At least now I knew I was as tough as Megaton Man. I had survived being sucked up into the orbiting ICHHL satellite and the subsequent drop back to earth. My government-issued uniform and space helmet had proven their mettle as well. But that didn’t mean I considered myself a full-time megahero—far from it. For one thing, I was never one of those crime fighters who went around wearing her uniform under her street clothes in case she needed to change into her secret identity and save the world on a moment’s notice. I didn’t have one of those world-savior egos. Beat up somebody for cheating on their mid-term? For the most part, my Ms. Megaton Man uniform—along with my cool new visor and other accoutrements—remained safely tucked away in a garment bag in the back of my closet on Ann Street, although this never sat well with my cape, who loathed hibernation mode and yearned to be free.

My focus had to be on my schoolwork. I had some serious studying to do if I wanted to make it back on the dean’s list—that was my top priority for the coming semester. To further complicate things, I now realized I wanted to shoot for a labor studies and urban policy double-major, which meant not only making up for credits blown during my delayed freshman crisis. Now I’d have to add a bunch more new classes—essentially, adding a whole extra year of undergraduate work, making for a five-year degree instead of four, total.

The upside was that Stella—who had started a year after me—and I would both graduate together two years from now. That was cool. Even with raising a toddler, Stella was certain to finish in four years, thanks in part to a few transfer credits she had in her back pocket, and in no small part to the help that Trent was providing in raising their kid. Simon was already walking, and by graduation he’d be in daycare, enabling Stella to move on to the real challenge she faced: grad school. Frankly, I couldn’t see that far ahead for myself, especially in the wake of my own self-created setback, but it was nice knowing Stella and I would be racing toward the baccalaureate finishing line together.

That is, if everything went according to my revised plan. The wild card was that I was now, emphatically, Ms. Megaton Man—and although I hadn’t exactly signed a contract with the government or ICHHL or anybody, I had a feeling being America’s Newest Nuclear-Powered Hero was going to complicate my already hectic schedule. With great megapowers came the increased likelihood that my life could somehow going to get all fucked up, even if I tried to behave myself.

Maybe it was my new persona, or the vulnerable academic position I had placed myself in, but I also sensed something different—a feeling of apprehension—around the Arbor State campus. I overheard classmates—and even professors and staff—remark on various strange sightings and odd occurrences around town. One of these sightings, obviously, was me.

One of the reasons Ms. Megaton Man could so easily be spotted simply had to do with the terrain of southeastern Michigan and metropolitan Detroit, to say nothing of Ann Arbor. The landscape is flat, and most buildings tent to be no more than a few stories—even are skyscrapers are stumpy compared to Megatropolis. There, megaheroes had to leap over really tall buildings, which meant they were so far from the ground pedestrians couldn’t see them. I, on the other hand, was usually no more than fifty or a hundred feet in the air—I could have flown higher, but it just didn’t occur to me. That meant people on the ground could bet a much better look at me than most civilians could of their local megaheroes in New York.

What was amusing was hearing myself described in various ways: as a mysterious flying object spotted in the skies at odd times. For example, I was sitting behind a group of students who whispered about the subject during my Social Theory class:

“It was primary-colored,” one girl said. “It flew over South Quad—at the speed of a rocket.”

“It couldn’t have been a rocket,” said a boy. “It maneuvered like a helicopter—up, down, sideways—on a dime.”

“Our school colors are yellow and blue with accents of red,” said another girl. “Maybe it was one of those blimps promoting football season tickets.”

A blimp? Thanks a lot—my ass is not that fat.

“It was going too fast to be an advertisement—it would have to go slow enough to read to be effective, wouldn’t it? Unless it was one of those subliminal mind-control things.”

In my American Labor History class, there seemed to be some dispute as to whether the object was a man or a woman:

“It looked like a girl to me,” said one guy. “I saw her over the freeway coming down from Pontiac. She was a black chick with burgundy hair.”

“It wasn’t a girl,” said another guy. “She’d have bigger tits. All those female megaheroes have enormous tits”—he motioned with his hand—“I mean tits out to here.”

I tucked my burgundy hair up under my Abyssinian Wolves knit cap and wrapped my jacket around my small chest.

So much for my alter-ego in the popular imagination.

Even more disconcerting to my classmates were the bulked-up guys being spotted around campus since the start of the semester that no one had ever noticed before. These weren’t just your usual beefy athletes—Arbor State University was a Big-Time sports school, after all—but guys with maxed-out, megaheroic physiques. There were even some girls who seemed to be overdoing it at the gym. As I waited tables at the Li’l Drown’d Mug Café, I overheard a group of what I took to be professors talking:

“I hear it’s some kind of military experiment—they actually make these monstrous specimens in a lab.”

“Not our lab. We only give B-12 injections to mice.”

“It’s some new venereal disease that’s going around, I heard. I understand it gives you megapowers, instead of some hideous rash.”

“These megaheroes are a hideous rash—on society, if you ask me.”

“One of my students jumped from a building, convinced they could fly. Turns out they didn’t have Megapowers.”

“Did they have a towel pinned to their shirt? Ha, ha.”

“Were they hurt?”

“Not too badly; it was from a second-story dorm window—they landed in a dumpster on some old mattresses.”

All this talk was making me jittery. All across campus, everyone linked the mysterious flying burgundy-haired girl and the hyper-muscled freaks. I was beginning to believe the link myself—that my little post-firewood sowing-some-wild-oats spree had inadvertently spread the megahero bug I caught from Yarn Man throughout the student body. This despite Dr. Joe’s theorizing that the source of my megapowers was more likely hereditary. But evidence contradicting his assertions was piling up. Perhaps my promiscuous indiscretions had resulted in a sexually-transmitted megahero outbreak. So far, there hadn’t been an increase in reported violence. But what havoc could they wreak if something set them off?

One night, after I got off work at the Li’l Drown’d Mug Café, I made it a point to walk around downtown and across the campus Diag. There were plenty of people out, and I spotted several overly-muscled persons. I got close enough to see their faces; what puzzled me was I didn’t recognize any of them—at least not as people I had slept with in the aftermath of gaining my own Ms. Megaton Man megapowers. Some looked familiar—on a huge campus like Arbor State, it was likely I had been in class with more than a few—but they had all been skinny before—nerdy losers who were not all bulked up and maxed out.

I was desperate for any explanation I could find. I had to know if the phenomenon was related to me; specifically, to my promiscuous sexual behavior in the early weeks of my megahero career. I watched the student newspaper for items, I asked local librarians for their hunches. I even sought out the half-baked speculations of Imelda at Border Worlds Used and Slightly New Bookstore. I dreaded broaching the subject with her—mostly because she’s a weird hippie chick to begin with, but also because she was likely to have formulated some crackpot theory that would be of no help at all. But, I figured, one must hear things—working in a used bookstore.

I found Imelda, with her preternaturally greying hair, granny glasses, and layered skirt, stocking the children’s storybook section when I approached her. She looked more like a Witchy-Poo version of Stevie Nicks than usual.

After a casual greeting and some small talk, I came right out and asked her. “Is it just my imagination, or have you noticed an uptick in bulked-up guys around campus?”

“Omigosh, they’re coming out of the woodwork,” said Imelda. “Some girls, too. Anabolic steroids are a massive social problem—abuse can result in male impotency and other health problems down the road.”

“But it’s more than just guys wanting to look like jocks, don’t you think? Some of these dudes are bigger than Samson ‘Body by Nuke’ McSampson; they’re almost as big as Megaton Man.”

“You’re telling me,” said Imelda. “We discourage them from shopping here anymore; they’re prone to knocking over our displays. There’s one customer who used to come in here all the time—a mild-mannered poet, skinny as a rail. Recently, he became increasingly absorbed with muscle and fitness magazines and books; he’d stand over in that section for hours, getting a hard-on. Then, overnight, he was as big as a house.”

“What do you think is causing it?” I asked, dreading the answer.

Imelda got very serious and leaned in to whisper to me. “It’s all the doing of the Megatonic University.”

“The what?”

“Megatonic University,” Imelda repeated. “The university-within-the-university. It’s an open secret Arbor State University was deeply involved in the development of megaheroes during World War II and throughout the Cold War. They’re a part of the megahero-industrial complex. Rumor has it they’re about to launch a new generation.”

The pit of my stomach sank. Except for the occult-sounding name, Megatonic University closely described what I knew could easily be a reality. After all, the campus was crawling with ICHHL secret agents, and both Megaton Man and the See-Through Girl had been maneuvered to settle here, so that the government could keep an eye on them and their baby. Was there also a greater plan to create more megaheroes—and had my breakout as Ms. Megaton Man really been an accident?

“Is there any documentation on this?” I asked. “Any books on the subject?”

“That’s just it,” said Imelda. “You can’t find anything in the school libraries or archives; It’s all hush-hush. And the few titles we get in here from time to time get snapped up as soon as we set them out on the shelves.”

“What would a university-within-a-university look like?” I asked rhetorically.

“It’s a network of laboratories buried deep under the campus,” said Imelda. “That’s where they manufacture the new megaheroes.”

This kind of suggestion would have sounded completely crazy to my ears a little more than a year ago, except I happened to have just recently come from an orbiting satellite, and lived with a couple of former megaheroes and a talking cat on Ann Street. I was also acquainted with a secret agent over on Detroit Street, and knew a certain Dr. Joseph Levitch who was affiliated with Arbor State and labs here and in California.

“So, you think these big guys are somehow connected to these hidden labs under the campus?” I asked, playing dumb. “Not some kind of sexually-transmitted virus, or anything?”

“I know so,” said Imelda. “Some of our employees have heard you can buy stuff from these labs off the street to make you into a big, bulky megahero. Although I wouldn’t put it past the government to cook up a virus and set it loose in the general population, either.”

I’m not sure what would be accomplished by turning the entire planet into megaheroes with nary a normal man nor woman. But whether it was accidental or intentional, it seemed to be happening.

I located Trent, who was also working in the bookstore, in the History and Political Science sections, shelving Locke and so on. I recounted Imelda’s theory to him.

“Imelda’s given to some wild conspiracy theories,” said Trent. “But it’s entirely possible. I don’t know about cooking up new megaheroes in the lab, but that booster shot I was given is proof that Levitch must have manufactured a recent batch of Mega-Soldier Syrup in some laboratory somewhere. It could very well be right here in Ann Arbor. One of the lab techs could be making some extra profit on the side by selling it to willing parties; that could be the culprit.”

Didn’t Preston say that Samson “Body by Nuke” McSampson used to work for Dr. Levitch as a lab assistant?

I met with Preston Percy in the nearby Li’l Drown’d Mug Café. For no apparent reason, Kozmik Kat accompanied him—not in his usual goggles, cape, and buttons, but in his navy-blue beret, mirrored aviators, and white scarf. He was traveling incognito, or so he thought, which was sure to appear only more conspicuous.

“What do you think is going on?” I asked.

“Dr. Levitch spoke too soon about you not being contagious, obviously, Missy,” said Koz. “I’d say you had the morals of an alley cat, but that would be to slander some very upstanding alley cats I know.

“I resent that remark,” I said. “Besides, I’m not talking to you.”

“That’s no way for a sidekick to treat her senior megahero partner,” said Koz.

“I’m not your sidekick,” I said, “and you’re not mine—you’re just a stupid cat. Go back to Bing.”

Koz turned to Preston “See how dysfunctional we are as a duo? How am I supposed to crack this case when you stick me with a passive-aggressiveness partner like this?”

Preston ignored Koz. “Do you recognize any of these bulked-up people, Clarissa? From when you were on your little sex-addiction tear?”

“None of these dudes were my lovers,” I said. “Or any of the chicks. At least, I don’t recognize any of them—I only went for gorgeous hunks and stone-cold foxes. Of course, it was very dark sometimes; I was hanging out in night clubs and stuff at three in the morning.”

Once again, I expected some kind of lecture—about how I had lost my head at finding myself on the A-list and had totally abused my megapowers. But Preston refrained from expressing moral outrage, since his own lifestyle wasn’t all that different—we do what we have to do to find love. He only remarked, “I know the story.”

“The funny thing is,” I continued, “I do recognize some of these people from some of my classes. But they weren’t jock types. They were scrawny guys—now they’re all beefcakes and then some.”

Koz sipped his frothy caffeinated beverage. “Scrawny like Preston Percy here?” asked Koz. “Now they’re big, brawny he-men. Hmm.”

Preston ignored the jibe. He was one of those unflappable people who seldom reveals anything they know—who plays dumb, in fact—but is more than willing to listen to your every question, only so they can figure out how much of the truth you know.

“I think some of your Mega-Soldier Syrup is leaking from the lab,” I said to Preston. “Some lab technician or janitor or something is selling the stuff to geeky guys who want a shortcut to a Herculean figure. What other explanation could there be?”

“I can neither confirm nor deny exactly where the Mega-Soldier Syrup is manufactured,” said Preston. “But it does sound plausible.”

“You’re damn right it’s plausible,” I said. “You heard what Dr. Joe said about the likelihood of a megahero virus I could be spreading—it’s next to impossible. Besides, my Mama confirmed—my real father was a megahero.”

This was news to Preston. “Your mother told you this?” said Preston. “Did she identify the megahero in question?”

“No, but I think you know and you’re just not telling me.”

“I have no idea,” said Preston. “Honestly, your conception happened a long, long time before I ever was on the job, and I have no concern for history. But getting back to the subject at hand, it can’t be originating in any ICHHL lab. Dr. Joe hasn’t manufactured that stuff since I injected Trent, and all of our inventory is safely under lock and key. We’ve checked.”

“It could be somebody who knows the formula,” said Koz. “But they’d still need a lab.”

“Not necessarily,” said Preston. “If you had the formula, somebody with the chemical know-how could cook it up in a bathtub.”

“Imelda says they’ve been cooking up megaheroes underneath this campus for years,” I said, “various experiments—like Samson ‘Nuke’ McSampson or the Megaton Man series. Or me, or God knows what else you have going on down there now.” I had subconsciously adopted Imelda’s metaphor of a secret university-within-a-university being under the Arbor State campus.

“And who’s Imelda?” asked Preston.

“Some spooky hippie chick who works in the bookstore with Trent,” I said.

“Ah, yes—the Megatonic University hypothesis.” Preston took a drag on his cigarette. “Interesting, if far-flung, legends. I wouldn’t believe every bit of speculation I heard around this town, Clarissa—especially from a crackpot who works at a used bookstore.”

“You said yourself you were here in Ann Arbor to work on ICHHL projects around—and under—the campus,” I pointed out.

Preston smiled. “You’d make a good detective, Clarissa.” He took his notebook out of his shirt pocket and scribbled a few notes. “We’ll have to review our security procedures at the laboratory.”

“Is that it?” I asked. “Somebody’s selling Mega-Soldier Syrup on the street—and putting the blame on me for spreading some non-existent megahero virus—and you’re going to review your security procedures?”

“I’ll bet it’s that Body by Nuke guy who’s dealing Mega-Soldier Syrup on the side,” said Koz. “I suspected him from the beginning.”

“Samson McSampson is above suspicion,” said Preston. “He had an impeccable record when he worked as a lab assistant for Dr. Joe. But he has no connection to that side of the operation anymore.”

“It could be somebody on the inside,” I said. “Somebody who’s supplying Nuke with the product, then he’s dealing it out of his semi.”

“I told you, our supplies are secure,” said Preston. “Besides, I can’t believe Samson would risk the lucrative business he’s got going for some stupid John DeLorean move like that.” Preston scribbled a few more notes. “Still, we’ll have to double-check everybody. Thanks for the heads up.”

I was sitting on the front porch swing on Ann Street doing my homework a few days later when Body by Nuke’s big semi pulled up in front of the house. The motor abruptly cut off, and out hopped Samson McSampson, hopping mad. He marched across the lawn straight up to the shrubs, and started yelling at me in front of the porch banister.

“How could you?” he demanded, with a look in his eyes that was equal parts hurt and anger. “My security clearance with ICHHL has been revoked. I’m being investigated for smuggling Mega-Soldier Syrup out of the labs and selling it on the street. My national cable deal is in jeopardy because of this. I’ve never taken anything stronger than vitamins and whey protein—I never touched a chemistry set when I worked for Dr. Joe. I just moved equipment around the lab and made sure it was set up and functioning.”

“It wasn’t me,” I said, mortified. “It was that racist cat.” Which was true; even though I suspected Samson, it was Koz who had raised the possibility with Preston.

Nuke pointed a finger at me. “You’re a self-hating woman of color, that’s what you are,” he said. “I never would have believed it.”

I got tears in my eyes. “Look, I’m really sorry…”

“Don’t lie to me. You thought I used Mega-Soldier Syrup. You accused me when I was giving your housemate a workout.”

This was true; at first, I did think Samson’s amazing physique was due to the same chemicals as were in Trent’s Megaton Man booster shot.

“You’re right,” I said. I laid down my homework and stood up. “I was a bit loose in my speculations. But if it wasn’t you, then who could it be?”

“I have an idea who might be selling the stuff,” said Nuke. “We would have to catch them in the act. And Preston isn’t going to stop this epidemic if he’s wasting his time investigating the wrong people.”

We both had to clear our names. Samson had to prove he wasn’t responsible for Dr. Joe’s Mega-Soldier Syrup hitting the streets, and I had to prove to myself that I hadn’t set off a megahero virus epidemic. But how?

I snapped my fingers. “We have to set up a sting. Whoever it is that’s dealing this stuff, he—or she—can be smoked out with someone who wants to buy.”

“They’ll recognize me,” said Nuke. “Besides, I wouldn’t make a convincing buyer. You gotta get somebody like your housemate Trent to help out.”

“I don’t think he’d go along with it,” I said.

“Why not? He’d be perfect. If anything were to go wrong—like the seller forcing him to take the Mega-Soldier Syrup to prove he’s a real user, and not some phony—it wouldn’t have any effect on him, because his metabolism is already resistant to it.”

I wasn’t so sure about that. When Trent was injected by Preston, it still had an effect; it just didn’t last as long as it should have. “I’m not sure Trent would want to risk becoming Megaton Man again, even if the risk were small,” I said.

“It’s not exactly a fate worse than death,” said Nuke. “Look at you; you seem to be thriving with your megapowers and your hot little body.”

“Oh, cut it out,” I said. “I regret casting suspicion on you, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to give you a lay.”

“We have to catch the seller in the act,” said Koz, who came out of the house onto the porch. He wore his cape, buttons, and goggles again. “I overheard the whole conversation—I’m a snoop.”

“Why do we have to catch them in the act?” asked Nuke. “We can just beat the crap out of whomever we suspect.”

“That’s not how they work it in the crime dramas,” said Koz. “You know, you call me a racist, but you people seem to know a lot about police procedure—what a cultural stereotype.”

“Where are the Megatonic University labs?” I asked Samson. “We should start there.”

“What are you talking about?” asked Samson.

I explained Imelda’s theory.

“That’s rubbish,” said Samson. “Besides, Dr. Joe shut down the Ann Arbor labs five years ago. That’s when I started my business as a personal trainer.”

“Then Preston’s telling the truth?” I asked. “That the Mega-Soldier Syrup isn’t originating from here in Ann Arbor?”

“That’s not what Preston said,” Koz corrected me. “It could be some disgruntled former lab assistant whipping up the stuff in a bathtub or something. Is there anyone you know, Samson, that was pissed to be left behind when Dr. Joe moved his operation to California?”

“Could be any number of people,” said Samson. “A lot people were employed in the lab. But I’d know them if I saw them.”

As I predicted, Trent wanted nothing to do with our little sting operation. But amazingly, Preston was persuaded that we were onto something, and agreed to volunteer as our mark. We dressed him an Abyssinian Wolves sweatshirt and sweatpants, which hung loosely on his skinny frame, and talked him into hanging out in the Exercise and Fitness section of Border Worlds Used and Slightly New Books and leaf through the picture books and magazines of sweaty, oily guys and all their muscles.

“They won’t think I’m in the market for Mega-Soldier Syrup,” Preston demurred. “They’ll just think I’m gay—and they’d be right. Although big, oily muscles were never my thing.”

“You have any better idea?” I asked.

So, while Preston leafed, Kozmik Kat and I hung out on the sidewalk, sipping coffee at one of the outdoor tables—a coffee bar was a new addition to the bookstore. From there, we could observe Preston at the magazine rack or in the Exercise and Fitness, wherever he happened to be.

On the third day, about ninety minutes into our surveillance, we were about to give up when a man in a green jogging suit came into the store. He looked suspicious. After looking surreptitiously around the store, he sidled over to Preston and started perusing through a book.

I put on my visor so I could pick up the audio from the wireless microphone Preston was wearing.

“Don’t you wish you had muscles like these?” the man asked.

“I wish I had a lover with muscles like these,” said Preston. “I could really go for an oily, over-muscled guy.” What a bad liar.

“Well, if that’s your bent,” said the man. “I don’t judge. But don’t you think you’d stand a better chance if you had muscles like that of your own? Like attracts like, you know.”

“Sure, but where am I going to get such big, oily muscles? I’ve tried exercise; nothing seems to work. I just don’t have the metabolism.”

“You don’t need a metabolism,” said the man. “I know a shortcut—some medicine you can take that will give you muscles like you wouldn’t believe.”

“You don’t need a metabolism,” Koz repeated, sinckering. “That’s a good one.”

“Yeah?” said Preston. “Do you know where I could get some?”

“If you’ve got the money, you can get anything your heart desires,” said the man. He named a price.

“I don’t carry that kind of cash on me,” said Preston. “I’ll have to find a bank, or an automated teller.”

“There’s a narrow pedestrian alleyway that runs right alongside the movie theater a few doors down,” said the man. “It leads from State Street directly to the university parking structure in back. Meet me out in that alley in half an hour—and bring the dough.”

The man left the store. A few minutes later, Preston came out the front door and walked right by us. “The bait is set,” he said into his microphone. “Meet me in the parking lot in twenty minutes.”

Koz and I walked back through the alley to the parking structure. There, Nuke sat in an ICHHL van; he opened the door when we knocked. “I got the entire conversation on a reel-to-reel tape recorder,” he said, taking off his head phones.

“Did you recognize the voice?” I asked.

“Naw. It could be anybody. I still say we just kick the crap out him.”

I took off my civvies and threw them in the van and put on my gloves, boots, and cape to complete my Ms. Megaton Man uniform, which for the occasion I was wearing underneath. “Hopefully there will be no need for violence,” I said. “But just in case.”

Samson closed himself back up inside the van, and Koz and I hid ourselves. At the appointed time, the man returned along State Street and turned down the alley. When he got to the midpoint, he stopped and looked around for Preston, who was nowhere to be seen—not surprising, since the alley was two blank walls separated by about five feet, and being only two stories, well-lit in broad daylight. When the man turned back around, Nuke stood at the far end of the alley by the parking lot.

“Mervyn,” said Nuke. “How could you? I was the one who got you that job. How could you betray Dr. Levitch, ICHHL?”

“I thought I smelled a trap,” said Mervyn. He turned on his heel to run back to State Street.

Koz and I, who had run over the rooftops, were standing there in full costume.

Mervyn sneered. “But I have a little trick of my own!” He pulled a vial of Mega-Soldier Syrup out of his pocket along with a hypodermic needle. “I’ve never had to do this,” he noted, “but in case of an emergency such as this, I knew I could always just use the product myself.”

He stabbed the vial’s foil cap with the needle and quickly drew out the contents into the syringe. Sneering, he plunged the needle into his arm.

“I can always fight my way out of a jam as a megahero!”

Neither Koz and I at our end of the alley or Nuke at his end took one step closer; we waited for the expected breakout to occur. Mervyn turned red in the face; his eyes bulged; he started to twitch. His shoulders broadened under his green jogging suit, his biceps and thighs bulged.

He was clearly wracked with pain, but grimaced and laughed. “You won’t take me without a fight!” he snarled.

We also wouldn’t take him alive.

Mervyn exploded. Green juice splattered all over the walls of the alley.

Koz shielded his eyes with his cape. “Yuck,” he said. “There isn’t enough left of him to scrape up with a trowel.”

For once, Kozmik Kat’s remarks weren’t hyperbole: There was nothing anatomically recognizable left of Mervyn. The green slime quickly broke down into a watery residue and evaporated into a cloud of green steam that rose from the alley and escaped over the low rooftops.

Neither Koz, Preston, Nuke or I breathed for a minute until the mist dissipated.

What had been a clean, well-lit alley walkway between the parking structure and State Street moments before was once again clean and well-lit, as if nothing had happened. The scene of the crime had completely disappeared.

“That’s convenient,” said Koz. “No remains, no police involvement. I hate it when the fuzz gets in my hair.”

“Mervyn sold the stuff with confidence, thinking he could always get out of a jam by taking the stuff,” said Nuke. “If a deal went bad, he could always turn into some mega-being, at least temporarily, and he could fight his way out. That was his insurance policy. Or so he thought.”

“Until it turned out to be lethal,” I said.