all reviewers: Thank you for your reviews... and now prepare for the very last chapter.
Disclaimer: For the last time... the Incredibles belong to Pixar and Disney.
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Chapter 7: Revealed identities
Although she was photographed from all sides, she flashed no smile. She didn't care a damn about what people thought of her, probably they believed, her behavior was grim determination. Okay, this was even right somehow. Because she had nothing but her work any more, she put her elastical back into it. But these press harry's would not understand, that she didn't do it for the town, but for herself. She did her work to take her mind off the emptiness inside of her.
The tempest of photoflashs ended and Elastigirl dropped the unconscious kidnapper carelessly, whom she had held up until now. Immediately her face was surrounded by a bunch of microphones. Without the slightest visibly emotion she answered some of the questions, that spattered down on her, the others she left unanswered. However, she was not really in the mood for this bustle, but she hadn't still given a single interview, since she had moved to her hometown again... in fact she had spoken with nearly no one. Thus it was only logical, that the reporters couldn't miss this chance. Nevertheless she decided that it was enough. One last question, then...
"Elastigirl, you have caught dozens of criminals during the last weeks and at the moment you are the most successful superheroine in the whole country! What do you have to say about this matter?"
She turned around to the very young reporter, who had put this question and gave him a piercing look. "Just that such a success is always bought very dearly", she replied coldly. "Everyone who wants to work successfully, has to surrender something very important in return."
"And what is that?"
"The private life", she answered. After this answer most of the reporters relapsed into silence briefly and Elastigirl took advantage of this break and stretched her arm to reach for a sill and to hoist herself. She enjoyed the disappointed faces of the reporters underneath her as she was swinging onto the roof and disappeared from their range of vision. In earlier times she had always enjoyed these interviews, but now she just wanted to be left alone. But these pains in the neck would probably never understand that!
Involuntarily she remembered the fact, that this had been the subject she and Mr. Incredible had talked about at their first meeting. At that time this tragedy had begun. Elastigirl grimaced while she jumped onto another roof. Since she had moved into her hometown again, she had hunted down criminals and had saved people in every free minute. Indeed, in this town there were not so many incidents, nevertheless she was very occupied. She almost never permitted herself to take a break and therefore she mostly fell in her bed dead tired.
And nevertheless, she had not succeeded in forgetting Bob. The superheroine sighed. She had put away all photos and presents, which could have reminded her of him, but even so she wasn't able to do anything but longing for him. The bewildered expression in his face when she had told him about her escapade, was still haunting her dreams... or better nightmares. She hoped, that she would be able to block out this picture sometime, but she had only little hope. She clenched her teeth. She needed at once one more criminal, whom she could beat up, otherwise she would come home completely frustrated again. She landed onto another rooftop.
"Hi."
Elastigirl had not recognized, that somebody had been waiting for her. But now she solidified. She knew this voice! In a hurry she turned her head.
"Long time no seen", Mr. Incredible, who leaned against a water tank, said.
For a moment she was not sure whether she should simply run away or attack the other superhero, but she decided for the first one. She ran until she had reached the end of the roof and stretched her arms in order to seize something on the next roof. Then suddenly something hit her legs and they froze in position. Her hands missed their aim and her arms shrinked back to their normal size. When she looked down and noticed the ice that had enveloped her feet, she was hit by more ice rays. After a few seconds her whole body except the hands and the head was frozen.
"May I introduce you to an old friend? ", Mr. Incredible, who walked closer, asked placidly. He pointed at the other side of the roof, where a wiry, black superhero in a blue-white supersuit and anti-glare refraction goggles was standing. He had crossed his arms, but now he lifted one of the hands to greet apologizing.
"Frozone", he introduced himself. "I'm really sorry, Elastigirl, but Incredible here has menaced me to break both of my legs, if I don't agree to help him."
„Get me out of here immediately!", she shouted loudly and glared at him furiously. She tried to move, but the ice was too thick. Naturally it was going to melt soon, but as long she was trapped. "If you don't release me IMMEDIATELY, I will break your legs!"
Frozone cut a grimace and looked at Mr. Incredible reproachfully. "A really nice mess you've got me into!", he accused him. "Now I have one archenemy more. Thanks!"
Mr. Incredible gesticulated unwillingly. "Let us discuss that later, okay?", he suggested. "Could you please leave us alone for a few minutes? "
"Alright", the black superhero answered and hunched his shoulders. "Now that I have trapped Elastigirl, I probably have to act as a deputy for her. Have fun with her, Incredible." With these words he turned around and created an ice rink from the roof down to the street, which he skated down elegantly.
"Is it too cold for you?", Mr. Incredible inquired, nonetheless he gave her a wide berth. You never knew. "Tell me, then I will break open the ice."
"You would really destroy the only thing, that saves you from losing your teeth?", Elastigirl growled aggressively and clenched her fists.
Mr. Incredible sighed. "Can't we behave like adults? ", he asked her. "It took me long enough to find you."
"I didn't want to be found at all!", Elastigirl snapped and glared at him. "At least of all by you! You have ruined my life!"
"That's exactly, why I wanted to talk with you", the superhero replied quietly. "But at first you should admit, that you weren't completely innocent of this... affair. I haven't forced you to do anything. In addition you should know, that I have lost something too... or better someone." He made a short break and looked at the ground. "Because of our common night my girlfriend has left me."
„And now I should cry, shouldn't I?", Elastigirl inquired snappishly. "But what have you actually expected? That she would fall on your neck because you have cheated on her?"
Mr. Incredible looked at her intensely. She did not like this look, and even less his uncanny calmness. "She didn't leave me therefore, Elastigirl", he answered. "She left me right after she had confessed to me, that SHE had cheated on ME."
Elastigirls eyes widened horrified. All at once she became white as a ghost. No, this wasn't possible!
"You know, back there I woke up most assuredly, that I was the biggest dirty swine in the whole world", Mr. Incredible told her without averting his eyes for just one second. "I had cheated on the girl, that meant more to me than everything in the world. I was terribly scared of going to her, but I was still intent to confess everything to her. I didn't want to maintain a lie, she didn't deserve that. But it didn't turn out that way." He made a short break. "When I went to the door, she was already standing outdoors. I considered, what I should say to her, but she completely took me by surprise. She confessed to me, that she had slept with another man, said farewell and ran away."
In Elastigirls head the thoughts whirred like moths around the light. She could not think straight because every fiber of her body refused even to accept this possibility. But at the same time she saw her own past in front of her minds eye, when she had confessed her infidelity to Bob. It could, no, it must simply not be true!
Bob smiled sadly when he saw, how stunned she was. "It is really hard to accept, isn't it? ", he asked quietly. "I have been refusing to acknowledge this as a possibility for days. I simply refused to believe, that the girl I love could possibly be identically equal with the woman, who had ruined my life. Even now I am not sure whether it is so." He inhaled deeply and reached for his mask. "But I am ready to take the risk."
At one go he wrenched off the mask. Elastigirl stopped breathing as she saw his face, and hers lost the last little bit of colour. She had a lump in her throat and her eyes became as big as plates. The iciness around her was completely forgotten, when she looked into the face, which she had longed for for weeks.
Bob looked at her strangely, sadly and gladly at the same time. "Maybe I'm making a huge mistake right now", he admitted. "But I'm willing to risk it... because Helen is the most important person in the world for me."
This was too much. The world started to fade in front of Elastigirls eyes. With a quiet sigh her head fell forwards and her whole body slackened. A merciful blackout tore her out of this strange nightmare...
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Helen awakened. For one moment she did not know where she was, just before she recognized her small apartment. She tried to calm down her raving heart. This nightmare had worried her tremendously. Now it was luckily over. This was just due to the fact, that she was missing Bob so much, Bob and Mr. Incredible were NOT the same person, she ...
At this moment she recognized, that she was laying in bed in her Elastigirl-suit. She sat up abruptly, looked to the window and became as pale as death again. It was late afternoon. At this time she usually wasn't at home, but going on a manhunt. But if she was here, that would mean that ...
"Are you feeling better?"
She winced with shock and turned around jerkily. Her heartbeat accelerated again when she caught sight of Bob, who was leaning in the door frame. Frightened she asked herself, whether she had gone completely crazy at last. Bob could not be here, he was not Mr. Incredible, she was just imagining all these things!
As Bob realized how badly off she was, he sighed and approached the bed slowly. Elastigirl pressed herself against the wall panicky. "I brought you here, right after you had become unconscious", he explained to her and sat down on the edge of the bed, but he bewore of touching her. "I got the address from Rick, my contact man at the government. It had taken quite a time until he finally came out with it. He can be quite pigheaded." He became silent briefly and looked at her seriously. "How are you doing?"
Elastigirl was still squatting in her corner and observing him tensely. The voice, the warm tone of it, the concern at her feelings, all of that reminded her of Bob. But she was still afraid... afraid that this mad story could actually be true. Afraid that she had been suffering all that time for nothing.
"Why ... why haven't you unmasked me?", she asked with breathy voice.
„You mean because I wasn't sure back then, that you are truly Helen? ", he asked. She nodded wordlessly. "Oh, I am still not well and truly sure. I would like to believe it, because I could convince myself in that case, that I'm innocent. That I found everything Helen lacked in my eyes in Elastigirl, because I felt instinctively, that they are one person. And there are many indications for that: the fact, that Helen had rarely time for me, that I have never seen her in the croud of journalists around me, that you two look very similar, even if your suit is hiding a lot..., however, I am just not sure." He shook his head. "And therefore I cannot unmask you. For a superhero nothing is more important than his secret identity, everybody knows that. If I had unmasked you, I would have betrayed your trust... it doesn't matter whether you are Helen or not." He made a short break and clasped his hands. "If I made a mistake... if you are not Helen, then tell me to leave. Then you will never see me again. But..."
In this moment he was interrupted, because Elastigirl threw herself into his arms so tempestuously, that he would have nearly fallen over. She buried her face in his chest and let out all the tears, which she hadn't allowed herself to weep during the past weeks. She wasn't able to say a word, thus she concentrated on weeping away all her grief. A bright, relieved smile appeared on Bob's face, when he clasped her in his strong arms and stroked her hair gently.
"It's okay", he whispered and rocked her in his arms like a small child. "The nightmare is over, Helen. Everything is going to be allright."
Helen swallowed to regain control of her throat. "Forgive me..."
"There is nothing to forgive, Helen", Bob replied quietly and laid his cheek on her hair. It felt so good just to be allowed to hold her in his arms, to smell her smell again, to feel her presence. "I'm to blame for this misery as much as you are."
„No..." Helen replied and embraced him even more tightly. The love Bob was emitting like a lamp was so overwhelming, that she felt as safe as in the arms of her mother. She recognized, astonished, that she hadn't felt that well in the whole night she had shared with Mr. Incredible... free from all worries, protected and beloved. "I didn't trust you..."
"There was no reason to trust me." Bob's expression became sad when he remembered his behavior during the last weeks. "I haven't been honest to you, Helen. If I had told you earlier, who I was, then the whole tragedy would not have happened."
"That's not your fault, I should have done the same thing", whispered Helen, who was still listening to his heartbeat with closed eyes. The tears were still flowing unhamperedly, but now a faint smile began to play on her lips. "But I had known for a long time, that you were the most important person in the whole world for me. And, nevertheless, I ran away without giving you the chance to speak with me."
"How about we just stop blaming ourselves for everything that had happened?", asked Bob. He pushed the slightly trembling girl gently away and looked into her eyes. "The only important thing for me is, that I have found you again. I was afraid, that you would perhaps lay hands upon yourself."
Helen shirked from his look. "Several times I was on the verge of doing that", she confessed. "I thought, that I had lost everything, that was important to me." She touched Bob's cheek. "Thanks for saving me." Then she wanted to kiss him, but Bobs hands held her back. She looked at him uncertainly. "What's wrong? ", she asked worriedly. "Why don't you want to kiss me?"
"I would die for one of your kisses", Bob confessed with a sly grin. Then he became serious again. "But I only want to kiss the girl I love... I want to kiss Helen, not Elastigirl."
Relief spreaded in Helens body, when she took off her mask and looked at Bob sheepishly. The young man smiled back, leaned forward and kissed her tenderly. Both had been starving for each other so long, they didn't want to end this kiss anymore. It was no hard and demanding kiss like the ones Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl had shared, but full of the trust and the tenderness, which only Bob and Helen were able to feel. Both were suddenly feeling strange, like walking on air, like if this kiss had changed the sorrow they had suffered into joy with a blow. Finally Bob had to break away from her first to gasp for breath.
"You know", he said thoughtfully, "I have always known, that I didn't choose an easy life, when I became a superhero. But I would have never expected, that a little girl could possibly overwhelm me."
Helen grinned briefly and stroked his cheek. "Please stay with me tonight, Bob", she begged quietly. "I don't want to be separated from you again."
"I don't know at all, if I would be able to leave you now", he confessed. He composed his features. "I love you, Helen."
"I love you too, Bob... so much."
Their lips met once more in a kiss. The two sank down into the bed snuggled together, where they lost themselves completely in the sensations of the kiss. It was no wild night like the one they had shared as Elastigirl and Mr. Incredible. In the end, after many whispered terms of endearment, they fell asleep tightly embraced. More than that wasn't necessary. This closeness was everything they needed. Everything they wanted. Forever.
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I'm considering whether I should write a short epilogue in the present... I had something in mind like a talk between mother and daughter about being careful about boys. But I don't know, if that will fit into this story. Please tell me, what you think about that (okay, I'm happy about a review without your opinion too, but I would appreciate it).
