The Birth of the Silver Specter (part 3) 

Barbara waited until night fell before making her move against the mob. While 
still at City Hall, Barbara picked up her bag and walked into the ladies’ room. 
After checking to make sure the coast was clear, she took off her clothes and 
placed them in her bag. Then she pulled out one of the silvery balls Amy had 
given her. 

“Here goes nothing, “ she told herself and slapped her hands together on the 
ball. As before, the ball collapsed and the silvery material crawled up her 
arms. She picked up her bag and turned to look at herself in the mirror. “I 
really look like something out of a comic book!” she said in dismay. 

Then she looked down at her bag. She couldn’t leave it here and she couldn’t 
walk back to her office and drop it off. She cursed herself for not really 
thinking things through. Then she remembered that City Hall shared space with 
the Police Department. She could put the bag in one of the lockers in the gym 
over there. 

Barbara felt rather conspicuous as she moved among the building’s corridors in 
her silver body suit. She quickly made it to the gym and dropped off her bag. 
She wish she had a padlock to put on it and hoped the bag would still be there 
when she got back. She hurried out of the building before anybody could spot 
her. 

As she jogged over to her destination, Barbara mused she would have to work out 
a better way to change clothes in privacy, without letting anyone suspect that 
she was really this silver vigilante. “Maybe Amy will have some ideas,” Barbara 
thought. 

Barbara picked her destination with care – a dark dump of a building where 
several of the gang members who ran errands for the mob were known to hang out. 
A good place to test her abilities and to send a message to the mob as well. As 
she suspected, it wasn’t long before she was noticed. 

“Hey lady,” said a sneering youth behind her, “the hookers work the other side 
of the street.” 

Barbara turned around to see a surly, teenaged punk dressed in torn clothes. 
Despite his bravado, he was half a foot shorter than she was. She knew she 
should have come up with some sort of snappy come-back, but she was too 
flustered to say anything. She just frowned down at the boy and hoped that would 
be message enough. 

“Well, since you’re here,” the boy continued, “you’re going to have to give me a 
sample of the merchandise.” 

“I don’t think so.” Barbara replied. 

The boy casually flipped out a switchblade and waved it under Barbara’s chin. “I 
think I do.” He poked her suit above the sternum and drew the blade down, 
intending to cut the suit open, but it sealed itself behind the blade. 

“What the…” the boy looked at her suit and his blade in wonder. 

“Looks like your knife is dull.” Barbara told the boy calmly. 

“Like hell it is!” The boy yelled and stabbed her in the belly with the knife. 
The blade snapped in two when it met Barbara’s invulnerable skin. The boy looked 
down at his broken knife with the beginnings of fear creeping into his eyes. 

Barbara didn’t wait, but slapped her thigh as Amy had shown her and brought out 
her night stick and brought the club down on the boy’s skull. He crumpled into 
an unconscious heap at her feet. Barbara was elated. She’d done it! 

Her victory was short. A new voice cut through the night. “Well, well, well. 
Looks like Bug found a woman he couldn’t handle!” Several male voices sniggered 
behind Barbara. “Like that’s anything new!” offered a second boy. Judging by the 
laughter, Barbara could tell these boys were not impressed by her performance. 
She slowly turned around to see a half dozen punks lounging on the steps of the 
building. 

“Congratulations,” said the boy who was obviously the leader. “You managed to 
catch one of us with his pants down. Bug wasn’t much to worry over, but he’s 
still a member of our gang, and for that, you’ve got to pay!” 

As he said this, the gang members sprang to their feet and surrounded Barbara, 
brandishing knives, pipes, and similar weapons.  Barbara could see by the 
healthy distance they gave her that they weren’t going to make the same mistake 
that their fallen comrade had. 

A punk on her right made the first move, hoping to draw her out. Barbara swung 
her club in his direction, but kept her eyes in front of her. Sure enough, a boy 
on her opposite side was trying to take advantage of the feint to knock Barbara 
out. She punched him in the gut and then the chin and he hit the ground hard. 

Another punk on Barbara’s left side tried to slash at her midsection with a 
knife, but the blade didn’t harm Barbara and she rammed her fist into his face. 

Then Barbara slapped her left thigh and was pleased to see a club spring into 
her left hand. She dove into the midst of her remaining attackers, her two clubs 
moving like a blur. The clubs met with the punk’s skulls with a satisfying thunk 
and it was not long before all of Barbara’s would be attackers were sprawled 
around her on the pavement. 

Barbara pushed the clubs back into her palms and surveyed the damage. “Not bad 
for a night’s work” she told herself. But then she noticed one of the boys was 
missing. It was Bug, the first boy she encountered. Then she heard the heavy 
bolt of an automatic weapon slide back behind her. Barbara whirled around. 

Bug was standing there, this time with a machine gun. “I don’t know what you are 
lady, but nothing can stand up to this!” Barbara instinctively shielded her face 
with her hands as Bug pulled the trigger. 

The boy sent a hail of bullets into Barbara’s body. The slugs ripped dozens of 
holes in her silver costume, but didn’t pierce her skin. Bug continued to shoot 
until he had used up all of the gun’s ammunition. Then he watched as all of the 
holes closed up and Barbara lowered her hands, unharmed. 

“Jesus!” the boy muttered and he dropped the gun and ran as fast as he could, 
away from the woman who wouldn’t die. 

Barbara watched him leave and decided it was time for her to go as well. Amy 
would be interested to know the suit held up to automatic weapons fire. Barbara 
hoped it would last long enough to get her back to City Hall.