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Chapter Text

Gamma Jack was alive.

If you had asked the NSA, they probably would have told you they didn’t know what happened to him. He was one of the many supers who had mysteriously vanished in recent years.

If you had asked Syndrome, he would have told you he had watched that super blow himself up in a radioactive meltdown that left him as a bloody, melted corpse in a super suit.

If you had asked Jack himself? Well, it’s a little complicated. But, simply put:

Six months ago, “Dan Donahue” was a mercenary and a grunt for Syndrome, who hid among the very people trying to kill him in order to survive the mad genius’s genocide of superheroes.

Three months ago, Jackson Hart was able to return to normal life along with the Incredibles, destroying the machine that killed so many of his kind and the monster behind it.

Today, Gamma Jack soared over the cityscape of Metroville, a blur of mercenary grey and gamma green against the clouds in the afternoon sky.

The Underminer’s speech was still ringing in his ears!

There was a supervillain attacking the city!

And that meant, you needed a superhero to save the day!

Or, maybe a couple superheroes if they didn’t have anything going on at the moment.

Jack plunged into the heart of the buzzing metropolis, the sunlight reflecting off the glass like a spotlight as he watched the maze of asphalt roads and scurrying civilians take shape below him.

And in the corner of his eye, wrapping around the face of Insuricare’s office building, was a roadway of ice carrying a skating super.

He lunged towards the figure, the smile on his face growing with the wind as he caught up with Frozone.

“Heeeey, you found your super suit!” Jack exclaimed, doing a couple barrel rolls around Lucius’s ice path as the hero joined him along the side of the skyline. “Honey’s not mad at me for asking you to tag along, is she?!”

“Good question!” Frozone shouted back, grinning back while subsequently ignoring said question as they both dodged the steepled point of a rooftop. “You said the Underminer is here?! He sure made himself scarce in a hurry!”

“He probably heard supers were coming and crawled underground!” Jack scanned the road for any glimpse of a drill bit poking its nose up for air. “I’m thinking we should hit his usual targets and see if he tries to ‘undermine’ them. There are two Metroville Credit Union offices nearby, and that Bank of Municiburg is on the same street as city hall!”

“Sounds like a plan! I’ll–! Is that Helen?!” Lucius exclaimed, somehow managing to slide to a stop before Jack could pivot in the air.

Elastigirl was racing down the streetface set in utter determination that was obvious from 20 stories up. Her chase only paused once so she would latch onto a streetlamp and launch herself onto the rooftop of a set of row-houses for a better view to run for.

“What’s she doing here?!” Jack called after Lucius, who was already skating down an ice trail towards her.

“We’ll find out! You track the Underminer and I’ll see if she wants a lift!” Jack told him, waving him off as he slid down his path.

“Roger that, Nick Fury!” Jack shouted back, smirking as he directed his focus to the path the Underminer had driven under, and launching back to full speed.

He knew it wouldn’t be that hard to find this guy.

The Underminer was pretty well known for his–

*BOOM*

*ba-ba-ba-BA-BA-BA-BOOM*

Found him.

An entire skyscraper fell through the concrete jungle’s floor, followed by its neighbor, then two more in rapid succession that flooded what little remained of the block with enough debris to qualify as a dust storm.

And right in the middle of it all…

The only branch of the Bank of Municiburg in Metroville was completely swallowed into a new, ravenous cavern below the city.

This is why the NSA needed to have so many heroes guarding the twin city. It has such bad luck, even when it’s got something to do in Metroville, disaster strikes!

The gamma-powered superhero raced down the street, wind snapping against his face as he arched towards the green rooftop glinting through the smoke.

Whatever the Underminer had needed from the bank was apparently a fast enough trip that by the time Jack arrived 30 seconds later, he could already see the Underminer scurrying back into the underbelly of his tank-drill.

And not a moment later, said tank-drill was careening through the under structure of Metroville, ripping an escape path into the heart of the city.

Jack flew around the edge of the collapsed block just as the tank-like drill began to burrow away, dragging waves of dirt and sewage pipes with it.

The deep, rumbling shrieks of the machine echoed through his head as he plunged beneath the road, holding a burning, green hand up against the dirt before it could snag in his eyes.

The green fumes grew and flickered into a fire that ran up Jack’s arm, taunting him into releasing his power now.

He held out for another, agonizing second.

There was just enough space underneath the belly of the machine that Jack could slip between the treads that were grinding the ground into mud and pebbles.

Jack eased himself between the drill treads, praying that the drill wouldn’t leave any jagged pieces sticking up from the ground to skewer him. There was nowhere to dodge under the machine, pieces of rock narrowly missed his skin, some managing to land glancing blows that would be bruises in an hour.

Every so carefully, he managed to face the under belly of the tank. Its rusted undercarriage wasn’t exactly pretty, it was built to withstand a beating.

Yet the trap door entrance was easily blasted off its hinges with a wave of radiation from Gamma Jack’s palms.

He grinned a little to himself as he swooped inside the belly of the monster.

Jack landed in the middle of what seemed like the main control chamber. Aptly indicated by the wall of blinking dials and grease-covered levers plastered to the nose of the chamber.

He might have tried to make a grab for the brake–

“Jack?!”

–if he wasn’t instantly knocked to the ground.

Pain snapped between his shoulder blades, toppling him onto one knee as Mr. Incredible leapt over him, fist raised to the supervillain charging towards him. “Sorry. What are you doing here?!”

Well, that explains why Helen was running around topside.

“Am I not allowed to crash the party?” Jack asked, cranking the pain out of his shoulder before leaping back to his feet.

Just as the Underminer’s robotic fists smashed Mr. Incredible across the cheek.

“Well, a little help would go a long way right now!” Bob informed him, parrying the Underminer’s next attack.

Underminer managed another hit on Mr. Incredible as Jack threw a ball of radiation at their feet. The miniature bomb was so precise that its radius didn’t so much as brush Mr. Incredible boots, but threw the Underminer into the air with a cry. Opening the perfect opportunity for Bob to grab the weasel-y supervillain by the metal hands and throw him against the controls at the front of the room.

Alarms wailed at them as red lights as the entire drill began to tip upward.

The steam from the vents in the floor began to crawl up their backs, the ceiling tipping away. The Underminer smashed into Mr. Incredible, who had to make a desperate grab for the walls to try and find something to hold onto. Jack tried flying for about as long at it took the next bump in the road to throw the tank at an odd angle, knocking the super into the back of the chamber.

The Underminer was falling right towards him, but managed to snag a hand around the hatch to his escape drill.

The supervillain grunted, his arm almost popping out of its socket. But offered them all a cocky, “Buh-bye!”

Then he swung himself into the open hatch, locking the door behind him.

The entire cylinder rolled out of a side compartment of the tank-drill. Jack just briefly caught what he thought were tank treads spinning out from the escaping contraption as it hit the ground outside, before the door closed him and Bob into the now driver-less, screaming drill.

“Can you stop this thing?!” Jack shouted at Bob, scrambling onto his feet as the red-clad super somehow managed to climb all the way up the vertical incline to reach the sparking computer console.

They were going to breach the surface in less than 10 seconds…

“Stop a drill bigger than five tanks before it crushes all of downtown?” Mr. Incredible looked up from the controls just long enough to read the warning signs flashing against his eyes.

He grabbed what looked like the break, and yanked on the lever.

Aaaaaand, it broke off in his hand.

Bob tossed the piece over his shoulder. “Piece of cake…”

Jack pushed himself off the wall, trying to steady himself as the drill climbed higher. “Great. I’ll be right back.”

An explosion of green light erupted against the side of the tank, washing out the blinking red lights with a small mushroom cloud that melted through the armored exoskeleton in less than a second.

Jack squared himself opposite the hole, taking just a split-second to calculate his exit.

And he shot out of the drill, flipping into the tunnel, and catching himself on a jet of gamma radiation.

The tank drilled out of sight as he righted himself midair.

Then Gamma Jack shot back down the tunnel, diving into the hole the Underminer had made for his escape, and continued the chase.

Entire chunks of asphalt dragged cars through the roof of the tunnel as they fell, throwing enough dust and debris into the air that Jack almost lost the Underminer’s escape drill as they dove deeper below downtown Metroville.

Radiation flowed over Jack’s body like a protective aura, disintegrating any broken sewage pipe or dangling underground cable that tried to grab him as his eyes narrowed on the taillights getting closer to the power rushing from his hands.

With just a mere couple of inches between them, Gamma Jack swung his feet forward, landing against the metal hull without enough force that it began to rust just by his presence.

He threw his hand forward, rubber-covered fingers grabbing for purchase against the round bulkhead. His bare palms latched around the edge of the cylindrical drill just as the treads jolted against a boulder.

Jack shot a gamma beam to the side, managing to propel himself away from the tunnel wall that got so close to grinding off his nose that he could practically feel the exposed stone grabbing after his face.

A barrage of rocks the size of Jack’s head rained from the ceiling. They bounced off the backside of the drill or got caught in the backside of the treads, which would hurl shraplet back up at Gamma Jack. His radiation shield broke them into molecules before they could reach him, except for the few that managed to land squarely against his shoulder.

Sure, when they did hit, they were about the size of pebbles and melted into air before they hit the ground, but Jack just got out of a two month stint in a hospital! He wasn’t in the mood to risk putting up with that again.

Green power curled around his fist, deadly, electromagnetic force roaring from his veins to claw at the air, begging to be released.

Mutated shadows ran against the mangled walls, like they were chasing to catch the helpless vehicle fleeing from them.

The frail, pure air was charred with a dark, acidic tang that filled Jack’s lungs with more relief than a summer breeze.

It dripped from his glowing eyes like tears of absolute joy, the same kind of wonder and potential as waking up for the first time.

Everything that he saw on Nomanisan Island, everything that he couldn’t think about with Simon, everything that came with returning to a civilian life, that was burned away to let this intrinsic part of his core feel a euphoric rush that made him recognize, This finally feels normal.

Oh, it felt good to use his radiation without fear of melting down again!

Gamma Jack emitted the charged beam right into the middle of the drill’s back, striking through the rapidly-corroding metal like a nail sledge-hammered through paper.

The attack rammed all the way through the escape drill, incinerating anything between Jack and the control console, until said console became a pile of rust and the radiation ate away the engine instead. The drill bit itself exploded in a fit of green radiation.

Jack leapt back into the air as the nose of the vehicle bucked into the ground, ricocheting into the ceiling, and burying itself in a miniature cave-in.

The super touched down just shy of the opening he’d left in the escape drill’s back. A few singed corners of dollar bills floated in the stifling air as Jack stepped inside, feeling the temptation to let his guard down in the irradiated metal wreck.

But, he wouldn’t get to enjoy the comfort of his custom-made environment.

There was the distinct, retching sound of someone coughing their lungs up emanating for a staggering shadow inside the wreck.

Jack felt his jaw drop as the Underminer caught himself on the wall. “You’re still alive–?!”

Just to have the Underminer punch his face hard enough to knock Jack off the vehicle.

“Agh…” The super’s instinctively grabbed at the throbbing in his face, clicking his jaw back and forth to make sure nothing was broken as the Underminer’s buck-toothed smile popped out of the escape drill.

Man, it must be convenient to be Mr. Incredible. He could barely get a scratch on him if you threw him off a building, yet Gamma Jack, who was completely immune to radiation, somehow only had the durability of a normal person.

Bob even had radiation immunity as well! How was that fair?!

“Gamma Jack!” The Underminer’s gravelly voice had the gall to interrupt Jack’s belly-aching. The yellow smile stretched wider as Jack glanced his way. “We meet again!”

That confused Jack enough that he forgot about the spreading ache in his face. “Have we met?”

The super got to his feet, dusting himself off as the Underminer jumped over the drill’s locked treads. He’d have to know if he’d smashed this guy’s face before, he looked like a vole that had spent its entire life in a dumpster behind a fertilizer plant!

“Legitimately, I can’t remember,” he concluded, flicking a gauntlet of radiation around his hand. “So I probably won, yeah?”

The Underminer balked, flashing his jagged teeth at the hero in a scowl.

“Maybe you’ll remember, Gamma Jack…” The villain flashed his fists to the side, showing off a set of robotic metal fists that served as his weapon of choice. The rusty knuckles began to beat the air as his grimace turned into a sadistic grin aimed at the hero. “After you’re reintroduced to Jack Hammer!”

Jack blinked. “...That’s your weapons’ name? You’re serious?”

The Underminer lunged forward, nearly connecting with the super’s face before he stepped out of the way.

Right into the other…”Jack Hammer,” which pummeled into his side hard enough Jack felt himself get tossed into the air.

He capitalized on the inertia and flew up to their roof of the crude tunnel, well out of the Underminer’s reach.

“So, you’re not in the mood to keep talking, got it,” Jack noted from the ceiling.

Just to swing down and dropkick the villain into the ground.

The Underminer roared again, punched Jack’s calf out from under him.

The super tumbled to the ground, getting an up and personal view of the villain’s fists careening for his face.

A bolt of green erupted from Jack’s eyes, slashing the robotic hands off their gauntlets.

The moleman shrinked back, face contorting with rage as he watched his weapons disintegrate into rust on the tunnel floor. Only for that face to turn into mortification as he noticed he now only had two metal stumps for hands.

He skittered back a few steps, helmet bowed defensively. “Since when can you do that?!”

“You think I can only shoot stuff from my hands?” Jack checked, flexing his fingers over the hole in his gloves that had been burned away from his gamma use.

Before the Underminer got a chance to respond, a bolt of radiation plowed into him, launching him into the cave wall.

His head smacked into an exposed telephone cable. Instantaneously, he was limp, practically rolling onto the floor like a puddle of mud. A burning hole was eating away at the headlamp implanted on the front of his helmet.

Still, you could just make out the slow, unsteady rise and fall of his chest beneath his overalls.

Gamma Jack groaned. “How are you still alive?”

That made his life a whole lot harder.

Cuz, yeah, kill a villain in the line of duty? Whatever, part of the gig.

But, killing one while they were unconscious and you’d technically won already?

Eh.

“...Fine, I’ll capture you…” Jack groaned at the body, stomach already recoiling as he took a step forward.

He and Everseer weren’t exactly bosom buddies, but Jack couldn’t have agreed with him more about supervillains: generally, they were not clean people…

Jack could practically hear the telepath’s thoughts swimming through his own head, warning him about the parasites and the viruses that he’d contracted just standing over the Underminer’s body for that long.

And Gamma Jack actually felt himself finding some humor in imagining that.

Until he remembered seeing Everseer’s face covered by a red TERMINATED bar.

Followed by Macroburst.

Then Phylange.

Then Blazestone.

Gazerbeam: Terminated

He scraped those thoughts out of his head, biting them back with a bitter scowl, and decided hauling around the Underminer was better than letting his brain spiral through all of those memories right then…

The cavedweller practically melted into sludge the moment Jack’s gloved hand wrapped around his shoulder.

He would have cursed his bad luck if he wasn’t so conscious about the kind of noxious fumes he was probably inhaling from having the Underminer tossed over his shoulder.

“You’d better stay exactly in place, cuz if you fall off, I’m not going to bother picking you up,” Jack warned the unconscious villain.

The Underminer had a trail of blood and drool dripping down his chin in response.

The super hopped into the air, testing the weight on his shoulder a few feet off the ground before he was satisfied that the Underminer wasn’t going to make him faceplant into the tunnel floor.

Gamma Jack shot down the passage, not taking so much care to dodge any obstacles on the trip back. “Also, I probably gave you, like, five different kinds of cancer when I blew up your clunky ride, so you probably want to get that checked out in a few weeks.”

They had gone farther than Jack had realized, taking at least a solid 10 minutes before they were close enough to street-level that the hole in the ceiling let sunlight trickle through.

Another few seconds in complete darkness and the fat lump of buck teeth and gear grease would have made Jack leave him behind in the mud to let the police handle for themselves. He wasn’t sure if he wanted to know what kind of soot and grime was being rubbed against his body, or if he should find out in case he was needed to be decontaminated

Forget burning flesh and radioactive robot shrapnel. This was going to take hours to soak out of his suit!

It wasn’t like Syndrome had invested in expensive material for his mercenaries. Jack had never taken Edna’s skill and dedication for granted, but, man, he wished there had been a way to salvage his suit from the island. Still, it would have needed a week in Edna’s labs to be sewn back into something that resembled a piece of clothing, instead of just a patchwork of bloody holes.

On the other hand, the mercenary jumpsuit he was using instead was like being squeezed into a sausage wrapper. It would have smelled like one too if Jack didn’t bother taking such good care of it.

The grease dripping off the Underminer didn’t help with that sentiment…

When Jack finally came across the sunken bank and its neighbors, he was ready to blast into the Metroville skyline, throw the Underminer into a containment cell, and find Frozone and the Incredibles. So he could congratulate them on a fun day of work, then get home at record speed to get the supervillain stench off.

So, of course, he wasn’t allowed to do something that simple!

Because the moment he so much as stuck his mask over the rim of the caved-in road, Jack was blinded by the red and blue flashing lights of an army of cops leaving city hall.

He was so taken off guard by the military-sized police force he barely noticed the Underminer’s drill-tank had been caught in a glacier of ice and was currently stabbing city hall in its clock.

Nah, he didn’t think about how there was a collapsed highway and a monorail had been knocked over like a house of cards.

What caught his eyes was the bulky, black armored truck driving away from the Incredibles’ and Frozone’s successful attempt to stop the drill.

Was that…?

A police prison truck–?

Jack’s grey boots softly landed against the roof of the entombed bank. He found himself slinking along the shadows as he watched the parade of black cop cars with flashing lights escort the prison truck down the ransacked street.

The Underminer grunted in his unconscious stupor.

Jack winced as he felt something leaking down his back from the supervillain’s mouth. “Do you enjoy being a disgusting, vomit-shaped man or is this just what you do when you’re bored?”

He, thankfully, didn’t get a response. Or Jack might have just thrown the Underminer onto the street overhead and let the cascade of cars pick him up.

But he didn’t, cuz he was nice. And Jack really didn’t want to get into the back of a prison truck with the villain he’d just captured for them.

Seeing as how many cops it took to cart away what Jack assumed was every other super who’d responded to this fun little mission, he decided he wasn’t in the mood for a shoot out, even if he would win.

After he lost count of the cars around 23, Jack slumped on his heels and declared, “Oooookay, I think I’ll just meet them at the station…”

********

“Superheroes including Frozone, Mr. Incredible, Elastigirl, and Gamma Jack caused further damage to the city. The Underminer remains at large…”

The same message blared across every television mounted in the police station, beating that nail into the ears of every listener tenfold by the time you’d so much as stepped through the front door.

Jack promised himself he’d ignore it.

But he’d also promised he’d ignore the fat globule of oily spittle dripping down his shoulder, and he wasn’t keen to try adding another task to his to-do list.

The TV continued to bark over his shoulder. “There have been reports of excessive damage to city hall, as well as much of the surrounding downtown. However, police reports have confirmed that Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl have been taken in for questioning, though Frozone and Gamma Jack remain at large.”

Normal citizens shuffled their feet away in their chairs as the towering super walked by with his prisoner, clutching envelopes and purses like shields.

The few officers in the lobby looked like they’d been slapped across the face by one of the Underminer’s hammers (no, Jack wasn’t calling them the “real” name). One of them looked like he was going to reach for the walkie talkie on his belt but couldn’t get his attention off of the superhero and supervillain long enough to complete the motion.

The secretaries behind the double glass were frozen, jaws popped open as Jack approached the one on the end. It was pretty great, usual he’d have to smile for marginally longer to get the same reaction. “Hey, can you tell me where my friends got carted off to?”

The dame raised a finger to the door at the end of the hall.

That…really didn’t help, the rest of the building behind that door was probably a maze of corridors and detainment rooms. But how hard could it be to find the Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl?

So, that trademark grin stayed on Jack’s face as he looked back at the secretary, offering her a complimentary wink for just how shocked she’d been that whole exchange. “Thanks, doll.”

Jack shifted the supervillain over his shoulder as an officer happened to open the hall door. The poor man was stuck with one foot in the lobby and one coming from the back offices as he stared at Jack. He stepped around him, thanking the startled man for holding the door for him and the slobbering gopher on his shoulder, and went on the hunt for the Incredibles.

Jack gave it two seconds before–

Mr. Incredible’s words reverberated against the walls. “Look, I don’t get what you’re trying to say right now!”

One second. And Bob is already letting me know where they parked him.

His shouting grew louder as Jack turned the first corner, startling another police officer as she was about to unlock an evidence closet. “We didn’t start this fight!”

“Well, you didn’t finish it either!” a new voice joined in, already trying to match Mr. Incredible in volume and sheer annoyance at the situation.

Somehow, no one else in the back rooms was disturbed by the fight from inside their own interrogation rooms. Everyone was too busy watching the superhero making his way through the corridors, stalking through like this was the Glory Days. The officers populating the halls parted for Jack like there was a chance they would be the next person slung over his shoulder.

He turned around a third corner that guided Jack down a hallway that smelled like bleach and what was probably blood, but that still could have been the Underminer. Jack had given up trying to figure out what oozes were leaking down his arm, already anticipating a long shower, followed by throwing his mercenary-outfit-turned-temporary-super-suit into an entire bathtub filled with WD-40 Specialist Heavy-Duty Degreaser.

His dark grey boots began to pick up the pace as he recognized the innocuous doors of the interrogation chambers growing out of the hallway. “Did you stop the Underminer from inflicting more damage?”

“No,” Bob mumbled, no longer as audible through the walls.

Jack waved himself through a few startled cops as he set his eyes on the only door in the hall with two armed guards outside of it.

The second interrogator continued, just loud enough to confirm Jack’s suspicions about the other supers’ location. “Did you stop him from robbing the banks?”

The guards outside the door had to do a double-take as a super marched up to them and offered a grin that was so charming they had to step aside.

The supervillain he had brought for them didn’t hurt his chance of admission either.

Jack somehow managed to grab the handle without dropping his payload on the impeccable floors. Bob’s admission almost vibrating through the door for how downtrodden it was. “No…”

The detective roared, “Did you catch him?!”

The door to the interrogation room burst open. Half a dozen eyes flew to the radioactive super who stepped inside. Even the detectives were stopped in their tracks for a moment as Gamma Jack strode to the table separating them from Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl, and dumped the groaning, twitching Underminer in front of them.

Jack crossed his arms over the green gamma symbol on his chest, glancing at both of the inspectors to see if they wanted to be the first to speak. Then gestured at the wannabe-moleman and pleasantly informed them, “We did, actually.”

The Underminer hacked a puddle of snot and mud onto the white table.

Somehow, neither detective looked impressed. The one sitting in front of the Incredibles buried a hand in his face. “This guy…”

Jack got the feeling he wasn’t referring to the supervillain he’d just hand-delivered.

“Oh, that’s great– JUST– GREAT!” The gangly detective exclaimed, tossing his hands into the air before his sharpened features stabbed against Jack’s unbothered expression. “So, Gamma Jack, how about you join us!? We need to talk about how much of the city we’ll have to quarantine because you showed up with your sparkly lightshow!”

Jack bristled, tilting his head towards the detective. “Yes, you’re welcome, I caught the domestic terrorist who stole a bank.”

“Just answer the question, smiley!” the detective insisted.

“That was a statement, not a question. Now you’re just trying to keep me unimpressed,” Jack spat back. “I had the half-life on those attacks set to about an hour. The entire area will be completely fine in 6, 6 and a half hours.”

“Great. Wonderful, we have radioactive waste to dance around for 7 hours before we can begin work on reconstructing!” the detective exclaimed, about ready to pull his hair out.

That wasn’t doing anything to make Jack more charitable. “I was mostly using my powers in the tunnels underground, it would take more than 7 hours for you to get a crew down there to try cleaning it up! And don’t you have an overpass and a monorail and a city hall to keep you busy while you wait??”

“Setting off a radiation-based attack in a populated area means needing to clean up any remains, informing the public about potential health risks, and getting specialists to come out to the site to make sure it’s dissipated enough for livable conditions, including concerning any stolen valuables that were in the vicinity,” the the sitting detective informed Jack, the bags under his eyes seeming to grow with each new piece of bureaucracy he mentioned.

“You’re acting like we didn’t just stop a criminal from charging around downtown in a drill-tank built to sink buildings four stories under the city,” Jack informed them.

“The banks were insured, that wouldn’t change if the Underminer had escaped,” the detective continued. “We have infrastructure in place to deal with these matters. If you had simply done nothing, everything would now be proceeding in an orderly fashion!”

Bob’s face was growing redder with each word, finally boiling over as the detectives moved to leave. “We did more than any of your own police force could, and what? You’d prefer we’d do nothing?!”

“Without a doubt!” the second detective assured him, with enough venom to shut down even Mr. Incredible.

The door to the interrogation room slammed shut behind them.

The awkward silence afterwards was thankfully short-lived as Bob turned to a figure that had been hiding in the shadowy corner. “You weren’t much help.”

“What?” A yelp echoed through the bare room as Jack turned around and saw Rick Dicker sitting by the door, having watched the entire mess. “When did–?!”

“He’s been there, Jack,” Helen quieted him, her expression hidden against her chest. Jack didn’t think she’d said a word since he’d arrived. He wasn’t sure he’d even noticed she was sitting next to Bob.

“Didn’t mean to startle you,” Dicker informed him, though his eyes were solely on Bob, never touching Jack or Helen. Something tired was in those stone-like eyes as he pushed himself to his feet. That tiredness pinned Mr. Incredible in place as he warned him, “You want out of the hole? First, you gotta put down the shovel.”

“Dicker,” Jack started, intercepting the comment, “you and the NSA are the ones that put us in the hole to begin with. So I’m not sure what kind of authority you have on the topic.”

If the super wasn’t covered in 10 different kinds of mud and mucus, and the two behind him weren’t brought into the building at gunpoint, Jack imagined Dicker might have something different to say.

Instead, all he did was give Jack an agonizingly long scowl, one that would have made him flinch when he was a rookie superhero. Now he could see the cracks that showed just how tired the agent was.

And Dicker left.

Just like that.

No fanfare, no words of wisdom. No comment about how there was a supervillain custody because of those heroes!

He just…left.

Jack looked at Bob and Helen to see if they had noticed that, but both of them were caught up in a mumbling argument that managed to spring up in two seconds. They didn’t even remember the unconscious body dripping onto the table they were hunched over.

So Jack left the Incredibles to nurse their wounds and slipped out of the interrogation room.

It wasn’t like Dicker was hard to find, his age was starting to get to his knees. And it didn’t hurt that he was the only person in the building to be dressed like he was going to a funeral.

Jack was able to catch him halfway to the back door. “Hey, Dicker.”

The agent stumbled, contemplating slowing down, but waited until the super was practically clipping his heels to acknowledge his tail. “Jack.”

“What was that?” he demanded, waving back at the interrogation room. “‘Put down the shovel,’ we’re just trying not to get buried alive!”

“No one asked you to interfere, Jack. Or any of the others,” Dicker reminded him, already trying to turn away.

“So what are we supposed to do when we see something like that happening?” Jack asked him. “Say, ‘Oh no, I hope someone does something!’ and call 9-1-1 like a good little citizen?”

“That’s what you’re supposed to be,” Dicker bluntly told him. “Maybe without the ‘little’ part. You’re a member of this society, so you’re expected to follow the rules of it.”

“I’m not Socrates, Dicker, or whoever you’re trying to reference. We saw something that could have killed people and we did our duty to protect the city. That’s our job.”

“Hmph. Glad you’re still hanging out with Bo– Mr. Incredible.” Dicker muttered, shaking his head as he chuckled to himself. “I remember when he used to say that. ‘We’re the city’s protectors, we must always remember that.’”

Jack wasn’t in the mood for reminiscing. “So what changed about that? We come back from the island and–”

Dicker shut up Jack with one look.

The island.

They didn’t talk about the island.

No one talked about the island outside of approved NSA meetings, where every word was recorded and carted away to become a footnote on the records.

And it wasn’t even for a noble reason, like ensuring the public didn’t panic about someone like Syndrome trying to kill off the old supers.

The NSA was very blatant when they explained that it was to make sure the public didn’t start a witch hunt for superheroes whenever someone disappeared for an unplanned vacation. Just in case nosey neighbors began to suspect that those trips to visit a sick aunt were actually a secret superhero mission. In case someone actually did go missing, the investigation wouldn’t be clogged up by the influx of people demanding to know if the person was a super in disguise as a normal citizen.

And it made Jack sick to think about how that also meant nothing about the island would ever amount to more than the medical bills he’d wracked up while he was in the hospital for those two months after he got back.

Dicker raised an unkempt eyebrow as Jack’s fists tried so painfully hard to stop themselves from disintegrating the nearest wall. “We can't pretend it didn’t happen.”

…Dicker sighed. “We’re going to have to, kid.”

“Why?” Jack almost hissed. “Why do you care so much about hiding this? Why can’t we act like it happened??”

“Because there isn’t going to be anyone who will care about what the NSA has to say for much longer.” Dicker held Jack’s radioactive gaze as he said the next words, feeling them out as he let them slip into the world. “The program is shutting down.”

The green power that had been building in Jack’s hands trickled back into his veins. “...It’s what?”

Dicker’s mouth was pressed into a thinner line than Jack had seen it before as he explained. “Outside of Nomanisan Island, there’s been no major superhero activity for over a decade. So, the big brass have made the call to disband us.”

“What about relocations?” Jack asked, stumbling to put his thoughts together for the organization that he had…many, many mixed feelings over. They’d done wrong by him, and they’d done wrong by every super they’d forced underground. Sweeping the Nomanisan Island genocide under the rug was just the most recent offense to the supers they claimed to manage. But, admittedly, the NSA was also the reason why he was standing in front of Dicker with a super suit on. “Wiping memories? Training supers to use their powers correctly?”

“That will all be distributed to the proper authorities,” Dicker informed him, like he was reading it off of his own pink slip. Disturbingly familiar and bland after having needed to regurgitate it repeatedly in his own head. “Including your regular blood collections. You’ll be getting more information about that over the next two weeks as we shut down operations.”

The scars on the inside of Jack’s elbow prickled at being mentioned. He shook them away as he watched Rick Dicker, the agent responsible for managing every high-profile super in Metroville…quit? Retire?

The words felt unnatural to use in the same sentence as his name.

“...So. …That’s it,” Jack concluded. “Poof. You’re done.”

Dicker’s long gaze seemed to pierce right through Gamma Jack. All the way through the costume and the mask. Landing on a 16-year-old Jackson Hart, looking back at him over a blank Superhero Registration form.

Jack watched as this man he’d known for more than half his life gave him a tired nod, and a smile that ached enough for every super Dicker had watched throughout the program. “It was a fun ride, Jackson. It was an honor to work with all the good people I got to meet. …Good luck, kid.”

“...Yeah.” Jack felt a hard swallow go down his throat. Ugh, why was this bothering him so much? “Take care of yourself. Okay?”

Dicker sighed, glancing down the hall to the door. “We’ll both try our best.”

He offered his old, bony hand to Jack’s. They got one last handshake in farewell.

And then Dicker turned around and walked away.

Jack watched at his hunched back slowly leave the super behind, his growing shadow slowly obscuring him into a formless shape. Until Dicker had opened the back door, and disappeared into the twilight.

…”You wanna get out of the hole? Put down the shovel.”

Gamma Jack walked past the interrogation rooms, to the lobby, and out the glass front door that opened to the city of Metroville bathed in golden sunlight.

People gawked and stared as he stood at the top of the station stairs. He wasn’t sure if he was expecting to look down and see them carrying pitchforks or flashbulbs.

But all these normal citizens could do was stop themselves in their tracks, some shoving against the frozen waves of onlookers to see if they could spot an illegal superhero. Possibly the first super they had seen in over 10 years.

Some had wide-eyed, jaw-dropped expressions, others scowled and pushed their friends away in case something happened.

Gamma Jack just smirked back, tipping his fingers to them, and took off, his figure blending into the rays of sunlight reflecting off the glass buildings caging him in.

…But why bother with climbing out of the hole if you can fly?

********

That evening, it was rather quiet in the penthouse.

Not that Jack had ever been worthy of the “loud neighbor” accusations that occasionally came with the rare, accidental radiation bomb in his kitchen!

But the apartment felt emptier since he’d returned to it after Nomanisan Island. Like Jack’s presence hadn’t quite re-entered the apartment yet, leaving him partially a guest in his own home.

He hadn’t been missing long enough that anyone had tried to collect his belongings, which was lucky for Jack and anyone who would have dared mess with his meticulous furniture placement.

There was a stack of overdue bills on the counter he was having to slowly file through. He had no doubt the IRS had tried and failed to track him to the island, but eventually gave up.

The potted plant by the balcony doors that had been teetering on dying for years finally gave in while he hadn’t been around to sporadically water it. Probably for the best, with all the radiation Jack regularly used around it was starting to make it look a little funny…

That morning he had finally cleared out all the missed calls that had been clogging up his voice mail, which were half met with his grumbles about, “I was posing as one of the mercenaries of a genocidal maniac so he wouldn’t kill me, no I didn’t feel like donating to the alumni fund last month,” and the other half were mostly from work or NSA agents seeing if they could track him down.

It was…nice? In a way. To think that people had looked for him, at least for a while. Not that they had any luck.

The NSA itself had given up after confirming he was just one of the dozens of other heroes that had mysteriously vanished in recent years.

It made him wonder about the other phones in the other supers’ houses. The supers who didn’t return from the island.

So, every super Gamma Jack had known except Mr. Incredible, Frozone, and Elastigirl.

The acid in his stomach sloshed against his esophagus, threatening to make him choke on a memory of smoke mixed in a tropical sea breeze.

Heat began to build in his chest as a momentary flicker of a red TERMINATED slash throbbed in his eyes over dozens of smiling, digital faces he knew were mutilated into pulp or dissolved into bones.

It was the heartbeat of a madman desperately trying to infect his own, drag him back there, let the Omnidroid chase him down for another three days before it finally caught him, red visor taunting him as his own gamma radiation destroyed them both in an explosion that wiped out an entire part of the island–

“Hey, Jackson, this is Lawrence. I know you’re probably just going to delete this, but–”

Jack wasn’t even paying attention as he wiped his messages clean.

The pill bottle the NSA doctors had sent him home with was tempting him too loudly as he’d watched himself putting his shoes on. That can of sedatives were practically screaming for him to reach out and take them, slip them into his work bag as he grabbed it from the hall closet that morning. They had only shut up when he was down the elevator, out of the lobby, and blending into the other white collar men in button up shirts going to work.

Such a boring, mundane, innocuous way to live.

…But for the first time since the superhero ban, he’d actually been looking forward to going to his “real job” and leaving the exciting life of Gamma Jack at home.

That was stomped into the ground that afternoon, pretty much immediately once his phone call with Honey was interrupted by the Underminer, of all people, making a reappearance down the street from his balcony.

He didn’t even care that his current supersuit was that same, rubbery, repurposed soldier uniform from the island with its sloppily dyed-green limbs and a crude gamma symbol drawn on the chest. Or that the mask that hid his identity from the world was a spare one of Syndrome’s Mirage had dug out of a storage closet for Jack during his escape.

There was a bad guy! And he was a hero, so he got to go blow up said back guy!

Then what seemed like the entire Metroville police department showed up to put an end to Gamma Jack, Frozone, and the Incredibles stopping that moleman maniac from destroying more of downtown.

And it was their fault for stepping up when they saw a problem? Weren’t “normal citizen” supposed to step up when they saw something dangerous? That was an honorable thing for them!

“Normal citizens” were praised for their bravery and their selflessness!

“Normal citizens” were told to be good people!

“Normal citizens” weren’t expected to put their lives on the line for others, so they were considered the pinnacle of mankind when they dared to risk their squishy, feeble lives!

But because they were superheroes, they weren’t treated like normal people. They were only “normal” in name, and they weren’t allowed to forget that.

If they did, they would be locked in an interrogation room and berated into submission for trying to be those good, upstanding people.

Dozens of heroes had wanted so badly to prove the public, the cops, the government wrong that they agreed to help defeat a rogue Omnidroid robot, and they were all dead.

TERMINATED

After an hour of trying to scrub that red line out of his eyes, Jack finally gave up on getting to bed and tossed away the blankets, grabbing a bathrobe off the back of his bathroom door on his way.

He needed a distraction.

Each creak of the stairs nudged his eyes open just a little more, until Jack was awake enough to get blinded as he turned on a lamp.

He blinked a couple of discolored blobs out of his eyes and picked up the phone, tapping his finger against the smooth plastic as he decided to finally get around to making this call.

The line was already ringing as he sat down on the arm of the navy blue sofa, eyes momentarily drifting to the framed picture on the end table.

The one showing Gamma Jack, Gazerbeam, Frozone, and Mr. Incredible at some sort of award ceremony for stopping a record number of bank robberies in a year. Or catching those terrorists from taking over the Metroville Credit Union. It was probably one of the two.

That picture was probably more than 15 years old. And had been occupying Simon’s desk until earlier that month when Jack and a few of Simon’s relatives had cleaned out his office.

Still, it somehow managed to make him smile. As long as he separated it from the context of why Simon no longer had it…

The line picked up. A flat, distant voice echoed through from the other side. “You have reached the office of Ms. Edna Mode, please state your business.”

“Wow, E, your voice changed,” Jack announced. He hoped the silent response meant the security/secretary on the other side was having to contain himself from laughter. “I’d like to set up an appointment.”

A keyboard sprang to life on the other end of the line, clacking away at too many words for what Jack had said. “Reason for appointment.”

Jack hummed to himself, trying to pick the best word. “Consultation.”

The clacking continued. Jack had to wonder if the poor guy’s fingers were more than nubs from how often he must do this. “Name and company you are representing.”

“Jackson Hart.” He caught himself subconsciously twirling the phone cord around his fingers as the manic typing continued. “And I represent myself.”

The keyboard stopped, making Jack wonder if the line had gone dead a moment before the other man told him, “I don’t see your name on the list of approved contacts.”

“Check the list for…old friends,” Jack amended. He listened as the man stood up, no doubt going to an old filing cabinet where the paper records were kept.

The phone picked up again as the man sat down at the keyboard. “My apologies, sir, it seems you do have pre-approval. I assume you would like to talk with Edna Mode herself.”

“She’s the only person I’m interested in talking with,” Jack clarified, enjoying the familiar touch of self-importance that used to come much more easily to Gamma Jack than it had since his “retirement.” It was nice to let that muscle stretch occasionally with people who obviously knew when they were talking to a superhero.

“Of course,” the man apologized. A strangely gratifying feeling. “Would you be available to come in Monday at 5:00pm?”

“Monday at 5:00pm?” Jack mumbled as he reached over the receiver and picked up the standing calendar on the table.

He thumbed through it with one hand until he skipped over to Monday, where his slanted, loopy handwriting was smeared across the paper in red ink: WORK TRIP in New Urbem (that train thing)

“I don’t think I’ll work,” he told the securitary, trying to keep his tone business-like as he cursed the fact that he was already being sent on business trips again, “do you have anything else? Still this week.”

If he was going to do this, it might as well be before the program was completely shut down so he could get it written off his taxes.

*Clackity clackity clackity…* How was this man not driven insane??

Maybe being around Edna constantly made him capable of handling most things. “Ms. Mode is free the next day at 2:00pm.”

“That would be Tuesday?” Jack tucked the phone against his shoulder and flipped to the next page.

His plane was set to arrive back in Metroville by 11:00am. Giving it another hour or two for delays, that left Jack free to get cleaned up (and take a powernap; two flights in 36 hours was a lot for anyone) before he flew over.

“Yeah, that can work.”

“Alright, so 2:00pm on Tuesday?” The man typed something into the computer on the other side, finishing the reservation with a definitive click. “Ms. Mode will be expecting you. What is the make and model of the vehicle you will be driving so we can clear it through the main gate?”

“I won’t be driving,” Jack told him, snorting a little bit as he realized he was saying, “Just leave the helicopter pad open, yeah?”

“There will be a note to keep it clear, sir.” The man didn’t bother asking if Jack actually intended to use a helicopter. “Have a good evening.”

“You too.” Jack hung up, practically tossing the phone back into the receiver so he could grab a pen from the table’s drawer and add another red note to Tuesday’s schedule. He drew his pen through his reminder for, “Meeting with Mirage 2:00pm.”

Hopefully the NSA wouldn’t crashland outside his apartment and demand he stop this madness at once while clutching their radioactive pearls.

He should at least be allowed to replace that suit he had lost on the island–

*Knock*

*Knock*

*Knock*

Jack’s eyes snapped to his front door, red pen halfway back into the drawer.

You have got to be kidding me.

He tossed the calendar haphazardly onto his phonebook and stood up.

If that is the NSA, mark my words, I’m going to go save another major metropolis from a supervillain!

His bare footsteps stalked across the penthouse floor. Somehow they managed to sound like a lion prowling through the background of a jungle as he crossed from the carpet to the tile entryway.

Whoever this visitor was knocked again. Then they realized there was a buzzer and converted to using that instead. Jack flipped aside the metal flap over the peephole, gamma radiation flickering through his fingers.

Someone pulled their arm back from the door buzzer, revealing three familiar silhouettes standing in front of Jack’s door.

Wearing trenchcoats, for some reason.

With super suits very obviously poking out by the top– Were those sparkly, thigh-high crimson alizarin boots???

Jack undid the locks on his door and yanked it open. Bob, Lucius, and Helen were standing in the hallway, occasionally shifting their eyes around like they were plopped in the middle of a C-tier spy thriller. “Are you guys even trying to be subtle?? What are you wearing??”

“And good to see you too, Jack,” Helen exhaled. Considering the afternoon they’d all had, she seemed weirdly calm for modern-day Helen.

That just made Jack more concerned as he noticed the same excited, nay, flatout eager expressions Bob and Lucius were boasting. He sighed, wiping the final bit of sleep out of his eyes as a final trickle of green radiation petered out of them. “Fine, I’ll bite. What’s going on?”

“There’s…a lot to talk about,” Bob admitted, glancing at the other two. And the trenchcoats. “But we’re kind of in a hurry, so we’ll have to give you the short version.”

Jack was scowling before Bob could get to the punchline. “Is it about the program shutting down?”

“That’s–” Bob balked in surprise but pressed on. “That’s not what we came to talk about, but you heard?”

“Yeah, Dicker pulled me aside after the whole interrogation room thing,” Jack grumbled, leaning a shoulder into the door frame.

“What ‘interrogation room thing’?” Lucius interrupted, sending a look Bob and Helen’s way.

“Yeah. That’s what happens when you do illegal hero work and are stupid enough to turn in the criminal you catch, apparently,” the youngest super mumbled, but lathered an easy smile over his features as he looked at Frozone. “Wait up next time, I’ll just leave with you and we’ll both avoid any trouble, okay?”

“Hey, you’re more than welcome to bow out with me when the situation starts cutting things a little close,” Lucius joked back, gesturing like Jack was free to tag along now, a few hours later.

The slight amount of ease that brought fizzled away as Jack looked at Bob and Helen. “So, how much longer with the motel?”

Helen held in a deep breath, like she needed to get used to saying these words. “Two weeks.”

“Well, you know Lucius and I aren’t going to stop offering to throw our guest rooms at you guys,” Jack half-joked, internally pleading that they wouldn’t keep being stubborn and refuse the offer again.

But Bob shook his head. “We appreciate it, but neither of you want all five of us cramping up your apartments.”

“Hey, we wouldn’t be trying to get you guys to stay if we didn’t mean it,” Jack light-heartenedly insisted, probably because he could sense the Parrs had already decided this part of the conversation was over.

So there was a different reason they were standing at his door the night after they’d all done a public act of heroism.

Jack crossed his arms, gesturing a finger up and down his three friends. “Now tell me what’s actually going on with the outfits.”

Bob glanced at Lucius.

The two of them were already planning something.

But it was Helen who spoke first. “Just to double check, you’re not…busy right now, are you?”

“Am I busy?” Jack blinked, taking a second to realize what she was implying about the very stylish bathrobe tied tightly around his waist. “Wait, am I busy??”

He ducked back into the apartment, going back upstairs with that kind of anxiety you get in your sternum when you realized you might have forgotten something important. Just to open his bedroom door and see that no, he was alone, he hadn’t brought anyone over that night.

“Nope, I’m not busy,” he announced as he arrived back in the atrium, having to retie the robe so his boxers weren’t peeking through after his quick jog. He didn’t really care for how obviously relieved they were that he was alone, so he rolled his eyes and moved onto the important things they’d promised to tell him. “Now will someone explain what’s going on?”

Bob glanced at the ice super in their party as Helen told him, “Lucius, you’re the one getting us mixed up in all this. You can tell him.”

“That’s not disconcerting at all,” Jack noted, resuming his pose against the doorframe.

Lucius chuckled and shook his head. “Well, after you were all temporarily detained, I had my own little misadventure. And I talked to a man who invited us to have a chat with this tycoon.”

A business card flicked between Lucius’s fingers before he handed it over to Jack.

Jack tried to laugh to cover how his hand shook to take it from him. “You know, the last time I was given one of these because of my powers, it was from a dame who lured me to her boss’s island to get me killed.”

Winston Deavor

CEO of Devtech

“Name sounds kind of familiar-ish. …I think I've sent people to inspect some of his nuclear-powered projects for government approval.” His voice was even, but his eyes were scanning every molecule of that business card, trying to detect anything that might be a shred similar to the card that tablet from Mirage had spit out a few months ago. Annoyingly, there wasn't anything outwardly suspicious about the card, nor did he have any distinct memories of bad marks in his records against the guy, so Jack had to admit, “It’s not ringing any alarms, so I think he’s clean.”

“I already checked him out myself. He’s about as legit as they come. The man even has some minor NSA certifications signed by Dicker.” Lucius extended a hand to take the card back.

Jack reluctantly returned it, not enjoying that he wasn’t going to get a few hours to make sure it wasn’t a trap before it disappeared into Lucius’s pocket. “What does he want to chat about?”

“He wants to talk with the four of us,” Frozone gestured to himself, Mr. Incredible, Elastigirl, and Gamma Jack, “about what could be next for superheroes.”

“And that’s all the information we’re privy to,” Helen made clear, her smile about as tight and unimpressed as someone could manage without frowning.

“But if he’s okay with Dicker, I think we should hear him out,” Bob explained to Jack, though he was putting an arm around Helen as he said it.

“And why does he want us specifically?” Jack asked, his skepticism still winning over any smidgen of hope they were trying to instill in him.

“We were the ones fighting the Underminer when he saw us,” Lucius explained. “And the supers who defeated the giant robot a few months ago.”

“So it’s a mysterious man with a clear amount of power, connections to the NSA, and just happened to want to have a talk with a handful of the greatest superheroes of the Glory Days. And all he gave you to work with was ‘I want to talk about the future of supers,’” Jack summed up, counting off the ways this sounded waaaaaaay too similar to the offer he’d been given by Mirage.

So who could blame him? Jack started laughing.

Hard, painful laughs, the same kind you hear from a hyena to show they were in distress.

They were, out of nowhere, given a golden opportunity to, *gasp* become superheroes again? From a mysterious benefactor who happens to know where to find them? And he had little business cards for them as well, how cute!

Maybe he also had some giant robots he wanted to kill them with!

They could all die to this lunatic instead of the manchild on Nomanisan Island!

Wow, Jack was worried for a second, he thought he’d survived two Omnidroid, three months disguised as one of Syndrome’s goons, finding out all of his friends were dead, watching half a dozen supers get killed while he couldn’t do anything, burning out his gamma reserves so he wasn’t able to operate at full capacity for months, and having his psyche messed up so badly that when he returned to normal life he had to spend two months in the hospital getting dosed up on sedatives so his nightmares wouldn’t make him go into meltdown again and blow up the entire building, to not die!

This was his third chance to kick the bucket! What a joy!

He was out of breath when he finally managed to straighten from where he’d almost bent over onto the hallway carpet. “So you’re all insane!”

Helen’s brow furrowed in concern while Bob and Lucius exchanged a glance that probably translated to, “they gave him the discharge forms from the hospital after he got out, right?”

“Okay, I won’t bother asking what’s so funny because I think you’re going to do that yourself,” Helen informed him, watching to make sure Jack was controlling himself despite the flummoxed smile on his face.

“Do you honestly think this guy is going to help us?” Jack asked, smile twisting with the memories of that first tablet. “In case you missed it, I just got back from dealing with Syndrome’s genocide island, your husband was tricked into going twice, Lucius would have been next on the chopping block, and they were actively searching for you.”

“This is different,” Bob insisted, brushing over the accusations behind those words. “We haven’t met him, but Deavor is a known member of the community. He’s not hiding behind someone to do his dirty work for him.”

“Bob, do you not know what the definition of a CEO is?” Jack sighed, running a hand through his tousled hair as he tried to grasp how these three were falling for this. “No, he isn’t going to help us. And if you go there, he’s going to do something to exploit you, or he’ll end up killing you.”

“Hey, look,” Lucius started, “I didn’t get called to that island, but I assure you, with all of us there together, there’s no way he’d have a chance to do something shifty.”

“It doesn't really matter how smart or cunning or stubborn you are,” Jack warned him, bitterness seething in his words as those red slashes cut through his thoughts.

Gazerbeam: TERMINATED.

“Again, all of us going together renders that moot,” Frozone insisted, holding his hands in front of him like he was trying his best not to scare a feral animal. “That’s why we should all go. If there is something we need to worry about, all of us will be there to watch each other’s backs.”

“Or he could have a trap in place specifically made for the specific heroes he sought out. Where have I heard that before?” Jack wondered aloud, tapping the side of his chin. “Oh well, can’t remember. All those drugs in the hospital must have messed with my memory of almost dying.”

“Jack,” Helen started, clenching her teeth like she couldn’t believe she was the one saying this, “I agree. This is a horrible idea, and we shouldn’t get involved, at the very best all it’ll do is force us to go out illegally to meet this man. But if he is planning something, the heroes I see right here are the most suited supers to deal with him. And I wouldn’t be going unless these two were because someone needs to be the skeptic and remember what almost happened.”

“Or you could just not go,” Jack reminded them, shifting his posture to put a hand on his hip instead. “Save the headache and investigate him before you agree to anything.”

“I already did,” Lucius reminded him. “He’s cleared by the NSA and by Dicker himself.”

“And Helen’s right,” Bob added, “If this is a trap like Syndrome, he’s going to call other heroes instead. And we’re the most powerful supers the city has to offer, so we would have the best chance to take him down tonight.”

…They weren’t wrong.

If this was a trap, Jack wasn’t inclined to sit around and watch more supers get fed to an egotistical grinder.

At the very least, he was in the best position of any of them because he’d been the one to stay hidden from Syndrome after he had allegedly died.

Not to mention he wouldn’t hesitate when something got a little dicey.

So if they wanted their best chances of survival, they probably would want the walking nuclear bomb with them.

They had already lost so many chances to try and reclaim their old lives. People had lost everything because of it.

And…Simon would have wanted to give it a try.

Relegalizing supers was a dream after the Glory Days, but this could actually give them the chance to start the push for it, especially as public opinion was slowly being nudged their way after the Omnidroid battle.

Besides. If anything happened, Jack would just disintegrate Deavor before there were any problems.

“...The only way you’re getting away with this is because I’d love to go blow something up after the day we had,” Jack muttered, giving them each a glare as they smiled at each other in victory. “Don’t you dare think this is me trusting him.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Bob laughed, squeezing Helen’s shoulder before letting his arm fall to his side. “Can you leave now?”

“Sure. Why not, I have nothing else planned for the night,” Jack dryly exclaimed, still not letting up on his sharpened stare.

“Glad to have you with us,” Lucius told him, a shred of his usual humor back in his words that wasn’t there for most of the conversation. “You don’t happen to have the old suit, do you?”

“It’s probably still stretched across a dead man in the morgue on Nomanisan Island,” Jack told him, regretting he’d only made that call to Edna a few minutes ago and not when he’d first gotten back.

Not that he’d been free, he was in recovery, then had to deal with Simon’s estate, then had an actual job he needed to do cuz he liked having money.

But he didn’t like admitting his only option was still that radiation-stained rubber jumpsuit. Especially because he was pretty sure he’d left it half-submerged in the kitchen sink to soak out the Underminer’s grimy remains. “Think he’ll kick us out if I use the ‘Mercenary’ Jack outfit?”

“It’s better than what you have on!” Lucius exclaimed as he waved his hand up and down the silky teal bathrobe, finally getting a laugh out of the party. “We’re not trying to traumatize the guy, go get changed!”

“Yeah, we have a matching trenchcoat waiting for you,” Bob joked, earning an eye roll, but also a smiling Gamma Jack.

“Don’t threaten, me, Bob, you’ve already done enough of that tonight,” he declared, somehow managing to keep himself at ease. Jack nudged open the door and waved them inside after him so they could sit down while he got himself assembled. “I’m only going because if anything does happen, I need to make sure one of us kills these people when they double cross us.”

Chapter Text

In The Past (1951)

Infrared radiation and ultra violet radiation were discovered just over a hundred years ago in 1800 and 1801.

Radiowaves were first produced artificially in 1887.

In 1895, a coincidence led to the discovery of X-rays.

A year later, in 1896, a student would coin the term for this energy, “radioactivity.”

Alpha particles and beta particles were discovered in 1899.

And in 1900, a hundred years after the discovery of this invisible power, one of the most powerful and dangerous types of radiation was discovered, coined in 1903: gamma radiation.

The discovery of neutrons and neutron radiation in 1932 spear-headed the race to the atomic bomb as World War II loomed on the horizon.

In 1945, the first succession nuclear weapon was created. Followed by the deployment of said nuclear weapons to end the deadliest war in human history.

It was a corrupting power, one that melted flesh and disintegrated bones as the victims screamed from vaporizing throats.

It was the trigger and the gun for the nuclear arms race that fed the Cold War.

It killed more in those strikes than the Battle of the Bulge, more than five Battle of Bataans, more than 50 D-Day invasions.

This was power that shouldn't, couldn't, be controlled by the wrong hands. This was more dangerous than the world had ever anticipated. With the wrong man, it was no longer a potential threat, but a massacre of millions waiting to happen.

And, in 1946, the fear became warranted.

A file crossed the NSA's desk containing information on the first human known to create and control radiation like a nuclear reactor, and detonate it like a nuclear bomb: an 11-year-old boy from a wealthy suburb of Civicton named Jackson Hart.

It had been a struggle for the NSA scientist. Plenty of children with dangerous powers were brought to them for training, some with the added benefit of having powers that allowed for crucial scientific inquiry. But, they were children. Gifted with immense, dangerous abilities that could easily pose a danger to society if left on their own.

Or if they happened to be controlled by a teenager who repeatedly reminded them he was only here because he would be detained forcefully if he refused.

Which they promised wouldn’t happen, he was there as a volunteer.

A statement he still didn’t believe five years later.

“I’m not a volunteer,” he had bemoaned as the car pulled in front of the stark, white, cube-like building a few hours before. “They need me to come here because I’m easier to study than a nuclear bomb in Nevada.”

“Honey, that’s not true,” his mother had insisted, pausing while she bit her lip and backed them into an ‘Employees Only’ parking spot. They both winced as the back tires bounced against the curb. “You’re here because you’ve got a gift. And you got one that can help so many people! It’s just also super dangerous, so they do need to make sure you know what you’re doing.”

Jack preoccupied himself by fiddling with the window crank in the front seat of their Plymouth de Luxe that had seen so many bad days they overnumbered the good.

In just five years it had long outlived its former days of luxury, and even if it still looked like a car his father would have had in his driveway, it ran like its engine was made of old paint buckets.

Still, his mother kept it. She had tried to sell it the year before when summer rolled around and dried up the boarding house’s income again, but her only potential buyer took one look inside the sawdust-infused engine and never touched it again.

So, his Ma took it as a sign and decided to just run that car into the ground. Jack knew she was insane, but he’d been aware of their finances since they moved out of that three-story house behind the big iron gate. He didn’t bother suggesting they get something better, no matter how many times he was told to pop open the hood and see if he could find what was making that week’s horrible sound.

Despite how she was either working all day at the bank as a teller, or she was managing the boarding house while he did the house chores, Jack probably saw more of his Ma now that it was just the two of them.

Neither of his parents had been incredibly attentive when Jack and his older siblings were kids. That’s what you hired nannies for. And the maids. Three boys left to roam a mansion was more than enough to cause some messy trouble fairly regularly.

But when they had discovered Jack’s powers, his mother and father had needed to figure out what to do with him.

That was when things got…tricky.

So much so, his Ma had taken Jack by the radioactive arm, put both of them into that same car, and driven to her parent’s house closer to town.

He still wasn’t sure if he resented her for that or should be thanking her…

The last time either of them had been there was a year prior, when Jack’s grandfather had passed away and left the property to his only daughter. It was dusty and cramped compared to what they were used to, but his mother hadn’t exactly thought about what to do after she got Jack away from his father, so any spare room was rented out to cover the difference until she found a job.

Jack didn’t really know the semantics of what that made his parents, only occasionally hearing the word “separated” when his Ma would have to explain their situation to the principle at his new public school. Which was followed up by one of those polite smiles that was trying desperately not to say something offensive as the overset principle had looked between her and the lanky, blonde thing sitting outside the office.

His Ma had a long, hooked nose like a parrot, and black and grey hair that got tangled with her undone bobby pins as it tumbled down to her waist. Her bone-thin frame made it look like her chestnut eyes were going to pop out of their sockets whenever she slammed on the car brake too hard.

Needless to say, he had entirely taken after his father.

Still, the family resemblance became uncanny as a smirk bloomed across her face, a very familiar mischief tugging at the corner of her lip as she looked at her youngest son trying not to melt the car door with the radiation in his hands. “I know, it’s not exciting like a superhero, but think of all the good you’re doing by just being her, Jackie! You’ve probably saved so many lives without even knowing you did it.”

Jack scoffed, his head hitting the back of the seat as he felt her staring at him expectantly. “Yeah, you’re right, Mama. I can save so many lives. Like making weapons that destroy cities, that’s gotta save lives. Or maybe they can put it into household items and the factory girls working on those items will get radiation poisoning. That’d save a lot of lives. Maybe they figured out how to use radiation to fight cancer! Oh, wait, it causes cancer.”

She pursed her lips, staring at the horizon over the dashboard. “...Hey.”

A hand landed against his jacket, making him flinch away before his Ma dragged herself to his side.

A short nail scraped a line against his shoulder as he heard her start to speak. “It’s hard. I get it, it’s hard. And…I don’t know if it’ll get better. But right now, you’ve got to be strong for me and make the right decision.”

“You don’t know what the right decision is,” he reminded her with a sigh. “I don’t know what it is and I’m the one people think is going to blow up Civicton if I’m having a bad day.”

“Well, if the right decision was obvious, then good people would always make them,” she insisted, still trying to stroke some of the pain out of his shoulder while her son’s glowing eyes were set on the white building.

Where he would have the stay for the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, letting the government scientists of the NSA try to understand how they could use his powers. She knew it wasn’t fun, but he had to understand his duty to the world. Her son was so important, and it made her proud to be his mother, even when it meant she wasn’t living the life she was meant to have.

His Ma’s hand diverted to squeezing his shoulder instead. “It can be a dangerous world out there for people like you. Supers are so much stronger than a normal civilian, but that means it can be challenging for the rest of us to understand that. We probably never will truly understand just how much more powerful your kind are than the rest of us.”

“Then why am I the one being treated as a lab experiment?” Jack demanded, though it was the kind of defeated demand that meant he already knew the answer.

“Just because someone is more powerful, doesn’t mean they know what’s best for everyone else,” she gently reminded him.

The same words that rattled in his head whenever she needed him to stop misbehaving and take out the trash, or to go inside to NSA building to let the nice scientists take off his shirt and stick needles into him as he blew up a car.

“And whatever happens, if it gets too much,” she began to grin again, humor dancing in her voice and she brightly declared, “we’ll just run away again!”

Jack snorted despite himself as he finally looked over his Ma.

“We’ve done it before, and look how things have turned out! It’s so much better than what would have happened with your father.” Her free hand waved at the parking lot as if it was a highway to the next city over. “We can go to a far off land where no one has ever heard of us!”

“No one here has ever heard of us,” Jack insisted, even as he was given an annoying reminder that her optimism could be infectious. “The only people who know we exist are in that building I’m about to walk into.”

“And that’s just what it should be,” she concluded proudly. “We don’t need fame or fortune. We can carve our own path!”

“I know, Mama, I know…” he promised her. Cutting out the part that he liked fame and fortune.

Jack had never asked for her to take him on this wild adventure to nowhere.

He wasn’t really sure if the advice his Mama gave him was all that good.

And maybe his father was secretly hiding some sort of dark intentions that he never got to learn about, but how much worse would it have been than this?

At least back home Jack would have known there was a home to go back to instead of walking up the sidewalk every afternoon half expecting to see a foreclosed notice on the door.

But he didn’t say any of that.

Because, regardless of what was and wasn’t necessary, whatever life was behind or in front of them, she was the only two people left who knew about Jack who actually wanted to ensure his well-being.

“You’re a good kid.” The grin on her face faltered before she took in a deep breath and reignited the chipperness in her voice. “So, go in there and show them what Jackson Hart can do! Okay?!”

“Okay,” he droned, barely processing what she said as he reached for the door.

“Jackie,” she started, dipping into a maternal tone for the first time in that conversation. It made Jack’s shoulders drop as he looked over at his Ma, who somehow managed to beam regardless of her true feelings. “Behave for them.”

“...I’ll think about it,” he informed her.

…Okay, thinking was over, he’d probably be about as reluctant to help them as he usually was.

As if she could read that thought, his Ma tilted her head towards him and warned, “Really behave for them. Understand me?”

“Of course I do,” he promised. And, finally, finally that matching smirk appeared on his face. He really did understand but, “I can’t promise I’ll listen.”

She laughed, her cackle filling the car as she tousled his hair into his face. “There he is! There’s my handsome boy. Get going, you’re late.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he chuckled, running a hand through his hair as she shooed him into the parking lot. Jack paused just as he was about to close the door to inform her, “But still, no promises.”

His Ma’s expression turned halfway to serious as she rested a bony elbow on the headrest. “Seriously, behave for them today, okay, Jackie? If you blow up the wrong tank again, you’re on KP until school is out for the summer!”

“I already am, Mama! You put me on after I set that guy’s lab coat on fire,” he reminded her, swinging on the door a bit as the pleasant memory of charred, white fabric filled his mind.

His Ma rolled her eyes, waving a hand up and down his lackadaisical pose.

“You see? I’m running out of ideas for what to do with you! Get going!” she exclaimed before her son finally got on his way.

Jack would still see her waving from over the dashboard as he stepped in through the side entrance, his Ma only disappearing when the metal, window-less door locked in Jack face.

The sound of over-polished dress shoes was already clipping down the hall before Jack could turn around to see the lab technician approaching him.

“Mr. Hart, you are late,” she informed him, only glancing at him to make sure she had the right teenager.

So he didn’t bother offering her an apology. “Good to know.”

She probably didn’t hear him as she turned back around, walking down the steel-plated walls of the hallway knowing he would follow.

It didn’t even register to him when he was led into the same, bleached room and sat down in the metal chair that he was so familiar with he wouldn’t have been surprised if it was worn down to match the curve of his back.

He did notice when another lab coat showed up with one of those medical carts rolled in, but that was just so he could remind himself not to tense up as one of the technicians grabbed his arm and pulled it straight against the arm of the chair. An alcohol pad tracked down the inside of his elbow, his two second warning before a sharp prick stabbed into his skin.

If they kept that up, it would scar eventually.

When a thick river of green-tinted blood began to trail from his arm into the collection tubes, he was tempted to try talking to the half a dozen people watching the nurse, but they were all preoccupied.

The stagnant look in her eyes as she swapped collection vials made it seem like she was trying not to blow herself up with nitroglycerin instead of trying to steal blood from a teenager.

So Jack commenced his favorite pastime for this meeting and rolled his eyes until he felt the needle getting pulled away.

When the piece of gauze was taped into place and he was feeling slightly less lightheaded, one of the technicians finally looked up from her clipboard and blandly informed him, “You’re finished here. I’ll take you to your next appointment.”

“Yay,” Jack dryly responded, standing up as soon as the nurse had determined he was stable enough.

It took until Jack was led halfway through the building for the dizziness to wear off. And to notice he didn’t recognize the blank door he was now facing.

He blinked a couple of times, trying to see if his memory had been fogged over or if he was genuinely unsure of what was happening. “Um. What’s this?”

The technician looked at his pointing figure, then back at her clipboard. “You were requested by one of our representatives.”

“...That doesn’t explain anything.”

The technician offered him a noncommittal shrug. “The only other note for today’s schedule is that you must attend this meeting.”

“What’s the meeting about?” Jack asked, sparring a few looks to the unfamiliar door.

“You are not qualified to know that information at this time,” she easily responded.

“But…?” he gestured to the door. “I’ll find out in a few seconds anyway.”

“Correct. So please do not delay,” the technician simply responded, making note of something on her clipboard, then walking away.”

Jack was left to stand around in the hallway if he chose.

…Nah, they would find him standing there.

The handle turned like it hadn’t been oiled since the war as Jack stepped from the cold corridors of the research facility and into…

…A normal office.

It had a desk with a chair behind it, an unused umbrella standing by the door, an appropriate amount of clutter strewn across a windowsill.

And, in the middle of it, was a man sitting behind that desk.

An unassuming, non-disclosing expression was etched across his stone-like face as Jack closed the door behind him, already wary enough about this meeting.

The man was in a suit that was probably meant to be crisp and pressed, but probably hadn’t been for a week of being worn. His strictly down-turned mouth and bulbous nose was framed by short, slicked-back brown hair that made him seem more put together, if you didn’t look down as notice the bushy, almost tangled eyebrows over his deep-set eyes. If the NSA emblem was emblazoned across the cufflinks on his suit, you could have convinced Jack that this was just some civvie lawyer or something.

The burning in Jack’s arm had to remind himself this was another government man. And he didn’t trust those.

He seemed to be assessing Jack as the young super did the same, neither of them making a move until they had to. It could be that they were already wary of each other, which Jack didn’t doubt.

“...Would you like to sit down?” the agent asked the young man standing in front of him. Jack noticed the green armchair in front of the desk had been slightly pulled back for him, expecting this meeting. “If you’d rather stand, I won’t get in the way, but this might take a minute.”

The green trickle in Jack’s eyes dissipated as he slowly sat down, even if his attention never left his host.

“This meeting is being recorded for posterity,” the agent warned him, like he was reciting that from a pre-rehearsed script. “Do you mind?”

Jack looked at the bulky tape recording sitting on the desk by the gent’s elbow.

He didn’t really mind being recorded. But he was in a bad mood.

“No, I actually do mind,” he decided, crossing his arms as he made himself comfortable.

Shockingly, the agent just shrugged and turned off the recorder. There was even the slightest, smallest chance that he maybe smiled a little as he looked at Jack again.

“Better?”

Jack didn’t know what the guy was trying to pull.

So he responded with a quick and simple, “Sure.”

“You know, based on your track record with the labs’ staff, I thought you were more talkative,” he noted, tapping his thumbs together as he recalled something he didn’t bother mentioning to Jack.

Who watched in some minor horror as the agent extended a hand to him.

“Agent Rick Dicker. I represent the more conventional side of the National Supers Agency,” he announced, taking no small amount of pride in that statement.

The teenaged super looked at that hand, then at the man attached to it, and reluctantly shook it. “I think you know who I am. Or you wouldn’t have been able to ask for me.”

“Getting straight to business,” Agent Dicker noted, letting Jack be the one to take his hand away, then returning his own to one of the drawers in his desk.

“I waste enough of my day in this place,” Jack bluntly explained, glancing around the office for emphasis.

Though, admittedly, that didn’t really help.

As far as government buildings went, the office was downright homey with its green, cushioned chairs and wood-panelled walls. The wall behind Agent Dicker was covered in superhero memorabilia, like how a parent would put their kid’s macaroni art up on the fridge. The window just overlooked the charming view of the gravel rooftop, but at least there was a window of some sort.

Dicker finished rummaging in that desk and pulled out a love piece of paper.

The look he gave Jack only made the teen more apprehensive as the agent pushed the stationary to him. Jack glanced at it long enough to see the NSA logo at the top, then glanced back at Dicker.

The agent was holding his fists under his chin before he gestured to the paper. “Take a look at that for me.”

Jack gave him an unimpressed stare.

But he took the paper, snapping it in his hand. A pair of sea blue eyes tracked down the form, committing every grain of wood to memory.

Superhero Registration Form

Name:

Date and Place of Birth:

Date of Power(s) Discovery:

Type of Superpower:

Are You of 16 Years of Age or Older?:

Etcetera, Etcetera.

The purpose was obvious.

What Jack couldn’t figure out was why Agent Dicker had slid it across the table like he was presenting him with a million dollars from a long-lost, recently-deceased rich uncle. His voice dripped with that same suspicion as he continued to inspect the paper. “What is this?”

“That,” a pencil tapped the “S” in “Superhero,” “is an offer.”

“How specific,” he grumbled, crossing his arms as he leaned back into the fabric of the armchair. It took him by surprise, his back instinctively tightening to meet with the straight, metal chairs that populated the testing rooms downstairs. “Glad I asked, I got such a clear answer.”

Agent Dicker pressed his elbows against the table, mimicking the same pose as Fironic was in a newspaper pinned behind the wooden desk. “Young man, have you ever considered becoming a superhero?”

The low grit in his voice slipped across the wood grain and struck right in Jack’s chest.

A perplexed, misshapen expression grew across his face, contorting it into a slack-jawed, pinched-brow look of utter confusion. “I’m sorry, excuse me?”

“Have you ever considered,” Agent Dicker repeated, dragging out his words as he saw them struggling to be processed, “becoming a superhero?”

The wall of posters and newspaper clippings on the wall behind the agent loomed overhead.

Sparkling smiles and winking masks soared across cityscapes in brilliant flashes of monochrome color, painting the black and white photos with bolts of lightning and storms made of darkness.

Mr. Incredible lifting a submarine over his head

Elastigirl swinging between buildings.

Frozone entombing a mad scientist’s laser gun.

Meta Man smiling over a recaptured Baron von Ruthless.

Apogee levitating a whole building back onto its foundation.

Dynaguy launching into the air on his rockets.

Psychwave standing over a frozen criminal.

All of these heroes, these defenders of justice, had sat in this same room and been asked the same question.

He could imagine their excitement, the feeling that the world was open to the horizon.

Being a superhero was the chance to find your full potential. The only type of person who put on a mask to become who they truly were. Burying that civvie life that considered them a ticking bomb behind costumes and capes.

It was a golden opportunity, one that comic books and movie theaters sold to normal people so well that civvies actually wanted to be supers.

Which made sense, why wouldn’t you want to be a super?

It was your chance to be more than you were. The arm of strength and justice with the face of national pride.

No longer an insurance agent or a lawyer or a housewife, that was just your other half, the real disguise.

You were a hero. Anything else was secondary.

Especially for supers with unmatched abilities, the ones who struggled to live a normal life because of their powers, this lets them embrace every part of themself. Those super strengths were no longer a burden they had to try and keep hidden, but what made them the greatest humans on the planet.

Then here was Jack, who numbly shook his head before he could snap himself out of the temporary shock and told Dicker, “No, of course not!”

“And why is that?” Dicker calmly asked, brushing off Jack’s clear agitation like he had with so many other unruly supers in his career.

The unexpected lack of annoyance in his question made Jack stop for a moment, thinking about what Dicker must be up to.

Before rolling his eyes and pulling his arms over his chest, staring Dicker down as he informed him, “Look, maybe a couple of fat heads can devote their lives to blowing up armies of ninja robots or whatever, but I have a bit too much going on to ‘volunteer’ for another gig with you people.”

“And what are you doing that’s so important?” Dicker pressed, pencil now tapping at the paper.

It made Jack’s eye twitch. “Not sure if you remember going to one of these, old timer, but there’s this thing called ‘school’ I need to be at most of the day.”

“Shift schedules are flexible for high school students,” Dicker informed him, as casually as giving a weather report. “We don’t expect people your age to be that committed to the program yet. And parents generally want their children to stay out of the worst trouble we run into.”

“It’s not like I have time in the evening either,” Jack informed him, resisting the urge to pick up the form to see if Dicker was being honest with him. If he didn’t keep his attention solely on the agent, he’d be tempted to actually look at the form again. And Dicker couldn’t be getting the wrong idea. “I’m in charge of keeping things in check at the boarding house when Mama– when Ma has late nights at the bank.”

“We are willing to let you have a very restricted active duty if that would be to your benefit,” he told him. “The NSA doesn't like to push potential heroes away if they can’t sign on full-time due to familial commitments.”

“It’s not ‘familial’ commitments, it’s financial, agent. The college kids are leaving for home soon, so we need to get every penny out of them before the renters dry up for the summer,” he slowly explained, just in case Dicker was another one of those government agents who hadn’t had to work for themselves before. Jack used to know what that felt like, and now he was more than happy to grieve that old life by rubbing his new one in some stuffed shirt’s face. “In June I’m probably going to be working at the steel mills to try and cover the difference.”

Even if the idea of those rusted smokestacks by the river made those terrifying green sparks flicker against his newly-calloused fingers.

Still, Dicker seemed completely unbothered. Maybe it was the portraits of supers behind him that gave him an aire of immovability. Reminding people that he’d wrangled all of these people into obedience, he wasn’t scared by you.

“You do understand that being a superhero is a job, Mr. Hart?” Dicker continued, making a note at the angry flicker of light in the young man’s eyes at the name. It was fairly obvious to him that the young man’s relationship to his now somewhat distanced father was trepidation at best. But Jack quickly regained his composure as the next sentence was put between them. “We would compensate you for your work.”

That temptation started to work its way back into Jack’s mind, just for him to quash it with a snort. “What, $0.75 an hour? The foundry in Civicton would do $1.70 easily.”

Dicker remained completely unphased by the venom in his voice. “The average salary of a starting, full-time superhero in the NSA is $3,000-$3,500 a year.”

“How–?” Jack felt his brain misfire as it processed that. “Excuse me?”

“I know that’s not quite enough to be in the median income range as one person,” Dicker went on, seemingly misunderstanding the teen’s newly-intensified gaze. “And you would also have to take into account you would be part-time, and wages are usually lower to start.”

Jack’s words trailed off before he could correct him. “No, that’s…”

Enough to not have to board people again? To not have to scrape for summer work to try and cover the bills? To never have to hear his mother crying in the bathroom at night wondering if she had made the right choice to get her youngest son away from the rest of their family?

He swallowed, hiding it behind a contemplative look. “...That’s enough.”

The silence in the room seemed to make the agent think Jack was actually starting to think about this crazy idea. “Since you’ll be confirming you’re under 18–”

“I’m not confirming or signing anything,” Jack reminded him, a glimpse of that fire back as Dicker marched forward like he had already agreed to be a different kind of government puppet.

The agent gave him a quick look for cutting him off. “If you’ll be confirming you’re under 18, that means you’ll receive an offer for the NSA’s Super Career Placement Initiative during your senior year of high school, which will help you and me find an appropriate job for your civilian life that will function as a second source of income.”

“Aww, so maybe then you’ll actually pay me for all the monitor patches they glue onto my skin?” Jack wistfully mused, leaning his face against his fist like he was dreaming of rescuing a princess from a tower.

“Government jobs are the easiest for us to place you in, but we have connections in non-federal locations if you’d prefer that,” Dicker pressed on. He was going to finish this sales pitch whether Jack let him or not.

“Yeah, I’m sure you’d let me just get a normal job,” he grumbled, the bandage in the crook of his elbow starting to chafe with the dried blood from his donation a few minutes ago.

“You’re sure you wouldn’t want to get into politics? You’re insubordinate enough for it,” Dicker wondered aloud, getting a startled laugh from the young man as the agent checked one of the papers off to the side of the desk. “But if you’re able to meet the grade standard for admission, you could also be eligible for the Supers Youth Education Initiative.”

“What, boot camp for supers?” Jack guessed, tamping down his amusement at finding out this guy actually had a personality under the government suit.

“No,” Dicker chuckled. “Have any of your teachers talked to you about college?”

That only earned him a confused look. “I’m not sure more than two kids from my school have even gone to a college.”

“Well, college is becoming an option for more and more gifted young people these days, and we’re interested in helping any supers who might have that in mind,” Dicker explained, like he wasn’t talking about sending the first person in Jack’s entire family to college. People don’t just go to college! “So four years ago, the NSA started this initiative to fund any high-education a super enrolls in.”

“...So you’re saying if I become a super, I make more than my Ma and you’ll pay for me to go to college,” Jack had to confirm, like he needed Dicker to suddenly tell him, “Surprise! This is a joke!” for him to start believing him.

But Dicker was entirely serious, not even batting an eye as he said, “Income does increase by level of performance and the amount of time you put into it, but for a standard work week, that’s about the size of it. And funding is only available if you manage to get into a federally-sponsored school. So, no Harvard, but something like Penn State, University of Pennsylvania, either would be just fine.” Dicker waved the suggestions into the air like, sure, just get into one of the top universities in the country and we’ll pay your way through. Easy, right? “You might have heard of Stormicide? The young woman in our Metroville-Municiburg branch in California. She’s currently one of our top-performing supers in the program.”

“...Hmph. Well,” Jack tossed his hands into the air and let them fall onto his lap. “I’ll give you this. That’s the best offer I’ve gotten from someone like you since I got volunteered to be your lab rat.”

Dicker shrugged, opening his psalm against the table. “I can’t let a kid with your talent get past us without giving you a chance to use your skills for something worth your time.”

“Wow, and flattery now, you’re really trying to sell this to me,” Jack announced. Finally, he let himself take a glance at the paper, so innocently taunting him from the desk. “...But my answer is no.”

“...You’re sure, son?” Dicker’s voice was stilted when he spoke, the first glimmer of surprise flashed through his features as he pulled his hands back to the edge of the desk.

The first glimpse Jack got that maybe this agent was giving him a good deal, but he was after the same thing: he wanted to get this dangerous super under control.

That was all anyone wanted.

That’s all they would ever want after people found out Jack could cradle the most sought-after weapon in human history in the palm of his hand.

That’s what his father tried to do.

That’s what his mother wanted to do by running away from him.

That’s what the NSA R&D department wanted to do when they found out he existed.

And Jack knew instinctually, practically intrinsically after five years, that’s what this NSA agent was offering him. Just disguised as a job. Faking the chance for Jack to live as normal a life that super like him could ask for.

…The difference this time was that Jack might get something out of it other than a new address and some scars on his arm.

“...I think it would be a great step forward for you. It would help your mother out–”

“Don’t bring her into this,” Jack mourned, his gaze darkening for a second as that split-second of attention was given to the floor.

Dicker’s attention was still full on him when he finally looked up. “...I’m missing something, young man. If you like, you can explain it to me. Or we can never speak again. As much as I would love to have you for the agency, it’s not skin off my back if you turn us down to try and live a normal life.”

“Normal” life.

It almost made Jack laugh again.

He wasn’t supposed to live a normal life.

He’d had one of those for 10 years and that’s all the universe had allowed him.

After the day when he found out he had this gift, he had tried to hide it from everyone for a year, and that didn’t work.

Whether he wanted to hide it or not, he was stuck with these powers, and he had no intention of trying to get rid of them.

Why he had them, no one knew.

No super knew why they got their abilities.

But when you did, it was like the entire map of yourself had been filled in.

Every country had a name, every river had an origin, you could trace the entire path of your life with the glowing tip of your finger.

It was like lighting a bonfire and realizing you had been walking in darkness, but no one had told you until you discovered it for yourself.

Instead of “normal” people, who spent all of their waking days wandering aimlessly from purpose to purpose, trying to find the spark that gives life meaning, a super had theirs.

It excited you and filled you up, made everything click into place and told you, “This is who you are. I know what you are. And you will be the greatest at it.”

Even when you had doubts and heartaches and you were on your knees scrubbing the tiles in the boarding house bathroom that use to be yours, you could ask any super who they were and they could each tell you”

“I am strong.”

“I am flexible.”

“I am enduring.”

And in the back of Jack’s mind, the place where he could reach out and feel the pulse of gamma radiation generated in the core of his being, was the undeniable truth that came from the nature of his existence: “I am powerful.”

He wasn’t a scared kid.

He wasn’t a lab rat.

He wasn’t a petri dish they could keep locked away in a metal vault until they decided he could go home to be “normal” again for the rest of the world.

So, instead of the biting retort he wanted to say, or the maniacal insistence that Dicker was crazy, or even a snide remark about how the agency was going to have to impress him before they would get anything else out of him, Jack’s words were quiet.

Small enough that he hated how it sounded like they were coming from a scared kid.

Despite how that’s exactly what he was.

Jack picked at an invisible piece of dirt on the sleeve of his government-approved, lab-safe shirt as he asked, “...Would the tests stop?”

And Dicker knew this.

Only the clock ticking my Dicker’s elbow percolated through the room as the agent thought it over.

Jack hated it. The waiting for someone to decide for him.

Because he knew what they were thinking.

Man, this kid is young.

He’s already been through so much.

I wish I didn’t have to make him do more, but there’s not much I can say about it.

Eventually, Dicker admitted exactly what Jack knew he would. “I can’t guarantee that.”

Jack shrugged in defeat. Government agents were getting too easy for him to read.

“But,” Dicker continued, those bushy eyebrows seeming to glare into Jack’s soul, “it’s possible you could make a case that being active in the field would provide better research opportunities than dry testing in a lab.”

An uncomfortable feeling began to buzz in Jack’s chest.

For once it wasn’t radiation.

He was pretty sure this was something kind of familiar, but he hadn’t remembered the last time he felt it.

Was that…? Ugh, hope??

“Though, you would probably have some low-level monitoring imposed on you while you’re on a shift. And I imagine they will want the blood tests to continue since they can’t obtain through other means.”

He almost didn’t hear the last part of what Dicker said, too busy imagining what it would be like to wake up every day and not have another geiger counter hanging over his head.

Sure, it wasn’t baseball practice or chess team or whatever civvies did after school.

But it was better than what he had now.

…He would get to be a superhero?!

Like, an actual superhero! With the mask and the cape and the–!

There was no way that was possible.

No way.

No, absolutely not–

He was being offered the chance to be a superhero by an agent of the NSA!

It would take away all of those tests and they would pay him and he’d get to go to college and maybe his mother wouldn’t have to worry about him constantly and there’s no way this was possible.

…Jackson Hart was asked to be a superhero.

Green light traced his irises as he looked at the form being offered to him.

Dicker was watching him, hesitantly expectant, as the young man struggled to find the right words to say. His tongue felt like they still had lead pressed to his skin.

Until, finally, he forced out one sentence. “Can I think about it?”

Agent Rick Dicker smiled at him and pushed the paper to the edge of the desk. Jack took it, looking at it like he’d been dying in a desert and had just been given a map to find water.

Then Jack folded it up, slipped it into his pocket, and left the office.

Two weeks later, Dicker heard a knock on his door.

And in 1951, the first known radioactive super was inducted into the National Supers Agency under the alias “Handsome Jack.”

In the Present

Gamma Jack could give credit where credit was due.

Of the two limo rides he’s had in the past couple of months, this was the best.

And that was all the credit he would be giving out for the rest of the night.

Okay, and, yeah, the glass and steel headquarters of Devtech stretching so high the clouds got in the way, that was also kind of impressive.

They had long since shedded those trenchcoats, including the one Bob had brought along for Jack, leaving the four supers in the back of the limo to proudly show off the colorful costumes that had protected their identities for so long.

It was almost eerie for Jack, seeing the three of them in their super suits without any sort of danger to fight. More so because it had been over 10 years since the four of them would have worn super suits in the same place.

Not including when they had fought the Omnidroid.

And when they’d fought the Underminer.

But, for this outing, three of the four supers were actually excited to have their suits back on, exchanging nervous but hopefully glances with each other as the car drove through Metroville, crossing the river to Municiburg, and arriving at the ocean that bordered the city, and the corporate tower that stood there.

The limo stopped just short of the curb, a smiling man in a suit appearing just outside the back door to show them out.

A fistful of lanyards appeared in the man’s hand as the four supers stepped back into the cool night air. He offered one of the cards on the lanyards to each of them, only explaining, “Your security badges.”

The others slipped the badges around the necks with no hesitation, Bob giving Jack a slightly irritated look when he noticed the youngest of their group was inspecting the badge like he had that business card Lucius showed him just an hour ago.

So only Jack noticed that there was a tiny piece of glass embedded into the center of the security badge.

It looked almost like a camera lense, but tiny. Barely the size of your big fingernail.

Or about the size of your pupil.

Memories flooded Jack’s head of the spy parrots from the island, those cameras in their eyes that tracked every move of the Omnidroid’s battles against the supers…

Or this could just be a weird fashion choice for a temporary security badge.

Either way, Jack shrugged and consented to just “mistakenly” put the badge on backwards so all it would get to look at was the gamma symbol on his chest.

Giving him plenty of time to notice the man who had handed them out was sweating and stuttering at Frozone. “Hey, listen, you’re my biggest fan.”

Jack held back a snort as all Frozone could think to respond with was, “Good to see you.”

The man blushed as he caught himself, but Frozone had to catch up with the others. “I’m– I’m your biggest fan.”

Jack sauntered up to Frozone as the man muttered an embarrassed, “Shoot!” to himself. The radiation super nudged his elbow into Lucius’s arm. “Look at you ‘Zone, still make fans stumble over their words after 10 years.”

“Hey, when you’ve got it, you’ve got it,” Frozone informed him, nudging Jack back as they crossed through the glass double doors behind Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl.

Thank goodness there was an assistant?/concierge?/butler? waiting inside to lead them to this Deavor character, otherwise they would have been hopelessly asking for directions for a few hours. The four of them had gotten used to navigating the NSS headquarters in town, yet they would have struggled to find their way to the glass elevator that granted them a sparkling view of Municiburg, before plunging them into the sky above the clouds. The only part of the city left for them to gawk at were the few desperate spires of smaller skyscrapers glittering through the rain clouds settling on the city.

What exactly did Devtech make that let them build such an impressive headquarters??

When the elevator opened behind them, their only option forward was a hallway that brought the party to a pair of double doors. A short, squat butler of sorts was waiting just by the glass elevators, quickly bringing them down the corridors and escorted them into the next room.

Jack expected they would be brought into some sort of conference room, or at least be directed to one.

And they were.

Kind of.

It was definitely “some sort of” conference room. If a conference room was entirely made of marble and three stories high. A spire of stone the size of a small house sprang up through the middle of the room, a spiral of stairs wandering around it and the comparatively small fireplace in its base. The only thing that seemed to imply that this might be a meeting room was the lone, 10-seated table on the perimeter of the room that looked absolutely tiny in the large space.

Aaaaand, Jack had to give more credit to Deavor. The four supers spent their first few moments in the room practically gawking at the insanity of it, hardly even noticing the walls completely made of glass or the chandelier over the table. It was a rather amazing building, even from the inside. Helen actually had to spin around to try and catch every detail in the ceiling.

The pensive, awe-struck silence in the group was only halted when a new voice echoed down the stairs.

“I LOVE superheroes!”

Bob and Jack leapt into battle positions, baring their fists, and in Jack’s case, hopping into the air.

Just as a man in a tight, blue suit practically pranced down the stairwell, his toothy smile sparkling like his eyes as he got a good look at each of them. He sounded like a fanboy as he approached them, almost hopping off the stairs. “The powers, the costumes, the mythic struggles!”

Jack reluctantly settled back to the ground between Frozone and Elastigirl as the perky man approached them.

There’s no way this was–

“Winston Deavor. You can call me Win,” the man announced, opening his arms in a joking bow, before straightening and holding his arm to his chest. “Genuine pleasure to meet each of you.”

And that’s as long as he could contain his excitement.

Winston extended a hand to Lucius. “Frozone!”

Who quickly accepted. “It’s good to see you.”

“Gamma Jack!” Winston cheered next, offering his hand.

Jack kept his well-practiced grin on his face and took the hand, reflectively telling Deavor, “The pleasure is yours.”

Win’s smile grew as that got a quick laugh out of him before he turned to, “Elastigirl.”

“Nice to meet you,” Helen replied, the perfect example of measured politeness as she shook the CEO’s hand.

And then, the fanboy in Winston fully emerged again as his wide eyes landed on, “Mr. Incredible!”

He grabbed Bob’s hand with so much gusto the super actually flinched in surprise.

“Hello,” Bob automatically responded as he got his hand shaken. Hopefully not remembering the last encounter he’d had with one of his fans on a certain island adventure…

But that seemed to be the last thing on his mind as Winston started…singing? With a little shimmy dance on top of it? “Mr. Incredible, Incredible–”

“Incredible!” Bob suddenly joined in.

“Catching the bad guys!” they both sang.

Earning no small amount of snickering from Jack, Lucius, and Helen as they were all suddenly flooded with buried memories of their theme songs.

“Pow, pow pow!” The super and the fan punched the air as they sang the last line, laughing between each other.

And then Winston decided it was Frozone’s turn, spinning on his heels to face the ice hero. “Who’s the cat who’s always chill–?”

The NSA had thought this would be a great idea for posterity, you know, comic books, TV shows, theme songs.

Jack thought they were kind of stupid. They were cute enough, but, uh, the lyrics weren’t exactly inspired.

So he decided to get distracted in the hopes Winston’s apparent steel-trap memory for old superhero jingles would overlook him and do Elastigirl’s next.

Which meant he was the first one to notice that while Windston was singing, “When survival odds are close to nil?” that the doors opened again.

A woman a probably about Winston’s age stumbled into the marble meeting room, seemingly losing a wrestling match with herself as she dropped her cup of coffee and tossed her overstuffed bag and rolls of paper onto the poor, unassuming butler. Her coat got stuck on her shoulder as she tried to juggle it off her arm, so she gave up and threw her sunglasses off her face. They landed on the butler’s growing stack of junk as the woman finally got her coat off and bundled it around the few papers still in her hands and shoved them into the butler’s arms. She almost forgot she had a hat on until she was about to take a step forward.

Why didn’t Deavor start with this in his sales pitch??

Sure, she was a few years older than Jack, but he wasn’t exactly going to complain. Maybe her respect for butlers was only as much as her respect for a hat rack, but still, a spikey pixie cut, a symmetrical face, a reasonably fashionable sweater, and an awkward smile on her face as she struggled to fix her hair on her jog over to the group? Gamma Jack could easily work with that.

“Frozone, Frozone, Froooozooooone!” Lucius and Deavor finished, arms waving in the air while Helen full-on laughed and Bob remembered to add the song’s tagline. “Yeah!”

“Can’t tell you what a thrill this is,” Winston informed the assembled heroes, trying to compose himself.

Jack was very helpful with that and pointed right at the woman coming towards them. “Who’s the dame?”

All attention snapped to the flustered woman. Winston offered them a grin and grandly gestured at her. “And this–”

“Oh, hello there, superheroes…! I’m so sorry I’m late,” the woman apologetically chuckled, offering them a wave as she came to stand next to Winston.

“Is my tardy sister, Evelyn,” Winston finished, with an almost smug look on his face as he explained this to the supers.

“And I’m scolding myself,” Evelyn informed her brother, grabbing his arm and affectionately shaking it, “so you don’t have to, Winston!”

“Spectacular,” Win sarcastically informed her, using her grip on his arm to pull her into their little circle. “Now that we’re all here, let’s get down to business! I’m sure you’re all wondering why I called you here.”

“That did occur to us,” Bob confirmed. Jack appreciated that he kept his focus on Deavor, not ousting Jack as the one who was apprehensive about this.

“I’m glad you asked!” Winston announced, breaking away from the group as he talked before gesturing for them to follow him. “This is a pivotal moment in supers history. Just a year ago, you wouldn’t have been able to suggest that supers could be legal again, but after that robot fight, we’re finally seeing the push we wanted!”

“Who’s ‘we’?” Jack asked, having to tear his eyes away from Evelyn so he could keep up with the conversation.

“Well, all of us who were against the ban!” Win explained, finally slowing them all down as he approached the wall by the double doors.

On the white stone was a portrait nearly as tall as the floor-to-ceiling windows, towering over anyone looking at it like they were staring at a giant.

“Before everything happened, I was actually training to work with the NSA. I even got partially certified!” Deavor explained as he tucked his hands behind his back. “When the ban happened, they weren’t looking for new agents, but I’ve never stopped having an appreciation for the supers.”

Winston’s attention went up to the portrait, taking a few slow steps towards it like he was hoping to get its attention. The resemblance between Deavor and the man gazing across the city in the painting was nearly identical, only differing in suit color and the man in the portrait having a beard.

“My father was so proud that I was even remotely connected to you guys,” Winston began, a sort of reverence in his voice as he introduced them to the portrait. “He used to call you the last line of defense. He was your top supporter! He donated to superhero causes, he raised money for the Dynaguy statue in Avery Park– He got to know many Supers personally. Even installed a phone with direct lines to Gazerbeam and Fironic in case of emergencies!”

“Oh, I remember that,” Gamma Jack mused, not meaning for his words to be so thick in his throat. It snapped Winston out of his reverie, prompting the super to keep smiling so those memories around that name would come out. He diverted his attention to the other supers to see if they knew what he was talking about (and not notice how forced that grin was). “Those phones that you could get installed that went directly to a super’s house?”

“Yeah, I think I had a couple of those around town,” Bob agreed, nodding along with a faint memory. “Did either of you?”

“I might have had one or two,” Frozone agreed with a chuckle. “I think a couple of friends had one without realizing who Frozone was.”

“I…never let them give my number out,” Helen admitted. She’d never been one to try and get her personal life and her super life mixed up. Elastigirl was too well-known (*cough* and too much of a heartbreaker *cough*) to risk civvies deciding to call her just for a chat.

“But Gazerbeam was all about public reach-out programs like this,” Bob continued, prompting Jack to get very interested in wondering where that dame had gotten off to so he wouldn’t have to pay attention. And Mr. Incredible, admittedly, did seem to notice that and flipped the subject slightly. “But Fironic, he didn’t give a direct line to just anyone. Your father must have been quite the fan.”

“He loved that, showed it off to everyone.” Winston agreed, eyes glazing over a bit as he recalled, “He was heartbroken when you were all forced to go underground.”

“Father believed the world would become more dangerous without,” Evelyn’s voice trickled towards their group as she leaned against the conference table.

“He didn’t know how right he was… There was a break-in.” Winston’s expression slipped into something darker than Jack had thought possible for the two minutes they’d known him. The fireplace seemed to shrink as Deavor pulled up a memory he didn’t often share. “My father called Gazerbeam– The direct line. No answer… He called Fironic, no answer.”

“What?” Jack interrupted before he could stop himself, earning a glare from Bob that he ignored. “That’s not possible. Beamer wouldn’t just ignore a call on a direct line. He wouldn’t ignore a call if he heard it coming from a dark alley and he was in his civvie clothes!”

“Supers had just been made illegal,” Winston continued, offering a pained look to Jack before the man was dragged down into the conclusion of the story. “The robbers discovered him on the phone, and shot him.”

The room went silent for a moment, Mr. Incredible and Frozone’s expressions turning pinched as Helen’s shoulder dropped.

Jack turned his attention towards the floor, but his mind was racing.

Why wouldn’t Simon pick up the phone?

Sure, supers had just been made illegal, but he would have at least answered. Forget being a lawyer and upholding justice or whatever, Gazerbeam was horrible at ignoring a person who needed his help. That’s why after the ban Jack would have to make regular trips to Simon’s office just to make sure he was sleeping occasionally. Simon nearly– No, he did run himself into the ground after that ban, trying to help with relocations and easing the transition into civvie life for his fellow supers–

…That was why.

Simon wasn’t at home to receive the call.

He was practically living in his office during that first month, forgetting to take care of himself unless Jack was there to brow-beat him into drinking something other than coffee (usually unsuccessfully, but he’d converted him to decaf before his nerves became too shot).

And, admittedly, even if he was at home, Jack didn’t imagine there would be anything for Simon to do. He wasn’t faster than a speeding bullet, and neither was Fironic.

Winston’s wavering voice brought them out of their temporary mourning. “…So…”

“It must’ve been hard,” Elastigirl softly muttered, her words dripping with sympathy.

“Especially for Mother,” Evelyn chimed in front across the room, her reflection in the window showing her bowing her head. “She died a few months later. Heartbreak.”

Jack humorlessly snorted. “That’ll do it to the best of us…”

“If superheroes hadn’t been forced underground, it never would’ve happened,” Winston reminded her, his words biting against an enemy he’d probably never even seen.

“Or Dad would’ve taken mom to the safe room as soon as he knew there was trouble,” Evelyn flippantly suggested, head inclined to the floor as she seemingly tried to spell out her solution with her hand.

Winston spun around, face contorted into something harsh as he held his pointed fingers to the ceiling. “I disagree strongly!!”

It echoed against the ceiling for a split-second.

To be cut off by Winston composing himself and diffusing his tone into something closer to perky, “But, we’re not going into that right now.”

“No, wait a second,” Jack said, getting in on the hand-gesturing game and holding up his own to pause the conversation. “You had a safe room in your house?”

“Yep,” Evelyn confirmed, ignoring how her brother had gone wide-eyed at the super. “It was state-of-the-art, and never got used…”

“Was this one of those safe rooms that was built in a basement?” Jack checked, trying to recall when most of those safe rooms had been built. Usually for upper class clientele with connections to the NSA, those rooms were usually used as prison cells for supervillains who couldn’t be put into normal custody. And someone decided to sell them as supervillain-proof bunkers, which was a good idea.

Except…

“Yes?” Evelyn confirmed, her voice already wary of what the super was implying.

…usually they weren’t easily accessible during dangerous situations.

Jack slowly turned his gaze to the other three supers, hoping they would get what he was implying.

Helen’s expression shifted, and she looked away.

Bob and Lucius were totally lost.

“Jack, what are you talking about?” Frozone checked, trying to steer them back to the reason they were here.

Jack glanced at Evelyn, and decided that since he was probably not going to take whatever deal they were going to offer him anyway, figured it was fine to lose his chance. So, he explained, “Most of those safe rooms weren’t really designed with anyone thinking they would actually be used since, you know, there were constant super patrols that usually caught burglaries and whatnot. So, unless you guys could have magically teleported into the basement and locked yourself inside, it was a lose-lose situation.”

“A lose-lose situation?” Evelyn sputtered, eyes suddenly glaring daggers into Gamma Jack. “Going to the safe room would have at least given him a chance at surviving! How do you think we did? Mother brought the two of us down there until the police came and found–” She swallowed. “And found Father dead.”

“And you probably had time to get down there because the burglars got distracted by…” Jack bit his tongue as he realized what he was about to say.

They got distracted by your father being an idiot and calling for superheroes to help when neither of those supers could have gotten there within two seconds.

He quickly switched gears, already sensing Evelyn’s demeanor beginning to change to something sharp and heated while Winston was still frozen in place. “I’m just saying I agree with your brother. If supers weren’t banned, the NSA probably would have made a note that someone was using one of those phones to call for help and sent a patrol, or a patrol would have noticed the break-in on their own. Not to mention any supers going out would have been arrested!”

“So Father needed to die for us to get away safely??” Evelyn exclaimed, fingers almost tearing into the marble table. “Well, that worked out! Mother died anyway because of him not listening. The safe room would have given him a chance!”

Jack was struggling so, so hard to not snap at this woman before the Deavors had actually said anything devious. People die every day, doll, and I’m sorry your father got the unlucky hand that day, but collateral damage is expected and you’re probably alive because of him!

It was a horrible thing to say. Even if it was true.

“The point is,” Winston interrupted, yanking Jack and Evelyn out of a staring contest that had started to make the super’s eyes glow. The CEO was smiling again as he began to lead them towards the cylinder of marble in the middle of the room, “nobody expected us to be able to actually run Dad’s company.”

Frozone and Elastigirl gave Jack a, “why did you do that??” look as they followed, but at least Frozone had the courtesy to throw a pained smile over his glare.

Gamma Jack rolled his eyes at their backs and didn’t bother turning around to see Bob’s look of dismay as the small train walked along the curved windows.

Evelyn no doubt gave the super a deadly stare as Winston continued past her, “But, with Evelyn as designer, and myself as operator, we threw ourselves into building Devtech into what it is today!”

“A world-class telecommunications company,” Frozone finished for him, offering a genuine grin to the rest of the supers as Winston stepped towards a small alcove hidden under the marble landmark.

“Bigger than ever,” he proudly agreed, “Perfectly positioned to make some wrong things right! Hence, this meeting.”

The younger Deavor sibling ushered the four supers into the alcove, directing them onto a couch that was a little tight for all of them, but they made do.

Evelyn slipped into the room last, holding a finger to the switch on the wall that closed the sliding door behind them.

Jack felt his adrenaline spike as they were effectively closed in, half-expecting those goo cannons from the island to pop out of the walls.

But, Deavor kept on talking as if nothing was at all troubling about the situation, positioning himself in front of all of them like a teacher giving a lecture. “Let me ask you something: What is the main reason you were all forced underground?”

“Ignorance,” Mr. Incredible responded without hesitation, a small drop of venom seething with the statement.

“Perception,” Winston corrected, tapping a finger in the air between them as the lights went off and a projector appeared from the back of the wall.

Jack had to hold his legs against the couch to stop himself from flying into the air and launching a ray of gamma radiation at the door.

The projector flashed an image of the Underminer’s tank-drill poking into city hall like it was a dartboard, followed by the highway that had been turned into an Evel Knieval jumpramp, and the bank that had been pulled underground. “Take today for example, with the Underminer. Difficult situation. You were faced with a lot of hard decisions.”

Jack groaned, leaning his arms against the back of the sofa. “Ugh, seriously.”

“Oh, tell me about it,” Mr. Incredible commiserate, propping his elbow along the back of the couch as well.

“I can’t,” Winston told them, a grin on his face that made them all feel their stomachs drop when he explained, “because I didn’t see it. Neither did anyone else! So, when you fight bad guys like today, people don't see the fight or what led up to it. They see what politicians tell them to see.”

All four supers watched as a video of the news report from that afternoon panned from the drill stuck in city hall to the Incredibles being led away at gunpoint.

Jack and Frozone shuffled in their seats as they finally got to see what had happened while they were away.

They see destruction and they see you,” Winston concluded, holding his hand to the stilled image as his expression temporarily became almost as fed-up with the government as Evelyn’s had been fed-up with Jack. “So, if we wanna change people's perceptions about superheroes, we need you to share your perceptions with the world.”

…He did have a good argument. If this was a trick, it was a decent one.

“How do we do that?” Elastigirl asked, remembering she was also a skeptic in this situation.

“With cameras,” Evelyn explained, making all of the super’s look over their shoulders as she clicked a button on her controller.

Winston’s words repeated themselves as three recordings of him (and one recording of something smudgy and grey) appeared on the screen in front of them and Elastigirl’s voice followed.

“We need you to share your perceptions with the world.”

“How do we do that?”

Evelyn continued as the supers all realized that the angle of the footage was exactly where their badges were hanging from their necks. “We embed tiny cameras like those into your super suits.”

Three upside down faces replaced Winston’s on the screen as the supers looked into the pieces of glass. Gamma Jack was the only one to actually hold the badge so he was looking into it rightside up cuz he wasn’t about to look like an idiot in front of people he was still pretty sure were going to betray them.

Elastigirl on the screen perfectly matched the Elastigirl that spoke: “Wow, so small. And the picture is outstanding!”

“Thanks. Designed ‘em myself,” Evelyn nonchalantly informed her as she clicked the controller again.

The screen went black, but not before Jack caught Elastigirl nodding in admiration at the woman.

“We’ve got resources, lobbyists, worldwide connections, and, very important, insurance,” Winston announced, very proud of himself for being the one superhero fan that remembered how expensive the career was.

“Insurance is key,” Bob agreed. Surprisingly, without any flashbacks to the job Jack remembered him drowning in when they’d last spoken before the island (well, they had kind of fallen out of contact, meaning that had been two years ago, so maybe Bob had grown to have an appreciation for Insuricare).

“All we need now, are the super-est superheroes. It needs you four!” A collage of the four of them appeared on the screen as Winston proudly declared, “Come on! Let’s make all supers legal again!”

“This sounds great!” Bob decided, hopping to his feet and rubbing his gloves together. “Let’s get this going. What’s my first assignment?”

“That enthusiasm is golden, now hold onto it,” Winston chuckled, pulling Mr. Incredible back onto the sofa. “But for our first move, well…”

All eyes followed Winston as he settled in front of Helen.

The lights turned back on. “Elastigirl is our best play.”

Helen absolutely lit up, mouth popped open as she processed that she was somehow the best candidate for this crazy idea.

It looked like someone had just slapped Mr. Incredible in the face. “Better than…me…?”

Helen squared her features again and cleared her throat at her husband.

Jack picked himself up from the end of the sofa. “Incredible. Really?”

“I mean, she’s good! She– Uh– Really! A credit to her– But I–” Mr. Incredible instantly tried to say, breaking down into sputtering. “You know. You know.”

“Yeah, you’re Mr. Incredible, the Golden Boy of the NSA and America’s sweetheart,” Jack finished, flopping back onto the couch with an amused smirk. “We know.”

“With great respect,” Winston told him, redirecting the conversation, “let’s not test the whole ‘Insurance will pay for everything!’ idea on the first go ‘round. Okay?”

Frozone and Gamma Jack glanced at each other and chuckled, the former trying to hide his amusement behind his fist. Elastigirl had to pinch her eyes shut as she tried not to join them.

“Wait a minute,” Mr. Incredible interrupted, clearly offended. “You’re saying what? I’m messy?”

“Well, Evelyn did a cost-benefit analysis comparing all your last five years of crime-fighting before going underground,” Winston explained, picking up a manila folder and handing it over for Bob’s inspection. “And Elastigirl’s numbers are self-explanatory.”

Mr. Incredible flipped open the first page and began running his gloved fingers through the numbers, Helen leaning over to try and catch a glimpse before she and Frozone gave another impressed look to Evelyn. Jack was happy to keep trying to read the tiny pie charts and bar graphs Bob was flipping through.

“Well, it’s not a fair comparison,” Mr Incredible insisted, closing the folder. He was about to set it to the side before Jack made a grabbing motion for it. The big super hardly noticed as he handed the analysis to Gamma Jack, who immediately began flipping through it like a child would look at a toy catalogue. “Heavyweight problems need heavyweight solutions.”

“Uh-huh, I’m sure Win has a lot of problems that involve punching supervillains into the next state,” Jack informed him, though he was only half paying attention.

The cost-benefits analysis was just that, a cost-benefits analysis.

Pie charts comparing the four of them based on expenses after combat situations, graphs logging what sorts of private sector workers that were called in to assist with rebuilding, footnotes about any sort of extenuating circumstances around their battles. That included a very long note under Gamma Jack’s profile about the amount of times he had temporarily irradiated an area of interest and people had to wait a couple hours before they were able to start working.

There were just as many footnotes saying that he didn’t actually contaminate anything and that they could proceed immediately after battle! He was not a messy fighter, he knew when he could punch a villain in the face and when he had to set off a bomb around them!

And, there didn’t seem to be anything personal about the supers at all in the files. Not that Jack assumed the Deavors would be stupid enough to hand over an indication that they would know something sensitive, but Jack didn’t notice anything that could even hint that they knew their secret identities or their weaknesses.

The files were annoyingly, pain-stakingly clean, and all of the numbers matched what Winston had said: Elastigirl’s abilities usually meant the least amount of damage.

Sure, they probably didn’t want to send her out to fight an army, like they might have considered for the other three supers, but she was efficient, she was skilled, and she was more than capable of taking on most threats that came her way.

If that smirk on her face was anything to go off, she would have agreed with Jack’s assessment.

…So why did it sit wrong with Jack that they had picked her?

Sure, he would have loved the chance to be offered the opportunity, but he wasn’t stupid, he knew his reputation preceded him in both good and bad ways, and his powers usually led to some side effects that weren’t the easiest to clean up. He was too polarizing and too dangerous for a job as essentially an ambassador for superheroes. Probably rescuing kittens from trees and helping grandmas cross the street, or whatever.

What bothered him was kind of exactly that.

Elastigirl was popular, she was probably one of the most popular supers from the Glory Days.

But out of the four heroes in the room, she was also the weakest.

She was just as vulnerable as a normal human, she couldn’t make any kind of shield, she couldn’t escape danger quickly when need-be. Elastigirl was incredibly skilled, but if she was put into a situation like the Omnidroid, Jack didn’t care for her chances.

Gamma Jack had barely managed to survive the Omnidroid, and he had dropped a nuclear meltdown on its head!

So if the Deavor’s were plotting something like he assumed…she was the easiest target.

Evelyn’s presence behind the sofa suddenly felt stifling as Winston’s overly enthusiastic mouth kept talking.

The siblings were up to something.

But what?

“Of course! We’re gonna solve all kinds of problems together. After the perfect launch with Elastigirl!” Winston assured Mr. Incredible, grandly looking at Helen, who was struck with an awe-inspired expression.

“So?” Evelyn asked from the shadows behind them, tilting her head to see Elastigirl’s face. “What do you say?”

“What do I say?” Elastigirl chuckled with surprise, feeling the weight of everyone in the room looking at her bowed head. Then, her honored smile faded away, and her hands rested on her knees. “I…don’t know.”

Jack noticed Winston’s smile crack a little in disappointment as a long pause dragged through the room. “That’s fine! I totally understand, it’s a big decision! Why don’t we call it a night here, and you can think about it? I’ll give you my number, and we’ll sort this all out after you’ve slept on it. Sound good?”

“Um…” Elastigirl shook her shoulders, taking a moment to debate with herself before she relented, “Yeah, sure. Sounds like a plan to me.”

“Wonderful.” Winston clapped his hands together once as Evelyn opened the door to the alcove. “In that case, it was such an honor to meet all of you! And, hey, I’ll be keeping in touch, so if you ever have any questions or any thoughts about what we can do, please, don’t hesitate to reach out! My line is always open to any of you!”

“Yeah, it was great meeting you, Deavor,” Frozone told him, standing up first and shaking Winston’s hand again before filing out. “We’ll stay in touch.”

“We’ll definitely be staying in touch,” Mr. Incredible agreed, mirroring Frozone’s handshake as Helen got up to do the same.

When it was Jack’s turn, he made sure that trademark smirk stayed on his face as he shook Deavor’s hand again. “You know, you might have something going on here.”

“You think so?” Winston asked, catching himself from sounding too excited. “Because Evelyn and I certainly do.”

“I really do,” Jack told him, not sure whether he was lying or not. So, he distracted Winston by shaking the folder in his hand. “In fact, I might be able to do some number crunching of my own and see if we can boost the efficiency of this little project even more.”

“If you want to try looking those over, we’d be happy to let you take that copy,” Winston informed him, glancing over Gamma Jack’s shoulder to doublecheck with Evelyn. Jack assumed she shrugged her approval because Winston returned to smiling at him. “By the way, and, I hope you don’t mind my asking, but where did you get the new look?”

“Oh, this old thing?” Jack laughed, looking down at the repurposed mercenary uniform to stall for an idea. “It’s an old back-up suit I would use on rare occasions. ‘Zone mentioned you probably wanted the classics, but you caught me right in the middle of having it cleaned.”

“Well, I’m glad you still have it. That was a classic! Everyone knew the Gamma Jack look!” Winston exclaimed, not quite catching himself from fanboying again. “And I never knew you had two suits! Was this ever used for public missions?”

“I don’t think so,” Jack chuckled, so happy Winston was willing to believe him, “you two might be the first civilians to see me in it when I’m not next to a giant robot or hauling around the Underminer.”

“Wow. Then this really is an honor,” Winston decided, beaming from ear to ear. “I’d love to chat again if you’re ever free. Maybe if you’re able to figure out some of those numbers for us.”

“Well, now I can’t turn down the fans, can I?” Both of them laughed as Jack started to leave, folder in hand but kicking himself for not being able to find anything suspicious in Winston’s words. “Have a good night, Win, I’ll be in touch.”

Gamma Jack started to leave the alcove, making it halfway across the room before he realized he still had one more obstacle to get through that night.

Evelyn Deavor was busy spreading her paper scrolls across the table, mumbling to herself as she found a coffee stain splattered across a design for what looked like a gasmask contraption.

Smirk still in place, Jack sauntered up to her, trying to appear as non-threatening as possible.

Apparently he didn’t succeed, because the moment she saw him approaching, she rolled him her diagram and moved it to the side of the marble conference table. She crossed her arms as she looked up her nose at Jack.

“Look, doll, I wanted to apologize for earlier,” he started, letting some true remorse creep into his voice as he approached the opposite side of the table. “About your father? I was out of line. You didn’t deserve to have to hear any of that.”

“Oh, really?” she drawled, eyes narrowing ever so slightly as she tried to understand his expression. “Should I be flattered that the great Gamma Jack is apologizing?”

Jack pretended to wince, using the brief silence to sound even more apologetic. “This is about flattery or reputations, Evelyn. That’s fine for the cameras, but I want you to know I’m genuinely sorry.”

“Hmm.” She tipped her head against her shoulder, managing the most condescending look Jack had seen since Mirage when she helped him escape Syndrome. “Well, I guess you can think about that when you wonder why you’re not being selected as our candidate.”

A spark of green radiation tumbled out of Jack’s palm. But he kept his voice even as he assured her, “I recently lost someone very important to me. And I’m not going to compare one loss to the other, but I know I would have hated to hear everything I told you earlier. So, I’m sorry.”

Her expression stayed silent and cold, almost glowing with bitterness as he righted himself and replaced the sympathetic frown that had overtaken him for something more similar to his usual grin.

“I hope you have a good night. And I hope we can smooth this over. It looks like your brother is expecting a visit from me,” Jack informed the older Deavor sibling, offering her another apologetic look before he left through the double doors. He could sense her gaze burrowing into his shoulderblades until the heavy wood shut him from her sight.

The others and their butler guide were waiting by the elevator when he got there, and then in the limo ride back to the rendezvous point in the back alley in Metroville, they were all debating about the offer that had been given to them.

So Jack didn’t have a chance to feel that scowl creeping onto his face until he was back in the penthouse, that manila folder strewn across his coffee table as he rubbed a headache out of his temples.

There were too many pieces to this, and too many possibilities to try and understand.

But something was going on.

And he was going to figure it out.

He wasn’t going to allow the Deavors to take advantage of supers like Syndrome had.

Jack sighed at the ceiling and tossed his mask onto the table. Followed by that stupid trenchcoat he would need to return to Bob.

Then, he took out all of the files from the folder, ripping out staples as he pushed aside the stack of law books he was temporarily using as table decorations. “You feel like sleeping tonight Si?”

The amount of pages was enough that he had to set a couple on his lap and a couple on the floor by his boots.

He snorted to himself, getting up to set those boots by the door, then going upstairs to change into some pants and a shirt before settling onto his couch.

“Yeah, me neither.” Jack tugged on the chain that turned on the lamp next to that framed photo, and he began his investigation into Devtech, the Deavors, and their true intentions for his kind.

Chapter Text

“How late were you?”

That’s the first thing Jack saw when he woke up on that plane over New Urbem. The smoggy afternoon sunlight glared into his eyes like it was personally offended he didn’t want to look at the rusting scrap pile they called a city as it slowly rose up around the descending airliner.

Jack groaned into the fist propping his face against the armrest, slowly peeling it away as he reclined in the deep embrace of the airliner seat.

“Sir?” A woman in a tightly-sinched stewardess outfit appeared, the sunny smile on her face doing a pretty decent job at distracting her groggy passenger from the way her skirt hugged her legs.

Had he flirted with her since he got on the plane?

He must have. Jack was a frequent flier, but he didn’t exactly turn down the chance to chat up a stewardess when the opportunity presented itself.

The way her smile widened and her cheeks flushed as she noticed the attention swiftly confirmed that suspicion. “I didn’t want to disturb you, but we’ll be landing in just a couple minutes.”

“Oh, we are?” he mumbled, looking out the window as he stalled for a few seconds to wake up and plaster on his own smile. “Well, I’m sorry I slept through most of the flight. I hardly got to enjoy the company they keep around here…”

“Well, if you’ll be in town for the night…” A pink card with a hastily-scribbled hotel phone number appeared in her fingers as the brunette extended her arm across the empty seat between them. “Feel free to stop by and…enjoy the company.”

Jack took a long moment to trace his gaze around every swoop of her handwriting, his expression turned into something a little interested. “You know, maybe my appointment won’t be as long as I thought…”

“I like the sound of that,” the stewardess informed him. Her dark lashes fanned over her gorgeous, ice-like eyes as she waved her fingers and stepped away to take care of another passenger.

Jack shook his head as he chuckled quietly to himself, tucking the card into the breast pocket of his navy blue sportscoat.

He was sorry he was half-asleep when he’d gotten on the plane, he wanted to know just how he had gotten this kind of reaction from the dame!

The sun disappeared behind one of the skyscrapers groping for the clouds as the airliner began to straighten with the runway.

They were scheduled to arrive in New Urbem between 2:30-3:00pm, which meant Jack had to be at the train ceremony around 4:30pm, so the entire ceremony could be given the go-ahead before the 6:00pm start time.

And, according to his watch, it was–

“How late were you? -S”

That engraving around the watchface got a startled snort out of Jack.

He still had no idea how Simon had managed to find a watch that didn’t melt when Jack used his powers and still found a way to put an engraving on the side just to taunt the radiation super.

And it still worked just as well as any watch: 2:59pm.

Jack smirked like he was sitting next to the man asking. I’m actually a full hour and a half early, thanks for asking, Simon.

Si would have been very impressed. Then remind him that Jack meant to get there two hours early, but whatever, he’d be impressed Jack wasn’t getting into town an hour and a half late!

Jack did briefly stop by the hotel room that had been booked for him, mostly to put his travel bag somewhere, check his schedule for anything he’d missed, and flop onto the bed until he actually had to get going.

He enjoyed flying, sometimes more so when he wasn’t the one responsible for keeping himself in the air, but flying with his powers usually didn’t exhaust him as much.

Ignoring how he had barely been able to use his powers at all after his second fight in the Omnidroid.

And ignoring that he’d been up most of the past few nights trying to make heads or tails of the financial spreadsheets Winston Deavor had given him.

But there was hardly anything for Jack to investigate! He didn’t have access to the data that went into those sheets, and he certainly didn’t have a working relationship with the woman who had written them up.

So that left him scribbling and underlining things like he was a detective in those bad noir films Simon used to watch, half-tempted to go and buy a ball of twine to start connecting pages together like a crime scene.

There really wasn’t anything that useful in them other than what Winston had said: Elastigirl was the most cost-effective super out of the four of them, so she would probably be the best option to make a campaign to re-legalize superheroes.

It was exactly what he’d told them…

Maybe Jack was being paranoid.

It was…possible.

As painful as that was to admit…

He could be worrying over a genuine offer from a genuine guy (and his sister who never left her shadow-y corner).

That would have been great. Jack would be the first person to jump up and down for joy if there was actually someone who cared so much about superheroes that they would risk the chance of trying to get them legal again.

But while he waited to figure that out, he had to go to work.

New Urbem wasn’t a city he was particularly familiar with. Pretty much all he knew was it used to be one of the old steel cities, kind of like Civicton had been when he was a kid. But unlike Civicton, when the steel factories in New Urbem closed, the metropolis had effectively, and thoroughly, financially collapsed.

They had been trying and failing to make a comeback for a decade, but it seemed like they had gotten a mayor who finally understood the difference between “progress” and “regress,” so the city had been slowly and steadily building up its industry again. This train was supposed to be another great reveal of the city trying to rise from its own rusty ashes, which Jack could appreciate, but it didn’t make him less twitchy as he made his way towards uptown.

(And Hypershock had been from New Urbem, so that probably didn’t help Jack’s apprehension.)

On the few occasions the NSA had sent Gamma Jack to collaborate with other agency branches, it usually wasn’t something that required him taking a plane to get there. At most it would be just far enough that he could fly himself in a couple of hours.

Which, as powerful as Jack was, he wasn’t as fast as a jet. So, most of his work trips back in the Glory Days had been in the Metroville-Municiburg area.

Jack hadn’t really expected to be travelling more as a civvie than he had been as a superhero.

“Join the Radiation Control Bureau, see the world,” wasn’t their slogan, but apparently it was true when you get promoted to the chief inspector for the entire west coast.

Even if that required him to fly all the way up to New Urbem to take a look at their fancy nuclear-powered hover-train for posterity.

Sorry, the “Metrolev Train.”

Why did they call it that? It sounded just like “Metroville,” it was so confusing…

Anyway, when he got to the train, he didn’t really pause to look at its grand and sleek design, or to ooh and aah at how classy and modern they had made it with all the comforts of a high-end commuting experience, according to the mayor’s assistant showing him to the back engine.

“We won’t be using this one for the maiden voyage,” she explained, almost wringing her wrists onto the floor as she approached a handle that looked like it led into a closet. It popped open in her wrinkled hands, showing Jack an entire wall filled with blinking lights, gauges, and dials. “This is the access port to the back engine’s readouts.”

“I thought it operated under the same power source,” Jack mentioned, stepping around her to do a quick preliminary sweep before he’d have to get into anything technical.

Good news, it wasn’t going to blow up!

Okay, now things had to get technical…

“It does!” she exclaimed, watching as Jack began to scan each of those blinking dials like he was translating another language. “But we have two engines that operate off of it. That way if one is compromised, this back-up engine can work in its place.”

“Gotcha, I think that was in my notes for this,” Jack told her. He looked over his shoulder and asked, “And the other engine is on the other side of the train?”

“Precisely!” she informed him with a nod. “That will be the one we are using for the demonstration today, but, of course, safety first! We want both checked!”

“Of course,” Jack cheerfully parroted, trying to keep the old woman from dying from the stress of organizing all of this for the mayor. “I’ll do my check of both and then report to you?”

“Exactly,” she breathed, managing to relax for 0.1 seconds before grabbing his hand and shaking it. “Thank you so much for coming on such short notice, Chief Inspector Hart, we appreciate this.”

“It’s just part of the job,” Jack insisted, patting his hand over hers before letting her go. “I’ll probably want to take a while to make sure everything is in shape, so don’t worry if you don’t hear from me for a little, okay?”

“Alright,” the assistant sighed, like she was reassuring herself as she stepped away. “I should be just outside if you need anything!”

“I’ll come find you as soon as I’m done,” Jack promised, already turning back to the maze of bits and bobs that he didn’t actually need to make sure the nuclear engines were functioning properly. But it did look more official on a government form to check off a bunch of boxes instead of writing “my radiation senses say everything is good :)”

Unfortunately, it also meant Jack had to spend a whole half an hour on an engine that would otherwise take him five minutes, but, eh. He didn’t hate his job and it paid for a penthouse in Metroville, so he wasn’t going to complain too much.

Especially since there didn’t seem to be anything wrong with the hover-train, just as he suspected.

Nothing dangerous, nothing glitching, nothing to be concerned about.

That changed a little right when he was finishing with the front engine.

Just not for the reason Jack expected…

A female security guard in all black came in through the sliding metal doors and grabbed her partner by the elbow, hastily whispering something into his ear.

“What?” the other agent exclaimed before she could shush him.

Neither of them noticed Jack standing not ten feet behind them, pretending to be busy examining the computer embedded into the main console of the front engine.

“What sort of threat?” the man asked, his voice slightly lower.

“We’re not sure,” she hissed in response. Jack could see her eyes darting around in her reflection on the canopy. “Just keep alert, okay? When the driver takes his place, no one goes in or out of this room, okay?”

“Shouldn’t we have someone manning the secondary controls?” he asked, now also nervously glancing around the control hub.

The inspection behind them ground to a snail’s pace as the woman shook her head, “No, the mayor isn’t delaying this to get another driver to come in at the last minute. Just, ugh, I don’t know. Check in if you see anything suspicious. We already have a call put into the police and they’ll be keeping an eye out on our route.”

Jack took a step towards the security agents grimly mumbling to each other, a nonchalant air about him as he announced himself. “Hey, I’m so sorry to interrupt, but I just wanted to let you know everything in both engines seems clean and secure, so we’re all set to get going.”

Still, both of the guards jumped, quickly freezing serious expressions over their faces as the woman responded. “Inspector Hart, so sorry, we were in the middle of a routine patrol check.”

“I didn’t mean to intrude,” Jack apologized, making sure to keep his words sounding calm and unbothered. “Should I find someone else we’re all set to shove off?”

“The mayor’s assistant is taking care of all of those details,” the woman informed him. Which Jack already knew, but he had some questions before he gave his final verdict that would okay this train to get going.

“Right. Thanks, I’ll find her real quick,” he informed them, stepping around the two darkly-clad guards. “It’s kind of exciting to see this sort of thing in New Urbem, isn’t it?”

“Yep. Sure is, sir,” the male guard agreed, his voice wavering so much Jack wondered if he was about to faint.

Okay, there was an actual problem going on and they weren’t letting anyone know about it.

Which was probably decent information for the super on the train to know about.

Still, Jack kept his demeanor at ease, until he reached the far end of the first passenger cart and looked back at the guards, fake remorse in his voice as he told them, “I don’t think you wanted me to hear that, but you were talking about a threat…?”

“Oh, no, no nothing to worry about, Inspector,” the female security agent assured him, practically waving away any of the words that were about to come out of the other guard’s mouth. “These sorts of empty threats happen all the time at this kind of event. They’re never anything to be concerned about.”

“You’re sure?” Jack asked, a more sincere worry slipping into his words. “Because if there is some kind of threat, I don’t want to okay a nuclear-powered engine for take-off, that’s just a recipe for–”

“It’s fine, sir,” the female agent insisted. “We need the ceremony to go on.”

A little more of the act dropped away as Jack gave her a “seriously??” look. “You’re absolutely sure?”

“It will be fine,” she insisted again, her teeth now snapped together in a pained smile. “The police have been informed and we’ve been given the all-clear to proceed.”

“...Well, if you’re sure, then I am as well,” Jack cheerfully lied, tipping his fingers to the guards as he stepped into the next car. “Enjoy the trip!”

There was something seriously wrong.

After sharing with the mayor’s assistant that, yes, the engines all looked fine, he was ushered to the side to politely smile and clap with the rest of the trained seals, er, *ahem* generous benefactors and esteemed personnel. They all got to watch the mayor’s speech to the assembled crowd and news reporters.

Jack hoped he was applauding at the right moments, all of his attention was on the security agents now bustling around the nose of the train, giving thumbs ups through the canopy to the driver who had just sat down at the computerized controls.

“Mayors often brag about their cities,” said mayor chuckled, standing just to the side of the big red ribbon in front of the train doors, “and I’m no exception. And I’m willing to admit that New Urbem is not the only city…”

The super had to stop the green flickers in his eyes as he scanned the assembled crowd, trying to spot anyone who might conveniently be wearing a shirt that said, “I’m an evil bad guy and I’m about to kill everyone here!” Or at least the glimpse of a gun or a bomb or something that would warrant that much distrust from the guards bobbing through the assembled citizens.

At least there were allegedly going to be police officers watching their path forward through the city. Not that they’d be able to do anything, but Jack pretended they would so he wouldn’t start to make people around him nervous.

The mayor’s voice droned, “...on budget and ahead of schedule to launch our magnificent new hover-train.”

That’s when someone caught Jack’s attention.

On the road above the crowd, parked on the sidewalk like it had every right to be there, was a bright red motorcycle.

And on that motorcycle was…someone without a bike helmet and in a jump suit?

“It can get you where you need to go at ridiculous speeds,” the mayor prattled on before he was handed a huge pair of scissors. “The future is open for business!”

The tagline was so cheesy Jack actually got invested in the mayor’s speech, just as the ribbon was cut.

A swarm of reporters seemed to launch themselves at the train, snapping pictures and shouting questions for the mayor.

Jack wanted to curse them for blocking his view of the motorcycle. But this was pretty obviously a moment to smile and clap, so he played the part of the clueless civvie for another few seconds as everyone assembled in front of the hover-train was shown inside for the maiden voyage.

The agitated super might have been a little too quick to sit down, trying to get another glimpse at the motorcyclist that was rubbing him the wrong way before the train shot off down the tracks.

He was so distracted, he didn’t even notice the cute blonde in a tweed dress he’d sat next to. “It sure is exciting isn’t it?”

Jack’s attention snapped away from the window and right onto the young woman looking at him.

…Well, okay, it was probably just a curious motorcyclist wondering what all the fuss was about and had pulled over to take a look.

There, mystery solved, now Jack had the chance to smile back and agree. “Yes, it is. You know, this is the first hover-train of its kind on the west coast.”

“I did know that, actually,” she confirmed, a clever twinkle in her eye as she informed Jack, “I’m one of the consulting material engineers from New York.”

“You are?” Jack asked, actually surprised as he let out a low whistle. “What did an intelligent, beautiful young lady like you do to be assigned to a job in New Urbem of all places?”

“I could ask a similar question,” she teased back, almost making Jack miss when the doors to the train closed. “What’s a guy like you doing in a rusting up city like this?”

Jack sighed, dramatically leaning back into the surprisingly comfortable chair. “Nothing nearly as interesting as you, I’m sure.”

“What, are you one of the benefactors?” she chided him, still grinning as she noticed the price tag that probably came with him. “You don’t seem like you’re quite as boring as all the other stuffed shirts they got to put money into this project.”

“Maybe. Or maybe I’m a secret agent sent to protect the train from a supervillain. Who knows?” he told her, earning a pleased giggle from the woman.

“Okay, well, at least you’re funnier than those crusty old men,” she decided, letting her crossed arms fall into her lap.

“You think that’s funny?” Jack asked, shaking his head. “I didn’t realize the bar had been set so low by everyone else.”

“Oh, you have no idea,” she agreed, sending long looks at the other chatting members of the boarded party, all chipper and nestled in their seats. “But, really, what’s your role here?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” he teased her back, enjoying how easy it was to please the engineer.

Jack had intended to answer her.

He really did.

But right then, he noticed a slight change in the air. Like the train had sucked in a breath.

He felt the radiation in the engines flicker a moment before the lights blinked off.

And the hover-train fell against the tracks.

Everyone inside choked out a shout of surprise as the muffled band outside abruptly cut off.

Gasps from the onlookers slipped into the train as the engine turned on again, pushing the train back into the air.

And they were back on track!

The train smoothly drifted through the air, picking up speed as they went through the station until the city outside started to blur.

There were still a few muffled gasps and sighs of relief, but they all disappeared as Jack heard one sentence that put him on high alert.

The mayor of New Urbem was clutching the armrests of his chair, eye wide behind his glasses as he hissed at his assistant. “It’s going the wrong way…!”

Welp, found the threat to the train.

Jack sprung to his feet, startling the woman next to him as he started to make his way towards the back door. She exclaimed, “Wait, are you actually a–??”

“Well, I couldn’t tell you if I was,” Jack joked back, a grin still on his face as his sixth sense was ripping through the radiation in the train’s engine, trying to find any sign of trouble obvious at a first glance. “Don’t go anywhere, okay?”

The woman offered him an uneasy but somewhat assured smile as Jack walked through the train car that was slowly being filled with civvies demanding answers from each other, a few even shouting at the mayor or the engineers for an explanation.

Jack ignored the few cries that demanded to know where he was going as he passed through the next car. His hand instinctively grabbed for the overhead bars as they tore down the straightaway, picking up the pace until he almost had to run with the train to keep up with the floor trying to escape beneath him.

Everyone else in the cars were murmuring in panic, watching the city blend together into a smear of grey as Jack pushed through a handful of people trying to get to the front of the cars to figure out what was going on.

A few snippets of, “we have 25 mies of track, what can we do to stop this?,” and, “we need to secure the passengers” echoed through Jack’s ears as he made his way into the last car, the only one left before the secondary engine in the tail of the hover-train.

When the automatic doors failed in their very name and didn’t automatically open for him, he smacked he butt of his hand against the release switch on the wall, but the metal panels stayed in place.

Locked shut.

Jack felt his teeth clench together as he glanced for any occupants in the back car.

No reporters or normal passengers had bothered making their way so deep into the train cars, and apparently no one thought to try and have someone on board go look at the backup engine.

So, after one more scan of the ceiling for anything that even looked similar to a security camera, Jack narrowed his attention on the door.

His nails dug into the seam of the door, metal biting into the nailbeds as he tried to concentrate on making the thinnest gamma blast possible.

A sheet of green jumped from his fingers, slicing through the lock keeping the doors in place.

The double doors snapped open, forcing Jack to pull his other hand out of the way before his fingers were pinched in the seam between the sliding doors and the wall.

The train tracks rattled by in a blur, hardly distinguishable as a gust of wind barreled into him.

Jack bit back a curse about what this was going to do to his sportscoat, before biting the bullet and leaping to the backdoor of the engine car.

He smacked into the glass sliding doors, catching himself on the ring of stabilizing handles on its perimeter.

Apparently his blast from a few seconds before hadn’t been as controlled as he thought, because the lock between them was also disintegrated into rust. Even as the wind continued to claw at his back, he managed to toss aside one of the double doors, forcing both of them open so he could yank himself inside.

An eerie silence overtook him as the wind disappeared behind the doors, cutting him off from the rest of the hover-train and its occupants.

Which is exactly what he needed.

Jack immediately clicked open the compartment to the engine readouts, even though his powers told him that radiation levels were normal, the engine was behaving exactly as it should.

No technical malfunctions, no computer glitches, no chances of a nuclear accident. Everything was running as expected for speeding backwards at over 100 miles per hour.

All great news, except Jack had no idea what was going on!

He was going to have to slow it down manually, probably by leeching the nuclear energy into his own systems. Which might make him glow green a bit if anyone found him before he could release it somewhere, but hey, still better than careening off the edge of the track when they ran out in 25 miles.

So, he walked to the engineer’s seat and spun the chair to the side to sit down.

And noticed something…strange.

Very, very strange.

The main computer monitor on the console, the one that you used to access the steering and navigation controls, wasn’t displaying the normal digital layout and readings he’d seen on it just half an hour ago.

It wasn’t displaying anything.

In place of the controls the engineer would use to control the hover-train from this console was a swirling, sickening loop of white and black square

and white and black and circle and black

and white and squa

re and̸̫̭͕͡ ̷̬̠̎ͅc̸̡͇̀̒irclḙ̴̟̰̊ ̴͕̦̑̀͐a̶͖̞̪̐̿n̶̼̅͂d̴̪̪̫̋̈ ̵̼͔̀b̸͚̩̽

ļ̸͠ã̷̛̲̅c̶̛̯k̴̦̰̹̽̕ ̴̺̿̍̊w̸̹̔h̴͕͊i̷̯͗̽͜t̶̠̒͌e̵̠̯͑͘ ̸͚̈́̋̆ͅc̸̲̘͖̍i̷͖͎̇̇ṟ̴̛̗̤̅

c̸͇̐l̵͎̮̐͘e̵̪̣̅̓.̷̡͎͌.̶̨͎͌̕.̸̢̤͋ͅ

There’s a woman’s voice. It’s familiar, but not important. “This thing's really moving. 100 and climbing.” “

S̷̡̬̼͒̀͐ḽ̴̻̒̀͡o̴̲̬̓͒͜w̴̨̟̓̓̐ ̶̝͂͝d̶̀̕ͅo̵̼̺͠w̶͓̬͆n̷̜̾͂.̷͖̓ ̴̞̳̉L̴̼̦̐ē̸̼͕͈̍t̵̓̚ͅ ̶̻́h̴̤̖͓̍̿̏e̴̹͊͝͝r̵͔͆͑̔ ̶̣͑̿̕c̸̟͙̻̈́â̵̡͚͂͘t̶̖͉̚c̵̘̭͝ḧ̶̭͉̤ ̵̧̪̑͘ủ̷̖͖͌͂p̷̪̗̾̕.̵̨͈͙̌

The train responds as its nuclear power core drains slightly and the engineer taps the breaks, slowing down just enough that when it goes around that sharp turn, you stay where you are.

“How much track is built?”

Her voice. “About 25 miles.”

K̵͓̇́ȅ̵̲̱̓̉ͅê̷̞͎͆̿p̵̝͕̪͐ ̴̢̾t̸͎͔͂́̄h̴̢̞̓̈́̊i̵͔̯̺͋s̴͈̈́̍͠ ̶̥͓̊p̵̣̤̽͠ā̵̞̗̮̏̀c̴̭̱͆̈́e̸͎̎̎̈͟.̴͈̓

You keep this pace.

“No one can shut this thing down?”

F̷̨̛a̷̡̞̽̈́̚s̸̲̪͛͐ẗ̸͉́̊ē̸̝̠r̸̙̎ͅ,̶̼̝̈̔̚ ̶̲͐̈͘p̴̯͑ô̴̥̤͎͡l̴̪̗̐̋i̴͔̫͕̇̄ċ̷̰͙̰̏͗ẽ̸̥̆ ̵̟̼̹̃̆͡į̷͔̫̀̓̉n̴̤͗͛̀-̵̨̺̾̇b̸̖̻̆͆̚o̸̲̒̏̽ų̶͍͋̈n̴̡͍̄̄d̷̩͝.̵͓͕̎̍̈́

You go faster, there are police in bounc.

“Overrides?!”

Her voice. “They’re locked out of the system.”

N̶͓̯̓͑ē̷̗̠v̴̯̳̦̈͝e̷̲̯̅͟r̷̼̔m̶͍̽͂͑i̴͇̺͛n̶̝̫̈́d̵̛̝͛̚,̶̘̣̅͠ ̴̗͖̻̽̊t̵̡͚̋ḧ̴̺́́ě̷̡̛̬͖̐y̴̙̕ ̶̛͓͆͆g̸̘̥̈́̕ọ̵̓̓͘ṫ̵̨̤͟͝͠ ̸͖̀̋s̸͓͔̋̔͝t̶̳̟̆o̵̖̮̓̃p̵̘̕͟p̷͚̚e̸͙̜͂͌d̴̩̯̚͟.̷̆ͅ S̸̟̎̾̈́l̷͙̄͝ȍ̴̠̒̚͜ẅ̸̻̲̿ ̴̧̰̰̎d̸̦̥̍̕͝o̴̓̿͝ͅẃ̸̪̫͜n̸̙̗̉

You slow down.

The police got stopped and Elastigirl needs to be able to catch up.

“What about a fail-safe?!”

Her voice. “Not enough time!”

“Someone’s calling. Switching over!”

A different voice. A child’s. Unimportant. “Hey, Mom. I can't find my high-tops and Dad can't find them either. But he won't call you and ask, so I am.”

You are confused because she is confused.

Then another voice. You are not going to like this one. “Do NOT call your mother!”

“Dash, honey. Can't talk right now, but look under your bed, okay?” It is the original, unimportant woman again. “How much time?!”

Her voice. “Less than two minutes! There's a shortcut. Cut through the culvert up ahead!”

L̷͖̙͊̈e̴̝̓̀͛t̶̺͎̟̃͗̓ ̴̦͘h̶̟͎̉͊͜ě̸͖r̷̳̠̔ ̸̦̖͔̿̾c̶̱͚͑à̴̭̘̬͋̕ṯ̸̦͉́͌c̶͈̣̤̎͆h̷͈͉̱͆ ̵̙͍͗y̵̥̮̐̓́o̷̭̰̗̿̕ụ̵̟̤̿

You are going to let Elastigirl catch you.

…

…

…

*THUMP*

Should you attend to that?

S̸̯̥͈̔h̵̩͐͟ẽ̸͇͎̂ş̴̘̿ ̷̛͈̣̊͘o̴̘̩̳͐̌n̵̨͈̰͌͆ ̷̞̦̮͐t̷̟̀̅h̷̦͑̓e̴̺̙̾̌͝ ̶̺̯̹̓̇͝r̴̝̎o̷̙̤̮͠o̵̞͔̚f̷̟̾!

Good. She has almost accomplished her mission.

*BOOOOOOOM!*

S̵̖͇̪̃̓̃h̶̳̒ȇ̵̟̣̄̿͜ ̷̲̜̘̆̊d̷̜̞͖̏i̷̧͎̒̀t̵͚̂͌̈́ć̷̡̺̩̌h̴̲̓́e̴̩͉͔̋d̸͉̪͓̈́̒ ̶̙̬̌͗͘t̶̞͔̽h̷͔̘̉̽̎ë̴̜̝́̎́ ̴̟̝̉b̴̢̒̈́̔ͅi̵̙̓̂́k̵͔͛̉e̷̮̾͌͑ į̷̜̂ͅg̵̼̘͇̊n̶̼͈̒ò̷̬͕̀̄r̷̠̤̀̈͑ẹ̸͍͘

You ignore the explosion over your head.

S̴̢͉͋̀͟l̴̮͆̈͝ö̶̧̰̰́̀w̵̖̾͊͟ ̵̧͉̥͗d̸̘̄́͠ọ̶̅̀w̵̝̝̌̈́ͅn̷̬̱͓͗̿̔!̷̨̓̅

You slow down.

S̷̺̣͗̓h̴̠̝͍̀è̶̡̫͛'̴̮̤͖̓͑s̴͓͝ ̷̫͓͘g̴̩̙͍͌o̷͉͆i̴̛̝̭̋̇n̵̨̛̒́g̵̡͓͋ ̶̻̑͆͝t̶͍̚ơ̴̫̪ ̶̱̤̇̈́͒r̶͎̞̪̅̍͠e̴̡͕̚l̶̜̞̞̂̄e̶̲͒̇͟a̸͚̬̖͑̂̀s̶͎͋̾e̵̻͑̆ ̴̥̭́t̷̪͒̑͠h̶̺̾̓͠e̷̬̟͝ ̴͙̊͘m̷͓̠̍͛̾ȃ̵͓̲ǐ̶̟̥̚n̵̢̼̰͊͒ ̸͉̣̂͘ē̸͉̬̾͌ñ̵͈̘̲͗ģ̶̒ĩ̵̡̬͜n̴̩͖̼͆͑̏e̴̯̜͑!̷̥̣̔̈́̕

Elastigirl is going to release the main engine and attempt to stop you.

I̶̹͙̫̓͡n̸̨̚ ̷͉̀3̵̨͚͛.̵̯͙͠.̴̮̀͐.̷̙̩̯̇̆

2̶̼̤̍̅͜.̶̘̗̓̈́͂͟.̶̡̜͍͆͗̾.̶̳̰͋

1̶̝̊̾.̸͎̠͐.̴̳̤͒͑̒.̶̬͋͘!

The hover-train jolts underneath you as the engine is removed. You feel Elastigirl trying to stop the train.

It is working.

S̶͖͎̘͒l̵͉̇͆̆i̸̠̫̭͂g̸͙͙̤͊͝ḧ̴̼̰̩́̐̃t̵̻͑͠ ̷̛̏͜͝b̵̻̹̭̋̆̾r̴̼̔̓̎e̶̹͓͉̎̾̅ạ̶̰̓̓̆k̴̰̭̩̂͑̂

You slightly pull the breaks. The main engine sparks against the hover-train’s tracks while the nuclear engine dulls in the rest of the train.

S̵̅̎̑͜t̵͍̠̔a̷̛̯̐̕ỹ̷͎̜ ̷̡̽͛s̴̟̝̹͌̀̑t̶̤̫́ĩ̶̘̾̕ͅḷ̴̮̪͘l̶̮̖͑

You stay perfectly still as the train is barrelling towards the station.

The train jolts as Elastigirl makes a parachute to slow the train down.

It is working well.

The train slows to a stop.

Ļ̸̛͚̅͠ͅe̶̦͑̍t̵͍̗͚́͋̕ ̸͕̞̄̊̉t̴͕̫͋͋͊ḥ̵̍̾ě̸̜̭̂͡ ̶̫̫͑̓̓ę̷͓̓ͅn̵̙̓g̵͚͍̓ī̶̬̭n̷̢̗̊̋e̷̩̐ ̴̛̩͉͜ḧ̴̭i̶̳̝̲̾̑̾t̵̙̟̓̃ ̶̩̠͋̕͟t̶͍̀̄ȟ̶̖̳e̵̡̩͙͛̀͝ ̵̢̼̒̓͗t̷̢̛̊͐r̸̩͘͟ä̵͉͝ȉ̸̬n̸͓͈̟̓̐.̶̧̇͊̏

Maybe it will hurt someone.

Maybe it will show that superheroes are not so safe and powerful.

You want that.

The main engine barrels into the train, trying to knock the tipping back engine over the edge.

*CRASH*

Pain smashed into Jack’s chest as he was hurled into the control console, the wind getting knocked out of his lungs as he fell out of the engineer’s chair and onto the floor.

His breath came out in small wheezes as he grabbed the edge of the metal dashboard, momentary panic lacing through him as he realized the backup engine was now dangling precariously over the edge of the train tracks, nose pointed into the construction site below.

How–?

Where–?

Huh?!

Jack shoved himself onto his feet, using the back of the chair to yank himself into a standing position with the angle of the floor.

When he swivelled his head towards the door, the engine readout panel was still exposed.

But then how did he magically appear at the control console?!

Over a pit?!

And, most importantly, why was he glowing?!

His hands were visibly green as he inspected himself for any sort of damage.

For most people maybe that was the concerning part, but he glowed when he was using his powers to any great degree, or when he absorbed environmental radiation.

And, considering the train car was still in one piece around him, Jack assumed that meant he had gone through with his plan and…absorbed the radiation…from the engine…?

While magically appearing by the console…?

Jack shook his head as he let the stored power make its way back into the engine, hoping maybe that would clear his head, but nope!

He just didn’t remember the past three minutes!

“...What?! Just! Happened?!”

*beepa beepa beep*

Jack froze, slowly spinning himself towards the console.

In the middle of the computer screen was a message, typed out in real-time as he watched, he wasn’t the intended recipient but he happened to it anyway:

“Welcome back, Elastigirl.”

“-The Screenslaver”

Jack felt his mouth bobbing open and closed as he tried to understand what he was seeing.

The train was hacked because someone wanted to send a message knowing Helen would be here?

Jack supposed that made sense, she was in-town and probably searching for–

…He knew Elastigirl was here.

But how could he?

She was chasing the train.

…How did he know that???

The door flew open behind Jack, nearly making him disintegrate the unlucky paramedics that were rushing into the room.

“Are you alright?!” one of them bellowed, instantly running up to his clearly unsteady figure and looping Jack’s arm around the paramedic’s shoulder.

“I’m fine, but–” Jack glanced at the computer monitor.

It was blank.

“...But I think I might have hit my head during the crash?” Even though he could sense a bruise starting to creep along his chest where he had smacked into the dashboard.

“Not to worry, sir,” he assured the disgruntled passenger, “we’ll get you out of here and take a look at you.”

“It’s a good thing Elastigirl arrived when she did,” the other paramedic mentioned as he held open the broken doors for them.

“Elastigirl?” Jack mumbled, not even realizing he’d said it until the paramedic holding him up gave him a sympathetic look.

“Yep. Who’da thought a superhero would be the one to save the day, huh?” He chuckled, going on about how they had an area set aside at this station to look at people who might have gotten banged up in the crash.

“Yeah…” Jack thought he said, not really paying attention. “Good ol’ Elastigirl. Releasing the main engine and slowing down the train…?”

********

Helen sighed into the phone as she settled against the hotel bed, hardly feeling the ache in her shoulders anymore. “I love you, honey. I’ll be back soon. Sweet dreams.”

Bob’s voice carried through from the other side, so obviously exhausted but hoping she wouldn’t realize. He really was adorable. “Sweet dreams, honey…”

She heard her husband put down the phone, so she reluctantly set her own on the receiver by the bed.

Then proceeded to squeal like an excited school girl, somehow managing to further flop into the fluffy robe and the quilted blankets and the memory of that feeling!

That feeling of being a hero again!

Helen hadn’t felt that in, wow, 15 years? Already?

It was actually rather unfortunate she was feeling it now. Bob had struggled to grapple with that not long after the ban had been fully put into place, relying on her to be the steady, even head when it came to the topic. Of course, he had it harder than Helen did, Bob had the innate ability to sense danger around him. So, he was always aware when there was a chance for him to step in and be a hero.

Not really a good thing to have when you’re banned from doing exactly that…

Heh. How had Helen become the one selected for this mission?

Elastigirl was well and truly retired, locked away in a box of memories with all of the other memorabilia of the Glory Days.

…But, come on, she had just saved a runaway train! On his first day back! Ahhh, she could celebrate one night, right?!

*knock knock knock*

Her head shot up from the pillow, her brow pinching as the sound of someone knocking on her hotel door faded.

The excitement that had been glowing from Helen’s smile was quickly replaced by a tentative, furrowed frown as she slunk out of the bed, quietly making her way towards the door.

When Helen looked through the peephole into the hallway, she wasn’t sure who she was expecting to see. Maybe Evelyn or Winston, even though they’d already said their goodnights and would have been in their rooms hours ago.

But she would have expected to see Bob before she would guess Jack Hart was waiting outside her door.

She didn’t even get a word in between opening the door and Jack declaring: “Helen. We need to talk.”

“Jack, what are you doing here?” she asked, a bit too startled by his arrival and a bit too high on her earlier train ride to say ‘hi.’

The younger super barely noticed he hadn’t gotten an invitation before he was walking into her room. “I flew.”

Jack saw Helen stop in the corner of his eye, hand still glued to the door. “You flew? The whole way?”

“On a plane,” he quickly amended as he tossed his shoes off by her new, shiny black boots.

When did she get those?

Didn’t matter, Jack had enough mysteries going on to add “she got a new outfit” to his list!

Jack thought he heard Helen wander through half a dozen different questions before she finally settled on, “Why are you in New Urbem at all?”

“Work trip!” he easily responded as he made his way to the hotel’s kitchen table, setting down a plastic takeout bag and the manila folder from the Deavors meeting a few days prior before turning to look at Helen. “The other side of that question is: what are you doing here?”

“I–? New Urbem has one of the worst crime rates in the country, so Winston and Evelyn decided this would be the place to make our first move,” she explained while Jack practically ripped off his bomber jacket. Somehow her explanation just made that wild look in Jack’s eyes border on crazed.

“Well that’s convenient isn’t it??” Jack exclaimed, throwing his arms into the air, one still stuck up the sleeve of his jacket before he snarled at it and threw it onto the table, knocking the folder into the decorative fake flowers.

Jack knew Helen though he was making a fool out of himself when she mushed her fingers into her eyes and smeared away the first trace of drowsiness that had begun to creep in. She’d figured out this was gonna be a long talk. “Okay. You need to explain what’s going on. ”

“Screenslaver wasn’t trying to kill anyone, and they weren’t trying to crash the train,” Jack instantly started explaining, hardly waiting for Helen’s permission. “This was a direct attack against a very public demonstration, but because of that message that was on the screen, it shows that whoever orchestrated this knew that the train would still be in enough pieces that the computer would work and you could read their message!”

He felt his feet starting to pace underneath him while his mind raced after him, Helen watching in worry somewhere in the background. “At that, it specifically knew you would read it. So, this Screenslaver person knew you would be able to stop the train, and the train would be relatively fine. Also, I didn’t know if the Deavors got you dinner so I found one of those bad Chinese food places you like. Please say thank you, I nearly hurled when I smelled all the grease dumped on that stuff. And all of this means that Screenslaver is someone who, A) knew you would be in town! Which no one should know because you’re not supposed to be active at all!”

He motioned to the TV in the bedroom, showing off images of the train surrounded by flashing police lights that were occasionally interrupted by Elastigirl with microphones shoved down her throat.

It flashed to footage from her suit-cam where she had run into the main engine room. “B) knew enough about how that hover-train worked to hack it and put a pre-recorded message into the computer. And who are the two tech-savvy individuals who went out of their way to bring you to New Urbem on the day this train was being tested?!”

Helen looked genuinely concerned about Jack’s blood pressure as he scooped up the manila folder and waved it through the air like he was practicing using it to smack Screenslaver in the face.

“I present to you C),” he announced, the poor papers in the folder probably having gotten motion sickness, “the Deavors are the only people who could have coordinated this!”

…Okay, to be fair. Jack was a little heated.

So he probably should have expected the absolutely gaping expression Elastigirl gave him as he finished his uncontrolled rant.

“Jack, what are you–? Wait, we need to start over,” Helen decided, flicking her hand at him to bring his attention to the fact that he was now floating more than a foot off the ground and the green glow around him was drowning out the couple lights she’d kept on.

He crossed his arms over his bruised sternum and reluctantly set his socks back onto the carpeted floor. “Which part of that wasn’t clear?”

Elastigirl slinked over to the table, at least inspecting the takeout, even if it was 10:00 at night and the delivery boy was a high-strung nuclear reactor. Jack had to admire just how calm she was being about the whole thing. “Well, let’s just take a step back. How do you know about Screenslaver?”

The green glow around Jack’s eyes dissipated as he tossed the folder back on the table. “I was in the back engine when…something happened. I blacked out for a minute or something, and when I woke up, ‘Welcome back Elastigirl. -The Screenslaver’ was on the console.”

The rustling of the Chinese takeout bag stopped as Helen looked up at the super. “You were on the train? Don’t tell me you changed careers and became a full-time ‘generous benefactor.’”

“It was a nuclear-powered engine,” Jack slowly explained, setting his hand against a kitchen chair as he joked, “you know, the thing I have a little expertise on?”

“I keep forgetting your superpowers include ‘innate knowledge of nuclear physics,’” she chuckled, motioning for Jack to sit down with her. Probably so Jack would have to take a couple extra steps to start floating again, but he’d also just flown across the city to meet her so he wasn't going to complain.

“Nah, I got the government to pay for that shiny diploma in my office,” Jack proudly reminded her. His two second break while his mind was racing down those train tracks and right off the rails. “I was called in to take a look at things before they shoved off.”

“And I assume that means you noticed the train starting to pull out of the station backwards,” Helen finished, pulling the bag down to reveal a few plastic tupperware cases dripping with mystery sauces.

Which Jack was trying, so, so hard not to wrinkle his nose at. “Yeah, well, I was a little busy so it took me a second… But I knew there was only one driver, so I went to the back engine to try and slow us down.”

A pair of chopsticks snapped apart in Helen’s hands. “...Was the back engine room similar to the front?”

“They’re identical,” Jack confirmed, holding up two fingers in case she needed the emphasis.

Helen bit her lip, attention drifting to the red designs on the side of a box of rice. “So it had a computerized driving console as well?”

“Yeeeeah?” he confirmed, not sure how to feel when she actually started smiling.

“Well, I figured out one mystery for tonight,” Helen informed him, popping open a container of curry. “You didn’t black out. You were hypnotized.”

“...Hypnotized?” Jack mumbled, running back the memories of that day, focusing on the gap between walking through the back of the engine room and waking up as he was thrown into the dashboard.

…That’s way better than blacking out!

…Ugh, how violating!

He didn’t know that much about hypnotism, but he hadn’t imagined you just didn’t remember what was happening.

They didn’t in movies, but Jack really didn’t realize hypnotism wasn’t just a figment of Hollywood until he was a teenager.

But there’s no way it was this powerful. Psycwave had given him a lecture about it once after he’d called her powers “a magic trick.” A lecture she delivered while she stalked around his petrified body in the break room after their shift.

Well. One mystery solved, one mystery added.

“So ‘Screenslaver.’ For a guy who hypnotizes you through a screen.” Jack snorted, shaking his head as he nudged the folder along the wood. “And I thought pun names were considered too old-fashioned.”

“It seems like a couple of old ideas might be coming back.” Helen actually seemed like she was about to giggle as she leaned across the table. “Have you been watching the news?”

“Yeah, I think I have ‘Elastigirl’ ringing in my ears by now,” Jack laughed. But his expression quickly got pulled into a frown. “...How do you think Screenslaver knew you would be there?”

“They might not have,” Helen mentioned, not giving it much thought by what Jack could see. “I was in the right place at the right time.”

“But what are the odds that you would be in New Urbem at the hover-train?” Jack asked her, hoping she actually had an excuse that unveiled something obvious he’d missed. “Not to mention, how did Screenslaver know you could catch the train? You lost that thing back in the Glory Days.”

“Jack, most supervillains aren’t expecting to be defeated,” Helen reminded him, a self-assured smile trying to assure him as well. “That message you saw was probably a contingency plan if I didn’t manage to save the train. But I did, so don’t worry!”

He wasn’t so easily convinced. “Look, Helen, I know it’s a lot of fun with the cameras and the reporters and everyone saying how great you are. I’m the literal poster child of attention-seeking and I wear it with pride. But you can’t let that get in the way of noticing there’s something really weird going on.”

Helen’s expression bordered on strained as she looked up at him. “I think you might want to work on your sales pitch. You think I’m, what, blinded by all the fanfare around this?”

“I figured out which room you were in because I heard you squealing in joy about how you saved a runaway train,” Jack dryly informed her. “That’s genuinely impressive, I didn’t know your vocal chords could do that.”

“I’m allowed to be excited that I had a successful mission,” Helen admonished him, some of her mom voice slipping in. “But I agree, Screenslaver is still at large, and we need to find them.”

“...You don’t think we know who it is?”

“What do you mean?” Helen asked, not pausing to take in what he was trying to say.

“We already have two candidates,” Jack reminded her, “the only people who knew Elastigirl was going to be at the hover-train opening ceremony in New Urbem.”

Helen froze, then waved his words to the side so she could process them. “Wait, you’re telling me you think the Deavors, what, set me up?”

“...Yes!” he insisted, running a hand down his face. “Isn’t it obvious?”

“Clearly not,” Helen informed him, forgetting about Jack’s generous donation as she crossed her arms on the kitchen table. “How could either of them have set up something like that? They have no connections to the people running the train, even if they had some sort of twisted motive to do that, why bother if they knew I would stop it.”

“I don’t know why yet,” Jack dejectedly explained, a bit disappointed in himself for not figuring all of this out earlier. “But they’re the only ones who have the means.”

“Plenty of people had the means to mess with the computer console. If you’re using that logic, you’re a suspect,” she informed him,

“How? I didn’t know you’d be in town,” Jack noted, shoving his chair back so he could cross his legs. “That only leaves the Deavors, or someone they told about you.”

Helen seemed less than impressed. “Is this because you wanted the job they offered me?”

“What?” Jack wasn’t sure whether to sputter or just blow up the next building over as a demonstration for why, “No! That would have been a terrible idea!”

“Okay, I just wanted to make sure,” Helen explained, keeping her voice calm while Jack gave her an incredulous look.

“How petty do you think I am, Helen? There are a million other things I could be doing tonight– …” Jack remembered that pink card in his pocket and groaned. “I forgot about the stewardess. You know this is serious if I forgot about a handsome dame like that!”

“Can we get back on track?” Well, at least Helen knew Jack hadn’t completely lost his mind. “It couldn’t possibly be the Deavors, they were in a mobile communications truck the whole mission so they could monitor my suit-cam.”
“Why would that change anything?” Jack asked, returning to a more conversational posture mourning the loss of that stewardess.

“Because you and I both saw that message as someone remotely typed it into the console,” Helen insisted. “The whole ‘Welcome back Elastigirl,’ that wasn’t on the screen when the train stopped. Someone waited to type that in from a remote access.”

“There wasn't a way for them to do that,” Jack corrected her. “That computer wasn’t designed to do anything except make the hover-train move. It couldn’t receive or transmit a message like that, so there’s no way someone was typing it in.”

Helen almost groaned as she fell against the back of her chair. “You don’t know that.”

“It was probably programmed to show up right after the hypnosis program or whatever stopped playing.” He stopped himself as he noticed that the hypnosis screen he couldn’t remember probably had to be manually downloaded as well. “Which, I mean, that’s further proof, right? Whatever program was used to hypnotize the driver and I also couldn’t be done remotely.”

“Do you remember what the screen looked like when you got hypnotized?” Helen asked, trying to change the subject.

…Maybe just the fuzziest, thinnest thread leading to…her.

…But he didn’t know who her was, so that was useless.

It probably just meant Elastigirl.

“Nope. Get back to me on that, I’m going to see what I can do about it later. Probably with a lot of caffeine” But Jack wasn’t so easily distracted once he had his mind set on something. “So it must have been the Deavors because they’re the only people who could have coordinated putting not just a message, but a full hypnotizing program onto a computer system they knew you would access during this mission.”

“We don’t know if that’s how this worked,” Helen insisted, reluctantly committing to talking about this. “The Deavors wouldn’t go out of their way to set up something this elaborate for no results.”

“We also don’t know what they want their results to be,” Jack told her, the room raising a couple degrees in temperature as he flipped open the folder and jabbed his finger into the sentence ‘Elastigirl is the Optimal Choice.’ “This could be phase one, just to see how well you would do on their little assignments.”

"But we saw it being typed out on the screen," Helen slowly reminded him. "Evelyn and Winston were in my ear the entire time, I would have heard if they were typing something."

Jack might have actually felt his eye twitch. “It looked like it was being typed when you read it, but it was a computer on a train! You can’t transmit ‘Hi! I hate you!’ to a steering wheel! That had to be pre-programmed to appear.”

“And suddenly you’re an expert on computers too?” Helen sighed, nodding her head against her shoulder.

“No, I’m– Ugh!” Jack nearly pushed the table as he got up, clawing his fingers into his hair as he took a few steps away. “Helen. Stop being so obtuse about this! If there’s anyone who’s a likely candidate to be the Screenslaver, it’s probably one of the Deavors!”

“You don’t know that,” she declared as she also stood from the table, somehow managing to stomp towards him in her bare feet. “Why would they approach us about making supers legal, fly me out here, set me up with a police scanner, get their own mobile HQ for monitoring me, then somehow hack into a train that (by your logic) they knew I would be able to save?”

“Again, I don’t know why,” Jack emphasized, feeling like a broken record as she ignored his proof and jumped to the parts he hadn’t figured out. “I’m just saying they had the best means, and it’s not hard to hide a motive from people who are desperate.”

Helen balked at him. “I’m not desperate to become a super again.”

“After tonight, you still want to stay a civvie?” he inquired, watching as her hard-set expression softened into something disgustingly hopeful for that split-second.

Before Elastigirl raised her eyes to meet his, trying to remain civil as she asked, “Alright, look, pretend that they do have some sort of secret, convoluted plan. What are they hoping to do to me?”

Jack didn’t hesitate. “Probably kill you.”

“...Excuse me?!” Helen explained, taken completely off-guard at how thoroughly Jack believed that!

“What about that is so insane?” he demanded, holding his ground as Helen’s glare became acidic.

“Suspicion is one thing, but accusing two people, who have shown nothing but kindness and concern for us, of wanting to murder me??” She caught hold of her emotions and let out a sigh, trying to sound as diplomatic as possible as she asked, “Is this because you and Evelyn had that spat?”

“How petty do you think I am?” Jack exclaimed, practically spinning into her as he felt his emotions start to conflate with the radiation in his stomach. “I’m not going to accuse everyone who doesn’t like me of being a potential murderer!”

“When what’s gotten into you?” she demanded, giving up and just shouting back.

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because I almost died a couple times because I made a deal with Syndrome!” He was slightly hovering off the ground now. “Now you’re all caught up in a different deal and I’m crazy because I’m concerned?”

So Helen clenched her jaw and stretched to meet his eye level. “These people aren’t trying to kill me.”

“How do you know?” he asked, exasperated at how he thought she was obviously overlooking his evidence. “Just because they give you a new super suit and a motorcycle doesn’t mean you should be acting like everything is fine”

“I am concerned. There’s a new supervillain on the loose and I’m responsible for them because none of you are able to go into the field. But you can’t assume everyone is out to get you, Jack!” she insisted, stretching even higher to look down at him. Like she just assumed that would put him in his place!

“You’re ignoring me because you want to enjoy being a super again,” he reminded her, tempted to grab her and shake his fears into her before she talked herself into thinking he was crazy. “You’re in danger, Helen, I’m trying to help you!”

She was ready to let him crash through the ceiling to try and get some sense knocked back into his head. “Don’t think because I actually believe in people occasionally that I’m weaker than you.”

“Believe in them all you want, they’re just going to get you killed,” he warned her, not knowing how much more obvious he could be! "That's all 'normal citizens' like them want to do with us: exploit our powers then leave us out to dry when we don't do exactly what they want. They don't care about us, we're just characters on the news to them!"

“There’s nothing that I can’t handle in this situation!” she promised, even if that promise felt like a slap. “I’m not scared of the Deavors!”

“Why aren’t you scared?!” he cried, his shadow arching over Elastigirl before it was burned away by the radiation threatening to bubble out of his irises. His voice was wet and splintered as he demanded to know, “Why are none of you bothered by any of this?!”

“Bothered by what?” Helen exclaimed, stretching higher so they were at equal footing, despite how they were both almost at the ceiling.

“By everything that’s happened! Why aren’t you worried that the Deavors will try to do it too?!” Jack explained, like it was more obvious than the files on the table telling them how perfect Elastigirl was for this job.

How she was the only one who could help them.

How she was their only chance to defeat this evil threatening them.

How he was the only one who could stop the Omnidroid, Mirage said.

“They tried to kill us, Elastigirl! And it worked…” he reminded her, vision swimming away from her and landing on the red in the painting above her bed. “You remember Stomicide? How about Apogee? Bob would complain he couldn’t take you out every other Friday night because you, Bea, and Karen were having ‘girls night.’”

Helen sputtered as she tried to keep up with him. “Well, of course I remember, but–”

“What about Downburst?” Jack cut her off, watching a red bar flash in his eyes before he shook it away, “He made that Elasticycle hat you didn’t shut up about! You loved that thing so much the Deavors made you another one! Do you remember him?”

“Yes, I remember Dennis, what are you going on about–?” she tried to butt in, but Jack wasn’t done.

“Did you wonder why you stopped hearing from Simon?” he almost growled, hardly noticing that he had flown a few inches higher.

Gazerbeam: TERMINATED

Jack pinched the red bar out of his eyes, only opening them again to glare at Helen. “I didn’t. He had to go on another business trip and I said, ‘Wow, two in a couple months is a lot, but I do it so it’s nothing weird.’ I didn’t bother saying ‘good-bye’ to him. He was supposed to come back.”

A quick chuckle passed through the room.

Jack didn’t realize it had come from his own mouth until he saw Helen flinch away.

A bitter, broken smile crawled along Jack’s lips. “Remember all of them, Elastigirl? Remember all our friends? You’d better, BECAUSE THEY’RE ALL DEAD!”

And Jack was supposed to be dead too.

Gamma Jack was supposed to be one of those teal faces on Mirage’s supercomputer.

Just another superhero in a long list, only memorable because he had a red slash across his eyes that cemented his place in history as a tragic figure who would never leave the island.

He was supposed to have gotten crushed by the Omnidroid’s claws, the red visor almost smugly watching as he overheated him from the inside, unable to stop the radiation from leaking out of his skin while plumes of green smoke poured out of his lungs, tipping closer and closer to meltdown as he couldn’t think anymore he couldn’t control his own powers and it was going to kill him and he was supposed to be dead he was supposed to die–

An arm wrapped around Jack’s torso.

He flinched away from the touch, the Omnidroid’s face filling his vision.

Then a second arm joined the first.

Jack’s fists were balled at his sides, wondering why his cheeks were wet.

Elastigirl pulled him into her chest.

He didn’t want to die.

Helen was hugging him.

…And he didn’t die.

Gamma Jack had lived.

He had escaped Nomanisan Island and they had defeated the Omnidroid and he had made sure that monster named Syndrome was reduced to a handful of burnt ashes.

Jack felt his arms wrap around Helen before he really noticed what he was doing, burying his face in the crook of her shoulder.

She didn’t say anything for a moment, letting Jack slow the rapid rise and fall of his chest.

Letting him feel the cold hotel air and hear the faint fall of feet from the corridor outside the room.

Eventually, maybe a minute, or maybe half an hour, or maybe two seconds later, Jack picked himself off, opting to push himself away.

Helen kept him in that embrace before he could try acting like none of that had just happened. “...Has that been happening since the island?”

Jack shrugged, needing to clear his throat before he could talk. “It used to be worse.”

He meant that to be reassuring, but Helen stiffened. “And it’s been happening even after you got out of the hospital?”

The younger super in her arms didn’t try to say anything to deny it, but it was too wide of a gaping wound to admit.

“...I’m sorry.”

That earned another shrug.

“No, Jack, don’t brush this off,” she insisted, trying to smile a little to make him see she wasn’t upset with him for this. “None of us know what it was like for you on that island. And we’ve been trying our best, but…if you need anything, Bob, Lucius, and I are always there. Okay?”

Those eyes were dim, their natural blue seeming to darken.

Helen’s smile wavered. So she gave up and decided to say, “...Do you remember those soldiers from the war who would come back and…be different?”

“...”

“I was very close with one of those soldiers– You remember Snaug, right? He was one of the flight instructors when they made all you fliers get a pilot license." she continued when he didn’t indicate for her to stop. “He was a great guy, the kindest, sweetest man you could know. But when he came back from the Great War, things were, well, a bit hard for him. It took a long time, and it wasn’t always that easy for him, but he was able to get better. There are bad days, but he always told me having other people to lean on was what got him through the rough patches.”

“...Yeah,” Jack mumbled, feeling his radiation roll through his veins.

His father was shell-shocked from the World War II.

And I don’t want to become like him…

“You can always come to any of the three of us. Okay, Jack?”

He wanted to refuse. To tell her he was fine and he knew what he was doing and he had dealt with it long enough so he was okay with dealing with it himself.

Instead, he weakly nodded. “...It’s not that often…”

“Then none of us have an excuse if you reach out to us,” Helen assured him, giving his torso another squeeze. “...But, I do need to ask you something.”

Jack humorlessly laughed, how fingernails biting into the backs of his hands as he let Helen hold him up. “Sure, go for it.”

“Why are you scared of Evelyn and Winston?” Helen’s voice was gentle, Jack thought almost too motherly for their 5-year age gap.

But someone finally putting it into words, finally stringing together the tattered threads that had been clogging up his mind, made Jack have to swallow back an ache in his throat. “...I need you to be careful.”

“I will be,” she promised, slowly shrinking as she pulled him back to the ground. “You know I’m careful.”

“Syndrome was hunting you too,” Jack warned her, hating how his voice sounded like it was going to snap again. “He found Frozone and he would have been next but he found Bob and decided he just wanted to kill Bob instead–”

Jack sucked in a breath as Helen’s voice brought him back from another episode. “Evelyn and Winston aren’t going to hurt us. I promise.”

“...How can you be so sure?” Jack implored her, unable to comprehend how she could be so fat to believe their promises.

“You just have to take a leap of faith in life. And, if you fall, well,” Helen’s patted the tense curve of his spine. “I’ll grab onto a nearby building and swing away.”

“...I still don’t trust them. But I’ll trust you.” Jack snorted, finally pulling himself into the embrace as he felt himself land on the ground. “Fine. Screenslaver knew about your mission through a completely unrelated string of coincidences. Happy?”

“Eh, we’ll work on that,” Helen decided, pleased Jack seemed to be slowly returning to form.

She slowly let go of him, giving him the chance to stay if he wanted, but Jack was content to stand on his own two feet again.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets, that grin slowly returning to his face as he told her, “You know, that food I paid for is probably getting cold.”

Helen twirled around and let out a surprised laugh, tossing her hand in the air as she walked back to her seat. “Right, thank you for saving me from room service.”

“There’s room service here?” Jack asked, now just confused. “You’d rather eat takeout than actually decent food?”

“I’m going to accept your free gift and not feel like I’m imposing on the Deavors by ordering a $30 salad,” Helen informed him, sifting through her horde of egg rolls and curry and steamed rice. “Do you want any?”

Jack scoffed at the offer before he could catch himself. “I hate Chinese food.”

“You can’t hate an entire culture of food,” Helen corrected him like he was one of her kids. “Dash ‘hates all vegetables,’ but I think you’re more mature than a 5th-grader.”

“Try me. I already boycotted the entire state of Oregon from my diet,” Jack declared as he .

“Tough luck, sit down,” she insisted, stretching her arm under the table to tap the empty seat.

Jack rolled his eyes and pulled the chair towards him, leaning against the wooden frame as Helen snaked her arm into a cupboard 10 feet away and pulled out a plate. She started to scoop rice onto the plate as Jack crossed his legs and sprawled his arms over the back of the chair. “Lucius and I always wondered how you were able to wrangle Bob into being a husband.”

“I didn’t have to ‘wrangle’ him,” she insisted, her attention trailing off as she eyed the container of curry in front of her.

Jack shook his head, letting her concentrate on dumping the brown compote onto the plate with her rice.

That manila folder was still opened on the table.

“...Hey, you know, I brought this because I needed to make my point,” Jack started, turning Helen’s attention away from her food and to the cost-benefits analysis. “But I legitimately think I found a way they could cut back on some of the charges they’re planning on making for this plan.”

“Really?” she half-mindedly responded, shoveling chunks of spiced meat into her mouth.

“Mind if I run it past you?” Jack had to hide a snicker as a few dribbles got onto her white robe. Which earned an equally unimpressed look from Helen, so he got back on topic. “Or are you too busy?”

Helen made sure Jack got a good view of that annoyed glare in her eyes before she reached for a napkin by the fake flowers. “Why not? What do you have?”

Chapter Text

Some people would say it was difficult for Jack to adjust to civilian life after the superhero ban.

Some people would say it was even worse for Mr. Incredible, who went from the greatest super hero of the Glory Days to a danger-sensing insurance agent.

Some people (Jack) would tell you it was Simon, who struggled for years to re-integrate into civilian life.

But no one person, not even by a small margin, had adjusted worse to the end of the Glory days than anyone else:

“Edna,” Jack began, unable to take his attention away from the short fashion designer as they walked down a stone hallway that displayed thousands of dollars of super suits as if they were common household decorations, like an aunt would display her collection of antique vases, “are you really complaining about being paid millions of dollars to fly to Italy and host a show in Milan?”

“I am extrapolating my opinions!” Edna Mode patted away Jack’s comments with the tip of her cigarette holder as she corrected him, “And it was Prague, darling, Prague.”

They passed through the gallery of super suits and into a hall actually filled with expensive vases, Jack’s long, even strut still somehow not quite keeping up with the determined traipsing of Edna’s short stature. “No, it was Milan.”

“If there was a Milan it was more than three months ago and I do not invest my time in such things,” Edna curtly informed him, as if this was the most common knowledge that everyone possessed from birth.

“Grant me a little mercy, I’ve been busy,” Jack unseriously bemoaned (he'd just been in New Urbem yesterday and had another early morning tomorrow) as he paused in front of a particularly reflective vase. The short trip from the city hadn’t been more windy than any other flight, but he was still relieved that his shirt hadn’t been ruined by any birds passing overhead, and his bangs were still perfectly swooped in place. He might have cornered the market on hair gel, but when you’re a flying super, the only options are one of those wrestler masks or you need to invest in a lot of hair products.

Edna’s voice trailed into his ears from several yards away, and growing farther. It might be one of the few voices capable of breaking Jack’s attention away from himself when appearances were on his mind. “Yes, so busy you have not been able to keep track of my work, yet you come begging for my assistance.”

He snorted and righted his angled posture, hopping back into the air and zooming back to Edna’s side, perfectly falling back into stride with her. “Then what have I been doing? Let’s keep this fair.”

“Yes, yes, I am sure the civilian life of Jackson is equally fascinating,” Edna commented, even as the grin on her wide mouth beat out the sarcasm in her tone. It was a vaguely-hidden inquiry about what he’d been up to lately.

“Oh, how you wound me,” Jack lamented, shaking his head and holding a hand to his chest as he avoided the vaguely-hidden inquiry about what he’d been up to lately. So he didn’t have to mention the whole Nomanisan Island thing.

Or finding out Simon as dead.

And the rest of his friends and Edna’s clientele were dead.

And this whole mess with the Deavors.

Instead, he returned to form and side-stepped the conversation to something else. “E, you can just call me Jack. That’s part of my alias and part of my real name.”

Edna waved his words away as she led both of them past a hall of glass and into her vaulted-ceiling receiving hall. “Pish posh, come along, Gamma Jack, I have so much to discuss with you!”

The hall was entirely windows other than the lone wall they had just walked around was made of a piece of some ancient temple Edna had rescued from being torn down after the war. You might have been able to access any part of the mansion from that room, if you could navigate the metal stairs leading up from the middle of the marble floors, calculate which corridor went to the evergreen garden behind the window, maybe get lucky and figure out where the never-ending trash shoots in the sides of the armchairs led.

Jack had long since given up on trying to figure out how this place worked, so he chose to just follow Edna to the small sitting area in front of her two-story tall, cascading, indoor fountain made of gold.

Edna really was so homey.

The black and red armchairs were more supple than you would think at a first glance. They had long been approved by Jack as excellent places to sprawl. “Would you like to discuss how Elastigirl and I were involved with a runaway train the other day?”

Edna paused in front of her circular, stone table, her eyes darkening behind her thick frames as she looked at Jack over her shoulder. Her voice hissed, “We do not speak of such things.”

Jack balked. Her shadow seemed to stretch longer against the morning light pouring in from the windows looking over the mountains he’d just flown past a few minutes ago. “Don't tell me you really haven't been keeping up with Elastigirl's new–?”

Edna’s cigarette holder snapped through the air, demanding his silence even though she was only tall enough to wave it below his chest. “We do not speak of such things within these walls!”

…What?

For a moment, Jack wondered if Edna could have meant that she was also concerned about Elastigirl getting back into hero work under such shady circumstances.

But how could she have known about the Deavors’ plans?

Did she know that they were going to send Helen to New Urbem to face Screenslaver?

Did she somehow sense that the owner of one of her super suits was in danger?

Did Edna have pre-cognition powers??

And then…Jack realized.

He leaned forward onto his knees, ignoring the cigarette holder in his face, as he grinned. “E. Don't tell me you're jealous of Galbaki.”

“Peh! I have long since ridden myself of such minute impulses, Jackson, you should realize this. However!” Edna’s face didn’t bother with “surprise,” skipping right into pure disgust as she threw her arms into the air and trampled the tile floors beneath her. The fashion designer threw herself into her seat, resting a hand dejectedly against the arm. “As the official designer of Elastigirl, I cannot help myself but feel disturbed by this new-found preference for the moody and the angsty rather than suits of quality!”

Jack nodded along with her, pleased he wasn’t laughing since he did agree. Edna was a designer of the gods! That’s why any of the golden age supers knew to go to her, not the cheap knock-offs that bragged only about style without the necessary durability and grit a super suit needed! “I don't understand how she could have betrayed you so severely, Edna.”

“Yes, yes, darling, you understand. Please, continue to lift my spirits with your presence,” Edna insisted, expression tightly bound between annoyance for Galbaki and the strain of trying to put herself into a better mood while she stared off into the distance.

“E, I love you, please continue to speak to me like that,” Jack sighed, feeling some of his worries from the previous night in Helen’s hotel room easing away the longer he was with Edna in her expensive mansion and her expensive taste and expensive ideals for suit quality. “But don't worry. As soon as that fancy suit rips, her sponsors will realize their mistake and they'll just have to reach out to you.”

“Sponsors?” Edna turned to him with a dash of shock behind her glasses, temporarily forgetting about Galbaki’s butchery of the brand she had crafted for Elastigirl. “What sponsors, has she become one of those racing car drivers? You make no sense.”

Jack groaned as he leaned into the back of the armchair, setting his ankle against his knee while his arms took over every part of the black armrests. “She's gotten involved with these people that run a company called Devtech–it's some sort of telecommunications company–and these Deavor siblings are trying to sponsor her to do hero work so it’ll help push for supers to be legalized.”

“Hm. That is quite admirable. And also explains why I was informed that there was someone requesting I create a duplicate Elasitigirl outfit,” Edna mumbled to herself, holding her chin between her fingers as she shifted her attention to the black table in front of her. “If it was not for their use of Galbaki, I would be undeniably approving of their noble efforts! Yet they use such a man, and wound me…”

“They never should have done that to you,” Jack agreed, happy to indulge un melodramatic with a fellow dramatic. “You're the best of the best, a true technical artist.”

“Yes, yes, I know,” Edna bemoaned, quietly lamenting to herself while she sadly listened.

“What is Galbaki?” Jack huffed. It made him happy to see Edna being fueled by her disdain for betrayal. “Just a visionary garment designer. He has no innovation, no expertise in super-level textiles. That's why you're the only person I'll take my business to.”

“You speak so nicely to me, Jackson, I shall try to feel something in the cold, dead interior of my heart,” the fashion designer grieved, longingly looking toward the super fountain.

“Don’t let it get to you,” he tried to tell her, a grin still on his face. She could pretty clearly see it, but was he lying? No! You don't lie to Edna! What is wrong with you for even thinking that?? “You’ll always be the greatest super suit designer to the rest of us. When Galbaki is left in the dust and forgotten under a pile of his dismembered and burnt suits, we’ll all see you standing there and happily listen to you say, ‘I told you do.’”

“...Darling, must you stay away for so many years? You have rejuvenated my spirit!” Edna exclaimed, that manic smile pulled across her teeth. It was a moment of triumph. And then she quickly reset herself into business mode. “Now, what is it that brings you here? Of course, I already know, you would like a new suit. There is no reason to fret darling, I shall have your entire image re-vitilized and beautiful once more! A true testament deserved by superiors of our kind, that Galbaki could never comprehend!”

“I already said I loved you so I won't reiterate it because you know that.” But as Jack said that, his smile cracked into something less than his usual ease.

He wasn’t sure Edna had ever seen him look anything less than the picture perfect image of Gamma Jack. They were business partners that could be friends, but Edna wasn’t privy to Jack’s personal life like Jack wasn’t privy to hers. So, he wasn’t sure what to let her know about…everything.

He coughed, trying to stall as he bit his fingernails into his palm. “It's just…”

She was watching him expectantly. Unsure of what she was seeing.

“Edna, look,” he started. Then opened his mouth to continue. Then reconsidered. Then opened it again. Then finally, painfully admitted to the fashion designer. “I don't need a new suit. I was wondering if you could remake my old one.”

Edna was still looking at him. Her eyes never left his own, narrowing as if they could figure out who he was and what had happened to her long-term client. He knew her policies and her preferences. They usually weighed out the opinions of even the supers she created outfits for! “...Jackson, I must have hallucinated, repeat yourself in a way that makes logical sense.”

“My suit was lost because of some covert hero work that I can't legally talk about,” he blurted, patching it together with half-truths and somewhat-accurates that were short enough that he didn’t have to explain. “I was hoping you'd be able to recreate it.”

The water from the fountain was the only noise in the room before Edna sat up in her chair.

“You ask me such insanity!” She was practically painting a picture with the cigarette holder in her fingers as she threw her hands toward the ceiling, around her head, and to her mouth, like she was trying to pull the thoughts into her lap. “I do not comprehend the word ‘recre–’ ‘recreatrea–’ This is a concept foreign to my mind. So, no, I am afraid I cannot.”

“What?” He should have expected this. He had expected it. But it hurt worse to hear than imagining her saying it. “Edna. You designed it! You're telling me you can't pull out the files and make another? My measurements are probably the same, the materials were perfectly fine, I don’t need anything changed about it.”

“Jackson, darling, the creative mind best functions when it is not filled with such things as nostalgic attachment,” Edna warned him, tossing her hair back into place.

“The only reason we know each other is because I’m a superhero and you're a former superhero designer,” Jack reminded her. A touch of frustration was creeping into his words, despite how he knew she would never ‘lower herself’ to repeat a design. “If this conversation isn't about nostalgic attachment, what else are we here to do?”

Edna shook her head, pinching the bridge of her nose as if he was giving her a headache. “I am an artist, not a copying machine. Dwelling on the past does nothing but hamper your interest in the future. And the future is what waits for us! The now is what we live in!”

Jack didn't really want to live in the now.

Or at least he wanted a distraction from it.

Both of them didn’t belong in this room together.

They were relics.

Meant to be dusted off and put on display like those rows of super suits Edna kept that would never be worn. They existed because Edna couldn’t stop herself from wanting to create something for heroes, and Jack was here because he hadn’t been able to stop himself from wanting to use his powers.

Gamma Jack wasn’t brought to Nomanisan Island because he had an investment in defeating a raging machine. He got lured to the island because an attractive dame told him he could blow something up with his powers, and no one would be able to stop him.

Finally, he’d be able to open the cork on his radioactive core and let his powers flow freely, like they were intended. Like every super could except Jack because he would kill anyone who happened to be nearby if he dipped into his instincts. Sure, small instances of flying to a high shelf in his apartment or his eyes sparking when he got heated at a radio show were well and good, but it wasn’t the same as the near-euphoric feeling of releasing his abilities at their full potential.

It was supposed to be a fast mission. A quick indulgence that left Jack able to go back to normal life.

A momentary lapse in his control so he could do what he really desired, but wasn’t allowed.

The government had taken a nuclear bomb and forced it to become a blood bank, then expected him to just sit around and let them take and take and take because he’d always have more to give! Jack was made to create and control radiation, and they thought he could just stop when they didn’t want him?

Sure, Jack could just stop breathing as well, but eventually he’d need to gasp for air!

He’d been so stupid to let Syndrome prey on that.

Now, he was sitting in Edna’s “living room,” having to barter with her to reclaim the suit he’d had to sacrifice to get him out of Nomanisan Island alive.

Jack’s voice was thicker than he intended. “...My choices were I would lose the suit, or I would die.”

TERMINATED

He blinked the image of the glowing teal screen away with his equally teal eyes, hoping Edna wouldn’t think anything of it.

“So, please, E.” He swallowed. “I don't want to lose another part of being a superhero.”

If the silence before had been deafening, it felt like Jack had just dropped himself into that void around the supercomputer behind the lava waterfall.

The fountain seemed to be holding its breath as it realized what was happening.

And Edna…

She watched him for a moment. No doubt remembering the last time she had seen Gamma Jack, more than 10 years ago. Probably for a fast patch job. Maybe he’d been complaining about the new boots he’d gotten being too chafing on his ankles. Or he might have come along with one of their friends just to keep Edna’s company while Frozone tried to explain what the burn marks on his super suit were from.

Whatever had happened to him during that decade…it was enough that when Edna looked at him, she had to pause and search for anything genuine. So full of lies and so distracted he didn’t notice how often he was doing it.

Lies and excuses and dodging her questions. And he still wasn’t able to hide that the reason for it all was lingering right at the surface of his eyes. Threatening to give away something precious and dangerous that he wasn’t going to admit to her.

Whatever had happened that made him lose his suit, Edna wasn’t inclined to push. She was an artist! The psychology of a hero, she left to Dicker and Everseer. “...Darling, you speak like you are a ghost!”

Jack was about to rebuke her for suggesting that (especially since he had successfully not thought about those red slashes across the computer that apparently just showed up whenever they wanted!), but Edna hopped off the chair and began to walk towards the metal stair.

He black bob swished in the wind of her strutting as she called for the young super. “Come, come, you shall follow me while we discuss my temporary insanity.”

“Excuse me–? Now?” Jack sputtered, finding himself getting to his feet without any consideration to what she was talking about.

Edna didn’t bother to check if he was following, she knew he would be just a few paces behind her. “It shall take but a moment!”

“No it won’t,” he bluntly pointed out. Regardless of her dedication, Jack knew it had to take Edna at least a couple of hours. Cuz, you know, she needed to make it?

Still. His smile was back without any of those cracks hinting to what was fighting him behind it.

“Hush, hush, hush, what do you know? You insist I make you a copy of a suit that has long slipped the steel trap of my memory,” Edna chided him, showing him down a new hall on the second story.

Jack nonchalantly slipped into stride beside her, like he was already familiar with the grey walls with the obvious security panels glaring down at him. “Have I ever mentioned your bouts of ‘temporary insanity’ are my favorite part about you?”

“You push too much darling,” Edna warned him, smiling to herself as they approached a 3-way door lock. “Be grateful I find you so stimulating or I may not let myself engage in our conversations so eagerly.”

Edna Mode’s design room wasn’t so much a design room as it was a full laboratory.

Yeah, it was behind a blast-proof metal door that aimed a full gun turret at your face if you tried to enter without passing security, but that was just the entrance.

The inside of the lab was a sanctum of technology and innovation, covered floor to ceiling in types of machines Jack didn’t recognize even after having spent time inside the deepest parts of the NSA. Some seemed harmless enough, possibly just fancy light fixture, while others were needle drills and acid cutters. There was a table in the very middle of the room with the outline of a super suit etched into the plastic surface, almost like a chalkline around a body, but for the purposes of creating something instead of marking a loss. Three mannequins rolled out from their storage closet as Edna approached, soldiers waiting for her command. Bolts of fabric lined deep shelves embedded in the walls, overlooking slanted drawing tables covered in pieces of paper taller than Edna herself.

All very impressive if you hadn’t grown up around fancy needles and eccentric older women.

Edna immediately went to a wall covered in sleek, silver drawers while Jack meandered to the glass containment room on the far side of the lab.

It didn’t exactly ring of any good memories (reminding him just a touch too much of the hospital room observation deck that monitored him during his recovery from the island), but this was different. This was a place where supers were treated with respect, given the awe and attention they deserved. Not locked away like the volatile weapons the government tried to make them out to be.

“I don’t suppose you need me to hop in this, do you?” Jack asked, the light from the testing chamber glowing against his face.

“Do not threaten me in my own home,” Edna warned him amid searching through files folders.

The very first instance of Jack being invited into the lab was not too long after he’d become a superhero. Naturally, during his first appointment with Edna, she insisted that she had to know just how powerful his radiation was so she could find a material that wouldn’t be affected by him.

She was certain the chamber would be alright, it was lead-lined.

But lead didn’t actually dim his powers… It made Jack weak if he was holding enough of it, and being exposed to too much did make him weak. But his actual powers were only blocked by led, not inherently worse because of it. Like a hammer smashing into steel. The steel stopped the hammer, but if you hit it hard enough, the steel would bend.

So Jack blew out all of the windows and damaged the metal sliding doors so much that Edna couldn’t actually take him on as a customer for three weeks because she had to fix her lab.

Ah, good times.

“I wouldn’t ever!” Jack promised, eyeing the support beams for any of that lead he remembered. “I already mentioned Galbaki’s name, I’m talking on thin ice. …How did you hear about Galbaki anyway?”

“I have been watching the news, how do you think I inform myself?” Edna, well, informed him, selecting yet another drawer.

Jack slipped his hands into his pockets and began to wander closer to her side, casting long looks at the needle machines hanging from the ceiling. “Intuition and general brilliance?”

“Yes, yes, well, I do occasionally enjoy the television as it just proves that I am always correct.” She finally pulled out what looked like a paper manila folder.

Edna clicked her heels against the floor as she redirected Jack to the low table in front of the testing chamber. The folder slipped onto the table as Edna made herself comfortable, motioning for Jack to join her on the swivel chair opposite her own. The fashion designer poked the tip of her cigarette holder under the folder and tossed it open to the first page.

A profile of Jackson Hart dated from the early 1950’s.

Jack wasn’t sure whether he was expected to shake his head or hide from embarrassment at the picture of his teenage self, which looked more like a mugshot for those first few years. But, really, he had to be a little amused.

That kid had grown up a lot. And still managed to find himself getting dragged into the worst kind of bad luck.

A cigarette appeared in Edna’s hand, nonchalantly held towards Jack. “Would you care to join me?”

“I quit right after the ban,” Jack reminded her, attention fighting to get back to the owner of the lab.

“Oh,” she drawled, recoiling her offer as she tipped the cigarette into the end of the holder she had been waving. “How disappointing.”

Jack rolled his eyes as he made himself comfortable in the low chair. “You know those things are really unhealthy for you.”

“First you insist I create-re your suit, now you insist I do so with nothing to calm my fraying nerves?” Edna snipped while a machine popped up from just next to her seat at the table.

The machine transformed into a blowtorch and expertly lit the tip of Edna’s cigarettes, then folded back under the table.

Still, Jack was not so easily impressed. “Do you want to get lung cancer?”

“It would not dare cross paths with me,” she gravely assured him, the tip of her slim cigarette holder disappearing into the corner of her mouth for a brief moment. A pop of smoke trailed behind Edna as she spun on her heels and marched to the far side of the room, where a cabinet of files would be waiting “But if you wish to fear your own body, you may. Your measurements have not changed since last we spoke?”

“I’m very consistent with my bodily expectations.” He didn’t have a private gym in his apartment to impress guests.

“Mm-hmm…” Edna flipped to the most recent page in his files. Still from more than 10 years ago, but at least he didn’t look too terribly different from 25 at 35. “And since you are demanding I make an exact replica of your suit, I would ask if you desired any upgrades to be made, but as it is the materials I would need to use for that do not lend themselves to upgrades.”

“Aww, so no bullet-proof fabric?” Jack jokingly bemoaned.

“Darling, you are already bullet-proof,” Edna reminded him, making another note on the file with the thin, black pen she had brought with her.

Jack pouted a little as she moved on. “But I need to focus on making a radiation shield around myself to do that. Can’t I just get a suit to do that for me?”

“Perhaps I could if you were not demanding an exact replica of the suit I designed,” Edna suggested, then completely ignored his plea while she flipped through her paperwork. “Now, do you wish to tell me how exactly you managed to lose my creation?”

“Nope. We’re not going there at the moment,” Jack very quickly shut her down. “Let’s just say, I’ve been having to make due with a very…unwanted option.”

“Yes, do not think I haven’t realized that you were also wearing another brand in your fights recently, Gamma Jack,” Edna told him, tracing a curl of smoke in the air that slowly drifted towards him.

“Oh, it’s terrible, E. Literally the only good part about it is I found a black mask that kind of matched my actual mask, so it let me suffer with some dignity… I feel like every move I make is going to make the suit squeak like it’s made of actual rubber!” he began, shoulders slumped back as he held his hands up to recount his woes. “It’s this really awful dark grey that someone must have picked when they were sleep-deprived and couldn’t see color. It’s not radiation-proof, so the lower parts of the arms and legs are covered in green radiation stains– But somehow the gloves and boots are fine?? Well, no, the boots are fine. I kind of burned the fingers off the gloves. And the palms... I even had to improvise with my logo and just drew it on my chest in two seconds!”

Edna was staring at Jack as he finished recounting the horrific tail, mouth hanging open in absolute pity for him as she tried to picture him having to put up with that. “No, no, no! Why?!”

“I didn’t have much of a choice. Limited materials and all of that.” Meaning, he stole a mercenary uniform from one of Syndrome’s guards, cut the hood/visor part off, and made due.

“We can do so much more than this,” Edna declared, grabbing a sketchbook from seemingly out of nowhere and beginning to draw something that Jack couldn’t see. “Gamma Jack cannot be seen in a trash bag! Though, I am sure you look absolutely beautiful in anything, darling.”

“Stop it, E, you’ll make me blush,” Jack told her, very obviously hoping she would continue. “But I want the original. Not a new suit.”

“Well, I regret to inform you, but I will be required to create two outfits,” Edna warned him. With a practically gleeful stroke to her pen. “Peh, ‘create,’ as if I am not making an exact copy of something I had designed… Hence, I require titillation, and I have decided I shall make you a new suit as well!”

He really should have expected that.

Did Jack really think he could visit Edna’s and not get a new outfit? This was Edna Mode, she didn’t even let herself repeat a look, why would her clientele. “Do you have time to make two suits?”

“You say you enjoy my temporary insanity,” Edna reminded him, half-way through a balancing trick of her cigarette holder and the pencil as she began scribbling. “I invite you to indulge with me. You would need it after having been in that thing you just described!”

Before Jack could come up with an appropriate response to the fashion designer forcing him to get another super suit, Edna had already hopped to her feet and was waving the notes she’d written on his file against the bolts of cloth kept in the walls.

So he got up and followed her, almost clipping his knee on a high-tech fabric cutter on the way. “I’m not in a rush for a new suit. I kind of need the copy as soon as you can get it to me for no particular important reason, but you can take your time with–”

“You fret too much! I now know how urgent it is!” Edna called from the shelves, not bothering to turn around as she began flipping through blacks, greys, greens, blues, golds, silvers, fingers flying through each like an instrument she has played for decades.

She held up a strip of crimson as Jak arrived next to her, holding it between them like how a movie director would hold up their hands to place someone in the correct position for a shoot.

Jack saw the red and immediately decided he wasn’t going to let her color coordinate him to the Omnidroid. He chuckled to himself, hoping that masked the flash of discomfort he had at the idea. “What, do you think I’m one of the Incredibles? Red isn’t my color, doll.”

“Hmm… This is true.” Edna tucked the crimson fabric back into place and turned her attention to choosing between Cambridge Blue and Caribbean Green. “Red fabric with green powers should not be done unless strictly intentional. What are your feelings on Cadmium Green?”

“Absolutely not! Cadmium releases beta particle radiation, it wouldn’t match my branding,” Jack informed her, a few flickers of gamma radiation dancing around his hand in case she needed a reminder. Sure, he was immune to beta radiation like he was immune to pretty much any radiation unless he actively chose not to be, but he could only control gamma radiation, so that was a no.

“Yes, of course! It is entirely contradictory, we cannot allow it!” Edna agreed, shoving the dark green fabric further into the shelf as she went to a bolt of gold that Jack was all too familiar with.

He didn’t realize he’d actually feel excited as Edna paused over it. “Well, I didn’t expect us to find this so quickly.”

Edna didn’t bother looking away from the paper in her hands. “What are you referring to?”

“This.” Jack leaned over and tapped a finger on the fabric just over Edna’s shoulder. “It’s what my cape is made of.”

“And that is why I have no clues as to what you are referring to,” Edna…did not elaborate. But she twirled her pencil and cigarette holder through the air, so she must have expected Jack to know what she was tlaking about.

He gave her a second to explain, but gave up. “What are you talking about? Are you not planning on giving me the cape that goes with my suit?”

“Capes are no longer part of my repertoire,” Edna informed him, finally sparing a look of utter disdain his way so he could try and comprehend what was going through her complex mind. “No capes shall again leave my services, thank you.”

Jack returned the look, but bordering between confusion and annoyance. “I told you I wanted the exact same suit, and I’m going to be paying you for the exact same suit. So, actually, yes, I will be getting the cape too.”

“No capes!” Edna insisted, tossing an arm into the air and turning back towards her stock. The matter was settled–

“No, I want the cape,” Jack informed her, hands falling onto his hips as he stayed bent over her small figure.

Edna looked up at him with the sort of frustration a mother gets when her child keeps demanding her play with a blowtorch. “You must never risk yourself for fashion, darling, regardless of how devastating the blow!”

“What, do you think I’m going to tie it around my neck and get myself killed?” Jack asked, standing up to his full height. “It attached at the top of my chest and I made a clasp that lets it break away if it snags. You know this!”

“Must you torture me with such requests, Jackson?” she sighed, holding her head as if bracing herself. “Fine. We may proceed.”

Jack was almost swatted across the chest as Edna threw her arms into the air, her voice echoing off the walls as she proclaimed a now infamous list of supers:

“Thunderhead, November 15th of ‘58, cape snagged on a missile fin!”

An uncomfortable pang snapped against Jack’s ribs. TERMINATED

“Stratogale! April 23rd, ‘57. Cape caught in a jet turbine.”

TERMINATED

Seriously, Edna? This wasn’t helping anything–

And Edna wasn’t done. “Meta-Man, Express elevator!”

TERMINATED

“Dynaguy, snagged on takeoff!”

TEMRINATED

“Splashdown, sucked into a–”

“Okay, I get it, I get it!” Jack exclaimed, practically having to shush his own brain while he rubbed away a forming headache. He was already struggling with the list of dead supers in his mind, he didn’t need Edna listing off her own regrets on top of it!

Edna begrudgingly snorted, crossing her arms against her chest as she waited for Jack to realize that there were reasons it was better not to dwell on the past. “We will not be giving you a cape, Gamma Jack. I do not wish to discuss it further.”

The images were back to being just echoes as Jack sighed up at the ceiling. “E, I don’t feel like negotiating this. Just let me have the cape, I’ll make sure it’s safe for me to use, and we’ll both be happy. ‘Kay?”

“Apparently you have missed the part where I already denied it to you,” Edna told him. “You have been functioning perfectly well without it, you have no need for me to create another.”

“I don’t want to lose anything else to that place,” he grumbled, not quite sure if she heard him.

But of course she did. She was Edna Mode. And he was standing two feet in front of her, so it was hard to ignore.

Something had happened to this super, and she had no idea what. However, she wasn’t about to give him a cape after doing so with other supers had killed them! By her hands! Still, she didn’t want to aggravate him more than he already was, so she tried to be somewhat reasonable in her argument.

“It does not have the same flash or flare, but that is for your powers, not the suit! I only emphasize the importance of what is already there! None of your friends required their suits to make them the heroes they are!” She smirked a little to herself, sparing part of that look to Jack, and continued to reminiscence. “Disregarding that one friend of yours. Your very close “friend”. Gazerbeam had unique circumstances that did mean he required a suit to aid in his abilities.”

Jack froze, fire slowly being dumped into his veins at just the mention of that name. (Much less, the…thinly veiled implications behind the way E had emphasized it). “Excuse me?”

But Edna barreled on, not even noticing. “I actually did need to design that helmet for him to train in controlling his powers, but it is a rare instance that I do such a thing!”

“Simon’s dead.”

The words slipped out before Jack could stop them.

And they made the room so quiet you could have heard one of the needles fall out of the drills in the ceiling.

Jack almost tried to take it back, if not for the look of utter shock on Edna’s face, for the rising wave of tropical heat in his chest.

Edna was frozen in place. For the first time in years she was…well. She didn’t know what to say. Eventually, she had to give up on finding the perfect words to match the absolute shock in her heart and the devastation Jackson was so desperately trying to hide from her. “...I do not understand. What are you speaking of?”

“Gazerbeam is dead,” Jack told her, though it was really just mumbling. In his head, it might as well have been loud enough to break the sound barrier. “...He’s been gone for a couple of months.”

Edna said nothing. Just stood there, fighting to keep herself in the present.

Jack hated it. Because now he had to say something.

And if he said too much, he wouldn’t be able to stop and he’d just break down in front of Edna like he’d broken down in front of Helen and that wasn’t a can of worms he wanted to deal with right now and why wasn’t Edna saying anything–?!

“...So…Yeah. That’s been going on.”

It was hardly secret that Simon Paladino had died, but because the government was keeping the island genocide quiet, Edna wouldn’t have thought to look at a civilian newspaper and find someone she knew dead.

“...”

Edna turned away. For a moment, her eyes might have lingered on that gold fabric. Then the dark, blue-ish grey next to it.

Before she could remind herself of why this was so terribly stupid, she righted herself, holding her head up high, and took in a long, long drag from her cigarette. The smoke poured out of her mouth in a sigh, not so dissimilar from how Jack felt ready to breathe out a plume of green fumes building inside his lungs. “I will allow you to purchase it from me.”

Jack had to blink himself back into the present. “...What?”

“You may purchase a few yards of the fabric for yourself,” Edna declared, no trace of despair or resignation in her voice as she smacked the bolt of gold fabric with Jack’s file. “It is not a cape, so I feel no guilt in parting with it, but I refuse to take accountability for what you could do with it!”

Are you serious?

Jack didn’t know if he meant, “Are you serious, you think a couple yards of fabric will make up for what happened?!” and “Are you serious, you’re compromising on this for me?”

It probably meant she knew that whatever had happened to Jack’s suit had some relation to Simon’s death.

Gazerbeam died a few months ago, Gamma Jack had an outfit he’d only been wearing for a few months after he lost his real suit. It was logical enough.

And if that was the case…Edna must have known Jack was just trying to cling to something from the past. An incredibly unhealthy, unattractive quality in her mind, but this? …This was a situation she could allow the smallest compromise for.

But that didn’t mean she was going to dwell on it!

Edna quickly returned to flipping her hands through the air and began to march towards her drawing board. “Naturally, this means I will not be designing your new suit with a cape! If you want a dangling piece of fabric on the back of your neck, I suggest a hood, but no capes!”

“I…?” Jack cleared his throat, trying to match her easy return to normalcy as he meandered towards her. “I guess that means I’m honored you made an exception for me.”

“Yes, yes, you should be,” Edna agreed, dropping his file onto her drawing board and placing a blank piece of paper over the other design still haphazardly strewn across the surface. She waved him away as she raised her chair to meet the board’s height. “No go, I must begin my work!”

And they both needed time to process this new reality…

********

It had started to rain.

Of course it had started to rain…

Jack yanked his soaked shoes off by the door, muttering to himself as he crossed the long distance to his living room coffee table in his socks. The bag from the hardware store landed on the wood with a worrying *clang* as Jack felt around his sofa cushions for the TV remote.

The harsh light of the television broke through darkness made by the evening rain clouds, illuminating Jack like a ghost as he clicked through channels.

Some talk show from New Urbem was playing. Probably boring enough that Jack could use it as background noise while he worked on remembering how to make that cape clasp.

He let Chad the TV host talk about some sort of ambassador’s big, important speech as Jack made his way upstairs to change. It wasn’t late yet, maybe 8:00pm, but Jack didn’t expect to go out again and just threw on his pajamas. He contemplated grabbing that old sewing machine from his office while he was upstairs, but really just didn’t feel like lugging it downstairs, so that meant he would probably get to using Edna’s fabric tomorrow.

Who would have known his mom forcing him to learn how to sew when he was 12 would have been so useful? It saved him all those walks of shame to Edna’s that he knew Mr. Incredible, Frozone, and Gazerbeam had to undertake.

And that beat up sewing machine was going to get some use still when he got to work on that cape. You know, when he had the energy to do it. He'd had a long day and he had somewhere to be early the next morning, he was going to be a little lazy!

Somehow, the TV host was still talking after Jack got back downstairs. He wasn’t going to get all of the water out of his hair, yet he somewhat successfully toweled off most of it. It left him looking more disgruntled than he would ever let himself be in public, but again, he was settling in for the night. And he could be sitting around in floppy pajamas with equally floppy hair for a few hours before he went crazy.

“Many say your speech today is critical.” The TV drifted in one ear and out the other as Jack gave the bag from the hardware store a passing glance.

The fluffy towel joined the remote control on the sofa as he walked towards the end table to turn on some light.

His phone was blinking up at him next to that framed picture. “You have (3) missed calls.”

“Both sides just want the best for their people,” some politicians voice continued, barely noticed by Jack as he picked up the receiver. “We are so close to finally getting peace in the region.”

The phone buzzed against Jack’s ear as he clicked the voicemail button.

A familiar voice echoed through to him. “Hey, sorry I keep calling this number, but I’m trying to find someone. So if this is Jackson Hart from North Port near Civicton, this is Lawrence, and I need to talk to you about our–”

Jack rolled his eyes and deleted the message deleted that one without a second thought, clicking down to the next one.

The man speaking to him through this one didn’t ring any bells. “Hello, Mr. Hart. You missed your appointment today. Please call back when you are available to discuss our plans moving forward.”

…Okay then. That was a conversation that was probably going to go even more painfully considering he had no idea what it was about.

So, Jack left that alone and went to the third.

A woman’s voice crackled over the line, intermittently interrupted by what sounded like a dog excitedly barking in this background. “Hey, Jack, this is Veronica Paladino. I’m still available for tomorrow, but I’ll probably have to leave a bit early. I just wanted to let you know, and, yeah. Have a good night.”

Jack’s hand clenched around the phone as the woman’s receiver clacked back into place on the other end of the line.

He needed to get a hold of himself.

If just that name was going to drive him insane–

Nope. Jack needed to be calm. He’d known her for years. He wouldn’t go crazy and almost blow up around Veronica just because she shared her brother’s last name.

…Anyway, Jack quickly went back to that message about a missed appointment before he could think too deeply on what exactly he had promised he’d do with Veronica tomorrow.

The man on the line didn’t say anything about Jack not being allowed to call back after a certain time. Hopefully that meant 7:53pm wasn’t too late.

The phone rang a couple of times as Jack spared a quick glance to Chad and Ambassador Selick chatting away about world peace, or something equally idealistic. When the other line picked up, he fell right back into Cheerful Jack mode. “Hey, this is Jackson Hart, I just saw your message.”

The unfamiliar man answered on the other side. “Good evening, Mr. Hart. We’re pleased you could call us back, but we’re disappointed we didn’t see you today.”

Yeah, what was he supposed to have missed?? Tell him that! “I’m so sorry about this, I had something else come up and I couldn’t get it cleared from my schedule.”

Jack didn’t have a blood drawing that day, he didn’t have a follow-up with the NSA doctors, he didn’t have a dentist appointment… There wasn’t anything for him at work that day, right? He was pretty sure that day was cleared for him.

Why did he have today cleared again?

“This was an incredibly important assignment. We would like a good explanation…”

The voice seemed to contort for a moment, making Jack tap at the receiver in case that would clear it up.

But whatever vocal distorter had been placed over the voice was removed. Replaced with the low, melodic timbre of Mirage. “You can start by telling me what was so important.”

The pit of Jack’s stomach sank as he smacked his hand against his forehead.

Right, he’d had to reschedule his visit with Mirage so he could go to Edna’s.

Only, he’d forgotten about the “reschedule” part of all of that plan…

“So is the vocal distortion a fun ice breaker or did the government not let you have quality phone service?” Jack quipped, unable to stop himself from getting in one jab before he got down to business. “Sorry I missed you. I had an appointment for supers stuff and forgot to tell you.”

Mirage might have sighed on the other side of the line. “I understand that this must be a difficult meeting for us to conduct, but we cannot keep pushing it off.”

“I didn’t mean to. I wrote it in my calendar and everything this time,” Jack informed the woman who had betrayed Syndrome.

Mirage wasn’t completely free from the law. It’s just that the circumstances of her arrest were a little messy…

Nomanisan Island wasn’t US land, and Mirage wasn’t a US citizen. Syndrome was, yes, but he was dead and couldn’t serve time. And all of the murdered supers on the island were US citizens, but the man who had killed them was, again, dead. That meant the highest ranking member of the operation on the island, Mirage, should have been arrested. But she had actually betrayed Syndrome, and was being reasonably cooperative with the whole thing. And Jack hadn’t known it when things started, but the NSA shutting down probably made things even more difficult for the government to figure out how to handle the genocide they were sweeping under the rug.

Which boiled down to: Mirage was on extreme house arrest while she oversaw the transfer of sensitive information and property to the US government working with international law.

And putting Gamma Jack, Mr. Incredible, and Elastigirl right in the middle of it as the only reliable parties who had been on the island.

“...This is a difficult topic,” Mirage began, probably tapping her long finger against the phone. “If you are uncomfortable with discussing the remains of the supers on the island, I am willing to pass further discussion to Mr. Incredible.”

“Supers remains,” she meant dead bodies that she’d help to make.

Jack had to remind himself to just feel tired and hide away anything else as he told her, “No, I’d like to be involved with this. I just forgot to reschedule with you.”

“In that case, would you–”

“We have some breaking news coming to you live about Ambassador Selick!”

Jack glared at Chad’s dopey face and told Mirage, “Sorry, could you repeat that? Ambassador Selick did a backflip or something hopefully worthy of praise on TV and Chad wanted to talk about it.”

“Ambassador Selick?” Mirage echoed. She sounded almost hollow at the name, like it rang an old bell she’d left abandoned.

Jack didn’t know how to respond to that other than, “So, you know her?”

“We originate from the same place,” Mirage enigmatically explained. “Back to the discussion at hand–”

“We’re coming to you live from New Urbem, where Ambassador Selick’s aerocade has just been hacked by the Screenslaver! Elastigirl is in pursuit!”

Whatever else Mirage was saying got drowned out by Jack’s startled, “Wait, what?!”

Mirage seemed a bit flummoxed at being interrupted. “Transportation schedules are not worth that much confusion, Gamma Jack–”

“Ambassador Selick’s helicopter was just hacked!” Jack shot back, scrambling onto the sofa to turn up the volume.

Chad had been replaced with a grim-faced news anchor with a freshly-printed report in his hands (he was kind of cute too– Excuse me?! Jack shoved that thought to the side the instant it appeared!). “We are now receiving reports from the ground, Elastigirl has been spotted entering one of the three hijacked helicopters. Currently we have no visuals. Ambassador Selick had just been on the Chad Tonight Show to discuss recent civil unrest in–”

“Well? What are they saying?” Mirage hissed, suddenly invested with the TV blaring in Jack’s living room.

“I thought you wouldn’t like to hear about superheroes being actually good people,” Jack snapped, though neither of them took the harshness in his tone too seriously. Obviously Mirage was invested because this ambassador was from…wherever Mirage was from. “They don’t have any visuals, but Elastigirl is breaking into one of the escort helicopters.”

“Are you also going to be called in?” Mirage asked, no doubt confused about why Elastigirl was there.

“She’s doing it illegally, so, no, and this is going on a couple of hours from where I am, I couldn’t get there if I wanted to,” Jack elaborated, becoming almost monotone because of the attention he had to give the TV and the conversation in his ear.

The news anchor continued as the screen panned to a shaky camera following a burning helicopter flying through midtown New Urbem. “It appears that several persons have been ejected from inside one of the helicopters, but we have no confirmation on their identities. Police are currently enroute to retrieve any survivors who–”

“A couple people fell out? I think?” Jack tried to report, while equally trying to scan the helicopter for that grey suit Helen was wearing.

He caught the slightest flicker of someone at the controls of one the helicopters, just as the only other remaining chopped in the sky collided with it.

Smoke began to pour out of the engine as Jack held his breath.

Don’t you dare get yourself killed, Helen, I swear–

The helicopter crashed into a construction sight, flames licking at the night sky. A small blob of grey and pink gently drifted out of the plume of fire, that flew safely to the ground, where the shaky camera zoomed in on Elastigirl reshaping herself next to the frazzled, possibly fainted, but otherwise untouched ambassador.

Jack leaned back into his sofa, finally releasing that breath to tell Mirage, “Okay, Elastigirl and the ambassador are fine. The helicopter is kind of a burning heap, and I don’t know what was going on with the other choppers, but at least two people are alive.”

“...Is there a reason for that attack?” Mirage wondered from the other side of the line.

Jack wasn’t sure if she meant to say that aloud or not.

He was saved from having to answer by the news anchor reappearing, “–and police are now reporting that several other dignitaries have been removed from the New Urbem Central Reservoir. It seems, at least for some people tonight, Elastigirl has once again saved the day from Screenslaver.”

His knee had almost gone numb from how hard Jack was clutching it under his fist.

Screenslaver was back.

At that, Screenslaver probably never left!

Two days in a row and they had tried to undermine a major public event and an ambassador on public TV!

And both ties, Elastigirl had saved the day…

In New Urbem…

Where she wasn’t supposed to be…

And even if she was, somehow Screenslaver knew she would be around to save the day…

“...I don’t know,” Jack admitted. A cold, dazed admission as his mind settled on that fact.

He didn’t know what was going on.

Just like he hadn’t known on the island.

But at least there, he knew what syndrome’s face looked like so he could imagine melting it to the bone!

Screenslaver didn’t even have a face yet.

…But they would.

“Hey, can I call you back?” Jack mumbled to Mirage, forcing himself to stay in the present instead of hopping back onto that train to try and remember anything Screenslaver might have put into his mind.

Mirage had insisted on a new meeting, which Jack had expected, but he didn’t really notice what he’d agreed to. He felt the pen in his hands as he wrote it down on his calendar again, and he felt himself say good-bye to the somewhat reformed villainess, and he felt himself put down the phone.

The whole time, his eyes were latched onto the TV screen, unable to look away as fire trucks and policemen and Elastigirl reverberated into his living room, dancing over the hardware store bag on the table and the hand still on the receiver, and stabbing into Jack’s ears.

Screenslaver might have gotten people killed tonight.

Regardless of what Helen said, people could be dead because of this mysterious supervillain.

And Jack was sitting at home in his pajamas, living on the promise he’d made to Helen that he trusted her, even if he didn’t agree with her.

The rain outside was pounding on the sliding glass door, practically threatening to knock the balcony off the side of the building as news from the distant city continued to flood the room.

“I just think it’s lucky that I happened to be in the right place,” Elastigirl told the young reporter holding the microphone to her face. Barely a hair was out of place around her nonchalant smile, as if Helen had been doing hero work for the past 10 years instead of the past two days. “Civilian safety is my top priority, and I’m always going to stand by that.”

“And what do you intend to do about this new Screenslaver threat?” the reporter ask, stealing the words right out of Jack’s head.

Elastigirl didn’t skip a beat. “That’s an excellent question. Currently, we’re going to clean up the mess they left for us, and then I’m going to start tracking them down. They’ve struck twice in two days, so I’m praying they don’t think third time’s the charm, because they’re not going to be threatening us for that long if I have a say in it.”

The reporter laughed and Jack had to stop himself from disintegrating his couch.

Something was going terribly wrong.

If he could just remember anything about when he was hypnotized, no, mind-controller on that train, maybe that would–

Someone rang the buzzer to his door.

And would have gotten a gamma bolt right through the chest if Jack didn’t off the couch, into the air, and have to dodge the ceiling.

It was becoming a trend that week for him to get visitors at inappropriate hours, and he wasn’t particularly enjoying it.

Jack half-expected to see Bob and Lucius waiting outside with another trenchcoat given his luck.

Instead, there was a silver box the size of a small table with the word “Mode” boldly written across the top, partially cut off by a packing sticker from the delivery company.

…That was fast!

Jack really should have learned to expect Edna to be unexpected, he'd known he long enough to not be surprised by her, but she managed to impress him regardless.

Given that he knew there was a hypnosis supervillain lurking around, Jack probably should have tried to be more subtle about picking up the package. But he was wet and tired and currently trying not to plot murder, so it was excusable that he opened the door without another thought and snatched up the box like a gremlin.

The TV was still blaring as he opened the box, dragging a radiation-lit finger along the seam to disintegrate it open.

He felt the power in his chest swell into a warm, crackling fire that beat out the rest of the damp, autumn night.

Under his glowing hands was a royal blue super suit, proudly displaying a golden gamma symbol that was burned into the very memory of the golden age of superheroes. Tucked to the side was a pair of matching gold boots and a custom set of gold gloves that didn’t have fingers or palms to allow his powers an escape from the radiation-proof cloth. Edna had even remembered the matching utility belt that went along with it!

Jack did take a quick note of the new super suit hidden underneath, but he could hardly pay attention to it when it felt like he was holding a solid memory in his hands.

This suit felt a little too fresh, a little too crisp for having a career of crime fighting, but with some proper wearing-in, it might actually be hard to tell the difference between this one and the suit he’d had to abandon on Nomanisan.

It was hard to notice how much he had missed this outfit until he was holding it again, realizing that he didn’t want to let go of it in case it disappeared into radiation fumes when he did.

“Do you have any comments to make about the new push for superhero legalization?” the reported continued from the TV.

She didn’t sound dismissive or inconsolable about the idea.

She seemed excited.

Elastigirl politely laughed. “It’s a long, complicated history that’s getting a little too simplified. But I’ll say, if it does get pushed through, I won’t object. It’s nice being back in the spotlight. You know what I mean?”

People didn’t want them back in the spotlight.

Syndrome had already tried to erase supers once. Twice, actually, in Gamma Jack’s case.

Now, after one threat was defeated, this Screenslaver appears out of nowhere just as people are starting to get interested in supers again.

Jack settled a hand around the smooth, almost silk-like fabric, like putting a hand on the shoulder of a friend he hadn’t seen in years. The report carried on. “Well, you certainly had quite the spotlight on you tonight! What were your thoughts as you risked your own life to save people you might not have ever known?”

Currently the only people who had any leads on who it might be were Jack and Helen. But Helen had decided that she was going to trust the Deavors instead.

And Jack wasn’t about to go back on a promise but…

Would it really hurt to just double-check and make sure they weren’t up to anything?

Especially if people were dying because of Screenslaver?

He knew a huge glass skyscraper that might just hold a couple of answers to those questions.

“Well, you remember what Mr. Incredible used to say?” Elastigirl asked the reporter, practiced professionalism in her voice. “It went like this: we’re the civilians’ protectors. And we’ve got a duty to fulfill because of that.”

Jack held up his super suit, the gamma symbol on its chest level with his eyes.

“So I wasn’t going to rest until I was sure everyone was safe from Screenslaver’s influence. Simple as that.”

Until every civilian was safe. As simple as that.

Including Helen Parr.

Jack took the suit and gently set it on the coffee table, next to the bag of clips and screws and matching screwdrivers he dumped a moment after, then went upstairs to find that sewing machine.

If he was going to investigate Devtech, he was going to be in his full uniform while he did it.

Chapter Text

In The Past (1961)

Mounds of grey rocks and pointed obelisks surrounded by stone cherubs speckled the park like trees in a dead apple orchard. All in uniform rows with uniform flowers to mark their territory from each other.

A couple of the rocks shared custody over a space.

Occasionally you would stumble across a row of flat plaques in the ground.

They were usually not far from the field of flowers with little American flags stuck into their bouquets for the soldiers under the ground.

Overhead, by the shield of oaks that lined the rim of the park, just slightly over everything else on the hill, were small temples made of pillars and sloped roofs that stood proudly against the setting sun. One of them even had a small creek spinning around it, like the moat to a forbidden castle.

The Metroville-Municiburg skyline seemed to take a step back from the small oasis of nature in the city, somehow appearing smaller despite how it surrounded you. The traffic and air travel overhead seemed to be lulled into a sense of quiet when you were on the hill. Only a gentle, cool breeze of early fall dared to disturb the few people left wandering the grassy plane.

It was a place to be at peace.

And that was just one reason Jack felt his skin crawling as he walked down the path. His hands were shoved into his pockets like he expected someone to leap out and grab him, pulling him under one of those rocks if he lingered for too long.

It was a stark contrast to the silhouette standing in front of the setting sun, head bent down as it read something on the stone in front of it. Then, after the appropriate amount of time had passed to pay respects, the silhouette took a step towards the next memorial, once again pausing to read the entire transcription.

When they had finished, Jack was only 10 feet away, but something in the way it held itself made him hesitate. The humanoid figure wasn’t relaxed, not in the slightest. But the tension still caught in its shoulders was only strong enough to keep your posture straight. The grim furrow of its brow only contemplative, not fighting off another headache. Even the way it tapped its foot wasn’t impatient or nervous, only keeping up with the beat of an old memory the shadow couldn’t quite place.

For someone standing around in a graveyard, the silhouette looked downright at ease.

“Hey, Simon!” Jack shouted, cigarette temporarily held between his fingers. Well, he’d probably only talked at slightly louder normal volume, but that felt like shouting in a place like that.

The silhouette straightened, turning its face away from the glare of the sunlight so Jack could finally make out the startled smile on Simon’s face. It grew into something genuinely pleased as he recognized the sun-kissed grin walking towards him. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh, you know, just felt like walking through a graveyard tonight. Ever get that urge?” Jack sarcastically responded, holding his hand over his face so he could actually see where he was going. Green smoke trickled from the stick in his hand as he slipped the filter back into his mouth.

The joke passed Simon’s head as he glanced at the grave he was standing in front of. “Not an urge, no. …If you don’t mind, could you put that out?”

Jack cocked his head to the side, not sure what Si was talking about until his eyes kept flickering back to the smoke.

That earned an eye roll from Jack, who drew in one last drag, sighing the green vapor into the air as he held the cigarette between his fingers. It disintegrated into dust with the rest of the smoke. “Happy?”

“They’re saying those can give you cancer, Jack,” Simon reminded him, not quite remembering that Jack was trying to avoid that particular topic at the moment.

“Yeah…” Jack coughed, pulling his usual ease back into the forefront. “Yeah, I know. I’m doing better, that was my first in two days.”

“That’s wonderful,” Simon cheered, that familiar proud smile spreading across his face. The same sort of smile you could see after he’d just arrested a criminal or put said criminal behind bars.

Jack had to say something before that dopey, proud smile on Simon’s face made Jack smile right back.

“Then what are you doing here?” Jack asked. He took up his customary spot next to Simon and tried to mimic his pensive expression as Jack looked at the grave in front of them. He didn’t recognize the name, and Simon wouldn’t have hidden a recent death in the family from him. Jack liked getting doted on by the Paladinos too much.

“This is a client,” Simon informed him. Then continued when all that got him was a more confused expression. “I visit her on Saturdays.”

That didn’t help Jack at all. “So…was she, like, murdered…?”

“No, she wasn’t murdered,” Simon assured him, chuckling a little to try and ease Jack’s nerves but not quite looking away yet. “She passed from natural causes. I did have a client that was murdered several months ago, but unrelated.”

Jack watched as Simon pointed a few aisles away to a grave he couldn’t pick out, but he knew Simon would be practically triangulating its position.

“I only found them because I had a different client ask me to visit their mother while they were being kept in custody,” Simon explained, rattling off deaths with more ease than Jack felt comfortable with.

He coughed, trying to lean his body language away from the gravestone they were standing in front of. “You just…visit a graveyard? A lot?”

“It’s not as if they’re going to rise up from the ground and drag me down with them,” Simon informed the younger man, who couldn’t tell if that was supposed to be a joke or just an obvious fact. “There’s very little to do for someone after they’re gone, so I like to do what little I can just in case.”

Another moment passed before Simon finally decided he was done for the day and began to take a step back onto the path. “But what–?”

Only to be cut off when he saw an unfamiliar sort of smile on Jack’s face.

Jack wasn’t even sure what that smile meant. It was supposed to go with a shake of his head or a pat on Simon’s back, and he couldn’t decide which, so he was just kind of staring at him with bemused awe.

A look Simon didn’t try to meet, letting his eyes linger for just a moment before he averted them to the ground, to the trees in the distance, back to that smile, the mausoleums. “What are you doing, Jack?”

“Eh? Ah, nothing,” Jack decided, shrugging the question away, despite how that smile stayed on his face. “Just…you’re some guy, Paladino. A complete and utter weirdo, but some kind of guy…”

“...Yes?” Simon decided to agree. That seemed like the safest bet when Jack’s voice went quiet like that. Almost breathy. Like he’d meant to keep something to himself and it slipped out anyway. Simon liked that voice, regardless of if it meant something or if he just wasn’t made to understand it. “And you are also some kind of guy?”

“I mean, it’s nice that you do this.” Jack snorted, shaking himself out of the weird reverie he’d almost fallen into. “You know, I was actually concerned when I was flying by and saw you shallumping through here, so I’m glad it’s just to say ‘hi’ to someone you barely knew. And on a Saturday! I don’t think I’ve seen you outside the office in a couple months! It’s barely 6:30 and you’re not still at work!?”

“You were flying?” Simon exclaimed, the usual low tone of his voice rising a few notes as he began to glance around.

“Relax, no one saw me,” Jack insisted, beginning to walk back down the path.

Simon instinctively followed him. If anything, just in case the NSA swooped in out of nowhere and arrested Jack for taking a twilight flight around Metroville. “You can’t be doing that…”

“If you didn’t want me to stop by for a chat, I’m happy to leave now,” Jack told him, non-commitally shrugging as they fell into step next to each other, the setting sun disappearing behind their backs as they started to make their way down the hill.

“I didn’t say I wanted you to leave,” Simon corrected him, the graves shrinking smaller and smaller as they led each other down the uneven pavement. “But you could always pick a better place for a ‘chat.’”

“Like where?” Jack asked, rolling a stone under his foot.

“Well.” Simon stared straight ahead, which immediately made Jack redirect his attention to him. Simon didn’t just stare at stuff. That’s how he blew things up. “Are you doing anything at the moment?”

“I don’t know…” Jack hummed to himself, nonchalantly checking the time on his watch, despite how he knew his evening was entirely free. Simon always had the same, surprised and flattered expression on his face whenever he saw Jack was still wearing that watch, and Jack enjoyed getting a glimpse of that look whenever he could. “Yeah, I think I am. What were you thinking?”

“Would you like to get drinks tonight?” Simon asked him, a strange mix between stilted and mumbling as the gravestones around them became smaller and smaller until they seemed to fade into the grass.

“Sure!” Jack decided, a little confused why his friend seemed almost nervous about that. “Which kinds of drinks? Drinks, or drinks?”

“Drinks,” Simon confirmed. Leaving it completely ambiguous to any passers-by what the tow of them were talking about, but Jack easily interpreted as, ‘Aww, no alcohol, we have to get normal drinks…’ So, naturally, when he saw Jack pouting, Simon had to be the mature one and remind him, “I’m not letting you fly around the city tipsy. I shouldn’t be letting you fly around the city at all to begin with.”

“Fiiiiiine,” Jack bemoaned as they finally arrived on the sidewalk on the perimeter of the grassy plane that made the Metroville-Municiburg Bridge Park. “But I get to choose where we go.”

“I forgot you only went to seven coffee shops in either city,” Simon sighed, earning a snicker from Jack for just how exasperating that made finding a place to eat when the two of them were about town. “Which is closer?”

“Well, where did you park your car?” Jack started, mentally mapping out the location of said coffee shops in his mind.

What? They were the only places in the city that had consistent and appropriately-priced hot drinks! It wasn’t “being picky,” Jack knew who treated him right and was loyal to quality!

“I took the train today,” Simon told him as they both paused by the curb, evening traffic slowly snailing past them. “How far are you willing to walk?”

“We could take the subway?” Jack offered, even though his stomach kind of rolled at the idea.

Which Simon practically sensed, if that look meant anything. “You would never be seen on a subway.”

“Oh, thank goodness, you’re okay with walking,” Jack concluded. He tossed his elbow down the street, towards a highrise with a telecommunications company logo on its side. “Want to just go to Mike’s Diner? That’s, what, 15 minutes? 20 minutes from here?”

“...Well, their coffee is decent enough,” Simon concluded, squinting a bit to find out if he could see the coffee shop from there. “Though, if it’s too far away, I’m concerned you could go into withdrawal from not flying for so long.

“Wow, and people really don’t think you have a sense of humor,” Jack chuckled. Simon opened his mouth to say something in response, but his voice shrivelled up into a sharp intake of breath as Jack grabbed his hand, gently tugging at it as he took the first few steps. “Come on, Si, I’m taking you out for drinks tonight.”

He should have noticed that the sunset wasn’t what was making Simon’s face turn pink as they walked into downtown.

And Jack should have noticed that the heat on his own face wasn’t there from Simon’s eyes lingering against him.

Well, maybe a little because of how Simon was looking at him. Just not because of his laser vision.

Ugh, what was Jack saying??

Nope. No. Grab that feeling, smash it into a little ball and chuck it as far away as you can, Jack.

You already almost made him think you were one of Dorothy’s friends that night in his office, you don’t need him to start thinking about that again.

Even if Jack was holding onto Simon’s hand until they were standing outside the diner. Forcing himself not to notice Simon was cradling Jack’s hand just as firmly until the taller man let go to get the door. But even when the teenage hostess was walking them back to the only empty booth in the restaurant, Jack couldn’t shake the strange, fuzzy feeling radiating up his arm from where Simon had been holding him.

Thank goodness Jack was balancing that out by talking about the girl he was with the night before as they stepped around the dinner crowd shuffling around them, “I’m telling you, that dame last night was insane! I don't know what was up with her.”

He could sense Simon holding back a sigh as a waitress rushed past them, holding a tray with the wafting smell of fresh coffee tumbling into the air around it. “I see.”

“Ugh, no you don't,” Jack bemoaned, dramatically flopping against Simon's shoulder as they slipped through the crowd to follow the quick teenager to the booth tucked in the corner. “Blondes are crazy.”

Jack felt the heat of Simon's stare burning against his head.

He rolled his eyes, swatting the back of his hand against his shoulder. “Yeah, don't lie, you like that I'm a little crazy. Shut up.”

“I didn't say anything,” Simon cheekily informed him, looking quite pleased with himself. The hostess disappeared the instant they both sat down so she could go help a different waitress pick up two spilled dinner plates.

Jack stared right back into those infuriatingly blue eyes, narrowing his own in suspicion. “But you were thinking it really hard.”

“Mm. Fair enough,” Simon relented, just in time for a waiter in a brown apron to appear next to the table.

“Good evening everyone, sorry for all the chaos in here tonight,” he apologized, putting on a professional smile. “What can I get for you?”

He was kind of a cute barista at that.

What?

What??

Why was Jack having all these weird inverted thoughts today??

Or Jack had meant to be thinking about the female waitress behind this guy, the one who was busy cleaning up the mess she’d made on the ground. Yeah, that had to be it.

Jack needed to get more sleep, being with that dame the night before must have messed him up…

“Just a black coffee,” Simon told him, the order so familiar it might as well have been, “hello.” Honestly, if Jack walked into a room and said, “Hi,” and Simon responded, “black coffee,” Jack probably would have carried on with his day and never realized.

The waiter scribed something down on his notepad before he was smiling at both of them again. “Anything else?”

Jack opened his mouth to speak, but Simon beat him to the punch. “He’ll take a hot chocolate, no whipped cream, but if you have marshmallows he would like that.”

Simon rattle that off like he’d read the order from a teleprompter over the waiter’s shoulder. Like it was from an old script he’d read years ago but still remembered a few of his favorite lines.

Jack’s mouth stayed open, but slowly curled up into a pleasantly surprised smile. The taller man sensed he’d done something to garner the amusement of his compatriot because Simon turned to look at Jack while the waiter finished scribbling in his notepad.

And for some reason, Simon had the nerve to look worried??

About what? He’d actually managed to decipher one of the many indistinguishable lines of gibberish that made up Jack’s somewhat bizarre eating habits?

“No, no, you’re doing great. Keep that up,” Jack teasingly assured Simon, watching to make sure the sudden tension in his shoulders deflated.

“Okay, I have that down. Did you guys want menus or where you just going to do drinks?” the waiter asked, tapping his pen against the paper.

Simon shook his head as Jack explained, “Nope. Just drinks.”

“Got it. That’ll be out in a jiffy.”

The waiter scurried off to the kitchen, pausing to help the waitress with her things before fading into the crowd.

“Simon, I’m a grown man, I can order my own hot chocolate with toasted marshmallows, thank you very much,” Jack playfully admonished him. Making sure to keep his voice as cheerful and light as he had intended the joke. Something seemed to be bothering Simon and Jack was going to make sure whatever it was had nothing to do with him. “Also, how did you know my order?”

Simon shrugged, obviously trying to act more nonchalant than he felt as he leaned forward on his elbows. “I asked Karen.”

Jack brightened at Apogee’s name, even if that was quickly tarnished by the fact that, uh, Beamer wasn’t exactly Karen’s favorite person. Whether Simon knew that or not, he wasn’t actually sure. “I didn’t know you and Karen still talked.”

“We don’t,” Simon admitted, a touch of melancholy to the words.

They probably hadn’t really talked even when supers were still legal. Gamma Jack and Apogee always got along, she even tried to get Dicker to make him part of the Thrilling Three instead of Gazerbeam. She had very different opinions and the man sitting across the table from Jack, but it didn’t mean they couldn’t get coffee together back in the Glory Days. Which meant, naturally, she would have known Jack’s usual beverage of preference.

“I asked years ago,” Simon followed up, almost sheepish with how he said it.

And Simon had gone out of his way to ask Apogee about it, despite how they never did see eye-to-eye.

Jack had to admit, he was a little flattered by just how flustered this admission was making Simon.

“And you decided to remember that for years? Wow, Si, you do care,” Jack cooed, trying not to sound as touched as he was. Simon’s diet wasn’t exactly the most conventional either (who could drink a gallon of black coffee one day, then wake up the next and decide to do it again?!), but Jack was very specific about what he liked. He didn’t hold many expectations for people remembering the details like this! So, he ignored the fact that Simon had gone out of his way to ask Apogee for Jack’s beverage order of choice and changed the subject. “Speaking of those good old days, do you feel like going bowling with the guys tomorrow?”

Simon’s eyes shifted to the side, doing a couple laps around the napkin dispenser as he reluctantly forced out, “We’ll see. I like to try being in bed at a reasonable hour on Sundays…”

“I can try to talk them into a basketball night instead,” Jack offered, feeling a touch of satisfaction to see Simon’s eyes temporarily light up at the idea.

Simon blinked away the glow behind his glasses, readjusting his frames as he insisted, “No, bowling is just fine.”

“But you miss getting to play with Downb– Dennis, yeah?” Jack asked, recalling how the two of them were usually the ones messing around in the basketball court the NSA had in the Metroville-Municiburg headquarters.

Jack was never a sports guy, per say. He was sure he would have liked them well enough, but being a lab rat for most of his tween and teenage years kind of got in the way of any after school activities, and superheroes didn’t really have time for rec leagues. So, Gamma Jack had to make do with shouting awful advice to Simon when Gazerbeam and Downburst both happened to be playing at the recreation hall.

“He was the only other person in the agency who could play,” Simon said, completely deflecting the question.

Jack wasn’t actually sure where Downburst had been relocated to.

And since his only contact on that sort of information was currently trying not to shoot one of those diner jars of sugar, Jack decided to just follow wherever Simon’s comment led.

“That’s because you’re both freaking tall!” he insisted, pulling an eye roll out of Simon as Jack waved his hand up and down his currently slouching figure. Jack was 6’0” and content with that, but somehow this glasses-wearing lawyer was a full head taller than him. “Hey, remember that old pingpong table?”

Simon laughed at an old memory before he could hold a fist over his mouth to keep the rest of it from coming out. “...I remember Cassie nearly setting it on fire several times when we were using it, yes.”

Yeah, they didn’t get to keep that ping pong table for long with the amount of times Blazestone was using it. And how that woman seemed to celebrate both defeat and victory by accidentally setting something on fire.

“Deservedly so!” Jack scolded him, smiling at the smug expression on Simon’s face as they both remembered that he was just amazing at ping pong too for some reason! But, Jack’s voice was calmer as he spoke again. Maybe a little too sentimental. “You’re too good at everything you try…”

Just enough to make it look like that tinge of red had snuck its way back into Simon’s cheeks. He rubbed a hand around his wrist as he corrected Jack. “Not everything. I never did quite beat Karen’s score on the pinball machine.”

Jack didn’t mention how Apogee had ripped him a new one while she was complaining to Jack about, “the nerve of that man! He’s already taken over the Thrilling Three, he already drives the Chopped, now he’s taking the pinball machine?!” because that would be childish. Also, he didn’t want to skate by the topic of the Thrilling Three again. “Good. Because that was my sport of choice and if you had beaten her, I would have had to beat you to defend her honor.”

Simon raised an eyebrow at him. “Beat me at pinball, or in a duel?”

“Pinball.” Jack blinked. “Why would I need to defeat you in a duel?”

“I wasn’t sure. You started talking about defending a fair maiden’s honor and I assumed this must involve trying to punch me,” Simon explained, somehow adept at the basics of Medieval honor duels but not at the fact that Jack was joking.

“It doesn't matter. I would have beaten you anyway,” Jack assured him, smiling smugly to himself at the thought.

“You would have tried,” Simon corrected. That earned such a gobsmacked expression from the other man that Simon might have worried he just shot a laser into Jack’s face.

Jack sputtered, clutching a hand to his chest. “Well! Then Specs, guess I’ll be defending my honor after all!”

Simon chuckled softly to himself at the borderline evil smirk that grew along Jack’s face. “Alright. Pick your method of destruction.”

He said it with so much seriousness Jack actually laughed, picking his hand up from his chest to catch the guffaw as it came out of his mouth. When he composed himself, they were both grinning at each other, waiting to hang on the words that left Jack’s mouth. “Simon Paladino, for tarnishing my honor and daring to say you would beat me in a sparring match–”

“I would.”

“–and interrupting me while I'm on a roll!” Jack improvised, shooting Simon a glare. That only made him shrug and keep smiling at the way Jack's nose scrunched up when he was trying to look angry. “I challenge you to a game of bowling with me, Lucius, and Bob tomorrow night!”

“...Fine,” Simon relented, knowing Jack would happily drag him along by the arm if he tried to refuse one of his games. Even if Simon crossed his arms and lamented his sleep schedule by mumbling, “Why can't we do it on a Friday? Or a Wednesday? I don't have to go in early on Thursday mornings…”

“It'll be fun!” Jack insisted, scooting forward in the booth to lean against the table to mimic the pose Simon had been practicing until he'd started crossing his arms. “And they sell those peanut butter and chocolate candies you like in the vending machines, so if you're not having fun, I can just bribe you.”

“This again?” Simon exclaimed. Well, as much as he could exclaim while keeping his voice the same deep, monotonous tone that you could feel in your bones.

It had occurred to Jack a couple times just how easily Si could have made a dame feel weak with that voice, if he bothered trying to talk to any.

Simon kept his arms pinned against his chest to stop the urge to wring his wrists again and continued in a huff. “Why does everyone assume that I have some sort of undying devotion to peanut butter and chocolate? I mentioned it once in passing and I haven't been able to escape it.”

“Because you do like it,” Jack easily spelled out for him.

Simon glared at him, then had to rub away the glow of his lasers in his eyes before he continued. “Yes, but I do enjoy other things. Like–”

“Black coffee and hot chocolate?” The waiter reappeared beside their table so suddenly both supers had to physically restrain their instincts from launching him into the ceiling.

Instead, Jack pointed at Simon and said, “Black coffee is his.”

The waiter quickly set down their drinks and apologized for any delay, then left the two men to their conversation.

Simon raised his mug to his lips and drank down a full fourth of the mug. Jack had to watch with a little bit of amazement as the lawyer seemed to ignore the scalding, steaming liquid no doubt burning a hole through his throat.

“I thought you didn't have any heat-resistance as part of your powers,” Jack whispered, having to point this out whenever Simon pulled that stunt.

Simon just shrugged and responded with the same response whenever Jack made that comment. “Of course I do. I'm a lawyer."

And, every time, Jack snickered, then Simon would just throw back another quarter.

He let Simon settle in with his mug before he nudged his own mug towards him, the fluffy white marshmallows swishing around in the hot chocolate. Jack looked up at Simon expectantly, like a puppy would nudge their ball forward for their owner to throw. “Hey, Si, could you…?”

Simon glanced at the mug, then up at Jack, then into his own mug, then looked back at Jack, disappointed that those bright teal eyes were still looking at him so hopefully he had to be annoyed so he wouldn't start blushing again. “Jack. I’m not allowed to do that anymore.”

“Please?” Jack pitifully poked at his mug. “I'd do it myself, but I'd just turn the marshmallows into ashes…”

His eyes momentarily glowed green to emphasize his point.

The other man sighed, holding out for another moment, but they knew Jack would get his way.

Simon didn't really need much convincing from Jack. It was an unfortunate character flaw that the blond took full advantage of.

The older man lowered his own cup so he had a clear view of the mug in the middle of the table. With one more defeated look of fake annoyance at Jack, he let the power behind his glasses build. Heat rippled from his eyes, warping the air between them and the cup just enough that you might notice if you were paying attention.

The long stare lasted just long enough to properly toast the marshmallows floating at the lip of the mug.

Thank you,” Jack almost sang, picking up his hot chocolate and tentatively sipped at it. And of course it was amazing, because toasted marshmallows were the best thing to have with hot chocolate, hence Jack didn't see the need to drink it any other way! Simon was given an appropriately thankful smile after he had finished dispersing the lasers threatening to burst out of his eyes.

“What do you do when I'm not there to help you?” Simon sighed, maybe joking, but because this was Simon he had to be half curious.

“I set a lot of stuff on fire,” Jack told him, swiping a drop of white goo off of the corner of his mouth. “There's also a lot more explosions. But notably fewer holes in my walls, so, it's hard to tell what's the better of two evils.”

“Well, if you ever need a good lawyer, you know where to find me,” Simon offered. That was definitely a joke.

Jack grinned, leaning his jaw against his fist. “What if I let you come to me instead?”

“If I see a green explosion anywhere in Metroville, you should be afraid that I'm going to come find you,” Simon warned him. You could see the stack of paperwork for such an incident already piling up in his head.

“No promises. I could use the company. It's lonely being a rich, handsome playboy, the only vice for my comfort being the droves of women throwing themselves at my feet,” Jack sarcastically lamented, taking another sip.

Simon shook his head, sparing a glance at Jack for his theatrics before reminding him, “And because you're ineligible for a pro-bono lawyer, I can't defend you. So please don't blow anything up.”

“Fine, I'll just invite you to get actual drinks when I miss you,” Jack decided, tipping his cup of hot chocolate towards Simon. “Are you usually free Saturday nights?”

Simon paused to think it over. “Occasionally.”

“Are you free next Saturday night?” Jack clarified, not realizing he was actually making this a real offer until he started to worry that Simon was busy.

“Yes–” Simon cut himself off to mentally double check, but shook his head. “Yes, I think I'm free.”

“Great! It's a date, I'll pick you up,” Jack decided, settling against the back of the booth.

Simon almost choked on his coffee, needing to take a moment to set it aside before he could ask, “Where are we going?”

Why was Simon blushing again?

Jack shrugged noncommittally, finding a weird smugness is getting that kind of reaction. “Not sure yet. But if I’m picking you up, it’ll probably be somewhere near your house.”

“...” Simon coughed again and resumed hiding behind his coffee mug to try and get a little bit of his decorum back. “You don’t have to pick me up. I can get you instead.”

“Nah, Si, I’m not making you drive all the way into Metroville,” Jack scolded him. …Okay, but, “Unless you want to pick me up on your motorcycle, then I might be convinced.”

The pink in Simon’s face was still refusing to go away, but Jack felt a bit better when the blushing was joined by a genuine smile. “How about you try to convince me where to go, and I’ll try to convince you to let me take you there?”

“...And whoever convinces the other person first gets to do what they want for both,” Jack added, needing a little bit more stakes involved.

Simon didn’t bother pointing out that would have happened regardless of this additional clause to the deal, but he wasn’t going to argue. Jack had that excited, almost giddy gleam in his teal eyes that liked to show up whenever he was trying to get Simon to do something he wasn’t sure about. It was always just amusing enough that it could always get Simon to feel like they both won when he agreed. “If that’s what you want.”

“It’s what both of us want. Because we both know I’m right,” Jack explained. After all, this was common knowledge. “Okay, but back to this blonde girl I was telling you about–”

Simon just rolled his eyes and watched Jack as he talked about his night.

The diner passed around them in muffled, cheerful blurs, never able to break through to the conversation at the booth. The sun set behind the buildings and the streetlamps turned on, helping the neon “Mike’s Diner” sign illuminate the sidewalks that were slowly growing more and more empty as twilight tipped into night. Headlights flashed through the glass windows, occasionally blinding one of the two men while they talked about work and silence and women (though that was mostly Jack), eventually settling into a conversation about how Bob and Lucius were going to destroy them both at bowling the next day.

The mugs on the table were refilled at least three times, and would have been more if either of the supers was paying enough attention to them to ask for the waiter to come over. The dinner rush died out within an hour, people slowly drifting out into the streets while Simon told Jack about how he’d been practicing jokes. You know, just in case. It was all Jack could do to politely give him tips instead of falling over sideways into the booth with laughter at every botched attempt. His sense of humor really had gotten ruined by hanging out with Simon so much over the years.

The waiter was cleaning the booths that bookended the one where Jack and Simon were sitting. The chatter of the diner became more muffled, most intimate. Not so much about the experience of going out, but more about finding a place to hide away with your thoughts, and maybe a person or two to share them with. It reminded both of them about that private room in the back that they used to always go to. Where Mr. Incredible, Frozone and Gamma Jack had met the man who would become Gazerbeam, and all of the afternoons after that where they would complain about their shift or recount the juiciest parts of the battles they had just gotten out of. They would take turns bickering over who had to pay, and regardless the two pairs of friends would stick together, leaving Bob and Frozone to go pay and Gamma Jack and Gazerbeam to stay at the table, or vice versa.

The check had been delivered to the booth for probably a few hours, and Jack had long since won the argument to cover that one because Simon had ordered for both of them. He still couldn’t believe Simon knew his drink order, that was enough to make him want to pay for any other night they went out together.

Which would be next Saturday.

Somewhere.

Neither of them knew what they were doing, but they were both too busy trying not to act excited that they would figure it out later.

According to the chrome clock on the wall (double-checked by Jack’s watch), it was after nine o’clock when they both finally decided to get going. Simon had to try and catch one of the trains leaving the city and Jack was admittedly a little drowsy now that he was putting in normal hours at his, ugh, “real” job, which required him to get up way earlier than what should be legally allowed.

Simon had chuckled at Jack’s short tirade about that as they were walking down the sidewalk. The breeze of autumn settling in around them made it chillier than either of them expected, making them walk a little closer together than they usually would. Despite that Jack was wearing a gab jacket and Simon had indeed gone into the office that morning so he was still wearing one of his grey sports coats.

They were hardly going in any direction, just wandering wherever they noticed they were walking. Maybe they should have been on their toes or glancing over their shoulders for signs of trouble, but they had lived too long as superheroes to let a little night stroll bother them. This was just nice.

“–Veronica is sorry she missed you the other day,” Simon continued as they were walking past a corner store that had closed hours ago.

“Aww, she was visiting? I’m sorry I missed her, I feel like I haven’t seen the little squirt in months!” Jack exclaimed, kicking a pebble down the sidewalk.

Simon held a hand in front of Jack’s chest before he could walk into the street. Jack had seen the car before it drove through the crosswalk, but he couldn’t fault Gazerbeam for his protective reflexes kicking in. It was even kind of touching, in a way.

“You haven’t,” Simon reminded him, taking his hand away as they crossed the street.

“Yeah, because I’ve been doing double duty between work and making sure you’re not asleep on your desk,” Jack chided him, nudging his shoulder into Simon’s arm. “And I still stop by your parents’ house with you when I can, so it’s her fault she’s been busy when I’m visiting.”

“I’m surprised you haven’t been scared away just yet,” Simon admitted. Though, with some level of irony, Jack’s loud personality probably fit in with Simon’s family better than Simon himself.

“Nah, they’re all great. Except your nona. She’s scary,” Jack informed him, completely serious. Like a elderly Italian woman with leathery skin and too many mason jars was the most terrifying opponent he could ever dream of facing.

It forced Simon to bite back his smile and look at something else whenever Jack brought it up. Which Jack noticed every time because Simon was so awful at hiding how funny he thought the situation was.

“She is!” Jack insisted, if anything, just to watch Simons have to struggle even harder to keep himself from laughing. “Every time I need to drop Veronica off at your parents’ house, your nona opens the door and doesn’t even say ‘hi’! She smiles and says, ‘Polpetto di Simone! It’s so good to see you!’ Which I thought was fine until I realized she was calling me your meatball, and I’m still not entirely convinced she’s not insulting me!”

Simon couldn’t stop himself from choking out a few utterly amused laughs, not helped by the fact that Jack was looking at him like he might have gone insane. “No, she’s not insulting you, it sounds better in Italian. That only means she assumes you’re my…close friend. Try not to read into it.”

Jack was so busy rolling his eyes at Simon’s lack of sympathy he didn’t notice that small pause. “Your meatball is looking for some sympathy, Si, stop laughing!”

“...”

“...”

That was when they both broke down into a fit of snickers on the sidewalk, the shorter super holding himself up on Simon’s shoulder as they made their way down the block.

“Okay, back to Veronica, I want to know how she’s doing,” Jack said, trying to compose himself a little.

Simon was always much more capable of being proper and professional, so he was already back to the polite smile he usually wore. “You’ll be pleased to know, she has decided she knows what to do with her life and has successfully applied to and gotten a position as a secretary for the county clerk.”

“Hey, that’s great! Good for her!” And Jack was genuinely excited for the little scamp. She’d been through at least five career paths in four years, she had to be getting close to finding something she actually wanted to do. But, uh “How long do you think she’ll be able to stand working behind a desk?”

Simon’s eyes purposefully darkened back and forth across the streets. Just in case. “...I would like to hope she stays for at least a year.”

“Ooh, high bar,” Jack warned him, practically already hearing her bouncing off the walls of the little office they were going to stick her in.

The grim expression on Simon’s face told Jack he was thinking the same thing…

“She’s got a good head on her shoulders, she’s just got a lot of energy everywhere else,” Jack reminded him. He could only assume how helpful this was, Veronica had been kind of a point of contention for the family for a few years now, but she was a good kid. And Simon knew that. “As an expert in being the youngest child, I can assure you, we do in fact calm down eventually. Sometimes we even learn about this thing that I think is called ‘responsibility.’”

Simon didn’t say anything for a moment. But Jack could see those gears in his head turning, trying to figure out the best way to say, “How can it be this difficult for her??” without actually meaning that.

Which was good, because Jack would have shot back, “You’re one to talk,” and they would have had to remind Simon of the many reasons why it wasn’t normal to become randomly obsessed with learning the complete history of admiralty law in Guam for months.

“I know she’ll be just fine,” Simon admitted, hands in his pockets as they crossed between streetlights.

“But on the other hand, what if she’s not?” Jack added, knowing he’d hit the nail on the head when Simon didn’t respond. “Then she has both of us to look out for her.”

Jack felt Simon stiffen next to him. “‘Both of us’–? Jack, you already put yourself out enough–”

“Both of us. You, and your meatball,” Jack insisted, a mischievous grin creeping onto his face as he watched Simon smile down at him. “Don’t you dare call me that in any other context or I will set off a nuclear bomb underneath you.”

“You are such a strange person, Jackson,” Simon remarked, something strange creeping into his words. The closest word to it was probably ‘gratitude,’ but that didn’t seem to be it.

Jack took it anyway. “If I am, it’s because I’ve been around you too much. But apparently I’m not going to stop, so thanks for that.”

“I hope it doesn’t go in reverse as well,” Simon mumbled, deciding it was a good opportunity to turn right.

Jack followed along, grinning up at him as he leaned into his arm. “Why? Scared being around me will finally make you get up the nerve to talk to a girl?”

The look Simon gave him at just the suggestion was downright comical. “No, I don’t think that will ever happen. But I just can’t imagine not liking black coffee one day…”

Jack shook his head and stood back to his full height, wondering just how he had gotten mixed up with this guy whose most important concern was getting the energy he needed to burn the candle at both ends.

The streetlamps grew as they passed into a more modern part of town.

“How’s your mother doing?” Simon asked. It was gentle and it was said with utmost care, but it made Jack stiffen into a board.

“Fine. She’s doing good,” he blankly responded, not sure which answer he was looking for or which answer would be most appropriate. “The doctors are saying she’s doing pretty okay, so they want her to come in again next week.”

“That’s good,” Simon tried to reassure him.

But broaching the topic was like trying to get Jack to say he was going to give up using his powers: it wasn’t true, and it wasn’t going to happen.

So, all that left Simon to do was remind him, “She can pull through. She already has with so much for so long. And if she’s anything like her son, I’d be foolish to place any bets against her.”

That…got a little bit of a smile back on Jack’s face.

It was more like the corner of his lip twitched up, but still…

And that meant it was time to change the subject!

“Yeah, I bet she will,” Jack agreed, plastering a grin back onto his face to hide the smile that refused to reform underneath. “Man, it’s getting late, isn’t it?”

“I think you’re right,” Simon agreed, glancing at Jack’s watch over his shoulder. They’d been walking for almost an hour.

“And I also think that means if we want to get you on a train, we have to be there, like, now.”Jack hissed through his teeth, picking up the pace.

The streetlamps were starting to look familiar the longer they walked, until Jack saw a part of the skyline that looked downright identical to the one outside his apartment.

They had somehow managed to walk all the way back to his apartment complex??

Even if they took the subway, that meant they wouldn’t get to a train station for 45 minutes!

“Think we can make the last train by 10:30?” Jack nervously asked, eyeing the sidewalk for a subway station he knew wasn’t there.

“If we could find a monorail that went double the speed of any other metro I’ve ridden and we could find it in two minutes, then yes,” Simon informed him, trying to look around but he wasn’t as familiar with the area as Jack. It probably didn’t help that his night vision was absolute trash.

“Any chance you could sleep at your office?” Jack chuckled, trying not to let the worry creep into his voice. “Or I guess you’ll finally have to take up my gratuitous offer and stay over for the night.”

This time it was Jack’s superhero instincts that kicked in when Simon outright froze in the middle of the street. “You weren’t joking?”

Jack grabbed him by the jacket and yanked him onto the sidewalk as a car came around the corner. He quickly dropped his hand to the side, not letting Simon know why he was suddenly blushing so much. “Uh, yeah. I mean, no, I wasn’t joking.”

Why was he blushing? That was Simon’s gimmick for the night, not Jack’s!

“I don’t want to impose,” Simon started to say, straightening his jacket much more than was required for the small tug Jack had given it.

“You’re not imposing if I’m offering,” Jack insisted, fighting away that blushing for all he was worth. “I have a guest room for a reason. You can just borrow some of my pajamas, I don’t care. I only wear one set at a time.”

Simon seemed outright flustered, not something that either of them were used to seeing. “Really, Jack, I can manage–”

Jack’s sigh cut him off. That, and the fact that he had grabbed his elbow and was now dragging the reluctant lawyer towards his apartment building towering over them. “Come on. You’re going to accept my hospitality whether you like it or not.”

And, somewhere between the sidewalk and the towering skyscraper, Simon managed to grumble out a, “If it won’t be too much of a bother…” that Jack took as the closest thing he’d get to, “Yes! Of course I would love to stay with you for the night, oh my greatest best friend!”

And then Jack almost ruined their tentative agreement by not taking Simon to the front door, but leading him to a side alley so he could fly them up to his apartment. Which Simon adamantly refused–he wasn’t about to let Jack get caught illegally using his powers because he hated elevator music–so Jack had to convince him with a smirk and shooting into the sky without his permission.

After the startled yelp of surprise that garnered from the lawyer, they were practically almost at Jack’s floor.

“This is a horrible idea.”

“It’s fine! No one will notice!”

“Yes, keep shouting. That will make people want to look outside, and they’ll watch as I’m proven right.”

“You’re such a stick in the mud sometimes, you know that?”

Jack hopped over the balcony railing and let Simon escape from the princess hold he’d scooped him up into. Not that it was ideal, but it was something they were both used to Jack doing, and it was better than tossing Simon over his shoulder firefighter-style. “Ta-da. We have arrived, no one noticed, and we’re here before the elevator would have gotten to the ground floor to let us in.”

Simon tried to give Jack a condescending look, but it just turned into a bemused expression. “I suppose this should be when I thank you for letting me stay.”

“Hm, well, I do tend to do things better when I’m praised for them, so, yes,” Jack confirmed, still hovering a few inches over Simon’s head as he proudly grinned, “get to the good part.”

“Alright,” Simon chuckled. Then lightly wrapped his fingers around the middle of Jack’s jacket, slowly pulling him back to the ground.

Jack felt something hot just under his jacket.

Between the ribs where Simon was holding him in place.

It buzzed against his sternum as he felt his feet touch down on his balcony.

Now he was looking up at Simon, noticing just how close they were standing. And the buzzing started to feel like a burn.

Simon takes his hand back and puts it at his side. Just for the deep, drowning voice to oh so sincerely tell him, “Thank you.”

It must be because he’s tired.

It must be because it’s getting later into the night.

It must be because he was winded from carrying him all the way up to his floor.

There was no other explanation for why those words slipped through Jack’s ears, coiled down his spine, and hit something in his gut that forced him to hold back the urge to shudder.

It occurred to Jack just how closely they were standing. Practically flush to each other save for the smallest ravine between them that let the night air pass by.

Such a small jump from standing apart to standing with each other.

If he wanted, Jack could have tipped forward and grab simon by his own coat, nothing else keeping them separated as he–

…What did he want?

It felt like when Psycwave would have you under her powers’ influence.

You could feel yourself, sometimes you could even see yourself, but you had no control over what you were doing.

Only instead of being locked in his body, Jack had to force himself to keep his mind locked away from doing anything stupid.

Like what?

What did he want to do so badly?

…Simon shuffled to the side, breaking the moment before Jack could decide.

“I can still try to catch the last train,” he offered, possibly genuine, possibly just trying to find a new conversation to break free of the silence that was temporarily wrapped around them.

Jack sharpened his features again, sauntering past Simon to get the door. “Too late, you’re already here.”

He grabbed the handle for the sliding glass door and opened it, grandly gesturing for Simon to enter his humble abode.

“Besides, your only escape is through my apartment, so you might as well just stay,” Jack pointed out.

“I suppose I will be,” Simon finally decided, the weight in his words making it official as they both stepped inside.

Jack showed Simon where he could put his shoes, then jogged upstairs to quickly change into his own pajamas and grab a pair that might fit Simon.

Maybe if they had been lesser friends, not so much the type to know what the other would say or know each other’s drink orders (He knew my drink order :) ), it would have been strange to instantly arrive at someone’s home, throw on pajamas, and commence an adult sleepover, but Jack had decided Simon wouldn’t care, and Simon knew that Jack would be more than happy to skip any formalities.

So when Jack threw a set of pajamas in Simon’s face and told him to go change, neither of them thought it was particularly unusual. Simon went to find the guest room on the second floor of the penthouse, and Jack flopped onto his navy blue couch, yanking the TV remote out of the cushions.

He had flipped the channels around, trying to find something worth watching at that time of night, lingering just long enough on some Marilyn Monroe movie that it was what he was watching when Simon came back down the stairs.

Both fortunately and unfortunately, Simon and Jack weren’t terribly different builds, so Jack’s loaned pajamas didn’t necessarily fit badly. But Simon was almost half a foot taller than Jack, so he was still wrestling the outfit into the modest position.

And if Jack happened to stare at the abs that occasionally poked out from underneath Simon's borrowed shirt, well, he was just happy that both of them were still keeping up with their superhero training even a year after the ban.

“What did you find?” Simon asked, as if either of them had discussed putting on a movie at all.

Jack got temporarily distracted by the fact that Simon just decided to tuck the shirt into his pants and therefore, the abs were now gone forever, but he got himself back on track as Simon sat down next to him. Admittedly, Jack wasn’t much of a movie-goer. He didn’t have anything against them, any good-looking dame on a screen was bound to get his attention, but he’d only just started watching more TV now that he wasn’t working as a super.

So, Marilyn Monroe, he knew her.

Why she was playing the ukulele in a room full of women and one guy with coke bottle glasses, uh, that he might need an explanation on.

“No idea.”

Simon looked at him like he’d just said he hadn’t seen Singin’ In the Rain. Which, well. He hadn’t seen that either.

“Is this one of your noir movies?” he double-checked, but judging by the way Simons just grew more concerned, Jack decided he must have missed several details.

“Alright, we’re watching this,” Simon declared, taking the remote from Jack and setting it on the coffee table.

Jack sputtered as Simon made himself comfortable. “It’s probably halfway through already!”

“Then you have a lot of catching up to do,” Simon informed him, settling the matter.

Jack huffed, crossing his arms and deciding to stay stone-faced as the rest of the scene played out. Even though he didn’t have any reason to be annoyed, it was just for the fun of the game, sometimes.

A game Simon won when he grabbed at Jack’s elbow and slowly brought him closer to the middle of the sofa, making the latter reluctantly sigh.

One key thing neither of them remembered was that Simon was currently still working off three cups of coffee and that wasn’t going away anytime soon. Jack, on the other hand, was not so energetic after the outing.

Sometimes during the movie, they had both scooted closer to each other, an unconscious decision that they didn’t even notice until Jack started to have trouble keeping his eyes open.

Jack slowly drifted off sometime around 11:00pm, a laughably early time if he was still a superhero. Simon wasn’t the best pillow, but he was warm and smelled like old books and coffee, so he wasn’t the worst option.

He wasn’t awake enough to question why Simon flinched when Jack leaned into his side. Or when Simon tried to pull himself away to give Jack more space, the younger super had groaned and groped the sofa cushions until he found one of Simon’s thighs and pulled it back into place. Or when Simon tried to keep his surprise at the gesture to himself, only to be distracted by Jack scooting back against his side.

Simon had lifted his arm into the air to try and move away from Jack, but now that the man had basically pinned him in place by his leg, Simon didn’t dare try to move any further. So, that meant he was resting his hand against the small of Jack’s back, occasionally rubbing small circles into his spine when he mumbled something in his sleep. Though Simon wasn’t sure how successful it was, a couple times it just made Jack’s sleepy moans grow louder.

The movie continued on with Jack’s head resting against Simon’s chest and Simon’s hand slowly making the trip around Jack’s waist. They were more than just “practically” cuddling by the final scene. They were technically, intrinsically, and actually full-on snuggling with each other on Jack’s couch.

He looked so small like this.

Less like one of the greatest superheroes the world had ever seen, and more like…

Well. He looked like Jack.

In all the small, infuriating, lovely ways that made him the most idiotic, charismatic, dangerous, and wonderful person Simon could remember meeting.

It was all Simon could do to not accidentally blow up Marilyn Monroe’s face.

Jack wasn’t innately aware of what was going on other than he was sleepy, Simon was way more comfortable than he’d imagined, and maybe somewhere the TV was playing.

“Well, in the first place, I’m not a natural blonde.”

“Doesn’t matter.”

“I smoke! I smoke all the time!”

“I don’t care.”

“Well, I have a terrible past. For three years now, I’ve been living with a saxophone player.”

“I forgive you.”

The man in Simon’s arms groaned, slowly waking himself up enough to sense that the movie was almost over.

Jack almost didn’t remember who was holding him, but he hoped it was Simon. Doing it with one of his quick hook-ups would be embarrassing, and Simon…

Jack didn’t have a good reason.

He just wanted this to be Simon.

“But you don’t understand, Osgood! I’m a man!”

“Well, nobody’s perfect!”

Right.

But Simon was a man.

That’s why Jack couldn’t have a good reason to want him this way.

What “this way” was, he couldn’t even place. It was an ambiguous desire, knowing he wanted but not what it was so he could look for it.

Jack could only imagine what normal people would want from someone they cared about this much. But relationships were a two-sided sword, and Jack knew that. Everyone wanted something from you. Especially when they could wave a paper in your face and demand it from you in vials of blood.

Or they need you to help take care of the finances because it was a rough season again and one job wouldn’t get them through summer.

Or he gave you the option of staying a lab rat or becoming a superhero, just to choose the latter and have it stripped from him not even a decade later.

…What was it like to be in a relationship where he wasn’t the one always hurting afterwards?

Where there wasn’t a take, unless you wanted to give into it. Something where you could be gentle and sweet… Well, Simon already was.

And he wanted to like it so, so, so bad when Simon was holding him like this, being so careful not to disturb Jack while Simon reached for the remote. Or when he got his drink order correct. Or when they would just talk. They could talk and talk and talk and talk and never run out of things to say because they didn’t want to stop hearing it from each other.

How wonderful it would be to know what that was like.

But that’s not what this was. And it wasn’t going to be.

Simon turned the TV off as the end credits played out, bathing them in silence for a quick moment before he had to try and get Jack to go to a real bed.

“Jack.”

Jack groaned as something nudged at his shoulder.

“Jack…”

A little more insistent now.

“Jackson. You need to go to bed.”

Jack grunted, putting an arm across Simon’s stomach. “Okay. ‘Night.”

That earned a small chuckle from the super. “In your own bed. Not on a sofa.”

Jack cracked an eye open, a soft light peaking out in the dark room. “But I’m sleeping on you…?”

“No, you’re not supposed to,” Simon informed him, slowly getting to his own feet to try and lure Jack with him.

It kind of worked, Jack sat up, got to his feet.

…And nodded off while hovering a few inches off the ground.

“...Jack,” Simon’s low tone interrupted him from truly falling asleep again. A hand softly wrapped around Jack’s, trying to lead him forward. “Come on.”

“I’m awake, I’m awake,” Jack insisted. Somewhat true, he did manage to turn off his flight and just walk instead. But that meant he needed to practically use Simon as a crutch.

“How was the movie?” Jack cheerfully mumbled as they got to the top of the stairs. “I think I dozed off for part of it.”

Simon shifted his arm to support Jack by the shoulder as he brought him down the hall. “It was good. I’m surprised you didn’t stay awake to it.”

“Sorry.” Jack yawned, almost forgetting to cover it as he felt them pass through a doorway. “But you were too comfy, so it’s your fault.”

“Mm-hmm, don’t worry about that right now,” Simon instructed him, helping Jack lower himself onto his bed.

Jack somehow managed to wrangle the neatly-made covers off, sure, getting some help with the blankets from Simon.

“Good night,” the older super mumbled, trying not to wake up Jack too much, but he did offer his shoulder a quick squeeze to let Jack know he was leaving him be.

Just for Jack’s tired fingers to trail after that hand and gently grab it before Simon was out of reach.

“Simon…” he groaned, that burning feeling back in his chest the longer his friend’s hand was caught in his own. Jack could still just make out his best friend standing over him, patiently waiting for Jack to give him his hand back. But Jack had to tell him why this wasn’t going to work and why they needed to stop this sort of thing. Just in case one of them forgot this wasn’t something Jack was going to try and make work. “I’m a man.”

“...” Simon actually chuckled at that. Or maybe at himself, because the next thing he said was just a quote from the movie Jack had fallen asleep watching. “Nobody’s perfect.”

“That’s not true,” Jack mumbled, trying to say something. Something he really, really wanted to tell Simon, about how he was actually so amazing, and just how much Jack wished… “Nope. Not true…”

Jack’s hand went limp in Simon’s.

If he didn’t fall asleep, he would have seen Simon smiling, something similar to that proud, almost goofy smile as he tucked Jack’s hand back at his side. His fingers lingered against Jack’s, not quite ready to leave.

It really was so strange seeing Jack peaceful. Even when he was asleep he still carried a flicker of intensity that meant he never was fully relaxed, regardless of how he might appear.

“Thought you were going to bed, Si.”

He almost jumped, but it turned into a gentle touch as Simon brushed aside a few loose strands of hair that had fallen across Jack’s handsome face. “I am. I’m just…”

It felt so unnatural to be able to stare at anyone that Simon hovered for perhaps longer than he should. Perhaps Simon should have gone to bed the moment Jack had fallen asleep, instead of whatever this was.

“I just wanted to make sure everything was alright before I left.”

Jack shrugged, leaning into the touch as he cracked an eye open. “Doesn’t matter. You make it better. Now go to bed, you’re never going to have a decent sleep schedule if you keep doing…”

“You’re so stubborn.” Simon’s hand slipped down against Jack’s cheek, and he felt the blond relax from his touch. “Alright. I can try this ‘decent sleep schedule’ once.”

“Heh. Good job…”

Simon’s hand lingered there for a moment. Just until he knew Jack was asleep.

Then he went back downstairs, made sure the balcony was locked, checked the TV was actually turned off, and went to bed.

Chapter Text

Dawn had just barely gone away when Jack arrived at the bottom of the hill. The early morning light licked at the edge of the graves, which grew taller and higher as Jack put one foot in front of the other.

A lot of them had chipped over the years. The edges of the stone weren’t as sharp. A few of the obelisks were blunted and a few of the cherubs had stains on their faces from the rain, making it look like they had been shedding tears this whole time.

The mausoleums hovered on the edges of the graveyard, the dead kings and queens that overlooked a court of the dead and the visitors that dared to disturb the sacred, still air.

A few distant mourners paraded between the rows of headstones. As if death had struck them so deeply that they were the real ghosts that haunted the graveyard, never daring to get too close to anyone else.

Jack hardly even noticed them as he made his way past the columns of graves, sparing a glance for the stones he’d seen Simon in front of on occasion. Those were more than 10 years old now, names still proudly in place but not seen as regularly anymore. As more time passed, more people were able to move on. Eventually, the only people at a grave were those who couldn’t bear to live life without the people under the soil. So, they made it their mission to visit. Until being in the graveyard was so familiar it wasn’t any different to visit a dead body than going to your parent’s house for Sunday dinner or Christmas Day.

He hated the fact that he would become one of those people.

Towards the edge of the graveyard, next to an empty field that would no doubt be filled generously by next year, were the new graves. The ones that had only been dead for a few months at most.

Those new graves were usually busier than the old ones, the more recent death making it harder to completely part ways.

That’s why Jack made sure he would be there before most reasonable people would wake up and decide, “Yeah, today, I’m going to visit dead people.”

It was kind of ironic, in a way. To be excited to go to a graveyard.

To see the permanent reminder of that ache you felt whenever you wanted to call someone, but their voice wouldn’t be on the other end of the line.

The reminder that you could still go to their house, but it would belong to someone else now.

The reminder that you could never ask them to go to the diner, or watch TV on your couch, or go save the world from another supervillain.

They weren’t even here. It was just their headstone.

Still, Jack had assumed he would be distraught after having come to see this place so many times since he got out of the hospital.

It was a weird sort of fear that followed him on those trips, like when you’re flying and about to dive for the ground, knowing you would save yourself before you crash but your instincts insisting you were in danger.

But when he found the grey tombstone, Jack didn’t feel the dread he wanted.

He didn’t feel afraid to see those words.

Which in-and-of itself was terrifying, but it almost felt like there was a presence there behind the markings. Sure, it was “just wishful thinking,” but wasn’t he allowed to have a little wishful thinking?

Because until Mirage was able to let the superheroes’ bodies be recovered from Nomanisan Island, this was the closest Jack could get to seeing him again.

Simon James Paladino

A beloved son, brother, and friend. And a true hero to all.

“...”

The air was still in that corner of the graveyard.

The world holding its breath as Jack stood in front of that stone.

Waiting for him to feel at peace, or feel his heart rip out, or feel something other than the cold freeze creeping up his back like just standing in front of the grave of his friend was pulling Jack closer to death as well.

Instead, Jack felt like he was watching a dream play out, not quite real, not quite fake. The strange in between where you’ll distinctly remember that moment, but you’ll struggle for the rest of your life to figure out if it was real or not.

Because…Simon wasn’t really there.

Not metaphorically, not spiritually, Simon wasn’t really there.

It was just a stone over a grave with an empty casket.

His corpse was still lost on that genocide island, rotting away into bones.

When heroes had died in the Glory Days, like Dynaguy, there were two funerals. One for the civilian, one for the hero. Your secret identity could still hurt the people in your life after you passed with supervillains around who would be more than happy to take revenge on your parents or kids, so the two halves of a super had to be laid to rest separately. The citizen was dealt with how the family chose, the hero was dictated by the government.

Someone useful like Jack would probably never get more than these fake graves. His body was going to be carted away and used for experiment decades after he was gone.

But Gazerbeam wasn’t able to be recovered. So, it was only Simon Paladino who got a funeral. Only half put to rest.

Jack didn’t know if that was comforting or not.

Simon’s life wasn’t completely closed, but he was only living on as a voice in the back of Jack’s head and as an open case on a government official’s desk.

“I bet you think this is funny, huh, Si? Being a legal case after you died,” Jack mumbled to the stone. He tried to keep a smile on his face, trying to find it funny with Simon. It hurt as much as someone trying to nail the corners of his mouth into his cheeks.

But someone next to him chuckled. Something that was a mix between a light chuckle and a mourner’s broken voice. “I mean, he probably would.”

Jack’s mouth fell into a sharp line at the reminder that he actually wasn’t alone with Simon. “I’m sorry I was late.”

The woman next to him shrugged her weak shoulders under her deep, purple shift dress. There was a black smudge on her shoulder where she’d wiped her eyes but forgot that she was wearing mascara, completely staining the outfit before she’d even gotten to work. “Thanks for coming with me... I’m glad you didn’t forget.”

“No, never,” he promised, feeling more defensive than that comment probably entailed. “And, again, I’m sorry I couldn’t actually attend, I was still in the hospital and they wouldn’t let me out for anything.”

“It’s okay,” Veronica promised in return, scratching a long nail against her eye to catch another tar from dripping down her make-up-covered cheeks. “I mean, does it even count? He’s not actually down there. …So, you’d better come to the actual funeral!”

Jack tried to stir up a more amicable expression, but his face just wasn’t working. “I’m sorry.”

Vee shuffled next to his shoulder, voice slowly thickening. “Please stop saying that. I know you can’t tell us what happened, but when you apologize, it sounds like it was your fault, and I don’t want it to be your fault. I don’t want any of this…”

“I’m sorry that I can’t tell you what happened, then,” Jack decided, the lump in his throat growing with each thought of that island passing through his head but not allowed to get into his mouth. “You’d know I’d be more than happy to explain everything, but, heh, the NSA is kind of breathing down my neck right now and I don’t make to make the rest of the family deal with them…”

It was a lie.

Veronica probably knew it was a lie.

Jack just wasn’t up to talking about it yet because he didn't want to accidentally turn Simon’s sister into a puddle of ashes next to his grave.

All Veronica or any of the Paladinos needed to know was that Simon had died while on a mission as Gazerbeam. That was the easiest solution.

It’s a lot easier to stomach, “he died in the line of duty,” than it was, “he died because a madman was trying to kill every super and Gazerbeam fell for the trap.”

And that Jack was somehow involved in all of this. “But I got a call from someone who’s arranging to get his body back, so…”

“Oh. That’s nice…” she numbly decided, moving her hair behind her ear. “...Sorry it’s just…I don’t know what you’re supposed to feel for this situation. Like, supers were banned, but Simon died doing superhero stuff, now I’m supposed to be happy when his best friend tells me that someone recovered his body?”

“It’s a lot,” Jack agreed, nudging the toe of his dress shoes into the edge of the sidewalk.

He should have been better at this.

For all the people he’d killed, he should have been better at this.

But it was different when it was some supervillainess, and not…

“…You really were Simon’s best friend, you know,” Veronica mumbled with a touch of jealousy to her tone, not taking her dripping eyes from her brother’s gravestone. “None of us knew how you were able to get through to him like you did.”

Jack glanced at her, tipping his chin up an inch so they were at eye level. “I didn’t think it was that complicated.”

“Really?” Vee almost whispered, daring to glance at him through her mascara-dripping eyes for just a moment.

They were striking eyes, pale and sharp like ice broke on a frozen lake. Like her brother’s, you could almost feel yourself get caught by them all the way across a room, unable to look away.

But unlike Simon’s, Veronica’s would never glow with heat and power. She never had to struggle to avoid eye contact with people, she never had to worry she could kill someone by accident, and she never had to fight herself to never use them again after the supers ban.

They didn’t hold Jack like Simon’s could, letting him turn back to the grave as Veronica started to speak. “He was just so hard to reach, and I know the laser eyes were kind of a problem, but in every conversation we had he was so monotone I had to double check that he was paying attention. Then he’d be confused when I needed to make sure! Every time we saw each other the conversation would just fizzle out and he’d decide the best way to fix that was to tell me about this new legal case that came up…”

“Yeah, he was pretty great,” Jack agreed, finally able to have a soft smile for himself.

Veronica scrunched up her brow, not meaning any of those traits as something particularly good, but intrigued why Jack might think otherwise.

Her brother’s friend looked downright wistful as he fell back into the past. “The first time the two of us were hanging out alone in the break room, he gave me an hour-long lecture on the Radium Girls. Then actually answered my questions about the nuclear chemistry involved. Do you know how hard it is to find someone who knows anything about nuclear physics?”

“I…don’t know…” she admitted, her voice so hollow that Jack almost felt guilty for smiling. Those eyes that were so similar to Simon’s looked down at the ground where he was supposed to be. “I don’t know a lot of stuff right now. Maybe I just didn’t try hard enough to be a good sister.”

“Yeah, take it from me, sometimes siblings are only related, not family,” Jack warned her, shadows of two boys running through his mind before he could keep them out, toothy, dirty-covered, sparkling grins contorting into looks of absolute horror–

“You have two brothers. Right?” She immediately waved her hands apologetically as she noticed Jack stiffen. “No, no, I’m so sorry, I just remember you mentioning them and I should have assumed you probably didn’t want to talk about them since you never even mentioned their names, heh, so, sorry, forget–”

“Their names are Lawrence and Kenneth. And there’s a very good reason I don’t talk about them,” he explained, chopping out all of the details around why before Veronica got the idea to ask him about them. Instead, he forced his shoulders to relax and he told her, “My family is a mess. You and Simon were just bad at talking to each other. There’s a difference.”

“I guess,” she hissed, her lips pressed tightly together so they turned white. “But it must have been pretty miserable communication on my part. Like, why didn’t I notice when he didn’t call for almost a year? Why didn’t I notice how frazzled he seemed the last time I saw him?!”

She stomped her heel into the gravelly pavement and cried out, almost gasping her lungs out of her throat.

The man standing next to her didn’t say anything.

What was Jack’s last meeting with Simon like before he disappeared?

It was a stark memory. One he still wasn’t sure should have happened at all.

Jackson. We need to talk.

Jack still wasn’t sure what he was supposed to think of that meeting.

So, he didn’t.

Veronica huffed, her fingers biting into her elbows as she whispered, “But, it’s all making me wish I’d known him better. …Isn’t that just an awful thing to say about your brother?”

“I think there’s always going to be a lot of regrets we have about our relationship to someone after they die. But there’s not much left to do for someone after they’re gone. So…talking about them, visiting them…it’s what little we can do. Just in case,” Jack mumbled, those words feeling weirdly familiar to him. He didn’t bother remembering why.

TERMINATED

A soft breeze trickled past the two of them, standing and watching the stone in front of them.

Veronica shuddered, teeth chattering as the strangely cold morning brushed against her exposed arms. Jack chivalrously put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her into his suit jacket, taking care to stroke some comfort into her arm to help her fight off the emotion that kept welling up behind her eyes in waves. “...Do you think that does anything?”

TERMINATED

“...Yeah. Yeah, of course,” Jack assured her. Because if he wasn’t sure, he didn’t need her to know that. Because being here was freezing him from the inside, making that breeze feel as warm as a summer’s day. Visiting didn’t do anything for him but act as a more permanent reminder of what had happened, but maybe if he didn’t admit that, Veronica could find some comfort here.

TERMINATED

“I don’t mean for us. I don’t want to be comforted if all I’m doing is talking at a rock!” she explained, gesturing her mismatched, colored nails at the tombstone with her brother’s name. “...I meant, do you think it does any good for him?”

Ah.

“And questions like that are why you were never a bad sister,” Jack bitterly informed her, squeezing her shoulders. “But, yeah, of course he’s listening! He probably loves it when we pop over here because he doesn’t have to waste time looking for us to chat!”

Jack let go of Simon’s sister and stepped across the small patch of grass to the gravestone. His knuckle rapped against the corner of the grey stone like he was knocking at Simon’s door.

“Hey, Si!” he shouted towards the field behind the stone, like Simon was wandering around the graveyard until they acknowledged him, immediately earning a startled snicker out of Veronica. “Vee was worried you were busy or something, but we just wanted to say ‘hi!’ Check in with her sometime, okay?! Also, she says she wants to listen to one of your legal rants again!”

“Yes, I would love that!” Veronica shouted, now giggling to herself as she wiped her eyes again. “I really would…!”

Another breeze tumbled through the row of tombstones, tugging at Jack’s tie and playing with the short waves of Veronica’s hair.

“See, squirt? He’s paying attention.” Jack’s smirk when finally genuine again as he crossed back to Simon’s little sister, clamping a hand over her short sleeve and giving her a playful shake. “And you were doubting me.”

“No!” she insisted, grabbing his wrist off her shoulder with a grin on her face. “Well, just a little bit, but not enough that it counts!”

“So you were doubting! Don’t you know I’m always right?” he exclaimed, then reached up to tousle her dark, wavy hair out of its somewhat professional-looking beehive.

It actually kind of looked better now, but Veronica was already trying to pull up a facade of annoyance. “Excuse me?”

And she punched him right in the stomach.

Jack buckled over in surprise, not hurt at all, but it got him to laugh. “Wow, low blow, Vee, thanks.”

“Now you sound like my brother,” she pouted at his joke, reaching up to fix her hair, but huh, Jack, actually kind of did make it better. “But at least he wouldn’t have been late to this visit!”

“Now you sound like him,” Jack jabbed back, poking at her side as he stood up.

Veronica shrugged and rested an elbow against Jack’s shoulder as they both turned their attention back to the grave. Curse the Paladino’s and their weirdly tall genes. “That probably means he is listening, huh? He’s trying to possess us and force us to have not only a bad sense of humor, but a good sense of punctuality!”

“If he was going to possess anyone for anything, that’s probably exactly what he’d do,” Jack chuckled in agreement, hugging Vee like he used to when she was barely out of high school and treated him like another older brother.

Jack had long suspected that’s why he couldn’t see Veronica like other women.

He was willing to make a pass at almost any good-looking woman, and Veronica would have fit the criteria for “good-looking woman” even with your eyes closed.

Her hair was such a dark brown it was black, and thick enough to catch your fingers in. Strong shoulders that tapered into a waist cinched by her belt. Perfectly sculpted legs amply shown off by her tights. And of course those eyes. Those ice-blue eyes with flecks of pale grey and glittering white that seemed to glow in the right light. When she smiled, really smiled, it was this proud, almost goofy smile that looked like she was straining herself to stop from laughing with you or lecture you about something.

She was the beauty of the family. It was always the joke at the dinner table whenever the elders of the family forced Jack and Simon to stay for supper. Veronica got the beauty, Simon got the brains.

Not that Veronica's flightiness or innability to stay still made her stupid. And Simon was cute to look at, Jack could attest to this, but there was no denying that there was a reason Veronica had as many boyfriends in a year as job offers after high school.

Maybe she and Jack were somewhat kindred spirits in that regard, and that’s why he had never felt attracted to her.

It could also be because she was Simon’s little sister. And by a good margin, Vee was 11 years younger than Simon.

What Jack actually told himself it was because he was friends with Simon.

Close friends.

The closest either of them had.

So it just felt intrinsically wrong to want this woman, the uncanny replica of Simon with all of the features Jack remembered on him so well.

He couldn’t bring himself to want after this blurry copy of his friend like he wanted after so many other people. Jack didn’t want to think about being with someone who would be a constant reminder of who he would be trying to replace. He didn’t want a reminder.

…He wanted his friend.

Jack wanted Simon.

Veronica sighed, sniffling one more time from Jack’s arm before she shot upright. “Wait, before I forget, I found something for you.”

Jack blinked, trying to pull himself back into the moment as Vee looked for something in the purse looped in the crick of her elbow. “Oh? Some of your nona’s cooking, I hope.”

“I could get some for you, I just thought that would be a bit of a problem since we both have to go to work!” she apologized, nose hidden behind the lip of plum fabric as she was shuffling through her bag.

Jack shook his head, rolling his eyes as he leaned down to pick up one of the flowers that the breeze had blown out of the bouquet Veronica had placed in front of the grave before Jack got there. “If you could carry an entire casserole dish in there, that would be insane.”

“Ooh, challenge accepted!” Veronica promised. Just in time to find whatever she was looking for and snatch it into the air. “Ta-da!”

It was an envelope.

A plain, white envelope.

Jack’s stomach jumped into his throat as he imagined what such an envelope might mean with the context, “I found something for you.”

Jackson. We need to talk.

He hated that his hands were trembling as he took the envelope from Veronica, but neither of them found a need to figure out why. It was slightly heavier than he expected, with a noticeable lump in one corner that obviously wasn’t a piece of paper.

But then he noticed a sprawl of black letters in Simon’s sharp, crisp handwriting: “For Jackson Hart, Bob Parr, Lucius Best, and anyone else related to them if they can’t be found.”

“Do you remember that footlocker my parents got from Simon’s house? With the Gazerbeam symbol on it?” Veronica asked while Jack tried not to let his eyes pop out of their sockets. He nodded fervently, so she continued, “Well, I was trying to open it, and I found that taped to the back. I think it’s just the key, but he specifically asked for you first. So, well, I think that means it's more likely he wanted at least one of you to have it…”

Jack flipped the note around and around his hands, then flicked a small green aura around his hand so he could use the light to see through the paper.

There was, in fact, a key-shaped shadow in the envelope.

“...It’s probably some old superhero stuff,” Jack explained, even though he had no idea what sort of superhero stuff could take up an entire footlocker. He traces the lump in the paper, but then his finger fell against the sharp corners and straight lights of Simon’s handwriting.

Simon was still talking to Jack, in some way.

Gazerbeam still needed Gamma Jack’s help for something. It was taking care of his superhero possessions after he was dead, probably so none of his family would hurt themselves, but it still made Jack feel a little warm and fuzzy inside.

These were all little crumbs of Simon’s life still being found by the people who cared about him.

And Jack savored each of them whether it was that book Simon had brought to Nomanisan Island before his death, all those legal textbooks Jack was using as table decorations because he didn’t want to put them away yet, whatever he was able to find.

Now he had this.

Jack didn’t notice he had started to feel water around his eyes until Veronica was hugging him, roughly patting his back while the envelope was pressed to his chest.

"I can...try to come by your parents' house sometime and check it out." His voice was warbly when he spoke, regardless of how he tried to swallow it back. “He really did love you. Just in case you forgot. We would talk about what you were getting up to. And he’d have the same serious expression on his face as he did to go fight Xerek, or whoever was causing us problems that day.”

“I know,” Veronica admitted, painful and wet near Jack’s ear. A few droplets fell onto his work suit, but neither of them pulled away. “And he really did care about you more than anyone. We would joke about it, sometimes. Like…you were so attached at the hip, we’d just as soon believe you were together.”

Jack politely laughed. Because it was a joke. It was a joke.

Usually Veronica was also the funny sibling. He was surprised how not-funny that was…

…

“I’m so happy you had each other,” she admitted as they both pulled apart. Finally there was a familiar glimmer of life behind the eyes she had mostly shared with her brother. “For the civilian life and the super life. Cuz I couldn’t even be there for when he was normal…”

“Neither of us are ‘normal,’ Veronica,” Jack almost scolded her, a bolt of green flashing through his eyes.

Veronica actually stepped back with a clear look of shock on her face.

He immediately felt apologetic as she looked away, but he made sure to hide the slight offense he took from that by gently saying, “I’m glad too, squirt. Simon meant a lot to me…more than I think I’ll ever actually be able to say.”

Veronica nodded, looking at her brother’s grave one more time. “Yeah. More than I ever could too.”

The rest of the visit was spent in a comfortable silence, the two of them having a newfound sense of peace around the situation. Regardless if it would be temporary, no doubt wearing off by tomorrow when they would feel unable to get out of bed without dreading the fact that they had to face this whole mess once again.

For now…it felt manageable enough

Being this close to Simon was, for now, good enough.

But, eventually, the sun had fully risen above the horizon, and they had to get back to their lives.

They both had work that morning (“I’m working at a veterinary clinic now!” “Nice! …So, how long are you–?” “I’ve been there a couple of months and haven’t gotten bored yet, so maybe this one is a keeper!”), so they made their farewells brief and parted ways. Veronica waved to Jack until she was past the treeline, disappearing in the opposite direction of where Jack was walking down the paved path.

The graveyard was starting to come to life as the morning reached a more reasonable hour for people to be awake.

A few of the lawn crew had arrived for the semi-regular maintenance routine.

There was a young couple and their child stopping in front of a grave not far from the path.

There was a lone woman standing next to one of the usually ignored mausoleums, hat dipped low over her face in mourning..

Jack even made a point to stop by a few of those tombstones he remembered Simon would make a point to visit. He didn’t know if that meant much to the strangers buried there, but why not help out if he could?

It was just after he had finished with the last of those quick visits that something rolled down one of the short hills from the mausoleums and hit his ankle before being caught under his foot.

It was a slightly smashed scroll of plotting paper, the kind that architects or designers would use.

Jack glanced around the graveyard for where something like that might have come from as he leaned over to pick it up, but the closest people to him were that young family. Probably not the sort to bring a massive roll of paper to a graveyard.

So, he shrugged and unrolled it slightly, looking for a name in the corner while he tried to smooth out the crease where he had stepped on it.

There was a name written in the designer's notes, which he should have noticed immediately. But his eyes had gotten pulled down to something else entirely.

A different name, written in hasty cursive along the margins next to some sort of hooded, gasmask design.

“hypnosis augmented by Peggy Baardsen “generous donation”"

Jack had to do a double take.

Peggy Baardsen?

What was Psycwave’s name doing here?

And what do you mean a hypnosis thing augmented by Psycwave??

That name should be anywhere near “hypnosis”!

Like how fire shouldn't be anywhere near "flammable"!

And she was dead! For years at that point…

“Hey!”

Jack looked up from the roll of plotting paper as the woman from the mausoleum with the floppy hat charged at him, somehow with fire in her eyes despite the sunglasses plastered over them.

“Put that down, that’s classified, private property!”

She had already reaching out to snatch it from his hand before Jack had a moment to process that he knew this dame.

Apparently she thought a floppy hat and sunglasses was enough to disguise that spikey pixie cut and her very expensive taste in sweaters.

Jack practically sneered through a smile as Evelyn Deavor skidded to an angry stop in front of him, “I assume this is yours?”

She panted against her knees, then squared her shoulders and stood back to her full height. “Yes. It is. And I would like it back, unless you have a problem with that.”

“None at all,” Jack blatantly lied, extending the scroll back to Evelyn with all the hesitancy of handing away his life fortune.

He wanted to say, “Why do you, one of the Deavor's, have blueprints with Psycwave's civvie name on it?”

Better yet, “No I’m not giving it back, you just flashed my dead frined’s name in my traumatized face and expect me to just let you take it?!”

But he wasn’t Gamma Jack right then. He was some random guy Evelyn ran into after she visited what Jack assumed was her parents’ grave.

It was probably best Evelyn didn’t even know his name was Jack considering the way she was on edge just from dropping the paper currently being stuffed into her over-sized shoulder bag. She almost ripped it half a dozen times before she zipped the bag closed and rearranged her hat.

Jack…did feel a little bit of sympathy for her. Even if he had no doubt she and her brother were up to something, both Jack and Evelyn were at a graveyard first thing in the morning for important reasons. It would also be really embarrassing if it turned out Evelyn wasn’t planning his murder and he was rude anyway.

So, he did try to look somewhat empathetic. “Hey, doll, are you okay?”

Evelyn’s eyebrows almost shot up through her hat before she could compose herself.

The way her face slowly, also painfully contorted into a smile didn’t make Jack think it was out of gratitude.

Did he say something wrong?

He called everyone “doll” occasionally and no one had ever looked like they were about to bite his face off.

“I’m fine. Thanks for asking,” Evelyn almost spat through her teeth, hefting the shoulder bag up her arm. Then, she did something Jack didn’t expect. She politely asked, “Hey, this might be strange, but you sound really familiar, have we met?”

…Oh– OH.

That’s why she looked so freaked out!

The only one-on-one conversation Evelyn had with Gamma Jack was started with him calling her, “doll.”

So Evelyn heard someone with Gamma Jack’s voice, build, height, everything except the mask over his face, call her that again, while she was grieving that father who was killed, in her eyes, because he relied too heavily on superheroes.

That was really, really bad.

Well, time to furrow his brow, squint his eyes, and lie. “I… Hm. Maybe? By chance, are you that girl who works at the laundromat on 8th and Grant Street?”

Jack through he saw Evelyn tilt her head in suspicion, but it was so quickly replaced with an apologetic smile on that conniving face that he decided to let the moment pass and hope she forgot about this interaction. “Nope, that’s definitely not me. Sorry, you just sounded familiar, I guess.”

“Hey, it happens,” Jack replied vaguely, still smiling for her. “Hope you have a good day, alright?”

“You too,” Evelyn told him, dragging out her words in the way you only would when you’re suspicious of something.

But she brushed past him without another moment wasted on him.

Not true, she actually glanced over her shoulder at him once, before she continued on her way down the hill.

Jack watched her go, waiting until the curve of the hill hid her from his line of sight, then decided to just get on the train via a different stop.

It didn’t occur to him until he he had walked through the doors of the nuclear inspectors agency lobby, waved at all his well-wishing, good-morning-ing co-workers, and had closed the door on his corner office, that according to Helen, Evelyn had been out of town with her and Winston. The dame should have still been in New Urbem with the others.

Unless they’d gotten back that morning.

Which meant phase one of their little project was already done.

So Helen was either back in town, or she was dead.

Jack had dropped the nuclear registration paperwork he’d been reading through and lunged for the phone, jabbing the number of the motel the Parrs were staying at into the receiving.

Then remembering that they’d been offered one of Winston’s spare mansions and sending Jack on a scavenger hunt through his impeccably-organized desk to find the company stationary pad where he’d written down their new number.

Only then was he able to smash the number into the phone, pinning it between his hand, shoulder, face, and sanity, then wait several agonizing hours, days, somethings, as he waited for Bob to pick up the line.

Jack was already asking his question before the phone had finished being picked up. “Bob! Is Helen back in town?!”

“...Wha…t?” Bob sounded like he’d just been woken up for a 30-year-long coma. During which he’d been dreaming he was being chased by lions. On motorcycles. And Bob had been dosed up on benadryl.

“Did, Helen, get, back, in, town?!” Jack ignored that and repeated the question. Just, slower. The volume didn’t change. “Also, hi, this is Jack, good morning.”

“Oh… Good–” Bob yawned loudly enough Jack was surprised the walls of his office didn’t shake, “–morning, Jack…”

“Bob, is Helen–?!”

“No… I mean, yeah. Yes.” Bob probably had to sit up a little in bed to try and answer. “Yes, she should be getting back in town this morning. Why…?”

The sigh Jack let out as he flopped against his chair echoed through Bob’s ear. “Nothing. I just ran into Evelyn this morning and I was curious about Helen.”

“...You haven’t found out anything suspicious with the Deavors, have you?” Bob asked as Jack heard him get out of bed, genuinely curious.

…Wow.

Is this what it felt like to be taken seriously?

It was nice. Jack had missed that.

“I mean, maybe?” Jack said, listening to Bob pad across the bedroom. “Evelyn was carrying around this roll of paper, I think it was for one of her designs, or whatever. And there was a note about it about Peggy!”

The line went quiet for a moment. Jack tapped the receiver a couple times to check if the connection went bad, or if Bob had fallen asleep where he was standing, but Mr. Incredible’s voice came back onto the line a moment later. “You’re absolutely sure it was Psyc–”

“Don’t say that!” Jack hissed, throwing himself into the desk like he was reaching out to shove the words back into Bob’s mouth. “You’re using one of the Deavors’ phones! They could have tapped it!”

“...But wouldn’t they know you’re talking about her since you already said ‘Peggy’?” Bob asked, having grabbed the receiver so he could bring it into the bathroom while he got his toiletries ready for the morning. He really didn't think Jack was right, paranoid if anything, but Bob was letting a few comments go unsaid since he seemed so agitated. “Which you’re talking about because you accidentally ran into Evelyn this morning and saw her designs for something?”

…When the big lug was right, he was right.

Jack cursed to himself, shocked he hadn’t thought of that. “You’re right… Okay, look, thanks for letting me know about Helen. As soon as I have more evidence, I’ll go over to your place and we’ll have a chat, okay?”

“Okay…?” Bob decided just to let Jack roll with this since he was clearly so agitated about it. “Does Luc– Does Frozone know about this?”

“Not yet,” Jack admitted, half mumbling it to himself. “I’ll have to tell him too, and Helen knows a little bit but not that much– I’ll carve out some time to come over and talk, okay?”

“Sure, everything’s going just fine over here,” Bob told him, turning on the sink.

Jack blinked. “I don’t think I asked that.”

“Well, they’re fine. Thanks for asking.”

“...Coooooool.” How half-asleep was Bob? “I’ll let you get back to things. Say hi to Vi, Dash, and Jack 2 for me!”

“Of course!” Bob promised him. “I’ll see you, what, tonight?"

“Ah, I think I’ll be busy tonight,” Jack admitted, feeling a plan form in his head as he drummed his fingers against the oak desk. “But I’ll be in touch soon. And if you need anything, let me know. Even if you’re out of the motel, the offer still stands for anything you need, got it?”

Bob chuckled and he uncapped his toothpaste and squired it onto the matching toothbrush. “Still trying to do the right thing, Jack, I like it! You’ll beat the ‘narcissistic, hero-supremacist allegations eventually!"

Jack snorted and rolled his eyes. “I mean, they’re not wrong, but I would like a title change.”

“Eh, I don’t agree,” Bob informed him, sounding like he’d stuck his toothbrush into his mouth. “But I’ve got this, don’t worry.”

“I don’t doubt it, big guy,” Jack assured him, dragging his own receiver closer. “Have a good one. And, I don’t know, make some waffles or something, you sound like your kids ran you over in a bulldozer.”

********

Jack could appreciate the fun Edna must have had designing him the new suit.

It was clearly inspired by Gazerbeam’s suit, with the distinctive V divide of color over the shoulders and chest, only now the V also contained the gamma symbol Jack was known for sporting.

He had to imagine Edna wanted to make it his trademark blue and gold, but navy blue had also been Gazerbeam’s signature color and Edna would have thought that was too similar to his. Or she was in the mood of doing different colors for iconic heroes since Bob had walked in with a blue suit and walked out with a red suit. This suit Edna had made for Jack was mostly the same bright green as his radiation powers, with black on the chest and shoulders, utility belt, boots, and gloves (the gloves had to be the same holes cut into them as Jack’s original/copy suit since the fabric was radiation-proof, and he couldn’t shoot through it because of that).

That hood she had teased Jack about was also sewn onto the back of the suit in place of a cape, which seemed to prove to Jack that she didn’t actually think he would wear it but she was in a creative mood and needed to play around with him a little.

Jack chuckled at it and shook his head as he left it in the box, sealing the fancy cardboard and pushing it into the back of his walk-in closet. But not before taking out the brand new copy of his original suit.

And, oh, Jack thought it felt good just to look at the suit?

Putting the blue and gold uniform back on what borderline euphoric!

Seeing it back on his body after months of thinking would be marooned on Nomanisan Island. well–?

It was him! This was who he was supposed to be!

Not the filthy mercenary he’d posed as for months.

Not the half-dead superhero who’d escaped Syndrome’s genocide.

Not even just Jackson Hart.

This was Gamma Jack!

One of the most powerful supers of the Glory Days. Equally feared and loved and brimming with the most terrifying force of the age.

The moment he saw Gamma Jack walk up to his mirror, he felt like he could fly around the world, blow up Devtech, and then do a victory lap!

And, depending on what he found there that evening, maybe he would do just that.

Work had been a chore to get through, even after he reasonably suspected Helen was safe.

People would be surprised to hear it, but Jack actually did like his job to a certain extent. He was paid to basically stand in a room and pretend to use scientific instruments to scan for radiation leaks, so he mostly just hung out for a few minutes and his job was done. And as the Chief Inspector, he could even send out an army of grunts to do all the locations he didn’t want to deal with!

Excluding when he was asked to go do special events (like go to New Urbem for that whole train thing…), those he usually had to attend himself. But even those were usually interesting (unless it was NEW URBEM FOR THE WHOLE TRAIN THING).

It was possible Jack just hated trains.

He certainly felt inclined to after he got mind-controlled in one by a supervillain.

A supervillain who very likely had access to data on Psycwave, a superhero who could, you know, possess people.

It was too much of a coincidence that had happened, right?

Sure maaaaaaybe Evelyn had started researching Psycwave because she was trying to understand this new supervillain her golden goose, Elastigirl, had gone after.

But then why would the name be on a blueprint for some sort of mask design??

Come on, that was really suspicious!

So the moment Jack had gotten out of work, he’d broken several pedestrian traffic laws to run home and one superhero ban to fly up to his balcony on the top floor. He’d thrown off his civvie suit from work and thrown on his super suit, then took off towards the oceanfront where the Devtech skyscraper was waiting for him.

That was probably the only nice thing Jack could truly say about the NSA disbanding, he loved not having to worry that their “A-level monitoring” was still in effect.

Would they directly tell him that he wasn’t being watched anymore?

Uh, no, that would be stupid. Tell the guy you’re watching that you can’t anymore, without thinking he’s immediately going to do something stupid? Bad idea.

Anyway, Jack was about to do something that might be considered “stupid”...

The security around the building was a mystery. Likely the Deavors had plenty of hidden cameras and traps for anyone who might be trying to break into their billion-dollar company, none of which the supers had seen that first night since they were guests.

But, since Jack didn’t want to risk finding out if the Deavors had something similar to Syndrome’s goo cannons, that left him with quite the bold choice: walking through the front door?

Oh, you think that’s too risky? Too suspicious?

Pfft, this is Jack we’re talking about, he had it covered.

Gamma Jack may or may not have stolen his ID badge from his first meeting with the Deavors (blowing out the camera while he did so). He just had to flash it at the security guard at the front door, and he was instantly let in.

The security guard didn’t even seem phased by the superhero, nor did he ask a reason for why Jack was there, or why Jack had a security badge.

…Okay then.

Apparently he’d made up an entire novel’s-worth of lies to explain his presence for nothing.

He’d even brought that manila folder of the cost/benefits analysis to wave at anyone who dared to glance his way.

Instead, all he got was a receptionist saying, “Oh, if you’re looking for Mr. Deavor, he’s on the 50th floor with the others.”

…Also, okay then.

It would have been easy to assume they were just expecting to see Gamma Jack come back around for some reason, but he really didn’t feel like being swindled again, so Jack stayed suspicious as he smiled, thanked the girls behind the counter, and made his way to the elevator.

As the city flew by the glass walls of the lift, he had to start coming up with a plan.

He wasn’t familiar with the Devtech building, and most likely it was even more expansive than Syndrome’s complex because it was at least 100 floors, possible more if there were sub-levels.

Most of those floors were probably administrative, marketing, etc., but how many and what floors did they encompass?

There were probably also several testing floors for the tech they made here since that seemed to be Evelyn’s wheelhouse, but again, how many and which ones?

Sub-levels were always a good bet to find shady information that people didn’t want public, and Jack even had a good track record with those considering Syndrome’s basement was where he’d found those lead-lined hallways, the blood labs, the dead supers’ possessions–

Syndrome really had kept a lot of stuff in his basement.

But Jack’s broken security badge wasn’t going to get him very far in the Devtech building, not like his security clearance card had when he was posing as a guard in Syndrome’s mercenary corp.

So he’d need to find where Evelyn would keep her top secret data, read it, remember it, and then get out without anyone noticing him. In this building that employed thousands of people.

He probably should have waited until it was late at night, like any decent spy.

But, Evelyn was up to something and he wasn’t going to waste time letting her and her brother do it, especially since he knew Helen was probably currently okay. He wasn’t going to wait around for that to change.

He knew what it was like to wait around instead of being able to take action…

TERMINATED

There was work to be done…

And that started with the most important of any step he would take from there on…

Checking the directory pasted to the metal wall of the elevator and finding where “CEO’s office” was listed.

If there was anywhere that would point Jack towards where the Deavors had hidden the dark secrets of this palace, it would be in Winston’s office.

Jack stayed hovering out of sight as the elevator opened on the top floor, only daring to peek out when the door started to close and no office workers had tried to get in.

He slipped into the wood-panelled hallway, taking care to avoid any of the security cameras that were pointed at the millions of dollars of artifacts lining the corridor like they were thrift store tchotchkes that Winston and Evelyn thought would make cute decorations.

Just in case there were hidden lasers, or boobie traps, or pressure tiles, or whatever Evelyn thought would be funny to protect the luxury offices of the high-ranking officials in the company, Jack stayed hovering just slightly off the ground, scanning each door for hers or Winston’s name.

After an agonizing, treacherous, uh, five-ish minutes? Jack found a set of double doors with gold-lined plaques proudly stating “Winston Deavor: CEO” and “Evelyn Deavor: CDO” on them.

Jack was reaching to open the metal doorknob, so close to getting into that office, when he froze.

...Simon. This is going way too well. I’m sorry if knocking on your grave was, I don’t know, disrespectful, or you were sleeping and I woke you up, but I need someone to watch my back cuz this is usually when things go horribly wrong.

Gamma Jack put his hand around the doorknob.

And as if on cue, his ears caught a faint, familiar sound.

Footsteps.

Instincts rushed in as Jack leapt into the air, spinning past a modernist chandelier and landing against the ceiling. His back pressed to the smooth surface, pinning his cape behind him as he barely dared to breathe.

The footsteps came closer.

Almost prancing along.

Apparently someone had decided to be in a good mood that day…

Jack hoped they’d hurry up and have a good mood somewhere else, the bevelling in the ceiling was putting an uncomfortable crick in his spine.

Who could be in a good enough mood to prance down the hallways of a telecommunications company??

While–

…Singing?

Was this guy singing?!

Winston’s voice bounced off the walls as he practically boogied down the hall, somehow not dropping the sloshing cup of coffee in his hands, completely unaware of the man watching him from 10 feet overhead. “Gamma Jack! Gamma Jack! Flying fast with a gamma attack–!”

Jack winced and tucked his chin into his shoulder, holding back a hybrid of a groan and a sigh as he heard the unfortunately-familiar words to his theme song.

Why did he even get a theme song? Gamma Jack wasn’t exactly a superhero you wanted your kids to take after.

His hard-earned reputation made sure of that.

“Villains watch out, he’s comin’ for you! You’ll fall for his grin and his radiation too!” Winston continued, unknowingly torturing the hero as he hopped into a pose and proceeded to punch the air like he was shooting gamma beams.

Seriously, who wrote this song?

“3…2… 3, 2, 1, boom!” Winston chuckled to himself, no doubt hoping that there wasn’t anyone around to catch him in his impromptu performance.

Jack was just happy Winston didn’t bother looking around for any surprise audiences, because the super was pretty busy trying not to shoot him with a beam of that radiation from his eyes.

Is this how you always felt, Si? No wonder civvie life was a pain, it’s just so tempting to shoot people with a glare sometimes…

Winston slipped his own security card into the automated lock expertly incorporated into the wooden door, then disappeared inside with his coffee.

…Great.

Now Jack was going to have that song stuck in his head, and the office was occupied.

He didn’t really have a back-up plan for that, he’s kind of assumed Winston would be like any self-righteous CEO and take the day off after getting back from a business trip. Or he’d be entertaining Elastigirl. Or he’d be evilly cackling with Evelyn in their secret lair.

Fortunately for Jack, it only took as long for Winston to reappear as it did for that song to get thoroughly trapped in Jack’s short-term memory.

The CEO, now sans his cup of coffee, let the door slowly fall back into place as he resumed his solo musical number, thankfully having switched to someone else’s theme song as he vanished back into the halls of the telecommunications company.

Jack didn’t wait to hear the encore as he flew down to the door, slipping through just as it was about to snap shut.

A bit too similar to some of his memories involving a certain lava wall.

The memory where he’d broken into the supercomputer room and was interrupted by Mirage before he could find exactly what he was looking for.

This time in enemy territory, Jack didn’t waste time on dramatics or anticipation, letting the tension rise to meet him as he walked towards the black voice with the spotlight on a white computer console.

Instead, he took in the two desks on opposite sides of a massive picture window, noticed one of them had Evelyn’s floppy black had on the back of its chair, and ran to it.

The entire desk was covered in paper scraps and pencil shavings mixed with broken remote control and designs that had been ripped in half and taped back together.

The phone was off its receiver and the pencil sharpener still had a pencil stuck in it, the crank halfway pulled.

You couldn’t see the desk for all of the bits and bobs and wires and gadgets and coasters covered in ringstains from missing coffee mugs.

Even the trashcan was overflowing with scrapped plans, the chair becoming a secondary table to hold an empty shoulder bag and that floppy hat, along with not one, but two pairs of sunglasses with one arm open, one retracted.

It was like an avalanche of paperwork and drawing supplies had crash-landed on that half of the office, making Winston’s seem downright pristine despite the cup of coffee left on his desk next to his, uh…basketball?

Sure, why not?

Gamma Jack didn’t really have time for an analysis of what any of this could mean.

He was here to find a clue about why Evelyn was carrying a paper with Psycwave’s name on it. And if he didn't find it here, Jack would tear the entire floor upside down until he got a smidgen of a clue that pointed him in the right direction.

His hands worked as fast as a gust of wind, tossing and flipping and rearranging papers so he could try and dig through the scraps to find something underneath, then having to put everything back into meticulous order so no one would know he was there.

The shoulder bag, the drawers, the cabinets overhead, everything was opened and closed, opened and closed, then inspected for secret panels, then checked again before moving on to the next suspect.

Just up to when Jack’s hand closed around one drawer, pulled, and it didn’t open.

…Promsing.

He tried again, a little harder this time in case it was jammed.

Like all of the drawers, there was a little keyhole in the top of the imported wood, but all of the others had been unlocked.

Except for this one.

Which could only mean one thing: there was something in there no one was supposed to know about.

And that was exactly what Jack was here to find!

Thank you, Evelyn, you made his search so much easier by locking only the thing you needed to protect!

Jack spared an unimpressed look for the simple lock and leveled a finger at it.

The weak metal disintegrated with barely a touch of his power.

He pulled the drawer open and was practically jumpscared by the amount of file folders squished that had been together sandwich-style.

That was almost a better security measure than the lock itself.

Almost.

Jack just skipped through the slots marked “B” and “P” until he stumbled across something that flashed the name “Psycwave” at him.

There was a stack of papers about as thick as a fingernail bound together with an alligator clip and covered with so many different layers of yellow highlighter that some sentences were completely bleeding onto each other, and the three after it.

Every page was copied from a page of a handwritten book, but the shorthand was so small and frilly Jack would need a microscope to try and read it.

Fortunately for his search, on top of the small manuscript of printed out papers was a note written with Evelyn’s stationary: “Peggy Baardsen notes on Psycwave; journal excerpts recovered from private estate sale.”

Jack let out a nervous breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding as he read that.

So this wasn’t quite a Syndrome situation.

The Deavors didn’t actually know Psycwave’s secret identity, just that Peggy was an eccentric psychiatrist who apparently worked with Psycwave.

But that was immediately replaced with the stronger, more apparent worry.

Evelyn was looking at notes about Psycwave.

A mind-controlling superhero.

And the Screenslaver was a mind-controlling supervillain…

So, yeah. This is when things could go horribly wrong.

Footsteps approaching the door jolted Jack out of the start of his panic.

His ears caught every millimeter of plastic sliding through the security lock as he grabbed the manuscript and another random file from the drawer.

The doorknob was turning as Jack threw his stolen goods into the back of the cost/benefits folder and slapped the entire thing closer.

Jack rushed to the other side of the room as the door began to open.

When Winston stepped into his office, Gamma Jack was casually reclining in the CEO’s chair, manila folder innocently placed on the desk where he had his feet propped up.

That signature smirk greeted the young CEO as he jumped. “Aww, surprised to see me? I thought I said we’d be in touch.”

“Well…yes! So happy to have you, as always,” a very startled Winston informed him. But he brushed off that surprise and strode across his office to take Jack’s hand in both of his and give it a vigorous shake. Like this was an entirely expected meeting they had planned and Winston was just fashionably late. “Glad to see you around, Gamma Jack.”

“Always a pleasure, Win,” Jack informed him, that easy, personable mask taking over when his true personality was a little too on-edge to be chipper. “How about I give you the throne back?”

“Yes, thank you,” Winston laughed, jokingly shooing Jack out from behind the desk so he could stand in front of his over-sized chair.

Jack shifted to the front of the desk, eyes pleasantly glowing green as Winston noticed the manila folder he’d given Jack a few days ago.

The CEO’s eyes seemed to sparkle a bit as he asked, “You actually did look at the cost-/benefit analysis?”

“Yes, I did,” Jack flippantly explained, as if it was obvious he would take time out of his busy schedule to look at numbers and data sheets. “We’re somewhat business partners, and I’m invested in making sure things work out for both of us.”

Winston shook his head, looking at the notes Jack had hastily made before he’d gone off on this little quest to investigate the very man standing across the desk from him. “It looks like you put a lot of thought into this as well.”

“Naturally. It wasn’t that hard,” Jack bragged, which was true. It had been maybe a collective five minutes of work.

But if it impressed Winston, then Jack was just as brilliant as he thought, or he’d accidentally found something that Evelyn genuinely hadn’t thought about in the analysis.

Either was, it was probably true and both were very nice for his ego.

And helped calm down the buzzing going through his body from having to suppress the adrenaline coursing through his veins with the impatient radiation.

Jack’s eyes wandered to the amber color of liquor inside a crystal decanter on the edge of the table. His fraying nerves immediately begged him to ask, “Hey, mind if I?”

“Oh, of course, help yourself!” Winston insisted, waving for Jack to have as much as he wanted before handing the super one of the down-turned glasses.

The super kept his back to the CEO as his shaky hands poured him a shot, tossing it into the back of his throat before he could stop himself to wonder if it was poisoned.

When he didn’t keel over, he took that as a sign he was probably okay and resumed smiling for the CEO. “Now, I know I’ve made a bit of a sudden arrival, but I heard you, Evelyn, and Elastigirl were finally back from New Urbem and I wanted to check in.”

“No, this is great, I really appreciate you taking the time out of your no doubt busy life to do this,” Winston told him, flipping to the next page and giving Jack a heart attack as he got closer to the Psycwave manuscript.

Jack didn’t know what would be worse: Winston finding out that he’d stolen something from Evelyn, or Jack having to explain cost/benefits revisions if Winston actually agreed with, “If you’d like, we can go over it now. I’m free, but I should have thought to ask if you were tired after the trip.”

“I’m totally alright, thank you,” Winston replied genuinely, smiling at Gamma Jack before picking up the front page of the analysis. “And I’d love to go over this right now!”

Oh, come on!

Winston waved the paper through the air and shrugged. “Except, unfortunately, I just had to stop by here for a moment before heading back to– …”

Jack didn’t like the way Winston started to smile.

It reminded him too much of how Dash or Violet would smile at each other when they were about to do something that Jack was going to have to very diplomatically explain to their parents so all three of them wouldn’t get in trouble.

Still, the super forced himself to keep smiling as he saw some secret, conniving thoughts start to percolate through the CEO’s mind. “I think you should come with me to this.”

Jack paused, trying to read the excited, wide-eyed look Winston was giving him. Then just gave up. “Go to, what, a meeting with you? Isn’t that what Elastigirl is for?”

“She’s there too!” Winston explained (not really), tapping his fingers against the cost/benefits analysis and the hidden manuscript underneath. “So I think this is the perfect opportunity.”

It took everything in his power not to grab Winston and remind him that toting a superhero around to meetings like a pet when they were illegal not only ticked Jack off, but also would get him arrested. “No. I’ll pass. We’ll just do this another time.”

“No, I insist,” Winston informed him, picking up his cup of coffee, drinking it all down in an instant, dropping into the trashcan, and walking around the desk. Long strides carried him all the way to the door before Jack could fully swivel himself around to face him. “I won’t take no for an answer!”

“I’d really rather not, Win,” Jack admitted, still polite, but letting himself slip just enough that Winston would hopefully get the hint and let him go home. So Jack could spend the risk of the night plotting out how he and Evelyn were secretly trying to kill him and the rest of his friends.

Winston ignored that as he hung onto the lip of the door, motioning for Jack to follow. “Come on, you’ve got to meet the other supers!”

“No, really, that’s fine, I’m…” Jack paused, a hand reaching out to grab the manila folder. Then nearly snapped his head off his shoulders to look at Winston. “Excuse me, the who??”

Chapter Text

There is almost always a correlation between power and popularity.

That had certainly been the case for the supers of the Glory Days.

Mr. Incredible was the greatest superhero of the generation, the strongest man alive. And that meant he had the most fans of any super, from snot-nosed kids to old ladies who needed their cats rescued from trees.

Frozone and Gazerbeam had similar track records: powerful, capable, and because of it, loved by everyone.

Elastigirl was almost an anomaly in that regard. She never broke the top three most powerful superheroes, and it was always a bit of a debate if she even belonged in the top five. But power is in words just as much as it’s in actions when you’re a public figure, and Elastigirl was the icon for every woman in the United States. The numbers spoke for themselves, as Winston might say. Elastigirl was one of the most respected supers, and one of the most popular because of it.

Then there was Gamma Jack.

And, oh, what a terror he was in his golden years.

So dangerous that he needed constant supervision from the NSA. So outspoken that entire news reals were dedicated to politicians debating his statements. So powerful he could have won the Cold War on a slow afternoon.

So scandalous that he wasn’t just popular, he was on par with Hollywood celebrities.

Who didn’t love a controversial figure with a smile so charming it let him be a womanizer? Just brash enough to be intriguing, but still a hero who could easily stand toe-to-toe with Mr. Incredible on a good day. Even despite his priority list for beautiful women or the sheer collateral damage his powers caused.

Gamma Jack was practically an event, more than just a standard super.

So when Winston opened the door and presented the newest guest to the party, every single person in the room snapped towards that golden gamma symbol.

And every jaw dropped as they slowly looked up and recognized Gamma Jack himself walking into the room.

It took every fiber in every muscle in Jack’s body to keep him from turning right back around and leaving the Devtech building.

“Hello, everyone!” Winston cheerfully declared as he directed Jack to the middle of the room. “We have one more special guest visiting us today!”

There were half a dozen supers in the room that he didn’t recognize, all of them in clearly homemade super outfits of varying quality.

Helen was busy talking to one of those heroes, some short, orange guy with a red mask. Both stopped to stare at Jack with the others as he kept getting dragged along by Winston.

Evelyn was hiding in the corner by the refreshments stand, which didn’t surprise Jack at all. Even her thinly-veiled glare over that smug smile was just something he was getting used to.

As long as she didn’t recognize Jack from earlier that morning, or snatch his folder away from him and find Peggy’s notes, they could both get through this somewhat painlessly…

And thank goodness Winston had decided to drag Jack over to the table first, because that’s when Jack noticed there was a plethora of alcoholic choices at his disposal.

Suddenly, the manila folder he’d been clenching didn’t feel quite so heavy now that he knew there were a couple bottles of different kinds of alcohol at his disposal. So at least if his nerves started to get fried, Jack had something to fall back on.

Especially because he took one look at the food being offered and saw none of it matched his mental checklist of dietary requirements.

Over-ripe bananas? Already too brown. Exposed apples? No protective skin, someone might have poisoned them. Blast-O cola? He didn’t even drink on-brand coke, fuzzy drinks hurt. Some sort of pink and white cake? It was pink and white! He didn’t eat anything with those colors.

Yes. Seriously. Red and white was also a color combo that was off-limits.

Along with pork, uncooked peppers, cilantro, powdered sugar, excess grease, unknown green sauces, every known white cream other than cream cheese, mushrooms other than this one specific way of making them, ground meat, dark chocolate, lavender, artificial sweeteners, liquid coffee–

His personal standards were convoluted enough that it was easiest to assume that he wouldn’t eat anything.

So when Evelyn offered to pour him any of the many bottles of alcohol littered around the room, he was genuinely grateful to be given a glass.

Now he just had to be his polite, charming self, and get out of there before Winston got him talking to these superhero wannabes for too long…

“I am Brick.”

Jack waited a moment to see if she could give him anything else to work with. “...Cool. What are your powers, Brick?”

The hulk-like woman standing overhead hardly changed her stone-set face to respond. “I am like brick.”

“...Also very cool,” Jack struggled to respond to the giant woman. She needed to give him something to worry with if they were going to keep up a conversation!

“Don’t worry yourself about her,” a short, toad-like man told Jack as he came up and patted Brick on the arm. It earned a purely serene grin from the giant. “It’s harder for her to speak when she’s in ‘brick mode.’”

“I see,” Jack, in fact, did not see.

“I transform,” Brick tried to clarify, having to chase after the words so she could string them together. “From small human, to brick wall mode. But talk becomes harder.”

“Oh, you’re a shape-shifter?” Jack asked, a little more intrigued now that he knew she could transform from a normal human into this bulky, super form and she wasn't just ripping off Mr. Incredible’s powers. “That’s really rare, we don’t see too many of those. It’s a pretty special power, you should be proud! Does it have a trigger, or is it on command?”

Brick actually might have blushed a little bit. Attractive men hardly even looked at her in this form, but less gave her what seemed like a genuine compliment. “I control the Brick. But I am always Brick here.”

“The Deavors are interested in seeing us showcase our powers,” the toad-like man explained to help her out. “So, she’ll be staying in her strong form for now.”

“Yes,” Brick confirmed, giving the grandpa super a thankful smile that expressed more than her words would have even if she was in her ‘normal’ form.

“Now, I’m Reflux,” the elderly man explained, smiling to himself as he said, “medical condition or superpower, you decide.”

Jack unexpectedly laughed, praying that it was a joke. It sounded like the kind of thing Simon would have said. “Okay, gotcha, so you’re a fire breather…?”

“I’m a lava breather, actually,” he declared, hoisting up his chest like he meant to show off the diagram of a burning digestive system on his super suit’s belly. He was clearly proud Jack had enjoyed his tagline.

“Wow. That’s quite the power to have for…so long,” Jack mentioned, trying to lightly hint at the man’s age before taking a sip of his drink.

“Oh-ho, don’t I know it,” Reflux chuckled, giving his burning inside a pat. “I’ve been keeping this quiet for years now. But, when the Deavor kids reached out, I figured it was finally time to put myself out there!”

“No, that’s great,” Jack told him, kind of impressed with the old man’s dedication. “So, did you ever get approached by the NSA or were you just able to take enough heart burn medicine to avoid them?”

Reflux let out a hearty guffaw that was joined by Brick’s stilted but equally amused barks of laughter. “Why, yes, I did take a lot of heartburn medication! And I had some family in the NSA, so I think they helped me keep my nose clean.”

“Really?” Jack exclaimed, leaning back on his heels. “Anyone I would know?”

“Hm, well, it’s always possible, you did work in the same precinct, I believe,” Reflux mused, stroking the bottom of his chin. “Did you ever meet a young lady who went by Blazestone?”

Jack almost sputtered on his drink. “Blazestone?! Of course I knew that fireball! Man, what a dame that was…”

“That’s my great-grandniece!” he declared, somehow even more proudly when he reminded both of them, “She had a bit of a wild life, that one, what with starting as a villain. Part of the reason I never did see fit to put myself out there after considering it for a few decades.”

“Well, I’m glad you are now!” Jack declared, happy green flames dancing in his eyes at just the mention of Cassie. “We’ll need to get together and catch up about her sometime, I miss that woman.”

Blazestone: TERMINATED

Jack’s glass didn’t seem to empty at all during the conversation.

Which was strange. Jack had been nursing it for a while, but he hadn’t expected to see that it was still practically overflowing with whiskey.

It was making him start to regret asking for that shot of liquor in Winston’s office.

But the conversations weren’t going to stop, and Jack getting slightly less tense over the next hour or so was making him much more inclined to stick around and chat with these new supers.

Which is how he ended up standing around a coffee table watching an owl man recite Shakespeare.

The owl man, which had introduced himself as Screech with a very cordial handshake, was standing on top of the table to garner a little more height as Jack and two more superheroes in blue stood around watching him. “And if King Edward be as true and just As I am subtle, false and treacherous, This day should Clarence closely be mew’d up, About a prophecy, which says that ‘G.’”

It kind of reminded Jack of Phylange, on the rare occasion Jack had seen him performing at the opera.

Jack had almost fallen asleep during that too. The only difference was now Simon wasn’t they to nudge him awake with his elbow, there was no singing, and it was being done buy a guy dressed as an owl

“Of Edward’s heirs the murderer shall be. Dive, thoughts, down to my soul: here Clarence comes,” Screech concluded, garnering some smattering of applause from the three of them.

If only because Jack had no idea what he had been talking about and it was impressive how someone could remember to talk so much about nothing that made sense.

“Yes, thank you, thank you,” Screech declared, bowing slightly as he alighted from the table to join them.

“You actor in normal life?” a bulky, blue-clad hero asked. Jack had vaguely remembered seeing him using telekinesis earlier but hadn’t gotten a chance to ask about it since they had all somehow gotten wrapped up in this mini ren faire.

“Oh…no, but would that not be grand?” Screech lamented, holding a hand to his chest.

“Well, what you do?” the super asked again.

Screech seemed slightly offended at the idea of having to discuss it, but admitted, “I work for an aviary in Montana.”

“I’m a musician,” the wiry blue hero added.

The muscular man responded in perfect deadpan, “No one ask you.”

“So we can listen to him talk about his life but we can’t talk about mine, I see how it is,” the gangly hero groaned, a few sparks of lightning dragging across his arms as he folded them to his chest.

Jack snorted, rolling his eyes as he slowly marched around the small group. “Ladies, ladies, I love to see the drama, but you’ve already made a huge error.”

“Huh?” the wiry one asked. Jack was fairly sure he’d been on way too many drugs and riding around in a rainbow van with a peace necklace around his neck at some point in his life. His brain seemed partially shot sometimes.

“Yes, what are you addressing?” Screech joined in, hands on the hips of his owl costume.

Jack smirked knowingly at them and raised his glass of whiskey to his lips. “You just told me your civvie jobs. If I was determined enough, that would be enough for me to track you down.”

“Just from that little information?” Screech exclaimed, unnatural feathers somehow ruffled. “I doubt that.”

“Don’t underestimate someone who wants to find you,” Jack informed him. Not that he was going to be too harsh on these guys, they were clearly just trying to figure out how all of this worked. “Speaking of, how did the Deavors find you guys?”

“Many, many stories,” the bulky, blue-clad man explained.

Jack could assume that was probably the case.

Screech was apparently from Montana, already remote enough that Jack had never been there, and those two blue supers both had very obvious accents of some sort. And not like the slight Civicton accent that you could hear in Jack’s voice if you really, really, really listened, those two weren’t from the US. He’d even heard the bigger of the two mumbling something in a completely different language when English became too frustrating.

“Well, then I guess I’ll have to wait for someone to make a comic about your super original story,” Jack joked, earning a laugh from the other three men. “Speaking of, I’ve met you, Screech. What are both of your call names?”

His finger darted between the two blue heroes.

The wiry one was, of course, the first one to speak, chest proudly puffed out as he boldly introduced himself. “He-Lectrix.”

“...” Jack didn’t have a polite response for this. “Good to meet you…Electric Guy.”

He-Lectrix seemed a little offended. Good, Jack had avoided ‘greatly offended.’ “It is because I zap things electrically and I am a man. ‘He,’ and ‘electric’ equals ‘He-Lectric.’ And the ‘x’ improves any word!”

Jack’s smile might have been grimacing slightly from just how bad that name and that explanation was. “Okay, yeah, I figured. But…you’re absolutely sure?”

“I spent a long, hard five minutes discovering the name that I was destined to bear,” He-Lectrix informed him, dramatically holding his fist in front of his chest. Then dropped that hand to his side and widened that slightly unhinged smile he had. “So what advice do you have to make it better?”

“Hm, try not to make a name that’s so underwhelming,” Screech suggested boldly. “Does ‘He-Lectrix’ not sound distinctly similar to ‘Electrics’? That would be most confusing!”

“Well,” Jack started with a hiss. “If you wanted me to be harsh, I’d say you could probably use a name tune-up as well. Not that Screech is bad, just like He-Lectrix isn’t bad, but…”

They weren’t good!

Just off the top of his head, Jack could come up with half a dozen better options.

Like, yeah, sure, these were supers practically raised to act like civvies, but come on, did they not learn anything in school??

“...They could use a little revising,” Jack decided, swishing the ice around in his glass.

“Well, perhaps you might share your advice, Gamma Jack?” Screech prodded, lifting a gloved hand inquisitively.

“I don’t know, I’m not really an authority on this sort of thing, Jack lamented, tossing his iconic golden cape back onto his shoulder because it had slowly slipped in front of the iconic gamma symbol that matched Gamma Jack’s iconic name.

Quite literally a poster child for good branding.

“Come on, we want to break into this career just as much as you did!” He-Lectrix exclaimed, earning a squinting stare from Jack.

Who immediately relented and informed them, “Sure, why not? It’s not like I had anything else to do today.”

Other than the manila folder tucked tightly onto his side.

Jack tried his best to ignore that slab of paper against his side as he smirked. He was humoring these three rookie supers instead of actually doing what he’d wanted to do (break into Devtech and figure out that the Deavors were indeed planning to do to him and these other supers).

But the Deavors were in the room with all of them, and he needed to wait until all eyes weren’t on him to look at Peggy’s file.

So, why not? He could help these new supers out just a little bit.

“You’re not just naming yourself, you’re naming a brand,” Jack began, placing himself in the center of the group. “Let’s see, I could have been ‘Radioactive.’ Ta-da, perfect, descriptive name, unique, call it a day. But you wouldn’t name a company ‘Radioactive.’ That doesn't tell you anything about the company other than radiation is involved, probably.”

“I do not think it is so terrible,” Screech decided, settling into the small circle he and the other two heroes had created around Jack.

“Give me a sec to finish explaining,” Jack implored him, taking another sip. “Single-word names are only good if they’re unique, descriptive, and instantly make the public think of only you. Like, take ‘Apogee’ for example. Unique: it’s not a name anyone else got close to picking. Descriptive: her abilities were most powerful when the sun was at its apogee. And you probably immediately think of her because no one in their right mind uses ‘apogee’ in their daily vocabulary. That’s the kind of name you want. Also, it should sound cool.”

“So, she could have picked ‘noon’ or something and that would have worked,” He-Lectrix decided, finding himself very knowledgeable on the subject.

Jack very much disagreed with what he assumed his level of knowledge actually was. “‘Noon’ wouldn’t have been better for her because that’s too bland, too common, and you think of 50 dues at high noon before anything else.”

The blue, bulky hero scoffed. “That is why you need good name.”

“You can’t say anything!” He-Lectrix informed his fellow blue hero. “You picked Crusher! Like the machine that smushes tin cans!”

“I did not choose ‘Crusher,’ bleh! No, no,” her admonished the wiry super. “I choose Kraushauer. K-R-A-U-S-H-A-U-E-R.”

“‘Kraushauer,’” Jack repeated, already exhausted just trying to follow along with the spelling. “No one is going to care how unique the spelling is, they’re just going to struggle to pronounce it, or hear ‘Crusher’ and assume it’s spelled like the boring, unimaginative name that is it.”

Kraushauer wagged a disappointed finger at Jack. “I don’t like this one.”

“Hey, maybe you’re not a very imaginative guy, so it’s appropriate,” Jack told him, leaning onto one foot, “but then you need to get someone else to come up with a name! I have this great friend, and his first idea for a superhero name was Viewpoint. I bet none of you will guess what his powers were.

He-Lectrix raised his hand like he was still ins school. “Seeing stuff?”

“Nope,” Jack instantly responded.

‘Seeing stuff’? Really? This guy was just bad at describing literally anything, apparently.

“X-ray vision?” Screech replied with a little more thought.

“Nope!” Jack repeated, resting a hand against his hip. “I’ll make it easier: his eventual superhero name was Gazerbeam.

“...My goodness–” Screech lamented.

“He was going to be ‘Viewpoint’?!” He-Lectrix laughed.

“Why?!” Krushauer exclaimed, personally offended by the idea.

“Hey, I actually liked it well enough,” Jack informed them before they could slander Simon’s idea too much. “But it didn’t work as a superhero name since it didn’t actually describe anything about how his powers were related to vision. But what really put the coffin on that name was there was this awful soap opera running at the time called The Viewing Point.”

He-Lectrix snorted. “Oh, yes, that would do it.”

“I think I might vaguely recall the show,” Screech reminisced, rather wistfully looking to the horizon. Ever the melo-drama queen.

“He’d never seen it, but Elastigirl loved it~” Jack announced, directing the comment to Helen so she would give him a quizzical look before he got back on topic. “Which meant Mr. Incredible found out it was an awful soap opera that only Elastigirl was watching, so he insisted Beamer had to pick something else.”

“You call him ‘Beamer’?” Kraushauer asked. “I not heard that.”

“It’s also a sign of a good name if it can be made into a good nickname,” Jack informed him, taking another sip from the drink in his hand.

And somehow his drink had gotten refilled again.

Weird.

“A-anyway, I’m Karen,” the blue-haired woman summed up, sticking out her rubber glove with its fingers splayed open like the nervous smile on her face.

Jack almost smiled at the fact that she told him her real name before remembering she was a “superhero.” Cuz it was kind of funny, that meant he knew two superwomen named Karen: Blueberry Slushie and Apogee.

TERMINA–

Nope! We’re not doing that right now!

His eyes rolled to the side as he crossed his arms over his chest, buying a moment for Jack to shove that thought aaaaaaaall the way to the back of his mind while simultaneously giving Madam Blueberry a grin that made her entire face flush red. “Sorry, I don’t speak civvie, what’s your hero name?”

“Oh! O-oh, um, my name is, um, Voyd!” she declared, waving her fingers in the air for nervous, dramatic flair. “And my powers are also green! …ish-blue! Well, more like a teal, but–”

“Okay, doll,” Jack had to wave away the rest of that blabbery speech, but he did look genuinely intrigued to hear what this woman’s powers were. It had been a looooong time since he’d heard of new superpowers, and you could see the excitement sparking in his eyes as he leaned forward on his knees. “Whatcha got?”

“W-well, I can make– It’s not anything too crazy like yours. Like, wow, I can’t believe how awesome it must be to have radiation powers, that must feel so insane,” Karen almost squeaked, her spine twisting into a pretzel while she moved her hair out of her face (which instantly fell right back into her face). “Or Elastigirl’s stretching, I wish I could do that, but I’m not nearly coordinated enough with my own powers, there’s no way I could be as clever with her powers.”

It was around then that she noticed Jack was still anticipating getting to see these mysterious powers sometime that evening.

The red on her face bloomed all the way down to her neck. “Wait, right, yes, what can I do? I do this!”

Karen threw her fingers towards the bottle of whiskey that hadn’t yet been opened, surrounding it with a ring of teal fire. The bottle fell right into the hole and reappeared in another ring of fire right above Karen’s head, the young woman snatching it out of the air as it fell out of the portal.

She chuckled nervously with that wide, toothy smile and presented it by the neck with a flourish. “I know, it’s not nuclear bombs, but–”

“You can make portals?” Jack exclaimed, hopping to his feet so he could stick his hand into the portal still in the table. His golden glove appeared over Karen’s head, flexing its fingers at Jack’s command as that grin on his face turned outright giddy. “That’s insane! I’ve never gotten to meet a portal-maker before, you’re such a rare person in our kind.”

“Oh, yeah, well, but it’s not like I’m all that good at it yet,” Karen informed him, handing him in the bottle when he motioned for it. “I’ve known about it since I was maybe 13? But I haven’t actually formally trained with it or anything.”

“Yeah, don’t worry, that’ll change,” Jack promised her, uncorking the bottle.

The closest thing in reach were two whiskey glasses, so Jack unfortunately relented and decided to pour a small bit of the expensive whiskey into the short glasses. The dark red liquid gushed into the glasses, one of them going to Karne’s hand, one staying in Jack’s as he grinned through a short toast. “I hope you get the long, successful superhero career, Ms. …?”

“Voyd,” Karen informed him, hand shaking as she took the expensive glass from him and tried to mimic the gesture. “I’m Voyd.”

Jack had to wait for her to tell him this was a joke. “So, wait, do you make portals to a void?”

“Nope. Uh, that’s just my name!” she nervously giggled, eyes darting to the side. “I thought it sounded cool…!”

Jack’s shoulders slumped. This was absolutely adorable. So many of these guys were so clueless about how to be decent superheroes. “It’s a good start, it just needs a little coordination with your outfit and your powers– Actually, I already talked with He-Lectrix, Screech, and Kraushauer about this, and they seemed interested in diving into it a little more in-depth about it in the future. If you like, you can join us when we get around to talking about names and costumes. All that basic stuff about superhero branding.”

“Wait, like, a workshop? With you?” Voyd asked, straightening her spine.

Jack scratched the back of his neck. “It sounds like a corporate-mandated training lesson when you put it that way, but, basically– Woah!”

Voyd was suddenly hugging him. A very unfamiliar sensation from another superhero, so it took Jack a moment to realize what she was doing. “That would be so awesome! I’d love that! It’s so amazing to meet you, and Elastigirl, and, ugh, I can’t believe this is finally getting to happen to people like me!”

“You mean, people like us?” Jack snorted, finally reaching a hand around to pat the young woman’s back. “You’re a super, kid, and you always were. We just need to make sure it’s legal for people like us to do what we were made for.”

His glass was full again.

Jack was starting to not feel so good.

He didn’t drink much, and the glass he’d poured for himself hadn’t even gone below three-quarters full.

But his head was starting to feel weird, and his vision was starting to get fuzzy on the edges.

At first, he decided he was just tired and on too much adrenaline again.

But then, just after Winston said his good nights to everyone, Jack caught the older Deavor sibling tipping the bottle of whiskey they’d been using for mixing drinks into Jack’s glass.

And he’d just been starting to enjoy himself too…

“What are you doing?” Jack almost snapped, pulling his glass away as Evelyn finished topping him off.

She blinked innocently, looking apologetic as she told him, “You were getting low, so I was just giving you a refill.”

…This was why he never seemed to be finishing his glass!

And why Jack was starting to feel his stomach crying out for him to sit down, or it would need him to go hide in the bathroom for a while.

How many times had Evelyn noticed Jack was “getting low” and duped more whiskey into his cup?

Evelyn was really trying something so petty?

As if Jack didn’t already have ample proof that she and Winston were up to something, now she was trying to get him inebriated enough to, what, make a fool out of himself? To paint him in a bad light in front of these supers?

“...Thanks.”Jack almost broke a tooth at the thought, green flickering into his eyes as the woman took a step back. “Keep the refills to yourself, okay, doll?

Evelyn’s expression had darkened as her jaw clenched. “No problem. So sorry about that.”

Jack glared at her until she’d refilled her own glass and set the bottle back on the refreshments table. She gave him a constant, unimpressed glare until she had taken her first sip, and left him so she could chat with Elastigirl again.

He sighed and made his way to the back sofa, tossing the manila folder on the table in front of him.

The nerve of that woman.

What did she think that would do?

Did she really think getting him tipsy was going to help in whatever grand scheme she and her brother were planning for supers?

Pathetic.

She was messing with Gamma Jack, one of the most powerful and renowned superheroes of the golden age, not some two-bit discount super from the training grounds.

Green light glowed along the surface of the brown liquid in Jack’s glass as he opened the folder, tossing the cost/benefits analysis on the empty side so he could quickly look at Psycwave’s manuscript.

Only to remember he’d stolen more than just that.

There was another file tucked behind the journal entries.

A single piece of paper that seemed to have been part of some sort of budget report.

Jack pulled it on top of the manuscript, eyes swimming as he tried to make out all of the numbers:

Final Budget for Auxiliary Headquarters (Approved by Evelyn Deavor)
253 5-D Backing Road, Slummerville, CA

Capital Equipment Purchases
Gel/Templates $19.50
Models $193.47
Light Equipment $353.60
Computer Set Up $923.85
Posters $4.23
Metrolev Blueprints $1.24
Helicopter Blueprints $1.32
Fencing $81.92
Antennae $930.90
Wiring $942.02
Monitors $894.02
Research Equipment $758.12
Labor $76.21

And the list continued on.

It was a list of weirdly specific equipment payments for, what, a hidden Devetech building in Slummerville.

Which housed blueprints for the hover train, helicopters, research equipment, computers–

…This was an address for a place that could very, very likely be something that the Screenslaver would frequent.

Was this an address to another one of the Devtech buildings, but in the middle of downtown Slummerville, a place where no one with the Deavors’ money and influence should have ever stepped foot in.

Yet it was written on an official Devtech budget sheet.

It had to be something the Screenslaver used.

That made sense, right?

Jack was having some trouble thinking straight, but he had to assume that this was at least suspicious.

A mix of dread and hope whirled up inside of him as he reread the document, trying to find anything of interest.

Elastigirl and Evelyn’s voices drifted toward Jack from across the room while he read, Helen catching Jack’s attention as she exclaimed, “Oh! I know how to get him! Screenslaver! You’re tech-savvy, I need to lock onto a signal and trace its origins… How fast can you slap something together and meet me at the airport?”

Airport?

“Airport?” Evelyn exclaimed.

That’s what he wanted to know!

But Helen was on a roll. “I need to get out of town, pronto.”

“I can get your contraption together by 5:00am,” Evelyn declared, just happy to go along with this.

“I need to get on TV,” Elastigirl continued, tapping her fingers against her chin for a moment before remembering the talk show she’d tried to be on a few nights before. “Chad!”

Yeah, that already ended badly once, why not do it again?

“I’ll get my brother to get up an exclusive with him tonight on the newscast!”

“Finish our interview by phone!”

Jack was confused. Were they trying to get up a call with Chad for that night? Or the next night? Cuz, uh, it was getting a little late for them to get on a plane and find Screenslaver before the evening news.

So, this was going into motion for the next day.

“Independence from Screenslavery!” Helen cheered, almost waking up Reflux as both women pumped their fists in the air in front of that.

Evelyn beamed, jokingly cheering back, “Chad tonight!”

“Boom!” They both laughed, patting each other on the back.

“I’ll go talk to my brother and get you a slot on Chad’s show for tomorrow evening,” Evelyn informed her, already going towards the door. “Screenslaver will be going down!”

“What better way than in the same show where they tried to take us down before?” Helen exclaimed, both women practically giddy at the idea.

…Alright, so that put more of a timecrunch on Jack’s discovery.

If he wanted to investigate this place before Helen was possibly sent on another dangerous mission, he had until tomorrow night.

Which meant he had about 24 hours to get to Slummerville, investigate this Devtech building, and get back.

He had his civvie job in the day, and Helen apparently had a death with for the next night–

So he only had tonight to go check this place out.

Jack clenched the budget sheet and tried to gently place it back into the folder, finding himself staring at it almost dejectedly as he realized what that meant.

He had another lead.

And if it paid off, he might find Screenslaver’s lair. That night!

Jack moved to get up from the sofa and leave the party, hoping no one would notice since Winston had also taken his leave.

Only for Elastigirl to meander towards Jack, smiling at him as she made her way closer. “Hey, we haven’t gotten to talk much yet.”

Jack had to pull up one of his own smiles as she moved to sit on the other side of the couch he had claimed. “Aww, sorry, I must have gotten caught up talking with all my fans.”

“You were certainly busy for a while. I didn’t expect you to be here,” Elastigirl started, almost accusingly as she leaned a hand against the arm at the other end of the sofa.

Jack shook his head, turning away from Evelyn’s figure disappearing into the hall. “I didn’t expect to be here either.”

“Did Mr. Incredible and Frozone also get invited?” she asked. Jack could feel her gaze landing against the side of his face while he looked through the budget sheet.

“I just happened to…be in the area?” Jack informed her, trying not to let his words slur. He thought it sounded pretty coherent, but hopefully Helen thought so too.

“Were you here to talk with Winston about the cost-benefits analysis?” she asked, trying again to get Jack to admit why he was there.”

“Yeah,” he lied.

Totally convincing. Totally great job, Jack. No wonder you managed to survive undercover on Syndrome’s island.

Helen stretched a little closer, trying to get a peek at what she assumed was the cost-benefits analysis.

“Hey!” Jack slapped the folder closed on the budget sheet, shutting off the Slummerville address from her gaze. “This is my espionage information, go steal your own.”

That made Helen stop mid-stretch. “...You stole something?”

“None of your business,” Jack snidely informed her. “You didn’t believe me about Screenslaver before, you don’t get to know about what I found.”

Helen recoiled, looking at Jack's clearly tipsy posture a couple of times, and sighed. “You promised you wouldn’t keep being suspicious of the Deavors.”

“I actually never promised anything, I just said I trust you,” Jack reminded her, spinning a finger through the air. “And I do trust your abilities, but you’re ignoring a lot of weird stuff, so, ta-da! Recon!”

That didn’t seem to reassure her of anything. “How much have you had to drink?”

“...Excellent question.” Jack leaned over and grabbed his glass from the table, holding up the brown liquid to the lamp over Helen’s head like he could somehow decipher how many times Evelyn had topped him off. “I don’t actually know.”

“Alright. I think you’ve had enough for now.” Elastigirl shook her head, but almost seemed reassured by that. She stretched out her arm and gently guided his wrist back down so the glass settled on his knee. “Let’s put that away for now and talk about something else.”

Maybe Jack had just gotten one too many and was being the slightest bit delusional at the moment.

The way he frowned at her probably meant he wasn’t pleased with this idea, but Jack reluctantly crossed an arm over the gamma symbol on his chest and let the folder be. “...So. There’s a bunch of new kids now.”

“Yes, there are,” Helen agreed, looking over the smattering of brightly-colored supers sitting all around them.

Voyd and He-Lectrix were still chatting away about something only the two of them could understand while Krushauer had started to inspect the remains of the refreshments. Jack felt acutely jealous of Reflux getting to fall asleep. Brick and Screech seemed to be hanging out together by the door. The two veteran supers in the back of the room both had to wonder what that conversation must have been about between the theatrical man and the monosyllabic woman.

“You seemed to be getting along with them well,” Helen noted, hoping to keep Jack from continuing to focus on his conspiracy for a while.

Jack had walked in with that manila folder, and now he was practically hiding against the back wall so he could read it. Helen had no idea why, and it was probably for the best if Jack didn’t remember why if he was inebriated.

Jack grinned at her, somewhat ensuring her that the topic had been successfully changed. “I mean, who wouldn’t want to get along with Gamma Jack? Even people who hated me in the good ol’ days still wanted me to like them.”

“Hey, I wasn’t doing too badly myself,” Helen responded, earning a teasing shrug from Jack. She just rolled her eyes and tossed her hand into the air. The mixed drink she was holding onto seemed like it had been barely touched, despite how everyone had dipped into the stronger beverages as the evening stretched towards night.

“But, no, it’s really nice seeing some young blood,” Jack told her, as genuinely as he could while his head was swimming. “I was a better candidate to be a super when I was 16 than any of them are right now, but who can blame them after so long in hiding?”

That earned another unimpressed smirk from Helen. But, it was kind of nice seeing Jack slightly more at ease, so she decided to be nice and ignore his jab at the new supers. “It’s just a shame the NSA is shutting down. If we don’t get this law revoked, there won’t really be anywhere they can train to improve.”

“You don’t think we will?” Jack asked. This was the only instance he actually heard Helen sound unsure about the crazy plan she was stuck in. “I mean, Screenslaver is doing…whatever if is they’re doing, and I think it’s the Deavors, regardless if you want to believe me or not. But other than that, everyone is on your side. The media is on your wide. Do you know how rare that is?”

“No, I know,” Helen assured him, tapping her gloved fingers nervously on her glass. “I just…it’s so weird. Just a week ago, I would have laughed at this whole idea. Now I’m sitting at a party in a room full of superheroes, and I think I might actually see them again.”

Jack snorted, deciding to sip at his own glass. He was particular about his mixed drinks like he was particular about everything else, so his glass was still just straight whiskey, a little diluted by the melting ice. He hadn’t actually finished one glass, just kept skimming off the top because of Evelyn’s interference. “Ironic for the great, retired Elastigirl to say. …Think you would get back into the hero business if it did come back.”

“...I think I would,” Helen admitted softly. A small, hopeful smile flickered across her face, just long enough for Jack to know she meant that. “Well, supposing I could work it out with everything at home, and make sure I could still take care of the kids.”

“Good. We’d want you back,” Jack informed her, confirming that he’d go back if he could.

Helen didn’t miss that detail. “So, I take it you would also get back into hero work. Even if that was made possible because of the Deavors?”

“I don’t know what’s going on with the Deavors,” Jack admitted, now with that new address haunting him. “I’m actually going to try and hit Slummerville tonight to follow a new lead. But If there was a way to get back to the Glory Days, uh, yeah. Of course I would.”

“I can only imagine. Especially because you’re still required to go in for those blood draws and were under monitoring for years–” Elastigirl froze, slowly turning toward Jack. “What did you mean about Slummerville?”

…Whoops.

Jack tried to keep that smirk, despite the way Helen was now watching him almost accusingly. “What about Slummerville? I heard you and Evelyn talking about your little idea to track down Screenslaver, why can’t I do some tracking for myself.”

“Jack, you’re not breaking into a Devtech building, are you?” Helen almost hissed. Ignoring the fact that it was more than likely Jack had broken into this Devtech building and that’s how he’d gotten invited to the party at all.

“Helen, you’re not trying to prevent the capture of Screenslaver, are you?” Jack almost sing-songed in return, earning a look of utter annoyance and panic from Helen. “Don’t worry, I’m just following a new lead. It won’t be dangerous.”

“Forgive me if I’m not reassured,” Helen retorted, setting her glass on the table between herself and an empty chair. “You’re planning on going to Slummervile tonight to find Screenslaver? Where? How do you know to look there?”

“If I tell you, you’re going to stop me, or you’re going to tell the Deavors since you practically need their permission to leave this building while you’re working for them,” Jack informed Helen. Just in case she hadn’t figured that out. “So, I’m going to check out this lead by myself.”

“That’s a horrible idea,” Helen informed him. As if he wasn’t already aware that a solo mission into enemy territory was, in fact, a horrible idea.

“So if working for people who probably want to kill you. We’re both acting on horrible ideas right now,” Jack reminded her.

Helen started to say something, but was cut off by Evelyn re-entering the room and coming up to the hero, an excited bounce in her step.

“I just set it up with Chad, you’ll be on the air tomorrow night, same slot as last time,” Evelyn told Elastigirl, almost hopping back into the chair next to the sofa. She grabbed her own glass and settled in before innocently asking, “Oh, sorry, were you two talking about something?”

Helen had to fight to not grit her teeth as she said, “Just come reminiscing.”

“That happens a lot,” Jack helpfully chimed in.

“Oh yeah?” Evelyn leaned back into her chair. “Anything in particular or…?”

“Missing old friends,” Helen sighed, like she was reluctant to admit it. It was a decent enough lie that Jack didn’t have any problems with. “It’s a lot, seeing all these new faces. It makes you start to wonder who else is out there still. Who would want to come back when we get the law changed.”

Evelyn chuckled, ice cubes clinking in the brown liquid. “I guess that would be really strange to think about. Didn’t you all keep in contact after the ban happened?”

“Some of us did, some of us didn’t. Mr. Incredible, Frozone, and I all stayed in touch,” Helen non-commitally told her, making sure she was vague enough that she didn’t accidentally give away anything that could hint to secret identities.

“I was actually out of the loop with them for a few years until the robot fight a few months ago,” Gamma Jack added, trying to help Helen out while fighting the alcohol in his system. “But, clearly we’re all back together now.”

“Huh. Sorry, I just assumed you had all stayed somewhat close,” Evelyn told them, crossing her legs. “It must have been a difficult situation, trying to have a new civilian life while leaving behind all of your super lives.”

“It was,” Jack very quickly informed her, a touch of venom in his voice.

“And, unfortunately, we can’t speak much for anyone else we might know about for the sake of their privacy,” Helen interjected, making sure to steer Jack away from mentioning how many of the supers they had known were…gone. “So, I’m sorry, but if you had any favorite heroes, we can’t really talk about them.”

“Oh, no, I understand completely,” Evelyn eagerly promised, completely ignoring Jack and moving all of her body language to face Elastigirl.

Jack kind of hated the way she seemed to be devoting herself to doting on Helen.

You could say he was jealous, but Elastigirl was also the one the Deavors had wanted to do this illegal assignment with them.

It didn’t sit well that Evelyn was now trying to placate Elastigirl at any given moment.

Best not to let Evelyn have the chance to focus on Helen for too long.

“Did you have a favorite superhero?” Jack asked, tapping his finger against his refilled glass as he watched for Evelyn to shift her attention back to both of them.

It was a funny thought. Trying to imagine this super-hater a decade ago, dancing to someone’s theme song like her brother. Turning on the news like a Saturday morning cartoon, hoping to catch Metaman’s most recent victory over Baron von Ruthless. Rushing through crowds to try and catch a glimpse of the Phantasmics as they paraded down Main Street. Wearing that same floppy hat, but with Elastigirl’s “e” pinned to it.

Evelyn seemed like one of Elastigirl’s fans. Those quick-witted dames who’d repeat, “Leave saving the world to the men? I don’t think so!” like it was tattooed to the inside of their eyelids.

She had certainly seemed to take a shine to the old super, constantly hanging onto her elbow like Elastigirl was the worm and Evelyn was the hook.

Of course, it could have been because, as Jack suspected, Helen was being manipulated by this woman’s seemingly altruistic but abrasive behavior. There was something alluring about a woman who could tell you everything you wanted to hear, but in that deep, melodic tone that made you wish that made you compelled to like her. Jack certainly had a special place in his heart for a person who could order him around how he liked it~

But Evelyn seemed to think about his question, slowly swirling the dark liquid in her glass as those stern eyes focused on the skyline slowly illuminating with billboards and apartment lights. The process was so long, Jack had time to scootch closer to the arm of the sofa and prop his tilted chin against his knuckles.

There was where he noticed Evelyn wasn’t necessarily thinking about who her favorite super was. Rather, she glanced at Jack, examining him from cape clasp to knee-high boots.

The alcohol-induced tipsy smile he offered her for encouragement apparently really worked, because after staring at it for long enough, she decided he was far enough gone that it didn’t matter.

So, in the quietest, most delicate voice, she held her head against her first, swirling the whiskey in her glass and forlornly admitted, “I think it must have been because of those phones father had in the house. We were adults when they were first installed, but Winston’s favorite had always been Fironic. So, my favorite was Gazerbeam.”

A pang struck Jack’s heart at that name.

Helen stiffened on the sofa, warily eyeing the space between Evelyn’s newly pensive gaze and the lasers of radiation beginning to build behind Jack’s eyes.

She held back as sigh and started trying to say something, “Well, he was one of the best–”

“He was my second favorite,” Jack mumbled, the surface of the whiskey in his glass rippling as he set his hand against the arm of the sofa. “I was my first favorite, of course.”

“Of course,” Evelyn groaned, the temporary bubble of serenity that had come over her quickly popped when she remembered just how egotistical and self-absorbed this hero was. How did he even have a right to call himself a hero?

They were all the same, weren’t they?

Always too caught up in being the best, being the favorite, to actually care about saving anyone.

That’s what Jack knew Evelyn was thinking. So, he made sure to let her know, “Beamer was one of the best we ever had. He spent his whole life trying to be a good person. And I think he succeeded.”

The older Deavor sibling scoffed, her disagreement palpable before she even opened her mouth to sarcastically say, “I’m sure…”

“No, he was,” Helen agreed, jumping to Simon’s defense. She wasn’t going to let Jack be the only one to talk about him when the last night Jack discussed anything about this he’d had an…episode. “There was a reason that Gazerbeam was considered one of the greatest heroes of the Glory Days. Even if he did make some human mistakes.”

“Well, he definitely made some mistakes, now didn’t he?” Evelyn muttered bitterly about her former hero, swirling her own glass around. “Like the Phantasmics? He barely lasted a few months with them. And the Thrilling Three? That was a mistake. Did you ever listen to Apogee’s interviews after the team broke up? It really makes you wonder what was going on in his head.”

Jack narrowed his eyes at Evelyn, hand getting twitchy just listening to that. “Apogee was a bitter old hag about the situation, and even if we were friends I had to disagree with how she responded to–”

“Well, there were a lot of feelings around the disbandment of the Thrilling Three,” Elastigirl jumped in, shushing Jack with her gaze as she slowly looked back at Evelyn. “Mistakes can be made no matter how good you are at your job. And some incredibly competent people just aren’t good leaders.”

“Sure. But if you’re not qualified for the job, you need to step aside and let more appropriate people take the spotlight,” Evelyn informed her, not bothering to direct the answer to Jack. “Like, what if Apogee had taken over as leader of the Thrilling Three? Maybe we’d be having a different conversation.”

It was kind of funny how much that name had been coming up lately.

Apogee and Jack got along well in the Glory Days, but hadn’t stayed in contact.

Yet her name had been making itself known lately.

Jack wondered what she must have been up to before she died.

Did she have a family? Did she ever get around to having a night dancing? She’d never liked California, had she moved back to Arizona?

He should have tried to find out years ago.

Why hadn’t he bothered reaching out to her in 10 years? He had so much time and never used it to find her. Or any of the people he was close to in the Glory Days.

Jack had fallen out of contact with the Parrs and the Bests for a couple of years as well! It wasn’t anything malicious or intentional, they just stopped calling each other, expecting the other to eventually reach out if they wanted to.

That just left him and Simon.

And in those last few months, Jack hadn’t even seen Simon…

He blamed the alcohol Evelyn had been dosing him up on for how he sniffled. “I miss Apogee.”

Evelyn practically rolled her eyes while she put on a viper’s smile. “Well, I’m sure once we get the ban written out of the law, you’ll see her again.”

Jack sputtered, shaking his head. “Naaaaaaaah. She’s dead.”

The lamp between Evelyn and Helen seemed to dim.

Evelyn, for the first time since Jack had known her, seemed legitimately shocked. Her usually nonchalant expressions was pulled down into a slack jaw before she could figure out a response to that. In the end, she had to settle for: “...Oh?!”

“Mm-hmm,” Jack hummed, the glass in his hand starting to blur a little. “A lot of our kind are. They wanted us dead, so we died.”

“What are you talking about?” Evelyn almost demanded, a hard edge in her voice.

Jack completely missed how Helen was clenching her jaw, trying to silently signal him to stop. But his nose was back into the nearly empty glass of whiskey. He really shouldn’t have had that liquor in the Deavors’ office… “Syndrome. He wanted to kill us. So, Apogee is dead.”

Evelyn’s expression only grew deeper and more puzzled as she tried to process what that even meant. “And Syndrome is…what?”

Elastigirl’s eyes went wide, fervently scanning across the party room. Thank goodness no one seemed to be paying them any attention, so hopefully no one had heard what Jack had just said. “And that’s a very sensitive, isolated, classified case. Right, Gamma Jack?”

Jack interpreted what she didn’t say out loud.

“Because we’re still not allowed to talk about it.”

“We’re still pretending everything is fine to protect the soft, fragile minds of civvies.”

“Supers aren’t allowed to care about our own pain, what sort of weak little lab rat would even be bothered by this?”

The glass in Jack’s hand almost shattered, veins of green fighting to break out of his skin as he grumbled, “…Right. Nevermind, I can’t tell you.”

Then the rest of that drink disappeared down his throat.

Evelyn looked at Helen as if the superhero would explain what Jack was talking about.

The easy solution would be to point out that Jack was tipsy, he didn't know what he was saying.

Instead, Helen was preoccupied watching the younger super for any glimpse of another…episode.

She had hoped he had gotten it mostly out of his system, but grief wasn’t a quick emotion. It lingered, sometimes festering deep in your joints, until you had to let it out so it wouldn’t consume you.

And if the other night was an indication, Jack was going to have a much longer road than anyone was going to admit.

The blue and gold super flopped against the sofa, the half-melted ice cubes clinking against the glass as his hand dropped to the cushions and he looked back at Evelyn. “Can I tell you something else?”

Helen’s head looked like it was about to snap off her neck from the strain of trying to stare Jack down. “Maybe we should change the topic. It’s been a long day, we’ve all had a little too much fun, we can settle in for the night.”

But Evelyn was only paying attention to the blue and gold superhero. Almost captivated by the way his practically melted posture was warring with the angry green radiation bubbling in his eyes. “What is it?”

Jack’s head lolled to the side, mouth scrunching into a dozen different shapes as he tried to figure out how to say it.

Was it the alcohol? Was it the fact that he hated having to admit it?

It didn’t really matter.

It popped out anyway, with the kind of nonchalant authority that made you genuinely fear what Jack was going to say next. “Gazerbeam is dead.”

Elastigirl stopped breathing. Her heart rate almost visibly began to rise as Evelyn watched the superhero in front of her, trying to work out what he’d said.

Jack probably shouldn’t have said that.

Helen didn’t know if she should admonish Jack for telling Evelyn that, or come up with a lie to get away from the fact that Jack had just admitted that there had not only been a superhero genocide, but also that one of the most high-profile heroes from the Glory Days was dead.

It hadn’t exactly done Jack any favors to give into his slight inebriation and mention Simon.

Just mentioning that name was making radiation build in his skull, bleeding into his eye sockets as he felt a heavy puddle of gamma settling into his core.

Not to mention, this Deavor openly showed she had a bone to pick with the supers who couldn’t save her parents. Making Gazerbeam one of the most abject, horrendous failures of her life.

Still, Jack almost didn’t notice the way her breaths had become slightly shallow, the way she almost seemed like she was feeling some remorse for that fact.

He was too busy trying to separate the TERMINATED bar from the epitaph on Simon’s grave.

“I was visiting him this morning…” he mumbled, momentarily lost in that park of stones and black coats. “But, uh, Fironic is probably still alive, so Winston can be happy that his favorite didn’t get slaughtered too.”

The place that hardly counted as a grave. It was just a cenotaph to placate anyone who didn’t know who Simon Paladino really was.

Who he’d died being.

Remembering that pushed a long, long moment of silence into the room.

Completely forgetting that Evelyn had been in that graveyard as well.

Jack had been the man who caught her design as it tumbled out of her hands. Had been the one to smile and apologize and call her “doll” just like he had the first night they met.

Of course, Jack knew that had been Evelyn. But he was in his civvie outfit, in a city with millions of people. The chances of her putting two and two together were slim.

Yet, she had almost recognized Jack.

And hearing that Gamma Jack had been visiting a dead friend that morning…

The way her mouth closed into a thin, tight line sent that realization back into Jack faster than he could process what he’d done wrong.

He had just practically admitted he’d been the man she had seen that morning.

The one who had picked up that scroll of plotter paper with Psycwave’s name written on it.

Evelyn’s presence across the room suddenly loomed overhead, her own whiskey glass being subtly strangled as she put that piece together.

When she looked at him again, her usual nonchalant expression had a subtle sharpness to it.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” Evelyn told him. No genuine sorrow in her words.

Told him. Not comforting, not apologizing, not commiserating.

She was letting Jack know she knew it was him.

She knew he had read part of her design.

Now, she had her face tightened into mock sympathy for his dead, former co-worker.

Jack so badly wanted to disintegrate the woman right then and there.

But he was held in place by Helen, and the promise he’d made that he would trust the Deavors.

At least enough that he wouldn’t try to hurt them while she was in the same room as him.

Elastigirl was trying to keep herself from grimacing too deeply at the darker tone this conversation was taking.

She leaned forward in her seat, as if getting slightly between the two of them would stop anyone from trying to punch each other in the face in a few moments. “It was really tragic what happened. And I wish we could get more into the details, but I think we should save this conversation for a different night.”

“Are you sure?” Evelyn asked, seemingly more invested now that she saw a crack going all the way through Gamma Jack’s ego that she could potentially exploit. Like a wild animal with a limp. “If there’s something you want to get off your chest, Gamma Jack, we’re here.”

The vaguely hidden intrigue in her voice made Jack’s skin crawl.

She’d seen him as a civvie, and she knew he’d seen something in those papers.

It wasn’t a huge leap to think that was why he showed up to this party.

Or why he had that folder filled with documents he’d been overly protective of all evening.

Jack’s hand went for the manila folder on the table next to him before he could stop himself. He should have taken more care to hide it, think of some excuse to pick it up.

He really should have said something before he abruptly stood up, smiling warbly as he tried to force his usual, easy cheer through the buzz of the alcohol in his stomach. “Nope. I’m aaaaaall good. In fact, wow, it’s like, seven o’clock? Way past my bedtime.”

“Jack…” Helen started warily, giving him the same look she might give one of her children when they were acting funny. “If you’re going to leave, I think you should wait for a car.”

“Nope, I’m all good!” Gamma Jack’s mouth might have been smiling as he waved away her concerns. His abandoned glass was set on the table. “Thanks for all the drinks, Evil-lyn.”

“Anytime,” Evelyn assured him, sipping her own as she watched that manila folder get tucked under Jack’s arm.

He squinted conspiratorally. “Uh-huuuuuuh. …Well, I’ll see you ladies around! I’ve got a long flight home!”

Helen stood up just as Jack turned around, having to dodge around the chair holding a sleeping Reflux as she maneuvered to grab Jack’s arm. The super froze as he felt her gloved hand wrap around his elbow.

“Really, I think I should call for the driver,” Helen told him, trying to keep Jack’s squirming arm in place as. “You’re in no condition to fly.”

“Yes, I am,” Jack insisted, trying to yank her noodly arms off of him. “It’s a long flight to Slummerville, it’ll wear off soon.”

Eleastigirl gaped at him. “You’re not flying to Slummerville tonight.”

Jack cocked his head, stopping his struggle. “But…I am?”

“No, you’re not.” Helen sighed, massaging a headache in her temple. “You’ve had too much to drink, and I’m sure you have work in the morning.”

“But this is important…” Jack told her dejectedly, almost hugging the manila folder to his chest.

“If this is about the files, we can talk about them after my mission with Evelyn tomorrow,” Helen suggested, another maternal grin creeping onto her face as she gave Jack’s arm a squeeze. “Okay?”

Jack snorted, almost pouting. “You’re such a mom.”

“Well, that is my profession of choice,” she joked in response, but her tone stayed firm. “Get home and get some rest. We’ll talk after tomorrow.”

She seemed so determined to do this. To figure out who Screenslaver was so she could save the world like it was the Glory Days again.

Jack looked at Elastigirl, hoping to find a way to reason with Helen underneath. The one who had chewed out Bob dozens of times for using the police scanner to do good illegally. Yet somehow she was refusing to see the conspiracy happening right under her nose.

It made Jack’s core swirl with worry mixed with the radiation.

But what else could he do? She wasn’t going to let him do this on his own.

Evelyn had already tried to ruin his credibility, or at least his general motor abilities, throughout the night. He wasn’t in any condition to go to Slummerville.

On the other hand, she knew what Jack looked like out of uniform, and that he had a lead to something she was working on.

The Deavors needed to be stopped more than Helen needed to know the truth.

So that ever charming smirk reappeared on his face, and Jack relented. “Okay. …But promise that you’ll be careful.”

“I always am,” Helen assured him.

Elastigirl finally let Jack pull his arm away.

And the moment Gamma Jack had left the party, he made his way to the nearest window, and began his flight to Slummerville.

********

It was a bit of a flight from Municiburg to the downtown apartment of Slummerville took Jack well into the early morning to complete. Thankfully not nearly as long as the flight would have been if the files had needed the super to fly all the way to New Urbem again.

But enough that the alcohol in Jack’s stomach was more than threatening to hurl itself out of his mouth by the time he landed on the apartment rooftop. Pigeon poop and rusty runoff from the overpace looming above the teetering building wasn’t doing much for Jack’s queasy gut.

Fortunately for him, the sick feeling he’d been fighting back since he realized Evelyn had been topping off his drinks was tamped down and hardened in determination as he noticed something interesting on the far side of the roof: dozens, if not hundreds of antennae and industrial cables infecting the concrete block like spores. And all of them trailing down to a dark window.

He stumbled forward, through the graveyard of metal spokes and wires for a few paces before he remembered he could fly. Then practically tossed himself into the air at the edge of the roof, spinning midair so he could grip his hands on the underside of the old window.

The green, glowing trail he left in his wake when he flew was brighter than any of the streetlamps on that road as he slowly raised the glass biting down around the hundreds of wires leading into the apartment. But it barely broke through the darkness waiting inside the apartment.

Even as Jack slipped inside, letting his glow gently brush over the metal shelves and twisting bookcases filled with plastic crates of yet more wires, he could barely break through the stifling blackness encroaching around him. The lunette windows were blotted out by grime and the overpass stretching above them, and despite how it was clear no one was home, Jack didn’t see a lamp they could have used if they wanted to.

Everything in the apartment seemed to be made of industrial-grade something. There wasn’t so much as a folding chair’s flat cushion to break up the monotony of what looked like a mad scientist’s storage room.

Except for something buried deep in the heart of the apartment.

Something that looked like a different sort of green light. Like from a machine someone had forgotten to turn off…

Gamma Jack called his power back into his body, extinguishing the protective shield of radiation so he wouldn’t have any other light interfering with his quiet prowl forward.

The green in his eyes faded away into their normal teal as he tried to carefully step over the cables strewn across the floor. That manila folder in his hands was getting wrinkled into a stress ball as his balance kept getting thrown off by the maze and the alcohol slowly being digested.

But after what felt like an hour of poking through the tiny apartment on his tiptoes, the unnatural green glow of half a dozen computer monitors flashed into Jack’s eyes.

It was an entire wall filled floor to ceiling with those bulky, military computers you’d see in science fiction movies. The ones with computer monitors flashing swirling graphs of geometric patterns, beeping important data to you if only you could understand such sophisticated machinery. There was even old-fashioned harddrives and memory tapes mounted onto it, like they would have been from a computer 20 years ago.

Jack took one disappointed look at the incomprehensible dials and decided that this was either way above his paygrade, or it was fake.

What did get his attention was how the computer station created its own little hallway to another section of the apartment. One with a desk tucked under displays of eyeball models from doctors offices and yellowed, crusty circus posters about hypnosis. But when Jack took a closer look at those posters, they weren’t actually all that old.

And they weren’t actually for hypnosis.

One was a poster advertising a hypnosis show that was from the New Urbem theater a couple years before, one was a cartoon picture of the human nervous system, one just a graphic of an eye surrounded by swirling waves. The only ones that displayed any real pictures about the brain or the eyes or how hypnosis actually could work were fakes. The kind of “scary” posters you’d get to decorate your house for Halloween if you were going as a mad scientist, so they were made to look old and battered and used, but they were new enough that they didn’t have any creases in them yet.

The eyes on the desk weren’t even useful for studying hypnosis either. They were just plastic models of eyeballs, only useful for a doctor to point to and say, “Look here, sonny, this is your pupil, this is your iris, and this is your sclera!” There was even a clipboard on the desk with a sketch of a human brain, as if the person making this set-up knew it looked incredibly fake if you looked too hard, so they were desperately trying to patch together something convincing.

This was a fake hideout.

Or, if it was real, whoever had made it intentionally left displays of illegible computer monitors and fake hypnosis research in the hopes that intruders would turn back.

…Kind of a weird setup if that was true.

Why would Evelyn and Winston go out of their way to make such an expensive, elaborate set-up, just to make it so obviously unbelievable?

Were they just this incompetent?

Jack was willing to believe that considering how easy it had been for him to swipe the address from Evelyn’s desk, then break into this secret “lab.”

It didn’t even have a lock!

And the window was open!

But there was no way they could be this bad at being villains.

There had to be something here other than an expensive red herring.

So, that’s why Jack was almost happy to hear the ear-splitting *DING DONG DIng dong…* of a clock crash through the apartment.

He spun on his heels and landed in the air, radiation launching through his skin so he could hold it defensively in his hands.

It was a good thing the alcohol was starting to wear off or the hypnosis-themed clock staring at him from down the hall would have been charred bits of wood and gears before it could tell Jack it was 2:00am.

A wheezing sigh filtered out of Jack’s lungs as he slowly made his way down yet another hallway of bookshelves.

Screenslaver would need to have some maps lying around for snooping supers to find their way back out of there.

There was a single, horror movie-themed lightbulb waiting over the desk that housed the hypnosis clock. Which Jack ignored because he’d seen horror films, and instead summoned more radiation from his core, building it up behind his eyes so he could see the schematics and blueprints pinned to the corkboard over that desk.

These at least looked somewhat legitimate. Someone had gone out of their way to dig up the structural plans for the hover train in New Urbem that was attacked a couple of days prior and laid it out so any nosy neighbor could find it strewn across the table. And pinned up real design layouts of the helicopters that had been escorting Ambassador Selick. Which there was also a smirking picture of, right next to the schematic.

But again. Everything was useless!

Screenslaver attacked using screens to hypnotize people.

So why did none of the blueprints have anything to do with, hmm, maybe, the computer screens on those vehicles?

This was supposedly Screenslaver’s lair, but it was filled with fake computers, posters for magic shows, plastic eyeballs, and blueprints about vehicles, but nothing to do with screens!

There was no way anyone actually worked there! It was entirely fabricated!

Jack had the receipts to prove it! In the very folder in his hand was a transcript about Psycwave, which meant Screenslaver wasn’t actually using hypnosis, they were using mind-control. So everything about hypnosis was fake, if that wasn’t already blatantly obvious.

The budget he’d swiped also said that there were thousands of dollars spent in electrical equipment, but the most tech he’d found was on the roof! So, apparently the most expensive part of the entire place was just making it look the part.

Then, the only part of the lair that actually connected to the crimes being committed and at least assured Jack he hadn’t broken into the wrong place, were a couple of blueprints for the hover train and the helicopters. But none of them had anything to do with the screens actually in those vehicles that Screenslaver used to attack people!

So, whatever this place was, it didn’t intend to be used for any of Screenslaver’s actual missions.

This was a fake lab. Probably meant for storage or throwing off the cops if anyone got to close.

And that would make sense. Winston and Evelyn spent most of their time in Municiburg at the Devtech headquarters. So why would either of them want a secret lab that they would need to take an airplane to get to?

Gamma Jack’s eyes almost burned a hole into the smiling picture of Ambassador Selick before he could close them, swallowing back the burning in his irises and breathing out a slow, steady stream of green fumes.

“...Okay, Simon. I need to go home before I blow this place up and let the Deavors know I paid it a visit,” he mumbled over his shoulder, trying to keep himself slightly chipper so he wouldn’t just blow the place up out of frustration.

There wasn’t technically any evidence that the Screenslaver did work in that apartment. There wasn’t anything about mind-control or computers, so it was almost more likely Jack had stumbled across the weird living conditions of the Deavor’s liminal space-obsessed cousin they didn’t want to talk about.

It didn’t look like anything there was actually made to hurt anyone.

But, there was still one space that Jack had failed to notice.

As Gamma Jack turned around to head home and lick his wounds for a few hours before work, he noticed that there was a room entirely made of chain-link fencing. And, yet again, there was a desk inside of it.

But this time, instead of the useless junk he’d stumbled across, this room had something a little more intriguing.

An object hidden by a shapeless, painting cloth.

Now, he wasn’t about to just walk into a room that looked suspiciously like a cape, so Jack made a nice, him-shaped hole in the chain-link fencing, and flew inside. Not even daring to let his feet touch the ground in case there was a trap hidden in the black floorboards.

Gamma Jack summoned a fist of gamma radiation as he slowly raised his hand to grab the cloth over the mysterious object.

The green light practically crackled against the silence of the apartment as the cloth was slowly removed.

And revealed a wooden mannequin head wearing nothing but a pair of bug-like goggles.

Their uncanny stare at the melted cage was already enough to make Jack feel the slight twist in his stomach, thoroughly knocking out any trace of alcohol that might have lingered since the party a few hours ago.

Those copper-tinged lenses stuck in the black frames didn’t seem like one of the props that littered the rest of the apartment.

Jack tossed the manila folder between the wooden mannequin and a forgotten pencil sharpener, sizing up those beady eyes like he was expecting the mannequin to confess the purpose of the goggles.

When they didn’t seem like the talkative type, Jack slipped his fingers under the stretchy, rubber band, and pulled the goggles into his hands.

They were lighter than he expected. Only about as heavy as two pairs of regular sunglasses.

He flipped them around a couple times, summoning radiation back into his eyes so he could see what he was doing while he inspected them for a smidgeon of evidence.

There wasn’t a name.

There wasn’t a manufacturer.

There wasn’t “Devtech” written in big, shiny letters anywhere.

But there was a small engraving along the left brow, only visible if you looked at the glasses like you intended to put them on: PROTOTYPE

Right underneath a small button, right where the goggles would fall on the bridge of your nose.

Jack pinched it under his fingers, and the glasses lit up.

Two bulbous circles of green bathed the caged area in a wave of piercing light that made Jack squint.

It wasn’t quite like the blue light that had been appearing on newsfeeds for the past few days, the one where you could see the helicopter pilots’ faces bleached white by mind-controlled screens.

These were an older model. Not so advanced, not yet perfected, but you could see the unnatural patterns of black squares and circles if you pressed the goggles over your eyes.

A familiar, swirling, sickening loop of white and black squares

and white and black and circle and black

and white and squa–

Gamma Jack let go of the button, yanking the mind-controlling power back into the lenses.

The goggles went dark.

Only the soft, green glow from his own eyes remained as his head began to rattle with new ideas around this discovery.

The ticking of the hypnosis clock a few feet away beat in time with Jack’s heart.

…They were the prototype for those computer attacks!

These green goggles had to be linked to Screenslaver. If they weren’t, then they were what had inspired the Deavors to make those mind-controlling screens.

This was the first real piece of evidence that Jack had found that meant maybe there was something going on here. Not just speculation or noticing the coincidences, but real, physical evidence.

He needed to tell Helen about this.

He needed to tell Bob and Lucius about this!

Then they all needed to get together and confront the Deavors about the papers Jack had found, and they needed to beat the both of them into the ground!

Also, all the green theming in that place was starting to make Jack feel uncomfortable. It looked too similar to his own powers. He should get it trademarked or something.

Gamma Jack had found evidence that Evelyn, and by extension Winston, were linked to all of this.

He just needed to get back to Municiburg with those goggles and the manila folder, then–

The door opened.

A flash flood of ice water ripped through Jack’s veins as he snuffed out the radiation glowing in his eyes.

The apartment door slammed behind whoever had just entered, darkly mumbling to themselves as half a dozen locks were slowly clicked into place.

Jack’s boots slunk to the back of the cage while their shoes practically broke through the floorboards.

Were they getting closer?

Were they walking to another part of the apartment?

It was impossible to tell because of how the maze of shelves had been laid out.

Regardless, if Gamma Jack was currently holding the only piece of real evidence in the entire building, he needed to get out of there before anyone realized it wasn’t on the mannequin.

But without being allowed to retrace his steps in fear of bumping into the apartment’s occupant, that didn’t exactly leave any options.

The clouds outside moved past, letting a small trickle of the moon become visible through the high lunette windows. Jack pulled his golden boots out of the way of the small spotlight, forcing his breathing to stay in the same, steady pattern it would have any other mission.

The indistinct mumbling became louder for a moment as the other person dropped a heavy box onto the floor, making the cage behind Jack rattle.

They were getting closer.

So hiding and waiting for them to leave was also an option Jack wasn’t comfortable gambling with.

No hiding. No window. No front door.

…That only left the lunette window glaring down at him.

Gamma Jack closed his eyes and slipped the goggles over his head, making sure they were tucking under his chin and falling against his chest before he dared to look back at the semi-circule window.

Ever so slowly, he took a step outside of the chain-link room, gently placing one foot after the other as he listened for the tell-tale sound of approaching figures in the dark.

The wall to the window seemed to grow ten-fold as he looked up at freedom.

Gamma Jack had to pray the glow from the computers down the hall would be enough to disguise the glow of his radiation as he flew those couple of feet into the air. Just a sheet of glass away from freedom as he steadied himself in front of the widest panel of the window.

That mumbling began to match the steady pace of feet falling somewhere in the maze.

Hopefully that would be enough to mask the sound of radiation corroding the metal muntins in the window.

Every soft crunch of a heel against wood made the radiation in Jack’s hands spurt faster, breaking down the metal into rust as he carefully cut a path out of the lair.

Until, finally, after an agonizingly-long 15 seconds, Jack knocked the loose piece of glass out of the window, not even staying to watch it tumble through the air as he forced his shoulders through the opening in the window.

By the time that glass had shattered in the alley below, Jack was already flying back to Metroville, leaving behind the strange events of the fake lab, and the caretaker who had interrupted his search.

Jack had the prototype goggles. And that was what really mattered.

However…

He failed to realize one very important detail had been forgotten.

And, yes, it was always possible it would stay forgotten and unnoticed, left to gather dust on that desk in Slummerville.

But Jack hadn’t realized until halfway through work the next day, that while he did have the goggles, he had lost the one thing that connected them to the Deavors.

He’d left the manila folder with Peggy’s journal manuscript and Evelyn’s budget by the wooden mannequin.

Chapter Text

In The Past (1964)

Being in a bowling alley was like being in a warzone with cannon balls flying down the lanes, crashing into rows of uniformed, white soldiers.

People shouted with glee whenever a hit struck true, league players bouncing up and down with pride whenever they landed a strike.

The action bowlers, who would be at the alleys until well past two in the morning, were tossing bets for thousands of dollars between each other. Just waiting for the next hit of adrenaline while their star players took to the lanes. Quite impressive for a Tuesday night.

Cigarette smoke and cheap beer was percolating through the entire building, making you cough at how strong it was, but after a few hours, it became as necessary for life as oxygen itself.

Lights flashed on and off as games were completed, then lanes instantly filled up again, making an almost dizzying display of illumination and darkness that could give you a headache if you focused on it for too long.

Being at the lanes for that time of night was an exciting, overstimulating, convoluted mess of fun and the kinds of intoxication that didn’t come from alcohol.

And Mr. Incredible was at the forefront of it all. The muscles in his shoulder bulged like a bull's as he wound his arm back, the 15-pound bowling ball as heavy to him as a mosquito.

That ball flew out of his monstrous hands, hardly skimming the smooth wooden lane as it glided right into the heart of the assembled pins.

They all went flying, clattering and crashing into a pile of rubble at the end of the lane before Bob and Lucius could start cheering at the perfect spare. Simon was politely trying to figure out why this was worth all the excitement while Jack furiously scribbled down something in the scoreboard. The bookkeeper at the helm of this strange navy vessel.

The four of them always picked the same lane, the one farthest from the bar, under the lights that always stayed dark. Like they were trying to hide away from the world while they were in there. Hiding away from reminders and expectations that came with being supers in a world that didn’t want them anymore.

They were just normal citizens named Bob, Lucius, Simon, and Jack, and it was bowling night. Like it was every week for so many other normal citizens.

They had it down to something of a routine at that point. Lucius and Jack came in from Metroville to meet Bob and Simon in the suburbs. Sometimes it involved visiting Helen at the Parrs’ house, which would strike up a moral obligation to visit with Violet and Dash for a couple minutes while Bob tried to placate his wife into letting him go play with his friends.

Other nights, they would all meet in the back lane of Admiral B. Bowling (a truly bizarre name for a bowling alley, but alright), and they would assume positions like they had for the past few years:

Bob would hardly ever sit down, too excited by the prospect of hurling chunks of black resin at unassuming hunks of plastic. No doubt it was a way to ever so slightly remember what it was like to throw cars through buildings, but after years of this, he had actually become a very competent athlete in the sport.

Lucius would somehow never leave his seat while also somehow always having another bottle of cold Coca Cola to offer the rest of them. Also a competent bowler in his own right, he had floated the idea around that the four of them should try and make a team at some point, but really only he and Bob were at the skill level required for league or action bowling.

Simon sometimes brought work with him to read over between his turns, but if he didn’t, he would sit back and practically study the way Bob and Lucius bowled. He hadn’t exactly been a good bowler before they had made these nights customary, but he could be considered fairly decent now.

Jack was there to man the scorekeeper podium at the start of the lane. Not that it was particularly difficult to count how many pins had been knocked down, but he was the quickest at math and that meant he could spout out their scores practically as soon as the pins fell down. Which compensated for the fact that he hadn’t ever bowled before they started making bowling night a weekly occurrence. Even if he could now successfully get through a game without a gutter ball, he didn’t have any expectations of beating the other three.

“You guys are cheating.” Jack exclaimed, stabbing the pencil into the paper scoreboard he'd been manning all night. “That's your fifth spare tonight!”

Lucius laughed, grabbing Jack's shoulder with an ice-cold hand and giving Jack a shake as he joked, “Do we keep you around to complain or to tally the scores?”

“Speaking as the person tallying the scores, you should probably pay me a little more respect,” Jack warned him. Then, wagging the pencil's flattened eraser at Lucius's chest like a teacher who'd caught a student misbehaving, he asked, “So, were you using ice to give the ball a little less traction, or are you just running cold today?”

“Woah, just because you're in last place doesn't mean you have to be all fussy,” Lucius retorted with a pleased smile, pulling back his hand to mockingly surrender to the younger man. “Just because you don't have helpful powers, that doesn't mean we're taking advantage of you.

“Hey, cut him some slack. He's not used to being the worst at something,” Bob joked along, spinning his black bowling ball on his finger like it was a basketball.

Jack just rolled his eyes and ripped the top piece of paper off the score pad. “That's 126 for me, 157 for Simon, 198 for Lucius, and 205 for the oh so wonderful Mr. Incredible.”

“Yeah!” Bob whooped, Lucius offering some polite, vengeful applause that only a friend would recognize as sinister.

Jack crumbled up the paper and tossed it into a trashcan filled with his friend's Coke bottles and his own Shaefer's Beer bottles so he could write down their names on a new paper for another round. “Okay, Lucius, you’re up. We're not done until someone beats the big guy, and it'll have to be you.”

“Do we have time for another game?” Bob asked, glancing around for the clock. Strangely apprehensive about losing his winning streak.

Jack glanced down at his watch and shrugged. “Mm, it's a little after 11:00.”

“So we'll finish around 12:00-ish? Is that okay for everyone?” Bob said it like he was asking all of them. But he was focusing on Simon, who had become increasingly withdrawn the longer they stayed, as he said, “I know you have work in the morning, we can stop if you need to go.”

“Hm?” Simon's usually unfocused gaze seemed to have been swimming more over the past few minutes. It hadn't escaped Jack's notice that Si was getting less and less talkative over the last few rounds, until he'd finally crossed the threshold into silent. But he still managed to smile a very tired smile when he told them, “No, that would be fine…”

“...Alright,” Bob said warily. “But since we usually have bowling night on Wednesday, it's okay if you have to leave.”

“No, I'm fine,” Simon insisted. Which should have been a clear sign to Jack that he wasn't. Simon lived and died by his schedule, and changing bowling night from Wednesday to Tuesday on Tuesday afternoon was enough to mess him up for the rest of the week if he wasn't careful.

So there was so way he was being this nonchalant about this.

“You're sure. We can call it a night,” Jack offered.

“No. It's fine,” Simon reassured him with an encouraging smile, but words choppy and stilted as he practically rang his wrists off his arms. He had to spend a few seconds rubbing the deep corners of his eyes before offering the weak explanation of, “I'm just tired…”

Bob glanced at Jack, silently asking if he trusted what Simon was saying. Jack didn't bother to return the look, too focused on staring behind those thick glasses to see if he could parse out how truthful Simon was being. Which didn't really help since Simon was refusing to look at anything for more than half a second before he'd have to rub at his eyes.

Nope. Jack knew Simon wasn't up for another round of bowling that night.

“Hey, you know, I could use a refill,” Jack declared, tossing the pencil back onto the scoring pad.

His second bottle of Shaefer’s had been half full on the scoreboard podium for an hour, but Jack needed the excuse for them to give Simon a little space.

“Yes, a refreshing refill of the beverage sounds wonderful,” Bob agreed, sounding so blatantly like a liar that Jack had to glare at the smile Bob put on. “I will go with you, Jack.”

“Don't take too long,” Lucius told them as he sat down on the bench opposite Simon, just as nonchalant as always. That way, if giving him space didn't work and Simon had one of his freezing episodes anyway, someone would know.

None of then really understood what those spells were. Sometimes it was just too loud and too bright and too pungent and too overbearing, and Simon would have to retreat into himself for a while. It wasn't dangerous, the worst thing that would happen was he practically stabbed his fingers into his eyes while trying to massage the tension building behind his eyes. But when he started to pull back from the world, Jack knew the three of them needed to quiet down their excitement and let Simon's brain try to calm down before he became unreachable for a “freezing episode.”

The rate of success for avoiding an episode after Simon was showing symptoms was, uh, subpar at best.

Overhead lights like spotlights desperately trying to cut through the dim, smoggy expanse that clogged everything except the bar by the front door. It was occupied by league players moonlighting after long days of being suburban moms and dads, who had stuck their kids with babysitters or reluctant older siblings. The smell of cigarettes and bowling alley beer wafted from the bar, brightly lit by red neon advertisements. The crackling TV reporting on the Metroville Municipals vs. the New Urbem Bombardiers.

“You have to wonder what causes those,” Bob mumbled at the bar, drumming his thick fingers against the chipped varnish. They’d all wondered it, but saying it again was enough of a distraction to drag Jack's attention away from the two shadows sitting back at their lane. “Shame he can't pull out the Gazerbeam helmet. The noise-cancelling gauge in it would be pretty helpful for quieting things down.”

“Don't start talking about that again,” Jack grumbled as his elbows sank into the corner of the cheap wooden bar they'd won from a squad of league bowlers. He had to curl his hands into fists to stop the angry green radiation from crawling free. It was already enough for Jack to try and focus on keeping his eyes their natural teal. “It's just another reason they never should have signed those laws into place, and I don't feel like thinking about that right now…!”

A long, angry green wisp slipped through Jack's hands. Bob watched it fade into the smoky air, then turned his attention to the young super.

An elbow leaned into the corner of Jack’s vision, Mr. Incredible’s familiar presence always present, but not completely tangible after the ban. “...I know, you're worried about him. But this happens sometimes and he's always fine-”

“Yeah. And we used to save people from burning buildings all the time, they were always fine,” Jack snapped, his voice a whisper so the passing bartender wouldn't hear him.

Bob's expression was far too patient for Jack's liking, like he completely understood why Jack and Simon’s friendship involved the two of them fussing over each other so much.

Like Bob understood why they had that constant need to make sure one of them wasn’t still at the office at midnight.

Or one of them wasn’t getting caught up with a woman again.

Or they weren’t so busy trying to watch out for each other that they kind of forgot to take care of themselves.

Bob could only imagine what kind of friendship made their bond so strong.

Mr. Incredible and Frozone were best friends for years before Handsome Jack had been recruited by Dicker, and Bob had never worried over Lucius like that.

Jack worrying over Simon reminded both of them much more of Helen and Bob. How they would spend entire shifts pace around the break room at headquarters, asking for updates on the other until Elastigirl or Mr. Incredible walked through the door alive. Or, if it was a slow patrol, they would find a quiet rooftop and just sit and chat until they got a buzz on their comms about a bank robbery they needed to foil. It really was the sort of relationship where you could almost always expect to find one two seconds from the other, regardless of if they were on duty together, in the medical wing together, or just huddled on one of the break room sofas and talking so long they realized they were supposed to go back to civvie life in five minutes.

Bob really could admire a friendship that strong. He hadn’t expected anything like that when the three of them had brought Gazerbeam into the NSA years ago, but it was obvious just how much these two had formed an unbreakable friendship since then. “You know him better than anyone, so you know he can pull through these.”

“That doesn't mean I want him to have to deal with this if it can be helped,” Jack retorted, running a hand through his hair in frustration. It probably messed up his well-crafted look, but he was kind of distracted!

An unusual thing, for Jack to not worry about his image before anything else. It made Bob pause, even chuckle a little, to see how much the kid had managed to grow up over the years. “Well, Si is in good hands if you’re this worried about him.”

“Tecnically he’s in Lucius’s hands right now,” Jack reminded him. He was having to fight back the worried green sparks from pooling out of his eyes. “I should go back there. Just in case there’s something I can do–”

Bob grabbed Jack’s wrist before he could make his escape, the bigger man, barely even bothering to sigh as he smiled. “If there’s anything you could do to help him, it’s probably not rushing up to him all panicking and worried, right?”

Jack’s face scrunched up into something unapologetically annoyed for being manhandled. …And maybe cuz Bob was…a little…tiny bit right…

“He is the best at keeping calm under pressure,” Bob reminded him, slowly bringing Jack away from any thoughts of charging back to the alley and beating Simon in the head with compassion. “He’s got this. And if Simon really needs more help, you know Lucius will come and get you.”

Bob had already let go of Jack by the time the younger super sighed and resumed his pose of leaning into the bar. “Right…”

The crowd continued to laugh and chatter all around them, having to shout sometimes to get over the music blasting from the speakers mounted in the corners.

“You know, it’s kind of nice seeing how much you’ve gotten a hold of yourself over the years,” Bob said, not realizing just how bad that sounded until Jack was giving him an incredulous look. “Don’t get me wrong, but you were a little rough around the edges for a while when you first started working with us.”

Jack snorted, leaning further into his elbows. “This is why I hang out with Simon. He actually knows how to compliment me.”

“I’m just saying, it’s impressive to go from ‘potential supervillain,’ to worrying about your teammates this much,” Bob summed up. Even if it wasn’t particularly elegant, they’d all lost some of their touch since the Glory Days. And Jack could enjoy the sentiment.

“Hey, after all, what was that you used to say about me?” Jack puffed out his chest and deepened his voice to an All-American baritone. “I think you'll always want to do the right thing, Jack. You just need to remember what the right thing is.”

“Yeah, I did say that,” Bob remembered, nodding in approval of his decade-old advice. “And I stand by it.”

Jack didn’t really know why. But, hearing that did fill him with a small sense of pride.

Bob had almost successfully calmed down the former hero.

Then Lucius’s voice broke through their conversation. “Jack.”

“Hold that thought.” Jack spun around, startled by what looked like concern on Lucius's face as he made his way to the bar. He felt his own paling a bit just. “Yeah?”

“I’m not going to alarm you,” Lucius started, which, naturally, immediately alarmed Jack, “but I think you should take over from here–”

“On it!” Jack tossed a fistful of random coins and one wadded up dollar bill onto the counter and began to race back to their alley, his slippery bowling shoes helping him go even faster than what was probably acceptable. “I don’t remember what I bought, but that should cover it, I’ll be right back.”

Bob caught a few of the coins as they fell off the counter and called after him, “You didn’t order anything–?”

“Then, yay, you get free money!” Jack congratulated him, then leapt around a young couple as he continued to barrel through the middle of the rumbling building.

Simon wasn't doing well.

The usual pinstraight posture that was so characteristic of him had warped into a full-on hunch, shoulders tucked over his chest while his elbows were pressed into his knees. One bowling shoe kept bouncing against the ground like it was trying to tap out a frantic message in Morse code, while the other state glued in place. Simon’s hand was pressed into the meat of his eyes, like it was trying to put a cork over his laser vision.

It was the exact sort of pose someone would be in if they were trying to hide away from the world for a little while. Trying to block out some of their overbearing surroundings so they could recalibrate their thoughts without the extra background noise.

Jack's first instinct was to pounce to Simon’s side, grab him by the shoulders, and yank him out of the building.

But, well, he wasn’t really legally allowed to use his powers to blow up the roof and dramatically carry Simon away. And Simon probably wouldn’t like having to put up with even more chaos at that particular moment.

Hence, like so many other times, Jack sat next to Simon, watching for any glimpse of unease. When Simon didn’t try to keep himself away, Jack slowly came closer on the maroon cushions. A tentative hand reached out towards the limp fingers left by Simon’s side, until Jack’s were sheltering them underneath his own.

It could have been his imagination, but Simon’s shoulders seemed to ease just the tiniest bit at the familiar gesture.

“Hey,” Jack carefully ran his thumb against Simon’s wrist, watching every rise and fall of his tapping foot, “you can take me home now.”

Simon was driving, after all. He wasn’t going to let Jack near a steering wheel when he knew Jack would have a couple beers, like at bowling night.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Simon nodded.

Bob and Lucius both breathed a sigh of relief as they saw the other two leaving, before they both went back to their lane to make sure everything was cleaned up and anything that had gotten left behind was pocketed for when they saw Jack and Simon again.

The grey, brick-shaped building of Admiral B. Bowling watched Jack and Simon’s retreating backs until they were safely inside the latter’s Lincoln Continental. The relief from the clear, crisp night air was immediate, banishing the last remains of the smoky building from their lungs and sending a well-needed chill down their spines as the car doors closed around them, Simon the driver’s seat, Jack in the middle seat next to him. The neon sign of a smiling sea captain with a bowling ball winked at them every three seconds from the entrance to the parking lot, an unofficial timer Jack could use to make sure this episode wasn’t going on longer than usual.

Those next, long minutes in the car used to be peppered with Jack fiddling with the radio, cursing at the fact that Simon thought smoking was evil and that meant he didn’t have any cigarettes in his car to keep Jack occupied.

Now, four years after the superhero ban, the only sound that broke the relative silence was the occasional squeak of the leathery seat as Jack nestled into Simon’s side.

The familiar presence was enough to make Simon melt slightly in contentment, eyes pinched closed and back straightened against the seat. The dark, soothing silence of the car slowly began to drain the tension from Simon’s tense body, while the smell of cigar smoke was replaced with Jack’s strangely comforting scent of ozone and expensive, light cologne. It was a near perfect reversal of their usual roles, except that Simon usually found a way to wrap his arm around Jack’s waist, but in the car that night, Jack had to make due with keeping his hand against Simon’s leg.

Jack really had no idea what he was doing, but told himself that the gesture helped Simon stay grounded or something.

It’s not like either of them knew why Simon’s brian did this sometimes. The four of them just knew that getting him somewhere quiet was the best way for Simon to recalibrate if he got overwhelmed.

Jack almost lost count of the amount of times the sign had flashed against the hood of the car when he finally felt Simon’s shoulders sag into his.

The younger super grinned up at him. “Hey.”

Simon glanced down at the blond cuddling into his side and snorted. “Hello. You do realize I’m fully conscious when that happens, right?”

“Feeling any better?” Jack asked. He sat up a little bit, giving Simon space to remove his glasses and clean off a fingerprint that had been smudged right across one lens.

“Much better, thank you,” Simon confirmed, slipping his glasses back over his nose. He looked out across the parking lot as he sighed. “I apologize… I didn’t mean to cause such a problem for the three of you.”

Jack gave him a miffed look, already blurting out, “Don’t be sorry for that–”

Before he cut himself off.

Because saying, “Hey, don’t worry about it, I legitimately do not care and neither did the guys, I really just wanted to make sure you were okay!” was the easiest way to make Simon commit to apologizing incessantly for the next few hours.

So, Jack rolled his eyes, grabbed Simon’s wrist out of his crossed arms.

Simon gave Jack a puzzled look as the younger man started tugging on that wrist. But, he quickly relented and let Jack pull him closer, resting his head against the blond’s shoulder. “This is probably more comfortable when you do it because you’re shorter than I am, but it doesn't work as well for me.”

“Shut up and let me comfort you,” Jack snipped in response, finally getting the chance to hug his arm around Simon’s waist. Simon was smiling and shaking his head as Jack insisted, “Also, when we’re sitting down, you’re only, like two inches taller than me, so don’t try to play the ‘I’m 6’5,” a giant among men’ card. You will relax on my shoulder and you will like it.”

“Thank goodness I was informed.” But Simon readjusted himself to be more comfy against Jack’s shoulder if he was being forced into therapeutic cuddling.

“How do you manage to be so smart and so bad at taking care of yourself when I’m not there to do it for you?” Jack bemoaned, watching the sea captain in the neon sign winking on the neon sign. “Okay, now that you’re feeling better, you can tell me how smart and strong and handsome I am.”

Simon picked himself up slightly, needing to check Jack’s face to gauge how serious that request was. It made him chuckle a little to find out that Jack seemed almost genuine with his demand. “But you already know that about yourself.”

“Yeah, but I like hearing you say it,” Jack informed him with a teasing glint to his grin. He squeezed his arm tighter around Simon’s waist. “Not to mention you worried me!”

Jack swore he felt Simon’s breathing hitch for a moment at the hug, but he got distracted by Simon reminding him, “I’m perfectly alright. This happens, it’s not exactly dangerous.”

“If you don’t let me take care of you, I will stop hugging you right now,” Jack threatened, earning something close to a laugh from Simon, but no more complaints. “Uh-huh, that’s what I thought.”

“Mmph. You can win for now,” Simon decided, settling back against Jack’s shoulder.

Simon? Being the one to initiate snuggling?

Unheard of.

Jack snorted, pulling his friend in closer despite sceptically asking, “What’s gotten you so mushy?”

“...You’re warm,” Simon informed him, that characteristic, genuine honesty ringing in his words.

Jack expected something slightly more poetic than that. So naturally his response was to plop his chin on Simon’s head and elegantly remind him, “No duh, I’m a nuclear reactor.”

“And it’s a good thing I’m immune to your abilities or that would make this a much different conversation,” Simon pointed out. “Also, could you please move? Your chin is too pointy.”

That change in topic wasn’t what Jack expected. “Excuse me? All of my features are the perfect proportions, thanks.”

“Come on, get up,” Simon chuckled, waiting for Jack to move. It turned out Simon missed having ramrod-posture and straightened himself.

Slightly.

Jack’s arm was still wrapped around his back, and neither of them felt too inclined to move it.

Especially when there was a long moment where they both happened to get caught in each other’s eyes.

That was around when Simon’s hand had accidentally started to rest on Jack’s thigh.

The cool, crisp night air of early autumn was somehow warmer, softer for a moment.

Even when Simon spoke again, it was layered with something that made the deep tones in his voice sound more comforting.

As if his voice wasn’t already unnaturally too entrancing to belong to some nobody lawyer from Metroville.

This tone of voice matched the flickering, unreadable emotions hidden behind his piercing eyes, which were looking into Jack’s. Perhaps it was because Simon’s powers were related to his eyes, but Jac couldn’t help but notice how striking and vibrant and so crystal clear they were that Jack accidentally found himself trying to describe the color he saw in them with fancy names like, “Arctic ice” and “ocean glass.” Before he realized that meant Simon was looking straight through to Jack’s soul as he said, “We should probably go…”

It was an empty threat.

But it still made Jack’s heart shrink back a little at the suggestion.

Jack’s voice was uncharacteristically soft when he chided him. The sort of softness that was both nervous but completely in control of what it wanted. “I mean…we could just sit here. For a bit.”

Why was Jack offering that?

It was Simon’s call when he wanted to go home, he was the driver.

Jack added a mumbling, “If that would help.”

A pinprick of a laser started to pool into Simon’s eyes and he blinked his attention into his lap.

An uncomfortable feeling tightened around Jack’s core, soothed into place as Simon’s hand apologetically settled over Jack’s leg. That grin never wavered as he joked, “What? Were my eyes too mesmerizing?”

Simon was quiet for a moment. Staring through their reflection in the windshield so he could admire the view of the gravel parking lot filled 4-door sedans under the blinking neon sign.

He had many options of what to say.

And Jack didn’t expect Simon to pick the option where he almost sheepishly asked, “...Were they always so green?”

Jack blinked, ironically needing to do that to realize Simon was referring to his eyes. Not where he expected the conversation to go, but he shrugged and easily explained, “Mm. They used to be more blue. The more radiation I use, the more green they get. It’s not dangerous, but, yeah, they’re kind of teal now.”

“They look…nice. Both ways,” Simon told him, the pink glow of the neon suddenly creeping onto his cheeks.

Something deep in Jack’s chest wished Simon would have said the actual word he meant instead of just “nice.”

Why? Who knows.

It wasn’t like he needed Simon to compliment him.

Jack was worried that the same pink color was going to infect him as well if he didn’t say something to diffuse the situation.

But what came out was: “You can keep looking.”

A simple, innocuous, teasing response befitting a narcissist.

Simon had to have known that.

He had to.

That’s why Simon obeyed and returned his attention solely to Jack.

That’s why those intimidating blue eyes so easily held Jack’s gaze with the same kind of tenderness you would expect from a lover.

That’s why Jack’s hand had covered the one Simon had placed on his thigh.

That’s why Jack felt almost excited when Simon reached over and fixed the slight imperfection Jack had made in his hair when he was worrying about Simon earlier.

That’s why Jack felt something akin to disappointment when Simon’s hand brushed his jaw, but didn’t let himself linger. Instead, Simon let both of his hands settle around Jack’s, knotting their fingers together just in case either of them needed a reminder of the air growing thick and electric and all too present. Almost physically pulling them closer to each other. The adrenaline making Jack’s heart beat faster would have been the scent of old books and coffee that lingered on Simon’s jacket.

Because Simon was playing along with the joke.

It was the only logical explanation.

That feeling in Jack’s chest had started to bubble over into something tangible as they stayed tangled together in Simon’s car. Like they were two teenagers at a drive-in movie, who weren’t really there to watch the picture.

That was a thought that just made the squeezing in his chest worse.

They weren’t some stupid kids sneaking cuddles at the movies.

They were two grown men sitting in the Admiral B. Bowling parking lot at midnight when they both had work in the morning.

It was entirely impossible for them to do something as stupid as sloppily stealing snuggles until they broke curfew, only witnessed by James Dean and Natalie Wood watching through the car windows.

Not that Jack had the motivation to try!

He wasn’t one of those frilly little *ahem* “friends of Dorothy.” Jack was attracted to women and that was as clear as the pink-tinted windshield next to them.

Sure, guys could be cute, and it’s not like Jack was repulsed by the idea of kissing one, but who was? Were there actually people who were completely grossed out by the idea of kissing someone of the same gender? Jack had never been. But that didn’t mean he could love a man like he could a woman.

He wasn’t attracted to them, wasn’t going to flirt with them, wasn’t interested in them at all.

Sure, Simon hadn’t exactly admitted it, but both of them knew Simon was completely uninterested in women. And Simon had basically confirmed that night in his office years ago that he was…

*cough* You know.

(One of those, uh…gays...)

But it’s not like Simon had ever made a move on Jack.

And it’s not like Jack would have ever reciprocated.

So what if they had a history of snuggling on Jack’s couch and watching movies until the morning? Or going out for coffee and talking for hours so they knew all of the minute details about each other’s day? Or holding hands in Simon’s car while looking into each other’s eyes?

That wasn’t flirting!

That was friendship!

If it was flirting, Jack would have noticed!

After all, they didn’t really talk about the fact that Simon was one of those.

The one time the topic had been broached was about a year ago.

Jack had been staying over in Simon’s guest room for the night, and while Simon had been sorting through the kitchen to come up with a plan for how he was going to feed the picky blond, Jack had just asked, “Hey, so, how did you find out you were…inverted?”

Simon had frozen. Not because of the question itself (Jack’s questions were somewhat characteristically to-the-point, so any shock value that used to come with them was somewhat lost on Simon after years of friendship), but because Jack had seemed genuinely curious about the answer.

Unfortunately, his curiosity was only met with, “That’s a complicated story.”

Jack had scoffed and hopped into the air to grab something from a shelf Simon was struggling to reach. “Is it longer or shorter than figuring out you had laser vision?”

They hadn’t brought it up since.

Now, Jack was regretting that choice. The silence of that conversation was almost stifling, leaving too many things unsaid.

With too many questions Jack didn’t want Simon to answer.

Because Jack wouldn’t be able to stand it if he noticed anything similar between that part of Simon’s life and any of Jack’s own experiences.

Like why he had the very unsettling, exhilarating urge to ignore his thoughts, pretend Simon was a dame, and kiss him right there under the neon sign.

Instead, the buzzing feeling in Jack’s chest morphed into fear in response to the giddy thought that Jack would like that.

So his hands let go of Simon’s.

They both pull away just slightly. Not even to create any real distance, but after having some form of contact since they got in the car, just an inch of space felt like a full cavern had opened up between them.

Simon was the first to speak. Bringing them back from the edge of whatever cliff they had been teetering near. One more time, he insisted, “I am sorry for making all three of you uneasy about something that isn’t very important.”

“It really is okay,” Jack quickly answered, forcing himself to stay relaxed and unbothered. “We were pushing things a little. But you know Bob and Lucius also don’t mind helping out, right?”

“I really should thank them for worrying so much,” Simon mumbled, sitting up a little straighter.

“Yes. Thank them. Tomorrow.” Jack declared, defiantly crossing his arms over his chest before Simon could argue, “But it would be rude to just leave without properly acknowledging them for helping.” He knew he was too tired to win that argument, so Simon just let Jack declare, “It’s late and we both need to get to bed.”

Simon breezily responded with the same thing he offered every time they were in the car together, “I’ll drive you back to your apartment.”

“Nah, that’s alright, I can fly back,” Jack said, conjuring an unimpressed look from Simon.

“You are not illegally flying back to the city,” Simon informed him, rubbing away the start of a laser at the back of his eyes. “Especially not after you were drinking.”

“I had maybe two beers, I’m not even buzzed,” Jack told him. Though, with that lawyerly tone of voice, both of them already knew Simon wasn’t going to allow it.

“I will be driving you back to your apartment. Understood?” Simon sounded so serious. Like he was in court and telling Jack to, “Please be quiet, you don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Jack raised an eyebrow at him, then broadly gestured to the thin line of sparkling silver and steel that made the skyline of Metroville on the horizon. “It’s, at a minimum, an hour drive there and back. And that’s if you’re driving 40 miles over the speed limit.”

Simon glanced out the windshield, noting that he had parked at the start of a straightaway that went right to the parking lot exit. His hands excitedly grabbed the steering wheel, his shoulders leaning forward towards the neon sign as he cheekily suggested, “Only 40? I can do that.”

Jack gaped at him, sputtering out a laugh. “No! Don’t do that!”

He grabbed Simon’s wrists, weakly pulling at them to distract Gazerbeam from the dormant, speed demon instincts starting to show themselves.

“You’re free to do that on one of your motorcycles if you want, but not while I’m in the vicinity,” Jack informed him, poking a finger against Simon’s chest to make sure he knew who the boss was for this decision.

“Alright,” Simon sighed. Then immediately got that goofy, proud smile on his face as he decided, “We’ll go to my place, get one of my motorcycles, then I’ll drive you home.”

“Don’t you dare make me ride one of those things when I can’t legally fly away from it!” Jack warned him, flopping back against the car seat. “I swear, it’s a miracle Apogee and the Phylange survived riding around in the Thrilling Three Chopper with the way you drive those things…”

“Apogee had gravity powers, and the Phylange would deal with any obstacles that worried the two of them,” Simon matter-of-factly explained.

“Yeah, good for them, but I’m not letting you tear up the streets just for fun,” Jack definitely decided.

Which meant that it was easy enough for Simon to figure out what Jack really hoped to get out of this conversation. “You want to borrow my guest room again.”

Jack’s mischievous smirk sprang back onto his face. “Well, if you’re going to offer, I’ll just have to accept.

After so many years of that same song and dance, Simon didn’t even bother to acknowledge how obvious Jack could be sometimes. He just grabbed his keys out of his pocket and started the car. “Your usual pajamas are still in the guest room closet.”

“You mean those super baggy things that were even too big for you?” That smirk could mean so many things as Jack cooed in Simon’s ear. “I’m starting to wonder if you just think those look cute on me.”

“You look cute in everything,” Simon reminded him, the pink of the neon sign flashing over both of them as the car slowly began to make its way towards the parking lot exit.

“Just like you look cute whenever you need to borrow my pajamas,” Jack added, pleasantly smug at how Simon’s eyes began to shyly flicker between him and the road. “Tomorrow’s Wednesday, so I think I need to wake up for work around the same time as you do.”

“Half an hour earlier,” Simon corrected him, turning on his blinker at the exit. A few pairs of headlights drove past them as he waited to make the turn.

That got a groan out of Jack. “Nope. I don’t care. I’m waking up at the same time as you, who cares what the agency wants?”

“You can’t just be late for work,” Simon scolded him, craning his neck to see if there was another car coming. “You’re already late for everything else, and I’m not letting you get fired because you can’t operate on a schedule.”

“Fine, fine! I swear, if you were ever in love with anyone it would be a law book,” Jack grumbled. Then remembered something actually kind of important. “Oh, hey, I was planning on visiting Mama tomorrow since I’m heading out of town in a couple days. Want to come along?”

“Of course, I would love to see Charlotte.” Simon answered almost before Jack could finish asking the question. “Not that I would hear the end of it if I refused. …How is she…?”

Jack’s smirk turned into a full, beaming smile as he announced, “As of last weekend, she is officially cancer-free!”

“Really?!” Simon asked, forgetting to look at the road as his voice rose just ever so slightly in pitch. “That’s– My goodness, Jackson, that’s wonderful. We should do something for her– I can’t believe she's finally managed to do it after four years.”

“Oh, you’d better believe that she would!” Jack chided him, but contentedly tucked his hands behind his head as he kept talking. “Expect her to talk about it for at least an hour when we visit, she’s righteously proud and needs to tell someone other than me and the ladies in the tulip club.”

“I would love to hear about it,” Simon honestly responded, forcing himself to return to watching for cars. “She at least deserves someone to listen to her story after all she’s been through.”

It was such a Simon-like way to respond to that news. Making sure he took care of everyone else, regardless of what that entailed. Jack shook his head in admiration. “And that’s the reason I love keeping you around, Paladino.”

The pink neon sign blinked against Simon’s face one more time. “Oh?”

His voice was strangely stiff as he responded to what Jack thought was an innocuous statement.

Whatever, it probably didn't mean anything, Jack decided. “Because you seem like you genuinely care about people. That’s pretty rare these days… And, you know, you’ve figured out how to understand a Hart. It’s not an easy thing to do.”

Simon’s expression turned a strange blend of amused and melancholy as his eyes stayed on the road. “No. I assure you, I don’t understand any heart at all.”

The Lincoln finally turned onto the suburban street, and started the short trip to Simon’s house.

In the Present

“...Okay. So let me get this straight.” Lucius leaned his elbows onto his knees, holding his hands together as he prepared to try and piece together everything Jack had just exposited into his living room. “You ran into Evelyn Deavor yesterday morning, and you saw that she had written ‘Psycwave’ in her notes for one of her projects. So you broke into Devtech’s headquarters to figure out why, and you not only stole a copy of Peggy’s journals that Evelyn got in an estate sale, but you also found a budget report for an off-site laboratory that turned out to be a fake lab. Except it wasn’t a fake lab, because you happened to find a pair of goggles that you know belong to Screenslaver. Which you only know because you were hypnotised–”

“Mind-controlled.”

“Mind-controlled by Screenslaver on the train. Which you don’t actually remember except for the pattern you saw before it happened.”

“And that took a lot of mental gymnastics to remember!” Jack added helpfully from the other side of the coffee table.

Honey shushed him from the sofa. “Hush up, we still have half of your story to run through! Keep going Lucius, honey.”

Did that mean that Lucius called her “Honey, lucius?”

Lucius was too close to snapping his brain in half for Jack to feel tempted to ask. “So now you have these goggles. But you lost the folder that connected them to the Deavors. And you’re not reporting this to the police for some reason, but you’ve decided that the only way to prove the Deavors are up to something is to prove it to Helen. Cuz somehow she thinks you’re just being paranoid because of what happened to you on the island. Am I missing anything?”

“Well, the reason I’m not going to the police is because we’d be calling them on Helen for doing illegal superhero activity,” Jack bluntly reminded him. Then, a little quieter, “...Also because I broke into Devtech to steal that stuff. And an apartment owned by Devtech. And these glasses are probably Devtech property.”

Honey facepalmed. “Lucius, why do all of your friends need to break the law all the time?!”

“Oh, I do two burglaries and suddenly I’m only Lucius’s friend?” Jack asked, crossing his arms over his chest.

Honey wagged a disapproving finger at him. “Don’t you start. You’re not dragging my husband back into no derring-do, electric boogaloo superhero shenanigans, or whatever!”

Lucius ignored his wife’s demands and barreled on ahead. “So, we can’t call the police. Can we just ask the Deavors?”

“We don’t know their endgame. We don’t want to just waltz up to them on their own terms in case they’re prepared for that. And considering they haven’t been more than two seconds away from any piece of Devtech property since we met them, that’s not an option either,” Jack explained, now realizing just how convoluted things were. “The best option we have is to convince Helen that she can’t trust them. If we can get her back, their entire plan will fall apart because she’s the one they specifically requested.”

“Do we even know what this masterplan of theirs could be?” Honey interjected, poking at the pair of beetle-like goggles on her living room coffee table. “So far it seems like it was just giving Elastigirl a new villain to fight so it would help the media push for supers to be legal again.”

“Which does align with what Winston had been saying this whole time,” Jack admitted, however reluctantly.

“Not to mention, it’s working!” Honey grabbed the remote for the TV and flicked it on, flying through news channels like it was a magazine in the check-out line at the grocery store.

Every single news station was proudly saying how much public support the superhero re-legalization movement had become. People who had been forced to hide their powers for years would finally be able to use them for good once again. There were pictures of Elastigirl’s many recent victories, including some of her interview from the previous night after she’d caught the Screenslaver. There was even a few clips from an interview Winston had done that morning to publicly announce he and the rest of Devtech fully supported the superhero cause. There was talk that Devtech would be funding a meeting between major pro-superhero politicians in the next few days at a secret location, where they would sign the first of what they hoped would be many legal documents that would advocate for the legalization of supers.

Of course there were a couple of voices in the mix denouncing the whole affair. There were reports mentioning how the government had just recently shut down the NSA. A couple people mentioning how if superheroes were legal again, that wouldn’t actually cut down on supervillain activity, but just exacerbate insurance companies again. Governor Blakely and Senator Atwood of California were both interviewed recently and shared their resentment for the public outcry for superheroes, as the Superhero Relocation Program had successfully gotten rid of the “superhero problem” for a decade.

But, for once, the negative voices were in the minority.

There was no longer a demand to hide people who wanted to do good with their powers.

People wanted heroes again.

And if Jack wasn’t stuck in the middle of this Screenslaver business, he probably would have been excited.

Instead, all the TV did was fill his stomach with bubbling, bile-like dread for what this villain’s next move would be.

“So, regardless, I think superheroes are getting legalized again,” Honey concluded with a proud smile to the two supers in the room. “Whether there was some sort of plan by the Deavors to stop it, or to jump-start it, there’s going to be a push for you guys now.”

“Yeah, it sounds like the Screenslaver just inadvertently made things easier for us,” Jack agreed. Still, he huffed and leaned back in the chair they’d let him lounge in. “But then why does it seem like there has to be more to this than the Deavors planting a villain? Why would they actively risk people’s lives? Multiple people have almost died because of this, and I’m just stuck not knowing what to do about everything!”

“Maybe the Screenslaver was invented by them. But his real intention was to make superheroes look bad, so they’d never get legal again!” Honey decided, throwing her arms up into the air like she’d just solved the entire plot, they could all go home now!

Jack’s eyes widened, trying to grasp at the idea. “And that’s why they picked the weakest hero out of the four of us! The two of us and Mr. Incredible would have been too difficult to deal with, so they wanted a hero who wouldn’t destroy their entire plan!”

“Even if that’s true, you do know Helen caught the Screenslaver last night?” Lucius checked, making sure Jack knew this was probably a pointless investigation. “She went to the same lair you were at, and she caught him. Problem solved.”

“I know that,” Jack snipped, somewhat annoyed that Lucius would also think he was chasing ghosts. “But you have to admit it’s weird that Evelyn had the budget sheet for that building, and she had notes about Psycwave. You know, Peggy the Mind Controller? That Evelyn just conveniently had notes on while there was a mind-controller villain on the loose?”

Lucius looked like he was about to argue. But then gave up on trying to justify that and said, “Yeah, that’s a coincidence that’s too on-the-nose.”

“And the day after you find these doohickies, the Screenslaver gets caught in the same building you were snooping around in?” Honey chimed in, eyeing the glasses like they were a piece of rotting fish. “...Nu-uh. That’s strange.”

Hearing that managed to work out some of the tension that had been infecting Jack’s shoulder for the past week. “Finally, someone who doesn't just blindly trust those guys!”

“You’re saying Helen and Bob don’t think this is weird?” Lucius exclaimed, a flash of worry in his eyes as he took his attention from the glasses back to Jack.

And Jack’s shoulders tensed again. “Helen is too busy pretending she’s not reliving the Glory Days to listen to anything I have to say, and I don’t know, Bob isn’t picking up the phone. So that leaves only you two. Who else could I call? My Ma? Veronica?”

“You don’t think the Deavors kidnapped Bob, do you?” Honey asked conspiratorally.

“Don’t scare him like that!” Lucius chided her as Jack visibly winced at the idea. “He just got back from the murder island, we don’t need to put thoughts like that in his head!”

“Well, I’m sorry, I thought we were dealing with a mass conspiracy to stop superheroes from becoming legal! That is what they want, right?

“Yes! …Probably! And if it is, they did such a horrible job at it, superheroes are in more demand than ever…? …Ugh.” Jack rubbed a hand across his eyes. “I don’t actually know. None of these pieces are fitting together, and whenever I find something, the others fall right back out of place.”

“Look,” Lucius interrupted, pulling both of them back to the conversation, “regardless of whatever anyone’s plan is, this is really weird. And, apparently, the three of us are the only ones who had noticed it. So, what’s our plan?”

Jack and Honey glanced at each other. Then simultaneously glanced at the mask.

“I guess our plan is to investigate the only lead we have,” Honey decided, squirming a little at just the sight of the ugly goggles Jack had stolen. “Do either of you brave heroes want to do the honors?”

Jack rolled his eyes and smirked as he picked up the thick, black lenses. “Never fear, Gamma Jack and Frozone are here.”

“Oh, my heroes, saving me from those ugly, mind-control swim goggles,” Honey cooed, fanning herself and “fainting” against Lucius’s shoulder.

He laughed and tried to push her off his shoulder, but that just made Honey more determined to flop against him in increasingly dramatic poses.

Jack would have found their marital antics funny. But he was kind of pre-occupied.

These were the prototype for the screens that the supervillain had been using in New Urbem.

But why were they shaped like glasses?

Were they originally supposed to be worn on the Screenslaver’s face? So whoever looked at them would be mind-controlled?

Or were they designed to be worn by the victims?

Jack tipped the back of the goggles towards his eyes, squinting just in case his hand slipped and clicked the button on the bridge of the nose.

They seemed like the classic kind of bad guy weapon. Overly complicated, but insanely cool.

It just bothered him to think that if these weren’t a prototype, they might have been on the Screenslaver’s face when Helen fought him.

Those might have been the glasses that killed her.

…Why would the Screenslaver have made a pair of glasses if he wasn’t planning on fighting Elastigirl in person? They would have been useless if he didn’t bother to let her see him.

While the Bests were starting to call each other pet names on their couch, Jack pressed the goggles over his face, clicking the bridge of his nose against the button on the cold metal.

Instantly, the world flashed a green-tinged light that clawed into the meat of Jack’s eyes and refused to let him look away. That unnatural patterns of black squares and circles was ensnaring his brain.

A familiar, swirling, sickening loop of white and black squares

and white and black and circle and black

and white and squa–

.̶͋W̸̘̆͟ͅḧ̵̪̂a̷̳͐t̵͓̾͘͡ ̴̨̖̀̌͂t̵̜̍h̸͒̑̿ẽ̸͉̅ͅ–̶̾͠͝?̶̃ ̵̧̝́͑ ̷̧̲̓͑͗Ṫ̴͕̃̂h̷̤͑̏̚e̸̺͑͊s̵̡͙̭͆̈́ě̵͉̖̊ ̴̾̈́ ̷̚͡s̴̼͡h̸͋ȯ̷̔u̵͐͐͆l̷̬͆d̷͍̿n̶̽͋͂’̶̮̽́̃͟t̸́͛͠ ̷̘̄̃̍ḅ̷̀̽̚é̵̞͔ ̶̣̬̌a̷͑͆̌ĉ̷̞̉̍t̵͔̠̍i̷͒͘v̶̗̖̔e̷͐.̴̋

Jack felt his heart racing against his ribs as the garbled voice entered his head.

It touched on something familiar from that day on the train, the parts that we were always barred from remembering.

It’s possible it wasn’t the same person, but someone was on the receiving end of the goggles.

More importantly, this time, Jack was aware of what was happening.

He could feel his hands clenching the goggles over his face, he could feel the urge to blink but being too frozen to do so. His own thoughts were present, not washed away by the white lights.

That’s probably why that pair of glasses was the prototype.

“Uh, hello?” Honey’s hand waved in front of Jack’s blank glare before she snatched it away, like his lack of response had burned her. Her next words were a whispering hiss. “He’s being controlled!”

W̴͍͖̞͊̐h̷̛̫̖̘́̀e̷̗̽̅͟r̸̼͎̾e̴͚̅̕͝ ̴̿̔̀ā̶̹͊̌r̶̡̪͇̒̒͘e̶̞̪̿ ̵̹͚̮̇y̷̖̮̣͛͑o̶̢͖̓̉u̶̡͘…̷̖͒̌̌?̴́̚

There was some sort of scuffling on the other end of the goggles, like the person was scrambling to sit down.

G̶̙̼͖̑ĕ̵̱t̵͍̫̝͝ ̶̨̥̊͜u̷̠̾͊p̴̭͖̀ ̷̦̗̄́̍a̵̙͛̍͜n̵̦̽͑d̵͍̣̭́̚ ̴̼̩͒g̶̢͕̣͋̐͗o̸̟̍́ ̵̝̘͗͟t̴̟̄̈́ö̵̪̣́́ ̴̫̟͑͜a̷̙͗ ̶̌̓͜͜ẅ̸́i̵͕͐͛n̶̆͑͊d̴͚̬̉̈́ǒ̵̟̅̒w̴̥̙͂̑͗!

Jack felt his legs launch the rest of his body into a standing position, almost tipping him over before the instincts buried away from his conscious thoughts caught him.

He felt Lucius stand up next to him reaching out to grab his shoulder before Jack shrugged it away with enough force that it could have been a slap.

Before either of the Bests could figure out what Jack was planning on doing, he was running towards the giant picture window in their living room.

Jack’s reflection stared back at him as he stalked towards the glass, his steps too measured and his gait too sure. The green-tinted eyes emitting from the goggles narrowed their focus as Jack was compelled to keep moving. They were desperately trying to find some sort of landmark through the window, a hint to the location of this person who had gotten their hands on these goggles.

But instead of a landmark, they got the vague reflection of the person who stole the goggles.

.̷̤͕̈͘͠.̶̪̓̌.̴̲̀̇̏Ï̸͐s̸̬̈́̈́͘ ̷̉͠t̵͎̩̤́ȟ̷̫͂a̵̪̲̋͡t̴̥͎̙͂…̶̦̪͆G̶͇̠͂͂͆ą̵̼͆̎͟͝m̵̨͎͈̐̎ṃ̴̋̉ͅả̵̧̼͎̑͌ ̵̻̖̙̈́̿͌J̵͓̓a̶͓̤͊̍̇č̶̪̻̝͠k̸̹̀́?̸̦̾ͅ

A pair of hands appeared over Jack’s eyes temporarily blinding him before he felt the goggles get ripped out of his hands.

Lucius was standing in front of him, eyes wide in panic. “Jack, are you okay??”

“Why did you put that on your face?!” Honey exclaimed, yanking Jack’s hands back down to his sides and ushering him over to the sofa.

“It seemed like a good idea at the time?” Jack mumbled as he was forced to sit on the sofa.

Whose voice was that…?

“Well, don’t have anymore good ideas! They’re a hazard to your health,” Honey warned him, grabbing his cheeks and yanking his face to both sides to make sure there wasn’t any permanent damage to him.

“Honey, I know that my face is the best one the NSA has ever seen, but I’d like to have it back,” he informed her, trying to pull away.

She sighed, dropping him against the back of the sofa. “Lucius, baby, can you stop messing around with the supervillain glasses and help me make sure Jack isn’t still possessed.”

“Man, why can’t I find a dame that can order a man around so well~” Jack chuckled. Hopefully just slightly woozy from being mind-controlled.

Lucius raised an eyebrow at Honey and informed her, “Yeah, I’m 100 percent sure he’s fine.”

Honey narrowed her eyes at Jack, inspecting him for anything that seemed even slightly like the Screenslaver. But, even she had to admit that he seemed stupid, but okay. “Don’t you dare do that again in my home.”

“Yeah, all supervillain possessions can only happen to legal residents. It’s part of the zoning laws in the building,” Lucius chuckled, hefting the goggles in his hands as the phone began to ring. “I’ll get that.”

Honey watched Lucius’s back retreat towards the phone on the end table across the room while Jack melted into the sofa.

“...I think I need to have another talk with Helen,” Jack concluded.

“If she didn’t believe you about the train, she isn’t going to believe you about the mask,” Honey said, still giving it wary looks. “No matter how much of a fool that will make her.”

“People will do almost anything to get the chance to do what they enjoy. That usually means they’ll ignore anything remotely questionable as long as they can justify it. You know how that goes, you were chasing Frozone, Mr. Incredible, and their police scanner around Metroville for years,” Jack pointed out.

“No, I’m still chasing them around with their little police scanner,” she informed him, sending a quick glare down the hall to where Lucius was on the phone. “But I think you need to try and knock some sense into her. I’ll send Lucius with you if you think that’ll help!”

“I might have to take you up on that,” Jack snickered. His eyes drifted to the TV, where there was yet another news reel about the Devtech involvement with the re-instating of superheroes. “I have no clue where she is today with all the interviews and junk. But tomorrow there’s some sort of fancy party thing at Devtech, and she’s got to be at that.”

“Seems a bit cliche,” Honey mused. Which Jack did not approve of. “What? You’re going to confront her in the middle of a huge party? That’s the best time for evil to strike in the movies.”

“Well, it’s the only time she has free anymore because she’s so busy being a puppet in whatever this is,” he mumbled up at the ceiling, not expecting anyone to hear him. “I’m so tired of running around and trying to figure out what all of this means.”

“Oh, believe me, I am too. And I only just found out there was more to this than some millionaire trying to get you to save runaway trains!” Honey informed him, tossing her hands into the air. The bracelets on her wrist clacked together and she sank her elbow into the arm of the sofa. “I don’t know what I would be like if they’d requested Frozone for their crazy schemes. Now, knowing that they’re involved with this Screenslaver guy, I’m even more happy that he didn’t get picked.”

“I’m surprised. I thought you would be running out of places to hide his super suit,” Jack mumbled, smirking a little as Honey’s blood pressure rose tenfold just at the phrase “super suit.”

“He thinks he’s been outsmarting me, but I’m a professional at this,” Honey said, shimmying her shoulders defiantly. “Lucius can get his suit when he needs his suit, but I’m not relocating again! It was already enough to relocate here a few years ago, I’m not going through the rigmarole of packing up and moving two buildings over just because he felt like freezing a robber’s getaway car again!”

“Well, at least this new place is about as nice as your old one,” Jack promised, glancing around the high ceilings and the futuristic furniture. He hadn’t actually been in the Bests’ knew place, or known they’d been relocated until he’d gotten back into contact with Frozone after the Omnidroid battle.

It really did feel strange.

Jack had been gone from Lucius and Bob’s lives for so long that he’d missed entire life events.

Lucius had been relocated once, Bob had been relocated once, the Parrs had a third kid, the Bests had their 10-year wedding anniversary, the Parrs had their 15th. Jack hadn’t exactly been twidling his thumbs, he’d been living his own life and was content with it for not being a super anymore. But he’d stepped away from his friends, and only found them again after he’d almost died.

What would they have thought if he had died on the island?

Would they have thought anything at all?

Of course they would have, they weren’t heartless. But he couldn’t help but worry that it wouldn’t have been the death of a friend anymore, just the death of an old friend that you hadn’t talked to in a few years. Long enough for the emotional ties to shrivel up and whither away, leaving a couple good memories in their wake, but nothing else.

Jack wished he had reached out sooner. But he’d assumed that if Bob and Lucius wanted to talk, they would have tried to get in contact with him.

Then again, what if they’d said the same thing and were waiting for Jack to contact them?

It didn’t matter anyway.

The entire Incredisquad would never be back together again.

Syndrome killing Simon had ensured that…

The news anchor blathered on regardless. “In other news, entrepreneur, Victor Catchet, has once again struck gold for his exotic car collection with the addition of the Incredibile, the supercar once driven by superhero, Mr. Incredible–”

Jack’s ears perked up. “Did you hear that?”

“Isn’t that Bob’s old car?” Honey checked, suddenly aware that she’d left the TV on that whole time.

Some sleazy guy in a million-dollar garage was nonchalantly explaining the discovery to a news reporter while the two of them watched curiously from the Best living room. “It’s the kind of thing you buy when you have everything else.”

“I thought Bob said that thing was beyond repair?” Honey said, not really remembering the story behind the car.

“Yeah, they said it was destroyed,” Jack agreed, trying to dredge up the memory of what would have been a tragedy in Bob’s life. That was one of the rules that Jack and Lucius had to learn about their friends: don’t touch Simon’s motorcycles, and don’t touch Bob’s Incredibile.

“Hey, Lucius, come take a look at this!” Honey shouted for her husband, trying to wave him over.

“Just a minute!” Lucius shouted back from the end of the hall, having to press his hand over his ear so he could hear what the caller was saying over Jack and Honey shouting for him. “Sorry, Violet, what did you say?”

“Violet’s on the phone?” Honey mumbled to Jack, giving him a concerned look.

Jack shrugged in equal confusion. “Ask her if Bob heard about his car!”

Lucius gave him a bit of a glare for that, but whatever he’d told Violet was apparently important enough that he came back into the living room a few seconds after hanging up.

And whatever Jack had been expecting, it definitely wasn’t, “Jack-Jack had powers and Bob is about to have a mental breakdown, so I’m going to head over to their place and make sure the building is still standing. Is that cool?”

“Excuse me, the who has what and the who is having what and the what is huh?” Honey stammered, not sure which part of that statement was the most important to answer.

“Jack 2 had powers?!” Jack exclaimed, hopping/hovering out of his seat on the sofa. “What kind, how many, what do you mean you need to make sur ethe building is still standing??”

“This isn’t going to involve you needing to run off with that super suit and save the city, is it?” Honey sighed, already imagining the 10 million ways her husband could be maimed and/or killed by a superpowered baby.”

“I’m not answering all of that. I’m not even sure what all you both said,” Lucius warned both of them, but more specifically Jack. Because he immediately answered one of Honey’s questions, “No, don’t worry, it’s not anything actually dangerous. It’s just a quick wellness check on the Parrs since Helen had been gone for so long. And Jack-Jack is exploding, so, that’s kind of freaking everyone out.”

Honey sighed, massaging the headache that had already formed in her sinuses. “...If you want to go, I won’t stop you.”

“Honey, it’s not a mission,” Lucius argued, almost like he and his wife were starting a small playground squabble. “I’ll be there and back in a few hours, no bodily harm required.”

“...What kind of superpowers does Jack-Jack have?” Honey asked. Just to make sure Lucius wasn’t about to have his skin melted off his bones.

“Violet didn’t get that far before she had to go help Bob keep Jack-Jack from setting something on fire,” Lucius admitted, knowing that wouldn't do him any favors.

Rightfully so, Honey’s face immediately flashed to the disapproving lecture she was going to have to give him after his skin was melted off his bones.

“I’m coming too!” Jack decided, flying over the coffee table and leaning an elbow assuredly on Lucius’s shoulder. “I can keep an eye on him, don’t worry.”

Honey’s disapproving frown went from her husband, to Jack, back to Lucius.

Eventually, she sighed and said, “Alright. But you take care of him, Jack! He’s not allowed to do anything stupid, and if he does, you send him right back to me!”

“Yes ma’am,” Jack promised, offering a two-fingered salute before Lucius could come up with a snide retort for his wife. Jack smacked Lucius on the shoulder before he decided to use that snide remark anyway. “Come on, I want to see what Jack 2’s powers are!”

********

Though there were exceptions, supers’ genetics tended to work in somewhat predictable ways.

If you have superpowers, but you developed them when you were 10 or older, you probably didn’t come from a superhero family and have no supers in your ancestry. It was just luck that you developed powers or they came from an outside source. That’s where you get supers like Jack and Simon, who both learned about their powers when they were 10 and 15.

If you developed super powers when you were a little kid, including when you were a toddler, you probably had one parent who was a super, and one parent who was a civvie. Jack had heard Frozone’s backstory once, and even though he couldn’t remember the exact age, he knew Frozone was that sort of super.

Jack might have been told what Bob and Helen’s backstories were at one point, but that wasn’t particularly relevant at the moment.

Because the Parr kids were the trickiest kind of supers to deal with: kids who had two superhero parents. That usually meant they started showing signs of their powers when they were really young. Which was great for getting them used to having them present in their life. Usually those kids also had the least traumatic backstories since they’d just been born with those powers and didn’t remember a time when they didn’t have them.

On the other hand, being born with powers meant that you started to experience what it was like to be a super at a very malleable part of your life. So, you wouldn’t actually get one power, you’d get multiple until you grew up enough for your instincts to pick the one that was meant for you. Maybe you’d get lucky and keep a couple of them, or you would get one. Violet had managed to keep both invisibility and forcefields, and Dash had just kept super speed.

But in the meantime, while you were a baby, you probably had more powers than you did teeth.

Which means that everyone who was in charge of taking care of you was going to suffer much more than civvie parents.

And poor Bob was learning firsthand what all that entailed…

Now, Jack really didn’t mind kids.

Which Simon would have immediately contested by saying that was because Jack sometimes acted like a child.

Regardless of that, Jack did like getting to see super kids actually enjoying life like kids were meant to. Not holed up in a lab or having needles stuck into their arms like what had happened with him. They just got to be normal kids. Those were the only kind of “normal civilian” Jack would argue actually were slightly better than being a superhero.
Though, being the youngest in his family, and never interacting much with kids when he was an adult since he wasn’t the most kid-friendly superhero, that meant he didn’t have the most experience dealing with them.

But Jack was pretty confident that he at least knew enough about them that a baby happily squealing and chewing on his teddy bear’s ear was a good thing.

Violet and Dash had met him and Lucius at the front door and immediately brought them into the kitchen, where their dad and Jack-Jack had been peacefully waiting. Bob looked like he'd just gotten attacked by a whole squadron of supervillains, but Jack-Jack seemed to be happily minding his own business as he continued to teeth on the stuffed animal.

Which made him side-eye Bob a bit as Lucius said what both of them were thinking, “Looks normal to me. When did this start happening?”

“Since Helen got the job,” Bob mumbled, having to smear the palm of his hand into his baggy eyes so he would stay awake.

“I assume she knows?” Lucius warily checked, the three of them never taking their eyes off Jack-Jack.

Until Bob had to gawk at Lucius. “Are you kidding? I can’t tell her about this, not while she’s doing hero work!”

Bob had never looked less like Mr. Incredible than he did in that moment. His hair and clothes in complete disarray, he smelled like old baby food, there were a few days of five o’clock shadow clinging to his jaw. His eyelids were so heavy he probably needed his super strength to keep them from falling over his eyes.

And Jack thought the situation had been stressing him out.

“Yeah, sure, but I think she’d like to come home to a husband who’s more than a corpse,” Jack informed him. Then noticed Jack-Jack starting to waddle towards the TV.

“Also, your baby is escaping.”

“I can’t just– Oh.” Bob scooped up the controller and turned off the TV.

It almost looked like he was going to break the remote, or break every tooth in his mouth.

“I’ve gotta succeed. So she can succeed. So we can succeed!” His hands painfully mimed towards himself, Elastigirl, and the both of them.Just so Jack and Lucius could have a visual guide to his pain.

“I get it, Bob, I get it,” Lucius assured him, waving down his gesturing hands as he focused in on the dark circles under Bob’s eyes. “When was the last time you slept?”

“Who keeps track of that?” Bob asked, sounding too genuine for Jack to laugh.

“That’s not a good thing!” Jack pointed out, snapping his attention away from the baby crawling around on the carpet. “Are you trying to end up in a hospital when you have three kids to take care of and a wife who probably wants a husband?”

“Look, I’m doing just fine,” Bob promised. While his head bobbed to his chest and his eyes temporarily closed. Besides, he’s a baby. I can handle it.”

“So, you’re good then?” Lucius checked. “You got everything under control?”

“Your daughter called for help because everything was perfect?” Jack sarcastically asked Bob. “Cute. Sounds true.”

Bob turned to continue the conversation while facing Jack-Jack.

Just for Jack-Jack to vaporize into a stream of blue light and disappear into the aether.

“Oh!” Lucius cried out just as Jack leapt into the air in shock. “What that–?!”

Jack had to remind himself how his mouth worked, “Where did he–?!”

Baby crooning echoed throughout the room, but regardless of where the two supers looked, the disembodied voice of Jack-Jack seemed to be coming from every direction.
Bob picked up a jar of cookies, hoisting it in his arms like it was as heavy as an anvil was to a normal person, and he started to hold a cookie towards the ceiling. “Cookie? Cha cha want a cookie? Num-num cookie?”

Jack and Lucius warily looked at each other, just to make sure they weren’t hallucinating Mr. Incredible say “Num-num cookie” to a baby that had just poofed out of that plane of existence.

So Jack asked the obvious question as they followed their deranged friend through his kitchen. “Where did he go??”

“Oh, just the fourth dimension,” Bob flippantly explained. Too tired to realize how Jack and Lucius were gaping at him. “He’ll be back when he’s ready. Cha cha wanna num-num? Num-num cookie!

The chants of “Cookie! Cookie!” filled up the kitchen until Jack-Jack whirled back into their dimension, excitedly chanting, “Dada! Dada!” until he got the num-num cookie.
Jack and Lucius both jumped in surprise, while Bob looked ready to collapse.

“Woah!”

“How did he do that?!”

“Okay! Okay…” Lucius tried to compose himself as he searched for answers. “So, he can still hear you from the…”

“From the other dimension, yeah,” Bob confirmed.

“...That is freaky,” Lucius concluded, now eyeing Jack-Jack with maybe a little fear. “I mean, that’s not like–”

“Not like our other kids. No, it is not,” Bod responded robotically, as if he’d rehearsed this a million times already. “Full powers, totally random.”

“So, he just has completely developed powers,” Jack asked, trying to comprehend how someone that small could do something crazy like jump through dimensions. Jack didn’t figure out how to do his flying trick until he’d been using his powers for a couple years, at least! “How long has this been going on that you’ve figured this out?”

“A couple…somethings,” Bob helpfully elaborated. “It’s a lot to keep track of after power number seven…”

"Excuse me, seven fully developed powers?!” Jack exclaimed. Now it was his turn to take a step back from Jack-Jack in fear. “What do you put in his bottles, steroids?!”

“So, now he’s what?” Lucius asked, watching Jack-Jack shove the last of the cookie into his mouth. “Is he good?”

“Yeah, you’d think so, right? Obviously I can’t keep giving him cookies!” Bob suddenly shouted, earning a confused burble from his son. “But if I stop…”

Bob closed the lid of the cookie jar.

And immediately, the tiny super’s face began to turn red with fury.

His body began to distort and mutate into a stronger, sharped form that had fangs and claws and was lunging right for Bob’s face–

Lucius cried out in shock as this demon form of Jack-Jack began chomping on Bob’s arm. A flash of radiation ran down Jack’s arm in shock, as he tried to understand what he was seeing.

“No! No biting the daddy!” Bob exclaimed, trying to rip Jack-Jack off his arm. “No biting!”

Lucius shouted, “What the fu–?!”

“You can’t say that!” Jack smacked his hand over his friend’s face. “There’s a child in the room!”

Lucius swatted Jack’s hand away as the demon baby somehow managed to get wrangled in Bob’s hands.

“That’s a demon, I can say whatever I want!” Lucius pointed out, already with ice ready in his hands in case Jack-Jack decided his cookie fury extended to his honorary uncles as well. “Bob, why can he do that?!”

Bob was trying to wrestle Jack-Jack into the living room. “I don’t know– Ow! Jack-Jack, no biting! No!”

And then Jack-Jack saw the cookie jar and began attacking him with new fervor.

Which naturally meant that older Jack launched a bolt of radiation at the cookie jar and disintegrated it. “There, problem solved!”

Jack-Jack paused with a confused pout. He shrank back into his normal form, wide eyes staring at the smoking pile of dust that used to be the cookie jar.
Then burst into tears.

Which, of course, included bursting into flames as well.

“He can catch fire too!” Lucius noticed, “Cuz why not?! Why doesn’t he just have every kind of destructive superpower?!”

The wailing baby seemed to take that as a challenge and shot at the ground near Luciu’s feet with a set of green lasers.

“He has green laser vision?!” Jack exclaimed, temporarily excited by the prospect. “Aww, okay, I like that one.”

“He’s also still on fire!” Lucius reminded him, ice prepped for launch. “Hold him still, Bob!”

“Huh?” Bob somehow managed to groan.

You would think three grown men with several decades of superhero careers would be able to figure out how to handle a superbaby.

…So, anyway, half an hour later…

Lucius and Bob had collapsed onto the sofa. Jack had been assigned the duty of holding the baby since, surprise, Jack-Jack also had electromagnetism powers and that meant
Gamma Jack was the only one of the three available adults who wouldn’t get disintegrated by him. Which meant he was pacing, Lucius was traumatized, and Bob was a blob on the couch.

The kid seemed to be in pretty good spirits until the ice puck in his little hands disappeared into his mouth. Jack and Lucius both tensed up as the baby super started to whine (Bob would have as well, but he was closer to death than the very couch he was sitting on). The smell of something starting to burn trickled into the room as Jack-Jack began to wave his fists at the radiation super’s face.

Jack immediately held him towards the ice super a few feet away. “Lucius, flaming baby, flaming baby–!”

“Okay–” Lucius jumped in with a full sphere of ice to replace the puck that had kept Jack-Jack quiet for a collective five minutes. Which meant Uncle Jack was back to pacing while Uncle Lucius kept an eye on Bob.

“I think I just need a little bit of me time,” Bob mumbled, hopefully directing that at Lucius and not imaginary sleep hallucinations. “Then I’ll be good to go…”

“Oh, you need more than ‘me time,’ Bob,” Lucius informed him, the same way a dentist would inform you that you needed to get a cavity filled. “You need major life realignment on a number of levels. Starting with baby superfreak here!”

Jack scoffed at the hand Lucius used to gesture to the baby he was taking for a walk. “I’d appreciate you not trying to make the living grenade act up while I’m holding him.”

“You’re doing great, Jack, keep it up,” Bob mumbled, drawing Lucius’s attention back to the slumped over super.

“...Okay, I’m starting to understand why Violet needed to call in for back-up,” Jack said, nudging the ball of ice to make sure Jack-Jack didn’t knock it onto the ground.

Lucius made sure Bob was (sort of) paying attention as he concluded, “You need some solid, outside-the-box thinking.“

Jack wasn’t really sure how Lucius had come up with the brilliant idea for sending Bob and Jack-Jack to go see Edna. Probably just because she had flame-resistant, laser-resistant, and tear-resistant facilities that wouldn’t get immediately disintegrated if Jack-Jack decided to turn into a demon baby. But did he really think Edna would be all that thrilled at the idea of an exploding baby and his semi-conscious dad knocking on her electric fence for help? Jack was willing to be pleasantly surprised.

More unexpected than that, Bob had been awake enough that he had written down a list of things for Jack and Lucius to try and get done while they were…

“Babysitting?” Violet had questioned the moment she had reappeared from her room. “I think Dash and I can handle ourselves after the past few days, don’t worry.”

“We’re not going to stress your father out anymore by leaving both of you to fend for yourselves tonight,” Lucius informed her matter-of-factly.
A blur swooped into the room and stopped in front of the both of them.

Dash’s smile was so wide his face must have hurt. Quite the juxtaposition to the stack of math textbooks under his arm. “No way, both of you are hanging out with us tonight! That’s so cool! It’s like a boys’ night out! But it’s a boys’ night in! And it’s with my sister!”

“It’s just for a few hours,” Jack pointed out, but Dash was already practically jogging in place from excitement.”

“This is going to be so cool! Can one of you help me with my math homework? I think I have a quiz tomorrow. This is the best night of my life for the week!”

“Just remember you have homework to do,” Violet scolded him, making Dash stick his tongue out at her. “I have homework too, don’t forget! I can’t be helping you with yours all the time!”

“It’s okay, Vi, we got this covered,” Lucius assured her.

She did seem to let some of the tension leave her shoulders at the reassurance. Even if they stayed stiff and uptight as Violet thanked him. “We do appreciate it, guys. It was kind of random and short-notice, so, yeah. Thanks.”

“Any time.”

“It’s not a problem at all,” Jack promised.

She just politely smiled and turned away, hugging her arms against her chest as she went back to her room.

Dash was already taking Lucius’s attention, so Jack let himself feel a little concerned for how stressed Violet seemed. “Hey, I’m going to talk to Vi for a second. Are you two all set?”

Lucius froze. “You want me to do math homework?”

“What? How hard can 5th grade math homework be?” Jack quipped, taking his bomber jacket off and setting it on the kitchen island. “I just want to make sure she’s doing okay. It’s probably been a lot for both of them lately.”

“Oh, it’s been insane!” Dash announced. “We didn’t even know Mom was doing superhero stuff until after we’d moved into this house! And it’s such a cool house, there are waterfalls in the ceiling! I accidentally made them eat two, no, three, no, four, not, five, wait, yeah, six sofas! And there’s every channel on the TV! Have you ever watched Johny Quest? Race Bannon is literally the coolest character ever who doesn't have superpowers! Oh, oh, wait, did you hear about Dad's car? I didn't know he used to have a sweet ride like that!”

Dash continued to tell Lucius all about every detail that came to mind about life since living in the mansion as Jack made his way to the stairs.

The door to Violet’s room (as noted by the purple “Violet’s Room” poster Dash had probably taped to the door) was closed when Jack softly knocked his knuckles against it.

“Hey, princess. Mind if I come in?”

Wow, it had been over 10 years since he’d first met Violet and called her that.

Jack thought he could hear Violet pause, then turn to the door. “Um. Yeah, sure!”

The bedroom door opened slightly, letting Jack push it the rest of the way.

“Just, sorry about the mess…” Violet said, stepping over a small minefield of dirty shirts and piles of CD’s. She was already perched on the edge of her bed when Jack started to eye her desk chair as a good place to sit. “What did you want to talk about?”

“You just seem like you have a lot that you might want to get off your chest,” he explained. He gestured towards the chair, silently asking if he could sit down, to which she nodded.

“...Is it that obvious?” Violet mumbled, a few strands of her hair falling into her face.

“Hey, it’s nothing to be ashamed of. You needed help, so you reached out,” Jack assured her, removing some haphazard stuffed animals from the chair. He sat down and crossed his legs. “That’s better than most people your age would do.”

“...It’s just.” Violet sighed, trying to tuck those loose strands of hair behind her ear. “It’s been really hard. Dealing with all of this while Mom had been gone and we’re in this new house, and…everything seems like it changed so fast! All summer we were in a motel, and before that our house blew up, and before that Jack-Jack was almost kidnapped, and before that there was the Omnidroid and the island… So why do I have to deal with this along with everything else?!”

Jack’s mouth pressed into a thin line. “It’s a lot for anyone to try and deal with. Especially kids like you and Dash. But you’re doing a great job with it! I don’t know how I would have reacted if I had a baby brother that could just start phasing through walls whenever he wanted!”

“Yeah, finding out dad was hiding Jack-Jack’s powers from us wasn’t fun. Dad seems like he’s been so stressed out lately, and I somehow missed it?” Violet pulled her legs up to her chest, her stocking foot picking at the fluffy white blanket that had been donated by the Deavors. “Like, it’s obvious, isn’t it? He clearly isn’t doing okay! So how did I not notice until today?”

Jack shrugged, somewhat mirroring her pose as he began to sprawl on the chair. “We don’t always notice when people around us aren’t doing well. And it’s even harder to know what to do about it after you figure it out. But you’re trying your best, and as a teenager, you’re doing great.”

“If I’m doing so great, why is this,” one of her purple forcefields appeared over her hand, “always causing me so many problems?!”

“Did your powers break or something?” At a first glance, Jack didn’t see how the glowing purple energy was related to being stressed out by her baby brother turning into a demon. He leaned forward in his chair, summoning an aura of gamma radiation around his hand. “How do they work exactly?”

Violet shrugged, not really caring.

Then Jack’s green-coated hand pressed against the violet bubble, and slipped right through it.

Violet’s melancholy posture immediately straightened. Her eyes didn’t leave Jack’s hand until it had exited the forcefield just as easily as it had entered. “Woah.”

No one had managed to just slip through her force fields.

The Omnidroid had cracked it open, but no one was just immune to them!

Yet Jack seemed almost entirely unphased as he inspected his hand. “Hmph! I think these are some kind of UV radiation manipulation.”

“How…?” Violet cleared her throat, using it as a distraction from her shaking hand. “How come you can go through my forcefields?”

“I’m immune to radiation unless I override it into my body.” Well, that’s the easiest way to put it. Jack was immune to anything with a shooter wavelength than visible light on the electromagnetism spectrum. So, gamma rays, X-rays, ultra violet. He could be affected if he wanted to. In the Glory Days, he drove NSA medics insane when they needed to get X-rays of him after combat, since he needed to be conscious to let the X-rays work on him. But in any other circumstance, he was naturally just not bothered by it. “How are your shields causing you a problem?”

Violet shook her head, having to trust that this wasn’t the mind-blowing discovery she thought it was.

“It’s not just my shields.” The bitterness creeped back into her voice, coming from what must have been years of these thoughts always hovering in her head. “Having powers hasn’t done anything good for our family except get us in trouble, and now I’m in trouble because of them.”

She might as well have just slapped Jack across the cheek and spat in his face.

“...Vi, what are you talking about?” He couldn’t believe what sort of sacreligious thing she’s just said against their kind! “You have a gift! People have literally killed because they want to be like us!”

“Yeah, but they also tried to kill Dad! Syndrome probably wanted to kill Mom and Uncle Lucius as well. He did…try to kill you,” she told him, quietly just in case it was still a sensitive topic. But it was her reminder to him that he also had a stake in this game. “Not to mention Dash is always using them to mess with his teachers, Jack-Jack is turning into a monster, and I just lost Tony because of them!”

…Ohhhhhhhhhh, it all made sense now.

Her powers had somehow lost a boy that she was really into and now she was lashing out.

That was totally it.

Jack felt much better to hear it was just Violet being annoyed rather than truly hateful of her powers (hopefully).

“...How did you lose Tony because of your powers?” he asked, more gently now that he knew what was really wrong.

“Because he saw me in my supersuit when we were going to fight the Underminer,” Violet explained, starting at a reluctant mumble that grew louder with each word. “And then Dad decided it would be a brilliant idea to call Dicker and have him erase Tony’s memories of seeing me in that suit, and take away all his memories of the rest of me too!”

“I see. So you’re blaming your powers, when it was actually the government messing up.” The same reasoning they had given when banning superheroes in the first place. Typical. Now they were trying to make new supers like Violet feel ashamed for being more powerful than any of them could dream! “Don’t blame yourself for other people’s mistakes, Violet.”

“I guess… But that doesn’t fix anything!” she pointed out, hands flopping uselessly in the air before hugging her knees.

“Maybe not, but you can at least blame someone else,” Jack cheekily offered with the hint of a grin on his face. It seemed to ease Violet just a little bit as he continued. “But if you and this, uh, Tony? If you did have some sort of connection, I’m sure it wasn’t based on if you had powers or not. So you can strike up those feelings again, nobody is going to stop you.”

Violet considered that. A few seconds of silence passed through the room, making Jack think he had successfully solved teenage drama for the first time in history. But, it only took a couple more seconds for Violet to demolish that notion. “Uncle Jack, you’ve been in relationships before. How do you know if you love someone?”

If you listened closely, you could hear Jack’s self-confidence crack just the tiniest bit at that question. Just enough for him to feel, but no one else to notice.

“That’s an awesome question. With a really complicated answer,” he struggled to begin.

“How do you know if you love someone?”

How was he supposed to know that?!

“So, you love someone when you care about them enough to put their needs in front of yours. Usually that means taking care of them, and knowing a lot about them, and wanting to spend time with them. And there are, of course, different kinds of love,” Jack began, already starting to pivot away from a certain subject he didn’t feel like bringing up with his friend’s 14-year-old daughter. “You can feel that for your family, or for your friends–”

“Yes, but I wanted to know if I have the romantic kind of love for Tony,” Violet elaborated, completely shattering Jack’s attempt to quietly change the subject. “Is that why everything just…feels so weird now that we aren’t talking anymore?”

“Uh.” Of course it felt weird when they were gone. You had tangled so much of your soul with theirs that when they left, your soul was torn a little from the strain of losing them. “Well, I can’t really comment on that. I didn’t know this kid.”

“But you’ve loved people before, right?”

Jack had to swallow back a wince, slowing uncrossing his legs. “Yeah, but, Violet, you have to understand. There’s a difference between loving someone, and wanting to be with someone, and being really good friends with them, and…”

And this was a very slippery slope for him to be talking next to.

So, Jack stayed frozen with the backs of his hands on his knees. “You know, I think Lucius is a better person to ask about this than me.

“O-oh,” Violet sputtered, red growing on her cheeks out of embarrassment. “Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have asked something so personal–”

“No, it’s totally okay,” Jack promised. While also trying to come up with a better excuse to get away from this topic than “please, please, please, no, I’m not doing this right now.” “It’s just, well, I've had flings. Lucius has had a marriage that’s lasted more than 10 years. He's the better authority on this stuff.”

“...Okay.” But still, she had to apologize again. “I’m sorry.”

“Please, don’t be, I’m just not great at this kind of stuff,” Jack begged her. Truly wishing he could explain why, but truly, truly, truly feeling sick at just letting the slightest hints of those thoughts back into his mind.

Those thoughts about the last few times he had seen Simon before Gazerbeam was killed on Nomanisan Island…

For some reason, when Jack was halfway down the hall to Lucius, he was also on his way up to talk to Jack. They both stopped just at the top of the stairs.

Jack smirked, but he was genuine when he asked, “Hey, I was just coming to get you. Look, do you think you can have a chat with Violet? She’s bent out of shape over this guy at school, and I don’t think my resume is the best suited for that conversation.”

Lucius had already opened his mouth to say something to Jack. But the surprise at the randomness of that request caught him off-guard just long enough to agree. “Yeah, of course. But do you think you can help Dash out a little?”

Jack gave Lucius a surprised, but unimpressed look that matched his snort. “Seriously? Fractions are too difficult for the great Frozone?”

"Jack," Lucius grabbed his shoulders with a grip already covered in sharp shards of ice. Panic was laced in his voice. "They changed math."

And Jack thought he’d just left a somewhat confusing conversation. "...What?”

"I don't know how they did it,” Lucius said despairingly, “but they changed math!"

Apparently, schools now expected kids to do the “right way” instead of “whatever way works for you.”

Lucius had literally almost frozen the dining room table into a popsicle just trying to understand what that grade school assignment was asking Dash to do!

But yet, that sounded way more appealing to Jack than dealing with relationship problems… His own had been a miss for decades, he wasn’t about to start enjoying them just to help Vi.

That’s how he ended up back in the kitchen while Lucius went upstairs to talk with Violet.

“So, Uncle Jack, you’re going to help me with my homework,” Dash asked skeptically.

“Yep. That’s what Lucius and I decided to try out,” Jack responded as he stepped around the kitchen island.

“I see, I see.” Dash leaned against the counter, holding a fist to his cheek like he was in deep contemplation over his new tutor. “And what makes you qualified to be in this important role?”

“Probably because I got an A in multivariable calculus, kinematics and thermodynamics. And all of 5th grade.” The moment Jack opened the fridge, he was blinded by the gaudy red and white, plastic takeout bags that had haunted his dorm many a day when he was in college. “Dash, what's The Happy Platter?”

Dash's eyes turned wistful, perhaps even misty as he remembered the beautiful memory of Violet's nose erupting with water. “A land of tap water and philodendron…”

Jack waited for a better explanation from the 10-year-old, but gave up after a few seconds of Dash staring at the kitchen sink. “...Cool. Does your dad have any beer?”

“Oh, yeah, it's in that bottom sliding drawer,” Dash told him, pointing to the customary plastic drawer where every dad in the history of refrigerators famously kept their beer.

The discovery that Bob only had cheap beer caused Jack to scrunch up his nose, but beggers can't be choosers, so he reluctantly tossed a can into his hand. “You want anything before we start?”

“I can eat while doing homework?” Dash exclaimed.

Jack paused just after he'd cracked open the can. “Are you not allowed to eat while you're doing your homework?”

“Mom says it's ‘too distracting,’” Dash told him, adding a really bad impression of Helen for emphasis.

“What, does she think a hungry kid is less distracted?” Jack snorted and opened the fridge wider for Dash to take a look inside. “Grab what you want. I'm stealing any almonds this household could be hiding from me.”

“Woah,” Dash gasped, like Jack had just offered him the keys to a forbidden food locker. Which, naturally meant that Dash immediately had a glint in his eye for the one thing he wasn't supposed to have. “You know, I think I'm also in the mood for a beer.”

Jack stopped just before he was about to take a swig from the can. “Oh, are you?”

“My dad totally said I could drink it,” Dash “promised.” Just in case his nervous grin wasn't obviously telling Jack he was lying.

But Jack just shrugged and handed Dash the untouched can. “Sure, why not? Knock yourself out.”

“Really?!” Dash exclaimed, staring at Jack's hand like he needed to see this to believe it!

“Your dad said you can, and I think he knows what's best for you.” Jack really needed to spend more time with the Parrs. Dash didn't know him well enough to figure out the grin Jack was wearing was entirely filled with cheeky mischief.

“This is so awesome– I mean, yeah, of course, if my dad said so,” Dash said, trying to play it cool while his eyes were already swimming in the alcohol being offered to him.
Jack might have looked just a little too smug as the kid took the can of cheap beer and immediately guzzled down a huge gulp.

Dash's momentary look of triumph was instantaneously replaced with utter revulsion.

He coughed and choked on the taste, gagging hard enough he thought he might actually throw up as he ran to the sink and spat his giant mouthful into the drain.
Jack had to stop himself from laughing as Dash zipped to grab a glass from the cabinet and fill it with water. It took several glasses to finally rinse the taste out of Dash's mouth, and just as many for him to stare at Jack is abject horror.

Dash hardly recognized the man who had claimed to be like an uncle to him, but had just let him drink something that awful! “You like that garbage?!”

At least that confirmed he wouldn't grow up to be another Hypershock.

“You like soda with those painful bubbles!” Jack retorted, kneeling in front of the fridge to grab a second can.

“Beer has bubbles too,” Dash pointed out. “And it tastes 100 million times worse!”

“I thought you said Bob lets you pop a beer with him occasionally?” Jack sarcastically asked as he grabbed a dish rag to wipe up the slight spill Dash had made in his rushing around. “You'll like it eventually. Give it six years or so.”

“You started drinking in high school??” Dash exclaimed, catching Jack off-guard with just how innocent it sounded.

Jack winced a little at the admission. “Well, yeah– But I probably shouldn't have.”

“Is that when you started flirting with girls all the time too?” Dash asked, glass overfilling had he held it under the faucet for too long.

“How do you know about that?” Jack demanded, reaching over Dash's shoulder to turn off the sink.

“I dunno. I read a lot of books about Mom and Dad's friends since I never got to meet them,” Dash explained, hopping down from where he'd perched his hand against the lip of the sink.

That felt like a punch to Jack's gut as he watched Dash wander back to the fridge. “What do you mean? You met me a few days after you were born.”

“Yeah, but you kind of disappeared after I was six,” Dash reminded him as he started to root around for something appetizing. “So I did my own research!”

Jack assumed that might have been comforting.

But it didn't make the weird tang of guilt leave his mouth, even as he swallowed back the emotions starting to settle there.

He really hadn't seen Bob, Lucius, Helen, and their families for four years.

If he'd died on that island, he wouldn't have ever given himself the chance to even say good-bye.

Would he had even been missed like a friend, or just as a memory?

…Well. He was alive. And he was going to make the most of it.

Even if “making the most of it” had to include sitting at the Parrs’ borrowed dining room table, trying to decipher what Dash was making him look at.

...They changed math!

Which might explain why Jack seemed to always be on the verge of an evil monologue, much to Dash's amusement. “What do you mean, I need to draw a box and do 50 rounds of subtraction to figure out the answer to 71.68÷8?? Why are we drawing boxes in math?! Is this geometry? No! This isn't even algebra! ‘Your good friend Garthberg has 71.68 liters of juice that needs to be split between 8 members of his family. How much juice does each family member get?’ Diabetes, that's what they get! And why is his name Garthberg? Did they run out of names, or did they know one day he was going to try and give them 8.96 liters of juice and they wanted to take their revenge early??”

“That's what Dad and Uncle Lucius said,” Dash told him, grimly looking into the bag of potato chips on the table. “Even they couldn't defeat 5th grade math…”

Jack's glowing glare landed on Dash. “Oh, it is so on, kid. We have, what, 10 of these things? We're using the ‘old-fashioned/better’ way and we're going to get through this in less than an hour. That's more than these questions deserve.”

“...That's what Dad and Uncle Lucius said,” he repeated, looking back into the bag of chips. Then shoved a handful of them into his mouth.

Jack grabbed the piece of paper and snapped it in the air as he read it over again. “Okay, let's start with the basics. What's the thing we're dividing, and the thing we’re dividing it by?”

Dash squinted at him in confusion. “You mean the dividend and the divisor?”

Jack's eyes might have twitched on a spark of radiation. “Sure. Whatever gives the solution.”

“You mean the quotient?”

“...” Jack set down his can of beer, and slowly breathed in through his nose, and out through his mouth. “I have a degree in nuclear physics from the University of Pennsylvania. So, I tell you this with a lot of authority when I say, you will hardly ever see the word ‘quotient’ in reference to the solution to a division problem. No one is going to say, ‘give me the quotient for this dividend and divisor’! Why are they teaching this to 5th graders??”

Dash shrugged, hands greasy and covered in flecks of salt. “You’re the guy who went to college, you figure that out.”

“Uh-huh, thanks, wise guy,” Jack grumbled, tussling the kids a hair, eyes never leaving the paper in front of him. “But, come on, let’s get started. You ready?”

“Eh, maybe?” Dash set the chips bag back on the table and proceeded to wipe his hands all up and down his shirt until they were somewhat clean.

“You’re filling me with confidence, kid,” Jack snarked as he spun his pencil in his fingers. “Did you eat, drink, and use the bathroom?”

“Yep!”

“Do we know the expectations of the assignment?”

“Uh, do the math problems?” Dash weakly offered. Then he asked, more suspiciously, “That’s not a trick question, is it?”

“The hoity-toity name for this is ‘a mindfulness check,’ Dash. People who get easily distracted like you need them sometimes,” Jack informed Dash, bopping him on the head with the pencil eraser, much to Dash’s reluctant amusement. “Are we organized-ish?”

“Emphasis on the ‘ish’!” Dash helpfully announced, proudly looking at the semi-sorted pile of 5th grade math books, notebooks, and the trashcan under the table.

“And would you like to start with the easy ones or the hard questions first?” Jack offered. He stuck his hand into the bowl of almonds he’d stolen from the pantry and tossed a handful into his mouth.

Dash hummed to himself, holding his chin deep in thought. “How about none?”

“Easy it is!” Jack slid the paper in front of Dash so he could reread the question about his good friend Gerthburg. “Come on, let’s stop wasting time.”

Dash stared at the paper for a long moment, barely remembering to take the pencil Jack was offering him. It was like watching someone tilting their head further up a mountain, realizing far too quickly that they were woefully under-prepared for this journey.

“...Tell you what,” Jack decided, leaning onto his elbow. “We’ll go through all of them once. The answers don’t have to be right the first time, we’ll just get them done. Then we’ll take a break, come back, and see if we got anything wrong. Then just repeat until all the answers are right.”

“...Yeah. We can try that, I guess,” Dash mumbled, holding his face up by his fists.

“Hey, don’t sound defeated already! You don’t know what I have planned after you have completed everything,” Jack vaguely offered. He didn’t know how this parental thing worked, he was just trying his best to come up with a way to get Dash’s math homework done without picking up the kid’s hand and making him write the answers.

But apparently, the vague promise of a reward was what Dash needed to perk up a little. “Like what? What could we do? Can we go beat up another robot? Ooh, wait, can we go steal Dad’s car from the rich guy??”

“We’re not doing anything else illegal today!” Jack informed him, putting a hand on Dash’s shoulder as the kid hopped out of his seat.

“You did something illegal today?!” Dash cheered, eyes wide and sparkly at the idea.

“...Other than letting a minor drink alcohol, not in the past 24 hours. I think.” Jack quickly brushed that aside before Dash could ask anymore questions that weren’t part of his homework. “And you’re distracting yourself again. Gerthburg is desperately waiting for your help.”

What followed was a very long lecture about how to do long division. Which I would love to tell you about, but I am not legally allowed to write it because Jack has since had it copyrighted and will be publishing his own textbook on how to defeat modern math classes, and I don’t want to get sued.

That’s why, an hour and a half later, Lucius walked outside to this quaint scene of domesticity:

The pool was on fire.

There were beer cans littered around the entire backyard.

Dash had streaks of mud on his face like football face paint and oven mitts on his hands.

And Jack was chucking beer cans into the backyard like he was a mounted cannon on the roof.

“Tremble before my might, hero!” Jack bellowed at the kid, using a voice that would come from vaguely European villains on Saturday morning cartoons.

“You sound really tough for a guy who's about to be caught by the Great Dash!” Dash shouted back, curling his small fist into the air. Which lost a little of its intimidation factor considering the oven mit on his hand.

“Oh no, I'm being threatened by a child!” Jack dramatically lamented, holding a hand to his chest in mock concern. He picked up another can of cheap beer from his dwindling stack and used it to point at Dash. “Little do you know, my ultimate attack is now ready! I will reign destruction over Fakeplacia, and then the world!”

“That's only because I've been waiting for my super, ultra, mega, ultimate attack to charge up! And now it's ready too!” Dash challenged his uncle on the rooftop. “Face me if you dare!”

Jack gasped, hovering a few inches into the air. “You wouldn't dare use your super, ultra, mega, ultimate attack on Baron von Ruthless!”

“I won't hesitate, Baron!” Dash shot back.

“Very well, boy! Beholdeth, mine ultimate attack!” Jack pulled back his arm, winding up like he was about to throw a baseball. “What's 0.1 ÷ 8?!”

“0.0125!”

“Correct!” Jack hurled the beer can into the backyard, as far away from Dash as he could muster.

But Dash got under it at lightning speed and punched it out of the air with his mom's oven mitts. “That's the best you have to offer?!”

“No, he got the question right!” Jack lamented as he picked up another can. “What's 9 ÷ 8?!”

Dash smirked as he responded, “1.125!”

“How are you correct again?!” Jack von Ruthless demanded to know as he threw another can into the air.

That time it almost landed on one of the pool deck umbrellas, but Dash threw one of the oven mitts and somehow managed to knock the can onto the concrete pool deck. “Try that again, Baron, I dare you!”

“Don't worry, I dare!” Jack tossed another can between his hands in a loose juggle. “50 ÷ 8?! I bet you won't get that one!”

Dash scoffed, crossing his arms as he shook his head. “You disappoint me, it's 6.25!”

Jack threw the can into the air, burying his laughing face in his hands the moment he did. “How–” he snorted. “How could you have bested me so easily?!”

“Because I have something you never will!” Dash charged under the beer can and caught it in his remaining oven mitt. He momentarily broke character to beam with pride, but quickly schooled himself so he could yell at the supervillain, “The powerful and incomprehensible speed of the Great Dash!”

“No! Not the powerful and incomprehensible speed of the Great Dash! My one weakness!” Jack von Ruthless collapsed onto the rooftop, his demise imminent. Until green radiation began to flicker in his eyes once more, evil smiling on his face. “Except, I have one last question. If all of that is true: what is 59.1 ÷ 8, rounded to the tenths place?”

Dash blinked, scrunching his eyebrows into a point as he tried to quickly add 0.0125, 1.125, and 6.25 while Jack began to cackle.

“You hesitate for too long, hero. Your math skills are deplorable and your test has been failed! Whatever progress you have made ends here! I shall take my revenge on the poor, innocent people of Madeuptopia, and there is nothing you can do but watch! Now beholdeth, as I deploy my weapon into the very heart of WhateverIgiveupaville!” Jack summed up. The real Baron von Ruthless would have monologued for at least another couple minutes, but the sun had dipped below the horizon and someone had just turned on the patio lights.

So, the final beer can was set on the edge of the roof. Jack's foot met it perfectly, like it had a bulls-eye painted perfectly for him to kick. It flew over the edge of the roof, twisting and tumbling for the pool lit with green, radioactive fire.

The Great Dash's eyes widened as the Baron laughed overhead.

But he couldn't rest now.

Innocent lives were in danger if he didn't stop that bomb from landing in the heart of his city.

So the Great Dash ran into action, a mere blur on the battlefield as he flew past innocent civilians. A few women fainted in awe as they saw him, a couple business men mumbled to themselves that he was the greatest hero of the time. He was the superhero everyone cheered for, the most loved super in the world (Violet was second best, though)!

Dash jumped over the pool, his speed carrying him farther than what should have been possible for someone his age.

His remaining oven mitt reached out for the can, green flames trying to hop out of the water and grab him.

The metal cylinder spun one more time. Then disappeared into the paisley oven mitt's waiting grasp.

Dash landed on top of one of the chaise lounges that had been strategically barricaded around the other side of the pool just for this occasion.

He bounced once, twice, three times, his grin becoming more and more giddy with each bob on the orange fabric. Jack saw the kid's ruddy cheeks about to burst from smiling as he reminded the “supervillain,” “Nice try, but your plan has failed, Baron von Ruthless! Now, I will use my own final attack!”

Dash coughed to deepen his voice as he held the beer can. With each word, he reared back further and tightened his arm, until he was as wound as a spring. Super! Ultra! Mega! Ultimate attack!”

He hurled the can up into the air, aimed straight for Jack's chest.

(It only got about a story off the ground, but) Jack clenched a fist over his heart, unbearable, indescribable pain lacing through every evil bone in his body. He staggered towards the edge of the roof, swaying dangerously towards the open air between him and the radioactive pool. “ Oh no! The Great Dash has hit me with his super, ultra, mega, ultimate attack! That's my secret weakness: dying! Bleeeeeeeeeeh…!”

Jack tripped backwards and plummeted into the air, the back of his hand pressed to his forehead and the other still clutching his chest.

Then, in a beautifully-executed aerial maneuver, he somersaulted mid-air and landed perfectly posed in the orange lounge chair next to Dash.

“Not bad, kid,” Jack decided, extending a hand to shake Dash's shoulder before he settled in on the chaise lounge.

“Woah,” Dash mumbled as Jack reached over to grab a discarded can from a nearby table, as if he's just hopped over the arm of the chair and not the rain gutters. “You’re really cool for a deadbeat uncle who day-drinks.”

Jack guffawed before he could stop himself. “I am the coolest uncle, and I do not day-drink, I math-drink! And, sure, maybe I was the most present friend to your parents over the past few years, but if you need any more math help, I’ll be here.”

“That was so awesome! That was the best way to do math! Ever!” Dash declared, flopping into the chaise lounge. “I mean, not that I actually need this stuff. I’m going to be a superhero when I grow up.”

That made Jack pause and look away from the clouds hovering in front of the moon. “Yeah? What makes you say that?”

“Cuz Mom is out there making superheroes legal again,” Dash pointed out, leaving an unspoken “duh” between them. “And she’s going to win, too! She already beat the Screenslaver, and she helped beat the giant robot, what can she not do?”

Jack smiled, even if it was a little heavier than what he would have wanted. It was nice seeing a kid who wasn’t old enough to realize just how human his parents were. And how flawed the “good adults” could be.

“And when I’m a superhero, I’m going to be the best one Metroville and Municiburg have seen! I already have a suit planned and everything,” Dash rattled off, words at the same break-neck speed as he could run. It reminded Jack a little too much of Blazestone. “It’s going to be red and have lightning bolts, and have plasma cannons that I can shoot faster than the eye can see–”

“Plasma cannons? No, Dash, you’re faster than a cannon blast, you would just run into it,” Jack somberly told him. Then grinned as a truly brilliant idea occurred to him. “Now, knives! Wrist-mounted knives?! That would work!”

That was when Lucius showed up. “What were you doing??”

Both of them sat up as Lucius stepped onto the patio. He wasn’t sure where to look first: the disastrous state of the yard, or the 10-year-old and 35-year-old kids grinning at him without a care in the world.

“Just talking about important superhero business,” Jack quipped, feigning indifference for the look of concern on Lucius’s face. “We’re going to give Dash knives and release him upon the world!”

Lucius tried to process that. Then got distracted by the green flames still bubbling in the water in front of them. “Did you irradiate the pool?!”

“No!” Jack’s eyes wandered towards the pool, filled with fuming green vapors identical to his gamma powers. He quickly summoned the radiation back into his body, innocently smirking at the ice super. “Not anymore… How’d Vi?”

“Did her adolescents stop?” Dash asked, flopping back into the chair with annoyance.

“Did her what stop?” Lucius shook his head, waving away whatever that was supposed to mean. “Jack, can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Yeah, sure,” Jack answered warily, hopping over the arm of the chair and walking over to the other super. “Dash, can you pick up the cans and toss the worst ones in the recycling?”

“The Great Dash is more than happy to assist in cleaning up the damages caused by Baron von Ruthless,” Dash announced, but squinted his eyes accusingly at Jack. “But he’s disappointed the villain himself is going to be helping.”

“Baron von Ruthless has to go discuss evil battleplans with Xerek the evil scientist,” Jack apologized, swatting Lucius’s shoulder when he got close enough. “But I’m sure the Great Dash has things covered.”

“Uhhhhhh, fiiiiine,” Dash grumbled. He launched off the lawn chair and began to zoom around the yard, straightening and rearranging everything that had been tossed out of place during their review session.

Lucius led Jack back into the kitchen. “You know you’re going to have to pay the Deavors for all that, right?”

“I don’t think they care if I blew a couple bucks on really bad beer,” Jack informed him.

Lucius’s glare turned icy. How appropriate.

Jack sighed, a small puff of green radiation slipping out of his mouth. “But, yeah, I’m sure Bob could use a full case of beer sometime in the near future, I’ll replace it.”

“That’s all I wanted to hear,” Lucius said. Then immediately demand more answers from him. “And don’t do that again! Someone could have seen you flying all over the place!”

“Where would they have been watching from? The bushes with binoculars? This mansion is in the middle of nowhere! Also, technically I wasn’t flying, so you can’t get made at me for that.”

“You were flying,” Lucius informed him. Just in case the blond had gotten beaned in the head by a beer can.

“I can’t actually fly. It’s not in my NSA file or anything,” Jack reminded him as they took up positions around the kitchen island. “When I ‘fly’ I’m using controlled radiation bursts to propel myself through the air.”

“That’s the same thing as flying.”

“You also do that with ice!” Jack pointed out, mimicking the way Lucius would aim his arms at the ground to release a burst of cold air that could throw him into the air. “I’m just better at doing it for longer periods of time. So, no, I wasn’t flying.”

“You know, the more we’ve been hanging out lately, the more I’m remembering why the NSA had you on A-level monitoring,” Lucius grumbled, words pointed as they were sent at Jack. Who tried to respond, just to get cut off. “But, okay, back to what we needed to talk about: these kids haven’t eaten dinner yet.”

“...When you have a fair point, you have a fair point,” Jack admitted, swallowing back what would have been a scathing retort.

Lucius nodded in approval as he sensed his friend starting to remember that they were the adults in this situation. “Now, I don’t have the best cooking skills in the world. And I assume being a perpetual bachelor means you don’t either. But can you cook at all?”

“I only eat the same 10 things each month. So, 10 things,” Jack noncommittedly offered with a shrug.

“Great, pick one and make it,” Lucius ordered him, rooting around for the note that Bob had left him. “Apparently Dash needs to eat at least one vegetable, can you do that?”

“I’m single, not dietarily incompetent,” Jack scoffed, already wandering towards the cupboards to see what Bob and Helen left him to work with. “Anything you in the mood for, or should I just guess?”

“You can do whatever you want. We’re making sure the kids eat, don’t worry about me” Lucius said. So neither of them were feeling particularly hungry, apparently. “I’m going to call Edna’s and make sure Bob didn’t pass out on her couch.”

“If he did, I think you would have already heard about it because she’d call to let us know he wasn’t going to be coming back tonight.” They both chuckled at the idea of Bob passed out on one of Edna’s collector’s edition vintage leather couches from Tibet.

Violet eventually came out of her room after Dash practically hauled her down the stairs to get dinner. She probably would have been content to just eat ice cream again, but getting real food was a better option than touching the takeout boxes from The Happy Platter.

And since neither Lucius or Jack had experience with how family dinner with kids was supposed to work, that meant all of them turned on the TV and lounged in various positions of relaxation in the living room while they ate off paper plates.

Dash acted out every moment of Adam-12 that he was allowed to watch before he started to nod off. And Violet was somewhat less interested in the cop show, but could at least appreciate the temporary distraction of having to be the responsible one in the family.

However, eventually the credits of the second episode rolled. Dash started to nod off, and Violet maybe could have stayed up longer, but she needed some alone time before she also passed out.

Lucius escorted both of them to go to bed while Jack got to work disintegrating the paper plates that had been left scattered around the living room. The ice super came back downstairs a few minutes later as Jack was scrubbing something out of the bottom of a pot.

“Well, I’d say that was a pretty successful intervention,” Jack declared, smiling and covered in soap suds up to the sleeves rolled up to his elbows.

Lucius snorted through a yawn as he surveyed the kitchen for some way to help. But Jack wasn’t the type to leave a mess in someone else’s house, so he’d made sure to keep things tidy while he’d been working. “I’d say so. Pretty successful day…”

“You sound tired,” Jack pointed out as Lucius went back to the living room to turn off the Sunbeam Bread commercial bubbling out of the TV.

“When you get to the ripe old again of 42, you learn that staying up past 10:00pm isn’t that appealing anymore,” he called back, setting the remote next to the blank television.

“Don’t threaten me like that, old man.” Jack shook his head as he finished rinsing out the pot, setting it to next to the pile of forks and knives he’d collected from dinner.

It had been a fun night.

Somehow in the middle of everything crazy in his life, Jack had a night where he didn’t worry about Screenslaver and the Deavors for a few hours.

It was really, really nice.

“You know, Lucius. I think if I’d had the chance, I would have wanted to work with the kids in the NSA.”

The other super gave him a look of pure confusion as Jack inspected the silverware for any spot he missed. “...You scare me. After the afternoon we had? Teenage drama and math homework and whatever you and Dash were doing with those cans? Nope, I’m good.”

Jack laughed.

Yeah, okay, maybe that was kind of an ironic thing for Gamma Jack, of all people, to say between his character and the scars from the blood samples the NSA had been taking out of him since he was one of those kids in their walls. “Really? Come on, you didn’t have fun with this? Just a little?”

“I enjoyed the part where things had calmed down and both of them started acting like civilized human beings,” Lucius said, deadly serious.

“Where’s the fun in that?” Jack scoffed, picking up the dish soap to start working on the second pot.

“Are you sure you didn’t enjoy this partially because you have the maturity of a child?” Lucius had to check, earning a grinning eye roll from Jack. “Don’t get me wrong, I love these two, but I’m good with staying a perpetual uncle.”

Jack reminded him, “Hey, I would have liked to help supers who were in the system, like me, that’s all. But I’m busy with my own life. I need to make sure I give bachelors a good name.”

“You’re definitely giving them…some sort of name,” Lucius informed him. The eye roll that time was a little more derogatory, but joined with a snicker. “I’m going to stay and wait for Bob to get back, but you can head out now if you want.”

“Are you sure?” Jacked asked, setting the pot at the bottom of the sink while he reached for a sponge. “Honey’s probably waiting up for you, I think you should head home.”

“I don’t want to make you wait around,” Lucius told him, but was ignored.

“I’ve already missed out on the past few years, I’m happy to hang out for an extra half an hour,” Jack announced, defiantly squirming a jet of yellow soap into the pot. “Go home and go to bed, old man.”

“Call me old man again and I’m freezing your feet to the ground,” Lucius warned him, but he’d already taken a step towards the door. “You’re sure you’re okay with staying?”

“I’m fine,” Jack laughed, feeling like Lucius had forgotten Jack wasn’t actually one of the kids. “It’s nice to take a night off from Screenslaver stuff.”

“...Alright,” Lucius finally decided, slowly making a move towards the front of the house, just in case Jack changed his mind and flew out of the window. “I’ll see you around.”

“Get home safe,” Jack half-mindedly told him, turning back to the dishes as Lucius disappeared around the stairs.

It really was nice to have a night off from Screenslaver.

To pretend that Elastigirl really had saved the day, and no one would have to worry about them again. That the Deavors were innocent and they were going to start the process of re-legalizing superheroes the next day.

It’s nice believing when things are too good to be true.

Because that voice from the goggles was still ringing through Gamma Jack’s head.

And tomorrow at the gala, he’d need to finally convince Elastigirl to open her eyes to what those goggles meant about the Deavors.