Lag 6.1

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

A pair of eyes opened slowly, bright light shining directly at them making the action more labored than it had to be. Those same bright blue eyes fluttered once… twice… a few times more as consciousness took hold.

As she lay on her side in her soft king-sized bed, it took more than a moment for Susan Veder to come to terms with the idea that she was actually awake as she faced the red light of her alarm clock, the numbers '8:35' easily decipherable even as groggy as she was. The early morning sunlight from her window beamed down directly on her face, her curtains open just enough to let in a single shaft of said light. Her ears perked up as another moment passed, the sound of subtle movement from behind her drawing her attention and drawing her further into the waking world.

She rolled over in her bed, turning away from the sun and the light of her alarm clock to face the other end of her room. Almost immediately, her eyes widened.

"Hey."

The single syllable was accompanied with a wave and a smile, both innocent as anything else.

Innocent but… unexpected.

In fact, everything about this was.

"Greg?" The word came out groggily, sleepiness still clinging to Susan as she did her best to rise from her bed. Propping herself up one elbow, she stared hard at the figure sitting in the loveseat next to her bedside table, as if to convince herself that she was not simply dreaming.

"Greg?"

"That's the name you gave me, yeah."

She blinked again as her tired mind took a moment to process the joke, then once more in mild confusion. Susan raised a hand to rub her eyes and let out a long yawn as she did so. "Swe…" She paused to let out another yawn, the same hand lowering to cup her open mouth. "Sweetie…"

"Mornin', mom," her son spoke up again, suddenly much closer than he was before.

Susan's eyes widened slightly as Greg neared her, her son somehow having moved from the other end of the room to the foot of her bed in between eye-blinks. She was silent for a moment, too stunned to return her son's greeting as she noticed something in his hands, a tray that she couldn't recall seeing moments ago.

The blonde woman shook her head, rubbing her eyes one more time to clear whatever grit remained. A tired smile on her face, she glanced back up at her son. "Good morning, sweetie." A slight groan left her lips as she raised her arms above her head in a languid stretch, mouth expanding as she let out a gaping yawn just seconds into it. "Nggghh… what time is it?"

"8:38, if you wanna get technical, but honestly I prefer..." Greg paused for a moment, a smile beaming as he stepped forward and around her bed until he was at her side. "Breakfast time, mom, the most important meal of the day… in bed," he added as an afterthought, smile faltering only slightly at the stilted continuation.

Susan Veder shook her head slightly, the action meant for nothing more than to shake away some of the grogginess she still felt. The movement was almost unnecessary, the woman already having been shocked by the knowledge of how late it was. Almost 9 and just waking up, she noted with slight bitterness, the emotion directed at her smiling and oblivious boy. Three hours wasted. Sick guilt warred with it an instant later, Susan unable to hold the prior feeling whenever it came to him. Not his fault. Mine. Mine.

Attempting to take her mind off her own thoughts, she focused her gaze on the black dinner tray her son held, the smell easily drawing her attention anyway.

Greg's smile was still affixed on her as he stood there. "You hungry?"

Susan found herself nodding as she continued to stare blankly. The breakfast part wasn't so much a surprise to her, all things considered, seeing as how Greg had been busy in the kitchen every morning, afternoon and night over the last week. In fact, almost every time Susan had made her way downstairs every morning, it was to the smell of an almost perfectly-cooked breakfast.

The only real surprising part of this was the "in-bed" portion of it all.

"Very..." she began as she sat up straighter against her pillows. In response, her son gently placed the tray on her lap. She kept one bleary eye on Greg as he stepped back a bit, her left hand busy rubbing the other one free of the usual sleep crust. "What's the special occasion?"

"Hmm?" A confused glance from Greg was all Susan received in response, a familiar expression but one she couldn't deny as unmistakably adorable. "...special?"

"I mean, breakfast in bed?" she continued, lifting one of the bell jars on the tray to expose a plate full of piping hot scrambled eggs and a small mound of sausage links, steam still visible and wafting off of them. "It's not my birthday… and I'm pretty sure it's not Mother's Day either."

"I can't do something nice for my mom, now?" Greg replied, hand over his heart in mock outrage. It might have been enough to hint at the concept of sincerity if he had managed to wipe the smile off his face as he did it but that was asking for far too much. "What has the world come to where it has to be a holiday for the best mom in the world to know her son cares?"

Susan paused, a forkful of well-prepared eggs keeping her mouth occupied for a few seconds as she chewed. "Not that I don't appreciate all you've done, sweetheart," she paused again, an eyebrow raised. "Especially all the cooking these last week but… I should be the one taking care of you."

"But why…" Greg shook his head but his smile didn't waver as he answered back, "Why can't I take care of you?"

"Because I'm your mother," Susan answered him back, a hint of finality in her tone. And I'm tired of having you treat me like an invalid went unspoken, but the white-knuckled grip with which Susan held her fork spoke for her nonetheless.

"I mean, I'm pretty sure you are, yeah," Greg chimed in obliviously, a faux-pensive look on his face. He held a look with his mother, the older blonde ignoring her food for a moment to fix her son with a blank glare. Unperturbed, he gave a slight nod and continued with, "It'd be pretty hard to fake that video you showed me, I guess."

Susan let her fork clatter onto her plate with the slight tink-tink of metal on porcelain and allowed a wry smile to cross her face, if only to humor her little boy. "...Funny."

"I thought so too," her son replied, head tilted slightly to the side as he did so. She managed to catch the sight of white teeth for an instant before Greg pushed his grin back into a closed-mouth smile, a common occurrence over the last seven days.

Odd, but not worth bringing up, Susan could only remind herself again. It was one of many things that she had noticed as odd about her son's behavior over the last week; Greg's newfound habit of covering up his grins was far lower on the totem pole than his incredible cooking skill that seemed to have sprung up overnight or his tendency to walk around shirtless all of a sudden.

All of those absolutely paled in comparison to Greg's sudden growth spurt. It was all very confusing and uncomfortably familiar, but they were nothing that Susan felt needed to be brought up in conversation anytime soon.

Not without pushing my baby boy away. She shook her head again, jaw set as she pushed those uncomfortable thoughts down and forced a smile again. Nothing's worth that. Glancing down at the tray as she lifted another bell jar to expose a rasher of crispy bacon and what had to be sauteed mushrooms… How much time did he have down there? She couldn't help but wonder once more.

Raising her head from her plate again, the blonde voiced her question towards her son, Greg's expression shifting towards nervousness as he replied, "W-well… I had to shower and get ready first, so I had to rush a bit, y'know. So, about thirty minutes?"

Greg let out an awkward chuckle, his smile losing some of it's confidence as he continued. "Give or take five minutes, I guess?"

"Oh…"

Wait... Susan frowned slightly for a moment, frown only deepening as something important suddenly made its way to the forefront of her mind.

Something far more important than breakfast.

Her gaze flicked down and to the right, eyes locking on to the jet-black alarm clock resting on her bedside table..

Red numbers stared back at her.

'8:40'

All traces of tiredness immediately left her, replaced with shock and the sort of anger reserved for all exasperated mothers everywhere. Susan Veder whipped her head back to face her son, face already set in a stern glare as she prepared to tear into him. "Wha-"

However, that wasn't to be.

All the anger in Susan's expression bled away as it was replaced with yet more shock as the single mother found herself alone in her bedroom, her door wide open and the sound of hurried footsteps on her wood floor already fading away.

It only took a second more for her to hear the shouted flurry of words from the bottom of the stairs, "Notimelateforschoolsorryloveyoulotsbyyyyyyyeeeee!"

One second more and the anger and exasperation came flooding black.

"GREGORY LUCAS V-"

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

The door slammed right behind him as Greg leapt from his doorstep and landed just a foot away from the sidewalk with easy grace, knees barely even bending as he touched down from the nearly fifteen-foot jump.

The almost-nonexistent weight of his backpack slightly throwing off his center of balance, Greg spun in place to offset the rest of his momentum and struck a pose in front of his house like a flamboyant 80s rockstar. Per. Fec. Tion.

"Mornin', Gregory."

The teenager stumbled forward despite having been frozen in place and, a moment later, glanced up with an awkward smile as he turned toward the voice that called out his name. One hand rubbing the back of his neck, Greg took a few steps forward onto the sidewalk proper and waved over in the direction of his neighbor, the old man just one house over lazily watering his lawn.

Sprinkler system be damned, the man would do it anyway.

"How you doing, Mr. O'Donovan?"

The older man nodded over at Greg, the one hand not occupied by the hose in his hand raised in Greg's direction in a lazy hello. "I'm doing just fine," he replied back, voice drawling slightly. "You, though... aren't you running a good bit late for school?"

Greg found himself holding back a snort, biting his lip to avoid the laughter that threatened to spill out at his neighbor's choice of words. Clapping his palms together, the teenager brought them up in front of his face and replied, "Yeah, uh... funny you'd say that, actually..."

As if not hearing Greg's attempt at a reply, Mr. O'Donovan continued speaking. "I saw the bus you'd usually take down the street pass by an hour ago when I came out to top up my birdhouses. And two more buses passed by since then." He shook his head, garden hose in hand moving in time with him. "Next one's not for another thirty minutes."

"Already knew that, by the way, Mr. O' Donovan," Greg shot back, doing his best not to be rude to the old man as he let him drawl on, "but thank you, anyway. Gonna catch a ride once I head out the neighborhood."

"Alrighty then..." The old man nodded at Greg again as he paused to release the pressure valve on his garden hose, the stream of misty water coming from his garden hose immediately fading to nothing. "You be caref-"

Before the septuagenarian could even get his whole sentence out, Greg was already a third of the way down the block, the young blond moving at what he felt could be considered a leisurely jog. Fast as he was, the teenager wasn't far enough to avoid hearing the old gardener call him a "real oddball, that one."

The teenager snickered to himself as he galloped down the block and made a sharp corner towards the long winding street leading out of his neighborhood. "Man, if he knew..." Greg snickered again, face screwed up as he let out little snorts of laughter. "I mean, he'd probably have a heart attack, actually. That'd be soooo funny, though."

Shaking thoughts of possible elder abuse out of his head, regardless of how humorous it would be, Greg glanced from side to side as he ran across the large street just outside of his neighborhood a few short minutes later. Satisfied that no one was around to see him, he finally began to pick up a bit more speed as he rushed down a forested side path that he knew would take him into the city proper.

Let's kick it up a notch.

He ducked his head down and began actually pumping his arms, lower body almost a blur as he raced through the barely-trodden path through Brockton Bay's denser foliage. An actual smile crossed his face, one he could taste as real, even though it was a good bit smaller than the usual expression that usually covered his face. Man, haven't had a moment to really just take this in since...

Greg's smile dimmed slightly as he zipped through a break in the path and jumped over a fallen tree. Well, since before two weeks ago, at least. Been way too busy.

Busy was a word he could use, he supposed.

Although, considering most of his days were spent lounging around the house or taking care of the cleaning and cooking while his mom rested and recovered, he supposed that it would be better to describe his nights as the busy ones.

Ping-ping-ping-ping-ping-p-

Greg shook his head as if to shake away the phantom remnants of a maddeningly familiar sound that only served to haunt his nights. I could have been sleeping but noooooo. Noooo, we can't let ol' Greg have one peaceful night at home in his own bed. That'd be asking way too much.

The blond huffed to himself in slight annoyance but his mood brightened back up a moment later as both of his sneakered feet left dirt and sparse grass and met the cracked edge of a sidewalk. Greg skidded to a quick halt, eyes flicking from side-to-side to take in the environment around him. Already here, huh? Nice. The blond allowed himself a nod as he recognized the area, a sort-of happy medium between the quiet suburbs and the more urban areas of Brockton Bay; not dangerous enough to be worried about, but still not safe enough to be walking around in the middle of the night if you could manage it.

Clustered with brownstones, townhomes, big-name stores and various gas stations, the area itself was just a few minutes away from his neighborhood if you took a shortcut through the woods.

That is, moving at his inhuman pace.

For anyone else, roughly the better part of an hour.

Not everyone can be super, I guess, Greg thought to himself as he began to stride across the near-empty street, not enough cars on the street to make him even worry about checking for traffic. Not that I have to even bother looking out for cars anyway. Even still, the blond glanced around as he walked across the crosswalk, unable to help but note how empty the main street actually was. Very few people were actually out and about, even considering that it was almost 9 AM already. He knew the reason, of course, considering he lived the reason. Even then, it still hurt to see the city like this.

As he reached the other side of the street, Greg ducked into a nearby alleyway as quickly as he could without drawing suspicion from the few people still milling about. Reaching the center of the filth-ridden alley, the teenager craned his head up and smirked, finally happy to be around buildings with some actual height to them.

Without wasting another moment, the teenager leapt.

A single jump.

Forty feet up.

It was just a second later that Greg landed feet-first on a grimy rooftop, one hand running through his growing mane of hair. Four stories, one jump, His smirk grew slightly as he mused over the thought. Let's see how much air I can get on the way to school.

The blond teen bent his legs, hands at his sides as a sudden breeze began to pick up around him. As if that wasn't enough, his lower body began to glow as well, the wind swirling around enough to ruffle his hair and make the jacket he wore flutter wildly.

His smirk burst into a full-blown grin as a sudden thought came to mind. "Heh... air."

With a sound like an air cannon, Greg Veder launched himself into the sky.

"WOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOoooooooooooooooooooooooo!"

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

"-one though a lot over the last few weeks and I don't intend to make that harder for you over the next few months. Of course, we're still required to stick to the curriculum in the wake of parahuman disasters but I do plan on blah blah blah blah blah... blah blah blah blah blah..."

The substitute teacher standing in front of the dusty blackboard continued to drone on to a class of students that could barely drudge up the motivation to care about him, his name or even any of the words leaving his mouth as he continued to drone on with as sympathetic of an expression that he could manage. Wannabe actors doing sub work now? Weak shit.

Even with the fact that what was being said would be something they would have likely been excited to hear in any other circumstance, none of them felt like listening. The few that weren't talking with their friends in hushed tones, simply stared blankly at the teacher or out the window. For most of those, their reasons for not paying attention stemmed from actual boredom or simple distaste for the school environment after roughly two weeks without having to attend. For a few others, they had far more on their minds than worrying about their grade point averages.

"-s I will be replacing Mr. Pickney till the end of the school year, I want to make it clear that I don't intend to replace him in your minds. You probably had a connection to your Biology teacher and I know he cared about blah blah blah blah blah. Blah blah blah blah-blah-blah extra credit and blah blah blah..."

This guy needs to get with the program, I fuckin' swear, One student sitting at the very back thought to himself. His chin sat atop his arm as he rested his head on his desk and glared viciously at the reed-thin man half-sitting, half-leaning on the desk that still held all their old teacher's possessions and knick-knacks. He looked more like a senior than he did an actual teacher, the pencil mustache he sported only accentuating how waifish he actually looked. Blah blah blah, niggas don't care. Just hand out the classwork and shut the fuck up.

Axel "Sparky" Ramon rarely found himself in a mood that he could consider good.

None of those rare moods ever occurred within the halls of Winslow High School. This was especially true considering this was his first day back. Heading into homeroom with a certain blond nowhere in sight was irritating enough, but Sparky could deal.

He could.

Honest.

He knew Greg wasn't dead and he knew that he definitely wasn't hurt, so it wasn't like he was worried, right? His mood only worsened as homeroom went by and Greg Veder remained nowhere to be seen. It wasn't like he had been hoping to see his best-fucking-friend after two whole weeks of not actually being around each other. It certainly wasn't that Sparky thought seeing Greg would make him feel less annoyed with the world.

No, definitely not.

Either way, Sparky didn't care.

It wasn't like the blond hadn't bothered to stay in contact with him much over the last week, barely responding to his pings on PHO and the shitload of messages Sparky had sent. No, it wasn't even like Greg had even tried to message him first, Sparky having to make every single move when he felt like hearing from his best friend who had just gone through a fucking trauma train...

Again, not his problem.

Not. His. Problem.

Why did it feel like his problem, though?

Fuck me, right? Fuck me for being a good friend. Fuck me for ever fucking trying to even help that ungrateful piece of...

The olive-skinned teen closed his eyes and unclenched his fists as he let out a long, hopefully calming breath breath through his nostrils. Even as he tried to center himself the way his mom had taught him, the sub continued to drone on, introducing himself like any single person here actually cared what his fucking name was or where he went to college. Jesus, would you just shut the f-

"How's it shaking, Mr... Waaaaaait, you're not Mr. P."

A familiar voice made itself heard, the heavy classroom door swinging shut at the very last syllable as if to act as punctuation. The class was jarred into paying attention, Sparky included.

"Umm... Who are you?"

"Name's Greg. Veder. You?"

"Oh, I'm your new blah-blah blah..."

A pair of amber eyes opened again, focusing their usual glare towards the front of the room again as a figure walked to the back of the room. In no time at all, he stood there, in an unzipped royal blue hoodie, blue jeans and a white shirt that had the word "shirt" in simple black lettering in the center.

"Yo, bro! Long time no see!"

Blue met gold as both friends locked gazes for the first time in roughly two weeks.

A smile

A scowl.

"I don't speak to shitheads that ghost me."

Greg raised an eyebrow, an awkward smile on his face as he began to respond. "See… uh, the thing about that…"

Yeah, Sparky thought to himself, his pronounced frown lessening. Still the same idiot.