Electra
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Erin grinned at that. "Maybe Chris," she agreed. "Night, Mike." Turning, she headed up the stairs to the girls' dormitory floors, wondering already if Alex would be hanging around. Truthfully, she wasn't sure if she was ready to talk about any of this or not. She didn't really know what to think about the whole evening herself. But it had been nice, really, a lot better than she'd expected. That in itself was kind of worrisome, now that she thought about it.
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With a laugh, Stesha rolled over to look at him, resting her fingers against his face. "You're too sweet," she told him. "I suppose I'd rather not get arrested while I'm trying to fight crime. Plus, winter in Freedom City is nothing to sneeze at. I think I'll make sure my costume has a jacket or something. Maybe like Phantom's cape, but with actual clothes underneath it, too. The last thing I need is leotard-related frostbite." She chuckled again, then sighed. "Think we should get started packing up?" she asked with some regret.
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Erin rolled her eyes at Zoe's last-ditch attempt to preserve the charade. "This is probably not a good place to talk about any of this," she pointed out, looking over at the lunchtime crowd still hoping something interesting was going to happen in this weird little drama. "I'm sure you all have really got a lot to talk about that you don't want everybody else hearing about. I'm sure you can grab one of the study rooms in the library at this hour and have it all out with nobody going for anybody's throat." She hadn't been sure of that a few minutes ago, had never seen Mike look that mad at anyone, but he seemed a lot calmer now, if confused. At the very least, he probably wasn't going to stay mad at Mark.
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"I did too," she told him. "It was fun. We should play baseball again, as soon as I can find a program that'll let us actually play through a whole game. Maybe I'll bug Darian about it." Erin hesitated at the bottom of the stairs, looking back at him. "And thanks for listening and not making me feel, weird, I guess, about anything. That was nice too. See you tomorrow at training?"
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Even going slowly, the ride from Hanover to Claremont didn't take very long by express air. Erin made the most of it, soaking in the cityscape full of lights that seemed close enough to touch. "That was really neat," she told him as they began the gentle downward arc that would put them down on school property. "Thanks for sharing that with me." Maybe some of the conversation had been kind of awkward, but when they hadn't been trying to just sit and talk, it had been a pretty good evening.
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"Sounds good to me," she agreed. "I've got a wedding on Friday, and then I'm supposed to meet Ace on Saturday so he can help me find a real costume. I don't know why I said yes to the idea, except that I think I might be crazy." She chuckled, so that he could feel the vibrations through her back. "So maybe one of these days you'll get to see me heroing around in a costume that's better than a sweatsuit with a hoodie! That'd be something, all right. I kind of wish I was like you and could just go around naked when I was working." She laughed full-out at that.
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Erin wrapped a hand around his arm, leaning out further to look down at the panorama spread out below. She wasn't worried about falling, even a fall at this height wouldn't hurt her unless she were very unlucky, but it was good to have an anchor. "It looks so much different when the lights are on," she said, studying the sweep of headlights in the streets far below. "It's so much better. Pyramid Plaza looks horrible in the dark, like giant mausoleums. Now it looks like some kind of beacon, like you could be out in space and still use it to find your way back. It's really neat."
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Erin sucked in a quick breath of surprise when he scooped her up with an arm under her knees and took off, but she quickly relaxed as the scenery captured her attention. Freedom City lit up like a million stars at night, each light the representation of a living person, just going about their daily lives without a second thought. That was an amazing thought, somehow. "It's beautiful," she murmured, craning her head and twisting her body to get a better look. "You must come up here all the time, just to see it."
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Stesha nodded soberly and took the gun from Taylor, mimicking her motions in checking to make sure it was unloaded. The impulse to pose like a Charlie's Angel and yell "bam, bam, bam!" was surprisingly strong, but with the stern warnings in mind, she prudently refrained. "Most of the villains I've seen or read about have really weird guns that shoot energy or bees or whatever. But I suppose your average mugger is still going to have a regular gun." She reached into her hair and plucked out a flower, opening it wide and dropping the gun inside, then turning the flower over and shaking it back out, just for practice. "That doesn't seem too hard," she decided. "But how do we get the gun in the first place?"
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Erin elbowed her way up behind Erin, moving considerably more easily through the crowd, for all it made her uncomfortable. She stared at the scene unfolding overhead. "Oh, crap," she muttered. She blinked a few times in surprise as Alex gave her impromptu biology lesson, then helpfully yelled, "Whatever you heard is a big misunderstanding, Mike!" She was sure that was probably true, at least.
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"I'd rather fly," she told him, taking his hand and telling herself not to be a ninny. "I've seen most of Freedom City on foot by now, I know what it looks like. And maybe the lights will be coming out." It was starting to get dark outside now, with streetlights and neon signs just starting to glow against the gathering dusk. "And we won't hit any traffic."
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Erin straightened up, putting both hands on Alex's shoulders and waiting for Alex to look at her. "Come on, Alex, you have to stop this," she demanded. "You're not thinking clearly and you of all people should know it. You can't make big life decisions when you're upset. There's no reason for you to leave school and no reason for you to start worrying about money right now. There are scholarships and things like that, it'll get taken care of." She sighed, awkwardly patting Alex's shoulder. "Let's go back to the room, okay? I'll borrow the hot pot and we can have cocoa or something."
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"What?" Erin asked, baffled. "Why would you do that? I mean, I'm not going to say I'm his biggest fan, but he's your boyfriend. He should be around to support you when you need it, right? He's got at least that much responsibility. And maybe he'll have some ideas about what you can do. You probably don't want to talk to your parents about this, I'm guessing." She leaned against the wall, chewing on her lip as she tried to think of something helpful. "Nothing needs to change right now, anyway. You're still going to finish school, you can still be a hero. You've still got all your friends around. If you really think this is a responsibility you have to take on, we'll do what we can to help."
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Erin wet some more paper towels and handed them over. "You still should've told me. It's not like I have anything better to do than work off a few demerits. I promised I'd go with you, didn't I?" She leaned back against the sink, studying Alex. "It doesn't have to change anything, you know. You could just forget about the test results and go on with your life. Nobody would blame you for it, and maybe it would make everything easier. I mean, what's Mike going to think?"
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Erin finished off the last of her milkshake as Mike paid the waitress, concentrating intently on the task. With her sunproof skin, it was impossible to miss the quick flush of embarrassed color in her face. Maybe someday she'd figure out how to react to things like normal people again, but it didn't look like it was going to be today, she decided ruefully. "Um, yeah, that's a good idea," she told him, pushing aside her empty glass. "I've got some homework and stuff before training tomorrow morning. Thank you for the milkshake," she added as they rose. "I like your diner."
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Erin looked down at his hand over hers, her entire arm stiffening to the shoulder as she wondered what to do about it. She didn't pull her hand away, though, that would've been rude. And it didn't feel bad, just... weird. Most people didn't touch her, except in the context of training, when it was just workouts and didn't mean anything. "The bat helps," she said with a half-smile, trying to just ignore her own conflicted feelings. "And all the training. It's easier now to keep my focus than it was when I came here. Once you learn one way of fighting, it's hard to change it, but in another two years, I'll have been doing hero stuff longer than I was just fighting on my own, so by then it'll be second nature, I guess." Her words sped up a little even as she tried to act entirely normal. "Especially if they keep up this training schedule."
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Erin looked away, rubbing the back of her neck, equally uncomfortable. "I shouldn't have said it the way I did," she replied, "but I'm glad if it helped you. You've really stepped up a lot lately, and I think everyone notices. Out of everybody on the team, I know you're the one I'd want at my back in a real fight." There was Mark too, of course, but he wasn't so much a fighter as a changer of circumstances, and he didn't count. "But I figure, if we keep going at this rate, we'll be ready for the Freedom League in two years. I think I'm going to apply right away, at least. I don't know what I'd do in college anymore. But two years or six years, either way."
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Erin had no idea what most of the paperwork meant, but she was fairly sure that James, or one of James' many "people" had already looked it over and knew what it said. She picked up a pen to sign on the first of the indicated lines, then got as far as writing "Er" before remembering that it wasn't her legal name anymore. Or wouldn't be, anyway, when she had one. Biting her lip and hoping no one would notice, she quickly scribbled out the two errant letters and wrote in "Keeley E. White" on all the marked spaces. "Is that everything?" she asked, pushing the papers to Alex to sign.
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Erin figured she might have drawn a little attention with her race up the stairs and down the corridor, but most people were asleep at this hour anyway, and it wouldn't be the first time or the tenth time a speedster came down the hallway in a blur. She ducked into the bathroom and shut the door behind her, taking in the scene quickly. "I thought you were going to ask me to help you when you decided to run the DNA tests," was the only thing that came to mind to say right away. As soon as it was said, she realized what she'd given away there. "I mean... those are lab results, right?"
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On the other side of campus, Erin ground to a sudden halt while running wind-sprints, sending up yards-long divots of soil with her heels. "I'm on my way," she said immediately, out loud. She couldn't project the way Alex could, and just talking out loud was the easiest way to get ideas to sit in the front of her head where Alex could find them. She began running towards the building at full speed, leaving her knapsack back by the bleachers. "Where are you?"
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Stesha nestled in against him comfortably, covering his hand with her own. "I like to think of it as a really good beginning," she murmured, smiling with her eyes still closed. "That speaks of even better things to come. I know I'm going to miss you when we're both off doing our own things this week. You should come over when you have an evening off. We'll have dinner and watch movies, maybe take a walk in the park. This weekend has been amazing, but just being with you is fun." She didn't mention him staying the night, because she figured it would just fluster him, even now, but that was certainly on the table as well. She had a feeling her apartment would seem lonelier than usual tonight.
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Erin was surprised to hear that, she'd never really heard much about Alex's grandma. "Was she a superhero too?" she asked curiously. "I mean, did she do outside hero work, or was she a builder? It must've taken a lot of time and energy to put all of this stuff together." She glanced over at Alex to see if her friend knew about all of this. It was interesting stuff.
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"Sure," Erin said with a shrug. She wasn't really, but she rarely turned down a chance at food that wasn't caf food. After washing the rust and chemicals off her hands, she sat down with Alex and her grandfather. "Did you build all the stuff down here?" she asked him curiously, between bites. "Or did you have other inventors and scientists and stuff who helped you get it all set up?"
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"Mmm, I'll take that as a yes," she chuckled, nibbling lightly on his earlobe. As entertaining as it was to play in the water, though, some things were probably best left to dry land. Rather than bother with walking back, she once again reached out and transmitted them, popping them out in the middle of camp. They teetered, nearly fell, but she just laughed and held on while he caught his balance. It didn't take long for them to duck back into the tent for one last entertaining vacation activity.
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Erin thought about saying that wasn't what she meant, that it was different to lose one person when you only had one person to lose, but she decided not to. She hadn't hurt Alex's feelings, so at least she didn't have to worry about that, and the last thing she wanted was to have a chat about loving and losing with someone who'd had so few losses. She didn't need any more memories to drag around, that was for damn sure. But Erin didn't want to go down any of those mental avenues, so instead she refocused, like a good little therapy patient. "Do you think we should get that what-do-you-call-it to your grandpa before we start messing around with the rest of this stuff? He's probably waiting to start fixing the teleporter.