Thursday morning, the news went out city-wide: Lung and Bakuda had been captured and were in PRT custody. A giant bomb with the yield of a small nuclear warhead had been stopped and disarmed thanks to Dennis and Missy, and the rest of the Protectorate and Wards were instrumental in ending things.

  I was happy. Relieved, even. I was ground down and happy for things to be over with. With the end of the war in the streets came elation and celebration across the city. People collectively took a deep breath and were finally able to relax.

  There was some bitterness, too. The bad guys didn’t get credited for saving the city, even though we had done the bulk of the heavy lifting by a wide margin. That was okay, though. I think most of us didn’t want the spotlight.

  It had been immensely profitable for me. And for Faultline’s Crew as well. Mercenary life was thankless, but it certainly paid well. I’d gained a massive amount of respect for the men and women who did this job without powers. I wasn’t sure what motivated some of them to go and risk their lives day after day for money, but the fact that they did? Incredible.

  Of course, with the end of the war also came the end of the truce. There had already been some action between Coil and E88. The airport was attacked by The Travelers for some reason, and a corporate headquarters downtown of all places had a literal gunfight between corporate security and the sorts of mercs that Coil hired. Medhall Corporation.

  Still, I was relieved. All I had to juggle now was building up my base, going to school, taking contracts, which I figured would taper off, and catching up on what felt like a month’s worth of socializing with friends, family, and a few others.

  I was watching the news at my apartment when my civilian phone buzzed. I fished it out. Melody.

  I answered.

  “Hey, you’re not in school, right? Are you busy?” she asked, sounding a bit excited, a bit breathless.

  “No, why? What’s up? Everything good?”

  She laughed. “Yeah! Everything’s great! I was going for a run outside now that this is all over. We’re having a little get-together. Will you please come?”

  “You, Mom, and Dad, you mean? Or the Dallons?” I asked.

  “Nah. Amy and Victoria are busy with their family.”

  I nodded. Made sense. “Sure, when?”

  “Twelve thirty! Dad’s grilling some dogs and burgers, better bring your appetite, and don’t be late!”

  I am pretty hungry. Less than an hour to get over there.

  “Yes. Hell yes. Let me take a shower, and I’ll head over. Tell Dad to throw an extra burger or two on for me, I’m starving.” My own excitement was bubbling up in my voice.

  “See you then, Morg! Don’t be late!”

  She hung up.

  My stomach rumbled under me from where I’d been sitting and resting on my elbows. I’d nailed the call. Imitating people as Apex came easily now. I’d taken the call imitating myself.

  I hadn’t shifted yet this morning, so I had more than enough time to go hang with my family for a few hours. I pushed through the change into Morgan with a middle-of-the-road urgency. That cut my changing time down to just a couple of minutes at the cost of some moderate discomfort. The discomfort was fleeting. I usually ended my changes feeling more or less great. And I was long since past the point where the revolting sounds, appearance, and sensations bothered me in the slightest.

  It didn’t hurt like breaking bones. Just uncomfortable–bordering on painful, but not quite. Watching my leg bones crunch and joints dislocate had become passe. Funny how things change.

  I had changed. Still was. Sure, physically like I was doing now, but in deeper, under-the-hood ways. I was feeling more myself than ever as Big Blue. I rarely took the mask off, if ever. I’d been working on ways to express myself more through movement than facial expressions.

  My shift finished. I yawned and stretched. I didn’t need to shower, but I wanted to. I went and got cleaned up. When I was done, I pushed through a small shift: to give myself my other self’s skin and a quick shake.

  Boom. Instantly dry.

  I was trying to get better at thinking with my power. Taylor, as Skitter, had been terrifying. Not just because of the biblical plagues of bugs, but because she was effortlessly, unbelievably creative. You’d think someone whose only power was controlling bugs would be, I don’t know... middle-of-the-pack on a fantasy hero league tier list?

  I got dressed, grabbed my keys, and headed home.

  But Skitter, Taylor? People did underestimate her. Her twiggy ass looked like she was barely over the hundred-pound mark. Negative points on the physically intimidating part, although her costume really did kick ass and helped a lot. But no, it was just the sheer level of creativity she had in thinking with and using her power. She didn’t just hold her own. She took down the biggest, meanest, and strongest villains in the city. Multiple times. And Lung? That dude fought Endbringers.

  I envied her.

  I’d grown tremendously. My power still creeped me out sometimes, but I didn’t hate it anymore. Quite the opposite. It had grown on me. But figuring out how to use it? That was the hard part. I’d spent years as an athlete and martial artist, training hard to get the most out of my body. A fixed set of variables. Now I had to throw that entire formula out the window and fundamentally change my thinking. To change my body to suit the situation instead.

  That was ludicrously hard for me.

  I was working on it. Starting with the little things. Drying off without a towel. Doing my hair and makeup with my power. Growing extra limbs–usually tentacles–to reach and grab stuff. I think it was helping. A little.

  I enjoyed my walk over to my parents’ house. It was finally starting to warm up most days and approach that bright, sunny summer weather I loved. I could smell food walking down the street. My mouth was watering. I walked up the sidewalk and let myself in. Everyone was pretty dressed up for a celebratory cookout lunch, but hey, everyone celebrated in their own way, I suppose. I wasn’t going to knock my family about it.

  I felt like a bit of a goober, standing there in sneakers, basketball shorts, and a racerback top with my sports bra peeking out.

  Fucking Lisa. Maybe I really am Phoenix Dyke.

  Melody had a nice dress on, Dad had slacks and a polo, and Mom had on a blouse and a skirt. I gave everyone a big round of hugs and kisses, then set out to help with food prep. Dad handed me a jumbo pack of hot dogs.

  Say no more. You might be the household grillmaster, but if there’s one thing I can cook, it’s meat on fire. Unga bunga, Morgan cook.

  I headed out back and got to work. Melody came with me, and we caught up. I was listening and replying more than I was contributing much on my own, but she didn’t seem to mind. We were having a good time. Things finally felt like they could be normal.

  I heard a pair of vehicles coming down the street. Motorcycles. One had the bub-bub-bub-bub kind of engine I’d come to associate with real assholes. The other had the brrrr-brrrr kind of engine. Come to think of it, the people who rode those were a different variety of assholes. I guess, in my mind, motorcycles were just vehicles for assholes. Sounded like they stopped at the neighbors across the street, I couldn’t see from the backyard.

  My sister and I chatted a bit more while I finished putting some grill marks on the hot dogs and transferred them into an aluminum catering-style tray with a matching lid to keep them warm. Then Melody and I stepped through the back door into the kitchen. I’d no more than put the tray on the stove next to the one with the burgers when I heard a familiar voice.

  No.

  Heat surged up from my chest, up my neck, into my face. I tried to hold my composure, but I was pretty sure I was some shade of beet red at the moment.

  I turned around slowly as my parents came in with two guests.

  Hannah and Colin, in dressy civilian clothing, no masks, nothing. My parents were smiling and laughing with them.

  My heart was pounding in my ears. I kept my breathing slow, maybe too slow. One of my eyelids was twitching.

  You. Can’t. Do. This.

  “Thanks for inviting us over, Nate,” Armsmaster said to my dad.

  “Yes, thank you both,” said Hannah.

  Armsmaster–Colin–smiled at my sister and me. It was a good smile. Practiced. Convincing. Fake.

  “Hello, Ms. Rivera. Ms. Rivera.”

  Jokes. He’s got jokes.

  “Thank you for coming over. I am amazed you had the time, with the news and everything,” my mom said to Colin.

  They knew. Their familiarity.

  Have they been keeping tabs on me through my parents this whole time?

  I glanced out the windows. Half-expecting armored officers to be scaling the backyard fence. I couldn’t reveal myself here. Not to my parents. Not to Melody. Not like this.

  Was that what this was? Bait me in where my defenses were down, have a hamburger, shoot the shit, then walk me out the front door in handcuffs? Would they have the fucking decency to let me put myself into an unmarked cruiser without showing my parents?

  Wait. Did they know? About me? The real me?

  “...Morgan?”

  I blinked. My dad was talking to me. I’d just been standing there like a statue.

  “Would you mind plating up a hot dog and burger for everyone?”

  “Yeah, sure,” I mumbled and turned away from the two intruders in my home. My head pounded with my pulse. Started pulling buns from bags and filling them mechanically.

  “What’s up with the low-key freakout?” Melody whispered to me as she brushed past me to grab some baked beans from the oven.

  “Did you know? ” I whispered back to her, my voice tight in my throat.

  She glanced up at me while pulling the beans out with some oven mitts on. A curious look.

  “What, you didn’t? I thought this was partly your idea?” Confusion flickered across her face.

  I accidentally cut a hot dog in half with my tongs.

  I cursed under my breath.

  Mom cleared her throat.

  My power was roiling in my head. I wasn’t sure if it was reacting to my mental state, or what, but it was taking effort to focus. To not let something slip.

  I served plates for everyone at the table. Melody helped, and then we sat down and started eating.

  Just a totally normal celebratory victory for the first and second in command of The Protectorate in the dining room of my house.

  The topic of the day? The fall of the ABB, of course. Return to safety. Business as usual in the Bay.

  “The news was saying that The Wards defused the bomb that terrorist made?” my dad asked.

  Hannah wiped her mouth and nodded. “That’s right. Clockblocker and Vista.”

  “That’s incredible, I can’t imagine having that sort of responsibility as a teenager,” my mom empathized with the Wards who’d been placed in such danger.

  Guess that’s who I got the empathy from.

  “Well, we’ve been dealing with explosives and devices all over the city for a week and a half, so we expected that there might be something, but we were taken by surprise by the scale of what she built. Those two made it possible to save everyone,” Colin said.

  It sounded scripted.

  “You must be very proud of the young members of the team,” my mom said, beaming. She turned to me. “Isn’t that wonderful?”

  I set my fork down, very slowly, very carefully. With my power roiling the way it was, I didn’t trust myself not to crush something by accident.

  I looked at my mom and nodded. “Yes, it is. I’m sure they were scared, but both of them are incredible under pressure. I wouldn’t have expected any less of them myself. They’re very talented.”

  I turned to Colin. “You must be looking forward to them joining The Protectorate. Both of them have limitless capabilities.”

  The faintest twitch in his jaw.

  Good.

  Hannah coughed and took a drink of tea.

  “I’m sorry if this is rude to ask…” my dad began, but Colin cut in, waving a hand, encouraging him to go on.

  “We’ve been following everything pretty closely. It was the only thing anyone could think about. We watched a lot of cellphone footage posted online on PHO. Weren’t a lot of villains also involved in assisting the city fight against the chaos?”

  Go…Dad?

  Hanna cut in to answer: “Yes, it’s true. Please keep this to yourselves, but there was a negotiated truce between government forces and the villain community to work together to end the terrorism. We don’t condone any of them, of course, but many of them were just as eager to put an end to the bombings and chaos. They were equally as concerned.”

  Leave it to Hannah to have a partially nuanced take on things.

  I looked away and shoveled beans into my face like an uncouth barbarian. I was still hungry, and with everything up in the air, I wanted to enjoy it while it lasted.

  “I can’t imagine having to deal with them,” Melody said beside me. “Some of them are absolutely disgusting, like Skitter, Hellhound, and Apex.”

  This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

  Shit.

  I accidentally bent the spoon in my hand at the mention of Apex. Tried to straighten it back out, think I mostly pulled it off.

  Speaking almost under my breath, I said, “I don’t know. Skitter’s kind of cool.”

  “Eh!?” Melody recoiled like I’d just grown a third eye.

  I glanced over at her, then back down at my beans. “Her costume. It’s really well-made. Sleek, menacing, on-theme.”

  Melody blinked rapidly and tilted her head.

  “You know, I never really thought about it that way, but you’re right. Hard to see past the gross bug swarms, but she’s got real style.”

  She elbowed me and grinned.

  “Still keeping up on your homework, huh, sis?”

  I nodded and shoved more beans in my mouth.

  We ate with a few more minutes of mostly idle chatter.

  It wasn’t terribly awkward, but I was half-convinced you could see the tension between Colin and me hanging in the air.

  When the table had been cleared and we’d all had a little dessert, Armsmaster–Colin, I was struggling to see him without the armor on–placed his hands on the table. “Thank you all for the excellent meal, and for the chance to get away from work and the office for a little while. There’s just a little business I wanted to discuss before we headed back.”

  Mom and Dad were grinning.

  Hannah’s face was unreadable.

  Colin had a lightly amused look on his face, probably fake. Everything about him like this, here, and on television? Manufactured. Carefully practiced showmanship to pass as a normal person, instead of the cold-hearted, entitled prick he really was.

  He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out two stiff envelopes. One was fairly thick with what I assumed was folded paperwork. The other was slimmer.

  “This is for you,” he said, and extended the thick envelope to me. My name was handwritten on the front in precise script.

  I clenched my jaw and took it stiffly.

  Happy Birthday, here’s a warrant for your arrest.

  “Go on, open it,” Dad urged me.

  I am this close to losing my shit.

  I closed my eyes for a moment. My head felt like a kick drum. Then I opened them, opened the envelope, and unfolded a stack of papers.

  On top, a cover letter. Handwritten in the same script.

  Ms. Rivera,

  In light of your work and dedication in assisting the city during a gang uprising and terrorist threat, and your bravery in confronting numerous heavily fortified and armed positions, The Protectorate East-Northeast formally extends an invitation to join our ranks.

  There was more. A whole lot more. I think there was even an apology buried in there.

  It was signed: Collin Wallis.

  I looked up at him. The standard-issue PRT headset in his ear was blinking with a slow, steady blue light.

  He’s on a call? This whole time?

  Strike Team Bravo Six on standby?

  I glanced at Hannah. No headset. But then again, she wasn’t the leader. Her face looked tense. Maybe concerned?

  I folded the letter and attachments, slid them back in the envelope, and tucked the flap back closed.

  “No.”

  I hadn’t even realized I’d said it. I didn’t think it. It just… came out.

  Mom gasped.

  “Morgan!” she snapped, sharper and louder than I’d ever heard from her.

  I put the envelope in the middle of the table. I didn’t even want to touch it.

  Colin’s mask–and he was definitely wearing one–slipped. A vein popped out on his temple.

  Hannah’s eyes tracked me, sharp and alert.

  “What, why?” Dad asked.

  I took a breath. Let it out real slow.

  I looked at him and at Mom. Both stunned.

  Melody just looked confused, completely lost.

  I turned back to my parents.

  “I don’t want to talk about it.”

  My voice was like cast iron. I didn’t sound like Morgan; I sounded like Apex. Not in the deep, bassy, androgynous way, but in how I spoke. Flat. Final.

  I turned to Colin.

  “You had other business?” I gestured toward the other envelope.

  He snapped out of whatever it was that was distracting him, and the mask was back. He smiled tightly. Leaning forward, he extended it to Melody.

  She tilted her head. “For me?”

  He nodded, and she took the envelope, opened it, and gasped.

  She pulled out a quartet of stadium-style tickets, very fancy-looking ones. She waved a hand and bounced in her seat. I smiled at her, and I meant it. If she was happy, I was happy. I didn’t know what they were for.

  I stood up. So did Colin and Hannah.

  I felt my anger rise again, my face warming, but not to the degree it had previously.

  Hannah whispered something to him, and he cleared his throat.

  “Ms. Rivera–Morgan–could we speak in private? Here in your home?”

  I looked at him. Masked up. I looked at Hannah.

  Seemingly reading my mind, she said, “I’ll come with you both.”

  Fuck it.

  I shrugged and said, “Sure. We can talk in my room. This way.”

  I walked out of the dining room, not giving a single shit whether they followed or not. I was resigned to ride out whatever the hell this was.

  Stupid. Idiotic. Moronic. That’s what it was. They couldn’t have misread me and how I’d react to the offer any harder than they had. I walked into the room and turned around, leaning back on my desk with my arms crossed. My stomach was knotted. I vaguely wondered if I might be sick.

  Colin walked in, and Hannah after him. She closed the door and locked it.

  Colin pulled a dome-shaped disk from his pocket, about the size of a drink coaster. He set it on my nightstand, pressed a button, and a ring of lights spun up like an old flying saucer. A faint hum filled the air. Everything else went quiet.

  “We can speak freely now,” Hannah said. “No one will hear anything, even if we yell.”

  I didn’t wait. No filter, Faultline-style.

  “What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” I asked Colin, Dead-on.

  He blinked. Twitched.

  “What am I doing? What are you doing? I write you a personal apology, come hand deliver it, offer you exactly what you asked for, and this is how you act? In front of your family?”

  “My family,” I snapped at him the same way Apex would, “is the entire reason why I’m so mad I’m having trouble not destroying their home by accident right now.”

  “Is that a threa-” he cut himself off.

  Seriously, what the fuck is up with him right now?

  Hannah glanced around my room, hands in her pockets. “Bit empty, isn’t it?” she asked casually.

  I exhaled slowly. Tried to calm down.

  I wasn’t mad at her.

  I had the impression she, again, wasn’t fully on board with this.

  I nodded slowly.

  “Yeah. I moved out the day after you fired me. I'm pursuing an independent hero career, and I wasn’t going to risk my family.”

  She frowned, her expression softening.

  “I’m sorry,” she offered.

  I think she meant it.

  I shrugged.

  “Cape life is the only thing I’m good at. The only thing I want to do.”

  My eyes misted up a little, and I cursed myself silently. Looking up at the ceiling.

  “Such a tragedy, too. I’ve gotten so much better at it. Really been making a splash, and a name for myself.”

  Colin rubbed his temple. Sighed. “Can we try this again? I don’t–I really don’t understand why you’re this upset. I am here, trying to make things right for you.”

  I shifted against the desk, jaw tight.

  “You really don’t get it, do you? She told me you were bad with people, but this isn’t just that. You don’t understand other people. It’s like you have no empathy at all.”

  His cheek twitched. “Who did?”

  “It’s not important. Sure. I’ll lay it out for you,” I said. My voice was back to being cast iron once again.

  I took one hand off my arm, and gestured around the room. “Hannah gets it. Look at her. It’s written on her face.”

  He did, but I still don’t think he got it.

  Fine. Guess words were needed.

  “You—personally—though I’m sure Director Piggot played a part, ruined my life.”

  “It’s been a month–” I raised my hand up to cut him off.

  “It’s not the time, Colin.”

  “You put me in a position where I had to make choices I can’t take back. I left my home. I wrecked my family. I barely speak to my twin sister, the one person I was closest to in the world. I’ve been here maybe two, three hours total in the past month. That’s including today.”

  My voice was level, but my jaw was trembling.

  I was not about to cry.

  “You could’ve transferred, gone almost anywhere else in the States…” I cut him off again, same gesture.

  “First off, that’s a fucking lie. You think I could’ve gotten into any Protectorate division worth a damn with my scores–and that scathing report in my file?”

  “Second, you could’ve moved. Or reassigned someone on your team to make space, why didn’t you?”

  He scoffed. “Because we’ve earned our positions.”

  I nodded. “Exactly. Exactly. You’re not going to move; you deserve it. You earned it.”

  “And you think no one else feels the same?” I asked.

  Hannah cleared her throat. “What report are you referring to?”

  I tongued the inside of my cheek and looked up, trying to recall the exact lines.

  “Let’s see if this jogs your memory. Hmm.”

  “She is not a deterrent, and she is not a priority asset. If not for her work ethic and drive, it is unlikely she would have been cleared for fieldwork at all.”

  I paused.

  “Not suitable for Protectorate candidacy under current performance and classification metrics.”

  Colin frowned hard.

  I glanced at Hannah.

  “Thank you, Hannah, for the kind words.”

  “And you were right all along: ‘She is not weak. She is underdeveloped. There’s a difference. Recommend reconsideration for long-term support and mentorship. I’ll volunteer to do it myself.’ ”

  “Those documents are classified.” His tone sharpened.

  “Did you break into PHQ and steal them?” Colin all but demanded.

  I threw my hands up in exasperation.

  “No, Colin, I did not! ”

  “It’s like you can’t hear a single word I say! I told you the night you all decided to arrest me on a power trip that I’m not your enemy! And I went out of my way to prove it, by doing nothing but fleeing!”

  I looked between them.

  “Your system? The PRT? It’s as corrupt and rotten as anything else!”

  “All your ‘highly classified’ documents are just out there, for sale. Anyone can buy them whenever the hell they want!”

  “You’re at least smart enough to redact where our families live! Otherwise, I might have Empire Eighty-Eight stopping in to murder my family, like what happened to New Wave!”

  Hannah frowned, visibly troubled.

  Colin crossed his arms over his chest. He looked like he was about to say something.

  I jabbed a finger at him.

  “You know, I lost all my healthcare and my mental healthcare provider when I was fired?”

  “That night you tried to arrest me, I nearly had a breakdown. I did have a panic attack.”

  “Do you even know I’m claustrophobic? If you’d followed standard containment protocol and sent me to the Rig, I would’ve had a full-blown breakdown. Would’ve been sealed in containment foam and lost my damn mind. You’d have had to stick me in that parahuman psych facility down south.”

  Finally– finally –something got through.

  He rubbed his face with his palms, took a breath, and sighed.

  When he lowered his hands, he said, “I’m getting a better idea of things now. Thank you. In our defense, we didn’t realize you were Apex until more recently.”

  I crossed my arms back over my chest and said, “You mean when you finally stopped to read my file? Which you should have done before considering me for employment–

  instead of shrugging and tossing me–” My voice cracked.

  “--out like a piece of fucking garbage.”

  I wiped my eyes.

  The anger drained out of me, just like that.

  My shoulders slumped. I hung my head, tears slipping down my cheeks.

  I coughed. “I thought you were going to arrest me. Right here. In front of my parents. In front of my sister.”

  “I haven’t even done anything. I talked to people on the naughty list, told most of them to eat my ass, and then did the right thing anyway. And I nearly got arrested for it. For nothing. ”

  “You were involved in busting into an ABB arms and munitions depot. Weapons you knew from your time with us were illegally smuggled in from overseas. Weapons that have since gone missing and are presumed sold on the back market. Millions and millions of dollars of material.”

  I sniffed and looked up at him, puffy-eyed, indignant. “No, that’s where you’re wrong. Again. ”

  He shifted his stance and puffed his chest with the challenge. Not much, but enough that I’d caught it before he corrected.

  This wasn’t someone who was used to being wrong,

  He wasn’t used to being wrong. And he hated hearing it.

  Well, fuck him. I took pride in my work.

  “I wasn’t involved in that operation, Colin.”

  “ I was that operation.”

  “Explain,” he demanded, his voice going cold. “Because it sounds like you are admitting to committing dozens of felonies.”

  “I had nothing to do with the arms trafficking. I’m not some gunrunner. I didn’t know about it, I wasn’t part of it. I don’t even like guns.”

  I wiped my eyes with the back of my thumb.

  “I was hired as a private contractor to handle the ABB.”

  “I did. Fucking flawlessly, I might add. And then I left all that shit exactly where it was when I walked in.”

  “There’s ample evidence that you were present in your Apex form, based on the destruction at the site. You’re claiming that you single-handedly took down 118 people armed with automatic weapons and heavy ordnance?” His tone was incredulous.

  “Yes, Colin,” I half-snarled, heat flaring back into my voice.

  “That’s exactly what I’m saying. I took down that entire building—and every single person in it—alone. No backup. No support. And I didn’t kill anyone. ”

  I coughed and cleared my throat.

  “And I got shot with fancy anti-armor bullets, a machine gun bigger than I am. Rocket launchers. Grenade launchers. And those stupid-looking mines.”

  “Some of them had gunshot wounds,” he countered.

  “Oh my god!”

  “They fucking shot each other trying to shoot me in the middle of their crossfire!”

  “Most of them got hit by bullets breaking and ricocheting off me!

  I deliberately stood there and let them unload on me while I knocked them out one by one so they wouldn’t kill each other.”

  “Did you not stop and question why all of them had giant fucking porcupine quills sticking out of them?”

  He frowned once again and shifted to a more defensive stance. “There were no quills present in any of the suspects we arrested.”

  I rubbed my forehead. “Fucking figures. No evidence.”

  “What do you mean?” Hannah asked.

  “My body, when things break off, or leak, or I bleed, it sort of just like… dissolves and evaporates.”

  I sighed.

  “I didn’t realize that it affected the darts, too.”

  Looking back at Colin, I asked: “Tell me this, did everyone except for a few in the basement and on the roof have injection wounds? Like from a heavy-gauge needle?”

  He gave me a stony look and nodded.

  “There you have it. They dissolved and probably left a welt and bead of dried blood.”

  I leveled a look right back at him.

  “And if that’s not enough, I have a literal fucking pile of fancy bullets I pulled out of myself. In a baggie, including some of those giant machine gun bullets.”

  “I’d like to see those, if you could,” Hannah said. “It could be useful for tracking the origins of the weapons, people involved… and to verify your claims with hard evidence.”

  Colin was silent for a long moment, then he admitted, “I’d like to see them as well. I’m having a hard time taking your claim seriously, but we had a lot of unanswered questions.”

  I thumped a fist against my chest.

  “I did. Apex happened. I didn’t pick the name on a whim.”

  He sighed and looked at Hannah.

  He looked tired.

  I was sure I did, too.

  We all did.

  He turned back to me.

  “The offer still stands. Full invitation to the Protectorate ENE. Reinstatement of all benefits and privileges, plus everything Wards don’t get. You can still be Phoenix Strike, and do good for people, for the city.”

  I looked down and away, my face flushing.

  But for the first time during this whole fiasco, it wasn’t anger.

  It was shame.

  Why am I feeling ashamed of who I am?

  I’m more now than I ever was before.

  Except one.

  “I can’t,” I said quietly.

  Colin sighed, long and sharp, exasperated.

  “Why not?” Hannah asked gently.

  She always asks the right questions.

  “I changed,” I murmured.

  “So change back,” Colin said. “That’s what you do, isn’t it?”

  Hannah turned on him. “Colin!”

  I stepped away from the desk.

  Walked to the wall.

  Thumped my head against it.

  Once. Twice. Three times.

  If only it helped with the headache.

  I was silent for a long time.

  When I finally spoke, my voice was full of anger.

  Anger–and grief.

  “I can’t. And this isn’t some hero-villain metaphorical shit. I changed, completely, and I can’t change back.”

  “Explain,” Colin said. He paused, cleared his throat, and asked in a softer tone: “Please explain?”

  I turned around to face them.

  I gestured at myself, from head to toe.

  I grabbed a handful of hair and shook it.

  I slapped my thigh. My chest. My arm.

  “This?” I slapped my thigh.

  “This?” My chest.

  “This and this?” My arm. My hair.

  “None of it’s real. I’m not real.”

  “Morgan Rivera isn’t real. ”

  Anger and desperation bled through.

  “Me? Me-me? The girl who was Phoenix Strike?”

  “She’s gone, man.

  Never coming back.

  Can’t come back.”

  Colin opened his mouth, brows furrowed, Hannah cut in: “Can you explain more simply for us? We don’t understand.”

  “I am going to be disgusting. It’s the only way I can make you understand. And it’s just how my goddamn power works . So I’m demonstrating two points at once. Please do not freak out and shoot me.” I glared at both of them.

  “You have my word,” Hannah said. Colin stayed quiet but nodded.

  I held my hand out to Hannah. “Give me your thing, but a knife, please. A big, nasty one.”

  She glanced at Colin.

  He didn’t move or say anything.

  I threw my hands up.

  “Fine, don’t trust the hardcore supervillain. Whatever, I’ll do it the hard way.” I turned, yanked open a few desk drawers, and found what I was looking for.

  A letter opener.

  I turned back around.

  Raised the blunt blade to my right eye, tip angled at the outer edge.

  “Hey! Hey, wait! ” Colin shouted.

  I jammed it in.

  Fuck almighty, that hurt.

  I grunted through clenched teeth, prying my eye free.

  “I hope you– hng–fucking appreciate this because I still feel pain just fine! ”

  Pop!

  I caught my eye in my left hand, still dangling from the nerve.

  “See this?”

  I shook the eye.

  “ This. Is. Not. REAL! ”

  Colin looked slightly nauseous.

  Hannah didn’t seem to be phased in the slightest.

  I tossed the letter opener on the desk.

  Holding my eyelids open, shoved the eye back in–

  Pop.

  Give me my real eye.

  I let my power flow.

  The room swam. My eyelids merged with the organ.

  And suddenly I had super-vision in half my field of view.

  I picked the letter opener back up, narrow end gripped.

  And smacked the metal handle into my eye.

  Clack. Clack. Clack.

  It didn’t move. Bonded to bone.

  I didn’t feel a thing.

  “That? That’s the real me.”

  I flickered my power again, real skin sweeping across my left arm.

  I stood beside my desk, laid my arm on top of it, and then flipped the letter opener in my hand.

  And stabbed myself right in the forearm with it.

  Twang!

  The blade snapped in half.

  I held it up. The wicked claws were out, gleaming. I hadn’t meant to grow them.

  Fuck it.

  I brought my thumb claw up and sliced the solid metal handle in half.

  “This is the real me. Are you getting it now? ”

  I pushed my power again. Restored my skin, fixed my hair, reapplied the makeup illusion..

  I tapped my fingertips on my collarbones. “This is a charade. This isn’t real. I’m not real.”

  “ I’m mimicking myself, the memory of what my body used to be.”

  “ That body doesn’t exist anymore. Do you understand?”

  “ Morgan Rivera doesn’t exist anymore.”

  “Therefore, I can’t play dress-up as Phoenix Strike as a member of The Protectorate. Not for anyone.”

  I swept the pieces of broken letter opener off my desk and hurled the pieces into the trash.

  “I can’t stay like this for very long. Part of a day, and then I have to go back.”

  “I am Apex. This is me pretending I’m still a regular person, clinging to the scraps of what’s left of my life.”

  My breath hitched in my throat.

  “Even being here, having lunch with my family is fake. There’s a terrible monster lurking in their house, and they don’t even know it.”

  Hannah didn’t say anything; she just stepped closer to me, and after a moment, held her arms open at her sides.

  I embraced her, and I held her tightly.

  She squeezed me back. I drew a ragged breath.

  “I’m sorry you’ve had to go through all of this. Everything,” she whispered. I nodded.

  I let go of her and stepped away, then looked at Colin, calmer now.

  “Do you understand?” I asked him.

  He clenched his jaw, but I don’t think it was anger. Not this time. He nodded.

  “The people of Brockton Bay aren’t ready for Apex to protect them alongside the Heroes of the Protectorate.” I only let a tiny amount of sarcasm slip with the term Heroes. “And Apex isn’t ready to be fighting against the bad things out there from the limelight.”

  I paused a moment. “I don’t know if that will ever change. I’m not saying this to exaggerate, by my power is horrifying to see in action. No amount of makeup and PR can change that.”

  I took a breath.

  “I have literally watched my entire body explode in ribbons of blood, flesh, and broken bones and knit itself back together. I can’t put a positive spin on that. I’ve been fighting for more than a year now to try and make peace with it.”

  “Now? I’m just so desensitized to it now that it doesn’t bother me. But I don’t think my power can be anything but monstrous.”

  Colin cleared his throat. “When did your… metamorphosis happen?”

  I took a deep breath and exhaled.

  “It started slowly. The night I was shot at the ABB raid, before all of this kicked off. That was the first night I had let my power work without layers of restrictions. And it took liberties. I’m assuming you saw the PRT medical records about my sudden and strange skin condition?”

  He glanced at Hannah and nodded.

  “After you all fired me, I was desperate, on my own, nobody to talk to or help. I wasn’t taking good care of myself, and I didn’t even notice it was continuing to progress.”

  “A day or two later, I became seriously ill, nearly dying, from holding my power back.”

  I shook my head.

  “I didn’t know what was happening. Friends helped me. I let go. Let it take over. And when I did… the change completed. My body fully converted.”

  I paused, speaking quietly. “Only now do I understand what happened. I was trying to hold onto my human self, this, for too long.”

  “Parts of me were no longer human. I was forcing them to pretend. And if I do that for too long… I think my body starts to break down.”

  Colin looked away. Off to the side, at the wall.

  “I’ve been Apex every day since then. Trapped in my own house, afraid to go out and get arrested.”

  A big exhale. “Eventually, I talked to some people. They convinced me that I could still be the hero I set out to be, even like this. So I stopped giving as much of a shit about appearances. And I started living my life the way I want.”

  I gestured vaguely downstairs in the direction of the kitchen. “I haven’t had the nerve to tell my family. Me coming here, like this, sitting with them, talking, laughing, pretending it’s all normal?”

  I swallowed hard.

  “It’s like… visiting my own grave from the afterlife. It’s weird. I hate it. I only do it because I love them. ”

  I choked up again.

  “Do you know how hard it is, just standing here, having to justify my existence to the people in power?”

  I crossed my arms, but really, I was hugging myself.

  “All I want to do is try to help people and live my life. I’m going to break the rules. Maybe some laws. I probably already have. It’s not that I don’t want to be a member of the Protectorate. I do. But I can’t. Beyond logistics, beyond image, I’ve met some of the people who wear black hats. They’re not all bad people. Some of them need someone who lives between the two worlds. Someone to talk to.”

  Colin turned to face me directly. “Some of those people are career criminals. Murderers, or worse. And they can come forward. They’d get leniency. They choose not to.”

  I shook my head. “No, you’re right about some things, but you’re also wrong about others. There are genuinely bad people out there. Disgusting, like you said. But the net you’re casting is too big and too wide. Crime-by-association is fundamentally broken. If you lock a dog in a cage, starve it, beat it– of course, it’s going to lash out.”

  I saw I was losing him again. Held up a hand. “I’ll say one last thing and then get off it. I think some of them would come forward. But doing that? It means cutting ties with everything. Friends, sometimes family. And risking their lives. Even if they kept quiet, they just walked away. That shadow follows them. Being labeled a rat. It’s a death mark.”

  He looked down at me, lips tight.

  Just stared.

  Technology-granted silence stretched.

  Then: “You’re right. I made a mistake not hiring you.”

  He let out a breath.

  “You’re mature for your age, and you are correct in some of what you’re saying. We’ll discuss some things internally about the concerns you have with membership. Bring us that evidence. And attend the party tonight. I gave your family first-class tickets.”

  I smiled. Just a little. The charity thing, of course.

  “You know, Colin, you might not be such a terrible person if you ever showed this side of yourself.”

  His lips tightened. Hannah coughed, hand half-covering a smile.

  “Don’t push your luck,” he said, but his tone had softened.

  I pointed an index finger at him and poked him in the chest, Melody-style. “You don’t push your luck. I’m letting you off easy with a few rough words after you ambushed me at my family’s place.”

  His face darkened. “I didn’t ambush you; I was here to deliver the letter. And your family’s tickets.”

  For a moment, I thought he might have been fucking with me. And I swear I heard faint laughter.

  He turned on his heel, took the dome up and clicked it off, and pulled the door open.

  Where Melody was standing.

  “Oh, uh. Hey,” she said.

  He and Hannah filed out.

  “Get your fancy shit out, sis,” I told her. “We've got a party to go to tonight.”