BANK ROBBERY!!

Oh yes! OH YES! I was off yesterday and a bank robbery came in over the police scanner!

Even better: It was a CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION doing the robbery!

There's a group here in town of two-bit thugs called The Bad Guys. They run around town wearing stupid cartooney burglar suits. You know what I mean. Black mask, black pants, striped shirt.

They were hitting the Old National Bank on 2nd street. Of course, I got off my butt and got into action!

I don't think I've ever made it downtown so fast. The cops were surrounding the building, yelling through megaphones, just like in the movies. I was so freakin' jazzed! One of the Bad Guys was hanging out the front door of the bank with a shotgun pointed under the chin of a little blonde lady. "I'll send one of 'em out every time one of your cars takes off!" he was yelling.

Oh sweet! It's a bank robbery GONE WRONG that's turned into a HOSTAGE SITUATION!

The police didn't even notice me until I used one of the cop cars as a springboard and dove through one of the office windows on the second floor.

I love the sound of breaking glass!

In the office was a scared, balding man. The bank's president. He was dusted with broken glass from my grand entrance. "Oh, God! It's you!" he said.

"It's me!" I said as I rushed out of his office.

Oh awesome, a BANK ROBBERY HOSTAGE SITUATION! That's all I could think!

I rushed downstairs and came out into the lobby.

This is where things get hairy.

In the room were maybe 10 Bad Guys armed with sawed off shotguns. A few of them were holding old-fashioned tommy guns. Half of them were looking up at the ceiling. They heard me coming in. The others were looking out the windows because the cops were screaming "Punchernaut, stand down! This area is under control!"

About that time, one of the guys running crowd control wisened up and saw me. He pointed his tommy gun at me and opened fire.

Have I mentioned how bad I hate getting shot?

The only thing I hate more than getting shot is getting shot with a machine gun. It's like when you get in the shower and it's too hot. You sort of panic and start trying to get away from the hot water and cower in the back of the shower until you calm down enough to reach out and turn the heat down.

BUDDA BUDDA BUDDA BUDDA BUDDA

"AAH! AAAH OH SHIT OW OW OW!" and I'm scampering across the lobby of the bank, swatting my hands at the bullets. One jams the ring finger on my left hand and breaks the nail down to the middle almost. OW!

"GET IM BOYS!" one of the Bad Guys shouts and then they're ALL shooting at me. The poor patrons in the bank cower against the walls with their hands over their heads and I jump back where the tellers are cowering under their counter.

I've got about 100 holes in my shirt and bruises are already forming under some of them. "Son of a bitch!" I shout. The Bad Guys cease fire and I can hear them coming my way.

One of the tellers is looking at me, terrified. "Well..." she says, "Do something!"

I frown at her.

There's no pleasing some people.

And I'm taking getting shot by 10 guys with tommy guns and shotguns a lot better than she would have.

And with that on my mind I jump over the counter and into the spray of gunfire.

The tommy guns BUDDA BUDDA and the shotguns KA-CHK BLAM and I take out the two guys who came over to finish me off. Two more are headed for the back door, money bags under their arms. I slam their heads together, oldschool Superman style. I throw them at their friends and knock two more of them down. The rest are on their way out the door, toward the police, and I let them go. The police can deal with them from there.

Then it hits me...

How the hell am I going to get out of here!?

Cops are all over the place, I don't feel like I can fly, and I REALLY don't want the cops to shoot me because I've had my fill of getting shot for the day.

I stand there out of breath as the two guys I knocked over crawl out from under their fallen friends. Cops are on their way in to clear the place out. They four cops in the front get the fleeing robbers in headlocks and wrestle them to the pavement but there's a legion of more policemen behind them, all of them wearing SWAT and riot gear.

I'm about to rush them when, all at once, I turn invisible.

I had no idea I could turn invisible.

It is a really weird feeling to blink and still be able to see. You really take that half second of darkness for granted.

You don't know what you got till it's gone.

Silently, I slip past the police as they enter the building, and I walk down the block a ways.

This is seriously way too easy.

My finger is throbbing, so I change out of my costume a few blocks away and I stop by WalGreens to get some bandages for my split fingernail.

I guess the point of this story is, I totally foiled my first bank robbery.

It was even a hostage situation!

AND I TURNED FREAKING INVISIBLE!!

All in all a pretty successful superhero day, wouldn't you say?