The Good Fight
Disclaimer: I own nothing but Jesse and her reality
A/N: I felt Jesse's personality was sketchy and clashed with her background so I've put a new spin on things. Please let me know what you think even if you absolutely hate it I want to know.
Chapter 1: Ashes to Ashes
There was no real panic as the rotted floor gave out beneath her and she began to fall, just a sickening weightlessness and an odd since of relief. They had cornered her were trying to burn her out, but they wouldn't have her, she'd die first.
As her body made contact with the hard wood of the docks below, she was taken over by pain, her head and vision swam as the pain receded, and breathing became difficult as she went numb. Through her bleary vision she could see the smoldering structure around her, the smoke thick and a velvety black and the flames bright dancing shades of destruction.
She could barely feel the heat of those flames on her skin as a creaking sound filled her ears, it grew louder as the wood splintered beneath her and gave way to the salty green depth below. She could not feel the water as it consumed her like she could not feel the flames that had embraced her the only things she were aware of was that she was floating again this time up right and her labored breathing had stopped. She didn't struggle against it only let herself drift as darkness crept up on her.
But that last feeling of peace was short lived, she should have known better. In her world moments like that were for those who could afford them and those like her were not aloud such a luxury. She was torn out of that darkness as an explosion, it's sound thunderous even muffled by the water came from above. Flames reaching the fuel tanks though her mind had no time to process the cause.
Her eyes snapped open just in time to see the ball of flame surround her, it's burning heat made no less by the water. It seemed to come from everywhere and it devoured her whole filling her with a pain so intense it felt as if it would rip her apart. Her head was ripped back and a scream ripped from her throat, which no one would ever hear. A last agonized cry of pain and rage made silent by the water, then darkness.
0o0o0o0
As if pulled by the hand of some unknown higher power she broke the surface of the water her mouth opened as she gasped for air. It did not take long for her to pull herself from the waves disoriented and in pain. She collapsed on the sand gasping for air and bringing up water, after a moment when her body stopped shaking she moved her head to look around.
She was put off by her surroundings, the light was that of early dawn giving everything an otherworldly glow and the shoreline was empty. No warehouses or docks and no garbage littering the ground and no signs of a city. She was completely alone and sick feeling suddenly struck her as the events of the previous night came flooding into her mind. Is this hell? She looked down at her hands to see the faint red stain caught in the lines of her palms and fingers. Blood? She thought Not my blood. A raged gasp escaped her and hot tears stung her eyes at the memory playing in her mind.
She was running, they were coming and she was running, but she wasn't alone. A turn into a warehouse… Trye, it was Trye pulling her along… She was shoved to the ground. She turned to watch him stumble back as his chest exploded in three places; his body rocked with the impact of each bullet. He raised the gun fired, fell over and she went to him.
Those eyes, those impossibly blue eyes staring into hers. She was trying to stop the bleeding; it wouldn't stop. His hand touched the side of her face his fingers growing cold he was saying something she couldn't hear, couldn't remember… his eyes… There was no light anymore.
His hand fell away.
Her hand went to the side of her face where Trye's had been and she went to the water furiously scrubbing at her hands to get rid of the last traces of blood. Hot tears traced their way down her cheeks as small waves lapped against her legs. She stood up right looking over sand and water as a cool breeze blew the hair from her face. Where was she? If she wasn't dead and this some twisted version of an afterlife then where was it and how did she get here?
Her thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a large vehicle. Overcome by her instincts to survive she ran from the water across the short stretch of sand and crouched beneath an embankment. She waited but nothing happened, no one came. Perplexed curiosity winning out in the end she stood peering over the sandy hill to see the beginnings of a city. It was not the city she was used to, it was clean and inhabited in short it was a real city and not just a shell of something that used to be.
She looked off to her right to see a small building the closest of the structures out side it was parked the vehicle she had heard. There were men unloading boxes, she watched as they were taken inside after a while the truck pulled away, two figures went inside. She climbed up the hill and began to walk towards the building. She needed to find her feet, figure out where she was, it seemed to be a public building, possibly some sort of shop and it was closest it was as good a place as any.