"Just don't let them take off my mask," whispered Larkin.

The wind whipped her quiet words away as Finn flew her across the city to the Markusville Community Hospital. Only with his advanced hearing was he able to catch what she had said.

Larkin shifted in his arms, hoping that they would just get there already, hoping someone could get the stupid knife out of her arm, hoping that this was an injury she would be able to hide with a simple long sleeved tee.

"I won't, I promise," Finn said back.

"You know, it's not like I was stabbed in the leg. I could walk myself to the hospital. You don't have to fly me there like some damsel in distress," said Larkin. She was beginning to feel more like herself again. She didn't know if the shock was making her feel this way, or if it was from being carried by Finn.

Finn let out a slight chuckle. "Yes. I'll let you drag yourself to the hospital that's five miles away as you slowly bleed out. That would make me a great friend."

Larkin couldn't help but laugh at that. She glanced at her wound with the knife protruding from it. "I think it stopped bleeding."

"I guess that's a good thing."

The two supers arrived at the emergency room no less than thirty seconds after they stopped their conversation. Finn landed just outside the entry doors. Not breaking stride, he pushed open the door with his back.

Almost as soon as they entered the doors, the smorgasbord of injured people looked up from their laps with shocked expressions. Larkin supposed many of them had never seen an injured super before. Heck, some of them may not have seen a super in the flesh, ever. Larkin would have tried to paste a smile on her face for all of the people that were now staring at her and Finn as he walked up to the reception desk, but really, she just wanted to get the knife out of her arm.

"You can put me down now," Larkin whispered to Finn.

She gestured toward the ground with her good arm and squirmed in Finn's arms. Finn only pressed his lips together before reluctantly letting Larkin set her feet on the floor. Larkin slowly walked up to one of the receptionists typing away at her computer and cleared her throat, Finn beside her.

The woman looked up and didn't bother to conceal the surprise that flitted across her face. "Coalesence. And Black Lightning. What is your problem?"

Larkin turned her body so that the knife in her right arm was visible to the woman. "I was knifed," said Larkin.

Finn elbowed her in the side at her blunt words. "There were some bank robbers. One of them caught us unawares. Coalescence saved my life."

The receptionist nodded before continuing. "Usually, I would ask for your name, social security number, and date of birth..." She trailed off without finishing her sentence. "And then we would have a nurse come to take your vitals before determining how severe you're injury is."

"Can I just, like, pay in cash or something?" asked Larkin.

The receptionist, whose name Larkin noticed was Katherine, raised her eyebrows. "I'm sure we can figure something out. We will get you to a triage nurse right away, though."

After the two of them were led out of the waiting room and into a room that appeared to be a typical hospital room, another nurse entered, and Larkin figured her to be the triage nurse. Whatever triage means. The walls were a color in between yellow and beige, and there were a few cabinets on the walls. Larkin took a seat on the examination chair and Finn sat in one of the comfortable, stuffed chairs.

"Hi, I'm Ashley, and I just need to assess your vitals, and we can talk about what brings you here tonight. All right?" chirped the nurse.

Larkin nodded.

"I'm going to take your heart rate and while we do that you can explain what happened," said Ashley.

"Well, we were both fighting some robbers, and one of them snuck up behind. He was going to throw a knife at Fi-Black Lightning, but I jumped in the way. Now that knife is embedded in my arm."

The nurse nodded, and Larkin was impressed at how professional and collected she was, but then decided she had probably seen worse things in the emergency room.

"About how long ago did this injury occur?"

"Maybe ten, fifteen minutes."

"Also, are you feeling nausea, vomiting, light-headedness, or anything abnormal?"

Larkin shook her head.

"Well, considering that this wound has stopped bleeding and you aren't dead from lack of blood, I can confirm that the knife didn't hit any major arteries. We'll get you stitched up and you can be on your way," she said. The nurse then stood from where she had been sitting in a rolling chair and motioned for Finn and Larkin to follow her out of the room.

()()()

After one hour of impatiently sitting on a lumpy chair in the waiting room. Larkin was taken back to be stitched up. They wouldn't let Finn go with her, so he waited alone. Then, approximately one more hour later, Larkin emerged with five stitches, a bandage, and a tetanus shot.

She smiled at Finn who was, to her surprise, still sitting in the waiting room, waiting for her. He perked up when he caught sight of her.

"You know you didn't have to wait for me," said Larkin. She stood, twisting the extra bandage the hospital had given her around and around her hands.

Finn just shrugged. "I had to make sure you didn't die while in surgery or something equally as terrible."

"I wasn't even in surgery. They only gave me stitches. I've had stitches before so it's not really anything new."

"Still," said Finn. He smiled sheepishly back at her.

"Come on. I want to go home. Fly me."

"You are so demanding," complained Finn.

"Says the one who made me get up in the middle of the night to dive to the bottom of a pool to get his mask," said Larkin as they walked out the exit of the emergency room. "You even made me get a cold from that."

"I guess I'm sorry about giving you a cold."

The two supers continued on their walk away from the hospital. They decided that it would be best not to take off in the middle of the parking lot of the hospital. A few minutes later, Larkin demanded to be flown again.

With a sigh, Finn stopped walking. "I guess I can fly you back."

Larkin stopped walking, too, and looked back at Finn. "Then what are you waiting f―"

Larkin's words were cut off when Finn rushed her and scooped her into his arms bridal style. She let out a delighted scream as they flew higher into the night sky.

"It's so perfect up here," said Larkin. She stretched out a hand, as if to grasp one of the faraway lights that were stars.

The wind whipped her hair around her face, but she just pushed it behind her ears and continued to gaze at the night sky. She reached out a hand and was reminded of her powers over the night sky. A smile broke out upon her face as she made a falling star pass through the sky right over their heads. She leaned back in Finn's arms, craning her neck to see the horizon line behind her.

She heard a slight whisper. Something quiet that was ripped away by the wind as soon as it left Finn's lips, but was still slightly detectable with her advanced hearing.

"What did you say?" Larkin asked. She looked at his face, taking in the stray hairs that escaped the hood of his costume and the ice blue of his eyes that was visible through his mask.

His lips twitched into an almost-smile and Larkin wished she could see if his eyes crinkled at the corners. "Nothing. Nothing at all."

And the two supers landed outside of Larkin's house without making a noise.

()()()

The rest of Larkin's week went as normal as any of her other weeks went. She went to school on Monday wearing a long-sleeved shirt as to cover up her new wound. She got a few odd looks from her friends, but they didn't mention anything about it. She and Jacob turned in their chemistry project on time, and much to her relief, Friday rolls around soon.

Friday meant Labor Day camping trip to Sterling Lake with her friends and family.

Greta, Silvie, and Larkin chattered endlessly over what they were going to do over the weekend while camping.

"We definitely need to make s'mores," said Greta.

Larkin and Silvie nodded vigorously in agreement.

"I'm going to bring Reese's Cups to put on my s'mores," said Silvie, who was an avid lover of peanut butter."

"And we should bring cards," Larkin added. "Even though I'll be the only one winning, I know you enjoy go fish."

"Shut up. I'm not that bad at go fish," denied Greta.

()()()

The day continued with Larkin arriving home, already packed to go to Sterling Lake. She knew her parents wouldn't be going; they had to go to the rescheduled debate on Saturday. Instead, Aunt Libby had volunteered to go camping with Larkin.

Larkin strolled through the front doors of her house around three thirty and was surprised to find her mother and her father at home already. She figured they would still be at work.

"Oh. Hi mom, dad," said Larkin. She had frozen in the entryway when she noticed both parents sitting in the living room with a suitcase on the floor next to them.

Her mother looked up from the romance novel she was reading and addressed Larkin. "We're going to head out to Des Moines early tonight. You're going to have to stay with Aunt Libby again."

Larkin blinked. "I was going camping with Aunt Libby this weekend anyways," she said, slightly offended that her parents had forgotten about her plans. They never have really paid attention to where I am. For all they know I could have joined the mafia years ago.

Her father wrinkled his eyebrows. "Well. I guess that works out perfectly." His slight frown changed into one of his dazzling politician smiles as he stood up and pulled Larkin into a bone crushing hug. "I hope I'll see you in the audience at the debate tomorrow, but I get it if you don't want to go to another one after last week's fiasco."

Larkin nodded, wondering if she would end up at the debate or not. "I might come anyway."

"You better go get your things. We're heading out in a few," said Larkin's mother.

After gathering her already packed camping supplies and driving to Aunt Libby's house, Larkin gave her parents one last goodbye and entered her aunt's house.

"Aunt Libby? I'm here," called Larkin. She walked further into the house and dropped all of her bags in the kitchen.

A crash from the hallway echoed into the kitchen. Larkin reacted and rushed towards the source of the commotion. She entered the hallway with all of the bedrooms in it to see her Aunt leaving the guest room that she used to use all the time: the room that she saw a stranger sleeping in.

"What was that?" asked Larkin.

"Oh." Aunt Libby firmly closed the door behind her. She had a large sleeping bag tucked under one arm and another canvas bag under the other that might hold a tent. "I didn't hear you come in. I just knocked over a few things while getting these out of the closet. Nothing to fret over." Without looking back, Aunt Libby strode out of the hallway and into the kitchen. "I'm about ready, Larkin, but I still have to dig out some flashlights. Then we can head out to the lake," she said.

Larkin nodded before leaning against the kitchen counter. In less than five minutes, Aunt Libby had gathered everything, and the pair set to work stuffing everything into Aunt Libby's minivan. Then they were off.

()()()

The drive to Sterling Lake would take almost an hour. It was a rather small lake, but it was surrounded my woods and forests, and Larkin couldn't say there was any place better to spend her Labor Day weekend.

While driving on another unrecognizable highway, a lull in the conversation convinced Larkin to bring up a topic she had been avoiding for some time. She didn't know if she'd be able to get a straight answer out of Aunt Libby or not, but she figured something would be better than nothing.

"So," Larkin began, "you know how I always used to stay in that one guestroom? The one with the fuzzy rug on the floor?"

Aunt Libby briefly took her eyes off the road to look at Larkin. "Yeah. I remember."

Larkin decided not to beat around the bush. "Did you know that a strange man has been sleeping in that guest room?"

Larkin watched her aunt's facial expressions carefully. At first, there was nothing evident on Aunt Libby's face, and Larkin was surprised that she wasn't trying to deny anything. After a few seconds, Larkin noticed that her aunt's lips had tweaked up the slightest bit at the corners.

"I do," said Aunt Libby, rather calmly, in fact.

At the answer, Larkin was not exactly surprised. Aunt Libby had gone to great efforts to keep Larkin out of the guestroom. She was surprised that Aunt Libby wasn't surprised at how Larkin knew someone was sleeping in the guestroom.

"Who is he?" asked Larkin.

Her Aunt replied with a smirk on her face. "I am astounded that you haven't figured it out yet."

There was not another word on the subject for the rest of the night.