Author's Note: I set myself up with this thing where I start every section with an entry from Ralph's journal.

Kiiiiinda not going to do that for this first section because I can't figure out how. So let's just call this a continuation of the last scene.

Previously on Ralph Dibny, PI:

"Why're you so impatient?" Ralph asked, suddenly suspicious. "You're safe at STAR Labs. You're safe with me. What does it matter if we don't catch him right this second?"

Sue hesitated, and the niggling doubt that been bothering Ralph suddenly became clear. "Why do you want this guy put away so much?" he demanded, taking a step forward.

Sue, to his surprise, actually took a step back. "Who says I do?" she asked cagily.

Ralph squinted at her suspiciously. "Sue Dearbon... what are you hiding?"

Present time:

"I wasn't completely honest with you," Sue admitted as she and Ralph sat together in the STAR Labs lounge area. Sue had a glass of alcohol in front of her and Ralph had his phone resting on his knee, waiting for a notification that the second round of facial recognition had done its job.

Ralph rolled his eyes at her words. "Why am I not surprised?" he asked, unable to resist glaring at her a little. He might not have been surprised... but he was still somewhat hurt.

Sue made a face. "Well, sorry if I just didn't think you'd help me if you knew the truth!" she cried.

Ralph crossed his arms. "Try me."

"I was in that warehouse that night because I was investigating," Sue began. "Vayden Marx has been on my radar for awhile."

"So all that facial recognition was for nothing?" Ralph asked, peeved.

"No," Sue said. "I never knew his name, so... thanks for that. He goes by Vayden in the underworld, which I assumed was a cover but is apparently just his first name. I met him a few months ago when we did a deal together. I needed some quick cash and he needed some information, and we made our exchange. But it turned out that my information wasn't... correct. Vayden immediately assumed that I'd double-crossed him and he started hunting me down."

"So why come to me now?" Ralph pried. "After all this time, why just show up looking for protection now?"

Sue bit her lip. She reached for her glass but didn't take a sip, slowly rotating it between her hands instead. "Things have gotten more... serious," she confessed. "Threats on my life- that I can handle. I'm moving all the time. I'm almost impossible to track, as I'm sure you know. But Vayden... he found out things about me. About my past life."

"Your parents," Ralph concluded. It was a guess, but it seemed like his intuition hadn't done him wrong.

Sue nodded quickly and her grip on the glass tightened. "He started sending me these... messages. That'd he'd hurt my parents if I didn't give myself up. So that's when I came to you. I need him behind bars. I can't let my life and my choices hurt my parents, Slick. I can't."

Ralph let out a long breath and leaned back on the couch. As hard as it was to trust Sue after she had lied to him yet again, now he had almost a more pressing reason to help her. If nothing more, the Dearbon's were his clients.

Then again... who knew if this story was even the truth? Sue could have seen Ralph growing suspicious of her and had grasped at the first thing that she could think of that would make sense and play to his righteous side. Someone hurting her? Sure, he'd help her. Someone threatening to hurt her completely innocent parents? He definitely couldn't resist.

Sue set her glass, still full, back down on the table in front of her and got to her feet.

"Where are you going?" Ralph demanded, standing himself.

"I'm... leaving," Sue replied blankly. "I mean... I lied to you. Again. At this point I don't even deserve your help."

She glanced over her shoulder at her escape route (AKA the door), and then back to Ralph. Her eyes seemed suddenly very large. "Thank you for giving me his name," she said. "And for helping me get this far. I, uh... I'll see you around, Slick."

Sue turned fully towards the door and began to walk towards it. Ralph gritted his teeth, trying with all his might to resist.

But when she reached the far wall, he couldn't help it. "Wait!" he blurted, hurrying after her with quick strides. He put a hand on her arm, making sure she didn't go any further. "Just... wait a second. I never said I wouldn't still help you. I- I don't like that you tricked me. Again. And for all I know you could still be tricking me. But... the fact of the matter is that if I let you walk out right now, I will be beating myself up for God knows how long. And I..."

He hesitated and reached up to rub his mouth a second. "If you get hurt, I'll... I'll never forgive myself."

Sue stared at him, eyes wide. "Wow," she said after a moment. "Ralph Dibny... you are an even better person than I thought you were."

She stretched up on her tiptoes and pressed her lips to his cheek before turning and walking quickly out of the lounge area, back towards the Cortex.

linebreaker

'It's entirely possible that my day today is the definition of spiraling out of control. But Ralph Dibny, PI, is going to see this through to the end.

We managed to find Vayden's location with facial recognition and are tracking him with that. Our plan is to drop Sue into an area where we know Vayden will be. She'll be linked up to mics and a small video camera and I'll be on standby, ready to rush in and play hero. Our hope is that Vayden attacks her and she can get the evidence that we need to incriminate him. True, explaining to the cops exactly why Sue just happened to have a mini spy camera on her person at the moment she was attacked is going to be a bit challenging, but hopefully I can take our case directly to Joe and he can give us a hand.

At the moment, I'm in the car and Sue is inside the mall. She's going to buy an outfit that doesn't subsist of my shirt and her underwear... assuming she was even wearing underwear this whole time.'

Ralph stopped his entry as he caught sight of Sue, lit by the fluorescent parking lot street lamps with a shopping back slung over her shoulder. She was dressed in a pair of blue jeans, a flowy olive shirt with flared cuffs, and an unzipped grey utility vest. Her hair, to Ralph's surprise, had styled itself completely naturally as it dried, and now laid in perfect curls across her shoulders. He was once again struck with, if this had been any other life, they might have been a couple out to go shopping.

Sue tugged on the door handle a few times before giving him an annoyed look. "It's locked," she mouthed, and Ralph hurried to let her into the car.

"You look, uh..." he floundered a little, not wanting to come off too complimentary. Any other girl, sure; Ralph would be laying on the blush-inducing charm. But with Sue, that just wasn't apart of their game. "What's in the bag?"

If Sue was disappointed at his lack of comment on her new outfit, she hid it well. "Clothes," she said, looking at him like he was an idiot. "What, do you think I'm going to wear this outfit for the rest of my life?"

"No..."

"Also some makeup," she went on, and started digging in her bag. "So start driving and by the time we get to Vayden, I'll be good to go."

"You don't need makeup," Ralph blurted as she pulled down the sun visor and slid the flap to reveal the mirror. "I mean... you look good. Without makeup. You don't need makeup to look-"

"Just drive," Sue ordered him, rolling her eyes and unscrewing the cap on her mascara.

Ralph nodded obediently and put the car in reverse to pull out of his parking spot.

"Thanks," Sue added softly.

"No problem," Ralph replied, and tried not to grin.

While Sue had been obtaining a real outfit, Ralph had spent a moment plugging his phone into his car and securing their directions to Vayden's ever-updating location. Now, he followed the on-screen path to the red dot pulsing slowly in a spot downtown.

"I wonder what he's doing," Sue asked contemplatively, leaning forward and peering at the red Vayden-tracker on Ralph's dashboard screen.

"Probably just lurking in an alleyway, waiting for someone to knife so he can steal their wallet," Ralph guessed cynically.

When they were about a block and a half away, Ralph found a parking spot along the side of the road and pulled over. "I'm going to get up top of a building so Vayden doesn't see me," he said, turning to Sue. "And you're-"

"Going to walk into whichever alleyway he's camped out in and give myself up," Sue finished. "I know."

She craned her neck to stare at the sky. "You think it's late enough yet? He might not make a move if he thinks people will still be around."

Ralph checked his watch. "It's almost ten o'clock," he reported. "Unless you want to sit in the car and wait, I'd say you're a go. There's no one around. He'd have no reason to pass up such a good opportunity to nab you."

Sue nodded, but she still didn't get out of the car. "How long does it take you," she asked suddenly, "to get down from one of those buildings? With your stretchy-ability-thing, I mean. How long does it take?"

"I dunno," Ralph shrugged. "Fifteen seconds, tops? I let gravity do most of the work if I want to go faster. Why?"

"I just have to wonder if you..." Sue's voice trailed off to an incomprehensible murmur.

"What was that?"

"If you'll be fast enough to save me!" Sue burst out, twisting to face him full on. "I mean, this guy has a gun and he's angry and he's been angry for months. All these times past, I've run and I've gotten away but it hasn't been... it hasn't been without a cost."

She untucked her shirt and carefully pulled up the hem. In the dim light coming in front the street lamps and a few still-open storefronts, Ralph could see a knotted scar faintly in the pale skin of her stomach.

"He shot you," he whispered, before turning his gaze upwards to look at her accusatorially. "You said it was just a graze!"

"Well, I lied," Sue huffed. "What else is new? He shot me in the stomach the first time he found me and honestly? I'm not sure how I managed to get away. Now I'm turning myself in. What's to stop him from shooting me where I stand, the second I walk into that alleyway and he sees me?"

Ralph reached out and grasped her wrist. "Me," he said firmly. "I'm going to stop him. I promise."

linebreaker

'In case, for whatever reason, I die in a few minutes, I'm going to write something quickly.

Sue is checking all of her equipment and is going to start heading towards Vayden soon. I'm ready on the building above him. Right now, it just looks like he's smoking and that he's alone. Hopefully it stays that way.

I can't write for long. Sue is counting on me in a way that I never thought she would. Who knew that the spider and the fly could come to work together to best the snake in the end.'

Ralph tucked his journal into an inside-pocket of his suit and got himself into a crouch. He wrapped his hands around the building ledge, ready to vault himself over the side and to the ground at a moments notice.

"I'm ready," Sue said through their com system. Ralph looked up and squinted down the street to see her step out of his car and push her hair back, adjust her vest, and start walking towards Vayden.

"You're a go," he replied softly. "I'm right over him. He's-"

A side door from the building opposite Ralph's swung open, and two more men walked out. "Sue, Sue, wait," Ralph said hurriedly, glancing back to her form on the sidewalk to make sure she'd obeyed. She was frozen, hovering between the car and Vayden. "More people just arrived."

The extra men approached Vayden and Ralph could hear their muted laughter and conversation filtering up to him. Vayden lit one of the man's cigarettes with his own and he settled against the wall beside him.

Ralph bit back a curse, looking between the men and Sue again. "There's three of them now," he reported. "You still want to go through with this?"

"I didn't want to go through with this in the first place," Sue growled. "But we're here now. You think you can stop three guys at once, Slick?"

"I can try," Ralph said dubiously.

"That's very reassuring."

"Yes," Ralph sighed. "I'll protect you. I promised, remember?"

"Then let's go." Sue's shape began to move again, coming rapidly closer to Ralph and Vayden. A moment later, she was turning the corner into the alleyway. "Vayden!"

The three men froze and slowly turned to stare at her. Vayden stepped forward. He was shorter than the other two guys but his shoulders were broader and Ralph could see that he had, not one, but three visible guns attached in various places on his person.

"Sue Dearbon," Vayden replied. He had a surprisingly middle-range voice for a man of his size, but Ralph felt a shudder run through him nonetheless. He didn't like the feeling it gave him that a man like Vayden knew Sue's full name. "Fancy seeing you here."

"I'm here to talk," Sue said, taking another step forward. Her voice was steady but Ralph was almost positive he could see her shaking.

Vayden raised his gun and Ralph tensed. "And what's to keep me from shooting you right where you stand?"

"Go ahead," Sue challenged. "Try it."

Vayden cocked his gun, and Ralph swung into action. His legs flew over the edge of the building and stretched out, longer and longer until they hit the pavement. Then the rest of him followed until he was standing protectively in front of Sue.

Vayden started to laugh. "I am impressed," he declared, lowering his gun. "I wasn't really expecting him to show up."

Then, with one smooth movement that was too fast for Ralph to anticipate, he pulled a different gun from his belt and fired. Ralph prepared himself to rebound the bullet, hopefully to some place that would hurt Vayden and not kill him, but instead he felt a searing pain coat his skin.

He let out a scream, the pain intensifying in an instant, and fell to his knees.

Vayden laughed again, stepping up to Ralph's side. "Then again," he said. "I'm prepared for everything."

Then he reared back and brought the butt of his gun down on Ralph's head.

Everything went black.

Author's Note: AHHH GUYS YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW FUN THIS IS I'VE LITERALLY WRITTEN THESE PAST TWO CHAPTERS IN A SINGLE DAY!