Chapter 5 - The FR.A.T.'s Strike Back

That morning was calm, peaceful, and tranquil. It was the peace that comes from having no semen left in your body, the dehydration that results from having many, many orgasms. They had sent the girls they took home with them back to wherever they had come from. After all, they had served their purpose, and Johnny wanted some alone time with his best friend. Melissa slept in Johnny’s bed. Don’t get any funny ideas, he has a huge bed, and they slept a comfortable (for her) distance from each other. Being a jock at Rutgers has its privileges. Johnny opened the huge bay windows of his bedroom and sunlight filled the room. He watched her sleep for a while before he realized what time it was.

“M, wake up, time to get up. You’ve got that Queer thing to get ready for. And I have a little job to do for El Presidente Lawrence over on Busch…I’m going to have to find a Cantonese/English dictionary…”

Melissa turned over. She was wearing a shirt that was hers, and a bra that wasn’t. “Johnny, whose bra is this? It isn’t yours is it?” She smiled warmly and arched her back. Johnny watched her bask in the sunlight like a cat.

“No it’s not mine. I think it belonged to one of the girls we did last night…I’m not sure which one though, there were so many. Are you sure that anti-VD serum you came up with will work? I mean, I’m immune to disease, but you…”

“John, I knew good and damn well when I came here that I was going to need more than a dental dam to keep myself from getting herpes at this school. But your right, If I’m going to be I.D. today I have to get into character.”

Melissa took the bus over to Douglass. She was quite right, she did have to get into character. I.D. was all about anger, which Melissa usually had a lot of. But after spending a night with Johnny she felt too good and relaxed to really get excited about shooting anyone. But Melissa had faith in the good people of Rutgers. “Someone will piss me off eventually.” Sure enough, along came Jana, the straightest girl ever. The woman who single-handedly set back feminism 100 years by her mere existence. The woman who was completely oblivious to Melissa’s intense, divine hatred of her. “Hi Mel!” Of course she had to sit right next to her. “I’m so happy to see you! I wanted you to see my new dress. It’s kind of low cut so I constantly have to pull up the top to keep, like, just everyone from seeing my tits, and the slit up the side is kind of high so you can see just a little too much of my legs, and I’ve nearly killed myself in these platform shoes three times over today, but I look good, and that’s all that matters. Don’t these shoes make my toes look cute? I spent all night painting them so they’d look just right. I should have been studying for my chemistry test, but if I smile at the professor the right way, I know he’ll let me do a make-up test. Isn’t it great using your looks to get what you want?”

Melissa cringed. She hated this girl for so many reasons she couldn’t decide which was her favorite. She considered recruiting Jana, but then she realized that it probably wouldn’t change her personality any. Instead of being an incredibly annoying breeder, she’d be an incredibly annoying lesbian, which could conceivable be worse. “Yeah”, Melissa whispered under her breath, “you’d fuck it up for the rest of us.”

“What did you say? I can’t hear anything since I got this sixth hole in my ear. But it looks so cool doesn’t it? OH! OH! Did you see that awesome fight between Captain Hetero and that skank Iron Dyke? He would have won if she hadn’t cheated. Oh that Cap Het is such a piece of fucking man-meat! I would ride his big, black…”

“OK!” Anyone who was looking might have actually seen the storm cloud forming over Melissa’s head. Even though Jana’s voice excelled at producing high-pitched white-girl noises, there was something else behind Melissa’s anger. Jealousy, perhaps? “I get your point, you like him! Look, if you like him so much why don’t you go be his sidekick.”

A flash of light flickered in Jana’s eyes. At that instant, destiny was changed, or perhaps followed, and Melissa knew that with a few words she had made the absolute biggest mistake of her life. “Hey…do you think he would let me?”

***

On College Ave., a crowd gathered in front of Brower. On the stage, an impeccably dressed gay man with a slight French accent stood, addressing the crowd. “Ladies and Gentlemen, Queers of all ages, in recent weeks, a hero has emerged from our midst championing the cause of Gays and Lesbians everywhere. Today, we bring you this hero. I present to you, IRON DYKE!” Melissa floated down from the sky in her brand new shiny Iron D armor. It was a prototype and not fully functional yet, but after the trashing her other armor took, it was all she had available. Besides, it looked good, and that was all she’d need for today. “ROCK ON DYKES!” The crowd roared. Breeders scattered. “I just wanted to let everyone know that now that I’m here, no one will ever have to worry about prejudice or gay bashing again. The only bashing that will happen is the bashing of those fuckhead straight males who oppress us. No woman need fear oppression again. Queers in general need not fear anything, because where ever we face discrimination, there will be a Dyke in Shining Armor there to fight for our rights.”

“Not after we kill you here.”

A voice came from nowhere. People looked around, but no one was to be seen; until, they looked up. I.D.’s scanners had already picked up the danger. Ten targets, armed to the teeth, had taken up strategic positions on rooftops around her. “Hey Dyke, remember me? Ethan Ridge. Yeah you know, that guy you beat up for no good goddamned reason a few weeks ago? Yeah well I’m back baby, and I’ve got my brother’s with me. Yeah, we’ve, like, made some new friends, and now we’ve got the firepower to take you down. There was one little condition to getting all this kick-ass gear. We have to kill you. Sorry…wait, actually, no I’m not. FR.A.T. boys, fire!”

While he talked, Melissa schemed. “Hm…10 targets. Good thing I finished that new attack move the other night. Computer, upload attack pattern ‘Women’s Scorn’. He’s about to fire. Have to move…”

“Melissa.”

“Huh?” The distraction couldn’t have come at a worst time. The FRA.T. boys opened up on her. She was hit from every angle by high-energy plasma charges. Melissa didn’t understand…she felt a lot of sharp pains, her armor buckled. She met the sidewalk face first. “But…somebody called me…my real name…who would know…”

“We have to talk Melissa.”

The ghostly voice faded as her consciousness did the same. Melissa saw red…her blood…from her head she guessed…a sticky warmth spread down her chest. “So, this is what it’s like to die…I always thought I’d be more…drunk when I died.”

The F.R.A.T. Boys jumped down onto the steps of Brower, randomly beating people in the crowd. “Listen up all you fuckin fags, and you bull-dykes too. You better crawl back into whatever closet you came out of cuz us F.R.A.T. Boys are gonna make sure you keep your disgusting selves out of us normal people’s faces. You have two choices, either straighten up or get fucked up. Understand?” Ethan pistol-whipped the MC for effect. The well-dressed Frenchman fell hard on the steps, a trickle of blood running down his forehead. “You will never get away with this, someone will rise to stop you”, he spit out defiantly. “Who’s gonna stop me? A sissy like you, or that dead dyke over there?”

Melissa had a fail-safe built into her program that would teleport her back to base should her brain waves cease transmitting. She crackled with energy and disappeared.”

Is this the end of our Lovable Lesbian? How will the Hetero Hero avenge his best friend’s death? You’re going have to wait until next issue to find out. But just so you don’t worry too much, remember. In comic books, how long do superheroes ever stay dead?