“Yes, Austin. I think you’re quite impressive. You can literally create snow and ice from nothing and now I learn you can also…hide in darkness? It’s a never-ending list of impressive things.”
He laughed then winced. “I told you to stop doing that.”
“Sorry.”
“Also, it’s not hiding in darkness. I can control shadows, blend in, use them as spies. When I’m not harnessing my freezing powers it actually takes a lot of effort to keep my shadows from…hovering.”
“So you’re using your energy to keep them at bay right now?”
“I’ve been holding them back for so long, it’s just a subconscious thing at this point. But yes, I am.”
“Do they fully engulf you?” I was using the talking as a distraction, he hadn’t even noticed I pulled the bullet in his shoulder loose.
“No.”
“Stop.” I placed the tweezers down, switching it out for the gauze and rubbing alcohol again.
“What?”
“Stop holding them back, let them free. As long as I can still work on you, there’s no reason you should be wasting your energy.”
“Okay.”
At first nothing happened. I almost thought he was messing with me until the shadows started to take form; little glimpses materializing, moving like they were living, breathing entities. They coiled around him, not venturing too far, moving close to me then pulling away. They almost seemed…curious.
“They’re incredible.”
I reached out to see if I could touch one—if it would let me. It shied away from my hand, so I pulled back. But it was still curious, following my movements as I put the alcohol and gauze on the coffee table, then worked the other side of his shirt open.
He hissed as the fabric pulled away.
“I told you to do my shoulder first.”
“I did.”
“But—” He cut himself off when he looked down and saw the hole in his shoulder already starting to close. “Shit, I didn’t even feel it.”
“You were distracted.” I smiled.
“Keep talking, it helps.”
“Well, now I don’t know what to talk about, this is far too much pressure.”
He chuckled; this time he didn’t wince. An improvement.
“I overheard you in the bar, the day you met Eva. You’ve been here for six years?”
I shrugged, picking up the tweezers for the last time.
“Not exactly. I grew up in Mountainside, but when I moved out at twenty, I found this place. It was a long commute from my house to the hospital, being so close to work felt like a miracle. Thenthe incidenthappened and this whole area went to shit. Luckily, my parents had put me in self-defence classes from a very young age.”
“Do you see them often? You were visiting them whenthe incidenthappened, right?”
I nibbled my lip. He trusted me with two of his secrets, I could trust him with one of mine.
“I lied. I was supposed to but they cancelled because the pipes burst at our cottage. I stayed locked in my apartment through the whole thing. I found out when I tried to go back to work. They were just getting the water cleaned out, the quarantines weren’t lifted, the bodies were still being cleared out of the streets. After I heard that everyone either got superpowers or dead, I decided to keep my mouth shut. I got neither.”
He was listening so intensely; he hadn’t flinched as I pulled the final bullet loose. I traded the tweezers for the gauze and rubbing alcohol one last time before I continued.
