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As the door shut safely behind them, Lizzie finally turned to Scar, her mask hissing as it was removed revealing a less than impressed face. “Alright, want to tell us what that was all about now?”
Scar sucked in a deep breath and ignored the spike of pain, having been wanting to tell them since they left the alley but unfortunately, gushing about his encounter with the vet was not good for stealth. “Oh boy, do I.” He responded as he removed his own mask.
Jimmy, already in the process of removing the unnecessary bits of his costume, spoke up. “You should probably sit down though, I'll make us some coffee. We can't afford to sleep now.” His nose immediately scrunched in distaste at his own statement.
Both Lizzie and Scar shared a look of weary pitifulness and both went to collapse onto a couch.
“Alright.” Lizzie gestured impatiently for Scar to talk.
Before Scar could do more than open his mouth though, Jimmy's voice came back through the entrance to their kitchen. “Hold on! I want to hear this too!” Pouty annoyance clear in his voice.
Lizzie huffed and crossed her arms, falling back against the couch, pulling a laugh from Scar. “Well, while we wait, tell me how things went for you and Jimmy.” Scar urged.
Lizzie winced. “Not well. I mean, we didn't get shot by arrows or anything, but they were just short of ruthless tonight. Feels like we pissed them off. Also I-,” Lizzie's eyebrows scrunched together as she hesitated, “I had an odd moment where I could have sworn I saw Blackhole.”
Scar shot her a look between doubtful and concerned. “The G's weren't even scheduled to be on duty tonight.”
“I know.” Lizzie pressed two fingers to the side of her temple, rubbing at it. “And it was so quick and so dark I honestly can't tell if I just imagined it, but it really threw me off.”
“Where,” Scar drew out the word, trying to piece through this, “did you think you saw him?”
“An alleyway, I think the one by Forrester's? I don't know, I was running and in a panic and it was dark. Might've been the adrenaline talking.”
Scar couldn't tell if she was trying to explain it to him or herself, and his mouth twisted to the side. On one hand, he wasn't one to doubt his teammates. If Lizzy had been confident she saw him, Scar would believe it immediately, but her doubt spurred his own. Figuring it wasn't worth stressing out about when they had bigger issues at play, he sought instead to soothe the anxiety he saw plaguing his friend. “I think, if the G's were there, it'd have been obvious. I mean,” he gave her a crooked grin, “when have they ever not taken the opportunity for glory?”
A wry grin brightened her face a little. “You're not wrong there.” She snorted.
Scar nodded securely. “Exactly. I mean, we can keep an eye and an ear out, but it's not worth worrying about.”
Lizzie sighed and relaxed against the back of the couch, eyes casting over to where Jimmy was entering the room. He had a look of total concentration as he balanced the three mugs in his hands. “Alright. I don't want to let those heroes get into my head any more than they already have anyway.” Lizzie concluded.
Jimmy managed to get to the table and a clash of clicking announced his success as he set the cups down. “What's this about heroes?”
Lizzie shook her head. “Nothing important. Not like somebody's explanation of how he ended up with a vet of all people.”
Scar immediately brightened as Jimmy sat down in their armchair. “Ah! It was so interesting, actually! I was for sure in trouble. When I had been trying to get away, I was on the roofs, and I kind of ran out of ground. Just bad planning, wasn't really thinking. So I turned around to see if anyone had followed me and even though Slayer was like, five buildings away! She still spotted me and, unfortunately, got a shot before I could figure out what to do.”
The shared looks of concern between Lizzie and Jimmy made Scar give them a dismissive gesture.
“It's fine, it's fine. The Vet was there!” He beamed. “I had just enough energy to stop my fall enough to avoid any more agre- bad injuries, and passed out pretty much as soon as I hit the ground. From there I was in that-, you know,” he moved his hands in a vague way as though that might get his point across, “half-awake half-dead space?”
Jimmy nodded in solemn understanding, causing Lizzie to give them both judgmental looks, which Scar very politely didn't argue with. It wasn't their fault Lizzie didn't tend to end up on the 'hit bad enough for the half-awake half-dead state’ side of things like Jimmy and Scar were prone to do. She was magic or something. Scar and Jimmy had agreed that a while ago.
“Anyway, I was in and out of consciousness, at some point managed to get the mask off so I could get better air, but that just sent me right back to the black. Next thing I know, I'm waking up with someone moving me around. At first, I thought it might have been one of you, and let me tell you, the panic that hit me when the vet spoke and I realized it wasn't one of you? Woke me right up.
“So, I'm over there panicking, sure that I'd been caught by some random new hero looking to make a name for himself,” Scar put a dramatic inflection to his voice, drawing his two friends into the story with him, “trying to get away and just hurting myself more, when this random stranger shoves me back against the wall like some kind of debt collector and says, “‘Did you hear me? I said I was going to help. Quit moving and listen.’” and I was so startled I just froze.”
Scar laughed a little at the memory. “Here was this random guy, shoving me against walls and getting mad because I wasn't sitting still so he could help me! Not capture or anything! Just genuinely mad like I was some misbehaving child who wouldn't stop squirming over a scraped knee!”
“But it was an arrow.” Lizzie interjected sardonically.
“But it was an arrow.” Scar nodded in agreement, deftly ignoring the jab. “So, I manage to keep my head about me enough to ask who this guy was, and I found out he was a vet and his name was Grian. Grian.” Scar repeated it with emphasis, just something about the name that made him want to say it over and over again. “What kind of name is that? Grian. Like a cheeky growl.”
“Okay yes, Scar, the man's name was Grain.” Jimmy spoke up with annoyance. “Finish your story.”
“Right!” Scar had to remind himself to be aware of the injury as more excitement filled him with the story. Wouldn't do well to disappoint the ol’ doc by opening the stitches gesturing too hard. “So he starts talking doctor jargon to me and at some point asked me for a phone for a light and I'm thinking, ‘oh no, I don't have my phone, and the only light source I have is a very-obvious dead-giveaway red one.’
“But you know, at that point I figured, better the doctor figur-”
“I thought he was a vet?” Jimmy interrupted, looking confused.
Scar shrugged, “Vet, doctor; potato, patato, who cares. We're just smart animals anyway. I think he deserves the title of doctor anyway, after what he did tonight.”
Lizzie and Jimmy shared a look Scar couldn't read but had the deep suspicion was at his expense.
“Anyway, I was thinking, it was better for the doctor to figure out who I was and run away screaming, than to die in an alleyway because I was too stubborn to use a light, and I just used a little bit. Just enough.
“I thought for sure he'd figure it out, but he just said 'wow’ at my light and didn't even look at me! Which was kind of insulting, to be honest.” Not that he wanted Grian to have looked at him, that wouldn't have been smart, but still. Some part of him was pouty about it. “And then, and then! The man, without saying anything! Just takes off my belt and shoves it in my mouth!” He was nicer about it than that, so shockingly gentle the whole time in a way Scar just wasn't used to, but that didn't sound as dramatic.
A surprised snort came out of Lizzie while Jimmy just looked baffled. “Why?”
“Oh, because he didn't have pain killers.”
Lizzie winced while Jimmy let out a, “damn, sorry dude.”
Scar once again waved them off. “It's fine, the doctor was there.”
There was that secretive look between the other two again, that Scar again, politely decided to ignore.
“So, more doctor jargon later and the next thing I know, he's operating on me like some back-alley surgeon.” It had hurt, a lot, honestly. Scar was pretty used to pain, but still, being cut and dug into was up there on the list of most painful things he'd done. Yet the whole time, Scar was so fascinated with just watching Grain work that the pain was bearable. Scar couldn't put his finger on why, but the image of Grian's concentrated and determined face under the soft glow of Scar's light just kept floating around his head. “With the way he worked though, you wouldn't believe he was just a vet.
“He really knew what he was doing, and confident the whole way through! I would have been freaking out if I had to fish an arrow out of someone, but it was like this was just another Tuesday to him!
“So, he finished and then suggests I get a human doctor.” Scar giggled a little. “That's how he phrased it. A human doctor. Like doctors are just vets who specialize in one animal.”
Lizzie gave a considering face, “I mean, they kind of are.”
“Right, which is why being a vet is cooler.” Scar nodded.
“And this is an opinion you've suddenly gained tonight?” Jimmy asked, a strange sarcasm to his voice that had Lizzie pressing her lips together like she was trying not to laugh.
Scar frowned. “I'm sure I would have had the same opinion if you'd asked me before. It makes sense. Vets are cooler.” He said it with a finality like a fact and continued before they could interject. “Anyway, then he tried to leave for an ambulance and I just barely managed to convince him not to. I made the mistake of saying I'd call someone myself, and he full-on yelled at me for it. Something about mood lighting and me having a phone the whole time.” Scar snickered at the memory. At the time, it'd been terrifying. Grian's voice was like a siren giving their position away, but in hindsight, Scar couldn't find anything but hilarity in the memory of the angry vet.
“Once I got him quiet, we waited and I was really hoping the heroes wouldn't come back, but they did.” Scar winced at this point in the story. He'd been more terrified in that moment than he had the entire night. He knew he wasn't going to be able to get away if they both descended on him with that injury, and more than that, the idea of Grian being implicated in Scar's crimes just for the mistake of being too good for his own good was sickening. Still, Scar continued the story, dropping and slowing his voice for dramatic effect. “They start talking, and I heard that you two got away, but then they decide to look for me, because of the arrow thing.
“Me and the doctor were as deep in the shadows as I could possibly get us and we had to be so close. They-”
“You had to be.” Jimmy repeated and Lizzie snorted.
Scar frowned again. “Well, yes. Taking up any more space than necessary would've made us easier to spot.”
Lizzie and Jimmy nodded in agreement but there was something about their faces that gave Scar the distinct impression he was being made fun of. However, Scar stood by his decision. It was the necessary thing to do. He hadn't made it this far as a villain without honing a good instinct of how to stay out of sight. The others were being unreasonable, he decided. “Slayer and Furioso,” he stated the names with emphasis to get the other two back on track with the story, “come down to start looking for us.
“And of course, the first place Slayer goes to look is our alleyway, the one-”
“Our alleyway.” This time Lizzie repeated it.
“Could you two stop interrupting?” Scar frowned at them, causing them both to giggle.
“Sorry, sorry. Continue.” Jimmy waved him on.
“Right. The alleyway we were still in, because we hadn't been able to move at all. It was like something out of a horror movie, watching her light creep closer and closer from the corner of my eye, and I couldn't even see that much because I was facing Grian.” Scar once again ignored the look. “Just when I thought she was going to spot us, she stops!”
Thankfully the other two seemed a bit more engaged in the suspense of the story now, and leaned forward.
Scar grinned. “You see, Furioso had found the arrow.”
The faces of the other two immediately dropped and Scar rushed to assure them.
“It was a good thing! The fact that the arrow wasn't broken made them believe I'd gotten away. It was a stroke of genius on the doctor's part to throw the arrow so far away from us. Without using her powers or anything, they gave up, just like that. Didn't bother to finish checking even the one alleyway. So then I called you guys!”
Scar left out the part where he'd tried to talk to Grian. As much as he knew it was inevitable, Grian figuring out who he was had been a risk. He could have gone running and shouting after the heroes, letting them know he'd found Ringmaster, but he didn't. He'd just seemed afraid. Initially, it had felt good, in the way people fearing him always felt good. The power and respect and knowing even his name alone was impactful.
But then Grian had continued to be afraid of him. Once Scar had ensured Grian hadn't seen his face, and ignored the weird disappointment when Grian confirmed he hadn't, Scar had wanted to lighten the mood. The miraculous man had just singlehandedly saved him. Not for any reason, but just because. Because, inexplicably, Scar had been unfathomably lucky enough to fall near what was probably the single goodest and bravest person in the city.
When his joke had failed to make Grian ease up, that earlier pleasure had quickly soured. It hadn't seemed right, suddenly, that Grian should fear him. Not Grian. Not the vet who'd run into a dark alleyway to save a life. The vet confident enough to walk the city at night around known criminal activity. The vet who'd shoved him against a wall and yelled at him about lighting. Not Grian.
So it'd been a relief when the others showed up, and that unflappable confidence came back. Getting yelled at just one more time by Grian for daring to move too fast made everything feel right again. There was the Grian Scar knew, and was it stupid to feel like he knew Grian after spending probably not more than an hour with him? Most of it in silence? Maybe. But he couldn't help it. Grian was just so distinctive a person.
Scar was knocked out of his reverie by Lizzie. “Scar,” She dragged his name out in a way that immediately had Scar's guard up, the wary look she shared with Jimmy only making it worse, “did they take the arrow with them?”
“Oh, I don't know.” Scar answered, confused for a bit why it'd matter before it hit him. “Oh! No, it's okay! The vet had wiped the blood off. They even said themselves they wouldn't be able to get a DNA sample from it.”
Jimmy and Lizzie shared one more look before Jimmy said something that made Scar's stomach drop.
“And the tools?”