Amberlight, pt 10/13
Title: Amberlight
Fandom: AU The Devil Wears Prada
Pairing: Miranda/Andy
Rating:Mature
Summary: A year after Paris, Andy has her life on track again, she's rocketing to success in her job at the Mirror and her freelance work has caused her to be taken under the wing of one of New York's elite writers. So, it's obvious that it's about time for fate to throw a wrench into the works once again.
Author's Note: I hate this, I've turned into that fanfiction writer that I loathe. You know the one, that author who wrote that story that left you wanting to see it to the end and they just... didn't... finish it. They left it alone, and then after it was all said and done, they maybe tossed out an ending.
Argh. Well, ok, I lied. I was going to become that author, but kicked procrastination in the rear and typed out this chapter. Why did this chapter hurt? Because it didn't sound right. It didn't flow right. I still don't think it flowed right but I'm going to burn my computer and dance around the wreckage if I try to finangle this bit any more.
Three more chapters. Three chapters that, thank the writer's muse, are looking to flow so much smoothly in their final drafts. If anyone has stuck with me this long, I thank you very much. Without further ado, here we go.
If you need a refresher, the story is at my journal, relatively all in chronological postings starting with: je-talveran.livejournal.com/530.html#cutid1
***
Amberlight, 10/13
Underneath the instinctual rabbit-flight syndrome that her brain was locked into, Andy's intellectual mind quickly processed that though the door was heavy and while a normal wolf couldn't possibly figure out how to open a door, a werewolf was more than capable of using the same level of human intelligence. The sound of nails scrabbling over wood pushed her fear into overdrive, but she had to think.
She was good at thinking.
“Ok, Andy, focus.” She coached herself. She pulled in a shaky breath and held it for two seconds, then exhaled. She repeated it. After the second exhale, she felt calmer and less flighty. Good to have one's head in a life-or-death situation! Her heart wasn't thundering in her ears, and her mind was slowing down to process her next move. She saw enough horror movies that to run without a clear plan was to get eaten by the monster. To stay in one spot and panic was another good way to get killed.
Nails scrabbled at the door.
“Shiiiiiit.” She tugged her lower lip between her teeth. She knew from the tour that the other rooms down the wing were similar to her own. One exit in and out. No-go. There was the parlor staircase, but the others were around that area and she wasn't keen on bumping into them if they all were growing fur and fangs.
A flash of white appeared at the far end, close to where the back ways twisted to the maid hallways. Andy turned to get a better look and her heart skipped a beat.
Miranda, if the large ghostly-white wolf was indeed Miranda, stood at the corner of a hall. Her eyes glowed an eerie blue that Andy could pick up even with the distance between them. Miranda had always held the ability to make Andy freeze like a rabbit before the fox, but the addition of being a wolf who's fangs were probably bigger than her steak knives made it worse. Andy felt pinned underneath the stare she knew so well from the Runway offices. Miranda blinked slowly, then the expression shifted. The piercing stare morphed into a questioning glance of how Andrea could possibly be so dimwitted as to just stand there gaping like it was the latest Cinnabon sale at the corner market.
Andy could work with that gaze. That gaze was familiar and if one wanted to keep their heads (or their jobs) they leapt up and obeyed it. She closed her eyes, heard the whispery “I love my job” deep within some recess of her mind, and opened her eyes, ready to do whatever needed to be done.
The wolf was gone. It didn't matter. Thinking didn't matter. When one thought, she could miss the elevator to make that coffee arrive before Miranda. Or miss the order to grab skirts. Or screwed up her escape.
A unearthly howl shuddered from behind her and the hallway shook with the force thrown against the closed door.
Her footfalls thudded over the carpet as she raced to the corner. She whipped out her hand and used it as a brace on the wall to balance the turn down the narrower hall. The walls shuddered again. She grit her teeth and lowered her head, picking up her speed. Another slam against the door ended with a sickening crack. Apparently a werewolf didn't need to remember how to open a latch, they just had brute force. She weaved through the back passages from memory alone. Left here. Right here. Right again. Skip the middle door.
There! The stairwell's door was ajar. Somewhere behind her, another resounding crack of wood blasted through the halls like a shotgun blast, and then a victory snarl. Her heart climbed into her throat as she almost took the steps head-first in a dive. Down the steps, past the plant. Into the glow of the hall. There was no sound save for her heartbeat thundering in her ears, and her breath coming fast and panicked.
Where had Elizabeth sent the group? To the south veranda? Andy furrowed her brow and stepped cautiously out into the hall. Nothing sprung at her. No eyes, no growls, oh where the fuck had Elizabeth said the rest were? Could she get to anywhere before the wolf-that-was-Doctor-Michaels barreled down the stairs with fangs bared?
Stairs. Oh god, she left the door open.
Andy remedied that with a quick shove of her hand, and then, inspired by the horror movie marathons she had cowered underneath blankets with Nate, she pushed the large potted plant before the door, hoping that it would stall another brute-force attempt. She marveled at her handiwork for a fraction of a second, then bolted down the long corridor to the foyer with the low lights and the memories of flimsy robes that weren't thick enough to be counted as fabric.
The doors were shut, but as Andy tugged down on the latch, they opened easily underneath her hand, without the squeak she'd been dreading. Thank god for the vanity of the rich and famous, she offered silently as she jumped the steps down to the circular drive. Her heels clacked loudly in the surprisingly calm night, but if she was lucky, one werewolf was trying to figure out how to move plants, and the other ones were ... well ... were somewhere not here and not so close as she could feel the heat of their breath.
“One of you has to have left the keys in the car.” She mutters as she skids to a halt besides a dark-colored Mercedes-Benz that probably cost more than all of Andy's expenses since before she was born. The door was unlocked. Andy allowed herself a moment of exhilaration, dear god she was going to live, and then slid into the driver's seat. Her elation deflated. The ignition was bare. No keys in the glove box, or hidden on the visior.
“No! Damn it, come on!” She smacked the wheel in frustration and then froze as it honked in indignant retaliation. “Shit!” That mistake had cost her any lead she had gained. She never moved so fast as she did tearing out of that car.
As her feet touched the pavement, the first howl ringed out over the grounds. It sent a shiver straight through her nervous system and stopped her heart. By the time the car door barely missed her hand as she swung it shut, another wolf had joined in, the howl becoming some sort of stucco duet.
Andy didn't want to stay around to see how many others joined in. Like a runner at the sound of the starting gun, she tore away from the circle of expensive cars and followed the winding driveway. Her breath hurt as she struggled to suck it through her lungs quickly - she had never been a good sprinter --- and her knee ached with each step. Heels weren't made for life-or-death dashes along brick.
She wasn't far along the drive when the pack fell in step behind her. Now it was a race to reach the gate and the road beyond it. There, she had a chance to hail down a passing car. Here she had little more than a few yards, and even that was falling away fast. She wondered if she turned around, would she see death in their eyes? It sure clung in the air, spurred on by the heat of the wolves' breath just at her heels. She could feel the dampness of their spittle, and the steel of their fangs as they teased her, drawing their mouth close enough to brush against her ankles, then back away.
There wasn't enough time to kick off her heels as she reached the gate. She would have to climb in them, maybe even kick them off at anything that tried to get at her. She managed a stumbled, but successful jump and started to work her way up along the vines of iron, thanking herself for going to that gym last month during the trial-period. Now, if she could just swing her leg up and get it hooked around ...
Fangs tore through her skin and muscle like they were tissue-paper and clamped down over the bone. Pain seared up her leg and Andy's grip fumbled. The wolf shook her leg like a rag-doll and she crashed back onto earth hard, stars dancing before her as she struggled to fight blacking out. It still had a firm hold on her, tugging backwards now. It was black in the silverly splash of moonlight that blanketed the drive, and it's teeth were stained even blacker from the blood.
She hurt, but she wasn't hurt enough to take being eaten alive lying down. With a yell to bolster her own faith, moreso than startle the wolf, she kicked out with the bitten leg and grabbed her shoe from her still-not-a-chew-toy leg. Then, with the two-inch heel, she shifted upward and then forward, driving the heel into the wolf's eye. “Get off!”
The wolf instantly let go, crying out in agony as it shrank back from her, it's left eye shut tight. She didn't worry if she damaged it permanently, she just wanted it to stop biting her. She kicked her other heel off, and used the gate to work herself to her feet. She looked behind her.
She could count six wolves. The closest was the one she had injured. Then Miranda, her back to Andy, in a staring-contest with a shaggy, gold wolf who looked twice her size. Then two more wolves, both a rich, chocolate brown. They flanked the final wolf, the one approaching up the drive.
The one who had started all of this. Andy couldn't tell if the wolf was more red than brown in the moonlight, but she knew those eyes. Those haunting, ghostlike amber eyes that cut through her. The wolf in her room. The wolf in her apartment.
The damned wolf that had pinned her down in the middle of the driveway and tore into her shoulder like it had been the last supper.
The wolf was already shimmering as it loped up, it's image flickering from beast to man, in a reversal of the way the Doctor had changed. Every step, the wolf appeared less and less, and the human appeared more and more, until her attacker stood naked before her.
Andy's eyes widened. “You!
***
Back to Part 9
je-talveran.livejournal.com/2907.html#cutid1
Fandom: AU The Devil Wears Prada
Pairing: Miranda/Andy
Rating:Mature
Summary: A year after Paris, Andy has her life on track again, she's rocketing to success in her job at the Mirror and her freelance work has caused her to be taken under the wing of one of New York's elite writers. So, it's obvious that it's about time for fate to throw a wrench into the works once again.
Author's Note: I hate this, I've turned into that fanfiction writer that I loathe. You know the one, that author who wrote that story that left you wanting to see it to the end and they just... didn't... finish it. They left it alone, and then after it was all said and done, they maybe tossed out an ending.
Argh. Well, ok, I lied. I was going to become that author, but kicked procrastination in the rear and typed out this chapter. Why did this chapter hurt? Because it didn't sound right. It didn't flow right. I still don't think it flowed right but I'm going to burn my computer and dance around the wreckage if I try to finangle this bit any more.
Three more chapters. Three chapters that, thank the writer's muse, are looking to flow so much smoothly in their final drafts. If anyone has stuck with me this long, I thank you very much. Without further ado, here we go.
If you need a refresher, the story is at my journal, relatively all in chronological postings starting with: je-talveran.livejournal.com/530.html#cutid1
***
Amberlight, 10/13
Underneath the instinctual rabbit-flight syndrome that her brain was locked into, Andy's intellectual mind quickly processed that though the door was heavy and while a normal wolf couldn't possibly figure out how to open a door, a werewolf was more than capable of using the same level of human intelligence. The sound of nails scrabbling over wood pushed her fear into overdrive, but she had to think.
She was good at thinking.
“Ok, Andy, focus.” She coached herself. She pulled in a shaky breath and held it for two seconds, then exhaled. She repeated it. After the second exhale, she felt calmer and less flighty. Good to have one's head in a life-or-death situation! Her heart wasn't thundering in her ears, and her mind was slowing down to process her next move. She saw enough horror movies that to run without a clear plan was to get eaten by the monster. To stay in one spot and panic was another good way to get killed.
Nails scrabbled at the door.
“Shiiiiiit.” She tugged her lower lip between her teeth. She knew from the tour that the other rooms down the wing were similar to her own. One exit in and out. No-go. There was the parlor staircase, but the others were around that area and she wasn't keen on bumping into them if they all were growing fur and fangs.
A flash of white appeared at the far end, close to where the back ways twisted to the maid hallways. Andy turned to get a better look and her heart skipped a beat.
Miranda, if the large ghostly-white wolf was indeed Miranda, stood at the corner of a hall. Her eyes glowed an eerie blue that Andy could pick up even with the distance between them. Miranda had always held the ability to make Andy freeze like a rabbit before the fox, but the addition of being a wolf who's fangs were probably bigger than her steak knives made it worse. Andy felt pinned underneath the stare she knew so well from the Runway offices. Miranda blinked slowly, then the expression shifted. The piercing stare morphed into a questioning glance of how Andrea could possibly be so dimwitted as to just stand there gaping like it was the latest Cinnabon sale at the corner market.
Andy could work with that gaze. That gaze was familiar and if one wanted to keep their heads (or their jobs) they leapt up and obeyed it. She closed her eyes, heard the whispery “I love my job” deep within some recess of her mind, and opened her eyes, ready to do whatever needed to be done.
The wolf was gone. It didn't matter. Thinking didn't matter. When one thought, she could miss the elevator to make that coffee arrive before Miranda. Or miss the order to grab skirts. Or screwed up her escape.
A unearthly howl shuddered from behind her and the hallway shook with the force thrown against the closed door.
Her footfalls thudded over the carpet as she raced to the corner. She whipped out her hand and used it as a brace on the wall to balance the turn down the narrower hall. The walls shuddered again. She grit her teeth and lowered her head, picking up her speed. Another slam against the door ended with a sickening crack. Apparently a werewolf didn't need to remember how to open a latch, they just had brute force. She weaved through the back passages from memory alone. Left here. Right here. Right again. Skip the middle door.
There! The stairwell's door was ajar. Somewhere behind her, another resounding crack of wood blasted through the halls like a shotgun blast, and then a victory snarl. Her heart climbed into her throat as she almost took the steps head-first in a dive. Down the steps, past the plant. Into the glow of the hall. There was no sound save for her heartbeat thundering in her ears, and her breath coming fast and panicked.
Where had Elizabeth sent the group? To the south veranda? Andy furrowed her brow and stepped cautiously out into the hall. Nothing sprung at her. No eyes, no growls, oh where the fuck had Elizabeth said the rest were? Could she get to anywhere before the wolf-that-was-Doctor-Michaels barreled down the stairs with fangs bared?
Stairs. Oh god, she left the door open.
Andy remedied that with a quick shove of her hand, and then, inspired by the horror movie marathons she had cowered underneath blankets with Nate, she pushed the large potted plant before the door, hoping that it would stall another brute-force attempt. She marveled at her handiwork for a fraction of a second, then bolted down the long corridor to the foyer with the low lights and the memories of flimsy robes that weren't thick enough to be counted as fabric.
The doors were shut, but as Andy tugged down on the latch, they opened easily underneath her hand, without the squeak she'd been dreading. Thank god for the vanity of the rich and famous, she offered silently as she jumped the steps down to the circular drive. Her heels clacked loudly in the surprisingly calm night, but if she was lucky, one werewolf was trying to figure out how to move plants, and the other ones were ... well ... were somewhere not here and not so close as she could feel the heat of their breath.
“One of you has to have left the keys in the car.” She mutters as she skids to a halt besides a dark-colored Mercedes-Benz that probably cost more than all of Andy's expenses since before she was born. The door was unlocked. Andy allowed herself a moment of exhilaration, dear god she was going to live, and then slid into the driver's seat. Her elation deflated. The ignition was bare. No keys in the glove box, or hidden on the visior.
“No! Damn it, come on!” She smacked the wheel in frustration and then froze as it honked in indignant retaliation. “Shit!” That mistake had cost her any lead she had gained. She never moved so fast as she did tearing out of that car.
As her feet touched the pavement, the first howl ringed out over the grounds. It sent a shiver straight through her nervous system and stopped her heart. By the time the car door barely missed her hand as she swung it shut, another wolf had joined in, the howl becoming some sort of stucco duet.
Andy didn't want to stay around to see how many others joined in. Like a runner at the sound of the starting gun, she tore away from the circle of expensive cars and followed the winding driveway. Her breath hurt as she struggled to suck it through her lungs quickly - she had never been a good sprinter --- and her knee ached with each step. Heels weren't made for life-or-death dashes along brick.
She wasn't far along the drive when the pack fell in step behind her. Now it was a race to reach the gate and the road beyond it. There, she had a chance to hail down a passing car. Here she had little more than a few yards, and even that was falling away fast. She wondered if she turned around, would she see death in their eyes? It sure clung in the air, spurred on by the heat of the wolves' breath just at her heels. She could feel the dampness of their spittle, and the steel of their fangs as they teased her, drawing their mouth close enough to brush against her ankles, then back away.
There wasn't enough time to kick off her heels as she reached the gate. She would have to climb in them, maybe even kick them off at anything that tried to get at her. She managed a stumbled, but successful jump and started to work her way up along the vines of iron, thanking herself for going to that gym last month during the trial-period. Now, if she could just swing her leg up and get it hooked around ...
Fangs tore through her skin and muscle like they were tissue-paper and clamped down over the bone. Pain seared up her leg and Andy's grip fumbled. The wolf shook her leg like a rag-doll and she crashed back onto earth hard, stars dancing before her as she struggled to fight blacking out. It still had a firm hold on her, tugging backwards now. It was black in the silverly splash of moonlight that blanketed the drive, and it's teeth were stained even blacker from the blood.
She hurt, but she wasn't hurt enough to take being eaten alive lying down. With a yell to bolster her own faith, moreso than startle the wolf, she kicked out with the bitten leg and grabbed her shoe from her still-not-a-chew-toy leg. Then, with the two-inch heel, she shifted upward and then forward, driving the heel into the wolf's eye. “Get off!”
The wolf instantly let go, crying out in agony as it shrank back from her, it's left eye shut tight. She didn't worry if she damaged it permanently, she just wanted it to stop biting her. She kicked her other heel off, and used the gate to work herself to her feet. She looked behind her.
She could count six wolves. The closest was the one she had injured. Then Miranda, her back to Andy, in a staring-contest with a shaggy, gold wolf who looked twice her size. Then two more wolves, both a rich, chocolate brown. They flanked the final wolf, the one approaching up the drive.
The one who had started all of this. Andy couldn't tell if the wolf was more red than brown in the moonlight, but she knew those eyes. Those haunting, ghostlike amber eyes that cut through her. The wolf in her room. The wolf in her apartment.
The damned wolf that had pinned her down in the middle of the driveway and tore into her shoulder like it had been the last supper.
The wolf was already shimmering as it loped up, it's image flickering from beast to man, in a reversal of the way the Doctor had changed. Every step, the wolf appeared less and less, and the human appeared more and more, until her attacker stood naked before her.
Andy's eyes widened. “You!
***
Back to Part 9
je-talveran.livejournal.com/2907.html#cutid1