vive la résistance

Ghost pulled away a little from Alexandre once he was done squeezing and twirling the boy around, wanting to assess and make sure he was really all safe and sound. He knew it might be stupid to fuss, but he couldn’t help it. He had Xandre for his own son, the kid he never got to have, it was always worrisome to see him in the middle of their messes; the oneiroi couldn’t even imagine how his real parents must be feeling like.

“Of course you did. You’re brilliant,” he sighed, taking Xandre’s face in hands to pull him in and press a kiss to his forehead. Saying he was proud didn’t feel right, even if a part of him was; he was proud the shade got everyone out and helped the others, but he wished they would start finding better fucking escape plans than just doing this every time. He should have a talk with the others later. “We’re good, don’t worry, X. Sush was with me and I’ve seen Cyrus to know he’s okay, too,” he reassured softly. “Any other time I might tease you for the way you just said Kasey’s name, but I’ll let you bring that up on your own. Come, let’s get you some water, at least. And some chocolate. Not as much of a mess that some sugar can’t fix.”

Alexandre closed his eyes, leaning into the kiss, able to physically feel the heavy weight in his stomach disappear. For the first time in days he relaxed. He had inherited his mother’s anxious nature, just like her he did everything with great passion – including worrying himself into imagination hell whenever something happened. But Ghost was so reassuring, so kind and lovely in his voice and manner that Alexandre’s bad feelings vanished. “That’s good.” His smile was weaker now, when he allowed himself to feel the exhaustion. His cheeks turned proper red, lips pursed together as his hand shot up to cover his mouth. “I didn’t–” he started, but fell silent, realising that there was no use – he was a bad liar, and worse around Ghost. “Fuck, well, alright.” Sighing, he followed the other to the kitchen. “How did you and Khatri get out? Gallagher? Were you close to the explosion?”

One minute, Kasey had been trying to help a random woman who was still stuck underneath a door, then the next, he was in Xandre’s apartment. He’d hardly heard the shade, and the phoenix wasn’t exactly going to argue. The apartment was painfully familiar, and he had to gather his bearings as he heard Xandre begin to cough. “Easy, mate.” He put his hand on the other’s shoulder, squeezing lightly, “I can help…in a few minutes. I have to cry, you know,” he managed a small smile, hoping that’d ease the tension. At the other’s question, he shrugged his shoulders, running a hand through his messy hair, “I’m fine. Really, I’m okay,” he said slowly, clearing his throat. “I’m just glad you are.”

Alexandre couldn’t care less about his own budding bruises and scraped hands – he didn’t look worse than after a good night out. His throat was a pain, sure, but nothing that wouldn’t fix itself within a couple of days. “You don’t have to cry for me,” he mumbled, sounding as if he’s taken up smoking in sometime in preschool. They were alone, but he couldn’t understand his own reasoning as to why. “I’m fine.” As the stillness caught up to him, the silence of his home in contrast to the chaos of the explosion, he felt echoes of the night pulse in his head. He sighed, immediately feeling an unfamiliar burn in his throat. “If you, uh… Do you want me to take you to HQ instead or– because I have aspirin and I could make like... tea or something?” 

If there was ever a time Ghost would wake up from a nap to answer his door, was the time someone was pounding on it right after they had just performed the terrorist attack of the century. The only reason he was sleeping anyway was because he was completely exhausted, worked to the bone, after staying up for too long trying to make sure everyone was okay. He’d already checked and heard all his loved ones were doing okay, he was just planning on a catnap before he went out to visit them.

But this knock was so sudden and so urgent that he found himself getting up before he was even fully awake, half-naked and dazed. All it took was one look at Xandre’s face for his brain to kick into action, a matching grin spreading on his lips. “Oh, tutu, I’m so glad you’re okay,” he muttered against the boy’s shoulder, arms squeezing tight and lifting him for a dramatic twirl around his living room. “Don’t worry, I wouldn’t leave you so easily. Are you alright? Are you hurt?”

Alexandre had spent the last hour convincing his mother that he had been far from the explosion. He had lied and told her that he had been sick and spent the whole evening at home, having to repeat himself at several occasions as she handed the phone over to his father. Mr Revere had been much calmer – lacking the European flair for dramatics – suggesting that perhaps Alexandre should live with them for a few weeks, ‘until God was done with that wretched city’. Alexandre missed them greatly, even his father, and by hugging Ghost he imagined himself hugging them; the massive Oneori a substitute for what had been his greatest source of safety.  

Ghost was a solace in this afterlife, having pulled him out from his darkest moment and given him a new family. He felt his feet leave the ground, spinning around as safely as a little child in the Oneori’s arms. “Yeah,” he mumbled as he found footing again, his voice still raspy from the dust he’d breathed in. “I, uh, I wasn’t very hurt so I got our people out of there.” The shades were the constant escape plan after all. “I couldn’t find you, or Cy, or Khatri… The last one I got was Kasey and…” He trailed off, quickly adverting his gaze before a soft red flushed his cheeks. “It was a real mess, wasn’t it?”

Alexandre looked normal. He was bruised, some fresh wounds here and there, sure, but no more than from a Saturday night out. His throat was still sore from breathing in far too much dust while getting his fellow Ouroburos out of the confusion. That was the only thing bothering him, ripping on his insides whenever he spoke or, well, breathed. While he had found many of his allies, he hadn’t been able to find Ghost in all the chaos. Worry had been creeping up on him because of it, and no reasoning could completely rid him of it. Not many hours of peace had passed before the shade found himself outside his self-proclaimed dad’s door, nervously banging his bruised firsts against the door. When it took the other more than two seconds to answer, Alexandre walked straight through the door instead, becoming tangible inside Ghost’s hallway. 

“Holy hell,” he exclaimed softly, feeling his throat burn mercilessly from the dust he had breathed in. He had placed Kasey on the brown Chesterfield sofa in the living room on the first floor, having had taken the Phoenix to his home in Greenwich Village rather than to the HQ where he had taken the other Ouroburos. Sliding down next to Kasey he started coughing violently, his body finally catching up to the discomfort it had suffered. “Fuck–” he wheezed, wiping the tears as they came from his red eyes. “Mon Dieu… Are you alright?” Placing a hand on Kasey’s arm, Alexandre turned to face him properly, his expression gentle despite his worry. “How are you feeling? Kasey... Are you okay?”