She didn’t mention how they were connected to the collapse three years ago that had killed Joon, didn’t mention how we’d been tracking them for years. No one admitted that we had completely dropped the ball.
I kept thinking about the way Glitch had focused on Alex; the words that he’d said. It was as if he were proud of her for stopping us. I hated how he’d fixated on her, and how thoroughly I got my ass beat. I was so wrapped up in it, I barely noticed when Alex walked through the door.
“Good news,” she chirped, startling me as she sat down with a bag in her arms. “Dahlia is giving you as much time as you need. She’s too busy dealing with the tabloids; she wants you as functional as possible before going after Splinter and Glitch.”
I scoffed. “They can’t handle another failure.”
“True,” Alex shifted, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “But that works in our favor. You don’t have to rush anything; focus on getting better. You should be released tomorrow, do you need any help at home?”
My body had been repaired, but everything was still heavy. When I stood up, my ears would ring, and colored lights would sprinkle my vision. Apparently, healing everything as quickly as they did took up every ounce of my energy.
“No,” the word blurted from my mouth, quick and panicked.
I didn’t want Alex to see how I lived, didn’t want her to see my shame. I was terrified of scaring her away after so much progress had been made. She didn’t need to know how bad it looked, when I was just starting to move forward. But she narrowed those blue eyes at me, and I found myself staring at the ceiling.
“What if you faint?”
I rolled my eyes. “I’ll be fine. I’m durable.”
“What if you get confused, or fall, or need help?” she kept pushing.
I sighed. “Don’t give yourself a headache, Sweetheart. Don’t get all nervous with me just because I kissed you. I don’t need you to take care of me.”
It was a vain attempt to distract her, pulling her focus from her current mission of protecting me. Part of me loved it; I wanted to drown myself in her attention, and was tempted to push it, leaning into the woe-is-me card just to see how she’d react.
Alex watched me with those knowing eyes, and guilt pooled in my stomach. “What if I want to take care of you?”
That was it; the nail in the coffin, the words that broke me. I’d bow to her whims, no backbone in sight. I sighed, chewing my lip as I ached for a cigarette.
“… Fine. But you’re not allowed to make comments, got it? Don’t… don’t try tofixanything.”
Her face scrunched, and the freckles on her nose smashed together in a way that took up all my attention. “What is there to fix?”
This…wasa mistake.
Alex stood in my apartment, settled in the basement of the VIA headquarters. Her eyes scanned the room as grocery bags sat tucked in her elbows. I could see the way she tried not to grimace, how her gaze hovered on the steel walls and large, industrial fans in the ceiling.
“This is…nice,” she squeaked.
I sighed, grabbing the bags from her arms, the ones that only minutes ago she’d refused to let me carry. But now, she was distracted, picking apart every inch of the space.Myspace. Everything was steel; the walls, the furniture, my kitchen and bathroom. My bed had a single blanket, and I’d made sure that was fireproof, too. It was the same material as my Hero suit.
I should probably get that replaced now that we know I can burn through it.
“You’re a bad liar, you know that?” I whispered in her ear before placing her haul on the countertop.
I flinched at the clanging sound it made, how it echoed. My mind worked, desperate to distract myself from her frozenform as I unpacked everything. A grin spread across my face as I pulled out five packs of cigarettes that were tucked in with vegetables—was she expecting me to go overseas?
Maybe the plan is to kill me slowly.
“Seriously?” I chuckled, waving them in the air. “I’m notthatbad. I thought you were worried about my lungs?”
With the endless rotation of Variants that had been sent through my hospital room, I’d actually gotten good news. The scans showed that my lungs were similar to how they’d been three years ago—they weren’t healed completely, but that was three more years tacked onto my lifespan. Reed told me it was time to take the win and quit.
I’ll deal with the whole stop-catching-on–fire thing first. Then I’ll quit. Maybe.
Alex chewed her thumb, still fixated on the space around her. She shivered, and I’d forgotten how low they kept the temperature. Every precaution was needed for the hothead Hero.
“Hey…” I groaned. “I said No comments.”
