The original idea just wasn't working for me, but as I was rewatching the first season of Revolution, episode 1X10 gave me a better idea.

I own neither the Iron Druid Chronicles nor Revolution. This is purely a work of fan fiction for general amusement.

"Mom, look at me." She waited until her mother's eyes met hers. "Whatever he's asking you to do, you can't do it."

"Is that so?" She saw Monroe gesture to the guard with the salt-and-pepper hair. She didn't think as she started moving, just began shrugging out of her jacket, ignoring the sound of the man taking out his side arm and checking that it was fully loaded. Her mother tried to get between them and the soldier, sounding protests, but was pulled aside.

"Mrs. Matheson, I'm sorry, but you need to choose which one of your children I'm going to kill."

Her mother called Monroe a son-of-a-bitch, which sounded about right. "Listen to me."

"Which one? The boy or the girl?"

She didn't have much left in the way of reserves. Her body had used up much of what she had on its own to repair the head injury. It had been a lot nastier than she had let Miles know. He didn't know how close she'd come to actually dying.

"I've seen the Militia kill dozens of people and if you help him they will kill hundreds if not thousands, Mom." It would be tricky, trying this fully clothed. She would need to be quick to get free from her shirt but she would most definitely have surprise on her side. She was already constructing the knots in her head, getting ready to act.

"The boy or the girl? Which one is your favorite?"

She'd done so well, keeping her secret. Her father had pushed somewhat when she had come back from going 'away' with Atticus and Granuaille, but she had never told him. Had never told anyone. She even kept her bindings hidden so no one would see, though the chances of running into anyone who would know what they meant were slim and none.

Her mother begged 'no'. "Some things are more important than family."

"Choose now!"

"Hey, Bass!" Everyone paused as she met Monroe's eyes. He arched a brow at her use of the nickname, an odd thing for her to do considering she didn't know him and certainly wasn't a friend or an equal. "Wanna see a neat trick?"

She used the last of her reserves to bind her form to that of a falcon. She moved at the same time, concentrating on keeping her wings close to her body so she could move through the neckline of her tank. She was aware of her mother's cry of surprise, of Danny's shocked curse, of the confusion and disbelief of the men around her.

She was most aware, however, of the shiny pendant dangling from Monroe's hand. She attacked him with claws and talons, surprising him enough that she was able to yank it from his grasp. She pushed herself up and used his shoulder to launch herself at the open door.

The hallway was tight, very tight. Her wingspan was almost too wide to fit without tilting a bit to the side which made flying straight less than easy. She was better suited to soaring, not flapping. Still, she had to get away. The shock of the men behind her was wearing off and she heard them give chase. A bullet to a body this small would hurt, but she hadn't trusted one of her larger forms to get out alive.

The hallway broke open to the center of the plant with the wide open space reaching several stories. This was better and she let her wings open wide. Keen eyes searched and she found an open window below. Tucking her wings to her body she dove for it while at the same time making herself into a smaller target. She slipped through the opening and into the open air outside.

Opening her wings again she went for altitude. She needed to get high enough she could soar or dive over the wall. As she rose up she saw three forms moving towards the power plant. Miles, Aaron and Nora. Excellent. She hoped they would bounce back more quickly than Monroe and his men. With determination she aimed for them, rocketing towards the ground.

Impact at this speed would be painful, but going back to her natural form was a 'freebie'. The spot she was aiming for put her about four or five yards in front of their path when she switched back to her usual self, rolling with the landing. The binding tattoos that ran down the right side of her body came in contact with the ground and she felt her strength surging back into her. She could have cried she was so happy to be back in touch with the earth.

"What the fuck?!" Miles was staring at her. They all were. Charlie took the pendant from her mouth, getting to her feet.

"Talk later, run now!" She ran towards them, heedless of her nudity as she grabbed Aaron by the arm and pulled him with her. "We need to get to cover." It was hard, so very hard, not to leave them behind. She reached out towards Aaron, the most vulnerable, and worked the bindings that would connect him to her, giving him her strength, speed and stamina. And then Aaron was running as quickly as she, both of them moving swiftly towards the treeline with a grace and agility that left Miles and Nora struggling to keep up. This felt wonderful! So right! After playing down her strengths and abilities for so long, to be out in the open like this was heavenly.

They got to the tree and Charlie kept going, encouraging the others to follow. She reached into the earth beneath them with a feeling of greeting. /Druid calls/shelter needed/where?/

Fairmount, the name of what was once the national park here before the Blackout and the name Charlie had learned to think of when speaking to the elemental of this particular ecosystem, responded quickly. /Fairmount greets Druid/Harmony/Shelter awaits./ She received an image of a cave system nearby. Fairmount noted underground springs available and enough openings in the natural ceiling to allow for sunlight.

"This way!" She veered off in the direction of the nearest opening, sending a request to Fairmount to cover their tracks. The elemental was more than happy to do so. She was even happy to cover the entrance of the cave after they were inside so they would be harder to find.

Miles was staring at the quickly moving vegetation now growing over the cave's mouth as Charlie snagged his pack. She could manage without extra light, but the others would probably like to see what was going on. She fished out the small candle lamp that he carried for just such an emergency and lit it. "We should be all right here. At least we should have time to regroup and figure out another plan of attack."

"Charlie, what the fuck just happened back there?" Miles was shrugging out of his coat and all but shoved it into her hands. She slipped it on and fastened it close. He was tall enough that it would at least protect her uncle's scandalized modesty. "And when did you get those?" He pointed a finger at the extensive tattoos down the right side of her body.

"About two and a half years ago. I kept them hidden because Dad was freaked out enough when I took off for those eight months."

"Those look like what the O'Sullivan's had."

Miles looked back at Aaron. "The who?"

"The O'Sullivan's. Atticus and Granuaille. They used to live in the same village. Charlie spent all her time with them and their five massive dogs." Aaron swallowed. "Then one day Charlotte and the O'Sullivan's were gone."

"I told Dad I had to go. He told me I couldn't, I said I was going anyway and that I'd be back." Charlie shrugged. "I kept my word."

Miles looked crankier than usual. "All right. Back up. Let's assume that you can turn into a bird, because we all saw that."

"Merlin Falcon, to be exact." He glared at her and she fell silent.

"So you turn into a falcon and soared out of a window. Why?" Charlie held up the pendant. Miles blinked. "You stole back the pendant."

"Not a lot of options. Monroe had that ghoul, Strausser, point a gun at mine and Danny's heads and told Mom to choose which one of us was going to die."

"Wait," Miles cut in, his face going pale, "Rachel's alive?"

"Yeah, and apparently she knows how to build an amplifier for this thing. One that will increase the range and allow Monroe to use all those toys he's been gathering." Charlie twirled the amulet by the leather cord strung through it. "I only had enough juice for one action, so I decided to go for the most surprising."

"Turning into a falcon and stealing the amulet."

She grinned. "Right out of Monroe's hand. I think he even yelped." She took in a breath and exhaled it. "So we'll have to come up with some other way to get Mom and Danny out." She turned and went back further in the cave. "There are a couple of springs in here. And there are several 'rooms' so we can get some sleep."

"Charlie." Miles scowled but she kept walking on as though she hadn't heard him. He gave a little growl in his throat and followed her. "Do you even know where you're going."

"Yep." She ducked through a five foot tall opening, one he had to turn sideways to fit through, and came into a room with a still pool. Crouching down, she stuck her hand in. "Cold. I wouldn't jump in, but it's safe to drink." She peered around, clearly thinking. "Jaffe."

"What?"

She sighed and turned to face him. "The amplifier Monroe wants Mom to work on. He said it was started by someone named Jaffe, but that Mom killed him before he finished it. Apparently she stuck a screwdriver in his chest."

Miles had come to a stop with his hands on his hips, his usual 'I'm awesome' stance. "Can't say that I'm really surprised by that. Your mother can be a real ball-buster when she needs to be."

"I'm getting that idea, but it got me to thinking."

"About what?"

"How did this Jaffe know how to build one? Maybe this," she held up the amulet, "isn't the only one of these out there."

Miles got it. "If this Jaffe had one, then Monroe may still have an amulet."

"And he's still got Danny to use to force Mom to build the amplifier." She grimaced. "Well, fuck. Shock is bound to be wearing off by now."

"Probably so, but I don't really see that we can do much about it. Any element of surprise we may have had is gone, now. They'll have security tightened." Miles realized how he sounded and winced. "But you made the right call, taking the amulet like that. It will buy Danny time."

"Yeah. Time." She had a contemplative expression. "I think I have an idea, but I need to make a call, first."

The terminology took him by surprise. "A what?"

"There's another room through that passage and about fifty feet back that's got a thermal spring in it. It's warmer and we can clean up there. I'd recommend bunking in there. Can you get Aaron and Nora settled in while I go do something?" She didn't wait for his answer, just took off back to the front of the cave.

** Early Evening **

Miles went looking for Charlie after a while. She was at the front of the cafe, checking the sky through a small gap in the foliage. "What are you doing."

"Waiting for it to get a bit darker. Then I'm going to sabotage Monroe's helicopters"

He blinked. "You're going to what?"

She looked at him. "The helicopters, they've got to be somewhere in an open space, right? I mean, they have to get up into the air, so no ceiling."

"Yeah, that would help."

She reached down and picked up a couple of rocks. "See this? Ordinary rocks. Natural objects. Right?"

Where was she going with this? "Right."

She held one rock in each hand and looked at them. He thought she was muttering something under her breath. The next moment, the rocks snapped together as though they could bear to be apart. She tossed them to him and he caught them in surprise. "Try to pull them apart."

He couldn't. It was as though they were fused together. "How did you do that?"

"By biding the molecules together. I can do the same with metals made from ores mined from the earth. Helicopters have metal parts, right? Gears and such?"

Now he was catching on. "You can fuse the working gears together so that they won't move, even if Rachel finishes the amplifier. Monroe's helicopters would be useless."

"At least until he scraped up enough parts to replace the ones I break. He'll be guarding the amplifier and the amulet. Shouldn't be so heavy on the helicopters themselves."

Miles had to hand it to her; that was clever thinking. "So what are you thinking?"

"Wait until it gets a bit darker, then I go under camouflage, fly in, do the sabotage, fly back here."

"Camouflage?"

She gave him a smile and extended her right arm. He watched as the tattoos seemed to shimmer and vanish. "I can do the whole body. It's not invisibility, in the light of day you look like a heat shimmer if someone sees you. But in the dark, if they see anything it's just... shadows. And it doesn't take effort to keep going."

"That's how you hid the ink all this time."

"Like I said; Dad was already freaked about the eight month hiatus. Didn't feel like pushing things." She let the camouflage go and the tats were visible again. Apparently she didn't feel the need to hide them any longer.

Miles drew in a slow breath. "So... what are you?"

She gave a small smile. "Druid. The real kind. And, no, history doesn't know anything about us. The problem is that real druids practiced an oral tradition, so when the Romans and the Church wanted to smear their reputations, there was nothing to rebut their propaganda"

He seemed to mull that over. "All right. What can a druid do besides fuse things together and turn into a bird?"

Charlie's smile got a bit wider. "Coax the earth to do things for us, we can fight, we can see the bindings and connections between the different parts of the natural world and strengthen or undo them. I actually have four different animal forms, by the way, not just the falcon. I can also turn into a doe, a dolphin and a Canadian Timber Wolf."

"A dolphin?"

"I didn't pick them. If so, I'd have gone with a horse and a big ass shark. Or at least a killer whale."

"That all?"

She shrugged. "As long as I have contact with the earth I'm faster and stronger than most people. I can run for days without tiring if need be. Without that contact, however, there's a limited amount of power I can hold, and once it's gone I'm tapped out until I get back to bare ground. That's why I only had enough for that one action. My body burned up a lot of what I had to take care of that head injury."

He seemed to take it all in. "This would have been good information to know before now."

She winced internally. "It's not something you really talk about with people, Miles. We're a secretive lot. There aren't a lot of us. To my knowledge, only four right now. The man who taught Atticus has an apprentice who should be pretty close to being ready for his bindings, but I don't know if it's happened yet."

She checked the light again. "I should be good to go."

"Alone?"

"Better that way." She started unbuttoning her borrowed coat. "Look, Atticus is on his way here. He may be here before I get back. Can't miss him. Curly red hair, same kind of tattoos, will probably have an Irish wolf hound with him. I tried to convey that we could use some provisions and clothes, so hopefully he won't show up empty handed."

She handed him his coat, apparently unconcerned by her own nudity. "Don't worry. I'll be fine." She shimmered and was gone from his sight, though he thought he saw a flickering shadow as the vegetation moved aside to let something pass.

Miles was... lost. His mind was having trouble wrapping around the events of today. Part of him, a rather large part, wanted to shield and protect his niece. It told him that she shouldn't go out there, potentially back into the lion's den, alone. Another part of him also recognized that what he had seen today meant that Charlie was the best qualified of them to do this. If she could get in and out without being seen, sabotaging the helicopters as she did so, so much the better.

He looked at the rocks still in his hands. No matter what he did, he could not pull them apart. A little smile quirked at one corner of his mouth. He'd love to see Bass' face if Rachel got the amplifier to work only to find that his toys were already broken.