Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

When people are young, they often dream about becoming a hero.

Not for Green though. For Green, his dreams were destroyed once he became a hero.

What dreams, you may be wondering? How could it be possible that achieving glory and fame and helping everyone around you could possibly shatter any kinds of dreams one may have?

Well first of all, the dream of living a normal life. As the training seminars all said, the life of a hero is a dangerous one, and once you become one, you can never go back to being a civilian again. Even if something happens so you can no longer perform hero work, from a legal standpoint, you would be regarded as an Ex-Hero, not a civilian.

And second of all, it literally destroys your dreams because you don't dream anymore.

Because you don't sleep anymore.

This is where Green found himself, wide awake and ready to fight at one am, walking along a dusty alleyway with his fellow hero and friend, Mimic, also known as Red.

"I just don't understand! What's even the point of going to school if we're heroes and already have jobs and stuff for the rest of our life?" Red complained, waving his hands for emphasis.

"I dunno, critical thinking skills? Or maybe they just want their heroes to be educated so it looks good?" Green responded idly.

"Well it's not like they can even tell people what education we have or where we went to school, that would risk our identities! So then what's the point?"

"I think I read somewhere that school improves problem solving and communication skills as well."

"Well I can communicate with you guys just fine! And the only problems out here are how to defeat villains, and the solution is to fight them. And-"

Right when Red was about to continue complaining, Green heard a thud to his left, followed by a sharp intake of breath and a quiet "Cursors!" Both of their heads immediately snapped to the side, and after some shuffling, a figure emerged, standing up straight with two large wings spread out behind him and a moth-shaped mask on his face.

"Hello Rhapsody, Mimic," He said smoothly.

"Hello Saturn," Green, whose hero name was Rhapsody, replied.

"For the fourth time, it's Saturniidae, you insufferable clarinet," Saturniidae said, for the fourth time since they had first met.

Saturniidae was a fairly new villain who had appeared around three weeks ago. He had two powers that they knew of, which was extremely rare seeing as most don't even have one. Luckily, they were both pretty simple ones; the ability to summon two large moth-like wings to his back, and the ability to turn invisible. Unluckily, he knew how to use them, and by the cursors did he know how to use them well.

"I notice you said the fourth time, rather than the last time."

"I know full well that you're not going to listen, and I'm going to have to say it at least two more times for the message to stick," the villain said bluntly.

"Well, if everything goes well for us tonight, then there's not gonna be a next time for you!" Red chimed in, which Green took as his signal to move in and go for a melee attack with his custom made, government issued weapon. It was similar to a spear, but shorter and with points on each end. There was also a small button towards the middle of the staff that, when pressed, allowed the user to pull it apart and have two even smaller weapons instead of one. Green rarely used it, but he was still trained to be able to do it in a second if he ever needed to.

Saturniidae turned invisible at the last moment and dodged. Green looked around and saw him now hovering behind Red, who had used his power to turn into a large dog.

"Mimic!" Green called. Red heard and moved out the way, but not fast enough, as Saturniidae's dagger still pierced his skin, causing him to yelp in pain. Red twisted up and around to snap at his ankle, and managed to get a solid bite in before Saturniidae's dagger came down on him once more.

Saturniidae kicked off of Red before turning invisible. Green felt something move behind him and turned around right before feeling something sharp hit his side. Luckily, his armor stopped it from properly stabbing him. Unluckily, it was still powerful enough to hurt, and Green knew there would be a bruise the next morning.

In retaliation, Green sang a note to blast towards where he thought Saturniidae was, and he was proven right as he became visible again and stumbled backwards.

"Since we're legally required to say this every time, come with us peacefully and we may show you mercy, or something," Green deadpanned, then waited about three seconds before sending out another blast, which Saturniidae dodged this time.

Before he could do anything else, a large boom sounded in the distance. Everyone paused for a moment, then Saturniidae stood up a bit taller.

"Well, looks like that's my signal to go!"

He kicked off the ground and flapped up above their heads. Red transformed into a hawk to try following him, but Saturniidae went invisible. Red came back down a couple minutes later, a disappointed look on his face.

"We lost him again."

"Ugh. Should we head back to the tower?"

"Yeah, it's 1:38 we should be done in twenty minutes anyways."

With that they began the long and arduous walk back to the Hero Tower to get healed up.

Chapter Text

Purple was drop-dead exhausted. He was after every fight.

His powers were quite useful. Most people thought it was just the two abilities, being able to summon wings and turn invisible. It was so much more than that, but he let people assume. The aftereffect, however, was that he would be absolutely worn out any time he used them. During a fight and the ensuing chase, the adrenaline was usually enough to keep him going, but the second he got to Mango's house he collapsed into bed.

If he woke up five hours later, short of breath and heart beating out of his chest, then that was no one's business but his own.

Purple threw on a random indigo hoodie from his closet, quite predictably seeing as his name was literally Purple, and some baggy black jeans before heading downstairs.

"Good morning Purple," Mango said from where he stood at the coffee maker, pouring out a cup for each of them.

"Hi Mango," Purple responded, grabbing a bagel and biting straight into it. They had used up the last of their good butter two days ago and had yet to buy more. Purple grabbed a second one, this time with sesame seeds, and set it down on the table for Mango.

"How did last night go?" Purple asked. He was supposed to be distracting the heroes in the area so Mango could go do... whatever he did. Purple wasn't usually told, and he didn't bother asking either. If he really wanted to know, he could just check the news.

"Well enough," he replied vaguely. "How did things go for you? Did you have to actually fight anyone?"

"Yeah, ran into Rhapsody and Mimic a couple blocks out. Called me 'Saturn' again."

"How rude."

Purple hummed acknowledgment, sipping his coffee. Despite the amount of caffeine the two of them combined drank, there wasn't a single bit of creamer or sugar in the house. They both enjoyed their coffee as dark as their souls.

Purple finished his bagel and grabbed his bag. He waved goodbye to Mango as he headed out the door to go to school. He honestly thought it was odd how Mango insisted he get an education despite both of them being literal villains, but the guy let him stay in his house basically for free, so who was he to complain?

It was now 3 PM, and Purple took back that statement. He had every right to complain. What even was pre calc.

On the bright side, he had the first Photography Club meeting after school. He knew from the group chat, though, that most of the people from last year wouldn't be able to return for one reason or another, so the club would be a lot smaller than it was before.

"Hey, is anyone sitting here?"

Some guy wearing an outfit fresh out of a Pinterest mood board came up to Purple and pointed at the seat next to him. Y'know, despite the fact that most of the seats in the room were still empty. Honestly, Purple was tempted to say yes just to spite him.

"No, why?"

"Well I mean I was planning on sitting there if it wasn't taken."

"Oh. Go ahead, I guess."

"Cool."

After a moment, the Pinterest guy turned to him with a smile. Not a normal one though. More the sort of smile that Purple started bracing himself for a headache for.

"So, I'm Green," Pinterest guy, whose name was apparently Green, said.

"Good for you." Okay, that wasn't hostile at all. This was probably why people didn't talk to him that often.

"Do I get to know your name, or...?"

"It's Purple."

"Nice."

Awkward pause.

"So I noticed earlier that you had gum on you. It's alright if you don't want to share of course, but um... can I have some gum?"

"So that's why you sat here?" Purple could be found chewing gum most of the time, since it helped him focus, but at least two people asked for some every day. He could, of course, just not give it to them, but he preferred handing it over and seeing their reactions to the Grenades Gum he kept in his bag specifically for these people. Most of them never asked a second time.

Just for show, Purple sighed. "Here you go. Knock yourself out."

Green took it with a soft "Thank you." At least he was polite about it.

Contrary to what Purple was expecting, Green didn't even blink when he popped it into his mouth. No reaction at all. He just put what was commonly cited as one of the mintiest gums, instant clearing of your sinuses, the Vix of gum, into his mouth, and started chewing it with no reaction.

"Why're you looking at me like that? What'd I do?" Green said with a straight face.

"How." Green stared at him for a second longer before laughing at the expression Purple was wearing.

"Not the mintiest thing I've had. At least I was expecting it this time," Green shrugged.

"What."

"So, Purple right? How long have you been at Photography Club?" Green changed the subject.

"Um, three years," Purple answered. "How about you?"

"Oh, this is my first year here. Wanted to try something new."

"Mm." Wow Purple, great conversational skills. Oh wait, he should probably ask a question now since Green had asked a question. "Have you done any photography before?"

"Yeah, I know the basics. Don't have a camera or anything, though, so I just use my phone most of the time."

Thankfully the teacher in charge finally arrived in the classroom and started talking. Since it was the first meeting, it was really just what Photography Club is and joining the Google Classroom, though somehow it managed to take up the whole period.

Afterwards, when Purple was grabbing his stuff to leave, Green caught up to him by the door.

"Hey, here's my phone number. Text me." Green then handed him a green sticky note with a number on it before smiling at him and walking off oddly fast. Huh. Okay. Sure. That wasn't weird at all.

Green seemed like an interesting enough guy, so Purple might as well message him later. Plus, he probably did need to socialize more seeing as none of his friends were in his lunch period or any of his classes. The chances of Green being in either were pretty slim, but at least they were there.

When he got off the bus and made his way to Mango's house, Mango was in the living room looking at something on the computer. He looked up for a moment when Purple came in.

"Hello. Looks like we need to go out again tonight. I'll be around 75th Street. You know the rest."

"Okay." Purple gave a thumbs up in response and went upstairs to his room. Before bothering to start his homework, he took the sticky note out of his pocket and shot the number a text.

Purple: Hello
Purple: This is purple

He only had to wait a couple minutes before getting a response.

Green: hey
Green: this is green

Chapter Text

Purple: Hello
Purple: This is purple

It was maybe half an hour after Photography Club had ended when Green got a message. He usually took this time to take a nap before patrol, but tonight he couldn't due to how much homework he had. That's why he was, unfortunately, still awake when Purple messaged him.

Green: hey
Green: this is green
Purple: Hello
Green: hi
Purple: Wyd
Green: homework
Purple: Same
Green: hey
Green: can you send me a bad photo of yourself
Purple: Why
Green: so i can add your contact
Purple: Can i send a good photo ?
Green: no.
Purple: Ummm give me a minute
Green: whatre you doing
Purple: *What're
Purple: Use the apostrophe
Purple: Otherwise it looks like you just misspelled water
Green: thats crazy coming from you
Green: you dont use apostrophes
Purple: I do with the word what're though
Green: nah
Green: now answer the question purple
Purple: Looking for a photo of myself
Green: just take one right now
Purple: No
Purple: I need to find a decent one
Green: what part of a bad photo do you not understand
Purple: I have no bad photos of myself
Green: take one
Green: right here and now
Purple: Never
Green: fine
Green: send a good one then
Green: and see my photo editing skills
Purple: Alright sure
Purple: Here you go
Green: ty

Purple had finally sent an image. Green clicked on it to see Purple, two arms extended towards the edge of the frame as if he was holding his phone with both hands, and face tilted slightly to the side as if to highlight his smirk. It was genuinely a really good picture.

Not too good that Green couldn't ruin it, of course. He pressed the small button to edit it, and about a minute later he sent back the new and improved version to see Purple's thoughts.

Green: here you go <3
Green: what do you think
Purple: ...
Purple: What in the name of the cursors is that abomination
Purple: Why would you do that
Purple: You ruined a perfectly good selfie
Purple: Look at it
Purple: Its got anxiety
Purple: I spent so long looking for the perfect photo to send you
Purple: And this is what you do with it
Purple: Im going to ban you from photography club
Purple: You don't deserve to hold up a camera
Green: so you like it then
Purple: Please never talk to me again
Green: in your dreams
Purple: I am begging you
Green: wait actually nvm i still need to do my homework
Green: bye purple ill bug you later
Purple: Bye green!!!! Please dont
Green: hahaha youll never get rid of me
Purple: Why me

Green looked at the photo of Purple again before closing his phone. Seriously, the guy was really photogenic. It was part of what made Green want to sit next to him in the first place. What could he say? He was a sucker for a pretty face. The other part was, of course, the gum, but could you really judge him for that?

Anyways, homework. Green had an essay due for his English class by the end of the week, and it was already Wednesday, so he figured he could start with that.

After about five hundred words of his English essay and two additional hours of work, he had finally done enough to consider himself satisfied. Green set a timer for two hours, hooked his phone up to one of his speakers so it would be loud enough to wake him, and flopped onto bed.

And yet despite preparing for it, he was still extremely startled when heavy metal started blaring two hours later, loud enough that the neighbors could hear it, and woke him up. He was then annoyed at being woken up by heavy metal, despite being the one to pick it out.

Like anyone would, the first thing he did after silencing his phone and speakers was check his notifications. Apparently one of his group chats, the one named "the skittles," was blowing up. Green didn't bother reading any of the messages before sending one of his own.

Green: hey guys
Yellow: Please do NOT eat the grape!!!
Blue: Hi green :]
Second: But yellow its glowing
Yellow: And that's why you shouldn't eat it!
Second: But what if it gives me superpowers
Second: Like spiderman but with a grape and not a spider
Green: whats going on
Red: sec microwaved a grape 🍇
Blue: Thats a horrible superhero idea D:<
Blue: Grapeman
Red: wait i thought you hated spiderman 🤨
Second: I dont actually
Second: I say i do to annoy dark
Second: Im pretty sure spidermans like their hero or smth
Yellow: Are we going to move on from the grape or??
Second: Reddit says i can eat the grape
Yellow: Why would you trust Reddit?
Second: Its never lied to me before
Yellow: It probably has and you just didn't realize it.
Blue: I think you should totally eat the grape
Blue: Because then you can have powers and become a hero like us :D
Second: Wow
Second: No need to rub it in blue lol
Red: wow blue 😱
Red: how could you be so rude 😢
Green: omc blue
Green: why would you do that
Yellow: I can't believe you Blue.
Yellow: This behavior is unacceptable.
Blue: Im sorry D=:
Green: whats that face
Green: is that a snail
Blue: No
Blue: The D is the mouth
Blue: The = is my tears
Blue: The : is my eyes
Red: i think thats a snail 🐌
Yellow: Snail mouths don't look like that though.
Red: shhh 🤫
Second: May i remind you guys that you all have to be at work in around twenty minutes
Green: oh shoot
Yellow: I'm already on my way.
Blue: How are you so responsible yellow ?
Red: what would we do without you 🫡
Green: i havent packed yet guys
Green: gtg ttyl

Well. Now Green had to actually get ready and go to the hero tower.

He grabbed his bag first - a medium black crossbody bag that he used to store things like his headphones, phone, and snacks. The hero tower did have food, of course, but it was all healthy snacks and protein bars. Green tended to pack more chips and candy, and the occasional Sprite. Sure, maybe this wasn't healthy for him, but neither was staying out until two every single night, and nobody had an issue with that!

Then he looked down at his outfit, which today consisted of a beige hoodie he had tucked in, a dark green coat, and basic black pants. He had thrown off the coat when he got home, but the rest he had slept in. Rather than changing, he just smoothed out his clothes, quickly combed his hair, and called it fine. He'd never go anywhere else dressed like this, but he would change into his costume anyways once at the hero tower, so it really didn't matter.

Other than that, there wasn't much for him to do to get ready. He did, unfortunately, have to go the whole way on foot, so he swung out the door and lightly jogged for around ten minutes and then walked the last five. He finally arrived at the tower, greeted the secretary, entered the elevator, tapped his keycard, and went up to the 12th floor.

When Green opened the door, the first thing he saw was Yellow, in her outfit as Overcharge. She was chatting with her girlfriend, Blue, over by the patrol assignments board. Green headed over there to greet them and check the board. Since the four of them were the only four trainees the tower had, it was guaranteed he'd be patrolling with one of the other three. However, when they turned eighteen and became full heroes, they would all be going separately.

"Hello, Green," Yellow greeted in her normal fashion.

"Hi Green!" Blue exclaimed.

"Hey guys!" Green responded.

"Sup everyone!" Red shouted, running in through the door loudly like the being of pure chaos he was.

"So," Green started. "How have you been?"

"We saw each other, like, eight hours ago," Blue, also known as Azalea when in costume, responded jokingly.

"Well, yeah, but who knows? Anything could've happened in those eight whole hours. Hey, how did that chemistry test go?"

"Pretty easy. But everyone in the class got a different answer for number fourteen, so theres only about a one in thirty chance I got it right." Blue sighed as if the very notion of getting a single question wrong offended her.

"Unless none of y'all got it right, in which case it wouldn't even matter because the question would be removed." Green. Ever so reassuring.

"Y'all."

"That's what you choose to focus on."

"You aren't even from the South!"

"Y'all is a perfectly acceptable word for anyone to use, not just people from the South. I don't see why you have such a problem with it."

"Don't you mean, I don't see why y'all have such a problem with it."

"I mean-" Green fixed her with a look of war in his eyes, "-I don't see why all'a'y'all got such a dang issue with me saying y'all all the time, but I know that y'all'll regret it eventually, when you look back and realize y'all'd'nt've even a slight issue with it if it weren't for the way y'all were raised."

"Um," Blue began. "Can you translate that to English please?"

"I do not see why all of you guys have such a large problem with me using a perfectly normal contraction fairly often, but I can see that one day you will look back on your actions and feel remorse, because you realize that you all would not have such an issue with it if it were not for the way you all were raised."

"Please keep in mind that I have a C in English right now."

"Would you prefer I translate to Italian then?"

Blue looked at him with apprehension, as she had heard Green's horrible Italian firsthand. However, before she responded, a yellowish-green clad vigilante walked by, freezing when they saw them. For good reason, of course, seeing as heroes had a history of attacking vigilantes since they were technically breaking the law. But since Green and Blue were pretty familiar with this specific vigilante, they weren't planning on it.

"Hey Apollo. What's up?" Green began.

Hi Rhapsody. Hi Azalea. Nothing much." Apollo said, relaxing slightly. They nearly reminded Green of Second, with their bright orange hair, the constant bags under their eyes, and just their overall demeanor. If it weren't for the fact that Second had no powers while Apollo did, Green would even go as far as to guess they were the same person.

"Have you seen anything around tonight? It's been pretty quiet," Blue chimed in to ask.

"No, it's kinda suspicious. There's usually at least one mugging a night 'round here." At that moment, their watch beeped, and they sighed. "Well, nevermind then."

"Do you need any help with that?" Green offered.

"Nah, I know you won't attack me but my brother's don't, and I don't want 'em to attack you guys."

"Yeah, fair. See you around then," Green waved goodbye.

"Bye Apollo!" Blue gave a joking two-fingered salute.

"Bye," Apollo said before sprinting down an alley.

The rest of patrol after that was pretty quiet. Nothing happened except for their bickering and bantering the whole time. That's why it shocked them so much to arrive back at the tower and see Yellow, looking extremely winded, surrounded by medics, covered in blood, with her arm in a makeshift cast.

"Yellow! What happened?" Blue immediately rushed forwards to check on her.

Red was the first one to answer in between breaths. "Saturniidae. Broke her arm."

"What? How?" Green asked.

"Surprised us. On 75th." One of the medics came up to check on Red, but he waved them off. "Go. Help her. 'M fine."

"When? Did you guys just get back?" Blue called over. Yellow wasn't responding. Probably because of the blood loss, Green guessed, if he was right in assuming the blood was hers.

"Yeah. Fifteen minutes ago. Sprinted all the way here while carrying her." Red finally took a slow breath. "Adrenaline is one hell of a drug."

"You're gonna be so sore in the morning."

"I know."

Yellow was transported onto a stretcher and brought into the actual medbay. Meanwhile, Green and Blue continued to grill Red about what happened.

Apparently, they were patrolling along 75th street when Saturniidae snuck up on them, invisible, and started attacking them. It started out like the average fight with him, with quips and whatnot, but then Yellow landed a solid hit on him and nearly caught him. This made Saturniidae start to fight harder, which made Yellow and Red fight harder, and in the end he got away, leaving Red exhausted and Yellow with blood loss and a broken arm.

"He was rutheless," Red reported, "we could've died."

Green was a pretty vengeful person. While they may still be alive, there was a high enough chance of death at the time. To him, that was the moment that he knew.

Saturniidae was going to pay.