Chapter Text
Girl Like You
I've never known a girl like you before
Now just like in a song from days of yore
Here you come a knockin', knockin' on my door
And I've never met a girl like you before
You give me just a taste so I want more and more
Now my hands are bleeding and my knees are raw
Cause now you've got me crawlin', crawlin' on the floor
And I've never known a girl like you before
You've made me acknowledge the devil in me
I hope to God I'm talkin' metaphorically
Hope that I'm talkin' allegorically
Know that I'm talkin' about the way I feel
And I've never known a girl like you before
Never, never, never, never
Never known a girl like you before
This old town's changed so much
Don't feel like I belong
Too many protest singers
Not enough protest songs
And now you've come along
Yes you've come along
And I've never met a girl like you before
By the looks of it, the day should be going as normal. The sunlight was dashing shadows, like an artist would their canvas across Felicity's hair that gleamed golden in the splattered light. There were no signs of bad weather such as stormy clouds or thunder, which (as everyone knows) are bad omens. There were no sinister crows flying around in mobs of ten, sprinkling bad luck over the heads of walking people. Neither was there a black cat anywhere and she hadn't broken a mirror recently. So, if you read the signs, it should be a perfectly pleasant day.
Oh, boy, was she wrong.
30 minutes before fatal mistake
"I am done," Felicity declared happily, shutting off her computer with a satisfied smile.
"I hate you," Sara grumbled. Lyla muttered something in unison.
"Don't hate me. I can help you."
Sara threw a marshmallow at her. "I don't need your pity. Now get off your butt and go home. It's your turn to cook anyway."
Putting her computer inside her backpack, Felicity eyed her over the heap of candy wrappers and empty energy drinks. "Are you sure?"
"I'm sure. We're sure. Right, Lyla?" Sara asked Lyla, nudging her in the side. Lyla jabbed Sara right back, much harder than required and smiled, but never let her eyes leave the page she was currently squinting at. "Yes, totally good. Nothing but good here. Good."
"Okay, I'll come get you in an hour. The pizza will be waiting."
"Pizza," Lyla sighed longingly, her eyes almost getting crossed in her attempt to keep the focus on the computer screen.
"Is she high?" Felicity asked loudly behind her back. Sara cocked her head as in a yes-maybe-who-knows kind of way. Just to play it safe, Felicity pocketed the last of the energy drinks. "This is for your own good," she reminded. At that Lyla's head snapped up, and her stare made Felicity take an involuntary step back.
"Give me those," Lyla all but growled, her blue eyes turning into slits of focused fury stemming from cramming for a particular gruelling exam. It was a haunting sight and much more common than one would think when it came to college students. Felicity did what any sane and normal person would do faced with the amount of explosive power that could exist inside a thin brunette starved of basic necessities like bathroom breaks and toothbrushes. She ducked behind the nearest shelf and ran for her life.
"Run, Smoakie, run!" she could hear Sara cry after her in an attempt to cheer her on. Or maybe to encourage her to not trip over her own feet if Lyla indeed had given chase. Felicity dared a glance behind her after she'd passed the entrance and the locomotive that was Lyla Michaels was nowhere to be seen. Slowing down to a walk, Felicity hummed to herself as she opened the door out of the MIT building and started to cross the dew-covered lawn.
It really was an amazing night. The wind was cold and fresh and woke her up more than all of those energy drinks had put together. The grass beneath her feet turned into pavement that in turn turned into dirt since the short cut was crossing at the margin of the woods. She'd walked here so many times before that the darkness didn't really bother her. Even if she'd been blind, she'd find the way home. As if to take away her self-assurance, Felicity tripped in that moment on a root and fell flat faced into the dirt.
"Ouch," she muttered, feeling earth dig itself up her nose.
Placing her now scratched palms against the ground, she pushed herself into a sitting position. Brushing off her large hoodie on which the print said: I SPEAKO ANGLISH in bold blue letters, Felicity was grateful at least that her baby had been fine. She patted the backpack just to make sure. Her glasses, however, wasn't. They weren't broken, thank god - she couldn't afford a new pair right now - but they were extremely dirty. She wiped them vigorously for a few minutes on the part of her hoodie that wasn't smeared with damp brown dirt. Her world looked a little foggy, she found out, squinting behind the glasses but it wasn't too bad. Just as she was about to push herself up from the ground and trek the rest of the way home, something caught her eye.
She turned towards the park and the back of the houses. There wasn't anyone she could see and all the alleys were quiet and dark. It was probably nothing, she said to herself, rising to her feet. But as she lifted up the backpack, she saw it again. There was something moving through one of the farthest away street lights, flickering in and out. What was that?
She took a few steps closer, trying to make out what was moving so fast and then, when more shapes started to move, she understood. The backpack slipped from her hand; her fingers moved by themselves as they dug for the cellphone in the back pocket while her legs were busy running at top speed. She stumbled down the hill and ducked beneath the chained sign stating: No Unauthorised Persons Beyond This Point! She ran through the fenced alley, while her fingers dialled 9-1-1. The signals seemed to drag out forever until a male voice greeted her calmly.
"9-1-1, what's your emergency?"
"Someone's getting beaten to death down by Crows Park!" she screamed into the phone, finally reaching the end of the alley. Felicity lurched to a stop, hiding behind a large trash can.
"Tell me what you see," the voice exhorted in her ear.
She did as instructed, peaking over to see what was happening but it was impossible to make out anything except someone getting brutally kicked.
"I don't see anything!" she whispered as urgently as she could. "Please, hurry!"
"A patrol is on their way."
"One?" Felicity echoed.
"Yes."
"How long?" she asked, already dreading the answer.
"They are 8 minutes out."
Felicity felt how her adrenaline started to pump when she realized what she must do.
"Tell them to send an ambulance," was her final plea before she disconnected the call and stepped out from her protective trash can.
Fatal mistake in three, two, one ...
"Hey!" she yelled loudly.
Now when she'd stepped into the light and could see clearly, and also since the fight slowed down by her impromptu presence, she noticed that their was one guy lying on the ground. And there were four around him, all of them big as quarterbacks.
Sometimes, most of the time, in fact, Felicity wished for a private opera singer. One who would act as a pop-up book every time she was about to make a really bad decision. He would then proceed to serenade her, singing in a high C the word: MISTAAAAAAAAAKE. It would be utilized in her everyday life most eagerly since she had a brain and a mouth that really hadn't gripped notions like; smooth, or non-embarrassing. But right now, one flash of a second after she'd called out, she desperately wished she'd had that opera man serenade her earlier. It would have saved her the uncomfortable feeling of healthy self-preservation coursing through her stiff body when her cry made two of the four bullies look up at her. She realized that in her panda flats, red polka dotted pants, glasses and ponytail, she looked a whole lot more like a victim than a saviour. According to how the creeps snickered, they thought so too. This was not going well.
The two of them, the once that had interrupted their little Wednesday amusement of torturing someone, were slowly coming towards her. Felicity pulled her phone in front of her like a shield.
"I've called the police. They'll be here any second."
The bigger of the two, though both were large, flirting with huge, winked at her when she'd finished.
"Well, that's a shame, pretty," he said in a leering voice that made her insides want to puke. "Guess we have to wrap it up, boys!" he called over his shoulder but he never turned enough to break the contact his eyes had with her legs.
This really wasn't going well. Felicity saw how the second guy who had walked towards her started to turn back. She had to do something. Anything! Her mind zeroed in on distraction and reminded her of what she had in her pockets. She acted on what was hopefully a strike of genius. Before the sleazebag could take another step in her direction, she pulled out one of the energy drinks she's stolen earlier and hurled it as hard as she could. Genius struck, as in struck the sleazebag in the jaw, making him bend and yelp in pain.
While he was busy being injured, Felicity took out the other can, this time aiming. It struck him on the crown of the head, effectively making him fall onto the pavement without a sound.
"Yes!" she cried out happily right before the rest of her breath got stuck. Forgetting for one second that she didn't have time for a victory dance, was apparently one second too long. Felicity only had time to register movement to her right before someone's hands were around her throat. She panicked, ripping at the hands and kicking to get loose. It didn't work and the guy, who was the slightly smaller guy from before, looked absolutely ready to kill her on the spot.
The realization of that gave her another jolt of adrenaline. Her nails bit into his hands and when she found his pinkie, she pulled until it cracked disturbingly. Finally, he let go with a howl. Felicity coughed like a chain smoker, trying to get precious oxygen down to her lungs. Just as she had got one whole intake of glorious air, a hard fist struck her right across the cheekbone and she smacked into the ground. The pain felt like a bomb ignited inside her bone, shattering it into million pieces. She cried out in shock and pain but kept her arms over her face, quickly rolling to the side in case the bastard got the idea in his head that she would make a good rug.
The guy was lacking in imagination since he decided to kick her instead. How original. But it felt pretty novel to her when the pain in her face turned into a smidge, a dirty speck on the pain scale. His old sneaker sunk deep into her stomach, making her feel like it was actually inside her. It was enough to make her loose her air, feeling how it drained from her lungs. Felicity gasped, fighting to get her breath. But in the back of her head, she was just waiting for the next strike. Strangely enough, it never came. Around her, she could hear how punches were distributed with a steady rhythm. The groans of that poor guy on the ground sounded horrible when she heard them through the fog of her own haze. Felicity wanted to look but she was too afraid of what she's see. If she could lift her arms, she would have covered her ears too. The sounds were jolting her insides. Every sharp groan ricocheting against her, until it felt like someone was kicking her again.
At last, the moans and pained whines turned into silence.
Felicity waited, her head down on the pavement, for the victors to come and finish what they'd started. But as the seconds passed and there was nothing but silence, she forced her unwilling head to move. When she viewed her surroundings, it struck her as rather strange. There were four bodies lying in her proximity. She could only recognize the two she'd seen face to face but she'd bet her money on all four of them being that gang. So how were all of them knocked out? Where was the victim? She pushed herself up on her forearms, searching for the fifth body when she saw a figure standing in the shadow by one of the alleys. He had blood all over his face and his eye seemed swollen shut. A deep gash ran across his cheek. His whole body was stiff, rigid even. He didn't seem at all as exhausted as she felt. It was only now, Felicity realized that she was blatantly staring at him, and he was staring back, had been staring even before she was aware of his presence. She couldn't pry her eyes away from him, waiting for his reaction to all of this.
He seemed like he was waiting for something himself. Still motionless, he stood unwavering until the wait was seemingly over. Despite an obvious limp, he made it to her very quickly. Wordlessly, he offered his hand to her. Felicity's gaze wandered between his mangled face and his almost equally mangled hand and took it. She was quickly on her feet, standing, well, swaying, on the spot.
Seeing her unsteady, he clasped her wrist to support her. At least that was what Felicity thought he was doing before she was suddenly tugged behind him like a toy dog. He walked with an intensity seldom displayed anywhere except those determined to win an Olympic racewalking competition or with those who really need to go to the bathroom.
"Hey, what are you doing?" she asked, as gently as she could in case he was some sort of walking deviant.
"It's not safe," was his very vague explanation.
"But what about the police?" Felicity exclaimed.
"There might be more of them," he replied, not stopping or looking back.
"But the police have guns," she tried again, reasoning with the crazy person.
As sudden as he'd appeared in front of her, he wheeled on her, his sharp eyes, eye in this instance, boring into hers. It was much how she'd imagined staring into the Cyclops' eye in the odyssey would have felt like.
"If you want to live past tonight, come with me. If not, then I don't need the dead weight anyway," the Cyclops bit off.
Her wrist was suddenly free, holding suspended in the air by her will alone.
"Who are you?" she questioned, and with some right to know, if he wanted to know her opinion. But Felicity had a feeling Cyclops wasn't really interested in what her opinion about that was. He didn't really seem that concerned for her as a being.
At that obviously audacious question, Cyclops turned back to where he'd been headed and strode away, leaving her behind. Felicity glanced behind her, at the warm sheen coming from the Crows Parks entry lights. It illuminated a small trail of blood and a heap of bodies that would certainly wake up soon. As if to give her estimation skills some credit, one of them started to moan in pain.
With a lot of doubts, even more question and a voice in her head that was berating her in an high C over how stupid and careless she'd been, Felicity rushed after the both stranger and obviously strange guy into the darkness that had enveloped him in its blanket.