CRAWLING IN MY SKIN
Being stabbed is bullshit.
It leaves him feeling weak, which he hates. Sedentary recovery grinds him into a helpless, numbing boredom. There's only so much WWE he can watch with Killer Frost before he wants to throw the TV across the MedBay.
When he'd woken up, the doctor was gone and her snarky twin was devouring a bag of Lays and watching Hulk Hogan stride up to the wrestling ring, Rick Derringer's "Real American" blaring through the speakers. They don't bother with conversation until, five minutes into their third episode, Killer Frost sits up straight and presses her finger to the commlink in her ear.
"If it's backstage, then it's Mick's blood."
He glances over at her. She ignores him as she listens to whoever has found the gory trail he'd left at the Juan Atkins warehouse concert.
"No way; he's too dumb for that. He's gotta hero complex."
Mick furrows his brows. No way was she talking about him now.
"How could they knock him out? He's made of steel!"
Heywood, he frowns. "Gideon?"
"Doctor Heywood is currently missing, Mister Rory. So far, Miss Jiwe has been trying to locate him inside the warehouse while Mister Palmer searches the perimeter. Captain Lance and Miss Tomaz have taken to the rooftops."
"Fuckin' damn it," he rumbles, pulling the sheets from his lap and leaning off the pillows. He winces at the sharp pain in his side. Dismissing it, Mick clenches his jaw and swings his legs over the side of the bed. "Gideon, gimme some painkillers."
"Not a good idea, big guy," Frost leans back in her chair, propping her feet up on Caitlin's computer desk and tossing a potato chip in her mouth.
"Dumb ass got himself caught," his fists the mattress in his grip as he tries to rise.
"Mhm. Sure did. Got a whole team looking for him right now."
Mick inhales through his nose and then pushes himself off the bed. Standing hurts like a bitch, but there's no way in hell he's gonna lay around while Heywood faces off the fuckers in masks. He looks over his shoulder at Frost, who's watching him with a scowl.
"Shut up," he warns.
She rolls her eyes. "Whatever. Do what you want."
He takes a step. And then another. He can feel her stare; satisfied that she holds her tongue as he makes his way towards the exist.
"Mister Rory, I must suggest you -"
"Shut it, Gideon," he snaps. The AI didn't understand. If Heywood is in trouble, it's up to him to get the idiot back. If any one of them is in trouble, it's his job to get them out of it. Snart had gotten him out of trouble repeatedly; whether it be prison or the entrapments of his own insanity, Leonard Snart made it clear that they were partners and that meant something.
He was gonna honor that, no matter fucking what.
"Guess patching you up was a waste of Caity's time."
Before he can whip around and snap at her, Gideon interrupts. "Doctor Heywood has been located, Mister Rory. Doctor Palmer is en route as we speak."
"See?" Killer Frost smiles. "Nothing to worry about. The team has everything under control."
As soon as she says it, her hand goes to her ear and presses the commlink. "How yah doin', Nerd?" While Mick waits for her to relay the response, he keeps a sharp eye on her face, noticing the shift in expressions. "Wait, what?!"
He glares at her as she stares back at him in ever growing worry.
"Okay, hold on. I'm coming."
"Gideon!" Mick barks. "Patch me through!" In seconds, the AI has him linked to the others. "What the fuck is going on?"
"Do not get off the ship, Rory!" Sara shouts at him. "That's an order!"
Killer Frost passes by him, heading out the door and into the hall. "A gang war broke out at the concert," she explains. "Amaya is stuck inside and Ray's been spotted by the same losers who stabbed you. He's got six on him and he says his stupid suit is glitching." She presses her commlink again. "Yeah, I'm on my way. Don't get shot until I get there." She starts to leave, but stops to say to Mick over her shoulder. "Look, I'm not gonna waste my time telling you to stay here and wait, but I'm also not going to babysit you if you start bleeding everywhere again. It's your choice."
Without hesitation, Mick snatches his heat gun off the chair next to the operating table. "Let's fuckin' go."
"Amaya?" Captain Lance's voice is laced with concern over the commlink.
She swings her fist, connecting with her attackers nose. "I'm okay!" The fight around her had escalated when shots were fired, killing two concert attendees who belonged to a rival street gang. Panic ensued and chaos followed after that. The warehouse had become a mad moshpit of survival. Bullets soar every which way while the screaming, neon crowd tries to sprint for the doors. "I'm near an exit; just give me a minute!"
She ducks as a lead pipe is swung at her head. Crouched, she kicks her leg out, striking the kneecap of the dirtbag who'd tried to cave in her skull. He drops his weapon, falling to the cement ground, screaming. "Bitch! You busted my knee!"
Amaya rolls her eyes at him as she pushes off the floor and sprints for the door. She throws her bodyweight against it, to no avail. The damned thing is locked.
"Come on," she sighs and backs up a few paces, ignoring the jerk still swearing at her from the ground.
He swipes at her with his fist. "Come any closer and I'll rip that ugly hair off you!"
She glares down at him. "Shut up, fat head." She touches the totem at her neck, summoning the power of a rhinoceros. Sprinting as fast as she can, she smashes through the back door, coming out into an unoccupied alley.
"I'm out!" She pants. "I need a location, Gideon."
The AI relays the exact coordinates, where Ray is trying to fight his way through six of their masked foes to get to Citizen Steel.
Generally Ray is a decent fighter and the Atom suit serves well as a high tech weapon in and of itself. Still, six on one is dicey, and Ray had been hit with a blast that shredded half of the suit. He's fighting alone, with only his own fists until someone can get to him and provide backup.
And, Nathaniel.
They had no idea who these enemies were, why they wanted to harm the Legends, or why they took Nathaniel. The fact that they were even able to sever his communications and physically over take him is alarming. If the team can't reach Nathaniel in time, he would be lost to them, possibly forever.
No, she shakes her fears away, forcing herself to focus on what she can control. I can reach him. I can find him and save him while the others help Ray.
Touching the totem again, the power shifts from the strength of a rhinoceros to th speed of a cheetah and soon she is racing down the alley.
"C'mon," Mick mumbles, crouched against a wall. He grips the heat gun, holding it against his chest. Killer Frost follows him silently as they sneak closer to the vacant black Volkswagon Transporter parked at the far end of an alley that leads to the shipping docks.
They stop behind a dumpster, peering around it to get a good view of Ray. The Atom suit is torn to pieces, and underneath it Ray is bleeding. He stands, but just barely, with both his fists drawn up to protect his face. Blood pours from his nose and one eye is swollen shut.
Mick's blood boils. "How far can yah stretch that power of yours?"
Killer Frost, jaw clenched and eyes glaring where Ray is being backed against the brick wall, grumbles. "As far as you need." Ice trickles from her fingertips, creating sharp spikes. Her anger thunders through her, pushing her powers as if it were a separate, living being wanting to break free and encapsulate everything.
Good, Mick thinks and raises the scope of his gun to his eye. "Kill 'em."
She doesn't hesitate a second longer and stomps her boot onto the pavement. Ice trails along the concrete, snaking its way towards the group beating the everliving fuck out of their teammate. The ice grips one of mob, latching to his boot and crawling up his leg. It moves too quickly for him to scream for help. In mere seconds he is nothing more than a frozen statue.
Killer Frost pushes her hands out, sending dagger sized icicles flying. Her victim shatters like glass on impact.
The others stop their assault on Ray at the sound. Seeing Frost's damage, they scatter, trying to find the source. One rushes over to their getaway car.
Mick pulls the trigger. A stream of highly-concentrated combustible liquid bursts from his gun, igniting into flames as soon as exposed to the air. Swallowing the van in a rage of fire, the vehicle explodes with enough force to obliterate it and the would be driver all together.
"Don't tell Snowflake 'bout this."
"She's screaming in my head," Killer Frost answers calmly. She steps forward, that ice blade she loves raised and ready to strike.
Mick holsters his gun and crosses with her to join the fight against the remaining four attackers. The pain from his surgery is sharp and aggravating, even though Gideon was able to speed his recovery. He doesn't concern himself with paying it any attention. He can stand; that's good enough for now.
"Hey Haircut," he barks. "Thanks for savin' some for us."
Ray slumps against the wall, his head drooping to his chest.
"Boss, we gotta man down."
"What the fuck are you doing off the ship?!" Sara shrieks in his ear.
Mick avoids answering and puts himself between Killer Frost and their enemies, heat gun aimed to keep them in check. Killer Frost slips over to Ray, crouching to inspect his injuries. "He's lookin' really bad, Caity. What do I do?"
Sirens wail in the distance as the police race closer to the warehouse. Black smoke rises from the destroyed van. The group before him stands still as stone, eyeing his every breath. Mick mimics them, filing away everything he sees in them: the one favoring his left leg as he stands; the blood trickling into the eye of the girl in the back; the guy barely breathing with the heat gun aimed at his chest. Any weakness, any flaw, any sign that he can use to turn this over into his favor. He locks it away, waiting to pounce.
C'mon you fuckers. Make a move. Gimme a reason to unleash and send yah all to hell. He can taste it, that release of all his self control itching to snap and dominate everything around him.
"Alright," Frost nods. She starts an assessment of Ray's condition, answering Caitlin's questions as she checks his pulse, opens his eyes, inspects the cuts on his face and head. "Damn Nerd," she murmurs quietly. "They really fucked up that handsome face."
"Gideon," Amaya's panicked voice comes over the commlinks. "I can't find Nathaniel."
Mick snarls at the people before him as the AI answers, "Doctor Heywood is no longer in the surrounding premises. In fact, he is completely untraceable."
In the cargo hold Sara cracks her bo staff over the ribs of a man tied to a chair. His mask has been pulled off, revealing brown hair, brown eyes, stubble across his jaw. Sweat beads down his temple, mixing with blood from the gash the assassin had given mere moments ago. She's knocked two of his teeth out of his mouth and broken his nose as well.
And still he will not talk.
Mick leans against a stack of wooden crates, a cigarette between his lips. The inferno of rage inside of him grows with each passing second, building as he'd helped Killer Frost lug the unconscious Ray Palmer up the Waverider, igniting at Amaya's panicked relay of sprinting through the city streets, searching for her kidnapped boyfriend, and thrilling when Sara Lance hauled a stumbling foe onto the ship and threw them into the holding cell.
Sara grabs the man by the chin, forcing his bruised eyes to look at her. "I'm going to kill you." She squeezes his face, digging her nails into the skin and drawing blood.
"Boss," Mick pulls a drag from is cigarette. He walks towards their hostage as Sara backs up a few steps. Mick blows out his smoke and crouches down to face the man. "It don't matter if yah talk." He takes another drag, the smoke swirling as he speaks. "She's gonna kill yah anyway."
The man glares defiantly, keeping his lips pressed into a thin line.
"See, your life don't mean shit to me." Another drag. He blows the smoke in the other guys face. "And it don't mean shit to her."
"We know you're after us," Sara says behind him. The weight of her anger fills the room. The promise of death. She takes Nate's kidnapping as a justification to slip back into her ruthless assassin persona; to let herself give into the bloodlust and seek revenge. "You tried to kill two of my men and stole another." Her fists are wrapped around her bo staff so tightly her knuckles are white.
Mick watches their captive, presenting as the picture of absolute calm even has he boils with fury. The other man stares back at him with a detached disposition. Until, slowly, a maniacal smile spreads across his face.
It's when he giggles that Mick reaches out and snaps his neck.
Mick rises from his crouching position as the body sags to the floor. Sara comes to stand next to him, staring down at the dead body with loathing. "We're going to find Nate," she says through clenched teeth. "And we are going to kill them all."
He grunts his assent, feeling that beast inside of him rearing. It slips over him like a blanket, that crazed creature that craves destruction. It's lived in him for so long, operating on impulse and hatred. And it's ready to be released again and burn everything in sight.
Sara looks at him and he knows he has the same feral, murderous craze in his own eyes. This is the part they understand most about each other, the part the rest of the team cowers from and want them to cage.
"Captain Lance," Gideon suddenly breaks the intensity they sit in. "I have located Doctor Heywood. The ship will make landing in twenty minutes."
She holds his stare for a silent moment before whispering, "Don't hold back." And then she is running out the door.
When he makes it to the Bridge, Amaya stands next to Sara, her eyes red rimmed and watery. He doesn't say a word, but lets it fuel his anger even further.
Killer Frost leans against the wall, arms folded across her chest and a scowl on her face. He strides over to her and mimics her posture. Glancing over at the others as he mutters, "Gonna go get Pretty back. Gonna get real nasty, real fast. Feel like taggin' along?"
She sneers, "Caity won't let me."
He frowns at her. "She the boss?"
Killer Frost grinds her teeth. She meets his eyes. "She saw what I did. She knows what you and Lance are gonna go do." As she speaks, the roots of her hair become brown, the color gliding down every white tress. Her icy blue eyes darken to oak brown.
Caitlin stares up at him pleadingly. "Please don't kill anyone," she whispers. "Please. I know you're angry, but you can't give into that rage."
"I fuckin' am rage, Snowflake," He growls at her. "Don't bother with tryin' to get me to change."
Caitlin shakes her head. "No. No, you're better than this. You don't have to be a killer. Neither of you do." She glances at Sara, who's watching them from the hologram table.
"They took Nate," the captain snaps. "They took him. They tried to kill Mick. Ray is laying in the Medbay, barely alive! And you want us to do nothing?!"
"Not nothing!" Caitlin's voice raises. "I don't want you to lose your humanity! You are two of the most lethal people I have ever met in my life. But, you're also good people." She reaches up and cups Mick's cheek gently. "You have a soul," she whispers. "Please don't lose it. There's another way."
The buzzing of something between them grows as she keeps her palm against his stubble, holding her gaze steady. He doesn't make a move until Gideon announces the arrival of their destination. And then he is backing out of her touch, his eyes locked on hers until he turns to retrieve his teammate and shed blood.
The abandoned two story house sat on the edge of town. Empty save for a single dining table, the house is crowded with a small audience of people dressed in head to toe black. Nate lays across the table, naked and bleeding. Bound at wrist and ankle, he glares up at the woman standing over him.
"Tell us where the stone is." Her voice calm, patient as she surveys him.
"Tell me where I am." He can't get over her face, how it looks like a beast had tried to claw it off.
"New Jersey," she answers simply. "Trenton, to be exact."
"What year is it?"
"Tell me where the stone is."
He tries to lurch forward. "I don't know anything about a fucking stone!"
She smirks at him and folds her hands behind her back, letting out a sigh as she turns and walks away from him. "You're lying." She makes eye contact with one of the goons surrounding the dining table. "Again."
He approaches Nate, a long rod in hand. Electricity sizzles at the tip, crackling as it jumps out into the open air.
"You'll notice you're unable to transform into steel. That was my doing." She smiles as Nate screams from the burning of his skin. "I have been studying your team; finding your weaknesses; understanding what makes each of you so special." She turns to face him again, her red painted lips still smiling at his pain. "And you are special, Doctor Heywood. I took extra care to familiarize myself with your condition. And now," she leans over him, bringing her face mere inches from his own. "I'm afraid I will have to take away your unique ability."
Panting, Nate stares at her in horror. "W-what do you mean?"
"I find I have need of you, and once I have harvested that which gives you your powers, I will return you. Of course, you likely won't be alive to continue on anyway, but I am a woman of my word."
She straightens away from his face and strolls around the dining table, circling as she continues to talk. "I am a woman of science, Nathaniel. And I seek to fill my life with as much knowledge as I can access. However, once my own world failed to fulfill my thirst, I had to venture into the multiverse. You understand; you are a man of intellect as well. Most worlds are filled with ordinary discoveries and ordinary people. But your world - Earth Prime - has such a plethora of outstanding peoples. As does Earths 3, 17, 26-32, 48, 51 and X. Though, I truly have no desire to visit Earth X after you and your colleagues destroyed the Führerer."
She stops at his feet, hands clasp behind her back. "I'm sure this is very hard for you," She lets out a sigh. "To hear these words and see your mother's face. It would be enough to crumble the spirit of most."
Nate glowers as he pants through the pain of the electric shocks. "Not exactly what I expected."
Doctor Dorothy Heywood nods in understanding. "My own son died in utero. I like to think he would have grown into a career similar to my own." She swallows, the only sign of any true emotion. "When I discovered the multiverse; when I realized there were versions of my son who lived…" she bites her bottom lip. "The joy I felt; the curiosity! It was as if I had been given a second chance at motherhood."
The room is silent with a pregnant pause, the crowd of subordinates looming in every available space. Nate lays spread on the dining table, tense from fear and agony. Mercilessly, this mother from another Earth quietly instructs his tormentor to step away with the electric rod.
"I have a business partner," she informs. "Another scientist, specializing in microbiology and analytical chemistry. Unfortunately, she was unable to attend our mission, but you will be meeting her shortly. I have the most -"
With a deafening blast, the front door and bay window shatter. Debris flies everywhere, showering the inhabitants in a cascade of rubble. Fire erupts instantaneously, the flames growing ever higher by the second.
For the briefest of moments, Dorothy makes eye contact with Nate, looking as if she weighs the risk between leaving him and taking him with her. But, the old dump of a house is the perfect kindling for an inferno. And tramping through where the doorway once stood, is Mick Rory, his heat gun blazing a stream of red-hot hell. Sara stalks in next to him, murder in her eyes and a knife in her hand. She ignores the fire and searches for her prey.
"Doctor," one of the henchmen rushes to Dorothy. "You must reach safety." He takes her by the elbow and leads her out the back of the house.
Sara rushes through the flames and throws herself at the remaining gang. Mick follows, quickling making more use of his gun by cracking it across the closest enemies skull. In a matter of seconds the entire house breaks out into a mosh of fighting.
"Hey!" Nate screams. He's battered and his Citizen Steel powers have been tampered with, but he's a goddamn Legend and he's going to fight his way out of here.
Sara is at his side in a matter of seconds. "Nice dick," she smirks, and cuts him loose.
"This was not my choice!" He quips back, swinging his legs over the side of the dining table. "Behind!"
Sara whirls around and catches her assailant in the throat with her knife, pushing it all the way to the hilt and ripping it back out. She doesn't give the corpse another glance as it sags to the floor. "Can you fight?"
"The other day you specifically told me I can't and then beat my ass in front of my girlfriend."
Sara rolls her eyes. "You are such a baby sometimes. Here." She produces another dagger from her utility belt and hands it over to him. "Get to the jump ship outside and call the team. Mick and I can handle this."
A roar from the other end of the house snaps both of their attentions towards the front living room, where Mick is battling against four. One has his arm around the arsonist's neck, while another attempts to yank the heat gun out of his hand.
Sara takes off towards them, jumping and kicking her foot out and striking the second attacker in the ribs, sending him to the ground.
Mick flips the other over his shoulder and shoots with enough power to make the other man combust on the spot. His jaw is clenched; his whole fucking body is tense with that seething mania of anger that claims him. His ears are ringing, his vision tunneling, and that fucking need to obliterate everything in his fucking sight is rising, and rising, and rising…
Everything is red.
He can hear his own breathing, hard and fast. That laugh, is it his? That deafening, untethered, unending stream of obnoxious cackling?
Everything is red.
The joy that spreads through him. The highest of highs. The feeling he always wants to chase. The caged beast that begs to be let out. Let me out, let me out, let me out. His true self. His inner beast. The being that can take, devour, destroy, burn the entire world.
The red.
The beautiful, beautiful red…
"STOP!"
He blinks and it's as if he's reemerging from a cloud. The edges of his vision are fuzzy. His head feels heavy. There's an ache in the back of his mind; a pair of doe eyes, begging.
"Rory, stop!" Sara is screaming right in front of his face. Her hand is pushing the heat gun down. "You got 'em, Mick. Stand down."
He struggles to focus; struggles to actually see, the smoke from his flames is thick. Around him, the floor of the burning house is painted in blood, bodies scattered. He looks to Sara, confused.
She swallows, terrified. "You got 'em."
The Waverider lands a half mile away from the location Dorothy Heywood and her mob had taken Nate. Already on board with fresh bandages and a set of clothes, he greets them once the ramp has lowered.
Sara walks with Nate, listening as he relays information regarding his capture and torment.
Mick walks slowly up the ramp, his mind a jumble and his adrenaline from before slogging down to the point of exhaustion. The clicking sound of stilettos has him abruptly halting at the top of the ramp.
Caitlin stares back at him, her eyes big and pleading.
He can't take it. His balls his fists and looks away, rushes of anger and guilt filling him. And he hates it. He's never once felt anything for the crimes he's commited, never cared. But the way Caitlin is looking at him now, the way Sara was screaming at him earlier to stop…
"I told you not to try to change me," he murmurs. Before she can respond, he steps passed her and marches down the hall.