a semi-original superheroine story by Dangerguy
WARNING: This story is strictly fictional and is not intended to portray any real persons, living or dead, nor is it at all intended to encourage the type of activity portrayed here. It is not to be resold for profit. It is strictly a fantasy/parody, intended for the personal enjoyment of those who appreciate the superheroine in bondage/peril/sexual situations genre. The story depicts graphic sexual situations, including bondage, violence, and non-consensual sex, among a number of other nasty things. It is NOT intended, nor is it at all suitable, for minors. If you are under the age of 18, or if this type of thing offends you, you shouldn’t be reading it. Otherwise, carry on, and enjoy.
It should come as no surprise that the story I'm about to tell you is all about a girl. The best ones usually are. But before you go jumping to conclusions, thinking that I'm the big hero who saves the day and rescues the girl in question, let me assure that this story's more complicated than that. Again, the best ones usually are.
My name's William MacIntyre, but everyone calls me Billy. You'd think I would have insisted that everyone start calling me either Bill or Will as soon as I quit using training wheels, and don't think I didn't try, but the name stuck. Girls seemed to like it—I guess it made me seem boyish or something--and I was smart enough to figure out that anything the girls like, you stick with it.
I live in High Plains City, which isn't exactly the most thrilling place on earth, granted, but it's no worse than most other places, and a hell of a lot better than some I've heard about. I grew up a few blocks from Telegraph Road--that's the main artery that runs east of downtown, all the way to the city limits. I'd say it's a working-class neighborhood except for the fact that most people who live along the road don't work. Not at honest jobs, anyway.
Oh, I hear you say. That kind of neighborhood. Yeah. Tell someone around here that you're a Roadie, and you can see it in their eyes--all the assumptions. All the fear, too. Doesn't matter if you're white or black, either. Roadies are Roadies as far as everyone else in High Plains is concerned, and nothing good comes from the Road. People don't say that out loud, but they think it, and they whisper it when they think you can't hear.
The thing about me is, I'm not your typical Roadie--if such an animal exists. Compared to a lot of the kids I grew up with, you could say I turned out all right. I gotta credit my folks for that one. They had jobs, not great ones, but they paid the bills, and they rode me pretty hard about doing well in school and making something of myself. You might think that when my dad died in a car crash when I was fourteen, and my mom died of cancer five years later, I would have become royally screwed up. But I didn't--I just felt like I had to live up to this potential they always said they saw in me. You know, honor their memory.
Sorry--here I'm rambling on about myself, and I said this was all about a girl. Well, I'm getting to her. You see, I wound up attending High Plains University. Yeah, imagine that--a Roadie at HPU. Studying science, if you can believe it. Anyway, I'm sitting in this huge lecture hall on my first day, with about three hundred other kids straight out of high school who were probably checking their shorts for cake just like me, when in walks the most beautiful girl I've ever seen, swear to God.
I guess you want a description. Okay. Five-foot six. Auburn hair--just past shoulder length, kind of wavy and tousled. Perfect white skin, big brown eyes, this cute little nose that just turns up a bit at the end, and these two luscious lips, the lower one just a little thicker which gives her this pout and makes you just want to kiss it 'til it curls into a smile. Oh, you want to know about below the neck, do you? All right. Killer bod. All the usual expressions apply: nice rack, stacked, built like a brick shithouse (that's a weird one, though, isn't it?)...you get the idea. Narrow waist, curvy hips, long, slender legs. Made me want to howl at the moon and change my religion.
So, I spot her, and I wish I could tell you I was Mr. Cool and approached her right on the spot and had her eating out of my hand. Yeah, right. She walked right by me without even a glance in my direction--I was sitting at the very back of the lecture hall--and she chose a seat right down in front. And I sat there like a love-struck imbecile. I remember shortly after the lecture started, she asked the prof a couple of questions. Good ones. So, not only was she beautiful, she was also smart and gutsy.
Now, admit it: those last two things would have turned a lot of guys off. I don't get that. What's with these guys who like their girls stupid and wimpy? Whatever. Obviously, that's not me; the brains and the bravery just made me want her more.
So why the hell did it take me three fucking years to even say boo to her?!?
Okay, remember the geography lesson about my home town I was just giving you? About the Road? Time to tell you about the flip side: the Heights. That's the rich part of town. It really is up higher than the rest of the city, which is appropriate, I guess. You see, High Plains City is smack-dab where the continental plateau meets the foothills of the Rockies, so the wealthiest part of town is in the hills on the West side. Remember how I said that when you tell people in High Plains you're from the Road, they think they know your life story? Well, tell someone from the Heights that you're a Roadie, and they'll have their private security guards escort you off of whatever premises you clearly have no business trespassing upon.
Guess where my dream girl hailed from. Yeah.
Well of course the story doesn't end there. I found out what I could about her without drawing attention to myself. Now, look, I'm not a stalker, let's get that straight. I didn't follow her around or anything creepy like that. No, I had a lot of classes with her, because we were both studying science, and I saw her around campus a lot, and...well, mostly, I eavesdropped on a few conversations. Okay, I guess that is a bit creepy. So sue me.
Anyway, I found out her name: Candace Roberts, though her friends call her Candy. That's right, Candy. Gotta love that. Whoa, wait a minute though--don't judge her by her name. Turns out that the word 'smart' doesn't do her justice. He has a genius I.Q. and was taking two degrees at the same time, one in Science, one in Engineering. On top of that, her dad's a multi-millionaire businessman, and her mom--get this--was High Plains City's district attorney, until she got elected to Congress. No shit. A whole family of over-achievers.
Now, don't get me wrong: I'm not easily intimidated. The Road is a tough neighborhood. I grew up fast, and had to learn how to handle myself, how to assess a dicey situation and figure out fast if I could handle it or if I should back off. I also took martial arts classes for years, and I wasn't a half-bad defensive linebacker in high school, either. On top of that, I've had my share of good times with the fair sex. I may not be Brad Pitt, but I'm not hard on the eyes, or so I've been told: six feet tall, one hundred ninety pounds of mostly muscle, short, curly black hair, blue-green eyes, straight nose, thick lips, and this cock-eyed smile girls seem to like. Granted, I'm no superstud, but I'm no slouch, either.
But Candy--as much as I liked her, as much as I wanted to be near her, I just couldn't work up the courage to say a thing to her. I should have known better, because I always saw her treat people decent, but I just couldn't get past the idea that if I told her I was from the Road, she'd scream and run in the other direction. No, that's stupid, I'm exaggerating. What I was really afraid of was that she'd give me that look, the one I told you about, where she'd think she knew my pathetic, wrong-side-of-the-tracks life story. And then she'd take the first chance she had to get the hell away from me.
So I bided my time and watched her when I happened to be nearby. Turns out she started dating this guy--a total loser, he was actually seeing this other girl on the sly at the same time. Can you believe it? I mean, here he's got the most gorgeous creature in God's creation on his arm, and that's not enough for the guy. Anyway, she broke it off when she found out a few months later. Good for her.
So now you'd think I would have made my move, but no, I was still playing the gutless wonder. Pathetic, I know. But you see, this is where the story starts getting complicated. I'd been watching her for almost a year and a half, and she'd just broken up with her boyfriend, when all of a sudden there was something different about her. Not better, not worse, just...different.
I know, I know; gee, could I be more vague? It wasn't anything dramatic. It was little things. Like how she'd show up for class looking kind of bagged some days. That had never happened before. And she seemed, I don't know, distracted sometimes--and she used to focus in class like a laser beam.
I couldn't put my finger on it, but I figured she was going through something. I put it down to the breakup with her boyfriend, but it persisted for months. Anyway, I thought the last thing she needed, if she was going through a rough time, was some working-class mook hitting on her. So I kept my distance, even though it was driving me crazy. I tried dating other girls, but gave it up pretty quickly; none of them could hold a candle to her.
Right around this time, something incredible happened to High Plains City. We got our very own superhero. It was all rumors and wild stories at first, and most people--me included--just put it down to an urban legend. Even when some of the stories started to make the local news, I figured it was just someone like the Flash or even Superman popping into town to open a can of whoop-ass on some of the local crooks.
I was wrong. We do have our own superhero. Her name is Duster. Before you start laughing, you should know that here on the high plains, we get these brutal, kick-ass wind storms once or twice a year. The only thing to do when they start is to batten down the hatches and ride it out. We call them dusters, because they kick up so much dust. In High Plains City, when someone tells you there's a duster coming, you take cover.
So she chose her name well, especially considering her powers. Turns out she could command the wind. I'm serious. She could call up a gale-force wind as fast as you can blink, and blow bad guys down the street or into a wall like so much trash.
Duster spent most of her time down near Telegraph Road, which makes sense, since that's where most of the crime occurs. Now, not every Roadie is a criminal--not even close. My folks weren't, I'm not, and most of the people I grew up with still aren't. Even so, the crooks have a lot of the folks down on the Road by the balls. Suddenly here's this chick with superpowers, coming down to the Road and kicking some serious ass. Well, me and most everyone I know were all for it. Frankly, we figured she must be a Roadie herself, and that made her even more popular.
It's also why I didn't figure out what you probably have by now: that Candy and Duster were one and the same. Well, I dropped enough hints for you, didn't I? Not that I picked up on them; even after I'd met both Candy and Duster, I still thought they were different people, despite the physical resemblance.
But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Fast forward about a year. Duster's still kicking ass down on the Road. I still haven't said word one to Candy. A few months before, she went through another breakup. That threw me for a loop, because I didn't even know she was seeing anyone. But she had that look, you know the one, that empty look, the shuffling gait, when someone's gone through the worst type of breakup. So I was still keeping my distance.
Then the accident happened. Actually, two accidents.
I forgot to mention, I have a kid brother, four years younger than me. His name's Danny. Nice kid, good-looking, everybody loves him--he's more popular than I ever was. Too bad he doesn't give a shit about anything but riding his skateboard. One day he's out with some buddies, doing stunts at the local library, when he loses it and cracks his head open on a concrete step. Fell into a coma. The doctors contacted these brain surgeons down east, at the Mayo clinic, who said they could help him--but our insurance company said no way.
So there I am, both my parents dead, barely enough money in the bank from their insurance and my student loan to keep myself in Wheaties, and my brother's lying comatose in a hospital because the insurance weasels found a loophole to keep themselves from paying to help him. It's a wonder I could drag myself to classes everyday--maybe I kept doing it because it felt, I don't know, normal. And because every now and then I'd catch a glimpse of Candy and that would just make me feel a little better.
Anyway, that was the first accident. On to the second.
One day right after Danny's accident, I'm in a physics lab, doing some advanced work on quantum phase transitions. And then...oh, sorry. I'll try to explain, but I'm oversimplifying the idea. The objects you think are solid really aren't. You see, there's all this empty space between the molecules, and electrons, and quarks, and so on, that make up matter. But every object has this intrinsic field which prevents other objects from passing through those empty spaces. Theoretically, by modulating a phase transition at the quantum level in an object, you could get one solid object to pass through another.
That's what I was trying to do, but without much success. My lab partners had wisely given up and left; I stuck around late, though, trying to get this experiment to work. I'm like that; I'll get obsessed with something and I won't be able to let it go. Kind of like my feelings for Candy. It was also a distraction from what was going on with Danny, which I couldn't do anything about--or so I thought.
Maybe if I'd been a little less obsessed I would have noticed the thunder storm. Maybe it would have occurred to me that doing a complex experiment with delicate scientific equipment while an electrical storm raged outside wasn't the brightest idea. Well, I didn't notice--I almost had the experiment working when a lighting strike hit the University's power grid. This huge power surge flooded the equipment I was working with, and WHAM!--it threw me across the room.
I woke up in a hospital bed a couple of hours later. The funny thing is, I felt fine--great, in fact. The doctor shrugged it off and sent me home. I got back to my place and I decided to take a shower before I go to bed. I was in the bathroom, about to get into the shower stall, when suddenly I felt dizzy. I reached out with my hand and leaned against the wall...and I fell right through it.
No, the wall was pretty thick, and it wasn't damaged. I phased through the wall, passed through it as though it wasn't there. I also phased through the floor on the other side and fell into the basement. I was lucky I fell on some boxes, otherwise I probably would have broken my neck. I got a few bruises just the same--which at least proved it had really happened.
Well, as you can imagine, I was pretty freaked out. I went back up to the bathroom and pressed myself against the wall, which felt pretty damn solid. Suddenly I remembered the experiment I'd been working on earlier. I looked at the wall again and this time I focused. I reached out with my hand and willed it to pass through the wall. It did. My heart nearly jumped out of my chest, but I kept with it and walked through the wall. I didn't fall through the floor this time, thank God.
Over the next few days, I experimented with my new ability until I felt like I had a pretty good handle on it. I even figured out how to phase other objects I was touching so they could pass though solid matter with me. Which was good, because it meant I could keep my clothes on! Somewhere along the line, I got my big idea on how I could help Danny. I became a thief. A damn good one.
Now, you might think that I would have just started phasing into bank vaults and walking out with huge piles of cash. Guess again. That's the sort of supervillain-type crime that would have brought a big-time superhero down on my ass in a hurry. No, I had to be more subtle. I wasn't planning on doing this for any longer than I had to. Like I said, my folks brought me up right, and I knew what I was doing was wrong. But what the insurance company was doing--or rather, what it wasn't doing--was wrong too. Yeah, I know, two wrongs don't make a right. Try telling that to your kid brother when he's lying in a hospital bed, taking all his meals through a tube, and you're his only hope.
So the wealthy homes in the Heights became my targets. I figured, hey, these people can afford to have a few of their possessions liberated, and it won't attract too much serious attention. All the same, I went out of my way to avoid hurting or even meeting up with anyone. Folks in the Heights go out of town a lot, so it was pretty easy to find an empty house and make it even more empty.
Of course one night I chose the wrong house. I'm going through the china and silverware when I hear someone behind me. I turn around, and there she is: Candy, my dream girl. She was holding a huge freakin' butcher knife in one hand, and looking at me like she had no compunction about gutting me with it. As well, she was wearing a kitchen apron. And nothing else. You can imagine the state of confusion I was in. Part of me wanted to rabbit; part of me--you can probably guess which part--wanted to stay there as long as possible.
Fortunately, I was disguised. I was wearing all-black clothing, including a ninja-style hood over my head, so only my eyes were showing. Just in case someone did see me. Anyway, I don't know if it was the best idea, but I tried to sweet-talk her. Not ask her out or anything, come on--just convince her that I wasn't a threat. I put back all the stuff I'd stolen from her place on the dining room table and suggested that I should just leave. Candy was determined to call the cops. I couldn't let that happen. As soon as she turned away from me to use the phone, I backpedaled and phased through the dining room wall. I imagine it must have freaked the shit out of her when she turned around and I was gone, but it couldn't be helped.
You'd think I would have left it at that, counted my blessings, and avoided her from then on. Oh no, not me. You see, I'd broken the ice, in a way. I'd finally talked to her. Not that she knew it was me, and it wasn't the friendliest of conversations, but I'd gotten over that hump. I figured if I could talk to her when she was staring me down with a butcher knife, then striking up a friendly conversation in class would be a breeze.
Turns out it was even easier than that. The next day, she was late for this advanced physics class we were both taking--really late, by more than an hour. She'd obviously called the cops after I left and lost a lot of sleep chatting with them. The class was ultra-competitive, which meant no one was going to help her out by loaning her their notes. Well, no one except a certain lovesick Roadie. It was a perfect in, and I jumped at the chance.
A few minutes later, she's buying me a coffee to thank me. How perfect is that? I had to find a way to spend more time with her, but I wasn't about to ask her out--not yet. So I suggested that we form our own two-person study group for this class. I didn't know this at the time, but Candy was having trouble keeping her grades up; she'd actually failed several courses, which I still find hard to believe. But I guess the crime-fighting was taking its toll. Regardless, I didn't know any of this; all I knew was how ecstatic I felt when she agreed to my idea.
So I was on my way with my dream girl, and thanks to this fence I hooked up with, I was also on my way to getting Danny back on his feet. I figured things were finally going my way. I should have known better.
First off, a couple of days later, I walk out of another place in the Heights with a duffel bag full of loot when who's there to confront me but Duster. There hadn't been any worthwhile pictures or descriptions on TV or the papers, so I was pretty stunned when I saw her float down from the sky, riding a whirlwind. It wasn't just the superpowers; she was a goddamned goddess. Long, wind-tossed reddish-brown hair around her face. Her eyes were hidden by this dark green visor. Her body--my God--big boobs, thin waist, flaring hips, all covered by this bright green spandex thing she looks like she was poured into. Her thighs were bare, and her lower legs were in these sexy knee-high green boots. She wears this long, dark brown leather coat, too, but sweeps it back to show off her body. I had half a mind to surrender right there, just so she could manhandle me and put me in cuffs. Kinky fun, you know?
Here's the part where you finally figure out what a total geek I am, ex-football player or not. Once I get over the sight of her-- which took awhile--instead of running or fighting, I go into full hero-worship mode. No, I mean it, I was all 'it's such a thrill to meet you' and 'you're my personal heroine', blah blah blah. Christ.
No wonder she wanted to knock my teeth down my throat. Not that she succeeded. She hit me with a gale-force wind first; I just let it phase through me. It was cool to see her powers at close range, though. When the wind didn't take me down, she got even more pissed and decided to knock my block off. I wasn't about to hit back--I'd never hit a woman--well, okay, maybe not never, but certainly not a superheroine. Between some defensive aikido moves I threw at her and the phasing, though, she couldn't lay a finger on me. Eventually she lost it and launched herself at me. I took the opportunity to phase through this high brick wall that surrounded the place I'd just robbed. Got away Scot free.
Now, you'd think I'd put two and two together and figure out that Candy and Duster were the same person. Well, guess again. I'm no idiot; I noticed the physical resemblance. It's probably why I thought Duster was so goddamn gorgeous. But they seemed like totally different people! Candy was friendly, sweet, charming, even a little introverted. Duster, on the other hand, was a no-holds-barred ball-buster. They carried themselves different, talked different, acted different. I could relate; put on a costume, a mask, and start using super-powers, and trust me, you'd act like a different person too. And like I said, most of the people I knew had Duster pegged as a Roadie.
Anyway, I was feeling pretty full of myself. I'd encountered our local superhero and had gotten away without a scratch. I guess it gave me the boost in confidence I needed to finally ask Candy out, which I did the next day.
I asked her out to a movie. At first, I thought I'd blown it, because she turned me down flat. You can imagine how I felt: crushed like a soda can. I tried to hide it, but I'm pretty sure I failed miserably. Fortunately, she noticed, and she changed her mind. Hey, I'll take a sympathy date over nothing at all. She said she was free the next day during the afternoon, so I suggested a picnic. Kind of dorky, I know, but romance is like that. And she liked the idea, so there.
That night, I'm feeling really full of myself, so I decide to change targets and hit one of the ritzy stores on Belgravia Road, which is the Heights' shopping district. Not the bright idea I thought it was, as it turned out. I'm about to phase through the back door of this boutique when I see Duster on the roof. I high-tailed it out of there, but she caught up to me--in a blind alley, if you can believe it. I'm trying to figure how to get out of this without revealing my powers when she attacks me again.
So I'm fending her off, waiting for a chance when her back is turned to phase through one of the walls nearby, when I hear the wind pick up behind me. A moment later, these heavy metal garbage can lids came flying by my head. Two of them missed me. The third passed right through me--of course I was phasing--and it would have clobbered Duster if I hadn't caught it. But she saw the thing go through me like I was made of air. So I figured, okay, the jig is up, and ran away from her and right through a wall. Now, as much as I admired Duster and what she was doing for my home town, I couldn't stop myself from laughing my head off right after I did that, when I imagined her reaction. I wish I could have seen the look on her face.
The next day I went up to the Heights to pick up Candy for our date. I have this classic motorcycle, a British Vincent Black Lightning 1952, that my dad left to me. It was his prized possession. I do my best to keep her in shape. Of course I was hoping Candy would like it.
Well, it turned out even better than that: she loved it. I was taking it easy, riding safe so as not to scare her because she'd never been on a motorcycle before. Then we got out of town into the foothills, and we're on this curving road that's climbing up a slope, and she gives me this thumbs-up signal. So I opened the throttle and showed her what the bike could really do on those curves. Speaking of which, I could feel her curves, pressed against my back, her arms tight around my chest, her body moving against mine when she laughed or shouted with excitement...Christ, I was on top of the world.
So I took her to this park up there that I go to sometimes--has a great view of the city. And we have lunch and we're talking, and she asks how long I've had my eye on her and how come it took me so long to ask her out. And I'm really starting to open up to her, though I still haven't told her I'm from the Road--not yet. Then she opens up to me a little, about how being the big brain intimidates a lot of people, keeps them away from her. So then I'm telling her how I've seen her help her friends, and do charity work, and how terrific she is, when she sits up and pecks me on the cheek.
Remember that power surge that gave my my phasing ability? The one that knocked me out and put me in the hospital? This was a hundred times more powerful. I mean it. When she kissed me, it was like every nerve in my body suddenly stood up at attention. It was like time stood still. Like I said, I've been with some other girls before, but none of them ever made me feel like that.
I looked at her, and she was watching me with this nervous but expectant look on her face. I could hardly believe this was happening. I leaned forward and brushed my lips against hers. She didn't run away screaming, so I figured that was a good sign. I pressed my lips against hers again, this time a little more firmly--a real kiss, none of this tentative stuff, I decided to go for it. She kissed back. I put my hand behind her head and pulled her closer.
That was pushing it. She broke the kiss and pulled back. I was cursing myself, reminding myself that this wasn't some Telegraph Tart who'd lie down and spread her legs at the drop of a hat. But she wasn't offended. She told me that she'd gone through a bad breakup a few months back, just like I thought, and that she wanted things to go right this time, which meant going slow. She said she liked me and thought it could work between us. Well, Christ, I couldn't argue with that, it was what I'd been dreaming about for three years! That's pretty much what I told her--that I'd waited three years to even talk to her, so I could be patient. And it's true. Come on, you meet a girl like this, you know it's worth it.
I pulled off a job that night without any sign of Duster. Hooray. I nearly had enough for Danny's operation at that point. I figured I had maybe four more jobs to pull and I'd be there. I could hardly wait. Not only did I want my brother back on his feet, I knew I was taking a big risk. Cops I could handle. But having a superhero on my tail was dicey. It takes one to catch one--that's why I think superheroes exist, because who else can take down the supervillains? Not that I'm a villain, I mean, come on. But it was only a matter of time before Duster figured out a way to beat me. The sooner I finished my career in crime, the better.
The next day, Candy and me were studying together, minding our own business, when these rich kids she went to high school with came along and started harassing us. One of them I recognized; he was the quarterback for their football team. At least he was right up until I sacked him in a game in our senior year. He was trash-talking my buds early in the game, trying to get them to take dumb penalties, saying shit I thought had died with Martin Luther King. I mean, he should have been wearing a bedsheet and a pointy hat instead of a football uniform. So I decided to shut him up. Hit him hard enough to break his collarbone.
So this time, the mook figures out who I am and decides to mix it up with me. Big mistake. I caught him and flipped him, then put a choke-hold on him. Candy convinced me to let him go--said he wasn't worth the trouble. She was right, and I sent the asshole packing along with the rest of the brat pack. Then a minute later, it hits me: Candy knows I'm a Roadie now. Even worse, my impression of a Neanderthal proved it and probably every lousy thing she'd ever heard about Roadies. I was convinced I'd completely blown any chance I had with her.
I should have known better than to underestimate her. She told me she was even more impressed with me than before, because I must have had to overcome all these obstacles to get to University. That's the moment, I think, when I really fell in love with her. It had been this infatuation--no, an obsession--up until then. But when a woman uses nothing more than a sentence and a smile to take you from feeling two feet small to ten feet tall, well, game over, you know?
That night, I went over to her place for dinner. We watched a movie together too--her folks have this unreal home theater set-up, flat plasma screen, Dolby 5.1 sound, DVDs, the whole deal. No, I didn't put a move on her during the movie--I promised to take it slow, remember?
Still, after the movie, she gives me this look, like the look she gave me the day before when I kissed her. I took the hint. Barely a minute later, we're making out and I'm in heaven. Her body's pressed against mine, my arms are around her, I flick my tongue against her lips and she makes this little moaning sound that just about sent me into orbit. Suddenly, she goes wild--no, really. She throws herself on top of me, straddling me on the couch; she starts grinding her crotch against my cock, she's Frenching me like there's no tomorrow, and she takes my hands and puts them on her breasts. God, they felt incredible--more than a handful, soft and yielding, but firm, too. I figured I was going to get lucky, and said something to that effect.
Well, that blew it. As sudden as she'd gone all hard core on me, she freaked. She virtually threw herself off of me and pushed herself away to the far end of the sofa. She had this look on her face, her eyes darting around, like she was just waking up from a nightmare.
And I freaked right back at her. I kicked myself about it later, but here I was, all worked up, and she'd suddenly looked at me and scrambled away like I was a leper or something. I should have known better, but I put it down to me being a Roadie and her being from the Heights. I got all offended and told her off--said some things I really shouldn't have. I'm sure you've been there. It's one of those moments when you run off at the mouth, and there's this voice in the back of your head telling you you're being an idiot, and to shut the fuck up, and you ignore it out of some perverse sense of pride. She hurt me, so I wanted to hurt her back. And man, did I succeed there. I could see the waterworks were about to start, and I knew I would have buckled if I'd seen even one tear, so I turned around and hauled ass out of there. Fucking moron.
As soon as I got home, the anger was wearing off and I started to realize what an insensitive shitheel I was. Still, I didn't call her--nope, I still had that stupid sense of male pride. I couldn't bring myself to go out and do a job either; I just lay in my bed, feeling sorry for myself, until I fell asleep.
The next day, I knew it was time for a good-sized serving of humble pie. I still couldn't bring myself to call her--I thought she'd just hang up, and I couldn't take that rejection. So I hopped on my bike and went to her place. If she hadn't been home, I was just going to sit on the front step like the pathetic asshole I was and wait for her.
Turns out she was home. She came to the door in her bathrobe, and I could see from her face that she'd been crying, and that she hadn't gotten much sleep. Here I'd been thinking I couldn't possibly feel any worse than I already did, but right then, I found an even lower place. I know some guys would get off on the fact that they can make a girl cry and lose sleep over them, but that ain't me.
Still, I took the fact she didn't slam the door in my face right away as a good sign, and I launched right into my apology-and-please-give-me-another-chance speech. When I finished, I realized this would have been a perfect time for her to get her own back. She could have told me to never speak to her again, and frankly, close as it would have come to killing me, I would have thoroughly deserved it. Instead, she reached out and took hold of my hand, and I just about flew over the moon.
She started off by telling me what happened was her fault as much as mine, and that she wanted me in her life. So far so good. Then she took the wind out of my sails, saying that she was going through some things, that she has all these issues she can't tell me about, and that she wasn't sure she was ready for a relationship.
Fuck.
Well, I made my last ditch effort at that point. I made the inevitable, predictable, can't-we-still-be-friends offer. It galled me, because I've been in that situation a couple of times before, and I know that once a girl pigeonholes you as "just a friend", there's no fucking way to get rid of that label. She must have been thinking something similar, because she said she thought we couldn't just be friends. But I kept at it--I didn't want to lose her. If I stayed in her life, in some way, then there was still a chance for us.
Somehow, I think I managed to convince her. At the very least, I talked her into going for a bike ride with me. Well, I let her get dressed first. It felt good, riding up into the hills again, her body pressed against mine, her arms wrapped around me. At one point she gave me this real tender squeeze, and I swear I just about lost it--no, really, I had to blink away some tears, man. Because she was telling me that things would work out.
I took her to this special place I know. There's this bridge above the High Plains River on the highway just outside of town. The traffic is annoying, but the view is spectacular. A hundred feet below the bridge, the river is this raging torrent of water running through a narrow canyon, and its roar drowns out the traffic noise. It's amazing, and humbling. We were standing there, looking down, and I began to tell Candy how all my problems seem so much smaller when I look at the river and the canyon it took thousands of years to carve. She gave me this look--like the way you dream of having a beautiful girl look at you, if only once in your life--then she put her hands on my face and kissed me.
Of course, just when something goes right in my life, some other goddamn thing has to go wrong. Right at that moment, this passing eighteen-wheeler blows a tire. Chunks of it went flying into the other lanes, and this van loses control and swerves straight towards us. I grabbed Candy, held her tight, phased, and hoped for the best. I'm pretty sure Candy had her eyes closed, but I kept mine open. Just curious, I guess; must be the scientist in me. The van would have killed us both, I saw it crash around us; but instead we passed through it harmlessly and it went spinning along the guardrail, then back into the middle of the highway.
It cut off this inter-city bus, which wound up swerving and crashing right through the guardrail until the front half of the bus was hanging off the bridge. I could see maybe two dozen people inside, all freaking out. And what do they do? The worst thing possible, of course: they headed straight for the only exit, which was located--you guessed it--at the front of the bus. Their shifting weight made the bus start to tip over the side of the bridge and into the canyon.
I'm watching this, helpless and horrified, when Candy pushes herself away from me. At first I thought she was going to run to the bus and go over the side with it, and I'm getting ready to tackle her, when she stops. She spreads her arms, and just as I'm wondering what the hell she thinks she's doing, this howling wind rips up from the canyon and slams into the bus. The tilting slowed, but it didn't stop. The bus started to go over. Candy screamed, then the wind became a tornado. I shit you not. If I hadn't been so caught up watching Candy control this thing, I would have shit bricks.
The tornado caught the bus and stopped its fall, then lifted it back on to the freakin' bridge. I know, I can barely believe it myself, and I was there, I saw it with my own eyes. The tornado stopped, and the bus passengers came out--they looked shaken up pretty bad, but at least they were alive. Then Candy collapsed. I went over to her and took her in my arms; she felt limp, like a rag doll. That's when I knew she'd brought up and controlled that tornado, and that's when I knew who she was. That's when I knew I was dating High Plains City's own superheroine, Duster. I was in love with the woman who wanted to throw my sorry ass in jail. The term 'ironic' just doesn't cover shit like that.
She asked me to get her out of there, so I carried her back to the bike, placed her on it, and took her back up the highway. I got off at the first exit and led her to this patch of grass so she could rest a bit. I looked at her and the resemblance between Candy and Duster hit me like a freight train. I felt pretty stupid that I hadn't put it together before, but...well, I told you why.
When she got some of her strength back, the first thing she asked me was if I was okay with her being Duster. I actually was, really...aside from the fact that she wanted to arrest me for a series of B and E's. Of course I knew I couldn't just tell her what I was doing. Hell, you might wonder why I was going to tell her at all. I guess I just had to know--if she could accept everything about me. I always have to push things. I never learn.
So I didn't answer. Instead, I told her I had to show her something. I took her back into town, to the hospital. Showed her Danny. Told her how he got hurt, how I can't afford the operation to help him and how the insurance fuckers won't pay for it. Then I told her what I was doing to get the money for Danny's operation. You know, I really did think she'd understand. Candy's just so sweet and caring--I thought once she saw Danny and saw why I needed the money, she'd back off.
Boy, was I wrong. She freaked. Totally wigged out on me. First she's all shocked and disappointed, then...okay, I know this is going to sound weird, but all of a sudden, Candy's gone, and I'm talking to Duster. Remember how I said they seemed like two different people?
So my sweet, caring girlfriend is gone, and I'm left with this hard-ass, crime-busting bitch who tells me she's going to find a way to bring me down. And once again, I start running off at the mouth. First I got angry, and then I got nasty. I told her off--called her a cocktease. She tried to slap me, and I really should have let her, but I just phased and let her hand pass through me. I was mad, and I wanted to wipe that angry, confident look off her face.
Well, we exchanged some more angry words, and the battle lines were clearly drawn. She stormed out, leaving me with Danny. I remember I paced around angrily for awhile, then I just slumped down into this chair. I can't remember the last time I felt that depressed. Things had been going so well, I'd managed to fix my fuck-up from last night, and then I had to go and fuck things up even worse.
I had a long talk with Danny. One thing I'll say for his accident, it turned him into a much better listener than he'd been before. By the end of it, I felt a little better--I managed to convince myself that Candy would calm down, that she'd think about my sitch and come around. So. Did I call her? Try to make things up to her? No. Again, I had to push things.
The rich bitch we'd encountered the day before at the U let it slip that she and her family were heading out of town. I heard it, Candy heard it--so I decided to test her. I figured I'd go and hit the rich girl's place that night just to see if Duster showed up to stop me. If she didn't, I figured I still had a chance with Candy. But if Duster showed--well, that'd be it, then I'd know it was over.
So, with the way my luck was running, guess who's there to meet me that night when I come out of the rich bitch's house with a bag full of shit her family will never miss? Duster. I couldn't believe it. Once I got over the disappointment, I actually felt sorry for her--I mean, she can't touch me if I don't want to let her, how the hell did she think she could catch me?
Well, remember how I said you shouldn't underestimate Candy? I started to walk away from Duster when this whirlwind whips up around me. And I'm thinking, Jesus, this is pathetic. She tried to whack me with the wind before and it didn't work. So I kept walking, and the whirlwind stayed with me. I took a few more steps and I suddenly realized I couldn't breathe. It only took me a second to figure out what she was doing. I tried to run, but she kept the whirlwind going, sucking all the air away from me.
I got dizzy and fell to my knees. I remember I looked up at her--I just couldn't believe she'd do this to me--and I thought I saw her face soften, just for a moment. But it wasn't enough. She kept the air away from me, and I was slipping away, these black spots were forming in front of my eyes. Then this manhole cover flipped over from the wind, and I got this idea: there's a whole network of sewers and shit under the pavement--I can use them to escape! I grabbed my bag and phased.
I fell for a second or two, then I entered in this tunnel and went solid. I landed in some water, took a breath, and nearly tossed my cookies. Of course I couldn't land in a telephone or cable tunnel, no, I gotta land in the fucking sewer. You would not. Believe. The stench.
So I'm covered with and wading through shit in a pitch black tunnel, which I realized was a pretty apt metaphor for my fucking life at this point. But I sucked it up and started crawling out of there before Duster came down after me. The whole way, I'm cursing and swearing, all of it directed at her, because this is all her fault, of course. I never considered for a moment that maybe I'd brought it on myself. I never thought how creeped out I would have been if I was a girl and some guy came on to me the day after he'd broken into my home. I refused to realize that there's a pretty fine line between having a romantic obsession and being a stalker.
Eventually I found a way out, and I made my way downtown to my fence, Manny. I snuck into the back of this pawn shop he runs. He caught one whiff of me and ordered me into this dingy shower he has in the basement. Don't go thinking he did it out of the goodness of his heart, because his heart doesn't contain that ingredient. No, he just didn't want me stinking up his shop.
So after I shower and put my clothes in his washing machine, I wander into his office, wearing nothing but a towel and a smile to talk business. Good thing Manny ain't gay, 'cause I would have had to break his nose if he'd put a move on me. I only rushed up there because leaving Manny alone with my loot made me nervous, so I didn't want to be gone long. Anyway, we started talking about how I wound up crawling around in the sewer and I told him I'd met up with Duster. Then he tells me that this guy, the Motormaster--who ran a local car theft ring and fancies himself a supervillain--just broke out of prison and is looking to capture Duster and put the hurt on her.
I'll forgive you for thinking that I probably cheered at that moment. I didn't. Instead, it was like, okay, I can be mad at my girl, but if some thug threatens her, he's going down. Because in spite of everything that had happened, in spite of the fact that she tried to suffocate me and throw me in jail, I still thought of her as my girl. Hey, I'd done that for three years in spite of all evidence to the contrary, so it was an old habit that was dying hard. Pathetic, I know. But come on: all guys on the make are a little pathetic, aren't we?
Still, I knew I had to play it smart. Manny's a seedy, pudgy scumwad, but he's a player in this town. As far as he was concerned, the Motormaster was about to do him a big favor, and he wasn't going to let me bust up the party. So I managed to convince him that I had this intense mad-on for Duster and wanted to see her get what she had coming to her. Considering that I'd just crawled though human waste to get away from her, Manny bought it. He gave me a contact, this slutty bartender in a dive near the Road whose roommate just happened to be the Motormaster's girlfriend. My phony vendetta against Duster--and a C-note--convinced her too. So she told me where the Motormaster's chop shop was located.
I had this real simple plan. I was going to go to the Motormaster's converted factory and offer him my services as a thief. I had Manny to vouch for me, and his word can carry some weight with the scumbags in this town. Once I'd infiltrated his gang, I was going to keep them from catching Duster. Or, failing that, I was going to help her escape. Yeah, I know, then I'm the big hero and my girl runs back into my arms, blah blah blah. I didn't really believe it was going to work out like that. I kind of hoped it would, but I doubted it. I just wanted to make sure she was safe.
So I get to the factory. It's two, nearly three hours since I last saw Duster in the Heights. And I go in, I phase through this big garage door at the back. And they've got her. And...
Shit. I'm sorry. It's like I'm right back there again, and I can feel my fists clenching, and my teeth are grinding, and my blood is boiling...
Sorry. Okay. They've got her. The Motormaster and his gang, about a dozen guys. They've got her tied up, spread eagled in this fucking bondage rig. And she's naked. Christ. They even took her visor off. And I look at her body, her beautiful body, and I can see these marks, these bruises...on her breasts, and...and on her thighs, right in between...well, you get the idea, right? I just knew, right then, that they'd raped her. They raped my girl, my brave, beautiful girl. They tied her up and stripped her and they...Jesus fucking Christ. Goddamn animals.
But that wasn't enough for them. When I walked in, they're fucking torturing her. This white guy with short brown hair--the Motormaster himself, it turns out--has these paddles covered with short wires and with cables running from them, and he's pressing them...he's pressing them against her breasts, okay? And they're electrocuting her. She's screaming. Really screaming, like she's in the worst sort of pain, like she's in hell.
I don't know if you've ever experienced anything like this. Frankly, I hope you haven't, and I hope you never do. I mean, you're standing there, watching someone you love getting hurt. And all you want to do is make the hurt stop, and you're not sure how to do that. I wasn't. I mean, there's over a dozen guys around her, probably all armed, and me, on my own, to stop them.
I couldn't think straight. I had no plan. All I had was anger. Rage. In spades.
The Motormaster pulls the paddles away from Candy, and her body just slumps like she's dead. She wasn't, I could see her taking these ragged, shallow breaths, but I'm sure she wanted to be dead. I just knew I had to make it stop. So I march right at them and yell at them. I tell them to let her go. Yeah, right, that'll work. Well, at least it got them to turn around and leave my girl alone for a moment. I see her eyes raise when she hears me. She looks at me and I can see this desperate hope there, that I'm there for her, and whatever differences we have don't matter...and I know I have to come through for her.
The gang fans out around me. I can see them all reaching into their coats and waistbands for their guns. Fine. The Motormaster tells them to kill me, and the shooting starts. Well, of course I phased. The bullets pass right through me, no problem. Well, no problem for me, anyway. Nearly half the gang fell, dead or wounded, before they clued in that shooting me wasn't going to work.
Next, they launch themselves at me, two guys in particular. I stay phased and let them come. BAM! They slam into each other, nearly cracking their heads open. Two more down. Another guy takes a swing at me; his hand goes right through me, and he turns white as the ghost he thinks I am. I go solid, knee him in the groin, and jab him in the temple. Another one down.
Now, if I'd been thinking, if I hadn't been so goddamn mad, I would realized that instead of attacking, I should have just phased and run right through them, grabbed Candy and phased her out of her restraints, and high-tailed it out of there before they'd known what the hell was happening. Instead, I'm pissed, and I want to put the hurt on them in the worst way, which means turning solid so I can hit them, but it also means they can hit me. Which is what happened next.
This guy comes up and clobbers me from behind. I mean, he really unleashed a mighty fucking thunderclap right on the back of my head. I spin around and fall to the ground. I'm trying to phase, but I can't concentrate. Stars are floating in front of my eyes, and the floor is tilting around me. This other guy pulls his leg back. I see it just in time to roll with the kick so it bruises my ribs instead of breaking them. But it still hurts like a son of a bitch, and I still can't phase. I roll over and see the first guy who hit me; he's the biggest fucking black man I've ever seen in my life. He picks up this lead pipe, and I just know I'm dead--even worse, I know Candy is dead.
Except she's not, not yet, and thank God for that and for her. The Motormaster gave her this drug that suppressed her powers, but the dumb fuck didn't know that electricity would neutralize it. So Duster has her powers back, and when she saw me fall, she knew she had to use them. Here I came in there to save her, but now she's saving me. Some big fucking hero, huh? I told you it was complicated.
The garage door at the far end of the factory blows in, and this hurricane-force wind topples over everyone still standing in the factory. I swear, over the roar of the wind, I could hear Candy laughing. It must have felt great to get some of her own back on those bastards. The Motormaster crawls over to her and punches her in the stomach to make her stop, but I've got my wind back, if you'll excuse the pun.
First thing, the goddamn mountain that walks like a man who wailed on me dropped his pipe, so I pick it up and wail on him until he's in la-la land. Then I use it on the remaining thugs until they're down. The Motormaster's girl got into the act at this point. She was decked out in this fetish gear, and I just knew she'd done something sick and twisted to Candy. Something about a woman doing that to another woman really bugged me. So I kicked her in the crotch, then cracked her nose against my knee. First time I ever hit a woman. First time I ever met one that deserved it.
So the gang members are all down, either dead from their own guns or out cold. Just when I think I've finally won, I look up and I see the Motormaster with one arm around Candy's neck. In the other hand, he's holding a gun against her head. Well, shit.
So there's a brief standoff, then the motherfucker tells me to come back tomorrow morning, and I can pick up the tattered remains of my girl then. He says she'll be alive, but that's the only promise he's making me. I look into Candy's eyes, and I can see the fear there. Now, she's a brave girl, but everyone has their limits. She's been through several hours of hell with this bastard already, and now she's facing several more. She's begging me with her eyes to save her, to find a way to get her out. And I can't think of a goddamn thing I can do. I can't look her in the eye. I drop my gaze to the floor.
That's when I got my idea. A desperate and crazy idea, but it was all I had left.
So I tell the Motormaster I agree to his terms. I do my best to ignore this awful, despairing cry Candy makes. The Motormaster tells me to fuck off, and I take a deep breath and phase into the floor.
I stayed phased, floating just below the floor as if it was water. I can't see a goddamn thing, of course, but I can hear some things. I hear the Motormaster walk over to this table, and I hear him drop the gun on it. I hear him grab something from the table. Then I hear him walk back towards Duster. He passes right over me.
I reach up and grab his ankle. Then I phase him--just the foot, and that was tricky, let me tell you, but I did it--and I pull his foot into the floor. I let go of him and leave him there.
So here are two solid objects--the concrete floor and this motherfucker's foot. The latter is phased into the former until I let go of it. Now it's not phased anymore, so what happens? Well, the foot's molecules can no longer pass through the empty spaces between the floor's molecules. The intrinsic field of both objects kicks in again, and you basically have one solid object embedded in another. The problem is, the floor's molecules kind of go, 'hey, pal, we were here first!', and the foot's molecules lose out. They've got the floor's molecules running through them like a lattice work, separating them. Essentially, the bones of the foot can't stay together and become something like powder, and the skin and other tissues are ripped to tiny molecular shreds.
As you might imagine, it hurts like hell.
I'm pulling myself out of the floor like a swimmer out of a pool--and taking a grateful breath, just like a swimmer, because I can't breathe when I'm completely phased inside a solid object--while the Motormaster screams his head off. His shattered foot is trapped in the floor and him with it. I enjoy the screaming until he starts shouting threats. That's when I shut him up with a good, solid kick to the chin. Did I mention I was also my high school football team's place kicker?
I hear Candy moan from behind me and suddenly she's all I care about. I rush over to her and phase her naked body out of that goddamn bondage rig. She collapses to the floor--I barely manage to catch her, and I drop to my knees with her. I ask her what they did to her; she says, 'everything'. Then the horror of it hits her like a ton of bricks, and I'm holding a wailing, weeping, trembling girl while I fight off my own tears. But she's out of danger and back in my arms and that's something, anyway.
A moment later, she pulled herself together. I told you she was strong. She had me retrieve her coat, and I helped her put it on. She got these plastic zip strips out of the coat pocket and had me bind the Motormaster's gang--the ones that were alive. She had me leave the Motormaster himself with his foot still stuck in the concrete. I didn't have a problem with that. After an anonymous phone call to the cops, we were out of there.
I gave Candy a ride home on my motorbike. On the way, I began to feel less and less certain about things. Okay, maybe I'd saved her life, and maybe she was on my bike with her arms wrapped around me, but a lot of things were still unresolved between us. Mainly, I was still a thief, and she was still a superhero. I even began to worry that what she'd been through would just make things worse between us--you know, that it would just reinforce her mission and make her even more hard-assed. On top of which, in light of what she'd endured, I was experiencing one of those few occasions in my life where I was ashamed to be a man.
What, you got a problem with that? Try watching your girlfriend get gang-raped and tortured by a dozen guys and see how you feel afterwards. Pride in your gender won't be one of the emotions you'll experience, trust me.
When we got to her place, I thought that would be it, but she asked me in. Insisted on it, in fact--said she didn't want to be alone. We went to her room, and suddenly she pulled her coat off. I turned around and looked away. It wasn't that I felt disgusted by her--not even close. I just thought the last thing she would want was to have a guy ogling her.
Candy told me to get some of her dad's clothes to wear, because she wanted me to spend the night. I picked out a pair of sweats and a t-shirt while she took a shower. She was in there a long time--so long I started to worry. I nearly phased myself into the bathroom to check on her, but I was still trying to respect her privacy, so I knocked instead. She came out a minute later. She had this haunted look in her eyes, but a tired look as well. I was ready to sleep on the floor or in another room, but she wanted me to sleep next to her.
She snuggled up against me and laid her head on my chest like we'd been lovers for ages. She fell asleep within seconds--poor thing must have been exhausted--but I didn't. I lay there for a long time, feeling her sleeping and breathing against me while I thought things through. Her body seemed to just symbolize the two sides of her personality: I could feel her breasts pressed against me, all soft and vulnerable; but my hand kept stroking her back and shoulders, which were hard and strong.
But the main thing was, it felt good. In spite of the horror I knew she'd gone through, it just felt so good to lay there and feel her next to me. And I knew I wanted to be that way with her every night for the rest of my life. So I made my decisions about things and finally went to sleep.
Even though I fell asleep well after Candy had, I woke up before her. She'd rolled off of me during the night, so I snuck downstairs to make breakfast. I figured after last night, she could do with a little spoiling. I also knew we had one of those big talks coming up--the ones most guys can't stand to have--and I thought anything I could do to put her in a good frame of mind would help my cause.
I almost undid everything again when I went back to her room. I phased through the door--hey, my hands were full--and nearly scared the shit out of her. If I'd known she was awake, I would've knocked. Fortunately, the sight and smell of breakfast seemed to restore her good opinion of me.
The 'big talk', sure enough, came right after we finished breakfast. I won't bore you with the details. She apologized, I apologized, she cried, I held her...you get the idea. There was one weird part...well, maybe not so weird now when I look back on it; maybe 'ironic' is a better word. She told me she was thinking of giving up the superhero gig, which was pretty understandable, but I...I actually talked her into sticking with it. I know, it's kind of unreal, maybe even irrational, given everything she went through. But Duster means a lot to this town, especially to the Roadies who aren't crooks and are just trying to get by. Knowing there's somebody strong looking out for you makes each day just a little easier, you know?
I also told her I was giving up stealing, that I'd give everything I stole back. I didn't know where that was going to leave Danny, but I just couldn't stand it if she wasn't proud of me. She blew me away by offering to get her dad to help Danny. Here I was ready to drop out of school and work my ass off, and she swoops in, problem solved. Is that a superheroine or what?
I made her an offer, too: I said I'd be her partner. I don't want to sound chauvinistic here, because I'd say the same thing about a guy, but I really don't think she should be doing this stuff alone. Hell, I'm doing it with her now, and I'd never want to do it alone! It's fucking scary sometimes, no shit. But it's a little less scary when you know you've got someone watching your back.
Oh, I guess you're wondering if we made up, uh, completely. Well, yeah. We had to be gentle, though...my girl was still hurting from those vicious bastards. Couldn't exactly do the full monty, if you catch my drift, so we found other things to do. What, you want more details than that? Sorry. She's my girl, and that's private. I'll tell you this much, though: she's all better now, and I am one happy--and often tired--motherfucker.
I guess you could say everything turned out okay. The Motormaster and his gang are in prison, where they belong. Danny's on the mend. Candy moved in with me--I know, it's hard to believe this Heights chick is living with a Roadie in this old East side bungalow my parents bought and I'm struggling to pay off. What can I say? It's love. Besides, she's closer to the Road, so there's less of a commute for her and me to go kick bad guy ass every night.
Oh, one other thing: Candy told me she was having these nightmares for a long time, but they stopped right after all this happened. She thinks it's because she lightened her load by postponing the Engineering degree until she's done the one in Science, and because she resolved this inner conflict she was having about being a superheroine.
Yeah, maybe.
I think the nightmares ended because she lived through one, and she survived. I think her subconscious mind gave up on trying to scare her. Because it realized something that I knew all along: that my girl Candy, my heroine Duster--she's fearless.
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