Time Cubed
Author: dragons_syn
Email: dragons_syn@yahoo.com
Rating: NC-17 to R
Pairing: Jesse and Grae (my own character)
Disclaimer: I do not own Mutant X or any of the characters of Mutant X. I am purely borrowing the characters for the purpose of entertainment. I do however own the character Grace/Grae Summary: (AU) Takes place after Time Squared. The effects of Gabriel Ashlocke killing his parents have unforeseen consequences.
Chapter 6 - You've got questions, you don't get the answers
Grace returned home to an empty house. The note in the kitchen said that Joey went out with friends, no doubt he would be stumbling home somewhere around dawn, and according to the calendar, her remaining brothers would be working late. Grace didn't know how Doug had managed it, but he managed somehow to save enough money to buy martial arts dojo. Doug was always the smart one, he had busted his ass to keep the family afloat, and still managed to get a degree and a masters degree in business. And it was paying off. They had more money now, but they were far from rich, but they were comfortable. Doug keeps telling them about how someday soon, he wants to buy a house for the family, a real home where they all can be safe and loved. *That would be nice* she thought to herself. She didn't really know what it was like to be loved until her knights in shining armor rescued her that fateful day.
"Hey, snap out of it, why think of such sad things" she told herself. "What am I going to eat for dinner?"
As Grace stared into the refrigerator, she couldn't help but remember a completely different time of her life.
She couldn't remember exactly when it started, she could remember as far back as when she was four years old, but she knew it had always been this way. She could make her toys come to her without a second thought, she could make things would move without her being near them. It was always like this. Always that is, until her parents found out she could do it. Then mysterious more serious things would happen. She couldn't explain it, her parents couldn't explain it, and they didn't like it. Objects would still move for no reason, but then things started to explode for no reason as well, and she would start to disappear for hours on end and not really know where she went or how she got there. Her parents would find her out in the backyard, in the basement, underneath the kitchen table. When these occurrences started to happen too frequently, that is when her parents decided that they would lock her in her room, lock her away from the world. Sometimes for days on end, cut off from the outside world, her only link, her only form of education was the television. Her parents became mere specters in her life. The only time she would see either of them was when they were bringing her food. Often times they wouldn't even talk to her, sometimes not even look at her. It was almost like they were ashamed of her. Yet they still took care of her, brought her food, clothes, toys, books, games, but never really engaged her. Instead she felt like some sort of animal at the zoo, stuck in a cage to be looked after and fed. Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into years, eventually the television was accompanied by a computer, that was state of the art and complete with a cable modem. It was from either the television or her computer, that she taught herself to read and write, it was from these devices that she could see the world outside, what people looked like, how people behaved, a glimpse of a world other than her world of toys, books, scratched up walls and a canopy bed. As she grew older, stuffed animals and Barbies didn't interest her. Surfing the Net became on obsession, over the years she had become a very skilled hacker, so she utilized this skill to search the Web for anything she could find on why objects moved by themselves, and why objects exploded seemingly by themselves and why was she dreaming of places and people from other times, anything that could help her to understand what was going on with her, anything to help her to understand who or what she was. Every night she would notice that that she would dream of places that were unfamiliar to her, there seemed to be one place that she would dream of more often than any other. In her dream, she could see a quaint two story house with smoke coming from its chimney, she could see children playing in the yards and fields around the house, there were five children. She could see the mother hanging the laundry on the line and shooing the children away so they didn't get it dirty again. She could see that for as far as the eye could see there was nothing but vast fields. Wheat, she thought, maybe hay, maybe both. She could see livestock in the barn and in the sty, she could see the chickens running around freely. Every night she would dream, often of the same quaint little cottage in the fields, every morning how she wished she could live there, but every morning she found herself locked in her room, and every morning she would have a monster of a headache. Then one morning she noticed the walls of her bedroom appeared to be scratched up, like an animal was stuck in the room and tried to dig its way out, and then on another morning her pillow had been ripped to shreds. What ever was happening to her, it frightened her. She pleaded with her parents to talk to her, to help her to understand what was going on within herself. She pleaded with her parents to let her out, for just one day, one hour, just for a little while, to see how much the world had changed for herself, and not through some box in her room. And with each passing day and each denied request she grew angrier, and as she grew angrier, her dreams became more vivid, and her room looked like a war zone every morning and the frequency of exploding objects increased as well.
While searching the Net, she could surmise that she obviously had unique powers, but from all the information that she had read throughout the years, nothing really explained who or what she was. There was no documentation about her dreams, only her abilities or "gifts" as one of her cyber-friends put it. She eventually learned that her "gifts" were linked to her emotions, if she got to angry, things would explode, she would exude some sort of telekinetic power and take her anger out on inanimate objects, akin to punching a punching bag. As she learned to control her emotions, she found that she couldn't control the dreams, and they became even more intense, often times it felt like she was actually in the places that she dreamed. This frightened her even more. *How could this be possible she thought.* She would think to herself. Then one day it happened.
She had just concluded a interesting chat session with her occult internet community group, she was amazed at how many other people had the same "gift" that she did, although maybe not the degree that she was, but still it made her feel good. It made her feel like part of the human race again, not some freak who had been locked up by her parents for 10 years because they were ashamed of her. She signed off bidding all of her friends good night and that she would talk to them tomorrow and made preparations to go to bed. As she started to drift off to sleep, she started to dream again, this time she dreamed that she was "traveling" through this corridor of some sort, she wasn't walking, she was gliding, the images she saw didn't make sense to her. There were images that she didn't recognize, people who she did not know, of course being locked up in her room she didn't know many people. She wasn't just dreaming of a specific place this time, she was dreaming about several places. The images that she saw pass by quickly and she only caught glimpses of each image. The next thing she knew she was in standing the fields near that quaint little house of her dreams. She was in Medieval Europe. The place she had been dreaming about for months prior, while she dreamt all those times before she always had this feeling like she was standing there on the hillside. She could feel the wind on her body, she could smell the wheat growing in the fields, she could hear children playing in the distance. Then she realized that she was standing on the hillside, and that she was feeling the wind and smelling the wheat and hearing the children, she could see the children. They were running towards her. *How is this possible?* She thought to herself. *How can I possibly be here? I am only dreaming. This is really vivid dream, but I am only dreaming.* She was in such a state of shock that she didn't realize the children were standing right in front of her, talking to her. When she didn't respond, the eldest of the children ran back to the house to summon his parents.
The next thing she remembered is that she was being carried down off the hillside. By the time she regained her composure, she realized that someone was carrying her. Upon that realization, she screamed and quickly jumped out the man's arms. The man, presumably the father of the children and later was confirmed to be the father, tried to calm her down. She was inconsolable, she was hysterical. She kept repeating "This is a dream, this is a dream, this is a dream". It took quite a few hours of prodding from the mother to calm her down, get her properly clothed and fed. But before long, she began to realize that she was out of her room, she was not locked up anymore. She was overjoyed. She was free! She was free, but where was she free. She was born in 1978, and here it was 1485, Henry VII's reign of rule. "How was this possible" she would ask herself everyday that she stayed with Mr. and Mrs. MacIntyre and their five children: Martin, Samuel, Agatha, Martha, and little Joseph.
At first she was shy and hid a lot in the loft of the barn. Martin, the eldest, would always come and find her. If he couldn't coax her out of her hiding spot, he would bring her food and leave it for her for when she was ready to come out and eat. Eventually she came out of her shell and began to talk to Martin. They were the same age, 14, so they hit it off right from the start. They talked for hours on end about whatever they wanted. She would always ask about him and his family, she wanted to know everything about having a family. She wanted to know what it was like to live on the farm, to put it simply to be able to go outside. When Martin would ask about her and her family or how she ended up at their farm without so much as a bag of clothes, or shoes for that matter. She would always try to skirt around the subject of her parents or how she got their house. Martin, although disappointed, would always understand and say that he was there whenever she was ready to talk about it. She loved him for that. Days progressed into weeks, weeks progressed into months. Before she knew it, it had been two months that she had spent with the MacIntyres. And then she started to dream again. It was during this time that she dubbed her dreams: traveling. That was exactly was it was "traveling" she was going to different places and different times and she had no control over them. Once she found herself in Feudal China, but only for a very brief time, not longer than a night, because she was back at "home" the next morning, and another time she found herself in Ancient India, also for a very brief time. Every morning, she and Martin would talk about her dreams, at first he thought she was loosing her mind, but she never went into explicit details. She would just describe the places that she saw and what the people wore, and Martin would just sit and listen. He had told her that she had a very vivid imagination. She, of course, knew these places existed, but how was she going to explain that to Martin, so she just let him think it was her wild imagination. She found that she was experiencing a quiet peace that she never had before. She was able to talk to someone about what was happening to her, she had someone who cared for her enough to listen to her. She had someone who would listen without condemning her. She loved that. She craved that. That was the missing piece to her life, her life back with her parents.
As time went on, she and Martin would spend more and more time together. They would take long walks down to the lake, and stay together all day, much to the dismay of Mr. MacIntyre. Martin had chores and responsibilities that were not being fulfilled because of his attachment to her. Despite his father's disapproval of the time being spent, he didn't begrudge her. As it came upon the one year anniversary of her arrival to the MacIntyre family, she and Martin were sitting by the lake throwing stones into the lake, when their discussion took an interesting turn.
"Grace?"
"Yes"
"Do you like it here?"
"Yes, I love it here. Why do you ask?" she asked, closing her eyes as she laid down on the shore of the lake basking in the warmth of the sun
"Just wondering..you see..I was wondering, well we, that is my family and I were wondering.."
"Martin, you're mumbling"
"Aye, that I am."
"What's this about?" she asked, she was getting curious as to what Martin what getting at
When he didn't say anything, she opened her eyes to find him looking down at her. Before she could ask again, Martin had given her a soft kiss on the lips. Her eyes got wide and she pulled back slightly.
"Grace, please accept my apologies. I didn't mean to overstep my bounds."
She had read all about kissing on the Web, but reading about it and experiencing it were two completely different issues. She felt like she had a million butterflies trapped in her stomach, her face became flushed, and she felt what seemed like an electric current run through her body when his lips touched hers. This was a feeling unlike any other. She didn't know what to make of it. All she knew was that she wanted to feel it again.
"No. No, Martin. Don't apologize. You didn't overstep any bounds, it was just unexpected." She said as she leaned over to give him a kiss. This time catching Martin off guard. She remembered the look on his face, he never expected her to kiss him. Never the less, they enjoyed the moment for what is was. The moment they realized that they has intense feelings for one another, feelings that may be love.
Then one morning she awoke to find Martin sitting in the room that she shared with Agatha and Martha. She had been dreaming again, she had been "traveling" to yet another place she didn't recognize. He had this look of pure contempt in his eyes.
"Martin? What's wrong? Is everything alright?" She whispered not wanting to wake up the girls. It was unusual for Martin to be up in their room, she was concerned. Then he grabbed her by the arm, dragged her out of bed, hissed at her to be silent, shoved her out of the room and out of the house and ordered her to leave.
"Be gone from this place, woman!" Martin yelled as he let go of her arm
"Martin, what is wrong with you!" she yelled back
"Be gone, witch, you will not bring the devil upon my family, be gone or I will not be held accountable for my actions" he said with anger
"Witch?! What are talking about! I am no witch!"
"Aye, you are, witch, I saw you this very night, make the change into a wolf. I saw you with my own eyes. You changed into the wolf so you could work your dark magic on me and my brethren. I will not let you bring evil upon us." He said as he took a step forward threateningly.
"I what? I couldn't have! That is impossible! I would know if I could change into a wolf?" she said *I would, wouldn't I?* she thought to herself.
"Be gone! Leave this place and don't come back, I am no longer affected by your dark magic. I will no longer fall for you attempts to make me embrace evil. I have seen your true form. Now leave vile creature!" he hissed
She knew Martin too well, the look in his eyes told her everything. She knew that there was no talking to him. All she could do was run, she turned and ran as fast and as far as her legs could carry her. She didn't understand what was happening. *A wolf? How could I have changed into a wolf?* she kept thinking. *That explains the scratch marks on my bedroom walls and the torn pillows. That explains why I ended up in those strange places around the house. But how? Why?* She didn't know who long or how far she ran before she finally managed to stop running. She was exhausted. She had come upon a felled tree that had been hollowed out by the forest creatures and decided to take refuge there. As she curled up into the fetal position all she could think of was the look in Martin's eyes. He had this look of betrayal. He thought of her as a witch, as someone who violated his trust, his love. She couldn't bear to have him look at her that way. She started to cry, she cried for the loss of the only real family she knew and she cried for the loss of the only real person who loved her. As she drifted off to sleep, all she could think of what how sorry she was to bring such sorrow to the MacIntyres, to Martin.
A single tear fell down Grace's face. She quickly wiped it away. She realized that the time she spent with the MacIntyres was the really the first time that nothing weird happened. Nothing exploded, she didn't make anything move, she didn't have shredded pillows. That was the first time she was really and truly happy. "That was long ago, I have a real family now, they accept me for who I am, they love me and I love them, that is what is most important." she said to herself as she brought herself out of her revelry.
She wasn't hungry anymore, so she left the kitchen and headed for the shower. She was sore all over. "I definitely overdid it during training" she said to herself as she stepped into the shower. She decided to get a work out at the dojo today before work. Often times she found if she got out her aggressions at the dojo, then she could handle the trials and tribulations of her job. Being a female bartender was very demanding. Not because the job itself was taxing, but it was more fending off all the creeps and jerks who were constantly hitting on her. Tonight, somehow every drunk bastard that came near her manage to spill their drink on her. She smelt like a brewery. "If I didn't already have an aversion to alcohol, this would definitely do it" she muttered as she started to wash the stench of alcohol off her body. After washing her hair and body for the fourth time, she began to think about if she was going to see Jesse tonight. For the past three nights, she had dreamed, for the past three nights she had violated her brother's trust and attempted to contact someone or something that could provide answers, for the past three nights she still didn't have an answer, and for three nights HE was not there. She was beginning to wonder if he was real or was he a figment of her imagination or was he was something else. As she stepped out of the shower and dried off she began to remember that there was something special about Jesse. Something that she couldn't get out her mind. He had this look of pure unadulterated innocence. One look into his eyes told her that he was a man of his word and a man of conviction and passion. He was loyal to those he cared about. He was a man who would give up everything in order to help someone else. She liked that in him. "I hope you are real, Jesse Kilmartin. I hope you are real." She said aloud, hoping that somehow someway the universe would hear her and maybe, just maybe tonight, they might meet tonight.
Author: dragons_syn
Email: dragons_syn@yahoo.com
Rating: NC-17 to R
Pairing: Jesse and Grae (my own character)
Disclaimer: I do not own Mutant X or any of the characters of Mutant X. I am purely borrowing the characters for the purpose of entertainment. I do however own the character Grace/Grae Summary: (AU) Takes place after Time Squared. The effects of Gabriel Ashlocke killing his parents have unforeseen consequences.
Chapter 6 - You've got questions, you don't get the answers
Grace returned home to an empty house. The note in the kitchen said that Joey went out with friends, no doubt he would be stumbling home somewhere around dawn, and according to the calendar, her remaining brothers would be working late. Grace didn't know how Doug had managed it, but he managed somehow to save enough money to buy martial arts dojo. Doug was always the smart one, he had busted his ass to keep the family afloat, and still managed to get a degree and a masters degree in business. And it was paying off. They had more money now, but they were far from rich, but they were comfortable. Doug keeps telling them about how someday soon, he wants to buy a house for the family, a real home where they all can be safe and loved. *That would be nice* she thought to herself. She didn't really know what it was like to be loved until her knights in shining armor rescued her that fateful day.
"Hey, snap out of it, why think of such sad things" she told herself. "What am I going to eat for dinner?"
As Grace stared into the refrigerator, she couldn't help but remember a completely different time of her life.
She couldn't remember exactly when it started, she could remember as far back as when she was four years old, but she knew it had always been this way. She could make her toys come to her without a second thought, she could make things would move without her being near them. It was always like this. Always that is, until her parents found out she could do it. Then mysterious more serious things would happen. She couldn't explain it, her parents couldn't explain it, and they didn't like it. Objects would still move for no reason, but then things started to explode for no reason as well, and she would start to disappear for hours on end and not really know where she went or how she got there. Her parents would find her out in the backyard, in the basement, underneath the kitchen table. When these occurrences started to happen too frequently, that is when her parents decided that they would lock her in her room, lock her away from the world. Sometimes for days on end, cut off from the outside world, her only link, her only form of education was the television. Her parents became mere specters in her life. The only time she would see either of them was when they were bringing her food. Often times they wouldn't even talk to her, sometimes not even look at her. It was almost like they were ashamed of her. Yet they still took care of her, brought her food, clothes, toys, books, games, but never really engaged her. Instead she felt like some sort of animal at the zoo, stuck in a cage to be looked after and fed. Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into years, eventually the television was accompanied by a computer, that was state of the art and complete with a cable modem. It was from either the television or her computer, that she taught herself to read and write, it was from these devices that she could see the world outside, what people looked like, how people behaved, a glimpse of a world other than her world of toys, books, scratched up walls and a canopy bed. As she grew older, stuffed animals and Barbies didn't interest her. Surfing the Net became on obsession, over the years she had become a very skilled hacker, so she utilized this skill to search the Web for anything she could find on why objects moved by themselves, and why objects exploded seemingly by themselves and why was she dreaming of places and people from other times, anything that could help her to understand what was going on with her, anything to help her to understand who or what she was. Every night she would notice that that she would dream of places that were unfamiliar to her, there seemed to be one place that she would dream of more often than any other. In her dream, she could see a quaint two story house with smoke coming from its chimney, she could see children playing in the yards and fields around the house, there were five children. She could see the mother hanging the laundry on the line and shooing the children away so they didn't get it dirty again. She could see that for as far as the eye could see there was nothing but vast fields. Wheat, she thought, maybe hay, maybe both. She could see livestock in the barn and in the sty, she could see the chickens running around freely. Every night she would dream, often of the same quaint little cottage in the fields, every morning how she wished she could live there, but every morning she found herself locked in her room, and every morning she would have a monster of a headache. Then one morning she noticed the walls of her bedroom appeared to be scratched up, like an animal was stuck in the room and tried to dig its way out, and then on another morning her pillow had been ripped to shreds. What ever was happening to her, it frightened her. She pleaded with her parents to talk to her, to help her to understand what was going on within herself. She pleaded with her parents to let her out, for just one day, one hour, just for a little while, to see how much the world had changed for herself, and not through some box in her room. And with each passing day and each denied request she grew angrier, and as she grew angrier, her dreams became more vivid, and her room looked like a war zone every morning and the frequency of exploding objects increased as well.
While searching the Net, she could surmise that she obviously had unique powers, but from all the information that she had read throughout the years, nothing really explained who or what she was. There was no documentation about her dreams, only her abilities or "gifts" as one of her cyber-friends put it. She eventually learned that her "gifts" were linked to her emotions, if she got to angry, things would explode, she would exude some sort of telekinetic power and take her anger out on inanimate objects, akin to punching a punching bag. As she learned to control her emotions, she found that she couldn't control the dreams, and they became even more intense, often times it felt like she was actually in the places that she dreamed. This frightened her even more. *How could this be possible she thought.* She would think to herself. Then one day it happened.
She had just concluded a interesting chat session with her occult internet community group, she was amazed at how many other people had the same "gift" that she did, although maybe not the degree that she was, but still it made her feel good. It made her feel like part of the human race again, not some freak who had been locked up by her parents for 10 years because they were ashamed of her. She signed off bidding all of her friends good night and that she would talk to them tomorrow and made preparations to go to bed. As she started to drift off to sleep, she started to dream again, this time she dreamed that she was "traveling" through this corridor of some sort, she wasn't walking, she was gliding, the images she saw didn't make sense to her. There were images that she didn't recognize, people who she did not know, of course being locked up in her room she didn't know many people. She wasn't just dreaming of a specific place this time, she was dreaming about several places. The images that she saw pass by quickly and she only caught glimpses of each image. The next thing she knew she was in standing the fields near that quaint little house of her dreams. She was in Medieval Europe. The place she had been dreaming about for months prior, while she dreamt all those times before she always had this feeling like she was standing there on the hillside. She could feel the wind on her body, she could smell the wheat growing in the fields, she could hear children playing in the distance. Then she realized that she was standing on the hillside, and that she was feeling the wind and smelling the wheat and hearing the children, she could see the children. They were running towards her. *How is this possible?* She thought to herself. *How can I possibly be here? I am only dreaming. This is really vivid dream, but I am only dreaming.* She was in such a state of shock that she didn't realize the children were standing right in front of her, talking to her. When she didn't respond, the eldest of the children ran back to the house to summon his parents.
The next thing she remembered is that she was being carried down off the hillside. By the time she regained her composure, she realized that someone was carrying her. Upon that realization, she screamed and quickly jumped out the man's arms. The man, presumably the father of the children and later was confirmed to be the father, tried to calm her down. She was inconsolable, she was hysterical. She kept repeating "This is a dream, this is a dream, this is a dream". It took quite a few hours of prodding from the mother to calm her down, get her properly clothed and fed. But before long, she began to realize that she was out of her room, she was not locked up anymore. She was overjoyed. She was free! She was free, but where was she free. She was born in 1978, and here it was 1485, Henry VII's reign of rule. "How was this possible" she would ask herself everyday that she stayed with Mr. and Mrs. MacIntyre and their five children: Martin, Samuel, Agatha, Martha, and little Joseph.
At first she was shy and hid a lot in the loft of the barn. Martin, the eldest, would always come and find her. If he couldn't coax her out of her hiding spot, he would bring her food and leave it for her for when she was ready to come out and eat. Eventually she came out of her shell and began to talk to Martin. They were the same age, 14, so they hit it off right from the start. They talked for hours on end about whatever they wanted. She would always ask about him and his family, she wanted to know everything about having a family. She wanted to know what it was like to live on the farm, to put it simply to be able to go outside. When Martin would ask about her and her family or how she ended up at their farm without so much as a bag of clothes, or shoes for that matter. She would always try to skirt around the subject of her parents or how she got their house. Martin, although disappointed, would always understand and say that he was there whenever she was ready to talk about it. She loved him for that. Days progressed into weeks, weeks progressed into months. Before she knew it, it had been two months that she had spent with the MacIntyres. And then she started to dream again. It was during this time that she dubbed her dreams: traveling. That was exactly was it was "traveling" she was going to different places and different times and she had no control over them. Once she found herself in Feudal China, but only for a very brief time, not longer than a night, because she was back at "home" the next morning, and another time she found herself in Ancient India, also for a very brief time. Every morning, she and Martin would talk about her dreams, at first he thought she was loosing her mind, but she never went into explicit details. She would just describe the places that she saw and what the people wore, and Martin would just sit and listen. He had told her that she had a very vivid imagination. She, of course, knew these places existed, but how was she going to explain that to Martin, so she just let him think it was her wild imagination. She found that she was experiencing a quiet peace that she never had before. She was able to talk to someone about what was happening to her, she had someone who cared for her enough to listen to her. She had someone who would listen without condemning her. She loved that. She craved that. That was the missing piece to her life, her life back with her parents.
As time went on, she and Martin would spend more and more time together. They would take long walks down to the lake, and stay together all day, much to the dismay of Mr. MacIntyre. Martin had chores and responsibilities that were not being fulfilled because of his attachment to her. Despite his father's disapproval of the time being spent, he didn't begrudge her. As it came upon the one year anniversary of her arrival to the MacIntyre family, she and Martin were sitting by the lake throwing stones into the lake, when their discussion took an interesting turn.
"Grace?"
"Yes"
"Do you like it here?"
"Yes, I love it here. Why do you ask?" she asked, closing her eyes as she laid down on the shore of the lake basking in the warmth of the sun
"Just wondering..you see..I was wondering, well we, that is my family and I were wondering.."
"Martin, you're mumbling"
"Aye, that I am."
"What's this about?" she asked, she was getting curious as to what Martin what getting at
When he didn't say anything, she opened her eyes to find him looking down at her. Before she could ask again, Martin had given her a soft kiss on the lips. Her eyes got wide and she pulled back slightly.
"Grace, please accept my apologies. I didn't mean to overstep my bounds."
She had read all about kissing on the Web, but reading about it and experiencing it were two completely different issues. She felt like she had a million butterflies trapped in her stomach, her face became flushed, and she felt what seemed like an electric current run through her body when his lips touched hers. This was a feeling unlike any other. She didn't know what to make of it. All she knew was that she wanted to feel it again.
"No. No, Martin. Don't apologize. You didn't overstep any bounds, it was just unexpected." She said as she leaned over to give him a kiss. This time catching Martin off guard. She remembered the look on his face, he never expected her to kiss him. Never the less, they enjoyed the moment for what is was. The moment they realized that they has intense feelings for one another, feelings that may be love.
Then one morning she awoke to find Martin sitting in the room that she shared with Agatha and Martha. She had been dreaming again, she had been "traveling" to yet another place she didn't recognize. He had this look of pure contempt in his eyes.
"Martin? What's wrong? Is everything alright?" She whispered not wanting to wake up the girls. It was unusual for Martin to be up in their room, she was concerned. Then he grabbed her by the arm, dragged her out of bed, hissed at her to be silent, shoved her out of the room and out of the house and ordered her to leave.
"Be gone from this place, woman!" Martin yelled as he let go of her arm
"Martin, what is wrong with you!" she yelled back
"Be gone, witch, you will not bring the devil upon my family, be gone or I will not be held accountable for my actions" he said with anger
"Witch?! What are talking about! I am no witch!"
"Aye, you are, witch, I saw you this very night, make the change into a wolf. I saw you with my own eyes. You changed into the wolf so you could work your dark magic on me and my brethren. I will not let you bring evil upon us." He said as he took a step forward threateningly.
"I what? I couldn't have! That is impossible! I would know if I could change into a wolf?" she said *I would, wouldn't I?* she thought to herself.
"Be gone! Leave this place and don't come back, I am no longer affected by your dark magic. I will no longer fall for you attempts to make me embrace evil. I have seen your true form. Now leave vile creature!" he hissed
She knew Martin too well, the look in his eyes told her everything. She knew that there was no talking to him. All she could do was run, she turned and ran as fast and as far as her legs could carry her. She didn't understand what was happening. *A wolf? How could I have changed into a wolf?* she kept thinking. *That explains the scratch marks on my bedroom walls and the torn pillows. That explains why I ended up in those strange places around the house. But how? Why?* She didn't know who long or how far she ran before she finally managed to stop running. She was exhausted. She had come upon a felled tree that had been hollowed out by the forest creatures and decided to take refuge there. As she curled up into the fetal position all she could think of was the look in Martin's eyes. He had this look of betrayal. He thought of her as a witch, as someone who violated his trust, his love. She couldn't bear to have him look at her that way. She started to cry, she cried for the loss of the only real family she knew and she cried for the loss of the only real person who loved her. As she drifted off to sleep, all she could think of what how sorry she was to bring such sorrow to the MacIntyres, to Martin.
A single tear fell down Grace's face. She quickly wiped it away. She realized that the time she spent with the MacIntyres was the really the first time that nothing weird happened. Nothing exploded, she didn't make anything move, she didn't have shredded pillows. That was the first time she was really and truly happy. "That was long ago, I have a real family now, they accept me for who I am, they love me and I love them, that is what is most important." she said to herself as she brought herself out of her revelry.
She wasn't hungry anymore, so she left the kitchen and headed for the shower. She was sore all over. "I definitely overdid it during training" she said to herself as she stepped into the shower. She decided to get a work out at the dojo today before work. Often times she found if she got out her aggressions at the dojo, then she could handle the trials and tribulations of her job. Being a female bartender was very demanding. Not because the job itself was taxing, but it was more fending off all the creeps and jerks who were constantly hitting on her. Tonight, somehow every drunk bastard that came near her manage to spill their drink on her. She smelt like a brewery. "If I didn't already have an aversion to alcohol, this would definitely do it" she muttered as she started to wash the stench of alcohol off her body. After washing her hair and body for the fourth time, she began to think about if she was going to see Jesse tonight. For the past three nights, she had dreamed, for the past three nights she had violated her brother's trust and attempted to contact someone or something that could provide answers, for the past three nights she still didn't have an answer, and for three nights HE was not there. She was beginning to wonder if he was real or was he a figment of her imagination or was he was something else. As she stepped out of the shower and dried off she began to remember that there was something special about Jesse. Something that she couldn't get out her mind. He had this look of pure unadulterated innocence. One look into his eyes told her that he was a man of his word and a man of conviction and passion. He was loyal to those he cared about. He was a man who would give up everything in order to help someone else. She liked that in him. "I hope you are real, Jesse Kilmartin. I hope you are real." She said aloud, hoping that somehow someway the universe would hear her and maybe, just maybe tonight, they might meet tonight.