I sighed. My shoulders slumped. It looked like once again Fialux had won. Just like she’d won every round so far, assuming that Fialux and Selena Solare were the same person.

  I’d really hate to go up against her in a game of poker.

  I threw the remote to the ground and it shattered into pieces. People cried out, but it’s not like it mattered since the thing was keyed to my voice and the remote was just a hunk of plastic with a big shiny red button in the middle.

  I’ve already mentioned how much I loved big shiny red buttons.

  “Goddamned Applied Sciences Department and their useless crap!” I screamed.

  The rotating red light, almost a solid bar, immediately stopped and the thing floated down into my outstretched hand. That’s right, come to mommy.

  Everybody stared. Some breathed sighs of relief. Some put away various religious talismans they’d brought out. Others looked like they’d finally gotten around to soiling their pants and were trying to figure out a way to get the hell out of the room without letting everybody else know about the situation downstairs.

  And if I didn’t miss my guess there was at least one couple in the back of the room bouncing away. Apparently they’d decided if they were going out then they were going to go out with a bang, as it were. Their sudden deliverance didn’t stop their enthusiasm or the bouncing, not that anyone else was paying attention since they were so busy coming to their own realizations that they weren’t about to die.

  Only one person looked completely and utterly calm.

  Selena Solare.

  Damn her.

  “Well, that was fun. Now we should probably talk about your midterm!”

  A couple of people near the back of the room fainted outright. I smiled. I still had it.

  The stress of thinking they were about to die was bad enough. Thinking they were about to die and bringing up a massive midterm paper that was worth a healthy chunk of their grade?

  Well it was no wonder that overwhelmed a few unfortunate souls. The ones who didn’t faint didn’t do much better. A collective groan rose from the class, but I held up a hand with a smile.

  "You'll be happy to hear that we won't be doing a test for your midterms," I said.

  Immediately the angry muttering turned to more upbeat muttering.

  "Instead, you will write a ten page paper describing a situation where there would have been far less destruction if the hero hadn't intervened in whatever the alleged villain was planning."

  The muttering turned angry again. I remembered well from my time in college that the only thing worse than having to study for an exam was being forced to write a paper. And ten pages was pretty long as far as undergrad intro level courses went.

  Even if this was an undergrad course mostly populated by lazy seniors who hadn’t bothered to get this out of the way until they were on their way out.

  "If you have any questions you know what my office hours are," I said. I sat down at my desk and pretended to work while students filed out.

  It was such a familiar ritual at this point that I didn’t even have to look up to tell whose shadow was crossing my desk after most students had filed out.

  There was still a slight lingering smell in the room left behind by those unfortunate enough to actually have little accidents when they thought they were on death’s door. The custodial staff was going to have a field day with this lecture hall. I just hoped they’d be able to take care of the smell before the next class shuffled in.

  “You almost had me there,” she said.

  I looked up and smiled. She smiled back, and it was radiant. “I did?”

  She shook a finger at me as she grinned. “You did! For a minute there I really believed you’d lost control of that thing!”

  I returned the grin. “Who’s to say I didn’t?”

  The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.

  “You didn’t,” she said. “I have complete and utter confidence in you and your abilities when it comes to this stuff.”

  Well that answered one question at least. She still thought I was a hyper competent university professor rather than an increasingly incompetent super villain in disguise.

  That was good I guess?

  “So to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit today?”

  She bit her lip. God did she look so hot when she bit her lip like that. I was surprised her eyeglasses weren’t fogging up from the heat she was radiating. And it was getting late enough in the spring semester that she was starting to wear some outfits that radiated some serious heat, if you catch my meaning.

  She looked me up and down and a shiver ran down my spine. “Well it’s not for the usual reasons today.”

  “Oh? What is the reason?” I asked.

  I raised an eyebrow. This was interesting. I felt butterflies dancing in my stomach. Was she going to say something? Was there finally going to be an end to the tension that had been building over the semester?

  “I have serious reservations about the midterm assignment you gave us.”

  Oh. So much for resolving tension. At least she bit her lip as she said it. That was something. I’d never get tired of her biting her lip like that.

  “Well I’d certainly be happy to discuss…”

  Her phone started ringing. Of course her phone started ringing. That damned phone started ringing every time things started to get good.

  Damn her boyfriend for monopolizing her time. I wanted to pull out my blaster and vaporize the thing, only that would definitely give me away.

  “Let me guess? Your boyfriend?”

  Selena looked at the screen and her face fell. She seemed to do that more and more every time she was interrupted.

  I was starting to have serious questions about this guy. Who was he that he could draw the attention of a living goddess? Only she picked up the phone and swiped at the screen. Of course she was going to accept the call.

  She looked up to me and mouthed “sorry,” but I was having none of it this time. I leaned back in my chair and put my arms together behind my head. “Well if you have a problem with the assignment then now’s the time to talk about it. Just get rid of the person on the other end of that phone call.”

  It was a test more than anything. A test to see if she’d actually put the phone down.

  Like most people from her generation, heck, like most people from my generation considering I was only a few years older than her at best, she had an unbreakable attachment to her phone. Only with most people in class that unbreakable attachment manifested itself in the form of texting under their desk or browsing the Internet since it was a big lecture class and they probably figured it’s not like I was going to remember exactly who they were and dock their grade for it.

  Of course those students hadn’t counted on me recording every session and using facial recognition software to figure out exactly who was texting in class and by what percentage their grade should be docked. There were going to be some big surprises when the participation part of grades was added in.

  But I was getting distracted from what was important. Fialux, Selena, Miss Solare, whatever the hell her name was, was the only person I knew who was constantly distracted by the video function on her telephone. I opened my mouth to say something, to try and get her away, but she already had that vapid empty stare on her face. The one that told me she was deep in conversation with whoever this guy was on the other end.

  I sighed and leaned back into my chair. There was no helping it now. She was firmly in the thrall of her electronic god and nothing I could do would stop her. Nothing would get through to her.

  And I couldn’t even hear what he was saying since she put in earbuds every time she accepted the damn call.

  Noise off in the distance pulled my attention away from Selena and towards the massive windows that ran along one side of the lecture hall.

  Sirens. Coming from downtown which could be seen through those aforementioned massive windows. As I watched a massive explosion went off in the distance. Big enough that it rattled the windows.

  I briefly considered opening a feed to one of my drones but decided against it with Selena still in the room.

  She was acting odd now as well. She was looking out the window too, and as the sirens kept up their wail that blank stare started to disappear. Her face started to harden with resolve. Her arm dropped to her side. The phone still glowed, but the call was forgotten.

  I sat forward. Now this was interesting. Finally something was breaking through whatever haze came over her when she took a phone call from this guy. I peered at the phone to try and get a closer look at his name, but her thigh was blocking the screen. Damn it.

  Selena glanced at me and she was back entirely. A look of regret passed across her face, then the resolve was back.

  “I’m sorry, but I have to go,” she said.

  I grinned despite myself. That was exactly the sort of thing I’d expect Fialux to say. Off to save the city and all that.

  Inside I danced with glee. I’d found a way to pull her attention away from that damned phone and all but proved that she was Fialux.

  She was moving towards the exit at top speed, faster even than the people scrambling away from the matter dispersal bomb earlier. Too fast for me to try the stasis field on her without alerting her that something was up, and there was still the pesky problem that I wasn’t absolutely certain she was Fialux. I needed to think fast.

  “Stop by my office hours if you want to talk about that paper!” I shouted.

  I didn’t know if she heard me or not. She was out the door and I was left alone in a massive lecture hall that was starting to smell as the unfortunate aftereffects of my earlier demonstration wafted through the room.

  I hit a button and there was a bright flash as I teleported up to my office. I figured I could watch the show downtown from one of the drones while I waited for Fialux to take care of business and hopefully head to office hours after.

  I could only hope she’d heard me. Then maybe we’d finally get some one-on-one time with each other without her phone and this mysterious boyfriend interrupting.

  A girl could hope.