"Elizabeth … Potter?" Alaric looked up from her application.
Lizzie nodded along eagerly. "Well, my full name is Elizabeth, but I go by Lizzie. I'm named after my grandmother, who I never … actually … met …" She trailed off when she realized she was oversharing at the same time she was trying to give a false identity, sealing her lips shut and folding her hands in her lap.
"Ever killed anyone?"
She thought of the one time she stabbed Landon with a demon sword - but that didn't count, right? She knew he would come back to life. "No."
"Good." Alaric smiled proudly. "Because we don't accept cold-blooded killers into our program."
"Oh, my blood is warm," Lizzie replied quickly. She snapped her mouth shut again. "Sorry, I make bad jokes when I'm nervous."
"Nothing to be nervous about. I think you're a perfect candidate for this program."
"You do?" Lizzie's eyes were wide. She sat up straighter in her seat.
"Of course." Alaric furrowed his eyebrows, still smiling. "Unless you have something else I should know about?"
Lizzie thought about telling him everything right then and there, about her diagnosis, about her real identity, about all the trouble she had caused before. But instead, she just shook her head silently.
"Perfect." Alaric snapped his notebook shut and grabbed a sheet of paper from his desk. "Then I'll just need a parent's signature here."
"It's … just me," Lizzie said.
"That's alright. Your signature then."
Lizzie started to scribble her name down, jerking her hand away from the paper when she instinctively put an S after her name. She played it off, dotting the end of it and signing Potter immediately after it.
"That's funny." Alaric smiled at her signature as he took the paper and added it to the file. "You sign your S's just like me."
"Ha," Lizzie laughed dryly. "Small world."
She swallowed her fear along with her laughter, counting the seconds until she could leave the office.
"Well I'll have my daughter meet you in the lobby shortly to give you a tour."
Lizzie forced a smile and nodded along. "Only child?"
"Yeah … I couldn't - Well, it's a long story. And sort of personal."
Lizzie nodded even quicker than before. She could see the pain on her father's face and she knew the story. Jo, accidental pregnancy, wedding day, Kai, a lifetime of grief, a wound torn open every time he looked at his Gemini twins …
It was better this way. She was sure of it.
YOU ARE READING
Without Me
FanfictionLizzie's dreams of being a superhero had gotten her into messy situations before, but nothing like this. She sacrificed her life during the final showdown with Malivore but what life she sacrificed wasn't what she was expecting.
