Boston Austin looked down from his perch, high above the city of Portopolis. He wasn’t sure why heroes were supposed to do this. It’s not like he could actually see any crime from this high and his fear of heights wasn’t helping, either. Who had ever heard of a hero that was afraid of heights? No one. That’s who. He wasn’t a hero. He knew that. Everyone knew that, actually no, they didn’t. They all thought he was a hero just because he stopped a bank robbery once. It didn’t help that the league of heroes, Boston Chapter, signed him up as a publicity stunt. That’s where the Boston Austin had come from, but he was really from Canada. The publicity stunt had failed as there was still only one chapter of the League of Heroes, but it had been great getting his career off the ground. He had even been able to get a movie deal out of it, but the sequel had fallen flat when it was discovered that he couldn’t act. Still, the comic book was going strong and there was talk of reboot with a new actor once his publicist had said that he had been unable to devote the time needed for a movie and keep the city safe. The public ate that junk up and once the movie was underway, he could comfortably sit back and enjoy the royalties for possibly the rest of his life.

“Mr. Austin, do you think you could move a little closer to the edge?”

Could he move closer to the edge? They already had him halfway out on a 100-year-old gargoyle, any further out, and the damn thing would probably snap in half. “You know I can fly, right?”

“Don’t need you to fly, just to crawl, sir.”

“Fine,” Austin snapped back, inching his way out toward the tip. Apparently, he didn’t need a safety harness to die. This stupid photo being more important than his own life. He looked down. It was so far down. The people below him only black specks and the cars were no bigger than rain drops. He could feel his muscles clenching up as he crept even further out on the ledge. There was a loud crack, and he dropped.