[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

◈ ◈ ◈

Everything was going according to plan.

Right down to their timing of the shift change, it felt more like he was infiltrating a military-operated institution rather than a second-rate “hey let’s see how many people we can fuck over today” insurance company. The security was absurd – six guys for a two-story building, cameras in every corner (including the bathrooms), and an alarm system that – if Charlie, their contact inside the company who was one microwave dinner away from wrapping tinfoil around his head and screaming about the impending invasion, could be trusted – was linked up with a specific patrol unit of the SFPD – the kind of guys who shot first and asked questions later.

Lennon had picked Quali-T Insurance out of a handful of prospective marks after spending about a month sorting through articles and reviews – mostly lawsuits and complaints which all seemed to be swept under the rug. It was pretty clear the company was doing more than luring people in with low premiums only to crank it up after the first month into the realm of the obscene, but Lennon hadn’t really been able to find much else on them.

Not that it mattered – they were only after a couple files that had been stored away in the archives of their main office building.

In and out, easy peasy.

The first floor had more than enough windows to provide Royal with a point of entry into just about any room he wanted; the trick had been to figure out which windows were out of sight of the cameras’ field of view, which had taken them the most time, considering they had had to coordinate with three very nervous, very uncomfortable employees who wouldn’t even share their names – just in case everything all went to shit.

Fair enough.

The archives were in the basement – which was great, considering the heaviest of the security was on the second floor. He’d managed to dance around the cameras, but the last he’d had to cut off.

Three minutes.

Three minutes before there would be a response.

It only took one and a half to grab the files; one to snap all the pictures he needed; ten seconds to put it back.

Twenty seconds.

The glass of his “suit” shifted in colour to match the pasty white matte of the building’s tragically bland interior as he paused at the door, listening for voices or footsteps or the sound of anything amiss.

Fifteen seconds.

Mirrored mask over his face, he didn’t have any air to breathe – not that he needed it – but he still grimaced behind it, going through the motions of sucking in a steadying breath through his teeth out of habit. In the next moment, the door was open, and Royal was dashing across the hallway, keeping to the same path he’d taken before.

Ten seconds.

The alarm went off – blaring and glaring and loud – and the suddenness of it jolted him forward. He stumbled, staggering just for a moment into the last camera’s range, but his foot blended with the carpet enough that, though there was the clear noise of running feet in the hallway, the guard stationed at the security desk didn’t seem to notice.

With one last leap, Royal threw himself through the window. Only, instead of crashing, smashing glass like what one might have expected had one been watching the whole scene, the smooth surface of the glass rippled like water, and he passed through as easily as if he’d just jumped through an empty hole in the wall.

The window pane immediately solidified as he hit the ground running; the smooth, form-fitting glass (including what was usually his mirrored mask) shifted to match the greens and browns of the grassy, carefully landscaped exterior. In the half-light of the street-lamps, however, it was difficult to mask himself completely – not that it mattered much to Royal; after all, as far as he knew, his pursuers were still searching the building, not outside of it.

Careful to tread lightly but quickly, he hurried toward the street, scanning the sidewalk for any passersby, and, just like it always did, the world decided to toss a particularly massive wrench into his otherwise flawless evening.

The guy was at least a head taller and was definitely twice his weight in pure muscle. He had that look: that wide-eyed “I need to do something” expression all the idiots and their dogs wore when they realized someone was doing something they shouldn’t be doing. Only… this guy looked like he meant it, and he definitely had the muscle to back himself up.

Uncertain of what the other guy was capable of but well aware of exactly how many bullets would soon have his name all over them if he hesitated, Royal opted for the unknown - after all, one guy in comparison to six plus soon-to-be-shooting cops? He wasn't a specialist in probability, but he preferred his odds taking on the big boy, if it even came to that. With a quick, cocky wave, his featureless mask once more shimmering into a mirrored surface that reflected the man’s own expression back at him, he sprinted past.

He just needed to get out of the parking lot and down to the overpass; a minute dash tops.

Just… stay there, big guy. Even had he had the air to say the words out loud, he doubted the meat-head would have listened to him away. Fuck.

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

”Die.”

”Stop it.” He moaned for the thousandth time.

”You deserve to die.”

”Stop.”

”You’re a killer, an eye for an eye.”

”Stop.”

”Yeah, stop!”

”Stop.” He mumbled, defeated. It had become his mantra for the night. He’d been plagued by voices all day, and they’d only been getting worse. He’d been stumbling aimlessly down the thankfully empty street, hoping that some change of scenery would distract his mind enough that it would hinder the voices.

”They are watching you.”

So far, no luck.

He was a little behind on his Haldol. He didn’t break into the pharmacy until he was clean out - he wanted to put that part off for as long as possible - but it turned out the pharmacy was clean out as well. He was a day behind maybe, but he was already starting to feel the effects. His mind felt jumbled, like there was a fly buzzing around inside his head. It was unpleasant. It wasn’t bad enough that it physically hurt, but it was certainly annoying. Or maybe it was just the fact he hadn’t had an alcoholic beverage inside of him since this morning. That usually kept him pretty numb; maybe he’d just removed the numbness, that was the problem. Whatever it was it was annoying as hell and he just wanted it to go away, but he couldn’t quite connect the pieces of how to do so.

As he was trying desperately to gather his thoughts, a man suddenly landed on the ground in front of him. Was he real? He looked real, kind of. But his face changed, definitely a sign that he wasn't real. Still, stranger things were real nowadays. The man stared back at him, holding something, and quickly took off running in his direction. It took him a second to put two and two together until Tect commented:

”He is running away from a crime.”

But by that point the man was already past him.

”Go get ‘em!” Clara encouraged enthusiastically.

With a shake of his head, Brian increased the muscles in his legs and took off after the man. ”Wait! Come back!” He shouted after him. ”I won’t hurt you!”

”He’s not going to listen to you, fucking idiot.”

That was true, but it didn’t hurt to try. With the increased strength in his legs, Brian caught up to the man in no time, but the man kept running. ”Stop, please stop!” But he didn’t stop. With a deep breath, Brian increased the strength in the right arm and punched the man in the side, not enough to hurt him, just enough to knock him to the ground and stop him.

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

◈ ◈ ◈

Big Boy wasn’t just big. He was fucking fast.

Royal didn’t consider himself the peak of humanity’s physical performance – there were plenty of other people better at that sort of stuff than he was. Stronger, faster… not so much the endurance bit, but he accepted that he cheated pretty hard on that one, so anyone with blood and bone got a pass in comparison.

This guy, though… he flew.

Not literally – a distinction that crossed his mind the moment he thought the words – considering there were now people who actually could fly, but the amount of time it took for Big Boy to catch up was disconcerting at the very least.

It was pretty clear his snap decision to test his chances was gearing up to bite him in the ass, but he didn’t stop – even when the guy asked him to in what had to be the politest chase he’d ever been in. A part of him almost reflexively tried to mutter a curt, “Sorry, man.” Usually, when someone was shouting at him to stop, they were pretty pissed about it.

Big Boy just seemed sort of… down.

Royal tried to pull out ahead, his own legs of glass moving with almost robotic efficiency, but, while there was no strain of encroaching fatigue thanks to his unique biology – if it was even in the realm of a living organism anymore –, he just didn’t have the speed. His limit was set, and there was no pushing past it.

He considered, as Big Boy asked him to stop with all the force of an apologetic kid who just spilt his ice cream on someone else’s shoes, evening the odds and scattering half of his get-up to trip-up his follow-up, but the half-baked plan quickly spiralled out of the pan to splatter all over the street and-

Holy shit.

The guy straight up punched him.

It wasn’t enough to completely shatter him – and though he experienced pain very differently from the average human, he felt enough of it to know that there was a hell of a lot more force behind that controlled ham of a fist. His protective layer of glass wasn’t prepared for the sudden contact, and it immediately splintered into a radiating spider’s web of fractures, clinging to his body for the four seconds it took before he bounced along the hard concrete of the sidewalk, now at the mercy of his own interrupted momentum.

The first bounce shattered the glass around his torso and arms – it was a surprisingly quiet ordeal, like a distant, discordant wind chime. The second sent a sizeable series of cracks across his back and up around his neck. The third used up the rest of his momentum and left him blinking – disoriented – from behind the now cracked, mirrored mask that kept his identity safe for the moment.

He’d made it to the overpass – something he determined more by sound than sight, the world still spinning as it was – which was better than getting knocked down in the parking lot of the company he’d just stolen from. But, as he shook his head to try to gather up his bearings, grimacing as he felt the dull sting of the missing fragments that had splintered off from his shoulder and neck, he wasn’t sure how much better it actually was.

The bottom half of his mirrored mask seemed to melt, conforming to the shape of his lips while still obscuring everything else from the bottom of his nose up. It was the only real way he could speak while wearing the mask, but it made him look like some sort of chrome Power Ranger – not really his style.

Still… function over fashion.

“The fuck you think 'I won't hurt you’ means?” he groaned, staggering to his feet as his mask seemed to repair itself on its own, finally allowing him a good look at the shadowy figure that loomed over him. It was too dark to get a really good look, but Big Boy seemed a little worse for wear – which was saying something considering he wasn’t the one who’d just been slammed into the ground.

The scattered, shattered glass zipped back toward him, avoiding Big Boy – a precaution of “let’s not piss this guy off” more than a courtesy considering there was a good chance he really didn’t want to kill Royal – and crawling over his body like a thousand glittering bugs until his suit was once more in place. Some of the foreign glass slid into the fractures along his back, soothingly taking the place of his missing pieces.

“Alright, you stopped me,” Royal started, voice a little shaken but regaining its composure as he continued, visored eyes staring sharply at the other man’s now disproportionally sized body. He bounced just slightly on the balls of his feet, knees bents and ready; just his luck: another fucking meta. “So, what do you want, Big Boy?”

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

Brian gasped in horror as the man’s body shattered before his blow. He thought he’d killed him.

”Look who did it again!” Dennis pronounced with glea.

But then he realized that it wasn’t blood and guts that was flying out of this man, but glass. Still, that didn’t stop Brian from repeating, ”I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…” Over and over again as his voice cracked and tears started forming in his eyes. He shrunk his muscles down back to regular size. His hands were shaking, one pressed over his mouth in horror, and he simply watched, frozen in place, as the man scattered across the pavement.

”Go help him dumdum!” Clara urged.

But it didn’t look like he needed much help. His body seemed to be repairing itself. Brian flinched at his words. ”Sorry, I’m sorry I didn’t want to hurt you, I just-I wanted you to stop, I…” He floundered. He felt that cold, sinking feeling inside his chest, that feeling that he’d done something horribly, irreversibly wrong. He felt every inch of his body teeming with guilt. It wasn’t a pleasant feeling.

He watched, a little mesmerized as the man’s body formed a cohesive human figure, all expect for the face, which remained partially obscured.

”Hehe, Big Boy, I like that.” Clara giggled, ”Poor baby Brian is a Big Boy.”

Then he remembered something, something the myriad of psychologists, psychotherapists, and psychiatrists had reminded him to do on a daily basis when in their care. Reality check.

There was a good chance this glass man wasn’t real. He didn’t often have visual hallucinations, but when he did they were typically of humanoid figures. They weren’t usually this vibrant, but they could be. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anyone else around who could confirm or deny this man wasn’t real, but there were other ways to check.

”Interact with something. In the uh...in the environment.” He requested, wringing his hands nervously.

”He will lie to you.”

”Please.” He added. ”Please do this, please.”

”You’re acting like a beggar.” Sasha scoffed, ”Pathetic.”

"Please." He asked one more time, softly.

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

◈ ◈ ◈

“Worse for wear” no longer really covered the now half-mumbling, half-bumbling mess of a man in front of him. There was something… off with him; whether it was a side effect of his more-than-human nature or something else all too entirely human, the combination of instability paired with all that raw strength?

Not something he wanted to fuck around with.

The request that came was simple, but the context of it escaped him. “…what?” First Big Boy chased after him, then he punched him to get him to stop, and now he wanted him to… “You… you alright, man?”

He was pretty insistent about it – in his own weird, apologetic, pleading way.

For a moment, Royal considered throwing up a cloud of jagged glass blades and making a break for it, but Big Boy had already proven he was faster and stronger. It wouldn’t have surprised him if the guy was basically some kind of alien, meat-shifting superman whose kryptonite was most definitely not glass.

The sound of police sirens in the distance helped push him off of the fence between escape and obedience, but only enough that his toes brushed the ground.

“Yeah, okay. Sure.”

Interact with something. He shook his head, eyes still set on the other man, watching to react to any sudden movements. What a fucking weirdo.

Above them, cars sped by at an even rate, sending a cascade of differing engine noises down into the empty street below, echoing off of the cold stone and asphalt. The insurance building was out of sight, obscured by an artificial hill that helped to lift the overpass… over. There were a few parked cars, some run-down buildings, and a couple wheel-less bikes that had been abandoned on the side of the street.

There wasn’t a whole lot for him to interact with.

“Uh…”

They were standing about three paces away from each other – his paces, not Big Boy’s –, and the closest thing to their side of the street was a dilapidated town-house that hadn’t been lived in by anyone paying a mortgage in at least a decade. Though grimy, the windows were still mostly intact.

Sure, why not.

Holding up a steadying hand, fingers splayed to – ideally – give the impression he wasn’t planning on trying to take the other guy down, Royal split his focus between watching his could be assailant and yanking the glass panes from their places. There was a groaning, creaking sort of resistance for just a second before the glass came free with a scratching, shattering screech.

It darted through the air in large, dirty chunks, softening the moment it was within his arm’s reach, becoming fluid and flowing, casting off the grime in favour of a more gentle amber. He worked quickly, eyes darting between the mass of glass in front of him and the man standing on the other side. It would have been pretty easy to impale him but…

“There.” With a flick of his wrist, the amorphous blob broke into a series of letters that clattered to the ground, catching in the light of streetlamps to clearly read:

Can I fucking go now?

He let his hands fall to his sides as he stared and waited. The letters were more than just a cocky message – they were a primed and ready barrier if Big Boy had a sudden change of heart – which, judging from the way he handled himself and from what he knew of the transient population of San Francisco, he wouldn't put it past him.

The sirens were getting closer.

“I’m uh… kind of on a tight schedule here.”

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

”I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I know it’s weird, I’m sorry.” He responded shakily. No, he wasn’t alright, he knew very well he wasn’t alright, the only solace he had was that he was sane enough to be aware of his wasn’t-alrightness.

”He already knows you’re insane.” Sasha prodded, ”How sad.”

Brian sighed with relief as the man agreed to follow his plea, and watched nervously as he looked around for something to fulfill his request. He realized there wasn’t much he could interact with.

”That’s part of his plan.” Dennis whispered in his ear. A shiver shot down his spine, but he tried his best to ignore it. He had more important matters to deal with.

Brian held his breath as the man lifted his hand toward the town house, and watched as one of the window groaned and creaked and Brian flinched as it shattered and the splinters flew toward the man. He was almost afraid they’d impale him, but they halted in front of him and fell to the ground, much to his relief.

The growing sirens accelerated his anxiety, but before they could leave, he needed to check on something. ”Hold-hold on.” He requested before quickly running over to the town house and tentatively passing his hand through the open hole in the wall, then he dashed back toward the man and picked up one of the glass shards, holding it firmly in his hands. ”So you’re just a meta.” He sighed with relief. ”Okay, okay.” He slowly stood up. The sirens were getting louder. ”Look, I can help you, I can get you away from the police. I just-I just wanna talk.” He tried to explain desperately. ”I don’t, I wanna help, I don’t-” The sirens were interrupting his train of thought, his heart was pounding, his head was buzzing ferociously. They needed to get away now. ”Come with me, please. I don’t want the police to get you.”

It was then that Brian realized he had no idea what he was doing. This was the first time he’d ever interacted with a criminal before the police got to them. He had a very loose plan, but it kind of fell apart after the talking section.

”Just gotta think on your feet, Big Boy!” Clara encouraged.

”Okay.” He mumbled, his face turning bright red when he realized he was talking to his voices in front of someone else. Maybe they wouldn’t notice. ”I know it doesn’t look like it, but I can help you. Please come with me.”

”You are saying please too much.”

”Sorry.” He mumbled under his breath.

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

◈ ◈ ◈

What is it called again? Neurosis? Psychosis? One was worse, and he was pretty sure it was the one that sounded like “psycho”. Big Boy definitely had a little something extra going on that meaty head of his; it was like watching a kid – a kid with the potential to shatter him with a single, well-placed punch.

Royal’s fingers twitched, ready to cut the other guy up the moment he moved – but instead of charging him as he half-expected, Big Boy dashed over to the house to… verify.

“…the fuck?” he muttered to himself, staring with a fascinated morbidity at the relative car crash that was the other man. Guard still up, he took a reflexive step backwards when Big Boy stooped down to pick up one of the letters – the “o” in “go”, specifically.

Just a meta.

Royal was no Sherlock, but it didn’t take much to extrapolate from that little sentence that Big Boy was dealing with more than just super-powered strangers. His background in biology wasn’t well suited for psychoanalysis, but he knew enough about pop-culture and had seen enough of those sappy-sweet romantic comedies with Lennon to figure a guess that the guy had something messing with his brain.

Bi-polar? Multiple personality disorder? Schizophrenia?

Whatever it was, just one more reason not to push him.

It seemed he wasn’t the only one acutely aware of the approaching sirens; Big Boy’s eyes – already darting like a little fish in tank-too-big – seemed to fog each time the rolling noises hit their apex.

“Uh…”

Help him? 

If Big Boy hadn’t fucking knocked him to the ground earlier, he would have been strolling down 43rd right about now, getting ready to meet with Lennon at that bar on the corner across from the 7-Eleven knock-off. The only help he needed from the other man was to stop doing whatever this was.

“Look, I-“

Wasn’t there a sort of protocol for dealing with people experiencing a psychotic break? Lennon would have known, but he’d already glanced down at his phone and found it had broken sometime between getting punched and skidding along the street. At least pictures were stored on the chip because the actual body had snapped almost in half. That’s what he got for buying the cheapest piece of shit he could find.

As for Big Boy… talking was better than running or getting caught – if it actually happened. The longer he was with him, the greater the chances of something unpredictable happening; the alternative was booking it now, and he knew he wouldn’t get far before Big Boy caught up and – probably – punched him into splinters.

Talking it was.

Glad he was wearing a mask that kept the dubiety of his eyes hidden, Royal twisted his tone into a passable amiability. “Alright, Big Boy. Let’s go.”

As he took a step forward, the glass on the street lazily rose up from the cold asphalt, melting in the air into thin tendrils that snaked around his body, melding with the glass already there until there was no trace of them. “Just, you know…” he shrugged, trying to keep his voice soft and unintimidating – not dissimilar to how one might talk to a frenzied cat. “Stop apologizing. I get it.”

He tentatively patted the guy on the shoulder. “You’re sorry.”

With a nod toward their situation in general, he withdrew from their brief moment of contact, his ice-cold hand probably providing Big Boy with about as much comfort as Royal felt in that moment. “So, uh... which way?”

The sooner this was over the better.

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

He felt eyes on him, a million eyes, watching, judging. It was a feeling he was somewhat used to, but it was still quite uncomfortable. He was aware he was acting weird, which was both good and bad. Good, because it told him he was sane, bad because it provided a theater for the millions of eyes watching, and two eyes in particular, the two he actually knew to be real.

That pause made his heart sink even more. He knew he wasn’t doing a great job explaining things, and the fact that he’d just splintered the guy into several pieces a couple of minutes ago early certainly didn’t help things. But this was what he set out to do in the first place, wasn’t it? Ever since he got his powers and...came to his right mind. Now was the time, the opportunity to actually do good, to help someone. He couldn’t pass that up, no matter how much his anxiety was hindering the process.

”You can do it Brian!”

”Sure you can, Brian,” Dennis spat. ”Not like you’re going to just end up making an ass of yourself, Brian.”

Nope. He was just going to ignore them. Both of them. All of them. This was his quest. He was going to help this person. The voices would just make things worse. All of them, even Clara.

”Even me?”

He responded with a curt nod, not wanting to vocalize his response and alienate this guy even more.

He knew that tone. That ‘better walk on eggshells around this guy or he's gonna snap’ tone. It made him feel supremely self-conscious, but was far better than the more confrontational alternative. In fact, he could probably use it to his advantage.

”Sorry.” He instinctively apologized for apologizing too much. He quickly put his hand over his mouth, his cheeks turning bright red, flooded with embarrassment. ”Sorry.” He said softly one more time before once again realizing his error. He just took a deep breath through his nose and pressed his lips together, willing himself not to apologize again.

His muscles tensed as he felt the man’s hand touch his shoulder. He wasn’t used to non-combative human contact, but he didn’t remember it being this cold.

”It’s part of his powers, you imbecile.”

Of course. Of course. He was stupid. He was so fucking stupid. He- No. No time for that mental spiral into an oblivion of self-hatred. He needed to be positive. Positive...That was too strong a word. Maybe he’d just have to be not entirely negative. Yes, that would have to do.

Which way? Brian realized he hadn’t thought that far ahead. He looked around a bit to get his bearings. Luckily, his years on the streets had afforded him some street smarts. Immediately, he found a path into the back alleys of San Francisco he’d lived in so long. ”Come on.” He gestured for the man to follow him.

He took a deep breath. He better start explaining things. He couldn’t keep this guy in the dark forever, and maybe explaining what he meant by ‘help’ would make him seem a little bit more sane.

”So um...I’m Brian, so you can stop calling me Big Boy I guess, if you want to.” He introduced himself as they walked. ”So, I’m not a Hero, obviously, but I try to stop criminals and stuff and, well, help them not have to be criminals anymore I guess.” The sirens were slowly fading into the background. ”You’re actually the first person I managed to stop before the police arrived, so I don’t...really...know what I’m doing. But I figured talking would help? I don’t talk that much, so I don’t really know what I’m doing there either. I’m...I’m just trying to do some good.” He explained. ”So...um...what did you steal and..uh...why? If you don’t mind telling me. And what’s your name, or what should I call you if you...you know...don’t want to tell me.” He muttered. By now they were deep into the back alleys of San Francisco, the sirens had all but disappeared.

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

◈ ◈ ◈

Royal held in a sigh.

Out of all the crazy meta-humans running around San Francisco hoping to step up and be a “hero”, he got stuck with a hallucinating mess of gutted self-confidence. “Pathetic” was pretty accurate, but he’d spent enough time around guys in similar states to know better to outright pity him.

No one appreciated that kind of shit.

Nodding as Big Boy took the lead, Royal fell into step a few feet behind him – enough of a berth that the guy would have to at least lunge to reach him. He didn’t seem to worry that his back was exposed, which was either a sign that he didn’t need to worry about Royal trying to literally stab him in the back, or he was too lost in his own head to remember. Or both.

Better to just go along with things for now until.

Surprisingly enough, Big Boy – or “Brian” now – followed through with the talking. The more he said, the more Royal had to fight back an incredulous grin. Not only was Brian a sizzling hot mess of who knew what kind of personal issues, but he was also a fucking vigilante - a vigilante with a mission statement to reform the criminals he stopped.

He would have thought Brian was crazy if he didn’t… already know he… was.

Royal let him talk. He wasn’t feeling particularly chatty, considering he was an unofficial prisoner of an apologetic, hesitant warden who gave off a very strong suggestion that he had no idea what he was doing. He even came right out and confirmed it too.

At least he didn’t have to worry about the cops for the time being.

“Call me Shatter.” 

Lennon had picked it out, and it still sounded stupid whenever he had to use it, but it was better than telling good old Brian up ahead his actual name. A very small part of him felt a little guilty trading an alias when Brian had already – assumedly – provided his given name, but it was about as big as both his pity and his rapidly shrinking fear: enough to toss a passing thought at but nothing more than that.

“So you’re like, uh… like a meta-human councillor, huh?” He risked the exposure and took a few larger steps to catch up – not quite within reach, but much less of an awkward half-shouting distance. “Bet that licensing was a bitch.”

A little test to see just how lucid Brian actually was – and how much of his timidity was an act. He didn’t answer any question but his name; both because he didn’t want to and because he wanted to see how Big- how Brian would react.

The broken pieces of his phone had already been absorbed into his suit, stored in the centre of his back for the time being. The extra glass he’d added hid what would have otherwise been a little bump where the phone was stored. He wasn’t even really sure he needed that flawless of a hiding place, considering Brian had had to ask him to prove if he was real or not, but it was better to be safe than shattered.

Stepping over a particularly large pile of rubbish as they wound their way through yet another alley, Royal’s curiosity danced almost harmlessly in his tone and he continued. “How do you know, by the way?” He pulled ahead just enough so he could better see Brian’s face through the murky shadows. “Who’s a criminal and who’s, you know, like you?”

A double-bladed question. Another test. How far gone was this guy, and how far did he need to be pushed before Royal could get away?

He studied him in the few seconds of brief silence before he responded, and even without a sense of smell, he could tell the guy probably stunk. His hair was greasy and matted into individual locks – and not in the kind of way that the bohemian wannabes of the Pacific Northwest were so fond of wearing. Even in the shadows, his eyes looked sunken – almost hollow, had they not burned so brightly with a barely suppressed paranoia.

Brian looked like the kind of person you’d expect to find in a gutter with dark, rotting bruises in the bends of his arms and eyes glazed over.

That small part of him that had felt guilty earlier pipped up a little louder.

“Like a…" he started, amending his leading question with a mumbling clarification, "Vigilante or a... a ‘hero-hopeful’ or whatever.”

Fuck it. Brian was just as screwed by the shit-stain of a world as the people he was trying to help in his own way. Pushing him was one thing, but there was no reason to break him.

Not unless he had to.

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

He noticed how the man kept a deliberate distance behind him. His paranoia was going off like a siren in his head.

”He’s gonna stab you in the back!”

But he ignored it, admittedly with difficulty, but still he managed. He didn’t blame the man for keeping a wide berth. He had punched him after all. And he was acting a little...off. That is to say like himself. Like all the things he hated about himself.

”Like a fucking schizo!”

He flinched at Dennis’ words, but otherwise ignored them. He needed to focus. He needed to get this guy to trust him? Maybe? Yeah, that sounded like a reasonable next step.

”Shatter.” He repeated, ”So is that like a made up name, like an alias, or an actual name?” He asked. ”I guess it would be kinda weird if that was your actual name. Sorry-sorry if that is your actual name.” He added abruptly. ”I don’t have any alias or anything. Obviously. I don’t-I’m just me. And I guess that’ll have to be good enough.”

”Unfortunately.”

Brian cleared his throat to drown out the voice (to little avail). He wanted to laugh at Shatter’s comment about licensing, but found that he was unable to do little more than lift the corner of his mouth. ”No, not a counselor. And I-I don’t just deal with metahumans. I-Ideally it’s for everybody that needs help. I-” He took a deep breath to steady his shaking voice. ”The way I see it, everyone does something for a reason, and instead of punishing people for doing something wrong, we should understand the reason and...and try to fix it if it’s causing them to do something that hurts others.” He scratched the back of his head ashamedly. ”That’s an...inelegant explanation of my reasoning, but, yeah, now that I have the power to actually help people, I-I want to do that. I want to help people. No one else is.” He explained. ”That was a good joke about licensing by the way. Sorry I couldn’t laugh at it.” He apologized.

”He is testing you.”

Once again, Brian ignored the voice. They were just trying to stoke his paranoia, as always. And for once he felt he was actually getting somewhere. He wouldn’t let the voice get in the way now.

Brian pressed his lips together at Shatter’s next question. It was a tricky inquiry with a dishearteningly easy answer. ”If they’re like me they need help too.” He answered softly. ”I don’t just stop criminals by the way. I just...stop anyone who’s hurting anybody.” He elaborated. ”I try to anyway.” He scratched the side of his face, ”I don’t really call myself a vigilante or anything else. I just...I try to help.” He settled on, ”I try.”

They eventually reached a desolate alleyway with cracked concrete walls covered in graffiti. At the very end of the alley, away from the main street lay a dirty blanket where he’d been sleeping the past couple days. It was empty, and though it was lit, it was lit quite poorly. He gently spread the blanket so it laid flat on the ground and sat cross legged at one end against the wall and gestured for Shatter to sit somewhere on the blanket as well. ”I’m sorry,” he grimaced, ”it’s the best I could do, and I promise it’s not as dirty as it looks.” He persuaded. ”Please, why don’t you just sit down and tell me why you stole...whatever you did.”

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

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Man, the guy was a wreck.

Every time Brian opened his mouth, he just painted the picture of his life all the darker, drabber… it was getting difficult not to outright pity him. Royal just nodded when it came to names and alias; Brain seemed to work stuff out out-loud instead of keeping it in, which, annoying as that would have been if he’d been his roommate, Royal didn’t really care as long as he wasn’t getting punched again.

“Sure.”

If nothing else, Brian was idealistic – tragically so, judging by how screwed up he was. There were those people who were so messed up and broken that they went around trying to fix everyone else, like that would somehow make up for the fact that they were little more than a patch-worked, bloody mess of misery.

Brian seemed a lot like that.

With a shrug, all he offered in response to Brian’s good-hearted-but-way-too-naïve spiel was a quiet, “You said it fine, Brian.” There wasn’t a hint of patronization in his voice; he spent so much time with downtrodden and chewed up people just like the big guy. Nine times out of ten, it wasn’t their fault they were constantly apologizing. When the entire world was against them, what else were they supposed to do?

“God-damn,” Royal grinned – really grinned – and shook his head. It was definitely the first time anyone had apologized to him for not laughing at a joke. The grin didn’t stick though, and he let out a sigh through his half-parted lips as Brian answered his question. “So you’re… like, one of those ‘good Samaritans’, then.” Not a question, and he more muttered it to himself than presented it like it was meant for Brian to hear, not that he cared either way.

He’d found the haunted, piss-stained ghost of Mother Theresa, apparently.

It sounded like Brian cared – or wanted to care, anyway. People like him were a dime a dozen: all these plans to help make the world a better place but, usually, no way to make it happen. Little things every day – smiles on the bus, money in paper cups, a friendly wave or concerned shoulder to lean on. Only, Brian did have a way to make it happen, physically.

Mentally? Probably not so much. That had to be rough.

“Huh,” he offered, falling into pace beside him, still out of reach, but his glass-covered shoulders were much more relaxed in spite of himself.

Lennon was probably starting to get worried, but, as things stood, Royal didn’t really feel comfortable just ditching. Sure, Brian had decked him and screwed the whole night up, but he wasn’t a bad guy. Worst case scenario, he’d just wait until the big guy inevitably passed out and take his leave then. That was… what? An hour? Two tops? Brian already looked like he was ready to topple over any minute. It couldn’t be that long.

And in the meantime? Brain wasn’t the worst company.

When they “arrived”, Royal paused, legs tensing and eyes – still hidden behind his mask – narrowed toward the big guy. A dead-end alley, big muscle-shifting dude… not really an equation that produced a whole lot of fun answers.

Brain seemed to mistake the sudden shift in tension for something like… disdain or some other completely trivial shit, which helped to diffuse Royal’s well-founded fears a bit. “You run like a fucking bullet and can punch through walls, Brian.” He followed but opted to lean on the wall instead, chrome lips turning in an amicable grin. “Pretty sure you can do better than-” He waved a hand at the sorry excuse of a “home”. “-this.” There wasn’t anything dismissive in his voice – just good clean jest.

And another point in favour of Brian’s mental health; he’d not only noticed Royal hadn’t given him shit, but he even managed to weave it into a passive-aggressive little jab. No, it wasn’t quite as sly as that, but it was clear the guy wasn’t completely off the reservation. Yet.

“Uh,” more a sigh than an actual word. “Sure, yeah.”

Lennon was gonna have a fit when he got back smelling like whatever-the-fuck was growing on the wall he was leaning on.

“I didn’t technically steal anything, by the way.” Sort of. “Short story? They fucked over a shit ton of old people.” Long story, Lennon was going to use the account information he’d stolen to redirect the company’s funds into her scattered charities and funnel everything back into the lives of people who actually deserved the money. Not necessarily Quali-T’s victims – that was a little too conspicuously Robin Hood for the two of them –, but they had an ever-expanding list of candidates, and the people that shit insurance company had left in the lurch weren’t going to be forgotten.

They just might have to… wait a little bit. Which was a hell of a lot better than getting nothing at all, as far as Royal was concerned.

“So…” he sucked in some air through his teeth and shrugged. “Not hurting anyone; just lookin’ to fix someone else’s fuck-up.”

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

You said it fine. It was rare to hear reassuring words. It was...comforting. Comforting in the way a therapist talks to a client. There was certainly an imbalance of power in this interaction, and Brian most certainly wasn't on top.

”Brian, always the baby.”

“Good Samaritan, sure, if you want to stick with that.” Shatter seemed set on that label, so he accepted it. Samaritan still seemed a little strong for him, but he didn't want to fight him on this. ‘I'm not good enough to be a Samaritan’ seemed just a little too pathetic, a little too bare in his self hatred to reveal to Shatter.

Shatter’s tone was light, but his words cut deep. “I...I really can't do better. I-” He stopped himself before he said, ‘I can't trust the government.’ That sounded way too classic-paranoid-schizophrenic. But he really couldn't take part in any government institution. They would find out he escaped from the hospital, they I would figure out what he'd done and then they'd send him back to the hospital or - worse - prison. They'd take him off the Haldol and he'd lose his mind again and he'd hurt someone and- He didn't want to think that far ahead. He wasn't going to allow himself to hurt anyone ever again - not unless he had to - so he kept himself as sedated as possible, drugged up to his eyeballs on typical antipsychotics and alcohol so he couldn't hurt anybody ever again. ”I wish I could but I can’t.” He settled on.

He took a hit to his self-esteem when Shatter opted to lean against the wall rather than sit, furthering the power dynamic they’d established. Brian found himself looking up at Shatter rather than down. It felt weird, but it felt...right.

Brain listened intently at Shatter’s explanation, his skin growing cold. “Oh, so you just...you steal from bad people. Well, not bad people just like...big corporations and stuff.” He muttered with sinking realization, “I may have made a mistake.” It was an easy mistake to make, but a mistake nonetheless. Shatter could easily be lying, but he saw no reason that he would other than to just fuck with him, which, while a decent possibility, was one he chose not to focus on. Trust was a two way street after all, and if Brian couldn't trust Shatter, Shatter couldn't trust him.

”So naive,” Sasha scoffed, ”how pathetic.”

Yes he was pathetic, but he had no idea how to remedy that so he supposed he'd have to remain pathetic for the rest of his life. It was disappointing but that just seemed to be the trajectory thus far and it didn't appear to be stopping anytime soon.

So, Brian had made a mistake in punching Shatter. Shatter, it seemed, was one of the good guys, he was doing something good, helping people. ”Can...can I help?” He asked shyly in a sudden one-eighty. Shatter wasn’t hurting people, he was stopping people from hurting others. That was Brian’s modus operandi, and if stopping Shatter was hindering his ability to fight evil, he didn’t want to stop him, he wanted to do what he’d set out to do this entire time: he wanted to help.

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

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He probably could have told Brian just about anything and the guy would have believed him; that alone was reason enough to at least do him the respect of telling the truth – at least, however little of it he was willing to share, anyway. Brian’s willingness to trust him when he should have been at least suspicious was a little too childlike to sit right in Royal’s stomach. He almost preferred Brian trying to kill him than being unintentionally guilted into being nice to someone who had knocked him around.

Almost.

“You and me both,” Royal grunted, shaking his head at Brian’s little realization. His mistake had been not immediately severing the other guy’s ligaments to leave him writhing immobile on the ground as he made his escape.

It wasn’t the worst one to make though, he supposed, considering Brian was a pretty nice guy - for a crazy, homeless, super-strong, super-fast, self-deprecating weirdo, anyway.

He was an open book in that way. While Royal couldn’t read minds and wasn’t the most empathetic of human beings around, Brian’s utter lack of self-confidence oozed like a thick, putrid puss out of every orifice of his body and dripped off of every quiet, apologetic word that came out of his mouth.

It was a shame to see all that potential locked so haphazardly behind those deep-sunken eyes and nervous ticks, but it wasn’t like Royal could do anything about it, even if he’d wanted to.

“Uh- what?” He’d been expecting something like an apology or rationalization or something more… “Brian-like”. It wasn’t often he ever actually made use of rhetorical questions, but the word was out of his mouth before he could do more than half-process what it was Brian had even said. “You… wanna help?”

It took Royal a few seconds to sort through his own thoughts, settling them back into some semblance of order, before he was able to actually consider the simple offer. It wasn’t like he and Lennon couldn’t use an extra set of hands, but Brian was clearly pretty fucking unstable. They operated subtly, carefully, and, though he was sure some people would beg to differ, sanely.


Brian was… maybe one of those three things on a good day.

Then again, they worked that way primarily because it was just the two of them. Sure, they got help from people here and there – mostly normal, average citizens of the United States of America, but they’d ran into their fair share of metas and still kept contact with some of them. Brian was definitely a whacky funhouse of personal problems, but he was also a pretty insanely powerful trump card for anything they came across that needed that extra oomph.

It all came down to the classic face-off of brains and brawn; only, in this particular instance, it wasn’t a matter of intelligence so much as psychosis.

“Well uh…” he stared down into Brian’s widened eyes – not really hopeful but noticeably less dull than whenever he was harshing on himself – and those same eyes were reflected in the surface of his mask. “I think you’ve probably helped enough with this job already.”

With a short sigh, he eased himself down onto the blanket, glad that his body was no longer able to provide a nurturing environment to ticks and lice and whatever else was probably creeping and crawling just out of sight in between the fibres. “If you really wanna help, I’m gonna be straight with you, Brian. Whatever’s going on in here?” Royal tapped the side of his own head with the tips of two of his fingers. “You’re gonna have to get a handle on that shit.”

He spoke calmly and casually; there was no accusation or condescending superiority in his voice. “Pills or therapy or… I don’t know- fucking ‘crystal energies’ or whatever shit works for you.” Slowly, he nodded, more to himself than Brian, “But if you think you can manage that… yeah. Why not? Who doesn’t wanna have a fucking tank up their sleeve, right?”

Aware of what he was asking – and to whom he was asking it –, Royal shifted in place so he was squared up with the larger – and yet somehow far more timid – man. “I can probably get you uh… pills, a place to stay… some new clothes, if you need ‘em.” His words were slow and deliberate as he studied the other guy, watching his eyes and subtly searching for not only comprehension but at least the suggestion of conviction. “But don’t, you know… read anything more into it than what I’m offering. You help me, I help you.”

And if you fuck me over, I fuck you over.

◈ ◈ ◈

[Brian Harris]

Shatter’s comment left him wondering what his mistake could’ve been. He hoped desperately that it didn’t involve him, that he was thinking of some other nebulous mistake that he made in his life. But-

”You are a mistake.”

Yes, everything in his life had made that perfectly clear. But no time to go down the suicidal rabbit hole, not yet. He couldn’t break down completely in front of Shatter, not when it seemed they might actually be getting somewhere.

His muscles tightened at Shatter’s surprise. He didn’t know what he was expecting, but that reaction seemed...bad. Reasonable but bad. ”I...I told you, I want to stop people from hurting others and...that-that seems to be what you’re doing so…” He mumbled, ”I...haven’t been able to make much leverage on my own so I could...use some direction I guess.”

He watched nervously as Shatter actually considered his offer. His heart was pounding out of his chest. He’d put himself out there, for someone to judge his abilities, his worth. If he said no...well, that would be tough to recover from, but that seemed like more than a decent possibility.

Brian’s cheeks flushed as he saw his own eyes reflected back at him, staring down at him. God, he was pathetic. Like a little puppy. Well, a big puppy. A big, depressed, anxious, schizophrenic puppy, lost, alone, scared, in desperate need of someone else’s care. Because god knew he couldn’t take care of himself.

”You’re disgustingly infantile.”

”I like puppies!”

Some of the tension in his body was relieved as Shatter took a seat on the blanket. The power dynamic between them became somewhat less uncomfortable.

Was that a yes? Kind of? Sort of? Would he actually be able to be a part of something? There was just that one condition...

“Oh.” He muttered dejectedly. “I'm...I'm on medication. Really strong medication. It just...doesn't do everything.” He said. “I know I'm weird and I know that sometimes reality is weird for me, but-” but I don't know if I can get any better. “but I'm functional...for...for the most part I suppose.” He mumbled, getting quieter as he talked.

“You call this functional!?”

“I just happened to miss a day recently, which is why I was skeptical of your, you know, existence.” He explained. "I can try though, I can try to get better." He asserted. "I will try. I will."

”You cannot get better.”

"I will." He issued as a demand to himself.

His eyes lit up when Shatter explained what he could do for him. Medication he wouldn’t have to steal? A bed? A room with walls and a ceiling? It was almost too good to be true. ”God you better not be fucking with me.” He whispered under his breath.

“Can...can you do that without the government getting involved?” He asked. “And I know-I know that sounds crazy, but believe me I have very good reasons for not wanting to get the government involved in my life.”

“Her head split open like a watermelon.”

“Very good reasons.” He started chewing on the tip of his thumb, hoping he wouldn’t have to divulge any more information.

”I’ll...I’ll help you help people. I won’t, you know, hurt people without a really good reason.” He looked up at Shatter, again staring back into his own large, sunken eyes. ”Thank you. He said. ”Thank you for humoring me and...and coming with me, I know you didn’t have to. And if you can really do all this for me…” He took a deep breath, ”I really can’t thank you enough.”

[Deleted]

s h a t t e r e d

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As a kid, Royal had been relatively healthy. He’d gotten runny noses and headaches and had even had a pretty serious case of chicken pox thanks to a clerical mix-up with his medical records, but when it came down to it, he didn’t really understand medicine all that well. His time at university had been focused mostly on anatomy and physiology; pills and potions weren’t really anything he’d been interested in.

So, when Brian said the pills didn’t fix everything, Royal didn’t really know either way whether it was a fact or just Brian being Brian.

Probably better to just play it by ear then and see if he improved once he had what he needed.

“Look, I know better’s asking a lot, so… just try not to miss your meds at least.” He wasn’t sure he could expect much more than that, even with Brian’s assurances.

“And I won’t fuck with you if you don’t fuck with me.” His casual shrug was much more non-committal than it probably should have been considering he was dead serious about what he said, but Brian was touchy enough, he didn’t feel the need to push anything too hard. The big guy managed to put an aggressive spin on pretty much anything that was said to him – or thought at him.

As far as the government went, Royal wasn’t sure what Brian was expecting. It was pretty clear Royal wasn’t with that joke of a “hero” program, which put him on the wrong end of the law, regardless of whether or not he was helping people out. “Sure, fuck the government.” Another shrug, this one appropriately non-committal.

Whatever his reasons, Royal didn’t need to hear the whole sob-story just yet. There wasn’t any point in investing too much into the guy if he couldn’t self-manage enough to be useful when he needed him. He took note of Brian’s poorly hidden reluctance to elucidate anyway, figuring it’d be something to bring up if they made to a “later”.

“Like I said before,” he offered a short nod before standing back up, a clear indication he wasn’t planning on sticking around much longer. “Don’t read too much into this.” In spite of himself, he offered a friendly twitch of the corner of his mouth.

He didn’t have any money on him. He used to before Lennon had realized he’d been taking his wallet with him on jobs; after that, she’d gotten into the habit of confiscating it before sending him out to do anything “Shatter” related. It was a fine precaution, but it made for an awkward follow-through on his offer. “I don’t have any money on me right now, but if you think you can stomach a little uh… trespassing, I can get you a shower and a bed tonight.”

While he didn’t really know exactly where they were, he knew the area well enough; he and Lennon never went into a job without scoping out the surrounding streets and business in case something went wrong. Something not dissimilar to all of this. So, he knew there was a newer apartment complex that had just recently been renovated on 24th street; a couple of tenants, but mostly unrented, which meant that the building had running water at least.

“I’ll meet you there in a week, if that’s where you wanna stay.” He’d realized early on that Brian probably didn’t have a phone, which made coordinating a meet-up way more difficult than it needed to be. If the guy was paranoid about the government, maybe he’d get him a… pager or something? Lennon would know.

Shit, Lennon was going to be pissed. He needed to get going.

“And uh, yeah, so… if not, hang around that park by Village Square. Um… Gary Canyon Park? Glen?" It was a dumb name, whatever it was, but it wasn't too far from where he was pretty sure they were, which is where he assumed Brian would stay if he didn't feel comfortable staying anywhere nicer. "Something like that." He paused, considering. "And gimme the name of the pills you need.” He paused again to look Brian up and down. “And your sizes for clothes.” The guy was definitely a large, at least.

◈ ◈ ◈