The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

Epilogue the first: In Memoriam

G-day II + one week

I’ve spoken at some length about Greg Wolfe. Let me take some time to give a brief eulogy of that selfless, courageous woman, Annette Wolfe.

Annette Jolie Dubois was born and raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, in the USA. Later in life she was fond of telling people of her hometown, “It’s pronounced just like it’s spelled: bah-tawn roozh, loo-zana.” At age 8 she met her best friend for life, Julia Charlotte Crosby of Falkirk, Western Australia. They met in their first Jovan Farmer Trust “Summer Program for Girls” event, a very effective cover for getting young Ten Thousanders from all around the world together. They resolved to stay loyal pen pals, and, wonder of wonders, they actually did. Much of what drew them together was the thrill they shared in the real life adventures of the Legion of Heroes, most particularly the adventures of their favorite hero, Majestic Woman.

At age 18 she and Julia both accepted Jovan Farmer Trust fine arts scholarships to Corpus Christi College at the University of Oxford. They had often said that neither of them would have made it through austere, stuffy Oxford without the other. While there Annette met (with my help) and fell in love with (all by herself, but I would have insisted had she not) Rhodes Scholar and “boy genius” Greg Wolfe. Greg had somehow (with my help) turned his high school investment club in Adelaide into a multimillion dollar concern, well on the way to its first billion. After four years, Annette and Greg graduated and married on the same day. There was not a dry eye in the house. Shortly thereafter, much to Julia’s delight, I moved them to their current home in Falkirk.

The astute reader may recall that outside the door of Greg and Annette’s penthouse there was one other door in the short hallway. That was the door to Julia and Annette’s shared studio, which was actually somewhat larger than the apartment itself. Julia was a lithographer, focusing on photorealistic, yet surreal, landscapes and cityscapes. Annette was more the sculptor. Her favorite medium was clay; she loved the feel of it in her hands, molding it, shaping it. Her sculptures exploded with the joy and warmth that she felt in her heart.

Although the circumstances were horrifying and sad, Annette died much as she had lived, with great passion and love. May she rest in peace.

A week after “G-Day II”, two dozen of us—the Wolfes, the Duboises, and the eight of us who lived nearby—all gathered around an unmarked memorial in my park in downtown Falkirk. It was strange in that the memorial couldn’t mention Greg and Annette by name, since they were still ostensibly “alive”, but the ones who mattered knew the truth. The monument was three meters tall, and in the shape of two buildings: the once-tallest building in the world in Dubai, complete with exploded wreckage at the top, and the “new” tallest building in the world complete with the tiny robotic slaughterhouse jutting from its side. At its base there was this small inscription: “To the true heroes of Dubai and Themiscyra. You will live in our hearts forever.”

Cindi and I intend to live up to the very letter of that promise.

Epilogue the second: A Queen, Her King, and Their Kingdom

G-Day II + four months (or so)

We mourned the loss of Greg and Annette much longer than I would have thought. Both of us had lost more friends over the millennia than any mortal could possibly comprehend. We were both adept at saying our fond farewells to the dead, fixing them in our memories, and moving on. But this time ... this was different. Greg and Annette had sacrificed their lives for us, and yet we could see them every time we looked in the mirror. Greg had known going in that he would be a target, even though the end took him unawares. Annette ... Annette had sacrificed herself with her eyes wide open, begging me to let Cindi live on in her place.

It was hard for both of us. But over the weeks and months that followed, we began to turn our eyes to the future. As is often the case with us human animals, we overcame the grief of death and sad memories with the help of new life and joyous hopes.

Cindi was carrying my son, genetically Greg and Annette’s first-born. I was uncharacteristically impatient. Well, I may be understating it a bit. Cindi said that she thought I was going crazy. I told myself that it was just my hope that this child would carry forward the next stage of my breeding program. But Cindi saw right through me.

She finally called me on it one day, shortly after her morning sickness had passed. Apparently I had been ... hovering ... a bit. She had asked me what the hell had gotten into me, and I had just told her, again, I was nervous about the breeding program.

“Bullshit,” she said.

“Bullshit?” I responded, somewhat amused, somewhat ... displeased. In her heart of hearts she still considered herself my slave, but she was becoming much more able to confront me. Particularly when she thought it was for my own good. Like now. But she had to learn to do so, more ... respectfully. I demanded it, and when it got right down to it she demanded it too.

Seeing the expression on my face, she crumpled to her knees.

“P-please, My Lord. Please have mercy!”

I shook my head “No” and swapped us to the training room. This was actually something of a break for her, escaping the aches and pains and discomfort of her pregnancy for just a while. Not to worry, soon she would have plenty of pain in this body to make up for it. She was not restrained. I almost never had to restrain her for punishment anymore. I had her fetch the crop. She returned with fear in her eyes and arousal dripping down her leg. I had her bend over the waterboarding table. She began to moan even before I touched her.

WHAP! “Aaagh!”

“What did you do?”

I was dis-disrespectful, My Lord!”

WHAP! “Aiiya!“

“So is that what you want? Do you want us to be ‘buddies’ now? Do you want to be my ‘equal’?”

“No, My Lord, no! I will always be your slave! I live to serve you!”

WHAP! “Ahaieee!”

She was crying openly now, but I’m really not sure whether her face or her thighs are wetter.

“So you noticed an anomaly in my behavior. So far, so good. You are my slave, but you are also my queen, my most trusted advisor, and the love of my life. How should you have addressed this anomaly?”

“Re-respectfully, My Lord.

WHAP! “Maaahauw!”

I paused to massage the red marks criss-crossing her ass.

Then I continued, but more softly. “Be specific, cunt. Give me an example.”

“I, I ... ‘My Lord, please forgive me if I’m overstepping, but I don’t think you are being honest with yourself about your feelings.’”

WHAP! “Waaah-aaah!”

“That’s a good start. You haven’t overstepped your bounds yet. It’s true that I am more nervous than I normally am at the start of a breeding experiment. Continue.”

“This is our child,” she said, “and you are emotionally torn. You are bursting with pride, and beside yourself with worry, bouncing back and forth between the two states like a rubber ball. I’m experiencing all the same things too, but ... from the inside. This child is a part of me. But you ... you feel like you’re just an observer. You’re used to being in complete control—which I love, by the way—but now you feel like you’re on the outside looking in.“

WHAP! “Please, My Lord! Mercy!”

“Is there more?”

“Yes, My Lord! Your nervousness, your anxiety, it’s ... it’s only natural, My Lord. It’s only sob ... human.“

She cringed at the last bit, imagining that I would be displeased to be demoted to “human”. She was wrong about that, but clearly right about everything else. I was actually relieved and, well, happy about it. Who would have thought that I would ever be happy to be thought of as human? Who would have thought that I would ever have accepted this ... analysis ... from one of my Ten Thousand, however respectfully delivered?

But more important right now, her punishment was over, and she was horny. Moaning with her need. Almost involuntarily rubbing her hip against my groin. I pulled her up by her hair and pushed her into the nearby stone wall. This position against the uneven stonework would be really uncomfortable for her, especially as I would be holding her up by her bruised ass. But somehow I doubted she would even notice the pain.

Later, back in the penthouse, Cindi did more than just analyse me. She had ideas. She begged me to take charge of her nutrition and exercise program. Not as some kind of make-work; she really needed help moderating some of her wilder cravings. She signed us up for childbirth classes together. She allowed herself to become more obviously needy. She wanted me to spend even more time holding her, cherishing her, willing myself to be a part of her pregnancy. She wanted me to spend more time disciplining her too, but that was not really a recent change.

And then she did something I never would have thought of. Behind my back, she commissioned a genetic analysis to find the markers for the “Nice Guy” trait I was trying to propagate. It took less than a month for the results to come back. Then she had her doctor perform an amniocentesis and genetic analysis on her little passenger.

I was astounded. “How did you do this without me finding out?”

“Well,” she said, “it certainly helps that you are giving me more ‘privacy’ inside my own head. I know that must be hard for you to give up that level of control, My Lord. But I hope that it actually helps me to serve you better.”

“I love you, Cindi. And you know I trust you implicitly. It is hard for me to give up that control, but you were right. I can tell that you do serve me better if I give you a ‘longer leash’. I’ve even started using your ‘ringing the doorbell first’ idea with the rest of the Ten Thousand. It really does work. But ... but this report. It’s amazing. You’re sure—“

“My Lord, My Love,” she smiled, “He’s going to be everything you’ve hoped for and more. It appears the ‘Nice Guy’ gene is extremely dominant.”

“Not unlike its owner,” she added with a whisper and a smile.

I smiled too. My son was going to be a good man. Well, with our help ...

Then I saw that calculating look in her eyes. I almost peeked but stopped myself just in time. I had learned that I liked it better when I let her surprise me. She was clearly deciding whether or not now was the time to bring it up, whatever it was.

“My Lord?” she began, a somewhat hesitant start to what was would clearly be long, maybe even contentious, conversation.

I nodded; she continued, “I just wanted to know if you’ve given some thought to my other, um, idea.”

“Giving up the nomadic life? ‘Settling down’ in Greg’s body?” I actually made air-quotes as I said that. “Cindi, I don’t know. I’ve wandered from body to body for so long that I don’t know if I really can have any other existence. These few months in Greg’s body are the longest I have stayed in one body since I started my breeding program, nine thousand years ago! I do know that I refuse to grow old and that I will not die. I won’t let you die either. I’ll drag you with me kicking and screaming into your next body if I have to. I want to live, Cindi! That’s why I fought the Morlocks! I want to live! I want us to live! Now more than ever!“

She grabbed me around the waist. She held me tightly. Her head was buried in my chest. I wrapped my arms around her, but clearly she was trying to comfort me.

“I know, I know,” she said, quietly, tenderly. “You won’t have to die, My Lord. We won’t have to die. But I want to find a way to live as something other than the shadow of a person. We deserve more. We deserve to live full lives like normal people, like normal families. I,” she hesitated, “I have a plan ... if you would like to ... if it would please you to see it ... My Lord.”

With my assent she laid it out to me. We would still live forever, but we would live like normal people, well, normal-ish people who were actually the secret immortal rulers over a hidden subspecies of humanity. It sounds ridiculous when you say it like that, right? How could our lives ever be “normal”? Sure, she had a plan, but I was still skeptical.

What was she proposing? Well, first, we would travel down the path we were already on. We would let ourselves live as ‘the Wolfe family’ for another ten years or so, until Greg’s and Annette’s bodies reached their mid-thirties. Then we would begin our endless cycle. We would choose a young couple from the Ten Thousand, a married couple in their mid-twenties, and begin to live a dual life with them, sharing time in each other’s bodies. Their family would be our family; our family would be theirs. They would come to know their Lord and His Lady, closely, intimately. They would live their lives intertwined with ours, swapping bodies back and forth with ours daily, if not even more often, for ten years, until the older couple (“Greg” and “Annette”) reached their mid-forties. Then the younger couple, now in their mid-thirties, would swap permanently into the older bodies, while we (“Cindi” and “Lord”) would now live in the younger bodies. At this point, Cindi and I, now in our mid-thirties again, would pick another couple in their mid-twenties, and the cycle would begin again.

“Why would they agree to it, Cindi?” I challenged, “They’d end up losing ten years of their lives!“

Cindi regarded me seriously. “That’s a very good question. I’ve ... I’ve thought about that too, My Lord.” She paused, making sure that she could tread that fine line, that her words would carry confident authority about her well-vetted plan, while at the same time she would show me all the deference that I was proper for a slave addressing her Master. “I think, My Lord, that it might be possible that you are underestimating the loyalty of the Ten Thousand. All of them have offered their lives for you already, just like I have. Now think of how lucky the chosen couple would feel. For ten years they would become the closest companions, the most intimate confidantes, of their Ruler, their Master, the superpowered Immortal who literally made them who they are, the mighty Hero who exposed and defeated the Morlocks.” She was on quite a roll, but now she paused, and blushed a bit. “And, well, they seem to like me too. Please, My Lord, just try to see it from their perspective. They would literally live the same lives as people who are like Gods to them. And then, at the end of that ten-year adventure they would be, what, twenty years older? Well, so what? They’d be retired, in their mid-forties, and wealthy beyond the dreams of kings! Sounds like a deal to me.“

Could it be that easy? I had my doubts, but she had me hooked.

“My Lord, just let me lay the groundwork,” she continued. “We have ten years before we would have to start the cycle. Ten years to refine the plan, to work out the bugs, to introduce the idea to them. I bet that by the time we’re ready to pull the trigger on this, our biggest problem will be how to prevent the other Ten Thousanders from being insanely jealous of the chosen couple.“

I still had my doubts, but they were waning. Her enthusiasm was ... infectious. “Okay,” I said, “Let’s do it.”

Epilogue the third: Despair

G-Day II + one year

Seated in the lotus, he tried to center himself. One last time he looked out over the cliff of his Hokkaido estate, out into the vast Pacific Ocean, then he picked up his cell phone and called down to the mansion. He had already been living here even before the madness had lifted, just one of his many luxurious hideaways scattered around the globe. He had been biding his time. He had been plotting his next move. He had been pretending to be “retired”, as he had promised that crazy Aussie psychic who had dared to dictate terms to him. His servants here knew their gaijin Master only as “The General”, and they had feared him greatly, just as he had desired.

Of course, when the Morlocks had died, when his powers had vanished, when his madness had lifted, all that had changed. He had realized almost immediately that fate had given him the perfect place to do what he would ultimately need to do. But not right away. First he would have to exorcise the poison, the evil, from his system.

It had taken him almost a year, but he had written it all down, every insane, sordid act he had perpetrated over the course of three millennia. He wept again at the thought of all those wasted years, and of the horrible atrocities he had committed just because it had amused him. He was no longer amused. He was burdened. He was horrified. He had actually finished his bitter memoir over a week ago. There was only one more thing to do, one more task to complete. But for that task he had waited until the day of the one year anniversary. It seemed ... appropriate. His staff were the only people who had seen him during that year of self-imposed exile. They had seen his pain. They had seen his anguish. They no longer feared him. Now they feared for him.

Young Jono Hiroshi, his body man and head of his household staff, walked up the steps behind him, answering his summons. Standing to the side, so as not to spoil his Master’s ocean view, he nonetheless bowed deeply. “General-sama, what can I do for you?”

The General did not turn to look at his manservant as he spoke, but continued to stare out into the ocean. It might seem rude to you or me, but he was actually honoring his servant’s courtesy.

“Jono-san, I have seen you practicing in the courtyard with your kun, your staff. You are very skilled.“

“You are too kind, General-sama,” said the servant, unsure where this strange conversation might be leading.

“Are you equally skilled with the katana?” the General asked, lifting up his sheathed long-sword from his lap. “I myself no longer need it. I will make do with my wakizashi. It will suffice for my remaining needs.“

Hiroshi blanched, realizing what his master was demanding of him.

“Please, General-sama. Please don’t do this. It’s madness! You have to—”

Anger suddenly filled the seated man’s voice. “Don’t speak to me of madness, Jono-san. You know nothing of madness.“

He paused. He tried to center himself again.

“I need your help, Jono-san. I need your friendship. But if we are to be friends, you should at least know my name. They call me ... ‘Ares’.”

Light dawned in the young man’s eyes. He now knew, or thought he knew, the source of his Master’s pain. He took the sword. He drew it out from its scabbard. He stood in the proper ceremonial position behind his Master, ready to do what was necessary, should his Master’s resolve falter.

“I have only one further request, Jono-san,” he said, gesturing toward the bound sheaf of papers off to his side, “Please deliver this manuscript to the authorities. It should explain ... everything.”

“It would be my honor ... Ares-san.”

With his last bit of business finally handled, Ares drew his short sword ... and disemboweled himself, completing the ritual.

Epilogue the fourth: Hope

G-Day II + ten years

Blake Warren was in Athens. People whispered as they passed him, recognizing his face. He was the world-renowned philanthropist, founder and co-president of the “Kynthia of Themiscyra Foundation”. The Foundation, his life’s magnum opus, was dedicated to helping the community of Amazons assimilate with the outside world. He had found the damsels in distress who needed his help, all seventy-five thousand of them.

A large portion of Warren’s considerable fortune had gone into the Foundation, but over ten times that amount came from an anonymous source: “The Jovan Farmer Trust”. No amount of digging—and believe you me, Blake Warren knew how to dig—no amount of digging could expose the person or persons behind the huge trust. But the funds the trust had brought to bear were larger than any of the largest known individual or corporate pools of wealth by a significant margin.

Much of that funding had gone into legal expenses and the final settlement, paying off the huge back debt the city owed to the rest of Greece. The Foundation’s legal team had managed to cap the backlog of debt at one century—well, one century before that awful day, the day that Kynthia died—back to 1914, but even so the payouts had been staggering. In fact, most economists agreed that the “Themiscyra Reconciliation” had single-handedly lifted Greece out of a crushing recession.

As it turned out, Blake had just come from Themiscyra, a place that had become a second home, but this time had been special. He had been there to commemorate the bittersweet tenth anniversary of the “Death of the Morlocks”, always observed in Themiscyra as the “Martyrdom of Kynthia”. This year the keynote invocation had been given by Powerhouse, now in her first rotation as chair of the Legion of Heroes. She was the first female chair since Kynthia herself. Blake had always considered himself a hard, analytical man, but there, in the shadow of the Tower where his friend had died, Sadie’s speech had made him cry like a little child.

He had been in good company at least. His friend and occasional lover, Kalliope Kynthiakos, “Kalliope of Kynthia”, had been sitting next to him, bawling even more than he was. He recalled yet again how they had met. It was the first meeting of Blake’s fledgling Foundation, about nine and a half years ago. Neither of them remembered who had introduced them, but they both remembered their first sight of each other. He actually had not taken much note of her last name; “Kynthiakos” was an extremely common adopted surname among the Amazons. But no, in that first meeting, he had taken one long look at her and something beyond reasoning just clicked. Before he could edit himself he blurted out, “You were her best friend.”

Momentarily taken aback, she looked him over carefully, and then she returned volley. “So were you.”

It had been the beginning of something ... good.

They had been lovers, but not really as intimate as Blake would have liked. Once he had joked with her that he had been “friend-zoned with benefits”. As well he might be. His love-em-and-leave-em playboy reputation has once been the only thing he was famous for. He couldn’t blame her for keeping him at arm’s length.

Even so, Kalliope had changed over this decade that he had known her. She had lost a lot of weight over the years, not that that had ever mattered to Blake. At the ceremony she looked more buff, more alive than ever. More the runner’s physique than the brawler’s now.

“I’ve only got seventy years left, if I’m lucky,” she had said to him once, years ago. It was a common refrain among the once-immortal Amazons, adjusting to a life only measured in decades, instead of centuries. Instead of millennia. But her reaction to that realization was among the best, the most hopeful. “I’m gonna savor every damned second of those seventy years. I owe it to her.“

In any case, when they met up at this 10-year ceremony, something seemed, well, different. He didn’t feel “friend-zoned” at all, in any way. It seemed as if she wanted more, as if she wanted intimacy, as if she was finally ready to let him in. At the end of the week-long event, she had all but demanded that he come for an “extended visit” to her Washington, DC home. Her actual words were “Please, Blake. Come stay with me.” She had never asked such a thing before; she had always come to him.

But as for the ceremony itself, though the occasion has been sad, Blake’s role had been upbeat, triumphant even. It had been his proud duty to report a banner year for the Kynthia of Themiscyra Foundation and for Themiscyra itself. Just a few months before the anniversary, both the European Union and the UN Security Council had finally given approval to recognize the city as a small constitutional monarchy wholly contained in Greece. In order to achieve that recognition, the Amazons had been forced to make major social changes, including accepting men as free and equal citizens.

Blake had once despaired of ever convincing the Amazons that men could be their equals, much less that men could live among them in peace. But amazingly it was Hippolyta herself who broke the log jam of the Amazons’ fear and hatred of men. On the very day of the death of the Morlocks and of poor Kynthia, Heracles had showed up on Queen Hippolyta’s doorstep to commiserate with her over the loss of their daughter, to stand beside her and help her in any way that he was able, to make suit for her hand in marriage. She welcomed him with open arms. She proudly proclaimed to one and all that he was the father of the greatest hero in Amazon history.

Even then it was not so simple. Centuries of hatred and distrust did not give way easily. There were even Amazons who challenged Hippolyta’s authority, but all challenges faltered in the face of the force of Hippolyta’s personality and leadership. After all she was the second-greatest hero in Amazon history, even though she was in league with ... in love with ... the greatest villain in Amazon history. The Amazons eventually learned to accept Heracles as the father of Kynthia, and then as the husband of their beloved Queen. When the time finally came, you could almost feel the gestalt shift. Almost as an entire nation, they forgave him—and by extension all men—for his crimes against the Amazons.

So the world at large was finally accepting the Amazons, and vice versa. It hadn’t all been a hard uphill battle though. There were other international organizations that had recognized and befriended Themiscyra almost from the outset. Most notable among them were NATO and the International Olympic Committee, although both of those had befriended Themiscyra for transparently selfish reasons.

NATO was interested in the Amazons because the concentration of military wisdom in this place was clearly unsurpassed. Immediately after the exposure of Themiscyra and its secrets, military analysts around the world began pouring over Kalliope’s Dubai invasion plan. Military scholars could see the genius behind the plan. They knew that for years to come—if not centuries—war colleges would teach the fine points of that plan the way that art colleges teach Picasso and Michelangelo. And it was a plan that had never even been tested in battle!

The U.S. Department of Defense had actually hired Kalliope as a consultant, although that was only a part-time job. Her main job was as a correspondent for the National Geographic Society, climbing mountains and hacking through jungles, and then sharing those adventures with her loyal readers.

But we were talking about NATO and the IOC, right? The IOC was, if it were possible, even more mercenary than NATO in their friendship with the new nation. Why? Well, the Greek Women’s Olympic team was suddenly was cornering the market on gold, silver, and bronze. In fact, when the issue of the new nation’s independence came before the European Parliament, Greece came just short of demanding that the Themiscyra continue to contribute its athletes to the Greek team. It had become a source of inspiration and pride for the small country that had always considered itself the true home is the Games. Greece was actually building its new Olympic Training Center in Themiscyra, ostensibly a foreign country. And, of course, the introduction of Amazons to the Games was a spectator drawing card like no other. For the first time in their history, the IOC was not dependent on American and Western European media—and their “home team” proclivities—to fill the committee’s coffers.

So in any case, now the work of the Foundation was winding down. It had been hard work, but well worth it. Blake’s secret life as a superhero had ended years ago. Now he could foresee the end of his public career as a philanthropist. He pondered what might be next. «Is Kalliope really ready to open up to me now? It certainly seemed that way at the memorial.» Never an indecisive man, Blake acted as soon as he was sure of himself. «I’ll do it.» He pulled out his smartphone and changed his return flight from Carthage City to Washington.

With pride in the Foundation and its accomplishments and pleasant hopes for his personal future buoying his mood, the sad memories of ten years ago that had threatened to overwhelm him were held at bay.

It helped that he had found a good place for his ruminations. A place to enjoy some down time. He was at his favorite restaurant here in the Greek capital, sitting at a sidewalk table, reveling in the warm, clear Mediterranean sky. It was a glorious day in “The Glorious City”.

His reverie was interrupted when a young family bustled in to be seated at a larger table not far away. Mother and father were lovingly herding three unruly boys and an adorable little girl. The father was a giant of a man, six-foot-five if he were an inch, muscular but not muscle-bound. He had short blonde hair and a stubbly brown beard just beginning to show some salt amongst the pepper. His gently smiling eyes completed the picture of a man deeply in love.

As well he might be! The olive-toned mother was one of the most beautiful women Blake had ever seen, and he had just come from a city teeming with gorgeous women. Blake inhaled sharply as he saw her face and realized that she was the spitting image of his long lost friend, the heroine, the martyr whom he had been honoring only yesterday.

«Yes, she could be Cynthia’s twin sister. A little older maybe. And not as toned and muscular, but then what normal woman is?»

She was even wearing that transparently happy expression that Cynthia wore in the last days that he knew her. And, also like latter-day-Cynthia, she moved as if she were dancing to music that only she could hear. She was wearing a lovely pale-yellow sun dress that matched her daughter’s, but hugged her delicious, voluptuous figure like a jealous lover. Around her neck she wore a thin silver choker with a heart-shaped locket. Blake gasped audibly when he noticed it.

«No, it can’t be her. Not at all. She died in Themiscyra. The DNA at the base of the Tower was a perfect match.»

She caught Blake staring at her and smiled warmly back at him. She lifted a glass in salute. He returned the salute with his own glass and a wistful grin.

«Wouldn’t it be nice if it were her? Wouldn’t it be nice if she survived? If they both survived?»

Blake’s genius mind started to churn as he remembered the incredible powers that Cynthia’s lover had demonstrated. His wild intuition was still nagging him even as he and the young mother continued to look into each other’s eyes over the rims of their wine glasses.

The woman’s toast to Blake was interrupted when hubby pulled her into a rough, enthusiastic kiss. A kiss that she returned just as joyfully, melting into his strong arms. Their eldest son covered his eyes and complained, “Ewww! Mom! Dad! Not again!".

Now Blake was fighting against his runaway imagination. «That kid couldn’t be Cynthia’s. He would have to be ten or eleven. He’s way too big for just nine years old,» Then, almost against his will, he revised himself yet again, «But maybe not. Just look at his father!»

Blake’s smile broadened. His mind was going crazy, making leap after broad intuitive leap. «Yes. Wouldn’t it be nice if she were alright? Wouldn’t it be nice if she wanted to let me know that she were alright? That she were happy? But how could she do that without breaking the cover of a being whose superpower is “keeping a low profile”?»

As this wonderful fantasy consumed Blake’s thoughts, another, younger couple showed up. Another giant and another beauty. They joined the happy family, sharing handshakes and hugs all around. Mom, Dad, children, and guests were all involved with each other now. He couldn’t keep staring at them, so he looked away, out at the street, out at the city, losing himself in a daydream that he hoped was true.