Behind the Brilliance [Quintis Scorpion Fanfiction/Drabble]

Behind the Brilliance

Walter and Paige had taken Ralph out for ice-cream, but knowing Walter's opinion regarding sugary, sweet food items, he had probably changed Paige's mind and took them to the museum. Sylvester was at his chalkboard, working on a new theorem of probability. I was at my workspace, analysing my patient files. Happy was nowhere to be seen.

Her workspace was neat, as usual. Several loose screws and her backup tool-box were on her table. No pictures, no frames, no notes, unlike Paige's. Happy was not sentimental, not unlike the rest of us, but I knew that her stoicism had far deeper roots than ours.

"When I was two," she had said that day in the basement, "My dad took me to Saint Luke's, handed me to a nurse and said find her a good home."

She never talked about her family, never about her past, her childhood. But that day, in the basement during the bio-hacking mission, she had spoken up for the first time, opened herself up to me. But I didn't know, then, what I was feeling. Ex-fiancee not returning my calls? Not really the ideal time for me to realize my own feelings.

But it's been three months. I got up from my chair, put my hat on and went to where I knew she would be. Happy Quinn.

"Where're you going?" Sylvester said, when I was nearing the door.

"Run the potentialities, Sylvester," and I walked out the door.

I found the garage door open. I could hear the sound of metal clanging over metal, a cog turning. Motorcycle. I smiled. Rebuilding an engine was one of the simplest things in the breadth of Happy's abilities, but whenever I see her working on one, there is a determination in her eyes, a trace of a smiling muscle behind her face. Her posture told me everything; she loved it. I walked in, and found her bent over her desk surrounded by the vehicles she had fixed in the past.

But something was wrong.

She was in her usual denim jacket and combat boots, but her lips were quivering, her jaws clenched. It doesn't take a genius to see that she was feeling something beyond what I have seen her emote. The veins on her hands were popping green against her skin, tense. She was clasping a wrench.

I walked slowly towards her, feeling a lump in my throat.

Her hair was down against her face, and it was only then did I realize that she was shaking, too. She was heaving in deep breaths, gulping, shivering.

Oh, what is caution? I dropped my slow pace and sprinted to where she was. There was a voice in my head telling me to hold her, to calm her, to make her feel okay, and I acted, then, only to this voice. 

But before I could reach her, she had already looked up, her almond eyes carrying the residue of the tears she cried. What was she telling me? Eyebrows angled, eyes wide, lips parted. She was surprised.

"Hi," I said.

She quickly dropped the tool in her hand and wiped the tears off her face. She blinked a few times and took a moment to catch her breath, but once she regained her composure, she said to me with her usual regal poise, "What do you want, Toby?"

She was always this way; petite with an attitude of patronising balance. Her voice never betrayed, but it was the way she moved that told me otherwise. A flinching muscle on her temple, a flicker of a frown on her face, the twitch of her ring finger.

"What is this? An engine?" I replied, gesturing to her table.

"No, it's a chocolate cake," she glared at me. She'd slipped back into her costume, her disguse.

I took a chance. "What's wrong?"

She frowned at me. "Nothing's wrong. I'm rebuilding an engine."