Chapter 3: Finding Our Home
"What do you want, boy?!" And without warning, Michael grips firmly onto the man's throat with unnatural swiftness, catching the man beyond off-guard as the sound of hand colliding against hard flesh echoes throughout the entire Diner. Wasting zero time, Michael slams the man against the table of a nearby empty booth, only to then grab onto a blade, holding it only a few centimetres from the man's eye. As Michael slowly opens his eyes, seemingly glancing at Mallory, the impure sight of his eyes cables chills down the ensemble of her spine. His eyes have swirled and shifted into a lifeless black, not dilated the way they would if he was angry at a normal level, but instead, completely black, like a dark mist have swallowed them hole. The man follows up with the question again. "What- what do you- want from me?"
"You're life."
The entire diner was completely silent now, it had been silent ever since that dickwad started yelling after the waitress; the laughing, the cheering, the compliments on the food, everything seemed to have faded away. As soon as the man, who Michael now holds by the throat, opened his mouth, she felt Michael's spine tingle, something snap, something click in that erred head of his, it was the only warning she got, and she overlooked it when she should have said something, consoled him. Even if that isn't the right thing to do, the people here are in pressing trouble, and she wanted to walk away from it, and why? Because of the fear of a situation like this, of Michael snapping and falling out of line, this was her fear from the start, and it's coming true. If this escalates and someone gets hurt, or worse, that's on her, and she'll be the one cleaning up the mess. Complicated, such an underwhelming word to match this situation.
Mallory's eyes switch away from Michael to monitor the man's five other friends, seeing that one of them is reaching for a concealed weapon, their hand moving onto the chamber as if to cock the weapon. Michael continues to hold the man down at a strength so seemingly raw, the man isn't even coming close to raising his head or body from the table, but this focus has made him unaware of the friend's actions, making him vulnerable to the lethal attack, an attack Mallory cannot let happen. Mallory rises from her seat in a swift motion, mirroring the movements of the friend with the gun, before using telekinesis to tear the weapon from his grip and into her own grasp.
"This is your only warning, if you have a concealed weapon, put it on the ground and slide it towards me," Mallory says, cocking the handgun in her grasp. "I've had plenty of practice with a gun, trust me." A lie, Mallory hates lying, but in this current situation, a lie is beyond needed, she needs to exact fear into these men, which is why she lies again. "I shot my first boyfriend with a gun, so don't tempt me to shoot you, asshole."
"You're gonna' shoot us?!" One of the other friends says, holding their weapon rather than aiming it, slowly placing it on the floor, same as the other friend.
"I don't want to, but I dare you to give me a reason to," Mallory snickers, a smirk on her face as she winks at them. "Try me." That's when she looks back at the waitress, but with only a quick glance, nothing more. "When they give us the weapons, I want you to be the one to grab them, just place them on the table and I'll make sure they don't get close enough to get it back, I promise."
The remaining four asshole friends use their boots to kick-slide the handguns towards Mallory and Michael before backing up and sitting deep into their booth, watching silently as their weapons move into the range of the waitress. She quickly swoops up the weapons and places them on the table, just as Mallory had asked, before finding herself directly behind her, she's seemingly become a powerful aurora of safety.
"This is how this next part is going to go; we're going to keep the guns and the bullets, then you're going to get into whatever vehicle you fuckers own, and you're going to get the hell out this place and never come back. Or, my friend and I will just kill all of you. Six unarmed men against a Witch with a gun alone? You guys should be shitting yourself, I know which decision I'd make."
She wanted to steer clear of the 'W' word, it's dangerous to declare such power to the public, Cordelia taught her that herself, I guess it just slipped out. And it seems that the message worked because the man's friends start exiting not just the booth, but the diner itself, stock-piling themselves in a large pick-up truck like they're in a hurry, obviously not thinking about the man they left behind. The man that Michael is still holding by the throat.
"Michael?" Mallory says, placing her gun on the table before slowly approaching him. "It's over now, you can let him go."
Michael's pitch black eyes quickly glance at her, subconsciously being careful not to get seen by anyone else, just Mallory and the asshole he's threatening to kill. He stares the man in his terrified eyes before slowly and extensively places the knife on the table, then finally letting him go. "Go, now, before I change my mind."
The man doesn't waste any time whatsoever, pretty much running to the pickup truck and diving into the fray, screaming at his friends to get the fuck out of dodge. As the truck drives away from the diner and begins disappearing from view, Michael's closed eyes open to his striking blue eyes, any sign of the darkness in them has been driven away, at least for the moment. The way he looks at Mallory and the waitress, and his surroundings, there's no anger left, no rage, no darkness, only the tears that swell his eyes remain. The first thing Mallory senses is this endless regret, he wants to apologize, she doesn't need supernatural abilities to know that, he wants to apologize to the entire diner, every person individually, for the possible mess he could have made, but he doesn't know how, he hasn't been taught how to apologize to so many people, but hell, has anyone? Instead, he flees from the diner, running at full speed past the car and towards the road, only to keep running.
"Oh fuck," Mallory sighs, looking at the waitress and then everyone in the diner. "I'm so sorry for everything, just, take care, all of you." Before transmutating out of the diner.
Michael continues running at full speed, trying to outrun the darkness within him, the danger he became in that diner, the eyes, those terrible eyes that stared, he can't get it out of his head. He could feel that voice crying out to him, begging him to kill that man, to drive that blade in his eye and out the back of his head, and he wanted to, he wanted to listen to the mysterious, to take the man's life like he did that other man in the strange clothes and cross in his hand. He wanted to listen, but the voice would want more blood, more death, so he'd have to kill the others too. But what if it wanted more? The eyes would have to go too, but if it asked for more? Mallory?! No, not Mallory, he could never hurt Mallory, never ever hurt Mallory, he would never forgive himself if he did, but can you hurt an angel?! Can you harm a being so pure and beautiful?! He'd rather not test his luck, because it was her presence, her purity, her power that stopped him from going further, from taking that man's life; he wants to be better after all, and Mallory is the perfect example. That's when she appears in front him, appearing out of nowhere, just blinking in his view, using her magic as she did in the diner.
"Michael! Please, stop!" Mallory begs, holding her arm out to him. "Don't run, not from me!"
"I could've killed him, I- I could've killed all of them, Mallory."
"But you didn't, Michael, you held back, you did what you had to do; you scared him, probably gave him a concussion, but you didn't kill him."
"I'm sorry, Mallory," Michael cries, tears rolling down his cheeks. "I just lost my temper- I get so angry sometimes and- I can't control it."
Mallory shelters her arms around the sobbing Michael, hugging him in a long, tight embrace, and his immediate reaction is to wrap his own arms around her, accepting the comfort she offers. They stay like that for a few minutes and after they're done they turn around and begin walking towards their car, hands intertwined. Food will have to wait, they need a calming and legal place to rest, after a night like tonight, they could both use some sleep.
Mallory didn't sleep for long, the backseat of a car, even when folded back, is different in contrast to her bed at Miss Robichaux's, god she misses that bed, so after strapping in Michael's seatbelt while he remained asleep, she was back on the road. Michael had stayed asleep through the traffic jams, the bumpy back roads and even when she passed construction sites, there was seemingly no end to Michael's fatigue, but at least he was getting his well-deserved sleep. Her thoughts originally laid back with the diner and how in control he was; she was so proud of him, and she let him know that before he fell into his slumber, he wanted to hear those words, to know that he was doing good, even if he came remarkably close to crossing that line. It appears that unless totally enraged, Michael will find himself with more and more control, over time and practice, that will be the first thing she teaches him when they reach Miss Robichaux's, control, and afterwards, with the obvious help of Cordelia and her beautiful council, she'll begin to teach Michael the art of the practice of magic, show him what he can really do when he gets his mind to it. Even after the numerous hours that passed, with only one food stop (and one wake up call for Michael) in between, her thoughts still aligned with the pleasing idea of her teaching Michael the distinction of right and wrong, how to harness his abilities for genuine use, and she's so close to that thought becoming a reality. So close, in fact, that as she turns a corner and into a new street, she can see it, the home they've been searching for over thirty god damned hours; Miss Robichaux's Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies, a safe haven for young Witches, and hopefully for a young Warlock too. Mallory and a recently awoken Michael glance at one another, a smile and hope branded onto their faces, hope that Miss Robichaux's will become something more for the both of them, something that Mallory has already experienced in the last timeline, but something she hopes they can share with Michael himself; a home.
