"She Just Wanted to be Heard Days 28-29," PG-13, The Ring/Supernatural/LHotP
She Just Wanted to Be Heard
Day 28: Closer, My Dear, Come Closer
Part of Story Arc 1: Counterclockwise
A "The Ring/Ringu" Fanfic
by Laurel (Sailorhathor)
Chapters: 28 of 100
Rating: Overall Rating PG-13 (adult theme; horror elements that might be too scary for children under 13; bad language)
Dates: Begun September 2006. Some material is based on previously written stories from 2003-2005. This chapter was written in Oct. 2008.
Word Count: 4,783
Summary: Sam and Jessica discuss the curious and dark case of the Bloodworth family, where cruel methods were used to bring out the childrens' psychic powers. His suspicions about Cheyenne Bloodworth are confirmed. Sam/Jess.
Warning: Contains spoilers for the entire Ringu and The Ring series. This chapter contains the hunting of animals, as well as fictional historic content concerning Adolf Hitler and the Nazi SS guard.
Fanfic Challenges: Fits 50_darkfics prompt #28 Innocence and coclaim100 prompt #28 Unbound.
Author's Notes: This chapter is a cross-over with the tv shows Supernatural and a brief appearance by Little House on the Prairie.
Set pre-series for Supernatural, during Sam's years at Stanford. Very post-series for LHotP.
Thanks to Rekka for translating my English into Japanese!
For those of you who see "cross-over with Little House on the Prairie" and think, "Must be crack!fic," you're very wrong. LHotP wasn't just a sappy, goodie-two-shoes show full of church and life lessons. It often got very, very dark. Those darker aspects of the show are explored in this x-over.
More notes at the end of the chapter.
Just two yards from possible salvation and Jasmine ran headlong into Beckett, who turned in front of her, blocking her path. He seemed immovable, as she stumbled and almost fell down from the sudden impact. Before Jasmine could recover, Beckett's eyes filmed over, milky and dead, and she was lifted into the air by a power Samara didn't use as often - her psychokinesis. Jasmine yelped in surprise and terror. It startled her so much, she dropped her cell phone on the ground.
"The police are on their way," Jasmine said, mustering as much courage as she could.
"Do you really think we're afraid of them?" Beckett questioned in that soft, childlike Samara voice. "We all have policemen in our wells."
Several of the other girls like Samara emerged from the forest, surrounding them. The German twins. Sadako, the Japanese teenager. The blonde adoptee from post-Civil War America. The quiet Asian exchange student on the 'Missing' poster in the student union. And Charlotte, the bitter high schooler with her happy future torn from her. They looked up at Jasmine with venomous stares.
"Why do you want to hurt us?" Charlotte asked. "You don't know what we've been through."
"This is none of your business," the Asian exchange student said.
"You should have kept out of it," added the frontier-era adolescent.
"Watashi-tachi wa irona riyuu ga aru no yo," Sadako declared.
"You can't possibly know our pain," said one of the German twins in heavily accented English.
"You should consider yourself lucky that you don't," Samara-Beckett finished. "'Though you're about to find out."
Police sirens came closer and closer. She just needed to buy a little more time. Making a desperate effort not to cry, Jasmine frantically screamed, "Beckett! Fight her! Don't let them hurt me!"
"Beckett's sleeping. You shouldn't be worried about him. You should be worried about yourself." Samara puppeted the boy to raise his hand, which he gestured with toward Jasmine. "If you survive, remember that this is only a fraction of the pain we've endured. Keep your nose out of our business." He swept his hand toward the road, spinning his index finger.
"No, wait!" The last word was almost cut off as Jasmine's head whipped back with the force of her body being hurled into the road.
The police car held two cops. Their intention had been to park and find the girl and the man she said was following her. But, the girl found them.
Officer Hanley was saying, "...is she wearing a jacket or coat?" when his partner cried out and slammed on the brakes.
What they saw was a black teenage female illuminated by the headlights, coming out of the trees on the left side of the road as if someone or something had thrown her. She was spinning as she flew through the air. The policeman could not keep from hitting her. For a moment, they saw the fear on her face as her body rolled up on the hood and connected with the windshield, then was tossed off the front of the car and landed several feet away in the road, broken and unconscious.
While the policemen got out of their car, checking on Jasmine as they radioed for an ambulance, Beckett made his way quietly through the trees and headed back to his house. They never saw him.
The police never saw Stacy either, who had made it to the park just in time to hear voices in the forest, a police siren, and then the sound of the car hitting her friend's body. She now peeked from behind a piece of playground equipment to watch the policemen hovering over Jasmine, talking into one of their shoulder radios, occasionally scanning the woods with a flashlight. When one of them stepped further into the trees and bent down to examine Jasmine's cell phone, Stacy slipped out and ran back toward her house.
Three blocks away and she stopped, breathless and overcome with guilt, and crouched beside a stone wall to sob into her hands. Those girls did it. If Jasmine died, Stacy felt she would be partially responsible. Her best friend was just an innocent bystander, trying to help her. Oh God, what if she was already dead?!
The ambulance passed her on its way to the park, sirens blaring. Stacy said a silent prayer that they would get there in time.
*****
Sam had barely had time to put any of the books back on the shelf when a corner of his room faded and changed into the clearing, the clearing in the forest where Richard and the other hunters had stood. He defensively raised one of the books, as if there was anyone to hit, but lowered it when he realized the phantoms just had one more thing to show him.
The hunters celebrated over a pile of dead deer, the moose, and many rabbits. One of them was talking about how his daughter had always wanted a patchwork rabbit fur coat. Richard picked up Samara and spun her around; she giggled, smiling from ear to ear.
"Richard, when you said you could provide the best hunting experience I've ever had, you weren't just blowing smoke up my ass," one of the hunters said. "This hunt was monumental."
The other added, "Worth every penny."
Disgusted with this bit of information, Sam muttered to himself, "He made them pay to go?"
Alexandra appeared nearby; Sam saw her out of the corner of his eye and turned toward her. "Can you believe the man exploited his own child like that? His adopted child, anyway." They watched Richard put Samara on his shoulders and dance around, singing a little song. Delighted laughter bubbled from her mouth. "These hunts were the only reason he ever spent any time with her."
Sam noticed the sad tone in Alexandra's voice, like Samara was a creature to be pitied. "You're trying to make me feel sorry for her," he said cynically.
"Do you think their lives were always easy?" Alexandra regarded him as one would a child, like one day, Sam would finally get it.
Salt was not really something he kept in his room. Not only would it look odd for him to have a bag of rock salt under his bed, but also, Sam wanted anything that had to do with hunting as far from his new life as possible. Or so, he thought he did. Gerald did, however, have a set of heavy iron bookends on the shelf next to Sam's head. Sam picked one up and threatened to throw it at Alexandra. "You can't make me feel anything but contempt for your girls, so stop trying. My father and brother are going to wipe up the floor with you. So get out of my room, lady."
A brief pause to regard his behavior and she began to laugh at him derisively. "We won't be stopped. Not by you or anyone in your family. You should trust me when I say that it would be better for all of you if you just mind your own business. That's what Jasmine should have done."
Swallowing hard, Sam replied, "What did you do to the girl?"
"Oh, you want me to stay now? You want to have a chat?" Alexandra asked with a mocking laugh. "Well, Sam, I'll tell you. I'll tell you that you might want to buy the girl some flowers. Would you like to know what hospital she's in?"
With an exasperated grunt, Sam threw the bookend at her. Alexandra dissipated before it hit the ground.
*****
After his two morning classes, Sam found an empty table in the library and began searching pertinent sections of the local newspaper for articles about anything happening to a woman named Jolene or a teenager named Jasmine. Nothing. Next, he looked through a bigger paper for the closest major city. So far, it also yielded nothing helpful. Overall, that was good, but also very frustrating, as Sam needed to know if they were all right.
He had turned another page and started scanning it when he heard a familiar, very welcome voice heading his way, quietly singing a song.
"Put another nickel in, in the nickelodeon. All I want is kissing you and music, music, music."
Sam's face lit up when he raised his head to see Jessica, singing a little song and doing a little dance much like the flappers used to do in the 1920's. She danced up to the table, grinning at him, a book in her hands.
"Well hello there you. Something's got you in a fantastic mood," he laughed. "Where'd you get that song, the eighteen-hundreds?"
Being playful, Jessica danced the Charleston, presenting the book as if it was the centerpiece of her routine. "1949, actually." She held her arms out in a 'Ta-da!' motion. A couple students who had been staring at her now clapped; she bowed with a flourish. The librarian shushed them.
"Would you sit down before you get us thrown out?" Sam said with a chuckle. "Just say no, Jessica."
She plopped the book down on the table like she was offended. "I'll have you know, Mr. Winchester, that I'm high on life." Jessica pushed the book toward him. "I'm in a good mood because of this." She grinned. "I found you the motherload."
"What's this?" Sam read the title. The Bloodworth Case.
"I decided to see what else I could dig up, so I started with the publisher of the Alexandra Baptiste books, Marigold Publishing. It's owned by... wait for it..."
"Who?" he said with a laugh, nudging her arm.
Jessica's grin widened. "The Bloodworth family."
Sam was instantly reminded of those V-8 commercials where people smacked themselves in the forehead. Rowan Bloodworth looked more and more suspicious by the minute. "Well, that's one way to get your books published."
"Yeah," Jess laughed. "I did a general search through the list of books they've published and found this one." She tapped the book on the table. "It's been out of print for around ten years, but luckily, the library had a copy."
"And this is the motherload?" Sam, turning the book over, started to read the summary on the back.
With a laugh, Jessica grabbed the book and tried to take it from him. "If you don't appreciate the very interesting book I found you, I could always take it back."
He laughed too, and they wrestled over it briefly. "Come on, Jess. I want to see what it's about."
"I'll tell you what it's about." Sam allowed her to take the book, sitting back and grinning. He loved to just listen to her talk. Jessica claimed, "I happen to have read it."
"Oh, really? In one morning?"
"Okay, no, I didn't read it all. But I did skim it, and read certain passages that looked interesting in their entirety."
"Well don't make me wait, woman. Tell me what happened," Sam chuckled.
"I think I will." Jessica turned her nose up at him like a snooty maitre d', putting the book down with a pinky raised. "If you think you're worthy."
"I'm not, but tell me anyway."
"Alright." Losing the snooty routine, Jess sat forward with her arms on the table. "The book's about an experiment conducted in the early 1990's involving the children of William Bloodworth, A.K.A. Bill." She said 'Bill' mockingly, as if she didn't like the man very much.
"Let me guess. Rowan Bloodworth was one of those children," Sam suggested. And Cheyenne was the other.
"Very good, Samhopper. He has a sister named Cheyenne. Marigold Publishing has been in the Bloodworth family for generations, since before the Civil War. After Bill's wife Lillian died, he kind of went a little cuckoo. He claimed that his kids had psychic powers and paid all these scientists and doctors to come in and run experiments on them."
"What was he trying to prove?"
"That they were psychic, I guess. After the experiments were over, he took Cheyenne on a tour of the country, showing off her 'psychic abilities.' Made a ton off of lectures and books he wrote about it. All published by Marigold, of course." Jessica shook her head. "Can you believe a father would do something like that to his own innocent children?"
"That's horrible," Sam agreed, although he could have elaborated on the subject from his own experience with fathers and what they did in reaction to the supernatural.
"Tells you a bit more about his motivations, huh? Anyway, they set the lab up in Bloodworth's home, which is this huge mansion north of here - I think his family still owns it - and they set about trying to bring out Rowan and Cheyenne's powers," Jessica explained.
"What, the kids hadn't even shown any signs that they had them?"
"Not exactly."
"Then why did Bloodworth bring a whole team of scientists in there?"
With a sly smile, Jessica replied, "Because their mother, Lillian, said her children were psychic. That she was psychic. That it ran in the family... because they were descendants of Alexandra Baptiste."
Blinking, Sam sat back in his chair, no longer joking or laughing. "Hold on. I thought the Nazi and his daughter were the descendants."
"They were. Or, she was, anyway." Again, Jessica grinned with mirth; she knew things Sam didn't, and it was fun to see his reaction to them. "Her name was Suzette Christaller. Maiden name, Metternich. She had a twin, Sophia, who died during World War II. Sophie was always very sickly."
Sam, remembering the illusion from the night before, pictured the twin girls holding hands out in the forest.
"As an adult, Suzette claimed she and, of course, her twin, were the descendants of Alexandra Baptiste, from her mother's side. The father of the twins was Dr. Rudolf Metternich..." She took a dramatic pause for effect. "...of the Nazi SS medical corps."
Momentarily closing his eyes, Sam shook his head and uttered, "You are shitting me."
"I most definitely am not. Suzette survived the war, got married, and gave birth to a daughter."
Now, Sam gave a small nod. "Lillian."
"Yes. And she had Rowan and Cheyenne with Bill Bloodworth. Suzette Christaller was the one who started the whole psychic bloodline thing; she put the ideas in Lillian's head about her children. When the kids were still pretty young, Bill wanted to begin the experiments, but Suzette objected, and their differences separated them for a few years. I think that Lillian was just standing by her husband. I mean, she doesn't seem like a bad mother." Jessica shrugged.
"What makes you say that?"
"Just the way the kids talk about her in the book. They each recalled some of their favorite memories." She ran a finger over the book's cover, thinking about what she'd read. "With her mother out of her life, Lillian was open to manipulation, I guess. You know her grandfather, the Nazi?"
"Yeah..." Sam replied.
"Turns out he escaped when the war ended. Spent more than forty years in South America. In the late 1980's, he came to America to spend his last years with his granddaughter and great-grandchildren." Scoffing, Jessica added, "I think Bill Bloodworth learned a thing or two from him."
"You're kidding," said Sam, amazed. "They harbored a former Nazi?"
"Bill claims he wasn't aware of Dr. Metternich's past. He says the Nazi used a fake name around strangers, which he did think was pretty weird. But it seems like Lillian was the only one who knew the truth. She did nothing about it because she adored him."
"So the Nazi turned over a new leaf."
"That's what was so scary about the Nazis, really. They spent their days murdering people in all sorts of grisly ways, and then went home to their families as loving parents." Jessica scrunched up her face in disgust. "I'm sure some of them were monsters at home as well, but not all of them, from what their surviving families have said."
"Yeah. Pretty terrifying, really," Sam sighed. "How does a person bring himself to the point of thinking of the killing of men, women, and children as a job?"
Jessica, shuddering, agreed with him. "Well, good thing is, once Suzette found out about it, she turned her father in. The Israeli Secret Service came and took him away. Before they could properly question Lillian Bloodworth about her part in hiding him, she took her own life."
For a moment, Sam felt sorry for Rowan and Cheyenne, losing their mother in that way. His face was sad, thoughtful. "Poor kids."
"Yeah. I think Lillian's grandfather just had her completely snowed. Book says Lillian was prone to depression. Probably made her vulnerable. Anyway, with their mother out of the way, Bill Bloodworth was open to get things going on the experiments. Suzette had no say in the matter. Grandparents don't have any rights."
"No, I guess they don't. How old were the kids when the experiments started?"
"Uh, somewhere in their teens?" Jessica continued to speak while flipping through the book. "I think Cheyenne was twelve."
Sam wondered aloud, "How do you bring out someone's psychic powers, anyway? I mean, what did they do?" He couldn't remember his father ever dealing with a case like that, where methods were employed to bring out someone's psychic abilities, so Sam had no point of reference. He could have made some guesses, but...
Looking at him over the open book, she explained, "They built these special chambers and forced the kids to stay in them for hours, several days a week. Sensory deprivation chambers. And also, something called a..." Jessica turned the pages and skimmed until she found it. "...a psy-cho-man-tium chamber. Wow, say that three times fast."
"My... God." Sam only had a limited understanding of sensory deprivation chambers, and had never encountered a real psychomantium, although he'd heard the word in passing during one of his father's research talks with Caleb. "Their father supported this?"
"Sam, he funded it."
"Jesus."
Jessica, pointing to a photograph in the book, continued, "I don't think they were traditional sensory deprivation chambers. Those are usually like, a tube that you lie inside of, floating in water. The pictures in the book show a little room, completely enclosed, with just the floor to sit on." She showed him the photos. The chamber was the size of a public bathroom stall. "From the outside, you could see in, but when you were inside with the door closed, you couldn't see anything but blank, black walls. In the prolonged absence of any visual or auditory stimulation, you're supposed to be able to release your own psychic abilities."
Pausing, Sam finally had to ask, "Did anything ever happen?"
She smirked at him. "Do you think they would have written a book about it if nothing ever happened?"
"What could they do?" Then Sam added, "Allegedly."
"Cheyenne didn't manifest any powers for a long time. But Rowan had almost instant results. He proved to be a really excellent channeler. Know what that is?"
Sam played it a little dumb. "Isn't that a person who's really open to being possessed by the spirits of the dead, and they speak through him or something? I think I saw that in a movie once."
"Very good. You know, with my awesome research skills and your above average intelligence..." Jessica leaned across the table and ruffled his hair. "...you just may learn something about the supernatural yet."
Snickering with his mouth closed, Sam just looked at her with a grin. "I've read a book or two."
"It shows."
"So who was Rowan Bloodworth channeling?" He took a sip of his coffee, which he'd almost forgotten was there.
Very matter-of-factly, she replied, "His Nazi great-grandfather."
Sam, not foreseeing that, sputtered and choked on his coffee. Jessica giggled at him; that was pretty much the reaction she'd been expecting. He put a napkin to his nose. "Wow, that's hot coming back out," Sam muttered, making Jessica laugh harder. Once he'd caught his breath, he commented, "I should have seen that one coming."
"No argument here." Giving him a wink, Jessica pointed to a passage in the book. "The boy would take on the persona of Rudolf Metternich, pacing the chamber and ranting mostly in German about any subject that came into his beady little head. Usually he'd talk about why the Third Reich fell and how his kids were impure, and how he would have been able to 'finish them both off' if only Hitler hadn't stopped him."
"Holy crap. It does not say that."
"It does." She held the book out, pointing to a page.
"Was he saying that he murdered Sophie?"
Consulting the book again, Jessica replied, "It sounds like it, doesn't it? But when they asked Metternich that question, he'd refuse to give them a direct answer."
"That's just... wow."
She nodded. "Besides that, Metternich would sing songs in English and German. But as you can guess, Rowan didn't speak German. Metternich's favorite singer was Teresa Brewer, especially her signature song, 'Music, Music, Music!' He'd do that one in both languages. I guess it entertained him when he was bored."
"Ah, that's why you were warbling that tune when you came in," Sam concluded with a laugh.
Jessica laughed a little too. "It's one of those evil songs that is so infectious that it just gets stuck right in your head. Like, in a horror movie, when they want to indicate that the old-timey ghost is coming, they play some old song that used to be charming but now it's just creepy? This would be one of those songs."
Laughing again, he asked, "Did the Nazi have anything else to say?"
"Uhh..." She looked in the book again. "Says here that after a while, Dr. Metternich began to demand that they bring him books, books of all kinds. They tried to get him to describe what kind of books, but he'd just get angry and yell, 'The books, the books, bring me my books!' When he'd rant like this, the scientists noticed that he usually sounded drunk, so they concluded the spirit might be reliving something related to his life."
"How'd they shut him up?"
"They got him some books. When the books were given to him, he promptly ripped them up, tearing out the binding. Then he'd go, 'No, this isn't it,' and move on to the next one," Jessica said, shrugging.
"What was he looking for?" asked Sam.
Jessica shrugged again. "Wouldn't say."
"Did Rowan channel anyone else? Any other long lost relatives looking to destroy fine works of literature?"
She shook her head, chuckling.
"What about Cheyenne? What could she do?" Sam's voice took on a more cautious tone. He thought he knew the answer, but couldn't let on that he knew.
"She appeared to be able to project, like, images that she pictured in her head onto photographic plates. But she had a lot of trouble with it. Gave her headaches and stuff. They did have some results, though; there are reproductions of some of the plates in the book. The girl must've done a lot of sitting in that chamber, trying to make things appear. Kinda makes you feel sorry for her."
Remembering his conversation with Alexandra the night before, and the implication that they had hurt that girl Jasmine, Sam found he still had a problem feeling much sympathy for them. "I guess."
"The scientists tried bringing out any other abilities the kids might have by sticking them in this psychomantium thing. Something to do with mirrors. You're supposed to be able to contact all kinds of freaky things in one of those." Eyes wide with the bizarre nature of it all, Jessica elaborated, "Ghosts, spirits, angels, demons, the works."
"Wow, I've never heard of one of those things," Sam lied. "Sounds scary."
"Apparently, it was - the kids didn't last very long before they had to stop using it. The experience was just too terrifying; they couldn't handle it."
"What did they see?"
"Again, book doesn't say. Disappointing, huh?" Jessica gave another shrug. "They went back to the sensory deprivation chambers after that."
"How long did this go on for?"
"How long does something like this ever go on for?" Her tone half-joking and partially dead serious, she finished, "Until someone gets hurt."
For his own part, Sam was only slightly surprised. "There was a death, wasn't there?"
"Yes," Jessica said with a nod. "One of the scientists. They think it was a stroke, but if it was, it's the weirdest stroke I've ever seen." Leaning forward as if they were about to exchange a secret, she almost whispered, "There's a picture in the book."
"Well let's see it!"
Jessica smirked. "Are you sure?"
"Come on..."
Flipping through the pages, she found the picture and turned the book around to Sam. "What do you think of that?"
John Winchester had shielded his sons from seeing as many terrifying sights as possible, unaware that the worst sight they could have ever seen was his empty bed, night after night. As a result, Sam remembered almost every horrifying monster that they did manage to see as children. When he viewed the photograph of the dead scientist, Sam decided that it had to be one of the most disgusting, frightening things he had ever seen.
The man lay on a concrete floor, arms at an angle by his sides. His skin was a bluish gray, as if he'd been found in the water several days after he had died. Blood stained the front of his lab coat. It had apparently come from his nose. But the worst part was his face. Eyes rolled up to the whites, and mouth frozen open in a scream.
The caption under the photo said it had been taken within two hours of the time that he died.
"What were the circumstances of his death?" Sam asked, scanning the page for the answer even as he proposed the question.
Jessica had already gleaned that information from the book. "The other scientists went out to lunch, but this guy stayed behind. He was alone with Rowan and Cheyenne for almost two hours. They found him like that when they came back. Rowan was channeling Metternich at the time and he just kept laughing and laughing, like he'd had something to do with it. But how could he?"
"What about..." Sam spied the paragraph he wanted. "'Cheyenne was in her deprivation chamber, curled into a ball when they returned.' Huh, must've scared her."
Jessica furrowed her brow at the sarcastic tone of his voice. "What do you think happened?"
"I don't know." Looking at her over the book, he tried to smile, taking himself out of what his family would call 'deep research mode.' "I guess they stopped the experiments after that."
"Yeah. Rowan Bloodworth went into his room and promptly became mute. Refused to speak for two years."
"God."
"Bill began writing books and took his daughter on a tour of the country. Suzette Christaller moved in to take care of Rowan while they were gone. They had tutors and stuff; the kids didn't attend real school very much throughout this time. And that was that." Jessica tapped the book's spine. "You can keep that. Just turn it back in to the library in two weeks." She grinned. "Well, do I win the Research Assistant's Award of the Year or what?"
A lead weight sunk to the bottom of Sam's stomach. After what Alexandra had said last night... "Um, you're great, Jessica. But maybe we should cool it for a while. There doesn't seem to be much else to unearth here."
"Awww, but it's all so interesting. And I was, um, kind of enjoying the time we've been spending together." Under the table, she poked his ankle with her foot. "Haven't you?"
"Oh, very much," Sam breathed. She grinned again. "We don't have to do research all the time, though. There are tons of things we can do together." Taking her hand across the table, he asked, "Want to get a late lunch?"
His warm hand in hers, Jessica didn't even care who saw them out together. Not even Craig. "I'd love to."
As they got up from the table, Sam laughed and said, "For someone who only skimmed the book, you sure knew a lot about what was in it."
"Okay, maybe I read most of it." Jessica linked her arm with his. "But I'm a fast reader."
Sam peeked at the cover of the book again to see who wrote it. Maybe he'd recognize the name. But no, he didn't.
The Bloodworth Case, by Dr. Marcus Scott.
More Notes: You diehard "Ring" fans out there will recognize the name Dr. Scott. He's the doctor who experimented with Samara at the psychiatric hospital back in 1978. I don't believe they ever gave him a first name anywhere, so I made up one for him.
There's a letter in the "Don't Watch This" featurette that we barely get a glimpse of because there are pictures of Samara on top of it. It's hard to tell, but it seems like it details the death of Dr. Scott. I could be wrong, though. Since the letter was never fully shown or confirmed, let's just say Dr. Scott lived on.
Sadako's Japanese: "We have our reasons."
The title and the verse Jessica sings come from Teresa Brewer's song "Music, Music, Music!", (c) 1949. I swear, I have nothing against the music of Teresa Brewer; in fact, I love some of her work. I'm just having a little fun with it in this chapter. ^_^
I'm obsessed with the idea of psychomantium chambers. Not sure you could ever get me in one, as I'd probably run screaming the other way, but I love writing about other people using them. ;D
I also enjoy Sam doing spit-takes where liquid goes up his nose a little too much. XD
it won't stop
The Ringu series is (c) 1998 The Ring/The Spiral Production Group. It is based on the novels by Koji Suzuki. My fanfic is more based on ideas presented in the films, which were created by director Hideo Nakata and screenwriter Hiroshi Takahashi.
The motion picture The Ring is (c) 2002 DreamWorks Pictures. The title "She Just Wanted to Be Heard" comes from a line of dialogue spoken by Rachel Keller in this movie. The motion picture The Ring Two is (c) 2005 DreamWorks Pictures. This fanfic is heavily inspired by ideas presented in the American movies, which were directed by Gore Verbinski and Hideo Nakata and written by Ehren Kruger.
I do not know if the prequel, The Ring 3, will have any bearing on this story or not until I see it.
Supernatural is (c) 2005 Kripke Enterprises, Wonderland, & Warner Brothers/The CW Television.
Little House on the Prairie (TV Series) is (c) 1974 NBC Enterprises and Lionsgate Home Entertainment.
Everything else is (c) Demented Stuff.
She Just Wanted to Be Heard
Day 29: The Secrets We Keep
Part of Story Arc 1: Counterclockwise
A "The Ring/Ringu" Fanfic
by Laurel (Sailorhathor)
Chapters: 29 of 100
Rating: Overall Rating PG-13 (adult theme; horror elements that might be too scary for children under 13; bad language)
Dates: Begun September 2006. Some material is based on previously written stories from 2003-2005. This chapter was written in March 2009.
Word Count: 3,890
Summary: After some sexy airport shenanigans with her British boyfriend, Danica Kirkland comes home from England and is confused to find that her brother has barely slept for four days.
Warning: Contains spoilers for the entire Ringu and The Ring series. This chapter also contains a sex scene that borders on Adult rated territory.
Beta Thanks: Thanks to Sammie for beta'ing this chapter!
Fanfic Challenges: Fits 50_darkfics prompt #29 Guilt and coclaim100 prompt #29 Thunder.
Author's Notes: I think most people can figure out the British slang on their own, but one word may confuse the non-British: that's "Phwoar!" Phwoar (also spelled Fwoar) is a slang exclamation one would utter when they see something that turns them on sexually.
A sparkler bomb is created when one tapes a huge bunch of sparklers together and then lights them all at once. Do not try this at home. ;)
Danicalifragilisticexpialidocious = Of course, a play on the song "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" from the movie Mary Poppins.
For a while now, I've wanted to make some changes to Svetlana's speech. In a past chapter, she was talking about how she knew three languages, and something about it made me realize that she should be speaking in broken English. So, I went back and edited all of Svet's dialogue from past chapters. The speech quirk will also be reflected in this and future chapters. For those of you who have been reading for a while, I hope it won't be too jarring. I've been told it actually adds to Svet's personality. For the most part, she just drops the occasional word and screws some up; nothing too incredibly different. This is how she sounds in my head. Now you all can hear her too. ;)
"Was that thunder I heard just now?"
The blond Brit grinned to himself. His girl was afraid something would keep her from going home for her visit with her family. Danica had been worrying about that for days now. Maybe even weeks. "Oh, you don't really think God would do that?"
She looked up from the overpriced airport goods she'd been idly gazing over and put her hand in his. "Do what?"
Colin Owens met her eyes. "Dare send down rain to keep your flight from taking off."
Danica lightly swung their joined hands, bouncing on her heels with nervous energy. "You're right. He wouldn't dare do that."
Chuckling, Colin gave her a kiss on the temple. "Get a girl like Danica Kirkland teed off? Even I know not to do that. And I'm far from omniscient."
"Damn straight."
"What, that I'm not all knowing?"
Danica laughed and kissed his mouth. "That it's not a good idea to piss me off. Especially when I'm about to see my family for the first time in three months."
"Oh, no. Keeping you from going home after you've been looking forward to it and talking about it and planning for it..."
Shaking her head, she laughed again. "Yeah, yeah."
Colin kept on talking. "...for the last three months... well, that would make you spit tacks." He took Danica in his arms, holding her loosely about the waist. The other travelers passed them on their way to their own destinations, but the two young lovers didn't notice anyone but each other. Colin did, however, see how close they were coming to the checkpoint in their slow meandering to the gate, where they'd have to part. "If these security people think terrorists are a fright..."
"Oh, really?" Danica put her arms around his neck and snickered into a long, involved kiss. "You make it sound like I've been planning for this trip since Christmas."
"Well, haven't you?"
"Christmas was the last time I went home," she replied with mirth.
"What's your point, love?"
They both laughed into another kiss. "Technically, it's only been two and a half months," she protested.
"Get technical, then." They pressed their lips together once again.
He looked over her shoulder. "We've reached your checkpoint. I can't follow you beyond here."
Danica let out a small groan. "I can't wait to see everyone again, but... I wish you could come with me." Pouting slightly, she kept her arm around Colin's shoulders, alternating her gaze between him and the looming checkpoint. "I want you to meet my family."
"Oh, sure, darling, I'll just pop off and buy a ticket to America. How much can they be?" he said with a thin, sarcastic smile.
Rolling her eyes, Danica sighed and laid her head on his shoulder, looking up at him. "How 'bout you get in my carry-on bag? I'll tell you when it's safe to breathe."
He chuckled. "Sounds like loads of fun."
Danica moaned under her breath. "I wanna go, but I don't wanna gooooo..."
Bringing her hand to his mouth, Colin kissed her fingers near a sizable diamond ring she was wearing. "You know I'll be right there with you. You can call me any time."
"I just wish..." She admired the ring. "...that you could be sitting next to me when I tell them."
"So wait, and don't tell them yet."
"No... no, I already kept it a secret over my entire last visit. I can't put it off any longer."
"I know, you were just bursting with the tasty little tidbit." They embraced each other again. "How much time do we have?"
"I should make my way to the gate in about half an hour."
"Hmmmm... what should we do with our time, then?"
Danica, smirking, leaned in close. "How about one for the road?"
"At the airport?" Colin asked, grinning mischievously. "Join the Mile High Club? No, that's not right... would it be the Foot High Club, then?"
Danica smiled at his joke. "We can do it in the bathroom. The stall doors lock," she whispered.
"Right here, in the loo?" he questioned teasingly.
"Oh, you don't want one to go on?"
"Of course I do. Don't be silly." Now he leaned in closer. "That noise you heard? It wasn't thunder. It was my sex drive revving up at the thought of you." When he growled the word 'revving,' Colin gave her bottom a discreet, quick squeeze. Danica squealed and jumped in his arms.
"You sex maniac," she laughed, and smacked his chest. "Come on, let's hurry."
Danica scurried into the women's bathroom to check things out before coming to get him, taking Colin by the hand and saying, "I think it's empty." Her skin tingled with anticipation.
They eyed each other hungrily as they snuck toward a back stall. Danica tore her gaze away from him long enough to bend over and check to see if there were any feet visible under the doors of the nearby stalls. Colin gave her bottom a good, healthy smack.
She squealed saucily and straightened up. "You are intruding upon my person, Mr. Owens."
"Is that a problem, Miss Kirkland?"
Danica pushed open the door of the handicapped stall (because it was the biggest) and practically threw in her carry-on suitcase; it teetered along on its wheels and rebounded off the wall. "What do you think?"
Colin removed his blazer, tossing it over the wall of the modest cubicle. "Considering you propositioned me, I would think not."
"That's what I like about you; you're so bright." Grinning at him, Danica lifted her long, paisley-patterned skirt to give him a great view of her baby blue panties, and waggled it back and forth like a can-can dancer. Because the door had swung nearly closed on its own, she kicked it open with a backward sweep of her leg and backed into the stall, with Colin following eagerly right after.
"Phwoar!" he growled at her.
As soon as the lock slid home, he turned and pulled her to him. They kissed passionately, open-mouthed, her up-ended skirt crumpled between them. At first, his hands squeezed her bottom, but soon moved to cup her breasts, thumbs rubbing aggressively over rising flesh through the fabric. Danica moaned quietly. Colin kissed her neck until she was panting, dark hair falling out of its clip and slinking over his face, the clip hanging by a clump of hair he'd uprooted when he ran his fingers through it. He squeezed his hand between her legs and snaked his fingers along the baby blue fabric.
Danica mewled for him. "Uhh... Colin!"
He pressed his fingers in hard and stroked. "You get these good and wet for me, 'kay love?" His finger made quick circles. She huffed out a moan. "I want your scent all over them. They're staying with me."
"Uh... ah... okay, baby..."
Giving her another half minute of attention, Colin then hooked his fingers into the waistband of her underwear and tugged down on it. Danica, eyes half-closed, brought her legs closer together for a moment so he could slide her panties to her ankles. She stepped out of them and they kissed again, Danica placing one leg up on the toilet seat. He stepped in close.
"I love you, Colin," she said as they both scrambled for his pants zipper. Danica wrapped her legs around his waist, his hands going back to her bottom to help her up.
"Love you too, pet," he replied breathlessly, and pressed into her.
The women who came into the bathroom for the next few minutes usually left giggling or with mouths agape at the noises they heard coming from the last stall. Already wound up, it didn't take long for the two lovers to finish, rumpled clothes clutched in each other's grip.
Colin panted with his head down, sweat running from his hairline. Grinning, Danica said, "You okay? I didn't hurt you, did I?"
He chuckled, and looked up into her green eyes. "You wear me out, love."
Her brow creased at just how hard he was panting. "No, really, Col, are you alright?" She felt his forehead for fever. "You getting sick again?"
"No no, I'm fine." He tapped the outside of her thighs with his open palms. "Come on then, down now."
A woman in a wheelchair waited just outside the door with a cross expression upon her face. After leaning over as far as she could to see under the stall's door, she rapped on it with her fist. "Time to come out. That stall isn't for you; I can see you standing there."
Danica and Colin both had to laugh. "Sorry!" He retrieved and put on his tan blazer, and then, before she could, bent over and scooped up her panties, stuffing them in his pocket with a smirk. "Something to remember you by."
"Oh? What do I get?" Danica asked, grabbing the handle of her suitcase and hooking her other arm into his.
"My undying love."
As they exited the stall, still panting a bit, Danica tried to fix her hair with one hand. The lady in the wheelchair frowned at them. "Pervy," she said as they passed.
Colin, smiling at her like he was plotting something, spouted off, "You know these Yanks, ma'am. They come here and act like they own the place. Before her, I was a churchgoing, upstanding citizen. Now I'm grabbing a knee trembler wherever I can get it."
Danica giggled with a hand to her mouth. "You do remember who colonized who, right?"
"If memory serves me, I just colonized your scanties."
Looking after the impetuous youths, the woman shook her head.
They stared again at the checkpoint with a sigh. "I should get going..."
"Yeah."
Rolling her eyes, Danica groaned, "With the time difference, I figure I'll get there before I left."
"Give or take."
"The jetlag is totally going to suck."
Colin agreed with a nod. "I'll send you a video over the phone of the next sparkler bomb Nigel and I set off. That should wake you up right quick."
She snickered, fully aware of the puerile activities that took place whenever he and his cousin got together. "Bomb go boom; it pretty."
"Sparkler sparkly." They laughed into another kiss.
After a minute of hugging and kissing, they finally parted. He held her hand, twisting the engagement ring he'd given her just a little back and forth across her finger, until she'd walked too far for him to hold it anymore. Danica's eyes welled up with tears when their fingers no longer touched.
"It's only a week, love."
"I'll miss you."
"Miss you too."
Danica struck a provocative pose, a hand behind her head and a leg cocked outward, lips parted just slightly. "Take good care of my underwear."
Colin grinned. "Phwoar."
After she'd disappeared through the checkpoint with one final wave, he winced, cracked his knuckles, and winced again when it didn't help.
*****
Disorienting. That's what it was. Beckett couldn't remember going to sleep, and here he was waking up in the clothes he'd been wearing the day before.
Disorienting.
He sat up in bed and looked around, discovering that he was still wearing his shoes, even. They were caked with mud. Beckett had been sleeping on top of the covers, a couple of his school books open at the end of the bed, with the window wide open. And he had little memory of what had happened. It was all very bewildering.
Trying to make sense of it, Beckett recalled, I was doing my homework, and I must've fallen asleep. But didn't I wake up and try to make a phone call?
Sometimes, we are not alone in here.
Faulken. What do you mean?
Cryptic as always, his spirit guide simply replied, Sometimes, we are not ourselves.
Please explain. Beckett waited. Faulken?
There came one last reply. The videotape. Then the guide was silent.
The videotape. Beckett knew something strange had happened when he touched that cursed tape. What exactly, he wasn't sure.
The longer he sat thinking about it, the more certain Beckett became that he had made a phone call. He searched for his phone, found it in one of his pockets, and checked to see whom he had last called.
Jasmine. Beckett had wanted to talk to her last night, but when he remembered, it was too late to call. Isn't that how it went?
Why couldn't he remember this phone call?
Beckett started to dial her number until he saw the time. 5:47AM. Too early for it.
Faulken, what the hell happened last night?
He gazed at his muddy shoes again, and the open window. Beckett's heart began to beat fast in his chest at the thought of what he might have done.
I can become people like you.
Charlotte calls it possession.
*****
Quinn's lower jaw bobbed up and down, his mouth making a smacking sound, as Jodie shook him as hard as she could. "Quinn, would you get out of bed already? Your parents are almost here to pick us up!"
"Uhhh ngh."
"Quinn!"
He batted at her hands. "Ung nuuuh."
"Come on, your sister's coming in on a plane in an hour. We've got to be there!" Jodie yanked on his covers, pulling him so far over that he teetered on falling out of bed.
"Alrigh Jo-eeey, mm up, lemme lone."
Lying next to him, Svetlana sat up and shoved on his hip with her foot until he did fall out of bed. Quinn went over with a whooping sound, eyes going wide. "You two already wake me up; not fair you get five extra minutes."
Jodie had to laugh at Svetlana, sitting there with her hair sticking in five directions, half of it in her exhausted, annoyed, sleepy-eyed face. "You tell 'im, Svet."
With no time now for a shower, Quinn and Svetlana made themselves as presentable as possible in record time, finishing just before Mr. and Mrs. Kirkland arrived. Steven Kirkland looked at them curiously with a furrowed brow. "Why are you two so tired? You look like you just rolled out of bed."
Quinn shrugged. "We pulled an all-nighter," he lied. "Got lots of tests and projects due before Spring Break."
"Quinn, you knew your sister was coming in today," his mother scolded.
"I have a project to finish," he replied, and shrugged again.
"Well..." Steven jerked his thumb at the door behind him. "...you can sleep in the car. Let's roll."
The ride to the airport proved awkward for Jodie, who sat to the left of the sleeping couple in one of the mini-van's back seats. With Quinn and Svet leaning on each other, dead to the world but breathing softly beside her nonetheless, it was almost like being alone with Quinn's parents. Dahlia Kirkland checked her son's reflection in the rearview mirror every few minutes with a concerned expression.
"They were up all night, huh?" she asked Jodie in passing, although Jodie knew just from the inflection in her voice that she was worried. Just the other day, Quinn's had gone by his parents' house and been an exhausted wreck, and here he was again, an exhausted wreck. Of course the woman found it troubling.
"Yeah," was Jodie's only reply. She didn't know what else to say, the truth being so unbelievable.
"They've been doing that a lot lately."
"Well, you know how college is."
Steven cut in with, "I think we can remember back that far," and they all chuckled.
Quinn's mom didn't lose that creased, worried browline, though, and it made Jodie feel guilty that she didn't have anything to say that would quiet the nice woman's fears.
Once they all became quiet again, Jodie sighed to herself in relief; the more questions Mrs. Kirkland asked and the more she had to lie to her, the guiltier Jodie would feel. Without that anxiety breathing down her neck, she could take the time just to watch the world pass by the window and notice all the little things people rarely noticed unless it was quiet. Like how sweet and helpless Quinn looked while he was sleeping. With Svetlana's head on his shoulder and his head leaning on hers, they formed a sea of blond hair made more golden by the sunlight glinting off its waves. Jodie smiled to herself, and her heart felt warm at the thought that even if Quinn married another girl, she would still feel this love for him. Perhaps the thought should make her sad, but Jodie couldn't explain it. He'd been her first love. She surmised that maybe most girls felt that way about the first boy they'd ever truly loved, who had loved them back, who had taken their virginity and given them their first stuffed bear for Valentine's Day.
Then Jodie looked forward into the front seat, noticing that Mr. Kirkland had his hand on the center console, and Mrs. Kirkland had draped her hand over his; he was softy rubbing the backs of her fingers with his thumb. That image was the one that made her feel sad. It was wonderful for Quinn, that his parents were still in love after so many years together. But it just reminded Jodie of how different her own situation was with her parents. She loved her mom, but sometimes it could be painful to have a mother who jumped from boyfriend to boyfriend and a father who wasn't much of a presence in her life. Seeing two parents still in love after 25 years of marriage made Jodie wistful to know what it felt like, to have that stability.
As they pulled into the airport's main parking garage, Mr. Kirkland began to snicker to himself. He checked the rearview mirror, saw that there was no one coming in behind him, and said, "We're just about here. It's time to wake the sleeping beauties. Brace yourselves, girls." Then he simultaneously let out a comical scream and stepped on the brakes. "Ahhh, oh my God, we're gonna crash!"
Quinn and Svetlana were both tossed up against their seatbelts, their heads lolling forward. Svetlana came awake with wide eyes and a startled gasp, jumping in her seat, but Quinn's eyes went even wider, and he let out his own squeaky, comical scream of surprise. Jodie couldn't help but giggle. She actually laughed out loud when Quinn pedaled his hands at the air as he tried to get his bearings.
"Wha, who, what's happening?!" he babbled, looking all around.
Even Dahlia giggled behind her hand. "Steven..."
"What?" he replied with a smirky grin.
Quinn opened and closed his eyes several times, rubbing them. He finally realized that his father had played one of his jokes on them. "Daaaad..." he whined. "That's not funny."
Once Jodie had gotten started, she couldn't stop; Quinn caught her giggling and shot her a look so fatigued and frustrated that the laughter died in her throat. She instantly felt horrible.
By the time Quinn turned his head forward again, the expression was gone. He was getting good at hiding what he was going through from his parents. "And I was actually having a good dream."
Quinn and Svetlana were grumpy and sullen-faced all the way in to the terminal. But once he saw Danica walk through the checkpoint in her long skirt and Guns n' Roses T-shirt, and that smile of pure joy spread across her face at the sight of her family, Quinn was hit with such a warm feeling of nostalgia and love that he held his homemade sign up under his chin and proudly waved it back and forth. The words on the sign may have been simple - just 'WELCOME HOME DANICA!' - but Quinn felt every word with such enthusiasm that he seemed absolutely giddy with the knowledge that his other half was finally home.
Jodie just about sighed with relief when she saw the happy smile on Quinn's face. The sun was starting to come out.
Everyone grinned and waved at the approaching girl. As Steven was the first person she came to, Danica dropped her carry-on beside her and threw her arms around his neck. "Daddy!"
He kissed the side of her head with a loud "Mwa!" sound. "Welcome home, Sweetness."
Next, her mother got the same big, homesick hug, something Danica didn't even realize she was feeling until she saw them all again. Turning to Jodie, she opened up her arms and squealed. "Jodester!"
Jodie imitated the position, arms wide. "Danister!" They both gave the other a kiss on each cheek as a joke, hamming it up for the sake of the others. "Just like the French do!" Jodie cried, and then they hugged for real, squeezing each other tight.
"I missed you," Danica said into Jodie's ear. They rocked back and forth a couple of times before releasing each other with ecstatic grins.
Because she'd only met Svetlana once that past Christmas, Danica didn't feel like she knew her very well, but she still gave her a polite, warm hug. "Welcome home, Danica," Svetlana said. With her accent, the name was pronounced much slower than everyone else said it, with each syllable over-accentuated; it came out almost as 'DA-nee-kah,' where the others said simply 'Danih-kah.' Danica couldn't help but giggle.
Just as she was turning to her brother, he dramatically threw his arms open and cried, "Danicalifragilisticexpialidocious!"
"Come 'ere you," she laughed, and yanked him into a long, clingy hug. "Oh, I missed you so much," Danica said, patting his back.
Dahlia and Steven watched them, her eyes getting misty. "Aww," she cooed at her twin children, and how hard it could be on them to live apart.
When Danica tried to let go, Quinn clung to her a bit too long. "Okay, we can hug some more," she conceded with a small laugh. A few more seconds of back patting and he finally let her out of the embrace. Quinn, embarrassed, looked anywhere but in her eyes, but she wasn't having it. Danica held his face in her hands and ran her thumbs over the bags under his eyes.
"Quit it, will ya?" he responded, trying to pass it off with a laugh.
"Quinn... you look exhausted. Haven't you been sleeping?" she asked. It was a rhetorical question; she knew he hadn't just from looking at him. "I'm the one who's supposed to be jetlagged here."
"Later," Quinn mumbled at her. He darted his eyes in their parents' direction twice, indicating that there was a story there, but he didn't want to talk about it in front of them. In that moment, Danica got that jittery feeling she'd had back at the airport in London, as if she'd just heard thunder rumbling outside, but this time, it felt more like the moment between spotting a lightning strike and waiting for the loud crash, not knowing just how bad it was going to be. Would it be a small, rolling growl, or a sudden crash that jarred your insides and made the windows shake in their frames? She could tell just from the look in her brother's eyes and the way his skin seemed to shake from the inside, like every moment he anticipated something bad would happen, that something intense was keeping him up at night.
"Quinny..." she started to say with concern, but then he spotted the diamond ring on her finger. His eyes widened a bit; he looked confused and elated at the same time. Danica quickly snapped her arms down, trying to hide the ring in the folds of her skirt.
They had a silent conversation with their eyes. Is that an engagement ring?!
Not yet. Later. I'll tell everyone later. You keep my secret and I'll keep yours. Okay?
Clearing his throat, Quinn took Danica's arm. "That carry-on can't be your only bag. If I know my sister at all, there's a very large trunk full of clothes waiting for us at baggage claim..."
"Just a regular size suitcase."
"By the time this week is over, you'll be taking back two. Mark my words. Mom said something about shopping."
Dahlia nodded. "Lots and lots of shopping."
As they trooped in the direction of baggage claim, Jodie hung back a little, taking in the scene before her. She couldn't have been more glad to have Danica home. Dealing with Quinn and Svetlana's problem practically by herself had been harrowing. (Darcy hadn't been much help so far, at least not in Jodie's eyes.) Now there would be two brains on the job.
A sliver of light peered over the horizon.
it won't stop
Day 28: Closer, My Dear, Come Closer
Part of Story Arc 1: Counterclockwise
A "The Ring/Ringu" Fanfic
by Laurel (Sailorhathor)
Chapters: 28 of 100
Rating: Overall Rating PG-13 (adult theme; horror elements that might be too scary for children under 13; bad language)
Dates: Begun September 2006. Some material is based on previously written stories from 2003-2005. This chapter was written in Oct. 2008.
Word Count: 4,783
Summary: Sam and Jessica discuss the curious and dark case of the Bloodworth family, where cruel methods were used to bring out the childrens' psychic powers. His suspicions about Cheyenne Bloodworth are confirmed. Sam/Jess.
Warning: Contains spoilers for the entire Ringu and The Ring series. This chapter contains the hunting of animals, as well as fictional historic content concerning Adolf Hitler and the Nazi SS guard.
Fanfic Challenges: Fits 50_darkfics prompt #28 Innocence and coclaim100 prompt #28 Unbound.
Author's Notes: This chapter is a cross-over with the tv shows Supernatural and a brief appearance by Little House on the Prairie.
Set pre-series for Supernatural, during Sam's years at Stanford. Very post-series for LHotP.
Thanks to Rekka for translating my English into Japanese!
For those of you who see "cross-over with Little House on the Prairie" and think, "Must be crack!fic," you're very wrong. LHotP wasn't just a sappy, goodie-two-shoes show full of church and life lessons. It often got very, very dark. Those darker aspects of the show are explored in this x-over.
More notes at the end of the chapter.
Just two yards from possible salvation and Jasmine ran headlong into Beckett, who turned in front of her, blocking her path. He seemed immovable, as she stumbled and almost fell down from the sudden impact. Before Jasmine could recover, Beckett's eyes filmed over, milky and dead, and she was lifted into the air by a power Samara didn't use as often - her psychokinesis. Jasmine yelped in surprise and terror. It startled her so much, she dropped her cell phone on the ground.
"The police are on their way," Jasmine said, mustering as much courage as she could.
"Do you really think we're afraid of them?" Beckett questioned in that soft, childlike Samara voice. "We all have policemen in our wells."
Several of the other girls like Samara emerged from the forest, surrounding them. The German twins. Sadako, the Japanese teenager. The blonde adoptee from post-Civil War America. The quiet Asian exchange student on the 'Missing' poster in the student union. And Charlotte, the bitter high schooler with her happy future torn from her. They looked up at Jasmine with venomous stares.
"Why do you want to hurt us?" Charlotte asked. "You don't know what we've been through."
"This is none of your business," the Asian exchange student said.
"You should have kept out of it," added the frontier-era adolescent.
"Watashi-tachi wa irona riyuu ga aru no yo," Sadako declared.
"You can't possibly know our pain," said one of the German twins in heavily accented English.
"You should consider yourself lucky that you don't," Samara-Beckett finished. "'Though you're about to find out."
Police sirens came closer and closer. She just needed to buy a little more time. Making a desperate effort not to cry, Jasmine frantically screamed, "Beckett! Fight her! Don't let them hurt me!"
"Beckett's sleeping. You shouldn't be worried about him. You should be worried about yourself." Samara puppeted the boy to raise his hand, which he gestured with toward Jasmine. "If you survive, remember that this is only a fraction of the pain we've endured. Keep your nose out of our business." He swept his hand toward the road, spinning his index finger.
"No, wait!" The last word was almost cut off as Jasmine's head whipped back with the force of her body being hurled into the road.
The police car held two cops. Their intention had been to park and find the girl and the man she said was following her. But, the girl found them.
Officer Hanley was saying, "...is she wearing a jacket or coat?" when his partner cried out and slammed on the brakes.
What they saw was a black teenage female illuminated by the headlights, coming out of the trees on the left side of the road as if someone or something had thrown her. She was spinning as she flew through the air. The policeman could not keep from hitting her. For a moment, they saw the fear on her face as her body rolled up on the hood and connected with the windshield, then was tossed off the front of the car and landed several feet away in the road, broken and unconscious.
While the policemen got out of their car, checking on Jasmine as they radioed for an ambulance, Beckett made his way quietly through the trees and headed back to his house. They never saw him.
The police never saw Stacy either, who had made it to the park just in time to hear voices in the forest, a police siren, and then the sound of the car hitting her friend's body. She now peeked from behind a piece of playground equipment to watch the policemen hovering over Jasmine, talking into one of their shoulder radios, occasionally scanning the woods with a flashlight. When one of them stepped further into the trees and bent down to examine Jasmine's cell phone, Stacy slipped out and ran back toward her house.
Three blocks away and she stopped, breathless and overcome with guilt, and crouched beside a stone wall to sob into her hands. Those girls did it. If Jasmine died, Stacy felt she would be partially responsible. Her best friend was just an innocent bystander, trying to help her. Oh God, what if she was already dead?!
The ambulance passed her on its way to the park, sirens blaring. Stacy said a silent prayer that they would get there in time.
*****
Sam had barely had time to put any of the books back on the shelf when a corner of his room faded and changed into the clearing, the clearing in the forest where Richard and the other hunters had stood. He defensively raised one of the books, as if there was anyone to hit, but lowered it when he realized the phantoms just had one more thing to show him.
The hunters celebrated over a pile of dead deer, the moose, and many rabbits. One of them was talking about how his daughter had always wanted a patchwork rabbit fur coat. Richard picked up Samara and spun her around; she giggled, smiling from ear to ear.
"Richard, when you said you could provide the best hunting experience I've ever had, you weren't just blowing smoke up my ass," one of the hunters said. "This hunt was monumental."
The other added, "Worth every penny."
Disgusted with this bit of information, Sam muttered to himself, "He made them pay to go?"
Alexandra appeared nearby; Sam saw her out of the corner of his eye and turned toward her. "Can you believe the man exploited his own child like that? His adopted child, anyway." They watched Richard put Samara on his shoulders and dance around, singing a little song. Delighted laughter bubbled from her mouth. "These hunts were the only reason he ever spent any time with her."
Sam noticed the sad tone in Alexandra's voice, like Samara was a creature to be pitied. "You're trying to make me feel sorry for her," he said cynically.
"Do you think their lives were always easy?" Alexandra regarded him as one would a child, like one day, Sam would finally get it.
Salt was not really something he kept in his room. Not only would it look odd for him to have a bag of rock salt under his bed, but also, Sam wanted anything that had to do with hunting as far from his new life as possible. Or so, he thought he did. Gerald did, however, have a set of heavy iron bookends on the shelf next to Sam's head. Sam picked one up and threatened to throw it at Alexandra. "You can't make me feel anything but contempt for your girls, so stop trying. My father and brother are going to wipe up the floor with you. So get out of my room, lady."
A brief pause to regard his behavior and she began to laugh at him derisively. "We won't be stopped. Not by you or anyone in your family. You should trust me when I say that it would be better for all of you if you just mind your own business. That's what Jasmine should have done."
Swallowing hard, Sam replied, "What did you do to the girl?"
"Oh, you want me to stay now? You want to have a chat?" Alexandra asked with a mocking laugh. "Well, Sam, I'll tell you. I'll tell you that you might want to buy the girl some flowers. Would you like to know what hospital she's in?"
With an exasperated grunt, Sam threw the bookend at her. Alexandra dissipated before it hit the ground.
*****
After his two morning classes, Sam found an empty table in the library and began searching pertinent sections of the local newspaper for articles about anything happening to a woman named Jolene or a teenager named Jasmine. Nothing. Next, he looked through a bigger paper for the closest major city. So far, it also yielded nothing helpful. Overall, that was good, but also very frustrating, as Sam needed to know if they were all right.
He had turned another page and started scanning it when he heard a familiar, very welcome voice heading his way, quietly singing a song.
"Put another nickel in, in the nickelodeon. All I want is kissing you and music, music, music."
Sam's face lit up when he raised his head to see Jessica, singing a little song and doing a little dance much like the flappers used to do in the 1920's. She danced up to the table, grinning at him, a book in her hands.
"Well hello there you. Something's got you in a fantastic mood," he laughed. "Where'd you get that song, the eighteen-hundreds?"
Being playful, Jessica danced the Charleston, presenting the book as if it was the centerpiece of her routine. "1949, actually." She held her arms out in a 'Ta-da!' motion. A couple students who had been staring at her now clapped; she bowed with a flourish. The librarian shushed them.
"Would you sit down before you get us thrown out?" Sam said with a chuckle. "Just say no, Jessica."
She plopped the book down on the table like she was offended. "I'll have you know, Mr. Winchester, that I'm high on life." Jessica pushed the book toward him. "I'm in a good mood because of this." She grinned. "I found you the motherload."
"What's this?" Sam read the title. The Bloodworth Case.
"I decided to see what else I could dig up, so I started with the publisher of the Alexandra Baptiste books, Marigold Publishing. It's owned by... wait for it..."
"Who?" he said with a laugh, nudging her arm.
Jessica's grin widened. "The Bloodworth family."
Sam was instantly reminded of those V-8 commercials where people smacked themselves in the forehead. Rowan Bloodworth looked more and more suspicious by the minute. "Well, that's one way to get your books published."
"Yeah," Jess laughed. "I did a general search through the list of books they've published and found this one." She tapped the book on the table. "It's been out of print for around ten years, but luckily, the library had a copy."
"And this is the motherload?" Sam, turning the book over, started to read the summary on the back.
With a laugh, Jessica grabbed the book and tried to take it from him. "If you don't appreciate the very interesting book I found you, I could always take it back."
He laughed too, and they wrestled over it briefly. "Come on, Jess. I want to see what it's about."
"I'll tell you what it's about." Sam allowed her to take the book, sitting back and grinning. He loved to just listen to her talk. Jessica claimed, "I happen to have read it."
"Oh, really? In one morning?"
"Okay, no, I didn't read it all. But I did skim it, and read certain passages that looked interesting in their entirety."
"Well don't make me wait, woman. Tell me what happened," Sam chuckled.
"I think I will." Jessica turned her nose up at him like a snooty maitre d', putting the book down with a pinky raised. "If you think you're worthy."
"I'm not, but tell me anyway."
"Alright." Losing the snooty routine, Jess sat forward with her arms on the table. "The book's about an experiment conducted in the early 1990's involving the children of William Bloodworth, A.K.A. Bill." She said 'Bill' mockingly, as if she didn't like the man very much.
"Let me guess. Rowan Bloodworth was one of those children," Sam suggested. And Cheyenne was the other.
"Very good, Samhopper. He has a sister named Cheyenne. Marigold Publishing has been in the Bloodworth family for generations, since before the Civil War. After Bill's wife Lillian died, he kind of went a little cuckoo. He claimed that his kids had psychic powers and paid all these scientists and doctors to come in and run experiments on them."
"What was he trying to prove?"
"That they were psychic, I guess. After the experiments were over, he took Cheyenne on a tour of the country, showing off her 'psychic abilities.' Made a ton off of lectures and books he wrote about it. All published by Marigold, of course." Jessica shook her head. "Can you believe a father would do something like that to his own innocent children?"
"That's horrible," Sam agreed, although he could have elaborated on the subject from his own experience with fathers and what they did in reaction to the supernatural.
"Tells you a bit more about his motivations, huh? Anyway, they set the lab up in Bloodworth's home, which is this huge mansion north of here - I think his family still owns it - and they set about trying to bring out Rowan and Cheyenne's powers," Jessica explained.
"What, the kids hadn't even shown any signs that they had them?"
"Not exactly."
"Then why did Bloodworth bring a whole team of scientists in there?"
With a sly smile, Jessica replied, "Because their mother, Lillian, said her children were psychic. That she was psychic. That it ran in the family... because they were descendants of Alexandra Baptiste."
Blinking, Sam sat back in his chair, no longer joking or laughing. "Hold on. I thought the Nazi and his daughter were the descendants."
"They were. Or, she was, anyway." Again, Jessica grinned with mirth; she knew things Sam didn't, and it was fun to see his reaction to them. "Her name was Suzette Christaller. Maiden name, Metternich. She had a twin, Sophia, who died during World War II. Sophie was always very sickly."
Sam, remembering the illusion from the night before, pictured the twin girls holding hands out in the forest.
"As an adult, Suzette claimed she and, of course, her twin, were the descendants of Alexandra Baptiste, from her mother's side. The father of the twins was Dr. Rudolf Metternich..." She took a dramatic pause for effect. "...of the Nazi SS medical corps."
Momentarily closing his eyes, Sam shook his head and uttered, "You are shitting me."
"I most definitely am not. Suzette survived the war, got married, and gave birth to a daughter."
Now, Sam gave a small nod. "Lillian."
"Yes. And she had Rowan and Cheyenne with Bill Bloodworth. Suzette Christaller was the one who started the whole psychic bloodline thing; she put the ideas in Lillian's head about her children. When the kids were still pretty young, Bill wanted to begin the experiments, but Suzette objected, and their differences separated them for a few years. I think that Lillian was just standing by her husband. I mean, she doesn't seem like a bad mother." Jessica shrugged.
"What makes you say that?"
"Just the way the kids talk about her in the book. They each recalled some of their favorite memories." She ran a finger over the book's cover, thinking about what she'd read. "With her mother out of her life, Lillian was open to manipulation, I guess. You know her grandfather, the Nazi?"
"Yeah..." Sam replied.
"Turns out he escaped when the war ended. Spent more than forty years in South America. In the late 1980's, he came to America to spend his last years with his granddaughter and great-grandchildren." Scoffing, Jessica added, "I think Bill Bloodworth learned a thing or two from him."
"You're kidding," said Sam, amazed. "They harbored a former Nazi?"
"Bill claims he wasn't aware of Dr. Metternich's past. He says the Nazi used a fake name around strangers, which he did think was pretty weird. But it seems like Lillian was the only one who knew the truth. She did nothing about it because she adored him."
"So the Nazi turned over a new leaf."
"That's what was so scary about the Nazis, really. They spent their days murdering people in all sorts of grisly ways, and then went home to their families as loving parents." Jessica scrunched up her face in disgust. "I'm sure some of them were monsters at home as well, but not all of them, from what their surviving families have said."
"Yeah. Pretty terrifying, really," Sam sighed. "How does a person bring himself to the point of thinking of the killing of men, women, and children as a job?"
Jessica, shuddering, agreed with him. "Well, good thing is, once Suzette found out about it, she turned her father in. The Israeli Secret Service came and took him away. Before they could properly question Lillian Bloodworth about her part in hiding him, she took her own life."
For a moment, Sam felt sorry for Rowan and Cheyenne, losing their mother in that way. His face was sad, thoughtful. "Poor kids."
"Yeah. I think Lillian's grandfather just had her completely snowed. Book says Lillian was prone to depression. Probably made her vulnerable. Anyway, with their mother out of the way, Bill Bloodworth was open to get things going on the experiments. Suzette had no say in the matter. Grandparents don't have any rights."
"No, I guess they don't. How old were the kids when the experiments started?"
"Uh, somewhere in their teens?" Jessica continued to speak while flipping through the book. "I think Cheyenne was twelve."
Sam wondered aloud, "How do you bring out someone's psychic powers, anyway? I mean, what did they do?" He couldn't remember his father ever dealing with a case like that, where methods were employed to bring out someone's psychic abilities, so Sam had no point of reference. He could have made some guesses, but...
Looking at him over the open book, she explained, "They built these special chambers and forced the kids to stay in them for hours, several days a week. Sensory deprivation chambers. And also, something called a..." Jessica turned the pages and skimmed until she found it. "...a psy-cho-man-tium chamber. Wow, say that three times fast."
"My... God." Sam only had a limited understanding of sensory deprivation chambers, and had never encountered a real psychomantium, although he'd heard the word in passing during one of his father's research talks with Caleb. "Their father supported this?"
"Sam, he funded it."
"Jesus."
Jessica, pointing to a photograph in the book, continued, "I don't think they were traditional sensory deprivation chambers. Those are usually like, a tube that you lie inside of, floating in water. The pictures in the book show a little room, completely enclosed, with just the floor to sit on." She showed him the photos. The chamber was the size of a public bathroom stall. "From the outside, you could see in, but when you were inside with the door closed, you couldn't see anything but blank, black walls. In the prolonged absence of any visual or auditory stimulation, you're supposed to be able to release your own psychic abilities."
Pausing, Sam finally had to ask, "Did anything ever happen?"
She smirked at him. "Do you think they would have written a book about it if nothing ever happened?"
"What could they do?" Then Sam added, "Allegedly."
"Cheyenne didn't manifest any powers for a long time. But Rowan had almost instant results. He proved to be a really excellent channeler. Know what that is?"
Sam played it a little dumb. "Isn't that a person who's really open to being possessed by the spirits of the dead, and they speak through him or something? I think I saw that in a movie once."
"Very good. You know, with my awesome research skills and your above average intelligence..." Jessica leaned across the table and ruffled his hair. "...you just may learn something about the supernatural yet."
Snickering with his mouth closed, Sam just looked at her with a grin. "I've read a book or two."
"It shows."
"So who was Rowan Bloodworth channeling?" He took a sip of his coffee, which he'd almost forgotten was there.
Very matter-of-factly, she replied, "His Nazi great-grandfather."
Sam, not foreseeing that, sputtered and choked on his coffee. Jessica giggled at him; that was pretty much the reaction she'd been expecting. He put a napkin to his nose. "Wow, that's hot coming back out," Sam muttered, making Jessica laugh harder. Once he'd caught his breath, he commented, "I should have seen that one coming."
"No argument here." Giving him a wink, Jessica pointed to a passage in the book. "The boy would take on the persona of Rudolf Metternich, pacing the chamber and ranting mostly in German about any subject that came into his beady little head. Usually he'd talk about why the Third Reich fell and how his kids were impure, and how he would have been able to 'finish them both off' if only Hitler hadn't stopped him."
"Holy crap. It does not say that."
"It does." She held the book out, pointing to a page.
"Was he saying that he murdered Sophie?"
Consulting the book again, Jessica replied, "It sounds like it, doesn't it? But when they asked Metternich that question, he'd refuse to give them a direct answer."
"That's just... wow."
She nodded. "Besides that, Metternich would sing songs in English and German. But as you can guess, Rowan didn't speak German. Metternich's favorite singer was Teresa Brewer, especially her signature song, 'Music, Music, Music!' He'd do that one in both languages. I guess it entertained him when he was bored."
"Ah, that's why you were warbling that tune when you came in," Sam concluded with a laugh.
Jessica laughed a little too. "It's one of those evil songs that is so infectious that it just gets stuck right in your head. Like, in a horror movie, when they want to indicate that the old-timey ghost is coming, they play some old song that used to be charming but now it's just creepy? This would be one of those songs."
Laughing again, he asked, "Did the Nazi have anything else to say?"
"Uhh..." She looked in the book again. "Says here that after a while, Dr. Metternich began to demand that they bring him books, books of all kinds. They tried to get him to describe what kind of books, but he'd just get angry and yell, 'The books, the books, bring me my books!' When he'd rant like this, the scientists noticed that he usually sounded drunk, so they concluded the spirit might be reliving something related to his life."
"How'd they shut him up?"
"They got him some books. When the books were given to him, he promptly ripped them up, tearing out the binding. Then he'd go, 'No, this isn't it,' and move on to the next one," Jessica said, shrugging.
"What was he looking for?" asked Sam.
Jessica shrugged again. "Wouldn't say."
"Did Rowan channel anyone else? Any other long lost relatives looking to destroy fine works of literature?"
She shook her head, chuckling.
"What about Cheyenne? What could she do?" Sam's voice took on a more cautious tone. He thought he knew the answer, but couldn't let on that he knew.
"She appeared to be able to project, like, images that she pictured in her head onto photographic plates. But she had a lot of trouble with it. Gave her headaches and stuff. They did have some results, though; there are reproductions of some of the plates in the book. The girl must've done a lot of sitting in that chamber, trying to make things appear. Kinda makes you feel sorry for her."
Remembering his conversation with Alexandra the night before, and the implication that they had hurt that girl Jasmine, Sam found he still had a problem feeling much sympathy for them. "I guess."
"The scientists tried bringing out any other abilities the kids might have by sticking them in this psychomantium thing. Something to do with mirrors. You're supposed to be able to contact all kinds of freaky things in one of those." Eyes wide with the bizarre nature of it all, Jessica elaborated, "Ghosts, spirits, angels, demons, the works."
"Wow, I've never heard of one of those things," Sam lied. "Sounds scary."
"Apparently, it was - the kids didn't last very long before they had to stop using it. The experience was just too terrifying; they couldn't handle it."
"What did they see?"
"Again, book doesn't say. Disappointing, huh?" Jessica gave another shrug. "They went back to the sensory deprivation chambers after that."
"How long did this go on for?"
"How long does something like this ever go on for?" Her tone half-joking and partially dead serious, she finished, "Until someone gets hurt."
For his own part, Sam was only slightly surprised. "There was a death, wasn't there?"
"Yes," Jessica said with a nod. "One of the scientists. They think it was a stroke, but if it was, it's the weirdest stroke I've ever seen." Leaning forward as if they were about to exchange a secret, she almost whispered, "There's a picture in the book."
"Well let's see it!"
Jessica smirked. "Are you sure?"
"Come on..."
Flipping through the pages, she found the picture and turned the book around to Sam. "What do you think of that?"
John Winchester had shielded his sons from seeing as many terrifying sights as possible, unaware that the worst sight they could have ever seen was his empty bed, night after night. As a result, Sam remembered almost every horrifying monster that they did manage to see as children. When he viewed the photograph of the dead scientist, Sam decided that it had to be one of the most disgusting, frightening things he had ever seen.
The man lay on a concrete floor, arms at an angle by his sides. His skin was a bluish gray, as if he'd been found in the water several days after he had died. Blood stained the front of his lab coat. It had apparently come from his nose. But the worst part was his face. Eyes rolled up to the whites, and mouth frozen open in a scream.
The caption under the photo said it had been taken within two hours of the time that he died.
"What were the circumstances of his death?" Sam asked, scanning the page for the answer even as he proposed the question.
Jessica had already gleaned that information from the book. "The other scientists went out to lunch, but this guy stayed behind. He was alone with Rowan and Cheyenne for almost two hours. They found him like that when they came back. Rowan was channeling Metternich at the time and he just kept laughing and laughing, like he'd had something to do with it. But how could he?"
"What about..." Sam spied the paragraph he wanted. "'Cheyenne was in her deprivation chamber, curled into a ball when they returned.' Huh, must've scared her."
Jessica furrowed her brow at the sarcastic tone of his voice. "What do you think happened?"
"I don't know." Looking at her over the book, he tried to smile, taking himself out of what his family would call 'deep research mode.' "I guess they stopped the experiments after that."
"Yeah. Rowan Bloodworth went into his room and promptly became mute. Refused to speak for two years."
"God."
"Bill began writing books and took his daughter on a tour of the country. Suzette Christaller moved in to take care of Rowan while they were gone. They had tutors and stuff; the kids didn't attend real school very much throughout this time. And that was that." Jessica tapped the book's spine. "You can keep that. Just turn it back in to the library in two weeks." She grinned. "Well, do I win the Research Assistant's Award of the Year or what?"
A lead weight sunk to the bottom of Sam's stomach. After what Alexandra had said last night... "Um, you're great, Jessica. But maybe we should cool it for a while. There doesn't seem to be much else to unearth here."
"Awww, but it's all so interesting. And I was, um, kind of enjoying the time we've been spending together." Under the table, she poked his ankle with her foot. "Haven't you?"
"Oh, very much," Sam breathed. She grinned again. "We don't have to do research all the time, though. There are tons of things we can do together." Taking her hand across the table, he asked, "Want to get a late lunch?"
His warm hand in hers, Jessica didn't even care who saw them out together. Not even Craig. "I'd love to."
As they got up from the table, Sam laughed and said, "For someone who only skimmed the book, you sure knew a lot about what was in it."
"Okay, maybe I read most of it." Jessica linked her arm with his. "But I'm a fast reader."
Sam peeked at the cover of the book again to see who wrote it. Maybe he'd recognize the name. But no, he didn't.
The Bloodworth Case, by Dr. Marcus Scott.
More Notes: You diehard "Ring" fans out there will recognize the name Dr. Scott. He's the doctor who experimented with Samara at the psychiatric hospital back in 1978. I don't believe they ever gave him a first name anywhere, so I made up one for him.
There's a letter in the "Don't Watch This" featurette that we barely get a glimpse of because there are pictures of Samara on top of it. It's hard to tell, but it seems like it details the death of Dr. Scott. I could be wrong, though. Since the letter was never fully shown or confirmed, let's just say Dr. Scott lived on.
Sadako's Japanese: "We have our reasons."
The title and the verse Jessica sings come from Teresa Brewer's song "Music, Music, Music!", (c) 1949. I swear, I have nothing against the music of Teresa Brewer; in fact, I love some of her work. I'm just having a little fun with it in this chapter. ^_^
I'm obsessed with the idea of psychomantium chambers. Not sure you could ever get me in one, as I'd probably run screaming the other way, but I love writing about other people using them. ;D
I also enjoy Sam doing spit-takes where liquid goes up his nose a little too much. XD
it won't stop
The Ringu series is (c) 1998 The Ring/The Spiral Production Group. It is based on the novels by Koji Suzuki. My fanfic is more based on ideas presented in the films, which were created by director Hideo Nakata and screenwriter Hiroshi Takahashi.
The motion picture The Ring is (c) 2002 DreamWorks Pictures. The title "She Just Wanted to Be Heard" comes from a line of dialogue spoken by Rachel Keller in this movie. The motion picture The Ring Two is (c) 2005 DreamWorks Pictures. This fanfic is heavily inspired by ideas presented in the American movies, which were directed by Gore Verbinski and Hideo Nakata and written by Ehren Kruger.
I do not know if the prequel, The Ring 3, will have any bearing on this story or not until I see it.
Supernatural is (c) 2005 Kripke Enterprises, Wonderland, & Warner Brothers/The CW Television.
Little House on the Prairie (TV Series) is (c) 1974 NBC Enterprises and Lionsgate Home Entertainment.
Everything else is (c) Demented Stuff.
She Just Wanted to Be Heard
Day 29: The Secrets We Keep
Part of Story Arc 1: Counterclockwise
A "The Ring/Ringu" Fanfic
by Laurel (Sailorhathor)
Chapters: 29 of 100
Rating: Overall Rating PG-13 (adult theme; horror elements that might be too scary for children under 13; bad language)
Dates: Begun September 2006. Some material is based on previously written stories from 2003-2005. This chapter was written in March 2009.
Word Count: 3,890
Summary: After some sexy airport shenanigans with her British boyfriend, Danica Kirkland comes home from England and is confused to find that her brother has barely slept for four days.
Warning: Contains spoilers for the entire Ringu and The Ring series. This chapter also contains a sex scene that borders on Adult rated territory.
Beta Thanks: Thanks to Sammie for beta'ing this chapter!
Fanfic Challenges: Fits 50_darkfics prompt #29 Guilt and coclaim100 prompt #29 Thunder.
Author's Notes: I think most people can figure out the British slang on their own, but one word may confuse the non-British: that's "Phwoar!" Phwoar (also spelled Fwoar) is a slang exclamation one would utter when they see something that turns them on sexually.
A sparkler bomb is created when one tapes a huge bunch of sparklers together and then lights them all at once. Do not try this at home. ;)
Danicalifragilisticexpialidocious = Of course, a play on the song "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious" from the movie Mary Poppins.
For a while now, I've wanted to make some changes to Svetlana's speech. In a past chapter, she was talking about how she knew three languages, and something about it made me realize that she should be speaking in broken English. So, I went back and edited all of Svet's dialogue from past chapters. The speech quirk will also be reflected in this and future chapters. For those of you who have been reading for a while, I hope it won't be too jarring. I've been told it actually adds to Svet's personality. For the most part, she just drops the occasional word and screws some up; nothing too incredibly different. This is how she sounds in my head. Now you all can hear her too. ;)
"Was that thunder I heard just now?"
The blond Brit grinned to himself. His girl was afraid something would keep her from going home for her visit with her family. Danica had been worrying about that for days now. Maybe even weeks. "Oh, you don't really think God would do that?"
She looked up from the overpriced airport goods she'd been idly gazing over and put her hand in his. "Do what?"
Colin Owens met her eyes. "Dare send down rain to keep your flight from taking off."
Danica lightly swung their joined hands, bouncing on her heels with nervous energy. "You're right. He wouldn't dare do that."
Chuckling, Colin gave her a kiss on the temple. "Get a girl like Danica Kirkland teed off? Even I know not to do that. And I'm far from omniscient."
"Damn straight."
"What, that I'm not all knowing?"
Danica laughed and kissed his mouth. "That it's not a good idea to piss me off. Especially when I'm about to see my family for the first time in three months."
"Oh, no. Keeping you from going home after you've been looking forward to it and talking about it and planning for it..."
Shaking her head, she laughed again. "Yeah, yeah."
Colin kept on talking. "...for the last three months... well, that would make you spit tacks." He took Danica in his arms, holding her loosely about the waist. The other travelers passed them on their way to their own destinations, but the two young lovers didn't notice anyone but each other. Colin did, however, see how close they were coming to the checkpoint in their slow meandering to the gate, where they'd have to part. "If these security people think terrorists are a fright..."
"Oh, really?" Danica put her arms around his neck and snickered into a long, involved kiss. "You make it sound like I've been planning for this trip since Christmas."
"Well, haven't you?"
"Christmas was the last time I went home," she replied with mirth.
"What's your point, love?"
They both laughed into another kiss. "Technically, it's only been two and a half months," she protested.
"Get technical, then." They pressed their lips together once again.
He looked over her shoulder. "We've reached your checkpoint. I can't follow you beyond here."
Danica let out a small groan. "I can't wait to see everyone again, but... I wish you could come with me." Pouting slightly, she kept her arm around Colin's shoulders, alternating her gaze between him and the looming checkpoint. "I want you to meet my family."
"Oh, sure, darling, I'll just pop off and buy a ticket to America. How much can they be?" he said with a thin, sarcastic smile.
Rolling her eyes, Danica sighed and laid her head on his shoulder, looking up at him. "How 'bout you get in my carry-on bag? I'll tell you when it's safe to breathe."
He chuckled. "Sounds like loads of fun."
Danica moaned under her breath. "I wanna go, but I don't wanna gooooo..."
Bringing her hand to his mouth, Colin kissed her fingers near a sizable diamond ring she was wearing. "You know I'll be right there with you. You can call me any time."
"I just wish..." She admired the ring. "...that you could be sitting next to me when I tell them."
"So wait, and don't tell them yet."
"No... no, I already kept it a secret over my entire last visit. I can't put it off any longer."
"I know, you were just bursting with the tasty little tidbit." They embraced each other again. "How much time do we have?"
"I should make my way to the gate in about half an hour."
"Hmmmm... what should we do with our time, then?"
Danica, smirking, leaned in close. "How about one for the road?"
"At the airport?" Colin asked, grinning mischievously. "Join the Mile High Club? No, that's not right... would it be the Foot High Club, then?"
Danica smiled at his joke. "We can do it in the bathroom. The stall doors lock," she whispered.
"Right here, in the loo?" he questioned teasingly.
"Oh, you don't want one to go on?"
"Of course I do. Don't be silly." Now he leaned in closer. "That noise you heard? It wasn't thunder. It was my sex drive revving up at the thought of you." When he growled the word 'revving,' Colin gave her bottom a discreet, quick squeeze. Danica squealed and jumped in his arms.
"You sex maniac," she laughed, and smacked his chest. "Come on, let's hurry."
Danica scurried into the women's bathroom to check things out before coming to get him, taking Colin by the hand and saying, "I think it's empty." Her skin tingled with anticipation.
They eyed each other hungrily as they snuck toward a back stall. Danica tore her gaze away from him long enough to bend over and check to see if there were any feet visible under the doors of the nearby stalls. Colin gave her bottom a good, healthy smack.
She squealed saucily and straightened up. "You are intruding upon my person, Mr. Owens."
"Is that a problem, Miss Kirkland?"
Danica pushed open the door of the handicapped stall (because it was the biggest) and practically threw in her carry-on suitcase; it teetered along on its wheels and rebounded off the wall. "What do you think?"
Colin removed his blazer, tossing it over the wall of the modest cubicle. "Considering you propositioned me, I would think not."
"That's what I like about you; you're so bright." Grinning at him, Danica lifted her long, paisley-patterned skirt to give him a great view of her baby blue panties, and waggled it back and forth like a can-can dancer. Because the door had swung nearly closed on its own, she kicked it open with a backward sweep of her leg and backed into the stall, with Colin following eagerly right after.
"Phwoar!" he growled at her.
As soon as the lock slid home, he turned and pulled her to him. They kissed passionately, open-mouthed, her up-ended skirt crumpled between them. At first, his hands squeezed her bottom, but soon moved to cup her breasts, thumbs rubbing aggressively over rising flesh through the fabric. Danica moaned quietly. Colin kissed her neck until she was panting, dark hair falling out of its clip and slinking over his face, the clip hanging by a clump of hair he'd uprooted when he ran his fingers through it. He squeezed his hand between her legs and snaked his fingers along the baby blue fabric.
Danica mewled for him. "Uhh... Colin!"
He pressed his fingers in hard and stroked. "You get these good and wet for me, 'kay love?" His finger made quick circles. She huffed out a moan. "I want your scent all over them. They're staying with me."
"Uh... ah... okay, baby..."
Giving her another half minute of attention, Colin then hooked his fingers into the waistband of her underwear and tugged down on it. Danica, eyes half-closed, brought her legs closer together for a moment so he could slide her panties to her ankles. She stepped out of them and they kissed again, Danica placing one leg up on the toilet seat. He stepped in close.
"I love you, Colin," she said as they both scrambled for his pants zipper. Danica wrapped her legs around his waist, his hands going back to her bottom to help her up.
"Love you too, pet," he replied breathlessly, and pressed into her.
The women who came into the bathroom for the next few minutes usually left giggling or with mouths agape at the noises they heard coming from the last stall. Already wound up, it didn't take long for the two lovers to finish, rumpled clothes clutched in each other's grip.
Colin panted with his head down, sweat running from his hairline. Grinning, Danica said, "You okay? I didn't hurt you, did I?"
He chuckled, and looked up into her green eyes. "You wear me out, love."
Her brow creased at just how hard he was panting. "No, really, Col, are you alright?" She felt his forehead for fever. "You getting sick again?"
"No no, I'm fine." He tapped the outside of her thighs with his open palms. "Come on then, down now."
A woman in a wheelchair waited just outside the door with a cross expression upon her face. After leaning over as far as she could to see under the stall's door, she rapped on it with her fist. "Time to come out. That stall isn't for you; I can see you standing there."
Danica and Colin both had to laugh. "Sorry!" He retrieved and put on his tan blazer, and then, before she could, bent over and scooped up her panties, stuffing them in his pocket with a smirk. "Something to remember you by."
"Oh? What do I get?" Danica asked, grabbing the handle of her suitcase and hooking her other arm into his.
"My undying love."
As they exited the stall, still panting a bit, Danica tried to fix her hair with one hand. The lady in the wheelchair frowned at them. "Pervy," she said as they passed.
Colin, smiling at her like he was plotting something, spouted off, "You know these Yanks, ma'am. They come here and act like they own the place. Before her, I was a churchgoing, upstanding citizen. Now I'm grabbing a knee trembler wherever I can get it."
Danica giggled with a hand to her mouth. "You do remember who colonized who, right?"
"If memory serves me, I just colonized your scanties."
Looking after the impetuous youths, the woman shook her head.
They stared again at the checkpoint with a sigh. "I should get going..."
"Yeah."
Rolling her eyes, Danica groaned, "With the time difference, I figure I'll get there before I left."
"Give or take."
"The jetlag is totally going to suck."
Colin agreed with a nod. "I'll send you a video over the phone of the next sparkler bomb Nigel and I set off. That should wake you up right quick."
She snickered, fully aware of the puerile activities that took place whenever he and his cousin got together. "Bomb go boom; it pretty."
"Sparkler sparkly." They laughed into another kiss.
After a minute of hugging and kissing, they finally parted. He held her hand, twisting the engagement ring he'd given her just a little back and forth across her finger, until she'd walked too far for him to hold it anymore. Danica's eyes welled up with tears when their fingers no longer touched.
"It's only a week, love."
"I'll miss you."
"Miss you too."
Danica struck a provocative pose, a hand behind her head and a leg cocked outward, lips parted just slightly. "Take good care of my underwear."
Colin grinned. "Phwoar."
After she'd disappeared through the checkpoint with one final wave, he winced, cracked his knuckles, and winced again when it didn't help.
*****
Disorienting. That's what it was. Beckett couldn't remember going to sleep, and here he was waking up in the clothes he'd been wearing the day before.
Disorienting.
He sat up in bed and looked around, discovering that he was still wearing his shoes, even. They were caked with mud. Beckett had been sleeping on top of the covers, a couple of his school books open at the end of the bed, with the window wide open. And he had little memory of what had happened. It was all very bewildering.
Trying to make sense of it, Beckett recalled, I was doing my homework, and I must've fallen asleep. But didn't I wake up and try to make a phone call?
Sometimes, we are not alone in here.
Faulken. What do you mean?
Cryptic as always, his spirit guide simply replied, Sometimes, we are not ourselves.
Please explain. Beckett waited. Faulken?
There came one last reply. The videotape. Then the guide was silent.
The videotape. Beckett knew something strange had happened when he touched that cursed tape. What exactly, he wasn't sure.
The longer he sat thinking about it, the more certain Beckett became that he had made a phone call. He searched for his phone, found it in one of his pockets, and checked to see whom he had last called.
Jasmine. Beckett had wanted to talk to her last night, but when he remembered, it was too late to call. Isn't that how it went?
Why couldn't he remember this phone call?
Beckett started to dial her number until he saw the time. 5:47AM. Too early for it.
Faulken, what the hell happened last night?
He gazed at his muddy shoes again, and the open window. Beckett's heart began to beat fast in his chest at the thought of what he might have done.
I can become people like you.
Charlotte calls it possession.
*****
Quinn's lower jaw bobbed up and down, his mouth making a smacking sound, as Jodie shook him as hard as she could. "Quinn, would you get out of bed already? Your parents are almost here to pick us up!"
"Uhhh ngh."
"Quinn!"
He batted at her hands. "Ung nuuuh."
"Come on, your sister's coming in on a plane in an hour. We've got to be there!" Jodie yanked on his covers, pulling him so far over that he teetered on falling out of bed.
"Alrigh Jo-eeey, mm up, lemme lone."
Lying next to him, Svetlana sat up and shoved on his hip with her foot until he did fall out of bed. Quinn went over with a whooping sound, eyes going wide. "You two already wake me up; not fair you get five extra minutes."
Jodie had to laugh at Svetlana, sitting there with her hair sticking in five directions, half of it in her exhausted, annoyed, sleepy-eyed face. "You tell 'im, Svet."
With no time now for a shower, Quinn and Svetlana made themselves as presentable as possible in record time, finishing just before Mr. and Mrs. Kirkland arrived. Steven Kirkland looked at them curiously with a furrowed brow. "Why are you two so tired? You look like you just rolled out of bed."
Quinn shrugged. "We pulled an all-nighter," he lied. "Got lots of tests and projects due before Spring Break."
"Quinn, you knew your sister was coming in today," his mother scolded.
"I have a project to finish," he replied, and shrugged again.
"Well..." Steven jerked his thumb at the door behind him. "...you can sleep in the car. Let's roll."
The ride to the airport proved awkward for Jodie, who sat to the left of the sleeping couple in one of the mini-van's back seats. With Quinn and Svet leaning on each other, dead to the world but breathing softly beside her nonetheless, it was almost like being alone with Quinn's parents. Dahlia Kirkland checked her son's reflection in the rearview mirror every few minutes with a concerned expression.
"They were up all night, huh?" she asked Jodie in passing, although Jodie knew just from the inflection in her voice that she was worried. Just the other day, Quinn's had gone by his parents' house and been an exhausted wreck, and here he was again, an exhausted wreck. Of course the woman found it troubling.
"Yeah," was Jodie's only reply. She didn't know what else to say, the truth being so unbelievable.
"They've been doing that a lot lately."
"Well, you know how college is."
Steven cut in with, "I think we can remember back that far," and they all chuckled.
Quinn's mom didn't lose that creased, worried browline, though, and it made Jodie feel guilty that she didn't have anything to say that would quiet the nice woman's fears.
Once they all became quiet again, Jodie sighed to herself in relief; the more questions Mrs. Kirkland asked and the more she had to lie to her, the guiltier Jodie would feel. Without that anxiety breathing down her neck, she could take the time just to watch the world pass by the window and notice all the little things people rarely noticed unless it was quiet. Like how sweet and helpless Quinn looked while he was sleeping. With Svetlana's head on his shoulder and his head leaning on hers, they formed a sea of blond hair made more golden by the sunlight glinting off its waves. Jodie smiled to herself, and her heart felt warm at the thought that even if Quinn married another girl, she would still feel this love for him. Perhaps the thought should make her sad, but Jodie couldn't explain it. He'd been her first love. She surmised that maybe most girls felt that way about the first boy they'd ever truly loved, who had loved them back, who had taken their virginity and given them their first stuffed bear for Valentine's Day.
Then Jodie looked forward into the front seat, noticing that Mr. Kirkland had his hand on the center console, and Mrs. Kirkland had draped her hand over his; he was softy rubbing the backs of her fingers with his thumb. That image was the one that made her feel sad. It was wonderful for Quinn, that his parents were still in love after so many years together. But it just reminded Jodie of how different her own situation was with her parents. She loved her mom, but sometimes it could be painful to have a mother who jumped from boyfriend to boyfriend and a father who wasn't much of a presence in her life. Seeing two parents still in love after 25 years of marriage made Jodie wistful to know what it felt like, to have that stability.
As they pulled into the airport's main parking garage, Mr. Kirkland began to snicker to himself. He checked the rearview mirror, saw that there was no one coming in behind him, and said, "We're just about here. It's time to wake the sleeping beauties. Brace yourselves, girls." Then he simultaneously let out a comical scream and stepped on the brakes. "Ahhh, oh my God, we're gonna crash!"
Quinn and Svetlana were both tossed up against their seatbelts, their heads lolling forward. Svetlana came awake with wide eyes and a startled gasp, jumping in her seat, but Quinn's eyes went even wider, and he let out his own squeaky, comical scream of surprise. Jodie couldn't help but giggle. She actually laughed out loud when Quinn pedaled his hands at the air as he tried to get his bearings.
"Wha, who, what's happening?!" he babbled, looking all around.
Even Dahlia giggled behind her hand. "Steven..."
"What?" he replied with a smirky grin.
Quinn opened and closed his eyes several times, rubbing them. He finally realized that his father had played one of his jokes on them. "Daaaad..." he whined. "That's not funny."
Once Jodie had gotten started, she couldn't stop; Quinn caught her giggling and shot her a look so fatigued and frustrated that the laughter died in her throat. She instantly felt horrible.
By the time Quinn turned his head forward again, the expression was gone. He was getting good at hiding what he was going through from his parents. "And I was actually having a good dream."
Quinn and Svetlana were grumpy and sullen-faced all the way in to the terminal. But once he saw Danica walk through the checkpoint in her long skirt and Guns n' Roses T-shirt, and that smile of pure joy spread across her face at the sight of her family, Quinn was hit with such a warm feeling of nostalgia and love that he held his homemade sign up under his chin and proudly waved it back and forth. The words on the sign may have been simple - just 'WELCOME HOME DANICA!' - but Quinn felt every word with such enthusiasm that he seemed absolutely giddy with the knowledge that his other half was finally home.
Jodie just about sighed with relief when she saw the happy smile on Quinn's face. The sun was starting to come out.
Everyone grinned and waved at the approaching girl. As Steven was the first person she came to, Danica dropped her carry-on beside her and threw her arms around his neck. "Daddy!"
He kissed the side of her head with a loud "Mwa!" sound. "Welcome home, Sweetness."
Next, her mother got the same big, homesick hug, something Danica didn't even realize she was feeling until she saw them all again. Turning to Jodie, she opened up her arms and squealed. "Jodester!"
Jodie imitated the position, arms wide. "Danister!" They both gave the other a kiss on each cheek as a joke, hamming it up for the sake of the others. "Just like the French do!" Jodie cried, and then they hugged for real, squeezing each other tight.
"I missed you," Danica said into Jodie's ear. They rocked back and forth a couple of times before releasing each other with ecstatic grins.
Because she'd only met Svetlana once that past Christmas, Danica didn't feel like she knew her very well, but she still gave her a polite, warm hug. "Welcome home, Danica," Svetlana said. With her accent, the name was pronounced much slower than everyone else said it, with each syllable over-accentuated; it came out almost as 'DA-nee-kah,' where the others said simply 'Danih-kah.' Danica couldn't help but giggle.
Just as she was turning to her brother, he dramatically threw his arms open and cried, "Danicalifragilisticexpialidocious!"
"Come 'ere you," she laughed, and yanked him into a long, clingy hug. "Oh, I missed you so much," Danica said, patting his back.
Dahlia and Steven watched them, her eyes getting misty. "Aww," she cooed at her twin children, and how hard it could be on them to live apart.
When Danica tried to let go, Quinn clung to her a bit too long. "Okay, we can hug some more," she conceded with a small laugh. A few more seconds of back patting and he finally let her out of the embrace. Quinn, embarrassed, looked anywhere but in her eyes, but she wasn't having it. Danica held his face in her hands and ran her thumbs over the bags under his eyes.
"Quit it, will ya?" he responded, trying to pass it off with a laugh.
"Quinn... you look exhausted. Haven't you been sleeping?" she asked. It was a rhetorical question; she knew he hadn't just from looking at him. "I'm the one who's supposed to be jetlagged here."
"Later," Quinn mumbled at her. He darted his eyes in their parents' direction twice, indicating that there was a story there, but he didn't want to talk about it in front of them. In that moment, Danica got that jittery feeling she'd had back at the airport in London, as if she'd just heard thunder rumbling outside, but this time, it felt more like the moment between spotting a lightning strike and waiting for the loud crash, not knowing just how bad it was going to be. Would it be a small, rolling growl, or a sudden crash that jarred your insides and made the windows shake in their frames? She could tell just from the look in her brother's eyes and the way his skin seemed to shake from the inside, like every moment he anticipated something bad would happen, that something intense was keeping him up at night.
"Quinny..." she started to say with concern, but then he spotted the diamond ring on her finger. His eyes widened a bit; he looked confused and elated at the same time. Danica quickly snapped her arms down, trying to hide the ring in the folds of her skirt.
They had a silent conversation with their eyes. Is that an engagement ring?!
Not yet. Later. I'll tell everyone later. You keep my secret and I'll keep yours. Okay?
Clearing his throat, Quinn took Danica's arm. "That carry-on can't be your only bag. If I know my sister at all, there's a very large trunk full of clothes waiting for us at baggage claim..."
"Just a regular size suitcase."
"By the time this week is over, you'll be taking back two. Mark my words. Mom said something about shopping."
Dahlia nodded. "Lots and lots of shopping."
As they trooped in the direction of baggage claim, Jodie hung back a little, taking in the scene before her. She couldn't have been more glad to have Danica home. Dealing with Quinn and Svetlana's problem practically by herself had been harrowing. (Darcy hadn't been much help so far, at least not in Jodie's eyes.) Now there would be two brains on the job.
A sliver of light peered over the horizon.
it won't stop