“Hey Sunshine,” I whispered, gently nudging her shoulder. “Suuuuunshiiiine, wake up already, please. I really need you to.”

After a couple more seconds of shaking and the fear in my mind increasing, my daughter’s eyes fluttered open. She licked her lips and said, "Why…does my mouth…taste like blood?”

I sighed in relief. “Because there's blood in your mouth. Here, I'll get that for you.” I wiped the red liquid off her face and then playfully shook her curly hair.

“Jerome…?” she asked cautiously, slowly sitting up. “That's you, right?”

I gave a thumbs up. “Yeah, it's your amazing, brave, daring dad who absolutely destroyed the enemy and got you to safety.”

“You look really different.” Her eyes widened in what looked to be excitement. “You look so…cool!”

I quickly covered her mouth and made a “Shh” noise to her. It was then that she realized where we were now. After I defeated Dante, I immediately grabbed Sunshine, whose forcefield had finally vanished, and carried her out of the Radius’ headquarters. It took a bit longer than I had hoped it would due to the number of panicking citizens everywhere, but I eventually found the best hiding spot to hide my daughter.

A little boy’s bedroom!

Thankfully, the kid was already asleep once Sunshine woke up.

“There’s someone in here sleeping in that bed over there so could you please keep your fangirling to a minimum?” I asked, removing my hand from her mouth.

Sunshine nodded and then scanned the room–in awe of everything as if it was the greatest thing she’d ever seen in her entire life. The poster of a costumed superhero on the wall with a bat symbol in the middle. A couple of school trophies, labeled with the name Johnny, lined up on the shelf. A giant status board on the wall that looked like the TVs in the Radius building. Everything a normal kid would have…maybe not the giant TV though.

Her brown eyes sparkled even in the darkness of the room, only illuminated by the green light emanating from my body. “Wow. Is this one of those…bedrooms I’ve heard about? This looks cool.”

“Oh, yeah. But you don’t want any of this, right? You’re an apocalypse lover, after all.”

“I mean…yeah, the apocalypse is cool and all but this…I don’t know.” She furrowed her brows, conflicted about what she’d say next. “Sometimes, sleeping in a cave all day can get pretty rough on my back.”

“Oh…um. Let’s see then.” I looked at the large bed where the boy was sleeping. It had a blue blanket with a ton of black bat symbols on it. “I know. We’ll just take that kid’s bed and-”

“What?” my daughter cut off, nearly forgetting to keep her voice down. “We can’t do that. Now that I think about it, what are we doing here in the first place? I thought you said you got me to safety.”

“This is safe. Or at least safer than where we were before. But to sum up our current problem, let’s just say a few strong guys are scouting the city, looking for us.”

“And you decided that hiding in a bedroom was a good idea?” she said, flashing one of her patented raised eyebrows at me.

“Oh, we’ll be fine. There’s no way anyone would find-”

“Uh…who are you people?”

Me and Sunshine jumped, immediately turning our heads to see where the voice came from. The boy had woken up and his expression of fear turned into one of excitement and curiosity the moment he laid his eyes on me.

“Woooah! You’re a superhero,” he exclaimed, jumping off his bed and approaching me.

I raised my palm at the boy, signaling for him to stop. “Hey, kid. Stop making so much noise, or else you’ll wake up your parents.”

The boy stopped a couple inches away from me, wiping his snot on his blue pajamas. “Why can’t I wake my mom and dad? They always take a pic-pic of me when I do something new. And I never spoke to a superhero before!”

I slapped my forehead in frustration. How could I forget how dumb kids were?

“Listen, I’m not-”

“He’s not…an evil villain,” Sunshine blurted out. “He’s a really strong superhero.”

“Really?” the boy asked, joyfully hopping. “I knew it!”

“Yeah, yeah.” Sunshine approached him and bent down. “And we're hiding from your parents in your room because we're playing hide and seek. You, me, and my dad. So it would be pretty bad if your parents caught you playing when you're supposed to be sleeping, right?”

“Oh yeah, that makes sense.”

Hearing this, she patted the kid’s head. “Good. So just be quiet so we can keep playing. My dad only plays with nice kids who follow the rules so keep doing that and we’ll play.”

Wow. I can’t believe Sunshine was out-parenting an actual parent on dealing with a kid. This isn’t just a little intelligence. She reminded me of…her mother.

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His blue eyes shimmered. “Woah, that superhero is your dad?” he said, his voice finally low.

“Yeah. Pretty cool, right?”

“Super cool. How is he? What’s it like having a superhero as a dad?”

I still couldn’t understand how that kid could look at me with those innocent eyes and think I was the coolest thing he’d ever seen. I mean, I’m a zombie!? He can see that, right? I guess if he was living underground his whole life, he would’ve never seen one before. But comparing me to one of those actual heroes like the one on his poster and the stack of comic books on his desk was just flat out wrong.

After all, my daughter only had until the end of the year to live and I was the reason for it. Who cares if some nuclear bomb was the source of it when all those pills and other drugs I kept feeding her only made it worse. I was worse than some fictional evil villain.

I was a bad father. A horrible one. That was definitely what Sunshine thought of-

“I think he’s pretty great at what he does.” Her words shone a light in my mind, illuminating the cave of dark thoughts that intruded in there. “Sometimes, he can be a little annoying but…”

My daughter looked back at me, and for the first time in a while, she smiled at me. “I think he’s a good dad.”

Seriously!? After everything that’s happened so far, she still thinks that? Geez, I just might cry again.

I stood up and quietly walked over to the two. I then bent down and said, “Sorry if I was a little mean before uh…Johnny? We’d love to talk with you more, but we really need to leave. I have…” I looked at Sunshine. “We have superhero work to get done. This girl’s my sidekick.”

“Why do I have to be the sidekick?” she asked, sounding genuinely confused by her fake role.

“Because I’m your father and therefore, I’m better than you. Also, I’m the only one who fights.”

“Awww. Do you guys really have to go? Can I come?”

Sunshine shook around the kid’s curly hair. “You can’t come on this adventure. You still gotta get your sleep ‘cause sleep is very important. But next time, we’ll definitely take you to beat up some bad guys, right, Da-Jerome?”

“Sleep is important” is rich coming from the girl who followed me all the way to Woodshaven and caught me hooking up with some girls…

“Right. And if you’re ever in trouble and you need my help, I’ll-”

The wall of the bedroom burst open, causing dust and rubble to wash over us as it filled the room. Instinctively, I embraced Sunshine, shielding her from the debris. To my surprise, Johnny somehow moved away in time before anything could hurt him, clinging onto my back.

“Sit on the chair behind you, and don’t move or make any noise.” Despite looking no older than five years old, the boy now had the voice of maybe a ten year old. It freaked me out for a second until he repeated the order again, which I quickly followed. For some reason, Sunshine had been rendered unconscious and there was green aura radiating from her head.

Was she using her ability, right now!?

As soon as I sat on the chair, the dust cleared, and a large figure entered the room through the giant hole. It was Jason, wielding a bloody machete that looked like it had just been used.

In an instant, he caught sight of me and stomped towards me, yelling “Syphilis” as he did. Then, Johnny jumped in front of him and spread his arms out.

“Hey, what are you doing in my room?” Johnny pointed at me and Sunshine. “You can’t just barge in while I’m having play time with my toys. That’s rude!”

Jason stared at us, then stared at the boy. “Decapitation?” he said, tilting his head.

“You don’t believe me? Here, I’ll show you!” The boy ran up to us and whispered “Use a little bit of your power when I touch your leg.”

He pressed his finger against my knee and said “Watch this, big guy! This thing has rocket blasters.”

Taking that as a secret message, I shot out my energy through my calves–small enough so that it wouldn’t blast me forward.

“You see? Pretty cool, right?” asked Johnny, walking back to the hockey masked man. ‘

Shockingly, Jason gave a thumbs up, assumingly falling for the trick we just did. I guess it made sense considering I had a pretty different form since the last time I’ve seen him. And since he didn’t seem to notice that the girl on my lap was Sunshine, I’ll just assume he’s never seen her before.

“Alright, now that that’s settled…” Johnny placed his hand on the man’s leg. “Shouldn’t you get going now? Before my parents get here.”

An eerie silence settled over the room, making each second stretch unbearably long. I was worried he’d hear the sound of my daughter’s heartbeat or breathing, but Jason didn’t say a word. In fact, his attention was only on the little boy.

Then, the silence was shattered by a faint dripping sound—Jason's drool trickling from his mouth, landing with a soft splat on the wooden floor. His eyes were feral and his breaths were heavy–heavy enough to blow Johnny’s hair like it was the wind on the surface.

Then, unexpectedly, he spoke.

“It’s been a very…very long time since I’ve killed a little weakling like you.”

Wh-What the hell? This is the first time he doesn’t speak like a maniac and his first actual sentence was something only a maniac would say!

“What…” whimpered Johnny, his body shaking.

Jason tightened the grip on his weapon, fresh blood dripping off of it. “I’m sorry, little one. I just can’t really control myself sometimes, that’s all. The guys’ll be mad if I add a third kill to the list but it’s their fault for not letting me finish my battle with that Radion.”

“I-I’ll call my pare-”

“I killed your parents already.” Jason poked his machete on Johnny’s forehead. “I wonder how I’ll carve you up…No, I have to find that missing Radion and the kid. But maybe…”

Shit. That kid’s definitely gonna die. No doubt about it. There’s no way I could save him right now even if I wanted to. I…have to protect my daughter. Save her. Yeah, exactly!

I-I-I can’t save him. I mean…Sunshine was using her power on him so clearly this is what she planned, right!? No, she wouldn’t plan for a kid to get murdered there’s no way! After all that talk about me being a hero, she-

The kid stared at me with this terrified look, eyes watering.

What the hell am I thinking!? Move! Get the fuck off this chair and save him! Sunshine will be fine, right? They called me their her-

It was too late for me to save him as Jason had already chopped off the boy’s head, sending it flying through the air until it hit the wall next to me.

And for a moment, it looked like Johnny had reverted back to his old self.

I had no time to process what happened right in front of me before Jason shifted his attention back towards me, wiping the drool off his face with his camo jacket’s sleeve.

“Decapitation!?”