Shatter

NOTE: Wait... STRAIGHT porn? Damn, Ceri, you losing your touch?

No, in all honesty the premise for this story was a dream I had and adapted into a coherent plotline, so, yeah.

Hope you guys enjoy this weird-ass story!

-Ceri

***

She was only vaguely aware, as it happened. When they'd taken her, they'd been nice, saying she was going to a safe place, where she couldn't hurt herself. Almost immediately afterwards, they pricked her with a needle, and everything had been hazy for... a long time. They treated her like she wasn't even there, like she was a doll as they dragged her around the building, putting her in a bleak little room whenever they didn't need her. At first, it was just confusing. She wanted to feel like herself again, she wanted to go home. After that, she felt sad... sad that nothing would ever be the same again. She knew that things wouldn't go back to when she lived at home with her parents anymore, even if she got out.

Afterwards... it shifted again. It became anger. She hated these people who trapped her here, who pricked her with the needles, who dragged her around in her dizzy, disoriented state, to various rooms and pieces of machinery. Once, when her fury and rage rose to a peak, coinciding with a tiny lull in her fuzziness, she managed to lash out. She reached out with her Inner Voice, feeling the tiny pieces that made up the two people dragging her. All it took was a tug, a tiny little tug, and they fell apart, exploding in a shower of blood and bone and viscera. She'd pulled harder than she needed to, even though it felt like such a small little motion...

They'd been upset with her, after that, pricking her with another needle, but she didn't care. She hated all of them, she would have done the same to every last one. The act of violence had done nothing to sate her rage, her pain, and had only fuelled it further.

Finally, they'd strapped her into a table, attaching all kinds of things to her head. She felt things sticking to the top of her head... her hair was gone... when had they cut her hair? Her mom had always told her it was so pretty... As the people in white coats around her worked, running back and forth, she kept clutching at her Inner Voice, trying to bring it to bear against these people, but it kept slipping away from her, just beyond reach.

Finally, something started to happen. She started to fade away... and it was different this time. Her body had felt numb, the entire time, but she knew it was there, she could feel herself walking, being carried, fed, bathed, even if she couldn't control her body, she had a sense that it was there. Now... Now she couldn't feel it anymore, she was alone, in a dark, dark place, no touch, sound, sight, smell, or taste. Only herself, alone, in a void. Time passed... and she couldn't even say how long she'd been in there.

She reached for her Inner Voice, over, and over, desperately trying to grasp it even though she couldn't feel it anywhere. It was an eternity, but, eventually... she did feel it. It was the tiniest thread of it, floating across her consciousness, barely even perceptible, and yet, in that space of nothingness, she could never possibly have missed it, for it was something in an infinity of absence.

She clung to it like the blade of a sword, and with all her fury, swung it at the invisible walls of her prison, the walls she couldn't see or touch but she knew were there. It was enough, and the walls shattered, earning her some freedom, but she didn't escape back into her old life at all. It was different here, she felt the bits and pieces of things, the parts too small to see, and she had a sense of life, of voices around her, but none of it made any sense.

She wanted to go home. To feel her arms and legs again, to hear the sound and the full breadth of her Inner Voice, and to wield it against those who had done this to her. She floated through the abyss for what could have been another eternity, no sense of where she was, or where she was going. She could tell she was moving, though... things moved past her, objects, lights, voices, like when her dad drove her in the car, back when she'd been little, the sound of things getting louder, and then fainter, as they moved along the road.

She screamed, dispersing her hatred and her anger into the void around her, the red hot star of emotion blazing bright, but diffusing harmlessly into a seemingly infinite space around her. She felt her will wane, as the burst of emotion faded and echoed into the nothingness around her. The thought of being trapped here, in purgatory, forever, began to settle around her like a cold fist. She started to give up.

A voice pierced the dread, the anger, and the defeat. 'Hello? Who's there?' It asked, the clarity and the form of the words that she understood overcame her with emotion. It was human contact, even in so abstract a form as a whispered question echoing across the cosmos. She tried to call back to the voice, to speak to him, but found that she didn't know how to form words, and instead just echoed more of her emotions back at the voice. She wanted to send hope, joy, relief, and indeed she did, but... anger went out too. Not at the voice, but it was all she'd known for so long, she didn't know how to turn it off, how to cap the wellspring of rage that was pouring out of her.

'Why are you so upset... where are you?' The voice called to her, inquisitive and timid. This time... she noticed something she'd neglected to pay attention to, last time. A direction. Not knowing anything else to do, she turned, and began to float in the direction of the voice, using the sliver of her Inner Voice to propel her across the dark sea of nothingness. She had no idea how fast she was going, or how far away the voice was, but she knew she was moving, and that had to be enough.

'You're coming closer... do you hear me?'

'So much anger... are you like me? Did they hurt you too?'

'Please... be safe... I don't have long...'

She stopped. She was right on top of the voice now, it was so close, but she couldn't reach out, couldn't interact with it, the way she'd hoped. She wandered in circles, orbiting the voice, trying to find a way to communicate better, but there was nothing else here, she hadn't known what to expect, after all.

'You must be in the facility here now... I'm sorry...'

The sad words filled her with rage again, flaring the dull but ever-present embers back to life. This person, this consciousness was like her, trapped, kept in a pen, separated from the outside world. She felt the voice shrink away from her, frightened, but it couldn't even flee, it was stuck where it was, like she'd been.

...Wait...

Something changed. She felt it, like she was standing on a downhill slope all of a sudden, caught in an undertow. She was slipping towards something... It was a door. A light. A passageway towards... something, but anything was better than this tormented existence, and so she let herself fall, to be drawn towards this opening, this whirlpool in the black ocean she floated upon.

She was in a box again, like before, but this one was different, and someone else was there. Confusion and fear radiated off the other presence, but she felt herself overwhelmed with a sense of familiarity. This place was hers, and this presence was an intruder, it didn't belong here. She used her needle to rip and tear at the intruder, taking it apart piece by piece. It was horrified, it tried to fight back, but she had a sharp object, and it did not. The last piece of it fell to shreds, and she'd liberated her place... But... now wha-

***

Her eyes opened, and she jolted awake.

"Woahh there, Paula, calm down, we're almost done here." There was a person dressed like a doctor, a look of concern on his face. She was back, she was in her body again, but it felt... different. "You know better than to try to jump off the table like that after an exam, you've been in that body for, what, five years?" He rolled his eyes at her, reaching down to detach some electrodes that had been stuck to her face. Paula... she wasn't Paula. That had been the intruder, the one she'd removed.

They'd put someone else inside her body. The revulsion of the thought washed through her and she felt physically ill, but she held it together, she didn't want this person to know, just yet, what had happened.

Experimentally, she reached out to her Inner Voice, and the chorus that responded to the tentative gesture was deafening. She felt... everything around her. All of her strength was still there, this was nothing compared to the little needle she'd wielded in the void.

"You feeling okay? Readings had a bit of a weird blip at the end there but I figured it was nothing." The doctor asked her, looking concerned.

"I'm okay..." She answered, the act of talking felt... strange. Her anger still burned, this person deserved death, obliteration, and she wanted nothing better than to lash out and rip this disgusting man to shreds. But something stayed her hand... the voice... were they near? They'd been trapped just like her, after all. She had to find out. "It felt like... someone was calling to me, in the darkness..." She spoke slowly, trying to keep her voice calm and level. She wouldn't have known that she could speak fluidly after so long, but it came so easily and naturally to her.

"Really? We've got a powerful empath here, prepping him for evacuation pretty soon, actually. It's weird that you'd feel him, but stranger things have happened." The doctor looked very perplexed.

"Where is he? Can I see him?" She asked, not sure what else to say. She'd tear this entire place apart to find him, if she needed to, but she didn't want to risk hurting him, her savior, the one who had led her out of that place.

"Yeah, sure, I don't think his shell is sold just yet. You're planning on reselling that shell already?" She frowned back at him, anger simmering inside her at his words, so casually talking about her body that way. "Alright, alright, far be it for me to question you rich folk. This way."

As she stood up, she paused for a moment. She was so much taller than she remembered, and her body was... older? How long had she been drifting across that sea of nothingness? She looked down at her body for a moment... she looked like an adult now... she'd been so small when they'd taken her...

She followed the man through several twisting hallways, ones she recognized only vaguely, as the fuzzy memories of a drugged little girl. But even so, there was no doubt in her mind that this was the place. Swiping a keycard in a reader, he opened a door to a room that she recognized as the same as one of the ones she'd been kept in. A plastic cell was on one side of the room, a featureless pen with a clear window, and a big man in a uniform sat idly nearby, playing with his phone more than watching. The uniformed man waved at the doctor as he led her into the room, but otherwise didn't look up.

The boy in the cell, however, looked up immediately, and his eyes went wide. He looked older... or at least, older than she'd been when they'd taken her, maybe he was the same age as her, now. He was small and scrawny, malnourished, and his eyes seemed almost too big for his gaunt face. He looked at her, immediately, recognition flashing in those eyes. He knew who she was, and she felt something swelling inside her. Affection... gratitude... rage. Rage at the people who had locked him up, just as they had to her. As her fury mounted, he shrank back, trembling, hugging his legs to his chest.

"We don't keep this one under sedatives, since all he can do is sense and manipulate emotions. Project thoughts a little, too. I think we're evacuating him early next week, if you want to place a bid." The doctor started to explain, but she was entranced, walking forward towards the wall of the cell, sinking down to her knees once she reached the clear plastic wall so that she was eye level with him.

"Hi... I'm so sorry I couldn't answer you... I didn't know how..." She whispered to him in a quiet voice, which seemed to calm him down a little.

"You're the one... who are you?" he whispered back, opening up to her a little, but still clearly afraid.

"You, uhh, really shouldn't be talking to him-" The doctor tried to dissuade her, but she ignored him.

"It's okay... I'm here to save you. We're leaving here, okay? They won't hurt you anymore." She smiled at him, as she felt the strength of her Inner Voice begin to thrum. She wanted blood.

"Paula, maybe I should take you back to make sure the imprint took properly..." The doctor seemed very worried now, and the security officer was finally paying attention.

She stood up, and turned around, dropping the flimsy facade, her face twisted with rage. "You..." She hissed, her voice dripping venom, acting as a release valve for what had felt like an eternity of anger and hate. "You sold me... you locked me away in the darkness..."

"No... that's not possible, we-" She materialized several sharp tendrils, and used them to lash out at the two men. They didn't have time to react before the translucent manifestations ripped into them, boring holes through them like they were made out of mist. They collapsed in a pile on the floor, dead before they even realized what was happening. An alarm began to screech, reacting to her act of violence as quickly as if she'd pressed the button herself.

She turned around, and ripped the cell wall to shreds, reducing it to broken fragments of plexiglass in an instant, and stepped towards the frightened boy cowering in the corner. "We should go. I want to destroy all of them, but I won't let them have you." She put her hand on his shoulder, gently.

He nodded at her, trust shining amidst the fear in his silver eyes. "I think we're underground... I feel people far above us, sometimes." He turned his gaze to the ceiling.

"Point the way. I'll make a path." She stood up, pulling the boy onto his feet, as well. He turned around, and pointed at one of the corners of his cell. She walked over to the corner quickly, letting her Inner Voice reach its zenith, as she reached into the tiny spaces between the parts of the wall, and pulled. Concrete, ceramic, metal, and plastic came loose, falling into a pile of broken materials on the cell floor. Sparks flew from broken power conduits for a few moments before they sputtered out, and the sound of the alarm came at them through the hole she'd torn, as well as from the other side of the door.

His thin, weak hand clutched hers, and she looked back at him. "This is dangerous..." He whispered, looking worried.

"I know. But we can't stay here. Come on." She smiled at him and hugged him close, the feeling of a warm body next to her felt... so foreign, but... The alarm blared, bringing her back to the present, and she ran up to the hole she'd ripped in the wall, dragging the boy along behind her.

"Two people to the left, they're alert." The boy tugged at the black suit she was wearing. The hole opened up into another hallway, and she formed spines in the air just in front of her. With a shove, she threw them to the left, where the boy had told her. He winced as though she'd struck him herself, and looked up at her, nodding, after the gargled screams died down. "There's more... all around us, frightened, curious, angry. There's more far above us..." He bit his lip anxiously.

She nodded, and caught the sight of an elevator door in this new hallway. She dragged them towards it, and wormed her mind into the cracks between the doors and the frame. With a tug, they came loose, steel shrieking and twisting as she ripped them out of place and discarded them on the floor, exposing the sight of elevator cables suspended in darkness. 'We have to go up...' She thought to herself, hesitating for a moment. She knew how to tear things apart, that part came easily to her, but could she get up here, somehow? There must be other ways to use her strength...

An idea came to her, and she coaxed her Inner Voice out, forming a wide translucent tendril, this one lacking the razor thinness that she formed when she needed to cut and tear. She wrapped it around the two of them, hugging the boy close, feeling the slight tremor as he shivered in fear.

She lifted the two of them up, being as careful and gentle as she could. It was different, not how she was used to using her strength, kind of like she was trying not to spill a full glass of water. It was slow going, but worked, their feet left the rubble-strewn hallway and they started floating up the elevator shaft, the boy squeaking in distress and squeezing her tighter as they ascended.

Shouts came from below, echoing up the shaft, and several small points of light began to shine upwards at them. She growled at them, for having the audacity to pursue her. They had seen her fury, and seen what she could do, and yet they still came? She tore at the walls of the shaft, and the entire structure groaned in protest as she ripped metal and concrete free from its place to tumble down the elevator shaft. Curses and screams echoed up at them, but the lights flickered out.

"Here..." His voice snapped her out of her concentration, as he pointed at the side of the elevator shaft. "There's people above us, waiting for us, but we can get through here, I think..."

She nodded , floating them a little higher, and reaching into the wall. Sure as he said, after a few meters, she felt the concrete and steel end, and she pulled out the piece of wall she'd grabbed with her Inner Voice, sending another shower of building materials down the elevator. Shortly after, she heard a crash, and the twin cables in the middle of the shaft twitched and vibrated, one being yanked downward, the other upwards. The flailing cable came close to striking them, and the boy cried out in fear, burying his face in her chest. She acted quickly, floating them into the hole she'd dug and away from danger as the wildly flailing end of the cable shot down the elevator shaft just behind them.

They were in a parking garage, the kind she'd been in before with her parents. Dim lights buzzed, and off in the distance, tires rolled and crunched against gravel and decaying roads. She released the tendril surrounding the two of them, but he kept clutching her closely. "I need you to lead the way... I don't know where we're going..." She whispered to him.

"Right... but... no more killing if we don't have to? These people aren't the ones who hurt us." He looked up at her, eyes innocent and frightened. She realized then that he was probably just as frightened of her as he was of the people who'd caged him. She'd just happened to be the more powerful.

She smiled down at him, a powerful protective feeling blossoming through her. She would keep him safe from anything... "I think I can do that. It's probably better if we don't attract attention, anyway."

He gave her a small smile, and, taking her hand, lead her into the parking garage, back into the real world.

***

"Siren." He said, once they caught their breath and settled down in the abandoned building he'd scouted out. "That's what they used to call me, back when I had a name, before they found out about me, and what I could do."

"Siren... that's... pretty..." She smiled at him, hugging him close. She was quiet for a while, and he felt confusion coming from her, and more than that, she... she was questioning her sense of self "Icy." She finally spoke, "I think... I remember someone calling me that..."

"You're the one... I felt you, from so far away... you were so angry..." He spoke quietly, huddling on the floor, resting his chin on his knees as she hugged him close. He'd never felt someone from so far away, before, he initially hadn't even been sure if she was human or something... else. They must have evacuated her, torn her mind out of her body and stored it on a hard drive somewhere to study it, like they did to all psychics. How she'd... 'gotten back;', he couldn't possibly know.