Running From Himself 3-6 (Patreon)

"I still can't believe people don't recognize us with a hat on and some regular clothes."

Gold-painted fingernails yanked down the brim of a brand-new Dodgers cap, the blue fabric doing almost nothing to hide a pair of stormy gray eyes that scanned a crowd of exhausted parents and screaming toddlers.

“What’d I tell you?”Nubia grunted at Reggie’s reply, the woman swimming in a plain white Hanes tee and gray sweatpants that would only really be her size if she started eating like he did. “How am I supposed to remember anything you say?” An eyebrow raised itself high as the woman folded her arms, somehow managing to look as imperious even when her gold-and-white Vought branding was buried under a bunch of the most basic clothing she could find. “You run your mouth more than you do your feet.”

…I’mma take that as a compliment. Reggie wasn’t sure how he was supposed to, but he’d figure it out. 

Walking beside Nubia, he kept his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his oversized generic black hoodie, charcoal beanie pulled all the way down to his eyebrows as he tried to pretend he didn’t have security eyeing him from the moment he walked in. The recycled air was thick with Auntie Anne’s and other perfumes, Roosevelt Field Mall’s overconditioned atmosphere washing over him with basic mall smells and the white noise of hundreds of bodies milling around. 

"Imma say it again for you, ‘cause I know you don’t listen.” He leaned out of the way of a swing that might have had a normal man laid up in the hospital for a good day, laughing his ass off at Nubia’s scowl. “If people don't expect to see a superhero walking in the crowd with them, they don't see a superhero walking in the crowd with them.”It was simple enough, and pretty obvious; something he remembered from his first life, his normal one, after hearing about how the guy who played Superman could just walk around in glasses in the heart of New York. "People only really look up when somebody’s flying or being flashy. Down here?” He slid to the side, edging back to Nubia as he dodged a double-wide stroller the size of a golf cart. “We just look like two tired people trying not to lose a kid."

Speaking of the kid, Maya Nubian was only a few yards ahead of them; the little girl pressed flat against the thick glass of a Build-A-Bear Workshop, both palms slapping against the window as she shouted back at the both of them.

"You think you're real smart, don't you?" 

Reggie shot the tall woman a sideways glance. “No need to think, my heart.” He flashed his teeth with a grin, turning his head just enough for her to catch it. “Your boy knows what he knows.” 

"Don't move too fast, boy." Nubia scoffed back at him, gray eyes rolling hard enough she could see the ceiling. 

He didn’t miss the way her mouth twitched though, just enough to make the grin on his face flash even brighter. Smile for me, bumblebee. You know you want to.

Speaking of boys, Reggie allowed his thoughts to drift back to the cavalcade of fuck-ups that were still using his mansion, Lamplighter included. Need to get them the fuck out of there as soon as this Vought testimony is over. He fought the frown back down at the thought of a certain particular fuck-up. Kenji and Lil Kim and… The scowl was strong, but he was stronger. Okay, pretty much all of them can stay, but Beans and Toast needs to get the fuck on.

Shaking his head at the thought of Billy Butcher, Reggie adjusted his beanie as he and Nubia walked side by side, hands close enough to touch and then even closer than that, squeezing even tighter to dodge a group of teenagers glued to their phones.

"Not gonna lie, it’s a little weird. Didn’t expect you to say yes when I asked you out." Reggie kept talking, eyes on the bouncing yellow blur that was Maya Nubian in front of them. “Thought you might swing at me again.”“I did swing at you again.”Reggie tilted his head to that. “Yeah, but you ain’t put any heat on that thing. ‘Sides, you still said yes.”“Because I’m not rude.”Reggie shot her another side-eye just to meet a pair of gray eyes narrowed back at him. I’m not even gonna take that one. “Whatever you say, Bia. Still weird, though.”A groan left the woman’s lips. “You do run your mouth a lot. What’s weird now?”“I’m just saying…” He kept his eyes locked on Maya as she kept smacking the glass, yelling something muffled at the stuffed animals just inches away. “Don’t people wait until the third date to introduce the kid to the new guy? You kind of skipped ahead on that one."

“Yeah, well, most people don’t have their kid’s life saved by the new guy, so…” Nubia’s laugh came out sharp and short. "You mind?"

"Nah," Reggie bumped his shoulder right up against hers, on purpose this time. "Pretty sure Maya's the sweetest thing about you."

Nubia’s jaw shifted, mouth open with something sharp ready to fire open. A breath later, it simply stayed like that as the woman looked at her daughter currently jumping up and down in front of a bin of un-stuffed teddy bear skins.

"...you're probably right.” The supe deflated all at once, the words coming out quiet and almost rushed. Her chin tilted back up, vulnerability locked back away before it could melt her. “Don’t get a big head about it, though.”

Reggie allowed himself a smirk. “Told you I knew I was smart, bumblebee.”“...why bumblebee, out of all things?” Nubia clicked her tongue, the woman folding her arms again. “I get Big Bird, but bumblebee?”“Oh, that’s easy.” Reggie’s smirk grew to a grin. “You’re black, you wear yellow and you fly like a drunk.”“...I’mma kill you, Reggie Franklin.”

“Mr. Reggie!” Before Nubia could make good on that specific threat, Maya bounded back over to them, the girl nearly tripping over her own neon pink sneakers. "Mr. Reggie! The guy in the store ignored me! Like, so rude!"

“Oh no, princess.” Reggie laughed, dropping down a little to meet her at eye level. “Want me to beat him up for you?” 

Both tiny fists went up in the air as Maya voiced her approval with a hissed, “Yessss!”

“No beating up anyone.” Nubia shut the fun down instantly, hand planted firmly on her hip. “You can use your words, Maya.”

“Boooo!” Maya’s pout puffed her cheeks up into two round little balloons. “Mommy, are you sick or something?”

“You little…” Gray eyes narrowed down at Maya as the little girl just giggled, hopping a few steps back toward the safety of the stuffed-toy store. “And you…” 

Reggie aimed a finger at his chest, blinking at the woman in the Dodger’s cap.“Yes, you. Stop encouraging her.”“Encouraging…?” Reggie opened his mouth to deny what had clearly been the fault of years of violent TV and living with supes when Maya rushed up to him again, pointing her own tiny finger exactly where his had been aimed a second ago.

"Hey!" 

The speedster blinked down. “Hi?”

Maya tilted her head, attention squinted right where the zipper of his hoodie was pulled down a bit, the bright blue piping of his super-suit barely visible underneath. "Why’s that big 'Z' on your suit anyway? You went from A to B, right, so why Z?"

"That’s an easy one." Reggie straightened up, already having explained this one a few times to his own nephews. "Ya see, in physics, something happens when things move super fast closer to you, and light shifts to the blue spectrum. Long story short, the Z is the symbol for that shift. It's science, little bee."

"That’s so…” Maya blinked up at him, face scrunching up as her mouth searched for the right word. A few seconds later, she found it, “…dumb."

Reggie blinked back. "No, it’s cool."

"No, you have a big 'Z'.” Maya shook her head at him. “You should just go by Zoom. Zoom is way cooler."

"I can't go by Zoom, Maya." Reggie sighed, one hand rubbing the back of his neck as he thought about all the heat that would bring down on him; probably from Vought, too. "That'll get me sued. Copyright infringement is no joke."

"But aren't you, like, super rich?" Maya crossed her arms, the full devastating force of nine-year-old logic on display. 

“Yeah, kid.” A dry little chuckle scraped free from his throat. “That's exactly why I don't want to get sued."

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

Reggie hadn’t been expecting a lot from Build-A-Bear workshop, but things had gone a whole different way than he’d thought from the start.

Maya Regina Nubian was a precocious handful, easily as willful as her mother, and with a sense of humor that could easily belong to someone twice her age. That was made especially obvious when she completely bypassed the generic bears, all the licensed Disney characters, and the sparkly unicorns too on her march straight to the Vought-licensed merch. 

She didn't pick up the Starlight bear. She didn't even look at the Queen Maeve bear. Even a Homelander plush got knocked aside in her single-minded hurry to pick up the last-remaining A-Train plushie.

Reggie blinked at the cartoonish approximation of his likeness, complete with the blue-tinted glasses and the white and blue chest plate. "Seriously?" He leaned back against a bin of tiny stuffed sneakers, face half-buried in one hand. “Maya… you don’t want anything else?”

"Oh, this is too damn good.” Nubia was right up next to him, shaking so hard with laughter he was surprised she hadn’t ruined her makeup with her tears. “We are buying this immediately."

"It's vintage!" Maya made her defense clear, clutching the plushie to her chest. "They don't even make these anymore!"

Reggie sighed to himself, pulling his beanie even lower as eyes turned their way. "Yeah, there's a reason for that.”

The embarrassment was almost worth it when they hit GameStop ten minutes later, Maya vibrating out of her shoes as she stared at the display for the VoughtStation 5. Nubia just shook her head, mentioning the simple and honest fact that Maya hadn't cleaned her room in three weeks.

Oh, you don’t want her to have this? Bet. Reggie didn't even hesitate as he stepped up to the counter, a matte black card pulled free from his wallet. "I'll take it."

Nubia spun on him almost immediately, the woman halfway to yelling. “You are not buying my daughter a seven-hundred-dollar video game console!"

"It's her birthday next week," Reggie swiped his card with a shrug. "Besides, she’s on a date with us, right? Let her get a lil something."

“You’re the best ever!” Maya didn't give her mother a chance to argue, her little arms already wrapped around his waist in a tackle of a hug. "I'm totally calling you Zoom now!"

“Please…” Reggie patted her back, biting back a groan. “Please don’t.”

By the time they stepped out of the Gamestop, Reggie carrying the massive white VoughtStation box under his arm, Maya was already skipping ahead with her A-Train plushie clutched tight.

Nubia’s mouth was already half-open, probably ready to lecture him about spoiling her kid, when the noise hit.

Breaking over the ambient noise of the mall was a scream; sharp, jagged and terrified enough to make everyone that heard it — him, included — freeze up.

A thud vibrated through the whole place, glass storefronts rattling around them as another scream joined in with the first; more and more and more overlapping and compounding into a wave of pure panic.

"Maya, get behind me!" Nubia’s snap came out the same moment as Reggie dropped the VoughtStation box, cardboard hitting the floor with a hollow smack. 

He was already in motion before super-mom could get the next sentence out, vaulting the glass of the second-floor concours as the world around him dropped into a blue-tint that made everything shudder.

Gravity turned into molasses, coffee cups hovered in the air while hot brown liquid spilled in thick droplets. Shoppers slowed mid-sprint, scrambling and trampling with faces stretched out and distorted with fear. Tables and chairs were overturned and already flying, half-eaten trays of Sbarro and Panda Express scattered across the tile.

Down in the food court below, a yellow-skinned man in dirty streetwear had his head reared back, throat bulging as something steamed out of his mouth; a messy arc of battery-acid vomit suspended in the air and tracking directly toward a family huddled behind a turned-over fiberglass table.

Gravity was too slow. 

Blue lightning sparked off his sneakers as he kicked off the glass right behind him.

A split-second later, he hit the floor tiling hard enough to crack the ceramic, not slowing down as he drove his weight forward. Sneakers smoked against a freshly-waxed floor as Reggie forced his path direcly in front of the caustic sludge.C’moncmoncmon. He didn’t try to catch it and didn’t bother with trying to block it. Blue sparks bleeding off him, Reggie slid under the mess as he throttled his pace just enough to grab the father by the belt, the mother by her waist, and the two screaming kids in one hand by their shirts.

Thirty feet away, time snapped back in a rattle of a blur as he dragged all four of them backward to safety; his body in front of them like a shield as he held them close.

Vomit thicker than mud and the color of dehydrated piss splashed across the space where’d they just been, hitting the fiberglass and ceramic both with a hissing eruption of white smoke that melted straight through both. 

A heavy splatter clipped Reggie’s back and shoulder, his eyes going white from the heat and chemical burn. A choked scream forced its way out through gritted teeth as acid sludge chewed through the thick cloth of his hoodie, the whole thing dissolving into a sticky ruin.

“Motherf-!” He ripped the hoodie over his head as quick as he could, melting fabrictossed off to the side as he was left standing there, disguise blown; a bright blue ‘Z’ stark against the tight black fabric.“Ge-” Reggie bit down another hiss as he yelled at the family, shoving them toward the nearest exit. “Get outta here! Now!”

Heavy boots crunched behind him and Reggie spun around at the sound to see exactly what he expected; three raggedy-looking bastards. Fuckin’ Rojos, man.