Since you've been gone
I can breathe for the first time
- "Since You've Been Gone" by Kelly Clarkson
Bex was feeling extremely downhearted as she rode home in a taxi. Syndrome must have found out about her departure by this point - and she was almost worried that he would figure out some way of arriving at her destination before she did. Besides, she was returning into the black abyss - the miserable life and apartment that she and Eric shared.
She tried to comfort herself by saying that it would all be over soon, that the break up would lead to a small fight and then a rapid departure, and nothing more. Soon she'd be free of the chains of fear - free of all the heavy burdens she was carrying - free to do what she wanted. Free to go back to Syndrome.
"This where you wanted to go?" the taxi driver asked dubiously, interrupting Kauri's thoughts. Up until he had spoken, she hadn't even realized they'd stopped. He was studying the decrepit apartment building outside the window with distaste.
Bex sighed despondently. "Yeah, that's the place," she said.
"Doesn't look like the right spot for a nice girl like you," the driver said disapprovingly. "You sure you'll be ok?"
"Yeah," she said, nodding slowly. "I'm leaving this place today, anyway."
"Good for you," the taxi driver said. He turned around and said, "That'll be six fifty, by the way."
Bex handed the driver the money and stepped out of the vehicle with great reluctance. The taxi driver went off with a small wave, but Bex didn't notice it. She sighed again and approached the door.
One of the usual thugs was standing outside smoking. "'Sup, Bexer," he said, jerking his head in a motion of greeting.
She glanced at him. "I'm getting out of here tonight," she informed him.
He nodded slowly. "Better watch your back, then," he said. He nodded slightly towards the window of her apartment. "Your boyfriend got back earlier today, and he was pissed. Beat up three guys before stomping up to the room. You'll get the same treatment the moment you tell him that."
Bex shuddered involuntarily, but she forced herself to say, "We'll see about that."
The man snorted. "What, you gonna suddenly get the guts to fight back?" he asked disbelievingly.
"That was my plan."
He shook his head. "Good luck to you, Bexer," he said, throwing his cigarette into the ashtray by the front door and walking around the back. "Don't get killed. And don't leave any blood on the floor, either."
"Thanks," Kauri muttered sarcastically. She put her hand on the doorknob and pulled it open, walking inside.
She walked slowly up the stairs, reluctance growing in the pit of her stomach. Maybe she should just run. Maybe she should go back to Syndrome and let him deal with Eric. Or maybe she should run to the Parrs and tell them the whole story. Bob'd kick Eric's sorry ass so hard -
But there was no time for that. She heard a door fly open and an angry snarl of, "Bexer!"
Kauri swallowed hard. "Eric," she choked.
He came storming down the stares, slowly, deliberately, his rage written on every corner of his face. "'Eric, do you have any idea how good your girlfriend is in bed?'" Eric repeated what Syndrome had said in a singsong voice edged with deadly fury. "Would you care to tell me how he has any idea what your skills in bed are like?"
Bex crossed her arms over her chest and stood firm, despite the fact that she felt like running in the opposite direction. "You already know the answer to that," she said icily. "And I'm really surprised you care, since you haven't touched me since God-knows-when! Hell, you haven't even looked at me as human in three years! I'm just your personal punching bag that you can use to take out your anger whenever you feel like it! Well, no more, Eric! It's over. I can't just stand here and take this anymore."
"Take it?" Eric repeated. "You deserve it, you little slut! You ruined my life!"
"No," Kauri said scathingly, "You're the one who has done that. It's no one's fault but your own that everyone rejects you. Hell, you've even forgotten what it means to be a Super."
"You never knew what it meant to begin with!" Eric shouted.
The shouting didn't intimidate Kauri. After holding her emotions in for so long, she was letting them loose, like a dam being broken. "At least I'm not so self-righteous that I think it's only about the fame!" she hissed. "You pretend to save people while you let everyone else do the work and you expect everyone, even me, to love you and applaud and call you the biggest hero in the universe! Well, you can't do that anymore. You're nobody's hero - least of all mine!"
The last words hit a raw, wounded spot in Eric's soul, and he snarled furiously and hurled a stream of fire at Kauri. Kauri ducked just in time, and the stream caught the ceiling above her head and lit a mean blaze, crackling and hissing.
In the split second that it took her to duck, Kauri felt the two halves of her personality come together, and she could almost hear the satisfying click as they slid perfectly into one united piece. When she stood, she was no longer Bex, nor was she Static; she was simply Herself, complete and whole.
She looked at Eric briefly, studying the fury written across his features, and smiled complacently. Then, she raised her hand and knocked him flat with a bolt of lightning.
Eric screamed and writhed on the floor as the electricity ran through him, but the pain didn't keep him on the floor for long. He propped himself up high enough to aim a stream of water at Kauri. She turned and ran down the stairs, so that she could be standing on safer ground. Eric leapt to his feet and followed her, continuing the stream of water, putting out the fire on the staircase as he did so. "You won't get away that easily!" he growled, and lit a ring of fire around her.
In one fluid motion, Kauri crouched and then leapt over the blaze. The flames leapt higher, licking the soles of her shoes, but they weren't high enough to cause damage. She had escaped the first obstacle.
Eric swore profusely and put out the ring of fire, and then pointed towards the ground. Suddenly, mounds of earth busted through the floorboards, rising from beneath the wood and brick and blocking Kauri's path. The earth began to close over her head in an attempt to bury her alive, but Kauri was still wearing bits and pieces of her supersuit, which included what she liked to call an "ascension wristband." It had a rope and hook that would attach anywhere that she shot them. She aimed for the ceiling and watched as the hook leapt in the air and caught in the wood. Smirking, she climbed the rope nimbly before the dirt could collapse over her head, released the hook from the wood in the ceiling, and slid down to the floor.
Eric howled in rage and was after her in a flash, sending a tidal wave of water to flow after her. The wave rushed towards her at colossal speed and knocked her over, sending her crashing into the opposite wall. She groaned in agony, but she didn't have time to waste; Eric was rushing towards her through the water, ready to kill. Thinking quickly, Kauri plunged her hands into the water and set off the most incredible electrical shock of her life.
Eric stood in the water, sparking like mad, his mouth open in as he screamed in pain, but Kauri continued her attack. She watched him howling until it was only the shock of electricity that was holding him up, and then she released him. He fell face first into the water and laid there, completely knocked out.
Kauri stood. The power in the building had died as soon as she had begun her electrical attack, and people were coming out of their apartments and wondering what the hell was going on. Before anyone could notice her standing so conveniently at the scene of the crime, Bex turned and pulled open the front door. A river of water rushed out after her down the cement stairs of the building, drenching the man she had spoken to only ten short minutes before.
He swore as the water splashed over him and then looked up as Kauri went past. "What the fuck?" he said, by way of asking what had happened.
Kauri turned back to him and shrugged. "Waterline must've sprung a leak," she said with a brilliant smile, and then turned and went to the parking garage to get her car.