InsaneJournal

AI Fic: A Rush of Blood to the Head 23/24
TITLE: A Rush of Blood to the Head
AUTHOR: Mari
RATING: R
PAIRING(S): Michael/David
DISCLAIMER: This is a wild-ass AU. Nothing that happens in it is true.
SUMMARY: There’s someone in Los Angeles who could change the dynamic of vampires versus humans forever. Naturally, both sides want him dead.
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Due to subject matter, most of the details of David Archuleta’s family have been changed.

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four
Part Five
Part Six
Part Seven
Part Eight
Part Nine
Part Ten
Part Eleven
Part Twelve
Part Thirteen
Part Fourteen
Part Fifteen
Part Sixteen
Part Seventeen
Part Eighteen
Part Nineteen
Part Twenty
Part Twenty-One
Part Twenty-Two



Part Twenty-Three

She was not a machine. She was a woman, and it sucked.

Syesha crept along past a discarded popcorn machine that she swore to God actually had something growing within it, inhaled the scents of mold and must, swore that she heard her own blood thundering in her ears and the blood of everyone behind them. They were too loud. They couldn’t see nearly well enough in the darkness to compete with things that could glide through shadows as if born to them. They were utterly and completely fucked in his mission before it even had a chance to get started, and if they were smart they would turn back now before a whole mess of very evil creatures ripped their heads off and spit down their necks.

Syesha shivered abruptly and remembered how young the kid had felt when he was sobbing on her bed, how young she had felt as she was trying to soothe him and then again later as she was all but collapsing with the force of the tears trying to wrench themselves out of her chest and Carly was standing by in stunned silence. If this was the floodgates opening up, she thought with a wry sense of amusement, knowing that she didn’t really mean it, then she would love to know what the secret code was going to be which forced it back closed again.

“I don’t think that David needs to know about this,” Carly had said after Syesha had finished blurting out everything that she needed to say and was just winding down again from her crying jag.

Syesha had leaned back further against the wall that she and Carly were both bracing themselves against, feeling exhausted and wrung out. “Because it’s not that big a deal?”

She had said it sarcastically, but that didn’t stop Carly from flicking a look at her as if she had been wondering if Syesha had actually found a whole new level of crazy to descend to. “Oh, no,” she had said. “It’s a huge fucking deal, and you’re a moron.” Syesha had held out her hand for Carly to bump fists with and felt much better when Carly had complied. “But getting into it right now will only cause a big, ugly fight, and can we possibly do that after we’ve saved this kid’s ass?”

“He wouldn’t have been taken if it weren’t for me,” Syesha had answered. She had thought that it was a good thing that she had not eaten for several hours, because otherwise she would have wound up depositing it all neatly across her shoes.

Carly had stared straight ahead and wouldn’t look at her. “Maybe he wouldn’t have,” she had said. “Maybe if you had told us that Ramiele was sliding around the security so that she could come and visit you, we would have been able to nail up the hole and stop her.” Carly had turned her head, finally. “And maybe she would have just found another one. We have a lot of them. I’m not going to blow a bunch of smoke up your ass and tell you that everything’s hunky-dory and you didn’t do any harm at all, but we’re running in place here, fighting them. Shit’s going to happen. We all knew that when we signed up.”

“No, we didn’t,” Syesha had felt compelled to point out. Most of them, when they had first agreed to this gig, had not been able to force back the niggling thought that maybe they were going to save the world.

“Okay, no, you’re right. We didn’t have a clue. But still.” Carly had fallen silent and chewed on her thumbnail for several moments before finally reaching out and taking Syesha’s hand. “There’s going to be yelling later, probably, so I’ll say this now: it’s good to have you back, Sy.”

Syesha allowed memory to take over her for only a second before abruptly throwing it back out again. She had a job to do. Being a machine clearly hadn’t gotten her there, but she thought that being a stone-cold bitch just might do it. Ramiele would have been proud.

Someone--Syesha thought maybe Kim, from the feminine sound of the curse that followed-kicked something in the dark and sent it skittering across the floor. Syesha grit her teeth but did not bother to scold, as Kelly’s group all already had to know the danger. Judging by the tense silence that followed, they also all already knew the likelihood that their presences had not been noted by now, and perhaps were being monitored even this very second.

You didn’t do the job that they did for any length of time without developing a certain second sense for danger, not and do it successfully-and the consequence of failure was a broken and drained neck. Something’s wrong, Syesha thought. Something is so very wrong here. She hadn’t made contact with the other two teams since entering the shadows. There was nothing wrong with that, in and of itself, as they were supposed to be triangulating towards the center and Archuleta, but still. Syesha could not shake this feeling of unease that was sweeping through her entire body and all but rattling her bones.

“Do you think--” she started, turning towards Elliot directly behind her.

Something made a scraping sound against the worn carpet, patchy in places with bare cement showing through. Syesha had been in front, informally acting as the leader even though none of them had actually discussed it in any way. There shouldn’t be anyone there, and that could only mean that the person there was not in the strictest sense a person at all. Syesha did not think, but hurled herself to the ground and was dimly aware of the other three doing the same even though a word had not been spoken among any of them. A small person flew over her head, feet first; the kick would have at the very least broken some ribs and knocked the breath out of her if it had connected and maybe, if the person delivering it had been trying hard enough, even broken her spine.

Syesha knew even before she straightened that the deliverer of the kick certainly would have been trying hard enough. She rolled and settled into a crouch from which several different offensive and defensive moves were available to her and watched as Ramiele straightened and spun back around. There were a few security lights still operating; everyone’s faces were lit by an eerie red glow.

Look at that, Syesha told herself as her breath began to quicken in her chest and her heart began to hammer independently of any ability to control it. Memorize every detail. That’s not your friend. She hasn’t been for a very long time, and she never will be again.

“Long time coming,” Ramiele said in a precise tone as she walked slowly back towards Syesha, as if she was reading Syesha’s mind. Syesha ordered her body to respond, to do something. Hell, it didn’t even have to be her, it could be any of them, she wasn’t going to be picky about who took Ramiele out, but the the entire group seemed frozen. Further dark shapes rose from the shadows like liquid; with these Syesha had no difficulty whatsoever doing her job. She jerked in the direction of the first one who caught her eye, drew her gun out, had it leveled, and brought her finger back against the trigger in one fluid move. The security lights caught the thing’s head as it exploded and threw back blood in deep jewel-tones. Maybe she wasn’t going to be able to wave a wand and magically be all better, maybe she knew that it was unhealthy, but Syesha could not help but get an internal thrill at that sight. And if she could just finally get up the nerve to do it to Ramiele, then she would either get better or she would go insane, but at least her wanderings through limbo would be over.

Syesha darted a glimpse from one side to the other, but everyone who could have come to her aid was otherwise occupied. As she was distracted, she saw Ace take a blow powerful enough to hurl a man even his size end over end and straight over what had been a candy counter, when this place had still been running. He made a grunting sound as he fell.

Distractions were the single most cardinal sin that any of them could possibly make. Syesha did not realize how dangerous a sin it actually was until she was struck in the face and then the ribs in rapid-fire, knocking first all of the air out of her lungs and then making her teeth in their back sockets rattle so hard that she was certain she was going to wind up spitting one of them straight out and into Ramiele’s face. Ramiele didn’t seem as if she would actually mind. She was grinning, she was exultant, she was...the exact opposite of everything that the friend that Syesha had known would have done.

“Been a long time coming, Sy,” Ramiele repeated. She bounced rapidly from one foot to the other, waiting for...what? For Syesha to get her wind back, so that the fight would be fair? Syesha might be crazy, but she was not nearly crazy enough to believe that. Ramiele was holding back because she wanted something that would be fun.

Syesha thought of the way that Carly had called her “Sy” earlier, and how she had done such a good job of meaning it, and wrinkled her teeth back from her lips. “Don’t call me ‘Sy’,” she snapped back at Ramiele. “That’s something that only my friends get to call me.”

“I thought that I was your friend, Sy,” Ramiele insisted to her. She never lost her eerie smile, was the worst part of it. Syesha on a sudden burst of rage wanted to knock it straight off her face. “You never told anyone about my little visits, after all.”

Syesha did not know how Ramiele could have possibly known that, unless she had actually succeed in putting bugs within the compound. Whatever Ramiele had not been sure of, though, Syesha was sure that her smile would have confirmed only a second later. She could actually, physically feel the blood falling away.

“You used to be my friend,” Syesha snapped at Ramiele. “Now you’re just the thing that’s wearing her skin.”

Ramiele’s face twisted. Syesha was terrified for a second that what she was seeing was actual hurt, and that would shatter her, that would kill even the infant thing inside of her that was actually trying to rise up and do its job. She was lucky; Ramiele’s face went so cold and blank less than a second later that it was difficult to even believe that a person had ever been there at all.

Good. Because all that left was a monster, a creature that had been made for one thing and one thing only, and Syesha intended to take her out. She danced backwards with a speed that even she would not have thought herself capable of as Ramiele came at her. It was all that she could do to even stay on her feet; Ramiele had been so very good when she was alive, it made sense that it would carry across with her even here. Syesha slipped once, lost one step out of the dance that she and Ramiele were doing with each other, and came so damned close to winding up with a knife in her gut that it took her breath away. She dropped down to the floor, intending to sweep her leg out in her favorite kick and knock Ramiele’s feet out from under her so that she could finish her off once and for all, but neglected to remember that it was Ramiele who had taught her that move in the first place. Ramiele hopped over Syesha’s foot as easily as if they were playing a game of skipping rope with one another. She also did one further, grabbed Syesha’s retreating ankle, and jerked her forward as if she weighed nothing at all. Syesha brought her teeth together with a clicking sound and nearly took the tip of her own tongue off as she hit the ground hard. She could feel the back of her shirt riding up, consequence of Ramiele dragging her by that foot across the floor that still had ancient remnants of candy ground into it.

Syesha had one answer for that, and she swore to herself that no matter what else happened, she would not regret it. There was a terrible splintering sound as Syesha put her booted foot into Ramiele’s mouth that Syesha knew she would recognize as that of teeth breaking if she only let herself stop and think about it. She jerked back before Ramiele could gather herself enough to retaliate, but did not go far, and this time her kick was successful in sweeping Ramiele’s legs out from underneath her and putting her flat onto her back on the floor. Syesha rocked back onto her heels and into a position in which she could have done several different things--attack, defend, remain exactly where she was--and came so very close to doing the third, watching as Ramiele struggled to pick herself back up. She must have hit her head very hard. Ordinarily, even when she had still been human, she would have leapt back into an upright position so quickly that the eye hardly would have been able to follow her.

Ramiele managed, it finally, dragging one leg; with a rage that must have come so quickly that Syesha had hardly even noticed its presence, she had nearly broken Ramiele’s ankle.

“Bitch,” Ramiele spat at her, in a tone that Syesha only barely recognized as Ramiele at all. The girl that she had known had almost never sworn.

And that was the point.

“You’re goddamned right,” Syesha said in a clipped tone, not trusting herself to say anything further, and hardly paused long enough to drop her gun and draw a silver stake from the small of her back. It was warm with the weight of her body, and Syesha knew exactly what she needed to do with it. Syesha ducked one punch and then wound up taking another, straight in the mouth hard enough to snap her head back and fill her lower lip with blood. She spat it to the side and even in the eerie red light was able to see the eyes of every vampire in the place triangulating upon it. Syesha hardly even registered this fact, let alone considered the possibility of using it to her advantage, before she hurled herself at Ramiele for all that she was worth.

Ramiele was impossibly strong now, but there were still certain laws of physics that she could not argue against. Syesha hit her with her larger and taller form, and the both of them tumbled over with Ramiele on the bottom. Syesha did not stop to think of strategy or finesse as she did it. She didn’t think at all, hurled herself forward only. That didn’t mean that what happened next occurred without her control; Syesha didn’t get the out to tell herself that it was accidental. The silver stake was warm in her hand, dangerous proximity weapon that she needed to put away, put away right now and collect her gun, little girl, and Syesha swung it in a short arc like it was an extension of her arm. Ribcages made a sound like breaking spaghetti when they splintered. Syesha ended her flip with both hands braced to either side of Ramiele’s head, staring down in shock at what she had done. Ramiele finally, wholly looked like herself again, staring up at the ceiling with eyes wide open. Syesha could not get away from her fast enough. She skittered backwards until she was touching the long-discarded snack bar.

Her legs wobbled out from under her and threatened to spill her from her crouch and straight onto her ass instead, but there was no time for the meltdown that she desperately wanted to have. Syesha glanced up and saw that the final vampire, the only one that was not yet done dying, had Ace by that long hair that was probably pretty damned impractical, now that Syesha paused and thought about it. His head was wrenched back at an angle that had to be straining his spine to a level that it had never been expected to actually tolerate; fangs were only a few millimeters away from his neck. In the time that it took to draw a breath and less than it actually took to let it out again, Syesha drew her remaining gun and fired one shot. The vampire fell, harmless and dead in such a way that it would not be coming back from, before smoke even had time to curl up from the muzzle of the gun.

Syesha’s legs stopped wobbling and finally made up their mind, refusing to hold her any longer altogether. She would not look at Ramiele. She would not look at the stake that she no longer had in her hand. She would not do it.

She could not say her mantra, either, she discovered, even if she had wanted to. Syesha put her head down between her knees of the floor and took in deep gulps of the must and stale popcorn smell of the place as she struggled to make her heart stop sounding so much like that of a caged bird. I’m going to lose my mind, she thought, the words flying through her head at a manic’s speed. I’m going to lose my mind right here and now, and that’s going to be the end of this entire deal.

Someone touched her on the hair; Syesha nearly screamed and, wrenching her head up and striking out hard, nearly taking off Ace’s arm at the elbow before she recognized that it was him. He backed off a step, hands held up in the universal gesture of beneficence. “Easy. easy,” he said. “I wanted to thank you.”

“Don’t thank me for that,” Syesha gasped. It was all that she managed to say before she had no choice but to leap up again, for the other option was to throw up across her own legs. Pain like ice picks went up and down her sides; she wondered if she had not taken a few blows to the ribs that she had been too focused upon other things to notice. Syesha spat when she was done and, even though she was struggling hard to keep it under control, felt sobs starting to rise in her chest. The other three were all standing about and staring at her as if she had grown a second head. Syesha could really not bring herself to give a fuck.

“She was a vampire,” Ace said finally, He sounded as if he was on the verge of touching her again, and if he did that, Syesha swore to God, she was going to rip his arm off at the shoulder and worry about consequences later. “Come on, any one of us learned a long time ago how to do that and shrug it off--”

“I don’t want to be like you,” Syesha blurted without thinking. She leaned back against the faded and battered popcorn stand and put her hands over her face. Her breath was a sick-smelling rasp. Her entire body felt as if had been submerged in ice. She was holding her breakdown back with the single whitest-knuckled grip that she was capable of, and she had no way of knowing how long that would last. “I don’t want to be like you,” Syesha whispered again, though she had no idea what the hell else she was supposed to be in the absence of that.

No one here to hold your hand, princess.

Syesha pushed the heels of her hands so hard against her eyes that she saw spots and took deep breaths, one in, one out, until the world stopped swinging so alarmingly from one side to the next. She used no silencer; the shot had echoed all about the place, and her ears were still ringing with it. And yet no one was rushing to see what was the matter.

If she put any more pressure against her eyes, she was sure to bruise. Syesha considered. Her group had no leader; Kelly had gone with Carly and a handful of her own people. Peeking out from underneath her hands when she was certain that she would fall over or burst into tears, Syesha listened carefully. Two of her people, so far as she knew, were still alive. Syesha did not even want to think about what she would do if she was mistaken.

“Something’s very wrong,” she said. Her answer was a series of glances traded back and forth among the others, like, No shit, there’s something wrong here, cuddlebutt. Syesha took a deep breath, and then another, her mind whirring, Why do you ignore a gunshot? Because it doesn’t matter. Because the rest of the force has already been taken, and what’s left ain’t even close to being a threat.

Another deep breath. She didn’t feel as if a sedative would be a good idea any longer. That didn’t mean that she felt good, either, but she needed to take what she could get. Fucked since we started, Syesha told herself grimly before she drew both of her guns.

“Well,” she said. “Is there anyone here who’s really thinking about retreating?”

Elliot flashed her a smile that look bizarre against the essential kindness of his face. He said, trading a glance with the others and gathering their assent without a word needing to be spoken, “Not a hope in hell.”

Syesha nodded. “Then it’s going to have to be blietzkrieg,” she said. “Forget stakes, knives, or anything else that you think would be an honorable way of taking them down. Bullets to the brain. That’s it.”

And Kim, whom Syesha had been largely dismissing up to that point, drew both of her guns at once, ably flicking the safeties off with her thumbs. “I don’t think that you’ll find any objection to that.”

“Okay.” Syesha nodded. “Okay.” The way that they were all looking at her, the way that they had looked at Kelly, both as if they would follow her to the ends of the earth and that she had damned well better have a plan for getting them there, was both unnerving and exhilarating. Syesha ended with a tick of her head that they should follow her, and did not need to tell them to keep their senses about them. The vampires knew that they were here. Everything forward was going to be a hard uphill slog.

As she passed Ramiele, Syesha knelt and with trembling fingers drew Ramiele’s lids down so that she was no longer staring up at the ceiling in such a disturbing way. She caught Ace watching her as she drew her hand back. Syesha didn’t allow herself to feel self-conscious. “You should have done the same for Chris,” she said softly as she rose again.

Ace shook his head. “Wasn’t Chris there any longer.”

“Then you should have done it for the same reason that we hold funerals--respect for what was there.” Syesha was proud of herself; she sounded much calmer than she actually felt. Maybe being a machine was out of her grasp, but when push came to shove she could still be one tough, compartmentalizing bitch. Ace still looked at her as if he couldn’t even begin to understand what she meant and why it was important, but Syesha still thought that she needed to say it. Maybe he would get hit in the head really hard and it would sink in, or maybe it wouldn’t; either way, the feeling of having swallowed lead eased from Syesha’s chest just a little.

They didn’t attempt stealth. Syesha didn’t want to give the vampires the satisfaction of thinking that they were actually fooling anyone. She had a feeling that the others really just wanted to taste blood. They weren’t nearly as different as the things that they were hunting as they probably wanted to think, in that regard. It came down to the bloodsuckers themselves. The more that they ran across, or that ran into them, the closer they were to center. Syesha pulled her finger back against the trigger so many times that she ran out of one clip and hand to switch to another, ignoring the way that her hands had not stopped shaking and that she could still feel adrenaline running through all of her veins. There must be a neon sign on her.

Come and get me, fuckers, Syesha thought grimly, and watched a vampire’s head explode like a melon left in the sun. She ducked back to keep herself from being splattered. That left one theater in front of them, the best chance that they had left. Syesha traded a glance with Elliot and, as one, the two of them kicked open the door. Syesha was feeling pretty good about the imminent badassery of that move until her leg was abruptly seized and she felt herself flipping through the air, landing hard on her back and getting every ounce of air knocked out of her lungs. Upside down, she saw David and Carly, both looking horrified. She saw Jason and his remaining bride. She saw the kid. And, from the other side of the theater, the emergency exit, she saw a dark shadow that was moving much too quickly to be made of human flesh.

Syesha rolled hard to the side before she could be impaled with what looked like a fragment of the actual fucking seats and leapt to her feet. She didn’t have time to think after that. She didn’t have time to do much of anything at all other than fight; it was not the comfort and ideal that it had been, but she would take what she could get.

And the feel of a vampire’s neck snapping before she finished it off was still not something that she would ever regret.

End Part Twenty-Three

Continue to Part Twenty-Four