Chương 4: Stray Cat

I looked up at that hand that tried to pull me further into the shit. For a guy so chipper, this Christian asshole really did just ambush me like that. And here he was, all smiles, offering to help me back up like it wasn't an issue. He said we could synergize well. I had no idea if he was trying to make a pleasant observation, or just trying to condescend to me. The hand could go fuck itself. That auditor's poisonous grasp was enough to last me a month at least.

I leaned away from it and planted a hand on the edge of this pit of foam cubes and pulled myself out. The throw put my senses back on alert. I was noticing little things like how the tile floor was unnaturally even, like there was some filmy residue on it. Bad floor polish, maybe, which raised more questions but I wasn't in the mood for answering. I wanted a mattress to lie on.

Bringing myself to my feet, I looked down at the spry little redhead who used me for a cartoon gag and finally decided a full sentence was necessary.

"I get Tancred said you need to give me a tour, but I just want some sleep. Can you just point me to the beds?" Christian cocked his head, never losing the smile he kept lightly beaming at me.

"What, you're not gonna even ask how I did that?" He probably had some weird floating power. So, I shook my head. Whatever he'd tell me wasn't going to be the whole truth because he's not going to want to give out that kind of information in detail and risk people having means to learn his weaknesses.

"There's no reason for you to give me the full picture. I'm just guessing you've got some kind of flight power or something so you don't have to worry about falling." He's not dumb enough to give the nitty-gritty, that'd be too wide an openi-"Oh no, I don't have any physical powers at all! I've just got a mutation in my eyes that lets me see the flow of how things move. I know where your weight's going before you do.

And my dad's been having me train in his Aikijujutsu school since I could walk, which taught me how to redirect energy. You can't really do anything to me without me letting you." He just blurted this all out like it came free with a large soda and a side of fries. I could feel my jaw hang a little as it tried to open the way for the proper collection of bewildered cursewords to spill out at how stupid he was for just giving this information to a complete stranger.

"Whuh-" Come on, Leo, not grunts, words.

"Why the Hell would you just say that? Do you tell everyone on the street what you can do? Do I get to know your social security number to go with that?" Christian's eyebrow crested high and alone. Lack of eyebrow, really. One of those types of gingers whose eyebrows were so light they looked barren.

"No? You'll probably get my SIN, though. We're supposed to be working together, man! If you know how my powers work, it means you can cooperate with me and work better. You'll probably want to know about the rest of the team too. Are you worried about explaining how your power works like you're gonna have to owe me some kind of favor?" I shook my head again.

"I wasn't gonna tell you regardless. You said you've read my file so you know everything that needs to be known. I'm strong and stuff doesn't hurt me." Christian nodded, bringing his hands up, palms forward like he was trying to show me he didn't have any weapons.

"Wasn't gonna ask, dude. So long as you know how your power works you can coordinate with us when you learn everyone else's powers. You only just got here, I'm not gonna drag every little thing out of you. I'm not like Agent Tank. So long as you can help I'm happier than like, two clams!" Bullshit. You don't air out all your personal stuff and expect nothing back. I told him more than enough anyway, it's all I knew and all that mattered.

"Sure thing," I conceded, "now can you tell me where I can lay down?" It only then occurred to me I have no idea what the hell "happier than two clams" means. I questioned if one of us had brain damage. The apparent leader of this outfit snapped his fingers.

"I'll do you one better," don't you fucking dare-"I'll show you!" I pondered, for just a moment, if The Firmament would've been better than this. I don't like this put-on work, it felt like I was being set up for something. The redhead led me along to the door on the far end of the room, and through it revealed a room, bearing far less subtle concrete walls with a deep blue paintjob over them, illuminated by halogen lights implanted in the ceiling. There were six doors.

Two on each wall besides the one we entered from. The doors were all labeled with names. On the doors to my left: Christian Lofield Leo Holt Directly across from me: May Hart Jairo Carter And to my right: Samantha Way This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. Samuel and Samara Way I squinted at the door bearing my name. I didn't like that there was a red carpet rolled out for me like that. What if I told them no and went to jail?

Would they have just scraped the label off and put on another name for some other unlucky kid? Christian seemed to have noticed my look as he tapped the back of his hand on my shoulder.

"It's just a print-out sticker with a label maker I bought with the stipend we're given. It's actually pretty cool, the sticker's got a reflective material so if you look at them from the right angle, they almost kinda glow. Try it." I think I was so thrown off by the moment that I was far more suggestible than I should have been. I did take about four steps in and noticed the light bouncing off of the door labeled with my name, bringing it from an off-black color to a shimmering white one.

Fascinating for all of three seconds. But that wasn't the important question. The important one was:"Why is my name next to yours?" I looked at him as I passed my question over, which he seemed to catch like a natural-born shortstop.

"So when we were originally getting our rooms, it was just May and I. May went one room separate so we'd have space. Then Dr. Way joined and she wanted a room for her kids, so they both took the right." Kids?

"Yeah, she's got a pair of twins. Well, fraternal twins, one's a boy and one's a girl," Christian answered. I didn't even realize I said that out loud. I needed to work on not repeating every word that surprised me. Christian looked around my age. He was leading. They wouldn't let one of the younger people take a lead spot.

"How..." I trailed off, chasing after the words. Small-talk like this was an elusive animal for me, but the question had to be asked.

"How old are you all?" I practically exhaled it all at once. He seemed unbothered.

"I'm twenty-two. May's nineteen, Jairo's seventeen, and Dr. Way's twenty. Her twins are five." I blinked at those last two ages, and my head involuntarily tilted. Like looking at him at a forty-five degree angle would answer my questions on its own. He pursed his lips and nodded.

"Yeah. She takes good care of them by herself though, she's a really good mom. Never even occurs to her that-""The government hired a teen mom?" Christian shook his head.

"She came on after me, and this all happened within the past..." The green in his eyes had gone past the center-line that was normally leveled towards me, off to my right.

"... Seven months?" They only just started getting into bullshit right before I did.

"She's turning twenty-one soon, I'm pretty sure. Her birthday should be December if I remember right. It's a late -ember month. I can ask her when she's back." He shrugged with a smile normally reserved for recently canary-fed cats. I just kept a half-squint as I looked at him through his answer, and his smile sunk a bit and became much more apologetic-looking.

"I don't think it was the worst thing for them to do. We're becoming superheroes. And we all needed some kind of direction. Just like you do." The half-squint became full.

"Do you think I'm some kind of stray cat or something?" shot out of my throat and I refused to stop it. Christian's hands came back up, defensive like before. He shook his head again.

"No, no! But I know what it's like being alone." His mouth made a smile, but his eyes didn't join it.

"Trust me. I really do know. You can feel kind of lost and when you're looking for where to go on your own, you sometimes only get things half-right." His right hand traced the side of an invisible rounded shape, and when it hit the bottom of that shape, his palm just loosely aimed towards me. Must have thought I'd bite his pointer off.

"I read about what you were doing. I think you had the right idea. Stop bad guys. Save lives." Now even his mouth couldn't follow his smile.

"Avenge who couldn't be saved. Now you're with people who can help you with your idea. You weren't a stray or something, I just think everyone needs some guidance sometimes." I just watched his face. Something one of the half-dozen "behavioral experts" who tried to figure out my issues mentioned once that normally, eyes read faces in triangles. Eye, eye, nose, then back to an eye. I tried mentally tracing his path. Nose, mouth, chin, cheek, ear, eye, nose, eye. Eyebrow, forehead. Forehead for a bit longer.

Not sure why he was lingering there. Then it hit me, and I relaxed my browline. His eyes found their way back to the territory of that triangle, though his gaze seemed to read more circularly, and not very evenly at that. I finally spoke.

"You're really trying to sell after the close." He shook his head." I just don't want you to get the wrong impression. I like to keep an open book- And an open door! I want us all to be able to talk to each other about these kinds of things so we can cooperate better. Not all of us can be like Agent Tank and keep all the important stuff behind weird attempts to relate to us. Your bed should already be in your room. I can knock once the others are here so you can introduce yourself.

It's not really super-furnished yet, there's just some basics like your own bathroom, a bed, and a desk. We usually do a big shopping thing for furnishing rooms. I'd be happy to help you get it set up. But it should be enough for sleeping tonight. You clap to turn the lights on and off." I watched him the entire time he spoke. Still reading circularly. He can't read eyes triangularly. He watches slow. That or he's taking in more details than me. Can't be sure yet.

But I just nodded, and trudged my way over to the door and pulled it open. I expected a room immediately. Instead I was met with... stairs. Metal rails up to the ceiling along the stairs were the only thing preventing someone from breaking their neck. I followed along them down until the room became visible below. More blue concrete for everything, including the stair steps themselves. But that didn't strike me as much as something else.

From floor to ceiling, probably twelve feet high, on the opposite end of the room from the stairs, was not a concrete wall. It was glass, and on the other side was... water. Dense, light blue water. Plenty of fish swimming around in it. There wasn't a lake or anything near the building. It was just a parking lot. The water was so present that it actually seemed to leave a lingering glow in the room, just barely coloring the edges of the walls adjacent to it. Did all the other rooms have something like this?

Why was there something like this? No matter how thick that glass was, that was just a risk factor. But it'd been here for long enough that if anything load-bearing would've broken, it would have well before I got here. Seven months, he said. I'd just have to hope I could hear cracking sounds in my sleep. The rest of the room was very drab. Blue paint, same as the stairs and that "lobby" leading to the rooms.

There was, near the stairs, an open door to the bathroom which bore obnoxiously contrasting clean white tile. Did they only have budget for blue paint? If it was worth asking I could ask it later. What I did see was, on a metal frame, a simple twin mattress. It was enough. I had lumbered over and practically fell into it, getting the first bit of real sleep on a real bed I'd had in about six months. Didn't feel like I'd earned it.