WARNINGS: Implied nudity (brief), mentions of a past branding, scars.
“Hi, I’m Dawn. Do you speak English?”
The kid stared back at Dawn with blank eyes, lacking even a slight sign that they understood her. Zorra had turned up with the kid a half-hour ago, and explained that she’d found them in an alleyway, alone in the rain. They were filthy, dirt and blood matted into their white-blonde hair, and too skinny for their own good.
That, combined with the huge black and blue wings on their back, meant that there had to be some form of story here. It also meant that they couldn’t go to CPS for this one; they were notoriously shitty to powered kids, especially the visibly powered, as Slingshot would testify if asked. That meant that the kid was a Renegade problem now, whatever that entailed.
With a sigh, Dawn turned to Q, who was still scrolling through data on his tablet. “Still no sign of them?”
“Nope.” Q replied, pushing dark curls out of his eyes. “No hospitals in the city have patient records matching them. I’m trying further afield but I’m not optimistic.” He added, and Dawn ran a hand through her short hair.
“Someone has to be looking for them.” She said, and Q shrugged helplessly.
“They’re not going through official channels if they are. I’m keeping an eye on missing persons reports as well, and still nothing.” He said, flipping to a different set of data.
Dawn glanced back at the kid as Q read through the data, and found herself meeting wide, scared eyes. The kid had their knees pulled up to their chest, their wings wrapped around themself, and they were watching Dawn and Q with pale, almost terrified eyes.
“Poor kid.” Dawn said, and Q made a humming sound that sounded almost like an agreement. “So, what do we do now?” Dawn asked, and Q frowned deeply at her, screwing up his nose and almost dislodging his glasses.
It was a look that said ‘Well, you’re the one in charge here, you tell me.’
Dawn very pointedly ignored it.
“Well, Zorra’s got that telepath friend, right?” He said after a long moment, and Dawn nodded.
“Daydream, yeah.” She agreed.
“I was thinking that she could push English for them, help them understand us.” He said, and Dawn frowned deeply.
“That’s a little…” Dawn trailed off with a frown, and Q gave her a shrug in return.
“Yeah, it’s a little morally ambiguous.” He said, “But we can’t help them if they don’t understand us.“
“Get Zorra to call in Daydream.” Dawn said after a few moments. “We’ll take care of the kid until then.”
“On it.” Q said, turning out of the room, presumably to tell Zorra. While a valid move, it now meant that Dawn was in charge of the kid.
“First job.” She mused, looking over the kid fully, from the blood-matted hair to the soles of their feet, stained almost black with dirt. “Bath.“
Getting the kid to actually follow her to the bathroom was a slight ordeal, but eventually the kid followed her silently, their eyes soft and scared.
Dawn wished she knew what was going on inside their head.
When they finally made it to the bathroom, Dawn ran the kid a quick bath, filling the tub while the kid watched, their wings nervously twitching. They looked like they were half-expecting Dawn to hurt them, a wary resignation to their posture as they backed themself into the very corner of the room.
“C'mon kid.” Dawn said as she turned off the taps, keeping her tone warm and bright. “Bath time.”
The kid looked at Dawn with the same blank expression, cocked their head, and made an odd chirping sound.
Well, that was certainly new. They sounded confused, with the head cocked to the side like that, a quizzing tone to their voice.
Dawn took their wrist, gently, and lead them over to the tub. The kid made another chirping sound, a soft trill as they looked at the water.
“It’s a bath.” Dawn said, knowing it wouldn’t matter. “For getting clean.”
To demonstrate, she rolled up the sleeves of her costume, and scrubbed down her forearm with soap and water.
The kid did not take this very well, and flinched back into the wall, pressing themself as far away from the bath as they could reasonably get.
Dawn sighed, accepted that she’d need to dry her costume afterward, and climbed into the tub. Leading by example, and all that.
The kid watched her for a good few minutes, as Dawn went through the motions of washing. Then, they crept closer, and without warning, climbed in with her, water creeping dangerously close to dripping out of the tub.
Dawn waited to see what they’d do, and were met by the pale eyes watching her, soft-scared and nervy, their feathers all stood on end.
They looked like they were regretting their decision to get in the bath, but couldn’t quite muster the courage to bolt, now that they were wet.
Dawn took the sponge, already lathered with soap, and started scrubbing the kid down. The kid went rock-still, seemingly waiting for Dawn to do whatever they were expecting to happen.
Eventually, they relaxed a little, their feathers settling back down, trilling softly in their odd little language. It sounded avian, although what any of it could mean was beyond Dawn.
She chatted mindlessly to the kid as she got them clean, washing the dirt from their skin, and carefully washing their hair, untangling the matted blood and dirt with the help of warm water and her fingers.
The kid sat through it all with a surprisingly good nature, considering that Dawn could see their hands were shaking.
Still shit-scared enough of her, but wanting to get clean, perhaps?
More like they were too scared of Dawn to protest, Dawn thought. She had spent enough time kicking around supervillains to know when somebody was scared of her.
When she tried to touch their wings, the kid started so badly that it sent water crashing to the ground, as the kid let out a shrill cry of distress, their wings flattening into their back as wet feathers tried to puff out defensively.
“Okay, okay.” Dawn said, holding her hands where the kid could see them. “I won’t touch your wings, little bird.”
The water around them was near-black with dirt once Dawn deemed the kid clean enough to get out. She coaxed the kid out, although it didn’t take much to get them out the water, and frowned at their sodden hospital gown.
“You need something else to wear.” She mused. “But I suppose a towel will do for now.” She added.
The kid slid out of the gown easier that she might have liked to have seen, sliding down onto their knees as Dawn pulled what was really no more than a wet rag over their head.
“Where have you come from, little bird?” Dawn asked, crouching in front of them. There was something on their shoulder, an old scar of some kind. Dawn squinted to get a closer look, and her stomach flipped, nausea rising in her throat as she realised it was a brand.
Someone had burnt this kid, deliberately mutilated what was clearly no more than a teenager. The brand was old, deep but long-since scarred over, positioned right over their shoulder blade. It was an ornate and curling C, easily as wide as Dawn’s fist.
“Who’s done this to you?” She asked the kid, to caught up in her anger for a moment to mind her tone, and instead got the kid to flinch back, wings flaring around them defensively as they cried out softly, ducking their head. “No, no, I’m not angry with you, little bird. Angry for you, that’s all.”
Dawn didn’t get a response, barring the little chirp as the kid burrowed down into the towel Dawn had wrapped around their shoulders.
A soft rap at the door sounded, startling the kid again. Dawn glared at the door.
Surprisingly, it was Slingshot on the other side of the door, his slate-dark eyes dim and a bundle of cloth in his hands.
“I brought clothes for the kid.” He said, pressing the soft bundle into Dawn’s hands. “I cut holes for their wings.”
“Thank you.” Dawn said, with a smile. Slingshot made a vague huffing around and stalked back off.
“Okay, little bird.” Dawn said. “Let’s get you dressed.”
Dressing the kid was an ordeal, and the kid seemed half-mistified, half-distressed for the whole thing, wiggling and trilling softly every time Dawn tried to get them into an item of clothing.
Clearly the clothes Slingshot had provided were his own, as they were huge on the skinny little kid. They were dressed in a soft pair of sweatpants that Dawn had had to roll up, and a t-shirt that was huge on them, some band logo splattered on the front in neon blue and black.
It matched their wings. It was oddly sentimental for Slingshot, who Dawn had never seen successfully demonstrate an emotion.
The kid squirmed in the clothes, their wings pinned to their back by the shirt until they figured out how to pop their wings through the holes Slingshot had cut.
“Alright kid,” Dawn said, “Let me change into a dry costume, and we’ll go find you a room.”
315 for a quick pause. Thought I did a 10 second pause but it was more like 8. Still good for being 168 pounds, hungover, not enough sleep, heavy deadlifts yesterday with lots of heavy accessories, sore, hungry, tired, and the list goes! But no excuses. -Inspiration is for armatures, the rest of us just show up to work. #Roadto500 #singshot #bossofbosses2
