After what had happened, I decided that Charlie needed a distraction to ease his mind off the event that had probably caused him to have a few more nightmares. He ate all the same, acted all the same when we talked and I taught, but at night when he was sleeping, I could hear his murmurs through the wall, hear his small whimpers as he tossed and turned. It was that exact reason that caused me to find him a proper distraction.

Like I had mentioned earlier, Charlie had taken a fondness to cartoons. He found the images funny and the dialogue intriguing, and that was why I had climbed up the ladder to my small attic to find an old box I knew I had put up there many years ago.

A box filled with antique comic books.

Yes, in my teen years it wasn't a surprise that I was a bit of a dork. I'd been more interested in gamma radiation and radioactive spider-bites than I had been in playing with makeup and going to parties. Of course it was the same reasons I had pursued a career within science and biology, and more precisely, what happened when the two mixed.

And that's when C.E.N.T.U.R.I.E.S had approached me.

Now, while I didn't approve of their methods, which, granted I only knew so much about, I still found it fascinating to get to work with the specimens they had genetically managed to create. Creatures had been the first successful breed of many, many attempts of creating a stronger human kind, and getting a chance to oversee just how they developed was what had me saying yes to their offer. Even if I still felt the end didn't justify the means.

And now after having spent almost three weeks with Charlie, I knew enough about him to know that what had happened inside that facility had scarred him in a way he didn't even know. It was all he knew, after all. Now trying it on in the real world, he saw just what he had been deprived of.

So climbing down from my attic and closing the latch, I headed down the stairs, carrying my box full of old comic books. They could probably sell handsomely for a total grant in all, but I just didn't have the heart to part with them. They were my childhood, my youth, the one part of me that remained innocent as they clung to the pages of the fiction written within the colorful, laminated pages. Maybe they could give some of the same to Charlie.

"Charlie?" I smiled as I came into the living room and found him chewing on some apple slices I had cut out for him while he was watching Adventure Time intensely with a deep frown like it was complicated, philosophical stuff. "Can I talk to you for a moment? I've got something you might like."

Blinking his eyes away from the TV, he looked at me with the same childish curiosity he always had whenever he was about to absorb something new. His eyes dropped to the dusty box as I set it down in front of him, getting down on my knees next to him.

"I figured since you love cartoons so much, I wanted to introduce you to these," I said and opened the cardboard box, instantly feeling nostalgia swell in my heart by the sight them. "These are called comic books. Back before everyone had a TV, these comic books were how children got their daily yucks. They're the old fashioned version of cartoons," I explained when Charlie gave me a confused look.

Letting his eyes drop to the front cover of the first comic book, he frowned lightly and tilted his head to the side. "What's a Super-man?"

"Superman is..." Wow, I hadn't considered how to explain exactly what they were to him. "Superman is one of many fictional characters that we call superheroes," I begun, thinking fast on how to wing it best. "Whenever someone is in danger, Superman, or any other hero, swoops in to save the day with his or her powers."

"Powers?"

I nodded and picked up the Superman comic book, flipping through the pages until I found one that could demonstrate. "See, here he's using his strength to hold up a heavy piece of roof to prevent it from crushing the woman below. He saves her."

Charlie stared at the image for a long time, and I would've given my own left leg in that moment to know what he was thinking. Was it making any sense to him?

"Anyways, I figured I'd give you the offer if you wanted to read them," I told, putting the comic book back into the box again. "There are some great things to learn from them and there's also—"

"I'll read them," Charlie said, his voice quiet, but solid. Determined? "Thank you, Carly."

I smiled, but for some reason wanted to frown a little as he abandoned the TV and instead dug into the box full of comic books, laying them out on my carpet to look at all the covers. Wonder-woman, Captain America, The Flash, the Amazing Spider-Man... the list went on and on. For a brief time I had been a collector, so I had quite a few comic books. Charlie seemed enthralled by each and every single one of them, but there was a look in his eyes I couldn't decipher. Hence the frown.

After a moment of simply just watching him splay them out on the floor, I decided to leave him to it and instead turned on my foot to go into the kitchen to see what I would cook for dinner today.

Distraction accomplished.

~~~

Charlie spent the next two days reading the comic books I gave him. Several times I had to pull him out of one of them when his nose practically touched the page from his eagerness. We had a schedule to upkeep; his daily marathon on my treadmill, our social lessons, and of course, our small and now much less drastic outings into the real world, being a walk around the neighborhood. Even so, it was safe to bet on the fact that whenever we came home, he ran up to his room where he kept the comic books, and then dived into the next one and then the next one.

The distraction had worked and I was happy to hear that his nightmares had dialed down, even over the course of just 48 hours. I heard nothing from his room at night, but a gut sensation told me it was because he actually wasn't sleeping, but was reading the comic books under his blanket like a true new comic-book addict. I might accidentally have turned him into one.

So on the third night, after we had said goodnight and I'd made sure he was lying in his bed – only until the moment I closed the door of course – I felt like everything was going well again. Charlie seemed content and aptly satisfied with his new pastime, and I was happy that he was still making progress with his learning. The comic books actually helped him there as well. He was learning about things to say, absorbing 'normal' dialogue.

And if I knew Marvel comics correctly (which I obviously did), it wouldn't be long until he caught onto sarcasm as well.

So that night as I stripped down for bed and took off my earrings, I was pretty damn happy. My laptop was waiting in my bed, firing up the old Internet Explorer so I could log onto my email and send my report to C.E.N.T.U.R.I.E.S – the one I hadn't gotten written yet since it got interrupted the last time.

But as I was unclipping my bra and pulling it out from under my shirt, the door to my bedroom suddenly opened. Gasping (because I had learned my lesson about screaming), I spun around and found a rumpled-haired Charlie standing in his boxers (which I after the first morning had convinced him to sleep in) with one of the comic books in his hand. All of his toned body got accentuated in the only light from my night lamp that I was sure was conspiring against me.

Jesus, why did they have to send me such a hot Creature? Why not send me a Hemsworth brother instead and be done with it.

"Charlie!" I exclaimed, quickly yanking down my thankfully oversized shirt to cover the fact that I was only in my panties – a lace pair that was particularly see-through. "What are you doing in here, what's wrong?"

Charlie frowned a little at what had to be a weird action to him, me covering up. Even though I had explained to him the rules of that, he didn't quite seem to understand it. "I have a question. You told me I could always come and ask."

"Yes, during daytime," I specified, which I now realized I maybe should have, but hell, I didn't know it would even be an issue. Though it also reminded me I hadn't talked to him about privacy yet and the concept of it. I was going to do that first thing in the morning, teach him about knocking. "But since you're here now, what did you want to ask me?"

Charlie looked down a little, fixing his gaze on the comic book in his hand. A Superman one. "I was just wondering... how come they all have secret identities? If all they do is save the day and do good, then why not... show everyone?"

My eyes softened as I understood the real question behind the one he asked. I slowly sat down on my bed and patted the spot next to me. "Come sit down, Charlie."

He moved forward and sat down, placing the comic book in his lap. I tried really hard to keep my eyes on the comic instead of the thick bulge between his legs that I was shamelessly staring at – damn you, Carly! – and looked at the cover like he did. Superman was heroically posing with his fist stretched above his head, cape battering in the wind behind him as he flew. Posing greatness, I understood Charlie's confusion.

"You see, Charlie," I started with a heavy sigh. "The world is built like this; not everyone can see what's right and what's wrong, and people have different interpretations of it. Sometimes, if a hero saves someone from dying, there are always those who will argue that he should've let that person die."

"But... who would want someone to die?" Charlie asked, touching the cover with his hand. I saw his eyebrows crease as he tried to understand.

"Someone who's scared," I said, frowning a little, too. "People fear what they don't understand. They're afraid of it, and when you're afraid, even someone's good actions can seem bad. People's opinions can be influenced and manipulated, like reading one side of a story – in a nutshell, that's politics; determining what's right and wrong, good and bad. Everyone has a say about it."

"But how come it's so hard to determine?" Charlie pondered deeply.

"It's very complicated," I patiently told. "Good isn't always good and bad isn't always bad. It's not as black and white as it seems. But," I said, placing my hand on top of his on the comic book, watching as his body tensed up at my touch. "This is the part where it's important to remember how you yourself feel about it. People can tell you how to feel, but nobody but yourself can truly make you feel something you don't want to. Just because they say bad, it doesn't mean it's bad. Do you understand?"

Charlie nodded again. This time I thought for sure he was going to get up and say goodnight, but he surprised me by instead frowning deeper and staring harder at the floor. "But... if good isn't always good and bad isn't always bad... then how am I supposed to know I'm choosing good?"

Ah, hell. He was asking me deep questions at ten o'clock in the evening. His brain wouldn't accept anything but something logical, something he could put into context with his logical foundation.

"Good is not something you're naturally born with," I therefore replied, squeezing his hand a little. "It's something you learn to be, something you choose. There are ways you can somewhat tell if you're doing good though," I explained. "But they're like a rule of thumb; Not always positive."

"What are they?" He still wanted to know.

I took a deep breath and then exhaled. "Well. You know you're doing good... when your heart doesn't hurt while you do it."

Charlie nodded apprehensively. "And... bad?"

I pressed my lips tightly together. "If you feel any hurt when you do something or if someone else does it to you, then you know it's bad. Bad things create pain. Good things create joy." I watched him absorb my words carefully. "But like I said, they are not always guaranteed, but if you just stick to those as your baseline, then you can't go all wrong."

Charlie finally nodded one last time with apprehension and then quietly stood up, taking his comic book with him. "Thank you, Carly."

"You're very welcome, Charlie," I replied, smiling to his back as he walked to the door slowly, each footstep heavy, hesitant. It didn't come as a surprise to me when he stopped up in my doorway. "Did you want to ask anything else?"

Charlie simply stood still for another long moment, just glancing down. Then, he turned a little sideways and looked at my slippers. "So pain means bad, right?"

I nodded, slowly, trying to see what he was getting at. "Yes...?"

I noticed his jaw tightened a little, but then he unclenched it again and looked away. "Those scientists at C.E.N.T.U.R.I.E.S were bad people then."

And then leaving me with a heart shattered into pieces and my jaw hanging wide open, he stepped out of my bedroom and silently closed the door.

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

• • •

Poor Charlie.