ic Of Martyrs and Men [IC]

[Gizmo]

Alex could see fear in Erik as well, but it wasn't fear of her. It was fear for her, and fear for the world after the bleak future she'd described. The young man let out a long breath through his nose as he resumed walking to catch up the teenager. "You're part of Young Freedom, right?" he asked suddenly. "You've got people watching out for you, watching your back?"

[alderwitch]

Alex smiled, this time brilliant and happy, "I am. I have the very best people who watch out for me and more every day. I mean, I have friends and now you know the truth and if something bad ever comes down the line, you'll raise your voice against it and get your friends to do the same. That, right there, is why I'm doing it. It's worth getting a bit of fruit thrown at me to make that sort of difference."

She smiled and touched his arm, "I'm gonna be okay, you know. I really am. I always think, even with all I see, that people are basically good until something scares them into making bad choices. Some aren't but they're a tiny minority by comparison."

[Gizmo]

A cocky, lopsided smirk slipped onto Erik's face for a split second before he schooled it into a less distinctive smile. "Yeah, my crew are pretty good at, ah, 'raising their voices'. Tell you what, you stick with that green kid with the goggles; he knows what he's doing. Chica with the bat, too." Apparently reassured knowing that Alex wouldn't be facing her trials without the proper allies, the tanned young man shrugged, his features falling into an impression of mild embarrassment. "Mi hermanita has all the magazines," he explained. "You kids have surprisingly good PR." Frankly, the fencer was a little jealous; the general perception of the Interceptors was far from as sterling.

[alderwitch]

"Well, yeah, we do. Although its mostly just the truth, but we present ourselves well. Edge is really actually good at just sort of instinctively knowing how to make people listen and we have me to calculate all the different angles, so it's really just a matter of knowing who does what well and letting them play to their strengths." Alex said with a smile, "Geckoman's a bit nuts but he's got a good heart and Wander's probably the fiercest one on the team. I'm glad you like our articles, though. It's really important to most of us to be good role-models and all that too. Hellion and Zephyr less so on that."

The last she added with a wry twist to her lips and a dry tone of voice.

[Gizmo]

Oh, man, I had totally forgotten what that big 'G' actually stood for, Erik realized. The athletic young man shrugged. "Well, I mean, I'm more of a 'who cares what other people think' kinda guy, so long as the job's getting done, but a lot of kids probably look up to you guys, right? So it's good you look, y'know, good." He rubbed the back of his head and looked around the street and pulled a face. "The gangs start recruiting pretty young these days. It's frustrating."

[alderwitch]

"I know," Alex said sadly, tucking her hands into her pockets, "Youth outreach can only do so much and its really hard when you have all these powers and advantages to say 'Hey, stand up and be just like me. It totally won't get you stomped into the pavement by the bullies in your school'. Or worse, they try and do stupid, stupid things to get powers to make it all better. So you've got to find a way to reach out and try and say, 'no, you've got all the power you need' without sounding like an after school special. The best program we have for it is a big brother sort of thing but that's still hard and there's just never enough people to go around."

She sighed and then looked up at him with a small smile, "So what do you do?"

[Gizmo]

"Oh, well, I've done a lot of stuff," Erik replied without hesitation. He gestured at the buildings around them. "Like I said, did a few shifts at Tony's, most of the other local shops. These days I'm a live-in handyman for one of the apartment buildings." He ran a hand through his dusty brown hair ruefully. "Pays not great, but hey, free room and board. I just sorta do general... troubleshooting for the landlord."

[alderwitch]

"Oh, do you like it?" Alex asked curiously, tilting her head to the side without probing further. Either he had successfully not tripped the teen psychic's mental alarms or she was simply not concerned with trying to get past any deceptions he might be spinning. "Its not that different from what I do, I think. I spend most of my time troubleshooting while everyone else runs everything that's already set up. I like it better than the setting up part. It's a lot simpler to keep a machine running than to build it up to run right in the first place."

[Gizmo]

"Heh, clearly you've never had to deal with a building full of leaky faucets before," Erik drawled around grin. "But yeah, I like it. It's not exactly saving the world twice before breakfast, but it's nice to feel useful, right? Make somebody's day a little easier." The athletic young man wasn't sure just how well falsehoods would work on Alex's particular brand of telepathy, so he was being extra careful to stick to what was technically the truth... from a certain point of view. The best lies were based around facts anyway, he reflected.

[alderwitch]

"My powers would make that scenario easier, I must admit. I'm little-miss-fix-it, after all." Alex acknowledged with a small smile and ducked her head a little at that, "So, you're good with your hands? My boyfriend is too. He likes fixing things up a lot. He says its nice for things to be simple, sometimes. That there isn't enough 'simple' things left in the world. I think you'd like him."

She glanced around the empty streets as they walked, her eyes bright with curiosity and she occasionally drew to a stop to look up at the building faces now and again, "I think you probably help more people than you realize."

[Gizmo]

More that you realize, Half Pint, Erik mused to himself. Unless you're reading my mind right now, and you're just messing with me. Hrrn... It occurred to him that the trouble with telepaths wasn't so much their abilities as the inevitable paranoia having them around caused. The young man also wondered for a moment which one of the Claremont boys Alex was dating. Probably Matchstick. Strikes he as the 'handsy' type.

"Simple, huh? Yeah, I gotta agree with that," he nodded amiably. "Sounds like you kids don't get much of that."

[alderwitch]

"Well, what kids do these days, really? There's a billion things making us grow up faster than they used to. I mean, how many sixteen year olds aren't having sex or going out partying on the weekends? Never realizing just how little they're prepared for the consequences they're constantly flirting with. A lot of them skate by without any consequences, but they never think for a moment that they'll be one of the ones who doesn't 'get away with it'." Alex said, her tone far more weary with this topic than she had been with her economic restoration. She rubbed her brow slightly, looking far more like a beleaguered parent than one of those kids. Which, in this case she was. She was thinking about Zoe and all the poor choices her time displaced daughter was making at the moment.

"So you just chase after them with a safety net as best you can and hope that you can keep the bumps and knocks of growing up to a minimum. Its all anyone can do. Right?"

[Gizmo]

"You can't take all the bumps and knocks out," Erik opined. "That's when you do the growing up, right? Find out who you really are." The tanned West Ender regarded Alex questioningly. From the diminutive teen's expression it was pretty clear she wasn't speaking purely hypothetically. "Anybody in particular you're worried about?"

[alderwitch]

"My daughter," Alex said simply and then looked up, cocking her head to the side as she smiled reluctantly, "Speaking of which, it looks like my family needs me. It was very nice to meet you. Thank you for the tour of your home."

She held out one slender hand, the nails short and unpolished and a bright clutter of cheap bangles around the wrist. She stuck her hand out for him to shake, her grip very light and the bones in it having a birdlike fragility. "I hope you have a very nice night."

[Gizmo]

Erik blinked slowly. "Your...? Oh, uh, right, yeah, go do... what you've gotta do." Taking the girl's hand, he noted it's delicate nature and rather than shaking it, bowed forward, sweeping one arm out in a gallant gesture. "Pleasure was all mine, kiddo." Straightening with a lopsided grin, he released her hand and touched two fingers to his forehead in a vague salute. "Take care of yourself, alright? City needs all the heroes it can get."

[alderwitch]

She smiled at him, a bright and happy smile and gave him the salute back. It should have looked silly but with all that she'd shown him of herself, it came off as just one more face. Child, mother, soldier... She dropped the slight illusion that kept her powers from being visible to the naked eye and a sparkle-y corona of energy surrounded her. "You too. And don't worry about Tony's. Everything there will be just fine."

Then with a thought she propelled herself up into the sky, leaving a glowing trail of power in her wake and for the first time, Erik felt the flutter of her thoughts brush his mind as delicate as moth wings. 'I promise.'