The war for Tristatium Prime, a world choked by toxic flora, tyranids and fortified men of iron, had settled into a brutal, grinding campaign. It was precisely this climate of perpetual, low-stakes warfare that attracted the attention of one particular Helldiver known simply by his rather derivative callsign: DR EVIL.
DR EVIL, or as he insisted on being called in private comms, Heinz Doofenshmirtz, was not interested in spreading democracy or achieving tactical objectives.
On the third orbital rotation, while the primary Helldiver assault teams were busy arguing over who got to deploy the orbital railgun on the heaviest factory, DR EVIL was setting up his own operation near a minor, largely ignored regional capital: the humid coastal city of Zirra.
He had landed his personal pod—customized with a regrettable purple racing stripe and a small, flickering neon sign that read 'DOOFENSHMIRTZ EVIL INCORPORATED'—on the roof of the tallest, but structurally unsound, government building.
"Ah, behold, Agent P—I mean, nameless rival who I have yet to encounter!" DR EVIL exclaimed into his helmet's general broadcast channel, despite being completely alone and standing on a roof where the ventilation unit was currently on fire.
He was wearing the standard Helldiver heavy armor, though he had affixed a pair of unnecessarily large, ornate metal shoulder pads that constantly snagged on doorways.
"Tonight, I, DR EVIL, shall finally conquer an entire planet! And not just any planet, but Tristatium Prime! And once I conquer Tristatium Prime, I shall use its massive reserves of highly corrosive jungle muck to… to coat my nemesis' lawn gnomes! Yes! Oh, the wrath I shall invoke!"
He gestured dramatically towards his latest invention: the Prime-Conquering-Inator.
The Inator was a monstrosity of duct tape, repurposed drone parts, and blinking warning lights. It was roughly the size of a small tank, painted an offensively bright shade of lime green, and mounted atop an unstable tripod made of three salvaged men of iron legs.
Its primary function seemed to be centered around a giant, antique novelty magnifying glass pointed at a complex array of spinning CDs.
"You see, this is not just any conquering machine," he continued, still broadcasting to no one in particular, though a handful of bewildered Helldivers in the region were starting to pick up his signal and were debating whether to report him or not.
"This is the culmination of my life's work! When I was a little boy in Gimmelshtump, my parents—or my neighbors, it changes depending on the Tuesday—forced me to eat only broccoli!
Broccoli! Do you know how much that traumatized me? It took me thirty-seven years to realize that broccoli could be steamed! But by then, the damage was done! I was fated for evil! And so, I built this Inator!"
He took a pause for effect, pulling a handkerchief out of his sleeve to dab at his forehead.
"This Inator works by emitting a highly focused Boredom Wave! Yes! A wave so incredibly dull that every man of iron, every tyranid, and every citizen on this planet will immediately lose interest in fighting, managing, or even existing!
They will be too bored to lift a finger, and then, I, DR EVIL, can simply stroll in and sign the planetary deed transfer!"
He leaned closer to the primary control panel, which was a repurposed cogitator.
"The secret, my nameless nemesis, is in the magnifying glass! It focuses the sheer, crushing monotony of the latest intergalactic tax code filings—which I've cleverly stored on these 1990s compact discs—and projects the resultant Boredom Wave across the hemisphere!
Brilliant! Simple! And completely untraceable, because who would suspect the tax code, eh?"
A distant Helldiver, known as SkullCrusher420, finally cut into the channel. "Uh, DR EVIL? Is this a stratagem or something? Because if you're trying to bore the tyranids to death, I think I'm gonna extract right now. My ears are bored."
"Silence, you non-believer!" DR EVIL shouted, pressing a large red button labeled 'DO NOT PRESS, ACTUALLY.' "Soon you will all see the genius of Doofenshmirtz Evil Incorporated! Prepare for planetary disarmament! Prepare for the era of… Dr. Evil!"
He activated the machine.
The Tristatium Prime-Conquering-Inator emitted a sound like a wet kitten trying to cough up a hairball, accompanied by a faint, high-pitched whirring that could only be heard by small dogs and particularly anxious accountants.
The spinning CDs inside the Inator began to wobble precariously. The novelty magnifying glass focused the energy, and a narrow, shimmering wave began to project outward towards the central men of iron stronghold twenty miles away.
For exactly three seconds, nothing happened.
Then, the wave hit a single object: a rusted, abandoned garden sprinkler, inexplicably left in the middle of a toxic field.
The results were instantaneous and entirely unexpected.
Instead of being struck by existential dread and apathy, the sprinkler was infused with a massive dose of localized overwhelming enthusiasm. It began to spin wildly, faster and faster, shooting water arcs that were no longer arcs, but high-pressure jets that instantly carved a perfect, three-foot-deep moat around the derelict garden patch.
The Boredom Wave, instead of boring the planet, had somehow become the Overwhelming-Enthusiasm-Sprinkler-Inator.
"What!?" DR EVIL shrieked, clutching his head dramatically. "It worked! The energy output is correct! But why—why did it make a Sprinkler-Inator? I spent three days painstakingly compiling the tax code data!
Did I… did I use the wrong brand of duct tape? Perhaps the racing stripe is causing aerodynamic drag on the motivational resonance!"
He frantically checked the instruction manual, a handwritten scroll taped to the back of the Inator.
"Ah, here is the problem!" he realized, pointing a gloved finger at the bottom-most line. "'Note: Ensure the power coupling is attached to the correct side of the novelty magnifying glass. If attached to the wrong side, the Boredom Wave will be inverted into a highly unstable, targeted burst of Joyful Obsession.' Oh, curse you, little Dr. Evil!"
Meanwhile, down below the building, the ground Helldivers were dealing with the chaotic aftermath.
The highly enthusiastic sprinkler, now radiating pure, unadulterated motivational energy, had completely altered the personality of the men of iron in its immediate vicinity.
A battalion of hulking units, previously dedicated to planetary genocide, had suddenly dropped their missile pods and begun constructing a magnificent, albeit temporary, gazebo out of salvaged wreckage.
They were working with astonishing efficiency, happily whistling the tune of 'For Liberty,' even though their auditory processors were just metallic scrapings.
"Democracy!" a formerly murderous man of iron shouted, holding up a bouquet of jungle weeds. "Let us celebrate the common man's right to recreational horticulture! I feel alive!"
"This is the most confusing bug hunt I have ever been on," mumbled a nearby Helldiver, MachoManTim. He stared at a screaming robot meticulously organizing color-coded pebbles for the gazebo floor.
"Sir, the men of iron... they've stopped fighting," reported his teammate, BoomStickBetty. "They appear to be arguing over the optimal thread count for a picnic blanket."
"The Boredom Wave! It must have been the Boredom Wave!" DR EVIL's frantic voice cut through the comms channel. "It's too much! The enthusiasm is out of control! I have inadvertently created the most polite, yet highly disruptive, men of iron garden party in the sector!"
In his panic, DR EVIL hit the emergency self-destruct button, which, naturally, he had labeled 'RESET INATOR'.
The Inator simply collapsed, causing the massive novelty magnifying glass to shatter. The resultant glass shards, reflecting the intense jungle sunlight, focused a beam of light directly onto DR EVIL's heavy shoulder pad.
The shoulder pad, instantly vaporized by the focused sunlight, exposed a small can of highly pressurized, aerosolized cheese snack he kept for emergencies. The heat caused the can to rupture, spraying a sticky, orange cloud directly onto the central control unit of his Helldiver helmet.
"Ah! My eyes!" he cried, momentarily blinded by the spray cheese. "Curse you, unexpected dairy reaction! This is just like when my childhood hamster ran away, only messier, and much, much smellier!"
Due to the intense heat and the sudden cheese explosion, the structural integrity of the entire roof finally gave out. With a groan of twisting metal, DR EVIL's landing spot, his custom pod, and the remains of the Inator all crashed three stories down into the abandoned government cafeteria below.
From the wreckage, a muffled, heavily accented voice could be heard over the comms channel, now staticky and coated in processed cheddar.
"...Foiled again! I have been foiled by a highly motivated sprinkler, an overly reflective pauldron, and my own emergency snack reserves!
Truly, Tristatium Prime is not ready for my genius! Prepare the extraction! And please, bring napkins. The cheese is everywhere!"
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Tri-Statium Prime - get it?