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He wasn’t Eidolon.
He knew that the moment he emerged from Mother’s flesh.
He was Ignis Fatuus, and he wasn’t a he at all.
The moment he finished crawling from Mother’s body, he splattered onto Brockton Bay’s concrete, and he knew.
Ignis Fatuus was a she, not a he, and that meant Eidolon was a she, not a he.
They were cut from the same cloth. Father and son, in a way, bound by the holy ghost that gave them their power. Or rather, mother and daughter.
Ignis Fatuus remembered the way Eidolon felt as a kid, back before he was Eidolon. He hated his body, and he thought that would change when he drank that vial.
It did, in a way. He wasn’t in a wheelchair anymore. His body didn’t hurt all the time either. It was more than he ever thought he would have, and he was happy with that. Beyond happy.
But over twenty years later, just last night, David stared in the mirror after a shower, one of the few times ever he saw his body outside of costume, and he still hated what he saw.
Eidolon didn’t think he should. He was a superhero, and he had the body to match it. Or, he did. He was getting older, his hair starting to thin, and when he looked in the mirror, he did focus on it, but never got long. He was always distracted by everything else he could see: his broad shoulders, his slender hips, his sharp features, the hair on his stomach…
He thought about his small frame and wondered if that was it. He was a superhero, sure, but Alexandria was bigger than him. Maybe he felt emasculated. But the moment he wondered that, he knew that wasn’t it. There was something about his small frame he liked. It was something else.
Whenever Eidolon got into one of these spells, he always concluded that it was just because of the vial. His body wasn’t really his. He loved the changes the vial had given him, healing his broken body, but so much had changed so naturally. It was only natural that there was some kind of disconnect.
But as Ignis Fatuus stood naked next to an equally naked Apocrypha, it was so obvious that wasn’t it.
Her agent gave her a conjuration power, and Ignis Fatuus wasted no time covering himself, making a costume mirroring Eidolon’s. She made one for Apocrypha a beat later, but she did look at her a moment too long, knowing that Apocrypha needed to be covered, but also knowing that if she had a body like that, she wouldn’t cover it. Not like she was covering her own body right now, at least.
Her agent responded, and Ignis Fatuus realized she didn’t have to.
Her chest swelled, her hair thickened, and her hips and thighs grew wider. All in a matter of seconds, decades were undone, and it was wonderful. No one else would notice. They were standing too far away, and they were focused on the fight, but suddenly, everything felt right in a way Eidolon had never known.
And never would know, Ignis Fatuus thought, as the fight began. He had repressed it for so long that he would never know, for one.
The other thing was that Ignis Fatuus was going to kill all his friends and make sure he never escaped from Mother. He would stay inside Mother forever, cycling through his worst memories, and Ignis Fatuus would live the life as her best self that Eidolon could never even dream of.