The Shadow of Death - Modern Brumaria - New Year’s Eve
This is apparently the month for me to throw together short pieces last minute on holidays. Bruno belongs to Izzy (painful-pooch) and is used with permission!
Kamaria shifts her position against the wall of the closet, pulling up her knees so that she can prop Bruno’s phone against them. Her eyes flick quickly over to his face. He’s still focused on the colorful lights and cheering people playing across the screen, good. There are lines of tension in his face, but overall he seems okay at the moment.
They’ve been sitting here ever since it started to get dark outside. Normally Kamaria isn’t keen on spending much time in closets, but with the light filtering down on them through their clothes and with Bruno sitting here with her, their hands entwined between them, it’s not so bad. Besides, even if it was bothering her, it would still be worth it. For him.
A countdown starts up on the screen, and Kamaria manages to find the button to turn the volume up a little louder, though not so loud that his noise-cancelling headphones will cut it out.
Five, four, three, two, one…
The mirror-covered ball ends its slow descent, and there’s an explosion of confetti across the tiny screen. At the same time, the loud pops from outside go from occasional bursts to a giant cacophony of sound. Bruno’s hand tightens around hers.
When she turns to look at him, worried, he stretches his mouth into a thin smile and leans down, pressing his lips gently against hers. She can hear the shakiness of his breaths as they kiss.
“Happy New Year, Kamaria,” he whispers once they break apart.
“Happy New Year, Bruno.” Laying the phone in his lap, she drops her head onto his shoulder and wraps her arm around him, careful to avoid his chest. He’s trembling slightly beneath her touch, and when he returns the gesture he clings to her as if she’s the one thing keeping him anchored to this closet floor.
Even so, he hums a soft, cracking rendition of the song that’s playing over the phone’s speakers, as the explosions continue all over the city. Kamaria squeezes her eyes shut, and hopes for his sake that they won’t last much longer.
Contains: dude whump, lady whump, superheroes and supervillains, burns, out of control superpowers, found family
It’s a really crappy day to be in a fight. Nari woke up this morning feeling awful, temples throbbing and throat scratchy, obviously trying to come down with something. She needs to be at home drinking Baesuk tea, not on some abandoned street battling Dagger and his cronies.
But here she is. Ah, the life of a superhero - everyone else’s safety has to come before a little thing like a cold.
Even if she is a little bit concerned about how well her body is faring, especially the longer the fight goes on. Her power feels harder to access, somehow. It’s not as precise when she uses it, either, the shards of metal she keeps in a bag over her shoulder not quite hitting their exact marks when she sends them flying toward her targets. She’s sluggish, unfocused. Worried that she’ll slip up and get someone hurt, she informs the team through the comms that she’s pulling back to fight on the outskirts.
And that’s all fine and dandy. She can’t actually help with Dagger himself from back here, but the team has fought him so many times by now, they’ve got it handled. Meltdown does follow her, probably seeing her change in position as suspicious. With more space to work, she at least doesn’t have to worry about accidentally hitting one of her teammates with a stray shard. She and Meltdown can just throw metal and fire back and forth at each other, no problem.
But everything goes wrong just a few minutes later. A stomach-churning scream bursts through the comm in her ear and echoes down the street at the same time, followed by a clamor of shouts that she can barely understand. Nari’s eyes go wide and her focus is torn from Meltdown to search for each of her teammates. That was Jamil, wasn’t it? He had several clones of himself running around a minute ago, but now they’re all gone.
“Phantom?” she calls frantically. “Where’s Phantom, who has eyes on - agh!”
She’s interrupted by a searing pain in her arm. In her worry over Jamil, she’d momentarily forgotten about Meltdown, and he’d taken advantage of her distraction to shoot a stream of flame at her - thankfully her costume is flame-retardant, but she definitely felt the heat through it.
“Fantasia, are you okay?” Quinn’s voice crackles in her ear.
She stumbles toward the fight, trying to get away from Meltdown, eyes still frantically trying to find Jamil through the chaos. “I’m fine, where’s Phantom?”
“Can’t get to him,” he pants. And yeah, he’s being pinned down by Dagger’s rapid fire of magic right now. Alex isn’t in much better shape, fighting off Reaper.
Meltdown is shouting something and throwing more flames at her, but Nari pays him no attention, taking off at a run back into the fray. Panic crawls up her throat, choking her. Why isn’t Jamil answering? If he was okay, he’d have said something by now, but he hasn’t, so he’s not, and why can’t she find him?
Finally, dodging past the other fighters, she spots him, but there’s no relief there. He’s crumpled on the ground, not moving.
“J-...Phantom!” Her earlier exhaustion is forgotten, feet pounding against the pavement as she rushes to his side and drops to her knees. She scans his body with bated breath. “Phantom, talk to me, what happened?”
With a groan, he opens hazy, pain-filled eyes to squint up at her. “Dagger,” he coughs out. “Energy beam. Through…two clones. And me.” Shakily, he lifts his hand, revealing a grisly burn all the way through his clothes and deep into his side underneath.
Nari sucks in a trembling breath. That looks bad, and if Dagger hit two clones, too, that means Jamil felt triple the pain when it hit. He’s usually careful about keeping his replicas hidden or out of the way so things like this don’t happen, but sometimes the villains get in a lucky shot.
“Okay. It’s okay, we’re gonna get you through this, it’s okay.” Her heart is pounding, magic stirring within her with a need to do something. There’s nothing she can do, though. She can’t pick him up , and even if she could, there isn’t a safe route out of here. Quinn and Alex can’t help until they take care of the three villains, which is going to be much more difficult with only two of them.
But Jamil needs medical care now. If only Liliana was here to heal him. They don’t bring her out to fights, though, she has no way to defend herself. Nari’s metal manipulation is completely useless for injuries, and she has no first aid supplies on her, so all she can do is sit there by him and murmur pointless reassurances while he curls further in on himself and moans in pain.
Suddenly a shower of energy bullets sprays the ground inches away from them. Nari throws her body over Jamil’s as a shield. “Pull him back!” she screams into the comm, even though logically she knows that Quinn’s doing the best he can. Her fear for Jamil and the headache that just keeps intensifying are drowning out all other thoughts, though.
Her power, already unstable today, keeps trying to take on a life of its own, responding to her emotions by rising up and reaching out. It’s a problem she hasn’t struggled with in years, not since it was first activated as a teenager. She barely notices it, though, until things around her start reacting.
The shards in her bag, hanging at her hip, are first. They rattle against each other, then begin to lift up into the air. Nari can feel their pull. Still distracted by Jamil’s pain, she yanks the strap over her head and tosses the whole bag away from her, never taking her eyes off of him.
But the pull doesn’t stop. In fact, it’s stronger now, coming from all directions. Everything metal in the vicinity is responding to her - the nearby street sign bending toward her, the grates in the storm drains vibrating, even the metal roofing on the next building beginning to groan.
She does her best to ignore it all, despite the growing awareness of each and every nail and screw around her. Dagger is still too close. She has to protect Jamil, she can’t let him get hurt any more than he already has.
A metal shard from the bag finally breaks free and comes flying, sharp point embedding itself in her arm. With a cry of surprise and pain, she jerks it out and throws it. Blood wells up in the puncture it left behind.
Not only can she not help Jamil, now she’s a danger to him, herself. What if that had hit him? What if more pieces come? She knows she needs to breathe, to calm herself down, but she can’t. Her lack of control over her own power just adds to her panic.
“Nar.”
Her black eyes meet his. His voice is so quiet, there’s no need to worry about him using her real name, not that she would have reprimanded him at this point, anyway.
“It’s okay. I’m…gonna be okay. You’ve gotta…stop worrying…so much.”
“Can’t,” she chokes out. “You’re the baby. ‘Course I’m gonna worry about you.”
He breathes a laugh, face immediately screwing up in pain. “‘m not…the baby anymore. Lili took…that spot.”
Her heart skips a beat at seeing him suffer, and the pull of her power grows stronger in that moment. The bag of shards scoots a few inches across the pavement in their direction, the street sign leaning over farther.
“Hey,” he breathes. “It’s okay.”
She sucks air in through her nose. “You’re still a baby, even if you’re not the baby. It’s my job to worry about you.”
“Okay, Mom,” he jokes weakly. “But maybe…don’t tear the street apart? While you…do it?”
A response is on the tip of her tongue, but she never gets it out. One of Dagger’s energy beams carves into the pavement far too close to their heads for comfort, leaving a steaming, melted rivet behind. Yelping, Nari curls even further across Jamil.
“It’s okay…I’m okay…we’re okay…” he keeps repeating in her ear.
She’s supposed to be the one comforting him, not the other way around. But she can’t even protect him like she should. Energy pulses continue to rain down around them, and she can feel him trembling beneath her…or is that her trembling? It’s impossible to tell as her power grows to a crescendo inside of her.
The metal shards burst to life again. Two more hit her in the leg, while the others scatter across the ground around them. At the same time, there’s a loud clatter as a storm drain grate loosens, and the street sign finally uproots itself from the ground and goes flying through the air.
Nari gasps, head swiveling to follow its path. It narrowly misses Alex and Reaper, sending her heart up into her throat.
In the next moment, though, Alex stoops down and picks it up by the pole, spinning around and slamming the sign into Reaper’s head. The villain crumples immediately. Alex twists the other way, and Meltdown gets a street sign right in the chest, knocking him over backwards.
Hope blossoms in Nari’s chest. They just have to take down Dagger, and it will be over. They’ll be able to get Jamil home and heal him.
With that peek at the light at the end of the tunnel, she reins in her power and forces it to work for her. Stretching out her hand, she directs the storm drain grate to lift off the ground and flings it toward Dagger as hard as she possibly can. For a moment, she’s afraid she might hit Quinn, instead. But the heavy metal piece strikes Dagger in the helmet, disorienting him enough that Quinn’s able to send him to the ground with a strong blast of lightning.
Meanwhile, Alex races to Nari’s side, anxiously glancing back over his shoulder at the three villains. “I’ve got him, let’s get out of here.”
“Careful!” she cautions, motioning to Jamil’s wound as she backs off to let Alex pick him up. She’s never been more grateful for his strength than at that moment. “Eagle, we’re making a retreat!”
“Yeah, go! I’m right behind you!” Quinn calls back through the comms. As they start to run, he flies to catch up with them, landing at Nari’s heels and falling into step with her.
“You okay?”
She nods, eyes still trained on Jamil curled up in Alex’s arms. Her head and throat still hurt, she’s completely exhausted, and the cuts from her shards sting. But Jamil’s going to be okay, that’s all that matters.
This is the next chapter of Querencia, following Whumptober Day 1!
Taglist: @darthsutrich , @inky-whump , @painful-pooch , @pigeonwhumps (thank you for beta reading!), @bookworm2107
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No. 14: “Feed me poison, fill me ‘till I drown.” | Water Inhalation
Contains: dude whump, electrocution, water whump, Deaf whumpee, captivity, restraints, revenge, death mention, noncon drugging, needles, superpowers
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Quinn jolts awake in an unfamiliar room, still half-expecting to be in charge of steering an out-of-control vehicle. Instead, he finds himself in what looks like a warehouse, but definitely not the one they converted into their home. This one is dingy and in sore need of a good cleaning. The events of the evening come back to him in flashes - the park, the drive home…the spike strips in the road and his inability to avoid them or prevent the crash afterward.
This was planned, whatever it is. And now he’s alone, without his team, and he can only hope they’re all alright.
He doesn’t remain alone for long. The trio that enters the room looks vaguely familiar, but with his head still swirling from unconsciousness he can’t quite place them. Besides, his thoughts are more caught on the fact that none of them are wearing masks or anything else to conceal their identities. Kidnappers without masks generally don’t plan to allow their victims to leave alive.
“The great Electric Eagle himself,” the woman begins, strolling closer. “Right here in our grasp, isn’t it exciting, boys?”
The bigger man circles him where he sits. “Somehow he doesn’t seem quite as intimidating without the whole superhero getup.”
“That could also have to do with the handcuffs,” the second man laughs.
“True!”
“Where is the rest of my team?” Quinn asks, careful to keep his expression and voice steady. They normally wouldn’t seem very intimidating, but they’ve already proven themselves rather capable of causing trouble. At the moment, though, any fear in him is for his team, not himself.
“Oh, he’s British! Did you know he was British?” The woman puts a hand to her heart, looking at the other two. They shrug, unimpressed. “I do love me a British accent. But sorry to tell you, honey, it isn’t going to keep me from making you pay.”
“And…what, exactly, is it that I’m paying for?” He knows these three from somewhere, it’s driving him mad that he can’t place where.
“He doesn’t remember.” The bigger man crouches down and grabs a fistful of Quinn’s shirt, yanking him in close to his face. “What, we weren’t important enough for you to think about, once you’d ruined our lives and moved on with yours?”
“You got us arrested, that’s what. None of us even had records until you and your cutesy little team of superheroes came along and ruined it all. We lost all the money we’d gotten, lost our jobs, can’t get hired anywhere else, Greg’s wife left him…”
Oh. Now he remembers them. Criminals, of course, as he’d assumed, but more specifically a gang of three bank robbers that they’d worked together to stop. Which means that it shouldn’t be just him that they have a complaint against.
“Where…is…my team?”
The bigger man, Tommy Lewis, shoves him backwards so that he sprawls on the floor, hands trapped behind his back. “They’ll get their turns! But you’re the leader, so you get first go at paying up, how does that sound?”
He has no idea what they have in mind, but no doubt that it will be unpleasant. Maybe by the time they’re done with him, the others will have come up with some kind of escape plan and will be able to avoid having to go through whatever it is, themselves. If anyone is going to get hurt here, it should be him.
Greg Sanders, the other man, comes closer, and Quinn’s eyes immediately go to a syringe in his hand. “What’s that, then?”
“Sheila may have lost her job at the lab, but she didn’t lose all of the formulas she was working on in her spare time.” He smirks, waving the syringe a bit. “You all will get to try out a couple of different specialties of hers while you’re here!”
He comes at him with the syringe, and Quinn kicks out with his restrained feet, trying to knock it from his hands. If it’s just something she’s been working on at home, there’s probably a limited supply. He doesn’t know what could possibly be in it, but being poisoned isn’t high on his list of fun activities for himself or his team.
Greg dodges the kick, and before Quinn can try to roll further out of the way Tommy is on top of him, sitting on his legs and pinning his upper half to the floor. With his hands beneath him he can’t summon any lightning, and the man is too heavy to fight off without leverage. The needle sinks into his arm.
The three criminals step back and stare at him as he scrambles to at least sit upright. He takes it that something visible is supposed to happen, then. His heart is pounding in anticipation, waiting to start feeling excruciating pain or to grow an extra limb or whatever horrible, drastic thing they have planned.
Then lightning crackles in his palm, without his permission.
“Aha!” Sheila screeches. “It’s starting to work!”
Quinn swallows hard. If this is something that affects his powers, it could be much worse than he’d feared. As if in response to his thoughts, another bolt arcs from one hand to the other. The trio starts donning long rubber gloves.
“If my powers go out of control, you’re going to need a lot more than rubber gloves and soles to keep you safe.” He’s imagining the whole room filling with streaks of lightning, taking out the lights and the people and charring the walls and floor.
Meanwhile, electricity snakes up to his wrist and hits the handcuffs, and for the first time since he was just learning to use his power, Quinn actually feels the effects of it himself. He jolts and grunts in utter surprise as it buzzes through his skin. There’s a reason why he and Nari have to be careful to keep their abilities separate. Metal and electricity do not mix well.
Greg smirks. “We’re not really worried about it.”
Distracted by getting shocked, he doesn’t notice the hose in Sheila’s hand until a blast of cold water hits him in the chest. “Let’s speed this up a little bit, shall we?”
“This is a bad ide-” He gets a faceful of water before he can finish the sentence, leaving him sputtering.
“Oh, I think it’s the best idea we’ve had in a while! This is going to be fun.”
He tries to scoot himself backwards, away from the persistent stream of icy water, but they just follow, laughing at him, soaking his whole front. They haven’t managed to get his hearing aids yet, thankfully, but he imagines at this point it’s only a matter of time.
He’s trying to come up with some other way to dissuade them or a way out of this situation when his power activates again. This time it crawls all the way up his arm, hitting both metal and sopping wet fabric. From there it takes on a life of its own. Quinn’s body jerks backwards, his head slamming into the concrete block wall he’d moved up against, before uncontrollable shaking sends him to the floor. Everything burns like there’s fire inside his veins. He’s fairly certain he screams at some point, without meaning to. He knows for sure he bit his tongue, because his mouth is full of the bitter taste of blood when he can finally breathe and see straight again.
The trio is laughing at him some more. He can see that, though he can’t hear it, which means his hearing aids are fried. Fantastic. At least he doesn’t have to listen to their annoying voices anymore.
Before he’s fully caught his breath, it’s happening again. And again. And again. It seems to be getting worse the longer the drug is in his system, and of course the more they soak him down with the hose. Sometimes he screams, sometimes it gets trapped somewhere inside and feels like it’s ripping through his throat. He doesn’t bother trying to pick himself up after each round. He’s too exhausted, and everything hurts.
After a while, they must get bored with that method, because Tommy comes over and yanks him up off the ground with gloved hands. He’s saying something… “new game,” Quinn’s pretty sure is in there somewhere, but his lips are a bit of a blur.
He can’t walk, not with his ankles chained together, so he gets dragged across the room and deposited on his knees…in front of a bucket full of water. He can already see where this is going without needing to hear whatever taunting they’re doing.
Sure enough, a hand grabs onto his curls and shoves his head down into the water. Instinctively, he pushes against it, struggling to get up while holding onto what air he was able to gulp in.
He can’t let them kill him. The team needs him, he has to help them get out of here. They can’t go through this. Just the thought of it makes him sick to his stomach.
His head feels like it’s going to explode. A burst of bubbles escape his lips, relieving a little of the pressure, but now his lungs are aching instead. He needs to breathe, he needs to breathe…
He’s jerked up out of the water by his hair. Rivulets run down his face, over his eyes and into his open mouth as he gasps loudly for precious air. Greg and Sheila are across from him, big grins on their faces.
One last gasp - not nearly enough - and he’s back down again. This time, though, his power comes to life, shooting up through his body with a force that makes his back arch. His lungs spasm involuntarily, and then he’s choking, coughing, taking in more water, until mercifully the bucket tips over with his erratic movements and he hits the floor, water spilling across him as he continues to shake and cough.
He can see open air but he can’t breathe. Water rattles in his throat and chest. The lightning stops, but he still kicks and squirms, trying desperately to draw something in or expel something out, anything.
Someone flips him over onto his side and kicks him hard in the back, and he’s finally able to spew out the last of the water, coughing until his ribs ache and his throat is on fire.
He’s not even aware of anyone that’s around him until another needle pricks his arm. No, please, no more… They’re talking amongst themselves or maybe even to him, but he doesn’t know what their plans are anymore. If his power goes even more haywire, though, he’s not going to survive it. They’re going to kill him.
Minutes pass, though, and the only lightning that happens is small, more like the first few times. Enough to make him jolt, but not writhe. It seems to be calming down, much to his immense relief.
His ankles are released and someone pulls him to his feet. His legs feel leaden, but he stumbles along beside them as they lead him out the door and down a hall, eventually unlocking another door and shoving him inside.
Immediately he drops to sit on the ground, no strength left. It’s only then that he sees Liliana sitting there, staring at him wide-eyed and fearful. He forces himself to turn, and there are the others, too. Safe.
Everyone’s lips are moving, probably asking a million questions, but he’s too tired to try and comprehend. He just shakes his head. “Aids got fried.” He hates talking out loud when he doesn’t have them in, but signing isn’t exactly an option when his hands are still cuffed and Liliana still doesn’t know much sign, anyway.
Nari’s face is etched with concern, her eyes darting to his ears, then across his soaking wet body once more. “What did they do to you?” Her mouth moves, but she also signs it as best she can with one wrist cuffed to the wall. “We were so worried!”
Quinn’s eyes drift shut, and he shakes his head again. “I don’t…want to talk about it. Not yet.” He'll have to, eventually. He has to prepare them for what they might face.
They have to figure out a way out of here before that happens.
Consider this piece a sneak peek of what I hope is to come in the future of one of my series. If you pay close attention, you should be able to figure out which series!
If you haven't met Siren before (I've only ever written one other piece for her on tumblr), she started out as a rp character and now has a special cinnamon roll place in my heart. I’ve written a bit of intro for her at the link below that tells some of her backstory if you’re interested. She has a very simplistic view of a very narrow corner of the world, which I tried to convey in the way I wrote this.
Siren's Introduction
No. 8: “I’ve got soul, but I’m not a soldier.” | Outnumbered
Contains: lady whump, dude whump, conditioned whumpee, muzzle, superpowers, dehumanization (not pet whump), living weapon, stabbing, implied corporal punishment, sensory overload
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They’re giving her another chance. Siren’s first mission was…a disaster, she thinks is a good word for it. That’s a word her trainers use sometimes when she does really, really, bad, and that’s what happened on her first mission. Going outside for the first time was nothing like she expected it to be. Everything was too bright, too colorful, too loud, too warm, and there were smells and there was air moving against her face and…she got out of the van and froze. She knew what she was supposed to be doing, but she couldn’t make her heart slow down and her breathing go back to normal. All she could do was stand there squeezing her eyes shut and covering her ears with her hands, even though she knew how bad she was being.
After her correction, the trainers had started sending her outside for training. She had to get used to what it was like out there so she could be the good weapon she was supposed to be. And it’s been working! The moving air doesn’t distract her anymore, her eyes have gotten more used to the bright sun, and her ears aren’t so hurt by the loud noises that they play for her. She’s still amazed by how blue the sky is up above her, but she knows she can’t stand and look at it no matter how pretty it is. That gets her corrected.
So now they’re giving her a second chance, and just in case her training isn’t enough, they’re giving her some special tools, too. She gets small soft pieces to go in her ears that make everyone sound much quieter than usual, and the mask that she wears over her eyes for missions has what they call ‘lenses’ now that make everything darker.
She’s very nervous to try this again, but she has to do it right this time. Her handlers are expecting her to be a good weapon, and she knows she can be. She wants to be, so badly.
The van is just as strange the second time around. She’s put into the back with one handler and they’re left shut in the darkness. It rumbles and bumps underneath them for a while as the handler goes over her mission again, then the doors open and they’re suddenly in a different place than before.
And past those doors…is the outside. The real outside, not just the training yard. The bright, colorful, loud place with all the people and vans and tall, tall buildings.
She can do this, though. She’ll be a good weapon, she’ll complete her mission and make her handlers proud of her. Maybe she’ll do good enough that they’ll even say, “Well done.” She loves it when they say that.
The handler in the van removes her muzzle and points her in the right direction. She immediately walks forward, past the dark walls and the big metal boxes that smell funny into the open, bright area where all the vans are going by. That’s where she’s supposed to be. There’s still so much to look at and take in, but with her new tools it doesn’t make her want to shut her eyes and curl up small. And she’s not allowed to just stand here and look at it, as much as she’d like that, so she starts thinking about the next step of her mission.
She’s supposed to use her power on the people walking by. They’re not going to fight her, she doesn’t think, which is strange because that’s when she usually uses her power. But it doesn’t have to make sense to her. She only has to obey.
Siren looks around to make sure there are people nearby, then opens her mouth and screams.
Immediately, people are running and shouting and grabbing their heads. She doesn’t know what her power feels like. She’s never felt it herself. But she knows it hurts people, and that gives her a feeling in her stomach that she doesn’t like at all. She never wanted to hurt people. There was a reason that she was locked up and muzzled, and it was because her power was so horrible. She was a monster.
But her new handlers told her that she could be a weapon, instead. She still didn’t want to hurt people, but she got more used to it the more they trained her. And it doesn’t matter what she wants, anyway. Weapons aren’t allowed to want. She’s just happy that she’s not a monster anymore, even if she does have to hurt people.
So she screams again, ignoring the feeling in her stomach and trying not to watch the man who’s collapsing nearby and the woman who’s crying. This is the first part of her mission, and she’ll keep doing it until the second part happens.
It doesn’t take too long, which is good because her throat gets tired after too many screams and most of the people have run away, anyway. She can tell when her real targets arrive because they’re the only ones running toward her. There are two of them, both wearing masks like her. She’s fought two people at once before, this is okay. She can do this.
The boy immediately goes to the man who’s still lying on the ground, checking on him and calling a couple of others to help him get away. The one wearing a hood faces Siren, arms crossed.
“So. New girl in town, huh? Any particular reason you’re out here causing trouble?”
She almost answers her. All questions must be answered truthfully and immediately. It’s been ingrained into her, so much that not answering right away is making her dig her fingernails into her palms, entire body tense. But she knows that that only applies to handlers and trainers. She’s not supposed to speak to her targets at all.
Instead, she screams again.
The girl doubles over, hands on her ears. “Ah, crap!” Straightening, she sticks one finger in her ear and jiggles it around. “That smarts.”
“Yeah, if you could not do that again, that would be great,” the boy groans from the side. “Note to self: store earplugs somewhere in this outfit.”
They’re…strange. But she’s not here to try and figure them out, she’s here to fight. Siren screams once more, and this time she darts forward when the girl reacts and starts kicking and punching. The first couple of swings land before she starts blocking. Siren quickly learns that the girl’s really good at fighting. As good as her trainers. But that’s alright, she’s used to fighting her trainers, and she still has her power she can use. She doesn’t scream again, wanting to save her voice for when she really needs it, but gives little vocal noises with each punch or block. She can see the way it affects her immediately when she winces and almost misses blocking her.
“Would you stop that?” The girl is late again and takes a punch to the shoulder. “Of course you won’t, you’re a villain. Gotta make our lives difficult.”
Villain? She doesn’t know that word. She’s a weapon, not whatever a villain is.
With another grunt, she manages to punch the girl target across the face, sending her stumbling backwards a couple of steps. Before she can follow through, though, the boy target suddenly appears in front of her. One second he’s not there, the next he is, and Siren nearly falls over as her momentum is interrupted. How did he do that? She’s never seen anyone do that before, not even her trainers!
It doesn’t matter, though, she can’t get distracted. He’s not nearly as good of a fighter as the girl, which means he isn’t as good as Siren, either. She can take him down fairly easily, even without her voice, except that the girl is still around. She’s not joining back in, like she expected her to, which would make her job much harder but still not impossible. Instead, glances over in her direction in between strikes seem to show her…pulling something out of a bag? Maybe it’s a weapon. She can’t tell yet. She really, really hopes it’s not a gun. She hates guns.
The boy is practically running away from her, doing what fighting he can but mostly trying not to get hit. Every once in a while, he disappears and reappears a few feet away, making her change directions.
When she raises her hand for another punch, a sharp pain slices across her knuckles. She still swings, but glances at the hand after. A small stream of blood is running down her fingers. Where did that come from?
Another pain like it pierces her shoulder. Stopping her march after the boy for the moment, she looks for the source and finds a small, pointed piece of metal sticking out of her shirt. She pulls it out, staring at the blood on the tip, then looks up at the girl. She’s throwing things at her. No…not throwing. As Siren watches, another metal piece lifts from her hand as if on its own, then comes flying through the air straight for her. She jumps to the side, and the piece swerves after her, just nicking her other arm as it passes.
Her trainers never told her people could do things like that. Like both of these targets are doing. Maybe…do they have powers? Like her? Are they weapons? They’re allowed to talk, though, and ask questions. But maybe that’s just because their powers aren’t their voice, even though she isn’t allowed to ask questions with signs, either.
She’s gotten distracted again. She’ll get corrected if she doesn’t stay focused.
She turns her attention back to the boy, doing her best to ignore the girl and her metal pieces. A few more hit her, but she knows better than to react to pain. Besides, this pain isn’t that bad. It’s nothing like what she’s used to.
Just as she thinks she’s going to win this fight, though, there’s suddenly two boys standing in front of her. Two of the same boy, that look exactly alike. There are so many questions running through Siren’s mind, but that’s nothing unusual for her. This is fine. She can still do this. The two boys are better at fending her off than just one, but neither of them seem very eager to actually attack her.
Until the girl joins back in. First she kicks from behind, and when Siren spins around to defend herself the two boys start actually getting in some hits. It’s fine, though, it’s fine. She’s fought three people before. She’s never beaten three people before, but those were three that were actually all good at fighting. There are a growing number of spots on her body that will probably turn into bruises, and a couple of those metal pieces are still stuck in her skin, but she’s okay.
And now there are three boys. The more of them there are, the more confident they get in hitting her. She’s now blocking instead of hitting. Throwing in some more grunts and cries helps back them off a little, but not enough. Her focus is pulled in too many directions, and the next thing she knows, her feet are knocked out from under her and she hits the ground hard. One of the metal pieces, poking out of her leg, gets shoved further in with the impact. She throws her head back with a gasp.
This can’t happen. She can’t lose this fight, fail this mission. Siren does what she should have a few minutes ago and screams, long and loud, not even watching how the targets respond in her rush to get back on her feet.
“Phantom, you good?”
“...yeah.” The boy - there’s only one of him now - sounds like he’s in pain. “Wasn’t fun hearing that with three sets of ears.”
The girl is watching Siren carefully, more metal pieces floating above her hand, but glancing over at the boy from time to time. “You need a retreat?”
“N-no.” He shakes his head, trying to straighten up from his hunched position. “No, I’m fine.”
She almost has him beaten, she can feel it. She screams one more time, and he falls to his knees, clutching his head and crying out. The girl stumbles toward him, her metal pieces scattering to the ground.
“Phantom! Okay, that’s it. I’m getting you out of here.” She looks over at Siren and makes a swiping motion through the air with her hand. The metal comes to life from the ground, five or six pieces shooting toward Siren all at once. She dives out of the way, rolling across the ground and jarring the piece inside of her again.
By the time she’s back on her feet, the targets are running away, the girl’s arm around the boy.
She did it. She won!
She’s so happy that she just stands there a moment, breathing hard, staring after the two as they disappear around a corner. Then she remembers her handlers, waiting nearby, and turns to limp back into the darker, narrower area with the big metal boxes and the van. Her muzzle is put on and she’s loaded into the back without anyone saying anything to her.
“Did we get enough data from that?”
“Yeah, we got some stuff to work with. Also looks like we need to talk to its trainers about it fighting multiple assailants. And maybe they can somehow simulate superpowers, or get someone in there with superpowers to help?”
“Maybe. I’ll tell ‘em when we get back.”
The handler climbs in the back with her, and the doors are shut. The van begins its rumbling.
No one tells her, “Well done.” But they don’t say anything about correcting her, either, so Siren is content.
Stabmas 2024 - The Shadow of Death - Cinderella AU
It's the second annual celebration of Stabmas, hosted by the Slices of Whump discord server!
And yes, yet another new Brumaria AU. Bruno, as always, belongs to the brilliant and lovely Izzy (painful-pooch), and she wrote a good bit of his dialogue for this.
Happy Ides of March, everyone!
Taglist: @painful-pooch , @sssunshinebreeze
The Shadow of Death Masterlist
Contains: referenced lady whump, dude whump, stabbing, mild blood, referenced parental abuse, referenced noncon touch, touch aversion, referenced mass murder
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A million stars fill the night sky, a full moon illuminating the cobblestone drive and the tips of each of the castle’s spires. The heat of the day has faded, cool air brushing Kamaria’s bare shoulders and arms.
It’s a perfect night for a ball. Or so most of Ethorcon seems to think, judging by the number of carriages parked outside, awaiting their owners.
Kamaria marches past them all, uncaring of what the drivers and footmen may think of her less than dignified arrival. Reaching the steps, she hitches up the heavy silk skirts of her mother’s borrowed dress, only pausing her momentum once she reaches the towering front doors. The uniformed man standing there gives her an odd look. When she merely nods at him, doing her best to look down her nose like nobility are wont to do, he gives a slight bow and tugs open one door to let her inside.
The entrance hall by itself could fit her father’s entire manor inside, she’s fairly certain. Everything gleams, from the marble floor that she can nearly see her reflection in, to the golden ceiling high above. A magnificent waste of money, on display for all to see.
That’s nothing new to her, though. Nobility all think the same - why waste your riches on helping people who desperately need it, when you can spend it all on flaunting your status?
She’s arrived late out of more than one necessity. First off, she had to wait until her father had taken the carriage to come this way, himself, before she could even start getting herself ready and make the long walk. But more importantly, the ball is already well under way. No one but a few staff members have noticed her entrance. She doesn’t have to mingle with the rich, doesn’t have to be announced, and of course, doesn’t have as much of a risk of running into her father.
There’s a gold-framed mirror hanging on the wall to her right. Kamaria takes one last glimpse at herself, avoiding actually looking at her face in favor of adjusting the stiff dress and brushing back a few stray curls.
Then she takes a deep breath, skims her hand across the knife hidden safely in the folds of her skirt, and forges further into the castle.
She has a prince to find.
She expects him to be in the ballroom, right in the thick of the festivities. After all, this entire spectacle is about him. King Tristan is determined to find him a wife, and every eligible young lady around is here throwing themselves at his feet tonight.
Technically Kamaria fits that description, as well, but she has no intentions or delusions of marrying. Even if she did, Prince Bruno is the absolute last person on earth that she’d ever consider.
It isn’t hard to find the ballroom. All she has to do is follow the sound of lilting music, which grows into a cacophony of instruments, murmuring, laughter, and the clinking of glasses the closer she gets. The doors are thrown open wide, with a few guests spilling out into the corridor.
Kamaria stiffens when she sees them, adjusting her posture and expression. The last thing she needs, when she’s finally this close, is to be called out for not belonging. Her heart pounds, but she reminds herself of the reflection she just saw.
For tonight, she is as noble as her blood. No one can see the scars on her back or the callouses on her hands. No dirt or ash smears her cheeks. She looks the part of a lady, and so long as she plays it, no one should be the wiser.
Swallowing hard, she edges her way into the ballroom, but stays on the outskirts, slowly circling the room. Beyond a few columns on one side is an open section that no one seems to be utilizing, too eager to press into the center and be near all of the action. Kamaria gladly takes it for herself. It’s no quieter, but the lighting is dim and it feels much safer than being within the crowd. From here, she can linger in the shadows and still see everything.
There’s a dance ongoing, couples swirling by in a dizzying whirl of color. The prince will likely be out there, dancing with some lucky girl who’s caught his attention. He doesn’t seem to be with the king and queen, sitting on their thrones on a platform overlooking the festivities, anyway.
She has honestly no idea what he looks like. She’s counting on the crown to give him away. Faces are going by too fast to catch from this distance, but she should be able to spot the flash of gold in the torchlight.
“You have the right idea, I believe.”
Kamaria is so caught up in her search that she doesn’t notice the man’s approach until he’s upon her. Jolting, she grabs fistfuls of her skirts and tries to calm her suddenly racing heart, giving a quick sideways glance up at him. She has to think of something civilized to say.
“I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you.” There’s a smile in his voice. “I mean that, uh…this can all get to be a bit…much.” With one finger, he indicates the dancers and the crowd. “Sometimes I need to hide away, too.”
Part of her automatically wants to agree with him, but she can’t give away how very out of place she feels here. “Yes, well, I just…needed to catch my breath for a moment. All that dancing, you know.” She cringes inwardly at how stupid she sounds, but then again, maybe that’s for the best. Let him think she’s just another airheaded noble. She doesn’t really care what he thinks of her as long as he doesn’t call her bluff, she needs him to move on so she can continue looking for the prince.
“Right.” She can see him shift out of the corner of her eye, shoving his hands into his pockets. “Personally, I’d stay back here the whole night if my father wouldn’t hang me for it.”
Something about the way he says it has her taking a second, longer glance at him, just enough that the golden glint above his brow is quite obvious. Suddenly her heart is in her throat, pulse roaring in her ears.
It’s him. After all these years, the prince is standing here, right next to her, close enough to touch.
Her fingers itch to reach for the knife, but she can’t. Not yet. Not here.
She clears her throat, trying to find her voice again. “I’d think that you would enjoy all of the attention from so many young ladies, sire.”
He sighs. “Well, if any of them were interested in more than just the position my father is offering them, perhaps I would.” She can feel his gaze on her. “What about you? I’m fairly certain you haven’t attempted to approach me yet. You won’t even look at me now.” He sounds amused. “Am I not what you thought I would be? Or has someone already claimed your hand?”
Drawing in a deep breath to steady herself, she spins abruptly to face him, chin tilted up to meet his gaze. Whatever response she was concocting is gone immediately. His blue eyes light up, and a smile spreads across his face as he voices the exact words running through her mind.
“It’s you.” He chuckles, as if Kamaria’s whole world hasn’t just come screeching to a halt. “I’ll admit, I’d kind of hoped to see you here tonight. I was foolish enough to leave without getting your name before, which made it rather difficult to find you again.”
Her mouth has gone dry. “You…you’re Prince Bruno?” Maybe it’s a misunderstanding. Yes, he has on the crown, and he confirmed that the eligible ladies were here for him, but…maybe she’s made a mistake somehow.
“That would be me.”
Every part of her wants to turn around and leave, to find somewhere quiet where she can process this and decide what to do now. But no, nothing has changed. Her plans haven’t changed, she still has to follow through. Just because an hour conversation with this man had made him seem kind and caring and polite and funny and nothing like any other man she’d ever met, that doesn’t erase the last decade of knowing that he has to die.
“You, um…you failed to mention that you were royalty during our first meeting.” She prays he can’t tell how fast her heart is beating or hear the slight quiver in her words.
The prince gives a sheepish smirk. “Yes, sorry about that. It…didn’t seem relevant at the time? We were having such a nice conversation, and…”
He didn’t want her reaction to him to change by knowing who he was. And he’s right, it definitely would have changed. Just not in the way that he was expecting.
“Of course.” She tries to force a smile. So far, he doesn’t seem to suspect anything, not even that she’s actually a servant. Thankfully, she’d been presentable that day in the orchard, wearing a clean dress and having just washed her face and braided her hair. She probably looked like a peasant, at best, but then again, he hadn’t been dressed like a prince, either.
She opens her mouth to suggest that they find somewhere quieter to talk, but he speaks before she can get the words out.
“Would you dance with me?”
Kamaria can feel all of the blood drain from her face. “I…I couldn’t, I don’t…” I don’t know how, she almost blurts, but every lady should know how to dance, right? “I’m…not very good at dancing, I’m afraid, and…” Her eyes flit over the crowd. “There’s…so many people…”
His gaze follows hers. “I understand. A dance with me unfortunately would draw a lot of attention. How about right here, then?” He gestures to the dimly lit space around them. “And don’t worry, I won’t judge your dancing skills.”
What can she even say to that? She has no excuse to say no anymore, none that would be acceptable.
Why does he have to be such a gentleman?
Forcing another half-smile, she reaches out her gloved hand to take his outstretched one. “I’d be honored.”
His hand wraps around hers, engulfing it in warmth, and a tingling sensation shoots all the way up her arm. It makes her automatically want to jerk it back, but she just clenches her jaw and steps in closer. He’s smiling so genuinely, sliding his other hand gently around her waist to rest on her lower back. It feels like ice against her spine.
Touch like this isn’t usually gentle. It’s usually harsh, possessive, accompanied by Lord Roderick’s leering face and nauseating words. And that’s the only kind she gets, other than her father’s fists striking her. She can’t even remember the last time that someone touched her and it didn’t hurt or repulse her. Even now, with no evidence in his stance or expression that he’ll change from exactly what he’s doing right now, she desperately longs to disappear.
But instead, she does exactly as she always does. She stays very still, focuses as hard as she can on her breathing, and pretends not to exist.
The orchestra begins a new song, a slow, violin-led waltz, and Prince Bruno’s feet start moving in rhythm, pulling her along. “Just follow me,” he murmurs. “And don’t worry if you step on my toes. I have tough feet.”
This is not what she’s supposed to be doing right now. This is the exact opposite of what she should be doing right now. Being held firmly in his arms, swaying and twirling through the shafts of moonlight that illuminate the floor, like two lovers…she feels dizzy, and it’s not from the dance itself.
He’s a murderer, and a perfect gentleman. She allowed herself to like him, the day they met, to think about him often since then. Now, knowing who he really is, the thought makes her sick. But at the same time, she still feels herself drawn toward him in that same way. The way he looks at her…it’s nothing like she’s ever seen before. He makes her feel wanted, and no one has wanted her in many, many years.
Kamaria sucks in a sharp breath and pulls her gaze down to his shoulder. If he actually knew who she was - a servant and a Navarian - he wouldn’t want her. Perhaps he’d order her death, like he had dozens of others.
“Are you alright?”
He sounds so concerned, and she can’t take it anymore. She stops abruptly, stepping away and yanking her hand from his grasp like she’s wanted to all along, before she fully realizes what she’s doing. Luckily, she’s granted a plausible reason as soon as she glances past him. A group has gathered between the columns, gawking, apparently having noticed the movement of their dance and realizing that it’s their prince finally dancing with someone. Kamaria stares at them for a moment, heart still pounding, long enough for Prince Bruno to turn and see for himself.
She has to get out of here. There’s a door in the corner, she has no idea where it leads, but it has to be better than this stuffy room full of curious people and too-loud music. Leaving the prince behind, she lifts her skirts slightly and runs toward it as fast as she dares.
To her immense relief, it lets out onto a large balcony, overlooking the gardens at the back of the castle. Kamaria crosses to the railing and drops her skirts, leaning heavily onto her hands and taking in gulps of the cool evening air. She’s trembling all over.
The door opens and shuts behind her, and she tenses, fingers gripping the rail.
“I’m sorry about that. Unfortunately, that kind of attention tends to follow me.”
She swallows and forces her voice to work. “Will they now? Follow you, that is.”
“No.” He’s walking a bit further onto the balcony, but staying back away from her. Giving her space, presumably, because he always seems to somehow know what she needs. “I’ve ordered a guard to hold them off, with the promise that I will return shortly.” There’s a pause, even his footsteps quieting. “But I don’t have to. I don’t actually have to return at all. Will it tick my father off? Yes, but I don’t really care.”
No. No, he doesn’t have to return. He doesn’t deserve to return, doesn’t deserve to keep living his luxurious, perfect life being fawned over by hundreds while her people’s blood stains the ground.
The knife is out of its hidden pocket and in her hand without her really thinking about it. She turns slowly and begins to walk toward him, the rush of her blood once again filling her ears.
He has to die. It doesn’t matter how good he seems now, he sealed his fate ten years ago.
He’s leaning against the wall, watching her. She can’t look him in the face, if she does she might falter, and that’s the one thing she can’t do. Close enough to hear his breaths, she places one hand against his arm to brace herself.
She’s ready. Just like all those times she’s practiced. One sure, swift movement, and the knife is buried in his flesh.
There’s a quiet choking sound, deep in his throat. He sucks in a sharp breath, huffs a laugh. “Was it…something I said?”
Kamaria stares at the knife hilt protruding from the prince’s shoulder, at the bright red blood seeping out from around it, at the blue silk glove on her hand that still holds it. She should pull it out. Stab him again, in the chest, where she’d meant to stab him to start with.
She can’t seem to do so.
"You're not the first to do that. And I'm sure you're not the last.” He’s still talking, still so bafflingly calm despite the fact that the woman he was flirting with has just stabbed him. “Do you really want me dead? Because you sure didn't think I was a terrible person when we were talking a few weeks ago.”
She’s shaking again. Or still, perhaps. It’s unclear whether or not she ever stopped.
This is supposed to be her moment. She’s been planning this for so long, been waiting for the perfect chance, and now it’s here and…it’s all wrong.
His hand comes up, slowly, and covers her, wrapping around the knife just as gently as he’d held onto her inside. "How about we talk about this. You can keep the knife there, or not. Preferably, I would like to live after this, but if you are determined enough, I suppose I could go."
Now he doesn’t even care whether she kills him? He wants to talk, rather than just shoving her away, shouting for the guards, having her arrested and hanged?
She shuts her eyes, jaw clenching and unclenching. “You weren’t supposed to be…nice.”
"I wasn't supposed to be a prince either, but things don't work out that way, love. I'm sorry I wasn't a terrible person like some think of me."
Kamaria’s eyes fly open, and she finally looks him in the face, glaring. “You are a terrible person. You killed them. And I’ve been waiting my whole life to return the favor.”
"And who told you what I am?" His brow is furrowed, confusion with flashes of irritation playing across his features. "What would I have succeeded in the death of others? If you think that low of me, then go ahead, twist the knife, or go for something lethal this time."
His hand releases hers in favor of raising both in surrender, obviously moving the left carefully to avoid jostling the knife. "There's nothing I have to hide, my dear. Nothing. If you want answers, then I'll do my best to help you find them. If you want to do away with me once you have your truth, then so be it."
She knows the answers already. She just doesn’t understand them now that she’s here. What if she’s wrong? What if she’s had it wrong all along, and this is really not the man she should have been looking for?
Her eyes search his, looking desperately for the truth. "I don't know. I can't...I can't reconcile the man I met in the orchard with the one who had my family killed. Which one are you? Was everything you said to me...a façade? Or are you going to try to convince me that you've changed, because that was all so long ago? Or that it was a necessary loss for the good of the country?"
"I'm the same man I've always been, the one you met. I have not lied to you since the moment we met, and I don't plan on changing that about myself." He lowers his arms, noticeably gritting his teeth as he does so. More blood oozes out and stains his crisp white shirt. "I did change, but not in the way you imagine. And I would never…what loss would make the country great? Our people are our people. What would there be to gain from killing those that I'm supposed to protect?"
"You tell me!” she spits. “Because those were royal soldiers that burned down the village that night. I was there. I saw them.” The memories of that night are seared into both her mind and her skin. “And all fingers have pointed to you as the one who sent them." She pauses, still watching his face, ready for her next question to reveal his true nature. "Was it because we were Navarian? Because we were outsiders?"
He does react, but not in disgust like she expected. He flinches, as if she’s physically struck him. "I never sent my troops to harm your people." She can almost see the thoughts racing in his mind. "Navarian or not, I swore to protect their lives as well."
He just keeps on denying everything, and Kamaria doesn’t know whether to believe him or stab him again for it. She leans in a little, putting more pressure on the knife. "Then why are they dead?"
Prince Bruno tightly shuts his eyes, the pain obviously getting to him. "Let me figure that out with you. You want justice, and I'll make it happen. I never wanted to hurt people." He opens his eyes to meet hers, and she hates that she can see honesty shining in them. "You have no reason to trust me, but I need you to give me a chance to prove my innocence. Because if I didn't do this, then that means someone else will just let it happen again."
She wants to believe him. She wants to see if he can actually find different answers than the ones she’s always known.
Part of her, the part that has planned his death since she was twelve, also wants to be done with this here and now.
But as she’s debating, the clock tower in the center of town begins to chime. Her attention jerks to it. Midnight. Far later than she ever planned on being here. Her father won’t stay much longer, and she still has to walk all the way back home. If she’s not there when he gets there…
“Fine.” It’s an effort to pry her fingers away from the knife, but she does so, taking two steps back. “You have your chance. If you didn’t kill them, then find out who did. And I’ll find out if you’re lying to me.”
She has to go. She doesn’t know whether to hope that she ever sees his face again, or not. But she turns, hurrying toward the door on the other end of the balcony, one that doesn’t lead back into the ballroom.
"Wait, can I at least have your name this time? I want to find who hurt your people, and I want to be able to tell you when I do."
Her steps slow, then stop, and she stares at the ground, debating what to tell him. If he comes looking for her, he’ll know that she’s a fraud, a pathetic lord’s daughter being used as a servant in her own home. Maybe he won’t even want to help her anymore.
She should tell him something, though. And since her father refuses to call her by her real, Navarian name anyway… “Kamaria.” That will have to do. She’ll just find him herself as soon as she can get away, and make sure he’s holding himself to his vow.
She looks back over her shoulder at the prince, still leaning heavily against the wall with her knife sticking out of him. “Don’t let me down.”
Without waiting for an answer, she shoves through the door and runs off into the night.
You guys voted, and amazingly enough, I have delivered! This chapter was already floating around in my head, though it’s not technically the “next” chapter of the series like the poll said. This falls right after Shopping Trip and before Just a Cold and the Mind Control trilogy, and is a moment I realized was missing from the story.
Contains: lady whump, dude whump, broken ribs, self-deprecating thoughts, references to past homelessness, hidden injuries
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Liliana is alone in the warehouse, and it’s…a bit creepy, if she were to be honest. The place is huge, and her footsteps echo everywhere she walks. She’s tempted to hide in her room until the team returns. Then again, something about being shut in a room with no idea what’s going on in the rest of the building is even more disconcerting than being out here in the emptiness.
She should be ready for when they get back, anyway. This is the first time they’ve gotten called out on superhero duties since she’s been staying here, which means that they could very well get hurt and need her to heal them when they get back. Nari has assured her that it doesn’t happen very often. Still, that’s the only reason she’s here, right? If one of them does come back hurt, she should be ready to help right away, not locked away in her room.
So she makes her way to the infirmary, instead. It’s a small room, mainly comprised of a cot in the center, a counter with cabinets above it on one wall, and some shelves on another. They keep it stocked with first aid items, some a bit beyond what’s typical like crutches and slings and forceps.
They don’t really like to go to the hospital, Jamil had explained. None of them have ever had personal encounters with people who hate Nons…Supers…but they’ve heard the tales. They can’t risk being at the mercy of doctors and nurses whose political leanings they don’t know.
Liliana understands that perfectly.
They won’t need all the paraphernalia anymore, though, not with her around. She’s happy that she can take that burden off of them, take away the worry of what if someday we get hurt too badly to treat here. They’ve done so much for the city, after all, and now for her. They deserve to be taken care of.
At the same time, the longer she sits there, kicking her feet and staring at the blank walls, the more nervous she gets. She hasn’t healed that many people. There were a few accidental healings when she was young, but other than the arthritis those were all scrapes and bruises and one common cold. Then came the years at the facility, when she wasn’t allowed to even think about using her power.
While she was on the streets, she’d healed twice - both times with an enormous amount of fear that someone was going to leap out into the open and drag her back to the facility for doing so. The first time was the worst thing she’d ever healed. A lady had gotten mugged in an alleyway, and Liliana had healed where the mugger had hit her over the head with the butt of his gun. The only reason she’d stepped in and shoved her fear aside then was because she was afraid the woman might die otherwise. The headache she’d gotten from that was horrendous and lasted for a few days straight. Not something that she was looking to repeat anytime soon.
The second time she did with slightly less trepidation, since there hadn’t been consequences for the first. That was the man with the broken glass, the time when she’d met Nari and Quinn. The pain from that wasn’t all that bad, just a few stinging cuts. She still has the little white scars on her stomach.
And the only other time she’s healed was Jamil’s broken nose, which had been nerve-racking, too, but she was the one who’d broken it so she had to offer to heal it. That had hurt for days, too, and she kept feeling like she couldn’t breathe.
Today could be her first official healing, though. Her first time really performing her new job.
When she’d agreed to join their team, it had been a spur of the moment decision. A decision she’s second guessed many times, for reasons ranging from I shouldn’t have moved in with a bunch of strangers to they need someone better than me, someone with less problems than me.
Now, in this moment, she’s second guessing her ability to handle the kinds of injuries a team of superheroes might come in with. They could have broken bones. They could get shot, stabbed, burned, impaled, electrocuted…the villains they fight against have all varieties of powers that can do a ton of damage. Can she really heal any and all of that? More importantly, can she do it without letting on that it hurts, for however long it may take for those things to heal?
She doesn’t have a choice. They let her in so that she could heal them. If she can’t do it, then she’ll get kicked out, and she’s not sure she can handle going back to the streets, losing all of this comfort and care that she’s finally starting to get used to. And she can’t let them know that it hurts her, they’ll think she’s too weak and the result would be exactly the same.
It isn’t that they’re mean. They’re the nicest people she’s ever met. But they need someone who can do this job. She has to make sure that’s her, so she won’t lose even more people and yet another place to live.
The wait is excruciating, but eventually she hears the beeping and opening of the front door from just down the hall. Jumping to her feet, she moves to the doorway, wringing her gloved hands as she peers out. One, two, three, four…they’re all on their feet. It doesn’t mean no one is injured at all, but it’s certainly not as bad as it could be.
Quinn’s face brightens when he sees her. “Liliana, hey.” His eyes dart toward the room behind her. “Everything alright?”
She nods, still glancing up and down at what she can see of all of them. “I’m just, just waiting. For, um…for you guys to get back. Just in case.”
“Oh, that’s perfect. We’re mostly in one piece, but Alex did break a rib or two.” He gestures back toward the redhead, who she can see now is pressing one hand to his side.
“Ehh, I think they’re just cracked.” He waves his free hand casually. “Nothing new for me, honestly. I get beat up a lot.” He laughs at his own joke, then winces in clear regret.
Liliana’s eyes widen. Cracked ribs. She can handle that, right? She’s never had injured ribs before, but if Alex can treat it so nonchalantly then maybe she can, too. She definitely doesn’t want him to keep being in pain, it makes her stomach churn watching him react.
“I can, I can help. That’s what, um, what I’m here for, r-right?”
He grins at her and enters the infirmary as she steps back to make room. “I’d really appreciate it, if you think you’re up for it.” Gingerly, he settles on the cot facing her. “I’m used to having to deal with these things for weeks. If you can really make it disappear in an instant…”
“Mhm.” She nods again, still toying with her fingers. She’s just standing there, and he’s sitting, watching her…waiting on her, she realizes. Everyone is waiting on her. The other three are crowded into the room behind her, ready to watch her perform her task.
Right. She can do this. Gloves have to come off…well, maybe just one. One glove off, then she has to…oh, shoot, she has to ask him to…
“Um. I, um…I n-need…” Her face is growing hot. “I-I have to, to…to touch…like, um…s-skin…”
His eyebrows go up in realization. “Oh! Yeah, no problem.” He lifts the bottom hem of his shirt, revealing a cluster of bruises on his right side. “And don’t worry about hurting me, I’m tough.”
Her cheeks are still burning. “It, um, it shouldn’t hurt.”
“It doesn’t!” Jamil pipes in from the doorway. “At least it didn’t for me. Barely felt a thing.”
“Oh right! I forgot you’ve done this before.” Alex leans over slightly to see him. “Is it cool?”
“Definitely. Though I didn’t get to actually, you know…see it. I’m looking forward to it this time.”
The others are agreeing, and Liliana wants to curl up in a hole somewhere and disappear. They’re all acting like this is some huge special thing that she can do, and it’s just…her power. The power that got her kicked out of her family and locked up for three years. Yes, if she has to have a power she’s glad that it’s one that helps people, but it’s not special. It’s not that big of a deal.
“Okay, I’m, I’m gonna…” She motions toward his ribs and steps forward, sliding the glove from her fingers. Her hand is shaking a little.
Ever so gently, she places her fingertips against the bruised skin. Blue light immediately spreads across the area, soaking up the black and purple, seeping down until it reaches the cracked bones and beginning to mend them.
Don’t make a face, don’t make a face, don’t make a face.
The pain of her ribs “cracking” is sharp and immediately invades every breath. Liliana bites down on the inside of her lip to keep from gasping or making any noise.
Cállate, cállate, no hagas ruido, no pueden averiguar.
She glances up at Alex’s face, but his head is tilted down to watch the healing. Good. If she did slip and make any kind of expression, no one would have seen.
The light fades away as the last of the pain transfers, and she lets her hand drop, quickly moving to put her glove back on. “How’s, um…how’s it feel?”
His gaze comes up, and his eyes are wide with amazement. “Wow.” He stretches his arms over his head, bends his torso back and forth. She knows for a fact that those movements would have been very painful a minute ago.
“It feels great! It’s…totally gone, like, not even a trace left.” Looking down and pulling his shirt up again, he runs his fingers over the now unblemished skin. “That’s crazy.”
The others crowd around, Jamil poking at Alex and Nari making teasing comments about how he just can’t keep himself from getting hurt, and Liliana shrinks backwards, out of the way. Sharp pain shoots through her ribs with any little twist of her body. She’s going to have to learn how she can and can’t move, but try her best not to look stiff in the meantime.
A few weeks, he said, right? She can do this. It’ll be fine.
Alex stands and pushes his way past the others, not a difficult feat considering how much space his height and muscles take up. “Seriously, Lil, you’re fantastic.” He chuckles to himself. “Get it? Lil? ‘Cause you’re so…lil? I’m calling you Lil from now on. Anyway, I’d hug you, but you probably don’t want me to and that’s fine, so…fist bump? Can we fist bump it?”
She definitely does not want a hug right now, not with cracked ribs, but…she can handle a fist bump, she thinks. Tentatively, she raises her fist, and Alex gently knocks his knuckles into hers.
“Welcome officially to the team, kid. It’s great to have you here.”
Everyone spills out of the room exclaiming similar messages, making a huge deal out of what she just did and her presence with them. Liliana follows along silently, cheeks flushed again, trying not to let the praise get to her.
She still wishes they wouldn’t make such a big deal out of it. But if her power can make them this happy, then she’s very glad she can share it with them. Even if it ends up hurting much worse in the future.
This is canon 'verse and takes place after the captivity with Kane. Bruno belongs to Izzy! For this piece I used a different line of the prompt song as inspiration.
Taglist: @painful-pooch , @sssunshinebreeze
Masterlist
No. 23: “Please forgive me I’ve got demons in my head.”
She’s not sure what started it all. A nightmare, most likely, he was lying down resting when she left him and probably fell asleep. Reasons and explanations are far from Kamaria’s mind right now, though, all she knows is that she walks back into the clearing to find Bruno deep in the throes of panic.
He’s standing, too close to the smoldering campfire for her comfort when he’s out of it like this, and he looks ready for a fight but in no condition to be in one. His forehead is soaked with sweat, turning his hairline dark. He’s panting, eyes darting around as if seeing an enemy that isn’t there, and as she watches one hand comes up to clutch at his shirt over the scars on his chest.
It hurts her heart to see him like this. He doesn’t deserve to be so afraid.
“Bruno.” She calls to him from a distance to start with, setting down the armload of firewood she gathered. He doesn’t acknowledge her presence, still lost in his memories and fears.
So she walks a little closer, getting in his line of sight, and raises her voice. “Bruno. Istulta!” Sometimes that works. Today it does not. “You’re alright. You’re safe. Can you hear me?”
He stumbles backwards, thankfully away from the fire, and spins around, putting his back to her.
He’s warned her before about getting too close to him when he’s like this. She’s never had to help him out of one this bad, and yes, he’s lunged at her a time or two, mostly when she first wakes him up from a nightmare. But he’s never hurt her. And even if he might, she can’t just leave him to suffer. Hurt is nothing new to her, anyway, she can handle it.
“Bruno.” Circling around, she approaches him slowly from the front. “Come on, amachari, you can do this. Come back to me.”
He’s looking straight past her, straight through her. Talking alone isn’t going to help. Kamaria reaches out, debating for a split second where the safest place to touch might be, then lays her hand gently on his arm.
The effect is instantaneous. His hand closes over her wrist in an iron grip, too quickly for even her normally lightning-fast reflexes to evade, and he slings her to the ground. It wrenches both her wrist and elbow, but she barely notices. She’s too busy trying to scramble back to her feet.
He doesn’t give her the chance for that, though. Before she even rolls over he’s there, punching her across the face. The force of it knocks her back to the ground.
He’s seeing her now, finally. But he sees her as an enemy.
A deeply ingrained, instinctual part of her desperately wants to pull a knife, but she can’t. It’s Bruno, and he’s not trying to hurt her. She has to stay calm, to help him however she can even if she gets hurt in the process.
Even if she wanted to fight back, he’s moving with an intensity that she rarely sees from him. He grabs her by the shoulder and slams her back into the ground, then straddles her hips, pinning her down.
All of the oxygen is suddenly sucked from her lungs. It’s no longer Bruno above her, it’s Kane. It’s happening all over again, she’s trapped underneath him, she can’t escape. She’s already broken for him but it’s never enough. He’ll never stop.
The first punch doesn’t break her from the memory. The second does, if only briefly, long enough for her to see Bruno’s face - both angry and terrified at once. She throws the arm he’s not holding down over her face, trying to protect herself, gasping and sobbing all at once.
“Bruno…Bruno please…”
He tosses that arm aside and presses it into the ground and the moment of clarity is lost. “Please…please don’t!”
There’s blood filling her mouth. Her vision is blurred, ears ringing. Kane’s voice echoes in her mind, laughing at her pain, at how pathetic she becomes as soon as he’s on top of her. She sees Bruno again, but it’s like she’s drowning, coming up for gulps of air and glimpses of reality before she’s plunged back into the turmoil of the past. His fist won’t stop coming down, over and over.
She has to stop him. Has to help him, has to stop him, he’s hurting, she can’t do this again.
A knife finds its way into her hand without her consciously deciding to draw it. She doesn’t know who is hurting her anymore, all she knows is that it has to stop, and that Bruno’s safety depends on it. With what little leverage she has from the position she’s in, she stabs upward.
The man above her cries out, almost crumples on top of her, then rolls to the side and disappears from view. The pressure on her hips vanishes, but still she struggles to breathe. Her face throbs. Kamaria turns over onto her side, wanting to get up and run far away but unable to move any farther with her head pounding and the ground spinning beneath her. She spits out a mouthful of blood, then curls into a ball, shuddering.
She wants to scream.
She does scream, and it hurts all through her nose and cheeks and temples.
“Ka-...Kamaria…”
Bruno.
Shoving her hands into the ground, she pushes herself up to sit, mind still whirling as she tries to place what just happened. There was no Kane, was there? It was only Bruno the whole time. He hurt her. But she can’t hold that against him, not when she knows exactly what it feels like to be trapped in your own head like that. He didn’t mean to. He’s not Kane, not in any capacity.
He’s going to feel terrible when he realizes what happened.
She has to go to him, though, she has to see if he’s okay now. She pulls up her hood that she uses to partially hide her face on missions, knowing it will do very little good but trying to put off the inevitable as long as possible, and crawls toward him.
He’s lying on his back, eyes filled with pain as he spots her. “Kamaria…love…are you…?”
“I’m here.” Her voice sounds raw. “I’m coming.”
As she approaches, she’s alarmed to see blood coating his shoulder. Did she…she did, didn’t she? She just barely remembers it, the feeling of the knife in her hand, the desperate need to get him off of her. She picks up her pace, half crawling, half stumbling.
“You…I heard you scream. Are you…are you hurt?”
“I’m fine.” She drops down next to him, bent over the wound on his shoulder, fingers gently prodding around it. He hisses in response, neck arching.
“What…happened?”
“Don’t worry about it right now. I need to take care of this. It’s not too deep, thankfully.” It’s not through his heart, thankfully.
She gets up, swaying in place for a moment before she can see straight enough to walk over to the bag with the medical supplies. She’ll have to take care of her own wounds, eventually, but his is more pressing. Automatically she’s trying to figure out how she can keep it from him, whether or not she can wash up enough that it isn’t noticeable and how long she can keep the hood on before he gets suspicious.
He’s going to find out, though. Better she focuses on breaking the news as gently as possible.
“I feel like I’ve just run the length of Ethorcon.” He’s got his uninjured arm draped over his face. “Did you…stab me?”
“Perhaps?” Setting the bag down next to him, she rummages until she finds the alcohol and a clean cloth. “This will sting.”
Bruno grits his teeth as the liquid sloshes over the wound, letting out a quiet groan while she begins to pat the area clean. “I’m so confused. I was just lying there, waiting for you to come back with the firewood, thinking about dinner, and…”
He’s starting to understand, she can tell by the way he trails off. “I was afraid. When…when I woke up bleeding, before I ever realized I was injured or heard you scream, I felt afraid.” His arm drops to the ground and he turns his head to look at her. Kamaria keeps her head carefully ducked toward her work. “I did it again, didn’t I?”
She gives a sympathetic smile that he probably can’t really see, split lip smarting in response. “I think you must have had a nightmare. You were awake when I got back, but…”
He lets that sink in for a moment. “Right. That…explains why I’m so exhausted now.” He’s too quiet, still thinking, trying to make sense of it all.
Setting the cloth and bottle to the side, she gets out the needle and thread. “I need to sterilize this.”
The fire that they were supposed to be stoking to cook dinner is nothing but coals, so she busies herself throwing in a couple of the pieces of wood she’d brought and stirring up some flames to hold the needle in. Her body aches with exhaustion, as well. After this, she’ll rest. They both deserve a good rest.
“You stabbed me.”
She turns her head slightly toward him. “Yes. I…I’m sorry.”
“Kamaria, did I…?”
She’s frozen in place, unable to respond. She wants to say no, of course not, she’s fine. But he hates it when she lies about being hurt.
“It’s…you…” She swallows and shakes her head. “I shouldn’t have tried touching you. It was the wrong choice.”
“Kamaria…” He sits up and starts scooting toward her. She keeps her back to him, hands clenched into fists.
“You need to lie back down. You’re going to make it bleed and I’ll have to clean it all over again. This needle is ready, I’ve got to sew you up.”
“Please look at me, love.” He’s sitting right behind her, and the pain in his voice makes her chest hurt. His hand comes up and lightly grasps her hood. She tenses, but doesn’t move to stop him.
Ever so gently, he tugs it off. She ducks her head as she finally turns to face him.
Bruno swears under his breath. “Kamaria. I don’t…I didn’t…”
“You didn’t mean it.” Tear-filled eyes come up to lock with his. “I’m not upset with you, you weren’t trying to hurt me.”
“But I did!” She can see the anger growing in him, fists clenching, ready to hit something until his knuckles bleed as if he can punish himself for his mistakes.
She knows he’s hurting, but she can’t take it right now. Quickly reaching out, she grabs onto his wrist. “Please, please don’t get angry. I can’t…” She can’t handle seeing that expression on his face again, not this soon. “It wasn’t your fault. If it was anyone’s, it was mine, you told me I shouldn’t touch you and I did anyway.” She will again, too, if she thinks it will help him, but that’s a discussion for another time. “And this is nothing compared to…I stabbed you. I could have killed you.”
“I deserved to be stabbed.”
“No, you didn’t. You could never.” She says it firmly, but hunches over after, sucking in a shaky breath. “I didn’t even know what I was doing. I was…confused, you were on top of me and I couldn’t think straight and…I could have killed you!”
“I was on t-...” He cuts himself off and tips his head back to stare up at the sky. “Please, please tell me I didn’t.”
She squeezes his wrist tighter, blinking away the memories of that moment that press at her mind. “It’s okay. Please, you’re…you’re making a bigger deal out of my pain than you should. We both experienced bad memories. Yours lasted much longer. I got cuts and bruises, you got stabbed.”
“You were defending yourself.”
“So were you!”
“From a real threat. You were actually being hurt. By me.”
She shakes her head. “No, you weren’t the one I was trying to stab. If I’d been thinking clearly, if I’d known for sure that it was you, I would have fought you off another way. I would never have hurt you like that…just like you never would have me.”
Looking up at him, she tugs his arm a little to get his eyes on her. They look as wet as hers feel. “We both got hurt because of being stuck in our memories. Neither one of us are at fault.” It certainly doesn’t feel that way, when her knife is still laying nearby with his blood on the blade, but it’s what needs to be said at the moment. “Now please, let me take care of your shoulder before it bleeds any more.”
Lips pressed together, he gives a solemn nod. They spend the next several minutes in silence as she expertly stitches the wound shut and ties it off, dousing it with alcohol one more time to be safe before wrapping his shoulder in a clean white bandage.
He catches her hand in his as she starts putting things away. “Now it’s my turn.”
“You don’t have to -”
“Let me do this.”
She nods, placing her hands in her lap as he gets out a new cloth and pours some of the alcohol onto it. One hand comes up to cup her chin and she stiffens for an instant. Bruno pauses, waiting without touching until she lets out a breath and whispers, “I’m okay.”
His touch is gentle and feather-light, carefully dabbing at her split lip and cheek and bloody nose until they’re clean. He takes a sweet-smelling salve from the bag and spreads it across the cuts and bruises.
“I’m afraid there’s not much I can do for the swelling at this point. Hopefully it will go down soon.”
She helps him repack the bag, then they sit silently for another moment, each staring at the other’s wounds. In the quiet, the exhaustion has settled fully over her, weighing her down. She imagines he feels much the same.
“Will you hold me?”
“Are you sure you want me to?”
Kamaria gives him a half-hearted glare for still thinking ill of himself, then reaches out to take his hand. “I think we both need it.”
Without another word, he holds his arms open, and she moves forward to curl up against his chest, watching his reaction to make sure he’s comfortable with it. Gingerly, he lays them both down next to the remains of the fire.
They both fall asleep entwined in each other’s arms.
Taglist (let me know if you’d like to be added or removed!): @darthsutrich , @inky-whump , @painful-pooch
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Contains: dude whump, mind control, referenced lady whump, death mention, electric shock, superhero typical violence, mild blood, restraints, needle mention, magical nonsense, referenced minor whump, referenced sibling death, referenced choking
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This has been, without a doubt, one of the worst days of Jamil’s life. Not the worst day, but definitely in the top three.
Watching his friends get hurt has always been the hardest part of this whole superhero job. He doesn’t like for them to be in pain, and he worries that someday they’re going to be permanently injured or maybe even die. They’ve all come close to it, one time or another. It, unfortunately, comes with the territory.
But he never, ever thought that it would be his hands hurting them, his own powers threatening to kill them.
Every movement that he makes is completely out of his control, but he can feel the impact of all of it. His knuckles ache from the punches that a dozen different replicas have landed. Electricity buzzes beneath his skin, his whole body aching from the “deaths” of his copies. He’s completely exhausted. If he’d been in control, he would have collapsed and given up ages ago.
But Luna clearly isn’t tired yet. He highly doubts that she’s feeling the same pain he is, she probably conveniently blocked that part of his brain from reaching her. And regardless, she doesn’t care anything about the anguish ripping through him each time she succeeds in making him hurt someone. She doesn’t care that the sight of Alex curled up on the floor at his mercy, the sensation of his fist against Quinn’s jaw, the fear and betrayal in all of their eyes, will haunt him for perhaps the rest of his life.
And maybe worst of all, the feeling of his hand around Lili’s throat, watching her struggle for breath and look at him with those wide, pain-filled grey eyes. He…he thought he was going to kill her. He thought he was going to have to watch her die, have to feel the life drain from her underneath his palm.
That’s the point where he starts to cry. Not the replicas, but himself, the real Jamil. Either Luna actually doesn’t have control over that one thing, or she decides she can allow him that. Maybe she finds it entertaining.
In the end, he’s fairly certain it’s what helps Quinn determine which one is him. He keeps glancing at him as he takes out the copies with his lightning, and whenever he can catch a breath starts calling out things like, “It’s going to be okay, Jay.” “We’re okay.” “We’re gonna get through this.”
Jamil tries to let the words soak in and believe them. It gets a bit easier when Alex is suddenly back in the fight, blood still drying on his face but looking fairly decent, considering the beating he’d taken. Lili. The pieces click together in Jamil’s mind. He’d seen her with Alex, out of the corner of his eye, but he hadn’t been able to stop to think about what she was doing. The knowledge that she’s okay enough to heal him and that he’s okay from her healing, combined with Quinn’s encouraging words, is enough to keep him going for now.
When this is all over…if they can figure out how to get him out of this mess…he owes them all so much. Quinn for saving Lili, Lili for saving Alex…all of them for doing their best not to hurt him despite what he’s doing to them. They ought to just knock him out. Electrocute him, hit him over the head…whatever it takes to stop him. He’d tell them that, if he could.
He isn’t even sure what happens, at first, when everything comes crashing down. Namely, when he comes crashing down, hitting the floor hard enough to make his vision go wonky. Alex is suddenly on top of him, using his enhanced strength to pin him down, and Jamil’s legs are kicking but somehow useless.
Then Nari appears above him. “Turn him over,” she orders, a pair of handcuffs in her hands. Ah. That’s what happened, there’s something metal binding his legs, probably thrown and wrapped by her from a distance. Thank you, Nari.
It isn’t over yet, though. Alex is strong enough to keep his body under control as he rolls him over and holds his hands behind his back for Nari to cuff, but they can’t control his powers. Luna is still fighting, still ripping replicas from him and turning some of them invisible, too. Jamil’s back arches as Quinn strikes another with lightning.
Alex hisses through his teeth. “I’m sorry, man. We’ll figure this out, okay?”
Of course he can’t respond. He’s not worried about himself, though, not when it comes to a little pain. He just wants this woman out of his head. He can feel her try to teleport him out from underneath Alex, but he just doesn’t have enough magic left. It’s been running on fumes for a while now, and that attempt is the last straw. Whatever copies are out in the room, including the invisible ones, fade out and draw back into his chest, leaving Quinn with crackling fingertips, waiting for more.
There’s a trickle of blood coming from Jamil’s nose. His head hurts, he’s tired beyond words, and he just wants to lie down and sleep. His body keeps jerking against the restraints, though, trying to throw Alex off.
You might not have magic left for now, Luna’s voice whispers, but that’s alright. I’ll just wait until it replenishes.
Jamil wants to sob.
“There’s gonna be a pinch in your arm, okay? Sorry, bud.” Nari’s voice and touch are both gentle. She knows how much he hates needles, but right now he hardly cares. Whatever she’s giving him, she must think it will help, and that’s all that matters.
Afterwards she crouches down where he can see her, tentatively reaching out to stroke his mess of curls. “You’re gonna get sleepy in a minute. This is just for now, so we can keep you and everybody safe until we figure this out, alright? We know this isn’t you. We know something’s going on…we’ll figure out what.” Her voice starts sounding very far away by the end. “Somehow.”
.
.
He doesn’t…wake, exactly. It’s more like one moment, he’s listening to Nari, there’s a flash of darkness, then he starts to become…aware. Everything is still mostly dark, but he can sense that there are things nearby. Colors catch his eye, but when he turns they’ve slipped away. Thoughts echo in the distance but don’t quite take shape.
Then that voice again. Her voice.
So, you’ve come to my domain now, hm? An image of Luna shimmers to life in the black. It’s imperfect to start with, parts of her fuzzy and incomplete like a barely-formed memory, but then she huffs impatiently and the image comes into focus.
“That’s right! I’m still here, even though your dear friends have sedated you. Can’t get rid of me that easily.”
“Yeah, but you can’t hurt them anymore like this,” he shoots back. The words don’t feel physical, though, they’re still just thoughts, if a little louder than normal.
“For now.” She examines her blue nails, clearly bored. There’s apparently a blue theme going on with her…blue eyes, blue lips, blue shirt, blue nails…she’s committed, he’ll give her that. “They can’t keep you sedated forever, though.” Stretching, she looks around, as if expecting to see something in the darkness. “This is pretty interesting, actually, I’ve never had anyone unconscious while I was controlling them. Usually I get bored and leave before we get to that point. Kind of expected it to just be more of your boring memories until you woke, but then you showed up.” She quirks an eyebrow. “Your consciousness, or…whatever this is.”
“Yeah, well I guess strange things happen when you mess with people’s brains!” He doesn’t understand a bit of what’s going on, if he’s honest, but it’s dawning on him that maybe this is his chance to somehow get rid of her. If he can just figure out the trick to it. “How do you even do this, anyway? How does this whole controlling thing work?”
Luna gives a high-pitched laugh. “Oh, wouldn’t you like to know? That’s cute, that you think I’m just gonna explain it to you.” She yawns, dark hands running through her blonde hair. “Well, you’re really no fun when I can’t make you do stuff, so…I’m gonna go rummage around through your brain some more and see if I can find some interesting ideas for later.”
“What? No -!” But she’s gone already. Rummaging through his brain… Well, maybe he can do a bit of that himself. Not that he knows how. But he’s got to find a way to get rid of her somehow. Otherwise what happened earlier will just keep happening, him hurting his friends, the team suffering at his hands…
Suddenly those images are flashing in the darkness, larger than life. It’s terrifying, seeing them so close and clear, but the shock of it seems to draw him right back out of the memory, back to a blank black room.
“Okay. Okay, I think I’m starting to figure this out.” His voice echoes through the emptiness. It seems that somehow, he’s been drawn into his own mind, and this is like a mental landscape. If he imagines things, like if he remembers cooking breakfast for the team this morning…suddenly there it is, an image of his hands mixing pancake batter. It’s just like how his thoughts normally work, but…bigger. More real.
So maybe he just needs to think of Luna. No not Luna, he doesn’t want her to appear again. Luna’s power. He needs to figure out where her power is located in his mind, and follow it there. Her power has to be anchored somehow to keep her hold on him.
Jamil does his best to focus, to block out all the other thoughts that want to intrude and hone in on that feeling of not right that lingers somewhere in the distance. It starts to grow stronger the longer he searches for it. He feels a bit like he’s wandering through his own mind, following a beacon, until he finds himself looking at a door. A locked door, to be exact. Just looking at it gives him an uneasy feeling in his stomach, an instinctive knowledge that he does not want to know what’s behind it.
“Oh you really don’t wanna go in there.” Luna is standing beside him again all of a sudden. “Trust me. I’ve been around people’s minds a bit, and I know a bad memory when I see one.”
A bad memory? The feeling in his gut intensifies. It could be nothing. It could just be some childhood fight with his siblings or his hamster dying.
But it also could be…a lot worse.
“It’s behind a door for a reason. Your brain has locked it in there so you don’t have to look at it.” Somehow he knows she’s not lying. “Do yourself a favor and walk away, superhero.”
“Why?” He asks the question before he’s fully thought it through, and she gives him a look with one raised eyebrow. “Why would you be warning me about this? Don’t you like tormenting me? I would think you’d want me to go in there, if it’s so bad.” It clicks with him, then, what it could mean. “Unless…you have another reason for wanting me to stay away.”
Luna narrows her eyes and scowls. “I don’t care what you do. Just don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She disappears again, leaving Jamil alone with the door.
This has something to do with her power. He’s certain of it. Whatever is behind that door may be his absolute worst nightmare, but…
But it’s just memories, right? If he doesn’t get her out of here, then he may have to face something much worse than memories.
Jamil forces the door open.
Immediately he’s pulled into a scene that’s way, way too familiar. It isn’t like the memories earlier, just an image on a screen, he’s standing right in the middle of this one, exactly in the spot he’d actually stood in eleven years ago. In the center of the road. With a black sports car barreling straight toward him.
He was right, the door really did lead to his worst nightmare.
Suddenly he’s thirteen years old again, the same terror filling him, freezing his feet in place. Someone is screaming his name. He knows already who he’s going to see when he turns his head, though her face has grown a little fuzzier over the years.
His little sister. Akhila. They were two years apart, but people used to mistake them for twins all the time. She was his greatest annoyance some days, but also his best friend.
He’s already lived this memory enough times to know exactly the terrified expression he’ll find on her face…up until the moment she starts running.
He doesn’t want to see it again.
But something in him has to, something forces him to face her, probably because it’s what he did in real life. Only it’s not Akhila standing there. She’s calling for him with the same fear, glancing over at the rapidly approaching car and back before making her decision just like his sister had, but this time, it’s Liliana.
Liliana?
But that’s not right, she wasn’t there, he didn’t even know her yet…
Because this isn’t real.
He’s not thirteen, he’s not back in India, and all of this is just a really bad memory. And if this memory has been tampered with, then maybe he was right, maybe Luna has been here. Maybe there’s something he can do here to stop her.
Liliana is sprinting across the road, eyes wide and afraid for him. Real or not, he doesn’t want to watch her die any more than he wants to watch Akhila die again. He hasn’t allowed himself to acknowledge just how much she reminds him of his little sister before now, but she does. He wants to keep her safe.
And he doesn’t have to watch this time. This time, he’s in control. His sister saved his life all those years ago. This time, it’s his turn to save someone.
She’s almost reached him, is just about to make impact and knock him out of the way right before the car can hit him. Jamil doesn’t wait. He lunges forward, grabbing her by the arms, and uses her momentum to throw them both out of the car’s path. They go tumbling across the pavement, though he doesn’t feel any of it, and the car zooms past without pause.
He did it. A wave of relief floods him, so much so that he laughs aloud. When he looks over at Liliana, she’s smiling softly at him.
Then she fades away, the road and the sidewalk and the sky and everything else with her, and he’s looking at the door again. His smile slips away as he gazes at it.
“I don’t think I ever said thank you, Akhila,” he whispers. “Probably because I wasn’t very thankful. I didn’t want to live my life at the expense of yours, and that shouldn’t have been your choice to make.” Sighing, he rubs a hand across the back of his neck. All of this he’s thought a million times already, and it’s not what he wants to say now.
An image of his sister appears next to the door. He has to concentrate hard, thinking of photographs of her, to get her face to come fully into focus, but he wants to say this while imagining her as she was in life, not staring at a reminder of her death. “Thank you. I’ll never stop wishing you were here, but you gave me the gift of life, and I love the life I have now. So…yeah. Thank you.”
He allows the image to disappear and turns his attention back to the door, carefully locking it back up tight.
.
.
Jamil opens his eyes. Quinn, Nari, and Alex are all hovering above him, though maybe not quite as close as they’d normally be. He can’t blame them for that. In fact, his first reaction on realizing he’s awake is for his anxiety to spike, waiting on his body to start moving without his permission, to start hurting them again.
But nothing happens. He just remains lying there, holding his breath, and…wait, is that possible? For him to decide when to breathe? He forces the air out, as a test, then sucks it back in again. All his own doing. He lifts a finger. Blinks rapidly. Raises and lowers his eyebrows. It’s…it’s all working. It’s all his again.
“G-guys?” His gaze shoots over to his team, and the wary looks on their faces kill him. “I’m…I-I’m so s-sorry…” Tears begin pouring from his eyes, rolling down his temples and into his hair.
“Jay!”
There’s a quick conversation of, “What if it’s a trap?” and “I don’t care, I’m not gonna let him lie there and cry,” before his wrists are released from their restraints and Nari is yanking him up off the medical table to throw her arms around him. His whole body groans in pain, but he doesn’t even care. He just returns the gesture, burying his face in her shoulder and soaking her t-shirt with his tears.
“I’m so sorry, guys, I’m so sorry, I didn’t want to, I couldn’t stop her…!”
Nari shushes him and pets his hair, and soon Alex and Quinn step in closer, too, patting his back. “We know, man,” Alex offers. “We knew it wasn’t really you. It’s okay. It’s all okay now.”
Sitting up suddenly, Jamil looks them all over frantically. “Are you all okay? Are you hurt? Wait, what about Lili, where’s Lili? Is she okay?”
“I’m here,” croaks a small voice.
He swivels around and sees her lingering off to the side. There’s a nasty set of black and purple hand-shaped bruises already forming on her throat, and his stomach turns a somersault at seeing them. He did that. Those are his hands.
“And I’m okay,” she continues. Her voice is completely wrecked. “I, um…I’ve got a bit of, of a headache, but…n-no worse for wear otherwise.”
There’s no way that’s true. She looks completely exhausted, squinting as if the bright lights of the infirmary are hurting her eyes. She must have overdone it, healing Alex right after Jamil had…had almost killed her.
“I’m sorry, Lili.” He doesn’t know how many times he’s repeated the phrase at this point, and he’s not likely to stop anytime soon. “I didn’t…I was so scared that you…I’m sorry!”
“Hey.” Quinn gets his attention, squeezing his shoulder. “We’re all okay. A little bruised, a lot tired, as I’m sure you are, too. You don’t have to keep worrying about us. We’re alright, and it’s over now.”
Jamil’s eyes fill up with tears again, and he nods. “I-it’s over. Yeah.” He searches his mind again for any sign of Luna’s power lingering, but finds nothing. He probably won’t quit checking for a while still. “It’s over.”
