It seems, since besting the Sludge with my intentions, and I can finally say that my once broken heart has long-since been repaired.
Well, actually - it hasn't been that long, at all. It's been a few hours. I haven't slept a wink.
It is now morning, and the dawn of a new day, indeed.
"Vlad!" Maddie calls from a bed not far removed from my own, in a room preserved from the tussle (they were both equally expensive beds, but I am a gentleman as I've told you, and will not lay with her until I know it is right to do so).
Her voice rings out in a tired and restricted presence, weakly, dryly, no doubt hungover and still in shock.
- "Vlad - you saved me..."
"Oh, pshaw-" I gleefully feign attempts at being modest. "It was nothing. All in a day's work for your typical superhuman billionaire." I strike a vain pose and smile, hoping she is entertained by my bravado.
When I see that her eyes are shut tightly and frown becomes somehow a painful wince, I kneel by her bedside and press a cold compress of jewel-encrusted ice against her forehead to soothe her cranium. I use my powers to keep it confidently chill. Compelled of its own will, my other hand slips over hers and cradles it gently in a hold.
"No -" Maddie corrects - "It was... something."
She groans a bit, and leans forward into my embrace, and into the shimmering cold light.
"We've always been something, Maddie."
The sheets and blankets move forward like recinding waves. Maddie sinks into a smile, somehow taking in the memory of what could have almost seemed like a dream.
"You're right," she replies, as she squeezes my hand. "Where's Danny?"
Oh - right. He's still alive. I tell her the room number somewhere in my long, labeled corridor, and hope that is answer enough for her. I understand her concern as a mother, but right now, I'd like to deal with one pain in the neck at a time.
"Back to us," I try to direct - "about us being something..."
"What kind of something are we, Vlad?" she softly groans, pulling me forward towards her.
My bottom lip quivers at just the thought of a kiss. The mere suggestion nearly melts the icepack, alone. My grip on her hand tightens - as hers does, in mine - and I lean forward, prepared for this moment with a very refreshing breath mint still a stain on my tongue. My hair is a suave gray nest atop the back of my shoulders. I watch Maddie's hair shimmer in a much more perfect radiance as it falls to the pillows on all sides.
"You can put the icepack down now," she declares, "and thank you."
I do as instructed, and touch the brisk, wet surface stain it leaves on her face with my now free hand.
"Today is a day for new beginnings, Maddie," I begin to her, "and you're welcome. It's a beautiful day outside this castle, and there is a meadow that I must show you."
"That... sounds lovely, actually." she says, in smile. "There aren't any vengeful ghosts in the meadow today, are there? I ... kind of feel like taking the day off, if that's alright with you."
"Quite understandable," I say, nodding in mid smirk. "Last night was certainly a revelation."
"That it was."
"But..." and I linger on the moment, hanging from her presence and the way that the light catches her beautiful face. "Anything is possible now, Maddie."
"Anything?"
We are inches apart now, and our lips are like bridges coming apart at the seems to merge into a crashing gush in the sea below.
"Anything, my darling."
I can feel her breath still sweet with wine combining in the air with mine like twisting barrels of smoke. I close my eyes, still half-convinced that we didn't actually survive last night - that, surely, this had to be too good to be true. Surely, this - the moment that I feel I've waited lifetimes for is almost too perfect. Since the day she ran away from me all those years ago... there could only be one thing to ever stand in the way of us. Surely, though, that time is -
- "MADDIE!" -
Oh no.
"What?!" I hear my love stammer in confusion.
This can't be. This is impossible - it's -
"Jack?!"
"HOW COULD YOU?!"
The ominous voice of Jack Fenton is now twisted and hollow, and repeating in an endless, echoing funnel from beyond the grave, and beyond out sight. Somewhere in this very expensive room, with very expensive beds, Jack is definitely here... and vengeful.
So much for one pain at a time, I guess...
I back away, and glow furious in power. My hands warp energies from the unseen to beckon as I transform, rather unexpectedly, out of what I thought was the Plasmius' retirement.
"Jack?" Maddie calls again, believing herself delirious. "... Where ... are you?"
"Dead!" I shout - unfortunately willed to anger in the moment's impossible rise. "DEAD! DEAD, AND I DON'T CARE HOW MANY TIMES I WILL HAVE TO KILL YOU TO MAKE IT STAY THAT W-"
"VLAD!" Maddie scolds.
Damn it.
So... close...
"Maddie!" the ghostly fencepost, an idiot both in life and death, laments. "That... GOOP ... that goop is evaporating into the air. The ghosts - Maddie - they're -"
"They're what?"
I dart my eyes around, searching astral planes for energies and any possible disturbances. Curiously, beyond my own anger at my mortal enemy clinging to life, I sense no such hostility. On the contrary, the world of my once proud legion seems almost asleep.
"If you go with Vlad-" Jack says "- All the ghosts will yield to you, and him... and Danny. I can't leave this world knowing that you would tamper with that kind of power!"
"Oh?" Maddie surprisingly scoffs at the specter's voice, grimacing. "What - you think I can't handle power, Jack?"
- "Maddie, it's not that - it's just -"
"Jack," Maddie subdues, "What did you and I achieve with the power WE had? Did we better the world by harming the ghosts? Did your friend have a long, fulfilling life, or did he feel like HIS life was stolen by our tampering?"
"What about Danny?" Jack calls.
"Danny is smart enough to make his own decisions, Jack... as am I..."
"Maddie..."
"I'm sorry, Jack," she declares. "Vlad's expensive bed apparently has an advanced astral spectrometer on its headboard."
"It was three million extra-" I interject, "-but worth every cent."
"No doubt," Maddie confirms.
"What does this mean?" Jack asks.
The headboard projects an image of a reading similar to a film projector, and shows Maddie, more or less, what I see: sleeping paranormal energy, and remnants of the Sludge. Somehow she and I pick up on it at the very same time in different ways.
"You're keeping the goop alive, Jack," she says. "You have to let me go..."
"Let you go...?"
Part of me cannot even comprehend the words I am hearing, but - no doubt - neither can Jack. Somehow, even more miraculously, the readings show Jack's projected body reaching critical mass, and starting to dissipate in the air as he leans sympathetic towards her words.
"I will protect her, old friend," I say... now influenced by the waves of energy warping and binding all around us. I begin to shed the violence of my alter ego, and return to a normal state... somehow feeling all the more rejuvenated.
The room grows quiet now as I move in close to check on my beloved, and trust in her new dawning words. I caress her cheek slowly as she closes her eyes and tears of resilient acceptance stroll down her delicate face.
"You... are... incredible," I whisper to her. "I... I love you."
"I love you, too, Vlad," she whispers.
Now, finally, I hang on the moment of all moments, one more time. Our lips draw closer in magnetism unbridled.
Finally the kiss arrives as the readings disappear, and the ghosts shield around us, protecting watching eyes from what no mortal man could ever know again: the absolute and pure devotion of my Maddie.
But I am no mortal man.
Maddie's lips are soft and sweet, though slightly dry. My hands cup around her face as I begin embracing her inside the bed.
Though things are moving quite fast, like my powers, everything feels very manageable. The love story that I never thought could be ours finally begins and ends.
In a way, it's probably better that the boy didn't see his father in such a state. To know that the great Jack Fenton relinquished his facade to set his former lover free - to hear him yield to me, as the superior - to probably be teased in his high-school about his dad being a "cuck" - to
... Wait. Why are these bad things?
Maddie's body is warm and welcoming. Her arms and mine interlock, and I am compelled to say again the words that begin my retirement... again.
"I love you."