#myheist

Dana, he had learned, kept a stash of alcohol in her room. Just one bottle of rum for “emergencies.” Kai and Vivian would have been furious if they knew, more for Kit’s sake than for his. But Robin had to admit, it was well hidden. Kit never would have found it.

But Kit wasn’t psychic. Robin was.

And he was also trying very, very hard not to get high. Which was far easier said than done.

Today had been a rough day. His powers had acted up. He'd seen some things he didn't want to see.

And that was exactly how he'd ended up in Dana's room, stealing her rum and telling himself to buy her a new bottle later.

(Of course, if he were wise, he wouldn't do that, because the odds of him drinking that were pretty high, too. But he wasn't wise and he knew it. Having the bottle in the warehouse was like having a shitty safety net. It was exactly the sort of thing addicts weren't supposed to do, but Robin had never been good at avoiding those behaviors.)

He'd had... too much of the bottle before Dana found him, sitting on the floor of his room, back to the wall, shot glass abandoned on the desk. He'd tried rationing it out at the start, but that hadn't lasted long.

He heard the door open and his eyes slid open, glancing at her. She looked angry, but he wasn't surprised.

“I owe you new rum,” he mumbled by way of apology, the words slurring together.

“Don't bother. I'll just go to a damn bar next time I need a drink.”

He nodded, shutting his eyes again as the world moved a bit too much with the motion.

“Sorry.”

“Are you really?”

Her footsteps moved closer and his grip on the bottle instinctively tightened, not that it mattered. He was easily the weakest person in the house and Dana had the strength of a dragon behind her.

“That I'm drunk? No. That I stole from you to get drunk? Yeah, a little.”

But the nearest bar had been too far and besides, Robin didn't like drinking in public. The point of getting drunk or high for him was just some peace. Bars weren't peaceful.

“Guess I should've known better than to keep this here,” she muttered. He didn't argue with that, because she should have. She lived with two addicts now. She'd have to get used to what that entailed.

At least Kit was clean. It tended to take a lot to push someone back into a relapse once they'd been clean for this long. If he'd only been sober a little while, Robin never would have agreed to move in here, knowing it would be too easy to push him over the edge. He wouldn't have jeopardized Kit like that. But it was... fine enough, he supposed.

“Do you wanna talk about it?” she asked settling down beside him against the wall.

He opened his eyes and looked over at her. “About what?”

She gestured to the bottle, now just out of easy access. “Why you went through like half of that while we were gone today?”

A shrug. It was rare that Robin felt like talking about anything to do with his powers. His... poor habits were a consequence of them, a shit coping mechanism that would never work as well as he wanted it to. “Not really.”

“Look, I'm not exactly... good? At the whole comfort thing. But I know that you're only gonna do this again if you don't tell people what's going on with you.”

Right again. And hardly the first person who’d ever said something along those lines to him, not that he’d ever bothered to listen before. Then again, he hadn’t been this drunk around someone offering that advice before.

He was quiet for a long moment, but she stayed beside him until he finally spoke.

“The only person I’ve ever met who knew jackshit about my powers…” His eyes moved to the ceiling, intentionally avoiding eye contact with her all while trying not to remember the encounter too vividly. “Used them to literally torture me.” Another pause. Dana didn’t interrupt. He wondered if she knew he had more to say or if she just didn’t know how to respond. “My powers aren’t… The things I see aren’t always set in stone, you know? A lot of times it’s more like… if one thing happens, then the second thing will happen. But if you can stop the first thing, then the second changes.” Which was generally a good thing. It meant he could maybe fix the really awful thing.

His fingers balled into fists at his side, the gloves the only things stopping his nails from drawing blood from his palms. “And he knew that. He fucking knew that. And he used it to show me…” He shook his head, wanting another long drink out of the bottle to chase away the too vivid memories. “I foresaw my roommates dying. Over. And over And over. And it was always different but it was always bloody and awful.”

It had been the wrong strategy for the hunter to use. The more death he saw, the more resolute he’d become to not give them up. But it had been miserable.

“I’m not drunk enough,” he muttered.

“You’re plenty drunk. So what happened today?”

“Hmmm?”

She leveled him with a look. “Don’t bullshit me, Robin. Something made you think of that today, so what the hell happened?”

He reached for the bottle, but she pushed him away from it with ease. Honestly, it was a little ridiculous how strong she was. He let out a heavy sigh. “I saw Vivian die.” He could see the horror in her face, before he elaborated, “Foresaw. Foresaw it. She was out on a hunt and her gun jammed. It’s fine; I sort of stole the gun from her which should be enough to change things.” The future wasn’t hard to intervene with. One little tweak was enough to make major differences. “She’ll be fine.”

Dana looked at him for a long moment, understanding slowly coming into her expression. “You saw her hunting.”

A nod. There was nothing to say to that.

“You know she’d never--”

“Of course I know that. I’ve met her. I’m not an idiot. At least not a complete one anyway. I know she wouldn’t hurt anyone here and I like Vivian, but I can’t trust her, okay? I’ve tried. I’ve tried really hard, but she scares the shit out of me.” Not all of the time. In fact, he was usually fine around her-- or as fine as he could be-- but there were days when she’d startled him and his heart was still racing like an hour later.

“You could talk to her?”

“And say what? ‘I know you’re not going to murder me, but I’m still kind of terrified you’re going to murder me’? It’s not like she can do anything about it.” It wasn’t her fault, not really. In fact, she was one of the nicest people living in the warehouse and he knew that. He just couldn’t get all of his brain to accept that.

“So what? You’re just supposed to suffer in silence? That’s not great either, kid. This is supposed to be your home, too.”

He shrugged. “She was here first.”

“Doesn’t make it less your home.”

“It doesn’t matter. I can’t just… It’s not going to be easier for me and then she’s just going to feel bad and we’ll both be miserable. It’s my shit to sort out.”

She scowled at him. “But you’re not sorting it out. You’re getting drunk.”

“What else am I supposed to do?” he snapped, throwing his hands up in frustration.

“See a therapist?”

“Right, right. Because I can totally mention the psychic thing without sounding like I’m out of my fucking mind.”

“Dude, that clinic near here has doctors who can handle the supernatural. I’m sure there’s a therapist or two specializing in us.”

He suppressed the urge to roll his eyes at her argument. “Even if we could find one, how am I supposed to pay for that?”

A derisive snort escaped her. “Like we pay for everything.”

“Therapy’s a lot more expensive than our weekly groceries.”

“Kai could make it work. Would you try it? If we found one?”

He considered that for a moment, gaze flickering down to his hands for a long time before he looked at her and offered a nod. “Honestly? Yeah. I’d be willing to try. I’d try anything that might help.”

She gave him a pointed look. “The drinking and the drug habit kind of indicated that.”

“...right.”

“You know we care, right? Like, I get that feelings and shit aren’t exactly anyone’s area of expertise here, but we do care.”

“I think Kai and Viv would prefer it if I didn’t live here,” he responded. He couldn’t blame them for that.

“They’re just worried about Kit. But they care about you, too. We all do, whether you believe that or not.” She rolled the bottle between her hands. She wasn’t very good at sitting still. It was no wonder she got along with Vivian, really.

“Are you going to tell them about today?” he wondered.

She was quiet, messing with the bottle a while before answering. “Not this time, but if you do it again, yeah.”

“You should probably get rid of that, then.” He couldn’t and wouldn’t promise not to do it again if she made it even remotely an option for him.

“Yeah, I know. It’s fine. I don’t really need it.” She still didn’t seem thrilled to have to get rid of it, but he supposed he didn’t blame her. It was good rum. “...wanna see something cool?”

His brows furrowed at her. She opened the bottle and took a long swig before slowly exhaling a breath of flames. He’d seen her do that before, without any alcohol, but it was still pretty cool. Living with so many different supernatural beings would probably never stop being interesting.

She grinned when she was done. “Rum burns blue.”

She was right. The flames had been blue, though he hadn’t considered that the reason why.

“Do you keep that on hand for party tricks?”

She snorted again. “Of course not. This is good rum. Normally I use the cheap shit for that. This one was in one of the cars I stole not long ago. I guess it got left in the trunk by the owner. I was saving it for a rainy day.”

“Well… it was kinda used for one.”

Her eyes rolled. “For me, dipshit.” She took another long swig and exhaled more fire. He paid closer attention to the blues of the flames. It really was beautiful, even if it slightly pained him to watch the alcohol burn. She finished off almost the whole bottle that way, only bothering to actually drink about one shot. But at least she got to enjoy some of it.

When she was done, he shut his eyes again, leaning his head against her shoulder. He felt her tense beside him.

“Aren’t you worried about--”

“Can’t see shit when I’m this drunk.” The words were accompanied by a somewhat amused laugh that sounded dangerously like a giggle. But it was true. This was the whole reason he had a drug problem. The less sober he was, the less his powers worked. It seemed like a decent trade off to him. He was happier any time his powers were down than he was any time they weren’t.

She shook her head. “And you wanted more alcohol.”

“Mmmm… another quarter of the bottle would’ve been nice.”

She looped her arm under his shoulders and stood. “Come on. Let’s get you in bed. And you might wanna shower before anyone else sees you tomorrow. You’re lucky no one else has the heightened senses thing.”

“Aaaaah. Is that how you found me?”

She nodded, helping him stumble over to the bed. She propped him onto his side and set his trash bin next to the bed. “I meant it, you know. I’ll find you a god damn therapist, even if it means doing cross-country skype sessions on one of Kai’s fancy encrypted laptops. You’ve got enough shit on your plate, so let’s try to clear what we can.”

He’s willing to be she regrets that now. He’s willing to bet she regrets every second of it. He’s just looking for a bookie dumb enough to go for it.

Because Christian Miller is good at politics. Because he is smart and he does have a nice smile and pretty eyes and he is a Miller. So he goes to the parties and meets the people and smiles and plays along. He goes to college and takes the classes he’s told to take and waits, planning this out, biding his time. He makes friends of his mother’s friends and their children. He makes allies wherever he sees the chance. And then he runs for office.

He runs for his mother’s office, in the party opposite her.

And he’s so graceful and polite about it. He tells the press that he still loves her very much and he’s proud of how far she’s come and of course he still respects her-- not a word of this is true-- but that he thinks she’s misguided in her views and that it’s time for a change. He smiles and she seethes on the inside, but she’s a Miller too and she doesn’t show it.

They still have family dinners every week. Because it’s good for both of them, to show that they still love each other, politics aside. None of that’s true either. But politics aside, they never loved each other in the first place. Jamie is the only one who talks during dinner. He asks questions, pretends that things are fine, until he can’t pretend anymore and stops coming. Christian powers through without him, though it’s harder, but he’s determined.

People love him. He smiles and shakes hands and makes more friends. People trust him. He hates them all, but Jamie’s the only one who ever sees it, who sees anything resembling Kit and not Christian. And Kit’s miserable, but there doesn’t seem to be much for Jamie to do about it, other than be there at the end of the day, so Kit can be a little more himself and a little less… whoever the advisors need him to be.

He wins the election. It’s not a landslide, but it’s a bigger margin than anyone expects. But everyone seems to think there’s something so genuine about this son who’s standing up to his mother without trying to destroy her reputation. Kit laughs about it to himself; Angelique screams.

He has destroyed her reputation, because her career is her everything. She’s always placed it above everything else. It’s more important than her married and certainly more than her children. Or it was. Now it’s gone. He’s stolen it and there’s something far too satisfying about that.

His family thinks he’ll stop. He’s won, he’ll serve his term, and then step down. Even Jamie thinks he’ll step down. But he doesn’t, because even though he’s never had any interest in politics, he’s found something he’s extremely good at. He is, after all, his mother’s son and though they’ll never admit it, they have plenty in common. He’s calculating and manipulative, too, just for a different side.

People hate him. Not just his mother and father and sometimes, though he’ll never admit, even Jamie. He’s a politician. People don’t trust that. Those are Kit’s favorite kind of people, the ones who can see through the bullshit and loathe it all. But they’re not the kind of people Kit can associate with. He has a career to think about and reputation to uphold. People like that are trouble.

People like that include a hacker and an ex-hunter, a dragon and a seer, who never meet because there’s no warehouse for them to live in, no Kit to bring them all together. Some of them don’t know who Christian is, don’t have the time to care about politics. Some of them don’t like him. The seer thinks he’s an asshole. He’s not wrong. But it doesn’t matter what they do or don’t think about him, because he’ll never meet any of them.

He’s too busy being Christian Alexander Miller, politician and prodigal son.

Part of him wishes he had, now. But he’s not sure Jamie would have been better off, not sure he’d be safer now. He’s tried to check in on his baby brother once or twice, but he’s never managed to actually do it. It’s too hard and he thinks he’s too weak.

But he’s gotten the hang of letting other people see him. He’s reunited with his former roommates and introduced them to Ace. She’s dragged him along to meet her friends and to meet the only family she has left. So it’s time for him to do the same, to introduce her to the only biological family that matters. (He won’t admit it, hasn’t said anything to Ace or to them, but the thieves are his real family now.)

There are a few perks to being dead, it turns out. One of them is the lack of a heart-beat and he appreciates that he can’t feel his thundering away in his chest. He knows his stomach would be in knots if he still felt that sort of thing. But despite the lack of physical symptoms, he still feels nervous about this whole thing.

He won’t say it, but he wishes he could hold her hand.

Ace has to be the one to knock. Kit would do it, but he doesn’t wanna burn any excess energy, considering the amount of effort it takes to reveal himself to… well, anyone other than her. Jamie is in college now; Kai and Ace helped Kit track him down. Kit guesses their parents are still paying for things, based on how nice the apartment building is, but he can’t say he blames him.

It’s weird when Jamie opens the door. He offers a confused, but polite smile to Ace, who gives him her trademark grin in response. She starts to offer a greeting when Jamie’s eyes find Kit and, well, he looks like he’s seen a ghost. And seeing as he has, Kit can’t blame him for that either. He feels like he’s seeing one too, if he’s being honest.

It’s been years since he’s seen his baby brother and Jamie’s not really much of a baby anymore. Taller, maybe taller than Kit. His cheeks have lost the baby fat and Kit’s never seen him with facial hair. It’s just some five o’clock shadow, but it’s still the sign that his brother’s growing up. He’s sure their expressions are mirrored. He’s sure Ace will tell him about it later.

“Kit?” Jamie’s voice cracks as the word escapes, despite it being barely above a whisper.

He forces a smile. “Hey, Jamie.” He’s not sure what else to say, looks at Ace, remembers why he came here. “And, uh, this is Ace. My girlfriend. I wanted you to meet her, you know?”

Jamie spares another glance at Ace, tries to offer a smile, before his gaze is back on his brother. “Where have you been? What the fuck?”

“Long story. Can we come in?”

He purses his lips and Kit can’t blame him for being mad. He hasn’t mentioned being dead, so now it just looks like he bailed and left the younger man to deal with their parents by himself. And, well, he did, at first, but now? Not so much.

Jamie offers a nod, opens the door a bit wider, steps out of the way. Ace follows Kit inside. He doesn’t need to use the doorway, but one step at a time.

They sit in the living room. Well, Ace sits. And Jamie sits. If you look closely, Kit hovers, but only if you know what you’re looking for.

“I am dead,” he starts, because Kit is blunt and this is how he handles things. Ace elbows him, probably both to illustrate the point and to remind him to be a little more gentle with his baby brother. He launches into the whole story, glossing over the handful of years where he was actually alive but their parents lied about it. He’ll tell Jamie about that one day, but that day’s not today. Today is mostly to check up on Jamie and to introduce him to Ace, because she’s important and he deserves to know about her.

“So you were the only one who could see him at first?” he says, studying Ace.

She nods. “We think it has to do with the numbers, maybe? But we’re not really sure.”

Kit can see that Jamie has questions about that, but he doesn’t really want to get into how Ace’s powers work.

His gaze falls back on Kit and honestly, he’s never been so nervous around his little brother in his life. “So what took you so long to swing by?”

He shrugs, reaching for Ace’s hand and just letting his own float above hers. It’s comforting in its own weird way. The best they can do, he supposes. “Just waiting for the right time? I had to figure out a way for you to see me, first. And then I had to figure out if I really wanted to haunt my little brother.”

“I’m taller than you.” Kit’s brows furrow in confusion at the response and Jamie elaborates, “I’m not exactly little anymore.”

Ace laughs and the sound has Kit relaxing a little, drawing a smirk to his lips. “Yeah, well, you’re always gonna be small stuff to me. Jesus, you had a growth spurt though, didn’t you?”

He nods, looking back at Ace again. “Yeah. Seems like we both missed a lot, huh?”

“You have no idea,” Ace answers and this time it’s Kit who’s laughing.

“Sounds like you guys have had some adventures.”

“She’s trouble,” Kit says, grinning over at Ace.

“Oh, so it’s my fault?” she teases.

He puts on his most innocent face. “What trouble can a dead guy possibly get into?”

Jamie snorts. “Even I don’t believe you’re staying out of trouble without her.”

Kit shrugs, unable to deny that and changes the subject to something simpler, brings up school, tries to learn about his brother’s life. Jamie’s studying law, apparently, and wants to become an environmental lawyer. He hasn’t told their parents and won’t, until he graduates. They’ll probably stop paying for school if he does. Kit doesn’t blame him for keeping that one a secret. Kit wouldn’t blame him for keeping any of it secret.

Jamie asks about Ace, about how they met, about how the whole ghost/living person thing works. She explains the pun of her name, that it doesn’t matter that he’s dead-- even if it would be nice if they could at least hold hands. She gives him the abridged version of their meeting story, which is almost as weird as the full version, really. He’s not sure Jamie understands all of it, but he still nods along and listens to what she has to say. They play a board game, because it was something they did when they were kids. Kit tells him Ace will win. She does. She says she didn’t cheat. Kit’s not sure she can actually ignore the numbers completely, even when she tries. But he can’t read her mind-- thank god that shit didn’t follow him to the grave-- so he’ll never really know. It gets late; they decide to head home. Kit promises to visit more often. Jamie says he’d like that.

He comes back a few days later, while Ace is busy doing something with Cham. He doesn’t knock and walking through the wall scares the shit out of poor, unprepared Jamie. He apologizes for the broken cup and he’d clean it up if he could, but Jamie’s left to pick up the mess.

“Knock, dude. Knock or you’ll give me a heart-attack.”

“Sorry. I’ll work on it.” He watches for a few minutes as Jamie mops up the liquid before beginning to sweep up the glass. “Did you like her?” he finally asks, the question soft.

Jamie pauses, looking over at his brother. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you care about anyone that much.”

He shrugs. “Ace is… special.”

“So I noticed,” he answers, resuming the sweeping. “She seems… wild. But so are you.”

“Think she’d make a good sister-in-law?” he wonders.

“You’re dead; you can’t get married,” he answers, frowning slightly and looking over at Kit once again. The broom continues sweeping without Jamie bothering to touch it. It seems he’s gotten the hang of the telekinesis better than Kit got the chance to.

“Logistics. I’ll worry about it later. I do think I’d like to call her my wife one day.”

He smiles, a soft laugh escaping. “Mom and Dad would hate her.”

“Mom and Dad hated me.”

“I’d like to get to know her better, but yeah. I think I could get used to calling her family.”