A bit of an early update! Yay!
This may be my last update for a while, sadly. My laptop charger broke, and by broke, I mean one of the prongs stuck in the wall socket. I have no idea how long it will take for the new charger to be mailed to my house (in the middle of nowhere), so a fairly-long update to hold you guys until I get it!
Like I think I said in the last chapter, we learn a little bit about Nikki's childhood. I had one of my friends read this, and thought I should add a warning, so,
*Warning: This chapter contains implied child abuse-Absolutely nothing graphic.* I think that a warning makes is sound worse than it is, but, I figured I'd be safe and add one.
Enjoy the chapter!
~Christianne
PS~ For and Marvel fans, check out my Captain America fanfic Beyond Repair!
Nikki POV
I'd been standing outside the bank for an hour. It seemed like a lot longer, but it was only an hour.
I'd moved around the crowd, getting closer to the barriers and the cops before hanging back and staying out of sight. I had a roommate at Yale who was a criminology major. I remember her telling me that some police forces had started taking pictures or video of the crowds around crime scenes. I don't know if Milwaukee was one of those police departments or not, but I wasn't taking any chances.
I hung around for another half an hour before I left to get food. If I didn't get food in my system soon I'd faint.
After stopping by Subway, I went back to the crime scene. I managed to get closer to the front, munching on my 6-inch BLT. I saw a few new cars, shiny black with government plates. I made a slightly face, then stuffed more BLT in my mouth to try and hide it.
FBI
Omniscient POV
Special Agent Hendrickson was used to people thinking he was a hardass. He'd gotten to the point where he didn't really care that much anymore.
"Where are those security camera videos?" He yelled after he hung on up Dean Winchester.
There was a high class jewelry store across the street. If Victor Hendrickson believed in a God, he'd be on his knees thanking Him because their security camera had been knocked sideways by some local punks, pointing them directly at the door to the bank.
One of the local cops brought the feed up under the tent outside.
The local tech fast-forwarded to roughly 11 am, when the Winchesters first went into the bank. Hendrickson narrowed his eyes as he saw a girl walking next to the tall one, Sam. He raised an eyebrow when Sam picked her clear off the ground before putting her down behind him and his brother.
"The girl. She anywhere else on the tape?" Hendrickson demanded.
"Uh…" the tech typed. "Yeah, this is just before the local cops got here, half an hour after the two dudes went in." The video showed the same bank doors, and the same girl with her dark hair tied back into a braid. She tried to open the doors, and seemed genuinely surprised when they didn't open. She tried again, but they still didn't open for her.
"This is seconds before the first police cars got there." The tech told Hendrickson as the video showed the dark haired girl running away from the doors.
"Ok!" Hendrickson yelled. "I want facial rec. on this girl! I want a name! Birthdate! Hometown! I wanna know where her great-grandmother planted her damn petunias!" he ordered the people around him.
"Uh, S-Sir?" the tech said, trying to get Hendrickson's attention.
"What?" he snapped at the tech, who shrunk back a little. Wordlessly, he pointed over his screen into the crown. Hendrickson followed his finger and thought about taking up religion for the second time in the span of an hour when he saw the dark haired girl from the tape leaning lazily against a building across the street.
Nikki POV
Taking another bite of my BLT, I saw a few of the people walking around the various vans and cars stop. They started looking at the crowd.
I caught the eye of a tall black man with a goatee in the standard FBI jacket. We just stared at one another for a few seconds, before he yelled something over his shoulder and started running towards me.
I threw my sandwich off to the side and ran.
"Sorry! Sorry! Excuse me! Sorry!" I said over and over as I sprinted through the streets, pushing people out of my way. After a few turns down allies and some zig-zagging I lost the two or three agents that had managed to keep up with me.
I stopped in an ally, leaning on the side of a building to catch my breath. I yanked my hand out of the braid and ran my fingers through it in an effort to change my appearance a little.
I tipped my head upside down and shook my curls out. When I flung my head back, I heard a familiar sound. My eyes closed and I swore under my breath. Putting my hands up, I slowly turned around. A few feet away, I saw the same black guy in the FBI jacket. And, of course, he had his gun up.
"Fine…Fine…" I said, still out of breath. "You win." The agent's eyes narrowed. "Just no cuffs. I was chained to a chair a week ago and the bruises haven't quiet gone away."
"Really?" I asked, holding my cuffed hands up. The black agent, Hendrickson, I think, just slammed the door of the police car shut.
I groaned and leaned my head back onto the back headrest.
They'd taken my jacket, which had my knife and my wallet in it. So, they had my ID. It'd only be a matter of minutes before they had my whole damn file.
"Nicolette Blake, born December 4, 1983-approximetly." Hendrickson read out of the file he was holding while he opened the door.
"Last time I checked." I grumbled, settling back against the seat.
"You know, I have to say, reading your file; it's almost too dramatic to believe." He said, leaning on the open door.
"I've tried to sell the rights to Disney." I said sarcastically.
"You were about a month and a half old when you were left on the door step of a church in the middle of the night, during one of the worst thunderstorms northern Wisconsin has ever seen." Hendrickson said, quite successful in ignoring me. "Sadly, little Nicolette wasn't adopted as a baby, or a toddler.
"Three, wasn't it? Three years old? That's the first time foster parents said they couldn't handle you?" Hendrickson asked rhetorically.
I had my hands in my lap as I stared out the other window, refusing to look at him. "Yeah. The Millers."
"Now, how long did they have you in their house?" He asked. I tried to keep my mouth shut, but I just couldn't seem to do that.
"Four months." I said flatly.
"Right, right…And from the looks of it, that was the longest time you ever stayed with one foster family until you where ten." He said, flipping a page.
"Nine." I snapped. "I was nine."
"Right, right…" Hendrickson nodded, flipping the page again. "And it looks like you were one clumsy kid." He chuckled.
Please don't.
"Four years old; broken rib. Five years old; broken collar bone and a fractured jaw. Six years
old; broken arm, two different times. Seven; more broken ribs, another fractured jaw and a torn rotator cuff." He listed off. "And that's just the emergency room visits. There's a whole other list of doctor visits and school-nurse testimonies about the cuts and bruises you walked around with as a kid."
I didn't say anything.
"But, when you were nine, things started lookin' up, didn't they?" Hendrickson said with a fake cheerfulness in his voice.
"Yup. Spent three and a half months at the Williams' house. Thought I was going to break my own record." I said, still staring out the window.
"But then, there's a gap in your file. From March of 1992 to April of 1993, nothing. No school records, doctors' visits, nothing." Hendrickson said, slowly pacing.
I knew he wasn't trying to, but he was pulling back a rubber band. It was only a matter of time before it snapped and hit him in his stupid face.
"So, I did a little digging." Hendrickson said, pacing again.
"Stop." I said, eyes shut as I leaned my head back against the headrest.
"Took me awhile. You know, Wisconsin really goes out of its way to protect the identities of minors in the system." He kept going.
"Stop it." I growled, bringing my hands to my head. My fingers knotted in my hair as my wrists strained against the cuffs and pressed my palms to my temples.
"I was surprised when I actually read it. I mean, a place like that, for a year; surprised they didn't keep you there longer." The agent kept going.
"Stop it." I said again, my voice was near begging. I could feel something inside me start to stir.
"When you're convicted, you'd have a good basis for an insanity plea if you enter this in. Personally, from what I've read, you should have never left-"
"I said Stop it!" I yelled, slamming my hands back into my lap.
The instant my hands made contact with my thighs…
The windows in the car shattered outwards. There was this outward pulsing force that seemed to blow through the car, making the ground shake, and Hendrickson fall backwards into the ground.
I was panting once it was done.
Hendrickson, being the closest, was the only one knocked on his ass. I slowly looked at him. His face was a mask of indifference, but it was clear in his eyes that he was scared.
"Sorry." I said simply, looking ahead of me, where the thick plastic divider used to be in the police car. It was shattered over the front seats now. "I'm still sorta new at this. Can't really control it."
Hendrickson just stood up slowly, then started yelling people. 'Get her out of that damn car!' 'Get some clothes for her to change into! Send the ones she's wearing to the lab!' 'I want her in full body restraints!'
I just let out a loud sigh and rested my head back on the head rest.
I didn't know what to do. I didn't have a plan. I had absolutely no idea what to do.
While the police officers were running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to follow the orders Hendrickson was barking at them.
I bowed my head towards my lap and clasped my cuffed hands together.
God? If you're listening to this, I could really use some guidance here.
I squirmed in the hospital scrubs from the ambulance I'd been all but forced to change into. I could wrap my head around them wanting my thermal, my tank top and my jeans, but my Converse and my bra?
I think Hendrickson was just pissed at me.
I mean, I guess I understood that, but that didn't mean I liked it. And I can't say I'm not a little happy to find out that they didn't have any full body restraints.
"So, what? You got daddy issues?" I heard Hendrickson say. I glanced up from the handcuffs (that I was trying to force open with magic) and shrugged.
"Yeah, and a bit of a bad-boy complex, but that has nothing to do with Sam and Dean." I said, figuring I couldn't get in anymore trouble, so why not tell the truth.
"You know about anit-heroes?" I asked Hendrickson before he could ask me anything else.
"No." he said, clearly annoyed.
"Think…Think Batman." I kept going. "An anit-hero is like when you ask for a fireman, but you get some shmuck with a bucket of water with no parents. Yeah, the fireman would put out the fire. But the orphan with the bucket would find the guy who started the fire and beat the living shit out of him with the bucket."
"What the hell does this have to do with anything?" Hendrickson asked me. Jeez, this guy must have one Hell'a'va stick up his ass.
"Anti-heroes usually have two types of people who talk about them; the ones that think they should be put in jail, 'cause they don't use traditional, conventional methods of keeping people safe, and the ones who think they need to be rewarded medals for doing things other people can't, or won't, do." I said, looking at Hendrickson calmly.
"What? You and Batman and Batman's kid brother are anti-heroes?" Hendrickson asked, still irritated and pissed off.
"First of all, Batman's sidekick is Robin, and I'm pretty sure the Caped Crusader was an only child. Second, I just wanna make it clear that if Dean is Batman, it's not me and Batman, as in, me and Batman share a bed. I may have a bad-boy complex, but I still have standards." I said, a casual smile on my face.
Hendrickson scowled and shut the door of the cop car. As he did, he yelled at the local PD again.
"Get SWAT ready!"
I, was, pissed.
That's the only description I could think of for the feeling I had.
Not taking the time to focus, I just pulled. I trusted my abilities and pulled at my cuffs, trying to force them to unlock.
My hands came apart.
At first, I was ecstatic; after hours of trying, I finally got the damn handcuffs off. As I looked at my wrists, I frowned; I didn't unlock them. I just broke the two or three links holding them together. I still had the round metal cuffs on my hands.
I looked out the window of the car, making sure no one saw me. All of them, even the FBI agents were huddled around the radios and the computer screens. I looked out the back window. It was almost 6 in the morning now. The standoff had lasted all night. There was no crowd anymore.
I tried the door handle. It opened. Looking back at the agents and police officers, I got out of the car and ran, and didn't stop until I was back at the Impala.
I leaned against it and tried to slow my racing heart.
"Jogging. No more excuses about being on the road. Start, jogging." I told myself.
The parking garage was empty and I was tired. I didn't care that I was stripping down in the middle of an empty parking ramp. I opened up the trunk and dug around for my duffle bag. I yanked off the scratched scrubs and pulled on a pair of jeans. I found a bra in my bag before I pulled off the shirt, and put it on.
As I was digging around for a shirt, I heard two people walking towards me.
In the mood I was in, any thief, murderer or rapist was going to have his head blown off by a .22 if they came up to me. I turned around, still only in a bra on top, and saw two men in SWAT gear walking towards me. They pulled off their helmets and the spandex face masks they had on.
Sam and Dean. Good. Good, they got out, and they're ok.
"You two just can't stay out of trouble, can you?" I asked, turning back towards the trunk.
"You ok?" Sam asked simply. His cheeks were flushed, and I wasn't sure if it was from running, or seeing me leaning over the trunk of the Impala in a bra. I kinda hope it was the latter.
"Yeah." I said. "Yeah. Yeah, I'll be ok." I think I was trying to convince myself more than Sam. I finally found a clean shirt; it was one of the ones I made with Wendy. I pulled it on as I got in the back seat, pulled my hair out of the back.
"Can either of you pick handcuffs?" I asked after both boys were in the car.
"Yeah." They both said. I put my wrists over the front seats. Dean just shook his head. Sam got lock picks from the glove compartment and started picking the cuff on my left wrist.
"We are so screwed." Dean said simply, starting the Impala and driving out.
It'd been three days since Milwaukee, and the tension was just starting to wear off.
"I just don't get it." Dean said defensively. "I mean, how could breaking handcuff be easier than just unlocking them?"
"Dude, let it go." Sam chuckled, shaking his head.
"You know, you're wanted by the feds now, maybe you should become a blonde." Dean spoke up a few minutes later.
"No thank you," I laughed, running a hand through my dark brown curls. "I'm very happy with my natural ebony, thank you very much." Both boys laughed as I did a very uncharacteristic and girls hair flip.
I rolled my eyes, hissing at them to shut up as I answered my ringing phone.
"Hello?" I asked, still giggling a bit.
"Nicolette Blake?" A male voice asked me.
"Yes?" I asked carefully. The car went over a pothole, and my phone slipped out of my hand. I swore loudly at Dean, and hoped that the person on the phone didn't hear.
"—And, af-after his parents, you're listed as next of kin." I caught, before the voice stopped, expecting me to say something. I smacked the back of Dean's head (pretty hard).
"Sorry, dropped my phone. Who are we talking about?" I asked, smacking Dean's head again when he turned the radio up.
"Captain Christopher Harper."