super + ordinary

She blew the hair out of her eyes and surveyed the scene. She had to get out of there—and fast. Gargantor roared again and she could hear her bones rattle. She was running out of time, and right now, when she should be thinking about saving the citizens of the city, she could only think about where the liver was in a frog.

‘I really hate giant zillas,’ she thought as she dodged the giant L beam being thrown at her. She slipped behind the wreckage of a nice car from a highly recognized and elite manufacturer. ‘I wish I had a car that could be ruined by a giant rampaging reptile.’

He roared again.

She spotted it—her salvation—and made her move.

She stood up and turned to face the beast.

“What’s wrong, Gargantor? Not a morning person?”

‘Neither am I,’ she internalized, dodging the Hummer thrown her way.

“You know, the owner of that is probably not going to be very happy about the fact that his precious vehicle was just used as a bowling ball.”

This time, he hurled a Ford Explorer at her. That was a bit too close for comfort. She just needed to move a little bit further and everything would be easily taken care of. That is, easily taken care of as long as she could figure out where frogs kept their livers within the next thirty minutes.

Somewhere in the distance, a clock chimed. Make that fifteen.

Ah, there we were. Now all she needed was a nice little distraction…

“Hey Gargantor! I heard they were thinking of letting that ugly girlfriend of yours out of prison. Sorry to hear that you won’t be the man of the house for much longer!”

He came charging. She was ready.

Sort of.

Now, she had to time this just right. Too soon, and he would realize what she was doing and all of her efforts and hard-flung insults would be in vain. Too late, and she was as good as a hot dog at a Fourth of July weenie roast.

She raised her arms, lifted her head to make sure there weren’t any low flying aircraft, and flew straight up.

Now, she had never been a big fan of Charlie’s Big House of Coffee. Not only was his stale coffee overpriced, his donuts were overcooked, too. Not to mention the state of the women’s facility in there. However, it was probably because of that creepy mascot of his that she truly despised the place. That, and the fact that the eerily pedophile like mascot had been made into a twenty foot statue and plopped unceremoniously and quite garishly upon his establishment. However, it would now serve her purpose.

She flew up and braced her feet against the top of the building. She grasped one of the frightening figurine’s feet, and with a brief unlady-like grunt, pulled it free.

She swung it—once, twice—and then hurled it at the huge zilla’s head. He was out like a light. It was the first time in history, that someone had been put to sleep or, in this case, knocked out by coffee.

The cheers were immediate. She grinned and flew down to greet the crowd. It was the usual bunch: terrified citizens, nosy reporters, flashy paparazzi, some members of that really creepy fan club that had formed after the Metropolis Incident…and him.

As if a large rampaging dinosaur hadn’t been enough to ruin her day…

“What are you doing here?” she demanded.

“University Unified Press. How would you like to respond to Senator Kelly’s accusations that you are sullying America’s view of the modern woman and undoing decades of women’s rights advocacy?”

“I said: WHAT are you doing HERE?”

“Ah, terribly sorry, I’m afraid I forgot to introduce myself—Stephen Thomas Noel, representing Western State’s University Unified Press newspaper. Now then, how would you like to comment to the fact that your vigilante acts have cause several million dollars’ worth of damage to the city within the last—“

“NO COMMENT.”

She pushed passed him, only to be surrounded by dozens more microphones and flashing bulbs and people and—

--a clock chimed. She was late.

She began backing up, hoping the crowd wouldn’t think it prudent to follow her.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the press, I would love to answer all of your questions, but I have a pressing engagement I must attend to. Please, if you would like a response, you may attain my post office box address from the mayor’s office and I will get back to you as soon as I possibly can. Thank you and have a safe today.”

No one got the message. She continued backing up, but gave up after taking only a few more steps. There were easier ways of doing things when you were her.
She glanced up at the sky, and with a wave good bye to her followers, flew.

#

Liz stepped as lightly as she could, hoping her steps would not echo in the nearly empty halls. The only other people who were in the hall with her were faculty walking to their offices, or students with some free time left on their hands completely free of studying. She was the only one hurrying along.

She paused outside the door and gave herself the quick thrice-over: once for all the necessary garments to be deemed as somewhat acceptably dressed by society, twice for actual coherence of the said outfit (today it was a grey tweed dress with some killer black vintage boots she had found and a black pinstripe blazer), and thrice for the actual presentation of herself (hair neat, teeth brushed, no blood leaking from any unsightly gashes). She seemed fine. After two minutes in that room with that teacher however, she most likely would not be.

A deep breath, and there was nothing more to do. She was as good as doomed.

She opened the door as quietly as she could and attempted to slink to her seat in the same manner that a masked spy would sneak through a government building before rifling through sensitive security files.

Unfortunately, she was currently undeclared as a major, and there was a key reason that she was not going to school for international espionage.

“Miss Rider, to the front of the lecture hall, please.”

Caught. Well, maybe she could weasel her way out of this one.


“I would love to, professor, but it appears that the other students are currently in the midst of a test, and I would hate to be the one to interrupt—“

“Now.”

Well, no one could fault her for being disobedient. Like a homeless puppy dog she walked down the steps to the bottom of the lecture hall.

When she reached it, she attempted to appear as small and feeble and truly repentant as she possibly could.

Her instructor glared down at her.

“Are you aware, Miss Rider, of what time that this class is scheduled to begin?”

She thought quickly, trying to discern the trap that lay before her.

“Uh…yes, sir?”

“Is that a question or a statement, Miss Rider?”

“A statement,” she choked out. “Sir.” Added for good measure. It seemed to not improve his mood. She would have to remember that for future instances.

“And what time,” her aged professor compounded, “is this class scheduled to begin?”

“Eight o’clock sir.”

“What time is it now, Miss Rider?”

This answer came easily.

“I would love to tell you Professor Milton, but unfortunately I seem to have misplaced my watch and am unable to refer to it at this very moment. However, seeing as there is a test going on, I would really love it if I could—“

“It is eight forty-five, Miss Rider. The exam began almost one hour ago. Can you please explain to me, why it is that you are so late when all the rest of your class mates managed to get here on time?”

This answer came even more easily.

“Oh sure. Well, you see I was actually a bit early this morning. I woke up about fifteen minutes before my alarm went off and so I was just chilling around my house, enjoying the extra time, and I went into the kitchen to have a bagel, but then the police scanner that I keep in there went off and I heard over it that Gargantor—you know, the giant zilla—was on the rampage in the city again for some reason or another and so I had to go and stop him, but he somehow got into one of the radioactive waste sites on the way over here and so he was a bit larger than I remembered by about 100 feet, give or take, so I had a bit of a difficult time DDD him, but luckily we were right by Charlie’s Big House of Coffee so I was able to take that huge statue of Cheery Charlie off the roof and whack the zilla over the head with it and that was done with, but then I had to ditch the reporters and my fan club, and then on the way home to change I had to pull some people out of this absolutely awful car crash and then by then I was running really late, but I couldn’t just show up to class in my hero clothes, you know, so I didn’t have a choice but to fly by my house and change and then I hurried here as fast as I possibly could.”

A few brave souls behind her dared to let several stray giggles loose.

Her professor, however, was unimpressed.

“Well I am so very sorry that this class is impeding your budding super hero career, Miss Rider. But I simply cannot grant you special privileges because you just so happen to save the city on a daily basis. Now take your seat and I hope you have come prepared for the exam because I will not be giving any extra time on it.”

#

“So how do you think you did on the exam?” Maree jumped on her the moment she left the class.

Liz paused to give her a dead pan look before stomping past her on her way to the elevator. Maree’s bracelets jangled behind her.

“How do you think?”

“Well, did you study?”

“All night, but I still couldn’t tell you the difference between osmosis and lactic acid burn. I’m telling you, Maree…there is just no way that I am going to pass this class.” Liz jammed the elevator button quite angrily several times.

“Well there has to be one, considering you need this class to graduate.”

word count: 1 788

And that's where I stopped for tonight. The title is super + ordinary, pronounced as just "super ordinary." More on that later. Hope you like it.