Aftermath

She'd been too drunk to dream the night they came in, but there's no alcohol to drown out the memory tonight.

The earth shakes, and the world is full of the terrible sound of buildings being ripped apart and the air screaming as if in agony.

The wall of white fire chases them, hunting down its prey, and Annabelle knows that no matter how hard they try, they cannot run fast enough....

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

leadinghome

Jaw hanging.

No, he has no words, at all.

"Shit!" Well, besides that.

From:

aeons_crackshot

That was Annabelle's thought at the time too, more or less.

Annabelle keeps talking, voice distant. It's possible that she's forgotten when and where she is. "You run, even though you know you can't escape. The air screams and the world is full of fire...." she shudders a little.

From:

leadinghome

Connor frowns and holds her closer, tighter, to remind her she is not there anymore.

She is safe now.

From:

aeons_crackshot

"It was only 20 feet away when the Door showed up," she continues. "I suspect the two of us are the only ones who got out alive...."

"He killed his own soldiers. Men, women, children, on purpose....I don't....I don't understand how anyone could do that." she whispers, voice cracking.

From:

leadinghome

"Someone who does not care about anything, or anyone." Connor sighs, stroking Annabelle's hair.

From:

aeons_crackshot

"I suppose," Annabelle says with a sigh. She leans into Connor's touch.

It's comforting, being held like this.

"I couldn't save them," she says quietly. "It's not....why just the two of us, why?"

From:

leadinghome

"Why not? Anabelle, you can not blame yourself for not stopping a nuke... nobody could do it, hell, I doubt the eleven of us would be able to do it. You were lucky, far enough to not be hit, and I am sure lost of people are right now having another drink because they had JUST moved out of range too."

From:

aeons_crackshot

No fair using logic, Connor.

"Only because this place showed up when the fire and shock-wave was still 20 feet away," Annabelle replies with a shake of her head. Why were just the two of them snatched out of the hands of certain death? Why them and not someone's mother, someone's child....

From:

leadinghome

"Annabelle. You did not kill them by surviving." His voice is calm, but firm. "There was nothing anyone could have done, and it is not your fault a madman destroyed a city. Blaming yourself, you are only hurting yourself, and not helping anyone who needs your help."

From:

aeons_crackshot

"I know that, in my head," Annabelle replies, putting her head on Connor's shoulder. "I just can't make myself believe it in here," she replies with a sigh, putting one hand over her heart.

Annabelle's used to pulling off the impossible and saving people, you see.

From:

leadinghome

"Well, it helps if you start with taking a stand for yourself." He lifts her face up, looking into Annabelle's eyes. "When you heart tries to take the leap from 'I wish I could have helped more' to 'I am a bad person for not doing it', you have to stop yourself. Put your foot down and repeat to yourself, you did not sacrifice anyone to live, you did not kill any innocents to escape a goddamn nuclear explosion."

"You escaped because Milliways showed up. If you had tried to grab someone else and pull along, you think would would have made it, or would have just been blown to ash?"

"Your feelings hurt because you are a good person, Annabelle. But you can not let the hurting feed itself."

From:

aeons_crackshot

There are tears in her eyes when Connor lifts her face up.

"It was just the two of us down there," Annabelle says quietly. "If there had been other people there I would have gotten them through the door." Even if that meant that she didn't make it out.

One hand cups Connor's face, "I hate feeling small, helpless and afraid," she says with a sad smile. "Did I ever tell you what happened to me when I was 12?" It's not as random a question as it may appear on the surface.

From:

leadinghome

"No, but I can guess the general lines." He leans close and kisses her forehead. "How do you think we felt when we realized how bad we screwed up the world?"

"Well, most of us?" Connor takes Annabelle over to the bed so they can sit down. "Tell me."

From:

aeons_crackshot

"Much the same as I felt the other day, I would imagine" Annabelle says with a sad smile.

She sits down on the bed without thinking about it. "I don't know if I told you that I grew up in the circus," Annabelle says with a small smile. "My mother was an acrobat, my father was a contortionist, and I was involved in nearly every act at one point or another growing up."

From:

leadinghome

Oh, nothing to think about. She might be in slight danger of ending on Connor's lap, but past that? "Yes, you did." He smiles a bit, nodding.

From:

aeons_crackshot

"By the time I was 12, I was doing my own trick-shooting act," she continues.

"I was damn good at it too," she says with a smirk. "Which, unfortunately upset some of my competitors," she continues.

"One of them in particular got very upset at losing customers to a freak, and drunk enough to think that acting on that anger was a good idea...." she says, expression turning slightly grim.

From:

leadinghome

He nods, stroking Annabelle's hair and just listening for now.

From:

aeons_crackshot

"I didn't generally have a weapon with me back then," Annabelle continues. "A rifle is a bit awkward to carry around all the time."

"It was fairly late at night, and I was alone, walking back to my tent, when he confronted me...."

One hand goes to her left upper arm, where a bullet scar used to be visible before a strange creature in the Congo tried to take off her arm. "I wasn't expecting him to shoot me..." she says quietly.

From:

leadinghome

Connor frowns, drawing her closer, nodding. Waiting to hear the rest.

From:

aeons_crackshot

"If he hadn't been nearly too drunk to stand, I would have been dead right then," she says quietly. "He hit me in the arm, and was lining the gun up to take another shot."

"I'd never felt that afraid, that small and helpless before. I knew that nobody was going to get there in time to save me, and I was absolutely sure that I was going to die..."

From:

leadinghome

"But you did not." Quite obviously.

From:

aeons_crackshot

"No," Annabelle says with a small smile. "I'd been knocked over by the shot, and there happened to be a kitchen knife lying there on the ground next to me."

"I had no intention of going down without a fight, and I'd been damn good at knife throwing before I took up shooting."

Annabelle pauses for a moment. "I put that knife in his left eye and killed that son of a bitch before he had the chance to fire again."

From:

leadinghome

"I would have probably made the gun blow up in his hand."

"Likely to give him a face-full of shrapnel."

From:

aeons_crackshot

"I didn't have any extraordinary abilities at all, then," Annabelle says with a wry grin. "Not even my uncanny knack with weapons."

"The local police wrote it off as a miracle shot while a sawbones was trying to get the bullet out of my arm." She smirks, "None of the circus folk felt like enlightening them on that matter."

From:

leadinghome

"Well." He lifts her chin again, and this time kisses Annabelle. "I am glad you are here, and escaped yet another dangerous situation."

"I also know better than to ask you to not do those risky things again..."