Haven slowly opened her eyes and suppressed a sigh. Morning. Or rather, almost afternoon. Her late patrols with Achilles meant she would stay up quite late. Even though it was past 11:00, she was still tired. Despite that, she dragged herself out of bed, being careful not to wake up James. Running a hand through her messy hair, she wandered to the bathroom to shower.
The past week had been quiet. Too quiet, after all the nonsense that had been going on. First, a couple of Miracle villains had landed in jail a week ago today, then on Monday Team Chaos had suffered a major hit and hadn't been seen since.
It was good that patrols were quiet, but she couldn't help but feel a sense of foreboding. When would the next problem crawl out of the woodwork? What was Team Chaos up to behind the scenes?
She could never truly relax. Even while Achilles, Knight and Light Master cheered about how they'd won, she felt anxiety rolling around in her stomach. Yesterday, she'd even felt like she'd throw up. Luckily she hadn't - it would have been too easy for someone to see past her illusion if she had - but the icky feeling remained in her gut.
As she did her hair after the shower, she sighed. This was exhausting. It had never been this hard to keep up the facade before. Whoever she dated, whoever was taken in by her carefully crafted persona, they weren't with her as much as these guys were. Achilles especially. When he'd asked her to move into the same room as him, she hadn't felt like she could refuse.
And there went her one place that was truly her own.
Haven couldn't afford to let her mask slip for even a moment. This was what she had wanted. She had a place beside someone strong and reasonable, someone kind, someone important. She was finally worth something.
So why did it all feel so empty?
"Maiden?"
As she headed down to eat, James seemed to wake up. Haven nearly jumped, but held herself back and forced a smile.
"Morning, James." He smiled back at her.
"Ready for another day of heroing?"
"Always. Do you want anything specific for lunch?"
"Whatever you're having." James stretched and hopped up, then went to get dressed. Haven turned and headed for the kitchen.
What was she even having? She hadn't thought about it. In that case, it would probably be best to make one of James' favourites. If he decided he didn't like her anymore, her life may as well be over. Best to do her best to stay in his good graces - though obviously without him noticing she was trying.
Something simple that James liked...
Right. Sandwiches with flavoured cricket and plenty of vegetables. He wasn't as big a fan of some of the vegetables, but he'd enjoy it enough and Haven could pretend they were her idea. The vegetables would make everything healthier.
With that decided, Haven set to work. No one was in the kitchen at this time of day - Prime and Knight were on patrol, and Light Master never bothered to prepare his own food. He mostly used his hero money to buy takeout. The kid really needed to better learn to take care of himself. Alas, James considered him a peer, so nobody could really treat him like a kid, least of all Haven. She had to stay as the perfect girlfriend.
By the time she'd thrown the sandwiches together, James was on his way down the stairs. Haven took a breath as she sliced the last sandwich in half and plastered a smile on her face again.
"I just made some sandwiches," she said as he came into the kitchen. Haven held one plate out to him, and James took it with a grin.
"Nice. What kind?"
"Dill pickle cricket with some veggies." Hers, of course, was a slightly different flavour. She wasn't a fan of dill pickle flavouring on cricket. Instead, she'd given herself plain salt and pepper cricket.
"How'd you know that's my favourite?" James asked with a wink. Haven forced herself to smile shyly and look away. He liked it when she acted bashful.
They moved to the table and ate the sandwiches. When James asked if Haven had the same sandwiches as him, she lied and said yes. Not like he'd look in the garbage and see that there were two different packages of flavoured cricket in there.
"Can't wait for patrols today," James said with a grin.
"Do you think something's going to happen?" Haven nervously chewed through her sandwich.
"Something has to happen soon, right? I mean, everything's been so quiet. I'm hoping for some action."
Haven bit back a retort about the 'action' he'd just gotten last night and looked away.
"I mean, Paris is still out there, right? I'd feel better if he were out in the open doing stuff, but with things the way they are I just don't know what he's up to. Best to keep him within eyeshot, right?"
Why don't you two just admit you're in love with each other?
Haven couldn't say that, of course, but Achilles seemed to talk about Paris an awful lot. To the point where Haven kind of wondered why she even tried. How could a mere teammate compete with a destined rival?
At least he still paid attention to her. For now.
"You don't think it's better if they just stay down and don't come back?" Haven asked carefully.
"That's not going to happen. That's not how stories work. The hero and their destined villain have to have a big flashy show down. Things won't end until that happens, and I put him out of commission for good."
"So you'll kill him?"
"Of course not! Dustin's..."
James paused and stared at the wall pensively for several minutes, as if collecting his thoughts. Interesting how he had enough in his head to need that much time to collect them.
"Dustin was my best friend. It's...fate that we're rivals like this. My job is to stop him. To teach him that he's wrong, and that there's a better way to be. I'll get through to him, no matter how long it takes."
Haven stared down at the table, biting her tongue.
How many more people would have to suffer before Achilles 'got through' to Paris? People didn't just change because you wanted them to. You couldn't fix someone. If they were toxic, they'd stay toxic. No matter how hard you tried, they'd never change.
She knew that better than anyone.
James kept talking about his destiny and Paris, but Haven tuned him out. Two hours until their next patrol. Then she'd be free of James for two hours, and have to deal with making people believe she was a perfect superhero.
The acting never ended.
