#hskjdhj this one was lowkey so ufn

[thetomorrowshow]

apologies

empires superpowers au masterlist (currently out of date)

a story that takes place during chapter 10 of ‘poisoned rats’.

cw: past abuse, anxiety, food

~

“Hi, Major!”

Jimmy starts, looks behind them.

Blossom is standing on the curb across the road, opening up a mailbox to remove the contents.

Scott waves back cheerily, one hand still unlocking the front door. “Hey, Blossom! Your garden looks so cute today!”

“Scott,” Jimmy mutters, tugging anxiously on the hem of his own hoodie. “Scott. Can we please go in?”

“Aw, thanks! Hi, Major’s roommate! How are you doing?”

That’s Blossom. He can’t—he looks over at Scott, silently begging him to unlock the door and let him in so he doesn’t have to answer.

“We’re both doing wonderful,” Scott replies, in lieu of Jimmy saying anything. Blossom smiles widely, and Jimmy’s close to actually tapping Scott on the shoulder because they’ve been standing there with the keys in the lock for what feels like hours and he really doesn’t feel comfortable making small talk with Blossom, of all people.

“Scott, please,” he whispers, and Scott finally notices his distress and pushes the door open, stepping aside to let Jimmy in.

Jimmy pushes past him, uncaring of how rude it probably seems, as Scott calls another pleasantry across the road.

It wasn’t his first venture out of the house, but only his third, and he’d been on edge the entire time at the hardware store, had barely been able to give his opinion on the paint swatches he was supposed to be looking at.

They’re painting his room, as much as he insists he’s fine with the white walls. He’d decided on a pale green eventually, and now he sets the two cans of paint down on the dining room table and puts his hands beside them and just tries to breathe.

He’s fine. It’s fine. He lives in a neighborhood of superheros, of course he’s going to run into them at some point. It’s unreasonable to think that he can live in total isolation and still get better.

He’d just prefer they were strangers.

The front door closes. “Jimmy?”

Jimmy doesn’t look up, just presses his hands harder into the table. “I’m fine,” he lies, voice shaking.

Scott sounds unsure when he next speaks. “Was it—was it just someone talking to you? Or was there something else?”

There are some things that Scott will just let go. Things that he clearly doesn’t know how to handle, so he doesn’t push and accepts that it’s something Jimmy isn’t capable of and they leave it at that.

This is clearly not one of those things.

“I’ve hurt her,” he manages, swallowing past the lump in his throat. “Both recently, and . . . before. I’ve—I’ve hurt all of them, Scott, I’ve hurt Pearl and Gem and the Mad King and—”

“Do you want to sit down?” interrupts Scott, and Jimmy nods gratefully and lets Scott take him by the arm and lead him to the living room sofa.

“Jimmy,” Scott starts, glancing uncertainly at him, “they don’t . . . Blossom doesn’t know, you know? Most of them don’t know who you are.”

Most implies that some of them do, and that does little to calm Jimmy’s nerves anyway. The facts of the matter are that Jimmy’s hurt a lot of people whether he meant to or not, and some of those people just happened to be well-loved and extremely powerful superheroes, and if he tries to apologize and explain to any of them, he’s more likely to be killed or jailed than forgiven.

“Who does know?”

Scott bites his lip. “Gem, for sure. She knows just about everything, actually, and she’s a very forgiving person and is fine with it.”

Gem is one of the people he’s hurt the worst—he remembers hurting her so badly back when she first became a hero that she was out of commission for weeks.

He needs to apologize in person.

“And because Gem knows, fWhip knows, and maybe Mythics and Pearl, considering whatever weird friendship they all have.”

Great. That doesn’t make him panic any less. He knew that Mythics knew the connection between Solidarity and the Canary due to less than fortunate circumstances, and he’d had a hand in kidnapping Gem so that makes sense anyways. fWhip doesn’t particularly like him, but if he hasn’t said anything then hopefully he doesn’t have to reach out. Pearl is an unknown.

“Oh, and Joel, of course,” Scott waves off, and Jimmy frowns.

“Joel?”

Scott blinks, his face falling. “Forget I said anything?” he tries half-heartedly. Then he shrugs, grins at Jimmy. “Eh, you would’ve learned it eventually. That’s the Mad King, he helped a lot in getting you and Gem out of there.”

Okay, that’s not . . . that’s not too bad. His memory is, admittedly, blurry, but he can vaguely recall the Mad King turning up at the end of . . . that day.

At least it’s not the entire city. Jimmy knows that Scott had had to pull some pretty powerful strings to arrange for his identity to be kept a secret, which he’s forever grateful for. It’s just utterly terrifying, knowing that there are so many people who do know who he is, and those people just so happen to be those wronged by him.

He clenches his hands into fists to keep them from shaking. “I need—I need to apologize to them. If I can.”

Scott doesn’t answer at first, just surveys him with an unreadable expression. “You sure?”

Jimmy nods. It’s absolutely terrifying, but he has to do it—just like how he still has to apologize to Lizzie.

Maybe apologizing with other people, for less important transgressions, will make the eventual confrontation with his estranged sister easier.

“Well, there’s actually a neighborhood barbeque this weekend,” Scott offers, and there’s something—there’s something sly in his voice, something suspicious, but Scott’s face is open and innocent when Jimmy meets his eyes. “Masked, of course. We could go to that, and you could see those people in person.”

Already, a pit in his stomach opens, dread spilling out of it. It’s Tuesday. That only gives him a couple of days before he has to see these people. Barely any time to plan anything, barely any time to try to find the words that he’s been searching for for the past five weeks while he postpones Lizzie’s visits.

Scott’s been talking a lot lately about spontaneity.

Jimmy used to live his life based around spontaneity.

Maybe he can just . . . be spontaneous again. It’s been so long since he didn’t have a schedule (even if it wasn’t one that he planned out), so long since he just rolled with the punches.

Maybe this will be good for him.

-

Jimmy’s precisely thirty seconds into the barbeque and he knows it will not be good for him.

It’s being hosted in the Mad King’s backyard, just down the street, and he and Scott are early enough that they’re the second to arrive, just after Blossom.

“She’s usually on time to stuff,” Scott whispers to Jimmy as they help the Mad King—or, Joel—lug coolers out onto the patio. “Gem is too, but if she’s bringing fWhip along she’ll be late.”

Gem doesn’t arrive at six on the dot, so Jimmy assumes fWhip is coming along. Joy.

It’s not a large group that’s gathered in Joel’s backyard by the time a half hour has passed, but there are several unfamiliar faces—or, masks, rather. Scott mentions that they don’t necessarily all live here, but there are many upstart heroes in the city and inviting them to neighborhood events is a way to show that the city-sponsored ones recognize the good they do.

He mostly sticks to Scott’s side, fiddling with the sleeves of his hoodie, tugging at his mask every so often. It feels like everyone at the party is watching him, knows who he is. There’s no way they don’t recognize him. There’s no way they don’t see his hair combined with his frame and mask and see the Canary or Solidarity.

“Hi, Major’s roommate,” Blossom greets him cheerfully when he and Scott make their way to the drinks table. She’s getting herself some lemonade; Jimmy fills a red solo cup with water and holds onto it to try and stop his hands from shaking so much.

“Hey, Blossom,” Scott says for him, picking up a cherry tomato from the vegetable spread someone had brought and popping it into his mouth. “I’m not sure I ever thanked you for catching my shift last week. Did anyone give you any trouble?”

“Not at all! I think they knew that I was around, and I wasn’t playing games, Major,” Blossom teases. Scott scoffs.

“Yeah, right. More like they decided to go easy on you.”

“Hey, TJ, right?” someone says loudly from behind him. Jimmy jumps, spins around to be face-to-face with the Mad King, a mask crooked over his eyes and a plain apron thrown over his jeans and t-shirt.

“I—uh—”

The Mad King jerks his head toward the grill. “Don’t freak out or anything, just wanted to ask for some help.”

Jimmy glances at Scott, who gives him an encouraging nod, then follows, feeling almost as though the Mad King is leading him to the gallows.

Which is entirely overdramatic, especially since the man helped rescue him in the first place.

The Mad King hands Jimmy a pair of tongs and a plate of hot dogs, explains the segment of the grill he ought to put them on, and tells him when to rotate them, even as he seasons burgers already on the grill and flips them around. Jimmy’s not quite sure what’s happening—he’s never used a grill before, so he isn’t sure if Joel’s cooking is anything particularly talented, but he’s impressed at least.

“How’ve you been holding up?” The Mad King asks after a moment, voice low. Jimmy blinks.

“Um. I’m—well, I’m here?”

Joel snorts. “Yeah, I thought that was kind of weird, really. What’d Major have to do to convince you to come to the superhero barbecue?”

At some point while crossing the yard, Jimmy had set down his cup. He wishes that he still had it, so that both his hands could be occupied. Instead, he stuffs one in his hoodie pocket, and very carefully turns a hot dog with the other.

“I want to apologize,” he says eventually. “I—to the people who know who I am. S—Major said, like—like, Gem, and fWhip know? And maybe Pearl? But I don’t know . . . I don’t. . . .”

“Know how to, like, start a conversation like that?” Joel suggests, and Jimmy nods. Joel clicks his tongue. “Go for it blunt. ‘Hi, my name’s TJ, I beat you up a couple times. How ‘bout we let bygones be bygones, yeah?’ Like that.”

“Absolutely not,” Jimmy says instantly, horrified by the idea. “I can’t just—I need to do it right—”

“‘Hi, Gem, remember when I kidnapped you and submitted you to torture? That’s my bad. Want to play pin the tail on the donkey?’”

“Oh my gosh—”

“‘Oh, fWhip! Yeah, I’m the guy who broke your back. Good times. How’re the kids?’”

“You are something else,” Jimmy manages faintly, setting the tongs down to bury his face in his hands. “Does he really have kids? Did he really break his back?”

“Pretty sure he didn’t break his back, you know, but yeah, his back got broken. Not sure about the kids.”

“I’m never going to get through this,” Jimmy mutters, slightly hysterical. “I’m going to die here. I’m going to panic and break something and then Scott will send me away and—”

“Hey, hey, secret identities,” the Mad King chides. Jimmy presses his fingers into his eyes, trying to regulate his breathing. After a moment, there’s a heavy pat-pat on his shoulder that he just barely doesn’t flinch away from.

“There, there,” Joel says awkwardly. It’s out-of-place enough that Jimmy laughs a bit, sucking in a long breath.

When he can, he lifts his face, picks the tongs back up, returns to watching the hot dogs cook. He glances around, checking to see if anyone’s watching. Everything’s going as normal, nobody seems to have noticed—even Scott, across the yard and lightyears away, is just laughing at some joke Pearl made.

“Sorry,” Jimmy says. Joel chuckles.

“How about you just start with apologizing to me?”

Well, the Mad King is on his apology list. But though he’d just been talking with him, though the conversation even seems almost friendly, Jimmy’s suddenly sweating from everywhere, heart jumping into his throat.

He has to do this.

“I’m—sorry,” he ekes out. He sets the tongs down, then doesn’t know what to do with his hands, and picks them back up. He avoids making eye contact with the Mad King. “For—for all the times I hurt you as the Canary. Or as Solidarity. I wasn’t—things weren’t going great. And also that time I hit you with a trash can.”

“Twice,” Joel points out.

Jimmy swallows. “Yeah. Twice.”

“Those are probably done, by the way,” Joel says, holding out the plate. Mechanically, Jimmy layers the hot dogs onto it.

“Honestly, TJ?” says Joel, flipping a burger and setting another one on the plate. “I’m really surprised you’re even here. It’s been, what—five weeks? Six? Since you got here?”

Jimmy nods.

“Right. Well, if I were you, I’d—I’d be bloomin’ terrified. I wouldn’t have even left my room. You just being here—even if you don’t talk to anyone else—that’s huge, in my opinion.”

Jimmy nods again, glances over to Scott, who is now alone. He starts to sidle away—he isn’t sure how to end conversations, really, he hasn’t had much practice and Scott never minds it when he just heads out to avoid the ending part, but Joel holds a hand out, offers him a small grin.

“And thanks. I accept your apology,” he says, before waving Jimmy on. “Go on, have a good time. Or don’t, more likely. At least eat something, yeah? Lizzie would kill me if she knew you weren’t eating.”

Jimmy doesn’t process that until he’s halfway across the yard, but when he does, he freezes in his tracks.

And it kind of makes sense, when he thinks about it. He’d witnessed the Mad King in battles teamed up with his sister, and they’d both gone with Scott to rescue him.

He tables that for a later date. Maybe Scott knows something about it. He doesn’t really want to strike up another conversation with the Mad King just to ask about it—as nice as he is, he is a little disconcerting.

Jimmy continues toward Scott, only to freeze again when someone taps him on the shoulder.

He spins around, and—fWhip.

fWhip offers him a toothy grin. “Hey, Major’s roommate, yeah? How long have you guys . . . you know. . . ?”

Jimmy stares back, mouth slightly agape. One of the people he definitely has to talk to, and the anxiety in his chest is bubbling up past boiling point.

fWhip’s grin fades. “Right. Um. Anyway, my sister and I—that is, Gem—we were wondering if we could chat with you for a quick minute? I promise we won’t keep you from Scott for very long.”

Which is an odd thing to say, but not exactly wrong. Jimmy thinks for a moment longer—for all he knows, they’ll lead him to a back alley somewhere and beat him up—but he’d deserve it, really, so he decides to go along.

Gem is waiting just inside the house, leaning against the kitchen counter. She smiles wryly, waves a little bit.

“Hi,” she greets him. “Are you still the Canary, or just Solidarity?”

Jimmy winces. “Er, neither,” he says stiltedly. “Just—just TJ. If that’s okay.”

“You weren’t mind-controlled, were you?” fWhip says bluntly. “The Mad King always said you weren’t. And—”

“TJ,” Gem interrupts. “I wanted to say I’m sorry. Mythics told us how badly you were hurting, and we never even noticed anything was wrong. It’s made me rethink my approach to being a hero. I want to help people, but I think I made things worse for you, and I’m sorry.”

Jimmy blinks. Tries to process that.

She’s apologizing to him? But—he doesn’t deserve that, he doesn’t deserve it when he’s the one who hurt her over and over before he was even Xornoth’s, then kidnapped her and subjected her to torture.

His head feels a bit like it’s spinning.

“I mean, I’m not gonna apologize,” fWhip says, shrugging. “But no hard feelings, yeah? I think we’ve both been in some pretty bad situations recently. So yeah.”

Jimmy swallows a few times. At least fWhip hadn’t apologized, he’s not sure what he would’ve done if he had.

“I’m sorry, too,” he forces out. “I shouldn’t have—I hurt you, both of you, a lot. You didn’t do anything.”

“It’s fine,” Gem says at the same time that fWhip says, “Thanks for apologizing.” They exchange a look, then both turn back to Jimmy.

“I know Major pretty well,” Gem says. “I trust him to be a good judge of character. I look forward to getting to know you, TJ.” She smiles warmly, then slides past him and out the backdoor.

“I don’t really trust you,” fWhip says. “Or Major, really. But I trust Gem. So, just . . . glad you’re reforming and all that. See ya.”

And then Jimmy’s alone in the kitchen, and that hadn’t exactly gone as anticipated. It hadn’t gone at all like anticipated, actually.

He’s going to need a couple of days to come to terms with that.

Jimmy heads back out, making a beeline for Scott. This time, nobody pulls him aside, and he can get all the way to him with no issue. Scott raises an eyebrow, but Jimmy shakes his head, so Scott just points him to the grill.

“Go get something to eat, yeah? We can leave after that if you aren’t comfortable.”

Joel shoots him a grin when he takes a hot dog, and Gem passes him the mayo at the condiments table, and Blossom corners him by the chips to ask him if he and Scott have seen the latest episodes of some unknowable TV show (and when he says they haven’t, she gushes about it for a good ten minutes while he tries to eat, frequently giving him strange looks whenever she brings up the main character’s romance).

It’s a lot. It’s inevitable that something goes wrong—and it does, but nothing big, just Jimmy trips over a small crack in the patio that quickly becomes a very large crack as the corner of the paving splits off.

He looks over at Joel, who shrugs, then back to Scott, who calls out an apology to Joel. And that’s it. Joel turns back to his conversation with Pearl and that’s it.

For the first time that evening, the knot in Jimmy’s chest loosens a little bit.

And if he can handle this, then talking to Lizzie will be a piece of cake.