Elliot and Dan slid from the diner booth without even the smallest shred of notice from the girls as they continued to yell wildly at each other and made their way into the chilly city streets, the autumn air turning just cool enough that Elliot was starting to feel mildly inconvenienced by it.

Dan sighed dramatically as they stepped outside, “Finally.”

“You think that’s bad? I live with it.” Elliot said sharply, crankiness at the weather overriding most of his cognitive functions, “I’m not usually one to kink shame but jesus, their foreplay is intolerable.”

Dan’s face reddened, “I-Is that what that is?”

“That diner is lucky if those morons don’t get started right there in the booth.” Elliot said with a laugh, “You made a good call with this escaping idea.”

Dan began walking in a poor attempt to hide how red he had become, “I’m reconsidering becoming her roommate.”

Elliot kept pace easily, but wasn’t sure what to make of the space Dan was keeping between them, unconsciously or not.

“I don’t know why you’d consider it in the first place.” Elliot spat, noticing the slight look of offense on Dan’s face, “Not that I dislike her, Valerie is just…”

Elliot paused, wondering while he was weighing his words so carefully, as that was not something he was known to do.

“Crazy?” Dan offered with a soft smile.

“Nuts.” Elliot concluded, feeling a surge of relief.

There was the slightest feeling of concern beginning to surge in Elliot as they walked, the soft neon glow of the city street lights did nothing to ease the growing tension building inside of him as they seemed to reflect in an almost obnoxiously perfect way off the lenses of Dan’s glasses.

If he didn’t know any better, Elliot would actually think he was attracted to the short little nerd walking besides him.

Not that he didn’t experience attraction, of course, but that was such a rare and fleeting thing. Elliot required that one not bore him in order to maintain attraction, and most people were suffocatingly boring.

But something about Daniel Chae piqued his interest, and Elliot wasn’t quite sure what it was.

“If you don’t want to walk, that’s fine by the way…” Dan said, interrupting Elliot’s train of thought, “I just thought we might actually get to know each other like this.”

“What,” Elliot smirked, “A heated debate about the perfect heel length wasn’t accomplishing that? And here I thought I had discovered your deepest secrets a moment ago.”

“Ha! Trust me, there’s not enough time in the world to cover those.” Dan said, practically beaming.

“Can’t say I pegged you as a man of mystery.” Elliot said.

“Well if we’re going off of first impressions, you assumed I was a serial killer.” Dan said humorously, “Not that mine was much better.”

“Of what, me?” Elliot said, raising an eyebrow.

“Well, yeah. Val showed me pictures and stuff.” Dan admitted sheepishly, “Which led down the rabbit hole of InfoBYTE articles and stuff.”

Elliot couldn’t keep himself from cringing at the mention of his job title, “Rabbit hole?”

“I have officially read every single one. I even-” Dan quickly stopped himself, “Nevermind. I’m not admitting to this.”

“Well, now you have to!” Elliot beamed, completely unsure if he had ever felt such a bizarre rush of excitement.

Dan blushed furiously, “I kinda liked a few of them...You’re not bad...or whatever. I actually cared about shit I don’t think I had even heard about until that point.”

A rare blushed creeped across Elliot’s cheeks, “Uh...thanks. It’s mostly mindless drivel, so I’m flattered.”

“Don’t be, I just wanted to see if you’re writing was as vapid as your social media profiles.” Dan said with a laugh, “It was, but surprisingly enjoyable.”

“You thought I looked vapid?” Elliot asked in mock disgust, “Why I never!”

“Dude, you have two pictures that aren’t of yourself.” Dan said flatly, “Maybe not vapid, but definitely narcissistic.”

Elliot shrugged nonchalantly, “Guilty as charged.”

“Hey,” Dan said a bit more quietly than he had been speaking, “If I looked like you I’d probably be full of myself too.”

Now Elliot knew something was wrong with him. He wasn’t usually this weak to flattery, but that awkward little offhanded comment had actually managed to make him feel something.

He’d dare say he even swooned.

What the hell is wrong with me today? Elliot thought, opening his mouth to speak but was suddenly interrupted by a loud noise just down the street. Sirens whirred on into the distance.

Dan froze, whipping his cell phone out of his pocket and swiping at the screen furiously.

“Shit.” He hissed to himself, shoving the phone into the pocket of his jeans as rapidly as he had taken it out.

“Everything ok?” Elliot asked cautiously.

Dan looked at him, his expression unreadable, “I need to uh...go.”

Smoke filled the city street and Dan’s facial expression grew more worrisome, Elliot felt a wave of confusion wash over him.

Dan held out his fist, Elliot mindlessly returning what may have been the most awkward fist bump he had ever experienced in his life.

“I’m so sorry, I uh...I’ll call you!” Dan said quickly before dashing down towards the direction of the noise.

Elliot watched as his blind date faded into the chaos a few blocks down, a cop car whirring past where he stood on the sidewalk, sirens very much echoing the noise currently in his head.

Desperately searching his brain for all of the various things he could have said wrong, Elliot made the block trip back to the diner, not entirely the biggest fan of the disappointment he felt prodding at his insides.

Val and Winn were still arguing in the booth by the time he got back, though the mood was, admittedly, much different than before.

“Yo, where’s Danny?” Val asked, pulling her long blonde hair into a bun.

Elliot shrugged, “Your guess is as good as mine. There was some commotion a few blocks down and he just kind of...ran off.”

“Fuck.” Val said, nearly spitting as she fumbled out of the booth, shoving a handful of french fries in her mouth as she did so, “Win, can you meet me back at my place in a sec? I need to go check this out.”

“Sure, but check what out?” Winn asked, feeling the shock of mood whiplash.

“Awesome! See you later!” Val said as she practically ran out of the diner, avoiding both Winn and the question.

Elliot sat down, his expression blank, “What the hell was that about?”

Winn blinked in the direction that the two had run off in, “Beats me.”

They sat there in stunned silence for a moment, listening as the sound of sirens grew louder and seemingly closer.

“We should get you home before this gets worse.” Winn said, waving absently in the direction of the streets.

“I couldn’t agree more.”

The two of them made it out relatively quickly, the crowd on the streets having gathered to watch the commotion as some fool in tights shot into the air.

“You know, if you’re going to commit a crime I don’t see why you’d hide your face like that.” Elliot frowned, turning away from the crowd to head towards his apartment.

Winn raised a perfectly sculpted eyebrow, “What do you mean? They don’t want to get caught, obviously.”

Elliot rolled his eyes, “Homeboy can fly, and half of those other freaks have laser vision and shit. They’re not really at risk for getting caught, they just need to scare people into submission.”

Winn shivered dramatically, “Thank god you don’t have superpowers, I’d have to have someone kill you.”

“I’d sure look better than whatever the hell his deal is,” Elliot said as he gestured at the two masked figures fighting it out in the city skyline, “Actually, both of them. God, has no one read a comic book? What even are those costumes supposed to be?”

“Practical?” Winn offered with an amused shrug.

“Well, they’re hideous. Only great super-villains know how to rock a cape. If you want to succeed in that business you need a cape.”

“Like Inferno?” Winn asked, knowing Elliot was nothing if not shallow in that regard, “He’s such a-”

“Beautiful man with the decency to let us all witness his glorious face?” Elliot finished for her, “And a superb villain! Precisely what I mean.”

Winn cringed, “You’re disgusting. What about The Magician?”

Elliot frowned, “You can’t call yourself that and then have an outfit that’s essentially sweatpants. Don’t think I didn’t notice.”

“He has a cute aura to him.” Winn said with a sigh that meant Elliot, your taste in men is horrifying, “Speaking of cute…”

“What?” Elliot shot, immediately knowing where she was going with this and immediately knowing he didn’t want this line of conversation to continue.

“Daniel Chae. You guys seemed to vibe really well.” She grinned, “And like...you’re an intolerable twat so that’s a rare sight.”

“Thanks.” Elliot retorted flatly.

“Well?” Winn prodded, “What did you think?”

“I think he ran out in the middle of a blind date and I’m ready to go home.” Elliot snapped, not liking the odd sensation of insecurity.

Elliot Edison did not feel insecure. He was basically God’s gift to gay-mankind.

Elliot frantically brushed away the topic of Daniel Chae, embarrassed by the fact he cared so much, until they made it back to his apartment. Winn was in a hurry, for reasons that were obvious, so Elliot rushed her out of the door.

It was as much to avoid the conversation as it was to help her, he assured himself.

Except that he wasn’t entirely that assured.

A cigarette dangled haphazardly from Elliot’s lips while he sat haphazardly in the windowsill of his apartment, phone cradled between his neck and shoulder and a thumb drive in his clenched fist.

It felt like the longest he had been on hold in the entirety of his life, but if he played his cards right it would be entirely worth it.

His boss, an eccentric woman in her late forties, only answered calls past ten at night. An odd business practice, but it delegated a small window for her employees to contact her and within this thumb drive Elliot had hoped he had the necessary sample articles to prove he was ready for an actual journalistic opportunity.

The holding music dribbled on, reminding Elliot he needed to listen to more pop because he knew that’s what this was but couldn’t identify anything about it beyond that. A faint gust of wind from behind caught him off guard, startling him.

Elliot turned far too quickly, however, watching as the cigarette fell from his mouth and the thumb drive tumbled down the fire escape.

Swearing under his breath, he swung himself onto the opposite-of-trustworthy metal grating, begrudgingly hanging up his phone before shoving it in the pocket of his shorts.

Briefly he wondered if anyone else was outside or in view, as he was sporting the same t-shirt he’d been wearing all day but had substituted a rather nice pair of slacks for a pair of pajama bottoms he’d stolen from Winn’s floor.

Not that he felt any shame in his ass being covered by llamas, but it wasn’t necessarily an outfit he’d want to be mugged in...He’d want his newspaper photo to be a flattering one.

Making his way down the fire escape, Elliot noticed it was far more windy than it had been before. It wasn’t something he was thrilled about, but hey- at least the weather had briefly taken his mind off of this evening.

Unfortunately he found his cigarette far before he found his thumb drive, and his heart sank as he realized it may have fallen behind the dumpster.

Of course you fell there, asshole, He thought as he pushed the large, green bin away from the building wall enough to squeeze behind it. Almost immediately his eyes fell on the bright red savior, Hell of a lot of good you’ll do me now though, Patricia is probably on her last call for the night.

He slid the thumb drive into his pocket, wiping his hands on the pants leg before grabbing his phone.

Elliot had pulled his phone out long enough to turn it on when a figure descended from the sky.

Elliot froze, staying in his place behind the dumpster as he scrambled to turn on his phone’s camera, hitting the buttons for zoom and record faster than his phone could keep up with.

The man in the alleyway was one of the good masked freaks that had been roaming the streets of Starlight City. To Elliot’s recollection, he may be the only good one.

The Magician? Magic-Man? Elliot tried to remember as the phone recorded the scene before him, Something really stupid.

Holy shit, I’m going to be famous.

The man shrugged off his shirt first, his back covered in a nasty wound but also revealing that those pants were, in fact, actually sweatpants. Elliot was both appalled and thrilled that he was right.

Perhaps it was just the fact that he was stunned, but Elliot felt as though time had stopped as he waited on the figure to remove his mask. Even if it was just enough to guess at the identity of Starlight City’s masked hero, it would be enough to make Elliot an internet sensation in the least.

Slowly, the figure slipped his thumbs beneath the dark green mask, pulling it over his head.

Elliot felt his heart sink.

But he also felt an odd surge of relief.

Slowly, he eased his way out from behind the dumpster, phone still on record, as the figure shrugged back on a vaguely familiar looking quarter-length shirt.

“Daniel Chae,” Elliot said, almost embarrassed at how smug he thought he sounded, “I gotta say, I wasn’t expecting to see you again.”

Daniel spun, eyes wide in horror.

“At least” Elliot cooed, “Not so soon.”