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She was talking, her voice deeper than it was for everyone else.
Adam heard the droning tone that his power stretched her voice into, even if he was only partially paying attention. He was considering what it would take for him to sneak into Albert’s room and switch the paints from one tube to another. He wanted to zip out and do a computer search for the closest art supply store. Arthur had a computer that could almost keep up with him, it wasn’t too much of a chore to us that one. When his brother threw in that gazillion permutation lock on, Adam found it quicker to just run around the city and look.
The silence lasted a full second to him, and he realized she’d stopped speaking. He processed what all that droning had been.
“I understand that this isn’t easy. Every speedster has to difficult time getting themselves to work in sync with regular speed people, but I need you to focus and work on it. Rumors are starting to circulate about you, and we can’t have anyone investigating if you have powers.”
Was this a valid time to facepalm?
She understood? How the Hell could she ever imagine what it was like to be him? Even if she’d spoken to other speedsters, he only knew of one whose speed work in a similar way to his, and she lived in Russia. And if Georgina Armstrong had somehow spoken with her? She wouldn’t be sitting here telling him she understood how he felt. At least his family didn’t bother lying about it. Even among them, he was an anomaly. The one who had to fake being normal. They accepted him as he was and offered comfort instead of saying ‘we understand’
Even trying to explain things to her was going to be a chore since he couldn’t just say everything and be done with it. He had to slow his speech down to her level, speak in the droning tone the rest of the world used. Maybe he needed to record some sort of speech and just hand that to everyone so they’ll stop trying to pretend.
She was still looking at him.
Of course, she was. He’d jacked up his speed reflexively. As far as she was concerned, not even a second had passed.
He sighed, made it a slow one so it would register to her as what it was. Being able to slow his speech to their level didn’t make it easy, even after being forced to do it for all these interminable years.
“You have no idea what it’s like.”
“Adam, I might not have super speed, but I know what it’s like to feel like the entire world can’t measure up to your capabilities. That you have dumb yourself down just to have what passes as a normal conversation.
He sighed again. That, right there, show she had no idea what it was like for him. What was he going to use this time? The hare and the turtle? The playing an entire basketball team game by himself? Would she even…
He smiled. “Do you know the Zootopia movies?” he asked.
“Which one?”
He shrugged. “Doesn’t matter. I think the character was in all five of them. Everyone seemed to find him funny, so they felt they had to put him in it, then his girlfriend in the fifth movie.”
“I’ve seen the first three,” she replied. “I wasn’t overly impressed with them, very simple—”
“If I wanted a review, I’d surf the net,” he cut her off, already bored of the idea she thought he was interested in her opinion. It’s was a kid’s movie. Not Shakespeare. “Do you remember the sloth character? The one with the fast car, he works at the DMV, or whatever they call it in the movie.”
She nodded, her expression neutral.
“Good. So it’s the same setup in each movie. They need information from him, and Wilde and Judy have to stand there as he slowly explains it. In the first one, Judy tries to speed things along by trying to finish what he’s saying for him, but it doesn’t help. In the third movie, they even go with cut-scenes showing Judy and Wilde doing various things while they wait.”
Georgina cracked a smile, just as Adam had hoped. Everyone seemed to find that scene funny.
“You’re the sloth,” he stated. “The entire world move as the speed of the sloth to me. It’s not that no one measures up to what I do that makes it difficult for me to deal with everyone. It’s because you are all so damned slow. You just won’t get to the God Damned point. You go on and on about needless things thinking you’re being funny, and I have to endure all of it because if I try to finish what you’re saying, you just keep going. Do you get why this I have to work harder at ‘fitting in’ is never going to work?”
“Mister Orr, I still think—”
“That I need to work harder? That I’m really hot? Thanks but I don’t swing that way. That there’s a chance you’ll win the multiple dollar jackpot? That this school’s footballs team will win the championship. By the way, why football? And why just with the normies? Should the Super-side get a team too?”
“—you—” She stopped and Adam grinned at her.
“I can do this a lot longer than you can stand it.”
“I see.”
“Now, can I get a waiver so I don’t have to sit through those never-ending classes and we call this done?”
She sat there, looking at him, her face impassive. Adam found he admired her dedication to looking neutral. Because everyone moved so much slower than he did, micro-expressions weren’t a thing to him. They were big and loud. She had none of them.
“I’m afraid I can’t agree to that, Mister Orr.”
Adam’s face fell after the second word. He’d raged by the time the fourth one was out of her mouth, and his anger had turned cold by the time she was done.
“I see,” he replied frostily, standing very slowly.
“Mister Orr, We aren’t done.”
“We are. I explained the problem, and you’re more interested in trying to get me to bend over and do things your way than admitting my situation is beyond your ability to deal with it. You aren’t the first—” he made the quotes very slowly. “—‘expert’ who thought all they had to do was give me a pep talk and everything would be okay.” He left.
He purposely didn’t destroy her door in the process, enduring her rushed protest as he slowed as much as he could, and then gently opened and closed it. Then he ran.
His brothers who were in the house had greeted him as he crossed it. He knew because they always did, even if he was gone by the time the words came out. He’d asked why they bothered, in the early days. And they told him he was their brother, and they would never ignore him. Never act like he didn’t matter or his presence wasn’t wanted. They loved him, speed and all, and if he was in too much of a hurry to hear the greetings, they were okay with that.
He usually slowed enough to listen and greet them back. He loved his brothers.
The cold rage had burned away during the run across the campus and through the university town where they had their house, and all that was left when he dropped in bed was abject misery. This was going to be Hell. As much as he wanted, he couldn’t just break the rules and run out of classes. That would get him expelled, and if they threw him out, Arthur would leave too, and his brother deserved a chance to prove how good he was.
Adam wouldn’t be the one to cost him that.
The bed shifted as someone lay on it next to him. He didn’t look. He didn’t care. One of his brothers had realized something was wrong and was here to comfort him. An arm draped over his back. Another shift as another one of them joined them, then a third, and a fourth.
The wrapping him in a cocoon of them. His family, his brothers. They didn’t say anything. They didn’t ask what had caused him to seek refuge in his bed. They simply held him. Let him know they were here for him.
He let go of his power and they became statues. He would soak in as much of their love as he could because, without it, he would surely go insane.
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