Leverage/Mistborn Trilogy Fusion: The Allomancy Jobs
Title: Snap (Part 1/5: Parker - Mistborn)
Disclaimer: Leverage, Mistborn, etc, belong to their respective owners; I'm just borrowing. No copyright infringement intended!
Author's Notes: The blame for this rests entirely on a dear friend of mine, who insisted that I pick up Brandon Sanderson, while at the same time giving into my insistence that she pick up Leverage. Conversations about the two became a bit...muddled, and the hypothetical question was brought up of what sort of allomancy each Leverage team member would use.
This happened.
The setting is modern day, bringing the powers into the Leverage world instead of the team into the Mistborn books because I am not that brave (nor confident enough to play with Sanderson's character's directly). A basic understanding of the powers system in the series is suggested, but not strictly necessary. Throw in a dash of "suspension of disbelief" and you're good to go.
ovo
"Allomancers have the ability to "burn" (or use) metals, in order to fuel a variety of physical and mental enhancements and abilities."
Parker Snapped when she was eight years old.
Everybody said that in order to Snap you had to have survived something deeply traumatic, but Parker didn't remember anything particularly awful about the day. Just the death of her brother.
Okay, so maybe her Snapping wasn't as random as she chose to believe.
Up until then, she remembered being a normal kid. Sort of. If the life of a foster kid could be considered normal. She and her brother had bounced around in the system together, which was more than could be said for most kids in their situation who were actually blood-related. They had no family but each other, and for a while it was okay.
It was enough.
It was too good to last forever.
He was older by about three months, but Parker was braver. She was the one who made decisions for them, created elaborate games for them to play. She was the first to climb into trees and out of windows and jump in the swimming hole. She was the one who found the discarded bike in a trash heap and learned how to ride it.
She taught her brother immediately, because she liked to share with him, wanted to do something special for him. At first, it worked beautifully.
Then wheels.
She hadn't meant to kill him.
A man got out of the car, panicking. Her foster mom rushed out of the house and started yelling at him, and Parker, and the neighbors, and her foster son who was bleeding on the ground. (Years later, Parker would understand that she yelled because she was scared, but at eight years old all she knew was that the woman was angry and it was her fault.) A neighbor ran inside to call the police, the hospital, whoever it was who responded to accidents like that.
Parker existed in the center of the maelstrom, on her knees and desperately shaking her non-responsive brother. His dusty lips still smiled from the triumph of mastering the two-wheeler. He didn't wake up.
He was dead.
She'd never seen death before.
Suddenly, Parker felt like she was choking, suffocating, and she released him like he was something poisonous. Like death was catching. Her mind was filled with a single, desperate thought of away.
Something burned in her belly. Before she understood what was happening, she catapulted over the heads of angry foster mothers and curious neighbors and EMT's, towards a metal-wrapped chimney across the street. At first, she was so surprised she nearly fell off the roof. But she caught herself, wrapping her small arms around the rough bricks and clinging so tight they scraped her skin.
For three days she sat on that roof. No one could convince her it was okay; not her foster parents, not the social worker, not the various policemen and firemen who tried to coax her down. When one of them fell off the roof as she glared at him - belly still burning - they stopped trying to come near her.
Itsyourfault, her tiny heart beat out at a breakneck speed. Hesdeadhesdeadhesdeaditsyourfault...
When she heard them talking about what to do with her - "We could try for an air lift, but I'm concerned she might jump off the roof" - she knew it was time to go.
Hesdeadhesdeadhesdeadmyfaultimsosorry...
When she focused on the burning inside her, she felt a tug towards another chimney across the street. She let it take her, flying over the dark, misty street and landing on the roof with a painful thump. Guilt ate her up. Imsorryimsorryimsorry. Her brother had liked this family, sort of. More than the last one, at least. He had hoped they could stay. I'm so sorry.
Parker ran, flying across rooftops through the night, her sorry mantra thrumming through her veins.