[center][h2]Nicole[/h2][/center]
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[b][u]Serious caution. This post is not going to be a fun ride. So, y'know. Trigger warning in effect, especially for depressive issues and violence.[/u][/b]
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[hider=TRIGGER WARNING IN EFFECT]
[b]The Wayward Center, Lost Haven
5:36 AM[/b]

It had been hours. Maybe days. Nicole glanced at the clock on the wall of the little room they had placed her in, from her position on the bed, where she had flopped down. [i]Ah. Five minutes. Maybe I should get a watch. [/i] The image of her father's wrist flickered through her mind, and she almost lost it again. Instinct caused her to curl up defensively, hands over her ears, but she managed to fend of the flashback this time. Her eyes still brimmed with tears, though.

The woman, Alice, had talked her down, though it had been kind of a close thing. After she had come down, deep, inky darkness had clouded into her mind. It choked her thoughts, except for one driving one that came on the edge of it like flotsam on the tide. [i]I should have died with them.[/i] It had taken Alice and two other people to wrestle the knife out of her hands, but not before she had broken it against her wrist, screaming at them to just let her die. But it was useless. As she had begun to suspect weeks ago, she couldn't die. Not of starvation, explosions, or knives, at least. She had some sort of impenetrable forcefield around her or something.

They had managed to calm her down, and move her to this room, explaining it was hers now. Stay here as long as you need, please try not disturb others but if it's an emergency come get us, etcetera. Blegh. The blackness hadn't lasted long anyway, though now that she knew it was there, she could feel it. Crawling, oozing, trying to find a way past the hasty mental barriers she had erected. She had heard Alice saying no to a hospital, which was good. Nicky hadn't been to one before, but she was [i]not[/i] looking forward to finding out she was crazy, nor trying to see if pills would work. She somehow doubted it.

The room was nice. No window, but the little bed was just comfortable enough to allow her to lie down without hating everything. Then again, for all she knew, it could be cardboard. She hadn't been uncomfortable since...Anyway. It had a scratchy wool blanket, blue and green plaid, and nice white sheets. The floor was some sort of dark hardwood, like downstairs, but here she had a thick rug to walk on. A little chest of drawers sat across from her, and a little hand mirror sat on top of that. Otherwise it was bare, but maybe they usually got people with stuff when they came here. As it was, she was in a hotel room, essentially, at least what she had always thought one was. That's what they looked like in the little detective stories her Dad had read to...Shit.

Well, breakfast would be soon. She'd probably eat, if only to make herself feel halfway normal. [i]huh. Wonder if I can still poop.[/i] She picked herself up off of the bed, checked that she wasn't completely unpresentable, and opened the hallway door. She hadn't been paying much attention when she came up the stairs, which were at the cross of a T-intersection of hallways. Her room was at the far end of the right hand as she came up, with a door right next to the window. She glanced outside.

The blonde cop from last night was outside, just coming through the gate, chatting with Alice. Her partner was leaning against the wall, just lighting a cigarette. They both looked like they had come off a long shift. [i]Maybe they've come because you're more trouble than you're worth,[/i] the little voice echoed from the ooze in her mind. She shook her head and began padding down the hall. Another girl was coming out of the room across the way from her. Couldn't be more than eleven or twelve, wearing a pink nightshirt. She waved at Nicky timidly, and was too adorable for Nicky to not respond in kind.

“Did you just get here?” the little girl asked as the both approached the stairwell, which Nicky honestly thought belonged in some fancy movie and not a halfway house. She nodded dumbly.

“Well, I know it's scary, but I'm Mandy. I've been here three months now. It's not so bad!” The girl's voice was squeaky, but not [i]quite[/i] enough to be annoying. 

“Yeah, uh. I got in last night. I'm Nicole.” She managed a half smile as they both reached the stairway. The little girl paused before stepping down, holding her arms out straight and hovering just before taking each step.

“Oh yeah? That's cool. I like Alice, she's really nice. What's your power?”

Nicky stopped between steps. What the hell [i]was[/i] her power? “Um. I'm invincible, I think.”

Mandy spun on the bottom step and stared at her, with brown eyes that seemed to grow with every second. “Whoooooa! That. Is. [i]Awesome![/i]” She took off running for the kitchen, yelling to someone. Alice had just walked in with the blonde cop, and looked up and smiled at Nicky, calling across the lobby.

“So, you feel up to joining the rest of us for breakfast, Miss MacNamara?”

“Yeah, I figured I could be a normal hu-” Glass crashed upstairs. All three women froze in place. Nicky raised one eyebrow. “One of the more rambunctious residents?” There was a pop, like a firecracker. Two more windows broke, and the blonde's radio went off. She bent her head to it. 

“Say again, Alfie?”

[i]”-peat, building is under attack!”[/i] There were the sounds of gunshots, a rough staccato, both from the windows and the radio. [i]”It's those assholes from the teevee, Pat! Get the kids out now!”[/i]

The side rooms began filling with smoke, as did the top of the stairs. Screams echoed from the kitchen. Alice moved like a thunderbolt, waving kids out and into the rear hall, but she looked up the stairs with terror. Nicky heard her mutter, “...too early.”

The blackness came back, almost absurdly fast, whispering in the back of her mind that [i]this[/i] would happen to every home she ever had, but Nicky was beyond depression now. Her sadness and fear had leaked out earlier, cried into a river in the arms of a woman who obviously had only one thing on her mind. She knew she would use the boiling in her mind in a moment, but Alice was right. Kids first.

The teenager fairly flew up the steps, grabbing three kids, one older than her it seemed, and two adults, guiding them through the smoke that was obviously blinding and choking them. [i]Mark up another thing I'm immune to, I guess.[/i] She led them down the stairs, where Patricia the Policewoman was standing guard, calling into her radio for back up. When they passed, she moved with them, pointing her gun towards the front door. Which gave them no cover when Nicky thought a thousand wasps flew through the side windows. Both adults with her, one of whom was an old man, and one of the kids dropped like stones. The other two ran for the back rooms where the rest were presumably hiding. Nicky stared in horror, frozen in place, staring at a twelve year old boys sightless eyes staring up. He had been hit in the side of the head. She felt Patricia's hands tugging at her, but she shook her off. 

Low animal sounds started in her throat, and she felt the anger from the streets boil up again. The day her family died. Those two assholes on the highway here. The Triads. The abuses she had faced every day walking to and from school. The powerlessness of Icon to do anything. The police, blaming her. Everything roiled in her mind. She felt herself move a couple of times as bullets struck her, and the blackness a the edge of her vision was burned away with white hot rage.

Which is, of course, when the power cut off, leaving only smoky haze and hints of sunlight at the edge. Nicky could see no targets until the little green lasers clicked on and the enemy charged through the front door. They were already firing. They obviously were not police, and they [i]certainly[/i] not taking prisoners. Nicky bent down, heedless of the gunfire, and snatched up something glittering in the darkness. [color=azure][i]Glass. This'll work.[/i][/color] Making sure it was steady in her grip, she lunged up from her kneeling position and slammed the shard as hard as she could, up under the visor on the helmet of the first soldier to reach her, screaming so loud she would have ripped her vocal cords apart if that were still possible. She saw the gout of blood as the man fell, screaming his own cry.

[color=azure][i]I may not be like Icon,[/i][/color] she thought as she rode the man to the ground, still carrying through in her leap. [color=azure][i]I may not be any stronger or faster than you fuckers.[/i][/color] She picked up the dead man's assault rifle, spinning it around inexpertly, but managing to pull it up to a hip firing position. [color=azure][i]I may not be super strong, or fling lightning, and be faster than the bullets.[/i][/color] She spun to the side as a round hit her shoulder, pointing her now in the direction of the lasers. Two flashlights lit her up, showing her face, spattered in blood and shaking, almost [i]vibrating[/i] with rage. [color=azure]”But I can sure as hell pull a fucking trigger, motherfuckers!”[/color]

The clip emptied way faster than she was expecting, but she had gotten at least three of them. Hard to tell in the light. Bullets kept knocking her around, disorienting her, so she ran at the nearest laser. She couldn't see anything remotely well enough in the fog, so she gripped her now empty rifle by the barrel and swung it like a baseball bat in front of her, pleasantly surprised by the impact. Less pleasant was the explosion of force that hit her from the side, directly into her head, and set her spinning sideways in a complete circle before hitting the ground hard.

They made the terrible mistake of thinking she was dead, so she did not hesitate, but snatched the gun that had hit her from another man's shocked grasp, sliding it down until she found the trigger and turned it to blow a blast into one of his friends. It flared [i]blue[/i], and shot a gout of flame that engulfed the man. A shotgun, it seemed. She pumped the action and fired again. Another went down. Some sort of awful fire shotgun.

She only stopped firing when she realised there was no one else to fight. She was encircled by the dead, men in black body armour, spent shell casings lying around her and gun smoke hanging thick in the air. Thumps from up stairs, however, told her she was not clear of foes yet, though. A voice called out hesitantly from behind her. 

“Are we good?” Patricia came out of the darkness. Nicky was panting, not with exertion, but rage. Mandy also stuck her head out. The police woman turned to usher her back, when Nicky saw the green dots appear on her back. 

[color=azure]”[i]NO![/i]”[/color] she screamed, throwing herself with her arms wide between the woman and the enemy. Bullets slammed into her in rapid succession, driving her backwards with the force of them. Like a thousand blows to a punching bag, none of them were hurting her, but she was still only a fifteen year old. So she swung her arm back down and squeezed off two more round from the shotgun before it clicked in her hand. The firing stopped, but she could hear them reloading.

Patricia's arm dropped onto her shoulder, firing into the corridor. [color=azure][i]Holy shit she's using me for cover![/i][/color] Nicky might have been more taken with how awesome that was if she hadn't still been a rage-fuelled missile. As soon as the cop stopped firing and fell back, Nicky launched herself forwards, screaming like a banshee again and with no particular goal except to hurt everything in her path. The first one she got to was just raising his rifle again, so she grabbed the front of his jacket, fumbling for anything she could use. Her hand found a knife hilt and something else. Round. Small. With a pin. [color=azure][i]Yes[/i][/color].

The man shoved her off and raised his rifle, but Nicky threw the grenade at him, right into the light of the other behind as they did the same as him. She saw the hesitation as all of them realised what it was, but Nicky charged in right behind it, snatching a gun and firing wildy up the stairs as she went [i]up[/i] the man and flew past them. She was pretty sure she only hit wall before the grenade went off, throwing everything into chaos.

She wasn't certain, having only seen movies, but as she was flung backwards along the lobby, she was fairly sure that grenades were supposed to explode with fire and bits of metal. So she was surprised to see a bright flash of light and then bolts of lightning flare across the bodies of the men on the stairwell. At least five more of the assholes went down to that. She got up, righting herself by sliding along the wall she had landed against, and strode over to the bodies. Not one moved. She could see Patricia staring from the hallway when she glanced around the stairs, so she proceeded up them. No one up there either.

As she hit the top, she was confused as to why the whole hallway shifted sideways, until she landed, skidding across the ground, and something big slid into her vision from the side of her head. Another bullet. A [i]huge[/i] one. Apparently they had a sniper somewhere.[/hider]