skin and your electric powers.”
“Powers don’t always pass down to your children,” I reminded her.
“True,” she said. “But you’re also both hot, so they’d still be gorgeous.”
My phone rang, and I pushed my ear communicator to answer. “Yes?”
“There are a dozen monsters headed in your direction. I’m working on the large monster currently, so please stay safe and don’t do anything rash,” Transistor said in my ear.
“Understood,” I replied.
“Love you,” he whispered.
My heart stuttered, and I swallowed. “I love you, too.”
“Intel?” Vortex asked.
His voice was even, but I could see the edges of his eyes tensed in irritation.
“There are a dozen creatures headed our way. Maybe we should try getting on a rooftop for a better view?” I suggested, avoiding who had given me the intel.
Crystal Woman grabbed my arm and flew up into the air and onto the nearest rooftop.
I gaped at her.
She smirked. “Didn’t know I could fly?”
“I did not,” I admitted.
She shrugged. “I can’t actually fly. I can just jump pretty high and float for a bit longer than ordinary humans.”
Vortex used his powers to create a burst of air to shoot him up to us. “I always forget you can jump that high.”
She beamed. “I’m not just rainbows and beauty.”
I smiled wide. “You and I really need to hang out more.”
“I was going to suggest the same thing,” she said. “Drinks this weekend?”
I nodded. “You’re so on.”
I walked between the two heroes and thought about how different my life was now.
I had been a human, working a boring desk job, dating an asshole hero.
Now, I was dating a villain, three heroes, and had another hero who was my best friend. Hopefully things would go well and Crystal Woman and I would become better friends, too.
Crystal Woman turned to me. “Did your intel happen to tell you how far out—”
Her question was cut off as ten dog cyborgs jumped onto the rooftop in front of us. They looked like Dobermans with heads twice their normal size and eyes a red color that was not normal.
“Wonderful, genetically enhanced hounds,” I mumbled. “I am really tired of fighting these.”
“Are these your...I mean, the villain you fought last time’s?” Vortex asked, almost slipping and asking if it belonged to my parents.
I glared at the hounds. “I don’t think so. That villain and I made a sort of truce.”
“You made a truce with a villain?” Crystal Woman asked as she gathered power in her hands.
“As long as they don’t attack me, I won’t attack them,” I explained.
“So, these shouldn’t belong to them then. Well, let’s assume they’re someone else’s and just destroy them,” Vortex said.
“Sounds good to me.” I inhaled and electricity zipped down my arms to my hands, sparking off my fingertips.
“Ladies first,” Vortex said and smiled at us.
I aimed my hands at the dogs before us and exhaled. Electricity shot out of my hands and into the ten hounds before us. Their bodies spasmed and they writhed as they were electrocuted.
Crystal Woman shot out crystals from her hands, sending them into the hounds’ vital parts.
The hounds fell, and I wondered why these ones were easier.
Were they Mom’s? Or was someone trying to copy her?
She would just love to know someone was trying to copy her.
Dammit, I needed to get a sample of their DNA and any chips in their bodies.
“Alfred,” I whispered.
“On it, Lucky,” he whispered back.
“Wait, that was ten,” Crystal Woman said as she counted. “Didn’t your intel say there were—”
Two dogs leapt up from our sides, each latching onto Crystal Woman and Vortex, their jaws clamping down on their arms.
Both heroes cried out in pain.
I turned to Crystal Woman, but I couldn’t electrocute the hound without electrocuting her as well.
Drawing the gun from my hip, I fired two rounds into the hound’s skull, splattering its brains on the ground behind it.
The hound released its hold on her arm and fell, lifeless beside her.
I turned to Vortex, but the hound was already dead beside him.
“Here,” Crystal Woman whispered and held out a roll of gauze and medical tape. “Tape him up while I do mine.”
“Alfred,” I hissed.
“I did not sense them. These are not normal or like the last ones. They do not have heat signatures or anyway for me to track them,” he said softly, like he was disappointed in himself.
“Can’t you find some way to track them with the samples you took from them?” I asked.
“Who are you talking to?” Crystal Woman asked.
I knelt and bandaged Vortex’s arm. It wasn’t too deep, so my worry over