Title: Turn Up the Fakes and Lies
Author:
iron_fist123 and
vinvy Pairing: Frank/Gerard
Rating: R (for language and adult situations)
Summary: He’s probably decided he’s tired of me. Or he thinks I’m crazy. I think I’m crazy so...
Warnings: profanity, shoddily researched lab processes, angst, long chapters
Disclaimer: Not labeled for individual sale. We own the original characters and the plot. Hands off. The rest never happened.
A/N: Posted in 2 parts because LJ loathes our long chapters.
Previous Chapters Here:
http://iron-fist123.livejournal.com/5205.html#cutid1 Waking up with a chill and goosebumps spattered across his skin was not a common experience. In fact Frank couldn’t remember waking up cold once in his life. Battery City was a balmy 72 degrees indoors and out year-round and the desert was just plain hot from sun-up until sun-down. Being a somewhat late riser Frank had gotten used to waking up in a sweat and wondering how it got to be so hot.
Being alone was not something he’d expected either. That little detail would explain why he was so cold.
Poison had been gone when Frank had finally decided it was bedtime. He’d figured he was out partying or something- there’d been some mention of a part of the House that was actually a club- but clearly Poison had never returned to their shared room.
He’s probably decided he’s tired of me. Or he thinks I’m crazy. I think I’m crazy so...
As per Junk Punk’s oh-so-chivalrous rules women and children got to bathe first- between dawn and seven in the morning- which meant there was zero hot water left by the time the men got there. Had he woken up wrapped in the arms of a certain red haired Killjoy the cold wouldn’t have been a problem and he wouldn’t have even minded the already-annoying schedule that the Fuck You House ran on.
Frank groaned up at the tiled ceiling and rubbed at his eyes. There was a switch for the odd string lights that hung above the bed there somewhere. If he wanted fresh breakfast he needed to be up and moving before nine. That was not a pleasant thought.
Unbidden, everything that Poison had been rambling about the day before rose to the top of his brain like so much bile. Lunch was around noon, dinner was six hours after that. There was the option of helping work on tunnel repairs and construction which became compulsory if one was able bodied and staying for more than a week. There was a collection of rooms equipped to serve as a hospital and clinic area, open all the time, where volunteers were hugely appreciated.
A school of sorts existed for the kids. Those who were even a little educated were encouraged to teach what they knew so classes were on everything from Killjoy History and Reclaimed French to Engineering and Color. Raiding parties went out for supplies every week, sometimes more often.
He wasn’t sure how he remembered it all.
By the time he wandered his way from the bathroom to the cafeteria his mood was comparable to that of a buttered badger. He sat staring down into a bowl of oatmeal that was sprinkled with cinnamon. It was good food but he did not feel like eating.
“Hey, they call you Fun Ghoul, right?”
“Yeah, who’s asking?”
“I’m Renaissance. You look like you need some company.“
Frank finally looked up at the man sitting across from him. His shaggy hair and freckles made him look like a kid. The flashers strapped across his back and corresponding batteries in the belt at his waist said otherwise.
“You name means ‘rebirth’. Did you know that?”
“I heard someone say something like that once a few years ago,” his big blue eyes smiled, “it’s a real shame I was contracted to kill ‘em. It’d have been a nice conversation to have, names and what they mean. I guess you’d call my name an example of ‘irony’- I don’t really know. I just liked how it sounded. You can just call me ‘Ren’ if you want. Most do.”
“You were an assassin?”
“Yes.”
Frank shook his head. “You do not look like the type that would willingly kill some stranger.”
“I get that a lot. That’s what makes me good.”
“So you still do it?” This conversation was a pleasant distraction from his angst.
“Yeah. I’m not on the job right now, obviously, but I’m still a gun for hire. Life as a killjoy makes you into more of a mercenary than an assassin after a while. A lot of people need long term protection here.” He chuckled and played with a lock of his hair, “You lookin’ for a rental soldier?”
Frank laughed at that just for the sake of not coming across as awkward. “No, I can take care of myself. Thanks for the offer, though.”
“Yeah, it looks like you can.” He glanced down at Frank’s arms. “What’re the bandages for?”
“I got bit on the arm by a bitch and on the hand by a flasher.”
Ren burst into a fit of giggles and pulled off his leather fingerless gloves. “I’m not workin’ so I don’t need ‘em. You’re skatin’ with the Fabulous Killjoys and you obviously do.”
“I don’t want your gloves,” Frank protested, pushing them back at him.
“No, I don’t need them. You gotta keep that ink on your hands from being messed up.”
He sighed and let himself be coerced. He didn’t bother pointing out that the there weren’t any tattoos on his palms… yet.
“So how’d you get involved with the Fabulous Ones, Fun Ghoul? What’s it like to run with them?” Ren was leaning across the table on his elbows, looking utterly absorbed in an answer that Frank had yet to give.
“They just sort of found me one day,” he said, not entirely lying, “and it’s alright, I suppose. It’s not easy or fun most of the time.”
“Oh, I’m sure you’re just being modest.”
Is he flirting? Oh fuck this is annoying.
“Actually, I’m not,” he replied in a flat voice, “I’ve spent most of the last month of my life confused and in a lot of pain. I keep getting hit upside the head and otherwise injured. More than one person has called me Poison’s “pet” or “project” or some other demeaning thing and most folks who meet me think I’m an idiot. This fucking sucks.”
Ren let out a laugh again. He thought Frank was kidding.
Getting laughed at turned Frank’s mood from tolerant to really, really mad. Before he could do something childish like throw his oatmeal in Ren’s face then break his nose, Kobra Kid appeared at his side. He had on a bright white lab coat that was too reminiscent of BLI for Frank’s liking.
“We need to talk, Ghoul.”
“You gonna shove your gun down my throat again?”
Ren choked on his laughter and Frank’s lips twisted into a crooked grin. Miscommunication could make for some hilarious moments.
“Just shut up and come with me, will you? “ Kobra looked as amused as ever.
“See you on the other side of the sun, Ren,” he said and stood to follow Kobra Kid.
The man had started walking away already, his shoulders squared and his demeanor irritated. He didn’t look willing to talk yet so Frank walked beside him in silence, tugging on the gloves Renaissance had given him as he did.
They walked from the main, high thoroughfare into a narrower corridor. The walls here were covered in layers of paper. On closer inspection Frank could see that they were wanted posters. The crossed out faces of hundreds of killjoys stared out at them. Graffitied notes to these dust warriors were written in all sorts of colors. Some had added their own versions of the posters bearing caricatures of Ms. F and Korse. In places whole letters were penned by relatives and lovers.
Frank noticed that Kobra had slowed with him. He looked at the messy wall out of the corner of his eye, trying not to seem interested. His hands were folded behind his back.
“So, uh, what’d you need to talk to me about?”
“You know if there’s one thing I can’t fault BLI it’s their advanced equipment,” Kobra said, stepping on the end of Frank’s question, “The lab here is sorely lacking. It’s going to take me about twice as long as I thought to duplicate the vaccine from Morgan. The centrifuge here doesn’t work consistently either which makes things harder. Do you think you can look at it?”
“… Yeah, sure.” Frank was startled by the outpouring of language from the taciturn Killjoy. “I won’t make any grantees but I’ll try to fix it. I’m not usually so good with technology.”
“The problem is mechanical, I think, not in the programming.”
“I can work with that. So Morgan was able to synthesize a cure from Grace’s blood?”
“A vaccine, which is the next best thing, really. … I feel bad for the kid. She did not like having her blood drawn- she thought we were going to make her sick again. Jet had to sedate her to keep her from having a panic attack.” He hesitated for a moment, running his hand across one of the posters- it was his brother’s. Someone had outlined it in glitter and yellow paint.
“... Ghoul, you know that I’d never actually kill Morgan’s kid, right? I’d kill Morgan faster than you could say “carburetor” because he’s just a waste of air that I could be breathing, but his daughter has potential. She likes color too much to stay in the City for long. She’ll be useful when she’s older.”
Frank opened his mouth to speak and got out a few unsure syllables before Kobra went on, like he only had so long to say so much and he’d never get the chance to again.
“I suck at the whole subtlety thing so I’m not even gonna try. I need to say something about my brother and you’re going to need to get it through that thick, damaged brain of yours or this won’t end well for you. Understand?” He shoved his hands into the pockets of his lab coat and waited for Frank to nod. “Gerard is better with people than I am, obviously, but he’s really bad with those he cares about.
"… He trusts you more than he even trusts me, I think. He’s even willing to sleep around you, Frank. You don’t realize what a big deal that is, do you? He hasn’t slept a full night in ten years. At the diner, with you, he was out for the full night every night.”
“Are you serious?”
He rolled his eyes. “That’s a question that I’m not even going to justify with an answer. Remember that I’ll kill you if you hurt him. Wanna come and look at that centrifuge now?”
Frank nodded then frowned. He’d spent the last twelve hours so wrapped up in how unhappy he was that he hadn’t given much thought to Poison. He hadn’t been in bed that morning.
“Have you seen Poison today, Kobra?”
“Nope. He might be my brother but he’s never needed a keeper. He’ll be around. Just make sure you’re done being such a dumbshit when he is, okay?”
“Kobra, it really pisses me off when you insult my intelligence,” Frank bit out, trying very hard to be polite.
“Then don’t give me a cause to. There is a reason your name is “Ghoul”. I know you’re not a complete idiot, don’t think that, it’s just that you’re an idiot about things that matter.”
He gnawed on the inside of his cheek and narrowed his eyes. “Do you want me to fix that damn machine for you or not?”
The centrifuge turned out to be a disgustingly easy fix. The rotor needed to be replaced and a couple of screws were missing. Frank was sure Kobra could have managed it all by himself, without any help at all. As it was, however, he finished his assigned job and watched the scientist work on the other side of the lab.
Under a fume hood (incredibly inadequate protection for the job, if anyone bothered to ask Frank his opinion) Kobra Kid was doing something to a sample of the Zone Virus and spending quite a bit of time doing something else to a sample of the vaccine that Dr. Morgan had created, each in their own separate test tubes. Once in a while he would slide his rolling chair over to where his laptop sat on the far side of the room and make notes on the somethings he found out.
“What exactly are you doing?”
“The vaccine that Morgan created is an attenuate form of the Virus. It’ll get the most effective immune response from the patient but it could also mutate back into its virulent form at any time. I’m killing off some of the living virus with formalin to make another vaccine. I’m gonna shoot those rats up with it then try to give them the Zone Virus.” He gestured to a set of cages next to his computer, “Some others will have Morgan’s version of the vaccine and some will be the control group that’ll just plain get infected and die. Depending on which rats survive- mine are the white ones, his are brown- then that’s the vaccine I’ll use to inoculate people with.”
The scientific jargon that Kobra used made some sense in context but Frank wasn’t entirely sure he understood everything. He was tempted to ask what “attenuate” meant and what “formalin” was. He’d also been under the impression that vaccines took months to prepare- how was Kobra speeding up the process?
“Isn’t there a chance of the Virus getting spread when you do that?”
“Only if some fucker is stupid enough to mess with the sharps I have left over before I incinerate them... or get bitten by the rats. The virus isn’t airborne- it’s spread by bodily fluids. That’s why the sore stage is when the most new hosts are found.” He spoke as if Frank should know these things already. Why didn’t anyone get that Frank hadn’t been allowed to see the intell he stole?
“Oh. How will you keep people out of here? The door doesn’t lock.”
“I’ll guard the door myself if I must. Jet might be the sharp shooter but I’ve got pretty good aim.”
“Okay.”
Kobra nodded at him and wheeled back to his work, looking surprisingly content.
“Knock, knock,” a voice sang from the door.
They both turned to see Kandy leaning in the doorway, looking winded and extremely… pregnant. Her technicolor hair was in a dusty disarray.
“Kandy? What the hell? You’re supposed to be with D.” Kobra was standing in front of her in an instant, his hands protectively on her shoulders.
“I know I am but we lost Grace.”
“What?”
Oh shit.
“Grace wasn’t in the van. We realized it yesterday afternoon. We ran into some Wave Heads who were goin’ back this way and I caught a ride with them. Please tell me Grace is with you, Kobra.” Her brow was furrowed with concern.
Kobra didn’t hear much past the phrase “Wave Heads”. He drew his ray gun from his side. “They let you fucking leave? With those mutants? I am going to destroy that derby rat!”
“Um,” Frank spoke up, “Grace is here.”
“Oh, good,” Kandy sighed, and reached out for Kobra who was stepping around her. “Calm down, baby, it’s no big deal. They were a nice enough group.”
“Calm down? Kandy, you could have been killed! What Zone did you see Pony and D in last?”
She snatched his hand and put it in the middle of her taught belly. “Shut you lips, lover, and pay attention to your son. He’s practically dancing for your attention.”
A second later Kobra’s face lit up- the baby had kicked beneath his hand- and he stared down at Kandy with wide eyes. He holstered his gun and placed his other hand on her stomach, too. He whispered, “What makes you so sure it’s gonna be a boy?”
She smiled. “What makes you so sure it isn’t?”
Frank shifted in his seat and looked away. He was intruding on a very intimate moment just by existing.
“We need to get you to the infirmary,” Kobra said suddenly raising his voice a bit, “you need rest, like, now. You shouldn’t have been out in the day- the radiation can’t be good for the baby. You haven’t that those prenatal vitamins since you left Smoke & Sound, have you? Would it be bad for the baby if you took extra to get caught up? Do you think they’ve got ultrasound equipment here?” He rattled off several other questions like that as he slipped out of his lab coat and rushed to lock the virus and vaccine in a safe under the fume hood.
While Kobra spazzed, Kandy turned to Frank. “I don’t think I’m going to get out of this hospital business. Do you think you could find Grace for me? I need to see her. I mean, I trust your word but I just to make sure she’s really alright. It must be my mothering instinct or something.”
“Yeah, sure, will do,” Frank nodded several times.
“Do you think you need a wheel chair, Kandy, baby? Can you walk? I can carry you.”
Frank left Kobra to fret over his girl. He needed to hunt down Watercolor and by extension Grace. The pleasant woman was in charge of most of the orphans that ran around Junk Punk’s (there were surprisingly many) and Frank had left the girl in her care the night before. With any luck she hadn’t taken her too far.
XxXxX
“How on Earth did we get to Mars?” Grace stood with one hand on her hip, positively owning the makeshift stage.
“What makes you think we’re on Mars?” The freckled boy replied, stuttering.
“Isn’t the soil red?”
“But- aren’t we breathing just fine without rebreathers,” he countered.
“Don’t you remember that we’re Martians?”
“No we aren’t- wait!”
A bell dinged and the boy slouched from the platform.
“Remember guys,” Pepper called out from her perch on a folding chair. She looked so far from hostile it was unreal. “You can only ask questions. That’s the whole point of the game.”
Grace was smiling from the stage, bouncing on the balls of her feet. It made her curls bob hyperactively. Whatever game they were playing, it seemed that she was winning.
“Excuse me?” Frank tapped Pepper’s shoulder with a hesitant finger, stepping out of his hiding place by the door.
She wheeled around and glanced down at him only after realizing that there wasn’t someone her height in front of her.
Being short officially sucks.
“What are you doing here?”
Frank couldn’t miss the note of disdain in her voice. “I’m here for Grace.”
“Watercolor is the one who dropped her off for class this morning-“
“Yeah,” Frank huffed, “and I’m the one picking her up. Is that a problem?”
“I can’t let you just take her like that. She’s a child and you’re-“
“A Killjoy? Look, lady, I don’t need a lecture. We didn’t get off to the best start, anyone can see that, but I’m about the closest thing to a “legal guardian” that that little girl has. Oh and by the way, you’re a killjoy too. Everyone out here is a wanted criminal by association.”
Pepper was about to say something that was very much like the uptight nuns from his days in Catholic school- Frank knew that irritated tilt of the chin- but she didn’t have time to open her mouth.
“Mr. Ghoul!” Grace hopped off the plywood stage and ran up to him. “We’re doing drama! Like acting and stuff- it’s so shiny. Have you ever acted in anything?”
“That is way shiny, Grace, and no I haven’t ever acted in anything. You should teach me some time. So, sunshine, can I get you to run away with me for a little bit?”
“How come?”
“Well you know how you snuck into the Trans Am?”
“Yeah.” She looked like she’d been caught with her hand in a cookie jar.
“Kandy came all the way out here looking for you. She was worried and she wants to see you.” Frank felt an immense surge of awkwardness at the situation. He didn’t much like the role of the scolding adult no matter how gently he went about it.
“Oh, okay. Miss Pepper, may I please have my phaser back now?”
Frank raised his eyebrows as Grace’s colorful handgun and batteries were handed over with great reluctance.
“What was that about,” he asked when they were safely in the corridor.
Grace clicked the batteries into place at the base of the phaser. “Miss Pepper says that only adults should have weapons. I tried to explain to her that it’s just for protection but she says that that’s what grown ups are for. I asked her what happens when they aren’t around and she just told me to give her my phaser so I did. Is it true? That only adults can use ray guns?”
“No,” Frank said after a pause, “only people who know how to use them should and you’re learning from Jet so its fine. When you’re around Pepper, though, you should leave the batteries out of something so she won’t bitch about it. There’s nothing wrong with being prepared, Grace.”
“Oh, okay. By the way, my name isn’t “Grace” anymore.”
“It isn’t?” He emphasized the curiosity in his voice.
“Nope. Remember how Poison said that I’d need a nickname to broadcast with Dr. Death Defying? Well I came up with one this morning.”
“Are you going to tell me what this fantastic new name is? I have to have something I can call you, you know.”
“Rainbow Fright.”
“”Rainbow Fright”, huh?”
“Yup. Neat, isn’t it? I thought it up when they took me to the infirmary.”
“Oh, good, so you know where it is?”
“Mhmm. They saw my scabs and I guess they thought I was still sick because my skin hasn’t decided to heal all the way yet. Jet Star gave me some gel stuff to put on them but I think I might have left it back in the van with Show Pony…”
Grace led the way to the infirmary without looking back at Frank or stopping the steady stream of chatter from her vocal chords. Once inside the clinic, however, she stuck close at his side and lowered her voice. Though none of the medical professionals gave the girl a second glance she eyed each of them warily while telling him about a play she was reading for Drama. It sounded an awful lot like a Faerie-story he’d heard growing up but had more pro-feminist storyline than he remembered.
“Well look who’s here! Just where have you been, Grace?”
“Her name is “Rainbow Fright” now,” Frank interjected, “all that’s missing is an official KJ poster.”
Kobra sat beside the hospital gurney as stoic as ever.
Kandy, however, laughed. She sat up, folding her legs. “Ah, excuse me, Rainbow Fright. Come on up here chickadee. You and I need to have a chat.”
Grace sat on the foot of the bed, facing the pregnant woman. “I’m really sorry that I left and made you worry. I didn’t mean to and I won’t do anything like that again. Mr. Ghoul says I shouldn’t. If I ever have to again, though, I’ll leave a note or something so you know where I am.”
Kandy glanced between the girl and Frank then grinned. “Well it looks like Fun Ghoul has got it covered. I’m glad you understand, Gra- Fright. That was dangerous and you could have been hurt. That would have made me, for one, very sad.”
“But you don’t need me anymore…”
She choked on the juice she was sipping from a pastel hospital cup. “What?”
“The Killjoys needed me to make the cure for the Zone Virus and now you have it so you don’t need me anymore.” Grace spoke in a factual tone but her eyes showed a deep wound.
“What gave you that idea?” The three adults spoke more-or-less in unison.
Grace flinched at their loud response. “Back before I met you that’s what happened to sick kids except they didn’t usually get better like me. The men in white just took them away…”
Kandy grabbed Grace into a tight hug. The pose was comedic considering the roundness of her belly. “Oh honey we are not going to get rid of you.”
“Grace,” Kobra spoke up, “do you remember what I told you about the men in white?”
“That they’re mean and they don’t get presents from Santa?”
“Yeah, that, but what else?”
She bit her lip. “Fuck the men in white?”
Of course, Kobra was as unfazed by that as he was by everything else. Kandy was completely scandalized that he’d taught the girl to swear, though and Frank had to chew the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing.
“I was going for “they don’t know anything about anybody,” but that works just as well.”
“But Rainbow Fright, sweetie, keep the swearing confined to when you’re talking about those BLI losers, will you?”
Frank was a little startled at this linguistic leniency but then again Grace was not their child and this was the desert. One could argue that it took a whole Zone to raise a child, hence the concentration of them at Junk Punk’s.
”Yes, ma’am,” Grace smiled and pulled out of Kandy’s arms. “You’re still pregnant, right?”
She snorted, “Yes, very much so. That reminds me, Kobra, baby, your son wants sour worms and cappuccino ice-cream. Think they have that here?”
The blonde’s lip twitched a little in disgust.
Wow, three facial expressions in one day. I think this is a record.
“If my daughter wants it I’ll find it, trust me.”
“I sure hope he doesn’t grow up as stubborn as you. Can I have some blood sausage, too? That sounds delicious.”
“You got it.”
Frank couldn’t help but cringe. Was she really going to eat it all together?
“So is it a boy or a girl?” Grace put a hand on Kandy’s stomach.
“We don’t know yet. Kobra’s convinced its a girl but I’m willing to bet it’s a boy. Or maybe twins, considering how big I’ve gotten.”
“Why do you think it’s a boy?”
“I’m not really sure. It’s just a feeling I have. If you ever have a baby one day you’ll know what I mean.”
“Oh… can it hear us?”
“Some of the medics I’ve talked to say so. Kobra and I have been playing the baby Mozart and MGMK in turns.”
“Good choices,” Frank said, more to himself than to the expecting mother.
Suddenly, Grace hugged Kandy. More accurately, she hugged Kandy’s belly. “I don’t care if you’re a boy or a girl or twins,” she said into the woman’s shirt, but when you’re born we’re gonna be friends. I’m gonna teach you all about everything.”
Kandy brushed some of her dark hair out of her face, looking overwhelmed at the girl’s sweetness. Had there been another man present Frank would have probably feigned gagging but as it was he stood there grinning and wishing he had a camera. That would have been the best picture- one for a photo album cover for sure.
“Okay, I’ve finally found it,” a nurse in leopard print scrubs announced, “I’m sorry it took so long. Can I please see your arm?” She held an IV bag and line, presumably with something sharp at the other end.
Before Kandy could offer up a vein to be punctured Grace twisted to put herself between the young mother and the nurse. She had her phaser out and pointed right at the nurse’s nose. “Get away.”
END PART 1
PART 2:
http://vinvy.livejournal.com/10113.html#cutid1