Valentine's Day

Alec Merceau/Regent
June 10th, 2012

It’s been nearly a month since our fight with The Adepts and… things aren’t looking great. Lisa thinks their plan actually worked, that a few potential assets she was looking at have decided to just go through us into New York. A few parahumans is bad but the real problem is how weak we ended up looking. 

I’m not privy to whatever the hell Lisa tells the others but I’ve got wifi and PHO account and that’s all I need. People have flooded the boards, each with their own photos or videos, and while there’s some highlights for Grue or Bitch, the vast majority of it is focused on us getting our asses kicked. 

And what isn’t focused on that is worse, sure, there’s some shots with us being badass but most are fixated on one of two things. One: What the hell does Epoch mean about there being ‘a charade, a farce?’ and Two: holy shit, Regent’s got himself a new thrall and sure, that guy’s got a kill order the same as the last one but fuck, are we really okay with this?

Lisa’s doing her best to draw focus away from the first thing, her and all the people she’s paying to derail discussion and get threads locked. It’s scummy, but it’s a proven tactic, without discussion, the shit Epoch said will fall to the wayside without anyone wanting to look into it. Of course, how she does this isn’t great for me.

Her main ploy, or at least her bots ploy, is a pretty good one. THe second anyone brings up that speech, just throw in a “Why is no one talking about what Regent’s doing?!” and then have a dew more bots get reactionary and boom: ‘charade, what charade?’

I can’t say it isn’t working but the ramifications for it might not work out well. Whether they like it or not, Regent is an essential cog to this machine, without me? Well, they’ll have a hell of a time maintaining their power.

Not that they can’t do it, there’s nothing they can’t do once they put their minds to it and… I should be grateful they haven’t gotten rid of me already. In a way, I guess it’s a good thing.

Regent, despite literally having Shatterbird get his drinks for him, wasn’t feared before but now? With a symbol like Ubermensch, the guy who’s routinely put into who would win debates with Alexandria, people are starting to notice that well… maybe they should be afraid.

That’s gotta be it, Lisa’s just… she needs the Undersiders to look scary, that’s all it is, she knows there will be discussions about me, real discussions, the one’s behind locked doors in congress. And sure, they’ll bluster and they’ll suggest giving me a kill order of my own but it’s not like they’re really gonna do it, they can’t.

It doesn’t matter if they hate me, if the whole world hates me, the fact remains that the Bay has never been safer and I’m a big fucking part of that.

I toss and turn on my bed when my mind reminds me, that didn’t stop the BBB from overthrowing Marquis. That guy made this place safe, hell, the numbers don’t lie, right after the teeth abandoned the city, and it was just him and The Empire, the Bay had never been more prosperous.

Even now, after half a dozen catastrophes, the Bay is approaching that same kind of prosperity and all it would take is one stupid fucking hero getting the drop on me.

Maybe it would be better that way, the others might have a bit of trouble without me but I’m sure they’d be fine. Maybe even a bit better. No, I shouldn’t think about that, I can’t go, I… I’ve put too much time here, way too much time to just call it quits.

Besides, getting the drop on me wouldn’t be easy for a lot of reasons and lately that’s owed a lot to where I crash most nights. Since our big blow up with each other, or more accurately, my big blow up with them, I spend… I don’t know, probably four nights out of the week crashing outside of the tower.

Where I end up sleeping doesn’t really matter so long as I’ve got my phone with me, all they need to do is call and I’ll be there like a drop of a hat. Is that expression right? It sounds right but…

Fuck, I wipe at my eyes, trying to get the everpresent drowsiness out of them and falling predictably short. It feels like I sleep all day but for the life of me, I don’t get an ounce of rest from it. It’s not the bed’s fault I don’t think, over the past month I’ve couch surfed with Trevor, Alexi, Diane, hell when I was really not looking forward to interrupting the other four’s movie night I even shacked up with Chrissie.

The memory makes me feel dirty, sleeping with her might’ve felt great in the moment but I couldn’t help but think I was doing something wrong the whole time. I think she enjoyed it though, at least, I would hope she did, it was the least I could do for her after all.

But yeah, I don’t want to end up on her side of town again, I know she only likes me for my body and waking up that morning made me feel like a piece of meat. Come to think of it, I can’t really sleep over at Trevor’s either.

The locomotive Tinker owes a lot to us, especially given that Coil was gonna use him as a suicide bomber, But the last time I stayed at case de Mendoza… well, I might not be the best when it comes to emotions but Trev has the poker face of a guilty six year old. I’d have to be blind not to notice the crush he has on me.

No, I wrinkle my nose at the thought. Trevor doesn’t have a crush on me, he isn’t gross or depraved enough to think I’d be a good match for him. He’s a good dude, smart and maybe a bit too cocky given his greeness but he deserves someone better, someone that isn’t a freak. Trevor Mendoza is in love with the idea of me, with the idea of Alec Merceau, the persona I put on so long ago it almost felt like skin.

If he knew who I really was, he’d but on those jet boots of his and run off into the ocean, he’d rather run anywhere else than look at me for a second longer and no one would fucking blame him.

I roll over and stare at the ceiling, things… things aren’t great for the Undersiders as an organization but for just the five of us? Things are… well, I think they’re better. The others don’t bother with me anymore and I’m grateful for that, I’ve learned too much in the past few months to learn anymore.

I don’t feel anything, not the fire or the slime or the buzzing or spikes or… or anything. It’s empty, whatever well I thought I was tapping into last February has officially run dry and… I think I’m grateful for that. It’s less like I’m bulletproof and more like there’s nothing to shoot at.

It’s… been nice almost.

It isn’t sunshine and lollipops but it’s what I’ve got anyway.

Last night wasn’t that bad a night all things considered, I had my scheduled fight with Timesnatch and Assault and we made off well enough. The only real downside was that I was too beat to remember I shouldn’t go to the tower.

The thought makes me snort, not because I find any actual humor in it but muscle memory is one hell of a bitch to kill. It’s kinda fucked up that I’ve just started calling it ‘the tower’ like it’s some fucking fantasy lair.

But I can’t help it, I can’t call this place home because it doesn’t feel like home. I thought it would be another Loft, I thought it would be… I know it sounds silly now but I honestly thought it represented something, I thought it was a promise.

I thought it was supposed to be the end, y’know like the castle an adventure gets after the journey’s over. I thought this place was supposed to be where I could finally put my feet up, finally relax and grow old and comfortable with my friends.

Friends that… I’d still like to kiss. That thought earns another chuckle but the sound dies as it does something else, for a brief instant, the numbness collapses a bit, with a sickly green cloud filling up behind my eyes. 

I scrub at them until they’re sore and the whites of my eyes are red, the cloud vanishes a little but stays as an awful green tinge in my mind as I go over the thought with a finer edge.

It’s… wrong. It’s wrong in a way I can’t define completely, it’s wrong in a conceptual way, like someone telling you that ice freezes when warm. Something wrong in a fundamental way, that’s the only consistency, it’s wrong, it’s wrong, it’s wrong… and yet…

I still want to kiss them, I still want to hold them in my arms and be held by them and I’m such an idiot! Last Valentine’s Day… I really thought that was the way thing’s were heading. I don’t know how I was ever so vain to think I could stand with them, that I could be an equal in what I was damn near positive was going to happen.

But that thing, that future I thought was all but guaranteed, that passed me by the moment we started living with each other again. Before, in the Loft, it might’ve been easy to live with each other but that was built out of necessity, they didn’t know who I was then and they didn’t really have a choice.

But now they know me, they really know me and… I’m such an idiot for thinking they could prune off the ugly parts of me and think that would be anything left after. But even after it all, all the hate and rudeness, all the awkward pauses that became angry shouts, through it all… that desire in me hasn’t waned.

Like a stubborn torch down a windy pass, it stays lit, this little thing inside of me, a desire that’s mirrored a million times over by the emptiness. I don’t know why I still have it, since February the others have gotten closer and… also less so. 

I thought there was more to it, the lingering stares and wandering hands, I thought that… well, I thought they had feelings for each other too. I would’ve sworn it. But those must’ve just been my hopes, my mind making connections for things that weren’t actually there.

That makes sense, more sense than the alternative anyway, that somehow, the five of us were really… yeah, I’m just an idiot.

I’m startled out my thoughts by a knock at the door, a small, tentative knock.

That… that’s strange.

The covers slide off of my torso as I sit up, pooling around my lap as I look towards the door. The midmorning light makes my room a warm and dusty yellow as I swallow the dryness in my mouth. That knock… that used to belong to Taylor, that gentle tap, tap, tap she used to do before she traded it for something harsher, before she realized she could just barge in whenever she needed to.

For a long moment, I think my mind’s playing a trick on me but then—

Tap, tap, tap.

I sit up straighter and clear my throat again, trying to get the less used vocal cords to spool up as I examine myself. I’m grateful I remembered to shower before I crashed last night. The tower is kept pretty warm even in the summer and these baggy clothes make me sweat like crazy, but still, it’s better I wear this than my usual lack of attire. 

It’s better for everyone if they don’t see the scars running up my arm and side, better that they don’t see the failed attempt on my life, better that hey aren’t confronted with the fact that on some level, they still owe me.

With my throat cleared, I try to speak as clearly as I can but there’s still in a rasp in the two words.

“Come in,”

Taylor steps into the room, her hair blends with the darkness of the hall for just a moment before the light from the window overtakes her. She looks radiant, like a goddess stepped out of one of her old books.

She’s… I know she was getting comfortable with her femininity but that’s… well, that’s undeniably a dress. 

Beautiful and dark green, the dress is simple but tasteful in a way that you just don’t see much. It’s like what Hollywood advertises people wear, that perfect rose tinted glasses version of humble fashion. It doesn’t have a design on it but the stitching is beautiful, pretty enough that I bet she got it from Parian.

The dress leaves her arms and shoulders bare and though I avert my eyes as soon as I look down, I don’t miss that she isn’t wearing any tights. That’s… I know I sound like a broken record but I can’t help but restate the most obvious thing, this isn't something Taylor usually wears but… damn if she doesn’t wear it well.

She’s so pretty I only realize I’m still in bed when she starts walking towards me. I try to sit up straighter, with my right almost out from under the covers when she… sits on the edge of my bed. 

It’s so dumb but I can’t look away from her legs, the way they dip into my mattress, the physical proof that she was able to be on this bed with me. I finally wrench my eyes away from them and back up her frame when they catch on something in her hair, a cute, golden bee barrette keeps her ebony locks tucked safely away and I can’t help but get lost following her curls.

I must look like a freak because eventually Taylor coughs into her hand, bringing my attention back to her face. What I find there makes me flinch away.

Her brown eyes lock onto mine, angled and big and… and so fucking soft my chest hurts to feel them on mine. When was the last time she looked at me like that? I mean, really looked at me and… and did this?

My attention pulls back just enough to catch the gentle and soft smile on her face and the whole expression makes something flash in my chest before the emptiness pushes back on it, like the pressure of the ocean.

“Hey,” she greets, voice somehow just as soft as he gaze and twice as syrupy sweet. “Good morning.”

I swallow something in my throat, something… tingly.

“Morning,” I return the greeting and push myself back a bit, my eyes racking over her and trying to piece together why the hell she’s in my room. Just like the others, they treat this little boudoir of mine like it’s a toxic waste dump but here she is, having strolled in like she hasn’t gagged around me the past month. 

There’s a moment of silence between us but to my shock and confusion, it’s not tense, it’s not even awkward it’s almost… no, it is nice. I gulp again even with nothing to swallow as I look at her again, my mind putting away how she can stomach me and now focusing entirely on what she’s wearing.

The jewelry, the dress, the smile, it’s all… fuck I don’t know what it is and while Rachel might let a sleeping dog lie, I certainly won’t. The joke makes me falter for a half second, I shouldn’t be doing that anymore, I know better, why the fuck did I tell a joke?

Even to myself, that’s too much, sure, it starts internally but the next thing I know I’ll be mumbling it under my breath and what then? Then I get comfortable, then I say it to their face, then I—

“Me and the others were going out for breakfast,” Taylor says, answering the question I wasn’t able to ask. Her eyes look away from mine and her hands come together to wring the edge of her dress. “We were wondering if… you wanted to come with?”

That’s the last straw, her dress, her behavior, her smile, her voice, all of it has been weird but this just makes it all look normal. She’s… she’s fucking timid. Why the fuck is she timid?

She should know by now that she doesn’t have to be any more timid around me than she should be around a chair or vase. I’m beneath her notice, I’m beneath all of their notice and I thought they were finally getting that but… why?

I’m worthless, I’m a stain, I’m… okay, it’s fine. It sucks but she needs to know who she is, she needs to know she can do better than me, that she doesn’t have to string me along, that I know I’m not her friend anymore.

I open my mouth to speak, about to tell her that: ‘it’s okay, I’m not really hungry’ when… she places a hand on my knee. 

Her palm somehow presses through my blanket and sweatpants, somehow piercing through all that fabric to be decadently warm against my skin. The action makes me swallow and that gets stuck in my throat when she starts to rock the leg back and forth in a gentle rhythm. 

It’s… I… it’s really fucking nice okay?

Like everything else since she walked in, it is a herculean task to bring my focus away from her delicate fingers and I’m left awestruck by the eyes she pierces me with.

Why… why the hell is she doing this?

Last… September I wanna say, I think I or maybe Lisa told Taylor that if she worked on her puppy eyes, there wasn’t anyone on the planet that could resist it. We meant it as more of a teasing thing, Taylor was always really easy to do that to and we had a fair bit of fun watching the blush crawl up her face like a mercury thermometer.

What we weren’t expecting was the retribution. Unbeknownst to us, Taylor actually took our fucking advice and practiced on Brian and Rachel until she could have them both wrapped around her a finger with a single pout.

I still remember the day, the Halloween party we had and even drunk like a sailor, the way she leveled those brown eyes at me… I remember thinking that I’d do anything she’d ask. Thankfully, all she asked for was a kiss.

The point is, her puppy dog eyes are weapons grade and even though I haven’t been on this side of them in quite some time, my resistance is as nonexistent as ever. She doesn’t need to say anything else but she tilts her head in that little way that means she’s being earnest and she delivers the death blow.

“Please?”

“I’ll be right down,” I reply, “Just give me a minute to get out of this.”

Her smile gets wider and I can’t help but feel like I’ve won the lottery when she gives my knee a final squeeze and gets up to go. She pauses in the doorway just as I’ve gotten out of bed and her smile feels… like more than I deserve before she disappears into the hallway.

I head for the closet as quickly as I can, slide open the door to it, and reach up to take my shirt off. The garment falls to the floor and I don’t bother to pick it up as I examine my wardrobe. I don’t know why there’s a sudden lightness to my limbs but I don’t question the feeling inside of me until a traitorous thought rasps a ragged thought.

Do you really think it was her eyes that got you to get out of bed? I clench my jaw but the thought hurdles onward, unimpeded as it lays into me. You think your life is some cheap romance novel, that she can get you to anything because: ‘oh, you’re just so in love with her.’ Who the fuck do you think you’re fooling

I yank a shirt of a hanger and put my arms through the sleeves, trying not to dignify my thoughts with a response when it keep going.

No, it wasn’t her eyes that got you, this isn’t one of Chastity’s stupid books. It’s because you’re such a pathetic, worthless, good for nothing fucking leech that you’d jump off the roof if they asked you two. You need them the way a rat needs a corpse to climb inside of, you—

I cut it off by slamming the closet closed as much as I can, my breath coming out in gasps as I look down. Somehow, I’ve gotten myself dressed and the clothes are… okay, they might be a bit too much.

I turn around and examine myself in the mirror opposite the closet. I'm wearing a white button up shirt, the top two left undone and giving a nice but tasteful view of my neck and the uppermost part of my collarbones. The slacks I’m wearing aren’t too dissimilar from my costume, sleek, black and formfitting while also nicely complimenting my dress shoes.

It’s all definitely too much but… well, it’s better to be overdressed than underdressed and… Taylor was wearing something pretty nice too. It almost looked like she was getting ready for… no, what the hell am I thinking?

I dash the thought as I walk over to my nightstand, shoving my wallet and phone into my pocket and also hastily using my brush to get the bedhead tamed. I work a bit too quickly and my scalp stings as  I pull on the roots but when all is said and done, I look a lot more presentable.

With a deep breath, I step into the hallway, my right hand mindlessly playing with the sleeve of my left. We’re just going out for breakfast, most people dress up when they go out with someone, not just because it could be a… No.

I can just barely hear the others talking downstairs and my steps start to slow as an old habit starts to kick in. I can’t make anything out at this distance, it just sounds like noise, not really words. I stop at the top of the stairs and strain my ears to listen when suddenly, they all stop talking.

“You’re not fooling anyone Alec,” Lisa says, “C’mon down already.”

Her words, I gulp as I take them in. They’re… a command but the tone she used, it didn’t sound like admonishment or frustration or dislike, it almost sounded… teasing. Like our old banter was. My legs don’t fall into the same pitfall my mind does and they carry me down the steps to greet the rest of my teammates.

The sight of the other three draw me up short, both because we haven’t all been in the same room since May but also because… well, they’re dressed just as nicely as Taylor and I.

Four pairs of eyes lock on to me as I make the final step and their attention is too much for me to match. I look away from their faces and can’t help but appreciate their outfits. Brian’s wearing most of a blue suit (minus the tie), Lisa’s got a nice duck feather yellow blouse and long blue skirt, and Rachel… she cleans up very nice, with an outfit almost identical to mine.

The clothes look nice but it’s not that that gets me to pause, it’s the fact they’re smiling. Their eyes are kind, warm, and… as much as I pretend I don’t see it, they feel achingly safe. Their gaze and their smiles don’t dim, even after a full moment of realizing I’m here, I’m going wherever they are and… they look happy that I’m coming along.

I want to sink into it, I want to take that leap and let my body go into muscle memory I thought was forgotten, but I can’t. There’s something in the way, a dissonance that I can’t ignore. This isn’t right, as much as I want it to be, this doesn’t make sense.

For months they’ve swept me aside like dirt off their shoes and now they’re happy to see me? It doesn’t… people don’t make 180’s like this, not unless they really want something. It’s basic psychology, and though it’s been years since I had to sit in with my father’s tutors, I can spot a tactic like this a mile away. 

I… what the hell do I—

Any thoughts I might’ve had drain out of my head as Brian steps closer to me, close enough that I have to tilt my head up to look into his eyes. His eyes like cooled caramel, his eyes like the sunset bouncing off a lake, his eyes that feel more like a home than any place I’ve ever lived in. The gears in my head slowly start to turn again when he closes the distance, his two strong arms wrapping around me in a firm but not suffocating embrace. He’s… he’s hugging me.

And not that shitty side hug that he gave me last February but an honest to god ten second hug, his arms tighten imperceptibly as my own reach up on autopilot, my fingers lacing with each other over the middle of his back.

I can’t think. There isn’t a thought that passes through my head, every synapse in my brain is dedicated to soaking up as much as this feeling as possible, the warm, fuzzy, feeling that was in the background nearly all of December, January, and maybe half of February.

He holds me longer than he ever has when he’s awake, even at our closest, Brian wouldn’t let himself hold on to any of us unless he was dead on his feet but the moment now keeps stretching, ten seconds, then fifteen, then thirty and finally, he starts to let me go. I want to hold him close, I want to stop his retreat but thankfully, the past few months haven’t been for nothing.

They’ve given me enough self control to let him go, and I do it with as much dignity that I can apply… y’know, discounting the warmth on my face. No one says a word after that and I think the silence is supposed to be awkward but my brain’s too far away to put that into perspective.

We all just pile into the elevator and I can’t help the fact that my brain lapses back every second to what just happened. He hugged me, the guy on my left, he… he hugged me. The same guy that wouldn’t let me talk to his sister anymore, the one who asked why I hadn’t died for him already, he hugged me and… fuck, I wish I had been more present when it happened.

His arms, they felt like him. Strong and loyal and… I know I felt conviction but did he actually enjoy it? Did he actually like hugging me or am I just putting thoughts in his head?

Rachel and Taylor start talking but for the life of me, their words aren’t making any sense. I can’t focus on them, my head keeps skipping back like a damn record and I know I’ve got to look crazy when I shake my head.

The action works regardless of how dumb it looks and I’m able to clear my throat as I speak up.

“So…” I say, feeling ice fill my veins as Rachel stops mid sentence. “Where are we going exactly?”

I try not to cringe, what the fuck is wrong with me? One hug and suddenly I think I can just fucking talk to them, that I can interrupt a conversation? I lost the right to talk to them like this and I should be grateful they’re lowering themselves to even be in the same room as me.

Fuck, I definitely blew it, we’re gonna get to the lobby and they’re going to go and tell me to go back or fuck, maybe they just brought me along to carry some shit and—

“The Ideal,” Lisa answers over her shoulder, her smile dull enough that I can’t call it a smirk. “They’re reopening today and without anything to do, why not?”

Her answer makes me pause… It's probably just a coincidence but The Ideal’s my favorite spot on the Boardwalk. Or, well, it was before Leviathan swept it out to sea. I know the owners made it out of the Bay but after all the shit that happened after, I sort’ve resigned myself to the thought that I’d never get to eat there again.

I hadn’t kept tabs on it since the Gesselschaft tried their luck with us but if it’s actually back… shit, that’s great news!

I force my face neutral as quickly as I can, my poker face is the best the Bay’s ever seen but I don’t doubt Lisa can get a full readout of me from a twitch of my nose.

She confirms my thought with a wink and an even softer smile, the kind that just barely makes her eyes crinkle at the edges. I gulp but thankfully, she turns her head away from me before she can pick me apart anymore.

The rest of the ride is silent, and I don’t miss that Charlotte does a double take when all five of us leave the elevator, her dark blue eyes widening when she catches me in the middle of the group.

She doesn’t know me well enough to read me but I give her a shrug all the same, I have no idea what I’m doing here either. The warm New England summer greets us as we exit the tower and I gulp as a fucking limosine pulls up.

I know it’s just because Lisa doesn’t like driving if she doesn’t have to, I know it’s just because without competitors in the city, we’re taking in more money than we could ever burn, but this… I’ll allow myself to make the comparison just this once.

With the way we’re dressed up, where we’re actually heading, and the expense of our trip… well, I think any sane person would say this screams ‘date.’

The thought feels blasphemous as soon as it pops in my head and as the door opens for us, I try to rationalize it. Like I said, it isn’t a date, it might look and feel like one but it absolutely isn’t, I need to keep that in mind.

And so, after Brian and Rachel get in, I decide to climb in after, hoping to get a corner spot or whatever passes for being as far out of the way as possible. But of course, what with being under a Thinker spotlight, Lisa doesn’t let me.

I barely have a moment to recognize that she’s holding my fucking hand before she pulls me back to the middle of the seats, setting me right between her and Taylor as I gulp. The door closes and the vehicle hums to life, the outside world is hidden behind the heavily tinted glass so there’s nothing for us to see other than each other.

We start to move and I have to gulp again, the purple light coming from under the seats and the small table in the center gives the whole interior an almost ethereal glow. My teammates look especially good in this lighting, all of their best features highlighted.

Rachel’s bloody red hair looks almost black and her amber eyes glow as they stare at me, her eyes have always looked kinda wolfish but seeing them here reminds me of the actual animal. Like I’m prey to be devoured. It’s probably fucked up of me that though that expression’s accurate, I’m not even a little afraid… if anything… it feels kind of tingly.

I look over to the seats across from her and find an equally distracting figure. Brian’s head is turned to face me, his dreads are just a silhouette in the dark and his features are only perceptible by the purple highlights. His brown eyes are completely black, the pupil and iris indiscernible but undeniably fixed on me.

That tingle in my chest turns into a dull buzz and then the hand squeezing mine makes itself known. I look down at it, Lisa’s hand shifts, letting go of mine for just an instant before it settles itself back on top. The palm is warm and soft, soft in a way that feels almost sinful against me.

I gulp and let my eyes trail up the wrist and arm to Lisa’s face. As the girl closest to me, I can make her features the best, her blond hair catches the light in an odd way, looking almost white in spots but then pitch black in others. Her green eyes are darker but I can tell what color they are, even when they’re half lidded.

Her smile is perfect and I can’t believe I would ever mock it, the scar running up her cheek is a badge of honor and I know I hurt her when I brought it up last month. How could I have done that, how low could I have fallen so low to mock her for it? The quirk of her lips is lopsided but that smile belongs in everyone’s mind, the same way the Mona Lisa’s might.

I can’t help but smile back, one part because of the unintentional pun and ten parts because her grin is just that infectious.

I look away from her the same way a catholic might turn their head from the Sistine Chapel, her face is something I can let myself bask in, no matter how much I want to.

Of course, at that exact moment, Taylor takes my attention, both of her hands reaching down to cup my own. The feeling makes my legs stiff, my right actually slipping on the floor of the limo as I look at her. I right my limbs immediately before I look at her and what I see takes my breath away.

The color in her dress has been zapped into a midnight black, the darkness of it highlighting the pallor of her skin and making her long lashes and curly hair pop as she blinks her eyes open to me. Like Brian, her eyes are dulled by the dark into a barely there brown circle with a pitch pupil but the look is somehow smoldering.

The frog in my throat refuses to be swallowed as she rubs a nonsense pattern into my skin, her shoulders resettling before she speaks.

“Thank you for coming,” she tells me, voice too soft, almost husky as she continues on in a whisper. “We really appreciate it.”

My mouth is a fucking desert and I don’t think anyone can blame me for it. The spot they’ve put me in, in the middle where no one can talk to each other without seeing me, it feels so fucking deliberate. They’ve put me on a pedestal and… and it’s really fucking nice.

Unable to speak, I just nod and do my best not to smack my lips. Again, Lisa picks up on it and she leans forward, grabbing my attention as she reaches under the low table with her free hand. She uncorks the plastic water bottle with one hand but she doesn’t give it to me.

No, with Taylor’s hands holding my left and Lisa’s holding my right, the blonde has decided to give me the water in a… more direct way. She places the cool plastic against my lower lip and I open it without question, letting her quench my thirst while also making something churn in my gut.

I can’t help it, there’s something about this, being gently immobilized and the center of attention that makes my legs shuffle and a heat climb up my face. I can only hope the dim lighting can hide my beet red complexion as Brian clears his throat.

My eyes dart to him and I don’t miss the way he leans back, that kind of lower back centered way every guy does when they’re trying to hide certain parts of their anatomy. A part that I can’t believe I’d stir up, even given the provocativeness of what Lisa’s doing to me.

But I guess people can’t help what gets their motor revving, even someone as strong willed as the boy in front of me.

Lisa makes me drain half the bottle and when a dribble of it starts to fall off my lips, she idly wipes it with her thumb. The little action shouldn’t make the churning any hotter but all I can think about is how much I wish I’d worn lipstick or gloss or fucking anything that smeared.

I actually gasp when Lisa leans back in her seat, the air no longer suffocating as I gulp. The others give me a moment to catch my breath and the whole while they never take their eyes off me, content to just let me squirm before Brian eventually takes reign of the conversation.

“I was wondering…” he starts, “You took over Ubermensch much faster than Lisa and you estimated… why is that?”

Like every question he’s asked me the past three months, I’m worried it’s a trap, some backhanded way for me to incriminate myself. My hesitance goes on long enough that Lisa takes pity on me, answering and surprising me yet again by the lack of heat in her voice.

“He’s been working himself much harder,” Lisa says, a kind of… regret in her voice? My eyes snap to her, ready to examine for any tells or hooks but stopping cold at the look she meets me with.

Her eyes are deep and full, the edges of them brimming with a sadness I can only recall maybe a handful of times. She looks at me with a questioning tilt of her head, asking me nonverbally: 'is this alright?'

I don't know what she's asking about, whether it's okay for her to answer for me or that I've been pushing myself harder. Either way, I can only nod, sure that my tongue would trip over itself if it tried to form words.

"How hard?" Rachel probes further, leaning out of her seat and setting one forearm on her right knee.

Not hard enough , my thoughts answer for me, biting and cold and clawing and so fucking true that the teeth just feel sharper. If I'd gotten it done earlier maybe I could've—

"Too hard," this time, the girl on my left answers for me, her hands squeezing mine tight enough it almost hurts. 

Taylor's eyes look up from my hand to me, her bottom lip caught between her teeth before quirking them to the side, again, regret palpable on her face. "I've had bugs near him and almost everyday he went down to work on Ubermensch."

I… hadn't even thought of that, that regardless of where I was in the tower, so long as she was there, it didn't matter. I could be in the basement and her on the roof and I'd still be well in her range 

"Everyday?" Brian asks, a bit of incredulity in his voice but mostly just calm.

"Yep," I finally find my voice and look him in the eyes. "Pretty much I mean, I think I was heading down there every day when March started and I didn't get done till May 10th I think."

"'Didn't get it done till May?'" Brian quotes and I flinch back, my poker face actually fucking abysmal when someone knows me. But Brian doesn't take it as the weakness it so clearly is and his face gets softer before he starts to lean forward, going slow like a hunter trying not to spook an animal. "You did great."

His compliment hits my ear wrong, not because it sounds like a lie, but the opposite. It sounds like the truth, a genuine compliment… accompanied by his hand reaching over and settling firmly on my knee.

The palm feels perfect as he grinds it into my patella, his fingers squeezing softly and fitting around my leg like a puzzle piece.

"Uh…" yep, good job me. "Thank you."

"No need," Brian replies, voice still soft even as he pulls away a bit, his hand leaving my knee for a moment before leaving me with a final pat. "I know how much rushing it can hurt you and… I'm sorry we made you feel like you needed to do that."

The apology hits me like a sledgehammer, the impact of it harsh but the effect less so… it's like the actual hit of a hammer and more like aggressively corking a hole. The pit in my stomach… it isn't gone, but for the moment?

I sit up a bit straighter and for the first time in months, the next breath I take doesn't feel borrowed.

"It's okay," I lie, "I know we needed him up and running and—"

"No," Rachel cuts me off, her voice gruff but the edges of it aren't angled towards me. She doesn't meet my eyes when I look at her, instead she tilts her head and sucks on her teeth before replying. "That shit wasn't fair, it hurts when you rush and— sorry. That's all there is to say."

Her reaffirmation is echoed by the other occupants, each chiming in with their own hum or nod. Having them do that tightens the cork in my chest, the numbness seeps out from under it but maybe…maybe I can try and say it isn't there for today.

The rest of the ride goes smoothly, without a window to the outside, none of us could tell how close our destination was getting so the conversations we managed were pretty brief.

But they went well I guess, Lisa complained that Sinclair's little vengeance scheme went a little early, the showrunner for his new casino went missing with a lot of borrowed money. Taylor offered to track him down but Lisa waved her off, wherever Mr. Domino ended up, he was probably too dead to help with money.

Taylor and Amy had been experimenting with their powers, it’s taken a lot of encouragement from every side but the former Dallon is finally stretching her powers legs. It’s an odd deja vu watching Taylor get into her chatty mode, excitably rambling that she and Amy have been pushing the limits of how buggy something could be for Taylor to control it. Apparently, she can sort’ve control a bipedal bugman but the control’s fuzzy.

Rachel wants to expand the shelter a bit more, apparently being cooped up so far from the outside smells is getting her dogs anxious, unused to the lack of scents. Lisa says she might be able to allocate some funds but for now it’s probably best to just increase their walk schedule, the Horseman have apparently been poking around our southern territories and no one wants that freak War to get his hands on any dogs.

Rachel grips her seat at the mention of the bastard, he’s basically the Tinker version of her, able to ‘improve’ biological creatures with a cocktail of Tinker chems. The only problem? He doesn’t give a shit about any of the animals he brings in and more often than not, he expects them to die in the field.

Lisa puts her other hand on Rachel’s shoulder, promising that when things stabilize here, the first thing they’re gonna do is go after the bastards. I know it’s not my place to chime in, but I add my own two cents there, promising that Ubermensch will personally bring that bastard in front of her.

Instantly I think I’ve stepped on her toes, sure that the girl in front of me is about to bite my head off for daring to take her retribution from her. But like Brian before her, I’m proven wrong when she offers me a slight smile and rubs the edge of her boot against my calf. It’s strange and weird and sweet and so fucking Rachel that my heart feel full to burst.

Not all the conversations are great of course, Brian brought Aisha for maybe a sentence or two before he very clearly dropped the conversation, his eyes shifting to me as soon as he remembered I was still in the car. His discomfort isn’t nice to witness but it feels wrong to comfort him, there’s no way in hell he’d see that as genuine coming from me.

Thankfully though, the ride stops just as things were about to drop from awkward into tense. Rachel opens the door for us and keeps it open until all of us can pile out. I blink my eyes at the harsh light, my vision having got used to the dark limo.

Lisa heads to the driver’s side and tells the nameless man to pick us up in maybe an hour and a half. Her estimation makes me feel something fluttery, a tingling feeling not unlike the ocean breeze kicking up my curls. A whole hour and a half, stomaching me for an elevator and car ride is one thing but a whole hour and a half?

My mouth is dry when I finally look away from the limo, the driver probably finding some alley to park in when I see the line for the Ideal. Fucking hell, I knew the place was good but I wouldn’t have expected the grand reopening to stretch all the way down to the edge of the boardwalk.

Shit, a change in plans might—

Lisa walks over to me and takes my hand in hers, pulling me to the front of the restaurant in open defiance of the ridiculous line. The building has been drawn up exactly like the old one, albeit, this one doesn’t have the wear and tear of 20 years of customers.

I can almost smell wet paint as Lisa stops us in front of the front desk, completely unruffled from the glares we’re given as she tells the hostess that we have a reservation.

The guy behind me snorts and I can’t blame him, this place might serve really fucking good food but I think reservations are for places of a certain caliber of fancyness. Regardless, the hostess recognizes Lisa’s voice and a lot of the blood drains out of her face as Lisa asks to be led to our spot.

I don't know what got passed down the chain of command here but I’m sure the hostess was warned strenuously to keep an eye out for a group of five.

She grabs five menus and urges us to follow when a heavy hand lands on my shoulder.

I turn and lock eyes with a disgruntled man waiting halfway outside, his generous frame burgeoning with rage as he wrinkles his nose at me.

“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing son?” he asks, voice twanged with an accent probably better suited to somewhere way further down south. “I’ve spent all morning waitin in line and you and your friends just ought think they can hop in front?”

Are you fucking kidding me? Like, literally, the one good day I’ve had in months and this lardass wants to take it from me?

The smile that comes up on my face makes him shudder and I realize, I haven’t had a good chance to beat someone up with my bare hands in months. It’s easier when I get Ubermensch to do it for me but there’s something… cathartic about doing it yourself.

I’m not sure why I like it, whether it’s beating some asshole over the head with my sceptre or my own fists, I can’t deny the satisfaction I get from the impact. The way the skin of my palms tightens and pulls, probably forming blisters when my club/taser clocks someone, the vibration through my fist on contact.

Maybe Romeo rubbed off on me too much but I love it anyway.

But before I can open my mouth, before I can goad the asshole into taking the first swing, there’s another hand on my shoulder.

Rachel pushes me back gently at the same time she steps forward, the three or so inches she has on me has never made her look taller than right now, eye to eye with a grown ass man mad that someone had a reservation.

“You want something?” Rachel asks, voice a steady growl and eyes almost hazy with the heat of her frustration. The man hasn’t been the smartest so far but he’s wise enough to know this isn't a fight he’s going to be able to walk away from.

Still though, as a dumbass american living in a city that has no right to be as safe as it is, he tries to hold on to as much face as possible. He steps back twice, head tilted down and hands half up in a ‘don’t shoot’ motion.

“N-naw,” he stutters, trying to play it off like there was just something in his throat. “Didn’t mean nothin’ by it, my mistake.”

Rachel pulls away a bit, the heat in her eyes actually flaring at the spinelessness, I guess she wasn’t the only one hoping for a fight. She turns back to me and instantly, that fire dims considerably, turning back into her usual smolder as she reaches for my hand.

I let myself get pulled along to a table in the center of the right room, a big one probably meant for a party of eight that the five of us can sit in with some added leg room.

Rachel plants me right between herself and Brian, the latter offering me a smile as I awkwardly get in the seat the former pulls out for me. I can’t help but gulp when she pushes my chair in before taking the one on my right.

They’re so much bigger than me it looks almost comical, these two with muscles barely hidden under their clothes and me, a scrawny sliver sandwiched between them.

Before anyone can speak, a waiter comes by, a darker man with skin a bit lighter than Brian’s. His hair is done up in a boring coif and his mustache… well, it could be me but I don’t think facial hair looks great on anyone.

“Good morning,” he greets, accent light but noticeable, “My name is Rajesh, I will be your waiter this morning. Are there any drinks I may get for you?”

The smile on his face doesn’t seem forced and it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know why, a year ago, Rajesh and anyone with skin like his couldn’t work in Brockton Bay’s service industries.

The Empire and all their mouth breathing sycophants would sooner die than ‘let some foreigner take a red, white, and blue American job!’ Nevermind that that job would’ve inherently meant that the server was below them, no, if any of those morons could’ve wished for anything in the world, it would be to just eradicate anyone not like them.

It’s good they’re gone, sure, the vast majority of Empire members are still out there but only the dumbest of the dumb still wear their colors proudly, still shave their head and preach their hate as if Kaiser can protect them from the grave.

No, most of the skinheads have cast off their previous allegiance, they’ve stopped bleaching their hair and if they have more than two brain cells to scrap together, they’re wise enough to know not to bring up what exactly they’ve been doing for the better part of a decade.

Of course, that doesn’t mean they’ve magically ‘seen the error of their ways’. No, I imagine they’re still out there, all they’ve done is swap out the overt hate to diet racism.

“Good morning,” Lisa returns the greeting, “Well, we’ll be having two coffees, one black—” she points at herself, “One light on cream but with two sugars—” she points to Brian, “A green tea with honey—” she points at Taylor, “An apple juice—” Rachel puts up her hand to gesture to herself, “and an orange juice.”

I nod as Lisa looks at me, a little surprised she remembered I like the sweet and barely sour beverage. Rajesh writes it all down and taps his notepad before thanking us for the time and heading off to retrieve our drinks.

With that done, everyone takes a moment to look at the menus, their eyes scanning over the breakfast and lunch items. I pretend to do the same but I already know what I want, I’ve tried everything here before once and if they’ve brought the restaurant back to the way it was then—- ah, there it is.

It’s incredibly boring of me but I just go with the tuna salad sandwich, the meal probably takes five minutes to make and that’s including frying up the side that goes with it but… I don’t know, there’s something about the simplicity that works well for me.

I close my menu at the same time Taylor closes hers and the words leap out of my mouth before I can halt them.

“French onion soup?” I ask, a knowing edge to my voice.

Immediately, my jaw snaps closed, I don’t need the others to glare at me to know I’ve overstepped and—

Lisa snorts.

I turn my head just a little and catch her peeking past the corner of the menu, her eyes fixed on Taylor. The girl in question flushes and her shoulders hike even as she glares at me. But the look she’s sending my way, it isn’t actually filled with any anger.

Sure, her eyes are angled the exact same way they were in May but there’s nothing actually behind them. It’s the appearance of rage but really, she’s just going through the motion, maybe a little annoyed but mostly playing along with the bit.

It feels… heavenly the way she answers me, the slightest tremble in her mumble.

“I like soup,” she murmurs, “French onion’s my favorite.”

“It’s a good soup,” Rachel agrees, “It’s just funny that you get it whenever you see it.”

Rachel’s blunt commentary gets Taylor to flush harder but she can’t stop the smile climbing up her face, even when she brings a hand up to hide it.

Rajesh comes back and gives us our drinks with only a minor mixup, mistaking my and Rachel’s choice before we swap them around. He takes our orders diligently and swipes the menus from us as we start talking again.

Just like the car ride here, the conversation we share together is pleasant, of course, given the shitload of civilians here, we have to keep things on the downlow. I shake my head fondly when Rajesh places my order in front of me. Twenty minutes after he took it, twenty minutes of ‘secret’ messages and Taylor is still so goddamn cute, giggling to herself at the use of code phrases and inside lingo.

I don’t know why she finds it so funny, she got giddy when she first joined us, smothering her reactions to it all but obviously enjoying herself. There was a time I thought the humor had left her, she stopped laughing at the codes and didn’t even smile when we called our costumes ‘formal wear’.

But she didn’t stop laughing because the joke had gone stale, she’d only stopped because shit had gotten too serious in the Bay. There’s not really much room to laugh when the Slaughterhouse Nine are roaming around and even months after the fact, she couldn’t let herself relax knowing Echidna had somehow escaped.

Thankfully, that’s all behind us now and the chatty, giggly girl that had to go away during hell on earth has come back, getting happier and happier with each passing day and I… I can’t explain the feeling in my chest. The fact that I was deprived of her for so long still stings like hell but being here again, just able to bask in her presence, I feel like I’ve found an oasis in the middle of the desert.

Lisa says there’s some talk in the Wards, since Diane up and left their group, Weld has been having trouble keeping the rest of them in line.

Kid Win is annoyed with all the new oversight still in effect, since his mentor broke the truce during Leviathan’s siege, the board of Tinkers or whatever the fuck the yout h guard call it are hounding him in particular. He only discovered his speciality last summer but in that time since, he’s hardly improved at all given that nearly every new idea is shot down the second he tries to build it.

Timesnatch is doing well after she came out but things aren’t all rainbows over there, no one was happy when she interrupted yet another press conference to shoot down their ‘chronolass’ rebranding. Since then, she’s done a good job at keeping things civil but anyone can tell she envies Gallant.

It’s actually really shitty of the PRT to keep the poor girl stationed here, she has to go out every single day and know that even with all the HRT the youth guard is willing to give her, Diane’s transition was done instantaneously on a level so far beyond mundane hormones.

Vista’s getting suffocated under all the regulations, even with the city safer than ever, she’s been restricted to console duty nine times out of ten. It’s amazing how dumb management can be, even a field so vital as parahuman crime prevention. Should they let the Shaker 9 fight, should they actually use their biggest gun? No, for the sake of the children, it’s better to keep them cooped up and unable to do anything as the city falls further into our grip.

The way Lisa tells it, not counting Browbeat and Weld himself ], there’s a pretty good chance we’ll get three new members before the summer’s end.

“That might not…” Brian starts, his chin tilting a little and shaking as if literally weighing the idea in his head. “Be the best idea.”

“Definitely not,” I agree, “They were already pretty pissed when Crucible came our way, we got off lucky because he hadn’t signed anything but what we’d be doing there is actual poaching, I doubt the PRT will take it lying down.”

“What else can they do?” Rachel asks, “The only one we have to be worried about is Dauntless, the others aren’t shit.”

While I agree with her for the local Protectorate, whenever a gang gets as big as ours, y’know, maybe only a head shorter than the Elite, you stop worrying about the local branch and more the actual fucking tree.

The Protectorate has numbers, numbers that dwarf ours a hundred to one and in those hundreds, there’s maybe a dozen or so individuals that match our strength by themselves, and that’s including Shatterbird and Ubermensch.

Brian was able to lay out Alexandria because he got the drop on her. I doubt the super bitch is gonna let that fly twice and that’s not even mentioning her teammates. Legend could level this entire city in an hour and the less said about Eidolon the better.

“It’s not them we need to worry about,” Lisa says, addressing Rachel before turning back to Brian. “We wouldn’t be taking them officially of course, they’d still be Wards but all it takes is some scheduling changes and a few misdirections with power use to have them on our side. It’ll be easy enough to get Vista to read to kindergarteners in the afternoons and in the nights someone with very similar powers will help us clean up the boat graveyard.”

“Similar but not exact,” Taylor reinforces, spooning the last dredges of soup into her mouth. I’m about to agree with her when Brian clears his throat, in that way people do to get attention rather than actually getting rid of a cough.

Taylor’s spoon clatters in her bowl, her fingers slipping as her eyes dart first to me, then to the teen on my left. I follow her gaze and find Brian’s eyes lancing into mine, his brow heavy as he takes a deep breath.

I take one last bite, my hands trying to do something that will stall this for even a second longer. I know that look, I know that look too damn well, I’ve seen it from so many people all my life and I— please, please don’t do this, please, I—

“Alec,” Brian starts, “We need to talk.”

The food turns to ash on my tongue, the sandwich falling back to the plate and the bit in my mouth absolutely refusing to go down. Instead it just sits there as the largest of us settles his hand on my shoulder, it doesn’t feel like it did earlier, it doesn’t feel warm or comforting at all. Hell, it doesn’t even feel cold and painful.

It doesn’t feel like anything.

Instead it’s just a weight, a crushing, immovable, unyielding weight. The fingers wrap around my shoulder like a statue’s, so firm and tight that the thought of brushing them off feels silly. My lip trembles, mouth trying to decide on something to say when Rachel speaks up next, her baritone just a few octaves lighter than Brian’s/

“We’ve been talking,” she says, taking my attention away from Brian. The Shaker finally let’s me go and my hands reach for the napkin in my lap, I bring it up to pretend to wipe my face when I spit the mouthful out into the cloth.

The relief it offers is fleeting, my tongue still feels like it’s made of sandpaper as I wring the fabric closed. I look over at Lisa, trying to read her and finding that it comes frighteningly easy.

Her green eyes are fixed on me but downcast all the same, the warmth in them isn’t as prevalent as… as… I don’t know what it is. It’s like sadness but not, it’s… kind’ve like resignation but that doesn’t really fit either. Her eyes meet mine and I can finally name the feeling I see in her expression, the slight frown and heavy eyes, it’s a textbook example of: ‘I’m sorry.’

It hurts to look at, like the sun itself is staring back at me and when I turn my gaze to Taylor, I find an equally inhospitable expression. Taylor’s eyes are brimming with sorrow, tears making the brown into a haze that combines with her lashes. She flinches a little when she catches me staring and it… it doesn’t feel right to me. Why is she the one sad, she’s not the one in the middle, she—

Brian’s hand squeezes tight enough that I can feel the tips nearly bruise my skin. My eyes turn back to him and I see that his gaze is full of a different kind of heat, his eyes a low smolder that says: ‘don’t make this any harder than it has to be.’

I freeze at the look, damn it all, I’m so fucking stupid! I felt… I felt safe , safe between him and Rachel, safe for the first time in months and that was never the point of it. They weren’t sitting beside me to protect me, they were sitting there to box me in.

“We t-think it would be better…” Taylor picks up where Rachel left off and immediately trails off herself, her eyes darting to Lisa’s. The Thinker finishes the sentence with a deep breath.

“If you were to move out.”

The world stops.

It ceases.

I can hear nothing for a good few minutes and even though there’s still dozens of people here, all with their own chatter going on, I would swear you could hear a pin drop. There’s a hundred different things going on in here, plates clanging, silverware dinging, mouths moving, hands slamming, all of it doesn’t matter.

The others are silent, waiting for my response. It’s odd, I know what they’ve done to me is such an ugly thing to do, leading me on like this, taking me out to my favorite place, letting me… letting me be a part of the group one last time, all that… just to knock me down. It’s an ugly, ugly thing.

But still, I can’t help it. The way the light comes in from the window behind me bounces off Taylor’s hair beautifully, making the midnight glow a warm jet black in places. Lisa’s eyes still sparkle like emeralds, just as mesmerizing as the day we met, the day she shook my hand and said “Well, who’s to say we can’t be coworkers and friends?”

I lean back in my chair so much that the corners of my backrest hit the wall, providing me a good angle to let myself lean on the back two legs.

Rachel’s face is still the perfect rugged beauty, a blunt nose and a hard jaw but with so much damn softness in her eyes that it counters it. Brian’s not nearly so rugged, once upon a time he might’ve been but now he’s the ideal picture of handsomeness, lantern jaw defining but soft.

They’ve done a very ugly thing to me, ugly enough that the cork in my chest falls down into the bottomless nothing below it. But even given that… they’re still so damn beautiful.

“Why?”

Their eyes look back at me and I feel nothing at the waver in them, the bit of hesitance doesn’t matter. They’re the Undersiders, they’re gonna waver for a second but then they’re gonna shrug it off and power on through. It actually takes me until LIsa opens her mouth that I realize, I’m the one who asked the question.

“Alec…” Lisa’s sigh sounds remarkably genuine, not put upon at all. Sure, there’s some frustration lacing the guilt but that doesn’t sound off, she’s angry with me but at least she’s not trying to hide it. I can appreciate that honesty I suppose. “You know there’s a… friction between us.”

“Between you four and I?” I clarify, it’s a leading statement, just a formality really. The way things are going, I’m gonna try and get them to talk as much as possible, at least so I can have the memory before I go.

“Yes,” Lisa answers. “We… we’ve all tried to make it work but things are…”

“Bad,” Rachel completes the statement and I snort. Bad? Is that what she calls it? Well, I suppose I shouldn’t be so surprised, she’s always had a knack for making long things short. My chair falls forward with a clatter loud enough to get a few other customers' attention.

“Yeah, I’ve noticed that too…” I answer but there’s… there’s something wrong. My chest? It doesn’t feel as limitless as it just did, it feels… tight? Yes, very fucking tight, tight like when you wrap a piece of string around your thumb, when you do it enough times the skin gets purple and numb. “It’s…it hasn’t been great.”

I don’t mean for my voice to come out in a rasp but the last word sounds like the death rattle of a corpse all the same. I try to get a grip on myself, try to put that same nonchalant mask back on but for the life of me, it feels the straps aren’t tight enough, that my face is gonna fall off.

“No,” Taylor speaks up, her voice a bit less of a wreck than before but still well beyond her usual demeanor. “It hasn’t been and… for what it’s worth…” she trails off and I instinctively know she wants me to meet her eyes for the last bits.

The second they meet, I wish to god they hadn’t. Tears fall down her face in a silent cascade, combining at her chin and falling down into her bowl as her lips pucker in the best attempt to quiet a cry.

The sight makes my chest feel worse, like someone’s banging on it from the outside with a sledgehammer. The nothing that was just there a minute ago shrinks as the clouds part behind me, letting Taylor’s brown eyes be revealed to me.

I try not to think that Chrissie has never seen Taylor’s eyes before, that Trevor and Alexi haven’t even seen her face. I try not to think about how that surely awaits me, I’m still going to be an Undersider, but I won’t be… one of them anymore, I won’t be a part of whatever the fuck we had going on. Maybe on paper nothing’s gonna change, but I know everything will.

I can’t believe I’ll… I’ll probably never see their unmasked faces ever again, at least not in person.

But I’ll be okay. I won’t have as glamourous a lifestyle as I used to and the workload’s probably going back to how things were before the tower but I’ll be fine. I’ll be a good soldier. I’ll take orders, I’ll—

Taylor reaches across the table to hold my arm and I hate that it still feels just as soothing as this morning, that her brown eyes still make the suffocating tightness in my chest just a little looser.

“I’m sorry we couldn’t make it work, I’m sorry things played out the way it did, and… and—” she stutters into a sob and I smile as best I can, trying to show her that the knife in my guts doesn’t hurt too much.

To be honest, I’m kinda flattered. The fact she’s crying means she isn’t putting these emotions away, she isn’t forcing them into her bugs and I know it’s genuine, Taylor’s never been that good of an actor even when she’s robo-Skittering it up.

“We had a good run,” I tell her, smiling as much as I can and feeling the fragile thing on my face when Taylor nods. That little gesture hurts so damn much, the acknowledgment that: ‘yeah, we did have a good run… but now it’s over.’

“A-are, are you—” Taylor can’t get through her words and Lisa takes over for her, a hand on the noirette’s shoulder to push her back in her seat as she looks up at me.

“Do you have somewhere else to stay?” she asks me, voice strange without any of her smugness or edge to it. I nod, the lie comes too easy, too quickly, but I doubt Lisa cares anymore. The job is done, I’ve been… I’ve been excised.

That’s a good word for it, I can’t remember when Taylor told me that word, but I’m sure it was her who explained it to me. Excised, removed surgically. That’s what this was, from the moment she walked into my bedroom, her and the others performed an operation, I just can’t believe it took me this long to find out I was the tumor.

“Yeah..” I wipe at my mouth as I stand up, the other hand fishing for my wallet and opening it up the second it’s free. My index and middle finger grab at some random bills and I gently toss them in the middle of the paper, the amount doesn’t really matter, I only carry hundreds. “Yeah, I got some spots…um…”

Fuck, ‘um?’ Fuck, they finally stop pretending to give a shit about me and all I can say is fucking ‘um?’ I pause there, my eyes flicking down between the four as that fucking tightness wounds even further, the pressure somehow making my fucking eyes feel heavy as I squeeze between Brian and the wall. 

“I… uh, I’ll send a guy to get my shit some time this week, I’ll,” my eyes get even heavier and I shut them tight as I walk away from the table. “Bye.”

The farewell stings as it leaves my lips, like I just threw up a fucking cactus. The world is misty when I open my eyes and I rub my palms into them, forcing the stupid fucking dust out as I walk past the hostess and the incoming guests. The ocean breeze feels awful against my skin, the wind getting under my shirt and feeling like a thousand little knives raking over me.

I scratch at my neck when I start walking away from the restaurant, my eyes dead ahead as I slowly leave the Boardwalk behind. The fucking itch just jumps the second my fingernails scrape over it, my skin gets red as the damn sensation climbs in random spots, splitting and multiplying and fuck, I must look fucking crazy, scratching myself like a wild fucking dog.

The comparison makes a chuckle come up my throat as I pick up the pace, speed walking up the hills and leaving the beach.

A date, I actually let myself fucking believe it was a goddamn date. How fucking stupid am I? How fucking pathetic, they couldn’t have been clearer the past few months and I actually thought, I really fucking thought they were gonna just… just fucking let me waltz back in!

A date, it wasn’t a fucking date, it was.. It was… it was taking the family dog to get put down. Yeah, that’s it, they took me to my favorite place, lavished me with as much attention as they could stomach, and then they said goodbye.

At least I got that I suppose. At least I got a goodbye, it could’ve been worse I suppose, it could’ve… it could’ve b-been—

I start running as fast as I can, I don’t know where I’m going or when I’ll get there and I don’t fucking care so long as I get away from here as quickly as possible. My fucking eyes won’t stop feeling heavy and my fucking chest won’t stop hurting and my fucking skin keeps itching and I just don’t fucking care anymore!

All of this shit has just kept coming, the hits after hits after hits and fuck! I can’t do this anymore, I want to do this, I want to try, I want this more than I’ve ever wanted anything before but I just can’t fucking do this goddamnit!

My legs burn and my arms pump and I still can’t get this thing out, I can’t get this fucking shit out and fuck, my ears are ringing and my eyes are stinging and—

An uneven fucking sidewalk catches the tip of my toes and I fall on my hands and knees hard. The slacks I’m wearing rip along the kee, the fabric torn and hanging as my skin gushes the blood inside.

I scramble up and look at my hands, a fair bit of both palms have been skinned away and dirt and a few small pebbles cling to the slick redness. The pain makes me stop and I sit there for a minute, my eyes turning back the way I came.

I didn’t even run that far, maybe a half mile at most. The others wouldn’t have had a problem with that distant, the others wouldn’t have fucking tripped over the goddamn sidewalk, the others wouldn’t be sitting here like a bitch and—

I rise, my legs are on fire and my steps are shaky from the fatigue and pain but I start walking all the same. I don’t know which roads we took to get to the Ideal but I’ll be damned before they see me like this on the way back.

That tightness in my chest has faded the tiniest bit and though my eyes don’t feel as heavy, there’s still an unmistakable pressure lurking behind them as I take in my surroundings.

There’s a motel just a few feet up the road, their sign blinking that they still have some vacancies ready to be filled. I guess I’m just that fucking lucky.

I limp into the parking lot, my steps slow and laborious but I eventually make it to the receptionist’s office. The lady who greets me doesn’t even bat an eye at my appearance, at my dirtied clothes and bloodied knees, in a city like Brockton, she’s probably seen a lot worse.

I book a room for way too long, putting a whole goddamn year’s worth of payment on it. I don’t care to be honest, this place is close enough to the tower that I can still get Shatterbird and Ubermensch whenever they’re needed.

I snatch up the room key and head for my little slice of hell, the tiny little shit box on the far right of the upper floor. Casa del Alec for… who knows how long.

The door slams shut behind me and I take in my accommodations, the carpet smells like mildew, there’s handprints above the bed frame, a dead roach literally laying on the bed. Yep, about what I deserve I think.

I take a seat right at the foot of the bed, marveling for a second how it can be both hard and soft when I fish my wallet out of my pocket. I start counting the bills when… when a drop of water lands on one of the bills.

Goddamnit, is this place leaky too?

I look up at the popcorn ceiling but blank when I don’t see a damp spot. I’m about to write off what happened when I feel moisture slide down my cheek. I bring my right hand up to wipe it away and feel the corners of my lips twitch when I spot it.

Tears?

That’s a bit dramatic, don’t you think? I mean, tears aren’t for me, tears aren’t for me, they’re for people, people get emotions and fuck, didn’t I learn this already?

I bring my shoes up on to the bed with me as that fucking tightness comes back a hundred fold, squeezing me like an invisible python. My eyes get so damn heavy and when I try to blink it away, more of the damn things fall down my face.

I… I… why’d they do it like this? Why couldn’t they have just told me this morning, why’d they string me along, why were they so damn cordial, why is it that the first time they treat me like a human being in months, it’s to throw me away?

My bottom lip trembles against my will, the feeling not unlike when I’m first getting a thrall, when their nervous system tries to fight me.

My shoulders shake and I try to force it down, try to swallow that fucking lump in my throat one last time but it… it comes out anyway.

It's not so bad I suppose, the way I'm gasping and exhaling, the way I'm wailing and trying to hide my face, I could almost call it laughing.

Almost.