[CoV fic] Breaking the Habit
Title: Breaking the Habit
Fandom: City of Villains/Heroes
Characters: Tainted Shade, Darkfire, mentions of others
Wordcount: 5,837 - yes, this one is long. I have no excuses and make no apology :P
Notes: Shade's life is changing, and there's lots and lots of information about his character and personality in this story, though since I'm still working on his backstory, I'm trying to avoid revealing everything. This story consists of mainly narrative and introspection. The accompanying song is Breaking the Habit, by Linkin Park. (grab it here if you'd like)
The streets and buildings of St. Martial fell behind him in succession, eaten away by each jump he took in the murky night. Up ahead, he could see the beckoning glitter of the island’s neon district, the mill of late night gamblers and tourists. With well practiced ease, the shadow spine landed on an art deco ledge, lost in the dark to any eyes that might have looked his way. He paused for a moment, to listen and look, and make sure there were no dangers lurking around, before settling down with his back against the cool concrete of the building, and his feet dangling over the edge.
Tainted Shade opened the bottle of beer he had brought with him, tossing the cap into the air and down into the street below. He took a long full drink, and set the bottle on the ledge beside him, hand gripping tightly around the neck.
He sighed heavily. Alone in the night, as usual. Shade was hollow. There was no enjoyment for him in his usual haunts. He’d just picked up a few bucks off the Black Market for some items he’d cobbled together out of junk, but the money made little impact and had less meaning. Night after night, the shadow stalker was just going through the motions. Pretending to exist.
Though he couldn’t honestly say that he’d ever been happy since arriving in the Isles, lately the general dissatisfaction he felt toward his life and circumstances was particularly acute. This had never been what he really wanted anyway, but even trying to make the best of things no longer held any interest for him. Now that he was one of Ghost Widow’s errand boys, he had reached as close to the top of the Isles’ food chain as was possible given his own sense of morality. Now, his so-called career consisted of an endless string of the same types of jobs that just blurred one into the next until they, and the nights upon which they occurred, became indistinguishable from each other.
Shade took another drink, the bitterness of the cheap beer crawling down his throat unpleasantly. He had gone past just feeling dissatisfied and unfulfilled. Most of the time, he didn’t feel anything. Thanks both to the monotony of his life, and to careful emotional design. As he sat there, shadowed in the dark and watching the busy movements in the neon district below, Shade wondered if he was alive anymore. His heart didn’t even seem like it was beating. He was so far removed from who he had once been. There was nothing inside except for yawning emptiness and looking forward to nothing.
When he thought about it, he realized that lately the only things he felt were anger. Irritation. Frustration. At least it was something. Even as unwelcome as annoyances were, like a whole recent situation when someone thought it would be funny to pull a stupid juvenile prank on him, they prompted him to feel when he otherwise didn’t. Shade still hadn’t found out who had done that, but it hadn’t gone on for long - a quick check with Ghost Widow had verified that she hadn’t given him those ridiculous instructions. If he did find out who’d done it, Shade would be sure to teach them a spiny lesson, but the whole incident had just driven home a greater point to him.
When the only things he could be spurred into feeling anything about were negatives, then something was seriously wrong in his life.
And then there was the whole debacle with Arachnos in Warburg. He and Darkfire had taken a couple of the, relatively, newer members of the group on what had promised to be a routine job for Recluse’s organization, and had been asked to do something morally reprehensible. Shade was glad that Darkfire had also refused the job, though he hadn’t doubted it of his Boss, but it turned into a bad fight, during which Shade’s anger over the direction his life had boiled over. He hadn’t felt that furious in ages. It was a struggle to keep it all contained enough so as not to be apparent to the rest of the team how thoroughly upset he was. Enraged and close to losing control. How the entire incident shook him right down the empty core.
He lifted the beer and pressed the bottle to his forehead, just to the side of his row of spikes. This was what he had become? He was an excellent assassin, but that was not something to be proud of. It was a morally ambiguous profession at its best, and it definitely wasn’t at its best here in the Isles. Really, he was nothing more than a murderer and an Arachnos pawn, disposable as far as they were concerned, with no future. A criminal. A shadowed non-entity in the dark. The reality of his situation weighed heavily on him, like wet rain, soaking him through. It was almost as if he had been battered by it, there was such a wound in his soul now. A wound that hurt more than he could admit, so he refused to feel it.
Just as he refused to feel most things. It was easier that way, to not feel. Cowardly, Shade knew. But easier.
Somewhere below him, a car honked in the street and braked with a screech. A moment later came the sound of loud arguing. Shade pressed the back of his head hard against the concrete of the building and shut his eyes tightly. The beer sat sickly in his stomach. For once he was glad he refused to feel anything anymore, because otherwise… how could he live with the murderous failure he’d ended up as?
If he had a saving grace at all, he thought it was his work in the War Zone. He went there so often because he believed that he was helping to do something worthwhile. And lately, the assignments he took on there were the only ones that didn’t seem grey and pointless.
Working in the Isles was soul crushing. The same thing night after night. He usually drank afterward, to dull the pain and blur the memories of his crimes, to numb himself enough to be able to sleep by early morning, but he was starting to require more alcohol to reach that point. He couldn’t even find escape in working with his hands, like he’d once been able to. He’d once wanted to create and build, work with wood and metal. But quality materials and tools were nearly impossible to find in the Isles, and he’d grown tired of scavenging and stealing what little there was. Banging together salvage was a poor substitute for actual creation. And, where once he had gotten at least some satisfaction from acting as Black Sunday’s base maintenance man, that had become just as hollow as everything else. Team members came and went, those occupying the base were always changing, shifting. There was nothing permanent there, in spite of Shade’s efforts to fix, repair, and make conditions enduring. The only thing in his life that he could even remotely count as some sort of pseudo-family was fracturing and unreliable.
So, in a very real way, right now his work in the War Zone was the sole thing that he was existing for. Because, at that moment, Shade refused to give thought to the only other bright spot in his life since coming to the Isles. Pain lay in that direction. So, the War Zone was it, then. The only thing that had meaning, that made a difference. The only thing that helped him forget for a little while what an empty, dissatisfying and complete failure his life had become.
Shade pushed himself away from the wall and got up into a crouch. He left the empty beer bottle in the spot he had vacated. On the oily neon-streaked street below, Arachnos troops had arrived to break up the brawl caused by the car accident. He watched emotionlessly for a long moment, before tensing and springing upward into a shadowing jump that took him away from his private spot of contemplative misery. Crossing the night, Tainted Shade travelled the rooftops until he arrived at the inconspicuous warehouse that housed the Vanguard Portal to the War Zone.
The lights in the Vanguard base were always too bright for his pale sensitive eyes, so Shade tended to spend as little time there as possible. He just got his assignments and left, then called in from the field so he wouldn’t have to go back. But on his way through the base this time, Borea stopped him unexpectedly.
“Tainted Shade.” She waited for him to approach her, while he dropped his aura and skirted around a team that was getting ready to go out. The Vanguard base was also always busy and noisy, another reason Shade tended to stay in the field as long as his supplies lasted. The paradox of his life, he thought humorlessly to himself. He wanted to be around others, to be part of something, but he enforced his own solitude more often than not. Shade was well aware of all the reasons why he did so. Changing those habits, however, was more difficult.
“I’d like a private word with you,” Borea requested, gesturing for him to follow her. She led him into the nearby theater room, where Vanguard recruits often gathered to view around-the-clock showings of a film about the history of Earth’s conflict with the Rikti. Though the film was flickering away obliviously, there was currently no one present watching. The slightly dimmer lighting was a mild relief to Shade’s eyes.
Borea turned to face him, crossing her arms over her chest in a business-like manner. As much as he liked anyone, Shade supposed he liked Borea. She was no-nonsense and she understood his skills well, always giving him assignments that she knew he would excel at, mainly solo missions that required stealth, or an assassin’s skill. She had made it known on several occasions that she valued his abilities, giving the stalker another reason to keep coming back to the War Zone.
“Shade, we heard about your recent refusal to take innocent lives at Arachnos’ bidding,” she began without preamble.
He was surprised. He’d wondered what she wanted to talk to him about, but that unpleasant incident was the last thing he expected. “How--?” he began to ask, but then stopped. Some of the factions of Vanguard were extremely covert, it was really no surprise that they would hear information like that in the course of their work. Especially since the fight in Warburg that had resulted from his and Darkfire’s refusal had been pretty significant, and culminated in the incapacitation of not only a high-placed Arachnos Executioner, but a Paragon hero as well.
What he didn’t understand, however, is why Vanguard would care. Maybe the fact that they’d sent Blast Furnace to a hospital via his transponder would be a concern, but for the most part Vanguard’s policy was to turn a blind eye to much of what their Isles-based recruits did, since they needed all the warm bodies they could get in the Rikti conflict. Shade didn’t doubt at all that Vanguard knew exactly what kinds of things he got up to working for Ghost Widow and scrounging his own jobs. But they needed precisely those skills that made him the go-to assassin in the Isles, to gain advantage in the War Zone, so they pointedly ignored what they might have otherwise condemned.
At least, that’s what they usually did. Shade hoped they weren’t about to discharge him from Vanguard over giving Blast Furnace a few well-deserved bruises. Or worse yet, try to arrest him. Shade was not about to go quietly back to prison, even if he knew damn well he deserved to be there.
“Frankly, we’ve had our eye on you for awhile, Shade,” Borea continued. “You’re a good fighter, highly skilled in stealth tactics, and we know that we can count on you to always get the job done. Plus, we’ve seen that you didn’t come to the War Zone for the pay, like many from the Isles did. You’re here because you want to fight the fight, we know that. We also know that you’ve done some reprehensible things,” she told him seriously, pointedly showing her disapproval through the tone of her voice and stern expression. “But, you took a stand and refused to harm innocents at the risk of your own life.”
Shade was working hard to keep his expression as neutral as usual, while he tried to figure out just what she was getting at with this. Borea smiled knowingly at him.
“In cooperation with GIFT, we’d like to give you the opportunity to take some assignments in Paragon City, Shade,” she continued. “If things go well, and with consideration for your record of service with Vanguard, we may be able make the necessary deals with various sponsorship and probation programs for you to work off your remaining prison time, and your record. There are a number of super groups in Paragon that accept and work with reformed criminals. If you can prove that your actions in Warburg weren’t a fluke, we’ll see about getting you into one of them, and you’ll have the chance to put those abilities of yours to good use.”
As she talked, Shade’s heartbeat began to speed up, a thump punctuating each of her increasingly impossible statements. Was she really saying what he thought she was? Was she really offering him the chance to go to Paragon, to take the kind of assignments that… he almost couldn’t even think it, it was too much… to take the kind of assignments that heroes took? The stalker felt like he’d just been hit by a Nullifier; everything was a little wobbly and his thoughts did not want to process this information. It was just too incredible and he had to protect himself from it, because when it turned out to be a huge mistake, Shade knew he would be crushed.
“Are…” Shade swallowed down on what he wanted to say, self-conditioned to not respond, open himself up or give himself away. But, he realized, this was too important to habitually hide from, even if his uncertainty was completely evident in the swirling of his shadow aura around his feet and legs. His first instinct was to shield, block himself from hope. He had to consciously will himself to keep his aura down.
“Are you serious?” he finally managed to ask.
“Of course I am,” Borea nodded. In spite of his efforts to not show it, it was obvious that the young man was completely rattled by the opportunity she’d just offered him. She chose not to acknowledge that, not to point out that the fact that he was reacting this way told her that she’d been right in her estimation of him. He was more than what he could be if he stayed in the Isles, she’d seen that when he’d first come to Vanguard, and he’d proved it with his record since. If he didn’t care, he would have dismissed the offer right away, or scoffed at it.
It was best to be business brisk with him. “I know you may need some time to think about this. When you make your decision, you can use the Vanguard base portals as access between the Isles and Paragon. But make no mistake, Tainted Shade,” she added warningly. “We, and every other law enforcement agency in Paragon, will be watching you very closely. Do not take wrongful advantage this opportunity.”
Shade honestly did not know how to react to this, aside from numbly acknowledging that his hopeless monotonous world had just been shaken up like a snow globe, and set down sideways. He felt his fingertips tingling from anxious anticipation and his stomach was flipping over. Borea was actually serious. They were actually giving him the chance to turn it all around, to prove himself. To be the hero… that he’d always wanted to be…
After all this time, and so many years of broken hope, emotional betrayals and endless nights of having all of the life sucked out of him by the despair and darkness that was the Rogue Isles… did Shade still have what it would take to care enough to be a hero? He had changed a lot from the stupid idealistic kid he’d once been. Years of familial isolation… prison… murder… those things had all stripped away at him, until little more than anger remained, when he allowed himself to feel. Could he be angry, and still be a hero?
Dreary doubts thus tempering his initial excitement, Shade knew that Borea was right. He would have to think about this. And, honestly, there was at least one other consideration in this aside from himself. Maybe more than one. And… wait a minute!
Shade looked at Borea abruptly. “My Boss, Darkfire. He was in Warburg with me, and refused the same job…”
Borea kept her smile to herself. That his thoughts had so quickly turned to another was further verification that she was not wrong in making this offer. “We’re aware of that. But this opportunity is for you, Tainted Shade.”
He felt a bit uncomfortable about it, but accepted her answer. Excitement making him feel unexpectedly like he might be ill, Shade turned and left the theater, relieved that he could finally pull up his shadow aura, least anyone else see him, and be able to read from his expression how thoroughly shaken up he really was.
In the cramped kitchen of the Black Sunday base, two oversized mugs of coffee sat steaming on the chipped Formica-topped table. The coffee was far too strong for Darkfire’s palate; he’d never really gotten the hang of how much grounds to use when brewing a pot in their office breakroom-style coffee maker. But Shade didn’t seem to mind the bitter strength of the abysmally black beverage. He cupped his grey hands around his mug, while Darkfire gave up on trying to drink his, and instead rested his elbows on the table, steepling his fingers together.
“I think it’s a really good opportunity,” he told the stalker sincerely. “You can’t pass it up, Shade. I know you’re not happy here.” As much as anyone could be, Darkfire was aware of at least some of Shade’s habits, and had definitely noticed a gradual but steady increase in the time Shade spent next door at the Deathtrap bar. He still did his work, didn’t neglect the responsibilities he’d assumed in Black Sunday’s maintenance, and even often brought back food, or gave Darkfire money for base rent, bribes, and upkeep. He was loyal to what he had, but Shade was obviously directionless. And he was lonely. Darkfire knew the other man would never admit to that, and would probably hate to know how apparent it was.
Shade nodded, staring at a scratch on the surface of the table without really seeing it. He had already made his decision. He didn’t know if he still had within him what it would take to be a hero. Maybe he had been emotionally gutted once too often. But, even as painful as failure would be, Shade had to try. Because, he knew that if he didn’t, he would spend the rest of his life cursing himself for being a coward. For fearing to overcome and change the emptiness that was so weighing him down.
“If it doesn’t work out, you’ll still have your place here,” Dark continued, knowing that life with Black Sunday in the Isles wasn’t much of a consolation prize. But he’d noted that being able to rely on something seemed to be important to Shade. He always performed best when he knew what was expected in regards to his job, and he had a specific routine of coming and going that Darkfire had observed over the years. So, Dark wanted to make sure that Shade knew he could count on Black Sunday remaining a place of refuge for him, if he needed it. “And, you can come back here until you’ve proved yourself enough for them to make arrangement for you over there.”
He offered a smile across the table for the stalker. “And I know you will.”
Shade lifted his eyes to meet Dark’s. For a variety of reasons, not the least of which was that it had been Darkfire who’d picked Shade up as a stray and brought him to Black Sunday to begin with, Shade had a great deal of respect for Dark. And the older man’s opinion of him was very important to Shade. Hearing him express confidence in Shade’s ability to make it in Paragon, went a long way toward helping the stalker to shore up against his own doubts.
He half-smiled in return, and took a drink from his coffee to hide his embarrassment.
“I feel bad,” he said as he lowered the mug again, “that they didn’t offer you t’same opportunity, Boss.”
“Don’t worry about it, Shade.” Darkfire certainly wasn’t going to begrudge the stalker a chance like this over something like that. “But, if you want to make it up to me, you can do me a favor.”
“Sure, like what?” Shade asked easily.
Darkfire knew full well that the other man wasn’t going to like this at all, so he put on his most serious Boss face to make it obvious that this was not a trivial request. “I want you to take Simaster with you, when you go to Paragon.”
Shade’s reaction was just what Darkfire had expected. The stalker stiffened, sitting up straighter, and his grip tightened around his coffee mug. His pale eyes narrowed. “What?” His voice was low, and his shadow aura swirled around him in agitation.
Darkfire lifted a hand in a placating gesture. “Let me explain. From what I understand, Sim recently helped a person of interest out of the Isles and back into Paragon, and it really angered some of exactly the wrong people. The heat has been on him ever since, and it would be good if he could spend some time outside of the extent of their reach. At least until things blow over.”
Shade groaned and slouched in his seat again, tipping his head back onto his shoulders. Damn it. He really really disliked Simaster. It seemed like the mastermind had made it a point to antagonize him at every turn since he’d joined Black Sunday. Shade couldn’t even remember if there had ever actually been an initial incident between them that started the whole mess, but it didn’t really matter. Their infamous Prank War had been the most disruptive and obvious of their altercations, but even after that, they still bickered whenever they had to be on the same team, often to the point of furiousness on Shade’s part. And once, during a particularly heated moment, Simaster had sneered out some words made of pure truth, a crime which Shade had vowed to never forgive him for.
One of the last things Shade wanted to do was willingly take Simaster along with him when he’d reached what could potentially be one of the biggest turning points of his life. He didn’t want to share that with a man he so completely disliked. But unfortunately, Darkfire had known just which of Shade’s buttons to push to get him to consent. Even if he didn’t like Simaster, the stalker’s personal morals and commitment to the ideals of team loyalty were strong, and if Simaster was in trouble, Shade would help him out. Because he was a teammate and, though Shade would not have admitted this under any amount of torture, part of Shade’s pseudo-family.
But that didn’t mean he had to like it. “Darkfirrrrre…” he protested petulantly, sounding every inch the sullen put-upon twenty-year old that he was.
Darkfire chuckled knowingly. “See, this is why you’ll make a good hero, because you’re always willing to help,” he teased. “Seriously though, Simaster does need it. And it would be good for the two of you to learn to get along better. If you’re going to Paragon, you’re going to have to get used to working with people that you otherwise wouldn’t want to. Like Longbow,” he pointed out, knowing that Shade had a sore spot when it came to that particular organization. He wasn’t surprised by the face of annoyance that the stalker pulled at their very mention. “And it won’t be good for just you two. Even if you end up not being here for much longer, I know the rest of Black Sunday would breathe a sigh of relief if you and Simaster weren’t constantly at odds with each other.”
“Fine, fine. I get ya, Boss,” Shade sighed with a dismissive wave of his hand. He wasn’t thrilled in the least, but he knew that Darkfire was right on all counts. “But, if he messes this up for me, I’m gonna chuck him right back through the Vanguard portal into the Isles. I don’t care who’s waitin’ on the otherside to slice him up.”
“Fair enough,” Darkfire agreed.
Shade didn’t spend very much time in his room in the Black Sunday base. A big part of the reason for that was because it was a small interior room without windows, or any alternative exit aside from a very small ventilation duct, so the stalker couldn’t stand to be in there for very long before his claustrophobia sent him out into the Isles. He could sleep there if he’d been drinking, and thus numb and clouded enough to not feel like he was trapped. But generally Shade’s room was more of a place to just store his stuff. What little he actually had.
There were his few changes of clothes - jeans, black t-shirts, his leather jacket - which were usually just stuffed under the old salvaged wire frame bed if he considered them clean enough. He had the suit he’d bought to wear for Atratus and Harrly’s wedding, it was hanging up on the back of his door. He never used the overhead light; it was too bright for his eyes. Instead there was a dim homemade nightlight, plugged into one of the outlets. Anyone else would have had difficulty seeing by that light, but for Shade it was the perfect amount of illumination. His pale eyes were extremely light sensitive; he could see very well in the dark, so the nightlight was only used when he needed to be able to see details.
Beside the rumpled unmade bed was a pile of books, with titles like How to Fix Household Appliances, Metallurgy, Building Decks and Patios, and A Price Guide to Antique Dutch Mantle Clocks. Shade’s workbench was against the wall opposite the bed, home to whatever tools he had been able to either buy or steal while haunting the industrial areas of the Isles. Though most everything else in the room was piled haphazardly or left wherever it happened to land, including the boxes of wood and metal scraps, salvage, and bits-that-might-someday-be-useful, Shade’s tools were neatly organized, each in their proper places on the bench. Beside them sat a stack of battered notebooks, filled with Shade’s ideas: hand-drawn plans and schematics, lists of measurements, sketches of furniture he’d someday like to build.
He turned on the nightlight and sat in the folding chair at his workbench. Most of these things he probably wouldn’t bother taking with him if he proved himself good enough to move to Paragon, he thought as he absently switched on the radio, which was perpetually tuned to a distant classic rock station on the mainland. The tools and the scraps were not quality, just the best that he was able to find in the Isles. There were only a few things worth keeping. He’d give the salvage to Black Sunday. Maybe the books too, if anyone wanted them. Only the notebooks, his clothing, and a couple of the tools would be coming with him.
Well, there were a couple of other things, currently hidden away under Shade’s bed. But those were private.
He tore a page out of one of the notebooks, retrieved a pen, and started to write a letter. It was very difficult to write, especially when he couldn’t say for sure if he even should have been writing it. Each word that came from the pen to splay out across the paper in his scrawling handwriting, made something inside of him hurt. He couldn’t just ignore the feeling like usual, because in order to write this letter, he had to acknowledge the pain, uncertainty, and worry that he felt. For as straightforward as the letter ultimately ended up when finished, it seemed like he’d had to stop and start, agonize, and question himself more than should have been warranted.
When it was done, it lay on the workbench, his messy writing looking foolish and amateurish, especially considering the seriousness of the words it formed. Shade stared at it for a long time. It wasn’t too late to just tear it up and forget that he’d ever written it. That would probably be the smartest thing to do. Because forgetting it would be the same as letting go. And, Shade knew, that was what he should do, for the sake of his own heart and damaged emotions. It was what he wanted to do.
Instead, he folded the letter in half, picked it up, and got to his feet. Pulling his shadow aura up so that he could travel undetected, Shade left his room and moved through the corridors until he reached the closed and locked door of another private room in the base. A very particular room.
Tiny Tantrum had a habit of disappearing from the group for extended periods of time. The first time it happened, she and Shade had been a new couple, and he was still getting used to the idea that he had a girlfriend. She’d left without notice, without letting him know where she was and when she might be back. And for a young man with abandonment and trust issues, that had been extremely difficult for Shade to handle. It had hurt, and he’d been very wary about accepting her back when she finally returned. But he had. Because she was the one bright light in his life, the only person that could make him genuinely smile.
They discussed things, she promised to be more forthcoming with her plans in the future and he reluctantly decided to risk his heart again. Her absences were easier to take after that, as long as Shade felt he could rely on her to return. He knew she had family responsibilities in Paragon, and couldn’t begrudge her the time to take care of them. Family was important, Shade believed that still, even if his own family had failed him. And then Tiny told him that she was going to be attending college, and he couldn’t argue with her on that either. That was a smart move on her part, and it meant she’d have a good chance at a hopeful wide-open future. He kept to himself the opinion that higher education would eventually put her far out of his league, in favor of just enjoying what they had together while it lasted. And when she was around.
But now… now she had been gone for a very long time, and he had received no word from her at all. He didn’t know if there was something wrong and if he should be worried for her, or if she had simply reached the conclusion that he’d always anticipated she would - that life in the Isles, and with him, wasn’t for her.
Not knowing for sure was a large part of the pain that Shade felt in regards to Tiny. He’d clung to their relationship, and the few rare moments of togetherness, because that was all he had. If she was in trouble, he wanted to help her, support her, and be with her through it, no matter what the problem was. But he would understand if she didn’t want him there, if only she told him what was going on. It was the possibility that she’d just decided to leave him and not tell him that caused the stalker the most pain. Certainly it would hurt if that were the case; Shade knew that he’d likely feel absolutely gutted, but at least he would know, and that could be the end of it.
But she hadn’t told him, hadn’t contacted him. And Shade’s heart was telling him that, for his own emotional safety, he needed to just forget about it all. He couldn’t keep clinging to essentially nothing. It hurt too much. He wanted to let go for his own sake, even though he knew it would hurt even more to admit to himself that it was over. But at the same time, Shade also wanted to trust her, because she was his bright spot, and because he desperately needed to believe that at least one significant person in his life had not abandoned him.
His heart pounding hard with a rhythm of indecision and a fear that he would have never admitted to feeling, Shade unfolded the letter in his hands and looked at his messy handwriting once more.
Daphne,
You haven’t been here in a long time and I don’t know where you are, or if your okay. I hope you are. I got a chance for work in Paragon. If I prove myself, I might be able to stay there and do hero work, so when you come back, I might not be with Black Sunday no more. Darkfire will know how to reach me if I’m gone. I know you got family in Paragon and I know your going to college there, so when I'm there I’ll always be looking for you. When I see you, I’ll tell you your still my girl. I hope you’ll say I’m still your guy.
~Tag
Taking a deep breath, Shade folded the letter in half again. There really wasn’t anything more to say. Whether it was a good idea to keep clinging or not, he crouched down and slid the letter under the door of Tiny’s room, putting it out of his reach and thereby committing himself to hoping. Maybe it wasn’t poetic or elegant, or even entirely grammatically correct, but he’d meant every word he’d written. While he was in Paragon, he would be looking for her. And until she said otherwise, she would be his girl and he would stay loyal to that commitment.
It hurt, but Shade felt better now that the letter was safely out of his reach. Delivered. Come what may. He pressed his hand briefly to the door, then turned and headed back to his own room. He had some packing to take care of.
Fandom: City of Villains/Heroes
Characters: Tainted Shade, Darkfire, mentions of others
Wordcount: 5,837 - yes, this one is long. I have no excuses and make no apology :P
Notes: Shade's life is changing, and there's lots and lots of information about his character and personality in this story, though since I'm still working on his backstory, I'm trying to avoid revealing everything. This story consists of mainly narrative and introspection. The accompanying song is Breaking the Habit, by Linkin Park. (grab it here if you'd like)
The streets and buildings of St. Martial fell behind him in succession, eaten away by each jump he took in the murky night. Up ahead, he could see the beckoning glitter of the island’s neon district, the mill of late night gamblers and tourists. With well practiced ease, the shadow spine landed on an art deco ledge, lost in the dark to any eyes that might have looked his way. He paused for a moment, to listen and look, and make sure there were no dangers lurking around, before settling down with his back against the cool concrete of the building, and his feet dangling over the edge.
Tainted Shade opened the bottle of beer he had brought with him, tossing the cap into the air and down into the street below. He took a long full drink, and set the bottle on the ledge beside him, hand gripping tightly around the neck.
He sighed heavily. Alone in the night, as usual. Shade was hollow. There was no enjoyment for him in his usual haunts. He’d just picked up a few bucks off the Black Market for some items he’d cobbled together out of junk, but the money made little impact and had less meaning. Night after night, the shadow stalker was just going through the motions. Pretending to exist.
Though he couldn’t honestly say that he’d ever been happy since arriving in the Isles, lately the general dissatisfaction he felt toward his life and circumstances was particularly acute. This had never been what he really wanted anyway, but even trying to make the best of things no longer held any interest for him. Now that he was one of Ghost Widow’s errand boys, he had reached as close to the top of the Isles’ food chain as was possible given his own sense of morality. Now, his so-called career consisted of an endless string of the same types of jobs that just blurred one into the next until they, and the nights upon which they occurred, became indistinguishable from each other.
Shade took another drink, the bitterness of the cheap beer crawling down his throat unpleasantly. He had gone past just feeling dissatisfied and unfulfilled. Most of the time, he didn’t feel anything. Thanks both to the monotony of his life, and to careful emotional design. As he sat there, shadowed in the dark and watching the busy movements in the neon district below, Shade wondered if he was alive anymore. His heart didn’t even seem like it was beating. He was so far removed from who he had once been. There was nothing inside except for yawning emptiness and looking forward to nothing.
When he thought about it, he realized that lately the only things he felt were anger. Irritation. Frustration. At least it was something. Even as unwelcome as annoyances were, like a whole recent situation when someone thought it would be funny to pull a stupid juvenile prank on him, they prompted him to feel when he otherwise didn’t. Shade still hadn’t found out who had done that, but it hadn’t gone on for long - a quick check with Ghost Widow had verified that she hadn’t given him those ridiculous instructions. If he did find out who’d done it, Shade would be sure to teach them a spiny lesson, but the whole incident had just driven home a greater point to him.
When the only things he could be spurred into feeling anything about were negatives, then something was seriously wrong in his life.
And then there was the whole debacle with Arachnos in Warburg. He and Darkfire had taken a couple of the, relatively, newer members of the group on what had promised to be a routine job for Recluse’s organization, and had been asked to do something morally reprehensible. Shade was glad that Darkfire had also refused the job, though he hadn’t doubted it of his Boss, but it turned into a bad fight, during which Shade’s anger over the direction his life had boiled over. He hadn’t felt that furious in ages. It was a struggle to keep it all contained enough so as not to be apparent to the rest of the team how thoroughly upset he was. Enraged and close to losing control. How the entire incident shook him right down the empty core.
He lifted the beer and pressed the bottle to his forehead, just to the side of his row of spikes. This was what he had become? He was an excellent assassin, but that was not something to be proud of. It was a morally ambiguous profession at its best, and it definitely wasn’t at its best here in the Isles. Really, he was nothing more than a murderer and an Arachnos pawn, disposable as far as they were concerned, with no future. A criminal. A shadowed non-entity in the dark. The reality of his situation weighed heavily on him, like wet rain, soaking him through. It was almost as if he had been battered by it, there was such a wound in his soul now. A wound that hurt more than he could admit, so he refused to feel it.
Just as he refused to feel most things. It was easier that way, to not feel. Cowardly, Shade knew. But easier.
Somewhere below him, a car honked in the street and braked with a screech. A moment later came the sound of loud arguing. Shade pressed the back of his head hard against the concrete of the building and shut his eyes tightly. The beer sat sickly in his stomach. For once he was glad he refused to feel anything anymore, because otherwise… how could he live with the murderous failure he’d ended up as?
If he had a saving grace at all, he thought it was his work in the War Zone. He went there so often because he believed that he was helping to do something worthwhile. And lately, the assignments he took on there were the only ones that didn’t seem grey and pointless.
Working in the Isles was soul crushing. The same thing night after night. He usually drank afterward, to dull the pain and blur the memories of his crimes, to numb himself enough to be able to sleep by early morning, but he was starting to require more alcohol to reach that point. He couldn’t even find escape in working with his hands, like he’d once been able to. He’d once wanted to create and build, work with wood and metal. But quality materials and tools were nearly impossible to find in the Isles, and he’d grown tired of scavenging and stealing what little there was. Banging together salvage was a poor substitute for actual creation. And, where once he had gotten at least some satisfaction from acting as Black Sunday’s base maintenance man, that had become just as hollow as everything else. Team members came and went, those occupying the base were always changing, shifting. There was nothing permanent there, in spite of Shade’s efforts to fix, repair, and make conditions enduring. The only thing in his life that he could even remotely count as some sort of pseudo-family was fracturing and unreliable.
So, in a very real way, right now his work in the War Zone was the sole thing that he was existing for. Because, at that moment, Shade refused to give thought to the only other bright spot in his life since coming to the Isles. Pain lay in that direction. So, the War Zone was it, then. The only thing that had meaning, that made a difference. The only thing that helped him forget for a little while what an empty, dissatisfying and complete failure his life had become.
Shade pushed himself away from the wall and got up into a crouch. He left the empty beer bottle in the spot he had vacated. On the oily neon-streaked street below, Arachnos troops had arrived to break up the brawl caused by the car accident. He watched emotionlessly for a long moment, before tensing and springing upward into a shadowing jump that took him away from his private spot of contemplative misery. Crossing the night, Tainted Shade travelled the rooftops until he arrived at the inconspicuous warehouse that housed the Vanguard Portal to the War Zone.
The lights in the Vanguard base were always too bright for his pale sensitive eyes, so Shade tended to spend as little time there as possible. He just got his assignments and left, then called in from the field so he wouldn’t have to go back. But on his way through the base this time, Borea stopped him unexpectedly.
“Tainted Shade.” She waited for him to approach her, while he dropped his aura and skirted around a team that was getting ready to go out. The Vanguard base was also always busy and noisy, another reason Shade tended to stay in the field as long as his supplies lasted. The paradox of his life, he thought humorlessly to himself. He wanted to be around others, to be part of something, but he enforced his own solitude more often than not. Shade was well aware of all the reasons why he did so. Changing those habits, however, was more difficult.
“I’d like a private word with you,” Borea requested, gesturing for him to follow her. She led him into the nearby theater room, where Vanguard recruits often gathered to view around-the-clock showings of a film about the history of Earth’s conflict with the Rikti. Though the film was flickering away obliviously, there was currently no one present watching. The slightly dimmer lighting was a mild relief to Shade’s eyes.
Borea turned to face him, crossing her arms over her chest in a business-like manner. As much as he liked anyone, Shade supposed he liked Borea. She was no-nonsense and she understood his skills well, always giving him assignments that she knew he would excel at, mainly solo missions that required stealth, or an assassin’s skill. She had made it known on several occasions that she valued his abilities, giving the stalker another reason to keep coming back to the War Zone.
“Shade, we heard about your recent refusal to take innocent lives at Arachnos’ bidding,” she began without preamble.
He was surprised. He’d wondered what she wanted to talk to him about, but that unpleasant incident was the last thing he expected. “How--?” he began to ask, but then stopped. Some of the factions of Vanguard were extremely covert, it was really no surprise that they would hear information like that in the course of their work. Especially since the fight in Warburg that had resulted from his and Darkfire’s refusal had been pretty significant, and culminated in the incapacitation of not only a high-placed Arachnos Executioner, but a Paragon hero as well.
What he didn’t understand, however, is why Vanguard would care. Maybe the fact that they’d sent Blast Furnace to a hospital via his transponder would be a concern, but for the most part Vanguard’s policy was to turn a blind eye to much of what their Isles-based recruits did, since they needed all the warm bodies they could get in the Rikti conflict. Shade didn’t doubt at all that Vanguard knew exactly what kinds of things he got up to working for Ghost Widow and scrounging his own jobs. But they needed precisely those skills that made him the go-to assassin in the Isles, to gain advantage in the War Zone, so they pointedly ignored what they might have otherwise condemned.
At least, that’s what they usually did. Shade hoped they weren’t about to discharge him from Vanguard over giving Blast Furnace a few well-deserved bruises. Or worse yet, try to arrest him. Shade was not about to go quietly back to prison, even if he knew damn well he deserved to be there.
“Frankly, we’ve had our eye on you for awhile, Shade,” Borea continued. “You’re a good fighter, highly skilled in stealth tactics, and we know that we can count on you to always get the job done. Plus, we’ve seen that you didn’t come to the War Zone for the pay, like many from the Isles did. You’re here because you want to fight the fight, we know that. We also know that you’ve done some reprehensible things,” she told him seriously, pointedly showing her disapproval through the tone of her voice and stern expression. “But, you took a stand and refused to harm innocents at the risk of your own life.”
Shade was working hard to keep his expression as neutral as usual, while he tried to figure out just what she was getting at with this. Borea smiled knowingly at him.
“In cooperation with GIFT, we’d like to give you the opportunity to take some assignments in Paragon City, Shade,” she continued. “If things go well, and with consideration for your record of service with Vanguard, we may be able make the necessary deals with various sponsorship and probation programs for you to work off your remaining prison time, and your record. There are a number of super groups in Paragon that accept and work with reformed criminals. If you can prove that your actions in Warburg weren’t a fluke, we’ll see about getting you into one of them, and you’ll have the chance to put those abilities of yours to good use.”
As she talked, Shade’s heartbeat began to speed up, a thump punctuating each of her increasingly impossible statements. Was she really saying what he thought she was? Was she really offering him the chance to go to Paragon, to take the kind of assignments that… he almost couldn’t even think it, it was too much… to take the kind of assignments that heroes took? The stalker felt like he’d just been hit by a Nullifier; everything was a little wobbly and his thoughts did not want to process this information. It was just too incredible and he had to protect himself from it, because when it turned out to be a huge mistake, Shade knew he would be crushed.
“Are…” Shade swallowed down on what he wanted to say, self-conditioned to not respond, open himself up or give himself away. But, he realized, this was too important to habitually hide from, even if his uncertainty was completely evident in the swirling of his shadow aura around his feet and legs. His first instinct was to shield, block himself from hope. He had to consciously will himself to keep his aura down.
“Are you serious?” he finally managed to ask.
“Of course I am,” Borea nodded. In spite of his efforts to not show it, it was obvious that the young man was completely rattled by the opportunity she’d just offered him. She chose not to acknowledge that, not to point out that the fact that he was reacting this way told her that she’d been right in her estimation of him. He was more than what he could be if he stayed in the Isles, she’d seen that when he’d first come to Vanguard, and he’d proved it with his record since. If he didn’t care, he would have dismissed the offer right away, or scoffed at it.
It was best to be business brisk with him. “I know you may need some time to think about this. When you make your decision, you can use the Vanguard base portals as access between the Isles and Paragon. But make no mistake, Tainted Shade,” she added warningly. “We, and every other law enforcement agency in Paragon, will be watching you very closely. Do not take wrongful advantage this opportunity.”
Shade honestly did not know how to react to this, aside from numbly acknowledging that his hopeless monotonous world had just been shaken up like a snow globe, and set down sideways. He felt his fingertips tingling from anxious anticipation and his stomach was flipping over. Borea was actually serious. They were actually giving him the chance to turn it all around, to prove himself. To be the hero… that he’d always wanted to be…
After all this time, and so many years of broken hope, emotional betrayals and endless nights of having all of the life sucked out of him by the despair and darkness that was the Rogue Isles… did Shade still have what it would take to care enough to be a hero? He had changed a lot from the stupid idealistic kid he’d once been. Years of familial isolation… prison… murder… those things had all stripped away at him, until little more than anger remained, when he allowed himself to feel. Could he be angry, and still be a hero?
Dreary doubts thus tempering his initial excitement, Shade knew that Borea was right. He would have to think about this. And, honestly, there was at least one other consideration in this aside from himself. Maybe more than one. And… wait a minute!
Shade looked at Borea abruptly. “My Boss, Darkfire. He was in Warburg with me, and refused the same job…”
Borea kept her smile to herself. That his thoughts had so quickly turned to another was further verification that she was not wrong in making this offer. “We’re aware of that. But this opportunity is for you, Tainted Shade.”
He felt a bit uncomfortable about it, but accepted her answer. Excitement making him feel unexpectedly like he might be ill, Shade turned and left the theater, relieved that he could finally pull up his shadow aura, least anyone else see him, and be able to read from his expression how thoroughly shaken up he really was.
In the cramped kitchen of the Black Sunday base, two oversized mugs of coffee sat steaming on the chipped Formica-topped table. The coffee was far too strong for Darkfire’s palate; he’d never really gotten the hang of how much grounds to use when brewing a pot in their office breakroom-style coffee maker. But Shade didn’t seem to mind the bitter strength of the abysmally black beverage. He cupped his grey hands around his mug, while Darkfire gave up on trying to drink his, and instead rested his elbows on the table, steepling his fingers together.
“I think it’s a really good opportunity,” he told the stalker sincerely. “You can’t pass it up, Shade. I know you’re not happy here.” As much as anyone could be, Darkfire was aware of at least some of Shade’s habits, and had definitely noticed a gradual but steady increase in the time Shade spent next door at the Deathtrap bar. He still did his work, didn’t neglect the responsibilities he’d assumed in Black Sunday’s maintenance, and even often brought back food, or gave Darkfire money for base rent, bribes, and upkeep. He was loyal to what he had, but Shade was obviously directionless. And he was lonely. Darkfire knew the other man would never admit to that, and would probably hate to know how apparent it was.
Shade nodded, staring at a scratch on the surface of the table without really seeing it. He had already made his decision. He didn’t know if he still had within him what it would take to be a hero. Maybe he had been emotionally gutted once too often. But, even as painful as failure would be, Shade had to try. Because, he knew that if he didn’t, he would spend the rest of his life cursing himself for being a coward. For fearing to overcome and change the emptiness that was so weighing him down.
“If it doesn’t work out, you’ll still have your place here,” Dark continued, knowing that life with Black Sunday in the Isles wasn’t much of a consolation prize. But he’d noted that being able to rely on something seemed to be important to Shade. He always performed best when he knew what was expected in regards to his job, and he had a specific routine of coming and going that Darkfire had observed over the years. So, Dark wanted to make sure that Shade knew he could count on Black Sunday remaining a place of refuge for him, if he needed it. “And, you can come back here until you’ve proved yourself enough for them to make arrangement for you over there.”
He offered a smile across the table for the stalker. “And I know you will.”
Shade lifted his eyes to meet Dark’s. For a variety of reasons, not the least of which was that it had been Darkfire who’d picked Shade up as a stray and brought him to Black Sunday to begin with, Shade had a great deal of respect for Dark. And the older man’s opinion of him was very important to Shade. Hearing him express confidence in Shade’s ability to make it in Paragon, went a long way toward helping the stalker to shore up against his own doubts.
He half-smiled in return, and took a drink from his coffee to hide his embarrassment.
“I feel bad,” he said as he lowered the mug again, “that they didn’t offer you t’same opportunity, Boss.”
“Don’t worry about it, Shade.” Darkfire certainly wasn’t going to begrudge the stalker a chance like this over something like that. “But, if you want to make it up to me, you can do me a favor.”
“Sure, like what?” Shade asked easily.
Darkfire knew full well that the other man wasn’t going to like this at all, so he put on his most serious Boss face to make it obvious that this was not a trivial request. “I want you to take Simaster with you, when you go to Paragon.”
Shade’s reaction was just what Darkfire had expected. The stalker stiffened, sitting up straighter, and his grip tightened around his coffee mug. His pale eyes narrowed. “What?” His voice was low, and his shadow aura swirled around him in agitation.
Darkfire lifted a hand in a placating gesture. “Let me explain. From what I understand, Sim recently helped a person of interest out of the Isles and back into Paragon, and it really angered some of exactly the wrong people. The heat has been on him ever since, and it would be good if he could spend some time outside of the extent of their reach. At least until things blow over.”
Shade groaned and slouched in his seat again, tipping his head back onto his shoulders. Damn it. He really really disliked Simaster. It seemed like the mastermind had made it a point to antagonize him at every turn since he’d joined Black Sunday. Shade couldn’t even remember if there had ever actually been an initial incident between them that started the whole mess, but it didn’t really matter. Their infamous Prank War had been the most disruptive and obvious of their altercations, but even after that, they still bickered whenever they had to be on the same team, often to the point of furiousness on Shade’s part. And once, during a particularly heated moment, Simaster had sneered out some words made of pure truth, a crime which Shade had vowed to never forgive him for.
One of the last things Shade wanted to do was willingly take Simaster along with him when he’d reached what could potentially be one of the biggest turning points of his life. He didn’t want to share that with a man he so completely disliked. But unfortunately, Darkfire had known just which of Shade’s buttons to push to get him to consent. Even if he didn’t like Simaster, the stalker’s personal morals and commitment to the ideals of team loyalty were strong, and if Simaster was in trouble, Shade would help him out. Because he was a teammate and, though Shade would not have admitted this under any amount of torture, part of Shade’s pseudo-family.
But that didn’t mean he had to like it. “Darkfirrrrre…” he protested petulantly, sounding every inch the sullen put-upon twenty-year old that he was.
Darkfire chuckled knowingly. “See, this is why you’ll make a good hero, because you’re always willing to help,” he teased. “Seriously though, Simaster does need it. And it would be good for the two of you to learn to get along better. If you’re going to Paragon, you’re going to have to get used to working with people that you otherwise wouldn’t want to. Like Longbow,” he pointed out, knowing that Shade had a sore spot when it came to that particular organization. He wasn’t surprised by the face of annoyance that the stalker pulled at their very mention. “And it won’t be good for just you two. Even if you end up not being here for much longer, I know the rest of Black Sunday would breathe a sigh of relief if you and Simaster weren’t constantly at odds with each other.”
“Fine, fine. I get ya, Boss,” Shade sighed with a dismissive wave of his hand. He wasn’t thrilled in the least, but he knew that Darkfire was right on all counts. “But, if he messes this up for me, I’m gonna chuck him right back through the Vanguard portal into the Isles. I don’t care who’s waitin’ on the otherside to slice him up.”
“Fair enough,” Darkfire agreed.
Shade didn’t spend very much time in his room in the Black Sunday base. A big part of the reason for that was because it was a small interior room without windows, or any alternative exit aside from a very small ventilation duct, so the stalker couldn’t stand to be in there for very long before his claustrophobia sent him out into the Isles. He could sleep there if he’d been drinking, and thus numb and clouded enough to not feel like he was trapped. But generally Shade’s room was more of a place to just store his stuff. What little he actually had.
There were his few changes of clothes - jeans, black t-shirts, his leather jacket - which were usually just stuffed under the old salvaged wire frame bed if he considered them clean enough. He had the suit he’d bought to wear for Atratus and Harrly’s wedding, it was hanging up on the back of his door. He never used the overhead light; it was too bright for his eyes. Instead there was a dim homemade nightlight, plugged into one of the outlets. Anyone else would have had difficulty seeing by that light, but for Shade it was the perfect amount of illumination. His pale eyes were extremely light sensitive; he could see very well in the dark, so the nightlight was only used when he needed to be able to see details.
Beside the rumpled unmade bed was a pile of books, with titles like How to Fix Household Appliances, Metallurgy, Building Decks and Patios, and A Price Guide to Antique Dutch Mantle Clocks. Shade’s workbench was against the wall opposite the bed, home to whatever tools he had been able to either buy or steal while haunting the industrial areas of the Isles. Though most everything else in the room was piled haphazardly or left wherever it happened to land, including the boxes of wood and metal scraps, salvage, and bits-that-might-someday-be-useful, Shade’s tools were neatly organized, each in their proper places on the bench. Beside them sat a stack of battered notebooks, filled with Shade’s ideas: hand-drawn plans and schematics, lists of measurements, sketches of furniture he’d someday like to build.
He turned on the nightlight and sat in the folding chair at his workbench. Most of these things he probably wouldn’t bother taking with him if he proved himself good enough to move to Paragon, he thought as he absently switched on the radio, which was perpetually tuned to a distant classic rock station on the mainland. The tools and the scraps were not quality, just the best that he was able to find in the Isles. There were only a few things worth keeping. He’d give the salvage to Black Sunday. Maybe the books too, if anyone wanted them. Only the notebooks, his clothing, and a couple of the tools would be coming with him.
Well, there were a couple of other things, currently hidden away under Shade’s bed. But those were private.
He tore a page out of one of the notebooks, retrieved a pen, and started to write a letter. It was very difficult to write, especially when he couldn’t say for sure if he even should have been writing it. Each word that came from the pen to splay out across the paper in his scrawling handwriting, made something inside of him hurt. He couldn’t just ignore the feeling like usual, because in order to write this letter, he had to acknowledge the pain, uncertainty, and worry that he felt. For as straightforward as the letter ultimately ended up when finished, it seemed like he’d had to stop and start, agonize, and question himself more than should have been warranted.
When it was done, it lay on the workbench, his messy writing looking foolish and amateurish, especially considering the seriousness of the words it formed. Shade stared at it for a long time. It wasn’t too late to just tear it up and forget that he’d ever written it. That would probably be the smartest thing to do. Because forgetting it would be the same as letting go. And, Shade knew, that was what he should do, for the sake of his own heart and damaged emotions. It was what he wanted to do.
Instead, he folded the letter in half, picked it up, and got to his feet. Pulling his shadow aura up so that he could travel undetected, Shade left his room and moved through the corridors until he reached the closed and locked door of another private room in the base. A very particular room.
Tiny Tantrum had a habit of disappearing from the group for extended periods of time. The first time it happened, she and Shade had been a new couple, and he was still getting used to the idea that he had a girlfriend. She’d left without notice, without letting him know where she was and when she might be back. And for a young man with abandonment and trust issues, that had been extremely difficult for Shade to handle. It had hurt, and he’d been very wary about accepting her back when she finally returned. But he had. Because she was the one bright light in his life, the only person that could make him genuinely smile.
They discussed things, she promised to be more forthcoming with her plans in the future and he reluctantly decided to risk his heart again. Her absences were easier to take after that, as long as Shade felt he could rely on her to return. He knew she had family responsibilities in Paragon, and couldn’t begrudge her the time to take care of them. Family was important, Shade believed that still, even if his own family had failed him. And then Tiny told him that she was going to be attending college, and he couldn’t argue with her on that either. That was a smart move on her part, and it meant she’d have a good chance at a hopeful wide-open future. He kept to himself the opinion that higher education would eventually put her far out of his league, in favor of just enjoying what they had together while it lasted. And when she was around.
But now… now she had been gone for a very long time, and he had received no word from her at all. He didn’t know if there was something wrong and if he should be worried for her, or if she had simply reached the conclusion that he’d always anticipated she would - that life in the Isles, and with him, wasn’t for her.
Not knowing for sure was a large part of the pain that Shade felt in regards to Tiny. He’d clung to their relationship, and the few rare moments of togetherness, because that was all he had. If she was in trouble, he wanted to help her, support her, and be with her through it, no matter what the problem was. But he would understand if she didn’t want him there, if only she told him what was going on. It was the possibility that she’d just decided to leave him and not tell him that caused the stalker the most pain. Certainly it would hurt if that were the case; Shade knew that he’d likely feel absolutely gutted, but at least he would know, and that could be the end of it.
But she hadn’t told him, hadn’t contacted him. And Shade’s heart was telling him that, for his own emotional safety, he needed to just forget about it all. He couldn’t keep clinging to essentially nothing. It hurt too much. He wanted to let go for his own sake, even though he knew it would hurt even more to admit to himself that it was over. But at the same time, Shade also wanted to trust her, because she was his bright spot, and because he desperately needed to believe that at least one significant person in his life had not abandoned him.
His heart pounding hard with a rhythm of indecision and a fear that he would have never admitted to feeling, Shade unfolded the letter in his hands and looked at his messy handwriting once more.
Daphne,
You haven’t been here in a long time and I don’t know where you are, or if your okay. I hope you are. I got a chance for work in Paragon. If I prove myself, I might be able to stay there and do hero work, so when you come back, I might not be with Black Sunday no more. Darkfire will know how to reach me if I’m gone. I know you got family in Paragon and I know your going to college there, so when I'm there I’ll always be looking for you. When I see you, I’ll tell you your still my girl. I hope you’ll say I’m still your guy.
~Tag
Taking a deep breath, Shade folded the letter in half again. There really wasn’t anything more to say. Whether it was a good idea to keep clinging or not, he crouched down and slid the letter under the door of Tiny’s room, putting it out of his reach and thereby committing himself to hoping. Maybe it wasn’t poetic or elegant, or even entirely grammatically correct, but he’d meant every word he’d written. While he was in Paragon, he would be looking for her. And until she said otherwise, she would be his girl and he would stay loyal to that commitment.
It hurt, but Shade felt better now that the letter was safely out of his reach. Delivered. Come what may. He pressed his hand briefly to the door, then turned and headed back to his own room. He had some packing to take care of.