knife_bender: ([pos] hopeful)
Diego Hargreeves ([personal profile] knife_bender) wrote2022-08-03 07:28 am

MHA #2 | Wednesday Morning

The weekend had been weird, but the kind of weird where the good outweighed the bad, so Diego couldn't really complain. The Five thing had been weird. Same with the lack of powers and tattoos. But, he was happily married, and apparently had some awesome kids that could throw a rager. So, really no reason to mope.

Just a lot of not asking questions was happening over here. Instead he was just...very, very focused on the Food Network the last couple days. Maybe one day he'd actually cook something he learned on TV.

[For the fiancée, and open to anyone who wants to stop by for some reason]
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - affectionate smile)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 01:19 pm (UTC)(link)
Annie noticed too, and reached over to very gently trace her fingers along the inside of his wrist, near his tattoo but not touching it. (Considering she generally consciously avoided it, this was already a lot.) "Think we can cook in the future?"

The twins had not sounded, like, malnourished, at least.
Edited 2022-08-03 13:20 (UTC)
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - sensitive)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 01:35 pm (UTC)(link)
"Maybe," Annie replied, leaning to press a kiss to his cheek. "That does sound like us. But it seems like there were a few unexpected things."

Like his missing tattoo. And his missing powers. And her missing job.

"So maybe we both go to culinary school in like five years, who knows."
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - hopeful smile)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 02:06 pm (UTC)(link)
"Margaret and Benecio." The rager had been fortuitous in a few ways, including allowing Annie an opportunity to use her kids' full names when talking to them over the phone about what was actually going on at home. "I wonder why we changed our minds. Maybe we don't like the fall anymore."

Doubtful, since they were getting married in the fall.

Another thing Annie had definitely not thought about at all and definitely not gotten out scratch paper at one point to figure out: if the twins were eighteen in that future, then some version of her would have to be pregnant in the next year for that to line up.

It probably should have been scarier?
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - collarbones)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 02:15 pm (UTC)(link)
"She didn't seem to like being called that rather than Maggie, so I think she agrees," Annie noted, smiling fondly. "I don't have, like, an Aunt Margaret or anything, so I wonder where that came from."

She actually knew a person named Maggie fairly well, was the thing. She just never called her that.

"And I like that he's still Ben," she added, echoing the narrative's sentiment. Though it was also kind of weird that they seem to have adjusted their thinking on that, too?
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - real talk)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 02:57 pm (UTC)(link)
"Probably was a hell of a party if they do. Did," Annie replied, struggling a little with the verb tense to use there and threading her fingers through Diego's. "Seemed like I had mine, too."

Or at least, her eyes had lit up when they'd done what you'd expect these two to do in a hotel room away from their children for the weekend.
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - unsure)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 03:09 pm (UTC)(link)
"Yeah," Annie murmured. "Whatever it was took out your tattoo, too. It didn't look like it was laser-removed."

It was like he'd never had it at all, which was -- very weird, and she actually did not know how you did that? Was future Diego like...a clone?
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - sensitive)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 03:14 pm (UTC)(link)
"Uh, I am also really grateful you have all your fingers, for the record -- now and in the future," Annie noted, drawing his hand up to her mouth to kiss his fingers for emphasis. "Five tell you that?"

It was an educated guess.
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - in profile)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 03:27 pm (UTC)(link)
Annie shrugged a shoulder. "I don't know? Like, it makes sense that I wasn't on the team -- honestly, Maeve and Homelander are both kind of old to still be active for most heroes." And Black Noir was old enough to be everyone's dad and yet maintained his spot, not that Annie knew that. "And I always figured I'll take a step back when we have kids. But it was kind of weird that I didn't seem to be...consulting, or anything."

Especially given the fact that Starlight was, like, record-breakingly popular. Vought probably wouldn't have let her take that big a step back unless something drastic had happened.

"Poor Five," she added. He wasn't, like, her favorite Hargreeves (she could provide a ranking on request) but losing a limb seemed pretty fucking horrific.
Edited 2022-08-03 15:34 (UTC)
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - warm)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 03:59 pm (UTC)(link)
"We seemed really happy," Annie agreed softly, smiling at him as she snuggled in closer. And she kind of wanted to talk to him a little about what she had noticed about the timeline, there -- but she also didn't want to skate right past the powers thing. "How do you feel about it? The no powers, the...being happy without them?"
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - affectionate smile)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 04:08 pm (UTC)(link)
"You could complain. I mean, who knows how much time you'd had to make peace with it by then," Annie pointed out. Though, again with the timeline -- if he'd had a lot of time to get over it, it was probably happening sooner than later. "I don't know of anything at home that takes away powers, for what it's worth."

It was also strange that Annie's had been intact, but that wasn't that unusual; the sources of their gifts seemed so different (the Hargreeves' powers might have been a relative mystery, but it seemed to be the consensus that the answer was probably not 'injected with Compound V as infants') that that kind of thing didn't throw her too much.
Edited 2022-08-03 16:09 (UTC)
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - thinking)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
Sounded about right.

"Yeah, he like, refuses to just walk places," Annie noted. "He kept yanking me all over the place when we were looking for you in Dallas. But to be fair, mine aren't even like...something I depend on, and I'd be lost without them, too."

Like, very possibly not as chill as Diego had been, even given the amount of time that might have passed.
defenderofdesmoines: (annie - you're pretty cool)

[personal profile] defenderofdesmoines 2022-08-03 04:35 pm (UTC)(link)
Annie could easily see Diego taking all of that superhero drive and turning it into being Super Dad even with his powers, so that made sense -- and that was attractive in a way that felt wholly different from her usual, baseline, 'Get over here, you incredibly sexy man' attraction to him. Hearing Diego talk about their children kind of knocked her sideways, and she loved it.

"So about the kids," she noted softly. "Did you pick up how old they were?"

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