#tidamh

It wasn’t just about the scar, either. The clear and damning evidence of torture, a calculated and possessive torture to boot, was only the most obvious sign. The fact that it had taken them this long to notice it was embarrassing, but to be fair to Remus, he’d been preoccupied noticing a whole lot of the other signs. 

The littler, less obtrusive ones, like the way he retired to his room at the same time every night, even though the Prince of Paranoia had eased up on his guard dog duties to the point that none of them would have blinked twice at Patton taking a midnight walk or grabbing a glass of water. The way he had quietly and discreetly taken over all the household chores that Janus loathed the most, and seemed almost uncomfortable at the idea of sitting down and relaxing with them on the rare days that they weren’t out in the city. The way he lived in an undecorated guest room in borrowed clothing and with not a single pair of civilian shoes to his name, like a prisoner, without a qualm.  

Remus knew what it looked like when someone tried to make themself smaller in the hopes of avoiding bad attention. It had never worked for him– he was the type to drag the attention in regardless, revel in the looks and shouts even if they were full of hatred– but he’d seen it enough that it was easy to recognize the picture Patton painted with all these quiet habits.

What was harder to puzzle out was why. 

Lightshow had been a solid, towering bastion of a villain, reciting his monologues and launching his attacks without hesitation. What array of memories could have been taken away to uncover Patton, like the soft, chewy core to a particularly sanctimonious-flavored Tootsie Pop?

… Or maybe, the real question was: what exactly had been done to Patton to force him into the role of Lightshow? And most importantly, who had done it, and how quickly could Remus get his hands on them? 

“The previous incidents have been subtle. Without Lightshow’s presence as an indicator, I haven’t been able to narrow down when or where our opponent has been striking, not amidst all the other criminal activity that occurs daily,” Janus admitted as his expression darkened into something thunderous. “It wasn’t my highest priority, before. It most certainly will be now.”

Remus grinned in satisfaction, the edges of his mouth splitting further than humanly possible. Having the full force of Janus’s attention lock onto one goal was a surefire way to get a proper lead on this guy, and he was looking forward to hunting the fucker down. 

Normally, he’d be too antsy to sit around while Janus did all his fancy info-gathering and investigating, but luckily he had the perfect task to occupy himself for the duration: retail therapy!

“I’ll leave all the boring stuff to you, Janabanana,” he announced with a sloppy salute. “And in the meantime, the rest of us will go shopping!” 

Sure enough, that was enough to drag Janus’s attention away from the meticulous plotting he was about to sink into and get forever lost in, bog-style. His head snapped up to glare narrowly at Remus. “Not with my wallet, you won’t.” 

“Don’t be so cold-blooded, snakeboy,” Remus shot back brightly, “it’s for a good cause. Glowbug needs a real wardrobe, as much as I’m sure you like seeing him in our pajamas.”

“You—!” Janus smacked Remus’s arm, ignoring the meaty thwack of it detaching and tumbling onto the floor between them. Truly, Remus’s genius comedic gags were wasted in this household. 

“I’ll sue you for libel,” Janus finally managed, which meant he was flustered enough to resort to legalese, and thus Remus automatically won the banter. “Put those eyebrows away before I tell Virgil who ate the last of his special edition Halloween poptarts and he shaves them off in your sleep again.” 

Remus obediently stopped wiggling his eyebrows. 

After a brief pause to sigh extensively and pretend to massage away a headache he absolutely didn’t have, Janus conceded. “Clothes only. Do not bring back any more exotic animals or repossessed organ coolers, I cannot emphasize enough how troublesome the paperwork gets.” 

“I don’t choose to find the kidneys, the kidneys find me,” Remus intoned solemnly, before snatching one of Janus’s wallets off his desk and hightailing it out of his bedroom. “No promises!” 

Janus flicked his fingers, telekinetically hurling Remus’s abandoned arm out the door after him. “Bring home a box of my usual tea or I’ll change the locks while you’re out!”

“Don’t threaten me with a good time!” Remus called back over his shoulder, and then proceeded to skid directly into Virgil’s door at the end of the hall. The thud of impact was loud enough to rattle windows, because he was a professional. 

When this move garnered no immediate results, he dragged his phone out of his pocket and spammed the group chat with the same extremely low quality gif from Mean Girls, about 37 times. 

After a truly apathetic amount of time had passed, their resident emo pulled the door open, looking as ghoulish as ever. He glanced down at Remus, who was crumpled in a heap upon his doorstep, and then stepped over him to walk down the hall. “No.”

“Gasp!” Remus pointed his detached arm at Virgil in not-so-silent accusation. “Party foul! Nobody can deny the power of Regina George’s summons to shop!” 

Virgil didn’t even turn to look. “You won’t catch me in pink on Wednesday, either.” 

Patton, bless his little heart, had already poked his head out of his own doorway shortly after the original wall-shaking thump of impact, and now visibly brightened at the approach. “Oh, are you guys going shopping?” 

There it was. As always, he assumed that any outdoor ventures were off-limits, because they’d never clarified that he wasn’t actually a prisoner in so many words. They hadn’t really thought that they’d needed to, that investigating the circumstances of his past and providing him a home in the present was enough to show him that he was someone they wanted to protect, not trap.

Even if his teammates, suspicious creatures that they were, were still watching out for some larger plot, it didn’t change the fact that Patton had wormed his way into their hearts like an alien parasite nestling into an astronaut’s chest cavity. 

Besides, even if they had rescued a less charming and pun-oriented individual, they wouldn’t have sentenced them to indeterminate confinement in one of their safehouses. Patton was effectively a civilian at the moment, their shared history of superpowered murder matches set aside, and didn’t pose a threat to anything but the potted plant he kept overwatering. For civilians, there were official channels one could reach out to for aiding those suffering from superpower aftereffects, multiple organizations that would provide resources and housing to a victim of mind manipulation. This much should have been part of the general knowledge that Glowbug still had, but instead, he walked around like one wrong step would get him locked into a medieval torture device and slowly disemboweled. 

Despite his cheerful demeanor, it was obvious that Patton always expected the worst, and even more concerningly, he seemed to accept it as his due without complaint or protest. Remus couldn’t even be irritated about the misunderstanding, because it had become abundantly clear that someone had used torture to rewire Glowbug’s brain into a minefield, and brains did what they had to survive when it came to that kind of thing. 

Patton didn’t have to make himself small to survive anymore. Not here. The three of them just had to make sure he understood that, too.

Thus decided, Remus made meaningful eye contact with Virgil, attempting to convey his very subtle and lowkey plan: namely, to convince Patton of their affection and his permanence in their household by drowning him in material possessions. 

Blissfully unaware of his own role in Remus’s machinations, Patton tilted his head slightly, blinking curiously. Really, who could resist that face?

As expected, Virgil folded like a soggy piece of bread in the face of their combined psychological pressure. “Alright, fine. But I’m driving.” 

—

Virgil drove exceedingly carefully for someone with that strong of a death grip on the steering wheel, which meant that Remus had plenty of time and attention to dedicate to reassuring Patton that everything was fine.

Which was good, because Patton took a lot of reassuring. He’d practically had to be coaxed out of the apartment in the first place, and the whole drive there was filled with increasingly antsy questions.

By the time they reached the mall’s parking lot, Remus was half-convinced that he should have brought Janus along after all, if only so that Patton would finally be sure that they weren’t sneaking out under his nose. 

“Are you sure—,” Glowbug started, and Remus began to wonder if picking him up and shaking him would help the words sink in faster.

“Relax,” Virgil finally cut in, grimacing as though even just the word tasted hypocritical in his mouth. “We’re going shopping for clothes so you don’t have to wear dusty hand-me-downs all the time.”

“You really don’t have to go to all this trouble,” Patton tried weakly. “I don’t have any money—,”

“Money, schmoney!” Remus flapped a hand casually. “We do this all the time, Deedee’s got us covered.”

“It’s part of the contract between us and the city. We have a monthly stipend for victim care,” Virgil elaborated, adjusting his hood around his shoulders as Remus gallantly opened the passenger-side door for Patton to climb out. “It would just go to waste if we didn’t use it for stuff like this.” 

Patton stared at the mostly-vacant parking lot as though the ground was covered in poisonous vipers. “What if it’s not safe?” 

Virgil turned to scan the parking lot as though the mall was going to come to life and eat them, because he was twitchy about questions like that. Remus knew exactly what sort of ‘unsafe’ circumstances Glowbug was worried about, and leaned down to meet his gaze. 

“We’ll be right beside you,” he promised, grinning wholeheartedly. “There’s probably not a more secure place in the whole city than wedged between the two of us, no matter what kind of power someone’s packing.” 

Remus had run the gamut of having unstable powers himself, he was more than familiar with the terror of not being able to trust in oneself. So, this was his promise: if Patton somehow snapped right back to the supervillain they used to battle so often, the two of them would make sure he couldn’t hurt any civilians. 

Patton swallowed thickly, and Remus didn’t miss the way his hand twitched up to graze a spot just under his collarbones, as though seeking reassurance. 

(He’d noticed the locket the previous night, though he wasn’t sure Patton had noticed him notice it. It certainly hadn’t come up before in any of the conversations they’d had about Patton’s missing memories, but Remus had picked up on several little motions like this, ones that seemed habitual and well-worn. Like he was brushing a hand over a treasured gift. 

Remus hadn’t asked, not yet. But he had a feeling that once Patton was ready to go seeking out more answers about his past, that locket would be the first place to look.) 

“Okay,” Patton managed after a few more moments. “Do I still get to keep the hand-me-downs? I’m pretty loon-y about those duck pajamas.” 

“You bet my bottom you can!” Remus answered, extending an elbow for Patton to hold onto as they made their way to the main entrance. 

“I don’t think a loon is a kind of duck,” Virgil contributed, because he was a hater. 

“You’re probably right,” Patton said. “I guess when it comes to identifying birds… I ran outta duck.” 

Remus cheered obnoxiously, and then course-corrected when Virgil started veering a little too close to the Hot Topic. “Let’s put a quack in our finances!” 

“Or we could not do that,” Patton laughed nervously, but the longer they went without earning a second glance from the other patrons around them, the more he began to relax. 

Remus was killing this whole ‘re-socializing your supervillain’ thing. He should write a book.

He let Virgil take over once they actually reached a department store, because his idea of fashionable and/or comfortable was often deeply contradictory to the general public’s, and they were trying to find clothes that Patton could wear outside without getting gawked at. So, not really Remus’s area of expertise.

After an extensive period of offering Patton different fabric types and then different types of tops and bottoms (of the clothing kind), and scrutinizing his reactions with the sort of focused intensity one might perform open heart surgery with, Virgil successfully narrowed their options down to a pretty solid selection of outfits. There was also a surplus of graphic tees, because Patton kept smiling at the jokes on them and then they mysteriously ended up stuffed in the shopping cart the moment he looked away. 

Through a brief series of glances and hand motions usually used in the field, the two of them mutually decided that Virgil would go buy the clothes on his lonesome, thus ensuring Patton wouldn’t have to witness whatever ridiculous number Macy’s was charging for pants in this day and age. 

While Virgil departed for the checkout, Remus steered Patton towards the furniture section with plenty of promises that it was only to take a little look-see, they weren’t going to buy anything else today, really! 

(He wasn’t lying, of course. Furnishing Patton’s room would just have to be a tomorrow project. Hooray for technical truths!) 

The trip had been going swimmingly, to the point that Glowbug was finally chattering on with his usual level of confidence, so Remus probably should have expected that it wouldn’t last. 

As it was, he only had a heartbeat to notice the sudden reddish tinge to all the lights before the skylight above exploded into a billion razor-sharp glass shards. 

Remus shoved Patton under the sturdiest-looking desk in reach with a yelp, and paid for his moment of inattention by getting nearly bowled over by the charge of a mechanical knight, all of its deceivingly delicate-looking plating painted a bright, firetruck red. 

His brother always had had the worst sense of timing. 

Remus twisted his body in half just in time to avoid being decapitated by a swing of the contruct’s gleaming broadsword, and retaliated by kicking it in the groin, hard enough to knock it into the perfume display across the aisle. Someone screamed shrilly nearby. 

If you don’t piss off right now I’m telling mom about our eighth birthday party, Remus thought very intently in the general direction of the automatons descending dramatically through the ceiling. Absolutely nothing about the scene changed, which meant that twin telepathy really was a scam, and Remus wanted a refund. 

“Stay put, Glowbug, Umbra will be here in a snap,” he promised, certain that Virgil had heard the cacophony and was on his way. “I need to go re-enact that one scene from the Old Testament, you know, the one with the rock. It’ll only take me a minute!” 

Flashing Patton a thumbs up, he spun around and punched the head right off of another automaton, stomping on the chest of it until it caved in, utterly ruining the intricate latticework. It began to self-repair immediately, one of the bitchier enchantments Roman had managed to work into his craft, but Remus was quick enough to yank the glowing crystal out of its torso and return the construct to inert metal. He tucked the energy source into a pocket so Roman couldn’t salvage it from the remains later, just to add a little insult to injury. 

(Roman had tried making them self-destruct when removed at one point, but that charming quirk had quickly been redacted after a battle where Remus had destroyed twenty-three constructs in one go by lobbing a freshly-removed energy crystal directly at the biggest group and starting a chain reaction. These days, his brother knew better than to offer grenade-adjacent opportunities on a platter.)

He heard Patton trying to say something to him, concern evident in his tone, but the words were drowned out by another nearby scream, and a quick once-over of the store showed that the place was being swarmed by medieval warriors and mythical beasts, all of them made from that shining red metal. 

“Just hang on!” There wasn’t any time for conversation, not with this many civilians in imminent danger and no Janus at hand to help with evac. “I’ll be back in two shakes of a duck’s tail, Glowbug, I swear!” 

Patton nodded from under the desk, face still crinkled with worry, and Remus checked one last time that there weren’t any other constructs nearby before he sprinted off, snatching the black cylindrical handle from his belt and flicking its switch as he went. The energy weapon buzzed into its usual form, a morning star made of neon green light, and he immediately swung it full force at the chimera lunging at him. 

Remus bared his teeth in a grin, relishing the earsplitting crunch of mangled machinery, and pressed on towards the next opponent. 

Instead, he waited until Remus had settled back against the couch and used his superior position perched on the backrest to nudge him with his ankle. “Still need the pressure?”

Remus leaned against his leg like the clingy bastard he was. “Nah. Everything’s sticking together again.”

Virgil was glad to hear it. He never minded playing weighted blanket or providing pressure therapy, but Remus’s ‘power malfunctions’ tended to leave him mentally drained if they went on for too long. He’d described it as suddenly feeling like he was made of badly-matched puzzle pieces, like each and every part of him was just barely connected and if he didn’t stay focused on keeping together, he’d fall apart.

Before Emile, he actually would, too. It was the downside to having an ability that was only limited by Remus’s own creativity: his power responded to compulsive thoughts nearly as well as his strategic ones.

The physical drawbacks of Remus’s power had mostly faded with time and experience, but coping with the mental drawbacks was still a work in progress. They’d found that pressure helped, and that someone else being with him, reassuring him that he was still a whole person who existed, helped as well.

Remus rolled his shoulders testingly, as though double checking, and then grimaced. “Might need the scar cream though. If His Highness can bear to be pried from his elevated throne.”

“Oh, shut it,” Virgil grumbled, shaking his leg loose from his grip and ignoring Lightshow’s gaze as he tilted back into the patch of shadow behind the couch and popped up in front of the cabinet next to the kitchen sink.

The small white container was next to the first aid kit as expected– Janus had made a habit of stashing them all over their living spaces– and he grabbed it and returned to the couch via shadow with only slightly less grace than he’d departed with.

Remus laughed at him as he scrambled to grab the back of the couch and haul himself back up, because he was an ungrateful bastard.

In retribution, Virgil toppled into his lap shoulder-first, but Remus dodged the mild castration attempt with ease. “Shirt off,” he grunted irritably.

There was a nearby squeak, and Virgil turned to see Lightshow was sitting there, looking a little flushed in the face. He squinted at him. “You good?”

“Should– Should I leave?” he asked, totally nonsensically. Virgil squinted at him harder, trying to figure out what the hell he was talking about.

“No, don’t leave!” Remus whined, still wrangling his shirt over his head. “What’s the point in medical treatment if I don’t get to show off my scars to hot men in the process?”

“The point is not being in pain,” Virgil deadpanned, unscrewing the lid of the antioxidant cream.

“Medical treatment?” Lightshow echoed, still sounding a little faint. Maybe the guy needed to go back to bed.

“For my kickass scars,” Remus explained, flexing in a way that showed off the oddly-spaced rings of scar tissue along his arms. “Took me a while to understand how my powers worked.”

Virgil snorted. “That’s Remus-talk for ‘I didn’t realize that I could imagine myself not being horrifically injured with each use of my ability for months of crime fighting,’” he translated, pulling one of Remus’s arms in front of him so he could start massaging the cream in. Remus flipped him the bird.

Lightshow was staring at the scars with a worried little furrow in his brow. His gaze flickered down to the hand Virgil was holding, probably searching for a scar from the little display Remus had just put on. “Your power… hurts you?”

“It’s more like I was using it wrong,” Remus corrected. “Like if you were trying to perform a brain surgery with a butcher knife: messy! Duckie and Umbra helped me experiment with it, and now it doesn't even leave a mark.” He wiggled his scar-free thumb at him to prove it. Some parts of his hands were scarred, but most of those had been from minor fights and so healed a little better.

Virgil moved on to the next arm, watching as Remus reassured their former nemesis that he was just fine. For someone who loved to showboat, he was being remarkably restrained about actually using his power. He was like this in front of the more skittish kids, too, because despite his menacing aesthetic, he didn't actually want to give any grade schoolers nightmares.

“In fact, I don’t scar at all now unless I’m totally out of power,” Remus complained, and Virgil tightened his grip slightly in warning. That was too close to a weakness for him to be comfortable with Lightshow hearing it. “I mean, my collection is pretty impressive already, but there’s always room for improvement, you know?”

“If they still hurt, I think these ones are more than enough,” Lightshow replied, reaching forward and skimming his fingers gently over one of the rings. “They do look very, um, kickass, though.”

Remus’s grin stretched from cheek to cheek, genuinely ecstatic about the compliment, Patton swearing, or some combination of the two. “Fuck yeah they do! I’ve got the sickest scars in the whole city.”

Virgil stopped dead mid-wrist massage. “The hell you say.”

Remus’s smile turned maniacal. “You heard me.”

Virgil wiped his hands off on Remus’s discarded pajama shirt before unzipping his hoodie and pulling off his own shirt.

Lightshow made a noise oddly reminiscent of someone strangling a chicken, but Virgil didn’t have time to worry about supervillains. He had something to prove.

“Read ‘em and weep,” he intoned with perhaps a smidge more drama than necessary.

Whereas most of Remus’s scars were of a similar kind, lines of thick rigid tissue that wrapped around limbs like a tiger’s stripes, Virgil had a whole scattered assortment of marks.

They were spread across his entire frame, from the twisted burn scar that curled around one arm from a guy who could turn into a dragon, to the two bracket scars under his pecs from surgery, to the grid-like scarring along one hip from that one time with the razor netting trap.

“What was that about sick scars, huh?” He mockingly cupped a hand around his ear, adding the dual meaning of gesturing to the nick in it from a zweihander’s near-miss. “That mine are the coolest forever and you know it?”

“Maybe I just wanted to depose Duckie from his role in our household as sayer of untruths,” Remus replied, grinning enthusiastically the way he always did when he managed to goad Virgil into doing something stupid.

… Like undressing in front of a supervillain.

Virgil froze. He could feel his face heating up, and it was 2 AM so he didn’t even have any concealer on to hide it. Remus’s grin widened in an extremely bastardly manner.

Lightshow was quiet, but when Virgil worked up the courage to turn and glance at him, he didn’t see calculation, awkwardness, or even amusement at his expense.

Instead, Patton’s face had tangibly drained of color, and his gaze was locked on– shit.

On the perfect circle of red scar tissue that sat just above his waistband on the right side of his torso, the little white lichtenburg scars that radiated out from the edges of it like tiny lightning bolts.

There had been plenty of times where Lightshow’s powers, in such sharp contrast with his, had caused close calls or near-misses. This was from one of the few times he’d been hit dead-on. He still remembered being knocked out of the fight immediately by the blistering pain of it, only regaining consciousness for brief periods as he was rushed to the hospital and the resulting surgery.

It was one hell of a way to lose an appendix.

“What’s… What’s that one from?” Lightshow asked, and the two vigilante crime fighters in the room exchanged a loaded glance.

Virgil didn’t understand the reaction. He wanted to be suspicious, accuse the guy of knowing more than he let on. And yet, if Lightshow remembered inflicting the injury, he wouldn’t look so horror-struck by it.

He opened his mouth, intending to say something along the lines of, ‘A supervillain nearly murdered me. Sound familiar?’

Upon meeting Lightshow’s gaze, however, the words shifted somewhere between his brain and his mouth, and came out as, “It looks cool, but it’s kind of a boring one,” instead.

Remus tilted his head so Lightshow couldn’t read his expression, and raised an eyebrow at Virgil in silent question.

“Yeah, I actually just… mishandled a… gizmo. A, um, gadget or whatever. One of those doomsday devices villains are always toting around. Dropped it. And it exploded, just… very precisely. That happens all the time with doomsday devices,” he finished lamely.

That settled it. He was going to dig a very deep hole and stay there forever.

“Well, someone certainly isn’t stealing Dee’s title as lord of the lies anytime soon,” Remus muttered under his breath, and Virgil flipped him off behind his back.

Despite his floundering, Lightshow didn’t show a hint of doubt. Instead, a wave of relief seemed to sweep over his expression, too intense and invested in the answer for Virgil’s liking.

Before he could slip in any mildly interrogative questions, however, his gaze caught on something.

Lightshow had lifted his hands up to press against his face, seemingly overcome by emotion, and one of his pajama sleeves had slid down just enough to reveal the edges of a spot of mottled purple-green.

“Hey, what’s that on your arm?” he asked, despite knowing exactly what it was. He was a vigilante, he was more than familiar with bruises in all their shapes and forms.

From what he could see, this one looked bad.

Lightshow had tensed up, quickly tugging at his sleeve. Despite this recalcitrance, his answer was honest. “Just some bruising. I don’t really remember where from…,” he trailed off as Virgil extended a hand in a silent demand.

His wrist was reluctantly extended, and Virgil pushed the sleeve up to reveal an array of deep-set bruises, clearly beginning to heal but just as clearly completely untreated.

“Glowbug, have you had these the whole time?” Remus asked, his gaze locked onto the injuries.

Virgil wondered if his teammate was remembering all the random household tasks that Lightshow had been taking upon himself while they’d been out. Calculating how bad the bruises must have been at the start, to still be this present now.

“I think they’re probably not as bad as they look,” Patton tried, shrugging a shoulder uncomfortably. “They’ll heal up in no time, and they won't keep me from anything, don’t you worry.”

“Patton,” Remus said, all levity gone from his expression. “Are there more?”

The resulting moment of clear hesitation said enough. Virgil immediately headed for the first aid kit, foregoing his shadows to walk over to the kitchen manually as Remus coaxed Patton into removing his shirt and letting him look at the injuries he’d apparently had all along, on top of what they’d treated that first day.

It felt as though his thoughts were racing a mile a minute as he grabbed the entire kit from under the sink, thinking about blood clotting disorders and the possibility that a hematoma had formed, but the moment he turned back into the living room, he stopped dead.

Patton was facing Remus, shirt off to reveal skin covered in both freckles and more of those bruises, even scabbed over scrapes. Those weren’t what had frozen him in place, though.

What Remus couldn’t see from his angle was the clear, distinct handprint that was set over Patton’s spine, an almost cartoonishly clear-cut burn scar that was layered at the edges, as though the injury had been repeated, searing barely healed flesh over and over again until it warped and deadened the skin so severely that there was no chance of recovery.

It was the sort of scar that could only have been developed from long-term torture.

Whatever expression he was making seemed to alarm Remus, which sent Patton turning around to face him.

“Umbra?” he asked, confused and nervous, but not moving in a way that suggested he was trying to hide the scar. He honestly didn’t even seem aware of the scar, though from the way Remus’s eyes had gone wide and then dark with anger behind him, he was now the only one to not know.

Lightshow had seemed sick and faint at the sight of Virgil’s burn scar, for reasons that were now very clear in hindsight. Virgil couldn’t imagine what memories they might dredge up by telling him about the one settled on his own back.

“Just surprised,” he managed, only sounding a little like he was choking on the words. “You were pretty banged up by the time we caught up with you, huh?”

He set the kit on the table, made meaningful eye contact with Remus (not now, not yet), and started rifling through it. “Sit down, dude. It’s gonna take a bit to get all these treated.”

“Oh, you really don’t have to go to the trouble–,” Patton started, and then cut himself off for a moment before trying again. “They’re already almost gone, it’s not worth the resources–”

“Treating injuries isn’t about worth,” Virgil told him. “We try to avoid unnecessary pain around here, including pain from ‘small stuff’ like bruises.”

He shot Remus a warning glance, half-expecting him to interject with some saucy, ill-timed comment about BDSM or whatever, but none came. All his teammate did was scoot over to one side and pat the cushion between them invitingly.

It did the trick; Patton hadn’t yet passed up on an opportunity to cuddle, and he didn’t seem to be starting now.

The physical torture the supervillain had been through certainly put the behavior in a new light, a surprising desire for contact where Virgil would have expected touch aversion, but he didn’t let himself linger on the thought as he carefully dabbed bruise cream along Patton’s side.

His mental image of Lightshow didn’t line up with the reality of Patton, and it was keeping him from noticing things. Big things, like the scar. That couldn’t fly anymore. It was about time he started rolling with the metaphorical punches, rather than bracing so hard for the literal ones.

By the time they finished doing everything they could and checking for signs of any complications, Patton had lost every bit of tenseness, somehow trusting them to ghost fingers over painful spots without ever digging in. Remus volunteered to carry him to bed, sweeping him up in a princess carry with ease, and Virgil followed them down the hall.

Patton had thanked them and said goodnight, visibly confused but also radiating a shy sort of happiness, and after his door had closed, the two of them had stood there in silence for a moment.

“Janus needs to move finding Glowbug’s former boss up on his list of priorities,” Remus finally said. “I think that anyone who’s that fond of burns really deserves to get acquainted with me and a flamethrower.”

He wasn’t the best cook, but he was good at what he knew, and he had the time and the energy to make meals where the others dragged themselves back from patrol looking near-ready to collapse. It was the least he could do for them, even if Dee insisted on buying the groceries.

When their schedules got really rough, Umbra in particular had been sustaining himself on pre-packaged snacks, coffee, and stress. Patton seemed to be slowly but surely working his way into the hero’s good graces through warm meals alone.

Remus was an inventor in the kitchen, and so excited to try bizarre combinations that it was contagious. Whenever a dish went sideways or Patton had an odd idea for a garnish or sauce, he found himself setting the trial portion in question aside for Remus to try.

Whenever Dee got the chance, he would appear in the kitchen to help him, chatting as they worked through preparing each dish, probably making sure Patton wasn't poisoning anything. He had mentioned several times that Patton ‘really didn’t have to do all this’, but Patton had noticed the way his shoulders had eased and his face lightened when everyone ate together.

He enjoyed the cooking process, too, introducing him to new recipes or better ways to prepare certain foods. Patton suspected that Dee would have been filling this role already if it weren’t for the fact that– no matter how many hands he had on hand– he simply didn’t have enough hours in the day.

After all, it was The Conductor who seemed to do most of the managing when it came to their chaotic crime-fighting trio, and even when they weren’t patrolling the streets or battling megalomaniacs, he could be found nose-deep in extensive legal documents or making phone calls to mysterious contacts and/or friends in high places. According to Remus, it was thanks to him that the three of them could use their abilities without being impeded by local law enforcement in the first place.

It was amazing, watching the way they put their all into being heroes, into helping people. Even someone like him. It was only natural that he’d want to return that kindness as much as he possibly could.

And so it went.

Every day, Patton did his best to make himself useful and make the three of them happy.

Every night, he tossed and turned under the force of horrible, gut-wrenching memories, fragments of a life he didn’t want to remember.

Every morning, the pit of guilt grew larger in his gut and he thought about telling Dee.

And yet, the words remained locked in his throat, all stoppered up by the idea that he’d tell them just as soon as he had to leave. The promise that he’d confess once he finally overstayed his welcome.

But he was still here. And the memories were getting worse.

They’d started out like that first dream. He still felt like himself, if a version of him that had been through an unending streak of bad days. The memories would start during little moments of solitude, walking the streets or curled up at home, finally feeling like he was half-settled in his skin. No matter how hard he tried, he could never remember his surroundings or read any of the street signs.

Then, the dream would shift to a punishment, like he was being reprimanded for those little moments of selfhood even in his subconscious mind. They varied in method and intensity, but none of them were as simple or painless as that first memory’s blow.

He learned that he could tell how old the memory was by his reaction to the worst punishment. In the old memories, the ones that were even hazier than normal and patchy at the edges, his memory-self would struggle and writhe and beg. It would take several other people to pin him down and force him into a kneel, their harsh hands leaving heavy imprints.

In the more recent memories, he didn’t fight. He folded to his knees and simply waited there, still and silent and unrestrained, for the blistering pain to white out his vision. His mind was mostly blank, but the reasoning still lay there under the surface: They went quicker that way. Only a single hand laid on him that way. Boss was happier that way. It was better.

Patton woke from those memories sobbing every time, trying to remind himself that it wasn’t real, that it wasn’t him, that he hadn’t given up hope. But he had, hadn’t he? If someone pressed along those fault lines, wouldn’t he do it again? Didn’t the memories prove that?

He hadn’t known it was possible to feel so betrayed by one’s past self.

Patton was jarred from his thoughts by a timer going off, and found himself stationed at a cutting board, halfway through dicing some chives. Hadn’t he been in the middle of something else before…?

Turning, he could see the ground beef sitting on the stovetop on low heat, already seasoned and ready to be scooped into taco shells. The smell of cumin and garlic powder was thick in the air, seemingly impossible to miss. He had no memory of even pulling the containers from the spice rack.

He’d lost time again. It was so easy to get caught up in his own head these days. Alarmingly so, when he didn’t know just what lay in the corners of his mind. There might be a supervillain in there somewhere. He was lucky that the episodes had been subtle so far, enough that he could just be dismissed as airheaded.

Something was wrong with him. Really wrong. He needed to tell the others.

The front door opened, and a chorus of three mismatched voices called out a greeting, toppling into the kitchen like sleep-deprived college students.

Umbra ducked past him with a grumbled ‘behind you’ and hauled both the first aid kit out from under the sink and four plates from the cabinet, Remus hopped up to sit on the bar with bloody lips and a cheshire grin that was missing a tooth, and Dee stripped off his outer armor to don his favorite apron (emblazoned with ‘No Bitchin’ in My Kitchen’, courtesy of Remus) before bustling over to the stovetop.

“Welcome home,” Patton told them, watching as they bickered and set the table and slowly but surely let the strain of a long night slide off their shoulders.

It was late. They were tired. He would tell them later.

—

“Umbra, now!”

His lips twitched down into a muted scowl as a bubble of darkness descended on him, blocking out his view of the street around him. Surrounding him entirely in darkness, with only his own glowing form visible in the void.

Only a heartbeat later, there were multiple hands grabbing hold to his arms, legs, all of them attempting to pin him in place. For a moment, his mind grew confused, a memory of punishment– of darkness and gripping hands– overlapping with the present for just long enough to make him pause.

“Surrender,” The Conductor demanded, his voice strained with the power of maintaining his constructs. “Whatever it is you’re dealing with, we can get you help.”

Anger bubbled hot and bright in him. These false heroes were a plague, and they insisted on trying to infect him. Unforgivable.

The bubble of shadow constricted closer, heavier around him, but it didn’t matter. They couldn’t hide away in the darkness. He was the bringer of light.

His glow grew into a piercing shine, brighter and hotter until it was burning away the hands and evaporating the darkness. Cleansing the scourge from this city, as always.

The so-called heroes disengaged, more than familiar with his blast radius, but he wasn’t willing to let them go so easily. He would engage them here, keep them occupied and contain their impurities while Boss made changes in the city unhindered, working on a bigger scale than these meaningless skirmishes.

He didn’t like the heavy darkness. A small, distant part of him cowered away from it.

With an outstretched hand, he pulled back his light before it could finish its usual crackling halo and redirected the energy towards a new target, one darting between the shadows cast by his brightness. Between one shadow and the next– there.

“Umbra!”

The others’ warning only gave the hero enough time to turn his head. His eyes went wide and frantic, the terror on his face lit from below as the bolt of concentrated light struck true.

—

Patton woke to a scream strangled in his throat and hot tears in his eyes.

A dream. Just a dream. … A memory?

No, that dream– it couldn’t have been a memory. It couldn’t have been. It hadn’t been like the others, where he felt like a real person, like himself, and only realized it was a dream when he woke up. This one was different.

He had watched from the eyes of– of Lightshow, fine, he could admit that much. But the shift of his gaze, the wave of his hand, the step of his feet? Patton hadn’t been able to control any of it. He’d been forced into the position of a silent spectator, trapped in place, forced to watch as his body moved and fought and burned.

It wasn’t a memory. Those weren’t his thoughts. It was just a nightmare, a normal run-of-the-mill nightmare, constructed by his mind as some twisted response to stress. He was feeling guilty over not telling them, and his brain had taken it too far, that was all.

It had to be just a nightmare.

Patton tried to calm his breathing, to lay back down, but Umbra’s expression at that last moment flickered into view every time he closed his eyes.

Eventually, he gave up, just like he had that first night, and climbed out of bed. On the nightstand, the clock’s digital numbers glared up at him; three AM. Maybe he could figure out something really fiddly and time-consuming to make for breakfast. Maybe Umbra would help!

To his surprise, when he rapped quietly on his door (to avoid ‘scaring the life out of’ Umbra the way he had that first night) and poked his head out, there was no hooded figure sitting next to his door, back against the wall.

Had the other two finally convinced him to stop keeping watch on Patton? Or…

A sudden jolt of foreboding ran down his spine, and he pulled the door open wider, looking up and down the hall. Nobody was there. Had something happened to him?

Patton hesitated; they’d never explicitly told him to stay in his room while they were sleeping, but it only made sense that they’d want a potential threat contained. If he started wandering around now, would they be upset with him?

A flicker of that memory flashed in his mind’s eye again, and it was enough for him to force his shoulders firm and cross the threshold. A potential punishment wasn’t important. Not when Umbra could be in danger.

He hurried down the hall, only registering the sound of lowered voices a beat after he’d burst into the common area.

Remus was laying on the couch, flat on his stomach with his face buried in his arms, and above him on the back of the couch–

“Umbra,” Patton said, unable to contain the relief that swept through him. It didn’t even matter if he was in trouble for breaking the rules. Umbra was here, he was alright, he was safe.

The hero in question blinked at him in surprise for a moment before frowning, more confused than upset. “Lightshow? What are you doing up?”

Remus popped his head up, craning it back at a painful-looking angle to grin at him. “Glowbug!”

Patton smiled back and drifted a few steps closer automatically before stopping short, remembering that he had yet to explain himself. He opened his mouth.

“You weren’t there.” … That wasn’t what he’d meant to say at all. That wasn’t an explanation, that was an accusation!

Before he could start panicking, Umbra raised his eyebrows questioningly, and then seemed to put it together. “Oh. Yeah, I left to help Remus. Figured you probably weren’t going to get up and murder us all on only two hours of sleep.”

“Unless…?” Remus drew the word out suggestively, and Umbra jabbed his heel into his back in retaliation. Neither of them seemed upset at him, not even a little.

Patton dared to step a little closer, shaking his head and showing them his empty hands as proof that he had no murder plans. Remus pouted, letting his head flop forward once more.

“Help with what?” he asked, watching the way Umbra was applying pressure to Remus’s back curiously.

Umbra stiffened a little, narrowing his eyes at him the same way he always did when he thought Patton overstepped in his questions (which was frequently), but Remus didn't hesitate to answer in his place.

“Power malfunction,” he said, his nasally voice muffled through the couch cushion he was talking against. “Couldn’t sleep, so Paramoan here is keeping me company.”

“I couldn’t sleep either,” Patton replied wryly. A power malfunction? “Are you… hurt?”

Both of them went oddly still, and Remus rolled over onto his side to shoot Patton an incredulous look.

“Wait, do you not know my power?” he asked. Patton flushed, embarrassed. “Holy shit, you don’t know my power!”

“Here we go,” Umbra said with an eyeroll, drawing his legs up and tucking them under him like a cat as Remus squirmed up into a sitting position. He was going to give a demonstration of his power. Patton felt dread begin to fill his lungs, making his breaths shallower.

“Behold,” Remus announced grandly, waving his arms and wiggling his fingers dramatically for a moment before slamming his hands together. He had his two hands fisted side-by-side, with a thumb poking out between his pointer and middle finger of his left hand.

… Wait a minute.

“Tada!” Remus crowed, pulling his fists apart to reveal that he’d ‘separated’ his thumb from his right hand. It was a classic grade school magic trick. Above him, Umbra was facepalming.

Patton muffled a chuckle, smiling good-naturedly. “Remus, I may not remember much, but I wasn’t born yesterday. I know that one.”

“Aw, damn. Well, here, for your troubles,” Remus said, and dropped the thumb into Patton’s hand.

The thumb. The single, unattached, warm thumb.

Patton looked up, eyes wide, and Remus waved at him gleefully. His right hand was conspicuously missing a digit.

The thumb in his hand wiggled.

A short, strangled shriek of terror escaped him. “Your thumb!”

“No, Patton. It’s your thumb now,” Remus told him solemnly, apparently completely unconcerned.

Patton skittered over to Remus with his hands cupped around the missing appendage, mind racing. Could a finger be reattached? Would it heal if they put the pieces back together!?

The others had jerked back at his approach, but Remus obligingly held still as Patton grabbed his injured hand and inspected the wound that would surely be gushing blood by now.

The wound that… wasn’t gushing blood at all, actually. Instead, there was a dark green patch where flesh and blood should have been, as though Remus’s insides were made of clay. When he looked down at the thumb in his other hand, the severed end of it looked the same.

“Superpowers,” Patton recalled out loud, and slumped over onto the couch as his utter panic faded. “I forgot about superpowers.”

Remus immediately started cackling at his expense, and even Umbra had his face turned away to hide amusement of his own. Abruptly, Patton realized that he was so exasperated that he’d forgotten to be scared. He hid a smile, waiting for Remus’s amusement to die down before holding his hand out.

“I’m sorry Remus, but I can’t accept this gift,” he said, offering the thumb back. “It’s too opposable.”

That had definitely been a snort from Umbra’s direction. Patton resisted the urge to fistpump.

“Ah, well,” Remus replied with a delighted grin, taking the thumb back and reattaching it to his hand with ease. “You win thumb, you lose thumb.”

Patton cracked up. “I can’t believe you!”

“Just be grateful he didn’t do ‘pull my finger’ instead,” Umbra told him, shaking his head, the beginnings of a smile on his face. “He pulled that one on me and I threw the finger at him.”

“So cruel!” Remus agreed enthusiastically. “I mean, on one hand, I was wounded. But on the other hand, I was fine.”

There was a beat of silence, and then Umbra grabbed the nearest throw pillow and attempted to smother Remus with it. The homicide attempt was accompanied by snorting laughter, though, so Patton thought it was probably fine.

Knifes didn’t really seem Lightshow’s style though, with or without memories. Maybe he’d get burnt to a crisp instead, Patton turning white-hot under his arm until the smell of cooking meat permeated the house. It’d be a way slower death, probably slow enough that Janus and Virgil could come back and witness his final moments.

“He was upset with me,” Patton said, shaking Remus from the crushing grip of his thoughts. The guy’s words were half-muffled from the way his cheek was squished against Remus’s shoulder.

“Umbra is pissed at me,” Remus corrected, and Patton gave him a tight smile, like he thought Remus of all people was trying to soften the blow and spare his feelings. He continued before Remus could protest.

“I thought maybe you guys had just mistaken me for someone else, but… I don’t really remember much of anything.” He shifted, pulling back only slightly so he could meet Remus’s eyes. “Do we… know each other? Am I…,” he trailed off, but Remus could hear what was left unsaid. Am I evil?

Janus probably had some sort of elaborate plan all drawn up, like he always did, but after years of companionship, he’d gotten plenty used to working around Remus’s tendency to splurt out secrets like blood from a severed artery. The moment he’d left Remus alone with Patton, he’d accepted that the truth might come out.

Remus could tell him right now, spill every excruciating detail about their past encounters with Lightshow, describe the way Virgil would twitch away from sudden light for weeks, the piercing migraines Janus could get from having his mental constructs obliterated, the time he himself had been burned badly enough that he could see bone beneath the charred flesh.

Lightshow had droned the same meaningless lectures so many times that Remus could probably recite one of them verbatim. He could mimic some dull rant about the corruption of the so-called heroes in this city, and the way they needed to be purified, for the greater good of everyone, and see if Patton would remember or would agree or would just realize how disgusting he was and recoil from him.

Remus sighed gustily, pushing himself up from where he was half-leaned against the table, jostling his villain-limpet slightly. “Pretty sure I would remember if I’d talked to someone as funny as you before,” he announced, because lying was Janus’s thing and because he wanted to and because he liked Patton better than Lightshow anyhow.

Patton smiled, a tremulous but real one this time, and rubbed tiredly at his non-swollen eye.

“We should get you in a guest room before you start looking like Umbra before his fourth cup of coffee,” Remus mused, and then added on, “unless you want to join me in my bed, of course!”

He offered Patton his most ridiculous eyebrow waggles, but the last part of his sentence hardly seemed to register. Behind the mask, Patton’s gaze had turned a bit frantic.

“I couldn’t-- I’ve been such a burden already, I couldn’t possibly stay here,” he denied, shaking his head. “You’ve all been so nice, I don’t know how I’m going to repay you as it is--,”

“If you wanna go home, that’s fine too,” Remus offered, since Patton’s voice had slowly dropped in volume to an indiscernible mutter. “Just tell us where and we’ll drop you like you’re hot.”

Patton shot him a relieved look and opened his mouth to presumably do just that, before stopping short. He stared blankly at nothing for a long, silent moment.

“I-- I don’t remember,” he finally said, and then his face was crumpling and his breath was hitching and suddenly Remus had an armful of sobbing supervillain.

He floundered for a moment, and then squished Patton further against his side as though to physically block the bad feelings from him.

“It’s okay, Glowbug,” he tried, “we’ll figure it out. We’re heroes, stuff like this is in the ridiculously-long job description somewhere, right next to being public menaces and getting our teeth knocked in. I bet Duckie already has a whole menagerie of schemes set up to figure out how to help you out!”

“Quack,” Patton contributed, his breathing still unsteady.

“Quack,” Remus agreed solemnly.

“I see we’ve returned to the duck jokes,” Janus lamented, having slithered back inside while Remus was struggling to remember how to console people without freaking them out.

“What can I say… they’re really all they’re quacked up to be,” Patton offered, and Remus watched the corners of Janus’s face soften in real time upon hearing the scratchy post-tears quality to their guest’s voice.

“Dearheart, let’s get you somewhere to settle in for the night. A well-rested mind is a powerful one, after all,” Janus decreed, ignoring Remus mouthing ‘Dearheart?’ at him with a shit-eating grin.

Patton was quiet as they led him to a guest room, looking a little stricken at the sight of Virgil finishing up the oh-so-grueling task of putting new sheets on the bed, but all the emo did was roll his eyes and bustle past them with his head down, which was practically friendly in Virgil-speak. The talk with Janus must have reassured him after all.

Janus started adjusting several different parts of the room at the same time, opening the window to clear out the admittedly rather stale air. Of course, he did this with his powers, meaning that it looked like the room had just developed sentience and was having a fit about the horror of existence. Patton jolted and shrunk back against him at the ruckus, and Remus jostled him reassuringly.

“No worries, Firefly, it’s just Duckie. I got rid of our poltergeist problem months ago.”

Patton still seemed a little uneasy, though he hid it admirably when Janus turned to shoot him an almost apologetic look; the guy wasn’t used to not showing off with his powers.

“I guess they weren’t a very polite polterguest,” he replied, and lit up when Remus cackled. Only figuratively, thankfully for every flammable object in the room, but the expression felt plenty bright anyhow.

Once the room fit Janus’s exacting self-care standards, they left their guest to his privacy, Patton detaching from his side with a visible reluctance that made Remus’s chest feel all weird and fuzzy, like mold was growing in there or something.

Weird, he thought, and ignored Janus’s amused stare.

Remus closed the door behind them, and glanced over to see Virgil leaning against the wall outside the guest room door, planted like a gargoyle statue that was particularly into early 2000’s music. He didn’t bother groaning about it; they all had their little neuroses, and expecting Virgil to sleep while there was a stranger in the house was asking too much.

He tousled his hair, though, just to make it stick up all over the place. Virgil’s shoulders jumped slightly, and then he looked up at Remus’s sharp-toothed smile with a pointedly unimpressed scowl.

And if the gesture had the added benefit of Virgil knowing that they were fine, calming down the frantic little black mice that ran on the hamster wheel in his brain, he certainly wasn’t complaining.

--

The next morning, one of Janus’s hands yanked on his arm hard enough to rouse him from sleep, the urgency of it unmistakable.

Remus rolled out of bed and yanked on boxers before sprinting out of the room: you could only run into an urgent situation naked so many times before your roommates got sick of it and/or a supervillain tried to take a potshot at your--

“He’s gone,” Janus cut into his thoughts neatly, standing stock still at the end of the hall. Remus wasn’t sure which one of them he was referring to, because it was clear that both of the other house’s occupants were missing. The door to the bedroom was wide open, and there was no slouched figure sitting against the wall outside of it.

Remus could tell that Janus was beginning to freak out, his fingers tense and curled in, probably thinking about how if something bad had happened to their resident stormcloud, it would be his fault for convincing him to play along with this situation.

He bounded an extra step forwards, prying Janus’s fingers loose enough to slide his hand into his grip. “Have you checked the rest of the house?”

“No,” Janus said stiffly, managing to make a single word sound like ‘but he would have told us.’

Remus tugged them down the hall, because they’d probably need to use the front door anyways if they were planning to go hunt a supervillain down for kidnapping Virgil, and there was the distinct clatter of dishware from the kitchen.

They shared a look, and Janus picked up his pace, the two of them bursting into the fancy open-concept kitchen/dining area at speeds Remus normally got scolded for going indoors.

Patton turned to them, still in-costume but sans the eye mask, holding a whisk covered in batter and a large plastic mixing bowl. “Good morning!”

Virgil was sitting on the counter, looking vaguely dazed in a way that suggested he’d been hit by a hurricane-level force of personality. His mask was still on, but there was a smudge of batter on his nose that clashed horribly with his concealer.

Janus was giving him an absolutely furious look to cover up the fact that he’d been fretting, and Virgil shrugged helplessly. “Pancakes.”

“Pancakes!” Patton agreed brightly. “I figured the least I could do was make breakfast, since you’ve all been so kind to me.”

Their encounter had started with Remus making fun of him and Janus literally using superpowers to put him in a full body-bind, but nobody seemed keen on reminding him of that. Especially not when he was making them free food.

“Thank you, Patton, that was very considerate of you,” Janus said, abandoning his attempt to strangle Virgil with his gaze alone to instead stare with some confusion at the kitchen. “I wasn’t aware we had the ingredients for this on hand.”

“Neither was I,” muttered Virgil, and then blinked as Patton set a plate of warm pancakes on his lap.

“First dibs go to helpers!” he announced cheerfully.

“But I didn’t do anything. You don’t even know if I like pancakes,” Virgil said contrarily, and then belied his own bitching by yanking his plate closer to his body and hissing viciously at Remus when he attempted to steal one. Patton beamed like he’d won an award.

Janus’s offer of help was denied with a firm smile, and he was bustled over to one of the dining room chairs, sitting and crossing his legs elegantly at Patton’s insistence he 'take a load off'. Remus took the opportunity to sidle closer to the stovetop, whistling out of tune innocently.

Patton looked up at him, utterly unfazed by his near-nudity as he poured another circle of batter onto the pan with a slight wobble. “Any preferences for yours, Remus? I’ve got chocolate chips!”

Remus felt his teammates eyes on him, and his smile grew, sharklike.

Out of the many, many villains they faced, Lightshow was easily on both the more powerful and the more annoying end of the scale. The three of them had dealt with enough slander from the media and law enforcement, they hardly needed to hear more about how they needed to be ‘purified’ from a villain, of all people.

Despite his repetitive monologues, Lightshow did make an interesting foil: his ability to manipulate light energy was considered a typical ‘hero’ powerset, just as Virgil’s control over the shadows was viewed as ‘villainous’, or Janus’s specific brand of telekinesis was considered ‘weak’.

Still, as their little team had proved many times over, powers didn’t decide a super’s alignment; actions did. And going by the many times Patton had wielded harsh ethereal light against them, he was firmly on the side of the villains trying to wipe Dunnsvale and it’s heroes off the map.

Janus had long suspected that Lightshow wasn’t working alone. The villain operated under a single minded drive to defeat them, dedicated but with no greater scheme or motivation that Jannus could parse. The last few times he had shown up, Janus had later learned that several suspiciously random, suspiciously well-timed crimes had occurred while the local heroes had been distracted.

Someone was pulling the strings, and hero or not, The Conductor didn’t take kindly to being yanked around.

So, when the calls rolled in about civilian sightings of Lightshow, he decided to try something different.

Lightshow was one of the few villains that went out of their way to avoid civilian casualties, only attacking the heroes and causing property damage with his rather explosive powers. According to the reports so far, he hadn’t even begun his normal routine of ‘lighting up’, becoming a crackling beacon of burning energy that could be spotted miles away.

Janus would never divide them to fight a villain as powerful as Lightshow, but they could afford to keep the villain waiting long enough to gather some extra information. So, he sent Remus to go keep eyes on the villain from a distance, and accompanied Virgil in portalling across town to all the regular villain hotspots to find out just what they were being distracted from this time.

Fifteen minutes later, they’d found exactly nothing, and Virgil had begun to grow antsy.

Five minutes after that, Remus had stopped checking in.

Janus had looked away for one moment, to check and see if any new reports on Lightshow had come in, and when he’d looked back, it was to the sight of Virgil ducking away into a shadow with the beginnings of a panicked snarl on his face.

And so he’d been cruelly abandoned, forced to haul ass over several blocks’ worth of rooftops to catch up. Not for the first time, he’d cursed the impulsive nature that his two best friends shared.

He wouldn’t have been as worried if they’d faced Lightshow together from the start; the two of them were formidable and flexible enough to handle it, and Lightshow wasn’t a schemer. But that wasn’t how it had played out.

Instead, Remus had abruptly gone off comms, and Virgil had dove headfirst into a likely combat situation with shadow powers that had a history of reacting unpredictably around Lightshow, and Janus was stuck a step behind, which was his least favorite place to be.

There was no sign of the explosive attacks that Lightshow usually led with. Janus tried not to think about what that could mean for his teammates.

All things considered, when he finally stumbled upon them, the last thing he expected was for them to be standing at opposite sides of an empty street, not a single scuff on their surroundings to indicate a fight.

Remus was tense with anticipation, and Virgil was leaking energy the way he did when he was worked up, but neither of them were injured in the slightest. He felt overwhelming relief at the sight, along with a healthy dose of confusion, but before anything else, he needed to make his entrance, distract Lightshow from… whatever this was.

He didn’t resist the urge to snipe at them for leaving him, though.

He’d long adjusted to the sensation of stepping onto the invisible hands that his power formed, which meant that he had plenty of attention to spare for when Lightshow darted forward, heading towards Remus, who was directly below and had turned to look up at Janus.

Virgil had caught the motion, skipping back with his shadows flaring, but Janus was faster, snapping a hand up and channeling his protective rage into the precise control he had over his telepathy.

The hands latched onto Lightshow, which wasn’t a surprise. It was difficult to dodge what one couldn’t see coming, after all.

Lightshow didn’t immediately blast away the hands with burning light, which was a surprise.

Instead, he collapsed with a high-pitched whine that seemed to carry down the street, visibly trembling. Janus’s power vanished in a heartbeat, but the villain only curled further in on himself, shielding whatever he could as though he expected to be kicked while he was down.

Of course, Janus was mindful of a ploy as he approached, but between the malicious-looking injuries and the man’s body language, he wouldn’t bet on this being a trick. It simply didn’t work as an act to get their guards lowered, the shift from Lightshow’s usual persona to... this was far too jarring.

And then Lightshow looked up at him, one eye bruised and caked over with blood and the other lacking anything resembling recognition, and claimed not to know of his own supervillain alias.

Janus’s headache doubled.

-

Janus shoved a few bottles of cleaning fluid aside in the cabinet, grimacing at the pungent chemical smell as he reached for the bulky first aid kit shoved into the back corner.

He was normally more stringent about keeping these easily accessible, lest Virgil deem it ‘too much work’ to find a kit and instead curl up on the couch to try and ‘sleep his wounds off’, but they hadn’t used this hideout in months and it showed.

Notorious supervillain Lightshow was sitting on one of the dining room chairs, kicking his good foot back and forth slightly as he watched Remus and Virgil bicker about something with a bright, curious gaze. It was uncanny how alive he seemed currently when compared to the dull, furious way he normally acted.

Janus approached with the med kit, and though the villain offered a friendly smile, there was a subtle, wary edge to his body language. He’d followed them here, but he wasn’t sure if they would hurt him or not, Janus realized, and ignored the resulting pang of guilt. Lightshow was a supervillain, he’d been well within his rights to react defensively to protect his teammates.

He shook away the thoughts and held up a damp washcloth, gesturing to the visible cuts littering him. “May I?”

Lightshow nodded, only the barest note of hesitation in the gesture. Janus moved with care as he slowly scrubbed at the dried blood and dabbed at the cuts with hydrogen peroxide, announcing which cut he was going to clean before moving, ending with the forehead wound that had bled all over half his face. He lightened his touch even more for that one, not wanting to agitate the bruised, swelling flesh around the villain’s eye. “You should probably ice this.”

As though on cue, Remus plopped a bag of freezer burnt frozen peas into Janus’s lap, accepting thanks with a cheerful, “Always happy to help you pea your pants!”

Janus rolled his eyes and wrapped the bag in another washcloth before pressing the makeshift icepack into Lightshow’s hand. “There you are. There’s a bathroom down the hall. You’re welcome to use the kit to tend to any other injuries you’ve sustained.”

Going by the way he moved and the stiff manner in which he held himself, Lightshow was either more injured than he appeared or he was tense from being surrounded by unknown factors. Seeing as that eye-searing white costume of his was built to take hits and had no visible punctures, Janus expected it was the second option.

Lightshow didn’t seem eager to take him up on the offer of more treatment, either, only smiling and nodding minutely, the motion likely jarring his head wound. “Thank you so much, Duckie. I’m sure you guys have important stuff to do, so I’m very grateful for your help.”

There was a pause, the room falling utterly silent.

“What did you call me,” Janus asked in a deadpan, prompting a new fit of cackling from Remus.

“I… Um, I’m sorry!” A flash of something alarmingly close to fear crossed Lightshow’s face, and Janus made a conscious effort to soften his features. Honestly, it was only a nickname.

Remus crowded forward and threw an arm over Lightshow’s shoulders, dramatically wiping mirthful tears away. “Don’t apologize, you are so much more fun like this!”

Lightshow seemed to go still in the casual grip for a moment, before practically sinking into it, leaning against Remus with something like awe on his face. Remus’s eyebrows raised slightly, but he did nothing to dissuade the man even as Virgil’s suspicious glare increased tenfold from where he was lurking in the corner.

“I assume you heard The Duke refer to me as ‘Duckie’,” Janus said, studying Lightshow with no little curiosity. “That is not actually my name, simply one of the many monikers he regularly subjects us to.”

“You love my nicknames, don’t lie,” Remus teased, and Janus primly ignored him. Affectionate name-calling in the comfort of their home was one thing, but being called ‘Duckie’ didn’t exactly intimidate his opponents on the field.

“What is ‘Duckie’ short for?” Lightshow asked.

“It’s short for The Conductor,” Janus replied. Lightshow mouthed the word, taking a few seconds to puzzle out the duc-to-duck connection, and then grinned when he got it.

“Well, I can’t beak-lieve how nice it is to meet you, Mister Conductor!” he enthused, only spurred on by Remus’s shit-eating grin. “My name is Patton!”

There was another beat of silence as the three heroes in the room struggled to register that their nemesis had just handed over his name with friendly ease. Lightshow-- Patton’s smile faltered slightly.

“You may call me Dee,” Janus finally decided, “only because I’m sure you’ll continue with the duck puns otherwise.”

Remus shot him a knowing grin, and then, because he’d never been one to back down from doing insane and ill-advised things, said, “I’m Remus!”

Patton nodded, and then twisted around a little to look at the figure in the corner with hopeful eyes.

“Absolutely not,” Virgil spat, apparently having already worked himself into a proper seethe just watching them introduce themselves. “Have you guys gone crazy? Why are you giving out your names like he’s not literally a v--”

“Umbra.” Janus’s voice cut right through Virgil’s rant, leaving a fraught silence in its wake. “Let’s speak privately. Remus, can I assume you’ll be able to keep our guest entertained?”

Janus shot him a look, tapping his communicator meaningfully as he spoke. Stay in touch this time. Remus executed a purposefully sloppy salute with his middle finger, which was frankly as good as he was going to get.

Virgil’s shoulders were firmly up next to his ears by the time they got out of the building, expression thunderous. Janus turned to face him, gesturing for him to speak his mind as he clearly wanted to.

“This is dangerous, and it’s going to end badly,” Virgil said immediately, with the confidence of someone who was always thinking about worst-case scenarios. “What if it’s all just a trick?”

“Oh, yes, I certainly never considered that this could be some villainous scheme,” Janus replied, a bit testily. “It’s not like my whole thing is strategy or anything.”

“Then why are you letting Remus share his identity?” Virgil demanded, his hands coming up to clutch frustratedly at his hair. Janus sighed, letting his posture dissolve slightly as he reached forward with his telepathy.

“First of all, neither of us let Remus do anything,” he said wryly, invisible hands carefully prying Virgil’s grip loose. “He’ll do what he wants, and he was thinking clearly when he did it, believe it or not. Between the three of us, he’s got the least to lose by giving away his name. It’s a good test, seeing what Light-- Patton does with the information.”

Virgil hissed, petulant as he always was when a scheme involved any of them being at risk. “I just don’t get why we’re even entertaining this. It’s idiotic.”

Janus knew Virgil well enough to discern what he wasn’t saying. He was scared.

It made sense. All of Umbra and Lightshow’s past clashes had ended messily at best, and Virgil felt the effects of the villain’s power more severely than either of his teammates. Janus usually kept him on the sidelines of fights with Lightshow for that exact reason.

But there was more to this situation than met the eye.

“Patton is the only lead we have on whoever he was playing distraction for. With him, we’re one step closer to the answers we need. And if he really does have amnesia--,” Janus ignored Virgil’s disbelieving scoff, “--if he retains no memory at all of the last few years of his life, then he’s been left alone, afraid, uncertain. Possibly with nowhere to return to.”

“And what sort of heroes would we be if we didn’t stick our necks out for a guy in need of help,” Virgil finished, grumbling but already slouching a bit in acceptance. “Ugh. Why did I let you talk me into being a vigilante hero again?”

“Because you have an alarming tendency to jump in front of innocents to take knives, and this is best curtailed by my direct supervision?” Janus snarked, prompting Virgil to flip him off with flushed cheeks.

“I don’t get stabbed that much!” he argued, lying through his teeth. Janus was so proud. “Anyways, I won’t fight you on this if you’re sure. But I will be watching him, and I’m not telling him shit about us.”

“I wouldn’t ask that of you,” Janus replied smoothly. “Still, do try to be civil?”

His head throbbed again as he misjudged the distance to a curb and almost tripped right over it. He’d woken up with his left eye swollen-feeling and his eyelashes crusted together with dried blood, so depth perception wasn’t his strong suit at the moment.

Still, he made it over the curb and continued to wander slowly down the street, not entirely sure what he was looking for. Help, maybe? He was bleeding in a lot of places, and he was hurting somehow even more, so maybe it was the hospital he was looking for.

He paused, catching movement in the corner of his eye.

It was himself, familiar soft brown hair and bright blue eyes reflected in the smooth glass of a storefront. He tilted his head back and forth, studying his outfit with little recognition. It was a one piece, all shiny and white, down to the little mask over his eyes, though the prim and proper effect was a bit ruined by all the dirt and blood he’d managed to get on it. He even had a cape tied over his shoulders, like he was cosplaying a superhero or something.

As he stood there, the neon ‘OPEN’ sign in the window blinked out. There was a flurry of panicked movement, and the backroom door slammed shut seconds later. He stepped back, feeling his cheeks flush slightly with embarrassment. His own fault; it wasn’t polite to stare.

“Ooh, looks like Flashlight came out to play!” A loud voice echoed down the street, the words bright and singsong. “I’ve gotta say, your entrance today was subpar, totally boring. You didn’t even blow anything up! Did you contract gonorrhea or— uh.”

The speaker cut off sharply as Patton turned to listen, and he realized abruptly that they were firstly, standing in the center of the road with their hands on their hips and secondly, looking right at him. Had he been mistaken for someone else?

“Oh, um, hello there!” he tried, feeling a little flare of excitement at the sight of someone approaching him, rather than running away. Maybe now he could start clearing up this big misunderstanding!

The stranger stared back, and Patton noticed that he was dolled up in his own fancy outfit, all blacks and radioactive greens, shredded in a purposeful way. He had a mask, too, the bottom of it covered in real teeth and what Patton hoped wasn’t real blood.

“...Huh. What happened to you?” the stranger finally asked, confusion spilling into his manic glee. “Are you seeing other heroes on the side? I never took you for unfaithful, Firefly!”

He did a silly little hip wiggle to accentuate his words, and Patton offered him a confused half-smile.

“Well, y’see, I…,” he paused, hand drifting up to the gash on his forehead. “I’m sorry, I’m not entirely sure. But I’m sure it’ll come to me eventually!”

“You don’t remember who beat you six ways to Sunday?” the stranger raised an eyebrow, whistling lowly. “Must have been a helluva fight. Color me impressed! I didn’t think you had that sort of down-’n-dirty in you!”

Had he been in a fight? Patton’s headache pulsed a little bit harder, as though rejecting his attempt to recall. “I don’t know about all that, but I guess I mudst have gotten dirty somehow!”

His pun must not have been as fun as he’d thought, because the stranger’s grin faded slightly, his eyes narrowing. “You’re awfully friendly today, Glowbug.”

Patton furrowed his eyebrows, confused. Why did the stranger make that sound like a bad thing?

Before he could reply, a short, three-note jingle rang out from a device strapped to the stranger’s belt, prompting him to skip back a step into the radius of a streetlamp. His shadow stretched out behind him, unnaturally long and looming, and then with barely a whisper, a whole person popped right out.

The new addition seemed to float for a moment before gravity kicked back in and dragged them back down to the ground in a precise landing. Patton couldn’t really make much out, between the shadowy wisps that clung to his edges and the back of the oversized hoodie he wore.

“Duke! I thought you said you were going to check in,” he snapped, voice low and gravelly.

The first stranger— Duke?— had gone from lax to tense the moment his friend had appeared, gaze locked on Patton almost challengingly. “I was dealing with something interesting,” he replied, unrepentantly cheerful. “Did you portal across the whole city to come check on little ol’ me?”

“I did if you were engaging Lightshow alone, the way we specifically decided not to!” the other stranger hissed in response, the streetlight overhead flickering along with his words.

“You mean like we’re doing right now?” Duke asked, pointing a finger over his hooded friend’s shoulder at Patton.

Patton glanced behind himself, wondering if maybe someone else had popped out of his shadow, before turning back to see that Hoodie had soundlessly moved several meters back, while still putting himself between Patton and Duke.

“Um… me?” he asked, pointing to himself. The two strangers stared at him with varying levels of incredulity. “I’m Patton!”

“You’re what?” Hoodie spat out, as though Patton’s two word introduction had insulted his whole family tree.

“I told you,” Duke chimed in, “interesting! He’s been like this the whole time, not a single mention of ‘evil’ or ‘purification’ or anything! It’s like whoever beat the snot out of him also knocked the stick out of his ass!”

“What, that wasn’t you?” Hoodie asked, the shadows around him melting and curling as he looked Patton up and down, taking in his multitude of injuries. “Then, who--?”

“Are you two superheroes?” Patton blurted out, bouncing a little on his heels. The motion pulled at his wounds and made his vision swim a little, but he couldn’t help how excited he was! Real superheroes!

There was a pause as the two stared at him with matching expressions of utter blankness.

“...What,” said Hoodie flatly.

Duke threw his head back and cackled like he’d just heard the world’s funniest joke.

“You have superpowers, right? With the shadows, and the popping up outta nowhere?” Patton fumbled on, feeling a little foolish. “Sorry, I’m still sorta out of it…,”

“You’re fucking with us,” Hoodie stated, like he was daring Patton to say otherwise. “Duke, he’s fucking with us, right? He’s not seriously--”

“Oh, joy, my teammates,” a droll voice called from above. Patton glanced up, finding a third stranger-- superhero?-- standing on the edge of a roof, a short black cape flaring around his shoulders. “I do so love when they just run off into dangerous situations without me.”

Hoodie shoved his hands in his pockets, shoulders hunching up as he shrugged. “The Duke did it first. I just panicked.”

“Duckie!” Duke called brightly. “You finally caught up!”

‘Duckie’ shot Duke a look, and then stepped right off the building, casual as anything.

Patton couldn’t help the way he jerked forward a few steps, eye wide with panic, as though he could somehow put himself between Duckie and the fall--

There was no fall. Duckie had stepped out onto thin air as though it was as solid as any floor.

His sudden movement hadn’t gone unnoticed, though. Duckie’s head snapped up to glare a hole right through him with surprising vehemence, and half a heartbeat later, his hand snapped up as well.

Abruptly, there was pressure all around him, like the invisible hands of a crowd all moving at once. Patton cried out as they grabbed at his hair and dragged his head back, locked around his wrists and pulled them above his head, and yanked at his ankles so that he stumbled roughly.

New pains made themselves known as his body was jarred, and Patton caught a flicker of an almost-memory-- calloused hands holding him down, keeping him still for his punishment, he was wrong he’ll do better please please please-- and felt his heart rate ratchet up into the hundreds. What had he done wrong? How bad would it be?

“Uh, Glowbug? This is the part where you start up your little light show,” someone stage-whispered from nearby.

Patton could barely parse the words through his panic. A strained whimper escaped him, and he dropped to his knees, burning tears building in the corners of his eyes. In the next instant, the pressure vanished entirely, leaving him to curl in on himself and brace.

“What’s-- What’s wrong with him?” Hoodie asked, his voice dropped to a near-whisper. “He’s acting like… like he’s never even seen-- Dee, wait!”

A careful touch to his shoulder made his breathing go even shallower, and after a moment, there was the shuffle of clothing as one of the superheroes knelt at his side. Patton caught the edge of some yellow lining-- Duckie, then.

“No touching, I-- I understand. Deep breaths, now,” the hero instructed, voice starting uncertain and then firming into something more soothing. “Can you look at me?”

Patton didn’t want to, but he-- he couldn’t remember why. The sickening feeling in the pit of his stomach wasn’t a good reason to be rude, so he carefully lifted his head bit by shaky bit until he was no longer curled up like a little pillbug of panic.

Duckie was crouched to be level with him, his gloved hands lifted in front of him in a peaceful gesture, his face a mask of calm composure. Both of his teammates stood close at his shoulders, staring down at Patton with their own varying levels of unease and agitation.

“There you go. Much better,” Duckie praised, and Patton realized that he’d begun to match the hero’s breathing, slow and exaggerated. “Are you back with us, Lightshow?”

Patton lifted a hand and scrubbed it over his eyes, the motion clumsy with lingering shakiness from his sudden panic. His embarrassment faded, replaced with a sort of mental fatigue as he turned the question over in his mind. It was as though he was putting together a puzzle with only half the pieces.

He wanted to, he really did. The kindness they spared for him was warm and addictive, and he’d thought he’d do anything to keep receiving it, but clearly that wasn’t true-- he’d tried to remember and only gotten the barest flicker of terror before his mind had just shut down.

So Dr. Picani had left, and Umbra had slouched into the living room after them between one blink and the next, and Patton had waited patiently for the part where they told him what would happen to him, where Remus stepped back or pushed him away and Dee’s face turned away in disinterest.

He kept waiting, and waiting, and holding it all together despite the immature part of him that wanted to cry at the idea of leaving behind the only friendly faces he knew— the only faces he could recall at will without that pickaxe pain in his skull.

It’ll be worse if you make a fuss, something small in the back of his mind whispered, and though couldn’t recall why, he knew it was true. A lesson he’d learned the hard way, for it to be so ingrained in him.

And then, very suddenly, he found the day was over, and he’d been led back into the guest room.

“The others picked up some pajamas for you,” Dee was saying, gesturing to the pile of folded clothes sitting at the edge of his bed.

Sometime between this morning and now, someone had come in and made it, the sheets all tucked neatly back into place. Patton would have to remember to do it himself tomorrow. It wouldn’t do for him to make trouble on his last day.

“Thank you, Duckie,” he replied, meeting Dee’s bright golden eyes and trying to make his gratitude clear. “For everything.”

Dee’s mouth had upturned slightly at the nickname, but his reluctant mirth faded as he studied Patton for a moment with an expression he couldn’t figure out.

“It’s no problem,” he finally responded, and stepped back out the door. “You know where to find me if you need me.”

The door closed softly, and Patton waited for his footsteps to fade down the hall before letting out a long sigh and beginning to peel off his suit and the thin coveralls underneath.

Each movement seemed to bring a new ache or pain, and he looked down at the heavy bruises that sprawled over his torso and arms like a thundercloud. The contusions were easier to ignore when he was focused on the others; now, in the privacy of this room? Not so much.

They’d offered him medicine for his head and his scrapes, Dee even applying the first aid himself, and he was grateful. He didn’t really need to treat bruises, especially not when the supplies could be better used on for-real superheroes, but they still stung enough to make his eyes water.

Still, he was staying positive! It could be worse, after all.

The pajamas were soft and cottony when he picked them up, and he was happy to see that they were long-sleeved. He could even wear these out to breakfast tomorrow!

The pants were patterned, covered in bright yellow rubber duckies, and Patton smiled to himself, almost certain that it had been Remus’s doing. He stepped into them and leaned over to pull them up to his hips.

Something soft and glinting swung into the corner of his vision.

He reached for it curiously, and found that it was a necklace with a golden heart-shaped pendant, hanging from his own neck. It had been warmed by his skin, enough that he hadn’t even noticed it until now.

Patton turned it over in his hand, studying it and wondering if maybe it was a locket. There didn’t seem to be any seams (heh) he could pry at, but there was a very small keyhole.

He checked the pockets of his suit, and to his disappointment, found no corresponding tiny key.

It probably wasn’t safe to head to bed with a necklace on, especially if he moved around in his sleep, but when he reached up for the clasp, he found his hands were too shaky to open it.

He drew them back to hold them in front of him, frowning. They hadn’t seemed too trembly before, but maybe he was having a delayed reaction to the stresses of the day?

Well. It probably wouldn’t hurt to sleep with it on for one night. He could just leave it be.

The pajama shirt— bold font reading “I don’t give a duck!”— was much easier on his bruises than his suit had been, and as he relaxed, he found himself slipping the locket under his shirt collar in a practiced motion.

He wouldn’t be able to explain it if asked, and they were already frustrated with him after his failure earlier today. Better not to risk making it worse.

He wasn’t sure what they would do if they got too fed up with him. Not knowing made him antsy, but he also couldn’t stand to do something to upset them on purpose.

He wasn’t sure if they were always nice, but they were so kind, even when they were teasing. There was an easy camaraderie between the three of them, a practiced partnership. He could see it in the way they moved and talked and held each other up, all of it making some fluttery thing deep in the core of Patton spark with warmth.

It probably wasn’t right of him, but he wanted to keep basking in the outskirts, to cling to that feeling for as long as he possibly could.

He fell asleep with the embers of it still glowing in his chest.

-

The world was made dreary and gray by the rain as Patton walked home.

He turned into the side alley next to a foreclosed apartment, hauling himself up the fire escape with barely any noise. The place looked like a fixer-upper on the best of days, and today was definitely not the best of days.

He pushed past the door to the ramshackle old building hesitantly, wincing dully when the hinges shrieked with every inch, the way they did every time. He paused, his gaze flickering over old furniture and scattered trash. Something was off.

“Get in here, now.” The voice was sharp, and he winced. The part of his mind that was Lightshow stirred like a rising snake, searching for targets.

He didn’t bother pushing the fragments down as he quickly shut the door behind him and scurried into the dilapidated kitchen. Lightshow always came out to listen when Boss spoke. It was better for all of him if it seemed like he was focused, paying attention.

The man in question was standing in front of Patton’s fridge, his expression of disgust somehow clear even though his features were hazy and indistinct. Patton knelt, his head bowed, and focused on keeping his breathing even and calm. His back began to ache.

“You’ve been lying to me,” Boss said, and Patton could’ve sworn his heart skipped a beat.

“What?” he asked, lifting his head up. “No, I ha–,”

The blow was even sharper than the words, the entire left side of Patton’s face stinging from the impact. He’d forgotten himself. He slipped further into Lightshow, staring at the ground and blinking the reflexive tears away. He wondered if the mark was a bruise or a burn.

“I’m disappointed in you, Lightshow. You know better than to interrupt like that,” Boss reminded him, voice like a carefully-polished blade. “Do you think you know better than me?”

“Of course not, sir.” Patton kept his head down, trying not to slip entirely away. He couldn’t slip up again. He just had to get through this conversation, through whatever mistake Boss had decided to punish him for, and then he had the weekend to himself. No super business for two entire days. He could handle a little pain for that. He’d handled worse for less.

Even after all this time, it still took effort to keep himself from shaking.

“That’s right. No matter how you try, I’ll always be a step ahead. Better not to try at all, hm?” Boss must have been in a good mood, though, because he seemed content to move on without any further punishment. Patton’s relief was quickly overshadowed by his wariness. The type of things that made Boss happy weren’t generally good for Patton. Or pretty much anyone else in this city, for that matter.

“I recently came into possession of an interesting bit of information. You’ve been hiding things from me, Lightshow,” he told him, lips curling back into a snarl. “And after all I’ve done for you,  too. Absolutely treacherous.”

He spat on the floor, began circling around him, but Patton barely noticed, his mind racing. There was only one thing Patton was hiding, the only thing worth hiding anymore, and he couldn’t have possibly–

Boss opened his mouth and spoke, the words winding around Patton’s head like meaningless gibberish. The words sliding between his ribs like a dagger from behind. He couldn’t have– He’d done everything to make sure– What had happened to–

“Luckily for you, I’m a very generous man.” A large hand, splayed out on his back like a threat. “I know just the way you can make up for this.”

He was supposed to be off-duty. This was supposed to be time to scrub the blood from his hands, to be himself. To see–

“Unless, of course, you’d prefer I use someone else instead–”

-

“NO!”

He woke as though he’d been doused with ice water, drawing in big, shuddering breaths and kicking the tangled blankets free from his legs.

Between one moment and the next, he was at the window, his hands on the sill, ready to push it up and scale whatever he needed to as long as he was getting out getting free getting away—

Another knock at the door, a worried voice. “Patton? Are you alright? I didn’t mean to startle you.” Dee.

The realization of where he was sunk into him like a calming weight, overlaying the dream until he could barely recall the contents.

The terror still lingered, his heart pitter-pattering under his skin, but he took a deep breath and pushed it all down, releasing his grip on the window frame.

“I’m– I’m alright!” he managed, keeping his voice even. “Just surprised me a bit, no harm done!”

“... If you’re sure,” Dee said, though he didn’t sound convinced. Did he think Patton was lying? Patton felt fear shudder down his spine like a silent warning bell, but the hero didn’t come in, didn't even try the handle. “Umbra picked up breakfast on the way back from patrol, so if you’re hungry, we’re all down in the commons.”

Patton made some sort of affirmative noise, and then held his breath until he heard Dee depart.

That dream… it hadn’t been just a dream, had it?

The echoes of it still had his body drawn tight like a coiled spring, fine tremors running through his hands when he pressed them to his face. It had been a memory, a bad one. He wondered if maybe Dr. Picani’s power had helped him remember it this time.

He’d thought that the power had been shockingly painless, but maybe that made sense, if this was the sort of thing it brought about.

Even now, though, the details grew hazy. What had his dream-self been so terrified about? What was the secret he’d been keeping? No matter how hard he tried to remember, his thoughts slipped away like sand trickling through his fingers.

The only things that lingered were the phantom pain from the blow, the prickling shame of his betrayal, and the certainty that if he didn't stay focused, he’d lose himself to the caverns of his own mind.

He’d been called Lightshow in the dream, hadn’t he? Lightshow, the villain. His chest suddenly felt tight.

This was the breakthrough they’d been waiting for. He’d remembered something from his past. He had to tell Dee, let them know that whatever had been done to him was wearing off before he lost himself and became… however he was before.

Going by the way that everyone had reacted to him out on the street, he didn’t think he’d like who he was before this. He was certain that the others wouldn't like it, going by the dark suspicious looks Umbra cast his way.

On the other hand, he didn’t really feel more evil than he had last night. He wasn’t sure exactly what the signs were, but the memory hadn’t made him feel angry or cruel or vengeance-seeking. He’d just been… terrified. Kind of sad, too, in an empty way.

Patton turned towards the door, hand reaching up to press over his locket as he listened to the faint sounds of the heroes down the hall. They’d gotten breakfast for him, and nobody liked to have their appetite ruined, so maybe it would be okay to hold off on the revelation?

He really wanted to enjoy the last of his time with them. A few hours of secrecy couldn’t make that big a difference, right?

Maybe he could tell them once they told him that they were kicking him out, just get all the bad news out of the way in one go. Like ripping off a bandaid!

Patton nodded to himself. That way, even if they were mad, they’d already be conveniently sending him away. It all worked out.

Virgil sighed, squeezing his eyes shut as the growing headache in his temple pulsed. He was used to going without sleep, well-adapted to it, but with the added stress of inviting yet another person into whatever the hell this disaster was, a migraine seemed imminent.

Doctor Emile Picani had been a contact of Janus’s for a while, and Virgil had even had a few sessions with him at his partners’ insistence, though they mostly consisted of surface level conversation and long awkward silences that he would remember later with an embarrassed wince. The guy was friendly and enthusiastic, and Virgil knew that if he got hurt while trying to help them deal with the Lightshow issue, it would suck for everyone.

Even so, they didn’t have very many options. After breakfast, Janus had tried to gauge just how much Lightshow was missing, and found that it was way too much. Like, a deeply concerning amount. The guy was still functioning, and clearly understood societal rules and general knowledge, but any specifics about himself, his loved ones, or his past in general were out of reach.

According to him, anyway. Virgil had his suspicions.

Either way, they’d called in a therapist, and now they were all suited up and crowded in one of the small guest rooms, listening as Picani asked questions about the situation.

Virgil was leaning against the back wall and watching Lightshow carefully, ignoring the way Janus shot him a look. A few shadows curled around his head like a dark visor, trying to keep the overhead fluorescent light from worsening his headache. He brushed his hand against the manifestation of his power gently in thanks, wondering if Patton-- Lightshow’s energy ever responded to him subconsciously like this. He couldn’t imagine that harsh burning light ever trying to protect anyone, even its source.

“I know I was wandering for a while,” Lightshow was saying, “but it gets hazier the further back I try to remember, like one big blur. It… It kind of hurts, when I focus too hard?”

He was clinging to a stuffed plush deer, one that Picani had brought along since they refused to meet him in his office for something so sensitive. Why his first thought when treating a supervillain had been to bring a cuddly Disney plush, Virgil had no idea.

Picani hummed thoughtfully. “I understand. It could be a way your mind is protecting itself from the hurt of certain memories or the information in them, like Spinel from the Steven Universe movie! Self-inflicted amnesia is much trickier to address than injury-based amnesia, least of all because removing that protection too soon can make your situation worse.”

“Everyone’s counting on me to know, though,” Lightshow said, furrowing his brow in stubborn determination. It was a far cry from the glassy arrogant expression that he usually wore during their fights. “I… I also have these strange dreams.”

Janus’s interest caught with a tapping of his fingers, only visible to those who knew about his little tells, the ones he allowed himself in friendly company. “Dreams?”

Lightshow glanced up at him, and then looked back down at the plush like he was telling it instead. “They don’t make very much sense, and I don’t-- I don’t really recognize the people in them most of the time, but sometimes I get that feeling-- when you feel like you’ve done something before?”

"Déjà vu?” Janus offered.

“Gesundheit,” Lightshow replied, and Remus let out a cackle. Virgil himself just barely muffled a snort, forcing his face impassive when Lightshow peeked back at him.

“Can you share what the dreams are normally about?” Picani prompted, bringing them back on topic.

Lightshow went tense, his fists clenching. Virgil couldn’t help but stiffen up in response, though matching gestures from both his teammates kept him from moving forward.

“I…,” Lightshow struggled for a moment, before visibly drooping. “I can’t. It’s all just… too much. I’m really sorry.”

“No need to apologize,” Picani replied, exchanging a quick glance with Janus. “This is what I’m here for after, all!”

Lightshow tilted his head slightly in puppylike confusion, curly brown hair flopping to one side.

“Patton,” the therapist started, “if you’d like, I can try and help you soften that mental block. I’m primarily a normal therapist, but I do have a low-grade power, and I’ve been licensed to use it to help patients.”

From the front, Lightshow must have kept his composure, because none of the others reacted, but from behind, Virgil could see the way his back muscles bunched up in a familiar configuration, like he was facing something that he desperately wanted to flee.

The question was, what was he afraid of? Picani hadn’t even revealed what the power was yet.  Could it be that the very idea of a mental power was alarming to him?

Abruptly, Virgil remembered when Janus’s hands had grabbed onto Lightshow during their first encounter, the way his alarm had abruptly spiked into utter, mindless terror.

… Was he just afraid of people using their abilities on him in general?

“If you think it will help us figure this out, then we can try it,” Lightshow said, his voice a little wobbly from nerves.

Picani hesitated, a little thrown off his script. “Well, uh, let me tell you about it! The power is called Nostalgia, and it allows me to help a patient safely pull forward repressed memories that might otherwise be difficult to manage. I wouldn’t usually recommend it in the first session, but I’ve been told this is an urgent situation.”

Virgil had expected Lightshow’s next question to be, “Will you see the memories?”

The assumption wasn’t even borne from suspicion (mostly), it was just a natural question to ask about psychic abilities, to gauge the level of intrusion. Virgil himself had asked it almost immediately upon learning about it.

Instead, what Lightshow said was, “How much will it hurt?”

His posture was still tense, braced for the worst.

Virgil could see all the little ways that Janus and Remus responded to the implications of that particular question, but Picani didn’t flinch, maintaining his friendly, open demeanor.

“It won’t hurt at all unless something goes very wrong,” he stated firmly. “The point of using my power is to make this recall as painless for you as possible, and I’ve trained with it for a long time to make sure that even if something does go wrong, I’ll be able to disengage ASAP, okay?”

“Okay.” Lightshow nodded, a little bit too fast, almost before Picani was done speaking. “Let’s do it.”

Picani reached out and settled his hand on one of Lightshow’s temples, closing his eyes, and somehow, Virgil found himself equally worried about both of them.

There was a long stretch of silence where they held this position, the local superhero team sitting as quiet outsiders with bated breath.

Then, abruptly, Picani withdrew, shaking his hand a bit as though he’d gotten a static shock. Lightshow’s eyes snapped open, and they flickered from place to place in the room before settling on Picani with worry.

“I-- Did I mess it up?” he asked with no little uncertainty, a far cry from the hyperventilating, emotional mess Virgil had been the first time this method had worked on him.

“There’s no way to ‘mess up’ in my office, only temporary roadblocks,” Picani replied with a smile, flexing his hand a few more times. “You’ve got a pretty strong roadblock though, and it would take a lot more than my measly little station wagon to break through it. I’d say your nightmares are probably the bits and pieces that are slipping through the cracks.”

“So they are real memories?” Lightshow asked, voice heavy with some indecipherable emotion. Picani nodded.

“Did you see anything recognizable in these dreams,” Janus asked, shifting forwards slightly, “either of you? If these are real memories, any information from them could be crucial to helping find out what happened to Patton.”

“He would have to be asleep for me to see them at all,” Picani replied, his mouth turned down at the corners.

“I…,” Lightshow wavered. “It’s always so hard to think in nightmares. I don’t think-- I don’t remember recognizing anything.”

“Are you sure?” Janus pressed, and Lightshow’s breathing turned a shade quicker.

Remus stood with jarring quickness, stepping to Lightshow’s side. “That’s enough,” he announced firmly. “Sometimes brain bears are better left unpoked, unless you’re into being maimed.”

He hesitated only the barest moment before reaching an arm out, the closest to vulnerable that Virgil had seen him in front of anyone but them in ages. He felt protectiveness for his partner swell and bubble up, ready to snarl if Remus’s offer was harshly rebuffed, but it ended up being unnecessary.

Lightshow rose to meet Remus like a magnet, slotting against his side as though they’d known each other for years, as though the many rough scars that littered Remus’s body barely even registered. There was no disgust or wariness in the lines of Lightshow’s face, only exhausted relief as he clung on. It seemed that they’d finally found someone who was just as much of a squeezer as Remus when it came to cuddling.

Janus relented immediately at Remus’s warning, his expression dampening slightly with regret. He reached out a gloved hand, one of his visible ones. “Of course, beloved. I didn’t mean to upset you. Either of you. Or your mind bears.”

Remus reached out and clasped his hand tightly, his forgiveness coming easy once earned.

“I wasn’t beary upset,” Lightshow added, gaze darting between their interlocked hands and Virgil like he was trying to piece together a particularly challenging puzzle. He shook his head after a moment, his brow taking on a troubled wrinkle as he refocused. “I shouldn’t be-- It’s my fault for not being able to give you anything useful. And after all you’ve done for me, too.”

The words felt well-worn, almost recited. Virgil felt his face scrunch up in confusion for a heartbeat, and by the bewildered look Remus shot him over Lightshow’s head, he wasn’t the only one. As grumpy as he’d been about it, a first aid kit and a single night’s stay in a dusty guest room wasn’t exactly a burden for them to arrange. It certainly shouldn’t have been enough to drive someone to eternal gratitude.

“Dearheart,” Janus started reassuringly, and since when had Lightshow earned a nickname? “We don’t hold debts for little things like taking in someone in trouble with nowhere to go. In fact, if you ask me, nobody should be paying for basic life essentials like food and shelter. Have you read any Kropotkin?”

He led the way out of the room as he spoke, playing an excellent distraction as Remus and Lightshow trailed after, and Virgil waited until they were down the hall to close the door and loom over the last occupant of the room.

“Doctor Picani,” he greeted, because despite their sessions, he hadn’t yet hit the required level of emotional openness to be anything but bluntly polite acquaintances with the guy. Besides, this was about business, not him personally.

“Virgil!” Picani replied, because his default setting was an alarming level of friendliness. “I hope one of my favorite clients isn’t about to ask me anything that would violate my patient-doctor confidentiality!”

Virgil rolled his eyes. “I don’t care about whatever you think is going on with his brain. I want to know if he’s dangerous.”

“Because of who he is? Because that still sounds an awful lot like his brain you’re asking about,” Picani replied. Some of Virgil’s stress must have shown on his face, because Picani reached out and set a hand on his arm, offering him a sympathetic smile. “If he was a danger to himself or others, I would be legally required to take action. Which I am notably not doing.”

“Like you care about the law,” Virgil scoffed, “you work with illegal vigilantes.”

Still, his shoulders relaxed slightly, some of the strain falling from them.