"You spend a lot of time here, don't you?" Erica asked as she walked into the abandoned station. Even after they moved back to the Hale house, Isaac seemed to stay here often.
"Well, I don't have anywhere else to go," Isaac said, looking up from the floor.
"...The Hale house?"
"It's an old abandoned house," Isaac grumbled, "No place to put this."
"This?" Erica echoed as she joined him on the floor. In his hands was an edition of The Amazing Spiderman. Her eyes trailed over to a crate next to him and saw piles more of other comics inside. She wondered why she never noticed it earlier. "You had these here the whole time?"
"Yea, it was the only thing I could get out of the house before the police came knocking," Isaac said with a sigh as he flipped the page.
"Why this stack of papers out of all the things in the house?" Erica asked like she was trying not to care, but it was evident that she did. She cared not because she was curious, she cared because they were a pack now.
Isaac shrugged, trying to act like he didn't care either. These were comics, things that were fun, things that didn't need to be taken so seriously, "My dad bought most of them for me."
Erica nodded. She had a feeling that the subject had to do with Isaac's father and decided not to press any further. She pulled the crate over and began looking through them. "Why are you hiding these here? There is space in the Hale house. These are all Marvel?"
Isaac scoffed, "And let my collection get crushed by a random falling beam or something? Those are all Marvel and I don't know about you, but I'm a serious comic book collector."
Erica stopped searching and turned to glare at Isaac. "Are you saying I don't take comics seriously? I'll have you know I have been collecting Batman since I was seven. Superman, Wonder Woman, and I got a really nice copy of The Brave and the Bold #60 at a yard sale once. I've trained my eye for these jewels," she ended with a perky change in tone and flipped her hair back with a smirk.
"DC?" Isaac made a face, "No wonder you don't know how to take care of comics."
"What? What's that supposed to mean?" she hissed back.
"DC sucks, it's a waste of time."
Erica's eyes widened and she bared her teeth, "At least I don't look up to a bunch of ex-killers and people who kill without thinking."
"It's called being realistic and relatable," Isaac growled back.
For a while, they stayed staring at each other with a threatening look on their faces. Their claws were drawn, teeth bared, and eyes ready to kill. It was one of those tense moments where Derek was usually around to break up. The three of them lived and fought like brothers and sisters, especially between Isaac and Erica. They were both newly confident beta wolves whose personalities both complemented and conflicted with each other when the time came.
This was one of them.
And strangely, maybe it was because no one was there to prevent the wreckage they would create, they calmed down. Claws were lowered, muscles relaxed, they turned around, facing the abandoned train in front of them.
Isaac understood, Erica was a girl who was sick. People who were unbeatable and had amazing powers were probably an inspiration to her. She probably wished that she was well and could do all the things that they did.
Erica understood, Isaac's home situation wasn't a good one. It was the uglier side of life, like what all the Marvel heroes had gone through were more realistic to him. He probably wanted to grow up to be like them, people with terrible backgrounds that overcame it and became a hero.
"You can borrow some of them if you'd like," he offered.
"Not Marvel, no," she answered.
"Suit yourself."
"You can borrow some of mine, too."
"I'll think about Batman. He's somewhat likable."
"Arghh," she growled, "You!" She gave him a hard shove and they broke into chuckles.
There were lots of playful shoves and a couple of more painful scratches, but everything healed. By the end of the day, Isaac carried his collection to Erica's house where they could keep it safe from abandoned stations and half burned houses. Erica agreed to try reading an issue or two of Marvel and lent Isaac was allowed to take some of her collection with him to read in his spare time. In the end, if you have heroes and dreams, any comic is a good read.
A/N: Still getting used to the characters, hopefully they didn't end up too OOC ;w;