The Daily Bulletin offices ...

Betty looked around the bullpen and marvelled at the noise that assailed her. Muted, but there. Not the noise of the incessant rush of a working newspaper, though there was enough of that, but the noise of thoughts leaking from the minds of her co-workers. It was, to say the least, a revelation, and she felt more than a little like a voyeur, intruding upon the privacy of others.

She twisted the ring upon her finger, now the correct size for her own hands, and watched as people hurried around the office. The copy boy, who had a crush on Barnes, the sports columnist. Elsa, who really wished she could sing as well as her animated namesake. Phillip, who had carried on an affair with his best friend's wife for the last three years and had, literally, no regrets about breaking that particular trust.

The more juicy, lewd and downright filthy thoughts, she ignored and her power pushed those thoughts into the background, muffled, but still there. Her power. She still couldn't believe it. If someone had said to her the day before that she would join the ranks of the super-powered people, she would have laughed in their faces. Still, it opened up many avenues. The things she could learn, the secrets and the lies. It would revolutionise her career.

But that would crash, headlong, into her unassailable ethics. Not to mention that simply knowing that kind of information would not mean she had evidence and, in the reporting game, evidence was king. Oh, some, less scrupulous, reporters had a laissez-faire attitude to presenting evidence, but she was not one of them. It could be a tool, but it could never take the place of true reporting skills. She would still have to investigate, interview and search for the truth.

"Burns! Do I need to tell you that daydreaming doesn't win a Pulitzer?" Brody Quint stormed through the crowd like a stay-at-home mom on Black Friday, her colleagues practically leaping out of his way. "Stories, Burns! Stories keep newspapers alive and you're only as good as your last! What have you got?"

"I'm still working on it." She dropped the hand bearing the ring to her lap and made a play of looking at her laptop screen. She hadn't written a thing. "Though I do have something about the fires in Torquay Heights. That new villain, Phaross, and ... and Psycona arriving late again."

"Is this a story? Any idiot can report on a fire!" He dropped his spreading backside on her desk and looked about ready to smoke the unlit cigar he always held in his hand. He'd stopped smoking years ago. "Who is Phaross? Where did he come from? What does he want? What's his connection with Psycona? Don't give me crap and I won't bury your stories on page twelve!"

Everything was an exclamation with the chief. Everything of viral importance. Of pure journalism. He shouted and yelled to keep errant reporters in line, showing a gruff and immoveable façade to his staff. Only, now, Betty could hear a different side to the man. On the inside, Brody Quint cared. He cared about every single one of his staff members, wanting and expecting the very best of them. He liked her. Thoughts poured from the man who hadn't even told anyone that worked here the name of his wife.

In Betty, he saw a daughter. Someone that could carry on his work in the future. The kind of reporter that could eclipse him as Editor-In-Chief. He wanted that for her. Expected that of her and Betty almost blushed at the confidence the man had in her. But she also felt dirty at learning such things. The chief kept those thoughts private for a reason and she had intruded upon his privacy. As she thought that, the chief's thoughts faded into the background, becoming nothing but incoherent whispers among many others.

"I think there's a definite connection between Phaross and Psycona, chief. I'm just lining up the evidence before I commit to saying anything." That was mostly true. Except she didn't think there was a connection, she knew there was. "You wouldn't want me to do something half-assed, would you? You want me to be thorough? I'll have the Torquay Heights story ready in five. Trust me, the wait for the Phaross/Psycona story will be worth it."

"Well. Alright." The chief looked at her, twirling the cigar in his fingers and then stood, before bashing his fingers upon her desk. "Get it done! Or you'll be second-stringing the fashion section!"

He popped the cigar between his teeth and scowled at her before turning away, looking around the office and searching for anyone else he could browbeat to be a better reporter. Eyes caught each other and the chief stormed in the direction of Jordan, the city beat reporter, who tried, and failed to duck and avoid the chief's ire.

Betty smiled as the chief began to roar at Jordan, everyone in the bullpen thanking their lucky stars they were not on the receiving end of the tirade. She tapped upon the mouse, bringing up her, empty, story and started to type her account of the fires before sending it to the chief. The clock in the corner of the screen told her she still had hours to go before she could try to get more information about Psycona. And that, in itself, held many problems to overcome.

-+-

Sean Smith's apartment, that evening ...

Zjahn had paced across every millimetre of space in the apartment since returning after the exploits of the morning. He had closed the heavy, black drapes across the windows and had locked his door. He couldn't make it easy for himself. Or, rather, for this other self he had unleashed upon the world.

Of course, he knew very well that locked doors and mere fabric could not stop the emergence of Phaross, should it happen again, but it gave him a modicum of comfort. The primitive communication methods of humans had garnered no responses from his calls for aid. He had few that he could, in a certain light, call friends in the supers community, fewer still of those that he could trust with the knowledge of his fall, but he had tried.

Principle, damn his perfect hide, would do his very best to help, but he still remained caught up in whatever actions he undertook in whatever part of existence he had transported himself to to find his lover. Likewise, Drone had accompanied him, along with Swift. Of the others, no-one had the required abilities to help him, or the strength to oppose him should the situation deteriorate. Anyone else, outside those few, he did not know well enough to place his trust in them.

The fault for all of this lay firmly at his own feet. Since arriving on this planet, he had held himself apart from everyone else. Not only the superhero community, but from the world at large. He had made no connections, no relationships outside of this room. None. He cherished his solitude, his aloofness, but that had all come back to haunt him. He had no-one upon whom he could count. No-one that he could speak with and try to understand what now happened to him.

And, worst of all, he had seen himself as something more than the people of this planet. He had seen himself as their superior in every way and that superiority, that supposed superiority, had seen him tire of his duty, had seen him grow bored of the task he had set for himself. And, in his arrogance, he had sought greater recognition for his efforts and that, alone, was the clearest sign of his unmitigated hubris. He had never started this task, to fulfil a debt, for recognition.

"You deserve that recognition!" Once again, the voice of his construct invaded his mind. "You are superior! You are their better in every way. They should all fall to their knees and worship you as a god!"

"Be silent!" Zjahn whipped around, searching for the owner of the voice, knowing full well where that voice came from. "If we are, if I am superior to these people, then why could I not save everyone? Why, then, did a human almost succumb to the ferocity of the flames you caused and yet throw himself back into the fight? I would argue that he showed superiority. I would argue that he deserves far greater recognition than I!"

The image of Phaross shimmered into existence before Zjahn. He looked taller, more muscular, more imposing and threatening. His countenance had grown more fierce, more cruel and evil. Phaross was evolving each time he escaped from Zjahn's subconscious. The construct peered down at Zjahn and sneered beneath the helmet, green fire blazing where the eyes should sit. Zjahn turned away, unable to control or contain the creature he had created.

"Your arguments are facile. Nothing about these primitives is superior to us. We are pure. We are pristine. Perfection!" Phaross gripped Zjahn by the shoulder, spinning him back around to face him. "Together, we could rule this world. I, the ever-present storm, ready to rain destruction upon them all. And you, their protector, their saviour. They will reach for you with pleading fingers and you will deign to shield them. You will be magnanimous in your victories and ruthless in the execution of your rule. None shall stand before us. They will look upon our works and despair."

"Principle will stop us. You cannot hide what you are from him." Zjahn knew well the irony in his words. "And he's not the only one. The heroes of this world will not stand by and let it happen. They will stand. They will fight. And I will gladly lay down my life to stop you."

"You. To stop you." Phaross waved a gauntleted finger between them, a vile grin spreading upon his features. "You already see us as separate, but we are not. And, as far as Principle is concerned, you know how to kill him. You've always known."

That was not true! Zjahn had never even considered the possibility of killing Principle. The very thought of it sickened him. As a Peacemaker, the oath he had taken, that all Peacemakers had taken, strictly forbade taking a life under any circumstances. It was the guiding principle of his homeworld, that life, no matter how vile, how ugly of mind, how cruel of hand, or how destructive of touch, all life was, to him and his long-dead people, sacred. That no-one had the right to take the life of another. Perhaps that had led to the destruction of his homeworld, perhaps not, but Zjahn could never betray those principles. Not in thought, and certainly not in action.

Except ... he already had.

The man, Wade Tompkins. Those people that had perished in flame, choked upon smoke and ash and crushed beneath falling masonry. Zjahn could blame those deaths, and the attempted murder of Tompkins, on Phaross, but he knew well, to his shame, where the true blame lay. It may have appeared as though Phaross had wrought the destruction upon those apartment buildings in Torquay Heights, but it was Zjahn's hand that had dealt the deadly blows.

He had betrayed everything he held sacred, everything he held dear.

"What have I done?" Zjahn fell to his knees before the image of Phaross. "I am become a monster."

Phaross reached out with a gauntleted hand, smoothing down the hair of the human façade that Zjahn still showed. An act of compassion, of empathy, from a vile creature of Zjahn's own making. His evil counterpart opened his mouth to speak, stopped only by the sound of soft knocking upon the unpainted wood of the apartment's door.

"Ugh. You should really kill her, you know." Phaross curled a lip in distaste. "Before she ruins everything."

Zjahn couldn't sense anyone beyond the door, and that could only mean one person. Betty Burns had come to call once again and, in that moment, Phaross faded away.