Harry Dresden (i_wizard) wrote in we_coexist, @ 2011-01-05 16:13:00 |
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Entry tags: | harry dresden, in arkham |
Things Don't Get Any Easier When You're Dead [Arrival Narrative]
The only certain thing in life is change. Most of Harry's changes, lately, hadn't been good ones.
Maybe this one wouldn't be good either... but it didn't have that feel to it.
He took forty minutes shaving and putting on his nicest clothes, which amounted to jeans and a t-shirt that had actually been ironed. He didn't have any cologne, so the deodorant and soap would have to do. Harry didn't allow himself to think about what was going on. In a dream, if you ever start to realize it's a dream, poof! It's gone. Harry didn't want that to happen.
After that, waiting for Murphy to come back, he spent a while just... breathing. She'd said an hour. That would be fifteen more minutes. So Harry listened to the water around the boat. The ticking of the clock. The peaceful silence. Drinking in the comforting sense of solitude all around.
Then he said, aloud, "Screw this Zen crap. Maybe she'll be early." He exited the Water Beetle's main cabin, into the early afternoon sun, shielding his eyes against the light to study the Chicago skyline.
His foot slipped just a little, and Harry, about as nautical as a camel, nearly lost his balance. Something smacked into the wall of the cabin behind him, a sharp popping sound, like a rock thrown against a wooden fence. He turned, and it felt slow for some reason. Harry looked at the Beetle's cabin wall, bulkhead, whatever, and thought, Who splattered red paint on my boat?
Then his left leg started to fold all by itself.
He looked down at the hole in his shirt, just left of the sternum, and thought, Why did I have to pick the shirt with a bullet hole in it? Then he fell off the back of the boat, into the icy waters of Lake Michigan.
It hurt, but only for a second. Then his entire body felt deliciously warm, monstrously tired, and the sleep that had evaded him seemed, finally, to be within reach.
It got dark.
It got quiet.
And in the depths of it came a bitter, hateful old man's voice. "Die alone!"
Harry opened his eyes and screamed. White light flooded into his eyes, and he shut them quickly, blinded by the intensity. He struggled to sit up, but something was holding him down. The water was gone, the quiet broken. He could hear noises all around him, though they seemed muted. Footsteps, machines. A buzzing noise. His hands were caught at the wrists. Harry yelled again, more a reaction to the agony in his chest than anything else. He could feel it still, the bullet tearing through him, the icy waters washing over his head... but there was no blood on his chest, no water. Just the beeping of a heart monitor - which was going damned fast - and footsteps in the hall.
He risked opening his eyes again. The room was white, entirely white. He was wearing white. Even the grate covering the small window on the door was white. The only thing standing out were the pale brown leather straps secured to his bare ankles, wrists, and across his chest.
The door rattled. Someone was out there. And as much as Harry wanted another person there, someone, anyone to drive back that curse ("Die alone!"), he wasn't a fool. Whoever had put him in this bed wanted him helpless.
Fear was gripping him, and Harry used it, channeled it through his hands. "Hexus!" he shouted, and heard the heart monitor go static and die. On his chest, he felt the pads burn out, leaving tingles of electricity across his skin. Metal scraped at the door, and the locks turned. Harry tugged at his wrists, wishing like hell that his father had taught him about escaping from these types of things, and tried a fast spell. He was too scared to focus the energy properly, but it came out as ice. A blast of freezing cold to his right wrist, shattering the metal in the strap and allowing Harry to get one arm free.
Then the door swung open. Men in white rushed into the room. One voice called out, "He's loose!" and one of the men fell over Harry's free arm, pinning it down. Harry let out an outraged cry. Dying in Lake Michigan to this? What the Hell?
He tried to move, but the searing cold had burned his wrist painfully, and the man holding it down had no idea about that. Harry yanked, trying to free his arm, but he couldn't get enough leverage to free himself. Not with the rest of his limbs being held down by other men in white. Dimly, Harry was aware of a pinprick in his thigh, but he was too busy struggling to give it any real consideration. A moment later, however, his limbs became lead weights and clouds of cotton began to fill his mind.
He tried to focus on a spell, but the cottony feeling in his head was messing things up. "Ven... ventas" he tried, the fingers of his right hand wiggling a bit as the man replaced the leather strap and secured it. Not so much as a flutter of air.
The men were talking. Harry tried to listen, but he was losing the battle to stay awake.
"...he get out anyway?"
"..magician... escape artist..."
"...thinks he's some kinda wizard..."
No, thought Harry. I am a wizard. It was the last conscious thought he had before the sedative took effect.