Liz Sherman (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
walking_napalm) wrote2009-02-27 02:39 am
walking_napalm) wrote2009-02-27 02:39 am
Braddock Town, Pennsylvania -- 2002
Ice creeps up the steel girders, crackling as it goes; the sense of dread, of oncoming unidentifiable bad, strengthens in the dark.
"Readings just went off the charts," says Agent Quay, and the handheld machine is beeping, insistent and too shrill.
From behind: a terrible scream. Liz whirls and finds an agent caught in the beam of her flashlight, his eyes rolling back in his head, his tongue hanging out, and his back wrenching into an angle not meant for the human spine. Something moves away from his head, rippling in the air; it might be mistaken for a cloud of frozen breath, if it weren't for the purposeful way that it moves, the sweeping turn that it takes against the lack of wind.
And then there are dozens of the misty entities, sweeping through the abandoned foundry, and more agents shrieking, and Liz doesn't have to watch; she just knows that a vengeful spirit dives and disappears into Quay's chest. His neck snaps with a sharp c-r-r-r-ack under the force of his convulsion.
The foundry fires light, suddenly illuminating decades of rust and neglect and abandoned machinery, and Liz feels her bones ignite in response; the telltale prickling up her spine. Her eyes flash blue-white, and every spirit in the foundry freezes at once, leaving several agents frantically batting at nothing over their heads -- and then the three men disappear, fading into the dark.
Agent Quay steps up, his neck hanging at a sickening angle, and his face -- Liz thinks, dimly -- isn't the face it ought to be. It's the face of a dark-haired stranger. His lips peel back from his teeth in an expression that has little in common with a smile, and Liz shudders blue flame.
Get out, she needs to say; she needs to warn the un-possessed agents. Get out of here before I-- but her throat isn't obeying and her mouth won't move, and that will, she knows, make this her fault.
Liz blinks and she stands in the eye of the storm, the spirits swirling around her in an ever-tightening cyclone. A voice bellows, searching for her, and she tries to shout that she is here, but she hears nothing beyond the roar of the cyclone and the overwhelming, overlapping pulse of disembodied voices in a dead language.
She cannot find her gun or her voice, and as the sick fear in the pit of her stomach ratchets up, so does the roaring inferno surrounding her, nearly eclipsing the howling spirits. The world shifts and before she can think that she ought to have more time than that -- a white misty blur of movement, all at once, and then something foreign (hundreds of foreign somethings all as one) dives into her.
Liz's head snaps back against her will. She does not recognize her own voice in the high, desperate sound that tears her throat; her flames WHUMP in desperation and explode (not quite an explosion, not yet) higher than she's seen them in years, and she can no longer fight it back, not with -- what had the professor called them -- demonic entities burrowing as deep as they can go, twisting and wiggling, clawing their way into every inch of her. They're cold, so cold, and she instinctively knows from the over-spilling cacophony of voices and hunger that they are seeking warmth, that they're reaching for the very heart of her fire.
Someone says her name and she hardly knows if she's sitting or standing or breathing but she thinks she may be screaming and she knows that she is choking, and as she sees the face of the man who isn't Agent Quay once again with that same rictus smile, she feels herself turn into uncontrollable fire and she knows what she is about to do.
"Readings just went off the charts," says Agent Quay, and the handheld machine is beeping, insistent and too shrill.
From behind: a terrible scream. Liz whirls and finds an agent caught in the beam of her flashlight, his eyes rolling back in his head, his tongue hanging out, and his back wrenching into an angle not meant for the human spine. Something moves away from his head, rippling in the air; it might be mistaken for a cloud of frozen breath, if it weren't for the purposeful way that it moves, the sweeping turn that it takes against the lack of wind.
And then there are dozens of the misty entities, sweeping through the abandoned foundry, and more agents shrieking, and Liz doesn't have to watch; she just knows that a vengeful spirit dives and disappears into Quay's chest. His neck snaps with a sharp c-r-r-r-ack under the force of his convulsion.
The foundry fires light, suddenly illuminating decades of rust and neglect and abandoned machinery, and Liz feels her bones ignite in response; the telltale prickling up her spine. Her eyes flash blue-white, and every spirit in the foundry freezes at once, leaving several agents frantically batting at nothing over their heads -- and then the three men disappear, fading into the dark.
Agent Quay steps up, his neck hanging at a sickening angle, and his face -- Liz thinks, dimly -- isn't the face it ought to be. It's the face of a dark-haired stranger. His lips peel back from his teeth in an expression that has little in common with a smile, and Liz shudders blue flame.
Get out, she needs to say; she needs to warn the un-possessed agents. Get out of here before I-- but her throat isn't obeying and her mouth won't move, and that will, she knows, make this her fault.
Liz blinks and she stands in the eye of the storm, the spirits swirling around her in an ever-tightening cyclone. A voice bellows, searching for her, and she tries to shout that she is here, but she hears nothing beyond the roar of the cyclone and the overwhelming, overlapping pulse of disembodied voices in a dead language.
She cannot find her gun or her voice, and as the sick fear in the pit of her stomach ratchets up, so does the roaring inferno surrounding her, nearly eclipsing the howling spirits. The world shifts and before she can think that she ought to have more time than that -- a white misty blur of movement, all at once, and then something foreign (hundreds of foreign somethings all as one) dives into her.
Liz's head snaps back against her will. She does not recognize her own voice in the high, desperate sound that tears her throat; her flames WHUMP in desperation and explode (not quite an explosion, not yet) higher than she's seen them in years, and she can no longer fight it back, not with -- what had the professor called them -- demonic entities burrowing as deep as they can go, twisting and wiggling, clawing their way into every inch of her. They're cold, so cold, and she instinctively knows from the over-spilling cacophony of voices and hunger that they are seeking warmth, that they're reaching for the very heart of her fire.
Someone says her name and she hardly knows if she's sitting or standing or breathing but she thinks she may be screaming and she knows that she is choking, and as she sees the face of the man who isn't Agent Quay once again with that same rictus smile, she feels herself turn into uncontrollable fire and she knows what she is about to do.
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Disoriented he looks around and the glow of blue flames to his side draws his attention.
"Liz? Hey, Liz." His tongue is sluggish as he tries to wake up and he looks down at her, tired but concerned.
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The bedding was designed to withstand extreme temperatures, but only so far; the pillow is beginning to singe under Liz's hair.
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He sits up and shakes the last traces of sleep quickly.
"Liz, c'mon, wake up!"
Reaching out he grips her shoulder, giving it a shake.
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The fire is hers; she works with the fire rather than against it, it won't burn anything that she doesn't want it to tonight--
That's what she silently tells herself, anyway, over and over again.
The most obvious immediate effect comes on the flames themselves, which gutter low against her skin, flickering far more slowly than the hungry roar they had been crescendoing into. The blue light lowers, her hands shaking on her knees.
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As the flames begin to die he speaks, voice soft and worried.
"You all right?"
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After a second -- waiting, to make sure -- she bobs her head. Another second, and she opens her eyes (still blue, but less wild), turns around, and hides her face in his chest, fisting her hands, still shaky with exertion, in the back of his shirt.
"I really thought I got over this," she says, muffled. The occasional flicker of troubled blue flame runs up her spine or weaves through her hair.
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"Hey, it's okay."
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Behind him, she lets go only long enough to shake out one hand, then the other, using the sharp movement to extinguish the flames that had still been burning across her palms.
Liz says, "Sorry" into his chest.
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"It's okay," He repeats. She doesn't need to apologize to him, not for this.
As the flames die out the darkness creeps in around them and he holds onto her, for as long as she needs him to.
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(For a split second, the red light reminds her of a foundry basement lit by red flame, of the flashing lights of fire trucks and ambulances that came afterward, and her fingers momentarily tighten in his shirt then relax.)
"Go back to sleep," she says, drawing back with her hands on his shoulders, and she squeezes reassuringly. "I was gonna get up soon, anyway."
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"You sure?"
He can't see the clock, but he's certain it's still very early.
"I'll get up with you."
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Nodding once he unwraps his arms from around her.
"All right. You need me... " She'll know where to find him.
Reaching his hand up he gently grazes her cheek, then leans in to give her a light kiss before shifting and laying back on the mattress.
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She untangles herself from the blankets, slides out of bed, and pads across the room on near-silent bare feet. Bowl, spoon, and box of Cheerios are acquired with the ease of somebody who does this most mornings, and it's nice because it's routine. It's habit. She doesn't have to think about it; she can just do it. She'll brew some coffee while she eats, then she'll do some meditation exercises and then -- she pauses with her hand on the cereal box, her mouth lowering, at the thought of purposely calling her fire to hand with Zuko at Milliways today.
But she needs the training, she reminds herself, stepping over to the refrigerator, she needs to keep learning, and she can't do that by herself. Obviously, she finishes bitterly, thinking of her singed pillow, and of how much worse it could have been if Red hadn't woken her up.
Liz looks into the fridge -- and looks, and looks. On third glance, the only carton of milk is still empty. Somebody put it back in the fridge, empty.
Liz huffs a breath through her teeth.
Five minutes later, still putting an arm through the sleeve of her sweater, Liz slips through the closet door.