Come On Eileen

Participants:

brian_icon.gif eileen_icon.gif nick_icon.gif

Scene Title Come On Eileen
Synopsis Brian and Nick converge on Eileen's location.
Date February 21, 2011

Ruins of Midtown


Broadway

Bleecker

Lafayette

A small redlight dances off the corner of a building in the distance, swinging across the street to a building on the other side of the road. Shining brightly, the red light then dances to the street signs. Moving through midtown is the safest at night. It's also the most dangerous at the same time. But since Brian first ran into the robots, he hasn't spent much time in Midtown without being properly prepared. So while one Brian moves on the street level with a sub-machine gun, a pair of Brian move in the ruins of buildings above. Both working on carrying a portable XM307 ACSW which is a lot of letters to say very large gun.

Pausing at the corner, Brian peers around into the darkness. Holding up one fist over his shoulder to his companion. There was something moving. Crouching low, Winters leans into the wall to peek around the edge. A light chuckle seeps out of his lips. Looking over his shoulder. "Newspaper." Beckoning with one hand he goes to straighten.

Moving around the corner he stalks down the street, weapon up. "See anything that looks like a mansion?"

The Nick that has met Brian on the corner looks worse for wear — not quite as bad as he looked when he first showed up on Pollepel Island in November, but not much better either — dark scruff covers his face and he's wearing the same clothes he's been in for several days; the bottom of his jeans are stained dark with grime from dirty water, his face and hands are soiled and smudged with dirt and blood. He looks, in short, homeless, as he hasn't been home for several days.

He gives Brian an incredulous shake of his head and nods toward the steps leading into the subway station, long abandoned. "She's underground. I been trying to find her but I was off a few blocks. Woulda taken me a couple more days to get down this way."

He wears a pack on his back and carries a gun in his hand as he moves down the steps. "I started down to see what I could find, but came back up to meet you — my guess is if I find her, gonna need help to get her out, and you and your little army of clones'll come in handy."

Once down into the bowels of the subway, he nods one way. "I already cleared that direction, so I'm hopin' it's this way. Careful. Sometimes these tunnels look clear, the ground solid, and then suddenly there's a ditch or the ceiling's falling in." And then there's the robots.

"You know even when you're working with someone, you're an asshole." Brian murmurs quietly, glancing this way and that. One boot slinks in front of his other as he stalks through the vacant street. "I was kidding about the mansion. Ass." Brian growls, moving to the side. "And just so you know. I was here first while you were getting a morning wood holding Dee's hand and seeing your sister in a corset…" His rifle sweeps the emptiness of the street behind them as they move down into the subway.

"I was already out here." Winters glances over at Nick. Teeth baring for a moment. "I've been in Midtown five times more than you have." Someone might be a bit touchy today. Starting down in the direction that Nick indicated Brian pauses, letting out a long breath.

"Sorry. It's a hard time right now."

The younger man's brows scowl as Brian mutters at him and his hand curls into a fist at the mention of morning wood, but his sister is in danger and he needs Brian to help get her out. "Jesus. Do you never shut up?" he growls as he moves through the walkway that leads to the subway platform, a flashlight out to guide their way with its beam.

When he gets to the platform, he shines the light one way, then the other. "Right or left?" he asks, frowning — every moment might count.

A trickle of water can be heard to the left, and his jaw twitches, and he juts his chin in that direction. "Let's go this way."

This way is a long, narrow tunnel with crumbling walls and exposed pipes that sheen with frozen moisture under the light of their torches — even down here, in several inches of dark, stagnant water, it's cold enough for ice to form in glittering sheets on the metal and brick. The chances of someone surviving below ground without access to somewhere dry are not very high, but you can't enter the mind of a dreaming person if they're dead because the dead don't dream.

Presumably.

There are smaller passageways that branch off the main tracks — access tunnels designed for men to fit through rather than trains, and they pass several of these yawning openings before coming upon with that's been blocked off by a rusted gate with an old, drooping chain and padlock, and it's on the other side of the gate that they find what they're looking for.

Eileen is a small shape, her back to the gate and legs drawn up into her chest, but it's the sound of her thin, haggard breathing and the rise and fall of her shoulders that distinguishes her from the other shadows.

"Nope." Brian answers quietly. "Asshole. Asshole. Asshole. Asshole. Asshole." The insults eventually turn into whispers but don't stop. Pressing through the silence Brian's nattering doesn't stop. Because he apologized. And Nick didn't take it. So the Assholes are incessant. Finally though, they stop. The flashlight in his gun waving around the tunnel pauses. His boots pausing in their march.

"Nick." He calls out, the asshole barrage halting. Winters takes a few rapid steps forward. "I got her." Rushing forward his gun falls to the side as he sprints towards her.

The barrage of insults is ignored — Nick is tunnel-visioned in his quest. His breath catches when he sees that form and he hurries forward. "Lee," he murmurs, breaking into a jog, heart pounding. "Lee, we're here. Are you alone? Is he somewhere nearby?"

And then he's there, crouching next to her, touching her shoulder lightly. "We're here," he tells her again, trying to see her face, to see how badly hurt she is.

She's breathing, which is at least something.

He's up from his knees again to grab the rusted lock, peering at it before he takes his Maglight and smashes the lock against the fence — one, two, three strikes before the rust-eaten metal gives and the padlock falls to the ground; Nick's knuckles bleed with the effort but he pulls the gate open, the creak loud against the trickle of water, and he winces, looking up. If Sylar's nearby …

He glances at Brian, the words unspoken — they need to hurry.

He moves through the gate to crouch again, pale eyes seeking Eileen's face, worry furrowing his brow. "We're here. Brian… Brian's going to carry you, all right?" Nick says softly.

The gate opens, and Eileen reaches out to steady herself with one hand — the other dangling in a makeshift sling made from her coat's lining — and leaves a sooty smear on the wall in the shape of her fingers. She's not all there — exhaustion and dehydration muffle the sound of their voices and impose a delayed reaction time on her response to external stimuli. The whites of her eyes show in panic like a cornered rabbit, but she lacks the energy to resist either of the men when they move on her.

Her first thought is that this is some kind of elaborate trick, and she shows bloodied teeth in a snarl that hisses out, "Sylar."

The light shines around from Brian's gun as he waves it in a wide perimeter to make sure he is nowhere nearby. Once satisfied no one is around the strap of the gun is thrown around his shoulder. The gun draping against Brian's back. Moving forward, Brian goes to kneel next to Eileen. One arm sinking under Eileen's legs, the other under her back. At her snarl he gives pause. "No this isn't Sylar. This is Brian. I punched you and put you in the back of a car once, remember?" Surely Sylar doesn't know about that. "Then I gave you a knife to stab my friend." No one could ever make that up.

Brian then scoops Eileen up smoothly, holding her against his chest carefully. Moving to step behind Nick, she's carried gently, one hand going to support her head. "We're going to get you out of here Eileen. .." A beat. "I swear what I mean."

Blue eyes are taking account of her injuries, his expression grim before he pulls his pack off his back and pulls out a water bottle, moving closer to Brian to gently place it in Eileen's hand that isn't tucked into a makeshift sling. He studies her face. "We're getting you out of here, Lee. We'll take you somewhere safe, get someone to come look at your injuries. Delia, maybe, or that doctor who took care of her at Redbird, someone safe. I won't let Sylar hurt you. You're safe."

The words make him grimace and he throws Brian a pained look. "Come on. If you get tired, pull another one of you to carry her, yeah? We need to hurry." He might still be around, and if Sylar is as powerful as Gabriel, Nick knows he can't fight him, though his gun is held and ready for the first sign of trouble. "Let's go."

"Toora loora toora loo-rye-aye," Eileen answers Brian thickly, and more than what he's telling her, she's convinced by the smell of him — something she's sure Sylar wouldn't remember, because sometimes she loses track of what she tells Gabriel and what she doesn't. So much between them is implicit. Torchlight reveals extensive bruising on one side of her face, jaw purpled, and something uglier under the hollow of her eye where she was struck, either by something or someone.

She flexes the fingers attached to the hand in the sling to see if they still work. (They do.) "Dome?" is what she asks Nick, her head lolling on Brian's shoulder.

"Ding ding ding dong ding!" The notes follow the melody of the song of the Midnight Runners and their leader. Whatshisface. An agitated look is cast to Nick. "Oh is that how it works? I've never been a replicator before." Brian mumbles as he starts to move carefully after Nick.

Frowning down at Eileen's injuries, Brian allows Nick to answer her question. "Eileen. You shouldn't have come down this way, the cheap hookers are on the other side of midtown. You totally went the wrong way." He explains gently as he jogs behind Nick with her held safely in his arms. After a moment of silence… "Tooo ra… tooo ra la roo laa aaay.. too raaa.."

Stony eyes and face meet Brian's barbs and Nick focuses on Eileen, swallowing hard before he speaks. "The dome's down," he says quickly. "I've been down here for a few days looking for you — I ain't been outta Midtown. But once we get you squared away, I'll go looking for them, all right? I ain't got any messages, but it just came down yesterday at noon."

He withholds how much damage it did in coming down — there's no reason to worry her, not when she needs to feel safe, not when she needs to be taken care of. "Soon as we get you with a doctor, I'll head there and look for them," he repeats, leading the way with his flashlight back toward the surface.

"Hate that fucking song." Eileen would sound angrier if she had it in her. She doesn't, but Nick can maybe sense that even though she doesn't protest him going to look, that it's not enough. Her breathing grows more laboured, anxious, and she curls a hand at Brian's arm.

Incidentally, yesterday at noon doesn't mean anything to the woman who's been trapped underground long enough that she isn't sure what day it is anymore. Whether or not she can feel the sun's warmth on her grime-streaked face when they emerge onto the street will tell her how long ago that really was.

"Eileen." Brian answers, sounding faux annoyed. "All I want is to be your sledgehammer. So why don't you just call my name, alright? Put your mind at rest." When her hand grips his arm, he instinctually brings her in a littler closer to his chest. "Hey if you feel better about it. I think you're in better shape than the last time I carried you around." When he kidnapped her. "So that's a positive." Winters glances up at Nick, pausing behind him for a moment before continuing up the stairs. Taking deep breaths which each step, trying to keep her steady as he climbs.

As children, he often could tell what she was thinking — he was the more talkative by far, and often would speak for her. "It's the 21st. You been down almost a week," Nick says quietly. The journey is long, longer for Brian carrying Eileen, but Nick gives her that distance. As soon as they get closer to the surface, his phone is pulled out, messages checked — finally they emerge on the street, and he nods toward his F-150 on the corner, the only thing shiny and new in this desolate ruin. "Over there." He glances at Brian. "Where we wanna bring her? I got the apartment in Brooklyn, but it's on grid. Staten's pushing it, luckwise."

"Allegre," Eileen bites off. "West Village."

A lot has changed since they were children, but this one thing has at least stayed the same; Nick still talks more than his sister does unless she's speaking for someone else as a member of the Ferrymen network's council, and right now she might not be able to tell him all of their names. "Can't leave New York — promised. They'll be there."

"I have an apartment."

Brian looks around, frowning at Nick then Eileen. No one ever wants to go to his apartment. "In Chinatown. I have protection." He won't explain how. Pulling out behind Nick a ragged breath is let out as he makes it surface side. "But sure. A random French guy would probably be better." He bites down on his bottom lip.

Nick's keys are dug out of his backpack and he unlocks the truck with a remote, nodding to it, his jaw tensing at the mention of Allegre. "Whichever. We can go to Chinatown and bring Allegre to her."

He hurries toward the truck, pulling the passenger door open. "Put her in the front, and you can climb in the back on my side." At least it has a backseat, crunched as it might be.

He heads around to the driver side, stumbling a little on rubble with feet exhausted from walking tunnel after tunnel hour after hour. Once everyone is situated, he climbs into the truck, starting it with a rumble. A touch to something silver at his throat, he whispers, "Thank you."


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