“Chase Bradford’s comic book has been published? By a real publisher? That’s wonderful,” I said. I had seen much of the original artwork while he was working on it, but being busy with grad school myself, I hadn’t been in touch with the aspiring cartoonist in quite a while. “How do you know, Nancy? Have you seen it?”

“Chase sent me a flyer,” said Nancy. “He sent Peggy one, too. He lives in Wisconsin now, near his underground publisher. But he’s coming back to Detroit for a personal appearance at some suburban comic shop in a couple weeks—a release party. I guess he’s expecting all his old female acquaintances he knew in Detroit to fall in love with him now that he’s a big-time published cartoonist.”

She went to the kitchen where she’d posted the flyer on the refrigerator and returned with it to show me. “It came this morning,” she said. “I’m surprised you didn’t get one.”

I’d been at school all day and realized I had never stopped back at my apartment; I’d gone straight to meet Berke at the bar, then had run into Nancy at the restaurant. “I probably have one waiting for me at home, in my mailbox,” I said.

I read from the flyer:

Meet Hot New Comic Book Writer-Artist

Chase Bradford

and get your personally-autographed copy of

Megatron Man #1

Published by Kitsch-In-Synch Press

A full-color alternative comic book masterpiece printed on Baxter paper!

The text was entirely in Chase’s distinctive hand-lettering, which surrounded a reproduction of the first issue cover. Megatron Man, apparently a cybernetic, semi-robotic megahero, possessed an impossibly broad-shouldered, massive physique. Under his uniform of armor and circuitry, which covered his entire body, the only visible human parts of him were his lips, mouth, and jutting jaw—white-skinned, of course. Surrounding him in background were several other megaheroes. The text read,

Featuring Gum-Band Man! Sweater Girl! The Psionic Pspartans! Ms. Megatronica! The Transistor City Trio!

Plus: The Menace of Dr. Soft Machine and his Monstrous Tube Amp!

“That’s you in the background, isn’t it, Clarissa?” said Nancy, pointing to a tiny figure with a short cape flying around the skyline. “I remembering him talking about how important you were to the storyline.”

“I guess so,” I said, although it was hard to tell, given the reduced size of the reproduction. “It looks like I’ve been demoted to a supporting cast member.”

I noticed the address of the comic shop: The Eye of Horus in Ann Arbor.

“I know exactly where that is,” I said. “I’ve shopped there!”

***

By the time I walked home it was almost daylight. I was sleepy but recharged from a night of intermittent orgasms with an old, familiar lover. I’d been so engrossed in schoolwork and my conference paper lately I couldn’t even remember the last time I had even thought about sex. Now, instead of a couple hours of much-needed sleep, I was thinking more about the vibrator and dildo in my book bag Nancy had gifted me, and about getting a little more in before my morning classes.

I walked around to the back door of the apartment so as not to disturb my sister, whose room was right by the front door. But Avie was already up and in the kitchen making breakfast. Sure enough, a copy of Chase’s flyer had come in the mail the day before, and Avie already tacked it to the refrigerator with a magnet.

“Isn’t it exciting?” she said, stirring some scrambled eggs. “Chase showed us the pages he was working on right in this very apartment only a year ago, and now it’s being published as an actual comic book. You’ll be famous!”

“But that story featured a female protagonist,” I pointed out. “Ms. Megatronica hardly even looked like me. Now Chase seems to have gone with a white male megahero—not only that, but he seems to be spoofing every megahero we know—I wonder how that’ll go over with my friends.”

“We’ll find out,” said Avie. “We’re going to the signing, aren’t we? We have to go—to support the arts!”

***

The scene in Ann Arbor that Saturday afternoon was amazing. About ten inches of snow had fallen the night before, but the sidewalks had already been cleared and covered with rock salt, and the above-freezing temperatures—mild for mid-February—were already melting the snow. The line outside of The Eye of Horus trailed down the stairs from the second floor and spilled out onto State Street and out past the storefront of a boutique clothing store. It seemed like a big crowd, but maybe that was because it was only a tiny store.

Avie and I were dressed in scarves and knit caps and gloves, but our coats were open and we were almost sweating as progressed up the stairs.

“Isn’t this exciting?” said Avie. “It’s like a movie premiere. Where’s Trent?”

I hadn’t told the former Megaton Man he was being satirized in Chase’s comic book, although Border Worlds Used and Slightly New Bookstore, where Trent worked, was almost directly across the street.

“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe he already got a copy.”

The other people in line were mostly white males; many wore Arbor State Abyssinian Wolves apparel, but many others wore jackets from high schools around southeastern Michigan. Most seemed younger than college age. We overheard some people ahead of us saying they had driven two hours just to visit the Eye, that they didn’t have a comic shop this good anywhere close to where they lived. Some in line had already bought copies of Megatron Man #1 a few days before, on the day of its released, and had come back to get it autographed.

Standing right behind us was a slightly portly young man with curly hair and glasses who wore a Frantic Man T-shirt and a button of a scowling Megatron Man declaring, “I eat Youthful Permutations for breakfast!” Avie noticed he already had a copy of Megatron Man #1 in his hands; it was in plastic bag with a cardboard backing, outside of a paper bag.

“Do you mind if I take a look?” she asked.

The curly-haired young man recoiled and horror and nearly shrieked. “Are you out of your mind? Nobody’s reading this—I’m keeping it in mint condition. It’s going to be a priceless collector’s item someday!”

“You’re not going to read it?” asked Avie. “You paid a dollar-ninety-five for a comic book, and you’re not even going to read it?”

“I bought a second copy to read,” said the guy, holding up the paper bag. “One to read, and one to collect. I’m not stupid.”

“Well, can we take a peek at your reading copy?” I asked. “Me and my sister both happen to know the artist.”

This didn’t impress the collector. “No way!” he said emphatically. “Just because I read a comic book doesn’t mean I want it downgraded to ‘fair’—I read my comics very carefully. I’m quite particular. Just wait and buy your own.”

I wanted to say I was a grad student that had actually visited rare book and manuscript collection without ever having once chewed on any archival materials. But I refrained.

I looked at my sister and shrugged. We turned and faced up the stairs.

“Comic book collectors sure are weird,” she whispered. “You were geeky when you were and undergrad, Clarissa, but never this geeky.”

She was right; most of the people waiting in line were even more shy and introverted than the typical Arbor State student I used to see in classrooms. But there were a surprising number of female fans, too. By the time we got inside the shop, we noticed a number of customers not only waiting to meet the artist, but flocking around the racks of all kinds of new comic books, and not just commercial megahero comics. There were spinner racks of undergrounds and so-called ground-level and alternative comics, too. A particularly cute, diminutive blond girl in an Arbor State jacket was mooning over Chase as he sat behind a table sketching in ballpoint in her notebook.

While most of the customers not waiting for autographs from Chase Bradford were absorbed in megahero comics, Avie was drawn to spinner rack of underground comics that was drawing little notice. It held complete runs, and several copies per issue, of such series as The Psychedelic Hippie Sisters, Haight Street Toon Revue, Stoned Comix, and The Adventures of Dr. Dropout.

“Why are the insides black and white?” she asked. “They only have color on the covers.”

“Color printing is more expensive,” said a slender, bearded with an intense gaze behind large glasses. He wore a Captain Orpheus T-shirt, and I suddenly noticed issues of Captain Orpheus all over the walls of the store. “It’s usually reserved for mainstream megahero comics with big print runs and therefore lower per-unit costs—we sell those too, by the ton, plenty of them. But my heart is in the black-and-whites we sell. The artists have more freedom to explore social issues and controversial themes, like The Isle of Lesbos, an anthology of women creators. I’m Norm, the proprietor. Is this your first visit to the Eye?”

“No, I bought some coverless comics here a few times,” I said. “There was some other guy behind the counter, not very friendly.”

“Must have been Randy,” said Norm. “He used to open the store for me on Tuesdays and Thursdays. He graduated—applied mathematics—finally. He’s in Chicago now, at Exposition University studying rocket science—literally, rocket science. Well, have a look around. Enjoy!”

Norm moved on to greet other customers.

“Why do you suppose he recommended the Lesbian comics to us?” I said to myself. “Do I look that butch? I need to start wearing makeup.”

“Rocket science,” said Avie in awe, who was now leafing through the black-and-whites. “They sure are smart, comic book fans. Weird, but smart.”

***

“I’m so glad you guys came!” said Chase when we finally got to him. “This is crazy—can you believe it?”

“Frankly, no,” I said. “Congratulations—you’re a spinner-rack superstar.”

I had Chase sign five copies, one for me and the others to be circulated among my friends. Avie got several copies too.

“Boy, these are expensive,” she said. “Why are yours two bucks and the others only sixty-five cents?”

“Mainstream megaheroes,” snorted Chase. “Commercial, corporate junk cranked out on an assembly line by lawyers and stockholders. But someday the revolution is going to come, and America’s greatest artform will finally get the recognition it deserves.”

“Looks like it’s already happening,” I said. “I can’t wait to read it.”

“I’m lucky it’s in color,” said Chase. “Because it’s a megahero parody, Megatron Man is selling just well enough for the publisher to cover the extra costs. The first issue sold out, and orders for the second issue are even better.”

I noticed the cute little blonde girl, still mooning over Chase, now off to one side. She was clutching her notebook as if had just been inscribed by Elvis.

“Well, we don’t want to keep you from your public,” I said. “We just stopped by to say hello. How long are you in town?”

“Just for tonight,” said Chase. “I fly back to Milwaukee tomorrow morning.”

“Jet setter!” said Avie.

“Say, do you guys want to grab a bite to eat later?” said Chase. “I have so much to fill you in on.”

***

Avie and I proceeded over to the L’il Drown’d Mug Café on South University for a cup of coffee to pour over our purchases and wait for Chase to join us. Avie had bought a complete run of Isle of Lesbos and various other underground and alternative comics and was studying them with intense curiosity as if they were artifacts from a different world.

“Avie, you’re not a comic book fan,” I said. “You’re not even gay. You spent a small fortune on those.”

“We have to support culture,” she said in all seriousness. “And I have an obligation to the sisterhood. These have tremendous social significance—although I admit I don’t get the humor. So, what do you think of Megatron Man #1?”

“I hardly recognize it,” I said. “It bears very little resemblance to the stuff Chase was working on last spring—there are no Garnookian Butt Worms of Rott, for example, and Ms. Megatronica’s hardly even in it except for the cover. She hasn’t even gotten her megapowers yet.”

My avatar’s main narrative function seemed to be as sidekick to Sweater Girl, a voluptuous woman with intellectual glasses who wore a thick turtleneck sweater and pink panties. After quitting the Transistor City Trio, Sweater Girl—a thinly disguised spoof of the See-Thru Girl—paraded around in her megahero uniform, if you could call it that, showing a lot of leg although she was now a nursing student at Transistor City University Hospital.

“Jamey Clarity’s only reason to exist seems to be as someone for Sweater Girl to talk to,” I said. “And to ogle Sweater Girl’s ass and be shocked at all her scandalous exploits. And look, there’s a flashback of her and Megatron Man humping on the roof of a skyscraper. How does he get away with that? I can’t show these to Trent.”

“They’re fully clothed,” said Avie. “But these undergrounds leave nothing to the imagination. You’d like these, Clarissa.”

We sat reading comics and just enjoying being in Ann Arbor for an hour, until Chase showed up with his portfolio.

“Wow, Clarissa, what’d you do to your hair?” he said. I had taken my knit cap off and he saw my short haircut, now starting to grow out, and he impulsively ran his fingers through it.

“Where’s the cute blonde?” I asked. “She sure seemed into you.”

Chase set his portfolio down and pulled up a chair. He had to think for a minute. “Oh, that girl,” he said. “Oh, she’s not that cute. Besides, she’s way out of my league. Some college girl.”

Considering I had performed with Chase every debased pornographic act a skin magazine editor could think of, this didn’t do much for my self-esteem. “Not in your league?” I said. “Oowee, I really need to start wearing makeup. And working out again.”

“So, when did you leave town?” asked Avie. “I didn’t even know you’d gone.”

“Well, Clarissa here helped me mail out photocopies of my stuff last spring,” said Chase. “I got fifteen rejection letters, but a bite from Kitsch-In-Synch Press, who invited me to Wisconsin to shoot stats and do lettering touch-ups.” Chase explained that the publisher began with a counterculture newspaper collective in Milwaukee in the sixties, but moved out to the country during the “back to nature” communal movement in the early seventies. “They reprint all the Philosophical Phantasm comics and Rip Rory comic strips—classics of the genre. I reworked Ms. Megatronica in my spare time.”

“Obviously,” I said. “This is quite different. What happened?”

“We decided to go in a more satirical direction with Megatron Man,” Chase explained. “The Direct Market is dominated by two publishers, Marketable and District; all they do is serious, sober megaheroes. You saw yourself, at The Eye—even the most progressive comic shops still stock megaheroes. It’s their bread and butter. They crowd out indy publishers mercilessly. We hate megaheroes at Kitsch-In-Synch Press. The publisher noted my sense of humor and urged me to use my talents to bring them down, train my fire on the whole bankrupt genre.”

“And cash in at the same time,” noted Avie. “I’m sure making fun of megaheroes will bring the mainstream comic book establishment to its knees.”

“You’re also making fun of friends,” I said. “How much of what I’ve told you do plan to use?”

“I changed all the names,” said Chase defensively. “We cleared it with a lawyer and everything. Besides, my targets are all industry tropes.”

“You also made your protagonist a white guy,” said Avie. “That’s only logical, considering your audience.”

“Hey, I’m no sellout,” said Chase. “I still plan to use chunks of that Ms. Megatronica inventory material in future issues.”

“I see the sales dropping already,” said Avie, smirking as she made a thumbs-down gesture.

***

The three of us caught a screening of Charles Chaplin’s City Lights at the Michigan Theater after dinner before dropping off Chase at the motel on the outskirts of Ann Arbor where he was staying.

On the drive back to Detroit, Avie said to me, “I hope we weren’t too much of a bringdown for Chase. After all, this was his big day.”

“I just feel bad he didn’t get laid,” I said. “That one fan girl did everything but send him an engraved invitation, and he let her get away.”

“Cartoonists are weird,” said Avie. “I wonder what Trent and Stella and all the folks in Troy are going to think when they find out they’ve been lampooned in comic book.”