Kim had never felt so heartbroken in her whole life.
For all their scientific genius, Jim and Tim were still just twelve years old. They were way too young to understand sex, let alone rape. Kim couldn't even begin to imagine how terrified they must have been that afternoon, or how deeply they were hurting right now. Part of her felt like she had failed as an older sister—how could a superhero who protected the entire world let such a thing happen to her own brothers? And worst of all was the reality that she, the girl who could do anything, was completely unable to heal their pain. Kim wanted so badly to give her poor little brothers their innocence back, but she couldn't. All she could do was hold and comfort them while they sobbed their hearts out into her shoulders.
So that was what she did. The brothers and sister had a long cry together, and after the boys calmed down Kim moved back a little to look them in the eyes, her own tears streaming down her face. "Jim, Tim—I am so, so sorry you went through that. And I'm really proud of you for telling me about what happened. That must have been incredibly hard, but you did the right thing."
"So—so you aren't mad at us?" Jim asked, still sniffling. "Mr. Gray said—he said it was our fault."
Tim nodded. "He said that we made him do that. Because we got the detention."
As if Kim wasn't already heartbroken enough. Not only had this monster violated her baby brothers, he had lied to them and made them think they were responsible for it. She had to fight back a fresh wave of tears, but she managed to keep her composure. "That isn't true," she told them. "The detention doesn't even matter right now. What Mr. Gray did to you is called sexual abuse, and it was not in any way your fault. An adult never, ever has a right to treat a child in that way. Never. I don't care what you said to your science teacher, you absolutely did not deserve what happened to you. Mr. Gray was incredibly wrong to do what he did, and he's the only one to blame for this. Does that make sense?"
"I—I guess," Tim said. "But what happens now? Is he going to do that to us again?"
"Absolutely, positively not. I promise you both on my soul that I won't let him so much as lay a finger on you ever again. He'll have to go through me to get to you, and nobody goes through your big sister. And more importantly, he's not going to be a teacher anymore. What he did wasn't just wrong, it was a very serious crime and he needs to be stopped from doing it to anyone else. That's why we need to get more people involved, starting with Mom and Dad."
The boys visibly tensed up, and Kim bit her lip. They had already shown a lot of courage in talking to her, and now she was asking them to do it again. But she knew it had to be done. "It'll be okay, I promise. Like I said, it's not your fault, and they'll know that. They'll want to help you and be there for you, just like I do."
Jim looked at her nervously. "Will—will you be there with us when we tell them?"
"Yes, absolutely. I'll be right there with you. I promise."
They still looked nervous, but they nodded. "O-okay."
Kim smiled and hugged them again. "I'm really proud of you guys. Do you want to stay in my room tonight? Maybe that'll make it easier to sleep."
The tweebs agreed and followed her to her room, where all three of them got into Kim's bed. It was a bit crowded, but Kim's presence did seem to put the boys more at ease. (It certainly didn't hurt that she was a world-famous superhero.) They were able to fall back asleep, and also seemed to sleep a lot better—Kim did see Jim start to shake a little at one point, but she gently placed a hand on his shoulder and he calmed down.
For her part, Kim got no sleep at all. How could she, after what she had learned? She spent the entire night alternating between worrying herself sick about her brothers and indulging in fantasies of what she would do to Mr. Gray once she got her hands on the bastard. She had a temper, and could get angry over anything from Bonnie's taunts to other girls expressing interest in Ron, but right now she was feeling a raw protective rage that she had never realized she was capable of. As Kim lay in bed keeping a watchful eye on her brothers, she silently vowed that she would personally see to it that Mr. Gray paid for what he had done. Jim and Tim deserved no less.
