A/N: Please leave a review if you're able. Even if it's just to tell me what you hated, or didn't quite understand, I really, really would like to read other people's opinions on this story. I might make some revisions to this chapter soon for spelling and grammar, but the thematic elements are what I'm really concerned about.

Arc One, Chapter 3
Title: Ain't No Rest For...
Characters: Kyd Wykkyd, Jinx, See-More (mentioned), Geo-Force (mentioned), Professor Chang (mentioned)
Summary: Jinx needs a favor. Kyd Wykkyd needs a distraction.
Warnings: Ooh boy. This chapter contains references to long-term anxiety and paranoia, drug use/abuse, binge drinking, eating disorders, substance addiction, and several other unspecified destructive behavior(s). My purpose in writing about these is not to glorify or romanticize any of them. Trust me, I know EXACTLY how terrible these sorts of habits can be in a person's life, and in other lives around them. I know.

ARC ONE: THE OUTSIDERS

Ain't No Rest For...

Kyd Wykkyd didn't bother attempting to sleep that night, or the night after that. He'd fled the lounge halfway through Mindcreep, teleporting himself back to his room on the base's sublevel and barricading himself inside with the lights out. He needed a dark and quiet space to dispel the terrible thoughts and memories conjured up by the movie, of Brother Blood, and—and Psimon. Wykkyd was too worked up to care, if any of his teammates had seen him leave or might remember.

Once safely in his room, he tried his best to meditate for an hour or so, but to no avail: with his quarters dark, he might not have noticed the base's power going out, but the sounds of shouting downstairs ruined what little concentration he had. His hearing was too sensitive to drown out the others or ignore them. In a fit of temper, Wykkyd considered returning downstairs to make his teammates suffer personally for bothering him when he was already on edge, but the rational side of him said that was a stupid idea. He had to figure out some other way, to dispel the twisted feelings eating him up inside.

There were a few guilty indulgences that made him feel better when he got like this. The easiest one was usually Agent H, a specialty drug once produced by the H.I.V.E. and now made exclusively by Professor Chang, though not without relative impurities. Wykkyd had already tried raiding the infirmary and the others' bedrooms earlier in the week and found nothing left of the drug, which meant that the previous month's supply was already completely used up. The lack of it made Wykkyd want to scream in frustration, though he kept his temper reined in. He'd done a decent job so far of hiding from the other Outsiders how badly he relied on the low-grade Agent H they bought every month, and how much of a typical four-week's supply went to him and him alone. A bad movie that reminded him of a few old horrors shouldn't have been enough to evaporate the remains of his self-control.

Without the drug, however, Wykkyd lacked too many other reliable coping mechanisms. He supposed he could swallow the remains of his pride, and go up to the infirmary to sleep with See-More in his cot, but the power outage meant the others would come that way to find him at some point. See-More was the only one capable of repowering the generator. Kyd Wykkyd didn't want to risk an encounter with the remaining Outsiders when he was like this, not least because he might be expected to them help out until the power was restored. He rarely felt like being productive on his best days without Agent H, and in a bad headspace he didn't trust himself not to be cross with anyone who brought up the suggestion. With his usual level of expressiveness bordering in the area between "mild, friendly gestures" and "impassive poker face," copping an attitude would catch the others' attention. Kyd Wykkyd didn't want that.

He supposed there were other ways to curb his inner demons, though all of them carried certain risks. For one, Wykkyd hated drinking, perhaps solely among the Outsiders—he hated the loss of lucidity and control alcohol brought on, hated that it made him so uninhibited with his inner nature. Mostly, he hated how good it felt to be drunk. He had an addictive personality, and knew he couldn't afford to go casually picking up vices, the way his teammates had over the years. Drinking, clubbing, cigarettes, recreational drugs...even binging and purging on occasion, when Mammoth thought nobody was paying attention. Kyd Wykkyd had no intention of indulging in any of that. He had his caffeine addition, and he had Agent H, and that was it. He had a hard time managing even those.

There was one vice he had left. Kyd Wykkyd grappled with himself for a few hours before he finally surrendered, pulling out the necessary tools from the caches hollowed out inside the walls. If Angel knew what he was doing, she wouldn't hesitate to confiscate everything. Wykkyd didn't want a repeat of last time.

—

Luckily—or perhaps unluckily—the power outage saw See-More, Jinx, and Angel all too busy to check up on Kyd Wykkyd over the course of the following two days. Mammoth and the others certainly weren't going to bother with it; though to be fair, Geo-Force might have at least tried if he knew how to find anything in the lower levels of the base. For better or worse, ultimately Wykkyd was left alone to deal with his inner demons for the duration. He did so in the only way he knew how.

By the time anyone came to search for him in his room, all evidence of his troublesome activities were long since hidden. Wykkyd hadn't slept in 48 hours by that point, though he felt calmer and more in control than he had since seeing Mindcreep. He figured sleeping now would only be an open invitation for his unwanted memories to catch him off-guard in the form nightmares, so any distraction that would keep him awake would be welcomed.

"Hey," Jinx said to him as Kyd opened the door for her. Rather than continuing right away, she let herself inside his room and ignored his staring upon her back, her catlike eyes surveying the disastrous state of his lightless abode.

"Man, you really don't ever clean up the place, do you?" Jinx said, rather matter-of-factly. "At least Mammoth has his sister to pick up after him when he makes a mess..."

Kyd Wykkyd folded his arms and waited for her to get to the point. He was partly glad to see her, but also partly annoyed at having her judging the state of his room. After another moment, Jinx turned around and faced Wykkyd directly, jerking her head silently toward the door to indicate she wanted it closed for privacy.

"Thanks," she said heavily as Kyd Wykkyd obediently shut the door and locked it behind him. "Hey, I've got a favor to ask. What've you got going on today?"

Kyd shrugged noncommittally, as if to say, Nothing. Why?

Jinx smirked at him, snapping back to her usual air of bossiness.

"Excellent. I've got to head into the city today to see Professor Chang, about buying us some Agent H for this month," she said. "Gizmo says we're fresh out again. Ever since that whole thing with the Titans, Chang's been trying to rip me off every time I go to see him one-on-one. Usually, I'd just send See-More or Gizmo to deal with him, since they both speak his technobabble better than I do, but the two of them are stuck here at the base until our generator stabilizes. The tracking system says all the Titans are all on the other side of town fighting Cinderblock, so I need someone to come out with me while the coast is clear. As far as I know, you're the only one that Chang is still afraid of on our team."

Kyd Wykkyd smirked internally at her words, though on the surface he carefully pretended to consider the proposition before nodding. It was rare that Jinx came to him specifically to ask for help, which was exactly the way he liked it, but in this case he would gladly make an exception. Agent H was all he'd been thinking about lately, aside from Psimon, and there wasn't a lot Kyd wouldn't do to dispel his awful memories of the latter. Even visiting Chang's lab up on the surface had to be better than waiting down here in perpetual boredom.

When he'd given his assent, Jinx smiled again, pointing down at an angle toward the floor. "Mind if we take the 'shortcut' to the garage?" she asked, gesturing toward his cape. "I'm not gonna ask you to teleport us all the way to the border to Chang's, but if we have to drive, I'd rather that the others didn't see us leave. They might start...you know, asking questions. This way'll be a lot easier."

Kyd Wykkyd hesitated. His powers had been getting more unpredictable as of late, and on a day with no sleep and zero meditation, weakened as he was, there was a definite chance that some unexpected mishap might occur. Jinx, seeing him pause, seemed to mistake his hesitation for a question.

"It isn't any of their business, that's all!" she insisted, folding her arms defensively over her chest. "What's it to you?"

...Well, now he was definitely curious. Wykkyd stared openly at Jinx, waiting to see if she would elaborate, and she didn't disappoint him: with a hard sigh, she dropped her hands to her sides and relented with a grudging glare.

"Okay, it's mostly Geo-Force I don't want to know about this," she said shortly. "I brought him in, so he's my responsibility, all right? I'm still trying to figure out how good he is with all the...stuff that we do around here. He says he doesn't have any memories before a few weeks ago, but it can't be amnesia, it's too convenient and stupid and Angel said his other symptoms don't match up at all. I want to know what's up with this guy before we start to really trust him. The less he knows about where we go and how we get around outside the base, the better. At least for now."

She made no mention of Agent H specifically, but Kyd Wykkyd caught her meaning anyway.

The fewer people that know half our team's addicted to experimental amphetamines, the better. Agent H may be our greatest liability.

Nodding his solemn agreement, Kyd Wykkyd reluctantly opened his cape and opened a rift in the shadows, teleporting the two of them discreetly to the base's garage.

The sick part was how excited he still was about the trip.

Character Notes

Psimon – A psychic villain who had a small role in the Brotherhood of Evil arc of Season 5, and made several later appearances in Teen Titans Go! as a recruiter for a new team of villains formed in conjunction with Dr. Light.