takecourage | Debut

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Debut

It should be fairly straight forward: she just needs to find the effluvia, the thing personal enough that it'll let North track down Tara on the other side, beyond the veil. The retainer should do the job; what could mean more to the pretty blonde girl that Tara had been than the possibility of perfect teeth? Alex fills the sink with water and drops the retainer into it. A pale hand grasps at it and, when she looks up, North is holding it, his perfect lip wrinkled with distaste.

"You wanted effluvia," says Alex, with the barest shrug.

The man in the doorway, not a gray but a man, living and breathing and furious, startles her. SHe opens her mouth to speak but it's too late, he's already charging at her, barelling into her and slamming her back against the wall. Her head cracks against the windowsill and she sees stars, shock singing in her ears. His thick fingers curl around her throat and Alex claws at him, black spots already dancing at the corners of her eyes.

Not like this, she begs. Not like this. Not like this.

Van Nuys girl to the end, she jabs her fingers into his throat, like she'd wanted to do to Darlington that day he'd set Lethe's jackals on her. His grip loosens, which lets her suck in enough of a breath to slam her knee up between his legs. When he doubles over, Alex shoves past him, hurtling into the hallway but, shit, she can't remember where the fucking door is and he's right behind her and it shouldn't have been possible for him to be this quick but here he is and she has the chance to think portal magic before he's on her again, and he's broken her ribs, she knows that he has and every breath screams with pain. Before she can get past him again, he has his hands around her throat again.

"Nowhere to run, bitch."

North is at the edge of her vision, shouting, though all she can see is the working of his mouth - from this far, she can't hear a word. He wants her to let him in, doesn't he? It's the only chance she has. She reaches out her hand to him. She lets him in.

Everything after that is a blur. She hears his bones crunch: his fingers, his knees but he still manages to punch her hard enough to send her crashing to the floor. Even North's strength can't keep her standing. She goes under. And she's only dimly aware of Turner there, with his badge and his gun, saving the day. Her pain is like a time-lapse photograph, blooming all in one go, and Alex can barely keep herself standing. She just needs to get back to Il Bastone. She just needs to get back to Lethe, and then everything will be okay

Except Darlington won't be there, will he? So maybe everything is never going to be okay again…

She hears Dawes' voice, barely stumbles up the stairs to the armoury and props herself up against the side of Hiram's Crucible. It vibrates softly, gently. Alex keeps herself standing while Dawes strips her down and then she crawls into the crucible, sinking down into the liquid that's warm as a dream. As she closes her eyes, Alex wonders if the crucible could burn away her past, her present, make it so she would never have to see another gray. Is that what she really wants?

Hurting so deeply, Alex closes her eyes and lets herself sink.

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"Baba what?" asks Alex, both eyebrows firmly raised. "Look. I appreciate the welcome wagon, but do you have like...t-shirt and sweats or something I can borrow? I feel like this whole conversation wil go easier if I'm not this fucking naked."

"Baba Yaga," Nova repeats, waving an impatient hand. It doesn't matter. He considers the bowl of liquid and then sighs, accepting the sacrifice he's about to make. Shrugging out of his sweatshirt, Nova can only remind himself that it's not even really Superdry, since brands don't actually seem to exist out here. Oversized as it is on him, it'll cover her like a dress.

"My apartment's a couple floors up. I guess this one's where you're gonna be living." He tosses her the hoodie and waits.

He doesn't seem about to turn his back and Alex remembers, suddenly, stripping down to her bra in front of Darlington and how his pretty face had coloured when it had. Half turning away, she stands up, the milky liquid sheeting down her body, coming up to her knees once she's standing. She takes Nova's sweatshirt and pulls it on over her head, relieved when it hits her mid-thigh. Somewhat awkwardly, she steps out of the crucible, wet feet hitting the floorboards.

"Thanks."

Nova glances sideways but doesn't otherwise turn. He's already seen her naked in a bowl of whatever the fuck it is. Turning away would make it weirder, in his opinion. "I hope that stuff washes out," he says. "I like that one." But she thanks him all the same and he nods to acknowledge it.

"You're pretty calm about being in another dimension. This normal for you...?" He trails off, realizing he doesn't know her name.

"It's just milk," she says. It's almost as clear as water now that the crucible's done its job. Carefully, still feeling the ghost of aches just healed, Alex climbs over the edge of the crucible. When she slips, she grabs for Nova's arm, catching herself before she falls.

"It's been...a rough few months," she says.

Despite their less-than-friendly footing, when Alex slips, Nova reaches out to catch her. Her pale hands settle on his arm and he flexes his arm, holding it rigid so that she can get steady. "Yeah, I know how that goes," he says. There's a little smear of that milk on his arm and Nova watches it bead and roll off his blackened skin.

"Don't know if this city is rougher or not than where you came from but it's probably weirder."

He's solid and Alex is grateful for that. She keeps hold of him until she's hauled her way out of the crucible and is standing next to him, watery milk running down her thighs and pooling at her feet.

"Somehow I doubt that," she says. "But try me."

"I got kidnapped by goblins in the middle of a snowstorm last winter," Nova deadpans. He lets Alex decide how serious he is as he walks toward the door, snagging the keys that are left in the knob and holding them out for her to take.

"Last time I met someone new, she woke up in my bed. Came raging out while I was making coffee."

"I just got the shit kicked out of me by a guy who should have been locked in a prison cell and then got healed by a giant fucking magic bowl," says Alex. She slips the keys into the pocket of the hoodie, because she has nowhere else to put them right now.

"Full of milk," Nova adds, darkly amused. "Was it whole or skim?"

For once, the ancient, rickety elevator comes in a timely fashion and Nova gestures for Alex to go in. "I'm on the eighth floor. This is the second." She can walk, if she wants, but like hell he is.

"Goat," says Alex. "Don't ask me why, but it was. I might need to wash my hair." She ruffles the damp ends and wishes that she had a hair elastic so that she could knot it back. "Right."

A gray catches the corner of her eye, and she flinches, looking back at Nova deliberately.

"Goat," Nova repeats. It makes as much sense as anything else, though in his mind, goats belong in stew first and foremost. Never mind the creepy one that roams the countryside that may or may not be a literal devil. He steps onto the elevator and pretends not to see Alex flinch. He wonders what she sees, because she must see something. Anyone lying in a bowl of milk naked to heal probably does.

"Going up," he says, hitting the button for the eighth floor.

Alex braces herself in the corner of the elevator, her eyes closed until the doors slide shut and she's safe with just him. Safe is a strange concept - she's never seen him before, but she trusts him. Or she thinks she does.

"So what else do I need to know?"

"This city brings you here. It doesn't let you go until it's ready. You might leave soon, but you probably won't," Nova says, because there's no point in spinning it. There's nothing that'll make the truth easier to swallow. "You get money every month and it's a'ight. Pays the rent. Won't get you far after that."

He waits for the elevator to shudder to a stop and for the telltale ding of the old thing.

"You want coffee?"

"God, yes," says Alex, and she doesn't think she's ever meant anything so much in her life. "And, you know - pants. If you have any that'll fit." She frowns. "Is this like...a fucking pocket universe or something?"

Her stomach lurches sickly, and all she can think of is Darlington.

"Yeah, pocket universe is a pretty good summary," Nova says. "As far as I know, there's no ritual, no magic, no science, no nothing that works."

Fishing out his keys, Nova unlocks his apartment and gestures for her to go in, following shortly after. "Clothes first or coffee first?" Glancing around, he finds a pair of sweatpants on top of a pile of laundry that he cleaned and never put away, over a week ago.

Darlington is still on her mind and all that she can think about is how much he would hate that - that there's no concrete answer, no way to manage this situation.

"Definitely clothes," she says, conscious of her bare legs. "And if you've got a towel for my hair, that would be awesome too. I probably ought to shower before i start to smell like yogurt, but that can wait, right?"

"Bathroom's there," Nova says, pointing the way. "It looks from the inside." As far as he's concerned, they're well past that, but he can think of plenty of times a white woman got uppity about that kind of thing and none of those instances ends well for him.

Not waiting for an answer, he tosses her the sweatpants and then starts rummaging in the hamper for a clean t-shirt or something.

"Thank you," she says, because she might be an asshole a lot of the time, but she also definitely knows when someone's doing her a favour. She waits until Nova tosses her a t-shirt and then disappears into the little room, shutting the door behind her. She doesn't bother locking it - it's not like he doesn't know she's in here. She stands under the hot water for a long time, letting the crucible wash off her skin. She soaps her hair with shower gel, combing it through with her fingers and then rinsing away the suds.

Eventually, she climbs out, drying herself off, pulling on Nova's clothes and wrapping her hair.

"Thanks," she says, her voice pitched to carry when she opens the door. "That really helped..."

Nova hasn't hooked up much in Darrow, had people stay over even less. It's equal parts startling and amusing to pick up the scent of his own shower gel as it carries on the rising steam. Grinning to himself, he enjoys the image for half a second, and then pushes it away. Alex seems like the kind of person to spot it on him.

"Coffee's there," he says. It's a tiny cup of sugary, bitter cafécito. His own cup is half drained and topped up from the open can of condensed milk between them.

Alex sits down on the sofa and then reaches for the cup, cradling it between her hands, letting the warmth leech into her. Climbing out of the crucible left her cold, but the coffee and the shower are helping.

"So what else do I need to know?" she asks. Her eyes flicker towards movement in the corner of his apartment; a young woman, about her own age, is standing at the window, crying and brushing her hair.

"You go to the train station," Nova says. "They'll give you a creepy-ass file with an ID and bank card and shit. You'll get money in your account every month and it'll pay the bills."

He sees Alex's eyes slide away from him and Nova turns, following her gaze to an empty corner. Instinctively, he hooks his index finger into the beads of his prex and forces his eyes away from that corner. They land on the statuette on his windowsill, above the kitchen sink, instead. Sinmagos might see Jesus but Nova mouths a silent, unseen prayer to El Papá instead.

"There's only one," she says, almost reflexively, because that would have been the next question out of Darlington's mouth. "I'll get rid of her if she does anything but stand there." She watches him touch the necklace. "Are you Catholic?"

"Catholic?" Nova repeats, making a point of sounding insulted. Then his mouth crooks into a grin. "Nah, but I can blend in if I need." Slowly, he extracts his hand from the necklace and lets it fall against his chest. There's no rosary hanging from it, just an elegantly pointed crystal.

"You have the gift of the veil, then?"

"Don't look at me. I'm Jewish, I don't know the difference," she says, and gives him a flicker of a smile. She's never heard it described as a gift before, even if Darlington have been unreasonably jealous when he first found out.

"Something like that," she says.

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