by Adam Graham
“She’s no stranger. She’s my friend. If you trust me, give her a chance.”
“Very well, I’ll give her a sniff.”
The sheriff was parked by the side of the road. She smiled at Naomi and got out. “Thanks for clearing out all those meth labs. I don’t think they’ll be coming back this way.” She glanced at the tom and her face softened. “Oh what a cute cat. Here, kitty, kitty.”
The cat sniffed the sheriff’s leg.
She knelt and stroked the cat’s fur. “I’ve been meaning to get a cat, but my job keeps me busy. I got ten acres for him to run around in, though.”
The cat meandered to Naomi and rubbed against her legs. “Mine.”
Naomi laughed. “Could you adopt the sheriff into your family?”
“Does she have food?”
“Yes.” Naomi glanced to the staring sheriff. “He’s yours.”
The sheriff said, “Well, I can’t thank you enough, ma’am. Enjoy the rest of your vacation.”
“Au revoir.” Naomi strode on down the street and reached where she’d tied up her horse. That was it. She really didn’t have any more bad guys to take out. She bit her lip. She could always ride around looking for domestic abusers. It’d be fun to beat them up.
Naomi gasped. Fun? When did beating people up become her idea of fun? Maybe she was doing this too much.
Cyrus nuzzled her. “Do I have to keep wearing this stupid mask?”
Naomi turned. “Let’s get away from here, and we can change out of it.”
Then again, who cared why she did this? Certainly not the sheriff or the parents whose kids were hooked on meth. She’d scared the meth dealers away from the county. Results mattered more than anything.
Didn’t they?
Mitch Farrow sat at his underground lair, staring at a hated cable news outlet’s “Where’s Powerhouse?” online bulletin board. It charted the big man’s journeys all over town.
Fournier whistled. “Varlock sure is keeping him hopping.”
Too much. Farrow grunted. “He’s keeping Powerhouse busy searching for the escapees all night, so he will be exhausted tomorrow when Varlock’s minions go after him. We need to get Powerhouse to go to sleep.”
Fournier said, “Consider it done.”
Powerhouse soared over the city on his jet pack. Near the Seattle Center, a twenty-foot robot strolled through the city with its massive arms behind its back. Civilians scattered.
The robot sang off-key, “Go to sleep, go to sleep, little Powerhouse.”
It released gas.
Powerhouse squinted, dissipated the poison, and snarled. “I am about sick of this. You may be a giant robot, but I am a man!”
He punched the robot in the chest. The entire center of the robot’s chest cavity collapsed, exposing all of its wires, as it crumpled to the ground.
Why had he said that? He yawned. Must be really tired.
Powerhouse yawned and flew off. “Got to get some more coffee.”
Good thing that gas couldn’t get through his force field.
Farrow rolled his eyes at his mad scientist. “That was your big plan?”
Fournier sniffed. “I didn’t see you coming up with any ideas. Besides, I had the robot lying around.”
“You know how much that cost?”
“Why should I care? From what I gathered, we have a billion dollars in cash sitting around Varlock’s lair. Don’t talk to me about budgets.”
Farrow sighed. “Okay, hotshot, you have any other bright ideas?”
“One of my friends is in a witch’s coven. I could pay her to cast a spell to help Powerhouse go to sleep.”
Farrow smirked. “Why don’t we hold a prayer meeting?”
“Don’t be so absurd. Prayer is silly superstition. Witchcraft uses lost alien technology to communicate with elemental forces and manipulate them.”
Grandma’s voice echoed in Farrow’s ears. When people stop believing in God, they’ll start believing in anything.
Farrow grit his teeth. More the mad scientist who’d been raised to be a free thinker instead blindly accepted whatever his family’s honored authorities said. “We’re not going to consult witches. We’re going to act like naturalists. We do have plenty of cash, but I’m not going to spend it on kooky occultists.”
“But if we run out of money, you can just get more printed.”
“No, we’re not Congress. We can’t keep having special billion dollar runs printed. Someone will catch on. Now, we have to get ready for the big show tomorrow and find more ways we can help Powerhouse.” Farrow swallowed. Oh yuck. “I need a drink.”
Albert beeped.
Or not. Farrow growled. “We need to mitigate these villains. I’ve got an idea for stopping that Humyn Revenge gal. I’m going to start an impromptu John Wayne film festival.”
Fournier said, “I have formulated a hypothesis on how to stop Seal Man, but what about the other four? I can’t see taking down the Remote Master.”
“Or Invisibility Master, if we don’t know where he is. Quandary’s a force of nature, and we don’t even know if there’s a sixth man. Hopefully, if we can help him with two, Powerhouse can take on the rest himself.”
He’d better. Rosie’s life depended on it.
Major Joshua Speed knelt at the grave of his friend. “Lord, Father, I’m sorry. When I was trapped in the twenty-first century, I wanted to get away so badly, I never asked what you wanted. I assumed my desires were your agenda too, and my return caused this to happen. Lord, forgive me.” He wept. “Help me to be obedient to you and to seek you first. I pray you’d lead me and give me a heart to follow. Amen.”
He lifted himself up and glanced behind him. Ace’s widow stood wearing a black overcoat over her black dress.
Speed asked, “How long have you been standing there?”
“It wasn’t your fault, Josh.” She hugged him like a sister. “You didn’t know this would happen.”
“I know I didn’t pray. If I had, maybe God would’ve told me to stay in the future, and my best friend wouldn’t have died.”
“You can’t think like that, Joshua. All you can do is go on with God.”
“But I led him to the slaughter.”
Arlene put up her hand. “Don’t. The biggest honors of his life were to be my husband and your sidekick. He offered to quit for me, but I knew he didn’t want to. I told him to keep on. We lived each day knowing he might go home to the Lord on one of these missions, but it was important. Women overseas have their husbands taken from them for just reading the Bible. People are tortured by the Russians, the Chinese, and the North Koreans. The free world has to stand up for them, or some day our own little Josh might be enslaved.”
Joshua smiled. “When did this turn into a Crusade for Freedom rally?”
Ace’s widow sobbed and touched her heart. “That’s what he believed here. He was fighting evil. He wasn’t a victim. He was a hero. Honor that.”
“I will.”
“That means you need to keep on your fight.”
He swallowed. Didn’t he owe it to Ace to stay out of harms way and marry his widow and provide for her and little Josh? “What about you?”
Arlene shrugged. “With the church’s help, we’ll get by until we can sell the garage and move.”
“Move?”
“I need to support myself and Little Josh. I’ve been practicing at the local golf course. I expect to rejoin the Lady’s Professional Golf Association tour.”
Joshua grimaced. “I can take care of you. I get my work underwritten.”
“I’m not accepting charity—or a suitor who wants to marry me out of guilt and pity.”
No use arguing. “I’d better be getting back home.”
“Let me pray with you before we go.”
Joshua bowed his head.
Arlene’s lip quivered. “Dear Lord, you’re good to us. Thank you for the years with Ace. He was such a good man.” Sobs interrupted. She sucked in a deep breath. “Lord, it feels
like this pain will never end, but I declare I will see him in the resurrection. Lord, I pray for Joshua. Grant him your peace. Move by your power in his life in Jesus’ name, I pray. Amen.” She gave him a sisterly hug. “You take care of yourself.”
Tears flowed down Josh’s cheeks. “You too.”
She released him and dashed home.
Despite what Arlene had said, he’d allowed Ace to come on the mission. Now thanks to him, she didn’t have her husband, and little Josh’s mommy was pridefully going to work rather than humbly letting him take care of her. She was right about what Ace would want him to do, though.
He took off at his usual running speed. The countryside flashed by.
He arrived in Kansas City, Missouri and unlocked his apartment’s door.
His black rotary phone was ringing. He grabbed the receiver.
A familiar voice said, “Speed, it’s Black Cobra. I know you’re still broken up over Ace passing away, but we’ve got word that East German agents are planning an assassination in West Germany. I’d like to give you more time, but this one is so complex.”
“I’ll be there in two hours.” Joshua clenched his jaw. Arlene was right. Ace wouldn’t want him to settle down. He’d want him to fight on.
Chapter 12
A Little Help From Enemies
Powerhouse soared over the harbor in his jetpack. God, I’ve got to catch these guys before they hurt someone. Next up in his magic act: inserting a straw through his visor and pulling another energy shot out of his pocket. “Bottoms up.”
He swung out over the harbor and tuned into the radio. It said, “This is the cruise ship Mesopotamia. We are under attack. We are being robbed.”
A male voice said in the background, “Put the radio down.”
Powerhouse listened for the man’s voice and zoomed after it over miles of clear blue ocean before he landed on the deck of a cruise ship.
On the ship’s deck, Seal Man wore a headpiece that looked like a seal’s head. A retiree with glazed eyes crawled on his hands and knees to a stand with bike horns on it and played them with his nose.
Two seals stood by and clapped.
“Now justice has been served,” Seal Man said, laughing. “For decades, seals have played horns with their noses to entertain humans. Now, thanks to my hypnotic powers, humans play a horn with their noses to entertain a seal.”
Powerhouse snorted. What was this joker going to do his for his second act? Make his victim cluck like a chicken? “You make a good case for mental health spending.”
“This has a higher stake than mere amusement. A bomb is under the ship off the starboard, and it will detonate should this mere human miss one note on his ABCs.”
Powerhouse gasped, ran jumped off the starboard bow, and transformed his armor into a waterproof version of it. The water churned.
Seals and walruses rose from the depths. They all slammed into him.
A walrus bit his force field, and a seal was spanking his force field.
Seal Man shouted something down to him.
“Can’t hear you.” Powerhouse flung walrus a few hundred yards away.
Seal Man spoke through a megaphone. “One of the creatures swallowed a time bomb.”
“You claim to love sea animals. How could you do this?”
“Oh, this is against my principles, but we all have our price.”
Powerhouse grunted. He couldn’t hurt the poor seals. They didn’t know what they were doing.
Seals kept crashing into him and bouncing off his force field.
He listened for clock sounds in the vicinity. Must be digital. He picked up an attacking seal, bear hugged it, and x-rayed it.
No bomb. This was too slow. What was he going to do?
He rocketed into the sky and scanned the seals and walruses all at once.
An elephant seal resting under the boat had a bomb inside it.
Powerhouse superimagined the bomb gone.
He flew onto the deck. “Now for you, Seal Man!”
“Not so fast!” Seal Man smirked as hundreds of the critters streamed on the deck. He clapped his hands. “After him, me buckos!”
The seals flung themselves at him.
Mustn’t risk hurting them. Powerhouse batted aside the attacking seals.
Seal Man laughed. “I have hundreds of seals, and you won’t stop them permanently because you don’t want to hurt them.”
Powerhouse dodged. “They’re cute animals you’ve put under your spell.”
“I should have teamed up with ‘Giant Bunny Man’ to annihilate you. The cuteness would be too much for you to bear. Regardless, my victory’s assured. I can keep this up all day.”
“Not if I have anything to say about it,” said a voice with a Southern accent. Out of their blind spot beside the ship rose the Sheriff of Atlantis. Gold Grecian armor gleamed as it was worn with a mighty power belt and khaki clothing. Plato hit a button on his belt. “Scat, critters.”
The seals all jumped overboard.
Seal Man gasped and wept. “You took control of my seals using your Power Belt.” He stomped his feet. “They were mine! Mine! Mine!”
“Don’t act like a youngin’ now.” Plato wagged his finger at Seal Man.
Powerhouse stepped back. Best to let his comic’s guest star handle it.
“Not fair!” Seal Man charged at Plato.
Plato flipped the villain over and slapped on Atlantean restraints. “I’m mighty obliged to you, Powerhouse. We’ve been looking for this slippery eel. You know what he done did? He plum near raised a renegade army to invade Atlantis. Yes, sir. He wanted to take over our city and plunge it into darkness.”
Seal Man sneered. “All will bow under the heal of the Mighty Seal Man.”
“Boy, you got a wild imagination. You ought to write you some stories.”
“Soon I’ll write a true story about killing you and eating your entrails.”
Plato smiled. “Well that don’t sound neighborly.”
“You’ll scream in terror when I wreak vengeance.” Seal Man licked his lips. “Does the Atlantean prison still serve those kale and crab cakes?”
“Yeah, Aunt Helen’s makin’ some with eel gravy.” The Sheriff licked his chops and rubbed his belly. “Mmm, hmm, that’s gonna be good.”
Powerhouse glowered. “So long as your Mayberry fixation doesn’t extend to leaving the cell unlocked.”
“Nah, we’re not that neighborly. You ought to come over for supper after we finish building our new hall for guests who breathe air. I’ll have the missus make octopus pie for you, along with seaweed and fried puffer fish.”
Sounded like an aquarium trip, not a dinner. “Um, I’ll think about it.”
A submarine surfaced off starboard. Plato loaded the prisoner in it and came back up to wave. “Tell your gal howdy.”
“Will do.” When was Naomi supposed to be back anyway?
His cell phone rang.
He hit the button on his left arm. “Powerhouse here.”
“It’s the chief.”
“The Sheriff of Atlantis has taken Seal Man into custody.”
The Seattle chief of police sighed. “But he was our prisoner.”
“We can afford to spare him a supervillain, especially when his prison has the daunting security feature of being miles beneath the ocean surface.”
The chief grunted. “I have Jesse Peralto in custody.”
“Cool. Which cop bagged him?”
“None. It was a Powerhouse Squad member called the Blue Morpho. She tasered him. However, Peralto says he’s planted a bomb and he won’t tell us where. It’s set to go off at eleven.”
Powerhouse groaned. “I’ll be there as soon as possible, Chief.”
“I’ll leave the window open. It’ll save time.”
A few minutes later, Powerhouse flew in through the chief’s window and the chief led him to an interrogation room. At the table slouched a man in a dark orange jump suit covered with pale pink Qs.
The man fingered his purple belt’s green buckle. “Powerhouse, tell John Law to take a powder.”
“Who’s John Law?”
“The Fuzz. If it’s the Quandary you want to beat, get groovy to hipster lingo, Daddy-o.”
Powerhouse raised his eyebrows. “Chief, we still in the same century?”
The chief smirked. “Yeah, but tell that to him. You may question him.”
At least the guy didn’t speak in rhyme. “I’ll let you know if I need a translator.”
The Quandary said, “So what’s the pitch?”
“Where’s the bomb?”
“I dig what you’re putting down, man. But you know how it is, pop. I got to give you a riddle. You dig?”
“Yeah, I super dig you.”
“You are squaresville, pop, but here’s my groovy clue. What’s brown and blue all over?”
“I’ll solve this riddle.”
“If you don’t, when that clock strikes eleven, a lot of people are going up with my primo bomb, drip.”
Powerhouse stomped out. “This looks like a job for crowd sourcing.”
He used to his phone to email the riddle to Melvin Stankewicz of the Powerhouse Squad, writing, ‘Alert the Powerhouse Squad. Have them send me their answers directly. You dig?” Powerhouse deleted the last part. Man, that hipster thing was catching.
Mitch snickered into his cell phone at the Dorado Hotel Convention center. Around him, John Wayne posters were being hung. “So your big plan to help Powerhouse was to contact the Atlantean redneck and have him bail Powerhouse out.”
Dr. Fournier said over the phone, “It worked.”
“I expect you to be more proactive next time. Get down here and bring me a truck filled with pureed tuna. Were going to take out one villain for him. Not only will we sabotage Varlock’s plan, but we’ll deprive Powerhouse of the glory for capturing the criminal.”
After following half a dozen failed leads, Powerhouse rocketed back to the station. Below waved a middle-aged woman with flaming red hair. She was dressed in a brightly colored blue butterfly costume and holding a duffel bag.
