Hello, everyone! It's me, Claude again!
Yes, I know I should upload an update to Planet of the Pies. I WILL, I promise! I'm not that great a writer and as it happens, writing customer feedback is tiring! Tons of little stories about how much I care about teeny non-problems. It's very grating and makes it tough to want to write things I'M interested in.
Please enjoy this AU I've been playing with for awhile. Flint will be introduced very soon, but let's give Sam the show! She is, after all, the magical girl here. And now, without further ado, Lightning Rider.
Sam couldn't believe that she was going to be late. Her very first high-profile job and her third day, and she was running tardy to work, as if it was one of her college classes. She sighed as she darted through the crowd, small backpack hoisted on one shoulder as ballast (and that day's lunch). New York was always crowded, and today was no exception.
Today she was to introduce herself as the WNN's newest face, and she played out in her head what she ought to say. "Hello America, I'm Sam Sparks! I'm an average girl, but my love for meteorology sure isn't!" Ugh, that is so LAME! There ought to be a better way to introduce who she was! She thought to herself.
"Scuse me, scuse me!" She shouted at the mass of orange-vested people in her path. She managed to shove through them and saw another group, but this time of large strawberries and blueberries, huddled against the building. Who just wastes this much food when the city was full of hungry people? Sam snorted angrily and launched yet another step, her blond ponytail bouncing, when her foot collided with a foot-high strawberry in her path.
Sam yelped as she flew head over heels onto the concrete. Upon landing, she was instantly annoyed. She didn't have time to fall on her butt; she was already running super late!
"Saspa?" The berry suddenly turned to her; large green eyes met smaller ones. This time, understanding dawned on Sam. For whatever reason, this wasn't food waste, but the latest outcrop of terrifying and monstrous sentient food terrorizing the city. Although looking at it now, this "monster" was not quite as terrifying as the newscasters made it appear. She shrugged it off; it's a newscaster's job to make things appear more dramatic than they were, and leapt back up on her feet to start the mad dash to work again.
At least, that was her plan.
Instead, she slammed right into another large group of people.
"ExCUSE me," she hissed, trying to shove through. She knew she was being rude, but dammit, so were they, and she had somewhere to be!
"I don't think so, Ms. Sparks," came the deep-voiced reply. Sam jumped back, shocked. "You're coming with us."
No, NO! Sam scrambled for a reply, but opted instead for the smarter option, to double back and run away. At this point she figured she would be lucky to get to work ALIVE… what was being a couple of minutes late anyway? She darted into an alleyway, panting, and came out the other side, thinking she had beat them.
She was grabbed by the arms suddenly and hoisted into the air! "LET ME GO!" She hissed and shrieked. Thinking back on her self defense classes, she screamed a number of attention-catching words. "HELP! MURDER! FIRE!" A large hand descended to cover her mouth. She wriggled furiously and bit. There was a growl, then a poke in her arm, and her vision turned dark. She thought she could make out a "SASPA!" but didn't have the brainpower to devote to thinking about it.
When Sam awoke, she was seated in handcuffs at a long, sterile white table. Her seat was metallic, hard, and uncomfortably molded. She took a look at her surroundings groggily, and noticed that the whole room was white: white tiles, white popcorn ceiling, white drywall, and too-bright white lights. Her backpack sat at her feet, violently shuffled through but contents untouched. When she saw that, she knew that this was no police operation and she started thinking of escape plans… but at that her head began to spin, and she groaned, holding her forehead in her hands.
A panel with metallic framing in the wall appeared to open inward; when Sam peeked up she found that it was just a door with no handle on her side. A slim, but intimidating figure stepped through; she had no idea of his appearance because he wore a high-collared dark jacket and the darkest sunglasses she'd ever seen. All that she could see of him was that he was bald and had a white mustache and close-cropped beard.
"Do you know why you're here, Ms. Sparks?" His voice was threatening, but had a nasal tinge. He seemed to hiss when he talked; maybe that was just her imagination.
Sam shook her head.
"We have reason to believe that you might be a terrorist, driven towards destroying Live Corp."
Sam looked up suddenly at that, aghast. "N-no. Th-there must be some sort of mistake," she slurred. She cleared her throat and tried again; the drug was still affecting her and made it difficult to talk. "I've never done anything against Live Corp… I know that the New York branch, at least, is driven towards the betterment of its people. Why would I want to take that away?"
"You tell me, Ms. Sparks. Earlier today our agents saw you consorting with one of the monstrous species that a terrorist had unleashed on the city… the same terrorist we've been trying to capture. I'll leave you here to think about that."
"Oh, noooo, you see, that was just a big misunderstanding –" Sam tried to argue.
"Ta-ta, Ms. Sparks," the mysterious man said, withdrawing back into the lit hallway.
Sam sighed a long, deep breath and put her head back into her hands. The drug was already starting to clear, but she had absolutely no experience in breaking out of handcuffs; why would she? Although, she thought, maybe this is the sort of skill I SHOULD pick up if I'm going to continue with journalism.
The one mercy about this room is that there are no cameras. If I can just make it out of these handcuffs, I can start moving… I'll plan as I go. I can do this.
"Saspa?" her backpack squeaked. Sam started, then opened her backpack.
Out hopped the strawberry from earlier! "Oh, no, not YOU. I'm sure you meant well enough, but you're what got me INTO this whole fix!" Sam groaned.