Seek {Superhero AU} - Ending 1

30: Eye For An Eye

A/N: You guys should know I am making a Great Sacrifice^TM by writing this chapter because my computer is currently broken. Approximately every 30-50 seconds, it shuts itself off. I can't even finish a paragraph most of the time. Sometimes it only stays on for like 3 or 4 seconds before shutting off again. A chapter that would normally take two hours to write now takes me four because of my computer.

If you've noticed lower quality chapters recently, it is because I am losing my mind writing because I can't even make it through a sentence sometimes before it shuts off again. I am going to riot.

Also, if this chapter is bad, I wrote most of it while having some Weird Health Issues^TM, so try not to judge too harshly. I was very out of it.

WPOV

Track: Hayloft II, Mother Mother

There's something horrific about seeing my own face staring at me. It chills me to my core, turning my bones to ice and my blood to syrup in my veins.

That mask isn't my face—I know that. But I've seen myself in the mirror wearing that mask so many times that it feels like a part of me sometimes. Watching someone else wear it is unnerving—like somebody else walking into a room wearing a cardboard cutout of my face.

I recognize the icy blue eyes staring back at me. This is Luke. The crowd around him is equally concerned and starstruck—for many of them, Sunburst is like Spiderman. A person of supernatural abilities walking among us. But this isn't Sunburst, I want to scream—it's an imposter! Don't believe any of this!

Some of the couples around Luke are inching away, glancing from Luke to Nico and back again. Wondering if a fight is going to break out in the middle of the dance floor, probably. They're talking to each other, eyebrows knit together, but I can't hear a word that they're saying. Others, though, are trying to surge toward Sunburst to unmask him, to get an autograph, to get a picture. Sunburst throws up a blinding light into the air, and I only manage to just barely cover my eyes in time.

"We don't want any trouble," comes Nico's desperate voice. "Whatever you want from us—"

"What the hell is Sunburst doing at our homecoming?" Lou Ellen asks from behind me, her voice tinged with nerves. "Does that mean the Ghost King is here, too? Are we in danger right now? Should I be running?"

Nico is rigid, staring Luke in the eyes. The supervisors have realized that something is wrong, so they've turned off the music and turned on the lights, earning many loud complaints from the few remaining oblivious couples who are too far away to see Sunburst.

"Uh, yeah, Lou, you probably should. Cecil, you too," Nico says finally, his eyes stuck on Luke's silent, staring eyes. "Will and I can stay here for a moment longer, and we'll let you know when it's safe."

"No way!" Cecil protests. "If we're leaving, you're leaving, too. Why would you stay somewhere that's potentially dangerous?"

"...And why is Sunburst so interested in you in particular, Nico?" Lou Ellen asks, but it comes out like an accusation.

Nico finally breaks his staring contest with Luke to give Lou a pleading look. "Now's not the time. I will explain later. For now, can you just promise to get yourself and Cecil somewhere s—"

Luke uses Nico's distraction to punch him in the gut. Then he calls light to his palms, and I know instinctively that it's going to burn—I grab Nico, who's hunched over and groaning, and push him behind me. Face to face with my own alter ego—ready to fight if need be.

"You can't have him," I seethe. "You need to leave us alone."

When Luke speaks, it comes out robotic. A gift from the Viper, no doubt. "I am just following orders. You know that. If Nico wants to avoid a certain piece of delicate information being shared with the school right now, he must turn himself over to me."