At a back booth in The Pirate Punch Bowl, The Steamer, dressed in his usual attire of blue fishing bib overalls, shirt, rubber boots, and fishing mask, looks at the clipboard in his hand, and says, "Well, I don't think we'll wait any longer. I contacted everyone in the area on the real-life superhero list, and got ten responses but it's past eight o'clock and it looks likes only the five of us are going to show."
"Typical, they want to look cool on the Internet and pretend they're superheroes, but when it comes time to break some bones, they're nowhere to be found," says Dead Boy, dressed like a 1977 punk rocker with leather jacket and spikes, his face caked in white makeup.
He chugs the rest of his beer and stands up.
The Steamer coughs and says, "Well, I hope nobody gets any bones broken tonight, Dead Boy."
Dead Boy heads towards the bar.
"Dead Boy?" The Steamer says, as Dead Boy walks away.
The Steamer turns back to the rest of the group, "Well, he'll be right back, I'm sure. In the meantime, I'd just like to thank you all for coming. Even though I'm sure we're all making a difference in our individual communities, we might someday face a situation bigger than any one of us could handle. That's why I thought it might be a good idea to meet and discuss forming a group."
"What kind of joint is this? It looks more like where the criminals would hang out than where we would," Chip-Chop says, dressed in her gold designer hip-hop costume and mask, with her sword leaning against the wall, as she looks around at the ramshackle bar, with emphasis on the "shack" in "ramshackle".
"Well, it was a central location for all of us, plus it's in a bad neighborhood that maybe we could patrol together afterwards, you know, to see if we all get along," The Steamer says, smiling as Sailwing the parrot flies past.
Dead Boy comes back with a fresh beer and slides back into the booth. "Did I miss anything?" he says.
"We were just introducing ourselves," The Steamer says.
"I think I know everybody except the guy with the wig on his face," Dead Boy says.
The Coyote sticks out his left hand, "I am The Cleaveland Coyote."
Dead Boy shakes hands with The Coyote and laughs, "Well, I'm glad you have Cleaveland in your name. That way I won't mix you up with The Coyote from Detroit."
"There is a Coyote in Detroit?" The Coyote asks, puzzled.
"He's joking, Coyote," Tugboat says, sitting beside The Steamer and dressed similarly to him, except her dominant color scheme is yellow.
"Well, I'm glad you didn't add Cleaveland to your name, Steamer," Dead Boy says, chugging the rest of his beer.
"Ha, ha, like we've never heard that one before, DB," Tugboat says, and The Coyote would guess that Tugboat's annoyed, but her face is obscured by the mask, which also muffles her voice a bit, so it's hard to tell for sure.
"Well, anytime you want to do one, let me know," Dead Boy says, putting his bottle down on the table.
"We're sort of an item, Dead Boy. You know, Steamer and Tugboat?" The Steamer says.
"Oh, sorry," Dead Boy says as he gets up to get another beer, "Anyone else want anything while I'm up? Chip-Chop, you're single, right? You want a drink? No? Anyone else?"
"Uh, no," The Steamer says, "I make it a policy to never go out on patrol intoxicated."
"Suit yourself," Dead Boy says, as he heads for the bar, "I usually bring a six pack on patrol myself. That way, when it's all gone, I know it's time to call it a night."
"His patrols must last about ten minutes," Chip-Chop says, shaking her head.
"Well, back to business. The first item on the agenda I thought might be our name. I have an idea. How about The Justice Society Of Ohio?" The Steamer says.
"That's a swingers group, I think," Chip-Chop says, "I bet Dead Boy would know for sure though since apparently he came here looking for another kind of superhero teamup than the rest of us did."
"Seriously?" The Steamer says, "Well, OK, how about The Justice League Of Ohio then?"
"I think that's a victims' rights group," Chip-Chop says.
"OK, how about The Cleaveland Crusaders?" The Steamer says, crossing names off his clipboard.
"Some of my family is Muslim. I don't think they'd appreciate me belonging to a group called 'The Crusaders'," Chip-Chop says.
"How would they know?" Tugboat horns in, "Don't you keep your identity secret?"
"Well, never mind, let's just try something else. I want to find a name that everyone likes," The Steamer says.
"How about The Sonic Reducers?" Dead Boy says, returning with a fresh beer.
"Sonic Reducers? What does that even mean?" Chip-Chop says, "How about Vengers?"
"Vengers? What's that?" Dead Boy says, then swigs.
"It's like The Avengers, but there's no 'A'," Chip-Chop says.
"We'd probably get sued. Better not," Tugboat says.
"What about The Fantastic Five?" Chip-Chop says.
"If one of us quits or we get a new member, then we'd have to change the name. That'd be a pain. No, no numbers in the name please," The Steamer says.
"I need another beer," Dead Boy says, getting up, "I'm cool with whatever you want to call it, but I like something that's punk, so if it could have the words 'hate', 'cock', or 'drunk' in it that'd be cool."
"Drunk Cock Haters? That's a terrible supergroup name," Chip-Chop says, "How about something with an 'X' in it, like X-Men or Malcolm X."
The Coyote glances in the mirror beside the booth and sees himself in a dive bar with a booth full of people wearing masks, arguing over what to call their vigilante gang, and begins to think that coming to this meeting may have been a bad idea. These people all seem nuts. Is this how people see him? He wonders why he spends his time fighting crime, when that's the job of the police. Doesn't he have anything better to do?
No, he doesn't have anything better to do.
"How about The Guardians Of The Great Lakes?" The Steamer says, as a gang of bikers wanders in and gets into a fight with Dead Boy, who yells, "Hey, guys! A little help here please!"
Chip-Chop grabs her sword, "Great! I need an arch enemy anyway! Maybe if I scar one of these guys, then he'll fill the bill."
"Yes," The Coyote thinks, "This definitely was a bad idea."
Blog Love Omega Glee is a novel by Wred Fright about two bloggers who fall in love while the world falls apart, which is being serialized on his blog. To start reading from the beginning or read another installment, please visit Blog Love Omega Glee Central on WredFright.Com. If you like what you've read, or you've read all of Blog Love Omega Glee and want more Fright, then please read his first novel, which is available in print and as an ebook.
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