#downside au

Checking into the hotel had been almost too easy. He had learned quickly that if you just went about as if you knew what you were doing, people wouldn’t question you. He even enjoyed acting calm about the whole thing, despite how crazy his heart was racing. After signing the papers to check in and getting the card key, he brought his suitcase up to his room and locked the door behind him, letting out a sigh. 

“Finally…” Clyde carried his bag to his bed and picked it up, slowly unzipping it and checking the inside. He pushed his old clothes out of the way until he saw the familiar plastic bag sitting underneath. The stolen money he had taken from the bank sat inside the unassuming cheap bag. Both the best and worst thing that’s happened to him over the past 24 hours.

Taking the money was the most stressful and exhilarating thing he had ever experienced. The new scale on his left forearm was easily worth it. Why didn’t Remy see that? Imagine what they could do together. This was only just the beginning! With their powers combined, they could do so much more, be an unstoppable duo.

“He’ll change his mind eventually,” Clyde mumbled to himself. He knew his own powers didn’t work on himself and there’s no way he’d believe his own lies. Even still, he hoped Remy would understand him sooner or later. He hoped everyone would see what he was trying to do. Especially Virgil, whom he didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye to properly. He wasn’t even sure when he would see his little brother again, but he hoped it would be sooner rather than later.

---

Two Years Later

---

Middle school was the literal worst for Virgil. He could see people looking his way and laughing at him, judging him and whispering amongst themselves about who knows what. People had come up to him all nice , probably to ask him questions before they used it against him. That’s just what people do. His older brother had taught him that years ago.

That wasn’t even the worst of it. The worst thing was all of the lies. ‘I wouldn’t do that to you, Virgil’ or ‘you can trust us’ before the inevitable stab to the back. He had more than enough of it. It hurt and made him second guess everything and, worst of all, it made him think of his brother more and more. Clyde would lie, sure, but it was always jokes or something silly or unimportant. He never lied to hurt Virgil! It had been two years since his parents had kicked Clyde out. Two whole years without his big brother he always looked up to. Two years of not knowing what had happened to him and never knowing if he would see him again. 

His parents had tried to throw out all of Clyde’s things. Virgil was able to hold on to a few knickknacks here and there. The big one, though, was Clyde’s pet snake. His parents planned on bringing him back to the pet store or giving him away, but Virgil would have none of it. The snake was innocent and Virgil cared for it just as much as his brother so it was just as much as his pet in his eyes. So, after a few arguments, they had agreed to let Virgil take over caring for the snake completely. Virgil went and did a lot of research on the ball python that he could. While he wouldn’t realize why his brother decided to name the python Monty of all things for another few years, Virgil loved that snake since it was the last real thing he had to remember his brother by. As he grew older, he tried wearing a lot of Clyde’s old clothes as well. His parents were less than okay with that decision. They kept trying to take him out clothes shopping and removing the old outfits, but Virgil wouldn’t budge. There wasn’t a lot that still fit him, but black went with a lot of things and Virgil knew he could get away with wearing that at least until he fully grew into everything else. 

With Clyde gone, his parents being unusually cold to him lately and Monty now his only friend, Virgil grew bored rather quickly. Home felt more like a box he was forced to sit in than a place of comfort it had once been.

After one of his lamps for Monty’s tank died out, Virgil decided to fiddle with it and fix the problem to avoid telling his parents. He knew he shouldn’t be afraid to ask but knowing their distaste for the creature, he didn’t want to risk somehow losing Monty. Virgil unplugged everything and handled the bulb carefully, inspecting it. A change of bulb had done nothing and the old bulb still seemed to be in working order. After a short while, he was able to figure out that there was a loose wire in the plug that just needed a bit of adjusting. It was something so minor and so easy to fix, but being able to take care of it on his own made him swell with pride.

It had piqued his interest and only grew after that. He began to look for more things that needed fixing. He started taking simple things apart and putting them back together to see how they worked. While Clyde had a silver tongue and could get himself out of most situations, it seemed like Virgil was able to create. It only seemed logical that he had decided to build the one thing he wanted most.

His first batch of, erm, ‘friends’ didn’t come out the best. LED lights for an eye and awkward limbs, he went back to the drawing board multiple times to simplify the design. His brain wanted them to look cool and flashy, but he started making them simple and building up from there.

His new talent for tinkering still had a lot to be desired. Most of his new toys were more like puppets he still had to control and move around and were barely able to do that. They were stiff and lifeless but Virgil was determined to work on them for as long as it takes to bring his vision to life. 

Whenever Virgil had any spare time at school, he took out some paper and tried figuring out what to do next. The next thing he’d have to learn and what he wanted to do. He tried ignoring the bullies the best he could no matter what, speed walking through the halls and making himself look as small as possible to avoid any trouble. But sometimes…

“Hey!” Virgil had been too busy looking down at his feet as he marched through the halls to his next class to realize someone was talking to him. “Wait a second!”

Oh crap... One on the face again? And you can see it more than the others too. How many does he have now? 15… 16 maybe? At least most of them can be covered with a shirt, but the ones on the face? Those could become a real problem.

But he had to use it. If Ms. Mayer knew he was the one who took the money out of the register? She would have fired him and he needs the money too much for that to happen.

Clyde stood in front of his whole body mirror. He was wearing an old Disney shirt of his, which he would never admit to anyone he still had, but he just couldn't let it go. Used socks and T-shirts were spread around his relatively dimly lit room, still lying in the same position he had thrown them there from the days before. The sound of a terrarium, with his favorite little snek buddy Terrence in it, filled the thick air, breaking the silence.

The 17-year-old looked at his face in the mirror with a disgruntled frown. He had to figure out a way to hide them somehow. Not that they didn't look cool but other people would start to ask questions that he can't even answer himself.

A sudden knock on his door threw him out of his thoughts. Without waiting for an answer, his little brother stormed into his mess of a room.

“Dinner's ready!’’

He turned out of reflex towards the sound but remembered quickly why that would be a terrible idea. He ducked his head down quickly so that his bangs would cover a little of his face and got down on his knees, pretending as if he was cleaning his socks off of the floor. But it was no use. The curious kid had already had a glimpse of what he was trying to hide.

“What's that on your face?”

“For f**ks sake, Virgil, if you don't want your head ripped off you better stop storming into my room like that.”

It threw him off a little that it was already time for dinner. His parents were apparently home early today, great.

While he was throwing socks under his bed, the 10-year-old approached him.

“What? Do you care about me seeing your dirty socks all of a sudden? That’s a first. But seriously I think you have, like, dirt on your cheek or something.”

Bending down, Virgil tried to get a glimpse of his brother’s face but he kept turning more and more to the side so he couldn't see.

Suddenly a sock went soaring and made a landing right on Virgil’s face. He stumbled back a little and ripped the stinking object off while his brother stood up from the ground.

“Ewww, gross! You’re disgusting!”

“And you're a pussy.”

They taller boy tried to go around the right side of the smaller boy while having his head turned so that Virgil couldn't see the three scales on his left cheek, but was stopped by a hand gripping his arm and attempting to pull him back.

“Look at me!”

“Let go or I'll make you.”

“Not until you show me! I wanna see!”

Getting irritated with him he barked out an “Okay!” before he turned his head. The side of his face he was trying to keep hidden was in full view of his little annoyance who still clung to his right arm.

Virgil's eyes widened in shock.

“Woooah. Are those scales?! That looks so cool! Are they real?”

Clyde's face showed maybe a second of surprise on his face but masked it quickly with a confident grin.

“Are they real? Of course not. This is my Halloween costume. Well, an idea for it.”

Virgil's furrowed his eyebrows.

“You're lying.”

“Wha- Me? Never!”

He got down to his younger brothers eye-level.

“Virgil, I would never ever lie to you, little brother.”

Virgil rolled his eyes.

“That's a gigantic lie. You told me yesterday that you didn't eat my pudding, even though you were still holding it!” Clyde couldn't help but chuckle a little at that memory. “So just tell me the truth. I know when you're lying.”

Clyde's face darkened a little, his smile fluttering. He was thinking about using his powers on his brother but considering that using his powers caused this dilemma in the first place... he chose to tell the truth.

“I- ok, you have to swear to not to tell our parents or I will rip you into pieces.” Virgil straightened his back and stared wistfully into his brother's eyes. “I have these scales because of my superpowers.”

The smaller boy's shoulders went down, disbelief and disappointment in his eyes.

“You still pretend like I'm an idiot. You, brother, you're an ass.”

With these words he left out of the door, leaving a smirking Clyde behind.

Sometimes the truth is the best lie to hide behind.

The young man got up and his eyes fell again to his mirror. Through it, he could see the terrarium with his snake resting inside. He turned and walked around his bed. He looked into the glass box, to see a curled up Terrence on a stick with his beautiful light yellow scales.

He had a soft smile on his face before he shuddered and his eyes showed maybe something akin to… worry.

Maybe he shouldn't use his powers as much anymore. What if he-

Clyde was anxiously sitting in his trashy car in front of the bank. He wasn't too sure of the thing he was about to do. But he needed the money and he couldn’t crash at Remy’s place forever.

Checking his face in the rearview mirror again, he gladly noted that the makeup still hid his scales that seemed to like to appear more often on his face than anywhere else now. He also let his hair grow out quite a bit to hide them a little behind bangs that fell over the left side of his face. By now he nearly looked like an emo. Working with that style, he wore a gray scarf that hid the scales that had appeared on his neck as well.

Looking down on himself he wondered if his yellow shirt and black leather jacket were casual enough.

Yeah, probably. He was thinking too hard about this. Or not hard enough.

Breathing in through his nose and letting the air slowly out through slightly parted lips, he got out of his car. He could see his breath in the air in front of him. It has gotten pretty cold since he left his parents with the most valued things he had, including his pet snake, a few weeks ago.

With a faked confident walk as he squared his shoulders, he got closer to the glass door and stepped into the building.

He was extremely lucky, there were only three other people inside. Two women who worked there as the tellers and one man who was talking to the woman on the left, so Clyde went to the other teller on the right.

“Hello, sir. What can I help you with, today?” the brunette in the white blouse asked with a sweet smile.

Clyde put on as much charm as he could muster as he smiled back. “Hello there, I hope you're having a lovely day. I'm here to make a withdrawal.”

He was good at pretending to be a more likable person than he actually was. He always wanted to be an actor, but never went to any auditions for school plays because of his social status as one of the “cool kids” that smoked and drank alcohol behind the school. The entire thing was an act in his school days, but he was good at adapting to change.

“Very well, your name sir?”

“Oh, no.” He chuckled “I was under the impression that you just wanted to give it to me,” his smile widened a little.

The woman gave him an amused sound, taking it as a joke. Out of the corner of his eye, Clyde could see the other man leaving the bank. It was just him and the two tellers alone, now.

“Good one, sir, but this would be easier with a name,” The woman spoke with a chuckle. The other teller woman went into a back door and slipped away for the moment. Perfect.

“Well if you want to call me something, I think you could just go with Deceit,” He spoke with a calmness he wouldn’t have thought he could muster at this moment. He felt his hands shaking and start to sweat as he held down his nervousness.

The woman’s smile faltered a little. “Excuse me?”

Clyde looked back over her shoulder to make sure the other girl was really gone. Then, he looked back into the sweet face in front of him which got more confused by the second.

The perfect opportunity.

He looked in her deep blue eyes.

“You wanted to give me $50,000, right? That’s why I’m here.”

His left eye shimmered and glowed with a light yellow and he noticed the familiar sensation of an itch on his left forearm.

He still looked at the woman who stared back with a face he couldn’t quite put into place. It was nearly blank but still a little puzzled at his words.

That happened every time but he always felt the nervousness at that moment again and again. A million thoughts rushed into his head, like what if it didn’t work (again) or what if he phrased it wrong? Happens to the best, and this scenario was new to him.

This was the first time he did something really bad. Usually, he used his powers to get out of trouble for smaller things or to get free booze, but stealing $50,000 directly out of a bank, in bright daylight? That was insanity!

He had felt a weird sensation in his gut since he began ‘planning’ this. Honestly, this whole ‘rob a bank’ thing was an idea he and Remy had the night before while they were balls drunk in the basement of Rem’s parents. His parents that had no clue Clyde was even hiding there.

Rem was two years younger than him but was a pretty chill dude he had hung out with in school. He was the only one he could count on that wouldn’t snitch him out to anyone about his powers and where he was, because, well, he had powers too. Powers Remy’s parents weren’t very fond of, so they generally stayed away from the cellar.

The woman blinked as she awoke from a daze. The moment surely wasn’t longer than a second, but to Clyde, it felt like years.

The brunette locked eyes with him again and put her smile from the beginning back on.

“Of course, I remember now. It will only be a second, Mr. Deceit.”

--------

“Fuck! I did it!”

Clyde opened the basement door so fast he nearly broke it out of the old, rusty hinges. A very startled Remy, who looked like he had just been woken up, fought his way out of the blanket that had been lying on him.

He had been sleeping on his disgusting makeshift bed, which was made of just two stacked mattresses on top of the cold concrete ground. The basement looked like it should have been finished years ago but no one ever bothered to finish the job. At night, they took one of the mattresses off and slid it onto the floor next to the other so that Clyde didn’t have to sleep out on the bean bag. They had tried that the first night, but it resulted in a stiff back and a very grumpy Clyde in the morning.

Clyde-- er, Deceit moved a few steps forward, to click on the floor lamp that only had an old light bulb screwed on top and no lamp shade. The lightbulb was a normal, fluorescent bulb which somehow exclusively produced greenish light. Clyde had asked about that the second day he had stayed here but Remy too didn’t exactly know why either, not that he cared.

With the light, the messy room had become a little more visible. It was even dirtier than Clyde's old room had been, especially since he had moved in. They both didn’t really care enough to clean all the filthy clothes of the ground except when they ran out of fresh clothes, in which case Remy had to go upstairs with a decent sized pile that was unsuspicious to his parents since they didn’t have to know about Clyde’s existence in Remy’s room.

If they found out about the other kid with powers in their basement? That would mean massive trouble for both of them.

Remy’s guardians were already not on best terms with their son since he had intruded their dreams by accident on more than one occasion. They didn’t hate him but Remy had sometimes messed up their sleep so much that they were first confused what was happening, then they screamed at him to stop and at last, they started to get him out of the way.

He was ok with that. He was just in his basement room, enjoying his life without the worry that his parents would storm in.

But if they knew that he invited someone else to live at their house without their knowledge, they would be very mad. They would probably scream at him again and would call Clyde’s parents, even though he was actually old enough to live on his own, as a 19-year-old. Clyde just didn’t have the money to live on his own. He had been fired a few months ago from his job at the pet shop.

He had to leave his home weeks ago in order to hide his powers from his family as the scales became more and more obvious, so he came to the only one he knew that would at least understand.

It wasn’t much fun sleeping next to someone who had the ability to go into your dreams whenever both of them slept at the same time. Rem didn’t do it on purpose of course, the closer you sleep next to him the more likely it is that he just stumbles into your dream by accident. That's why he had to sleep in the basement, while his parents slept on the third floor. They simply wanted him as far away at night as possible.

What the two did all day now was lying around in the dirty cellar on the green bean bag and the mattresses and talked about everything and nothing. Somedays they played games on the old arcade machine Remy had or they had matches on his kicker, all while smoking pot or drinking beer Clyde brought back every time he went out.

But not this time. This time he brought something better. Money. And lots of it.

Remy tried focusing on the guy with the weird scales in front of him as he blinked the sleep from his eyes, “Wha-?”

Deceit ripped away the blanket and threw a full plastic bag him. It hit him in the chest, where you could read ‘Never SLEEP again’ on a gray shirt, and caused him to lay down again with the bag sitting on top of him.

“I said I did it! I actually did it, I stole the money!” Deceit stood proudly next to the ‘bed’, hands on his hips, with the broadest smile Remy had ever seen on the guy. It kinda creeped him out, to be honest.

Then the bank robber turned around into the direction of the old foosball table and lifted his arm triumphantly into the air and tilted his head back so he looked at the ceiling.

“Oh my god! I feel great! This was way better than drugs!” he screamed in euphoria.

Remy leaned up on his elbow and let the bag fall next to him on the bed.

“Flippin’ shut up, man! You're gonna wake the whole street shoutin’ like that.”

Deceit turned his head back to his friend, puzzled.

“It's 5 in the afternoon?”

“Oh really? I'm up early,” the sleepy head grinned.

Deceit made a face at him that could only have meant ‘you fu**king serious?’

Rem's eyes fell on the plastic bag next to him. With one hand he lifted a handle and looked inside. His eyes widened, only now had he realized what Deceit had actually done. He shot up straight on the mattress and put the bag on the ground so he could take a bundle of hundred dollar notes out. He ran a finger across the stop slowly as the reality of the situation began to sink in.

“Jesus Christ, you actually did it?!” he looked up shocked at the criminal who now faced him again. With the head movement, the green shade sunglasses that had apparently been lying on his purple dyed and messy hair the whole time he slept, fell onto his nose.

“Hell yeah, I did! And it was so easy too! Like stealing a lolly from a baby.”

The seventeen-year-old sitting on the mattresses gathered himself enough to get a little of his sass back.

“Cliché.” He looked back down to the pile of money. “Jeez, how much even is this?”

“50,000 bugs,” Dee’s eyes sparkled saying that.

“Holy shit. Holy shit, I can't believe it! I thought we were just joking around yesterday! We were drunk for fucks sake!”

Remy would have never thought that Clyde would actually do something this incredibly stupid. They just talked like idiots about how they could have anything they wanted if they used their powers more, not that he ever actually considered doing so.

“Come on, just imagine what we can do with that much money!” Deceit stepped closer to him, gesturing with his hands.

“With the stolen money.”

“No one knows that!”

“Babe, don't you think 50k will be missed? Where did you even get that from? The bank like we said?” he took his shades with his forefinger and thumb on the rim of the glasses and slid them down a bit so he could look into Deceit's eyes.

“Yeah and no, no one knows I took the money. I made sure the woman was the only one there and I just made her give it to me.”

“50k in cash. Someone will miss that! They’re going to notice that much missing! Did you think of the cameras?” Rem’s eyebrows furrowed as he put his shades back on properly.

“I do not like to repeat myself. She just handed it to me! It looks completely innocent on camera. And as far as she knows, that money belongs to me.”

Deceit got frustrated with his friend. Just the night before he also loved the idea and now he was lecturing him?!

“You can't keep the money here, babe. I'm not ok with that much stolen cash under my roof!”

“It will be gone soon anyway.” He tried again to reason. This was a good thing, why couldn’t he see it?

“You need to leave,” The voice sounded monotone.

Deceit’s shoulders fell. “What?”

“Clyde, sweetie, don’t get me wrong. I'm totally up for all kinds of stupid shit but that's a bit too far man and I really don't want to get in trouble because of you.”

“So, you're throwing me out?”

“You have enough money to rent a hotel room,” he said gesturing to the bag at his feet.

Deceit looked with disbelief into the green-tinted sunglasses that hid Remy’s emotions pretty well.

How could he just throw him out? He thought the other would be happy about the money. He would have even shared it with him for letting him stay here, but now…

He growled “Fine. I'll leave. I don't need you anymore anyway. I can do whatever I want without you. Just don't come crawling back to me when I'm ruling the city.”

“Sure thing rip-off Disney villain.”

“You've seen the last of me.”

With that Deceit took his luggage, bound the bag of money to it and lifted a small terrarium with Terrence in it under his arm and left the basement.

Remy let out a shaky breath into the stifling air of his room.

For a second there, he had been afraid that Clyde- no, Deceit would use his powers on him.