The week before the Supe convention, I spent every evening training Annie in covert operations. She was powerful—her light manipulation abilities were impressive—but she'd been trained for PR appearances and scripted rescues, not actual combat or espionage.
We met in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of the city, far from Vought's surveillance network.
"Again," I said, dodging her light blast. "You're telegraphing your attacks. I can see you gathering energy before you shoot."
"This isn't how I was trained," she protested, breathing hard. "Vought taught us to pose, to look heroic, to make sure the cameras got our good side."
"Vought trained you to be products. I'm training you to actually fight." I moved faster than she could track, appearing behind her. "In a real fight, hesitation gets you killed."
She spun around, releasing a burst of light that I barely dodged. Better—that was instinctive rather than calculated.
"Good. But you're still holding back. Why?"
"Because I could hurt you?"
"Annie, I've absorbed eight Supes' worth of powers. You literally can't hurt me with anything less than your absolute maximum output. So stop pulling your punches and actually try."
Something shifted in her expression—determination replacing uncertainty. She planted her feet, and I could feel the energy building around her. Not just light, but raw power.
When she released it, the blast was blinding. It caught me full in the chest and actually drove me back several feet, my energy shields flaring to absorb the impact.
"There we go," I said, grinning despite the lingering sting. "That's what I'm talking about. Again."
We trained for three hours, and by the end, Annie was moving with real confidence. Not just throwing her powers around hoping to look heroic, but using them tactically, thinking three moves ahead.
"You're a natural," I said during a water break. "Once you stopped thinking about cameras and started thinking about actual combat."
"It feels wrong," she admitted. "Using my powers like this. I always wanted to be a hero, to save people. This feels more like... being a soldier."
"Sometimes being a hero means being a soldier. The world isn't clean and simple, Annie. Sometimes the only way to save people is to fight the monsters trying to hurt them."
She was quiet for a moment, processing. Then: "How do you deal with it? The killing, I mean. Taking lives, even when they deserve it."
It was a question I'd been avoiding asking myself too directly.
"Honestly? I don't know if I am dealing with it. Every time I absorb someone's powers, I get fragments of their memories, their experiences. It's like carrying pieces of them with me. The violence, the cruelty, the justifications they told themselves. It's... heavy."
"Do you regret it?"
"No. Because every Supe I've killed has been a monster who was actively hurting people. The Deep assaulted twenty-three women. Translucent violated thousands of people's privacy. Compound King murdered forty-three people for entertainment. The world is objectively better without them. But that doesn't make carrying their deaths easy."
Annie reached over and squeezed my hand. "Thank you. For being honest. For not pretending this is simple."
"Nothing about this is simple. That's why we need each other—to remember why we're doing this when it gets hard."
We sat in comfortable silence for a few minutes, the warehouse quiet except for the distant sounds of the city.
"Can I ask you something?" Annie said eventually. "Your powers—the hypnosis, the absorption—where did they come from? You said you're Mazahs, but what does that mean?"
I'd been avoiding this conversation, but she deserved the truth.
"Honestly? I don't fully know. I woke up in this world with these abilities and the name echoing in my head. Mazahs is from comic books—an evil version of Shazam from an alternate reality. He could steal the powers of those he killed, including gods."
"Comic books? What, like you're from a different dimension?"
"Maybe? Or reincarnated, or chosen by some cosmic force. I genuinely don't know. All I know is that I have these abilities, I'm in a world that desperately needs someone willing to use them against corrupt Supes, and I'm trying to do the right thing with what I've been given."
"That's terrifying."
"Tell me about it. I'm literally making this up as I go, hoping I don't become the villain of my own story."
She smiled slightly. "Well, for what it's worth, I don't think you're a villain. Complicated, maybe. Dangerous, definitely. But your heart's in the right place."
"Thanks. That means a lot, actually."
We continued training until the early hours of the morning, and by the time we finished, Annie had improved dramatically. She wasn't ready to take on The Seven alone, but she could hold her own in a serious fight.
More importantly, she was committed. The uncertainty I'd seen in her eyes before was gone, replaced by genuine determination to see this through.
We had an ally inside The Seven. Now we just needed to survive the convention long enough to use that advantage.