Super Man and the Bug Out Read online

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  The Super Man and the Bugout============================

  "Mama, I'm _not_ a super-villain," Hershie said for the millionth time. Hechased the last of the gravy on his plate with a hunk of dark rye, skirting theshriveled derma left behind from his kishka. Ever since the bugouts had inductedEarth into their Galactic Federation, promising to end war, crime, andcorruption, he'd found himself at loose ends. His adoptive Earth-mother, who'dnamed him Hershie Abromowicz, had talked him into meeting her at her favoriterestaurant in the heart of Toronto's Gaza Strip.

  "Not a super-villain, he says. Listen to him: mister big-stuff. Well,smartypants, if you're not a super-villain, what was that mess on the televisionlast night then?"

  A busboy refilled their water, and Hershie took a long sip, staring off into themiddle distance. Lately, he'd taken to avoiding looking at his mother: herinfra-red signature was like a landing-strip for a coronary, and she wouldn'tlet him take her to one of the bugout clinics for nanosurgery.

  Mrs. Abromowicz leaned across the table and whacked him upside the head with onehand, her big rings clicking against the temple of his half-rim specs. Had itbeen anyone else, he would have caught her hand mid-slap, or at least dodged ina superfast blur, quicker than any human eye. But his Mama had let him know whatshe thought of _that_ sass before his third birthday. Raising super-infantsrequires strict, _loving_ discipline. "Hey, wake up! Hey! I'm talking to you!What was that mess on television last night?"

  "It was a demonstration, Mama. We were protesting. We want to dismantle themachines of war -- it's in the Torah, Mama. Isaiah: they shall beat their swordsinto ploughshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Tot would have approved."

  Mrs. Abromowicz sucked air between her teeth. "Your father never would haveapproved of _that_."

  _Tha
t_ was the Action last night. It had been his idea, and he'd tossed itaround with the Movement people who'd planned the demo: they'd gone to anarmy-surplus store and purchased hundreds of decommissioned rifles, their boresfilled with lead, their firing pins defanged. He'd flown above and ahead of thedemonstration, in his traditional tights and cape, dragging a cargo net full ofrifles from his belt. He pulled them out one at a time, and bent them intoballoon-animals -- fanciful giraffes, wiener-dogs, bumble-bees, poodles -- andpassed them out the crowds lining Yonge Street. It had been a boffo smash hit.And it made great TV.

  Hershie Abromowicz, Man from the Stars, took his mother's hands between his ownand looked into her eyes. "Mama, I'm a grown man. I have a job to do. It's like. . . like a calling. The world's still a big place, bugouts or no bugouts, andthere's lots of people here who are crazy, wicked, with their fingers on thetriggers. I care about this planet, and I