Phantom was sitting in the common room, jaw clenched unnaturally tight, posture too straight, tone too clipped. He'd been watching the older ghouls all week, trying to emulate their authority, their poise, the way they moved through the world like it never shook them.

Phantom had always been the runt. The younger. The weak. Being Topside meant he had a shot at turning that around without anyone really knowing he wasn't what he pretended to be. He could always shrug his first week off as acting weirdly from being Topside for the first time, needing to adjust. But that this was the way he truly was. Maybe they'd believe him. Maybe he'd start believing it himself.

He wanted to be like the others. Solid. Controlled. Worthy. It didn't fit right, but he refused to be anything else. Anything other than young and weak. Because that had been where it had gone wrong in the Pits.