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Misfire has travelled across the border from Uber to unknown relative to Uber, and now he’s standing, unsure, in his biological father’s kitchen.
“Really, Dad?” says a man, who Misfire can only assume is his half brother, who’s pacing back and forth and talking wildly with his hands. Misfire does the same thing when he’s trying to think.
Henry Spencer—his biological father, apparently—shrugs, but he’s defensive, hackles still raised. “Oh, come off it, Shawn. It was after your mother. It was one night!”
Knowing he is a one-night stand isn’t the greatest thing to know, but Misfire can handle it. It’s not like the opinion of his biological father means much to him anyways. He only learned about him a couple of days ago, when he was sorting through his attic, in search of pictures of toddler Crankcase to show Krok. He had seen a collection of images tucked away into an envelope, and his stupid curiosity got the best of him and he just had to open it.
Inside that envelope was pictures of his mother and an older man dancing together and kissing and Misfire couldn’t believe his mother would kiss somebody who is very obviously a cop.
(Not that he has much reason to dislike cops, per say, but he is a mutant and he does have to be extra careful around them, has to try to be normal and extremely human, like he’s an alien in a skin suit. He has to smile and wave and be friendly but not too friendly and smile normally and not too wide and wave slowly but not too slow. It’s all confusing and extremely exhausting.)
“You had a kid. With another woman,” reminds Shawn, rather dramatically if Misfire does say so himself. It’s really not the end of the world.
“We were divorced. I did nothing wrong, I was just blowing off some steam,” says Henry.
“Blowing off steam? Really? Y’know what? I’m done,” Shawn hisses. Henry shouts his name again, but Shawn’s already out the back door.
Henry sighs, putting his hand on his head. He rubs his face. “I’m sorry, Misfire, I was hoping he would take it better.”
Misfire’s wings twitch, folding tighter against his back. “No. It’s alright— it’s okay.” He isn’t sure what else to say. He’s trying not to ramble, because he knows that if he starts he won’t ever stop. He knows he’s annoying. He knows that the only people that have ever been able to handle him are his friends. His mother is too tired all the time, and his teachers haven’t liked him since he stepped into kindergarten, and no girlfriend has ever been able to stay long enough to comprehend his talking.
He knows he’s a lot. He knows he’s too much.
Henry shows him around town, mainly the harbour, where his boat is. Henry likes fishing, Misfire learns. He likes fishing a lot. Misfire doesn’t fish. He lives in a tiny town in Alberta, he doesn’t have time to fish; he barely has time to do his homework and go to work and have a breakdown in his car and try and strap his wings to his back to hide them and hide the alcohol bottles in his room and cook dinner for himself and put leftovers for his mom in the fridge.
When would he have time to fish?
“I’ll teach you,” Henry offers, opening the door of his truck and taking out his tackle box. “Shawn couldn’t ever wake up early enough to learn. I’m hoping at least one of my sons can pass it down.”
All of the sudden, this all feels incredibly personal—too personal. Misfire doesn’t want to be some kind of replacement for his real son. He is only here because he was vaguely curious about who his father was, and because his mom was scheduled to be out basically all week.
“I dunno about that,” he responds, because what else does he say to that? He’s not even sixteen yet, he isn’t thinking about passing anything down, he isn’t even thinking about what’s after high school, or what is next semester is going to look like, or even what he thinks the next Leafs game score will be.
Henry gives him a look Misfire can’t place. “You— you like girls, right?” he asks, glancing up at the pink in Misfire’s hair, and Misfire is so floored by that question he almost forgets how to talk.
“What—? I—? Yeah?” he tries, stumbling over his words as his brain runs too fast for his mouth to keep up.
What the hell? What is this? Who asks a teenager that?
“Not that gay people can’t have kids. They can adopt, I just—“ Henry stops searching through the tackle box and looks up at him.
He really hopes he doesn’t sound this disorganized when he’s rambling. “I’m not gay,” he says, truthfully. He’s bisexual, sure, but that’s not something that Henry Spencer, of all people, needs to know. At least he knows that he would be trying to be supportive if he ever came out to him. That’s a plus.
“Okay,” he says, “it would be okay if you were.”
Misfire really doesn’t want to have this conversation. He holds himself back from snapping his wings in irritation. “The pink is natural, from my mutation, I don’t dye my hair, my mother would absolutely murder me if I ruined the tub.”
“Okay,” he repeats.
“Okay,” Misfire echos.
While Misfire is —attempting—learning all about the different tackles, Henry gets a call from the police about Shawn. He ends up bringing Misfire along for the trip, and the feeling of being some kind of piece of meat for a petty, decades old, father and son drama comes back to him tenfold.
“A bullet went through your car’s window, Shawn. That’s not nothing,” says Henry, seething with worry.
“Actually, it was my car,” recalls Shawn’s friend, Gus, from his spot at the sidelines of this little argument.
“I see you’ve brought my brother,” Shawn says, almost confusingly venomous, ignoring Henry’s concerns and glaring at Misfire.
“You have a brother?” asks a pretty, blonde detective who Misfire is sure is Shawn’s friend.
“Half-brother,” Henry corrects, “and he’s not staying long.”
“I think we can tell which half,” mutters another detective. Misfire snorts in amusement. This other detective reminds him so much of Crankcase, it brings back the feelings of missing him like a limb, feelings he had thought he had gotten over.
Crankcase is all the way in Ontario, being recruited for a fancy private school, and Misfire is in British Columbia, in the middle of the police station for a problem he didn’t start. (Which is definitely a first.)
He slides his phone out of his pocket, tuning out the talking that swirls and bounces over his head.
His lock screen shows no new messages.