I sat on the riverbank eating a ham sandwich as I came to terms with the likelihood that I’d never don a superhero cape. It wasn’t the lack of powers that stood in my way. It was the system in place that dictated who could become an action hero or not. I had been told before that Hollywood was exclusive. The comic con gigs for major action stars was even more so.

I didn’t have much time to process whether I should make the cut. Because an aggressive goose was stalking the beach below me. It didn’t have to do with my ideal plan being a hero, but it would infringe upon my ideal plan for those next five minutes if it charged me.

That’s how I met Brockman. The son of a bitch that charged me. Wings up and mouth wide, that cobra chicken went after me like I owed him money. I should have remembered the Minneapolis accord of 1994 that brokered the rights of citizenship for geese after it was discovered they were sentient beings. They were also little rat bastards.

Brockman Goose stood two feet tall and had a wingspan of six feet long. He was a bigger goose than most. While he was technically a Canada Goose, he was an American citizen. Something that didn’t sit well with the good people of Minneapolis for a long time. Foreigners taking over their airspace? The audacity. That was thought to be an exclusively American practice.

After I swung a right hook at Brockman and he snapped me in the face with his wings, we settled down. He told me I was imposing on his mating grounds. I hadn’t consciously cock blocked a goose before, but I had enough decency to apologize. He had almost enough to do the same. Brockman was the youngest son of Richman Goose, the first avian attorney in the city of Minneapolis. Where Brockman’s brothers followed in their father’s wingflaps, he decided to strike out on his own as a private investigator. He told me living life on the edge was the only way he felt alive. I told him he should talk to a therapist about that.