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❛ ᴛʜᴇ ʙ. ʙ. ᴇꜰꜰᴇᴄᴛ​​​​​​​​​​. ❜ ° . ༄
- ͙۪۪˚   ▎❛ 𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐑𝐋𝐔𝐃𝐄 𝐈𝐈𝐈 ❜   ▎˚ ͙۪۪̥◌
»»————- ꒰ ᴡʜᴇɴ ᴀʟᴇxᴀ ᴍᴇᴛ ᴅʏʟᴀɴ ꒱　


❝ ECCENTRIC BILLIONAIRE
& ADVENTURER, MY ASS ❞

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2009

Alexa didn't meet Dylan right away after leaving the Academy. In fact, she'd completed two years of community college and was starting her first year at a four-year college when she finally met her best friend. It had been hard adjusting to life outside of the Academy especially in the wake of everything that had happened, but Alexa was known in her family for her positive thinking and creativity so she was able to pull herself together and had settled herself into a steady routine by the end of a year.

Now, she sat in her eight a.m. history class as she waited for the professor to begin. There weren't many students in this section as waking up this early on a Monday morning was not most people's first choice. Alexa, though, had been so used to waking up early due to the Academy that she'd kept up with the tradition, unable to find a reason to waste time with sleeping; after all, she knew better than anyone how precious time was.

There were six people already present, not including herself. Besides that, she didn't pay much attention to what they looked like. As she'd done in community college, Alexa planned to keep to herself and focus on her studies in order to keep moving on with her life. There was no need for friends or other relationships; she had two goals: get a decent job and bring Five home. She was pretty sure the boy would be proud of her for not indulging in something so frivolous as friends.

The blonde was pulled out of her thoughts when she registered the familiar feeling of eyes boring into the back of her head (she could thank Five for that.) She tensed slightly but ignored it, figuring the person would grow bored. However, throughout the hour and a half lecture the feeling persisted. As the students packed up Alexa stalled, not wanting to be pursued in the hallway if someone wanted to talk to her.

She was pulling her books towards her when beige-clad legs interrupted her vision. Her eyes followed the line of cloth to a blue button down shirt and up to a rather square face that held hazel eyes which were covered slightly by wavy chestnut hair. Alexa tensed as the twenty-something year old man smiled at her, looking slightly embarrassed.

She met his eyes critically. "Yes?"

He shifted uncomfortably. "Hi. I. . . I know this is our first class and I don't want this to be awkward—"

Alexa slipped her books inside her bag. "Yeah, well, I think it's too late for that." She fought the urge to glance over her shoulder to watch Five's expression. Even after seven years of his absence it was still hard to remember he was gone.

Pink colored the man's face. "Right. Well, I—"

The blonde zipped up her backpack and stood. "Look, it's early and I skipped breakfast. If there's something you want to say, you've got less than a minute." Alexa knew she was being rude but she had a feeling of what he wanted and she didn't really need him holding her up.

She gave a faintly irritated sigh and pushed past him to walk toward the door while she ran her fingers through her (newly) short hair in an irritated fashion. As her foot stepped over the threshold, the man suddenly blurted out: "I want to take you out!"

Alexa could practically imagine his wince of shame but she couldn't help the smirk that formed on her lips as she turned around. "Well, good luck with that. I'm afraid that will be very hard for you." Then, she laughed. "Look at that, I've made a double entendre!"

Confusion clouded his face for a moment before he shook it off and corrected his mistake. "I meant, would you go on a date with me?"

She pursed her lips and gave him one of the are you stupid looks Five was famous for. "No," came her response before she turned on her heel and strode out of the door without another thought.

☂☂☂

Alexa successfully ignored the chestnut-haired man for the rest of the month. With her major and extra classes in physics, that wasn't really hard. History class was most difficult but she always arrived on time (never early) and left right away. Luckily, he seemed to take defeat better than most stories of rejected guys she'd heard so she never actually feared he would become a stalker or something.

Now, she sat in the window of a coffee shop and stared out at the changing leaves while she tried to find the patience to do her physics homework. She startled when there was a soft "hey" from somewhere above her. Looking up, she saw the guy who'd tried to ask her out on a date on the first day of school. Alexa cringed, ready to tell him to mind his own business but he smiled apologetically. "I know you said 'no' to a date so you don't have to worry about me asking again. I just wanted to know if I could take your extra seat?" He gestured towards the one across from her.

Alexa hesitated as her eyes landed on the empty chair and for an instant, it was occupied by a dark-haired fifteen-year-old boy with a faintly irritated expression on his face. The blonde-haired woman blinked and suddenly he was gone, leaving nothing but free space in front of her. She sighed. "If you must."

The man thanked her and sat as he took a curious look at her current subject. "Physics? That's impressive. You wouldn't catch me dead forcing myself to work through all those numbers."

Alexa snorted faintly in amusement, "I don't want to be doing this either. It's more of a. . . side project."

He still looked interested but she ignored it in favor of studying the mind-numbing problems in front of her. Luckily for her, he seemed particularly intent on carrying a conversation. "I never got to introduce myself since I was such a stuttering mess earlier. I'm Dylan."

The blonde glanced up and sighed slightly, knowing she would have to respond. "Alexa," she replied shortly. At least he knew how to take himself lightly.

"Look," Dylan began. "I know I caught you off guard that way and while I'm disappointed, of course, I understand. This is extremely juvenile of me, but would you want to be friends instead?"

Alexa glanced at him for a moment before she replied, "I don't make friends." Then she added, "or have relationships."

He blinked in shock. "What, so you're at college just for. . . school?"

He sounded so surprised that Alexa's lips quirked upwards slightly. "Yeah, believe it or not. That is what we're here for."

Dylan huffed. "I'm not the most social person but even I don't spend twenty-four hours a day studying." He pointed to himself proudly. "History club, baby! You know, our first interaction was actually my best effort of asking someone out; usually I end up spouting history facts of little or no relation to the conversation."

This caused a surprised laugh to escape the blonde's lips and Dylan smiled triumphantly. "Guess I'm special, then?"

"I'd say that, yeah."

☂☂☂

From that first meeting, she began to be more friendly with Dylan although she always reminded herself that they would never be friends. It was winter now and snow gently blanketed the ground. Alexa was more obviously quiet today than she had been in the entire time Dylan had known her. She wasn't particularly outgoing but there was an obvious melancholic look to her face that she usually tried to hide. At lunch, which he had begun to eat with her, she barely touched her food.

Alexa stared at the salad before her, appetite entirely lost. She'd woken up today with the annual sense of grief that she usually tried to push down on all other days of the year: it was November 9th, the anniversary of Five's disappearance exactly seven years ago.

Dylan gave her his approximately seventh worried glance of the day before he finally broke into her cloud of sadness. "Al, you've been quiet all day and you haven't even eaten anything. What's up?"

He'd genuinely meant his concern but he thought her strange mood was one of those woman's mood swings or perhaps she'd watched a sad show the previous night and was still thinking about it. His question, though, broke the dam and she let out a startling sob, causing him to exclaim, "shit, Al!" He stood and came around to her side of the table in order to better comfort her.

The blonde woman was funny about who touched her for some reason as Dylan had found out when he'd tried to hug her in greeting for the first time. Now he cautiously put his arms around her and to his surprise, she leaned against him while she struggled to keep her sobs at bay. They sat there for awhile while Alexa tried to hold herself together. Through the blurriness of her eyes, she could almost see the familiar, dark-haired boy across from her look uncharacteristically apologetic. She rubbed her fists in her eyes to try to clear them and when she looked again, saw that there was no one there and Dylan had his arms around her as he hugged her gently.

As she got her herself under control again, Dylan asked her worriedly, "do you want to talk about it, Al?"

And suddenly, Alexa was so tired of holding everything in that she gave a little nod, much to the surprise of the man holding her. Later that night (as the college cafeteria was no place to have such a conversation) they sat on her bed in her dorm. Her roommate somewhere else; Alexa had never learned the girl's name or schedule.

The blonde took a deep breath and twisted her hands in her lap as she stared at the physics book in front of her, unable to look at Dylan himself. "Do you know my last name?" she finally asked, deciding that was the best place to start.

He looked puzzled. "I'm sure I've heard it before."

"It's Hargreeves," Alexa said as she carefully studied his reaction. To her surprise, he didn't give one, so she explained further, "I'm adopted. My birthday is October 1st, 1989."

Dylan's expression furrowed as he thought. "That date sounds familiar. There was something strange that happened that day, wasn't there?"

The blonde nodded. "I was born, but before the twelfth hour of that day, my mother hadn't been pregnant."

The man's hazel eyes widened. "Wait— there were superheroes with that story. I remember now!" he exclaimed excitedly. "It was all over the news. I was just a baby, obviously, but my parents told me about what happened when I was older and there was a group— something to do with an umbrella?"

Alexa gave a weak laugh at his lack of knowledge. "Yeah, the Umbrella Academy."

"And-and you're saying—"

She nodded. "I was a member."

Dylan's jaw dropped. "I knew you were special but wow. You're famous!"

Alexa shrugged. "Yeah. It wasn't normal fame, though. My father is a paranoid old bastard."

Dylan was still looking at her incredulously. "You're saying that about Reginald Hargreeves?"

Even with his limited knowledge, everyone knew her father's famous eccentricities. She nodded again. "It's a better description than what he gives himself. Eccentric billionaire and adventurer, my ass."

"Okay, but what does this have to do with today?" he asked, bringing the point back. "I mean, I'm glad you trust me enough to tell me your secret identity but— wait, are you Rumor or the Protector?"

Alexa gave him the 'are you stupid' look that she was taking over from Five. "Do I look like an black woman to you?"

"Good point. Sorry, wasn't thinking," Dylan said, still in awe. The memories of the Academy's fame were coming back to him; he could remember watching them use their powers and one of them was sitting right in front of him. The news coverage hadn't been good quality during the superheroes' missions but he could picture in his mind's eye a little Alexa's— the Protector, to the general public— bright blue shields as she protected her siblings from harm.

Alexa's momentary uplift in spirits disappeared quickly as they returned to the point in question. She sighed and her expression fell rapidly. "You might remember— either from footage or stories in magazines— that Number Five— The Boy, I mean— and I were always closer than any of the other Academy members."

Dylan nodded slightly as he recalled several articles in teen magazines debating what the best couple pairing would be and even with their masks on, The Boy and The Protector were often ahead of everyone else. Even though they were raised as siblings, the world didn't seem to care about how their views might complicate relationships.

"Yeah, well, you might also remember he disappeared?"

The man blinked as the pieces came together. "Today's the day he left, isn't it?" he asked much more softly. Some of his excitement disappeared. Alexa's expression confirmed his statement.

"It's been seven years," she said heavily before she gestured to the book that lay between them. "Like I said, this is a side project. I'm trying to bring him home."

"Bring him home?" Dylan asked.

"The reports just say he went missing," Alexa explained in a sad voice. "But he lost patience with Reginald— he never had much when it came to the man, anyway— and instead of biding his time, he got up during dinner one night and time traveled. I still believe he's out there, somewhere, and when we were growing up he was obsessed with complicated equations. I wish I'd paid more attention to them but here I am, taking physics. I know it's stupid, he's been gone for so long but—"

"It's not stupid, Al," Dylan interrupted her. "I obviously don't know everything that happened outside of missions but seeing you like this, now, I can tell you really cared— care— for him. I'm hoping you're going to say no to this but if you want, I'll take physics with you to help you out?"

☂☂☂

As much as Alexa had appreciated Dylan's offer she had declined, much to his relief. While she still had misgivings about making friends she couldn't deny how nice it was to have someone support her even if she didn't deserve it. Sometimes, she could be just as selfish as her fifteen-year-old shadow.

She'd recovered better than she usually did  from her annual grief (this could probably be because of Dylan) and now they were well into spring. Finals were on the horizon and Alexa was panicking slightly about her physics exam— slightly, of course, being a complete lie. Dylan had decided that they would take a break and go to a bar on Friday night in late celebration of his twenty-first birthday. Alexa, being several months older than him, liked to hold this over his head. They'd suffered through the week of extreme pressure with Dylan joking that he could probably be worth his weight in gold now that he was a diamond.

The blonde had her misgivings about going to a bar with all of the Academy training in her but she didn't protest. Now that she was actually sitting on a bar stool, it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be. Dylan had had two beers— cheap ones for college students— and seemed slightly less stressed. Alexa, on the other hand, had chosen not to have anything since she preferred to have her wits about her, thank you very much.

During their time at the bar, she'd noticed a slim brunette woman giving Dylan several sideways glances. She finally came over as the man received his third beer and smiled flirtatiously. "Hi," she said, giggling slightly as her words slurred slightly. "I'm Mary. What's your name?"

Dylan blinked at her uncomprehendingly. Alexa leaned forward slightly as she smirked. "Dyl, she wants to know your name."

"I'm nobody," came his immediate answer and his face flushed pink, "but I do know several Marys."

The brunette giggled again. "You do? I'm sure I could make you forget about all of them."

Dylan snorted. "That's unlikely. They were famous queens— you know, Queen Mary I or Bloody Mary, Mary, Queen of Scots."

Present-day Mary's expression became confused. "Why do I care about them? They're dead."

"They're dead?" came Dylan's incredulous question. "They were major queens in history! The first Mary attempted to completely reform England's religious beliefs— violently, of course. The second Mary ascended the throne when she was only six—"

"Dyl," Alexa cut in with a laugh. "She's gone."

The man blinked, realizing his audience had disappeared. "Dang it," he said good-naturedly. "That always happens. I think it has something to do with the killing."

"Mm," was Alexa's response; she couldn't believe he'd actually been telling the truth about his flirting techniques.