Chapter Text
The rings are important, he knows. Cuffs. Power limiters. He snaps them into place around his wrists, and his head stops buzzing long enough to think clearly.
More clearly, at any rate. The buzzing is quieted, but he still feels…unsteady. Something is missing. Probing his mind for it feels like leaning over an abyss, looking down and seeing shapes in the darkness, something unfathomable lurking in the deep that he cannot reach without drowning-
So he pulls away from it. If he can’t find it from within, then maybe he’ll find it here. The landscape is dusty and dry, pockmarked with craters like the one he’d pulled himself out of, and for a moment he lets himself wonder where here is -
Earth, provides a voice in his mind, soft and gentle. It belongs to a shape in the abyss - he doesn’t know where that certainty comes from, but something soft and hurt and newly uncovered in him trusts it deeply, and he listens. Earth is your home.
He’s home.
…this doesn’t feel like home. This doesn’t feel like anything.
Maybe, if this is home, he can find someplace that feels like home. Someplace secure, where he’ll be safe while he searches the abyss for his missing pieces.
He doesn’t think he knows what safety feels like, either - it does not resonate with the abyss - but a close approximation should do.
Teleportation comes as easily to him as it ever did, pulling him away from the field of craters. He could tell it where to take him, if he could think of a place to go , but all his mind knows is craters, inside and out, and that won’t help. Instead, he thinks Earth , and lets the energy in his soul pull him away-
-to another field, grassy and green-
-then to the peak of a mountain, snowy and cold, so high that his view fills with an expanse of nearly unbroken cloud tops-
- then to a vast body of water, glassy and flat and still, empty as far as the eye can see-
-and then to a cityscape, damaged and still smoking as humans work to move debris and put out smoldering fires. The remains of heavily armored vehicles litter the street, impeding the workers in their progress. There are no bodies, but those would be the first things moved-
Glass shatters in an explosion that whites out his vision, bowling him over across the floor before slamming him into a wall-
He shakes his head roughly, wincing until it clears again as the noise and sound and pain echo up from the abyss, along with a new voice. What did you do? it demands, accusatory and full of building rage, and he finds he has no response - any answer would require dredging the abyss, and he can’t do that right now-
Did he do this? This destruction - was this his fault?
He knows he is dangerous. The chaos energy in him means he couldn’t be anything but, and harnessing it is better than letting it explode and tear apart him and anyone unlucky enough to be caught in the blast. But this-
If he did this, then he doesn’t want to be here. This isn’t home - this is a mistake.
Earth, he thinks, and lets the chaos in him take him away.
(He sees three more ruined cityscapes before he clears his mind enough to stop circling that particular drain. The abyss doesn’t blame him for any of them, and so he does not linger.)
Earth’s offerings flash by, tundra and desert and mountain and swamp passing around him, and he does not stop to see more. Nothing is right. Nothing feels like home . The planet is huge, and he has no direction - there’s a very good chance he won’t find anything before he tires himself out, drained as he is from- from- from something the abyss has hidden from him, huge and looming in the deep - something that has left his quills singed and his body littered with aches and pains, cuts and bruises, the remnants of some form of violence - and he may have to settle for someplace less than safe before he pushes himself to the verge of collapse-
Chaos spits him out into another city, this one bright with daylight and crisscrossed by winding roads and steep hills. There is no destruction here, no guilt buried buried in the minefield of his mind-
There is a girl, roller skating down a hill.
He freezes in place on the rooftop he’s landed on as the abyss whispers, lacing his mind with the muted sound of laughter and the feeling of speed, followed by an end over end tumble and the sensation of something sweet lingering on his tongue-
The girl’s coasting picks up speed, and she swings her arms in practiced movements, the glittery stickers plastered onto her helmet glinting in the sun. He watches, letting the abyss whisper comfortingly to him as she flies down the hill, faster and faster-
Until her wheels catch on a plant growing in the cracks of the sidewalk and she falls -
Directing the chaos energy in him is second nature, something the abyss cannot steal, and between one blink and the next he’s down on the street, hand closed around the girl’s wrist to arrest her movement and keep her from hitting the pavement.
Unfortunately, his failure to consider her inertia doesn’t make the laws of physics any more lenient towards him, and the next moment finds her swinging around and colliding with him, sending him sprawling to the pavement as she lands on top of him. He lets out an oof and throws an arm around her to keep her from bouncing off him and hitting the sidewalk anyway. He can take it, injured though he is, and she’s delicate and needs to be protected-
He doesn’t know her. What is he thinking?
She pushes against his grasp and he lets go, watching her roll off him and sit up. He expects her to escape - he's dangerous and he grabbed her; shouldn't she be running? - but instead she blinks and her eyes widen. “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” Not the truth, but good enough.
“If you're sure,” comes the slow, considering reply. She stares at him, brow furrowed, tilting her head sideways as he sits up himself. “You remind me of someone,” she says, still slowly, like it's a test.
“So do you,” he replies as the abyss whispers in his mind, overriding his filter. She doesn't match the shapes in the abyss, but she's close enough to sting, and he can't figure out why-
She straightens up and shrugs; evidently he's passed her test. “What’s your name?”
His-
He has one- it's-
He's-
“I don't know,” he admits.
She regards him again. “Do you know if you have one?”
“I do.” He does- he was given a name by- by-
He pulls away from the abyss - obviously he can't search it and hold a conversation at the same time. “I don't remember it.”
She watches him again, then nods decisively and pushes herself to her feet, carefully angling her wheels away from the downslope of the hill. She knows what she's doing on those skates, at least. “You can come home with me,” she says, offering him a hand up. “We're gonna have to sneak in, though, because if Lena finds out about you, she'll tell Mom and Randall, and Mom will hit the roof.”
None of those names mean anything to him, but sneaking in somewhere he's not supposed to be resonates with the abyss. If all else fails, as long as he can get a visual, he can simply teleport his way in. He nods and gets to his feet himself, hiding a wince - no sense overbalancing her when he's fully capable.
She waits until he gets up to start skating down the hill again, zig-zagging slowly to prevent herself from picking up speed.
Oh. She expects him to walk.
He skates instead, slow and easy, falling into step with her and matching her pace. She looks over at him as realization dawns - “Oh, you skate!” - and her face lights up in a brilliant smile-
The abyss sings , and for that he would follow her anywhere.