Page 24 of Static/Cling

“Of?”

“Us.” Kassian waved a hand to take in the office. “People like us.”

Leif frowned. “What do you mean?”

“People with powers. People who maybe don’t want to be public superheroes. People who just want to live their lives and stay under the radar.”

“Y’all work for a superpower agency,” Bjorn pointed out, approaching from behind Leif, holding his hands oddly stiff at his sides.

Kassian lifted an eyebrow. “So do you.”

“I didn’t know that when I signed up, did I?” He shot a look at Leif, who turned the tiniest bit pink.

“I told you to read it,” he muttered.

“I’m reading it now, aren’t I?”

“This isn’t a superpower agency,” Kassian cut their argument off before it got any heavier.

“What would you call it?”

“We’re the Special Processing and Management Unit.”

“But what does that even mean?” Bjorn asked. “Because it’s never really explained.”

“What isn’t?”

“What we do.”

Leif snickered. “We’re SPAM. “

Bjorn shot him a look.

“We Process and Manage,” he said, still grinning.

“But what do we process? What do we manage?” Bjorn was intensely serious, which made Leif’s little grin all the more incongruous.

“Come on.” Leif made a motion like he was going to smack Bjorn in the chest with the back of his hand, but he aborted the motion when Bjorn scrambled out of his reach. “Still?”

Bjorn held up his hands. “Been trying, but if I let go of too much at once I’ll probably blow a finger off, or fuse myself to the filing cabinet or something.”

“Yeah, that was no fun,” Leif muttered, and Bjorn shuddered.

“No, it was not.” He glanced at his fingertips, all red and some of them blistered.

Leif made a pained sound.

“It’s fine,” Bjorn said. “I’ll put that cream shit you got me on them when we get home.”

Kassian got up to get a better look at his hands. “What have you been doing?”

“Reading.”

Leif snorted. “He’s been putting some of the files into the cabinet as he finishes them.”

“So?”

“It’s metal,” Bjorn said. “Which…” He shrugged. “You know when you have static electricity and you get a little zap when you touch something?”

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