[RFC] Going Native. (With Edits)

[Dartz]

I've had a wormfic ongoing for a while - original given the Rough title, 'Insecurity!'. A Couple of people hgave suggested it might linger a bit too long on the setup, so I had a go at trimming the first few dozen parts down to something a little bit shirter and faster.

Curious how it worked out, and whether going over the fic with a lawnmower is a worthwhile exercise.

--

“Good Morning, Shadow Stalker.”

That rabbit-in-headlights look never failed to make my day. Sometimes she got violent, sometimes she just wondered how, most times, her mouth would goldfish open, while the others stood and stared.

I grasped my Power and stepped back before she composed herself, and in a flash it'd never happened. Lost to deadtime.

Hess hurried passed, the terrible trio already late for the daily lunchtime struggle session. Whether today would be the day or not, I didn't know. I knew we were in the run-up to it.

My locker stood a metaphor for myself; a bit of a bloody mess.  It meant a struggle to find the notebook I needed for before the bell rang.

It meant being still focused on a cubic metre of school-rubbish, crash helmet and riding gear when something slammed into the side of my head, knocking me onto my arse. A football bounced off the tiled floor beside me, followed by laughter.

“Hah!, Nice catch, Mick.”

“Yeah man, right in the head and like, BAM! on his ass!”

Fuck. My turn today. I didn't know their names. I couldn't be arsed learning. One year held-back, a few centimetres taller, and the four of them walked around like they owned the place.

Sighing, I stepped back, and caught the football on the second try.

“Hey, Nice catch, man...”

“Try make it hard next time.” I passed it back with a gentle kick. It wasn't too different from a rugby ball. They'd find someone else to bother today, and that's good enough for me.

Butterflies are amazing creatures. Amazing the difference they make. The formed the single bit that flipped between a few moments of respect and few moments ridicule.

Ironic. I'd joined in the ranks of 'normal kid' now. Nobody special,. Bit tall. Bit on the larger side. Maybe a bit quiet, but understandable really. Just one of hundreds looking to keep their head down and just do their time in Winslow in peace. Having a little experience helped.

Who am I?

I am not the protagonist you were expecting. I am not even a background character.

Thankfully.

The bell rang and the bustle began. Taking the back stairs to class let me avoid the worst of the crush - a path I knew would take me passed the girl's bathroom and the possibility that today would be the day.

I considered turning back and taking the longer way around, chancing the crowd just so I could avoid knowing. I choose the risk of knowing over the risk of getting blindsided again. Every hair prickled on my neck as I reached the top of the stairs. My knees ached from the strain of the climb.

I stopped for a moment, regaining a little strength before forcing myself to walk through the corridor.

I saw Taylor backed into the space between two rows of lockers, surrounded by the three of them. What a perverse relief. At least one more day to go.

She saw me.

She looked right at me.

Why do you walk past?

Just like everyone else. I did nothing. Just like everyone else, I had my own crosses to bear and Taylor couldn’t be one of them.

The sound of footsteps running up behind me sent a quick jolt of adrenaline into my veins.

“Hey! Hold up, Ian?”

I glanced back, releasing the fist I'd made with my left hand. Once beaten, twice shy.

“Damien. What's up?”

Damien stood shorter than me, with fair shaggy hair like a an escapee from a Spielberg film grown up a few years, but a couple of ratchets up on the fitness level to the point where he might've been able to take me in a fight if I didn't have my advantage.

“Airplanes. Airplanes are up.”

Most of all however, he was a decent human being. Even if the pun obliged me to roll my eyes.

“You got the assignment?”

“Sure thing. Solid B grade.” He slipped few white sheets from his backpack, offering them to me. Freshly printed on crisp paper, On Parahuman Society and its Future. “And a summary clipped to the back incase you get asked any questions.”

I took it with a cheeky smile, leafing through it quickly to make sure I hadn't been handed something like the Unabomber manifesto as a prank. Especially with that title.

“Grand...” I said.

“Got my Math?”

You don't get anything for free in this world.

“One A-rated maths assignment.”

Easier for me to do. Twenty minutes at a computer, not that I told him that. Then print.

“Boys,”

Cursing through my teeth, I recognised the voice immediately. Step back....

Footsteps jogged up from behind me. This time, I expected them.

Hey, hold up, Ian?”

“Damien, What's up?”

“Glory Girl, man?”

Butterflies? Time to change things a little. Probably not the best idea to trade papers in the middle of the corridor. Well, do we look like experienced drug dealers?

“Poster get delivered?”

“Finally!” he grinned

“That's a glorious poster.”

“Damn fine,” his grin broadened.

Oh yes. That's what I liked about being sixteen again. The simple pleasures.

“Boys?”

Gladly. As welcome as a fart in a space station.

“What?” Damien was fast off the draw.

“We weren't doing nothing.” I tried not to sound like a whining kid. Naturally, that made it plain as day that we weren't doing something. Or something like that.

“Bags. Let's see what you've got in there.” He smiled like our best friend as he screwed us over.

I felt my power latch back into place. A moment later, became fifteen seconds earlier.

“Glory Girl man,” said Damien, grinning.

“Hey, ah, can we go a different way?”

He blinked owlishly, caught off-guard by the sudden swerve “We'll be late,”

I didn't care. “Better a tardy than getting caught with this. Trust me. There's a trap ahead.” I pointed at an office door.

“Alright,” he breathed “You've been right about stuff like this before.”

Both of us turned to take the long way around, back past Taylor and Friends, down the stairs, then back up the middle with the rest of the crush. My knees complained at the rush, but better some aches than getting busted.

“Boys! Stop right there.”

“Fuck’s sake!” Everyone flinched, my voice carrying down the corridor.

Kobayashi Maru. Fifteen seconds didn't help when your downfall had been set up minutes earlier.

“There's only one person in this school who uses partial differential equations in High School math, or so I'm told. And that same person doesn't use American English spellings in his essays.

And wasn't he so sickeningly pleased with himself?

Damien deflated.

“Fuck’s sake.” I admit it. I am not an eloquent man.

With hindsight, it should have been obvious. It mightn't have been the worst injustice in Winslow high, but fuck me if it didn't annoy.

-

I skated through the rest of the morning.

Industrial arts gave me something to focus on, to let the frustration cool, running parts off on the engine lathe for the class. The machine let me be myself, to be who I used to be for a few minutes at least.

The fun lasted until someone branded a kid with a file that'd been heated to somewhere between bloody-hot and absolute glowing hellfire with a gas torch meaning the rest of us spent the last half of the session sitting in stone silence while the teacher glared at us.

Nothing out of the ordinary.

The scream chilled me to the bone.

After a hungry hour’s wait wishing I could either be eating, or back on the machine, lunchtime finally arrived. I took laser aim at the food, forgetting everything else.

The habit refused to die.

I bobbed and weaved through the queue, earning a few curses in the process as I grabbed my fair share. Then a little extra, with a few cartons of froot-joose stuffed in the pockets of my jacket for later.

Another habit which refused to die.

I'd half finished before Damien sat down on the bench opposite, dropping his tray down on the table. My eyes fell on the pea that rolled free from the edge. I didn't even look up at him, jealously pulling my own tray towards myself. I didn't breath. I didn't speak.

“I don't know how you eat that shit,” he said.

I swallowed, taking a breath while I loaded my plastic fork with as much as it'd carry.

“Still better than rations,” I said, filling my mouth with another slab of mystery meat and synthetic mashed potato. “First lesson for survival.” I smiled. “Food and water.”

He prodded at the mystery meat with his fork, stirring it around its bath of brown slime and onion.

“I don't think this qualifies as food.”

“If you’re hungry enough, everything is food.”

I didn't even flinch as I scooped up another mouthful. It reminded me of dogfood. It tasted little better. You learned not to chew.

“I’ve never been that hungry,”

A thought rushed in with a vicious sting. You’re going to find out soon enough.

I filled my mouth with a sliver of meat before any words could escape. The weight of what that meant, fell on my shoulders, stirring things up from the back of my mind that I really didn’t want in the front.

Damien stopped poking at the slab of meat.

“You okay?”

I looked up at him. Thanks for asking.

“It’s alright,” I forced myself to say.

It didn’t feel alright. I couldn’t tell myself how it felt. Just that it did, sitting heavy like fat on the brain.

Six weeks to go. Tension rippled through my body.

For a moment it seemed crazy that life continued as normal, that nobody knew even though nobody could know. People queued for food, grabbing buns, butter and a quick chat. Insults were traded. Fights arranged. Girls babbled together, swarming some poor unfortunate who’d been served the white bread sandwich of poverty because her parents hadn’t kept her lunch account current.

Fuck’s sake.

“Aki’s In the library, I think,” Damien said, still poking at the meat with his plastic fork. “She didn’t get her stuff finished last night so she’s catching up.”

Thanks. I took a breath. The weight didn’t leave.

“She know we got caught?” I said, putting my thoughts to more practical things.

“I messaged her,” he said, flipping the screen open on his phone to show me. “Roberta and Alan got their stuff handed off too.”

“Grand,” I breathed. I threw a quick look over my shoulder. Nobody for now. Getting nabbed earlier had raised my paranoia – even if the noise of the cafeteria could swallow everything we said.

“They’ll be watching me us for a while,” he said, before finally plucking up the courage to take a bite. Hunger won out in the end.

My hand swirled the last morsel of meat through the jellied gravy, mopping up the remains

“Aki’ won’t be able to keep up on her own.”

“Not for long,”” he said through a full mouth. “In a few weeks it’ll be over anyway.”

I looked up from my plate, feeling my appetite vanish. Fuck’s sake.

After a moment, he managed to swallow. “Yeah, Summer can’t come fast enough.”

Six weeks to go.

--

Given the choice between taking two full week's detention and re-doing two assignments, or taking a taking a day and touting on all those involved, I took the weeks. Buy the ticket, take the ride. No sympathy for the devil as a good man once said. Take a seat in a full detention hall and take the time to get my homework done, then get the guts of the assignment for World Affairs done before I got bored.

My hand rubbed at the brace on my right knee. A long day had started it aching again.

The assignment on the desk in front of me proved one simple thing.

Worm was a story. This was a World.

By the time detention ended, the school had emptied. Only the last few extra-curricular stragglers and the janitor remained, leaving an eerie pine-scented quiet behind.

Empty schools always felt strange.

A crash helmet, some armour and a spare key waited in my locker. My bike had been parked where the bicycles were kept; a four-hundred-dollar rusty shed of a Honda that pre-dated parahumanity and came with a registration plate ominous enough that nobody even thought about stealing it.

The alarm on my phone reminded me that work started in an hour. A message, offered something more interesting than responsibility.

Damo: With Aki at Brokton Knights. They let you out yet?


The Honda carried me to the Brockton Knight's Arcade, lit up in glorious cyberpunk neon purples, pinks and blues. A few of the tubes had broken, but I thought that just added to the effect. It wouldn’t look right to be clean.  I chained the bike up outside, then stuck it in third gear and pulled the lever off.

I marched inside with my helmet hung off my belt feeling like a hero. Heavy crash-boots and armoured leather makes anyone feel invincible. Inside, the electric heat embraced me, the scent of bubblegum and warm electronics crawling up my nose.

I doubted the place had changed much in two decades, except for the addition of some chattering pachinko machines to the usual chiptune electronics and thrumming music piped in from overhead.

The people I searched for waited in the back, taking up two of six seats at an old Villains and Vigilantes booth. I preferred Space Opera, but being late came with a penalty – the game had been chosen for me.

“Hey, he finally shows up,” said Damien, waving me over.

“Hi!” Akiko bubbled. Say what you want about said-bookism, but I wouldn't be surprised if she triggered with the Power to make little candy love-hearts start popping into the air around her.

Akiko revelled in being the stereotype of every Japanese schoolgirl you ever saw. Shorter than average, with jet-black hair that seemed to have been varnished dead straight, broad cheeked and obsessed with the Kitty to the point where her hair at been speckled by a dozen jolly-rancher coloured flecks.  She proudly wore a DDID tattoo on her arm – not a real one, of course.

I liked her.

That's exactly what I meant to say and no more.

I took breath, dropping any mental baggage behind the chair. “Andy and Roberta not here yet?”

“Called ahead. Said they were busy.”

“Within five minutes of each other, too.”

“Shared study time?”

“I didn't say that...” The smirk on her lips said it far better.

“So, loser pays?” Damien suggested.

“Christ man, I can't afford to lose.”

“You can afford to go hungry then?”

I could've used my power to win every game, but I lost. It's easier to lose to friends. And more fun. The three of us laughed and had a great time. I could go into the minutiae of it, but there's no point. We were just three teenagers being friends.

Time melted away around us through match after match

On my first run through the school mill, I missed out on this sort of thing. My own fault really, I made the mistake of keeping too much to myself, of living in the grey box and just doing the work, getting the grades and grinding forward.

I suppose that's the advantage of experience. I could take a different route. I could choose to be happy, rather than do what the responsible ones called the right thing.

Akiko's phone chimed three times bringing the game to an end. She glanced at her, her smile dissolving in a instant, like she'd been told a grandparent had died or something. She scratched at the back of her neck, glancing between the both of us like she expected us to jump on her or something.

“Something happen?” Me and Damien spoke at once, glanced at each other, then focused on her.

“Sumimasen, ehno.”  She giggled, covering her mouth. “Ah...I got to go.” She jumped to her feet, fumbling her way out of the game booth, nearly tripping over her own feet “Talk tomorrow, Bye!”

She made it halfway to the door before she finished speaking. Me and Damien watched her leave, breaking into a full-on run before the door'd even closed. “That's been happening a lot lately,” he said.

“I hadn't noticed,” I said.

“Do you notice anything?

I shrugged. “Probably some family thing.”

My phone picked the wrong moment to sound out the Imperial march, putting the final coup-de grace between the eyes of what'd been mostly a decent afternoon.

“You too!”

I glanced at three-line screen, only needing to see where the message had come from to know it'd be a howler. A look at my watch confirmed it.

“The oulfella. I should've been at work an hour ago.”

“Shit,”

I borrowed one of Akiko's sayings. “Shikata Ga Nai.”

“Yeah. Shit happens.”

So it goes.  But for a crap start to the day, it hadn't turned out too bad, had it? Both of us stepped out into cold night air. A looming sky threatened rain in the morning, but for the time being it stayed dry. I'd get a bollocking from the oulfella when I got across town, but it felt like a fair price to pay.

Life's too short to miss out. I knew that too well.

“That's him!”

I turned my head towards the voice just in time to see the knife.

My Power pulled me out of the way.

--

The first time I got myself into a fight, the idea of accidentally hurting someone frightened me more than getting hurt. Funny that. Most people are like that at the start. It got scrappy in the way children's fights usually did. Neither of us really hit that hard. It ended in tears, not blood. We were both only ten.

The second time, a world away, half-starved and struggling to walk, I grabbed a hurley and cracked it hard over a man’s skull.  I hit him so hard his legs folded beneath him, dropping his body to the ground with pale pink blood trickling from his eyes and ears.

Both of us hungry. But I had rations.

The third time happened a week before the Christmas break, in Winslow. A group of ABB kids jumped me. The first time, they caught me by surprise. One the second try, fighting back earned me a knife to the gut. Third time around, my hands found a fire extinguisher, and I knew who had the blade.

There’d been others – the usual scraps and punch ups that happened when teenagers had something to prove. I could hold my own end and not be an easy target. I’d lived in the City long enough to learn my lessons.

I knew what to do.

“Damien. Stop,” I said, my voice turning cold.

He laughed “What? You think Gladly's around the corner?”

The expression on my face stopped him dead in the street.

“Two gangers. Asians.”

Adrenaline echoes thrummed in my veins, my heart clenching. I took hold of my Power, clenching my hands into fists, then turned and walked in the other direction.

Easiest way to win. Either one of the dickheads could’ve had a gun in the back pocket, and Samuel Colt Trumped many Powers.

“Hey man, how could you know that?”  Damien paced after me.

My mind’s eye saw the Knife again. It saw teeth. It saw eyes staring at me. It could still see the green of their t-shirts. Two of them, one with a blade, the other with a bat. With each pace, the pieces fell into place.

They'd been waiting.

My mind locked.

Motherfucker.

“How do you know?”

I didn't answer.

“How do you always know?”

I could hear footsteps, rushing up behind. I knew who owned them. Every muscle in my body stretched taut.

I looked at him. He looked behind, his jaw dropping wide.

“How?” he breathed.

I ran, pushing my legs, buying seconds for my power to latch into place. The universe folded inside out, twisting and wrenching itself around me, snapping mind and body back in the blink of an eye.

I stopped dead, Damien walking on a few more steps before turning to face me.

“Hey man, what is it?”

“We're about to be attacked.”

Now I knew. We didn’t have a choice. Adrenaline raced in my veins

He laughed. Again. “Get out!”

“Two Asians. Waiting for us.” I pointed to the alley.

He took a single, long breath, looking back over his shoulder to the alleyway. “Right.”

I had a Power. I could do it. I'd done it before. Maybe that's why. After so many months, a revenge attack?

“How do you always know this shit?” Damien asked me, again.

“Doesn't matter,” I said, through my teeth, hoping I wouldn't be heard. “We can't run. We have to fight.”

No other option. I tried to walk away, but they chased us. That proved it.  My fingers found a weapon in my pocket – an old Leatherman knockoff going rusty around the rivets. My sweaty palms fumbled on the metal grip, struggling to unfold it. The blade locked itself into place.

He stared at it.

“Surely. You can't be serious,”

“I am serious. And don't call me Shirley.”

Okay, that's just mandatory. Call me a moron, but bringing just my fist to a knife-fight seemed like a stupid thing to do. At least this gave me a chance. It made me feel better. Feel safer.

I had armour. I had a Power.

Damien sighed, resigning himself to it.

“Thanks mate,” I said, with a thin smile.

He snorted. “Fuck you man. If you get your dumb Irish ass kicked, I'll never pass math.”

I hugged the shopfronts on my left, remembering something I'd watched about Castles on Discovery Channel before it'd degenerated into inane reality TV.

On my side I had reach and strength. They had a blade and a baseball bat. I had a Power. I had a friend. My guts twisted themselves tight into a knot, every muscle in my body pulling to run away. They’d run us both down if I tried. I had to do this.  My fingers clenched tight on the grip-handle of the tool, skin blanching white.

I took one deep breath, letting the building adrenaline march me towards certain pain. I could take it. I could do it.

I glanced at Damien, his face glistening with nervous sweat. He seemed to grok my intent, stepping just ahead of me, both fists clenched. He'd get pasted if I got this wrong, but we could always try again.

I heard feet running.

I dived. We crashed into each other, my shoulder and fist burying themselves in someone's stomach. The shock of the impact numbed my fingers. Something bit at my wrist, before scraping off the armour in my jacket. My blade clattered free from my fingers as both of us rolled on the concrete. He grabbed. I puinched. Something caught me in the face and rang my bell for a moment

I scrambled to my feet while he clutched at his stomach, winded. My boot kicked his knife away, sending it skittering into the street.

Damien took a hard a hit to the chest with the baseball bat, knocking him to the floor, with his arms around his guts, panting.

I struggled for breath, a deep ache thrumming inside my arm. Nothing serious. It didn’t feel serious. My hand clenched into a fist. No pain, only a strange tightness. Still OK. No need for my Power.

The second stood a few meters away from me. He matched me in height, both of us standing eye to eye. I knew I had a few kilos on him. He stared at me through strands of sweat-slick hair, both hands gripped tight on the bat's handle, ready to strike out on my skull.

Or something. Baseball's not my thing, alright?

He glanced down at his friend, still struggling to his feet.  “Fuckers knew we were there, Dai.”

Dai managed to groan, still with his hand pressed on his stomach, a dark patch spreading around his fingers. He panted for air, raising his hand “Daijobou,” he managed to say, before dropping back down onto his face. He gasped for air, rolling onto his side.

His own knife must’ve got him somewhere in the scuffle.

I panted for breath, high on adrenaline. Every single bone in my body fizzed as I stood there, daring the one with the bat to make the first move. He stretched the bat towards me, aiming the tip of it at my head, telling me exactly what he planned.

My Power hummed, reminding me I still had the advantage

His eyes went wide, like he'd sat on a live sparkplug. Something slammed into him – causing him to step back. The bat dropped from his grip, cracking against the concrete of the path before bouncing back to knee-height. Both of us looked down to see a single arrow-bolt projecting from his chest – six inches of black carbon shaft topped with four white feathers.

“Cape...” he managed to slur as his eyes rolled up into the back of his head. His legs crumbled beneath him, his body dropping into a heap on the footpath.

“What?” I said.

Something clicked beside my ear, answering the question.

The thought to grab at it raced through my mind, chased by the idea that it might’ve been something far more dangerous than a switchblade.

Gun?

Common sense won. Slowly I turned, raising my hands. Something warm crawled along my arm, tickling under my jacket, running down to my shoulder.

Coming face to face with the Shiny End of a crossbow stood every hair in my body stand on end, especially when the person holding it hadn't been there a second ago.

Shadow Stalker.

Sophia. Standing there, looking up at me through a scowling Ayn Rand mask. Blocked patterns on her cloak absorbed the outline of her body, making it hard to tell where she stopped, and fabric began.

“Stand down,” she ordered.

Pro-tip. Don't argue with the point of a crossbow.

I stood there, staring down at her. “They attacked us,” I said, trying not to sound like a petulant kid. Would my Power work before the tranquilliser took hold? Could I grab it?

I think I could take her.  

Damien, still struggling for breath, took one look at me and shook his head. Don’t even think about it.

“I saw,” Shadow Stalker said, lowering the weapon. “Sit down against the wall and wait.”

The windowsill of a closed Pollo's gave me a comfortable place to sit and cool off as the adrenaline wound down. Damien shuffled in beside me, with his arm around his stomach.

“Hah. That was lucky,” he wheezed, rubbing at his gut. “That's why Brockton is the best.”

I looked at him, but didn't feel the need to say anything else. My whole body had begun to shiver. Sweat stickied up my gloves, my right arm still half numb and thrumming from whatever hit it. A girl with a purple skunk-stripe in her hair grabbed a snapshot with her phone from the other side of the street, before running.

Shadow Stalker zip tied each of the gangers with their arms behind their backs, not exactly being gentle about it either with a heavy stomp on the back to stretch their arms tight.

Dai struggled a little, earning a sigh and a bolt from a crossbow in the back for his trouble.

“Two gang members, ABB. Sycamore and Vale. Both have been tranquillized – one wounded. Two civilians - one wounded.”

She seemed to speak to herself, but I guessed her mask had some sort of intercom. I looked at Damien, still holding himself like his gutsa would spill if he let go.

“You alright?”

“She means you, dumbass. Your arm,”

He pointed a finger at it. A steady drip-drip flowed from the cuff, plashing in bright red spots on the concrete path. Three scarlet pools had formed, with another dribble running down my trouser leg. I held my arm in front of my face, watching the blood seep out from a split in the leather.

Something had grazed off the armour, slashed the jacket and nicked my arm deep enough to draw blood. Nothing serious. It didn't even hurt that much, not like the last time I'd been stabbed. I gripped it with my good hand, keeping the red in.

Shadow Stalker watched me.

“It's not that bad,” I said, trying to wave her off.

The Ayn Rand mask said nothing, turning away from me.

“Fine,” Damien shrugged. “Bleed to death why don't you. Getting me into a stupid fight like this.”

“It couldn't be helped,” I said, looking at him.

“We could've run away.”

I rapped a knuckle on my braces. “Not very far,”

“I don’t have to outrun them, just you.”

Alright, maybe some Americans do understand the concept of black humour after all. I gave him a wry smile and a dig in the shoulder.

“Then how would you pass maths?”

Both of us laughed, dry as a desert.

I sat there shivering, cold fingers crawling all over my body as I watched Shadow Stalker check both the gangers for weapons, cleaning them out. She found my multitool in the road. That metal face scowled at me and I grabbed for my power, just in case.

Bystanders snapped pictures. Probably tourists.

She marched over to me, boots stomping on concrete. I pushed myself to my feet, steadying myself with a hand on the steel shutter behind.

Shadow Stalker offered it to me on an open palm. My Power hummed in the back of my mind, reminding me I had a way out

“Take it,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “Before Armsmaster sees it.”

I blinked. What? That’s completely out of character.

“Tanks...”   That’s how I tended to pronounce ‘thanks’.

My blood slick fingers grabbed it from her hand, snapping the blade shut before she accused me of drawing it on her. The mask scowled, offering no warning of what happened next.

She stepped back, turned away, and left me standing there bemused, holding a bloody knife in my hand.

Apparently I'd arrived in the weird alternate version of Worm where Sophia isn't a complete bitch who takes pleasure in fucking everyone over, just because she can.

Knowing better than to look a gift horse in the mouth, I stuffed the tool into my back pocket and tried not to smile at her as I sat back down.

Damien nudged me from behind. “Dude, I read online that she's supposed to be a complete hardass.”

I gave a quick shrug. “I amn't complaining.”

The full weight of the day hung from my shoulders while I sat there staring at my arm and the patterns my own blood had left on the palm. I gripped my arm tighter, trying to stem the flow a little.

My ears thrummed, like an engine running inside my head. My eyes closed for a moment.

“Hey man,” Damien nudged me. I looked up

Commander Riker of the Ultramarines chapter loomed in the traditional superhero power pose. The shock of his sudden teleportation left me open jawed, wondering how he’d managed it.

“What happened here?”

Damien got the jump on me. My mind just spun in neutral. “These two guys were waiting for us. They tried to jump us but we spotted them. It was self defense man,”

“You spotted them?”

“Ian did,”

Armsmaster looked at me. Son of a bitch. I charged up my best petulant teen glare and grabbed for the first answer I could think of.

“I was walking along. I saw them hide in the alley. I recognised them as Asians”

He took exactly half a heartbeat to consider.

“You're lying.”

I took none.

“No I amn't!”

I stood up, almost managing to get eye-to-eye with him. The benefit of being a big Irish bastard. My legs went to jelly, but I caught myself with my good hand. No falling over drunk for me.

His head moved, glancing down at my arm, then at me. He araise his arm, tapping a single finger on the side of his visor.

“This tells me otherwise. Care to start with the truth?”

An angry growl rose out of my throat while I rifled through the back of my mind for anything that didn't end in 'Your under arrest' or 'Interested in Joining?'

No. Not joining with you.

My Power flickered, threatening to die out, before finally lurching to life. The world crunched and slurred around me, more a drunken stagger in time than a neat step, before crashing back into place with a jolt that left my head spinning.

I looked around, trying to place myself in the conversation.

“Well...”

Something I'd overheard one of the black lads say at school. Don't talk to those boys in blue. They ain't gonna ever help you.

Good advice.

“I take the Second,”

“You mean the Fifth,” he said.“Which only applies in cases where the answer might incriminate you.”

Damien nudged my shoulder. “Dude, don't be a dick. You'll get us into trouble.”

Armsmaster's the dick.

“Listen to your friend. We can sort this out here, but if you insist, we can take it to the local police station.”

“I saw them in the alley,” I said.

“How?”

“I had a way of seeing them.”

“A way?”

I have a fucking Power you thick-headed dope, but I don't want to say that out loud. Because then, what little bit of a life I've managed to put together and start actually enjoying will get pulled apart by you and your circus of caped insanity.

Because Sophia will know. You will know. I'll get the Pitch. I'll get pushed into wearing a cape because I know it'll make my family's life so much easier and then, hey, I'm the one fighting Skitter and friends and I really, really don't like the taste of cockroaches.

Fuck that.

'Um...” My mouth goldfished before my mind crashed into gear. “I saw them,”

“We've established that,” he said through his teeth. “I want to know how, when you would have been walking down a street with no clear view through any window.”

I watched him, rocking back and forth, blurring out of focus. How much did I have to drink?  I tried to breath, swallowing a cluster of deep, gasping breaths to clear my head. It failed.

I looked up at him, opened my mouth.

My Power triggered on its own, the universe collapsing around me in a dizzying whirl of colour and….

Something I just couldn’t remember.

--

My head felt like an elephant had used it for a chair.

Laying back on the bed, I closed my eyes and waited, trying to block out the usual noise of a hospital emergency department.

“Could you not just let it go, Ian?”

My eyes shot open. The mammy had arrived by teleporter, standing beside my bed her face set into that professional, piercing scowl practiced by all Irish Mammies.

“What?”

“That bike's worth, what, four hundred dollars? The insurance on this alone is over two thousand. Is it really worth fighting?”

Money? She's more concerned with money? Caught on the hop, my mouth found a gear before my brain caught the look of pain on her face.

“How the fuck am I supposed to know they're not going to hurt me anyway?”

I stood up, staggered, then caught myself like a drunk,

“If you don't give them a reason to...” she stepped back and I see that shot of fear in her eyes.  I had a full head and shoulders on her in height. She breathed. “...your father was worried sick trying to call you and he still has to run the pub. Have you any idea what you're putting us though?”

Yeah. I do. I had the right of this.

“Ah for fuck's sake, leave it out. It's not my fault!”

“If it's not your fault, then why does it keep happening?”

“Because I'm in a shithole school in a shithole city on a shithole world!”

Silence. Only a few machines chirped. Yeah. I said it out loud. Someone mumbled a complaint

“But you don't have other children getting into fights... how many thousand of them are there now. And this is how many times?”

She got close to me. Almost close to tears. But I'm right. She cupped my hand in hers with the warmth only a mother could manage. I snatched it back. I'm right.

“They attacked me!”

I knew I'd lost when she just buried her face in the palm of her hands and shook her head slowly from side to side.. She'd never see it my way. I could probably have pretended to see it hers if I bothered my arse.

But I didn't.

I could've just used my Power to spare everyone the stress.

But I didn't.

Using my Power would be backing down.

“Let's just get you home.”

The cashier declined the debit card, so the bill found it's way towards inflating the family credit account. Outside, the night had gone stone cold, rain still threatening to roll in off the bay. I followed her across the car-park.

“My bike’s still at the arcade…”

“Get it tomorrow.”

I glared. She didn't even look at me.

A wood-panelled Buick LeSabre in Griswold Green awaited.

Everyone called it a heap of shit. I liked it. It had seats that just sort of absorbed your body and coddled, especially when the heater decided to work. The engine rumbled along far away in another world like something from an ocean liner while the suspension drifted along undisturbed by salt-eaten roads beneath.

Brockton rolled by the window, a vision into the Days of Pearly Spencer. As familiar as home now.  A month away from being washed away. My fingers drummed on the door.

Over a month away, I reminded myself. Still time to run. Maybe I'd get lucky. I already had an alternate universe version of Sophia. This time around, how about Leviathan takes out other city? I'd like that.

Fuck Boston. Or Philadelphia. Or Portland.

Both of us sat there in silence, neither wanting to risk the first word. I looked at her. She looked at me, then looked away.

That hurt.

My Power bristled at the back of my mind, impotent now to save me from this fuckup, but still desperate to do something, a child in the back seat of my brain constantly nagging.

Can I do something? Can I do something? Can I do something?

The cut on my arm throbbed.  Gripping my hand into a fist proved nothing permanent had been damaged. Even the stitches had been more uncomfortable, than painful.

A familiar apartment block loomed into view – squat and stump like compared to the older steel cages around it - thick concrete columns framing sheets of glass. An half-rusted Civil Defense sign over the parking garage told the world of the shelter beneath. Just thinking about it made my blood run deathly cold, an ice-rain chill trickling down my spine.

We pulled in to our assigned parking spot and she shut down the car's engine. It dieseled over before finally settling down, leaving us in silence.

I reached for the doorhandle.

Locked. Trapped.

She breathed, a long draw filling her chest, the way all Mammies do, just to let you know how much pain and suffering you're causing them, giving time to brace for the guilt trip.

“Why does this keep happening? Is something wrong?”

I saw the look of pain in her eyes. I heard the strain in her voice. I tried the doorhandle again.

“You're not leaving this car until I get an answer.”
 
The mammy sat there, still waiting.

I thought I could tell her about my Power. But in fifteen seconds?

“Well?”

“If I didn't stand up for myself, I'd just become a target,” I said. “This place isn't like home.”

“No. It isn't.”  She shook her head. “But, I'm worried about you. This fighting was never like you, Ian.”

And where have I heard that before? Maybe something in dead time, maybe not. She tried to grab my hand, I pulled it back.

“I have to stand up for myself.”

“And make yourself a bigger target?”

“No, just....”

The words escaped me. How the fuck did this work?

“What?” she pushed.

“I amn't the same person I was a year ago.”

Fucking Understatement. She softened slightly.

“I know. But, this is a dangerous city. If this keeps happening, eventually it's going to go too far.”

She didn’t get it.

“It wasn't my Fault!”

In such tight confines, my voice resonated of the windows. Her skin bleached white in front of me.  My power latched back into place.  Try again!

Back to the start, fifteen seconds earlier. I did what I should've done the first time. I looked her right in the eye and drew a long, deep breath.

“It's late. Can we talk about this tomorrow?”

“Alright. Tomorrow,”

With luck, once put on the long finger it'd get forgotten about.

--

Fluorescent lights hummed overhead, casting everything in a hard white light or black shadow. Green linoleum floors shimmered like shallow water, reflecting the light strips. Panels of concrete had been painted a clean white, then allowed to dirty. A sign on the wall pointed the way to the nearest staircase.

The lift had been closed for repairs again.

I followed the mammy up the concrete fire-stairs. Despite the argument in the car, she still waited to make sure I was OK. I wondered why, before remembering it hadn’t actually happened. Bitterness still simmered in the back of my mind.

She really didn’t get it.

My knees complained about the climb. My physio would complain about me working them so hard.

But I made it.

The mammy worked at the lock of a heavy firedoor. The number 47 in brass marked it as home. As close to home as I’d ever get.

The door’s hinges squeaked at complaint as the mammy pushed it open. I followed her in, pull the door shut behind it.

Archie had waited with as much patience as a black jack russel could manage. All the energy pent up during the day exploded out in an apoplexy of sound and joy

the little black Jack dog vibrating with apoplectic joy, trying to jump up and kiss, sniff and taste where I’d been all day.

The black nose found the bandages in my arm. The dog stopped, gazing up at me with brown eyes filled with absolute compassion. How dare someone hurt the feeder!

I rewarded his concern with a soothing ear-scratch.

The mammy busied herself in the kitchen, cleaning up the last of the night's cold dinner while I retreated to my fortress of solitude, accompanied by my trusty sidekick.

The door to my bedroom latched shut behind me. The dog scampered to the bed. I took a moment to gather myself exhaling a long breath before following him shedding my jacket and trousers, then boots, then disassembling the braces that kept my knees from fucking themselves while I walked.

A full-sized floor-to-ceiling window could've given me a commanding view of the city if we'd been higher than the fourth floor. Opposite, sat my bed with a stack of bookshelves above it. I had a desk-study with something that could've been called a mid-range computer four years ago and a wardrobe full of budget clothes.

Beside the PC, there were photographs of me, at a home I knew. My brother who I knew for a whole day before he drowned.. A class photo with nobody I recognised, but a uniform that I did. And dozen other frozen moments that'd never been mine but kept up the pretense.

They weren't the mother and father I grew up with. This wasn’t my family. I wasn’t their son.

But they were. And I was.  Familiar enough to be a cruel reminder. Or a comfort, depending on the day.

To their pictures, I’d added others of my own.

One with Armsmaster, and me wearing the ‘Rescue Harness’ I’d built to earn a plastic trophy that sat on my desk, and the money to buy the bike. One on the observation deck of a building I once watched dissolve live on television on a Tuesday afternoon in September, looking out over a different Manhattan. A couple, with Damien and Akiko doing the things friends did in Brockton bay. One with Madison Clemens, whom I think you know…

Real moments that I owned. I’d done that. I’d been there.

I felt something but for the life if me I couldn’t place it. It just sat there, pressing in my mind. I sprawled myself on my bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to tease my mind apart and get to the heart of it.

Archie settled up on the bed at my feet and started licking at my toes That dog pulled a smile to my lips, clearing my head for a moment.

I sat up, giving the dog a gentle scratch behind the ears. Alright. It's time to take a principled stand. I know I'll make some enemies with this, but I have to just outright say it. Cats suck. Cats look down on you. Dogs are awesome. Good Dogs are always glad to see you. And I know I've made mortal enemies, more than if I'd joined the Nine or shipped Sophie/Taylor....but I don't care.

A man has to have his principles.
 
A snort of a laugh earned me a puzzled look from the dog. My reflection in the window answered with a wry smile. It cleared the air and gave my mind a chance to breath.

The gears of plot and time had begun to mesh around me. The story began in a matter of days. In a house not too far away, Taylor worked on her costume. The Undersiders had knocked over a casino four weeks ago. Glory Girl had been battering Empire thugs. Paige McBee stood trial on CNN. Speculation simmered on  the wider web about when and where the next Endbringer would hit.

I knew all of it. I had it all worked out once.

I worked out all the little strands that led to a Bad End – the sort of stuff that frightened even the nightmares away and left me lying awake at night in a cold sweat. Make the wrong call and I'll be lucky if I die screaming.

Call me a coward if you want. You're not sitting here.

I couldn't avoid the end. I couldn't get off. But I could try enjoy the ride while it lasted. And make the best of what came after.

---

I hated public transport.

Mitching from school on a Friday morning to go grab my bike gave me a chance to suffer Brockton Bay's public transit for the first time in months while I caught up on what the Mill had been doing.

Akiko; Talk with Lisa at lunch.

Not Lisa Wilbourne. Lisa Banbridge - a girl who lived in Emma Barne's social orbit.

Me; Better you than me
 
Akiko; She scam someone I think. We can use

Something clicked.

Motherfucker.

I marked her in the schedule as taking Lisa's work, blocked out a day on our common calender when she couldn't work on anything else, then added some of her workload to my own, before offering the rest out to whomever was free.

Andy grabbed some of it for himself.

If you called Project Management an art, I could just about manage a few deviantart-worthy doodles in the corner of a napkin. That still put me ahead of the majority of kids out there when it came to running things.

In another life, I'd been an engineer, an apprentice of the Tao of Scotty. Now....

My phone chirped in my pocket.

Damo; Yo buddy still alive?

Me; No.

Damo; Cool. Ger Hero's Autograph.

Me; Line's too long.

Damo; Mayb u in hell?

I looked out the window.

Me; No. Not going to school yet

From Damo; Tell me about it. WA today >,<.

Me: Fuck no. Dodging that. See you lunchtime

Damo; Right man, lunch.

The bus stopped two blocks from where I'd parked the bike, leaving a short walk that took me past the spot where, last night, I'd been in a fight for my life. The footpath had been jetwashed clean of any blood. The Pollo's from the night before had filled with tourists.

I found the bike sitting as I'd left it, unmolested by anyone. It came to life with unusual enthusiasm, both of us sputtering off in a blue haze. I raced through the streets, taking the long route back to the school, enjoying the morning air.

Bet had changed me, I mused.

A sick part of my mind added 'for the better'. I had friends at school. I did things. I had motivation. Drive. Energy. Self-respect. How fucked up is it that?

The multiverse had a cruel sense of irony at the best of times.

So what? I had shit to do when I got there.

My phone buzzed in my pocket again. I pinned it against the handlebar with my clutch-hand. Few morons live long enough to master the are of Texting while riding a motorcycle. Few Morons have a Power that lets them rewind until before they hit the truck...

Damo; Assignment on Capes for WA. Easy

Me; SS and Defiant?

Damo; U mean Arsmaster, rite?

Oops. Too late to take it back.

Me; Sure.

Damo; Effects of capes on world

A red light gave me time to think.

Me; Shouldnt be hard.

An assignment with a five-word answer. “And then things got worse.”

Another message came through.

Akiko; Lisa Late. Makn me wait

Me; Be careful

Something felt wrong about this, a spark deep inside lighting a smouldering dread. I twisted the throttle, racing to the school. Honestly, I expected some sort of ambush, a screw job of some sort to stick Akiko in the frame to earn brownie points with the administration or some other fucked up plan.

It wouldn't be the first time.

Tearing into the schoolyard at near 50 would earn me an expulsion if anyone reported it. So what? If the Mill got blown open I'd be fucked anyway.

I rode around the back of the school, skidding to a halt outside the rear entrance. What I saw there stopped me cold.

Taylor. Standing just outside the doorway, looking at me, a dozen different colours and flavours of soft-drink dripped from her body. A trail of sticky liquid followed her, snaking back into the building.. Her long hair had matted down onto her shoulders in tangles. Her clothes clung tight to her body, showing just how lean she was.

Like a drowned cat.

“Ah for  fuck’s sake,” I managed to say. My Power fizzed at the edge of my mind, demanding to be triggered, just to keep me from realising it, to let me live the rest of the day without knowing.

Today's the day.

Gestation. Insinuation. Whichever one the fuck it'd been called. We'd crested the climb and the ride had begun. Leviathan. The Slaughterhouse. All of it started today, as inevitable as the sudden stop after a long fall.

She turned away, realising no help would come from me.

My Power fired.

Back to the start, Taylor Staring at me again. Maybe I could?

I couldn't.

Did I really want to be a part of all that? I'd had enough of this shit, thank you very much, without taking on the responsibility for the entire goddamned planet. What if I give her a lift home and she changes her mind or something?

The chain gets broken. Bad End

My Power fizzled, reminding of the night it’d been born, in the midst of all those possibilities for fucking reality up. It churned itself, pressing inside my skull, begging to be let out.

She turned away, realising no help would come from me.

My Power fired.

And if I don't, what then? Up until this moment, I could be any kid in the universe. I could've been bystander #4, or some random piece of background colour – something that didn't matter. Something that either died or lived or, most likely, had the brains to get out of the city before it all went to hell.

Taking Taylor home would mean joining the narrative, joining the story, stepping up on to the dance floor and becoming a part of it – fair game for everyone and everything and all those fucked up things that came with it.

Or just being a single tag on a page.
 
Again, Taylor turned away,

Again, I fired my Power.

I might've watched her a dozen times, each time coming to the realisation that no help would come. I saw it in her eyes. The guilt bit deeper each time around. Grinding me down. No matter how I felt, or what I thought about the future that wouldn’t be fixed anymore.

My Power betrayed me.

Even as I tried to talk myself out of it, it became inevitable. Just the two of us at the back of the school. Nobody watching. Nobody to jeer, or to pressurise. Nobody to laugh at Locker Girl or any of the other shit. Just me, her, and a decision to make.

Ultimately, something simpler than The Fate of the World made the decision - I just couldn't bring myself to be that much of a scumbag.

Nothing else mattered. None of her history or her future. Just how I felt right then.

It's easy to turn away in a crowd, but placed on the spot, on my own, with nobody to see but myself and her, I had no choice. This isn't a story with a narrative to protect. I'm here right now.

My Power fired one last time.

The world reset. Taylor looked at me. I spooled up the nerve, grabbing hold of reality. I knew what I could do. Nothing major. Nothing world shaking. But it'd make me feel better about myself.

“Hey Taylor!” I called out. “How're you getting home?”

She stopped. Officially, we had entered unknown territory.

“There's a bus,” she said through thin lips, caught off guard.

“Eh,” I nodded towards the pillion seat. “I can take you.”

Welp, I'm fucked.

--