers gapes.
"Wait... I thought I raped you! Didn't I kill you, too?"
Blood gushes from Ms. Tanner's mouth. A swarm of maggots gush from her chest. She falls over, and dies...again.
"NO," Chambers shouts.
The cops arrive, and arrest Chambers...again.
"Billy Chambers, you're under arrest for the grave-robbing, illegal resurrection, and second murder of Amanda Tanner. You've the right to remain silent..."
"Wait, no! You can't do this to me! This is the NAU! I already killed her, this is double jeopardy! I WANT A LAWYER!"
They shove him into the back of a cop car, and lock him in. They haul his ass off...to a police station whose staff is sexually egalitarian.
Back at the Grey House, Fitz watches, as all three elephantfish slide out of the tank, with the last of the tank's water, and start flipping and flopping all over the Grey House floor. Cyrus lands at Fitz's feet.
Fitz smiles, and looks down upon him. "NOT killifishes, eh?"
As the flash flood dies, the elephantfish flop less and less. It looks like they're going to die.
All around, Fitz's shipmates/fellow POWs cheer. "We did it," they shout, rejoicing. "We killed da ewefantfish!"
They shout, jump up and down, and cheer. They slap Fitz on the back.
Farshad teleports in, and pats Fitz on the back. "Good show," he compliments.
Fitz nods, and looks Farshad up and down. "I think I still like you better as Tilda Swinton's Ancient One."
Farshad shrugs. "A man's gotta be himself, doesn't he?"
"Excuse me?"
Everyone stops cheering, and looks around. A little lost Afroasian amazon wanders into their midst, wearing a bath towel.
"I'm sorry to barge in," she says, "but...I was in hiding here, during the fake assassination operation, and my unit just left me here. Can anyone tell me where they might've gone?"
A dumbfounded silence falls over the crowd. Some of them are a bit more preoccupied with the amazon's hooters, playing peek-a-boo beneath that towel...
On the floor, the three elephantfish summon water to themselves. They trap themselves in cocoons of water, and rise from near-death. They've all got revenge in their eyes.
Fitz stands back, and watches them rise. He KNEW this felt too good to be true...
"Farshad," Fitz shouts, "get everyone out! This is between me and my chiefs of staff!"
In a flash, Farshad heeds Fitz's request. He gets all of the survivors...including the lost amazon...out.
THIS ISN'T OVER, Novak insists, telepathic again. WE WANT THIS HOUSE TO OURSELVES.
"Too bad," Fitz insists. "It isn't yours to have. It belongs to the people of the NAU...and the man they choose to have live in it."
IT'S NOTHING PERSONAL, OLD MATE. IT'S JUST THAT...WE cannot RETURN TO LAKE TANGANYIKA...AS MUCH AS WE PROBABLY DESERVE TO BE DEPORTED BACK THERE.
With that, the elephantfish rip everything they can from the Grey House, telekinetically, and aim it, like spears, at the President. They prepare to give him one last volley...one that will hopefully assassinate him...as much as they'd hate to assassinate their old boss...
They smash the glass from a framed photo of Mellie, and aim the shards at Fitz. They do the same thing with the shards of glass from a framed photo of Ulysses Grant.
The debris awaits the elephantfish's command. Fitz has got nowhere to go...but to his premature grave...both as president, and as himself.