"Judgment": A Dishonored Fanfic

Chapter 13

Elaine backed away fearfully, with one hand over her mouth, and jumped again as she felt more hands on her.
   "It's me," Corvo told her, "it's okay, it's me."
She turned round and flung herself into his arms, resisting the urge to cry as best she could while Daud moved forward to examine the scene with an incredulous look on his face.
   "What the fucking fuck was that?" He exclaimed. "Did you see it? Holy shit." He stared at the body, watching as the flames began to dwindle. Bizarrely, they didn't lick out to cover anything else in fire- they only existed on the now-dead weeper. "This green fire...it's not burnin' anything else here. This is crazy. I'm gonna check the rest of this floor, stay there." He walked away.
Corvo was watching over one of Elaine's shoulders as he held onto the still-shaking woman. He saw it too. That flash. The fire.
And he'd not imagined it, as he'd first thought; that unearthly green flame had come from her hands.
Unearthly was definitely the key word.
   "It's done now." He told her gently, kissing her cheek. "I don't know how you did that, but it sure worked."
   "...that was me?" She couldn't believe it.
He nodded slowly. "Yeah- we both saw it. The second your hands flew out, there it was. Bright green, like jade. You killed it."
She began to move then, slowly turning round. It took a few seconds but her eyes eventually spied the inert body in the opposite room, lying where it had fallen.
Daud then came back in, also moving to hold her.
   "Is there any more?" Corvo asked.
He shook his head. "No. Was just those two. Might have been drawn in here by the sound of the rune, happens sometimes."
   "Or just turned right here and then stayed."
   "Yeah. That too." He then gently pulled Elaine away from him a fraction, looking at her face. "You okay?" He double-checked. "You didn't get scratched or bit?"
   "I'm fine." She said. "He never got the chance." Slightly numb with shock, she then moved past him and walked towards the haphazardly-lying body.
   "Might not be a good idea." Corvo advised.
   "...I want to see what I did." Came the reply.
They followed her into the adjoining room and took a look.
Its face was locked into a typical screaming expression, hands still forming death claws. That was fairly standard, whether they were alive or dead. What wasn't standard, were the six holes that existed on the weeper's torso. They gave the surrounding areas of flesh the look of melted wax, almost, and the dust-covered floorboards of the room's flooring could be seen straight through them. That flame had gone all the way through in just a few seconds, causing relatively-instant death.
   "Fuck." Daud said with amazement. "How can somethin' burn that hot, yet not burn at the same time? There's not even a smell...well, no more than usual, anyway."
   "Definitely very strange." Corvo agreed.
   "I didn't...I just wanted to get it away from me." Elaine said. "I did want it to die as well, but back then? Just wanted it away."
   "You managed that as well, this is how far you threw it."
   "I didn't though. Didn't even touch it."
   "That fire was the same as the lamp upstairs." Daud said then, putting the two things together. "You said you didn't do anythin' to that either, but now...it was you. It has to be one of your gifts. Did you know about it?"
She shook her head. "Not until now, no."
Daud briefly wondered if he'd have ended up like that too, but then quickly dismissed that thought as she'd been agreeable at the time of their unusual encounter. "Well, there's nothin' else we can do here. Not for a job like that. Let's just find that rune and get the hell out of this house."
   "Don't need to tell me twice." Elaine moved first, wanting to search to take her mind off it. Corvo looked at Daud briefly, then they also moved to carry on helping her.

They eventually located the small, pale item, stashed behind a painting in the same room that the weeper had fallen.
   "When it's hidden like this," Daud explained, "from outside it can look like it's in one spot when it's actually close-by in another."
   "Sure wanted to keep it safe." Elaine agreed. "I will too."
She took it down from the wall, standing on tip-toes to reach it, and saw that it was quite yellowed on one side. "This might be pretty old." She said to them both.
   "Roughly two hundred years." The Outsider said as he appeared a metre away in a flash of pale light.
Corvo and Daud startled slightly, but Elaine screamed.
   "Fuck's sake!" She yelled angrily. "I've had more than enough shocks for one day, thanks!"
   "Easy." Corvo cautioned.
   "And earlier was the least pleasant, I know." The Outsider agreed. "That gift needs some focusing, I think. Your reactions cause it to lash out over too wide an area. If you use that rune, it's strong enough to help you with that."
He first went to both Corvo and Daud in turn, letting them give him a brief kiss, then the Outsider turned and began to approach the still-nervous Elaine.
   "You are not the cornered tiger now." He told her. "Hanging onto such things, memorable as they are, only breeds insecurity."
As he spoke and got closer, she began to feel calmer and instead focused on his eyes, as well as his proximity.
He ended up right in front of her, and he smiled as he stroked a finger down one side of her face.
   "That is more like you." He smiled. "Remember what I said, and know that I am very pleased with all of you."
He kissed her then, just the once but allowing it to linger for a couple of seconds, then he vanished again.
Her eyes opened and she looked bewildered for a moment, then turned to look at the others and saw them smiling at her.
   "I think he likes you." Daud observed.
   "I'd say so too." Corvo agreed.
She smiled too, then. Her eyes got drawn to the rune as she turned her thoughts onto it, and she felt a relaxing warmth flood through her hands and into her body.
It glowed briefly, then became inert as her first had done.
   "...so now your flash-bang is more focused?" Daud asked.
   "I assume so, yeah." Elaine shrugged her shoulders. "I don't feel any different, so I couldn't tell you."
   "Let's...not go and find more weepers to test that out." Corvo decided. "I'd much rather get out of here and get those scrolls into our ownership."
   "Aye." Daud agreed. "Let's move."