All the Other Ghosts (Boyxboy Superhero AU Fanfic (Klaine))

Chapter 4

From the queue for coffee Blaine keeps looking back at him, because he could vanish - literally - at any moment, Blaine knows that. But he just sits there at the coffee shop table with his hands over his face, elbows on the table, like he can't even move.

Blaine brings over his replacement coffee, sets it in front of him. The Ghost - weird to call him that when he's just a guy, well, not just a guy, he's, well, he's pretty, um, pretty pretty - takes his hands from his face and looks at him, sickly white and still. He looks down at the coffee, closes his eyes, mouths without quite making the sounds for it, Thank you.

"Are you okay? You look -"

He looks like he's going to be sick. Blaine looks around the coffee shop, spots the jug of ice water standing with the milk and sugar and goes to pour a beaker, brings it over to him. He focuses on it, with what looks like some difficulty, then lifts a hand and accepts it, and takes a shaky sip. This time he does manage to get out, familiar-strange voice (almost too clear without the static of the internet audios) trembling a little, "Thank you."

Blaine pulls the chair out, sits opposite him. "It's okay. You can trust me, you know you can."

The Ghost stares back at him, breathing slowly, and then he puts the water down and shakes his head. He swallows. "No. I don't know that." he says, his voice a little rasping and too breathy. "You don't even know what that means."

"I'm not going to -" Blaine glances over his shoulder but the coffee shop's noisy and no-one's paying them the slightest attention. He leans in a little. "I'm not going to tell anyone anything, you know I-"

"You have a brother. Right? Do you think I don't have people I love? I'm hard to kill, you don't think people who want me dead wouldn't go for them first?"

"I would never tell anyone anyth-"

His eyes are as hard and cold as saltwater. "Under torture you wouldn't? If they tortured your brotheryou wouldn't? Your parents, anyone you love?" His face is white, more anger than fear now. "Do you understand what the stakes are here?"

Blaine stares at him, mouth still open. He closes it. He tries to think, unable to look away from the fierce light flickering in his eyes. Cooper -

It jolts in his guts like a grabbing, twisting hand.

His mom, his dad. Friends. He looks to the side, away from the Ghost's too-cold glare, vicious pale green, and it shakes a little in him, imagining what could happen to other people because of his choices. His choices. He's allowed to risk himself, but -

He swallows, and stares at the floor, and thinks. It's not a decision he could ever have avoided entirely, and he always knew that, really, that he doesn't get to only risk himself, there's no 'only' for humans, tangled together like old cobwebs as they are. And even without choosing the costume and cape that strange power of his could always make someone want the wrong thing from him, and it's not only him who would suffer for that. Even if all he risked was his own sudden stupid death, other people would pay the price too, the suffering for what he did. He never could have kept them entirely safe. No-one ever can; it's a dangerous world to live in, the world in which you love people and people still die.

He speaks to the floor. It's too much, yet, to look back at the Ghost's face.

"It's a decision," he says slowly. "Isn't it? It's the same decision you make every night, when you - put that mask on." He draws a breath and looks at him now, at his distrustful eyes and tense jaw. "You choose what you have to do. So yes." It burns in his throat. "Yes, I understand what decision I'm making. I won't - I won't break my word, not about this, not to you. It costs you, so I have to accept what it costs me if I want to do this. So, yes." He shrugs. "Under torture, I won't betray the people you're risking. And I'm the one who chooses to risk the people who love me." He swallows again, hard, and it does hurt. "Just like you do. I - don't have the right to choose them over you. I won't tell anyone anything about you, I swear it. Whatever it costs me. You can trust me."