multiversallogs | Striking in complete silence / devastating, isolating, until I lose control

Entry tags:

Striking in complete silence / devastating, isolating, until I lose control

Who: Raylan Givens and Rachel Conway
What: Saving the day! Aaaand opening up a CR can of worms.
Where: Champion's Walk, Griss Twist.
When: Backdated a few days, in the midst of monster madness.
Notes: N/A
Warnings: Violence against monsters.

She'd been driven from her apartment three days ago, driven from her neighborhood a day after that. Rachel had managed to pack a bag on her way out, slung across her body now, full of what meager first-aid supplies she could gather and everything she could possibly use as a light source.

...Not that she intends to go that route. Ever. But better to be prepared for something you don't have to do than to be pushed into that corner and not be ready.

She's been moving through the city, doing what she can, sleeping when she can. She's hardly prepared for this; she's been a book editor and a tea house waitress and a low-level volunteer for a political party, there's nothing in her background to ready her for circumstances like these. But she couldn't just hide somewhere and not try.

The side streets tonight are reasonably quiet, if demolished here and there, bearing scars of earlier skirmishes. She makes note of buildings that look like they'll stay standing, and when she comes across the odd person wandering the street, she checks to make sure they don't need medical attention and then she shoos them off to the nearest safe place.

But as she nears Champion's Walk, the odd people become groups of people, and they're not wandering, they're fleeing. She catches the ones she can, directing them to a safe place, unable to get much out of them besides "monster" and "didn't want to be trapped."

There's a knot of people running through the open back door of a business that faces Champion's Walk. She fights her way through, dodging people, and she gets out the front door. She still can't see much--there's a group of people coming toward her, and some more, lit by the few street lamps still working, congregating by some buildings on the next block.

And then a shape moves between her and a lamp, flitting by so fast there's only a silhouette, and an impression of size. Great size.

She can't just stand here and do nothing.

Back through the shop she goes, back out the back door, but instead of joining the others fleeing onto the side streets, she takes one that parallels Champion's Walk. She sees another stream of people coming down an alley, and she squeezes through, popping out into the crowd of people gathered there.

"Who's in charge?" she asks the nearest person. "Is there anyone helping you guys right now?"

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She stops, looking down at him. "I feel better, thanks," she says, and it seems she is; her smile is more sure of itself than before, her usual good humor on its way back. "I'm sorry if I woke you up."

"Nah, I've been in and out." He shifts to sit up, wincing at the crick in his neck. "Seemed like everything was quiet for the moment, so I figured we could both use a break."

"Yeah, I think that was the right thing to do." She gestures in the direction of the sink. "You want some more water? That's about all we've got here."

"I'll take the water while we've got it, sure." He moves, carefully, to take a peek out the window. "Still seems quiet, for now. I mean, relatively speaking."

She refills both glasses, joining him at the window to hand him one. "Yeah. Relatively speaking."

Rachel sips from her glass, looking up at him. "What do you think we should do next? Camp out here? Try to move on while it's still quiet?"

"This place is defensible," he says, after reflecting, "but no food. I've got next to nothing on me. We're gonna have to keep moving, but we can rest a little more first if you need it."

She shakes her head. "Thank you. But I'm all right. I'm ready whenever you are. I don't want to linger too much longer and wind up getting caught when something else rolls back in."

"Right." He considers their options. "Were you headed anywhere particular, when we crossed paths?"

"No." The look she gives him is almost sheepish. "I didn't have any plan. I just got the hell out of my neighborhood when things started coming up out of the harbor. Since then I've been wandering the city, helping out where I could. I found you when I noticed there were a lot of people running away from one spot."

"I've been trying to herd them out of harm's way, but there's not really a better part of the city, so far as I can see. A few places declared safehouses. I heard rumors Sobek Croix's a bit better, but." He shrugs. "No particular direction either."

"I'm not surprised about Sobek Croix. That's Hellsing's stomping ground, I can't imagine God himself could raise any ruckus there without being taken on."

She falls silent, thinking. "How are you for ammunition? Any idea where we could find you more, if you need it?"

"I'm out on the handgun. Not much left on the shotgun." He sighs. "Can't say Baedal is overly fond of leaving firearms around, in my experience."

"Remind me, when this is over, that we should work on getting you a stockpile. So we're prepared for next time."

Because there will be a "next time"; nothing she's seen has her convinced this is the end of the intermittent hell-in-a-handbasket episodes the city likes to have every so often.

"I guess we keep moving, then. See what we can find."

"Maybe I'll find a baseball bat. Someone's always got a baseball bat in zombie movies." He drinks one more glass of water for good measure, then says critically, "Course, usually all the heroes die anyway."

"That's a good thought. The baseball bat, I mean. Not the other one--don't even think something like that now," she says, but the chiding is very gentle, as such things go. "I've also seen people use shovels in zombie movies. Those might work, too, if we come across any."

He smiles wry. "Shovels or zombies? But I wouldn't worry too much. Odds are if the pretty girl doesn't get killed right off, she has a chance of being the lone survivor."

He is probably teasing her now.

She laughs, shaking her head. "The shovels, Raylan. I can't imagine a zombie's ever going to come in useful."

Rachel doesn't say anything about his teasing, but the color rises in her cheeks just a hint. "So let's keep an eye out for anything else that might make a good weapon, while we're out there."

"Sounds like a plan. If we're going to move, we should do it while we've got some daylight to play with." It seemed like things were worse, if possible at night.

"Presumably whoever runs this place won't let everyone get killed. We just gotta outlast it."

"Yeah, exactly. The gods need us and our ambitions, or whatever the party line is, so I imagine they'll do what they can to help as many of us as they can. We've weathered everything else this place has thrown at us. We can outlast this too."

She sets down her glass. "If you're ready to go now, so am I.'

"Alright."

They head out cautiously. Everything seems fairly quiet for the time being, and Raylan checks his CiD map before heading vaguely North.

After a little bit, quiet, he says, "We don't have to talk about this now, but... how long have you known you could do that. With the shadows and all?"

She glances over, flashing him a brief, faint smile--it's all right, she doesn't mind answering his questions.

"I knew pretty much all my life there was something different. Off. But I didn't see it for the first time, realize, like, exactly what it was, until I was twelve. I didn't tell anybody for the longest time. I was scared. And there was already enough in my life that made me stick out like a sore thumb, I didn't need one more thing. My mom figured it out because of-- because of something that happened when I was a teenager."

They walk a few paces in silence before she speaks again. "It was kind of-- I sprung it on her and that was an awful way to find out. I figured, like, the entire world didn't need to know but I couldn't go surprising people I cared about. So I tried telling them, eventually, but I can't think of a single time it went well. They always wound up distancing themselves, like it was too much or I was too scary now or whatever. After a while I guess I just stopped trying to get close enough to people to where I'd have to tell them. It seemed easier that way."

She looks over at him again. "I'm sorry. I really was trying to figure out how I was going to bring it up but then... this happened."

Raylan considers all that. Finally, he says, "I guess saving someone's life is a decent way to tell them, when you consider the alternatives. Makes them look like an idiot if they get pissed off about it."

He's still working it through, but his comment is honest.

"Yeah," she sighs. "Yeah, I guess I have set you up a bit. But for the record, anything you do or don't feel or think about this--I wouldn't hold it against you. You didn't ask for any of this."

Rachel shrugs. "Keeping my secrets intact sure wouldn't have brought me a lot of comfort if one or both of us had died as a result. I'll deal with whatever comes of it."

"Rachel," he says with an ironic grin, "you are very far down on my list of 'things I didn't ask for that happened anyway.'" And not just in Baedal.

"You're still you. It's weird - I'm not going to pretend it's not weird, but if you haven't noticed, I'm not Mr. Congeniality. I don't have anyone to avoid you with except my boss, and I'm pretty sure he doesn't like me."

"Thank you," she says after a moment, soft and earnest and maybe even a little surprised. "It's weird, believe me--I'm the one living with it and even after all this time, it's weird. But I am still me, regardless. That's something I think other people maybe lost sight of."

She's quiet a moment, and then: "...what is it with you and lists, anyway?"

She is, perhaps, gently teasing, and doing a pretty poor job of trying to hold back a smile.

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