daemonmuses Prompt #2.
Black Mesa Central Complex
Sector C Employee Dormitory
May 16, 2001
9:12 A.M.
It was glazing day in the Vance studio, when Azian and Alyx put glazes on all the pottery they'd made in the past week. It used to be just Azian, but ever since Alyx was old enough to walk, she'd wanted to get into the clay herself. Eventually, Azian took to setting aside some terracotta for her daughter to use as she saw fit. There was a whole shelf in the living room full of her lopsided pinch pots and blobby sculptures; what Alyx lacked in coordination she made up for in prolificacy.
"What color do you want to start with?"
Alyx considered for a moment for a moment. "Um... blue."
"Here you go." Azian handed her daughter the pot of glaze.
"No, not that blue, the other one!"
"What's the difference?"
"'s inna big pot," replied Alyx. "'m still little so I need the little one."
Hidari chuckled in Azian's ear. "She's got you there."
Azian shot her frog-shaped daemon a Look, but gave the smaller pot to Alyx. The little girl nodded in satisfaction and set to work, her daemon flickering from sparrow to monkey so he could hold up the pot for her.
Azian turned back to the table, but Hidari was still watching Alyx, peering down from his perch on the woman's shoulder. "She's getting a lot better at this," he noted. "Almost no glaze on the floor this time."
"Be quiet," Azian murmured without looking up from the sculpture she was glazing. "This piece is delicate. If I--"
BOOM.
Azian broke off with a startled yelp as the whole apartment shook violently. The room was filled with the sound of shattering ceramic as sculptures collided with each other and with the floor. Alyx screamed and covered her head with her hands, Kei darting underneath her in mouse-form.
Then, as quickly as it began, the vibration ceased. Panting, adrenaline-giddy, Azian took in the damage. Half the furniture had been knocked over, glaze was spilled everywhere, and all but a handful of the ceramics were broken beyond repair. But she was unharmed, and so, thank God, was her daughter.
Alyx lowered her arms and stared, wide-eyed, at her mother. "What was that??"
"An earthquake," Azian murmured, face gone pale. "I didn't think we were close enough to the San Andreas to get earthquakes, but..."
"Are you joking?" yelped Hidari, still clinging to Azian's collar. "That was no earthquake. Something's wrong, I can feel it--"
"Shut up, Hidari," Azian hissed back. To Alyx: "Come on, we should get up to the surface. It'll be safer there."
"But my pot--"
"We can worry about the pots later, Alyx! Come on!" Azian picked up her daughter and headed for the door as fast as her burden would allow.
Whatever was happening, it would be less dangerous on the surface than in the tunnels of Black Mesa... right?
Whatever was going on seemed to have put the tram system out of commission, so Azian and Alyx were forced to take the long way around to get to the surface vents. There were no more tremors, but those weird noises they kept hearing in the distance weren't exactly comforting. And their daemons just wouldn't keep still. Hidari frantically hopped from Azian's shoulder to her head to the other shoulder and back again. Kei was even more agitated, switching forms rapidly as he darted around Alyx: a bobcat at her feet, a gecko on her shoulder, a dragonfly circling her head.
"Are we there yet, Mama?"
"Not much further, sweetie. Just up ahead." Azian turned the corner and stopped dead in her tracks. "Oh no."
The corridor ahead, the one that led to the surface exit, was blocked off by a pile of rubble. Apparently the quake had caused a cave-in. "What d'we do now?" asked Alyx, looking earnestly up at Azian.
"We'll just have to find another way around. Come on--" She ushered her daughter back the way they had come.
But before they got five yards down the corridor, something happened. There was a crackle of electricity and a flash of green light, and the air in front of Alyx and Azian tore open, disgorging... something. Something with hooves and tentacles and a long tail, something that turned to face the two women with a noise akin to a growl.
Azian's face went utterly colorless. "Alyx, get back around the corner," she murmured without turning around.
"Mama, what is it?" whispered Alyx.
"Back around the corner," repeated Azian. "Now." Alyx gulped and did as she was told, turning around to peek at her mother from a point of relative safety.
Azian, very slowly, took a step back away from the thing--
It whirled around, swinging its tail at her head. She was dead before she felt the blow.
"MAMAAAAAA!" Alyx screamed as Azian was thrown to the ground and her daemon dissolved in a whirl of sparks. She ran to her mother's prone body, all caution forgotten. "Mama, Mama, wake up!" She shook Azian's shoulder desperately, tears streaming down her face. "You gotta get up we gotta go Mama please..."
A shadow overhead made Alyx look up. The thing was standing inches away, blood-red tentacles lashing toward her--
And then a massive orange blur leapt from behind Alyx with a savage roar, tearing into the tentacled creature with sharp fangs and claws. The creature cried out once and then went down for good. The Bengal tiger that felled it looked back up, his eyes meeting the girl's, and then Alyx realized: it was Kei.
For a long moment, they both just stared at each other. It was Kei who broke the silence. "Get on," he said, cocking his head toward his furry back. "It'll be faster."
Slowly, reluctantly, Alyx let go of Azian's shoulder and stood up. She took one last look at her mother's body, then climbed onto her daemon's back, burying her face and hands in the fur around his neck.
And the lady and the tiger took off for parts unknown.