Having a girlfriend was the greatest thing in the world by far. Nothing could compare. Not saying goodbye to my ass of an old boss over the phone, not getting drunk and proceeding to kiss and hug everyone around me, and not even winning a bet against Troy and having him as my servant for a day.

It was the best.

And as an added bonus, my girlfriend was two of the most amazing people I knew put into one! My luck truly was out of bounds of what should be possible in reality. Not that I would ever complain about that though…

That aside, we agreed to meet up and march into Fractal’s base together after my business in Lupsville was over. Rob had some questions about where I’d disappeared for half a day, but when my lying ass started spouting stuff about visiting the local shopping center, he quickly lost interest. Just as planned.

The exchange of goods with Neutra the following day also went surprisingly smoothly. She acted pretty cold toward us, but at the same time maintained her professionalism and was respectful the entire time. I even thought I saw her smile for an instant when someone mentioned Fractal.

She also slipped me a letter to give to my boss and told me not to open it. Something about gutting me if I did. No idea what that was about, but I didn’t have the mental capacity to care, since I was still worried about how the meeting of Fern and Fractal would go.

The entire way back to Kitran City, I kept fidgeting and nervously looking out of the window, waiting for anything and everything to go wrong.

Like… a meteor falling out of the sky, or some extra-dimensional being appearing out of nowhere and wiping out humanity. All very reasonable concerns.

Surprisingly, nothing happened, and we made it back to the base. Fractal thanked me for a job well done, took the letter from me while muttering something akin to, “Oh, not again…” and then off I went back home.

Tomorrow would be the day I helped my girlfriend and my boss make up! I had no idea what I could do other than just being there, but I would try my best to make things right! Yeah!

“Hey, Aster! Have you heard? Apparently, your dream girl is back in town,” Troy greeted me with his signature grin when I returned home.

“What?”

“Lookie here.” He showed me an article headline on his phone saying ‘Iron Pack back from the dead?’

Exaggerated as always.

“Oh… uh, yeah. I know.”

Troy’s eyebrow went up. “You know?” A second later, his eyes went wide. “Wait, are you telling me you had something to do with it? Did you actually meet her or something?”

“W-what? No! That’s ridiculous. I just… uh…” My eyes shifted around for a second. “I already read that article! Yeah!”

Troy stopped for a moment, before deadpanning, “That article went up five minutes ago.”

Oh…

“Aster, did you seriously meet with a supervillain?”

Yes, many times, with many different supervillains. Including myself, apparently.

“No, I didn’t!”

“Aster, I get that being reckless and carefree is basically your signature move, but supervillains are superdangerous! It’s in their job description!”

“She’s not dangerous! She’s the nicest person I know!”

“Oh… my god…” Troy whispered, going pale.

Ah… shit. The cat’s out of the bag. Oh well, whatever! Now that he knew, I needed to overwhelm him before he had a chance to say anything.

“Look here, Troy! She didn’t even have a choice when it came to becoming a supervillain! She ran away from home from her abusive parents! She had to steal food just to survive, otherwise she would have to go back to those two assholes!”

Troy was now sitting on the sofa, staring at me and pretending to be a fish.

Oof… maybe I’d said a bit too much? I had only learned about all the details the other day, and here I was already spewing out her secrets.

Troy didn’t say anything for a long while, probably trying to process all of this information. Then, he finally looked up at me and said, “She also attacks churches.”

“Her parents were religious fanatics,” I immediately said, before realizing that wasn’t the greatest of excuses. “So, uh… she has some bad experience with religion and stuff… But I’ll talk to her and ask her to stop doing that at least.”

“Talk to her? Okay, seriously. You didn’t just meet her out on the streets, did you? How the hell did you get her to tell you all of this?! Don’t tell me…”

Ah, shit… I really had said a bit too much.

“I… err, she’s my girlfriend now.” I glanced away, feeling my cheeks warm up.

“What.”

“Anyway! She’s not a villain! Definitely doesn’t have to be! And I’ll help her out of this situation no matter what because I love her!”

I quickly rushed into my room and slammed the door behind me.

…

Well, I’d let Fern punch me in the face for revealing all of that later. For now, I had tomorrow to prepare for.

BottledChaos

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