Entry tags:

!completed gdoc, !log, [plot] power outages, eve levine (notthateve), kristof nast (wastheheir), ~2023 february

Who: Eve and Kristof
What: The ceiling comes down on Eve, Kristof saves the day
When: Late Afternoon Feb 24
Where: Building under construction
Rating: low

With no power, Eve was pretty annoyed. If this was like last time, she’d spend the last week of her physical self miserable before she turned into a ghost. Couldn’t the Dome time this better so she could be a ghost while all the lack of warmth was happening?

Currently she was walking down the street with her hands buried in her coat jacket. Like an idiot she forgot her gloves and she was planning to get to the cafe to get something warm to drink. What she didn’t expect was to see a young kid dart into a building she knew was under construction. Normally she’d be a little more liberal with the freedom she’d give kids, but she knew from experience that there were a few angry ghosts attached to the building and so she followed on instinct.

“Hey kid.” She called out and ventured deeper. The deeper in the building she went, the more realized she could hear some strange sounds. They were sort of mechanical, but she didn’t think she ever heard that sound before. Whatever it was, it unnerved her.

When she found the kid, she walked up to him and crouched. “Hey. This place isn’t safe.” As if to reiterate the fact, the building itself started to groan. “Go!” The kid thankfully didn’t stop to ask questions, but disappeared quickly. Eve was making her way out the door when the mechanical sound caught her attention again - it sounded closer. That was Eve’s undoing. The extra few moments she spent trying to place the sound meant that when the ceiling caved in, Eve could only throw up a spell on instinct before the room was in rumble.

When the room settled, Eve was left groaning and in pain, which was a good sign since at least it meant she was alive. Only now she was covered in dust and drywall and cement and she had a heavy piece of ceiling on her torso. “Fuck.” She managed to breathe out, though it was laboured. She could taste copper too which meant she was bleeding. She’d bit her lip in the event and she had a cut on her left eye too.

–

Kristof had been passing by the building, just in time to see the little kid run in and then a woman go in after him – though he’d been far enough away that he couldn’t clearly recognize either. Then the little kid came running out, there was a moment’s pause, and then the building was going down. And because Kristof could really be an idiot sometimes, there he was going in after whoever it’d been.

Structurally, the entrance hadn’t come down completely, still up enough that he didn’t have to crawl through rubble. No, the rubble came when he hit the hall just past the entryway.

Ugh, just fantastic.

Between magic and his willingness to move rubble with his hands, it was only a minute or two before he was past the obstacle in his path – only to see someone under more rubble. And a moment after that, recognition set in.

“Goddamn it, Eve,” he said with a resigned sigh. “Hang on, I got this.”

Hiding the worry, already.

***

She was trying to move the piece of ceiling off her bottom half while sitting up, but it was being a pain in the ass and much too heavy without the use of her legs - which thankfully she still felt . Eve was tempted to do a spell, but she also knew it was risky with how close she was.

It took her a second to figure out what was making the noise and she realized someone was heading her way. When he appeared, her expression probably temporarily matched her own. "Kris."

Of course she'd have this kind of luck. Now she was hurt and utterly embarrassed.

"It's nice to see you too." Did he have to look like a damn knight too? Damn him for aging well. His kids needed to work harder at giving him a run for his money.

"Careful of my sword. It's here somewhere." Obviously close by since it wasn't flinging to her, though now she's wondering if she was extremely lucky that she wasn't impaled or if it was part of the 'perk' of the sword.

"...thanks." she realized he was being nice and while she was overcompensating a bit for how helpless she was in front of Kristof, she did appreciate he was going to help her out.

–

“I’d scold you for being reckless, but I saw the kid run in here. I’d have done the same thing.” He would have, too – partly because as a parent he couldn’t stand to see a kid get hurt, and partly because he cared more about people than he ever would’ve owned up to back home. So many years in Madison Valley had mellowed him out in a lot of ways, after all.

“If your sword wants to pitch in and get you out of here, too, that’d be awesome.” He knew it wouldn’t work like that, but he was trying to get Eve to laugh and to keep her distracted given that she had to be hurting.

And if he had to be a little bit of an idiot while doing it, then so be it.

***

He got the desired result as she laughed though it turned into a bit of a cough. Even if it clearly hurt to laugh, it still put a smile on her lips. "I'll have a talk with it later for not pulling its weight."

The weird sounds heard earlier were forgotten now that Eve needed to get debris off her and go to the clinic, but later she'd be kicking herself for forgetting. For now she moved her hands to the big piece of ceiling again. "Think you can help get this thing off me? I can feel me toes at least, but this thing is heavy as fuck."

–

“Feeling your toes is a good start,” he said with a nod. “And… okay, here we go.” He’d considered a knock-back spell on it, but that was before he’d realized just how much Eve was being pinned down by it. Which meant the closest answer he had was a telekinesis spell. Thankfully it wasn’t a particularly difficult one, so between that and being able to get his other hand in position to shove, he was able to flip the debris off of Eve while hopefully causing a minimum of further hurt.

Though he was pretty sure they couldn’t have avoided causing it entirely, since he realized only after the chunk of ceiling had been moved exactly how big it was.

Well, then. When Eve did something, she did it big. Which meant that A: this wasn’t surprising and B: that was a joke he was not going to make at the moment. He’d save it for later.

***

Eve wanted to be all stoic about it, but as Kristof moved the piece off of her, she made a guttural cry from the pain. She inhaled after to ‘catch’ her breath and she was annoyed at how dramatic she just sounded. She funneled the pain in her body into a scowl on her face like she could just bitchface the pain away.

It wasn’t working.

She could breath better now though, even if she could confirm some ribs were unhappy with her. “This was all an elaborate ruse… to see if you still remembered that spell….” She offered a smile that was forced a little, but she appreciated the rescue despite being the sort of woman who liked to rescue herself.

Like said woman, she tried to get up on her own which resulted in a sharp curse. She exhaled, then reluctantly added, “... I might need a hand getting up.”

–

“You’re in luck, a hand getting up is something I can easily do.” He wasn’t going to dwell on the rest of it because one of the quickest ways to get on Eve Levine’s bad side had always been to focus on the things she couldn’t do. Give help, yes fine. Make a big deal out of it? Making a big deal out of it was as good as pointing out a weakness and that? Was a thing he’d only done a couple times before he’d learned better.

“And I’m helping you get to the clinic, don’t even argue with me.” His voice was calm, pleasant, but there was that tinge to it that said he wasn’t going to put up with an argument. Though he didn’t particularly think he was facing one.

***

“No arguments there.” Which was probably the biggest sign Eve was hurting a lot otherwise she’d just want to mend on her own. She just wished that Raelle girl had the ability to heal her. They had tried once and it seemed as if some part of Eve - she wondered if it was the demon part or the angel part - wasn’t allowing Raelle’s magic to do it.

“Okay.” She said it to herself despite being out loud as she psyched herself to stand up. She was well aware that she’d end up feeling whatever else was hurt, but she was determined to walk out of here unlike some damsel in distress dammit.

Getting up with Kristof’s help came with a few more gutturally unhappy sounds. Once she was up, she leaned on Kris a bit to catch her breath. That kid better grow up to be a doctor or something.

She exhaled once she got a hold of herself. “Thanks Kris.” She knew she’d have to tell Savannah and others, but she hoped she got an excuse for a few hours to rest before she admitted her stupidity.

–