Miss Marathon #2: Bay City Defenders

by Joseph Bradshire

  It looked like Blondie was about to walk on, started retracting her hair, but Tiny had been locked up too long.

  Tiny walked toward her, “How about just you and me then?”

  He reached out to touch her and that was it, she smacked him with her hair, hard, throwing Tiny into the side of Sammy’s pick up.

  Nobody moved as Blondie stood triumphant. Satisfied with herself. Brewskie sighed. He had control over his people to a large degree, but not Tiny. Tiny would do whatever he wanted.

  Tiny stood up from where he’d been thrown and unzipped his hoodie, tossing it to the side. It was about 6 o’clock in the afternoon, still an hour or so of sun left. Plenty of light. Tiny was already growing out of and ripping through his clothes by the time his hoodie hit the ground.

  When he started toward Blondie he was at least 7 feet tall. By the time she started entangling him with her hair he was over 10 feet.

  Great. There were cameras all over this event, news choppers too.

  Brewskie yelled, “Everyone haul ass and keep a low profile.”

  People started firing up their bikes, tossing their beer or food down and running to comply. Hopefully, if they got out of their fast enough, the Pacific Exiles wouldn’t be implicated in yet another major incident. You could only get so much press before the Feds started noticing.

  And this was definitely turning into a major incident. Blondie had Tiny wrapped up but wasn’t strong enough to control his legs. He was running with his arms pinned trying to swing her by her hair. She had good control though, so he ended up running into cars and trucks in the parking lot, causing carnage.

  Sammy pulled out of the lot in her truck with Chopper close behind. Brewskie was firing up his bike and yelled, “Goddamnit Tiny, we need to go and we need to go now.”

  It was no use. He was tangled up with Blondie and wasn’t getting away even if he wanted to. Hell, it looked like he was having a good time of it. Smiling.

  Brewskie thought about shooting Blondie while she was distracted. It would be an easy thing, gunning her down. The problem was all the cameras. A chopper was already hovering with a news van approaching.

  Tiny would have to take care of himself. Brewskie pulled out of the parking lot at speed and didn’t look back.

  * * *

  Maggie watched her brother on television, he was getting ready to jump over several buses with his dirt bike. She was so pleased with him, making a living doing what he wanted to do. It was dangerous, and she worried. She hoped he would someday choose a safer job. Being Miss Marathon was hardly a safe job, so who was she to judge? Still. She worried.

  Suddenly the screen cut to a breaking news report. Something in the parking lot of the Bay City Bowl. Cameras showed a massive man wrapped in hair. Blonde hair.

  Great. Blondie was in trouble. That girl sure was something. No wonder Chris liked her. Kindred souls, thrill seekers.

  She watched as Blondie grabbed a power pole to anchor herself as the enormous man was trying to swing her by her hair. He yanked and the poll came crashing down onto him. A huge mass of sparks and fire erupted. She saw the entire stadium go dark just before the lights in her room flickered and died.

  Back up power kicked on within seconds.

  Maggie tapped her link to the USS Patton.

  “Patty are you watching this?”

  “Yes. I have an uninterrupted feed. Should we do something?”

  Maggie hesitated a moment. She really should go out there to help, but she needed to wait until she was asked. She needed to play the politics.

  “No Patty. We sit tight. Call Cannon though, make sure he’s ready.”

  “Maggie, he’s already there.”

  * * *

  Cannon and the Jaunt Troopers flew in ‘V’ formation. Cannon and Cordel at the tip, the rest of the troopers spread to the sides and behind. Cannon had them on a cautious approach, slow, he wasn’t quite sure what he was getting into. Something about giants and hair.

  They needed Maggie and the Patton on things like this. Their eyes in the sky. He hated flying in blind.

  Suddenly there was an explosion up ahead and power went out.

  Well that’s that. “All units go to full power.”

  He goosed his jets to full throttle, outpacing Cordel and the rest of the troopers so that he arrived first. Coming onto the scene, he saw about what he’d been told he’d see. A giant guy and a bunch of hair.

  The giant guy was huge. 15 feet tall at least. The woman with the hair looked tiny next to him. He was pulling her towards him by her hair, hand over hand, as she scrambled to get away.

  Cannon wasn’t the most chivalrous of men, but he was definitely more chivalrous than average. You almost have to be to be in the hero business, with dreams of damsels in distress and all of that. Watching a huge bully reel in his victim by the hair, while she struggled to escape, was enough incentive for Cannon to pick sides.

  “All troopers, take down the big guy.”

  Cannon swooped low thinking to tackle the large man, but someone of that size would not be easy to tackle. Instead he went with plan ‘b’. He punched the guy in the face as hard as he could.

  The large man staggered back, releasing the blonde. Cannon hovered around him, distracting him, as the young lady gathered up her hair and ran.

  “You like to fight with girls, big man? That shit doesn’t fly in Bay City.”

  The large man replied, “How about you come closer so we can speak about it.”

  The big man leapt and swatted Cannon out of the air. Cannon had no idea a man that large could move so fast, and jump so far. Probably a 20 foot jump. Cannon crashed into a tour bus, ripping into it. The bus was empty, so that was good, but his flight gear was slagged.

  Cannon peeled himself out of the bus to see the Jaunt Troopers surrounding the big man and raining down shots of liquid webbing. Non-lethal capture weapons, they used web cannons to subdue and control. With a man that size they did next to nothing.

  The big man was ripping through the webbing and tossing motor cycles, tires, whatever else he could get his hands on, trying to knock the Jaunt Troopers out of the air. He’d already succeeded with one.

  “Cordel, get some altitude and hold station. What you are doing isn’t working. Switch to lethals as well, those web guns are useless.”

  Cordel responded, “Aye sir, altitude, go lethal and stand bye.”

  The big man roared at the troopers as they flew higher into the air, out of the reach of junk he was tossing at them.

  Cannon used the distraction to run up from behind and try for a chokehold. The man’s neck was huge, but Cannon was just able to get his arms around it and hold tight. Eventually every man, no matter how big, would pass out from a chokehold.

  All Cannon had to do was hold on until that happened.

  The big man thrashed around, bumping into parked cars, knocking over more power poles and streetlights. Cannon felt him weakening, slowing down.

  Then Cannon was airborne. Thrown. The big man had somehow gotten a good grip on his leg and flung him away.

  Cannon landed in a small electrical sub-station across the street from the Bay City Bowl. The surrounding area had lost power when the big man started knocking down power poles, but the sub-station was still very much alive. Cannon was being electrocuted. He could feel it, a tingling sensation, but there was no pain. Not at first.

  His diamond body was almost entirely immune to pain. What would have caused him pain before he’d become superhuman now caused him discomfort. He was profoundly uncomfortable. He could feel his body trying to explode from the inside out, absorbing far too much power. It wouldn’t stop coursing through him.

  Then it started to hurt. Bad.

  Cannon hadn’t been sure if he could be killed, not up until that moment. At that moment he realized that yes, if he kept absorbing this much electricity he would die. Most certainly. He would be blown apart, vaporized.

  He moved to drag himself out of the sub-station and sa
w the big man moving towards him. Cannon stood and opened up his arms, sticking his chest out, firing a blast of pure energy at the charging monstrosity. The blast drained him completely, the pain of all the electricity ceased, the power gone.

  The blast hit the big man in the chest, the resulting shockwave knocked Cannon out of the sub-station and into a street on the next block. Smoke, fire and darkness clouded everything.

  Cannon tried his radio to see if any of the Jaunt Troopers had a visual, but the electricity had melted his radio. Everything on his body had burnt away or melted. He looked down at himself, mostly naked and covered in soot.

  When he looked up again he gasped. He kept looking up. And up. The man he had blasted wasn’t dead or unconscious. Far from it. Through the smoke and wreckage he could see the man.

  The 15 foot man had become a 100 foot man. Everything went black as the giant stomped Cannon into the pavement.

  Chapter Thirteen

  God damn it.

  Director Richard McMurphy watched the news coverage from his office at Patton Base. They were showing a live feed of a giant man walking around near the Bay City Bowl. He was bigger than most of the buildings, thrashing about and causing destruction as police and the Jaunt Troopers shot at him.

  The mess was getting worse by the moment as the giant made his way toward downtown. Jets had already scrambled from half a dozen military bases across the Western United States. McMurphy had them all on standby, circling the city, ready to attack.

  Dumping bombs and missiles on a target in the middle of a city was bad, a last resort only decision. The lives lost would number in the thousands and it might not work anyway.

  So far, gunfire had only made the giant angry. Who knows what he might do if he was attacked by aircraft?

  Miss Marathon would know, that’s who. Damn her.

  McMurphy was a politician and didn’t like to grovel, but the alternative was to unleash hell on an American city. He thought about blaming the situation on Miss Marathon, spinning it, but only for a moment. She would probably dodge any accusations based on reputation alone. America’s darling. Hell, the whole God damned world’s darling.

  McMurphy had one last thing to try. He walked to the USS Patton’s hanger.

  He looked up at the ship, heavily modified but retaining the shape of the nuclear submarine it used to be.

  “USS Patton, you will engage and neutralize the giant man rampaging in our city. I’m sure you’ve been watching the news coverage.”

  “Director McMurphy I couldn’t possibly do anything without Maggie.”

  This was exactly the line of conversation McMurphy had anticipated, so he had a retort ready.

  “It is well known that you can function just fine without Margaret Cole’s piloting. Furthermore you are property of the US Government and by extension part of the Earth Defense League.” McMurphy paused here, the Patton wasn’t responding, just listening. McMurphy felt emboldened.

  “As Director of the Earth Defense League and having direct command of Patton Base and Special Response Forces, I am your commanding officer. I order you to engage and neutralize this threat.” There. A solid commanding tone. McMurphy had been practicing sounding authoritative and military.

  The USS Patton vibrated the words, “Director, with all due respect, if I am property then I cannot be ordered around. You can order a pilot around, but not a thing. If I am not a thing, but am a person, then I am certainly not a person in the military. I’ve not been sworn in, I’ve not volunteered and I’ve never been drafted.”

  McMurphy could see where this was going. Exactly as he’d feared.

  The USS Patton continued, “You might ask a judge to declare me sentient, a person, and then we can see about me enlisting with the armed forces. That might take a few months.”

  McMurphy could have swore he heard the Patton chuckling, it was hard to tell. There was definitely a twisted glee in the submarine’s tone.

  “Or you might release Maggie and ask her to volunteer for this job, have her take command of this vessel. As a volunteer.”

  And there it was. Exactly what McMurphy figured. Maggie was probably in constant contact with the Patton. Working all this out while he talked. They had him. Beaten.

  “Well Patton, I suppose Miss Cole’s price for volunteering would be the dropping of charges and my support in rescinding the super human conscription laws?”

  Now he was positive the Patton was chuckling, “Yes Director, and also the recognition that I am a person, an entity with free will...that’s my price.”

  Jesus. They really did have him, all of this was planned. They were basically removing themselves from any sort of military command. Not that it mattered. They were effectively outside of the command structure already. What good was it for them to be technically under his command if they couldn’t be made to take his orders.

  Plus, McMurphy had already spoken to several judges. Margaret Cole would be released and vindicated by a court of law by the end of the month anyway. And with her goes the USS Patton, like it or not.

  Look on the bright side. Aligning yourself with the world’s most popular person was good politics anyway.

  “Fine, Patton. You’ve got it. Everything you ask, you have my support. I’ll go release Miss Cole personally...”

  “Don’t bother. She’s already on her way.”

  * * *

  Maggie Cole, the supposed superhero Miss Marathon, sat helpless as she watched her city getting flattened by a giant man. She wasn’t exactly helpless, but to help she would need to break out of prison. She was about to do just that when Patty pinged her.

  “You’ll never believe it Maggie. McMurphy is here begging. He wants me to go fight this giant guy downtown.”

  “Well you have to do what he says right? You are military, like Cannon and Cordel.”

  “No Maggie. I’m not like them. They volunteered. Just like you said. They are bound by their word, their promise to obey. I never made that promise. I was never even asked.”

  How could she have not seen it? Of course Patty was part of all of this. Maggie had been fighting against forcing supers to join the military but hadn’t thought about Patty. Patty was in the same position as everyone else, she was having her choice taken away.

  Maggie already thought of Patty as a person. One of her favorite people, like family. Probably the closest thing she’d ever have to a child of her own. Of course Patty should be treated the same as everyone else.

  “Well Patty, see what you can squeeze out of him, I’m going to bust out of here and come to you. We can’t let the city get smashed by that huge lunatic.”

  Patty pinged an affirmative and Maggie set about her great escape. She wondered for a moment if she could sweet talk the guard, but she’d hate for him to get in trouble. She was famous, loved, especially by military people. It would be wrong to use that and hurt a person’s career.

  All the locks in the building were electronic. Maggie was already asking them to unlock themselves. They were happy to oblige. The real problem was her cell door. They’d outfitted it with a heavy manual lock. No electronics, all metal gears and tumblers.

  She couldn’t talk to metal. Not yet anyway. So she’d have to use the brute force method. Cannon would approve.

  Maggie backed up to the back of her cell, away from the door. It had been a large interrogation room before becoming her cell, so she could back up several long strides. She sprinted toward the door and kicked out with her cybernetic legs.

  Plenty of force. The door blew off its hinges, the metal tearing with a high pitched ripping sound.

  Maggie walked out into the hallway and turned towards the exit. The guard station was just before the exit. There was only one guard on duty. He was watching the news on his phone. He stood up, startled.

  “So, um, Miss Marathon, I take it you are leaving?” The guard said.

  “Yes. Are you going to stop me?”

  “How exactly would I do that?”

  “I
don’t know. Shoot me, I guess. Maybe use a damned taser. You are supposed to at least try, right?”

  “Well yeah, I’m supposed to, but I figure you are going to take on the giant guy trashing the city, right?”

  “Yes. I’m going to try anyway.”

  “Good. My mother lives near the Bowl. Do you need my key card?”

  Maggie smiled and shook her head as the magnetic locks disengaged and the door slid open for her. The guard smiled back, saluting her as she walked out.

  Maggie ran toward Patty’s hanger as fast as she could. Being Miss Marathon, that meant she traveled at a dangerous speed. Her pants, not built for such exertion, were already tearing away. She tore them the rest of the way off, showing her skin tight, bright yellow space suit underneath.

  She never took her space suit off, it was always under her clothes. She felt naked without it. It was her security blanket in more than one way. It kept her confident, it was how people recognized her and it had saved her life on more than one occasion.

  Complementing her ensemble was her riding jacket. Built to avoid road rash during a motorcycle wreck, it worked just as well when running and tripping at highway speeds.

  She put on her new riding gloves, the ones with the knuckle reinforcement, and she was in full Miss Marathon gear. Ready to take on anything.

  She passed Director McMurphy on the way to the hanger. She slowed down as he spoke.

  “Ah, Miss Marathon, I see.” His voice was dripping with bile. Maggie wasn’t so pleased to see him either.

  He continued, “The USS Patton is quite the extortionist. Holding the city hostage for a few personal concessions.”

  “More than concessions McMurphy. Freedom. And we were going to save the city anyway.”

  McMurphy sneered. “Of course. Never miss an opportunity to be famous. To save the day and be seen doing it. With a superhuman force of our own, you wouldn’t need to save the day. We could take care of ourselves. But that’s not what you want. You’ve blocked that. You want Miss Marathon to get all the credit, all the attention. I see through your tricks.”