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Each night, before Ray went to bed, he ran a security scan. He’d dealt with enough (attempted) break-ins now that they were above ground, so he had Schwoz create a system to detect any and all signs of life in the entire building.
Two heartbeats around the bedrooms, as expected— Schwoz had gone to sleep hours before, claiming some sort of sleep experiment. Three more below ground, accounting for the dungeon. He realized Drex was probably overdue for a meal, though considering he wouldn’t die of starvation… it wasn’t that high of a priority. He’d deal with it later.
But he couldn’t help noticing a fifth body lurking in the main room. He asked the computer if it could identify anything.
Subject: Chapa.
Ray groaned. Sure, it wasn’t the first time he’d caught one of the kids snooping around after hours, but he wanted to make sure it was the last. He pulled on a sweatshirt before he made his way to the source of the problem.
The room appeared to be empty… but the computer didn’t lie.
“Chapa, I know you’re in here!” Ray called. “I’m gonna turn on the security system whether you leave or not! And if you fry it, Schwoz is gonna be really mad!”
Silence. He crossed his arms, giving her a few more seconds to come out from wherever she was hiding... which, of course, she didn’t. There weren’t many places to hide as it was, so he wasn’t surprised when he crouched down and saw her staring at him from under the couch.
“Hey. You know this thing moves, right?” The last thing he needed was a kid getting crushed on his watch. “Not a good place to be.”
Chapa huffed, but didn’t protest otherwise— she only extended her hand so Ray could pull her out from underneath it.
“What are you doing here?” Ray asked while he helped her off the floor. “You should’ve been out of here hours ago.”
Chapa looked him up and down, eyes lingering on his heart-patterned pajama pants. “What are you wearing?”
“They’re comfortable,” Ray said. “Don’t dodge the question. Why are you hiding?”
Chapa rolled her eyes. “Why does it matter?” she asked. “It’s not like we haven’t stayed this late before.”
“Yeah, but... when I tell you to,” Ray replied. “You’re not working. You should go home and get some sleep.”
Chapa only crossed her arms, looking away from Ray.
Belatedly, perhaps, Ray realized... he wasn’t too sure where ‘home’ was for Chapa. He’d met Bose’s family even before parents’ night, he remembered Miles and Mika’s aunt had been the one to initiate their meeting in the first place. But Chapa had never so much as mentioned a parent before, and the events of that night only raised further suspicion.
He was missing something.
“How about we sit and chat for a minute?” Ray offered before he climbed to sit on the back of the couch. After a moment, Chapa spared him a glance, and slowly made her way over to sit down beside him.
“If you give me another safety lecture, I’m not gonna listen,” Chapa said. “I already know why it’s bad to—”
“Do you wanna tell me why you hired an actor to play your father?” Ray interjected before she could get them off topic again.
Chapa looked away again, and maybe she was trying to seem unbothered, but Ray could tell she was tense.
“Why’d anyone bring their real parents in the first place?” she asked. “It would’ve been a lot easier to bring in a bunch of randos and make them pose for a picture.”
“...True,” Ray agreed. “But… kinda need your parents to trust me. If we let them visit every now and then, they’re a lot less likely to think something’s up and start investigating themselves. You know?”
“I guess,” Chapa mumbled. “But you don’t have to worry about my parents investigating, so you can just... let it go.”
“Let it go?” Ray echoed. “Chapa. You want me to turn a blind eye when I don’t even know where you go after work every day?”
“Yeah.” Chapa shrugged. “Why do you care? You’re my boss, not my dad.”
Ray let out a sigh. Something was definitely going on, and while he knew he probably shouldn’t push it... he was going to push it anyway.
“No, I’m not your dad,” he agreed. “But I am the adult responsible for you for a good portion of the day, and as that adult, it’s my job to make sure you’re safe.”
“I’m a superhero. I can keep myself safe.”
“Oh yeah?” Ray asked. “I’m a superhero, too. You see me trying to work alone, sneaking around, lying to the people I work with?”
Chapa raised an eyebrow. “You said lying was an important part of being a superhero. That was, like… our first lesson.”
Ray pursed his lips. He probably should've guessed that might come back to bite him one day. “Okay, we’ll circle back around to that,” he said. “My point is, I don’t want you to get hurt, and I can’t guarantee that if I don’t know what you’re up to. So why are you here after hours, and why aren’t you going home?”
Chapa exhaled, her gaze falling to the floor. She didn’t say anything at first, but Ray doubted he could say anything else to convince her, so he'd just have to wait it out.
Sure enough, Chapa gave in and gave her answer.
“Because I don’t wanna go home, okay?” She huffed. “Because it sucks. I got tired of hiding out at random businesses after hours, and I thought staying here would be easier.”
Ray frowned. “Random... businesses?”
“Yeah. A lot of them don’t check that well before they close. And it’s shelter, and there’s a bathroom, and sometimes I can steal food, so it’s fine. But sometimes it’s hard to sneak out in the morning.”
Ray thought it best not to point out that what she was doing, especially the stealing part, was a crime. At least no one was getting hurt in the process... probably. “Whatever, that part’s not important,” he said. It was, actually, but not quite as important as his other questions. He was getting distracted. “What do you mean, ’it sucks?’ Going home sucks?”
Chapa only shot him a glare. Ray wasn’t sure how to read it, but he had a feeling it wasn’t a good sign.
“Chapa…“ Ray said, his voice a bit softer now. “Is something going on at home?”
Chapa looked at the floor again, and Ray waited.
“I ran away.”
Ray raised his eyebrows. “You… what?”
“You heard me.”
“But… why? What’s going on?” Ray gently nudged Chapa’s arm with his elbow, but she didn’t budge. “Chapa. Did someone hurt you?”
“No,” Chapa answered all too quickly. “Not… it’s not what you’re thinking.”
“Then what is it?” Ray asked. “I’m not playing twenty questions here, but I wanna help. You’re not… in trouble, whatever it is.”
Okay, that wasn’t entirely the truth. If Chapa, for example, revealed herself as Volt to her parents… she’d be in a little bit of trouble. But since Schwoz was working on a new memory wiper, anyway, it wasn’t the end of the world—
“I ditched them after I lost my phone. I couldn’t take it anymore.”
Ray blinked. It always came back to the phone, huh?
“Oh, shut up,” Chapa muttered.
“What— I didn’t say anything!”
“I can see it in your face. You think it’s a stupid reason to run away.”
Ray sighed. She had him there. “There’s more to this, isn’t there?” he asked. “It’s not just about the phone. There’s something else.”
Chapa seemed reluctant to look at him again. “Yeah.”
“And that is…?”
After a moment, Chapa spun around and hopped off the couch. At first, Ray thought she was trying to escape the conversation… but she just started pacing back and forth.
“My phone was my only way to talk to people who… who didn’t make me miserable,” she said. “And when that boy stole it, I couldn’t deal with living at home anymore. So I left.”
“Oh.” Ray paused. “You… really couldn’t just get a new one?”
“We’ve talked about this,” Chapa snapped. “You know how expensive phones are nowadays, Ray? This isn’t the 1900s.”
“Fair point.” They were getting off topic again. “Who’s making you miserable at home? Your parents?”
Chapa paused in her pacing to glare at Ray again, which he took as a resounding ’yes.’
“Okay,” Ray said, his hands in the air. “Maybe that was obvious.” Any other day, he would’ve given her a harder time about being so snippy with him… but he couldn’t really blame her now. “Do you wanna… talk about it, maybe?”
Ray wasn’t a therapist. He was hardly qualified to take care of kids as it was, despite six years of experience with Henry. But it seemed he’d done something correctly, because Chapa came back to sit on the base of the couch and kept talking.
“They don’t like me,” she said. “They don’t like that I’m growing up, and… making my own choices. They hate the way I dress, they freaked out at me when I cut my hair, and they won’t even call me Chapa. Even when they try to act like they love me, I can tell they think I’m just a huge disappointment.”
Ray frowned. That did sound like a lot to deal with. “I’m sorry, Chapa—“
“I have friends online I could talk to, but my parents put my computer on lockdown so I could only use it for school, so I was screwed without my phone,” Chapa continued. “The police weren’t doing shit to help me, so I went to find you instead.”
“...Oh.” Maybe Ray would’ve taken her case a little more seriously if he’d known… actually, at the time, maybe not. “Okay… I see.”
“And… y’know, stuff’s a lot better now, ‘cause I have you guys,” she said. “You guys respect me. But I still don’t wanna go back home and deal with my parents again.”
Ray nodded slowly. It was a lot to take in, but not entirely unfamiliar. Given, Henry’s parents never seemed to have any issues with who he was as a person, but they weren’t exactly… aware. He wasn’t all that surprised Chapa’s parents hadn’t figured out where their kid had been all this time.
Still, it didn’t make it any less bad.
After some thought, Ray reached down and rested a hand on Chapa’s shoulder. “Chapa… you’re right,” he said. “We all respect you, no matter what. Your hair’s cool, the way you dress is cool, and your name’s even cooler.” He couldn’t remember the rest of it, of course, but maybe that was fine if she wasn’t using it. “You don’t have to go back home if you don’t want to. But no more squatting in random business buildings, okay?”
Chapa sighed, her shoulders sinking. “Okay,” she mumbled. “Where am I supposed to sleep?”
“Well… we do have 899 more rooms here,” Ray said. “I’m sure at least one of them would work.”
Chapa turned her head to face him, a hopeful look in her eyes. “You’d… really let me stay here?” she asked.
“Of course,” Ray said. “I mean… I do want you to figure stuff out with your parents. Eventually.” If they ever smartened up and found out where she was, he didn’t need Captain Man or Ray Manchester tangled up in some sort of kidnapping case. “But if you need some help in the meantime… I’m here for you. We all are.”
Chapa turned away again, and Ray was worried he’d said something wrong. But soon enough, she hopped up onto the back of the couch… and pulled him into a hug. Ray stood frozen at first, taken completely off guard, not sure how he was meant to react.
And then he realized Chapa was trembling. Crying. And he returned the hug in earnest, holding her tightly.
“It’s alright,” Ray said, his voice just above a whisper. “Let it out.”
She was quiet for a few minutes, save for some shaky breathing, and Ray let her do what she needed to do. Eventually, she whispered, “If you tell anyone about this, I’ll kill you.”
Ray huffed out a laugh. “Not possible, but I’ll keep it to myself. Promise.”