THIS CHAPTER HAS BEEN WRITTEN BY TheResurrectionist.
Authors' Notes:
TheResurrectionist: Hey you guys! First time co-writing and it's been a lot of fun. Outsider!POV is one of my favorite tags too, so this was a big bundle of excitement for me the last few days. Many thanks to if-llamas-could-fly for late night PMs and better organization than me. However this goes, it's been a lot of fun! Hope you guys enjoy, and if you didn't see the description, spoilers for the Season Eight Finale.
if-llamas-could-fly: Hey guys! I've never ever co-written before, but I've heard that if you're gonna do it, then it has to be done with somebody who you can collaborate with. Thankfully, I found the writer who shares my ideas and is an amazing person to just talk to. TheResurrectionist is one of my favorite writers ever, and I am so happy to be working with her! Her writing's amazing in this chapter, so to read some epic stuff, I suggest you hurry up and read this already. Enjoy! :) ~Sammy
Start Of The Breakdown
Yesenia remembers the night the sky fell, even though she shouldn't.
She remembers how the night started, the drawn out hours at a job nobody wanted (and a lot of people had). How the coffee was just a little too cold and how the light above her desk kept flickering no matter how many times she yelled at it. And yeah did she yell, because when it's two in the morning and you haven't seen anyone for six hours it's completely sane to yell at inanimate objects.
That was before the lights went out completely, though. She stopped yelling as the emergency lights flickered on and waited for the inevitable call from the main office. Strange that the weather would knock the power out when it looked like it was only drizzling outside, but it wasn't her problem. It was so far away from being her problem that it was already gone from her mind when the first person (thing, creature, different) came stumbling through the door.
A frantic woman had another girl around her shoulder, tears streaming down her face as she rushed into the emergency area. Her eyes were wide with fear as she carried the other limp person in, stopping to yell for help.
Yesenia rushed from behind the desk after hitting the emergency switch, taking the almost-unconscious woman from her hands.
"What happened?" She asked the scared woman as she laid the woman down on the floor gently. A tattered suit was all she wore, and what looked like burn marks were visible underneath the thin cotton.
"I don't know, I don't know." The woman sobbed. "I was out on the highway and there was this light, and…"
Yesenia cut the rambling woman off with a hand. "I need you to stay calm, okay?" She asked the woman firmly. "What's your name?"
The woman put a hand to her throat, taking a deep breath. "Rhea. My name's Rhea."
Yesenia nodded at her, quickly running her hands down the unresponsive woman's body. Besides the burns, there seemed to be no reason for the woman to be so sedate. "Rhea, did you hit her with your car?"
The woman gasped. "No! Oh my God, no I didn't, I swear!"
"Rhea, I need you to be honest." Yesenia looked up, wondering where the hell her backup was. "Rhea?"
"She fell." The woman said with glazed eyes, clenching her hands viciously. "She fell out of the sky and…she was on..fire. I didn't hit her…She fell."
"She fell?" Yesenia paused, running her hand back up to the woman's neck. She hadn't felt any spinal injuries the first time.
"Did you see what she fell from?" She asked Rhea. The woman was almost catatonic for a minute, staring off into nothing. "A tree, a building, a car? Come on, I need you here, Rhea!" She snapped her fingers in front of the woman's face. "Rhea!"
The woman startled, eyes going impossibly wide. "The sky." She breathed out. "She fell from the sky. I swear, that's what I saw."
With that, her eyes rolled back into her head and she fainted hard to the floor. Yesenia reached out a hand just in time to cradle her head. Seriously, where the hell was everybody?
She made sure Rhea was breathing before re-checking the other woman's neck. She rolled her limp weight with a careful but deft flip, running her hands down to check her back and neck one last time. Within three seconds, the worst moment of Yesenia's life began.
The moment her hands hit two tears in the fabric, the woman beneath her jerked violently. An earth-shattering scream split the air, high and keening to the point of pain as it shattered the last of Yesenia's calm. She retreated quickly from the gaps in the fabric, but the damage seemed to have been done.
"No," The woman sobbed to the floor, curling around herself and grasping her stomach with white-knuckled hands. "NO!"
Yesenia stumbled back and fell as the woman screamed again, horror enveloping her. She tried to grasp some bandages from the cart above her but her hands were shaking all of a sudden. Steeling herself, she made a decision.
She needed to get back in control.
"Lady!"
The woman kept sobbing, breaking the night with screams and tears.
"Jesus Christ, Lady! Can you hear me?!" Yesenia shouted at the crazed woman. "Hey, hey! What's your name?"
A kick met her when she tried to get close, but it was shaky and clumsy enough for her to evade. Crazy woman went back to screaming, tears streaming down her face to the dirty linoleum floor.
She didn't notice as Yesenia plunged the needle of a sedative into her neck, standing just outside of kicking distance. Her eyes widened until the whites showed, closing as she slumped back to the floor. Her arms were still curled around herself, like she was some child in the throes of a nightmare.
Jesus Christ Yesenia thought to herself, and that about summed it up. She rolled the woman gently onto her stomach again and cut away the suit with a scalpel. A grisly sight met her as she put on gloves.
Twin burn marks dug into the woman's back, so deep she could see bone through the blackened flesh. It was past any third degree burn Yesenia had ever seen, and the sight alone was enough to make her shudder. The muscle had been burned off as well, leaving a clear liquid around the surviving tissues that smelled almost acidic. She tentatively prodded one of the burns with a gloved fingertip.
A ripple went through the woman, but she didn't wake. Shaking her head, Yesenia walked over and grabbed a cot. She was just barely strong enough to maneuver the woman onto the bed, leaving her facedown so the burns were still visible.
The doors slammed open behind her and she turned quickly, relieved to see Tom's face. Her relief soon faded as he wheeled another stretcher behind him, face pale.
"Tom?" Yesenia prodded as she ran to help him. "What happened? And where is everyone?"
Tom looked down at his stretcher, and Yesenia noticed a series of bloody scratches across his cheek.
"Got a call." He breathed out a second later. "I showed up and he started screaming at me, wouldn't show me what was wrong. He got me." He said, pointing at his face. "So I knocked him out. I have no idea what's going on."
"Has anyone responded to other calls?"
He shifted, running a hand absentmindedly to his face. "Radios are down, but I don't think that's the only reason."
"Something's going on." Yesenia murmured, ill feeling curling in her gut.
Tom frowned. "What makes you say that?"
She looked down at the unconscious man; her suspicions were confirmed when she saw the burned suit. "Roll him onto his stomach."
"What?" Tom asked dazedly.
"You heard me. C'mon."
He helped her shift the man, rolling him gently until the tell-tale gaps in the suit were visible.
"Look." She whispered, peeling away the rest of the burned suit. The same tell-tale burns were visible on his back, going down to the bone with the clear liquid surrounding them.
"Jesus Christ." Tom breathed next to her. "How the hell did you know that?"
She pointed towards the unconscious woman on the cot nearby. "She has the same burns. Tried to knock me out too."
"What is this, some kinda cult thing?"
Yesenia shrugged. "I'm guessing. Hell, I don't know, but we gotta start treating these burns. I've never seen them this bad before."
Tom looked down at the burns on the man's back before shaking his head in disbelief. "This is crazy. Okay, I'll take the guy, you got the girl. Where's the supplies?"
"Back shelf."
He ran back and got them, quickly applying the ointment to the burns that looked treatable. Yesenia did the same, working through the disgust she hadn't felt since her first year of medical school.
"Did they say how they found her?" Tom asked absently when they were done.
"Oh shit!" She said, turning around. Rhea was gone when she checked the corner she'd been in.
"What?" Tom asked, startled.
"I had a lady bring the first one in. Said something about her falling off of something, but I didn't find any spinal injuries. Only the burns."
Tom sighed, placing a hand over his eyes. "I got the same call. Some drunk lady saying she saw a fire and this guy falling. Good thing he fell onto grass, though."
"Fire?" Yesenia asked. "That would work for the burns, I guess. Did you see anything?"
"It looked like there was a meteor storm going on, actually." Tom said. "But that wouldn't make sense. People falling from the sky?" He shook his head in disbelief. "I still don't know why no one's here."
"I'm sure the radios are just down because of the meteor shower or whatever." Yesenia said, but the words tasted off in her mouth. Tom nodded like that was absolutely correct, eyes getting a little glazed from what she guessed was a lack of coffee or sleep.
"Here." She said, tossing him some change. It dropped to the floor, past his hands. He dully gathered it from the floor, looking at her in confusion.
"Go caffeine-ate. There's a machine around the corner."
He nodded before walking off, fatigue apparent in his movement. A minute later, he returned with a large cup of coffee and a little more awareness.
"Thanks."
She nodded, checking on her patients one more time. Their emergency room was small, considering the size of others she'd worked in, but the largest for many miles. Her only other patient was a small old man overnight for hip surgery the day before.
Ten minutes later, the emergency lights flickered off as the normal fluorescents came back on. She sighed in relief as her radio buzzed and the normal sound of voices returned.
"Ambulance Operator to Emergency Room." A voice spoke quickly. "You're about to get swamped, we've got about ten buses coming in."
"Ten?" Tom asked in shock. "Do we even have that many ambulances?"
Yesenia pushed the talk button. "Got you. Any descriptions so far?"
"Burns." Was the only reply. Tom spoke.
"So there was a fire somewhere. Does that mean that-"
He was cut off by the sound of sirens. They both got fresh gloves on and stood by the entrance doors, entirely unsure of what they were about to see.
Maybe that was a good thing, looking back.
No warning and suddenly there was a cacophony of noise, screams, sobs and medical equipment amplified until it was like hearing everything underwater. Carts rolled in with people in restraints, the same professional suits burned and ripped. Strange bursts of light flooded the room periodically from outside, but nobody seemed to acknowledge them. Some people were covered in mud or water while others were clean. There was no sense to any of it, and all Yesenia could do was grab a roll of bandages and dive in.
The next hour was a blur of burns and screaming, of restraints and a deep confusion. Nobody seemed to know what was going on, and the mental state of all of the victims was the most chilling part. Yesenia couldn't begin to count all of the screaming she'd heard, but in her personal opinion the silence was the worst. Instead of screaming, some of the patients just gazed blankly at the ceiling, catatonic in a way even some of the most seasoned workers had never seen.
It looked like something was on fire outside, but nobody made a move to leave the room.
"No, no." The blonde woman Yesenia was currently treating kept sobbing. She felt chills run down her spine as she remembered the first woman and how she'd sobbed the same thing. It was said so brokenly, as if..
As if she'd lost something. Like they'd all lost something.
She caught Tom a few minutes later, working on patients next to each other. A dozen people were shouting and running around her, confusion and panic rampant. Even sedated, the victims were a terrifying reminder that something wasn't right—Even though everyone was pretending it was.
"Do you know what they're saying about this so far?" She asked Tom, speaking quietly.
He shrugged. "Massive fire was the best guess anyone had." He replied. "But I don't think that can account for the location of the burns. They keep asking the victims, but they're too…distressed…to respond. We've had to sedate almost all of them."
Yesenia nodded in sympathy, finishing a bandage on the small woman in front of her. She'd been one of the only ones they hadn't had to sedate, curling into herself and crying silently. She was a tiny thing, blonde and slim, and for this to have happened to her…
It was unspeakable. It made all of the motherly feelings in Yesenia rise up. How could anyone have done this to all of these people?
When she looked back down, the young girl was staring up at her with some lucidity, eyes tracking her every movement.
"Honey?" Yesenia prodded, kneeling next to her cot. "Can you hear me?"
A slight sniffle was all that she got, but it was a sign. Leaning forward, she moved the girl's hair out of her face.
"Sweetie, can you tell me your name?" She asked gently, running a soothing hand down the side of her face. The girl shifted, mouth working a few times before she spoke.
"Simiel." A soft voice said delicately. "My name is Simiel."
Yesenia smiled at the small victory but kept her emotions in check, feeling Tom move closer behind her. "Simiel, can you tell me what happened?"
The girl closed her eyes viciously for a second, tears leaking out slowly. When she opened them, they were so pain filled Yesenia knew it couldn't just be the burns that were so terrible.
"My father cast us out of heaven." She said quietly. "He was gone, and now he punished us to live in your world."
What?
"You've got to be kidding me." She heard Tom say above her. "You fell from…heaven? Does that make you angels or something?" He broke off into frantic laughter, finally showing the cracks from the stress of the night. Yesenia silenced him with a sharp gesture, turning back to Simiel.
"Why did your father throw you out?" She asked, placing a hand on the girl's forehead. It was warm, almost feverish.
"I don't know." Simiel said brokenly, tears streaming down her face. "I don't know." She repeated even quieter, curling even further into herself. She was silent, and wouldn't speak again.
"This is crazy." Tom said.
"You're telling me."
"No, I mean, that you believed her!" Tom said loudly. "That she's an angel? I mean, come on, Yesenia."
"It's just a really bad night." She said diplomatically. "I'm not really sure what to believe."
"Me neither." Tom muttered before walking off.
The government came three hours later, and if that wasn't much of a surprise, the trucks that came with them were. Large and white, men dressed in bright yellow scrubs with giant helmets on their heads poured out of them swiftly and efficiently. They almost would've resembled a bunch of cheery astronauts save for the grim expressions hidden behind the large glass masks. The second they entered, the chaos that had been the emergency room for the last three hours quieted. Cots were rolled out before anyone could stop them, loaded up into the large white trucks. Some of the victims woke, whimpering in ways Yesenia had only ever heard from wounded soldiers.
They were gone within half an hour and nothing remained to prove their existence. TV and radio were down again, and of all things it had started raining.
Yesenia tore outside, desperate for something she couldn't put a name to. She stopped dead in her tracks as she stood in the parking lot, gaping at the world around her.
Slow streams of golden light tore through the dark clouds, spiraling down and disappearing. Thousands of gold streaks split the night sky, gorgeous and infinitesimal in a way that made Yesenia feel oh so very small.
She could almost see the outline of a human body within the light before she turned and ran back into the building. Screams chased her, imaginary and real as tears streamed down her face.
Some things were better left forgotten, and this was one of them.
Authors' Notes:
TheResurrectionist: There's more to come! Many thanks to my sister for her quick beta and to if-llamas-could-fly for helping out. Co-writing is fun!
if-llamas-could-fly: Okay then, that was awesome! Cheers to TheResurrectionist for raising and setting the standard that the rest of the chapters have to be now. This project is amazing fun, and will be continued for as long as we think it's flowing. Thanks for reading, and please leave a review! :) ~Sammy