Disclaimer: I don't own anything from the movie Collateral, Red Eye, Iron Man, or anything Joss Whedon.

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Chapter Nine – Shut Up and Let Me Go

Denial. It was usually the first step. She didn't believe her father was dead.

No, wait, it had been anger. She'd rushed at Vincent, absolutely believing that he had done it, but no, denial had come quickly, pushing her into panic mode. She ran away, and her intent was to get out of the building, to get back home, to see for herself.

But fear was pushing at both of them. The horror of the news he'd delivered seemed to be in competition with the horror of Vincent's presence. She heard him behind her, heard him call her name once or twice. She had to get away from him. Everything depended on it.

She didn't have a chance.

They rounded some corner, and her ankle twisted in her rush. She made only a light fumble, but it was enough. He slammed into her from behind, and mashed her into a wall, taking the breath from her lungs.

She tried to scream, but didn't have the air. He pulled back for a second and spun her around, and she looked up into his face.

This wasn't happening. It was a nightmare, brought on by her drinking. She was actually still asleep in her room, and she was going to wake up any second—

Her breath came back. She managed to get the first part of a scream out before his hand nearly stuffed itself inside her mouth. His thumb went into her jaw, pressing hard on a nerve that caused her to wince. Then, with a power she didn't know a person could have, he forced her jaw to close. Her teeth ground together painfully, but she had a second surge, and started to struggle against him, kicking and squirming.

"Stop it," he ordered her in a harsh, breathy voice. He was so close to her – bodies locked together, almost like lovers, but brutal. She could suddenly feel every inch of him touching every inch of her, and intimately – bones grinding, his thigh between her legs, pinning her hard.

She fought harder. It took every ounce of strength she had, but the knowledge of her father's death surged again in her brain, like a bad drug. Vincent swore in a language she didn't recognize, yanked her away from the wall, and the next thing she knew, they were in blackness.

A closet. He'd found a closet and put her in the corner, imprisoning her there, his body the only barrier. He held her tightly until she lost her breath again, and her energy was slowly sapped from her. Finally, realizing there was no getting away, she instead turned her head as far from him as possible.

His face had been pressed right against hers, cheek to cheek, the stubble of his beard scratching her neck in an unwelcome and intimate manner. She could feel his breath, smell his toothpaste. His lips were against her jaw, and she could hear him murmuring things into her ear, things her brain couldn't process.

"Calm down, breathe," she finally understood. His hand was against her mouth again, had been this entire time, and somehow he had her lips smashed so tightly against her teeth that she couldn't begin to open them. But the smell of him, and the taste – it assaulted her, filled her, until she felt like she was practically inside him, or he was inside her.

She twisted her neck, trying to gain some room. Finally, he said, his mouth causing her earlobe to move with the motion, "I'll take my hand away, but you can't scream again. Understand? Nod if you understand."

It took a few seconds for her mind to comprehend, but she did. Slowly, she jerked her head up and down. He lowered his hand and clean air filled her nostrils. She stretched her lips, moistening them. Damn, his taste was even more intense.

"Hurry up," she bit, her voice raspy.

"Hurry up what?" he asked, looking at her carefully.

She glared at him. It was accompanied by a heavy sneer of her upper lip. "Kill me. Like you did my father. Kill me quickly. You owe me that much."

He blinked. She thought he'd come to kill her. Well, it was a natural assumption and he couldn't blame her. Still…"I'm not here to kill you."

"Liar." She turned her head away. "You're just such a liar. You've never told the truth, not once."

"I've never lied to you," he said, feeling indignant, in spite of the trauma of the situation. "I'm not going to kill you, Callie. If I was, I would have done it in the hallway. I would have just shot you, like anyone else. Why would I be bothering with all of this?"

"Because I ran away from you," she said, with an insanely calm kind of logic that he couldn't fault. "I rushed you in the hallway before you could get a good aim, and then you didn't want to risk misfiring when you were chasing me. So just get it over with!" Her voice rose, and he pressed a finger to her lips, hard.

"For the third, and last, time, I'm not here to kill you. If I'd wanted to kill you, I would have done it long before tonight."

"Whatever," she spat, words distorted but understandable behind his imposing digit. "You killed my father, didn't you?"

He looked very serious. "No, I didn't."

"Liar!" Now she was loud, and he was going to gag her if she kept it up. He grabbed her face, squeezing her cheeks in with his fingers and thumb, causing her lips to protrude.

"I told you to be quiet," he hissed at her, his spit and breath fanning over her face. She winced, closing her eyes.

"You killed him," she whispered, eyes still tightly squeezed shut. "I know you did."

"No, you don't," he spat back at her with contempt. "You don't know shit, and you never have, and at this rate, you never will. I didn't kill your father, and if you say I did again it's really going to piss me off."

She opened her eyes. How they blazed at him! "Is that supposed to scare me? You getting pissed? You don't know pissed, asshole!" she growled, starting to wiggle again. It would have been impressive if she hadn't been talking through overly-puckered lips, caused by the hold he still had on her face.

And to her astonishment, he chuckled. "No, sweetie, it's you that doesn't know." And then he kissed her.

She protested with a loud, angry whimper – as loud as it could get with his lips squashed over hers. He pulled back, sure now that he had her full attention. He kept his eyes level with hers, his face only an inch away from hers.

"Now listen to me, very carefully. I did not kill your father. But the man who did is coming here to kill you. I'm here to protect you, you stupid bitch."

She did not believe him. It sparkled in her eyes, like light glinting off sharp metal. And the sudden burst of profanity, directed at her, surprised both of them. "Why?" she demanded.

Vincent did not answer. He pulled his gun and showed it to her. "See this? It's neat and simple. Painless, mostly, unless people try to be cute. And I'm good with it. But this other guy, his name is Rochester—"

He saw recognition dance across her face. He pushed it aside, intent on asking her later.

"—is a different kind of animal. And if he gets a hold of you, Callie, it's going to make everything that happened to you that night with me look like a romantic evening at a fucking amusement park. Do you understand?"

He let it sink in for a second, and then was quite satisfied to hear her say, "Yes."

"Now, you and I are going to walk out of this closet, and we're going to leave the building. You're going to come with me and I'm going to take you somewhere safe. Do you understand?"

She looked puzzled, and still insanely angry, but she nodded.

He tucked the gun away, seized hold of her upper arm painfully hard, digging fingers through muscle until they nearly hit bone, and dragged her behind him. He cracked open the closet door, and when he was sure that the hallway was empty, he stepped out, her with him. They managed to get down the hallway and turn two corners before there was a loud click behind them.

"Let go of my sister," Ray Fanning said.

Vincent froze. He'd been watching, but the corridors were dark. He'd been thinking too much about exactly what was going to happen next…he hadn't been watching carefully enough, and this guy had now snuck up on him.

He was going to regret this, but it was necessary.

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Callie could not believe that this was happening.

"I said let go," Ray said again, calmly. Callie felt Vincent's fingers unclench, felt the blood start flowing again. But she didn't move.

"Callie, step away," Ray told her. There was something really wrong with his face. It was wild – his normally smoothed back hair was going in all directions, bent and kinked down across his forehead and even into his eyes. The hand gripping his firearm, pointed levelly at Vincent's head, seemed to tremble. "Now turn around!" he ordered Vincent.

Vincent turned. Carefully, but unhurried, and certainly unconcerned. Callie suddenly had a terrible flash of that first moment in the alley…when she realized what Vincent was…those two street punks had had a gun right in his face, and he had killed them in two seconds. Probably less.

"No, Ray," she said, her voice scratchy. "Don't."

"Be quiet Callie," Ray ordered her sharply. To Vincent, he said, "You son of a bitch. You monster. How could you do that to—" His voice cut off, choked. His hand was shaking a bit more now. "You…bastard…"

"Ray," Callie warned, "Ray, please!"

"SHUT UP!" Ray barked at her. Callie saw Vincent move, saw his hand go to his back waistband, where the gun was tucked. She remembered the move, remembered it as clearly as if she'd just seen it two minutes ago. And she lunged forward, grabbing her brother around the waist and tackling him to the floor.

His gun went off and plaster from the ceiling showered down on them. There was yelling and a commotion, and when Callie looked up, it was Bill who was standing over her, asking her if she could get up on her own, making sure she wasn't injured.

Vincent was gone.

Bill pulled her to her feet and Ray dragged himself up. Everyone was talking at once – Bill asking her questions, Ray swearing at her, demanding to know why she'd done that, and then Bill trying to tell Ray to calm down, and more swearing from Ray.

"SHUT UP!" Callie screeched, a few centimeters away from Ray's face. The tactic seemed to work – Ray stopped talking, but only for a second. His next words were much, much worse than any profanity.

"Dad's dead."

In her mind, she wanted to say, "I know." She wanted to hug him, she wanted to cry with him. But her brain had hit its maximum point, and this confirmation, coming from her brother, was just too much. Systems shut down. Everything had to reboot.

And she fainted.

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Consciousness was almost more of a shock than the faint. It was as if Callie's brain had just suddenly realized that it was sleeping, and that it shouldn't be. She drew in a sharp breath and half-rose off the bed. Blinking wildly, she realized she was back in her room, at the institute, and someone was with her, talking to her in a soothing tone.

"It's okay," Laurie said, sitting on the bed beside her. "You're okay, you're safe."

She looked at him, made a strange choking sound, and then fell back again. "I'm not okay," she croaked. It sounded horrible.

Laurie sighed, deeply. "I know. Here, drink some water. It's cold."

Callie pushed herself up onto her elbows, moving slowly, because her head felt swimmy. Laurie pressed the straw to her lips, but she spat it out.

"I can't drink water through a straw," she grumbled.

He frowned at her. "Why not?"

"Pet peeve," she answered. He sighed at her in annoyance and removed the straw.

"Don't choke," he said, tipping the edge of the glass against her lips. She drank a little at first, and then nearly drained half the glass. "Easy," he warned, and put the glass back.

"What happened?" she asked, still feeling fuzzy.

"You passed out. It must have been shock." Laurie had his cane between his legs and was leaning on it with his wrists crossed over the handle. "Do you remember what happened?"

She lay back down, blinking rapidly. Yes, she remembered. As if it were all there in a picture and all she had to do was look to take in the whole thing. Every single detail sharp and clear. She drew a heavy breath, and then pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes.

"Yeah," she said, and then the tears came. She was surprised that she had the energy to cry them, but they came. She felt Laurie stroking her shoulder, and she popped back up again, clinging to him. He held her closely, cradling her.

She wasn't sure how long the storm lasted. She knew it felt good to be in Laurie's arms. She knew she was in the only safe place in the world at that moment. Or at least the only place that felt safe. Then she realized that Laurie was talking in a soft voice, and it wasn't to her.

"Going to be a while," came the reply. Callie lifted up her head and peeked over Laurie's shoulder to see Bill just inside the doorway. He looked like hell…she almost felt sorry for him. "He wasn't supposed to leave."

"He's not going to get into trouble," Laurie grumped in disgust. "That'd be stupid. He had an emergency and good reason to leave the scene. See what happened here?"

"What are you talking about?" Callie asked, wiping her cheeks and sniffing hard.

"Your brother," Laurie said. "He had to go answer questions. Police procedure. Now that you're awake, there's a detective outside who wants to talk to you, too. And there's two police officers guarding your door, and a third patrolling the windows outside that wall." Laurie pointed to the small windows, barred as they were.

"Fuck them," Callie growled. "I don't want to talk to anybody."

"I know," Laurie said soothingly. "But you're going to have to. In a little bit."

She looked at him sourly. Then she slumped back against the pillows of her bed, dejected. "Who cares? What are they going to do to me, throw me in jail? What can anybody do to me right now?"

Laurie and Bill exchanged looks. Callie was a rollercoaster and it was no surprise. She was sinking into the black, and as much as they wanted to help her, she just needed time.

"You want to be alone?" Laurie asked softly.

She thought about it for a moment, and then sighed. "Yeah. Please. I just want to…I don't know." She slid farther down, and turned so that she was curled away from them. "I just want everyone to leave me alone."

Laurie patted her lightly and got off the bed, following Bill out of the room. "If you need anything, just shout," Laurie said, and closed the door behind him.

Callie lay on the bed, trying to clear out her head. Now that she was alone, she realized it was a mistake. She didn't want to be alone. Being alone made it harder to deal with the truth that her father was dead.

Her father was dead.

But who had killed him?

Vincent swore he didn't. Not that his word meant much…but just the fact that he was here and she was still breathing spoke worlds. He told her, quite forcefully, as if offended, that he wasn't going to kill her.

Then what the hell was he doing here? Who was his target?

He'd said he was going to protect her. He'd tried to make her leave with him. It had to be more manipulation, more bullshit. More of him using her to get what he wanted. She was an easy mark, he knew that. He could use her and dispose of her and never have to worry…

A rational voice in her head spoke up, uninvited. It pointed out that Vincent had explained to her that Rochester, the man she had briefly met at the bar, had killed her father. Why would he do that? He also said that Rochester was coming to kill her. That didn't surprise her too much – she'd been waiting for someone to try and kill her for almost three weeks now. It seemed a relief to finally have a solid place to put that fear.

She rolled onto her back and shut her eyes. Nothing made sense…her brain couldn't be working right. Vincent couldn't care if she lived or died -- he didn't believe there was any good reason to live or to die. Not for anyone, not even himself. So why would he bother? Why would he go through so much trouble for her? It had to be a trick. A plan. A scheme. Nothing else made sense.

And then her brain did what she had wanted it to do all night. It went blank. Precisely, it went blank because there was suddenly a hand across her mouth, and an unfamiliar weight straddling her hips. Her hands flew up as her eyes opened, and she saw only a dark blur as the figure straddling her managed to get both her wrists pinned above her head in its other hand.

Finally, she got her eyes to focus. And what she saw did not surprise her. It was the man from the bar, who called himself Chess.

Rochester.

He smiled down at her. "Having a rough night, Calliope love?"

She didn't even have the strength to glare at him.

"Aw, poor baby. You're probably in that stage right now where you just don't want to live anymore. Usually happens in severe depression. But you know, it can always, always get worse."

He had a strange way of talking. A wiry kind of intensity that seemed to run through him like a live current of electricity, and at the moment, he seemed to have it barely under control. He was a colossal thunderstorm hiding behind fluffy white clouds. The rumble of his thunder echoed in the distance, threatening.

"Fuck you," she managed under his hand, muffled as it was.

"Well, actually," he said, looking thoughtful, "that is on the menu. But somehow, baby, I'm thinking that if we get into it right now, it'll be a rush job, and neither of us will leave satisfied. Now, you promise to be a good girl and I'll take my hand away, and we can talk like partly-civilized people, except for the whole me-straddling-you thing. Otherwise, you can scream and fuss, and watch me kill some more people tonight. Do you really think you could take that, sweetums?"

She shook her head.

"Then you're going to play nice for now and be quiet?"

She nodded. There was apathy in her eyes, and it was throwing him off. But he took his hand away, and she stayed silent.

"You're the one who killed my father," she said in a dead voice.

"Oh, so my reputation proceeds me," he said, sounding satisfied. "Did you get to see my work personally?" His answer was the lethargy in her eyes being smoldered by a slowly building white-hot rage. This seemed to excite him. "You know, I'd heard you were a firecracker, but up until now I wasn't believing the stories."

"Go ahead and do whatever you like," she said, her words coming from the bittern cavern that had replaced her heart. "Vivisect me for all I give a shit. You'd be doing me a favor. Dying can't hurt more than living right now."

"Ah, that's the grief talking. You know, sometimes I do get ahead of myself. When we dance, sugar, I want to make sure that I've got all of your attention. It's just no fun when the other party's mind is somewhere else. I'm pretty selfish – I don't like sharing you with anyone else." His eyes sparkled. "And right now, I'm doing just that, aren't I?"

She narrowed her eyes. "I don't know what you're rambling—"

"Vincent," Rochester said, smiling like a crocodile. "Your knight in shining – well, more like tarnished – armor. He was here, wasn't he? I can smell his aftershave on you." Rochester dipped down his head, taking a heavy sniff of her neck. She tried to shy away but there was nowhere to go. "Hmm…very uncharacteristic. You know, he used to be so good at this job. Not artistic, like me, but very efficient and effective. He's still got some skills, but he's got a big old weight hanging off his leg right now, and it's going to slow him down."

"You're crazy."

He chuckled. "Spoken like a woman in denial. I can't blame you, it's not exactly flattering. But he's going through some serious effort to keep you alive. Which means that you and I can't enjoy our private time until he's out of the way."

She scowled. "So you can't kill me until after you've killed Vincent? Why?"

"Because I don't rush for anything," he said in a slow kind of purr. "The thought of being interrupted…unbearable. So I'll let it ride for now, let the anticipation build. It'll be so much better that way."

"Why not just do it quickly and get it over with!" she barked, a bit too loudly.

He glared at her. "You don't tell Van Gogh how to paint sunflowers, do you?" And then, abruptly, he smiled, and stood up. He backed up, using the footboard of the bed, and reached up toward the ceiling, where a large vent sat in the middle. It slid out easily in his hands, and he let it fall with a loud crash that made her jump. Then, as if he could fly, he disappeared up into the opening, vanishing without another sound.

The cops came in, summoned by the crash. They only saw Callie, sitting on the bed, looking at Rochester's escape route. They tried to find him, and came up empty.

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Me: Are we going to do one of these every time?

Jackson: You sort of have to. You've set up a pattern and if you skip it, people will notice.

Vincent: And then they'll come looking for you, and this cab. That's not good.

Me and Jackson: Huh?

Vincent: Sorry, wrong movie.

Me: No, it's the right movie, just the wrong part. And that really, really wasn't nice to call Callie a stupid bitch. I'm going to get complaints.

Vincent: Well, that's your fault. I mean, how intense did you have to make it all, anyway? And why the hell did I have to find her dad?

Me: I dunno, I thought it was poetic. Or something. Look, it was hard enough to decide to off him, let alone how he got offed. And come on, we waited like eight freaking chapters for you and Callie to finally reunite! There were going to be some sparks and not all of them pretty as fireworks.

Jackson: Where did Bill and Rochester go?

Me: Bill had to get back to his gig with Joss Whedon. And Rochester…well…I don't want to talk about it.

Vincent: What are you babbling about?

Me: Well, turns out Callie is a Marvel fangirl, and…well…

Vincent: Oh, no! That's just going too far!

(Vincent runs out of the room.)

Jackson: Is that true?

Me: No, I just said that to get a moment's peace. Okay, everybody, go review!