USHER Dossiers: People you'll meet (Part 4)

Interview for MNN’s Veterans Day coverage, looking back at the contributions and sacrifices of Metahumans to America in wartime. Interviewer is in bold, Old Glory in normal type.

“Well, thank you for joining us, General! I’ve done some big interviews but never anything like this. What would you prefer to be called, General, Old Glory, something else?”

“Chris, please, Ma’am. I never really had a secret identity. Never saw the need for it. Anyone close enough to be considered family, well, I don’t need to worry about some punk ‘supervillain’ kidnapping them, let’s just put it that way.”

“All right then, Chris it is! You mentioned your ‘family’ and I gathered you meant your fellow metahuman heroes. Your best friend, and I don’t think this is any secret, would have to be the Savant. We’re showing that famous picture of you and he, arm in arm on VE Day. He’s gone missing and some have characterized him as, to use your word, a ‘supervillain’. They also say you haven’t done your usually thorough job bringing him in. What do you say to that?”

“No comment. Next question.”

“But clearly you and he…”

“I thought we had agreed there would be no questions about ongoing investigations, miss.”

“Fair enough. So, restricting your comments just to your relationship with the Savant, maybe?”

“Fred Williamson is a hero. He saved America during WWII, he saved Brazil during the Horde and he saved this planet during the Scion invasion. That was two years ago. Calling him a supervillain after that is a sick joke. How’s that for a comment?”

“Blunt? You mentioned the Scion invasion. You worked with some real heavy hitters during that dark time, and also some more obscure metahumans. What was that like?”

“I sent out a call on shortwave, asking for help. I knew I couldn’t do it on my own. There was no one obscure in that fight. Every single metahuman who answered my call is a hero. Most didn’t. You, for example.”

“Well, I never claimed to be a hero, now did I?”

“No, you didn’t. I’m sorry, miss, I have a developing situation that requires my attention, we’ll have to cut this short.”

“Christian Thomason, ladies and gentlemen, true, blue American hero. What? No… no, don’t try to follow him. He doesn’t like it when I try to follow him. No… well, he really doesn’t like me, for starters. What? We’re still on the air? Well maybe you should- ”