Hey guys! How's it going?

I am so sorry this update is late! I know I said October before, but you know, sometimes chapters take on a life of their own during revisions, and I get so caught up editing and perfecting it that I lose track of time. Haha! My total bad.

But this chapter is probably the strangest and rawest thing I've ever written. It's certainly very unlike all of the other chapters of this story, and I wanted it to be only the best for you guys.

Like I said before, this chapter has a special one time narrator. I'm sure some of you have been wondering what things have been like for this particular character throughout the madness of this story...and now you'll find out. This is the only time we'll get to see his perspective in this story. You'll also find out tons of things in this chapter, starting with the deepest mysteries that have existed since chapter two, along with the mystery of the second Unknown POV. There are also, I'd like to think, a couple of surprises.

This time, I've decided to put the playlist songs before the chapter, hahah. The songs for this chapter on the playlist are: The Scientist by Coldplay (because of course), The 2nd Law: Isolated System by Muse, Butterflies & Hurricanes by Muse, and Exogenesis: Symphony Part 3 by Muse. Lots of Muse this chapter! High stakes call for intense music. For explanations for each song, and for the songs for past chapters, go to my Livejournal.

I've tortured you guys long enough. Enjoy!

Thank you once again to my lovely beta reader TeenQueen661!

Warning: This chapter contains references to suicide.

Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, settings, or properties from The Powerpuff Girls, neither do I own that Carl Sagan quote or Anne Rice quote.

Sorry for any errors!


Chapter Nineteen

"Somewhere, something incredible is waiting to be known." -Carl Sagan

-Professor's POV-

I stared down at their emaciated, motionless, comatose forms.

All six of them.

After an agonizing week—the longest week of my life, where I could do nothing but watch as the boys slowly fell apart at the girls' bedsides, crying and screaming at them to wake up and losing every last bit of the lucidity they had left—they approached me.

They couldn't take it anymore, they'd said. Their symptoms had all taken a turn for the worse, just as it had happened to the girls before them. My treatments—the Chemical X drip, the nutritional drip, the hydration drip, even morphine drips—began to no longer work for them, and their physical pain along with their mental trauma compounded and ultimately became too much for them to manage.

So they begged me, pleaded me, to put them to sleep.

I didn't want to. I very nearly said no. But I looked at the hollow, deadened torment in their eyes, their faces which were empty shells, and I knew these homeless, powerless boys had nothing left. Even Brick, who had seemed the most determined to stick around after Blossom faded, his resolve and strength had worn down to dust in the end. I had never once seen these boys—the once all-powerful Rowdyruff Boys—seem so brittle and drained of everything that had once made them themselves. It was as if they had turned to glass, and any moment they would smash to shards. I couldn't refuse their request.

I knew that this was perhaps the last bit of kindness that I could ever offer them.

So I did it. Because they quite possibly loved my daughters as much as I did, and because they had been possibly the closest thing I would ever get to having sons, I did it.

I asked all three of them to lie down on their beds—Brick on his bed next to Blossom's bed, Boomer next to Bubbles, and Butch next to Buttercup—and did just what they had asked of me. I gave them an anesthesia to fall calmly, powerlessly asleep. And I watched their eyelids close for the last time.

And they didn't wake up. The mighty wave of their comatose states took over after 12 hours of sleep. So I hooked them up to life support, just as I had to with the girls. I lined up all six beds in a row. Limp body after limp body. Listened to their 6 respirators expand and collapse.

Over these last months, I had watched bit by bit, as my world crumbled to pieces before my very eyes due to my own hubris. Because of the boys' request, I completed the last of the destruction with my very hands.

And then I truly was alone.

It had been a few days since then.

I spent much of my time in here, in the hospital ward, just staring down at them. Torturing myself with all my regret and guilt. Going through all the ways that I, in hindsight, could have prevented this all from happening to me—to all of us. I worked through all of the precautions I could have taken; such as monthly—no—weekly health checkups. Constant monitoring. I could have seen it as it started to happen—the destruction.

I could have started my research years in advance. I could have developed a solution just in time. Before it was too late.

I knew that now it was too late.

But I couldn't keep from locking myself in my office, rifling through my files for the thousandth time, searching for anything I could have missed. Going through all of my notebooks and notebooks of notes. Flipping frantically through my books for a new piece of information to magically appear to me, a miracle solution that could surely manifest out of nowhere.

Then, habitually, I'd go straight to my experiment lab where I'd started and then stopped that one wretched, impossible project—the invention that wouldn't invent itself, and yet I could make no heads or tails of myself. I would stare at it until my vision became sightless and blurry, then collapse into a heap on the countertop, quaking like the cowardly mouse that I was.

I had promised Bubbles that I wouldn't give up. Promised. And none of them had known about my attempts at inventing this solution.

But it was too late to do anything now, even if I were to complete it. And deep down I knew I had already lost everything.

In my current tormented state, I of course got little to zero sleep every night. How could I, in my circumstances? My mind was spiraling from lack of sleep, and yet every time I closed my eyes, all I saw were my girls suffering. Suffering because of me.

My agonized mind begged for sleep, and yet my mind made sure that I would never get a regular night of rest possibly ever again.

Finally, out of desperation one night, I opened up my long-abandoned liquor cabinet, which had always been well hidden from the girls. I drank, and I drank some more, forcing my body to shut down into unconsciousness. When I awoke several hours later, bleary-eyed, hungover and utterly debilitated, I wished for death. Not just wished—I craved it.

I thought of some old prescription pills I had high up in my medicine cabinet. I wondered if I had enough left that taking the rest of them all at once would kill me. Maybe I didn't have enough. Maybe it would just be enough to destroy my brain and organs, and I would remain a vegetable—an ill-fated coward stuck inside his own broken mind until his body finally gave up.

I had no family left. No siblings. God knew where my parents were, if they were still alive. No significant other. No daughters, anymore. Who would miss me?

No one. And there was no one and nothing that would fill the gaping emptiness inside of me.

These days of darkness bled so seamlessly into each other that I began to lose track of time.

I no longer knew what day it was, or what time of the day it was. I spent my nights weeping until I was hysterical, and I spent my days lying awake in my misery. I didn't leave the house, either. I ordered hot food to be delivered and ordered all of my groceries—I barely had any appetite, and I considered starving myself, but then I would peer guiltily into the hospital ward at my girls, I'd think of how their ability to eat was taken from them. Then I would force myself to eat a meal.

I would give the delivery people extra tips to come through the back gate to the back door. And if any prying questions were asked by them, the door would be slammed in their faces without a single word from me.

As the days passed and it became longer and longer that the girls and boys hadn't been seen in public, the press became more insistent. Ringing the doorbell at odd hours of the day, calling the house. The phone rang constantly.

The girls' phones—which I kept charged for them, though I didn't know exactly why I did, except for maybe a sense of normalcy—constantly pinged and vibrated with text notifications and hotline notifications and phone calls. At some point, I saw the Mayor's caller ID show up when the home phone rang. I still didn't answer.

I knew better than to look at what people were saying on the Internet. I turned my Wi-Fi off to resist any temptation.

More time passed.

And during one equally dark day, after I woke up smelling like bourbon and wandered emptily into my office, I began flipping through my notes for what was probably the thousandth time.

And I didn't realize that I wasn't alone until that terrifying voice erupted the dead silence.

"Gracious, you smell awful. When was the last time you showered? And did you sleep in a brewery?" The airy, lackadaisical voice had an echo surrounding it, and it pulsed through the space of the room like a negative spike of electricity.

Every hair on my body stood up at once.

I spun around, grabbing the nearest object to me—it happened to be a pencil. A pencil that hadn't even been sharpened in days. Despite its' uselessness, I wielded the dull thing in front of me anyway. I couldn't afford to be empty-handed in this situation. Because there he was, sitting before me in all his otherworldly, frightening glory—Him.

Long limbed, unsettling crimson skin contrasted against his all-black designer clothes of some sort—save for the ginormous, fluffy pink collar that poofed out in all directions to the height of his cheekbones. Several feet in the air, close to the ceiling, he was sitting on what seemed to be levitating, curling, pink mist—it was translucent, but he was sitting on it like it was a solid chair. His legs were crossed at the knee, his arms were folded with his sharp claws tucked under each elbow, and his contemptuous black gaze was locked directly on me, his nose wrinkled in disgust. Then, with a strange wariness, the villain greeted me. "Hello, Scientist."

I couldn't hide my terror at the sudden appearance of this malevolent villain in my laboratory—it was as if he had materialized out of nowhere. Perhaps he had. "W-What are you doing here? Get out of my home!" I lifted the pencil higher as Him levitated closer to me, mist and all. "Stop right there! I'm warning you! I'll…I'll call the police!" Even saying that felt rather stupid. As if even the Townsville Police Department would help me now.

The pencil I held suddenly tugged out of my clenched fingers by an invisible force. As I watched in horror, it floated away from me a few feet in the air—then, completely on its' own, snapped in half and dropped to the floor.

I jumped, and reaching blindly behind me, I grasped a pen. Taking another backwards step away from Him, with my shaking hand, I held out the pen threateningly, beads of sweat beginning to gather on my forehead. "Don't come any closer!"

Him eyed my pen, seeming to deliberate over whether or not he wanted to snap it in half also, but to my surprise, the villain snorted. "Oh, would you relax? You look rather pathetic like that. And don't flatter yourself. I didn't come here to kill you." He sniffed, looking almost…affronted.

I stared at Him, pen still outstretched, staying guarded and silent.

Legs uncrossing, Him stood on his pink cloud is it moved closer to the ground—then he gracefully touched down to the linoleum floor, his high heeled shoes clicking against it. He continued, smoothing his jacket sleeves with sharp red claws, "Really, now. I have much better things to do with my time than to squash little cockroach humans such as yourself. And much more pride, I'd like to think." His black lips curved upward smugly in the corners.

Very slowly, warily, I lowered the pen slightly. His towering height and very aura was utterly unnerving. All of the instincts inside of me were screaming to defend myself and escape. As I stared at him, I thought through all of my possible escape routes. There weren't many. The front door was very far away. But in the hospital ward, there was a window—it was in a window well, but it was there. It was the only window in the entire basement. Could I climb out of it? Could I even outrun Him quickly enough to get there in my hungover state?

I squinted at Him, asking distrustfully, "Then…why are you here?"

Him sighed somewhat irritably. "I can tell that you still want to run. However, if it will help convince you that I mean you no harm today, I will be frank with you about why I am here." Abruptly, his smirk faded. Him stared at me, strange, alien-like eyes severe and hard. "It's simple. I've come to tell you that you can't let those super-powered nuisances die."

A silent moment passed. Then another. Then another. I didn't understand. I shook my head, not comprehending what this creature had just told me.

I was certain I had just imagined Him saying that. Maybe, in my crushing grief, I was hallucinating this whole exchange. That seemed much more likely than Him actually saying something like that, or Him even showing up here at all. Only I didn't dare pinch myself in this moment, just in case it was real. I blinked at him, then finally bit out, "What?"

He sent me an impatient look, sighing once again. "Work with me, here. You're not deaf, Utonium. You heard me." Him turned his chin up to me, sharp goatee aimed at me like a gun. "I told you to save them. So do it."

I didn't even know where to start with an answer for such an order. There were so many questions flying around in my mind that I didn't know which one to articulate. Eventually, the one that I settled on was, "Don't you think I've tried?" The question came out breathless, pained.

Dry, Him said as he folded his arms again, "Not hard enough. Clearly."

"But I have been." I backed away a step, my leg colliding with the chair behind me. I grabbed the back of it so that I wouldn't fall. "You have no idea what it would take," I told the strange villain, despite my remaining wariness. "What lengths I would have to go to." I didn't know why I was humoring this conversation, except that maybe I was curious to see where this would lead. Hopefully it wouldn't lead to my demise. If I had to leave this Earth, I had hoped it would not be at the hands of a demon.

"I know exactly what you have to do," said Him evenly, looking at me through a lidded gaze, in an almost bored manner. "You have to finish creating Chemical Y. You have to finish what you've barely started."

The shock burst inside of me like a short circuit. How had he known? Had he been watching me? Had he been watching all of us?

Somehow, knowing he knew precisely what I had to do made me even more upset. It added another 10 tons of weight on my shoulders. My legs gave out at once, and I slumped down onto the chair. "You don't understand," I said. "I don't know how I could. Chemical X took years for me to discover, years of trial and error. I can't even understand the composition of this chemical I'm meant to be developing. It's…utterly impossible. Far beyond my understanding and capability, and perhaps for any scientist alive. By the time I could even develop a working version of this Chemical Y, it would be far too late. I would be old and gray. And if Chemical X was flawed, how could I create some sort of flawless upgraded version of it? I couldn't. It's hopeless." My face was buried in my hands. I had thought about this process over and over, and each time I thought about it, it just filled me even further with misery. To myself, so low that I thought Him wouldn't be able to hear it, I whispered, "I can't do it."

Him's reply came bluntly. "Well of course you can't," he said with a light, mocking laugh. He went on, "Yes, there are even things the great Professor Utonium can't figure out by himself. And on top of that, you're already graying and wrinkling like a prune. You humans age like house flies." A flare of genuine aggravation lit up inside of me at that. He was wearing on my already thin patience. Him went on, "You may be a genius by Earth's standards, sure, but you're not limitless." There was a pause, one where I presumed that Him was watching me—it felt like he was. Then, quieter, Him said, "But I am. That's why I'm going to do it for you."

A moment of long silence echoed. Then, very slowly, I lifted my face from my hands and looked at him. "What?"

A slow, succinct nod. "You heard correctly. I'm choosing to save your pathetic reputation and help you."

My face had drained, and my throat had gone dry. Was I not hallucinating after all? Was this really happening? For another long moment, I didn't even know what to say. So, being the intelligent and articulate scientist that I am, I replied, "Oh."

The villain rolled his eyes and said, "However, if I'm going to do this, here's the deal. No one knows I was here, and they will never know." Him said, breezing past me as I watched. The huge pink fuzzy collar of his extravagant suit jacket stirred whenever he moved. "Ever. For as long as you live, you will not tell a living soul. And if you tell anybody, I will slit your throat with my bare claws." He spun, facing me again, sharp severe eyebrows raised high. "Deal?"

Finally, I mustered the courage to ask a timid question. "Why would you show up here to help me?"

He turned, facing mostly away from me again he was standing in the doorway, looking down the hallway at what I assumed was the doorway of the hospital ward. "Maybe I don't want to see those brats die this way. Maybe I want to mess with them forever." He paused, staring blankly now. "And since the boys are technically part my creation too, I think I should have a hand in saving them. I can't stand to see them go to waste this way."

I watched him still, straightening my glasses. The lenses were straining my eyes and making my hangover headache throb worse, but unfortunately I still needed them to see. I asked the villain another question. "But if I enlisted your help, how when I know you won't try to kill them?"

Him burst out in a dry, hard laugh as he turned to face me again. "Do you think I would go to these complicated lengths to kill them, and while they were at their weakest?" He rolled his eyes. "lf I had truly wanted to kill them, I would have done it already. I would have long ago crushed them like ants."

I eyed him distrustfully, unable to be sure if I could trust what he was saying to me. "You don't want to kill them?"

Him shook his head once, straight faced. "Never have." He paused, eyebrows lifting, then he shrugged a shoulder delicately, admitting, "Okay. Erase everyone in Townsville's memories of them and make them all turn against the girls with murderous inclinations, yes. That was just that one time. Just a bit of fun. But kill them myself?" He scoffed. "Come now. Where would the fun be in that?"

Remembering the mind-control incident from over a decade ago, I cringed in discomfort. Still distrustful, I continued. "How do I know you wouldn't mess them up in some way? Make it so they'll all belong to you, or something."

Him smiled an unsettling, fanged, painted-black smile. "I am not such a selfish creature, Utonium. I'm crafty, but not impatient. Why do you assume that I would take one of my true pleasures away from myself, and in so easily a way?" His mouth twitched. "Frankly, I'm insulted."

"Let me have your word," I told him. I didn't know how trustful his word was, but I still needed it so I could stop feeling like I was going to be fighting for my life at any moment.

"You have it, Utonium. You have my word," said Him. He was still smirking.

I examined him for a moment. Him watched me back, unflinching. Nodding, I said, "Thank you." Then I said, "But why do you care about what happens to them? Truly. Be honest with me. That's one thing I just can't understand about this," I said, frowning. "The boys I understand, because like you said, to an extent they're partly yours. But…the girls. Why would you want to save the girls as well? They don't mean a thing to you. Why not just come here to save the boys alone?"

Him paused for what seemed to me like endless seconds. The look of contempt and amusement wiped off of his face. Replacing it was a graveness that made him look ancient.

Finally, he said, in a voice so quiet that it took me by surprise, "Let me put this bluntly, in a way that you can understand. I have lived a long time. Longer than your brain could comprehend." Him gave me a measured look, looking strangely wizened. "I existed before this Earth did. I existed when this galaxy began to form from featureless bodies of gas and rock. I traveled all the dimensions in existence for eons without ever speaking, without ever meeting another living being that interested me. And then this world of yours finally came to be. For centuries upon centuries, and then for centuries after that, and more after that, I made this planet my residence. But still I rarely found other beings that interested me."

I had been stunned into awed silence, listening to him. Of all the things I might have expected him to say, this had not been any of it.

The villain stared down at the floor, at his own shiny shoes, continuing, "Let's just say that I lacked any sort of purpose for a very, very long time. This way of living that I have now…though you and every other human may not like it, though you may despise it and fear it, I'm finally living as my truest self, to my fullest potential as the being that I am. And in their own way…the girls and boys alike…they remind me of that. They challenge me—in an amusing way, of course. However, playing with them…it gives me something. Their passion when they protect all you humans and creatures, and your ways of life—I am not a creature that can be easily surprised, Scientist. I see all. And yet…they always find some way to surprise me." Him fixed his gaze on me again, unsettling black staring through me. "I feel as if…those things that challenged me are being taken from me. Taken from me just after I've discovered them. And that…enrages me. Deeply. And at first I passively observed what has happened, thinking that would be enough, and that I had no business getting involved in this…but I was wrong. I cannot tolerate it."

So that was what it was. To Him, they were his toys. And now his toys were being taken away. That reason made sense, considering a creature like Him couldn't possibly feel something like compassion or sympathy. He was here for his own gain.

Feeling as if I had caught a glimpse of something impossible, a fantastical worldview that I maybe never would have gotten to hear so candidly in my lifetime, especially if I had become a doctor like my mother had wanted, I accepted the things he told me immediately. They felt strangely sacred. I got the distinct feeling that I was possibly the only living soul he had told this to. Respectfully, I changed the subject slightly, feeling that prodding about what I'd been told would be rude and unwelcome. "What about Mojo? How does he feel about what is happening to the boys and girls?"

Him's reply was clipped and bitter. "He's gone."

This curt reply surprised me. "What?"

"Mojo knew about what was happening to the boys and girls. I told him. And through his new knowledge of their Chemical X failing, he realized that it was affecting him, too." Him turned, handing me a slip of paper that had inexplicably materialized in his claw out of nowhere. Hesitantly, I took it. After I took it, he said, "The Chemical X faded in him, too. He's just a monkey now. He can't help us. Read it for yourself." He stared at me. "It's up to us."

Giving him one last, unsure glance, I opened up the folded piece of paper. At the top, it said, 'FROM THE DESK OF MOJO JOJO'. Quietly, I read the compelling, disturbing letter that Mojo had written. It detailed the ways that his de-transformation had happened, and in the end, begged the reader to either contact me to help him, or for the reader to take his place as Mojo Jojo.

Finishing reading it with a heavy sigh and a shake of my head, I handed the letter back to the red devil in front of me. "Goodness," I said under my breath. "Perhaps I should have guessed this would happen. I was so preoccupied with the kids that I forgot that Mojo…" I trailed off. I didn't know what else to say.

With a brusque nod of agreement, Him took the letter back, folded it back up, and it disappeared into thin air again. "Strangely, I didn't know either. Not until it was too late. I had my back turned on him for just one moment, and—" Him stopped suddenly, clearing his throat. Then he folded his arms. "Nevertheless, that's another reason I'm here. To see if we could possibly save that maniac."

I considered this for a few long moments. Getting Him's help—his unlimited, powerful help—to save these kids would be invaluable. But would I risk bringing Mojo back just to have my girls? Could I live with the consequences?

Putting off the decision for a little longer, wanting to think about it more rather than make a rash decision, I asked the villain warily, "Why would you want to help anybody? You're evil, aren't you?"

He raised a neat eyebrow. "Evil is relative." Him cocked his head. "What does the word 'evil' mean to you?"

I took a moment to think. I leaned back in the chair I sat on. "Evil is the opposite of good," I finally said. I thought that this definition seemed simple enough to be true.

"I see," Him replied, shifting his weight to his other hip, arms still folded. He smirked down at me. "Then what does the word 'good' mean to you?"

I couldn't help but think that this felt like one of his riddles. I thought harder this time. Carefully, I said, "To me, 'good' means…pure. Harmless."

"Purity?" Startling me, Him burst into a laugh. It was booming, and it hurt my head. "You scientist types. So analytical. You always see things in absolutes, in black and white. I've got news for you, Utonium. Things don't work that way. In this universe or any."

Flummoxed at his rebuff, I asked the villain, "What do you mean?"

Him continued to laugh, shaking his head, beginning a slow pace around my office. "You're all the same. All your laws are written to keep you in place, and for what? They're broken anyway, even occasionally by your own law enforcement." His amused expression began to fade, contempt taking its' place as the tone of his voice sharpened. "You think laws and constructs make you good. You think doing everything right while everyone is watching makes you a saint. It doesn't. You humans? Hypocrites. Maybe you would see that if you weren't so busy condemning each other and tearing each other apart like starved tigers. Look at your histories. Isolating those that are different from you. Enslaving and killing those you deem not as human as you are. Fights to the death in arenas full of screaming spectators. That, Professor Utonium, is evil. If you ask me, goodness doesn't exist. Not readily, at any rate. Not in this world."

My throat had gone dry, watching him pace to and fro and listening to his vehement ranting. "Fair enough," I said. He had a point. Several good points, actually.

Him went on, his gaze scrutinizing me. "Maybe you considered Mojo evil, but at his very core, was he really? Think of where he came from. He was born a mere animal. An animal with no ability to form intelligent thought, no ability to have grand ideas, no personality. You inadvertently gave him all of that with the Chemical X. He gained a soul. And with that soul, he chose how he wanted to live. Just because he chose a life different from yours, it doesn't mean he was inherently evil. You throw that word around so easily, but what does it really mean to you? When does a person or being cross over from being misunderstood or eccentric or different to evil? Where does the line lie?"

I was nearly speechless. What was I to say to those provoking arguments? I nodded slowly, relenting. "I can't argue with that. You make very good points." Pausing a moment, I continued. "I admit that I don't have the knowledge to answer those questions. That being said, according to my personal beliefs and morals, Mojo was indeed evil. And so are you."

Him looked at me, not smirking this time, but at the same time having a smirking light in his eyes. "'Evil is a point of view', Utonium. Maybe to some, you're the evil one. You certainly were to Mojo."

I nodded again, accepting the fair blow. Perhaps everyone was, indeed, evil to someone else to a certain degree. Even if they didn't realize it. I leaned forward in my chair again, then stood up. "So, with this whole argument, I'm guessing you mean to tell me that though you aren't particularly good, you aren't so evil that you would refuse to help someone when you might get something out of it as well. Is that correct?"

The villain before me let a few seconds pass as he looked at me. Then a giant, toothy leer spread across his face. His teeth were such a bright white that they almost hurt to look at. "Congratulations, Professor. You're living up to your name."

For a moment, the absurdity of the situation hit me all at once as I pictured how we might look standing face-to-face like this: on one end, an aging, disheveled, human scientist, and on the opposing side, an otherworldly, immortal, six-foot tall humanoid demon dressed in heels and Prada. Complete opposites, and now an unlikely team in the pursuit of science.

I took a deep breath, then sighed. "All right, Him. If we're going to do this, I have to ask you some questions first. I need some answers, and I know you have them." I paused impassively, folding my arms as Him crooked an eyebrow. I added, "Only then will I feel like I can trust you enough to work together."

Him smiled again. Wide, baring blinding whites within black, glossy lips, almost lecherous in its' enjoyment. I couldn't help but squirm in discomfort at the appearance of it. Him said, "Then consider me an open book, Scientist. Ask me your questions. I'm sure I can guess at what they might be. The meaning of life, maybe? Bigfoot? Or the secret to time travel? Crop circles, perhaps?" He leaned forward, whispering indulgently as he added, "between you and me, around half of those crop circles are created by me. I consider them a hobby of mine. Certainly passes the time."

Ignoring his smug comments, rolling my eyes, I went forward with my first question. "So, Him, tell me. In that letter, Mojo says that he and someone else were the ones that made all of those white Chemical X monsters that the girls and boys were fighting late last year. Do you know who was working with him?"

Him's smugness abruptly faded at my question, and he blinked at me in surprise. "Of course I know who it was. It was I. Didn't you know?" Him added straightforwardly, "It was Mojo and I. Along with that dreadful Morbucks girl. Her millionaire father was the one that funded the whole project. Could have sworn you had figured that out already."

Jolting, I stared at Him in shock. So it was all three of them. No wonder the girls couldn't pin it all down on one single villain. "No, we didn't know. None of us knew." I stopped, flummoxed, then said, "Wait a minute. Morbucks? Princess Morbucks? But why would she work with either of you?"

A slow side grin. "She had always hated those girls. She hated the boys, too. She wanted them all gone. As did Mojo, obviously. It was an indulgent revenge scheme for the both of them."

I ruminated over this in awe. "I can't believe it. I knew she didn't like the girls, and for a while when they were kids, she was a real nuisance for them, but I didn't think…" I trailed off, shaking my head. "How did she even get involved with you two?"

Taking a deep breath, Him leaned his elbows back against the countertop behind him and began. "Well, when Mojo approached her, asking her to fund his plan to ruin the girls' and boys' statuses and then rid of all of them for good, she couldn't resist. They had already worked together before, and she was the only one still willing to team up with him after his reputation in the villain community had become so dreadful. She also hadn't had the best track record in her villainess career, after all, and it's not like anyone really wanted to work with her, either. She had been out of the business for ages, and such a hiatus is usually unwelcome for a crime partner, but Mojo really had no other options. So the two of them came to me, needing my powers to help create the most horrifying creatures imaginable. Creatures that would be nearly impossible to defeat in 1 on 1 battle. Hundreds of them. The plan seemed desirable, so I agreed. I hadn't joined in on anything fun in years, and it was good to get back in the game.

"The creatures were of my design, of course, and I designed the overlapping circles symbol as well, with one circle to represent each of us. I designed the creatures to be nightmarish in appearance, with unsettling human features at the same time. Their designs were meant to symbolically represent the monstrous sides of humanity. Quite artistic of me, I should say.

"They were also designed to appeal to each of the girls' weaknesses. Bubbles' aversion to insects, Buttercup's bloodlust, Blossom's tendency to overanalyze her opponents and rely heavily on her mind. I wasn't anticipating the boys' help during each battle, though. We had been counting on the girls fighting them solo. Mojo's schemes did always have flaws. I suppose that's where the plan was flawed." He paused. "That, and the cloned Chemical X that Morbucks girl's multi-million-dollar super computer designed. None of us had any idea that the clone chemical would burn out so quickly. We also didn't know the real Chemical X, which her father had bought a sample of from the Townsville Science Museum, was burning out. Not until you discovered it too late." He looked down, pinching his black lips together hard. "Not until it was too late for Mojo. That stupid, hopeless bastard."

Coming back down from my jolt of surprise at hearing that Mr. Morbucks had bought my Chemical X donation from the museum, I eyed the strange villain across from me. If I didn't know any better, it would seem like Him was upset about Mojo returning to his full chimp state. Whether he was sad, or just angry, though, was a mystery to me. I decided to change the subject back to the young villainess. "What happened to Princess when the monsters collapsed dead during the big battle?"

Seeming to recover from his brief moment of upset, Him answered, "For a few days, she launched a smear campaign against the girls and boys. Paid several media sources heavily to twist the story to make it seem like the girls and boys were washed up, useless superheroes."

I nodded slowly. That had explained the ridiculous media outrage. They'd been paid to do it.

Him continued. "It accomplished at least one aspect of the original plan. But when the public backlash didn't last as long as we'd all been hoping for, she just left. Cursed at us as if it was our fault that we'd failed, took all her money, and left. Greedy little bitch. And I thought your girls were the unbearable brats." After saying that, his eyes slid in my direction again. "No offense," he said slyly.

I only cleared my throat, folding my arms.

Him went on, "Honestly, though. That Princess girl is unbelievable. She's pursuing modeling now. Modeling. So much villain potential inside of her, so much potential to become my protégé, and she's squandering it on the fickle fashion industry."

I shrugged a shoulder, somehow amused at his outrage over her choice of career. "You never know. She could change her mind, one day." He directed a glare at me, seeming to catch my sarcastic tone, and I immediately sobered up again. "You know…I suppose in a way, I should thank you."

He made a giant, full-bodied recoil like I'd suddenly transformed into a rotten egg. "Disgusting. Don't be so absurd. Why on Earth would you thank me for anything?"

I thought for a moment, and then I just came out with it. "Well, without your aid in the creation of those monsters, I wouldn't have known what was ailing these kids until it was really too late. In a strange way, you've already helped." I nodded at him solemnly. "So, thank you."

Him had the strangest look on his face. He certainly wasn't used to being thanked by anyone, let alone me. He cleared his throat, looking very uncomfortable. "Do me a favor, Utonium, and keep your thanks to yourself. I already know that you're grateful for my being here, so let's not make this more uncomfortable than it already is." He away walked to the other side of the office again, heading to the door, his high heels popping against the tile floors. "So if you're done asking me these frivolous questions, let's just get this done with."

After I followed him out of the office, I showed Him where I kept my lab coats, he shouldered one on—making sure the furry collar of his jacket underneath still showed, though the sleeves were too short on his long arms—and we got quickly to work.

I showed him my blueprints for Chemical Y, along with all of my equations and all of my notes. Immediately, Him began showing me where parts of my plan were flawed, and which parts had potential. We discussed these back and forth for an hour—and then my stomach growled. Loudly.

"I forgot you humans have to consume things to stay alive," Him muttered to me ten minutes later. He was a few feet behind me, leaning against the kitchen counter and watching me haphazardly throwing a sandwich together. After another moment or two of silence, he grumbled, "Would you hurry up and eat that, please? It's not as if you're on a cooking competition reality show. Does there really have to be so many ingredients?"

Five minutes later, Him remained impatient as he watched me uneasily eat the sandwich under his gaze, bite by bite. I chewed as he sighed, shifted in his seat, and tapped his foot against the kitchen floor.

When I was finished eating, we immediately got to work on the new blueprints for Chemical Y.

Step by crucial step, we figured out how to build upon Chemical X's strengths and eliminate its' faults. We decided to keep its' radioactive qualities, but gave it more balance so that it wouldn't become unstable and burn out eventually. Him figured out how to give it more longevity, explaining to me that we had to strengthen its' structure. "This way it won't collapse. Ever," Him said to me when he was done explaining and writing the intricate equation down in his elegant handwriting. It was algebraic, but seemed to be some ancient form of algebra—I could have sworn that a portion of it was written in Greek.

I stared down at it, amazed. How had I never seen that myself? This was perfect. It was going to be perfect.

There was one thing, however: the radioactive quality of this chemical would be, though more balanced, stronger. More potent. How much more potent it would be, though, we wouldn't know until the experimental phase.

The day after that, we began the development of Chemical Y. At first, Him petulantly insisted that he just poof it into existence and get the boys and girls to ingest it right away. Aghast, I argued that it would take several stages of experiments to make sure that the chemical was just right, so that no mistakes were made. We couldn't risk botching or poisoning them.

I also added that, when the time came, their bodies would have to be fully soaked in the chemical so that it would absorb into their cells via osmosis, since their unconscious selves were in no shape to ingest anything. Grudgingly, the villain agreed, and after I gathered the necessary elements and equipment we would need, we got started on the first precarious phase.

Watching Him use his powers in the lab as if it was nothing was terrifying to behold—fascinating, but terrifying. Mostly I just looked away as he used them, or looked at him only in short intervals, or else I would get too uneasy and even a little dizzy. Every time he used them, it felt like the oxygen was physically being sucked out of the room. At my request, he only used them sparingly.

After many, many hours of slaving away, a full day in fact, the first tentative development of Chemical Y was completed.

Its' appearance was much different from how Chemical X looked—instead of being solid black, Chemical Y was silver and shimmery. That aspect of it had been Him's idea, of course. It was slightly more viscous, almost sticky, and it was opaque. And when it was freshly made, it glowed—its' glow had a kind of LED quality to it. It was so bright that I had to wear sunglasses underneath my lab goggles.

That day ended, and I went to sleep up in my bedroom.

"What about you?" I had asked Him before I began to climb the stairs. He had come upstairs to the living room to sit calmly on our white couch, legs crossed. It was perhaps the strangest thing I had ever beheld in my own home.

Him smirked up at me. "I don't do that thing that you call sleep. I don't need to." He lifted a claw, making a shooing gesture at me. "Go on, go ahead. I'll be in and out, find other things to do. I'll return by morning."

The day after, just as he said, Him returned. And after I ate some toast and had some coffee, we went straight to work. We started with the first phase of experimentation: reactions to living necessities, starting with water. Very carefully, I added a small drop of water to an even smaller sample of Chemical Y.

BOOM.

Unharmed, but startled backward from the violent, explosive reaction, I fell off of the stool I was sitting on. Him only stared down at me on the floor for a few moments. Then, lips pressed together as he nodded, he remarked, "Back to square one."

After a bit of digging, we found the compound that had reacted so adversely with H2O. We replaced the problem element with one that was similar, but not as reactive. Thus began the second development of Chemical Y.

This one passed a few more tests. It passed the water test, the carbon test, and the acid test. However, when we moved on to the temperature tests in my simulation room, it froze solid with relative ease, at barely 2 degrees below freezing. That would certainly not do. So, back to the drawing board we went.

Chemical Y 3.0 went slightly better, and it handled the first temperature test well, not freezing and keeping its form even down to -400 degrees Fahrenheit. We thought we might really have a winner this time—until the next test, when it boiled and then spontaneously burst into flames at temperatures just slightly above 120 degrees Fahrenheit.

After some adjustments, then came Chemical Y 4.0. It held its' own in extremely freezing temperatures, perfectly performed within 3000-degree heat.

Encouraged, we went onto the next phase of experiments. We treated a number of small potted plants with the chemical to see how they would react, or if the chemical would destroy them.

We left them overnight—I slept as Him helped himself to my movie collection, remarking that he didn't feel like leaving this time. He hadn't watched any human movies in a while and he needed something to do while I was 'lying around shutting [my] body off', in his own words.

In the morning, we went back into the experiment lab. All of the plants had disintegrated into ash.

Figuring out the solution to this one was more difficult.

"Why is it so important to you that the chemical can sustain and even nourish carbon based life?" Him asked me suddenly as we were brainstorming in my office. "Why does this matter so much? Can't we just leave that facet out? We're so close, Scientist. Can't we just forget that part, choose 4.0 and end this drudgery?"

I shook my head at Him, brow furrowed. "No, absolutely not," I insisted. "This feature is vital. It's what would make giving it to other living creatures possible," I said pointedly. Catching my meaning, Him's frustrated expression turned to solemnness. After a few beats, I admitted, "There's also another reason I want this feature. But it's a bit personal."

Him held up a claw. "Got it. Don't tell me. Please."

The room was silent for a few minutes as the both of us thought hard in silence. Then, almost hesitantly, Him spoke up again. "I may have an idea. But it's risky."

Risky was good. Risky was better than nothing. I spun to face him, expectant. "Let me hear it," I said.

Him explained to me that if we added a binding agent to the chemical, it might make the chemical able to bond to living things instead of ravaging and burning through it. I wasn't sure about it, but I was ready to try anything if it might work. We decided to try it with Chemical Y 5.0.

After some trial and error, we found a compatible bonding agent, and went to work with the experiments. All the early phases went without a hitch, every single one. When we finally came upon the plant experiment, we poured a water and Chemical Y mixture into the pots, hoping that the bonded Chemical Y and water would work together to nourish the plants.

We left them overnight, hoping for the best this time, but really expecting it not to work.

Imagine our surprise the next morning at what we saw.

I woke to a sharp claw jostling my shoulder and an echoing voice even louder than it usually was. "Scientist! For crying out loud, get up! Am I going to have to throw searing coffee on you?"

I startled awake. "Ow, that hurts! Ow! What?" I said crankily, still half asleep, leaning away from the villain's uncomfortable grasp and rubbing my shoulder with my hand. I was hoping he hadn't broken the skin.

"Well, pardon me," said Him, agitated even though he was the one that had woken me up in the first place. "I just thought I would rouse you for you to see the rainforest that has grown in your laboratory."

I stared up at him for a few moments, grogginess falling away as I processed this, and then I leapt from the mattress I'd moved onto the floor of my office, which was where I slept the night before instead of my bedroom all the way on the 2nd floor.

I dashed out of the door, and as soon as I stood in the hallway, I saw the green that spilled out of the doorframe of the experiment lab and into the hallway. It was, indeed, like a forest had grown in there.

"Goodness!" I exclaimed, making my way into the doorway. I pushed giant leaves and stems aside, making my way in.

Him followed leisurely in my stead, smug. "See? I knew it would work," he said. As a giant leaf suddenly fell and flopped onto the top of his head, he reached up with one claw, snipped the stem it was on and watched as it floated down to the ground. "You're welcome, by the way," he added.

I shook my head and turned back around, only allowing myself a wry grin after my face couldn't be seen.

Until the afternoon, we were clearing the giant, overgrown plants out of the lab. Since we had no place else to put them, we left them all in the backyard.

After that, we only had one experiment left. The animal phase.

Since I could not leave the lab myself, I asked Him to go get it for me—a lab rat. When he returned to the house after half an hour, with a white rat in its' own pet cage complete with a water bottle and small play tunnels, I decided not to ask where he'd gotten it to keep our truce partnership intact.

We poured a small bowl of Chemical Y for the rat to take a bath in, and with my lab gloves on, I covered the little guy thoroughly in it. We left him overnight, locking the laboratory door just in case.

The next morning, we returned to find it dead in its' cage.

"Oh dear," I murmured. Failure of this experiment, the last and most difficult stage, had been certainly imminent. But I still couldn't help but feel disappointed. I took my notebook out, adding onto the pages of notes I already had on Chemical Y. At the very bottom in the section for 5.0, I wrote, 'Works wonderfully with organic life. Has adverse effect on mammals—lethal.'

After brainstorming again for a while, looking over the properties of the chemical and running circles around all the work we'd already done, we came upon a realization—there was nothing left for us to change.

If we switched out any properties, we would risk completely ridding of the positive properties we had worked hard on establishing for this chemical, things that Chemical X did not have. We would risk demolishing all our hard work. I didn't think either of us wanted to start over completely at this point, especially if finding a solution this time wasn't at all guaranteed.

And Chemical Y in its' state now, which would become its' final form—if it could kill a rat in just a handful of hours, it would certainly kill a chimp too.

There was nothing we could do. Mojo was gone. Gone for good.

Silence passed between us, grim. When I took a quick glance at the villain, I saw a flash of grief pass over his face before it smoothed out unemotionally again, like a ripple over a calm body of water.

A slow, tense nod. "I suppose," Him said, his voice uncharacteristically somber, "that this is for the best, in the end. He struggled with his own intelligent existence, constantly feeling like nothing he did was ever good enough. He always had." Slowly, reluctantly, Him turned his face toward me, though he still kept his glittering dark eyes turned downward. "Better he live the rest of his days out as a happy, stupid chimp than to continue to be tortured by his own inadequacies."

This time, listening to the tall, inhuman villain talk about his unfortunate ally, I knew and realized that he really was sad. That in their own twisted way, they had been close. Maybe they'd only had each other to call family, toxic as it was.

And perhaps seeing Him this way should have disturbed me, but if anything, it only challenged everything I had previously known to be true. Much more than anything else that had happened to me in the past week.

So for his sake, I said very quietly, "I'm sorry for your loss."

Him stayed quiet at first. Then, slowly, he shook his head bitterly. "You humans," he said, voice dry, "always futilely sorry for things you have no control over."

#

That night, Him placed the folded, borrowed lab coat on the counter top in the lab. I had told him that he really didn't have to fold it, but he'd done it anyway. He now donned his full black designer clothes exclusively again.

Him said to me in a quiet voice, "You'll have to disconnect them all from life support and submerge them fully into the chemical. Their hearts will likely stop. But once the Chemical Y absorbs fully into their bodies, it should revive them, if all of our hard work holds true. I'll leave that last phase up to you." Earlier, he had briefly gone into the hospital ward to stare at all 6 of the kids with an expression I couldn't really read. I had wondered why, but of course knew better than to ask. He shifted, looking at me again. "My role here is done, so I'm going to take my leave."

So this was really it. He was leaving for good. I began hesitantly, "I just wanted to thank—"

Him cut me off, aghast. "I told you not to—"

I held my hands up defensively and interrupted, "Okay, okay. Sorry. I won't say it," I said. "Just know that…I feel a lot of gratitude towards you."

"That was the same thing. You only reworded it. I'm still deeply disturbed by your gratitude." Him straightened up, clearing his throat. If I didn't know any better, I would think that he was flustered. "And don't think that this makes us friends of any sort. We are one-time allies, and that is all. From the moment I leave this laboratory, we will act as if none of this happened. Understood?"

I nodded once, trying very hard not to smile. "Understood," I said. Though he didn't want to accept my gratitude, it would always be there. It would be inside of me for the rest of my life, and maybe even after that.

I didn't dare say this to Him, but that day that he had appeared in my office, he had saved my life. He'd saved all of our lives.

I think he knew this, too. It was probably why he refused to acknowledge it out loud. Maybe because he didn't want to acknowledge the fact that he had done something selfless and good. No doubt, if news got out that the almighty powerful supervillain Him had done something good, his reputation would be ruined.

I would keep his secret for him. As my thank you, that's would I would do. For now. Maybe I would find some way to tell the girls one day, maybe long after I would already be gone and Him could do nothing but scream at and threaten my bones.

"I mean it, Scientist," Him insisted, narrowing his eyes at me, almost as if he had read my mind. But I was pretty sure he couldn't do that. "Breathe one word of it to anyone, and I'll—"

"Slit my throat, yes, I know." I cut in, grin slipping onto my face this time. "I understand. Not a word. I promise."

For a moment, the villain stared at me, blinking at the grin on my face. He looked unsure for a brief second—even slightly uncomfortable. Then it swept away as Him nodded, seeming to accept my answer. "Good," he said. "Then farewell." Taking a deep breath, Him summoned his pink fog. It swirled out from behind him, lifting him into the air and drawing him backward into a void.

Before, seeing this would have scared me—but I think at that point in time, considering everything else that had happened, I felt like nothing could surprise me anymore.

Further and further he sunk into the void, and just before Him's neck and shoulders disappeared into the miasma, as he looked at me, his face suddenly burst into one last mischievous smirk. "And for pity's sake, Utonium," he remarked, "go take a shower."

The image of him swirled away with that, along with the murky, echoing sound of his mocking, shrieking laughter. The pink clouds curled in on themselves, draining into the void. And then Him was gone.

I stared through the space of air that Him had once stood in. I was alone again. And now I had a decision to make. The single biggest decision to make in my entire life.

Him had left this final phase up to me. The ultimate action of saving them—of saving all of their lives.

Now that I had my solution right in front of me, however, several things occurred to me at once. Several daunting, terrifying things.

Immersing these kids in Chemical Y would save my daughter's lives, and would save the boy's lives as well. Because I had brought them into this world myself, I could do this for my girls. But what about the boys' lives? Was I really responsible for their lives also?

And there was more to this action than just saving them. There was only so much I could know about this chemical from our numerous experiments. There was still much about it that I didn't know. Those things, those unknown things—was I really willing to take that gamble?

This chemical could have any number of effects on these kids. Sure, it could breathe new life into them, I knew. I also knew it could turn them into something else entirely.

It could transform them. It could turn them into monsters. Involuntarily, I thought of that Chemical X monster army from the previous year.

And what of their minds—what of their very souls? What would happen to them? What if they lost first their minds, and then their personalities and souls were lost as well? What if their very essence disappeared the moment the Chemical X was wiped from their systems?

What right did I have to do that to them? Saving them would be one thing. Changing them forever was another entirely.

I wasn't a god. Was I playing one? Was my hubris yet again blinding me to my faults?

Years ago, I had not known the risk of bringing three girls to life. I had not realized the gamble I had taken when, after accidentally creating three superpowered girls, what keeping them and watching them grow would mean. That—the way a parent never should in a good and merciful world—I would witness their death one day.

Was I being equally foolish now, fighting to keep them alive in such extreme ways? Inventing a brand new chemical with a villain that would extend their life? And who was I forcing them to stay alive for? Just for me? It was not just selfish—it was uncertain.

This was an unbelievably dangerous game I was playing. It could cost my life, I realized. It could cost the lives of civilians in Townsville and beyond if it went wrong. Perhaps even the world.

I remembered the speculation about me that spread worldwide after the creation of my girls—that I was a mad scientist. It hadn't occurred to me until this very moment that I truly was mad, and perhaps had always been.

I had to be crazy to take these sorts of risks. What I was doing could implode, ruin the world and life as it existed. It could be something that generations of people who lived in this world after me would curse me for, would condemn me for. Perhaps I would go down in history as the maniac that ended the world.

Or maybe it would change everything.

Maybe this world was much worse off without my girls living in it. My girls had already changed the world once. Maybe they wouldn't just save this world multiple times more, just as they always had before—maybe even without their powers, they would improve this world in countless astounding ways.

My Blossom could lead others with the power of her intelligence alone. My Bubbles could feed the hungry, help the lost, with just the warmth of her heart. My Buttercup could protect the feeble with just the strength of her smallest finger.

The boys needed to return, too—the boys needed the girls. The girls needed them, too. They all needed each other. Without their counterparts, they would lack balance. They all needed their equals to survive in this world.

Life, existence—it needed them. It needed them all. I would bring them back. I had already sold my soul to a devil to do it. And it was my duty. No matter the cost. Even if, in the end, I was just a mad scientist.

It was still risky, though, I knew.

Bringing them back could be like hitting reset on their brains. I knew that they could suffer memory loss, maybe multiple other side effects. They could be completely different people when they awoke—that possibility was most terrifying to me.

But that risk…I had to take it. Because if I didn't take that risk, the possibility of them never returning would turn from possibility into mere fact. And that, out of everything, was unfathomable to me. It was simply unacceptable. I could not—would not—live in a world where they didn't exist anymore. If they ceased to exist, so would I.

There was still no sure answer of what the outcome of this decision might be. But my mind was made up. I was going through with this.

And whatever happened next, I would withstand and confront the consequences, no matter what.

In the experiment lab, I set up six metal tubs, side by side. I filled each tub up three fourths full with the metallic, viscous Chemical Y. Then I left to the hospital ward, knowing that the hardest part had come.

I would have to do it quickly. For the sake of ease, for less complications, and for the sake of my sanity.

I started with Buttercup. Steeling my nerves, I took the respirator off her face, and took her off life support. One minute later, her heart monitor flatlined as her heart stopped.

I gathered her limp, frail body in my arms and walked her down the hallway to the experiment lab. Stopping at the nearest tub, with my gloved hands, I stripped her hospital gown off, then picked her up again. I gently began to lower her into the Chemical Y. I placed the mask of the respirator over her mouth and nose so that the chemical wouldn't enter her lungs. Before her head was submerged, I pressed a soft kiss onto the top of her shaved head. "Come back to me soon," I whispered to her.

I left back to the hospital ward, only returning with Bubbles' body in my arms after disconnecting her from life support, after hearing her heart stop. I put the mask on her face, kissed the top of her head, then submerged her into the next tub of Chemical Y, trying not to notice how cold her body felt.

As I left, and then came back, carrying Blossom's cold body this time, I couldn't help the tears that rolled down my cheeks or the way my gloved hands trembled. As my knees buckled after I looked down at her, I tried hard to remember that it was just for now. That they would be right back. They would be back soon.

I watched her body sink down into the metallic, shimmery chemical, and then quickly got to work with retrieving each of their heart monitors from the hospital ward. Attaching the connectors with resilient adhesives, I connected each of them to heart monitors.

Then came the treacherous waiting.

For an hour, the single darkest hour in my entire existence, the laboratory was dead silent.

It seemed as if nothing was going to happen. I had given up all hope of anything happening at all. For an endless 60 minutes, my girls were dead. And for those 60 minutes, I was frozen in time.

I truly believe that in those 60 minutes, those endless 3600 seconds, part of me had died.

Never was I, by any measure, a religious man. But during those 60 minutes, for the first time, more than anything, I wished and hoped that heaven was a real place. Because more than anyone else I had ever known, my girls deserved to be there.

I hoped that they were happy, and were doing all the things that they hadn't been able to do anymore. I hoped that they weren't afraid anymore, and that they couldn't feel any more pain or suffering. I hoped that they were flying around and giggling, just as when they were little girls, without any worries.

Because if they could never come back to me, at least I would know that they were okay without me.

The quiet continued. The end of the hour approached.

Just as I was beginning to plan out what I thought I never would have to do, how I could bear to plan a funeral, how I would call the mayor and tell him myself that the girls had passed on, that he could take care of telling the rest, including telling the press—the worst of the torture was over with. It happened all at once.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

The three heart monitors picked up slow, quiet heartbeats. They were so weak, so faint—but they were there.

Their hearts had started again. I jumped from my chair, leaping to turn all three respirators on. The respirators expanded and contracted. They were breathing.

They were alive.

I took a long, deep breath. Released it. It was the first genuine breath I had taken that entire horrible hour. Now that they were breathing, I also could breathe again.

Now that I knew that it was working, that it would work for the boys too, I quickly left to retrieve the boys' bodies to do the same for them. Disconnected them from life support, heard their hearts stop, one by one. Attached their respirators and heart monitors and dunked them in.

And then an hour after they'd been submerged in their Chemical Y tubs, their hearts also restarted with a slow, timid pulse from each of them.

It was small—and yet, ginormous. It was progress. The most important progress of all, the progress that meant my hard work with Him hadn't gone to waste. Progress that meant life over death.

They were back. That was all that mattered.

The next three days were filled with more of the same.

Slow heartbeats. Shallow breathing. My observing them in my chair across from their tubs. Because I'd thought of it, I set up my old camcorder on a tripod and aimed it at them. It would record the progress, if there was to be any, that is. I was running on such little sleep, so I couldn't rely on just my memory and observation for all of this. I had a feeling I would need more than just my notes to keep record of this.

I kept a small supply of food in the basement with me—I never once left them during the day.

I only left them at night, to get a few hours of sleep on my mattress on the floor of my office. I usually only slept from 3 in the morning to 6, if that. And I slept lightly. I tossed and turned, mostly, and slept in what felt like 15 minute intervals.

The fourth day was still the same. The slow heartbeats remained. The unconsciousness remained. All six of them remained in comatose states. I was beginning to wonder if anything at all would change—if the six of them would spend the rest of their days in comas.

And I wondered what kind of life that would mean for me. Hardly any life at all.

I imagined more days spent in the laboratory, just as I had done the past days. Only, it would mean weeks like that. Then months. Years.

I went to sleep that night with this thought in my mind. Just as I was between sleep and exhausted wakefulness on that fourth night, around 4am, that's when I heard it.

The distant sound of three heart-monitors' beeps increasing steadfastly.

I forgot about sleeping. Immediately, I shot up from my makeshift mattress-on-the-floor sleeping area and I ran out of the office. I sprinted down the hallway towards the experiment lab, skidded to a slippery stop on the tile floors, and bounded into the lab.

As soon as they were in view, I stared down at the girls' tubs—they were still stable. None of them were conscious. But still their heart monitors increased in speed, double, triple, four-times the rate. I read the BPM for each of them, still momentarily shaken, wondering what could be causing this to go so wrong—then it dawned on me.

380 bpm. That had been their average heart rate. Their heart rate before all of this began to happen. Before they lost their superpowers, before their health began to fall apart.

The heart rate of three superhumans.

Which meant that three more superhuman heart rates would soon follow.

A smile came to my face, slow and careful at first. Then it grew larger, and larger still, until tears pricked at my eyes and an involuntary laugh came from inside me, and pure bliss took over me in a way I thought would never happen for me again—lit up my very soul from the inside out. My veins coursed with sweet relief and excitement, flushing my face, heart pounding. It made me feel more alive than I'd felt in ages. Just as the girls and the boys had, I was coming back to life.

I'd done it.

We'd done it.

All by myself, though the red devil was long gone by now, and all of the kids were still unconscious, I shouted and jumped up and down and laughed in celebration.

It was over. It was all over.

I was filled with so much joy, in fact, that momentarily I was tempted to open a bottle of champagne—but immediately I decided not to. My girls were coming back to me. They were all coming back. They needed me again. I couldn't tend to them under the influence of alcohol. So I didn't.

After I had come down from my natural celebratory high, I left to go fetch my mattress and blanket. I dragged them into the lab and set them on the floor in front of all six of the tubs. Finally, exhausted again, I lay on the mattress and got under the blanket, facing the tubs.

I would need plenty of sleep for tomorrow, I thought. There were lots of calls I would have to make—maybe even have an interview or two to do, over the phone or otherwise. With only the straight truth this time, instead of half-truths.

The public deserved to know what happened to them, to know what they went through. And now they would.

Perhaps I would sleep well tonight for the first time in what felt like decades.

And as my eyelids drifted closed, I listened to that blessed beeping as it synchronized with my buoyant heartbeat, lulling me to sleep.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Ba-bump.

Ba-bump.

Ba-bump.


All right, you guys. I had you really worried there, didn't I? The worst is over. Stay turned for the return.

I'll be writing about this chapter on my lj, as always, so look out for it!

Only two chapters left. Holy moly, you guys. Losing Control is almost done. Crazy.

To those of you that have stuck around and have left reviews and supported this story in any way, you guys are the best. I appreciate you so, so much.

Chapter 20 will arrive sometime before Christmas. Hang in there!

-MsButterFingers