knife_bender | MHA #2 | Tuesday Evening

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MHA #2 | Tuesday Evening

Diego had spent extra time at the gym today, and if asked it was because he was feeling extra energetic. He wasn't trying to distract himself from the loneliness that set in whenever Annie left for New York. Nope.

Except yes. Tiring himself out allowed him to sleep better, at least. He took a shower after he got back to his apartment and into sweatpants, hoping he'd pass out in front of the TV pretty quickly instead of staring up at the ceiling all night.

[For the girl]

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"And we don't trust anyone on my team," Annie added. It was helping her kind of stay calm to go through ground rules like this. Maybe it was just the comforting lie that she was telling herself -- if they followed these rules and were smart and careful, they'd both live. "Not Homelander or Stormfront, obviously, but -- not Noir, either. Not even Maeve. I don't think she's...compromised? But they're all over her lately with this Brave Maeve stuff."

That kind of broke Annie's heart, a little, because she didn't want to give up on Maeve -- she was almost positive there was still something salvageable in the other woman. But she also knew she couldn't count on Maeve to help. She was too unpredictable.

"Yeah, that's smart." He felt bad for thinking it, but the Maeve thing was kind of a good distraction? "What about Hughie's group? Do you actually know anything about them?"

"There's at least three other guys," Annie said, thinking about it. "He had two dudes and a girl with him when I rescued them from that black site. And then there's the guy who shot me. I think he'll be there."

Which was weird. Annie wasn't exactly thrilled about that, but hopefully if Hughie ran interference, she could avoid being shot again.

"Oh, great." He totally wanted to meet that guy. "Should be fun."

"Be nice," Annie said, and her little smile was actually somewhat affectionate as she said that. (Let's be honest -- if she was potentially going to meet someone who had shot Diego, she would probably be pretty frosty towards them at best.) "I think Hughie and the girl are about my age? And then the others are all a little older. I have to think they're pretty...like, competent? I mean."

She reached a hand up lightly to touch her chest where she'd been shot. "I mean, that guy was for sure trained, and able to get his hands on something that shoots fifty caliber rounds. Plus they managed to kill Translucent, somehow."

"Yeah, you're right," he said reluctantly. "And it's not like we have any other allies there. So I'll be civil."

"Hughie's made some allusions to working for higher up people, too," Annie offered. "I'm not sure who -- which, like, that's probably kind of smart of him -- but they might have some resources."

Probably a sweet hideout, too, right?

"You don't have to be too civil," she added, her smile widening a tiny fraction.

"So I can still be a dick but no punching anybody?" he said.

"At least not right away," Annie suggested, laughing softly. "But by all means, be a huge dick. Hughie doesn't know about you, yet. Be a big, grumpy, knife-covered surprise."

Annie was going to give them both some kind of unpleasant Pavlovian association with the word surprise, at this rate.

Diego laughed. "Well since I have your permission and everything I'll be sure to."

His smiled softened some and he reached out to cup Annie's cheek. "You feeling okay? Physically, I mean, after the Homelander thing."

"Just scared," Annie said softly, managing a little half-smile. "I think he was pretty careful not to leave marks."

Because he was a fucking terrifying monster, but a careful fucking terrifying monster.

"He, like, jabbed his hand into me here, too," she added, reaching for one of Diego's hands to bring it to where she could still feel a little tenderness from where Homelander had shoved his fingers against her abdomen. "I'm not great at anatomy so I'm not sure what he was trying to...hurt, exactly?"

There had been a really gross intimacy to it all, though, so she had some guesses, and they were all horrifying.

Diego wasn't so great at anatomy either, but the fact he touched her at all was upsetting. "He's a fucking psychopath."

"He is," Annie said quietly, shaking her head. And the strongest Supe in the world, so, like, awesome. "He kind of upped his ante on like...the stalker thing with us, too. He knew about Valentine's Day."

Which, you know, had been almost a full month and a half before Annie had auditioned for the team, so either he'd been watching them before she'd ever tried out -- unlikely, but very weird -- or he'd been doing research, which was maybe even more upsetting because of the sheer effort he would have gone through.

Edited 2021-06-01 17:25 (UTC)

"All of it?" he asked. He didn't know what was worse, Homelander knowing Diego had powers or Homelander being a huge pervert.

Probably the last one.

"All of it," Annie confirmed. "I told him all he saw was me blowing my secret identity, but he knew...like, about the car."

So it was both! Both!

"He was all accusatory about you being secret," she added, a little helpless. "I tried to just say you were, like, private -- it's true -- and he busted that out."

And he'd had a hand around her throat, so Annie wasn't sure whether she had seemed convincing, or just desperate for him to believe her.

"That's really gross." He was stuck on the car thing for just a moment. Like...he was pretty sure you couldn't see much but clearly you could see something.

You could see them get in, you could see a light in there a few minutes later...and you could make an educated guess, given Supe biology.

So at least Homelander knew that, like, Diego looked after his girlfriend's needs? That was...reassuring, right?

"It's all so gross," Annie replied. "The stalking, the way he touched me, the -- Hughie stuff. Maeve tried to warn me how he was. I should have listened better."

Or, you know, Maeve could have been clear for once in her life, but that option didn't allow Annie to blame herself.

"To be fair, Maeve probably should have been less drunk when she warned you." He didn't know for sure that she was drunk, but it was an educated guess from what he heard.

"Probably." She'd at least been working on it. "And I wasn't like...in a great headspace, either time she's talked to me about you," Annie noted.

Once it had been after the Deep thing, and once it had been after the last Homelander thing.

"He's made comments that make me think that he'd probably like you more if he knew you had powers," she added with a little wrinkle of her nose. "I think there's a reason he and Stormfront...like, get along."

She didn't know just how alike they were, yet, but they were both blatant bigots. She could see that much for herself.

"You have powers and he treats you great. God, these people suck," Diego said, shaking his head. "I'm really glad you got out of there."

Sure, they were about to go right back there, but they were safe for the night at least.

Yes, well, Annie was a person with powers who was helping, in Homelander's words, mud people, but she wasn't going to repeat something that disgusting.

"Me too," Annie said softly, and now it was hitting her all over again how close she'd come to being killed today. And how close she'd come back in New Jersey. And how this wasn't anywhere near being over.

And -- okay. Okay. She wasn't going to ask him again if he was sure he wanted to help, but she was going to slip her arms back around Diego and cling kind of tight, because she'd started shaking a little bit once she really allowed herself to think again. "I'm not used to dealing with people scarier than me," she said quietly. "Especially not bad people."

"I know," he said, holding on to her tightly. "This is all fucked. You're not alone in this, at least."

Hearing that made Annie relax just the tiniest, tiniest bit, even as her mind was protesting that she was alone in all of it, and that she was making a huge mistake by bringing Diego into the middle of this.

It was easy enough to ignore, given that she was also awash with relief at the idea of having him with her. That comfort was worth a whole lot, even if Annie kind of hated herself for how weak she thought it made her.

"I love you," she said softly. "Thank you."

It seemed like too little, just thank you, but it was taking a lot of effort for Annie to even admit that she needed this.

"I love you too," he said, leaning in for a kiss. "That's the only time you get to thank me, got it? I want to be with you. I asked to go with you."

Annie leaned into the kiss gratefully, sighing out a little more tension.

"It's going to be so dangerous," she murmured after a moment, staying close.

That was not a protest! Or an argument! Just...like, an acknowledgement of why she was and had been worried about involving him.

But Annie was also able to appreciate that Diego had been watching her leave and go off into what they both knew was a dangerous situation for weeks, and if he could trust her to be careful as possible, then she could extend the same courtesy to him.

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