Tensor

Jared knew that he shouldn't be throwing himself into such a funk over everything, but it was just what happened win these sort of scenarios. Something terrible had happened and despite the fact that he was right in the middle of it, he walked away unaffected. Again. Not a scratch, not a bump, not a bruise. It was like he'd been telling people ever since it happened. He hadn't risked a fucking thing.

Petra had. The cadets had. The rescue teams had.

He had been in the center of it and yet still apart from it as he was trapped in his stupid damn bubble.

Rather than continue to hover and be moody around Petra, Adrian, Kitty and the rest, Jared was outside, walking and trying to decide if he should maybe go find Bobby and see if he could talk him into making giant ice slides. Or looking for something equally as distracting. Like maybe trying to bungee jump off a building.

Two days after Julian was taken to LA, the first pictures began to surface. Soon, all the tabloids were carrying them.

Julian, looking pale and weak. Julian, surrounded by a flock of useless, worried, lower-classification healers. Julian, the way he would have hated to be seen--helpless, his mother fretting uselessly by his side, his brother standing in the background with his arms crossed, brow deeply furrowed.

He didn't like showing his vulnerabilities, but for the tune of several million dollars a shot, the whole world could watch him be vulnerable now.

His mother gave interviews, clearly confused and possibly back on pills, pleading with desperate honesty, asking whoever was leaking the photos to stop, but legal action was never taken.

Julian's father, always a ruthless businessman, bought a new jet and didn't show up in a single shot. He'd emotionally cashed out of his family a long time ago.

( I just want you back. Any way I can have you. )