By dusk, Jiss had learned three things about Marvel New York:
The sidewalks never apologized for elbowing you.
You could smell ten different dinners and afford none of them.
Talking to the voice in your head made you look like the kind of person people paid not to make eye contact with.
He kept his rules like talismans: no eating people, no killing, no showboating, listen to me and let the city carry him. The hunger had retreated to a sulk, but it watched everything he watched, a cat behind his eyes.
Meat shop, Toxin murmured whenever a deli bled light onto the pavement.
"Budget first," he whispered back, lips barely moving. "Identity second. Anxiety always."
He turned down a block of brick-and-glass clinics and nail salons because the fluorescent lighting felt like safety. He didn't notice the curb until his toe caught it. He pitched forward, hands empty, dignity evaporating.
A small hand grabbed his sleeve and yanked.
"Hey—whoa." A girl's voice. Warm. "Careful."
He windmilled, found the curb, and didn't kiss the sidewalk. When gravity gave him back, he looked up into her brown. She had dark hair looped into a quick bun, scrubs half-covered by a hoodie, and a badge that read A. Reyes clipped to her pocket.
He tried for cool. Hit confused. "I… tripped."
"I noticed." Her smile tilted. Not mockery—relief. "You okay?"
Threat? Toxin asked, alert.
Human who pays taxes, Jiss thought. Calm down.
"Yeah," he said aloud. "Just, long day."
Her gaze skimmed his face the way a nurse's does: pupils, pallor, breath, lies. "You're a little pale. Dizzy?"
"Only socially."
She huffed a laugh. "Uh-huh. Sit for a second?"
He considered running. He considered his budget. He considered that someone had touched him without fear like he was a person with a problem, not a problem in person.
"Okay," he heard himself say.
She steered him to a stoop beneath a clinic's overhang, then crouched so they were eye level. Up close, he saw tiny ink stains on her fingers and a faint bruise on her forearm.
"Follow my finger?" She held up a pen and moved it gently left-right. He did, trying not to look like a raccoon in headlights. "Any headache?"
"Yes," he said, because the city was loud and his life had become a genre.
"Worse when you move?"
"Worse when I think."
"That's universal." She softened. "Do you know where you are?"
"New York," he said quickly. "Definitely New York."
"Neighborhood?"
"…Near a clinic?"
She bit back another laugh and looked past him toward the glass doors. "I'm on a break. We can do a quick check inside. No charge."
........
Panic punched his diaphragm. Hospital equals forms equals questions equals alphabet soup agencies, his brain screamed.
"I'm okay," he blurted. "Promise. I just lost my footing."
She studied him again, then let it go with a small nod that said I'm not your jailer. "Okay. Water?"
He hadn't realized how dry his mouth was until she said it. "Yes. Please."
She disappeared for thirty seconds and returned with a paper cup. He drank fast, barely stopping to breathe.
"Thanks." He tried a smile that didn't wobble. "I'm Jiss."
"Aria," she said, offering her hand. He shook it. Her grip was firm; her palm was warm. She didn't flinch like she'd touched static. "You from out of town, Jiss?"
"Way out of town." The joke slipped out before he could sand it. "Like… map ends, sea monsters, here be dragons."
She grinned. "So Queens."
"Worse."
Her eyes crinkled. "You got a place to go tonight?"
He looked at his shoes. They had become fascinating. "Yes," he said, which was not strictly false, he had ideas. "I'm figuring it out."
"That's a nice way to say no."
He shrugged, embarrassed. Don't attract attention, he reminded himself. Blend. Be boring. He opened his mouth to lie better.
The hunger slid forward, curious. She smells sweet, Toxin observed, weirdly content. Soft.
She's helping, Jiss thought. We're good.
Aria's voice gentled. "You don't owe me a life story. I just… know the look. Lost-but-pretending-not-to-be is basically half my job."
"Other half?"
"Bandaging people who tried to be brave without reading the manual."
He snorted. "Sounds right."
She dug in her hoodie pocket and pulled out a folded, grease-stained paper. "This is a list I keep for my screw-up cousins and my future screw-up self. Cheap hostels that don't ask too many questions. Churches that let you crash on the pews if you help stack chairs. A soup kitchen a few blocks over, they do dinner at eight."
She pressed it into his hand. His fingers shook. "You don't even know me."
"I know you're not high, you're not scamming me, and you're too proud to ask but not stupid enough to refuse water." Her mouth tucked on one side. "And I know New York eats people who trip."
He wanted to make a joke. He wanted to cry. He compromised with honesty. "Thank you."
"Welcome." She hesitated. "Do you need, like… cash for a metro?"
He shook his head and tried not to look at his wallet's dying moths. "I'll walk."
"Okay. Then consider this medical advice: sit ten minutes before standing again, drink all the water, and don't pick fights with curbs."
"I'll write it down."
She stood, then thought better and sat back beside him, shoulder to shoulder but not touching.
A man down the block started yelling into his phone.
Jiss flinched before he caught himself. Aria tilted her head like she'd seen the flinch and was pretending not to.
"So," she said, casual. "You said 'way out of town.' Where from?"
"A place where the news is less… shiny."
"That narrows it down to everywhere."
"Right."
She looked at him sideways. "Do you have family here? Friends?"
"Working on it."
"That's fair." A breath. "If you don't want a clinic, I can at least do the concussion drill. Lights bothering you? Nausea? Ringing in your ears?"
"There's always ringing," he said before he could catch it.
She glanced at the street, misreading the metaphor. "City'll do that."
She thinks you are lost, Toxin noted, fascinated, as if they'd discovered a rare insect. She makes soft words. Safe words.
She's kind, Jiss answered.
We like kind?
We do.
A teen barreled by, board under arm, nearly clipping Aria. Jiss's arm moved before he told it to—his hand out, catching her shoulder, steadying. She blinked, surprised, then smiled up at him. He snatched his hand back like he'd grabbed a stove.
"Sorry," he said.
"Don't be." She peered at him. "Reflexes are fine."
"Great. I can fail all the other tests."
"You're passing the ones that matter." She pushed to her feet and zipped her hoodie, glancing at the clinic doors. "I should get back. Mr. Rosenthal gets mean when his pudding is late."
"Nightmare."
"Truly." She dug out a small notepad, scribbled a number, and tore the page. "Here. If you pass out, or you need to find the soup kitchen, or you just don't want to walk alone, call. If I'm on shift, I'll answer. If I'm not, I'll pretend to be a superhero and still answer."
"I don't want to bother...."
"It wouldn't be a bother." Her tone made arguing rude. "You okay, Jiss?"
He looked at the paper, at her name, and at the warm ring left by the cup. Noise from the city came from every direction. He could feel Toxin listening: it focused when her voice went soft and settled when she stood without fear.
"I'm… getting there," he said.
"Good. That's basically adulthood."
She stepped backward toward the doors, walking the way only New Yorkers and cats do—like the ground belonged to her. "Eat something, okay? And water."
"Yes, Nurse Reyes."
"Not a nurse yet," she said, rolling her eyes. "Just a trainee with a badge and opinions."
"Formidable combo."
"Tell your curb to watch itself." She smiled one last time, then slipped walked the clinic doors.
For a moment, the city was quiet.
Jiss stared at the paper with her number until the ink blurred. He slid it into his wallet like something sacred. His chest felt too tight and too light.
Soft human helps, Toxin said, thoughtful. She did not trade. She gave.
Yes.
We like her.
We do.
Eat her enemies, it suggested, completely earnest.
He coughed a laugh. "Let's… table that."
He waited the prescribed ten minutes because she'd told him to, and because following instructions helped him stay steady. When he stood, he wasn't dizzy.
He went to the soup kitchen first: metal trays, steam, tired but kind volunteers. Then he went to a hostel from Aria's list. It smelled like old and stale air. He paid in cash, took a corner bunk with no bag to unpack, and tried to sleep.
In the dark, the hunger sat at the edge of his thoughts.
Jiss.
"Yeah?"
We did not run.
"No," he whispered into the pillow. "We didn't."
We liked soft human. We keep soft human.
"Easy," he said, even as something inside him agreed. "We just met her."
We keep, Toxin repeated, not a threat, an oath.
He lay there with Aria's number under his pillow and the city's noise filling the gaps where fear used to echo. Somewhere outside, a siren wailed. Somewhere inside, a voice purred. Between the two, Jiss found a thin, surprising thing that felt like the start of trust.