Ausente sin Culpa ni Presente sin Disculpa | Supervivencia

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Cecilia, fighting to survive, crosses a line she'd never have expected.

It was getting harder for Cecilia to breathe.

The stretched skin of a sadistic drug lieutenant was wrapped around her. His limbs, his stomach, his back, sagging off him and surrounding much of her forcefield. Inside it, she had a full range of motion; there was a good eight inches of space between her and him.

But she could hardly put it to use. The pressure was closing in on her. She could feel it around her body. It wasn't doing anything to her, not physically. But all of her strength and focus was going toward pushing her forcefield out and keeping it supported.

Her eyes opened to see Raúl's face, and it was only then she realized that she'd had them shut. His smug expression repulsed her, apparently enough that the psioplasmic field expanded around her in an effort to push him back.

"Mele, just give in." His voice dripped in her ears. She could feel him constrict, like the coils of a snake, pressuring her shield to collapse. It was if he could sense it, as his distended fingers dipped into a front pocket for a small metal vial. "It is time for it all to end."

"I'm not your whore," Cecilia spat back, her voice somewhat strained. She saw motion out of the corner of her eye, but she couldn't make it out. A bead of sweat trickled toward her eye, and she reached up to wipe it away, repositioning herself ever so subtly as she did. "Not giving you the satisfaction."

"That is why men always must take satisfaction. You know that." He uncapped the vial, and pulled it towards his equally out of shape nostril.

As if to punctuate his point, Cecilia's shield contracted. She gritted her teeth immediately, expecting his skin to close in on her. But between the sudden shrinkage and his divided attention, the space that her shell had occupied was empty, giving her room at maneuver.

Instinct - and maybe adrenaline - kicked in, and she channeled all of her remaining force and strength into her arm, shooting it out toward his face. The shield followed her, pushing back some of his skin as her hand closed into a fist and knocked the vial out of his hands.

The container fell to the floor, into the space between them. It made a metallic clank as it hit, some of its contents sprinkling onto the floor. Working on pure instinct, Cecilia dropped to the floor, scooping it up to take it out of the man's reach. As she fell, folds of loose, stretchy skin closed into the gap her shield had previously occupied, surrounding her on all sides.

His body constricted around her like a massive python, crushing against her ribs and choking the air out of her lungs. There wasn't even enough room for her to push the shield back up. As if to underscore the horror, the man began to sing again, crooning softly through his misshapen mouth as he tried to crush her to death.

She gasped as the weight of his skin bore onto her, feeling every inch and every wrinkle. Her shield was useless now, pressed so close to her body that it was almost enclosing her. She flinched as he tightened around her ribs, and she tried to break free. She squirmed, her muscles tightening, her fist closing around the vial.

The vial. The Rave.

Her heart was pounding through her temples now. The rumors were — they were rumors, still. But if they were true... She needed an edge. She needed to fight, to even the battle. This could be her only option.

A tendril of skin tightened around her thigh, and she let out another gasp. Her chest felt tight, and the breath was agony. No choice. When it came down to fight or flight, Cecilia fought. Every time.

The vial was uncapped, and she devoted all her energy to bringing it to her face, pulling it toward her nose as she'd seen him do earlier. She inhaled it, taking up some of the supply. The rest she brought toward her mouth, tipping it in before she dropped the vial to the floor.

She laid there for a few silent, painful seconds, waiting for the high to kick in. And then, almost suddenly, the spikes to began to appear on the edge of her forcefield.

Raúl snarled, feeling her forcefield push out against his body. "You are making this more painful for yourself, Mele. Just let go. Slip away in peace." He redoubled his efforts, trying to break her quickly now.

Cecilia's pulse was racing. Adrenaline, she knew, was flowing through her body. She felt his skin, felt it intensely — perhaps more intensely. Off, off. Off. She needed it off.

The spikes grew. Sharper. Longer, too, and farther away from her body as her shield pushed back against him. "Mele isn't here," she said through gritted teeth, practically snarling, her voice sounding almost dark. "My name is Cecilia. Dr. Cecilia Reyes." She began to thrash, kicking and squirming to get him off of her, but also hoping the spikes would start to cut his endless skin.

"I hold lives in my hands every day, puto." She looked down at her arms, which were wrapped in a light glow that formed jagged edges. Then she lifted her head toward him, the winces and grimaces replaced by a steely gaze. "How do you think you'll do?"

His response was only a twisted leer from his distorted face as he doubled down, trying to break her. His body squeezed in a vise like fashion, flattening to further exert more pressure and crack her forcefield. It seemed to be working as a spiderweb of glowing cracks began to worm across the surface of the shield. But it was interrupted by a tearing sound, as one of her field spikes suddenly punched through his skin. He screamed as her struggles pulled the wound open wider, tearing through his flattened body. The screams went higher as she twisted and writhed.

"The human body's fascinating." The spikes disappeared in almost an instant, but Cecilia didn't sound alarmed. Her voice was low and steady, echoing the disturbing calm of her demeanor. "A collection of nerves and vessels, and tissue, working as a system. Adapting. Responding. Mutating." The dome around her still glowed, with a slickness that stood out in alarming contrast to the ragged edges that had been there before. And then, with no warning, six-inch spikes took shape around her body, her bio-energy thinning in some places and pooling in others. The points grew, forming around specific nerve clusters in Raúl's body. "Well, sometimes, anyway."

The pain knifing through him from the puncture wound was no comparison to the tiny blade ends of the force field, jabbing into his nerves. With a shriek, he dropped his grasp, rolling away from her as he body returned to a more normal shape. His hands clutched his side, where the through and through wound was obvious, blood pouring through his fingers. He tried to speak, but his face had gone grey and he couldn't find the breath for words.

The power coursing through Cecilia was unbelievable. She felt ferocious. In control. She felt more at peace with her mutant abilities than she'd possibly ever felt. This was nothing she'd ever known — nothing she'd ever imagined being capable of.

And then, as his face turned ashen, something in her broke. The determination on her face vanished, replaced quickly by shock. And then, looking down at him, it became abject horror.

For a few seconds, she was paralyzed. And then an instinct took over, one that drove her to ignore his awful threats and her violent, visceral reaction. He was a man, and he was in pain. She was a healer, or at least professed to be. Driving him to the edge of death was not in her nature. Pulling him back from it was. Even if a part of her, the part that was still riding the high, wanted nothing more than to destroy him.

Without really thinking about it, she went into action, moving to his side. There was a man whose life she had to save. There'd be plenty of time to consider the ramifications of the situation later.