Chief of Police Stone Bachman ran up in a short-sleeved black shirt and a pair of jeans. “There you are. They’re waiting on you.”
“Just a moment, I’m taking steps to make sure my time at the fundraiser is not interrupted by crimes.”
The chief sighed. “We have two extra cars patrolling the area.”
“We need to be sure. I’ve seen all the warning signs around the city. I thought if I could put a few up here, I could get criminals to stay away during the fundraiser.”
“Signs? What signs?” The chief turned to the bakery behind them. “Oh, I see. ‘No Crime allowed,’ eh?”
“I put one on that vacant shop.”
The chief strode over to it “Thank you for not stealing cars.” The chief chortled. “Nice.” They marched down to the jewelry store and glanced at the white sign on its door. “This is a crime-free zone.”
On the shop at the end of the block was the last sign. Bachman smiled. “No Crime. Violators will be punished at their own expense.”
“So what do you think?” Powerhouse grinned and rubbed his hands together.
“I guess it’s an interesting experiment in criminology.” The chief laughed. “If it makes you feel better by all means. Just have them down after the fundraiser.”
“Thanks, Chief.” Powerhouse slapped the chief’s back. “Now, to the fundraiser!”
###
Powerhouse lowered the captain’s chair containing a fortyish woman with medium-length blonde hair. The crowd applauded. The grinning woman stood beside Powerhouse. A volunteer professional photographer took a picture of them.
She shook his hand. “Powerhouse, thank you.”
“It was a pleasure, citizen.” Powerhouse walked away to where Naomi was standing, wearing a white sleeveless dress with a red zigzag pattern.
She beamed. “So how has it been?”
“No one’s complained.” Powerhouse shrugged. “I guess it works.”
Pastor Leticia Jones stood with a mobile microphone in her hand and waved to the crowd. “Hey, ya’ll. Is this a fundraiser or what? This beat everything we expected. This community is ready to take back our city and bring light into the realm of darkness.”
The crowd cheered.
“We only need one more ride with Powerhouse and we’ll have the money for a down payment for a new church where a drug dealer used to live. Anyone want a ride?”
A seven-year-old girl near Powerhouse tugged on a thin woman’s baggy dark gray wool coat. “Mummy, can I go up with Powerhouse?”
The thin woman also spoke with a British accent. “Dearie, it’s a thousand dollars. With our medication, we have to watch our pennies.”
Her daughter lowered her chin and frowned. “Okay, Mummy.”
Naomi looked at them and over at Powerhouse.
He nodded. Go ahead, Naomi.
She smiled at the girl’s mother. “I’d be happy to pay for your daughter.”
The woman sniffed. “Madam, I don’t take charity.”
“It’s not. It’s something I want to do not just for your daughter, but for the city.”
“Fine.” The woman reached into her wallet. “I insist on paying $200 of it. My ex-husband finally got a new job and made good on my alimony. I think he’d find some irony in his money going to help build a church.” She handed Naomi money but kept her eyes down.
Naomi nodded. “Okay, your $200 and my $800.”
Stomach tied in knots, Powerhouse shifted from foot to foot. When do they stop negotiations and I start flying?
“Thank you. I’m Rebecca Farrow.” She extended her hand.
Powerhouse arched his eye brow. Mitch Farrow’s ex-wife?
Naomi shook Rebecca’s hand. “You’re welcome. My name is Naomi.”
The women walked over to the pastor and handed her their money.
Powerhouse bent down by the girl. “Hello, honey. What’s your name?”
She beamed. “My name is Rosalyn, but you can call me Rosie, Powerhouse.”
“Rosie, let’s go for a ride.” Powerhouse flew up into the Seattle sky with Rosie in his arms, past the ocean and mighty skyscrapers.
Rosie pointed at the old Ross Insurance building and read the sign. “El-Door-ado. My daddy works there. Can we go see him?”
Her daddy really was Mitch Farrow? Wow. Well, if the jerk had such a sweet daughter, he couldn’t be all bad. “He may be busy working in a big office, but we can fly by his window. What floor is he on?”
###
Mitch tossed the newspaper on his desk and cursed. “Here I’m trying to get skepticism and cynicism up and along comes Mr. Goody Good and starts this thing in my own backyard.” That and the anonymous ‘God bless’ guy doing all the random acts of kindness had to be stopped.
Mitch paced. Powerhouse was a sadistic, evil spreader of medieval fairy tales, a cruel false prophet of non-existent hope. He’d put an end to him one way or another.
Someone was tapping on his window. Clumsy window washers.
Mitch spun and gasped. “Rosie!”
She waved at him, her gaunt body ravaged by the disease he’d given her. He clinched his fist. Did Powerhouse dare taunt him with the pain he’d caused? That smile. It was the result of false hope from her mother, the cruelest thing in the world. Her only real hope lied in the invasion that would bring a cure for Rosie and all like her.
He turned away from Rosie. It was too painful to look at her. He had to bring this thing to a head to save her. He had to focus. He pressed a button on his desk. Electronic curtains closed and Rosie’s heartbreaking face disappeared from the window.
He took a breath and dialed a number. “This is the Pharaoh. I need to talk. We have a problem.”
###
Outside the window, Powerhouse clutched Rosie to his chest. She sobbed uncontrollably. Powerhouse scowled at the closed shutters. What kind of heartless creep could treat a sweet little girl like this?
Rosie craned her neck toward Powerhouse. “Why doesn’t my daddy love me no more?’
“I don’t know what’s wrong with him.” Powerhouse shook. He was the most powerful man on Earth, second only to Zolgron, but there was nothing he could do to fix her heart. Except pray. Lord, you can help Rosie. I don’t know how, but please help her.
Rosie touched his shoulder. “Powerhouse, can I go back to my mom?”
Powerhouse clutched Rosie tight to him. “Sure thing, honey.”
Powerhouse will return with Captain France and Major Speed in Powerhouse and Rise of the Robolawyers: Coming December 2012
A Special Preview of Powerhouse and the Rise of the Robolawyers
~Chapter 1:
The Secret Weapon~
1957
Major Joshua Speed burst through the garage door of the dimly lit warehouse, leaving a hole his shape. Speed frowned and scanned the place with his supervision. The warehouse piled high with crates. Finding Leopold was going to be a job. That Commie spy had probably hidden in a hole with the rest of the rats.
Speed blinked in the same space of time as he moved fifty yards to the center of the warehouse, surrounded by hundreds of crates. “All right, Leopold. I know you’re in here. I can tear this building apart. You and your comrades aren’t going to destroy this country. I’m going to find you sooner or—”
A beam of light blinded Major Speed. He raised his arms and squeezed his hands into fists, firing his electric gloves. It was no good, the energy was dissipating. A spark flew from the left glove as it shorted out. Major Speed pushed down with his magnetic boots, but they wouldn’t stick to the Earth.
He slammed into the side wall, and the shock spread like a tidal wave through his body. The energy pushed him in—into what? Into the side wall? No, this wasn’t something solid. He was being shoved into nothing.
Major Speed flailed against the oncoming oblivion. He couldn’t feel his legs. He twisted until he couldn’t do that either. He closed his eyes. “Christ have mercy.”
###
Big Ra
lph’s bottom flowed over the edges of his stool in a diner a mile from the warehouse. The four foot eleven crime boss shoved a forkful of spaghetti into his mouth.
Beside him, Little Louie wore a brown rumpled suit on his skin and bones, fit onto his stool with room to spare, and was around seven feet tall. Little Louie glanced down at Big Ralph. “Boss, what was that thing you used on Major Speed?”
Big Ralph shrugged. “Don’t know.”
Louie blinked and rubbed his head. “You whacked Major Speed and you don’t know how?”
Ralph glanced around the empty restaurant and leaned toward Louie. “I bought it from a rogue Ruskie. Back when Stalin was in power they executed a scientist, thinking he was a dissident. He left behind an invention, but they had no idea what it was, other than it wasn’t part of their defense plan. The rogue got it out of a warehouse and sold it to me for fifty g’s. I only got it so cheap because he couldn’t make any guarantees.”
Louie's eyes widened. “You didn’t know what it would do?”
Ralph shoveled another spoon full of spaghetti into his mouth. “Nah, he said it might even blow itself up.”
Louie’s eyes widened. “Boss, you didn’t tell me that before you had me fire it!”
Ralph reached up and slapped Louie’s shoulder. “It worked. Why worry you?”
Louie smiled. “Gee, that was nice of you. So what is Mr. Dorado giving us?”
Ralph twirled Spaghetti on his fork. “He’ll give you an RCA color television.”
“Wow, boss! Now I can watch Superman in color!”
Ralph glowered. “Don’t you see anything ironic about that?”
Louie scratched his head. “What’s ironic mean?”
“Skip it.” Ralph cleared his throat. “My reward is I’m going to get set up in politics. He said I’ll be a Congressman or Governor in a few years. Maybe President, but that might be asking too much.”
“You got rid of Major Speed forever and ever. You deserve it.”
“I don’t know if I did.”
Louie scratched his head. “Boss, we saw him disappear.”
Ralph took a bite of meatballs. “The Russkie said it might not disintegrate him. The scientist was trying to create a fifty or sixty year time warp. I’ll be dead by then, though, so Major Speed will be someone else’s problem.”
Louie grinned. “Boss, you’re thinking like a politician already.”
###
Major Joshua Speed ran through the nothingness of the limbo that surrounded him. It was like he was inside a transistor radio with all these circuits.
A shining portal opened up. Here's hoping this leads somewhere good. Major Speed dashed into it and ran through the blinding light in his solid blue costume.
He emerged back in the warehouse. A man stood in a T-shirt with writing on it, had a gun in a hip holster, and was sitting. He had plastic black things stuck in his ears and tiny black ropes leading from the little things in his ears. The little lines disappeared into the guy’s pants’ pocket. His face and ears were covered in piercing like a pagan.
He ran over to the pagan and pulled the gun out of the pagan’s holster.
The pagan swore.
Major Speed glared. "Who are you?"
The pagan swore again.
Major Speed grabbed the pagan by the shoulders and lifted him. "Where's Leopold? What was that trick you pulled on me?"
"I don't know any Leopold." The pagan swore again.
"Leopold is taking his orders right from Moscow. I don't know what he's paying you and your fellow tribesmen, but it doesn't pay to help the Commies."
The pagan blinked and cursed. "Dude, what are you talking about?"
Could this guy really be that oblivious? Major Speed glanced at the man's T-shirt and focused on the writing. Bumbershoot Festival 2012.
"2012?" Major Speed gasped.
"Let him have it!" the pagan shouted.
A jolt of electricity shot through his back and filled his body.
He screamed Where was that coming from?
The world fell out from underneath him.
###
Mitch Farrow scowled. "He's got to die."
King Bel's shining visage smiled through the viewscreen on the back wall of Farrow’s office. "Mr. Farrow, first of all, when you are in the presence of the king, you must remember to kneel."
Farrow sat in front of the webcam. "I'm not in your presence."
"Even if you're talking on a view screen."
This whole king thing was going to be hard to get used to, but if it meant curing his ex-wife and daughter of the deadly disease he'd given them, so be it. Farrow kneeled before the screen. "Forgive me, your majesty. I'm new to the protocol."
Bel smiled. "The people of your planet will all learn how to treat a king. Now, what is your request, Farrow?"
"I have to destroy Powerhouse. He is not only very powerful, he's beginning to create a sense of hope. Right now his activity is limited to Seattle, but it's gonna spread as soon as someone gets a good viral video of him."
Bel grimaced. "We can't have such evil trash menacing our streets, creating such cruel false hope. Talk to Dr. Fournier. His technology will be at your disposal."
"I'll contact him at once, your majesty. In the meanwhile, I'll unleash the most horrific weapon I have."
"And what's that?"
Farrow smirked. "A lawyer."
Bel bellowed laughter. "Fournier's weapon may be less severe punishment."
Mitch bowed his head. “Thank you.”
"You're learning."
The monitor went blank.
###
Mild-mannered stay-at-home-dad Dave Johnson sat on the sofa across from his wife Naomi and smiled at the check as he and Naomi sat watching television. "Hey Naomi, take a look at this before I deposit it. This is the biggest check I've ever seen."
Naomi stared at it. "I've seen bigger, but I work at a mortgage company. For personal revenues, this is really nice." She frowned and dropped the check on to lap of her jeans. "This check is from Blue Cat Comics and is made out to you for Powerhouse's royalties. Do you see a problem with this, Mr. Secret Identity?"
Yes, a huge one. Dave sighed. "I couldn't figure out how they could pay me without getting my name in the system. Their Chief Accountant knows, but that's it."
"You should have incorporated."
Dave laughed. "Whoever heard of a Superhero incorporating?"
"Whoever heard of a Superhero getting $50,000 per quarter or helping build churches and community centers? How are you handling the proceeds for the toys?"
"All going to charity, Naomi."
She shook her head. "Only because you don't want someone else having your true identity. That one guy is dangerous enough. What do you know about him?"
"Um, he's an accountant."
Naomi's eyes widened. "He could be blackmailed or become an embezzler."
"Well, he knows now. I can't make him forget it. The only way Superman could do that in the movies is by kissing them. He's definitely not my type."
"Very funny. He hasn't told so far, but as long as you're paid personally, somebody else could find out. Besides, you could use a business manager and the corporation could pay both of you. I mean, there are going to be a lot of details. You'll need to start a foundation so people can send you non-profit donations for your charity work. There will probably be a movie, other endorsements, personal appearances."
Dave put up his right hand. "I'm a superhero not a baseball player. Any thing extra that will take more time away from crime fighting and the family is out unless I can't help it. Besides, who could I find that I could trust with my secret?"
"Someone who already knows, silly."
“Hmm, tempting.” Dave sighed. "No, I can't see Agent Polk leaving the FBI."
Naomi tossed a cushion his head. "Me, you dork." She cupped her hands over her mouth and then uncupped them. "I'm sorry for calling you a dork."
Dave raised his left eyebrow. "But Naomi
you've won all those awards at work, you're one of the best employees they have."
"Yeah, I have a room full of trophies and great benefits, but a meaningless job. The company may care if I close another mortgage or so, but what Powerhouse does matters and I'd like to be part of. You're making more than we used to combined, so we could make this work. In addition, incorporation would protect you from liability."
"Liability?"
"Yeah, you know how crazy people are about suing. If they want to sue for something you did as Powerhouse, they could take everything. However, if you're working for Powerhouse Incorporated, they can only sue the corporation."
Dave shook his head. "Now who is mixing fiction up with reality? No one has ever sued a superhero in real life. That only happens in the Incredibles or on that one episode of Lois and Clark."
On the television, a female anchor said, "In other news, a lawyer is publicly offering to take lawsuits against Powerhouse. Our Dick Matabyas has details."
A male reporter stood with a microphone. "Seattle-based Attorney John Jordan says Powerhouse is getting away with far too much. He will soon be offering the option of suing Seattle's champion."
The screen cut to a tall thin man standing at a dais. "I'm here today to announce that Powerhouse will no longer be able to get away with committing actionable offenses. I will help those who have been harmed by this so-called 'do-gooder' to be compensated. I will stand by the little guy who wants to sue that big tin-plated bully."
Dave's eyes widened. For what?
Naomi crossed her arms. "You were saying?"
Find out what happens next in Rise of the Robolawyers (Now available where good ebooks are sold.)
About the Authors
Mild-Mannered Goofball and recovering journalist Adam Graham is a strange visitor to Earth whose ancestors hailed from Scotland and Ireland. With his amazing powers of wit and poignancy, he writes science fiction stories appearing in Residential Aliens, Light at the Edge of Darkness, and in the Laser & Sword e-zine, and he writes a political column that appears on pjmedia.com. With his astonishing ability to pack twenty six hours into twenty four, he is the host of the Truth and Hope Report podcast, the Old Time Dragnet Radio Show, the Great Detectives of Old Time Radio, and of course the Old Time Superman Radio Show. Our hero does all this with the help of a Journalism Associates degree from Flathead Valley Community College and his auburn-haired leading lady, Andrea.