Chapter Four
—=—
This was unacceptable.
Damian fumed, subjecting his pencil and notebook to his overabundance of indignation.
They shouldn't be friends?! What was Forger talking about?! Just because she said so?! Yeah, right! Who said she got to decide all by herself?! What happened to wanting to be friends with him? About pestering to be friends with him?! Well, too bad! She wasn't in her right mind! This is what she gets for trying to be friends with him, she had to follow through!
Damian scribbled notes furiously, not even processing what he wrote, and flipped the page to find indents carrying over.
Damian understood there was probably a good reason Forger had lost her marbles, and now he had nowhere to direct his frustration. He wasn't even sure why he was angry anymore. He wasn't angry at Forger, he wasn't angry at anyone, or anything, he was just. . . angry! As soon—as soon as he decided that Forger was worth being friends with, she changed her mind! No, not even, it wasn't that, she said they shouldn't be friends, not that she didn't want to be.
Damian paused and lifted his pencil from paper.
Not that she didn't want to be.
He smirked. Of course she did. He was Damian Desmond. Who didn't want to be friends with him.
His smirk fell.
Since lunch, he still no idea what could have happened to make Forger act this way. Did someone tell her they shouldn't be friends? Did someone at school tell her they shouldn't be friends? No. She was being weird around Blackbell as well, it had to be something else. What could have happened, then? As far as he knew, she'd been at home since the lab. So it must have been there. At the lab. When she'd been dragged out of the cell and separated from Damian.
He sighed, disheartened, and wriggled his pencil between his knuckles. Did something happen? Maybe the whole thing had just messed with her head.
. . .No. . .he was sure there was something. Before she was taken away, she wasn't like this. And then when she came back with Mr. Forger. . .
Damian didn't like this. He didn't think Forger would tell him, and he had no way of finding out. Did her parents know? She obviously wasn't okay and she was starting to worry him.
"Uh—" Damian blinked as his pencil hit his textbook. Worried? Was he worried about her?
"Do you have something to say, Damian?" Professor Henderson called him out and he shook his head. "Then I would thank you not to interrupt."
Damian nodded slightly and the professor went back to writing on the chalkboard.
Desmond felt it before he saw it and faced Ewen and Emile's stares. Ewen passed a glance over Damian's abused notebook as they returned to their own.
'. . .Great. . .'
Damian turned to a new empty page where there was no chaotic writing.
Of course Damian was worried, he accepted. Why was he so surprised by that? If he and Forger were friends, of course he would be. It would be no different with Ewen and Emile. What did he do, then? If Forger wouldn't talk with him or let him near her, how did he fix this?
Damian put an elbow on his desk and scratched behind his ear with the rubbery end of his pencil.
He'd just have to be impossible to ignore.
—-
Anya couldn't concentrate. She had escaped the house, but for what? She couldn't care less about the math equations written on the board, and sitting with Becky pulled on every sense of morality and guilt she had. But Becky was her best friend. She was her first friend, and despite how horrible it made her feel inside, she just. . .couldn't let her go.
It would be better to, though. How long could she keep Becky close and keep her shut out? Becky had noticed and it was no way to treat someone Anya cared about.
Becky nudged her and suddenly the class was over. The professor wiped clean the chalkboard and the students flipped closed their textbooks.
They filed out of the room and headed for the craft room where the children found a table to sit at.
Anya and Becky climbed into some chairs and another girl joined them. The table was prepared with six, three dimensional stars made of cardboard, various colours of wrapping tissue cut into squares, and several sticks of glue. Each star was about six inches wide, with a small hole cutting through the side of a point.
Across from Anya, a boy started to pull out a chair.
"This spot's taken."
Anya froze as Damian appeared out of nowhere and redirected the boy who obliged surprisingly easily. Desmond finished drawing the chair out as if he hadn't just stolen the seat with the assurance and grace of someone who believed that chair belonged to them. Ewen and Emile were equally surprised. "Wait, were sitting here?" Emile said and Anya watched Damian take the seat opposite of her like he was a ghost come to haunt her.
"Sure." Damian replied and his gaze set on Anya. "Why not?" He asked them and they took the two remaining places after him.
Anya glared unhappily at Damian and he glared right back. She knew exactly what he was doing, and she didn't like it. Why couldn't he just leave her alone!? Why did he want to be friends now of all times?! And. . .why was he so irritated about it?!
"Who said you could sit here?" Becky challenged lightly and completely dropped her aggressive attitude she so often used with him. She spoke directly to Damian. Not to his friends. Just him. She wanted to see how he'd defend himself for sitting with the girls, particularly with Anya. She was teasing him, and for once, Damian (sort of) kept his cool.
Ewen and Emile, curiously enough, also wanted to hear. Emile who sat at the opposite end to Damian, leaned over the table.
"Tch." Damian broke eye contact with Anya and shut his eyes imperiously. "As if I need permission. I can sit wherever I want." He proclaimed and Becky smirked.
"And you decided to sit here?"
Damian's eyebrow twitched. He didn't open his eyes. "A real man isn't so petty. I'm not like you. I'm past all this childish rivalry."
"Ohh." His friends awed.
"Uh-huh." Becky's smirk grew as she nodded her head. "Sure, sure. And Anya had nothing to do with it." Becky said and Damian looked at her in surprise. His friends' interest deepened and they seemed to forsake loyalty for their enthralment. They looked to Damian to see what he would do.
"What are you saying?! Of course not! Are you stupid?" His temper released and it only egged Becky on further.
"No." She laughed. "Just observant you blockhead."
"You're the blockhead, stupid uggo!" Damian backfired, jumping up on his chair, and his fierce denial only served to aid Becky's supreme smugness.
She laughed again. "Yeah, yeah. Do you see yourself? Calm down." Becky flapped a hand at him.
Damian inhaled deeply through his nose as if it could hold his temper and glared at her.
Emile didn't take his eyes off Damian as he leaned towards Ewen. "You were right." He whispered.
"What?!" Damian whipped his head at them and they both looked away.
'Why are they so noisy? Geez. . .' The third girl in their group thought.
"Children! Class is starting! Damian, sit down, please!" The teacher ordered and Damian sat.
"Tch." He said.
"Alright class." The teacher began after a breath. "Today we are making stars. We're going to glue these squares of wrapping tissue—" She held one up. "To the stars and when their done, we'll hang them from the ceiling. Like this one." She held up an example of a finished star covered in colours tastefully arranged. "Use whatever colours you like." She said. "Begin."
The children grabbed for the delicate paper and uncapped the glue sticks. Becky was careful to keep her hands and uniform clean as she assembled her star.
Anya did not.
She couldn't. Her star remained tissue-less. As the rest of the class played with glue, she couldn't bring herself to touch it. For reasons she couldn't explain, the thought of joining in made her sick. Her hands were dead. They wouldn't move to participate in the project, and she blanked on the cardboard, astral depiction. Pressure built in her throat and she suddenly felt like crying.
You should have stayed home.
She shouldn't be in this class, in this school. How many times had Kai told her that she wasn't meant for this life? That it wasn't right? That she wasn't normal? Looking at the star in front of her, Anya couldn't stop thinking about it. How many times did he tell her she was meant for other things? To be useful in ways no one else could be? Everything she was living right now went against what he said, and what she had come to eventually understand.
And every minute that she wished it wasn't true and continued to live the way she wasn't supposed to, live and be with the people she wasn't supposed to be with, was like someone had clamped onto her heart, twisting and pulling it into the pit where she was supposed to be. Where she couldn't hurt anyone. Where it was cold. And lonely. Painful.
And dark.
Sometimes it felt like she was already there. Sometimes she wanted to be there. If only to protect the people she cared about from herself. From her life.
She found herself on the rim, right then, staring into the black abyss. Staring at the star. It was a piece of cardboard. She was supposed to use it. She was supposed to do the stupid project. She was supposed to participate.
This shouldn't be so hard.
It was a piece of cardboard.
"Anya?" Becky waved a hand in her face and she blinked. "What are you doing? You haven't even started." Becky pointed out the bare star Anya was all too aware of.
"Mm." She said.
"Are you. . .okay?" Damian asked and Anya looked up at him. Why was he here? What was he doing? After the lab, he should have stayed far away from her. She didn't like that he noticed. She didn't like that he looked at her now with some kind of. . .knowing. That behind his gaze was an idea of where her changed behaviour came from. Some kind of understanding. She didn't like that he looked concerned.
He shouldn't be concerned. She didn't want. . .she couldn't grow attached to him. She didn't want to want to be friends with him.
She shoved it down.
He couldn't be allowed to get close to her. It was for his own good, and her own. She shouldn't be friends with Becky as it was.
Anya raised her hand.
"Yes, Anya?" The teacher said.
"Can I go to the bathroom, pwease?"
"Sure. Be quick."
Anya couldn't be here right now. She needed to breathe.
"Anya?" Becky watched her slip down from her chair and couldn't pinpoint why her friend seemed kinda off.
Anya didn't reply. She simply left and embraced the peaceful quiet of the empty halls.
—-
Forger hadn't answered. What was wrong? Damian watched her go as her pink head disappeared around the door and he glanced at her untouched star.
He looked up to meet Blackbell's intense gaze and the message behind it was unclear until she spoke.
"You know something I don't?" She asked and Damian went back to glueing colours to his star.
"Nope."
"Liar." Blackbell went back to her own star. Ewen and Emile pretended not to pay attention. Blackbell stuck purple and blue on the sides of her cardboard and looked purposefully back to him. She kept her sights on him until he looked up. She spoke intently with her eyes. Something's wrong with her. She said and Damian was compelled to hold it. Blackbell wanted to know and he wondered if she should be involved in this. This problem concerned the lab, she might be getting into more than she expected. He certainly had.
Damian returned her serious look and debated if this was a good idea or not. Obviously.
Blackbell was Forger's best friend. If something was wrong with her, Damian figured she would want this particular wasn't the plan, but maybe this would work plastered red and orange layers that emanated from the centre of his star.
Too bad it had to be Blackbell.
Her hands slowed and their eyes met again. Her face was steadfast and grave. We need to help her. She implied with a subtle nod to the door Anya left through and Damian flicked a look at his friends who carefully feigned inattentiveness.
Obviously. He indicated again, his brows furrowing stubbornly at her, and turned to review his work before he and Blackbell started to appear suspicious. He began glueing yellow to the sides.
When his gaze returned to her, her eyes had narrowed. We'll have to work together. She didn't speak it, but he felt her questioning his ability to do so and his resolve to help Forger. If Damian agreed, he was admitting he cared about Forger. That they were friends.
He audibly sighed. Obviously. I'm a man, remember? That's simple. He retorted.
Blackbell snorted mirthlessly, maintaining her glare, and it was like she trying to find the fault in his words. "It's a deal." Blackbell said out loud with the seriousness and gravity of a seasoned veteran preparing to launch an attack.
Damian nodded curtly.
"What's a deal?" Emile said.
"Nothing. Don't worry about it." Replied Blackbell.
"You guys are weird." The girl beside Blackbell said off-handedly as she attached green and blue all over her star.
Damian had nearly forgotten she was there, though it was the whole point they hadn't spoken out loud.
He finished glueing the yellow on the sides, and began on the the other face of the star. From the top point, he held it delicately so he wouldn't ruin the finished side, and attempted to make it identical.
He glanced up to the door. Forger still hadn't come back yet. He wondered what was bothering her. What could have happened? Could he actually help? How did he do that if he didn't know how?
He glued on another square.
A lot had happened at the lab. It could be more than one thing. When he thought about everything that happened, it all made him sweat and jittery with nerves.
The gun. . .the bodies. . .
He felt his face pale and he shook his head.
He was trying not to think about it. Seeing the image of the dark barrel pointed between his eyes, once, was enough. It popped in at the oddest of times though. Like a jingle you couldn't erase from your mind that played randomly to remind you of it.
Damian didn't think he would ever forget that. That or the bodies. The way Mrs. Forger was drenched in the blood. The way Mr. Forger knew exactly what he was doing. The way that Forger screamed when she was dragged from the cell as if she was about to be murdered.
The way Damian had never been so terrified in his life.
He had stilled and his hand hung in the air holding a red piece of wrapping tissue. As if trying to break from the memories, he slowly reached to add it to the ring he made on the outer part of the star. He began on the next made of orange.
He wondered when he would stop being scared to think about what happened.
Damian glued another piece, trying to distract himself from those thoughts, and glued another. And another. And another.
The orange ring was almost done when it struck him and he stopped to look at it.
It was the same.
He'd wanted to show his father the last project he'd made. Damian had wanted it to be perfect so his father would acknowledge him and tell him he'd done a good job.
If he showed him this. . .what would his father say now. Now that Damian knew?
It was a silly arts craft. A stupid decoration for the ceiling, and yet the inexplicable need for his father's approval had been behind every square he'd plastered to the cardboard. They were all laid so carefully, and he wondered if there was any point. His father would never see it, he probably wouldn't care, so why was Damian so meticulous? Still? With everything he did?
Maybe his father would care. Maybe it wasn't pointless. Just because his father wasn't who Damian thought he was, it didn't mean he didn't care about Damian. Maybe trying to win his affection. . .wasn't pointless.
Even as he thought it, he also denied it. He'd seen who his father was, but wanted to believe there was more to it.
He wondered if Demetrius ever felt this way. He was going to see him the coming weekend, but he didn't think he could ask.
He glanced again to the door. Forger still wasn't back.
—
Samuel was gone and Demetrius expected another 'warning' to come soon. Carter had just begun to make up with Samuel and at least Demetrius had had a little fun before it was ruined.
007 was in the back of the car when Twilight rolled up and Demetrius hopped in. She'd been absent from school for days, and with her keeping to herself lately, he'd had little to no interaction with her. Which he didn't exactly mind, but being around another esper, talking to one, was about as common as lightning striking the same place twice. Or it used to be. . .Demetrius was maybe a little curious. He couldn't hear her mind and he couldn't dissect what kind of person she was by her thoughts. He wondered how similar they were.
When they arrived at the Forger's, Anya went straight to her room and Demetrius deposited his bag on a chair at the table. Mr. Forger greeted his wife and while he went to prepare dinner, she went to check on Anya.
The Forgers hadn't told Demetrius much of their plans for Donovan yet, but they didn't have to. They had only the bare bones of one. Useful information on Donovan was scarce and even spying had only gotten them so far. Still, they probably had more than the little that Demetrius had had.
The Thorn Princess emerged from 007's room, concerned. She didn't understand what was going on with Anya, or how to help. When she was kidnapped the first time, she was gone for six weeks and it didn't have this kind of effect.
Demetrius paused in unpacking his homework and sighed, drooping his head. This had been going on for days and he'd gladly stayed away from it, but if it was because something had happened at the lab, he couldn't help but consider getting involved. He understood what kinds of things went on there. . .and she was another subject. . .
He sighed again, resigned. He should probably see what it was about. "Hey. . ." He asked Yor as she traveled to the kitchen. "Can I. . . ?" He indicated to 007's room and she nodded.
Demetrius blew a raspberry as he approached her door and lightly rapped a knuckle on the wood.
"Anya?" He said and it was quiet. "It's Demetrius." He heard nothing. She was ignoring him. He twisted the doorknob and cracked the door open a couple inches.
The room was dark and 007 was curled up on the bed with her dog, Bond. She wasn't asleep and eyed 004 stonily.
"Hey." Demetrius opened the door a little further and leaned on the doorframe. "What's wrong with you?"
Anya's nose crinkled in annoyance and only looked away, fiddling with Bond's fur.
"What happened at the lab?" Demetrius sighed again, pushing off the frame, and stepped inside. He came to sit on the floor with an arm on the bed to support his chin. "Your parents are freaking out." He said and it was a weird concept. He remembered his own mother crying for him a couple times when he was young, but he didn't see much of her.
"Nothing." She grumbled.
"Liar." He said. What a pain.
He heard the Forger's listening, as well as they could from the kitchen, and lowered his voice. This was none of their business. "Who are you going to talk to, if not me of all people?" He said and it seemed to give her pause. It should. It gave Demetrius' pause too. What was it like to confide in someone like him? Someone who could actually relate? Not a subject, but another esper?
007 dragged herself upright and looked at him for a long time. Her eyes dipped to her hand gripping Bond's fur and they started to well. He thought she wouldn't say for a moment, but then her voice shook slightly. "I don't belong here." Her whisper was barely audible.
'Oh'. Demetrius thought. Now this made sense. The fix was simple. "So what?" He said and her gaze whipped up at him. "I don't either, you think I care? Screw that. Live the way you want, no one's stopping you."
"But. . ." She said shakily and he didn't understand the way she was looking at him. Like he'd delivered the exact opposite of what she'd wanted to hear. "If I do that. . .people get hurt. . ." He could hear the sob catching in her throat now.
"So? Not your problem. People get hurt all the time."
Anya stared at him, astounded at his life lesson, and he didn't get what part didn't make sense to her. "But. . .I don't want them to get hurt. . ." Her voice wavered.
"Umm. . ." He didn't know what to sat to that. Why would she care? ". . .why?" Demetrius asked and she blinked as if he should already know the answer. She opened her mouth, and then paused, as if she didn't know how to answer either.
"Because. . .I just don't!" She cried and it was Demetrius' turn to blink.
". . .Okay." He said though he didn't get it at all.
"What about Sy-on boy?" She said after a moment.
"Who?"
"Damian. You don't care if he gets hurt because of you?"
The sentence took him aback and he paused. At the lab, he'd been worried sick, but he'd never considered that who Demetrius was could ever affect Damian. Mainly, because he rarely saw him in the past, and Demetrius had been living the way he was supposed to. The way his father needed him to. But it was different now. Demetrius' life, his identity, could hurt Damian and he had never had to consider that before.
Did he care? It was one thing for Damian to be locked up and experimented on at the lab or if it concerned their father, but it was another if it was literally anything else.
Demetrius didn't know how he felt about this. He was his little brother. Demetrius could definitively say that Damian was the only person he truly had any semblance of affection for. There was a lingering warm spot for his mother that had grown significantly colder, but it was nothing substantial. If she died, he didn't think he would mourn for long. . .or much at all. On the other hand, he would mourn for Damian. . .he was pretty sure.
He was pretty sure. . .
Maybe he did care. Did he? Why? What was there to worry about? People. Got. Hurt. It was just life. What the lab did was messed up, but everything else was just what it was. There was no point for him to care. Damian was no. . .different. . .was he?
007 was still waiting and Demetrius didn't have an answer. He wasn't sure. He shrugged.
This reply left her speechless for some reason.
"I don't think. . .I want to be like you. . ." She muttered after a while and Demetrius tipped his head.
"Oh? What changed? It's pretty simple to just live how you were before the lab. I think you're making this harder for yourself than you need to."
She sniffled and snuggled against the dog. "But. . .they can't. . .I'm not. . .I'm not like other people. . ."
Demetrius nearly said So what? again, but it wasn't as helpful as he thought it would be the first time. He sighed. 007 was definitely an esper, but she was a lot less similar to him than he thought. Why didn't his advice help her? "Being a telepath doesn't mean you can't do what you want."
"What about the consensus?"
"The what?"
"The conquestus."
"The what?"
"The con. . .sequester. . ."
"Consequences? That's not your problem."
She sniffled again. "But. . ."
Demetrius sighed and ran a hand over his eyes. This was just going in circles. He dropped the hand and changed position before his legs cramped. "What are you going to do then? Lay in bed for the rest of your life?"
She said nothing and looked dejectedly downwards.
"Look." Demetrius said. "No one is like us. If we want to live for other than what were meant for, or who we are, it's kind of impossible to. . .live. . .if we avoid everything and everyone."
"But. . .shouldn't we just do what were supposed to, then? What if bad things happen?"
"You're going to let that run your life? You don't really want to live the way your supposed to, do you?"
007 shook her head,
"Then don't."
She still looked uncertain.
Demetrius got up. "That's all I got."
"How come you only left home now, then? Weren't you doing what you were supposed to?" Anya asked before he could leave.
"Yeah. But I had my reasons. I didn't want to be there."
"Reasons? Like what?"
"Nothing you need to know about. Go to sleep." Demetrius abruptly ended the conversation and closed the door behind him.
Go to sleep? He thought. It was still the afternoon.
Demetrius felt he'd kept the conversation quiet enough, but Anya's parents still watched as he exited her room and sat at the table where his homework waited for him.
He said nothing, and they didn't know how to ask about it.
Demetrius had a feeling he'd stepped into something that was going to become a pain.