[Sodium_noir] Saturday Evening - En route to the Sinclair Party

[Liz Oleksyn]

Jack, Aurora, Christine, Mara, Mitsuko
Temple of the Five Dragons

Some myths are meant to be dispelled.  The one about
seeing a white light at the end of a long tunnel in
the moments before death is clearly one of those
myths.  Or maybe, it’s true for some - true for those
who’ve lived a good life and deserve to be shuffled
off into the afterlife in the warm company of loved
ones who’d previously made this wondrous, mystical
journey.

Jack did not qualify for such a demise.  Instead, his
last, lingering moments are more like a failing
television set - sound fading away and picture losing
distinction, becoming a snowy blur.

And then someone torches the bloody thing...

>Jack felt it. Nausea at first, and a rise in
temperature. Strange and still not entirely familiar,
the sensations from his body were overwhelming for a
time. But then, on some deeper level, he felt the
change. The wounds, his sacrifice for power, they did
not heal. But neither were they poisoned now. The
flesh was ravaged and scarred, but the sickness was
burned away. All that remained now was the puss of
dead >blood cells. 

> The Rote succeeds.

> And Aurora crumples for a moment at Jack's head,
laying >perpendicular
> to his body, breathing heavily and hard.  She was
relieved, but
> winded.

He is aware of the fire she’s blasted into him, which,
in turn, has consumed the fire that was killing him. 
He’s also aware of Aurora’s proximity, can feel the
lingering sparks of energy she’s expended on his
behalf

>"You okay?" asks Christine, looking intently at
Aurora. She lets her  
gaze stray again to the entity currently calling
himself Jack. Even  
in the short time since she last looked, his colour is
better, his  
skin no longer beaded and dank with fever sweat.
"Hey," she says  
"whatever you did, I think it worked! He definitely
looks better. Lot  
less like he's about to, y'know . . ." Christine
pauses in mid  
unfortunate comment, too late to retrieve it, "croak.
Sorry."  
Christine casts an apologetic glance at Jack, seeing
his closed eyes  
>tighten and flicker.

His eyes open slowly and world comes back into focus. 
The first thing he sees is Aurora’s face and, through
parched lips and with cracked voice, Jack smiles
faintly and whispers, “Thank you.”

He turns his head to see Christine, adding with a hint
of arched brow, “I don’t think I’ll be croaking today,
miss.”

Another pause.  There is a wealth of barely suppressed
emotion and a bit of dampness in his eyes (which he
will later swear was due to extreme fatigue and stress
of a near-death experience), as Jack’s gaze meets
Christine’s.

“Thanks for saving me.”


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