Unmasked

A Marvel Crossover

Disclaimer

All recognisable characters and locations in this story are the sole copyright and trademark property of Marvel Comics Incorporated. No breach of either copyright or trademark is intended. This is a not-for-profit fan work for free distribution through the worldwide web.

Censor: T – Just for safety's sake

Chapter 4 – Homework Night at Pier 4

It had been a hard week for both Julie and Franklin. They hadn't realised how completely their lives had come to revolve around each other until, suddenly, it wasn't permitted for them to meet on their own terms. Of course, they could meet at school, but there were things that they couldn't mention there and, anyway, the presence of over 200 of their peers naturally dampened down their freedom of expression. The stress from these limits quickly began to tell on both teens' behaviour.

The day after her speed run down the East River, Alex had spoken to Julie, severely, about decorum and the importance of discretion in the use of their powers. He was amazed (and more than a little horrified) to receive a tongue-lashing in return that verged on a rant, given its length and detail. Julie's voice reached such a pitch and volume that both their parents were attracted to the noise and had to separate them for fear the girl might actually become physically violent. In retrospect, Julie was more than a little relieved that they arrived during her lengthy dissertation on the subject of hypocrisy and the need for free self-expression for a healthy psyche. She didn't want to think of the consequences if they had arrived during the part when she was discussing Alex's own misuse of his powers for his own personal benefit and convenience.

After that display, Katie had been cowed to the point of silence around Julie. Alex himself seemed to be treading on eggshells that week and always ducked into a room if he met Julie walking the other way down the hallway at home (Jack teased Alex for being 'Julie-whipped'). Jack shut up too after receiving a super-fast wedgie for whispering something to his elder brother about 'time of the month'. Allison didn't help in the slightest by finding the whole situation hysterically funny.

It wasn't really her family that was the problem, Julie quickly realised. The problem was that she no longer had the escape route of venting to Franklin. Even if he didn't have any advice to offer, he could always make her feel better in some way, even if only with a quick, sympathetic hug. Lacking that safety valve, she found that she did have the stereotypical redheaded quick temper and a tongue as sharp as a razor (as several of the more bitchy girls at school quickly found out).

Franklin found that several things added to his personal stress levels. Whilst he was relieved that Julie never wore those revealing clothes again, the wardrobe that she had finally settled on did not do his blood pressure any favours. There was something about the way the jeans highlighted her hips that caught and held his eyes (to the point where he had walked into people he hadn't noticed). The hint of bare skin revealed by her loose vest swishing back and forth as she walked was triggering just a strong reaction – he had to continually restrain an urge to lift up the hem of her vest and stroke her belly!

It didn't help that his Uncle Ben and Uncle Johnny had put aside their two decade-long interpersonal conflict to unite in teasing him about redheads and their stereotypical characteristics (most notably, passion). Lacking any way of getting away from his kin, he actually found himself isolating himself in his room. He would spend hours sitting in front of his PC and scowling at the security lock-out graphic on the Instant Messenger program window, desperately reining in an urge to try to use his powers to reformat his grounding out of history. Julie didn't make his effective imprisonment any easier by being seen circling high above Pier 4 on several occasions.

What really haunted Franklin was what he regarded as the most important part of his Dad's impromptu lecture on finding 'the one'. "The one most important criteria in finding a life-mate, son, is that she must be, first and foremost, your best friend. You must feel comfortable with her and able to communicate with her on any matter… You will find that your thoughts stray to her, not in the narrow focus of obsession, but in strange, random ways… Passion fades in time, son, but you will find that you never stop caring about her, caring enough that you can easily put her happiness before your own or, paradoxically, are driven to the most extreme selfish feelings by her." Those words were making him a bit nervous because Julie was his best friend and he did find himself looking at things and thinking of how Julie would react or what she would say or think about it.

All in all, the final day of the heaviest restrictions on Franklin could not have come as more a relief to either teen.

"So, today is Liberation Day!" Julie announced brightly as she and Franklin sat on the wall near the school bus stop, waiting for their respective buses to start embarking for the journey home.

"Well, almost," Franklin replied. "I'm still grounded for another week, but at least I can see my friends out of school and go out at lunchtime to get real food to eat."

Julie personally didn't think of Franklin's dietary choices as 'food' and been trying to persuade him to eat more healthily. However, that wasn't relevant to the current discussion so she put that thought aside. "Even that will be a blessing," Julie reminded her best friend. "It has been really hard not being able to just talk with you freely, Frank. I don't think that I've even been doing so well with my homework without having you to bounce ideas off of!"

"Yeah, I've missed being able to just talk to you too," Franklin replied. "It just isn't the same here! There is always someone around and the gossip network is just too darn fast! If it isn't Dyle and his band of idiots twittering about 'lovebirds', it's Joe and the other guys at the Comp-Tech Club asking me about my 'girlfriend'!"

Julie looked searchingly at Franklin for a long moment before replying. "Would that be such a terrible thing?" she asked quietly and gently. "Me being your girlfriend, I mean?"

There was a long pause as blue and green eyes met and spent a long time measuring each other. "No," Franklin said. "No, it wouldn't be a bad thing at all. But it isn't something that I want to be rushed into by outside pressure, Julie. You're worth more than that."

With a start, the two teens realised that their hands had clasped together sometime during the conversation and, with a mutual blush, they let go and looked away. "No, I wouldn't want to rush into it either," Julie said at last.

The two were silent for a while again before Franklin tried to move the conversation back to less emotionally-charged matters. "Anyway, I should have finished my homework about seven tonight. Talk to you on-line?"

Julie looked at Franklin and he suddenly realised that he didn't know whether he liked or feared the slightly mysterious smile she was offering him. "Maybe," she said. "We'll have to see, won't we?"

Franklin stood up as his bus rolled up to the pick-up point. He squeezed Julie's shoulder and smiled at her before walking away. Now, what in the name of all the six soul gems did she mean by that?

Margaret raised an eyebrow as she watched her daughter, who had suddenly regained her equanimity in the last 24 hours, pack her school books into her old denim school backpack (dating from elementary school). "Going somewhere, dear?"

Julie jumped a little and, once again, wondered if her mom had stealth powers of some kind. "Um… no, I'm just setting up to do my homework." Margaret's expression encouraged her daughter to elaborate. "I'm doing it up on the roof," Julie explained.

"Really? That's the first time you've done that in a week or so! Any reason why you changed your habits for a few days?"

Julie shrugged and smiled gamely, not meeting her mother's oh-so-knowing eyes. "No reason, really," she replied. "It just didn't seem worth it." The girl turned back to the battered old pack to fasten its straps. "I haven't been doing so well since then, though," she added truthfully, "so I decided to see if doing it up there was part of my 'magic formula', if you know what I mean."

Margaret sighed and gestured towards the door. "Well, if you think it might help, dear," she said, despairing again of ever understanding the adolescent female mind. "I just want you down before eight, okay? It gets cold at night, even in summer, and I don't want you stumbling around on the roof in the dark!"

…

Franklin sat back in his chair at his desk in his room and stared at the Literature homework sitting in front of him. This is just the sort of thing that Julie's good at, he thought morosely. Just my stinkin' luck that this essay has to fall due when I can't talk to her as I write it!

…

Sue Richards raised an eyebrow as the small LCD monitor on the door of the refrigerator showed the security alert icon. She walked over the panel and pressed a control giving her access to the sensor displays. According to the radar, there was a small, human-sized object hovering at an altitude of just nine feet over the rear decking of the pier. With a slight smile, Sue reflected that she had a very good idea what, or rather who that was. She made sure that the kitchen was free of its worst post-supper clutter and walked to the back door. She opened the door and walked out onto the water-side deck. "Hello, Lightspeed."

Julie Power, dressed in her magenta-and-black costume, slowly drifted down onto the deck, her rainbow-coloured energy field dispersing as she did so. "Hello, Mrs. Richards," she replied. "You said that I could see Frank again after a week."

Sue raised an eyebrow and couldn't help but smile at the slight, unconscious intimacy of the girl using the contraction 'Frank'. "I said that I'd consider it," Sue reminded her. "What do you want to talk him about?"

Much to Sue's surprise, the girl swung a battered-looking denim backpack off of her shoulders and held it up as if for an inspection. "I thought that he'd like to do his homework with me tonight," she announced.

Sue blinked in surprise for a moment, not able to keep her complete stupefaction from being reflected on her face. "Homework?" she repeated stupidly.

"Yeah!" Julie seemed completely unaware of how she had totally wrong-footed Franklin's mother. Of course, there was the possibility that she did know it and was skilled at schooling her expression. That, Sue reflected, wasn't exactly out-of-the-question, given Margaret's comments about her intelligence and the skills that the girl would need to survive three siblings. "Frank and I always find that our homework is easier and turns out better if we do it together!" Julie completed with an ingenuous smile.

Sue smiled again and nodded to the girl, acknowledging her unequivocal victory. "Really? That's interesting. Well, I'm sure he'll welcome the company and the help! Literature isn't exactly his best subject."

Julie rolled her eyes, although the goggles on her mask hid that from Sue's view. "It would help if he didn't wait until the last moment to do homework in his weaker subjects," the girl said with a certain, unconsciously parental air.

Sue stepped aside and gestured for the younger superhuman to enter the residence. You know, you really have got it bad, she said silently. You're already looking after him! How long before you start organising his desk or brushing down his jackets? Noting that this was how it started with her and Reed, Sue followed her young guest inside.

"So, this is Lightspeed, huh?" Johnny was saying, blocking the girl's path out of the kitchen. "You know, you are quite the hot one! I can see why you caught Frankie's eye!" Julie blushed at the older man's charming grin and frankly complimentary gaze.

Sue, for reasons of her own, found herself not wanting Johnny to embarrass their houseguest. "She's come to help Franklin with his homework, Johnny," she announced to her brother. "I think he'd appreciate it if you didn't give her the third degree!"

Johnny, typically for him, missed the point and shot Sue a look as if he were a puppy-dog she had just smacked for doing a whiz on the carpet. "Don't be like that, Suzie! I just wanted to get to know my nephew's girlf… hey!" Sue goosed her brother with an invisible Ping-Pong ball-sized projectile and glared at him in a way that informed him that now was most assuredly not the time for him to cause trouble, no matter how good his intentions.

"I'm sure Lightspeed will submit to your Q and A when she is good and ready, Johnny," Sue said coldly. "However, if you are bored tonight and want something to occupy your time, we have a garage just across the street filled with miscellaneous parts that need cataloguing."

Johnny, realising that he was on the verge of losing the rest of his evening, fled. However, before he vanished from sight, he had one last parting shot to offer. "Remember this, Red: Make him beg before you let him make out with you! It makes us guys feel so much better about it!"

Julie blushed at the thought of doing… that with Franklin and felt the familiar desire to just melt into the floor and vanish. She turned around to find that her host had the most furious look on her face and seemed on the verge of exploding. "Oh that… brother of mine!" Sue snapped. "He is impossible!"

Julie restrained an urge to giggle. "Yeah, he's obviously a wild one. He reminds me of Ja… of Mass Master, my younger brother. Still, he might be utter obnoxious creep but, you know what? I'd miss him if he wasn't around!"

Sue stared at Julie in surprise for several moments before her mouth started curving upward into a smile. She nodded in agreement and both of them started laughing. Later on, she would realise that it was at this point that she accepted Julie as a potential part of their family and not just as the girl with whom her son had been running around.

…

Franklin was trying again to get into the mind of the late, great Thomas Hardy when someone knocked at the door of his bedroom. "Yeah?"

The door opened to reveal his mother, who was smiling as if she had a secret that she was about to reveal. "Franklin, you have a visitor," she announced.

Franklin turned around to look as his mother stepped aside to reveal a very familiar figure in magenta and black. "Um… Hi, Frank," Julie… no, Lightspeed said. "I… thought that you might need some help with your Literature essay and I thought that you could help me with my math in return!"

Sue couldn't help but smile nostalgically at the speed at which her son was on his feet and standing in front of his visitor. Franklin visibly had to restrain himself from hugging Julie, satisfying himself with grabbing her hands instead and dragging her over to his desk. Sue noted both teens' broad smiles with a strange pang in her heart. "I'll… leave you two to it," she said. She turned to go, getting the feeling that the two teens were probably no longer aware of her. At the last moment, she turned back with an afterthought. "Keep the door open, okay?" Silence; the two were communicating something silently and Sue scowled. "I said: Keep the door open, okay?" she repeated, much more loudly.

Franklin and his visitor visibly jerked and looked up at Sue. "What? Oh! Sure Mom!"

"Don't worry, Mrs. Richards! You can trust us!"

Sue sighed. And I am going to have to do that, aren't I, Julie?

"No, no way Jose! Absolutely not, Lightspeed! That's crazy! There is no way that Hardy could have everintended that interpretation!"

"I'm not making this up, Frank! This is a valid interpretation of the context! If you look at the start of the Fourth Phase, it is practically spelt out!"

Reed Richards homed in on the loud voices of his son and an unidentified young woman coming from the open door of the boy's bedroom. He walked up to the door and looked in. He couldn't help but grin. A redheaded young lady wearing a magenta-and-black masked costume was sitting in Franklin's desk chair, balancing a clipboard with notes on her crossed legs whilst Franklin was reclining on his bed, surrounded by sheets of foolscap notepaper. Both were holding battered and well-thumbed copies of Tess of the d'Urbevilles.

"Look, Lightspeed," Franklin was saying, gesturing wildly, "just because the man spelt it out doesn't mean that he was flagging up his objective for the story! There is something called 'misdirection' you know!"

The costumed girl, Lightspeed, evidently, laughed. "Frank, we are dealing with Thomas Hardy here, not Agatha Christie! He was a counter-moralist, not a mystery writer!"

"He was a counter-moralist according to your thesis, Lightspeed, we still haven't established that his intention was… oh, hi Dad!"

Reed watched as Lightspeed swung around on the desk chair with a slightly guilty expression on her partially-masked face. "Oh! Um! Hi, Dr. Richards!" the girl in a slightly surprised tone.

"I hope that you two aren't getting into mischief," Reed said in a casual tone, as if he were used to his son doing homework with costumed super-girls…

Which, come to think of it, Julie thought, he might be.

"No, we were just discussing whether Hardy thought that Tess had it coming or whether he was decrying the moral standards of the age," Franklin replied with an easy grin.

Reed shook his head. "Tess wasn't on the reading list when I went to high school," he remarked. "It was still considered either too risqué or not risqué enough by most teachers." He shook his head. "Well, in either case, please keep it down. We can hear you two in the Den. Also, I suspect that Valeria is wearing her iPod in her room so she can focus on her homework rather than yours."

"Um… we could just close the door, Dad," Franklin suggested, his eyes wide and guileless.

Reed quirked an eyebrow. "I might be old, Franklin, but I am not senile. Keep the noise down and keep the door open."

As Reed walked away, he had to swallow his urge to laugh at the hissed comments being exchanged in the room behind him. "Frank! I can't believe you said that you idiot!"

"Hey! Don't tell me you weren't thinking it!" Lightspeed's response was a high-pitched 'Eep', signifying a young lady caught out.

Reed shook his head and continued on his way back to the Den with a pleased smile. Intellectually challenging and emotionally comfortable! Those two will go far indeed!

Julie had broken off the Hardy-cramming to go down to the kitchen and get a glass of something to drink. She was confident that she had at least given Franklin enough of an opinion that he could write an essay on the subject, whether or not she agreed with his conclusions. Next up was their math homework and she hoped that Frank would be able to help her turn the meaningless squiggles of calculus notation into something that she could understand.

As she sipped a glass of water, Julie thought back to Dr. Richards' visit and Frank's suggestion on how to keep the noise down. Completely against her intention, her mind began to imagine just how it wouldbe if they had the residence to themselves and they were both able to get on the bed and spend ages just kissing. Maybe then she could find out just exactly what those wandering hands of Frank's, which she had noticed trying to steal a touch time after time at school, would do if they had the privacy they needed…

Julie was standing there like a sun-struck loon, her face slightly flushed, her breathing a little rapid and her eyes dilated when a voice announced. "So, you are young Franklin's paramour, hmm?"

Julie practically jumped out of her skin at the strangely-accented voice and barely avoided dropping her water glass. Instinctively she swung around, dropping into a crouch and raised a hand, powering up a kinetic blast.

"Hmm. Not a bad reaction time, but if I intended harm, little human, you would already be dead. You must sense the foe before they wish make themselves known, not after."

The woman in casual but extremely well-fitting clothes standing in the kitchen doorway was not human. Oh, she was humanoid but she wasn't human. The leaf-green skin, the outsize, pointed ears, bulging ridges on her chin and the mauve-on-yellow eyes identified her as a Skrull, a race of polymorphic reptilian sentients that dominated a significant portion of the Milky Way galaxy. The alien woman cocked her head and sneered at Julie, who was still in a fighting posture. "Of course, I wonder if your… distraction… might be more to do with what you would prefer to be doing with young Franklin tonight rather than study with him. Am I right?" she asked in an arrogantly insulting tone of voice.

Julie scowled and straightened up, recognising this interloper as Lyja Storm, aka 'Laser-Fist', the alien wife of Frank's Uncle Johnny. "That… Mrs. Storm… is none of your business," Julie spat, meeting insulting tone with insulting tone. She knew enough about warrior races from her time talking with Friday about what was out there to know that they did not respect politeness when they had offered a challenge, perceiving it as weakness.

"If you intend to befriend my nephew… or more… it becomes my business, stripling," Lyja purred. The statuesque alien woman stalked over to Julie and began to pace in front of her, clearly measuring her up. "Little more than a child," she murmured as if Julie were an animal and unable to understand her words. Lyja took Julie's chin in her hand and angled the girl's head up so she could look directly at her face. "Still… she seems healthy enough and might be acceptable, if properly trained." There was a nasty emphasis on that word that carried the idea of training a dog or a horse rather than teaching a person.

Julie snarled in response to the Skrull woman's clear insult and slapped her hand away from her. "You will keep your hands off of me," she snapped. "The choice as to whether to accept my company is Franklin's, Mrs. Storm, and maybe his parents'! Not yours!" Julie glared up at the tall alien. "And the next time you touch me without permission, they will be sizing you up for a prosthetic hand! Is that clear?"

Lyja's smile was terrible to behold but she genuinely seemed pleased at something. "Anger at insults," she said in an approving tone. "Caution. Wariness even. Focus upon and evaluation of a potential threat, but not fear. Excellent. You are not as new to the way of the warrior as Susan clearly thinks." Lyja stepped back, opening space between her and Julie and cocked her head in seemingly-genuine curiosity. "You also do not seem to be affected by the presence of one from beyond your world."

Julie nodded. "You're hardly the first alien I've met," she replied, putting an emphasis on the word 'alien' to imply that it was hardly a novel thing. "I've quite a reputation amongst some species out there!"

"Oh? Do tell?"

Julie raised an eyebrow. "Ever heard of the Snar… the Zn'rx? They have good reason to fear me and others of my family."

Lyja snorted. "The Zn'rx? Marauding nomadic vermin, barely worthy of being called pirates, let alone an Empire! Still, for all their lack of honour or any other worthwhile quality, they are capable enough fighters when roused. You have faced them in battle? Interesting!"

"More than once," Julie announced, raising her chin proudly. "They have learnt, in the ashes of defeat, that the skills and abilities of my family are not theirs to use for their own ends in their pitiful internal squabbles." Inside, Julie winced at the exaggerated expressions that she was using, actually quoted from an abortive attempt she made in writing a fictionalised account of Power Pack's dealings with the Snarks. Somehow, she felt that the alien woman would appreciate the rich language.

Much to Julie's surprise, Lyja pulled a stool out from underneath the counter that occupied the centre of the kitchen and sat down, looking at her levelly. "It is good that you have been blooded, even at such a young age," she announced. "Make no mistake, Lightspeed of Earth: To court the son of Mister Fantastic is to invite the enmity of powers of a magnitude that you cannot possibly imagine. Powers next to whom those overgrown bugs the Zn'rx are nothing but fleas!"

"Nothing worthwhile is without a risk," Julie replied quietly and defiantly. "If it is not worth fighting for, then it is not worth having."

Lyja nodded sadly, thinking of her own exile from her entire species and culture when she chose to bond herself to Johnny. "Indeed. However, sometimes the sacrifice necessary is painful beyond measure." She looked up again, meeting the young human female's eyes. "Remember this, Lightspeed of Earth, Franklin has friends who would take the greatest exception to any plot to harm him. However, he also has enemies who would take the greatest delight in causing him pain, especially by way of taking away that which he loves. I will not permit anyone to make him vulnerable because they were unable to survive the world that he inhabits."

"Look, I'm not a babe in arms," Julie snapped, crossing her arms defensively. "I've met aliens and fought threats way beyond what most kids of my age can even imagine. Just being an active superhero brings risk! Franklin is… he is the closest… friend that I've ever had and I won't ever give him up! I'm willing to take any problems that being with him brings upon me! " Something about Lyja's disdainful expression as she listened to Julie made the girl lose a little of her self-control and she continued, fists clenched and her voice rising in anger, to utter truths that she had previously never even admitted to herself. "I will be part of his life for as long as he wants! As long as I can be! I'm not afraid to love him!" Julie gasped and covered her mouth when she realised what she had said with her last, nearly shouted, declaration.

Lyja smiled in a perfectly ghastly way, her eyes filled with a certain mocking pity. "Not afraid? Oh, you will be." The alien woman leaned forward to glare into the young human's eyes, somehow seeming to see right through the lenses of her goggles. "You will be!"

Lyja stood up and strode firmly but unhurriedly out of the kitchen. Julie covered her chest in an attempt to hold in her pounding heart as the adrenaline slowly drained from her system. Did… did she just quote Yoda at me? the badly-disoriented young woman asked herself.

Sue and Reed stood on the rear deck of Pier 4 and watched as Franklin and Lightspeed exchanged farewells before the young woman in magenta-and-black took to the skies and vanished into the evening on a rainbow trail of light. Franklin wore a pleased and relaxed smile as he walked back into the residence. If it were in his nature, Sue bet that the boy would be dancing.

The two lovers stood outside together for a while longer as the sun vanished behind the towers of Manhattan behind them. "You didn't tell her that you knew she was really Julie Power," Reed announced.

Sue blinked at her husband. "Er… how…?"

"Simple logic," Reed responded with a shrug. "If you recall, Franklin first met the Power family shortly after they first moved to New York, evidently approximately at the same time when Lightspeed's abilities first began to manifest themselves. According to SHIELD records, rumours of 'super-children', including one with powers recognisably similar to hers, operating, originally in the upper East Side and, more recently, on the Lower East Side, all date from periods when the Powers were resident in the city."

Reed stretched his arms around his wife to hold her tightly against him. "These factors all are suggestive that the Power family is associated with these alleged 'super-children' in some way. Additionally, the dates prove that Franklin and Lightspeed's powers first began to manifest themselves strongly at approximately the same time. The close friendship Franklin has enjoyed with the Power children would allow for them both to have developed the familiarity with each other's abilities and the confidence in each other's tactics and skills that their 'patrols' together would have required. There was no way that Franklin could have first contacted Lightspeed without our knowing in the time-frame required for their abilities and mutual confidence in each other to have developed appropriately. Unless, of course,they first met in their civilian identities, with our knowledge, and came to know of each other's powers a short time later."

Reed placed a kiss on Sue's cheek. "The behavioural evidence simply backs this up. Franklin has clearly developed a close relationship with Lightspeed but Johnny reports that he has also developed a similarly close relationship with Julie Power. It is simply not in Franklin's nature to attempt to maintain two such relationships. Even if it was, Lightspeed has clearly demonstrated that she is a student in Franklin's year at Clayton P. Sturgeon High School. It would not be possible for him to maintain relationships with two girls in the same year and at the same school without the deception failing in a relatively short time frame, due to the extremely closed nature of the school community. The physical similarities between the two young women in question are merely the clinching argument. There is no logical way for Lightspeed to be anyone other than Julie Power."

"As for how I know that you already knew?" Reed grinned at his wife, who had settled back in his arms. "As soon as I deduced Lightspeed's secret identity, it was self-evident that you would have done so too. You are too close to the Power family not to have seen through Julie's disguise." Reed quirked an eyebrow in a mock-professorial manner. "QED," he concluded.

Sue raised an eyebrow. "My personal super-genius," she teased. "My reason for not telling her was that I don't want to frighten her off, Reed. She is terrified of exposure right now, which, given Margaret Power's sometimes… well, slightly inflexible views on 'normality', is not entirely unsurprising. I want her to view us as friends and trust us with her secret before I tell her that it isn't a secret any more." Sue growled. "Lyja hasn't made that any easier."

Reed laughed gently. "Don't misunderstand Lyja, love. She's worried about Franklin, of course, but I believe she was quite impressed by Julie. I heard her plotting about some kind of training program that would, to quote her 'have the Kree Elite Guard capitulating at the very rumour of her presence'."

Sue had to laugh too. Lyja, mostly due to her military training and warrior culture, was rough around the edges but she was a truly good soul underneath all the armour and spikes. "Reed, she cares for Franklin. She cares for him more than would just be expected from a friend, no matter how close."

"I think Franklin feels the same about her," Reed replied. "However, they're both young yet. Let's give them the space they need to decide what they are going to be to each other and not let them do something that they might regret before they are certain."