This despite the fact that Donna clearly knew every megahero I did, and probably more. She even told me to leave Kozmik Kat at home when I came to visit.
But after my afternoon classes and a long night waitressing at the Union Stripe Café, I was ready to put off my visit with Donna once more. It was well after midnight, and I was dead tired and ready to crash in my garret apartment when there was a knock at my door. Who could it be at this hour?
“It’s Audrey!” said a distraught Hadleigh Reese. “No one’s seen her for over a week—not Nancy, not Chuck…”
Hadleigh, the rich girl who lived with Audrey and Nancy over by the Self-Important Art School, I always thought of as stuck-up and kind of racist. For her to venture over to West Forest at this time of night, she had to really be concerned.
“Has Wilton been around?” I asked. My guess was he had not—the last I’d seen of his was a fleeting glimpse in the bowels of the aforementioned underground laboratory of Megatonic University.
Hadleigh shook her head in the negative. I could see she’d been crying.
I was standing in my underwear and bare feet, I hasten to mention; it was remarkable enough that Hadleigh wasn’t even shocked by this, such was her overriding concern for Audrey.
“What exactly did you expect me to do about it?” I asked disingenuously.
“Nancy says you know all those weird costumed crime fighters,” she said. Neither her nor Nancy knew for a fact that I was Ms. Megaton Man, or that the Y+Thems and Rubber Brother resided in the First Humanist-Holistic Congregation of Cass City church building two doors down from me. “Maybe you could put out an alert.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
Rubber Brother had already insisted Donna Blank was crucial to any scheme to investigate Megatonic University, although why was beyond me. Up till now, it had only been my insatiable curiosity and personal questions to which I hoped to find answers deep under Ann Arbor. But now it seemed clear that Wilton had abducted his longtime girlfriend and was holding her prisoner somewhere in the secret facility. If we were going to need Donna to break in, I could postpone my visit no longer.
After I calmed Hadleigh down and sent her home, assuring I would get to the bottom of Audrey’s disappearance, I pulled the garment bag out of the back of my closet and slipped into my Ms. Megaton Man uniform. I snapped on the brass button of my red cape to my clavicles and put on my orange plastic visor. At least the cover of night would cover my egress from my apartment building.
I flew the few miles north up Woodward Avenue from midtown Detroit to Royal Oak, a strip of businesses that were still alight, including restaurants and a movie theater. The storefronts were only a few stories tall, but the district had the feeling of a small town, and vehicular and pedestrian traffic was still bustling below me.
I alighted on the rooftop of the address Donna Blank had given me at the City-County Building hours earlier that morning. It appeared to be a small office building where a number of professionals had office space. I had brought my duffel bag and was preparing to change into my civvies when I happened to look over the side of the building and down toward the street.
At just that moment out of the window below me leapt the lithe, graceful figure of a very athletic, nearly nude redhead wearing only in the skimpiest bikini I ever saw. Her attire appeared to be roughly crafted from an animal pelt; specifically, the striped hide of a tiger or a convincing imitation thereof. Judging from how little she wore, the same animal could have dressed a dozen more girls in similar bikinis. At her hip, tucked into the strap of her panties, was a stone knife; in one arm she wielded some kind of spear or javelin tipped with a large, sharp stone arrowhead. She also wore a kind of cat-eyed mask of the same tiger-striped pattern, the lenses of which were opaque. On her earlobes were heavy, stone-disk earrings.
I only caught the briefest glimpse of her, but it was long enough to take in all this detail. For an instant, she seemed frozen in the lights rising from Woodward Avenue. In another instant, she streaked out over the traffic, two stories up; from somewhere, a vine appeared, which she grabbed with her free hand and proceeded to swing, as if she had been born in the trees of some exotic jungle. I peered up into the night sky to see what her vine could have been attached to, but there were no buildings along the strip taller than a few stories—certainly none tall enough to serve as the anchor for her rope. Instead, her vine seemed only to dissolve in the low-lying clouds and the darkness-shrouded night sky.
When I looked down again to try and spot the mysterious jungle girl, she had already swung away and disappeared down Woodward Avenue.
Instead of changing into my civvies, I left my duffel bag and the roof and slipped over the front edge of the building, dropping down to the ledge below. I gained access to a window that led to the second-floor hallway. Inside were office doors with old-fashioned frosted glass were stenciled with the letters of accountants, lawyers, optometrists, and a jeweler. On one side of the hall, the door said simply,
Donna Blank
Licensed Social Worker
The door across the hall, leading to the office where I was certain the jungle girl had leapt, read simply,
P.J.G., C.G., and B.B.,
Private Investigations
Yes, I had gotten in the habit of talking to myself—maybe I was going a little nuts—but there was also a reason. Although my cape, buttons, and visor seemed to malfunction in the bowels of Megatonic University, becoming confused as far as the map of the layout of the place was concerned, I knew I could still rely on the device as a simple audiovisual recorder. The cameras in the buttons were recording what I was seeing—I learned later this function was triggered automatically by sensors in the temples of my visor whenever my pulse quickened. Also, by speaking aloud, I was creating verbal notes for later reference. If only I could have figured out to use this for school
The cape and buttons also served another purpose: gaining entry into places I couldn’t—in this case, the mysterious office of P.J.G., C.G, and B.B. While the door was locked, a transom—which is a little hopper window over the door—was open just a crack. I detached my cape and buttons from my collarbones; they hovered in midair for a moment. “Go inside and take a look around,” I said. The lenses inside the buttons blinked on, and the red cape fluttered up and over the transom.
On the other side of the door, I heard some shuffling around; momentarily, I watched the doorknob turn.
“No, I just want pictures…”
The door opened; I stepped into the darkened room.
“Okay, this is breaking and entering,” I said. “But I guess I’ve come this far…”
The cape and buttons snapped back onto my uniform as I peered around in the darkness. The open window let in some light from Woodward Avenue below, but I fumbled for a light switch. Harsh fluorescent lights came on. There was an old oak desk with a swivel chair behind it, a water cooler, and a bookshelf of legal-looking books. There were also a couple of side chairs in front of the desk, presumably for clients and visitors.
But over by the window, what occupied the greater part of the office was really astonishing.
Inside a cage of thick iron bars a gorilla sat contentedly eating a banana he’d picked from a bunch that hung just outside his cage. He was so engrossed in this exercise he didn’t even bother to look over at me when they light came on. Next to the cage was a metal filing cabinet, on top of which a human brain bobbed inside a glass bell jar of burbling pink fluid. On the other side of the cage was a coat rack from the rungs of which hung a cowboy hat, two six-guns in holsters with a belt of spare bullets, a lariat, and a big metal ring with keys that presumably unlocked the cage.
“What have we here, cape?” I said in astonishment. “Our mysterious jungle girl keeps a menagerie consisting of an ape and pickled cerebellum in a specimen jar.”
Bubbles violently roiled the pink fluid in the bell jar. “I’m not pickled,” came a voice that seemed to come from the brain. “I’m just as alive as you are, and smarter than your dumb cape!”
I looked around the office to see where the voice had come from. “Who said that?” But the only living creature was the gorilla who was quietly peeling another banana—and his mouth was full.
“That’s some ventriloquism trick,” I said. “A monkey with a mouthful, throwing his voice. Why don’t you come out and show yourself?”
I hoped someone would step out of a closet or something, but the pink fluid only burbled again.
“This ain’t some roadside attraction, Girly,” said the brain, its spinal cord whipping like a tail, causing it to swim around in the narrow confines of the glass jar. “Bobo here can barely grunt on his own, let alone put together a coherent sentence. He’s completely illiterate, and barely responsive, as you can see. I’m the one talkin’ atcha.”
“You’re a brain—in formaldehyde,” I said. “Where are your vocal chords?”
“Don’t be silly,” replied the brain. “Nobody can live in formaldehyde. This is special pink stuff formulated to keep me alive—I would explain it to you, but you wouldn’t understand.”
“Who are you?” I said. “Or rather, who were you?”
“You mean, when I was encumbered with a body? Some schmoe…who cares? The point is, without the limitations of an external organism, I can devote my fine mind to loftier ambitions. I’m called the Brilliant Brain, for your information, and with good reason. If you’re looking for advice, you’ve come to the right place. If you need the Phantom Jungle Girl and Cowboy Gorilla to do some legwork, you’ll need to make an appointment during office hours.”
“So that’s what P.J.G., C.G., and B.B. means,” I said. “Phantom Jungle Girl, Cowboy Gorilla, and Brilliant Brain—it all makes sense.”
This had to be the weirdest detective agency in the world.
I ventured closer to the bell jar and tapped on the glass.
“Ouch! Don’t do that,” snapped the Brilliant Brain. “I still have sensitivity, you know. Now I’ll have a splitting migraine.”
“Sorry,” I said. I turned and examined the iron cage. Bobo the gorilla was merrily chomping away at another banana.
“What does the ape do?” I asked.
“Bobo doesn’t do too much,” said the brain. “At least, not in that condition. His only talent is sitting and eating, and smelling up the place. You’ll notice he isn’t even smart enough to reach for the keys. And heaven help us if he had the wherewithal to grab one of those six-shooters—Katie, bar the door.”
“But you called him Cowboy Gorilla,” I said.
“I called him Bobo,” said the brain. “There’s a difference.”
The Brilliant Brain could sense my confusion.
“I can see you need a little demonstration,” said the brain. “Step back, and I’ll show you—I don’t want you to get hurt.”
I took a few steps back and waited for something to happen. Suddenly, a huge crackle of energy, like an electrical bolt from a Tesla coil, leapt from the bell jar toward the cage. Bobo, complacent, was suddenly zapped; eyes wide, sitting bolt-upright, a new awareness appeared in his eyes.
The jolt had only taken an instant, but the transformation was profound. The ape slowly rose to his feet, brushed off chunks of banana that had fallen on its torso, and reached for the coat rack. Pulling the ring of keys off its peg, the ape inserted one key into the lock on the door of the cage. Free, he stepped out and hung the keys back on the peg. He placed the cowboy hat on his head and wrapped the belted holsters with six-shooters around his waist.
“Are you getting all this, cape?” I said.
The ape eyed me and lightly doffed his hat. “Evenin’, Ma’am,” he said politely. He walked over to the desk, pulled a tin star out of a drawer, and affixed it to the fur of his chest. From the same drawer he produced a pair of kid leather gloves, which he pulled on over his massive hands. Then, returning to the coat rack, he grabbed the lariat, forming a large lasso from the rope and spinning it over his head.
With a sudden whip of his hair arm, he flung it towards me. The rope quickly tightened, pinning my arms to my sides. The gorilla then pulled the six-shooters from his holsters, and pointing them up at ceiling, began firing off shots indiscriminately, sending chips of plaster and dust raining down all over the office.
“Yeehaw!” the ape cried. “Cowboy Gorilla rides again!”
He winked at me lasciviously.
“Looks like I corralled me a fine young filly!” he said, twirling his six-shooters deftly back into their holsters.
“Say, what’s the big idea?” I demanded, prying my arms loose and shedding the rope. “Now I have a talking monkey putting the moves on me!”
He advanced toward me, a leering smile on his lips and a gleam in his eye. I back up so that the oak desk stood between us.
“So, you wanna play cat and mouse?” he said. “Two can play at that game!” He slowly circled around the desk.
“Of course you need two to play cat and mouse,” I said. “But I’m not in the mood.”
I circled in the same direction toward the opposite side, always keeping the desk firmly between us.
I was now on the side of the desk nearest the bell jar; I tapped on the glass. “Okay, Brilliant Brain, this is all very funny. But you can call off Bobo now.”
There was no response.
“There ain’t no Bobo no’ mo’,” said the ape. “And Brainy ain’t home, either. There’s nobody here now but us chickens.”
“You mean, you actually switched minds?” That could be only answer. Somehow, in that bolt of electricity, the Brilliant Brain had taken over the mind of the monkey, and Bobo, for all I knew, was now inside the bell jar. But the brain no longer seemed as high-minded as he’d been, floating in his pink fluid. Now that he inhabited a body, an entirely different side of his personality was coming out.
“I’m a-feelin’ mighty frisky,” said Cowboy Gorilla. “Me for the wide open spaces—don’t fence me in!”
“Yeah, well, Cowboy Gorilla can take a cold shower,” I said. “Ms. Megaton Man isn’t into monkeys.”
“Once you go ape, you’ll never relapse,” said the gorilla. He leapt up on the desk, grabbed his six-shooters again, and fired off several more rounds. “Yeehaw!” he cried.
“That doesn’t even rhyme,” I said. “More than a few I.Q. points must get lost in the transference, it would seem.”
“Now you have some idea what I have to put up with,” said a voice I recognized.
It wasn’t the brain; it was a woman’s voice, one I had first heard at the North Cass Ditty in the City street fair, and later at Trent and Stella’s custody hearing for their son Simon. It was the voice of Donna Blank.
But when I reeled around, an altogether different sight met my eyes. Instead of the spiky-haired, vaguely punkish social worker carrying a briefcase, in through the window had slipped the slender, athletic figure of a woman in a skimpy tiger-print bikini with matching cat’s-eyes mask. She had long, wavy red hair and stone earrings, and wielded a javelin. It was the same figure I had watched swing on a vine down Woodward Avenue.
“The Phantom Jungle Girl!” I said.
“Now you know my secret, Clarissa,” said Donna Blank, leaning her javelin against the wall near the coat rack. She looked me up and down with the opaque lenses of her tiger-striped cat-eyed mask. “And now I know yours, Ms. Megaton Man.”
“Is it that obvious, Donna?” I asked. “Or did Jasper tell you I was a megahero?”
“I could have guessed, since you’re obviously tight with Rubber Brother and the Y+Thems. Besides, if your burgundy hair wasn’t enough to give you away, that translucent visor of yours sure isn’t enough to conceal your identity. And please, call me Fanny.”
“How could you see me on the roof?” I asked.
“Very little escapes the attention of B’nu G’ullai,” said Donna. “Call it a jungle sense that comes with the job. Also, Jasper phoned ahead and said you’d definitely be dropping by this evening. I just wanted to vacate long enough and give you time to see if you could put two and two together yourself.”
“We were just gettin’ ta know each other, Fanny,” said Cowboy Gorilla, who was still perched on the desk. “Why you had to a-come barging in here…”
“Get down from there,” snapped Fanny, holding open the door of cage. “Come on!”
“Aw, shucks,” said the ape. “Some people are no fun!”
The amazing transformation I had witnessed earlier replayed now in reverse. Cowboy Gorilla got down from the desk, placed his tin star and gloves back in the drawer, picked the lariat up off the floor, coiled it up, and hung it on the coat rack. Then he took off his hat and holster, and hung them up as well. Reentering the cage, he closed the door and locked the keys.
No sooner had he hung the ring of keys back up when a bolt of electricity jumped from the furrowed brow of the gorilla back toward the bell jar. Instantly, what little intelligence was evident on the face of the gorilla disappeared. With a vacant look in his eyes, Bobo grabbed another banana, peeled it and ate it.
The brain in the bell jar burbled violently. “It’s bad enough you insist on wearing that skimpy outfit to bust crime, Phantom Jungle Girl!” he protested. “But I can’t even get a night out every once in a while, just to let off steam!”
“The monkeyshines will have to wait,” said Fanny. “First, Clarissa and I have some business to discuss.”
Fanny took a seat behind the oak desk. I pulled up a chair. “Now that we know each other’s secret identities, I guess we’re just going to have to trust each other,” I said. “That’s how it works, isn’t it? I’m kinda new at this crime-fighting thing.”
“Usually, there’s some kind of battle,” said Fanny. “After we pummel each other to a draw, one of us is supposed to say, ‘You’re pretty good with your fists,’ or something to that effect. Then we shake hands and become blood brothers or whatever. But we can skip the formalities—I gather you have an urgent matter to discuss?”
I took off my visor and set it on the desk. I clicked on invisible buttons embedded in the temples of the device; a holographic projection appeared between us showing the layout of Megatonic University. This had been the set of blueprints Preston Percy had downloaded to me from ICHHL. It showed a configuration of corridors and laboratories the government had constructed deep underneath the Arbor State campus since World War II. It was almost as sprawling and far-flung as the college campus on the surface.
“They do all kinds of secret stuff down there,” I explained. “I have reason to believe my real father, the Silver Age Megaton Man, was developed in one of these laboratories. They also manufacture Megasoldier Syrup that can give a civilian megapowers temporarily. And Dr. Joe Levitch, one of the chief architects of the Megaton Man project, still has a lab down there, puttering away at who knows what kind of crazy experiments.”
The projection was suddenly interrupted; a glitch made it disappear for an instant. When it returned, the configuration of corridors and laboratories was just as sprawling, but completely different.
“But see how it blinks and changes?” I said. “That matches my experiences—I personally visited the place twice, only a few months apart, but it was like the entire complex had been completely made over in the meantime.”
“The computer file might be corrupted,” said Fanny. “What else would explain the layout of an underground scientific facility changing its configuration so drastically? It would have taken millions—maybe billions of dollars over decades to perform all that tunneling and construct all those spaces so deep underground. They couldn’t move around the buildings of Arbor State that quickly, let alone a comparable campus deep underground.”
“But they did, or else I’m hallucinating. I also have reason to believe a dead guy I saw explode with my own eyes is hiding down there, and another scientist—a Warren Woodward teaching assistant named Wilton Ashe—who’s disappeared. He may have kidnapped his girlfriend, Audrey Tomita, too.”
“Wilton and Audrey?” said Fanny.
“You know them?”
“We travel in the same social circles, so to speak,” said the Phantom Jungle Girl.
On the street below, a car horn started honking.
“That would be Jasper,” said Fanny.
I went to the open window and ducked my head outside. Sure enough, Rubber Brother was stretching out of the white van the Y+Thems had driven to Detroit from New York; presumably, Dana Dorman was at the wheel. “Are you done with your introductions?” he shouted up at me. “We’ve got a secret underground scientific facility to break into!”
I turned to Fanny. “Our ride’s here,” I said. “While I’m thinking of it, where does your vine go when you’re not using it? And where does it attach, anyway?”
The Phantom Jungle Girl grabbed her spear. “I’ll tell you the legend of B’nu G’ullai on the way to Ann Arbor,” she said.
“You’re going to regret not bringing along Cowboy Gorilla on this caper, Phantom Jungle Girl,” said the Brilliant Brain, burbling in his pink fluid. “You never know when a pair of six-shooters wielded by an unhinged simian may come in handy.”
Next: Tall Tales Told Along the Ann Arbor Trail [Link available 01/31/2020 10:00 am EST]
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Archival Images:
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| Unpublished cover for a planned reprint of Pteranoman #1, circa 1996. |
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| The Phantom Jungle Girl and Rubber Brother in The Savage Dragon vs. The Savage Megaton Man #1 (Image Comics, March, 1993). |
All characters, character names, likenesses, words and pictures on this page are ™ and © Don Simpson 2020, all rights reserved.
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