For those of you who aren't reading the start again (I know it's been a truly ludicrous amount of time; I'm trying to get back into a proper schedule for writing.) There have been some edits in the first two chapters to better align with where I want this story to be. I'd recommend giving them a glance.
Also, there is an announcement at the bottom of this chapter. If you're a fan of DC, give it a look.
#B6A063
In a fun twist of irony, Miles woke up sick.
He clutched at his temples, vainly hoping that the pressure of his fingertips would overtake the incessant screaming in his scalp. His ears held vacuums while his eyes swelled two sizes too big for his fracturing skull. He was intimately aware of every hair follicle sticking out of his head, each twitch and micro-bend tripping thousands of mental alarms.
And the rest of his body only felt worse. His scorching skin swaddled freezing blood. His tendons pinched between his bones. Every muscle—every cap of cartilage—had been shredded to hell and left in writhing tatters.
"Miles?" Judge groaned, swiping blindly at his glasses. Apparently, he did sleep—at his desk. "You—" he broke off into a wide yawn. "—You good?"
"Hngh…" His jaw wouldn't cooperate. He was trying to ask if they had Ibuprofen.
"Not good, got it. Go back to sleep if you can. I'll let Sumida know."
Miles dragged himself upright against the railing of his bunk, drunkenly swaying from the effort. He finally found his voice again, though the inside of his mouth felt arid and caustic.
"I can't…" he rasped, crumbling into a fit of coughs as his entire torso clenched. "Quiz… Your set…"
Judge pushed him back down into his clammy mattress. "Nah, man. You show up to class like this, you'll just get kicked out. If you wanna see my routine so bad, I'll give you an encore."
"But—"
"Stay in bed, dumbass," Judge rolled his eyes. A chorus of cracks cascaded down his spine as he twisted his shoulders in a one-eighty. "I'm getting Salas."
Miles turned onto his side and shivered as his damp back was exposed to the morning air.
Everyone's voice was too loud. Their movements, too slow. Like a live-action replay. Miles could even hear the pundit's commentary, complete with crude arrows breaking down their actions.
"He's hungover," the nurse scoffed, waving her flashlight over Miles' irises.
And right out the gate, we have the accusation—a classic opening from Nurse Gomez! If you direct your attention from her haughty sneer up to her Karen haircut, you can really see it all tied together in a brilliantly executed, sanctimonious facade. Little-to-no supporting evidence but the numbers show decent success without it. What are her odds here, Miles?
Well, Miles, I believe she's taking the safer route and banking her play on her position of authority. If she stays the course, I'm confident she can bring it home.
Safer, sure, but less rewarding.
Can't fault caution in a game as cut-throat as this.
"I don't know, Denise. He wasn't feeling well last night."
And Salas with the intercept! Beautifully done!
But can he follow through? Keep an eye out for his posture.
"He was high. Now he isn't. Search their room."
Salas' shoulders slumped as he let out a resigned huff. "Alright, boys. You know the drill."
Oh! Fumbled at the cusp of greatness! You hate to see it.
Devastating Miles, just devastating.
Non-pundit Miles couldn't help it—he broke out giggling. Where was all this during his set? Judge elbowed him in the side. Right. Serious situation. Maybe the parents' concerns about Sumida's comedy unit weren't completely unfounded.
"Do you think this is funny, young man?"
"C'mon, man. It's not like we're hiding a meth lab."
Miles wasn't concerned they'd find anything, but since when did people like her need proof?
If there was one lesson Miles learned in the past year that he was certain he couldn't have learned through more accessible means, it was the direct correlation between unreasonable standards and unfathomable arrogance. Visions had a serious elitism problem, to the point of palpable unprofessionalism.
Technically, Visions was a public institution—they received the majority of their funding from the state and thus were legally obligated to accommodate anyone who wished to attend. What kept them so exclusive was their stringent acceptance policies. If a prospective student wasn't a genius like Judge or rich enough to afford the right tutors, then they were like Miles—lucky—but even then, the expansive web of red tape his parents had to weave through just to get his name in the pot kept the remaining well of hopefuls shallow.
All of that changed after the Decimation. Thanks to their stable, private board, a decent majority of their faculty's survival, and a campus that would have been spacious even at full capacity, Visions was one of the last schools standing. After a weary pair of inspectors conducted a cursory once-over to ensure the facilities wouldn't kill anyone, nearly eight hundred "normal" kids were dropped unceremoniously into the academy's hallowed halls. The ergonomic, floor-to-ceiling lockers were torn out and tossed, only to be replaced with cramped, dull-grey cubbies, efficiently stacked to split their storage space into thirds. Classrooms that once held fewer than twenty students were now packed to the brim, crammed with as many bodies as they could possibly fit.
Rampant frustrations and stresses of the sudden change exposed a very unpleasant side of Visions' performance-forward culture.
The door just missed them as she stormed past, barely skipping a step to sneer at Miles. "We'll be calling your guardian in the morning."
"W-What!?" Judge sputtered, the fog of the early hour robbing him of his eloquence. "Why!?"
The door snapped shut behind her.
"Sorry, boys," Salas sighed, lifting a freshly emptied Erlenmeyer flask. One of Judge's personal projects, no doubt, based on his outraged gasp. "All lab equipment must remain in the labs. No exceptions."
"It's not the school's!"
"Any personal equipment must be logged and stored safely with your instructor. Those are the rules. They're in your handbooks."
"Name one student that's actually read them."
"It's out of my hands," Salas explained robotically.
Judge's scoff fell into a growl. "Fine. But it's mine. Why is Miles getting in trouble?"
"You share a dorm," he droned on. "You are both responsible for contraband and your exemplary record speaks for itself. Morales is already under suspicion for drug use."
"She can't accuse him of something and then use that accusation as evidence!" Judge's indignation temporarily overtook his fatigue. "That's virtually authoritarian!"
"Detention, Dredden. Show some respect."
"Respect!?"
"Judge…" Miles swiped vaguely at his shoulder. His roommate got away with a lot, but it wasn't wise to push it. "S'fine."
It wasn't like Aaron would get angry.
"Those pompous bastards!"
Well, he wouldn't get angry at Miles.
"I can't believe they're allowed to pull that shit!"
At this point, Miles was half convinced Aaron wasn't even talking to him anymore. Aimless ranting about Visions wasn't that uncommon of an occurrence.
"Of course, you weren't hungover! Like I'd let you leave the house unable to handle your shit. And the way those assholes look at me, like I'm exactly who they were expecting…"
"Uncle Aaron, it's fi—"
"It's not fine, Miles. You've got to stand up for yourself. No one else will, especially not now."
Miles scoffed and shook his head. Aaron was great, but sometimes he acted like the world owed them better. As if Thanos inflicted the worst of it on their family, specifically. "I'm pretty sure that's how kids get expelled. It's a competitive school. They'd take any excuse to give my spot away to someone better."
A very manly 'yelp' escaped Miles' lips as he held on for dear life when the bike jerked to the side. Aaron looked back at him.
"Watch the road!"
Aaron snorted and straightened the handlebar. "The hell you mean, 'better'?"
"Ya'know, performance. Someone to bump their stats."
"I sign your report cards, Miles. Your grades are fine."
"Fine isn't cutting it. Not at Visions."
Aaron huffed. "You're the only one keeping you there, Miles. There are closer schools. Easier schools."
"We're Davises. We don't do 'easier'."
It was hard to tell with the helmet on, but from his pose, Miles assumed Aaron was rolling his eyes. "Yeah, sure, Jeff."
He was teasing, but Miles couldn't help the warmth that spread through his chest at the comparison to his father.
"You feel okay to eat? We can grab breakfast on the way."
The groan from Miles' stomach briefly overtook the roar of the bike's engine.
Chuckling, Aaron took the next turn off their usual route home. "Great. We'll stop by Louie's."
"You can finish the orange juice. There's DayQuil in the bathroom. If you need anything else, shoot me a text; I'll grab it after work." Aaron paused in the doorway, his helmet tucked under his arm. "You sure you're good?"
Miles waved him off from his spot on the couch, right below Gerald's pouncing paw. "I already feel loads better. I'll be fine." Gerald—a sharp, purple tiger shrouded in wicked lightning—was a favoured character of Aaron's from his youth, and as such, was featured heavily in several of his paintings scattered across the city's plenitude of neglected walls. Aaron claimed Gerald was a source of good fortune. After all, he was only ever caught twice while painting him.
Miles wasn't sure if that last part was meant to be a joke. Aaron tacked it on at the end every time Gerald came up—as if he was reciting an inside joke of some kind—but was suspiciously tight-lipped about any specifics. Joke or not, Aaron still always made sure to hang some form of Gerald up in a prominent spot everywhere they stayed.
Aaron's acute eyes roamed up and down Miles' slumped posture, scanning for any lingering discomfort. Apparently satisfied, he nodded once. "Alright. Rest up."
The door clicked shut.
Miles' stomach growled again.
Seriously? At Louie's, he had to order more food than he could ever remember consuming in a single sitting. Aaron claimed it was normal—he was a growing boy, Aaron could eat half his weight when he was Miles' age—but even after a comprehensive second breakfast Miles barely felt sated.
His gut only ramped up its grumbling, insistently tugging at his windpipe and making a general nuisance of itself.
"Shut up!" Miles chided his body. At this rate, he was going to eat them out of their apartment. Was this what puberty was? The horrorshow that was Eighth Grade Health never mentioned any of this! Or maybe it did. Miles didn't have a clue how any parent expected a thirteen-year-old kid to pay attention while some crone was fondling medical charts.
It was throwing a full tantrum now. Forget somersaults, it was running a ten-point acrobatic routine, flipping and tumbling down the lane before sticking a flawless landing.
"Ugh! Fine! Be right back, Gerald," Miles sighed up at the painting and stretched. Stupid body. He stomped over to the pantry and poured himself a bowl of dry cereal. Aaron didn't allow wet foods on his nice, red leather couch.
His cereal in hand, Miles plopped back into his seat and switched the television on. Time to finally beat this godforsaken dungeon.
Glug Jumper! was the latest release from the Jumper! games, an action-adventure open-world series with a multiversal twist. Every game was set in a new universe with its own bosses, NPCs and general mayhem, including a new name based on each universe's word for 'Reality'. Branjo Jumper! and Phylos Jumper! were both excellent, but a loud minority of dumbasses complained that they were too easy and were beaten too quickly to be worth the sixty-dollar price tag.
The devs called their bluff with "Kraven's Crypt", an area so hard it inspired a separate speedrunning category. In it, Jumper (the player character) was stripped of all of his gear and forced into the labyrinthian tomb of the fabled Kraven the Hunter. To escape, players then had to steal and break Kraven's spear—thus restoring peace to the village above—before the Hunter's ghost added him to his wall of trophies.
The maze was randomly generated every time, with curved walls Kraven could phase through. Scores of additional monsters and mooks spawned infinitely inside to distract the player. Legendary treasure chests mocked them from across unclearable chasms. The platforming was finicky and fickle. Most puzzles were nonsense. Every QTE had to be frame-perfect, lest the dreaded, obnoxiously gorey 'THE HUNTER COLLECTS HIS TROPHY' endscreen catch and mock them for the nth time. Game journalists called it "the biggest middle finger to completionists ever produced by a AAA publisher." But what really pissed everyone off were the death parameters.
If the player opened the inventory, they died. If they paused the game, they died. If they stopped moving for more than five seconds, they died. Tutorials for exploits to make it playable flooded YouTube, as did thousands of clips of notable gaming creators rage-quitting after hours without tangible progress. And the entire debacle was only exacerbated by the sole dev responsible, Sergei Kravinoff, who immediately took to Twitter quote-tweeting every verified name that mocked the Jumper! series with the "Time Played" meme format.
The only saving grace to the game's ratings was that the dungeon wasn't mandatory, and it was otherwise a stellar entry in an awesome series.
That didn't stop Miles, though.
"Goddamnit!" He barely resisted the urge to throw the remote across the room after the seventh time his hitbox just barely clipped into a hidden spike. "Screw this!" He jammed his thumb into the power button with as much malice as he could muster before dropping the controller on the couch next to him.
Or, he tried to, at least.
Miles dangled his hand in front of his face, staring—dumbfounded—at the controller stuck to his palm.
"What on Earth?" He reached over with his other hand to pry it off, but the controller/hand hybrid came with it, locking his arms into a loop. He went to rub at his eyes, but the thought of him running around blind with his thumbs fused to his face was enough to give him pause.
Okay, what could it have been? He had some wood glue in his room, but that would have been noticed ages ago and wouldn't have dried so quickly.
He tried to force his hands apart but lacked the leverage to make a real effort.
Judge had been over last weekend. Maybe he was working on some sort of delayed adhesive and got it on the controller? It wouldn't be the first time Miles ran afoul of one of his roommate's experiments.
His knee got involved next. The couch was too soft, so Miles slapped his foot on the coffee table to create an anchored pillar that he might pry through his fused hands.
Three. Two. One—pull!
Sweat gathered around his hairline. Pain flared in his hands as his skin stretched away from his flesh. The controller began to creak ominously. He was seconds away from calling it when—
Crack!
Hard plastic shrapnel flew everywhere, pattering Miles' chin and falling into the collar of his t-shirt. Thankfully, his eyes were already closed. The noise must have triggered something in his brain.
He slammed his fist into the cushion, the remaining shards still stuck to his fingers digging deep into his burning palm.
Damn it, Judge!
He was buying him a new one! A good one, too! Brand new, customised. The works. Miles was gonna bleed him dry if he could. The bastard knew that he was in the middle of hunting Kraven's. And even worse, Judge didn't tell him what he'd done.
Miles ran his fingers through his hair to brush out any clinging flecks before finally blinking his eyes open.
Oh God, he was bleeding! Both of his hands were completely stained the same deep maroon as the couch itself…
The exact same maroon. And his hands weren't wet. No pain, either. The closest he had to a cut was a few tingling scratches around his wrists. They looked shiny, but only superficially. Like someone had tattooed the warping highlights directly into his skin; the patterns were all wrong for fresh blood. His eyes drifted down between his legs, slowly widening at the sight of the bright, reflective leather cushion below.
His knees turned Gerald-purple.
He slapped his hand over his eyes, just barely catching the skin of his palms crackling with veins of tiger's signature blue lightning.
Nope! He was seeing things. He was pretty sure he'd read about this on WebMD—post-fever hallucinations. A common side effect of imaginary hangovers.
Miles pushed off the couch and tripped drunkenly around the coffee table, his eyes still stubbornly squeezed shut. His flailing hands did very little to help his balance but did wonders in toppling everything that wasn't nailed down. He was pretty sure he heard at least three things break as he stumbled through the hall to his room, cradling the wall to keep his bearings.
He found purchase on the cool metal of his doorknob and threw himself forward, beelining straight into his closet and slamming it shut.
Miles drew his knees up to his chest and finally let his eyes flutter open. Breathe. Everything was okay. He waved his hand in front of his face. The dark, vague silhouette did wonders to calm his racing heart. No veins of lightning. No couch-leather striations. Black, just like everything else.
Everything was fine.
He lowered his hand down to the light streaming through the crack under the door, and let out a soft sigh of relief.
He needed to get out of the house.
On his way to the Keep, Miles tried to recreate the change. A bead of sweat rolled down the side of his face as he glared down at his clenched fists.
"And… green!" He flexed his shoulders and wrists, trying to will the colour over his skin.
No dice. He felt like a child again, trying to use the Force on the remote after the high from watching Star Wars for the first time. He glanced around the street. A few people were going about their day, but no one gave him a second glance. Gotta love New York.
"Red!"
…
"Blue!"
…
"Black!"
Yes! It was slight, but he was definitely slightly darker! Holy crap, he had—he was… How… What…
He stepped out from under the tree's shade, allowing the sun to wash over his form again.
Oh.
Did he really just imagine the whole thing? Was he still sick? He felt better. It was so real.
"Hey, hot shot! Shouldn't you be in school?"
Miles looked up; he'd arrived. Before the squatters moved in, the Keep used to be Miles' old middle school (Go Knights!), abandoned for better-funded facilities after the Decimation. He'd walked there so many times, now, it was basically muscle memory.
A busker was sitting under Sir Gwen as always, his iconic guitar—not that Miles had ever actually seen him play it—lying across his lap.
"Hey, Tom. I woke up sick, they sent me home."
Tom narrowed his eyes shrewdly. "Then whatcha doin' here?"
"I'm fine now. I figured I might as well use my time productively."
A sudden look of understanding washed across Tom's wrinkled face. "Ah! Of course." He winked dramatically. "You're a good kid, Miles. Whenever I 'got sick', I was wasting away with my dealer. I wouldn't have been caught dead in a place like this."
Miles snorted and waved him off. Tom was great, just a little rough around the edges. He didn't bother correcting him that he was sick.
As he walked up the stairs, he made sure to slap Sir Gwen's hand on his way in. For luck.
Sir Gwen was a suit of armour shoddily constructed from cardboard, bottlecaps and newspapers, held together through a healthy mix of paper clip chains and prayer. The squatters had a big project with all the kids decorating him while the adults figured out how to keep him standing. They got maybe ninety per cent of the job done, but couldn't figure out how to handle the extra weight of his tin foil sword. Eventually, they just replaced his hand with an open palm and claimed it was a salute. Everyone else gave him high-fives.
He was a little rough to look at—covered top to bottom in crayon smiley faces and glitter—but he was sturdy. They couldn't ask for a better-fitting mascot. And he acted as a sentry of sorts, watching over the kids and warding off their demons. Steadfast and stoic, his hand forever held forward.
Their own, local Avenger.
"Hey! It's Miles!"
"Miles?"
"Morales! ¿Cómo estás?"
Grinning, Miles clasped the offered hand and thumped the man on the back. He didn't recognise him—so not a regular—but he clearly knew Miles. "Bien, bien. You?"
"I'm okay." The man's smile took on a sadder tilt. "Things have been better lately."
"That's great."
"Miles Gonzalo Morales! Why aren't you in school?"
Miles froze in place as the gathering crowd scattered to the winds. Cowards.
He held up his hands in surrender. "I got sick. They pretended I was high and sent me home."
Gloria Davila. The impromptu leader of the Keep and source of the best wheatcakes this side of the East. She gripped the sides of Miles' head and stared deep into his eyes.
"Okay," she nodded and let him go. "You're telling the truth. That sucks. What happens to you, then?"
"Well, they can't do anything permanent to me without a full inquiry, so they called Uncle Aaron. Probably have a detention or two when I get back."
"You feeling better, though?"
"Yeah, loads. I just wanted to clear my head a bit, cool off."
"I get it," Gloria said sagely. "I'll clear your usual spot. Any chance you saw Bailey on your way in? Can't find him anywhere. Figures—he vanishes the second it's his turn to clean the kitchen."
And that was why Miles liked her so much. She never pried, never pushed, never pitied. She respected everyone's boundaries but made it known she was available whenever they needed her.
Her stepfather's sticker was the thirty-first added to the mural, just after Ruby Delmar's.
Miles shook his head. "No, sorry. I can do the kitchen, though."
"Can you?" Gloria beamed with pride and relief. "That would be great. We've got to start on lunch soon." She made to wave over some of the older kids in the back, but Miles cut her off.
"Nah, it's fine. I got it."
She dropped her hand. "You sure? It's a bit of a mess."
"I'm not feeling super personable right now. Wanna work some of this off before I start the interviews."
Gloria shrugged and patted him on the back. "Thanks, kid," she said, before leaving to handle another of her countless responsibilities. Miles was glad to alleviate at least one.
He made his way to the kitchen, greeting all the full-timers as he passed. Several waved back, relaxing slightly as they saw that it was him. More simply nodded, fully used to his presence but unwilling to offer their fraternity. Miles didn't take offence. He would struggle to come up with a viewpoint on relationships that he'd find unreasonable considering the circumstances.
He hip-checked the door open, extracting a soft smile from a kid sitting beside it, before freezing with abject horror at the disaster that awaited him.
"A bit of a mess? Good god, woman, the hell does a full mess look like?"
The kitchen was a battlefield of culinary carnage. Pots and pans lay strewn across countertops like fallen soldiers, their once gleaming surfaces now black beneath a crust of charred pasta. Spatters of tomato viscera adorned the walls and tiles in grisly clumps. The sink overflowed with dirty dishes threatening to engulf the entire room in a tidal wave of suds and despair. And amidst the pandemonium—dominating the centre of the wholly wrecked room—was a verifiable mountain of streamers, napkins, wet wipes and popcorn buckets nearly as tall as he was, precariously balanced on two garbage-bin-shaped legs.
"Gloria, what the f…" He trailed off before he could finish that thought, glancing at the woman through the serving window. She looked up from her clipboard and raised a single, unimpressed eyebrow. Somehow, she always knew. Miles shuddered and rolled up his sleeves.
He finished far faster than he'd expected. He slipped into a vague fugue, barely realising the passage of time as he swept, scrubbed and stacked. It was meditative. Or at least as close as Miles had ever come to the state described by his mother's yoga teacher. By the time he was done, his shirt had been soaked fully through and he was covered, head-to-toe, in suds. There was a dull ache in his palms, and the tips of his fingers resembled pink prunes.
But the results spoke for themselves. The kitchen looked spectacular. The brushed steel sparkled in the afternoon sun. The pots and pans hung neatly in rows, dripping water onto a line of paper towers. Miles could almost clock his reflection in the speckled linoleum. His shoulders groaned like frozen taffy—and he was half-pitched off cleaning solvent—but all of that was offset by the sharp satisfaction of a job well done.
The doors swung inward as Gloria stepped through her head turned down towards her clipboard. "Hey kid, just checking how you're—holy shit!" The board clattered to the tiled floor.
Miles smiled proudly, holding his arms wide. "I'm a god, Gloria. I shall henceforth be known as Milus, Patron King of Custodians and Scullery!"
Gloria rolled her eyes and picked her clipboard back up. "I was going to ask if you'd changed your mind about taking the help, but I guess you were serious. Christ, if this is what you can do after a hard day, maybe I should be meaner to you."
"Of course. Just what the doctor ordered; another hit to the ego," Miles pressed his hand to his chest, posing for an imaginary spotlight.
"Alright," she chuckled, propping the door open for him. "Your fan club's in your usual spot."
Miles nodded back into the kitchen. "Just gotta get the trash, tell 'em I'll be right there."
Gloria looked at him like he'd grown a third arm. "I can get someone else to haul it, kid. You've done plenty."
Miles shrugged. "The job won't feel complete 'til I see it done."
"You're weird sometimes, ya' know that?" But she didn't protest further. She patted his cheek gratefully and left.
In total, the volume of garbage was enough to fill both commercial bins way past the point of overflowing. Miles sighed and took out a third bag.
"Last leg, Miles. You got this."
The bins were too wide for most household bags—the sorts with the plastic drawstrings Miles could tie off. Instead, he had to underfill each bag until he had enough slack to scrunch his own ties. That wasn't normally an issue for most scenarios but—for Miles—there was one tiny consequence that made all the difference in the world when dealing with more than two bags.
There were no handles he could wrap around his forearms. It wasn't feasible to even attempt holding onto multiple bags in one hand. Miles knew from experience that path led only to torn plastic and ruined shoes. Now, a patient person (Judge) would say the solution was so obvious the issue wasn't worth mentioning. He (Judge) might even say that Miles was being ridiculous for bringing it up in the first place and that the damage to his sneakers was entirely his fault.
Those people (Judge) weren't only children and therefore weren't forced to take the trash out every day by default, and so they (Judge) could never understand the deep-seated trauma of multiple trips.
So, instead of spending the extra minute it would have taken for another trip to the dumpster, Miles spent nearly five threading a fourth garbage bag beneath the knots of the first three to make a rancid bola/vest he could hang off his shoulders. The smell was overpowering. Every step took twice as long and was half as short. He felt like he was on the verge of falling constantly and the weight added to the harshest workout Miles felt in weeks.
It was worth it.
The journey to the garbage pile was precarious, but sooner than he'd expected, Miles was dropping them into the week's pile downwind of the kitchen's side door. Raccoons had gotten to it, and a foul yellow puddle had pooled in the uneven pavement. His eyes watering, Miles held his breath as he turned back towards the door just in time to see Bailey inches from knocking him over.
"Jesus!" With an athleticism that eluded him on his best days, Miles jumped to the side at the last second. Bailey—who had always been a little too tall for his feet—wasn't so lucky. At least the garbage cushioned his fall… "You alright, man?"
Bile swelled in Miles' throat as he helped Bailey up to his feet. He was pretty sure some of the yellow liquid got in the poor boy's mouth. He glanced down to mask his disgust.
"Your shoes are untied."
Bailey gaped at him, not appearing to notice the smell. "You…" He keeled over in a gagging fit. He must've finally tasted it.
"There's orange juice in the kitchen, you want some?" Miles rubbed his back sympathetically. "You know Gloria's been looking for you, right?"
"Ru—" Bailey cut himself off, coughing. He was several years older than Miles, but at that moment, Miles couldn't help but feel responsible for him. He kept trying to speak, but all that came out were hollow wheezes.
"C'mon, man. Let's get you inside." He looked alright, but it was a nasty spill.
"No!" It was the first intelligible thing he's said. He reached up and dragged Miles down by the collar, his breath curdling in Miles' nose. "Run."
What?
"This way!"
Footsteps. Too many to count. Bailey got a wild look in his eye before he slammed his fists into Miles' chest. Not very hard. Bailey must have been in worse shape than Miles thought cause he barely felt anything, but it was enough for Miles to let go.
"Run," he whispered again, before doing just that, carelessly kicking through the garbage without a second glance.
Miles could be self-deprecating sometimes, but he never claimed to be stupid. He ran. Though he was slightly more mindful of where he was placing his shoes.
The duo rushed across the campus in the weirdest, most convoluted game of hide-and-seek tag Miles had ever been in. One where they never saw who was 'it' and the game didn't seem to have a time limit. Bailey would have them duck down, tip-toe, or full-on sprint with no appreciative cadence or logic. Miles hadn't moved this much since his injury. His back felt like someone had poured liquid nitrogen down his spine, but otherwise, he felt… fine.
Better than fine, he felt good.
Miles hated Judge nagging him about his rest, but his roommate wasn't exactly overreacting. Miles got tired easily. It was annoying on the best days and utterly debilitating on his worst, but it was a fact about his new life he was finally starting to accept.
So what the hell was happening to him?
But he didn't have the time to dwell on it. Bailey kept pushing them forward until they reached the opposite corner of the school. Miles never got closer to the people chasing them than he had back in the alley. He just wasn't sure if that was because Bailey's erratic directions were actually working, or if their pursuers simply hadn't followed them past the garbage.
Finally, the burning of Miles' confused indignation outpaced his fears of getting caught. "What the hell, man? If we were just trying to get out we could have taken a left from the main alley and walked the fifty feet to the subway."
Bailey kept his eyes ahead—never looking in one spot for longer than a second. "We couldn't. They were waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs."
Miles blinked. "What stairs? You mean at the front entrance? I'm talking about the gate."
"The stairs at the bottom of the subway entrance. Three waiting there, two more by the turnstiles."
"The hell you talking about, man?" Miles asked, throwing his hands in the air. "You listened to their plans or something?"
"Sure." Bailey's lips pulled very thin. "C'mon. Two more blocks, we'll hail a cab." He grabbed Miles' shoulder and forced him down the sidewalk.
Miles slapped him away. "No! Just stop!" he shouted, making a 'time-out' gesture with his hands.
Bailey turned but kept walking backwards. "We can't afford to stop right now. I'll explain when we're safe."
Miles waved back towards the school. "There's no one here! No one is chasing us, Bailey!"
But Bailey wasn't listening. "They are. I bought us a couple minutes, at most, but they're coming."
He was getting too far for Miles to hear him without shouting now. He cursed under his breath and ran to catch up. "Then at least tell me who they are. Who's coming?"
"Fair enough," Bailey sighed. "They're called the Last Stand. They're this sort of fringe, anti-Avengers group. After the Accords were signed, nothing truly changed. Or so they claim. The Decimation was just icing on the cake for them. Another example of the Avengers playing God and failing to keep the normal people out of it."
"But… what?" Miles faltered, straining to remember the specifics of the Titan's madness. "The Accords were about sovereignty and collateral damage. Thanos was in space and trying to kill everybody. The hell do the Accords have to do with anything?"
Bailey shrugged. "I dunno, man, just telling you what they say. Last Stand believes that the Accords were nothing more than posturing. They haven't properly been enforced since they were first introdu—get down!"
Miles' lungs rapidly deflated as he hit the ground, Bailey laying half on top of him. It felt like his teeth had been knocked clean out of his gums as he wheezed through the pain."What the shit man? Bailey?"
He wasn't moving.
"Dude? Bailey?" He slapped him on the arm. Nothing. "Bailey! Get up, man. Oh, shit. Shit, shit, shit!" Miles rolled him over and tried not to swallow his tongue. "Okay, get it together. You got this, Mom taught you the steps. No-No-GO, No-No-GO…"
Wait, Miles! What about the ABCs?
First 'No' was already covered. He wasn't awake, he wasn't responding.
No, Miles, we were told that the ABCs were wrong!
Why would Mom tell us about the ABCs if they were wrong?
What was the second 'No'? Pulse?
What's wrong with ABCs, it's so much easier to remember.
Clearly not, if we don't know if they're still being used.
But we still remember what they are!
"Shut up!" Miles shouted. At whom, he wasn't sure, but it seemed to help. "Calm down, Miles, you'll be fine. First question: is he awake? No. Second question…" What was it? "Breathing! Is he breathing normally?"
Miles held his knuckles beneath Bailey's nose and kept a keen eye on his chest. He was breathing! But they were shallow and slow. Was that abnormal enough?
Miles, his neck.
Miles paused. There was a nasty-looking bruise spreading from a burnt ring on his neck. It looked like someone had coloured in his veins with a bleeding blue Sharpie. "Oh, my God…" He quickly scanned the rest of his body and found two more bruises—on his back and left ankle—plus a fourth hole in the pavement a foot to their right.
Run, NOW!
"We gotta get out of here." Miles gritted his teeth and threw one of Bailey's arms over his shoulder. "Work with me, man. Wake up, please." His voice broke.
Just like with the garbage bags, Miles found his footing quickly. He didn't feel particularly stable, but it was enough to drag Bailey into the closest alley. A dead-end, ending with a dirty, crooked door, painted a chipped green-grey. At least they weren't out in the open anymore.
The point of No-No-GO is to avoid hesitating, Miles.
"Gotta go," Miles whispered, trying to steady his breathing as he lay Bailey flat on his back. "If he's fine, he'll wake up. 'Always err on the side of trying,' right? One-ten beats…" He started humming frantically as he counted them off. One. Two. Three. Four. "Another one bites the dust!" Oh Christ, no! Of all the songs in the world?
Metal dragged against metal. Click.
Miles kept his head down.
One. Two. Three. Four. Another one bites the dust.
Boots scraped against the sidewalk. It felt like Miles had swallowed a full lemon, skin and all.
One.
Two.
A slow, ramping whine rang out from the mouth of the alley. Like the flash charging on a disposable camera, only deeper. Heavier.
Three.
Four.
Miles looked up into the barrel of a gun and vanished.
ANNOUNCEMENT!
I, alongside five other writers, have banded together to found Detective Comics Adapted For Fanfic, or DCAFF for short. It's what it sounds like: a fresh, fanfic-adaption of the DC Universe. One continuity, multiple different series/characters. New timeline, new worldbuilding, new power systems, the whole nine.
Just search for DCAFF on FFNet, AO3 or SpaceBattles—we're the page with the coffee cup (get it?).
P.S.: If you have an idea for a DC story/character you'd like to try adapting, get in touch. It's a big universe, we could use the help.
Sincerely,
The Founders: Wolf, Ragnarok, Manke, Pincoat (daz me), Stella & Orion
LAUNCH DATE: 31 October, 2024.