This story and others I'll be writing are based upon characters from a DC RPG I'm a part of online. In this game, most of Earth's heroes have died in an epic struggle to save the universe, and now new heroes must step in to fill their roles and protect the planet themselves. Hawkgirl is the first character I made for the game and, so far, my personal favorite. I'll be doing more short vignettes like this spotlighting the heroes I create, all of them leading up to a story in the near future. I hope you all enjoy!

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Flight of the Condorman!

By The Mauve Lantern

Hawkgirl

At a quarter past four in St. Roch, Charlie Wright ran back to her home with a bounce in her step. She flew the last several feet to the front door (a habit her mother was trying to dispel) and, finding the door to be unlocked, threw it open.

"Mom! I'm home!" she called as she flew through the house in search of her mother. "Mom, you here? Mooooooooooom!"

"For Pete's sake, Charlie, I heard ya the first time! I'm not deaf yet!" her mother replied from the kitchen.

Charlie followed the sound of her mother's mock belly-aching into the kitchen, where she found the older woman chopping up a carrot. She gracefully swung through the air before wrapping her arms around her mother in a playful hug.

"And what's got you so excited, Charlie?" asked Mrs. Wright after kissing her daughter on the forehead.

"You're not going to believe this, Mom: I have an arch-enemy now!" Charlie cheered. She began to sift through the pantry in search of her favorite Choco cookies, not noticing the exasperated look her mother shot her.

"Another one? Ya say that like it's somethin' to be proud of!"

"That's 'cause you know that when you've got an arch-enemy, you're doing something right!" said Charlie. She started blissfully munching on the cookies, ignoring again her mother's horrified face. "Mmm, Chocos always taste best after a fist-pounding!"

"Charlie, at the rate you're making enemies, you'll be having the whole city after your hide by Easter!" Mrs. Wright hollered, but to no avail. The fact that her daughter had enraged another lunatic meant nothing to Charlie. So her mother simply decided to get over her surprise and find out what nutjob the "Angel of St. Roch" had beaten.

"Who was it? Someone big and tough?" asked Mrs. Wright as she poured Charlie a glass of milk.

"You're not going to believe this: it was some weird guy saying he was the real Hawkman!"

This caught Mrs. Wright's attention. Ordinarily, Charlie would fight people like a crazy Theater teacher, or a deranged goth girl, or just plain old bank robbers. But a Hawkman impersonator? She knew how much Hawkman meant to her daughter (she should know; it was Mrs Wright's idolization of the hero that started it all), so the mother wondered how her daughter handled the situation.

"What was he doing?" queried Mrs. Wright. Being a Hawk-fan herself, she needed to know if this man had done any lasting damage to the Hawk's name.

"Don't worry, he only flipped a few cars in downtown. Mr. Parker got them all fixed after the fight," replied Charlie. "The guy didn't even look like Hawkman! He wore this jetpack with wings stuck to the sides, and he was all bald, pasty, and nasty. Ew! Grosses me out just thinking about him!"

Her mother breathed a sigh of relief before asking, "So what happened?"

"Well, it all started when I was in English class..."

I was sitting there, listening to Mr. Martinez go on and on about when his mother used to teach pre-school and how those kids could learn faster than we could, when I got this text message from Mr. Parker.

TROUBLE DOWNTOWN-BUSY WITH ROBBERY IN EAST SIDE-HANDLE IT

So I replied: K- BRT

And so I needed to get out of class, right? But Mr. Martinez is really good at catching people sneaking out, so I needed some help. I sent a message to Laura saying: IM SICK. LETS GO.

ON IT, she said.

I started coughing like I'm actually sick, and Mr. Martinez actually bought it! He asked me, "Young miss, d'you need to see the nurse?"

I stopped coughing for a few seconds so I could say, "Yeah. I think I've got something bad. Can I go?"

"I don't see why not. You need someone to take you there?" he asked.

Laura raised her hand and said, "I'll take her, Mr. Martinez."

"Good, okay, but be back soon girls."

"We will," we both said. I mean, Laura would be back any minute. I was probably going to be busy for a while.

Once we were almost at the nurse's office, we split up so I could get my costume and get ready and Laura could go see the nurse for me. I ran as fast as I could to Mr. Kopper's room, and, you know Mr. Kopper; he was mopping the floor even though there wasn't anything to clean.

I told him, "Mr. Kopper! I need my costume. You've finished fixing the holes, right?"

"Huh? Whazzah?" he blabbered a little before he remembered where he was. "Oh! Charlie-girl! I gotcher cost-oom all fixed up n everythin'. Yessir, it's done real good."

"Thanks, chief!"

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I got changed as quick as I could and flew away as Hawkgirl. Then I got this text from Mr. Parker that said: HURRY UP-DAMAGE

ON MY WAY, I told him.

He gave me the directions to where all the action was, and when I got to 5th and Belle, that's when I saw him there, standing in the middle of the street on top of a flipped car. He was this really skinny guy, like, no muscle whatsoever. And this pasty guy was wearing this black leotard and gray leggings (totally gross, by the way), and he was SCREAMING, "I am the Hawkman reborn! Bow before me!"

"I do NOT bow!" I shouted as I tackled him from the air. We flipped around before he fixed himself. That's when I saw he had the jetpack. "You're not Hawkman; you can't even fly!"

He just laughed like an idiot and cried, "No! I can absolutely fly! And I am super-strong! I'll show you!" So this wackjob flew down to this Chevy and stopped in front of the hood. I saw him grab the bumper and begin to lift, but he wasn't moving it an inch. And then, suddenly, the car lifted up and spun through the air before it landed on the sidewalk.

"Still don't believe me?!" the guy grinned. I swear, Mom, I've seen some crazy people, but this guy was easily the king basket-case

"Yeah, I don't believe you. You probably put super-magnets in your gloves or something crazy like that," I told him.

"NO!" he bawled. Seriously, I thought this guy was going to start crying. "I am Hawkman! You people try to make me sound like I'm crazy, but I'm strong! And I can...hit!"

All of a sudden, he rockets at me and tried to tackle me but I spun out of the way and tried to get something to hit him while he was turning around for a second pass at me. I saw this hubcap that had come off a car, so I grabbed that and flew up to the crazy guy. When I tried to smack him though, he raised his wrists up and stopped the hubcap from touching him.

"Ha!" I laughed. "I knew it! You've got magnets!"

"Enough! You shall not taunt me again, not-Hawkgirl!" the pasty guy sneered.

Oh, no he DID NOT just call me that. I tossed the hubcap away and flew straight up in the air.

"Running away, you phony?" he laughed.

"Nope. Just getting some distance," I growled at him. Once I got really high up, I looked back down at him. He had begun to climb through the air, probably to attack me, but it wasn't going to work. Before he even knew, I burst through the air and caught him in the chest. I was totally faster and more powerful than this guy's jetpack, and he knew it, 'cause he started screaming and crying all over me.

"Ohpleasedon'thurtmeIdidn'tmeananyharmI'mnotevenreallyHawkmanI'mCondormandon'tkillmeeeeeeeee!"

I stopped just a few feet away from the ground and let gravity take over after that. The dude hit his head pretty hard; if he wasn't wearing a helmet, I might have gotten in some real trouble.

So the police showed up a few minutes later and Mr. Parker was right behind them. He told me like he always does, "Get back to school; I'll take care of the clean-up."

"And so that's how I got another villain!" finished Charlie after she downed the rest of her milk.

"Wow, sounds like this guy was a total freakshow," said Mrs. Wright as she took her daughter's empty glass. In her head, she was relieved that her daughter had survived another villain and that a Hawkman imposter (no matter how off he was) had been punished.

Charlie looked over at her mother and asked, "You wanna know what I told that guy when they were taking him away?"

"What's that, sweetie?"

"I AM Hawkgirl!" she shouted as she bounded up to Mrs. Wright.

Her mother turned and hugged her daughter. "You sure are, Charlie. You sure are..."