Identity Thief

"Decay?" she asks. "Like my skin is gonna get all icky?"

It's painfully obvious that I'm not known for being comforting. Still, I try to soften my voice to calm her down.

"You probably have three days before that happens," I say in almost a whisper. "A lot can happen in three days."

"Why me?" she cries. "Why did this stupid thing have to choose me?"

"I think it has a sick sense of humor," I suggest. "You know, the commercials you did for Paragon Card?"

Superheroes don't make any money superheroing. It's the endorsements that get them rich. Glamor Girl's schtick was that she kept changing costumes, even though there was barely enough thread in any of them to really consider them outfits. Still, Paragon Card had a successful ad campaign where Glamor Girl would say that no matter what she was wearing, her credit card always knew it was her. There was no way it could be compromised.

If the Identity Thief is capable of irony, this girl would be the perfect target.

"No! This can't be happening," she cries. "This has been the worst week. My application to join the Centurions has been rejected. Captain Champion broke up with me. And now I'm being possessed? Wouldn't I know if that kind of thing was happening?"

"It's already happened," I tell her. "I don't think you're even you anymore. You're just the Identity Thief thinking it's you. I'm sorry."

"What can I do?" she asks.

"Well we can maybe put you in cryogenics," I suggest. "That means freeze you so the Thief doesn't have a chance to destroy you and multiply. Dr. Royko has promising research in transferring consciousness into robotic bodies."

"I hate cold weather and there is no way I'm gonna be a robot," she cries. "So what else is there? Do I have to kill myself in order to kill the Identity Thief so it never hurts anyone again."

I just stare into her gorgeous gold-blue eyes. It's what we're both thinking and probably the only solution. But I'm not going to suggest it.

"You know, I haven't done too much heroic stuff," she sobs. "Not compared to a lot of people. I took enough martial arts and gymnastics to pass for a superhero. I've got the looks and was able to play the social media well enough for me to get famous without really having to do a whole lot of fighting. When I did, I made sure I teamed up with other heroes who did all the work. But now I have the chance to do something truly heroic, right? But it means dying."

She walks to the edge of the building. I almost tell her to stop but it has to be her choice.

"The city's beautiful isn't it?" she asks. I walk beside her and, as much as I hate Century City, I have to admit she's right. Some of the buildings are actually living creatures and they give off their own bio-luminescence. Flying cars, flying people and even flying cats dot the skyline. The sky lights up in brilliant colors as matter and antimatter clash above us in a brilliant display.

"Our problems seem so small from up here, don't they?" she asks.

"That's, um..deep," I say. I really don't know how to comfort this girl.

"And it's made me decide, I've got so much to live for," she faces me and smiles. "I've got the will to live and I'm gonna live. I'm not gonna throw my life away no matter what the circumstances. If that makes me some kind of coward then so be it. I'm not going to sacrifice all I have to offer the world to stop one silly supervillain. They've got flu shots, right? Maybe a flu shot will cure me."

Who knows what happened next. Maybe she had a change of heart and jumped? She had been so stricken with grief at her breakup that she was planning on jumping anyway. She lost her balance in those ridiculous high heel boots she wears as part of her costume.

Or just maybe I pushed her.

I am not going to mention that last suggestion when I report her death. But I'm so sick of these damned entitled flash-in-the-pan no-talents getting all the glory when I know what it's like to face true evil and death in the face. I've had to bury so many of my fellow officers killed in the line of duty. The long nights I spent awake trying to drink the memories out of my brain. The many relationships that ended as my job drove me crazy.

I was an officer of the law, not some carnival sideshow. Yet it wasn't until I started dressing up like a damned bird that anyone started to notice me.

"There's no such thing as an Identity Thief, Joan!" I shout to Glamor Girl as she shrieks and clutches at empty air. I want to smile but I feign a horrified expression in case someone with telescopic vision just happens to see her fall.

But they don't. The superheroes that fly across town are too busy thinking of themselves to care about anyone else. I walk away happy in the thought that tonight there's one less of them.