[Fic] Kinetic Energy (prologue; WIP)
Title: Kinetic Energy (prologue)
Summary (for the whole thing): Molly Parkman has decided to stay in the world she has created, but her old life continues to haunt her. When she crosses paths with someone who knows who she will become, how will the hunter deal with becoming the hunted?
Rating: R (For gore and some f-bombs)
Pairing: Allusions to Molly/Micah, but overall gen-flavored
Note: Sequel to Theory of Relativity. This is something of an ongoing project. From about the middle of when I was writing Theory, I knew that there was still a story to tell after the end. I'm still feeling this out and seeing where I want to go with it, but this is likely going to be the first chapter of whatever it ends up becoming. I'm just floating it out there. Thoughts and concrit are, as always, very much appreciated.
This is unbetaed.
The shotgun fired. Molly put her hands to her chest, and drew them away, sticky. Wet. She poked her fingers experimentally into the hole, and didn’t feel any resistance. She slid it in further, listening to the wet sucking sound the blood made against the skin on her arm. Her wrist, then her forearm, disappeared into her body. Her hand just kept going and kept going until she was sure she felt the heavy wool of the suit on her back. Why did nothing stop her hand? Wasn’t she supposed to have a heart there?
She pulled her arm out of her chest cavity with the sound of a child slurping up too many strands of spaghetti. She looked up, finally, to see that Matt was the one holding the shotgun. The Matt she’d left behind, the one with grey hair at his temples and wrinkles on his face, the weight of the presidency with all its conflicting emotions. “You left me,” he said.
“I saved you,” she replied.
“You broke our family apart,” he said. “The future doesn’t just change around those in it. You left me there. Alone.”
“Maybe it’s what you deserve,” Molly replied.
He shook his head. “I always knew the love in our family was one sided,” he said.
“Daddy, no! I-”
But then he cocked his head and stared at her. A thin line of blood dripped down his upper lip. There was a searing ache in Molly’s head, and she could feel a line of blood out of her nose as well. The pain got worse and-
Molly’s entire body shuddered with the effort of a great gasp, and suddenly she was awake in the dingy motel room off the interstate. She sat up and brought her hands to her chest. Solid. It was solid. No gunshot wound. Cold sweat beaded on her body as she panted in the darkness. After several minutes she stood, a bit shaky, and walked into the bathroom. She washed her face in the sink, but it didn’t do anything to take of the sweaty film of the dream from coating her body.
So she got into the shower and turned it on cold. Gooseflesh raised on her arms, but there was something refreshing in shivering. The water woke her up, and as the minutes passed the memories of the dream floated away until they were hazy and unclear. Something about Matt shooting her. Something unsettling. And that was it.
As she slid back under the sheets, naked and with hair slightly damp, she looked over at the clock on the bedside table. 4:31 am, the red glow told her. She closed her eyes, but didn’t fall back asleep.
It’d been four days since the events at the warehouse. Four days since she’d seen a version of Matt at all. And seven days since she’d seen the Matt that wouldn’t exist for sixteen years. Wouldn’t exist at all, if things were now destined to go as Molly had hoped. There was an ache in her, somewhere. A part of her wanted to go back to New York, to re-forge a familial relationship with a version of the man who still deserved it. The part of her that dreamed.
But it was ridiculous. That Matt, no matter if she’d changed him, especially because she’d changed him, wasn’t hers anymore. He was the father to a different Molly. A Molly that she had changed just as surely as anyone else that day.
But was it for the better?
She gave up on sleep, dressed in the dim dawn coming through her window. The parking lot was empty as she left the motel on foot. She made her way across the city, to a place she’d been to when times were better. When families were more than cordial and holidays were shared. And she made it, too, waiting on the corner just in time to see a dark-haired boy, already tall for his age, leave the house.
She waited until he made it to the bus stop. “Micah,” she said, and he turned to face her.
“Yeah,” he asked, his voice tinged by the wary attitude of a suburban kid knew he wasn’t supposed to talk to strangers but old enough not to be afraid. Maybe if he knew she was packing under her suit, he’d be more frightened, even though fear wasn’t her intention here.
“I need your help,” she said.
“My help,” he repeated.
She met his eyes. She remembered being in child-love with him at this age. But, of course, she was older now. Had been with the older version of him as he’d aged with her tastes. Had been with the older version of him when he’d bled out into the concrete. It was just a memory. She wasn’t about to add pedophilia to her crimes.
“I’m from the future,” she said. “I came here to change a past that needed to be changed, and I did my job. I don’t want to go home. But don’t have the...things I need to start a new life here.”
“You want me to set up an identity for you,” he said, and she nodded. “How do I know you’re not some criminal just out of prison or something who’s actually just looking to lie low?” he asked.
“How would I have known to find you here?” she asked.
“How did you find me here at all?” he countered.
“I know all about you, Micah,” she said, and somewhat awkwardly shoved her hands in her pockets. “I’m Molly. Sixteen years older than I’m supposed to be in this time, but still Molly.”
He looked at her with a new awe. It’d be years before they really came close, of course, years before Monica moved to New York with Micah in tow, but they had been long-distance friends at this age: Kirby Plaza, a couple of Mohinder-induced superpowered orphan playdates, internet chatting when she could convince Matt to let her use the instant messenger.
He tried to remain a little bit neutral, despite the fact that she knew exactly how he’d felt about her at thirteen. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
She cocked her head and made a face. “Come on,” she said, “Now that I’ve said it, you know that you see the resemblance.”
She could see it in his face that he did. She could also see in his face that maybe from the opposite end of the May-December spectrum, Micah wasn’t quite feeling the moral dilemma, which was more than a little off-putting. And not just because every time she looked at him, she remembered watching him die. So perhaps Micah’s bus had arrived at the corner in answer to her hurried prayer.
He lifted up his backpack. “Come by Nana’s house tonight,” he said. “I’ll set everything up for you then.”
And he did, true to his word. She felt a little foolish, standing outside his window in Nana Dawson’s tulips, but he created an entire life for her. Driver’s license with a DOB that didn’t mean she was twelve, passport, social security number (different, unfortunately, than the one she’d always used. That was just one more thing she had to cede to her twelve-year-old self). Even a fully-loaded bank account.
“What have you been doing for money for the past few days?” he asked.
“I had a few bills in my wallet that were old enough to pass,” she said.
Which was true. He didn’t have to know that she’d supplemented that amount by busting up a couple of drug deals in progress before she left New York. Killed the dealers, kept the money, dropped the drugs in the sewer. Maybe it was vigilante. Selfish. She didn’t feel it. Once Homeland Security, always Homeland Security. Fucking drug dealers in her fucking city...
“Do you want them all in the name of Molly Walker?” he asked.
She shook her head. She hadn’t been Molly Walker in years. She considered telling him to key them into her alias, but then, her name wasn’t famous name here, was it? Matt was just an NYPD cop. There was no one to recognize her. And if kept the one tie she had to her father...
“Molly Parkman,” she said.
“Okay,” he replied, and told the computers at the various governmental and financial bureaus to send new copies to her motel. “You should be good to go in a couple of days,” he said.
“Thank you so much,” she said, and reached out and tousled his hair. He grinned, and she pulled her hand back sharply.
“What’s the future like?” he asked.
“I’m hoping the future I know about doesn’t matter now,” she said.
“But what am I like?” he asked.
“We disagreed on a lot of things,” she said. “But I think no matter what the future is going to be like now, you’ll always be a good man.”
“Will I ever see you again?”
“Nope,” she replied. “But don’t worry about me,” she said. “There’s a twelve-year-old in New York who has a lot more relevance to your life than I ever could. Should.”
“Oh, yeah?” Micah asked, his voice a bit quick.
“Sure,” she replied. “Take care of yourself, Micah. Thanks for the help.”
She left Nana Dawson’s and returned to her motel.
Her dreams of Matt continued. He didn’t always shoot her in the chest. Once he shot her repeatedly in the stomach until her intestines spilled out on the ground below and she couldn’t fly anymore. When she woke up, she remembered that she couldn’t fly at all, but she thought of West Rosen for the first time in years. Once he just shot her in the head. Once he shot her in the head, stuck a metal rod in the hole and burned her to ash while he alternately laughed and pleaded with her to come home.
The passport, driver’s license, and social security card arrived in three days. The debit card arrived in four. It was time to move on, leave New Orleans. To start a normal life, without manipulative fathers or spy work or watching people as they drew their last breaths. She wanted to be a normal person. She could be normal. She could.
She wanted to go to New York.
She couldn’t go to New York. Didn’t.
She could be normal. She could.
She just had to keep telling herself that.
Summary (for the whole thing): Molly Parkman has decided to stay in the world she has created, but her old life continues to haunt her. When she crosses paths with someone who knows who she will become, how will the hunter deal with becoming the hunted?
Rating: R (For gore and some f-bombs)
Pairing: Allusions to Molly/Micah, but overall gen-flavored
Note: Sequel to Theory of Relativity. This is something of an ongoing project. From about the middle of when I was writing Theory, I knew that there was still a story to tell after the end. I'm still feeling this out and seeing where I want to go with it, but this is likely going to be the first chapter of whatever it ends up becoming. I'm just floating it out there. Thoughts and concrit are, as always, very much appreciated.
This is unbetaed.
The shotgun fired. Molly put her hands to her chest, and drew them away, sticky. Wet. She poked her fingers experimentally into the hole, and didn’t feel any resistance. She slid it in further, listening to the wet sucking sound the blood made against the skin on her arm. Her wrist, then her forearm, disappeared into her body. Her hand just kept going and kept going until she was sure she felt the heavy wool of the suit on her back. Why did nothing stop her hand? Wasn’t she supposed to have a heart there?
She pulled her arm out of her chest cavity with the sound of a child slurping up too many strands of spaghetti. She looked up, finally, to see that Matt was the one holding the shotgun. The Matt she’d left behind, the one with grey hair at his temples and wrinkles on his face, the weight of the presidency with all its conflicting emotions. “You left me,” he said.
“I saved you,” she replied.
“You broke our family apart,” he said. “The future doesn’t just change around those in it. You left me there. Alone.”
“Maybe it’s what you deserve,” Molly replied.
He shook his head. “I always knew the love in our family was one sided,” he said.
“Daddy, no! I-”
But then he cocked his head and stared at her. A thin line of blood dripped down his upper lip. There was a searing ache in Molly’s head, and she could feel a line of blood out of her nose as well. The pain got worse and-
Molly’s entire body shuddered with the effort of a great gasp, and suddenly she was awake in the dingy motel room off the interstate. She sat up and brought her hands to her chest. Solid. It was solid. No gunshot wound. Cold sweat beaded on her body as she panted in the darkness. After several minutes she stood, a bit shaky, and walked into the bathroom. She washed her face in the sink, but it didn’t do anything to take of the sweaty film of the dream from coating her body.
So she got into the shower and turned it on cold. Gooseflesh raised on her arms, but there was something refreshing in shivering. The water woke her up, and as the minutes passed the memories of the dream floated away until they were hazy and unclear. Something about Matt shooting her. Something unsettling. And that was it.
As she slid back under the sheets, naked and with hair slightly damp, she looked over at the clock on the bedside table. 4:31 am, the red glow told her. She closed her eyes, but didn’t fall back asleep.
It’d been four days since the events at the warehouse. Four days since she’d seen a version of Matt at all. And seven days since she’d seen the Matt that wouldn’t exist for sixteen years. Wouldn’t exist at all, if things were now destined to go as Molly had hoped. There was an ache in her, somewhere. A part of her wanted to go back to New York, to re-forge a familial relationship with a version of the man who still deserved it. The part of her that dreamed.
But it was ridiculous. That Matt, no matter if she’d changed him, especially because she’d changed him, wasn’t hers anymore. He was the father to a different Molly. A Molly that she had changed just as surely as anyone else that day.
But was it for the better?
She gave up on sleep, dressed in the dim dawn coming through her window. The parking lot was empty as she left the motel on foot. She made her way across the city, to a place she’d been to when times were better. When families were more than cordial and holidays were shared. And she made it, too, waiting on the corner just in time to see a dark-haired boy, already tall for his age, leave the house.
She waited until he made it to the bus stop. “Micah,” she said, and he turned to face her.
“Yeah,” he asked, his voice tinged by the wary attitude of a suburban kid knew he wasn’t supposed to talk to strangers but old enough not to be afraid. Maybe if he knew she was packing under her suit, he’d be more frightened, even though fear wasn’t her intention here.
“I need your help,” she said.
“My help,” he repeated.
She met his eyes. She remembered being in child-love with him at this age. But, of course, she was older now. Had been with the older version of him as he’d aged with her tastes. Had been with the older version of him when he’d bled out into the concrete. It was just a memory. She wasn’t about to add pedophilia to her crimes.
“I’m from the future,” she said. “I came here to change a past that needed to be changed, and I did my job. I don’t want to go home. But don’t have the...things I need to start a new life here.”
“You want me to set up an identity for you,” he said, and she nodded. “How do I know you’re not some criminal just out of prison or something who’s actually just looking to lie low?” he asked.
“How would I have known to find you here?” she asked.
“How did you find me here at all?” he countered.
“I know all about you, Micah,” she said, and somewhat awkwardly shoved her hands in her pockets. “I’m Molly. Sixteen years older than I’m supposed to be in this time, but still Molly.”
He looked at her with a new awe. It’d be years before they really came close, of course, years before Monica moved to New York with Micah in tow, but they had been long-distance friends at this age: Kirby Plaza, a couple of Mohinder-induced superpowered orphan playdates, internet chatting when she could convince Matt to let her use the instant messenger.
He tried to remain a little bit neutral, despite the fact that she knew exactly how he’d felt about her at thirteen. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
She cocked her head and made a face. “Come on,” she said, “Now that I’ve said it, you know that you see the resemblance.”
She could see it in his face that he did. She could also see in his face that maybe from the opposite end of the May-December spectrum, Micah wasn’t quite feeling the moral dilemma, which was more than a little off-putting. And not just because every time she looked at him, she remembered watching him die. So perhaps Micah’s bus had arrived at the corner in answer to her hurried prayer.
He lifted up his backpack. “Come by Nana’s house tonight,” he said. “I’ll set everything up for you then.”
And he did, true to his word. She felt a little foolish, standing outside his window in Nana Dawson’s tulips, but he created an entire life for her. Driver’s license with a DOB that didn’t mean she was twelve, passport, social security number (different, unfortunately, than the one she’d always used. That was just one more thing she had to cede to her twelve-year-old self). Even a fully-loaded bank account.
“What have you been doing for money for the past few days?” he asked.
“I had a few bills in my wallet that were old enough to pass,” she said.
Which was true. He didn’t have to know that she’d supplemented that amount by busting up a couple of drug deals in progress before she left New York. Killed the dealers, kept the money, dropped the drugs in the sewer. Maybe it was vigilante. Selfish. She didn’t feel it. Once Homeland Security, always Homeland Security. Fucking drug dealers in her fucking city...
“Do you want them all in the name of Molly Walker?” he asked.
She shook her head. She hadn’t been Molly Walker in years. She considered telling him to key them into her alias, but then, her name wasn’t famous name here, was it? Matt was just an NYPD cop. There was no one to recognize her. And if kept the one tie she had to her father...
“Molly Parkman,” she said.
“Okay,” he replied, and told the computers at the various governmental and financial bureaus to send new copies to her motel. “You should be good to go in a couple of days,” he said.
“Thank you so much,” she said, and reached out and tousled his hair. He grinned, and she pulled her hand back sharply.
“What’s the future like?” he asked.
“I’m hoping the future I know about doesn’t matter now,” she said.
“But what am I like?” he asked.
“We disagreed on a lot of things,” she said. “But I think no matter what the future is going to be like now, you’ll always be a good man.”
“Will I ever see you again?”
“Nope,” she replied. “But don’t worry about me,” she said. “There’s a twelve-year-old in New York who has a lot more relevance to your life than I ever could. Should.”
“Oh, yeah?” Micah asked, his voice a bit quick.
“Sure,” she replied. “Take care of yourself, Micah. Thanks for the help.”
She left Nana Dawson’s and returned to her motel.
Her dreams of Matt continued. He didn’t always shoot her in the chest. Once he shot her repeatedly in the stomach until her intestines spilled out on the ground below and she couldn’t fly anymore. When she woke up, she remembered that she couldn’t fly at all, but she thought of West Rosen for the first time in years. Once he just shot her in the head. Once he shot her in the head, stuck a metal rod in the hole and burned her to ash while he alternately laughed and pleaded with her to come home.
The passport, driver’s license, and social security card arrived in three days. The debit card arrived in four. It was time to move on, leave New Orleans. To start a normal life, without manipulative fathers or spy work or watching people as they drew their last breaths. She wanted to be a normal person. She could be normal. She could.
She wanted to go to New York.
She couldn’t go to New York. Didn’t.
She could be normal. She could.
She just had to keep telling herself that.