The Prospects Read Free Page B

giant swastika above the words: “Bringing The Hammer Down For A Better World!”
    In the next column was a cover of the May 1972 issue of TIME with the caption “The Flightsuit Has Arrived” under a picture of the Golden Gryphon. To the right was “Golden Gryphon #1,” the second most valuable comic book after Sergeant Hammer’s. Below was a New York Times front page with “Heroes Unite in NYC With Government Blessing” from 1976 and a framed first issue of “New York Guardians” with “The World’s Greatest Heroes in the World’s Greatest City” almost popping off the cover with bright colors.
    Alex skimmed through the comics and news stories of the 80’s. That was when the prose about superheroes was glowing and the comics were vivid. There was almost nothing on the wall from the 90’s, when the public’s love affair with superheroes ended abruptly. No framed magazines recounted how the Desert Dukes held the whole city of Albuquerque hostage rather than surrender one of their members to the local police after he brutally murdered his wife. There was also no articles about how Steelworker wrecked downtown Pittsburgh after a nervous breakdown.
    Alex didn’t have to see those articles. He knew how many metahumans and ultra-athletes, the non-powered people who could stand toe-to-toe with these anomalies of science, went rogue or were revealed as frauds or even greater menaces to their home cities than the villains they fought. The public demanded these vigilantes and self-proclaimed saviors be held accountable for their actions.
    But simply outlawing superheroes wasn’t a popular option either. Self-proclaimed villains, super-criminals, alien invaders, and other monsters didn’t care what the laws said. Someone had to hold them back to maintain the status quo.
    Every country handled this problem in its own way. Many nations passed strict laws restricting where metahumans on either side of the law could or could not go. Some required conscription for mutants, which gave them a superpowered battalion for national defense. A few politically turbulent nations saw metahumans set themselves up as dictators with regimes that lasted for as long as it took for other metahumans to come together and overthrow them.
    In the United States, the solution was an agency dedicated to overseeing and regulating the heroes. The federal government required costumed vigilantes to obtain legal recognition or join a team under the oversight of a MAB agent before they saved anyone's day. The superheroes themselves maintained autonomy over their careers, but they were responsible for all consequences of their actions.
    It wasn’t popular at first. Some iconic characters who valued independence and anonymity fought their government-supporting former comrades. After a few battles they were quickly arrested, deported, crippled, or killed.
    The drop in accidental damage, false arrests, and civilian casualties from vigilantes who hid behind masks over the following years made most people realize that regulation was, overall, a good thing. Citizens had someone to complain to if superheroes damaged their property or violated their civil rights in their personal pursuits of justice. Law-abiding superheroes, in turn, had agents who served as liaisons between them and local law enforcement. That made them more efficient as crime fighters.
    Alex scanned the periodicals from the last five years. There, on the cover of the New York Daily Post, was the public’s first view of Agent Exo, a MAB agent who became superhero in his own right. Under the headline “Exo-lent!” was a man in a blue and silver armored exoskeleton with his face concealed by the glare against the opaque visor. Next to it was a New York Times headline from two years ago, “Agent Exo Singlehandedly Subdues Bone Terror,” followed by an account of how he arrested a rampaging muscle-bound monster covered in bone spikes.
    He remembered the smell of the new exoskeleton, the