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Todd Rice has always had a pretty good idea of where his life was going to end up.
He’d work after school all through high school as soon as he could get a job. He’d save most of that so he could go to community college. Get a good job in the trades, invest his money, buy some properties so he can make money off of those, and then he’d be set for life.
There were some roadblocks, of course. He didn’t count on his dad losing his job (that cut a bit into his college money) or his parents’ divorce. Or finding out he had a long-lost twin sister who wanted to join a superhero team because she’s convinced that their dad is totally the Green Lantern. Stuff like that.
And it wasn’t really… the end of the world. It wasn’t in his plan – back before Mom left, if he’d been able to talk to her about stuff like this, she’d probably say it wasn’t his plan but it was God’s plan. And he’d only feel a little bit corny about agreeing with her. But it felt like it mattered, at least.
If Chroma had his way, nothing would’ve mattered. That’s what Todd doesn’t get.
Some alien lifeform in a rainbow costume comes to Earth, sings a song about how we’re all gonna die some day everyone acts totally enraptured like he’s the second-freaking-coming, and Todd’s the bad guy for noticing that this is weird ? \
They already dealt with it – or Chroma imploded on his own – but n o one’s really ready to talk about Chroma, as far as Todd can tell. The studio’s cleared out. Al’s visiting his mom in Florida; Norda’s going out with Marcie again; Jen’s taking care of Rose, her new charity case; Hector and Lyta are in their apartment which at least clears the whole place of their over-the-top PDA –
(and of course, when Todd mentioned this to Jen she said that jealousy isn’t a good look and people should be allowed to be happy).
… And Todd knows he needs to clear the air with Jennie- Lynn . He just doesn’t know how . They’ve never really fought about anything before. But they were fighting about Chroma and she was one of the people – the ‘everyone on Earth except for Todd’ – who was buying into the alien’s stupid hype.
And besides – there are questions he has to ask her.
Questions like, hey, is it just me or does Hall seem kind of like the soulless alien?
And he’d sound completely insane for that and everyone would just say he’s bitter and jealous when he’s not .
He knows Hall’s a clueless, spoiled preppie , but he can tell the guy at least wants to help people. That’s what they’re all in Infinity Inc for, he figures. And he and Hall butted heads but they didn’t really want to hurt each other.
Though Hall – under Chroma’s influence – didn’t seem to be so disappointed at hurting him .
Don’t make me hurt you, Hall had said when he shone his solar beams on Todd.
And Todd didn’t help, he said he always figured it’d come to this, your solar power versus my ability to totally eclipse it – and he reached out for him with his powers. With the intention of making Hall confront the dark side of his own soul.
And he didn’t see anything. Anything except his own self staring right back at him, like he’d used his powers wrong. His anger. His bitterness. His worst moments on repeat in his head.
He always sees something when he uses his powers on someone like that – when he reaches into their soul and makes them take a good hard look at themselves.
So the fact that he didn’t see anything but himself for Hall and he didn’t see anything but himself for Chroma should be super fucking concerning. But he has to get Jen on his side. She has that thing that he’s never had – that he’s never known how to get. People actually like her. They’ll listen to her.
He takes a bus to Jen’s apartment. Normally, he’d fly there in shadow form. But right now, he doesn’t want to use his powers. Not while everything’s… like this.
And he mostly just sits in silence on the bus and tries not to think about Hal l.
It works. Most of the way. And within an hour, Todd finds himself outside of Jen’s apartment door, unsure he belongs here.
He knocks.
Jen opens the door and smiles. “Todd!” she says. “Come on in!”
And Todd does.
He starts looking around for Rose, immediately. The middle-aged woman Jen met on her island adventure with Hall, Lyta, and Al. “Where’s Rose?”
Jen shuts the door, reverts to her green skin, and elbows him lightly. “Hey, are you here to see me, or to see her?”
Todd rubs the back of his neck awkwardly.
He sure as hell isn’t talking about this while Rose is in the house. Maybe Jen left her at the studio.
“ Uh, you, I guess.”
“You guess ,” Jen says. But she’s still smiling, so Todd knows she’s just making fun.
He’s not in the mood for it.
He walks over to her couch and sits down.
Jen sits next to him. “Everything all right?”
Todd shrugs.
He wishes he knew how mad she still was about the Chroma situation.
… And i f the effects of the brainwashing have worn off ye t.
He takes a look around. Jen’s apartment isn’t much different than his. The place is newer, and it’s a nicer part of town, but it’s still pretty sparsely furnished. Still ‘newly moved out young adult’.
“ So, Chroma,” Todd says. Just to rip that bandaid off.
Jen b l ushes slightly darker green and turns away. “ Look, it’s stupid,” she says.
I was saying that the whole time, but you didn’t listen to me.
She runs a hand through her hair. “I can’t believe we were actually fighting about that.”
I can’t believe you made me fight you on that .
“It’s – we’re family, Todd. Family shouldn’t fight.”
Todd bunches his hands in fists and swallows.
She looks back at him. Her green eyes are wide. Maybe on the verge of tears. He feels like an asshole.
“You’re right,” he says quietly.
Jen’s face is still dark green.
“ What’s it like?” Todd asks. “You know, whatever the stupid song was. Whatever was so convincing to everyone else.”
Jen looks down at her hands, crossed in her lap.
It feels wrong for her. She’s supposed to be more confident than that.
He wishes he’d decked Chroma harder. Anyone who can make Jen feel like that deserves to be decked harder.
“ It’s so stupid,” Jen says. “You feel like – like there’s some big plan out there. Like you can see the world from the outside perspective instead of what’s going on right now. Like – like there’s someone who has all the answers.”
Todd exhales.
He doesn’t need some stupid alien to make him feel like he’s seeing the world from an outside perspective.
He always is.
Ever since all the other guys started talking about girls in some way where it was clear that whatever they saw, he wasn’t getting i t. Like there was just something missing from him.
Maybe that’s why Chroma’s powers didn’t work on him. Maybe there’s just something missing that everyone else has and he doesn’t .
“ What was it like for you ?” Jen asks.
Todd shrugs. “The same as it always is.”
Jen grins slightly and elbows him again.
Todd leans back.
He figures it’s better to explore that whole soulless alien thing before g iving anyone ammunition they can use against him. Even if Jen probably wouldn’t.
“ I told you guys,” Todd says. “Chroma didn’t have a soul. There wasn’t anything in the music – in the alien. Just me.”
Jen nods slowly. “Yeah, I get that,” she says. “ Now . Obviously I didn’t get it earlier.”
At least that means the brainwashing is wearing off.
“ What do you think it’s like?” Todd asks. “Not having a soul?”
Jen sits up slightly. She looks kind of weirded out. “I don’t know,” she says. “I don’t really have anything to compare it to. I don’t really think about souls on a day-to-day basis because my powers don’t use them.”
“I hear you can think about souls outside the context of superheroing.”
Jen furrows her brow. “ Is this about… God?”
“No!” Todd says quickly.
He really doesn’t know how it would go if they brought religion into it.
“Good,” Jen says, “because I’m pretty sure the B ible doesn’t say anything about rockstar aliens.”
Jen laughs at her own joke. Todd doesn’t.
Todd leans forward and holds his hands together and stares at them. It’s easier than looking at Jen. He knows this stuff is kind of … taboo. And that Jen will think he’s making it about a stupid grudge when he’s not.
“You know how we were fighting?” Todd asks.
Jen doesn’t say anything, she just puts a hand on his shoulder.
Todd grabs her hand.
He guesses this is the kind of stuff he’d have done with Jeremy if he wasn’t so busy working and studying. Just… comforting sibling stuff.
“When I fought Hall,” Todd says. He tries to think of how to make it sound less bad, but can’t, so he just continues: “When I fought Hall, I tried to get him to see his own soul.”
“I know,” Jen says, and her hand closes slightly, like she’s beginning to make a fist. “What the hell were you thinking?”
Todd stands up.
He gets the idea they’re going to fight again, or at least yell at each other, and he doesn’t really want to do that from sitting down on the couch. “I was thinking that the guy was brainwashed by an alien and needed to snap out of it! That he sure as hell wasn’t going to pull any punches, so why should I?”
Jen just sits on the couch, both her hands in fists and on her knees. Her voice is strained when she says, “You should be glad Al interrupted you before you could use your power.”
Todd shakes his head.
“You decided not to do it?” Jen hops to her feet and holds a fist up and says, “Never doubted you for a second!”
His stomach is a pit; he doesn’t want to explain it.
It must have shown on his face, because Jen grimaces. “Are you serious?! You used your powers on Hec? Your ‘literally no one has had this power used on them and not lost their marbles’ power?!”
“Most of the time, that’s only temporary!”
“Most of the time! Why on Earth would you want to roll those dice! Todd, you are the luckiest asshole in the whole world – ”
Todd holds a hand up. “Jen, I know. You can cool it with the whole riot act!”
Jen crosses her arms.
She’s mad. Todd can’t really blame her.
This is how everyone would react if they knew. They’d get mad at him. It’d be so easy, wouldn’t it?
“I used my powers on Hall,” Todd says, “And it was exactly like using them on Chroma.”
Jen doesn’t say anything; she just narrows her eyes slightly.
“There wasn’t any soul for me to make him see!”
“Oh, come on, Todd!” Jen says. Clear annoyance in her voice. “I know you don’t care much for Hector but this is a bit ridiculous.”
“You think I want this?” Todd asks. “It makes no freaking sense. You can’t just have someone with no soul!”
“What metric of sense-making was I supposed to use with the alien rockstar who hypnotized the whole world?!”
Todd takes a deep breath.
He knows they shouldn’t be shouting at each other. It’s stupid. Not to mention dangerous. They’re each powerful enough that if they decided to fight, someone could get hurt.
Jen winces slightly and the tension seems to be slipping some from her stance, so maybe she’s thinking the same thing. “What are you trying to say, then?”
Todd sighs. At this point, he’s just wishing he left well enough alone. Maybe this has some perfectly rational explanation that he would know if he cared more about Hall’s past. He sure as hell wouldn’t want anyone looking into his past.
“I’m saying – well, I used my powers on Chroma and used my powers on Hall and got the same result!”
Jen thinks for a moment. Todd doesn’t interrupt her. If she has an idea –
Well the reason he’s here is to hear it, right?
“That’s it!” Jen says. She holds a finger out, pointing upwards. “Hector was brainwashed by Chroma when you were using your powers! That’s probably why he looked the same as Chroma, soul-wise.”
Todd’s trying to make sense of this.
Jen keeps talking: “Chroma probably temporarily overwrote whatever’s usually bouncing around his head. I mean, he was the only guy you tried to use that power on while Chroma was on Earth, right?”
… She is right. Hall was the only person he’d used that power on during the whole Chroma thing – besides Chroma himself.
It seems nice.
And convenient.
And it would mean there aren’t any huge implications of ‘how on Earth can someone have no soul?’ or ‘how do I broach this topic with Hall?’
“Chroma was obsessed with the idea that human civilization was just going to come to an end and die,” Jen says. “From his POV, humans aren’t anything special. Souls probably don’t enter into Chroma’s powers or equations; that’s why you couldn’t see anything on him or Hec!”
Todd nods slowly.
He’s still not entirely sure he believes her. But he knows he wants to. So he says, “Thanks, Jen.” He laughs to try to defuse any leftover tension, and adds, “Good thing I talked to you about this before any of the other Infinitors, right?”
Jen laughs too, and says, “Yeah they’d think you’re crazy jealous again.”
… Todd knows that.
She must have known he was annoyed, because then she’s next to him again, wrapping an arm around his shoulders, and saying, “C’mon. Let’s just go back to the studio. You can help me with my lines for the commercial I’m auditioning for.”
“I don’t think that you need help memorizing twenty seconds of lines for a Big Belly Burger ad.”
“That’s what you think,” Jen says. And she’s smiling.
And Todd knows she just wants to forget about Chroma and do something normal, so he laughs and says, “Sure. Though if I’m helping, I think I should get a percentage of the winnings.”
“‘The winnings’. There’s gonna be like forty girls there. If I get picked – and that’s a big if – it’ll be less than 200 bucks.”
“So I think fifty percent is fair.”
Jen laughs.
And it feels good. It feels normal. Like this is what having a sibling you can actually talk to and being able to spend time with is supposed to feel like. Like Hall really just was messed up by Chroma and everything’s normal now.
In the future, when Lyta goes missing after Hall’s parents are lost in time and the guy barely reacts, Todd will wonder why he brushed this off. He’ll wonder if he could have done something. But that’s in the future, and Todd is stuck living in the now.