Speed Racer - I touch myself - I search myself I want you to find me

[munnin]

Title: I touch myself – song-fic
Fandom: Speed Racer
Rating: Ranging wildly
Disclaimer: I own nothing but the inside of my head. And even then I wonder who I’m sharing it with.
Author’s notes: 100% organic. May contain minor flaws and imperfections that beta-treated slash wouldn’t.

 

I stare into the mirror, watching my own eyes. When the surgeon offered me a different tint to my eyes, I accepted without thinking. The colour of my eyes would be too easy a give away if someone was to call me out as Rex. But now, the more I stare, the more I wonder if that tint hasn’t affected the way I see the world.

Going to the Racer’s house today tore me apart inside. I did everything I could to hide it, to push it down but now...I’m stating to feel it rip me open.

I haven’t been home in ten years. Everything had changes and yet...nothing had.

The house was still the same – a riot of colour and noise, in harsh contrast to the muted colours of David’s place or the sombre sparseness of my own flat.

Seven years old Spritle answered the door with the same riotousness, all loudness and over the top reactions. He’s my brother and yet I’ve never known him and never will. This is the first time I’ve seen him up close though I’ve often watched the Racers in the grandstand. He reminds me of Speed when he was little – same roundness in the face, same enthusiasm, same love for life and yet he was a stranger to me. I watched him slam the door and run back inside yelling and wondered what his life has been like, growing up as a Racer in the family after Rex’s death.

“This is a bad idea.” I could feel the dread rising in me, facing the ghosts of my past, my own ghost.

“If it was any other driver you’d be here.” David retorts, reminding me this is my job and nothing more. The racers are no longer my family – just another mission, just another recruitment job. Any other family and I’d be here alone but not this time. Inspector Detector is the face for this one, the voice of the mission and I’m glad of it. I don’t know if David knew how close I was to the edge just standing on that doorstep.

Pops was sterner, older and harder but still...Pops. The way he addressed the Inspector, the rush of memories that he held back. In those simple words “ten years” all the pain and weight of losing Rex crowded into and yet there I was, the ghost of Rex Racer, hidden behind a leather mask and a squared jaw. But there was Pops - still the stubborn bastard I’d argued with that night. The man who had told me I was never to come back. And Rex wouldn’t. Rex could never come home.

I let David talk. It’s easier that way. It leaves me free to watch, hiding everything behind the mask. I find it hard not to watch Speed, now grown up. He’s as competent a driver in the league and until now I’d manage to avoid any contact with him behind passing each other in the locker. He’s smart, asking the right questions, always drawing the conversation forward. The way he tilts his head up to me, mentioning that we both failed to make the prix made me feel as if he knew me, better than I’d expected.

My heart leapt as I say the name of my burial ground, the race I chose to let go of Rex during. “Casa Cristo.” Mom’s hand shot out and Pops’ face turned hard, justifying and denying, demanding an answer but my eyes were on Speed. His chest hitched and his eyes fell dropped, not watching his parents. Even as Pops ushered us out, he was still watching, thinking...

Pops may have decided but Speed hasn’t.

Leaning over the bench on the CIB bathroom I stare into those eyes, the wrong colour in the wrong face. This was my family but I broke them. This was my life but I committed suicide. I am Rex but Rex is dead.

“You’re going to hurt yourself doing that.” Minx teases as she lets herself in. I could have sworn I locked that. She spins me around, pushing cowl the rest of the way off. “Stare too long and your eyes will fall out.” She runs her hands over my face, brushing away the tears I hadn’t even noticed. “Tough day at the Racers.”

“Could say that.” I whisper, seeming unable to form a sentence. I gave up my family and yet my family is here. The sister I never had. She looks into my eyes, reading my soul though the false tint before pulling me close, resting my head on her shoulder, her arms looped around my waist.

“It’s one of the messed up thing about our job. We live such complicated lives it’s easy to forget which life we’re living. Go home X,” she whispers in my ear, “go home and remember who you are.”

“Which home? Which me?”

She reaches into my pocket and fished out my keys, sorting though them. “This one.” She says with a smile, holding a key up to my face.

It’s David’s house key.