#Doctor Morlo

[isfjmel-phleg]

Thad, with his assigned life mission of studying Bart so that he can destroy him, talks about him a lot. And most of the time, he refers to or addresses him by his given name. Out of forty-eight instances I could locate in Impulse #50-53, 65-66 where he mentions Bart, he uses Bart's code name 11 times and his given name 37 times. That's more than three times as much. And it says a lot about their relationship.

He's proud of knowing Bart's given name and taunts him a lot with it when they first meet.

(Impulse #53)

While Thad makes a big deal of mocking the code name Impulse, the fact that he uses it much less than he does Bart's given name indicates that he sees not Bart just in his heroic capacity but as someone that he is on close terms with, despite not having met for most of Thad's long life. He's got a parasocial relationship with Bart that has gotten obsessive enough to use his given name casually. The first and last name when Thad wishes to emphasize Bart's status as an Allen, but most often simply the first name, both out loud to CRAYDL or Max and in his own head. After all, that's how you refer to your twin brother mortal enemy.

This changes during their confrontation on the way to the speed force. With his envy and hatred of his rival at an all-time extreme, Thad starts addressing him as "idiot" or "stupid" (emphasizing his own intellectual superiority in an attempt to combat feelings of inferiority) or even simply "Allen" (emphasizing their family rivalry), which he hasn't done before. The relationship has changed for him, and it never gets the opportunity to change again.

Meanwhile, in Bart's interactions with or references to Thad in Impulse #53, 56, 64, 66-67, out of the 11 times that he mentions Thad, he uses the code name every time. Thad introduces himself to Bart by his given name before his code name, but even so, "Inertia" is the name that has stuck with Bart.

It makes sense. He has a very different relationship with Thad. There's been no obsessive study on his end. All he knows is that this kid shows up, causes trouble, and needs to be defeated. Bart has no especial personal investment in their conflict. Inertia is just another villain to fight. Even after hearing Thad's monologues about their connection, Bart doesn't seem to see the two of them as related in any meaningful way, as indicated when he explains Inertia to Doctor Morlo. Note the use of "me and my family" and "him and his family," like they're two separate groups.

(Impulse #66)

So why should he use Thad's given name, like they're friends or something, when they're so clearly not?

Even when he's not addressing Thad as an enemy, when he's trying to stop him from harming himself by running headlong into the speed force, Bart still calls him Inertia.

The only person who ever addresses Thad by his given name--the shorter, more familiar form, no less!--is Max, who has interacted with him the most in a personal, non-enemy capacity. And it's when he is addressed by his given name that Thad starts to become more responsive to kindness--up to a point. He understands being on a given-name basis with someone as an indication of...if not exactly closeness, then as investment in that person as an individual. And that's something that he wants for himself.

But he can't receive it without his pride getting in the way, and the last thing he hears before vanishing is the boy he dedicated his life to replacing calling him by his code name like he's just another villain of the week.

[brown-little-robin]

42: Dog with Two Owners

part one | previous | next | masterlist | ao3 version

Thad wakes up blearily. It’s really bright. His head hurts. He groans and throws his elbow over his eyes. He must have fallen asleep outside the nutrient womb. Feels like he’s laying on a computer or something.

“CRAYDL, turn down the lights.”

Silence.

Max Mercury’s voice says, “Are you awake?”

Oh.

“Yes.”

He keeps his elbow over his eyes. His cheeks are burning. Where is he and who just heard him talking to CRAYDL? The last thing he remembers is being on Joseph’s lap in the lair. Did he lose time, or just fall asleep?

Thad sits up and eases his arm away from his face, letting his eyes adjust to the sunlight. He’s above ground somewhere he doesn’t recognize, surrounded by concrete blocks and rubble. Max and Joseph are looking at him searchingly. He suppresses the urge to hide his face again.

The surrounding pile of rubble looks like the aftermath of a fight or something, but Max and Joseph seem calm.

Joseph smiles at him and signs, “You fell asleep. I texted Max to come get us.”

No fight, then. Good. Relieved, Thad allows the adults to coddle him.

Max holds out his hand, and Thad lets the man pull him upright. Joseph asks if he can touch him, and when Thad nods, Joseph hugs him. Not just a quick hug, either. Joseph holds onto him. Thad buries his face in Joseph’s shirt. He feels hidden. Safe, for the moment.

Max asks, “How are you feeling?”

“Fine.” Thad reluctantly disengages from Joseph. “I can’t tell if the experiment did anything permanent to me.”

The white lightning has died down to his usual yellow, and the unnatural happiness is gone. Thad reaches for the void in his chest, the thing that Raven said was where a lightning rod was supposed to go, and can’t even tell if it’s there. He just feels embarrassed, and, under that, empty. Empty, empty.

His CRAYDL is dead and Thad isn’t even mourning it. Doesn’t have the capacity.

Thad is so close to being safe from the Allens forever. All he has to do is go to Doctor Morlo to get examined, which was part of several agreements he had to make to get this far. And then, provided his new lightning rod isn’t killing him, he can move in with Joseph. Today.

“Can you bring me to the lab, sir?”

“Of course. Come on.”

Max holds his hands out. Thad approaches him, conscious of Joseph watching. He hates this. He feels like a dog with two owners. Who is he supposed to obey? Who is he supposed to wag his tail for?

He allows Max to pick him up and carry him to Morlo’s lab. Max sets him down on the exam table and touches his cheek gently. Torn between the instinct to flinch back and the aching emptiness that makes him want to lean in, Thad just freezes. Max smiles sadly.

“You did good. I’ll be back soon.”

It takes longer than Thad expected for Max to return. He looks around the lab, idly refreshing himself on the equipment layout, and wonders what Max is doing. Probably reporting to the other speedsters. Bringing Joseph back to the house, too. There’s no reason for Joseph to be in Nevada when Thad will be delivered to his house soon enough.

Examination, then goodbyes to Max and Helen, then being taken to Joseph’s house. Then he can relax.

Thad shivers. It’s cold down in the lab with only a t-shirt and shorts.

Doctor Morlo comes in at last, clumping heavily down the stairs. Alone. He sets down his suitcase with a huge sigh.

“Well, boy,” he says. “You survived.”

“I survived,” Thad agrees.

Morlo nods. Then he puts his hands on his hips and stretches, grumbling quietly. Thad is content to watch.

“How do you feel?”

“Full report?” Thad isn't really feeling up to all the joking he usually does with Morlo, but he's content enough to relish the words. He likes play-acting, too serious or too casual, around Doctor Morlo. The "doctor" gets it.

“Full report,” Morlo agrees.

“Physically undamaged. No bones broken, no muscles torn, no nerve damage that I can tell. But I was hit by lightning, so it’s worth running a test, probably.”

“What about your powers?”

“I don’t know definitively yet. I need to do more testing. They changed… not permanently, though, I think.”

Thad tells Morlo about speaking to the spirits. He describes, as best as he can, the spirit that took him into the blank white space and then touched him, throwing him back into physical space. He leaves out the part where it called him beloved. That’s… private.

“My trace lightning was white for a few minutes. You know—what sparks from speedsters as they move?”

“I know. Is it back to yellow now?”

“Yes.” Thad frowns at his hands. “I think I was faster with the white lightning. Fast enough to outrun Wally West, although of course his top speed varies based on his emotional state. And I was… I was so happy…”

Thad’s throat closes up.

Morlo clears his throat loudly and clumps over to his minifridge. He tosses Thad an apple juice over his shoulder.

Thad catches it perfectly, of course. He tears the little plastic opening with his fingernail. Destroying something helps him focus again.

Morlo asks, “Any guesses about why?”

“Because I wasn’t afraid. I think I wasn’t physically capable of fear right then.”

“I meant the powers, but good to know.”

Thad flushes. “Right. I… I don’t know, but I felt like the white lightning was a gift. From the spirit.”

“You’re catching Mercury’s Zen thing,” Doctor Morlo grunts.

“I am not!”

Morlo shrugs. “I’m joking. Anyway, electricity overload, possible nerve damage, and your powers changed? Sounds like we should run a plate test.”

Morlo hooks the metal plate he uses to test Thad’s vibrational and speed abilities to one of his machines. Thad follows his directions perfectly, as always. His powers are working perfectly, forcing the world slower and faster at Thad’s whims. His lightning sparks and shines as poison-yellow as ever. It’s a relief.

Morlo starts to put the plate away, then turns around abruptly.

“Wait. You were hungry?”

“Yes. I ate… fourteen food packs.”

“How big?”

Thad gestures with his hands. “About the size of a 21st century granola bar.”

Morlo frowns. “Hmm. It could be the massive energy expenditure of communicating with this “spirit” of yours. Or your heat-shield aura trying to protect you from the lightning tunnel. On the other hand… it could be a symptom of something… bigger.”

Thad’s stomach sinks. He should have realized hunger was a bad sign. Being hungry is not normal for him anymore.

“You’re right. I haven’t had much of an appetite since I was in the speed force,” he confirms, and then realizes that he’ll have to distinguish his… reappearance… in June from his recent brush with the speed force. “I mean, since I…”

“Ran away?”

Thad winces. He can’t exactly refute that.

“You make it sound so petty!”

Morlo shrugs. “If you have a better thing to call it, let me know.”

Thad sits silent. Everything he can think to call it would be… dramatic. ‘Revoking my existence’ would be most accurate… ‘running away’ will do fine.

Morlo puts the plate away.

“I need your blood. I’ll run some tests.”

Thad straps his arm into the cuffs and strains to keep himself at normal speed. He hates feeling the needle go in, and the weird coldness of getting his blood drawn disturbs him. He’d rather just cut himself and let the wound drain, but Green Lantern was disturbed when he did that in the Watchtower.

Morlo holds up the vial of blood and grins at it.

“Mad scientist,” Thad teases him.

Morlo guffaws. “Little villain.”

Thad grins.

Doctor Morlo separates his blood into several vials, then pours some of it into what looks like a bunsen burner. Thad could come over and watch, but honestly, he’s tired. His own inertia keeps him lying on the exam table, waiting.

“So, Max tells me you still have that Inertia suit.”

Thad tenses. His arm pulls against the cuffs again, not vibrating, just digging the metal into his arm.

“Yes.”

“Ever think about trying it on again?”

“No!”

Thad stares at Morlo’s back, feeling nauseous. What did he do wrong? Why would Doctor Morlo think he wanted to be Inertia again?

“No,” Thad says, quieter, uncomfortably aware of how rough—how evil—his voice sounds. “I don’t want to be Inertia. I swear.”

“I said trying it on, not being Inertia.” Morlo looks at Thad over his shoulder. He doesn’t look angry, just curious. “No interest in spandex at all, though? Not even to make your own vigilante identity?”

Thad hesitates.

“I… I don’t…”

If these metal restraints were any sharper, he’d be bleeding. It feels far away. He’s staring at the back of Morlo’s white coat, only half perceiving it.

“I don’t know… I’m… useful, I know I could be useful, hypothetically. I’d be an incredible asset. But… even the issue of running aside, I don’t… want to.”

Pathetic.

“What if I hurt someone? Or what if the Flash got angry at me, or… I don’t want to put myself in a position to make a catastrophic mistake. I’d be done for.”

But Thad would be lying to himself if he said he hadn’t… thought about it. Being… a hero. Being someone useful, confident, adored.

He got a taste of the hero life when he was Bart. He loved being “Impulse”. It was so much better than being Bart Allen. He was fast, he was strong, he had a team and a mentor… everyone trusted him…

Foolish fantasies. Thad Thawne was ruined for that a long time ago.

Morlo sets the blood carefully in a rack in the fridge, then comes back and releases the restraints. Thaddeus swings his legs off the bed, grabs his arm, and squeezes where the upper restraint was, just below the elbow. The dull, bruise-like pain gives him something to focus on. Anything is better than the purposeless void of his new life.

Doctor Morlo heaves himself up onto the bed beside Thad. Thad freezes.

Morlo says, “All I’m saying is, it would be good to get you moving again. I’m not trying to pressure you into being a hero or anything. But you need the exercise.”

Thad flinches at the reminder of his failure to keep his body at full functionality. He’s been trying not to think about that.

“You’re a speedster. You have to run. For your health.”

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“I just can’t!” Thad snaps. “I know I ran away today, but I wasn’t in my right mind. Running triggers my fight-or-flight response. I can’t let that happen.”

“Work up to it, then.”

Thad shakes his head.

“I can’t do it.”

“What’s the worst that could happen?”

Thad laughs. “I murder someone and get executed for it? It’s not some kind of social anxiety keeping me from going for a nice little run, Morlo. I’m dangerous.”

“Dangerous my sweet butt,” Morlo growls. “Boy, just say you’re traumatized.”

“What’s the difference?” Thad snaps. “I still can’t run.”

Morlo turns and grabs Thad’s shoulders, forcing him to look into his face. Thad goes very tense, heart hammering.

“Listen, boy,” Morlo growls. “You and I are a lot alike, which is how I know you’re making a huge mistake.”

Thad tries to say “Let me go!”, but all that comes out is a whine. Morlo’s hands squeeze his shoulders harder.

“You are making your life into a big drama about mortal enemies and living weapons. It doesn’t have to be that way. Got that?”

Morlo lets him go. Thad covers his face. His arms are shaking.

After a minute, he can speak again. “I’m not like you! You were never a weapon!”

“I don’t have as much excuse as you, but I certainly was a weapon. You studied me, didn’t you?”

Yes, he did, but… well… maybe they are similar. Thad has to admit that Morlo is just as much a potential killer as he is. He was going to kill Max, even.

Morlo huffs.

“Look. You don’t have to start running if it’s that upsetting to you. But you have to know you're allowed to be a person. Pete's sake, boy, your family's not going to kill you if you slip up a bit.”

“Yes they will. I want them to.”

“Thad,” Morlo growls, and Thad glares at him through his fingers. This is about that stupid ‘suicidal’ thing again, isn’t it? Why is Morlo so bent on deciding that Thad’s suicidal?! It’s ridiculous!

“I don’t want to die,” he snarls, hating that he even has to say that. CRAYDL would be disappointed in him for sinking to the point where that’s even in question. “But I can’t be allowed to kill people. I made Max promise he’d kill me if I was going to.”

“This is above my pay grade,” Morlo groans. He gets off the table and goes to the stairs.

“MAX!” he hollers. “A little help here!”

Max appears at the top of the stairs, calm and elegant as always, and Thad sighs in equal parts frustration and relief. Max will know how to explain.

“Max, tell Doctor Morlo I can’t be allowed to kill people,” he demands.

Max gives Morlo a look. Thad waits.

Morlo tells Max, “He thinks you’re just waiting around to kill him or something.”

Thad is offended on Max’s behalf. “I’m trying to tell Morlo that you promised you’d kill me if you had to. He doesn’t believe me!”

“Ah.”

Thad rests his hands on his thighs, waiting for the sweet triumph of being proven right.

“I did tell him I’d stop him if I absolutely had to, in order to save lives,” Max tells Morlo pointedly. “But clearly something got lost in translation.”

Oh no.

Max comes down the stairs and makes eye contact with Thad. Thad looks away. He can’t do the emotional openness thing right now, not while being reprimanded for whatever it was that he misunderstood.

“I’m not going to kill you for making a mistake,” Max tells him. “And neither will Wally, or Jay, or Jessie, or Bart, or anyone else. We don’t kill in revenge, Thad, or as a punishment. We only take a life to save a life. As long as you didn’t mean to hurt anyone else, no one would hurt you.”

That can’t be right. That can’t. What about the vindictive streak of the Allen family? What about justice? What about Wally West?

Thad opens his eyes again, finding his argument. “What about Inertia in the museum, then? The one who killed Bart?”

Max inhales sharply.

Thad continues, a little spark of anger lighting in him, “Bart was already dead when the Flash crippled Inertia. I know that! I heard Wonder Woman say so! You’ve taken revenge before; don’t tell me you wouldn’t do the same to me.”

“Thad…” Max sighs. “We should talk about that more later, but that won’t happen to you. I promise.”

“How can I trust you?” Thad spits. Baiting him. His heart’s not really in it, but Thad is good at performing anger.

“It’s not the same,” Max says firmly. “That Inertia was an active risk. And Wally wasn’t in a good place then. Bart had been killed, Thad. We all thought he was gone forever.”

For an insane moment, Thad wishes he was the other Inertia. He wishes he could have been part of a world where Bart was dead and gone and he didn’t have to think about him anymore.

“You thought Bart Allen was dead,” Thaddeus says slowly, savoring the words, rolling them in his mouth like he’s forming them into a knife under his tongue.

He glances at Max. The older man is watching Thad warily.

“Bart Allen, dead and gone…”

Thaddeus’s mouth pulls into a terrible grin. He knows exactly what he looks like. He used to practice his grin of dark triumph in the mirrored surfaces of televisions.

“So why did the Flash have to cripple Inertia?”

Max hesitates one crucial second and Thaddeus launches himself into the metaphorical crack Max left there. “I know he was dangerous, but the Flash could have just taken his speed and left him normal! You claim that won’t happen to me, but are our situations really that different?”

“Yes.”

“No they’re not!”

“Death changes things,” Max says quietly. “I won’t claim Wally was right in what he did, but he was grieving.”

“So what,” Thaddeus hisses, throat burning. “I’m grieving too and I haven’t killed anyone over it.”

Morlo clears his throat. Thad’s eyes snap to him, and for a moment all he can see is how to snap the big man’s neck, sweep his legs out and punch through his stomach, yank him down by the beard and kick his teeth out.

“You’re a good person,” Max says.

No. He’s exactly like every other nameless clone who tried to kill Bart Allen. Thaddeus is cold as ice. Angry as an arctic storm. Empty.

“Liar.”

Max flinches. Doctor Morlo hurriedly turns his back on them and heads upstairs. Good idea.

“Thad, I—”

“I don’t want to hear it. You only protect me because I tricked you into loving me when I was Bart.”

Max’s eyes snap open.

“That’s not true.” Now Max is angry. “Sophos Thaddeus Anacletus Free, that is not true.”

“Then what’s your excuse?” Thaddeus snarls. “Go on, lie to me.”

“I love you like a son,” Max says, low and furious. “Thaddeus, it kills me inside every time one of you clones dies. I would protect you all if I could. But I can’t.”

Like a son!

Like a son!

For a blinding moment, Thad wants to cry.

And then the feeling recedes and Thad is filled and surrounded by that cold emptiness again. What good is Max’s love, anyway? Much good it did any of Thad’s dead clones. Max’s love means nothing. It’s a meaningless promise, just like everything else in Thad’s life.

He sneers, “That’s right. You can’t protect any of us. I’m leaving.”

Thad swings himself off the bed. He knows that he’s about to ruin all of his hard-earned trust from Max, but he can’t bring himself to care. He can’t do this. Sit there and look at Max’s guilty old face and pretend everything is fine. He can’t cuddle and cry with a man who let his clones—his clones!—be killed.

The only emotion that can spark through the clouds of this void of feeling is anger. They were his clones and the Flash and Impulse killed them. He feels like he’s been stolen from.

Max is speaking, but Thad doesn’t care enough to listen to the words. “I want to say goodbye to Helen,” he interrupts blandly, keeping the anger below his icy surface. “But I guess that’ll have to be later. I’m not in the right mood.”

“Thad, wait.”

“Don’t chase me. You don’t want to have to kill me, after all!”

And he runs away.

As Thaddeus kicks into motion, another emotion seizes him. Fear. He controls that too, allowing it to drive him faster but not to drive him out of his intended course. He’s going to New Jersey. He’s going to Metropolis to find Joseph.

And then he’ll never have to run again.

[out-of-context-flash]

Young Justice: Sins of Youth (2000) #1

[nehswritesstuffs]

The Seal Man of North Ronaldsay - The Island Nutter

The idea for this one actually came from a bunch joking around in the Clara’s Diner Discord server and the fact that some of us are still absolutely enamored with the image of Ian having a row with a bunch of sheep.

2382 words; I guess this is a reminder that this is a fantasy version of North Ronaldsay, where there’s more than a few dozen people who live there year-round (so, more like a few hundred at the least, possibly going over the historical highs of ~500) so there’s, like, some modern flats in town and enough kids to keep the school open; this is all just Ian the Island Weirdo as seen by the normal mortal residents; Time Lord thinking/shenanigans are sort of a perfect soft-scifi analogy for fae mercurialism and I really don’t know how I should take that

You can find more of the Whouffaldi selkie AU in the Seal Man of North Ronaldsay tag, as well as in this AO3 series.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

The thing about Ian Morlo was that he was never entirely what the other island residents expected when they learned that there was someone new living in Orson’s place. Well… an additional new person—it already passed though Orson’s nephew to the lass who owned it currently—but who was really counting? They watched him curiously from afar, which had been the only way to do so at first, as not long after he arrived, a nasty series of storms had passed through the area, but once the sea and sky were in their summer calm, he seemed to be anything but.

“Why aren’t you in the pund?!” he shouted at a sheep as it walked across his path. He had a list in-hand and a reusable shopping tote hooked on his arm; he was on errands.

“You know, if you wanted to, you could help out,” one of the villagers said as he watched the sheep meander through the road. Ian huffed, shoving his hands in his trouser pockets.

“The sheep and I don’t get on,” he claimed. The sheep bleated from afar, seemingly incensing him. “Yeah! Don’t think I’ve forgiven you for what you did to my hair!”

“What, exactly, did that specific sheep do to your hair?” the villager asked.

“It tried to eat it,” Ian claimed, with all the seriousness of a man used to saying much sillier.

“These sheep don’t eat hair—they eat brown kelp.”

“I know what they eat, and it’s frankly an insult.” The sheep came plodding back, gently headbutting Ian’s thigh. “Don’t think you can catch me off-guard, yeh soda-shitter.”

“Ian… it’s a sheep.”

“Like I said: we don’t get on. My hair is not that salty.”

At that, Ian maneuvered his way around the sheep and kept on walking towards the town, leaving the villager shaking his head. The man lifted the wayward sheep upon his shoulders and brought it back to the pund, placing it in the low stone-walled enclosure with all the other sheep of its grouping.

“What’s with that look?” wondered the other villager who was manning the pund. She watched as he shrugged.

“I don’t know if the academic over at Oswald’s is joking or if he’s just trying to get out of doing manual labor. Could be both.”

“Ignore him—the man’s probably going to leave soon anyhow,” she replied. “With how grouchy he is and how little guff she takes, there’s no way it’s going to last much more than after those visitors she’s got coming next week.”

“Maybe… maybe not… we’ll just have to see…” He glanced down at the sheep that he had placed back in the pund and raised his eyebrow.

Now why would a sheep want to eat human hair of all things?

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

It was nearly summer, which meant that he was shouting.

Well, it wasn’t as though he refrained from shouting during the winter months. Actually, he seemed to be rather good at shouting in all sorts of weather. It was simply put that, Ian Morlo, the man who inexplicably showed up one day and made a disturbingly-quick turnaround of stuffing, then marrying, the English lass on the northern end of the island, wandered more in the summer months, and that meant that others had to hear him shout.

“I will not be sassed back to like that!” he scolded. An elderly couple heard him from inside their house, causing the wife to cringe.

“You left the window open, again,” she scowled at her husband.

“It’s such a calm day,” he justified, remaining in his armchair. When he did not move, his wife huffed and went to close the window, except, she was trapped, as she made eye contact.

“Hello,” Ian said awkwardly. The toddler on the baby leash in his hand jumped up and down and waved, babbling importantly before returning to butterfly chasing.

“Hello there, Ian,” the elderly woman replied. “Could you please keep it down? I don’t know why you insist on talking to your daughter like that.”

“Oh, it wasn’t Terra, it was the wood nymph,” he stated, pointing at the tree next to him. A moment passed and he grunted sourly at the plant. “You try doing this sort of thing day after day and see how pleasant you are.”

“Ian… son… you’re talking to a tree…”

“I’m talking to the wood nymph inside of the tree. Now if you excuse me, Terra and I were going to meet Clara at the school, and I don’t think,” he glared at the tree, “I shall endure this abuse for much longer.”

“Are you alright, lad?” the woman asked. “You seem a bit stressed.”

“Been worse,” he shrugged. Ian then gently tugged on the leash, letting his daughter know they were about to start walking again. “Come on, pup; let’s go meet Mam at work so we can walk her home.”

“Mamma! Mamma!” the toddler shrieked happily, clapping her hands as she followed her father. The old woman shook her head and returned to her chair, not even bothering to close the window.

“It was the tree this time,” she said.

“I thought he said it was the nymph inside the tree.”

“There’s no pulpy tart inside that tree; be careful, or you’ll get just as mad as he is.”

“Seadh, a ghràidh,” he replied. There was no use arguing it. Now he just needed to learn to keep the damn window shut.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

If Charlotte had not seen him do something this level of strange before, she almost would have not believed her eyes.

She was returning to the pund after lunch, getting ready to continue shearing the small remaining portion of the flock she was in charge of that day, when she saw him: Ian Morlo. He was comely, that part was not to be mistaken, but the woman was not too keen on the fact that island’s resident nutter was standing atop the stone wall of the enclosure, dangling a lamb by its hind legs. The other sheep were bleating at him, possibly in an effort to have him put down the lamb.

“Ian!” she scolded. “What are you doing?!”

“I need to keep track of this one,” he claimed. He gestured with the lamb, as though that explained everything. “It’s the only one without a brine-soaked brain.”

“Put that lamb down right now!” she insisted. He didn’t, so she forcibly pulled it from his hands and let the creature go within the grassy pund. “You could have just looked at the eartag and remembered that.”

“That is inefficient—they can break and come off, and then what?”

“Then we just put another tag on it—simple,” she replied. “What the hell has gotten into you?!”

“I didn’t think there was anything—oh! Clara!” Ian waved as he saw his wife begin to walk towards the pund, their two-year-old daughter running along behind her. He walked along the top of the pund’s walls and walked right off the edge to land on the grass before them, seemingly not missing a step. “I think you need to explain to Charlotte how rare it is for me to find one of these kelp-munchers that actually is pleasant to be around.”

“What did he do this time, Char?” Clara asked.

“Looked like he was ready to drop a lamb from twelve feet up,” was the reply. Clara frowned at her husband as he picked up their daughter and allowed her to cling tightly to him.

“You’ve taken to threatening lambs now?”

“No! The very specific lamb I had was one of the good ones…!” He was cut off by his wife raising her hand, which he took as his cue to listen to her (and only her).

“If you’re going to threaten the livestock, then at least do it when they’re not captive in the punds, and stick to the adults,” she said.

“I told you,” he insisted, “I was keeping track of it…”

“Ian, be an adult about this.”

“Fine…” he muttered. His shoulders sank, which his daughter took as permission to climb onto them. Once there, she began to pet his fluff of hair, which he was allowing to grow a bit on the longer side as of late.

“Fwuffy!” the little girl cooed. “Daddy! You fwuffy like sheeps!”

“I am not ‘fluffy like the sheep’, young lady,” he groused. The flock bleated at him and he shot them a glare. “I’m watching you! Now don’t ruin that lamb’s chances at becoming something actually worth maintaining this pund for, you kelp-hoovers!” More bleating and Ian’s face went red. “You watch your mouths!”

“Ian come on, let’s go,” Clara insisted. She began to pull her husband along by his elbow, giving Charlotte an embarrassed grin. “I’ll see you when you come to pick Lorens up tomorrow!”

“Tìoriadh!” Charlotte said, giving her friend a half-hearted wave. She then readied to begin shearing again, trying to keep her mind off of why Clara kept Ian around; even with those looks, she was surprised that the other woman’s patience hadn’t run out long ago.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

To Lorens, there was nothing really like being at home.

His cousins would tease him for it, which he figured was fine. It didn’t matter that he moved in with his mam’s sister and her family in Lerwick for secondary school, nor did it matter when he visited his dad’s sister and her family in Bathgate, because none of his cousins knew how good it was when he’d step off the ferry and finally be back on the island. It was almost nine years since he had lived regularly on North Ronaldsay, and he was eager to pick that back up again. It was the familiarity of it all: the clusters of buildings, the high-built drystane dyke that kept the sheep in their preferred pastures, the folks with whom he had grown up with and around…

...even if some of them were nuttier than a bag of cashews.

“Hi there, Mr. Morlo,” Lorens said as he ran into one person in particular. He remembered the Spring when Mr. Morlo was wrecked off the coast and taken in by the now-Mrs. Morlo, as he seemed to be fiddling with the lock to the school’s front door. The other man lit up at the sight of him, seemingly taken aback by his presence.

“Lorens, your parents didn’t tell us you were coming in,” he said. “How’s the gap year coming along?”

“I’m honestly surprised that I don’t smell permanently of fish,” Lorens chuckled weakly. “I’ve hauled enough mackerel to feed all of the island for at least two years, and probably a good chunk of Sanday on top of it.”

“Did you hear from uni yet? I can’t be the only hopeless academic on this island.”

“No, but I sent out my paper a while ago, so I expect to hear from someone soon, no matter what the answer might be,” Lorens shrugged. “I did what you said in regards to sourcing the poems—my old instructor in Lerwick loves it.”

“Well now that;s goo—hey! What do you think you’re doing here?!” Lorens looked over his shoulder and saw a fully-grown seal flopping its way across the pavement. “You know not to haul out in town! There’s bicycles and cars up here! I don’t care if the sheep are being dense!” Mr. Morlo ran after the seal as it lumbered around without caring it was being shouted at.

“Oh God, not again.” Lorens looked back towards the door to see Mrs. Morlo stepping over the threshold, staring exasperatedly at her husband. She then caught sight of Lorens himself and smiled kindly. It used to be that she was taller than him and now, well, he had even grown taller than her husband. “Well, this is a much better surprise. How are you doing?”

“Well—thought I’d surprise Mam and Dad with a visit while work’s shut down—a fire, of all things.”

“Yes, I read about that; it’s good to know that you’re alright and no… one… was… hurt…” She seemed distracted, as she was looking up and down the road. “Did you see where the kids went?”

“Were they supposed to be with Mr. Morlo…?”

“Please, you’re old enough—we’re Clara and Ian—now where are those two?”

“Mam! Mam! Mam!” Right on cue, Terra and Douglas came running up to their mother, the former pulling a toy wagon behind her. “Oh! Hi Mr. Lorens!”

“Kids,” Mrs. Morlo groaned, “why is there a seal pup in your wagon?”

“Her name is Bridget and she wants to visit the crofts!” Douglas said excitedly. The fuzzy seal barked and the boy nodded. “Yeah, that’s our mam, and that’s one of our sitters, Mr. Lorens. He doesn’t come by too often.”

“So you named the seal Bridget?” Lorens asked cautiously. Terra shook her head as importantly as any nine-year-old could.

“No—she told us that herself.” The seal pup barked again, seemingly happy. “Bridget Dagmarsdottir of Clan Gannet, yes, we know.”

“Kids!” Mr. Morlo shouted from down the road. “Is that Bridget?!”

“RUN!” Terra shouted, pulling away the toy wagon as fast as she could, her younger brother right behind. Mr. Morlo attempted to chase after them, yet however double-backed a few strides and handed his wife a set of keys.

“Please lock up I have to go before Dagmar eats a small dog in protest bye see you at home,” he said all in one breath before scurrying off, his arms flapping in the air. The hauled seal—the presumed Dagmar—flopped after him.

“So… they all talk to seals now…” Lorens noted. Clara exhaled heavily.

“Yeah.”

“Sheep still too?”

“Every bloody day.”

“You know… my auntie’s neighbor is a psychiatrist… his office has children’s and genetics specialists.”

“Your mum told me. Several times.”

“Just… erm… putting that out there…”

“I know… I’m not cross,” Mrs. Morlo said as she locked up the school. “Just very tired. These kids just need to slow down… but you know that.” She patted Lorens on the arm before beginning to walk down the road and out of town. “Depending on how long you’re here, ever consider stopping by to babysit?”

“I’ll give a firm maybe,” the young man laughed.

[thedcdunce]

Max Mercury

“Just because you live in Alabama and not the thirtieth century doesn't mean you're surrounded by hicks, future boy. That's a stereotype.” - Max Mercury

Aliases:

Maxwell "Max" Crandall

Ahwehota

Windrunner

Lightning

Blue Streak

Quicksilver

Whip Whirlwind

Thunderpace

Gender: Male

Height: 6′ 2″

Weight: 177 lbs (80 kg)

Eyes: Blue

Hair: Grey

Powers:

Speed Force Conduit

Speed Force Empathy

Abilities:

Meditation

Multilingual

Universe: New Earth

Base of Operations: Manchester, Alabama

Citizenship: American

Marital Status: Single

First Appearance: The Flash Vol 2 #76 (May, 1993)

Powers

Speed Force Conduit: People who, for whatever reason, are connected to the Speed Force are sometimes called Speed Force Conduits. This means that they are connected to the Speed Force and are tethered to it.

Accelerated Healing: The Speed Force connection allows the speedster's body recover from injury much faster than normal.

Enhanced Senses: The Speed Force enhances the speedster's senses, allowing them to perceive the world at a rate attuned how fast they can react.

Phasing: Speed Force conduits can tap into the Speed Force to vibrate their molecules in a way to achieve intangibility for short bursts, allowing them to phase through objects.

Speed Force Aura: The Speed Force also manifests an aura around the speedster and whatever they are carrying, protecting them from adverse effects of their speed, such a friction with the air.

Superhuman Durability: The Speed Force Aura also protects speedsters from kinetic impacts, which in turn, makes them much more durable and resistant to injury than any normal human.

Superhuman Stamina: While not unlimited, the connection to the Speed Force does bolster the speedsters stamina well beyond the limits of a normal human.

Superhuman Speed: The main effect of the connection is to allow a speedster to move at vast superhuman speeds.

Superhuman Agility

Superhuman Reflexes

Vortex Creations: Speed Force conduits are able to create vortices of air by running in circles or rotating their extremities at super-speed. These vortices can be used for a number of effects.

Speed Force Empathy: Max can sense when another Speed Force conduit is troubled, and can be drawn to the location of that speedster.

Abilities

Meditation: Max practices a form of meditation called "hypermediation", that allows him to detect various aspects that are inside the Speed Force, such as a voice or a visual.

Multilingual: He is able to speak Japanese, English, Russian, Cantonese, Mandarin, and possibly more.

Origin

Max Mercury was born in the early 19th century. By 1838, he had been assigned as a messenger at a fort. He made friends with the local Blackfoot clan. Unfortunately his fort commander, who did not trust any of them, leveled a bounty on the clan and ordered a full-scale massacre. The shaman of the clan, with his dying breaths, told Max that many tribesman were returning from the hunt, and that they would be ambushed if not warned quickly. With a pinkish substance, the shaman drew a lightning bolt on Max's chest, gave a prayer to the god of the storm and the wind, and died. Max ran faster and faster and faster still. As swift as the wind, he took the soldiers' weapons and caught the Blackfoot arrows in midair. He devoted the next few years of his life to protecting the natives and the settlers from one another as Ahwehota, or as he was better known, Windrunner. However, one night during a thunderstorm, Max felt drawn to the lightning from deep within his heart. He ran as he had never run before, breaking all barriers, and he began to be drawn into the speed force, the energy field that gives speedsters their power. He finally had met his glorious destiny, but fear stopped him, sending him ricocheting through time to New York of July 14, 1891.

Again and again, he tried to get to the speed force and failed. He continued his super-hero career as Lightning, Blue Streak, and Quicksilver between each jump in time.

Golden Age

By 1947, Max had established the his current name, Max Mercury. He was sometimes called "The Whirlwind of the West." He often would team up with other speedsters, including the original Flash, Jay Garrick, and Johnny Quick, who would never believe that there was a speed force. Somewhere along the line, he got to know Zatara, the great magician who is father of Zatanna.

In 1949, Jay Garrick saved him from the Screaming Skull, a debt which Max vowed only to pay in a life or death situation.

In late 1947, Max saved the small town of Manchester, Alabama from Dr. Morlo and his toxic bombs at great cost to himself. Max's lungs were burned and his blood was tainted when he breathed in Morlo's mustard gas. Fortunately, the local physician, Dr. David Claiborne, found him lying in a culvert. David and his wife, Laura, cared for Max, who was out for nine weeks. He awoke to a new year and a new home. With David, he found a best friend with whom he shared a love of fishing, tennis, and the "Shadow" radio show. Laura, however, was special. She was lonely because David was always so busy, being one of the few doctors in the area. Max stayed with the Claibornes for quite some time. One lonely night, Max and Laura sat on the rooftop, looking at the stars. Laura felt so lonely with David always gone, and she and Max had grown to love each other. The inevitable happened. When David returned home, Max just ran. He jumped in time again, this time to New Year's Day, 1957.

By the sixties, Max again showed up, teaming with Johnny Quick as they fought the villain Savitar. Max chased after Savitar, a sprint that sent him flying into the seventies. He began to keep a journal in Korean, and he would often probe the speed force, trying to sense the presence of Savitar.

Eventually, Max gave up on his superspeed. Living in the Central Keystone area, he got a job selling subway tokens for MTA.

Return

However, when Professor Zoom was in town, pretending to be the late Barry Allen, Jay Garrick and Johnny Quick enlisted his aid, recalling the Screaming Skull incident. Jay had kept Max's old, forties costume. Max joined Jay, Johnny, and the current Flash, in fighting Professor Zoom. He began to teach Wally to find the Zen of speed, thus gaining the nickname, "The Zen Guru of Speed."

After Zoom was defeated, Max disappeared for awhile. When Wally was trapped in time after adding Johnny's speed formula (3x2(9yz)4a) to his own speed, Max appeared. He could only remain at that high speed for a short time, but he taught Wally a valuable lesson about making decisions. Later, Max would occasionally keep an eye on Wally, peering into his house through the window or watching from a nearby alley.

Mentor to Impulse

Max again showed up after Bart Allen had arrived from the 30th century, to teach Wally about the Speed Force, help train Bart, and lend a hand in defeating Kobra, who had unleashed Project Morpheus on Keystone City.

After trying to locate Laura Claiborne, only to find that she had died a while ago, Max learned that he had a daughter, Helen, who still lived in Manchester. Wanting to keep an eye on her, he decided to move there. Wanting Bart to be taught the finer secrets of speed, Wally sent him with Max to Manchester. Max, known to the average citizens as Max Crandall, Bart Allen's uncle, always stressed keeping a secret identity. He would put Bart through challenging drills, such as solving jigsaw puzzles in midair; dodging knives, axes, maces, swords, etc; and running obstacle courses while dodging knives, axes, maces, swords, etc.

One day, Max met his daughter, Helen, in the library. She took an instant liking to him. Not knowing that he was her father, she would always flirt with him, but he obviously never returned those feelings. He often would help her around the house. Bart, also not knowing the secret, would urge their relationship on.

One night, after Bart had returned from fighting Blockbuster, Max disappeared. He had been kidnapped by Savitar's ninjas and taken to his fortress, where he was tortured. Fortunately, just before he was to be killed, he escaped. He ran to his home, where he was met by Wally, who took him to the hospital. Using a map carved on Max's chest, he and Jesse Quick went off to fight Savitar. When Jesse destroyed Savitar's speed battery, Max felt a surge of speed energy, and was able to help the others fight Savitar. During this adventure, Johnny finally accepted Max's lessons about the Speed Force, and perished saving his daughter. After Savitar was defeated, Max and Bart returned to Manchester.

One day, Max and Bart showed up at Helen's to find her being beaten up by her ex-husband. Max's scream--"Take your hands off my daughter!"--revealed to Bart and Helen Max's secret. Max had to tell Helen the whole story, including his and Bart's identities. However, they now shared even closer bond.

Into the Speed Force

Max finally become one with the Speed Force after his body was taken over by Jay's nemesis, Rival.

The Speed Force eventually sent Max, along with Barry, Wally, and Bart, to an alternate Earth. Here, they decided to allow Bart to absorb the power of the Speed Force so that he could be sent back home to defeat Superboy-Prime.

Fun Facts

Max Mercury has gone by many nicknames over the years. Akin to the 'Scarlet Speedster', Max was called the Whirlwind of the West, Zen Guru of Speed, and Laughing Robin Hood.

[linette472503643-blog]

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[brooke81c996548-blog]

NuVasive's (NUVA) Chief Executive Officer Greg Lucier On Q3 2017 End results.

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[brown-little-robin]

38: Lightning Strike (Part One)

part one | previous | next | masterlist | ao3 version

Nevada, 1:00 in the afternoon, Pacific Time. The land is hilly but bare, full of treacherous ravines, covered with sharp plants and occasional scraggly juniper trees. The sun is searing into Thad’s eyes, turning every blade of grass into high-definition constructs, bleaching the sky white. There’s no human habitation in sight, and, Thaddeus is sure, for miles around.

All of the Allens are here.

Max Crandall and Thaddeus Free approach the group at a walk. There is no wind. Thaddeus’s shorts brush against his legs; his arms are bare. He dressed for the weather, hot, and for lightning, in case this operation overwhelms his friction aura and ruins his clothing.

Thaddeus keeps his head high and walks exactly at Max’s side. He is running on adrenaline, his focus narrowed to this moment, this one last mission. Get a lightning rod.

Every speedster in the world is here:

Jay Garrick, doffing his helmet, the only piece of his uniform he’s wearing. Thaddeus gives him a nod. Jay didn’t often kill him, but when he did, he made it quick. He appreciates it.

Jesse Quick, the only person in uniform. Either she didn’t get the memo about coming in civilian clothing or, more likely, she doesn’t trust Thaddeus with her identity. Fair enough.

Wally West, one hand on Irey West’s shoulder, the other on Jai’s. Thad’s eyes widen. He’s never seen Irey in person before; her red hair shines in the sun. He didn’t think—he didn’t think of this. That ‘all speedsters’ would include Wally’s children.

They look younger than him. Irey is bouncing on her tiptoes.

Thaddeus feels hot, cold, hot again. He’s grateful to the Wests for allowing their children to come. He hopes this operation doesn’t make him look weak in front of his cousins.

Bart Allen.

Bart Allen, twenty-one physical years old, tall and strong, his ring on his finger, ready to unspool his costume at a moment’s notice.

Thaddeus feels sick.

To prevent the bitter twist of his lip from growing to something dangerous, Thaddeus looks to Doctor Morlo, the huge leather suitcase in his hand. And, beside him, Joseph Wilson.

Thad smiles. He can’t help it. Joseph is wearing blue jeans and a shirt with a cartoony sunflower and words on it: Hello Sunshine!

Joseph waves to Thad, beaming. Thad’s smile grows a little wider.

Max asks “Where’s Raven?”

It breaks the weird stillness. Jesse shifts her position. Bart… Thaddeus looks away. He doesn’t want to know.

Irey waves. “Hi, cousin Thad!”

“Hi,” Thaddeus says, as softly as he can. He wonders what Bart thinks of him treating Irey like this. He wonders if Bart is offended she likes Thad. “Nice to meet you, Irey.”

Wally clears his throat. “I was just going to go get Raven. Zatanna should have been here already; I’ll check in with her, too. Be back in a flash!”

Jai rolls his eyes.

Wally disappears, leaving a little dust cloud behind. Thaddeus's body tenses, and Max’s hand comes to his shoulder, pressing hard. Thaddeus lifts his shoulder into Max’s hand. He’s grateful to Max for grounding him.

His eyes flick to Bart. Bart’s eyes, the same bright yellow as Thad’s, shimmer in the harsh light.

Vwoosh. Thad jolts, but Max’s hand on his shoulder keeps him from bolting at the abrupt appearance of Wally West.

The woman Wally was transporting hops out of his arms. She’s the backup magician: Zatanna, Thaddeus assumes, in see-through diamond-patterned leggings, a white button-down, and a top hat. The outfit does not inspire confidence.

A bloom of what looks like black smoke folds out into the shape of a bird, and Thad’s attention is fixed on Raven.

She looks as pale and strange as the day she pulled Thaddeus inside her and told him his soul was wounded. Your wounds are deep, she said, but they can heal in time. Well, look how that turned out. Thaddeus clawed himself out of the worst of his lethargy and cruelty, if only for survival’s sake, but he certainly isn’t any less wounded.

Raven closes her eyes, looking sad, and Thaddeus abruptly remembers she's a telepath.

Zatanna finishes giving Thaddeus an appraising look and turns to Wally West. “You sure about this?”

“Excuse you, I am six hundred years old and I can speak for myself!”

Zatanna pivots on her heel. Her eyebrows are raised.

“And you’re sure about this?”

“Yes!”

Zatanna purses her lips. “Fine. Your call. But if you are who I’ve heard you are, you’ll want to consider all your options.”

She’s heard who he is?! Of course she has. Thaddeus pushes his fear down and focuses on the mission. Options. Thaddeus likes the sound of that.

“We can talk. In private.”

Thaddeus glances defensively around the group of speedsters. To his surprise, Wally West and Jay Garrick are nodding.

Max says, “I’ll come with you.”

Max leads the way away from the group, far enough that they won’t be overheard. Thaddeus insists on going further, into a little ravine behind some trees. Bart has the ability to read lips.

Zatanna looks more at home in the witchy dark below the pines than she did in the harsh light. She speaks first.

“Let me get this straight. You want to psychically link your soul with Joseph’s? Using the timestream? To help with… anxiety?”

“Using the speed force,” Thaddeus corrects, rather than addressing Zatanna’s judgment. He does not want to deal with this right now. He wishes Max would step in. But although he can feel Max’s presence, heavy at his side, Max is silent.

Zatanna says, “Two words for the same thing. And this doesn’t seem extreme to you?”

“Extreme works.”

Zatanna gives a quick shrug.

“Have you considered that medication could solve your problem?”

Thaddeus laughs. It sounds bitter even to his own ears.

“Don’t you know? Medications don’t work on speedsters. Our metabolism is too fast.”

“But magic works on you?”

“Uh—” he blinks, fear rising in his throat. Magic could kill him.

“So enchant your pills,” Zatanna says, like a command. “Honestly, people don’t think things through.”

Thaddeus flinches at the rebuke, but stays silent, thinking. Enchanted medication? Is that what she’s suggesting? Enchanted… medicine. Would that work? Can magic do that? Make a physical substance proof against his lightning metabolism?

“Would that work,” he says flatly.

“Sure.”

Thaddeus bites his tongue. He needs the pain to keep him from floating away into the cloud of fear choking him. He breathes through his nose.

“Thad-boy,” Max’s voice says. “Why don’t we take a while and think about it? You don’t have to do anything today.”

He bites down harder. A burst of pain.

“No,” he snaps. “No, I need a lightning rod. I need it. Today. This is not just about anxiety. Anxiety is the least of my problems.”

“I can at least help illuminate his path,” Raven says, in her low, resonant voice.

“How?” Max asks. His hand comes down on Thaddeus’s shoulder again.

“I can talk to him,” Raven says. “Talk through what’s hurting him. Thad…”

Thaddeus glares at a pine tree between Zatanna and Raven, unable to meet their eyes and talk at the same time.

Raven says, “Talk to me here. Now, while you’re safe.”

“He is safe with his family,” Max says.

“He feels unsafe.”

“Fine,” Thaddeus says loudly, horrified that Raven said that in front of the magician. “Yes. I’ll talk to you here.”

He glances at Zatanna. She’s watching him shrewdly. Grife.

Zatanna says, “I’ll talk to you later. I have the hour before my next show, and Wally West knows where to find me. I’m sure you can take your time.”

Her nose wrinkles unhappily.

Does she not want to be here? Why did she agree to come here, anyway? Is West burning favors for Thad? Thaddeus hopes not. He doesn’t want to be in West’s debt.

Raven is coming towards him. She crouches in front of him.

“Ready?”

Thaddeus gives her a sharp nod.

He’s falling. He has impressions of heat and wind, of things moving all around him; he’s surrounded by pillars and walls of flesh.

And then Raven is standing in front of him, her hands on his shoulders. His feet touch down gently on a massive bone.

Raven smiles at him.

“Sorry,” she says. “I know it’s not the most comfortable place, but I thought you’d like to talk privately.”

“I did.”

He opens his mouth to say something more, to… demand something, keep her off guard, but he can’t think of anything. He just wants to be done with all this.

“I know,” Raven says.

Thaddeus shudders. He hates knowing that his mind isn’t a private place.

Raven removes her hands from his shoulders.

“You’ve never had much privacy.”

“No.”

Thaddeus tries to be unemotional about it, but the idea of having privacy is bringing up images in his mind—stumbling out of the nutrient womb naked, ashamed without knowing why; disembodied voices reprimanding him for missteps in VR programs; a dentist pushing his face to the side and breaking out his tooth—

“Enough,” Raven says, and the images cease like she clicked a button.

Wow. Thaddeus wishes he could do that to himself on command.

Raven smiles, and he wrinkles his nose at her wryly.

“So,” he says. “Uh… illuminate my… path.”

Raven sits down and pats the ground—the bone—in front of her. Thaddeus hesitates. He feels like if he sits down, he’ll lose the jittery energy keeping him going.

Raven waits.

Thaddeus sits. Digs his fingers into his thighs.

“So, you want to be able to escape.”

Thad flinches.

Escape what? The speed force? Eobard Thawne?

The Flash family?

Himself?

There’s silence. Hot, stinking wind. He can’t look at Raven, he just can’t, he can’t force his eyes up to look her in the face.

He wants to escape.

Finally, he whispers, “What do you want from me?”

“Nothing,” Raven says softly. “I just need you to relax, Thaddeus.”

“I can’t.”

If he relaxed, everything would spill out, all the weak emotions and secrets and—no. He has to keep his mind on lockdown. Raven will just have to deal with it.

“It’s not for me that I ask it.”

Oh?

“Yes. I can’t bind you to Joseph if you’re…”

“Freaking out?” Thaddeus spits.

“Mm.”

Thad’s whole body tenses. Do you have to be calm to get a lightning rod? Will he fail before he's even begun?

Then the tension eases. He calms. His breath comes slower.

Huh.

“Was that you?”

“Yes.”

Huh. Again, Thaddeus wishes he could do that to himself. It was so easy for her to prevent him from spiraling into panic.

“If you need me to be calm, why don’t you make me?”

“It has to be you,” Raven says.

What does that mean?

“The emotional work… has to be you. If I force you to trust Joseph, it will fade within the day.”

His breath catches. Raven can’t help him?

“I can channel the speed force into your decision,” Raven replies softly. “I can intensify what you already feel to the point that… hopefully… your powers recognize that you need a lightning rod, that you trust Joseph enough for it to be him.”

“It’s not about trust,” Thaddeus corrects. “It’s… love.”

Raven tilts her head.

“Usually. But for you, for a lightning rod…” Thaddeus doesn’t want to hear this— “For you, it’ll be about trust.”

Thad is a freak.

Even if he is capable of a lightning rod connection, it can’t be love, for him. Just animal trust, like he’s some kind of lizard whose highest brain function is not to run away.

“No,” Raven says immediately. “I promise you’re not a freak. You’re just young.”

Thaddeus hesitates, thrown. What does age have to do with it?

“It is simply different for a child. Adults run to people they love as an act of sacrifice and devotion. Children run to people they trust.”

Oh. Well, that’s an interesting concept. Thaddeus has a vague idea that he saw children run to their parents in some of his simulations, the ones where Inertia’s fights caused destruction in civilian areas. He remembers how they’d call for their mother, their father, flee to their stronger and faster counterparts to be saved.

Thaddeus has never been one of those children.

“Why…” Thaddeus falters.

Why do you count me as a child? I’m six hundred years old and I’m not a child, never a child—

Raven answers with a question: “Isn’t it a relief?”

Yes. Yes, it is. Thaddeus would be completely doomed if he had to muster up lightning-rod love for Joseph. He’s not even entirely convinced that he loves Helen.

Yes he does.

No he doesn’t.

Yes, he loves Helen.

No, that’s not possible, right?

Raven is listening!

Thaddeus speaks over his own mind: “So I need to trust him?”

Raven nods, mercifully refraining from commenting on his internal debate.

“I can summon the speed force through you. What happens then… I don’t know. It’s up to you to communicate with it. I’ll attempt to aid you, but… there's only so much I can do.”

Communicate with the speed force. Like it’s a person. Hmm. Crazy as the idea is… isn’t that what he was doing while inside it? Running through it, keeping himself away from its powerful core and its spirits, trying to predict its actions, avoiding its storms? Didn’t he feel that the bubbles of calm were signs of approval?

Can he communicate to the speed force that he trusts Joseph? That seems like a pretty complicated concept for something as primal as the speed force to understand.

Can he even survive direct contact with it?

It’s not like he has a choice.

“All right,” Thaddeus says. “I’ll do it.”

The middle of Nevada, 1:18 in the afternoon, Central Time. The sun is searing into Thad’s eyes, bleaching the sky white.

Everyone is here.

The Flash family is watching him from a respectful distance away. Thaddeus ignores them. Bart hasn't tried to catch his attention, for which Thaddeus is… grateful.

Thaddeus is kneeling, hands on his knees, breathing, breathing, trying to stay calm. Joseph in front of him; their knees almost touch. Raven crouches like a bird to Thaddeus's left, Joseph's right. Zatanna is standing with Wally West, observing, ready to step in if she needs to. Doctor Morlo looks like a worried thundercloud, but he gives Thad a thumbs-up.

Raven says, “Take each other's hands.”

Joseph holds out his hands. Thaddeus leans forward and places his hands in Joseph’s.

Joseph's hands are big and warm. Thad wishes he could just give Joseph a hug and be done with this.

He summons his power. Raven will be inside his mind, there with him to help as she sees fit, but Thaddeus will start this process and Thaddeus will complete it. He feels the initial surge of power-adrenaline that comes with the speed force, the same every time, no matter how long he lives. But he takes it slow.

Joseph’s hands tighten. Thaddeus keeps his hands limp in Joseph’s; he doesn’t want to hurt the man, moving at this speed. He looks up at Joseph, watches how his breathing slows and stops as Thaddeus pulls more and more power into himself.

He tries not to think about the speedsters around him, watching him like a pack of dogs surrounding a coyote.

Joseph's eyes close, and by the time they drift open, Thaddeus’s arms are crackling with the sparks of his power. Thaddeus is fast enough to outrace a cheetah, a scream, Max Mercury himself. Faster.

I am going to summon the speed force now.

And then—

Brightness. A beam of light rises from the ground through his body. Other, thinner beams of light rise from the ground around them. An ozone smell. Lightning. Thaddeus pulls faster, and he knows lightning can’t hurt him but it’s so bright—

He throws back his head, tracing the lightning bolt up from himself. Through the white sky above him is coming another lightning bolt, bigger and stronger and faster.

The two bolts connect.

Thaddeus feels pain—an eternity—he thinks he screams, he doesn’t know, he can’t feel his body—it HURTS—it’s too MUCH—

And then he’s not in pain and he can breathe again, but there’s still this bolt of lightning cracking and spitting all around him, faster than he is, even through Thaddeus can feel—he knows that he’s faster than he’s ever been before. It’s unimaginably bright. Thaddeus is blind. And he is not alone.

The spirits. The spirits he spent so long running from, they’re here, they’re standing around him on each point where a feeler of lightning rose from the ground. He can feel them.

“You wanted to talk to the speed force, kid,” comes a voice from behind him. “Here we are.”

“I—” Thaddeus doesn’t want to understand, but he does. The lightning he’s encased in is the speed force itself, but he’s too little and weak to talk to it. He’d die. He has to talk to the spirits instead.

They’re heroes. Barry Allen is among them. They’re going to drag him back to the speed force and rip him apart. He’s going to die.

“Speak,” says a spirit from his right.

“We’re not going to hurt you,” comes a voice from his left.

“We were never going to hurt you, Thad,” in front.

“But speak. You haven’t got much time,” behind.

Thaddeus is trembling, hair floating around his head. An eerie burning sparks down his spine. Grife, the nerve damage this could do—could already be doing—

“I need help,” he says, pleads, throws out his weakness in front of these spirits like baring his throat. “I need a lightning rod. Please. Bind me to Joseph.”

He has nothing to bargain with.

He’s shaking convulsively. He doesn’t know if his hands, outside the beam of white lightning, are still resting in Joseph’s. He can’t feel his hands. His body is going numb and all his nerves are on fire.

“You ask us to provide what you can’t grasp yourself, little wayward bolt.”

Thaddeus falters. He can feel Raven in his mind, feeding him strength, but it’s like she’s pouring water into a broken cup.

“Please, I trust him!”

“You trust no one,” a spirit hisses. And then there’s a cacophony of voices, loud, crackling, around and inside him: “Child—” “Ran from us—” “Paranoid—” “Thawne—” “Seven years—” “Bart’s—” “Soul-bonded—” “If—”

HE CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE!

Thaddeus looks up into the white of the lightning and screams.

The voices stop. Raven’s presence stops. The sounds of lightning stop. He’s in a blank white space, and there’s just one person in front of him. One single spirit, yellow and flickering. Thaddeus can’t make out any features.

There’s silence for a while. Thaddeus calms down, increment by increment. He lets his empty hands fall into his lap.

“Here, beloved,” the spirit says. “Is this better?”

Thad can’t speak.

[brown-little-robin]

36: Calm Before the Storm

part one | previous | next | masterlist | ao3 version

Thad wanted to move out on Monday. By Wednesday, he has heard “Patience, Thad, we need to think about it” enough times to scream.

Max says it again at breakfast, and Thad bites his cheek. Doesn’t scream. He is trying to be better, excruciating as that is, since… since Max told him he was capable of love.

Thaddeus still doesn’t know about that. It conflicts with his experience.

He is capable of love… in some forms. Obsession, centered on Bart, a mass of emotion so intense that it must have been something like love. Longing, yes, for praise and touch and someone to make him not alone. Enjoyment, yes. Even… affection. But love? Real love? Like how Bart Allen loved Max?

I’d die for him. Or with him. That’s what you do!

Would Thad die for Max? He looks at Max, his face obscured behind the newspaper he’s reading at the table. Weird old man. Yes, Thad would die for him.

But that doesn’t feel like love. Just guilt.

Metropolis University starts in a week and a half. He’ll be out of this house by then. Hopefully, Thad can last that long. Hopefully.

After Thad disposes of his dishes, Max catches him by the elbow.

“Come with me. I have something to tell you.”

“Could you be any more cryptic?” Thad snaps.

Max sighs.

“I’m not… ‘being crypic’. I’m saying what I mean.”

“Whatever.”

The fire has gone out of their arguments. They’ve soured into bitter ashes. Thad’s tired of this… of being unable to stop himself from snapping and snarling at Max. He tucks the notebook into his hoodie pocket and presents himself for carrying.

Max sets him down in a meadow. Thad wants to complain, but can’t find anything to criticize. It’s warm, almost humid; there’s no wind, but birdsong rings all around them. Thad tucks his hands into his hoodie pocket.

Max tells him, “You can move out. I’ve communicated with the family, and we came to a vote of confidence in you.”

“A vote of…” his mind feels very far away. “Of…”

He sits down abruptly, lightheaded. He leans his hands on his knees. The long grass sends shadows across his legs.

Max sits in front of him, looking unsurprised.

“A vote of confidence,” Thad repeats.

“Yes.”

“Was it—”

“Unanimous.”

This isn’t real. It can’t be real. It feels like a simulation.

Thaddeus pulls himself out of his body. He hovers in his own mind, fighting to figure out what’s real. What’s the win state in this situation? The trick?

His limbs are tingling. The bumpy earth under his legs feels very distant.

He sees Max Mercury sigh and cross his legs, settling in as if for a long wait. Thaddeus’s body is very still, but the sweet heat of the speed force is running through his veins. He’s in speed-time.

Thaddeus becomes aware that he’s not breathing.

Breathe, boy, he hears Doctor Morlo say; in and out. Aha. The objective.

After a while, he becomes aware of his hands on his knees again, the cold of the earth seeping into his pants. Long grass is brushing his sleeves.

“What’s going on in that head of yours?” Max asks.

He shakes his head. It would take too long to explain. “You’ll let me go?”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“Today, if you want.”

Thad stares at Max, searching his face. He meets only sincerity.

“What’s the catch?”

“Sometimes I don’t know if you’re serious or not. Why does there have to be a catch?”

Thad laughs incredulously. “There’s always something! It’s like pulling teeth to get information out of you, I swear. What do I have to do, Max?”

“Nothing.” Max turns his hands palms up. “I’m sorry I’ve been uncommunicative with you. I’ve… failed you.”

Thad freezes. How did he fail? How in the world did Thad fail? Or is Max talking about himself?

“How?”

“I’m a cautious, cowardly man sometimes.” Max’s voice is low. “I was too careful with you, Thad-boy. A little trust would have gone a long way, wouldn’t it? Ever since you came back.”

There’s pain in Max’s blue eyes. A rush of some unfamiliar emotion makes Thad bare his teeth as if to fight an enemy that doesn’t exist.

Max says, “You deserve better.”

“No,” Thad protests, and it comes out strangled.

“Yes,” Max says, and smiles sadly. “Look at us. It always turns into an argument with us. I wish you all happiness with Joseph, Thaddeus. I hope he’s better for you.”

Thad stares at Max, hurting very much.

This sucks. And he can’t even—he can’t even argue with Max, really. He feels like there’s something wrong with what Max is saying, but he doesn’t know what. He just wants Max to stop being so cruel to himself.

Joseph always hugged him when he said something harsh about himself. Maybe it would work with Max, too.

“Can I touch you?” Thad asks.

Max looks surprised, but— “Yes.”

Thad crawls awkwardly to Max, grass brushing his arms. Max yields, watching Thad with wide eyes, as Thad crawls up onto his lap and wraps his arms around Max’s shoulders.

“Don’t—call yourself—a coward,” Thad chokes out over the static that always fills his mind when his body is touching another person’s body.

Max’s hands settle on Thad’s back.

“All right. Thank you.”

All right, that’s enough. Thad disengages and scuttles back to where he was. His body feels uncomfortably tingly.

“When are you gonna get Raven to connect me to Joseph?”

Max hesitates.

“You’re not going to go through with it?!”

“Well, you’ve demonstrated your trustworthiness,” Max says slowly, frowning.

“But I need a lightning rod!”

“Why?”

“Because of Eobard Thawne!” Thad cries. He hates to even think about the Thawne-Allen war, but when it threatens his life—“Because of the time war! What happens when he comes after me? He’ll kill me!”

Max’s frown grows. “If Eobard… if anyone comes after you, run away. Run to one of us. We’ll protect you.”

The Thawne side of Thaddeus shudders at the shamelessness of the man. We’ll protect you. Protect a sworn enemy!

A child, the soft Allen half of him whispers. Protect a child.

Max says, “I really don’t see how this is connected to having a lightning rod.”

Thad has no choice but to explain.

“I couldn’t run from a Thawne. All he’d have to do is order me to stand down, I couldn’t—I couldn’t—I swear I’m not one of them anymore, I just—”

“Hey, kiddo,” Max says, gently, and puts his hands on Thad’s shoulders. “It’s okay. I know. Calm down.”

Thad takes a shuddering breath. Tries to calm down.

Max’s hands are firm on his shoulders, eyes gazing unthreateningly over Thad’s head. Thad knows he’s being handled carefully. It’s irritating. But he lets himself relax into Max’s grip.

“It’s okay, Thad-boy,” Max murmurs. “You’re going to be fine.”

“Not when Eobard comes for me!”

Max makes eye contact. Thad freezes.

“Would you really obey him?” Max asks. “I think you’d run.”

Thad looks away from Max’s eyes, unable to stand it anymore. The forest is a gentle green, mostly deciduous trees, softer than the evergreen forest around Adeline’s house.

“I’d… I’d… I’d hesitate. I was trained—was trained to obey his voice. I’d hesitate. Just for a second, and he’d kill me. Eobard is that fast and you know it. I have to break that—that compulsion. I have to have someone to run to.”

“Wouldn’t your lightning rod have to be one of us, then? A speedster?” Max asks in a tone of utmost reasonableness.

“No. No, it doesn’t have to be. If I had a person, I’d be able to start running, and I don’t stop once I’ve started. It’s not… logical, but it’s in my psychology.”

“Mm,” Max hums. “Okay, I hear you.”

Slowly, deliberately, Max pulls Thad into his lap. Thad wraps his arms around Max’s back. Thad’s entire body is tense.

He really, really needs to move out.

He’s really, really going to miss Max.

Max holds Thad in his lap for a while, rocking him wordlessly. Then he reaches slowly into his pocket, pulls out his phone. He calls someone. Thad recognizes Wally Wests’s voice on the line even before Max puts the phone on speakerphone and informs Wally that Thad is listening.

Max tells Wally that they might have to get Raven to help after all. Wally makes Max explain why, which makes Thad shrivel up a little inside, but he doesn’t want to talk so he doesn’t speak up.

Wally says he’ll talk to Raven. Max thanks him. Max hangs up.

Thad relaxes.

Max says, “I want you to know that you can be honest with me.”

Thad’s stomach twists. He really can’t, not if he wants to keep his powers.

“I know.”

“You seem scared to talk to me,” Max observes, too calmly.

Duh. “Wouldn’t you be scared in my place?”

“Maybe so,” Max sighs. “But I’m not going to punish you for having feelings. Even illogical ones. I just want to help.”

Yeah. Thad knows. He owes Max some honesty. But—but it’s hard to be honest when half of his energy is going to repressing certain aspects of himself, all the time. Things like his terror about Eobard Thawne, the gut-wrenching certainty that Thaddeus Thawne II will die by his many-times-great-grandfather’s hands.

If he thought about that stuff… if, horrifyingly, he told someone about that stuff… he wouldn’t be able to function.

“I wish you’d told me about Eobard,” Max murmurs.

If only it were that simple.

“I…” Thad whispers. “Try. To trust you.”

Max kisses Thad’s head.

“I know, braveheart.”

Thad squeezes his eyes closed and tries not to cry.

He asks to go to the library, later that day. Max brings him there, gentle and concerned and horribly quiet. When Thad licks his lips, steels himself, and walks away from their usual corner, away from the nonfiction section, Max doesn’t ask what he’s doing.

Thad almost wishes Max would pry. Especially when he takes a left away from fiction to the computer area.

He experiences a full-body shudder when he rests his hands on the keyboard. It’s like touching a corpse.

But he needs the internet today. He’s looking for specialized knowledge, something the library is highly unlikely to have in book form. He needs to know what will happen when he gets a lightning rod.

He has… myths and legends. From The Life Story of the Flash, from the VR programs, from every scrap of knowledge he’s gathered about the Allens through the years. To escape the speed force, a speedster has to have a person he loves so fiercely that he would rather run to that person than dissolve into the infinite warmth and light of the speed force. He has to know that person so well that he can find their soul in a million, in a billion, in the accumulated population of the universe across all of history. He has to love with a love powerful enough to break the universe.

Now, even if Max is right and Thad is capable of love—real love—he’s certainly never had anything like that.

He thinks back to his training in 21st-century technology. How do their computers work? Ah, yes—a ‘mouse’ to interact with the screen, a keyboard to enter commands. Independent “applications” using a single internet. Servers. Websites. Search engines. Tabs.

The library computer seems to have a search engine open already, which is a relief. Thad familiarizes himself with the mouse. Then he opens a new tab and hopes he doesn’t dissociate. He cannot be caught looking up what it’s like to love someone, letter by painful letter.

What it’s like to have a father.

What it’s like to have a good father.

Adoptive relationships.

PTSD and relationships.

What it’s like to fall in love. NO NOT LIKE THAT. Platonically. Platonic falling in love.

What is a best friend.

What does friendship feel like.

Low empathy can you feel love.

Low empathy relationships.

Thad becomes aware of a man approaching his area. He shuts all his tabs immediately, then turns to look at him. Sure enough, it’s Max.

Thad is 99% sure that Max didn’t see that.

95%.

His heart is racing.

“Finding what you want?” Max asks.

Thad grimaces.

“Somewhat.”

Thad is more confused than he was before. A good father makes his children feel safe above all, his sources said. So Thad can expect to feel… safe? Seems unlikely. Foster children take time to grow used to new situations; be patient with them, but that’s completely useless to Thad; he will be connected to Joseph all at once. Love is uncontrollable, intense desire for a person, the generic sources said, with a thousand sentimental metaphors, and Thad was both compelled and repulsed by the idea, but love is a commitment, a steadiness of relationship, the sources on low empathy said; not feeling lovey-dovey isn’t evil. But then there were the articles on why you should end relationships with people who can’t love you, and… anyway, Thad doesn’t know what to expect.

“Can I help?”

Thad would growl at him, but he wants to keep his library privileges. “No.”

He stares aggressively at Max until the man gives up.

“What are you looking up?” Max asks bluntly.

“Electricity, effects on the body.”

Thaddeus figures that getting an artificial lightning rod will probably involve some lightning. It’s a plausible lie. As long as Max doesn’t question it.

“Why?”

“Why do you think?”

“I think you’re afraid.”

What?!

Max says, “It’s a risk, Thad. This operation. I know it’s dangerous. And you’ve already been through so much risk. It’s perfectly right to choose safety.”

Thad’s stomach roils, partially because of the alarming word “operation” and partly with guilt. Max is looking at him with such tenderness in his old blue eyes. Because of a lie.

“I don’t want to talk about it. Don’t ask me about it.”

Max frowns.

“Please,” Thad adds belatedly.

Without waiting for an answer, he turns back to the computer. He resists the urge to watch Max. He types properties of lightning.

“You don’t know how to type?” Max asks.

Thad whips around and stares at him, nerves alight.

“Like this,” Max says, and puts both hands on the keyboard with his wrists poised in the air. He looks out of place, his thick, hairy arms placed delicately on a computer’s keys.

“I never needed to know how to use Stone Age technology,” Thad sneers.

Max doesn’t flinch. He leans forward.

“We’re alike, us two. Somewhat… lost in time. We both need to learn new things.”

Oh, and if only Thad’s problems only consisted of electricity and not knowing how to type. Then he could bond with Max over this.

“I…”

Whatever words he was about to say die in their infancy. He can’t do this. He can’t lie to Max again.

“I won’t be long.”

He turns away from Max’s frustrated face to his computer and starts reading.

Stupid. Boring. Nerve-wracking. He knows everything that is being said. Electricity. Weather patterns. Apparently, 21st century people still think lightning might be caused by cosmic rays from outer space, which is mildly interesting.

He’s bored. He glances at Max. The man is watching him still, frowning. He glances between Thad’s screen and his face.

This isn’t virtual reality.

Max can see what Thad’s seeing.

Thad flinches. A shock of electricity runs over him; he turns back to the corpse—the computer—and types lightning effects on the body.

Burns, muscle pains, heart attacks, occasional broken bones from falls and being thrown, blah blah blah. Seizures. Oh, of course. Electricity would tamper with the nervous system… why didn’t Thad know that?

Confusion. Behavioral changes.

Behavioral changes?!

Thad types, letter by frantic letter, lightning strike behavioral changes.

Lightning strikes can cause mood swings—

After being struck by lightning, you might experience personality changes, depression, chronic pain—

Lightning rewires the brain in the same way that electricity can scramble a computer—

After Francis was struck by lightning, his life was forever changed—

Nothing is normal anymore—

Headaches, memory deficits, mood swings, severe depression—

Permanent personality changes—

Permanent personality changes—

Thaddeus’s stomach heaves. He has a single second to realize he’s going to throw up.

He jerks away from the computer, falls backward, and the stinging liquid gets in his mouth and his nose. He’s in freefall, in speed-time. He’s going to choke and die—

Hands, big, pulling him to the floor where he can get purchase, put his hands and knees on the rough gray carpet and expel the entire contents of his stomach.

And then he’s on the floor, coughing and snorting acid out of every hole in his face, retching at intervals. Max’s hand is rubbing circles on his back.

“Shhh, shhh. Shhh. It’s okay, Thad-boy.”

Sprocking grife, Thad just threw up in the library, on the carpet. He can never come here again.

Complete personality change—

Thad’s coughing turns to sobbing.

Max croons a sad sound with no words. He picks Thad up, nasty vomit-covered face and neck and all.

He takes Thad home.

Max doesn’t put Thad back in his room, though. He sets him on the couch and gives him a blanket. Everything smells bad. Sticky tears are still running out of Thad’s eyes. His mouth tastes foul, and he can’t talk, can’t shout for Max to come back when he leaves.

The sink turns on in the kitchen.

Max comes back with a bowl of water and a washrag. He sets the bowl carefully on the floor by the couch, dips the cloth in it, and reaches for Thad’s cheek with it.

Thad flinches backwards, lightning—nothing will be the same—lightning in his peripheral vision, flickering from the ends of his hair. He vibrates out of the blanket and—

He manages to stop. To grab the blanket and hold on. To stay on the couch.

He’s bent backwards, looking up at Max, all of his organs totally exposed.

Max pauses. He still looks calm, but his hand trembles. Water drips from the cloth.

“I’m not gonna hurt you. I promise.”

Thad holds himself as still as he can. After a moment, Max moves forward again and touches the cloth to Thad’s face.

It’s rough, wet, and warm. Thad leans forward. He is so cold.

Max cleans his face and neck gently. Thad sits still for the warm cloth and shudders like he’s breaking apart.

Max brings him another blanket.

Thad finds himself tucked into a heavy nest of blankets, leaning on Max’s shoulder on the couch. The lights are off. There’s a black-and-white show playing on the television, and he doesn’t remember anything since Max brought the blue blanket.

“Max?”

Max looks down at him, eyes wide and relieved. He reaches for the remote and turns down the volume of the television.

“Thad.”

Thad looks at Max, at himself—only a bump in the pile of blankets—and at the black-and-white show. On the screen, a woman is eating chocolate very fast.

“What…” Thad’s voice rasps.

“I love Lucy.”

Sure. Fine. Not important. Thad looks at Max, straining his neck to see the man’s face. Max’s eyes scrunch up a little. He looks happy, in his understated way.

Thad tells him, “Sorry. For… stuff.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Thad clenches his hands in his invisible lap.

“I lied to you.”

Max looks at him with careful calm.

“When?”

“I,” Thad says, and his voice wavers. He scowls. “I told you I was looking for the effects of lightning on the body. I wasn’t.”

“Okay,” Max says softly. “Do you want to tell me what you were looking for?”

“No. But I—I guess—you have a right to know.”

“I sure would appreciate it,” Max murmurs.

“What-it’s-like-to-love-someone.”

A pause.

“Oh, honey,” Max says, like his heart is breaking.

Thad’s shoulders rise up to his ears.

He whispers, “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Okay.”

A pause. Thad’s tense enough to bolt. But Max doesn’t move. He’s solid as stone, warm as CRAYDL. And he smells musky, woodsy, distinctly Max. Real Max, not scentless VR Max Mercury.

“Loving someone…” Max sighs. “It’s like a fire. It can be very slow to start. It can flare up and die down. It can be warm, and it can sometimes hurt. Some people have bonfires, some people have candles, some people have lanterns. But it’s the fire that keeps civilization alive. It’s a good thing.”

Oh.

In just a few words, Max has removed all the confusion. Could he do it again?

“Max…? Is it true, that… that… lightning… can… can cause…”

Mercifully, Max cuts him off.

“Yes. It can.”

Thad’s stomach hurts. He doesn’t have anything in him to throw up, though. Anyway, he feels too tired to throw up. He’s sore all over—muscle pains, severe depression—

Max murmurs, “You don’t have to go through with the operation. You really, really don’t have to.”

Thad shoves his face hard into Max’s shoulder and chokes down the urge to cry. Grife. If anyone had ever told him he didn’t have to do something before, this wouldn’t be so hard.

He does have to have the operation.

Thad will not be safe without it. And if Thad is a loose cannon, Joseph will not be safe with him, either. A lightning rod, it’s someone you trust; someone you love; someone, crucially, you would never, never hurt.

“Thad,” Max says, gently but firmly. “Talk to me.”

Thad chooses the best of his options.

“The… the lightning thing. It’s not about the… operation. Max, I changed. I changed. I’m not the same anymore.”

“Mm.”

“No, listen,” Thad pleads. “I’m not like I was before the speed force. I’m… slow, and weak, and depressed, and—mood swings that I can’t control! And… all of it… might be permanent…”

Max is silent for a while. Thad keeps his face buried in Max’s shoulder, breathing stuffily through his squashed nose.

Max stirs.

“That’s… the way of lightning, Thad… to change what it touches. It’s too powerful for one little mortal body. What lightning doesn’t take from the world, it changes forever.”

That shouldn’t be comforting. But Thad feels… less panicked… now.

Simply, Max adds, “Sometimes it hurts.”

“But… the depression,” Thad says. “The… the scientific nature of it, changing the brain… Max, aren’t I a different person now? After the speed force?”

After it killed me, he doesn’t say. I died; did I die there forever?

Max sighs.

“Scientifically? Maybe. But there’s more to life than science.”

Thad thinks of Max’s meditation. His ‘zen’. Religion: another thing that the Thawnes didn’t let him study.

Max says, “You are still yourself. You are yourself touched by lightning. That’s no shame.”

Thad turns so he can breathe easier. He lets that soak into him, listening absentmindedly to the quiet voices from the muted television.

“Even with the depression?” he asks.

“Even so.”

Maybe… maybe it is that simple.

“You scared me half to my grave,” Max murmurs.

Thad doesn’t respond. He’s too busy appreciating the warmth radiating from Max’s body, all trapped in this cocoon of blankets.

Max says, “Next time, if you can, talk to someone before you're sick on the carpet, hm?”

“I’ll try.”

For once, it’s not a lie.

[brown-little-robin]

37: Storm Front

part one | previous | next | masterlist | ao3 version

“You WHAT?!”

Morlo looms over Max, white mane bristling like a lion’s. Thad watches with great interest. It’s morbidly satisfying to see someone trying to intimidate Max.

“…have a plan,” repeats Max, “To give Thad… an artificial… lightning rod.”

“Get out.”

Max opens his mouth, and Morlo shouts, “GET OUT! I am a doctor, darn it, and I am going to talk to my patient ALONE!”

Max is gone in a streak of white.

Morlo clenches his fists, then unclenches them. He looks down at Thad, concern looking very strange on his great crooked-nosed face.

“You scared him off,” Thad says, intrigued. He’s never seen Max back down like that.

“Yeah, well, I oughtta do a lot more than that,” Morlo growls, bushy eyebrows coming down into a scowl again. “For the love of—well, anyway.”

The big man looks at Thad for a minute, frowning, then says: “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine.”

Morlo hesitates, wavering back and forth as if he’s deciding what direction to walk. Then he says, “Sit on the table. I want to talk to you.”

Thaddeus goes to the tall medical table and sits down. It’s easier to look Morlo in the face way up here with his feet dangling in empty space.

Morlo clasps his hands behind his back. He leans toward Thad, looking at him closely. His eyes are gray-blue, paler than Max’s, like a clouded sky.

Thad looks away.

“Inertia…”

Inertia’s eyes snap back to Morlo’s.

“Thad,” Morlo corrects himself. “Uh… kid. I really need you to work with me.”

Inertia licks his lips. He could kill Morlo right here and now. Mercury isn't here to stop him.

“Yes, sir.”

Morlo’s frown deepens.

“How… do you… feel… about this… lightning rod thing?”

“Fine.”

In his carefully softened growl, Morlo says, “I’m no psychologist, but I’m pretty sure that ‘fine’… never means fine.”

“So what?” Thaddeus looks away again. “It doesn’t matter how I feel. I need this.”

Morlo leans closer.

Thad stares determinedly at the refrigerator. His heart is beating fast.

“Stop avoiding the point. How. Do you. Feel.”

“Scared! Obviously! Stop looming and maybe I’d feel better!”

To Thad’s surprise, Morlo backs up immediately.

Thad stares at him.

“Sorry,” Morlo grunts.

Thaddeus doesn’t like this. He wants it to go back to normal, how Morlo treated him like an athlete, not a fragile child.

“Just run the tests!” he orders shrilly.

Morlo gets a glimmer in his eyes. “Fine. On condition.”

“What?” Thaddeus snaps, already knowing the answer.

“You have to tell the truth.”

Tell the truth. The price of Doctor Morlo’s essential medical information. Information and advice which could potentially be life-saving. Still, Thad hesitates.

“…Fine.”

“You promise?” Morlo presses.

“Fine. I promise.”

His belly experiences a sinking feeling. He wraps his legs around each other and swings them tensely.

Clearly trying his best to be gentle, Morlo asks, “How do you feel? About this lightning rod thing?”

Thad takes a breath, feeling sick.

“Not… great.”

Morlo nods. “Good. Good job.”

Thad can feel his cheeks heating up. His throat hurts.

“But I need it,” he says, his voice coming out strangled.

“Why?”

“I—” surely a fellow ex-enemy will understand? “I’m-gonna-hurt-him. Joseph. If I’m not connected to him.”

“How do you know?”

“I just know!” And then he flinches, remembering his promise to be honest. “I tried. To hurt him. I almost hurt him. I don’t remember.”

Morlo frowns. “Come again?”

“I don’t know,” Thad snaps. His whole body is stiff. “I. I blacked out or something. And then I was about to hurt him.”

“How?”

“I had his shirt,” Thad confesses, and holds out his hands. “I was gonna—I dunno. Drag him through a wall or something.”

He blinks, and the sight of his pale hands abruptly makes him sick. He grabs the stiff material of his pants, squeezes so tight his wrists hurt.

Morlo is watching him, thinking about it, Thad guesses. Thad clenches his jaw and pulls his entwined legs up until his heel touches the bottom of the bed.

Morlo says, “If you’re attacking people, seems like staying with Max a little longer would—”

A skitter of electricity down his spine. “I can’t! I’ll die!”

Immediately, angrily, Morlo asks, “Is he hurting you?”

A single incredulous laugh tears out of Thad’s throat.

“Max? Hurting me? No. No no no. I just can’t live with him. I mean—I tried to kill him! I was created to kill him!”

Thad puts his face in his hands, abruptly overwhelmed. He was created to kill Max. Why is he living in his house?

“Yeah.” Doctor Morlo clears his throat loudly. “Have you ever thought he maybe forgave you for that?”

Thad doesn’t answer.

He never even apologized. But… but clearly Max has forgiven him. Holds no ill-will towards him. Max welcomed him into his home.

But Thaddeus is still a killer. Inertia or not.

“I can’t… keep… doing this. I don’t want to live like this.”

“Like what?”

“Wondering if I’m going to hurt someone.”

Morlo sounds very, very tired when he says, “Lightning rod’s not gonna fix that.”

Thad looks at him, teeth bared in a pleading kind of snarl.

“It has to!”

Morlo shakes his head. “Kid… it might make you more stable. I know you’ll feel safer when you can get back from the speed force if, and don’t do this, you ever get lost there again. But worrying you’re going to hurt someone… trust me. That one doesn’t get fixed by magic.”

Thad can’t. He can’t deal with any more bad news.

“Run the tests,” he orders.

Doctor Morlo huffs.

“You ever think before you order people around? There are no tests. This artificial lightning rod thing has never been done before.”

Thad gapes.

“You made me tell the truth for this?”

“Yes,” Morlo growls. “Because I need to know about you. I’m your doctor. I need to know if you’re serious about this. Do you really want this operation, or is Mercury pressuring you?”

“He’s not. He keeps telling me I should reconsider, but I—I don’t care what you say; I won’t be safe until I have it. I want it.”

Morlo frowns at him.

“You could get hurt.”

Thad looks at him flatly.

Morlo groans. “If—if!—Max says yes, you can try. But you have to have a back-up magician with you in case it goes wrong. And me. And every speedster on the planet has to be there too.”

Morlo doesn’t look like he’s kidding.

“That’s excessive!”

“What do you know about the speed force?” Morlo demands. “Listen, boy. Speedsters are the speed force. If something goes wrong, it’s very possible that all of your kind, working together, could fix it. Do you want to gamble your life on the possibility that nothing will go wrong when you try to influence the force that creates the possibility of change in the universe? Do you really want to meddle with that force with no backup plan?”

Thad is silent.

He died in the speed force. He knows how dangerous it is. He just… feels like he’d rather risk dying again than have Wally West and Bart Allen looking at him while he’s vulnerable.

Morlo lets out a huge gust of air. Thad twitches.

Morlo tells him, “You have to keep safe. I don’t care how scared or guilty you are. Stay safe.”

Thaddeus snarls silently. Morlo can’t tell him what risks not to take! He’s Thad’s doctor, but he’s not in charge of Thad’s life.

Morlo comes closer, frowning at Thad.

“I care about you.”

Thad flinches.

Morlo’s expression does something Thad doesn’t understand.

“I do,” he insists. “Thad. For my sake. Be safe.”

Thad snorts, recovering his composure.

“Like you wouldn’t be glad to be rid of me, ‘Doctor’,” he teases.

But Morlo’s eyebrows come together in a deep frown.

“Don’t you dare,” the man growls. “You can joke around with me, but do not say that. Suicide is not a joke.”

“Who said anything about suicide?” Thad asks, startled.

“Death jokes,” Morlo growls. “Don’t make them. You’re not replaceable.”

And Thad—

Thad doesn’t know what to do with that.

Morlo called him irreplaceable, meaning… if he dies in this operation, Morlo will want him back?

“Fine,” Thad says, far too shaky. “I—you can call Bart. I’ll be safe.”

“Good,” Morlo says, and it isn't praise; it’s sheer relief. “Good.”

[brown-little-robin]

In the first part of Strange Redemption you mentioned one clone was executed by his own CRADYL unit. Which clone was that? Or is this a spoiler?

I am also curious about what happened when Max met a dying Eight.

Hello reader!! <3

*vibrating with excitement* okay okay okay I'm so glad you asked! So, it's not a spoiler to tell you about that one, because the clone who was executed by his CRAYDL unit is not one of the named clones in the fic. :( There's a certain amount of tragedy that is woven into the Strange Redemption timeline.

What happened when Max met a dying Eight? Well, the bare-bones outline, as you've no doubt read in the fic, is:

(spoilers!)

“the clone that no one else knows about... stalked Max for a while before dying of lung failure. His CRAYDL brought him to Max, but it was too late; Max couldn’t save him. Even Morlo couldn’t save him. His lungs simply stopped processing the air. After he died, the CRAYDL self-destructed, leaving a surprisingly small puddle of green goo next to the body.

Max gave the boy a hand to hold and a decent burial. He never found him in the speed force, but then again, he never looked.”

What happened when Max met Eight was... well... an anticlimax. Max knew there was an Inertia stalking him for weeks before Eight approached him. Max had seen flashes of green and felt a speedster near him through the speed force. He just wasn't sure why this particular kid was here in person, following him, rather than watching with his future-tech and attacking out of nowhere like the others had. Max could have tried to catch Eight, but he suspected that Eight was thinking of defecting.

(Eight had no loyalty to the Thawnes, but he couldn't defect or they'd have terminated his CRAYDL unit. But! He knew he was dying, so he got permission from the Thawnes to "psychologically torment" Max by stalking him, and then just... delayed his mission forever, planning to die quietly and let his CRAYDL escape. That way, Eight could manage to do no harm.)

But then there came the day when Eight actually started to die, and his CRAYDL overrode Eight's orders. It physically carried him to Max for help. That was how Max met Eight—a preteen boy struggling for breath, held in the tendrils of a massive and terrified glob of neon green technoplasm.

CRAYDL explained what was happening. Eight could barely manage to inhale without triggering a coughing fit or hyperventilating, let alone speak, and he needed all the air he could get—his lungs were losing their capacity to process oxygen. Therefore, he couldn't speak. Which was why CRAYDL was able to disobey orders to bring him to Max! Eight couldn't say no. An artifical intelligence exploiting loopholes, how funny. ha ha ha.

Anyway, Max brought the clone-and-CRAYDL pair to Doctor Morlo, but they couldn't do anything for Eight. His oxygen was dropping too fast. Doctor Morlo informed Max and CRAYDL. Eight, lying in Morlo's dentist-chair, didn't really react to the news—he knew.

Max pulled up a stool beside Eight and sat down with him. He took Eight's hand. The quivering blob that was CRAYDL behind him reached out a smooth tendril and took Eight's other hand. Eight squeezed hard. Eight couldn't speak, and Max only spoke to apologize to him, quietly, when Eight started crying. To assure him it wouldn't be long.

Max held Eight's hand while he died. What more is there to say?

[brown-little-robin]

[Image Description: two brawny arms, labeled “Doctor Morlo” and “Thad Thawne”, meeting in an epic handshake labeled “Being reformed by association with Max Mercury”.]

[brown-little-robin]

9: That Was Abuse

part one | previous | next | ao3

The day after the storm, Wally drops off a black file containing a list of options and questions from Batman. Max skims it, then calls Thaddeus to the kitchen.

Thad reads the list, puts it back on the table, and rests his chin on his arms.

“We need to decide on your legal name.”

“Why not just Thaddeus Thawne?”

“That might draw unwanted attention,” Max says. “Safer not to have that on any legal papers.”

“Mm.”

“You could keep Thaddeus, especially if we make it your legal middle name,” Max suggests.

Thad shrugs.

Strange. Max expected him to be passionate about his name. He seems… lost.

“Thad,” he says. “The choice is yours, but I want you to know that I would be honored if you took Crandall as your surname.”

Thad stares at him.

At last, he says, “I… I don’t… I can’t do this today… Sorry.”

And he gets up and trudges back to his room and lays back down.

Max struggles not to be hurt. Thad is depressed. His whole life is changing around him. Let him have the dignity of putting off his decisions for a day. What did he expect? For Thad to jump up and down in excitement at being offered Max’s last name?

But the hurt does fade when Max sees Thad struggling. Max has to order him to eat lunch, leftovers of the cinnamon rolls that he enjoyed so much yesterday. After lunch, Max cleans out Thad’s closet, putting Bart’s old clothes in boxes under his bed. A while later, he finds Thad standing in front of his closet with a shirt hanging from his hand and a thousand-yard stare. It takes him two hours to put away half of his clothes.

Max and Helen exchange concerned looks at dinner. Thad eats his garlic bread joylessly, mechanically. He’s barely touched the speed force all day.

After dinner, Helen invites Thad to watch a movie with her. Max feels a little left out, today, but he doesn't object. Helen and Thad should have some bonding time. He lingers in the kitchen, observing, as they pick out their movie. Thad doesn't give any preferences except “nothing superhero-related” and “nothing serious”. Helen offers Thad a choice between Star Trek and Planet Earth; they settle on Star Trek. Helen gets the movie set up, spreads a blanket over the couch, and sits in the middle, giving Thad the corner spot he prefers. He pushes the blanket towards Helen and sits carefully in the clear space. Helen says “No no no. We’re watching a movie; we have to cuddle under a blanket.” And Thad smiles, tired but genuine, and gets under the blanket and leans on Helen’s shoulder.

Max swallows his jealousy at their easy intimacy and goes to commune with the speed force. Johnny Quick laughs at him, sensing his wounded pride. Barry Allen says wistfully, at least he talks to you. All seven years, whenever I tried to approach him, he ran away.

Next morning, Max tempts Thad awake with a promise of fresh butter-pecan cookies with breakfast. Thad grumbles wordlessly, but gets up and follows Max to the kitchen, rubbing his eyes. He’s still in his pajamas, the blue ones covered in silhouettes of cats. He seems completely unselfconscious about them. Does he not know that cat pajamas are considered childish, or does he not care? Max hopes it’s the latter.

Thad eats dutifully, then just… sits at the table, staring at the wall. Looks like it’s another tired day. Max is washing the cookie sheet when he hears Thad’s rough voice behind him.

“Good cookies.”

“Why thank you,” Max says, touched. Has Thad ever complimented him before? Max thinks not.

He turns to the table. Thad is still staring at the wall.

“What sort of backstory would you like for the paperwork?”

“Doesn't matter.”

“It’ll be easier to maintain your secret identity if you have a story that’s easy to remember,” Max coaxes. “We can incorporate some truth into it, you know.”

“Mm.”

“For example, we could say your studies were largely self-directed.”

Thad shrugs.

Max says, “Thad, pay attention for a minute.”

Thad looks at him. There’s no life in his eyes.

“You’ve been so passionate about making a new start… I’m worried about you. What’s making you reluctant to work on this?”

Thad doesn't answer.

“Are you… afraid of something?”

“…no. It’s just not worth it.”

“Not worth it?” Max repeats, puzzled but listening.

“I… I think I’m… decaying.”

Is this future slang? An Interlac word that doesn't translate well?

“Decaying?”

“I’m a clone, Max,” Thad snaps, with something of his old fire. “It happens. I think… something’s wrong with my brain.”

Oh. Decay as in genetic deterioration.

Max thinks of the poor misshapen Kryptonian clones, of the Inertia who died choking on his own lungs. He never told Bart about that one, just gave the child a proper burial out in the desert.

This can’t be happening.

Max phones Helen, makes Thad explain all his symptoms. Max gets more alarmed with each one: the loss of control of his powers two days ago, exhaustion, feeling cold all the time, and most alarmingly, spacing out for significant periods of time and having no memory of what happened. Helen shouts “FAMILY EMERGENCY, CANCEL EVERYTHING, hang on, Max, tell Thad I’ll be right there,” and hangs up. Max barely knows what he’s doing; he says, “Helen’s coming. We’re taking you to a doctor.” Thad, looking startled, answers, “What doctor? The Watchtower again? You know they don’t have real doctors, just magic people, right?” Max says, “A real doctor.” Thad says, “What—how? I don’t have paperwork! And anyway, it’s not like flawed genetics is curable.” Max says, “Doctor Morlo. He’s a genius with biology. If there’s even a chance—” and can’t finish. Helen arrives a few minutes later and they set out for Morlo’s house in Hanover. She’s speeding. Max doesn't say anything about it. It’ll still take about an hour by car.

Thad stares out the window, dry-eyed. He hasn’t cried since leaving the speed force. Max would have sensed the unmistakable motion of a heaving torso.

“How are you doing?” Max asks gently.

Thad snorts. “Apart from dying?”

“We don’t know that,” Max says.

“It’s a distinct possibility,” Thad retorts. “I’m not an idiot.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

Thad scoffs, turns back to the window.

Helen says, “You’re going to go to college.”

Thad’s nonchalant expression cracks.

They drive in silence for a while. Max is unable to promise what he doesn't know. He’s seen too many tragedies for that.

“I love you so much,” Helen says, and her voice cracks. “If I could… If I could take this disease… or whatever it is, for you, I would. I’d—”

She sniffs. The car wobbles a little.

“I’d die for you.”

Thad says, “Don’t do that. That’s the worst trade I’ve ever heard of.”

Helen says, “Well, you’re not allowed to die, so there. My house, my rules.”

Thad laughs. He sounds slightly hysterical.

Doctor Morlo greets Max at the door and raises his bushy eyebrows at Thad.

“Got empty-nest syndrome, Mercury?” he asks.

Max explains Thad’s presence succinctly, barely conscious of what he’s saying. He says, “We think he might be genetically deteriorating.”

Morlo says, “Tell me everything.”

Max explains the symptoms and apologizes for asking Morlo to do something so out of his area.

“I know quite a bit about clone biology, actually,” Morlo says, and doesn't explain any further, which is probably for the best. He leads them down to the lab. The lab’s better-stocked all the time now that his Doctor Morlo Fan Club is funding his research; Thad looks around, silent.

Max takes Helen’s hand. She gives it a squeeze.

Morlo brusquely gestures Thad into the center of the room and tells him to take off his shirt so he can examine his body for signs of deterioration like bloating, cracking skin, or bruises. Thad obeys. He looks healthy as far as Max can tell. But is he slightly thinner, his ribs more pronounced, muscles more wiry? Max can’t tell if he’s imagining it; Impulse and Inertia were always built lean, even for speedsters.

Doctor Morlo takes Thad’s arm in his hands; the boy tenses up, and his pupils grow so wide the brilliant yellow is just a thin ring.

Max hates the Thawnes a little more every day. What a senseless waste, to treat Thad as a weapon, leaving him so starved for affection that a single touch undoes him.

Morlo inspects Thad’s hand closely. “Your hands seem fine,” he says. “Deteriorating clones sometimes get cracked fingernails and swollen knuckles. Any vomiting or diarrhea?” No. “Nausea?” A little. “Joint pain?” No. “Aching in your whole body?” …yes. “Hallucinations or delusions?” No. “Other discomfort?” …sometimes the light feels too bright.

“Put your shirt back on. Roll up your sleeve and go put your arm in the restraints on the bed.”

Thad snaps, “Don’t treat me like a prisoner. I’m not Inertia anymore.”

Morlo growls, “You have no idea how I treat prisoners. Luckily for you, I am treating you like a speedster. I need to take your blood and I don’t want you vibrating away from the needle.”

“I’m not Impulse,” Thad says indignantly.

Morlo says, “I’m aware, m’boy, but speedsters flinch fast. This equipment will match your vibrations long enough for you to realize you’re vibrating and stop before you get blood on my floor.”

Thad huffs, sits on the bed, and straps his arm into the restraints on the armrest; Morlo checks the bindings and tightens them a bit, then swings two metal arms up to grasp Thad’s arm just below the elbow and just above the wrist. Thad’s eyes flick back and forth from the restraints to Morlo; he’s pulling subtly at both the restraints and the speed force, not fully speeding up but giving himself an edge. It’s a casually impressive display of his precise control of his powers; most speedsters only go normal speed or fast.

Morlo turns away, grabbing a syringe and needle. Thad takes a deep breath, slows down, and asks, “What’re the biological differences between speedsters and normal humans?”

Morlo looks surprised, but explains with good grace that the main differences are the heat-shield aura, electricity tolerance, and hypermetabolism. The information blurs. Max is focusing on watching Thad, feeling the stutter of his heartbeat as the needle slides into his arm. His attention keeps morbidly fixating on Thad’s heartbeat.

Thad says, “What about hyper-acceleration?”

“Ah,” Morlo says, “That’s an interesting one. Hyper-acceleration, where the body ages quickly, is an unusual secondary effect…” Max stops paying attention to the words until Thad says, “My original was hyper-accelerated until Wally West fixed him. I’m hyper-decelerated. I age slowly.”

“You’re still hyper-decelerated?” Morlo asks.

“Yes. The Thawnes considered my long lifespan an asset.”

“Well, if you ever want to change that, you know where to find me.”

“Morlo!” Max snaps. For heaven’s sake! The man has no tact!

Thad laughs at him.

Morlo removes the needle, unstraps Thad and opens his refrigerator, a bright green box festooned with tubes. He tosses a small box over his shoulder, and Thad catches it; it’s apple juice. Morlo separates the little tube of blood into three parts and sets his machines working on them.

Morlo tells Thad to run. Thad refuses. Morlo says, I have to test your powers. Thad says, test ‘em without me running. Morlo tells Thad to vibrate a metal plate instead, which seems to work.

The machines start beeping. Morlo flips through the bloodwork results.

He looks up.

Max squeezes Helen’s hand. She leans on him.

Doctor Morlo says to Thad, “You’re not decaying. Come back in a week and I’ll test you again, but I expect the same results.”

He isn’t dying?

Morlo says, “Speak with me alone, Mercury.”

Max follows Morlo up to his living room.

Morlo says, “This is trauma response, not genetic disease. All this emotion stuff is way out of my area… You know this means he feels safe with you, though, right, old friend? You seem to have a way with retired villains.”

Max shrugs.

“So do you, apparently. I’ve never seen him warm up to someone so fast.”

Morlo says, “I’m not scared of him and he knows it.”

“True. So post-traumatic stress can cause this? All of it, even the spacing out?”

“Six hundred years’ worth? Probably.”

“Ah.”

It hits Max suddenly that Thad is going to live. He’s going to live and grow and go to college and eat pecan desserts and watch Star Trek with Helen and Max is lucky enough to get to see it.

“Buck up, Mercury,” Morlo says gruffly. “He’ll be fine. Come on.”

“Thank you, old friend,” Max says dryly.

They go back to the lab.

“You’re not decaying,” Morlo restates bluntly. “Your genetics are fine. Your body is processing the effects of long-term trauma. You might have Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder or depression, but that’s not my area of science.”

Thad says, “PTSD? But I’m not traumatized.”

Every time Max thinks he understands Thad, he’s blindsided by something like this.

Morlo says, “Your training alone must have been traumatic child abuse, let alone the mission you were brainwashed into.”

“But…” Thad says, frowning. “The training was different… that was for a mission, I had to prepare… and I wasn’t a child, I’m over six hundred years old… I was the one doing everything, me and CRAYDL… I hardly ever even saw Thaddeus Thawne the First…”

He shakes his head hard, sending his hair whipping around his face.

He says, “Abuse?”

“They may never have hit you, but they still deprived you of a healthy childhood,” Max says. “That’s child abuse.”

Thad’s eyes are wide.

Dear old Morlo. He allows Thad a moment to recover by monologuing. “As far as I understand—and note that I’m not by any definition a feelings doctor—when a person is being abused, their bodies protect them from it. To cope with stress, like an injury, human bodies enter a ‘survival mode’ where they’re functioning well. They might even develop heightened senses or other physical advantages. But functioning under stress forces the body to use up its reserves, functioning at more than full capacity. This can be resolved in two ways: either burning out or processing the trauma and recovering from it. Once a person gets to a safe place, their body will allow themselves to experience the burn-out in order to recover. It’s like how adrenaline delays the pain response.”

Thad’s still staring at nothing. Max gestures continue at Morlo. Morlo makes a face at him, but continues.

“So… Your body now senses that it’s safe to rest and recover… It’s allocating most of your energy to recovery, which is why you’re tired and cold. I’d guess your mind is resting by entering ‘sleep mode’ even while you’re awake, leading to your ‘missing time’. You’re processing emotional trauma, so you’re emotionally exhausted… you’re too keyed-up to control your instincts, thus your heightened fight-or-flight responses.”

Thad says, “They abused me?”

He stands up and starts to pace around the lab.

“I read about PTSD and child abuse in the Psychology 101 textbook. I have enough symptoms to be diagnosable. The Thawnes abused me! Max, they abused me!”

“They did,” Max says.

“I hate them!”

“You have every right to.”

Thad’s lips pull back from his teeth. He seems not to notice crushing the empty apple juice box in his fist. He’s pacing the room with quick angry strides.

“They stole my childhood!”

“Yes.”

“I HATE them! I hate them, I hate them, I hate them, I want to rip their hearts out, I want to wring their necks, I want to beat them to death with their own STUPID VR GOGGLES! I’LL IMPALE THEIR KIDNEYS ON THEIR HOLOCRON ANTENNAE! I’LL FILL THEIR LUNGS WITH TECHNOPLASM AND WATCH THEM CHOKE! I’LL SEE HOW THEY LIKE BEING HIT BY LIGHTNING!”

Helen squeezes Max’s hand urgently. Ah—she’s never seen Thad like this before, worked up to the point of violent, screaming rage. It is… alarming, but despite all his noise, he’s not even touching the speed force.

“It’s okay,” Max murmurs, squeezing back. “He’s just getting it out of his system.”

“A bit more of a challenge than Impulse, is he?” Morlo asks dryly.

“Not really. Just different.”

A growl echoes around the lab.

The inhuman sound of it startles Max; it sounds like a tiger. But Max feels Thad’s connection to the speed force, and he’s not fooled. Thad is actually slowing himself down to achieve that rolling pulse, pulling himself in and out of real time in a precise rhythm. He’s play-acting, expressing his emotion in a non-destructive way.

But Helen is uncomfortable. It’s time to talk him down.

“Enough,” he orders.

The growl cuts off abruptly. Thad looks at Max, panting, eyes wide. He looks insane. He looks completely, gloriously alive.

“Do you really want to take revenge?”

“No. You know that.”

“Helen doesn't,” Max points out.

Thad looks at Helen and winces.

“Sorry. I don’t… I was just…”

“I forgive you,” Helen says. “I hate the Thawnes, too.”

Thad falls silent, paces in a tight circle around the bed and then a wide loop around the edges of the lab. His arms are wrapped around his torso, his fingers digging into his sides; he’s shivering. Max is willing to bet that Thad will fall asleep on the way home.

Thad’s face screws up like he’s in pain.

“This won’t last forever, Thad,” Max tells him. “The sadness… the tiredness… the hate… it’s okay to feel them. Those feelings get better in time. I know. I’ve felt it.”

“It gets better?” Thad asks, like he can’t quite believe it.

“Yes,” Max says firmly.

“So… I might still be able to go to college?”

“If I have anything to say about it, yes.”

Helen says, “What are we waiting for, then? Let’s go fill out the paperwork!”

Thad says, “I think… we’re gonna have to wait on that…”

“Why?”

“I’m gonna fall asleep as soon as I stop walking,” he says, and gives a shaky little laugh.

“Eat something first. You don’t want to burn more energy than you replace.”

Morlo orders Thad to sit down and gives him a large handful of granola bars. True to his word, Thad dozes off halfway through the fourth one. Max picks him up carefully, strokes his soft hair, presses a kiss to the side of his head. Finally, finally, Max’s heart starts to calm down.

“My word, what a scare,” he says.

[brown-little-robin]

25: Predator and Prey

part one | previous | next | masterlist | ao3

Thad’s choking.

He wakes up retching, dragging in hacking gasps of air like he’s expelling the nutrient womb liquid from his lungs. There’s no liquid, but he can’t stop coughing.

Max is going to come to check on him! Thad holds his breath as best as he can until his body stops heaving.

There’s a sour taste in his mouth. He wipes his mouth uselessly, as if he’d really just coughed up nutrient liquid, and sits up. Ow. He’s sore all over.

What was that?

He's in the loft bed. Sunlight is streaming through the window. Did he not close the curtains yesterday?

Oh.

No, he did not close the curtains yesterday, because Max carried him to bed yesterday, because he fell asleep watching Star Trek with Helen.

He spent a day without Max. Holy grife. The Flash gave him permission to spend a day without Max and he broke down and cried on Helen, breaking his two-week streak of self-control. He acted like a complete child.

He got too close to Helen. He let his yearning for comfort endanger his future. They’ll never let him go if they start thinking of him as—

She called him baby.

Thad’s breathing hard. His sympathetic nervous system is responding to a perceived threat. He is under threat, but this isn’t helping. He needs to calm his body.

He closes his eyes, inhales slowly: one, two, three, four, five, six…

He breathes past the count of four that the typical grounding breath exercise suggests. His lungs have greater capacity than a typical human’s. It would be too fast to count just to four.

He holds his breath, one, two, three, four, five, six…

Doctor Morlo said breathing the liquid of the nutrient womb for upwards of eighty percent of his life—with infancy spent 99% submerged, only removed from the womb to make sure he was capable of breathing air—improved his lung and chest strength. Thad liked that. He enjoys it when Morlo appreciates the perfection of his body. He preens under Morlo’s gruff admiration of the genius engineering of his cloning and training. Thad is an athlete. Morlo understands that.

He exhales, one, two, three, four, five, six…

It’s shaky. The exhale is always shaky on the first repetition. Thad can be patient. Thaddeus is good at being patient. Good at waiting and repeating until things come smoothly. Until it looks like he’s been good at them all along.

He inhales, one, two, three, four, five, six…

He was Inertia, but he thought of himself as momentum… the inexorable crescendo, the building of speed. He was an avalanche, gathering force until he became unstoppable destruction thundering down upon the Allens.

He holds his breath, one, two, three, four, five, six…

His destructiveness was written in his very genetics. He’s a crossbreed. Bart is too, but Bart was born from a truce, a marriage. Thad was created out of conflict. He’s half predator, half prey.

He’s more Thawne than Allen. His blond hair and the sharp, instinctive cruelty in his tongue attest to that. But there is Allen in him too. Maybe that’s what gives him the void in his chest. Not enough Allen to fully love someone, but enough to crave love.

He exhales, one two three four, and realizes he’s counting too fast. He lets go of his breath for a minute, panting.

Choosing his soft side is like lying down, exposing his belly, and baring his throat, every single day. It’s wearing him down. Given nothing to destroy, will he consume himself? He isn’t consciously self-destructive, but he keeps messing up, and his body and mind seem to deteriorate every day.

He inhales slowly. One, two, three, four, five, six…

He’s not a Thawne or an Allen, he tells himself. He’s his own person. He’s free.

In the bathroom, he looks up from washing his hands and sees Bart Allen’s face in the mirror.

Shortly before lunch, he slices his finger open. He was trying to cut an apple.

He stares at the blood. He can feel his heartbeat throbbing in the gash. A split second later, it’s healed.

He feels like he's floating.

Helen asks “Are you all right?”

Thad sucks the blood from his finger and says “I’m fine.”

But horror shivers in his belly, and he can feel himself drawing back from himself. He doesn't mind. It’s going to be a weird body day, he can tell from the way the sight of his hands keeps throwing him off-balance. And he keeps tasting blood. Today will be a good day to be distant.

During lunch, Max asks him how he would feel about having Wally West over for dinner.

Thad blinks at him, brain trying to catch up.

Helen says carefully, “I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

Helen is treating him like something fragile.

Max transfers his attention to Helen. They exchange looks. Now they’re excluding him from the conversation!

Thad speaks. He feels like he’s thinking through a thick layer of technoplasm, but his words come out clear. Good. He’d hate to slur his speech.

“It’s fine. Have him over.”

Max looks at him worriedly.

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

Thad leaves it at that, too distant to bother thinking of an explanation. To his mild surprise, Max just asks, “Is today all right with you, or would you rather save it for later?”

“Today is fine.”

He doesn't want to wait.

Maybe he’s been undermining himself… arguing so sharply with Max. Maybe it’s actually a better strategy to state his wants simply. Max has a real affection for him; Thad finds it within the realm of possibility that Max wants to let Thad make decisions.

While doing chores, Thad tests the theory. It takes him till midway through sweeping the kitchen to gather the impetus to speak.

“Max?” he asks, still working.

Max stops wiping the table. “Yes, Thad?”

“Can we not go anywhere today?”

“Sure,” Max says. “Ah… any particular reason?”

Thad considers it. Swish, swish, goes the broom, distracting him for a minute with the sound and motion of the frayed bristles, the tender ache of his sore body forced to move.

“I’m dissociating.”

Not that he hasn’t gone out with Max while dissociating before… he’s probably dissociating a bit most of the time, actually. But he’s curious what Max will say.

Max comes and kneels in Thad’s line of sight, blocking his path. Thad pauses.

“Are you feeling okay?” Max asks. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

Oh, that’s… that’s really nice of him.

Thad sets the broom upright, thinking. Max can’t ground him; Thad hasn’t talked to him about grounding techniques. And Thad doesn't want to stop dissociating anyway. Not… yet.

“I’m fine. But… you could notify me an hour before West gets here.”

“I’ll do that.”

Max stands, and Thad waits for him to get out of the way, but he steps closer, leans down, and tenderly brushes Thad’s hair back from his face. He kisses Thad on the forehead.

Thad feels Max’s lips tingling on his forehead for a long time.

The afternoon passes in an uncomfortable haze. Thad is not dissociated enough, or he’s too dissociated; he doesn't know, and he finds that he doesn't have as much control of it as he thought he did. He tries to relax under his desk, but nothing there can hold his interest.

He goes and puts away his clean laundry. Usually, he enjoys the repetitive, simple task, but today all he can think of is the incongruity of it: Thaddeus Thawne’s hands folding socks. Thaddeus Thawne’s hands hanging up a shirt. The soreness from waking up is gone thanks to his hypermetabolism, but the coarse shirt collar rubs on the back of his neck. The pants brush his legs every time he moves. He craves… sleekness… something that would cling.

He craves the skin-tight Inertia suit.

No. No. No.

He puts away all of his laundry. He is nothing if not persistent. Then he goes and showers, hoping to wash away the crawling-out-of-his-skin feeling.

Being naked feels better. Familiar.

Thad stands in the shower and breathes. Under the rhythmic drumming of the water, breathing the warm steam, he feels his heart finally begin to slow down.

And then he looks down at his hands and is hit by such a wave of wrongness that he instinctively clenches them into fists.

For a desperate moment, he considers telling Max to call off the dinner with West. But how could he explain that? Sorry, Max, I think I’m slipping back into being Inertia. Sorry, Max, I think if Wally West comes over I might have a mental breakdown. Sorry, Max, my Thawne side is fighting my Allen side and I think the Thawne is winning. And giving no explanation would just make Max worried and suspicious. It’s not a casual thing: Hey, Max, tell West NOT to come for dinner. I know I said I was fine with it, but I’m not. No reason!

He can’t tell Max. He’d decide Thad is an unstable child, someone to gently remove decisions from. Or a Thawne, too destructive to be trusted. Either way, his chance of having an independent life would be gone.

He has to hold himself together through the dinner.

Abruptly, Thad turns the water cold. He hisses at the shock. It does what he wanted it to, though: snaps him into alertness.

He dresses in the black on black of his most formal attire. He buttons the shirt up to his throat and looks at himself in the mirror.

He looks…

The words that come to mind are ‘ghost’ and ‘widow’. Black for mourning. The darkness makes his pale flesh shocking, the blond of his hair ghostly bright. The bags under his eyes stand out. But the severe formality gives him dignity.

Good. He’ll need the strength of his anguish for CRAYDL. If he couldn’t love CRAYDL enough to save it, at least he grieves it fiercely enough to seize what CRAYDL wanted for him… life.

He waits in his room, and soon enough he hears the muffled greetings. The Flash is here.

He listens, but he doesn't hear the chipper voice of cousin Irey. Only the voices of the Flash and his wife.

Thad opens his door and walks to the entryway.

“Thad,” the Flash greets him, letting go of Max’s hand. Linda Park is standing next to him. No children.

“West,” he answers calmly. “You didn’t bring your children?”

“No, they’re having a sleepover with the Garricks tonight,” West answers.

Thad looks into his eyes and sees… removal. Not defensiveness, but something more infuriating… something cold… the way Wally West looks at a person he’s not sure is truly his ally. Thad has seen this look in recordings.

Oh, sure, what a coincidence, Thaddeus doesn't say. Sending your children to be with the only people who could protect them from me.

Instead, he shrugs.

“I like Irey,” he says with mild disappointment. “Maybe next time.”

West smiles. Ah. That was correct.

Max herds them into the kitchen, sets Thad the task of setting the table, and starts a conversation. Thad concentrates on setting the table efficiently and obediently. They’re having pot pie and fruit salad.

He watches everyone with the intent focus he used to watch the styroband recordings of Bart with. He notes that Linda Park asks excellent questions, that Max is more talkative with the Park-West family than he is with the Garricks. Helen is a bit quieter.

He catches Wally West staring at him when he turns around to climb off the counter with the cups. The man looks away quickly.

Thad waits for the inevitable.

They get through about half of their meal discussing inconsequential things: Linda Park’s recent news stories, Max’s collaboration with the Barnett Zoo, Helen’s yoga club, how Wally West’s kids are doing. Thad notes the details about his cousins carefully. He’ll never be friendly with Wally West, but… maybe… his children could come to think of Thad as… family.

Irey likes to dance. Irey is more extroverted than Jai; they do about equally well in school. Jai likes to eat peanut butter off of spoons. Jai likes turtles, Irey prefers dinosaurs.

Max offers, “Thad has been interested in marine biology recently.”

Linda Park turns to Thad, smiles, and says, “Really? What kind of marine biology?”

“I like seals and penguins,” Thad says. “Cold-water surface predators, mostly.”

“Ah, I remember you told us about penguins,” Linda says.

Thad nods and does not elaborate.

After a moment, Max starts telling them about how they’ve been going to the library.

This whole situation is infuriating. Everyone is talking around him, watching him, watching each other’s reactions to him, and pretending that everything is normal. It’s an inspection, this dinner, Max trying to convince the West-Parks that Thad is a good clone now, and the West-Parks watching him for signs of danger. It’s like Max is putting a trained animal through its paces: look how he sets the table! Isn’t he well-trained? He even goes to the library with me like a real boy!

Thad quells the urge to growl when Helen laughs artificially, telling Wally West and Linda Park that they’ve been watching a lot of Star Trek. That’s special. At least—Thad thought it was.

And then he sees her fingers tighten on her fork when Linda laughs with her, and he realizes that Helen is just afraid. Like him.

And then Max broaches the subject of Thad’s paperwork.

“He’s got a new name now and everything,” Max says. “He’ll officially be my adopted son within a few days.”

“That’s great!” Linda Park says.

Wally West looks at Thad, and Thad tries to smooth his face out of the pained expression it went into when he heard Max say it. Why? Why taunt him with the false legality? Logically, he knows it’s a calculated move to inform West that Max thinks of Thad as a child under his care. But it still hurts.

“What’s your new name?” Wally West asks.

He doesn't know? Thad respects Max’s commitment to his privacy, but he wishes Max had just told West. It’s a vulnerable thing, giving someone his name, and he’s not prepared.

“Sophos Thaddeus Anacletus Free,” Thad says as firmly as he can.

West looks surprised.

He was expecting ‘Crandall’. Thad has undercut Max’s strategy. This is what comes of a lack of preparation.

Thad explains, “I’m not going to be anyone’s weapon anymore. Thus ‘Free’.”

West sets down his fork.

“Thad,” he says.

Thad meets his green eyes despite the thrill of fear it sends through him. Maybe, at last, something real will be said.

West says, “I know everything is all pretty new and strange for you. But we’re all really glad you’re making all these good decisions.”

Something about that infuriates Thad. He laughs coldly.

“Good decisions? Oh, please. If I hadn’t happened to live with Helen and Max seven years ago, I’d still be trying to kill you.”

“Thad!” Max says. He looks horrified.

“What?” Thad asks. “It’s true.”

But his stomach turns uneasily. He looks around. Helen has her hands to her mouth; Linda Park is looking at him with her eyebrows raised; and Wally West—

The Flash is frowning resignedly. Like he’s thinking yes, I knew all along: Inertia can’t change.

Thad is sick of this. Sick of being a good little prey animal, sick of this artificial small talk, sick of pretending he’s a normal child when everyone knows what he really is: a deadly weapon. If this charade goes on, they’re going to blame him when he inevitably makes a mistake and breaks the illusion. Better to force them to face the truth while it’s relatively safe.

Thad lets his Thawne tongue do what it likes.

“You,” Thad says to Wally West, almost crooning. “You know it’s true. I’m no better than those clones you murdered.”

The Flash’s green eyes open wide.

“Tell me, how many of my brothers did you kill?”

Thad hears Max Mercury snap, “Sophos Thaddeus, control yourself or go to your room.”

Hah.

Thad keeps his eyes on Wally West while he spits “You’re not my father.” Then, before Max can take control of the situation, he says to West, “I’m serious. How many of my brothers did you kill?”

Wally’s frown deepens.

“Two,” he says. “In self-defense. Did you know them?”

“I never had the chance. But they were my brothers nonetheless… bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh.”

Deliberately, Thad breaks eye contact and takes another bite of the pot pie. He licks it off his fork like an animal cleaning a bone. No one speaks. Thad’s senses are alight with adrenaline; he hears every breath that West takes, sees every motion in his peripheral vision. Max and Helen and Linda barely exist; it’s just West and Thad, a sudden tiger in the room with the tiger-hunter.

“I’m sorry,” West says.

Thad scoffs.

“Don’t give me that. I know you, remember? I memorized the book. The Life Story of the Flash. You’re not sorry for me; you think I’m evil.”

“I don’t think you’re evil,” Wally West says. “You changed the timeline, remember? The book isn’t true.”

“Yes. I changed the timeline.”

Thad looks Wally West in the eyes and lets his rage rise simmering to the surface.

“Call me selfish, but I didn’t like my ending. ‘Inertia would eventually run headlong into his own destruction in a suicidal bid for revenge… the evil clone almost redeemed by his refusal to live in a world without his loyal servant, CRAYDL. Did he truly care for the technoplasm monster, or was it hubris that drove him to fatal rebellion against the Thawnes? We will never know.’”

West winces.

“I’m sorry for your loss.”

“‘I’m sorry’ won’t bring CRAYDL back, and it won't absolve you of your sins,” Thad snaps.

“Thaddeus,” Max says, and the dawning horror in his voice says that he has realized that Thad’s aggression isn’t just instinct, it’s anger.

“Let him talk,” West says. “But listen, Thad. I don't take well to being yelled at. Say your piece if you need to, but keep it respectful.”

Thad laughs out loud.

“Respectful! Like how my memory is recorded? ‘Bart’s dark twin’? ‘Irredeemable sociopath’? ‘Sick, corrupt clone’? Or, oh, what about ‘half bloodthirsty animal, half calculating machine’? You Allens really know how to make a person feel respected.”

“Look, I’m sorry. I really am. But that’s in the past. We really don’t think of you like that anymore.”

“So what? If the speed force hadn’t spat me out—”

A quiet, pained sound from Helen. Thad doesn't let it distract him.

“You’d have gone on acting like I was a monster!”

Sounding strained, West says, “Sometimes all you can do is move on. I moved on. I am sorry… but you might have more peace if you did, too.”

“Move on,” Thad sneers. “All you do is move on, huh, Flash? And you want me to move on? CRAYDL is dead, and my brothers are dead, except the one that’s stuck in the Flash museum as good as dead, and you’re trapping me here just like him, and you think you can make everything right with apologies?! How dare you. How dare you come here and tell me to move on.”

“I’m trying to give you a chance,” Wally West says, and finally, finally he sounds angry. “Believe me, I never wanted to kill your brothers. I had no choice.”

“Oh, I believe you. The Thawnes give no choices. But is keeping me on this short chain self-defense, Wally West, or do you just hate Thawne clones that much?”

“I don’t hate you.”

“You hate the idea of me,” Thad parries. “It makes you shudder, doesn't it…? That there are clones of Bart, but wrong. ‘The Thawnes' weapons’, you called us. ‘They know nothing except killing.’ Don’t think I didn’t hear you talking to Green Lantern in the Watchtower!”

West’s recoil is very satisfying.

“Hypocrite,” Thad spits. “Treating me like a weapon. You’re the murderer here.”

West says “You sure have the Thawne mouth on you.”

“I AM NOT A THAWNE!” Thad shouts.

And then Max Mercury’s hand is on his shoulder, and Max is saying “Thaddeus, breathe.”

Thad lets out his breath in an explosive exhale. He completely froze when Max touched him, he realizes. Did he lose time? No. He doesn't think so.

“I’m not a Thawne,” Thad repeats.

And Wally West looks at him with those brilliant, terrifying green eyes, and he says nothing.

He can’t convince him, Thad realizes. Words will never convince Wally West. He only cares about actions. And Thad is not going to get a chance to prove anything with his actions. Not like this, not trapped with Max, not if the day he spent with Helen didn’t change West’s mind. And if he doesn't prove to the Flash that he’s not a Thawne…

Sooner or later…

Thad shudders suddenly and pushes Max’s hand off his shoulder. Will—he wonders morbidly, uncontrollably—will Max help when West takes Thad’s speed? He certainly won’t protect Thad. Will Thad be given a warning, or will West just—burst in one day and chase Thad down—force him to pull on the speed force, faster and faster until the Flash overtakes him and—rips the speed force out of him—like a plant by the roots—

He hears CRAYDL's voice. Work the problem, boss. You've got this.

Thad stares down at his plate, mind racing. The essential problem here is that Wally West doesn't trust him. Okay. Solution? Convince Wally West that Thad is trustworthy. How? Prove that he has had the opportunity to be a Thawne and chosen another path. How?

What would a Thawne have done? he hears CRAYDL ask.

Aha.

Wally West won’t be convinced with words that Thad isn’t a Thawne? Fine. Actions it is.

You can do it, boss.

Thad yanks on the speed force, vibrates, turns, and runs.

[brown-little-robin]

29: Metropolis

part one | previous | next | masterlist | ao3

Joseph’s living room has green walls, a pink rug, paintings and photographs—mostly of people Thad doesn't know—on the walls, and pillows on the floor. Bright colors are everywhere. The bedroom, blue and grey, is more sedate. Thad is grateful for that.

Thad retreated to Joseph’s bedroom as politely as possible. To make up for his no-doubt rude demand to be alone for a while. So much for impressing Joseph with my good manners, he thinks wryly. Ugh. But he had to get away. The eye contact, the vulnerability of laying out exactly how Joseph could hurt him… the uncomfortable feeling of that giant window looking out on the Metropolis skyline… it was all too much.

Thad’s suitcase is just where he put it, at the foot of Joseph’s bed. He kneels in front of it and unzips it. He brought his entire Sherlock Holmes collection. He picks up The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and begins to read.

He’s too agitated to concentrate. Thad sets the book down and sighs.

Some kind of machine is humming in the background. It sounds a little like one of the noises CRAYDL used to make with the computers. Thad keeps remembering and forgetting that the sound exists.

There's a clunk, and the hum stops. Thad flinches.

He touches his throat. His heart’s beating fast. Fear, he realizes. His body is feeling fear. Strange. His mind is fine, except for not being able to concentrate.

He really wants to take out the soft little stuffed seal that Helen got him, but he doesn’t want Joseph to think of him as too much of a child. So he just sticks his hand deep in the suitcase, fumbles around in the clothes until he finds the seal buried under his clothes, and squeezes it. For a while, it keeps the panic at bay. Then, reluctantly, he lets go.

He takes his phone from the top pocket. He goes to “contacts”, selects “Morlo”, and dials.

Stupid, clunky, piece-of-trash equipment. Thad hates the phone and all the guilt that comes with it. But he wants to hear a familiar voice.

It rings and keeps ringing. Thad waits, biting his lip. He worries that maybe it’s rude to call someone while he’s in Joseph’s apartment. Maybe he should have asked permission.

“Hello?” Morlo’s gruff voice barks.

Thad smiles.

“Morlo,” he says, and he hates that he sounds so relieved.

“Thad?”

“That’s right.”

“Hah!” Morlo barks. “Well it’s a good thing I decided to answer on the first go. If I ever don’t answer, just keep calling until I get fed up, all right, boy?”

“All right,” Thad says, still grinning like an idiot. He can feel his body relaxing. Morlo is so easy to talk to.

“Why’d you call?”

Thad hesitates. He’s only quiet for a second, but Morlo notices.

“Are you alright? If not, I can shoot someone, no problem.”

Thad laughs a little. “I’m fine. Just… I don’t know. My stupid body’s freaking out about nothing again.”

“Freaking out how?”

“It’s not important,” Thad says, embarrassed that he even brought it up. And Joseph might overhear, and… Thad knows Joseph is going to have to know about all of Thad’s issues sooner or later, but he doesn’t want it to be this way, by overhearing an illicit phone conversation.

Morlo growls, “Thaddeus Free, I am your doctor. Tell me.”

“I’m just scared, okay?” Thad snaps. “I called because I couldn’t calm down.”

A pause.

“Have you talked to Max about that?”

“I’m not with Max,” Thad reminds Morlo.

A longer pause. Thad strains his ears, but he can’t tell what Joseph is doing at all.

“Do you have a place to stay?” Morlo asks. “And do not say you’ll be fine in your lair because I will end you if you think you’re going back there.”

Did Morlo not get told about the Joseph Wilson thing?! Does Morlo think—

Thad hisses, “I didn’t run away! I’m staying with Joseph Wilson! Max brought me here!”

Morlo groans, long and eloquent.

“Don’t scare me like that, kid! I thought the Flash must’ve done something to you! I was ready to get my disintegration gun and go kill Max!”

“Sorry!” Thad gasps, and he finds himself laughing. If Joseph hears him—Joseph must hear him—he must be wondering—!

Thad doubles over with laughter and finds his body seizing up, terror threading its way through his laughter like a squid’s ink through water. His heart is hammering; he’s breathing hard and fast, he’s still laughing and it’s loud and he can’t stop. He can’t stop.

Hyperventilation, his brain tells him unhelpfully. Breathe slowly.

Slowly. He can’t do that. When Thad slows down, bad things happen to him. Lightning sizzles along his arms and makes his eyes sting; he’s pulling on the speed force, his whole body crackling with power. The laws of his existence say that if he slows down, he’ll be ripped apart. But he’s going to rip himself apart if he stays so fast.

It takes a monumental effort. It takes three tries. It takes thinking Morlo is expecting me. But Thad lets go of the speed force.

“Thad,” Morlo’s voice says. Thad finds that he’s clutching the phone with both hands. “Breathe.”

Thad manages to gasp “I can’t—”

“In,” Morlo commands, in such a strong voice that Thad instantly wants to obey. “Count of four. One… two… three… four.”

Thad tries to breathe in, and to his own surprise, it works. He’s still kind of choking, but he manages to get a lot of air in his lungs.

“Out. One… two… three… four.”

Thad breathes out noisily so that Morlo can hear him.

“In. One… two… three… four.”

Thad obeys. He concentrates on breathing for Morlo and lets everything else leave his awareness. Morlo’s voice gets less harsh as Thad’s breathing evens out.

“Last time. Out. One… two… three… four… good. Good job.”

Thad shudders. He likes earning Morlo’s praise, but he wishes he could be praised for impressive things again, not fighting his own body. Breathing. The bare minimum of being an alive human being.

Where did Morlo even learn to do that?

It’s all quiet for a while. Joseph is still out in the living room; Thad is alone in the bedroom between the bed and the wall. He leans his head back against the wall and breathes slowly.

That was a panic attack, his brain informs him. With the same level of importance, it tells him the blue paint on the nightstand is flaking. It’s a duller blue underneath.

Thad unsticks the phone from his sweaty cheek. He wipes the phone and his face with the bedsheet and then leans back against the wall.

His chest is sore. That’s not right. His hypermetabolism should take care of that in a fraction of a second. Is this psychosomatic? But he doesn’t want to be sick.

He remembers that he has a speedster specialist on the line. Well… while he has Morlo, he should take the opportunity to ask.

“My chest hurts. Is it physically possible for a speedster to have muscle pain that lasts this long?”

“How long has it hurt?”

“It didn’t hurt before I panicked.”

“Huh,” Morlo grunts. “Best guess? Hypermetabolism prioritizes the worst injuries. A bruise might stick around because your arm is broken. Your hypermetabolism is probably busy.”

Oh. Thad is a bit offended that Morlo thinks he’d hide an injury from him. He tries so hard to be good.

“I’m not injured. I would tell you.”

Despite his best efforts, he sounds hurt.

“I know. Your metabolism’s probably busy trying to fix your neurotransmitters and adrenaline and stuff. I’m not a brain specialist, Thad, I don’t know.”

Oh, good, Morlo doesn’t think he’s lying. …Wait!

“Are you saying my hypermetabolism is going to stop working every time I have a panic attack?” Thad demands.

“It could,” Morlo says.

“Great,” Thad hisses. “I get to be insane and have my healing break when I panic. That’s just wonderful.”

“Could be a good sign,” Morlo counters. “If your body thought you were in physical danger, you wouldn’t lose your healing. It would be trying to keep you alive.”

Huh. Actually, that makes sense. So his body knows he’s not in danger of his life now, but it still makes him panic?

“Interesting. Still sucks.”

“Yep.”

“A fat lot of help you are,” Thad says, and sighs.

“Shut up, you,” Morlo says, and Thad knows he’s forgiven.

A moment of silence goes by. Then Morlo speaks again.

“You want to hear about my new leeches?”

“Absolutely.”

Anything to get Thad’s mind off of recent events.

“They’re hybrids of medicinal leeches with Tamaranean Starkiller worms, and they have gills, sixty to a hundred twenty segments, and seven legs.”

“Is it technically a worm if it has legs?” Thad asks.

“Yes it is. Look up Australian velvet worms.”

Thad grumbles wordlessly. Keep talking. Please, Morlo, keep talking.

“They have seven legs. The extra one is a useless quirk I don’t know how to get rid of yet.”

“Did you cross the worms?” Thad asks.

“Yes, but if anyone asks, they’re mutant medicinal leeches. I like ‘em because their ink stores electricity. Like a battery, but with higher capacity.”

“Oh, like the neurowire in my VR headsets,” Thad recognizes.

“The what?”

“Neurowire. It’s wire insulated with vermifluid capsules around it which store electricity in case of a power outage and regulate the flow of information through the wire.”

“What are the capsules made of?!” Morlo demands. “I can’t manage to store the stinking fluid, it vaporizes in two days!”

“Poly… vascular… uh… I don’t know the English words for it. In Interlac it’s ‘lalow boruburda ouboriam’ta’.”

“Could you draw the symbols?”

“Sure, but I don’t know if the Interlac chemical symbols will translate.”

“We’ll have to try next time you visit,” Morlo says.

A brief silence.

“Thad,” Morlo says, quiet and serious. “I want you to come at least every few months. I know you’re hyperdecelerated, but even normal clones can deteriorate very fast with few outward symptoms. With your metabolism, I don't want to take any chances.”

Thad feels sick.

“I know,” he says calmly.

“And you can call me any time. Any time, got it? If you have symptoms, I want to hear about it. Even if it turns out it’s just PTSD. But—”

“I’m sorry,” Thad blurts out.

“It’s fine, kid.”

An uncomfortable pause.

Morlo says gruffly, “I’m not angry at you. I’m glad I could help. But if you’re scared, call someone you know will answer first. Got it?”

“Got it.”

“Good. Do you need to go?”

“…Probably…”

Thad really doesn’t want to. He wants to stay here and listen to Morlo talk about his experiments longer. But if Joseph heard any of that, and Thad is willing to bet that he did… Thad needs to do damage control.

“Right. Good luck with this Wilson character.”

Thad snorts. This Wilson character. Morlo makes him sound like some kind of thug.

“He’s okay.”

“He’d better be,” Morlo growls. “You just call me if he’s not.”

“And you’ll bring your disintegration gun, I know,” Thad says, smiling wearily. “I got it. Goodbye.”

“Goodbye.”

The phone beeps.

Thad clicks the phone closed and puts it back in the suitcase. Then he stands and stretches. His chest still hurts. Oh well. His heart isn’t hammering so hard anymore. He’d better get this over with.

He stands with his hand on the doorknob for a long time before he actually musters the courage to open it.

Joseph Wilson is painting a sleeping wolf in a cross-section of a den. Well, actually, he's sketching it with a pencil, but he already has an apron on. He looks up as Thad opens the door, and he smiles.

Thad looks away, feeling small and dirty and unworthy of that beautiful smile. When he remembers to look up, Joseph has set the pencil down and clasped his hands loosely in front of his apron. Listening.

Thad’s mind goes blank.

Joseph signs, “Want anything?”

“No, I just… wanted to say…”

Joseph signs, “You called someone?”

Thank you, thank you. “Yes. My… a friend. Is that allowed?”

Joseph signs “Of course!”

“Okay.”

Joseph signs, “Would you like to go out for a walk? The weather is cool now.”

Thad’s immediate reaction is no! I need to be alone!

But then he considers it, and he thinks… maybe that’s a good idea. This apartment, colorful and unfamiliar and full of things Joseph loves, is making Thad feel… so… alien. It would probably be better to be outside for a while.

“Sure,” Thad says.

Joseph takes off his apron and goes to get changed into warm-weather clothes. Thad puts on a t-shirt and shorts and sandals. He follows Joseph out the door, down four flights of stairs, and out of the apartment.

They stop on the sidewalk. The sky is dappled with clouds, light and dark, fading into each other, shifting. A cool wet wind stirs Thad’s hair. The sidewalk is wide and surrounded by grass. Tall buildings surround them; down the street, Thad can see the huge globe of the Daily Planet tower. He recognizes it as the landmark that could tell him where he is in the world: Metropolis, New Jersey, where he should be wary of the Kryptonians who have declared this city under their protection, who are fast enough that they could possibly kill him if they caught him off guard.

…huh. Thad’s not in danger from Kryptonians anymore. If Superman saw him here in his shorts and t-shirt and sandals, he’d think he was a normal boy. Thad is a citizen now. Soon, hopefully, he’ll be a citizen of Metropolis—and therefore under the protection of not one but two Kryptonians.

No one has ever protected Thad before.

Thad grins.

There’s a tree every so often, and a few people are out… a mother with a stroller, a man smoking a cigarette, a man with a package, two children with sticks they’re using to color on the sidewalk, a runner with earbuds in, panting as she passes them. Thad draws back from her.

Joseph starts walking, heading toward the heart of the city. Thad follows. He wishes there weren’t so many people around, but it’s nice anyway. Everything is so big—the buildings, the trees, the roads. So tall.

Joseph stops at a street corner and signs, “Would you like to go to a park?”

“Sure,” Thad says, and smiles, because he feels like he should.

Joseph smiles back.

They walk past a lot of apartments and something called The Metropolis Symphony House. Joseph stops to point it out.

“Do you like classical music?” he signs.

Thad answers honestly that he doesn’t know. Joseph looks thoughtful.

“I’ll have to introduce you to it.”

Thad shrugs. “I’m willing to try,” he says. Then he goes back to looking at the trees and the buildings and the sky. And sometimes at Joseph.

Thad doesn’t really understand Joseph. He never knows what Joseph is thinking or planning; he gets the feeling that Joseph doesn’t really strategize at all, not like Max does, anyway. All he can get from Joseph are pure feelings. Empathy. Happiness. Concern.

While walking, Joseph looks down at Thad regularly. Thad pretends not to be looking at him for a while, then realizes that that’s deceptive and allows Joseph to see Thad looking at him.

Their eyes meet. Somehow, it’s not terrifying, even though Thad can feel Joseph considering him.

He wonders if Joseph might have some form of hypnosis. To make people trust him. Maybe. But… Joseph is no danger to Thad. Unfamiliar, yes. Conceptually intimidating, yes. But actually frightening? No. Not when Thad is looking at him. He can’t be afraid of him, not while looking at his gentle sea-green eyes.

And, again, Thad wonders: is it hypnosis, or does he actually trust this man?

Joseph gestures Thad to come to the side of the sidewalk so they can stop and talk. Joseph doesn’t sign much while he’s walking; it would be awkward for Thad to have to walk in front of him to read his hands.

“You seem more comfortable outside,” Joseph signs.

“Yeah,” Thad says, uncomfortably aware that he had a panic attack in Joseph’s bedroom for no reason. “Sorry. I don’t know why.”

Joseph smiles, not unkindly.

“You’re a speedster,” he signs, quick and easy. “Wide open spaces are good for you.”

“Oh,” Thad says, and considers that. “Maybe. I spent most of my life in a box underground, though, so I don’t think the enclosed space is a problem.”

Joseph cocks his head, interested.

“Maybe it’s being somewhere new,” he signs.

“Maybe…” Thad thinks out loud. “I always had so much time to adjust to everything. Six hundred years I spent in my lair… I was in VR a lot, so I have experience of a lot of different places, but I ran every single simulation dozens of times until I got it perfectly, and a lot of the runthroughs were just to get used to the environment…”

“Six hundred years?” Joseph signs, eyes wide.

Thad flinches. He forgot Joseph didn’t know that!

“I—yes,” he stammers. “It’s called hyperdeceleration, it’s not—”

Joseph puts his finger to his own lips. Thad falls silent.

Joseph kneels, putting himself on eye level with Thad. He ignores the woman walking next to them who gives him a strange look. He looks remorseful.

“You don’t have to tell me about it right now. I’m sorry.”

“I forgive you,” Thad says. And he does forgive Joseph, even though he doesn’t know exactly what Joseph is apologizing for.

Joseph signs “Thank you.”

Thad twists his wrist, silent. Joseph stands and keeps walking, checking on Thad a bit more frequently now.

They go into a shopping district full of beautiful shops. There’s one shop just for chocolate, a whole place for sandwiches, lots of stores that Joseph says are coffee shops, lots of clothing stores with weird items in the windows. The buildings are all ornate and enormous. Everything is so big here, so unlike tiny Manchester. Thad would love to look at the shops and puzzle over the window displays all day, except there are so many people here and he doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like it when they look at him. He’ll be fine; he sticks close to Joseph and no one bothers them, but it’s a little bit intimidating.

He keeps accidentally pulling on the speed force, alerted by various things: a crow bursting into flight a few feet away, the wail of a siren, someone shouting into her phone… and each time he pulls on the speed force, he has to hastily slow down so that—hopefully—no one notices. Thad is glad to get back into a residential area after that, where he can look at all the different houses in relative peace.

There are so many different kinds of houses. Thad has never noticed before how many different kinds of houses there are. Every single one is unique. When he was in cities for his training, he never looked at the houses individually. It would have been useless.

He likes the ones with stones in the gardens, and he likes big windows. He likes the dark blue houses and the creamy one with a black roof. He likes fountains and sculptures, but not the garish plastic things. He really likes a garden with purple flowers, so many of them, running up the side of the house and mingling with little white flowers in the grass. As they get closer, Thad sees that there are three kinds: tiny purple flowers with pale hearts, which grow in the grass; large purple bells with long stems and ruffled petals; and a profusion of little sprays of purple on the vines all over the house.

He looks up at Joseph to point it out and finds Joseph already smiling in delight. They stop in wordless agreement to stare at it.

“Why doesn’t every house have this many flowers?” Thad asks.

Joseph laughs silently. Thad frowns at him.

“No, I’m serious. Why?”

Joseph tilts his head thoughtfully.

“People think it looks better to have neat grass,” he signs. “And people can fit in more easily if they conform.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Thad says. “What a waste of good land.”

Joseph looks surprised. Then he smiles like he’s recognizing something.

“You should meet Starfire,” he signs. “She thinks the same thing.”

Thad doesn’t know of any Starfire. It sounds like she’s a vigilante, from the name. Hm. He hadn’t thought of this… that he’d have to meet Joseph’s friends.

That… could be too much of a challenge. With Thad’s aversion to touch, his Thawne-bred fear and aggression… he barely holds himself together with one person. If he has to meet lots of strangers, it could go wrong. He could seriously hurt someone. Or he could get himself hurt. Not everyone in this world can be as strangely nice as Max and Helen and Joseph. And there are so many ways to hurt Thad.

Well, he’ll survive it. If worst comes to worst, he can always run away for a while. Now that he won’t be living with a speedster.

They walk on. Thad runs his hand along a fence and laughs at the tink tink tink of his fingers hitting each pole.

The park has a plaza with a giant metal sculpture, a gleaming pile of interwoven tubes, and a fountain. Below the plaza is a big grassy area, with a set of wooden towers and metal slides on a woodchip-floored area. The grassy area is huge, with a sidewalk meandering past trees, benches, and occasional flower-garden displays. Thad is enchanted. Of course, he’s been in parks before, like the infinite garden maze simulation. But this… this is real. There’s actual wind on his face, tugging at his hair.

They pass by a wall entirely covered in greenery and flowers. Thad can smell them. That elusive scent that appears every so often when Thad is outdoors is coming from the flowers.

Thad stops short when he realizes that.

“Joseph!”

Joseph looks down at him.

“The flowers,” Thad says, and stammers briefly. “They—do flowers always smell like that? Like… like sugar?”

Joseph looks at him in surprise. Then his expression goes tender.

“They’re all sweet, but every flower smells unique.”

Thad takes his wrist in his hand. Oh. There are so many kinds of flowers. He knows that, but he doesn't know the names of them. And every one of them smells different? He had no idea!

Grife. He had no idea that flowers smelled like this. If he killed Bart like he was supposed to, he'd never have known.

For a minute, he thinks he might cry. But he manages to breathe until the tightness in his throat subsides.

[nehswritesstuffs]

Hello! I hope you're doing wonderfully. Ok the petition is this... suspicious of a late late and unexpected baby. Only because I'd love to see 12th freaking freaking out in excitement while Clara is freaking freaking out of panic. I leave the choice of fic to you dear! All the love to you!

I am, as Nine would say, fantastic,thank you!

1376 words; takes place in the Seal Man of North Ronaldsay verse,which is in this tag and this AO3 series for the newcomers; takes place about amonth or so before Terra turns three

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

Clara wasn’t exactly certain as to why she didn’t very wellthat particular day. She already felt like vomiting twice and was sore in oddplaces despite the fact it was only lunchtime. After firing off a text to Ianto check in (he and Terra both ended up being fine, despite the fact she hadrun off and hid in the garden on him again), she proceeded to ignore hersandwich and crisps in favor of only having some tea. She was able to make itthrough the remainder of the workday without slipping up, though she did happen to vomit in a hedge on herway home.

“Mummy!” Terra gasped the moment Clara entered the house.The preschooler barreled into her mother, nearly knocking her over onto the floor.“Are you okay?”

“Mummy’s fine, dear—go back to playing now, yeah?” Terrarushed back to the sitting room at that, freeing Clara to head towards thekitchen, where Ian was sitting with some scribbled notes and a fresh cuppa,leaning over the latter so that the steam hit his face. “Feeling any betteryourself?”

“Not entirely,” he sniffed. “I think this cold is nearlygone though; it’ll be good when I’m not constantly cold all the time. Do humansnormally have colds that last this long?”

“Not really, but you’re probably a special exception giventhe circumstances,” she replied. Clara poured herself some tea and sat down aswell, glancing over the papers on the table. “I thought you weren’t going toget back to work until after you felt better.”

“I’ve been down for over two months—I can’t afford to putthis off any longer,” he said sourly. “This paper will end up being a decentsupplement to your paycheck, and then we can put that addition on that youwanted plus put away for a familyholiday.” The selkie then glanced over at his wife and narrowed his eyes.“What’s the matter?”

“I don’t feel good myself,” Clara admitted. “It’s probablyjust that fermented fish we brought into class yesterday for the kids to tryfinally getting to me.”

“Whatever it is, I’d like us both to get better soon so wecan get back to… you know…” His hand found her knee and he gave her a bashfulsmile. “Terra’s going to be a good sister, don’t you think?”

“About that, Ian…” She exhaled heavily, discomfort apparentin her voice. “I’m not sure about that anymore. Terra would be fine, it’s notabout that, but I don’t know if I canhandle it right now. Maybe again in October, but not this very moment.”

“Why October?”

“So I can have the baby in the summer holiday, that’s why. Idon’t want to be off work for very long—they’re talking about giving me three grade levels next term.”

“Can they do that?”

“If they want to keep the school open, then yeah.” Clara clutchedher mug tightly, staring down at the milky tea. “I do want one more, don’t get me wrong, but since I’m not pregnant frombefore you caught the bloody cold of thedecade…”

“I understand,” Ian relented. “One day… just not today…because you can’t afford it with work, and we need to be able to afford thingsalong with the child we already have, right?”

“That’s a good way to sum it up, yeah,” she nodded. She tookhold of his hand and they continued on with their tea. They’d get there,eventually, and they were fine with that.

-_-_-_-_-_-_-

She was ill again the following day.

Actually, Clara took notice of the fact that she did notfeel well the entire rest of the week. It was only that weekend, after missinga menstrual cycle, did she suspect that anything was going on. She took a testkit with her to the loo (thank God, Sjeh Mither, or whatever, for discreet packagingwhen ordering off the internet), coming out completely baffled.

She wasn’t ill—she was pregnant.

Frankly, it shouldn’t’ve been possible. She and Ian had stoppedtrying completely when he caught that ridiculous cold that had been making itsway around the island (impacting the human inhabitants much less severely), andshe knew she hadn’t been pregnant thanks to a doctor’s visit she went to in themeantime. Everything had come back negative except for the little stick in herhand—how…?

Ian found Clara that night in a completely flustered panicin their bedroom. He had just put Terra to bed, meaning they were alone.

“Is everything alright?” he wondered cautiously.

“Ian, I… oh, screw it: I’m pregnant,” she replied, cuttingto the gist of things. “I’m pregnant and I shouldn’t be and—”

“Oh Clara, that’s wonderful news,” he beamed. He picked herup in a hug that spun halfway around before putting her down. Taking a goodwhiff of his wife, the selkie grinned, “Yes, you definitely are. I wouldn’thave known had you not said so for about another week or so; this dumb cold,you know…”

“This is serious!” she snapped. “We haven’t had sex inmonths!”

“The baby just waited until it sensed I was beginning to gethealthy again to implant itself, which must mean that it can sense bothparents, and…”

“Wait, it what…?!”

“You mean… humans don’t… do… that… when… um… breeding…?”

“We do no such thing!”

“Huh, that’s odd, because that’s what seals do all the time,and I—” Ian was cut off by his tiny human wife emitting such an annoyed soundthat it sent a chill down his fae spine. “Is this one for the notecards?”

“Definitely one for the notecards,” she hissed, pointingtowards the writing desk in the corner of the room. He went over and took afresh card from one of the drawers, printing “Do not confuse seal and human physiology and/or natural processes”on it, stuffing it in with a small pile of other cards sitting on the desk,bound by a rubber band. He returned to her side, holding his arm out wide.

“Done,” he said. “I promise I’ll try not to delay-impregnateyou again.”

“Fine,” she mumbled, headbutting his chest as he hugged her.There was no denying how warm he was; warm and comfortable and smelling of thesea. He was more than just the father of her child—no, children—but he was her best friend and the one person she couldn’tstay cross at, not for a million, billion years. “Can we go to bed now? Ireally should get to bed, if I really am pregnant with your mutant seal-faechild… again.”

“We most certainly can, and you most certainly are,” Iangrinned. He picked up Clara and carried her to bed, climbing in afterwards touse her shoulder as a pillow while he laid there with his hand up her shirt,touching the bare skin of her stomach. “Now instead of trying in October, we’llbe changing nappies.”

“Don’t sound too happy about that,” she teased. She gentlytapped the back of his head as he craned his neck to kiss her throat—what anidiot. “Hey, Ian?”

“Yeah?”

“If this baby, um, behaved like a seal when it came tocoming into existence, does this mean that they will be a selkie like you?”

“Possibly, but nothing is for certain,” he said. “I musthave changed my mind over a dozen times when you were carrying Terra.”

“Now that I remember clearly.”

“At least one thing is for certain: they will be a littlebit of you and a little bit of me.” The door then creaked open and the mattressshifted slightly. “Speaking of… how’s our precious pup?”

“Daddy, under the bed,” Terra whined. She clung to herfather, who held her as he got out of bed.

“Let’s see what we can do to banish that wee imp once andfor all,” he said. He kissed his wife before bringing their daughter back toher room, determined to make the imaginary spirit vanish in the lass’s eyes.Clara laid alone in her room, putting a hand to the warm skin her husband hadjust touched.

It was earlier than expected, but she would takeit.