Chapter 1.2.33 — Alias, Pythia 2

Ash went over the preparations in their head again. And again.

And again.

Just because this job wasn’t as dangerous, didn’t mean that there was any room for error.

The apartment was dark except for the overhead light of the kitchen and the three scattered candles on the table. Ash leaned over their table and examined the documents provided by their employer. The floor plan was mirrored, the names and details written in cipher—these things might obscure the details, but they wouldn’t fool anyone in a lettered agency.

It would be immediately apparent that these documents were part of planning an attack.

The obfuscation was to protect Ash’s employer—not Ash. They were expendable.

Ash leaned back and rubbed their temples, then their arms.

The apartment was nestled above a laundromat on the edge of downtown Belport. It was cramped and most of the time, hot from the heat seeping up through the floor. Ash had opened a window in the kitchen, hoping the cold air would help them think.

Ash suppressed a chill, regretting wearing a tank-top and leaving their robe in the bedroom. It would’ve been a short walk, but then Ash wasn’t one to take a break before they were ready.

Or to stop something before they were finished.

Instead, Ash rubbed their upper arms, partly trying to warm up, and partly to practice their power.

Poison gathered in their fingertips, and Ash practiced holding onto it just beneath their skin. It was a delicate art—delicate and dangerous. Hold on too loosely and risk the poison slipping out of her skin and becoming visible and active… Hold on too tightly and risk reabsorbing the poison into their own bloodstream.

It wouldn’t kill Ash. At least they didn’t think so. But they’d seen first hand what the hallucinogenic compounds in the poison did to someone.

And it was almost time to do it again.

Footsteps in the hallway startled Ash back to the moment. They gathered up the papers in their right hand and held it next to the lit candle. They stared across the kitchen at the front door and waited.

The footsteps stopped in front of Ash’s apartment door and then the lock jingled as the key was inserted. Ash relaxed and spread the documents back out as Carter unlocked the door and walked in.

“Lock it behind you,” Ash said. Carter usually did, but Ash couldn’t help reminding them… Old habits and all that.

The latch turned, and silence followed. Ash could feel their partner staring at them from the doorway.

“Another job?” Carter asked.

Ash nodded.

“Like last time?”

Ash sighed. “Not like last time.”

Finally, Carter hung up their jacket and walked over to the table. Carter sidled up beside them, shoulder-to-shoulder, and all hope of Ash concentrating on their work was gone.

All they could focus on was Carter’s bare shoulders and their Pirouette perfume.

Ash turned, hoping to meet Carter’s eyes, but their partner was looking down at the documents on the table. Ash took in the sight of their partner: Their sharp cheekbones, the tightness of their shoulders, the curve of their breasts that they tried so hard to hide.

In so many ways, the pair were antithesis:

Ash prided themselves in fluidity, at least as appearances went. Though their newfound employment necessitated that personality follow suit. Disguises were necessary in their line of work, after all.

Meanwhile, Carter was rigid in their androgyny, and in who they were… At least they had been.

Ash could feel the stress in their partner increasing. Their jaw was tense, their breathing was getting steadily quicker, and they hadn’t blinked. Carter’s eyes darted across the documents, unable to read them, and wanting to take Ash at their word.

Ash and Carter had met at a Gnosis work party. Their mutual friend Jessie had introduced them, and they’d hit it off immediately. Both had been wild idealists, who talked a big game about wanting to change the world. Not just the normal liberal-minded talk about workers’ rights and the woes of capitalism, but the rightful place of supers, and the dynamics of power across old cabals, nationstates, and rising corporations. Laced through everything was the need for change.

Both were activists with disdain for inaction. As fate would have it, they both nearly crossed paths at three separate protests before Jessie introduced them.

‘Change might be written into the laws of the universe, but sometimes it needs to be helped along.’

So when the first mutagen variants hit the streets, Ash grabbed a vial for themself and for Carter.

But Carter refused it.

At first, it didn’t bother Ash, but then it did.

Soon after, Ash got word of a group of these new supers that wanted to shake things up. That wanted to bring about change a little faster. Help it along, so to speak.

Over the better part of the last year, Ash had been involved in six missions—the last of which was the infiltration of the Donjon Club and the poisoning of the super named, Amarque.

For Carter, that mission was a step too far. It was too dangerous, not just for Ash, but for the city of Belport.

They were antithesis:

Carter was inflexible in so many ways, but they bent when it came to the methods. When it came to how far they were willing to go.

Ash was fluid in everything else, except that. They were willing to go as far as was necessary—Belport be damned.

Or so they thought.

At one time, Ash believed they would have stood in front of Paragon and spit in his face. But when Carter saw Amarque lose control because of the poison, Carter pleaded with Ash to stop.

‘Too far,’ Carter said. ‘Too far.’

When Carter threatened to leave, Ash found how flexible they really were. Ash agreed to take less drastic measures and to keep their missions nonviolent.

Carter repeated their partner’s words like a reassuring mantra. “Not like last time.” A long moment passed before Carter finally looked up. Tears were in their eyes. “Right?”

Ash nodded meekly, wanting the tears to stop. “Not like last time. This is just a little one.” The words felt pitiful and stupid, but it was all Ash could get out. They couldn’t tell Carter any of the details, and if Ash kept talking, they felt like they would start crying too.

Finally, Carter nodded and wiped their eyes, smudging their mascara. Then they turned and walked off toward the bedroom, leaving Ash standing alone in the lone light of the kitchen.

Ever since that fight, things hadn’t been the same between them. Where once their relationship had been unshakable, unflinching, and unapologetic, now it felt…

Broken.

Like building a beautiful house, one you dreamed you’d never ever have. It was a sappy, if not apt, metaphor. Ash and Carter had let each other into such a house, shown each other their heirlooms and memories, furniture marred deeply with sadness and happiness. In a similar sense, they’d begun cleaning out old cobwebs and pulling up rotted floorboards.

Theirs was the kind of relationship built on the ruin of past relationships and hard lessons learned. In school, Ash had learned that stars were built much the same way.

When the universe was first created, there was nothing but hydrogen and helium, so that’s what the first stars were made of. As they went through fusion, they produced steadily heavier elements like lithium, beryllium, and boron. These stars eventually went supernova, and after even longer time-spans, their debris coalesced again into new stars. These second generations of stars had slightly heavier elements and metals then the first.

Their sun was a third generation star and the Earth was seeded with elements from those that came before.

It was poetic that the universe was built the same way as the city of Belport—urban sprawl built upon the brick and mortar of the past. And that their relationship was built the same.

But all this, the missions and the fight… It was like a tornado had blown through. Their house was still standing, and at first it seemed like the damage was minimal—nothing that couldn’t be rebuilt.

But the damage was much deeper than they feared. Much deeper than either of them wanted to admit. Like finding cracks in the foundation of their beautiful home.

Ash leaned heavily on the table and forced down the lump in their throat.

What else could they do but live a lie? Live like the house wasn’t fundamentally broken. Paper over the cracks and hang photos over the water damage. Put the floorboards back down and dance till the candles burned out.

Footsteps.

Ash looked up to find Carter walking back from the bedroom, wearing their mauve robe and bringing the matching one for Ash. The robes were some of the first things they’d bought together when Carter moved in.

Carter handed the robe to their partner and helped Ash slip it over their shoulders. Ash let out a breath they didn’t know they’d been holding and leaned into Carter’s embrace.

For a moment, time seemed to stop. There was no mission. There was no evening, no night, no tomorrow. No Belport or the packed ruins deep beneath it. The Earth wasn’t spinning or hurtling through space toward some. The sun wasn’t burning itself out—it wasn’t destined to go supernova.

There was just Ash and Carter.

Carter led them away from the light of the kitchen and to the small living room couch. Ash didn’t fight it—it would’ve been like fighting gravity.

For a few hours, the pair orbited one another like twin stars caught in each other’s gravity. There was nothing else, and they needed nothing else.

~

When the hour was late, and they’d already fallen asleep in each other’s arms once, Carter pushed themself up off the couch.

Carter shook Ash, whispering, “Come to bed.”

In a daze, Ash nodded. Then remembered the next mission.

“I’ll be there in a minute.”

Carter didn’t say anything. Their face was unreadable in the gloom.

A moment later, Ash got up and leaned over the kitchen table. Alone.

It felt like a branch in fate. Like stepping through a threshold and feeling the air change.

It was night now. The world was still spinning, and eventually the sun would rise on Belport. But for a while, it had felt like everything had stopped.

For a while, Ash had chosen Carter.

~ ~ ~