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 “That’s the thing about this city…” I murmured, staring out of the window.

"What's the thing?" Nimah asked, stretching out lazily on the bed. From her reflection in the glass, I could see her puffy eyes and ruffled hair.

I buried my irritation and continued to watch the city's skyline, mesmerised despite myself. "All of us made a promise never to return to this place. But I know the rest of them heard the call." I was smiling before I knew it, excited to cause chaos in the place where it all started.

"What's the call?" Blankets rustled as Nimah climbed off the bed, heading to the bathroom.

Nimah deserved answers by now, and she knew too much already anways. "I told you about our abilities right?"

I heard the tap turn on, and Nimah made a 'hmm' of assent.

"They come from the city, I don't know why. We had no family here, so we drifted all over the world. Now, the city's in quite a bit of trouble, and one of our special alarms went off."

"Like financial trouble?" Nimah asked, emerging from the bathroom, pulling a comb through her short black hair.

It wasn't her fault, I reminded myself, trying to smother my narcissism. It's not like she could read my autobiography or learn about this in school or anything. "Not exactly, more like supernatural trouble. You see, our enemies are circling the city, probably trying to either destroy it or take our powers." A pity for them that the city wouldn't be destroyed.

"Okay," Nimah was rifling through her bag. "Sorry, babe, I promise I'm listening." She smiled at me slyly, looking up. "I bet you can find my phone, can't you?"

Wow, I'm glad to know our relationship has progressed so far. I'm basically my girlfriend's lazy 'find my phone' app. I raised an eyebrow at that, and closed my eyes, letting my 'feelers' as Larry called them, spread throughout the flat. "Kitchen table, next to the pink lamp."

She smiled gratefully and padded away, quieter than the cat.

Speaking of the cat... I glanced under the bedside table, saying "Alright you pervert, how long have you been here?"

Larry opened one amber eye in the darkness and shot out, transforming back into a person. "God I've missed your drama. Brooding over the city, saying nonsense." He stretched, joints popping as his lanky limbs reappeared.

"Do you have any idea how weird it is that you've been here all night?" I asked, ignoring his comment about the drama. Sue me, I have a personality and a sense of importance.

"Was I supposed to go to a homeless shelter?" Larry wiggled his eyebrows amusedly, both of us silently agreeing to avoid discussing the icky matter of my love life. "Not everyone can rent a loft in the city centre."

I snorted, unmoved. "You have more money than all the people in this whole block of flats, combined." In the distance, I heard Nimah answer her phone.

Larry threw himself onto my office chair, turning in a circle before grinning nefariously. "You know, when we were all leaving, you put up a huge act about never wanting to see this city again."

I turned my hands up, confused. "That's the one thing everybody agreed on,"

Larry continued, still smirking. "Now I find out you've invested here the whole time. You've got your aliases on buildings, you know the doorman, the grandfather of the guy who runs the shawarma place." Larry jerked his head towards the kitchen, in Nimah's direction. "And then there's the long time girlfriend, born and bred here. She's very cute, by the way-"

"So?" I decided to interrupt him, narrowing my eyes. Suddenly, I remembered why nobody ever underestimated Laertes. In two days, he'd figured out all of my connections in the city?

"Did you ever actually leave?" Larry asked, tilting his head in mock curiosity. "I bet you were the one who activated our alarm call because you saw the danger. Because you never left this shithole."

I smiled pleasantly, uncrossing my arms to look less defensive. "Larry, I did leave. I travelled the world, I checked out the Louvre. And yeah, six months ago, and before that, I came back. Regularly."

I wondered if he would figure out why, and I wondered if I could convince him to become a cat before killing him. After all, cat bodies were easier to dispose of than human ones.

"Why?" Larry leaned forward, eyes amber again.

Nimah timed her return perfectly, tapping away on her phone. "Sorry, love, I've got to go to work, something weird as all hell-" She stopped and stared at us, blinking when she saw Larry. "Uh, who's this, and when'd they come in?"

I grinned at her cheerfully, glad that she knew enough of the backstory for an introduction.

Larry pushed himself off the chair easily, approaching with an outstretched hand. "I'm her therapist, Larry. It's nice to meet you, I've heard so much about you."

I couldn't believe Larry accused me of drama. He knew that she knew, and yet.

Therapist? Nimah mouthed at me, not fooled. She turned to Larry, eyeing his tank-top and muscles. "Oh, okay, um, how did you get in here?" Nimah smiled at him uncertainly, playing along.

"That's unfortunately covered under therapist-client confidentiality." Larry sighed apologetically, all charm. "What happened at work?"

Nimah sidestepped him and grabbed some clothes. "Some weird explosion, I'm headed there now." She kissed me and slipped into ankle boots. "See you later, have..fun with your therapist." Oh yikes, that was her 'we'll talk about this later' tone.

When she turned I flipped Larry the bird, and he stuck his tongue out at me as I led Nimah out.

"My therapist?" I asked, wandering back into my room.

"You clearly need one," Larry replied, his head buried in a book that used to be on my desk. "You never answered me, why did you stay in the city?"

"Travelling the world is great, but then the world started coming here. I saw what I needed to see. I wanted to make this place better." I shrugged, thinking of other bullshit answers if this one failed.

"And the call. Did that go out because we had a problem, or because you created a problem?" Larry asked, his eyes so focused on one spot in the book that I knew he was acting nonchalant.

Ooh, that was dangerously close to the reason I had brought them back. "Larry, I love you, but there is no way in hell I would call you back anywhere. We have a problem, and we need to work together to fix it. We need this city, remember?" I tried a risky emotional tack: the truth. "I only ever felt at home here, I couldn't leave, and I couldn't let it go. I'm not going to blow this place up."

Staring at my carpet, I tried to force some tears. No dice, my eyes were drier than sandpaper.

Larry's face softened, and I knew he'd bought it. I rose up to stare out of the window, running my eyes over the all too familiar skyscrapers, and the slowly changing sights.

If everything went well, by midnight tonight, our powers wouldn't just be ours anymore. Everyone in the city would be like us, improved.

I had travelled the world looking for people like us, and the ones I found weren't nearly as strong as we were. Then I realized that people in this city had gained something like our powers.

They could just barely read minds, they could just barely do the phenomenal feats a telekinetic could. Something in the water, or the buildings, was leaking out of the power source that gave us abilities.

It made the city great, rich, powerful. A hub for those who thought better and could do better. Since none of us could have children, this was the only family, only kinship we would ever experience.

I loved this city, and I was going to improve it. Our powers could be shared, whether the others wanted it or not.

Larry suddenly laughed, and I turned to look at him, surprised. "You're so weird! I travelled the world and found eighty cities that I fell in love with. The people are better, the food is...out of this world. How can you stick with this?" Larry came up to my side, gesturing to the sights beyond the window. "This city is so...it's just not-"

"You have to look closer sometimes," I told him, dragging my eyes over every inch of the city that I could see. “That’s the thing about this city, people look at it, and never see the full picture, the possibilities. And there may be eighty cities with this or that. But how many of them are home?"

Larry was staring at me, and I think he was realizing there was something more here. "There's no home without family, you know that right?" He said bitterly, eyes more ashen than usual. "We can go anywhere, we don't belong. You're kidding yourself if you don't get that."

No home without family? My lips curled into a smile. "I understand that."

Together we took in what the city was, but only one of us understood what it could be.