Antihero: Riding Dirty

When I came back to my dorm, I turned on the TV. Today's robbery was all over the local news. A good-looking black male reporter who covered the crime beat for the cable news show told the story. Two men and one woman stormed the local bank and made off with loads of cash, leaving one armed guard dead and six people critically injured. I was stunned. They had actually killed somebody? I felt anger welling up in my heart. I love to screw people over for kicks. Especially abusive authority figures like cops or politically correct college administrators. Beating them at their own game is more fun than playing video games. However, I don't kill people. The Enforcers of the world I lived in gave us super-powered beings a lot of leeway but they drew the line at killing. I would never cross that line intentionally. Killing isn't fun, it's messy and boring.

The reporter continued with his spiel. The three thieves had gotten away in a stolen red Hummer, and in the process of getting away had ran straight into a Mack truck, causing a ten-car pile-up which left seventeen people injured. Luckily, no one died. They were still on the loose, having gotten away on foot. There was a manhunt underway to catch these killers. The TV showed footage of the three robbers inside the bank. They duct-taped a dozen people and forced them to lie on the bank floor, eyes closed and trembling with fear. I watched in amazement as one of the robbers coldly shot an old guard who had been making a beeline for the door. He was going for help, knowing he was outgunned and outnumbered. He wasn't shooting at them. They didn't have to kill him. They should have shot him in the foot. That would have taken him down. Instead they killed him in cold-blood. I noticed with a certain fascination that the shooter was the female robber. She had been the trigger-happy one. So much for the gentler sex. Gritting my teeth, I slammed my fist into the dorm's wall. It went right through. I forced myself to calm down. Luckily I lived alone. It wouldn't do for a roommate to see me displaying superhuman strength.

The robbers casually shot a man who was no real threat to them. They used lethal force when it wasn't necessary. I was stunned. Don't get me wrong. I don't feel guilt. At least not the way you do. I like to do what I please, and I avoid hurting people unless absolutely necessary. With my powers, brutal or lethal force is never necessary. Especially when dealing with ordinary humans. I can fly at supersonic speed. I can't be hurt by mundane weapons. I am monstrously strong. And I can turn invisible at will. With such power, there is usually no one who can threaten me enough to merit killing. These four student-athletes originally had my sympathy. They gave the middle finger to the oppressive N. C. A. A. and robbed a bank before getting away from the dimwits of the L.A. P. D. I was ready to say kudos to them until they killed that guard, an old man whose only crime was being in the wrong place at the wrong time. And I actually let his killer get away. The guard's name was Patrick O'Bannon, sixty years old. A retired Army veteran. Survived by his wife, two sons and six grandkids.

I forced myself to look away from the heart-wrenching picture of the old man smiling at me from the TV. I instead looked inside the money bags. They were full of shiny green cash. I counted it. Five hundred and twenty six grand, plus one hundred and eighty four dollars. A man had been killed for this money. Was half a million dollars worth a man's life? I felt a stab of something in my chest. A phantom pain. Is this what humans call guilt? Being partly human, I suppose I wasn't totally immune to it. However, I pushed the brunt of it out of mind. I hadn't killed that old man. The tall blonde female student-athlete turned bank robber did. I was out for profit, not murder. It's not my M. O. I went on my computer, and accessed the bank's online personnel records. Patrick O'Bannon lived in a nice little house near East Los Angeles with Margaret, his wife of thirty years. I clicked off the site, and deleted my tracks. All of a sudden, I knew what to do with the money. Opening my window, I went for a flight.

Soaring above the city, I was fascinated by the glittering lights. This is the right thing to do, I told myself. And so I did it. I knocked on the door of the O'Bannon household. It was a nice little duplex, painted white. A rugged young man came to answer the door. He was the spitting image of Patrick O'Bannon, only a few decades younger. I was looking at a sturdy, dark-haired young man in his early twenties. I dropped the money bag at his feet. Startled, he nevertheless picked it up. I heard him gasp. Smiling, I flew away. I knew what made him gawk and gasp. Inside the bag was one hundred and sixty thousand dollars. In hundred-dollar bills. Almost half the money his dear old man died for. I kept the rest to myself, of course. I went back to my place, feeling a bit better.

What? You didn't really think I was going to give them the whole thing, did you? What do I look like, a charitable organization? I don't think so. I stole it fair and square, so that makes it mine! First things first, though. I had to get some sleep. Yes, I do sleep. Got a long day ahead of me. I've got three classes tomorrow. Intro to Business at ten. Modern Literature at twelve thirty. And Business Law at three. After that, I've got soccer practice from thirty-thirty to six o'clock. Coach Eileen Stewart is going to work us to death. We've got a big game next week against UCLA. Oh, and I've given myself a personal assignment. I'm going to catch the four robbers. And as for the bitch who shot the guard, I'm going to have a moment alone with her. Teach her the error of her ways. My way. How do I find them? I knew their faces, but in a city the size of Los Angeles, I had to do better than that. Suddenly, a bright idea spiked up from the bottom of my consciousness. I knew how to find them. I would check the sports pages of various Los Angeles-area colleges and universities. Sooner or later, I'd get lucky. I'd find these bastards and the psycho bitch who was their triggerman and when I'm done with them, they're gonna wish they'd gotten caught by the L. A. P. D.