Rodney Celestin March 4, 1999

THE OUTAGE!

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It was a cool, breezy night in the windy city; a little windier than usual. The mild-mannered superhero known as "E.C." was ripping through the skies while doing his regular rounds about the city. There was a mist of sinister evil in the air but he thought nothing of it; besides what is the worst that could happen? "Tonight is going to be a slow night", he said to himself. So our hero decided to grab a bite to eat at Harty Joe’s, but as he came in for a landing he noticed that, one by one, all the lights in all the building where turning off.

It appeared to be some sort of domino effect. Within seconds not only was the entire city covered in a blanket of darkness, but also the world! "Let me check the city’s power plant", was his first intuition. When he arrived he saw that all of the city’s generators had completely shut down. As he flew over the downtown streets hundreds of cars were left totally immobilized as their owners fled in terror. The question is: In terror of what? All computers, c.b.s and radios were deemed useless. E.C. could not find a reason or a solution. As he pondered over the situation he thought to himself "Generators, cars, light……..what do these all have in common………….MAGNETISM!"

As usual our super hero was correct. But where could have all the world’s magnetism have gone. There was only one being evil, conniving and heartless enough to pull off a stunt like this: Magneto. But where could he be hiding? E.C. surged into outer space where he found his arch nemesis sucking all of the earth’s magnetism from its poles. "Two can play at this game", he murmured to himself. Grabbing the longest wire he could find, E.C. crept up behind Magneto and wrapped it around him over 10,000 times. Then with all of his might and force he shot Magneto like an arrow towards the earth. A

Moments passed and then there was sudden blast and a yellow glow filled the air: Magnetism had returned!