#firewall explained

[itbabasachinsharma]

SOPHOS XGS SW-19.5.3 MR-3 Firewall | First Time Configuration | Step by Step in Hindi | By Sachin

[hackeocafe]

How to configure OpenWrt as Firewall for your home network and Guest Wifi and IPTables explained

Guest Wifi in your home network can easily be done with OpenWrt. How to configure OpenWrt as Firewall, how to build a firewall for your home network, How to make a Guest Wifi and a separate IOT Wifi and Firewall zone ? IPTables are explained in the middle part.

[the-firebrand]

Mrs Firebrand and I were driving around Xian (where the traffic may be used to punish sinners in hell) with an old college friend of hers and her husband, who spent a couple years in America doing post-doc work.

He said that when he was in America he noticed that when American drivers merge lanes, they look ahead, to the sides, and behind them, whereas Chinese drivers only look to the front and sides, and suddenly so much made sense.

[sixeyesonathiel]

nerd!satoru who yaps nonstop about the multiverse while you’re just trying to eat your lunch, waving his hands around dramatically as he explains the concept of alternate dimensions with half a rice ball in his mouth and crumbs stuck to the corner of his lips. who pokes at his food with a mechanical pencil because he forgot his chopsticks again, and then insists with wide eyes and a mouth half full, “technically, pencils are just wooden utensils for intellectuals.” he gets giddy over a new graphing calculator update like it’s a new iphone drop, tapping the screen like it’s a baby animal, and once dragged you into a 40-minute rant about ant communication hierarchies while you were just brushing your teeth, half-asleep and mouth foaming with toothpaste.

he has no less than ten tabs open at all times—reddit conspiracy theories, physics forums, a paused youtube video on quantum tunneling, a spreadsheet titled “do cats defy newton’s laws?”, a google doc labeled “reasons why kissing might be a form of molecular alignment,” and none of it has anything to do with the assignment he’s supposed to be doing. he zones out during lectures, doodling black hole spirals, equations shaped like hearts, and cats in lab coats in the margins of his notes. once, he drew you holding hands with a worm in a bowtie and captioned it “me and my universe.” somehow still manages to get top marks every single time, even though he once turned in an assignment with a greasy fry stain in the corner because he used it as a napkin in the library mid-cram session.

he mutters the weirdest things under his breath like “i feel like a misaligned proton today” or “the moon’s energy was too sarcastic last night” and you just blink at him like🧍‍♀️while sipping your drink. he wears mismatched socks on purpose and says, “it’s a metaphor for duality.” has five alarms labeled “wake up genius,” “ur gonna flunk,” “your girlfriend will leave you,” “pls satoru,” and “EMERGENCY: CUTE, PRETTY AND SCORCHINGLY HOT GIRL WAITING” and still manages to sleep through all of them unless you call him. his glasses? perpetually smudged, held together with washi tape. his notebooks? an unholy fusion of complicated theorems, grocery lists, pressed flowers, cat doodles, love notes to you, and a page just titled “top 10 reasons why my girlfriend is cuter than entropy.”

his laptop is a biohazard—dusty, overworked, full of files like “time_is_an_illusion_final_FINAL_reallyfinal_actuallyfinal.pptx” and “uRwrong_iMright.docx.” the case is covered in anime stickers, tiny equations, stars drawn with glitter pen, and a wrinkled polaroid of you sticking your tongue out that he keeps taped on like it’s a sacred relic. he listens to lo-fi while studying and pauses every few minutes just to sigh dreamily and whisper, “this part sounds like you looking at me for the first time.”

and yet… he’s so fine it’s borderline illegal. tall, messy white hair that sticks up in all directions and defies every known force of nature, ice-blue eyes that melt when they look at you, and a cocky little smile that makes your chest hurt even when he says things like, “do you think our cells are spiritually linked?” he doesn’t even try to be charming—he just is, like he spawned with a flirt trait.

you fw it. you fw him. every unfiltered ramble, every hyperactive explanation about wormholes or why he thinks bees are secretly time travelers. the way his voice speeds up when he’s excited, and how his hands start waving like he’s conducting an invisible orchestra of nerdiness. you don’t even bother trying to follow every word—you’re just watching him, heart doing somersaults, because he’s so beautiful when he’s passionate. and the fact that you never laugh at him? only ever smile and let him go on? yeah. that cracked his emotional firewall a long time ago.

so now he’s all sunshine and sparkles around you. a literal bundle of joy. grinning at his phone like a middle schooler when you text him “lol ok.” kicking his feet while giggling, voice memos full of stuff like “what if we held hands inside a particle accelerator 😳👉👈” sent at 2:13 a.m., followed by three minutes of him wheezing into a pillow. he calls you his “favorite constant,” even if you don’t get the joke. and if you do? he twirls his hair, blushes, and stares at you like you just split the atom and made it cute.

he makes playlists named “gravity got nothing on how hard i fell for you,” draws you in lab coats saying “ur the thesis to my hypothesis,” keeps your photo in his pencil case and shows it to random people like “this is my girlfriend. she understands my quantum jokes.” if they blink weirdly, he’ll just smile and say, “it’s okay, not everyone gets theoretical perfection.”

being loved by you makes him goo. makes his neurons do the macarena. you make all his bizarre little pieces light up like neon signs. you walked into his strange little world and said “yeah, i’ll stay,” and now he’s rearranging every cosmic thread to make sure it’s perfect for you. adds fairy lights. labels his notebooks “our theories.” buys matching pens. you made his chaos feel like a cozy little planet. he buys you plushies shaped like atoms and puts your name in the acknowledgements of his lab reports. tells people “she’s the reason the data graphs came out prettier.”

nerd!satoru who’s helplessly, hopelessly, tooth-rottingly in love with you. who grabs your hand mid-ramble just to feel you close. who brings you hot cocoa and explains entropy like it’s a bedtime story. who kisses your forehead and tells you “you’re my favorite anomaly in this whole universe.”

and he thanks you—not in grand declarations, but in the quiet moments: when he scoots closer to you without saying a word, when he tugs on your sleeve with glassy eyes after a long day, when he looks at you after an hour of nerding out like you built the whole galaxy just to hear him talk.

his world was spinning way too fast. then you walked in and gave it gravity. and now he orbits you—and he’s never been happier to revolve around anything in his life.

[astrumavis]

My dad was messing around with my old laptop (the one that broke) and he found an actual trojan virus that apparently downloaded itself thru Firefox when I accessed some kind of website

[aftertheleaving]

Not A Threat

Pairing: Damian Wayne x Reader

Genre: Light humor, fluff, slow-burn setup(kinda), soft enemies to lovers(again kinda), workplace antics

Warnings: swearing, caffeine abuse, reader is unbothered and slightly feral, Damian is suffering (but not really), no plot just vibes

Notes: for @ur-mums-house, who is my sleepy muse and deserves a fic where Damian gets emotionally steamrolled by a tech intern. Anyway I totallyyyy didn't find this while scrolling through all my drafts that I never posted (this is like from forevrrrrr ago when i told myself i'd start posting but never did). 🙃

1, 2, 3

You’re halfway through your fourth energy drink and at least eight hours into the worst debugging sprint of your life when you crack into a corrupted server cluster and find a file labeled:

"batcave_logs_alpha / GraySon_Phase02 / CodedAssets_v3"

Your first thought is:

Oh my god, they named a prototype ‘Grayson’? What is this, an anime?

Your second:

Cool. More dumb WayneTech documentation. Maybe I can finally go home.

So you click it.

And twenty seconds later, after bypassing a laughably weak encryption key (seriously, who still uses birthday codes?), you’re staring at a directory full of what are clearly mission logs. From vigilantes. Who operate out of a cave. With bats.

You lean back, sip your drink, and sigh.

“Well. That explains so much about this company.”

You don’t tell anyone—not because you’re scared, but because you’re underpaid, overworked, and Jenkins is still crashing. You simply do not have time for Batman’s extracurriculars.

Which is why, when you return from lunch the next day and find Damian Wayne himself waiting at your desk like a final boss, you groan out loud.

“You accessed a restricted directory,” he says flatly.

You drop into your seat. “Congrats. Want a cookie?”

He stares. “That information is classified.”

“So is the state of your backend infrastructure,” you reply, pulling up your terminal. “Your firewalls are like, held together with duct tape and prayer. You’re lucky I didn’t accidentally trigger a missile.”

He’s silent for a beat. You look at him, smirk creeping across your face.

“Oh wait,” you say, “I’m supposed to act shocked, right?”

You cup your hand around your mouth and whisper dramatically, “You know who.”

Damian visibly restrains the urge to walk into traffic.

“I’m not gonna tell anyone,” you assure him, typing lazily. “I’m too busy fixing Jenkins and wondering if I can make rice in a coffee pot. I have bigger problems.”

“…What is Jenkins?” he mutters.

“A CI tool,” you say. “It breaks. Constantly. Like you, apparently.”

He mutters something in Arabic that you think is an insult, but you’re too caffeinated to care.

“Besides,” you say, grinning, “You’re kinda short for a terrifying vigilante.”

“I am five-foot-five.”

“Sure”

A few days later…

You see him again, lurking in R&D like a disgruntled gargoyle.

You walk right up to him. “I have an idea.”

He immediately sighs. “No.”

You grin and hand him a rolled-up blueprint. “It’s a modular shock baton with thermal sensing and EMP shielding. Built it on my break. While eating a sandwich.”

He unrolls it and—you see the exact second he realizes it’s actually… good. Really good.

“This is—” he starts, then stops. Glares at you. “You should not be this capable.”

“Aw,” you say, patting his shoulder, “is that your way of saying thank you?”

“I said no such thing.”

“You did in spirit.”

“…Why are you like this?”

You smile, eyes glinting. “You’re fun to mess with.”

I think I’m actually dying. I was working on a Tim fic, minding my business, and then I got a comment from ur-mums-house and genuinely tweaked. Like. Fully spiraled. So then I went rummaging through the massive (for some reason??) collection of fics I’ve written and never posted, searching for anything Damian-related for ur-mums-house—and now here we are. Okay. Gonna go back to working on my Tim fic now. Bye bye 👋 .

[rottingghosty]

The Realms PR | DC X DP Part 2

this isn’t as good in my thoughts because writing as bruce??? really hard. how am i supposed to write a paranoid man if i am the most chillest person i can be… anyway heres your part 2 food of this au, not sure if i’ll continue writing more parts? depends on how i feel.

errors are made and sorry the the lackluster performance this might be

if you want to use my prompt please give me credits thank you

☁️☁️☁️☁️

Danny very much prefers to have nobody intervene on his business as the vigilante of Amity Park. He’s essentially called dibs on it if you consider the fact that the entire town is basically his metaphorical grave since it’s his haunt and he did die to make the portal to the Ghost Zone open. He very much ignores that specific can of worms because that’s a heavy topic that he won’t ever talk about because Spectra really ruined his own outlook on professionals. Jazz will most likely want to open that can but that’s for future Danny.

Where was he? Oh yeah.

Danny very much likes being a solo hero with his friends and sister aiding when they can. He very much dislikes the fact that people have been trying to enter his haunt without permission. Does he know why people who tried to pass through Amity Park suddenly find themselves back at where the welcome sign is? No. Is he going to ask? Also no because it allows the residents and himself privacy even when he’s got the GIW on his tail or even his own parents.

He’s not going to rebuke this gift especially with his influx of fame. Which reminds Danny that he needs to post a new tweet, maybe a video of Cujo playing with the kids in the park from a few days ago? He figures people would be more interested if they knew a ghost dog existed. Maybe he can include one of Ember’s concerts or something.

Man he has so many videos to post and such little time to do so, but he thinks Sam and Tucker are having fun being his PR team with the way Sam had a manic gleam in her eyes when Lois Lane and Clark Kent sent her a message of twitter asking for an interview. All while Tucker basically going giddy at Red Robin and Oracle trying to get through the firewall that’s blocking Amity Park from eyes being too close for all their comforts.

Bruce Wayne stared intently at the video before him, it was only thirty seconds but it was thirty seconds enough to cause him to tighten his grip on the arm rests of his chair in the Batcave. His blue eyes staring down at the figure in the video as it replayed on loop. His shoulders tense and bunched up as he inhaled sharply at the frame that happened ten seconds in.

Because right there, staring up at the camera looked too much like Jason. It looked too much like his boy, his son that he had lost when Jason was only fifteen. Normally he would’ve brushed it off but it was the way that it then shifted into Dick, Steph, Tim and then Damian—

Ancient of Hope is what Phantom had called them, the embodiment of hope and how its form switched to what people believed in. Apparently it looked so much like the Robins of Gotham because Gotham was— is the biggest source of hope there is. Yet, this was an unknown.

Bruce couldn’t trust a word that Phantom said, ghosts are an unknown. Trying to get Constantine to talk about it was a struggle itself, the equivalent of trying to pull teeth out because the man was equally as stubborn as Bruce and it was even worse when the man had cursed up a storm when they had a meeting about Phantom’s first videos.

Ghosts are a variable in an equation that Bruce is trying to solve but he simply can’t force his way into solving it, not when this whole thing has turned into a diplomatic nightmare with the fact that Oa has started pressuring the US government about the mistreatment of the Infinite Realms beings.

The Justice League Dark even adding in the pressure— Deadman being one of the more outspoken members as he explained as much as he knew about the Infinite Realms despite not quite qualifying as one of their residents but still considered as one in an odd way. Constantine grumbling about as he came and went, saying how the Ghost Investigation Ward could’ve started a war or destroyed everyone.

Clark and Lane were writing up articles, having conversations with the PR Team of Phantom— two teenagers who were involved heavily and considered ambassadors to the Realms because of their connection to Phantom.

Phantom who is the High King. Phantom who doesn’t want his subjects hunted anymore and took a peaceful route instead of simply declaring war.

Bruce takes a heavier breath, jaw clenched as he watched the video loop one more time before the closed the tab to look more into the GIW and their backers, eyes narrowing in two names.

Vladimir Masters and Lex Luthor.

[kaidatheghostdragon]

De-age fic, but good parents AU

Something de-ages danny, not a clue what exactly, but it does. BUT, danny had already had a good reveal with his parents, so he goes home and they see him de-aged and immediately get to work figuring out how to get him back to normal.

Life goes on as normal, its just that danny's body is about ten years younger. He still has to go to school (with a story that the thing that de-aged danny was aimed at fenton and phantom jumped in to take the hit but it got both of them - or open secret au, take your pick), still has chores, still has to deal with the ghosts that cause problems.

With barely a pause to question 'is that still danny?' everyone continues as normal.

Thing is, there's the typical information firewall we like to invoke to explain why the justice league doesnt know about amity. It blocks ghosts, Phantom, infinite realms, liminality and ecto-contamination, you name it.

What it doesnt block? Baby Hero.

As in, now that Phantom is tiny, everyone and their dog is taking pics and recording phantom to coo all over him on social media. Everyone is enjoying how adorable he is while it lasts. Even the rogues are playing nicer to soak it all up.

The justice league is concerned. Apparently there's some new hero (phantom has been active for over a year by now, minimum) operating in the midwest, and he is literally preschool age. Even the Robins didn't start that young! Who is raising this kid? What are they thinking?!

Its frustratingly hard to get any more intel about phantom (because the firewall is still catching everything else about him), so theyre gonna have to send someone in blind to scope out the situation.

Who do they send? You can decide, but i vote they put together a team: batman (wfa characterization) because he knows how to handle child vigilantes, wonder woman because everyone loves wonder woman and she's a good voice of reason, and zatanna (NOT constantine! Zatanna is more child friendly) to cover magical bases in case this is something like a captain marvel situation.

[emacrow]

Orphan's baby

Cass was in the middle of helping the Batfam along with Batman raids through the the hidden base they had found underground lab in an abandoned hospital messing with a neon verison of lararus pits liquid.

Red Robin had already adjacked the security and was going through the files with Spoiler. Nightwing and Red hood beating up the guards while batman was battling with the main boss behind it all.

She was with Robin as they were taking some samples and destroying the remaining ones.

She had already crack through most of seemingly important hidden rooms that seem to be hiding completely full with containers full of lararus pits with tags of PH4N70M, and a winter blue colored marble in a container sealed to the safe that was spelling out electricity every minute in the container.

It looked important, but why a marble..?

She broke the container holding the marble, taking most of the lararus pits containers as well while destroying the remaining unaware of the glow that pulsed in the marble.

By the time is was to retreat, everything was in the clear as Spoiler needed to unscramble hidden files that were behind multiples firewalls.

They were at the batcave when they were securing the containers of lararus pits for later sampling, only for the marble to be missing..?

She was sure that she place it in her bat waist pouch, but it wasn't there anymore..

Did she dropped it accidentally while collecting the containers of larausu pits?

It was already too late to check back now, so she decided not to tell anyone yet.

Until 2 months later, she started feeling downright sick nauseated. Right after Dinner of Alfred's infamous lasagna Tuesday, but.. it tasted a bland which was throwing her off completely.

She was only dropping down by the batcave to just self analysis herself.. only to stop walking half way the secure containement holding all the lararus pits that they brought back..

She couldn't stop herself from staring at it with vast hunger before the swirl of neon green filling her vision and blank her conscience out the window..

Only to wake up in her room on her bed, 3 empty containers with not a inch of lararus pits left inside as if it was wiped-or licked clean. She hide the containers under her bed and stood quiet later on as nobody had noticed yet what she had done.

She doesn't know what had happen, but the nausea and sick feeling went away as if nothing happen.

Hopefully it would be a one time thing...

Bruce and his long lines of lawyers had disbanded the GIW completely over the illegal experimentally on sentient aliens of another world which they tried to label them as ghosts until they tried to accused Superman of being one of them which quickly label their entire Government supported work as hate crime and was steady being searched, along finding a couple of missing traumatized teens, adults and children that had vanished the months before in the other hidden labs.

...

....

.....

She had her head in her hands as she silently groaned when she peak her eyes between her fingers to see several dozen empty containers and immediately close her eyes to try and pretend she didn't see them.

It only been 5 months since that incident and she had seemingly got away with it, but then nausea came back with vengeance like no other, and the increased appetite was new, but yet it didn't filled her belly with the bland taste or satisfaction even though she did felt a bit feint during the couple of night patrols despise feeling energized earlier.

Something was wrong and she know it as she went to the only person who could help her right now.

She went to Alfred straight away silently explaining the situation going on because she honestly have no idea was going on with her and she know she loves his food, and the feint spells, and the monsterous appetite and the insatiable need to swallow a crapton of lararus pits with twelve milkshakes and fourteen bags full bat burgers.

Alfred could only stared with his eyebrows raising slowly with every word spilling out of her mouth.

Alfred helped her get examined in the batcave medbay, and 2 hours later the blood result came in.

Case was pregnant, but It was a almost cryptic pregnancy.

Alfred didn't had the equipment out for a ultrasound at all yet, but from he know from Cass it was during the Raiding of that hidden lab and her being in contacted with this 'marble' that seemingly disappeared after she grabbed it.

That was 7 months ago, but luckily Alfred caught it in time before it literally became a cryptic pregnancy.

Oh the ultrasounds pics of the little baby fetus with his fast beating lil heart beating were precious as he got tiny misty eyes a bit compare to Cass's awestruck look staring at the screen then back at her belly.

He does help get extra vitamins pills, and call her off of Crime duty until further noticed . Bruce on the otherhand was concerned but all he got from Alfred was the You Better not investigate this because I have major blackmail of embarrassing toddler photos against you.

This is Alfred moment that he been waiting for since Bruce became a new adult but not yet sired a baby at the Wayne Manor at all. He is savoring this for the memories and scapebooking time. He is cranking opened that forgotten but clean baby nursery of forlorning hopes.

2 months later, By the time Cass was ready to deliver the baby on February 11, and at February 12th, 12:01am.

Wren Alf Cain was born premature yet crying softly into the word.

[suzukiblu]

Hey, I was reading through "kidnapping your soulmate for fun and profit" (which I adore, Tim's plot to kidnap Kon is gonna go great with definitely no more derailments for sure) and it seems like there's at least one post missing? Between the one ending with the "You didn't even look at me, though." "Didn't I?" dialogue to the one starting with "Superboy carts him halfway across town" without actually showing Superboy finding out about Tim's matching soulmark.

I . . . what the actual fuck, haha, there's like a good 700 words of PRETTY IMPORTANT CONVERSATION missing there and I cannot find ANY sign of any posts that should have them, mis-tagged or not, so like . . . Tumblr, what. Or ME what. Either Tumblr fucked up or I fucked up, and hell if I know which at this point. I could swear I posted those words, but god knows what happened to them and I am definitely not gonna go through ALL of this blog figuring out why they're not where they're supposed to be, so WELP, fuckit, here's just everything of this WIP so far all together and all in order behind the cut: 16.7k of an incredibly normal Tim Drake being an incredibly normal civilian about this situation.

Apparently Cadmus knew Experiment Thirteen was the one to invest in because Experiment Thirteen had a soulmark. 

Apparently Cadmus also considered terminating Experiment Thirteen because Experiment Thirteen had a soulmark. 

Tim knows this because he broke into the place and stole a copy of Superboy's file the day after they met. He also knows what Superboy's soulmark looks like, because these absolute bastards not only took multiple pictures of it, they put those pictures in his fucking file. Not even, like, classified or tucked away behind a firewall or a password or anything. Not even in a separate folder. Just right there in his standard file where literally any random scientist or doctor or goddamn intern could trip right over them without even meaning to. 

Forget the fucking mind control; that's fucked up. 

So yeah. Tim knows what Superboy's soulmark looks like. It's a stark, dark red, all sharp angles slung low in the V of his Adonis belt and cutting from one hip to the other, looking not unlike a stylized bird in flight coming at the viewer head-on. Bold. Undeniable. Very much like Superboy himself, really. 

And exactly like the mark that came in on Tim when, he now knows, Superboy was first put together in a fucking petri dish. So that's . . . a whole thing, there. 

Well. At least his soulmate is only literally fifteen years younger than him, not physically and mentally. 

Although that doesn't really seem like a big improvement, to be honest. 

Tim didn't even know he was into guys, actually? Definitely didn't know Superboy was into guys, all things considered. Like, he would not expect somebody like him to ever be subtle about who or what he was into. 

Maybe they're platonics, Tim tries to tell himself. The fact that his first reflex upon learning that Superboy was his soulmate was to immediately question his own sexuality doesn't really support that theory, though. 

Though it does help explain why Poison Ivy putting her hands on the guy had pissed him off so bad. 

Like. It very much does. 

Tim doesn't actually know what to do about this. Bruce still thinks he doesn't even have a soulmate, due to Tim previously really, really not wanting to deal with the absolute embarrassment of admitting that said soulmate was an actual fucking baby, so Tim never got the Bat-version of the soulmate talk. Bruce'd sat him down to give it to him when he'd first become Robin, but Tim hadn't had a mark then, obviously, so they'd both just assumed he didn't have to worry about it. Tim is pretty sure Bruce had been as relieved as he had to dodge that particular bullet, really. Apparently Dick had needed visual aids and hadn't understood the "gilly talk" version. And Jason had had questions. 

Lots of questions. 

Creative ones. 

Sometimes Tim suspects Jason might've been an asshole. Like, just a little bit of one. 

So no, Tim does not blame Bruce for deciding to skip that particular talk with him, especially when they'd both thought he wasn't gonna need to know any of it anyway. 

So . . . yeah. He doesn't know how he's supposed to approach this situation. Obviously telling Superboy that they're soulmates would compromise Tim's secret identity and therefore Bruce's, and everybody and their damn mother knows Superboy himself doesn't even have a secret identity so it's not like Tim can figure that out and approach him that way. 

On the other hand, not telling him that they're soulmates isn't a great start to being soulmates, now is it. 

Crap, Tim thinks. 

Then he calls Dick, because if he has to sit through the Bat-version of the soulmate talk, at least maybe Dick will be slightly less embarrassing to hear it from. 

As long as there's no visual aids involved, anyway. 

"Hey, Tim," Dick greets as he picks up the phone. Tim has a carefully crafted plan of attack, of course; several, in fact. He's got all sorts of subtle ways to lead the conversation without revealing anything too damning or too specific and while keeping everything in hypotheticals. Just making the whole thing either a quick thought exercise or casual curiosity from an unmarked kid who's heard one too many soulmate stories and wants to know more. So Tim's prepared. Tim's ready. 

Tim panics. 

"Poison Ivy kissed my soulmate and I want to burn down her entire life," he blurts. 

"Uh," Dick says. "You're . . . gonna have to catch me up a little here, baby bird. For starters, I thought you didn't have a soulmate." 

"I didn't," Tim says as he starts to pace back and forth across his bedroom floor, because he's already screwed this up so there's no point in playing coy now. "Then some dickheads in Metropolis decided to steal Superman's dead body and make a cocky asshole with douchey shades and a leather fetish out of it." 

"Ohhhhh boy," Dick says. "What'd B say?" 

"I found out like half an hour ago and you're the only person I've told, so nothing yet," Tim says. "What's the Bat-protocol for finding out your soulmate is somebody in the community, exactly? Specifically somebody in douchey shades?" 

"Depends," Dick says. "How'd the kid react?" 

". . . I don't know how to say this without sounding like a total creep, but he doesn't know," Tim admits with a wince. "I broke into Cadmus to make a copy of his file after I met him and they just . . . had his soulmark in it. Like. There wasn't even a password. It wasn't even in an isolated folder. It was just there." 

"That is the most fucked-up thing I've heard since the last time I had to talk to Jervis Tetch," Dick mutters in obvious disgust. "Alright, well, how are you reacting, then?" 

"My soulmate is a baby," Tim grumbles disgruntledly, dropping into his desk chair. "A baby who is also a teenager." 

"Tim, you're a teenager too," Dick reminds him wryly. "You are very much so a teenager too, in fact." 

"Yeah, and it sucks," Tim says emphatically. "And I have, like, actual legal guardians and a home and a trust fund. Superboy just lives somewhere in Hawaii with a sleazy businessman and his kid and some random guy from Cadmus!" 

"That's, uh, actually not great," Dick says, sounding a little troubled. 

"You think?!" Tim demands. "He's a baby! An infant! And he lives with his frigging manager!" 

"What the actual hell," Dick says. 

"Just–is it ethical to kidnap your own soulmate and does that even matter if they're not legally a person and so you couldn't actually be charged for anything anyway?" Tim mutters speculatively, drumming his fingers on his desk for a moment and then booting up his computer. "I mean, B can't get mad at me for doing it if the courts can't get me for doing it, right?" 

"Wait, Superboy's not legally a person?" Dick asks incredulously. 

"Nope," Tim says. "Which neither Cadmus nor the sleazebag selling his likeness for a living has in any way tried to correct, for the record. Technically he's classified as intellectual property, but Cadmus forfeited legal possession when Superman turned up alive again, presumably to avoid Superman ever finding out that they'd had said legal possession, so technically if I went and kidnapped him it'd be more like . . . salvage, maybe? Like, in the eyes of the law, I mean." 

"Yeah, okay, in that case kidnapping your own soulmate might be less an ethics question and more a moral obligation," Dick says. 

"Good point," Tim says, frowning consideringly as he pulls up his browser. "Do you think if I just do it as Tim Drake I can avoid compromising my identity?" 

"I have no idea but if I were you I'd already be booking my flight and thinking up a cheap excuse to 'accidentally' flash a teen heartthrob superhero my soulmark anyway," Dick says. 

"I am already booking my flight," Tim says mid-click of said booking. "Although, uh, flashing him our particular soulmark might require, like . . . third base, and I don't even know if he likes guys. I don't even know if he knows if he likes guys, he's like five minutes out of the cloning tube and like, I'm literally fifteen and don't know if I like guys, so why the hell would he?" 

"Okay, yeah, that could be an issue," Dick says. "Hm. Wardrobe malfunction? Slutty beach day? Wet T-shirt contest?" 

"I'm not above any of those options at this point, frankly," Tim grumbles, even though those ideas are all very "Nightwing" and not very "Robin". Technically he shouldn't be approaching this like Robin would anyway, because god forbid Superboy recognize his methodology. 

Slutty beach day might have to be a thing, Tim realizes with resigned dread. He is really not comfortable with slutty beach day being a thing. 

. . . maybe if he just gets lucky, he can catch Superboy having his own slutty beach day. Not to make any assumptions, just Tim's pretty sure if either of them were ever going to be the type to wear a speedo or low-waisted swim trunks or just walk around with their soulmark out in general . . . 

Which, in Superboy's defense, well–his soulmark is already on file with Cadmus, so yeah. He might not even care if other people see it or not, considering that. 

Then again, if Tim knew that a bunch of random strangers who'd wanted to mind-control him had all seen and taken pictures of his soulmark, he'd never wear anything that risked exposing it again. Like. Ever. Possibly he'd just live and die in a wetsuit. Or coveralls. Overalls. Or just–whatever. Something like that. 

. . . come to think of it, Superboy's costume is all one piece, isn't it. 

Cadmus is full of assholes, Tim decides as he confirms his booking, then gets up to throw together a go-bag. He has no plan whatsoever, but whatever; it's a twelve-hour flight. He's gonna have time to think something up. 

One go-through with airport security and a twelve-hour flight later, Tim has not thought anything up. 

Dammit. 

It's early morning in Honolulu and Tim is very, very tired. He didn't sleep on the flight because he was making plans, but to be honest said plans are all shit. His best option is gonna take six months to fully execute, for starters. Which is a reasonable amount of time to have to spend getting a near-complete stranger to trust you enough to let you kidnap them away from everything and everyone they know, he knows, but still. It's not even that solid a plan, even discounting the frustrating time delay. It's just the best of a bad lot. 

Maybe Tim should've, like . . . actually stopped long enough to tell Bruce what he was doing and get some advice. Or at least Alfred, anyway. 

Just . . . it's fine, Tim tells himself as he and his go-bag get a taxi. This is just preliminary work anyway. Recon more than anything else. Ideally he'll manage to "meet" Superboy, but he's not dumb enough to think he's going to get the guy to like him this quick, much less trust him. The goal is "passing awareness of his civilian identity's existence" and nothing else. 

Then the street kind of blows up in front of his taxi. 

So that's a whole thing. 

And here's Tim without so much as a damn domino in his pocket. 

People are screaming, things are very literally on fire, and some rando in lycra is yelling at the cop car on the corner. Normal Tuesday, really, except it's broad fucking daylight and again Tim doesn't have a mask on him, much less his bo staff or utility belt or anything actually any kind of useful. 

Fuck airport security, Tim thinks. 

"Who's the jerk with the monologue?" he asks the driver, who seems largely nonplussed by the whole situation and has definitely left the meter running while they're trapped between the other cars and the blown-up street. Priorities, Tim guesses. Can't blame a guy for having them. 

"Beats me, man," the driver says with a shrug. "I don't keep track of the spandex set, I just take the necessary detours around 'em when I'm working." 

"That might be lycra," Tim says, reaching for his wallet. "But fair enough. How much do I owe you?" 

He doesn't have a mask right now, no, but he can't just leave civilians unprotected. He can at least help people get out of the area and maybe distract the lycra rando for a bit, if it comes to it. If nothing else, he can–

Somebody in flashy red and blue and a black leather jacket crash-lands on top of the lycra rando with very deliberate flair and a very loud crow, and then the street blows up again. 

This time, though, the explosion is definitely telekinetic in origin. 

Specifically tactile telekinetic, Tim thinks it's safe to assume. 

He pays the driver, then grabs his go-bag and gets to getting people out of the area as subtly as possible while Superboy and the lycra rando tear up the street even worse. Like, almost impressively worse. Tim really wouldn't have thought the damage could even get that much worse, but they both find a way. 

He is going to have such a hard time convincing Bruce to let him drag Superboy to Gotham. 

Well, it's a six-month plan. Maybe the guy will mellow out a bit somewhere in there. Learn some subtlety. Pick up a bit of finesse. 

Tim isn't actually that delusional, obviously, but that's the lie he's gonna tell Batman when he pitches it. 

Superboy takes down the lycra rando without Tim having to improvise any assists, fortunately, and Tim manages to keep any civilians from getting in the other's way as he handles the fight. The street officially looks like a gravel road, but nobody's dead or even particularly injured–to surprising degrees, in fact–so Tim will take it. Superboy doesn't seem concerned, though a few of the civilians mutter disparaging things about what this is going to do to their commute. 

Tim technically understands their point, but also Superboy did just save at least those cops from getting blown up and the street was already pretty much fucked before he even got here, so he's not sure why they're all complaining about being alive and in one piece. People in Gotham are more intimately familiar with their own mortality than most private citizens, though, and also just grateful when it's not the Joker, so maybe it's just a regional thing. 

He shoos the last few civilians over to the EMTs to get checked out and starts trying to figure out his own exit strategy for this situation before any cops try to write his name down or something. Chances of getting Superboy's attention right now are slim, so it'd be best to just–

"Hey, man," Superboy says, landing lightly right beside him. "Thanks for the assist. Saw you getting people out of the way, made things way easier." 

Tim stares at him. 

"You didn't even look at me, though," he says reflexively. Superboy grins at him. 

"Didn't I?" he asks. His suit is torn right across his stomach and low down along his hips. His soulmark is not even slightly obscured and he is going to absolutely no effort to hide any part of it. 

Tim has never experienced something this convenient in his life. 

So yeah, Bruce is definitely going to assume that he deliberately hired some metahuman stranger to go to Hawaii and rip up Superboy's clothes in very indecent and very public fashion when he tells him this story. 

Frankly, that would've been a better plan than the slutty beach day one, so maybe Tim will just pretend that he did. 

"Uh," Tim says, really not sure what to say right now. Superboy flashes him the cocky smirk from all those lame teen magazine posters, still not going to any kind of effort to cover his soulmark. 

Tim hates Cadmus, but also is kind of embarrassingly affected to be seeing his mark on someone else's skin live and in person. With the photos, he was more distracted by the violation of their existence than anything else, but here and now Superboy is just standing in front of him with their mark bared for the whole damn world to see like he wants it seen. Like he wants Tim to see it. 

Like he wants everyone to know that he belongs to someone and exactly who that someone just so happens to be. 

So yeah. Tim is . . . affected. 

Tim is definitely, definitely affected. 

And increasingly less convinced of any possibility of this bond being platonic, too, because there is no way in hell that their mark looks half as good on him as it does on Superboy. Like. Not a chance. 

Tim really, really wants to touch it, which is technically SOP with soulmarks but is also a bit more fraught of an experience when said soulmarks are more suggestively placed. And they are very much in public right now, so, uh . . . yeah. 

So that's a thing and all. 

"Alright there, man?" Superboy asks, pushing his sunglasses up his nose. "Didn't get your bell rung or anything, did you?" 

Tim decides to just accept the gift the universe has given him and go for broke here. 

"This is really forward of me, to be honest, but that's me," he says, gesturing meaningfully at Superboy's soulmark. Superboy blinks. Tilts his head. Tim assumes he doesn't believe him, because why the hell would he believe a random stranger just saying that to him in the middle of what is technically a crime scene and completely out of nowhere, and resigns himself to having to flash his own mark on a public street with a bunch of way too interested people around. It's unfortunate and not remotely to plan, but there's no way he'll get Superboy actually alone this easy, so . . . 

"What, seriously?" Superboy says, looking bemused. 

"Seriously," Tim confirms. 

Superboy blinks again. Tim puts on a carefully sheepish smile and steels himself to–

Superboy jerks forward and grabs him, and the next thing Tim knows they're a couple hundred feet up in the air and zipping off to . . . who the hell knows where, even. Tim was so genuinely not expecting this turn of events that he didn't even register the instinct to hit Superboy with a nerve strike for lunging at him like that. 

Is he being kidnapped? Is that what's happening right now? 

. . . well, it'd be fair, admittedly. 

At least Superboy went with bridal style over, like, a fireman's carry. 

Not that bridal style doesn't have its own attached embarrassments, but still. 

Tim avoids doing anything as stupid as staring at Superboy's very close face and pretends to be interested in the view. It is a nice one, so it's not hard. Kinda makes him wish he had his camera on him, to be honest. Superboy doesn't say anything, so he doesn't either. He doesn't know how well they could hear each other with the wind in their ears anyway; according to those files from Cadmus, Superboy's not due to develop super-hearing for at least another year or two, and Tim definitely doesn't have it either, so it's probably just better to wait for the moment to avoid having to yell. 

Superboy carts him halfway across town and then lands them on a totally random-seeming rooftop that Tim assumes he has some reason to have chosen, though hell if he can tell what it was. The sight lines are all terrible and there are literally no defensible positions, and there's not even a single decent hiding place or useful perch. 

The local architecture is definitely nothing like Gotham's. 

"Uh," Superboy says as he lets Tim down on the roof, taking a step back from him and suddenly looking embarrassed as he pushes those ridiculous douchey shades of his up into his hair. "I maybe could've thought that one through a little better." 

"Well, I'm assuming you want to see my mark too, and this is better than me flashing it in front of the local press," Tim says, trying not to smile too wryly at the guy. 

Superboy blushes. 

Welp, there's another strike against platonic. 

"Um, yeah, I–" Superboy starts awkwardly, still blushing, and Tim decides to put them both out of their misery by lifting his shirt and tugging down his waistband just enough to reveal his share of their soulmark. Superboy visibly forgets what he was saying and just stares at it. 

"Honestly, I'm pretty relieved," Tim says as he directs Smiling Normal Civilian Face #4 at Superboy and tries not to get flustered by said staring. "I was absolutely expecting to have to deal with a literal baby in my future and I just don't need a soulmate who's gonna think Vena Cava is old news." 

Superboy flicks his eyes back up to Tim's face and sort of . . . grins, kind of, and looks unexpectedly . . . happy, almost? Tim thinks? 

Huh. 

Weird. 

"Uh, I . . ." Superboy starts, then just trails off like he's lost for words or maybe just not quite sure what to say. 

"Do you want to touch it?" Tim offers, because that's normal social behavior with a first recognition of matching soulmarks, and only realizes why maybe that wasn't the best suggestion when Superboy blushes even darker. Which–well, Tim might be blushing a little too, now. 

They really did get a pretty suggestive placement for their mark. 

"Uh–sure?" Superboy says, then somehow turns even redder and sputters: "I mean yeah! Yes. Definitely." 

Okay, Tim probably isn't straight. And this mark probably isn't platonic. 

That is . . . a lot to deal with right now, so he just buries it under Smiling Normal Civilian Face #4 and tries not to blush any harder himself as Superboy strips off his gloves and shoves them into his jacket pockets and then sort of–pauses, seeming a little uncertain, which is very weird to see on him. Superboy is the opposite of uncertain–to a fault, is he the opposite of uncertain. 

Then again, this is literally the second time they've met and most of what Tim knows about him came from either a Cadmus file or tabloid news and teen zine interviews, so maybe he's been making some assumptions here. 

"Together?" he suggests, holding up his own hands. Superboy nods immediately, his face still flushed almost as red as their mark. 

"Together," he agrees, and they both reach out at the same time. Superboy slips his fingers up under Tim's shirt and Tim slips his own between the torn edges of Superboy's suit, and they both just . . . touch. 

Tim's surprised, a little, by how soft and near-reverent Superboy is about it, and puts another strike against platonic. Then he immediately gets distracted, because touching your soulmate's mark is apparently very distracting. His fingers feel warm; his body feels warm. And Superboy feels . . . 

The empathy bond that Tim had always assumed to be exaggerated or romanticized settles in soft and warm and with a sense of rightness, and Tim feels a sort of nervous excitement and hesitant hope and an entirely unanticipated shyness and sweetness and softness where he was really expecting to get more like . . . brash and cocky reckless energy and just . . . very different things, really. This is really just not what he expected to get from Superboy, of all people. 

Not even a little bit, is this what he expected. 

And Superboy . . . Superboy looks flushed and flustered and fascinated, and Tim has the thought that if they, like . . . hugged or something like this, then their marks would touch each other, and then they'd be sharing the empathy bond through them directly, and . . . 

Yeah, okay. That's . . . a thought, definitely. 

Fuck. 

. . . although if either of them were, like . . . turned on or hard or anything, then they'd–never mind. 

Any potential platonic-ness of this mark is really, really losing ground here. 

Tim really does not know how he worked with Superboy last time without tripping over himself, at this point, but to be fair at the time he hadn't known what the guy would look like with his costume all ripped up and their shared soulmark exposed for the whole damn world to see. 

Tim is definitely, definitely kidnapping this guy. If it takes six months or six years, he's kidnapping him. He absolutely refuses to leave that soft little curl of shy hope and unexpected sweetness in this goddamn bullshit situation. He is kidnapping him and getting him legally recognized as a person and out of the stupid predatory contract with his manager and out from under Cadmus's supervision, and he is burning down literally anyone who tries to stop him at literally any point during the whole process. 

He will burn down fucking Superman if he has to. And also the US government and all of Cadmus and–

Just–anyone. Literally anyone it takes. 

"What's your name?" Superboy blurts, and Tim cannot believe he didn't even fucking introduce himself before asking the guy to touch his soulmark. What kind of fucking idiot is he, exactly? 

"Tim," he says quickly. "Um–Tim Drake. I'm from Gotham. Just, you know, visiting." 

"Hi, Tim," Superboy says, and gives him a soft little smile that all those lame teen magazine posters don't even deserve. Tim's heart does a rapid series of Dick-Grayson-level acrobatics in his chest. God, he hopes Superboy doesn't have super-hearing yet. He doesn't, right? God. 

Just–god. So, so many gods. 

"Hi," Tim echoes, feeling ridiculous. He clears his throat, then reclaims his hands from Superboy's soulmark. Superboy bites his lip, then does the same and takes a step back. 

Tim wants to throw himself off this roof, but unfortunately the lack of grapple is going to interfere with that theoretical escape attempt. Crap. 

Superboy's hands are still bare. 

So is his soulmark. 

"You did good with that guy who wrecked the street," Tim says, putting on Smiling Normal Civilian Face #2, which is a little more reserved than #4. Superboy turns red again. 

"Technically I also wrecked the street," he says, looking embarrassed. 

"It was already a wreck when you got there," Tim snorts. Property doesn't mean shit next to people. "And this way nobody died or got hurt too bad." 

"You helped with that part," Superboy says, still red-faced. "Made it a lot easier to keep everybody safe with somebody who was thinking straight about getting them all out of the way, like I said. It's hard to, uh–concentrate on that many at once, you know?" 

"Keeping track of where all the civilians are has to be a pain in a fight," Tim agrees, though he tries to make it sound more like he's following Superboy's logic than already fully aware of the vitality of situational awareness from his own vigilante gig. Superboy blinks, cocking his head. 

"Oh–no, that part's easy," he says. "I can feel everybody. It's just, uh . . . actively spreading the force field out that much? I gotta concentrate a lot harder. So it's just way easier when nobody's in the line of fire." 

Tim . . . pauses. Tilts his head. He is, technically, aware of how Superboy's tactile telekinesis works, but that sounded like . . . 

"Sorry," he says. "You had everybody there in your TTK field?" 

"Mostly," Superboy says. "Like I said, it's hard to concentrate on that many people, especially if they're running around all freaked out." 

"Why would you split your focus like that?" Tim asks, a little mystified. Though he guesses this explains how Superboy noticed what he was doing without ever actually looking at him, come to think. "Doesn't it weaken your powers?" 

"Well, yeah, but that dude was blowing up the whole street, man," Superboy says, making a face. "Somebody could've gotten shrapneled or something." 

It occurs to Tim, slowly, that the amount of injured civilians really wasn't as high as it should've been, and in fact most of the injuries he did see had almost definitely been caused in the initial attack. So that means . . . 

Oh. 

. . . huh. 

"Huh," he says. "I didn't realize that was something you could do.” 

"I try not to advertise that one," Superboy says sheepishly. "So, uh, bad guys won't start going after civilians harder when I'm fighting 'em. Or pick crowded areas to pick fights in." 

"I was under the impression that you advertised most of what your powers can do," Tim says wryly, though again, he did get that impression from stolen files and cheap magazines. 

"Well, yeah," Superboy says with an awkward shrug. "Otherwise people don't think I'm doing anything. Like, that I'm just punching stuff or whatever. Uh, so–how long are you in town for, then?" 

"Just for the day," Tim says while making further mental re-evaluations of his soulmate. And it's an admittedly terrible cover, but–"I'm flying back to Gotham on a redeye. I just dropped in to get some time to myself, but I've got school on Monday and a paper to write for it. You know how it is." 

"Not so much, man, I don't do that," Superboy says, and Tim . . . pauses, again. 

"You don't . . . what, go to school?" he asks. 

"Naw," Superboy says, shaking his head. "On account of supervillains attack it when I do.” 

"So you're home-schooled?" Tim assumes, trying not to cringe at the idea of Rex Leech teaching Superboy math or economics or anything even vaguely in that wheelhouse. That could not possibly end well. 

"Naw," Superboy repeats with another shrug. "Got superhero shit to do. And also, like, brand deals to do. Not really my thing anyway." 

. . . Tim is reminded, again, that Superboy is not in fact legally a person and is therefore not in any way protected by labor laws, and Rex Leech and every single dodgy opportunist he's been selling Superboy's likeness to probably knows that. Not even the laws intended for civilians or metahumans or minors or animals would apply, in fact. 

Fuck. 

The next six months of this kidnapping plot are going to be an agonizing wait, Tim's already realizing. 

Fuuuuuck. 

"Oh, I see," he observes non-committally, trying to figure out if he can move up that six-month timeline somehow. There's got to be some corner he can cut or something he can cheat, if he just–

"Do you wanna hang out for a little while before you leave the island?" Superboy asks hopefully. Tim stares blankly at him for a moment. What kind of question is that? Most people would be upset to find out they'd only have a little while to hang out with a newly-discovered soulmate, but Superboy's asking like he expects him to want to just . . . what, swap cell phone numbers and then go on about their original plans for the day? 

First of all: no. Second of all, Superboy doesn't know it, but this is Tim’s plan for the day, so still no. 

"That sounds cool, yeah," Tim says, applying Smiling Normal Civilian Face #5, which is a little softer. Superboy brightens, inexplicably turning red again. Tim has the even more inexplicable urge to pat his head about it. 

This is definitely not a platonic soulmark, no. 

Okay, so Tim's . . . gay, he guesses? Bi? Pan? Just–some sexual orientation that includes telekinetic alien hybrids that are at least male-presenting, anyway. That or Superboy is a trans girl and just not out yet, which he supposes is an equally logical option. 

. . . probably Tim being at least a little bit gay is likelier, though, because Superboy really is a look in that torn-up skin-tight costume he's (she’s?) barely wearing right now. Though Tim could also be bi and Superboy could be trans; it's not like either of those possibilities precludes the other. Actually, that combination would probably work out pretty well, right? In theory? 

At least, he assumes it would. Tim has admittedly not looked into that kind of thing too much, what with assuming it wasn't ever going to be directly relevant to his life. He infiltrated a GSA-style support group for a month and a half once for Robin-business and that's all he's really got to go on. His cover had been "kid with a newly-out older brother who was seeking basic information", just to minimize any potential concern about him dropping off the face of the earth after the necessary recon in the center was done, so he hadn't had to know anything even then, really. 

Apparently he should've been paying less attention to the layout and staff and more to the actual conversations. 

Go figure. 

"We could go grab some lunch," Superboy suggests, leaning towards him a bit. "I know all the best local places. Like, the not-touristy shit, I mean. Or maybe hit the beach?" 

"This is going to sound ridiculous, but I didn't pack a swimsuit," Tim admits. The possibility of the slutty beach day plan would've required a very different cut of swimsuit than his usual trunks, so he'd just figured he'd just buy a new one if he needed it. 

"I could lend you one," Superboy offers. He’s a little bigger and broader than Tim is, so Tim’s sure they don’t wear the same size, though he supposes if he had a pair of trunks with a drawstring waistband, or at least an elastic one . . . 

"Do you have a spare?" Tim asks, mildly dreading the thought. He's a Gothamite. They're not bred for the beach. And also, that would entail wearing Superboy’s clothes. 

Why didn’t he just say yes to lunch? Why is he stupid? 

"It's Hawaii, dude," Superboy says with a laugh, flashing him a wide grin. "Half my closet is swimsuits. Actually pretty sure I have more swimsuits than T-shirts, come to think.” 

Tim isn't sure if that means Superboy likes the beach that much–which would admittedly make sense for a Kryptonian hybrid, given the ridiculous amount of yellow sun that's out there free for the taking–or if that means that Superboy just literally never wears civilian clothes. He must sometimes, right? In theory? 

. . . Tim hates Rex Leech, he's pretty sure. Like. Really, really hates him. And also Cadmus. And Superman is on thin fucking ice, at this point. 

Very thin ice. 

He could get out the kryptonite ring again, if he had to. Like, that's an option that happens to be available to him. Just in case. 

"We could do the beach," he says as he reverts to Smiling Normal Civilian Face #5, because he’s an idiot, apparently. "Since it is Hawaii and all." 

"Cool," Superboy says, grinning wider for a moment before seeming to remember himself and straightening back up from leaning in so close. "Uh–cool, yeah! C'mon, I'll give you a lift." 

Tim, again, doesn't even have time to register the instinct to hit Superboy with a nerve strike before he's in the guy's arms and they're taking off into the air again. Does Superboy have super-speed? Tim was pretty sure he didn't. Like, at least not yet, anyway. Maybe all that constant island sun is paying off early. 

Hm. Note to self: look into that. He should really know if his soulmate has super-speed or not. 

Superboy doesn't actually tell Tim where they're going, but Tim assumes "his place" is a safe enough bet. Which is . . . a whole thing, actually, since it includes a marked risk of running into Rex Leech, who Tim absolutely cannot threaten this time. Which is really unfortunate, frankly. 

Then again, maybe if he can get the slime alone while Superboy is digging out that swimsuit for him, he can say something with some plausible deniability to it and Smiling Gotham Civilian Face (Nighttime Edition), which Tim has on good authority terrifies just about every other possible flavor of Normal Civilian. At least in the States, anyway. 

He'll have enough mercy not to use the Crime Alley version on the guy. 

Maybe. 

The flight isn't long, but the view is still nice, so Tim wouldn't have minded either way. Superboy sneaks a few glances at him from behind his sunglasses and Tim politely pretends not to notice so he doesn't have to deal with the weird fluttery feeling it puts in his stomach every time he does. It's not like Superboy can't feel him perfectly well with his tactile telekinesis right now, and also just his normal sense of touch; there's no real reason to keep sneaking peeks at him unless–

. . . wait. How well can Superboy feel him with his tactile telekinesis right now? Like . . . exactly how well? 

Oh god, Tim thinks, and desperately pretends that his only concern in regards to the answer to that question is if Superboy might notice he has more muscle and scars than a normal civilian should, whether they're from Gotham or not. 

Actually, if he can potentially feel something as subtle as scars–

Oh god, Tim thinks again, and then very quickly stops thinking altogether in self-defense. 

The flight to Superboy’s presumable place isn’t too long, like he said, so Tim manages to keep his brain from running off in too many buck-wild directions, and they’re landing in front of a big but slightly shoddy-looking plain wooden house before he’s catastrophized too badly. Or like . . . maybe not too badly. In theory. Probably. 

Superboy lands in front of the porch and the little group of people who appear to have been talking on and around it, and doesn’t even let Tim down before he’s excitedly blurting, “Everybody, this is Tim, he’s my soulmate! Tim, this is, uh . . . everybody.” 

Tim’s done his research at this point, so he recognizes Rex Leech sitting in a chair on the porch, Dubbilex sitting in another with a ratty-looking little white dog in his lap, Tana Moon standing by the steps, and Roxy Leech sitting on them. He doesn’t know the dog’s name or whose it is, but the rest of them he’s researched, for obvious reasons. They all look startled, then bewildered. 

Tim feels a little awkward about the whole situation, considering Superboy still hasn’t let him down from the bridal carry, but ignores it in favor of Smiling Civilian Face #4 and a polite little wave. 

“Nice to meet you, everybody,” he says. 

They all stare at him blankly for an awkwardly long moment, at which point Superboy finally seems to realize he should put him down, and then Roxy Leech lights up and jumps to her feet to run over. 

“Oh my god, SB, that’s amazin’!” she says brightly. Tim immediately clocks her as full of shit, but more in the sense of “trying to be happy for someone when not remotely happy herself” than “just being a fake asshole”. “Hi, Tim! I’m Roxy!” 

“Hi, Roxy,” Tim says, offering her a handshake to go with Smiling Civilian Face #4. She throws her arms around him and hugs him instead. Again, he’s too baffled to register the nerve-strike instinct. “Um . . . hi?” 

Dubbilex gets up and comes over with the ratty little dog in his arms and stares intently at Tim, who does his Bat-training best to think nothing but normal civilian thoughts. The dog sniffs him curiously and then jumps out of Dubbilex’s arms and straight for him. Tim barely catches it in time, which means now he’s got a dog and Roxy attached to him. Which . . . okay, sure. This might as well happen. 

Oh god, the dog’s licking him now. Why is the dog licking him now? 

“Krypto seems to approve of you,” Dubbilex observes. Tim continues to think very normal civilian thoughts, and Dubbilex tilts his head, looking . . . thoughtful. 

. . . Tim hopes these are normal civilian thoughts. 

“He’s cute,” he lies with Smiling Civilian Face #2, taking a blind guess on canine gender. The dog–Krypto, apparently–looks like a wriggly wet rag, actually, but that’s not the dog’s fault. Well, aside from the wriggling. Dubbilex still looks thoughtful. 

“Don’t lick him, you little shit,” Superboy says, eyeing Krypto dubiously. 

“Aw, you don’t think your soulmate’s lickable, SB?” Roxy asks with a sly grin, and Superboy turns bright red. 

“Don’t you lick him either,” he threatens, grabbing her off Tim and floating up into the air a few feet with her in his arms. She cackles delightedly and throws her arms around his neck. Tim wonders if she’s his girlfriend. It’d track with her being anxious about him finding his soulmate, but recon on Superboy’s interpersonal relationships was . . . unclear. 

Meaning, he couldn’t for the life of him figure out if the guy was platonic about a single woman or girl in his life, so who fucking knows. 

Tim really doesn’t know what that means for their mark, considering. 

He pats Krypto’s head, for lack of a better idea, and gets slobbered on again for it. Dubbilex still looks thoughtful. Rex and Tana come over a bit more grudgingly than he and Roxy did, Rex looking leery and Tana just barely frowning. Tim pretends to be an oblivious moron and ignores both their suspicious expressions to keep up Smiling Civilian Face #4. He is a perfectly normal civilian with a perfectly normal smile and perfectly normal thoughts, and that is all. Really. 

( and he’s going to get Superboy away from this fucking BULLSHIT living situation and into literally ANYTHING better, and away from Rex Leech and Cadmus and every single shitty person who’s trying to take advantage of him, and into legal recognition as an actual fucking PERSON while he’s at it, no matter which politicians he has to Bat-blackmail into passing some goddamn LEGISLATION already! )

Dubbilex tilts his head. Tim doesn’t panic, because he’s a perfectly normal civilian having perfectly normal civilian thoughts. There’s absolutely nothing in his head that Dubbilex would hear and think was weird. Nothing. Normal thoughts. All of them. Normal. 

. . . Tim needs to work on his normal civilian thoughts, maybe. Like, just a little. 

“A pleasure to meet you, Tim,” Dubbilex says, tone mostly neutral but still polite. “My name is Dubbilex.” 

“Nice to meet you too, Dubbilex,” Tim says like someone who definitely didn't already know that. He puts on Smiling Civilian Face #11: “Meet the Parents” Edition. It is . . . not actually one he's really had to use before. Like, not even with Ariana or–and actually also it’s probably not the right face to be using either, really, but Dubbilex is the closest thing to a not-an-asshole adult in Superboy’s life and he doesn’t want to be an asshole to him. 

Unless he turns out to be one after all, in which case all bets are off. But only then, obviously. 

“You sure this guy’s your soulmate, Kid? Not just some weirdo fan trying to take advantage or something?” Rex Leech asks suspiciously as he finally comes over, folding his arms and narrowing his eyes at Tim skeptically. Tim finds that a deeply ironic statement. And also a deeply hypocritical statement. 

Prick. Like Leech hasn’t been taking advantage of Superboy since he first fucking heard of– 

Civilian thoughts. Niiiiice civilian thoughts. Nice and normal and civilian, just like all his thoughts. Normally! 

. . . don’t think about white elephants, Tim tells himself, and immediately winds up with a full stampede of albino pachyderms in his head. 

It’s not non-civilian thoughts, so he’ll take it. 

“Relax, Rex, he showed me his mark,” Superboy says as he lets Roxy back down and lands again, the tips of his ears turning just a little bit pink. Tim considers both the reaction and the fact that he just noticed said reaction, then puts another point in under “not platonic”. It’s . . . getting to be a lot of points, at this point. No pun intended. “It matches. Like, it definitely matches.” 

Superboy doesn’t mention the fact that they’ve already touched each other’s marks to confirm, even though that’s a pretty normal thing to do upon mark-recognition. Tim makes a mental note of that, but doesn’t comment. He assumes there’s a reason for it, or otherwise why wouldn’t he? Not like Leech could argue with that, after all. 

Tana Moon follows Leech over to the group, looking a little wary herself. Tim sizes her up in his peripheral vision, pretending not to notice her approach. He’s “just” found out who his soulmate is, so he can sell the illusion of only paying attention to Superboy right now. It’s not an unusual reaction. 

It’s a pretty typical one, actually. The fact that Superboy decided to immediately show him off to everyone he knows is actually the less usual option, in fact. Not unheard of either, of course, but still. A lot of newly-discovered soulmates tend to just forget about the outside world for a few hours. Or days, even. A few missing person cases that Tim’s been involved in solving turned out to be cases of “I met my soulmate and we just eloped/ran away/went on a road trip/holed up in a hotel room without telling anyone”. 

Tim had thought it was ridiculous at the time, if obviously preferable to ending up with either a dead body or a traumatized victim, but Tim is currently in the process of planning an ethically-necessary kidnapping less than twenty-four hours after first cracking into Superboy’s file and not that much longer after first meeting him, so he supposes soulmates just bring out most people’s less pragmatic sides. 

Though he personally thinks carefully-planned ethical kidnappings are an improvement on spontaneous weekends in Vegas, pragmatically-speaking. But whatever. 

“He showed you?” Tana Moon says, glancing Tim over suspiciously. Superboy’s face reddens this time and he tugs at the slash in his own suit. 

“He, uh, saw mine first,” he says. “Kinda got into it with a dude downtown and Tim here was in the area, and like, he recognized it, obviously.” 

“It’s fairly noticeable as a mark,” Tim supplies helpfully, figuring he should be being supportive of his soulmate here, and also be shutting Rex Leech up as efficiently as possible. “And Superboy came over to check on me after the fight, so it was hard to miss.” 

“Sure it was,” Leech says, his face souring. “So then you won’t mind showin’ yours to–” 

“Shut up, Dad!” Roxy hisses, kicking him viciously hard in the ankle. Leech yelps in pain. Roxy is immediately his favorite, Tim decides. By far Roxy is his favorite. The dog’s kind of cute and Dubbilex seems decent, but definitely Roxy is his favorite. 

Her dad definitely fucking sucks, though. 

And as for Tana Moon . . . 

“You’re a tourist?” Tana says, just barely frowning down at Tim. She’s taller than him. She’s also taller than Superboy, because she’s a grown-ass woman and why, exactly, is a reporter even here right now? How is that necessary or reasonable? 

. . . admittedly she’s also taller than Leech and he’s a middle-aged man, but that’s not the point here. If Tim has to “no comment” this situation and figure out how to get either his parents or Bruce to kill a story, he absolutely will. He isn’t even slightly gonna hesitate there. He is gonna the opposite of hesitate, in fact. 

“Yes,” he lies, which might not endear him to Moon, given she’s a native, but is better than confessing to having premeditated designs on kidnapping a teen idol superhero. Especially to a reporter. 

Even if it is legally salvage. 

“I’m just in town for the day,” he continues. “I needed to get away for a little while, you know how it is.” 

“Sure,” Moon says, narrowing her eyes at him. “Who doesn’t.” 

“He’s from Gotham. And he helped the civilians get out of the area while I was fighting that guy downtown!” Superboy says eagerly, which is . . . odd, actually, and throws Tim off a bit. That seems like a weird thing for Superboy to be eager about, considering. Like . . . just very weird. 

“Well, that’s a Gotham thing, probably,” Tim says, putting on a sheepish Civilian Smile (#7). “We’re used to rogue attacks with area of effect concerns involved, so we get pretty good at clearing a street.” 

“You did awesome, man!” Superboy says, grinning excitedly at him. That is . . . still weird, yeah. Tim really doesn’t get it. 

Well, maybe Superboy’s just relieved to have a soulmate who knows how to stay out of the line of fire and what to do in a crisis, given how often crisises probably come up in his life. That would make sense, considering. 

“It was nothing, just a little light crowd control,” Tim tries, assuming that’s what a normal civilian would say. Probably, right? Almost definitely. “Nobody even needed any urgent medical attention. And you used your TTK really strategically and contained the guy too, that was much more impressive to pull off in a mess like that.” 

Yeah, that was normal civilian talk, he thinks, pleased with himself for managing it. 

Superboy turns pink, then grins again. Dubbilex . . . tilts his head. 

Normal. Normal. Normal civilian. That’s what Tim is. A civilian! Who’s normal! Very, very normal! 

Normal. 

He smiles Normal Civilian Smile #4 and pats Krypto’s head again. Krypto makes an enthusiastic attempt at licking his fingers off. 

Ew. 

“‘Light crowd control’,” Moon echoes. That’s what Tim said, yeah, so he’s not sure why she’s repeating it. Well–reporter, again, so it’s probably a trap. 

It’s almost definitely a trap, actually. 

Really definitely it’s a trap. 

“Sorry to just show up like this, hope I’m not interrupting anything,” he says to Roxy and Dubbilex with a smile, politely pretending not to be ignoring Moon. He is definitely ignoring Moon, though. Again: reporter. She may not be a Lois Lane or even a Vicki Vale, but he’s still not giving her any information he can avoid giving her. And he’ll just ignore Leech while he’s at it, too. 

“I invited you, dude!” Superboy says with a laugh, shaking his head. “We’re gonna hit the beach for a while, go hang out. Just swung by to grab Tim a swimsuit I can lend him.” 

“You came to Hawaii to ‘get away’ and didn’t pack a swimsuit?” Moon says skeptically. 

“Yup,” Tim replies with the most placidly innocent expression he’s ever worn in his life. Nothing. He is giving her nothing. Let all her reporter instincts strike against mirrored glass and high-security privacy windows and come to naught. 

Moon stares at him in silence, clearly waiting for him to fill it. Tim doesn’t fall for the incredibly obvious bait and just keeps the placidly innocent expression on. 

She frowns. 

“C’mon, man,” Superboy says cheerfully, apparently–and fortunately–oblivious to their stand-off. He grabs Tim’s arm and drags him towards the front porch. Tim seriously doubts its structural stability, from the look of it, but tactile telekinesis is hard to argue with. 

The steps manage not to collapse–possibly also because of tactile telekinesis, Tim can’t help suspecting–and Superboy pulls him straight into the house, which is . . . not particularly well taken care of, no surprise. The furniture looks like it all came from a thrift store, and not a nice thrift store. 

Admittedly Tim’s upbringing might be showing here, but also the corners need swept and there’s random boxes of assorted Superboy merch everywhere, most of which looks like cheap junk, and a huge stack of mail and four empty pizza boxes on the coffee table and overflowing trash cans with random junk scattered around, and it’s just . . . it doesn’t look taken care of, no. Which is something Tim would expect from a teenager or two, and maybe Dubbilex doesn’t know how chore wheels work or whatever, but fucking Rex Leech should at least be capable of getting out the broom once a week. 

Assuming there is one, anyway. Tim isn’t particularly optimistic on that one, honestly. 

Superboy’s room is even messier than the living room, covered in dirty clothes and abandoned comics and crumpled-up papers, but Tim’s bedroom looks like a bomb went off in it so he’s not gonna judge. Anyway, that’s Superboy’s personal space, not a common area. He can keep it however he likes, Tim figures. 

Somebody should really sweep that living room, though. And throw out those old pizza boxes, too. 

Tim isn’t judging, just–well, no, he is very much judging, actually. Specifically what he’s judging is Rex Leech, noted asshole sleazeball manager with predatory business tactics. 

Fuck that guy, seriously. 

“You want trunks or a speedo?” Superboy asks as he lets go of his arm to fly over to the cluttered dresser. Tim turns seventeen different shades of red and nearly disassociates. 

“Trunks,” he says quickly. “Please.” 

“Gotcha, man,” Superboy says easily, and then all the dresser drawers yank out at once and dump out crumpled piles of . . . mostly swimsuits and super-suits, it looks like, yeah. Like, basically nothing else but swimsuits and super-suits and a couple of cheesy-looking Hawaiian shirts. 

Well, that might be one lonely, lonely pair of cutoffs sticking out from underneath the swimsuits. But otherwise, that’s pretty much it, yeah. 

Fuck, that’s depressing, Tim thinks. 

Superboy comes back over with an armful of swimsuits, just about all of which have the S-shield either printed or stitched on them. Tim wonders why the guy even has this many swimsuits, especially considering he barely has any other clothes at all. At least not as far as he can see, anyway. 

He also wonders if he’s gonna die if he wears Superboy’s clothes. Is that a thing that might happen? Because it really might happen, yeah. 

Also wearing something with an S-shield on it feels like just a little too much to handle right now, so Tim’s hoping for a basic black option to be buried somewhere in that pile. Given Superboy’s apparent fashion sense, it seems unlikely, but hope springs eternal. 

“Take a look, see what’s good,” Superboy says, dumping the entire armful of swimsuits on Tim. Tim’s just grateful he remembered to stick to just the trunks, at this point. 

“So you spend a lot of time on the beach, huh?” he says wryly. 

“C’mon, man, it’s Hawaii,” Superboy says with a sheepish grin. “And I mean, I look good in anything but wet leather is just not a comfortable fit, you know?” 

“I guess it wouldn’t be, no,” Tim says, giving him Civilian Smile #4 again. Superboy’s ears redden a little again, and then he leans back and zips back across the room to shove all his drawers back shut. Tim lays out the pile of swimsuits on the bed, since it’s right there anyway, and then immediately feels embarrassed to be this close to Superboy’s bed. Which is stupid, even if they aren’t platonics. They’ve just met; it’s not like anything’s gonna happen. 

. . . even if Superboy is a notorious flirt and totally shameless and–

Tim is just not gonna pursue that line of thought right now, he decides. Just for his own sanity and all. 

He accidentally knocks some paper off the bed as he’s laying out the suits to get a look at them, and reflexively leans down to pick it up. The room’s a mess, yeah, but it’s Superboy’s mess. It’s still rude to just drop shit wherever. 

The paper isn’t as crumpled as some of the others, and Tim sees a glimpse of color as he picks it up. His inner detective reflexively wonders what it is, and . . . 

Tim uncrumples the paper a little, and blinks down at it in surprise. It’s a little kid’s drawing, it looks like. A sunny beach rendered in bright colored pencil and simple, awkward shapes all painstakingly but clumsily colored in and–

Superboy’s suddenly right back next to him snatching the paper from him and immediately hiding it behind his back, looking absolutely mortified. Tim’s confused, for a moment. What’s he embarrassed about? It’s obviously not anything he’d have drawn himself. It’s probably just something a fan or a neighbor’s kid gave him, or . . . 

Tim pauses. Then he recontextualizes just how much crumpled-up paper is lying around Superboy’s room and wonders, very briefly, if a bunch of STEM majors with delusions of grandeur would’ve bothered programming their custom-designed “Superman” with anything resembling art skills. 

So . . . maybe that is something Superboy drew himself. If Cadmus didn’t program him with the muscle memory or knowledge of how to draw . . . well, then he probably would draw like a little kid, wouldn’t he. 

And given Superboy’s cocky, braggart personality and defensive ego and how all that paper is all crumpled up as if in frustration . . . 

“Gift from a fan?” Tim “assumes” with Smiling Civilian Face #4, pretending to be oblivious. 

“Uh–yeah!” Superboy blurts quickly as he jumps on the provided excuse, though he keeps the paper behind his back. “Yeah, just–you know, just some kid gave it to me at a signing, whatever. Uh, bathroom’s through there, if you wanna get changed. Or like, whatever.” 

“Thanks,” Tim says, and resists the itching urge to peek at a few more of those crumpled-up papers. It’s just a lot of paper, especially if Superboy’s upset with the results. 

He wonders why the guy draws so much, if he’s that frustrated and embarrassed by it. Maybe it’s a rebellion thing, since it’s something Cadmus didn’t want him to know how to do. Tim would definitely understand that logic, if he were in Superboy’s situation. Or maybe he’s just bothered not to know how and trying to teach himself to make up for the perceived failing. 

Or maybe he just likes it, Tim supposes. That’s an option too. 

Probably a less likely one, though, given that it’s Superboy. Not to be an asshole or anything, just it’s a lot easier picturing the guy assuming he should be able to do something and getting fixated on trying to pull it off than just, like . . . liking to draw. Also, judging by all that balled-up paper, it doesn’t seem like there’s all that much there for him to “like”, either. 

Tim takes the plainest set of trunks with a drawstring waist, which are black and dark blue but still have an S-shield iron-on patch sewn onto their waistband, for whatever reason, and ducks into the bathroom with them. He realizes belatedly that said S-shield is probably going to rest right up against his soulmark, then feels like an idiot for feeling flustered by that idea and just sets his bag against the wall and starts getting undressed. 

He’s definitely wearing one of the spare shirts in his go-bag for this, he decides as he stuffs his clothes into his bag. Just–definitely, yeah. 

The trunks fit once he cinches the drawstring enough, but the S-shield definitely does rest right against his soulmark. Tim has never actually considered the sight of the S-shield to be, like . . . relevant or interesting outside of work, but he’s realizing that he sure does feel differently about it now that he knows his soulmate’s one of the people wearing it. 

Which is a little ironic, really, considering Superboy wears the S-shield as a branding thing or whatever and lets Leech slap it on whatever cheap shitty merch he can think of. Like, he’s probably the least respectful S-wearer there is.

Tim pulls on a plain clean T-shirt and a short-sleeve button-down to go over it, figuring that’s beach-friendly enough. He should’ve packed sunglasses, probably, but he was a little distracted by his kidnapping plans and didn’t think to. 

Seriously. He didn’t think to bring sunglasses to Hawaii. 

This whole situation definitely has him off his game, yeah. 

Soulmate thing, he guesses. 

Tim eyes himself in the bathroom mirror, mentally decides he’s being an idiot to worry about how he looks right now, and then grabs his bag and heads back out into the bedroom. Superboy’s changed into low-waisted S-shield-themed trunks of his own and flip-flops and nothing else, which does in fact give Tim an embarrassingly good and embarrassingly distracting view of their soulmark. It’s not quite distracting enough for him to miss the fact that the amount of crumpled papers strewn around the room has noticeably decreased, though. And there’s definitely more of them sticking out from under the bed and dresser and in the back of the closet than there previously were. 

Which is kinda cute, honestly, but Tim should probably not say that. Like, ever. 

“Thanks for waiting,” he says, smiling Normal Civilian Smile #4 at Superboy as he hitches his bag up a little higher on his shoulder. “And for the loan.” 

Superboy stares blankly at him for half a second, then seems to startle a little and puffs himself up. 

“Uh–sure, yeah!” he says quickly. “No problem, man. Anytime.” 

“‘Anytime’ seems pretty open, as an offer,” Tim jokes, because normal civilians make that kind of joke, and Superboy turns red. 

“Oh, uh–you know what I mean!” he sputters awkwardly, holding his hands up, which seems kind of a lot as a reaction, and then somehow manages to nearly knock over his dresser without even touching it. Well–that'd be the TTK, Tim guesses. 

It wasn't even that much of a joke. Like, lame suburban dad joke territory, that's all. 

“I do, yeah,” he says with a wry smile. Superboy finds a way to turn even redder and shoves his dresser back into a corner. That also seems like kind of a lot as a reaction, but Tim doesn't comment. Just seems, well . . . awkward? Unnecessary? “Are we good to go, then?” 

“Um, yeah, yeah,” Superboy says, clearing his throat and then zipping out into the hall. Tim wonders if he always flies indoors this much. “All good, dude! Let's head out.” 

“Sure,” Tim says, keeping the smile on. Superboy is still red, but floats along down the hall. Tim follows. Okay. They’re almost definitely not platonic, but Superboy clearly isn’t any more sure what to do with that than Tim is, so . . . small favors, he guesses. Like–that they’re at least roughly on the same page there, he means. 

Unless he’s just reading into things because of weird personal biases he didn’t even know he had, and Superboy is completely straight and just kind of socially awkward around civilians, and Tim’s just being socially pressured by the background radiation of living in a society that over-values romantic soulmates in comparison to platonic ones and sometimes disavows the value of platonic soulmates altogether. 

He supposes technically they could be familial, rare as that is. It’s not like he really knows how he’d feel about having a brother. Dick’s the closest thing to one he’s ever had, and that’s just . . . not actually the same thing, obviously, even if sometimes he wishes . . . 

Anyway. It doesn’t matter. He’s pretty sure having a brother wouldn’t in any way involve this level of embarrassment and unexpected hormones and just general sexuality-questioning over every little thing. Like, that seems very much not like what having a brother would be like. So–maybe he isn’t straight, or maybe Superboy’s not actually a boy, or maybe both of those things are true, or maybe he’s just really, really bad at having a soulmate. 

Entirely possible, under the circumstances. Tim’s not really all that good at getting close to people. If he got a little confused about how to handle having a soulmate, well . . . that wouldn’t really be a surprise, would it. 

Or maybe he just doesn’t want to have to figure out how to come out to his dad or Dana or the goddamn Batman. 

One or the other, probably. 

. . . statistically speaking, the likelier explanation probably is not wanting to come out to the goddamn Batman. 

“Wanna fly someplace or just chill on the beach out front?” Superboy asks as he floats backwards into the living room. Krypto runs up and jumps on Tim excitedly, his tail wagging so hard his whole little body’s wagging with it. He’s a weird-looking little mutt, but he’s really friendly, apparently. “Krypto, oh my god, get off him.” 

“I don't mind,” Tim says, leaning down to give Krypto a polite little pat on the head. Krypto barks happily and wags his tail so hard he knocks himself over. 

Yeah, weird dog in general, Tim thinks. But again, really friendly. 

“We can go wherever,” he says. “You're the local, you know the best places to get a little time alone to hang out, right?” 

“‘Alone’?” Superboy repeats, his ears reddening again as he somehow manages to trip in mid-air and hits his head on the doorframe. Tim can probably safely write off the idea of “platonic” at this point, but is still a little bit wary of his personal bias interfering. Though . . . “Uh–yeah! Totally! Yeah! We can do that!” 

Yeah, Superboy really isn’t selling the “platonic” idea here either. 

Does Tim have a boyfriend now? Is this how boyfriends happen? 

. . . well, or a girlfriend, maybe. He still hasn’t ruled out the “maybe Superboy’s just trans” option. That seems like a thing that might confuse his sexuality a little, if nothing else. 

This is definitely not anything like any previous girlfriend-getting he’s experienced, though. Like, not even a little bit. He’s not complaining, exactly, because admittedly it’s actually a little bit easier going into a new relationship with a plan and a cover established, even if the plan is still in flux and the relationship’s “romantic” vs “platonic” status is still unclear. It’s still something he can approach like a case, which is much more straightforward than just floundering around trying to figure out how normal people work. 

And Superboy’s about as far from a “normal person” as it gets, so really, this is a pretty ideal set-up on Tim’s end. 

Hopefully Superboy feels similarly, though he also, like . . . is lacking some pretty important information there, so . . . yeah, that might be an issue. Bruce would definitely not have appreciated Robin telling Superboy he was his soulmate, though, and who knows how Superboy would’ve even taken that. Going in as a civilian is going pretty smoothly, though, so Tim’s pretty sure it was the right choice. 

Hopefully it was, anyway. 

“Cool,” Tim says, keeping up the placid harmless civilian face and thoughts and Totally-Not-A-Vigilante vibes. Superboy does a very bad job of pretending he didn’t just bump into the doorframe and ducks back outside, putting on a cocky grin of his own as he does. It occurs to Tim, briefly, that maybe Superboy has his own catalog of performative expressions. None of his friends really seem to, but Superboy is in the community too, so . . . well, it’d make sense, right? 

Also he does sell his likeness via a sleazy manager’s sleazy business deals, so yeah. It does kind of make sense. 

Huh. That’s . . . a thought, he guesses. 

Not a thought he’d really had yet. 

Just . . . something they might have in common, Tim guesses. 

Though so is being in the community to begin with, obviously. And they're physiologically about the same age and have similar coloring, though Superboy is–well, not actually mixed with East Asian, because Krypton did not have an actual place called “Asia”, but he does have subtle hints of that look, same as Superman. Easy to mistake for just being white, but recognizable if you know what you're looking for. Superboy would be at least half-white given Westfield's DNA, Tim guesses, but . . . 

Yeah, no, he doesn't even know how to begin to figure out the nuances of racial identity on a dead planet he knows next to nothing about, much less any potential experience parallels there might be for a second-generation half-alien immigrant with effectively zero access to their own culture, but maybe he could–

Right, okay, he needs to focus here. There's some fascinating stuff there that he can theorize about and investigate later, once he's kidnapped Superboy properly. The kidnapping is the current priority, though. Like, it is very much the current priority. 

Tim follows Superboy back out onto the porch. Everyone else is still out there, which is fine in regards to Roxy and Dubbilex and not fine in regards to Leech and . . . well, jury's out on Moon, maybe. 

Also the dog. He doesn't really know about the dog. Though said dog does run after him and jump up for attention wagging his scruffy little tail hard enough to wag his whole little body, which is sort of cute. 

Or as cute as a wet dishrag can get, anyway. 

Tim’s trying not to judge Krypto for that, since obviously he didn't ask to be born as the living embodiment of a wet dishrag, and anyway he's a really friendly dog, so judging by appearances seems like a dick move. Even if Tim kind of wants to iron him, to be honest. Steam-clean, maybe. 

At least take him to a decent groomer, if nothing else. 

“Down, you little shit, Jesus!” Kon says, scowling down at Krypto and trying to shoo him away. Krypto growls at him, which seems weird, then goes back to fawning all over Tim. Tim leans down and pats his head, figuring it might calm him down. 

“It’s okay,” he says. “He is cute.” 

“Whatever,” Superboy grumbles, folding his arms and inexplicably glowering at his dog. 

“You gonna go swim, or just hang out?” Roxy asks curiously as she comes over to them again. 

“Oh, we’re–” Superboy starts, but Moon cuts him off. 

“Want some company?” Moon inquires, pleasant and suspicious all at once. Superboy looks–conflicted, momentarily, and then awkward. 

“Um, well–Tim’s only in town for today, so . . . next time?” he hedges. Tim resists the urge to eye Moon. Can I just spontaneously insert myself in your first day with your brand-new soulmate? is incredibly rude, as a suggestion. And incredibly fucking disrespectful to boot. Like, what entitled-ass kind of thing is that to ask, exactly? 

How old is she again? Twenty? Twenty-one? He should look that up later. Well–no, she’d graduated college and started her career by the time Superman had died, which was a good eight or nine months ago now, so unless she skipped a grade or two in there, she’s gotta be closer to twenty-four, if not twenty-five or twenty-six. 

That’s . . . a thought, considering there is definitely news footage of Superboy kissing her in Metropolis. Like, Tim very definitely saw news footage of Superboy kissing her in Metropolis. And she was very definitely kissing him too. 

In retrospect, that seems like something someone should’ve, like . . . done something about? Or at least addressed? And is definitely further proof of how fucking useless and slimy Rex Leech is. Sure, let the five-minute-old clone make out with a twentysomething reporter and hang out with her at home; all publicity is good publicity, so it’s fine, right? Sure. Why wouldn’t it be? 

Tim is going to absolutely decimate that bastard’s credit the first chance he gets. Leech probably already has terrible credit, mind, but he’ll make it worse. He’ll find a way. 

. . . though he’ll wait until he’s sure Roxy is eighteen and financially independent, he doesn’t actually know if she is or not. Roxy seems nice, she doesn’t deserve that particular fallout. 

“It’d be nice to get to know each other later, I’m sure,” Tim says before Moon can say anything, smiling Gala Smile #1 at her, which is a targeted psychological attack and not actually very moral to be trotting out this quick, probably. 

He has no regrets, for the record. Absolutely none. 

Moon narrows her eyes suspiciously. Tim blithely strokes Krypto’s ears, Gala Smile #1 flawless and unphased. 

“I’m sure,” she “agrees” frostily. Superboy remains apparently oblivious to the tension and grins brightly at both of them. 

“Cool!” he says. Oh, sweet summer child who has clearly never socialized with sharks, Tim thinks resignedly, petting Krypto again. Has Leech taught him literally nothing about conversational warfare, for fuck’s sake? At least living with your sleaze of a manager should be good for that, dammit! 

Then again, Leech is probably not actually competent enough to teach Superboy anything actually useful, so maybe that’s for the best. 

If nothing else, Superman could’ve taught him a bit of “bless your heart”, but apparently that’s not a thing either. 

Tim has a brief moment of dread that maybe underneath his personal list of performative expressions, Superboy might just be a straightforward and honest person, which is a concerning thought. He doesn’t even know how to talk to a straightforward and honest person at this point, after this long as Batman’s emotional support sidekick. How do you form a lasting relationship with someone who isn’t habitually using at least three layers of double-talk and constantly locked in on all your microexpressions, anyway? 

That’s going to be a weird experience, yeah. 

“Ready to go?” Superboy asks Tim, grinning brighter at him. Tim feels momentarily overwhelmed and just sort of . . . has to collect himself about that, a little. 

Or a lot. 

“Lead the way,” he says, smiling at him. He’s flustered enough to forget to use an appropriately-planned smile, which is embarrassing, but Superboy just grins even brighter–which should not be physically possible, but apparently is–and reaches out to scoop him up into his arms and into the air again as Krypto lets out an offended bark. It’s totally overkill and not even slightly necessary. 

Tim isn’t complaining, just–well–

It’s really flustering. 

“Air Superboy up, up, and away!” Superboy says cheerfully as they float up over the others’ heads. His face is way too close to Tim’s face. 

Tim is gonna need a bit longer to collect himself this time, he’s pretty sure. 

“Do I get an in-flight meal?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. Superboy laughs, which is even worse than his grin, and then takes off across the beachfront with him. It’s another bridal carry, which is quietly mortifying but could be worse, probably. Maybe. 

Somehow. 

Superboy flies them straight across the beach and then straight out over the water, skimming them along just above the waves. Tim makes a briefly startled noise, reflexively tightening his grip on the strap of his bag. 

“This isn’t waterproof,” he says just as reflexively, and Superboy laughs again. 

“I’m not gonna drop you, dude,” he says. Tim actually more assumed Superboy was intending to either dive-bomb them both into the water or just dump him in on purpose, because that seems like Superboy’s sense of humor, but maybe that was an unfair assumption. 

He really is not prepared for how it feels to be held in close against Superboy’s bare chest and arms like this, even if he’s still wearing a shirt himself. The idea of possibly doing that while they’re both wet seems a lot worse. 

Yeah. Definitely worse. 

Tim should’ve worn long sleeves. And maybe a wetsuit. And maybe a few layers on top of that. 

Jesus. 

“I’m gonna hold you to that,” he says, barely resisting the urge to loop his arms around Superboy’s neck as the other hangs a right and swoops them back around towards shore. Flying over the water like this is a pretty cool experience, admittedly, now that he’s not worried about Superboy dumping him in the water. 

Well. Less worried, anyway. 

Camera next time, Tim promises himself, glancing back over Superboy’s shoulder towards the shining horizon. The sun reflects off the waves bright and beautiful, and the sky is a smooth and perfect blue dotted with sparse but billowing clouds, and everything smells like salt and sea and leather, which is probably Superboy, even without the jacket on anymore. 

Definitely camera next time. 

“Definitely holding you to that, actually,” he says, and Superboy laughs again and brings them down in the surf just past the tideline with a splash. Neither the splash or the water goes high enough to soak Tim's bag, so he figures it could've been worse. 

Assuming Superboy isn't planning to toss him or anything before he can put his bag down somewhere safe, anyway. 

They both settle down into the surf and onto their feet, and Tim becomes very aware of how close together they’re standing and also how very, very shirtless Superboy is, and in fact the only thing between their soulmarks is the very thin layer of cotton of Tim’s own shirt, and if he leaned in just a little bit . . . 

Jesus, Tim thinks faintly, and forces himself to take a step back before he can make it weird. 

He smiles Generically Pleasant Civilian Smile #2 just to make sure he doesn’t look like a creep or anything, and Superboy grins excitedly at him. Tim allows himself all of two seconds to be overwhelmed by that gorgeous expression and their physical closeness and the reflection of the light in Superboy’s eyes, as bright and perfectly blue as both the sky and water, and then reasserts standard operating procedures and keeps Generically Pleasant Civilian Smile #2 locked in place on his face. 

“The water’s really warm,” he observes, glancing down at it. “Is that normal?” 

It’s probably not an impending supervillain thing, he tells himself. 

Maybe global warming or something, though. 

“I mean, feels normal to me?” Superboy says with a shrug. Tim considers mentioning the average ocean temperature, comparatively speaking, or at least the average temperature of the water off the docks in Gotham. Admittedly, Gotham waters barely count as “water”, legally speaking, but that’s not the point. 

“It’s pretty out here,” he says instead, and Superboy grins at him and leans in. He’s pretty sure it’s more an instinctive thing than a deliberate one, just from the way Superboy does it, but that doesn’t exactly make it less flattering. 

Or flustering. 

“I mean, it’s Hawaii, man!” Superboy says, grinning wider before kicking at the surf. “‘Course it’s gonna be pretty!” 

Actually you specifically are possibly the prettiest damn thing that I have ever seen, Tim thinks, but isn’t stupid enough to actually let out of his mouth. Superboy, unfortunately, continues to be all warm and grinning and lit up by island sun. Tim did not come prepared enough for this. 

“I don’t know, I’m pretty sure I’d be the guy who came to Hawaii and got a monsoon,” he says wryly, and Superboy laughs brightly. 

Tim really did not come prepared enough for this. Like, not at all. Not even slightly. 

“Guess you’d just have to come back, then,” Superboy says, grinning wider again and kicking at the surf again as he floats back up out of it. It’s–weird, a little, looking up at him like this. 

Well, not weird, just . . . yeah. 

Something like that. 

“Guess so,” Tim agrees, feeling embarrassingly flustered. Superboy’s friends can probably still see them from the porch, distant though it is, but part of him is still just considering very weird and dumb and insane ideas like maybe tugging Superboy back down to earth and into the surf and just . . . confirming the little sexuality crisis he’s been having since breaking into the other’s file and seeing their soulmark in it, maybe. 

Just, you know, ruling things out. Making deductions. Going through the process of elimination. 

Kissing him, maybe. 

He could very, very much kiss Superboy right now. They’re on a gorgeous beach in the surf and under the sun and Superboy is floating in front of him and grinning as happy and excited as could be and Tim’s stomach is fluttering in a stupid and also-embarrassing way, and . . . 

He could kiss him. That’s all. 

“I mean, it’s a nice place to visit, right?” Superboy says casually, linking his hands together behind his back. 

“The tourism industry seems to think so,” Tim says, wry again, and wonders what the “normal civilian who didn’t come here specifically looking for his soulmate to kidnap/salvage him to begin with” thing to say is here. He has absolutely no idea, because he actually has absolutely no idea how normal civilians react to superheroes. Robin is . . . not exactly an urban myth, necessarily, but definitely not a publicly-recognized superhero. He’s a vigilante that’s just barely allowed to operate outside the law, and not one with any kind of publicity or celebrity involved. 

Superboy, on the other hand, is not only a superhero, but a professional superhero. He’s selling his likeness and doing events and has signed a stupid predatory contract with a sleaze of a manager that technically shouldn’t even be legal, given Superboy isn’t even considered a legal person by the government. Apparently no one has ever realized that, though, or at least no one’s ever let Superboy realize that. 

Tim really doesn’t love that that’s a thing, to put it mildly. 

Actually, he just fucking hates it. 

Superboy laughs, and looks very, very pretty doing it. Tim continues to wonder what a normal civilian would do here, and for lack of a better idea falls back on small talk. 

God, his best plan right now is small talk. What is his life, even? 

No wonder he’s gonna have to take six months to kidnap Superboy, ugh. 

“So, uh–this seems like a weird question to be bringing up this late in the conversation, but what’s your name?” he asks, because it’s occurred to him that he actually has no idea what Superboy goes by when he’s off-duty. He knows he doesn’t have a secret identity, obviously, but there’s no way his friends just call him “Superboy”. Well–maybe his slimy asshole manager does, but otherwise. “I mean, if that’s okay to ask. Marks or not, I understand if you don’t feel like we’re there yet, given the whole superhero thing and all.” 

Robin knows Superboy doesn’t have a secret identity, after all, but Tim Drake is a normal civilian and shouldn’t act like he knows too much about any superhero in general, so–

“Naw, it’s fine, I don’t even have one,” Superboy says, for some reason just beaming at him, which is . . . weird, Tim thinks, but nowhere near as weird as that answer is. 

“You don’t . . . have one?” he repeats slowly, and Superboy shrugs easily. “Like–not at all?” 

“Yeah, everybody pretty much just calls me 'Kid' or 'SB', when it's not Superboy,” Superboy confirms. “Oh, and Knockout calls me 'Pup' when she's around but like, that's really just a 'her' thing and she’s low-key a supervillain, so yeah. So, you know, you can call me whatever.” 

Tim stares blankly at him for a long, long moment, speed-runs all five stages of grief, and also discovers a couple of new and unexpected ones. 

Alright. Well, he officially regrets literally nothing about this impending kidnapping. 

“Oh, okay,” he says. “Um–sorry, I guess I just assumed you’d have a more . . . civilian-ish name too, I guess?” 

“I’m a clone, man,” Superboy says, looking like he thinks Tim’s said something funny. “The only other name I’ve got is ‘Experiment Thirteen’, which is definitely not something I answer to.” 

Tim discovers a few more stages of grief that hit with all the subtlety of a spiked baseball bat and makes himself nod as much like a normal person as he can. 

“Yeah, I don’t think I’d go for that one if I were you either,” he says. “Kind of a mouthful, if nothing else.” 

Superboy laughs, then grins at him again. He is actually doing so, so much of that, Tim’s realizing. Tim was really not prepared for how much of that he’s been doing, in fact. He just did not come prepared for any of that at all. He’s got some nebulous kidnapping plans, but everything else here–from the supervillain attack to Superboy’s ripped suit and exposed soulmark–has been a crime of opportunity. 

He probably should’ve done more research. Actually, he definitely should’ve done more research. He kind of just panicked and bought a ticket and flew right over, and just because Dick didn’t stop him doesn’t mean it was a good idea. He just–he should’ve done more research. Planned more. Not shown up without something concrete. 

Admittedly Superboy doesn’t hate him yet or anything, but this was just . . . yeah, this was not his brightest idea at all. Not even slightly. 

Why didn’t he do more research? 

“You really can just call me whatever you wanna, don’t worry about it,” Superboy says with another one of those too-easy shrugs as he settles back down into the surf, which, unfortunately, puts him back into kissing range and is therefore incredibly distracting. 

Dammit, Tim thinks, trying to beat his stupid teenage hormones into order. Why is he even a teenager at all? It’s so inconvenient. He really needs to live to twenty just so he can stop being one, because god forbid he die at fifteen too and end up, like, a teenage ghost or something. He would just not be okay with that. He feels even worse for Jason thinking about that, actually. 

“Whatever I want?” he repeats, because he’s an idiot with no control over his hormones whatsoever. 

He really needs to make it to twenty. 

“Well, except for Experiment Thirteen. That one sucks,” Superboy says with another grin. Tim politely pretends not to notice the slight tightening of the corners of the other’s mouth as he says it. 

“Uh, okay,” he says, clearing his throat. He guesses Superboy doesn’t really care what his name is, then, but being told to just call him whatever he wants to is . . . well, a weird feeling, maybe. “What do you do when you just want to be a civilian for a while, though?” 

“I don’t,” Superboy says. 

“. . . don’t . . . what?” Tim asks slowly, not sure if he should be dreading the answer or not, but–

“Be a civilian,” Superboy says. 

Tim’s running out of new stages of grief, he’s pretty sure. 

“Ah,” he says. 

Superboy–for a second, Tim thinks he looks self-conscious, but then he’s grinning again before he can be sure, and . . . 

“Why would I, man?” Superboy says, puffing up proudly. “I’m Superboy! Nothing else I’d rather be.” 

Given how limited Superboy’s options for anything “else” he could be probably are . . . well, Tim’s not sure what to think of that statement. He doesn’t think it’s anything good, whatever it is. 

Yeah, he thinks as he looks at Superboy’s too-bright grin and thinks about how he just said "nothing" and not "no one". Definitely not anything good. Whether that was intentional or just an unknowing slip . . . well, who wouldn’t pick being “Superboy” over being “Experiment Thirteen”? 

And what else would Superboy even know how to pick, if he thought those were his only options? 

“Doesn’t that get . . . tiring?” Tim asks carefully. “Being Superboy all the time?” 

Superboy blinks. Tilts his head. 

And so, so obviously doesn’t understand the question. 

Dammit, Tim thinks. 

“Naw, man,” Superboy says confidently, grinning at him. “It’s great!” 

Tim genuinely cannot imagine how it could even be mediocre. They’re very different people, obviously, but–always? Always being the hero persona? Only being the hero persona? 

Not even being able to call it a persona, because it was all you ever were or had been? 

Even normal celebrities dress down sometimes or try to sneak around under the radar. A celebrity superhero . . . how does Superboy even do anything? Ever? It’s not like he lives in a gated community or a wealthy area or around any other famous people or superheroes; he’s an anomaly in both Hawaii in general and in his neighborhood specifically, as far as Tim can tell. Well–as much as he’s in a “neighborhood”, anyway. There seems to be a decent amount of space between houses, which makes Tim wonder exactly how expensive this house was, especially since it’s basically right on the beach, but also it’s not in particularly good condition and– 

God, he really wants a look at the setup of Superboy’s licensing deals, actually. And his bank balances and investments and just anything like that. And specifically, Rex Leech’s finances in relation to those deals and balances and investments. 

Seriously, fuck that guy. Tim wouldn’t trust Rex Leech with his spare change, much less literally everything about the entire livelihood of a teen idol with limited legal personhood. 

“Oh, cool,” he says with a very careful reissue of Civilian Smile #7, trying to sound like he isn’t actively fantasizing about faxing all of Rex Leech’s tax returns for the last entirety-of-Superboy’s-existence to the IRS with some very pointed notes in red pen. 

Very pointed. 

Superboy grins at him again. Tim thinks he’s going to have to start just inventing new stages of grief, at this point. The current ones aren’t going to cover this situation. 

“Sorry, I didn’t mean anything by it, I just thought it might be a little harder to hang out together if you’re really never doing the civilian look,” he tries, and Superboy–stills, suddenly, and the grin vanishes all at once. Tim has a moment to be split between having an anxiety attack about having said the wrong thing or having an anxiety attack about the supervillain attack that’s about to land on his head when he still doesn’t have a mask, and then–

“You–what?” Superboy asks, looking startled. “I mean, uh–like–you wouldn’t get bored doin’ that?” 

“. . . hanging out with you?” Tim asks blankly. They’re soulmates. And also Superboy is quite possibly the literally least boring person he has ever met, douchey shades or not, and the list of “least boring” people in his life includes Bruce and Dick and more superheroes than he could shake his bo stick at. How is someone getting bored around him even a concern that would occur to Superboy? Like, literally ever? 

“No, I mean–” Superboy turns red, looking briefly embarrassed. “You wouldn’t have more fun hangin’ out with Superboy than just, uh–some guy?” 

It takes all of Tim’s Bat-training and gala-experience to not stare at him over that. That–what kind of question is that? 

“I mean, I’m just some guy,” he lies. “But I just meant it’d be way easier to hang out if we weren’t having to deal with people bugging you for selfies or autographs or whatever all the time, you know?” 

“I–uh, I guess,” Superboy says, still looking flustered. “Like–probably, I guess.” 

“Also I don’t want, like, a Gotham rogue randomly deciding you being in town is a good reason to start some shit,” Tim says wryly, because he definitely does not want that, in fact. “Feel like Batman wouldn’t like that very much.” 

“You believe in Batman, dude?” Superboy asks, raising an eyebrow at him. 

“You’re a half-alien clone and you think Batman’s hard to believe in?” Tim attempts to deflect with, because that was definitely a fuck-up on his part, and Superboy just laughs. 

“No, man, I just have literally never met a Gothamite who’d admit to believing Batman was a real dude,” he says. “I literally met Robin like a week ago and, like, pretty sure he was low-key trying to convince me he didn’t believe Batman existed.” 

It was not even a week, Tim thinks, mildly indignant for no good reason, then puts Dubious Civilian Expression #1 on his face and rolls his eyes. 

“Okay, Batman’s one thing, but no one actually thinks Robin’s real,” he snorts, and Superboy laughs again, sounding straight-up delighted about it. 

“No, he totally is!” he protests, grinning at him again too and linking his hands together behind his back as he leans towards him, which is incredibly, incredibly distracting for him. “Dude’s got the sick flips and everything and I totally saved his ass from Metallo. And, uh, then he totally saved my ass from Poison Ivy. Long story. Also he’s got a stick up his ass, like legit you would think that was where he kept that quarterstaff thing of his.” 

This is a dangerous topic, Tim recognizes while forcing down the instinct to reply it’s a bo staff, actually, they’re pretty different, and tries to figure out how to change the subject as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Robin talk is not a good idea right now, when there’s a risk of Superboy possibly noticing something about him, what with meeting Robin a reasonably fresh experience in his mind. 

Not that fresh, apparently, since he thinks it was “like a week” ago. But whatever. Not the point. Tim’s just annoyed by the inaccurate intel. 

. . . seriously. A week? 

“Batman or not, you apparently already have beef with Poison Ivy, so definitely I’d be worried about you being publicly in town without needing to pack a super-powered weed-whacker,” he says wryly instead of anything more damning or secret-identity-blowing. Superboy looks–weird, for a moment, leaning back a little bit to straighten back up. 

“You’d, like–actually be cool with me visiting you in Gotham? Like–that wouldn’t be annoying or whatever?” he asks, sounding just barely uncertain about it, and Tim again has to force himself not to stare at him. First: Superboy being any kind of uncertain whatsoever is the weirdest thing he’s ever seen, and second: they’re soulmates. People will spend a lot more time with their soulmates than occasionally visiting each other in different cities, especially five minutes after meeting them when they’re still trying to figure out who and what they are to each other. Again: Tim has investigated multiple missing persons cases that turned out to be “I found my soulmate” cases! Multiple! In Gotham, even! 

“Yes,” he says instead of any of that. “I would actually really like you to, in fact.” 

“Oh,” Superboy says, and turns red again. “I–uh–yeah, I guess that’d be cheaper than you needing to buy a plane ticket or run up your phone bill if you ever feel like shooting the shit or whatever, huh?” 

“I have unlimited minutes, actually,” Tim says, forcing down another stare. The staring would not help, at this moment. Or like–ever, probably. “And the plane ticket was only like a week’s allowance, plus my dad’s got a disgusting amount of frequent flyer miles saved up he never remembers to use anyway. I’ll buy you a plane ticket if you don’t feel like flying yourself.” 

“. . . uh,” Superboy says. Tim should stop talking, probably, but– 

“Also you’re my soulmate,” he says. “I could get, I dunno, an after-school job if I actually needed to cover anything like that. I just figured we could take turns flying over or something. I mean, if you decided to go to college in Gotham in a couple years or something I wouldn’t complain, obviously, just we’ve just met and that seems like a bit much to suggest first thing. Especially, uh, since you don’t actually have any transcripts, apparently. Um. Just, well, if you ever did want to be a civilian sometimes . . . like, eventually, I mean? Well, Gotham would probably be a good place to hide a Super, right? Nobody’d expect to see you there, and it’s not like you can’t commute.” 

Superboy is staring at him now. Tim thinks maybe he said something wrong after all. Or maybe the lycra rando is about to jump him from behind. 

Fifty-fifty, given the way his life tends to go. 

“Um,” he says. “Like–no pressure or anything. I could also look into colleges out here, do you know if there’s any good programming–uh, programs around? Like just tech in general.” 

Superboy is still staring at him. 

. . . okay, at this point, it’s probably that Tim said something wrong, yeah. 

God, he’s usually so much better at subtle social manipulations. Is this the panicking thing again? Is he panicking again? 

Apparently, yeah. 

“Um,” Tim says again. Superboy jolts like he’s just gotten shocked by static electricity or something and turns blazingly red. 

That is definitely not a color achievable by human circulatory systems, yeah. 

“Uh!” Superboy says, looking incredibly awkward for a second and then clearly forcing a casual, cocky pose as he raises an eyebrow at him with a smirk. It might come across as more convincingly casual if he weren’t still blushing, but Tim isn’t going to judge; blushing is generally an involuntary response. “I dunno, man, I don’t ask the college babes what their classes are like, you know? Not really my priority in the conversation.” 

. . . Tim might judge a little. Just, like–in passing. 

He really needs to figure out if they’re platonic or not. Just–very much so does he need to figure that out. 

“Well, if you get the chance next time, maybe you could just see what they think about the curriculum,” he suggests, because maybe they are platonic, and Superboy–hesitates, for a second, and then Tim’s not sure if he said something stupid or not, and then Superboy just grins at him again, crooked and easy, and it sort of fries Tim’s brain a little. 

Okay, so like . . . uh. Another mark against platonic, Tim guesses while he’s trying to remember how his slightly-fried brain even works. At least another mark against platonic on his end, anyway. Superboy talking about “college babes” is kind of a mark for platonic, admittedly. 

Unfortunately, Tim is still the guy whose first reaction to finding out Superboy was his soulmate was “wait, am I gay?”, so . . . yeah. 

So like, that’s a few things he’s gonna have to process at some point this week, he guesses. 

He can probably fit it in Thursday, he tells himself. 

“I mean, if you want me to chat up some campus coeds for ya, I guess I can be a soul-bro like that,” Superboy says, grinning wider. His grin is unfortunately gorgeous, and the statement is unfortunately heterosexual. Or at least very strongly platonic-soulmate-leaning, anyway. 

And Tim, to his awkward embarrassment, thinks he might actually be disappointed by that. 

. . . maybe he’ll fit in his processing on Sunday, he amends. Sunday he has a little more spare time to work with, and there’s just . . . going to be a lot of it, definitely. 

Just a lot. 

[vbecker10]

Hiii I was thinking an angst thing about loki accidentally hurting reader with his magic? Or something similar? Have a good day!!

Please Forgive Me

Pairing: Loki x female reader (Y/N)

Summary: As an analyst, you're not even supposed to go on missions but when Fury & Steve decide you are needed in the field, Loki accidently volunteers to train you. Despite your best efforts, your crush on the God of Mischief grows and when he finally tells you that you're ready to go with the team, you're filled with nervous excitement. Loki makes you promise you'll stay close to him but his desire to protect you from danger leads to you being injured by his magic.

A/N: Thank you so much for sending in this request! I love a good angst fic! Sorry it took so long for me to write it. It also got away from me a little (a whole lot actually) and I made it about three times as long as I meant to. I hope you like it! 💚

"Congratulations captain, this might be the most absurd plan you have ever come up with," Loki says with an eye roll as he leans back in his chair across from you.

You feel yourself shrinking, trying to be invisible as you sit between Natasha and Clint. Your eyes focus on your open laptop. The notes you had been taking stop mid sentence, leaving off exactly where Captain Rogers announced you were expected to join the team on the next mission. There's no way I should be doing this. I honestly don't think I've ever heard a worse idea in my entire life. I know it and so does the God of Mischief, you keep your anxious thoughts to yourself.

"None of us can access the computers as quickly as Y/N can. And that's not the only issue, one misstep and all the data on those hard drives will be wiped, we can't risk that," Natasha explains calmly.

"Nat's right, we can't complete this mission without Y/N," Clint says, the conversation continues as if you're not in the room and you wish you weren't. "Normally we could just mirror the drives or physically remove them but we can't, they need to be accessed on site."

You bite your lip, trying to find a flaw in their assessment of the situation but you can't find any. This is what I get for being SHIELD's top expert in Hydra's overly complicated computer system. I thought it was a good thing when I figured out how to extract files without triggering their firewalls but it seems like it's working against me now, you think. I guess my boss was right, I really should have gotten around to teaching other analysts to do this too because now they're going to send me to a freaking Hydra base in the middle of nowhere. You sink further down in your chair and debate escaping from the conference room, your eyes drifting towards the door. There's no way I'd make it anyways, every single person in here is faster than I am, you give up on that idea quickly.

"What's your plan then?" Steve asks Loki, folding his arms across his chest.

Your attention is now completely focused on Loki, curious to hear if he actually has a plan but he's still staring down Steve. The Asgardian doesn't look in your direction once, almost at if he doesn't realize your sitting directly across from him. "My plan remains the same, leave her here so she doesn't get herself killed," Loki says and you're quick to note that there's no concern in his tone.

He's not worried for my safety, he's simply stating a fact. I've never been in the field before, never held a gun, never learned to fight and why would I need to? I spend my days as far away from danger as possible, tucked behind a desk in my office on the 73rd floor, you think.

"She won't get killed," Steve says matter of factly but you're not sure you believe him anymore than the god does.

"And you can guarantee her safety?" Loki asks again without even a hint of worry. "You cannot simply send a civilian into an active Hydra base and assume they will not be injured or worse. She needs training-"

His words are cut off suddenly by director Fury who is sitting at the opposite end of the oval table. "That's an excellent idea your highness," he says with a sarcastic tone that makes you nervous and Loki wary.

"What is?" the younger Asgardian furrows his brow and looks at the director. You sit up straighter in your seat, unsure if Fury is on your side or not.

"You're right, Y/N needs field training," he says and you look from Fury back to Loki quickly as your eyes widen when you realize what he means. "You have one month to get her ready, we can postpone the mission until then."

"Wait!" Loki stands in response, ready to argue. "That is not what I was suggesting-"

"This sounds exactly like what you were insisting on," Thor smiles as he stands from his seat next to Loki, patting his younger brother on the back.

"I was not offering to do it myself," Loki argues, pulling away from his touch.

"I think you were," Natasha smirks.

"No, this is absurd," Loki groans. "I do not have time for this mortal-"

"Then make time," Fury says in a tone that leaves the god no room for further arguing.

Loki sighs deeply in defeat as he sits back down, his arms folded across his chest and his eyes drop to his coffee mug. After a brief moment of silence, he lifts his head and looks directly at you for the first time since the meeting began. "Seven o'clock in the East training room tomorrow morning," he states. You nod and he adds sternly, "Do not be late Y/L/N."

(The next morning - evaluation day)

You walk quickly down the hall towards the training room Loki reserved for you this morning having no idea what to expect. You're almost ten minutes early but you could barely sleep and you're terrified of how Loki might react if you are even a few minutes late. Pushing open the heavy metal door, you pause when you see Loki leaning against a nearby wall reading a thick leather bound book.

"Oh, good morning," you say. You didn't think he'd already be here and you attempt to sound cheerful and not overwhelmingly nervous.

The prince looks at you silently, checks his watch then nods seemingly in approval of your timing. The book vanishes into a haze of green mist and he takes a step towards you. "It's good to see you can tell time at the very least Y/L/N," Loki says.

"Y/N is fine," you tell him, trying to ignore what might be the closest thing to a compliment you get from him today.

He looks at you for a moment and you can't read his reaction to you at all. Today is going to be the longest day of my life, you think as you follow him to the center of the empty room.

"Wow," you mumble, you've never seen the training rooms before but you heard they held some of the most impressive technology in the Tower. The large space is covered in what appears to be simple white tiles, the floor, the walls and even the ceiling. The holograms created by the computer program can mimic any setting or environment, even weather conditions. Your eyes travel up to the high ceiling and you bump into Loki after not realizing he stopped walking.

He lets out a deep sigh in annoyance and you apologize, "I'm sorry."

"After you complete the simulations today, I will determine how many times a week we will need to meet and how long the training sessions will be," he says without acknowledging your apology.

You bite your lip anxiously, "So today is a test?"

"Yes, I need to evaluate your current abilities," Loki confirms.

"In that case, I have a really bad feeling we're going to be spending a lot of time together," you mumble when he walks towards the door leading to a side room for observation.

"As do I Y/L/N," he agrees even though you thought he was too far away to hear you. The God of Mischief goes into the observation room and you watch him through the glass that separates you. He takes a seat at the desk and turns on the computers, the lights around you dimming slowly.

"Hey, before we start I just wanted to say thanks," you say and Loki lifts his head, looking at you through the window. "I know you didn't really volunteer but you were the only one who seemed... concerned," you know that's not the right word but it's all you can think of at the moment, "about me going on the mission."

"The super soldier sometimes forgets how weak humans truly are," Loki responds, his voice coming through the speakers into the room.

"Yeah... well," you shrug. "Thanks anyway, I don't actually want to die out there," you laugh awkwardly.

Loki's quiet and you sigh, not expecting him to respond but after a few seconds he says, "You are welcome Y/N."

You smile, hoping the fact that he called you by your first name means he might be warming up to you just a tiny bit. Only a second later, the lights go out completely, your heart suddenly racing as you realize the evaluation has started and you have no idea what's going to happen.

(One month later)

You duck low as a series of bullets fly towards you, hitting the car you're using as cover. Swearing under your breath, you sit up, pressing your back against the car then stand as you turn, returning fire. Each bullet hits it's mark, taking out all three Hydra soldiers and clearing your path. You stay low, your eyes scanning the debris that litters the street as you make your way quickly around the bullet riddled car. You spot another soldier just as he steps out from behind an overturned bus. You fire first, taking him out easily then you run towards the brick building across the street and head through the open door.

As soon as you step over the threshold you squint, shielding your eyes with your hand as everything around you becomes almost blindingly white. The sounds of the harsh wind and distant sirens vanish as suddenly as the unpleasant smells of smoke and blood. You lower your hand, smiling as the training program is fully turned off and Loki walks towards you.

"So... how did I do?" you ask, hopeful as always to have his approval after a training session.

"Very well, darling," Loki smiles warmly at you.

You can't help but blush at the pet name he started using just a few days ago. The first time the annoyingly handsome God called you darling wasn't even in the training room. You were sure you misheard him say 'have a good evening darling' when you stopped by his office briefly with a question but he continued to use the pet name each time he saw you after that.

"I have good news," he tells you while he follows you to get your water. "I think you are officially ready to join the team on the mission."

You take a long drink of water then look at him stunned. "Really?" you ask excitedly.

"You passed every assessment I have thrown at you for the last week," he confirms with a proud smile. "I am no longer worried you will get yourself killed," he laughs a little.

You smile wide, "You know what that means right?"

He sighs deeply. "You truly mean to hold me to that?" he asks, sounding annoyed by the bet you insisted on two weeks ago but you know him better than that, or at least you hope you do.

"Aww don't pretend like you're not super happy about this," you laugh and hold your arms out wide. "You agreed, if I passed your silly little evaluation I got a hug."

"It is not silly," Loki says and you continue to smile at him, your arms still open. "Fine," he caves as he walks up to you, "but this stays between us."

You can barely contain your excitement when he steps close to you and accepts your hug. You had brought up the deal as a joke after watching Loki's pained reaction to Thor trying to give him a hug. You never honestly expected Loki to agree to it and you definitely didn't think he'd actually follow through with it. Now that the moment is finally here, you really don't want him to let go any time soon because you know you might never get another hug.

"This is nice," you tell him, resting your head on his chest as his arms close comfortably around you.

He doesn't respond but you can tell by the way he breaths deeply that he doesn't hate this type of affection as much as he claims to. After much longer than you expected, Loki finally clears his throat and let's go of you. "That is enough of that," he steps away from you, his eyes lowered as he smooths the nonexistent wrinkles from his black dress shirt. You watch him closely and when he looks up, you can see the smile he's fighting to hide.

"When do you think the mission will be?" you decide not to tell Loki that hug was better than you had imagined.

"I will let Fury and Rogers know you are ready at our afternoon briefing," he says. "We could be sent out as early as tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" you ask, your nerves creeping in suddenly. Surviving the training was one thing but actually going on a mission is still a scary thought.

"You will be fine darling," Loki reassures you. "I would never tell the director you were ready if you were not."

"Cause you're worried about me dying," you tease, both of you knowing Loki is in this position because he pretended to be concerned for your safety.

He rolls his eyes at you, "I will neither confirm nor deny that I do not wish for you to die while on the mission."

You giggle, "You always say the sweetest things."

Loki laughs at that, shaking his head lightly as he walks towards the door. You follow closely and pick up your gym bag. He opens the door for you and just before you step into the hallway you say, "I really hope I don't disappoint you when we do finally get to the base."

"You couldn't possibly disappoint me darling," Loki smiles warmly at you.

"That's not what you said a few weeks ago," you remind him, trying not to focus on how much larger his smirk gets when he sees you blush.

"I have been known to be wrong once or twice in the last thousand years," he admits as he steps out into the empty hallway. "But that stays between us."

"Like the hug?" you ask with a giggle.

"What hug?" Loki says before turning to walk in the opposite direction you need to go in.

(Three days later)

You take a deep breath as the target location comes into view, the jet's radar beeping to alert everyone that you're entering the drop zone. Loki sits next to you, squeezing your hand gently, sensing your anxiety rising. He leans close so the others can't hear and whispers, "You are going to be fine. Stay close to me darling."

You nod, thinking back to Loki's promise this morning after the final briefing for the mission. He told you he would keep you safe and in return, he made you promise to stay near him. A few weeks ago, you never would have believed Loki's promise but today you trust him completely.

The pilot gives everyone the signal to get ready and you stand up, following the prince as he walks to the back of the jet. The door opens and a rush of cold wind whistles through the jet. You take a step backwards, your back bumping into Loki's chest as you watch Steve, Natasha and Clint jump to the ground far below.

Loki gently puts his hands on your arms, turning you so you are facing him without a word. There's a small smile on his face when he tugs on the straps of the bag containing your parachute, tightening them slightly then his eyes scan your uniform and belt to make sure all of your gear is in place.

"Just like we practiced darling," he smiles encouragingly, his hand resting lightly on your cheek so you are looking directly at him. "Then wait for me so we can go to the computer lab together," he reminds you again. For a brief moment, you think Loki might lean down and kiss you but instead you tell yourself now isn't the time for your crush on him to surface. He lowers his hand and you can't help but instantly miss his touch.

With another deep breath, you smile at him and nod your head. "I've got this," you say, your nerves calming as you become more confident. You've been working so hard to get to this point and it's finally here. In the last three years of working for SHIELD, you never once had a desire to be in the field but now that you're here, you want to prove to yourself and everyone else that you can do more than just sit behind a desk.

There's another reason you need this mission to go well, you want to make Loki proud of you. He spent so much time with you over the last month, helping you in session after session. Coming in early before his meetings, staying late at night, finding time on the weekends to make sure you were as ready as possible. The prince even made his own deal with you this morning, he said you could have another hug after the mission and that was all the motivation you really needed.

"Yes you do," he agrees, taking a step away from the door. "Ladies first," he chuckles and you laugh, another bit of tension leaving your body.

You step up to the open door, look at Loki briefly over your shoulder and jump from the jet exactly like he had instructed you to.

(Fifteen minutes later)

You pull the chair out quicky and sit behind the steel desk while Loki stands guard at the door that leads from the main hallway into the lab. There is a second door behind you that leads to a much smaller corridor and the prince keeps his eye on it while you get to work.

"I need about fifteen minutes," you tell the team over the comms as the system reboots.

"Try to do it in ten," Steve responds and you look up in time to see Loki roll his eyes at the sound of the captain's voice.

You fight to hold back a smile. Why does he have to be so cute when he's annoyed, you think. The computer beeps as you type in a command then insert the USB to begin pulling data off the servers.

"It will take as long as it takes captain," the God of Mischief answers for you, his tone firm yet he gives you a smile when your eyes met before you look at the screens again.

You continue to copy file after file to the USB as quickly as you can for the next few minutes. The distant sound of gunfire from above keeps you vaguely aware of where the rest of the team is. Their goal is to distract the soldiers for as long as possible while you finish your work which is thankfully almost done. "Two more minutes," you inform the team over the comms, "just a few more-"

The door behind you slams open, your heart pounds rapidly in your chest as your hand moves to the empty holster on your belt. The God of Mischief yells something but you don't hear the words, rising to your feet to reach for your gun across the desk. You had removed it from your belt and placed it there before crawling underneath the desk to move a few cables right after you arrived. As soon as you are on your feet with your hand on the gun, you see the soldiers rush into the room but in an instant their faces fill with fear and you look towards Loki.

Turning your head, all you see is a bright flash of green rushing towards you as Loki's seider reaches across the room and slams into you.

(Later that night)

You groan and open your eyes slowly, squinting at the sudden brightness around you. A faint beeping in time with your heartbeat fills the room as everything comes into focus after blinking a few times. Pale blue walls surround you, the smell of antiseptic and sanitizer makes you scrunch your nose then it hits you. Oh crap, I'm in the infirmary, you realize suddenly.

"Welcome back," says a friendly voice to your left and you feel the light tug of an IV in your arm when you shift on the bed. You turn your head to face the voice but the quick movement makes you dizzy and you close your eyes again with another groan. "I'll get the doctor, try not to move too fast," the nurse tells you.

Breathing slowly, you feel yourself drifting off to sleep until the door opens and closes again. You open your eyes, forcing yourself to stay awake, you're exhausted but you need to know what happened.

"Hi Y/N, I'm Dr. Palmer," she says, looking up from her tablet. "How are you feeling?"

"Everything hurts," you mumble honestly. Your whole body is sore as you try to sit up a little in the bed. When you put your hands down on either side of you for leverage you look down and see a white cast on your left wrist then look up at the doctor.

"I'm sure it does," she says, looking back down at the tablet to skim your records. "Seems like you were thrown pretty far."

"Thrown?" you ask, rubbing your temple gently when you feel a bit of gauze and wince.

"Careful," she reaches out to lower your hand away from your injury. "I'm not surprised you don't remember the incident."

"The incident?" you repeat her, looking down at your hands as you think and suddenly remember seeing a flash of green light before everything went black. "Loki?" you ask, looking up quickly which causes you to become dizzy and close your eyes again until the room stops spinning.

She waits for you to look at her again before answering. "According to the field report, the room was breached by Hydra soldiers and Loki failed to make sure you were out of the way. He threw the soldiers and you into the concrete wall at the far end of the lab."

You listen to her in silence, pieces of your memory slowly returning. The soldiers were coming... I tried to reach for my gun... no, I had gotten it, I remember feeling the metal grip in my hand... Loki yelled something at me... Loki's magic. You close your eyes tight, pushing away the fear that surfaces with the memory of seeing his seider spreading towards you so fast there was no time to react.

"I remember bits and pieces," you clear your throat and look up at Dr Palmer.

"You're memory will most likely return slowly over the next few days. You have a mild concussion, some bruises, a fractured wrist and several stitches," the doctor informs you. "You'll need to stay here tonight so we can keep an eye on you but you should be able to go home tomorrow. I want you to rest for the next week, then you should be able to return to work."

"Thanks," you mumble, staring up at the ceiling, your mind replaying the last few minutes of the mission you remember.

Dr. Palmer watches you quietly for a moment then pats your leg gently to get your attention, "Get some rest Y/N. I told the team they can visit you in the morning before you're discharged."

"Thanks," you respond again, barely listening to her. She turns and walks out of the door, leaving you alone with your thoughts. Your mind wanders back to when you first began training with Loki and you wonder if his first impression of you was right, you never should have been in the field.

(One month ago - first day of training)

You slam to the floor hard on your side, groaning in pain as the bright lights come back on and the room resets. "Shit," you mumble when you hear the observation door opening fast enough for it to hit the wall. It's the fourth time in a row you've failed at the same point in the simulation and you don't need Loki to tell you this isn't a good start to your training.

Loki's footsteps are not rushed but the heaviness of his leather boots on the tiles makes you get off the floor much faster than your body wants to. "I'm trying," you say in your defense before he utters a word.

"Not hard enough it seems," he counters in a harsh tone. "Honestly, am I wasting my time Y/L/N?"

You sigh at Loki's use of your last name, the little bit of progress you were making with him yesterday was gone as soon as you failed the simulation the first time. "No," you say, folding your arms over your chest despite how sore your elbow is. "I can do this I-"

"Possibly, if we had several months," he cuts you off, "but we have only one."

"I know," you look at the ground near where you had fallen most recently.

"As heartless as the team thinks I am, I do not actually wish for you to get killed on this mission," Loki says and you look up at him immediately. His expression is stern but his voice softens just enough for you to believe his concern for you might be real. "If you are not capable of succeeding, I suggest we put an end to this now. I do not enjoy watching you continually hurt yourself," he gestures to the bruise already forming on your cheek from a previous fall.

"I can do this, Loki," you tell him, more insistently this time. Sometime between 3 and 4 this morning you decided you were going to get this right no matter what. Your newfound determination was based mostly on your fear of failing but you were also desperate to prove Loki wrong. "Let me try it one more time," you bargain with the prince. "If I don't die in the simulation this time, you keep training me."

"And when you do die?" he asks, already expecting you to fail a fifth time.

"Then you give up on me," you tell him with a shrug. "Tell the director you were right and I'm not good enough to go out in the field."

"Very well," Loki easily agrees to your terms, turning to walk back towards the observation room. You wait for him to wish you good luck or tell you he does want you to succeed but he doesn't say a word. Instead, he simply closes the door to the observation room, takes a seat at the controls and turns the simulation back on.

(Present - the next afternoon)

A knock on the door of the small room sends a wave of hope through you, your heart telling you Loki is finally here to visit you. You know the prince won't come but you can't stop yourself from watching the door as your excitement rises slightly. You had a lot of free time today and you spent most of it trying to figure out why Loki is the only one who hasn't visited yet.

Three potential reasons stick with you, each more upsetting than the last. Your first thought is that Loki is so disappointed in you and he doesn't even want to speak to you. The second idea you reasoned out is that he is too busy gloating and telling the team he was right about you not being capable of succeeding in the field. The third idea is the most hurtful but it's the one you feel is more likely then the others. Loki isn't going to visit because he never actually cared if you got hurt. Calling you darling and seeming like he enjoyed being with you was just an act by the trickster god to get you to train harder, pushing you through pain and exhaustion.

"Hi Y/N," Thor smiles at you warmly when he opens the door and sees you standing by the bed, picking up the bag with your belongings the nurse brought it. "Glad to see you back on your feet so quickly."

"Thanks," you give him the same forced smile you gave Steve, Natasha and Clint when they visited earlier. The three of them stopped by only briefly but it was long enough to reassure them that you were fine. You honestly didn't mind them only staying for a few minutes, you were still tired and it was hard to pretend you weren't let down that Loki wasn't with them.

"Dr. Palmer said I'm doing better than expected so she discharged me," you tell him then walk towards the door.

"Heading home?" he asks, holding the door open for you.

"Yeah, I'll be back in a week," you tell him as you walk through the infirmary together. "Oh, actually I should probably stop by Steve's office before I leave right? I didn't get to write up my report on the mission, obviously, but I can do it from home."

"He already filed the case notes, I just came from the debriefing," Thor informs you.

"Wait, how?" you ask when he opens the door to the infirmary that leads back to the main building. "I thought he needed a report from everyone who was in the field."

"Loki explained what happened," he says, not looking at you as you make your way down the hallway. He sighs, "My brother is on probation again and he's lucky it's only three weeks. Tony was pushing for longer but-"

"Why is he on probation?" you stop walking.

"Because of what happened," Thor says as if that should be obvious. He gestures to your broken wrist, "He could have killed you."

"It wasn't his fault," you defend Loki without even thinking.

"He said it was," Thor starts walking slowly again and you stay with him. "We listened to the recordings of your comms, we could hear Loki yell for you to get down and only a few seconds later we heard him attack the Hydra soldiers and unfortunately you as well. Even if he had not admitted to being at fault, it's clear he did not make sure you were out of harms way before unleashing his magic."

"But that's not what happened," you grab his arm to stop him from walking towards the elevators again and he gives you a confused look. "I heard Loki say something right after the door slammed open but I was distracted looking for my gun. I got up to get it-"

Thor shakes his head, "You got up? You weren't already standing between him and the soldiers?"

"No, I was sitting. I stood up after the door opened, after he yelled," you explain, both of you heading to the elevators.

"And he knew that?" Thor asks, pushing the button on the wall.

"Yeah, he was literally looking right at me when they broke into the room," you tell him remembering the smile Loki gave you when you told them you were almost done. "Steve told me I was supposed to listen to Loki and instead of getting down like he said, I stood up. I got right in the path of his magic."

"Why would he lie about that?" Thor asks when you both get in the waiting elevator, you shrug in response. "This is truly odd. My brother rarely accepts blame for things he has been caught doing," he says, pushing the button to take you down. "I do not understand why he would insist this was his fault if what you say is true."

"I don't know why either but I'm going to ask him," you look up at Thor.

"He is in his room," Thor tells you. "He did not want to speak to me or anyone else after the meeting, I doubt he will come out anytime soon."

"How do I get there?" you've never been to the Avenger's quarters before and you don't want to wander around until you find him.

Thor smiles as he gestures towards the elevator panel and it's then you realize he didn't push the button for the ground floor like you had assumed. "I had a feeling you would want to speak with him," he says.

You walk down the hall, counting doors until you get to the one Thor told you belongs to his brother. Before you can lose your nerve, you clear your throat and you knock loudly. Loki opens the door a moment later and stares at you in silence, clearly not expecting you to have been the one knocking.

"Y/N, what are-" he tries to form a sentence but it dies off when you walk past him into his room without saying a word. He stands at the door watching you take a seat on his couch with a mixture of confusion and anxiousness. Loki closes the door but remains near it, almost as if he's afraid to come too close to you.

"Are you okay?" he asks when you still don't speak. His eyes focus on your broken wrist for a long moment before he sees the gauze covering the stitches on your temple.

"I'm fine," you respond vaguely then ask him what you really want to know. "Why did you lie about what happened?"

"I did not lie, Y/N," he says, still standing by the door. His eyes fall from yours to a space on the floor between you. "I hurt you, I should be help accountable for my actions."

"You know it wasn't your fault," you tell him and he shakes his head. "I wasn't standing in between you and the soldiers until after you warned me, I know you remember that."

"The specifics do not matter," Loki insists.

"Why not?" you ask, standing as you get annoyed with his refusal to answer your questions openly. "Do you think you need to take all the blame because you're the one who said I was ready for the mission? Or do you think you're helping me by trying to hide how stupid of a mistake I made?"

"Please, let it go," the prince says, his back almost against the door as you take a step towards him.

"Let it go, seriously? Loki, they put on probation because we miscommunicated. I can just tell Fury and Steve the truth and then you won't be in trouble," you suggest, feeling guilty that he's been punished.

"It is not necessary," the God shakes his head with no explanation which only annoys you more.

"Loki," you try again, taking a few more steps in his direction. "You just got off probation last year. You shouldn't be back on it cause of-"

"Just stop," his voice is stern you look at him, stunned into silence. He runs his fingers through his long hair and you bite your lip, thinking it was a mistake to come here. "I am sorry I just... Y/N, I have bigger concerns right now than my status on the team. I do not care about the probation."

"What's a bigger concern?" you ask, he finally moves away from the wall, closing the distance between you.

His eyes fall to your cast briefly then he looks into your eyes. Loki sighs, "You are."

"Me?" the word leaves your mouth quickly in disbelief. "If you were so worried, why didn't you visit me? Everyone else did, even Thor came."

"I wanted to but I honestly thought I would be the last person you wanted to see," he gives you an answer that never even crossed your mind.

"Loki, you were the only one I wanted to see," you tell him and now it's the god's turn to look at you in disbelief. You reach out and take his hand, "Every time the door opened, I hoped it was you. I just wanted to see you."

He squeezes your hand gently, "Darling, I am sorry I did not visit."

You can't help but smile a little when he calls you darling. "It's okay," you say but he shakes his head.

"None of this is okay," Loki let's go of your hand then strokes your cheek lightly. "Y/N, I am so sorry for hurting you. I promised to keep you protect you, to keep you safe while we were in the field and I failed to do so, I am the reason you are injured. I can not apologize enough darling. Please forgive me."

"I know you didn't hurt me on purpose," you put your hand over his. "And I promise, I really am okay. It's just a broken wrist and a few stitches, it's not a big deal," you decide to leave out the mild concussion to not make him feel worse. "You can ask Dr. Palmer if you don't believe me," you smile more sincerely than you have all day.

You watch him finally relax as his hand lowers and he smiles a little, "I believe you."

"Good," you sound more excited than you meant to and he chuckles lightly. "And before I forget, you owe me something and I plan on collecting."

"What do I owe you?" he furrows his brow.

"A hug," you smile wider. "You said I could have another one after the mission."

His expression changes quickly, a smile replacing his confusion. "A debt I am more than happy to pay," he says and you giggle.

You don't waste a second, pressing your body against his as you wrap your arms around him tightly. Your cheek rests on his chest and you close your eyes as you relax. He's quiet, one of his hands holding you around your lower back while his other hand moves slowly up and down your back. After a few seconds, you feel him press his lips to the top of your head lightly and blush instantly.

You lean back just enough to look up at him and he smiles but you can almost feel his sudden nervousness. Without thinking, you move and kiss him lightly but as soon as you feel his lips against yours, your body fills with panic. You try to pull away from the hug completely but Loki holds you in place against his body.

"I'm sorry, that was-" you don't look at him, embarrassed that you acted on impulse. You have wanted to kiss Loki for weeks, ever since your crush became more intense but this was absolutely not a good idea.

"You should be sorry darling," he says in a tone you recognize. It was the voice he used when you couldn't help but think he was flirting with you even though you tried to convince yourself he wasn't. You lift your head and look up at him, swallowing nervously when he smirks. "I wanted to kiss you first," the prince explains.

"You wanted to-" you try to repeat his words but they don't make any sense. You put your hands on his chest and distance yourself slightly but he keeps you gently in place. "I'm sorry. I've got a concussion, it almost sounded like you wanted to kiss me first," you giggle awkwardly as you look up at him.

He looks at you with concern, his smile fading quicky, "You did not tell me you had a head injury. Are you certain you should be out of bed?"

"Oh... right, yeah. I guess I left that out. I just didn't want to make you feel any worse but it's fine. It's just like a teeny tiny concussion," you tell him quickly. "Wait... no, don't get me off topic. That's not what I wanted to talk about. Why would you say that? You wanted to kiss me?"

He chuckles, "You are so cute when you are like this."

You blush deeply when he calls you cute and you press your cheek to his chest to hide again. Just a second later, you feel Loki's hand on your warm cheek as he tilts your head up. "You heard me correctly darling, head injury or not," the prince answers your question with another smirk. Before you can respond, Loki bends down slightly, pressing his lips to yours. He holds your body tightly and you give into the kiss easily, closing your eyes as your hands grip the fabric on the back of his shirt.

When he finally pulls back to break the kiss you can't do anything but giggle and he laughs while he plays with the ends of your hair. "So... you think I'm cute?" you ask him.

"I think you are truly stunning and I am amazed by you," Loki says with a smile that causes you to blush even deeper than before. "I had planned on asking you out on a date after the mission, when you came to get the hug I owed you but then I hurt-"

You place a soft kiss to Loki's lips, "Don't you dare blame yourself again."

He gives you a warm smile, "If I keep doing it, will you keep kissing me like that?"

"No," you laugh. "I'll probably tickle you or something."

"I would like to see you try darling," he smirks, taking your hand to pull you towards the couch.

"Oh, I should probably still talk to Steve and Fury," you tell him. "So you're not in trouble or on probation anymore."

"Absolutely not," he sits down and shakes his head.

You sit next to him and he puts his arm around your waist, keeping you close to him. "Why not?" you ask as you cuddle against him as if you've done it dozens of times.

"Because now I will have more free time to spend with you," he smiles and kisses the top of your head.

"I do like how that sounds," you kiss his cheek and lean on him comfortably. "Especially since I have the next week off, doctor's orders."

I hope you liked this!! Please like, share and comment if you did 💚💚 Please let me know if you want to be added to my taglist!

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[helinedmightbehere]

@m0on-shro0m

[laxxarian]

Danny as a background npc of Tucker's and Sam's stream

It all started with Tucker and Sam having an idea to go live streaming to promote their beliefs like Sam with her eco-friendly stuff and her defense technique tidbits and Tucker's meat importance and also some tech tidbits.

Both streams were getting views, a whole lot to a point where the two were so popular that some haters would try and expose them, even tried to hack but is shamefully failed because for some reason, each time they tried to search about this Amity Park, their screens would glitch and the like. It's like the firewall is protecting all residents from the outside world which got the viewers questioning but Tucker and Sam didn't know anything about that, not even Danny who suddenly popped in on their stream.

slam12kki: WHOS THAT???

dragonobsessed_coffee: ....someone needs some explaining to do...just in case.

animalkingdom123: No

Bruce_W: Hey, the kid's look a lot like...

animalkingdom123: NO

blueM0nk3y: YES

Llupex0x: only one things that needs to check out

While the chat was booming, Sam and Tucker is in a collab this time and is in Danny's house when Danny first popped in and so is Jack and Maddie with some snacks, and seeing Jack's features and personality the chat went wild.

Llupex0x: lmao, nvm

viviran76: we're gonna hav to weyt

OPrtx: wats wrong wit u??

Everyone is thinking that Jack may be a cousin or something but the thing is, the Fentons are in no way related to Bruce at all. Sam and Tucker was confused but shrugged it off.

Anyways, continuing on, another collab was set again and this time, Danny popped in casually with an angry look, not noticing that Sam and Tucker was still live but the two didn't mind and had their focus shifted to Danny and Danny started complaining about ecto-acts and how he can't go a day without getting shot and hunted down by Skulker who wants his pelt.

The Batfam who watches this got concerned.

Then another collab was set outside and Danny was seen in the background with a strange belt on and he looks like he's being chased and beaten up, Danny wasn't just running, he was also fighting back and all. The one who is fighting him is Vlad who also has a strange belt on and is now using an ecto gun, but nobody knows that, what they do know is that the man is carrying a gun and is actively shooting it at Danny and Danny also has a gun with him and a bat.

Vlad and Danny exchanges blows, the JL are now concerned.

Sam and Tucker are just continuing their live cuz they thought it would be perfect if they could ask for help with this type of proof (they can't seem to find anyone to come help in their aid and was dismissed as kids prank)

Another collab was set up once more, and this time, Sam and Tucker wasn't shown. What it did show was Maddie and Jack trying to fight the men in white while Jazz tries to get Danny out of.... chains?? and Danny is also inside of a cage??? looks beaten up and bleeding.

Sam and Tucker was sending proof.

But that was in 1990's and the heroes and the viewers saw the video in 2020's already

[sunarryn]

DP X Marvel #12

Danny Fenton never meant to end up in space, much less as part of a dysfunctional alien superhero squad led by a tree, a raccoon with PTSD, and a guy whose only qualification is that he’s listened to every 1980s mixtape ever made. But when you accidentally fly through a NASA portal powered by ectoplasm while trying to stop Technus from hijacking the International Space Station, you don’t really get much of a say in where you land. Which, in Danny’s case, was the cockpit of the Milano. Mid-flight. Mid-chase. Mid-explosion.

Rocket screamed. Gamora drew a blade. Star-Lord yelled, “WHO THE HELL ARE YOU?” And Danny, with his hair floating around his face in zero gravity and a half-melted Fenton Thermos in his hand, went, “Hi. Uh. I’m Danny. Do you have any snacks?”

A lot of things happened after that. For one, Rocket immediately declared Danny a “haunted science gremlin” and demanded he be dissected. Gamora stabbed him (not fatally, but like, “welcome to the crew” levels of stabbing), and Drax attempted to bond by declaring they were both hunted weapons of mass destruction. Groot tried to plant Danny in a flowerpot. Star-Lord, upon learning that Danny was from Earth and had ghost powers, decided he was now the team’s “Spooky Mascot” and handed him a Walkman, which promptly exploded when Danny touched it. Apparently, ghost boy plus alien tech equals “we now need a new comm system.” Danny fixed it in thirty minutes and Rocket reluctantly stopped trying to murder him in his sleep.

The team wasn’t sure if Danny was a ghost or an alien or some weird human mutant until he started phasing through walls and talking to the disembodied soul of a long-dead Xandarian war general haunting their fridge. (Her name was Bev. Danny and Bev played intergalactic chess on Thursdays.) Once the Guardians realized Danny could punch the soul out of people (and then slam-dunk it back in), they promoted him from “weird hitchhiker” to “full member with explosive privileges.” This was a mistake.

Danny was a space nerd, sure. He watched every space documentary, built model rockets, and could name the moons of Jupiter backwards. But what the documentaries didn’t prepare him for was being shot at by a gang of space pirates because Groot accidentally won a planet in a poker game, or Rocket creating a neutron grenade disguised as a cookie (“Don’t eat it, Danny—DANNY THAT’S NOT A REAL COOKIE”), or Star-Lord insisting they stop at an interstellar karaoke bar in the middle of a war. Danny had to fight off a swarm of brain-sucking parasites while singing “Eye of the Tiger” in full ghost mode. He got a standing ovation.

Things got worse when Technus came back, this time infecting Nova Corps servers and announcing himself as “God of Wi-Fi.” Danny had to team up with Rocket, who uploaded himself into a blender for reasons no one fully understood, to create an anti-ghost firewall using a toaster, Gamora’s sword, and Groot’s root clippings. The good news? It worked. The bad news? They accidentally opened a portal to the Ghost Zone mid-fight, unleashing the Box Ghost into the Nova HQ. The Box Ghost was immediately arrested and sent to space prison, where he became king of the vending machines.

Danny tried to explain Earth things to the Guardians. Like taxes. And Target. And what a cow was. Drax was horrified. “You allow milk beasts to rule your society?” Star-Lord cried when he learned Blockbuster was dead. Gamora tried to understand TikTok and ended up nearly assassinating a diplomat during a trend called “smash or pass.” Danny didn’t help by going ghost mid-video and screaming “pass” at the ambassador. They were banned from that planet forever.

But despite the chaos, Danny kind of… fit. He’d never felt truly understood on Earth, where being half-dead meant constant fear of being dissected by the government, but out here? Out here, people didn’t blink when he turned into a glowing, green-eyed wraith who could fly through spaceships and scream in an eldritch tongue. If anything, they applauded. One particularly wild night, Danny exorcised a Kree emperor’s cursed hover-throne live on intergalactic television. Ratings spiked. He was declared a demigod in three sectors. Star-Lord tried to get merchandising rights. Rocket tried to sell his ectoplasm as a weapon. Danny put them both in the Ghost Zone timeout corner.

They kept running into other people. Thor once landed on their ship looking for a beer and a nap, only to get into a flexing contest with Danny. Danny won. Barely. Thor still calls him “the glowing child of sorrow.” Tony Stark tried to recruit Danny for the Avengers. Danny politely declined by phasing through his hologram and turning it into a haunted Tamagotchi. Doctor Strange asked Danny to stop creating micro-rifts in the astral plane every time he hiccuped. Danny said he’d consider it.

The Guardians eventually got wind of a plot involving the Collector trying to obtain Danny’s core to power a ghost-zombie version of Knowhere. Naturally, they handled this in the most reasonable way possible: by launching a full-scale assault while disguised as a musical theater troupe. Danny, dressed as Phantom of the Opera, used his wail to destroy an army of spectral cyborgs, then accidentally set the Collector’s hair on fire. Gamora tackled him out a window. Rocket declared it a success.

Danny missed Earth sometimes. Jazz would call through the interstellar line to check in, often while holding a frying pan and yelling at someone in the background (“NO, TUCKER, YOU CAN’T ORDER CHICK-FIL-A TO SPACE”). Sam once left him a thirty-minute voicemail about ghost gentrification and the ethics of ghost labor unions. But even with all that, Danny knew he wasn’t the same kid from Amity Park. He’d been to star systems no human had seen, danced with sentient nebulae, and accidentally became betrothed to an alien princess after sneezing in her direction. He had battle scars and space memes and an intergalactic criminal record that included the phrase “unauthorized spectral possession of a judge.”

Rocket taught Danny how to rig a ship to explode using only shoelaces and spite. Groot taught him how to grow little plant buddies that helped him cook. Drax taught him the art of standing dramatically in silence, which Danny now did every time someone asked him about his tragic backstory. Star-Lord taught him how to moonwalk in zero gravity. Danny taught them all how to scream “GET BENT, YOU INTERDIMENSIONAL TWERPS” in ghost language, which they used during diplomatic missions. They were banned from another planet.

There were close calls. Danny once got trapped in a black hole and had to phase out by screaming every bad memory he’d ever had at once. He and Rocket were fused for a full day after a teleportation mishap—Danny’s ghost tail merged with Rocket’s back leg, and they had to fight like that. Gamora walked in on Danny watching High School Musical and refused to speak to him for a week. Star-Lord caught Danny crying while watching old Earth footage and tried to cheer him up with mixtapes titled “Sad Boi Vibes Vol. 1-9.”

But for all the wild, unhinged nonsense, Danny had a place. He’d spent so long being hunted, misunderstood, called a freak. But here, with this chaos crew of space weirdos and traumatized murder-huggers, he wasn’t just accepted. He was wanted. He was the team’s go-to for ghost stuff, space stuff, sarcasm, and emotional trauma suppression. He became a Guardian of the Galaxy not because he asked to be—but because he fought a black hole, exorcised a death god, and beat Star-Lord in a dance-off to “Take On Me.”

And when Earth eventually called—when the Avengers requested help with some “small ghost invasion” (Box Ghost had escaped space prison again)—Danny arrived with the Guardians, blazing through the sky like a neon comet. He kicked open a portal, yelled “SUP SLUTS,” and unleashed Groot, Drax, and an emotionally unstable raccoon with a bazooka onto New York.

Nick Fury sighed.

Tony screamed, “Why is there a tree in my penthouse?”

Danny just smiled, green eyes glowing, and said, “I brought friends.”

[malsmind]

➸ hacker!matt telling popular!reader about coding & hacking ❥

you and matt sit at his computer, the glow of the screen casting a soft light over his face. his fingers flying across the keyboard as he explains something about networks and firewalls.

“so, basically, if you know what you’re doing, you can find vulnerabilities in a system and exploit them,” he says, his voice full of excitement. “but, like, ethically, you use it to test security. penetration testing, you know?”

you hum, only half following along, more focused on the way he talks—his voice animated, hands moving as he types, the slight furrow in his brows when he’s focused. you shift slightly in his lap, and he tightens his arms around your waist, absentmindedly resting his chin on your shoulder.

“okay, look,” he says, adjusting his glasses. “i’ll show you something simple.” he pulls up a window full of code, and you squint at it, trying to make sense of the seemingly random letters, numbers, and symbols.

“this looks like gibberish,” you say, and he lets out a soft laugh, shaking his head.

“it’s not! this—” he points to a specific line— “is a script i wrote to check for weak passwords in a database. like, if someone uses ‘password123,’ i can see it’s vulnerable.”

you raise an eyebrow. “so you can just hack into anything?”

he smirks. “technically? yeah. but i wouldn’t. it’s illegal.”

“right, because you’re such a law-abiding citizen,” you tease.

he rolls his eyes but grins, his hands settling on your waist. “i just think it’s cool. like, understanding how systems work, breaking them down, and figuring out how to make them stronger.”

you watch his screen as he types out a few commands, explaining what each one does. you’re still not fully grasping it, but you love hearing him talk, love how passionate he gets about this stuff.

“you’re kind of a nerd,” you say, resting your head against his.

he huffs. “and yet, here you are, sitting in my lap, listening to me ramble about hacking.”

you smile. “yeah, because i like you.”

his hands squeeze your waist, and he tilts his head slightly, pressing a quick kiss to your jaw. “lucky me, then.”

you watch the lines of code scroll across the screen, feeling his warmth against you, the steady sound of his typing filling the room. you might not understand everything he’s saying, youprobably never will, it's just not your world. but you don’t mind. as long as it’s him talking, you’ll listen.

dividers by @bernardsbendystraws <3

—

series link

taglist

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@backwardshatnick @sturniolosymphony @sturns-mermaid @realzula @courta13 @sturnzzlovee @chrissweetheart @sturniolosymphony @sturniolo1trips @freshsturnzx @sturnslutz @rcklessheavn

[bluesidez]

Hi I saw your req open and I flew here ehe-

Hear me out please 😭

Miguel is a geneticist (someone who works around denetics) and sometimes he doesn't understand the programs that he 'made' and Lyla has to help him. That makes Peter B. and the spider-teens very suspicious of him.

What's even more suspicious is that once a month he leaves the Spider HQ to who-knows-where.

After some stalking investigating, they find out that every time that he leaves; he goes to a park to meet [Reader], that is the one who helped with all the tech he has at HQ.

When he returns the next day, he is confronted about it and explains that [Reader] is an old friend and he trusts them with the Multiverse secret. However Peter B. and the others obviously saw the mutual attraction between both of them so they help out Miguel confess to [Reader].

Fluff + a little suggestive with Gn Reader please ^^

Anyway drink lots of water and keep yourself healthy!! ❤❤

[Undercover Lover]

lab tester: @hikaru-sama 🩻

pairing: Miguel O’Hara x gn!Reader

summary: Miguel is willing to stop the world for you, you just want to be the small part of his world that makes it better.

content warning: fluff, longing from reader and Miguel, the spider-teens are all menaces (as in they all have chismosavirus), Peter is Peter, a little suggestive but nothing crazy, I also made Miguel’s relationship with the teens pretty adorable (Papa Miggy 🥺)

word count: 5.8k, halfway proofread (don't ask...)

a/n: This request is not outlandish in any way, btw. It's very cute! I hope you don’t mind that I added a little extra to the programming aspect. THANK YOU TO THE MIGGY SERVER FOR YOUR HELP AS ALWAYS! I have been wallowing in the chats for who knows how long. I thought it would be cute and funny. Also, I've been doing better with my water intake! I hope you're proud. 🥺

Miguel blew out a tired breath, eyes blurry after staring at the same set of files all day.

“Lyla, could you replay the scan from this morning?”

“I don’t know, can I?”

Miguel frowned as his eyes panned to the flickering yellow glow, “Are we doing this right now?”

“Doing what?” Lyla posed with her head tilted in her hand.

“Lyla. Replay the scan from Earth 450-”

“Here’s what I found on scams on 4chan.”

“I said scans not scams- what are you talking about? And what is 4chan?”

Lyla switched to a pose that mimicked The Thinker, her heart-shaped glasses morphing into ones made of stone.

Miguel shifted his weight to one side, hands on his hips as he watched Lyla float around his desk.

“Pull up the LYrate Lifeform Approximation code.”

Lyla snickers, glasses shifting to match the marks of a clown’s face, “You don’t know how to work that, buddy.”

“I didn’t ask you to tell me that, I asked you to-”

Lyla opens the file before he can finish his spiel.

“Now, what?” Lyla whispers with glee. “Gonna hack into the motherboard? Break down the firewall?”

Miguel ignored her and read through the constant formulas, coding that he's never even seen before becoming longer and longer.

Lyla popped up right in his peripheral view, pulling out one of the smaller codes to highlight, “What’s this one mean?”

Miguel squints at the line, “Something about how you respond to tone?”

“It’s my hair color,” Lyla’s voice is high and giggly like she was anticipating his completely wrong answers. “What about this one?”

“I, I don’t know. Your jacket?”

“Voice modulator,” the code danced around him as Lyla switched her voice to something of an old Hollywood star. “You’re not very good at this, tuts.”

Miguel felt a strange chill as Lyla walked around with a long white dress instead of a jacket and her brown hair in curls falling down her back. She laughed at him some more as she pulled her now, thick-rimmed triangle-shaped sunglasses to the top of her head.

“Lyla-”

Miguel’s watch jolted, a notification blaring at him. He answered with haste, mind frantic.

“Miguel? Is something up with Lyla, because I asked her to find this Mysterio’s dimension, and she started playing some wrestler’s theme song instead,” Jess huffed, throwing the villain's body over the back of her motorcycle. “Now, he won’t stop singing it.”

Miguel felt his head start to pound, “Something’s going on with her. She’s not functioning at her normal state.”

“You’re never functioning at a normal state,” Lyla sighed dramatically, arm over her head with wind blowing around her. “Always so tense!”

“Oh my god?” Jess’s eyes went wide as she took in the Lyla at Miguel’s side. “Why does she sound like that?”

“I’m not sure, but I’m shutting her down until I can fix it. Just send the Mysterio back here.”

“You can’t turn me off, Miggy! Don’t you want me to sing for you?”

“Yeah, hurry up and log her off. She’s freaking me out.” Jess ended the call with a disgusted face.

With her gone, the room was filled with Miguel’s thoughts and Lyla humming and brushing her hair in a vintage mirror, something she would have never cared to do on a regular day.

Looking at the lines of coding in front of him, there was no way he was going to find what was happening.

He reached across his desk to a new screen, searching for a certain folder. Miguel laughed to himself as he read the title.

Don’t open unless it’s ABSOLUTELY crucial to your health…and well-being. .3.

Miguel would consider this a crisis.

He tapped the folder, watching as a sprout of several different colors surrounded him. He shifted it through the lights, some of them being pictures of you and him, some of them being animated GIFs of cats, and others being helpful guides to small technological problems. He kept searching until he found a yellow tab that read “LYLA? LIGHTS OUT!”

With one click, Lyla went from twirling and singing in heels to being dormant, gone to the Spider Society. Letting out the breath he was holding, he shifted the files back into the folder and geared up to make the announcement.

“Attention Spiders,” Miguel held his watch up to his mouth. “Lyla will be down for maintenance for a couple of hours.”

He could hear the collective groan from the society all the way in his office.

“And I will try my best to get her up and running for future missions. Until then, please send any anomalies directly to Margo and stick to local crimes as well as protecting your respective neighborhoods.”

As soon as he ended the announcement, Margo was flooding his watch with back-to-back memes. Miguel remained confused watching a little girl in a cowboy hat complain to her grandpa while he dismissed her.

“I can send someone else down there to help you.”

“no because if anyone breaks my tech, it’s coming out of YOUR 🫵🏾 paycheck”

“Everything comes out of my paycheck.”

“whatever dad”

“?”

Perturbed, but not wanting to waste any more time, Miguel locked his office and called your number.

Two rings and you were picking up the phone.

“Hey, Spider-ider!”

“Hi,” Miguel refused to admit how the nickname sounded cute coming from you. “I need your help with something.”

“No ‘How are you?’ or ‘Sorry I haven’t checked on you in forever.’ Just straight to business, huh?”

“Sorry,” Miguel collected himself. “How are things? Did you manage to get the job with that tech company?”

“Why, thank you for asking, Miguel! I’m pretty good. Things are different! I did end up getting that job, but the manager is eerily creepy, so I’m trying my best to pile up the meanest HR case or try to wiggle my way into a new department. So far, the former is slowly but surely working, not sure if my sanity can take much more. How are you?”

Miguel's eyebrows shifted a bit, “You know you can just call for my help if anything goes wrong, right?”

“Miguel, you’re protecting so many people. More than I can even fathom, actually. I’m not going to ask you to stop to check on me.”

You should. He’d drop everything.

“It wouldn’t take much from my end, I could just-”

“Miguel.”

He bit his cheek, knowing you wanted to move the conversation along.

“How are you?” you asked again, tone back to normal.

“I’m neutral. Same thing as always. Now, it’s just that Lyla was really unbearable today.”

“Unbearable how?”

Miguel went into every detail, pulling in some last-minute reports from other Spiders that managed to use her before he shut her down.

“So you’re telling me she glitched out, wore an alligator head, and integrated ‘Flat Fuck Friday’ into every conversation?”

“Well, that was just one of the many cases. Is that, is that all you heard?”

“No, I got it,” you fixed your face to try and hold back your laugh. “It sounds like she hit her funny bone.”

Miguel looked up at the ceiling and back at you, “This is serious.”

“And I’m being as serious as I can be!”

“She’s causing all of this trouble because of a funny bone.”

You laugh at Miguel’s deadpan tone, “Ok, so technically it’s called a laughing virus. It’s been hitting a lot of major search engines for some reason, but Lyla is the closest to human-like AI there is, so it’s a funny bone!”

“As stupid as that is, I need your help to come fix it.”

“Aw, you need me to come check your work?”

Miguel avoided your gaze, “There is no work. I couldn’t tell one line from the next.”

“But Miguel, you were doing so good last time. What happened?”

“I-I don’t know, I thought I had one right but I mixed up tones with shades.”

“That’s still on the same playing field, so you got something right! That’s good progress, Miguel.”

“Mm.”

“I’ll be there soon. Don’t do anything crazy, although you’ll probably just loom over the desk dramatically.”

Miguel opened his mouth to rebuttal but you already ended the call with a laugh.

With truly nothing but his thoughts, he hurried to clean his space. There were a few loose wires and an empty box from the cafeteria scattered around.

By the time you were tapping the code into his office door, his platform was back on the ground and he’d just swept up some dust that managed to build in the corner of the room.

“Don’t clean up now just because I’m here,” you watched as his shoulders jumped a bit at your voice.

“I’m not,” Miguel huffs and sets the broom against the wall.

“Sure.”

Miguel comes closer to you with his hands on his hips.

You were probably the main reason that Lyla was the way she was, sarcastic and immature.

The only difference was Miguel could mute Lyla or switch modes for some peace. For you? It was non-stop. The only way he knew how to get you to stop was a method that’s been crowding his dreams ever since he met you.

He saw your lips moving at a mile per minute, but nothing was really reaching his ears.

They looked so soft, so perfect. He wondered if he should just let the society function on its own for just a few more hours.

“Miguel!” You waved your hands in front of him. “Lyla being down has really stressed you out, huh? You’re unfocused.”

He cleared his throat, “I still have a lot of work to do.”

“Well, let’s get to it!”

Miguel moved so you could walk to his desk, heart racing.

Whatever it was you were about to try to teach him wasn’t going to stick. He just knew it.

“Hey, Miguel! You know, I was wondering if we could implement some type of spider-baby daycare? MJ is pretty busy these days,” Peter strided into Miguel’s office with a wiggly Mayday strapped to his chest.

The platform was down, but the serious figure was nowhere to be found.

“Miguel?”

Peter tried to feel him out, but there’s no way anyone could miss Miguel in plain sight.

“Hm,” Peter put two fingers out for Mayday grab. She squealed glee, taking one finger to chew on. “If I were a Miguel, where would I be?”

He pondered through the halls, eventually finding himself at the entrance of the cafeteria. Mayday looked up almost as if she was disappointed.

“I need fuel to think!”

Peter ran down the line grabbing his usual: a 2099 burger, a large fry, and a medium cola, he’s dieting!

At the end of the line, a familiar voice called his name.

“Hey, kiddo! How’s it going?” Peter made his way to the table occupied by the younger spider crew.

Miles squinted at him, “Not a kid, but it’s going good! Have you seen Miguel? He was supposed to be training me an hour ago, but he’s not answering his watch.”

“Funny that you say that,” Peter stuffed his mouth with a handful of fries. “Went to his office and he wasn’t there.”

“What is with him and disappearing lately? It’s not like him,” Gwen mumbled. “I was supposed to report to him not too long ago and he wasn’t here.”

“Time is an enigma,” Hobie was tuning his guitar. “Glad he’s finally taking advantage of it instead of chatting about doomsday.”

“True, but he missed part of the big party we planned three months ago, too,” Pavitr supplied.

The table stopped and stared at Pav with various deadpan looks.

“What? He promised he’d try my special dish! He never breaks our promises.”

“He did pile a load of work on me when Lyla broke. Usually, he would come down and help me, but he said he was busy fixing her,” Margo turned to Peter.

The table sat and pondered for just a second then the teens started spouting out nonsense.

“He’s retiring!”

“He’s going to give HQ up.”

“He’s not going to another universe again, right?”

“He’s finally taking breaks.”

“He’s dying!”

Again, the table stopped to look at Pavitr.

“False alarm?”

“Look,” Peter held his hands up. “I don’t think it’s any of that.”

“What makes you so sure?” Gwen sounded nervous.

“Uh, he would tell me!”

Miles snickered at that which caused Mayday to fall into a fit of laughter.

“What? He’s told me things before. We’re buddies!”

“And where is your so-called buddy right now?” Margo folded her arms.

“Touche,” Peter took a giant slurp of his drink, cupping a hand under it to make sure nothing dripped on Mayday’s head. “But don’t you have a way to find him?”

“The Grumpy GPS? Yeah, but I’ve never used it because he’s always here,” Margo sighs.

“How about the next time he disappears, you let us know?” Gwen suggested.

“Love it,” Hobie fist bumps Gwen.

Miles scratched his neck, “I don’t know if this is a good idea.”

“Says the guy that snuck into the Spider Society,” Pavitr shook his head.

“That’s different.”

“Is it?” Gwen raised her eyebrow. “Margo is on Miguel-duty. We’re going to get to the bottom of this, right guys?”

Everyone nodded their head in determination.

Peter smiled. He’s still got this mentor thing down!

Margo was down near the Go-Home-Machine running Style Savvy through an emulator.

“That is so ugly,” she sang as she watched another contestant’s outfit go down the runway.

Her judging was interrupted by a dancing cartoon spider with bushy eyebrows.

She paused the game and stretched her arms to the other side of the room to give everyone a call, “Mission ‘Where is the Old Man?’ is up and running. The Grumpy GPS has been added to you guys’ gizmos. I’ve got everything ready to hack.”

“It sounds like we’re doing a lot more than tracking,” Hobie mumbled.

“But what if he actually is dying?” Gwen was lacing up her ballet shoes tight. “He would tell us, right?”

“Oh, but when I said that, it sounded crazy,” Pavitr pulled his mask down. “The double standards are appalling.”

“He could be just avoiding us. Can’t say it hasn’t happened before,” Miles’ voice was low and testy.

“He wasn’t avoiding you, Miles, he was just…projecting,” Gwen said matter-of-factly.

“Are we back on this? Sending the entire society after me is projecting. Missing our training sessions that he set up multiple times? That’s just foul.”

Gwen and Miles went back and forth, fussing over little things.

“They’re bickering again. How cute,” Pavitr stage-whispered.

“1 mission on Miles winning?” Hobie asked.

Pavitr thought for a second, “Deal.”

“You’ll probably be the most upset if he really is sick,” Gwen comments.

“Says who? I’m not worried,” Miles zipped up his jacket halfway.

“Then why are you bouncing around like that, Miles.”

Hobie sighed while Pavitr cheered.

“If you guys are done, Miguel’s moving on foot heading down 5th. I pinned a checkpoint,” Margo sent the coordinates to their watches.

“Time to go see if big man’s a killer,” Hobie yawned. “Or not.”

Peter felt the ground shake under him, hair rising on the back of his neck. His senses were screaming at him to turn around.

The thing is, if he turned around, he'd lose track on Miguel who was currently inside of the very building he was standing on top of.

The shaking grew, pebbles and vent plates rattling around him, then everything fell back into place.

One, two, thre, four pairs of feet hit the ground.

“Where’s Margo?” Peter asked, eyes not leaving the ground under him.

“In our ears singing,” Gwen groaned. “Where’s Mayday?”

“Enjoying a lovely Mommy-Daughter date with MJ and her girlfriends. Glad to have you all join me.”

“How’d you know he was going to be here?” Hobie crossed his arms.

“Like I said, buddies!”

“You waited outside of his office, didn’t you?” Pavitr pointed his finger at Peter.

Peter turned around with an offended face, “Details-schmetails!”

“Well, do you have any idea what he’s up to now?” Gwen put a hand on her hip.

“Well, we’re on the roof of an apartment, super expensive might I add, and I’m assuming his apartment is here. So maybe he’s just getting a nap in.”

“He’s on the move,” Margo’s voice buzzed through all of the teens' ears and they ran to the edge of the building, practically pushing Peter to the side.

“He’s wearing normal clothes for once,” Gwen’s voice was shocked.

“His trousers are quite nice,” Hobie nodded as if he was looking at a magazine.

“It’s so…weird,” Miles shuddered. “I’ve never seen him in anything else but his suit.”

“He wore a nice button-down to my Zoom celebration once,” Margo hummed.

“Guys?” Pavitr’s voice went high. “Where’s Peter?”

The three of them turned around to see a missing pink-robed Spider.

“Oh, come on!” Miles jumped from the roof to the next one, following the pink fluff. Miguel was walking fast on the sidewalk and Peter was keeping his trail from up high.

“Really, Peter?” Gwen swung alongside the two with the rest right on their tails. “Some mentor you are.”

“I’m a great teacher! You’re all catching on quite well,” Peter swung lower as Miguel crossed the street.

Colors flew across the sky, contrasting with the constant grays and small specs of green of Nueva York. Scaling from building to building was a lot easier with flying cars added to the mix, but it was a little odd to see wobbling vehicles every now and then.

“I think you guys should slow it down. His pace changed,” Margo noted. “He’s stopping at…a park? Didn’t know they still had those here.”

With a sturdy pull, Miles used his web to stop Peeter from running any further and the now quintet landed on the ground a safe distance from the park.

“A little dreary for a park, innit?” One eye on Hobie’s mask went higher than the other.

From where they were hiding, steel statues stood tall, tufts of greenery growing up the structure. There was more pavement than grass and the walkways contained several dips and turns.

“I think there’s some flare to it,” Miles countered. “Could use a lot more color.”

They quieted down as they watched Miguel find an empty bench. He sat down and started to rub his hands against his pants. He sat for a minute or so before he checked his watch and his leg started to bounce.

“Is he waiting on someone?” Gwen whispered.

“Oh, I wonder who it could be?” Pav whispered back.

“Why are you guys whispering?” Margo paused her side mission of trying to find any security cameras in the area.

“Doesn’t he have super-hearing?” Miles asked.

“Over this much noise?” Hobie brought the talking level back to normal. “If he doesn’t suspect us of following him, there’s no need for him to focus on us.”

After about five minutes of watching and making a game out of how many times can Miguel check his clothes, with Peter mumbling about how the pants aren’t going to get any looser with those thighs, everyone holds their breath as they watch someone take a seat next to him.

Miguel’s entire demeanor changed.

His face lit up, his back straightened, and the tension from his body fell.

“No way,” Pavitr whispered excitedly. “Guys!”

“What’s going on? I still can’t get into the security cams,” Margo’s voice was impatient.

“Miguel…has a partner?” Gwen tilted her head watching the two react. The mystery person got up to hug Miguel as he sat on the bench. He hesitated a bit, fingers twitching awkwardly before he hugged them back. “Or not.”

“If one of you could get closer, I could pitch the sound to everyone. And, I could see!”

Everyone turned to Miles.

“Why is everybody looking at me?”

“You can turn invisible, genius,” Gwen said.

He just sighed and faded from head to toe.

“How’s it going Spidey?” you lean back from your hug to look down at him. Your hands rub his shoulders. “You look nice today.”

Miguel averted his eyes, “You’re not supposed to call me that-”

“Outside of HQ or our phone calls. I know, I know. Seriously though, why are you so dressed up today? Got a hot date waiting?”

Miguel tilted his head, “Do I really look nice?”

The shirt he was wearing was barely hiding anything, any tighter and it would have been considered a muscle tee. It was tucked into some slacks with a belt that made his tiny waist even smaller. The pants hugged his thighs just enough.

“Yeah!” More than he could imagine.

“Thanks,” he smiled a bit. “There’s no hot date. Just wearing something casual.”

Your shoulders lifted at the words.

“Cool, cool.”

“You look nice, as well.”

“Really?” you looked down at your last-minute outfit. Some gray joggers you found at a thrift store and a hoodie you’re almost certain has a random bleach stain somewhere on the back. “You’re digging the midnight chic?”

“Midnight chic?”

“Yeah, an outfit you wear when going out for a snack in the middle of the night.”

Miguel pursed his lips, “It looks soft. Comfortable.”

You involuntarily gripped your bag tighter, watching Miguel’s eyes roam you from the neck down.

Lately, he’s been saying things that make your stomach flutter, from being willing to beat up your boss to fussing at you for running errands so late to remembering small details from months ago.

Only recently has his eyes began to wander. He doesn’t catch on as fast when you explain things to him. You’ve caught him staring at you while you’re looking at other things. His smile lingered a little longer. His hands were a lot more careful. Sometimes, he’d tense up when you touched him.

It was all so confusing and the feelings you’ve pushed down for years have crawled their way back up, waiting at the back of your tongue to be announced.

Still, you were just here to help him for as long as he needed you. Nothing more, nothing less.

You cleared your throat, “Okay so, you said you needed help with…Excel?”

“Mm hm,” Miguel nodded and locked his eyes back on your face.

You pulled your laptop, turning up the brightness so that the scenery wouldn’t shoot straight through the transparent device.

“So, this program is like, extremely old.”

“I know, but it's a middle ground for all of the Spiders. Anything newer would be too much for about a fourth of them and anything older would take ages for anyone to complete.”

“Got it,” you inch close enough to Miguel for his cologne to dance around you. He leaned closer to squint at your laptop and you had to will your hands to not shake like jelly. “So, the program is actually pretty simple. You just enter formulas, charts, numbers, or information in these boxes. There’s a lot more manual work than we’re used to, but it won’t take much to get used to.”

You walked Miguel through everything you’ve taught yourself over the past few days. Having him put in formulas and waiting for the result.

“Like this?”

“Almost! You’re missing a letter here.”

“Can you go over it again?”

Miguel's hands would hover over the keyboard, eyes focused and nose scrunched. Sometimes you would fight the screaming in your head and place your hands over his, helping him punch certain numbers in.

“Miguel, I think you’re messing with me. We’ve repeated this same thing on four other sheets now. I know you’re smarter than that.”

He poked his tongue in his cheek, “I’m just quadruple checking. Gotta teach this to some older people.”

“Fine,” you snort. “One more time and then I have to get ready to go.”

“Already?” Miguel turned to you. “I thought you didn’t have to be somewhere until this evening.”

“I don’t, but I can’t go looking like this. You spent 30 minutes arguing with me about the interface. Don’t you have to go back to HQ soon?”

“No.”

There was a noise behind you. You turn around to see nothing but a curved wall embedded with vines.

You put your heart to your chest, “God, I thought that was a reporter or something. Just the wind I suppose.”

Miguel’s eyes stayed planted on the empty space, “On second thought, let me walk you there. Don’t want any surprises.”

“So you don’t need me to go over this for the fifth time?”

“Nope,” Miguel grinned down at you. “I got it the first time, actually.”

“Oh my god,” you laugh as you hit his arm. He doesn’t even flinch. “You’re such a jerk.”

He looked around and got behind you to squat down, tapping on his gizmo. You could only hide so much of him. “Would a jerk swing you to your apartment?”

You look up at him equipped with his mask.

“He probably would, actually.”

“Aw,” Miguel said, red marks for eyes holding so much sadness. “Oh well.”

You yell as he yanks you up by the waist and shoots his web up to the nearest flying car.

“Miles! You almost screwed us over!” Margo did her best to wipe their trace.

“I panicked!” Miles tried to explain himself as he ran on the windows of a skyscraper.

“For what?” Gwen flipped as she connected from one structure to the next. “It was so clear that he meant that he wanted to be with whoever that was, not because he wants to quit HQ.”

“Seeing him like that feels like we met a new man,” Hobie said. His boots were light in the air. “Don’t like it.”

“You say that like he doesn’t let you get away with everything,” Pavitr said.

“Like what?”

“Like giving away food to the street cleaners.”

“Or like pasting your band stickers everywhere.”

“Or painting an ACAB mural.”

“To be fair, Miguel aligns with every single one of those things,” Hobie shrugged.

“This is great and all, but talk about a major fail,” Peter sighed. “He clearly needs a wingman.”

“I thought he did pretty good!” Miles said.

The rest of the group made a range of judging noises.

“His game definitely needs some work and he’s already on his way back to HQ, so hurry it up, guys. We need to hustle and huddle.”

Miguel was at his dock again, preparing to go check out the anomalies of the week. 

He was back doing the thing that distracted him most: thinking about you. 

Yesterday only confirmed what he’s been thinking about ever since you opened your mouth. 

He’s absolutely infatuated with you. 

At first, he thought it was a fluke, a blip in his timeline. No matter how many times your jokes made him chuckle or your smile brought him warmth, he wasn’t going to lean into it. 

But then, you called him one night and your voice brought him back from the darkness that was consuming him. Stories of your life, an exchange of nostalgia, a whisper of hope for the future, and the confirmation that he was more than the error in time that he thought he was. 

You’re something that he more than adored. 

And yet, he still hasn’t figured out how to tell you. 

He wanted more than the monthly meetups to refresh his memory on the stupid tech that kept this building running. 

Truthfully, he could call Gabriel, or worst case scenario, Xina for help, but every time he got a chance it was your name that crossed his mind. 

Miguel sighed as he started to shut some tabs down. 

“Spiders incoming,” Lyla popped up to inform him. 

Miguel saw the gaggle of teens plus Peter walking to his office. 

“Here we go,” he grumbled. 

“Turn that frown upside-down! Company is always good,” Lyla said. 

Before Peter can open his mouth Miguel is beating him to it. 

“What do you want?”

“Ouch!” Peter laughed. “Not up for a bit of family bonding time?”

“Not with you.”

“Oh c’mon, Miguel,” Peter inches forward as Miguel’s platform comes down. “Hear us out.”

“Make it quick.”

The teens all stared at Peter who looked back and forth between them. 

“Do any of you not know what the word ‘quick’ means?” Miguel asked with irritation lining his voice. 

“Well,” Miles started. 

“You see, we were thinking that you might need some help,” Gwen finishes. 

Miguel crossed his arms, “Help with what.”

“Your sad flirting,” Hobie says. 

“What?”

“You know,” Peter puts his arm around Miguel’s shoulders. “You need a wingman!”

Miguel’s frown grew deeper, “What are you talking about? Did you guys spy on me?”

Six voices overloaded Miguel’s eardrums, all explaining their part of some convoluted scheme. 

“Alright, alight! Quiet!” Miguel holds his hands out. “Margo!”

Miguel pinned his eyes to her with his eyebrows pinched. 

She danced from foot to foot, face scrunched, “We just! We were worried about you so we followed you and saw you making googly eyes at someone!” The words spilled out of her like water. 

Everyone but Hobie looked at Margo incredulously. 

“What?” she whined. “He was giving me his disappointed look. The disappointment was torturing me!”

Miguel turned and paced, pinching his nose as he whispered to himself. 

“Miguel, they could help you!” Lyla said cheerfully. “You’ve only been crushing on them for what…multiple years?”

“Lyla!”

“Multiple years? No wonder you’re always so tense. That’s pretty sad, bro,” Pavitr hummed. 

Miguel pointed his finger, “Don’t bro me.”

“Still seeking authority in his moment of weakness. Something’s got to give,” Hobie went to lean on a wall. 

“We really thought something terrible was going on,” Miles’ shoulders drop. “You also go M.I.A. whenever you have a problem.”

“We just wanted to help,” Gwen supplied. 

“Hey man, don’t blame the kids for this one, alright?” Peter’s voice lowered so only the two of them could hear it, albeit a bit useless in a room full of power-holding teens. “Say the word and we’ll stay out of it, but the kids deserve to know why you were canceling on them at least.”

Miguel looked at Peter with an exasperated face before looking at the teens, three of which looked like they were about to cry. 

He rolled his eyes to the ceiling and let out a deep breath, “I’m not sick.”

“But lovesick?” Margo asked. 

He gave her a tired look, “Yes.”

“Well why not say that instead of just disappearing?”

“They’re the one who helped make the tech for this society. Without them, there would be no updated gizmos, no updated Lyla, no new ideas. Every time I left it was to…get insight on something here. To fix broken tech.”

“And to stare in their face,” Pavitr snickered. 

Miguel panned his eyes to the floor, too embarrassed to admit it. 

“What’s the hold up in telling them how you feel?” Peter asked. “There’s no time like the present.”

“Don’t tell me yesterday was an example of what happens when you try to confess?” Gwen’s face twisted up, teeth clenched in second-hand embarrassment. 

Miguel’s silence was enough of an answer. 

“Tío,” Miles closed his eyes then looked back up dramatically with his hands out. “¡Vamo’! Sácale, llévale al cine.”

Lyla put a spotlight on Miles and held a microphone out to him while Miguel groaned. 

“Cómprale, un ramo de flores!”

“Ya no puédo mas,” Miguel swiped through the holographic mic. “Eso no va a funcionar.”

Miles slumped, “But how do you know? You haven’t even tried! Bañate, junto con el-”

“Don’t finish that song, Miles,” Miguel’s fingers went to his temples. 

“You should really listen to the lyrics-”

“Why don’t we help you win them over?” Margo stood in between the two, ending the squabble. “It’s clear that they seem to like you too.”

Miguel's eyes went softer staring at Margo’s pleading face, “How do you know?”

“We quite literally saw it,” Hobie spoke as if Miguel lost his mind. “No one ever talks to you that sweet.”

The teens all nodded their head in unison and Peter did a horrible job at hiding his laugh. 

Hobie wasn’t done, “Don’t let someone like that slip through your fingers.”

Miguel was at the park again, dressed up even more than last time. An open navy button-down was tucked into his pants, his slacks were dark gray, and he had on one of the more expensive pairs of dress shoes he owned. A chain he borrowed from Gabriel adorned his neck and he let his hair natural and loose for once. 

Under Miles’ advice, he did buy some flowers. Hobie told him to remain calm, Gwen told him to just talk, Pavitr gave him a bullet point list of what and what not to do, and Margo told him that he was the best no matter how the confession turned out.

Peter went on and on about the importance of love and relationships but Miguel was never inclined to listen to him. He did keep the comment about letting you know how much he means to you to heart, though.

He was so in his own thoughts when you showed up in front of him that he didn’t even notice you at first.

He jumped when you tapped his shoulder.

“Woah, it’s just me. And you’re super dressed up today. What’s the occasion? I’m not taking ‘casual’ for an answer this time.”

Miguel swallowed dryly, grip on the bouquet of cool-toned flowers almost enough to wilt the stems.

“Flowers?” your eyes went to his hand.

“Yeah, um.”

Just breathe, Miguel!

Margo’s perky reminders sounded off in Miguel’s head.

“I brought them for you,” Miguel placed them in your hands.

“Oh!” your face lit up. “These are beautiful. Thank you so much. I didn’t get you anything, though. I didn’t know we were bringing gifts today.”

“No need. I wanted to get them because,” Miguel felt his throat closing in. “I really, really like you.”

The smile on your face dropped as you stared at him.

“It’s been particularly hard over the past years to try to focus without you running through my thoughts and I don’t want the fear of myself or my circumstance to stop me from having a chance to be with you.”

Maybe his ears could pick up how fast your heart was going, too.

“So if you’re willing, will you please go out with me?”

You dropped the flowers and brought him in for a tight hug. 

“Are you kidding me? Of course, I’ll go out with you.”

Miguel was quick to wrap his arms around you today, burying his face in your neck, “No hesitation?”

“I’ve been wanting and honestly, waiting for one of us to make a move for years. You’re always so busy, so I was too nervous to even bother,” you look back at Miguel’s face, smiling from ear to ear.

“Sorry to keep you waiting then.”

You looked from his lips to his eyes, “Can we skip a few steps?”

“Such as?”

You pushed forward, melting into him as you slotted his lips against yours, head full of warmth and clouds. Miguel matched your pace, hand on your back as he pressed against you. When he opened your lips you pulled back, breath dancing against his. 

“Swing me to my apartment?”

Miguel smirked, “Always.”

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