Day Four

[shinyfutureboy]

Edit: 8/10/2005 Project abandoned due to sucky computer. Keeping these for my own sake, though.

((Part of chapter four because I feel like going out of order. Writing angry, tired, frustrated Booster makes for scary-darkness. I didn't realize he had a side like that but it seems to work. Uneditted, because I just finished writing it two minutes

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[shinyfutureboy]

Booster took a quick step back when he heard the Question speak, not seeing the dark haired man at first. He straightened up as he looked at his ally, barely masking the pain that flashed in his eyes when his ribs protested the abrupt movement.

"I'm okay," his tone suggested that he wasn't in the mood to discuss his injuries. Maybe even a little embarrassed, like a kid getting scolded for fighting at school. He gestured behind him into the shadowed alleyway with his badly bruised and now bloodied hand, the one he'd originally thought he'd broken a few days ago. "They started it."

He shifted his weight, leaning against the cool brick and looking anywhere other than his ally. He wasn't really comfortable with the Question, never really getting to know the man. Ted trusted him and that was enough, but Booster would have been more content to work with people he knew. He wouldn't put Ted in danger, and he couldn't get anyone else to believe him.

War made for strange bedfellows and this was a silent, secret war that no one cared to know about.

The scruffy blonde finally looked back up, an undertone of relief evident in his voice as he complained, "You could've come sooner, y'know."

[faceless_freak]

"Busy. Always busy in Hub."

The Question approached, faceless face tilted and peering at him eerily. "They always start it; not blaming you. Trouble finds you in Hub, whether you want it or not." Him? And what was the Question's position on finding trouble? Guesses. Assumptions. All of them saying 'he looks for it'.

Neither of them knew each other, making them both rather skeptical about one another. He knew Ted, from when they had worked on and off with each other in the past. Which was reasonably remarkable; the Question had only main contact with him and Oliver Queen and occasionally Batman. Otherwise, he kept himself completely separate from the superhero world.

Maybe with good reason. He and Superman didn't get along.

"Still hurt. Hold still, let me see; pretending it's nothing will make it worse and make you vulnerable for another attack." He didn't even wait for Booster Gold's permission and set to work to first observe his injuries closely, grabbing his wrist and eyeing the possibly broken hand.

[shinyfutureboy]

"Hey!" Booster protested, ineffectually trying to tug his hand loose. He really wasn't trying too hard, the Question had a very good point. To his own eyes, it was hard to tell if he'd broken it or just bruised the everloving hell out of his hand. The swelling had started to go down anyway... at least it'd begun to before his scrap with the two muggers back in the alleyway.

He'd given up after a moment, the dark-haired man wasn't likely to leave him alone. His mouth set into a frown, a pout really, as he sighed, "Look, if it's broken then I can't do anything for it anyway."

[faceless_freak]

"Maybe you can't. Maybe someone else can," the Question responded flatly. "Hold still."

Observing the hand - the thumb of his glove ran over it and he observed with the blank, expressionless face - he took a stronger hold with one firm grip, the other hand being used to snap and set some bones back into place without much warning.

"It wasn't broken before - likely. Not exactly. Not fully broken, anyway. Cracked. Broke it, in your fight." Tilting his head, he glanced briefly to Booster's ribcage, but it was a passing glance. Going into his pocket, he pulled out a strip of flesh-colored plastic-like material; it wasn't anything really recognizable, but it was pseudoderm, the same thing made of his mask. He gently wrapped it around the fragile hand.

"Will help it better, when in a place more private than the streets. Hold still - ribs."

Yes, he was going to set Booster's unfortunate ribs.

[shinyfutureboy]

Booster Gold had done an admirable job of not jerking away. It was more the shock that the Question had so suddenly, excruciatingly set the bones in his hand than any sort of discipline though. He'd barely made a sound aside from a strangled yelp as he stared at the human enigma with a wide-eyed look akin to that of a kicked puppy. He could deal with pain when it was nessecary. But that, to the blonde, was entirely uncalled for.

Booster gently cradled his much abused hand with his good one, mouth opening then closing as he tried to figure out just what to say. Diplomacy failed him as he settled on muttering breathlessly, "Oh, hell, no..."

[faceless_freak]

"Hell yes." A half-echoing, mocking response perhaps. It was difficult to tell with his shaking and maddening tone of voice.

The heel of his palm was pressed against Booster's shoulder, either expecting him to hold still like a good boy or just be pinned to the rotting brick wall. Either way, his other hand traced the broken ribs, exploring its damage before taking action; abrupt actions snapped them back into place, once again letting it flee his mind to warn Booster that he was going to set the bones.

"Try not to shift your weight to your hurt side too much. Will do more... later. Follow me, Michael."

No apologies. No more than his actions.

Well, fortunately, it wasn't as if the Question was ever particularly personal anyway.

[shinyfutureboy]

"I won't," Booster grumbled, shouldering his backpack and moving to follow with some ounce of his dignity intact by doing his best not to show just how much he was hurting. He'd felt worse, taken harder hits, but exaustion was making his pain tolerance a shadow of what it normally was. He'd not had the opportunity for sleep in two days, too busy constantly dodging and fighting Max's people--not to mention almost being blown to pieces. (He was still surprised he'd not been jumped yet, it was like they'd been watching his every move until he'd come to Hub.)

What little he'd heard of the Question was really starting to make sense now, the man was completely off his rocker. But trustworthy, the blonde had to keep reminding himself. And trustworthy meant for all unwarned pain involved in this first meeting, it had been for his own good.

"Where are we going?" Maybe there was some sort of QuestionCave. A QuestionCave with painkillers and food, preferably, but somehow he doubted he was going to be that lucky.

[faceless_freak]

"Good."

The Question placed his hands into his pockets, turning on the worn heel of his shoe as he took lead. A QuestionCave would be fashionable and nice and safer than Hub City. Unfortunately, there was no such luxury. He was not Batman and he did not favor such a comparison.

The streets were empty, save for the few stray gangsters and scum running around, then immediately fleeing at the sight of the no-faced man. Over a decade, and they knew that lack of face. They knew his brand of justice. Rightfully, they should run.

Rightfully, as the Question had more important things to be concerned with.

"Somewhere hopefully Max isn't going to consider annoying you for. Not that I expect him to come to Hub; there's no real reason you ought to be here. None that he should know." A guess. The Question had taken upon himself to research what he could, interrogate who he could.

"Stay close."

He continued down the street. It seemed what little life had existed in the decaying road had left the moment the Question stepped onto it.

He knew differently.

[shinyfutureboy]

"I didn't even know I'd come here until yesterday, Max shouldn't yet," Booster replied quietly. It still amazed him that Max was going to all this trouble just to shut him up, when he hadn't even really done anything yet. He just had a name of some sort of project, O.M.A.C., that Max was heading and some data that wasn't even solid enough to take to anyone in a position to do anything about it. It had to mean he was onto something, even though he doubted even that would get any of the first stringers, to get the JLA, to take note.

That was why he'd gone to the Question, the JLA didn't deal with conspiracies.

The blonde looked around the area uneasily at the order to keep close, it looked deserted enough and seemingly safe with the way the hoods had cleared out as soon as they'd seen the Question. One hand drifted up to his chest, lightly running fingers over the recently set ribs. "You expecting trouble?"

It went unsaid that Booster wasn't really in any position to be too useful in a fight at the moment, not unless he could go for his costume hidden in his backpack.

[faceless_freak]

"Always do," the Question murmured. "Never be unprepared - especially in this city. It's nothing like sweet Metropolis with its Godly Man of Steel taking guard, or Gotham with the Dark Knight watching in the shadows with robins and bats and wings in the night. There are no Gods or men pretending to be here. Foolish men, sobbing women, and dying children populate Hub City. Don't think otherwise."

An elaborate description. An embittered one. Yet, the Question was anchored to this city - perhaps for good, he was finding.

No League, Society, or any other gathering of Gods would touch the godforsaken city in its own pile of filth.

Turning at the corner of the street sharply, they were near the waters of the dock, specifically at a shack made of soaked, rotting wood, prepared to collapse onto itself. Opening the door with its shrieking rust, the Question pointed inside silently.

[shinyfutureboy]

"The city has you and that's gotta make a difference, right?" Idealistic, perhaps, but no less true in in Booster's mind. The dark haired vigilante might be fighting a losing battle, but he had to be doing something right since he stayed in the crime-filled urban wasteland.

He paused, eyeing the structure with evident distaste before slinking in ahead. Thick-headed or no, he knew that right now the Question was the one calling the shots and spared them both the trouble of his complaints.

[faceless_freak]

"Always wanted to believe that," was mused under the no-faced man's breath.

The cooperation was silently appreciated from the faceless vigilante; walking over creaking boards threatening to break under his weight, the Question retrieved a plastic bag and set it upond a propped up board over two crates that insinuated a table. "Chinese take-out. If you're hungry," was offered.

"What do you know about Maxwell Lord and what he's up to? Why, specifically, he thinks you're a threat instead of someone like a Martian or an Amazon princess?" The Question wanted to know what Booster knew before getting down to business.