Artie and Molly

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Artie comes to visit Molly. The two discover they have things in common that neither of them realized.


Artie had seen the prof's announcement about Molly. He hadn't paid much attention to it at the time, mostly because he hadn't been paying attention to much of anything. As he'd recovered, he'd started to go back and deal with the things he'd missed. And one of them was Molly.

He knocked on the door to her suite, bag of gummy bears in hand, laptop under his arm, still looking like a mess - his hair was growing back in as stubble and while he was no longer bandaged, you could see the healing scars on his head while livid green bruises still covered his face. But there was very little he could do about that.

After all the stuff with the evil bad guys (Mary Angie called them Slendermen), Molly had decided to stay in her room for awhile. But the adults believed them now so that was good. But now when she saw people in suits she had to be really careful not to do anything and to make sure they had faces before throwing things at them.

The knock at the door made Molly jump, and she closed her comic book, creeping toward the door.

"Who is it?" she said hesitantly.

Artie sighed and pulled out his phone, opening the speech ap. "It's Artie, Molly. Can I come in?"

"Oh! Yeah, okay!" Molly said, relaxing as she quickly flung open the door. Her eyes widened.

"Oh my gosh! Artie, what happened!"

Artie held up his free hand - wait and put his laptop down on the coffee table, sitting at the couch in front of it and began to type very quickly. He knew that there was a limit to what the kids had been told and he hadn't been out of his room much, especially during the day as he'd been sleeping enough to become almost nocturnal. Or maybe she didn't remember? Ugh.

After a moment, he hit speak. "I was at the Brownstone just before Christmas. Some people attacked it and I got injured. Marie-Ange and Amanda saved me."

Molly frowned deeply, then reached over and hugged him. He looked like he needed a hug. "I'm sorry. Did they go to jail?"

Artie hugged her back, startled. He couldn't remember the last time he'd had a hug. After a moment he pulled away and typed "Sort of," if sort of meant that they'd either escaped or been killed by various X-Force members. "We're safe from them now. I was wondering how you were going, actually."

Glancing down, Molly shrugged. "I'm okay. It's...kinda...all sorts of stuff...and...all at once and....stuff. And it's confusing. And sometimes I remember things but its all fuzzy a lot....and..." She let out a breath and made a face of confusion and frustration.

First they told her she forgot lots of stuff, then Miss Frost the 2nd tried to help her then there were scary bad guys. It was a lot of stuff.

Artie gave her a little hug around the shoulders. "Dude. That sucks balls. I think I know a bit of how it feels and it sucks. Especially when things are fuzzy."

Blinking, Molly peered at him curiously. "You do?" she said. That was a lot of people. Her and Artie and Mr. Logan too.

"How? Did your parents do it too?"

Artie nodded sharply and took a deep breath, clearing his emotions out before he answered. "Do you remember Annalee? She thought she was my mom and asked us to come live in the sewers with her? She made sure that for a long time I didn't remember anything before I came to live at the mansion. They thought I was just traumatized and forgot 'cos I couldn't talk."

Molly didn't respond for a few moments. She stared at her hands as a tremble moved across her body.

"W...why did she do that?"

Because she was a crazy lady. Artie thought for a moment before typing a response that was less bitter and angry. "We lived in the sewers. Our lives were pretty awful. I think she thought I'd do better if I didn't remember how bad things were when she gave me up." He shrugged.

Keeping her gaze down, Molly clenched her fists.

"That's what my parents thought too. To keep me safe and happy they thought they had to make me forget all the bad stuff," she said, her voice small but with a hint of her own anger creeping in. It was an emotion she didn't have that much use for before. It happened very rarely, like with Artie himself, and like with her parents. It was hard to feel.

"The bad stuff sucks but you still lived it. You should be allowed to remember it." He didn't like remembering his childhood but he'd lived it. "Not remembering that means that you lose pieces of who you are. Doc Haller said I'm allowed to be angry about it. Means you are, too."

Molly nodded, wiping her eye with a sniff. "That's what Miss Frost the 2nd said. It just makes me mad and sad and....all sortsa stuff....cause...cause my parents did it and they're my parents and they love me but they hurt me. Parents are supposed to love you," she said. Her next words were small.

"And...and that's why I'm stupid now. Cause they broke me. And made holes. And...and now I can't remember anybody...b...before..." Her eyes welled up with tears and she hugged her stomach, her lip quivering.

Artie wriggled over a bit to give Molly another one-armed hug around her shoulders, tugging his laptop onto his knees with his other hand and typed with it. "1. Just because they're your parents, just because they love you doesn't mean that they also do really stupid shit sometimes. 2. You can fix holes, right? You might need to catch up on stuff but you can do it.

You're Molly. You're tough. You can do it. And 3. You really don't remember anyone? That's awful."

"I didn't remember Clint, and Billy, and Topaz, and Renee, and Sue, and...and...there was another one...she's blond too...oh...Tandy! Cause...it was...after," Molly said, leaning against Artie with a frown.

"You really think I'm tough? Like...like more than just with my fists?"

"I don't really know them either. You want to get to know them together?" They were mostly juniors but Artie was only a year out of school and it wasn't like he could just avoid all the kids when he was only two years older than them. "And yeah, you're really tough. You don't get scared easy, you stand up for your friends and you're honest even when it's easier to lie and all that." Usually in situations that had Artie looking for the easy way out. "Being super strong is just like, a bonus."

Molly looked down, quiet for a little while, then gave him a tiny smile.

"Oh," she said, like it was news to her. Happy news, but still news. She just knew what she thought. She didn't think anyone thought that about her too.

She nodded. "Yeah...I'd like to get to know them."

Artie gave her a small smile in return. "Yeah. You'll beat this and you'll get to know them. Also, you have a Wade. He like, really cares about you."

Molly's tiny smile grew bigger. It was kinda hard for her not to smile. She didn't like not smiling.

"Wademan is cool."

Artie laughed silently. "He is but he's also kind of scary sometimes."

Tilting her head, Molly arched a brow. "He is? Why?"

Artie froze like a deer in the headlights. "He gets really protective of his people. You wouldn't want to be on the other side of that," he said eventually. Mostly because you'd be dead a few minutes later.

"Cause he beats 'em up?" Molly said helpfully.

"Yeaaaah."

Molly continued to stare at Artie oddly, since he kinda looked uncomfortable all of a sudden. But she shrugged it off.

"Thanks," she said quietly.

"I feel better now."

"I'm glad. Let me know if you need anything, okay? Or just want to hang out."

"Really?" Molly said, peering up at him curiously.

"You wanna hang out? I thought...you liked...y'know, being alone." Cause he was alone a lot when she saw him. It was not a judgmental question it was just what she thought he liked to be. Some people just liked being alone.

"No, not really?" Artie replied. "Sometimes, yes, though." Sometimes he just wanted to watch the whole world burn or at least punch people who were too lazy to learn your language. And sometimes he was busy. But the rest of the time...

"Oh...." Molly said, pausing with confusion. She wasn't quite sure how to respond to that.

"Um....Well, I'm glad you wanna hang out with me."

Artie nodded. "Yeah. You're cool, Molly." And she was, once you got to know her. Actually, he felt bad about how mean he used to be to her. But he wasn't bringing that up now. "Wanna play some video games?"

Another smile appeared on her face, this one bigger still, almost back to normal levels. "Really?" she repeated. He thought she was cool? Neat!

She quickly nodded. "Sure!"