Arch Frenemies

Part 15: Subleased Subconscious

Dedicated to: LadyVeniceMaria

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"Love me or hate me, both are in my favour. If you love me, I will always be in your heart, and if you hate me, I will be in your mind."
-Qandeel Baloch

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Hitting the start button, they both closed their eyes and leaned back against the headrest.

The machine behaved as he had expected it to. His forehead tingled as he focused on the premotor cortex area of his brain, channeling all his recently learned ballroom dance knowledge to Galaxy Girl. The process was nearly complete when something went horribly wrong. The circlet on his head began to vibrate against his temple. He couldn't open his eyes.

Not allowing himself to panic, immediately he calculated the issue, he was receiving unanticipated feedback from her, and their minds were now equally linked. A wall of raw emotion hit him like a tidal wave. "Shut it off!" he yelled. Emotion was not something he tended to feel. Something clattered to the ground, his eyes still glued shut, and he couldn't see what it was.
"Crud!" She cursed.

"Oh no, tell me she didn't lose the emergency stop." He thought fearfully to himself.
"I dropped it." She panicked. Then a second wave of more concentrated emotions hit. Loneliness, psychological pain, and the fear of failure, fear of disappointment, fear of her own self, but more prominently, the sinking fear that she was no longer as indestructible as she once thought. It was her pain he was suddenly feeling, and it was too much. Toxic's body began to tremble and rattle in the seat.

"I can't open my eyes!" She cried out again in panic. He heard a shuffle and assumed she was searching the floor for the stop button.
"This is too much. Make it stop!!" Her voice cracked in pain, as she was now experiencing his emotional trauma. Toxic winced, gripping the armrests of his seat. He was feeling her darkest fears. She feared being the monster she thought everyone thought she was. That one day she would do more than accidentally break bones. Though it was hard to tell over his own pains, the ones he had carefully buried deep down, the ones that now bubbled to the surface and were pouring into her.

Both were shocked beyond measure to learn that theirs fears were so similar, despite ulterior goals and motives, they mirrored each other, through the scarring haze of emotional and parental traumas it was hard to tell where his fears ended and hers began. "Got it!" She cried out after what felt like years. After a miraculous click, his eyes opened. Toxic jumped from his seat and threw his Altificator violently onto the ground, his heart pounding like thunder in his chest. She was kneeling on the floor by his feet, tenderly rubbing her bare, goose-bumped arms with her hands. He watched her try to calm her breathing down, she was trying not to hyperventilate, and meanwhile his own perfectly organized higher level brain was in complete chaos.

He held out his hand to help her up. Toxic wanted to speak, but the words just wouldn't come out. She stared at his gloved hand for a moment, before slowly bringing her gaze to her lifelong enemy's face, and placing her hand in his.

"Your... Pain... I felt..." She gasped breathing heavily, and trembled as she stood up. Shaking like a leaf, Galaxy was taken over by what could only be described as an instinctual need. She wrapped her arms around him, pulling him into a long hug. She pressed her face into his chest and clung tightly to him. His mind was still reeling, and as if also upon instinct he pulled her closer; wrapping one arm around her back while his other hand cradled her head against him.

There they stood, two self-described monsters, mortal enemies united in inner pain and one of the most human desires of all; the desire to be understood and the need for human connection. Her brain a fuzzy mess, she clung to his tall lanky figure. In the incoherent fuzz that was her current state of mind, it just felt right. Not safe, just right. The familiar feeling of having no powers felt soothing to both, and soon their breathings' evened and they calmed down. Galaxy snuggled closer into his warm chest, before gazing upwards to look at his face. When those blue eyes met a set of dark brown ones, they shared a dazed look of similarity. So much fear. She had felt his, it had never occurred to her that he could... have such deep feelings. It was deep, buried deep down, hidden under several layers of ego, but it was there. It was a familiar fear. Not being good (or evil) enough..., not living up to your father's expectations, or worse still- living in his shadow, as a second rate citizen. Then suddenly, like a rubber band, her mind snapped back into place and she realized what she was doing. She was hugging him!

The Hero could tell he sensed it to because reflexively, they both shot back from each other. A good arm's length, enough for their powers to come raging back. "What the hell was that?!?" She accused, yelling at him like it was his fault. Which it usually was.

"I have no idea!" Defended Toxic
"Don't you go yelling at me Galaxy Girl, as my ionic memory recalls it was you who jumped into my arms!" He yelled back. "My mind was screwed up by your stupid Altificator, and as my NORMAL memory recalls, you didn't exactly stop me!" She said loudly, still not believing what just went down. "Don't blame me, I was having.... Emotions." He shuddered as if disgusted by the word. "Yuck..." He shivered again. Eyes darting around, He was scrambling for an explanation.

"Ok. Ok. Ok. Ok!" He repeated. "Though neither of us likes to admit it, we are half human. Well you more than me but you know what I mean." He explained, referencing the fact that his mother was an empath, whereas hers was a normal human. "Go on..." She said, waiting for a logical explanation. He sat down on the couch, and ran his hand through his raven hair. "Ok... Ok, ok, ok!" He muttered again, sounding slightly like the mad man he always claimed to be. She crossed her arms.

"When humans experience fear, which is what you and I just did, somewhat anyways. Basic primitive instincts kick in, so what we just experienced was a primitive lapse in the brain's ability to logically reason." "That's makes sense."
She agreed quickly, without really thinking, eager to just forget about it.

"This never happened." He looked up at her with those sneaky brown eyes. A wave of déjà vu passed over the Hero as she replied. "What never happened?"

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A/N: Happy Tuesday Everyone. :)
This was one of my top favorite scenes during the writing process of this book. #ToxicAndGalaxy4Ever
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