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Disclaimer: I do not own The Expanse.
She'd never been so scared in her life. The lights were loud and weighed harshly on her skin. She'd thought darkness had been worse to be trapped in but the light was worse. Her ears rung harshly with the sound of vibrations, of the vidscreen, of the commotion going on in the belt around her. But she was trapped here, her body being wracked with coughs, alone and hoping.
She fought. Drowned out the light, drowned out the power, when it became too much for her. Hoped and hoped they'd come, the rest of her people, hoped they'd have some cure for this. Knew, knew they didn't. She wanted them safe. She wanted them to know what was happening. At the same time, she didn't want them, any of them near her.
Julie coughed harshly. Her body shook and she felt like she was being torn apart form the inside out. Maybe she was. She'd seen what had happened to the crew of the Anubis and the Scorpulii. She'd run.
She was so scared.
She held up a hand, watched it shake as she examined the changes that were writhing across her body, within it. Biometal, soft luminance, a deadly ripple of light. She coughed and she could feel the current of it run through her. It hurt so much.
Hours later, she was trembling as she shed her clothes. Fingers shaking as she pulled at the zip, only barely managing to hold onto it for short sections as she tugged. The clothes were grating on her skin. It hurt, it hurt so much.
Current was running inside her, breaking out of her skin. She knew parts of her face were gone. She could feel parts of her crystalizing, her ribs grating against clumps of crystals each time she took a breath. She didn't think she had veins anymore. IT all felt like pulsing current that was eating her, feeding on her, transforming her seeking all of her that was not yet its own.
She was so alone.
She thought of her friends. She thought of the belt. She thought of home. She thought of her people. And she longed for them.
Spasms of pain wrecked through her body again and she muffled a cry of pain. When the pain had subsided to barely manageable levels she twisted on the floor and began crawling to the bathroom.
It was out of the main room, it would give anyone who came in, some small measure of protection. It was also cool and she was desperate to feel some of the soothing coolness on her skin, just for a moment.
She crawled and crawled until she was in the bathroom, pulled herself up against the wall, face twisting in pain, in tears. She was so, so scared and so, so deathly alone. And this was the end.
She knew that this was the end with a certainty that robbed her of barriers. She wept because she wasn't ready to go. She wept because she never wanted it to end this way. She wept because her people, the belters, they hadn't been freed yet. She wept because she was scared and alone and needed, needed to know it wasn't all in vain.
She could feel it, whatever it was, clawing its way up her throat, freezing her lungs, destroying them. And she could feel it, something powerful and peaceful flood past the weapon that was destroying her, filled her in a way the pain, could not and then she saw him.
He came through the door with a bird, illuminated with light. In his hand he held her necklace, the one she'd left back in her apartment. And he'd come for her. He was coming for her.
And he'd know. He'd find out. And it wouldn't be in vain.
She coughed, choked and felt the weapon clawing its way into her mouth, luminescence flying out on her breath but she kept her eyes on him. He'd come and she wasn't alone.
When Julie Mao finally slipped away into the blackness, it was into the arms of that powerful, peaceful presence, it with the sense of going home.
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