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"Now where do you think you're going?"
You jump, heart in your throat, hands coming up—every fucking time. You spin around and glare at Charge, who is casually leaning against the wall of the alley. Casually crosses one foot behind the other; casually crosses his arms over his chest. Every time, he sneaks up on you; casually, effortlessly, and every time, you panic.
"Not to a bar," you grunt, forcing your hands to relax. "I've told you before; I'm not interested."
Charge smiles like a shark smelling blood. "Who said anything about a bar?"
You squint at him. All of his teammates were talking about it, but you can't remember him joining in. Not as last time; not as the time before that.
This is a trap.
"I'm leaving, Charge," you say, turning your back—you need to get going before you get caught.
"Good!" he exclaims, and you hear the staccato beat of his feet as he runs a few steps to catch up with you.
You stop again. Resist the urge to look at his face and see the self satisfied grin.
"You're not coming with me," you say, slowly; clearly.
He elbows you in the side. "Come on, Sidestep. Sides. No bar. No people, even! How about that? We buy a couple of beers; just you and me. I'm not so bad, am I?"
You do look, and the smile is worse than you thought.
"You are absolutely that bad," you mutter.
"Come on!" he says; throws his arm over your shoulder, "I have the perfect idea."
One day you'll flatten his nose with your knuckles. One day, when he does that, you'll be fast and brave enough to break the nose of Marshal Charge—all you can do right now is let him and wait for a good moment to escape.
He waves at the others as you exit the alley—you'll join them later, he shouts. Anathema and Sentinel both think that's bullshit, and Steel's dark look is an almost physical weight on your back. Charge's bike feels like the escape, suddenly, from their thoughts, from their expectations—you're not part of the team, but Charge is invested in you, thinks Sentinel, and you did certainly prove useful today—
"Get on with it," you grumble at Charge, throwing your leg across the back of the bike. He throws you a blinding grin over his shoulders—perfect white annoying teeth. Fake—no one has teeth like that, especially not when their job involves getting punched on a regular basis. If you ever do manage to crack his nose, they'll make sure to set it straight anyway.
"Ready?" he asks, but doesn't wait before drowning out any possible reply with the roar of the engine.
The bike skids off, your right knee precariously close to the asphalt, but he did that on purpose, you're sure, because it means you have to hold on hard to not fall off, and when you do you feel him laughing.
It does seem like a time for laughing; you can’t argue against that. You barely have bruises after the fight. There barely was a fight; the team set them up, and you were able to catch all the inevitable surprises in time. You felt the same extatic relief as the others at the easy success; felt their desire to celebrate. But clinging onto the back of the Marshal, the man with the unreadable mind, was not what you'd had in mind.
He drives like it's an emergency, like there's something chasing him, and the city passes by so fast that it all blurs into something not dissimilar from the static of his mind. That steady buzz, as constant as his broad back against the moods of Los Diablos, rippling around you now like the wind. All you have to do is hold on and let it all flow through you. You're not sure where you're heading, but it bothers you less than you thought it would. While you can't read Charge's mind, when you close your eyes it's like you can read his body; shifts and pulls that make you turn and accelerate and then, suddenly, slow down. He's pulling up on the sidewalk.
"Is this your plan?" you ask, squinting at the run-down street. He kicks down the stand, and you let go of his waist. You have to cross your arms across your own chest; the sudden emptiness is disconcerting.
He laughs. "Wait here," he says with a wink and takes off with a few running steps. It's a small corner store, covered in neon signs and sun-bleached posters—Charge disappears with a jingle. From the inside comes a little panicked flurry of thoughts when the person behind the counter notices who just entered their store. The bright suit isn't exactly inconspicuous—and neither is yours, even though it's mostly dark grey. You feel eyes on you, already, and you shift to adjust your pose. Look unapproachable, like you have a purpose; something important. Pull your shields in tight so you don't have to know what they think, what they see.
Something is itching, on your leg—you tap your fingers against your arm, resisting the urge to bend yourself into a silly pretzel to scratch the spot. Important hero Sidestep, on business with the Marshal. Not a nervous pretzel.
Then the store entry jingles again, and laughter follows said Marshal as he exits. Spins towards the interior, holding the door open with a foot, as he delivers a mock salute and then an elaborate bow to whoever's inside, a pack of six bottles of beer under his arm. With one more twirl he lets the door go, gracefully evades a stunned pedestrian and then bounces on towards you.
A whirlwind of blinding white teeth, blue lightning bolts and black curls; two seconds later you have to catch the six-pack and then he's shoving a plastic bag into your chest, "Hold on to this, will you?"
It's a bottle of whiskey, nothing fancy, but probably the most expensive thing they had in the store. "A gift from a fan of yours," he says, with a wink.
You snort. "What makes you think I like whiskey?"
"Just a feeling," he grins. "And it wasn't from me; from the cashier." He gets back on the bike again, pats the seat behind him.
"Sure," you chuckle. "You're too embarrassed to admit it, I get it." You hang the bag from your elbow and try to hold the beer tightly before you jump back on.
"What would I get if I did admit it?" he says, voice falling into a lower pitch. He twists, leaning on his arms so he can look at you.
"That you're a fan?" you say, keeping your voice carefully neutral.
"Uhu. A name, maybe? A good look at your face?"
"Maybe a good look at my knuckles, if you really insist."
Laughter again, before he turns away. "Hold on!" he exclaims, before turning up the throttle again. You zip off. Your seat feels more precarious this time, with only one arm. Luckily, it's not too long before you stop again, because when you do you feel slightly out of breath and you already have a funny cramp in your left knee.
It's an abandoned city block. A few high rises, half-collapsed, crumbling, a part of old Los Angeles that was never reclaimed. Across the cracked road ahead is a fence full of holes, door locked with a rusty chain and padlock, and a big sign:
Warning!
Private property: entrance forbidden. Trespassers will be prosecuted!
Charge kicks at a particularly big hole, and then does his silly bow again, gesturing at the makeshift entry.
"Abusing your privileges, Marshal?" you say, inspecting the edges before slipping through.
"For you?" he says. "Of course." You smile, despite yourself.
"What are we doing here?" you ask, skipping over rubble.
"No people!" he exclaims, gesturing at the ruined surroundings. "You keep complaining about too many people. Here you can remove that mask, and no one will see. Have a beer with me."
"You will see," you point out.
"Which is entirely the point, yes." He punches your shoulder lightly; a gesture of playful friendship. You let it roll off, use the momentum to elbow him in the side. Casual, relaxed, friendly. You don’t feel relaxed, but you can fake it.
"All right," he says, "which venue does my lady prefer on this splendid evening? How about," he squints at a derelict sign, "The Red Fork? Or maybe a rooftop terrace?" He gestures at one of the high rises with a gaping entrance that must have once been a lobby of some sort.
"You think we could even get up there?" you wonder, peering into the dark. You think you can make out the beginning of a staircase.
"Let's find out," Charge says happily, shoving the beer which he had been ready to open back under the arm.
Turns out the stairs are missing pieces already between the second and third floor.
"The handrail looks intact, I think," you point out, “we might—” You don't get to finish the sentence. Charge has already used it as leverage for a jump, and his legs are dangling in your face.
"I was going to suggest testing the integrity," you chuckle, ducking out of the way of a foot as he pulls himself up, "before putting weight on it."
"Consider it tested!" he calls. "Come on, hand me the beer and get a move on."
It takes you time to get to the top—the stairs have collapsed in several places. But after a few stories it would feel silly to give up, and thirty minutes later, Charge kicks up the roof door with an exclamation of triumph.
"Look at this," he says, throwing his hands out, plastic bag with whiskey going wide. "Best view in town!"
You chuckle. "One day you'll get so full of yourself that you'll explode, Marshal," you say, adjusting your mask. You're warm and sweaty underneath—the thing doesn't breathe half as well as you'd like. You throw the beer at him.
He curses but manages the catch without accident. "I was talking about the city," he says once he's caught his balance, "but I will take that as a compliment." He winks at you, before squatting and putting down the drinks.
It is a nice view. Los Diablos. Not a nice city, but in certain lights, from certain angles, it's almost pretty.
You hear Charge open one of the bottles, and then he shoves another one into your hands. "Now drink," he says, walking backwards towards the edge with a pointed glance at you. Places himself on a vent close to the edge, turning towards the view and the horizon. You look at the bottle. At his back, the bright blue of the suit contrasted against the pale hazy sky.
You bring your fingers to your face. You can pull the lower part of your mask down, leaving the rest of it in place—it's designed for exactly these kinds of situations. Your face won't be recognizable. You don't have any special birthmarks. No scars. Just a perfectly normal chin. Perfectly normal lips.
With a deep sigh you walk up to join him.
"Open this, then," you mutter, bouncing the bottle on his shoulder.
He looks up with the brightest smile, and then quickly takes the bottle and opens the cap with a hard edge on his glove. Holds it out by the neck—you can't stand that almost childish glee on his face, so you look out at the sky instead—after you've snatched the bottle back.
It takes just a simple tug to breathe fresh air again, and with your heartbeat loud in your ears you bring the bottle up and chug as much as you can.
"This beer is shit," you grumble—deflect, doge—it makes him laugh. You don't know if the beer is shit or not; you can barely feel the taste at all.
"Maybe it will taste better if you show your whole face."
"Shut up and be grateful," you say, taking another pull. "You wanted me to have a beer with you; here I am. Having a beer." You sit down with a little huff. “With you.”
He laughs, deep in his chest, and bounces his shoulder against yours. "Cheers to that, then," he says.
You clink your bottles together.
Then you make the mistake of looking at him, as he watches the horizon. The handsome profile and the curls, highlighted in copper and moving gently in the breeze. The soft smile. Not blinding, for once. You can look at him, for once. Feel the air cool your face and the trap snapping shut. Caught; you’re caught and what’s the point of pretending otherwise?
You're not sure it feels like a moment of celebration, exactly, but it does feel quite nice.