Supergirl (9 page)

STOP I LOVE YOU STOP JIMMY? Or YOU'RE SO FABULOUS STOP I LOVE YOU STOP JIMMY?
Like either one? No? Try
YOU'RE SO FANTASTIC STOP I LOVE YOU STOP JIMMY.

The rest of their gang, in the booth, started yelling their fried chicken orders over to Jimmy. "Hey, Olsen, get me the Fried Chicken Supreme . . . I want a Double Special Fried Chicken with Double Slaw . . ."

Lucy flapped her hands at them. Shut up, you guys! Judging by the shine in Jimmy's eyes, which finally discovered her face, it seemed he was right on the verge of saying something important.

"Lucy . . ."

"Yes, Jimmy?"

"Golly, Lucy. . . I really recommend Chicken Wings Supremo. I'll go get the orders."

This put Lucy in a fairly vicious mood. "Oh, sugar!" she exclaimed, under her breath. Fortunately, a moment later, her good spirits were restored by seeing Linda Lee entering Popeye's. She stood in the doorway, looking like a little well—not exactly
little
—lost lamb.

"Linda, babes! You got here!" Lucy ran up and hugged the taller girl. "I've been looking for you for ages! Did you have any trouble finding the place?"

Linda Lee shook her head. "I smelled it ten miles away, just followed my nose" Lucy laughed, and for a moment, Linda Lee seriously wondered what the joke was. Then she reminded herself that it was Supergirl, and
NOT
Linda Lee, who had super powers. Her slipup bothered her. She had to
be
Linda Lee when she was with Lucy; just be that ordinary Midvale School chum.

"The gang's over there," Lucy said. "And there's Jimmy" She pointed to the counter, where Jimmy was stacking plates of fried chicken up his arm. "Isn't he cute? I'm sure he loves me . . . and I kinda love him right back."

Holding Linda Lee's arm, Lucy brought her over to Jimmy and introduced them. "Lin, this is Jimmy Olsen, the greatest cub reporter and photographer in Metropolis! He works for the
Daily Planet
. And, Jimmy, this is Linda Lee, my roomie that you've heard me talking about so much. Remember, Jimmy? The babe in the woods? Now, you two guys have got to like each other."

Jimmy shuffled the plates of fried chicken and stuck out a hand for Linda Lee to shake. "Little greasy there . . . sorry. . . So you're Clark Kent's cousin."

Linda Lee was embarrassed. "Lucy," she whispered as they walked back to the table, "did you have to tell him that? He'll think I'm a show-off."

"Jimmy's not like that."

They sat down with the other kids. Their booth had a fine view of the highway. As Jimmy doled out the plates of fried chicken, Lucy introduced Linda Lee all around. The names flew by. Jamie, Jodie, Jim, Tim, Joe, and Jam, or was it Pam? "I'll never remember you all," Linda Lee said, blushing a little.

"How about me?" a cute boy named Eddie said. He had blue tattoos on the back of both hands.

"This is strictly not Midvale School stuff," Lucy said into Linda Lee's ear. She winked at Linda Lee. "Party tonight at Eddie's. His folks are away, you gotta come."

"I'm not signed out for an overnight."

Lucy rolled her eyes. "Whoever is? What you do is climb out the bathroom window. Mrs. M.'ll never know; by then she'll be drunk as a skunk. Come to think of it, she's probably already on another planet."

"It doesn't seem right," Linda Lee said anxiously.

Lucy sighed. "Lin, babes, you got it. It's not right. That's why it'll be fun."

Linda Lee nodded. "Oh. Oh! Oh, I see."

"Whew." Lucy fanned her hands in front of her face.

"Thought we were going to have a little trouble getting across there."

In another part of Midvale, Selena was struggling with the Coffer of Shadow, which obstinately refused to open. "Trouble! That's all I have. And why? I ask you, why? What have I done to deserve this? I'll tell you. Nothing!"

"You're, like, right," Bianca agreed.

"Toady. Do you always have to agree with me?"

"You, like, get sorta wild if I don't," Bianca explained reasonably.

"Picky, picky." Selena turned away from Bianca to look at her own much more interesting image in the full-length mirror near her bed. Her very favorite piece in the entire house, the mirror hung in an ornate mother of pearl frame.

Hmmm. She certainly was striking when she got mad. Maybe she should get mad more often. Nigel always said . . . Niiiii-gel! The thought of his name recalled to her all that she had lost—Ethan, the gorgeous, incomparable Ethan! When she thought of all the trouble she'd gone to, slaving over a hot stove to make the love potion, getting Ethan out here, then spiking his beer—all that time and effort wasted. WastedI Ethan was on the loose, as dangerous as a loaded gun, ready to fall madly, desperately, overwhelmingly in love with someone—someone
who wouldn't be Selena
. And all because of Nigel, that so-called warlock,that jumped-up, jumpsuited, jaded Romeo!

Striding around, stopping again in front of the mirror, she cried, "Where did Ethan
GO
? Selena wants to
KNOW
!"

No sooner were the words out than something extraordinary happened. The mirror emitted a strange noise, halfway between a crackle and a buzz, then turned a gaseous, streaky purple, dissolved, and re-formed itself into a screen, on which was none other than the figure of the much-lamented Ethan, staggering down the highway.

Selena and Bianca stared, mouths open.

For two precious seconds, the picture was there in all its Ethan glory; then as abruptly as it had come, it was gone.

"Ethan! Come back"

"Uh-oh, cable's out," Bianca said in a practical, grown-up sort of way.

"Cable, shmable. That's a mirror" Selena frantically started working on the Coffer of Shadow again. "That was magic, damn it. The real McGee!" Selena pried at the Coffer of Shadow, and suddenly it opened, sending her tumbling back. "Bianca," Selena said in a strange, hushed voice, looking into the Coffer of Shadow. "Come here. Look at this—thing. It's growing, isn't it?"

Bianca bent over the box, shielding her eyes from the light of the Omegahedron, which glowed more brilliantly than ever. "Yeah," she said in the same reverent tone as Selena, "like, it's
MUCH
bigger, ya know?"

Breathing hard, Selena slammed the box shut. "Okay," she said, "okay, no one get excited now" She clutched the box. "I want to see Ethan!" she commanded. The mirror crackled and buzzed, then once again slowly dissolved and re-formed into a screen. And, once again, Ethan came into view, weaving up and down the middle of the highway. A car whipped past him, horn blaring. Ethan, his eyes glassy, waved a feeble fist in the air.

In Popeye's, Lucy put down a leg of fried chicken and leaned past Linda Lee to look out the window. "Look at that dingleberry out there on the highway. He is asking to be totaled."

"What's a dingleberry?" Linda Lee said.

"Do you
BELIEVE
this guy?" Lucy said. Jimmy and Eddie joined the girls at the window. Lucy knocked on the glass. "Hey, space cadet, get out of the street."

Ethan staggered around in a circle. Horns honked. Brakes screeched. Drivers screamed furiously. Ethan stumbled on.

Selena held the Coffer of Shadow in both hands. It was definitely heavier. That
thing
in there was definitely growing. Which, she reasoned, could only be good for little Selena. Because if the whatchamacallit inside the Coffer of Shadow was giving her power, then the bigger the whatchamacallit grew, the more power she had. And the more power she had, the happier she'd be. And the happier she was . . . the happier
EVERYBODY
would be. She could see herself now, waving graciously from the balcony of the World Presidential Palace to the applauding mob below. A bigger scene than St. Peter's Square at Christmas.
Selena . . . Selena . . . Long live our Beloved Celestial Ruler Selena! . . .
But she couldn't stay on the balcony too long. Affairs of the world awaited her.
President Selena on her annual worldwide TV address reassured the people . . .

Selena held the Coffer of Shadow out toward the mirror. It had shown her Ethan. Good. But not good enough. "Power that be . . ." Selena intoned, "Power of Shadow . . . now, bring Ethan here to me!"

As he passed a wooden fence, Ethan tried to focus his mind on the signs advertising used trucks and bulldozing equipment. If he could only get something to work right—if not his mind, then his eyes or his legs—he'd even settle for his
ears
doing what ears were supposed to do. Up till now, his ears hadn't seemed to be any worse off than the rest of him, but suddenly they were totally out of control, bringing him the news of a nuclear bomb going off right behind that fence.
Ba-boooom . . . ba-booooooom . . .
Couldn't be anything else making such a racket. He swayed in his tracks, shaking his head. Baboom, everybody go ba-boom. Ethan too.

"Ba-boom," he said sadly, waving his arms.

The fence exploded.

Slats flew into the air. Clumps of dirt erupted, nails and boards sailed in every direction.
Baboooom . . . ba-booooom . . .
Ethan stared muzzily as the maw of a huge monster bulldozer appeared where the fence had been. The bulldozer's steel teeth dripped with weeds and vines.
Ba-boooom . . . ba-boooooom.
The monster machine, unmanned, rolled straight toward Ethan. Foul black smoke jetted out of the exhaust pipe. The machine's jaws gaped open, and as it headed for him, it seemed to Ethan to be alive, purposeful.

Run, he told himself, run fast, Ethan, otherwise your mother's favorite son is going to be in
BIG
trouble. His heart was definitely in the right place, but his legs had other ideas. Still wobbly, they race-walked him away on a spinning, zigzag course. The bulldozer turned, twisted, and came steadily after him.
Ba-booom . . . babooooooom . . .
Ethan crouched behind a car, his eyes closed. If he didn't look, maybe it would go away. The bulldozer lumbered toward the car, its steel jaws open eagerly. Ethan peeked. Uh-oh. He should have kept his eyes closed. This was disgusting. No manners at all. The huge glistening teeth tore into the roof of the car,

crunching and munching like a—well, like a bulldozer out to lunch. What if it wasn't enough of a meal? What if it wanted some dessert?

Ethan stumbled to his feet and ran.

The bulldozer swung around. It dropped the crumpled bit of metal it had been chewing and, ponderously, patiently, its bucket at the ready, moved after Ethan again.

Crowded at the window in Popeye's, Lucy, Linda Lee, Jimmy Olsen, and their friends watched the scene outside, wondering what was going on. Eddie, the boy with tattoos, said he thought they were making a movie. "Great effects"

Jimmy Olsen thought it was more likely a TV docudrama about defective bulldozers. They all looked at him respectfully. Since he worked for a newspaper, he had the inside track on everything.

But then Lucy said, in her positive way, "It's a runaway, I just know it is. That bulldozer has gone bananas." And everybody immediately realized she was right.

Very serious now about keeping his legs pumping, Ethan ran toward a building with a blinking pink neon sign. Sweat poured into his eyes. The sign said, something FRIENDLY something, or was it something FAMOUS something? Ethan, he thought, you could use someone either FRIENDLY or FAMOUS right now, and at full speed he barreled into the out door, which, naturally enough, rejected him (albeit a little harshly), throwing him flat on his back into the street.

Trumpeting its delight, the bulldozer crunched into the wall of a nearby bar, terrorizing the patrons, who spilled pell-mell out into the street. The bulldozer spat the wall out—maybe not well-cooked enough—and turned its whole attention to Ethan. On his feet again, Ethan backed away, backed up. Aw, come on, you don't want me. You want something more solid . . . I don't taste good. Honest. I'm sorta squishy, no crunch . . . not even a little bit crispy. Try that brick wall. . . . He stumbled, backed up two more steps, and fell. The jaws of the bucket opened hungrily.

Selena blew on the mirror screen, then wiped it clean with an edge of her white satin dress. "Way to go," she cheered as the bulldozer scooped up Ethan. "Come on home to Mommy, Ethan baby."

Lucy couldn't stand what she was seeing one more moment. That poor helpless guy with his legs dangling out of the machine's ugly steel mouth! Somebody had to
DO
something, Lucy thought, not for the first time in her life. And not for the first time in her life, Lucy decided that that somebody was her. She broke free from her friends and dashed into the street.

"Lucy!" Jimmy shouted. "Golly, be careful." He ran after her, clicking off pictures like a madman, hoping he'd remembered to load the camera.

Meanwhile, the bulldozer, with the hapless Ethan dangling in its jaws, rumbled toward a gas station. Waiting for the right moment, Lucy made a supreme effort, leaped, and vaulted herself into the driver's seat. She grabbed the controls. Hang in there, guy, she wanted to yell encouragingly, but she never had the chance. The bulldozer crashed into the gas station. Lucy hung on, fighting for control.

At her private screen on to the world, Selena called encouragement to the bulldozer. "Don't let her get away with it . . . fight . . . get that little snip off there . . . Fight, team, fight, rah, rah, rah"

Brave and determined as she was, Lucy was no match for the bulldozer. Like a rodeo horse trying to get rid of its rider, it spun around, bucking and snorting black smoke. It rammed into a display of tires. It knocked over a telephone pole. Wires snapped and popped. Lucy, thrown around like a rag doll, slumped over, unconscious.

In Popeye's, Linda Lee saw it happen. "Excuse me . . . excuse me . . ." She backed away from the other kids. "Excuse me, I feel sick. I can't watch this"

Eddie's eyes rolled up into his head. This wimp was Lucy Lane's friend? He would never understand women.

Linda Lee pushed her way through the crowd toward the back of Popeye's. "Excuse me, please . . . excuse me . . ." She dove into the women's room.