It is another night in The Jungle. The Jungle is one of the most dangerous cities in the world. It is infested by murderous, greedy and overall malicious criminals. At night, one can expect to run into any one of them. It isn't safe to be out here at night. For one unknowing citizen, this fact is about to become very clear.
The young man, while walking home from a late shift at work, is suddenly surrounded by a group of men wearing the colors of the Tiger Gang, one of The Jungle's most notorious gangs. They push him into a nearby alley.
"Alright kid, hand over your wallet and we won't hurt you," says the largest of the group. It is safe to assume that he is the leader of these neanderthals, since the rest merely stand their ready to pounce on his command.
"H-h-here," whimpers the young man as he hands his wallet over. After getting ahold of the man's wallet, the rest of the goons proceed to push the man around. Eventually, one of the gang members pushes him to the ground and the rest begin kicking him. In his head, the man prays for help in any form. His prayers are answered when a gruff voice comes from above on a nearby building.
"Alright cowards, leave the boy alone," echoes a deep, menacing voice. Upon hearing this voice, every one of the gang members freezees in horror. This voice was known among the criminal underworld to be that of The Frogman. The Frogman was known to be a vigilante who patrolled The Jungle every night, stopping every crime that he encountered. One would expect this Frogman to be a physically large, intimidating monster; but in reality, the man behind Frogman was a balding, middle-aged man who probably can't even lift a box of pillows to save his life. However, the criminals of The Jungle did not know this. He always hovered above on nearby building to keep the criminals from seeing the fact that the only thing that kept his potbelly from spilling over his belt was a lime-green, skintight unitard.
"A-a-alright! Please don't hurt us!" whimpers the leader as he hands the man his wallet back and helps him to his feet.
"If you don't turn yourself in right now, I can't make that promise," growls Frogman. Inside, Frogman was trying to keep himself from fainting out of fear. Realistically, the man that is The Frogman knew that he would never win a fight. He made up for this by using intimidation and other scare tactics to keep criminals afraid.The gang members then proceed to run away, screaming in horror. The young man tries to thank his savior, but looks up to see that Frogman had already disappeared into the night. Realistically, Frogman was struggling to slowly climb down the fire escape on the opposite side of the building.
Author's Note:
For my story, I decided to use the Tibetan folktale of
The Tiger and the Frog. In the story, a scared frog tries to keep himself from being eaten by an obviously larger, fiercer tiger. To do this, the frog pretends to be physically superior and pretends to eat tigers for fun. The tiger is actually fooled by this, so much so, the tiger runs away. Reading this, I couldn't help but see the basis for Batman. We all know the story of Batman, the vigilante who trains to be one of the world's greatest crimefighters. I wanted to make my character, The Frogman, to be a vigilante hero as Batman is, but the difference is that the Frogman is in no shape to be a crimefighter, whether it be physically or mentally. He instead acts like the frog in the Tibetan story, using intimidation to scare off the attackers (who happen to be members of the
Tiger gang).
Bibliography:
Tibetan Folk Tales. A.L. Shelton.
Link.
(The Frogman keeps a watchful eye:
