Peter gave her a smile. "Sorry I couldn't be more help."
Sarah shook her head. "It's not a big deal. Nobody's been able to help, really. I tried hanging around Leech to see if that helped any–"
"Leech?"
"Oh, he's another of the kids! He can make people's powers go away when he's nearby." Sarah chattered. "But all that happened while I was near him was that my bones stopped growing, but it didn't stop hurting."
"I see." Peter sighed. He couldn't help. Stopping further bone growth didn't stop what she did have from hurting. There was nothing he could do for her. He reached down for her for a moment and she flinched slightly, but held her ground. He tapped a fingertip to an unscarred spot on her forehead. "Maybe someday we'll find some help for you." He said gently.
She nodded carefully. "I hope so."
A figure lurched into sight in the doorway. Caliban had changed out of the warmer clothes he'd been wearing the night before and was only wearing the velvet purple suit coat and pants, with no shirt underneath.
He ducked into the area and turned oversized eyes towards the small child. "Sarah? What are you doing here?"
She turned to Caliban and squeaked. "I was just introducing myself to Mr. Dumas!"
Peter chuckled, then muttered. "See, she pronounced it right."
Caliban nodded, as thought he hadn't heard Peter. "Alright, but don't pester him. He's new and I was going to take him around to be introduced to everyone else."
Sarah nodded, then ducked around Caliban's spindly form. "Okay. I'll see you around!" She waved to Peter before stepping out of the area and out of sight.
"She was… nice?" Peter said, his tone intentionally neutral.
Caliban nodded. "She usually follows Calisto around. Caliban guesses she was curious."
"So…" Peter drawled the word out as he tried to find the right words to use. "Are we going to see a lot more like her?"
Caliban's oversized eyes met his. "Oh, yes. Many Morlocks were not fortunate when it came to their powers. Yours doesn't seem to have changed how you look–" He trailed off, seemingly trying to prompt Peter to volunteer more.
He snorted, fighting to keep the memories from rising up. "Believe me, it has its ugly side."
Caliban's mostly cheery disposition cracked for a second as he replied, "Caliban knows about ugly."
Not sure how to respond to that, Peter chose to ignore it. "Is there anything to eat around here?"
Caliban brightened at the prospect of breakfast and he nodded hurriedly. "Yes. They should be serving up breakfast right around now."
He lurched for the door and beckoned Peter to follow.
- - -
The part of the Alley that they had appeared in before was now quite crowded. A line snaked down the length of the Alley towards a set of folding tables that seemed to have food weighing them down. At the tables themselves, there were several people, keeping a close eye on everyone going past to ensure no one got more than their share.
Everyone was dressed in what could be best described as the rags the thriftstores hadn't been able to sell. The close warmth of the Alley also made it so that lighter clothes were fine. Peter almost felt over-dressed in his jeans and t-shirt, layered with a button up shirt and coat combo he had on. The heat didn't bother him any more than the cold did, so he didn't bother taking off any of the layers. He wasn't sure where he could leave them where they wouldn't be stolen and he didn't feel like carrying the clothes around.
He and Caliban waited in line along with the wide array of Morlocks. A lot of them simply looked older or just worn down in some way, but a large number sported some kind of more visible deformity or unusual feature. Ahead of them in the line, were a pair of massive, hulking young men with no shirts on, who had bright green skin and massive blonde sideburns. Further ahead was a skinny, slow moving person with a spikey head and tarry black skin that seemed to have random debris stuck to it. Close to the end of the line a woman who seemed to be a flat, monochrome white except for a rainbow gradient across her hair and face. Here, a child with a noseless, reptilian face. There, a woman wrapped up in gauze bandages covering up weeping sores. Others wore body concealing robes or cloaks that bulged in ways that hinted that the body beneath wasn't entirely human shaped.
On the other end of the spectrum, some were simply dressed oddly rather than sporting any obvious deformations. One man with a white beard, wore a leather skullcap and robe that sported a massively oversized, pointy collar. There were easily a dozen young men and women in punk stylings, right down to massive pompadours and mohawks.
"You are new, so the staring is expected," Caliban had told him quietly. "But do not make a habit of it. Most of us do not like to be reminded of how we look."
Peter flinched reflexively. "Sorry."
Caliban gave him a tight lipped smile. "As Caliban said, it is expected. Others gawk more openly their first time."
Before the awkwardness could get any worse, they reached the food tables and what felt like a wave of faint good cheer seemed to wash over Peter. It almost felt like walking into a sunbeam. A pleasant warmth that scrubbed away harshly at the rough spots of his soul and scoured out any lingering exhaustion and ill-feeling.
Peter glanced over towards Caliban who was also now sporting a wider smile. "Better than coffee sometimes," The pale man said as a completely inadequate explanation.
The person at the first set of tables was a small woman in her late forties. She had a sunny smile that did a great deal to make her plain face far friendlier. She had thick glasses and a bright yellow headscarf, from which wisps of curly, auburn hair that was showing signs of gray peeked out. She wore a brown, ragged and stained apron with a checkered pattern over an old-fashioned green dress that seemed to be in better shape. That feeling of sunlight seemed to be radiating out of her.
In front of her on the table were roughly carved wooden bowls, half-filled with what looked like runny oatmeal. Next to her was a massive steaming pot that the oatmeal came from. The pot reminded Peter of the stainless steel one his uncle used to use to deep fry a turkey with for Thanksgiving.
"Here you go, dear." The woman said, passing one of the bowls to Caliban as he got close to her station.
Caliban smiled at her. "Thank you, Anna Lee."
She returned his smile and reached out to pat his cheek. "You're a good boy, Caliban." Her voice was creaky, but warm. She had an accent that Peter couldn't quite place. It sounded vaguely Queens, vaguely Brooklyn, but with a faint hint of something Slavic. If nothing else, Peter was sure she was a native New Yorker. "And who's this?" She asked, turning her attention to Peter, as she grabbed a new bowl and passed it to him.
"Caliban just brought him in last night." Caliban replied, tone polite and friendly.
"I'm Dumas," Peter said, then after a moment added, "Ma'am."
That earned him an extra sunny smile and that good feeling coming off of her just seemed to intensify. "Oh, you're a good boy as well. You boys enjoy your breakfast."
He felt like he'd just finished all his chores and his aunt was praising him. Like he'd just gotten a full ride scholarship to Harvard.
Like there was still good in the world.
Peter tried to discreetly wipe away the tears that had formed at the corners of his eyes as he followed Caliban to the next table.
Caliban nodded. "She's like that."
"Like what?" Peter growled as he felt the good feelings pass as they moved further away from Anna Lee.
"She makes people feel things. Feel what she's feeling. She's the first person in the line because a lot of us Morlocks need the pick me up in the morning."
"She's always that… cheery?"
Caliban shook his head, his face turning grave. "No. Some days are bad. Bad days, she keeps to the far tunnels, away from everyone so she doesn't make us sad."
The next table was being overseen by a man who had a massively overdeveloped nose and almost no chin. He had a pair of dark sun glasses covering his eyes and loose brown hair peeking out from under the floppy, grimy chef's hat he was wearing. The man seemed to only be wearing a loose poncho and ill-fitting shorts for his under-developed legs. Long feathers grew from his mis-shapen arms. He had a wooden chopping board in front of him and he held a cleaver in overly long, slender fingers, that seemed to be somewhat scaly. Next to him was a large canvas bag that had some sort of round fruit that Peter had never seen before.
There was still half of one of the fruits in front of him that he was in the process of cutting into slices, when Caliban greeted him, "Chicken Wing. Good morning."
Peter had to admit the name fit, if nothing else. The now named Chicken Wing nodded towards Caliban in a jerky, nervous gesture and gestured to the sliced fruit. He eyed Peter for a moment and said in a high, screechy tone. "One slice. Take it."
Caliban took two slices, putting one in his bowl of oatmeal and the other in Peter's.
"Uh, what is this?" Peter asked as they stepped away.
Caliban replied blithely, "Tree-man fruit. It's good. All the nutrients."
"Er… wait, what?"
"Caliban will introduce you to the Tree-man later."
"Sure?"
Further on there was another table with wooden cups and a large water dispenser. "If you're thirsty." Caliban had told Peter.
Peter noticed a small distance behind the tables was Calisto, standing with a few others. She was dressed the same as when he'd seen her last night, possibly with a different shirt, but it was reduced to such a ragged state it was indistinguishable from the one she'd worn the night before. Her arms were crossed as she eyed the distribution of breakfast and made it manifestly clear that any misbehavior would not be tolerated.
Slightly behind her was a man in a sack cloth robe, tied at the waist with a thick hemp rope, looking for all the world like a monk that had lost his way. The robe's hood was up and hid the man's face in deep shadows, but wisps of pale, white hair peeked around the corners of the hood. Peter felt that impression of being considered prey sharpening as he felt the man's eyes sweep over him. He could only vaguely see into the robe, but the man's face did not seem to be quite right. The left half of his face in particular seemed to bulge oddly within the shadows.
Next to her was an immense slab of a man. At least seven feet tall, heavily muscled, bald and with blunt, brutal features. A cruel part of Peter decided that the man would not have looked out of place as the primary actor in a B-rated slasher film. He was dressed in jeans that were too tight for his immense frame, a badly stained T-shirt and what looked like a military surplus fatigue jacket that had the sleeves ripped off. He was wearing what looked like army boots, which, similar to Caliban's, had been polished to a high shine. The other incongruous element to the man's rough hewn appearance was a clearly well-cared for white scarf that had been tied off in a neat overhand knot.
Caliban caught Peter's gaze and said quietly. "The first Morlocks."
"Beg pardon?"
"They are the Morlock founders," Caliban explained, then gave a rueful smile. "Technically Caliban is one of them too, but Caliban is not keen on posturing."
Peter nodded encouragingly, allowing the pale man to keep talking.
"Calisto leads. She lays down the laws and ways that guide us. The big one is Sunder, he helps make sure people behave."
"I can believe it." Peter murmured back. "And what about the one in the robe?"
Caliban's face took on a twist of distaste. "That is Masque, it sounds just like 'mask' but he spells it fancy." He paused as though trying to find the right words before finally shrugging. "He is an asshole."
Peter snorted in amusement at the description. He realized that was possibly the first negative thing he'd heard Caliban say about anyone, which was probably enough to paint this Masque as the blackest of villains and Peter resolved to stay out of his way.
They moved past the press of the crowd, done with retrieving their breakfast as Caliban urged him towards a spot further down the tunnel. The dividers creating homes thinned out in this direction and a mismatched set of makeshift benches, chairs, tables and other furnishings made from bits of old furnishings or repurposed crates and pallets were scattered around the area willy-nilly.
It was a mess, but somehow seemed to come across as homey rather than just dirty. The faint breeze was still present, but now the air carried other scents to it. A sort of floral, citrusy scent that lingered and the persistent earthy smell seemed even more pronounced. The cement underfoot seemed to give way to patches of dirt with grass.
All around, people had taken seats. Some by themselves, others in groups, socializing among themselves. One table had a mound of flesh chanting to itself out of a dozen differently shaped and sized mouths. Here and there, children ran and played, speeding away from where they were eating before looping back to take a few more bites. Peter did notice that not everyone was taking quite a relaxed stance towards eating. A number of the older men and women ate with haste, hunched over their bowls and arms curled protectively around their bowls as though making sure no one could snatch it from them.
Peter had seen people eating like that at the shelters before.
Caliban gestured, pulling Peter's attention away from the other people and towards a table where he put his bowl down.
Caliban took a seat on an overturned crate at the table. Across from it was a semi-reclined lawn chair. Peter shrugged and took that for his own seat.
They tucked into breakfast with Peter slowly drinking the oatmeal down.
It was… fine.
It was a little bland, but Caliban took to it with a relish, taking small, delicate bites from the fruit in between long gulps of the runny oatmeal mush. "It is less watery than usual today!" He praised.