Part three of this prompt by @creweemmaeec11 : Hero and villain are fighting on live TV, and hero suddenly falls in the river that runs through the city. Turns out hero can't swim, so villain ends up deciding to save them even though the act is then caught on live tv, and now the entire city's media is in an uproar: "are they actually a bad person?" "Will hero owe villain now?"
Part one
Part two
***
The hero didn't even know where to begin when searching for the villain. He was always the one that inexplicably found her.
And after hours of searching, that seemed to still be the case.
She had gone back to the river and was standing near the shredded portion of the fence. Police tape had been put over the opening, and there was a partial barricade in front. She felt a little silly because, despite this, she couldn’t bring herself to get any closer than ten feet from the fence. She was going to have to sign herself up for swimming lessons sometime.
The sun was dipping below the horizon and she was about to leave, when she heard a voice from behind her.
“Out for a late night swim?”
She nearly jumped out of her shoes. She turned and there he was. “I think I’ve had my fill.”
“You’re mad at me.” It was a statement rather than a question.
Her hands sparked. Anger. Maybe something else. "Oh yeah, how could you tell?"
He smiled and glanced at her hands. “Oh I just know you so well.”
Even though she had just wanted to talk to the villain, she could feel her power surging inside her.
The villain must’ve sensed a fight coming because, rather than wait for her, he shot like a bullet, scooping her up in his arms.
Her fire blazed, but what she'd failed to realize in the dark was that he was wearing some sort of strange protective gear. Her flames couldn't touch him.
And then they were over the river.
Her eyes widened in alarm. "Wait! Wait, wait, wait!" Her voice cracked. “Put me down!”
"I'm not going to drop you on purpose," The villain reassured. "But keep fighting and my hands might slip."
She swallowed, anxiously eyeing the rushing water down below. She let her fire burn out. "What do you want?"
He shrugged, noticing with a smirk that even that small movement made the hero grip his arm tighter. "I just wanted to talk," he said. "But you seemed too focused on trying to burn me alive."
“So you’re threatening me?”
“Sort of.”
“Figures.”
His smile widened. “Word has it, you’ve been looking for me all day.”
“I wanted to talk to you too.”
“Well you’ve got me right here,” he replied.
She looked into his eyes, and was all-too painfully aware of the blush creeping up her cheeks. “Why did you disappear?”
He hummed. “Out of the two of us, I figured you look better on camera.”
She shook her head. “It’s been a nightmare, Villain. I’ve been followed around by reporters for the past week, I’ve seen it plastered on TV everywhere; I’ve had no privacy!”
“Oh yeah, I forgot how much you hate attention,” he teased.
She could feel her cheeks blaze even hotter. “It’s embarrassing.”
He glanced at her face and amusement twinkled in his eyes. “I can tell.”
That’s when she realized a soft light was falling on his features. She’d held her power back in her hands, but apparently that heat in her cheeks wasn’t just from embarrassment, her fire was glowing through her skin. She sighed. “It’s been a long week, Villain.”
He chuckled. “Okay, okay, I get why you’re mad at them,” he said. “But why are you mad at me?”
She was no longer glowing. “Because you have some sort of motive for saving me and I haven’t figured it out yet.”
"I already told you why I saved you."
"That can't be it," The hero replied. "You want to blackmail me, or you have some sort of other plan going on, and believe me I'm going to figure it out and then you are going d-"
He cut her off with a sudden kiss.
She couldn’t shove down the glow then. It took everything in her to keep her ears from lighting on fire.
When he pulled back, she was too shocked to say anything.
She was also shocked she didn’t accidentally burn his lips.
His eyes still gleamed with amusement. "Believe me now?"
"I'm starting to." She glanced at the river below. "Can you put me down now?"
He nodded and they slowly drifted down. Relief along with plenty of other confusing emotions flooded her when they finally hit the ground.
She took a deep breath, and settled her power down. Now the only light came from the city and the moon.
“I’ve never seen you do that before,” the villain commented.
“Um, it’s an intimidation tactic.”
He laughed. “Well, Hero, the next time you want to talk, you don’t have to search the whole city.” He handed her a scrap of paper. “Just head there.”
She glanced at it in her hand. “This isn’t an ambush is it?”
He shrugged. “Guess you’ll find out.” The villain took off then, and he was gone.
She sighed.
“He should’ve left me in that river.”
