Chapter Text
Dirk manages to avoid Dave for the rest of the day. The next one, he makes sure he’s the first at breakfast and eats fast so he’s out the door by the time Dave stumbles in. Dirk climbs up the house and spends most of the day on Jeff’s roof. It’s not nearly as comfortable as the apartment, being that it’s two sections of pitched roof with a small balcony on the second level, but Dirk doesn’t need to move around much. He sits at the front corner and concentrates on his powers. They may be useless to their current task but he might as well not waste too much time.
He looks at the houses around the street and seeks out the little flares of color within them. There are several people who stick around during the day. They are a bunch of moms who feel warm and stressed, kids of multiple ages that rise and fall with excited glee, some guy in his basement flaring bright and intense with some task Dirk can’t quite make out. There’s more but the farther out they get, the harder it is to catch the full gleam of them without giving more attention than the passive look he’s working on right now.
He centers on the guy across the street. He’s big hearted, all full of patience and love and duty. Dirk can feel how attentive he is, the way he’s keeping an ear out for the two little souls bonded to his own. Kids and somehow Dirk knows they aren’t his by blood but they are his. The kids aren’t quite bonded to him yet- their souls are tiny and new and Dirk is pretty sure they’re not quite toddlers yet- but Dirk can see the beginning of the connection forming there. Curious and with no real knowledge of what they were doing.
Jeff’s neighbor on one side is an empty house until mass exodus time but the other one as an older woman in it with a soul that feels as creased and weathered as she probably looks. It’s not the lively glow he expects when he looks at them now; it’s older, healed over and scared again and again. Like someone had swiped claws over it trying to get it out of her chest. He doesn’t know what caused that but as he peers harder at her light, he suddenly thinks he knows exactly when that light will go out. It won’t be long. She’s not destined for much more and she knows it. She’s come to peace with that. He can taste the quiet acceptance like tepid water in his mouth.
Dirk watches people for most of the day. He goes down sometime after dinner’s already over, flash stepping to keep from attracting anyone’s attention, and finds a plate covered and waiting for him in the kitchen. He wonders how much trouble he’ll be in with Jane but he eats and then washes up after himself so no one else will have to. He thinks maybe he’s ready to go talk to the others again, but then he hears Dave’s voice from the living room and instead climbs back up to the roof again. He’s not running away, he tells himself. He’s just… taking some time.
He can almost hear the auto responder’s response to that and it doesn’t make him feel any better.
John’s getting the cold shoulder again when Dirk goes to sleep in the living room. He doesn’t say anything bitchy this time. The next day is a repeat of the one before. Dirk is actually kind of amazed at how well he’s managed to stay out of Dave’s way, but then again he spends a long time on the roof seeing just how far he can look into souls before his head starts to ache. It’s not nearly long enough and he is going to need to do a lot of training to fix that weakness.
If he ever wants to keep from doing whatever the hell he apparently did to Jade in sparking her power spike tsunami catastrophe, it’s gotta figure out how far his powers go so he can keep them in check. Which means lots of practice. Which means he is so totally busy in completely acceptable ways. Perfect.
He almost runs right into Jane when he goes for dinner this time but a split second redirect sends him out of her way and he just tugs an apple from a bowl on the counter before escaping again. It’s enough that he thinks maybe he should start tracking his friends’ souls when he goes inside.
That night, he waits until everyone in the house is settled before he ghosts back inside. Jake’s on the couch again but it’s Rose that’s stretched out on half the floor blankets this time. He doesn’t mean to wake her but his eyes slide open as he lays down. Dirk goes still but she just quirks up a brow like she’s throwing out a challenge and, well, he can’t not lay down now. Dirk settles quickly even though her gaze itches against his skin like a physical thing.
“So, you are aware that the disappearing act is, in fact, entirely too much like his brother?” Rose asks after a while in a tone that is amused and also shaded with steel.
Dirk blinks and is kind of glad he didn’t tug his shades off. “What?”
“Dave’s brother. He used to only show his face when it was time to strife. Most of the rest of the time, he used flashstepping to be a veritable ghost.”
Dirk stares at her and then twists onto his back so he can stare at the ceiling instead. “That was completely not my intent.”
“I gathered,” she says with a certain dryness that makes him believe she really had. “That is why I am doing my sisterly duty in letting you know so that he will stop flinching when he catches a glimpse of you out of the corner of his eye.”
“He-” Dirk stops because she wouldn’t bring it up if he hadn’t. Dirk frowns and twines his fingers in the blankets. “Shit. I thought I was being careful- wait. Sisterly duty?”
“A lot of things happened on the meteor. It’s not entirely strange that I came to see him fondly is it?” she asks and that is not entirely what he asked but she keeps up with, “We may have been raised apart but Dave and I found quite a bit of comfort in our familial connection.”
Familial. What. “You and Dave are siblings.”
“Of course. You seem so surprised. I would have thought you’d known.”
He didn’t but now he is suddenly buffeted with the knowledge that if Dave and Rose are siblings, that meant he and Roxy were cousins- But Rose was Roxy’s daughter the same way Roxy was Rose’s. Oh fuck did he hate SBurb’s ridiculous ectobiology now-
“You really don’t know.” Roxy tips herself up on her elbow and laughs at him, light and quiet and faintly menacing. “Do you at least know that you and Roxy are our parents?”
Dirk’s brain activity abruptly halts. He- what? No. No. “That’s-”
“And Dave and I are, in turn, your parents. Quite the incestuous turn around, isn’t it?” Is she smirking? She is totally smirking. “At least with John and Jade, their parents had a couple third parties. We Strilondes seem to be opposed to doing anything in a conventional and acceptable way.”
Dirk covers his face with his hands and lets out a tiny wheezing noise that has her laughing again. He doesn’t know who to blame for this travesty. Roxy’s great, she really is. He absolutely does not want to think of having kids with her. It is kind of a nice thought to be her brother, though. Ugh, this is so damn weird.
“Please tell me this is exactly as weird for you.”
She snorts. “I’ve had time to take it in. Thankfully, neither of us had a crush on the other. That might have been awkward.”
That just makes Dirk choke again.
“Oh?” Rose purrs with absolute satisfaction. “Do I detect a sordid secret?”
“More like something mortifying I am never talking about.”
“Pity.” She lets him off easy and slides back to her earlier point. “He isn’t angry at you, if you were wondering.”
Dirk parts his fingers and peeks through them at her.
“If that was the reason you started avoiding him,” Rose adds primly. “He is… Hm. I suppose the best way to describe it is conflicted.”
“Forgive me if I don’t take your word for it,” Dirk manages after a couple seconds. Her brows lift as she regards him.
“I think you are mistaking his feelings for his brother to be the same as his feelings for you.” The way her eyes go heavy lidded and amused makes him pretty sure there’s no thinking about it. “Of course, he seems to be making the same mistake.”
“Well that’s just perfect. I guess we really are related.”
“You should join us for breakfast tomorrow.”
Dirk looks at the ceiling again. He’s not sure about that. The way Dave’s voice had tripped over the word hate echoes in his ears even now. He is pretty sure the best thing he could do is to just not go near Dave until he stops looking like his brother, and then the rest of his life just for good measure. It’s not like he’ll ever be anything good for Dave. That much is pretty goddamn obvious.
“You might be surprised at the results.”
Dirk might have responded but there is a sleepy groan from the couch before Jake grumbles out, “Can’t this wait until morning?”
Dirk is mortified that he forgot someone was in the fucking room. He shuts up as Rose lets out a little titter and rolls over to sleep on her side. Dirk shoots the couch a glance but Jake didn’t even turn over to grumble at them. Sighing internally, Dirk gives the ceiling a glare and pretends he’s not seriously contemplating Rose’s words.