Simon's life had been getting better and better too, he was starting to think that he could really get used to the cards he'd been dealt. Finally his mother was able to give herself a break and his father the care he needed without stressing about the bills. Simon's pizza delivery paychecks had been a trickle on their debts and bills before but now he was bringing home enough that he felt like he was really helping.
He felt good.
Sure his mom sometimes pointed out that she didn't want to pamper herself with what was essentially his blood money but he assured her the Stars and Stripes were good people. People like Vance and Shima and Miss America didn't hurt him or interrogate him, that was something else entirely, the team had been good to him from the very start and he was proud to finally answer a call with them.. that is until he found out what it was.
The darkness had been the reason he'd gotten into all of this in the first place. He was delivering a pizza during the party in the park and then he ran into Mink and then....he woke up on his lawn without his scooter or the pizzas... and with horns. That had been the end of a chapter in his life and he had agreed to take the blame for Mink so he could live punishment free for what happened. Looking at him now, dangling like a ragdoll at the center of all these tendrils of darkness, Simon wished he had told someone.
There was a knot in his stomach. Of all the first big missions he had to go on it had to be this one. It felt like he was having his boss battle and his punch of guilt arc all at once and far too soon. He tried his best to keep the pure distraught off his face as he adjusted the devices around his wrists. They were to help him until he could learn to propulse flame on his own, he was still early in his lessons... still level one.
The devices seemed to be working and he let the flames channel from the veins through the skin and up out of the pores down his arms. His arms were completely on fire but where the devices were covering was a span of flame he could shoot out, so that's what he did. He moved to the side opposite Shima and used his flames to push back the tendrils best he could as they tried to advance forward. The flames seemed to have a strange effect, they did make the darkness recoil but at the same time they seemed....corrupted by it.