Ashfall

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The parking lot no longer bore much resemblance to its original purpose. The tarmac radiated an unreal heat even from this distance, the late evening breeze transformed into a languid desert wind. Instinct demanded a blast site, but there was none immediately apparent. The handful of cars clustered near the store were mostly untouched. A sweltering crescent had been drawn across the ground, its final point blistered and deformed, the whole line haphazard in shape as if a bored deity had tried to burn ants. Tufts of foliage had crackled and folded or was in the process of humbly complying with its fate, stray embers fortunately contained by the deep urban landscape, having lost whatever ludicrous strength the original force had once possessed, now hesitant to gnaw further at the mostly artificial landscape. Eerily unperturbed, moving with passing curiosity, some nameless character traced his path along the inside of the crescent, one hand's thumb half resting, half brushing against the underside of his nose. A dual set of sirens in the distance were reduced to silence, bathing the area in an alien calm.

A muted cry ended up as abruptly as it began, a flickering shadow against the backlit windows of the store, like someone deciding in afterthought that silence was the best means not to be discovered and ducking behind the low walls under the windows. They were certainly not the first to have that idea.

[[characters:Keneh]]'s subconsciousness had clasped her left hand against her lips at an awkward and useless angle, a confused brand of horror battling against an instinct - deemed useless at best and stupid at worst - to shout across and ask if the figure needed help. Groceries had been discarded hastily but in a way that was almost embarassingly apologetic nearby, bag near-neatly folded against the wall, pizzas thawing in passive-aggressive disregard for the local apocalypse. Her right hand clung to her friend's left sleeve, pulling down as if gravity weren't doing them that favour already - and as if she needed unbroken, continual prompting to stay put.

A very different fire glinted further away, a golden, flickering sheen somewhere between the buildings, appearing silent and tame for the distance. A shadow of some forgotten bystander sprinted like a soundless gazelle into deeper shadows.

The apocalypse felt like it should be louder - like there should be gunshots, like there should be ceaselessly crying babies in discarded prams, like ambulances should be piling on top of each other trying to uselessly contain whatever had been pushed into motion. But for the time being, the world was held still with bated breath, trying to untangle its own surprise.

<fc #008888>It's a car crash, her brain told her. It's a car crash and the vehicle must be one of those hoons that drag race and have nitro tanks or something a heck of a lot more flammable than nitro because that heat was beyond mere petrol. And then the car exploded without wreckage. Or flipped onto a roof like something out of a movie.</fc>

<fc #008888>It was a car crash, or maybe a satellite crash or some other man-made object crash because the alternatives were not possible and she was not going to think on them because they couldn't be real. This was an ordinary disaster she had some hope of dealing with and that was that.</fc>

<fc #008888>Instincts were busily disagreeing with her brain and implementing millennia old survival mechanisms constructed when the brain had no idea what was going on and left that sort of business to reflexes. Which was probably a good thing, because instincts were focused on being small and being quiet and stretching senses to look for the danger and figuring out if it was the right time to start running yet. And that seemed more productive than standing frozen and gibbering.</fc>

<fc #008888>Crouching awkwardly wasn't making her knees protest like they should, so apparently they were siding with instinct and adrenaline while her brain rebooted and frantically sought nice calm logical scientific explanations that had to be there and preferably stayed put until the firefighters came because this was their area, right?</fc>

Keneh's knees were less agreeable. A moment later, she's tipping forward awkwardly, free hand pressing against the concrete wall, then pressing the top of her head against it, silently shifting her legs until the crouch morphed into a sit on her heels, marginally more acceptable. Near the end of the awkward motion, her fingers finally relented their useless grip on [[characters:Delaney]]'s sleeve, only to set against her nearest shoulder in some schizophrenic mixture of reassuring and desperate for protection.

Across the road, the glass from the store front //bent//, ballooning a few inches into the store before bursting as transparent shrapnel. The splintering briefly punctured the silence, overture for the nameless one's glance travelling along the luminous interior. A moment later, a scraping sound mingled with a soft, quivering sob, distant and insignificant enough to be imagined, shards of glass still lodged in the battered window's frame dislodging by the hand of some invisible force trailing in the wake of the disaffected man's gaze, visible at a distance mostly by the lazy motion of his head.

To Keneh, jolting at each spike of sound, he'd now unmistakably identified himself as the author of the carnage, extinguishing the trait of his humanity like one of the earlier flames that no longer danced across the tortured pavement. A creature - something that only coincidentally had a human form.

Bundling her panic and pushing it aside, distracted by the distressingly familiar ache of joints in a body that didn't know exercise to save itself, Keneh slid herself around, wincing soundlessly at the soft noise from the cloth of her trouser legs brushing across each other, breath laboured in frequency but painstakingly silent, hunching her back but sitting down with her back against the wall - or mostly the pillar that she and Delaney were both exceptionally close to. Her shoulders betrayed a slight shiver. She was still trying to figure out how to parse the sequence of events, with more primal parts of her psyche seeking a way to persevere against whatever this creature was and whatever its unreal powers were. Keywords bounced through her head - 'telekinesis', most prominently - that knotted themselves rudely into her gut as impossibilities. Amongst her fear, a self-loathing surfaced: How could she not figure out what was happening? Why was she reaching into a bag of vapid, childish notions like this?

In defiance of the situation, her mouth opened, ready to at least whisper something to Delaney - then closed again, for the moment still muted by a crushing fear of being discovered. An unrealistic fear - if the creature on the other side of the road was still endowed with human senses. Not to mention 'unrealistic' was rapidly losing its hold as an acceptable addition to her vocabulary. A hand freshly reached across to Delaney, stroking at her nearest shoulder in a 'it'll be okay, I promise - ...am I right?' gesture.

<fc #008888>A hand came up to silently clasp the one on her shoulder, comfort given and taken by the touch of something that was clearly human because that being may not be. Alien? Mutant? Some form of technology, it should be, but she hadn't seen any and her mind was wedged on X-Men and if they'd been caught up in some film as unwitting extras she was going to figure out who was responsible and then go find a lawyer willing to sue them for emotional trauma.</fc>

<fc #008888>The existence of said trauma should be easy to prove and there was a crater in the street. It'd be an easy case.</fc>

<fc #008888>But first they had to escape that being because there was no way 'fight' was going to work out for squishy untrained mortals like her and Keneh. Maybe there was a back door? They should sneak out a back door while it was busy being destructive elsewhere and surely a building or two in the way would be enough to cover them. A plan. That was a plan and it seemed practical and yet she wasn't moving, still frozen in place just in case it could sense their motion and turn into a cheetah and eat them or something freaky, she wasn't excluding anything right now.</fc>

At least it didn't seem to have noticed them. For something that set a section of parking lot on fire and punched through glass without touching it, it seemed remarkably unperturbed by the idea of someone showing up to riddle it with bullets.

The alarmed cry is audible even before the source become apparent - a slow, comically cautious approach of the creature toward the effortlessly destroyed storefront. Despair- and distance-garbled words fluttered in tatters through the silence, just as the shape of the creature passed into the building, increasingly eclipsed by its own shadow until a moment before it disappeared, it was nothing but a silhouette.

At the shapeless fragments of sound, Keneh's attention had jerked back across one shoulder and over the edge of the low wall, shoulders and spine twisted to catch a glimpse of what was happening now, a fresh bout of adrenaline spiking through her. Two seconds after the nightmare's disappeared from sight, an exhale of hers finally became audible, only to morph into a tense whisper: "...let's go." Nevermind that the flames in the distance suggest this wasn't necessarily something they could run away from... but that was a problem they could face when it became pressing. Staying here was certainly not an option, regardless how dire their chances.

<fc #008888>This was the part where they were supposed to summon a deep well of heroism and, if the movie was feeling kind, discover a hidden power. With or without some ability it was clearly the bit where they grabbed an impromptu weapon and charged over there to save the innocent bystander from the big bad monster as something triumphant and dramatic with lots of brass played in the background.</fc>

<fc #008888>Screw that for a joke. She'd always thought the villains had better wardrobes anyway.</fc>

<fc #008888>"Agreed, going is good," Delaney whispered back as she forced her eyes away from the window and tried to work out the best way to do so. Stay low. Instincts were firm on that one. Stay low, move fast, and move //away// from the predator. "There's got to be a back door and a loading dock, right?" And hopefully someone would have sensibly fled first and left them open.</fc>

That seemed a step ahead of what Keneh had been thinking, registering to her as somewhere to hide for a while, thoughts muddied. Instinct was guiding her home in the simplest sequence, which for the time being meant leaving the far too obvious target that was her own car behind, and leaving through any regular way meant as an exit, then taking a road shielded from the sight of the affected parking lot in a mostly straight line for as long as it took for her gut to shut up about immediate danger. She gave Delaney a look of confusion devoid of any subtext of accusation - then her gaze skittered along their immediate surroundings, realising for an instant of panic that she didn't have much of a sense of direction in her shell-shocked state. As if to make up for the 'needlessly' childish fear, a guilty glance finds the discarded groceries... should they take those along? It both seemed like an irrelevant question and the single most important one. Then she's nodding, agreeing, finally parsing the words correctly, finally //grasping// the situation, immediately on all fours, crawling away from their cover as rapidly as possible, toward the nearest substitute, driven to near-silent action, struggling against the instinct to get up simply to be able to run faster.

<fc #008888>Were they supposed to crawl on all fours or shuffle in a crouch or do some sort of fast werewolf run that she couldn't quite recall. How had that lecture on posture and gait gone? There was a disease that made humans move on all fours and she couldn't remember if they did the diagonal foot and hand thing or the same side sawhorse. Suddenly it seemed very important to know which was most efficient.</fc>

<fc #008888>An uncoordinated hasty scramble that alternated knees banging into the faux-marble and feet trying to tuck under her body surely wasn't it. But it was motion, and it was motion in the right direction, and it wasn't pretty but it wasn't going to take them hours to escape and that was about as much as could be hoped for.</fc>

<fc #008888>As they put a refrigerated display between them and the window Delaney remembered the groceries and had to swallow a hysterical giggle at the thought that they really should have brought them along just in case. This wasn't the end of the world, no looting was required. And if they were looting it should be something that wouldn't melt.</fc>

A part of Keneh was rebelling at the idea that they were shuffling away from the clearly marked exit. A different part was mocking the entire situation. Twenty long seconds had gone by without seeing the enemy; her incredulousness was back in full force. Surely it was okay to stand up and quietly leave, and surely they only had regular problems to deal with. The police would come in and mop all of this up and it would be forgotten a week later. An explanation would be found.

An automatic gesture later, meant to coordinate the rest of the scramble with Delaney, had her continue her crawl forward. It was too late not to look foolish, after all, and there was perhaps use for this yet; just because her psyche couldn't quite decide in what //kind// of trouble she was did not mean it wasn't the worst but most unrealistic of the options.

Two awkward shuffles later, a heavy, rectangular plastic tarp forming a door into a refrigerated room came into view. Keneh craned her neck, trying to discover how much of it must be visible across the road. The result was almost disappointing - there was no direct view at all. That didn't stop her gut from uselessly pointing out the enemy might by now just as well be hiding in that room.

Fuck it.

Another gesture later, willing 'more plausible' mental images of an angry storeworker glaring down at them as they waddled into the staff-only section out of her head, she's somehow leading the way, reluctantly following the advice of ancient auto-pilot subroutines.

<fc #008888>Cold meant the electricity was still on and that was obvious from the lights also still being on but it was somehow reassuring. No idea why though. There was power so it couldn't be //that// bad? This wasn't a raging bushfire, this was something they could theoretically outrun. And look, there was a door showing a sliver of outside, running could commence.</fc>

<fc #008888>Inside of bolting straight for it instincts made her carefully straighten and peer out to check that there wasn't some mutant lurking out there ready to... she wasn't sure what that thing wanted to do but it couldn't be good so she really didn't want to find out. If they came in peace they should go terrorise the wankers in The Lodge, at least that was something useful for a PM to do.</fc>

The room currently wasn't hiding anything but an atmosphere colder than strictly comfortable, dispelling any notion of taking refuge //in// it. The store's employees had wisely made themselves scarce or were out the back having an oblivious smoke. The dim blue light seemed to emphasise the temperature as Keneh struggled to a stand against legs that bore passing semblance to pillars of jelly. Her arms wrapped around her torso without conscious decision to guide them. A glance back at the settling tarp proved no one had followed them - unsurprisingly, only kindling the sense of trespass plucking at Keneh's gut.

No matter. There wasn't much in here and the back door wasn't a subjective mmile away, and no amount of dithering about what might lay beyond it could really compete against the idea of staying here like (very cold) sitting ducks or backing back into the store and hoping for the best.

A few seconds later, they're outside, facing an unmolested stretch of road. Not the apocalypse. Briefly, the thought of backtracking to get the groceries flitted through Keneh's mind, needled by a misplaced guilt. Her left hand found her right arm's shoulder, clasping against it as she paused, slowly becoming aware of the adrenaline in her system.

She closed her eyes for a moment, trying to will herself to calm down, to come to terms with the situation. She was still wholly uncertain of what she'd even witnessed - a nagging doubt in the back of her skull suggested that maybe she'd hallucinated a part of it, or missed a crucial element. A pang of embarrassment wound up her spine. Still whispering, not convinced the relative pocket of safety was necessarily going to last: "...what did we just witness?"

<fc #008888>That was a very good question. Delaney briefly considered it before whispering: "Some sort of rocket crash without the rocket and fire that doesn't look like fire is supposed to and a creepy guy smashing a window and hunting down someone in a shop. Who screamed. So I don't care if it looked like it broke the laws of physics, I vote we get the hell out of here. And then call the cops and report a crazy armed guy and let the people with actual guns and body armour and training deal with it." Whatever 'it' was.</fc>

<fc #008888>"If we've been dosed with a hallucinogen I still want to report it because I want to know what chemical it is and the hospital can probably tell us," Delaney added as an afterthought. Oh look, the science part of her brain was reviving itself.</fc>

Keneh's gut rebelled at the words 'smashing a window', confirming at the very least that they'd shared the hallucination, if not that it had been real. Of course, a hallucinogen was much more plausible than the alternative. It took her a moment of struggle with herself to even voice it, haltingly: "Looked like telekinesis... you- you think it's a trick?" The expected answer was 'yes, of course' - anything to restore sanity. Surely there were plenty of reasons why a window would bend inward, why shards of glass would splinter off the window frame in neat sequence. Just because the stranger in the parking lot had followed the phenomenon unflinchingly with his gaze meant nothing, surely?

<fc #008888>Despite the fact her mind had labelled the person 'mutant' it was highly reluctant to assign 'telekinesis' to his actions. Because telekinesis did not exist. Actions required force and force requires work - or was that the other way around? Her physics modules weren't functioning - and however it worked brainwaves could not provide leverage. So telekinesis didn't exist.</fc>

<fc #008888>Which still left a huge swath of comic book powers intact and possible. "If he can do it more than once it's measurable and not a trick, no matter how he does it." Autopilot, she could do autopilot, although shouldn't she be indulging in the urge to run away? Even if it required running, which was unpleasant. Walk away briskly, perhaps. "I don't know how. Maybe... uh, concealed weapon? A chest launcher? Compressed air? High pitched resonant frequencies?" Except the resonant frequency of glass was within human hearing range, wasn't it? Since the Mythbusters proved opera singers could do it.</fc>

Keneh's gaze wandered up to the sky, seeking the reassurance of familiarity for a moment of flimsy desperation. Then it's back on the landscape. There was a building between them and the destruction - that was an acceptable shield, but for how long? Unthinking, her right hand grabbed a hold of Delaney's sleeve again, and she's crossing the road, looking around. "Okay," she said, single-word acknowledgement of rambles many times more coherent than anything she felt capable of at the moment. "Okay, let's get home, switch on the news, see what they've got to say. By the time we get back there should be something on it." An explanation, reassuring advice, anything at all.