Work Text:
When Alfred traveled throughout his land, his body matched the rhythms of the places he went. In Alabama he felt warm and sleepy, like doing nothing more challenging than sprawling underneath the tree in his backyard with a glass of cold iced tea on hand to sip at. In New York City the energy of the massive populace coursed through him, getting him pumped. In Iowa he felt the quiet but somehow peaceful desolation of cornfields stretching on for miles with no one else in sight.
Sometimes the effects the land had on Alfred weren't so positive though. Like what he was going through now, pulled over on the side of Interstate 65, panting and retching into the weeds. He'd fallen to his hands and knees. His body felt like it was on fire. Even his worst wildfires didn't heat him up like this. His stomach churned and he lost the struggle to keep his lunch down, acid-covered chunks of fries and hamburgers spilling from his mouth onto the ground beneath him with a wet splatter. Alfred squeezed his eyes shut because the sight of vomit always made him feel nauseous, but if he had looked he would have saw red that wasn't from the ketchup he'd dipped his fries in. There was blood liberally mixed in with the upchucked food and bile.
Alfred felt sick. He felt...poisoned.
But there was no getting these foul toxins out with a little vomiting. He had to get away. Head swimming, he began to crawl back to his car. It was a Chevy Nova he'd rented in Louisville, picking it out because of its drop-top. He'd thought it was too beautiful a day to not see the sky spread out overhead as he drove, painted impossibly blue and full of fat fluffy clouds.
Now, Alfred didn't give a fuck about his pretty surroundings. Darkness bloomed around the edge of his sight, and was taking every ounce of his willpower to not black out, and to keep moving. The asphalt scraped against his hands and knees and burned against his skin, boiling hot from the rays of the bright overhead summer sun.
Alfred only stopped moving when he nearly bumped into the car, the small shadow it cast over his heaving body letting him know he'd made it.
'Don't pass out, don't pass out,' he chanted to himself mentally as he forced himself up into a kneeling position to grab the car door's metal handle. His sweat-drenched hand slipped against it and he nearly went sprawling back on the pavement, but he managed to catch himself.
Dragging the heavy steel car door open was almost beyond him. His unnatural strength had deserted him. But finally, gasping for breath, he flung it open.
Alfred's hands scrabbled against the upholstery of the bucket seat, barely gaining enough purchase to pull himself up into the driver's seat. Panting like an overheated dog, he slammed the button to close the roof. He couldn't shut the air out fast enough.
There was blood-streaked vomit smeared on his clothes, on his chin, but he didn't bother wiping off his face or pulling his now-stained white t-shirt over his head. He just slammed his foot down on the accelerator and floored it. Alfred didn't care what his boss ordered, he wasn't coming within a hundred miles of this place ever again.