I cross at night a familiar downtown street, broadened to Boulevard and once again lively and populated. I see at a distance a friend of a friend crossing the street, heading to the fun fair some community organisation has established in honour of some occasion or other. Many fine boutiques and businesses thrive in this dream-downtown, but I spy T. heading into a discount store. We look at strange toys, some sponsored by the NHL.
The news announces a comic-book crisis! Mickey Mouse and T's ex have been exposed to a powerful mutagen and have transformed into mindless, destructive giants who storm Godzillian fashion the city. Mickey wears those red pants with the outsize buttons. He gnashes his incisors. T's ex stomps cars and yowls with the pain of a relationship truly and finally ended.
We transform into superheroes, based on my username here and a name she has used online, and we fly into battle, still unaware of what our powers might be (Also: why would a superhero named for an ostrich fly?). We realize we can "phase" both Walt Disney's rodent and her ex through an alternate universe and back and this will somehow return them to their former states.
I revisit my father's workshop and contemplate some of his more unusual tools: the brass Matroyoshka screwdriver, the small level, the pen with the wire inside, the unusually-shaped wrench.