Chapter Text
Today seems like a good day
To burn a bridge or two
One with old wood creaking
It’ll burn away right on cue
1.
When their plan goes to shit, it goes to shit quickly and without warning.
Ava had been feeling pretty good about it up until then. Sure, she’d spent a good portion of the last ten minutes unable to use her legs, and the Halo had been humming weirdly since the tomb, since Adriel had pushed his hand through her chest, through her spine, and wrapped his fingers around part of her soul, but they’d kept it together. Trust your team, Beatrice had said, and she’d been right.
But now Ava’s frozen, staring across a crowded courtyard at a formerly dead, definitely evil maybe-angel, with the air above them swirling with wraith demons and Mary ramming past her in what is shaping up to be a glorious last stand.
And Ava knows she should do something – knows she needs to do something – but she can’t move. Even ignoring the incipient existential crisis looming at the back of her mind, she’s not built for this. She defaults to flight because that’s her nature, had tried fight because Beatrice asked, but now her limbs are stuck on freeze, immobile even as Lilith pushes past her to follow Mary into the crowd in a fountain of blood, with Beatrice two paces behind her with a knife in each hand. Camila shifts off to the side, reloading her crossbow and leaving Ava alone under an ornate archway, fingers white-knuckled around the hilt of the Cruciform Sword, watching Adriel watch her from the other side of the melee.
Trust your team, Beatrice had said, but Ava can’t even see her team. She’s back in the wall, with the weight of tons of rock crushing her and the comforting voice in her ear fading away. She’s back in the bed, numb below her collarbones and helpless against the thoughtless cruelty of her caretakers.
Stuck.
Paralysed.
Frozen, unable to do anything except stand and watch and scream impotently in the vault of her own mind – help them help me HELP THEM – until something responds with an angry buzz up her spine into her skull. It’s an odd sensation, tinged with sluggish irritation that reminds Ava of Diego on Sunday mornings in the orphanage, when the priest would visit and the nuns would wake them both up before dawn to pray, but Ava doesn’t have time to examine it properly before the halo activates with a burst of raw, primordial heat that slams out of her to sweep throughout the courtyard.
Part of Ava leaves her in that blast. The force of it pushes her to her knees and splashes bright, dancing spots across her vision, and the next few moments don’t form memories so much as impressions – the weight of a crowd thrown away from her, Adriel’s wide-eyed alarm, a haze of red blown away. Figures in black moving towards her. The ground rising up to meet her.
Beatrice’s face above her, Beatrice’s hand on her cheek, Beatrice looking up and shouting – shouting shouting Beatrice doesn’t shout – for Lilith to “do it, now!”
The world going red and sulphuric.
Nothingness.
|||
The first time Ava wakes up, can think again, they’re out in the street, and she’s suspended, mostly upright, between two warm bodies.
“Holy mother of goddamn fucking shit,” Mary gasps from somewhere nearby, which about sums up Ava’s feelings. It’s a testament to how fucked up the situation is that none of the nuns within earshot scold her. It’s enough to push Ava to open her eyes, worried that maybe there aren’t any nuns within earshot, that maybe they’ve somehow gotten separated, and she regrets it almost immediately when the world swims drunkenly into view, hazy with smoke and tasting of ashes and blood. The streets of Rome are chaotic, with panicked supplicants running away from St Peter’s Square and emergency responders pushing towards it, and the constant, confusing movement isn’t helping Ava’s disorientation.
Movement immediately beside her draws her attention to her position, and she blinks and looks around to find Beatrice on one side and a swaying Lilith on the other. They’re both coated in pale rock dust and blood that looks black under the orange street lights. Over Lilith’s shoulder, Ava can see Camila holding up an even-more-dishevelled Mary, looking almost naked without her shotguns and with an arm that hangs limp and too long down her side.
Beatrice shifts her grip on Ava – and oh, Ava hadn’t realised that she wasn’t standing under her own power, that her legs weren’t quite working – and looks around, assessing, then at Lilith and says, “Mother Superion.”
Lilith groans and grits her teeth, but steps away from Ava and disappears in a haze as Ava staggers more heavily against Beatrice without Lilith’s extra support.
Beatrice catches her, because Beatrice always catches her, and props her against a nearby wall. The cut on her cheek has reopened, oozing dark blood sluggishly down the line of her jaw. Ava wants to reach up, to wipe it away, but her arms feel lead-weighted and stiff.
The stone of the wall is rough under her hands.
“Can you stand?” Beatrice asks.
Ava wants to nod, but that would be a lie. “Just give me a sec,” she says instead, which is only slightly less a lie. Beatrice nods, but keeps a steadying hand on each of Ava’s shoulders as she looks around, taking in the street around them. Ava can almost see her mind working, planning them a way out. Her hood had been pulled off at some point, leaving a ring around her face where the dust from the explosion stops abruptly. The demarcation between grime and clean skin is stark and entrancing.
Ava wants to run her fingers across it.
Ava can’t move her arms.
With a sound like tearing glass and a bright haze of fire, Lilith reappears, this time with the rigid form of Mother Superion pressed against her side. Superion’s eyes are wild and her fingers are white-knuckled around her cane. Ava wonders if Lilith stopped to explain before grabbing her and teleporting – because Lilith can teleport and they’re going to have to talk about that soon – but she doesn’t get long to think about it, because Lilith staggers upon landing, then slumps sideways towards Beatrice. Beatrice releases Ava to catch Lilith before she collapses, and without her support, Ava finds herself slowly sliding to the ground.
Strands of her hair catch on the brick. Pull tight. Release.
Mother Superion grabs Lilith’s other arm, eyes darting around even as she adjusts her grip. Ava can see her doing the same rapid assessment Beatrice had done moments before. The similarity makes her want to laugh.
The pavement is cold against her skin.
“Can she walk?” Superion asks Beatrice over Lilith’s shoulder, nodding at Ava.
“No,” Beatrice says, which is probably true but stings all the same.
“Can you carry her?” Superion asks.
“Yes,” Beatrice says.
The Halo is burning between her shoulder blades.
There’s a man coming towards them. He’s close – far too close – before Ava realises that he’s in the uniform of the Swiss Guard, that the red haze isn’t just the streetlight reflecting off the smoke, that his eyes are black from edge to edge.
“Bea!” she warns. She tries for a shout. She gets a hoarse croak.
It’s enough. Beatrice shoves Lilith away and turns, catching his first, clumsy punch on her forearm. Her other hand flicks first to the shuriken pouches in the small of her back – empty – then to the sheaths on her chest – also empty – before simply ramming rigid fingers into his throat. Even possessed, the man falters under the strike, but it’s not enough to stop him, and Beatrice is exhausted. She keeps up with him for three more rapid blows before she falters, and his hand shoots out in a brute force imitation of Beatrice’s first move, seizing her around the throat and lifting her feet from the ground.
Nobody is close enough. Mother Superion is tangled under Lilith’s deadweight, Mary is swaying on her feet as it is, and Camila, with the holy sword sheathed on her back, is the furthest away. Ava lurches forward, lands hard on her hands and knees. She only has to ask once this time – no no help her – and the irritated buzz is back, rattling up to the place where her spine meets her skull then blasting out of her back in an incandescent wave.
The blackness takes her before she feels the impact of the ground.
|||
The second time Ava wakes up, it’s to the twin sensations that she’s uncomfortable, and somehow moving. Her chest is pulled against a surface that shifts subtly with the rhythmic movement, and there’s something digging into her stomach. Her arms are slung around something firm, but her cheek is pressed against something soft. Something warm, and smooth. Ava nuzzles into it instinctively.
“Ava?” Beatrice’s voice is oddly close to her ear, but it’s not until Ava finally opens her eyes that she works out why. It takes her a second to get her bearings, but when she does she realises Beatrice is carrying her, bodily, Ava’s front pressed along the length of her back. Ava’s arms are hooked over her shoulders and crossed over her chest, pulled tight by Beatrice’s hands around Ava’s wrists. It’s an awkward position, forcing Beatrice to walk slightly hunched forward to keep Ava’s feet from dragging along the ground, but the added height granted by her combat boots is just enough that she’s still mostly upright.
Ava head is pressed into her shoulder. The warm surface under her cheek is Beatrice’s neck.
Ava can feel her racing pulse against her jaw.
“Mhmm,” Ava mumbles, shifting her head just enough to look around.
They’re on a different street, stumbling forward as fast as possible when only half of them can move properly. Mary is up ahead leading the way under her own power, but one of her arms – the one that had been hanging at the wrong angle – is bound across her chest with a strip of black fabric and she’s limping with every step. Her working hand is clenched around the grip of a pistol, and Ava doesn’t have the energy to wonder where she got it. Two steps behind her, Lilith is draped heavily between Mother Superion and Camila, but she’s walking, just. Beatrice is bringing up the rear, with Ava slung over her like a holy-halo-bearing backpack.
“Ava?” Beatrice says again. She sounds out of breath, but she is bearing Ava’s entire weight on her shoulders and still somehow moving forward. A strand of her hair has escaped its bun and tickles across Ava’s brow with every step. She smells like ash and lavender.
The skin under Ava’s cheek is warm.
“I can see your hair, Bea,” Ava says, or tries to. It comes out as a slew of slurred consonants that even omnilingual Beatrice doesn’t understand.
The world is sliding in and out of focus.
“Just hold on, we’re almost there,” Beatrice says, squeezing Ava’s hands gently. “We just have to get over the river, past the roadblocks. Can you wrap your legs around me?”
There’s a joke in that request somewhere, just out of reach. Ava grasps for it. Misses. Tries to lift her legs. Fails.
“Can’t feel them,” Ava mumbles. She thinks maybe that should scare her.
There’s a golden buzzing in her ears.
“It’s okay,” Bea says. “Squeeze with your arms, I’m gonna let you go for a second.”
That, Ava can do. She tightens her arms, digs stiff fingers under the leather of Beatrice’s armour.
The Halo is burning along her spine.
Beatrice releases her hands slowly, ready to grab again if Ava’s grip fails, but Ava stays in place. She wonders if maybe her arms were made to do this, to wrap around this woman and never let go. Beatrice’s hands are on her legs, coaxing them up and around her hips. Ava lets her, lets her hook her legs around her waist until she can pin one with the other and hold them both in place with one hand, lets her use her other hand to anchor Ava’s arms to her chest.
Her heart feels unhinged behind her ribs.
“You good?” Mary calls from ahead of them.
“Yes, I’ve got her,” Beatrice answers, straightening her posture and lengthening her stride to catch up. The change in position shifts her centre of gravity, and Ava instinctively tightens her grip, feeling like she’s falling. Beatrice winces under the increased pressure, but doesn’t falter. Her voice is a vibration against Ava’s fingers.
Ava’s vision is swimming.
“It’s okay, you’re okay. I won’t let you fall,” Beatrice says for Ava’s ears alone. “I’ve got you.”
I’ve got you I’ve got you I’ve –
Ava succumbs to the soothing buzz in her bones with Beatrice’s voice rumbling through her skin.
|||
The third time Ava wakes up, she wakes up all at once, flooded with adrenaline and an unnameable dread. She tries to sit up, only to realise that she’s already sitting up, and there’s a hand on her chest and an arm around her back.
“Ava! It’s okay, you’re safe. It’s okay.”
Beatrice’s voice in her ear. Beatrice’s hand against her chest. Beatrice’s arm around her back.
“Beatrice,” Ava says. Her throat is raw.
“I’m here. You’re okay,” Beatrice says again, soft and soothing, and the agitated buzzing in Ava’s head lessens, taking the flood of fear with it. Every part of her hurts, but it’s a massive step up from the terrifying numbness she’d had before.
“Where are we?” Ava asks, trying to think through the weird, golden hum in her head.
“Just outside Rome,” Beatrice answers.
“Are you… is everyone here?”
“We’re all here. We’re all okay,” Beatrice says, squeezing briefly with the arm around Ava’s back as Ava breathes out slowly, flooded by a wave of relief.
As Ava relaxes against her, Beatrice lets her hand drifts slowly down from Ava’s chest to rest on her leg, just above her knee, which – while a comforting reminder that she’s not numb, that she can still feel – pushes Ava to actually examine the configuration of her limbs.
The humming at the base of her skull goes up then down an octave when she realises she’s in the back seat of a car – which is fine – but because there’s six of them crammed into what appears to be a fairly small sedan, she’s not sitting as one normally would. Instead, she’s wedged sideways against the door, with her legs slung over Beatrice’s lap and her feet tucked under Lilith’s legs. Beatrice has one hand curved around her back, keeping her upright and pressed against her, and the other resting lightly on her leg. It’s the closest Ava’s come to being cradled by someone for as long as she can remember, and she has to resist the oddly insistent urge to nuzzle into the warmth of Beatrice’s body underneath her.
Next to Beatrice, Lilith is sitting bolt upright, staring blankly at her own reflection in the rear-view mirror. The fact that she hasn’t yet objected to having Ava’s feet wedged under her leg is a mark of how out of it she is, but she’s present and breathing, so Ava will count that as a win. Mary’s sitting on Lilith’s other side, her face illuminated by the harsh glow of the phone she’s frowning down at.
Camila is driving, with her hands tight around the wheel and 3 and 9, with Mother Superion next to her in the passenger’s seat, her hands crossed over the hilt of the Cruciform Sword propped between her legs. They both appear unharmed, and seeing all of them here, still with her, eases tension Ava hadn’t realised she’d been carrying.
The car they’re in is very obviously not the van they’d originally used to get to Vatican City. It’s older, with plastic covers over the front seats and the upholstery of the roof lining sagging in places. Outside, one of the headlights is only half working, and they carve thick, uneven chunks out of the darkness around them, broken only occasionally by streetlights or other cars drifting past them. It’s too dark for Ava to gauge how long it’s been or how far they’ve travelled, and the only clock she can see is on the dashboard and alleges it to be just after three in the afternoon, so that’s no help.
“Why are we in a clown car?” Ava mumbles, mostly for something to drown out the humming in her skull. The adrenaline spike is rapidly fading away, and without it, Ava is sinking back into the sluggish lethargy she’s come to associate with pushing the Halo past it’s limits.
“It’s the only thing we could find that wasn’t lo-jacked out the ass,” Mary says, still scowling at her phone like it had done something to offend her.
“It’s not ideal, but we didn’t have many options,” Beatrice adds. Her breath ghosts over Ava’s neck as she speaks, which changes the rhythm of the humming, and it’s distracting enough that it takes Ava a moment to put the pieces together.
“Wait, did we steal this car?”
“Like she said, limited options,” Mary points out, finally looking over at her. There’s a cut above her eye and her lip is spilt, but they obviously haven’t had time for anything more than the most basic first-aid.
“Should I like, move or something? What if we get pulled over?” Ava brain isn’t properly connected to all her nerves just now, so she’s not sure if she actually feels or just imagines Beatrice’s arm tightening around her back just a fraction at the suggestion.
Mary makes a sound somewhere between a scoff and a laugh. “Babygirl, even if we weren’t all covered in blood and stone dust, what we did back there wasn’t subtle. ‘Ninja Nuns beat up Magician Jesus after Vatican explosion’ is all over the internet. We made the news. If we get pulled over, unrestrained passengers will be the least of our problems.”
“Oh. That’s… probably not great.”
“A problem for the future, I think. We have more immediate concerns,” Beatrice says, her voice a soothing vibration against Ava’s side. She’s removed the outer layer of her combat gear, and Ava is having trouble stopping herself from pressing further into the soft warmth of her.
She’s distracted from it by a ping from Mary’s phone. Mary looks down at it for a long moment, then hisses, “Finally!” Leaning forward, she taps Camila on the shoulder and says, “Follow the signs to Florence, I’ve got a guy there that can get us supplies.”
“A guy?” Beatrice asks as Camila nods and switches lanes.
“A contact.” Off Beatrice’s sceptical look, Mary adds, “He’s trustworthy. Ish.” Beatrice doesn’t look away, and Mary throws her one working hand up. “He owes me and is close enough to be useful, and like you said, we don’t have many options.”
Beatrice breathes out sharply through her nose, but relents. “Fine.”
Mary nods, then looks back down at her phone to tap out a message. Then, apropos of nothing, she says, “Camila, don’t freak out,” and opens the door of the moving car. Ignoring the collective yelp of surprise from everyone except Lilith, she leans out just far enough to drop her phone under the wheel before pulling it closed again. Camila, impressively, doesn’t freak out, but she does swerve a little as the door drags against the air, then scowls at Mary in the rear-view once she’s corrected their course.
Ava thinks Camila says something, and gets a snappish reply, but she’s stopped paying attention. The swerve of the car had pressed her body closer to Beatrice’s, just as they’d driven under one of the rare streetlights on the back roads out of Rome. The light had thrown the cut on Beatrice’s cheek into sharp relief, and even after they’d swooped back into the darkness, there’s still enough ambient light for Ava’s eyes to trace the dark line against her skin. It’s not bleeding any more, but the blood under it is smeared, like Beatrice had wiped at it absentmindedly before it dried.
Ava’s halfway through the thought that she wants to touch when she realises her hand is already there, tracing her fingers just under the damaged skin.
Beatrice’s breath hitches at the contact, but she doesn’t pull away. The humming in Ava’s head changes timbre.
“Sorry,” Ava says softly, stilling her fingers, but Beatrice shakes her head, just a fraction. Mary and Camila are still bickering, but in the darkness, with Beatrice’s eyes glinting at her in the moonlight, Ava feels a little bit like they might be the only two people in the world.
“It’s okay,” Beatrice says, just as softly. It’s dark enough that Ava can’t see her expression properly, but she can feel the soft wash of her breath against her wrist. Ava lets her fingers continue their path along her cheek, down the length of her jaw to trail over her throat. The skin there is darker in patches, bruised where the possessed guard grabbed her, and Ava ghosts her fingers over the marks until Beatrice’s hand comes up to cover them. “I’m okay, Ava.”
Ava watches her for a long moment, traces the reflected moonlight in her eyes, then whispers, “Thank you. For coming to get me.”
Beatrice smiles, quick and brilliant. It smooths a golden warmth along Ava’s spine. “Of course. I promised.”
The warm, golden feeling spreads, running from the base of Ava’s skull to the tips of her toes and fingers, then recedes, leaving a glowing drowsy feeling in its wake.
Something of it must show on her face, because Beatrice tugs their joined hands down to Ava’s stomach and says quietly, “You can sleep, if you want.”
Ava does want, badly, but, “Won’t I squash you?”
It pulls another fleeting smile from Bea’s lips. “You’re fine. Sleep, Ava. It’s okay.”
Beatrice shifts the hand on Ava’s back upward, sliding it up her spine until it lands at the base of her skull, directly over the humming place. Gently, she shifts them both and guides Ava’s head down until it’s resting next to hers against the headrest, and Ava gives in, lets her eyes slip closed, and drifts to sleep to the sound of Mary and Camila still bickering and the rhythm of Beatrice’s breathing against her skin.