Lesson 5: Life changes, whether you want it to or not.

After the others left the Hero life, I tried to carry on by myself but it wasn't the same. There was no Magenta to crack jokes with while we were setting up surveillance. Will and Zach weren't arguing over whose turn it was to play on the Xbox while the rest of us were planning in the Secret Sanctum. Layla wasn't lecturing Warren on the excessive use of force in his missions.

Friendships change. I knew this before, but I really thought that it wouldn't happen to us. Together we had been through so much in high school and as a result, I had believed that the closeness we had would carry over to our adult lives. I never thought that we could be divided up so quickly.

I still try to talk to everyone regularly, even though Magenta doesn't respond, and Layla doesn't understand. Warren, Will and I occasionally go to New York to meet up with Zach for a Guys weekend away, but it never really feels …right. We talk about sports, electronics, the odds of Coach Boomer ever getting a girlfriend, but we never talk about being Heroes. It's almost like it's forbidden. That without Magenta and Layla there, we aren't allowed to be Heroes any more. Like we aren't complete.

Sky High taught us so much, but there was some things they couldn't teach us.

They taught us how to save the Citizen, not how to cope with losing one.

How to stop a Villain, not how to stop from becoming one.

How to save others, but not how to save yourself.

They couldn't teach us how to keep on being a Hero when your world is broken and your beliefs shattered.

We really needed those lessons.