Cornerstone

by Vordigan

It's 2022, now the Thundertwins are known as the heroes of Hiddenville. Their fame is spreading across the main cities of the country, but as they get more attention, there is a tragedy waiting to happen. Love, crime, treason, death, maddness... Sometimes our destiny is written on a cornerstone. (Thundercest)

1. The secret life of the american twins

Chapter 1: The secret life of the american twins.

Delta Tower, Hiddenville Urban Zone.
September 18, 2022, Sunday.
10:45 PM

"And once again, the Thundertwins saved the day...!"

"...the city's favorite superheroes have stopped the bank robbers while..."

"...certainly, we haven't seen anything like this since the days of Thunderman and Electress..."

"...from Metroburg to Swellview, these heroes have won the admiration of..."

"Thank you Thundertwins, for making this city, a safer place to live."

After being surfing through several channels, the television went off abruptly, and right after that the remote was placed on the couch. Max stood up and walked to the operations room. He was using his super suit, just waiting to go on a mission. And as he entered the room he saw his sister in front of her computer, so he walked up to her saying:

"I can't believe what I'm going to say but... I think Cherry earned some points for suggesting our name some years ago. I'm shocked!"

The girl of wavy hair turned around on the chair to find with her brother, and smiled at him for his funny comment.

"I can't believe we graduated from High School 5 years ago and now..." She replied lowering her eyes and letting out a sigh after bringing all those memories back to her mind, and putting on perspective their new life as superheroes.

What Max was watching on TV was just the tip of the iceberg, because they were appearing in all the news lately. About a year ago, since they began fighting crime as the protectors of Hiddenville, they were the main topic of practically all the news, every day. None of the main channels would have lose the opportunity to talk about their heroic acts, and it was not surprising, because for the last months they've been trying so hard to keep their beloved city safe from those dangerous criminals that began to arrive some time ago.

Probably the attack of Dark Mayhem was the cause for some villains and regular criminals to start put their eyes on the peaceful city, either because they were trying to avenge the ultimate villain, or because they underestimated the powers of the twins. However, those criminals were no match for Max and Phoebe because whenever they fight together, they were almost unstoppable.

5 years had passed since Max took the hard decision of abandon his evil ways as a villain to become a superhero and fight against crime along with his sister. Things have changed a lot for them since that day. On 2017 they graduated from High School and attended to Hero University together. After their graduation, it did not take much time for them to be assigned by President Kickbutt as the protectors of Hiddenville.

The only difference was that they were not living in their parents' house anymore. Now, they were renting an apartment located in the urban zone, far away from their family and friends. Just the two of them.

"Yeah, and here we are now, about to go out to the city and kick some butts." Max said, after crossing his arms in front of her.

Phoebe's nostalgic mood had an impact on Max, because he quickly remembered when they had just a few days after they moved from their parents' house.

Around those days Max started to set up their new home with all kind of devices of his own inventive. These devices were very useful to plannign their missions. He was able to get some non-lethal weapons too for emergency cases, but having their powers as an advantage, they haven't had the chance to use them. Soon the apartment was turned into their new headquarters, one more resisting than the last one.

In rare occasions, the twins went on their own but yet, Max decided to build a super computer to link and encrypt the communications of their phones. The same computer that was behind Phoebe right now.

At that very moment, an alert came from Max's cell phone, so he immediately took it out of his pocket:

"Finally, a mission!" He exclaimed after seeing what the screen was showing.

"It's that from the T-Force app? Why didn't my phone warn me?" Phoebe asked while staring at her cell phone with an upset expression.

"Maybe it's because of that girly app you insist on using." Max replied after taking his eyes off the phone, trying to annoy her with a teasing smile.

'Cupcake Shop: Dessert Maker', was Phoebe's favorite app. 4 months ago she got really obsessed with it after Chloe installed it in her phone to play during one of their visits. She barely had time to use it, but she loved to feel like an awesome pastry chef, after finding out how difficult was for her baking real desserts for Max.

"I love to play 'Cupcake Shop', virtual cakes are way more easy to bake than..." She tried to explain but was interrupted by him.

"Hey we can talk about your delicious brownies later okay? We have to go. The T-Force app detected some guys breaking into Hidenville Galleria" Max said, showing his phone to her immediately.

"Hidenville Galleria? Max that's like 3 miles away from here." Phoebe replied, taking his phone out of his hands to see it closely.

"Don't worry Pheebs, for what I've seen in the cameras they don't look like professionals, they'll take some time before they can find a place steal from. Besides, its Sunday there's no traffic. We'll be there in a few minutes." Max stated while Phoebe gave him his phone. "Let's go."

He quickly went to the living room and put on a black leather jacket he left on the couch. He took a laptop bag from the same place and walked to the apartment entrance.

"Wait...!" A concerned Phoebe shouted out, moving as fast as she could.

She ran to the living room to take her bag, and once she had it, went to the door and followed her brother, who was now standing out of there, waiting for her in the hallway.

"All right, let's go." Phoebe said after closing the door behind her.

The next thing they did was running to the elevators. It was a long way to get there, but suddenly something came to Phoebe's mind, and as they ran through the hallways side by side, she told her brother:

"Max wait, we didn't close the door!"

"Yes we did." He answered while touching the screen of his smartwatch, which he used to control almost everything in the apartment.

He smiled at her when they got to the elevators. She smiled back, like always.

10:52 PM

Delta Tower had 10 floors and their apartment was on the 8th, so after taking the elevator they should arrive to the parking lot in just a few minutes. On the way there, Max and Phoebe were so close from each other, even if the elevator was completely empty. They were so focused on their mission that none of them realized this.

Fortunately for them, there were no people using the elevators at that time, so they could get down there without making any stop in another floor. Once the doors were open, they ran to their mean of transportation; the Thundercar.

This vehicle was nothing more than a blue Mustang 2008. A discreet but fast vehicle, equipped with all the technology of the Hero League. The car has been modified to be faster, it was completely armored and got both, bullet-proof windows and tires. In the inside there was an advanced panel linked to Hero League, which they used to check the T-Force app, among other things, like President Kickbutt's messages.

They quickly got in the car very quickly and prepared to get to their destination, as fast as they could. Once they left the building, Phoebe activated a special device invented by Max, to change the plate of the vehicle. It could generate random plates from Hidenville's database. That would help them to avoid getting the attention of police.

Max was driving and Phoebe was seated next to him, they've always done it that way because Phoebe needed to prepare her clothes before they started their missions. They had to put on their super suits before getting out of the apartment and cover it with something else. Things were very easy for Max, he just had to put on a jacket and nobody could've known he was wearing his super suit under the clothes. His black jeans would easily pass as civilian clothes.

But Phoebe was a completely different story. Since she was using skirt and boots, she had to carry a laptop bag bigger than Max's, besides she had to use jeans and sweater to hide her suit. While Max was driving, she'd have to take off the extra clothes to put on the skirt and boots of Thundergirl's suit, but sometimes she had some problems to do it and ended up with a little bruise or two while changing her clothes, just like now...

"Ouch! Watch out Max!" Phoebe exclaimed, after hitting her elbow with the car's door.

"Sorry, but you should really think about stop using those pants. If you only used the skirt you could cover it with another one, and wouldn't have to do this every time we go out on a mission." He suggested while driving down the avenue.

"Yeah, but the Hero League has a dress code, and no matter how much you'd love to see me using just my skirt, they don't think it's good for hero girls to go around making acrobatic moves, with next to nothing on." She emphatically said while making the last moves to put on the boots.

Max couldn't help but smile a little bit after hearing what she said, he used to have fun every time he saw the awesome movements Phoebe had to do to get dressed, but luckily she was still very elastic thanks to the strenuous hours she spent practicing ballet.

But things were not always like this, because when they started using the Thundercar, Phoebe used to get dressed in the back seat, because changing her clothes next to her brother was very embarrassing for her, but as the time passed they got used to be so close from each other, that all those embarrassing moments just disappeared.

With her super suit ready, Phoebe put on the seatbelt again and grabbed the bags from the back seat. She took out the capes and masks and put them on her thighs. Everything was ready. There were just a few cars driving down the main avenue, so they didn't take long to be half of the way.

When Max took Millbrook Avenue he speeded up the car, which always raised Phoebe's nerves to heaven, but he loved to do that, just to scare her a little bit.

"Whoa, slow down McFly, the thieves are not running away." She said with a nervous look.

"Easy Pheebs, I've got everything under control. We're almost there." Max assured her, confident of his skills in traffic

Hiddenville Galleria.
11:02 PM

Some minutes later Max was driving inside of the big parking lot from Hiddenville Galleria, and Phoebe was looking at the surveillance cameras on the car's panel. The thieves were still there and as far as she could tell, they were checking up some of the stores. In situations like this, Max used to park the vehicle far away from the main doors, and that's what he was going to do, because he didn't want to be discovered before even getting inside.

While he was parking the car, his partner in crime used an elastic band to tie her hair in a ponytail, and then she looked back at the analysis showed on the screen. Soon she found out something interesting:

"Max, the report says we have 5 targets, the scan does not specify if they're armed or not but we should be prepared." She warned her twin with a serious look on her face.

"Don't worry Pheebs, I'll be more careful this time. You ready?" Max asked right away.

"Always. Here." She agreed, giving him the last garments of his suit.

Max put on the mask at the same time Phoebe did, and then nodded to each other. It was like a secret code they came up with in all this time. Doing the same things at the same time was nothing weird for them, because when they were kids they used to do it all the time, and they loved when that happened.

During their teenage years this peculiar habit seemed to have been forgotten, but now they were there, unconsciously mimicking each other movements, just like a mirror of themselves. It was like time has not really passed. Once they got out of the Mustang they put on their capes to complete their suits. They were ready for action.

After taking a look around the place, they noticed it was completely empty, not even a security guard was walking around. Suddenly the twins felt a cold wind running through their bodies that caused their capes to start waving over and over again. Max locked the car by touching the screen of his smartwatch and soon after, they ran to the building together.

On the way there the silent was evident. They didn't want to get ahead of the facts, but they couldn't stop thinking that something was wrong. When they got to the building's entrance they found the glass doors completely broken. The twins stopped for a second to evaluate the situation, so Phoebe grabbed her phone to take a look at the inside:

"Max I know where they are, they're in front of a jewelry from the second floor. They're using clown masks" She informed, looking at the screen.

"All right. Wait... did you say clown masks? That's what I call retro, that's from 2016." Max remarked, and then smiled at his partner.

"I know. It has to be the same jewelry where we bought dad's watch. We have to proceed with caution." Phoebe said with a low tone of voice, trying not to speak out lout.

They saw the glass fragments were in the inside, so there was no doubt this was the door the robbers used to have access to the mall, but for some reason none of the alarms was activated. They had to go very carefully, since they didn't know if the guys were close to their position.

They slowly entered the building, trying not to make any noises. They stopped for a second to look around them, and even if most of the lights were off, they still got some visibility. Suddenly they heard what seemed to be crystals getting crashed. These noises were coming from the second floor so after sharing a serious look with each other, they walked faster to get there.

They knew the electric stairs wouldn't be working at that time, so they had to walk up the old fashion way, but most importantly, very silent. Max walked up the stairs first and Phoebe went behind him. Soon they were able to hear some voices saying something they couldn't really figure out.

"On your left, Max." Phoebe whispered while getting close to him, right before putting a foot on the second floor.

"De acuerdo." Max nodded.

Shortly after they went ahead and began running straight to the Royal Key jewelry, located at the bottom of the hallway. All the other stores were closed, so nothing but darkness was covering their path. As they got close to the store they saw some flashlights coming from the inside. Apparently the guys haven't ended with the looting yet.

In less than a minute the twins were finally in front of the jewelry, side by side with a determined look, and waiting to spot their targets. That jewelry was a very elegant place, and the front facade couldn't say the contrary. Fine jewelry and luxury watches were the main sales that kept this store in a constant grow, but this night, from all of the other stores in the mall, the Royal Key was bad lucky enough to be chosen by these robbers.

The door was made of glass too, so it suffered the same fate than the one from the main entrance. Max and Phoebe didn't have to wait there for longer, because they quickly saw two guys walking inside of the store. Apparently they were not aware of their presence yet.

In situations like this, darkness could be a powerful ally for those criminals, that's why Phoebe had the idea of taking this advantage from them. She just had to lift her right arm and move two of her fingers to slide down the switches from the power system on the wall. In an instant all the lights were turned on, exposing the robbers but taking their attention in the process.

"Sorry... Are we interrupting something?" Max ironically asked them.

The Thundertwins saw the bad guys through the surveillance cameras, but they could only distinguish their silhouettes. Once the place was lighted up, the heroes realized that they weren't just gang members as they thought before. They were using black tactical suits and got their faces covered with those singulars clown masks, primarily white with some shapes and other details in different colors.

Phoebe's suspicions were totally true, because both guys were armed and as soon as they saw the twins, they quickly aimed their guns at them, ready to use all of the ammo. The guns they were using were two semi-automatic pistols Infinity .45 caliber, far too sophisticated for street muggers. Max and Phoebe had no more doubts, these guys were professionals.

Without double thinking, Max and Phoebe went after their targets to stop them in their own way. Phoebe chose the guy on her left who was using a white-orange mask, and approached to him.

"Shoot them now!" One of them shouted out when they began getting closer.

But right before he could pull the trigger, the girl moved her right arm to use her telekinesis and ripped the gun out of his hands, making it fly away from him. Being completely disarmed he only had his hands to fight, si he went after her. Phoebe didn't want to take too much risk, and before he could throw a punch she aimed her left hand at him and made him fly though the jewelry, smashing other things in the process.

She threw the guy against one of the walls and left him there, floating in the air. He was so confused and unaware of what was happening.

"What is this? What the hell did you do?!" The guy yelled at her, as he desperately tried to move.

Once Phoebe was sure he was not a threat anymore, she blew with all her strengths and a powerful ice breeze left the man turned into a big block of ice sticked to the wall.

At the same time Phoebe was dealing with him, Max approached to the guy at his right who was using a white-green mask, but unlike his partner he managed to shoot his gun at Max. Shoot by shoot he let out all the 14 bullets from his magazine, and after shooting the last one he could only see how his ammo was floating in the middle of the air. He was so confused.

Max was able to stop all the bullets telekinetically, and now they were levitating in front of him. He just had to use one hand to achieve such a thing. This would have been very hard for him many years ago, even for Phoebe, but things were very different now.

When Max saw the robber reloading his gun, he dropped the bullets and just with two simultaneous movements of his right hand, he threw the pistol to the ground and then he lifted the guy to pin him against the ceiling, which forced him to keep his arm raised to keep canalizing his power straight to him.

Now everything seemed to be under control. Max looked for his sister with his gaze and saw that she managed to take down the other guy. He tried to smile at her just like he always did but he couldn't, because out of nowhere, two more guys came out of a small warehouse and shot their guns immediately. They were using white-blue and white-red masks.

Phoebe found the way to run away from the bullets and took cover behind the showcase. Max remained in his place but was able to react before the bullets could hurt him, so he quickly threw the guy he was telekinetically holding on the ceiling, which made him scream at the top of his lungs as he took down the rest of his partners by smashing them with his own body.

With all those shoots some of the furnitures and expensive objects were destroyed, but now they could easily thake down the robbers easily, so Max and Phoebe approached them. One of them, the one Max threw at the others was on the floor unconscious and the rest were fully awake, but there was nothing they could to to fight back.

"You better give up now, don't make this harder than it is." Phoebe warned them with an authoritative voice.

"Surrender and you won't end up turned into an ice pop, like your friend over there." Max added, trying to persuade them.

In the middle of the commotion, the thieves were forced to drop their guns. They already heard about superheroes saving cities around the world, but they have never seen any of them. Now there were two supes standing right in front of them. Two persons capable of doing things they could only dream of. They knew they didn't stand a chance, but were not willing to give up.

When they saw the twins getting close they desperately tried to grab their weapons, but Phoebe saw what they were trying to do and quicky moved her hand to telekinetically throw their guns at the bottom of the jewelry. Once disarmed, they had no other choice but stand up and fight them.

The one with the white-blue mask tried to punch Phoebe in the face, but she blocked it with her left forearm and kicked him in the stomach very hard. It was too late for her to realize that the muggers were using bulletproof vests, which may difficult hand-to-hand combat.

In the meantime, Max was dodging all the punches thrown by the guy with the white-red mask. He seemed to be an experienced fighter, so it won't be easy to be defeat. After reading most of his movements, Max was waiting for the right moment to attack.

Phoebe was trying so hard to knock out her attacker and was able to hit him several times, but he had a great endurance and was strong build, a huge disadvantage for her. Max in the other hand seemed to have gained control of the fight, and after blocking a kick he rushed to pucnch the guy right in the throat, which made him walk backwards to try to catch some breath.

The twins were still courageously fighting, but at some point the guy who was fighting Phoebe kicked her in the stomach and threw her against the wall, then gave her a hard punch in the face that made her fall to the floor in pain.

"Stupid bitch! That will teach you." The delinquent yelled, as he saw the girl was trying to crawl away from him.

The hit was so loud that it could be heard all around the whole place, and her moaning took her brother's attention immediately. The girl's hands were not fighting against her attacker anymore, because now they were covering her face, trying to ease the pain.

"NO!" Max shouted out, full of rage.

Now that he was distracted, the guy he was fighting with started to walk at him but couldn't go any further, because just by seeing his twin lying on the floor was enough for Max to have a sudden burst of rage, and without even using his hands, he telekinetically threw the robber and smashed him against some shelves at the bottom of the store, crashing everything around him. Now he was lying on the floor, unconscious.

Phoebe was astonished after what she just witnessed. She never saw her brother doing something like that before. He quickly looked at Phoebe's face and what he saw in her eyes provoked something unknown for him. She was in tears. Max gave the last standing man a cold gaze.

The guy started to walk at him but he never thought that Max has completely forgotten about the mission, and all he wanted was to avenge his sister. He wanted to make him pay for hurting his sister, so after aiming his right hand at him, he paralyzed the robber with his telekinesis and caused an incredible pain all over his body. Soon after, he threw him against the wall behind him, the same wall where he punched Phoebe.

Max was still aiming his hand straight to him, but his power was not holding the whole body anymore, now his hand seemed to be holding him by the neck only. Suddenly he began to levitate against the wall, making it hard for him to breathe properly. Max walked up to him and yelled in front of his face:

"Don't you ever touch her again!"

And soon after he threw a powerful punch in the face that made him spit some blood against the wall. The moaning he gave was heard in all the corners of the store but it wasn't enough for Max. He wanted him to suffer as much as his sister did, and as he kept the guy in the same position, he punched him in the face again, but this time he spit a lot of blood all over the wall.

It was not necessary to keep holding him against the wall, so he stopped his telekinesis to let the man fall on the floor, completely unconscious.

He quickly ran to his sister and helped her to stand up by taking her by the waist. Once the girl was standing next to him, they stopped for a second and looked at each other, without even saying a single word. Max was able to feel that Phoebe was still sored, and due to the punch she received some minutes ago, her cheek was getting red.

"Are you okay Pheebs?" He worriedly asked, as he cupped her face with both hands.

"Yeah, don't worry, I'm fine." She nodded, trying to give him a smile.

Max was sure she didn't want him to be worried. She had several fight with criminals in the past, but they've never hurt her like that before. He knew Phoebe so well that she didn't even have to say anything, all he did was hugging her with all his strengths. They stood like this for a few seconds until they were interrupted by an unknown voice:

"Look at the little couple of heroes. Is your girlfriend hurt?" The last robber said, as he walked out of the back warehouse.

The twins totally forgot that they just stopped 4 out of 5 guys, and as they could tell he seemed to be the leader. His face was covered with a clown mask similar to the one his partners were using, but this was black and white. Also, he was holding an assault rifle AK-47. Highly lethal.

After they saw the guy in the middle of the room, they immediately took a step of distance between them so they could try to stop him, but it was too late to use their powers on him, because he was aiming his gun straight to them. If they tried to use telekinesis to take him down they could get hurt, so after they shared a short look they decided to use their last resource:

"Thunder-shield!" They shouted out at the same time as they strongly hold their hands, and right after they raised the other hand thoward the enemy to create a telekinetic barrier right in front of them.

They did it just in time because right in the moment they touched each other's hands, the guy pulled the trigger and the automatic weapon began shooting a huge blast that seemed to shake up the thin walls around them. They were in the middle of the jewelry and all those shoots were deafening, they almost felt like they were in a war zone. The twins had to keep fighting.

There was no way that either of them would have managed to stop so many bullets on their own, not from a overpowered rifle like that. Some years ago, when they learned to use the Thunder-shield at Hero University, they thought that taking their hands to increase their telekinetic power to use it in a defensive way, was just stupid. They even said they would never have to use it, but they were wrong.

Right now, dozens of bullets were still hitting against the barrier and bounced to the walls. Other bullets were just falling to the wooded floor and burned it as soon as they touched it. Definitely that guy would never stop pulling the trigger of his weapon, and the blast will keep going until the magazine was empty, or one of them was dead.

Max and Phoebe were still safe and sound but as the time passed, they seemed to be more and more tired, because using this peculiar defense required a lot of energy and concentration, something hard to achieve in a moment like this.

They felt the weapon was almost running out of bullets but they were terribly wrong, because the criminal leader had the obsessive habit of charging his weapon with two drums, making possible for him to shoot up to 150 rounds.

Soon their faces were reflecting the tremendous cost of being safe from those powerful shoots, because each one of them would easily reach 2 ft/s. Suddenly the twins were being pushed back very slowly, as they kept forcing themselves to keep their protection going. Definitely their tactical boots were not working properly to stop the friction with the floor.

Some seconds later they started to being puhed really hard, and they only stopped until their backs were touching the cold showcase from the entrance, but the multiple shoots seemed to have no end. They were still safe by now, but didn't know how long they could resist.

"There's too many!" Phoebe desperately yelled.

"I know! Just keep going!" Max replied, encouraging her to continue.

Their hands were so tightened at that moment. They've never kept a shield for so long before, not to mention in a situation like this. At some point they noticed the bullets were not bouncing or faling to the floor anymore, because now they were getting stucked in the shield, less than three feet from their faces. It was a clear sign that their energy was about to end.

But just when they thought the shield would disappear, out of nowhere the shoots stopped, and they could only hear the distinctive sound of the rifle trying to find more ammo, but it was useless because both drums were empty.

Max and Phoebe shared another look and let out a sigh of relief. After the shield got vanished, they slowly let their hands go. They were so tired right now, and the sweat on their faces was a proof of it.

But no matter if the robber was out of bullets, there was no reason to believe they got away with it, because as they tried to make sure that the other was fine, they hear a peculiar sound. The next thing they saw was the guy was removing the drums of the gun, and then grabbed another magazine from his belt, a smaller one.

The twins had to do something quickly because there was no way they could stop another blast, no matter how small it was. They had to think about way to stop him without using telekinesis. That's when Phoebe startd to look around her, trying to find something they could use.

Then some shiny object on the ceiling caught her attention. Suddenly an idea came to her mind, and thought it was the only way to stop him, but there was no time to tell her brother what she wanted to do. She just hoped he could guess what her plan was.

"You're dead!" The guy yelled at them as he finished to reload his rifle.

At that very moment Phoebe raised her face to the ceiling and quickly used her heat breath to activate the fire sprinklers. In an instant the system released the water all over the jewelry. It looked like there was a small rain inside there.

When Max saw what she did, he immediately thought she came up with something, and after seeing the robber aiming his weapon toward them, something in his mind told him what he had to do, and right after the first shoot was heard, he used his ice breath to freeze everything around him.

The water streaming out of the sparkles was very useful to end with this task, and in a few seconds the entire place was covered with a thick ice layer, including the other robbers but specially the leader, who was now standing in front of them turned into an ice statue. The sparklers were frozen too, and now they were only dropping some small pieces of ice. Finally it was over.

With the situation under control, Max walked very slow to the guy in front of him and saw he was still holding his AK-47, and the only bullet he was able to shoot, was frozen with an ice line that came out of the barrel.

"Wow! That was close, right?" Max exclaimed as he looked at the ice statue. Then he ripped the bullet out with his hand.

"Yeah well, they can't say we didn't warn them." Phoebe answered, provoking a sudden smile on him.

"Man, look at this place. The owner is going to hate us too." He stated after looking around the place, remembering the other occasions they accidentally destroyed two of Mrs. Wong's restaurants.

"Right Pheebs? Pheebs...?" He asked again, but after noticing Phoebe wasn't answering, he turned around and saw his sister falling on her knees, so he rushed to get her. He was so worried.

"Phoebe, you okay?" He quickly asked after taking her by her waist, to prevent her from falling.

"Yeah I'm just... I'm just little tired." She replied, not being able to look him in the eyes. It was hard for her to keep her eyes open.

"Phoebe you've never been good at lying." Max stated, perfectly knowing she didn't want to worry him. "Come here." He added after he helped her to stand up. Then he slipped his left arm behind her back and with a single move, he lifted the girl on his arms to take her back to the car.

Phoebe's face was so close to his. She thought her mask would help her to hide the paleness she must have on her face right now, but Max didn't need to look at her face to know how exhausted she was. Sometimes they knew each other more than themselves.

The twins had to get out of there as soon as possible, because even if Hidenville police was abscent this night, they didn't get happy when they saw other people doing their job, so once Max was sure that the robbers and their weapons were completely frozen, he considered everything was fine, so he turned around and slowly walked to the Royal Key's doors, with his twin on his arms.

There were a bunch of crystal and cement fragments all over the place, and so dozens of jewels that were so close to be part of the looting of these criminals if it wasn't for them. The jewelry was quite a mess, but at least the mission was a success, well, sorta.

11:23 PM

Even when they've left the jewelry, Phoebe was getting cold. Normally this wouldn't happen, she must be okay at this point but this time was different. And now there she was, shivering in her twin's arms and trying not to let him know about it, but it was impossible.

"Are you cold?" He asked her, lowering his gaze.

"Yeah, just a little." She replied with a soft voice.

"Hang on." Max said after listening to her answer.

But then, as though she has read his mind, Phoebe placed her arms around his neck and used all of her strength not to fall. Max used his left hand to untie his cape and used it to cover up his sister. He then slipped his arm behind Phoebe's back again, and kept walking by the stores. But the girl's arms were still around his neck.

As her brother carried her through the mall hallways, she began to lose that cold sensation she had before. She thought it was because Max used his cape on her, but it was because of the warm she felt on his chest. She was so comfortable by being in his lap, that when the young man was walking down the stairs she placed her head on his chest. Not because she was exhausted, but because she felt suddenly sleepy, so she slowly closed the eyes.

11:27 PM

When they made it to the mall's broken doors, Max started to hear some sirens at the distance, and the next thing he saw was two police patrols parking in front of the entrance. After being walking in the middle of darkness for several minutes, those shiny red-blue lights were blinding him, so he was forced to put the head down a little bit, as he kept walking to the door.

Some officers were getting out of the cars and when they saw movement inside of the building, they quickly aimed their Sig Sauer at him, but when they realized who was inside of the building, they put the guns down and approached to him.

When Max was in front of them he didn't pay much attention on them and kept walking out of the mall, but as soon as he passed by the 4 officers, he finally broke the silence:

"There are 5 robbers at the Royal Key, you better have brought some blowtorch if you want to arrest them." He told the officers without stop his walk.

"Hey 'superhero', you have to give us your statement, remember?" One of them informed in a rude way.

"Call the Hero League tomorrow morning, they'll give you the report." Max replied, leaving the cops behind.

"What happened to the girl? Is she okay?" The same officer rushed to ask, after remembering he was carrying someone in his arms.

"She will be." He replied, not looking back.

11:58 PM

The lights have been illuminating the city for 5 hours or so, but now those lights were illuminating Phoebe's face every time the blue Mustang passed under one of the street lamps. With nothing else to do for the night, Max could drive at a normal speed, not like he did when they left the apartment.

He wasn't driving like that to avoid an infringement, but because he didn't want to wake his sister up. After the hard mission they had to bare this night, he thought that sleeping all the night was the best for her.

From time to time he stopped looking at the road to look at Phoebe, sleeping in the seat next to him. He liked to see her like that, so peacefully. He took the steering wheel with one hand and fixed the cape with the other, preventing her from getting cold again. He smiled at her softly and kept driving.

He was trying to remember when was the last time one of them ended up so exhausted after using their telekinesis, but he couldn't. They've never passed out for overusing their powers, the farthest they have ever pushed their abilities was to the point of running out of breath.

But after thinking about it deeply, they've never needed to take their powers to this entirly new level. Not even during those tough traingings at the T-Force headquarters. He couldn't stop thinking about it over and over again. He was worried.

Probably the hit Pheobe got has caused more damage than they thought. Maybe that's why she forced her brain to consume her energy faster than normal but he didn't know it, he was just speculating. Bhe was sure about one thing; he would take her to Metroburg's General Hospital tomorrow morning.

Delta Tower, Hiddenville Urban Zone.
September 19, 2022, Monday.
12:46 AM

It was almost 1 in the morning and there was a deep silence in Max and Phoebe's apartment. But in the middle of darkness, a message alert turned on the screen of a phone. It was Phoebe's MePhone on the living room table, and as soon as the screen turned off again, those dark brown eyes were trying to find it.

After the twins got home, the first thing Max did was dropping their things on the floor and he immediately carried Phoebe to the couch and laid her down. He took off her mask very carefully, trying not to wake her up. Sometimes she liked to sleep on the couch so he decided to let her sleep there. Soon after he went to bring a blanket and used it to tuck her in. He didn't want her to be cold.

He wasn't falling asleep that night because he normally stayed up all night, but he also woke up by midday. Dedicating their lives to be superheroes had a good side, he could sleep all he wanted as long as they didn't have an unplanned mission to take care of.

There was nothing important to do at that hour, so just to kill time he went to the operations area, and sat in front of the computer to send the report of their most recent mission to the Hero League. This task was nothing more than a boring protocol he always reserved for Phoebe, but this time he decided to do it himself.

It took him about 30 minutes to fill all the information about the assignment, such as a detailed description of the mission, the procedures they followed, the damaged they caused to private property, the number of targets, etc. But when he came across a text field that read "wounded", he didn't know what to write.

Phoebe wasn't really wounded, and no matter if he saw her sleeping on the couch like nothing happened, he couldn't stop worrying about her. At thtat very moment, Max heard a soft voice behind him:

"You can leave that blank." Phoebe suggested, after seeing what was he doing.

Max turned around immediately and found his sister standing right in front of him. She entered the room without making any noise, something normal for an experienced ballerina like her. She was still using her super suit and her hair was not tied anymore. She looked just the same than when they left the apartment some hours ago. Max was so surprised to see her, so he quickly stood up and got close to her:

"Phoebe... You okay?" He worriedly asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine just... just a little sore." She answered with a soft smile on her face.

When the computer screen lighted up her face, Max couldn't help but staring at her left cheek. It was a little swollen and had a bruise that reached to her lip. When he laid her down on the couch it didn't looked so bad, but after seeing her closely, he couldn't believe what that guy has done to his sister. He was so angry.

"That bastard! Look what he did to you!" He shouted out in rage.

"I know, I saw the bruise with my phone but... it's not a selfie I'd like to keep." She remarked, making a dislike gesture after saying the last part.

"At least I gave him what he deserved before putting his ass in the ice." He said with a hint of anger in his voice, right before turning his back on her, since he didn't want her to see him like that.

"Don't worry Max, in a few days I'll be like new, you'll see. Besides, I'm an expert with make-up." Phoebe replied as she walked around him to see his face, and smiled at him once again. "I'm fine." She insisted while looking him straight to his eyes.

He always had some problems to go against Phoebe every time she smiled like that, and this time was no exception. It looked like Phoebe had another superpower, but it was funny how it only worked on him.

"So... is the report ready?" She curiously asked.

"Yeah, I just needed to write something in the 'wounded' part but... yeah it's ready." He said after pressing the 'Enter' button on his holographic keyboard.

"Cool. Oh by the way... look, I got a message from Cherry. She wants to know if we can go with her and Oyster to watch a movie this weekend." She told him while showing her phone, very excited.

"Sure, it's been a long time since the last time we saw them, it'll be fun." Max said, agreeing the invitation.

They haven't seen their best friends for over a year. When they went to attend to Hero University they had to move to Metroburg, but they used to travel back to Hiddenville to visit them together. When they became full time superheroes, they were forced to reduce their visits to only a weekend per month, even now that they were practically living in the same city.

That's reason Max didn't hesitate to accept Cherry's invitation, because sometimes those sporadic reunions with their old friends from high school were just what they needed to bring some "normality" to their busy life. But in all this time being together, Max and Phoebe discovered how much they enjoyed watching movies together.

"Okay, I'll tell her we're in." An enthusiastic Phoebe said, without taking her hands off the phone.

After saying that, she turned around and got back to the living room. She walked to those big windows with an incredible look of the whole city, and once she finished sending her message to Cherry, she placed her phone on a little table next ot the window.

Sometimes Phoebe enjoyed sitting on the floor in front of those big windows for hours, just to watch the shining lights at the distance. But now she was standing in front of the windows, and her eyes were lost in those big buildings and illuminated houses. She frequently tried to find some funny figures using the lights to join the dots, but she always failed doing that, because every time she tried someone appeared behind her back, and interrupted her little game.

And that's exactly what happened, because at that very moment, two strong arms were slowly slipping around her waist, as she felt someone getting close to ehr. When there was no distance between them, she felt a soft breathing on her neck. Eventually, a pair of warm lips started to passionately kiss her.

Soon the hands of this mysterious man were sliding up until getting dangerously close to her breasts, but they didn't go any further because out of nowhere, her hands stopped him in his tracks, but not to reject his caresses, because with one single move, they intertwined their fingers as though trying to make this moment last forever.

All of a sudden, the blue-orange cape she was using fell to the floor, and the kisses she was receiving on her neck were getting more and more passionate at every second. But then the kisses stopped, and one of the man's hands traveled all the way to the girl's back. Soon the small zip from her suit began to go down very slowly, and those passionate kisses continued.

That's when Phoebe arched her neck to the left, perfectly knowing who was kissing her, and in the midst of a sea of sensations, on the verge of losing her breath, the girl could only say:

"I love you Max Thunderman."

To be continued...