Saying that Reggie was angry was a wrong assumption: he was furious. They had agreed to do this together, as brothers. But once again Delsin had decided to follow his own lead and get himself into more trouble, making his own life all the more harder. He didn't even know why they were doing this, it was not like they had agreed to hunt down every bioterrorist they'd cross paths with. Reg would have never supported that. He had hardly agreed with the original plan and still was desperately searching for other ways to solve their problems back home. But of course Delsin had to go play the hero, expecting praise and acceptance wherever he would show up, leaving Reggie behind and ignoring his advice and warnings effectively.

But he wasn't as angry at Delsin as he was afraid. He had seen what a bioterrorist could do, and every time Delsin charged into trouble head first, Reggie just remembered what someone with those powers could do to him, to everyone. He would think of the day that truck had crashed before the long house, when one of them had used Delsin as a shield to protect himself from Reggie, when said conduit had burned down the warehouse with Betty still inside. And the image of the long house filled with almost the whole tribe, disfigured and handicapped by gruesome shards of concrete growing out of various body parts would flash before his eyes. And not even Delsin with his new found powers had been an exception, laying there unconscious even longer than most of the others. Maybe his little brother had forgotten that he still was vulnerable, but Reggie had not. He would look for his brother's back, because Delsin would most certainly not, even if he claimed otherwise.

But it was a difficult task to just do that when said person just ran off alone, leaving him behind to figure out on his own where his smoking ass would stir up trouble next. By now Reggie knew his way around, using his brain -which, if he was being quite honest, Delsin sometimes seemed to lack entirely- and every advantage he got from his job as sheriff. Delsin may have not told him the correct address, but a full name nonetheless. From there it had been easy to figure out where to go to aid his brother, but not before beating some sense into that hollow skull of his. As he approached the right apartment block, he just hoped that he had arrived in time.

Immediately after opening the door a crack wide open as quietly as possible she heard a male stern voice talking about some sort of crime. Tensing up for a second, she focused on the oddly familiar voice, trying to find the matching face and listening for more information. When realization dawned upon her, she felt slightly relieved but also annoyed and silently cursed her own moment of stupidity. The voice belonged to a newsreader of the one newscast she always watched. And as long as that guy had not decided to intrude her home personally she was fairly certain someone else than her had turned on her television and watched the news. In her living room. On her crappy TV. It took all her will power to not just burst through that door and turn whoever it was into a nice and fragile ice sculpture which could shatter so easily. Yet she would do better without a confrontation, as she did not even know how many there were in total, if they were still there at all. Who knows, maybe they had already left and just forgotten to turn off the T.V.?

Ever so slowly she opened the door just enough to slip through the gap, closing it as soundlessly as she had opened it. The flat was in complete darkness, the TV the only source of light. And there she saw him, sitting on her couch completely relaxed, his back facing the door and watching the news. The dude who had almost shot her, revealed her identity to the world and pursued her through the streets of Seattle as if she'd been an escaped chicken, that Bannerman. She could have shot him right there and then, not really caring for the reason he had decided to show up at all if he just sat there to watch the news and disregarding anything else entirely. But chances were that he was more alert than he let on, and even if he had not noted her presence now, he certainly would if she decided to attack him. Even though she did not want to admit it, but she wasn't as angry at him as she was afraid. Not only afraid of how strong he was, but of the possible consequences his actions could have brought with him.

No, as long as he was still oblivious to her presence, she would go all Sly Cooper and sneak her way around him, grab some things and be gone through the window in her bedroom before he even realized what had been going on. And as long as that guy decided to not let his gaze wander away from the TV screen, he would not be able to keep an eye on the rest of her flat.

On her tiptoes and in a slightly crouched position she slowly walked to the open door, her back almost pressed to the cold wall behind her, creating as much space between them as possible without making too much of a detour. Her eyes never left his back, her whole body tensing up whenever he moved as much as a muscle. When she had almost reached the door leading to her bedroom, he turned his head over his shoulder. She stood there, completely frozen in place and watching him wide-eyed, as he shortly inspected the door she had come through just a minute ago. He had not seen her yet, as she was more to his left and he had been looking over his right shoulder. If he decided to take a full look around though, she would be spotted.

A little bit too hasty she grabbed the door handle to her bedroom, opened the already slightly ajar door and walked into it as silently as possible for her. The moment she was in the dark room, she closed the door completely, producing almost no sound at all. Yet a muffled cry of surprise sounded from the other side, undoubtedly coming from that guy, quickly followed by some rumbling and quick footsteps.

"Oh Skit, får i helvete.*."

She had only a few seconds to come up with a new plan. On first instinct though she threw her whole bodyweight against the door, pushing herself against it to keep it shut close and him out.

'Keep him out. Don't let him in.'

Surprisingly, it worked more or less, but she noticed all too quickly that the guy on the other side could very well overpower her and push the door open if he tried a little bit longer. She had to keep him out while she'd have to find a bag, some cash she had hidden in her bedroom, an outdated cellphone she kept in here in case her actual phone got lost, some clothes and her USB stick. She'd rather burn in hell than leaving that tiny piece of technology behind. But that would come to happen if she couldn't figure out a way to get the door closed permanently without her pushing against it.

She almost didn't hear the muffled voice of the conduit outside her room trying to talk to her. Sentences like 'Come on, I just want to talk','Just listen to me' and 'I don't want to hurt you, you can trust me, we're on the same side here' quickly turned into 'Come out there, young lady, we seriously need to talk' -which actually sounded more playful than demanding, but she really wasn't in the mood to laugh about it right now- 'I'd rather not make some alterations to your door' and 'If you don't let me in, I will.'. It really sounded like the stereotypical crazy lunatic who was obviously out to kill his victim but tried to gain their trust anyway, and she was the stupid teenager trapped in the old garage trying to save herself from getting murdered brutally. Question was: would she be the main protagonist and survive or just some side character whose demise had been certain from the beginning?

She looked around for anything to help her get out of this situation without using the last bit of her powers to create a thick ice wall between them. Because there was no water to give her additional strength; She was almost completely drained while he was probably all powered up and would burn through the thickest and most solid wall she could create right now in no time, leaving herself completely defenceless afterwards. Chances got higher that she really wasn't the main protagonist who survived the horror film. But then her gaze wandered to her feet, to the floor she was standing on and the tiny gap between the floor and the door she tried to block. An idea sprung to her mind. It would certainly be less exhausting than making a solid block of ice and buy her at least a tiny bit of time.

The pushing and banging against the door got stronger and he was about to break through. In a fluid motion she raised her foot, focused her powers to her sole and stomped on the floor. A thin layer of ice spread over the floor, covering it entirely and spreading even into the living room, even under the feet of the bannerman. The surface was smooth, but she had no problems with standing straight and moving safely on her own ice, a surprised cry followed by a loud thump and the lack of further banging against the door though told her that the conduit outside wasn't doing nearly as well as she was. A small smile crept on her lips as she heard his muffled complaints, mixed with some admiration and praise directed towards her powers, but there was no time to appreciate the indirect compliment. She grabbed the door handle froze it as well, making it impossible to get into the room without breaking through the whole damn thing which would be a rather difficult task if one had no secure footing. Yet it would only take him a couple of minutes at most to remember that smoke was rather effective against ice, so she wouldn't risk dawdling.

She hurried to her wardrobe and tore the door open, frantically digging through her ordered piles of clothes, searching for a bag big enough to carry all the stuff she needed to take with her she had put somewhere way in the back ages ago. When she found it, she could still hear the bannerman's swearing:
"That's cool and all, turning your apartment into an ice rink, reeeeally funny. Look how much I am laughing right no- whoa!"

'Maybe he isn't as smart as I thought.'

She heard another crash, indicating that he was trying and miserably failing at getting up. Meanwhile she had found her bag and had already started throwing random pieces of clothes into it. When she had decided that she had gathered enough of them, she ran to her bed stand and threw the medicine bottle filled with her remaining cash into the bag, and grabbed the flash light that had her USB stick tucked up in the space where the batteries actually belonged to. The sound of the bannerman failing to stand up had stopped, and Ella was actually quite sure he wasn't the type who just gave up and instead decided to sit there until the ice would melt on it's own. Her suspicions were confirmed when she heard the doorknob rattling, followed by some swearing:

"Your apartment really reflects your icy personality, do you know that?"

She had just gathered the emergency cellphone when she heard him making that awful joke and she would have rolled her eyes, but coupled with the situation she was in right now she widened her eyes in fear instead. The lunatic killer was about to get to his victim. But said victim had collected everything she needed and was about to make her dashing escape. She closed her bag, put the strap over her shoulder and ran to her still closed window and opened it quickly with her trembling hands.

All of a sudden a loud explosion erupted right behind her, and she could hear the door banging violently against the wall before landing with a dull thud on the floor. She threw a panicked glance over her shoulder and saw the conduit standing right there where her door had been only moments ago, a mixture of annoyance and smugness adorning his face. Smoke and tinder danced around his rather intimidating silhouette and as he stepped over the bedroom door which had burned and glowing marks on it's surface.

"I never really liked winter that much, I always was a summer's boy."

He might as well have said 'Here's Johnny!'. But she still had a chance, the window was wide open and big enough for her to fit through. And as a conduit she'd definitely survive a fall from such a hight, there was still a chance of escape. But apparently it had also dawned on the bannerman, as that smug expression turned into an alert one, immediately dashing forward to drag her back into the room.

She was halfway through the window, panic and terror swelling up in her chest and clouding her thoughts, every part of her body and mind had just one goal in mind: Get away! The feeling just intensified when she could feel a pair of big hands grabbing her and pulling her in again. In that moment her instincts took over completely and she began trashing and kicking wildly in an desperate attempt to squirm out of his grasp, screaming at him to let go of her. But that obviously didn't help, his arms kept her in an unyielding clutch, so she resorted to the last weapon she had. First she tried to dash away from him, but that would not work, she just couldn't turn herself into a cloud of snow and ice while being held by another conduit. So when that did not work, she started to push the remains of her stored up energy out of her body, and in no time ice and snow swirled around them, hitting various objects in her room, shattering the light bulb above them and freezing the whole place. Still she couldn't get away, but she couldn't stop herself from blasting her ice everywhere either. Not one shot hit him or caused a reaction where he would let go of her, and her already low reserves dried up fast. But she couldn't stop.

She was trapped, unable to run away and overpowered. The guy was shouting something at her, but it was just incomprehensible noise in her ears. When there was no power left that she could release from her hands, she felt the lack of energy numbing her limbs and her trashing lessened. When her protest had died down enough so that he felt secure enough to lessen his grip, she saw her opportunity. In one last attempt she gathered her last bits of energy one last time and dove forward, breaking through his iron grip and heading towards the window again. But his hand quickly shot forward again and his hot fingers curled around her cold skin. He pulled her away again, the motion so strong she unintentionally turned around and faced him. She tried to jerk her arm away from his grasp, but instead it just slipped down her arms as their fingers intertwined.

Suddenly her palms started burning as if he had just released a smoke bomb right into her palm. But when she looked down in shock and pain, she could see their hands glowing ominously, tiny shards of ice erupting from her palms and wandering in a swirling motion right into his hand while little snowflakes danced around their fingers. Something pulled at her powers, her energy, her being and her first instinct was to fight against that sudden and unexpected intrusion. But her efforts were in grasp on reality was slipping away fast and memories long buried in the depth of her mind were flashing right in front of her eyes once more. She quickly lost consciousness while reliving the torn and dishevelled pieces of her past.

Her father standing in their frozen kitchen...Him making some phone calls...her standing in the forest, smiling contently, some trunks littered with ice shards and her father patting her shoulder proudly...a frozen pool in a public swimming hall...she laying in a hospital, restrained, a doctor accompanied by two soldiers clad in yellow and black armour taking some blood samples of her...she sitting in the darkness of a large depot inside a ship...a small group with glowing hands, she a part of them, travelling from town to town...more and more members of the group going missing...the remaining members departing, trying their luck on their own.

When she got out of her daze she was laying on the cold floor, feeling terribly awful and unnaturally depleted. But her strength thankfully returned to her faster than normal, but only to the state she had been in before the guy had decided to pull off his scary mind-invading trick. She needed a moment to gather her thoughts until she remembered who was responsible for the miserable state she was in. She was wide awake again in not time, eyes searching for the conduit's presence. She spotted him laying right next to her, even in a weaker state than she was right now and only one question came to her mind: What had he done?

If she had been afraid of him before, she certainly was terrified of him now. His strange power somewhat intrigued her, she had never even heard of such an ability -whatever that ability actually was or what it was good for- but at the same time it scared her out of her mind. He had sneaked his way into the depths of her thoughts and gone past her defences with just one touch. And it disgusted her that he had just like that intruded and violated her privacy so severely. She wanted to get away, wanted to spend as little time as possible with that conduit who probably knew everything about her by now. And now was the opportunity to get away from him unharmed and without him knowing where she would be headed to next, because even if he had read her mind, he still wouldn't know, for neither did she.

A low and strained groan sounded from the guy still laying face-down on the ground, startling Ella out of her mind. She was up immediately, still a little bit dazed by that weird experience and feeling a little bit dizzy when she stood straight too fast. But no way in hell would she stay. She stumbled to the window, feeling as weak as ever and hauled herself up onto the sill. Her bag had survived the 'small tussle', still strapped to her body securely and she was relieved that she did not have to collect it from the floor, because she wasn't sure if she had actually would have been able to bend down and then get up again. She scurried to the window and swung her legs over the sill so they dangled outside instead.

"Hey, where are you going? Wait!"

But she had already let herself fall out of the window, hitting the concrete floor down below rather ungraciously and groaning from the harsh impact as she fell on her hands and knees. And as much as she just wanted to wait until the pain eventually ebbed away, she knew that the scary conduit was still hot on her heels and wouldn't just let her get away that easily. She didn't want to relive that experience again, she didn't want to touch him again, she didn't want to see him again.

But as she glanced up she could see his head sticking out of her window, looking at her concerned but also determined.

"Stay away from me." she breathed out weakly, not loud enough to reach the conduit's ears so he could do as she bid. Instead she watched him in horror as he also prepared himself to jump out of the window. She stood up on shaky legs and ran, it was unimportant where her legs would carry her, as long as she got away from him. Her feet were unnaturally heavy and she practically dragged them over the concrete. She needed energy, she needed power source, she needed water. Her eyes frantically searched for any source of water while she was running out of the alley she had landed in. She did not know nor care if the conduit was right behind her or not, if she wouldn't get any water soon it wouldn't matter either way. She accidentally bumped into a person, but at that moment she couldn't have cared less about him or his loud protest. She felt miserable, cold, exhausted, her body was shaking, and she wasn't sure if it was out of fear or because she felt so incredibly cold.

"Hey, are you feeling well, Miss?"

Someone touched her shoulder softly, a rather innocent touch actually, but right now it felt way too intrusive. She twisted her body away from the touch awkwardly. She heard the man swearing under his breath, yet she still did not look his way. She was looking for water.

"You are as cold as ice. Let me take you to the hospital!"

"No! Not the hospital, I'm fine, just leave me be, okay?" she blurted out, alarmed. She just needed water and she'd be fine again. But of course, she did not tell the man but instead just stumbled away from him, she would find it on her own. She did not hear him following her.

'I need water. I need water. I need water. I need wat...'
There! A puddle of muddy water right next to a hydrant. Hope filled her mind and she quickly stumbled into the puddle's direction, blending out everything else of her surroundings. She desperately stretched out her hand to the dirty liquid and started to absorb it, not caring if anyone saw or not. It wasn't much and did little to refuel her energy supplies, but it would be enough to get the hydrant open.

As a tiny bit of energy returned to her body she could hear some passengers screaming bloody murder when they saw the spectacle and the man who had just tried to help her back then shouting something at somebody, either her or the few panicking people around them. Another man's voice joined the shouting and her eyes that she had closed in exhaustion for one moment shot open again: the conduit!

She wasted no time and summoned the tiny bit of power she had extracted from that puddle and used it to completely demolish the hydrant. A huge fountain of water shot up several feet into the sky and rained down on her in thick, heavy droplets. More screams sounded around her, more shouting from the two men.

She held out both her hands and like magic the stream of water defied gravity, sneaking it's way right into her body through her palms. She got warmer again, more awake, aware of her surroundings again. A sheriff was gaping at her, alarmed by her violent action toward the defenceless hydrant in public, right behind him the conduit, also looking at her, trying to estimate her current status of hostility. The tension between them was almost tangible, her eyes nervously flashing between the two persons, the sheriff tensed up and slowly moving his hand to a holster on his hip, the conduit raising his hands in a pacifying gesture.

"Whoa, calm down ice-princess, just talk to m..."

The sheriff had taken his gun out of his holster and raised his arm in an attempt to aim at her. But she was on her full power-level again and therefore faster, reacting immediately by shooting ice at his hand, not freezing it, only forcing him to let go of his gun. She was relieved that her aim and ice control was still that good despite her current state: freezing off an officer's hand would have gotten her in so much more trouble than she had already been in.

But the conduit obviously did not approve of her rather harmless attack, shouting the officer's name in alarm and about to move forward. But she wouldn't have any of it, she did not want the conduit to move anywhere, so she aimed her palm at him threateningly, daring him to move one more muscle. She had her fountain still raining water down on her, the whole area around her already got colder than would be considered normal, and it was expanding with every moment; She was the one with the advantage now, and both of them were well aware of it. That thought calmed her down, and reason was returning to her actions again. The conduit stopped, his eyes never leaving hers. She didn't like it at all, she did not want him anywhere near her or him looking at her. She would take her leave, the D.U.P. would probably also only be minutes away. She'd be finished if she'd take her time to stay and fight them, but she would make sure they wouldn't follow her.

"Don't do anything you'll regret later on."

She did not want to hear the conduit's voice either, she realized. But as her gaze had lingered too long on the conduit, the sheriff had tried to move closer to her. But one too hasty movement betrayed him and her attention snapped to him again and she acted immediately. She shot her power at the street and once again ice spread over the concrete they all were standing on, repeating the trick she had used on the conduit just then and immobilizing the sheriff to some extent without physically harming him. Hurting a police officer would only bring even more attention to her than there already was, so he was off-limits for her. But luckily he didn't move anymore, realizing that he'd only slip and fall should he try anything hasty. The conduit was a whole other thing though. He would melt the ice, he wasn't daft after all. And he certainly tried to do something, as he took some secure steps towards the sheriff who could have been his friend or relative for all she knew. So she made sure that he wouldn't move anymore. Once again she aimed at the conduit and released another, more powerful blast in his direction, capturing him in a block of ice that reached up to his waist and that had also captured both of his hands.

'Jackpot'

"Delsin!"

The sheriff cried out in shock, forgetting what he was standing on and trying to move towards him and -of course- slipping right after taking his first step. Startled by his rash action, Ella looked at the sheriff again, distracted for a moment. But that had been her mistake, because 'Delsin' suddenly dashed forward and out of his prison without any problems, catching Ella off-guard. She could only watch in shock at what he had just done. He had escaped her ice. By dashing out of it, as a cloud only consisting of snow and ice crystals. Just. Like. Her. And by the look of it, he wasn't nearly as shocked by this turn of events as she was. She couldn't fathom it. He had copied her ability. What. The. Fuck?! How? Why? When? Had he been able to do this the entire time, or had he learned it through that weird mind-intruding shit he had done?

'What does it matter right now? Get your rear out of there ASAP!'

She turned on her heels and dashed away, trying to get as much distance between them as possible. But the sound of him following her again got to her again and she was terrified. She had lost her bag somewhere during all this, but she didn't care anymore. She just wanted to get away, or to get one of them both to disappear entirely. But neither of them did. Instead he got closer to her, for whatever reason. She concentrated on moving faster, rushing through deserted alleys and made many turns to get rid of him until she rushed through a vent, landing on top of a roof, where he finally caught up to her and wrestled her to the ground, this time trying to grab both of her hands rather than restraining her like he had tried the first time.

But like that time in her apartment, the moment their hands touched both of their hands started glowing again, but this time the pain was many times more intense, yet the feeling of getting her mind invaded again wasn't nearly as awful as the first time. Nonetheless she tried to wrestle herself free from his firm grasp and failing miserably. Instead she was doomed to fall back into her own memories again, and taking him with her as well. Everything went black again as she was swept away by her own memories again.

* Aw shit. Fucking hell

A/N:

Haha, look who showed up again after...I don't know, some millennia. But hey, one chapter after an eternity is better than no chapter at all, right? Right?! Yeah, okay, fine I'm just gonna cower in the corner of shame now and contemplate my sins while taking another ten thousand years to finish the next chapter. But just for the records, I'm trying, it's just that I am really failing at uploading regularly.

Anyway, I hope y'all enjoyed this chapter, even though I am not really good at describing action scenes (Then why did you decide to write a fanfic about an action-shooter? For obvious reasons, of course). Next time though, we'll really come to some interaction between Delsin and the queen of the refrigerators that doesn't involve some fighting and panicking. Yay for Delsin, yay for Ella's nerves, yay for me who doesn't have to write another action-scene. It's almost a total win-win situation.

Once again, I thank all of you who reviewed, followed and/or put this story on their favourites!

You guys (and of course the normal readers also) are great and make me even feel worse for my awful updating habits. :D

Savage Kill:

The 'secret' about her pills will be revealed eventually, don't worry, and don't get me the wrong away, I'm kind of glad that you're not certain about medication's prupose and still guessing, because that means my story isn't that easily and obvious to predict :D

About the 'Mary-Sue-thing', something along those lines. I mean, it's okay if one character is stronger than the other, but he can't be better at everything and be almost perfect, because let's face it: perfect characters are annoying, boring and can destroy the whole story.

Thank you for your review, and we'll see each other in the next chapter...I'll try harder this time, I promise :)

xoxo(guest):

I've skimmed what I've written so far and found some weird grammar- or spellingmistakes, thanks for the notification (though I can't be sure if I got them all, sorry for that), and thank you :)

Well, then at least I hope Ella won't turn out to be a badly-written character

Thank you very much for your review, I appreciate it :)

Aesculus (1):

Thank you for you kind word, and I'm relieved that Ella seems so likeable to you, tells me she can't be that much of a horrible character :D

Maybe I'll just stay with sotnös instead of sötnos and make sootsneezed her special and lovely nickname for the story, has a nice sound to it, wouldn't you agree? :D But seriously, thank you for your corrections, I appreciate all the help I get :)

Aesculus (2):

Good to know that my story seems to keep the golden mean so far. I just hope that won't change anytime soon, so I'll cross my fingers as well (though that could be troublesome while I'm writing this, so I'm counting on you :D)

Yeah well, you obviously know more about the swedish language than I do, so I am going to trust you with this (...even if you are a stranger on the internet :O) I mean, you are the expert here, because I know I'm not :D

Aesculus (3):

Don't worry, the more often I am told what I have done wrong so far, the more I'll tray to avoid these mistakes for the next time, so you can go on and correct me all you like.

I'm happy that you are content with this story so far, gives me hope that this won't turn out to be a complete disaster. And I'm actually proud of myself: even though you disagree with Ella's course of action, you don't throw tomatoes at her for her stupidity, which means that she is either likeable and/or logical enough, I'm flattered, I really am :)

Thank you for leaving a review for each chapter, I would have already been glad if you had just written one summarized review, but one for each chapter, I really appreciate it :)

Also thank all of you for reviewing the last chapter:

sandshrew master(guest), AddictedWithAPencil, Stargiving2413, and the guest