The Masked Maverick's Day Off (a short story)

Written as an entry in the NeoGAF Creative Writing Challenge #89.


 

Marvin McCaul surveyed the room carefully – taking in all the faces, any possible escape routes – but eventually his eyes returned to the woman at the bar. Redhead. Short black dress. Long legs. What fine specimen, he thought. Tonight I am not Marvin McCaul, or the Masked Maverick. Tonight I am Henry, Henry Hartz, looking to sell his family business to some investors. He glimpsed at his watch and figured it was time to make his move. He got up from his seat in the corner and placed himself beside the redhead at the bar.

“Bartender, I’ll have what the lady is having and another for her.

“Name’s Henry. Henry Hartz. Who might you be, and what are you doing here on a night like this?”

“Danielle Dupuis, and I happen to be waiting for a date who never showed up. Might I say, you sure don’t look local, Henry. So tell me, what brings you to town?”

“I’m a butcher and I’ve arrived in town to sell my family’s business to – ”

“Okay, timeout Marv. Stick to the script. How would a butcher be sexy anyway?” The façade of Danielle Dupuis disappeared, replaced by Stephanie Sullivan, Marvin’s girlfriend of three years.

“Alright – Like I said, I’m a professional treasure hunter and I’m in town – timeout – just next time, let me write the script okay?

“ – and I’m in town in search for the legendary artifact known as the Urn of Solidarity – timeout – couldn’t you have come up with anything better, Steph?”

“Just stay on script – Why, I happen to work for the local museum and we are preparing for the upcoming exhibit on the owner of the Urn, King Alexandros. In fact, I am the lead curator on the exhibit and I’m very interested in any information you may have on the location of the Urn.”

“Why … why yes, would you want to come back to my … abode (really, abode?) and look over my findings, maybe over a drink or two?”

“Why yes, Mr. Hartz, I would love to take you up on your offer.”

Looks like our game of seduction ‘worked’ after all, thought Marvin, as he escorted Stephanie back to his car.

In the car, Stephanie was becoming irritated, “C’mon Marv, can’t you drive a bit faster?”

“Marv again? Wasn’t this whole role-play thing your idea, ‘Danielle’?”

“Well, I know one way to make this ride back exciting,” she said as she flashed a smile and reached for Marvin’s belt.

“Whoa whoa whoa! Hey! Can we not do this in the car Steph! Not that I don’t appreciate it or nothing, but I kinda need to pay some attention to the road here. You know how I get when you do that. And what happens when we get to a stop sign or a red light?”

“Fine, no sexy time in the car. Killjoy!”

“It’ll be worth the wait. I have a bottle of ’89 Express at home that I bought for tonight. We can have fun after I park the car, alright?”

“Come to think of it, when they do this in TV or in movies, they immediately cut to them opening the door all hot and heavy. I wonder what happens on their way home. Because it probably isn’t anything like this.”

“Then I don’t know why we didn’t just rent a hotel room – right, the script. You’re just lucky the traffic isn’t too bad tonight.”

***

As Marvin turned the lock on the front door, he paused and turned towards Stephanie. She gave him a confused look.

“So … no hot and heavy coming in through the door?”

“Oh no, we’re back to roleplaying.”

“Then what was that back in the car?”

“Well, forgive me for trying to have a bit of fun on the way back. Besides, it’s not like I wrote a conversation about lost treasures for the way home.”

“Well then … Danielle,” as Marvin slipped back into character, “welcome to my abode. I am sure my findings may be of some help to you and your exhibit.”

Marvin seated Stephanie on the couch and continued his Henry Hartz charade, “So, I’ll be just a moment as I go get some drinks and my research on the Urn and – ah crap, I left the ’89 Express somewhere in the basement. I’ll be right back.”

After a few minutes, Stephanie began coming down the steps of the basement, “I’m coming down Marv. Just because it’s called a wine cellar doesn’t mean you can just leave wine in your basement.”

Stephanie entered the basement only to find Marvin rooting around the basement and becoming frustrated. As she looked around she noticed a bookcase that looked out of place and began examining the books on the shelf when one title caught her eye.

“Hey, you have the first edition of ‘All my Roses’? I didn’t know you read that,” as she reached to remove the book from the shelf.

The bookshelf began to shake and then moved off to the side to reveal a secret passageway.

“Holy crap.”

 
“What happened? Did you break something?” replied Marvin.

“Marvin … what’s down there?” as she pointed towards the new set of stairs that appeared.

“Ah crap. Well, I’ve been meaning to get that fixed (and that bookcase kind of gives it away too). Fine! I guess now is better time as any! Follow me for the tour, Steph,” as he began heading down the secret passageway.

As they exited the stairway, Stephanie realized they had entered into a large underground cavern littered with large computer screens and costumes. She stepped forward towards one of the display cases with a Masked Maverick costume and quickly examined it.

“Holy crap. Are you…”

“Yeah, you can say it.”

“Holy crap, are you one of the Masked Maverick’s sidekicks!? Is this his secret base!? Did you just bring me back to his secret base to have sexy time in!?”

“Oh, c’mon Steph!”

“What!?”

“I am the Masked Maverick.”

Stephanie blurted out a laugh in response.

“Oh my god,” as she fought back the laughter, “seriously? Oh my gosh. Really? I wouldn’t have pegged you as superhero material.”

“That’s kind of the point. It wouldn’t be much of a secret identity if it was obvious enough to anyone that could put two and two together. Anyway, I guess I should give you the tour now that you’re in on my secret.

“Alright, so here is the main supercomputer. Large screens and everything; picks up police frequencies too. Even goes to my suit radio. I usually use it to analyze lots of things – blood samples, computer code, Morse code, translation – whatever you can think of, this computer can take whatever you throw at it. Not riddles though, I have figure those out myself on my own because Tech Trickster won’t help me upgrade the OS.

“And here are some of my older costume designs. Took a while for me to figure not have bright orange on a costume. Just makes you too easy to spot, day or night. Unless we get stuck in the DayGlo dimension, but we usually don’t get much advance notice when that happens.

“Here is my first costume. Put it together all by myself; also taught myself how to use a sewing machine at the same time.”

“Looks pretty beat up.”

“Yeah, the guy I was up against was pretty big. Threw me into a couple of skyscrapers and construction sites.

“After that I started using some better material than spandex because let me tell you, after you get put through a building or asphalt a few times, it just tears too easily. And I just don’t have the time to stitch it back together.”

“Hey! Marv! When are you going to feed me?! I’m getting hungry!” a voice boomed from the dark corner of the cavern.

“What was that Marv?” gasped Stephanie

“Now for the final part of the tour. Can you … keep a secret? No one, and I mean no one can no about this. If they did, it could ruin me.”

“What could be so bad?”

“I sorta have a … prisoner. Let me explain, though!” as Marvin flicked a light switch to illuminate the dark corner containing a man in a rather large cage.

 “Oh don’t worry, he’s mostly just hungry. He’s pretty much given up wanting to escape anyway, right Clark?

“Steph, this is Clark. Clark Clarkson, meet Stephanie Sullivan. Stephanie, Clark.

“Clark here was my bully throughout grade and high school. Weren’t you Clarky boy?”

“Let me out Marv! I’ll take you even WITH your superpowers!”

“So fussy today. Now Clark, mind your temper around Stephanie here, unless you want to get stuck watching only reality television for a week. Don’t worry, he’s just hungry. I guess I forgot to feed him dinner before I left for the bar.

“To be fair, at least he gets three meals a day – not like before I brought him here. And there’s really no one looking for him or anything, or care to.

“That and he used to give me noogies every day, wedgies every other day, and a swirly every Wednesday.”

“Is that why you have that bald spot over there?”

“Yeah, he’s a real piece of work. Anyway, I bumped into him a while back and I asked if he felt sorry about bullying me just laughed in my face, so … here he is.

“And that concludes our tour. Now, if you would follow me into the elevator, it leads out to behind the fireplace. Yes, I just had to get a rotating fireplace, if you’re wondering.”

“Wow, that was a lot to take in,” said Stephanie as she exited the elevator.

“So I guess sexy time is off for tonight?”

“I have to ask – how long have you been the Masked Maverick, Marv?”

“I think maybe two years before we met. And I hope Clark there didn’t scare you.”

“Oh no, he definitely should be in that cage there for giving you that bald spot.”

“The cage is pretty roomy and he gets all the channels too.”

“I think,” as she pushed Marvin back onto the couch, “sexy time never left. I mean, I just found out my boyfriend is a bona-fide superhero. Who wouldn’t find that completely sexy?”

“Well, there was that one girl before you that… funny story for another time.”

“Then I think we should take this to the bedro– ”, as a large ring from the phone in the room interrupted Stephanie.

“Sorry, I have to take this.”

Stephanie let out a sigh and rolled her eyes.

“Will you accept a collect call from: …”

“Great Gentleman.”

“Yes.

"What is it Grant? I told you not to call unless it was an emergency. My day off, remember? Uh huh. What? Seriously? Alright, slow down. Another extinction-level event? Didn’t we just have one last week? You owe me, you know, right? I’ll be there in ten.”

“Who was that Marv?”

“Oh, just the Great Gentleman.”

“Is there something wrong?”

“The new guy didn’t do so well. Everyone thought he could handle it himself. Some guy named ‘Green Guardian’. They put him against the Amber Aggressor. Figured he thought we were joking when we told him to believe in himself and everything … he’s okay, though. Doctor Duality will have to grow his limbs back (if he can ever stop arguing with himself).”

“Sounds serious. Should I be worried?”

“They tell me it’s an extinction-level event, so sorry honey, but I guess we have to cancel sexy time tonight. Don’t wait up. Or worry, really. You might be able to catch me on the news. I should be back in the morning though. I’ll pick us up and get pancakes or something.

“Oh, and it Clark keeps wailing, just tell him you’ll delete his daytime talk shows off the DVR. That usually shuts him up. I gotta get suited up.”