[ For ten – fifteen – perhaps twenty minutes, the house fire rages. Furniture burns away to ash inside; floors crumble, windows shatter as the house re-lives its own death, becoming the shell they'd entered.
And then – for no very obvious reason – the fire goes out, and Milton House sits silently, a cold and blackened ruin of a once-great house, just as it had been. And, a few moments after that, the door judders, pushes open, and Wynonna Earp comes stumbling out.
She'd managed a perfunctory debrief with the masked man – enough for them to both know the other is fine, if deeply shaken – before making her way back down the treacherous stairs on watery legs, one of which is starting to ache from the way she'd wrenched it before. It lends a little bit of a limp to her steps as she comes down off the porch and onto the snow – her jeans are torn almost up to her thigh, she'll have to ask Jopson to mend them again – and tomorrow that leg will probably be a very pretty mass of reds and purples and blues. She can already feel the bruises starting to form.
But as sore as her leg is, it's nothing to how the rest of her feels; pummeled, sore and aching. Despite the heat, she hadn't burned, but she can still feel the frightened trembling of the little boy she'd held in her arms. His face, pressing into her neck. His arms winding around her.
Her cheeks are streaked with the dried paths of tears. She lifts a hand to wipe at them as she comes back to meet him – Edward Little, doing exactly like she asked him. Holding onto Peacemaker, keeping it safe. She can't help a small smile, despite the way it shakes at the corners of her lips as adrenaline and fear and that bone-deep ache slowly, slowly begin to slip from her system. She's exhausted, but even so there's a tired brightness that lifts her features as she comes over to him, as she sees that Peacemaker is fine and so is he. ]
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And then – for no very obvious reason – the fire goes out, and Milton House sits silently, a cold and blackened ruin of a once-great house, just as it had been. And, a few moments after that, the door judders, pushes open, and Wynonna Earp comes stumbling out.
She'd managed a perfunctory debrief with the masked man – enough for them to both know the other is fine, if deeply shaken – before making her way back down the treacherous stairs on watery legs, one of which is starting to ache from the way she'd wrenched it before. It lends a little bit of a limp to her steps as she comes down off the porch and onto the snow – her jeans are torn almost up to her thigh, she'll have to ask Jopson to mend them again – and tomorrow that leg will probably be a very pretty mass of reds and purples and blues. She can already feel the bruises starting to form.
But as sore as her leg is, it's nothing to how the rest of her feels; pummeled, sore and aching. Despite the heat, she hadn't burned, but she can still feel the frightened trembling of the little boy she'd held in her arms. His face, pressing into her neck. His arms winding around her.
Her cheeks are streaked with the dried paths of tears. She lifts a hand to wipe at them as she comes back to meet him – Edward Little, doing exactly like she asked him. Holding onto Peacemaker, keeping it safe. She can't help a small smile, despite the way it shakes at the corners of her lips as adrenaline and fear and that bone-deep ache slowly, slowly begin to slip from her system. She's exhausted, but even so there's a tired brightness that lifts her features as she comes over to him, as she sees that Peacemaker is fine and so is he. ]
I knew you were the right man for the job.