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  “Crap, that hurts!” she complained to no one in particular, and looking around quickly she saw that there was no one in the lab.

  There was no one there until the wall through which she had been thrown burst open and the man in the mecha suit followed her. With a single punch, All American Girl sent him back out the same way he had come in, quickly following him as she noticed the building’s roof beginning to sag. Her attacker fired a heat seeking missile, which she snagged out of the air and threw back at him, though it exploded before it was halfway there.

  “You’re starting to piss me off!” she shouted.

  Jumping up and doing a flip in the air, she slammed down feet first on the great robotic shoulder, ripping the right side completely off the machine. Then she reached inside and pulled the controller out, still strapped in his chair.

  Reinforcements for the base’s defenders had arrived. Two platoons of heavy weapons soldiers, armed with shoulder-mounted rockets. They were able to destroy two of the mechanical monsters, but then had to take cover behind a row of tanks as they became the target of the withering Gatling gunfire. Stella grabbed one of the attacking mechas from behind and used it as a club to smash two more, destroying it in the process. From the corner of her eye, she saw Skygirl cutting one in two with her heat vision.

  “That’s got to be handy.”

  Perhaps realizing that the cannon fire wasn’t doing the job, one of the mechas kicked Stella in the back, sending her flying through bulletproof windshield of a hum-vee.

  “That’s it! You’ve had it now, you fricking hump!”

  Climbing down off the hood of the vehicle, she lifted up the front end and reaching underneath, raised the entire hum-vee into the air. With a grunt, she lobbed it high up in an arc that brought it down right on top of two enemies. As a third took aim directly at her, Skygirl dropped down on it, smashing it into a robotic pancake.

  “That’s seven for me. How about you?”

  “I wasn’t counting,” replied Stella. “Hey those two are getting away!”

  Though one of the remaining battlesuits had been partially incapacitated by the soldiers, the other two, both intact, had shot into the air, powered by rockets on the soles of their gigantic feet. While Stella tore apart the damaged one, Skygirl rocketed right through the two escaping mechas, returning to the ground with their pilots slung over her shoulder; the same technique she had used at the beginning of the combat.

  “Well, that was fun,” said Stella as they turned the surviving bad guys over to the army.

  “Who do you suppose is behind all this?”

  “If this doesn’t look like Professor Destruction, nothing does,” said Stella. “He’s all into the robotic battlesuit stuff. But you never can tell. Still, I feel better.”

  “So what now?”

  “Chi-town sausages, girl. That’s what now.”

  Chapter Five

  Turvey Trading Card Co.;

  Windsor Street, New York City;

  “All American Girl, right on time.” The blond secretary in the grey blazer and gold-framed glasses smiled up at her. “I’ll tell Mrs. Dearborn that you are here.

  The executive didn’t keep Stella waiting long. She didn’t even have time enough to sit down in the chair provided before a smiling woman stepped out from behind her office door. Dana Dearborn, although well into her forties, was a very attractive woman with long black hair cut across the front in bangs. Her very businesslike attire extended only to the bottom of her miniskirt, cut well above the knee. Her platform pumps were definitely on the slutty side.

  “How nice to see you again, Stella. Come with me and I’ll walk you down to the studio. Andre has it all set up. I was on the phone with Irving this morning finalizing everything. As you know, we already have you as part of our Up and Coming Heroes series and the Chicks Who Kick Ass series. We thought we’d play a little more to our target demographic this time. We’re going with Hero Pin-ups. Irving said you would be okay with that.”

  “Why not? My costume is only a bit bigger than the typical swimsuit anyway.”

  “We won’t be doing any nudity. After all, we’re really aiming at teen boys. A few swimsuit shots on a beach set and maybe some coquettish poses—you know the stuff, tugging on your lower lip; that kind of thing.”

  They passed through double doors and into the photography studio. A backdrop with a beach picture had been set up and sand toys and inflatable floaties were arranged around it. A chocolate brown man with a faux-hawk was adjusting the lens of an expensive camera on a tripod.

  “Stella!” he squealed when he saw her. “I have been waiting for you, girl. You know this just couldn’t be a real pin-up shoot without that luscious bod of yours.”

  “Thanks Andre. You’re always good for my ego.”

  “I have two different outfits I’m dying to see you in. I picked them out myself. I just knew they would be perfect for you.”

  One of the assistants brought out two swimsuits on hangers. One was an American flag bikini. While decidedly on the skimpy side, it wasn’t much smaller than Stella would choose to wear to the pool. The other was a one-piece which, while relatively conservative on the top was cut down to a thong on the bottom.

  “This one won’t work,” said Stella. “I don’t do thongs.”

  “I think it would look fantastic on you honey,” said Andre.

  “I’ll give you the bikini. I’ll sexy it up by tugging down the side of my bottoms. Hell, I’ll even do the topless, I’m holding my own boobs thing. But I have a firm policy against wearing anything that rides up my ass.”

  * * * * *

  Stella relaxed at the sidewalk café just across the street from Turvy. She was wearing jeans, a white top, and a Cubs cap and could have been any attractive young woman. Her cell phone rang just as the waiter staggered out with a tray containing two chicken Caesar wraps, a steak quesadilla, two bacon double cheeseburgers, an Italian beef sandwich, a walnut-tuna salad sandwich, a cob salad, and a French dip. As he began arraying the food around her, she pulled the phone from her pocket and slid it open.

  “Hello Irving.”

  “Stella baby! Irving is so flattered that you’ve given him his own ring tone.”

  “I didn’t give you your own ring-tone, Irving. I just knew you were going to call me. The Turvy people are pissed that I didn’t wear that suit, aren’t they?”

  “Irving is not their people, baby. Irving is your people. Irving cares about what Stella cares about, and what Stella cares about is being on the New York Times list, and guess what?”

  Stella waited a beat before asking “What?”

  “All American Girl is on the list!”

  “No fricking way!”

  “Yes baby! You are on the list my sassy mega-girl, and not at one hundred either. No, you debuted at number ninety eight!”

  “You’re fricking kidding me! Wait, did somebody die?”

  “Nobody died. Well yes, some people did die, but that’s not why you made the list. You made the list because you kicked the crap out of some power-suited baddies and saved America!”

  “Did Skygirl make the list too?”

  “Yes, Skygirl did make the list and that is what Irving really called about.”

  “Where did she debut?”

  “Skygirl is not important. At least she should not be important, but you are making her important by letting her in on your turf. Chicago is All American Girl’s territory. Why are you letting her steal your thunder, my girl?”

  Stella was silent for a moment.

  “Did you hear me, Baby? Are you still there? Is Irving talking to a dead line?”

  “Yes, I’m still here. Where is she?”

  “She’s number ninety seven.”

  “Damn it!”

  “Irving feels your pain, baby. So why are you letting this chick hang out with you?”

  “It’s just… well, it just kind of happened, Irving. She sort of saved my life and then she was all nice and stuff, and the n
ext thing I know I’m living with her.”

  “Irving understands baby. That’s how it was with his second wife. But you cannot let her steal your thunder. The thunder is yours. It’s All American Girl brand thunder, with all the legal rights and privileges there-of.”

  “Yeah, I get it.”

  “You’ve got to get rid of…”

  Stella closed her phone and then accidently crushed it in her hand. Tossing the pieces down on the table, she looked at the vast array of food. She really didn’t feel all that hungry now—maybe just the two cheeseburgers.

  * * * * *

  Smithson Building Penthouse Apartment;

  Wabash Avenue;

  “I made dinner,” Linda called through the open sliding glass door as Stella landed on the balcony. “I roasted some barbeque chicken breasts and I made a salad.”

  “Isn’t Kansas City famous for steaks?”

  “And barbeque. Don’t worry. I have three breasts just for you?”

  “That’s what she said,” said Stella, kicking off her shoes.

  “How was your fashion shoot? I notice you were flying in your street clothes.”

  “I wanted a little down time, you know, sans costume. And it wasn’t so much fashion as soft-core porn... you know, trading cards.”

  “No, I’ve never done them. Linda was a model for a while, but she just wasn’t flashy enough.”

  “You mean Linda Ford? You? You’re Linda Ford, remember.”

  “Yes, it gets confusing sometimes.”

  “If anybody else starts talking about themselves in the third person, my head’s going to explode.”

  After dinner and a hot shower, Stella stretched out on the couch with a beer, while Linda curled up in a recliner reading a romance novel. Even though she didn’t watch much TV herself, Linda didn’t mind Stella watching it. In fact she kept it in the living room because, it seemed, she didn’t believe in having one in the bedroom. Stella on the other hand liked to watch as she drifted off, but her television had been destroyed along with her old apartment.

  Tanya Everson was on the news.

  “It looks as though Chicago’s own terrific two-some has hit the big time as Both Skygirl and All American Girl appeared on the New York Times top 100.”

  “How exciting is that?” asked Linda.

  “Yeah,” replied Stella unexcitedly, mentally noting not only that Skygirl had been mentioned first, but that she was apparently already one of “Chicago’s own.”

  “What are you going to do tomorrow?”

  “Buy a cell phone and a TV.”

  * * * * *

  Stella slept in the next morning and Linda was already gone when she got up. Pulling on her costume, she did a circuit of the city on her own before stopping at TV Town on Addison. There were dozens of places to buy electronics of course, but TV Town was one of her sponsors and she didn’t want to be seen shopping somewhere else. She picked out a fifty two inch LCD TV and a phone that was more or less like her old one, ordering the former to be shipped to her new apartment, and stuffing the latter into her cleavage.

  As she took off into the air heading east, Stella couldn’t help but notice the police presence in front of Wrigley Field. A barricade had been set up around a parked rental van. A dozen cop cars and the bomb squad van were parked at a distance and more were arriving all the time. A policeman in a bomb disposal suit was just returning to his vehicle carrying a handheld scanner.

  “What’s up?” asked Stella, landing beside him.

  “Fertilizer bomb,” he said, as a police sergeant stepped forward to help him remove his spacesuit-like helmet. The SDI confirms it, though I didn’t doubt Rusty.” He pointed to a basset hound panting happily in the front seat of a patrol cruiser.

  “A bomb like that could take out the whole stadium,’ mused Stella.

  “Why do you suppose they picked today?” asked the sergeant. “It’s not a game day. They could have wiped out thousands.”

  “Stadium security or you guys would have noticed a rental truck coming into the parking lot for a game. Nobody’s at the parking gate now.”

  “There are still forty people more or less working inside. I’ve got guys getting them out. But this thing’s probably on a timer. Who knows when it’s going to go off?”

  “What’s your plan?”

  “As soon as we’re clear, I’m going to open up the back,” explained the bomb tech. “I doubt there’s anything but a timer, but there could be a trigger on the back door or on the ignition. Then again, the asshole could be watching us right now, waiting to set it off with a cell phone.”

  Word came soon enough that the stadium had been cleared and that all the bystanders and police in the area had moved back to a safe distance. The bomb tech put his helmet back on and the police sergeant fastened it down.

  “I’m thinking maybe I should handle this,” said Stella.

  “Can you fly it out of here?”

  “Sure.”

  “Alright, but I’m going over there with you, just in case there’s a motion sensor.”

  The two of them started on the long walk back to the rental truck.

  “I’m Glenn King, by the way.” He stretched out his gloved hand.

  “All American Girl.” She shook it.

  “Yes, I know.”

  When they reached the truck, King walked slowly around it.

  “You’re going to have to get underneath it. I think the thing will be to keep it as level as possible as you lift it into the air.”

  “How high should I go to keep buildings and people on the ground safe?”

  “I’d like to see you at least a mile high, though even then I imagine we’re going to see some shattered windows and the like.”

  “Alright. It’s just a matter of getting high enough then I guess before it goes off. It’s only three quarters of a mile to the lake. Once I get there, I can toss it out to the middle and it won’t matter if it blows.”

  All American Girl lay down on the asphalt and slid under the truck. There were no electronics on the undercarriage and nothing else that looked to be part of a detonator. Spacing her hands equally apart, she pushed upward, raising the truck in bench press. She lifted as high as possible and sat up, and then slowly got to her feet, the vehicle balanced above her.

  “A.G., do you ever date normal guys?” asked King.

  “No,” Stella replied. “But guys who defuse bombs for a living don’t strike me as particularly normal.”

  Stella’s feet left the ground gently, without a push. She flew straight up, higher and higher, until she reached what she judged to be beyond ten thousand feet. Only then did she turn toward Lake Michigan, passing over Sheffield and Halstead and the night clubs, stores, acupuncturists, and churches that lay beyond. She passed high above the giant lead statue of Johnny Liberty in the center of Lincoln Park and then there was nothing below her but the great lake, a few sailboats zipping along in the light breeze. Stella went out to about ten miles from the city, and then stretched her arms back to throw the truck. That’s when the bomb exploded.

  * * * * *

  Skygirl was enjoying the sunlight as she swept in and out of the Chicago skyline. She did a circuit around the John Hancock Tower then dived down to shoot between Aon Center and the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Tower. Then it was three circles around the Whitaker Building. Rolling over onto her back, she floated along and let the alpha radiation soak in. It was a beautiful day. When she heard the sounds of screeching tires followed by a crash, she flipped over backwards to hover right side up and scan the area with her telescopic vision.

  On the street below a van was careening out of control right toward a crosswalk full of pedestrians. Had the driver continued on, he would have mowed down a nun and a young woman pushing a baby carriage. Instead, he tried to turn away at the last minute, causing the car to roll and sending it on a trajectory to crush the nun, the young woman, the baby carriage, half a dozen schoolgirls, two businessmen, and a seventy-eight year old cr
ossing guard. The air thundered as Skygirl broke the sound barrier on her descent toward the street. She passed between the crossing guard and the nun and threw her shoulder into the spinning van. The vehicle came to a sudden and complete stop, wrapping itself around the superhero.

  Skygirl scanned the driver with her x-ray vision. He was injured, but thanks to multiple airbags, he would survive. Pushing aside the jagged strips of steel around her, she suddenly felt very tired. Looking up into the large and toothy smile of the nun, the daughter of Skyman felt beads of sweat break out all over her body. What was that the nun was holding? It was an open bible, but the pages had been cut away to form a secret compartment. And right in the center of the book was a small, crystal clear gem of pure Polarite.

  * * * * *

  Stella woke from unconsciousness when she hit the water. Then she hit the lake bottom, which knocked the air from her lungs. She lay there looking up at the dappled surface above her for a moment before she remembered what had happened. Bomb. Lake. Right. She tried to move and realized that she hurt. A lot. All over. She slowly got upright and pushed herself toward the surface, taking a deep breath when she hit the air. The insides of her lungs burned. Slowly levitating herself out of the lake, she looked around to see if she spotted any damage from the blast. It looked as though she had gotten far enough away from the shore and there were no boats nearby.

  Then it hit her—an overwhelming feeling of nausea. She vomited down into the water. This purging offered no relief however. Her head swam. Then something slammed into it, knocking her back down to the water’s surface. She didn’t know what it was until a pair of powerful hands grabbed her by the neck and she looked into the grinning face of the Atomic Jack-O-Lantern.