It's a helluva world, Bill reflected sourly to himself, when things have to get to this stage. He closed his eyes briefly and shook his head, then settled
his beret firmly on his brow and brought his bow to bear, peering through the scope at the motion he'd spotted -- had been expecting to see -- where the
street ended in a T-junction, at a distance greater than most would consider possible for a man his age to see. Or a younger one, for that matter.
The girl he'd watched grow up over the past year came around the corner of the building, laughing in the cool afternoon breeze and chattering happily with
her companion. Behind her trailed the Rikti traitor. Bill scowled.
Through the scope her features were sharp and clear. He spared a quick glance down the arrow itself, to get the range, then returned his attention to the
magnified image in the glass. His fingers locked around the fletchings, and with a steady, smooth motion, he drew back the arrow. The head was dull,
non-reflective; a solid piece of razor-sharp impervium with bloodletter grooves winding in narrow spirals from tip to base, and backwards-facing barbs to make
removal difficult.
Bill had twelve more just like it, though he expected to need only the one. Rikti were tough, he knew from experience; but even the toughest of them
couldn't take one of these through the head, with no armor, and survive.
He couldn't believe the Rikti still had her hero license. It baffled and infuriated him, that by showing 'cooperation' -- hah! -- with her
Vanguard interrogators, they'd let her off the hook. Couldn't they -see-? It hadn't been until later, after he'd had time to think, that he
realized it wasn't their fault. Everyone knew the Rikti were telepaths. Obviously, a spy sent in to impersonate humans would have to be an excellent one.
Better than Vanguard specialists? He feared so.
And now she had her hooks into his little girl again. He wasn't going to let any damn Rikti hurt her. He couldn't stop it before, but he sure as
shootin' would now. He didn't give a good goddamn what Miss Romanova had said. Couldn't she see? The damn Rikti was in her head, that's all
there was to it. Making her think things that just weren't so. Just like she'd made his little girl into her unwitting puppet.
He hoped his shot might kill the Rikti; more likely, it would simply send her to the hospital. She still had her license; therefore, she still had Medicom
access. But it was for damn certain that at the very least it would mess up her brains a bit. Maybe enough to let his little girl break free of her spell.
He hoped.
His bow moved smoothly, unerringly tracking the pair as they wandered down the street. He almost took the shot then and there, but checked his fingers before
they more than twitched; he had to wait until it would be a clean kill, and there were pedestrians behind the Rikti infiltrator right now. He didn't think
the arrow would come out the other side, but if it did he wanted it stopped by a wall or the ground, not some innocent human shield.
Finally the pair came to the doorway. Alice fumbled with the lock, while the traitor stood behind her. The angle was good. A through-and-through shot would
hit the brick wall, nothing else. He took a deep breath and shifted his aim.
With his experience and skill, it wasn't conscious. He simply knew that, at this range and wind speed and direction, with the updraft from the building he
stood on and the downdraft from the road itself, the flexing and spin of the arrow and the natural unconscious movements of the head, all the factors, the
angle was thus-and-so. He couldn't have explained it, but he -knew-.
"I'm sorry, daughter," he murmured quietly as the arrow steadied on his chosen point of aim. He watched with his unaided eyes as Melissa finally
opened the door. Good. She was clear. His fingers could release the arrow now, it would streak through the air and blow that traitorous Rikti's head all
over the brick, and that would be that.
So why wouldn't they work? He realized, abruptly, that something was wrong. He had the shot, the Rikti was standing there, Melissa was beckoning her to
enter, and for some reason he just couldn't ... let... fly....
Alice.
Her name is Alice, you damn old fool, his mind told him, even as his body remained locked in tight readiness.
Alice. Not Melissa.
Slowly, the bow fell and the bowstring relaxed. His body, still in combat mode, dropped back down into cover behind the air conditioner units on the rooftop
without him deciding to do so. And then he was sobbing as the memories and emotions and rage and terror and all of it came rushing back to the forefront, all
over again.
At the doorway to the apartment building, Inyme turned and looked down the street, eyes squinted against the glare of the sun.
"What's the matter?" Alice said from inside. "C'mon in, you're letting the heat out."
Inyme entered the building and shut the door.
"Too old for this," Bill muttered as he threw the last of his essentials into his battered old duffel bag and cinched the top shut. He glanced
around the apartment and took a deep breath. He'd always lived simply, and now was thankful for that. The computer on the desk by the window would go
back to Mag, who was already on the way to pick it up; Bill had never gotten past basic email with it anyway and regarded it as more annoyance than tool.
Momentos and knickknacks and whatnot simply didn't exist; he didn't care for clutter much and all his pictures sat safely in a photo album. He did
feel a pang of regret over having to leave his library behind, but they would have a good home -- he'd left a note for his landlady that someone from the
Legendary would be by to pick them up. That plus the extra two weeks of rent he'd put in the envelope should keep her satisfied.
The only things left, then, were his clothes and his weapons, both in the duffel. And his resignation letters to Vanguard and The Legendary, sitting on the
table, ready to be dropped in the mail.
A knock sounded on his door.
"You're early, Mag," he called as he went to open it -- and froze.
"Running away, old man?" The Rikti stood there, blocking his doorway.
"I ought to kill you right here and now," he heard himself say.
"Then kill me," Inyme said, staring straight at the older man with an intensity that almost made Bill worry that, non-aggressive tendencies aside,
she might actually use the psychic powers he'd seen her demonstrate before. "You might as well. You're going to stab Alice in the heart if you
vanish. Might as well make a full go of emotional trauma and satisfy your bloodlust in the process."
Bill bristled, glaring back at her. "You'd love that, wouldn't you? Make someone like me out to be the bad guy for recognizing Rikti for what you
really are. Playing on the fact that I lost my family to you bastards in an attempt to make me do something stupid that makes you look better."
Inyme's jaw tightened, but it wasn't anger that Bill could see in those disturbingly human eyes. "No. I'm just trying to go along with your
patent idiocy, you stubborn old man! Don't you get it? If you up and disappear because you can't take what's happening, it will hurt Alice.
There's been enough permanent loss over this blasted, wasted war without you adding to it! Brightsky lost her parents, you lost your family, and Alice
lost her parents and even her past! And we all want the pain to go away, but we can't let go of the stupid hate! We kill you, you kill us, more and more
people lose people they care about. And now you want me to just sit back and accept this when I know losing the closest thing Alice has to a father over a
grudge is going to break her heart? No. You can go ahead and kill me, but I'm not letting you go. You don't get to hurt her like that. No one does.
Not if I have anything to say about it."
"Listen here, you arrogant little snot," Bill snarled. "Who are you to talk to me like that? -You're- the one that hurt her already, worse
than any of us. You and all your damn kind!"
Inyme's eyes blazed. "Yes, I did," she admitted steadily. "But I'm trying to fix it, not running away from it. Coward!"
Bill's hand lashed out, the grip that could crumble bricks in his younger years (and not much diluted by age) settling firmly around Inyme's throat.
He could feel her pulse under his palm as his fingers tightened and his teeth ground together in wordless rage.
Inyme raised her chin, her eyes defiant, leaving her arms slack at her side. There was no way she could speak, no air for her to speak -with-, the pressure of
his hand on her throat would have made any attempt at speech a hideous croak. But she spoke, and he heard her clearly.
"Do it."
He squeezed tighter. By arrow or by broken neck, he didn't care how she died!
"Do it." If anything, her voice was louder. He shook his head, a buzzing in his ears distracting him.
"Do it, you coward!"
Bill stared into her face, furious, as her eyelids began to droop and her weight began to drag at his arm. He marveled at the outward perfection of her
disguise, how it hid the hideous truth beneath. A tear leaked out -- my God, she could even cry, the illusion of humanity was that good -- and slid down the
curve of her cheek. His eyes followed it as it encountered his fingers and paused. He savored the moment, knowing that soon she'd be dead and her evil
influence would be over.
Oddly, he found himself remembering the last time he'd seen a dead girl in his doorway.
He'd been away from home when the attack came. It was sudden, and brutal, and had flattened towns and cities the world over. Hardest hit of all, of
course, was Paragon City itself, but that didn't mean the outlying areas went untouched. Rikti troops hit -everywhere-, it seemed, and in the early days
they were all but unstoppable.
His daughter's dead body, lying where it had fallen in the doorway, had been his greeting when he finally made it back to their home. Why she was there he
didn't know, but it didn't matter. His wife was in the living room, butchered by one of the strange blades the Rikti favored. The house hadn't
been ransacked, the troops had just crashed through and killed everyone they encountered.
Even those they had no reason to kill.
Bill flung Inyme away and fell backwards, landing heavily on the floor. Inyme hit the doorframe and staggered, but remained on her feet. Finally, one hand
came up to massage her throat. Her eyes remained bright despite the blue tinge to her lips.
"If you have reason to kill me," Inyme's voice said, causing him to glance at her reflexively and note with a sort of bemused detachment that her
lips weren't moving, "then -do- it. Satisfy your need for revenge, old man."
Somehow, the knowledge that she was in his head, that she had effortlessly heard his very thoughts, didn't bother him at the moment. He didn't feel
much of anything right now.
Her voice took on a different tone as she continued. "Kill me if that's what it takes. I won't stop you. But you are -not- going to abandon
Alice!" Her fierce, protective glare caught his eyes and held them. She dropped her hand from her throat and he could see the dark bruises already
forming, purple against chocolate, hard to see unless you knew what to look for but damning evidence all the same.
He opened his mouth to speak. Closed it. Closed his eyes.
For a time there was silence. Bill didn't know, or care, how long it lasted. Inyme seemed content to wait him out, even though he himself didn't know
what either of them were waiting for. He could tell she hadn't left, by the subtle noises and traces every living being carries with them that they
can't avoid.
If he'd unconsciously hoped -- hah! against a telepath? -- to wait her out, it didn't happen. Circumstance broke the tableau. Noise from outside
caught his attention; Bill raised his head and looked past Inyme to discern the cause.
"Yo, Bill, you sure about -- the hell?" Mag Flashlight appeared in the doorway, his bulky frame bounding up the stairs with that deceptive quickness
that kept his opponents so off guard. The shorter but broader man drew up short outside the doorway, raising an eyebrow and staring past the girl to meet
Bill's gaze. He scowled at what he saw there and turned his gaze on Inyme. Bill watched his eyes take in the bruises on her neck and nodded dully to
himself.
"You're -not- leaving," Inyme repeated. A quick glance told Bill that her mouth still hadn't moved. He winced at the sight of her neck --
his hand had very nearly encircled it entirely, she probably -couldn't- talk normally yet.
He cleared his throat. He knew he should say something. His upbringing and common decency told him that, at the very least, he owed her an apology.
He couldn't.
Not yet... possibly not ever, he admitted to himself, knowing full well that she'd 'heard' every word he'd said in the supposed privacy of his
own skull.
He cleared his throat again and spoke.
"Sorry to drag you all this way for nothin', Mag," he said in a voice so dull and lifeless that he wouldn't have guessed it for his own had
he not heard himself say it. "Looks like I'll be sticking around after all. Plans changed."
Mag Flashlight rolled his cigar thoughtfully from one side of his mouth to the other and back again, then nodded. "Yeah, I guess so," he replied.
"No problem. I'll see you around, Bill." Nodding politely -- "Inyme." -- he stepped back, pivoted, and was gone.
Bill slumped.
"You're not leaving?"
"You know the answer, damn you," Bill said tiredly.
Inyme turned and left, the door closing softly behind her. He knew she paused on the other side of it, both from his own senses, honed by a lifetime of
tracking wild game and wilder criminals, and because her 'voice' drifted across his senses again.
"You owe Alice the apology, not me," she said, and was gone. Bill took off his glasses and rubbed tiredly at his eyes.
God, he was getting too old for this.
This has been sitting for a couple weeks now in final form, and I'm glad Ops chose the format he did for
the finale of Ties. I hadn't quite envisioned it this way originally, but seeing this as an
after-the-credits sort of extended scene really makes sense.
Thanks for letting me play in your story, Ops. You did some awesome work!
--sofaspud
--"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs
his beret firmly on his brow and brought his bow to bear, peering through the scope at the motion he'd spotted -- had been expecting to see -- where the
street ended in a T-junction, at a distance greater than most would consider possible for a man his age to see. Or a younger one, for that matter.
The girl he'd watched grow up over the past year came around the corner of the building, laughing in the cool afternoon breeze and chattering happily with
her companion. Behind her trailed the Rikti traitor. Bill scowled.
Through the scope her features were sharp and clear. He spared a quick glance down the arrow itself, to get the range, then returned his attention to the
magnified image in the glass. His fingers locked around the fletchings, and with a steady, smooth motion, he drew back the arrow. The head was dull,
non-reflective; a solid piece of razor-sharp impervium with bloodletter grooves winding in narrow spirals from tip to base, and backwards-facing barbs to make
removal difficult.
Bill had twelve more just like it, though he expected to need only the one. Rikti were tough, he knew from experience; but even the toughest of them
couldn't take one of these through the head, with no armor, and survive.
He couldn't believe the Rikti still had her hero license. It baffled and infuriated him, that by showing 'cooperation' -- hah! -- with her
Vanguard interrogators, they'd let her off the hook. Couldn't they -see-? It hadn't been until later, after he'd had time to think, that he
realized it wasn't their fault. Everyone knew the Rikti were telepaths. Obviously, a spy sent in to impersonate humans would have to be an excellent one.
Better than Vanguard specialists? He feared so.
And now she had her hooks into his little girl again. He wasn't going to let any damn Rikti hurt her. He couldn't stop it before, but he sure as
shootin' would now. He didn't give a good goddamn what Miss Romanova had said. Couldn't she see? The damn Rikti was in her head, that's all
there was to it. Making her think things that just weren't so. Just like she'd made his little girl into her unwitting puppet.
He hoped his shot might kill the Rikti; more likely, it would simply send her to the hospital. She still had her license; therefore, she still had Medicom
access. But it was for damn certain that at the very least it would mess up her brains a bit. Maybe enough to let his little girl break free of her spell.
He hoped.
His bow moved smoothly, unerringly tracking the pair as they wandered down the street. He almost took the shot then and there, but checked his fingers before
they more than twitched; he had to wait until it would be a clean kill, and there were pedestrians behind the Rikti infiltrator right now. He didn't think
the arrow would come out the other side, but if it did he wanted it stopped by a wall or the ground, not some innocent human shield.
Finally the pair came to the doorway. Alice fumbled with the lock, while the traitor stood behind her. The angle was good. A through-and-through shot would
hit the brick wall, nothing else. He took a deep breath and shifted his aim.
With his experience and skill, it wasn't conscious. He simply knew that, at this range and wind speed and direction, with the updraft from the building he
stood on and the downdraft from the road itself, the flexing and spin of the arrow and the natural unconscious movements of the head, all the factors, the
angle was thus-and-so. He couldn't have explained it, but he -knew-.
"I'm sorry, daughter," he murmured quietly as the arrow steadied on his chosen point of aim. He watched with his unaided eyes as Melissa finally
opened the door. Good. She was clear. His fingers could release the arrow now, it would streak through the air and blow that traitorous Rikti's head all
over the brick, and that would be that.
So why wouldn't they work? He realized, abruptly, that something was wrong. He had the shot, the Rikti was standing there, Melissa was beckoning her to
enter, and for some reason he just couldn't ... let... fly....
Alice.
Her name is Alice, you damn old fool, his mind told him, even as his body remained locked in tight readiness.
Alice. Not Melissa.
Slowly, the bow fell and the bowstring relaxed. His body, still in combat mode, dropped back down into cover behind the air conditioner units on the rooftop
without him deciding to do so. And then he was sobbing as the memories and emotions and rage and terror and all of it came rushing back to the forefront, all
over again.
At the doorway to the apartment building, Inyme turned and looked down the street, eyes squinted against the glare of the sun.
"What's the matter?" Alice said from inside. "C'mon in, you're letting the heat out."
Inyme entered the building and shut the door.
"Too old for this," Bill muttered as he threw the last of his essentials into his battered old duffel bag and cinched the top shut. He glanced
around the apartment and took a deep breath. He'd always lived simply, and now was thankful for that. The computer on the desk by the window would go
back to Mag, who was already on the way to pick it up; Bill had never gotten past basic email with it anyway and regarded it as more annoyance than tool.
Momentos and knickknacks and whatnot simply didn't exist; he didn't care for clutter much and all his pictures sat safely in a photo album. He did
feel a pang of regret over having to leave his library behind, but they would have a good home -- he'd left a note for his landlady that someone from the
Legendary would be by to pick them up. That plus the extra two weeks of rent he'd put in the envelope should keep her satisfied.
The only things left, then, were his clothes and his weapons, both in the duffel. And his resignation letters to Vanguard and The Legendary, sitting on the
table, ready to be dropped in the mail.
A knock sounded on his door.
"You're early, Mag," he called as he went to open it -- and froze.
"Running away, old man?" The Rikti stood there, blocking his doorway.
"I ought to kill you right here and now," he heard himself say.
"Then kill me," Inyme said, staring straight at the older man with an intensity that almost made Bill worry that, non-aggressive tendencies aside,
she might actually use the psychic powers he'd seen her demonstrate before. "You might as well. You're going to stab Alice in the heart if you
vanish. Might as well make a full go of emotional trauma and satisfy your bloodlust in the process."
Bill bristled, glaring back at her. "You'd love that, wouldn't you? Make someone like me out to be the bad guy for recognizing Rikti for what you
really are. Playing on the fact that I lost my family to you bastards in an attempt to make me do something stupid that makes you look better."
Inyme's jaw tightened, but it wasn't anger that Bill could see in those disturbingly human eyes. "No. I'm just trying to go along with your
patent idiocy, you stubborn old man! Don't you get it? If you up and disappear because you can't take what's happening, it will hurt Alice.
There's been enough permanent loss over this blasted, wasted war without you adding to it! Brightsky lost her parents, you lost your family, and Alice
lost her parents and even her past! And we all want the pain to go away, but we can't let go of the stupid hate! We kill you, you kill us, more and more
people lose people they care about. And now you want me to just sit back and accept this when I know losing the closest thing Alice has to a father over a
grudge is going to break her heart? No. You can go ahead and kill me, but I'm not letting you go. You don't get to hurt her like that. No one does.
Not if I have anything to say about it."
"Listen here, you arrogant little snot," Bill snarled. "Who are you to talk to me like that? -You're- the one that hurt her already, worse
than any of us. You and all your damn kind!"
Inyme's eyes blazed. "Yes, I did," she admitted steadily. "But I'm trying to fix it, not running away from it. Coward!"
Bill's hand lashed out, the grip that could crumble bricks in his younger years (and not much diluted by age) settling firmly around Inyme's throat.
He could feel her pulse under his palm as his fingers tightened and his teeth ground together in wordless rage.
Inyme raised her chin, her eyes defiant, leaving her arms slack at her side. There was no way she could speak, no air for her to speak -with-, the pressure of
his hand on her throat would have made any attempt at speech a hideous croak. But she spoke, and he heard her clearly.
"Do it."
He squeezed tighter. By arrow or by broken neck, he didn't care how she died!
"Do it." If anything, her voice was louder. He shook his head, a buzzing in his ears distracting him.
"Do it, you coward!"
Bill stared into her face, furious, as her eyelids began to droop and her weight began to drag at his arm. He marveled at the outward perfection of her
disguise, how it hid the hideous truth beneath. A tear leaked out -- my God, she could even cry, the illusion of humanity was that good -- and slid down the
curve of her cheek. His eyes followed it as it encountered his fingers and paused. He savored the moment, knowing that soon she'd be dead and her evil
influence would be over.
Oddly, he found himself remembering the last time he'd seen a dead girl in his doorway.
He'd been away from home when the attack came. It was sudden, and brutal, and had flattened towns and cities the world over. Hardest hit of all, of
course, was Paragon City itself, but that didn't mean the outlying areas went untouched. Rikti troops hit -everywhere-, it seemed, and in the early days
they were all but unstoppable.
His daughter's dead body, lying where it had fallen in the doorway, had been his greeting when he finally made it back to their home. Why she was there he
didn't know, but it didn't matter. His wife was in the living room, butchered by one of the strange blades the Rikti favored. The house hadn't
been ransacked, the troops had just crashed through and killed everyone they encountered.
Even those they had no reason to kill.
Bill flung Inyme away and fell backwards, landing heavily on the floor. Inyme hit the doorframe and staggered, but remained on her feet. Finally, one hand
came up to massage her throat. Her eyes remained bright despite the blue tinge to her lips.
"If you have reason to kill me," Inyme's voice said, causing him to glance at her reflexively and note with a sort of bemused detachment that her
lips weren't moving, "then -do- it. Satisfy your need for revenge, old man."
Somehow, the knowledge that she was in his head, that she had effortlessly heard his very thoughts, didn't bother him at the moment. He didn't feel
much of anything right now.
Her voice took on a different tone as she continued. "Kill me if that's what it takes. I won't stop you. But you are -not- going to abandon
Alice!" Her fierce, protective glare caught his eyes and held them. She dropped her hand from her throat and he could see the dark bruises already
forming, purple against chocolate, hard to see unless you knew what to look for but damning evidence all the same.
He opened his mouth to speak. Closed it. Closed his eyes.
For a time there was silence. Bill didn't know, or care, how long it lasted. Inyme seemed content to wait him out, even though he himself didn't know
what either of them were waiting for. He could tell she hadn't left, by the subtle noises and traces every living being carries with them that they
can't avoid.
If he'd unconsciously hoped -- hah! against a telepath? -- to wait her out, it didn't happen. Circumstance broke the tableau. Noise from outside
caught his attention; Bill raised his head and looked past Inyme to discern the cause.
"Yo, Bill, you sure about -- the hell?" Mag Flashlight appeared in the doorway, his bulky frame bounding up the stairs with that deceptive quickness
that kept his opponents so off guard. The shorter but broader man drew up short outside the doorway, raising an eyebrow and staring past the girl to meet
Bill's gaze. He scowled at what he saw there and turned his gaze on Inyme. Bill watched his eyes take in the bruises on her neck and nodded dully to
himself.
"You're -not- leaving," Inyme repeated. A quick glance told Bill that her mouth still hadn't moved. He winced at the sight of her neck --
his hand had very nearly encircled it entirely, she probably -couldn't- talk normally yet.
He cleared his throat. He knew he should say something. His upbringing and common decency told him that, at the very least, he owed her an apology.
He couldn't.
Not yet... possibly not ever, he admitted to himself, knowing full well that she'd 'heard' every word he'd said in the supposed privacy of his
own skull.
He cleared his throat again and spoke.
"Sorry to drag you all this way for nothin', Mag," he said in a voice so dull and lifeless that he wouldn't have guessed it for his own had
he not heard himself say it. "Looks like I'll be sticking around after all. Plans changed."
Mag Flashlight rolled his cigar thoughtfully from one side of his mouth to the other and back again, then nodded. "Yeah, I guess so," he replied.
"No problem. I'll see you around, Bill." Nodding politely -- "Inyme." -- he stepped back, pivoted, and was gone.
Bill slumped.
"You're not leaving?"
"You know the answer, damn you," Bill said tiredly.
Inyme turned and left, the door closing softly behind her. He knew she paused on the other side of it, both from his own senses, honed by a lifetime of
tracking wild game and wilder criminals, and because her 'voice' drifted across his senses again.
"You owe Alice the apology, not me," she said, and was gone. Bill took off his glasses and rubbed tiredly at his eyes.
God, he was getting too old for this.
This has been sitting for a couple weeks now in final form, and I'm glad Ops chose the format he did for
the finale of Ties. I hadn't quite envisioned it this way originally, but seeing this as an
after-the-credits sort of extended scene really makes sense.
Thanks for letting me play in your story, Ops. You did some awesome work!
--sofaspud
--"Listening to your kid is the audio equivalent of a Salvador Dali painting, Spud." --OpMegs