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Nicole groaned as her shoulder slammed into the concrete floor.
“Heh, that’ll teach her to struggle.” The tall guard behind her, dressed in full body armor with a rifle slung over his shoulder, laughed to his partner as he holstered his stun baton.
“Little harsh, Joe,” said the other guard as he nudged at her side with his boot.
“It’s fine, Reg!” Joe grabbed her left arm and yanked Nicole to her feet. She tried to steady herself as he pushed her roughly forward, but the ground rushed up to meet her as she lost her balance. Throwing her hands out, Nicole tried to catch herself. The ring sparkled on her left hand. Joe sighed loudly.
“Oh, come on!” He threw his hands up. “It wasn’t even that bad you weak ass—”
“Joe! Stop it.” Reg knelt down as he looked her over. “Let’s just get her back to her cell, okay?”
The tall guard huffed in exasperation, but knelt down as well. Together they gripped her upper arms tightly as they hauled her up and began to drag her back to her cell.
Nicole was too tired to protest.
“Hey,” Nicole heard Joe speaking above her. “Think we’ll have to worry about that Earp bitch trying to break in again?”
They paused as Reg swiped his keycard to open the door to their cell block.
“Nah,” he said as they dragged Nicole past the first empty cells. “Recon says she’s running around in the woods with the town’s former sheriff. Apparently they’re trying to free the baby sister from a hell dimension or something.”
Waverly.
Waverly was gone and Nicole wanted to scream, wanted to rage and fight and burn Black Badge to the ground for trapping her here where she felt so useless. Where she felt Waverly’s absence like a hole in her chest. She tried to shake the exhaustion from her bones as Joe and Reg threw her haphazardly back into her terrarium cell. She hardly noticed Jeremy and Robin watching on in horror. She barely felt the welts around her wrists and ankles that were already turning black and blue.
She had to get out. Had to get Waverly back. It was all that mattered.
Summoning the last of her strength, Nicole hurled herself at the door as they tried to close it.
“Let me out you bastards!” Her throat was raw from screaming but she didn’t care. Joe threw his body against the door, holding it closed so Reg could seal it shut.
“Let me out!” Nicole slammed her fist against the polymer walls. They had changed her terrarium after she shattered the glass on the first day. She stood back and wiped at her face with her other hand, trying hard not to cry as they just chuckled and walked away.
“We have to get out of here,” she mumbled to herself, absentmindedly rubbing at her sore wrists.
“Better do it soon,” Jeremy said wearily from his terrarium on her left. “I know Black Badge, and they’re not going to stop until they get that ring.”
“Yeah, well, it’s not coming off!” Nicole could feel her anger bubbling to the surface again. They wouldn’t even be here if Wynonna hadn’t drugged them in the first place.
“Nicole,” Robin said gently from his terrarium on her right. She glanced over at him and felt herself calm slightly. He stood close against the wall that separated them, hand pressed against the polymer and his loose-fitting hospital gown fluttering around his knees as he nervously shifted his weight from one foot to the other.
“What did they do to you?” He looked her over carefully, something like heartbreak in his eyes.
Nicole was a mess. Her wrists and ankles were completely black and blue, thick bands of bruises where she had been restrained. Her hair was disheveled and her hospital gown was wrinkled and covered in what appeared to be soot. With dark circles under dead eyes, she looked like she hadn’t slept in days. Though, he supposed, that was something they all probably shared.
Nicole gripped her left arm gingerly, unable to meet Robin’s eyes and see the pity she knew they held.
“They tried to cut it off,” she mumbled.
“They what?” Jeremy got up off the slab bench that acted as a bed and leaned against their shared terrarium wall. “Didn’t they try that like three days ago?”
“Not the ring.” Nicole couldn’t meet his eyes. The whir of the saw and the smell of burning metal and flesh threatened to overwhelm her again. She stood in the middle of her terrarium while Jeremy and Robin pressed against the walls, wishing they could do more than just stand there and listen.
“They tried to take my finger first,” she whispered, so quietly that they almost missed it. “Then my hand.” She pointed to a thin burn on her wrist and another at her elbow.
“Then my whole arm.” She rubbed at her shoulder as she spoke. “But it didn’t work.”
Heavy tears spilled down her cheeks as the last few weeks came crashing down around her.
“It didn’t work! Just like everything else!” Nicole could feel herself losing control, her breaths coming short and shallow. She could feel it in her chest, how her emotions rattled at her ribcage, threatening to tear her apart if she didn’t let them out. “It didn’t work.”
Nicole brushed the tears away with the back of her hand. If she could just think clearly, could just keep it together for a minute longer, maybe she could find them a way out. A way to help. A way to do something.
She was vaguely aware of the fact that she was yelling.
“It didn’t work! Nothing worked!” Nicole had to do something, anything to relieve the fury building in her.
“And Wynonna left us.” Her fist smashed into the polymer wall, the bones in her hand creaking under the force of the punch.
“And Waverly is gone.” She gasped as the pain in her hand registered in some distant part of her brain. But she didn’t care. Waverly was gone and there was nothing they could do.
Jeremy looked on, helpless, as Nicole fell to pieces in front of him. He looked past her and wished that Robin was here to hold him instead of crying quietly two tanks away.
“And we’re stuck here.” Nicole fell to her knees, arms falling limp at her sides, as rage and grief and exhaustion threatened to drag her so far down that she might never get up again.
They stayed like that, Jeremy and Robin crying quiet tears against the terrarium walls, Nicole breathing hard and angrily wiping away tears that refused to stop falling.
“God, I wish they would turn these stupid lights off,” Nicole mumbled hoarsely as she pushed herself to her feet, trying hard to ignore that her entire world was falling apart.
Jeremy chuckled. “Yeah, but that would mean they like us.”
Nicole tugged gently at the ring, a flash of pain ripping through her at the memory of Waverly placing it on her finger.
“Honestly, I’d give them the stupid ring myself if I could get it—” The ring slid easily off her finger, sitting warmly in her right palm. “Off.”
“Holy shit!” Robin yelled.
“Hide that!” Jeremy hissed.
Jeremy and Robin nearly knocked themselves out, foreheads colliding with the polymer walls in their attempts to get closer to Nicole. They were pressed against them, looking eagerly at the ring in her hand.
“How?” Robin asked. “It’s been days and you couldn’t get it off.”
“I think it was protecting you,” Jeremy said thoughtfully. “We know BBD can hurt us, and they did hurt you, but not when they were trying to take the ring!” He looked to Nicole’s left arm. The bruises were still there, but the burns were not.
“Of course!” He started pacing in his cell, rambling about the ring and how it must have done… something. Nicole wasn’t quite sure; Jeremy’s voice became muffled every time he paced to the opposite wall of his terrarium.
“It was protecting—and so it must’ve been—yeah, definitely yours—”
“Jeremy!” Nicole yelled. “I only got like three words of that.” She glanced pointedly at the polymer walls. “Walls. Remember?”
“Oh, right,” he said sheepishly. “I was saying that the ring must have been protecting you.”
“Speak up!” Robin yelled from his cell.
“Okay?” Nicole questioned. “So why can I take it off now? It’s not like we’ve escaped to safety or anything.”
“I think, and this is just a theory, that it came off because you asked it to.”
“What?” Robin yelled across the tanks.
Jeremy sighed and pressed his forehead against the glass. He really needed a dry erase marker or something. Sending messages would be so much easier if he could just write them out.
He took a deep breath and projected as much as he could without yelling.
“Okay! So remember, a few weeks ago, the ring came back to you?” Nicole nodded. “And then we found out it belonged to Julian, so we assumed that it would choose Waverly to wield it?”
“Yeah!” Robin chimed in.
“Well, what if it didn’t?”
“You’re saying that the ring,” Nicole held up the ring. “This ring. Chose me? Seriously? It burned the hell out of me like three weeks ago!”
“Put that down!” Jeremy pointed to the upper left corner of Nicole’s cell, near the door. “Cameras, remember?”
“Oh crap,” Nicole moved her body between the ring and the camera, hoping that whichever bored security guys were on duty weren’t looking at the cameras right now.
“And,” she continued, examining the ring closely. “It even told us of Paradise, remember?”
“Well, its original owner protected Paradise, right?” Jeremy asked.
“Wait a minute.” Nicole squinted at the band. The Arabic that had been so deeply engraved in the metal was fading as quickly as her burns.
“Sorry, Robin, be right back.” She gave him an apologetic shrug as she headed toward the wall that separated her terrarium from Jeremy’s.
“Look!” she hissed, shoving the band of the ring against the polymer.
“Holy crap,” Jeremy whispered, bending down to examine the ring more closely. “It’s gone!”
“I know!” Nicole loudly whispered back. “But what does it mean?”
“I have no idea, but I think you need to keep the ring on for now.” He moved slowly away from the wall, glancing at the camera in his own cell. “For all our sakes.”
“Well, we can just add it to the list of mysteries to solve once we get out of here.” Nicole paused and held the ring just in front of her left ring finger, she could not bear to put it on. Her mind was filled with thoughts of Waverly, of the proposal, of how she had finally said it back.
I love you.
They needed to talk. About the proposal, about the ring, about everything.
Nicole nodded to herself. If this ring was really meant for her, if it chose her, then she had a job to do. And she needed a clear head to do it. Nicole slid the ring onto the middle finger of her right hand.
And screamed.
Robin flinched. Jeremy jumped back. Nicole was in agony.
She fell to her knees, pain racing through her veins like a forest fire through dry brush. The ring smoked on her finger, searing the flesh underneath. Her back felt like it was being torn to shreds.
“Holy shit.” Jeremy’s hand flew to his mouth.
“What is that?” Robin was banging on the wall, eyes wide with fear.
Nicole barely heard them. All she felt was agony.
Jeremy watched in horror as an intricate sigil burned through the back of Nicole’s hospital gown and bloomed between her shoulder blades, spreading up to the nape of her neck and down to the small of her back, just above the hem of her black boyshorts. Rivulets of liquid fire, blue and orange and so blazing hot he could feel it through the wall, flowed through its outline.
The fire filled the sigil and shone blindingly bright, then flickered out, leaving a black scar that seemed to glow faintly at the edges.
Nicole gasped for breath as the pain began to subside. Bracing herself with her right hand, she tried to steady herself.
“Wait!” Jeremy shouted. “Don’t move your hand!”
He knelt down, face scrunched in concentration, as he looked at the band of the ring. The Arabic had returned, but it was different. Harsher.
“It’s back,” he said in awe. “But that does not mean Paradise.”
“Then what does it mean?” Nicole asked she shakily tried to get to her feet. She looked intently at Jeremy, hoping he would have an explanation for what the hell had just happened.
Instead he recoiled. The sigil’s fire hadn’t subsided, not completely, and he could see the blue and orange flames dancing faintly in Nicole’s eyes.
“I think it means the ring has chosen its true owner.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Jeremy?” Nicole bit out as she stood, surprised at how quickly her exhaustion was fading.
“I don’t know!” Jeremy held his hands up in surrender. “All I know is that the ring has always, always returned to you. And the last time a new word appeared it was because the original owner’s daughter was wearing it.”
“Waverly.” Nicole breathed out softly. She sent a silent prayer to whoever was listening that Waverly was safe as she absently pulled the shoulder of her hospital gown back up.
Nicole paused.
There was no reason her gown should have slid off her shoulder in the first place. She felt for the tie at the back of her neck, but there was nothing there. Just harsh, ragged...
“Um, Robin?”
“Yeah?” Robin shouted from his terrarium.
“What the hell is on my neck?” Nicole asked cautiously.
“It looks like a marking of some kind!” he yelled back.
She spun around, trying to get a good look at the markings on her back.
“It’s a sigil,” Jeremy said. “A big ass, incredibly complicated sigil.”
“A sigil.”
“Yeah. It might be the most complicated sigil I’ve ever seen.”
A sigil on her back and the ring on her finger. Nicole was starting to believe it really was meant for her. And she felt good. Better than she had in months.
“Okay,” she said, more to herself than the boys. “This is good. I can work with this.”
As she examined the engraving on the ring, she could feel its power. Could feel it building in her veins, pooling in her palms and begging for a way out.
She strode to the front of her terrarium and placed her hands gently against the glass, feeling more than hearing as the power whispered at the edges of her mind.
“Stand back,” she ordered. Both Jeremy and Robin obediently stepped as far away from the terrarium walls as they could.
She checked that they were out of the way, and let the power go.
The thick polymer walls shattered like brittle glass and fell to the ground in a million sparkling pieces.
Jeremy and Robin began to pick their way through the shattered remains of their terrariums as Nicole stood in awe. She stepped over the remains of the front wall into the wide hallway that led to the door and tried not to notice Jeremy nearly knocking Robin to the floor with the force of his hug. Her sigil glowed faintly. It felt warm, like a comfort she had always known but somehow forgotten had come back to her.
“Okay! This is great!” Jeremy said.
“Yeah.” Robin kissed Jeremy’s forehead lightly and pointed toward the door, guard helmets completely blocking out the view from the tiny window. “But how are we gonna get past them?”
They barely had time to react before the door to their cells came hurtling into the hallway, blown off its hinges by the push charge. Guards in full armor marched in, their heavy riot shields forming a solid, menacing wall.
Nicole could feel the power humming below her skin, an endless well of absolute potential. Robin pulled Jeremy behind her as she crouched into a fighting position.
“Oh,” Nicole grinned, menacing and predatory, as the guards began their slow advance. “That won’t be a problem.”
It took less than a minute.
They tore through the doorway and into a brightly lit hall with sets of heavy-looking double doors at each end.
“Which way?” Nicole asked.
“I don’t know!” Jeremy looked from one set of doors to the other. “This is a temporary facility! They change the layout for every new one they build.”
“I came from the right earlier,” Nicole mused. “So, maybe left?”
“Good enough for me.” Jeremy shrugged. Robin nodded next to him.
They had nearly reached the doors when they burst open and a body barreled towards them, skidding to a stop a few feet away. Nicole threw her arm out to shield Robin, nearly clotheslining him in the process.
“Haughtstuff, it’s you!”
Wynonna Earp was standing in the hallway, Doc’s gun belt around her waist and a shotgun on her back as the doors slammed shut behind her.
“I’ve been looking for you guys for forever,” she huffed. “This place is huge!”
“You.” Nicole took a step forward.
Wynonna barely had time to register the rage in Nicole’s eye before she was flying backward, the double doors slamming back with the force of her blow.
Nicole watched her slam into the ground, her hands still balled into fists.
“Oh, god.” Wynonna groaned as the ceiling tiles came into focus above her. “Good to see you too, Nicole.”
“You left us!” Nicole roared. “We could have helped! But you drugged us and you left us at the homestead!”
She paced back and forth across the hall as Wynonna struggled into a sitting position.
“Do you have any idea what it feels like waking up in a goddamn cage?” Nicole threw her hands up in exasperation.
“Nicole—" Wynonna started.
“Look at us!” Nicole gestured angrily to their gaunt faces and graying hospital gowns. “What the hell, Wynonna? Honestly—"
“Nicole!” Wynonna shouted.
“What?” Nicole yelled back.
“Aren’t you in the middle of escaping?”
“Oh,” Nicole said, her anger dissipating slightly as she remembered the task at hand. “Right. Well then, let’s go, Earp.”
Nicole waved exaggeratedly toward the double doors Wynonna had flown through before stomping off down the corridor, grumbling under her breath as she went.
Jeremy and Robin followed behind, pausing to help Wynonna up.
She looked curiously after Nicole, then to Jeremy and Robin.
“Uh,” she said hesitantly. “You guys see the giant glowing sigil on Sheriff Tater Haught’s back, right?”
“We see it.” Robin patted her arm reassuringly.
Wynonna gave him a questioning glance.
“Long story. But first we need to find Valdez,” Jeremy said hurriedly. He glanced down. “And maybe some pants.”
“Wait,” Wynonna asked as they headed after Nicole, following the shouts and thuds down the hall.
“Who the fuck is Valdez?”