Not Your Villain by C.B. Lee

#aromantic #sidecharacter #twocharacters #scifi #superheroes #states

The second book in the Sidekick Squad, Bells Broussard develops shapeshifting powers and thinks he’s got a great path to being a superhero. His power is awesome; he can change his hair whenever he wants, and if putting a binder for the day is too much, he’s got it covered. That was before he became the country’s most wanted villain.

After discovering a massive cover-up by the Heroes’ League of Heroes, Bells and his friends Jess, Emma, and Abby set off to find the Resistance while their parents set iff on their own mission. With Captain Orion still on the loose with a dangerous serum that renders meta-humans powerless and a new militarized robotic threat, the sidekick squad might be in over their heads.

Toward the end of the book, Emma talks to Bells about not getting relationship stuff. Before this moment, Emma is shown as having attraction to people but dating really briefly and moving on. She has really strong aro vibes (she’s also in the first book, Not Your Sidekick, but the aro vibes seem subtler). She mentions asexual, but says that she finds a lot of people attractive. Bells talks about hee being on the ace or aro spectrum. And Emma mentions that she thinks she might be aromantic but not all the time. At the very end, Emma says she romantically likes Bells, who has a crush on her through the while book and hasn’t told her.

During his conversation with Emma, Bells mentions that one of his brothers, Sean, is aroace and figured it out in college. Sean appears as a minor character of little note.

The following book, Not Your Backup, has Emma as the main character and from the brief bit I’ve read so far, will likely warrant it’s iwn post so keep an eye out for it in the coming month.