Not Your Villain (Sidekick Squad #2)(80)

Emma nods and takes a deep, contemplative breath.

“Are you okay?” she asks.

Bells leans over and swings his arm around her. “Are you okay?” he asks. “I mean, it’s a lot to process.”

“Yeah, it’s… kind of a relief to talk about it, honestly. I thought there was something wrong with me, that I couldn’t want any of those things with Carlos. Like he was talking about anniversaries and doing something special and I… I didn’t get it, you know? I didn’t like him that much as a person. I thought I was—well, he was cute, and I liked kissing him and I thought everything else would just fall into place, you know?”

Bells makes a noncommital hm noise and strokes Emma’s hair.

“I just— It’s normal for people to date. I just wanted to feel normal,” she says quietly.

“There’s no such thing as normal,” Bells says. “I mean, there’s what we think people are like, but everyone has a different experience, you know?”

“What do you think? About me. Being ace or aro.” Emma looks up at him, eyes widening. She twitches.

A lot of this is new to Bells too; he had no idea Emma felt this way, that she always felt this way. If she doesn’t do romantic attraction, there’s no possibility of her being attracted to him—and that’s okay. It doesn’t matter, in the long run. He squeezes her shoulder. “You’re my best friend. I love you. Nothing’s gonna change that.”

Emma sniffles and buries her face in Bells’ shoulder, and he holds on to her, and they both pretend that Emma isn’t crying.

It’s not the way he pictured telling her that he loves her, but this moment isn’t about Bells. He can offer her friendship, and if that’s all he ever gives her, it’ll be more than enough.

*

The next day Abby pulls Bells aside after breakfast. She doesn’t press him for information about Jess. Instead, she takes Bells to a training room and asks him how he protected them from the MonRobots. “What you did out there— You saved our lives,” Abby says. “And you’ve never done anything like that before?”

Bells rubs the back of his neck. He tells her about the motorcycle crash when he was learning to ride, how he changed, somehow. His skin had turned to stone. He tells her about changing mud into an iron pillar when the robots chased him. “I don’t know how I did it, but it happened. Same when we were being attacked by robots.”

Abby nods. “That makes sense, you know. I mean, when I was first practicing with my powers, I did everything to test the range and strength of my telekinesis. The technopath stuff didn’t come until later, but even with that I experimented to see what I could and couldn’t do. Reading datachips I figured out by accident. I think you have a lot of potential.”

Bells nods.

“Could you try it again? Turn your skin into armor?”

Bells tries. He reaches inside him for the shift and tries to remember what he was thinking when he turned into stone. Stone and rock and toughness, he wills himself. “Anything?”

“Hmm. Your hair turned white for a second,” Abby says. “Guess that’s not what you were going for. Maybe you’re trying too much. Think of it as changing into another person, maybe? Or getting bigger? ”

Bells can do that. He thinks about being tall and can feel himself stretch until he’s twice as tall as Abby and his head touches the ceiling. He laughs and waves at her.

“Okay, do you think about different things when you shift yourself and when you shift your clothes? Because your clothes got bigger too.”

“Yeah,” Bells says, but he’s done it so often it’s hard to tease out the differences. He shifts into what Abby’s wearing, a sleek black workout top and pants, and then, for the hell of it, shifts into Abby, complete with the same braided hairstyle.

“Okay, very funny, you’re a taller version of me,” Abby says.

Bells shrinks to her size so he can stick his tongue out at her.

The door opens, and Jess walks in. “Hey, Abby, do you have—” She looks up from her DED, faltering at the sight of two Abbys. She blinks and freezes. “Um. What…”

“We’re testing Bells’ powers,” Abby says.

“Yeah, we think he can replicate what he did the other day, with the skin armor,” Bells says in Abby’s voice, mimicking her stance. She does a bit of a hip thrust, he observes, so he throws out his hip, and then, for good measure, tries to do a hairflip. Long hair is heavy. Good thing I’m not going to be like this forever. He watches Jess for her reaction.

“Really funny. This looks nothing like skin armor and more like you guys were gonna play a joke on me.” Jess rolls her eyes at Bells and then smiles at Abby without hesitation.

He shifts back to himself, pouting. “What? I thought it was a perfect copy!”

Both Jess and Abby laugh, and then they look at each other, awkward and hesitant.

“I was looking for you,” Jess says softly.

Bells excuses himself to hop on the treadmill and watches as Jess and Abby, talking in close, hushed whispers, leave the gym. They aren’t even at the door when Abby shakes her head and throws her arms around Jess, and both girls laugh in relief.

Brendan is convinced he can override the lock system on the exits, and Emma and Jess stockpile supplies so, when the moment is right, they can leave headquarters and get the Registry. It becomes a new routine, everyone working on their parts of the plan while Bells and Abby work on developing their powers together. Today Bells has an idea for Abby he wants to try, but she hasn’t taken to meditation well.