Present Day

"In other news, SFPD still has no leads on the young man who openly attacked police officials in the street just two weeks ago. Many sightings have been reported to the tip line, but as of yet none have been reported as plausible. Some reported sightings that have gone viral on social media have actually been documented as Superman sightings, causing new theories and speculation to come forth. Who is this young suspect, strong enough to withstand bullets? Could it be possible that he is in some way related to the famed Man of Steel?..."

"Huh, looks like Grayson might have his hands full out there," I said to myself as a knock sounded at my door. I turned off the news and made my way over to answer it, already sure of who it was. "At least he's got something to keep him busy...Hey Kyle, just who I was hoping to see."

"You flatter me, Madalyn, really," my delivery man said with a smile once I'd opened the door and greeted him. He'd been delivering my packages for months and was about as close to a friend as I'd managed since moving to Los Angeles. I ordered enough online that we practically saw each other weekly if not daily. "How's it going today?"

I shrugged, leaning against my doorframe. "Eh, the usual. Wake up, question my existence, find new ways to make money and not be bored, etc. etc."

"I feel that on the daily," Kyle laughed, holding my package as he handed me his scanner to sign for it. He scratched the scruff on his chin with his free hand, glancing around what he could see of the apartment behind me as he usually did. And as I often did, I wondered what he saw there in regards to me.

White, boring walls with no personalization at all. Open window space wide enough to let in plenty of sunlight to bathe the dozens of varying plants around the room. Expensive furniture that looked so new it might as well have been staged for an open house of some kind. If I was being honest, the only rooms that looked lived in were my bedroom and the kitchen nook, neither of which he could see from where he was. In fact, no one ever saw it.

My life was too dangerous to ever let anyone close enough.

"So, uh, this is probably the rudest question I'll ever ask, but...what exactly do you do for a living?" Kyle asked as we made our exchanges. He genuinely looked embarrassed for asking, so I couldn't help but chuckle. "I mean, it's not any of my business or anything, but I can't help but be curious. I deliver your packages at different times of the day and you're always here no matter what. Do you work from home or something?"

I smiled, struggling to hold back the mischief from it. I could tell him the truth, but he either wouldn't believe me or would turn me in to the police, which I couldn't have. At the same time, I wasn't fond of the idea of lying to him. He wasn't necessarily important to me in anyway, no one ever really is, but he seemed like a nice guy.

I didn't like lying to nice guys.

"Or something," I answered carefully, watching the curiosity dance in his muddy brown eyes. "I do work for the less fortunate. I invest time and materials into gathering things for them that will hopefully make their lives better somehow."

"That sounds pretty awesome," Kyle replied with a kind smile. The corners of his eyes crinkled with the gesture and it made me feel better for not lying to him. Even if what I told him was a roundabout version of the truth. "It's nice to know not everyone I deliver to in Los Angeles are complete tools."

"Amen to that, buddy," I agreed with a laugh, stepping back into my beachfront apartment, ready to close my door. "Thanks for your service and you have a great day, okay?" I already had my hand on the door, starting to push it closed when he spoke again and made me stop.

"Would you maybe want to go out sometime?" he blurted out.

The blood in my veins went cold as I stood frozen in the doorway before him. Kyle looked almost frozen too, as though he hadn't expected himself to ask me that and for a moment I questioned myself. Had I released pheromones without meaning to? No, no way. I hadn't done that since the first few weeks I found out about my abilities. Besides, I never had to use it on Kyle because I always knew he had a little crush on me. But he deserved better than someone as messed up as me.

Someone who wasn't equal parts haunted and in love with their past.

"I'm, uh, I'm sorry, that was inappropriate," Kyle rambled on when I didn't respond immediately. He chuckled awkwardly, raising his golden brown arm to scratch the back of his neck nervously as he avoided making eye contact with me. His whole demeanor was painful to watch; I couldn't imagine how it felt for him to live it. "It's just, we usually have a little banter when I drop off stuff for you and I always thought I was kind of picking up a vibe, but... I mean, obviously we don't have to go out if you don't want to. I just thought it might be nice to get to know each other a little better or—"

"Kyle," I interrupted, setting his shoulders squared in tension with just the sound of his name. I was beginning to feel guilty about having to turn him down and I hated being made to feel guilty. I let out a sigh and watched the smile drop from his face as he realized what was coming next. "Look, you seem like a really nice guy, you do. And yeah, we have a nice banter type of relationship when you drop off my stuff and it's great. But... I don't... I don't want to hurt your feelings or anything, but I don't like you. Not in that way, I mean. Besides, I'm not really into anyone right now." At least not anyone I could actually be with. "Sorry."

Kyle flashed another quick, embarrassed smile and nodded. "No worries, just thought I'd give it a shot. I'll, uh, see ya." He sped off down the hall so quick I didn't have time to return the farewell. Instead, I sighed again as I closed my door and locked it behind me.

Why was it that I could never have nice things? What did I do to deserve my life?

I'm not an idiot; I know I'm no saint. I don't even claim to be a good person, for the most part, but I'm not an evil bitch either. I know that the world isn't perfect and that not everyone has a life that they love every moment of. But I meant what I told Kyle before; every morning I wake up and question my existence.

I'm 29 years old, but I can't remember anything of my life before I was 23.

No memories of childhood, no idea who my parents are or where I came from. I woke up in Gotham, practically a newborn in a woman's body, lying face down and naked on the coast where the sewage pipe leaked out into the ocean. My body was painted with dirt and blood, though none of it was my own. My hair was a matted mess that fell just in the middle of my back, offering the barest minimum of warmth from the cold night air. I didn't know how I'd gotten there or why I had no clothes, so I did the only thing any logical person would do; I went looking for help.

Unfortunately for me, that so called help came in the shape of some messed up perv with the delusion that I was Lilith come to bare him redemption from the fruit between my thighs. He reached out to pull me to him and the next thing I knew, I was beating the shit out of him without having any idea of what I was doing. At the very least, through my fighting haze, I noted that I had broken his arm and he cried out for me to stop, to forgive his sins against women.

I took his clothes for his penance.

After that, I decided going elsewhere for 'help' wasn't for me and so I did everything on my own. I stayed in a homeless shelter while I found a job and worked as a barista in a coffee shop to save money for a place of my own. I still desperately wanted to know about my past, but it made more sense for me to focus on my present first. Until a few weeks after I "woke up;" when my abilities started surfacing.

When I tried, I was amazingly charismatic and always seemed to draw people in. I always just thought it was my personality, but eventually I learned that it wasn't; it was the pheromones. Since I didn't know about them at the time, I couldn't control them and so I was dispersing them pretty much everywhere. At work, on the street, in the shelter. I inadvertently made myself a walking target for anyone who breathed but didn't realize it until I noticed the spores one night.

I was closing up the shop with the manager, just talking about the last customers we'd had and how we hated that they always came in with the most complicated drink orders. We'd started joking while we finished cleaning up and I came to a stop right next to him in a slightly darker part of the room. I was saying something and then laughed, my breath coming out hard, when I saw the little spores in the air coming from my mouth. They looked like sparks coming off of a fire, dancing their way to his face before being inhaled by him. I could see the shift in him immediately as he looked at me, placed a hand on my cheek and pressed his lips down onto mine. I was caught off guard, confused by what I wasn't sure I had actually seen, and the kiss went on for a few seconds more.

Then he pulled away with a sharp gasp, blood streaking down from his eyes like tears, his mouth gaping as he struggled to breathe. I stumbled back, terrified, and watched as he collapsed, scratching at his throat with his hands so hard he started to tear the skin off in strips. I tried to stop him as I called 911 but it had been too late; the damage was done. He'd died before the ambulance could get there and since the shop camera saw nothing suspicious, I wasn't charged with his death.

Most people would've been happy with that and tried to let that horrible night go. But I couldn't. All I could think of was what I saw in my breath and everything that happened after and I needed to know; needed to know if it was something I did. Something about me.

So I tried it again. And again.

I'd killed four guys, including my manager, before I accepted that it was something about my breath that drew them in and my kiss that gave their end. None of them died the same way, so no one ever put it together or thought I had anything to do with it.

From there I learned to better control what I put out around me, but unfortunately it usually meant I needed to be a bitch. Or maybe it was just easier that way for me. I couldn't have a guilty conscious over killing someone if I kept them away to avoid it altogether.

Now, six years later, I like to think I have a perfect handle on my powers. My pheromones especially, because I tend to only use it when I'm trying to get my way without much of a hassle; plus, I've learned how to harness it so that no one ends up kissing me unless that's my intention. Easier to keep the body count low that way. In addition to that, I've mastered my plant manipulation so that I can control and use it from farther distances so I wouldn't feel helpless without vegetation in my pocket. Though, admittedly, I still keep a piece of vine in my pocket for luck and old times sake.

Not that I saw any of them coming, but, I most definitely didn't expect to find out I had a sonic scream that I could use to shatter brain vessels or for simple echo location. I also can't lie and say that I didn't love and find that one most beneficial to my nightly cause.

But I'll get more into that later.

When I first discovered what I could do, I thought it was awesome. I thought I could have everything I ever wanted because no one could stop me otherwise. But, within that first year of my life, I learned that that wasn't true.

I couldn't have a real life; I couldn't have a love like everyone else. Could I have sex without killing someone? Sure, but only if I didn't kiss them. Though, what's the point when inevitably, the other person is going to want more than a night under the sheets with no simple intimacies and no relationship future. What's the point when, eventually, you realize that that's what you would want too?

I've had that kind of love before and I'll never let it go because it was the best part of my life.

He will always be the only one for me; the only one who could ever understand me the way that he does.

It sucks being apart from him, especially when nice guys like Kyle ask me out on a date that I know I can't go on. Not just because I don't want to, but because it was too dangerous for everyone. As much of a bitch as I can be, it sucks to know I'm pretty much destined to be alone because of a stupid agreement I made in the heat of the moment.

Maybe it was what was best for the world, or whatever city we were in at the time, but it was the worst for me.

It was how I imagined my manager felt that night that I killed him.

I shook my head hard as I sat on my couch cross legged, package in my lap. I needed to stop thinking about the unfairness of it all.

I needed to stop thinking about him.

I had a mission tonight; one that I needed to go off without a hitch. At least on my end. If I could pull it off, I was one step closer to the cash I needed for my next stop on the discovering my past tour. One step closer to finding out who and where I came from; what I am. One step closer to hopefully finding a better way to live.

I don't believe in happy ever afters; I'm sure I never did. But after almost five years of being an outcast to humanity, I was willing to settle for the occasional miracle.

Hell, I'd take even just one.