Loop

Rex has a propensity for cracking bad jokes when under stress. Or well, whenever, yes, but, "What's crack-a-lackin', Noah? That's some quality playing there" falls flat even for him and Noah likes to think he can read him like a book regardless. So he does what he should have fifteen minutes ago and smacks the ball from Rex's hand, then dribbles and shoots without so much as a blink.

"Hey! I'm not done yet," Rex says, despite the fact that the score has been zero-to-some-double-digit-number since about the start of the game and the time is over so these three points mark Noah's victory. He wipes the sweat off his forehead and pouts, posture sagging. "Meh. Spoilsport." But he doesn't look Noah in the eye, has not for the past twenty-five minutes or so, in fact, basketball game considered and all, and if Noah rewinds and reaches back to where this strange behavior began, he can't see how a simple comment about how his parents were rejoicing over a promotion triggered Rex to swerve the conversation and jabber and go for lamer than usual quips.

"Oh well." Rex shrugs, still abnormally detached, and hooks an arm around Noah. "Let's go." Noah doesn't budge an inch from the sweaty hold but he makes a little noise of protest and just shoots straight to the point.

"Rex, is something the matter?"

Rex tenses up and freezes, terrible at lying if it cost him his life. Then his brain seems to reboot and he starts to walk, stride, trot, run, Noah under his arm and struggling to keep up until he grinds his feet against the ground to stop them both. Rex sighs, lets go and turns to fully look at Noah at last.

Noah knows he may be overreacting. But at the same time, he knows this could be serious, so unlike Rex to not come out and say what's bothering him. He crosses his arms and stares at him with as much persuasion as he can muster. Rex tries the same on his side with the wide, innocent eyes technique. A tie for now, he supposes, pushing at Rex's arm with his shoulder.

"Okay, whatever, no pressure here. I trust you'll get over it," Noah says without much emotion.

He starts to walk out of the court, and out of the corner of his eye he catches a look that he shouldn't have or couldn't have, Rex's eyes fixed too intently on him, too sad, but when he turns around it's gone, Rex walking beside him now. "Tranquilo, viejo. Guess I'm tired is all. Hard to admit, but you gave a pretty good battle today. You're upping your game, kid."

Noah blinks, before he rolls his eyes and laughs.

"Keep dreaming. Fifteen to zero." He sprints into a run, though this time feeling like he lost.

.

Even now, five days later, Rex is acting weird, distant, but Noah yields and lets it slide when they go to the movies in the afternoon.

It's a watered-down zombie movie. Noah has never shared Rex's passion for the genre but is nonetheless happy to be with him, even with his habits of devouring all of the popcorn before Noah can think of grabbing any and of leaning in repeatedly to tell him the plot points and the clichés.

In the middle of the preview trailers he jumps in his seat as Rex elbows him from the side. "Psst, hey Noah," Rex stage-whispers, as if he hadn't his full attention already. "I got you something." He fumbles for a small bag from his pocket and hands it to him.

Inside the bag is a DigiChum, in the shape of a gear and with metallic finishes, much like the one he gave Rex as a gift on his birthday, except orange-red instead of blue-green.

Noah wasn't expecting a present, much less two months before his birthday.

"Think of it as an early birthday present, from yours truly. You're lucky, 'cause I had to do a lot of favors to get it."

The flashing colors in the theater reflect off the toy's little screen. He runs his thumb across the smooth surface and casts an amused look at Rex. "I thought you thought they were 'so nineties'?"

"You kidding? This guy's my baby. I take care of it everyday, how dare you sir." He takes his own virtual pet from his other pocket and presses a button so Noah can see the evidence: a pixely little white blob that bobs up and down, with large wings and a pink beak. It gives a cooing beep in greeting. "I'll make it evolve into a Mecha type so I can take you down when we battle."

Noah chuckles. He makes a motion to connect the teeth of the two gears. They fit together like puzzle pieces.

"Thank you, Rex."

The light from the movie screen highlights Noah's smile. Carefully, he places the gift in the bag and into his pocket. "I'll be sure to give you guys extra slices of cake at my party."

"Thanks. Can't wait," Rex says, a smirk on his face.

He smirks back, eyes lighting up in nervous excitement. "Me neither! Oh man, everyone from my school is coming. Everything must be perfect. It'll be a blast."

"How much of a blast?" Rex asks after a while, lowering his voice at the movie starting.

His birthday is in early July, in the beginnings of summer, and he has been planning the party since maybe January. Maybe earlier. Rex never misses a chance to tease him for that, more so since that time he discovered the graphs and charts Noah had made to calculate the number of people coming and measure their likelihood of "having a blast" at the party.

Noah shoves at Rex's elbow with his own over the armrest. "Shut up. It's gonna be so awesome," he says, before he sips on his soda.

"Well, of course, it's your party. And you know you're totally rad, dude."

"Shut up," he whispers, all too loudly, of course, because he's actually snort-laughing and half-chocking on his soda, and the hilarity of the gurgling, wheezing sound sends them into a round of splutters and snickers, the kind that resonate throughout the whole theater at the worst possible moment.

A man behind them utters a "hush!" and they cover the rest of their laughter with coughs.

"No, really. Really, I can't wait to go, Noah."

The humor fizzles out. The mood sobers up and they turn to the movie. After the opening scene, Noah sneaks a sideways glance at Rex. There's a faraway look in his eyes. He's gazing through the screen instead of at it, and Noah tells himself to relax, you're worrying over nothing, goes back to the movie. However, in the back of his mind, he starts to second guess it all, starts to think that perhaps there is something to be worried about.

. .

Staring at the floor or the wall or the ceiling for extended periods of time proves to not be of much use when you're at a party. Your own party. The really cool one to which you invited lots of guys and girls from school, like Patty Darren and Brendan and Henry, triad of popularity and consolidated presidents of the student council, or that one kid, Berk Laurent, captain of the after-school football team, the guy all the girls swoon for, the one you're torn between admiring and wanting to punch, or the gaggle of girls you don't really know but invited anyway, the girls who giggle but don't help when you drop books in the halls, or the nerdy kids who look either confused or just bored, or the countless what's-their-faces that seem to gather anywhere but around you.

The music's too loud and too much, poppy, sugary and too kiddy, annoying ballads tacked on and on like it's a wedding instead, and Noah's left to sink further into his seat, glaring at the couples and groups forming on the little dance floor, and when a girl comes up to him either to ask him to dance or for the bathroom, who knows, and he barely opens his mouth and is about to answer that yes, yes she can sit here, his gaze is too angry and too piercing it seems, because she turns and heads back to where she came from, fast but cautious.

His pizza crumbles, crumbles, starts to fall apart at his holding and folding it for too long and not eating it, so he unfolds it, folds it again, puts it to his mouth and doesn't take a bite. Puts it down. He folds his legs and also his hands to keep from fidgeting, he fidgets, wishes for the umpteenth time that Rex was here, stupid Rex, it's Noah's birthday, but Rex can't, won't, couldn't, wouldn't, not when he's some five thousand miles away in some town with a name Noah can't even pronounce somewhere in Europe.

A beepbeepbeepbeepbeep makes him remember he has that virtual pet, the tone low-pitched and reversed and Noah takes a look. Dead. No wonder. He doesn't have the time to be periodically glued to a tiny screen, can't be feeding it digital food and picking up digital poop all the time, is not up to the commitment, not now. With a fork and maybe a bit more force than necessary he pushes the reset button.

His mother nudges his shoulder and ruffles his hair, says it's okay, enjoy yourself, enjoy the summer, friendship is friendship is friendship, you can keep in touch, there's so much technology, it's not forever, they'll come back you'll see, two years or three (or four or five) just that, you two still have so much to do, so long a life ahead, after all, you're only eleven years old and he's only ten.

. . .

Enter fall. The days blur and meld together and turn into week-long monstrosities, Noah already in the sixth grade at school. Nearly three months since Rex and his family left—and his own father, but when is he ever home?—find Noah categorically refusing to speak to them on the phone, his mother making and receiving his calls for him every time.

One day Noah asks her why they moved, because he honestly hasn't been told, not by anyone, and is more than irritated at her surprise. She assumed he'd figured it out by himself, always thinks that. It must give the impression that he's so slow, to admit he doesn't know.

Economic problems. Significant debts. A promotion to Research Scientists. The Project. Working on the Project up close would help them in their situation, and help their own family in return.

"They'll be back soon, Noah," his mother says, finality in her voice. "This is important, for them, for us, for the world. You know that."

But Noah doesn't. Not when the picture he has of whatever their job is about is an absent father and many empty promises.

Noah thinks, in hindsight maybe not too brightly, that if he had confronted Rex before they wouldn't have left, as if the both of them could have somehow conspired to protest against it. He growls in a way that has his mother looking at him with a mixture of pity and exasperation.

On Friday, before school, he calls Rex. Wakes up earlier to do so, six a.m. so that it's two p.m. for him. A beeping cry calls for his attention from atop his desk, and he reaches for the virtual pet to tinker with it while the phone is answered. The small black raven he was supposed to take care of has mutated into something unrecognizable, masses of ink-black and purple and red pixels strewn haphazardly to form what look like tentacles and faces in pain. Bad path. Terribly bad. Noah sets it aside, wondering what could have gone so wrong with it.

On the fifth ring someone answers and it's Rex. Rex, seemingly clairvoyant enough to know when Noah would call.

"Hello?"

"Rex, it's Noah."

The "Oh. Hey," he gets in response sounds remarkably like "Oh. Crap."

"Hey," Noah mimics, then proceeds to speak with the tone of one who doesn't want to talk about this, even though he's the one who dialed. "Rex, why did you lie to me?"

"I didn't."

"Rex, come on. Doesn't even feel like I'm your friend here."

"Well I- I didn't tell you anything. That's not lying…"

Noah's nails dig into his palm, and he would smack his head against the nearest object if the conversation weren't giving him enough of a headache. "Oh, sure. Thank you kindly. Sorry for not remembering that." Should have seen that one coming. "You know, you could've at least given me a chance to say goodbye, but you just up and left. The day before my birthday. You must be so happy over there. Good riddance, I guess."

"What, you think I wanted to move, to just leave everything in New York behind? I did have lots of friends at my school, you know." It really shouldn't feel so much like betrayal, so much like a sock to the jaw, a bitter bite in the back of his tongue. It's a good thing Rex can't see him now, because his eyes are beginning to sting and his vision to blur.

"Of course you did. Did you lie, sorry, hide information from them as well?"

Rex makes this low noise, a half-sigh, half-groan, as if Noah is some little kid who is particularly hard to talk to. All Noah does is purse his lips and kick at his schoolbag on the floor. "Actually, no. I told them." A pause. "Noah, I couldn't—I didn't tell you because… I don't like it when you—" On the other side of the line there's a shuffling sound which Noah assumes is Rex moving the phone from one ear to another. "I don't like to see you sad. …I'm sorry."

Not five seconds later Noah punches the 'off' button on his phone. With shaking hands he takes the stupid virtual pet and chucks it across the room.

Good thing Rex can't see him now.

When his mother knocks at his door and enters his room with a, "Noah, good morning" and a, "Something wrong, honey? You didn't sleep well?" he picks up his schoolbag and stands up sharply and wipes his eyes and makes a point of avoiding her gaze, walking past her to get out.

"No, Mom. I'm just fine." He takes a deep breath and goes meander around downstairs until the bus arrives.

The weekend marches on and goes as normal as normal can go. After dinner, on Monday, Noah does his homework in his room. Alternates between math problems and thinking about Rex or looking at the virtual pet still on the floor. Between practicing the flute and thinking about Rex.

It's dumb, he knows, pathetic, but he can't help but think about him a little, every day his absence too glaring, too solid, when he looks at the popular kids, or stares at the girl he likes in school and has to conform to admiring her from afar, and wonders what Rex would do, how Rex would act, what Rex would say, if he were Noah. Has always wondered. To approach anyone he wants and say what he means, to not stutter or go speechless or laugh awkwardly, to not be afraid of being rejected, or ridiculed or ignored. He knows Rex is (still is, surely) pretty popular at the school he went to. With almost everyone he meets.

Then it hits him, softly, like a tiny surge of water or light or air, that for how observant he thinks he is, until now he could never pinpoint what was so different about them, so essential to their friendship; that whereas Noah bottles up negative feelings, Rex seeks to release them, to transform them, to generate courage out of thin air to face them. And to help others do the same.

It doesn't add up, that Rex had to lie to protect his feelings. Noah doesn't understand how the concept is possible.

He dials the number quickly, almost unconsciously, this and Rex's number embedded in his mind since his mother had written them down for him. It's his duty as a friend, the least he could do, to tell the man to take care of his godson. Some sort of formal not-quite goodbye, but not really, they could keep in touch, after all.

"Noah? Uhh, what a surprise." His father's voice is raspy. Noah checks his bedside clock. Nine p.m. here, five a.m. over there. If it bothers his father, he doesn't mention it, and Noah, likewise, doesn't say a thing. "Good- evening. How are you? Is- is everything okay?"

"Hm, well, what do you think?" No response, so he says, "We're fine. How're things over there?"

It's like he winds up a key on the man's back because he goes into ramble mode, his voice light, all traces of grogginess gone. "Oh, Noah. It's… it's amazing, what the nanites can do. Years of work and research finally coming to fruition— we're breaching the boundaries between man and machine. Do you know what this means for humanity, for the world? It's- you have no idea. Everything, everything will change now, medicine, sanitization, food production, energy generation."

"Yeah, I should be there, huh?" Noah clicks his tongue and watches out the window, idly. A lone red-green leaf sways in the wind and falls off the branch of a tree. "Listen… Rex—"

"Forgive me, Noah. To tell the truth, I would love for you to be here as well, to witness this. …The nanites in him, every machine, Rex can feel them, hear them, control them. And that's not al—"

His hand twitches and tightens around the phone. "Wait, what? He's your test subject now? Is that why he's there?"

But his father takes way too long to answer. "Dad?"

"We were only trying to save him…"

He curls both hands around the phone and kneels down on the spot. "Dad. What." Through gritted teeth he sucks in a lung full of cold air. "What happened?"

"…We were terrified, but we acted quickly and I assure you, he is fine now. Completely healed, even better than before. His family should be with him at the center right— no-w—"

"Dad!"

What Noah hears just then is his father slamming the phone down and the line breaking up, cars and planes passing by outside, his heart thundering in his ears, packs of dogs barking in the streets, fireworks, all at once, because it couldn't have been anything else.

He doesn't talk to his mother that night. He goes to sleep immediately, sinking into his bed, his head like a stone. He wakes to a bursting, deafening sound in his mind, to the morning news downstairs and his mother sobbing on the couch.

. . . .

Ten past five and Noah's after-school activity is Rex-watching, and for all of his official status as Providence Agent, Influential Companion and whatnot he feels not unlike a common stalker, waiting for his chance to pounce. He's lucky no kid from school seems to be around for him to run across, because the whole thing would be pretty awkward to explain.

On White's notice that Rex fled Providence for the day he all but bolted after him; Rex taking that monkey with him wherever he goes makes him straightaway traceable. Not that Rex has any idea, or that Noah minds.

He feels ridiculous, lurking behind a tree, but he presses on and watches Rex and a bunch of random Joes hang out together. Or more like the random Joes hang out while Rex plays the part of the free soda dispenser, otherwise ignored. Upon catching on Noah takes his cue to stride over to the scene, purpose a tiny flare, pulsing in his chest. Indirectly he tells the guys to piss off but at Rex's response he snaps his mouth shut and takes a backseat.

A few seconds later they're done with him and the 'freak's roll out, Noah acting composed, seething inside as they walk away. The words 'monster', 'waste bag' and 'spoiled meat' flash through his mind, and all of his instincts tell him that Rex has had to deal with worse.

Then the monkey casually leaps to defense. Noah can't help but like him already.

When he approaches Rex again, his heart seems to both speed up and stop altogether. "So," he manages, with all the trained smoothness of the secret spying agent that he is, "You have a talking monkey."

He could never, in his whole life, begin to explain the concept of getting a good look at your best friend after five years of not seeing him, nearly five years of having no idea whether he was even alive, five years of remembering him as a little kid… and realizing that, drat, he's still taller than you even though you're the older one. Seriously.

Besides the fact that your best friend doesn't remember you at all, so you have to introduce yourself for a second time.

Months ago, on a day when he stared at the gray ceiling in his room and figured that an old childhood toy, a poster of New York and the memory of a father were absolutely not enough to get by without going crazy, he thought about taking matters into his own hands. About investigating. His quest for answers drew out nothing, his non-scientist mother almost as lost as him on the matter, any important document related to the Project gone along with his father. Countless groups and organizations existed for dealing with the nanite situation, most of them with no knowledge of anything aside from, "Nanites are bad. You are infected with them and they can turn you into an EVO. EVOs kill, if they aren't killed before." Finding Providence, with their option for a cure, was like unearthing a single rhinestone in a sea of lead. And while they had no solid information of the Event, of his father, or Rex's family or the day that changed everything—

They had found Rex.

"Retrograde amnesia. He currently has no memories of anything beyond Providence," White had told him, impassively. "At the end of the day we have no idea who he is or what he is capable of. Still, he is Providence's most valuable weapon. Tread carefully." It had made Noah's skin prickle and his blood boil, to think of Rex as a weapon, a blank slate to be caged and molded, everything about his identity wiped clear.

And right now he is a simple stranger that is about to become Rex's friend, along for the ride. To White. To Providence. They know nothing about him, not his real last name, nor where he lived before the event. They know about Rylander, that he had a wife; know he had a son, don't know his name.

He knows he'll be found out. Expects to be found out, secret by secret peeled and peeled off like layers of skin. But that's when he's either cornered enough or strong enough to face Rex. Not right now, when he himself is so desperately searching for the truth about that day. When he has no answers to give.

He glides through the afternoon as he drinks soda, walks around and sits and chats mindlessly with Rex, California sunset warming the dirty asphalt, and he can't help the odd sort of astonishment and giddiness that courses through him, Rex different and unchanged despite it all, his smile contagious. Yet the whole time he has this sensation he can't quite shake, of spells of déjà vu and nostalgia hitting him equally in waves, of a machine stuck in reset mode, and when Rex cracks a joke about his amnesia it's a blow to the gut, and he laughs, instead of grabbing Rex by the shoulders and shaking him and yelling "sorry."

The irony is biting and so dry. Lying to protect a loved one's feelings, an act of kindness or possibly a mistake, repeating in a loop.

. . . . .

.

The party was nice, paper bags and cement cakes aside. After it's over and the guests have dwindled away, Noah stays to help clean up. He doesn't have a present to give Rex on his anniversary (anniversary, he repeats in his head. Rex's birthday was months ago. He had no present to give him then, either, or for that matter a reason to), and his stomach sinks a little at that. Rex comes up to him with a leather-bound notebook in hand—his journal. He asks Noah to sign it. When Noah smirks and tilts his head, he explains; he wants Noah to write something for him, about him. "Like a school yearbook," he says. "But cooler. Bobo and Holiday already signed it. Just need to find Six."

So Noah writes. There's so much he wants to write, so much he could say. Everything, anything, feelings, memories, names. For a moment scrambled words threaten to spill out but he pushes them down, settles for using little more than five centimeters on a fresh page. As an afterthought he begins to scrawl a gear beside his text and then, tentatively, draws a sloppy-looking, pixelated raven inside. A doodle, something of a signature, long story, if Rex ever asks.

You may not believe me, but in a way, I understand how you feel. To know you could wake up one day and something precious is lost. Missing. Something vital. I know I'm not the best person to say this, but you can trust me. To be there for you when you need me, to help against EVOs, to hang out, to talk, to listen. I'm glad we met. You're an incredible guy, and maybe not everyone can see that, but the ones who can… they're lucky. Thanks for being my friend, Rex.

Noah :)

(A/N)

Kay, um. I started this quite some time ago, since around December, but was too afraid to post it. English is not my first language and I've never had a beta, so if there is anything too wonky with the grammar, I'd certainly appreciate it if you told me.

This series… nothing has been said about where exactly it takes place, but I have a theory for at least that place where Rex and Noah are usually seen playing b-ball and stuff, where Noah lives. You know that bridge in the background? It looks eerily like a section of the 6th Street Viaduct Bridge, in Los Angeles. I swear you can even see downtown L.A. behind it.

lolol I'm kinda obsessive over details like that. Second case in point: in 'Dark Passage' we see a quick bio of Rylander on a screen. If you pause on one of the photos you can see he graduated from a "University of Science N.Y." And, I'm a firm believer of the Noah is Rylander's Son Theory (best theory ever no matter what. It breaks my heart), so when 'Operation: Wingman' came out, something… clicked. In my crackpot mind, anyway. Noah has a poster of New York in his room, and since the show doesn't take place in New York, well… (And remember the 'String Theory' ep? How Van Kleiss wanted something from Meechum who was in New York? They haven't explained that). Then there's Rex and Noah's interaction, how it goes from chummy to awkward in Lockdown to chummy and extremely natural, with only that one awkward moment in Wingman. The idea is that it would be hilarious if Noah was ever all "Rex we kinda have been best friends for a while now actually haha sorry." It makes so much sense to me.

/coolstorybro

Anyway. I'm kinda new to the fandom (the show started in September in my country and I caught up slowly) and its fics. When I posted this I realized that someone could've tackled this idea already or done something very similar, so if you did and it bothers you, I can take this fic down, just tell me. :3