(Untitled)

[century_girl]

WHO: Jenny Quantum (century-girl) and the Midnighter (wardelivery)
WHERE: Near the Porter's island.
WHEN: Now.
WARNINGS: None.
SUMMARY: Midnighter is a dad.
FORMAT: Prose.

Comments

[wardelivery]

Jenny had sounded so young. That wasn't the voice of the teenager he'd left on the Carrier-- full of teenage sulk and sarcasm. That was the little girl he'd left behind.

Was she really younger? Had something de-aged her, or was she from a different time period?

But that filtered through his head without slowing him down as he crossed The City by the streets and rooftops, moving like a parkour runner at super-human speeds until he had to slow down to scout the coast near the island.

He'd thrown on the mask-- Lucas Trent, currently a box-slinging yokel, couldn't move like he had to move. And he couldn't blow his 'secret identity.'

He would have, though, in a heartbeat, for Jenny. It was just luck that had put his apartment in the path of his mad dash across the city. He hadn't actually ever planned on returning to That Fucking Island for some time.

[century_girl]

Midnighter wasn't trying to be subtle and it wasn't night, both of these allowed Jenny to see her dad before he reached her or the island she'd been on before.

She had just spotted him and hadn't even started flying towards him when he saw her, too, and it made her grin. She didn't wait for him to jump down the rooftop where he was standing and flew up to him, throwing herself in his arms to hug him tightly.

"Daddy! Do you know where we are? Everything's weird."

[wardelivery]

"We're on an alternate Earth, sweetheart," he said awkwardly, gathering her into his arms after a beat of hesitation, just a nanosecond for his implants to gather information from her and determine that nope not a doppelganger-- double and triple checks after what the fake 'Apollo' had done. "It's a closed-off dimension, I think, with only the Porter letting things in or out. The timeframe is a little funny."

'Little funny.' Jenny of 10/16 years old would have given him a withering glare for that kind of baby talk. But Jenny here wasn't even angry at him.

"What year was it when you left?"

[century_girl]

Jenny wasn't yet old enough to get annoyed by being talked to like this. Her dad had always talked to her like that, and she didn't even consider it baby talk. To her, it was just Daddy Midnight being nice and there.

"2005." She looked up, frowning a little. "You just left. Did you come here?" 'The timeframe is a little funny' meant he could have walked out on them and come here and been here for long. "How long have you been here?"

[wardelivery]

Damn.

"No. No, honey, I came here in 2010. But I've only been here a few months." Under the mask, his brow furrowed, shifting the leather just fractionally. "Did you come through the Door when you got here? Or did the Porter take you from somewhere else?"

Easier to focus on the logistics of her arrival than explain his three year absence and try to make excuses-- 'Mind control nanites' sounded like such a cop-out.

[century_girl]

She suddenly wanted to ask about the future, just tons and tons of questions about how she was in five years, about how everyone would be, but she stopped herself.

She shouldn't be playing with time and know things like this. She'd seen the future and it wasn't bad, maybe asking about it could change it all.

And part of her was scared about what it might be like.

Jenny shook her head 'no', never letting go of her hold on Midnighter's neck and shoulders. "I was in the Carrier and then... I wasn't. I was told to this," she motioned to her communicator, "and dog tags. They're in my pockets."

[wardelivery]

"Okay," the Midnighter said quietly. "We probably won't be picked up for a while, if at all. There are a lot of people trapped in this universe-- some from Earths I think we've run into. It's not easy to get out. But we'll be okay. I have an apartment. We can get you into school. You won't be part of the superhero conflicts here."

Over his dead body she would be.

[century_girl]

Jenny pushed back on Midnighter's chest just enough to be able to fold her arms on her chest, and then looked at her dad very seriously.

"But why? You'll need me. People will need me. You know I can fight."

This wasn't the first time they had this argument, but in their current situation, Jenny thought she had even more reasons to get involved as she did before.

[wardelivery]

"Because I don't trust a place who imports its police force without doing background screenings. That Porter has brought half the psychopaths in this place," Midnighter said firmly. "We don't have the rest of the team here. We can't trust anyone else, not yet, and we definitely can't trust this place."

He scowled. "There are people who want to hurt you. Some of them might be here, too."

[century_girl]

"People have always wanted to hurt me. It's not fair."

Her dad was right about a lot of things, of course. It was true that they couldn't trust the place, and it was true that the team not being there changed things. Jenny would dwell on the fact Angie and Apollo weren't there later. For now, she just wanted to argue, because they were by themselves, and she couldn't just abandon her dad and stay behind, could she?

She pouted before she kept on going. "If you're going to get involved, I better get involved, too. You can't just leave me behind."

[wardelivery]

"I'm not involved either," the Midnighter pointed out, looking at her solemn little face with a swell of paternal feelings and awkward guilt. "I haven't decided what sides to take here. I just... work. Like a normal human."

"I think it might be good for you to be a normal little girl for a while. Until we figure this out," he offered, because even as a little girl she'd wanted to be involved.

[century_girl]

This effectively distracted Jenny, who saw in the comment something interesting.

She laughed, close to a giggle, and grinned at Midnighter. "Do you have a real secret identity, now? Not like last time?"

She was half-teasing. Last time hadn't worked very well at all, not just because to her, Apollo and Midnighter had been exactly the same physically, but mainly because they were the same inside, too.

[wardelivery]

"Do you know what helps with secret identities?" he asked with a wry look. "Not being on the cover of People. And The Advocate. Twice. It's working better this time."

Sheesh. Kids. Every one a critic. "I'm using the name Lucas Trent. I don't know how Jennifer Trent is a name you can live with, though."

[century_girl]

Jenny laughed again, grabbing Midnighter's neck softly (not that she could really grab it any other way even if she tried).

"But you always wear your mask, it was Daddy Apollo's fault. He only wore glasses. This can't really work."

Her smile shifted into a sheepish one, then. "I don't mind being called Jennifer Trent but I'm not sure I want to go to school." Jenny would be getting incredibly bored in school, to say the least.

She wasn't going to repeat the 'but we're not normal' argument because Midnighter knew about it. That didn't stop her from thinking that school was maybe a bit too much. She didn't need to go to school to have a secret identity, did she?

[wardelivery]

"They were very flattering glasses. He should have listened to me about the wig, though," he said, a little cheerfulness under his scowl.

The scowl remained, however, as he strode back towards the City. "You have to look at least moderately normal. If I can find someone I trust, though, they can pretend to tutor you at home."

[century_girl]

She didn't want to look normal, but Daddy usually knew best and she would think about it a little and try to understand why he wanted this before arguing more. For now, she was overall glad that one of her dads was here.

Jenny nodded and then stuck her tongue out, teasing. "I didn't like the glasses. And you could have helped him dye his hair instead!" Because Midnighter was so good with hair dye.