For the handful of hours that this room has been mine, I’ve never been so happy to finally get to the door separating it from the rest of this school. As usual, it’s quiet. The lights burn bright and harsh. The ripe stink of antiseptic and fresh paint on the white brick walls burns the back of my throat. The large steel door groans open the second my hand wraps around the cold metal bar going across it. And almost immediately, I’m hit with warmth. Heat. Then comes a smell that fills my lungs so quickly I nearly gasp—heck, I gasp out loud and freeze in the doorway, all the fog of exhaustion suddenly vanishing out of my skull. Mom. She’s on the couch, wearing her gold and navy suit, her large golden cape spread around her like a loose blanket. A bowl of popcorn on her lap. Fresh pair of boots on the table. And that crappy soap opera she loves watching has her so hooked she doesn’t even realize I’m standing right next to the couch, because no way this is real. It must be some kind of trick, right? Another way to ‘calm me down’ or whatever, like the ceiling fan and the vents that blow smells of my old room and the house into the air.

  I jab her shoulder with my finger, fully expecting my half to slip through a hologram.

  I snap my fingernail and nearly fracture my finger doing that.

  Mom blinks, hits pause on the TV, then looks up at me. “Oh.” Then she smiles. “Sorry, Sams. You know how these shows get me. Humans can’t do a lot of things right, but they sure can make good television.” She puts the bowl of popcorn away and stands. She spreads her arms, and I step back. Reflex. The scars on my wrist almost start hurting on their own. Wary, that’s what I am, because how is she even here right now? I thought this place was air-tight…which sounds silly, because she’s Guardian, and I doubt they could even think about stopping her from going wherever she wants, whenever she wants. Plus, you know, my window is now wide open, thanks to her, too.

  “Come on,” she says, urging me closer. “Give mama bear a big hug.”

  She’s taller than me, more so with those thick-soled boots on her feet. The lights are off, meaning her eyes are softly glowing, a light blue color that burns through the dark. Mom waits, smile still clinging onto her face.

  I scratch the back of my head, then quietly say, “Why’d you leave early yesterday?”

  Her face softens, the smile slips, and then her arms lower. Mom sighs and puts her hands on her hips, looks away, then says, “Sam, you should know by now how these people operate. They’ll feed you and fatten you with everything you wanna hear.” She steps closer and puts her hands on my biceps, almost holding me in place as she gently rubs her thumbs against my skin. “Our traditions, our ceremonies—they dwarf everything the humans can ever think of doing, and I guess…” She’s silent for a moment. “I guess I somewhat got into my own head, seeing you celebrate them that way, when what you should’ve had for yourself was taken away. I kept telling myself that entire day to let you enjoy, to let you have fun. Actually seeing it was another thing entirely. So…I’m sorry, Sams. I really am. I have kept up to date with everything you’re doing. My little girl really is a rockstar in gold spandex.”

  “Are you mad at me?” I ask her. “Because I can get someone to try to delete those videos so—”

  “No,” she says, shaking her head. “You looked happy, and my daughter deserves to be happy.” She taps my nose with her index finger, then grins. “Speaking of being happy, you really don’t think I forgot your birthday, did you?” She ruffles my hair, then gestures at a cardboard box sitting on my bed. “Go on. Open it. From me with love.”

  “You snuck into school just to give me a birthday gift?”

  “Would I rather break your heart and not give you one at all?”

  “Fair enough,” I mutter. “What is it?”

  I start to squint, but mom steps in front of me, and I can’t see through her. It’s like putting my face right up close to a brick wall. “That’s no fun,” she says, wagging her finger. Sometimes I think she acts this way because she learns it from the soap operas and the movies she loves watching. She once spent an entire summer talking like a cowboy because she fell in love with old Westerns. It was a whole thing. Weird times. “No peeking. Promise, OK?”

  She’s being weird again, which means she isn’t angry at me anymore. Considering its nearly three in the morning, and she’ll be gone before four, I’ll just have to shelf my feelings for now. Besides, if I don’t open the boxes, she’ll get all disheartened and stuff, like during my tenth birthday when I told her I didn’t like the dolls she got me because, well, I wanted her action figure instead. They’re still in the attic, where she stayed for a handful of hours, looking at those cheap plastic toys like she just couldn’t understand why the advert she watched was wrong.

  I move past her. She stands right beside me, arms behind her back and tucked under her cape.

  Slowly, I flip open the cardboard box—then frown.

  A puppy, pure gold fur with amber eyes, stares right back at me. Its ears flop to the side as it tilts its head. Black nose wet. Its tiny red collar hung loosely from its scruffy white neck. I look at mom. She grins widely at me.

  “Really?” I say. “A puppy? Eight years too late, don’t you think? I probably can’t even keep him.”

  “He’s not just a puppy.” She picks him up and cradles him in her arms. He keeps staring at me, and it’s starting to freak me out. “On Utopia, we call them Pyrrhounds. They’re given to children as protectors, usually much younger than you are right now. When we came here, I only had a sample of my own Pyrrhounds’ DNA left. In essence, this is a clone of him.” She looks at me and smiles. “But I like to think of him as his son instead. They bond with us forever, keep us safe forever, and you won’t ever make a friend anywhere near as loyal as he is, too.”

  Mom takes him out of her arms and gestures for me to hold him.

  The pup keeps staring at me, blinks slowly, and tilts its head the other way.

  Usually, animals start barking or hissing or spitting at me by now. Something to do with the smell of our blood and sweat, or maybe we reek of something so far from anything they’re used to that it freaks them out. This is the longest any animal has been this close to me without losing its shit. The class gerbil in fifth grade literally jumped its cage, scaled someone’s arm and leaped out of the third-story window when it was my turn to take him home. The poor thing didn’t make it. Turns out those things are pretty allergic to concrete. The one that replaced it had a heart attack and died in my hands the second Mrs. Parkers set him on my palms. I heard its heart explode, too.

  So this is…new.

  And I kinda like it. I think.

  I reach out and take him from mom, and almost immediately, his face breaks into a floppy grin as his tongue starts dragging itself across my neck and my face and my cheeks. I splutter and put him at arms’ length, saliva sliding down my face. He quietly yips and flails his tiny legs and wags his bushy tail. I crouch and set him on the ground, ruffle his head and watch him dart around me in crazed circles. Fast. Way faster than any human dog. Maybe not Speedster quick, but more than quick enough to vanish in a golden blur and suddenly be on my bed, barking at me and digging his nose into my sheets. I can’t help but smile as it jumps from my bed and into my arms, and wow this little guy has some punch in him. I stumble when he hits my chest, and no, a dog didn’t just take the wind out of my lungs either. He licks my face again, and I have to stop myself from giggling like some school girl.

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  “He’s already got a name?” I ask her, struggling to get to the collar without getting licked to death.

  Mom shrugs. “Remember that old TV show I was on and the dog I was given?”

  “What was his name again?” I say. “Bart? Broly?”

  “Bud,” she says with a smile.

  Bud barks louder this time.

  But…isn’t that the other dog’s name, too?

  I hold him out again and look at him. Really look at him. The dog in the sim-room was bigger, had a dumber face, but it had the same golden fur and excitable eyes and the same collar. I frown and lower my arms.

  Mom’s face drops, too. “You don’t like him?”

  “No, it’s just…” Bud tilts his head again, like if he keeps doing that he might understand English better. I sigh and put him down, or try to—he hovers slightly above the ground, spinning loosely in the air, tail wagging like crazy, almost like some kind of propeller. I watch him float toward the ceiling and gently bump against it. He barks and stays there. I look at mom. “I went to the gym this morning. Well, yesterday morning. I needed to clear my head, and I ended up getting a chance to work out with the Fight Night team.” Mom nods, then sits on my bed and pats the space beside her. I push a hand through my hair as I float onto the sheets and fold my legs. “It’s…weird. I mean, it was really cool. And this one guy, Logan? Ridiculously powerful for a human. And they wanted to fight the Dark League, right? So they turned on the simulation room, and everything was fine for, like, three seconds, and then I woke up in a bedroom, and Bud was there—maybe not this Bud, but a dog that looked like him—and then I got into the living room, and everything looked old. The wallpaper. The freaking TV was the shape of a cardboard box. And…you were there.” She straightens a little, then her eyes narrow. “And so was Star-Sentinel. And you…” Another sigh. My thumb finds the scars on my wrist. “You guys were married, we all got into a fight, and you—”

  “Stop,” she whispers. Her eyes are shut, but she’s still looking away. Mom clenches her jaw.

  We sit in silence for a while. Bud slowly drifts onto the couch, bounces off it, and lands with a bark.

  Mom whispers, “Is that where you got those scars from?”

  I stop rubbing them. “What? No. Of course not. A sim-room can’t—”

  “Sam,” she says quietly, finally turning her head to look at me. “There is nothing on this planet that can scar either of us. Your skin is still delicate, still hardening, but by now, it would take a lot to scar it. And not like that.” She reaches her hand toward me, then pauses. Her fingers curl before she pulls her fist away. “Did I do that?”

  I swallow past the lump in the base of my throat. “Well, you didn’t. You’d never hurt me.”

  “Sam,” she says flatly. “Did I do that?”

  I nod and chew my tongue.

  She moves closer and pulls me into a hug, one-sided, powerful arms pressing me into her body. She rubs my back, face pressed against my hair, and whispers, “I’m sorry. If there’s one thing I would never even dream of doing, Samantha, it’s hurting you. In any way. I know…” She swallows. Holds me. Is she crying right now? What the hell? Since when does Guardian cry? Besides, they’re just scars. Fake ones at that. They’ll come off in a few days’ time, that’s for sure. She’s making way too big of a deal out of this. “I know I might not be the greatest at it, but you’re growing up so fast, and there’s still so much for us to do here, and before I know it, you’ll be making choices for yourself, going out there and making me even more proud.” She puts me at arms’ length, and yep, I was right—the Guardian, Earth’s Mightest, Protector of the Unprotected, has tears in her eyes and wetting her cheeks. “It must’ve been some kind of bad simulation, some freak accident. But I would never. Not if my life depended on it. The files must’ve been corrupted, or…” Then her eyes narrow, she stands up, and hovers off the ground. She looks at the ceiling fan, then at the TV, my wardrobe, the bathroom, and then at me. “They’re listening,” she whispers.

  “What?” I say, getting off my bed. “Who is?”

  “And watching too.” She’s talking to herself now. Bud barks. She looks at the dog. He whines and looks away, tail now flat on the floor. Mom looks down at me. Her eyes are dimly scarlet, just enough to shade her face blood-red, just like they’d been in the sim-room, just like they’d been when she’d threatened to make me listen, fingernails tearing through my skin like butchers’ knives to meat. “Did you sweep your room for bugs earlier?”

  I open and close my mouth, because what? Bugs? There’s a camera outside my room which does its job pretty well, I think. Besides, it’s not like I’d need… It clicks. Suddenly. I slowly hover off the floor and swallow.

  “They wouldn’t,” I say quietly. “Pantheon U isn’t that weird. They know everything about me.”

  “They know too much about you,” she mutters.

  “They wouldn’t spy on me, mom. That’s—”

  She turns in the air and gets closer. I slowly back up. Silence. A thick wad of it sits between us. She’s gone in a blur, then back in an instant. The flat screen now has a hole punched through it, vomiting wires and sparks onto the floor. The ceiling fan is busted, my bed a mess and I can hear the shower puking water without its head. She drops all of it onto the carpet. Bud whines and skirts away. I look down, clench my jaw, then look back at her.

  “They, Sam, if I’ve got to remind you, took your brother away from me, took your grandparents away from me—ripped my husband’s corpse out of my own arms, and tore your father to gore.” My throat is dry. Heart loud. I’m lower in the air than she is, but it doesn’t matter with my back against the cold hard concrete wall. “They aren’t your friends. They will never be your friends. Look at this, all of this—this room, those clothes, all these pointless human gifts. They want you in the palm of their hands, and you’re eating from it.” I flinch, even if she hasn’t moved a single muscle. I avoid her eyes as she tilts her head. The glare of their burn shines off the window beside me. “I want to believe there’s good in the average human. That the man selling coffee in a cart and the ones who planted these…these things in my daughter’s room are different. There is good in them. Some of them.” She gently takes my chin and makes me look at her. Now her eyes are fully scarlet, the hum of suns crackling inside of her skull. “Like I said before you left: be smart, but most importantly”—her eyes slowly turn back into a soft icy blue—“be good. But don’t make the same mistakes I did. Their charity isn’t free. Their loyalty isn’t unconditional. Those are just words to these people because their lives last seconds in the span of ours. For us, Sam, trust, loyalty, being good? It matters more, because hundreds of years from now, being good today, will mean a better future tomorrow. Just don’t let them fool you, even for a second, that a human will ever just have good intentions for you. They never do.”

  “But…” I shut my eyes, try to get my thoughts straight. “Evil Never Wins, right? But—”

  “They’ll die. Eventually.” Mom smiles. “Humans. Superheroes. Evil won’t win this time.” She boops my nose and turns around. “We won’t allow it. This planet is in a bad enough shape as it is, and we can’t let them ruin it more than they already have. There'll probably be a time when we need to step in and do what has to be done to protect the men and the women, the little guys, like you call them, from the real evil. When it does, be ready, OK?”

  “I thought you said I shouldn’t kill superheroes,” I whisper.

  Mom stays still, then shrugs one shoulder. With that, she turns around and says, “Well, I best be going. Oh, and one last thing…” She unclips the necklace she’s wearing and puts it on my palm, then gently curls my fingers around it. I open my mouth to protest. She holds up a finger. “In another life, you would’ve been queen. In this life, you’ll be a hero. And right now, Sam, this is yours. Your heritage, your heirloom to inherit. This gemstone? It’s a fragment of my crown.” My eyes widen. I open my hand, but the tiny black stone looks…dull, like light is trying its hardest to avoid it. “At this age, you’d be running your own colonies of the Utopian Empire. Planets. Star-systems. The best I can give you right now is this tiny thing. It’s not much, but…it’s something. Put it on, I wanna see it.”

  “Are you sure?” I ask her. “This feels stupidly important just to hand it over like this.”

  “Well, that’s what you are to me. You always will be.”

  I nod a little, then push aside my hair and lace the golden thread around my neck. The tiny black stone is icy against my chest when I’m done, and now mom is staring at me, shaking her head slowly, before smiling, too.

  She gently punches my shoulder. “Atta girl. Have a great day of school, alright? I believe in you.”

  “Yeah, thanks mom,” I whisper, but I’m talking to thin air.

  The curtains billow beside me, and I turn to watch her skim through the sky and vanish into the dark.

  Bud, finally, stops hiding behind the couch and barks at me. He’s quickly followed by my phone’s alarm.

  “Great,” I mutter, followed by a knock on the steel door. “Good morning to you, too, Pantheon U.”

  Let’s get this shit started.