EIGHT.

WILL SLAMMED THE door loudly without meaning to when she got home. She kicked off her shoes and dumped her backpack in the hallway.

"Anyone home?" she called out.

There was no response, only her own voice bouncing back, stripped and flat.

The hollow echo of Will's footsteps followed her into the kitchen.

She grabbed a cup from one of the tall brushed steel cabinets, the glass nearly cold enough to numb the tips of her fingers. She filled it with water from the sink, and leaned back against the marble counter to sip it.

The sharp edge of the counter should've been uncomfortable against her back, but there was a headache climbing up her spine into the back of her skull and she barely noticed.

Will closed her eyes against the dull throbbing. As soon as she did, her fight with Peter began to play in the dark space behind her eyelids, distorted and shaky like scratched film.

She sighed and opened her eyes.

She took another sip of water. It was freezing, just like everything in this house. Even in the summer, when the sun was low and hot in the sky, their house felt cold. Maybe it was the straight sharp walls or the chilly hardwood floors or the delicate glass tables or maybe it was just Will.

She had always hated this house.

It rose into the sky in orderly lines of black steel and white marble. Everything seemed to straighten up when she stepped inside, proud walls and floors eager to impress. It was a stiff place, unchanging in time, a monument of her father's wealth that refused to bend or sway.

As child, she had played pretend that she was trapped in a prison and had to escape without cutting herself on any of the sharp edges.

"Hey, kiddo."

Will jumped, water sloshing over the edge of her glass. She turned to find her father resting a hand on the edge of the counter.

"Dad!" she gasped, feeling her heart beat quickly. "You just scared the crap out of me! I called out and no one answered."

He shrugged. "Sorry. Must not have heard you."

"I thought I was alone," Will said. "Now I'll have to call everyone to cancel the orgy."

Adrian didn't say anything, just examined his knuckles against the gray slate tile. Will frowned. Her dad usually laughed at her jokes, no matter how bad.

"Is everything okay?" she asked.

He looked up at her. His glasses were pushed up on his head, cheeks sunken. There was a strange glassy quality to his eyes, her reflection distorted in his pupils.

He sighed and rubbed his forehead. "It was a tough day at work. I'm starting to wonder how we're going to keep this up if people keep knocking us down."

"Dad—"

"Will, listen. I've been thinking. I think you could be more useful at the company."

Will was taken aback. "But—I don't have time. I have school and decathlon and—"

Her father held up a hand. "I didn't say spend more time there. Just be more useful. In fact, I think we could cut the whole process in half."

She shifted feet, feeling uneasy. Adrian's voice was calm but his eyes were wide and bright and gleaming.

He seemed to sense her hesitation.

"Just humor me," he said. "Here, hold out your hand."

Will chewed her lip, but stuck out her arm, offering her palm to him. He took it, thumb running over the skin just under the junction of her elbow. He nodded, as though agreeing upon something, although Will hadn't said anything.

Before Will could even blink, Adrian grabbed one of the kitchen knives from wooden block on the counter. It sliced through the air in a thin, metallic rasp.

Will cried out and yanked her hand out of her father's grasp.

"What the hell are you doing?" she accused, taking a few steps back.

Her father blinked at her, looking confused. As though there was nothing out of ordinary. As though he wasn't holding a long, sharp knife in his left hand and Will was the one acting crazy.

"I would've let you cut me, but I think it'll work better this way," he said placidly.

"Tell me what's going on," Will said in a low voice. "Now. Or I'm calling Mom."

Adrian's gaze traveled from the knife in his hand to the horror on her face. His gaze seemed to soften, the gleam in his eyes dying out slightly.

"Oh, kiddo, I'm sorry. I didn't mean to scare you. I should've explained before I grabbed the knife," he said apologetically.

He put it down on the counter and stepped forward, drawing her into a hug. Will felt him, solid and warm, and realized she was trembling slightly. He seemed to realize too, because he squeezed her harder.

"Oh, honey, you're really shaken up, aren't you? I didn't mean to scare you. I really didn't."

He drew back, hands on her shoulders. He looked her in the eyes.

"Did you really think I was going to hurt you?"

Will didn't reply, chest tight.

Her father put a hand on the side of her face. "Will. I would never do anything to hurt you. Ever. I love you more than anything in the whole world."

She nodded finally. "I know. I know. I just—I saw you grab the knife and I panicked."

He smiled. "Well, good to know your reflexes are sharp. I was starting think you were kicking Schultz's ass so much that you weren't actually learning anything."

She laughed shortly. He guided her back towards the counter, where the knife waited expectantly.

"Let me explain. I was thinking of ways you could protect yourself."

Will looked at the knife. "But I already know how to disarm someone."

He pointed at her. "Right. But what if your opponent isn't some thug with a blade? The world is full of freaks now. You should be able to use your weird little problem as a weapon against them. Gotta even the odds."

"Who do you think is going to attack me?" Will asked, raising an eyebrow. "Tony Stark? I think he's probably a little busy hunting people for sport or whatever millionaires do."

"Yoga, I imagine," her father said absentmindedly. He caught Will looking at him.

"No," he said. "I don't expect Thor to pop down from the heavens and toast you with a lightning bolt. But there are more and more of these guys now, and they're just running through the streets without laws or restraint. Like that spider guy. Cops can't doing anything to stop him, can they? And he just blew up a sandwich shop."

Will wanted to argue, but she thought of shattered glass and dust in the air and wail of sirens bleeding through the silence. She thought about concrete piled on top of bodies that used to be people. She thought about the headlines that always followed: Captain America saves the day or Iron Man defeats evil again!. She found she couldn't.

She nodded. "Okay. How am I supposed to protect myself?"

He picked up the knife. Will tensed, but he handed her the blade. She took it carefully.

"Pain," he said. "is humankind's greatest weapon. A weapon I think you can manipulate."

She felt her brows furrow as she looked at him in confusion.

He put a finger on her forearm. "I want you to cut the skin here. Not deep, but make sure you can feel it."

Will inhaled sharply.

"And then I want you to take that pain, and I want you to make me feel it. I want you to grab my arm and give me what you gave yourself."

The edges of the kitchen were bending slightly around her. Will watched the knife and her father's finger on her skin, feeling her heart swell and collapse in her chest.

"Hey. Kiddo," he said quietly.

She looked up.

Her father's face was soft, the smile lines around his eyes more pronounced. He smiled slightly. His hands were gentle on her skin.

"You don't have to. If you don't want to. It's up to you."

This stiffened her resolve. Trembling blood solid once more in her veins, Will nodded.

"I'll do it."

She picked up the knife again. Its edge grinned at her wickedly, glinting in the light. But her father had taught her not to be a coward, so she put the knife against her pulsing skin.

The metal was cold, then hot with her blood as she pulled it across her arm. The motion was quick and violent, like the snap of a neck. Smooth, unmarked skin erupted with blistering, bubbling scarlet.

"It hurts," she whispered. She could hear the shock in her voice.

Will was used to pain. Her mind was a live wire, bending and twisting with every touch. But she had felt very little physical pain in her life, and when she pulled the knife away she was surprised how much it truly hurt.

It was a high, clear, hot kind of pain. Not like a bruise, which spread under your skin and into your bones and stained you for weeks. It didn't ache—it burned. Will felt her eyes water and the lights brighten at the sharp pain spilling out from her skin.

Her father put a hand on her shoulder. "You okay?"

"Yeah. Yes. I'm fine."

"Okay, good. Do you want to try now?"

Will swallowed. "Yes."

She dropped the knife on the counter, putting her fingers to the wound. With the other hand, she reached up and took her father's hand. She wound their fingers together, and closed her eyes.

Darkness didn't come.

The hollows of her eyes were exploding with pain and color, leaping and reaching. Her head was humming with it. Pain had energy, and hers was softly pulsing behind her eyes, trickling into the crevices of her brain.

She tried to imagine it as a solid thing. A writhing, tangled mass of blinding light and burning heat. Will pictured it unraveling, threads releasing their grip on her brain. The threads began to poke around, bumping through the darkness, searching for a new place to rest their searing hands.

And Will gave them that.

She urged them down her spine, winding around her nerves, until they reached her hand. She bit her lip. Her skin was becoming malleable, melting, until it disappeared. Her father's hands were her own. And they were burning.

She sent the threads of pain into his veins. She imagined them spreading out under his skin, enveloping his bones and pulverizing them. She thought of white ash and the slash of the knife.

When he began to scream, she let go.

She opened her eyes. She blinked, readjusting to her surroundings. The kitchen fell back into place as her vision cleared. Her heart was beating slowly, but the sound of it was thunderous.

Her father was gasping in front of her, clutching his hands to his chest. Tears had traced shining grooves in his face and his mouth was screwed up in pain. He was bent over slightly, and there was something dark red staining his face.

Will felt herself snap back into reality as the sight of the blood under his nose and around his mouth. She jolted out of whatever trance she had cast herself into as she darted forward.

"Dad!" she gasped. "You're bleeding! What happened? What did I do?"

She grabbed his hands, searching him for wounds. Her heart was pounding.

She had hurt him, she had—

Her father laughed, gums stained red.

Will blinked.

"Are you—are you okay? Did you hit your head?" she asked.

"Man," he wheezed. "You sure can pack a punch. Not the physical kind, I guess, but jeez. Felt like you reached in and tore my heart of my chest."

"I'm so, so sorry—" she whimpered.

"Are you kidding? Kiddo, you were awesome! It felt like you were turning every bone in my body to dust and all you had to do was touch me. I mean, I pity the son of a bitch who tries to hurt you."

"But you're bleeding!"

Adrian smiled, swiping at the blood around his mouth. "Just a little nosebleed."

"Your hands—"

"It's yours."

Will looked down. Both of their palms were smeared with her blood. It had dripped down her arm and onto the counter, startlingly red against the pale gray. The cut stood out against her skin, gaping and dark and wet.

"We should clean up," Will said, surveying the damage. "Mom will have a fit if she comes home and sees us bleeding all over her her Italian marble."

"No kidding," he dad snorted. "Took her six weeks to pick it out, and three months of my paycheck."

Will laughed. She didn't know how she could, bleeding and breathing hard, but she did.

She turned to the sink and ran her arm under the tap, watching the blood dissolve and swirl down the drain. She tossed Adrian a dishtowel from the rack underneath the sink to clean the counter. He tossed it back.

"Not this one," he said. "Grammy spent half a year embroidering Liz's face on it."

She huffed. She'd been hoping her father wouldn't realize and they could get rid of that stupid towel. Grammy had never embroidered Will's face on anything.

"Grammy is half blind," Will retorted. "Liz looks like Steve Buscemi."

"She's a teenage girl. And she's half black."

"Yeah, which is why it's even more impressive what a striking resemblance Grammy achieved."

Her father laughed at this, and the tightness in her chest eased slightly.

They finished cleaning the counter and floor in easy silence. Will threw the blood-stained towels in the trashcan out back where Liz and her mother wouldn't see. Her father washed the knife and slid it back into the block on the counter.

Will looked at the two of them, sweaty and covered in her blood, against the pristine white kitchen.

"We look crazy," she commented.

"We might be," he father replied.

He began to whistle as he pulled out a cutting board and placed it on top of the spot where their hands had been intertwined in a pool of Will's blood minutes before.

"How do you feel about fajitas for dinner?"

AUTHOR'S NOTE: i? don't really know what to say? i know you might be thinking right now what the fuck was sofia thinking? and hear me out: you're right. whatever crack i smoked this morning hit hard as i was writing this. i guess just enjoy this chapter and relish in the knowledge that will and her dad have a wack ass relationship (and i love it) (imagine them at a father daughter dance getting down to pitbull) (or going bra shopping) (that shit would be FUNNY) (okay im done)