When he raised his face from the sink, looking into the mirror, he saw traces of a skull across his face, where the cover-up had been washed away. His hair was in short, chemically textured curls, and he had a cut on his lip from where he’d been out in the cold.

It used to be that I was seventy-five percent civilian. Three-quarters of my waking hours, I was Brian Laborn. I worked, I bought groceries, I cleaned up my place, and I had nights where I pulled on a helmet with a skull on it and worked as a burglar for hire.

His belt was more of a ‘utility belt’ style, though he didn’t have much use for tools, a lot of the time. His belt buckle hid a few cards, including his Warden-issued I.D., a debit card, and a card for one of the big clothing co-ops. For a moment, he considered fishing it out and throwing it out. Then he reconsidered. It was important to hold onto things.

Instead, he went to the next compartment over. He dried with a paper towel and then popped open the oval container within the tiny pocket. The cover-up from that tiny container went on like clay more than anything, thick and similar to the texture of his skin.

Now I have to put my face on to be a civilian.

His eyes were still paler than they’d been before he’d died.

It was hard to shake the feeling that he had just walked off a battlefield. In a sense, talking about an hour ago, he had. He had watched as the woman who had brought him back from the dead succumbed to the cracks that chased her and became a monster.

Her ‘flock’ had dispersed.

The world was ending at this very moment, and that seventy-five percent of him that was battle ready was prepared to stride from this small washroom to go lead his squad, his team. Most of his experience had to do with face-to-face meetings in the underworld of Brockton Bay. Tattletale had been the strategist, and had left it to him to carry things out, and to handle the alliances. But he had attended six Endbringer fights and he had been there for part of the fight against Scion. All of that was so clear in his mind it felt like it had happened yesterday.

But that team wasn’t his anymore, and it wasn’t a team that was suited for this threat they were fighting.

He finished covering up the skull. For good measure, he used his power to dismiss some of the shadow that filled the bathroom, allowing the light from the ceiling to illuminate his head and shoulders. He could see through his own darkness, but different details stood out when he saw things with the light his power assumed he should have, as opposed to the shadows of reality.