Room 315, Wednesday Early Evening

[peace_n_war]

"Hey, dad. It's Warren again. I'm starting to wonder if you even have room on your answering machine anymore, but hey, at least if you've run out by now you won't have to listen through three or four lifetimes of me phoning you like this someday, huh? I'm sixteen still, but not for long. Seventeen tomorrow, dad! I've still got that job at the cafe, and I'm still hanging out with that girl I mentioned last time. She's been trying to get me to go swimming with her. Weird, huh? Me. Swimming. I don't even like the beach, except that I can throw fire around. Other than that, seventeen doesn't seem like it's going to be much different than sixteen was. I'm, uh, still not a villain. Not really a hero either, don't worry. I think I want to call Mom sometime, too, but I can actually talk to her. She'll want to know all that stuff I've been telling you, dad. Asking about girls and school and if I've followed in your footsteps and become a criminal mastermind, and if I have then I'm grounded for life. Thanks loads, Mom, right? ... Seventeen tomorrow."

...

"I miss you dad."

Warren hung up his phone, sighed, and reached for a book. Seventeen, sixteen, whatever. Wasn't like any of it made any difference either way.

[Open post is open! I probably won't be about tomorrow for a job interview, so Warren gets to birthday whine today.]

Comments

[heromaniac]

So now Momoko understood some of what they'd been talking about.

"And you're totally allowed to miss your dad and to want to see him and hang out and do all the father-son things that you can't, but he made a bad choice and ruined it and you really need to stop and think if you want to make another one and probably ruin your life and anyone else's who cares about you like you care about him. Change your actions not your reasons!"

[peace_n_war]

And now Warren was gritting his teeth, shoving his hands into his coat pockets and taking a few deep breaths before he could say anything else stupid.

"What do you want me to do? Forget about it? Pretend it's okay that I'm never going to see him again? It's not. I don't even have any actions to change. I'm not doing anything."

[heromaniac]

The look on his face took the rest of her lecture and tossed it out the window. Hopefully there was room somewhere for her to sit, because now she needed to.

"I don't see how you could forget or pretend; I mean, he's your dad! The fact that you even thought about doing something like that just means you really do care about him." She sighed. "Maybe the doing nothing part is what you can change? Have you asked anyone if it would be possible to visit him? Is there anyone that's got enough power to let you at least get in to see him?"

[peace_n_war]

Warren shook his head. What else could he do?

"He's in solitary. They don't exactly make exceptions for family with guys like him. He's in, that's that, he might as well be dead."

He hated saying that. But his dad wasn't coming out any time during Warren's lifetime. It was true enough.

[heromaniac]

"Don't say that!" Momoko narrowed her eyes at him. "Not only is it bad luck to say something like that about someone, but if he's dead then it's all over. No chance at all."

She thought for a minute. "Uhm, so, was it a superhero who caught him? If so, couldn't you ask them to vouch for you to whomever?"

[peace_n_war]

"I have my doubts that The Commander would do something like that." Warren's frown deepened some more. "He's too proud of getting him behind bars in the first place. He's the sort of hero that keeps souvenirs. Doing anything to help my dad would be against everything he is."

Even if Warren was kind of friends with his son, or whatever.

[heromaniac]

"He keeps souvenirs?" She blinked, then shook her head. Really now, how could you even do that?

"But it would be worth a try, though, right? Asking? He wouldn't be helping your dad, he'd be helping you! And that's what a hero, super or not, does: they help people!" Yes, she was optimistic, despite her growing horrors about the superheros on other worlds.

[peace_n_war]

Warren looked at Momoko tiredly for a moment, his expression mostly unreadable. And then he nodded.

"Yeah. I guess I can try."

Maybe he could ask Will. He hadn't spoken to Will in a while, anyhow. But this wasn't the sort of favor he really figured he'd be able to pull.

[heromaniac]

"You should. If you want, I can back you up! Talk to your 'Commando' superheroine to fellow superhero?" She'd have to transform to look the part, but she'd be willing to do it for this good cause! Momoko propped her chin on her palm. "Did this all just happen recently? I thought you mentioned something about him before, but you seem more... Upset? Than usual. Not that it's a bad thing! But it's sort of what worried me."

[peace_n_war]

"... I don't think I need backup." Really. Warren wasn't sure if he'd get many words out to start with, but he figured he stood about as good a chance as anyone. The Commander was going to laugh in his face, and he knew it. "And I'm not... More upset than usual. Really. I'm just thinking too much. So I started reading. It's something else to think about."

[heromaniac]

"I can always just be there as a friend too, okay? And if he says he won't help because of who your dad is, then not only is he a mean person and a bad hero but I can totally yell at him and threaten to stomp on his foot since I'd just be me as me or something ! And if he gets mad at me I won't care since he would just be a mean old man." She was only half kidding. When family and love was at stake, Momoko took no prisoners. "And then we can think of something else to do that wouldn't get people hurt. Maybe breaking you into the prison for a few hours or something, who knows."

She waved her hand towards the book. "So, what are you reading? It's Chinese, right?"

[peace_n_war]

Warren was so, so thankful for the topic change, right then.

But the idea of him breaking into the prison... That was going to be a difficult one to shake off. Hm.

"Chinese mythology," Warren replied with a nod. "It was a present from my employers back home."

[heromaniac]

"A present from your employers? If you brought it from home, you must really like it. You can read Chinese as well as speak it, then? Even Kanji?!" She couldn't read or speak more than a few phrases, Miyako was the languages expert. "You like the whole culture, then? Food, mythology, language...?"

[peace_n_war]

"You get immersed in it, you kind of pick up a few things," Warren noted. "I think I'm closer with my old employers at the Paper Lantern than I am with my mom."

There was a reason he'd always chosen to pick up so many shifts there. It was easier to spend time at work than it was to try to second-guess where his mom's head was going to be when he got home.

[heromaniac]

Now she really really really wanted to ask about his mom. What kind of person was she? Was she married to his dad? Was she a villain, too? Did she have powers? Was she nice? Did Warren look like her?

But after the heavy stuff about his dad, she wasn't sure she should.

"Even I know you don't just 'pick up' kanji; it's supposed to be really hard for westerners to learn, too. Face it, you're just super smart and totally cool. Although you'd be way cooler if it was Japanese, but I'm probably biased about that!" She grinned. "But at least now I know what I can buy for you when I need to buy you presents! It's kind of hard to wrap Chinese food."

[peace_n_war]

Warren was the spitting image of his father, actually. Except Warren had better hair than his dad had at this age.

"Hey, if you really wanted to wrap Chinese food, I'm sure you would have found a way." Warren smiled faintly. "And really, you don't have to worry about presents anyhow."

Not even tomorrow. Because he wasn't telling anyone for anything. Nope.

[heromaniac]

Momoko was happy to see even that faint smile and she grinned larger in return. "Well, that's true. About the wrapping, I mean. Of course I'm going to worry about the presents, you do that when you want the person to like what you give them!" Plus his eyes did sparkle when he was happy and she liked making him really smile.

[peace_n_war]

"I like the Abaranger," Warren noted, gesturing to where the action figure was standing in a place of honor on his shelf. "Getting the red one was a good call."

[heromaniac]

She looked and laughed, clapping her hands. "I'm glad you really did like it! I was going to offer to take it back if you didn't. My three-year old self was pretty sure that everyone would be happy with action figures!"

[peace_n_war]

"Looks like you had pretty good taste even at three," he smirked. "I guess I'm going to have to play with it sometime. It would be pretty sad of me to get such a cool toy and then just leave it to sit and collect dust."

[heromaniac]

"Then I need to buy you more in case the urge to play comes over you all of a sudden! Let's see, that's Chinese food, a book with inferior kanji, and cool toys. Christmas is gone... Valentines'... Right! Your birthday! When's your birthday? I have some shopping to do!"

[peace_n_war]

... Oh. Crap. There was no way to weasel out of this one, was there?

Nope. Warren couldn't see one.

"It's. Uh. Tomorrow."

Maybe if he mumbled it, she wouldn't hear and that would be fine!

[heromaniac]

She heard him, barely. But did she believe him?

"No, seriously? Really really seriously? Tomorrow?!"

[peace_n_war]

"Yeah," he clarified, sighing faintly. "It's tomorrow. So?"

It was just another day of the year. See? No big deal.

[heromaniac]

"So?! So?!" She threw up her arms and dropped her shoulders. "So, I don't have time to plan anything and there's not even a cake, although I could probably order one, but I don't know what kind you like and they may not be able to do one in time at such short notice. And I'm not too sure about the bakery in town, I mean they have good doughnuts and pastries but have you tried their cakes? Maybe I could ask my Food Appreciation teacher, but that's Tuesdayand I can't wait that long if it's tomorrow and I really should have asked you earlier so it's my fault and I don't even have a present for you!"