Look, Knives!
*******************************************************************************
If people stared at him while he walked the streets of December, Knives didn't notice. If they pointed fingers or whispered behind their hands at the gory picture he presented, Knives didn't care. If pedestrians scrambled out of his way, if cars came to a screeching stop when he passed through intersections, Knives neither bothered to notice them or tried to stay out of their way.
No one tried to stop him. That he would have noticed and it would not have gone well for whoever dared to interrupt his journey. It wasn't that he wanted to hurt anyone, wasn't that he was raging and suppressing the need to destroy something or someone to ease his anger. But had anyone gotten in his path with the intention of slowing him, well, he wasn't in a mood to pull his punches.
He knew, objectively, that people must be staring. He could feel the blood on his face, itching as it dried, and whenever he looked at the eerily still bundle in his arms he couldn't help but be surprised by all the blood. Even after thirty blocks it still dripped from her clothes, although less now as it began to dry. Due to the way he held her in his arms, you couldn't see the mess that had been her throat, but you would have to be a fool to not notice that there was something wrong, even without the blood as a clue.
During the walk his thoughts were strangely still. He didn't panic, didn't fret, just paced slowly through the streets, careful to keep his hold on her body. It wouldn't do to drop her now, after everything else she had been through. Aside from being a huge indignity, it would make him stop, and stopping might make the walls around his thoughts crumble, and then he would have problems.
No, better to concentrate only on not dropping her. For the time that it took him to travel to the plant all he had to do was not think very hard. That was easy enough to do.
As he entered the plaza facing the entrance to the plant, he noticed that someone was trying to contact him. Opening his mind, he let the thoughts travel through his consciousness. What they told him was enough to make him stop his steady travel and was even welcome enough to entice a small smile of gratitude to flitter across his face.
And then he started thinking again, thoughts tumbling over each other in a haste to penetrate the fog that was no longer there. Taking their advice, he first reached out to his brother.
Vash, I need you.
Through his brother's ears he heard a plate drop. Knives?
Bring Alex to the plant. Anne's been hurt.
How bad? He could feel Vash's hands tighten on the counter, then search for a towel.
She may die, even with all of us working together.
Is Ace there?
Ace did it to her.
There was a long pause and Knives could feel Vash's thought racing, adding things together and coming to a conclusion that had him begin to run, pausing only long enough to grab his son by the shoulder and drag him bodily from the restaurant. I told you that playing with Ace wasn't a smart idea, Vash shot off before closing his brother from his mind.
Knives frowned, not needing the reminder, and wondering what his brother meant by his remark. It wasn't his style to just say "I told you so." He didn't worry at the question long, but began to walk the last few paces into the plant.
The place was a madhouse. As he entered the doors, two people tried to push past him, either not seeing what was in his arms, or not caring. The lobby itself was home to three small groups of people huddling together and clucking, voices full of fear. Knives pushed past who he had to, then made life a little more exciting for the employees by pausing long enough to pull the fire alarm.
The shrill ringing of the alarm echoed in the hallways. He pushed past more people, the only one moving further in the building, forcing his was through the exodus like a salmon returning upstream. Here people noticed Anne, and some even commented or exclaimed in recognition, but her condition was assumed to be the result of the tumult in the building, not the cause.
It was only a few minutes before Knives made it to his destination, but the panic and crowds made it seem like an eternity, and he wondered why Vash and Alex weren't there yet. The emptiness of the plant chamber made it seem quieter than the hall, but the alarms were louder here than they were anywhere else in the building. Here one of the plants was fighting to go offline.
The technicians at their monitors struggled to bring the plant back up. Some did their best to redirect power needs to other plants, and if they were surprised to see that there was enough being supplied for the most pressing needs, then they just assumed incorrectly that the techs in the other chambers were doing their best to help out.
Knives walked past the workers intent on their nightmares and climbed the stairs to the bulb. Gently, he set Anne down on the walkway, then stood and faced the room. The plant behind him flared brightly, then brighter, then a flash brighter still, and those of faint heart fled the room, fully half the technicians willing to try their luck somewhere else where it didn't look like an explosion was about to take place.
Of those who remained, two thirds turned to look at what the plant was doing. Upon seeing Knives standing there, calmly resting his elbows on the railing, three of these remaining humans knew who he was. They, to a man, ran away, pushing each other in an effort to be the first to the door.
Now there were only three humans left, two still intent on their work, and one left wondering just who the heck the blonde man was, and was that blood? And where did everyone else go?