Megamind jolted awake, eyes wide, and sweat dribbling down his neck and forehead. He looked around the library, and winced as he felt the harsh pain on his neck that always greeted him when he woke up after falling asleep at his studies. Panting slightly, he reached behind and rubbed his hand against his neck. What time was it? Slowly, carefully, he turned around to see the grandfather clock to see it was almost seven o'clock in the evening.
"Nnngghhh..." he sighed and pressed his hands to the desk, and began to get to his feet.
"Ah, the prodigal son awakens!" Roxanne smiled as she walked into the library. Under one of her arms were a few books, having been plucked from the personal library hours before. "How are you going?" she asked.
"My neck's stiff." Megamind mumbled, before giving a faint smile. "But besides that, good..."
"Your neck?" she set the books down on the table besides his own. "Does that happen a lot?"
"Sometimes." he explained, not wanting to sound like a whiner and go on at lengths about the cricks in his neck that he got when he fell asleep at his desk. "It's nothing, really I-" Megamind was getting to his feet but next thing he knew her hands were on his shoulders and shoving him back, gently though, down into the chair. "What're you-"
"My uncle always made me give him shoulder massages when I went to visit him while I was growing up." she explained with a smile as she moved behind him, and placed her hands properly on his shoulders. "I got pretty good at it. Just relax."
Megamind felt like he couldn't, at first. He sat there, hands gripping at his legs as he felt her soft hands just gently resting against his shoulders. He was without his familiar leather tonight, Minion said he would be working on mending the tears to it today, so that left him wearing a simple striped t-shirt and jeans that he normally wore while studying. Without the security, and familiarity, of his leather he almost felt naked.
But then her hands began to pressurise against his shoulder, and his whole body began to slump under her knowing hands. "Ohhhhh my God..." he all but moaned as he began to tilt his head back slowly. "That feels so... good."
"Really?" Roxanne grinned to herself, and was grateful he was unable to see her face since she was certain it was turning slightly pink. "You're so stiff..." she mumbled.
"I know..." Megamind took a deep breath, and let his eyes slip shut.
"So do you always work so hard to the point of exhaustion, Megamind?" she asked softly.
"Yes." he admitted feebly.
"That can't be healthy for you, right?" Roxanne smirked.
"Yes..." Megamind purred as his toes curled within his slippers.
Roxanne worked at a particularly tough knot at his right shoulder, and she felt a sudden swell of courage. She took a deep breath and steeled herself. "Do you want to go out to dinner with me?" she asked.
"Yes."
She had to wonder if Megamind had even heard her question, and if he was just saying 'yes' because all of his answers before that had been the one word. Beneath her hands she felt him suddenly stiffen all over again, and she had to smile faintly. He just realized what he had said yes to, hadn't he?
Megamind turned his head around and the sound of his neck cracking filled the air. Roxanne released her grip on his shoulders and watched him carefully, and smiled again. "Yes?" she asked, slightly amused.
He stared at her with shock and awe, and those beautiful green eyes of his seemingly doubled in size.
"...y-yes." he confirmed again. "I'd like to... to go to dinner with you."
"Tonight?" Roxanne asked, "Unless it's too crazy for you..." maybe she was pushing it now. Tonight? Without any prior notification? What if he had people to hunt tonight?
"Uh. Um. Wait." he got to his feet quickly and moved across the floor, away from her. "I need to check to see if... if there's anything happening."
"I understand if you can't," she spoke up quickly, following him briskly across the floor.
"No, no. I. I think I need it. I want it." Megamind had suddenly wanted to say 'I need you' but he had enough wits about him to freeze the words in his impressive brain. He grabbed a book on the shelf and pulled on it, but not off of its shelf. It slowly began to ease back into its place, and a panel began to lift and reveal a screen.
"What...?" Roxanne asked.
"It's how we communicate. We can't trust the Internet, or mobile phones, not for real sensitive information like this." Megamind explained as he used the touch screen seamlessly. "Created by me." he added. "Once upon a time we did use other means of communication but this is much more secure."
"I see...' she joined him and gently leaned against his back, and watched the screen with interest.
The background was blue, and the writing was white. If anything, it looked like a simple online forum any person could use. There were various folders, with contacts, recent sightings, emergency news, and broadcasts. Megamind touched one folder and it spilled open over the screen. It was incredibly blank, save for one flashing red icon.
"Hmmm."
"A sighting?" Roxanne asked as he pressed the icon.
"A man was spotted in town..." Megamind read a codex Roxanne couldn't read. It was even in their own language, too? That was amazing. "Near... oh no. The library." he said quietly.
"The library?" Roxanne asked, eyes widening as Megamind quickly pulled out a mobile and pressed a button. "Bernard?" she asked quietly.
"Bernard." Megamind answered as he put the phone to his ear. He stood there, waiting, then frowned. "No answer."
"That's not good is it?" she asked quietly.
Megamind pressed another button, then groaned again. "Wayne isn't answering."
"That's worse!" Roxanne fretted.
"No, no. It's good." Megamind assured her. "He really can't be hurt at all by anything they throw at him. Maybe he's with Bernard. He could be, I mean. You know how they are..."
"That's... that's true." she paused as she saw the expression on Megaminds face. "Are you okay with that?"
"Huh?" he asked, lifting his head to her as he closed the programs down and the shelf closed over the screen again.
"Your brother and Bernard, dating. How do you feel about that?" she asked, feeling as though this was really important to know. To find out how he felt towards relationships not just in general, but in relation to a person like him.
The blue man looked at her for a moment before giving a small smile. "I'm... glad he found somebody who cares about him but... I gotta admit that I'm..." Megamind trailed off.
"You're...?" she asked.
Megamind answered with a quiet mumbled.
"Didn't hear that." Roxanne teased, smiling.
He tried again, but was still mumbling.
"Try again?" she asked.
"Jealous." he admitted quietly.
Roxanne hadn't expected that kind of answer. "You're jealous of him?" she asked.
"Well. Yeah I am. Have you seen my brother?" Megamind asked. "He's tall, handsome, strong, suave, confident, and he could have any person he wanted. He can go out, without a disguise, and people accept him. Me, to go out there, I have to change everything. Nobody would want to see me like that, nobody would want to date me. Who would?" he asked her.
She watched him carefully during his small rant, and she saw the pain there that he had probably kept hidden from everybody his entire life. Roxanne smiled faintly, before reaching out to him and brushed her hand against his cheek. "Well. Here I am, wanting to go out to a dinner with you. Is that good?" she asked. "Does that make you feel better?"
Megamind looked at her quietly, before his cheeks burned a soft lavender. "...more than you probably know." he admitted. Did she have any idea what her words did to him? She was a reporter, she knew how to watch people so he was sure she could see through his weak attempts at appearing cool and calm, as well as confident, to see him for what he really was.
"Good." she withdrew her hand and set both of her hands on her hips. "So, dinner. Do you want to go tonight?" she asked.
"Well there aren't any other alerts and if there's something really serious Minion can call me... but. Yes. I'd love to."
She smiled. "Brilliant."
Fate had a funny way of dealing a hand to people.
Wayne, once again a fully fledged fire fighter for the Metro City Fire Department had spent a busy day on the job. There had been a few call outs to fires that happened in kitchens when people weren't paying attention, or offices where power plugs were stacked full of appliances. It was all pretty standard stuff for him, and he liked being back in a job that made it feel as if he was really contributing.
Course, he was already contributing by being a spy for vampire hunters, but he couldn't go around and admit this sort of thing to his co-workers now could he?
He couldn't let drop around the water cooler that his little brother dressed up in leather and went out into the night to slay vampires and that his brand new boyfriend turned into a ferocious werewolf every full moon. If he did, he would have to swipe everyones memory and he never liked having to do that. Sometimes it was necessary, like when Megamind was spotted by a normal person who he wasn't actually rescuing from a vampire attack.
It had happened a fair few times, after all.
Thanks to his brothers ingenuity they would be alerted every time select phrases were uploaded to the Internet. Then they tracked the source, wiped their memory, and once again thanks to Megamind the trace on the Internet was done away with and lost to all. It really was a detailed process that had been going on for years.
But, in the end he was the guy to get a job and report unusual behaviour. So far today there hadn't been any fires that involved dead bodies so, thankfully, it had been a slow day. Having called it a day Wayne had waved his friends farewell and decided since it wasn't too late, to stop by the library to check in on Bernard. Also, quite possibly take him out for coffee or something before going home but not to ruin his appetite since naturally Minion would have made something delicious during the day.
When he reached the library, though, his heart froze. The doors were hanging open despite it being well past the time the library would be shut. His blood froze in his veins when he saw blood smearing against the glass doors, pushing from the outside. He ran inside as fast as he could and surveyed the destruction, the wrecked newspaper stands, the couch in pieces, and the blood that splattered the floor and the walls.
"Bernard." Wayne bent down and picked up the mans glasses that had been knocked away by something.
Now, Wayne was normally a very calm and collected, peace loving man. It was the way he had been brought up. But the realization that something had happened to his boyfriend in his absence, that he was blind, possibly seriously injured, ignited a flame within him that was rapidly growing out of control as he ran around the library in less than zero point two seconds. Bernard was no where to be seen, which meant he must be out in the streets somewhere.
The people, and traffic, outside were standing still as Wayne raced out into the streets. This is what he saw when he ran as quickly as he could possibly go, it was as if he was walking into a was museum. Looking around he knew he didn't have nearly enough energy to keep running around like this for long since it was a fast way to exhaust himself. So instead of relying on that entirely, he used his super sense of smell.
Bernard had a very particular smell that Wayne could recognize. He smelt of old books, Lemon Scent Power on his clothes, Winter Ice was his choice of aftershave, and his hair smelt of Volume Essence X for Men. Combine that with his own, natural musk that Wayne had gotten to know quite intimately, he picked out Bernard's scent almost instantly.
But what had him rush through the streets as fast as he could go was that he smelt blood.
Rounding a corner he made his way down the long back alley and came upon what he never hoped to see. A tall man, about the same height as himself, was standing victoriously over Bernard who was laying on his side. Bernard's lips were blue, and it looked as if all the life had been choked out of him.
Wayne began to feel time slowly unwind itself around him as he leaped at the vampire, and time well and truly got back to its normal pacing the second he came in contact with him.
The vampire screamed in alarm, and pain, as the mans fist came in contact with his chest. Ribs all but splintered, piercing his lungs and his muscle tissue, and the man went flying into a pile of trash cans and even flew straight through a fence. Wayne didn't have time to make this last, no matter how badly he wanted to make the monster pay for what he had done, but he had to tend to Bernard.
As he passed the fence Wayne easily snapped off a piece of wood and just as the vampire was beginning to get to his feet again the wood came slamming down into his chest, and was twisted again as Wayne pushed it almost entirely all the way through him. The vampires red eyes widened in pain as he looked into the cold, blue eyes of Wayne, before he slowly began to disintigrate before him.
Wayne didn't even bother to hang around to watch the vampire die, seconds later he was lifting Bernard's lifeless body into his arms.
"No, no, no no..." he said shakily as he stroked Bernard's blood stained face. "No, no you can't, not like this, not after everything...!" Wayne pleaded as he felt salty tears already rolling down his face. "Bernard, no, no... you can't die... we just... I love you please don't...!" Wayne's voice shook, and he had to force himself to try and calm down.
They needed to get to a doctor. But not the hospital. If Bernard could be brought back, and healed, then the hospital staff would surely realize his quick healing powers. And if he was in there when a full moon rose, then everyone inside was doomed. This called for the Family's medical expert who tended to the more severe injures, the one who had nursed his brother back to health after so many deadly and dangerous altercations.
He just prayed that Bernard wasn't dead.
"I feel kind of bad." Megamind said as he got into the Bentley with Roxanne later that same evening. "Minion said he had all this thing planned..."
"But he understands the importance for you to get away for a little while." Roxanne replied as she looked at herself quickly in the rear view mirror, and oh so subtly adjusted her breasts since the nice dress she was wearing had chosen to show off a little more than she had initially thought. Thankfully the cardigan she wore over it covered up most of the twins action.
Megamind mumbled something as he did his best not to stare, and gripped the wheel in his hands. Naturally, since they were going out for dinner, he was wearing another one of his disguises. This one was dressed in black trousers, a pale blue shirt with a matching black jacket, and thick black hair that could be compared to Bernard's. His same green eyes stared ahead as he pulled the car out of the drive way and out of the gates.
The car drive was relatively quiet, save for the radio that Roxanne turned on. At least it was, until they got into the city.
"So has Hal turned up yet?" Megamind asked as they began to drive through what was affectionately known as 'Dinner Drive' since it was littered with restaurants and places to find a good meal for a good price but almost impossible to find a decent park anywhere within walking distance.
"Not yet." Roxanne replied. "I... really want to think he's just sick."
"Has he done this before?" he asked, spotting a car beginning to pull out and sped up in order to get close to it and jump into the park before anyone else dare claim his precious park.
"Well. To be honest, yes." she said after a moments thought. "He's vanished for a few days and turned up saying he was too sick to call, but nobody really bought it..."
"So it might just be that happening again." Megamind offered as he grinned triumphantly and pulled neatly into the car park, aggravating somebody who had wanted the park too but had been far too slow. He put the Bentley into park and pulled the keys out, turned in his seat to face her, and grinned. "But enough about Hal." he said before thumbing to the world outside. "Shall we?" he asked.
Roxanne looked at his face carefully, and despite the appearance of normal peach coloured skin and the thick, black hair she could still see the Megamind she was slowly growing to know more about. He was so recognisable to her now, but she knew if he truly didn't want her to recognise him out in public that magical watch of his could turn him into anybody, and anything.
She just hoped he could gain enough confidence to become something very important to her, like she felt he wanted to as well.
Every journey began with a single step, they say. And when Megamind opened the door for her like he did, she couldn't help but feel as though stepping out into the cool night air was their first step on the way to something wonderful.
To be continued