Re: #15: Juliet & Claire
If this was because of some guy upstairs with a sick sense of humor, Juliet wasn't fucking laughing. Blasphemy, because she'd always been better at that than outright belief in anything, and as a cross-section of what had once been a tree smacked her full across the back and punched her square in the kidneys, Juliet swore in as many languages as she knew how.
But this wasn't about her. Not just her. As the light chased them from the standing spot to the next, she could hear Claire struggling. The rasp of breath in her lungs, the way her weight fell as they took a pace only a saint would consider forgiving. It wasn't Claire's fault that adrenaline rattled around in Juliet's empty carcass, leaving quicksilver instead of a bloodstream and the desire to move.
"Town Hall? Put us on a train to nowhere for a few hours in the dark. You don't think this has something to do with the eggs?" And no, Juliet didn't consider the light pounding through the earth and punching destruction in its wake divine retribution for escaping the mud. That? Had nothing to do with divine anything and she was alive because they were both too fucking stubborn to get sucked down and swallowed whole.
And Claire had balls. Claire had blood seeping through her shirt - gas-station chic showed every goddamn stain - and was still running at a criminal pace. They had to pick a direction, find somewhere the light wasn't planning on crossing.
Juliet looked at the trees and back to the asphalt and plunged back. "If you need to stop, say something." Not that they'd stop. But she'd carry Claire, if it came down to the bones of it and she'd think up an excuse for inhuman strength afterward. Just then she slung one arm under Claire's, her shoulder butting her armpit. "Ready?" No time to be polite. Another crack at their heels and Juliet ran.