~Prelude~
"I know you told me to stop looking into this...but I just couldn't, and...when you see it you'll know why this is so important." She pulled her face into an expression that signified she was waiting for him to respond. Her breathing quickened for each second that passed.
"Come on, you have to look at this. It's our only hope. Please..." Her pleading finally produced a raised eyebrow in question from him.
"I don't NEED to look at anything..." Were the words that escaped his lips after several minutes of silence. "I told you, to leave it alone. And as always, you went against my orders."
That particular word "orders", made her skin crawl, and she almost threw the papers at him in anger. "You know what? Fine. If you don't want to protect this city anymore, then I'll do it myself." With that she turned on her heel awkwardly and walked to the metal staircase leading out of the increasingly gloomy looking basement headquarters of their operation.
She wasn't crying, or even angry. More than anything, she felt disillusioned. The man she had followed for all these years, believing in his quest for making the city a safe place to be, trusting him to know what to do with the monsters of this world, had dissipated. She knew the deaths he'd experienced of people close to him, had taken a toll on his soul, but leaving the city to be ravaged by madmen was a disservice to their memories. Her last hope had been the news clippings she had intended to give him, of which he had no interest in it seemed. With that, her last thought of his kindness died within her.