Flyover City! A Novel (with Superheroes)

25. The Adventures of Night Ranger

 It was only a few minutes after 10 pm when I rode over the highway into the north side of the city, past the carnicerias and bakeries and Italian restaurants that had all closed up shop hours before. I locked my bike up on one of the better-lit streets a couple blocks away from the bar. It's hard to maintain superhero cred when you're rockin' a 7 speed.

Off my bike, the night air no longer rushing over me, I was beginning to overheat. I wore a variation of my uniform from the other night  - lightweight military pants, windbreaker (hood up, natch), and orange-tinted goggles instead of the infra reds, which were bulging in the pocket on my thigh. I thought it was best to be ready for action, in case Lilywatt decided we needed to do some impromptu detective work.

The bar was this nameless, dive-y little hole in the wall that Spliff and I came across on a bender one night; a neon "Coors" sign in the barred window the only thing to indicate it's there at all. Walking up the street, I stared to panic, worried that maybe it boarded up since last year. Instead, I found a group of men in bathtub-sized cowboy hats and enormous belt buckles sitting along the tiny bar, mesmerized by the television.

Shit - the big El Blanco match - "High Noon at Midnight", they were billing it. I wasn't counting on the bar being the dusty, immigrant cousin of Jackson's Hole.

The patrons all eyed me suspiciously, but at least the bartender didn't say anything about my outfit. Not to me directly. Not in English, anyway.

At the corner of bar, the dull glow of an open laptop illuminated a sickly-thin Caucasian man, looking only a little less out of place than myself. A tenth of a second worth of eye contact, and he was hiding his clutch of bills beneath the counter.

I sat in a corner booth with my cervesa and a bowl of peanuts, the volume gradually returning to what it must have been before my entrance. On the TV, the masked wrestler entered the ring and sent his robe out into the far reaches of the auditorium with a telekinetic shove.

"Viva El Blanco!" ... "Ole!"

I finished my drink, deciding it was best to just wait outside.

Striding confidently up the street was this gorgeous woman, dressed like she had just come from a funeral for a French new wave film director. Jet-black bob, black heels, black seam up the back of her stockings (I guessed; she was facing me). Just some art school girl heading back to her apartment.

She stopped directly in my path, like was waiting for me to say something. "Night Ranger, I presume?"

After the initial surprise, her cheap shot sunk in. "Huh? I... wait, I specifically said I wanted to meet with Lilywatt herself..."

She pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed, and I finally caught on. What can I say? She took me off guard.

"Oh, right. It's a little busier in there than I expected. Maybe we should find someplace..." I said to the door, as it swung shut.

She waited for her drink at the bar (she was too quick for me to buy it for her) and watched as the enormous, domino-masked Sumo wrestler on TV lumbered up to the ring. "Ooh, that's right. 'Midnight in Mexico City'. This ought to be a good one."

I searched behind the glasses that were surely part of her disguise, for something in her eyes that would indicate sarcasm; I came up empty. "Are you serious? You follow the Powered Wrestling Federation?"

She broke her gaze from the TV, as if suddenly remembering I was in the room, "You have a problem with that?"

"Uh, I guess not" I said, motioning her to a booth. "You do realize it's all fake, though, right?"