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After weeks of walking through outback and small towns in pursuit of something he then helped burn to the ground, Falst had been tired. Halfway to death. Completely knackered, even!
So instead of doing the logical thing and getting the hell out of dodge, he'd crashed at the place of the person who started the fire.
The reasoning that he had broken an arm hadn't held up when Falst healed fast and stayed even when things had mended themselves completely.
The fire had been a literal fire, too, burning down the sister lab to the one that had capital-C changed Falst. Because apparently it wasn't just science labs turning people into- into things like him. Some people lucked out and got fire powers completely free from half-decades of lab captivity.
Crucible- Dainix, "if you're staying with me you should know my real name", wasn't bad, he was just-
Awake late at night again, Falst heard the sound of the window in the next room opening, followed by careful steps inside- and a hiss of pain. The noises would have been muffled- barely audible to anyone with ears that were… normal. Not like his own.
Falst got up and walked into the apartment's living room to join the recently returned Dainix, same as many nights before.
"How was tonight?" he asked, settling into the couch and pulling out the first aid kit from underneath. After just a few nights, things became commonplace, routine.
Dainix made his way over towards the kitchen and a cup of water, slowly pulling off elements of the costume he wore for heroics on the way there and back to the couch. "Not different from usual- a little crime, some small injuries," Dainix took the kit and started to disinfect a few scrapes "helped someone set a bonfire."
"Bonfire- perfect use for things," Falst laughed quietly.
Dainix made a quiet noise of assent.
He closed the kit and placed it back in its spot below the couch. "Thank you, Falst. Goodnight."
And another late night talk, quiet and short, ended.
"Hey Dainix, if I joined you on the whole patrol thing-" Falst asked a few mornings later.
"We'd need to obscure your identity," the person in question answered from across the room.
Dainix's answer to that was something out of superhero comics and adventure movies, overstuffed with weapons and tools. Admittedly, it was cool. But Falst already had to hide himself in public (hoods obscuring ears, gloves to hide claws, any possible way to keep things quiet from the people around). And now superheroics, the slowly growing field it was, all over the country in isolated events and worried news reports, seemed to expect him to hide too.
"Do we?" Falst questioned over the table "just take off the gloves and then I look entirely different"
"A mask, then, for your face. People see that."
Dainix, of the two of them, had a lot more practice preparing actual meals, though every day Falst adjusted to society and what the years he'd missed outside had taught his peers equalized their skills. So Dainix was standing over the stove and cooking, while they took a break from Falst's attempts at omelettes.
"Well a mask and normal clothes would be boring," he groused, before sensing an opportunity "Dainix, Superheroes get costumes, right?"
"I mean if superheroes existed-"
"-what are you, then? And that sword guy who just turned up four hours away, or the sentient plants down in South Australia?" Falst argued. Flippantly, sure, but he was also right.
The world was getting weirder by the day, if you were looking for it.
Costumes were surprisingly easy to sort out, as were the more important masks and safety gear, so the day when things were ready for Falst to patrol the city, to do something with all the excess energy he had, came quickly.
Having clambered from the window up to a rooftop along with Dainix- Crucible, Falst had to remember to call him- just before nightfall, Falst couldn't help but simply stop. He'd seen the town from a similar vantage point before, briefly, but Goldenborough was different from up there. More rooves, less people. Shadows cast by the fading light of sunset that told them-
"Time to start"
Falst first figured out one very important thing about patrol: roofs were more tricky than expected.
Dainix hadn't mentioned it, in any of the conversations they had in the couple weeks leading up to things. Safety, sure, aliases, definitely. But not the damn roofs.
To see things in the alleyways between them you had to get really close to the edge. On the slanted ones, belonging to older buildings, Falst had felt close to slipping off at any second at any point he had to look off from them. He'd almost fallen off that way more times than anyone could or should count for one night.
…Dainix had had to pull him back up to standing, one time.
And then the things that people left on them. Rubbish people didn't care enough to remove, gutters that hadn't been cleaned in what Falst assumed was decades, balls unable to be knocked down (he'd knocked one into a school yard- hopefully some kid would find it), and on one memorable occasion, a dead cat. People did not care about cleaning them- and when they suddenly were your biggest way to get around, you noticed! He'd very much noticed.
But the worst thing, the one that had caused a hatred for the ages despite all the roofs he would have to continue to go on: gaps.
Gaps between roofs, to allow for alleyways, were things much appreciated from the ground. From on high they were an obstacle. Drops he didn't want to deal with- especially the ones he was sure would re-break his arm. Incredibly hard to adjust to with little training no matter how theoretically easier it was for Falst. After all he was…
different.
But instead, after incidents with cats and rubbish and almost falling off when he was standing on them, chaos came to call. Falst had attempted a jump following after Dainix towards the other side of an alley. It was between a bakers delight and some locally famous clothing alterations place (at least that's what the sign boasted). Both regular shops, with a perfectly normal space between them used for dumpsters and the occasional emergency extra car parking, not the place one would expect to massively misjudge a distance.
Falst, unfortunately, had massively misjudged the width of the alleyway-
Clearly, there was a method to it, an art form, one that he'd missed all the classes for. And now he was failing the exam.
He'd noticed halfway through the jump that he wouldn't be able to hit the next roof standing, or even sprawling across the roof just to make it. The pavement next to the bakers delight was coming up to meet his face. Why had he decided to do this- he was an idiot.
Falst, at the last second, grabbed the edge of a gutter on an instinct he couldn't name. The momentum of it all sent the rest of him careening into the wall, and the mush of uncleaned leaves and litter squeezed between his fingers. It was gross- horrible. But at least he hadn't fallen to the pavement.
"Ow"
It was official- roofs were things to be wary of. A great enemy for the ages.
After the roof debacle, Falst's next revelation about how things worked on patrol was that it included a surprising amount of aimless wandering. Having spent a good portion of his time beyond lab walls doing so, he'd consider himself an expert at such matters.
And in Falst's expert opinion, this was aimless.
Dainix had lead them both from the apartment- a starting point- over buildings with ever so slightly changing styles of architecture, looking out for anything, something that required help. There hadn't been much. And they had for some reason started looping around a small area of town, mostly comprised of businesses closed for the night apart from the few restaurants or bars. (no one leaving one of those had needed assistance, but going down to offer had been Falst's one break from the roofs)
"So, where do we go?" Falst finally posed the question, breaking rooftop silence.
Dainix, just ahead, paused and looked back at him. As he faced Falst his eye widened in a look of sudden understanding.
"Ah. Well the bakery down near high street keeps getting robbed Wednesday nights, so staying around that is priority. Then it's checking alleyways."
"News didn't report any dastardly criminal plans to fight?" It hadn't, Falst had listened to the reports longer than Dainix even could, on a workday.
"Not today," Dainix shrugged.
Falst had moved to join Dainix on the same roof, rather than just one behind. This one was flat save for the cooling unit mounted on the top of the building, slowly blowing hot air out of its vents as they stood together. Despite his hatred, it wasn't a bad roof.
"There has to be something to do! The night's so quiet!"
Dainix started to open his mouth to speak- and then a scream pierced the air.
Falst felt a little guilty for the thought but- finally, it was something to do.
It had been barely a few seconds between having heard the scream and Falst and Dainix mobilizing, as fast as they could, towards its location. The scream in question had come from a few streets eastward, and a pair of people half hidden in an alleyway. More isolated from the places and people near main street.
Between the two people, one blocked the exit from the other, cowering, figure, perpetrator and victim, probably, the situation looked pretty clear. The blocking figure, despite standing directly under lamplight, was almost indistinguishable from the darkness. Save, somehow, for a blinding white shark-toothed smile.
Dainix quickly motioned to Falst to stay before jumping between the two figures. He was the picture of experience as he grabbed a spear to point at the person-in-shadow as soon as he did.
The shadow's smile didn't fade or falter- in fact it grew. They raised their arms skyward, as they continued to ignore the light like some living shadow.
"Two victims for the price of one," the figure chortled, and then cocked its head to listen to an unknown sound, maybe kilometers away, maybe none, "three victims! Oh this is much too easy."
Three victims- him too. Shit.
The tip of Dainix's spear was slowly igniting into a flame, a protection method he'd just barely practiced enough to use safely, as he adjusted his stance.
Things were serious.
Who the hell was the figure? …and what?
In response to Dainix's change in stance, a threat, the figure in shadow's smile widened. He wasn't scared in the *least*.
As if commanded by Falst's offhanded thought, the shadow suddenly grew.
It bubbled, somehow, a broiling, mixing liquid of danger inching towards all three of them. Fire ignited around Dainix and the person inside the alley they'd arrived to protect, a circle of possible safety, if it could counter the inky darkness.
The shadows advanced no more- but now Dainix's face was strained. The fire on the spear had gone out to save energy, a necessity especially since Dainix had never been able to try what he'd now done.
Dainix couldn't move, or the protecting fire would go out, and if he didn't, he was going to collapse and fail anyways.
There was no course of action to take.
Falst himself, left on the roof, had to scramble towards another section of roof to get away- he'd had a bit more protection in distance, but that was all.
"What do you even want?" Falst yelled from up high.
The figure turned their- no, its smile towards him. A smile Falst had been all to slow to recognize.
A scientist. One of the scientists.
Falst was sure of it.
The sensation of years shuffled between labs and a cell, his body changing under him, the loneliness, all hit him in a fraction of a second. The dark was moving ever closer, and Falst had frozen up.
He'd been free, had escaped like all the other experiments in that isolated, outback laboratory. (Running, deciding to go look for information in the offices about something, anything, to make him normal, escaping with himself and a few files in his hands and having to run through kilometers upon kilometers of crumbling hallway- fucking mazes the building planners had made- and he needed to leave. he needed to leave. hadn't he left?)
Falst had felt safe. This wasn't safe.
(He needed to run why wasn't he running the walls were coming down while he stood-)
His hands stung.
That was what saved him, stinging hands, a shock away from the panic.
Yelping in pain, he scrambled away from the source. He'd almost- he'd lost focus, stupidly gotten distracted, and almost died for it.
Oh no, Dainix.
Falst looked down at the alleyway- Dainix's fire was dimming. The figure, still bathed in shadow, was giggling (and giggling, and giggling).
What could he do?
Maybe-
Falst took a few steps backwards, prepared himself, and jumped right off of the roof.
As he leapt towards the center of the darkness, he wound up a hand for a (poorly practiced) punch. It was aimed right for the damn teeth.
A fist connected, the sting of burning pain came back, and then, darkness.
Everything hurts, was the first thing Falst thought when he woke up.
The second was, muffled by a mouth still deciding not to know how to speak, "Wh' H'ppn'd?"
Dainix appeared in his vision from above, fretting, "the person ran away but, Falst, what were you thinking? Running in like that-"
"Saved everything," Falst interrupted, arguing upwards.
"You could have- did get hurt."
"I'm fine!" Everything hurt, and he was fine.
"You don't look fine, Falst," he was being bundled up in Dainix's arms, like some sort of child.
Falst resigned himself to being stuck there until he was put down- Dainix was strong, and he knew it. But-
"…does this mean things are over? Because you would have died out here, if you were alone. You know that right?"
Dainix sighed, "do you want to do this?"
That was simple: "Yeah."
"Please don't do what you did there tomorrow."
The injuries were mostly fine- Dainix set him down after ascertaining that fact, and so the both of them were able to get home on foot after. Even helped a few people on the way.
Almost-morning followed with injuries bandaged and cleaned, and Falst couldn't help but hope it'd be good- slightly new routines, with the both of them, but, good
When both of them were awake in the daylight, Dainix turned on the radio.
"-now I'm sure you've heard of Goldenborough's fire-forged protector Crucible on our program before, but we have got breaking news for you: there now seem to be two of them. A listener sent in photo proof of this entirely new face- and they don't seem to be exactly human. Cat ears and claws will do that."
The speaker paused- presumably to catch their breath.
"Dear listeners, like we dubbed the last new, dare I say it, superhero around these parts, the team over at the station have already taken to calling them Rascal as we followed the rest of their activities tonight. Someone made a joke that stuck. Will they be able to find their own footing? What does all this mean? What's this new Rascal like? For a real answer for all that we'll turn to Amanda on the nine-thirty program-"
Falst turned the radio down as it transitioned into another short news segment- right before Dainix spoke.
"Rascal," the word was quiet, like he was tentatively testing the alias out in his mouth.
"I'll take it," Falst smiled.
It'd be good.
Fin.