Minion paced the Lair, muttering at the brainbots. "It'll all end in tears. And guess who's going to have to pick up the pieces?"
Brainbot 71 blinked and said "Bowg?"
"That's right, me!" Minion said, jabbing a finger at the Lair's high ceiling. "Good ol' Minion! Always there in case I have to sweep up the shattered bits of Sir's broken heart and try to put 'em back together again."
The brainbot's jaws snapped closed over his waving digit. Minion absent-mindedly pried it off. He had sensory perception in all of his robotic limbs, but fortunately no pain receptors, which made it useful when he had to grab overflowing beakers of acid or take hot cookie trays out of the oven.
"I mean, I like Miss Ritchi, but she's the Damsel! What is she thinking?"
The brainbot blinked. "Bowg bowg?"
"Yeah. My thoughts exactly. It's the thrill. Once the excitement wears off, what then? And did you know he takes the same route to her apartment every time?"
"Bowg."
"I know! Like that's not an ambush waiting to happen."
He stomped over to the monitor station and ran through the security check, even though he'd just checked half an hour ago.
"It was when he began turning off the homing beacon on his wrist communicator," Minion said, patting 71 on the dome. "That was the first clue. You have to practically disassemble the comm to turn the signal off. Then all these mysterious 'errands'," he said, making quotation marks in the air with his hands. "Errands. Ha! Then he's gone all night. Like I won't notice?
"Hmph," he grumbled, crossing his arms over his chest. "Not like I'll have to guess where he's at anymore."
Roxanne padded back into the bedroom, took off the robe she'd thrown on to go to the bathroom, and slipped under the covers. Megamind rolled over without even opening his eyes and wrapped his arms around her waist, cupping her breast. Roxanne lay on her back and rested her cheek against his head. Soon he was breathing deeply again.
She was a little disappointed he hadn't woken up, and debated doing so. She felt like making love again before he left, but he was really zonked out. He didn't usually sleep so deeply when he was with her. The dark smudges under his eyes had faded, but weren't entirely gone. He had a highly irregular sleep schedule, staying awake for days, he said, then just catching up on sleep whenever or wherever he could.
Glancing at the clock she realized she would have to get up pretty soon anyway, so she decided to let him sleep.
She yawned hugely. It was probably just as well he didn't come over every night. She couldn't stay awake all night, every night.
She had her work and her friends, and he had his ee-vil devices to maintain and invent. The secret nature of their relationship prevented them from making too many plans in advance, or from getting together at a reasonable hour.
It wasn't like he could just drop by the station and meet her for lunch, at least not in his normal appearance. And if he showed up in disguise, people would talk. Her coworkers would wonder, who was the new man in her life? What about Metro Man?
She already got the occasional piece of hate mail from jealous female fans who didn't think she was good enough for the hero, not to mention some snide comments on various social media sites. If people thought she were cheating on Metro Man, the rumor mill would eat her alive.
She shifted a little to look at Megamind's closed eyelids, the black eyelashes lying against his blue cheek, the strong brows and bridge of his nose.
The sun wasn't up yet but the soft light of dawn spilled in the window. He'd be leaving soon. She wanted this moment to last a little longer, to feel the warmth of his body and the weight of their entwined legs.
She had thought he would be the sort of person to toss and turn and generally make a mess of the blankets, but once he stopped trying to tickle her and playing with her hair, he barely moved all night, even if he didn't doze off.
He told her that he used to sleep with Minion when he was a child so he had learned early on not to thrash around. He still shared a bed with Minion if he were injured, if he weren't locked up in the prison or the hospital, that is. Who would have guessed the self-proclaimed Master of All Villainy was such a cuddler?
She looked at the four thin parallel scars on his left arm. So pale they were almost white against the blue skin, and slightly raised, they ran diagonally across his forearm from elbow almost down to the wrist.
At first he joked that someone had attacked him with a giant comb, but at her persistent questioning he said it was an old injury from an Austrian werewolf, which hardly sounded any more believable, but she knew him well enough to know he was telling the truth.
After further pressing for information he admitted that 'werewolf' was shorthand for 'a man who accidentally had his genes scrambled with those of a wolf and several other unspecified animal components in an Austrian mad scientist's lab.'
"I thought you were so tough," she's said, teasing him a little. "What about your fabulous alien biology?"
He'd pursed his lips. "Sometimes there are... extenuating circumstances which make it more difficult to heal."
He told her. She was shocked.
After a few moments she managed to say, "When I was fifteen I got to go to Six Flags with my cousins on an overnight trip. You were battling secret government agencies."
He shrugged again, and smiled. "Only one agency."
"So modest. How did you do it?"
"A combination of my amazing intellect, persistance, and large amounts of running. Tremendous amounts of running. I could have participated in marathons."
Several more scars marked him, almost all of them hidden by his clothing, except for the very faint, almost invisible one by his right eye. From a knife wielded by another crimelord's henchman, he'd said lightly, though he did not reveal the name of either the crimelord or the henchman.
It grieved her that he'd suffered such injuries, but they excited her, too.
He wore them well, and unself-consciously. The scars didn't bother him. He was more bothered by the inherent physical differences between him and every other human on Earth. His bragging about being incredibly handsome covered a deep insecurity. She let him know through her words and actions that she found him very attractive indeed, and he thrived under her attention.
All of his spectacular losses to Metro Man had led her to believe he was an incompetent, borderline clown, but the scars were evidence of something she hadn't suspected: he really was one of the most dangerous men in the city, if not the most.
And he was all hers.
Four weeks ago, he hadn't been.
Four weeks ago, she'd been anticipating his latest escape with a heightened sense of anxiety, because of what had happened between them six weeks ago.
She found herself wondering what the hell was taking him so long to break out. Were the security features especially difficult this time, or was he... distracted by recent events?
Though when she finally got the call from the police that Megamind had escaped, as she always did when he broke out, to warn her to be on the lookout, she felt a jolt of panic.
I never should have let him kiss me, she thought as she hung up the phone.
The call was a mere formality. The police officer on the other end of the line spoke in a scolding sort of voice as if he believed she wasn't taking proper precautions, which irritated her. She thanked him curtly and hung up.
She spent the rest of the day jumping at loud noises and struggling not to snap at her co-workers.
She hadn't been this jittery since the early kidnapping days, before they became nothing more than a giant nuisance.
Metro Man came by shortly before she went out for her nightly broadcast and offered to fly by her place to check on her but she assured him it wouldn't be necessary.
She may have been a little too vehement in her refusal to have him drop by, because he gave her a puzzled look, but in the end he just said, "Well, if you need me, just scream."
Hal actually asked if she wanted him to sleep over on her couch so she wouldn't be alone.
"Metro Man offered to check on me, but thanks anyway Hal," she said, the words almost fighting each other to zoom out of her mouth.
Hal deflated. "Oh. Well, if you're, like, feeling scared, or Metro Man's, like, too busy or something, just give me a ring and I'm there."
Silently she thanked all that was holy that everyone thought she was the hero's squeeze, and didn't bother to mention to Hal that she had put Metro Man off, too.
The thought of Hal in her apartment was unthinkable, but she automatically said "Thanks, I'll keep that in mind," and promptly banished it from her thoughts.
She most definitely wanted to be alone when Megamind came around. Because they had to talk. Yes, they had to clear the air. There were things they must discuss.
She was well aware of her position as Metro City's Damsel. She wasn't going to get smitten like Anne Hemings the Damsel of San Antonio, who got seduced by El Diablo, the top super-villain of that city, two years ago.
Anne Hemings got pregnant, the scandal broke, and she fled to her hometown of Boise, Idaho in disgrace. El Diablo acted like she didn't exist, and took no notice of her or the daughter she'd borne him.
Authorities were keeping an eye on the daughter to see if she would exhibit any of her father's telekinetic powers, especially if she turned out to have his criminalistic tendencies.
Roxanne wished they'd leave the poor kid alone. All this attention could have the unwanted effect of pushing her into a life of crime.
After work, Roxanne paced around her apartment, fighting the urge to dig the bottle of Chardonnay out of the back of the fridge. God, she needed a drink. She was too nervous to eat supper, but she didn't feel hungry anyway.
Why did he have to kiss me? And why did I let him? she berated herself again.
She glared at the clock on the wall by the bookshelf. It was after midnight. He wasn't coming.
Why hadn't he come? Bastard. Kisses her, gets hauled off to prison, now he's out and he can't be bothered to show up?
Her stomach rumbled. She paced into the kitchen again and yanked open the fridge, settling on a leftover chicken leg from the deli.
Striding back into the living room, she picked up the remote and turned off the TV, too agitated to watch. It had merely provided white noise. Kicking her shoes off she curled up on the couch while she ate.
It must have all been part of the stupid hero-villain game, kissing her. Just trying to see how far he could push things.
Damn him. He was so predictable. Except now, he wasn't. She didn't know what he would do.
She was jittery and on edge and mad at herself for wanting...wanting what, exactly? She was the Damsel of Metro City, she shouldn't be getting... feelings... for the villain. Not for somebody who constantly tied her up and shoved her under swinging scythes and tied dynamite to her head, cackling and making witty remarks.
Then came his latest scheme, which ended up with both of them trapped in his so-called Grotto of Death, a hundred and twenty feet below Lake Michigan, the room slowly filling up with water, and all exits blocked.
Metro Man tried to punch his way in, which nearly made the ceiling collapse.
After Megamind got done shouting at him through the wall to get word to Minion to bring around the blueprints for the Grotto so the emergency responders could enter through the maintenance tunnel, (which also turned out to be partly blocked, but they were able to shore up the walls and work their way in), there was nothing for them to do but wait.
Megamind observed the water level was rising at one inch every fifteen minutes, so even though the Grotto was half flooded, they should have enough time for Metro Man and the emergency crew to reach them before the chamber completely filled, unless they ran out of oxygen, or succumbed to hypothermia, or...
At which point Roxanne told him unless he had something useful to say then he ought to just shut the hell up, and he huffily replied he was getting to that, they would have to share his cape for warmth since they were both soaking wet, unless she found his presence so loathsome she would prefer a slow lingering death, and she snapped well whose fault is that!
But she accepted the offer. Apparently there were no blankets or any other emergency supplies, though he did snatch up a flashlight as it floated by, and so they huddled together on top of the monitors like refugees, listening to the distant sounds of Metro Man and the rescue crew carefully moving debris and shoring up the tunnel.
She was extremely pissed off and found several more things to yell at him about, but six hours of shivering and huddling took the edge off her anger. Plus she found it rather difficult to keep shouting at someone whose face was only two inches away.
And the lights began to wink out. So that was kind of scary, and Megamind looked as miserable as she felt, and they talked some, about semi-ordinary things. And then he kissed her.