By FoxFaceStories

A Commission for Xerxes76

Since being transformed from an ordinary man to the powerful (and busty) Meteor Woman, Kara has come to love her new superheroic life. She’s in love with an investigative reporter, she’s closer with her family, she’s doing good in the world, and . . . she’s pregnant! But with all these changes on the horizon, new threats rise up. A shady real estate mogul wishes to tear apart the community she has helped protect, and she must find a way to stop him, all while dealing with an ever-growing belly!

First Part

Previous Part

Next Part

Original Here: Meteor Woman

Post-Story Commission: Meteor Woman: The Stories After

Issue 6: Crowd Control

The game of cat and mouse had truly begun. But who was the cat and who was the mouse? The pushback against Blackwell’s plot was Kara’s idea, but it took a whole community to put it into organisation. Such things take time, but once the wheels are sufficiently greased, contacts made, the word put out to trusted friends and associates, leaflets distributed, attendance by celebrity heroes and artists promised, then things start to move quickly. Kara began to grow excited at all the movement, even as she often found herself in the way of Leticia and Marli’s planning, which took on a power of its own despite how pregnant the latter was. They quickly began recruiting, and that process never stopped once they’d decided on the slogan to front their campaign: Stop Blackwell. Save Metropole.

It wasn’t exactly as hopeful or community-centred as Kara had initially desired, but Leticia was brilliant when it came to these things. 

“You have to understand,” she said in her calm, intellectual voice. “If it’s just ‘Save Metropole’, we’re playing into his hands. The key thing is that we’re on the attack. We make clear in every sign, every leaflet, and every media release that this situation is spiralling because of him and his company.”

Well, it certainly appealed to Kara’s more vengeful side, so she was able to roll with that. And it also allowed her to spend more time with her actual neighbourhood. She could actually have a proper chat with Yusuf, even if he didn’t know her alter-ego, and enjoy his magnificent Afghan kebabs as he supplied food trucks for fundraising and their upcoming events. She was able to get to know Imelda Moritz during one of their community planning sessions at a hired hall. She was another patron of the now-damaged Metropole Prenatal Clinic, and a woman who could well be Dinah’s first-grade teacher one day. She was an adorable white-blonde haired woman with thick glasses and borderline horseteeth, and yet her nerdy, rather pointy-faced appearance somehow all came together to produce a truly magnetic person.

“Oh, I’m so excited to meet you in person, Meteor Woman!” she exclaimed. “Oh, your bump looks gorgeous! You look completely gorgeous! You’re glowing!”

“So are you, Mrs Moritz.”

“Oh, it’s just Miss Moritz, until my boyfriend gets his act together! We didn’t exactly plan on having a little one so early, given I’m only twenty four years old, but now that I’m eight months along, I just can’t wait!”

Meteor Woman laughed at this. “Well, mine was a surprise too! Thankfully, my own partner and I are getting just as excited too. Say, you look familiar. Did I . . . did I rescue you from a train crash last year?”

“Yes! You did! Um, I think you might also be the reason I’m pregnant.”

Kara paled at this, spluttering as she took a drink to the point that her breasts almost escaped their tight confinement in her maternity wear costume. “I’m sorry, come again?”

“Oh, it’s very embarrassing, but, well, after you rescued me, and I really could have died, I just felt so full of life, you know, so when I got back to my boyfriend I was in a really excited, overwhelmed mood, and one thing led to another and . . . here I am.”

She cupped under her belly, lifting it a little. Meteor Woman couldn’t help herself; she burst out laughing.

“Well, I’m glad to have been of help in more ways than one!”

There were others who were gathering together too, and not just the ordinary people of the Metropole community. Ice Shard was coming through, putting out feelers with the help of Flame Dancer (when Vicki was actually available to help, she had other major concerns as the leader of the Hero Society, of course) to find heroes and heroines who could lend their voice to the Stop Blackwell, Save Metropole campaign. Surprisingly, there was quite a larger number.

Aqua was only eighteen. She was a cute Polynesian girl once going to be Blue Trident’s sidekick, but she had a teen pregnancy and quit the hero game. But now she was able to provide magnificent displays of flowing water in the air, keep protestors hydrated as they blocked the entrance to Blackwell Enterprises, and generally keep things ‘cool’ in the summer heat - literally. Dinah thought her son Max was the “best person ever - he throws all water! All water, Mom!”

Max had no powers. At all. He was just a three year old kid, but Dinah worshipped him anyway, and who was Kara to argue with?

Two wives and one husband of existing heroes joined the Mother’s March For Metropole. Adamant’s wife Sasha was a darling older woman who Kara would once have called a ‘total MILF’ before she effectively became one herself. She was in her early forties, and had all the volunteer boys in their twenties staring at her latina culo as she strutted about in her summer dress. Her best friend was Abigail, the wife of the retired hero Cannonball, who was sadly a paraplegic now. Despite the fact that she was five months pregnant with their second child, she wheeled him about and he greeted everyone enthusiastically, their three year old son on his lap waving like the march was about him - perhaps he thought it was. Lastly, there was Trent, who Kara alone knew was Signet Lance’s husband. He was the most mild-mannered man one could ever imagine, able to disappear in a crowd of one; brown hair and Caucasian skin and a boring suit. 

“Please, don’t let me make a fuss,” he said. “I’ll help in whatever way I can. I, um, I’m just not good at being at the centre of things. I’m not good with interviews. I’ll do what I can, though.”

Naturally, everyone loved him. He was like a timid teddybear, and not a mean bone in his body. He even apologised when he bumped into Kara’s, well, bump, but she just laughed.

“Don’t worry,” she said, rubbing her now-seven month pregnant stomach. “I bump it against the bathroom shelf every time I go to wash my face in the morning. It juts out.”

“Now try having twins!” Marli called out.

“Or quads!” a third woman announced, one Kara didn’t recognise. She excused herself to see who was the newest member of the Mothers’ March for Metropole, only to see that it was a costumed figure. Well, a costume that was stretched to the point where the woman’s entire naked belly was out. She looked even bigger than Marli. Much bigger, in fact. She was white, but had forest green hair and a slightly green hue to her skin, subtle but present.

“Wait, I know you!” Kara said. “I’ve read about you. Mother Nature?”

The woman winced. She wore a long skirt of leaves and a bra that consisted of the same, but with vines to tie around her back. The poor thing looked positively overwhelmed by her gravid belly, and the fact that she was quite short only made her gravid form more pronounced. Her chest wasn’t on Kara’s level, but she was smuggling E-cups in there still, or perhaps even F-cups.

“Emphasis on M-Mother these days,” the woman said.

“Holy shit, you were big back in the day! You don’t look like you’ve aged at all.”

“Don’t,” the woman said, still wincing as her stomach rippled. She pointed to her ears, which only then did Kara realised were tipped with prominent elven points. “Got my powers from fairy magic. I’m part-fae after I made my pact.” “Wow, that explains it. When I was younger I - I mean, my male cousin, he used to, er, really take a liking to you. Really shot him into puberty.”

Mother Nature chuckled, then groaned a little as she stroked her massively fertile mound. “Those were the good days! I made my deal with the fae for powers. I got fifteen years of being a hero who could control nature.”

Kara frowned. “And then?”

The woman gave a pained grin and gestured sheepishly to her huge belly. “And then I’d have to ‘give back to the fae.’ Didn’t realise that when they named me Mother Nature, I’d be doing the mothering part. This is my fifth pregnancy, you know. Last time I had just triplets. Time before that I had quints. God, I’m so preggo. Don’t even have the fun part either, they just start growing inside of me!”

“Wait, you have all those kids yourself?”

“Yup. Gotta raise ‘em, too. I rely a hell of a lot on the community centre and the youth programs. Don’t get out much since I’ve probably got at least ten years of making fae babies before I can do the superhero gig again - I think my blessing-slash-curse is on a repeat cycle - so I really, really need this community. Thanks for getting it organised, even if, well, I might need to sit down fairly often and ask people to look at for my young ones.”

At that point, Dinah screamed in excitement, running for Mother Nature. “Babies! Daddy, look! Lots and lots of babies!”

Kara laughed. “Don’t worry, I completely understand.”

Meteor Woman turned to see her Dinah with Ralph, who was touring the event. Their daughter, of course, was having a ball with the Mother’s March. Their chant was ‘Stop the Blackwell Buyout!’, and Ralph made sure to drum up the importance in his articles and live reporting. This area of their program was aimed directly at connecting the aggressive buyout of Metropole services that had recently ramped up: the community centre, the indoor market, the youth centre where Leticia worked. They had each been damaged in fighting and by ‘criminal action’ (organised by Blackwell, Kara suspected) and now numerous companies were swooping in like vultures to eat them up.

Shell companies. Fucking shell companies. Even an idiot like me knows what they are, Kara thought to herself as she read the news that yet another buyout was being proposed at city hall. That asshole is playing a literal shell game with our housing, our services, our fucking community. 

Ralph was busy connecting the tissue together, researching deep into these companies and slowly, painstakingly linking them back to Blackwell. But his true focus was on City Hall. When they finally found time to relax in bed at night, usually after reading little Dinah to sleep and then getting very passionate in order to settle Kara’s crazy preggo hormones, he would fill her in on the developments.

“You were right to get this moving, honey,” he told her, caressing her swollen stomach before gently cupping her massive breast as they lay together naked in bed. “This is big. Real big. At first I was just getting low-level evidence and following up. Paid lunches, free tickets for sports events, gifts of wine and invitations to fancy dinners to the Mayor and several councillors. I messaged a few of them, tried to arrange interviews, even wrote some minor articles to see what would shake loose, but they’re in lockstep together. Nothing was shaking loose. So I looked deeper, and watched everything on the bug. Our little ‘anonymous source.’ Well, suddenly I’m seeing men in suits I’ve never seen before visiting City Hall on the regular. Always different people, often in different styles, but they all say the same thing: “I represent an interested constituent who feels he has much to offer.” Always the same catchphrase. And I tailed one.”

She shifted herself over to face him, her belly pressed against his stomach - at least the power of flight made such a move easy.

“You did what? Ralph, that’s dangerous. You were already hurt in the attack just a month ago. You were lucky the Hero Dome doctors were there to see you and Dinah. God, things could have been so much worse and now you’re running around with your squishy body and trying to follow badguys!?”

Ralph raised an eyebrow. “Kara, I love you. But you fell in love with me because I’m an intrepid reporter, remember?”

She sighed. “Yeah, I did. Well, that and your cute butt. And your glasses. And you made me want to stay a woman. And you made me really appreciate having big tits.”

“A revelation I’m thankful for everyday. But my point is, I tailed these guys a few times. Sometimes I got nothing. Sometimes they evaded me. But more than once they met with a woman. Asian. Slim. Professional looking. Had a kind of device I just managed to notice on the side of her head.

Kara blinked. “Hope.”

“I’m not hoping I’m right, I know it.”

The buxom pregnant beauty sat up a little, using her flight to help with her belly. “No, her name is Hope. She’s Blackwell’s number two. She served us tea before I turned down his offer. When I planted that bug.”

“The bug we’ve got nothing from.”

“Only because he’s got that room like some kind of Faraday Cage. The bug will still be recording.”

“Let’s hope so. It might get something. These guys were then shuffled off in limos. But one of them, just as he got into the limo, changed appearance suddenly. Grew scales.”

“You’re telling me this now?”

“You made your passions clear when we got Dinah down to sleep.”

“Okay, point to ya. Damn. Okay, it’s coming together. We’ve got a full-on conspiracy here. Scales? What in the everliving fuck does that mean?”

Ralph chuckled. “You are such a swearer.”

“Chalk it up to me bein’ a rather ugly kind of fella before I, uh, ‘bloomed.’”

“And what a blooming it was, my dear. Especially in two locations.”

“Three now,” she said, rolling her eyes. “But seriously . . . scales? Wait, the Chinese Dragon-looking villain?”

Ralph bit his lip. “Could be. I’ll keep looking into it and hopefully -”

Suddenly, a child’s cry echoed up from the hall. The sound of night terrors.

“M-M-MOMMY! HELP!”

Kara used her superspeed to get her finger on her nose faster than her husband. “Not it!”

“She’s calling for you!”

“So, you need to make her start calling for you.”

“I had her all day,” Ralph said.

“And I am very pregnant right now.”

“A pregnant woman who can fly.”

Kara sighed, then smirked. “It’s a neat trick. Wanna see a floating pregnant woman in a silk dress?”

Ralph very much did. Kara struck a brief pose before him, then shot down the hallway and landed on her feet. She snuck into Dinah’s room, keeping up her secret identity for her child until Dinah was old enough. The poor thing was curled up on the bed, her little kid snuffling and shaking. The covers had been thrown off.

“I had a bad dream,” Dinah whimpered, her words slurred due to her fear.

“Oh, my darling girl. My little hero,” Kara whispered. She took her daughter into her arms and rested her on her round belly, snuggling her close in the comfort of her bosom.

“It’s going to be okay, honey. It’s just a dream. You’re with Mama. Everything’s gonna be okay.”

It will be, she thought, as Dinah began to fall back to sleep in her arms. It will be okay. Because we’re going to take that fucker down.

***

Meteor Woman did not lead the march. It was important, especially with all the negative media attention being heaped upon her, that she not be seen as its lead. That was the role of Marli and Leticia, along with other community leaders, a wide spectrum of different cultures, races, classes, backgrounds, and general walks of life. The crowd was mostly women, mostly mothers, including expectant mothers. Mother Nature was aided by several volunteers, her enormous pale green belly openly on display, shifting in response to her quadruplets. Several of her eldest children marched with her, and several were in the hands of caretakers, occasionally passed to her for feeding. Trent was there, waving shyly to Signet Lance and Lightning Lass, who was his romantic partner’s superheroic best friend (and beard). Aqua was also present, her little boy upon her shoulders, and he kept on waving to Dinah, who was now steadfastly ignoring him because, to quote Kara’s little princess, “he’s not my best friend anymore because he’s wearing blue and I hate blue now!”

Toddlers, Kara thought. She wished she could take this march with her little one, but she needed to be present as Meteor Woman nonetheless, in order to show what she truly stood for, and to combat the negative attention. Ice Shard was beside her, wearing a maternity costume that looked like her ski suit with the belly let out to show her bump. Other pregnant heroines, local women, and allies were present. Imelda the teacher was happily chatting to Kara’s mom Sally, who needed a bit of aid with her crutches due to her physical weakness. Of course, Kara could see that her mother was rather slyly getting some good words in and introducing the woman to little Dinah, who was ecstatic to see yet another baby belly, her being in her babydoll obsession phase.

That’s Mom alright. She’ll have Imelda eating out of the palm of her hand, soon.

Alexis was also present, playing the role of the civilian. She winked over at Kara, and then whispered under her breath, knowing her big sister could hear her.

“Now this is what a hero’s work looks like, big sis. Well done.”

Kara smiled, joyous that her little sister was looking up to her again. It’s so lame, but I really want to stay her favourite hero forever.

Of course, her sister being present played a dual purpose, the same reason why Vicki was present in her wheelchair, and various other heroes and ARTEMIS personnel were present; for security purposes. They had already gotten the news trending against Blackwell, and Ralph had called in every favour to begin untangling the man’s nefarious influence, but it was still an uphill battle. One major attack on a crowd could kill not just the movement, but give city hall the casus belli they needed to pull the trigger on his dream redevelopment. Already, there were more cranes and construction equipment coming into the borough than ever before, and properties that had been bought up in recent months were being torn down without any indication of what was coming next.

God, there’s so much fucking tension in the air, Kara thought. And this damn baby is doing flips in my uterus. Jesus, I swear I’ll never get used to knowing that I’ve got a damn uterus, and with an occupant no less!

She marched forward, along with the thousands that had been gathered. The permits alone had been staggeringly difficult to achieve, but Marli and Leticia had worked their magic with the authorities. Yusuf had turned out to be a master of sign creation, and numerous people held up his placards, a number of which had Blackwell’s smug face upon them with a cancel sign pasted over the top in red.

“Stop Blackwell!” the crowd shouted. “Save Metropole!”

“No more billionaires ruining our neighbourhood!”

Someone was shouting, “Wake up, sheeple! The 5G is going to control us when he takes charge!”

Kara narrowed her eyes. An agent provocateur to make them look crazy and grab the news. He matched the photo Ralph had taken of one of Blackwell’s employees. She nodded to Ice Shard, who knew exactly what to do. The icy heroine wandered closer to the fifth column agent and subtly used her power. The man ran off quickly and Ice Shard returned.

“Please tell me you didn’t freeze his nuts off,” Kara asked.

“C’mon,” Ice Shard said, looking annoyed. “That would leave things very obvious. No, I just gave him the worst brainfreeze imaginable . . . for a month.”

Meteor Woman’s jaw fell. She couldn’t remember Ice Shard ever being such a rules breaker. In fact, she’d come down hard on Kara in her early days for not doing things professionally.

“They nearly hurt my growing baby too, Kara,” Ice Shard said. “I’ll bend the rules a little. Just don’t expect me to snap them.”

She stroked her belly idly, then actually smiled. “He likes the cold,” Ice Shard said. “My little snow angel. He gets all excited and happy when I put snowflakes on my bare stomach.”

Kara couldn’t help but feel a bit emotional. Damn hormones! she thought. They’ve got me all teary-eyed!

But what wasn’t there to feel teary-eyed about? The march was going well, and it proceeded over the next hour, with demonstrators shifting as organised to hold up construction vehicles, sit-in at Blackwell Enterprise buildings and shell companies. Ralph and his reporter friends were covering it favourably, and there was a good vibe in the air. Finally, her husband made it to her, his cameraman at his side.

“Hello there, Mr Ralph Riley!” Meteor Woman exclaimed. “If it isn’t my favourite interviewer!”

“Good to see you again too, Meteor Woman,” Ralph said smoothly, playing along. “It seems you have quite a march here.”

“Not my march, though I’m proud to be part of it. This is the brainchild of the community leaders of Metropole, fighting back against Harrison Blackwell and his attempts to ruin our borough just so he can remake it in his billionaire image.”

“That’s a tall claim,” Ralph said. “Do you have evidence for that? Mr Blackwell denies such a so-called ‘nefarious conspiracy.’ He claims the rise in crime is natural.”

“Well then he can explain why his shell companies, recently proven to belong to him, are buying up all real estate in town. Why emails leaked from his own assistant show that he is pressuring local landlords to raise their rents to push people into the street, and paying them to do so. He can explain why the existence of new supervillains coincided with a complex pay scheme that not only pays for their bail on the regular, but seemingly re-employs them after they are released!”

“And this is all proven?” Ralph said, dangling the meat before her.

“More and more each day,” she said, puffing out her chest. She knew this would get a lot of views online; she had the most impressive bust of any superheroine, after all, but sometimes sex sold, even if the message was serious, and she’d long since stopped being embarrassed of her frankly fabulous boobs. If it got their message viral, all the better as far as she was concerned. “Simply go to any of our websites, including StopBlackwell.org and SaveMetropole.org, among others. What we have is growing evidence not just of his conspiracy, but that he has bribed officials, including those in city hall. And if they don’t start to abandon his crooked ship, they’ll go down with him.”

“Is that a statement on behalf of the Hero Society?”

She flashed her prettiest, yet most commanding smile. “No Ralph, that’s a statement on behalf of the people of Metropole.”

Ralph nodded, all in Serious Report Mode. God, he looks so sexy when he does this. We need to do that interview first-meet roleplay again. The one where he can’t stop getting distracted by my tits.

“Well, I’ll do the rounds and see if others are saying the same. Thanks as always, Meteor Woman.”

“Any time, Ralph. You’re my favourite reporter, you know that.”

They exchanged a grin that meant so much more to those who were in the know. Kara’s superhearing caught it all.

“Ugh,” Ice Shard muttered. 

“Awww,” Sally whispered.

“Get a room, you two!” Alexis giggled.

Their comments only made Kara feel all the brighter. She marched through Metropole, even skirting the area of Cornwall and the Narrows, her chest thrust out and her belly thrust out even further. She was a proud mother. She was proud to be pregnant. She was proud to be a superhero, but also to do something without needing to fire lasers from her eyes or give a hard sonic scream. She didn’t need her fists for this moment, just an open hand. Marli and Leticia pulled up alongside her and took her hands, and she and her two new friends marched, Flame Dancer wheeling herself further to the left in her civilian guise, Ice Shard with her resting bitchface showing the slightest hint of pride, and the entire community coming together.

This is going to work, Meteor Woman thought. This is what it’s about.

It was the kind of thing she’d decided to remain a hero for; to help the people around her that were so often trod upon and overlooked. 

“Listen, little one,” she told her baby, sleeping inside her belly. “This is your village.”

She still kept her superreflexes ready though, just in case anything happened.

But nothing did. 

No attack came.

The march was a resounding success.

To Be Continued . . .