Consciousness rushed in on the man known only as Bagheera. His eyes shot open. Fire and fury surrounded him. He recognized the remnants of downtown Pacific City, but he couldn’t quite grasp the reason why. Not through the fog in his head.

Whatever hit me, it must have been quite the whammy.

As he continued to take in the destruction, his hyper-regenerative powers did their work not just on his cuts and bruises, but on his muddled head as well. Slowly the last seventy-two hours came back to him.

Everything started with a young degen named Negate and an extract from his blood. The extract could not only remove a degen’s special abilities, but it would also transform a degen in to a normal. Painful, but effective. Thousands rushed for the supposed “cure”, but many others declared their opposition to the cause. Epsilon found itself stuck in the middle, while still dealing with the frightening growth of power of their own Mindset. Rubicon and his Brethren attacked Bay City and the research facility, bent on killing Negate and destroying the samples. In the next few hours, Mindset lost control, renaming herself Mindwarp and joined Rubicon. In the process, she killed her lover and Epsilon’s leader, Geotherm. Hours later she would kill Epsilon’s founder, Wave, as well.

The combined might of himself and the other surviving members Athena and Flint along side their oldest students barely allowed them to beat Rubicon. But it came with a great cost: their own pro-degen stance. Flint buried a syringe filled with the curative formula in to Rubicon’s back. Rubicon’s powers dissipated in moments.

At the same time, Bagheera found himself facing a woman he had longed for since he first stepped foot in America. But Mindwarp was far from the woman he once loved. Bagheera buried his clawed fingers in her carotid artery. She did in his arms and he realized now the psychic backlash had left him unconscious amongst the wreckage.

“Here!” Bagheera’s head went skyward towards the voice. He recognized the winged form of one of the team’s recent graduates, Air Raid. The feather-haired young degen swooped down for a fly-by.

Moments later, a massive golden bowl flashed in the sky above. The tub suddenly vanished and tons of water splashed down only a few yards from Bagheera. Bagheera braced himself, but only seconds later, a golden pain of glass appeared below him. The glass shot in to the air and Bagheera bent down in to a crouch to avoid falling.

Athena smiled at him from afar as she did her best to eliminate the spread of the flames with another flood of water carried by another of her hard energy creations. Bagheera’s conveyance floated down and joined a giant golden hand.

Bagheera found Flint in the massive palm along with their other recent graduates: Beauty, Thief, and Devil Boy. Beauty smiled weakly as she saw him. Bagheera knew she hadn’t come with them for the fight. That left only one option: she had been here for the cure.

He cut her off before she or anyone else could speak. “You did good out there today,” he said. “We took more hits in the last few days than ever before, but we persevered. We survived. We beat the bad guys. Despite everything that’s happened today, the cause remains. We will continue to protect degen and humans alike and hope the cost never will be so great again.

“Together we are Epsilon and no matter what happens, we will persevere.”

The students smiled and cheered at the speech. Flint’s rock-covered body creaked as he nodded his approval. Bagheera could only hope he could bring himself to believe his own speech some day.

*****

After hours of clean-up, Epsilon returned home to the Eastman Academy. The school sat in the middle of the great forests, miles from Bay City, and almost inaccessible by someone unaware of its location. Unscarred from the outside, the estate sprawled over several acres. Inside, the students still reeled from the death of their teachers and mentor. The betrayal of Mindset and the deaths of Geotherm and Waver were like a knife through the heart of the school.

Athena, Bagheera, and Flint stood in a loose circle in what two days earlier was Wave’s office as headmaster. With Wave now gone, they faced an important choice.

“It’s your decision, Calista,” Flint said. “You’re the only one who knows this school and those students the way Wave did.”

Calista Chaykin, better known as Athena to her students, was unlike her teammates. She bore no outward sign of her powers, as she simply wasn’t a degen. Her powers activated as a small child, and her parents couldn’t handle a metahuman child who heard voices on a regular basis. They shipped her off to a series of schools and “facilities” before Wave took her in to the Eastman Academy. Under his supervision and care, she finally gained control over her power. She became Wave’s closest aide and confidant as she grew in to adulthood.

She shook her head. “I refuse to let the dream die, but it’s not my place. Look at me, I can’t be the leader these kids need.”

Bagheera emerged from the shadows across the room. “These students need this school. Most have nowhere else to go. And I can’t think of anyone more ready to run it than you.”

Athena nodded. “I know that both of you are right. But I can’t do this alone. I’m not Wave, and I can never do what he did with this school. But with help, I think we can make a difference for the years to come. But I’ll need your help.”

Flint laid a massive craggy hand on Athena’s shoulder. “My position in the Department of Metahuman Affairs is over. I was proud to be the undersecretary, but my time there is over. This school needs me now. It is my future. I’m here for you, Calista.”

Bagheera shook his head. “I’ll be back, hopefully to stay this time, but I have my own demons to face first. But if you need me, Athena, I’ll come runnin’.”

“Let us help you,” Athena said. “You needn’t face your troubles alone.”

“You’ve got enough problems getting this school back in working order. You don’t need my hairy ass getting in the way. Besides, you know I can handle myself if it comes to a scrap.”

“Indeed,” she said. “Farewell then, my friend. Trust that the school will be waiting upon your return.”

“I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Bagheera said. “You take care of these kids. I’ll be back to run them through their paces soon enough.”

Flint wrapped a massive shoulder around Athena as Bagheera left the room, and soon enough, the Academy.

Athena pulled away and walked towards the massive oak desk. Her desk now, she reminded herself.

“No time for any regrets right now, Flint. We have a school to run.”

*****

Air Raid sat up in his bed as Beauty stepped in to his room. She crossed her arms across her chest as the door closed behind her. He smiled, showing the two beak-like teeth inside his mouth. His wings moved unconsciously as she stepped closer.

“Wh-what are you doing here, Beauty?”

The other students had given her the name Beauty as a joke. She appeared human, a gorgeous young woman with golden brown skin. But her powers marked her as a degen. An invisible layer of corrosive energy surrounded her body, cutting her off from all physical contact. Even the specially treated clothing she wore didn’t last more than forty-eight hours against her skin.

At least, until now.

She sat down at the foot of the bed, only a few inches from Raid. “Don’t call me Beauty no more, hun. I don’t need no handle now. I’m just Nessa Stewart again.”

“No, I know you were there. But you didn’t. I mean—”

Nessa took his hand in to her own. Air Raid gasped but there was no pain.

“I’m a norm now, sweetie. My powers are gone now. We can be together. Don’t you see?”

Raid pulled his hand away. “I don’t know. I want to, but do you really want this? You’re gorgeous. You can have anyone now.”

“That’s damn true,” she said with a laugh. She ran one hand across his ash blue cheek and over the sensitive pointed ridges of his ear. Her other hand reached for something lower.

“I could have any guy I want,” she said. “But all I want is you.”

She leaned in and kissed him. He kissed back as they fell in to the bed. Nessa tore at his clothes. She hungered to relieve the years worth of pent-up passion in her veins.

As she lowered herself on to him, Air Raid wrapped his wings around her, pulling her to him as their passions flared.

*****

Athena and Flint found most of the school’s two dozen plus students waiting in the common room for the verdict. The youngest students looked afraid. Bagheera’s sudden departure only minutes ago would have done nothing to assuage their fears.

Athena smiled to calm them down. She looked over the young degen boys and girls, men and women, all the students of the Eastman Academy. Most called it their only home as well. Two of the eldest, the albino-colored, elf-like Thief and the aptly named Devil Boy were now veterans of battle. Both looked tired and worried. Athena made a note to chat with both, help them through the trauma of their first war, as soon as she was able.

“Do not worry,” she said. “The Eastman Academy has lost much in the last few days and it will take time to heal those wounds. But if Wave’s vision means anything to us, it means we must persevere. More and more degens are born in this world every day. All will live hard lives, but every one of them will know they are not alone. That’s why Epsilon exists and that is why the Eastman Academy exists. If we can control our powers and use them for the good of all, despite hatred and bigotry, we can continue the path to human/degen equality.”

She looked over the students. “Are you with me?”

The cheer that filled the room brought happiness to her soul. Perhaps she could truly do this.

The Academy and Epsilon would survive for many more days to come.

*****

The park was nearly empty as dusk fell over Seaside City. The old man sat at the bench, glaring at the pigeons as they flocked around him. Only a day ago, he would have struck them down with a bolt of lightning or whisked them away with a blast of wind. Now, he could barely hold his aged frame upright.

The man once known as Rubicon wished he could weep or scream or cry out for the whole world to hear. Instead he just felt empty inside.

It was all over now. After sixty years the fight was over. And he had lost.

Lost everything.

He couldn’t even bring himself to suicide. He could only hold his head in his hands as he watched the birds search for their food.

He didn’t hear the woman approach him from behind until the knife touched his ear. Had he sunken so low as to be mugged here? He started to turn towards his sudden assailant.

“Don’t move, you old fool,” she said.

“Manslayer? Is that you?”

“Not anymore,” she said. “They cured me, now didn’t they? And you abandoned me! Left me for the government to find. But I survived too long to be captured by these norm swine.”

She laughed without humor. “But look at us now. We’re both human.” She stepped in to view before him, keeping the knife near his throat at all times.

“Unfortunately for you,” she said, “I’m the one with the knife.”

*****

The young woman stumbled down the driveway. Her clothes were little more than tatters and she walked as though she were half-dead.

Which she was.

She stumbled forward and collapsed only a few feet in front of the door.

She looked up at the Eastman Academy one more time. Then she saw nothing more.