Drabbles
Drabble 1 - Systematics
"Open your eyes."
"I don't want to."
"Raven, stop being a baby."
She cooperated, then, if only to level a glare on him.
"I'm not being a baby," she hissed. The air in the room thickened, computers and equipment lifting a few inches off their tables to float in lazy circles. "I just don't see why you need to go all 'doctor' on me."
"Because I'm a doctor?" he asked, chuckling. He cupped her face in his hands, smoothing his thumbs over the dark bruises on her cheeks. "Also, would you mind putting the room back as you found it?"
Drabble 2 - Meteora
"One of these days," Sketch mentioned, rolling one of the bodies onto its back, "you're going to realize that you're not some immortal superhero."
"Superhero? Pfft. I'm more the Bond type. You know, suave, intelligent, license to kill, always gets the girl, has -"
"Who's Bond?"
"Who's..." Azazel looked up from his palmtop, narrowed his eyes, and sighed heavily before he shook his head. "You know, if we're going to be friends, you need to get acquainted with the classics."
"I hatched out of a test tube two years ago, Az. I'm having enough trouble keeping up with current events."
Drabble 3 - Systematics
"So what is it?" Cullen asked, running his hand along the mirrored texture of the dome. It pulsed slightly beneath his fingers, sending tiny electric shocks through his skin.
"Some sort of highly developed nanotech. Same as the robots in the testing rooms."
"And it's sentient?"
"I guess it is," Noah said, shrugging. "I'm not entirely certain."
"Not entirely certain, but you still want to kill it." He stepped back from the wall and eyed Noah warily. "If this thing comes down, it'll kill everyone. You know that, right?"
"We're all going to die anyway," Noah said with a shrug. "Might as well be quick."
Drabble 4 - Us vs. the Apocalypse
They'd been driving maybe three minutes when Dixon finally reached over and flicked the volume dial, dimming the music to a whisper.
"Mase," he said, his voice hesitant. "About the call -"
"Shut up."
"We really should -"
"I said, shut up, Dix." Mason's jaw clenched, his eyes drilling through the windshield. His hands gripped the steering wheel so tightly his knuckles cracked. "I don't want to talk about it."
"Look, either you talk to me or you're going to be talking to Raymond," Dixon reminded, crossing his arms. "Which would you rather?"
"I'd rather you shut up."
Drabble 5 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
What's one more, eh, Reese? Shouldn't make that much difference to you!
The vultures swirled overhead like a cloud of flies. Black and brown feathers drifted down like snow, reeking of ash and blood.
Closing his eyes, he leaned weakly against the brick wall and let himself slide down until he sat on the wet pavement. He had tried calling the hospital. Nothing. He'd left Temi more disjointed and panicked voicemails than he cared to admit. Not a single call back. Like Jones, she'd simply vanished into thin air.
Didn't believe I'd take her, did ya? You stupid shit. You shoulda known better.
Drabble 6 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
The lights flickered on, sending a swarm of cockroaches scurrying for the nooks and crannies of the room. Their segmented legs ticked and scratched on the metal floor, a symphony of dark noises.
He hadn't been able to go back, not at first. The perimeter guard and constant surveillance in the early days made even getting near the lab impossible. After that, it was paranoia and imagination. The fear that they might finally catch him. The fear of what he might find in the abandoned rooms and long hallways, even if it was only a ghost of himself.
Drabble 7 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
He ran his fingers along the jagged edges of the thick glass. The tubes were so much smaller than he remembered. Had he really been tiny enough to fit in this, all those years ago?
A faint smile touched his lips when he thought of Kirsten, of Michael, of Caleb. Those familiar faces, still so clear in his mind after all this time. Their smiles, their laughter, their playful teasing. Were they transferred before this happened? He hoped so. Even if they were partially responsible for him, the idea of them possibly being caught in the crossfire burned him to the core.
Drabble 8 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
"You are such an enigma," Hades mused, tapping the riding crop against the side of Reese's head. "Look at you. Battered and bruised and still chugging along. Another man would have felt pain, felt fear, given up, but you? Oh, my boy, your tenacity is simply fascinating."
"It has nothing to do with tenacity," Reese hissed through his clenched teeth. He fixed his eyes on a crack in the concrete wall ahead of him, refused to meet Hades' cold eyes.
"No? What is it, then?" The tall man pressed the crop to his chin, thinking. "That little whore girlfriend of yours, perhaps?"
Drabble 9 - Us vs. the Apocalypse
He leaned against the glass, watching the dispatchers in the parking lot below. Old friends and new recruits alike, clustered around coolers and grills, enjoying the late afternoon sunshine. Smiles and conversation, camaraderie and contentment. As if there were no patchwork wall of concrete and steel spitting distance from them, keeping the dead at bay. As if the virus hadn't been birthed on their very doorstep - though nobody really knew anymore why it had started spreading, just that it had, and somehow that was enough for them.
Obliviousness was a small victory, he supposed.
Drabble 10 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
"Is this your idea of laying low?" Paul demanded, throwing the stack of newspapers across the table. "Gunfights in broad daylight? Public invocations?" He jammed his finger down on a particular article, his face red with anger. "And you let a human get involved?"
"Hey, Jonesy wasn't the best cover," Reese admitted, "but he was careful."
"You shouldn't need some mortal wretch to -"
"What was I supposed to do? You threw me out, remember? Abandoned me to Hades to save your own skin." Reese took a long drag of his cigarette. "Having friends is a good thing, Paul. You should try it sometime."
Drabble 11 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
"You really shouldn't be so harsh with him," Thena said softly, crouching to pick up the shards of the broken vase from the floor. "He makes some poor decisions, yes, but ultimately he does these things because he truly believes it's right."
"So throwing me out was right?" Reese asked sullenly, tapping his fingers against his chin to make sure the bleeding had stopped. Thena rocked back on her heels, pursing her lips. Her fingers stroked the petals of one of the smashed roses.
"Maybe not right, no, but..." She shrugged her thin shoulders. "Perhaps it was necessary."
Drabble 12 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
She was quiet as he swept through the room, tossing her clothing into her battered suitcase, checking all the drawers for missed possessions. Her fingers picked restlessly at the hem of her torn t-shirt.
"I really messed up this time, didn't I?" she finally asked.
"I think that's a fairly accurate statement, yes," Reese snapped, flinging a pair of shoes out of the closet. One hit the suitcase - the other narrowly missed her head.
"I don't understand," she asked as he straightened. "What did you expect me to do?"
"Not committing mass murder would have been a nice start."
Drabble 13 - Us vs. the Apocalypse
"Look at it," she whispered, wrapping her arms around her knees. Pushing her bare feet into the sand, she took a deep breath of the salty air and smiled softly. "It just goes on forever, you know? Sometimes I tell myself that the ocean's big enough that whoever's on the other side is safe." She bit down on her lower lip, her pixie features darkening. "But then it just makes me sad that it had to be us." She turned to look up at him, her chocolate eyes searching his face. "Is it wrong of me to wish it was the other way around?"
Drabble 14 - Meteora
"Hand over the knives," Chris ordered. He didn't even take his eyes off his screen, just extended his hand from behind his laptop. "And don't you lay your ears at me," he mentioned, as if somehow knowing that Azazel's ears would be plastered flat to his skull. "This is your own doing."
"She was going to kill me!" Azazel argued. "How is that my fault?"
"Seems like everyone who spends more than a few minutes with you wants to kill you," Chris commented. His fingers wriggled expectantly, waiting for Azazel to surrender his weapons. "Maybe you should tell you something, eh?"
Drabble 15 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
"Reese, don't..." She fixed her eyes on the ceiling as he brushed past her, waging a silent war with her urges to either scream or wring his neck. "Reese, can we talk about this?"
"Why does it matter?" he asked, grabbing his car keys from the bowl near the front door. "You've all made up your mind." Her jerked away when she tried to take his hand, lips pulling from his teeth in a soundless snarl when her fingers knotted in the sleeve of his jacket instead. "Let go, Thena," he hissed. "I won't tell you again."
Drabble 16 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
He shifted through the bloodless remains, pushing aside scraps of bone and flesh as he looked for any means of positively identifying the body. Half of a severed foot, the sole heavily calloused. A fractured piece of femur. An elbow, with only a few inches of arm on either side. But nothing that was useful.
He didn't want to admit that he'd seen bodies shredded like this before, but there was no denying it. When the Empusa Project had broken down, the entire lab had been filled with desecrated chunks of humans.
"And I thought my day couldn't get worse," he muttered.
Drabble 16 - The Empty Halls of Olympus
"When your door is being knocked upon, Ares, it's only polite to answer it."
Reese glanced up from his book with a raised eyebrow. The young woman was standing on the ceiling, hands on her hips, lips pursed and her sparkling, golden wings twitching in irritation.
"It's Reese," he reminded. "What do you want, Iris?"
"Your ear, of course."
"I thought you usually went to Paul?"
"Oh, I did, but it was a complete waste of time. Stubborn mule of a man." She blew her pale bangs away from her face. "Not that you're any better, you're just next on the list."