*hides underneath a table as a hail of bullets targeting my ass started coming at me without mercy* Sorry for being gone for so long! I just can't let any of my stories go unfinished. Life just happened and it ate me.
The blind guy is the first person Skye sees when she wakes up. She's then dressed with some light clothes-not hers by the way-which is, in all honesty, absolutely not weird at all.
Geez, look at that: sarcasm. Thank god she still has that one intact. Her mind-not to mention her clothes-seem to be not as fortunate. But then again, given her naked porcupine alternative, she feels like she has no other options than to be thankful. Beggars can't be choosers, after all.
"Hello again, Skye." He greets her rather cheerfully. He appears to finally have shed his trenchcoat in favor of some loose white clothing. He reminds her of those Japanese dudes who teach Jedi mind tricks to their naive underlings or something. "I see you're finally awake. Would you like some tea?"
Tea? TEA?
That's it, she internally groans. She really is in the most disturbing spa in the planet.
If only she weren't so dizzy...
"Uhh.. um.." Her world tumbles as she figures out how to make herself form more human-like sounds. Immediately, her eyes widen in sheer panic. For some reason, she feels like she'd forgotten how to speak.
He gives her a small smile. "Don't be frightened, dear girl. Your confusion is a perfectly normal reaction. Give yourself a few moments to reacclimate. It'll slowly come back to you, trust me."
Hearing the cheeriness in his tone is rather disconcerting. He can't possibly expect her to remain calm in this kind of situation. She can't fucking speak!
Still alarmed, she hastily sits up. Blinks groggily. Her tongue is trapped in a gazillion intricate knots. "Wha-what uhh, ahh..." What on earth is going on?
"A few moments Skye," he reminds her in some completely zen fashion that makes her want to hurl things at him. In rapid succession. "-a few moments. Take deep breaths."
"What did-" she begins, clearly not interested in heeding his suggestion. Ignoring the bitter taste in her mouth, she swallows hard and tries to speak again, "w-what did you do to me?" Her brain is fuzzy. She can't think straight. Was she drugged?
He arches his eyebrows at her. He probably isn't expecting her to be coherent that soon. "A process that made you feel a lot better, I hope."
She does feel lighter. More normal. She can't explain it; it's like she belongs in her own skin once again. Though the buzzing is not completely gone, it is somehow tamed. The weird sensation that she's been hopelessly ignoring burrowing harshly inside her gut is dulled into a weak rumble. Whatever they did to her, it calmed the raging monster of a force inside of her.
Despite all that, however, she knows she must not let her guard down around these people. She appreciates the most likely temporary reprieve from her recently acquired alien-derived suffering, she really does, but one act of goodwill could hardly make her trust them implicitly. And god knows what they did to her exactly.
Did they paralyze her? Is it the reason why everything below her neck feels like body parts of a heavily obese woman covered in lead?
"I-I don't-" The room is still spinning like a goddamn deranged roller coster. She badly wants to throw up. She's so dizzy; she fears that the smallest agitation would inevitably unlock the dam of vomit dancing in the back of her throat.
"You'd be feeling like yourself again in a few days." He mumbles softly, wise enough not to approach her yet. He's probably thinking how much of a shame would it be if she soils his perfectly polished shoes.
"I-" She groans, grimacing. Oh god, here it is. "I need-" Alarmingly green and unable to hold it any longer, she panicky scrambles on top of her covers and blindly grabs the basin which thankfully was sitting right beside her. She hurls.
He tentatively rubs her back. She guesses it meant to be soothing. (It isn't) "It's okay, Skye." He tells her over the horrendous retching sounds she's making. His attempt at reassurance is weak, and he seems quite aware of the fact. He simply doesn't seem to care. He is oddly calm for a guy standing in front of someone who's one puke short of vomiting everything she's eaten in the past seven years. It's like he's quite used to this kind of reaction. Like he's seen people retching many, many times before. "It'll pass."
'You gotta be kidding', she wants to scream back at the guy, but unfortunately, her stomach has other ideas. She grabs at the wretched basin again.
"The transition went smoothly as expected. Believe me; I could tell.."
Still cluthing the basin like her life depends on it, she cranes her neck, and shoots him a frightening glare. She's a small heave away from being the guest of honor to a bulimic convention and he's telling her that whatever shit they did went smoothly? "Are you fucking bli-"
"Blind?" Gordon supplies with a chuckle. "I thought we already established that?"
She gapes at him. She geniunely seems to have forgotten that little tidbit. Kidnapper or not, the idea of insulting him for his disability didn't even enter her mind. "Oh." She says, practically holding her tongue to keep herself from apologizing. She pushes the damn basin away from her.
"I can tell that you have questions."
Geez, she wonders what gave her away. "You did something to me." She didn't bother hiding the accusation in her tone. Her eyes are shooting him a boatload of figurative daggers.
"Yes." He says. "But nothing too intrusive, I promise.."
His words somewhat speeds up the clearing up process inside her brain. Nothing too intrusive? Wait a second…
With that state of yours, if I don't put you to sleep, and we continue the transition process, you may die.
Everyone went through this, even me. It's protocol.
As I've said, this stuff is not going to kill you.
What the-
She was drugged! She remembers it now.
The realization suddenly gets all of her cylinders firing. The nasty fog inside her brain lifts, and then slowly, everything that happened in the past few hours comes back to her.
Everything.
Everyone.
Lincoln.
"Wait, did you people just-" Damn it. How can she even forget about that? "Where is that fucking jerkface?" She bellows.
"We promised to help you." Gordon replies vaguely. "And that's all we did."
All he earns with that response is a sarcastic scoff. And who could blame her? They had her drugged. "Help? HELP?" She screams. "At what point did you people actually help me? Was it between you kidnapping and dragging me here without even asking, or was it when you removed my clothes without my permission just to turn me into a goddamn human porcupine?!
"That is just part of the process-"
"Process?" Her voice raised another octave. "That psycho minion of yours electrocuted and drugged me, for god sakes! Was that part of your goddamn process too?"
Gordon keeps his expression neutral. "I assure you; I'd be having a talk with him about that." He crouches in front of her and caresses her face in some fatherly manner. She shivers at the contact, jerking away from his touch as if he has the plague.
"We are not the monsters that you think we are, Skye."
"Monst-" She stutters. That word hurts her more than she cares to admit. After all that has happened, she has no right to ever call anyone else that. And that's not even the point of her anger. "I wasn't-"
"But you think you are the monster."
She rubs her face wearily, wanting to refute his assumptions but finding herself unable to.
A small smile crawls into Gordon's lips. "There's no need for denials, dear girl. I can see you thinking about it."
A thought suddenly crosses her mind, rendering her completely incapable of uttering even a single word.
Is he being literal? He can see her thinking about it? He's a mind reader, too? Really?
What's next, a telepathic dog? This is some deep shit she's gotten herself into.
Oddly, curiosity overwhelms her body's natural urge to freak out. And perhaps even her need to scream profanities at the man's general direction. She slowly inches herself out of his range. "You can read minds?"
"Can I read minds?" Gordon laughs openly at her, "Xavier's right, after all. You are one funny lady, Skye."
Wait… what kind of response is that? "So you can't read minds?" She clarifies.
He smirks. "What do you think?"
If he's indeed a mind reader, he'd stop smiling right at that instant. She just mentally cursed him and his balls with such profane language it would make a sailor blush. Normal people tend to frown upon those things. He doesn't seem to be affected by it at all.
But then again, he is not normal people.
"Okay, so when you said you could see..." She waves a hand in front of his eyes. "Did you mean that literally, or…?"
He catches her hand midway, and almost snorts when she flinches as if she just got burned. "Yes, but not like the way people normally do. I can perceive with my other senses and it grants me vision way clearer than before I have changed. The same way that I can see that you still have a question you wanted to ask me."
"Ohh-kay... great." She mutters under her breath. It is just her luck that each person she meets in this place proves to be creepier than the last.
He regards her rather thoughtfully. "You're scared of us."
"Scared?" She says incredulously. "Not on this lifetime, dude."
Gordon doesn't seem to be buying it. "Would it help if I promise you that we won't hurt you?"
"Well, that remains to be seen, blind guy." She snarkily responds. "For all I know, you lot are some psycho man-eating aliens from the other dimension tracking innocent people for you to do experiments on."
The grin he gives her is too cryptic for her liking. "Well, you're not completely wrong." He says.
Her eyes bug out at that. She gapes. It is just her luck that she gets kidnapped by cannibals. Fuck. "You're gonna eat me?" She squeaked.
He seems to seriously ponder her question. "Hmm."
Panic clouds her features.
These people are really gonna eat her! They made her feel better just to make a wicked stew out of her bones… serve her liver with fava beans and a nice Chianti.
Shit.
And then, as she least expects it, and as she tries to take control of the rapid pounding of her heart, he breaks his silence with a loud snort.
"Eat you?" He laughs again with that gravelly voice of his. "Never heard of that one before."
His response may be somewhat reassuring, but she still can't help but feel a bit perturbed by it. Regardless, a relieved sigh makes its way past her lips. No cannibalistic rituals anytime soon, then. That's something.
After a few moments, he sobers up a little. "You have no reason to be scared. I could give you the answers that you need. All you have to do is ask."
She stares at him quietly, trying so hard to read his face. No signs of deception anywhere.
"I know this is a very confusing time for you."
Confusing time? Ha. Confusing doesn't even cut it.
"We are not bad people."
"Let me be the judge of that."
"Of course." He nods, patiently waiting for the question he seemingly knows she's been itching to ask.
"Okay." First things first. She needs to clear this one up before anything else. This has been bugging her since they first appeared unannounced in the base. "Are…you… an alien?"
Eyebrows rising a tad, he answers her question with a question. "What makes you think that I am one?"
She gapes at him. He doesn't deny it. "I thought I am the one asking the questions here?"
He smiles at her feistiness. "Fine point." He nods. "Have you ever heard of the word 'Kree'?"
Kree? Her mouth gapes even wider.
Blue angels falling from the sky.
That's it. That explains it.
Oh god, she's fucked.
Only she would be that unlucky to get herself abducted by aliens. What is wrong with her?
"You're Kree." She squeaks. He doesn't appear anywhere near blue though.
Are they here to question her about the alien blood that saved her life couple of months ago?
The man's smile then turns into a full on chuckle. "No, Skye. Not exactly." He says. "As children, our people has been taught of a tale of a group of highly advanced creatures coming to our world thousands of years ago, bringing change to some select inhabitants."
"Change?" She's heard this before. From Raina. She told her a similar story way before the entire monumental disaster that is Puerto Rico ever happened.
"You don't seem too surprised." He notes.
"Ha." She laughs dryly. She gets it now. Ha, they almost got her. "Oh now I know what's happening here. You're with her. Of course."
"Her?"
"I see a pattern emerging, and it has her flower dress draped all over it."
Realization finally dawns on his face. "Raina did warn me you may not be as receptive as she is about this whole concept."
"So you really are in cahoots with that slime? Drinking the same Kool-aid? Okay. That's it. I'm out of here." She throws her blanket away and tries to stand, but blind guy stops her.
"I can't let you do that." He says. "And even if I wanted to, trust me, you wouldn't be able to stand without both of your knees buckling from underneath you."
"Watch me." She pushes him away.
"You can't."
"Whatever, I'm leav-aaaahh shit!" Her knees do buckle, just as he warned it would. Luckily, she's able to hold on to him before she plummets to the ground like some legless ragdoll.
He places her back on the bed gently. "Can I continue my explanation now, or should I simply let you be pigheaded all day?
Her nostrils flare in indignation, but she sits back down nonetheless. What else could she do? It's not as if she has a lot of options at the moment. Her legs are useless. She might as well be paralyzed from the waist down.
"It is said that they altered the very thing that makes us human, bringing forth a new race of beings capable of changing the world as we know it."
"New race." She repeats nonchalantly, rolling her eyes. She refuses to listen to any of this shit any longer. "Got it."
He glares at her (how did he even manage to do that without eyes?) "I am not a fan of sarcasm."
Wheesh. Sensitive much? "I'm not a fan of aliens either, and yet, here I am."
"Yes. Here you are." He stares her down sternly. (Seriously, how is he doing that?)
She schools her features, trying so hard to look more interested than she is so as not to upset him further. The guy can be scary if he wants to be. "Soooo... new race of beings... you're pertaining to yourselves, right? What now, you call yourselves Inhumans?" She heard them say that word when they first met. She thought nothing much of it, not until now. "Kind of a lame name, I tell ya."
Ignoring her last statement, he nods. At least she's been listening to their earlier words after all. "But that's what our ancestors chose to call themselves. That's what we are."
"Well, good for you." She tells him. "Is that all? Okay. Thanks for the lecture. I get it. You people are weird. Can you go now?"
Then, as if a bucket of cold water is dumped on her head, his words sink in. She pales. "Wait, what do you mean our ancestors?" She demands, mouth dry, and utterly caught off guard with the possibility. "Are we related?"
God, she sincerely hopes not. With her luck, this fucker could even be related to her father. She shudders.
"In a manner of speaking... yes. But that's not what's important right now." He replies. "Skye, the process you just went through, the change that happened to you, only happens to a few select people of our kind. It is called Terrigenesis."
Now she's really confused. Did he just expect her to ignore the fact that he just said they are somehow blood related? "Terr-terri-what now?"
"The mist from an ancient crystal called the Terrigen activates a dormant part of any descendants' genetic makeup-their DNA, if you will." He crouches right in front of her. "We are not bound by blood, Skye, at least not in the usual sense of the word-but we descended from the same group of people. And by some hand of fate, you got chosen to undergo the change."
"Ancient crystal? Is that-are you talking about the diviner?"
He nods. "Not all the descendants are chosen to undergo this change, but all of those who do will be given gifts like you can never imagine." He smiles again. "Skye, with the gift you've received, you can do wonders."
"Wonders? Ha! If you are referring to my killer earthquake juju, then I'm afraid you are terribly mistaken." What happened to that by the way? The buzzing underneath her skin is still gone. And by then she no longer feels any weird rumbling inside of her. "Because let me tell you, I can call that thing a lot of names, a gift-ain't one of them."
"All of us think like that at first. Take my case, for example. After I changed, everyone told me that my gift is something that I should treasure. That it is a precious miracle I should be thankful for." His fingers ghosts over where his eyes should be. "All I understood is that I was blind."
"Now you can totally save up money for airfare and gas. Amazing." Her smile quickly dissipates into a glare. "Want me to throw you a party?"
"We can teach you how to control your gift."
"For the millionth time, you creeper, don't you dare call this curse a goddamn gift!" She screams in frustration. "Just let me go! I don't fucking need you!"
How the guy maintains his zen is beyond her. But it is really starting to grate harshly on her nerves. "It is a gift, but until you can accept that, you will continue to have problems."
"I will continue to have problems as long as you are not letting me out of here!"
"You cannot escape your fate. This is what you're supposed to be. Accept it, and everything will be clearer to you."
"Oh everything is clear to me. You people are crazy." She scoffs. "Can't get any clearer than that."
"Give us a few weeks, you will find yourself here. This situation might be tough to swallow at first, but believe me, you'll be thanking us for it. With your abilities, you can be magnificent."
Magnificent? She snorts. He really could use some work on the sales talk. "Easy for you to say. At least for you, all you need to deal with was trying not to teleport yourself to the moon. My thing can actually destroy the said moon."
He seems to take that statement seriously. "I haven't actually thought of going to the moon."
"What?" She asks in disbelief. What the- Is he even for real? "Christ, you people are really messed up in the head!"
"Maybe," he says, "but then again, you have always been one of us. What does that say about you?"