“Alright, Sky…”SDN had some weird priorities — that was something he was coming to terms with pretty quickly. Like the SDN-issued ice pack was just an example of that, budget and all; cheap material having gone from properly cold to just a soggy mess in almost no time at all.Despite that, he kept it pressed tight against his temple, wishing every annoyance in the world on whoever was in charge of writing the word ‘Ice’ on the blue SDN-branded gel pack. The wet plastic was pretty much a dead fish by now, a lukewarm sack of regret sticking to a scar that hadn’t decided if it wanted to be numb or angry about getting split open again.
It definitely didn’t help that every throb in his aching skull kept perfect time with the too-fast clack-clack-clack of the keyboard two feet in front of him, his head the perfect metronome for the typing of his dispatcher.“Alright?” He answered with a barely held-back groan, Sky leaning back against the gray felt-covered wall that covered this whole floor. Cubicle hell.
Just rows and rows of them going back further than he cared to count or keep track of, bright fluorescence buzzing down on him in the same pitch that seemed a universal constant. A phone rang twice somewhere off in the distance, picked up mid-ring just for whatever voice that answered it to get swallowed up by an air conditioning vent kicking on.
The monitor directly in front of his dispatcher was all flat and bright, a proper high-def LCD screen crammed into a thick fat-backed casing that came right out of the eighties. Makes no sense.
"Alright." Robert Robertson echoed the exact same word again, the dispatcher slouched deep in his squeaky rolling chair; blue SDN shirt unbuttoned and untucked. "Walk me through it one more time."
"...one more time?"
"Yeah." The man sighed as his fingers hovered over the clunky keys in front of him. "Just in your own words. The situation."
Sky shifted his weight off the wall, ribs pulling tight as his lip as the skin there split again, scab tearing just enough to fill his mouth with the sharp metal taste of copper. "Two dudes." He swallowed it down before he found the rest of the words, shifting the ice pack against his head one more time. "Drunk. Fighting each other before I even got there. That part-”“Yeah, yeah…” The dispatcher waved him off. “That part I know.”“They said some slick shit to me, swung on me first too." Sky allowed himself a shrug, only to bite down a grunt when the motion tugged at his aching ribs. "Then they stopped bein' a problem."
"Sure, sure, yeah.” Robert's fingers didn't slow one bit with the clack-clack-clack, eyes locked on the fat-backed LCD. “And, uh… did you happen to attempt any de-escalation?"
De-escalation? Sky stared at the back of that auburn-brown head, trying to burn a bald spot in there with all the willpower he had in him. The needle behind his right eye dug in deeper the longer he glared, a hot little needle of pressure right under the thick scar tissue there. Sure, I de-escalated fine.
"...Yes, sir."
"Right-right.” One hand left the keys just to scratch at the stubble peppering his jaw. "And how exactly did you do that?"“...with words.”“I mean…” The man blinked up at him for a moment. “What words did you use?”
"Told ‘em to wrap it up."
"Told them to wrap it up." Robert III typed that in word for word, testing the sentence as his mouth barely moved. "And I’m gonna guess you gave them a verbal warning before… uh, applying force?"
Sky slowly lowered the ice pack a full three inches, water dripping down the wrist as he blinked down at the man like he'd asked him what color a cloud was "The warning was implied."
The typing stopped before the last word left SDN’s newest probationary hero, Robert Robertson III blinking slowly up at him. “By what?”
"By them having eyes—" Sky barely held himself back from grinding his teeth. "Sir."
A pair of scarred hands hung over the keyboard, suspended there like the man was giving the sentence a second to grow legs and walk its way over to making more sense.
Sky stared right back at him, holding eye contact. "...Something wrong?"
Robert didn’t bother answering that time, not even with a question as the man just let out a breath and turned his attention and focus back to the glowing beige screen. For the next few seconds, he started typing and typing — the man entering something significantly longer than what Sky had actually told him. What’s he even… Sky leaned forward a little, trying to peek at the monitor without being obvious about it — only to wince as the bright light just sharpened the throb in his head to a dagger.
A blur of yellow knit came around the cubicle partition, the scent of sour cream and onion thick enough to wrinkle Sky’s nose as it cut through the stale office ozone.
"You cannot…”
Bright blue eyes blinked down to find an old Black man standing there, a chipped coffee mug held loose in one hand as he leaned his weight up against the back of his dispatcher’s rolling chair.
"...write 'warning was implied by them having eyes' on an official report form."
"I can spell it for you if that's the issue." Sky's voice went hard and flat, the polite mask cracking at the corners to let some teeth through. "W-A-R—"
"Don't test me, boy." The old man’s heavy-lidded eyes narrowed up at him from somewhere around chest height. “I’m not the one.”
“And I’m not the two…” Sky narrowed his own right back at the white-haired figure who looked like he’d been around since before Sky’s grandparents had a Social Security number. “...sir.”
“Great…” Robert groaned low, two pale fingers digging hard into his own temples like that was actually gonna fix the headache. "Great system we got here. Really just... humming along."
Cold water ran a fresh line down his wrist as he raised an eyebrow at the man he answered to now. For someone who’d started the same day as him, apparently, Robert Robertson III managed to look wrung out in a way that didn’t seem to have much to do with the actual hour at all. Especially since — Sky glanced past the cubicle wall at a clock — it was barely two in the goddamn afternoon.Hell, he still wasn’t all that sure whether the dispatcher actually gave half a damn about any of this or if the guy had just stopped being surprised by anything a real long time ago. For some reason, there was something familiar about that, even if Sky couldn’t put a finger on exactly why yet.The man didn't yell, though.
Which was… kinda impressive, actually; just watching the man just absorb every dumb thing coming out of Sky's mouth like he’d heard it all before.
"Y'all always do reports like this?" Sky frowned. "Feel like I'm getting interrogated."
"Every incident report reads like this when a dispatch goes a little off.” The old man didn't look up.
Robert tilted his head. “I mean, Legal is a thing, Chase."
Chase scoffed. "Legal needs Jesus."
"How're we doing here?"
A bright voice showed up before the sound of heels on tile did, West Coast sunshine projected down the row of cubicles. A golden-yellow cape caught the overhead lights, throwing a little shine off it as the blonde boss of this whole place leaned over Robert's shoulder without waiting for an invite. Blue eyes, brighter than Sky’s own, scanned the text on the screen.
"Oh. You're filling out the Crypto Night report. I heard of how that went…" Sky fought the instinct to raise an eyebrow. Did you?Blue-gloved fingers rested lightly on the edge of the particleboard desk, a perfect smile locked firmly onto her face. "Wait..."
The smile tightened, a single blonde eyebrow raised high on a path to her hairline. "Both heroes are working together now?"
She looked up at Sky, a smile frozen in place. "As a duo?"
"When I woke back up," Sky pressed the ice pack back to his jaw, cold burning right against the phantom weight of a steel-toed boot that had put him there in the first place, "both Fight Men was still stompin' my ass, yeah"
The cubicle went quiet as omething flickered behind Blazer's eyes for half a second before it got smoothed right back under that managerial brightness. "Welllll..."
It was Sky’s turn to raise an eyebrow.
"Your method was unconventional, sure, but…" Blonde Blazer straightened back up to her full height, standing tall over him as her cape settled perfect against her back like it’d never known a single wrinkle. "Two heroes bonding into an actual working duo? That's definitely one for the win column. De-escalation achieved."
Blonde Blazer nodded with a thumbs-up aimed his way, that bright-white smile cranking up even brighter somehow. "Good work, Sky."
Sky's left eyelid twitched, scar tissue pulling tight as he swallowed down the taste of copper and dirty bar floor all over again. Freddy Krueger, he said. The words echoed in his head, a static hiss over the memory of the bar music. Fairy-ass name.
His fingers twitched. Bond. Sure, that was a word for it. Real Kumbaya energy in that bar.
"Thank you..."
Sky pulled his split lip back, teeth bared in a grin that he doubted counted as polite — more rictus than reasonable as his eye twitched again.
"...ma'am."