The Curse of a Hero? Or Hiro’s Curse?
Within their home residence above the Lucky Cat Cafe, Karmi and Hiro walked up the stairs to the top room that once belonged to the Hamada brothers. Now, it was a living space for their children, Kiro and Inaya.
In their uncle Tadashi’s old bed lay their son, sitting upright as he seemed to be working diligently on something on his digital tablet.
“Hey Kiro,” his father began, waving a stack of love letters in his hand with a smirk, “You got more mail. Care to explain who your secret admirer is? Because they have great taste in flowers and Aunt Cass and Inaya are absolutely enjoying the cafe’s new decorations. They’d like to thank them.”
The young boy’s face went red with narrowing eyes as he hid behind his tablet, “I’d rather not… it’s a bit… complicated.”
Karmi frowned, “Well, it’s going to be a bit difficult to explain to Megan that Isabelle has competition now.”
With an embarrassed outcry, Kiro yelled, “Sh-She’s not competition!”
With that, Karmi sighed in relief, “That’s good to hear. No one could compete with her.”
The young boy waved his hands frantically at his parents, “W-Wait! I don’t think you’re hearing that right!”
Hiro placed the love letters atop the desk, “So, you do know them, then? This does seem to be getting excessive. So, let’s hear it.”
Their son seemed a bit at a loss on how to explain his predicament, looking to his father. “Have you… ever had a girl treat you differently when you were in and out of your armor?”
Hiro quickly snorted as he looked to his wife, “This sounds familiar…” Soon after, he felt the sharp pain of his wife pinching his cheek while giving him quite the scary expression.
As he rubbed his cheek, Karmi looked to her son with embarrassment, “Your dad may have experienced something like that. Has someone taken a liking to the new Captain Cutie?”
“No…” Kiro blushed harder, looking away, “They hate Captain Cutie and… ummm… like me?”
“Huh?” Both his parents gave the young hero a quizzical look. Karmi seemed to be offended, yelling out, “How could anyone hate Captain Cutie!?”
Kiro rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, “Probably because… they’re a super villain that I fought as a superhero and then… treated their injuries as myself? Now, they’re kind of… in love with civilian me but I’m also their sworn enemy. I… told you it’s complicated…”
“WHAT!?” Karmi and Hiro simultaneously yelled out incredulously, as they both donned their nanotech armor ready to protect their son. “Who is this supervillain!?”
Their son chuckled nervously, “Ummm… the Emulator?”
“Oh…” Karmi and Hiro quickly looked to each other, as his father nodded, “We… gotta talk to Ian about this…”
Pictured above: Isabelle has self-volunteered herself to protect Kiro from Ian’s daughter, Amber.
Don’t worry, Ian has long since been redeemed and is not a super villain. But… his daughter is having a bit of a rebellious phase and taking up the super villain persona of “The Emulator.”
Author Note: And now I’ve reversed the “Clark Kent Effect” that young Hiro experienced with Karmi.
But poor Kiro is in the infatuated sights of a supervillain that hates his superhero persona and loves his civilian self. Only a son of Hiro Hamada would experience such things. Not that Isabelle is particularly happy about it…