A/N: First off, the nromal thank you's. This is by far my most popular story, and I love writing for you. Sadly, because I got school, updates will be slow and I will push them out whenever I can, but I got homework to think of, and I also write many one-shots, so in the mean time please check them out, and I will update when I can.
Bronwyn and Victor Bruntley
"RUN BRONWYN!"
The first thing that reahed Alma's ears as she stepped out of the loop entrance, was screaming. From the relative calm of having tea with with her sister Ymbryne, Miss Nightjar, in her loop, to a sudden situation of screaming and sheer panic, Alma could immidiatly feel the adrenaline pumping through her body as her mind switched to defense mode with a trained automaticy. Her body got riggid and tense, and she was, of course, ready to protect her children at any cost, doing whatever was neccesary to keep them safe.
Only her children wasn't there beside her, but the screaming had in the confusion of it all tricked her into beliving they were. Alma could recognise a child's screaming anywhere, even if it didn't come from any of her children, and realising it had been someone else's child did nothing to calm down her raicing heart beat and panting breath, because the danger remained, and so did the child. Alma barely had time to start looking around for the source of the screaming, the child, when another of it's screams reached her ears.
"WATCH OUT MISS!" It was a boy calling her, and she could see him running for her as she threw herself on the ground to avoid a large garbage bag hitting her over the head, followed by a animalistic roaring that sent chills down to her spine. The sound was so familiar Alma, seemingly pushing all the air out of her lungs as she tried to stand up once more on wobbly, aching legs, and she didn't even have to notice that she couldn't see the monster to know what it was, because it had been chasing her in her ngightmares for longer than a life time-
It was a hollowgast, an empty monster who's creation and existance had wrecked not only Alma's own ,but a never ending number of other peculiars lives as well.
It was the first and only thing Alma had ever wanted to kill, to make herself guilty of cold-blooded murder because of.
The skiny brown haired boy that suddenly came into view before Alma was being chased by a hollowgast, which of course must mean that he was peculiar, and though she had no idea how, he must be one of Miss Nightjar's charges who somehow manaeged to escape her loop.
The invisible beast let out a second, powerful and absolutely terrifying roar, and Alma saw two trashcans approximately five hundred meters away from her and the boys current position tipped over, warning them of how very close the monster was. Hollows were said to be huge, and considering how narrow they ally was, it wouldn't take more than a few steps for the beast to reach them.
The boy seemed to notice this, too, because suddenly he was in an extreme hurry, ignoring Alma and instead putting all his focus on something or someone on his other side.
"Wyn, you need to hide. Now!" As the boy grabbed her by the hand, opening a container and helping her climb in, Alma for the first time noticed the brown haired girl standing beside him. The little girl appeared younger than the boy, but overall they looked very similar, and Alma assumed they must be siblings or relatives.
She wondered how two of Miss Nightjar's charges could have escaped the loop, the loop for all the hard cases, where the charges were guarded like low-penelty prisoners and not even allowed to as much as unlocking the door or taking one step outside the house without tellign their Ymbryne first.
"Be careful Victor!" The little girl sniffled as the boy closed the lid to the container, wedging an empty carton in between it and the edge so that it wouldn't close completely and the girl could still breath inside. "Please!"
Though the boy must have heard what she was saying, he made no attempt to acknowledge his sister's words as he instead turned to focus on Alma, speaking. "Miss, you need to get out of here! I know it doesn't seem like it, but there's a monster there, and it's going to kill you if you stay!" The boys voice was hurried and persistent, grabbing Alma's arm and tugging at it as he tried to make her move.
A third roar erupted, even closer than before, and as the boy let go of her and suddenly, fearfully tried to back away from where he heard the sound, Alma made her choice. She had to defend the boy and his sister no matter the cost, and if she survived, she'd return them to the loop and have a talk with her Ymbryne sister about letting out her wards.
Alma had of course never confronted a hollow before, it was too dangeorus to even consider if there is any other option, but now she was forced to. Faintly, for a brief moment, she think of her childrne, her wards, who she might never get to see again. She would have felt scared at the thought, btu she knew she needed to protect the children with her here, and hopefully her sister ymbryne Miss Glassbillow who were currently watchign them would give them good homes if she didn't return.
An Ymbryne didn't leave peculiar children behind, not ever, and it didn't matter if they were hers or not. Peculiar chidlren was what she prioritized above all.
"What are you waiting for you?! You need to run!" The boy is screaming, jumping to the side as a ball of trash is flung through the air, and Alma doesn't waste a moment turning into a bird, flinging herself at the beast (she hoped) with her claws ready, suddenly burrowing them into something sickeningly soft that told her she hit her target, the hollowgast.
It is hard to fight something you can't see, but Alma attacked it best she could, thinking of the children and how she must protect them. With claws and beak she scratched and pecked, furiously attacking it again and again and simultaneously trying to avoid it's arms and tentacles reaching for her, knowing it will probably be her death if she let them capture her, but knowing ti would eb the children's death if she stopped attacking.
The one time she dare to look back at the child who she is trying to protect, she can see the terror on his face, big blue eyes carefully watching her as she prepared to make another attack at the monster who, despite Alma's continuous assaults, hadn't given up yet.
Only the last attack didn't go as planned, and suddenly, Alma felt something big and wet hitting her directly in the face, pushing her bird form back against a brick wall, pain coursing through her every muscle and preventing her from moving as much as a feather when she roughly landed in a heap on the ground.
"MISS!" If they boy had been terrified before, it was nothing compared to the way he looked when he rushed over to her lifeless form lying in the street. She tried to get up to greet him, but it only resulted in her falling over on her back and a sudden jolt of pain that had her screaming though she tried not to. "Miss! Did the monster hurt you?"
She wanted to tell him to go away, to run, because she could already tell that this hope situation was a trap, and that the invisible monster was a lot smarter than she thought, but the fact that she in bird form, limited to speaking like a bird and with intense, incapacitating pain radiating throughout her body made her unable to.
For a split second, she thought of the monster that had hurt her, and she allowed herself to wonder who it had used to be. Maybe it was Caesar, the Greek boy who could extend his tongue as far as he wished. He had had a twin sister, and he always said he was fighting for her right not to have her peculiarity compared to an Ymbryne's. He had been so, so smart, but still not smart enough to see what her brothers had been doing.
His sister's screams as she, like all of the rest of them, realised she lost someone she loved still haunted Alma.
The vision of all of them gathered in that room, the friends and family and loved ones of these beast, about to get the horrible news, was a picture that never stopped haunting her.
The sudden warmth of two steady hands circling her pain-stricken body snap her out her thoughts, and she realise the boy didn't get eaten yet, and that maybe it wasn't a trap.
Maybe the Hollowgast was as stupid as they had originally thought.
The last thought leave her a moment later when they boy suddenly cry out, throwing her into the air as he is trying to move away from the monster which now seemed to be approaching him.
Once she'd been thrown by the boy, Alma had to fight to stay in the air, because her left wing is hardly cooperating, pain coursing through her body every time she flapped the wing, and at the same time she is trying figure out how to aid the boy.
The fight with the hollow has been going on long enough that Alma's emptied her brain on most ideas for what she could do, and yet it was still far from dead and she didn't know if she would even be able to try any of the old tricks again, but still she can't abandon the poor children.
"LEAVE THE NICE PEOPLE ALONE YOU MEAN IDIOT MONSTER THING!"
The fight end suddenly, so suddenly that she can't even register what's happening until she's once more crashing against the ground, landing in a pool of sticky liquid next to a metal trash can. After a second, it hit her that the trash can hit the hollow, and the substance coating it's feathers is blood.
Suddenly repulsed, she get up on shaking legs, and she look around, looking for whoever threw the trash can, but only seeing the children she'd been protecting in the end on the ally, the younger girl no longer hiding in the dumpster, but instead crying into her brother's chest, face red and her fists curling into the fabric of his shirt.
Carefully, she limp towards them, surprised at herself as she know her limp normally doesn't show when she's in bird form.
When the girl see her coming, she abandon her brother and rush to pick up Alma. Alma is thankful, relaxing, finally relieved from some of the pain, but also terrified.
All Ymbrynes and peculiars alike knew, that being hurt could lock you in bird form.
Alma needed to try and regain human form, need to prove to herself that she's is not stuck, the bare thought of it making her restless and claustrophobic. She loved being a bird, it was freedom to her, and at first she could imagine being that way forever, but eventually she'd feel claustrophobic and wanting nothing but to change back.
She had never been unable to change back.
"Is she really that woman? Look at that wing, it's all bent out of shape! What did it do to her?" The little girl fretted over Alma's beaten form, and now Alma really wanted to reform, because no one had ever fretted for her, and she hated.
"It hit her with one of its arms, I think, but it's not that bad. Don't worry Bronwyn. It's probably just twisted, broken at worst, if she'd regain human form." The boy is patting her broken wrong, and Alma screech, because it hurt, and anyone should be smart enough to figure out it's a bad idea to pat a twisted or broken wing on a bird.
"Cut it Victor! You hurt her! And if it's just twisted then why won't she became human Victor? What if she can't Victor!" The girl, Bronwyn, is fretting again, visibly distressed and hugging Alma close to her chest as she talks to her brother, Victor.
"What if she needs her dress? She left it on the ground. What if she's like, naked, when she reform and she doesn't want to reform without her dress?" Victor suggest, walking over to her dress and picking it up, showing it off to his sister. "Put her inside the dress and see if she reforms."
Bronwyn gingerly does as her brother says, and to Alma's great relief put her down inside the dress, given her as safe way to reform. She was impressed the boy figured it out, and even happier that he got his sister on board with the idea.
Once the younger girl had carefully placed her inside the dress, Alma reached out for the human part of herself, happy to find it safely there where it should be, and she slowly let it take over and try to regain her human form.
It's not as hard as she feared it would be, not really, not until she reach the hurted left wing. It's like hitting a brick wall, and knowing you have to get through it in order to continue. It try to fight her, to stop her from changing forms, but she stubbornly refus to stay as a bird, and in the end she is standing there in front of the two children, a fully reformed human.
The children, especially the girl, is cheering on her as she return, and when she turn around, she smile at them, unsure what to say.
"Well I am glad that that is over. You two should consider yourselves lucky, few ever meets a Hollow and live to tell the tale." She smile again, trying to keep her arm as still as she can with the pain still coursing through it.
"A what?" The boy asked, looking looking honestly confused. "The thing Bronwyn threw the trash can at?"
The little girl is beaming with pride when they boy mention her throwing a trash can, and Alma blink in surprise. She knew, of course, that one of them must have thrown it, but would have guessed for the boy, rather than the girl, for the later was so small.
The girl couldn't be more than six or seven, and yet, there she stood, successfully having defeated a Hollow.
"A Hollowgast, yes. Surely Miss Nightjar told you of them?" Alma continue, trying to ignore the offhand comment about the girl throwing the trash can.
"Miss who?" This time, the girl is looking confused, and so does Alma. She had assumed the children were escaped from her sisters loop, but evidentially they did not know of her name.
"You don't have an Ymbryne yet? You don't live with any other peculiars?" The realisation that these children might, in fact, not have an Ymbryne at all hit her suddenly and upon her question the children nodd.
"We live on our own. We haven't had a family for four years, Bronwyn killed our step dad when she was four." The older boy explained, the girl's expression becoming grim upon the mentioning of the fact that she killed a man.
"He was really mean and hit us!" She explained, and Alma felt her heart aching. She, too, had known the feeling of being abused by her loved ones, both her father and her brother.
It was hard not to cry right at the moment, when she stood there, eye to eye with two children who shared a past all too similar to her own, telling a story that hit far too close to home. She wanted nothing more than to protect them, to be a beacon of hope in their dark world, and she hoped that she could achieve that if she could convince them to join her little family
"How would you like a new family? Mine is still looking for some new members, especially some who posses powers like no ordinary human have ever dreamed of." She smile, opening her arms, and before she knows it, she got two tiny bodies pressed against hers, one pair of arms looping her waist and the other one her leg as they hugged her.
"So you will adopt me and Bronwyn?" The boy, Victor, look at her in all seriousness, still not loosing his hold of her waist, almost acting ad though he feared she'd run away if he did.
"Yes. I will." Alma said, nodding, bending down to pick up Bronwyn in her arms and trying to grab the boy's hand as she turned to walk out of the alley, ignoring the pain i nthe arm she offered him. It wasn't the time to bother about personal injuries. "My name is Alma LeFay Peregrine, and from now on, your a part of my family."