Naoise Strikes Again

"Okay, okay," Johnny says. "Um, you can stop. Don't break anything. Here: I'm an asshole. Huge raging asshole." 

Then, "Yikes, dude. That sucks."

Lin Ling inhales, all pretenses of their spar dropped. He runs a hand through his hair, a little greasy, but not sprayed or waxed or styled.

"Hey, what did you just call yourself?" Lin Ling says to Johnny. "Just let me get my phone out first."

Johny laughs and Lin Ling half grins, still with that blunt hammering inside his chest. The kind of ringing you might get from tapping at the bars of a cage. The spar ends, an anticlimax, Lin Ling holding a hand out for Johnny to shake. On the other end of the training field, Lucky Cyan and Queen walk over, having finished their obstacle course.

"Look at you, shaking hands," Queen tells him. "You're such a nice young man, Commoner."

"I'm sorry," he grins, "but when you, in particular, call my by my hero name, it sounds like you're telling me to go be a potato farmer. Sorry, everyone, I have to go. The monarchy needs my harvest."

Queen blinks, then smiles back. "Lin Ling, then."

“Commoner is such a funny hero name,” Johnny snickers.

Fun fact, Lin Ling's brain informs him. Nice forgot his given name before he died. Wow, Lin Ling thinks back sarcastically. That is fun, anything else for me?

His favourite colour was yellow, his brain says.

Queen glances at her phone. "Oh, shoot. It's 12:18. We're supposed to be headed to the showers at 12:20 and back in my room at 12:35."

Lin Ling squints at her, a hunch gathering in the back of his head. As if joking, he covers the top of her phone screen with his palm. Maybe seeing what he's doing, Queen laughs and steps out of his reach.

"Don't," she says. "Everyone has a schedule," Queen says.

"Yeah, of course. Me too,” Lin Ling says despite his burgeoning hunch.

"See," Queen says to Lucky Cyan. Her voice dips into irritation as the popstar slowly reaches for her bag. "Qing Xingyun, forty-eight seconds. We need to go."

“Coming, coming,” she says, but hurries up.

Lucky Cyan jogs after Queen as the number two hero strolls away, waving at Lin Ling as she goes. He waves back, Johnny walking off in the direction of the obstacle course. Lucky Cyan doesn’t even look as she turns the corner, charging fearlessly backward. She misses the edge of the wall by maybe an inch, but if she notices, she doesn’t show it.

As if on cue, Lin Ling's suddenly thinking about Nice's ballet schedule after school when he was fourteen. Fifteen minutes stretching, two hours practice, another thirty minutes of developing choreography. Three times a week, Lin Ling thinks because he can't help it. He lowers his hand from the wave, lets it drop to his side.

____________________

The lights on the red carpet are so bright they're almost painful, the same kind of piercing LEDs they use at the dentist and Lin Ling experiences the same kind of terror, staring them down. He hunches over a mic, wishing briefly he had some of his old grace, the kind that came with white hair and perfect posture.

"What was Nice's favourite food? His plans for the future before he became a hero?" The interviewer says, eyes sharp and searching.

They want him to slip up, expose him for the new lie Treeman's selling: that Lin Ling was Nice's best friend before he stole his identity. A way to transfer Nice’s legacy, get the approval of a dead man for Lin Ling’s hero career. Lin Ling doesn't even know if Nice would have liked him.

"Did you know the man made his own noodles? Hand-pulled. I miss them almost as much as I miss him," Lin Ling winks, like he's making a confession.

Wrong. Nice's favourite food was the fried prawns his mom used to make, laid over a pretty bed of gai lan and rice. His least favourite meals were the ones he made in his first year of university, when he didn't have the time or skill to cook for himself and microwaved his scrambled eggs. Lin Ling knows.

Lin Ling says, "And he'd always admired Smile. I think we all know that now, seeing the way he tried to save him," Lin Ling says. Shakes his hair into artful dips. Smile with teeth. Boyish. "He wanted to be a hero. He was born for it. Really, my ranking is his. At least it is in my heart."

He's glad the words actually come out. Lin Ling’s gotten too used to mouthing them to himself.

"Aw," the interviewer melts at that. "What was your favourite memory with him?"

Because Lin Ling has so many to pick from. Well, there was the time he killed himself in front of me, Lin Ling imagines himself saying. Oh, and last night, when I dreamt he shoved his hand through my chest and then told me my skin is actually hollow.

He says, “He used to do this thing at say three in the morning when he was coming back from the studio. And he’d buy noodles from the convenience store, then find somewhere high and scale it. Sidewalk trees. Streetlights. Fire escapes. Whatever. Then come back and tell me all about how he’d hung upside down by his knees and how that was the best view of the city, when it was so quiet it was almost like the dead of winter. He showed me once and that’s my favourite memory of him. Just, happy. And he was right,” Lin Ling says.

“Right about what?”

“It was the best view of the city I’ve ever had,” Lin Ling says.

This one is a real fact, save for the part where Lin Ling inserts himself into Nice’s life. It was something Nice had done after ballet practices. A benefit of Lin Ling’s new Trust ability is that it really helps sell the lie.

The negatives are every other part of it.

A few steps up from him a robotic head swivels in his direction. He gives Loli a friendly wave and the emoticon where her face should be flashes into a colon and a bracket. Smiling back. Weirded out, Lin Ling returns it and looks away. He feels stupid interacting with her without seeing her face, like she might not really be smiling under there.

He manages to get away from the interviewer after that, the woman maybe sensing that pushing a grieving man might be insensitive. They want him to slip-up, not cry on camera. And if he is, then he has to tell his makeup team first so they can grab the waterproof products.

He should've brought ibuprofen with him, but he thought they'd be asking him about his new brand collaboration with Smack Sneakers. Or the music video he's appearing in with a famous singer next week, which he's dancing in. It's frankly exhausting to have to think about Nice all the time and more surreal to know things about a dead man he'd never spoken a word to.

But people expect him to have been Nice's best friend now. So the headaches aren't going anywhere fast.

Nice attended this charity event five times, Lin Ling remembers. Not remembers. Knows. It just feels like remembering. That's the disconcerting part.

Lin Ling fumbles past the packed tables, the one near the front with his namecard on it. He catches glimpses of Dragon Boy, dapper in a suit, who makes eye contact with him across the room and doesn't look away for what must be a whole minute. Loli's doing a video for the event organizers, doing little spins and outdressing the rest of them by miles.

Shang De is here. A cold sweat drips down Lin Ling's back. He'd agreed to work under the older man's management, but that was before he became 'Nice's Best Friend.' The only thing his new ability has ever said to him around Shang De is, Nice was never more afraid than when he worked with Shang De.

Afraid of what, Lin Ling asks his ability, but of course it doesn't work like that. Someone bumps into him, their plate overfull from the buffet and Lin Ling ends up with a smear of sauce along his button-up. He thumbs at the little red line like a cut before he can stop himself and swears.

"Oh, geez," is what comes out instead and Lin Ling's frustration doubles at hearing himself say it.

He waves off the guest's concern. "Really, I don't want to ruin your night. Don't stress about it, my stylists have like a hundred of these. Mass-produced from the same warehouse they made me," Lin Ling says.

The man laughs. "I just dumped my food on you, but now I think I'm going to walk away in a better mood than before I did. So charming, Commoner."

That's the point, Lin Ling thinks.

"Glad to hear it, sir," Lin Ling smiles and beelines for the bathroom.

The water does not get the stain off and does in fact make it worse. The claw in his chest, which he's done his best ignoring for the past few months, squeezes. The last time he'd ended up with food on his clothes, he'd been having a lot more fun.

The door clatters open and Loli walks into the bathroom. Her helmet swivels and she stalks toward him.

"The women's is the next door down?" Lin Ling says.

Wait, is he sure? Is he in the women's right now? Lin Ling exhales at the sight of a urinal behind him.

"I knew Nice," Loli says. "He was a coward. Self-interested. He ruined more lives than he ever saved," said so casually they could be discussing the forecast.

This is going to be a stressful conversation, Lin Ling realizes.

"Were you looking for me?" He pumps the soap dispenser.

"Yeah," Loli shrugs. One of her ears is twisted slightly and she readjusts it in the mirror. "I thought that whole thing with you and him was just damage-control at first. I don't think that anymore."

Lin Ling swallows. He'd been hoping this might be good-natured ribbing, something special for the newbie. But the calm, measured way Loli speaks makes him feel like she's about to rip the sink out and start beating him with it.

"It's just for the PR," he mutters.

"Yeah? Because when you talk about him and you say you liked him, I believe you. People don't talk like that about strangers," Loli looks at him, flicking off the faucet. She steps toward him and Lin Ling steps back.

"Let me help. I can make it look good," Loli reaches for his stained shirt and Lin Ling forces himself to unfist his hands. Her metal fingers are surprisingly delicate, pinching the fabric.

"Thanks," Lin Ling says automatically. He can't just not. That would be rude.

Loli's emoticon smiles at him. "No problem. Hey. You work for the same people as Nice did, right?"

"We're under similar contracts," Lin Ling agrees. He eyes the doorway. What if someone walks in?

Loli buttons up his blazer, covering the stain on his shirt. She doesn't let go and Lin Ling takes shallow breaths, her metal gloves cold when he exhales.

"So you work for Treeman. Shang De. I know what they're about," Loli's hand closes around his neck before Lin Ling can jerk back. She says, "And if they ever order you to hurt me or someone I love, I will kill you."

Her metal thumb flicks the top button off his shirt. Her other hand tightens around his neck and Lin Ling chokes. He clutches at her gloves, but there's no give. He gets the message. Her suit could rip through the soft skin of his neck just as easily as it did that button.

"I wouldn't," he gasps the second she lets go.

"You would give up your trust value, your marketing team, your shiny new costume," she says. "And go back to the life you had before this? You would just be following orders." Loli’s voice is mocking.

Lin Ling licks his lips. He knows what Loli's asking. Or at least, what she thinks she's asking. But there's no way back to who he used to be. Not even if he lost his powers.

"I'm not interested in hurting people. Or you," he says and Loli steps back from him. "You could've tried asking first."

Her face monitor blinks, processing what he'd said.

"I'm not asking you. I'm telling you," Loli says. "I prefer preventative action these days."

She goes to leave, but Lin Ling can't let her leave it at that. What had Nice done for her to track him, corner him while he's alone, and threaten to kill him? Nothing good, Lin Ling thinks and can't tell if it's his Trust ability or his own thoughts.

"Wait," Lin Ling runs after her. "What did he do?”

Loli shakes her head. “This is exactly why I bought into your friendship scam. Look at you."

Taken aback, Lin Ling shakes his head. "What?"

"You're as deep in it as he was,” she says.

When he understands what Loli’s saying, heat rises in his chest. He wants to spit the words, but instead they come out clipped. A step before pointed.

"Your gloves don't come off," Lin Ling says. He'd felt it earlier, when he'd tried to tug them off. The way they hadn't so much as shifted. "I think we're both a bit stuck."

He catches the flicker of her monitor changing, but doesn't see what expression it is before Loli clenches her hands. She doesn't like that. She puts something down on the counter, the button from his shirt, and then she's gone.

Once the door rattles into silence, Lin Ling presses the palm of his hand to his forehead.

Nice wasn't a good person. All his socks were from the same brand. He bit his pencils as a child and never needed to use calculators in school. He broke in his ballet slippers by throwing them at the wall to annoy Wreck. He hurt people and regretted it, but that didn't stop him from doing it again.

He hurt himself, Lin Ling thinks, head throbbing with knowledge he has no right to. And he didn't regret it.

__________________

The rest of the room is just as chaotic and loud as before Lin Ling went to the bathroom, but it feels worse coming out. He finds out why no one bothered him or Loli when he emerges to find cameras flashing.

"On the hunt, Commoner?" one of the photographers calls out. "Care to make a statement?"

When Lin Ling understands, he can't help but recoil. Or in this case, take a short step away.

"Just two coworkers getting caught up," he laughs awkwardly. There's a chorus of aw's. Lin Ling's stomach turns, still on-edge from Loli's threat.

"Are you sure? Don't you want your fans to know your relationship status?"

"Yeah," he says. "I’m not in a relationship."

He gets a few chuckles for that, interrupted only briefly by boos. As though they don't like his answer. People online, fans and otherwise, are excited for him to get a girlfriend. Treeman attributes his rise in popularity to the interest in his romantic life, at least in part.

You'd think they’d remember it’d only been a few months since- that the way she'd- that recent events would make them back down, but it's actually the opposite. People love Lin Ling when he's in love. They want to see it again and they don't care who it's with, just that they have someone to ship him with. That he’s still boyfriend material.

Lin Ling beats out a hasty escape, which he's careful to make seem like he just wants to greet the former Firm Man across the hall, now a brand ambassador for a company that sells sustainable mattresses.

Lin Ling would pay to leave this event. He wants to go home and make noodles and maybe have a scoop of ice cream after that. Maybe put on a show. Anything without heroes in it.

"Commoner!"

Lin Ling's pulled reluctantly from thoughts of his quarter-tub of strawberry ice cream at the back of his freezer. Ms. J is coming toward him from the middle of the crowd, a woman at her side Lin Ling recognizes vaguely from news articles.

"Commoner," she says. "This is Ms. Liang Jue. She specifically asked that you be here tonight."

Lin Ling bows, wondering if he's supposed to know who she is.

"Nice to meet you," he says politely.

Maybe sensing his complete incomprehension, Ms. J smiles and says, "Boss of the company we've been working with for our last three ad campaigns."

So he should definitely know who she is.

"Wow, your schedule must be packed," Lin Ling smiles. "I can't imagine keeping track of all those shoots, and people."

See, he's fine he tries to tell Ms. J with his eyes. He knows how to keep investors and people with big wallets happy. It's what he spent most of his time doing before he was ever the Commoner.

"Not at all. It's worth it for what I get," Ms. Liang Jue smiles. "I was hoping you'd make a speech, actually. Nothing too big, unless you're feeling spontaneous."

Ms. J's expression alone lets him know 'spontaneous' isn't the smart option.

If Liang Jue's helped bankroll his rise as the tenth-ranked hero, Lin Ling can't refuse. It sounds like a small thing to do for someone who's an important partner with Treeman. And she'd asked him, personally.

Lin Ling can't turn her down. His skin crawls at the thought.

He gets a few flashcards with the most important parts to mention and then, with a headache pulsing behind his eyes, stumbles onto the stage.

Smile. Wave. Smile again, smaller. You're not a suck-up, you're a hero, Lin Ling thinks, choreography ensuring his movements are smooth and natural when he feels anything but. He's rattled, still, from the questions, from Loli, from how as the night goes on, he becomes more and more aware that he's as much a product as anything these people sell.

"Did expect to see me, huh," Lin Ling grins. "Yeah, I didn't think I'd be getting up here either."

Chuckles. Lin Ling glances at his first flash card.

"I want to thank the sponsors for this year, BrainBox, FOMO, Jetty Way Delivery, Lost Lion Productions, and Treeman Group," Lin Ling says. "Who've been good enough to only water down the drinks a little."

More chuckles. He goes through a few more thanks, the announcement of Jetty Way's  hovering bikes, which supposedly ride smoother than the normal kind, but can't go higher than half a foot of the ground. The longer he talks, the more the words taste like ash. There's a poke in his head that goes, joke here, don't forget a pause to keep their attention, make sure you make eye contact with the people you thank, which Lin Ling can't shake.

He's almost finished the pack of cards.

"Extra special thanks to the former Firm Man for his promotion of today's party," Lin Ling says. "And Ghostblade too, who's auction in the back of the house has raised over * for our disaster relief fund." He hadn't even known Ghostblade was here. "Also, to- to-"

Loli's name is next on the list. Lin Ling has to thank the superhero who just threatened to kill him and he has to do it in front of this crowd.

"Thanks to-" he says.

He can't. He has to. Lin Ling promised. He has an obligation.

His eyes catch on Loli in the crowd, whose hands are held loosely at her side. She cocks her head to the side. As if saying, so, coward? What'll it be?

"Thanks to Loli," Lin Ling manages.

The relief in his chest is his immediate. So is the shame. Faker, he thinks. He's done it. Thanked someone who hates his guts. Even now, he doesn't want to disappoint Liang Jue. The thought of it makes his palms sweat. He has responsibilities to fulfill.

Lin Ling looks at the cards to find he's not finished yet. His stomach sinks slowly down. It's in Ms. J's handwriting, a last minute addition maybe, but one he can't ignore without getting in trouble later.

"I'm so grateful for all your support and trust. Really. And you can take it from me, someone who knows about inheriting trust they haven't earned."

Come on.

Lin Ling doesn't want to talk about Nice. Keep dragging out his predecessor's suicide like it's all a part of the show, like his death wasn't the only part of his life Nice had for himself. Now prettied up, turned into fodder for Lin Ling's own manufactured sob story.

He says, "Nice- he would have," Lin Ling grits his teeth. People are starting to look confused.

"Loved all this," Lin Ling finishes. "All he wanted was to help people. When he passed-it's like the world flinched. We still needed him and he wasn't there. But I was."

Lin Ling counts his pause. No longer than three seconds.

"All I want to do is live up to the task he left me. Taking care of everyone," Lin Ling says. "The way he took care of me."

Lin Ling comes off the stage. His hands hurt. They’re fisted, he realizes, though he’s not sure for how long.

No one had made him say any of it. There had just been that sick feeling in the bottom of his stomach at the idea of refusing. He's responsible, Lin Ling thinks, the sound of it like a curse. He owes. That's what it means to be polite and considerate and reliable, the kind of person everyone wants to be but no one can manage 100 percent of the time. Except Lin Ling.

Ms. J's waiting for him just to the side of the stage.

"The stutter isn't flattering. People will think you're weak," Ms. J tells him.

"Right," Lin Ling says. "I'll work on it," he lies.

She eyes him, then turns to an assistant. "Set up an appointment with a speech therapist tomorrow. Before the appearance with Dragon Boy on that awful cooking show. You're going to have appointments twice a week until your problem goes away."

Under her expectant gaze, Lin Ling finds himself agreeing, "I'll fix it. I'm going to work hard." And he guesses he will, from now on.

It's not a real stutter. Lin Ling has never had one before. It's some kind of disconnect between what he wants to say and what he should. He even knows how to fix it. Lin Ling just has to give in, stop trying to say upsetting things in public, be exactly who people want him to be and it'll go away. No more disconnect between his head and mouth.

Yeah, Lin Ling thinks. He just has to be palatable. Relatable. And never say or be someone who might make anyone else upset or uncomfortable again. He'll get right on that.

_________________________________________________

Little Johnny thrusts the camera of his handheld recorder way too close to X's face and the number one hero leans on his back foot to sway out of the way.

"What does our longest reigning champion do in his free time?" Johnny says.

X points his thumb toward the elevator. "I left my game console here. Just coming to pick it up. Hey, are you live?"

"Yes," Johnny says. "Showing the people what we're like. On the level. Day-in-the-life."

Trying to loosen the restrictions of their Trust value by showing the public their literal dirty laundry, Lin Ling thinks. He's here to use Queen's coffee machine on the residential floor (she buys better pods) and not get involved in whatever Johnny's doing.

"Cool," X says and then he's holding Johnny's camera. "Hey. Don't you think we should have four-day weekends. Try believing in something useful for once."

Johnny laughs nervously and snatches the camera back, though only because X lets him.

"Let this grown man grow a beard if he wants," X says over the shorter hero's shoulder.

There's a muffled noise from outside, big like a roar. Lin Ling feels its vibrations in his chest, the way X and Johnny shift toward it at the same time as him, as if called by name. A second later a shape rears past the window of the hero's tower. An ear, Lin Ling realizes when it flicks.

He runs toward the front door with Johnny.

"No, no," X calls behind them. "I've got us covered."

There's a noise, a light snap, and something happens. Something frightening and neon and something almost like a stomachache except Lin Ling feels it in his eyebrows. They jump off the side of the hero tower-how did they get out here- then slide down the flat side of a building, and then they're on street level.

Johnny stumbles next to him.

Lin Ling tells X what the fuck. Or, he tries and chokes on the words.

"I don't understand what just happened," he manages instead in a harsh voice.

"Tell me how you really feel, Commoner" X says, voice sarcastic, like he knows Lin Ling can't.

He opens his mouth and closes it again. X raises an eyebrow then flattens into the pavement, actually flattens, like a pencil drawing, and dashes toward the monster. Lin Ling loses him between the cracks in the pavement and the deep reverberation of the monster’s steps. The monster is a violent shade of purple, like smashed grapes before they become wine.

Lin Ling looks at Johnny, who’s still holding his camera up and has to abandon his eyeroll mid-motion. People are watching, after all.

Lin Ling throws himself into the fray. They fight for a long time before he realizes they’re losing. The monster’s limbs are too big for him to get his threads around and Johnny seems to be similarly struggling.

“Does Big Johnny feel like joining in on the action,” Lin Ling hedges. Isn’t that what all the training had been for?

“Not really!” Johnny shouts back, his companion slung to his back. “How attached are you to these buildings. And those ones. And those ones.”

Lin Ling’s starting to get a sick feeling in the bottom of his stomach. No buildings have fallen over yet, but they’ve had some close calls. The streets are packed with people, fleeing from their offices and apartments. They have to run a long time to even make it out from under the monster’s shadow.

This isn’t a choreographed fight. A lot of people are going to die if they can’t figure something out soon. Johnny looks like he’s beginning to realize it too.

Lin Ling ropes a thread around the massive shoulder of the monster and hauls himself up. He uses thread to tap at Johnny’s shoulder and point at his camera. Turn it off. Things are getting scary.

“They should see this part,” Johnny says even though his face is ashen.

Lin Ling can’t even snarl at him to turn it off.

“Really?” He says instead.

They spend a desperate few minutes trying to pin the monster down. Lin Ling wraps his threads around its neck, inhales, missing his ability to fly more than he ever has, and jumps off its torso. He flies in an arc, trying to trip it,  but the monster only buckles.

This is bad. Lin Ling doesn’t dare look at his Trust value. How many people are watching? Can they tell? X keeps dancing around the monster, frowning when it steps on sidewalks. Lin Ling has a hunch it’s too big for him to… do whatever it is he usually does to it.

“This would be easier if someone here could fly,” X sighs, standing on a window ledge. “Then I could just slap him on the side of my coin.”

“How?” Lin Ling shouts.

X holds the coin above his head and looks at it, which explains exactly nothing. Lin Ling doesn’t have any favourite heroes anymore as a rule, but he might make an exception for least favourite heroes if their number one keeps this up.

“Do you think you’re strong enough to launch him one thousand, maybe two, into the air?”

A question like that isn’t even worth responding to. Lin Ling starts climbing.

“Why do you keep saying ‘he,’” he demands to X, who struts casually up the side of a nearby apartment complex. 

Then he sees it. The hunch of the monster’s back, his bony vertebrae poking out. Even though his ears are sharp and he has enormous tusks curling out of a snout instead of a mouth, there’s something very human about the monster. It’s bipedal-ness, the way he pats the ground as if taking unsteady steps. As though on legs he’s not used to.

Lin Ling thinks, that used to be a person, and has to stop himself from throwing up all over the fleeing civilians. This is a fear-made creation, one of the hero corporations’ new experiments. This monster shouldn’t exist. Lin Ling looks at him, whoever this used to be, and thinks for the first time, maybe heroes shouldn’t exist. 

At least if the heroes went, the hero corporations would go with them. 

Alright. Alright, he thinks. He can’t launch this thing to the same height as a small mountain. But he’s strong enough to do something about it.

“Have you ever wanted to visit heaven,” Lin Ling says, maybe a little too cheerfully as he hurls past the side of a skyscraper.

X frowns in confusion. Lin Ling grabs him. It’s easy–he still has his strength, after all. With his other hand, he threads another, different skyscraper.

“Start packing,” Lin Ling tells X.

Wow, the number one hero can scream really loud. They fall a long, long distance, swinging forward with the help of Lin Ling’s thread. Lin Ling wants to squeeze his eyes shut, heart slamming in his chest. Then they rise, flinging upward. When they’re at the peak of their arc, Lin Ling cocks X–who he grips by the back– and slams him into the sky as hard as he can, sending himself jerking unsteadily downward. He thinks he gets pretty good height on X, but he’s a bit distracted because of how quickly he hurtles downward.

There had been a short period of time where, as Nice, Lin Ling had forgotten his fear of heights. But it wasn’t gone for long. Lin Ling chokes on the air. He can feel his bones and they’re cold.

Lin Ling throws a lot of threads, hard spools of gold unfurling beneath him. If he’s not careful he’s going to decapitate himself on them.

Oh god. Oh god. In a panic, he throws a string at a sky scraper beside him. It catches on the cement and Lin Ling smashes into the side of the building.

He squeezes his eyes tight. He wants to scream, but finds that he can’t build up enough pressure in his chest to do it. Lin Ling wheezes instead. A different kind of panic descends over him. 

He can’t scream. There’s the distant thump of helicopter wings overhead. They must be recording: people are still watching. 

That’s him now, Lin Ling thinks hysterically. Kind, polite, well-mannered. The Commoner. Common. The everyman, the one everyone can relate to who, at the end of the day, can’t be too much of anyone. 

So no screaming for him.

He’d always been a bit average. But this takes it to a whole new level, Lin Ling thinks.

He gets up and clambers down the side of the building gingerly. Lin Ling makes it to the ground just in time to see the monster wink out of existence. There’s a spot of blue-and-metal, some other hero that’s come to join them, but Lin Ling turns his blurry vision away to look for X.

There’s a glint from somewhere up high. The other hero, the metal one, runs and leaps what must be almost twenty feet straight up. The glint is a coin and the hero snatches it out of the air.

Then all of sudden, X is standing there, at his side. He taps a finger to the side of the coin, the monster painted onto it. As though X had placed it overtop him. 

“You’re lucky I have good aim,” X groans at him. “Never do that again. Next time it’ll be you in here.”

But Lin Ling’s not paying attention anymore. It’s E-Soul. The hero who had saved X is E-Soul.

Before Lin Ling knows what he’s doing, his fist is in E-Soul’s face. The other hero bats it away and Lin Ling cracks his other fist into the hero’s helmet. Facts flit by in the back of his mind, the fact that Mighty Glory sent E-Soul on a worldwide press tour, that they’ve been trying to rebuild his popularity in time for the Heroes Tournament, to make sure he’s still in the top ten. That he’d probably come back at this exact moment to claim the victory against the monster and get the good optics for saving X, even though Lin Ling knows the number one hero would have been fine by himself.

But none of that really matters. All that does is the gut satisfaction of yanking down E-Soul by the neck with his threads and slamming his knee into the other hero’s face.

“They’ve been keeping you away from me,” Lin Ling says. “But you came back. You actually came back. Good thing you weren’t gone for too long or I would have had to track you down myself.”

“Commoner,” E-Soul chokes.

There are people gathering. If collaborations are popular, there’s nothing more instantly viral than infighting between the top ten. People think he’s trying to climb a rank. If it means no one interrupts them, Lin Ling’s fine with that.

His whole body is cold. You killed her, Lin Ling thinks, and throws himself at the ninth-ranked hero.

“This is against the rules of the tournament,” E-Soul says. “No fighting right before.”

Lin Ling laughs. It sounds nothing like him. It hasn’t for a while now. Too sweet and high.

“You think I– I–“ give two shits, Lin Ling can’t say. “You k- ki– she was in front of me. She was finally safe, she hated it here, and you-“

The camera’s still recording Lin Ling realizes, tucked into Johnny’s overalls. People are staring and he can’t say it. He could let everyone here, now, know what E-Soul did, but he can’t fucking say it.

X tears him away. Lin Ling lunges forward, but there’s another snap and the world turns into blobs of light and shapes with too many sides and then he’s too far from E-Soul to lunge at him. E-Soul’s just standing there. He hadn’t needed to be held back, and Lin Ling needs to see him on the ground, sobbing on the pavement for his life, or that he’s sorry, or at least on the wrong side of Lin Ling’s knuckles. His unbothered stance, the way he steps back from Lin Ling, is unbearable.

Lin Ling’s chest heaves. He opens his mouth to scream and instead huffs. I hate you, I’m going to make you regret the day you were born, you took her from me and I never even got to know her half as well as I wanted to, Lin Ling doesn’t scream. She was going to be happy!

Instead a choked, hacking noise comes out, like coughing. His mouth moves and he can’t say any of it. He twists his face into a glare, but his eyebrows, his mouth doesn’t comply. All he can manage is something that feels more like annoyance. 

The only thing that makes it through the noise, the static slowly filling up Lin Ling’s lungs is, “I’ll see you at the Heroes Tournament. I’ll be there. Make sure you are too.”

E-Soul nods.

Aren’t they so civil. So noble.

Making public declarations of bodily harm isn’t appropriate in public, he thinks, half-hysterically. Challenges, though. The sign of a truly hard worker.

I hate you, Lin Ling thinks, not sure who he means it for anymore.

___________________________________________

“E-Soul’s a murderer,” X muses once they’re in the lobby. All the air goes out of Lin Ling’s lungs.

“He–” Lin Ling tries to say it too. He’s not sure why he keeps trying, only that he can’t stop. Like blinking.

“Hm. Cat got your tongue? I think I got the gist. He killed Moon, you’re upset about it, and you probably don’t want to live in the same building as a murderer, considering he’s back now and a floor above you,” X points out.

Lin Ling stares at him. The pressure in his chest goes away now that it’s been said for him.

“Yeah,” he says.

“Huh,” X nods, head tilted. “Well. Worth thinking about then. Maybe you should do something about that.”

He stalks away from Lin Ling, hand in his pocket, the other dangling lazily at his side. Off to drop that coin down a well. Or add it to his collection. Whatever he does when he’s not at the tower. When’s the last time Lin Ling had done something outside the tower?

“X,” Lin Ling calls. “What do your powers do to you?”

He doesn’t expect the other man to answer. When X does, it’s in a bored voice, slightly listing like he’s thinking of a show he’d rather be watching or adding an item to his grocery list.

“Hm. Are you a person, Lin Ling? You look like one. You act like one,” X slings an arm around Lin Ling and the two of them march further into the building, Lin Ling unable to pull away. “How about me, though? Are you convinced?”

“Convinced about what,” Lin Ling says, mouth dry.

X smiles. “Also, will you play Animal Crossing with me? And not critique my terraforming.” It sounds like a joke until he says, “Because things like that. They’re what make you remember how to sit out the bad. Change the routine.”

Nice had really liked city-building games. Like Lin Ling, he’d grown up in an age of heroics and his favourite hero had been Smile. He could peel an apple in one slice by age nine and the first time he’d flown, he hadn’t let himself touch the ground for days. For once, those thoughts don’t sound like a curse.

“Yeah. I’d actually like that,” Lin Ling admits.

_____________________________________

It would be an exaggeration to say Lin Ling never visits the other heroes. Unexpected maybe, but not something that warrants the deep stare Ghostblade gives him after Lin Ling steps into his floor. Lin Ling gives him a weak smile and tries not to aim it at Ghostblade’s floor. His room is a scary place. Lots of knives.

“Hey, I was wondering if you’d be interested in joining my organization,” Lin Ling starts. “It’s a non-profit. It’s supposed to help incentivize the community, so I’m trying to get as many of the top ten involved as possible.”

Lin Ling hands Ghostblade a pamphlet. Ghostblade takes it. Cool. Heroes can let whoever they want into their floor, Lin Ling reminds himself. If Ghostblade didn’t want him here, he wouldn’t have opened the elevator doors.

“People submit requests to us–what they’re looking to improve around town–like if they want more community events, or to repaint the playground, or maybe some families need help getting groceries,” Lin Ling rambles to fill the silence.

Ghostblade grips the pamphlet. Lin Ling’s not sure how to talk to him. Maybe he’d been let in as target practice for Ghostblade’s horrific wall (walls, actually) of knives. 

“We’ve already fixed street lighting in a bunch of alleyways and residential areas,” Lin Ling says. “It hasn’t been long, but crimes gone down by like 60% in those areas? For now. The organization's not a trick or anything. I’m not using it to commit tax fraud or clean dirty money or any of that.”

It had just been an idea at first. Until one day Lin Ling woke up and remembered, wait, I have a lot of money now. After that, he’d recruited some fans, reached out to other volunteer organizations, and all of a sudden, Lin Ling’s doing something that feels worthwhile for the first time in months. Something he’s actually proud of. He likes to think Queen and Johnny think so too and that’s why they keep coming back.

Lin Ling says, “I just want to help people. That’s supposed to be the whole point.”

Ghostblade flips open the front page of the pamphlet. He wanders further into his floor and sits on the couch. Lin Ling doesn’t follow him, not sure if he’s being invited or not.

“I could tell you more,” he suggests. “Or there’s an email and contact information on the back. Our next event is–” Ghostblade looks at him. There’s a knife in his hand that hadn’t been there before.

“Haha,” Lin Ling says. “Okay, bye. See-you-later-maybe. Oh gosh.” The last part comes out when he’s alone in the elevator. 

Something’s changed in the past few weeks.

There’s only so long Lin Ling can go trying to remember the last time he was allowed to eat fried chicken. Or staring in the mirror, opening his mouth to say something positive he felt today, and going silent. Of wanting to peel off his own skin and crawl out of it, like it’s not his anymore. A feeling like, I can’t keep doing this, and I don’t know what’s going to happen to me if I do.

It’s a feeling Lin Ling imagines is probably a lot similar to how Nice felt in the months, maybe years, before he died.

It’s the second time Lin Ling’s thought, I don’t want to be like Nice, and tried to do something about it. The organization is one of them. The other requires a lot of packing on Lin Ling’s part.

The first thing out of his mouth when he sees X in his room is, "What are you doing here?"

"Me? What are you doing hanging around this dump," X says and nudges one of Lin Ling's boxes with the toe of his shoe. "I thought you'd already have moved out by now."

Lin Ling doesn't ask how he knows how. Anyone with eyes could notice the boxes Lin Ling's been carting in and out of the tower for the past few weeks.

(That had been a fun conversation with Ms. J.

"You can't," Ms J. gestures to his slightly emptier floor.

"Treeman doesn't own the tower. Being in a relationship with Moon let you trap me here," Lin Ling says. "But you can't legally make me stay."

"Living in the tower and being friends with the other top ten is part of your brand," she stresses as hired workers undo Lin Ling's hard work, unpacking his boxes. "We'll buy out wherever you end up living."

"If you do, I'll go into hiding for three or four months. Maybe six, if I really need the vacation," Lin Ling says, voice friendly. "And when I come back, I'll announce that my working conditions drove me to attempt suicide. You'd be down three heroes in under a year. You need me. An apartment's a small price.")

Things had gone more smoothly after that. X doesn't even live here, something that had made clear to Lin Ling that living in the Hero Tower is a benefit of his rank, not an obligation. He has enough of those, anyway.

"Can I get you anything?" Lin Ling says. "Water, tea, pop...." Does X consume anything that isn't mostly sugar? Lin Ling would resent him horribly if he were his dentist.

Lin Ling needs to be at his new place in three hours to meet the plumber and fix whatever's wrong with his kitchen sink, he still needs to buy toilet paper and maybe two kinds of vegetables for the fridge. And then after that he has to meet with the other volunteers to do the set-up for Hero's Day. But it's not a bad list of errands. The opposite.

"Do you want to be a hero," X says. "Actually?"

That stops Lin Ling where he is, halfway to the kitchen.

"Yes. I think," Lin Ling says. "It's complicated."

"How?"

Another question where it sounds like X already knows the answer.

"It's everything I've wanted. Forever," Lin Ling says. "And a lot of sacrifices were made to get me here. And not all of them were my own. I want to help people."

"You could be a firefighter. A first responder," X says.

"Yeah," Lin Ling says, chest lurching with dissatisfaction.

"I figured something out recently. If it's something you want, and it has to be for this to work," X walks ahead of Lin Ling, into his own kitchen, "I can shift you out of heroism. You'll be Lin Ling again. No access to your Trust value. No fashionable platinum streak on that curly head."

"What?" Lin Ling says. "How?"

"Something complicated that ends with the Commoner disappearing, and no cultural memory of him left behind," X smiles. "Aren't you tired of being a prop, Lin Ling."

He fills a glass of water and puts it on the table between them. X fishes a can of pop out of his pocket-is it lukewarm, why does he do that-and puts it down beside the glass and looks at Lin Ling. Lin Ling gets the message. Time to decide.

"I wouldn't be the Commoner anymore," Lin Ling mutters. "But I could still do everything I'm already doing. Keep volunteering. Keep fighting criminals. Mercenaries exist."

Lin Ling's life has only been on an upswing because he's been fighting, tooth and nail, for weeks, to make it that way. But if he agrees, and X can really pull something like this off, Lin Ling could get through the night without thinking about how Nice always turned his light switches on and off five times before sleeping. Or choke on his words. He won't have to look at Yang Cheng in the street anymore and have the urge to walk up and shake his hand, to greet him politely.

Lin Ling wants that.

He picks up the water. "No," Lin Ling says. "I'm alright. I've got it handled."

If he agrees, he loses the rest of it.  Heroes as an idea are inherently flawed, but they still mean something. People look at heroes and think, okay, well a limited edition release of Johnny's new plush will get me to the end of the month. Or, I want to improve society the way Queen does. I want my change in career to be as successful as Moon's. I want to stand up for my values like she did, Lin Ling thinks.

Nice had been meaningful to his fans. A series of- If he can be a hero and have OCD- he cares how he looks and no one teases  him- I want to help someone, anyone today- if he cares about rising homelessness rates, maybe I should too. Whether or not any of it's true is besides the point sometimes. 

Lin Ling wants to be that person.

X raises an eyebrow, a faint twist to his mouth. "You're sure? Really sure."

"Would you believe I really enjoy doing toothpaste advertisements and appearing on reality TV?"

"No. Spill," X says. "Why not. If it makes sense and you want to, why not." The pop can tips under his fingers, like X is going to roll it off the kitchen island.

Maybe he wouldn't choose the same, in Lin Ling's place. If that's case, Lin Ling wonders why he doesn't just use his powers on himself. Lin Ling doesn’t ask. It's not his place.

Lin Ling sips his water. It's cold in the back of his throat.

"There's a version of the system we're in now where heroes are a social service. Where, in-between, the ads and performances and in-fighting, we're doing something worthwhile," Lin Ling says. "You should come to the event later."

He hands X a pamphlet, one of the leftover ones from when he spoke to Ghostblade.

"And maybe in the future, when heroes sign on or get ranked, they find their choices aren't all bad ones," Lin Ling says. "A system for heroes that isn't built so that we can't escape it or leave one day."

X takes the pamphlet. Lin Ling hopes he comes. It's good to have things that give you purpose outside of work.

"Did you manage to get Raymond on your island yet?" Lin Ling says and X sighs heavily.

X shakes his pop before he drinks it, the freak. The last time Lin Ling asked why, he'd said it was for 'the kick' and Lin Ling still doesn't know if X was fucking with him or not. They talk for a while longer, about X coming to Lin Ling's new place-only if Lin Ling can go to his- and what sport they'd win if they were allowed to participate in the Olympics.

(Lin Ling's is luge because it looks fun. X's is breakdancing because he always answers questions like this with the most jaded old-man thing Lin Ling's ever heard, or exactly the way a thirteen-year-old boy would.)

"X," Lin Ling says when the other hero's on his way out. "Why did you ask me?"

X straightens from where he'd dropped his can into the recycling.

"Earlier you said you knew someone who only had bad options?" X says.

All of a sudden Lin Ling's thinking about Nice again. About Moon.

"Yeah," he says, mouth dry.

X shrugs. "Me too."

There's a kind of pause after his answer, the kind Lin Ling can recognize from whenever someone asks him a question about Nice and Moon, which is often. The pause where your mind floats over the flicked end of a smile, and you have to take a second to breathe.

“Yeah,” Lin Ling says. “Thanks for caring.”

__________________________________

Lin Ling walks toward the pavilion and feels strange. Good, which is strange in itself. He chalks it up to getting more comfortable with the crew, his volunteers and maybe even a few friends, who've seen him tear out his hair over task management checklists and enormous spreadsheets.  

He's in his tracksuit instead of his battle suit, something Treeman doesn't get a say about since his work hours are technically over today. Technically because they don't know where he is or how to contact him, which is pretty much the same thing. They say the battle suit is more marketing friendly. Lin Ling thinks the battle suit, covered in Nice’s branding, allows them to keep selling Nice’s merch instead of eating the costs.

His arms are full with the banners they'd bought to set up the pavilion. He also has a ladder under one arm and a coil of cords under the other. Lin Ling might not have a car, but his strength has to be good for something that isn't punching, kicking, and punching again.

He sets up by himself for a while, decorating the pavilion and quickly scampering down the ladder when more people come in and tell him off for using it unsupervised.

"I have superpowers," Lin Ling defends himself against Wang Anhui, the organization’s coordinator.

"You have sauce on your tracksuit," she says. "And I've seen you get punched before on TV. Like really hard. Superpowers don't stop you from getting hurt."

"If you believed I can't get hurt, it might actually happen you know," Lin Ling taps the Trust value on his wrist.

"Well," Wang Anhui says, "You'd really better stay away from that ladder then."

Lin Ling scratches at the aforementioned stain and defeatedly follows her to where he's supposed to delegate the new volunteers.

"Hi," he says. "We need more people to set up the cords. If you're comfortable with heights, go help them. I want you three to set up our temporary garbages and you two to put up signs so people know where the bathrooms are."

And just like that, their dream of hanging out with the Commoner all day dies behind their eyes. A few people try and follow him around but Lin Ling hands them trash bags and banners to put up until they understand that he's only going to give them more work and he's mostly left alone.

One of the volunteers isn't moving to help. He’s staring at the statue in the middle of the pavilion, Lin Ling realizes. He'd clearly come straight from work, still in his suit and tie, a sort of generic-office-worker look to him. He's wearing glasses and Lin Ling walks up behind him.

"I always wondered," the man says at Nice's statue. "You donated it to Hero's day so quickly. Did you just have this on hand?"

Yes, Lin Ling thinks, but he doesn't want to say that. It'll be all over the news outlets before the morning if he does. People are already weird enough about his and Nice's relationship.

"It was commissioned," Lin Ling says, which isn't a lie. Just not by or for him. "It's how he would have wanted to be remembered. Just as he was. Too perfect."

"Hmm."

Lin Ling eyes the other man. "What?"

"You didn't know him very well, did you?" he says and Lin Ling inhales. "No, it's okay, you don't have to admit it. But that's not what friends say. They'd go 'he was way uglier in real life,' or 'I feel bad inflicting his sorry face on the world.' But not you."

Lin Ling scrambles for an excuse, some tidbit of truth to convince this random man.

“I knew some things about him,” he says instead.

“Like what?”

Lin Ling licks his lips. "He wasn't perfect. I didn't know him, but if I had, I would have told him it's okay. That it's not what made him important."

"Yeah," the man says, a look crossing his face, a bit like sadness. Maybe a bit of pity too.

Lin Ling looks at the statue, out of breath all of a sudden. If he could, he would tell Nice he understands him, what it's like. But of course, if Nice was alive to tell, Lin Ling wouldn't have any reason to.

"We all need a reminder every now and then," the man snaps a finger gun at him, turning away. "You're slacking off, you know. Leaving the hard work for everyone else. Asshole move."

Lin Ling laughs, half out of surprise, half because he can't remember the last time someone spoke to him like that.

"Okay," Lin Ling says. "Back to work with you too then, wiseass."

He blinks.

At one point Ghostblade shows up, which whips everyone into an excited, unproductive frenzy. Then the other hero spends two straight hours breaking off pieces of tape for people's posters and they lose interest.

He’s not sure Nice would have liked Hero’s Day, a day Queen and the rest of them organized with the city to remember fallen heroes. But knowing this pavilion exists, that it’s out there, alleviates some kind of tightness in Lin Ling’s chest. Maybe the knowledge that he doesn’t have constantly be thinking about Nice, about Moon. Because there’s a day and place for him to do it.

Lin Ling's lighter than he's been in months. Someone takes a video of him stubbing his toe and in thirty minutes it's gotten a few thousand views of him going beetred and saying some not safe for work words. Sure, go ahead, Lin Ling eyes down the man with the glasses, who he's pretty sure he'd seen filming. Lin Ling can go viral for looking stupid. What else is new.

"Hey, asshole! Eat a rock and die from indigestion," he says. It's louder than he'd meant it to be and Lin Ling flushes when everyone looks at him.

"Lin Ling, language!" Wang Anhui shouts, but everyone laughs.

The man has their streamers wrapped around his head and replaced his shoelaces with them like he'd gotten bored and decided to take it out on the decorations.

"If you like them so much, I'll bury you in streamers and leave you here," Lin Ling threatens, but the man is oddly good at dancing out of his grasping reach. "We can traumatize the visitors with your mummy. Two-in-one, we won’t even have to pay for front-page coverage.”

"If you're so mad," the man quickly pockets his phone, "don't smile so wide."

Lin Ling's knuckles scuff the back of his coat and the man weaves through the other volunteers, who laugh and jokingly shoulder check Lin Ling to throw him off course.

"The only unproductive one I see is you," Wang Anhui mutters, coming over to snatch his clipboard out of his limp hands. "What a commotion."

"Can I help it if some people are jerks," Lin Ling calls out. A few more chuckles.

"Your jacket is inside out," Wang Anhui tells him and Lin Ling takes it off and puts it on correctly.

For a second, no one's looking at him, too caught up in their own work. Lin Ling inhales as big as he can. He rolls out his shoulders. It's quiet in his head. The way the people here treat him, look at him, is normal. And they've seen him make stupid, avoidable mistakes, like throw out paperwork he still needed, or bring orange cardboard for Clean-Earth events when they needed green.

Quietly, Lin Ling says, "Fuck yeah." There's no stiltedness to his voice, the cautious sound kids make when they're not sure if they're allowed to swear. It just sounds like him. 

He presses his palm to his chest, until he can feel the warmth of his skin through the cloth. Lin Ling exhales. It's him underneath. All the way down.