A Hero Growing Up

Billy woke with a start, eyes wide. The night was calm and dark, and it was nearly morning. He stretched, then rose, padding off for morning ablutions. It had been a few days since he and Cassie had returned to Milliways, and last night she had stayed in her rooms downstairs.

And it had taken him forever to get to sleep in her absence. He didn't like it when she was gone. It felt wrong, out of place, un...right. He shook his head as he started his shower and stood in the scalding water, thinking of her. They had known each other for barely two months, really, and yet, somehow, his relationship with her was tighter and more secure, more warm and powerful, than anything he had ever known. He loved her, as truly and deeply as he could imagine. He wished she didn't have to go back to the rooms she shared with her mom and Sam and...

Realization hit, almost hard enough to make his knees buckle, and he stared at the shower wall for a long time, before finishing and walking out toweling and dressing.

He knew what he had to do, what he wanted to do, and when he saw her today... when he saw her, then he would ask.

With a grin, he headed to the computer and typed her a brief Email, then headed downstairs for breakfast.

Sunday Evening, sometime before Sunset...

Billy is nervous. Very, very nervous.

In just a little while, Cassie would be picking him up for their very first, real, honest to goodness, date.

He bounces a little.

His room was spotless and he was wearing a suit he had picked up on a jaunt out to the local tailor. It had taken several hours, but it was done and he was nervous and bouncy and.... yeah.

He smiles, and thinks of her face when he asked her, the day before. He loves her so much and cant wait to do this with her.

William leads her out of the doorway and into a quiet room, his hotel room.

He smiles at her and points the way to the door.

"The restaurant is just below us and the play is down the street."

The room is lushly appointed in reds and yellows and blacks. He leads her out to a just as lush but more tasteful hallway and to the elevators.

Nightmares crash over Billy, filling his mind with chaos and making him cry out in his sleep.

Almost a week has passed since he ascended to his room and he has been sick most of that time. Sick and getting sicker. Fever dreams grip him and he tosses and turns.

Old memories and new reach out to grip him in their hands, hands that feel papery thin, and dry, raspy. Claws scratch and tug and hands pull, and teeth bite, and Billy screams, deep in his dreams, his fevers, his nightmares.

Visions swarm his mind...

...of Stephanie and Zuko laying so still, and so very not alive...

flit to visions of a darker version of him, filled with hate and anger, roaring triumphantly...

flit to visions of his mother and father dying in Egypt...

flit to the man who died at his hands during the crisis...

flit to darker and darker visions...

He shudders as sweat pours off of him and he cries out , murmuring, or screaming, or groaning, as hours and days fly in his dark corner of time.

And time passes...

He doesn't see the person who treats him, who cares for him and bathes him, who changes his sheets and makes sure he gets medicine and food, as much as he can keep down... He doesn't see them, but that doesn't mean they aren't real.

And eventually, as all things do, this too passes, ad he finds himself resting in clean sheets, sleeping as deep and real sleep.

And, eventually, he wakes up.

Alive, refreshed, and ready....

...for what, he could not say.

Billy runs.

In the darkness of the pre-dawn of Milliways, he runs.

It is familiar ground, and he is tired. It is a good path, and he is out of shape.

He runs raggedly, out of breath, hurting.

But he runs.

He has been going over everything in his head, listening to the voices of those angry and those who paid attention, listening to the voices of the stupid and the smart. He has been thinking.

Time passes here in Milliways oddly. And sometimes, a day, a week, a month, can creep up and pass you fast, without you knowing it.

Billy runs.

His feet hit the ground now with an irregular pattern and he feels the strain, but he pushes and keeps going, even when it means his speed falls off to nearly nothing. He has spent a week mourning, recovering, and trying to find answers. Most of what he has discovered is that people find it easier to hate than to think, but he has also found great people here, kind ones, who listen, and think, and who have shown him what honor is, and means.

Billy runs.

And as he runs, he knows, at last, that he has made his decisions what to do.

Sometime later, he rose and moved to the window and jerked it open.

He needed air.

He needed to fly.

He screamed the name.

"SHAZAM!"

And then he was flying, high and away.

Even as he did so, inside him, a struggle was going on. Wisdom of Solomon against heartbreak and sorrow and too much darkness. His mind was chaotic as he soared higher and higher up, and over the lake. He struggled, even as he cried, his heart broken and his mind reeling.

The conflict activated a defense mechanism. Inside him, deep, he had planted the codes to, if he ever became dangerous, or unbalanced, deny him the powers of Captain Marvel. And when the conflict and chaos in his mind reached the near deadly point, when he paused in mid-air and threw up again, over the lake, blood and nothing else... then it activated... and suddenly, two-hundred feet up, Billy Batson was standing in mid-air...

...and then he was falling. His senses reeling, his mind completely chaotic, his heart hammering, he fell, and then he plunged into the lake. His impact sounded like a hammer against concrete and he felt things break, pain shooting into him further.

And he sank, into the waters, deep and dark...

...somewhere inside him, something was screaming. somewhere inside him, something was telling him he had to rise, had to try, had to fight. But he was tired of fighting, and tired of trying, tired of being the better man, tired of being a good guy and losing everything, over and over.

He despaired and sank further.

That small part of him, the one that wanted to live, the one that believed still, flung pictures at him; his friends, Sara and Hank. His sister, Rachel and blood-sister, Mary. His cousin Freddy, and others who cared, and he screamed again, in denial, and the darkness boiled around him. and the water sucked him down...

And somewhere inside him, at the base of him, at the deepest lowest point, one small part of him said, simply... no.

I will not die...

I will not fall...

I will not let myself end this way...

...and suddenly, Billy's eyes open, even as he settled to the bottom of the lake. And with the breath inside him, the little left, he spoke a word, his hands waving in a small line and a symbol.

On the surface, all was quiet, even the bubbles had stopped... and then they started again and the area where he had hit seemed to roil and bubble and boil... and out of the water, Billy Batson rose.

With a limp, he slowly walked across the surface of the water to the shore and collapsed there. He looked a mess, his clothing torn and battered, his whole body soaked, his face smeared with blood and looking like something a cat had dragged in.

It was a long time before he stopped shuddering, stopped moaning. But he slowly pried himself up, and rose and began to stagger towards the Bar, slow movements, limping, but moving...

After this:

One Day to One week Post-Break-Up

He cries all night. The next day hangs gloomy and dark and he staggers about, barely managing to get anything done. His eyes are red-rimmed and nearly swollen shut from crying, but every time he thinks about her, somehow, he has more tears to shed. His world narrows to keeping time, time since the Break-Up, which seems to have changed everything.

Days pass, slowly. No one comes to the Rock for awhile. And the chaos outside seems to roil especially badly. He doesn't eat much, with an appetite that had already been declining gone all to pot now.

In his mind and heart, he finds only sorrow, no reason to do anything, or move, or think. No reason for anything at all. He goers through the motions and moves about his duties, concentrating exactly as hard as he has to, in order to do his job, and then collapsing again, to either cry, or stare helplessly into the night, or at the ceiling, or out into the chaos from the terrace.

Sometimes he ponders just falling over that edge, but he knows he cant do that. If he leaves the Rock, it will explode, and release it's terrors, it's pains, it's darknesses. And so he never does. He walks, he works, and he lives.

But the boy he was? Is gone.

***

One week to Three weeks Post-Break-Up

They say time heals all wounds, and Billy figures it will some day, heal some of this pain. But Stephanie was the first woman he truly loved, the first woman he cared about enough to reveal his secret to for that reason, and the first woman he ever had sex with... He had hoped that maybe... somehow, someday, they could even take the next step.

Apparently he hadn't been good enough, hadn't been what she wanted at all.

It's better this way.

He keeps saying it over and over, but it doesn't work really well.

It is better this way that she is free to do as she wants and not saddled with me. She'll be better off... she'll have a chance to be happy. That is all that matters.

And slowly, he regains his footing. Slowly, he learns how to deal with this pain. Slowly, he begins to accept things will be better.

He doesn't stop crying and thinking about her face, but he starts to deal, slowly.

***

Four Weeks Post-Break-Up

He has friends at Milliways, ones he should at least see again, even if it is the last time. Even if he cant even think about the Bar without thinking about Her and that just starts the crying again.

But he makes his plans and he slowly gets himself together. He has gained height in the nearly two months since he was last at Milliways. He has gained height and lost weight at the same time. He isn't gaunt, but he is very close, very thin, and it shows most, in his face and eyes. Dark pillows seem to live there now. But he keeps getting ready, concealing his weight loss with baggier clothes, actually using a form of make-up to partially conceal his lighter build. He gathers a few things together, and does what he has to do.

And finally... he thinks he is ready.

He isn't sure,. but there is no point in delaying. He will go back, at least one more time.

He will return to Milliways.

People call on him now, and tell him things. The Phantom Stranger, of all beings, comes to him... Him! To talk things out. Billy feels a fraud in front of this amazing being who gives so much.

It is odd, to Billy, that so many see him as some hope, some great power and source of wisdom. He is the Wizard now, though, and as if he was never anything else, people come to him and tell him things, good things, bad things, horrible things, mystical things, mundane things. The people are never mundane, always powerful, but... it is still very odd.

He is just Billy Batson, and yet, he is this other person too... and sometimes he feels like a fraud to more than just the Phantom Stranger.

Well, a lot of the time.

But... people still come and tell him things.

They look at him and think him great and wise and powerful.

They look at him and think him something more than he is.

And ... sometimes, he despairs of ever being worthy of all this.

He isn't wise, or smart, or experienced enough for half of what he knows, and half of what he is told is so new, so amazing...he doesn't know what to say. He murmurs some obscure saying and they seem to accept it and he just sighs.

It is very odd.

There are losses along the way. Heroes die, civilians die, Gods die. Friends.... die.

Billy tries not to let the losses weigh on him too much, but he knows they do. He is used to loss, used to pain, and tears, and funerals. He is used to it and oh, how he hates it!

But there are losses as the weeks pass on Earth and more time, still, passes on the Rock. Something of perhaps trivial nature also happens, that he doesn't pay attention to; He loses weight. He has never been fat, but he had gained muscle and size as he grew and his magic had ensured he ate well

But now? He loses weight. He is less strong, less big, less... everything. He moves less sure, he acts less sure, and he is less sure... and he is not-quite gaunt.

He is eating, most of the time, when he remembers. But he is working constantly, and depressed, and thinking hard. And truthfully, his recent conversation with his sister just drove home how much he is alone most of the time. His blood sister almost never comes to see him now. And that just makes it all the worse.

So, he works, and eats, and moves and lives... and loses weight, faith, hope, maybe...

He is uncertain of things. He is tired a lot, depressed, really. It may explain why he hasn't tried to say hello before now, even though he is sure she might hear him.

He thinks about his sister, Rachel, chosen sister, not like his blood one, Mary, who he cant truly share any of this with...

Rachel understands a lot of things others don't, loss and pain and many more things. Rachel is... someone he trusts.

He is uncertain about a lot of things. Life, love, hope, dreams, and more...

He is unsure about his place in this new age of magic... but others keep telling him he has one, he is important... and he keeps looking them askance.

He is Captain Marvel, and Billy Batson, and The Wizard, the Keeper of the Rock, and the Last Bastion of Ninth Age Magic, Ordered Magic, left in the cosmos. He wears so many hats, somedays he feels that he will topple under the weight of it all...

He is unsure and uncertain and unenthused...

But he is sure of his sister.

So sometimes, he just thinks of her,and her flame and he smiles.