Here's a little something for  connercoon! We had a trade, and he gave me El Toro to play with for a little bit. Naturally, I packed more beef on everyone's favorite narcissistic lucahdore-themed superhero than a Texas cattle ranch. there's action, romance, and an obscene amount of muscle on display~

El Toro ©  connercoon
Story © c'est moi

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This was not turning out to be a very good day for Alex Smithers, better known as Master of the Dark Arts, Necromancer of the 21st Century, the Seventh Seal. First, he found out raising an army of the dead came with its own plethora of problems, like decomposition, rigor mortis, and being harder to manage than shepherding a clowder of particularly brain dead cats.

And second…

“FOR GREAT JUSTIIIIIIICE!”

Ugh. Superheroes.

The thickly muscled bull, in a bright red and yellow luchador costume, landed with a heavy thud in the villainous aquatic mammal’s hideout, a shack stuffed to the brim with artifacts out in the bayou. Pointing dramatically, El Toro shouted at the Seventh Seal. “Senor! Joor voodoo magic tricks are not popular with the audience, maybe joo should go back to balancing balls on joor nose!”

“Ugh, everyone makes that joke! I’ve never even been to a circus!” The Seventh Seal grabbed his grimoire, and shot a bolt of dark magic at the bull.

El Toro deftly side-stepped the attack, and charged with all the force of an oncoming train. “Headbutt of Justice!” He cried, ramming into the necromancer and plowing him down.

The Seventh Seal barked his pain, staggering back to his feet as he watched El Toro crash into an ancient stone Mayan calendar. “CAREFUL, you big idiot!” he shouted, gesturing to the exotic looking objects he had stacked to the ceiling all around him. “All of these are priceless magical artifacts!”

“Hah! That is why good will always win, Senor! El Toro doesn’t need old knick-knacks, he needs only his mighty mooscles to fight for justice!” El Toro dodged another bolt of magic, flexing his arm until his bicep swelled and nearly tore his sleeve. “Left Hook of Justice!” He slammed his fist into the seal’s cheek. The Seventh Seal stumbled again, spitting out a few teeth.

“Z-zombies! Attack!” Seventh Seal cried in desperation, sending a few of his shuffling minions after the bull.

“Haha!” The bovine superhero tackled one zombie to the ground, and tore off his arm. He wielded the decaying limb like a weapon. “Backhand slap of Justice!” He hit the other zombie so hard, his head spun off like a screw.

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” The Seventh Seal gulped. He looked up as El Toro loomed over him, the bull sporting a massive grin. He lifted the seal up in the air, and began winding up his arm. “Haymaker of--”


“Let me guess, Justice?”

El Toro smirked. “No, senor. Truth!” He hit the Seventh Seal hard enough to send him flying, the would-be Necromancer landing in a crumpled heap on the floor.

The battle ended, El Toro walked over and picked up the seal’s grimoire. “Mortuos suscitare oportet… this is a very bad Spanish translation, Senor.”

“It’s Latin, you oversized cretin!” the seal groaned.

El Toro lumbered over, placing his foot on the seal to keep him in place. “This magic book really works, si?”

“Yes!” The Seventh Seal was quiet for a moment, and then made an overdramatic gasp. “Oh, no! Whatever you do, don’t read the spell on page 58!”

“Oh? And why is that, Senor?” El Toro cocked his brow, rifling through the faded pages.

“It will… suck up all my power! Yeah! I’ll never be able to use the grimoire again!” The Seventh Seal put his hand to his forehead. “Oh, woe is me! My Supervillain career, cut so short! And me without a 401k!”

“Ha!” El Toro cried triumphantly as he reached page 58. “That is why crime never pays, Senor! Really, El Toro is doing you a favor. When joo get out of prison, joo can never come back to joor evil ways!” He frowned as he looked the spell over. There were a lot of big words. “Da mihi spirituum obscurorum semper viribus aucta... Fac me sicut deum? Did El Toro say it right, senor?” He asked, looking down at the seal.

“Oh… just perfect, El Toro.” Why was the seal grinning?

Oh, well. Who could ever understand supervillains? El Toro was willing to chalk up another victory. As he watched the police carry off the Seventh Seal, he realized he finally had time for a long-overdue vacation. There were no supervillains on the loose right now, which meant the superhero was free to do whatever he pleased. What would it be? Relax at home with Mama? Some tropical getaway?

Musing over his options, El Toro decided what was first needed was a well deserved night’s rest. It was past midnight, and The Seventh Seal’s bayou hideout was… creepy, to say the least. At least Mama would have a nice meal waiting for him.

The next morning, El Toro woke up as Jose Bravado, and could already smell Mama making fresh tamales. Something felt… off, however. As he stood up, he felt a little bit awkward, something he hadn’t felt since he was young. The bull lumbered over to the full length mirror in his room; made extra-wide to accommodate any impromptu flexing sessions that might strike his fancy. As he looked over his muscular body, El Toro’s eyes widened. He was definitely bigger. It wasn’t such a dramatic transformation; his biceps swelled up just the slightest bit more, his chest expanded out only a little farther than they usually dared, and his boxers rode just a little tighter around his thick hips and adonis belt.

“Heh.” He smirked, indulging himself with a small flex of his arms. “It is about time Jose saw some progress with his new workout.” The bull slipped on a polo, leaving the buttons open to give his newly engorged chest a little more breathing room, and see if Papa would notice he was bigger.

Walking out into the kitchen with a little more energy than he was used to, Jose smiled broadly at his parents. “Buenos dias, Papa!” He said, stretching his arms over his head so his lats would flare out while his arms tensed, stretching the fabric of his shirt.

The elder Bravado glanced up from his newspaper, and the short, stocky bull gave what Jose interpreted as an approving grunt before going back to his paper.

“Oh, look at my Jose!” Mama Bravado reached up and kissed her son. “So big and strong,” she cooed, “that he needs a muy grande meal to keep him going!” Jose’s mother pulled him to a table, where a big breakfast of eggs still sizzling in a pan, a heavy scent of rich spices wafting from the stove, and warm tamales, awaited the bull. Jose was only too happy to eat everything his Mama put in front of him; he could afford a cheat day or two, couldn’t he?

In fact, the more Jose tucked into his eggs the more he was warming up to the idea. He could afford to give the heroics a rest for a day or two. And the more food he ate, the more he was positive that he was going to make a point of eating all he wanted; it was going to be a cheat day, no, a cheat week that he’d never forget. Spending time with Mama, eating her cooking and watching TV with Papa… it sounded like a nice change of pace.

When his shirt felt a little tight the next morning, that was to be expected. The second day, even more so. Well, that wasn’t a problem, he could work it off at the gym. The third day, however. Jose wasn’t surprised that a three-day sabbatical filled with frankly irresponsible amounts of Mama’s cooking and TV left his clothes feeling a little tight around him, but what was surprising was that they were tight in all the wrong places. Well, not the wrong places… a small smile tugged at Jose as he looked himself in the mirror; he not only seemed to get out of his binge vacation without any consequences, but he looked stronger than ever. His arms seemed particularly pumped, as if he had just come out of the workout of a lifetime. The bull’s biceps were swollen enough that they were actively beginning to push against his meaty flanks, and his chest widened to a point that his beefy pecs were growing increasingly intolerant of any shirt daring to button up across them. Jose scratched his chin to ponder, pausing to watch how much his bicep swelled up. In nothing but his boxers, he moved to the living room, where Papa Bravado was resolutely still on the couch.

“Papa…? Can Jose ask joo something?”

The short, elder bull glanced up from his paper.

Jose rose his arms in a double bicep pose, the two globes of muscle swelling and budging up against his meaty forearms and broad shoulders. “Jose looks bigger, no? More musculoso?”

An affirmative grunt.

“Ah, Jose thought so too! But it doesn’t make sense, does it, Papa? Jose hasn’t been working out at all… n-not that he intended to avoid the gym for much longer.”

Papa Bravado arched his brow.

“Papa, please, Jose knows what joo are going to say, but Jose doesn’t have time for joor lectures! With all due respect, senor,” he added quickly with a nervous smile. “Jose merely wonders how he could get bigger-- in the musculo department, he means-- without working out. Is such a thing possible?”

Papa Bravado actually set down his paper to watch his son ponder. It was an exceedingly rare occurrence, and the gears turning in the young bull’s head were almost audible.

“It’s not anything Jose should be concerned about, should it? This isn’t normal…” He tapped his chin for a moment. “Ah, but joo are right, Papa. Jose shouldn’t be too worried… maybe he just needed time to rest to let his body grow! Si, Jose is certain. But first, Jose is going to need new clothes, he’s outgrown everything. Sorry, Papa, but Jose needs to cut this short. No offence, senor, but joo can really be a chatterbox about some things.” Jose moved back to his room to get ready, and Papa watched him with piqued interest. He was acting strange; well, stranger than usual.

Jose was very limited in his clothing choices; he tore two pairs of pants just trying to put them on. But finally, he managed something halfway decent; a pair of jeans that hugged every bulge on his overdeveloped legs, and a shirt that was quickly turning into a tank-top for all the stress and tear his swollen arms were giving the sleeves, and he didn’t dare try to button up, instead exposing a fair amount of muscular cleavage.

The first place he went to was a Men’s Big and Tall store; a bull bigger than most bodybuilders couldn’t just pick up a shirt at the mall and be done with it, after all. He approached a shop clerk, a petite, bookish looking cat, and leaned against her desk, unaware that he left his meaty chest hovering a mere inch away from her. “Excuse Jose, Senorita…” He grinned down at her, letting his huge shoulders roll. He couldn’t help but show off, after all.

The clerk’s jaw dropped, but she quickly recovered; thought it was very hard for her to tear her eyes away from the bull’s bulging pecs. “...Can I help you sir?”

“Could joo point out joor biggest sizes? Jose is in need of a new wardrobe, and, well…” he bounced his pecs, nearly slipping out of his shirt. “Only the biggest will do.”

“I-I can see that, sir… follow me.” The clerk, who never quite managed to focus on Jose’s eyes, led him to the back; there wasn’t anything overtly flashy or fancy, but a serviceable range of clothes to choose from. In the changing room, Jose lost track of time as he stopped to check out his new muscles up close, but soon got to the business at hand; and he liked what he saw. His favorite outfit was reminiscent of a flamenco dancer; a scarlet shirt with open sleeves that he rolled up to the peak of his biceps, a low neckline to again show off the cleft of his pecs, matched with black slacks and a vest that was never, ever going to manage to button up around his thick torso. Immensely satisfied, Jose walked out with a confident smile. On his way to the exit, he glanced over his shoulder, with some effort, and caught the store clerk with her eyes locked on Jose’s behind.

“Joo think it is a good outfit, senorita?” he asked in a faux innocent tone.

“It…” she cleared her throat. “It sexy y- It suits you, sir.”

Jose looked back, catching his reflection in the store’s glass door and smiling wide. “Si, it does, doesn’t it? Maybe Jose will have to come back soon?”

“We appreciate any and all returning valued customers,” she said quickly, her words tumbling out.

With that little ego stroking, Jose felt much better about today. When he got back home, he checked out every angle of the outfit; he especially liked how his massive back dwarfed his new vest. But, he caught a small white tag out of the corner of his eye. He fished for it around the shirt’s collar, and gasped when he found it; the label was never taken off. He had never paid for his clothes!

Jose fell to his knees in disbelieving shock, and shocking disbelief. “NOOOO!” He wailed, raising his fists to the sky. “This is not possible! Jose would never steal! Jose isn’t a… a…” he gulped, “...a thief!” The word was terrible even to say! The great El Toro, a criminal? Never! ...Still. The more he thought on it, the more Jose realized that he HAD felt really good about the new clothes. The store clerk was happy to let him walk out; maybe she intended it as a gift for the handsomest customer? Maybe this wasn’t such a bad thing after all? Besides, it’s not like he intended to steal the clothes… right?

Jose began pacing, his mind working at a breakneck speed. He had stolen clothes; for all he knew, the police were already on their way! He’d have to flee the country, change his name, come up with an alibi… or would he, though? No one seemed to notice… maybe he was a better thief than he thought! He hadn’t been caught. Maybe Jose had the potential to be a master thief…

He fervently shook his head at that thought with a loud huff. The great El Toro wasn’t a thief! But, it was true that there had been almost no crime reported in the past few days… even with him taking a vacation, no one dared try evil deeds knowing El Toro was on the watch! Had he accidentally thrown things out of balance? Maybe Jose was so great a hero, he had erased crime forever! What a terrible thought; no bad guys meant no more fights, no more chances to show how strong he was! He thought of all the police officers he was going to put out of business… no crime meant no work for them!

Jose agonized over this. If he had thrown things out of balance… then it stood to reason he should put things back in place. And with all the supervillains either in jail or too afraid of El Toro to do anything… it fell on him to bring crime back to the streets, and set things right. It’d be the ultimate act of heroic villany! “If Jose is going to be a villain, he will need a new name… something… bad.” He stroked his chin, and then snapped his fingers. “Jose has it! If joo mess with the bool, joo get the horns… so Jose will become… El Cuerno!” He let out a booming, sinister laugh. “El Cuerno will become the greatest criminal this city-- no, the world-- will ever know! Muahaha… MWAHAHAHAA!”

“Jose! Why are joo making all that noise? Keep it down, joor father is trying to read the newspaper!”

“Sorry, Mama!” He whispered. “Mwahahaha…”

The days ahead were ones of intricate planning for Jose; even if it was only just designing his new costume. His first design, expertly drawn out with the best crayons and colored pencils he could find, was almost entirely black, with lots of spikes. That was evil, right?

Unfortunately, he had to go back to the drawing board quickly. Mama wouldn’t sew on that many spikes. Something about it being “impossible, chico! That many spikes, joo couldn’t bend joor arms!”

Mama was always stifling his artistic side. Oh well; a red and black version of his luchadore outfit, let out to accommodate his burgeoning muscles, would do. When he hit the gym again, muscles were piling on to his frame. It had to be a growth spurt, or something. People got growth spurts at 26, right? It was going to be at the gym where El Cuerno would strike next; there were new protein shakes at the gym’s smoothie bar, and they expected Jose to pay for them? What a foolish thought; El Cureno takes what he wants! Right?

“Si… si, that’s right. El Cuerno takes what he wants!” Jose smirked, pumping his fist in the air. He struck when his workout was over; his black fur was sleek with sweat, highlighting each and every cut of his muscles. His tank top was stretched to the very limit, leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. It was practically painted on, with his bulging flanks actively tearing at the sides and fighting for more room, and his surging shoulders pressing up against his pillar-thick neck, threatening to snap the straps of the shirt if Jose so much as rose his arm too quickly.

He approached the bar and leaned across it, his meaty pecs practically spilling out of his shirt and casting the counter in their shadow. The bartender was a fit and trim hare whose jaw temporarily fell open as Jose all but buried him in his pecs as he reached out, swinging his arm around and flexing, his bicep grinding against the back of the bartender’s head.

“Hola, senor.”

“H-hi, can I help you?”

Jose chuckled, his chest rolling and pressing up against the hare’s chin. He smiled, his perfect white teeth dazzling his captive audience. “Perhaps the better question is… can Jose help joo?”

“W-what?”

In a surprising bout of quick thinking, Jose quietly used his free arm to slide the collection of protein shakes into his bag. With the bartender plastered against his pecs, and his line of view filled entirely with black, bulging meat, he never noticed that most of his stock was gone.

The deed done, Jose winked. “Jose is perhaps, not the only one thirsty here? If joo help Jose, maybe he will quench joor thirst, too…”

The hare let out a strangled sound, staring up at the bull. “W-well, uh…” He burst into a quick flurry of activity, and prepared a large smoothie for Jose. “T-this is our most popular, it’s uhm, mango and banana… I put in extra protein boosts. Those cost extra, but, it’s… on the house.”

The huge bull took the smoothie in his meaty hand and drank deeply. “It is bueno, amigo. Jose will, ah…” still leaning across the bar, he ran a finger across the hare’s cheek, “...see joo around… six?”

“T-that sounds good, yeah,” the hare squeaked.

Jose hoisted up his bag, and felt almost giddy as he left. Free protein shakes AND a date? Maybe being evil could be fun!

El Cuerno slowly began stepping up his crime spree, along with his size. His new hook-up at the gym wasn’t kidding about the protein boosts apparently, as his body’s expansion outpaced anything he’d done in the past. And his hook-up at the clothing store, whom Jose wrapped around his finger just as easily as the hare, kept El Cuerno well-supplied with enough clothing material to match his growth; for now.

Of course, he couldn’t stick to shoplifting via flirting forever. The police were still woefully inactive, and when Jose saw on Papa’s paper that they were cutting back on patrols because of a dip in criminal activity, he knew he had to act, for great injustice!

He had to rob a bank.

El Cuerno chose the First National Bank downtown for a reason; years ago, it had been El Toro’s first great victory, stopping a robbery from the local Canadian mafia. They had been clever fiends, using Tim Horton’s and maple syrup to trap the security guards, and a juiced-up hockey goalie to tear through the wall. The bull knew the place fairly well… especially its weak point; he could still find the crack in the mortar where the criminals had tried to make their escape. Jose was almost surprised at how easy the wall fell apart after just one hit from his mighty fist; it felt like tearing through cardboard. The massive criminal squeezed his way in through the hole he made, and quietly moved through the ground-level offices of the bank. When he came to the vault, with its towering door of four feet-thick steel, he spotted a security guard. He was a tall and burly bear, but at this point, Jose’s arm was wider than the bear’s shoulders.

The guard felt the rumbling of the ground, and as he turned his flashlight up… and up, he took in a mammoth bull. He had seen El Toro years ago; the robbery happened when a new rookie he was training was on duty. The cut of the black and red luchador outfit was unmistakable, even if the sleeves had been torn off to make room for those steamship engine pistons that were trying to pass for arms. But this guy couldn’t be El Toro; he wasn’t this big. Right?

“Halt! Stop right there!” The guard whipped out his pistol.

The titan in front of him chuckled, rumbling deeply and sending every bulging muscle on his upper body rippling. “El Cuerno,” he said huskily, in a deep, heavily accented voice, “stops for no one.”

Before the guard could do anything, the bull moved faster than expected, and scooped him up in his arm. The guard was wedged between a diving bell-shaped forearm and a tensed bicep hard as rock and roughly the size of an exercise ball. His feet dangling off the ground, he came eye level with the beast, who pumped his chest, two granite slabs forcing his jacket further apart, and rolled his Appalachian shoulders, swallowing up what little neck he had left entirely.

El Cuerno smiled his best winning smile. “This is nice, si? Dark, quiet, just joo and El Cuerno… lucky joo. Joo look like you work out, senor… not as much as El Cuerno, obviously.” He flexed his free arm, his knuckles able to press into that swollen mound of bicep. “But joo could spot for him, si?”

“Are…” the bear blinked in surprise, “are you flirting with me?”

Jose chuckled, and that chest started rolling like the tide coming in. “Just let Jo- I mean, El Cuerno grab a few things out of the vault, and joo and him can have some… fun. Joo are large and strong, senor, but wouldn’t joo like to see what king size is like?”

“I…” the bear’s eyes travelled down, soaking in every bulging muscle. “That sounds… fun…” He quickly shook his head. “Wait, stop! I’m straight! I’ve got a wife and kids!”

“Que?” Jose blinked. “Joor sure?”

The bear hesitated, tearing his eyes away from the bull’s pecs. “Yes.”

Jose frowned. “Oh.” He hadn’t expected this. “Well…” Panicking, he brought up his free fist, and bonked the guard on the head.

Laying his unconscious victim on the ground, Jose turned his attention to the vault. It was only now he realized he had no idea what the code was.

As he rested his hands on the spokes of the vault door’s tumbler, however, he realized he didn’t need it. With one massive grunt, his arms tensed and pulsed, his shoulders ground against his biceps and neck, and his back spread out like wings as he forced the tumblers open. The handles nearly snapped off, and with the screech of metal being twisted by force, followed by the deafening, scraping sound of four feet of steel being dragged across a marble floor, he opened the vault. Peeking inside, Jose’s mouth fell open. Wall to wall, the vault was filled with gold bullion, stacks of dollar bills, and deposited valuables, from gold statuettes to jewelery.

It was also at this moment that Jose realized that he had tripped the alarm.

Muttering that one word Mama wouldn’t let him say under his breath, Jose quickly grabbed whatever he could and bolted, just as police sirens were heard. He barrelled through the back alleyways until he couldn’t hear the sirens anymore, and then looked down at his small hoard of gold and dollar bills. This was evidence! He had to get rid of it…

That meant he was overdue for a shopping spree.

In the days that followed, Jose didn’t really know what to do with all the things he purchased… gifts for Mama and Papa would do. But how could he make that evil? Could one spoil their own parents? That’d be evil, right?

“Oh, Mama…” Jose sauntered in, squeezing his massive frame through the door. He was brandishing a new frying pan wrapped in a bow.

“Oh, Jose, stop!” Mama chuckled, reaching up as far she could to kiss him. “Joo already got me a new stove!”

“Si! And joo need pans to go with it!”

Jose flopped down on their new couch; plush velvet, naturally; which, while luxuriously comfortable, left little room for Papa with his massive son looming over him. “How do joo like the new couch, Papa? And the TV? It’s muy grande- almost as much as Jose!” The bull laughed.

Papa Bravado glanced up at his son, and scowled. He neatly folded his paper and tossed it into Jose’s lap. “Massive Bull Leads Massive Robbery!” read the headline, “$5 Mil Stolen From First National!” The article was accompanied by a picture of El Cuerno smiling for the security camera.

“Oh!” Jose gulped. “What a… dashing rogue this El Cuerno is, no? A complete stranger- never seen him before- Jose knows no one that could be that handsome and beeg! Besides Jose, that is,” he shut his mouth quickly, and smiled nervously. “But Papa, joo know Jose would never… Jose is a face, not a heel, si?”

Papa Bravado frowned, and crossed his arms.

“Oh, Papa, por favor, there is no reason to lecture Jose! Jose has done nothing wrong! It is this… El Cuerno fiend!”

The elder bull didn’t budge.

“Oh, now joor acting crazy! Jose can’t deal with this, he is going to work out and plan his next robbery--” he cleared his throat, “...in the ring! Si! Jose needs to… rob that championship belt from those puny other wrestlers! So he is going to go to the gym and steal-- steel himself! For the coming wrestling season. Si.”

He rushed out the door, and slammed it behind him. He leaned against it, and sighed. That was close. “Papa thinks he is so smart, but he will never expect that Jose is El Cuerno! Mwahaha… mwahahaha… MUHAHAHAHA!”

“Jose!” Mama’s voice shouted through the door. “What did I tell joo about making noises like that?”

Jose groaned. “Sorry, Mama!”

El Cuerno’s reign of terror continued unabated; however, so did his growth. Jose revelled in it, with every trip to the gym turning into a spectacle. He didn’t really work out so much as he performed, lifting heavier and heavier weights, flexing, and making sure no one was paying attention as credit cards and wallets just happened to lose their way… El Cuerno needed the practice, after all. If he was caught, which did happen on occasion, a few sweet words and a titanic arm slowly drawing the victim into the orbit of his gargantuan pecs were all that was needed, and everything was forgotten… as another valuable slowly disappeared. Hiding things behind his back worked remarkably well for Jose, if only because it was wider than most doorways at this point.

Soon, no conventional weight left really did anything for him, and with his adoring group of victims- that is, “fans,”- he had to go to more extremes. He soon moved his spectacle out to the parking lot, where he would bench press cars; even this wasn’t much of a challenge, as he was bigger than most of the vehicles. His neck was all but absorbed by his Himalayan mountain range of shoulders, sheer swells of muscle surging against his cheeks, and arms so over-developed, they could no longer simply rest at his side. Biceps the size of truck tires wedged themselves against his wing-like lats, propping his arms up at an angle and jostling his pecs, which now jutted past his muzzle by a good foot, at least, and threatened to smother him if he tilted down too far. All of this was propped up by legs so thick, they surged past the size of most people’s waists. Jose had never felt so powerful, so loved, so… sexy as he absorbed the adoration of the crowd, and quietly kept a tab of how much money he had burgled. Who knew being evil could be so much… fun?

Unfortunately, his ill-gotten wealth and tremendous muscles did have one adverse effect… he couldn’t live with Mama any more!

It was a very sad day for Mama Bravado when her poor son was forced to move; and so far away!

“But mi cerdito! What will happen if there is… a fire? Or an earthquake?! Or…” she dropped her voice down as she wrapped her arms around Jose’s thigh- at his size, it was the only thing she could grab on to. “...or a Taco Bell, mijo! Joo will never eat right again!”

“Mama…” Jose gingerly pried his mother off of his bulging thigh, hefting up all his luggage under one titanic arm. “Jose knows there is no Taco Bell at his new place, because Jose’s new place…” He pointed to a renovated warehouse across the street, sporting trendy new lofts and apartments, “...Is right there.”

“But joo never know, there could be one hiding on the other side! Who will make joo breakfast in the morning? I… I can send joo care packages!” The matriarch of the Bravado family was beside herself.

“Mama, Jose has to go now.” Jose wrapped one arm around her gently, so as not to crush her, and lumbered across the road.

“Jose Bravado, I taught joo to look both ways before crossing the street!”

Jose flinched, but made it across without any incident.

“Jose! Your Mama loves joo!” Mama Bravado shouted across the street.

Jose winced. People were starting to stare… “Jose knows, he loves joo too, Mama!”

“I love joo more!”

Jose sighed; she wasn’t going to make this easy. “Jose knows! He loves joo most!”

As soon as he rounded the corner, out of his mama’s sight, his phone buzzed. He didn’t need to guess who it was.

“Your mama loves you, Jose! <3 Call us when you get settled in!” the text read.

Jose huffed, shaking his head, or as much as he could. He had forgone most clothes by now. He could only force on a pair of spandex shorts; black, of course, to accentuate his undoubted sexiness, but if there was one way to ruin that image, it was his mama.

As soon as he lumbered his way into his new loft, a spacious dwelling with plenty of room to accommodate someone of his awesome size, his phone buzzed again.

“Why havent you called?! :(( Are you alright? Did you find a Taco Bell? Dont try anything!”

Jose slumped his shoulders and groaned. It was going to be a long day.

At least the night would give him something to look forward to; his first jail break.

It was important to shake things up; he didn’t want his new career in villainy to get stuck in the doldrums. The State Penitentiary was heavily fortified, with concrete walls three feet thick, a state of the art security system, and electric fences.

Needless to say, El Cuerno ignored all of this.

The super sexy super huge supervillain punched through the concrete walls, before shooting the security cameras a smile and a note with his phone number on it. The fact that the alarm didn’t go off told El Cuerno that the guard monitoring the cameras took up his offer. His phone buzzing with a new text reading “I’m off at 1 c u then?” confirmed it.

El Cuerno lumbered his way down the halls, and then found his target. As if he were tearing a piece of paper in half, he wrenched the iron bars of the cell off with a deafening scrape, and the terrified prisoner inside scrambled to his feet.

“W-who are you?! What do you want? Stay back! I command the legions of the damned!” a terrified voice squeaked.

“Senor,” El Cuerno said in his huskiest tone.

The Seventh Seal blinked, staring at the sheer wall of black fur and beef. “...El Toro?”

A meaty hand reached in, wrapping around the seal’s wrist, and yanked him out. Before he knew it, The Seventh Seal was plastered against a heaving slab of meat that he soon identified as a chest wider than his cell door. Peeling his face off the boulder of beef, he stared up at a face quickly being buried on all sides by surging muscle.

“Joo are now free…” He tightened his hold on the seal, his tensed bicep overwhelming the necromancer’s back. “But joo also belong to El Cuerno, now.”

A trendy loft in a middle-class neighborhood in midtown was not, precisely, what Seventh Seal would have considered a villain’s lair, curiously decorated as it was with several portraits of El Cuerno flexing. Then again, the hulking bull could easily point out a dilapidated warehouse in the bayou wasn’t exactly the crown jewel of an evil criminal empire. The seal was fascinated to see how El Toro- oh, pardon, El Cuerno- had taken to his little spell. He was immensely strong now, but in time… well, all men had their limits.

At first, Seventh Seal was afraid that he would be relegated to little more than whipping boy… no matter how thick the bull’s skull was, he could still snap the necromancer like a twig. But no, El Toro had been corrupted, just as Seventh Seal had intended, but what he didn’t intend was to become his partner in crime.

“Joo see, senor…” El Cuerno rumbled, his arm alone weighing more than Seventh Seal, and tensed to bulge and surge up like a wall, boxing him in as they sat at the kitchen table. “Even the mighty El Cuerno can’t pull this off on his own… joo are going to help with a museum heist.”

“...What kind of heist?” Seventh Seal asked, tearing his eyes away from that gargantuan arm and those surging pecs, bearing down on the kitchen table and roughly the size of a car hood each.

El Cuerno smirked. “Joo know magic, do joo not Senor? There is a collection of artifacts… from Ancient Greece, si? One is called the Golden Apple, from the Garden of Hesperides, guarded by the muy musculoso Atlas.”

“I know Greek mythology, thanks,” Seventh Seal scowled. It took a mere arched brow from El Cuerno and the slightest roll of his mountainous shoulders matched with the mere raising of his other arm to make the seal shut up and behave.

“S-sorry. Go on. Didn’t mean to interrupt.”

The hulking bull snorted, and then continued. “These Golden Apples, they are supposed to give life. El Cuerno thinks they will make him even stronger! He will be the strongest, the sexiest bull ever!”

“So… where do I come in?”

“Joo need to tell El Cuerno if it is real, si? Worst case, it is a gold trinket, and El Cuerno sells it for millions.”

Seventh Seal stroked his chin. “Alright. But, on one condition. You had me arrested--” El Cuerno arched his brow again, and began to loom over the aquatic mammal. “I-I mean El Toro had me arrested, and turned over my grimoire. We do this, you help me get that book back. Deal?” He held out his hand.

El Cuerno grinned. “Done.” His thumb looked bigger than the seal’s hand as he grasped it, and half his forearm with it.

“Well… we better get ready, then.” Seventh Seal gulped, still unable to fully tear his eyes away from all that muscle… granted, it seemed to take up the majority of his range of view wherever he looked. He didn’t know how he felt about that.

It was the next night that the two put their plan into action. Breaking into the Museum was the easiest part; even if El Cuerno smashing a hole in the wall was more than a little nerve-wracking for Seventh Seal. The necromancer marvelled as El Cuerno lumbered through the halls as if he owned the place, flashing winning smiles at the security cameras and, remarkably, he saw them turning off. Maybe he should try that spell. One job for this great lummox, and he’d get his source of power back.

They soon came to the Wing of Greek Antiquities; they passed urns, statues, and mosaics of gods and heroes, bits of plaster and murals under glass cases, and soon El Cuerno spotted it, his eyes flashing. There, in a glass case under a spotlight, was a golden apple. The mammoth bull giggled like a schoolgirl, and raced over to it. He loomed over it, eclipsing the spotlight and casting his prize in shadow.

“Careful,” Seventh Seal hissed. “There’s probably an alarm.”

“Ha! Alarms? Let them go off, guards aren’t a threat. El Cuerno wants an audience…” He wrenched the whole stand up, and let the glass case slide off and shatter as it hit the ground, catching the golden apple in his hand. Seventh Seal groaned as the alarms rang. This is it. He was going back to jail, because his partner was an overgrown idiot. He almost missed the apple as it was thrown at him.

“Now, senor! Is it magic or no?” El Cuerno shouted.

“I-I…” he examined the apple. He could sense something, but he knocked his knuckles against it. It was gold, metal. “There might be something, but it’s no use! It’s real gold, you can’t eat it! We need to go!”

El Cuerno snorted and snatched the apple back, and tore it in half, the gold coming apart like tin foil. To Seventh Seal’s amazement, it looked like there was real fruit on the inside. Greedily, El Cuerno crammed the contents of the apple’s golden skin into his mouth, and smirked. “Si… si! It’s real!”

“Great, it’s real!” Seventh Seal shouted over the alarms. “Let’s GO!” Where were the guards?

“What? Guards?” El Cuerno scoffed. “Guards are nothing to El Cuerno! Look!” he lumbered over to a monumental statue on display, a statue of zeus on his throne, nearly twice as big as the bull. “Look at how muy musculoso Jose-- t-that is, El Cuerno is!”

The bull grunted as he dug his hands under the statue of Zeus, and with a great, growling effort, hoisted the ancient god up. His body was actively bulging and growing; even as his arms grasped around the statue and lifted it over his head, his arms swelled until the base of the statue was pressing down on the crest of his biceps, so massively round that they were now pushing his arms and the flanks of beef that were his triceps to being wider than they were long. His neck was nothing but a memory as his shoulders actively pressed up against his cheeks, and his chin was wedged in the cleft of his pecs, his heaving chest surging out like an advancing army. His torso was so swollen that his abs were actively pressing down on one another, while his meaty sides began soaring out like wings. His legs wouldn’t have been able to support that massive upper body if not for their own growth, thighs pressing against each other as they bulged out thicker than the Greek columns on display. “El Cuerno is the strongest, the sexiest bull- no,” he tossed the statue like it was a hacky sack, catching it on his geographical landmass of a back, “he is a god!”

“Great! Great, you’re a god! Can we get out of here?!” Seventh Seal begged, the alarms ringing in his ears. Why hadn’t anyone come yet? The police must’ve been out by now!

The bull laughed heartily, his whole body heaving and rippling with every swelling curve of muscle. “Hah! Don’t joo get it, amigo? No one can take down El Cuerno, he- he…” the bull trailed off, frowning.

“He what?”

“H-he cannot, ah… move his arm…”

“What?!” Seventh Seal shrieked.

El Cuerno let go of the statue on one side, and his forearm barely moved as it flopped helplessly, pressed down by that engorged bicep. He tried to lower his arms, but his overgrown lats were propping them up. “Jose cannot put his arms down!”

“Oh, you’re kidding me!” Seventh Seal cried. He heard rushing footsteps bearing down the hall. “Can you at least walk? We need to move!”

“Ah…” El Cuerno tried taking a waddling step, but his thighs were so swollen and pressed against each other, it was like trying to dislodge a sausage from its casing. “M-maybe El Cuerno can distract them with flexing?”

“You’re always flexing!” Seventh Seal shouted. “That’s all you can do anymore, you meathead!” He could see the shadow of their pursuer on the wall, rounding the corner. “Oh no, this is it…”

Seventh Seal stopped panicking, however, when he saw their would-be captor. It was a diminutive bull, stocky and muscular, but he barely came up to the seal’s chest, and that was with his horns included. His black hair was peppered with grey, and he was dressed in a polo and jeans. “...You’re not a guard,” he said, confused but relieved.

El Cuerno, however, let out a less than dignified squeal. “Ah! P-papa! T-that is… p-poor stranger! Joo cannot hope to stand up against El Cuerno and his mighty…” he sighed, taking in the elder bull’s face. He let the statue slide off his back with a heavy thump. “Joo know. Joo can see through Jose’s sexy, sexy disguise.”

“What? W-what’s…” Seventh Seal squirmed as he took in the elder bull’s death glare. It was exactly the same look his girlfriend’s father gave him. Creepy.

“Jose was just here for the apple, Papa! Joo know the story, i-it…” he grimaced as the older bull grunted disapprovingly. “No, papa, Jose cannot move his arms… b-but, Papa, he is so strong and sexy! He is stronger than the strongest! He is the strongerest!”

“What’re you doing?! We don’t have time for a lecture, o-or whatever this is!”

Jose ignored the seal with another grunt from the older bull that had a decided note of finality in it. “But papa! Jose is muy grande! That’s bueno, si?”

Papa Bravado sighed, and then, without a word, smacked his son’s huge thigh. Jose tumbled to the ground like a felled tree, landing with a great whump. “P-papa! Jose can’t…” Jose grunted, squirming and rocking back on his bloated chest like a turtle on its back. His hands were flailing, unable to touch the ground. Papa Bravado stomped around his massive son, and grabbed his ear, and to Seventh Seal’s amazement, began dragging him out, not even breaking a sweat.

“No! Ow! Papa-- papa, please! This is not the sexy for Jose! It is… unsexy!” Jose whined.

“Hah!” Seventh Seal barked with laughter. “That’s what you get for crossing the great dark of the night, the master of the dead, the necromancer of the 21st Century, Seventh-- hey!” Papa Bravado had stomped over, and grabbed the seal’s wrist. With nothing more than a grunt, he flipped the seal on his back, and dragged both of the supervillains out for a much-needed timeout.

Jose was grounded. That was without question. All the money he had stolen was also given to charity, and he moved back into his old room… once he could fit, that is. The mysterious reign of terror of El Cuerno and the disappearance of El Toro had sorted itself out, and finally, all was slowly going back to normal. Papa even managed to somehow find a replacement for the golden apple. He outright refused to answer any of Jose’s questions about it, and Mama would distract her son with food whenever he asked.

Seventh Seal, however, had a bit more on his plate than usual. Literally. He was under Mama’s care now, under house arrest until Jose was properly mobile. And it showed, with no other option but to eat what Jose’s Mama put in front of him. He couldn’t fit into his evil robes of doom any more, with a belly roughly the size of a beachball, and it wasn’t going to go away any time soon.

El Toro was soon shrunk down to a manageable size… though he had leaned on Seventh Seal enough to be just a little bigger than he had been, giving himself a slightly bigger chest he could bounce for the benefit of his adoring fans. Apparently, being a muscular wrestler-cum-superhero who also did charity work was a great way to win fans. Who knew?