Every story has a soundtrack.

Chapter 1 – They Are Survived By… “This place kinda sucks.” Mike’s comment elicited a flat look from Adam, sitting across the table from him. They were by the window but it looked at the street and offered a view of little else. The booths around them were big but dated. Not retro, just dated. He could see that the only likely difference between how the diner looked in the seventies and how it looked now was the lack of cigarette smoke hanging in the air. He could almost still smell it. Adam had a simple response to his observation. “Yeah.” “How are you holding up?” Mike asked. Adam was quiet for a few moments. “Ok, I guess. It’s just weird. I didn’t expect any of that shit to happen that way.” Mike nodded. “I mean, we’ve worked some tough cases. We knew the kind of stuff they were up against. They always seemed to come out the other side okay. Cloak did, anyway. I’m sure Asphalt was the same.” Mike snorted. “Nothing fazed that guy.” “Right? And now they’re just… gone. Is it weird to you? Do you miss it?” “Honestly? Not as much as I feel like I should.” Mike stirred his coffee, not taking a sip. Maybe he was afraid to, given the look of the rest of the diner. They hadn’t ordered any food – the menus had Christ-knew-what stained onto the plastic. “I feel like we’re taking a break,” he said. “I mean, it’s done, I know it’s done. I don’t know. Maybe it hasn’t sunk in yet. It’s been, what, six days?” “Seven,” Adam told him. “Seven days. Shit. You’d think we would know what day it happened.” “One of us does.” Mike grunted at his comment. “Maybe it just doesn’t sting the way I thought it would. Asphalt and I didn’t have the same relationship you and Cloak did.” “He was a good guy. A little strange, but good.” “Asphalt wasn’t. He was a dick to me most of the time.” “Why did you work for him for so long, then?” Mike gave up stirring the coffee and shrugged. “I dunno. Maybe I felt bad for him, being like that. We did some good out there, I guess. Not that it mattered for much in the long run.” “And?” “And what?” Mike could hear Adam was preparing him for something, but he didn’t expect what Adam said next. “Maybe it’s a lifestyle you wanted to pursue, too.” “My skin isn’t made of blackened rock.” “I know, but maybe you wanted to be part of something that nobody else could be a part of.” “I wasn’t. Asphalt gave me shit all the damn time. I wasn’t a partner, I was his employee.” He looked down at the table. “Not a very good one, I guess.” “Do we have to go through the whole ‘it’s not your fault or anybody else’s fault’ thing, or are you good?” “I know that. But if you’re asking me if I worked for him because I wanted to be out there too, maybe that’s how it started. How many people run backup for a superhero?” “You, me, and a few others, obviously.” “Yeah, but five or six of us in a city of millions? Maybe when I was younger and dumber I wanted to be out there doing it, but I was fine running the show behind the scenes. He just made it a fucking grind.” “They probably weren’t all like that, though.” “The other heroes? Probably not. But he definitely was.” Mike took another long breath. “Why couldn’t I get paired up with Force or someone?” “I thought you know her?” Mike looked at him. “Sorry. Knew her.” “Kinda. I dated her sister a year ago.” “Seriously?” “Yeah. Force and Asphalt kept us too busy, though. You know how it is.” “There’s always something.” “Always.” They sat in silence for a little while. Their waiter strolled by, eyeing them before moving on. It had become pretty clear this was going to be a coffee-only visit. “Did he leave you anything?” Mike asked. “Cloak?” “Yeah. If you don’t mind me asking.” “A little money. We were taking that cop subsidy, you know?” “Us too.” Mike always thought it was a good setup. Being a superhero didn’t pay anything, so the city and the police force set up a sort of funding program to keep operations like theirs going. It was all under the table, of course – the police couldn’t be known to be supporting heroes who were technically vigilantes, but funding those vigilantes so that they could handle problems that were out of their scope of practice was good business. “Besides the money, the lab was already something I had set up at my house when we got started.” Adam looked like he was about to say more but stopped himself. Mike and Adam talked a few more minutes about nothing before getting up to leave. They each left a few bucks on the table for the coffee and the lack of service. Sometimes being left alone deserved a good tip. Outside they started walking towards the next subway station a couple of blocks up. The neighborhood wasn’t the best, but it wasn’t terrible. “Have you decided what you’re going to do now?” Adam asked him. “Probably sell the equipment. I don’t know how – I can’t craigslist it as ‘Asphalt’s Secret Lair’, but I should be able to get something for most of it. That and a little bit left of that subsidy… I think I’m just going to move out of town. Work legit.” “Like, slacks and show up early in the morning at the office, legit?” “What else am I going to do, Adam? They’re gone. There’s nothing for me to do here anym-“ Mike and Adam both stopped as a man stepped out of the alley a few feet in front of them. Light glinted off of metal held at his side. A knife. Behind them, they heard a heavy footfall. A second man. In the dim light, they couldn’t tell if he had anything, but he hardly needed it. He was twice the size of either of them. “All right, ladies,” Knife-Guy said. “Wallets.” “Oh, fuck me,” Mike said, fishing out his wallet. “Seriously? It’s been a week, and you guys are already out doing this?” “That’s right,” Big-Guy growled behind them. “Heroes aren’t coming anymore. Just you and us, little guy.” Mike tossed his wallet to Knife-Guy, who caught it and tucked it away. He pointed his knife at Adam. “Your turn, sweetheart.” “Or what?” Adam asked. Mike looked at him with sheer panic. This wasn’t something they did. This was something their friends did. Or used to. “Or I make you and your boyfriend ugly,” said Big-Guy, cracking his knuckles. Adam laughed. “Did you seriously just crack your knuckles?” There was no warning. Both Big-Guy and Knife-Guy lunged for him, completely ignoring Mike for the moment. Adam was ready. In an instant, something whipped out from behind his neck and waist, lashing out to push the two attackers off-balance. Mike saw that it was fabric, reaching away from Adam like tentacles from a squid. One tendril pushed Mike out of the way. Not hard, but firmly. Now Adam was between Mike and the other two. Mike recognized what was happening and could barely believe it. Adam was using the cloak. THAT cloak. “You two should have laid low a little while longer.” Knife-Guy lashed out with a wide slash of the knife but missed him completely. Adam’s cloak reached for the man’s wrist, grabbed and broke it. The knife clattered to the sidewalk as the man screamed and pulled backwards. Big-Guy rushed in to bear-hug him but Adam was faster. The cloak grabbed the man by the throat and lifted him off the ground, choking him. The man’s hands went to pull it away but the cloak was too strong. Just before he passed out, Adam pushed him into his friend with the broken wrist. The two darted down the alley they came from. Adam looked back at Mike, who was standing there in complete shock. Adam smiled. “Jack might have left me with something more than a little money.”