Chapter Text
Sounds, like any other sensatory phenomenon, can hold the attribute of ugliness. That ugliness can either derive by the way the human ear perceives it, or because of the connotation the human mind assigns to it. For example, sirens may be loud and annoying, and yet the breaking point might not be the sound in itself but what it means that a siren might be roaring—be it from an ambulance, a police car, a firetruck, or some sort of alarm, sirens are usually an indicator of danger or tragedy. Then again, some sounds may be associated to something ugly, and not be ugly at all. And the same goes for words. Words can sound ugly too, and yet not posses an ugly connotation, and vice versa. There are many words out there that one immediately catalogues as ugly even when they can roll off one’s tongue with ease.
Like segregation.
The definition of segregation that usually jumps to people’s minds the moment it is mentioned, the one that right away brings out that almost instinctive rejection of it, is the following: “the separation or isolation of a race, class, or ethnic group by enforced or voluntary residence in a restricted area, by barriers to social intercourse, by separate educational facilities, or by other discriminatory means”. It is often considered a symptom of either a repressive government and or a very sick society, scarred by war, be it internal or external, and most people in first world countries in the twenty-first century are convinced that it is a reality left behind a long time ago.
Most Ungifted people, that is.
Because, if one takes a look at another definition for the word, one like: “the separation for special treatment or observation of individuals or items from a larger group”, then it stops sounding so horrifying and it starts feeling a lot more familiar. For the Skilled population, at least. The Ungifted still defend the measurements taken, more than fiercely.
It is true that for many years, society didn’t even acknowledge the Skilled as a functional part of it. They were considered freaks. Anomalies. It wasn’t until the eighteenth century that the scientific community started to pay attention to what they hadn’t realized before was such a large group. And they realized they weren’t defective, but were in fact, an entire other class of people. People with a very special gene in common. Later it would become a known fact that if a child was able to freeze the water, then it was because there was a special trait in his DNA that could also be found in another child whose only special skill was that their toes were unusually large. It would be ridiculous to group together people so different, but how could they not? How could they not, when that gene alone is the one trait to identify people that could mean a real danger for the world? It was only logical some governments would take action, just to keep a record, simply as a preventive act. The thing the US and most other developed countries did was nothing more than that. It couldn’t be considered segregation. Testing for the gene was even illegal on children unless there was a very compelling reason. How could anyone think there was any sort of persecution against them? All the state was doing was making sure no citizen had more chances to hurt people. That’s all they did, by making sure the world knew what they were dealing with when in presence of a Skilled. Why would anyone oppose the bracelets, unless they wanted to take advantage of the anonymity a naked wrist would provide them?
For the Ungifted, the bracelets seemed completely harmless, and they didn’t even notice them that often anyway. Edward Van Ness didn’t think he had ever noticed a random person on the street wearing one. He knew no one in his family carried them either. Edward Van Ness came from a normal family. He had two ungifted parents, an Ungifted little sister, and he had the same worries than any other Ungifted seven-year-old had. He was normal.
Until he fell of his bed one night, through the mattress, waking up confused and scared, breaking into tears.
His parents weren’t surprised when they were called to principal Benjamin Franklin’s office later that week, before their appointment at the Center of Registration.
“Thank you for coming,” said the principal, looking apologetic. “I imagine you already know why I called you here.”
“Yes… but we don’t know what to do,” mumbled the father, a low-level alpha, William. “We’re going to take him to the Center of Registration this weekend, and hopefully they’ll help us a little, give us some advice, but…”
The principal bit his bottom lip, considering all the options. The problem was, he wasn’t well-trained on the issue either. “How about,” he licked his lips, “how about we ask other Skilled parents?”
“Edward told us he’s the only Skilled in his class,” replied the mother, a mid-level beta, Anne.
Benjamin nodded. “I know, but there are Skilled parents, adults who are Skilled, even if their children aren’t. They might have a better idea of how to deal with this.”
William seemed to find it a good idea. “That could work, yes.” His phone vibrated in his pocket, and he checked it as subtly as he could, which was kind of pointless at the end. “I’m sorry,” he grimaced, “I have to get to work.”
Anne sighed and patted him on the knee. “That’s okay.”
He disagreed, but he had no choice. They needed him to inspect a bloody crowbar, an element that had been missing for most part of the investigation and only now had been found, with little to no time to get the needed information before the trial was done and the jury made up their minds. Sure, he wasn’t the only medical examiner in New York City, but he’d been working on the case since the beginning and his shift started in twenty minutes anyway. Besides, the detective working the case had texted him to his cellphone, clearly ignorant of his schedule, so he couldn’t blame him. He was only lucky the school wasn’t that far from his workplace. A side effect of that was that he didn’t have enough time to take his mind out of the talk with the principal. Then again, the amount of time that would take was unclear. Once he was done confirming the suspect as the perpetrator, he sighed heavily.
Detective Mulligan, who could be considered a good friend of his by now, frowned with concern. He had texted the ADA on the case about the results and had been told that he had more than enough time to make it to the courthouse with the M.E.’s report. He had a few minutes to ask William what was up. “What is it, Will?”
“It’s Eddie, he…” he took a deep breath, “he’s a Skilled. And we have no idea how to handle it. The people at the school don’t know either. But they’re going to contact some of the Skilled parents and see if they can give us some advice.”
Hercules grimaced. “That sounds shitty. I’m sorry guys. But hey, what can he do?”
“He can go through walls. Falls through the bed every night for the last week.”
“Damn…”
William nodded.
Hercules pursed his lips and stole another glance at the screen with the blood analysis from the murder weapon. “Hey, there’s a new detective in the squad, nice guy, he’s a Skilled too. Do you want me to talk to him? Maybe we could all eat together or something.”
“I’d appreciate that, yes.”
Hercules immediately saw the relief in the doctor’s face, and was glad they had that conversation.
Gilbert de Lafayette had just been transferred from another precinct, and he wore a blue bracelet. As a police officer, Hercules was familiar with the Scale of Danger, and knew exactly what that meant, but it was difficult to conciliate the idea of that distant classification and the nice guy he had met. The color blue, second to last on the seven-degree scale, stood to warn others that in a situation of extreme emotional distress, the people in a 15 ft ratio were in high risk of being fatally injured by the subject’s skill. Hercules didn’t want to imagine what that skill was, if it could be so deadly. It was considered rude to ask, anyway, so he hadn’t. They’d only known each other for a week. Which also meant that simply asking the guy to talk to strangers about, well, anything, was kind of weird, but he wasn’t one to back away after making an offer like that. Still, he was considerate enough to stress over the right time to do so—as if there could be any—and pondered his words rather carefully, practicing on his head, fully aware that he probably would forget all about it the minute he was actually talking to the guy face to face about it.
Still, he had made up his mind, and he saw his chance when they got a call and the captain sent him and the new guy on it. He was almost happy about it. Almost. He couldn’t say he liked his job. He liked what his actions meant; a step forward towards justice and peace for the most vulnerable victims, usually of sexual assault. But being needed somewhere meant that there was a new victim, another person scarred for life just because of someone else’s wickedness. Still, it meant an opening to talk to the guy, while they were stuck in traffic.
“You’re the first blue bracelet I’ve ever met,” commented Hercules, eyes fixed on the traffic light. It might have been cowardly, but it was by far the best scenario he could’ve hoped for.
“Really?”
Hercules hummed. “That surprises you?”
“Yeah. Well, sort of. I could say I don’t know that many Ungifted, but you guys are everywhere.” The fact that he wasn’t close to any of them went unsaid.
“That’s not the same though.” And statistics were on his side. Blue bracelets, just like Green or Black, were not as common as the other ones. Those three colors only conformed about twenty percent of the Skilled population in the US.
Lafayette shrugged. “It feels the same. I don’t want to say that I don’t see color or some shit like that, but anything darker than orange feels like family most of the time.”
“Is everyone in your family Skilled?”
“Yeah. I mean, it’s just my parents and I, but my grandparents were as well. It runs in the family, literally, you know?”
“Yeah, but it’s a recessive gene, right? I mean, two Skilled could give birth to an Ungifted…”
“And two Ungifted could give birth to a Skilled, yeah, but that’s only in theory. It never happens.”
“It happened to a friend of mine.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, Willie Van Ness? The M.E.? His son is a Skilled, and they’re freaking out, man. They have no idea how to handle it.”
“Shit, that’s got to be complicated. How old is the kid?”
“He’s seven, I think.”
“Shit… did they register him already?”
Hercules had no idea, but wasn’t that the first thing one had to do in those circumstances? He nodded. “I think so, why?”
Lafayette was wearing a grimace, but he waved a hand to dismiss it. “Nothing. Don’t worry about it. We’re almost there anyway. What do we know about the victim?”
“Not much…” Just that she was in the hospital and the rape kit came out positive. As an SVU detective, Hercules heard those words often. More than often. But it never stopped turning his stomach.
The victim was wearing a green bracelet, and for a moment, Hercules considered letting his partner do the talking, but he was the senior detective there, and the woman lying on the hospital bed was no different than any other victim.
“Hello, Miss Lewis, right? I’m detective Mulligan, this is my partner detective Lafayette. Can you remember what happened?”
The girl was pretty shaken up, and almost everything in her behavior indicated that she knew who attacked her, even though she claimed that she couldn’t remember. It was frustrating, but it was too soon to insist. They were two alphas, after all, and she needed to start feeling like she was in control again. It would take time. But hopefully, with a colder head, she would give them a name on a future encounter. Still, while that didn’t happen, they just would have to put a little more effort on their job. They went canvassing, looking for witnesses and went through what little the victim had given them. They had fluids from the rape-kit. They just needed a good suspect. Although after the first day looking, said good suspect was nowhere to be found. The victim was a nice girl, single, and loved by everyone around her, but if she wasn’t giving the name of her attacker it probably was because they were someone close to her, someone she at least knew.
“Well, today was fruitless,” said Lafayette once they were back at the precinct without a single lead.
“Yeah…” sighed Hercules, sitting down heavily at his desk across from his partner’s. “Are you doing anything tonight?”
“What?”
“Remember I told you about Van Ness? Well, he was wondering if you would like to have dinner at his place, maybe clear some of their doubts. I’d go with you too, of course.”
“Oh,” he cleared his throat, “alright,” he smiled nervously. “Why not? What time should I be there?”
Gilbert liked the way his partner handled the situation, mostly because he treated the omega on the bed just like that: an omega in distress, a victim of sexual assault, and not just a Green Bracelet. He knew, from personal experience and by other close friends, that not any Ungifted would’ve done that, because what mattered the most about a Skilled was the color in their wrist, not the scent on their neck.
But in the week he had known his partner he had started to believe that maybe they were being prejudiced as well; that maybe there were Ungifted out there being nice, and they weren’t just exception of a cruel norm. But it was too early to tell. In twenty-nine years, Gilbert hadn’t met many others who could make him consider such a world.
Still, he didn’t know what to expect of detective Mulligan’s friends. He was a little worried, because he knew he had started to idolize the man in his head, and if his friends were not as… tolerant, as he seemed to be, then he knew he would be unreasonably heartbroken, and it would be no one’s responsibility but his. Then again, he could get away with hating on his partner a little bit for befriending people he shouldn’t befriend, but that wouldn’t be enough to request another partner.
Besides, he was only speculating. Maybe they wouldn’t be assholes. He had seen the M.E. a few times and his eyes had only moved to the bracelet for a second, never interrupting the flow of words regarding the case. At least he knew how to be professional, and if he was having him, a high-level alpha with a blue bracelet, for dinner at his home, then he had an idea of how to be a good parent as well, because he was trying.
That thought led him to a living room in Queens a couple of hours later, sitting awkwardly across from a pair of concerned parents that looked like they could use some good news.
“So, Hercules told me you just discovered your kid is a Skilled?”
Both Anne and William nodded.
“He’s only in second grade,” said he, “and there aren’t others registered Skilled in his class.”
“Nor the school,” added she. “The principal was just as clueless as us. He’s going to contact some Skilled parents, though.”
“If they have children your kid’s age, I’m sure they’ll want to help,” said Gilbert reasonably.
“But I don’t understand, if there are Skilled parents, how come there are no Skilled students?”
“Well,” Gilbert grimaced, “it’s an elementary school, right?” They nodded, and he licked his lips. “Then that makes sense. It’s not mandatory to register a Skilled child until they’re eleven. Besides, most skills do not manifest until they’re about, well, your son’s age, that’s more common. Seven or eight. I didn’t notice mine until I was nine.”
“So they’re not deliberately hiding it, then?”
“Well, I don’t know. I mean, some skills can’t be hidden. And even those that can, can be difficult to do so for a child that still hasn’t learned to control it. I’m sorry.”
“Well, of course you don’t know. You don’t know them,” reasoned Anne. “Let’s go to the table. The food is ready. Will, go tell the kids.”
“Okay…”
Dinner started tense, but it quickly became something lighter thanks to Hercules and his many topics of conversation. It also helped that the couple and their two children were genuinely nice, if only a little nervous with his presence there. But the food was delicious, and everyone on the table loved cake, which made the evening even more enjoyable when it was time for dessert.
“Well, tonight has been lovely…”
“I feel like all I did was eat your food!” admitted Gilbert. “Is there anything in particular that’s been worrying you? I’d like to help.”
“I can’t think of anything right now,” said Van Ness, “but I assure you, if you give me your number, I will be texting you at inappropriate times with questions, constantly.”
Gilbert chuckled. “That’s okay. I’ll try to answer, but I’m a heavy sleeper.”
“Uh, I have a question,” mumbled Eddie.
“Shoot!”
“I’m going to get a bracelet, right? What color do you think it will be?”
“Well, that depends on what you can do, buddy.”
“I could show you.”
Gilbert decidedly ignored the way every Ungifted in the room tensed. “If your parents don’t mind, then go ahead.”
“Why would my parents mind?”
“Well, some skills aren’t exactly appropriate for the inside, you know?” he winked. “Like mine, before I could control it well. And even now, to be honest, if my mom finds me using it inside the house she grounds me with no dessert!”
“That’s not fair, now you have to show me!”
Gilbert hummed. “Alright. I promise I’ll show you, but it has to be outside, so how about you wait until we’re leaving? It’s probably going to be soon.”
Eddie nodded. “Fine. I can do this,” he stared at his hand for a moment, focusing, and then proceeded to pass half his arm through the dining table.
“Woah, I’ve never seen anything like this,” said Gilbert, eyes fixed on Edward’s arm. “This is really cool, kid.”
“What does that mean, that you haven’t seen it before? Were you expecting something else?” asked William.
“Well,” he scooted in his chair closer to the couple, “some skills are getting more and more common, you know? Some studies say that certain things, like, I don’t know, a common one could be night vision, right? People with feline-like pupils? Some think that that sort of trait could become as common and ingrained in human nature as certain skin colors or hair. But then again, those are the same studies that say one day all the population will be considered Skilled by today’s standards, and,” he shrugged, “I don’t see that happening any time soon.” Currently, they conformed hardly forty percent of the US population.
“I had no idea. I never stopped to think if two people could have the same skill. I thought they were… you know, unique?”
“That’s a myth,” he waved a hand. “But this is seriously cool. High five!” They tried to clasp hands together, but Eddie’s passed right through Gilbert’s.
“Sorry, I still don’t know how to turn it off.”
“That’s okay.”
“Now you got to show me yours!”
“Eddie…”
“No, I promised. Show me your backyard.” He didn’t mind showing off his skill. Really, the only ones that thought asking about it was rude were the Ungifted, who were usually uncomfortable with them, but for Skilled, especially kids, it was quite common to compare and play with them. Always inside the house or in a discreet backyard, of course, but it was fun, and it was part of growing. A Skilled needed to learn to control their abilities in order to blend in the world as unthreatening as possible, and that control could only come from practice. Besides, it was better to keep the boy distracted so he wouldn’t ask again what color his bracelet would be. He was pretty sure it would be red, which was one of the most common ones, but it was also the lightest one that included ‘murder’ on the warning.
“Okay, I’m going to make a small one, but keep in mind that I can make them really big, okay?”
Eddie nodded, curious and nervous.
Gilbert took a deep breath, snapped his fingers, and a lighting 10 inches long appeared right next to him.
Eddie gasped. “You can make lighting?”
Gilbert nodded. It was a little bit more complicated than that, but nobody needed to hear the details.
Out in the car, before Gilbert could get in, Hercules tapped him on the shoulder and said: “Thank you for doing this. It was really kind of you.”
Gilbert scratched the back of his head, looking uncomfortable. “I don’t know. I did my best, but I’m not sure if I really did any good.”
“Trust me,” he grinned as he got into his car, “you did.”
Gilbert stared at that grin and his insides did a painful twist. He felt himself sliding down a dangerous, a very dangerous path, but he couldn’t care. He had always been an adrenaline junkie, and he could’ve sworn that very grin felt like a dopamine fix on his neck. He could do anything for that grin, even lie. Maybe he had already. The palms of his hands tickled in a way that surely meant he had. He braced himself, knowing that grin would vanish, and hated his own integrity.
“I lied,” he confessed.
Hercules raised his head from where he’d been adjusting his seatbelt to face him, startled, effectively losing his bright smile. “What?”
“They wanted to know if the other parents might be deliberately hiding their children’s skills, right?”
“Yeah…”
“And I kind of implied that they weren’t. I mean, I said it wasn’t weird there were no other Skilled kids because of their age and stuff. Well, I lied. I mean, not entirely. Almost everything I said was true, except how I actually noticed my skill when I was about six. But I lied because… Hercules, to be honest, I think those parents probably are. Hiding it. Deliberately. But if anyone should explain William and Anne about it, it should be them. And I could be wrong.”
“But why do you think so?”
“Because that’s what we do!” He shrugged and threw his head back against the headrest. “Getting registered… sucks. Everyone delays it as much as we can, that’s why the thing is mandatory for everyone over eleven. And us, Skilled, we usually recognize a Skilled child when they’re babies. There are… signs, you know? But I didn’t think that was important. I mean, I really have met other Skilled who didn’t notice their skills until they were older, and neither did their parents.”
Hercules sighed, but in a moment those white teeth were back in sight. “Then I guess you didn’t do anything wrong, Gilbert.”
Gilbert felt like he had. He must have cheated somehow, to get such a reward. But he wouldn’t argue, because he liked his partner’s smile too much, and because who didn’t like to hear they were alright?