Flyover City! A Novel (with Superheroes)

14. "Colorado's Own Heroes"

5 am Monday morning: The sky was pitch black, the streets abandoned, just as it is in so many other cities at that time, this far inland. Empty, like an amusement park during the off season. Skyline, cheesy public art works, lonely patio chairs - all waiting patiently for the unsung carny who shows up every morning, to turn on the lights and admit the day's visitors through the gates.

The air all around me was cool, but there was no wind resistance to the contours of my body as I ran.

Got that? "I ran". Not "I was running" not "I went out for run yesterday". Verb and noun melt together. No shower. No coffee. And yet... I ran.

I'm not sure what woke me up. I was perfectly comfortable in bed, no dreams that I can remember. I have the vaguest memory of tying my shoes, but next thing I knew I was out the door. My body didn't even fight me, the way it normally does when I head to the gym after work. Maybe the whole thing was my body's idea, to sprint out of Capitol Hill, and race downtown into the city proper.

The buildings called to me, cheering me on. I passed the construction site where the new Colorado History Building is being built, tunnels honeycombing into unknown, un-tested depths. Like a metaphor for my life.

My workouts are starting to take effect. I'm lucky; I've always been in better shape than I've had any right to be, what with all my smoking and partying. But I wasn't even thinking about that, right then. I wasn't planning out my costume (I'm thinking those goggles, like all the goth kids wear), or weighing the pros and cons of losing another ten pounds, versus gaining 20 more (of pure, lean muscle). My mind was empty, but hyper-aware. Clear.

Out the corner of my eye, low to the ground, I saw a humanoid face, crouched among the newspaper boxes. Angry, determined eyes peering out from behind a ninja's mask.

Not flesh-and-blood. Newsprint. And it wasn't even a photograph, just an artist's rendition. Figuring that out, that's when I lost my focus, and bashed my hip into that bench.

I buckled over into the grass in front of the state capitol, alternately panting and hissing curses from between my teeth. I pulled myself back out onto the sidewalk, to see the cover of a discarded Westword. I already knew what it was going to say.

"Colorado's Own Costumed Crusaders." Christ.

Ignoring the throbbing in my hip, I sat down on the bus bench and read the entire story from beginning to end.

Hoo boy. Now, it's not that I need to be Denver's only hero. I don't need that kind of pressure. I don't even need to be the first. But the article was basically a (well-deserved)tongue in cheek hit job on a couple of overzealous teenagers. Eagle Scouts with badges in Kung Fu, apparently on some big "Just Say No" anti-drug crusade.

So now, I won't just be fighting the public's initial skepticism about me; I'll be fighting against whatever impression "Wall Creeper" and "Zen Blade" leave. Who's gonna accept me as a hero, if these dorks' "patrols" consist of harassing the bums sleeping down by the Platte River, seven nights a week?

The moment was gone; I didn't feel like running anymore. And my bruise was already starting to sprout into the yellowish-purple blossom it is now. I needed coffee, but didn't have my wallet with me.

Which meant Starbucks. Nora was always good for a cuppa, gratis. Besides, I'd sort of been avoiding her since that night. Stopping in to say hey was really just the right thing to do.