Who: Teddy and Mia What: Superheroics and talking When: Thursday, June 20th, 2013 (bit backdated) Where: NYC Rating: R, violence, cussing, and serious trigger warning concerning topic of discussion.
Granted it was a little early to be out and about already. Little early, but not unheard of. Or perhaps it seemed early since the sun had finally finished setting, even though it was staying light outside so late now.
They were just finishing up their first patrol around the neighborhood that seemed quiet so far. She turned to her friend. “I can’t believe Tommy gave this up. I mean... I can, bu-”
She was cut off by an extremely loud wolfwhistle. Her head instantly jerked around to see where it was coming from, and when her gaze fell on the offending person it was just in time for him to make a lewd gesture and yell further at his victim. Sadly, sometimes you had to prioritize and normally she’d just yell for a street harasser to shut the fuck up if she was busy.
However, she wasn’t busy, and the girl he was yelling at, while not a child, was definitely a couple years younger than she was. “Excuse me, for a minute.” She said loading up a zipline. Almost as quick as the last word was out of her mouth she was already down there. She’d used her momentum so the guy definitely caught the sharpest part of her elbow to the nose. There was crunch, and the man’s hands went up to his nose.
“How old do you think she was?” Mia asked him angrily, while he just moaned in pain in response. “Get the fuck out of here,” She said moving a bit so she had eye contact with him. “If I see you around here again and anywhere near the girls in this neighborhood again, I’ll put one of these through each of your hands. Got me?” She asked waving an arrow slightly by her head.
The man nodded, and then he stumbled as he went to run away. Mia stuck the arrow back in her quiver and then glanced around before quickly jogging down the block and backup the fire escape of where she’d left Teddy.
~~~~~
Teddy had stayed fairly quiet on the Tommy thing. He understood the guy had different ways of dealing with what they’d been through. Teddy hurried to people and swung back into patrolling and helping where he could because it felt normal. Tommy... well, Tommy was Tommy and didn’t need people as much--and often went out of his way to prove as much.
Living with Mia had helped immensely, for Teddy. Billy was doing a bit better with the communication thing, but he was still a bit aloof. Having the Arrow-clan about to talk to had kept Teddy busy and fulfilled his social needs. Still, a person really didn’t know a person until they started living with them. Living with Mia was interesting. It was also a little wrenching, to suddenly realize there was a lot you just didn’t think about or was just never brought up about your friends. Then you wondered if you really a good friend, to miss so much about who they were.
This instance just brought that into sharp focus. He landed by her, wings folded. “Hey, enough.” He said it quietly while the guy scrambled and ran, dripping blood the entire time. Teddy’s face fixed into a wince. He’d had his nose crunched before, but at least his just bent back. That guy was not going to be so lucky. Then he looked to Mia. She still looked entirely pissed off.
Which wasn’t how she usually dealt with a lot of bad guys. Usually she went in snarking and quipping in style with a smirk. These type of situations though... “Yeah, pretty sure he’s not going to try that around here again... But, uh... Was that really necessary to threaten stigmata via arrow on him?” Not that Teddy entirely disagreed. People who abused kids were tops on the scumbag list, but something about how brutally she dealt with it bothered him, along with some other questions--things he’d overheard, things he had started to pay attention to.
“I realize this is probably super uncool to ask, but... this is too personal for you, isn’t it. I mean, guys... being...” He gestured vaguely, feeling guilty suddenly for even asking.
~~~~~~~
At that moment if Teddy had attempted some comforting shoulder pat she would have smacked his hand away. She definitely didn’t feel that she’d been too harsh. She had no patience for grown ass men being entitled creeps to women much less obviously underage teens. “She was like fourteen.” She argued. “He deserved it.” She said a tad coldly, but she did look a tad confused that he thought that was overboard.
Hands were a major weapon for those types of assholes. Didn’t Teddy see that?
Then Teddy had to go ahead and ask, and she couldn’t help the slight frown that came over her face. She really just wanted to tell him that it was super uncool to ask. Mia spent a lot of time alright. Hell, she was perfectly fine 99% of the time, but she kind of categorized her life in terms of before and after, and the only bleed through was the HIV. It worked for her, but once in awhile something happened or something was mentioned to make her think of it.
This was Teddy though, and he was living in her house for the summer. So her face lightened up a bit and she pulled down her hood and sat on the ledge of the roof so she could keep a look out. Kate knew all of this, but Kate was also gone. “Guys being creepy, rapey assholes? Yeah it’s kind of personal. Though it’s really something that should be personal to everyone.” But she knew that wasn’t what Teddy was trying to ask.
~~~~~
He sat down as well, watching her profile closely before looking out across the buildings. “...Personal... I guess it really is. It’s something that absolutely turns my stomach. Especially...” He shrugged his armored, green shoulders, trying to smile at her, but it just sort of looked pained. “Especially when you know someone who’s survived it.”
He leaned back on his clawed hands, frowning at the sky, too lit by the city lights for the stars to be seen. “You know you’re probably the strongest person I know, right? You probably don’t want to hear it, and I realize it probably is coming off patronizing, but I’ve thought that for quite some time. Just now I know it for sure.”
When his gaze turned to her again, though, it was more serious than gentle as it normally was. “Tough enough that it doesn’t need to harden you to that level. I see you lash out like that and I worry that it might.” Cause he was learning that Mia had layers, and some of the layers he saw, well, he worried about, and kicked himself for not realizing they were there.
~~~~~~
At first, and for a fraction of a second she was choosing to believe that when Teddy was referring to a survivor that Kate had something to him about her own experiences, but that didn’t last very long before Teddy was talking about Mia being the strongest person he knew. She didn’t really know how he knew, but he was living in their house now, so she was assuming there were a few things he was just picking up. It wasn’t something they talked about, but nothing was played close to the chest there. It was the one place she was the most open.
But he was talking about her hardening, and really she still wasn’t seeing much of a problem with how she dealt with that. It wasn’t like she’d really shot him, and his nose would heal. But he was being so sincere. Teddy had a lot of talents, but Mia really thought they all paled in comparison to his people skills.
She pushed her bangs out of her face, and was quiet for a couple long moments just watching the street. “I was nine.” She said not taking her eyes from the comings and goings on the street below. “My father just... Anyway, my mom was too drunk and hopped up on pills to notice, or she had and that’s why she drank so much I don’t know. He was pretty horrible to her too. After she died. He started inviting his friends over as well. I ran away when I was 12.”
~~~~~
Putting it together would have been difficult if he hadn’t started paying more attention to how differences in how she behaved, seeing how she was at home, versus the clubhouse among friends, versus bad guys, and then the different types, like the wolf-whistling jerk who probably did deserve a broken nose and more. Truthfully, at times Teddy even forgot that the energetic blond had HIV, but then he had been reminded, and again felt foolish for it, when she had a clinic appointment earlier that week. Then things had become a bit evasive when he had asked Connor how Mia had come to live with the Green Arrow (Senior). Connor was honest to a fault and hadn’t mastered social subtlety, so he had stumbled to change the subject.
He listened, jaw clenching a little, the immediate anger pushing in his chest before he willed it away. Parents were supposed to protect their kids. Well, no wonder why she takes care of herself so well. Giving favors, hardly asking for any back unless it was a sensible trade--at first he had just figured it was her good New Yorker nature, but the fierce independence now made sense. So did her street smarts and ability to talk jargon with some alley dwellers that a normal teen shouldn’t know.
“Twelve...” He repeated that quietly. Twelve and on the streets. He wanted to be angry on her behalf, be sad on her behalf, and he was, but he was being careful not to let it surface (not that he was doing a perfect job of it). If there was one thing he did know for a certainty about his spunky friend, she didn’t want to drag people down. Mia dealt without curling up as the victim. Definitely the toughest chic I know.. “So now when you see it, you beat the snot out of it.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
She didn’t turn to look at him. After all, she kind of hated the looks people gave when they heard something like that. She didn’t like pity, and she didn’t like the thought of anyone treating her differently. Not that she thought Teddy would. In fact, he always just seemed to magically know the best way to handle things, but the thought was still there.
She shrugged. She beat the snot out of a lot of things. Mia lifted a leg so she could rest her chin on her knee. “I was homeless for about 6 months.” She started, wondering if the beginning sounded like a happy story at first, until she continued. “Anyway, there was this guy, and his name was Richard, and he took me in. It happened really fast, but soon I was his girlfriend, and not long after that I was turning tricks. One night this city councilman got creepy and rough and I met Oliver. He was after the guy for something else, but found me. That was all she wrote.”
~~~~~~~~~~~~
That was a bit startling, and it showed with the quick, wide-eyed look Teddy gave her. His first thought that jumped to his mind was No way! not Mia. Not that he thought Mia would fib over it (flat out, she wouldn’t), but it just was kind of startling news. His brows lowered, obviously needing a few seconds to digest the new information. And gawd, what a creeper to put a girl out like that. Teddy felt a rather raw desire to find this Richard and break his nose just as Mia had the wolf-whistling jackass.
“Wow... Please tell me both of those jackasses are behind bars.” He rubbed his claws through his blond hair. “So GA got you out of it. And you’ve lived with him since?” Green Arrow was pretty big on looking out for the little guy, so he supposed that didn’t surprise him too much, and if he was any example, he was generous on helping people out of situations.
~~~~~
Having had some distance from her past life, Mia could honestly say her biggest regrets were that they weren’t in jail, or that she hadn’t even bothered to try. The thought that they both went on living their lives fully capable of ruining more lives did weigh on her. “They’re not.” She admitted. “I didn’t even try.” She continued on sourly. It was apparent that this was a bit of a sticking point. “My father is probably working his same shitty job and getting drunk at the same shitty bars. And the night I left Richard and I got into it and I cut him and told him if he ever tried to look for me I’d kill him, and I never saw him again.”
She shook her head. “He never said, but I think Oliver paid him a visit too, but I don’t know for sure.” She would bet money that he had though.
~~~~~~
Oliver Queen being the one to go after the wrong-doers in her past was probably a better option, in Teddy’s thinking. He considered her profile a moment before nodding.
“... It’s hard to draw a line, isn’t it? I mean, doing what we do, patrolling and stuff. We see the worst. And you know what it’s like being focused on by the worst. People do awful things. All we can do is prevent what we can.” He frowned some, claw digging at some dimple in the edge of the building in distraction. Sometimes he wondered if it was enough, or wondered if punching a bad guy was going to truly make them reconsider their course. But then he watched the girl who was whistled at turn around a corner while on her phone and meet up with her friends, seeming utterly relieved to see them.
“I’m glad you’re up here, Mi`.” Not just up on a building, sitting and talking with him. He was glad she was above it, metaphorically, and looking out for the rest who didn’t know how to say no to it all, especially when it needed a pair of fists to make it clear. Speedy could and knew exactly what to look for. Teddy could understand that now.
Just so long as it didn’t also make her bitter and blind in dealing out justice, but that’s why Teddy figured working in a group was best. Sometimes they needed someone to be a hand on their shoulder time to time. Even he needed it, careful as he tried to be, the few times someone truly woke his temper. His wing wrapped lightly around her, folding over her shoulder gently.
~~~~~~
Mia couldn’t help but tense up a bit when she felt his wing wrap around her. It was the same physical reaction she had the night she and Kate had spoken. She just felt vulnerable, like an open wound, and at that moment Teddy was officially in her life in a way not many people were. So she didn’t push him off. She shut her eyes and leaned just a tad bit into him. “You know...” she said with a bit of a shake of her head, “more people in our line of work have crossed a line then haven’t?”
She wasn’t sure what that said for all of them just that inevitably they were going to have to deal with one of them going too far.
“Hopefully, I prevented something tonight, and hopefully he’ll think twice. At least for a while.”
~~~~~~~~
He was quiet for a bit, leaning slightly against her. “I don’t want to cross that line, wherever it is. I don’t want any of us to.”
It was a real worry. Things got personal. His teammates could get hurt. Bad guys could come after their families. Or the past could get thrown in their face and it could just be too much. When the registration law had first come out, Teddy understood fully that heroes shouldn’t be immune to all laws, that they could be fallible, that people understood they could get hurt in the crossfire or things taken beyond the law. He understood why people would vote in such a law. Heroes could do bad things--some having massively destructive powers.
So what was going to happen, if one day they came across a creep who was doing more than whistling at a girl, more than what they had ran into previously? He didn’t know what he would do, and it scared him. Where was the line? And would they have enough control to not cross it?
“We can only hope. It’s something. With any luck, if he is that stupid, we’ll be around. And if nothing else, his crooked nose will make him a little easier to identify, right?” It was a small concession, but it was all they could do.
There wasn’t anything, no matter how much crime they stopped, to fix what was done and past. Only learn and hope people could change.
~~~~~
During the time she’d known Teddy, Mia had discovered that while Teddy could be a realist and he understood how the world operated, he was one of the biggest optimistic idealistic people she’d ever met. But she wondered if he understood that the thing about crossing the line is that it seemed that different people put that line in different places... and sometimes they thought that under certain circumstances crossing the line wasn’t crossing the line at all.
She wondered, since they were talking, if she should mention that taking someone’s life was already something she had done. She hadn’t been fighting someone who overpowered her, and she didn’t have some triggering stress event happen while taking down some human trafficker. No, she was completely herself, and she’d shot a man through the heart. Furthermore, she couldn’t exactly say she would have acted differently if given a chance.
Surely, now would be the time to bring it up, considering it was serious discussion time and on topic, but she just felt strange about it. Like the subject made her twenty years older than her friends and those naive whippersnappers wouldn’t understand. It was probably an unfair assessment.
“I think we’ll all be fine.” She wasn’t entirely worried about any of them. “I’m not that worried. No one’s given me cause to worry yet.”
~~~~~~
He mulled those words over a bit, along with what he had learned and how well Mia kept on, and then finally gave a smile and a nod. “Yeah, we will be.” They had to be, was more like it, but that thought didn’t truly cross his mind. It was be all right or consider stopping what they were doing. Stopping was not on Teddy’s list.
Nor was treating Mia any different than the friend he knew. Some of her past had been revealed, and while it made him understand more, essentially Speedy was Speedy, and heaven help anyone who forgot it. He stood up, holding a clawed hand down for her to lever herself up on. “Let’s move to a new spot, huh? I think you scared all the fish away.”