Ethan took a step back, smiling as he admired his work.
After spending the past three months in Ascension helping Alex recover, Ethan and Raz had moved back into their Stillrock apartment full time, spending the better part of the last week transforming the apartment into their new headquarters.
While Raz worked with Apex on building out their tech infrastructure to monitor Apex's early alert system, Ethan hired (and supervised, as he so often reminded Raz) a pair of cleaners to scour the entire apartment. It took twice as long as they thought it would, but the apartment was finally clean enough to have the team over, and with one day to spare Ethan took it upon himself to spend almost the entire day hanging pictures and posters throughout his room, littering the walls with moments he had found in a photo album he had thrown in a box and forgotten about years ago.
When he finished with that project, he realized there was still one more thing he had to hang.
In front of him now was a banner, slightly askew but proudly displayed on their living room wall that read "Protectors West", the official name of his group of Protectors in charge of every superpowered event west of Ascension.
His new team, consisting of himself, Raz, Quinn, and Rainey all gathered around to look at the new banner. Rainey, naturally, was the first to speak her mind. She pushed herself off the couch and sulked over to Ethan's side.
"This is such a weird thing to have hanging in your living room," she said, crossing her arms sullenly.
"You don't get an opinion," Quinn politely reminded her. Ethan laughed, shaking his head.
Rainey rolled her eyes. "It's been three months. How long am I going to be on probation, exactly?"
Quinn thought for a moment, then turned to Rainey. "You need to save as many people as you would have hurt, had Ethan not stopped you. Ascension has a population of a million, so save about five hundred thousand and we'll start taking your concerbs under consideration."
"Unreal," she muttered. "Are there even that many people in these nowhere towns?"
"I've done some research," Raz chimed in, "given how strong the snowstorm was the night you nearly levelled Ascension, there's nearly two million people who could've been affected by the radiation you unleashed. That's a lot of people who might need saving!"
"Speaking of," Ethan told them, standing in front of the banner, "it's our first official day as Protectors West! Raz has copied over the same system Apex used so he'll be monitoring the scanners for any Protector-related disturbances to deploy us where we're needed all over the Lavender Range."
"How do we know who is working when?" Rainey asked.
"Great question, I've taken the liberty of having Raz make us a chart…"
Raz went into the kitchen and pulled out a whiteboard that had each day of the week split into day and night. Ethan pointed to the chart behind him.
"Rainey, you'll start on nights, I'll take days."
She grumbled, but held her tongue.
"Actually," Quinn whispered to him, "I got us Ace's tickets for tomorrow."
"Oh," Ethan raised an eyebrow. He erased their names, then swapped them. "Actually, Rainey, you're on days this week."
"Is there going to be any sort of consistency to this, or is it just going to be based on whenever you have plans?"
"Probably the latter if I'm being honest, but if you don't like it you can always report to the prison in Florence?"
Rainey sighed dramatically, then shook her head. "Could you not convince Sola to join?"
"She's back to work at the vet office in Maybell. She's in reserve in case I want a vacation, which is something I can actually think about now that Apex pays me an actual salary, but in the meantime those kittens aren't going to neuter themselves. We can handle this ourselves and if we find anyone worthy of adding to our cause, we can work on evaluating them and scheduling them, too. But, we've got to find them first."
"The more people affected by the Surge you both find, the easier this is going to be," Raz told her.
Rainey grumbled. "Guess I better go get some sleep."
"Yeah, and I should head to work," Quinn said, grabbing her bag off the counter. "We should be finished rebuilding the Junction today just to seal that connection point permanently. Alex has been a huge help with that. Plus, the statistics team is also unveiling their fallout model from the March…incident, so I should have more information to share with you about where to start your search."
"Excellent," Ethan nodded, eager to get to work.
"Can you send me the report?" Raz asked. "Ethan doesn't read emails."
"I don't think they even gave me a phone!" He protested. Raz rolled his eyes. "Anyway, Quinn, do you need me to teleport you?"
"No, you have enough going on now. You're needed here."
"Fair enough, I'll walk you out. I need to get my patrol started since I'm on days now."
"We need to create a coverage map, like Apex did in Ascension, so you'll be starting in Crestone," Raz told him. "Head there, look for anyone with glowing hands or laser eyes, or really glowing any parts, and report back."
"On it, boss," Ethan saluted him and followed Quinn out the door, pausing in front of her car, the morning sun chasing out the last remnants of the spring chill.
"Well, you finally did it," she smiled, wrapping her arms around his neck. "Ethan Havoc, the newest Protector of Ascension."
"Protector of Stillrock," he laughed, "but close enough."
"Well, good luck on your first day. Let's hope this job goes better than your last one."
"Let's hope," he said, kissing her and sighing contentedly. Quinn gave him a wave goodbye, leaving him on his own. Before he took off for Crestone, he felt his phone vibrate. He shook his head, then took off for the mesa overlooking Stillrock, jumping from portal to portal, bursting through the clouds and falling back down to earth until he stepped right out onto the grass.
Alex stood looking out over their hometown, the sun just starting to set in front of her. Ethan crept up behind her and wrapped his arms around her.
"Dead," he said. He started to laugh, but Alex shoved him off a little too hard, tossing him to the grass fifty feet away. She leapt over to him, extending her hand.
"Damn it, sorry," she exclaimed, helping him up.
"I guess you don't need situational awareness when you're that strong," he rubbed the dirt off the back of his suit.
"I'm not fully myself yet," Alex said, sheepishly.
"You'll get your control back," Ethan sighed, meeting Alex's eyes. "And you don't need to beat yourself up. I haven't had time to apologize since you've been back, but I'm to blame for your lack of control, and I'm sorry."
"It's okay," Alex waved him off, "you were doing what you thought was right. You were wrong, of course, but I get it."
"That's the thing," Ethan shrugged, "I knew what I was doing wasn't right. I was lying to protect myself and get what I wanted. I was wrong, but just saying that won't get the months you spent recovering back. I'm sorry, Alex."
Alex reached out and hugged him, much more gently this time. "You don't ever have to apologize to me, except if you ruin any more of my floorboards."
Ethan laughed in her shoulder. "I don't do that anymore. Well, I still spill stuff, but I have cleaners now."
"Nice having a salary, huh?"
Ethan wiped his face, smiling. "It's the best."
"I forgive you, by the way."
Ethan nodded. "Thank you. I don't forgive myself, at least…not yet."
"Well," Alex's eyes drifted towards the mountains, "there's nothing like throwing yourself into your work to forget about things for a while. Who do you think is out there?"
"I don't know," Ethan smiled widely, opening a portal in front of him. "But I can't wait to find out."