Chapter Text
The National Security Academic Initiative—known unofficially, and with a certain irreverent pride, as the University of the NSA—had been designed with a very specific paradox in mind: how to teach the extraordinary to pass unnoticed. Supers were accepted under strict conditions. Their powers were to remain undisclosed, carefully masked, never revealed beyond controlled environments. Here they studied not only mathematics, physics, law, and ethics, but something far more elusive: how to exist among ordinary people without tearing the world open at the seams.
Jackson Hart excelled at this duplicity.
Officially, he was one of the youngest students ever admitted into the Advanced Applied Sciences division, specializing in radiological physics and controlled particle emissions. Unofficially, his body was a walking gamma anomaly, a living contradiction between brilliance and volatility. He was praised by professors, feared quietly by administrators, and adored—often briefly, intensely, and repeatedly—by beautiful women, whom Jack regarded with the uncomplicated reverence of a man convinced that aesthetic pleasure was one of life’s few non-negotiable truths.
That Jack could be both devastatingly intelligent and devastatingly honest was something the university had learned to tolerate, if not fully understand.
On that afternoon, he was alone in one of the restricted research rooms—technically called a Collaborative Analysis Laboratory, though students simply called it “the lab,” as if naming it more precisely might summon consequences. Rows of computers hummed softly, their screens glowing with simulations, radiation decay charts, and draft reports marked CLASSIFIED – EDUCATIONAL USE ONLY. Jack had been there for hours, shoulders hunched, hair disheveled, entirely unaware that time had continued without him.
He had been there long enough that hunger had become theoretical.
The door opened behind him.
“You need to eat more.”
Jack didn’t turn around. He recognized the voice instantly—flat, calm, familiar in a way that required no acknowledgment.
“I ate,” he said, after a moment. “At some point.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Jack smirked faintly. “It’s a very Jack answer.”
Simon Paladino crossed the room, his footsteps unhurried, and stopped by the tall windows lining the far wall. Without asking, he reached up and pulled the curtains open. Sunlight poured in, harsh and immediate, flooding the lab with an almost indecent amount of warmth.
Jack hissed. “That’s illegal.”
“You haven’t been outside in three days.”
“I’ve been near outside.”
Simon gave him a look—one of those looks Jack had learned to read over the years, the kind that said I’m not going to argue, because arguing implies uncertainty, and I am certain. He moved one of the chairs and sat at the computer across from Jack, rolling his sleeves up slightly, adjusting his glasses.
Jack finally leaned back and glanced at him properly.
“You know,” Jack said lightly, spinning his pen between his fingers, “the amount of time you spend in here is starting to make you look like a scientist.”
Simon’s lips twitched. “I’m not.”
“Debatable,” Jack replied. “You know your way around the equipment. You’ve memorized half the interface. I’ve seen you correct people.”
“I know the basics.”
Jack scoffed. “That’s what all terrifyingly competent people say.”
Simon ignored the comment, eyes scanning the screen. Jack watched him for a moment longer than necessary, then shook his head, refocusing.
“So,” Jack continued, casual, “what is it today? The library too crowded? Too many people breathing loudly?”
Simon paused. “It’s not that.”
Jack raised an eyebrow. “Really? Because last time you told me the sound of someone chewing gum ‘disrupted your thought process for twenty minutes.’”
“That was an extreme case.”
Jack laughed, easy, familiar. “Sure it was.”
There was a comfortable silence between them then, the kind that only existed between people who had spent enough time together to stop performing. Jack turned back to his work, typing, when the thought surfaced—unbidden, mischievous.
“Or,” he said, not looking at Simon, “you just wanted to see me.”
He chuckled at his own joke, already dismissing it.
The silence that followed was… wrong.
Jack frowned slightly and glanced sideways.
Simon wasn’t typing anymore.
He was very still.
Jack straightened. Huh.
Simon took a breath—slow, deliberate, like someone preparing to step into cold water. When he turned toward Jack, his gaze did not settle; it flickered to the desk, the wall, the floor, anything but Jack’s face.
And suddenly Jack was alert in a way he hadn’t been seconds before, his mind snapping into that sharp, analytical state he usually reserved for unstable readings and imminent explosions.
“Okay,” Jack said cautiously. “What’s that face?”
Simon adjusted his glasses. His ears were already faintly red.
“Since you’ve brought that statement before the court,” Simon said, carefully measured, “you won’t deny that—”
“Hold on,” Jack interrupted, laughing once. “Court? What court?”
“The hypothetical one,” Simon replied. “You implied intent.”
Jack blinked. “I implied a joke.”
“The evidence suggests otherwise.”
Jack opened his mouth, then closed it again. Evidence? That word snagged unpleasantly.
“The evidence I currently possess,” Simon continued, voice steady despite the color creeping up his ears, “supports the claim that I am in love with you, Jack.”
The words landed without drama, without flourish, like a line item in a report.
Jack stared.
Inside his head, something short-circuited.
Interesting, he thought distantly, noticing Simon’s ears. That’s interesting.
He cleared his throat, then did it again, buying time. “Okay,” he said finally, voice unsteady despite his best efforts. “That’s— that’s a sentence. A big one. And I feel like if you’re going to say something like that, you should at least—”
He gestured vaguely. “—have proof.”
Simon nodded immediately, as if relieved. “Of course.”
Jack’s stomach dropped.
Simon turned the monitor slightly and pressed a key.
A PowerPoint presentation filled the screen.
Jack leaned forward despite himself.
The title read: EMPIRICAL INDICATORS OF ROMANTIC ATTACHMENT.
“Oh no,” Jack muttered. “You made slides.”
Simon began explaining.
Heart rate fluctuations in Jack’s presence. Elevated attention markers. Time spent observing him—Jack froze at that, the word observing echoing uncomfortably. He shifted, and something warm and acrid hit his nose.
He looked down.
A tiny scorched mark marred the floor near his shoe.
“Sorry,” Simon said quickly, flustered. “That graph is accurate.”
Jack swallowed.
Time spent thinking about him. Time spent seeking proximity. Correlations between Jack’s mood and Simon’s productivity.
Jack’s mind raced, already cataloging potential flaws. Sample size. Confirmation bias. Emotional contamination. This can’t be right. Simon was methodical. Simon was careful. Simon didn’t do this.
Then another slide appeared.
A date.
“This,” Simon said more softly, “is when Subject B began appearing in my dreams with increased frequency.”
Jack stared at the timestamp.
“That was—” he stopped. That was when I told him to call me Jack.
Simon shifted, suddenly shy. “The numbers are approximate. It’s a work in progress.”
Jack laughed, too loudly, pacing now. “This is— this is insane. I’m not— I mean— I’m not even—”
I’m not gay, his mind screamed, unhelpfully.
Simon watched him, calm, attentive, terrifyingly sincere.
“I wasn’t either,” Simon said gently. “Until the data changed.”
Jack stopped pacing.
His heart was pounding—not dangerously, but noticeably.
He looked at Simon, really looked at him, and for the first time wondered—not academically, not abstractly, but with genuine fear—what would happen if this wasn’t a mistake.
And that thought, more than any radiation spike, scared him senseless.
—-------------
Jack composed himself with the efficiency of someone who had spent years learning how to appear calm while containing something unstable. The panic receded—not vanished, never that—but compressed, folded neatly into a corner of his mind where he could pretend it was no longer relevant. He straightened his back, rolled his shoulders once, and let his attention abandon entirely the report glowing forgotten on his screen.
Simon was the problem now.
Jack turned fully toward him, studying him with an intensity he would later deny ever having felt. Simon sat rigidly in his chair, hands folded together in his lap, eyes fixed on the presentation as if the slides might change their content if stared at long enough.
“Okay,” Jack said, voice steadier than he felt. “Let’s talk about the last graph.”
Simon blinked. “Which one?”
Jack tilted his head. “The dreams.”
A pause.
Simon’s shoulders tensed almost imperceptibly, the way they did when he was preparing for cross-examination or an argument he had not intended to have. Jack noticed it immediately. He always did. It irritated him—this awareness, this familiarity—so he pushed on.
“You’re very thorough,” Jack continued lightly, circling closer, “but you kind of glossed over the methodology there. I mean, you can’t just say I appear in your dreams and expect that to hold up without—”
“—details,” Simon finished faintly.
“Exactly,” Jack said, pleased. “So. What were the dreams about, Simon?”
Simon stiffened.
For a moment, Jack thought—absurdly—that Simon might refuse. That he would pull rank, lawyer to scientist, and declare the data confidential. Jack almost smiled at the idea.
But Simon didn’t retreat.
He inhaled, visibly bracing himself, then exhaled slowly. When he spoke again, his voice was quieter, stripped of its usual composure.
“Is it… necessary?”
Jack folded his arms. “That depends.”
Simon glanced up at him, then away again, gaze landing somewhere near Jack’s shoulder, safely non-confrontational.
“It won’t hurt to have more data,” Jack said, reciting the language of objectivity he had wielded his entire academic life. “Unless, of course, the content of the dream undermines your entire defense.”
The word defense hung between them.
Simon went very still.
Jack felt a flare of triumph—small, sharp. Cornered. Good. If Simon backed down now, Jack could dismiss the entire thing as overanalysis, a misinterpretation, a brilliant mind misfiring under stress. He could call it a day, tease Simon about it later, and return to the comforting certainty of equations and controlled variables.
Simon swallowed.
Then, in a voice so low it barely carried across the room, he said, “We were… h-holding hands.”
The words struck Jack like a physical blow.
Not violently—no explosion, no surge of radiation—but directly, precisely, somewhere behind his sternum, where his breath caught and refused to move properly for a second too long.
That’s—
That’s ridiculous.
He stood up far more abruptly than intended, the chair scraping loudly against the floor. The noise seemed to snap him back into motion.
“That’s not—” Jack said quickly, already crossing the distance between them. “That’s not proof.”
Simon looked up, startled.
Jack reached out and grabbed Simon’s wrist.
The contact was immediate, grounding—and dangerously informative.
“Simon,” Jack said, too fast, too close, “you’re confusing correlation with causation. That’s not evidence. I mean— I dream about you too.”
The admission slipped out before he could stop it.
Simon’s eyes widened. “You— you do?”
Jack froze.
Shit.
“That’s not—” Jack started, then faltered. “I mean— that’s not relevant.”
Simon’s voice was barely above a whisper now. “What were we doing?”
Jack stared at him.
The question lodged itself in his mind, unwelcome and persistent. His grip tightened unconsciously around Simon’s wrist—not painful, just firm—and some distant part of his brain registered the information flooding in through skin and pulse.
Simon’s heart was racing.
Not the sharp, startled spike of fear. Not the controlled acceleration of stress.
Something warmer. Erratic. Almost—Jack swallowed—thrilled.
“Is that important?” Jack asked, a little hoarsely.
Simon nodded once. “It would be useful to have more data.”
Jack huffed out a laugh that sounded more strained than amused. “You’re unbelievable.”
“I’m methodical,” Simon replied weakly.
Jack closed his eyes for half a second.
Get a grip.
He opened them again. Simon was still looking at him—not directly, never directly, but close enough. Too close.
Jack muttered, “We were holding hands.”
The words felt heavier this time, like they carried weight simply by being repeated.
Simon blinked. “We were?”
Jack’s stomach flipped unpleasantly. “Apparently.”
Simon’s surprise was genuine, almost endearing, and Jack hated that his mind chose that word.
“Oh,” Simon said softly. “That’s… interesting.”
Interesting.
Jack had thought that too. He didn’t like that.
He finally released Simon’s wrist and stepped back, rubbing his hand against his jeans as if to wipe away the sensation—only to realize that the absence of contact felt worse than the presence had.
Simon adjusted his glasses with trembling fingers. “Your temperature increased when you said it.”
Jack scoffed. “That doesn’t mean anything.”
“It spiked more than when you discovered the calculation error in your radiation model last semester.”
Jack opened his mouth, then closed it again.
He turned away, pacing, thoughts spiraling.
This is absurd.
I don’t— I don’t feel—
He stopped abruptly.
Do I?
Images rose unbidden: Simon sitting beside him late at night, quietly reading while Jack worked; Simon bringing him food without comment; Simon listening—really listening—to his rambling theories and half-formed jokes.
That’s just friendship.
Except—
Jack turned back.
Simon was watching him now, worry etched into every line of his posture, hands clenched together as if bracing for impact.
Something in Jack’s chest tightened.
Suspiciously.
Uncomfortably.
“Well,” Jack said finally, forcing a grin he did not feel, “dreams are weird. Means nothing.”
Simon nodded, though his disappointment was unmistakable. “Of course.”
Jack felt… something twist.
He did what he had always done with sensations that could not be graphed or neutralized.
He ignored it.
Simon rose from the chair.
The movement was unremarkable, almost casual, but it altered the geometry of the room in a way Jack hadn’t anticipated. Simon straightened to his full height, and only then did Jack remember—really remember—that Simon was taller than him. Not by much, but enough. Enough to shift perspective. Enough that Jack, who so rarely felt physically dwarfed by anyone, had to tilt his head just slightly upward to meet him.
“We should obtain more evidence,” Simon said.
Jack’s brain short-circuited.
No. No, absolutely not.
Simon, stop being reasonable, my cardiovascular system cannot handle this.
“Evidence of what?” Jack asked too quickly.
Simon gestured vaguely between them. “Of elevated heart rate.”
Jack scoffed. “Oh, come on.”
Jack opened his mouth once again to refute him—
—and then Simon stepped closer.
Jack froze.
Simon leaned in, hesitating only a fraction of a second, as if checking the legality of the motion, and then pressed his ear—warm, solid, real—against Jack’s chest.
Right over his heart.
Jack’s entire body locked.
The world narrowed to sensation: the weight of Simon’s head against him, the faint scent of soap and faint perfume and something unmistakably Simon, the sudden, unbearable awareness of his own pulse hammering wildly beneath skin and bone like it was trying to escape.
This is— this is illegal, Jack thought distantly. There are no protocols for this.
Simon listened for exactly three seconds.
Then he pulled away.
Straightened.
Adjusted his glasses.
“Your heart rate is increasing,” Simon said, not accusing, merely observant.
As if nothing had happened.
Jack stared at him, mind screaming incoherently.
“Well,” Jack said, voice a miracle of steadiness, “that’s because this situation is stressful. Obviously.”
Simon tilted his head. “Stress is a possible contributing factor.”
“Exactly,” Jack said, grateful for the foothold. “I’m under pressure. You ambushed me with a PowerPoint about your feelings. Anyone would be nervous.”
Simon considered that. “Heart rate elevation alone is inconclusive,” he admitted.
Jack seized the opening. “There you go. So how do you prove you’re really in love, Simon?”
The question hung there.
Simon faltered.
That—Jack saw immediately—was the fracture point. The moment where logic met unfamiliar terrain. Simon’s expression shifted, uncertainty creeping in, his confidence wavering for the first time since this nightmare had begun.
“It would be… problematic,” Simon said slowly, “if you were correct.”
Jack leaned back against the desk, folding his arms. “Exactly.”
Simon frowned faintly, lost in thought. “I have no prior experiential data.”
Good, Jack thought. Stick with that.
“You see,” Simon continued, thinking aloud now, “I lack comparative precedent. You, on the other hand—”
Jack stiffened.
“—have significant experience with attraction,” Simon finished carefully. “You flirt frequently. You date. Casually.”
Handsome Jack, Jack’s reputation whispered smugly.
Jack shrugged. “Yeah. And that’s exactly my point.”
Simon hesitated. “Then it’s possible that I’ve misinterpreted the data.”
Jack felt a flicker of relief—
—followed immediately by something unpleasantly close to disappointment.
Simon straightened again, seriousness returning like armor sliding into place. “Your increased heart rate could indicate nervousness. Or feeling threatened.”
“Threatened?” Jack barked a laugh. “By you?”
Simon didn’t react defensively. “It’s a hypothesis.”
Jack rolled his shoulders, recovering his usual posture, his usual confidence. “Look, heart rate spikes can be caused by a lot of things. Adrenaline. Stress. Cognitive overload. Hell, caffeine. You want a list?”
Simon nodded. “Yes.”
Jack blinked. “What?”
“You should test me,” Simon said.
Jack’s mouth opened.
Closed.
“You can’t just—” Jack began.
“Different scenarios,” Simon continued, earnest. “Stimuli that might increase your heart rate. If your interpretation is correct, then my hypothesis fails.”
Jack stared at him.
Then he smiled.
It was automatic, reflexive—the grin that had gotten him out of trouble more times than he could count. “Careful, counselor. That sounds like entrapment.”
Simon hesitated. “It could be flawed.”
“Yeah,” Jack said lightly, “because being in love doesn’t mean you stop feeling other emotions, right?”
The moment the words left his mouth, Jack’s brain betrayed him.
Wait. Why am I—
But he was already sliding into familiar territory, his panic dissolving into the comfort of theory.
“Okay,” Jack said, gesturing animatedly now. “Let’s say we design controlled stimuli. Variable isolation. No confounding factors. We’d need baseline measurements, repeated trials—nothing invasive.”
Simon had produced a notebook.
Jack had no idea where it came from.
Simon was already writing.
“First,” Jack continued, pacing, “we need to establish what doesn’t raise my heart rate. Neutral interaction. Casual conversation. Professional proximity.”
Simon scribbled.
“Then we introduce stressors,” Jack said. “Hypothetical threats. Sudden noises. Intellectual challenges.”
More writing.
“Then,” Jack said, warming to it, “we test emotional triggers. Embarrassment. Humor. Competitive scenarios.”
Simon’s pen moved faster.
Jack stopped mid-sentence.
Slowly, dread crept in.
“…Why are you writing all of this down?”
Simon looked up. “You’re outlining viable experimental conditions.”
Jack stared at the notebook.
At the neat handwriting.
At the bullet points.
Oh no.
He realized—too late—that he had just handed Simon a meticulously structured framework for emotional analysis. One that Simon, with his terrifying sincerity and complete lack of self-preservation, would absolutely use.
Jack swallowed.
Simon smiled faintly, almost shyly. “Thank you.”
Jack felt his heart rate spike again.
He didn’t say anything.
He absolutely did not analyze why.
That omission—rare, deliberate—lasted precisely two weeks.
Two weeks in which Jack returned to the same lab every day, sat in the same chair, worked on the same reports, and told himself with increasing conviction that the situation had resolved itself through sheer neglect. Simon had been absent. Which was normal. People were absent all the time. The university ran on absences, classified schedules, things no one asked about.
And yet.
Jack found himself noticing the door more often than usual. The silence felt different—less earned, less companionable. He worked faster, sloppier, correcting errors that should never have been there in the first place. He told himself this was because he was overworked. He told himself many things.
On the fifteenth day, the door opened.
Jack didn’t look up immediately. He recognized the footsteps.
Simon entered the room with a stack of papers tucked under his arm and something new on his wrist—a sleek device that looked like a watch, though Jack could tell at a glance it was far more sophisticated than that. Simon closed the door carefully behind him, as if sealing them into a controlled environment.
Jack finally looked up.
Simon smiled.
It was small, restrained, but unmistakably pleased.
Jack’s stomach sank.
“Here,” Simon said, approaching and handing him the papers. “This is my experiment. It passed review during the two weeks I was absent.”
Jack took the stack automatically, flipping through the first few pages. Charts. Tables. Footnotes. References. He felt a reluctant flicker of admiration.
“You actually—” Jack began, then stopped. “You really did it.”
Simon nodded. “As you can see,” he added, lifting his wrist slightly, “I’m wearing a biometric monitoring device. It measures heart rate variability with high precision.”
Jack grimaced. “Of course you are.”
Simon turned on the projector.
It worked immediately.
Jack closed his eyes for half a second. Of course it did.
“I’m not a scientist,” Simon began, voice settling into that calm, courtroom cadence Jack now associated with danger, “but I do enjoy reading.”
Jack snorted despite himself.
“For the purposes of this experiment,” Simon continued, “I conducted controlled interactions over a two-week period. Fifteen individuals total, divided into three groups of five.”
The slide changed.
“Group A: family. Group B: friends. Group C—” Simon hesitated, just briefly. “—tense relations.”
Jack’s attention sharpened. He knew. He absolutely knew who at least two—no, three—of those people were. He said nothing. Simon’s mouth tightened slightly as he moved on.
“These groupings are informed by a commonly referenced social theory,” Simon explained, “which posits that there are four versions of an individual: the self as perceived internally, the self presented to family, to friends, and to adversaries.”
Jack skimmed the papers again. The methodology was… solid. Damn it.
“My heart rate,” Simon said, “increased in both positive and negative interactions.”
Jack looked up. “Which proves my point.”
Simon held up a hand. “Objection noted.”
Jack smirked.
“In Group C,” Simon continued, “the increase corresponded with heightened stress. The conversations involved ideological conflict and, at times, hostility.”
His voice softened slightly. “My calculations weren’t incorrect. The reaction was physiological, triggered by perceived threat.”
Jack shifted uncomfortably.
“For Groups A and B,” Simon said, “the interactions were cheerful. Familiar. Predictable.”
Jack leaned back in his chair. “So your heart rate goes up when you’re stressed or happy. Congratulations, you’re human.”
Simon nodded. “That alone would not prove anything.”
Jack flipped another page. “Exactly.”
Simon met his gaze. “However—”
Jack sighed internally. There’s always a however.
“—none of these groups,” Simon said evenly, “produced a spike of this magnitude without direct interaction.”
Jack frowned. “What do you mean?”
Simon advanced the slide.
A graph appeared.
Jack’s breath caught despite himself.
“There are instances,” Simon said, carefully, “where my heart rate increased without physical proximity. Without conversation. Without visual stimuli.”
Jack stared at the timestamps.
“These correspond,” Simon continued, “to moments where I was merely thinking of you.”
The words were delivered plainly, without flourish.
Jack felt dizzy.
“That’s—” Jack began. “That’s not— Simon, that’s correlation. You’re priming yourself.”
“Possibly,” Simon agreed. “Which is why I compared it.”
He changed the slide again.
“Thinking about family did not yield the same response,” Simon said. “Nor friends. Nor adversaries.”
Jack’s fingers tightened around the papers.
“And yet,” Simon concluded, “your presence—actual or imagined—produces a measurable, disproportionate response.”
Jack stood abruptly, chair scraping back.
“That still doesn’t prove anything,” he said, too quickly. “You’re extrapolating. You want the conclusion, so you’re—”
“—motivated reasoning?” Simon offered.
“Yes!” Jack snapped. “Exactly.”
Simon studied him, expression unreadable. “Then allow me to summarize.”
He took a breath.
“This evidence demonstrates that my physiological responses to you are distinct from other emotional categories. Therefore—” He paused, then finished quietly. “—my conclusion stands. I am in love with you.”
Jack’s brain shorted out.
“No,” he said immediately, already moving. “No, that’s not possible.”
He crossed the room in three long strides and grabbed Simon’s wrist, fingers closing around the device.
“You made a mistake,” Jack insisted. “There’s no way my presence alone—”
The device beeped.
Sharp. Loud. Insistent.
Jack froze.
A red warning flashed across the small screen.
POSSIBLE TACHYCARDIA DETECTED
“Oh no,” Jack thought.
Simon looked down at his wrist. Then up at Jack.
Then—very carefully—he raised his free hand and placed two fingers against Jack’s neck.
Jack inhaled sharply.
Simon’s touch was light, professional, almost clinical. Almost.
“Your heart rate,” Simon said softly, “is elevated.”
“That’s because—” Jack began, then stopped. Because what?
“Stress?” Simon suggested gently. “Threat?”
Jack laughed weakly. “You’re ambushing me with data again.”
Simon shook his head. “I don't notes for a comparison yet.”
Jack swallowed. “Comparison to what?”
Simon hesitated.
Then, quietly, “To when you’re flirting.”
Jack stared at him.
“I wish to analyzed those interactions too,” Simon added, almost apologetic. “Public settings. Casual dates. Your heart rate increases, yes—but maybe not like this.”
Jack’s mouth opened. Closed.
“That’s impossible,” he said hoarsely. “I don’t— I don’t feel—”
Simon interrupted, careful but firm. “Feelings are not always recognized immediately.”
Jack stepped back, pacing now, hands tangled in his hair. “No. No, no, no. I’m not— I mean, I like you, obviously, but that’s— that’s different.”
Simon watched him, eyes warm, concerned. “I know.”
Jack stopped. “You do?”
“Yes,” Simon said. “You don’t have to be in love for me to be… and besides we are just proving my feelings towards you.”
The simplicity of it hit Jack harder than anything else.
Simon straightened, adjusting his glasses. “And if you argue that I am mistaken, I will accept that—pending further evidence.”
Jack let out a strangled sound. “You’re impossible.”
Simon smiled faintly. “I’ve been told.”
Jack looked at him—really looked at him—and felt that twist again, sharper now, undeniable.
“Oh,” Jack thought dimly.
That was new.
That was… alarming.
And his heart was still racing.