Allie:
It was midnight on the eighteenth of Armstadt. Twenty two hours had elapsed since the death of Raylund Hovis. Allisson Krei sat at one end of an ugly looking conference table, easily three times larger than was comfortable for the steel and concrete storage room in which it sat. Spaced around the table were a quartet of very serious people with very serious frowns. Behind each of them stood a pair of suit clad mobsters apiece, each with a poorly concealed sidearm, and an impressively humorless expression.
Every single one of them was glaring at her.
Allie was impressed. It rated a solid seven on the mafiosi intimidation scale. The flickering fluorescent lightbulb was a nice touch.
“Could you repeat that, Miss Krei?” said the mobster furthest to her left. “I think I must have misheard you.”
Allie inclined her head.
“Of course,” she said politely. “I want you to call off your search for this ‘Agent Twelve’ of yours, and cancel any and all outstanding bounties you have against him.”
There was an uncomfortable silence at that.
“And why in the hell would we do that?” the man asked, his voice deliberately even.
Across the table from him, one of his associates coughed into her hand, at which point the men behind her none too subtly pulled their sidearms out of their respective holsters, aiming them casually at the floor, as one does during a normal conversation.
Allie shrugged.
“Because he could kill every single person in this room. I advise you to let me handle him myself. If you do, I can promise that he will not bother you again.”
That, at least, won her a chuckle.
“Miss Krei,” the man said. “I don’t think you really understand where you are. You’re not on the mainland anymore. This is not your territory. Your father is a big name back in Boston, and that gets you enough respect for us to meet with you, but you don’t know how things work out here. We have wave suits, organization, and power users gathered from all across the world. The new Agent Twelve is a threat, but he is not the first Agent we’ve handled, and he will not be the last.”
Allison took that information on board, mulled it over, and did her best to answer diplomatically.
“He will murder every single one of you, you poor dumb fuck,” she said politely. “I’ve seen the footage of the Hovis incident. The only reason he left any survivors behind at all was because he’s too soft for his own damn good. I know him, and if you go after him, he will stop being gentle with you.”
A brief silence at that, then all four of the seated figures cleared their throats.
Behind them, the bodyguards dropped all pretense, each of them raising his weapon, and drawing a bead directly on her face.
“You know him,” said the man she’d just insulted. “Care to explain how?”
Allie sighed. Well. There went the last of her diplomatic options.
“His name is Liam Krei,” she said shortly, slipping a hand into her jacket pocket, then into the secret compartment in the side, and pulling the pin on her lucky grenade. “I’m here to take him home.”
The next time the lightbulb flickered, she vanished, stepping sideways out of reality with practiced ease, and leaving her jacket behind her in her chair. Live grenade included.
It was a shame. She’d liked that jacket.
She shifted back into the room after the blast had totalled it, and fumbled awkwardly in her jeans for her phone. The explosion had taken out the ceiling light, along with just about all the other furniture. Hard to tell the damage in the dark. Her feet kept bumping into rubble. She thumbed on her phone’s torch-oh, shit. She’d really done a number on the place. Fragments of concrete and furniture everywhere, still falling dust clinging to slowly spreading blood, the scent of copper and spent gunpowder.
“Hey,” she asked aloud. “Any of you fuckers still alive?”
She was answered by a quiet groaning from beside the door. She turned her torch towards it, and was rewarded with the sight of one of the guards reaching for his gun with an arm that looked to be broken in at least three places. She had to admire the spirit of him.
She stepped over to him through the shadows, and sat unceremoniously down on his hand.
He let out a noise that sounded like it would have been a scream if it weren’t for all the broken ribs.
She flipped her phone towards him, and pulled up a video: The last part of the fight between Liam and Hovis, a figure barreling towards them, his entire body wreathed in flames.
“Hey, bud,” she said kindly. “Guess what? If you can tell me where to find the asshole who attacked my little brother-” she pointed at the fire-clad figure. “-You get to live.”
----------------------------------------
There is a certain warmth that comes from vulnerability. Being close to someone. Being intimate. Aware that, if they wished it, they could hurt you, but trusting, against all sense and sensibility, that they will not.
There’s a safety to it, as counterintuitive as that may seem. A sense of place. Of belonging. No longer being alone.
My father tells me it used to be more common, before the collapse. People formed bonds more easily back then. Trust wasn’t quite so hard earned. I struggle to believe that our species was ever so naive. Still, though, intimacy has its moments.
----------------------------------------
After our encounter in the shower, David and I honestly have a lot that we need to talk about: How this relationship is going to work. What this relationship even is. Where this puts us, when half of his associates are actively hunting me down.
We are dealing with these questions in the only way that presently makes sense; by completely ignoring them and hoping they go away.
I nuzzle my frame a little closer against David’s chest as we sprawl across his couch in front of the TV, half-buried in blankets and towels. How a guy who gets paid mafiosi protection money can’t afford an apartment with central heating is beyond me. My mind isn’t focused too much on that right now, though. I have more important matters to deal with than the cold. I’m too busy trying to answer his last question without it sounding like a cop-out.
“No, seriously,” I mutter. “You’re the first guy I’ve ever made out with. I swear.”
“Bullshit,” he teases playfully. “You’re too cute for that. No way you went nineteen years without getting yourself into something. Come on, spill. Who was your first kiss?”
Stolen story; please report.
I roll my eyes, my cheeks warming faintly.
“Still you, dude,” I mutter. “Boys weren’t that big of a focus for me, okay? I had other priorities growing up.”
“Right,” David says evenly, his feet finding mine and rubbing against them for warmth. “So, closet case then.”
“Exactly,” I confirm. “Trust me, dad would have flipped a freakin’ gasket if he knew I was doing crap with boys under his roof. Wouldn’t have looked good for the family’s rep.” I wait for his feet to brush my own again, then use my toes to catch them before they pull away. “Hah. Got you!”
David snickers.
“Oh, no. I'm trapped.”
“Yep. Totally trapped,” I lean back, craning my neck to plant a kiss against his jaw. “So, what about you? Who was your first kiss?”
David shrugs, his shoulders buffeting me gently with the movement of his chest. He’s very warm.
“Kid named Ryan, back in eighth grade,” he says. “I liked that he could grind railings on his skateboard. He liked that I sometimes caught fire.”
“You did?” I ask. “Wasn’t that a suit power?”
“Nope. That one’s genetic. Suit just makes it easier to control.”
I snicker to myself at that.
“So, you’ve always been hot, hu-”
My exceptional pun is cut short by the TV screen abruptly cutting off.
“Fuck,” David mutters. “Power cut. Gimme a sec, I gotta go check the fuses.”
“Sure,” I chirp, something leaden sinking into my chest. “Be safe, kay?”
He chuckles.
“Will do,” he pulls himself off of the couch, unfortunately taking the lion’s share of warmth out with him. He lights a torch-sized flame in his hand for illumination, and steps out towards the hallway of the main apartment block. “Fuses are in the power room upstairs. I’ll be back in a sec.”
“Right,” I lie back in the couch, pretending I’m not worried just long enough for him to walk out the door. I scramble upright the moment he is out of the room.
Here’s the thing about growing up in a family of teleporting, demon hunting freelance murderers. It breeds a certain level of resting paranoia. Power cuts freak me the fuck out. That’s honestly baggage on my part, but I’m allowed. Back in Boston, cutting the power to a building was always step one when Dad really wanted someone dead. Usually, I’m cool with it, but I’m also usually the person cutting the power. It gets me twitchy. Even when I’m not being hunted by the mob.
I could just say all this to David directly, of course. Tell him that I’m worried and want to stay together right now. But that’d make me sound like a crazy person. Instead, I grab a knife from his kitchen drawer, and then stalk him from the literal shadows. Like a good boyfriend
I can’t get too close to him, unfortunately. The light of his candle flame prevents me from accessing anything within a dozen or so feet of him, and his movements as he walks throw around his own shadow too much for me to reliably occupy it. I stick as close as I can, hanging in the void outside reality as my re-entry point shifts again and again in his wake.
Things stay quiet, for the most part, right up until he reaches the walk-in closet that apparently doubles as this building’s central fuse box system. It is as he opens the door that it happens. A figure materializes in the shadows some fifteen feet behind him. I recognise her instantly. It would be hard not to. It’s Allie.
Fuck.
----------------------------------------
David:
David Volke was not paying attention to what was going on behind him in the corridor. He was focused on the pressing matter of fixing his apartment’s electricity. He leaned in towards the fuse box, and flicked the main breaker on and off.
Behind him, Allison Krei raised her firearm, took aim- and was abruptly tackled in the midsection by her frantic younger brother, the impact sending the two of them sprawling to the floor with a loud thud.
David turned around at the noise, raising the fire in his hand to examine the open corridor- but it was empty.
----------------------------------------
It is an arduous process, dragging someone through the void. Particularly when they’re unwilling. My sister is most definitely unwilling right now. It takes almost everything I have to wrestle her back to David’s apartment without her ‘porting back upstairs to kill him.
I step out of the shadows, and internally plead for her to do the same.
“Allie!” I whispershout. “Don’t kill him! Please! I can explain!”
The first slap is probably uncalled for. The second one definitely is.
“What! The! Fuck! Liam!” she shouts as she assaults me. “You run off in the middle of the night and all you leave is a FUCKING NOTE!?”
“I’m sorry!” I plead while the raving bitch queen continues to pummel me. “I’m really sorry! I wanted to tell you, but I was scared you’d try to stop me!”
“Damn fucking right we’d try to stop you!” she screams. “This is not how you come out to your family, you ass! And why are you protecting that guy!?”
I blink.
“Wait, coming out?” I ask. “I never did that.” Then, for added cover: “I’m straight.”
She glares at me.
“You’re wearing his fucking T-shirt, Liam.” She raises a palm to her forehead, and I feel something in my soul curl up and die. “Jesus. He’s an enemy asset, dude. What were you thinking? And what was that shitshow with Hovis, huh? Foreplay?”
“That was a kill mission!” I snap back, ashamed, but also deeply stung. “I only found out who he was after we screwed, okay!?”
“Then why didn’t you kill him!?”
“BECAUSE I LIKE HIM!” I yell, my cheeks crimson. “I fucking like him, okay!? Can I not have this one good thing in my whole life?!”
She stops at that, gazing at me, her rage halted.
I don’t expect the hug.
“You’re so god damned dumb, dude. He could have killed you. So many times.”
It is at this point that I notice David standing in the doorway. He is smiling at me. I go on to realize that he heard me admitting that I’m into him. Very, very childishly. Luckily, my brain seems to have run out of ways to experience any extra shame right now.
‘Don’t you say a fucking word,’ I mouthe at him. He raises his hands in bemused placation.
“... Also, I found a way to cure Dad’s cancer,” I say into my sister’s shoulder. “... That’s why I ran away.”
Allie pulls away from me at that, her expression surprised. Nonplussed.
“... What?”