Morgan didn't flinch under Cecil's gaze.
He shifted just enough to put himself more fully between Amber and the cluster of agents, shoulders squared, weight balanced. The gym lights glinted off scattered glass and confetti; the whole scene would've looked absurd if it didn't feel so deadly serious.
He turned his head slightly, enough to see Amber.
"You," he said, voice low but clear, "are the most important person here."
Her breath hitched. For a second, the anger, fear, and confusion in her eyes all melted into something rawer.
"Thank you," she whispered, and buried her face against his shoulder, fingers fisting in his jacket. He felt the tremor in her hands, the way she used him as a shield—not from punches, but from everything else.
Cecil watched them with something like clinical curiosity.
"Touching," he said. "Really. But it doesn't change the fact that all three of you are coming with me."
He flicked his gaze from Morgan to Mark to Eve, counting them off like items on a checklist.
"I don't work for you," Morgan replied, tone almost apologetic. "Sorry."
He could feel the storylines peeling away from what he remembered. The beats were wrong now. The timing, the players, the stage.
Looks like the plot is totally off, he thought. Oh well.
If things were on schedule, Omni‑Man should be at headquarters right about now.
Killing everyone.
Cecil took a step forward, hands still in his coat pockets, voice calm.
"You should," he said. "I can protect you."
"From who?" Morgan asked, genuinely curious. "Because from where I'm standing, you mostly protect your own plans."
Cecil's eyes narrowed a fraction. "Omni‑Man," he said.
The name dropped into the gym like a lead weight. A few students gasped outright. Others froze, eyes darting between the grown man in the coat and the kid in the cape who shared that man's blood.
Morgan looked at Mark.
Mark's face was a mess of confusion and dawning horror, like someone had just yanked the floor out from under him and he was still deciding whether to fall.
Then Morgan looked back at Cecil.
"You should probably check on your team," he said.
Something in his tone—not the words themselves, but the way he said them—made the hairs on the back of several agents' necks stand up.
Cecil's jaw tightened. He turned slightly toward one of the men at his side, a grizzled agent with a headset and a tablet.
"Check it out," Cecil said. "Status on HQ."
The agent tapped his earpiece, fingers flying over the screen.
Silence stretched.
"Well?" Cecil asked.
The agent swallowed. "All I get is static, sir," he said. "No video, no audio. Systems aren't responding."
A ripple of unease moved through the men behind him. Eve's eyes widened. Mark went pale.
Cecil's gaze snapped back to Morgan, hard now.
"What do you know, Morgan?" he demanded.
Morgan met his eyes without blinking.
"All I know," he said slowly, "is that you should probably head back. Right now. And take junior and his girlfriend with you."
He jerked his chin toward Mark and Eve, deliberately leaving Amber out of that category. His arm tightened slightly around her shoulders.
"Let the rest of these kids go home," he added. "They've had enough of your 'protection' for one night."
For a split second, Cecil looked like he might argue—like he might double down, try to exert control over a situation that was already slipping.
Then the calculation clicked behind his eyes.
Omni‑Man off‑grid. HQ dark. His primary asset standing in a gym full of civilians.
He turned to Mark.
"Grayson," Cecil said sharply. "We're leaving. Now."
Mark didn't move.
"Dad…" he whispered. The word tasted different now, laced with doubt.
Eve stepped closer, hand brushing his arm. "Mark," she said, voice low. "If he's right—"
"If he's right," Cecil cut in, "you're the only one who has any chance of stopping it."
That hit.
Mark tore his gaze away from Morgan, from Amber pressed against him, and looked toward the ragged hole in the ceiling—the exit he'd made with his own fists.
"I'm not going with you," Amber said suddenly, voice steady despite the way her body trembled. "Not this time."
No one had actually asked her to. The fact that she said it anyway was the point.
Morgan felt a fierce, quiet pride unfurl in his chest.
Cecil eyed her, then dismissed her with a tiny shift of his attention. "Fine," he said. "Stay with the civilian authorities. Grayson—"
"I heard you," Mark said, voice hoarse.
He looked at Amber one last time.
"I'm sorry," he said. It sounded different now—not the familiar, reflexive apology, but something heavier. "For…all of it."
She didn't answer.
He looked at Morgan.
For a heartbeat, the two of them—Viltrumite's son and Viltrumite‑Saiyan glitch—just stared at each other across the scuffed gym floor.
"We're not done," Mark said quietly.
Morgan's mouth quirked. "We haven't even started," he replied.
"Move!" Cecil snapped.
Agents shifted. Eve rose a few inches off the ground, constructs flickering to life around her hands.
Mark launched through the broken ceiling again, chasing a father he suddenly wasn't sure he knew at all.
Eve followed, pink light streaking after yellow and blue.
Cecil hesitated just long enough to give Morgan one last hard look.
"This isn't over," he said.
"Never is with people like you," Morgan replied.
Then Cecil turned on his heel and strode out, agents flowing around him and back through the doors, radios crackling, boots pounding.
The gym was left in ringing silence, broken only by the buzz of damaged lights and the distant wail of sirens outside.
Morgan exhaled slowly.
Amber lifted her head from his shoulder, eyes searching his.
"How did you know?" she whispered.
He could've lied. He could've deflected. He could've said, Lucky guess.
Instead, he said, quietly, "Because men like Cecil only ever offer protection from monsters they helped invite in."
Her fingers tightened in his jacket.
"Come on," he said, finally guiding her toward the nearest cluster of stunned classmates. "Let's get you out of here."
The plot was off the rails now.
Omni‑Man was at HQ—probably carving his way through people who thought they had contingency plans.
Invincible was flying toward a confrontation years too early.
And Morgan, prom boy in a tux with glass dust in his hair and a girl's hand held tight in his own, realized that no matter how much he'd tried to stay out of the "hero vs. villain" script, the universe had just shoved him onto center stage.
He looked down at Amber.
"You're still the most important person here," he murmured.
Her answering nod was small, but it was enough.
Whatever came next—Viltrumites, Cecil, Mark, the world catching fire—he knew where his line was drawn.
And he'd just told everyone in the room which side of it he stood on.
Four minutes of silence.
Morgan knew because he counted. Not out of impatience, but because it gave his mind something to do besides replay Mark's fist slamming into his palm and Cecil's eyes narrowing.
The limo's interior light painted everything in soft gold. Outside, the city slid by, all sodium lamps and distant sirens. Inside, Amber's hand stayed locked in his, fingers tight, knuckles pressed against his palm. She hadn't let go since they walked out of the ruined gym.
She stared straight ahead.
He waited.
At exactly the two‑hundred‑and‑fortieth second, she spoke.
"Are you going to be just like Mark?" she asked quietly.
Morgan turned his head to look at her. Her eyes were still on the window, watching reflections of a prom that had gone sideways in record time. Her hand in his tightened almost imperceptibly, like she was bracing for the answer.
He could've joked. Deflected. Instead, he went with the only thing that mattered.
"No," he said.
She didn't look at him yet, but her shoulders eased a fraction.
"I told you," he went on, "you are the most important person to me. I will never allow Cecil to have more access to me than you do."
That got her attention.
She turned, leaning back against the seat so she could see his face, the limo's soft light catching the faint dust still clinging to his hair.
"I don't want you to sacrifice the world for me," she said. Her voice was calm, but her eyes were searching. "I'm not asking you to choose between me and…everyone else."
"Don't worry," he said. "I won't."
Her brows drew together. "You won't?"
"You'll come first," Morgan said, "and Mark will save the world. I'll save you, then go and help him."
She stared at him for a second, then let out a slow breath she'd been holding since the ceiling shattered.
"Good," she said. "Since that's what he chose to do."
He nodded. "Yeah. It is."
They sat with that for a moment—the acknowledgment that Mark had chosen the world over her, and that Morgan was choosing her in a way that didn't ignore the world, but refused to pretend the world was the only thing that mattered.
Amber shifted closer, leaning back into him, resting her head against his shoulder. His arm came up automatically, settling around her like it belonged there.
"So," she said, voice a little lighter now, "what does that make us? In this…cape soap opera."
"Complicated," he said.
She snorted. "That's cheating."
"All right," he said, tilting his head against hers. "How about this: I'm the guy who doesn't wear an earpiece on dates, and you're the girl who gets final veto on how much of my life Cecil ever sees."
"Deal," she said immediately. "First veto: no secret government bases unless I say so."
"Already on my list," he said. "Second veto: no going to space without telling you first."
She huffed a laugh. "You planning on going to space anytime soon?"
"Not tonight," he said. "Prom nights are strictly Earth‑bound."
Her fingers played with the cuff of his jacket. "So you're really not going to…sign up? With him?"
"I'm really not," Morgan said. "Even if he comes back with contracts and contingency plans and promises to 'protect' me from Omni‑Man and whoever else."
She was quiet, thinking.
"What are you going to do, then?" she asked. "In this world. You're…not normal. I think we can both stop pretending you are."
"Hey, I'm extremely normal," he said. "I stress about homework and eat too much junk food and occasionally want to suplex my alarm clock."
"And you caught Invincible's punch with one hand," she said dryly.
"Details," he said.
She nudged him, gentle but insistent. "Morgan."
He sighed, letting some of the joking fall away.
"I'm going to live my life," he said. "Go to school. Annoy teachers. Play Go with Arthur. Eat Helen's questionable casseroles."
"That's the 'normal' part," she said.
"And when something threatens you?" he continued. "I step in. Hard."
"And if something threatens…everyone?" she pressed.
"Then I'll decide how much I can do without breaking the first rule," he said. "I'm not pretending I don't care about people. I do. But I'm done with stories where saving the world always means sacrificing the person right in front of you."
"That's…a lot," she said softly.
"Yeah," he said. "But I'm not the one who has to carry the 'save Earth or else' title. That's Mark. That's what he chose, whether he realized it or not."
"And if he needs help?" she asked.
"Then I help," Morgan said. "On my terms. Not Cecil's. Not Viltrum's. Mine."
She shifted, angling herself so she could see his face more clearly.
"And what are your terms?" she asked.
"You," he said simply. "You get the first say. If jumping into a fight means leaving you alone in a crowd with a man like Cecil walking around, the answer is no. If we can get you somewhere safe and then I can help without putting you back on the altar, I'll go."
She let that sink in, eyes softening.
"So I get a vote," she said.
"You get more than a vote," he said. "You're the tie‑breaker."
The corner of her mouth lifted. "That's…new."
"Yeah," he said. "I'm trying this radical thing where communication exists."
She laughed, and this time it reached her eyes.
The limo turned onto her street. The familiar houses rolled past, ordinary and solid, like nothing world‑shattering had happened an hour ago.
"What about Cecil?" she asked. "He's not just going to…let you walk away."
"He can try," Morgan said. "He'll send people. He'll ask questions. He'll dangle 'protection' and 'resources.' If he pushes too hard, I push back harder. But I'm not doing it alone."
She arched an eyebrow. "Who else have you recruited without telling me?"
"You," he said. "Congratulations. You're my handler."
She snorted. "That makes me sound like I work for Cecil."
"You work for you," he corrected. "I just…take your opinion very seriously."
She considered that, then nodded. "Okay," she said. "Then here's my first opinion: you're telling Arthur and Helen something. Maybe not everything, but enough so they're not blindsided when government guys show up at the door."
He winced. "They're going to be mad I didn't tell them sooner."
"They're going to be mad Cecil walked into your prom," she said. "The rest is negotiable."
The limo rolled to a stop in front of her house. The porch light was on. Her mom's shadow moved behind the curtains.
Amber didn't reach for the door handle yet.
"So," she said. "Us."
"Us," he echoed.
"You know this is going to be messy," she said. "Mark, Eve, Cecil, Omni‑Man—none of them are just going to…fade into the background because we want to dance in peace."
"I know," he said. "But for the record, I'd still like to dance with you again sometime when the ceiling doesn't explode."
She smiled, small and sincere. "Me too."
She leaned in and kissed him—soft, sure, tasting of melted ice from the punch bowl and the stubbornness that had carried her through all of this.
When she pulled back, her forehead rested against his.
"One more thing," she said.
"Yeah?" he asked.
"If you ever decide to go to space," she murmured, "I'm still getting a text first."
He laughed quietly. "Deal."
They climbed out of the limo together. Her mom took one look at Amber's face, Morgan's scuffed tux, and the faint shake in both their hands—and pulled Amber into a hug without questions.
Morgan stepped back, watching, feeling something in his chest unclench.
This, he thought, is the part worth fighting for.
Not the headlines. Not the legacy. This.
As the limo pulled away and he headed back to the Parkers' house, he knew the world outside was already changing—Cecil scrambling, Viltrum stirring, Mark flying toward a confrontation written in blood.
But inside that car, for eight minutes and a handful of promises, they'd claimed something the original story hadn't made room for:
A relationship negotiated in full view of the apocalypse.
And Morgan intended to keep that promise, even if it meant punching his way through canon to do it.