Chapter 17
This chapter is dedicated to Mayhem McGregor, known to the rest of the world as Jeff Thompson, one of the men who were killed by a crazed gunman in the club shooting in Columbus, Ohio. You are missed, my friend, you are terribly missed.
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Sara gritted her teeth. Her chest felt bruised and it hurt to breathe, her throat was so raw. What had happened to her? Clearly, the dream had been no dream. Ceto had hijacked her body and gone for a joyride. Or tried to anyway. She must have run afoul of Ian almost immediately, which could be both good and bad, depending on what she had done when they met.
At first, she had been too concerned about Ian to focus on her own discomforts, but he had finally stopped shaking and was cuddled up against her under the blankets Gabriel had piled over them. Nottingham weighed a goddamn ton. Not that she had noticed that at first either, but after the adrenaline rush had worn off, she definitely had. Not only was he heavy, but his weapons dug into her flesh in the oddest places.
Sara shoved him to the side. When he rolled, she smelled that odd combination of scorched cloth and skin that she had not thought to ever smell outside of a crime scene. Wondering if it was Ian or she, although Sara was betting on him as her chest felt more like she'd been shot that burned, Pezzini turned the blankets down.
"Uhm, Pez, flashing," Gabe choked out as Sara sat up. Her shirt had a huge hole in the chest, centered over her heart, but big enough and twisted around from her movements to expose most of one breast. He was friend enough to say something, but guy enough to ogle until she jerked a sheet over her chest.
"Ahem," Sara cleared her throat, jerking Bowman's attention back up to her face, "Turn around so I can see if I'm burned anywhere, you pervert."
"Uhhh, yeah, right," Gabe ducked his head, abashed, and spun his chair around. He didn't even try to deny the pervert part. What could he say? All men were. It was genetic.
Sara dropped the sheet and gently touched the blackened edge of the t-shirt. Other than feeling like a mule had kicked her, there was nothing. No burn, no bruise, nothing. Her old scar was a little dark maybe, but she didn't pay that much attention to it. The damn thing might look like that all the time, for all you could prove it by her.
Ok, she had gotten off all right, but had Ian? The burnt flesh smell had to be coming from somewhere. Almost afraid of what she would see, Sara carefully lifted the sheet away from the unconscious man's chest.
There was a black leather cord that led to the charred remnants of a bag. Further down were small bits of the bag, and charred cloth edging a pair of concentric circles burned into Nottingham's chest. The wound was red and raw, and looked deep. It was also, and this gave Sara pause, in the same place as the twin circles that Irons had told her were the mark of her destiny. What the Hell?
"Can I turn around now?" Gabe asked, wondering what was taking so long.
Sara grabbed an edge of the sheet and tucked it around her before saying, "Sure."
"So?"
"So what?" A glint of silver had caught the detective's eye, distracting her from the conversation.
"Are you ok?" Gabe barely refrained from rolling his eyes.
"I'm fine." She replied absently. Shifting gingerly, Sara reached down into the burned shirt.
Despite her concern and confusion, she couldn't help noticing how his skin felt under her fingers. His skin was soft, but the muscles underneath were not. Her hand tingled and Pez fought the urge to do a little exploring. Now was not the time. He was hurt, she was hurt, and Gabe was sitting five feet away, researching away on his laptop.
Finally her questing fingers touched cold metal. A sharp tingle went up her arm and Sara closed her hand over the familiar shape. Pezzini wasn't really surprised when she pulled the Witchblade out of Ian's shirt, not that she had been expecting it, but somehow it made sense for him to have it. He must have picked the Gauntlet up the night Carmelita had tried to kill her, and had been keeping it for her ever since.
Holding it between thumb and forefinger, Sara eyed the dull silver bracelet like it would turn and bite her at any moment. Ever since the Witchblade had come into her life, things had gone down the rabbit hole. She didn't trust it, but if Ceto had been telling the truth, the Blade was her best defense against the ancient serpent.
A snort of laughter escaped the brunette, bringing Gabriel's attention away from the monitor. "What's so funny?"
"I never thought I'd think of the Witchblade as the lesser evil." Sara shook her head ruefully, "But I've just come to the conclusion that if it's her or the Blade, I'm going to choose…"
"Hey! I thought that was gone?" Gabe scrambled out of his seat to get a better look at the small silver bracelet.
"So did I. I guess Nottingham was holding on to it for me. Good thing too, this must be how he drove Ceto out of my body." Sara held the artifact up to the light. The metal wasn't as bright as she remembered it being, the stone murky instead of that clear carnelian. Nor had the Witchblade assaulted her with visions or the urge to put it back on.
"It looks pretty beat up. Do you suppose whatever Carmelita did to you that night damaged it?" Gabriel watched the Gauntlet through the fringe of his dark bangs, wanting to touch it but knowing better.
"I think that's a safe assumption." Sara tilted the Witchblade, trying to see if there was any spark inside the gem. It lay quiet in her hand, no sign of the power that had saved her life.
Looking from the bracelet to the still-unconscious Nottingham, Pezzini began to piece together just what must have happened. The Gauntlet had been too weak to save her by itself, so it used Ian for power like an electronic device drew on a battery. No wonder he was out cold.
Sara closed the Witchblade in her fist, wondering if it had enough power by itself to keep Ceto out of her head. "Hey Gabe, you up for a little experiment?"
"What are you thinking?" Gabriel asked warily.
"I'm wondering if the Witchblade has enough juice to protect me. It looks pretty wasted." Sara paused, "I have to sleep sometime, and I don't want to wake up like this again."
"Yeah, I can understand that." Gabe gave her a sympathetic look.
"So, what I was thinking was, I put the Witchblade on and take a nap. You hang out with the dagger, just in case Ceto can take me over again. If she does, you can drive her out like last time." Sara opened her hand and looked at the bracelet.
"Whoa there Pez, are you sure you want to put that thing on? I mean, what if does to you what it did to Nottingham?" Gabe gestured to the assassin, still unconscious despite being shifted around and having Sara fishing around in his shirt.
"Huh. I don't know Gabriel, but my options are not real great right now. You've brought over some things that might work, and might not." Bowman started to cut in but Pezzini held up her hand for silence, "The knife worked for you, but you had to speak Greek."
"I'm not very fluent in Greek, Sara. I can read it much, much better than I can speak it. That was mostly by rote, I can teach it to you." Gabriel said earnestly.
"No thanks. I can barely order from the Mr. Gyro's menu." Sara deliberately pronounced it gi-ro instead of yee-ro, just to watch Gabe wince.
"Ok, but ask yourself, would you be putting it back on if there wasn't the whole snake-y possession thing hanging over your head?" Gabriel leaned forward to impress his seriousness on the stubborn brunette.
"No, but it is, and hypothetical questions don't mean shit when reality is kicking your ass." She was more afraid of being possessed again than she was of putting on the Gauntlet, but that didn't mean she was happy about wearing it again.
"You're going to do it no matter what I say, aren't you?" Gabe threw up his arms in irritation. Making decisions based on fear never worked out well for anyone.
"Yeah, I am. You got my back, or do I need to wait on Nottingham to wake up?" Pez pushed, knowing Bowman would agree to help sooner if pressured. She didn't want to have a lengthy discussion with him; her eyes were getting heavy again. She needed to sleep, and between the nightmare and then the possession, she hadn't gotten any to speak of since Ian had left the day before.
"I got you." Gabriel sighed and walked over to where he had left the ceremonial dagger. "But I don't think you've thought this through."
"Look, it didn't happen to you, so you have no idea. Waking up and knowing that your body had been off doing whatever without you is pretty damn scary. I hate being out of control, and that's about as far out of it as you can go. The Witchblade might drag me into things I'd rather not have anything to do with, but I was still me. Trust me, there's nothing else I've been thinking about since I woke up." Sounding about as defeated as Gabe could ever imagine her sounding, Sara put the bracelet on her wrist.
There was a soft hum and the stone glowed faintly for a moment, then everything was silent again. For Sara it felt like a bone that had been popped out of its socket had just gone back in. Tension she hadn't even been aware of evaporated, leaving her feeling more relaxed.
Gabriel let out his breath in a sigh of relief. It didn't look like anything had happened. "How do you feel?"
"Better, believe it or not, but still sleepy." She paused to yawn widely, "I'm just gonna sleep right here."
Before Gabriel's astonished eyes, Sara slid down and used Nottingham's muscular bicep for a pillow. Shortly after that, she began to snore softly. The sound made Gabe grin. He was going to give her so much shit for this. He wondered if he could pick up her snoring on his laptop's microphone.
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A/N: Sorry about the length of time between posts. I just had more to deal with than I could handle. When Jeff died, and in such a senseless fashion, I just... couldn't find any joy in anything, including writing.