Chapter Text
MEMORY LOG
[0.1]
OF THINGS YOU WILL NEVER FORGET,
YOU WILL NEVER KNOW THIS, BUT-
It'd started out normal (or as normal as things can get for you, now), as most days tend to. It'd started out alright, mediocre, entirely unassuming.
But you think you knew- you think you felt it, deep in your gut, all throughout the day. Something like aching, or like desperation, like the knowledge that the world was going to end and there was nothing no one could do to stop it.
Might just be your memory messing with you, though.
You'd driven Gabriel to school when it started, you think. You'd hugged him just a little too tight. You'd kissed his forehead, held his little hands in your own.
He's so small, fragile, you remember thinking.
Gabriel had asked if you were alright. Had told you you looked sad. You shook off your unease, determined to deal with it later, when he wasn't around. He was too observant for his own good.
"I love you, bubbas."
"Love you too."
You drove home, the radio stuck on channel 56 since you'd yet to fix the switch. They spoke of the weather, clouds grouping together to shadow over the city, or was it no clouds and sunny days? You don't remember, and you don't think it matters.
Then the news, wreckage wrought in another part of town, closer to your neighbourhood. Your hand clenches on the wheel, leaving behind dents. Some biker gang, or something. You think they had a ridiculous, funny-sounding name.
You took a deep breath in.
Someone should be doing something about this, you think. Injustice never bode well on your conscience. Neither did compliance.
You should. You could. You could be doing something about this.
The day passes without much fanfare, your daily routine keeping you grounded, but you think you felt something simmering under your skin for a long while, straining to be let out. You busy your mind with work, and then Gabriel's laundry, and then scrubbing the bathroom floors, and when you can't find a speck of dirt in the house you leave through the front door with your keys tucked in your palm, coat willowing in the wind.
You take a walk. You pass by familiar faces- people you'd helped, in one way or another. They wave at you as you walk past, and you wave back, smiling bashfully at their offers to return the favour. There's people you've helped lift heavy furniture up their seven flights of stairs, people you've protected from petty mugging, or a car that winded off it's path and almost got too close, or simply helping them cross the street. Little things.
(They don't ask the questions on their mind. They don't ask how you do it. You wouldn't answer them, in any case.)
It makes you feel accomplished, seeing them again, but only for as long as you don't remember that someone else will always need saving, and in new york city? Your sense of satisfaction never lasts long.
You take a walk, and before you've realised it you're on the path to Gabriel's school, body set on auto-pilot while your mind's out of commission. Or maybe your body knew before you did, something like survival instinct, ingrained into your genes. You're not too sure. You're on your way to Gabriel's school, and it's nearing the afternoon, so this is good. You can pick him up and go home. Stop feeling so restless.
You remember that something in your gut growing stronger, this time like dread, this time higher-up, in your stomach. You remember feeling sick. You remember your hands shaking as you walked, you remember trying to reassure yourself. You're just anxious, you try to force your hands to still, but it only makes it worse, everything's alright, you big idiot. You'll see.
You remember waving at people as you pass, and not getting anything in return. You remember your dread making it's way up, up up up to your throat, making it go parched and tight. You remember the unease rolling off people in waves, and you remember your dread soaking it all up like a sponge. You do not remember what they were speaking of. You don't think you could hear it, in any case.
You remember speeding up. You remember the breeze being cold against your skin, chilling what's underneath.
You remember your phone ringing, the alarm foreign, unfamiliar, frighteningly loud. Emergency alert system, you realise in a daze. You remember your heart lurching, your veins thrumming, and your feet kicking back.
It gets a little hazy, after that.
You ran. You know that, of course, but you don't quite recall it. You ran to Gabriel, to your son, to your family, watching as people's unease began to turn into full-blown panic. Children screaming and mothers crying and fathers hollering, the sky darkening to a terrible shade of red. You've never quite liked the color.
All your senses dulled, back then. One of the teachers spoke to you, her lips moving, but you couldn't make out the words through the fog in your head. You think your vision started blurring, too. You think you tried to tell her you didn't need shelter, you just needed Gabriel, just needed to hold him in your arms, but all that came out was mumbled gibberish, your tongue lolling uselessly in your mouth.
The world only shifted into focus once you saw her- a little girl, Gabriel's age, standing amidst the chaos. Everything gets slammed back into you- light, sound, the devastating smoke.
Everything is red, everything is loud, too loud, there's things set ablaze and glitching colors passing through the sky, there's a mass of black something with appendages that don't look human- but your gaze zeroes in on her.
She's crying, silent tears rolling down her cheeks in fat droplets, but she stands stock-still. She clutches at the toy in her grip with all her might. She tries to look brave. She tries to match its dreadful stare head-on.
She shouldn't have to, you think.
The- the thing glares at her, it's limbs twisting unnaturally, what you think look like teeth grinning wide, taking aim, precise and deadly and you realise she is going to die if she doesn't move-
I need to do something about this.
You send yourself tumbling, careening into her- you both roll across the ground and out of the cross-fire, the spot where she'd just been scorching and hot, blazing. You stare at her, and she stares back, star-eyed. Your breaths come out in heavy, greedy gulps of air- you manage to ask a police officer to find her parents, but just barely. She thanks you, and you think you smiled at her.
The pain should be catching up to you, but it's not, not really. You think of the girl again, of what could've been if you hadn't been there. If you hadn't decided to be there. You think of the way she'd looked at you, thanked you.
You think of Gabriel in her place, and your heart clenches painfully tight inside your rib-cage. Your eyes narrow, determined.
You are not going to let that thing hurt anyone else. Not today.
I'm going to do something about this.
You'd watched the thing for a while in between bouts of helping people evacuate- you made sure Gabriel was safe first, of course, so you can think easier, breathe easier. He's behind the barricade, officers stationed all around, and you make sure you can always see him, right there in the corner of your vision.
You'd watched as officers shot at it, watched as it shrunk back from the bullets, rage growing so hot it felt oppressive, what resemble pupils swirling frantically in it's black void of a body. Watched as it struck at another construction, sending rubble and concrete whizzing through the air.
Watched the foundation of the empty building creak precariously.
You'd formulated a half-assed plan, but you knew, somehow somewhere, that it'd work.
You remember taunting it, saying something ridiculous, "over here, fuck-face!" or some variant, running off to corners, to posts, and the thing doesn't seem to realise, lost to it's own blind rage, hurtling towards you, it's weight sending it crashing exactly where you planned it to.
(Distantly, hilariously, stupidly, you remember feeling irritated that the school was getting blown to bits. Gabriel had just started warming up to the new place, too. You think you might have said this out loud, trying to banter in the middle of the fight.)
The plan probably looks dumb and highly suicidal to anyone who sees you, you know this, but you know no one will interfere. You also know you will be fine, after this. It'll take time for them to dig you out the rubble, and it'll be dark and cold and desolate, but you will be fine. You know this.
You know this, of course, but your son doesn't.
It's the last pole holding the building up, the final piece. Once it's hit the building will come crashing down, down down down on top of you both, and you will be fine but it will not. You know this.
You've just said something petty and insulting again when you hear it. Footsteps running towards you, your name called out- you look past the thing in the middle of the hurricane, behind, and the breath is mercilessly stolen from your lungs.
Gabriel- Gabriel Gabriel your son, your son Gabriel, he's crying and screaming and running to you, he's wrapping his little arms around your leg and you don't know what to do, he wasn't meant to be here, he's small and fragile, he wasn't-
He says your name again, terrified. You will be fine, yes, but Gabriel-
You're too slow, just a second too slow- you watch as the beast lines up it's hit, firing up, and your useless useless limbs do nothing to stop it. You feel a cold, horrible, terrible foreboding settle over your nerves- Gabriel will die and there is nothing you can do about it.
You hear the thing shriek as it readies it's final blow, but it glitches.
It glitches at the last second,
it misses it's mark.
It hits the last structure holding up the building, instead, and everything comes down on you- it howls, pained and dying, but you don't really hear it. You clutch at Gabriel in your arms, body twisting to protect him from the oncoming hail of solid stone. He wails, he wails and wails, he says your name, he says he's scared, and you can't speak. You can't let him hear the tremble in your voice, nor the waver to your tone. You can't.
You look down at Gabriel, your son, your son is bleeding, he's crying and bleeding, he's hurt, and you remember thinking, hysterically, that you hate the color red. That you don't want to see that color ever again in your life.
THIS DAY CHANGED YOUR COURSE.
FOR BETTER OR FOR WORSE.
You startle awake- the nurse is shaking you, you realise, her smile kind, empathetic. You try your best to smile back, but all you can manage is a grimace.
The doctor says he'll recover just fine. He says he'll be free to leave in 3 weeks, and that's only because they're being cautious. He says you were very, very lucky, the both of you. He calls it a miracle, but you know better.
The constant simmering under your skin is gone. You don't listen to channel 56 anymore, nor the news, and when you do, you don't react. You have Gabriel. You have Gabriel and you won't, can't, ask for anything more.
You avert your gaze at the James Jameson poster out in the street, another super-villain wrecking the city. You can barely remember their names, these days.
You won't do anything about this.