Up until the bag came off, it was like a typical kidnapping. The noseful of knockout spray, the foggy feeling of the furry mechanical arm catching her as she fell, coming to in a chair with her wrists and ankles tied and light coming through the stinky bag, and then its sudden removal, bringing fresh (if cold and dank) air and the sight of a bank of electronic equipment, dark except for the blinky dials. The only thing she expected to see that she didn't was the swivel chair.

"Megamind?" she spoke into the room.

"I'm here, Ms. Ritchi." His voice came from behind her.

"What's going on? This isn't the way you usually do things."

"I know. I... have something to say that is going to be very difficult. Please bear with me." There was a long moment of silence before he spoke again. "Minion and I have always believed that, with the destruction of our home planet, the rest of our people died, that the two of us were the only survivors, the last of our kind. Then, just last night, we received a message from a group of fellow survivors. They were in space at the time our sun was destroyed and they managed to escape the system. They've found a suitable uninhabited planet about ten light years away and established a colony. They found out about us when they deciphered video signals coming from Earth. They've invited us to join them. Sent plans for a hyperdrive starship that we could build in about a month, that could get us there in a few hours, subjective time. We could be done with this awful planet where we'll never be accepted, where the best we can hope to be is villains."

She felt as if she'd been punched in the stomach. "So," she began, carefully controlling her voice, "this is goodbye?"

"Not necessarily. I... I love you. There. I said it. I love you and the thought that I'd never see you again, except on a screen, was enough to cast the whole project into doubt. But I won't stay if our relationship consists of this, of kidnapping and banter. If you return my feelings, if you even think you might come to return them, then I will stay. Minion can go. This world has been a far harder place for him than for me. It will be painful to say goodbye to him, but if you will be mine, then I will stay and do my very, very best to be what you need, whatever that turns out to be."

"You would pass up this chance just for me?"

"I would. Choose, Ms. Ritchi. I place my fate in your hands."

How could she make that choice? If she sent him away, the fantasies she'd had about him over the years would never come true. She'd never find out how he kissed or what was under that skin-tight costume of his. She'd never hear his voice or feel the warm tingle when he leaned close or see the glow of his inhumanly green eyes. But on the other hand, how could she deny him this experience that was both a homecoming and an adventure into the unknown, a new world among the stars, a life of continual learning and challenge that would finally be adequate to his brilliance? It would be a better life than he could ever have on Earth, a more exciting life than she'd ever know herself, and if she kept him from it, she'd never quite forgive herself. Suddenly the decision was clear.

"Take me with you."

"What?!" He finally came around where she could see him, scrambling, almost tripping as he turned to face her. He looked as astonished as he sounded.

"Take me with you. I want to see this new planet. With you."

"Roxanne, you would actually give up all the acclaim of the populace, the success you've enjoyed here, to come with me?"

"Hey, my career is about over. I'm twenty-eight and I know they're shopping around for someone younger to replace me. I'm not that close to my relatives and my work has really been my whole life. Between sinking into obscurity, missing you and envying you for this awesome adventure you're going to be having, I just can't see my future life on Earth being that hard to give up."

"But aren't you afraid that my people won't accept you any more than yours has accepted me?"

"You come from a more advanced civilization. I'm going to trust that. Hey, could you ask them about their marriage customs? I want to do this right."

The look of amazement and joy that came over his face was something she'd cherish in memory all her life. He dashed behind her, untied her wrists, then came back around, knelt down and freed her ankles. As he straightened up, she found her arms going around him of their own accord. He embraced her in turn.

"Let's not wait for them. We're in Metro City, so we'll use the local method. Roxanne Ritchi, will you marry me this week?"

"Yes," she said and leaned in for a kiss.

One kiss led to another, deeper one, then to nuzzling of ears and throats and collarbones, which led to Roxanne calling a halt.

"Stop. I'm not on the pill or anything."

"No, you're right. Excuse me a moment." He turned his back on her and adjusted something in front of himself. "There," he said, turning back around. "The protective gear built into this costume is very effective at minimizing the effect of a blow to the crotch, but it can make getting an erection very uncomfortable. And before we go any further, we should tell Minion." They both rose and went, hand in hand, into the next room, where the fish was online.

"Minion, prepare to be amazed. Roxanne wants to come with us! And she proposed!" The fish was properly amazed. He floated open-mouthed, his eyes going back and forth between his boss and their longtime kidnappee for a long moment, with occasional stops at their interlaced hands.

"Ms. Ritchi? Did the boss give you an injection, or something to eat or drink or..."

"No, he didn't drug me. I'm totally in my right mind. And I'm totally sure that this is the right decision."

"But...but what about Metro Man?"

"He's not my boyfriend. He never was. It was a misunderstanding that we let stand because it was convenient for us. But I'm not jilting him, so he has no right to object."

"He may not have the right, but he's gonna do it anyway. Just wait."

###

The first person Roxanne told was the person in her life most likely to take it well: her hard-drinking Great-Aunt Louise, her grandfather's black sheep younger sister, who had spent thirty years as an archaeologist in the Southwest, married into the Hopi tribe for a while, and was spending her retirement years as an activist working to prevent commercial exploitation of traditionally sacred land. She was seldom in Metro City anymore. Roxanne called her at her home in Taos. The older woman reacted with enthusiasm, told her how lucky she was, then said "You have to talk to Karen Slausson. She's an ethnobotanist. We went to the U of M together and she's back there now, on the faculty. While I was digging up abandoned pueblos out here, she was wandering around in the Orinoco basin, getting shamans to tell her what herbs they use for the tropical diseases that still had our doctors scratching their heads. She'll have a ton of advice for adapting to a new culture, and she'll be impressed as hell. I'll email her your contact info." After finding and reciting Professor Slausson's contact information, Louise had one more piece of advice. "Before you take off for good, make your blue boyfriend teach you how to drive that starship. If things turn ugly on that new planet, you need to be able to come back to this one, even if nobody you know now will still be around."

###

"They're just leaving?" Roxanne was only at the beginning of telling Metro Man, and he was already upset.

"I would think you'd be happy about it."

"I can see that this is a good thing for the city, if it's true, but I'm skeptical. Megamind's capabilities as a villain are all based on trickery, deception and outright lies. He told you all this while you were tied up in his lair, helpless and therefore easily influenced. There's no reason to think he wouldn't lie to you in order to further his latest plot against the city."

"Oh? And what kind of plot would that be?"

They were on Roxanne's balcony. The hero scowled in the general direction of the industrial district, thinking, before he answered. "A rocket and a missile look pretty similar. If we all thought he was leaving, we might let him build a missile right here in the city, only to find him using it to terrorize us. You might find yourself strapped to the nosecone."

"So you're not going to let him build it."

"Not if there's anything I can do to prevent it. Obviously if he went to the trouble of recruiting you, he needs us to let him build it because it won't be as easily hidden as his devices usually are. If he thinks this deception is enough to lull me into complacency, he's wrong."

Now it was Roxanne's turn to scowl into the distance. "I'll tell him. If you're right, he'll probably abandon his plot without too much argument. If you're wrong... I'm not sure what he'll do. Try to figure out some way to build his space ship that won't look like a potential threat to the city."

"Tell him? Did he give you his phone number?"

"Yeah. Wayne, I- There's something else you should know. When he told me all this... I asked him to take me with him, and he said yes."

"What?!" The hero looked at her is if she'd grown a second head. "You'd just leave the city, leave Earth forever, to be with his people?"

"Think about it, Wayne. No one has ever had a research opportunity like this. No astronaut has gone any farther than the Moon. I'd be the first to set foot on another planet, in another star system, the first to observe an extraterrestrial society. How could I pass up a chance like this? If it's true. You've raised enough doubts that I'm not sure anymore." She looked down a moment, then looked at him. He looked like he was about to say something, something angry, and then he just took off into the air.

He's too upset to stay and I didn't even tell him about the engagement. If I'd told him that, he might have really blown his top. She went inside to check her email again, to see if Professor Slausson had tried to reach her. If Wayne's right and Megamind was lying all along, I'll feel like the biggest fool on Earth.