Ivan was the first to stand up again. Hot clouds of steam rose from his naked body. He wiped the snow from his shoulders and pulled up his nose. “I’m not saying I’m cold or anything, but it’s freezing out here.”

An icy breeze blew his towel away.

Yes, he was Ivan. Cool and aloof. That tiny bit of snow and cold would never, never ever, bother him.

“Achoo!”

Confused and perplexed, the Five stared at the pitiful pile of rubble that had once been a log cabin. “You could almost assume there’s a causal relationship between this Japanese boy’s appearance and the collapse of our club house.” Tauno remarked, leaning forward and staring at Taro with a thieving grin.

Panicking, Taro jumped back. “I… I don’t know anything, I’m sorry!” He bowed frantically.

(Look out! Take cover!)

The wind increased. It grew stronger and stronger until it finally turned into a roar.

Like a silver lightning bolt, a small jet plane shot down and drove a path between the boys.

John grabbed Taro and pushed him aside, just in time before the jet plane could give him a new hairdo.

Once again the snow crept into Taro’s sweaty clothes, but he was too excited to think whether Northern Europe had as good cold pills as Japan, or whether he would die an agonizing death of man-flu later.

Everything that was happening appeared strangely familiar to him. He’d seen it on television so many times before: Five normal students suddenly faced with a sinister threat on a normal day. They were attacked - the monster shot over them again - and now all that was missing was a cute mascot, which revealed to them that they were among the chosen ones who should battle for love and justice.

Fully determined, Taro stood up and looked around.

Where? Where? WHERE WAS IT? There had to be a magical glow somewhere around them!

Once again, the jet plane launched an attack.

The other four cowered in the snow, freezing. They tried to convince themselves that they had all been sitting in the sauna for too long and that their painful icicles existed only in their imagination. Tauno especially, had transfigured a smile on his lips.

Wildly determined, Taro spread his arms. His stomach rumbled in positive excitement.

The monster shot down directly at him. Now he could also see that a small elf was sitting in the cockpit of the jet plane number E 174, which had two large magnets attached to its wings.

The Elf had angry obsessive eyes, as he took aim at Taro and directed his magnetic beam at him. “Give them to me!” He shouted. “Give them all to me!”

Taro straightened his glasses and broadened his shoulders. Now the time had come! Now he would finally become a hero!

“SHIBARAKU!” He shouted against the roar of the turbines. “STOP IT, NOW!”

But the Elf didn’t listen and shot straight at him. He could feel the magnetic beam pierce and immobilize him.

While the others cried out in horror and he slowly, almost in slow motion, dropped to the ground, his last breath formed one last thought: “I wish we could become superheroes …”

…

…

(Your wish is my command.)

***

The light at the end of the tunnel was a television studio. As Taro’s eyes adjusted to the bright spotlights, he suddenly realized that he and the four other boys were not only freshly dressed, but were also in a completely different place.

He lifted his glasses and rubbed his eyes. “Are we dead?”

A figure in the middle of the room waved his head back and forth.

Tauno raised an eyebrow critically and looked around. “But how is it possible that we were standing naked in front of the sauna only a second ago, where we were attacked by some monster, but now we’re suddenly here?! None of this makes sense!”

“Yes, it makes sense!” The spotlights pointed to the center of the room and revealed a creature that floated in the air like a drop of water at zero gravity.

Stern eyes gazed at the five boys. In fact, the creature was just a head with eyes, a lock of hair, and a long flagellum.

Ivan had to stop himself from laughing. “You look like sper-”

– “No comment on my current appearance! What you see is all that’s left of me after you idiots thought you could make a sauna infusion out of me!”

Five pairs of bewildered eyes stared at the water sprite in awe.

The creature cleared his non-existent throat. “There’s a plausible explanation for everything, but let me make it short: my name is Blob, and I’m a genie in a bottle. Right now we’re in a fold of the space-time-continuum that I created to fulfill Taro’s wish.”

Taro cheered happily and clapped his hands. “Does this mean we’ll all become superheroes now?”

Anders shook his head. “But I’m really not in the mood to fight monsters while dressed in spandex and a cape.”

John agreed with him. “All I really want is to get back our club house and my kitchen. There’s still a pie in the oven.”

Blob grinned, as good enough a grin that a drop of water was able to make. He spun around several times until finally five hatches opened in the floor and five screens went up.

Taro’s eyes glowed with anticipation.

Suddenly a happy song was played from unknown boxes. “Welcome to superhero Purikura, my dear Chosen Ones!”

“Purikura!” Taro knew immediately what Blob meant, and grabbed a pen attached to the edge of the screen.

“Purikura!”

“What the hell is a Purikura?!” Tauno did the same and picked up the pen as well.

Anders shrugged his shoulders and looked at the screen. “It’s one of those far eastern tech toy things.”

Strange characters, which only Taro could read, appeared, and a fanfare sounded. “Welcome to the Do-It-Yourself Superhero Generator. Please scan your fingerprint first and sign the data privacy statement.”

Everyone but Taro filled out the form blindly.

Blob floated from one to the other, adding, “Oh, the translation is wrong. This was actually a consent form for heroic activities and a waiver of damage compensation in the case of physical or mental harm caused by this unpaid work.”

“Wait, what?!” Tauno blurted out.

“Who ever reads the data privacy statement?” John sulked.

60:00

“Don’t complain, just hurry up!” Blob urged them. “Maybe you haven’t noticed yet, but there’s a countdown going on at the top right corner all the time. Now you have 60 seconds to configure your outfit and your powers. If you’re not done by the end of the countdown, this fold in space-time-continuum will collapse, and you will be pulverized by the monster. Oh, I’m so sorry - thanks to my explanation, there are only 45 seconds left. Hurry, hurry, hurry!”

45:00

Taro felt like he was on cloud nine. He already knew Purikura booths from the arcade at home in Kyoto. Now and then he had visited these photo booths with his big sisters and afterwards decorated the photographs with stickers and special effects. Step by step he clicked through the menu, added shoes, armour and special decorations, and finally confirmed his choice by giving himself a hero’s name: “Sakura! I call myself Sakura! Like my favorite heroine on TV!”

Anders broke out in a sweat. The possible variations seemed all so inappropriate and old-fashioned that he had a hard time choosing an outfit.

“Why can you only pick one colour? It’s absolutely boring and contradicts any sense of aesthetics!” With a heavy heart he chose the color cyan and the heroic name “Spruce”.

35:00

When he confirmed his choice, John protested. “Hey, that’s not fair! I wanted to have blue!”

Blob floated over to him and looked over his shoulder. “I’m very sorry, but everyone has to have a different base colour to keep the confusion low. Nice cowboy hat by the way!”

John nodded proudly and dyed his clothes yellow. “As sure as I am an American and my name is John Doe, I will fight in the name of my country. I shall call myself Captain America.”

A large X appeared on the screen, rejecting his plagiarism. John gritted his teeth, typed in the word “Mezcal” and confirmed his selection.

25:00

On his right, Tauno laughed hysterically. “Fantastic! This is fan-tas-tic!” He took the pen and coloured as many parts as possible black. “And my name is, of course, Metal.”

At the other end, Ivan was cursing and yelling. “Fucking hell, the contrast is way too high!” He frowned and squinted his eyes to see something on the screen, but his visual impairment due to albinism made the selection almost impossible.

10:00

“Fuck man, I need my glasses! Fuck, only 10 seconds left, fuck!” Adrenaline rushed through his veins. He took a deep breath and frowned again.

“Okay, home country, Russia. Name …”, the menu faded.

00:00

“Hey, man, I didn’t even pick a colour! Is that fair to people with disabilities?”

His next words were masked by a magic beep, as they violated superhero etiquette.

Slowly, the screens receded into the floor and the hatches closed. Then the center console opened to reveal a large silver sphere.

“For real, the magic sphere from the television?!” Taro’s eyes radiated stars of euphoria.

Anders rubbed his forehead. “Can I please wake up from this goddamn nightmare? It’s even worse than having to listen to Tauno after a long weekend!”

“Hey!” Tauno yelled indignantly and sulked. “I thought you were my best friend, Anders!”

Blob whizzed past them and opened the magic gate. “Talk about your relationship issues later. Now hurry, go through the portal and change!” And in the blink of an eye, he was already lost in a vortex of light.

Taro smiled happily. “Now we’ll all become superheroes! Yay!” With a dive, he followed Blob into the light.

He expected glitter.

A shower of stars.

Petals, at least.

But instead, he fell heavily to the ground on the other side of the magic sphere.

“Ouch!” For the second time that day, Tauno, Anders, John and Ivan landed on him. Taro’s glasses slipped off his nose.

“Wow!” Ivan said in amazement and looked around. For the first time in his life, he could see his surroundings clearly.

Irritated, he looked down at himself and assessed the damage. He wore white trousers in knee-high leather boots, a long coat with a wide belt, a back scabbard, and epaulettes decorated with a large diamond. His head was warmed by a fur hat. He grinned crookedly. “I guess I’ve become a Russian Cossack.”

The others, too, looked at their clothes with irritation. While John, a crop top cowboy with yellow decorations, walked around like a stripper from the last carnival party, Anders, wearing a cyan blue Danish garb, looked very elegant.

Taro had finally found his glasses, whose frame had become magenta-colored during the transformation. He happily looked all over at his traditional Japanese outfit with elements of the so-called Shinsengumi.

But when Ivan saw Tauno, he almost choked with laughter. “Hello, Legolas.”

“Hello, White Walker,” Tauno replied dryly. A few strands of his long blond hair were braided and held together in a ponytail fashion at the back of his head by a hexagonal silver brooch with an onyx inside.

His braids, the black strands of hair in his nape, and the Lapland costume with its upwardly curved shoe tips did not irritate Tauno as much as the fact that they all grew pointed ears.

Blob shrugged his non-existent shoulders. “Little added bonus from the world of genies. And sorry that the obligatory transformation was missing, there wasn’t enough time left anymore.”

Blob imitated a bow and was about to explain the principles of magic fighting to the boys. But before he could make a single sound, the micro jet rushed down once more and destroyed his body into a thousand drops of water.