I would like to say that’s what they did, that the cavalry came and saved the day.

Unfortunately, I’d be lying if I did.

“April, promise me you’ll run,” Clayton began, leaning down to whisper in her ear. He didn’t have much of a plan, but he knew they’d move against them again soon, taking them off to some other room or something, and that meant that he had to convince her to go along with his half-formed plan. It was really their only chance.

“What?”

“If anything happens, promise me you’ll run,” he repeated. Whatever they did, he figured he’d survive it, and if he distracted them, she could get away. Her and the baby.

“Clayton, do not do anything stupid,” she ordered, shaking her head. “Not now. We just have to… Have to hope that they show up soon and rescue us.”

“And you think that’s going to happen? Come on. You know better than that. I know better than that. There’s no rescue coming. If you get out, then you could get help, but they’re not just going to show up. They had another equipment failure or something, but no matter what the excuse is, they won’t be here in time. Please. Go. I don’t want you to… I can’t let anything happen to you.”

She grabbed hold of him. “And I can just accept something happening to you? Clayton, I am not doing this without you.”

He closed his eyes and shook his head, kissing her gently on the forehead. “I can survive it. We’re mostly certain of that. You can’t. And that baby’s even more fragile than you are.”

“I am so going to hit you for that one—”

“April, damn it, I can shift out of whatever he does to me. You can’t. That’s fact. And this isn’t just about you. It’s about more than you.”

She sighed, nodding reluctantly, biting her lip. Clay knew that even if the others hadn’t heard their whispers—and honestly, they probably weren’t much in the way of whispers—they probably had a good idea what he and April were talking about. They knew he was getting ready for to make a move.

“Oh, hell, not now,” Clay muttered, shaking his hand as it started twitching.

“Are you kidding me? I know that acts up when you’re stressed, but this is a really bad time for a random shift, Clay!”

He grabbed his hand, trying to stop it. “What, you think I want to do this? This feels bad. Really bad. I haven’t had one this bad in a while…”

He moaned, dropping to the floor as the rest of it started taking over, briefly managing to catch April’s eye. She gave him a reluctant nod, and he forced himself to move through the spasms toward Kilbourne, who was in the middle of ordering everyone to contain Clay. “Get him up and into the lab.”

Clay knocked into himself into Kilbourne’s legs, making the man fire the gun wildly. About the same time, April made a move, slamming the nearest goon into one of his friends so that they both fell into the wall. Then she started running, and Clay hoped that was enough to get her out. If she was safe, then… Then he didn’t really care what happened to him.

Kilbourne looked down at Clay. “She won’t get away. My men will find her.”

Clayton shook his head. “You don’t know my wife.”

“Impressive act there.”

“Um, hello, I’m five. You honestly think I did this on purpose?”

You ever have one of those moments where everything goes wrong at once?

Okay, so yes, in general, my entire life was one of those moments.

But really, can anyone have worse timing than I do? I mean, what a way to find that out, right?

“Um… You can’t be.”

April elbowed him, hard, and he winced. Clayton rubbed his stomach and turned her around in his arms. He couldn’t really see it, but that could just be because she wasn’t really showing yet. He would almost rather that it wasn’t, given where they were right now. He shook his head. “I mean that in the sense that… You wouldn’t be here right now if you were and you knew. You wouldn’t have done all that training with me and let me go on this stupid mission. You wouldn’t have gone to the diner with me. There’s no way. You wouldn’t risk things like that.”

She sighed, her hand over her stomach, tears in her eyes. “I… I had thought I maybe was before, and I wanted to talk to you about it, but then you got kidnapped, and I almost lost you, and it wasn’t really time to bring up the subject. And then I got caught up in helping you recover and training you and… Well, I didn’t have any of the early symptoms anymore, so I was able to ignore it, and all of this was set in motion when I actually took the test, and then I couldn’t tell you because you couldn’t afford the distraction. I figured that I’d tell you after we had this whole thing settled. When it was over. I just wanted that… normal life we kept talking about, and if we were going to have kids, I wanted it to be then, when we were safe, when they’d caught this creep. That’s why I finally gave in and agreed to doing all this work for the stupid plan. And I… I was being overly optimistic, I guess. We were only supposed to let Kilbourne see you were alive at the diner. It wasn’t supposed to be like this.”

“April, nothing ever goes according to plan with me.”

“I know! Why do you think I flipped out when we first got here? Because I should have known better. Because that damn electric shock could already have…” She flinched, the tears really coming down now, and Clay pulled her into his arms. Sure, there were worse ways to find out his wife was pregnant, but this had to be one of the top ten—at least in terms of how the timing really, really sucked. They were in the hands of a man that had experimented on Clayton and wanted to do the same to the baby after it was born.

“I can assure you, Mrs. Moore, I will not let anything happen to your offspring. It is far too valuable to me,” Kilbourne said, and April shuddered. Clayton gagged. No way was that man getting anywhere near his wife or their child.

Of course, how to stop him was a completely different story. Even with the training Clay now had, they were still outnumbered, Kilbourne had a gun, and April had to be protected.

Now would be a really nice time for the cavalry to show up.

And about now you’re wondering when the story turned into the April show.

Well… One part of it was.

“If you think you can make me do what you want by threatening April, then…” Clayton began, hating himself for the truth. “Then you’re absolutely right, but don’t hurt her. Just let her go, and I will let you do whatever you want. Looks like the suit and his team let us down again, so… I mean, maybe they’re hiding behind that whole ‘can’t do anything in this country’ bit, but I doubt that. It’s probably Larabee’s doing again. Much as I like the guy, he can’t build anything that works.”

“Clayton! You are not letting this guy take you, not even for my sake. I’m sure you think that’s heroic, but shut up. Now.”

Clay shook his head. If it was him they wanted, they could have him. He would probably survive whatever this was, so he’d stay and she could go. He pushed her back. “Let April go. You could even answer a few questions, and I’ll be very helpful in whatever experiment it is you’re planning on.”

Kilbourne laughed. “You’re amusing, Moore, but your wife isn’t going anywhere. You’ll cooperate, I’m sure, but I hardly need to bargain for that.”

“April, if he shoots me, just run. I should have a few healing shifts and be fine.”

“Clay, I swear, if you even think about—”

“He doesn’t know, does he, Mrs. Moore?”

Clay turned to April, hit by those same doubts from before. “What is he talking about, April? He’s just screwing with us, right?”

She nodded. “Yes. He’s—It doesn’t matter what he’s doing. We’re going to get out of this. We’re walking away right now.”

“Or not,” Clay said as some of the goons from the room he’d avoided showed up at the end of the hallway. They were really trapped now. “Damn it, April. Why couldn’t you just have gone when I said to? At least I can survive this. Probably.”

“And maybe not,” she said, getting close to him as the men circled them.

Kilbourne shook his head. “It is a bit impressive seeing what you can do for myself, Moore. You could do a lot better without that time limit, and I could help you with that.”

“But you won’t. You’re not going to give me a way out of here. You’re not going to make my lame ability better. Then I could actually use it, and that you can’t afford.”

“Ah, but what I learn from you can be used to perfect the next one.”

Clay stared at him. “What, you have some other kid in a vat? Or did you already create them? You’re going to use me to—No wonder you didn’t care if that sadist killed me. You just wanted to know what I could take so that you could modify your next one. Where is this poor bastard, then?”

“Ask your wife.”

Clay shook his head. He knew that Kilbourne was just playing games now. It would almost seem like stalling, but Clay and April should be the ones doing that, not Kilbourne. They should be trying to buy time for the suit and his people to rush in to the rescue. Clay had already given up on that again, though. Last time he’d been rescue because of April, and this time she was stuck with him.

“No,” she whispered. “He can’t know. He doesn’t.”

Clay wrapped his arms around her, not liking this. “What are you talking about? What can’t he know? Is this what you wouldn’t tell me earlier?”

“He can’t know,” she repeated, but Kilbourne gave her an evil smile that made her shudder.

“April?”

She closed her eyes with a wince. Her voice was almost too soft for Clay to hear. “Clayton… I’m pregnant.”

So the room below me was full of big, armed men. If I was a real superhero, I could have jumped down there and taken them all out before they had a chance to react at all. If I had any kind of special gadgetry, I would have thrown in a smoke bomb or something like that, a concussion grenade maybe, and then I’d have the whole room down and life would be good.

I moved away from the room, hunting for a new exit, one with less people to see me fall on my face when I landed.

Clayton hated ventilation shafts. He really, really hated ventilation shafts. He wasn’t sure there was anything more evil than a ventilation shaft. No, wait, there was. It was called… spandex.

He shuddered.

He took another look at the room below him. No good. There were way too many people in there. He couldn’t do that. He didn’t have anything to throw down there and knock them out or cause a distraction. He wasn’t that good of a fighter, and he knew it. He couldn’t take on that many men, not now. He was not going to be able to use that exit. He had to find a different one.

He could go back to April, tell her about this, try and talk strategy, but that was a waste of time. He should be able to deal with this on his own. He just had to keep looking for a different way out. It was simple enough.

Other than the fact that there were not very many outlets for this ventilation shaft, and he was having a hard time finding any besides the one in the room where April was and the one full of goons. This wasn’t going to be easy. Then again, it was him. He knew it wouldn’t be. They had thought that Kilbourne or whoever stuck them in that room overlooked his abilities, but maybe they knew there was no way out of this shaft.

He couldn’t afford to assume that, though. April was counting on him, and he was going to come through for her for a change.

He continued on, relieved when he finally caught sight of another grill. He stopped and looked down. Yes. Perfect. A supply closet. He could work with this. He’d even be able to climb down the shelves because even as long as it had taken to find this, he knew it hadn’t been twenty minutes, so he couldn’t shift back yet.

He forced the grill off and started down the shelves, carefully making his way and hoping he wouldn’t end up falling. It was hard with his hands this size. He was going to end up falling on his face. Of course, thinking about it didn’t help. He found himself on the ground, rubbing a sore spot on his arm. He’d better not pass out for that one. At least he hadn’t fallen from the top shelf or the entrance to the shaft. That would have been a lot worse.

He smiled slightly and went to the door.

And let out a curse. He wasn’t tall enough to reach the damn handle. It figured.

“What took you so long?”

“I do actually thank you when you bail me out of these things, right? You rescue me and I thank you profusely, don’t I? I make odes about how you’re the superhero and not me, how I don’t deserve you, and then I usually kiss you—”

April cut him off with a kiss. “Thank you. I’m sorry. It just seemed like forever before you opened the door.”

“Had to be at least twenty minutes, remember? Can’t believe I was too small to open the damn door,” Clayton grumbled. April gave him a look, and he pointed to the handle of the one he’d just opened. “Hello? I had to be a toddler to get through the ventilation shaft. I tried to open the door when I finally got down, but I couldn’t. Trying to fashion a makeshift stool just ended up with me falling on my butt repeatedly, so I gave up and waited to shift, okay?”

She sighed. “I really wish we could figure out a way around the twenty minute rule.”

“Ha. And have my power be useful? You’ve got to be kidding. That would be nice, and nice things—other than you—don’t happen to me,” Clayton muttered, grabbing her by the hand. “Come on. I did actually climb back into the shaft and work on some surveillance while I was waiting. I’ve got a pretty good idea of the layout, and I think the area we want is this way.”

April smiled. “My hero.”

“You’re just saying that to mess with me.”

She shrugged, letting him lead her through the building to the room he’d found that looked rather like a lab with a private office on the one side of it. He figured that was probably where Kilbourne’s office was, and that was where they wanted to be. The others should handle the men in here—if they showed up at all—and the answers they wanted would be in Kilbourne’s files. Plus, that room was unguarded, unlike the one full of goons Clay’d had to avoid earlier.

“What is this place?”

“I don’t know. The warehouse was convenient, I guess. This seems a lot more sophisticated. Like it might actually be where Kilbourne’s been working since he went rogue.”

April sighed. “I hate to bring this up, but that falls into the ‘too easy’ category, doesn’t it? I mean, if he is doing what we think he is, if he’s been working on some other projects since they forced him to stop whatever it was they were planning on doing to you, then why would he take us there? You might still be the key to his research, but me?”

“You are the brains of our operation,” Clayton reminded her as they reached the lab. “And you did save me before, so maybe they figured they had to take you out to get to me.”

“Or perhaps your wife is far more valuable than you think, Moore.”

Here it is, right? The moment where I finally came into my own as a superhero. Yes, I know what you’re thinking. Lame pep talk. And you’re captured, idiot. What kind of hero are you?

I’d point you to the various parts in movies where the hero comes back from insurmountable odds, to where they or their sidekick get captured and escape, and I’d even go so far as to reference the monologue conversations in The Incredibles. Yeah, this wasn’t a monologue moment, but it didn’t mean that escape wasn’t impossible. That I couldn’t be a hero coming into my own.

But that’s still kind of aiming high for me.

Clayton looked up at the vent. “That is high.”

“You know how to fall if need be.”

“Yeah, I got good with practice.”

April laughed. “Yes, and we’ll get you a ribbon, too, but you have to do this. You’re our best shot at getting out of here. I mean, it’s not like we really expected them to come save us. Ever. We’re not that stupid. We know a whole lot better than that.”

He nodded. “Exactly.”

“Come on, Clay. I got the grill off. You have to get up there and get us out of here. And be careful. I know that you can panic and get yourself in trouble with random shifts, but that isn’t going to happen, right?”

“Are you really going to be okay if I leave you alone? What happened earlier was… scary. It worries me. I have never seen you like that, never really seen you lose your cool. Angry, yes, beautiful and scary and dangerous when angry, that’s what you are, but frightened and teary and incoherent, that’s not you.”

“We can talk about that later, after we’re out of here,” she insisted. “Now focus. You know you’ll need the right kind of timing to do this. Concentrate.”

He put his hands on her face and gave her a good long kiss. “There. Okay. I think I can concentrate right now.”

“I can’t,” she grumbled. He smirked at her, and she smacked him on the arm. “Go.”

He nodded a final time and sighed, wishing that Kilbourne had made him a little more athletic when he’d engineered him in that vat. Clay could have used that to go with this age-shifting thing. Shaking that off, he did a quick countdown and did a bit of a run to build up some speed before jumping up. Grabbing the edge of the vent with his hands, he shifted as he pulled himself inside, stopping to catch his breath.
He turned around as much as he could. “For the record, that still sucks to do.”

“It looked flawless this time,” April said encouragingly. “Now go find a way to open this door so I can get out of here.”

Clay nodded, even though he knew that she couldn’t see it. That didn’t really matter. He had a job to do now, and only he could do it. He would find a way out of the vent shaft and then he’d get April out, a couple acts of a real hero type for a change, and then they could go find Kilbourne and get some answers.

He crawled and crawled for what seemed like forever. The vent shaft didn’t get bigger or turn. He was having a bad feeling about getting back to April at this rate. They’d both forgotten that pesky twenty minute rule, too. She was going to have to be very patient for him to rescue her.

“Finally,” he muttered when he saw the next vent. He crawled up next to it and peeked through the slits at the room below him.

“Oh, damn.”

It was all supposed to be part of a plan. Yeah, well, as previously mentioned—a lot, I believe—the plan sucked. We weren’t really expecting it to go well, I admit, but there’s a difference between a bit of trepidation and the realization that you just got in way over your head.

Okay, she’d hate me for saying it, but a lot.

Clayton looked at the crowd closing in on them and quickly pulled April close to him. He didn’t have any real illusions about fighting their out of this—besides which, that wasn’t the plan—he just wasn’t that good and there were way too many of them. The van was going to be packed like a clown car when they were all inside it. Still, he knew that even if he went through a bunch of random age shifts, he could take whatever their attackers might do better than her. He’d survive.

“We are so dead,” she whispered, and Clay nodded unhappily.

“We’re going to get you out of there, guys. Just hold tight,” Larabee promised through the comms, and Clay wished he was reassured by that, but he wasn’t.

Something hit him in the back, and he didn’t really have any time to figure out what it was as the current passed through him, knocking him to the ground. He tried to let go of April, hoping that he’d at least taken the brunt of that and cursing himself because he’d made it easy for them to get them both at the same time.

A couple of the goons picked up April, and Clayton tried to reach for her, but of course, that was about when his body decided to react to the pain by shifting his age. He couldn’t do anything. They picked him up and threw him in next to April, which was at least something. The pain wasn’t as bad, but he was still twitching, and he had a feeling he was going to end up passing out again as soon as his body decided to shift again for pain management.

“Larabee?”

Silence. Great. Not that Clay had expected anything different, but he knew that it wasn’t a good sign. He pulled himself closer to April, aware of the looks he was getting. They hadn’t expected him to be able to move after that.

Either that, or he’d freaked them out by the age shift. It was possible. He doubted Kilbourne told them exactly what they were dealing with in Clayton.

“April?”

She forced her eyes open and looked at him. “That… hurt… So damn… tired… Going to… kill… someone…”

“Shh,” Clay told her, combing back her hair. “Good news is I took it pretty well. Maybe I am a superhero.”

She rolled her eyes and passed out, and he sighed, but soon enough, he felt the twinge in his fingers and gave in as the second age shift happened, knocking him out cold.

“Not good. Not good at all.”

“April?”

She threw her arms around him, and Clay didn’t even care about the residual aches flaring up a little as she did. At least they hadn’t been separated. They’d been locked in a big, wide room with nothing in it. Plenty of room to pace and think about how stupid the plan was, but at the same time, nothing useful, at least not that he could see.

“Uh, April, I think that’s officially the longest hug you’ve ever given me, and that’s after you thought I might have died.”

She pulled back and looked at him. “I can’t believe I was so stupid. I can’t believe I didn’t think of that. I can’t believe I was willing to be any part of this. I must be insane.”

“It was a lousy plan. We all agreed on that, but you were the one that wanted to go with me to the diner. Well, Larabee wanted to go, too, but he’s tech support and needs to be in the van,” Clay began, but that hadn’t helped any with her rant. She had started rocking then, her head in her knees, whatever her latest babble was, it was completely unintelligible now.

Clay dragged himself up again, touching her back. “I’m not really sure what that stun gun was capable of doing, to be honest—but you know—this will probably piss you off—but you know, I’m fine. I shifted a couple times, and it’s all gone except for the ache from shifting, so I’m good.”

She shook her head, not looking up from her knees. He moved around in front of her, lifting her head so he could look at her face. “I’ve never seen you like this before. What’s wrong? I mean, other than the obvious.”

April started to say something and burst into tears, and he got nothing out of that one. Maybe they’d drugged her with something else. They’d have to get her checked out once they got out of here. He touched her face, wiping away the tears. “Hey, Ninety-Nine. My superhero. I know you’re in there. I’d expect this if Larabee had just come in wearing another skin-tight spandex number, but we’re far away from that right now. I need you.”

She forced a smile. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wig out like that. It’s just—Oh, I can’t explain it. We have to find a way out of here.”

“That’s more like you,” Clay told her with relief. He didn’t know what had caused that, but he knew they were going to have her looked at by someone because she had never reacted like that. Ever. It just wasn’t her.

“Oh, Clay. They’re so stupid.”

“Really? I couldn’t even figure out where the door is.”

She shook her head. “We don’t need a door. We have you.”

He frowned, then he saw where she was pointing. Great. A ventilation shaft. His favorite thing in the world. Perfect.

“Get me up there, and I can get the grill off.”

“I am glad that you’re back in take-charge mode, April, don’t get me wrong because whatever that was—that was just way too weird and has me very worried about you—but you’re overlooking the obvious. Only I can get in there. You’re small, but not small enough.”

“I know. But you’ll find a way back in here to let me out.”

“We have no idea where that ventilation shaft goes.”

She nodded. “I know, but I trust you. I know you won’t abandon me. You’ll come back for me because—lame superpower or not—you are my hero.”

You can probably guess how well this all went.

There’s that saying about the best laid plans of mice and men.

So you pretty much know what happened, right?

“I don’t think it’s working.”

“Don’t say that. Next thing you know, we’ll get kidnapped right outside the diner. I’m not looking forward to getting kidnapped, okay? I know you think that it’s okay, but we’ve established that you’re more than a little crazy, Clayton.”

“I know that,” he agreed, happily biting off the head of a gummy bear and getting a smile out of his wife. She looked at him, and he passed her one. She swallowed it whole, and he made a face. She took another and bit that one’s head off. “Forgiven.”

She rolled her eyes. “Sometimes I don’t know why I put up with you.”

“It’s your superpower. We established that, too.”

April laughed. Then she reached for the straw in her milkshake and turned it around as she sobered up again. “What are we going to do, realistically? If they don’t make their move right away, do we keep making exaggerated public appearances until they do? Do we go back into hiding? What is our plan after this?”

“I was thinking bench next.”

“At the park?”

He nodded. “Yes. See, I figure we hit all the old haunts. Well, that, and I kind of wanted to make out with you there. What can I say? I’m sentimental.”

She shook her head, laughing. “You are so strange. Fortunately, I like that about you. And don’t repeat that bit about my superpower. I’m already afraid of what Larabee might come up with for that one.”
Clayton winced. “Oh, no. That’s going to end up in a bunch of spandex lingerie.”

April put a hand to her mouth. “I might have to puke after that one. Especially since I just pictured him wearing one of them. That was so not an image I needed.”

“Me, either. And thanks for that. You know I have seen him naked.”

“Larabee, we love you, but remember, always, always wear pants,” April said, directing that comment to him as she shuddered. She lifted her milkshake and finished it off before setting it back down. “Well, Clayton, I guess we should go.”

“Here. You have the last gummy bear.”

She took it from him and ate it, then kissed his cheek as she rose. “I love you. If we get kidnapped now, I’m going to hurt you myself, but I do love you. For the record.”

Clay laughed as he stood. “I love you, too, and if we get kidnapped now, you totally get to hit me. I deserve it.”

She rolled her eyes as she took his arm. “I do want this over. I want to have a real chance at a life that does not involve a conspiracy and a psychotic scientist. And no, I do not mean Larabee with that one. Larabee is… harmless. Kilbourne is a monster.”

“I know. Hopefully this will mean it’s all going to end soon,” Clay said, opening the door for her. He couldn’t help looking around as they left, but he didn’t see anything suspicious. Not that he necessarily knew what that was, but he doubted that he would have spotted a good covert agent if they were around—other than the ones he already knew were there, of course.

He took April’s hand and walked along the sidewalk, heading for their old park and that old bench. It had been too long since they’d been there as well. “I guess if it doesn’t work, we just keep going on with our lives as much as possible. You’ll teach. I’ll… Well, I really don’t feel like going back to my cubicle, but we do need both of our incomes, so I should probably take my job back—”

“With the people that lied to you all your life? Clayton, are you crazy? You can’t go back to work for them. Even if things are a bit tough for a while, we’ll make do. You can start looking for something else, but I don’t want you working with them. We still don’t know for sure if they were telling the truth. We don’t know how much approval Kilbourne actually had for what he did to you.”

“I know. I just… I have been mostly useless throughout this whole thing, and I hate to put another burden on you,” he told her. She gave him a look. “This isn’t me being chauvinistic or thinking that I have to be the main breadwinner or the strong one. I already know that you’re better at all of that than I am, and I can admit it. Not sure what that says about my masculinity—”

“As your wife, I have absolutely no problem with your masculinity.”

He smiled at her, stopping to kiss her. Of course, doing that on a sidewalk, right in public view, while acting as bait for a group of rogue operatives led by a warped scientist was not Clay’s brightest idea ever.

He heard the tires screech and tried futilely to push April away to safety as the doors of dark van opened and they were quickly surrounded by men doing good impressions of ninjas in a low budget film.

“Okay, you get to hit me now.”

I have to admit—and I’m only going to do it here because it’s unlikely that April will ever know about this—that I still had a few doubts about her. Yes, I was that insecure. It seemed to simple, too easy—and I know that I certainly wanted to believe that it was all like she said.

I did my best to pretend that I didn’t have them, though. I just went through the motions like I was completely convinced that all of this was going to work.

“I still don’t like this. I wish we could do something besides offer you up as bait,” April said, adjusting Clayton’s collar. She kept messing with his clothes or his hair, though it had nothing to do with his appearance, really. She just wanted to touch him, and he figured she was also checking all the spots that Larabee had supposedly added tracking devices. Clay should have enough of them in his clothes—and possibly other places that he did not want to think about—that there was no way they’d all fail or get deactivated.

Somehow, though, it still wasn’t much of a comfort.

“I know, April, and I do, too, but I just don’t see any other way of doing this,” Clay began, and she nodded grimly. They were almost back where they’d been before he almost died, and none of them liked it. They were even going after the same people—sort of. This time Clay knew who he was facing and why, but it wasn’t much.

“It needs to end,” she agreed. “No more conspiracy, no more living in fear of Kilbourne and what he might have done to you or wants to do to you.”

“Exactly.”

“Freedom.”

“I should make a costume based on the statue of liberty,” Larabee said, and they both looked over at him. He shrugged. “What? I haven’t done that yet.”

“If you do, never, ever wear it,” Clayton almost begged. He didn’t need to see that. He didn’t want to see that. He didn’t think he could survive seeing that. “April, when all this is done, we should get you another class to make costumes for so that Larabee can put his… er, talent to a good use.”

She smiled at him. “I wish it was as simple as going in and demanding a class to teach.”

“Well, the suit does kind of owe us. As long as he’s not stealing someone else’s job, he should find one for you, at least,” Clayton said, looking over the other car. It was trying to hide in the back of the lot, but it didn’t matter. They all knew it was there, watching them. Well, okay, not the car itself, but the men in it. And there were others around, too. “Are we ready, April?”

She reached for his hand, squeezing it before she got out of the van. “We haven’t had a gummy bear sundae in a very long time. This is overdue.”

“Well, you couldn’t eat them for a while,” Clay reminded her as he shut the van door behind him.

“I know,” she said, almost shuddering. She wrapped her arm in his, leaning her head against him as they walked into the diner. They hadn’t been here in what seemed like forever, but this was a place that even the members of the conspiracy had to know belonged to them. Their special place. “Maybe we should move after this.”

“You can’t move!” Larabee objected in Clay’s ear, and he winced.

“Larabee, a little quieter, please,” Clay hissed as April opened the door for them. She had a radio, too, and they’d even put trackers on her just in case. They should only be at the diner to let Kilbourne and his people know that Clayton was alive, but anything could happen, and they were trying to prepare for that as well. “It was just a thought.”

“It might be nice, though we have a lot here, too.”

“We do.”

The kid behind the counter recognized them. “One chili burger with fries, a milkshake, and a sundae with gummy bears, right?”

“That’s us,” April agreed, nudging Clay. He took out his wallet and paid the kid. He’d know where to find them, too, when the food was ready. She reached for Clay’s hand again, leading him back to their booth. “How long do you think we’ll have to wait?”

“Well, I’d like to eat my sundae…”

Like I said—It hurt.

April smacked him right across the face. “Listen to me, you idiot. I am not working for anyone. I am not a liar. You know me better than that. I love you. I don’t know where this stupid idea came from, but I am not pretending. You unbelievable moron! I’ve stood by you when you turned into a five year old after kissing me. I stood by you after the gummy bears and the spandex and the whining! This is not—You really think that I could lie like that? That I would marry someone that I didn’t love just because of an assignment? I gave you my father’s coat. I married you with my mother’s ring. These are not little things, not to me. I have helped you chase conspiracies and recover from horrific beatings and I rescued you—more than once—and you think all of that is just… a lie? How dare you say that?”

Clayton rubbed his cheek, shaking his head. “You didn’t answer me. You don’t just get training like you have, like what you taught me, without something. You rescued me in the middle of a warehouse full of armed men and dragged me out of there mostly on your own! How can you sit there and tell me that isn’t suspicious? You can’t. I need an explanation, not a joke.”

“I don’t feel like giving you one now,” she began, shaking her head. “You—I am so angry. And hurt. How could you say that to me? After all of this, you still think that it’s got to be a lie? When you know how I feel about lying? I want to strangle you right now. I mean it. You are so frustrating. If it’s not your self-doubt or self-pity, then it’s your suspicion. Don’t you get it? Don’t you see what this really is?”

Clay turned away from her. He didn’t know how to face her—still unable to believe what she was saying and wanting to almost desperately. He’d held onto her because she was the one good thing in his life, but now he’d managed to put doubts about her into his head, and he couldn’t seem to get rid of them. He didn’t want to fight with her, he didn’t want to believe that she was lying to him, but what was he supposed to do? Pretend that he didn’t feel like this? It had actually hit him harder than anything else—not the fact that he’d almost died, not the conspiracy, not the fact that he was some kind of lab creation, or even the discovery of his ability in the first place. Not having April…

She touched his back, and he looked at her. She sighed. “You have a very wild imagination, and I wonder if maybe you could have really used that somehow—making your superhero thing into a great game for kids or a story or a movie or those cute costume parties you considered throwing—instead of this. Hurting yourself. Hurting me. Chasing shadows and monsters that don’t exist. You don’t have to be paranoid like this; you know that. I didn’t marry you because anyone ordered me to, and quite frankly, I don’t think they could pay anyone enough to that. I love you, my not-so-bright and not-so-super superhero. You can’t push me away because I didn’t answer one question.”

Clay reached up to cover her hand, closing his eyes for a moment. “I don’t know what to think anymore, April. This whole conspiracy has me up and down and all over the place, and I am scared. I’m scared of taking the next step, scared of what might go wrong, scared of it going right and what happens if it’s really over. Scared of what I might find, scared of what I could become… And then I go and screw up the one thing I need the most. Classic me. Classic self-sabotage, right?”

“Sounds like you, yes,” she agreed, moving over to stand in front of him. She put her hands on his face, and he winced when she touched the still sore spot where she’d hit him. She stepped up and kissed it gently. “You don’t have to do this. We don’t have to be scared of what’s coming or what we’re going to find. You can be excited because it’s over.”

“And… If we don’t really want it to be over?”

“Why wouldn’t we want it to be over?”

“Because then the story’s done. There’s nothing left. There’s just… the end.”

“Okay, clearly I have told you everyone dies at the end way too many times,” April muttered, rolling her eyes. “You silly man. This is where the story changes. Happily ever after isn’t really an ending. It’s a cop-out and a lie because we all know it doesn’t work that way, but even if someone were to write the words ‘the end’ after all of this, that doesn’t mean our story stops. Our story goes as long as we’re alive, and you… Well, you might never die.”

“Again—life without you? Not worth it. Can’t you just admit that you’re the superhero and you have a secret power and that’s why you have all that training? Please?”

She tapped a finger on his lips. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

“You said I can’t die.”

“Said you might not die.”

“Knowing me, I’ll go out in a flaming ball of spandex or something, but yeah,” he agreed, kissing her. “Should I say ‘we have ways of making you talk?’”

She laughed. “You have a terrible accent for a man with a linguistics degree.”

“It’s supposed to be terrible in that quote.”

“Sure.”

“Okay, admit it. Your superpower is being able to love me in spite of everything.”

She laughed and drew him close to her again. “Exactly.”

I had to say—I liked April’s way of fixing things. A lot.

Though… Maybe I might have preferred that in the end. It’s hard to say. Either way was pretty damn painful.

“I still say you should be the superhero.”

April laughed from her spot on the floor. She’d taken the hit and not moved, apparently preferring the floor to another knockdown. He knew that feeling well. “You’re insane, Clayton.”

“Yes, but you love me anyway, Ninety-Nine,” he told her, kneeling down beside her and giving her a kiss. “I can’t believe I’m actually winning.”

“Don’t be so impressed. I’m just a girl, after all.”

“You’re the better half in this relationship, and since when did you ever think of yourself as ‘just a girl?’” Clayton asked, combing back some of her hair. “You’re not. You never have been. You’re the surprised woman behind the successful man.”

She giggled. “I shouldn’t laugh. It’s not that funny that you put yourself down all the time. Okay, help me up. I’m tired. I think we might need to get someone else to train with you a bit. And by someone else, I don’t mean Larabee.”

Clay laughed. “Yeah, that wouldn’t help all that much. He’d win because whatever costume he picked would blind me, and I’d never stand a chance.”

“We are terrible. Always so mean to Larabee,” she said as she got up. She dusted herself off and sighed. “You’re getting better and stronger by the day, and I should be glad, but I have to admit—I’m scared. I know the better you are, the closer this bait thing gets, and I don’t want you being bait again. Even if Larabee’s machines are perfect, I don’t—I don’t want you to die, and I don’t want to go through that scare again.”

“I know. And believe me, I don’t want to do it, either. I just don’t want to spend the rest of my life in hiding, and if there is a possibility that Kilbourne’s actual research can make my life easier in any way—even if it’s only knowing what he was trying to do when he messed with my genetics, then I have to take it. I just do.”

She nodded. “And I know you do. That doesn’t make it any easier.”

“Nothing will. It’s not going to. This kind of thing shouldn’t be easy. That’s what I think they leave out of all those stories with heroes and superheroes. Oh, sure, they have dark times, and maybe a few minutes of angst, but overall, they still do the heroic thing no matter what. They always come through. And that’s supposedly the definition of a hero, right? Not backing down no matter what the odds? Always being courageous? And yet they always make this crap look so damn easy. It’s not. And it shouldn’t be. That’s why heroes don’t exist. Because real people are scared to death of this crap.”

She reached up to touch his cheek. “There are heroes. And even heroes need to know when to back down and live to fight another day. Sometimes running is the only option. Sometimes it’s the last stand. The hero that does it knowing it’s not easy and goes ahead anyway—that’s real.”

He kissed her again. “I can’t tell you what it means to have you believe in me.”

“I am a sucker for lost causes.”

He laughed, pulling her tight against him. “Yeah. And you sure found one in me.”

“No. I didn’t. Because this time you are going out there, and we are going to win. We’ll get that information, and we’ll take back our lives so we’re not living in hiding. We are going to have something beyond debates about superheroes and the limitations of your ability and this stupid conspiracy we got stuck in. We deserve all that.”

“I’m really just glad I’m not getting beat up anymore. I wish you’d been around for the first time I was doing this.”

She shrugged. “At least you know now.”

“Where did you learn all that, anyway?”

She put a finger to his lips. “If I told you that, I’d have to kill you.”

He almost smiled, but he pulled her hand down and looked at her. “Really, though, April. How did you know all that? And please don’t joke about it. I’m suddenly getting a very bad feeling about this. You didn’t actually let them… recruit you, did you? You’re not a part of this thing, are you? Is my life the damn Truman show? Tell me you’re not a part of this.”

She winced. “Clayton—”

He shook his head in disbelief, stepping away from her. “No. This isn’t happening. You—You were the one thing in my life that I could count on, and even that’s not real? How much of it is pretend? This is why you didn’t want to marry me, isn’t it? You don’t love me at all.”

“That’s not true. I do love you. You’re not letting me explain—”

“What is there to explain? Everything in my life is a lie.”