Who: Sachiel (hymnalize) & Elizabeth Gryffiths (outofboundaries); special guest appearance by Saul Cain's (byliner) near-corpse. What: Bailing folks out. When: Sometime during day two (Feb 10) of London falling down around everyone's ears. Where: The Metropolitan. Eventually Haven. Warnings: Nothing to speak of.
Elizabeth was, she supposed, in a certain kind of shock. (And boo hoo to that; she and everyone else in London. Self-pity had never been one of her strong suits.) She was still flush with memories of the birthday party to end all parties, as well as the dizzying dream-made-reality of a life rearranged to accommodate all those desires which she'd never dared voice aloud. Life with more opportunity, better choices, the savor of success; it’d disappeared, that fantasy, back into the ether. And yet there was clear memory still of her shaking hands scribbling hurried notes back and forth with Cath, who was out knee-deep in the trouble, and in response Lizzie's normal protectiveness turned into a blistering rush of fear for her sister's safety. The Library, she hoped (prayed, and considered, briefly, the merits of begging) would keep Catherine Gryffiths safe. There was a fuzzy-edged half-memory of winding through London gone mad, the city turned on itself, and Elizabeth alternating between running, slow-cautious walking, and occasionally the removal of her heels to pick through places torn apart by dreamers. She remembered the single-mindedness which told her to go to The Met, to find Saul -- because if anyone would know what the fuck was going on, or how to dig to the bottom of it, it would be him.
The blood was brighter than it had any right to be. And Saul? Saul who was huge, was a horrible excuse for a human being, loathsome and detestable (but once Lizzie's own kind of idol)? Saul who spat in the world's face and said the things which needed saying, stood even taller than he already was for that cocksure behavior -- he looked small when set beside the man (had it been a man? No, no it had not.) whose own grin somehow made Saul Cain's look dim and inoffensive. Lizzie had all but staggered into The Met, upon a scene which looked disturbingly like a Jackson Pollock painting. After that, memory was courteously blotted out by a curtain of adrenaline, panic finally come to a head after the long and exhausting trek across London, which continued to writhe in full apoplexy. There had been bargaining and threats, she thought, and the kind of toothy grin which made many women defensively clutch the bristle of keys between their fingers. A laugh and a wink and a nod, and if she didn’t think over-hard on the not-man who had been so intent on eviscerating their mutual acquaintance, she could forget the sickening lurch of fear. Fear, fear from her. Lizzie Gryffiths, who strutted up to interesting trouble and arrogantly put her hand between its legs, because that was how half the good stories were born. None of that panache here and now: she was terrified.
So memory was in equal turns crystalline and fogged-over, which was all well and good since not a whit of it really mattered. She’d tempted fate and stuck her head back outside; the phones were dead, the streets alternating between chaos and calm. (Was A&E an impossible dream? Was the world falling down around their ears?) Frustrated, she’d made quick search of the office and overturned what hadn’t already been thrown aside, because this fucking idiot man was bleeding to death on the floor -- half-dead already, look at him, the overachiever. She cursed him at some point -- ‘Do you know how many people will offer me awards if I let you die? I’ll get a Pulitzer for photos,’ that sort of thing -- kneeling on the tile, the vile man she’d looked up to barely breathing and bleeding out, ruining her dress, Elizabeth’s hands sticky with blood while she stared at the wet ruin of open wounds and the disturbing play of light off things which never ought be exposed.
The prayer, then, was desperate. Oh God-- Thoughtless, the sort of thing a shell-shocked woman newly inducted to magic could hardly be aware of. --weakness of our nature-- It was slipping into autopilot, a knee-jerk falling back onto faith Elizabeth had never actually given up, but instead set to one side, reprioritized. --those evils which we suffer-- It was painfully sincere, the sort of sharp clarity of faith she couldn’t remember since a childhood spent packed into a pew, crushed between two sisters like heavily-perfumed and much-mended comfort blankets. --please, please, please, please. If this was magic, then she didn’t want it.