Sarah had once estimated that she was 'Mazing Girl maybe 25% of the time. This was a good balance, she thought. It allowed her a job, a bit of a life, and while one could abstractly say that these were distractions, she felt at least without perspective she would have been a very bad 'Mazing Girl. Though that's kind of a contradiction in terms, if one took, as was commonly thought (mazing was a contraction of amazing) and not as she maintained (that mazing was its own word). However, she thought she'd found the fine line.

 

So most of the time she was just a normal woman living in LA.

 

She had however several elements of her life that weren't normal.

 

• Sarah hadn't been to a dentist since she was 13. Her teeth were perfect. No cavities, no tooth decay. She did brush her teeth, but did so more for cleanliness … when she remembered to. She was, for all practical purposes, invulnerable – including her teeth. Which affected her in a lot of ways. She vaguely remembered going to dentists, and did occasionally get toothbrushes as presents, but didn't really have any fear of them, or any notions of them. They were for other people. Dentists were one of the weird exotic people she went to appear like other people, and who she occasionally met socially. She had a very brief relationship with one, right out of college, that never evolved more then 5 dates and 2 fucks. She remembered the brief relationship mostly for his comment of how pretty her teeth were. When he mentioned that, unlike a doctor, he could legally treat her, Sarah had wondered if that would become a problem later. But it all sorted itself out when she learned he laughed a too little loud at movies.

• Sarah was fairly pale. When people quizzed her on it, she said she had Irish blood in her – which was true – but in truth, no amount of sun would cause her to tan. In fiction there are stories of perfect maidens of might flying off into the cornea of the sun. That seemed like an awful bother, and she could be kind of lazy. Better to look quasi-goth. Except she had red hair.

• Sarah's skin prevented her from getting any tattoos. In college Sarah liked tattoos on guys, and gotten several temporary ones – but nope. Her skin didn't let it work at all. Which was okay. It was ironic, as she worked in one of the few professional industries where a lot of visible tattoos is not going to hurt your employment

• Same for piercings. She didn't have earrings. When she she did wear them they were clip-on. For an art geek she had fairly limited knowledge of it. Both of these together were why she had never seriously gone punk. It would look kind of silly on her.

• Sarah's metabolism was kind of screwy. She ate a fair amount, and had at times tried to diet, but how much she did eat rarely effected her that much. Sarah tended to gain and loose about 15 pounds and two pants sizes with some frequency – sometimes within a month, going from 'plump', to the 'large side of average'. She usually tended to stay at rubenseque, and yes over the last 5 or six years she had gained more – but she attributed it to her superheroing and the constant constant excretes that entailed (on an average night she ran maybe 100 miles) to her gaining a lot of muscle – but some was certainly fat.

• This was particularly noticeable on her boobs. For those who have paid close to the stories, you will note that her boobs are sometimes described as D cups, or E. This isn't a mistake. Her breasts, sometimes on a day by day basis, grew and shank. Not dramatically, but noticeably on her foundation garments.

• This meant she had actually three sets of clothing that she took in and out of storage on a regular basis. It was one of the reasons that, for the most part, none of her outfits were all that expensive. It would get to her. However, she could rotate things better this way, so for a woman some of her clothing was fairly old for a 27 year old.

• It also meant that she looked to be maybe a 160 pounds to the average person. She actually weighted 320. Her muscles were very big, and very strong. But that was just a number.

 

These were the things she primarily noticed day to day. However, the stuff you might think, her strength, her stamina, didn't weigh on her mind so much. Average society had cars, trucks-it encouraged a kind of sedentary lifestyle which meant one rarely actually lifted very much weight. Sarah lived in a city and in an industry that encouraged a kind of bodybuilders mentality, of lifting 100s of pounds to achieve sweaty perfection. The shows producer, Robert Haskins, looked damn swollen, like someone out of a muscle of fitness magazine. But how much did he actually use this sitting behind a desk?

 

This was despite the fact that her job did involve a certain amount of lifting, it was never that much. The definition of a prop was something someone lifted – which meant it was liftable. Or if not liftable by an average person, lighter. The guns she used where mostly fake ones that weighed maybe a pound. Boxes labelled 'Heavy' were just empty boxes.

 

Once, when they did an episode of the show in a gym, she posed for a photo carrying a 500 pound weight over her head, with one hand, laughing.

 

Of course, it really weighed maybe 5 pounds.

 

Now this was abstractly not all that funny. A stupid sight gag. Out of something from Johnny Carson.

 

But to her it was hilarious! It had been the wallpaper on her computer for a couple of months. Which was perhaps yet another sign how different she was from other people.

 

However, her wallpaper was eventually replaced with a picture of her cat, so it all worked out in the end.

 

All of this meant one thing: That when Sarah was out and about – as she was one day when she went shopping in a Target store at Manhattan Beach – that when circumstances required her to have superpowers – it sometimes forgot her.

 

(Note for non-American audiences: Target ia a large retail chain, selling stuff like clothing, children's bikes, garden supplies – things you wouldn't find in a grocery store. Except recently it had moved very heavily into groceries. It was a store that lacked a lot of focus. Also technically speaking, it ruled about 1/3 of Canada. However, this rarely came up)

 

Sarah was shopping there for things one bought at Target. Her list included bras, oil for her car, soda, and possibly some jeans if she was in the mood.

 

None of these items were in her cart.

 

She was in fact in the DVD section. Target had a fairly good selection actually. In an industry that was drying up the target selection was pretty much the place to go if you wanted actual DVD's, and didn't want to go to Amazon – no more Blockbusters, Barnes and Nobles, or Sam Goodies – just, well … This was somehow heartening really – yep, it still existed.

 

And there was a copy of the movie Lone Ranger in Sarah's hand.

 

Sarah hadn't seen it, which was slightly troubling. The Lone Ranger was a superhero movie, and she usually watched pretty much every one of them that came out (and Sarah would have been interested to know there had been 60 in the last 10 years). Yep, she had watched them – even Super Capers, a movie that played about 20 theatres, stared the star of Dungeons and Dragons, and was pretty, cheapily, terrible) But she hadn't seen that one yet.

 

She knew that it didn't review well, though, and she had heard it was mostly an excuse to give Johnny Depp to play Weird Redface. She was still going to watch it.

 

The question was: Would she spend 25 bucks for the privilege, to own a physical copy she could watch any time?

 

She considered it.

 

The DVD case itself was pretty nice, and she had thought the second trailer was kind of visually interesting in a western way without going too heavily into steampunk, which was getting a tad tiresome in mainstream movies.

 

So she considered a little longer. Definitely not the Blueray. She didn't like paying extra for Blueray.

 

It was at this time that a loading truck hit one of the aisles, an aisle that wasn't properly bolted to the ground, and knocked it over. The aisle holding a great quantity of decorative rugs …

 

And there was suddenly a great amount of screaming in the store.

 

Which is where the story came to a fore. Sarah went from busy reading the DVD copy about a superhero, to actually being a superhero.

 

She shook her head.

 

Sarah reached into her grocery cart, and pulled out her costume bag.

 

And looked around.

 

People seemed to be lost in a panic, and it wasn't that crowded, which was good.

 

Because she was starting to hum the William Tell Overture …

 

Sarah grabbed her bag and ran into the pet food section. "Dah dadadh dahdadha, dah dadah dahdahdha, dah dadadahd dahdadh, dahdahddhahdah …"

 

The pet food section was empty. She was pretty quick at this, and in a few seconds she was down to her bra and panties.

 

She was going to get a new set actually. Should she slip over and take one? No, no … that would be dishonest. These would have to do.

 

She pulled up her pants and tugged on her boots – but just as she was going to put on her top an old man walked in.

 

"What the …?"

 

"Can you excuse me?" asked 'Mazing Girl. "I could use a little privacy here!"

 

And he turned and walked away. Which was pretty decent of him.

 

"Dah dadadh dahdadha, dah dadah dahdahdha, dah dadadahd dahdadh, dahdahddhahdah …"

 

'Mazing Girl ran through the store.

 

The aisle was half on its side, hitting the other side as it did. People were crawling out underneath.

 

Sarah grabbed hold of the 5 tons of plastic and steel (and semi quality carpeting) and pulled it to the side. It was stable enough now.

 

She looked in. There appeared to be someone buried in pillows. Though probably he or she had hit their head.

 

"Do dedededo do, Do dedededo do"

 

She ran over towards her (it was obvious about 20 feet that it was a woman) though she looked to be kind of punkish lesbian where one might initially be confused, like when Sarah's vision was slightly out of focus from taking off her glasses off, or you where being homophobic(and given sarahs recent life decisions … ahh). what she was doing in the throw pillows aisle at Target wasn't sure.

 

She pushed the pillows off to see her face – the woman was out of it, unnnscious from a pretty bad concussion. She was, however, breathing.

 

"Someone call an ambulance!" suggested someone who came up behind her.

 

"Good idea!" agreed Sarah. "You do that."

 

"I came to buy a new cellphone. I lost mine yesterday at Jewish delicatessen"

 

Sarah seethed slightly. The fact that it was a Jewish delicatessen wasn't something she needed to know. I mean, was there even such a thing as a non-jewish delicatessen, to serve unkosher meat? She supposed that Halal was kind of the same thing, but not really. And anyway, markets weren't called delicatessens, but were typically just called markets.

 

And there she went thinking stupid stuff. What kind of adventure was this?

 

Badah bum.

 

"Hey!" another man said. "Something weird is going on at the front of the store."

 

"Dah dadadh dahdadha, dah dadah dahdahdha, dah dadadahd dahdadh, dahdahddhahdah."

 

Sarah rushed forward … and then tripped on some pillows.

 

"Dah dadadh dahdadha, dah dadah dahdahdha, dah dadadahd dahdadh, dahdahddhahdah …"

 

She got up and looked at her knee. It wasn't skinned or hurt, it just looked normal – which was something that was slightly shocking to her, but still …

 

"Do dedededo do, Do dedededo do, do dedoedeodeodedoedeodeo … ..dooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!"

 

This was the back of the store, the ceiling was 20 feet tall – not really enough space to jump. But all Target outlets have a huge menacing aisle that usually held strollers and Nature CD's. She jumped over it in a quick leap, bending her head slightly.

 

Badad bum.

 

She saw what the guy was talking about. 10 or so thieves – not wearing masks and white stripped shirts – (again, not with the shirts) were at the cash registers. They had guns. The security guard had probably heard the commotion in the back – which they had caused – now they're free to do their business. Except …

 

"dah dadadh dum dum dud, dah dadah dadumdum, dah dadadahd dummmmmm, dahdahddhahdah"

 

She spoke loudly in the middle of the aisles, where according to probability theory the most traffic was, "Stop you thieves! Or …"

 

One of the thieves very quickly put a gun to a cashiers head.

 

"Or what?" he asked.

 

Dededededededededed de de de de deeeeeee de de dedeeeh de dede dedede de do do do do.

 

She just played the tune in her head, as humming at this point would be kind of crass.

 

Sarah felt that talk would be useless now, as well.

 

So she grabbed a pair of jeans off a nearby rack – not her size, they were just convenient.

 

DEDEDED DEDED DEDEDEDEDE. Ded du …

 

Then she paused. This wasn't going to help …

 

The thief looked perplexed, and he moved his gun ever so slightly..

 

DE de dede deeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee,ded dededededededede …

 

Sarah saw a shopping cart and pushed it forward, springing a large amount of merchandise everywhere … as it hit the guy straight in the chest.

 

dah dah dah dah dah dah dah dah dah dah..dah dadada. Dadadaha.da da dad dada dadad dadaddada …

 

He hit a cash register and was knocked out.

The other robbers all looked at each other, and raised their hands in surrender.

 

daha dad da dah dah dah ded dededed de ded dedd …

 

DUmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmM!!!!!!

 

And Sarah looked around looking for cheers at the end of the music. except no one was actually hearing it except her.

 

*****

 

That night Sarah did buy the DVD, even if she ended up picking her backpack up and going to another Target. The movie was actually very good. Arnie Hammer was a good actor, and he had the chops to play an action hero better then a lot of big actions heroes. He seemed to realise that his career as a leading man was at stake, and had given it a good college try. The box office takings, and some of the other performances that didn't live up it, notwithstanding, it was good, fun movie.

 

And when they played William Tell Overture, she hummed so loud her cat left the room.

 

But it was fun, because no matter what powers she possessed, anybody could hum the William Tell overture, and be human. just like her.

 

Despite the fact that she forgot to brush her teeth that night and suffered no ill consequences whatsoever.

 

None.

 

(special thanks to dru for editing and proofreading)