Psyche's Vignette: The Manor

[Avenger Assembled]

Psyche

 

The Manor was even more empty than usual at this point in the day. As it was early, early morning, Alex's grandfather was still in bed. Which, actually, was why Alex was in the 'hall of heroes' as she'd come to calling it. One of the rooms that they'd come accross was a memorial of sorts - a room filled with costumes under glass cases.

 

Oh, it had started out as the changing room, with each costume and accessories held under pristine conditions. It had slowly morphed into a memorial of sorts instead, the first time a sidekick hadn't been able for one reason or another to don their mask and spandex again.

 

It was the one room her grandfather had been unable to open and face, so Alex was up at the crack of dawn, quietly cleaning it. The glass cases kept the costumes themselves pristine but nothing else in the room certainly was.

 

In a pair of raggedy jeans, with her hair knotted up in a scarf, Alex industrially dusted, swept and mopped. Each silent glass tube was scrubbed lovingly, and each letter on the name plate below was meticulously cleaned off.

 

In this room, the soft hum of the manor's power cells was muted to a faint whooshing white-noise background. Like most of the areas of the underground potion of the base, the room was high ceilinged and panneled to look like a scene out of Star Trek. Except in this room, an aura of sorrow clung to the walls. Today, in the wake of the Halloween battle, Alex found a quiet sort of comfort in the ambient aura.

 

Once the room was pristine, Alex turned back to survey her handiwork for a moment. She walked through, touching the nameplate of the tube that held her grandmother's lab coat before continuing on to an empty tube. Pressing her fingertips against the keypad at the side, the air tight chamber whooshed open. Pulling the jacket from her backpack, Alex slipped the expensive leather into the display case and palmed the chamber closed.

 

Arms wrapped around her stomach, Alex watched as the jacket was held in stasis, waiting and in that moment understood exactly why this chamber existed. It wasn't about an eternal memorial. It was about the hope that the lost would one day walk down the hall and reclaim their costume. It was a promise that they were still and would always be waiting. Dry eyed, Alex walked out of the costume chamber.