Consider
it Fixed
The return of an ex-hero
"Fix-it Autobody." the monotone
voice answered the ringing phone.
"John? It’s me, Colleen." The woman’s
voice on the other side of the line came through quiet and timid.
"How’d you get this number?" John’s voice barked, impassioned.
"Your
business is in the yellow pages John. The name is not exactly a stretch
you know." Colleen gained confidence with every word spoken, getting
stronger as she continued. "I need your help."
"You know I’m retired
Colleen. I have been for months now. You know that business with the
trolls landed me, my team and the people we were attempting rescue
in the hospital and nearly in body bags." As John Fix talked, Colleen
could hear him lighting a cigar, a continuous habit with him.
"I know
you stopped fighting a while ago, but I need help from someone I can
trust." Colleen paused for a moment, sounding desperate, she added,
"I need results." John took a deep drag off his cigar and blew the
aromatic smoke forward. Of all his old contacts, Colleen was his closest.
A man of few friends, he considered her one of them.
"What do you
need?" Came the gruff reply.
"A reporter was kidnaped by the Tsoo..."
She began, John cut her off.
"A reporter kidnaped? That’s your emergency?
There are literally thousands of heroes in this city and you want
to pull me outta retirement for this? Don’t waste my time." Fixit
was just about to hang up the phone when he heard Colleen call out
in desperation on the other end.
"Wait! Please just hear me out. This
one’s personal, she’s my best friend."
"I’m listenin’." Came the reply.
"She’s been missing for two days. I can’t seem to get any of the heroes
interested in the case. Three others have agreed to look out for signs
of her, but they all admit to having more important cases right now.
The hero circuit has changed in these last several months. Everyone
is after arch-villains and alternate planes, they are no longer interested
in helping the average joe. I need someone who cares... I need you."
"Tsoo huh?" John said more to himself than to his friend asking for
help. He paused for a moment, then came the three words she had hoped
to hear. "Consider it fixed." Then he hung up.
John Fix grabbed a
black leather jacket off the back of his chair and looked over at
his motorcycle. Shrugging, he said ,
"Aw screw it." and leapt into
the air, his jump carrying him over a hundred yards and several stories
high."
It wasn’t long before he was in Steel Canyon, a known gathering
place for the Tsoo. Even less time elapsed before he was able to shake
down a few of the ninjas and get the location where they were holding
a reporter.
John made his way to the abandoned warehouse and gained
entrance with no difficulty. He even managed to get to the captive
with nearly no resistance. Hoping to sneak in and sneak out, he quickly
began to untie the captive’s bonds.
"Thank God you’re here Kreat...."
The reporter stopped. "You’re not Kreation." She said, obvious disappointment
in her voice. She had met Kreation on the streets earlier that month,
he rescued her purse from a gang member. She had been hoping he would
hear about her current situation and come to her aid again. Instead,
she found a rather unextraordinary man in blue-jeans, a white T-shirt,
a black leather jacket with some kind of swirl emblazoned on the breast,
a yellow bandanna on his head and worst of all, an unlit cigar hanging
from his lip.
"Name’s Fixit. Colleen sent me. Can you walk?" Fixit’s
voice came soft and gruff.
"What kind of super hero are you anyway?"
She asked, suspiciously. "You don’t look super."
"Would you believe
I’m retired?" Fixit looked at her with an intense stare, it made her
uncomfortable. "What’s your name? Or do I just call you reporter?"
She just stared at him for a moment, then shook her head, coming back
to the moment.
"Lindsay. My name’s Lindsay."
"Well Lindsay, if you
can walk, I’d think it best to get you out of here."
Wordlessly the
two then stood up and, having been tied up on the floor for two days,
Lindsay had to lean heavily on her rescuer. It did not take long for
things to go awry for the two.
As they reached a corner, Fixit leaned
over to spy ahead without endangering his burden. A ninja shuriken
imbedded its self a scant inch from his face.
"We’ve been spotted,
stay here." Quickly, but gently he set down Lindsay and turned to
face his three opponents. The Tsoo quickly began to grow in numbers.
Three became five, five became seven. Nearly all his opponents were
armed, and at least one, could wield the ninja magic. Lindsay honestly
believed that she would die in the halls of an abandoned warehouse.
"I hate ninjas."
Fixit did not back down, as she expected. Roaring
a wild cry, he leapt into the midst of them. Punching, kicking and
elbowing he was a flurry of movement among his foes. Swords cut him,
arrows pierced him, still he fought. Suddenly his attention was drawn
on something else. In the middle of the fight, he reached down and
grabbed what look to be a cellular phone!
"Not a good time right now
Medik!" He shouted while throwing a roundhouse kick at a ninja with
claws. Hitting him in the side of the head, knocking him unconscious
"yeah I KNOW my signal is active again!" He roared, "I turned it on
in case you and Sniper were still running around!" He dodged as an
arrow went whizzing by. "How about you lock on my signal and get over
here and help rather than call me when I’m fighting for my life!"
With that he hurled his phone at the ninja who had launched the offending
arrow, hitting him square between the eyes.
Lindsay was getting her
legs back, trying to find a way to help, when she heard his mutter,
"Not good."
Two more ninjas had arrived on the scene and Fixit was
obviously growing tired. He was torn and bleeding from a hundred different
wounds and still had three ninjas left to face. He quickly turned
on the closest ninja, hitting him with a stunning blow. As he spun
around, he threw his left leg into the air and cleanly knocked one
foe to the floor, unconscious. His final foe thrusted with a katana,
impaling Fixit through the abdomen. Fixit, keeping his feet, threw
a flurry of kicks at his foe, finishing him off. Shortly after, he
fell to his knees.
"Could sure use Medik right about now..." He said
as he fell to his side.
Lindsay, knowing that one ninja was merely
stunned, grabbed what was left of her dying hero and dragged him back
down the hall. She found a small nook filled with crates and boxes
and hid herself and the bleeding Fixit there.
"Great, all the heroes
in town, and mine is bleeding to death. AGH!" She gasped as Fixit
began to move and pulled the sword from his abdomen. "You shouldn’t
pull that out! You’ll only bleed more!" Lindsay was nearly hysteric.
"It’s uncomfortable." Fixit gasped. In his delirium, he continued.
"When I was a kid, I was good at sports. Very good. I could run faster,
throw farther and jump higher than anyone in my class. Turns out I
had an unfair advantage, my muscles are ultra dense. They coil and
spring with alarming strength and speed. I later turned to marshal
arts as a way to harness this strength. As I developed my abilities,
I learned that my body had other talents." As he spoke, Fixit’s voice
became stronger, less of a whisper. "It’s resilient to damage. It
can carry me great distances in a single leap. And," he continued
as he regained his feet, "it heals alarmingly fast." He looked around
himself and saw Lindsay looking up at him in awe. Offering her his
hand he said, "Come on, lets find a way to get you outta’ here."
Fixit
quickly finished off the remaining ninja who had lost them in his
dazed state. Pausing only long enough to place police transponders
on the fallen Tsoo, they continued on. Knowing that the fight must
have alerted the rest of the ninjas residing in the warehouse of their
presence, Fixit picked up his charge and leapt to the top of several
crates stacked nearly to the ceiling.
Using this vantage point to
scout the area ahead of them, Fixit took them from one stack to another,
allowing them to move around unnoticed. Lindsay began to believe that
they might live after all.
In order to take the last corner toward
the exit, the pair had to leave the safety of the crates. As they
turned that final corner, they saw a muscle bound Tsoo with yellow
tattoos all up and down his arms. For Lindsay, the world began to
turn upside down immediately. She could think, but her body would
not respond, much like watching in a dream. A quick glance at her
rescuer told her that he was suffering similar effects.
Suddenly there
was a loud roar, like thunder. Lindsay could see Fixit beating his
chest primally as if he were a beast. The Tattooed ninja seemed to
draw back and the effects of his power evaporated quickly as Fixit’s
brutal kick launched him through the doors into the street. The man
began picking himself up when a large rubber slug hit him square in
the chest, knocking the wind from him.
Fixit was upon him in the blink
of an eye. His arms moved faster than the eye as he relentlessly pummeled
his foe into unconsciousness.
"Thanks fer the help, Red Sniper." Fixit
said to the man in fatigues and a targeting helmet that emerged from
around the building. Lindsay emerged, hesitantly, from the dark warehouse
and shielded her eyes from the piercing midday sun.
"Thank you Fixit,
I’m glad it was you who came to help me out after all." After an awkward
hug, the two split up. Lindsay headed home, which she insisted was
not far and she would make it just fine.
As She left, she was passed
by a blur of speed so fast, the wind nearly knocked her over. She
turned to see a man in red and white stop in front of Fixit and the
one he had called Red Sniper.
"Want to help me with some robots over
in kings row?" The newcomer asked. Fixit looked at him, lit his cigar
and smiled.
"Consider it fixed, Medik."