by Jack Bristol
Look up.
Hey, how's it going?
I'm just hanging out on this rooftop that happens to be in Olivia Hamilton's neighborhood. Directly across the street, actually.
It's a coincidence, I tell you. A coincidence.
Okay, no coincidence.
I'm not stalking her. I'm just peeping in her window.
Hey, it's not like I haven't seen her naked.
Are you wondering what I'm wondering? You're smart people, so I bet we're on the same page. If—as Clarissa Westlake told me—I'm plain, old (extremely fucking handsome) Hunter Forrester when I'm out of the suit, then how the hell did Olivia Hamilton recognize me?
Good question.
I need an answer. So I'm up here, scoping out anything that needs scoping.
So far I've got nothing.
Olivia Hamilton is enjoying her new couch and chairs, nothing but her laptop for company. Every so often she gets up to pee or refill her drink (Diet Dr Pepper), that delicious ass of hers swaying as she walks. She's wearing the standard uniform for girls her age: yoga pants and a baby tee. My cock's like, "Awww, yeah. Bend over, baby."
We're big fans of the look.
She must be Skyping. Either that or she's cray cray. Girl's talking up a storm into that laptop.
The Twilight Zone theme song chooses now to strike. Mrs Margarita's got an assignment for me. Some girl is having big problems with her stalker ex.
If that sounds familiar, it's because it is familiar. I remember the address. Same girl I saved the other night, same stalker ex.
Guess Captain Kern couldn't make the guy stick.
Olivia Hamilton is gonna have to wait.
Super Fucking Hero to the—you know—rescue.
* * *
The front door takes a hint and opens wide. My foot may have been involved.
"You again?"
The guy with the disbelieving mouth is the stalker ex.
"Me again. I can't believe it either. Usually I don't need to put the same garbage out twice."
"She invited me over." He pokes at my red F with one finger. "This is on her."
"You fucking liar," snarls Long, Lean, and Gorgeous. Her ass still isn't much, but my cock remembers how she ground that thing down on his head.
Settle, boy. Looks like you'll get another shot at it.
It's rare I ride the same horse twice. Most girls who've had a whiff of trouble do their best to avoid it thereafter. But one in a while …
Every time it's them reminding me we've met. I play it cool, like, "How could I forget you, baby?" But I remember this one. She was a fun time—a very recent fun time.
I hear the question: Why remember her and not Olivia Hamilton?
Context. There's a difference between coming to someone's rescue and delivering their furniture.
"Don't care who started it," I tell them both, meaning every word of it. "But I'm stopping it."
This time loverboy snaps out a blade. Me, I plant my feet in the don't-give-a-fuck position, square my shoulders, puff out my chest.
"Come at me, bro."
So he does, and it goes badly for him.
TWANG!
That knife? It buckles the second it hits my suited chest. Super-rubber repels pointy sticks and other sharp things.
"Fuck!" He swings at me. WHOOSH! I feint and he stumbles.
After that, it's more of the same.
It's kind of difficult narrating a fight, so let's just say this. There's a lot of BIFF, POW, SLAM, and a bucketful of man-tears. And in the end it's me and the girl staring at her hogtied ex, wondering when he's gonna take a hint.
"She called me, fucko," he yells. "Look at her phone."
I glance at Miss Long, Lean, and Gorgeous, raise an eyebrow.
She shrugs. "Maybe I did."
"What'd you do that for?"
"Horny."
"Did he fix the problem?"
She drags her gaze all over my body. I'd feel cheap and dirty, but I'm a guy. We love the attention.
"Not yet."
"Fighting crime is what I do—and it's a very serious crime to leave a beautiful girl in …" My fingers hook through her belt loops, jerk her closer. "…need."
* * *
"Hey," I say. "What do I look like?"
She pulls my cock out of her mouth with a pop, smiles up at me. "Thor."
Jesus Christ. Of all the superheroes …
Look. Thor isn't even really a superhero. He's a god. And an alien. He's a spaceman god.
"Huh."
"Why?"
"Just curious."
"Yeah," she says in a dreamy voice. "You look like Thor, but with a bigger hammer."
After that, I come all over her face. That little sweet-talker.
Twenty
Nice night for surveillance. It's fun sitting up on this roof alone, without any company except my cell phone.
S'up?
That's me, shooting a text to Mario.
These days, I don't have many friends. In the old days, pre Super Fucking Hero, I was one of those guys who fit in with everyone. I liked people and they liked me. Was unusual to find me alone. Murder changes a guy. So does pulling on the superhero suit. Can't be the life of a party if you're always leaving. My friends drifted away, but I drifted, too—and faster.
There was a girl, but she's gone now, too. I don't think about her, except when I think about her.
Now it's just me and Mrs Margarita and Ethan—if I can call him a friend. He's more like a talking dog. One of the dim breeds. An Afghan Hound.
Okay, maybe something brighter than one of those broken lightbulbs. Point is, he's a sort of a buddy and, at times, a sounding board. But he's not the guy I text when I'm hanging out on a rooftop alone.
Nada. U?
Sitting on a rooftop.
Y?
Following a hunch.
Need help?
Nah. I'm cool.
There's a pause in the conversation, then: 'k.
He's a good guy. Eager. I hate to let him down. But the SuperCouncil can be real cunts. That loophole, I need to find it.
This time the message I shoot is to Mrs Margarita.
Could use some help researching superhero sidekicks. I'll love you forever.
In the meantime, I'm watching Olivia Hamilton chatting into her laptop. Jesus, the girl can talk and talk and talk. I remember now what a pain in the ass she was when she went starfish on me and I pulled out. Thought she never would stop trying to hammer me over the head with the final word.
My phone rings. It's Marvin the pimp.
"Hey, Super Fucking Hero, you busy?"
"I'm always busy, Marvin."
"Cool. Well, I got a problem with my girls."
My ears perk up. Not literally, but figuratively? Oh yeah. "What's up?"
He sounds pissed off. "All my tricks, that's what. I got hard dicks lined up, and nobody to get 'em off. None of my girls showed up tonight. Called Nancy and she told me to fuck and suck them myself. Can you believe that shit?"
"Maybe you should give them a bigger cut."
"Man, any less than I take now, I'll be living on the streets. Can you see what the fuck their problem is?"
"I'm a superhero, Marvin. Not a detective. Something like this, you need to talk to the cops. I think. Or their union or something."
"Hos don't have no union."
"Night, Marvin."
Sometime after midnight, Olivia Hamilton shuts her mouth and her computer. Lights die all over her apartment. I wait awhile longer, glad winter finally spit us into spring. Otherwise I'd be freezing my balls off.
Super-rubber is a lot of things, but warm it's not.
One of these days I'd have to talk to my guy, have him do something about that. Thermal super-rubber.
No movement. Nothing.
Time to fly home.
Mrs Margarita's answer never comes.
Twenty-One
"How long your folks been married?"
"My mother'
s dead, Ethan."
"Oh. Yeah. Right." There's a lull in this delightful conversation. Then: "How long were they married before that?"
"Twenty-two years."
"Long time."
Not as long as they wanted. "Your folks still married?"
"Thirty years. Not gonna make it to thirty-one."
My brows take a quick jog north. "They splitting up?"
"Yeah. Mom walked out on Dad last night. Went to her sister's—my aunt's."
"Jeez, that sucks."
His whole upper half nods. "Who's gonna cook now?"
Priorities: Ethan has them. "They fight a lot?"
"Naw. They were happy. Never fought, never talked …"
Can't see a problem there—can you? "Bummer, man."
"You got that right."
We dump the spindly kitchen chairs in the truck, alongside their matching table. Busy delivery day ahead. Business is booming at Mighty Fine Furniture, but you wouldn't know it from our paychecks.
"You think they'll work it out?"
"Your folks?"
We climb into the truck, slam the doors. Then we're on the road.
"Yeah."
I tell him the truth. "I dunno, man."
* * *
My apartment's empty.
No, I haven't been robbed. As if anyone could. I've got what's possibly an alien working the front door of this joint. He'd probably go all freaky spaceman, pull some Men in Black-style freaky spaceman tricks on anyone who tried.
By empty I mean there's no Mrs Margarita. Which is unusual.
Normally she's here, or she's just leaving, or just arriving. Not today. And there's still that unanswered text.
What's up with that?
I take the stairs down to the next floor. I've got the penthouse, while she's stuck with the dive below me.
Yeah, right. The place is a fucking museum. It's opulent in ways that would make most rappers cream their jeans. The woman has a gold-plated toilet. I assume it's plated. Could be solid gold. Sell enough carpet and you, too, could have a gold toilet.
Suck it, MC Hammer. All that guy could afford were the gold-plated faucets.
There's a "Can't Touch This" joke in there somewhere. Not gonna lower myself making it. But by all means, you can. I'll even laugh.
I do my super-secret superhero knock and wait.
"Who is it?"
"It's me. Hunter. You okay?"
"What do you want, Hunter?"
She sounds okay. Not sick. Not a hostage.
"Just checking on you. You're not in my apartment and you didn't reply to my text."
She mutters in Greek. Probably something about violating religious figures, which, she once told me, is something Greeks do a lot in everyday conversation.
"Go home, Hunter. I cannot help you anymore. It is time to grow up and be a man, not a little boy."
Whoa! What the fuck? "Are you sure you're okay? Because if there's something wrong I can—"
"There is nothing wrong. I am tired of being used. Go away."
It's a longer trip back up the stairs than down, mostly because I'm dazed. Mrs Margarita's always been happy with our arrangement. In fact, she initiated contact. And the cooking she does? That's all her. I can cook. I'm a great cook—did I tell you that last time? It's true. But she loves having someone to cook for since her husband passed. She told me so herself.
The woman brings me guyliner and tells me stories about Greek men drinking the tears of their enemies. She loves me, in her own way. And I love her, in my own way.
It's all very ying and yang.
Milk and cookies.
Laurel and Hardy.
Ya dig?
Whatever's going on, it's not normal.
But there's no time to dwell on it because my phone's ringing and it's my former best buddy, Jerry Kern, telling me to turn on the news.
"Which station?"
"Any of the local affiliates. Doesn't matter which one."
News comes on. They're giving highlights of some dog show. "A dog show, Kern? Really?"
"Shit," he says. "Channel Six."
Click.
The smooth-haired, picket-toothed anchor is wearing the super-serious expression he trots out when he's delivering bad news of the local kind. Sometime early this morning, a girl was attacked and beaten in one of the city's parks. She was running when the assailant stopped her. She's alive, but banged up.
Impossible. That kind of thing doesn't happen to girls in this city.
Not since Super Fucking Hero came to town. Not since Super Fucking Hero teamed up with Mrs Margarita and her third eye.
An invisible fist punches me in the gut.
It all comes rushing back. The way she didn't return my text. The harsh words she delivered downstairs.
And now, as a result, this attack.
"Who's the girl?" I ask Jerry Kern.
"Her name's Olivia Hamilton."
Twenty-Two
Good news travels fast. Bad news makes good news look like the slowest kid at a track meet. Soon it's everywhere that Super Fucking Hero failed to stop a crime against a young woman in this city.
The news calls her a young woman. You know me, she's a girl.
The same girl who saw through my superhero disguise.
Coincidence?
My gut says no. It also says I'm hungry and there's only one tiny piece of Mrs Margarita's Greek pastitsio in my refrigerator.
Night comes and so do a dozen more calls from Captain Kern. Violent crime is on the rise. Girls are no longer safe; they can't guarantee I'll leap out of the shadows to save their skins and pound their asses.
I'm flying blind.
Again, not literally. My vision is better than everybody's.
Right now I'm perched atop one of the soulless skyscrapers downtown. My attention is set to scan. If I can save even one girl, maybe crime will grind to a halt.
Amazing hearing, but I don't hear the footsteps on the roof with me until someone speaks. What can I say? I'm focused on the city below.
"Well, well, well, it's the about-to-be-former Super Fucking Hero."
Messenger Boy. That overgrown garden gnome.
"What the fuck do you want, Rolfe?"
"Rolfe?" he squeaks. Either his balls never dropped or the voice fairy skipped his house when they were handing out masculinity. Vocally, he's the mutant offspring of Mike Tyson, David Beckham, and Wayne Newton. Like all three guys jacked off into a test tube, and Rolfe here was the result. Again, only vocally speaking.
That's two references to Wayne in this story so far. Normally I'd delete one, but they're both apt. Deal with it.
"Moving on," I say quickly. "What do you want?"
Look at that smirk. Ugh. "SuperCouncil wants to see you."
"What time?"
"Oh," he says, consulting the watch he isn't wearing. "Now-ish."
"No can do. I'm busy. The city needs me."
"What they need is somebody who can do the job. You can't."
"But—"
He grabs my arm, propelling me off the roof. Yeah, I can fly, but the little dweeb caught me by surprise. So now we're falling, falling …
Man, when we hit that sidewalk, I bet it's gonna sting like a motherfucker.
Except the sidewalk never comes.
Twenty-Three
Fuck. We're at Superhero Headquarters.
Wait—there's no we. Just me. And somehow I've circumvented the lobby and Security. In fact, I've fallen at the feet of Belinda and her bodacious tatas. She's looking down at me without a modicum of surprise.
"How can I help you?"
"Super Fucking Hero to see the SuperCouncil. Apparently."
She consults her clipboard. "They're in the Curia Julia Room. It's—"
The bottom falls out of my gut. I'm lucky dinner's not splashing all over my boots. For anyone who isn't familiar with the Curia Julia, I'm not gonna tell you to run and Google it. I'll tell you, because I'm a decent guy, plus I want you to keep rea
ding. The Curia Julia is Ancient Rome's Senate House. The third one. Commissioned by the big JC himself. No, not Jesus Christ. The other JC: Julius Caesar.
And we all know what happened to him on the Senate House floor, right?
Wrong. He was actually killed in the Theater of Pompey, where the Senate was temporarily meeting while the old Senate House was undergoing a facelift.
(The lesson in all this is that if your initials are JC, you should consider changing your name. History says nothing ends well for you guys.)
My guts say it's a bad sign that the SuperCouncil has convened in a room modeled on Rome's old Senate House.
"Through the door. I know." I turn left.
Belinda clears her throat. "Wrong door." She points right. My right, her left.
Through the door I go.
No corridor. Just a small room hiding another door. I knock once and enter.
Wow. This place looks legit.
I saw the original when I was a kid. It was in decent shape for something that had been time traveling for a couple of thousand years or so.
But this? Looks new to me. Suspiciously new.
The floor is tiled, the walls freshly painted, and outside there's miles of clear sky. They've set up seating on the tiers that escalate three rows high on both sides of the tiled aisle.
"I know where we are," I say, glancing at both sides, to make sure every last member of the SuperCouncil knows I'm talking to them. "But when are we?"
"We have a problem, Mr Forrester."
That's today's designated speaker, Zhang Wei, the former Golden Chopstick. For whatever reason, he's wearing a dress. Don't look at me; I'm not responsible for the wardrobe around here.
"How can I help?"
Yes, I know by "we" he meant "I" have a problem. But you should know the drill by now when it comes to me and the SuperCouncil.
"Once again, you are failing to live up to your superhero name. This time it's the Super Hero part, and—by default—the Fucking."
Notice that nobody's asked me to sit?
Yeah, me too. There's not even tea at this party. No bread, just circuses.
That sounded funnier in my head.
