Once they were done eating and headed out again, Finch took over on the motorcycle. He suspected the conversation he was due with Luther would be better had in private, and until then, everyone else might as well have a break from his anger.

Finch had always seen Luther as a vain, selfish creature, but the way he was around Shadow didn’t really fit with that image. Finch could insult Luther all he wanted and Luther seemed to almost find it amusing, but the second he was even slightly, unintentionally disrespectful towards Shadow, it was a different story. And Luther was always fucking right, of course.

Cognitive dissonance. That’s what Adin would have told Finch he was experiencing right now. His firmly held beliefs about Luther were being challenged, and even though it was in a positive way, it was making him more angry than he would have been if Luther had simply reaffirmed the beliefs Finch had already held about him.

He hated feeling this way. He’d fought so hard over the years not to be an angry person, not to let himself get caught up in that dark place. Maybe he’d never really made all that much progress, though. He remembered being ten and punching holes in the walls of Adin’s cabin when some drunk idiots had decided to have a party down by the creek, but all that had changed now was that he knew how to bite down on those feelings long enough to go somewhere else. He still couldn’t sit and listen to those kinds of sounds and be okay. He couldn’t even watch things on TV that had a cheering audience, for fuck’s sake.

And right now, what was he doing? Just avoiding his emotions. Sure, removing yourself from a situation so that you could calm down was a mature alternative to lashing out, but at a certain point, you had to actually confront those feelings.

For now, though, what they really needed was clothes and groceries. Before it got too late and everything shut, Finch signalled the bus and they pulled into the parking lot of a shopping centre.

They managed to find somewhere to park the bus and they all headed inside together. Finch and Malyn had been given some basic clothing by the hospital so that they didn’t have to be poor sad weirdos going from test to test in their boxers, and Shadow had lent Tyla some clothes from his bag that Finch had rescued, but they were all a bit short on clothing just then. Finch had at least managed to rescue his boots along with his body armour, though he’d normally just wear trainers when he wasn’t fully gearing up.

They found a department store and spread out.

They didn’t have much money, but that was nothing new. Finch just wanted a pair of trainers, some socks, some underwear, and then a couple of pairs of jeans or something and some shirts.

“I’m done,” Adin said while Finch was still trying on shoes. He’d already found some shoes of his own and a pack of underwear. He’d had enough old clothes left at the cabin to get by for now. “I should go and get started on the groceries.”

“Do you want someone to go with you?”

Adin hesitated, and then nodded. “It’s quieter at this time of night, but people do like to stare. It’s much rarer for people to react badly to oddities like me these days, but it still worries me. Not for my own safety, of course, but…”

Finch nodded his understanding. He genuinely didn’t think Adin would get aggressive with someone, no matter how rude they were, because Finch himself had pushed Adin so many times as a child and he’d always maintained his calm, but he understood that past experiences had made Adin fearful and those fears didn’t have to be rational. “Take Tyla. I don’t think he really knows how to dress himself in human clothes, so Malyn’s mostly picking for him anyway. At least you won’t be alone in being stared at.”

“I suppose so.” Adin ran a hand over one of his antlers. “They’re still barely halfway grown in. Things will be getting worse before they get better.”

“They usually do. But they always get better in the end.”

Adin offered him a quiet smile. “I’ll see if Tyla is willing to come. It would be good to have someone with me as a distraction.”

Once Adin had left with an uncertain looking Tyla in tow, Finch found some shoes and moved on to looking at shirts. When he came across Shadow and Luther, he was tempted to turn and walk the other way. But no. He’d avoided Luther until his temper had settled, which had been the responsible thing to do, but now it was time to deal with him again.

“Ah, Finch,” Luther said. “I was just talking to Shadow about how awful it is being poor and not being able to afford nice clothes. He doesn’t really care.”

Finch sorted through a discount rack. “I wouldn’t know. I was born with negative money and I haven’t gone far from there. I’ve got nothing to compare it to.”

“Well, you do noble work. Isn’t it strange how noble work pays so poorly? Often you’re even expected to refuse payment. It’s poorly incentivised.”

“The incentive is that you get to not feel shit about yourself at the end of the night.”

“Hm,” Luther said. “I prefer money, I think.”

“Well, you said you wanted us to introduce you to our line of work, so too bad. We’ll probably be just about able to keep everyone fed and the bus fuelled.”

“I’m sure I’ll manage. I was born poor as well, you know.”

“Yeah. Shadow said you were a carpenter.”

“I was!” Luther said. “My father was one, too. He taught me, of course. That was how we did things. Did your parents work?”

Anger rose up inside of Finch, but the fact that he didn’t even know what to be angry at Luther for kept him from snapping. He took a deep breath, in and out. “I don’t like to be asked about that shit. Anything before I came to this world.”

“Oh.” Luther set a shirt he’d been looking at back on the rack. “I apologise.”

Finch shook his head. “You didn’t know, but now you do, so…”

“So I won’t do it again.”

“Wow, you really have changed,” Finch said. “Assuming you mean that.”

“I have,” Luther said. “Perhaps we could stop somewhere remote just before dawn and take a walk? Maybe we can clear the air a little if we have the opportunity to really talk things through.”

“Yeah,” Finch said. “Yeah, why not.”