Archive of Our Own

The Manhattan family didn’t hug. That was a rule that Jack had set from the moment he’d started dating Lucy. He wasn’t a hugger, so his wife and kids weren’t huggers either. The family mostly didn’t seem to mind. Manhattans were all business. They didn’t feel, they didn’t cry and they certainly didn’t hug.

Unfortunately and against his will, Johnny Manhattan was born with an innate need to do all three of those things.

He’d learned to bury it, mostly. If not to appease his family, to appease the standards society set for him. He was the son of maybe the most well known police detective in the NYPD. Hell, he shared a name with that detective. He wasn’t some kid who could just let his emotions run free whenever he wanted to. He was Jonathan Manhattan Junior.

Whenever anybody found that out, they’d get really surprised that Jack was his dad’s nickname rather than his given name. Johnny didn’t really get the big deal. His dad wasn’t the first person to use Jack as a derivative from Jonathan, and he probably wouldn’t be the last either. Johnny had even tried going by Jack for a little bit back in primary school. It didn’t fit him very well. Besides, it just gave people another reason to keep comparing him to his dad. He hated it when people compared him to his dad.

That fact hadn’t always been true. He used to like the comparison, back when he was a kid. Back when he could still think of his dad as a hero. On good days, when Johnny’s mom was at work and his dad didn’t have a case to work on, Jack would take all the bullets out of his pistol and let Johnny hold it. Vicki would insist on pretending to be a robber, and he’d chase her all around the living room trying to catch her.

“I’m Jack Manhattan, the best cop in New York! Put your hands up!” He used to say. And every time he said it, his dad would let out a big hearty laugh, which even then was rare.

“Yeah you are, kiddo.” Jack would always reply. And even though Jack Manhattan was a notorious liar, he’d say that sentence in a way that made Johnny believe he was telling the truth. He wondered now if his father’s implications with that sentence were more sinister. If maybe he had known deep down how everything would turn out.

Of course, his mom would always yell at his dad when she got home, talking about how “no sane father would let a seven year old hold a gun”. But Jack would always sweet talk her into letting them play for a few more minutes before dinner. Then he’d tell Johnny and Vicki a crazy story about a recent case, and their mom would pretend she didn’t care, but they’d hear her giggling about the stupid sound effects Jack would make during action-packed moments.

His dad’s work partner, Cosmo Chase, would come over to hang out when he and Jack weren’t busy with a case, and despite being so by the book, always brought cool new toys and games for Johnny and his sister. Cosmo balanced his dad out. While Johnny’s mom tended to match her husband’s energy, Cosmo Chase knew exactly how to balance them both out. He was a born mediator, and that’s what made him such a good partner for Johnny’s dad. He was over so much that eventually the kids started calling him Uncle Cosmo. He didn’t mind much. Johnny would even say he liked it, given that he never implied otherwise.

The Manhattan family used to be happy. Really. They’d make it through Jack Manhattan’s bad days and they’d make it through his good ones. And on those good days, they got along so well that Johnny almost forgot about the no-hug rule. Johnny looked forward to those good days a lot, until he learned to stop expecting them.

Things got worse as Johnny got older. As he realized that his family’s attitude wasn’t quite normal. Though he didn’t lose contact with the family, Uncle Cosmo stopped coming over as much. When Lucy asked, he’d just say that “life was getting busy, and cases were getting more complicated.” Jack Manhattan stopped having as many good days. He stopped being there. He started taking cases further abroad. He didn’t stay in touch with the family while he was away. When he was home, he’d lay on the couch for days on end without talking to anybody. Lucy had warned Johnny and Vicki to tiptoe down the stairs so as to not be too loud, because “too much noise hurts your father’s head, and your father’s voice hurts my head.”

Despite being a self-proclaimed “loose cannon”, Jack Manhattan was not a physically violent man outside of work. Never once had he laid a hand on any of his family members. Verbally, however, Jack Manhattan had no filter on what he said. He could hurt you with his words, and he could hurt you with his silence. He could lie to you and break your trust, or he could tell you the cold, painful truth. No matter what he said (or didn’t say), it hurt like hell.

However, Lucy Santangelo was not a woman who simply put up with her husband running his mouth. No, when Johnny’s mom felt challenged, she fought back. It didn’t matter who was challenging her. It didn’t even matter where they were. If Jack went off, Lucy went off, and sometimes they would be screaming at each other for hours. Sometimes they made up later that night. Sometimes it took them days on end. Sometimes it seemed like they would never make up at all. No matter how long the argument was, Johnny and his sister would always spend most of it hiding in one of their rooms so as to not get screamed at themselves.

Once, when an argument got really bad, the Manhattan siblings were curled up in the corner of Vicki’s bedroom, silently listening to their parents fight.

“Vicki?” Johnny had said in a whisper, barely audible even to the Vicki in question, who was sitting right next to him.

“Yeah?” Still, she managed to hear him, and responded even more quietly. There was a long silence, and Johnny took a deep breath. He knew what the answer was to the question he was about to ask. But he was cold, scared and curious. So he asked anyway.

“...Can I have a hug?” His voice was meek, shaky and vulnerable. So unlike a Manhattan. He never wanted to get that vulnerable again, especially considering his sister’s reaction.

“What? No! We don’t hug, Johnny. Do you want Mom and Dad to get even more angry?” Vicki’s eyes had widened, and she struggled to keep her voice down out of pure shock and panic. Though she was younger than Johnny, Vicki was as much of a rule follower as a Manhattan could be. Mainly because she feared what would happen if she didn’t follow the rules. Johnny usually was the type to try to argue with her, to try to change her mind, but he sensed that this time, he wouldn’t be able to. And frankly, he was out of the energy to try.

“Right. Sorry.” And the siblings descended back into fearful silence, simply waiting for the screaming to stop. Johnny had never asked for a hug again after that. Not from Vicki, not from his friends, not from anybody.

It took Johnny a long time to find a coping mechanism. He tried every hobby he could, in hopes something would stick. He tried playing sports, he tried being in the school play, he tried drawing. Nothing worked. In junior high, he tried playing the flute in the school band. And for once, as stupid as it sounded, Johnny had finally thought he found something. He was damn good at the flute. It was pretty surprising, seeing as his family was known for their hot temper, and the flute was a pretty calm instrument. He even got assigned the flute solo in one of their big numbers. But at the end of year concert, after putting his all into his solo, Johnny watched all of his friends get showered with hugs, congratulations and even flowers from their parents. But he walked out into the audience after everything was all cleaned up, and he couldn’t see his dad anywhere.

“You’re one hell of a flute player, kiddo!” Uncle Cosmo had grinned as he saw Johnny walking up to the small three-person clump of him, Lucy and Vicki.

“Where’s Dad? He said he was going to come.” Johnny tried to look around the room discreetly, figuring that his father must be in the bathroom or something like that. When the rest of his family heard Johnny’s question, their faces fell, and they exchanged looks of dismay. Johnny had raised an eyebrow, confused. It was Uncle Cosmo that finally spoke up.

“Sorry, bud. Your dad was pretty tired, so he decided to just stay home and get some rest.” Cosmo spoke with a sad, sympathetic smile. It didn’t make the facts hurt any less. Johnny felt his face fall, trying not to flinch at this realization. He hated being upset in public.

“Besides, Johnny, it’s just the flute. There’s always next time.” Johnny’s mom waved her hand in the air passively, as if his hobby were just a phase. Johnny’s heart tightened in his chest. Maybe he wasn’t as good at the flute as he’d thought. His family certainly didn’t seem to care very much either way.

Johnny didn’t say much the entire way home. Vicki and Uncle Cosmo tried to ask him questions about band and the concert, but he didn’t respond much.

“Sorry. Tired.” He’d replied half-heartedly to most of their comments and inquiries. Eventually, Vicki rolled her eyes a little.

“Wow, John, the flute must take a lot out of you.” His younger sister spoke in that classic little-sibling antagonizing tone that Johnny knew all too well. He didn’t need this. He was already having a hard time keeping his cool.

“Johnny. Not John. And yeah, it does, Vicki.” He spoke through his teeth, as his mom glared at him through the rear-view mirror, with a look that said something like ‘don’t you dare start a fight now, Jonathan Jr.’

He hated being called John. His mom knew he hated being called John. Hell, even Vicki knew he hated being called John. It made him feel too professional, too much like his dad. Not that his father was the most professional of people, but still. The two feelings weren’t entirely connected, but both were uncomfortably present every time somebody called him John.

“If you say so.” Vicki had rolled her eyes again, blowing some hair out of her face as they pulled into the driveway.

Uncle Cosmo didn’t stay the night. He didn’t even go in the house, which wasn’t typical of him. Nobody chose to comment on it. Vicki just went right up to her room, and their mom went straight to her home office.

Johnny hadn’t gone upstairs. Instead, he’d walked into the living room, where Jack Manhattan was lying flat on the couch, hand on his head as he stared up at the ceiling. Johnny walked quietly, and sat down near silently in the armchair across from the couch. His dad didn’t seem to notice. He knew that confronting his dad was probably the least rational thing to do in this situation, but he was a Manhattan, and when had Manhattans ever been rational? (This sentence didn’t make as much sense when you considered the fact that Johnny’s mother was a lawyer - and a good one at that.)

“Dad?” Despite the fact that Johnny had tried to be as quiet as he possibly could, his father still jolted at the sound of somebody else’s voice. Johnny flinched a little as his father yelped. He could tell this interaction was going to go poorly. But he started this conversation, so he had to finish it. He’d be a coward if he didn’t. And Manhattans were not cowards.

“Jesus, Johnny, the fuck do you want?” Jack had huffed impatiently, still gazing at the ceiling. Johnny took a deep breath, letting the silence linger on a little longer. When he finally spoke, he’d spoken quieter than usual.

“Why didn’t you come to my concert?” Johnny said the sentence in a way that felt both too fast and too slow. It took his father a moment to comprehend the sentence. When he finally understood, he had let out an exasperated sigh.

“You’re upset about that? It’s just a middle school band. It’s not a big deal, kid. Besides, I’m exhausted. Let me fuckin’ rest. I wouldn’t be able to do my job if I didn’t rest. I don’t know why this damn family doesn’t understand that.” Jack grunted, squeezing the bridge of his nose with his pointer and thumb. Johnny’s face dropped a little, but he continued to persevere.

“Yeah, but I had the longest solo in the entire woodwind section. Really, I’m one hell of a flute player. Uncle Cosmo said so.” At this point, Johnny sounded like he was practically begging. It was pathetic. He felt pathetic. His dad hated when people were pathetic. He’d made that pretty clear.

Jack Manhattan was not impressed. He rarely was, but he was especially unimpressed now. And Johnny swore that when he’d said Cosmo Chase’s name, he saw his dad’s face twist a little. Jack would never admit that it had, of course. He was Jack Manhattan. He didn’t admit to much of anything. But Johnny was watching. And he saw the way his father’s face changed at the sound of his partner’s name. He couldn’t linger on the expression long, however, before his father began to talk again. The man spoke so casually, but with so much venom, eyes still fixated on the ceiling. He remained scarily unmoving, and the words coming out of his mouth were far from kind.

“Jesus Christ. You’re a Manhattan, Johnny. You don’t go around playing the fuckin’ flute. I put all my free time into making a name for this damn family, and you’re playin’ the damn flute? Come on, kid. Do something with your life for once. Live a little.”

And when Johnny heard his father say those words, the boy's heart was filled with a fire. Not quite a fire of passion, but not quite a fire of rage either. Almost a fire of realization, as odd as it sounds. Johnny knew his dad loved him. It was in an odd way, because Jack wasn’t great at showing affection in a traditional sense, but Johnny knew how his dad treated people he didn’t love. He was lucky to be loved even a little bit by Jack Manhattan. And at this point, he had finally realized that nothing he was ever going to do was ever going to be enough for his father. Being simply loved by his father wasn’t enough. He wanted his dad to care. And what was the only thing that Jonathan Manhattan Senior truly cared about? His work.

Johnny Manhattan never played the flute again. He didn’t even engage any further in the conversation with his father. Instead, he went upstairs to his room and he thought. He couldn’t keep trying to find random ways to cope with something that would just keep getting worse. He had to find a way to get involved. And there was no better way to get involved than becoming the type of criminal his dad built his entire career around catching. It would be dangerous, and he’d have to work hard to not get caught. But he was a Manhattan. Getting caught wasn’t in their genes, and Danger was quite literally Johnny’s middle name. Really, he was Jonathan Danger Manhattan Junior. Take a wild guess as to which of his parents named him.

He started out small. Covertly snatching little things from nearby convenience stores. As his endeavors got a little bigger, he started wearing a ski mask every now and again. He got a little bolder. He’d always been pretty flexible, but it was only when he started stealing that he really began to put that flexibility to use. He learned to do kicks, flips, jumps, whatever crazy trick the situation called for. He wore the ski mask more frequently. He’d get some one-off jobs, and earn crazy amounts of money from them. And while he managed to keep this new ‘hobby’ of his away from the attention of his family, he’d started to get on the NYPD’s radar, just as planned. Not as Johnny Manhattan, of course. No, with the mask on, he was the Skulker.

As for Jack Manhattan, he continued to grow distant, no matter how many rooftops Johnny leapt across to try and reach him. The periods of time Jack was home for between missions got shorter and shorter. He would simply use the excuse that he and Cosmo were “focusing on the Shadow Falcon case”, whatever that was. Eventually, after a huge falling out with Johnny’s mom, he just stopped coming home for a while. Nobody could get a hold of him except for Uncle Cosmo, and even he had a hard time. Lucy refused to tell her kids the details of the argument.

“Your dad’s an asshole.” She’d always reply when Johnny asked her. And that was all she’d ever say on the matter.

Then Mom got a job offer as a DA in Los Angeles. She hadn’t even asked her husband if she could take it. She just came home one day, eyebrows furrowed, gripping the handle of her briefcase tightly.

“Pack your bags, kids. We’re moving to L.A.” Lucy spoke in a tone that seemed to be an odd mix of rage and excitement. She was hard to read. That wasn’t inherently a bad thing. She was a lawyer, after all.

“What? Why?” Vicki, who had been sitting watching TV, scrambled for the remote and turned the television off as soon as her mother started talking. Her hair had fallen a little over her eyes, but she pushed it away as she stared at Lucy, bewildered.

“Job offer I can’t refuse.” Johnny’s mom didn’t even bother looking up as she talked. She barely even stopped moving. She was grabbing stuff from all around the first floor of the house and shoving it in her purse. Eventually, she ran out of room in the small briefcase and huffed, opening up the front hall closet and grabbing a tiny carry-on suitcase that had been stuffed into the corner.

“Does Dad know?” Johnny raised an eyebrow, trying to hide his shock as he watched his mom grab coats from the closet and shove them into the carry-on.

“We don’t call him Dad when we’re mad at him, we call him Jack Manhattan. And what do you think the answer to that question is? He won’t pick up my damn calls.” Lucy still wouldn’t make eye contact with either of her children. Instead, she zipped up the suitcase up tight, and re-opened her own briefcase. She searched through it for a bit, before pulling out a neatly put together folder, slamming it on the desk and opening it so the papers were showing. She pulled out a blank piece of paper and started writing what seemed to be either a very angry or very passionate note. Knowing his mom, Johnny knew it was really anybody’s guess as to which one. Then again, it could be both. Anger and passion were intertwined when it came to Lucy Manhattan.

“What’s in there?” Vicki gestured towards the folder, which appeared to contain a collection of legal documents. The kids were sitting too far away from the desk to really tell, and their mom was in too much of a state for them to really risk getting in her way.

“Divorce papers.”Johnny’s mom slammed the pen down, placed the note on top of the folder and walked away from the desk, still scouring the first floor for any small items to shove in the suitcases she had immediate access to. The Manhattan siblings had turned to each other, with nothing but shock painting their faces. Sure, their parents hadn’t always gotten along perfectly, but they always managed to bounce back as best they could. Even after hearing them have some of their worst arguments, Johnny had never expected his mom to even consider separation, let alone go through with it.

“You’re divorcing Dad?” Johnny spoke without thinking, and for the first time in the conversation, Lucy looked up at her son, shooting him a glare that burned through his soul. He made a quick move to correct himself. “...I mean Jack Manhattan.”

“We’ve run our course. I don’t want anything to do with that asshole.” Lucy looked back down, shutting her suitcases tight and then setting them down by the door. “Grab boxes from the garage and suitcases from your rooms, and pack your stuff. I booked a one-way flight for tomorrow morning.” She’d shouted back at her kids as she started up the stairs to her bedroom, and they immediately listened. The two siblings didn’t make much conversation as they packed. How could they? Their entire life was being uprooted beneath their feet.

The family somehow managed to get everything packed before their flight the following morning. Johnny tried to call his dad on the house phone before they packed it away, but as expected, he didn’t pick up. Fine. If he was going to be that way, he could. Johnny wouldn’t be in New York to put up with it anymore.

Johnny didn’t stop stealing when they got to L.A. Far from it. If anything, he started to steal more. The one-off jobs in L.A. were more dangerous than the ones back in New York. Sometimes he’d be out all night. When he’d get home in the morning, his mom would often be waiting for him at the door, staring daggers through him.

“I didn’t know that naming you after your dad would make you inherit his behaviors,” She’d say a variation of each time. Sometimes Johnny would simply nod and say okay. Sometimes he’d shoot his mom a look back. Sometimes, when he was feeling dangerous, he’d give her some sass.

“Are you going to kick me out of the family too?” He’d muttered once as he walked past her. But she certainly heard his little comment, and he was lucky it was too early in the morning for a full blown screaming match. However, it caused enough of an argument that he’d had to head out on the town for a while.

He knew his mom probably knew he was a thief. She wasn’t stupid. She was the District Attorney of Los Angeles, for god’s sake. But if she knew, she didn’t care enough to say anything. And that was strangely affirming for Johnny. But he did wish she cared enough to stop comparing him to his father, who she very evidently was not too fond of anymore.

Johnny loved being a thief. It was odd, enjoying stealing so much while being the son of a detective and a lawyer. Well, maybe it wasn’t really the stealing. Mainly, it was the stunts. Johnny didn’t know why he didn’t try using sick kickflips as a coping mechanism earlier. Not only was it cool as fuck, but it really did calm him. So much so that he’d leap around the L.A. rooftops even when he didn’t have a job to do. And that was exactly what he’d done that night.

Little did he know that a simple rooftop flipping session would change his entire career. For better, or for worse.

It happened in the blink of an eye. One second, Johnny was on a rooftop testing out a cool new spin. And the next, he’d been caught in m being chloroformed by two men in all black suits and sunglasses - probably FBI agents, now that he looked back on it.

“What the fuck?!? What are you doing-” were the last words he remembered screaming before he blacked out.

When Johnny had opened his eyes next, he was in a dark room he’d never seen before. He was tied to a chair, and the only illumination in the room was a dim green bulb, which barely made a difference.

“Shit, where am I?” He was too disoriented to keep his thoughts on the inside. It didn’t matter much anyway, because he was alone in this room.

“The feds nabbed us.” Okay, scratch that. He wasn’t alone in this room. A somewhat shrill voice sounded off from beside him, and the sound of it made Johnny jolt a little.

“Oh, damn, I’m not the only one here? Who are you?” Johnny turned his head towards the source of the voice. Sitting beside him, tied to a chair just like him, was a scrawny pale teenage boy. His big blocky glasses sat snugly on the bridge of his nose, and his acne-covered face was framed by greasy brown hair, hidden mostly under the hood of a sweatshirt. If Johnny had to describe him in a few words, he’d probably choose “greasy little twig”.

“You can call me G13, and only G13.” The boy spoke harshly, but in a way that intrigued Johnny rather than deterred him.

“Call me Johnny.” And despite the bleak environment, Johnny felt himself smile a little. “Damn, it’s nice to make some friends in this city, even under these circumstances.” Unfortunately, the person across from him appeared to feel far from the same way.

“Fuck you mean friends? We’re not friends. I’m nobody’s friend. We’re coworkers. Nothing more, and never anything more.” Johnny could practically see the spit coming out of G13’s mouth as he snarled. Even in such dim lighting, the teen’s beady eyes seemed to stab right through his soul.

“Damn. Okay.” Wow. That guy sure knew how to kill the vibe. So much for making conversation, Johnny figured as he’d looked away.

The green light bulb suddenly went out, quickly replaced by two incandescent bulbs lighting the whole room. Johnny looked around him and saw several other young adults, all bound to chairs in a similar way. And standing at the front of the room, surrounded by a posse of other agents, was a blonde man in a sharp tuxedo.

“Thank you all for coming today. Or rather, thank you all for not putting up too much of a fight while we kidnapped you.” The man’s eyebrows furrowed as he talked. He scanned the room, making eye contact with each and every person. Johnny felt a shiver go down his spine as the man’s eyes reached his.

“Way to tell it like it is, assholes.” G13 snarled under his breath from beside Johnny. This earned him a sharp glare from the man who was talking.

“Watch your tone, kid.” The agent snarled. The boy with glasses rolled his eyes at the comment, although he did listen and go silent. The FBI agent nodded sharply and began to pace as he continued to speak. “My name is Agent Carter Haldwell of the FBI. The Bureau has gathered you all here today for a new project. You are an assortment of the most talented young criminals in the state. And we need you to be a part of our new project: The Shadow Falcon Protocol. Don’t worry, you’ll be compensated generously.”

Johnny listened intently as Agent Haldwell described the details of the Shadow Falcon Protocol, and how all the young adults in the room would become involved in it. The information was complicated, secretive, and honestly? Kind of awesome. This was by far the biggest job offer Johnny had ever gotten.

“There’s only one issue.” Haldwell stopped dead in his tracks, now near the end of his debrief. One of the men behind him passed him a file, and he opened it towards the audience of young adults, revealing an image of a very familiar man. “Detective Cosmo Chase. Former partner of renowned NYPD Detective Jack Manhattan. He’s been following our case since the early stages of formulation. If he gets any closer to finding us out, we’re going to have to take drastic measures.”

Johnny couldn’t help his eyes from widening a little. So this was the case Uncle Cosmo had been working so hard on. His father must have worked on it a little too. He didn’t even know that they’d stopped being partners. Emotions were swirling in his head and chest, and it was almost too much to handle.

“You. Johnny Manhattan.” Agent Haldwell turned sharply towards Johnny, pointing a stiff finger towards him.

“Yeah?” The boy hadn’t expected to be picked out of the crowd, let alone so soon after the Uncle Cosmo information had been revealed. He was pulled swiftly out of his thoughts to listen intently, as Haldwell leaned close, speaking through his teeth not entirely out of rage, but certainly out of an attempt to intimidate.

“From here on out, you’re the Skulker. That ski-mask you wear? Staple it to your face. You’ll be doing some dangerous work.” Haldwell corrected his posture as soon as he finished his sentence, standing up straight and professionally.

Johnny nodded sharply, in too much shock to truly object. As the initiation meeting came to a close, the boy knew he was in for one hell of a ride with this job.

Soon after, he bought his own apartment. It was too dangerous of a job to get his family involved, and he couldn’t risk intersecting paths with Uncle Cosmo, who had finally been given their address and started coming around more often because of work (and to complain about Jack Manhattan with Lucy.) His mom and sister tried to object. He wouldn’t listen to them. He refused to back down.

“I don’t understand why you want to move out. You have such a great room here.” His mom kept bringing up the same point. For a lawyer, you’d think she’d have a stronger argument. But she’d had a rough time these past few months, so Johnny forgave her. Even if it was kind of annoying.

“I got a new job. It’s a pretty big commute from here. I want to make it easier.” Johnny would keep repeating, sounding more and more exhausted each time.

“Fine. But call every day, or I’ll find your apartment and kick your ass.” After about 5 rounds of just both mother and son reiterating the same points over and over, Lucy finally gave in. She offered Johnny some money to help him pay rent. He probably should have taken it, but he refused it anyway. He wanted to at least pretend he was self-sufficient. Besides, if his mom helped him pay, she was more likely to get roped into any danger he got himself into. And that was the last thing he wanted.

He’d started stapling the mask to his face, just as requested. He’d keep it on as often as he could, but he’d always take it off when visiting his family. She’d berate him for the wounds around his face. He’d take the brunt of it, but he’d never let her know the cause of them, no matter how much she begged him. Eventually, he mostly just called her. Unstapling and restapling got exhausting. It was easier to wash his face with the mask on anyway. Just one quick dunk

He kept doing jobs for the Shadow Falcons. He avoided any trouble. He even managed to become one of their best employees.

And then he got the call.

It was the middle of the night. In a rare occurrence, Johnny was actually at home during the night. In an even rarer occurrence, he was actually trying to fall asleep. He had almost managed to completely tumble over when his home phone began to ring loudly and obnoxiously. Johnny groaned loudly and rolled out of bed to pick it up.

“Manhattan. We’ve got another job for you.” The voice of Agent Carter Haldwell sounded loudly from the phone

“Whuh? It’s like… 2 in the morning.” Johnny’s words were slurred, and his tone was groggy. That didn’t seem to phase Haldwell in the slightest. He spoke his next sentence as confidently as he always did.

“Doesn’t matter. We got him.”

Those words woke Johnny right up. His heart sank into his stomach. He knew exactly what Haldwell had meant with that sentence. Who else could “him” possibly be?

Cosmo Chase was dead. They’d killed him. He’d gotten too close to cracking their case, and now he was gone. And now Johnny was going to have to help cover it up.

“...You got him.” Johnny’s voice shook a little. It was barely noticeable, at least in his opinion. And Haldwell didn’t bother pointing it out, so Johnny only had his own assumption to go off of.

“Yeah, but we still need the evidence.” Johnny knew what the tone Haldwell was using meant. But he wanted absolutely no part in this. He would rather lose his entire career than take part in this. Or maybe it was just too early in the morning for this. However, it was incredibly emotionally distressing to learn that a man who played such a big part in his childhood had been killed by the very organization that Johnny had been working under for the past few months.

“I’m sorry, but I’m not getting involved in this. It’s a conflict of interest.” The thief’s heart began to beat faster in his chest than it had ever before. He was caught in a strange state of panic that was not helped by the hissing tone of the agent on the other end of the line.

“You’re working for the fuckin’ Shadow Falcons, kid. There’s no such thing as a conflict of interest. You’re gonna get that evidence for us. Got it, Skulker?” There was so much venom in the agent’s voice that Johnny could practically feel the poison slipping through the phone speaker into his veins. Yet somehow, it filled Johnny with determination. He wasn’t just going to stand by, right? He had to object. He had to stand up for himself.

“Or what? What are you going to do if I don't?” Johnny’s emotions got the better of him, and he spat into the speaker of the phone. However, immediately after, he could feel a pit of regret begin to form in his stomach. What was he doing? Why would he say that?

He didn’t know what response he was expecting, but the response he’d gotten would forever haunt him. Especially given the fact that he certainly hadn’t told his employers his legal name.

“Don’t think we don’t know where your family lives, Jonathan Manhattan Junior. Get those damn bullets, or you’ll be finding a bullet through your mom’s head.”

And before Johnny could say anything, the line went dead silent. They’d hung up on him. He had no choice but to do what his employers asked of him.

Uncle Cosmo’s funeral was nauseating. Johnny’s mother had taken it upon herself to organize it, as most of the Chase family was either dead or absent. This meant that between work and home, dealing with Cosmo’s death was virtually inescapable. Johnny couldn’t help but blame himself. It was his fault for cutting contact with his father’s ex-partner, all for the sake of his dumb job. Hell, it was his fault for working for the Shadow Falcons. But it’s not like he could quit. Not without losing his mom. He couldn’t lose her too. He wouldn’t be able to take it. No matter how much they argued, his mom and Vicki were all Johnny had left.

It was at the funeral where everything truly fell apart. And by that, Johnny meant it was at the funeral where he saw Jack Manhattan for the first time in a year. Lucy had made a point not to invite her ex-husband (well, unofficially. The man still hadn’t signed the papers.) to the funeral. But as Johnny stood by the closed casket, who else did he see but Jack Manhattan, solemnly dressed in a black polo and dress pants. He didn’t even know how he found out about the funeral. Part of Johnny wanted to walk up and ask him. To confront his father. Even to possibly fix things. But instead of talking to his damn family, he ignored them entirely. He was there for maybe a total of 5 minutes, and the deadbeat didn’t even bother to say hi to his kids. He just stood there smizing at the coffin like an idiot. It filled Johnny with rage. He couldn’t believe this man. He couldn’t believe his dad had really let himself get this bad. Or maybe he was always this bad, and Johnny was just too blind to see it. Either way, he was angry.

After that, he’d stopped going by Johnny Manhattan entirely. He was the last member of his family to drop the last name. Maybe it was because he was still clinging onto a little hope. But whatever hope he had was gone now. He didn’t want to be associated with his father anymore. On the rare occasions he was out of the mask, he was Johnny Santangelo. Otherwise, he only answered to the Skulker.

However, that matter was quickly complicated by the fact that Jack Manhattan had decided to take on Cosmo’s case. His dad was everywhere in Los Angeles. And it was pretty damn hard for Johnny to do the jobs that the Shadow Falcons wanted him to do with this stupid New York cop breathing down his neck. Worst of all, this damn cop was related to him, and the idiot couldn’t even recognize his own son’s voice. It hurt, but he supposed it meant things were going to be relatively easy.

Or so he’d thought.

Johnny didn’t mean to get caught, truly. Maybe it was his fault for getting involved in the Long Beach 5000. Maybe it was his dad’s fault for being at the Long Beach 5000. But no matter whose fault Johnny getting caught was, it was definitely his own fault for letting it all unravel as quickly as it did. He revealed too much. He got too caught up in the exposition dump, and now both his mother’s life and his own were at risk. Worst of all, Johnny had revealed himself to his father, and could feel his tough guy thief persona start to slip away as he began to get dragged around by his father’s crew.

So here Johnny is now, in front of the Santangelo home, ski-mask off, blood dripping from both his nose and the staple wounds around his face. And he was in the middle of a three-person hug, trapped between his father and a very attractive woman that he did not know the name of. And honestly, after all that, to feel his father’s arms around him, to feel anybody’s arms around him, let alone two people’s arms at once, was a feeling that Johnny Manhattan was far from used to. But it was also far from unwelcome. It was new. It was strange. It made all the hope he had in the past suddenly come flooding back. He didn’t even know the woman beside his dad, but her arms felt just as carefully placed and secure around him as his father’s. As he smelled the smoke still on his clothes from getting struck by lightning, Johnny sat there and thought for a moment.

Something monumental had changed about his father. That much was for certain. Johnny couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or a bad thing yet, but he knew that the Jack Manhattan that raised him would definitely not be hugging him right now. This man that was doing slam poetry about being a fifty-eight year old woman from Orange County was not a side of his father that Johnny knew about. He wanted to get to know this side of his dad. He wanted to relive his childhood with a father who cared. And the oxytocin from the hug made him feel too nice to really care. He could barely even say anything. All that came out of his mouth was simply:

“Wow.”

The word hung in silence for a little while, as the two people hugging him slowly broke away. But Jack Manhattan didn’t fully break away. In a completely unexpected moment, Johnny felt his father’s hand rubbing his back. Every part of him wanted to sink into his father’s touch, to truly just take this moment in. His dad cared. But he was in front of too many people to embarrass himself like that. So instead, he just sat forward a little bit.

“Dad, you and this really, really attractive woman-” Johnny made eye contact with his father as he spoke. It was unusual. It truly had been a while.

“Thank you.” The pink haired woman cut in, smiling genuinely. For some reason, it felt like she’d never heard that compliment before, which seemed highly unlikely. Johnny shook his head. There was no point dwelling on that. He had too many other thoughts to comprehend.

“...That’s the first time I’ve been hugged, that’s… Okay, wow. I’m covered in blood. Some of that’s from the staples, but not all of it.” He touched his face, and then looked down at the splatters of blood on his hand. Although the wounds still burned, the blood from them was mostly dry now. It still managed to rub off onto his fingers, however. Not to mention the blood from his nose, staining his palm red.

“No.” Jack Manhattan stared daggers at his son. He was sort of smizing, as he always was. But he somehow managed to make it intimidating, as he always did. He was Jack Manhattan. Everything about him could be used as a weapon.

“Okay.” Johnny raised an eyebrow, confused, but listening to what his father had to say.

“I want you to stop stapling your face.” The detective enunciated his words more than usual. His face moved in a way that Johnny had never seen before, but it was oddly endearing. If this was Jack Manhattan’s way of showing that he cared, it was working.

“Okay, Dad.” Johnny didn’t even bother thinking about the implications that this request had for his job. His dad asked something of him. His father wanted him to take better care of himself, so he would listen.

Johnny smiled at his father, who nodded at him knowingly, and cracked the slightest bit of a smile back. Woah. Too many feelings for one interaction. Johnny did not want to cry today, so he broke eye contact.

“It’s just, my dad was a New York City police detective, and I felt like I wasn’t close to him, like nothing I ever did was good enough, and so I started to steal, and I started getting really good at it. I could jump from roof to roof, do awesome spins and kicks and stunts.” As he spoke, the thief wiped his eyes a little to clear them of any water. He owed it to his father and the people around him to explain himself. Okay, maybe that wasn’t the real reason. Maybe he was just hoping to be anywhere near as good with words as his father had just revealed himself to be.

“Are you doing poetry?” Jack cocked his head a little, raising an eyebrow as he asked his son a question.

“No, this is me talking.” Johnny wished he was doing poetry. He considered lying for a bit, but thought better of it and told the truth instead.

“Okay.” His dad nodded, pursing his lips a little.

“Oh, great. Yeah.” The woman beside his dad spoke as well, simply enforcing Jack Manhattan’s answer.

“You doing a poem lets me know that I don’t have to get my feelings out through stunts and kicks and flips and jumps. I can do it with words.” Johnny’s eyes scanned the people around him as he finished his thought. He felt vulnerable. He usually hated getting vulnerable, but to tell the truth, right now, letting his emotions out was pretty freeing.

“That’s a beautiful monologue.” The catsuited woman (who he still didn’t know the name of) put her hand on Johnny’s shoulder. It felt weird. This was a lot more physical touch than Johnny was used to. Not that he was opposed to it. It was just new.

“Yeah, that’s a moment.” Vic Ethanol spoke up. Damn. Johnny had forgotten that the Vic Ethanol was here. His dad sure had some crazy connections. How did he even meet the famous street racer? Johnny didn’t want to know.

Johnny Manhattan often tried hard not to speak without thinking. It didn’t always work, but he certainly did try. But right now, he didn’t really care what came out of his mouth. He was overwhelmed, mostly in a good way. Too overwhelmed to really pay attention to what he was saying. Which resulted in four very impactful words coming out of his mouth.

“I love you, Dad.”

Immediately, Johnny Manhattan felt a wave of regret. Why would he say that? The Manhattans didn’t say ‘I love you’. Those three words may as well be banned in their house, just by default. It was better to simply imply it. But while he was spiraling, Jack Manhattan spoke four words that shook Johnny to his core.

“I love you too.”

And Johnny couldn’t stop his heart from swelling. Because to know that his father loved him was one thing. But to hear him say it for the first time, especially after so long, made Johnny practically short-circuit. All he could do was smile like a dork and say one singular word:

“Awesome.”

Things were going to be okay, Johnny thought, for maybe the first time ever. His dad was here, and he cared, and things were going to be okay.