2: A Call and a Meeting
Captain Happily Married: The Serial
Last time, we watched as Meg Atomic defeated the Owl Bandit on her way to a mysterious meeting with a man named Hawkins; meanwhile, Super Soccer Mom learned that the Kaboominator superweapon and the Sacred Kneecap of St. Gengulphus had been stolen. This week: we meet our hero at his civilian day job, and catch up with Meg Atomic!
The thing about flying is, it’s not all it’s cracked up to be. Sure, you can soar happily into the wild blue yonder, breaking the surly bonds of Earth and all that, but you’re not all alone up there. You’ve got to look out for birds, bugs, errant lightning blasts, any and all other weather problems, not to mention the definite possibility that a passenger jet might fly right smack into your flight path before you have time to say “Airplane!”
Fortunately, Captain Happily Married wasn’t worrying about any of that today, because today he was on the ground attending to one of the responsibilities of his day job: serving as a substitute teacher amidst the teeming halls of Edison City’s public school system. Today he was assigned to a history class in Henry Halleck High, one of the suburbs, where the normal teacher was absent having fallen into a vat of radioactive waste the previous evening. (It happened; people got used to it).
“Okay, kids,” the Captain, in his civilian identity, began, “Looks like Mr. Warner left off right before World War One. Oh my; what an exciting time period! Well, exciting and traumatic of course; but let me tell you, there’s a lot more that happened that what you might’ve seen on Downton Abbey!”
He paused, but was only met by bored stares and a few ironic snorts of laughter. More than a few of the students weren’t even listening, as they already had their phones out. Some were attentive, and he was about to plunge in regardless for their sake when his phone buzzed. It wasn’t the usual buzz. It was the particular coded buzz that meant superhero business was going.
“Ah,” he said, “Fortunately, Mr. Warner seems to have left a helpful video to explain it.” He quickly wheeled out the cart and within moments had a lovely documentary about the First World War going. “I’m just going to step out for a moment and…see if everything’s okay with your usual teacher, all right? Roll film!”
Within seconds, he was out of the school and away, soaring off as Captain Happily Married. “Super Soccer Mom, I received your call? What dire emergency threatens our city?”
“Not the city,” she said. “Us. The Kneecap’s been stolen.”
The Captain froze mid-flight. “But…it was in Vault Site B! They said that place was impenetrable!”
“Evidently not,” Super Soccer Mom replied, her voice hard-edged. “They got the Kaboominator too.”
“Son of a mailman!” Captain Happily Married exploded. “We’ve got to find them at once! Not only are our powers imperiled, the very world is in danger!”
Little did he know that he was already too late.
“So,” Hawkins said, sliding into his chair, “You want coffee?”
“No,” Meg Atomic said, “I’d rather just get it over with.”
“Fine,” he said. He clicked around a minute on his computer. “The mic in front of you there is active now. I’ll go first and then you’ll proceed.”
“Fine,” Meg Atomic repeated tiredly. She almost reconsidered the coffee. It was going to be a bad day.
He slid the computer aside. “This is Special Agent Peter A. Hawkins for the Department of Engagement with Risk-Enhanced Persons, file 102.22023, and I am here with a superhero who goes by the moniker Meg Atomic. Ma’am, can you please state your full civilian name for the record, please?”
“Margaret Amelia Case.”
Hawkins made a note. “Thank you. And can you state why you’re here today?”
She took a long, shuddering breath and closed her eyes. “Because… because the Kaboominator either is or will be stolen, and my father will go after it, and when he does, it’ll destroy the world.”
Hawkins didn’t even blink. After all, he’d heard this before. “And you know this how?”
“I’m Meg Atomic,” she said sadly. “I can calculate probability futures out to the next decade. I’ve been banned from every chess league on the planet and I don’t know how many other strategy gaming leagues as well. Believe me. I’m not wrong.”
“What if it hasn’t been stolen?” Hawkins asked, more out of curiosity than anything else. He’d already been handed a flash bulletin which said that it had. Along with another object Meg hadn’t even mentioned.
“That’s irrelevant now,” she said, wiping a hand across her bleary eyes. “I’ve seen the outcomes, remember? There’s some where you ask me if I want coffee, some where I don’t. No correlation. None that I’ve seen so far, anyway. Haven’t had time to do all the math yet. But in every possible scenario where you ask about coffee, it’s already been stolen. So there it is. The Kaboominator’s out there, and my father’s going after it, and if he does, the world explodes.”
Hawkins felt unnerved. This wasn’t how he’d expected this to go. “Well, then…then…”
“Now you’re going to ask me what to do about it,” Meg said calmly. “I have a suggestion. Why don’t you ask me about what else was stolen?”
“What else?” Hawkins repeated suspiciously.
“Yes,” Meg said, closing her eyes again. “There’s only one other thing related to us in that vault important enough for someone to make off with, and that would be the Sacred Kneecap. We’re going to have to find it, and we’re going to have to smash it.”
Thank you for reading! For prior episodes and other stories in the world of Edison City, check out the Index page here.
He started out as a high school student, so that was a logical jump.
"Son of a mailman!" I love that.
Interesting that the Captain is a teacher in civilian life. I know of a couple other fictional ones in that job also...