New Marvel: Caden

by CDrake

Most 17-year-olds are busy preparing for college or going to prom. Caden Drake isn't most 17-year-olds. After three years of fighting an elusive and deadly enemy, he has finally triumphed and is able to appreciate some measure of peace, but he knows he can't stay in this happy state forever, not with all he can do. So, the question now is: what SHOULD he do?

"Jan, stay with me. Stay with me, dammit!" A desperate fifteen-year-old kid cradled the bleeding body of a girl not much older than him. "Please, I need you. I l-"

"Caden...I-I'm not…"

He watched in horror as her eyes glazed over and she drew her last breath, nothing but a lifeless husk now.

"Jaaaaan!" The entire scene flashed in silvery light, and shifted to an operating room, where he stood in front of another man, scowling at him.

"She's not who you think she was. You were, as they say, sleeping with the enemy."

The view flashed again, and the two men were on a rooftop, facing off, their movements sluggish.

"I want the man who pulled the trigger," the boy said to his taller opponent.

"Why? Because you believe it's your duty to 'make things right'? Because of some misplaced hunger for vengeance?"

"No," the kid answered, his voice deep and resonating. "Because of a righteous need for justice. Not just for her, or my parents. For all you've destroyed." More silvery light engulfed them as they charged at each other, fists blurring in motion.

The girl was back in his arms, and he was holding her, looking into her upward-oriented, lifeless eyes as tears streamed out of his. He stared into them, into the deep dark brown of her eyes that had begun to fade with her death. Suddenly, they darkened again and rolled in their sockets to stare at him. His breath caught in his throat as he stared back, mouth agape in sudden terror when she spoke five words.

"Why didn't you save me?"

He had no answer for the ghost, for the girl he had loved and watched die. He barely had the presence of mind to look for the source of a sound that came from his right, barely enough reflex to reach for his knife as he tried to parry the blow that would split open his throat.

….

"Jan!"

Caden woke with a bellowing roar, a mix between terror, grief, and rage as he thrust his right arm upward, fist clenched as if he were holding a knife underhandedly. He stared into the empty darkness for a few seconds, expecting to see a shadowy, blade-toting figure there and instead finding only empty air. His breathing was erratic and choppy, as if he were having a panic attack, and he found himself unable to move at all save to continue breathing. Every muscle and fiber in his body was tensed.

"Caden," a small voice whispered from his left. He didn't turn to face it, frozen in place. "Caden!" the voice whispered louder, its source laying a hand on his left shoulder.

He snapped out of his death-stare and looked toward the hand, tracing its arm back to the brunette girl lying next to him, infinite worry chiseled into her perfect face. His terrified expression stayed, as did his uneven breathing, until she sat up and laid her left hand on his right wrist. He began to relax over the course of a few seconds, and he turned his face away from her, looking blankly into the distance, trying to numb his adrenaline-struck mind and suppress the intense feelings he had just experienced. The girl next to him drew closer, hooking her left arm around his from the side and looping her right around his back, just below his rib cage.

"Nightmare," she asked him. He nodded numbly. "Is it that night?" He nodded again, and she sighed. "I'm sorry." The girl held him close, leaning her head onto his left shoulder and nuzzling his neck. "I don't understand how after all this time, after all you've done to end that part of your life, your subconscious decides to play this cruel joke on you."

"Tonight wasn't the first time," he responded weakly, his voice cracking. He looked at her and saw confusion and shock in her eyes.

"When?"

"Immediately after it happened."

Her mouth dropped slightly. "How often?"

He gulped and looked away, his face contorted into barely suppressed pain. "Almost every night."

She looked at him, wide-eyed, her throat closing in emotion as she looked for words but couldn't seem to find the right ones to say. "It's been almost two years."

He nodded. "I know." His eyes looked back into hers. "I watched you die. Over and over and over again. For two years. Almost every-single-night." His entire body shook as barely contained sobs threatened to shatter him. Her arms curled around him and she turned his body to face hers, pulling him close and embracing him tightly, kissing his neck tenderly. His arms folded around her and he returned the affection, pressing himself against her, the security of her warm and very much alive body beginning to relieve the tension and fear in his.

"How," she asked, her voice cracking and distorting with tears, "how did you live?"

"I didn't. I survived. I kept breathing. Was a point I didn't even want to do that anymore, but I kept going. Revenge was the only thing keeping me from giving myself the fate I've given so many others. 'Til Aria snapped me out of it, anyway. A month later, I found out the real you was alive."

She sobbed against his chest and held him tighter. When they finally broke the embrace, he looked into her red-tinged eyes, taking in every detail he could see by the fading moonlight and permanently burning them into his eidetic memory. I've watched these eyes fade a thousand times, it seems, he thought. Never again. He kissed her longingly, staying there in gentle passion as she returned the gesture, all of their pain and fear evident, but fading away as they became lost in each other. When they broke the kiss, he held her close and lay back down again as she tucked her head against his bare, muscular chest, their arms wrapped around one another as they both drifted off again.

….

Moscow, Russia

2 years, 8 months after the Battle of New York

Caden Drake woke up to the morning sun streaming through the windows of the penthouse suite he and Kara Bensen, the former Janet Daniels, had slept in together. Noticing the gentle rise and fall of her chest between his curled arms, he smiled in satisfaction and rested his chin on her head, closing his eyes and drinking in the reality of it all. It's been almost two years. Almost. One year, ten months, and eleven days, to be exact. He opened his eyes and looked at the position they were in, melded together like they were two halves of a perfect whole. I never thought I'd be able to do this again.

A half hour and four thousand of his thoughts later, Kara awakened, nuzzling him gently and kissing his cheek.

"Hey," she said quietly.

He smiled at her broadly. "Hey." He kissed her lips gently and lingered there for a moment before breaking it off, then coming back for more. She pulled away gently and chuckled lightly.

"Mmm, later." He looked down at her with an arched eyebrow, but she ignored him and got up from the bed, her bare feet touching down on the bedroom's soft carpet with all the grace of a countess as she strode off toward the kitchen in her penthouse apartment. "I dunno about you, but I'm starving." He could hear her rummaging through the refrigerator and finally pulling a few things out when she found what she was looking for. Groaning slightly, Caden swept his legs off the bed and stood as well, wincing as he put weight on his left leg. Once he got to his feet, he walked over to the kitchen and leaned against the doorframe, smiling as he watched his girlfriend work.

She was moving around at a fast but leisurely pace, setting up pans and dropping slices of turkey bacon onto one, then pouring already-beaten eggs into another. His gaze was focused elsewhere, though, on her perfectly formed, six-foot tall body. Her long, dark brown hair, as usual, cascaded around her shoulders in loose folds, looking slightly bedraggled from just having gotten up, but still gorgeous nonetheless. She was dressed in a white tank top and a pair of shorts that were just short enough to show off her gorgeous legs while keeping herself decent. She caught him staring at her and opened her mouth to say something when Caden spoke first.

"Sleep well?"

She nodded and smiled sadly. "Yeah. Unlike you, I don't have nightmares." Her weak smile faded as she approached him, pressing herself against him in another warm embrace, looking down at his still-bare chest and gently stroking it with one hand.

"Don't feel guilty."

Kara looked back up at him. "How could I not? Your mind, your conscience, hell even your subconscious gave you hell for almost two years because you thought I was dead. And I never once tried to contact you."

"To be fair, I don't Raden would have let you."

She looked away, her face flashing pain for a moment as she returned to making breakfast, and he winced. Raden Jadselit. Founder and decades-long director of the Keystone. Her father. He closed his eyes and breathed deeply in regret. Just two nights ago, Caden had faced the rogue spy and dueled him hand-to-hand, desperate to end his potentially world-changing plot once and for all. Drake's mother and father, the latter's name that he now took for himself, had dedicated the latter portion of their lives and their deaths to stopping him.

Caden and Alexandra Drake had stolen several billion dollars and a highly advanced genetic formula codenamed Achilles that could completely change the genetic makeup and traits of a developing fetus. Raden and the Keystone had been working to develop it for years, basing their research on two previous projects: Dragon and Amazon, the latter of which he used to enhance Kara when her mother became pregnant. The Drakes were aware of this, and so took a single viable sample of the treatment, destroying all the rest, along with the project's research data. Three months later, as they entered the second trimester of Alexandra's own pregnancy, the couple injected the fetus with Achilles, giving him increased muscular density, unparalleled hand-eye coordination, improved cellular regeneration, and a host of other genetic modifications meant to create the perfect human.

The two former NSA and CIA agents trained him, teaching him everything they knew about their respective tradecrafts. He had taken in information, tactics, and techniques in like a sponge from the moment they started him, at age three, preparing him for the inevitable battle he would have against Raden and his legacy, yet not telling him either about this or the reason that he could learn and adapt so quickly. After the Keystone had his parents killed, Caden went into hiding at age ten and managed to stay one step ahead of them for five years before they finally caught up. The year he met Kara, or, as he knew her back then, Janet. Within three months, she had wormed her way into his heart and become his best friend, as well as something more the night she was kidnapped by the Keystone.

At the time they had met, she told him that she had a major case of episodic amnesia, and had no memory whatsoever of her early childhood, just extensive skills in hand-to-hand combat and the basics of espionage. They ran away together after he rescued her, separated, come back together again, and fought the Keystone for months in New York City following the Chitauri invasion, picking up two people in witness protection that quickly became like family. When she had "died," he met the source of his torment, both on that night and five years earlier, an assassin known only by his Russian codename, Drakon. Drakon explained part of his parents' history, how Caden had been the sole product of the Achilles project, and how his Janet was actually named Anne, and was the daughter of his parents' arch-enemy. He slew his parents' and girlfriend's killer on the same night, breaking his neck with a single punch after nearly half an hour of non-stop fighting, pushing his Achilles enhancements, of which he was finally aware, to the limit.

Afterward, he mourned for Janet and vowed vengeance on the Keystone and its then-unknown head, taking Aria Bensen, the only remaining partner he had, and waging war against his parents' old enemy. After dismantling a branched-off terrorist organization run by Carmine di Carmello, Aria all but forced him to take a break, seeing just how cold and self-abusing he'd become in his single-minded quest for revenge. He eventually relented and agreed to it, finding out a month later that Janet was actually alive and well by indirect means. The girl he had watched die was a perfect, high-end clone of the girl.

Caden looked at her now and gazed at her right arm, at a scar six inches below her shoulder. But it's the imperfections that make us who we are. He had been able to tell that the body in the Keystone morgue hadn't been the real deal when he saw the absence of that scar, and every time he looked at it now, it reminded him of that night. The night that he, for the first time in ten months, had felt hope.

After his discovery, the then-seventeen Caden took Aria and scoured the world for any information on Janet's whereabouts, eventually leading him to Moscow, where he discovered the Keystone's base of operations and its leader. He also, for the first time in a year and a half, saw Janet, then dubbed Anne Jadselit, her original birth name. She had been informed of her true parentage and taken the opportunity to get close to her father, to try and change him, to save him from the monster that he'd become. For months, Caden and Raden played a high-stakes game of cat and mouse, Anne trying desperately to find balance and the way to reconcile the parts of herself that loved both Caden and her father. Eventually, it all came down to what happened one week ago.

Caden had been collecting data and intel on the Keystone's final solution for months, and, just five days before its execution, sent everything he had to SHIELD, to the CIA, to the NSA, Interpol, to anyone that could or would do anything about the worldwide initiative known as Obshchego Vraga, which translates to "the Common Enemy." Raden's final plan was to have his forces spread throughout the globe and commit various acts of terror, then have the Keystone take credit for it and cause all the nations of the world to fight against him. By sacrificing a few hundred thousand people, he assumed, the Keystone could unite the people of the world and end the "petty conflicts" they had been embroiled in since the dawn of civilization.

With SHIELD spearheading worldwide operations against the organization, Caden went personally to Moscow, omitting the city as the location for the Keystone's headquarters in his communique to Director Fury. Drake confronted Raden in his office near the headquarters' top floor and fought him with everything he had, finding the battle much more difficult due to another project brought about by the Keystone. The Russian leader had used Anne's chromosomes to reconstitute Project Amazon, jumping his research forward years and starting on a new iteration: Project Hercules.

Hercules was designed to be used on a fully grown subject, and, after Caden almost single-handedly defeated Raden in a fair fight, the Keystone director used it on himself. This was a fact the Russian was most grateful for, since the very next day, Drake, following in his parents' footsteps, destroyed the Hercules lab, the formula samples, and all of his research data, even getting to several hidden drives that were off the main servers. Understandably angered, Raden sent for Anne and had her meet him in the main headquarters, where Caden was waiting for him. When the spy had attempted to assassinate Raden, Anne stepped in and fought him, their styles different but skills evenly matched.

Desperate to stop her best friend and former boyfriend from killing her father, Anne tried to talk him down, refusing to fight her hardest, and instead was knocked unconscious after an extended fight. Enraged, Raden tackled Caden, beating him half senseless before picking him up and throwing him off the second floor of the building. The seventeen-year-old survived the fall and continued his intel collection on the Keystone. One month later, when the hammer fell and SHIELD stopped Raden's efforts, the two enhanced spies fought hard while a conflicted Anne looked on, tears rolling down her face as the two people she cared about most nearly beat each other to death.

Caden sustained and delivered major injuries. Both fighters were limping near the end of the fight, when Anne finally decided that her father was beyond saving and threw a single customized .45 caliber pistol into the mix.

"Caden!" she had screamed as the silver Sig Sauer flew through the air. The gun's owner reached for it as it flew directly into his grasp, spinning 360 degrees counterclockwise to point it directly at Raden's chest.

Only a stare of understanding passed between the two duelists as Caden squeezed the trigger and unloaded shot after shot into Raden's center mass, six in all, driving him back toward a window with every round. Lowering the sidearm, the young spy roared and lunged at him in a heel kick that collided with his rib cage, slamming him back through the window and causing his already dying body to fall forty stories and smash into the street below. He remembered the look on Anne's face as she stared at the broken window, unable to look at her father's broken body even from that far up. Pain...mixed with relief.

Caden opened his eyes as he came back from his ten-minute review and found Kara almost done preparing breakfast. "I'll get the plates." She nodded in response as he strode over to a cupboard and pulled out two medium-sized breakfast plates, stacking and carrying them to the dining table one room over. As he walked through the apartment, his eyes scanned around the living space. It was a roomy, two-floored dwelling, the bedroom, kitchen, and dining area on the top floor of the penthouse while a training room, armory, and living area were on the bottom. The walls looked like panels of sharply polished chrome with glass panels connecting them. The entire apartment felt like a step into the future of high-class housing, and Caden loved it, even though he could live in a barn for all he cared.

Despite the frugal, spartan life he lived as a spy, Drake had always had a taste for aesthetics. Probably from my father. As he set the two plates down on the dining table, Caden sniffed the air, deeply inhaling the smell of cheese on eggs and turkey bacon. A warm, broad smile blossomed on his face. She always did know exactly what I needed. His smile stayed and even intensified when she came into the dining room toting two gigantic pans of bacon and eggs.

"I see you made my trademark mess," he said, referring to the contents of the pans. She flashed a cheeky smile at him as she set the two hot pans down on coasters for the express purpose and wiped her hands on a napkin.

Kara looked at him, her eyes locking onto his as another meaningful stare passed between them. He strode up to her and hugged her again, her head fitting neatly right next to his as he held her close, kissing her hair once before breaking the hug and sitting.

"Shall we," he asked. She nodded with a smile and took a seat next to him, both of them digging in ferociously for a good five minutes before speaking again.

"So," she started, "last night was...nice."

He smiled at his plate, remembering it all fondly. From the day they began dating, she knew he was exclusively celibate, and would stay that way until the night after he says, "I do." Caden was a self-proclaimed "hopeless romantic." But that doesn't mean I can't enjoy the closeness and body of a beautiful woman in a different way. Despite his extensive injuries just two days before, Caden had healed quite substantially, the minor fractures already beginning to form new connections to each other after the first 24 hours. So when the time came to renew what they had lost almost two years earlier, he hesitated barely a moment, and not because of his injuries. They made out for two hours the previous night, gently, lovingly, taking their time to become reacquainted with each other.

"Yeah," he responded, still smiling. His elbow nudged her in the side gently, and she nudged him back. It was "their thing," a quirky part of their relationship that had just...happened. It was a sign that said, "I'm okay, how about you?" The fact that she bumped him back was a clear yes. His smile faded as his thoughts returned to what was on his mind earlier. Should I tell her? Can I possibly be that blunt this soon? Shaking his head slightly, he willed himself to speak.

"Anne, I mean...Kara," he started, getting her attention as she looked up at him. "I don't know if it's too soon or not, but…" One look at her face told him she knew exactly where he was going with it, and he could see her brace herself to hear a harsh truth. He sighed and kept talking. "I need you to know that I don't regret what I did." He saw her gulp slightly and pick at her food halfheartedly. "He needed to be stopped. You know that, right?" She nodded grimly. "My only regret is what losing him did to you. What it's doing to you now. I know he was your father, and that you'd come to care for him, to love him, but...he was a-"

Caden hesitated, not wanting to say it aloud.

"A monster," she finished for him, looking down and shielding her eyes from him with her right hand.

"Yeah," he said quietly. He too had suddenly lost his appetite. Way to go, Cade. Way to ruin the mood. His fork stabbed a strip of bacon and lifted it to his mouth. It tasted like sand, and he knew it wasn't the bacon's fault, or the cook's. Whenever his emotions fell extremely out of his control, strange things happened to his sense of taste. It was like his mind had to be focused on what he was eating to truly appreciate it, a feat that was all but impossible now that an awkward silence reigned over the table. It stayed that way for a full three minutes before someone broke it.

"Oh damn it all," Kara said suddenly, turning to Caden and looking him straight in the eye. "I am not gonna let this come between us, understand? You did what needed to be done, and that's the end of it. Cade, you're my best friend, and…" She held onto his arm tightly. "...and I love you."

His eyebrows knit themselves closely together as his expression turned sad and almost mournful. "I...love you too." He looked away from her intense gaze.

"Then why can't you look at me?" His head lifted and his eyes locked onto hers. Her face flashed realization, and she looked away. "Oh."

"Kara, I just...I can't help but feel guilty. Every time I'm with you, I savor every moment, but...the shadow of your father just seems to be haunting me, tainting our relationship." He saw her defeated expression and cupped her face in his hands, turning her toward him. "I love you." In that kiss, and indeed throughout the entire day, the two long-time friends and sweethearts felt the conflict of their pasts weighing down on them, of their families and the generational feud between them. Though Caden knew that his relationship with Kara was the bridge that would end the conflict, he couldn't help but notice the tension between them as they interacted over the rest of the week, barely leaving the penthouse and spending all their time catching up with each other.

…

Two days later

At the end of their third day together, Kara revealed some shocking news to her best friend.

"I'm taking control of the Keystone."

He immediately turned to her from the modifications he was lavishing on his personal sidearm, his eyebrows knitted together, mouth slightly open.

"Why," he asked her, slight suspicion in his voice.

She winced at his sudden hostility before answering with a sigh. "A lot of rats didn't go down with the ship when Raden was killed. Almost as many refused to stop following his example." She turned over her modified Beretta M9 and pulled back the slide, inspecting the inside of the barrel through the casing ejection port. "Since I'm his only daughter and heir, I have ownership and control of the Keystone by right." She let the slide snap shut. "I'm not going to allow rogue agents to carry on my father's legacy while I have the power to stop it." Kara looked up into his eyes, and he returned her gaze. "I'm tired of fighting alone."

"You won't be. I can help you. I will."

She shook her head slowly. "It's not the same anymore." When she saw the sudden flash of hurt on his face, she hurried to explain. "It doesn't have to be just us anymore. There are good people in the Keystone, good, honest men and women who just want to do what's right."

"If they're so good and honest," he hissed out angrily, "why didn't they stop Raden's madness? Why was I the only one trying to bring him down?"

"You mean to tell me you didn't notice that nobody interfered in your duel that night? I assure you, it wasn't 'cause they didn't know what was happening."

He shrugged, snarling slightly, breaking eye contact and examining his gun. "So...they were passively helping." He laughed mirthlessly, shaking his head. "If they really wanted to do the right thing, they would have banded together and executed Raden years ago. That's the lamest excuse I've ever heard, and don't try to convince me it's anything but." He kept cleaning his weapon for a few more seconds before he noticed the complete silence coming from her direction and looked to find an expression of utter shock and pain on her face. His eyes widened as he realized why she was looking at him that way. Oh...she thinks I mean her too.

The hardness in his face and eyes was lost immediately as guilt flooded his features. "Kara...oh sweetheart I'm sorry. I didn't mean that." He laid down the gun and sighed, gaze downward, unable to look her in the eye. "I just...still can't let go of my anger after everything that's happened. Can't get over the fact that I fought them for years. Alone. Until the very bitter end."

"You weren't alone."

He looked at her for a moment before he knew exactly what she was talking about and turned away. "Yeah. But even then, it was...different. I was undercover most of the time, and when I wasn't, I distanced myself from her. Aria was like a sister to me even back then, but, like you, I thought I could protect her by isolating myself from her. Instead, she ended up resenting me for it and putting herself in the line of fire anyway. All because I was too stubborn and suicidal to ask for or accept her help." He looked into the brunette's dark eyes. "I wanted to die, Kara. I wanted to die in a horrible, violent manner against the people who'd taken you from me, and I didn't think for one second how completely that would destroy her until she took me aside, slapped me in the face, and told me how much of an idiot I was being.

"By the time I wisened up enough to work with her effectively as my partner, we had found out you were alive. I only had a month with her like that before we were attacked-and she was severely injured. I had to continue on without her." He shook his head in sorrow and painful memory, looking down again. "Hardest thing I've ever done, leaving her behind. But...she knew I had to, that I couldn't wait." A long silence passed between them as the two late teens collected their thoughts.

"Have you talked to her since?"

He glanced at her briefly. "Yes, multiple times. She was the proxy that I sent the files to SHIELD through. Aria was a...consultant during the sting operation that prevented Obshchego Vraga. She recovered from her injuries about a month after receiving them."

Kara narrowed her eyes in question. "Then why didn't she join you again?"

Caden opened his mouth to answer, then cut off, realizing he didn't have a set response. "I don't know," he said finally. "Maybe because she thought I would partner up with you again, but...that doesn't seem likely, considering we all worked together in New York." He thought for a few more seconds, then shook his head once. "I honestly don't know." He picked up his gun again and started cleaning it, a rote, mind-numbing task he'd grown accustomed to performing ever since his parents died.

Kara, knowing exactly what that meant, observed his sudden disinterest in talking on the matter further and, instead of pushing him, stared at the pistol. It was a beautiful, chrome-plated Sig Sauer. With a .45 caliber barrel and extensive recoil and other firing modifications, the weapon was the pinnacle of portable sidearm engineering. Caden had customized the weapon to a "t," so this came as no surprise to her. The master spy had long been a proponent and practitioner of personal modification when it came to the hardware he used in the field. Every time she looked at the gun, however, she had mixed feelings of both admiration and anxiety. It was, after all, the gun that killed her father.

As she stared at the side of the gun's slide, she noticed something that hadn't caught her eye before. "Is there something engraved there," she asked him, pointing where her eyes were focused.

He looked and nodded twice. "Yeah. My first name. I engraved my signature on both sides just after I eliminated that branch-off group last year."

"After you stopped being undercover."

He nodded again. "When I had that...intervention with Aria, I realized that I'd lost myself in my work. Lost who I was. Who you helped me to be. I realized that every time I looked in the mirror, I not only didn't recognize who was staring back in horror, but I didn't like who I saw. I wasn't...me anymore." He raised the gun and put the barrel at an angle where she could see better. "So I did this. To remind myself who I am every time I fire it, every time I clean it, or even just hold it." He swiped a rag over the chrome surface of the gun and returned to his maintenance. "I guess you could say it's become something of a trademark for me."

She nodded and looked away, reflecting on how inanimate objects could become so symbolic and important. To him, the weapon was a reminder of who he was and who he would continue striving to be. To her, it was a reminder of what he had taken from her, of the noble, loving father she never had and could never have. No matter how many times Kara told herself that he was beyond saving long before she arrived, a pang of guilt and failure always struck her every time she thought about the night he died. The moment she threw that gun to Caden and allowed him to put six shots into her father's chest. She would always see it as a bittersweet symbol, of the evil Caden had prevented with that gun, and the pain of losing all that was left of her past life.

"It sounds corny," Caden had once told her, "but we can't change the past, only focus on forging the future. There are some things out of our control, but our actions aren't among them. As long as your conscience is at peace, in my opinion, there's no more anyone can ask of you...including yourself."

And, she realized as she looked at his peaceful expression, no more I can ask of him. Her arms encircled his shoulders, and he stopped what he was doing, laying down the pristine weapon to hold her close.

…

Two days later

Kara rolled over in bed, her eyes stinging from the harsh morning light streaming through the bedroom windows. As her hand felt the other side of the mattress, her eyes shot open at the slight heat but lack of body. Hurriedly, she scrambled to her feet and left the bedroom, door swinging open wildly in her wake as she searched for her missing boyfriend. She finally found him in the Armory, packing his weapons into a black duffel bag, and stared at him as she stood in the doorway to the weapon room, looking on awkwardly.

"What are you doing," she asked suddenly, her voice seeming unnaturally loud in her ears.

He looked up at her and flashed regret for a moment before answering. "I'm leaving." Kara stared at him, mouth agape as she considered both the ramifications and possible causes of what had just come out of his mouth and the action to follow. Before she could ask him about it, he answered her unspoken question. "It's not exclusively about Raden, or about anything you've done. I love you. It's just...I can't be here, with you. Not yet. It just feels too soon, after what happened. Besides, if you're serious about retasking the Keystone to hunt down its former members, then you don't need me here to make things awkward. I'm sure your agents would be less than enthusiastic about their new director dating a man who's spent the better part of three years making life for them and their comrades a living hell."

She crossed her arms and bit her bottom lip, trying hard not to cry. When he was finished packing the guns, he strode past her out of the Armory and laid the bag next to two others that contained his clothes, gadgets, and virtually everything else he'd brought with him to Russia almost six months ago. When he was done going over the checklist in his head, he turned to her and smiled warmly, coming close but not touching her, letting her decide whether to embrace him or not. Her facial features shook as she vainly restrained her tears, eventually letting go and crying with abandon, pressing her face and body against his as she pulled his chest to her wet cheek. His arms encircled her, and his head tucked hers under his chin, his mouth whispering to her comfortingly.

When she became slightly more coherent, he whispered, "I love you. Always have, always will." He drew her away from him slightly and tipped her head up to look into her red-tinged eyes. "You know that, right?" She nodded rapidly, trying desperately to contain another crying fit. He smiled comfortingly as he drew her close again. "Good." They held each other for a minute before breaking the hug, Kara having composed herself for the most part.

"Caden," she said, her voice still cracking, "stay in contact, okay?"

He turned to her and smiled. "Of course. You're my best friend, and I have no intention of saying a permanent or even long-term goodbye to you again. Don't worry, I'll find the time to visit. Gosh knows I have the money, and since there's no more Keystone to hunt…" His words trailed off as he considered the validity of that statement and shrugged. "Well, not officially, but you get the point."

She nodded and managed a slight smile. "Take care of yourself."

"I will." And with that, he walked out of the door and, for the moment, out of her life.

…

Three months later

Daytona Beach, Florida, U.S.

2 years, 11 months after the Battle of New York

"Hey guys. Been a while." Caden felt the surprisingly cool Florida wind blow over his body, rustling the crisp fallen leaves of autumn that were scattered around him, and waited a few moments before continuing. "Just wanted you to know that...I made it. I finished what you started, what you meant for me to do. It's over." He waited a few more minutes, unsure of what to say next. "I guess that's all I really came to say." His legs started to turn him around and walk away before he stopped and faced the other direction again. "I should tell you that I couldn't have done it all without her. It's ironic, really. The whole reason that you stole that formula and...changed me-she was the one who helped me the most.

"She's family now, and I love her in...whatever way the future holds for us, be that permanent union or platonic care. I'm tired of being alone. I'm not gonna be afraid of attachment anymore. I know you wouldn't want me to be. Thank you for always being my inspiration, for always being the voices in the back of my head that told me to keep going, even if I didn't listen. I love you guys." Striding forward, he placed three fingers to his lips and kissed them, then pressed those fingers against the cool marble slab in front of him.

The chiseled block read: In Loving Memory of Caden and Alexandra Drake, 1965-2007; 1967-2007. He ran his fingers over the words at the bottom: Darkness is the Absence of Light. His lips curled into a smile. My family has always had a taste for the dramatic and poetic, it seems. After a long minute of staring at the tombstone silently, he spoke again.

"So...how did you find me?"

"You weren't trying to cover your tracks too hard, and besides, you know how good I am."

He nodded, smiling faintly, still not turning toward the source. "Why are you here?"

"Because," a new voice said from his rear left, "family sticks together."

At this, he turned and faced the source, his eyes alighting on a shorter girl with dirty blonde hair. "Ari."

She smiled and nodded as she strode closer to him. "Been a while, Cade." They embraced each other briefly before Caden turned to the other visitor.

"So...did you two have any plans for today?" The girls looked at each other and shrugged in response. "Good. There's this cafe downtown that I'd like to take you to. My treat."

The girls smiled and nodded at him, approaching him from either side and looping one arm around his waist as he slung his arms over their shoulders. As they walked toward his modified, stick-shift Lamborghini Embolado together, Caden felt an enormous sense of relief and warmth from the two of them, knowing that no matter what happened, he could always trust these two to be there for him.

Rely on yourself, and trust your friends and family. S'what my dad told me when I was six. It took me until seventeen to finally get it, and now, at age eighteen, I see exactly what he meant. His grip around the girls tightened slightly in affection, and they both smiled at him warmly. These are my friends, my family...and, together or apart, we're gonna change the world. He glanced at his right hip, where his trademark Sig was holstered under his light trenchcoat. I am Caden Christophe Drake, the worst nightmare of terrorists and killers. He smiled confidently, almost threateningly. And I'm just getting started.