Wonder City Stories #1

This story arc has been published as a novel!

Buy in print at Createspace or Amazon!
Buy the ebook at Kindle | Kobo | Apple Store | Scribd | Inktera

---

Welcome to the Jungle

The woman at the front desk of the YWCA handed Megan an address on a slip of paper while suggesting that it was a place more appropriate for "her type." Megan reshouldered her backpack and made her way back to the intersection with Main Street. She paused under a streetlight to pull the map from her jeans pocket.

"Great," she said, sighing. "Other side of Broadway."

Traffic stopped for the light, so she crossed Main and turned north toward the city center. The fluorescent spire of the new Trylon gleamed at the center of the skyline ahead of her. She supposed that if she walked another twenty blocks, she might see the top arc of the Perisphere as well. Maybe she'd go tomorrow, when she'd recovered from the bus ride.

She heard whistling air above and behind her and ducked. Someone scrabbled at her backpack from above. She reached up and back, gripped a handful of cloth, and helped change her assailant's momentum from "forward" to "down." He made a nasty crunching noise when he hit the pavement.

"Are you all right, miss?" a deep male voice said from above.

"Fine," she said. "I think he may have broken something in his fall."

A figure in midnight blue spandex, sporting a hood and a billowing black cape, landed lightly a few feet away. "You have excellent reflexes," he said, bending to examine the groaning figure.

"I'll tell my mom," she said. "Is he okay?"

"I think he's just broken his flight harness," the superhero said. He hauled her assailant up by the back of said harness. Wires and twisted metal trailed from a smashed box on the little man's chest. "Thanks, by the way. I've been trying to catch the Merlin here for a couple of weeks."

"She tried ta kill me," the Merlin said, trying to stop his bleeding nose with the patch of fabric visible just above his metal gauntlets. A few fake feathers tumbled to the pavement.

"Teaches you to mug women twice your size," the hero said. He turned a brilliant smile up at Megan from the depths of his hood. She wondered vaguely how he kept the hood from falling back. "I'll just get him out of your way, miss. I'd offer an escort, but it seems superfluous."

"Thanks," she said again. "Am I going the right way for the YPCA?"

The man cocked his head and thought. "Yep. Ten blocks northeast, by the rooftops. New in town?"

She nodded, stuffing the paper back into her pocket.

He grinned again and bounded to a rooftop, dragging the complaining Merlin behind him. Then he called down, "Welcome to Wonder City! I hope the rest of your stay is less eventful!"

Wonder City Stories #2

This story arc has been published as a novel!

Buy in print at Createspace or Amazon!
Buy the ebook at Kindle | Kobo | Apple Store | Scribd | Inktera

---

Pied-à-terre

The Young Paranormals Christian Association had provided a youth hostel for paras coming to Wonder City since 1964, the bronze plaque in the lobby proclaimed. A glance around the lobby told Megan that the YPCA apparently hadn't been redecorated since then: a couple of square, grimy, orange couches were shoved against the chipped plaster of the walls and the indoor-outdoor carpeting showed signs of having been green once upon a time. The reek of chlorine from the distant swimming pool stung her eyes.

The man seated on a stool behind the counter peered at her over his reading glasses. "Can I help you?" He was wearing a blue and white tuxedo-styled uniform nearly as wrinkled as his face, with a golden half-cape tossed over one shoulder.

"The woman at the YWCA sent me," Megan said, fumbling briefly for the slip of paper in some vague search for legitimacy, then giving up.

He nodded brusquely. "Fortunately, our ladies' rooms aren't as occupied as the gentlemen's rooms," he said, giving her an approximation of an encouraging smile.

"That's, um, great," she said. His nametag read: Hi! I'm Mr. Metropolitan!

"Runaway?" he said.

"What?"

"Are you a runaway?" he repeated.

"No." She watched him scribble on a form. "Do people really tell you when they are?"

"You'd be surprised what people tell you sometimes," he said with a sigh. He snapped the form onto a clipboard. "Please fill out the top section, and don't write in the shaded areas."

She sat on one of the orange couches and discovered that the cushioning had long since disintegrated. A spring jabbed into her thigh.

A few minutes later, she handed the clipboard back to Mr. Metropolitan. He glanced over it, and she watched his gaze come back to the top of the form. "Megan Amazon?" he said. "Not the Amazon's daughter?"

Megan repressed a sigh. "Yes."

His face rippled into a sea of a thousand wrinkles around a smile that showed surprisingly strong white teeth. "I liked Maggie an awful lot. Saw her at the old gang's Christmas party every year. Great kid. I can see the resemblance." He opened a cabinet under the counter and selected a key. "I hope she's doing all right?" he said, holding the key just out of polite reach.

"She was fine when I got on the bus 22 hours ago," Megan said.

"Good to hear," he said, handing over the key. "No battles indoors. We have a hot button to the Gold Stars. Third floor, turn right, all the way at the end of the hall. Quieter there," he said, winking.

She summoned all her energy into a smile. "Thank you, Mr. Metropolitan."

"Call me Ira, sweetheart," he said.

She managed to nod before hoisting her backpack and hurrying to the stairwell. She took the stairs 3 at a time.

Locked into the tiny cubicle, she sat down gingerly on the single bed that was too short for her. "Well," Megan said to the beige cinder blocks. "Here I am."

Wonder City Stories #3

This story arc has been published as a novel!

Buy in print at Createspace or Amazon!
Buy the ebook at Kindle | Kobo | Apple Store | Scribd | Inktera

---

Going With the Flow

The Stars n' Garters Diner had a battered china-blue door, a cracked plate glass window, and a sign hanging by a single rusty bracket. It came recommended by Mr. Metropolitan's morning replacement. Megan ducked as she passed through the door. Four stainless steel pedestal tables were ranged around the walls, each with four blue plastic chairs. Each table was occupied by a single elderly individual: a bald, bespectacled man reading a newspaper with a magnifying glass, a straggle-haired woman staring into her coffee mug, a well-wrapped person of indeterminate gender tinkering with a pile of gizmos, and a woman in a yellow flower-patterned muu-muu reading Tarot cards.

The first woman set her coffee mug down and turned to inspect Megan. Then she stood up, her knees cracking loudly, and limped toward the door. "You take my table, sweetie," she said, patting Megan on the arm as she went past.

"Uh, thanks!" Megan said belatedly. She sat down carefully, listening for tell-tale noises. The flimsy chair held. A middle-aged waitress, dressed in a pink short-sleeved dress, white apron, and white tennis shoes, emerged from the kitchen.

"What'll ya have, honey?" the waitress said, snapping her gum and producing pad of paper.

Megan was briefly mesmerized by the red beehive hairdo and the "Flo" nametag, then said, "May I please have coffee and 3 eggs, over easy?"

"Toast with that? How about sausage?" Flo said, scribbling busily.

"Rye, if you have it, and no, thanks."

"Got it," Flo said, clearing the table. She made her way to the kitchen door and bellowed, "Sonic Yenta, over easy!"

There was an explosion outside as Flo poured the coffee. Another crack arced through the window. Flo sighed and walked toward the door.

Megan tackled her, also knocking down the man with newspaper. The door blew open, splintering around the edges, as a piece of a car crashed into it.

"I knew this was going to happen," the woman in the muu-muu said, hurriedly gathering up her cards. The tinkerer ignored it all.

"That's IT!" Flo said, picking herself up.

Megan opened her mouth to say something, but Flo stepped into the open doorway, sturdy legs braced.

"YOU KIDS! GET OFFA MY STREET!" and a firehose spout of water erupted from her hands. Megan heard yelps and curses outside.

After a few long seconds, Flo dropped her hands and wiped them on her apron.

Megan picked up the elderly man and fetched his magnifier, with apologies, then hoisted the grey fender and headlight array from where it had lodged in the counter. "Er, where should I put this?"

"Thanks, honey, just put it out on the curb." Flo adjusted her hair and squelched to the kitchen door. "Ebb? Get out here and mop up, would you, hon?"

Megan sat back down and drained her coffee. Holding out her cup to Flo for a refill, Megan said, "Know anywhere I can get a job?"

"You got good reflexes," Flo said, pouring the coffee thoughtfully. "Lemme make a couple calls." She dealt Megan's plate onto the table. "Eat up. Big girl like you needs her strength."

Wonder City Stories #4

This story arc has been published as a novel!

Buy in print at Createspace or Amazon!
Buy the ebook at Kindle | Kobo | Apple Store | Scribd | Inktera

---

This Is a Job For...

The South Hill neighborhood was very flat, the hill having been relocated into the bay as foundation material for part of downtown. The streets were lined with squared-off row houses that looked like they'd been dropped into place from Philadelphia or Baltimore. Cyclone fencing defended most of the tiny front gardens and driveways from passerby. No one sat on the stoops, but occasional small dogs defended their yard fortifications. Megan turned the corner of 103rd and Sentinel and found the faded sign that identified Captain Zip's Lightning Delivery Service.

A single truck sat at the open loading dock. Megan was sure that the rockets mounted on the sides had never been fired. The bumpers were scratched and paint-streaked. A stout middle-aged man with a grey-streaked combover emerged from the far side of the truck, carrying a toolkit. "You the kid Flo called about?" he said gruffly around the cigar clamped between his back teeth.

"Yes, sir," Megan said.

"Come on inside." He climbed the stairs into the loading dock heavily, and she followed.

"The boy quit on me last week," he said, collapsing into a lopsided wooden editor's chair in the tiny office. "Threw my back out ten years ago against M.A.Y.H.E.M., and the Hargan Invasion did in both knees. Can't carry a damned thing over twenty pounds." He set his unlit cigar down on the desk. "How much can you lift?"

"Just about two tons, sir,"

He nodded and said, "I pay a dollar over minimum for 8 hours a day, 5 days a week. How's that?"

"Just fine, sir," she said. "When does the workday start?"

"Five ayem," he said, rifling his desk drawers. "Too early for you, sunshine?"

"No, sir. I get up early."

"Good for you," he said. "Here, fill this out. Gotta driver's license? Para Reg card?"

Megan handed over the cards, then sat down, resigned to filling out a lot of forms in the near future.

"Hey, you the Amazon's kid?" he said from the copier.

She gritted her teeth. "Yes, sir."

"She kicked my ass I dunno how many times," he said. "Helluva fine woman." The copy machine hummed and flashed. "Eh, I guess you hear that kinda thing all the time," he said, tossing her ID cards onto the table.

She gave him a tight smile as she collected them. "I'm starting to wonder if there are any people my age in this town."

"Oh, plenty," he said. "They're all in spandex, though. You in spandex, by the way?"

"What?"

"In spandex. You know, code name, signal device, saving the weak, plundering the rich, or whatever horseshit people do now?"

"No, sir," Megan said. "No, not at all."

He grinned. "See you tomorrow, kid."

Wonder City Stories #5

This story arc has been published as a novel!

Buy in print at Createspace or Amazon!
Buy the ebook at Kindle | Kobo | Apple Store | Scribd | Inktera

---

Time and Again

Ira Feldstein placed his nametag, keys, and wallet in the old glass candy dish on the table in the front hall. He retrieved the sticky note from the floor, found a roll of masking tape, and reattached the note to the lower edge of the mirror over the table. Hopefully, he couldn't help but see the "REMEMBER KEYS WALLET NAMETAG STOVE" as he left that evening.

"Good morning, Ira," Suzanne said as she emerged from the bedroom in suit and heels.

"Any change?" he asked his daughter-in-law.

She shook her head. "I made meatloaf last night. Leftovers in the fridge."

He thanked her and went to his room. As he changed out of his uniform, he thought that Suzanne was looking older, more worn around the edges. He thought he'd make something nice for her dinner tonight. Perhaps his mother's potato kugel.

"Have a good day, Ira," she said through his bedroom door. "Remember the new physical therapist is coming at 1. I should be home by 5 tonight."

"Okay," he said, opening the door and smiling at her. "It's no trouble if you want to take a couple hours for yourself, though. I don't have to be on the desk until 8."

"Thanks, Ira," she said, shaking her head. "I'm just so tired these days."

After Suzanne left, Ira went to the next room.

"Hello, son," he said as he entered. He stepped to the bedside and looked down at Joshua: craggy and wasted and peaceful, his tightly curled red hair starting to show some gray. Josh had opened his eyes sometime since Suzanne had checked on him. The first time it had happened so long ago, Ira and Suzanne had been mad with excitement. But then, as now, the searing blue eyes remained blank and sightless. Ira reached down and closed the lids gently. "Your eyes are just like your mother's," he said for perhaps the thousandth time.

Ira gently slid his arms under Josh's shoulders and knees and lifted. His strength wasn't what it once was, but it was enough to handle his son's tall frame. Poor little Suzanne used to wear herself out trying to haul him around. "Time for your bath, boy," he said.

Then there was the hospital johnny and the diaper and the feeding tube, and all the other messy morning things that Ira took care of. It was the least he could do, he felt, given the ridiculous hours Suzanne often had to work.

"You remember Maggie, Josh? The Amazon? The one who kept me from going into the Great Gulf after your mother. Well, her daughter of all people showed up at the Y last night, looking for a room." He lifted Josh out of the bath and dried him. "She's a fine-looking young woman. Same black hair and big dark eyes as her mother."

Ira got Josh into his usual bedwear and carried him back to the bedroom. "I think your mother would've liked her," he said, pulling the covers up over his son.

He sat down in the chair near the foot of the bed and leaned his head back. "I wonder if Maggie remembers your mother. Most of the others have forgotten her, with all the time twitches since the Gulf. And, hell," he said with a rueful laugh, "no one else at all remembers that the first Golden Guardian wasn't a man, so how can I expect them to remember my Tin Lizzie?"

Ira was still for a moment, then snorted. "I looked up your listing on the Hero History netsite last night. Do you know who they say took in the Godstuff and nearly killed you? Some fellow I never heard of named Skywraith. Nothing about one of your own teammates doing it, hardly anything about the fact that you stopped him from ripping apart the universe. In fact, there's no listing at all for the Iron Guardian. He hasn't existed now." He rubbed his face and temples.

"All this time shit gives me a headache." With a groan, Ira lurched to his feet. "Well, I'm going to get something to eat. There's always time for an old man to talk rubbish later."