A Ragdoll of the Whatnot Halloween Treat

(Unless you happen to be Dr. Norge)

By Jodie Phillips

He started in the bathroom, fresh out of the shower.  Water dripped down from his towel and onto the tile floor.  It formed a small puddle that he would have to clean up later.  Clean up was the last thing on Jim Segulin’s mind.  For now all he was concerned with was putting on his face.  That and learning the newest ditty he planned to sub in for the usual spoiler warning.  He valiantly tried to find a word that rhymed with orange while he smeared shaving crème across his face.  He didn’t knick himself with the razor, a plus, but he also couldn’t think of a word to rhyme so he would have to rewrite the entire couplet. 

Next the makeup, which he wasn’t particularly skilled with, but as long as all of his skin was covered he would be okay.  Should he add glitter?  It would certainly bump up the overall picture, and good art was in the details, but it was glitter. His hand wavered over the makeup case, but he firmly decided against the glitter, for now at least. 

The costume was definitely the hardest part.  It was tight and it rode up in places that clothe shouldn’t be, it was uncomfortable to say the least and he hadn’t even got the collar exactly right.  Jim had to admit, the purple looked pretty good on him, slimming even. 

The boots were the easiest part, thank god they weren’t heels, but he definitely wasn’t used to thigh high anything.  The contacts, he’d bought this pair especially for the costume, were a little trickier to put in then what they should have been, but he managed it with only a couple of misses.  If he could get the wig on without calling for backup he would count this as a total victory.  Even if he had to call for backup with the wig it would still be a victory, the thing was really big, heavy and somewhat intimidating with it’s non-regulatory length. 

After thirty minutes the wig was in place, secure and it looked pretty good.  He covered his streaky orange arms with the gauntlets and arm bands he’d spent the last two nights making and paused to look in the mirror one last time.  Another touch of lipstick and he would be done.

The drive over to Sean’s took longer then usual, the nice patrol officer’s sobriety tests were particularly challenging in his costume.  After he assured the man that he was both sober and not a lady of ill repute, he finished got back in his car and finished the drive to Norge’s.  He didn’t notice that he’d shut his long wig in the door.

Mariah met him at the door and stared for at least three minutes without saying a word.  Jim, loaded down with his notes and his copy of the Rage of the Month trade, was left to stand in the open.

When Sean’s long-suffering wife, who had thought she had seen everything and had been very very wrong, finally found words they were simply, “Let me find the camera.”

The good Doctor Norge, Jim knew, was waiting in the recording studio/study/shrine to Hawkman and would be more then ready to start recording.  

“Hey Norge, I really outdid myself this year,”  Jim grinned to himself and paused at the door.  He really wanted Sean to get the full effect of his carefully pieced together costume, “You ready?”

The door opened quickly Jim counted the seconds it took for Norge to react.

“Holy Hawkman!”

Norge was clad in a pretty decent replica of Dick Grayson’s Batman suit; he had even remembered the small details like how many spikes to put on the gauntlets.  He paled underneath his cowl and took a quick step back. He almost tripped over a stack of comics, and the bagged and boarded issues spilled across the floor in a colorful splash. 

“Jim!”  Norge’s voice actually jumped a half-octave, “When you said you were going to be Batman’s partner I thought you meant Damien Wayne!”

Jim carefully sat, he had to be mindful of his long wig, “Damien?  No, with the new Justice League team coming up I thought this would be more appropriate.”

“Appropriate?!”  Sean was somewhere between being scarred for life and laughing so hard he would have to change his tights, “Thank God this isn’t a video pod-cast, man.”  He looked his co-host up and down:  the curly wig, yellow eyes, orange skin, and skin tight purple one-piece with a wide v down the middle of his chest, it was a truly disturbing sight.  It would make a great entry on the ‘Where’s Whatnot Now’ page.  “Seriously no one is ready to see the Whatnot of Starfire.” 

Sean would never be able to look at Kori the same way again.