Interlude 1.5 (Patreon)

Midnight had long since fallen across the dark, cloudy Brockton Bay sky, and one Lisa Wilbourn was once again anticipating another long, sleepless night of doing what she did best, outside of getting discounts at pawn shops and pissing off old men - that is, running intel work for the Undersiders’ next gig. It wasn’t supposed to be a big one; Coil was still ‘testing’ them with relatively low-octane jobs, and the money was decent enough - for now - to excuse kicking in a few doors and scaring the pants off some civilians. Now, if only the night was young enough for her to finish up her work and do a bit of snooping into the identity of one positively curious civilian boy named…

“...Want a pizza bagel? The cheese is pretty cool now, so it ain’t the best, but…” Jason glanced down at her as they walked down the sidewalk towards the bus station. More specifically, he was walking her to the bus station after she bought her bag of 40 ft. ethernet cables. He’d offered after she made a throwaway joke - purposefully, of course - about the dangers of walking the streets alone at night.

He didn’t seem worried or hesitant when he offered, which implied that it came from a genuine place of kindness…or maybe it was more of a masculine urge to protect a ‘helpless’ teenage girl? She couldn’t see his eyes from beneath his glasses, and his lower face - albeit handsome and strong-jawed - rarely shifted out of a neutral frown or dry smirk. She couldn’t get a freaking read on him!

And that…wasn’t a bad thing? Maybe? Oh, it grated for sure…made her feel like she was walking on a tightrope with a blindfold on and no parachute, but maybe she needed a bit of that? It wasn’t like everything needed to be a puzzle waiting to be solved.

But even then, she found herself studying what was exposed of his face, his bearing, his presence - the way he still looked down at her as they walked, seemingly unperturbed by her silence. What could he possibly be thinking about, to not seem awkward in the face of what had to be an uncomfortable gap in conversation to him?

‘........’

Nothing. Maybe…maybe she was approaching things the wrong way? He was broad-shouldered, clearly built athletically with defined biceps and triceps and a vascularity to his forearms. She could only assume that his legs were similarly corded with lean muscle beneath his jeans. Maybe he was only walking with her in order to rob her for the money she’d ‘accidentally’ flashed while paying for her purchases? To bait out such a reaction had been why she’d done it, after all.

‘........’

Her lip twitched, stuck between amusement and annoyance. This fucking guy…

“Silent rejection, eh? Fair,” His deep voice brought her eyes back up to the dark lenses of his sunglasses. “I probably wouldn’t wanna eat lukewarm cheese at 12 AM either. ‘Specially being lactose intolerant…shit sucks, literally.” A crooked grin quirked at the corner of his mouth.

Lisa found herself grinning back.

Usually, this would be the part where her powers told her something like ‘Smiling too wide. Sweat beading temple. Eyes drifted down for 1.7 seconds too long. Is looking at my chest. Is turned on by the impression of my breasts’…and then would come the disgusting little factoids that she didn’t want to know at all, like what whatever man - be them adult or teen like her - wanted, sexually. The debasement. The shame - unfounded, and even more infuriating to feel when it wasn’t even her fault.

Here, though…

‘…….’

Lisa blinked at the little, unfamiliar flutter of warmth trickling through her tummy. Without the eye-rolling, embarrassing little quirks and dirty little secrets hanging over his head like a miasma, she had to admit…’Jason with the glasses’ was pretty cute.

“Lactose intolerant, huh?” She let out a fake wince of sympathy and shook her head side to side, her dark blonde braid whipping over her shoulder at the movement. “Sucks to suck I guess - I wouldn’t be able to survive without coffee. Whole milk, three extra sugars, a big ass dollop of creamer. Gets me through long nights.” And she was looking forward to enjoying a nice big mug as soon as she got back to the hideout. Coffee truly was God’s gift to this shitty, dog eat dog world.

Her new acquaintance side-eyed her appreciatively for a moment. “Long nights like these?” He asked lightly, inclining his head up towards the night sky. A dry tone entered his voice. “Careful with the caffeine after midnight. I’ve partaken before, and I gotta say…there are fates worse than lacking toes. Like ‘toddler ants’. Brrr.”

A heavy-handed, corny play of words on the term ‘lactose intolerance’ - Lisa saw it coming a mile away, even without her powers working towards her benefit, but the teenage girl still found herself, quite against her will, snorting and choking on her saliva at the absolute deadpan delivery. It was funny because it wasn’t funny, and sometimes those were the best fucking jokes. She kinda…liked how this conversation was going. She felt, not necessarily relaxed, but free? Untethered?

“Y-you…” Lisa snorted again, before exhaling harshly and covering up her giggles with an unimpressed frown, “Ahem. You’re absolutely terrible. Truly a 0/10 joke. Definitely stick to your day job, handsome.”

“We saw the type of cash my ‘day job’ rakes in already. Shitty stand-up comedy is probably a rare gem in Brockton Bay. I could make it work.”

Jason’s face morphed into another one of his crooked smiles. That was another thing she noticed about him - even without her powers, Lisa knew she was quick on the uptake, and something about the way that the other teen played with the emotions on his face and in his voice reminded her of a hotter, more witty Alec. It was possibly some sort of disorder, because his smiles and grins felt…not forced, but deliberate. As if he chose to smile rather than felt the urge naturally.

It didn’t put her off, but it definitely upped the mystique factor. Lisa could feel her brain practically abuzz with questions and curiosities that would make a professional interrogator blanch, but she knew she couldn’t scare him off like that. No, Jason gave her the vibe of someone with easy confidence. He wasn’t afraid to break off and do his own thing. He was probably pretty popular in school, too. If she wanted to learn more about this mystery boy, she’d have to play the long con.

It wasn’t as if the tasks Coil was having them do were too big-name or strenuous. She could afford a little side-project that didn’t involve planning how to fuck over her boss.

Abruptly, Lisa realized that she’d been staring at him for the past few seconds without replying. She’d been doing that a lot over the past hour - but sometimes her brain just ran away from her when there was a mystery she wanted to crack.

Not wanting to flounder the banter they had going on, she hurried to reply. “Right, so what is your day job anyway, mystery man? I’m guessing you’re a student, but you had two hundred bucks so you gotta be working part-time.” A solid question that would give her a bit more information to work with when she inevitably looked him up. Lisa mentally patted herself on the back.

The boy quirked an eyebrow at her. “Dropped out. School’s not really my scene,” he shrugged easily, before stopping in his tracks in the middle of the sidewalk.

Lisa stopped as well, having been watching him attentively to read whatever stray emotion he allowed to fall over his face. Before pestering him about answering the actual question, she noticed that they were coming up right behind the empty bus stop. The bus wasn’t there, but she had already planned out her late night outing beforehand - barring any interruptions, it would be coming around the corner in the next five to ten minutes. Probably sooner, since she’d spent extra time talking with Jason.

He’d done what he said he would do and walked her safely to the bus stop…but Lisa was not satisfied. She wanted to talk to him more, learn more about him, what made him tick, maybe even get him to open up a bit about whatever power he possessed that made him immune to her Thinker abilities. She couldn’t be sure that he was an active cape, although her gut instinct was telling her that he probably was considering his athletic body and unflappable countenance, but even if he wasn’t, she had to admit to herself that she still simply…enjoyed his presence.

The fact that he was possibly immune to other Thinkers was definitely a not-inconsiderable prospect that beget further inquiries as well.

“Huh. Well, looks like we made it in one piece,” she said, turning away from the worn bus stop bench and peering up at Jason. “Thanks for the walk and talk, Jason. Means a lot to a defenseless maiden like me.” The sharp curvature of her smirking lips laid to rest any possibility of her actually meaning that description, and the boy clearly knew.

He simply waved his free hand idly, the other gripping four different plastic bags over one broad shoulder.

“Don’t mention it, Lisa. Stay safe and watch your coffee intake. I’ve seen great men and women fall to its temptation.” His neutral frown pulled up into a little grin. “Be better.”

“So dramatic,” she laughed, but didn’t turn away. “I’ll keep that in mind big guy. You stay safe too. Watch out for your little ‘toddler ant’ problem tonight!”

“Heh, will do. Later.” He turned on his heel, hand still raised in goodbye.

“I’ll see you around.”

And she would.

As she walked back to the bench and sat down, dropping the bag of internet cords down by her feet and kicking back in the uncomfortable seat, Lisa watched his retreating form disappear into the darkness of the night. She hadn’t managed to concoct her original plan of grabbing his phone number since she had been, admittedly, pretty off of her game through most of their conversation, but there was always next time. Brockton Bay was big, but she had contacts of her own and a pretty useful ability when it came to finding out things. The information she managed to glean tonight had been minimal with Jason’s Thinker Immunity, but if her superpower was the only analytical thing about her then Lisa wouldn’t have as much pride in her abilities as she did.

Her smirk grew, and as she settled in for the small wait Lisa allowed her fingers to stroke the safety of the silenced pistol resting deep in the pocket of her hoodie. You could never be sure at this time of night, and there was no way she’d let some goon get the jump on her if she could help it.

Even then, with the scariness of Brockton Bay’s nightlife surrounding her in its shady embrace, the criminal found her mind drifting back to that mysterious boy.

‘Yeah,’ she thought languidly, ignoring the slight fluttering in her gut. ‘Mysterious, indeed. For now.’