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Epilogue
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Patrick walked, hands and feet bound, toward the interrogation room where a guest awaited him. This was some reporter, he’d heard.

Six days since his wife had been locked up, and their child discovered to be alive. Patrick and his lawyer put in a bargain to get him out of this place. The person he feared most was in another prison far away. The person he allegedly killed was alive. It had been a long eight weeks, trying to file for the motion, but things were looking up. Perhaps the reporter was here for his side of the story. Perhaps they were here to try and nail him, but too bad he had a story ready thanks to his attorney.

Life was grand.

He entered the room, and was led to the side opposite to the attractive young woman with dark hair and glasses with matching rims. Her features reminded Patrick of a young Mai when they had first met, between her hips and waist, her posture, and her eyes and face.

Ah hell.

The guard who had led him in was already out of the room. Patrick stood after him, but, the next second, the table knocked him back and he was pinned against the wall. The lights flickered. The young woman’s eyes filled with lightning. She hovered in the air.

“You,” she said. “You seem to think that my resurrection undoes everything you did to me. You’re wrong. I came here to tell you that whatever you thought, you’re staying here to rot for the rest of your life, or I will gladly cross the no-kill rule just for your sorry ass. Do I make myself clear, Father?”

Yes. He shook his head yes, as did his bladder. He was going to need new pants, and Patrick wasn’t sure if or when anyone was going to give him some.

“Good.” She settled down and walked to the one-way mirror. “See that you don’t forget it. I have no desire to see you ever again, not even in the news. Goodbye.” She was gone in an instant.

The prisoners gave her a mixed reception as she passed. Mary considered not caring at all. Her advisors often told her not to acknowledge these people were even there. She had a different philosophy on the matter.

Two guards escorted her as per procedure, but she didn’t mind saying hello to the prisoners in passing, even if she was here for one person.

She formed a snowball in her hands, and tossed it into one cell where two men fought over catching it like a pair of children at softball practice. It made her giggle, though she did have to tell the guards to leave it. The fighting wasn’t too violent.

Eventually, they reached the female cells. Most of the inmates from this block were outside getting their exercise. One woman sat at a table, wearing a power suppressor and a smile.

There was silence at first once Mary sat with Mai.

Mai was the first to speak: “So, Mayor Mary now; or will be once the election is over.”

“Yep,” Mary responded. “Apparently, the people of Paragon enjoyed my gall for doing what I thought was right. That, or having a former superhero as mayor resonated with them. I still have no idea why Captain Patriot or his close friends didn’t take the job.”

“I hear one of them took your old job helping the youth.”

“Where’d you hear that?”

“He was here talking to one child’s mother.”

“Oh.”

“So, how is everyone?”

“Everyone is as can be expected. Walter’s missing, again, though I feel like he had something to do with my nomination for mayor. Jeff helped take charge in the city’s reconstruction efforts; we’re rebuilding Faultline finally. Wyatt and Tatiana are fixing up their home for the coming baby. Kyra and Quentin are getting along so well I often fear for the pranks they might pull together, and I love them both for it, strangely. Jackie went home to pack all of her things and move to the Pacific Northwest where she plans to continue her nursing school. Warren is gone. I asked Peter about the magazine, but he said it’s carrying on with a new name in their staff. What?”

There was a look on Mai’s face. Mary had a hard time reading it.

She responded, “I received something in the mail, actually, now that you mentioned Warren. Let me tell you about Judy while I dig it out of this envelope here.”

“OK?” Mary was equally intrigued and confused.

“So she tried some sort of roulette to choose the first destination in her road trip. Net trip? Anyways! She accidentally emerged in a brothel that specializes in bondage. They didn’t do anything to her or anything, but the headmistress there asked her to stay a while and rest. Apparently, this person is as good at reading people as my sister, and she outfitted Judy with a non-conductive suit of latex. No pictures, but she said it made her blush profusely every time she thought about it during those few days. It also helped her focus her abilities some before she left the brothel.

“Since then, she’s sent a few postcards from a number of places with great scenery and very few people; not just to me but also our doctor. She spent one week in South America to put down a drug trade in a humorous way. Some major lab or another had staff so dumb that they just ran the machines to make the products after putting in the ingredients; somehow she turned a cocaine farm into a candy cane ice cream factory. The drug lords were furious, and she took them down once they were out in the open. That country’s economy remained intact once they were in jail, their assets literally frozen.”

Mary was laughing now. Oh, how she missed the good old days of running with Judy. Those were easier times. Then again, Mary realized, if this was a cheesy ending to a book or movie, this would have been the time for a happy-go-feely montage. So, she sighed and relented to the reality she lived in.

“Is this the letter you wanted to tell me about?” Mary asked once she had seen the paper in Mai’s hands.

Mai said, “Yes. It’s the strangest thing. The letter was addressed to me with an obvious alias name so that it would go through the mail system, but the postal workers and guards here should have picked up on that. What's more is how the letter starts.”

“Did you take it to anyone?”

“No. When I read the cover page you’ll understand why. Here: ‘To Ms. Tanimoto. Thank you for opening this message. I trust my risky enchantment helped it to find you. I hope you are doing well. You didn’t have to turn yourself in, but I will respect your decision. However, I must ask that you hang on to this letter and share the next page with a friend of ours who will be visiting you soon.’”

“Ominous. See, I’m not sure Paragon City or I can do ominous right now.”

Mai nodded, and flipped the pages in place. Then she slid them across the table for Mary to read. The second one, of course, was longer:

“Hello, old friend. Sorry for using Mai like a conduit here, but this seemed like the best opportunity compared to the alternatives I considered. The universe is safe now. Well, as safe as can be considering its own inherent dangers. With the Arachne Regime broken down to mere mercenaries for hire, the Circle subdued eternally to harmless mages, the Vanquishiri Bahitians gone forever, and the rift sealed tight between us and the end of everything, there is time to live. Time to explore.

“Now that I have time again to myself, and a certain loved one by my side, there is something I need to do while I see the world. Everyone who was once in the League will be receiving a gift soon. There will, of course, be spares, but consider it the final gift of a man who had to make a mess bigger in order to clean it completely.

“Someone may be able to guess my true identity, but that will raise questions too difficult to answer in simple terms. For that, I’m glad to say that I don’t mind them knowing, because they’d have to prove it. Sometimes, real life has bigger plot holes than our favorite stories combined, because that’s the universe. It has holes to slip through, and it wouldn’t surprise me if someone finds these holes that take them into the unknown. However, that’s a tale none of us need to worry about, for now. Scratch that, none of us need to worry about it ever.

“We have come a long way in a little over six years, as is to be expected. A couple that once couldn’t stand each other can start a loving family. A number of transgenders can find themselves and become who they were meant to be, though not always in that order, and we know of at least two whose lives are finally moving forward. The notions of love can be challenged for better or for worse, leading into the most important relationships of our lives. Leaders are born from those wishing to build where others see only debris. People come and go with different consequences. Ah, I might be losing track of what I’m trying to say here.

“As I sit here in a water park where the love of my life is trying waterslides for the first time in her life, I write to you with a point in mind. There may be many endings to the little things in life, but there is only one definitive end, and this isn’t it. We do not need to worry about that here, now, or possibly ever so long as we live. There’s time ahead of us to make more choices, to grow, and to enjoy what we find. I hope you take the universe up on its offer. While the long journey started one crazy night by a band of fledgling heroes is coming to its conclusion, it’s become time we move forward with our new lives, and pass the torch to another generation. Perhaps one day you will play a part in another’s story while you continue to grow. Let’s see where the next six years take us, or the six years after that.

“With love, the son of Cupid and Psyche.”

Mary leaned back as far as gravity would allow since these seats had no backsides. She was strong, but her boobs were still heavy enough to make her fall if she lost her center of gravity.

She looked at the final line again and again, always hoping to find that answer that would never come.

“I thought they had a daughter,” Mary said.

Mai said, “That’s what the stories say.”

“Well, that was odd . . . coming from a woman who went through all that I did.” If she could only count the ways, she’d probably be admitted to a psych ward.

“Yes it was.”

“So. Cards?” Card games were, after all, the main pastime she and Mai shared during these visits.

Twenty-four laps. Denise swam both ways across her pool at a leisurely pace. It was another fine afternoon in this part of California, and she had a small competition to attend in a couple days in spite of it being the middle of November. Simply being active in her element was more than enough. It had been the only thing that kept her going for longer than she cared to count.

After her last lap, she floated on her back in the center of the pool. She heard that Paragon City had gone utterly mental in the last several months, but the news here didn’t say who was involved in the latest near-apocalyptic scuffle. On the west coast, the news rarely ever spoke of the deeds of heroes. She tried to ignore anything to do with that city for the last five years, but bits of news always found a way to her.

In spite of her ears being submerged in water, Denise heard footsteps and clicking noises. Her peripheral vision told her something was at one side of the pool.

She turned to look, and gasped in shock when men in suits had their guns pointed at her.

“Out of the pool,” one man said. “You’re coming with us if you value your life.”

Big mistake. She wasn’t sure if she did. Oh, she enjoyed the swimming and the numerous competitions, as well as most of Cali’s weather, but life? She just stared at those men in an annoyed defiance.

There was a bang, but it took Denise a moment to realize that it hadn’t come from any gun. Her nerves took a moment to recover from the shock and clear her mind enough to see those men had all been knocked back.

A woman clad in a familiar costume descended where the men stood, and she kicked away a gun when one man tried to point it at her. The gun slammed against the fence. The mystery heroine set her foot down on the would-be kidnapper.

Before anyone else could say or do anything, Denise’s two bodyguards ran into the poolside, one of them stumbling while the other had blood dripping from his nose. The aimed their own guns.

“On the ground, now!” one of them shouted. “That includes you, hero!”

Denise said, “No, wait. She’s with me. She’s a friend.” She wasn’t sure why she said that since she never saw the woman’s face.

“Are you alright, Ms. Grandt?”

“I’ll be fine. Can you just cuff those men and get them out of here?”

“Heroes and their kind aren’t exactly welcome around here. Are you sure she’s a friend?”

“Please, just do as I ask, or I’m finding new bodyguards.”

“Ma’am.”

The bodyguards took the suited men away, and the heroine just stood there, never turning to face Denise while she remained safely in the pool. Denise hoped she was right about this one, but it was so impossible.

“Hello,” Denise said to the heroine.

“I’m glad you’re safe,” the heroine said. She lifted into the air.

“No, Judy, wait!” She saw the woman stop. Pixeletta didn’t fly, did she? “It’s you, isn’t it?” Denise climbed out of the pool and approached the woman.

The heroine turned. She was older, but there was no mistaking Judy’s face. “I’m sorry. This was a mistake. I need to go.”

“No.” Denise grabbed her arm. “You’re alive.” She had so many questions. How was Judy here? How was she flying? More, but most of all, “That’s all? Dead for five years, you never write, and now you’re taking off after saving me? Stay with me.”

Judy set her feet down again and gave Denise a weak smile. Denise could no longer tell if she was breathing. Not even her dreams were like this, and she had some wild ones since becoming a professional athlete.

Say something, she told herself.

However, Judy stepped closer. Words, thoughts, feelings, and penguins all crossed Denise’s mind as she tried to get something out to her friend. She leaned in to hug Judy. Judy leaned in, but head first, her eyes closing, and her lips . . . .