Author: A Markov
Title: Vanishing Love
Chapter: 1/14
Summary: Four years after the death of Syndrome, Mirage has her sights set on a Parr and Helen is ready for a fight. But which Parr is it and why?
Rating: PG-13
Warning: This story contains some explicit language and explores mature themes, including consensual sex between adults of the same gender.
Disclaimer: The characters and locations from The Incredibles belong to Pixar and Disney and are used here without permission or profit.

Chapter 1- A Typical Day at the Office

"What did this guy say his name was again?" the blonde man yelled as he dodged a flying manhole cover. He picked up a bus and held it protectively in front of several civilians who were trying to get away from the mayhem being caused by the latest threat to Metroville. He was a large man with an impressive physique that was accentuated by his red and black costume. A domino mask hid most of his upper face, concealing his true identity. The stylized "i" on his chest was unnecessary - everyone knew "Mr. Incredible."

"Grab 'em, mom!" shouted a young woman in a matching outfit, including a mask that partially hid her face but left her piercing blue eyes displayed to an appreciative public. Less developed than the woman she addressed, she was still mature enough to garner interested glances from the men they were helping and envious looks from the women. She had been dubbed "Invisagirl" by the press for her ability to project force fields and render herself transparent. They were converging on a typical downtown intersection. Although, normally, it would have been teeming with vehicular and pedestrian traffic, today it was nearly deserted.

"The TrogLuddite, dear," the more mature woman said. She was known as "Elastagirl", and watching her athletic form elongating and twisting as she as she stretched across the street to remove a young couple from the path of the speeding villain, the reasoning behind her name became obvious. Apparently the couple she rescued hadn't been watching TV or listening to the radio, or they would have known that a particularly bloody-minded villain had chosen this area of Metroville to carry out his nefarious scheme.

"Block that street with the bus, Dad!"

The three costumed heroes were members of a crime-fighting family known to the public as "The Incredibles." Today they were fighting without one of their regular team members. The absent member was the youngest. Everyone called him "Speedy." Speedy's absence was easily explained but the reason was not public knowledge. He had been caught playing video games instead of doing his homework, and he was grounded from superheroing until next week. But the three of them were more than a match for the misguided madman who was attempting to divert some Transitions from being delivered to the local post office.

"Trog-la-what...?" Mr. Incredible asked as he hurried to comply with Invisagirl's directive. Then, sprinting toward the miscreant in question, he asked, "What kind of name is that? I don't even know what the heck it means!"

Invisagirl projected a force field around herself as the TrogLuddite knocked over a telephone pole. "The Luddites were a group of textile workers in mid nineteenth century England." She said distractedly, "They protested against-NOW MOM!-automated manufacturing machinery during the industrial revolution, usually by blowing up factories with machines in them. C'mon dad, didn't you ever go to high school?"

Elastagirl stretched across the street between two light posts, while Invisagirl and Mr. Incredible worked together to herd their foe in her direction.

The TrogLuddite hurled rocks at them as he tried to keep his distance. "I will bury the cursed machines deep in the ground where they will no longer be able to threaten the manual laborer again!" he yelled at them. Unfortunately for him, his attention was focused on the two heroes behind him and he tripped headlong over Elastagirl and fell flat on his face.

"The burying thing... Is that the 'Trog' part?"

"Geez dad! I'm surprised they even let you graduate." The young woman rolled her eyes in embarrassment.

"Will you two cut the chatter and lend me a hand over here?" Elastagirl demanded. The TrogLuddite was wrapped in her elongated torso, but he was struggling quite a bit and had managed to start rolling her up.

"Grab his arm, Dad."

"Speaking of school…" Mr. Incredible said as he picked up the flailing criminal by the ankle.

"Aww, Dad! Do we have to talk about this right now?" She projected a localized force field that constricted around the TrogLuddite's upper torso and pinned his arms to his sides.

"Well, you're going to have-stop struggling, or I'll drop you on your head-to pick a school."

"I already picked…"

Elastagirl began the process of untangling the parts of herself that the TrogLuddite had twisted up. "You're too young to go to some Podunk school on the other side of the country."

"It's Stanford, Mom! It's a great school!"

"Your mother and I just think you should pick someplace closer to home."

"Metroville University has a good engineering program." Elastagirl was just about back to normal now. Her short brown hair set off her face nicely, and the domino mask she wore did nothing to hide her shining brown eyes.

Frustrated, the young woman threw her hands into the air and took a few steps away from her parents. "I don't want to be an engineer!" she shouted to no one in particular.

"HA!" the TrogLuddite crowed. "Engineers corrupt our way of life, inventing devices that are used by the government to keep the people chained within-"

"Oh, shut up!"

"Ms. Mera...?"

The exquisitely beautiful woman turned from the screen she was studying. "Yes?" She had shoulder-length, flowing white-blonde hair and soft green eyes. Her slender frame was tastefully enveloped in Christian Dior, Gucci and Prada. It would be very easy to mistake her for just another fashion model, but doing so would be a mistake. Her name was on the side of the building and she had surprised a lot of people who had thought she was nothing more than a pretty face.

"The news footage you requested…" The messenger timidly held out a small flat package. From behind her large mahogany desk, Chi Mera smirked inwardly, taking great pleasure in the messenger's reaction. In just over four years, she had gone from being a lackey to owning one of the most profitable companies on the Eastern Seaboard with all the power and respect that entailed. Outwardly, she gave him a kindly smile and gestured for him to set the package on her desk and leave. She turned back to the licensing agreement with Air-Cab. The airplane manufacturer wanted to use a new engine design for which she held the patent, and she wanted them to use it, provided she was well compensated for the use financially. After satisfying herself that her vetting lawyers were getting her as much as they could for as long as they dared, she signed the contract and signaled for her secretary to make sure it was sent out.

Chi watched the young man thoughtfully as he collected the items from her outbox and left unobtrusively. He was quite handsome and well built but he lacked the one thing that really excited her: Power. Something about a powerful man awakened her soul and started her engine. Her last boss had been such a man – intelligent, ruthless, hungry and powerful. Unfortunately he had also been quite insane, and in the end he had treated her poorly, foolishly wasting his power over her by using her in an attempt to destroy a man even more powerful than himself. That man was the subject of the news footage the messenger had brought her earlier today.

She inserted the disk into the player and started the playback. The opening shot was of Mr. Incredible holding up a bus, it looked like he had either just picked it up or caught it, and several people were scrambling to safety while he waved it around with little evidence of strain on his face. She watched the entire nineteen minutes of footage on the disk. The local news would probably run six minutes tonight, and the national news might pick up thirty seconds of it, but she paid well to be able to watch the uncut and unedited footage. When it ended, she started it over and watched it again, sometimes pausing it or advancing frame by frame as she allowed that part of her that was stimulated by his power to savor the sight of his prowess. The third time she watched it, she found her gaze drawn to a most unexpected place. As the heroes fought to protect Metroville from its latest adversary, one stood out. Not with displays of strength or physical power, but by her leadership ability and her control of the power of those around her.

Chi started the playback from the beginning, again. This time, she carefully watched as the awesome power of the Incredibles was controlled by a woman. She couldn't believe it – all this time she had been watching the wrong member of their team. As she watched the action unfold with her newfound appreciation of the true power behind the scenes, she felt a strange sensation in the pit of her stomach and she was somewhat uncomfortable in her chair. Shifting her weight produced an unexpected feeling between her legs and she recognized the tingling sensation of arousal. She stopped the playback and leaned back in her Italian leather chair.

Over the last four years she had been collecting and viewing news footage of the Incredibles as they fought. Today was the first time she had become sexually aroused while doing so. She walked over to her collection of disks and pulled one at random and popped it into the player. It was about six months old, but showed the same situation. He had the power but she had the control and watching it had the same affect on her physically. Had she always been the foundation of his strength? She pulled out a disk from nearly four years ago when they had fought the mole guy. Chi watched her carefully but didn't see any of the subtle dominance evident in the later fights; she concentrated on her physical response and found none.

Tense and uncomfortable, Chi poured herself a drink and sat down to consider this self-discovery. It was still power. She was still attracted to the power, it was just that now the power was wielded by a woman and, somehow, that made it even more alluring. She had left Mr. Incredible alone, content to watch and admire him from afar. She had almost been the cause of a rift in their family once before, and she would not allow her personal desires to contribute to the break up of a family. But this… this was something completely new. She had never felt like this before – even her last boss had not been able to evoke this kind of response from her. And no one could accuse her of breaking up a marriage. She reached for the intercom.

"Daniel, new research project, priority one. Subject: Violet Parr."

"Yes, Ms. Mera."

Chi sat back in her chair and sipped her drink. Her smile was full of anticipatory joy. She turned on the playback device and explored her body's response to the images she watched.

Kari was a cute girl, with a full head of red hair and a very nice smile. The problem was that no one ever got to see her smile because she couldn't shut her mouth long enough to form one.

"I was watching a program about babysitting on the Teaching Channel the other day… Well, it wasn't on the Teaching Channel-a little higher-I had taped it on Vivo, which isn't really taping at all, its more like saving it to disk, except there's no disk and you don't have to tell it to save, it does it automatically-that feels really good-and then you can watch it like a movie, but its not a movie, it's a TV show."

"Uhm-hum…" Violet encouraged Kari to keep talking as she kneaded the slender girl's shoulders.

"Have you ever watched the Teaching Channel, Vi? They have some great shows about babies… and they have shows about rockets too. What kind of channel has rocket shows and baby shows? I mean, you would think-a little lower-that there would be a rocket show channel and a totally separate baby show channel, instead of one channel that has both. Do you think that people who like babies like rockets?"

"Never gave it much thought," the dark-haired girl said absent-mindedly. Kari had just finished a long afternoon of babysitting Dash and Jack, while Violet had been helping her parents stop the TrogLuddite. Agent Dicker had been delayed and wouldn't be able to come by and adjust her memory until later, so Violet had invited her to stay for dinner and they were passing time in her room.

"Well, I think it's pretty obvious that if you like babies you probably don't like-that's nice-rockets. I mean, what kind of baby lover wants to see a baby shot into outer space? Not this one, I assure you. But I'm having doubts about Jack-Jack. He was doing some funny things. He disappeared once tonight, I never saw that one before, not like this, I mean sometimes the baby disappears but he's just hiding under the table, not floating through it-that's nice too-I mean, I never sat a disappearing baby before."

Violet continued to massage Kari's shoulders. Last time the young woman had been at their house, Violet had noticed that when Kari backed into the counter she had stopped talking for nearly five minutes. She had a theory that somewhere on the girl's back was an 'off' switch, and she was determined to find it.

"And Dash was running around so fast he made the books on the table fall off, I've seen running kids before but I don't know what he was eating that-OH!" Kari fell silent. She had been slouched on the floor in front of Violet, letting the dark haired girl rub her shoulders and back. Now she sat up ram-rod straight and Violet silently congratulated herself on finding Kari's 'off' button.

The loquacious girl's next action caught Violet completely by surprise. In one smooth motion, Kari spun around, rose up onto her knees facing Violet, wrapped her arms around the dark haired girl's neck, pressed her lips against Violet's and began kissing her with a relentlessness that matched her oratory style. Violet felt Kari's tongue lapping at her lips, seeking entrance into her mouth. The babysitter held Violet closely with one arm and began stroking her neck lightly with the fingers of her free hand. Her fingers were soon joined by her mouth and the sensation caused Violet's breath to catch in her chest. Kari let her hand trill lightly down Violet's arm to rest on her thigh. Her lips and tongue continued to nip on the hero's neck and shoulder. The dark haired teen's breath became short and her nipples crinkled as Kari's finger tips brushed the side of her breast through her shirt on their way back up to the hollow of her collarbone.

What the hell? Violet asked herself. Kari's lips and hands were insistent and her reaction surprised and scared her. Some of Tony's kisses had gone on much longer and his hands hand been in more intimate places, but they never generated this kind of reaction in her and it was freaking her out. She pushed the red haired girl away and stood quickly, trying to put more distance between them. Kari's eyes widened in fear and recognition.

"I'm sorry, Vi… I was just… You were… I…"

"Stay away from me!" Violet hissed. What did she do that for? She smoothed her shirt over her chest and mentally cursed as she felt her hardened nipples poking through the material. Oh, my God! Can she see that? What did she do that for? her mind raced. Kari sat slumped on the floor, unable to meet Violet's eyes. She looked up at the dark-haired girl and opened her mouth to speak, but before she said anything, Mrs. Parr's voice came to them.

"Kari… Your ride's here."

The red haired girl collected her things in silence, eyes downcast, and gave Violet a wide berth as she exited the room. Violet flopped onto her bed and curled up into a ball. What's wrong with me?