Just as Nefertiti Jones is getting ready for a date, her cell phone rings. It's another call for help. She heads to the docks and before you know it --KATANG! KATHUMP! THOOOMM!! -- the single mom who works two jobs, attends night school, spoils her son and buys her own bling is at it again. In sleek black near-ninja gear, she's fighting a man twice her size, saving a wayward youth. All on her day off.

She'd rather not be there. But someone has to keep the city of Metro safe from the dreaded East Side Trappers.

Welcome to one of the comic book worlds created by North Raleigh resident Mike Sales, who writes as M. Torez. His works combine manga -- a Japanese comic book style -- hip-hop and urban culture. His characters speak in the voices of privileged teens and wayward gangstas. And while there are moments of humor, the story themes include discrimination, segregation, crime and class.

And at the center of this man's works are girls, and in particular, grrrl power.

"Strong women have been the center of my life," Sales says. "All the women who had a beneficial influence on me have been strong, loving women."

Like Sales, observers say, more writers and artists of color, women, gays and others are joining the comics world telling different kinds of stories in a variety of genres.

Yet, the greater inclusion is not just happening among independent creators like Sales. Recently, Marvel Comics lured author Eric Jerome Dickey, known for his best-selling African-American romance novels, to write a series for X-Men character Storm. Before that, film producer and BET executive Reginald Hudlin helped the company revive the dormant Black Panther.

"If the industry is to not only survive, but thrive, this kind of growth is essential," said Comic World News columnist Rich Watson in an e-mail. "Mike is certainly part of that growth."

For Sales though, entering the comics world has been a personal journey. He grew up in Columbus, Ga., drawing pictures on his schoolwork, all over his notebooks and even in his textbooks. At 7, while most children were drawing stick people, he was re-creating comic book action figures.

"Even in elementary and junior high, my teachers would tell me they thought I had some artistic talent," says Sales, now 35.

But turning that hobby into a profession seemed frivolous.

"It was always in me to be a cartoonist, but honestly I never really saw it as anything more than a little hobby because my upbringing for a long time was blue collar, and when you grow up like that your goal is to get a job, buy a house and do all of that stuff," Sales says. "That really was my plan, but the artistic, cartoonist side of me never really went away. It kept bugging me, and these stories that I wanted to tell kept coming to the surface."

For years, he'd just dabble in art. Yet, in a way, life kept preparing him to return to comics.

While studying at Howard University, his focus turned toward writing. Reading authors like Zora Neale Hurston stirred something in him. "Howard was the first time I got exposed to black literature that reflected my Southern rural upbringing," he says. "I learned that the culture I come from is a viable culture, one potent enough to inspire people to write great literature."

It was at Howard, too, that he first encountered manga through the 1988 Japanese film "Akira." Sales and a group would watch the film over and over in 20-minute segments; a friend who understood Japanese would translate after each segment.

"It was like the first time I heard hip-hop, it was fresh and different. I had never seen art like this," Sales says.

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