A heavy weight seems to slide off his chest, the impression left behind as nothing more than a feeling. He breathes in deeply, expanding his chest. Like a wind blowing away dead leaves, the breath clears away the felt accrued in the space between his brain and his eyes.

As this heavy softness ebbs away, thought starts to circulate more naturally through his mind, and he starts to register other sensations, both within his body and outside of it. His heartbeat, for instance, is slowly picking up in a way that confirms he was just deeply asleep but has now woken up.

As for external stimuli, he can hear a rhythmic dripping sound somewhere relatively close to his head. Tommy forces his eyes open, blinking as the blackness is chased away by the dim light of the room. The ceiling above him is extremely dirty, yellow-brown spots creating a mosaic of oddly shaped monsters and wretched vanquishers. The space between each stain is a white-gray that casts tiny shadows with each indentation in the material. Other than that, the ceiling is still relatively normal, with no added features that would allow Tommy to determine where he is. The one clue he has is that the ceiling isn't familiar, and that only serves to place a disquietude in his heart.

Tommy's eyes get used to looking, so he uses them to expand his search of the room. The distant walls seem to be made from wood, but the indentations where the boards interlock make Tommy think the wood isn't that thick. These vertical boards cover the entire room save for a door made from a lighter shade of wood and a window frame with peeling white paint. The world outside the window is so bright that Tommy can't see any details beyond the white light, so he looks away from it before it starts hurting his freshly in-use eyes.

This leads Tommy to look at what is right beside the bed he believes he is currently lying on given the half-firm sensation underneath his shoulder blades and the thin blanket held between his clenched fingers. There is a stack of boxes that tower over the metal headboard, the marker writing across the cardboard surface illegible from both age and the writer's own inadequate handwriting. On top of the boxes, a blue-gray basin most commonly used in hospitals sits, a couple of faded rags hanging off the side, dripping with dampness.

In front of the boxes and directly beside the bed, Phantasm stands in his the supervillain outfit Tommy designed himself. His blue-tinged hair is pushed back, and his long overcoat has been removed. His eyes are as dim as the rest of the room, and Tommy can barely call them green. He thinks, for a moment, that they might actually be brown, but he pushes that thought away when Phantasm shifts, letting the green coloration grow brighter. Tommy must be imagining things.

The dripping noise comes from Phantasm. He is holding a rag over the basin, wringing it out to turn it from wet to damp. When the rag is to Phantasm's satisfaction, he tosses it into the air and catches it from the sides. Phantasm pulls, and the rag stretches taut, a few droplets shooting outwards like a fleeting firework. Phantasm uses his fingers to fold the rag twice. Both folds are from top to bottom so the rag is wider than it is long. Phantasm sets the damp, folded rag on top of Tommy's forehead, and the cool temperature seeps through Tommy's skin into his mind. It soothes him even though he hadn't even realized how much of that gunk still remained inside his head. He feels like he's taken a centuries long nap, but the rag does wonders to bring him both to the present moment and the realm of the waking.

Phantasm's green eyes slide across Tommy's form like a habit, but he stops suddenly. His eyes shoot backwards in their roaming, catching on Tommy's open eyes. Although his mask and the secret charm hides much of his expression, Tommy knows that something has shifted. Phantasm scowls dangerously at Tommy, and the blonde is struck between fearing for his life and wondering why Phantasm has been taking care of him thus far. The former part wants Phantasm to leave, but the latter wants someone to stay, even if it is a horrendous villain. Tommy is scared of that aspect of himself.

"You're a fool," Phantasm hisses, the secret charm pushes into the air between Tommy and Phantasm with enough vehemence that Tommy begins coughing. Tommy tries to stop his hacking to respond to Phantasm, but he isn't able to. His throat is scratchy and unused, and he's just opened the floodgate with that initial cough. Phantasm exhales sharply out of his nose as he grabs Tommy's shoulders with more gentleness than the anger in his eyes would make someone assume he was using. Phantasm sets Tommy down on the headboard, putting one hand on the blonde's back. He rubs it thoughtfully as he reaches around the other side of the basin. He lifts an open plastic water bottle to Tommy, and the blonde downs the drink with so much force that a few drops slide down his chin.

As Tommy acclimates to the new sitting position and the water suddenly filling his empty stomach, Phantasm continues to berate him in his ears. "If Lady Necrosis hadn't shown up, you and Pulverize would have been badly hurt, possibly killed. If Pulverize hadn't been strong enough to carry you, or if Salamander wasn't generous enough to take you two in without a word of warning, you wouldn't be in a secure area right now. If word hadn't gotten to me, you wouldn't have a healing potion anywhere near you, let alone in your system right now. That is too many 'ifs,' Tommy, and I doubt you were counting on all of that when you pointlessly rushed after Pulverize."

Phantasm steps back, taking the water and his comforting hand with him as he goes. Phantasm puts the water bottle back where he found it, and he shoves away from the boxes, ignoring the way they sway back and forth. Phantasm glares directly at Tommy, leaning down to put one hand on the mattress. His other hand gestures to Tommy's body, probably referencing the bandages Tommy can see now that he's pushed the blanket off. Phantasm's words are quieter but no less upset as he declares, "None of this would have happened, and none of this," his hand lifts up to gesture around the room, "would have been necessary if you had just stayed away."

Phantasm puts both of his hands down on the mattress, a foot away from each other. With the way the mattress dips, Phantasm is putting a lot of weight down on the bed. Tommy's stare hardens as he witnesses this. He opens his mouth, and the dryness seems to have left him because his voice, while a little scratchy still, comes out strongly. "I wouldn't have been able to stay away. Pulverize needed help."

Phantasm pushes off the bed. He takes one step back, mostly because of the opposing force his push inflicted on him, but also because he needs some space from Tommy and his words, as evidenced by the way he puts his hands up defensively. "Pulverize might have needed help, but he didn't need your help specifically, Tommy."

"Well, there was no one else around to fucking offer it!" Tommy snaps, shifting in the bed to look at Phantasm better. The blood inside of his body begins to heat up, and Tommy's anger becomes a swirling mass inside of him. Tommy keeps it at bay by sheer force of will, knowing those eyes can become so much more inflexible if he does anything adverse.

"Have you forgotten that you are a tailor, not a fighter?" Phantasm asks incredulously, swinging his arm around to the corner of the room where he abandoned his overcoat. It lies motionlessly against the wooden floorboards, bundled up in a way that is going to wrinkle later.

"But I've been training. I've been getting stronger," Tommy tries explaining. Phantasm won't know this, but Tommy has been going to the gym and practicing combat with Techno for the past few weeks. The training has been good for him, and he is starting to see some progress. He isn't as inept as he was when he first stumbled on Phantasm's body in that alleyway.

"I don't care," Phantasm half-shouts with an odd wailing quality echoing at the edges of his voice like a banshee whispering her keening song. Phantasm's eyes flash violently like a buzzing neon sign, and their luminosity doesn't fade again after the third flash. Phantasm takes a step closer to Tommy, his body language growing more withdrawn. "The Binary Killer is stronger than you, and it always will be."

"And the Binary Killer is stronger than Pulverize unless someone is there to help him... someone there to heal him," Tommy counters. He knew that revealing his secret to Pulverize was a risky decision, but Tommy didn't know what else to do in the situation. They had to stop the Binary Killer, and Pulverize wouldn't be able to do that if his wrist was completely broken. Tommy did what he thought was best, and he doesn't regret that decision. He's going to be pissed if Pulverize sells him out, but he won't regret his decision even then because he did what needed to be done, even if all they did was buy time for someone stronger than them to finish the fight they started.

"You shouldn't have put your life in danger like that," Phantasm says, his voice growing quieter. The whispering quality, however, does not go away. In fact, it's more noticeable now that Phantasm's scream isn't overpowering it.

"Why? Is it because I'm a tailor for the Syndicate? Or is it because I'm a healer?" Tommy spits, the vitriol adding another dimension to Tommy's voice. It isn't supernatural like Phantasm's voice, but it is irregular all the same. Tommy has gotten angry in his life but never at a supervillain, never at Phantasm. He has learned from years in foster care what consequences follow aggravation, even if he was provoked, so he's only ever shown anger against people he could manage or that wouldn't hurt him. Phantasm is the prime example of someone Tommy can't manage and who will absolutely annihilate him.

Despite this, Tommy's vexation is blatant in his tone, and Phantasm must notice this because his expression noticeably shifts, trying to force relaxation with very little results. Phantasm puts his hands out placatingly, "You're misunderstanding. That's not what I meant. I was-"

"Stop!" Tommy yells, slamming his fist down on the mattress. The effect doesn't have the desired effect of putting emphasis on Tommy's words, but it does make Phantasm take a half-step back, an unintended but still desired outcome. "You were the one that told me everyone makes their own decisions. Like it or not, I made my choice. If you can't respect that, there is only one explanation. It's because I'm a tailor... or worse yet, because I'm a healer."

This power has always been a curse. Tommy has lived his entire life looking over his shoulder, trying to stay away from every group in power on the island. It has filled him with the guilt of having the means to help but not going through with the act because of his own selfishness. It has put him in the path of supervillains tenfold his strength. Those merciless bulls will have no empathy for whatever china plate is thrown before them, and Tommy knew this as soon as he started to get tangled in the spiders' webs.

Tommy shakes his head, an awful smile spreading across his face that carries no humor in its shallow depths. He looks directly into Phantasm's eyes, watching for every tiny change in his appearance. The secret charm gives Tommy a headache, but he can't look away, not now, not with his anger propelling him forward. "I know about your claim on me."

"You don't understand-"

"No, I do understand, though. I understand that I'm pretty fucking valuable. I understand that the Syndicate wants me as a tailor, and I understand that you want me as a healer," Tommy says, his voice rising and falling in pitch like a cresting wave. It isn't as if Tommy doesn't get it. The suits he makes help improve the villains' image. They look scarier, and with all the added features Tommy implemented, they are probably more prepared. And he gets the healer thing, too. He can imagine how useful it would be to have a healer on the team. That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt, and his understanding doesn't make his rage fall away. Rather, it throws kerosene into the flames.

"No, you don't understand. I care about you," Phantasm explains it as if it were simple, natural, even. But it's patronizing, and Tommy wonders half-heartedly if Phantasm even realizes how he sounds.

"To what end, Phantasm? And for what purpose?" Tommy asks, his voice growing half-silent as he proposes the questions that he often asks himself when he considers the possibility of Phantasm legitimately caring about him. Tommy gives Phantasm the same answers he's been giving himself this entire time to shut down those fanciful musings. "You are a villain. There is no reason for someone like you to care about someone like me other than sport or necessity. I would rather keep my fucking dignity and claim that I'm a tool rather than a circus freak for your amusement."

"Don't call yourself that," Phantasm harshly snaps. His demeanor untenses as he continues, the whispering gone entirely from his voice. "I do care about you. I don't want you to get hurt."

"You don't want your fucking tool to run away," Tommy bites back, an almost manic laughter bubbling in his chest as he rationalizes Phantasm's words. "You don't want me getting any big ideas about being something other than someone's tool." Tommy shakes his head, his laugh disappearing. "Get out of my sight."

Phantasm doesn't move, and Tommy's emotions illuminate like a flare shot into the darkness. He half-swings his legs off the side of the mattress, daring to get closer to the villain. Tommy's voice rises in pitch until he's screaming, "Leave, damnit!"

In the next breath, Phantasm is gone completely. He is invisible to Tommy's eyes, and since his slowed heartbeat disappears from the range of Tommy's powers, he has probably gone intangible, too. Phantasm has done as Tommy asked, and he's left. There is some gloating happiness that comes from having the power to banish a supervillain from his sight with his words alone. It fills Tommy up, dancing in tandem with the remnants of his anger.

Both are washed away completely by his sadness. Tommy chokes on a sob, pressing his face into one of his palms. He holds his head up, bringing his knees to his chest. Part of him really did think Phantasm cared about it, and honestly, maybe that same part of him cared for Phantasm, too. But it doesn't matter. Tommy was being stupid and emotional. His friends and his new family care about Tommy, and he cares about them just as much. Phantasm is just a supervillain. He's a murderer and a terrorist. Honestly, it's better for everyone that Tommy and Phantasm don't care about each other.

Tommy's eyes lift up from his palm as the door swings open. Tommy can see a red-painted hallway behind Salamander, but Tommy isn't any closer to figuring out where exactly they are. Salamander doesn't give any clues as he steps into the room wearing his normal vigilante outfit, the secret charm pulsating with less power than Phantasm's charm. Tommy's head clears without the ancient magic messing with his senses, and he's able to smell the hearty scent of soup in the air as Salamander places a warm bowl of soup between Tommy's calves. Tommy glares at Salamander, but the vigilante crosses his arms over his chest, waving one of his hands. "Yeah, yeah, get over it, and eat your soup."

Tommy holds back a sigh, but he doesn't stop his eyes from rolling. Tommy leans down, picking the bowl up. Salamander, the bastard, didn't give Tommy an utensil, not even a measly fork, so Tommy is forced to drink the soup from the side of the bowl. Fortunately, the soup is worth sipping in an ungraceful manner. The first mouthful is warm and delicate, perfect for his aching body and near-empty stomach. Tommy sips another few mouthfuls before he pulls the bowl down enough to ask Salamander, "Where are we?"

"We're in my temporary base. Pulverize brought you to me after your showdown with the Binary Killer. I decided to bring you here," Salamander explains, his voice growing muffled as he steps into the hallway. Salamander returns a moment later with a foldable chair underneath his arm. He unfolds the chair beside the bed, sitting down on it backwards. He wraps his arms around the back of the chair, looking directly into Tommy's eyes. "It would be useless to tell the heroes about this place since I'm abandoning the place."

Tommy glare returns, sharper and more agitated than before. He takes another mouthful of soup, not angry enough to start throwing dishes yet, but he does hiss, "What do you fucking take me for? I wouldn't give a fucking thing to the heroes, let alone information."

Salamander winces, rolling his shoulders as he leans back. "I admit that it was a poor joke to make when you're clearly upset right now."

Tommy's expression is torn between confusion and fury. Salamander must understand the reason behind the face because he starts explaining. "The walls are pretty thin. I heard your argument with Phantasm. I tried not to, but well, I don't have much in the way of noise machines here. Packed all that up and took it to the new place."

Tommy nods slowly, turning his attention back to the soup. He should be a little embarrassed about Salamander hearing all of that, but honestly, at the moment, with all his fluctuating emotions, Tommy frankly doesn't care. Salamander makes no comment about what concerns Tommy as he runs one hand over his other hand, his face twisting with candor and awkwardness. "Look, I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the biggest fan of the Syndicate. Anarchy isn't my way... That being said, I've come to understand that they aren't villains for the sake of it. Phantasm must genuinely care about you if he went through all of this for your sake."

Tommy raises an eyebrow at Salamander from over the rim of the bowl. Salamander gives him an open-mouthed, half-smile, clearly confused about his own words, too. Tommy snorts, but he responds to Salamander's attempts with as much earnestness. "I don't understand why. All I have to offer are my sewing skills and healing powers."

Salamander tilts his head to the side, leaning his body that way, too. His expression twists with many fleeting emotions, but they finally settle to something between hesitation and resolution. "I have to disagree with that. The Syndicate is made up of the core villains and a bunch of henchmen. Yet, regardless of status, the Syndicate cares about all of its people equally. No sacrifice is made unwillingly. For some reason, people like the Syndicate don't see in values. They don't weigh others by their contributions or what they can offer. It's a contradictory thought to the rest of the island, but it's true. Even I can admit it, and well... I've made my stance pretty clear."

Salamander shakes his head, grabbing onto the back of the chair again. He squeezes, his skin turning white against his knuckles. "Even if all of that was a load of bullshit, I saw Phantasm. I saw the way he looked at you. I saw how he sat by this bed anxiously. No matter what the rest of the Syndicate thinks, Phantasm considers you as his-"

Salamander cuts himself off suddenly, his voice jerking like he suddenly slammed on the brakes. He looks upward at the dirty ceiling, frowning to himself. Salamander shrugs his shoulders, getting rid of whatever weight was lying on them. He looks back down at Tommy, a new look in the eyes behind his goggles, "It's not my business, and I'm not one to freak people out. Is that offer for a suit still standing?"

"One for the Syndicate's newest member?" Tommy whispers, no expression in his face. Logically, that must be what's happening. Salamander said he wanted to start a 'new game' with Nemesis. Either he or Pulverize told Phantasm where Tommy was, and only Salamander could have let the villain in. Even though Salamander doesn't agree with the Syndicate's anarchist tendencies, he did praise them and appreciate their way of valuing everyone equally. There are a few conclusions Tommy can draw, but this one feels right to Tommy as he says it out loud.

"Yeah, a new suit for Vulcan," The former vigilante renames himself right in front of Tommy.

"I have a growing list," Tommy complains, but truthfully, he doesn't mind. He made the decision long ago that he was going to stick with this business venture. His falling out with Phantasm isn't going to change that.

Vulcan smiles. He stands up from the chair, swinging his leg over the side. He reaches his hand out toward Tommy. The blonde raises an eyebrow, putting the near-empty bowl in Vulcan's hands. Vulcan rolls his eyes. He sets the bowl on top of the cardboard box next to the basin. He shows his hands to Tommy again, and this time, Tommy puts his palms against Vulcan's. The vigilante lifts Tommy up out of the bed. His legs nearly give out, but Vulcan helps Tommy stand upright. With one arm around Tommy's waist and the other pulling Tommy's arm around his shoulders, Vulcan helps Tommy step into the hallway. They head down until they make it to a metal door. Vulcan pushes the door open, the rusty lock snapping after so many times of being forcefully snapped together.

The air outside is warm, and Tommy can feel the damp grass through his borrowed socks. Vulcan turns them around, and Tommy faces the wooden structure in one of the poorer areas of the island. Despite the financial ruin of the area, there is a fair amount of space between each building. It almost reminds Tommy of an abandoned suburb overrun by filth and decay. Tommy wants to take in more details of the base, but Vulcan lifts his hand to the surface. From where his palm lies on the ground, a golden-tinged red fire spreads out. Vulcan steps away, pulling Tommy with him. Side-by-side, they watch the base go up in flames, the smoke billowing into the blue above them.

"Salamander is going to die in that fire," Vulcan whispers, leaning close to Tommy to be louder than the flickering of the flames. Vulcan stands up straighter, and his voice is clearer now that he isn't whispering. "Who else is going to die in this fire?"

"I don't know," Tommy murmurs. He can barely even hear himself, but Vulcan sighs beside Tommy like he knows every word. He shakes his head minutely, nudging his shoulder with Tommy's.

"Well, if you ever want to clear away the underbrush, I'm willing to be your lighter."

Tommy laughs gently. Even when his laughter fades, he continues to stand in the grass next to Vulcan. He can feel the warmth of the flames from this far away, and he relishes in it. He glances over at Vulcan, and the man is smiling widely at the destruction. As Tommy looks away, back to the golden fire, he thinks some strange friendship has just formed between the two of them, one built on a foundation Tommy never thought could be used for friendship.