fly;

“More for me,” he shrugged with a bit too much drive, before taking a bite out of the candy bar. Bringing his eyes back to the other Super as he chewed, Sean tried to recall if he had seen him before. “You’re not new, are you?” he asked after swallowing his bite. One hand still holding the chocolate in mid-air, his gaze wandered on no object in particular, trying to remember anything about him. “I– You’re – !” he exclaimed suddenly, his words not making much sense because of his excitement. Clearing his throat, he pursued with a grin: “You’re the dude with the wings, right?!” 

Evan watched the other boy, still very much confused, but not saying anything else just yet. He didn’t really know what he could say. “New? Not that new, no. I mean, it’s been a few months.” Evan shrugged. He knew why Sean wouldn’t recognize him, after all, it was kind of what Evan aimed for. He’d rather be able to hide about and not draw attention to himself, which was why most people didn’t even know how long he’d been there. “Hm? Right, yeah, that’s me. Um, Evan.” He nodded, furrowing his eyebrows in confusion. His power was not that exciting, was it?

Violet was never usually one to be the one to respond to a conversation starter, but if there was anyone in metro city that knew coffee, it was her.

“How.. um… Show me how you’re doing it at the moment?”

She stood up and slowly walked over to him. She started to reach for the mug of coffee in his hands. “May I?”

Evan normally wouldn’t have asked for help like this, but he really did like coffee, he just sucked at making it. 

“Yeah, okay.”

He went on to show her, in the process wondering if maybe he’d just gotten the wrong kind, which was why it tasted bad.

“Go ahead,” he nodded, giving up the cup. “Um, you don’t think... Maybe I just got a bad kind?”

“A cup of coffee? Seriously?” She looked at the boy incredulously, not to reprimand him (her Dad couldn’t figure out how to make a great cup of coffee either if his life depended on it) but in partial shock. Then there was the knock on her head that, hello Zia, not everyone waited on tables in a small diner long enough to be able to make a quality cup in their sleep. “Alright, i’ll show you how. Long as you promise to keep a secret…” She strolled over to pick up a cup, preparing the area to show how it’s done.

“Uh, yeah. I don’t really...” He trailed off, not quite sure how to take her tone of voice. He wasn’t used to making coffee for himself, he mostly just bought it already made instead of dealing with the hassle of making it. But he figured it would be easier just to learn how to make it himself. He was wrong. “Thank you. I promise,” he nodded, a small smile forming on his lips, feeling less intimidated by her than he originally thought he would be. “It can’t be that hard, right?”

“Don’t drink coffee, mate. Tea’s loads better. And I’m pretty sure you’re making it right. Coffee just tastes like shit.”

“You think?” Evan pursed his lips, staring at the cup of coffee. “I really like it. I just... Suck at it.” He shrugged his shoulders. Coffee hadn’t really always been his thing, but it had grown on him more and more lately. “I’ve never tried tea.”

In the process of pouring the last of the tea she had brewed into her nearly empty mug, Isla took a quick peek up at the speaker before looking back to the task at hand to ensure she didn’t cause a distracted overflow. “Uhh - coffee, no. I’m more of a tea drinker so I never bothered learning. I do know someone who could tell you how to make a fantastic cup of coffee but…I promised not to spill their secrets so I dunno..”

Evan gripped the warm mug in his hands, not yet moving to pour out the brown liquid inside. He’d only tried making it a few different times, but none had been as good as he’d like. “You’re the second person who’s said tea is better,” he nodded, looking down at the girl’s cup. “I’ve never tried it, but I think coffee’s my thing.” The boy shrugged. “Well if you promised them, then you uh, probably shouldn’t. I’m sure I’ll figure it out.”

“Not really?  Does that mean you’re sort of an authority figure?” Penny teased with a Cheshire Cat grin, tilting her head to the side.  “Nah, it’s okay.  You can hang out here all you want, I don’t mind.  As long as you don’t rat me out to Mr. Amazing for lighting up on his roof, that is.”  On queue, she took a hit from her pipe, holding the smoke in her lungs for a moment before breathing it out again.

“Anyway, I like the company.  That is, if you don’t mind keeping me company—which, if you do, I understand, because I can be pretty annoying.  But I’m willing to share blankets and weed, if that entices you.” She offered, lighting the bowl once again before turning her gaze back to the sky stretching out above her.

She sat for a moment like that before she spoke again. “If you don’t mind me asking, what are you doing on the roof?  I didn’t think anyone else knew how to get up here, to be honest.” She flicked her eyes back to him curiously.

“Um, well then, I guess just no? I’m not an authority figure at all.” Evan forced a small smile, not quite comfortable enough to be joking with her, although she clearly didn’t feel the same. He envied people like that. Evan shook his head. “I don’t really care, I won’t say anything.” The boy took a few steps forward, though he normally would have just retreated from the roof.

“Guess not.” He shrugged. He really didn’t mind sitting up there with her, he just hoped that she didn’t expect him to talk much. Evan came a little closer before finally sitting down a good distance away from her, but close enough that he didn’t look totally awkward. “I don’t smoke.” He shook his head.

The boy stayed silent for a few moments, almost like he wasn’t going to answer, but he was really just trying to think of a good answer. “I like the view. It’s the only place here where you can see the stars. And it’ll always be better than the ground.”

Although unsure he was the one being spoken to, Sean turned towards the voice he heard. The sight of the chocolate bar made him let out a loud laugh – that was definitely his (he always had at least one on him), but the fact that the other guy had picked up a chocolate bar that had fallen from his pocket just seemed hilarious to him somehow. “Thanks,” he managed to let out between laughs, before taking the candy bar from his hands. Opening the wrapping, he extended it towards the other Super once he gained back his composure. “Did you want some?” he asked, a grin still on his face. 

With furrowed eyebrows, Evan watched the other boy in slight confusion. He couldn’t really find where the amusement was in the situation. Sure, it was a tad odd that a chocolate bar had fallen from his pocket, but Evan didn’t see it as cause for uncontrollable laughter. So instead, Evan just took a few moments to let the boy do whatever he had to do until finally taking the chocolate bar. Evan scratched the back of his head. “Er, no, that’s okay. You keep it.” He was still very confused, not quite sure what else to do or say.

Noah waited as the boy approached him. He was new, right? Unfamiliar. Ethan, Evan, Egbert. E-something. He wasn’t terribly big, but his powers were probably unfathomably badass.

“You’re a lifesaver.” Noah said, taking the phone from E-something.

Slipping it safely into his back pocket, he asked: “So, what can you do? Be- sides find dropped things, of course.”

Evan recognized the boy, but he was almost certain the boy didn’t recognize him. He’d been there for a while, not incredibly long, but when you stay to the outskirts, people don’t tend to know who you are.

“Glad I could be of service,” Evan replied with a small smile.

There it was; Evan’s least favorite question. He never did think his powers were that cool. Not compared to others, at least. “Um, I guess I kinda... Grow wings?”

It took Iain a few seconds to catch his breath - clearly, endurance training was not working out as well as his trainer had hoped it would - and for a brief moment he was convinced he’d missed the reply altogether, until whoever was holding his glasses smiled and began talking. Somehow, registering the words took longer than realizing there hadn’t been a response yet, and Iain took a few steps closer before responding. “Gosh, wow, thank you - I’m not really sure what our eye-care insurance plan is, but I can’t imagine a plan that lets me keep replacing my glasses after I lose them.” He gave a small, joking smile. “The, ah, major issue with that plan is that I technically should be wearing my glasses all the time, but, well…” Iain trailed off, not really sure how to articulate his tumultuous relationship with glasses. “We have our ups and downs.”

“Probably not. I mean, I hope you don’t lose your glasses a lot though,” Evan furrowed his eyebrows. He didn’t quite understand how someone could keep losing their glasses if they couldn’t really see well enough without them. Yet there were a lot of things that Evan didn’t understand about people, and that was mostly his own fault. He definitely should have been more social growing up and would’ve understood it better, but sometimes he didn’t mind if it meant he didn’t have anything to explain to anyone. “Yeah? I don’t like glasses either.” Evan shrugged, not thinking much of it. “You should get contacts.” The boy added. It had been his own solution when he was in high school. His glasses were his least favorite thing.

Burgers. Noah had definitely seen cheeseburgers in the cafeteria today, and he would be damned if he didn’t didn’t get one, and soon. He hadn’t eaten in–how long? Since before training, but how long was that? 

          A cursory check to his phone                 gave him an answer:

                           Four hours. 

Four hours too long, for sure. He reached to stick his phone into his back pocket, hurrying towards the promise of food, stopped only by the voice behind him. He turned, facing the boy holding Noah’s phone aloft.

“That would be mine.”

The idea of being a rush was something Evan hardly understood. He was more of a go with the flow type of person, but maybe that was just him. Usually he thought he’d get there when he got there.

Evan paused when the boy turned back around.

He took a few more steps forward, ready to hand the phone over. He pressed his lips together in a line and nodded.

“I was hoping. I wouldn’t have known who else to give it to.”

It had been an odd day from start to finish, frankly: from waking up just late enough that he’d had to rush through breakfast to make it to class on time to dealing with the odd, unintentional time-stutter that he could manage with the wristband on, Iain had been far from… together before he was all but running to make it to the dining hall before it closed for dinner. He stopped suddenly, however, at the sound of a voice. “Sorry, what?” He paused, patted his pockets, squinted at the other man’s hand. “Wow, okay, not sure what that is that you’re holding, but I think my glasses fell out of my pocket?”

Grateful that the boy had actually turned around to hear him, Evan quietly planned through what he would say next. Usually when he did this, he took far too long to reply, which made things even harder for him than they had to be. A soft smile placed itself on his face, an uncommon feat for Evan. “You’re in luck, because that’s what I’m holding.” He nodded. “Uh, maybe keeping them in a case when you’re not wearing them could be more safe.” Evan shrugged his shoulders, not wanting to add too much input, but also wondering why it was the boy wasn’t wearing his glasses if he couldn’t see.

The towel pressed itself against their eyes, and its screaming atoms did well to block out the rest of their surroundings for a heated moment. So when they removed it, and they found that, indeed, there was someone sitting beside them, their nerve-endings jerked and they startled a little. A zap illuminated at the ends of their fingertips before they heaved out a sigh of relief.

Damn training sessions. Irony at its finest. Dangerous training in safe environments. Talk about a conundrum. It drove them a little mad, wondering whether or not something was alright. 

“I didn’t think it’d be shields,” they huffed, feeling somewhat betrayed by it. Then again, were they all not at the whims of those who were more experienced in making decisions as to what was good for someone else? “I almost wasn’t ready. It’s - not a big deal.” And now, knowing it had been witnessed by others, Freddie was quite embarrassed. “So - if you’re in here, and I’m in here, then does that mean they’ll be having us train together afterward?”

For some reason Evan always found interest in watching others train, just because of how strenuous it appeared for some of them. He was truly surrounded by amazing people, people who had powers he’d never dreamed were a real thing. Then again, before he’d figure out that he was one, he’d thought Supers were rather superficial. Being in a training room just proved to him how real they really were.

A slight concern passed over Evan for the person next to him. They looked distraught, though maybe they were only exhausted. He really couldn’t tell. He’d have asked if he didn’t already feel like he’d intruded too much.

Furrowing his eyebrows, Evan looked down. “Hey, it’s alright.” The boy shrugged, not thinking much of it. He was actually rather impressed with what he’d seen from them, but they didn’t seem to be happy about it. “That’s the part that sucks, right? They don’t always tell you.” The boy sighed, knowing that he should soon give a go at actually growing his wings, but first he should really remove his shirt so as not to rip it, and that was one of his least favorite parts. Leaving his body, clad with wings and a few scars, for everyone to see. “Um, I guess? That’s another one of those things they don’t really seem to tell you ahead of time.”