We All Feel a little Invisible at Times
Life was often considered ironic, wasn't it? When things got really bad, or really good, there were times you just had to sit back and stare, struggling to absorb what really was going on. For example, say a man could turn invisible.... most would aside he'd find it really easy to hide. But life was ironic, and it was the very invisibility that put this particular individual at the greatest risk. One man spends his life doing good, screws up and suddenly falls down the wrong track... another man spends his life screwing up and manages to trip over something half way resembling the right track. For a moment Darien Fawkes found himself thinking over that very process... thinking over each and every step, as best as any man could do, trying hard to recall what step lead him in which way. Not that any of it mattered... the ex partner, Hobbes, was right... in the end Darien had finally found something that he was good at, and something no one else could do... at least... till he found out about the wide spread mutant population. Suddenly a freak experiment just became one of a global phenomenon festering the human population... according to some folk anyway. Unlike these mutants though, born with whatever they possessed, Darien was anything but lucky like that, put through one test after another, subjected to pain and processing, over and over and left with a handicap that was not only very severe... but exceedingly dangerous to all around if left untreated. That magical cure... the Counter-Agent, a ticket back from the brink of insanity, but as far as cures go, it wasn't anything substantial, it didn't offer true freedom, it was like a parole sentence, with regular check ups and continuous rules and regulations.
"It's not that simple Darien... we can't store the counter-agent, it doesn't keep well," There was always excuses, but how was Darien supposed to know some of what they said was actually true, "I just need one shot doc, please," This little genuie pig learned quick that begging didn't help here, they weren't evil, really... they were just doing what they had to, or what they thought they had to. He was a weapon after all.... a weapon... give him 40 minutes invisible and they'll see what kind of weapon he was. "I'll 48 hours Darien... you'll just have to be careful," Careful, it was a laugh really, the things they sent him to do, the dangers that both he and his partner Hobbes had to face... there were days where he needed more then one shot to get through, and they would do nothing but whine and make excuses... too expensive, not ready, and his personal favorite, "You can't go over board with your usage, too much counteragent and you'll build up a resistance, you heard the Official.. he said once every 6 days," Another laugh, or was it a cue to start crying, sometimes Darien could never tell how he felt really, 30 minutes of quicksilver usage and he starts to go mental, and they send him on mission after mission and then give him that crap?
"Darren?" The womans voice cut deep, sharp like the Keeper's used to be when she talked, though instead of a blond, there was a brown haired woman, the hair cut much shorter then Claire ever had hers. For a moment Darien stared at her, so lost it looked as if he wasn't entirely sure who exactly he was staring at. "Darren, are you with me partner?" The same blank expression still lingered even when his face turned down to scribble a note into his booklet, flipping the lid closed with a shallow smile and uneasy sigh. "You look like crap, maybe you should call it a night?" There was a chuckle in reply, followed by a more light-hearted laugh of; "Yeah, well you don't look half bad yourself," A hand rose to rub at the back of his neck, that aching tapping echoed even as he talked, his partner was used to it, Darren often got headaches, but he always said he was seeing a specialist and that it would take time to fix.
"I'm serious D, I can handle this.. you've pulled a few late nighters, why don't you head home early," The scene around them wasn't exactly pleasant, but they'd seen worse, two youths seemed to have gotten into a fight, there was a lot of yelling, someone got hurt but witnesses were saying the guy cut up died trying to stop the fight. It didn't appear to be a difficult scene to process, as long as they followed the clues it would lead to the killers and so far the clues might as well have been light up like neon lights. Darien gave a soft sigh, he felt drained, tired, tired of everything really, sick of it too. He wanted to be Darien Fawkes again, not Darren Turwin, he missed being the Invisible Man, how stupid was that... no longer the 'special' one on the job, he was now just another face in the crowd. If only they knew.
"I'm too restless to go home," Half truth, besides, going home meant sitting in that place with nothing to do but think, and thinking was bad right now, he really needed something to preoccupy his mind. "Besides Kate, it's your turn to buy doughnuts," There, the frozen surface was cracked and they could progress on to the work around them now. Crouching down by the body, Darien thought he was about to get his wish, a gateway to distraction, when in the end, all it felt like he got was a severe hit across the back of his skull. A sharp grunt escaped before he could stifle it, a tensed gripping of the back of his lower skull... that same sensation of something trying to break its way inside. You'd think having taken the some of the dwindling supply of counter agents he had two days ago the bar wouldn't be gone, it wasn't even lasting any more.. the longer it sat in his freezer the less amount of time he had before the quicksilver seeping into his body started dragging him back into that very frightful state of madness.
"Hey, are you ok?" It's seemed like forever in that moment of pain, even when Kate's hands reached for him, an illusion of distance was felt in that agony, but despite it a staggered reply was still able to be made. "Yeah, god... I think I cracked my neck or pinched a nerve or something.." It was so easy to lie now, it came out smoother then any attempt of truth could do. "You know what, I think I will take you up on that offer... I must be getting old," He gave a laugh, and honest to god Darien thought for an instant that the pain would never go, but it did, at last it subsided enough to allow him to get up and give his polite farewells and assurances before heading to his car. Though inside he knew it wasn't like driving was an option right now, not with the back of his head splitting open. How many times has this happened? And yet it was still as frightening as the first time... all the way back in his brothers lab, that first time he woke up.... ok... there was a distinct lack of spiders here, unlike there... Nothing like a good stab of fear to get the adrenalin pumping, and a person with arachnophobia like Darien, that was a sure fire way to get it done. However that fear was nothing compared to what else came with the glade... that insidious side, the one unleashed only when the madness began to stir. The first time he woke disgruntled and agitated, his head splitting and pounding, the eyes that stared back in the mirror... they weren't his, he always felt that, never his that looked right back, but instead something else, something frightful. And soon enough, he was proved right, those demon red eyes... they didn't belong to him, they belonged to that monster, the Quicksilver beast that would rape and kill so heartlessly if allowed and left untreated.
Three shots of Counter-Agent left... two days per shot.. he didn't even have a week now... what happened at the end of the week? When he finally ran out what would become of him? Death? Surrender? What was he willing to do? Would the agency even take him back and would he even want to go back if they would? There were whispers in his ears, the fingers clutching helplessly at the back of the former agents head, there were times it was so bad he couldn't move, he could barely stay conscious, it sometimes felt as if death was the only freedom left to him. But that seemed to easy, and too difficult at the same time...
"Now what?" The question was directed towards the mirror, and for a moment those bloodshot eyes stared back, but were rubbed away stubbornly with tired fingers, "I'm not ready to go back... but I won't let you win either, do you hear me?" There was a moment where Darien simply glared at his own reflection, but it wasn't himself he was talking to, but the gland, that parasite inside his mind, taking over and controlling him as if it thought that Darien was just a simple tool to be used as it saw fit. Well that wasn't going to happen, not again, and either this gland continued to play nice, or Darien just might start to consider more drastic measures, because there was no way he was going to turn into another Simon Cole. Former cat burglar yes... future homicidal psycho.. not if he had anything to say about it.
TBC: Another Post, This Thread, Darien's Apartment.
They say the Human mind can twist and bend under the stress of reality
But sometimes...it can begin to crack, before shattering in pieces
Insanity was a scary process... at first it's a fear of what was coming... a fear that if caution wasn't taken then something bad will happen. And then suddenly it's there, within reach, almost but not quite ready to explode or fall apart... finally it's there, surrounded and engulfing ones mind like fire on a dried log. The fear of that fire haunted the mind and yet once the flames started to lick the surface.... everything went numb, melting away till nothing was left but pure madness, sick, malevolent and cruel. At least, that's how it was with Darien Fawkes.
The car seemed stuffy, and the drive home had been slow, taking the most quiet routes he knew to save any chance of accidents. Sweat coated the former agents skin, soaking lightly into the clothes now named Darren wore. Agent Fawkes may be marked as dead to the public eye, but he was haunting Darren Turwin just as bad as Simon Cole once had. Not that a new name and job would have driven the old identity away, it just seemed as if things were worse now, more dangerous then before and not just for himself but all those around him should the first stage of Quicksilver madness be reached outside of the Agency's walls. And what of stage 5? Once Stage 5 of Quicksilver madness was reached, even his pathetic samples wouldn't help in the least, he'd need to go back to them, he'd need the stage 5 formula.
"Come on now Darien... focus on the pleasentries," A glance at the tattoo on his wrist showed two bars left before reaching stage 1, that didn't stop the pounding in the back of his head. There was a time this point was reached and all Darien had to do was walts down into the 'Keepers' lair and ask her for his shot, more often then not it was given without incidents, but right now Darien didn't have that luxury. "All this time and I'm still not sure if I long to see you Claire.. or still just dread it," From now on he'd have to keep a vial on him at all times, there was no telling when an injection would be needed, especially since the counter-agent wasn't curing Fawkes as effectively as the fresh batches used to.
Dragging oneself up stairs late at night just made it easy to pretend that it was after work beers that put a slouch in the posture and a sway in the man's steps. The apartment waiting up stairs was sparse, there was a bed and a fridge with minimal food and a few cans of beer, a scattering of photos on the coffee table was all that seemed out of place and they were part of a case he was on. For a guy who spent the first half of his life breaking in to places, it always seemed ironic to Fawkes that he later spent his time trying to break out of places, or old lives and dodgey agencies. Two days of use was made by one vial and with very limited use of the quicksilver gland, it was definitely time to start to worry... of course Darien had been worrying about this since before he even broke out of the agency, he knew what was at risk and the problems involved... one vial was sent off almost two weeks ago to get tested, break down whatever chemicals were used in making it and to try and recreate the counter-agent. It should have been done sooner, fear and paranoia however delayed it and trying to find someone trustworthy hadn't helped speed things along either, but for now patience was required, and that just made it all so much harder.
"Hobbes... Hobbes, Hobbes, Hobbes.." There was a shake of Darien's head, a nervous chuckle as the frozen vial was removed from the freezer and placed down in the sink to thaw under running hot water. "Where are you buddy... I expected you to find me months ago," For all Fawkes knew his ex-partner had made the discovery and chose to keep it quiet for now, it just wasn't like Hobbes to just accept things so easily, Robert Hobbes wouldn't care who said what about his partner till he saw proof and without a body there was no proof that would sedate Hobbes determination. Just a little freedom, a reminder of the world outside that pathetic hole he worked in, for all the good he did there it never felt enough... maybe they were just giving him that little freedom, getting it out of his system.. but then again, that wasn't likely, it was too risky. They could just end up finding him and removing the gland to put in a host more willing to follow orders and do what he's told... Hobbes always had called the gland a gift. Of course, once the gland was removed from the back of Darien's head, then death would occur and that wouldn't sit well with either Hobbes or Darien for that matter, so getting caught was now seeming a very bad idea when thoughts like that arose.
The vial of counter-agent floated innocently in the pooling water, the sink now turned off and the needle placed carefully nearby. Sweat was rubbed from the brow with the back of Darien's sleeve, followed by a yawn and a pained expression as the hand went to rub irritably at the back of his skull. This is what Darien had always wanted right? The ability to control his own intake of the counter-agent? Well, people were always warned to watch what they wished for just in case it came true. There were times it was embarrassing to not wear long sleeves, the needle marks riddled his arms like swiss cheese and lets not even mention the dating department, rather difficult to explain why he was suddenly standing with gaping holes in his body and missing limbs once the adrenaline really started to pump into his system.
Which was ok in most parts, Fawkes really wasn't ready to settle down any time soon, but that didn't mean he wasn't interested in getting out there, which usually meant that if Darien homed in on someone who wasn't going to send his hormones insane, then he had a far better time controlling his abilities. But focusing on woman he only had a mild interest in really seemed to be growing dull... he felt as shallow as some people seemed to see him as at times. It was just as various names started popping into Darien's minds, their faces haunting him for a moment, that a pain shot through the back of his head, agony causing him to stagger and groan.
The counter-agent had thawed by now, all thoughts were pushed aside as focus was drawn onto this next simple task, to take the needle and draw the blue liquid into it, readying to inject it into his arms like all the times before over the last few years. "I thought this was supposed to free me from life without parole," Come on last lingering thought, sliding almost thoughtlessly off his tongue as Darien thought of the moment his brother, Kevin, had walked into the cell and proposed the offer that would devastate both of their lives. While there was a sensation of release, it wasn't anything like how it had felt back at the Agency with Claire's freshly made concoctions, a glance at the wrist where his tattoo monitored the Quicksilver in his blood stream showed that to be true, a recent shot and it just pushed the bars down half way. It was supposed to last him six days with minimal usage of the gland... it was barely lasting him two now... what was going to happen next?
Sleep, insanity could come in more then one way and right now he felt exhausted and sleep deprived on top of everything else. Though just as Darien's face struck the pillow with a grateful thud, it seemed only a groggy instant later that his phone was ringing.Ignore it. Such an easy thing to do, in fact, so easy all he had to do was keep his eyes closed and soon enough it would be nothing more then a distant chime as he passed out. It seemed however that the chiming refused to stop, that or his guilt drew it out longer, but with a sluggish flick of the phone it was pressed against the former FBI agents ear, his words coming out as more of a groan right now then anything. "Fawkes," It came out before Darien even realized, the shock at least helped wake him a little as Kate's voice was recognized on the other end, sounding a little beyond stressed, "Oh hey, sorry, was expecting an old friend to call... what's up Kate?" It was brushed off, and from what his new partner was saying Darien could understand why a severe slip up like that didn't even make a bleep on her radar. "What? Oh crap... I'll be there Kate, give me a few ok?" Well at least he hadn't had the chance to get out of his work trousers, all he needed to dress was a fresh shirt and to slip on the shoes and out he was. Something about mutants running riot on the streets, he really wasnt up for a debriefing on the phone, maybe by the time he got to the precinct he'd be awake enough to understand whatever was happening... a glance at the watch revealed it to be just after four. Some criminals really have no consideration for the guys who are supposed to catch them, up at all hours and totally uncaring of the fact that he, Darien Fawkes, had far better things to be doing at four in the morning... like snoring very loudly.
TBC: Into the CO's police side of the storyline.
They say the Human mind can twist and bend under the stress of reality
But sometimes...it can begin to crack, before shattering in pieces
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