Marauder: The Girl from New York

5. Robin Gets Fries

New York

July 23, 20:08 EST

The days had been long and achingly difficult. I was having to draw on reserves of physical strength I never knew I had. Rita and I hung out with the other kid on the block, playing basketball on the street, using a milkcrate strapped to a lamp post for a hoop. We often talked about food and threw around the idea all pitching in some money to get a haul from the store. Rita said she could make gumbo because her grandmother was from Louisiana.

A week later, we got an old rusted up barbeque to the rooftop, even the little siblings come up. Frankie and Ahmal were talking about what to do with the rest of the summer when Keyana broached the subject of my new school, but I could not even begin to express it.

"Kida! ¿Te va bien en la escuela?" she asked.

"For sure, yeah," I said.

"We'll miss you."

"Miss me?" I laughed. "I haven't started yet."

As I moved on, Bando put his arm over my shoulder. He was a couple years older than me. I think. with dudes like him it was often hard to tell. Every now and then I asked him to buy me a loosie or a brewski, so I guessed he was around twenty-one. But he was also the type to have a fake ID, so no telling. Plus, no one messes with him. He had a reputation. We all the hustlers who were about paper and only paper.

"Kida, what's good?" Bando dapped me up. His hands were super sweaty and hot.

"Not much, just getting ready for the new school."

"True, slide with me right quick."

Bando never really gave you the chance to say no. He was so fast-talking I've watched him finesse his way out of a weed citation once. God level.

I followed him off the roof and into the alley behind our block. "Where we going, yo?"

"You 'bout to see." Bando stepped between two big blue dumpsters and reached into the designer pouch he wore. He stayed fresh. "Check this out."

He pulled out a handgun and held it in his palm, completely nonchalant as if he was just showing me a collector's edition baseball card or something harm less like that. It was silver with a black handle. Small but compact. My stomach dropped at the sight of it. I'd see a gun before, but this felt too close for comfort.

I kept my face neutral.

"That a .38?"

"Hell yeah. Letting this joint go for a good price too. What you tryna do?"

Panic rushed through me, and I shook my head. "I'm good, brother. That's a pretty joint though."

Every instinct yelled at me to go full Marauder mode, but I shoved them down.

"Hell yeah, you know I'm 'bout quality. Shit, get at me if you change your mind. You know where I'll be, same place as always."

I did know, I just couldn't make myself do something about it. I couldn't betray my homies like that.

My phone buzzed as a got a notification from the Daily Bugle asking for photos of Marauder, meaning there was an attack of some kind.

-

-

"Impressive," said Robin as he scrolled through my camera, perched next to me on the ledge. "But on one ever questioned how you got shots like this?"

"Told 'em I climbed a flagpole."

It had turned out to be quite an eventful evening, not only did I fight a man in a bird costume calling himself the Vulture and had abducted the Wall Street giant Norman Osborn, but I learned the someone had sent a group of bozos called the enforcers to take me out. It seemed, just like Bando, I was getting a reputation, an urban legend forming around me. Then to top off the evening, Robin was in New York. I just wasn't sure why he came; I hadn't seen him since Independence Day at CADMUS Labs, and we didn't really get to say a proper goodbye.