Kimberly M. Denner's Story

Ralph breathed a disappointed sigh. While Petey's description of his Earth sound pretty nail-on-the-head, he also had a point about the odds of them being from the same world.

"I'm Ralph," he said. "And your place sounds a lot like mine. But it doesn't really matter, I guess. We're all here now." Ralph motioned to the barman for another round for himself and Minke. "Strangers in a strange land, and all that. No sleeping tiger here, that's for sure."

He turned to Minke. "Yeah. Those all sound pretty much like made-up words to me. Except Aslund, I think. I'm pretty sure that was a talking lion in a children's book where I come from."

A young woman came through the doorway. She wore a leather jacket with a grey hoodie underneath. Her hood was up over her head and much of her face was hidden by spiky dark hair. She seemed young, likely not yet out of her teens. As Ralph, Minke and Petey talked, and as the bartender was occupied cleaning a glass with a filthy rag, the girl raced up to the counter, diving over it. The barman dropped his glass and started after her, but before he was within three feet of her, she had grabbed two bottles of liqueur from the cabinet behind the bar, and leapt back over it. She sprinted towards the door.

"Dumb fuckers!" she cackled as she pushed the pub door open. Ralph stared after her. There was something... familiar there. Something in her eyes. Her face.

She gripped Pete's hand lightly. "It's very nice to meet you, too. I love newcomers from other worlds." She gave Ralph a coy sideways glance, then turned back to Pete. "That sounds a little bit like Terra, but not. It seems like less of a clusterfuck!"

Then, to Ralph, "That's Aslan! I loved those books." Yes. She had read them all. "So you think there's too much a chance you two aren't from the sa-" She paused, watching as the teenaged girl dove over the counter bravely (or perhaps more stupidly) and made a dash. Now, Minke was no police officer, but she wasn't about to let someone get away with shit like that.

"You two stay here and chat!" she called, bolting from her seat out the door. "I'll be right back!"

Minke was a quick girl. When you had little in the way of physical strength, that became a necessity.

The teenage girl looked back over her shoulder to see Minke darting after her. Turning swiftly into a side alley, the girl leapt over trashcans and artfully climbed over dumpsters and other obstructions. As Minke began to gain on her, she hurled one of the heavy glass bottles, aiming to shatter it at her pursuer's feet.

"Leave me alone, bitch!" she snarled back at her.

Back at Locust Moon Pub, Ralph lit up a cigarette and took a thoughtful puff. He looked at Petey, contemplatively.

"Think we should go after them?"

Minke sidestepped at the last second, but felt stings as thin shards of glass cut into the skin of her ankle and alcohol sprayed all over it. Fully used to much worse pains, she managed to ignore it, especially with all the adrenaline running through her body.

"Hey! You slow the fuck down!" she spat after the other woman. The tat mage skirted around the dumpsters and trashcans swiftly as she raised a hand. Black symbols danced over her skin in a spiral of ink, leaping from her arm as she whipped it forward in one fluid motion.

The snake was Minke's favorite tattoo. It was the most versatile ink she had ever gotten, able to transform into several things and serve many different purposes. It had a personality. It was intelligent. It could also be summoned on a whim, ready to use without needing to reach for it. It was always right there.

It was no question, knowing that, which ink she had sent flying through the air after the young woman, fangs outstretched as it grew in length, Minke's hand grasped firmly on the edge of the tail.

"No!" protested the girl, spinning around batting the snake away with the remaining bottle. She had been moving too fast, however, and tripped over a stack of cardboard boxes folded up in the alley. The girl hit pavement hard and skidded into the brick wall. When she staggered to her feet and turned back to face Minke, her lip was cut, a small trickle of blood running down her chin. She seemed momentarily daze before shaking it off and glaring at Minke. The girl's hood had fallen down, her spiky black hair freed and her face fully visible. She was indeed young, with pale skin and striking hazel eyes. Something about those eyes would strike Minke as familiar. Not just the color and shape of them, but the look they conveyed. A look of defiance.

"C'mon, then!" roared the teenage girl, reaching into her coat with her right hand and whipping out a switchblade with a snikt. She still clutched the bottle of liquor, now recognizable as vodka, in her left hand like a club. "C'mon!"

Incredibly amused, Minke grabbed a hand at her hip, drawing out her sword with a more impressive shhhiiing. She pointed it in the direction of the girl, lifting a brow.

"Might want to give up. Mine's bigger," she said darkly. "You've got no reason to keep running. Just come back with me."

Something about the girl's eyes indeed capture Minke's attention. It's all she could do, to look into them. Distractedly, even. Her grip on the sword faltered for a moment.

"No!" hissed the girl, rushing forward and swinging the heavy glass bottle at Minke's head. The defiant fire in the teenager's eyes burned stronger than ever. She had her switchblade drawn back as well, clearly prepared for a follow up strike, whether her initial swing landed or not.

"Take me when I'm dead!" she growled aggressively.

Minke flinched back and held up her arms as the bottle was hurled at her. It shattered against one of her arms, shredding the skin and stinging it with vodka. The tat mage let out what was both a frustrated and agonized snarl, glass shards falling into her, liquid spilling over the side of her face. It was just enough of a distraction to allow Kimberly another swipe, though Minke was taking another step back in retreat.

The snake rolled over Minke's skin, popping up over her head. "You know..." she said, voice barely over a whisper, "...you really shouldn't say things like that in Wing City."

The snake's head thundered down, maw open again to try and grab anything of Kimberly's- her arm, a shoulder, her shirt- anything.

The serpent's mouth clamped down hard on Kimberly's right forearm, it's long fangs sinking into her.

"AAAGH! FUCK YOU!" she howled, trying uselessly to yank her arm free of the tattoo snake. In her pain, she dropped the switchblade. She swung wildly with her free arm, but it was a wide swipe, easily blockable.

Minke stepped back once, to avoid the strike. She didn't need any more beating after what she'd just suffered. The snake clamped on harder, falling off of Minke's body, trying to constrict Kimberly's arms.

"I'm not having any more of your shit, young lady," she spat. "I am done with playing!" She sheathed the sword, then reached beneath her shirt and skirt to draw out the gun. Her expression had darkened remarkably. Blood and vodka rolled off from the fingers of her left hand and splattered down onto the ground. Little shards of glass was still embedded into her skin. There were scratches across the left of her face, neck, and chest where a few shards had escaped. Her blouse and coat were wet, and her hair sparkled with even more glass fragments.

Minke pointed the gun at the young girl. "You're coming with me. Now."

Ralph stuck a cigarette in his mouth and cupped his hand over it to light it. He took a long, thoughtful drag. There was no doubt in his mind that Minke could handle the young miscreant, though thinking about it, he actually wasn't sure what she would actually do to the girl.

"Yeah," answered Ralph, standing up and heading to the door. "Guess we'd better."

Back in the alley, the girl's eyes widened at the sight of the gun and she quite instantly stopped her writhing.

"Fuck," she grumbled to Minke, as the snake securely bound the entirety of her arms. "Are you a cop? You're a cop, aren't you?" She looked Minke up and down, only lingering on her uniform top. She also noticed the extent of how she had cut Minke with the glass. Kimmy found herself rather sorry. She hadn't actually meant to hurt the woman.

"Alright, you win," Kimmy grumbled shuffling forward with Minke, allowing the woman to lead her, hanging her head bitterly.

"I'm worse than a cop. I don't follow the rules," she grumbled. Minke lead Kimberly all the way back to the bar, the gun trained on her the whole time. Minke doubted the punk was going to get away easily with the snake at her command, but it was a precaution. And the ink mage was mad.

Once inside the bar, Minke would push her towards the counter and the bartender. "There's your thief. Do what you want with her. Where's the bathrooms?" she asked the bartender, only stealing a quick glance at Pete and Ralph. She slid her wounded arm behind her back. "I need to use it."

Ralph pulled the cigarette from his mouth, resting it in the ashtray on the table. He hurried to Minke, taking her arms.

"Jesus, Minke, what did she do to you?" Ralph exclaimed, frowning. "You've got glass in you!" He felt terrible. He should've gone with her from the beginning. "I'm... sorry," he added genuinely.

The teenage girl made a gagging sound. Ralph spun around to face her, glaring.

"And you. Think you're fucking smart do you?" He studied the girl. Her clothes were well worn, dirtied in places by grease or the unmistakable brown stain of dried blood. Her hair was spiky and dark, but it was frazzled and matted in places. Ralph could tell this girl had been living on the street for some time. She had dark, tired circles under her striking hazel eyes. There was something familiar about those eyes. His expression softened somewhat.

"Where are your parents?" He asked, knowing full well the answer.

"Fuck you," she spat defiantly.

"Where do you live? Who knows you're here? How old are you?"

This time she actually spat in Ralph's face. He wiped off the saliva with his jacket sleeve, grimacing.

"What's your name?" He demanded, before hitting her with his logorrhea spell, which causes its subject to literally vomit their hidden truths in a verbal stream. Her face contorted as though she was fighting an urge.

"MyparentsaredeadIlivewithWhippingTomundertheWestpointBridgemostnightsnobodyknowsI'mhere," she regurgitated. She paused for a second, sucking in a deep lung full of air before continuing.

"I'llbeeighteenonNewYear'sDaytwomonthsfromnowandmynameisKimberlyMarisolDenner."

Ralph listened, unblinking for the duration of the verbal torrent until the end. His eyes shot open wide and his mouth fell slightly ajar. He took a step back, turning slightly pale.

"You're name is...?" He attempted, almost shaking.

"Kim Denner," repeated Kimberly, glaring. She hated magic, especially magic being used on her.

Ralph realized now what was so familiar about the girl's eyes.

They were his.

Ralph took a cautious step forward. Of all the impossible things he'd seen in his life, this was the one that shook the foundations of his world the most. He came in closer, unconsciously reaching forward a hand and running it through Kimmy's dark hair. It was just like her mother, Elizabeth's. Ralph's sister. This girl was Kimmy, the New Years Baby that he, Alex and Markos had rescued nearly two years ago, the niece Ralph had unknowing placed in the hands of the worlds most powerful secret organization and had then risked everything to save. Kimmy. His Kimmy. Somehow, impossibly, almost seventeen years older.

"Fucking perv," snorted Kimmy, jerking her head away from his hand, then slamming her forehead foreword into his face, breaking his nose. Blood spurted from Ralph's face and he fell onto his backside, clutching himself.

After the gun, the blood, and the head-butt Pete’s brow twitched. He was out of raw materials; his Alchemy was useless now but this violence, it sent images of his stint with the sleepers running through his head. Spilled blood over the orange sand, The clatter of AK’s and the scent of gun smoke bathed in the vermilion hue of a West African sunset.

“Enough!” He shouted thrusting himself between Ralph and the girl “I may have just gotten here but I know a problem when I see it, and fighting well it won’t solve it. So sit down, both of you before this gets any worse. Christ, this really is just another earth!”

Petey, almost surprised by the words he cobbled together, shot a staggered glance to Ralph then Minke. He then turned to the girl “and you! You can’t deal with people being nice can you?"

"I'm fine, I'm fine! Don't even worry about it, I just need to get to the bathroom, it's not nearly as bad as i-" She paused as Kimberly started to make those sounds. Glaring at her the same as Ralph, she wasn't expecting the events that passed next.

Parents dead? Living under a bridge? Minke felt a pang of guilt. It was just enough to allow her to mask the pain of the alcohol and glass in her arm. Ralph's next few actions, which confused Minke to no end, further pushed her to try and forget about the injuries. When he was headbutted and fell to the ground, she bent down next to him panicky, to put her good hand on his cheek. "Ralph! Oh my God, what the hell did you think you were doing? Are you alright?"

She looked up to Kimberly. Well, the action was not completely out of the question. What was he trying to do? Her eyes came up to Petey as he spoke, unsure of what to think. She gathered her thoughts as she tried to help Ralph onto his feet. "Can you take care of her?" she asked Petey, pointing towards Kim. "It looks like both Ralph and I need to clean up. She won't bleed as long as the snake's fangs stay in her skin. The fangs are paper thin. No worries, right?"

She began to pull Ralph toward where she suspected the bathrooms were. She needed to speak to him.

Ralph pushed open the door to the Men's Room, and the two went inside.

"You're going to ask me, arn't you?" Said Ralph, grimacing, looking into Minke's eyes as he gently dabbed her cuts with a wet paper towel. His face was still somewhat streaked with dried blood and he had two rolled up pieces of paper towel shoved up his nose to clot the bleeding. His nose was still slightly crooked.

"She's my niece," said Ralph, coming right out with it. "My sister's kid. I don't know how it's possible, but honestly I lost the right to say "impossible" when I became an adept. Back where I came from, Kimmy's just a baby, but I know this girl is her. She looks just like her mom, and she's got our eyes, and... And... And she even fucking headbutts people like I do. You have to trust me on this," he pleaded, grasping her hands tightly. "She's my family. I know she is. I can feel it."

Ralph continued dabbing at Minke's arms.

"I'm sorry she hurt you. Thanks for not, like, killing her. I don't know what this version of Kimmy's been through, but she's seventeen years older than the baby I knew."

Kimmy eyes Petey suspiciously.

"So what's your deal, then?" She asked, nudging him with her foot. "You a magic head like those two?"

“Like those two? I don’t know.” Pete inched closer to Kimmy who instantly recoiled “But I can do some tricks” Pete said smiling palming the dime bag she kept in her coat pocket.

“Sleight of hand and all that, which frankly you need to work on” He said nodding at the wrecked bar. He moved in close again “You want to get out of here?”

Pete knew how he was coming off, but he figured if he pulled the “dad routine” she’d run away again she needed to be talked to not talked “at”. Petey didn’t know where he stood on this issue he just met these folks, but whenever he saw another kid down on her luck he felt the need to help out, even if it was just a little.

Minke hissed as the dabbing further pushed a shard of glass into her skin. Despite herself, tears formed at the ends of her eyes. She pulled away and reached into the wound with her fingers, impatiently and agonizingly removing the glass herself. She breathed a cry as it slid out, leaving a bleeding slice in her arm.

"I want...to believe that. And in all seriousness, I can believe it because here it's entirely possible." The tears fell, but she did not sob. She kept her tone as level as she could manage, but it wavered here and there. "I knew there was a reason, and to be honest, when..." A tiny cough escaped to clear her throat, "...when I looked into her eyes, I saw it too. I just...when you just came onto her like that, it...it was a bit sudden. A bit strange." She wiped her eyes with her palm, and though she was in pain, she smiled for him. "You've really got to tell me the whole story sometime."

She looked out toward the door. "Here, let's go out. The cuts aren't even that bad." She tried to snatch the paper towel from him and hold it to her skin. "Come on. You've got a lot of explaining to do, right? If she'll believe you."

Even though it happened all the time, and even though she said she understood, she had her doubts. It was masked behind the pain, but they were there. What if Ralph turned out to be this major sociopath, like Benny?

"I'm sorry," said Ralph. "I was caught way off guard. If she's who I know she is, then... well she means a lot to me. Back home I never had anything going for me until the night I met her. Saving Kimmy was probably the first worthwhile thing I did with my life. It put me on a path to every other thing I ever did in my life that mattered. And I never thought I'd live to see her so... grown up." He sighed, realizing he had managed to actually die twice before Kimmy even turned two, and that was before he ever came to Terra.

"She looks a lot like her mom," thought Ralph aloud with the smallest of grins and helped wipe a tear from Minke's cheek. "And yeah, sometime I'll tell you the whole story. I'm super manly in it. I'm really sorry you got hurt," he repeated.

_

"Hey!" Kimmy protested as Pete took her dimebag. "That's mine!" Her face broke into a wicked grin as he continued.

"I have this dumb snake on my arms!" she lamented. "It won't come off! If you convince the assholes in the bathroom to let me go, then sure buddy, we can make like a banana and get the fuck outta here." Kimmy became suddenly aware that the bartender had been talking the entire time about stealing and punishment and debts, and no one had been listening to him. She continued to do so.

"And once we do, if you don't give me back my stuff, I'll stomp your head in until you're a warm paste."

Pete smiled at Kimmy “what you’re fine as long as you don’t take out the fangs, ‘sides I’d like to meet back up with them later”

Pete turned to the barman over hearing his eerie Mumbling “Hey weird beard, can you give her a break I’ll settle up her debt”
Pete reached into his pockets coming back to the sinking realization that he arrived here with nothing.

“uh I can work it off, you look like a dude who enjoys a head trip every now and then. If you get me at least jr. chemistry set I can make a batch of UPS that’ll have you talking with dragons”

Pete turned back to Kimmy with a look of impending disappointment “dragons are normal here aren’t they…”

Kimmy raised an eyebrow at Pete, smirking.

"What, in Wing City?" she snorted. "Where would we put em? What's UPS? You some kind of drug guy?"

The bartender likewise raised an eyebrow, though it was hard to tell through all his bushy hair. Then he narrowed his eyes, looking to Kimmy.

"We'll talk," he muttered tiredly, looking back to Pete. Kimmy raised her bound arms up to Pete's face.

"Get it off me," she commanded. "Then we go."

Petey grabbed a piece of newspaper off one of the tables ripping it and folding it as he talked “Drug guy, Magic Head, I don't know? I prefer alchemist, you know transforming ordinary components -” Petey smiled and proudly tying off the roach on his improvised joint
“- Into something exceptional”

“I know nothing to special to look at but,…Hey,got a light” he said turning to the barman in the middle of his exhibition. The barman rolled his eyes and provided a match, Petey nodded to him igniting the end of his spliff “as I was saying it’s not what you can see, it’s what you miss”

Petey took a long drag than proceeded to grab Kimmys hands. He seemed to be intertwining them with his own hands and the snake itself. He then exhaled in Kimmys face and to her surprise the snake was now loosely draped in his hands.

“hack-hack, ekhem… I usually use better paper” Petey dropped the snake as Kimmy rushed him out the door as he began to cough violently.

Kimmy coughed as Petey blew the smoke her eyes, but then inhaled. Her eyes widened as Petey miraculously slid the serpent from her arms. She had no idea what it was he was smoking, but Kimmy decided it must be amazing. She grinned toothily as Petey dropped the snake on the ground, which hissed and coiled.

"C'mon!" she said, grabbing him by the wrist and dragging him out the door. "Let's get outta here." Kimmy and Petey tore out of Locust Moon and halfway down the street. Kimmy ducked into an alley, motioning for Petey to follow her.

"C'mon!" she repeated, climbing atop a dumpster and pulling herself up onto a fire escape. "And welcome to Wing City."

___________________

Ralph and Minke emerged from the bathroom, relatively free of blood. Ralph looked around, blinking uncomprehendingly at the suddenly empty bar (save for the heavily bearded bartender).

"What the fuck? You! Where'd they go?!" he demanded, rounding on the bartender.

"I dunno. Seems like they left," droned the bartender in reply with the barest of shrugs.

Ralph replied with a nonsensical string of profanity, ducking out the front door. He knew it was no use though. Even though he'd had seven months to learn these streets, in this world, Kimmy had her whole life. He wouldn't find her out there unless she wanted to be found.

Kimmy sat on the rooftop looking out over Wing City, a lit cigarette smoldering limply from her lips. Her mouth was turned up into a wide grin. The morning had been rough for her, but now things were starting to look up. She turned to Petey, the guy who'd helped her out back at Locust Moon Pub. She'd basically dragged him all the way out here when they fled.

"Hey," she said, speaking for the first time in several minutes. "Thanks for helping me out back there. You got a name?"

"Pete or Petey, up to you." he said plopping himself down on the edge of the building "where the hell are we, it looks like someone wanted to build the ass end of detroit out of industrial scrap." Pete grabbed the pack of cigarettes and lit one for himself.

"and you're welcome but why'd you do that, the drinking laws can't be that strict here in crazy town." Petey leaned back gazing at the gleam of the aerosol enhanced sunrise. "'sides why don't you just get some dumb rockerboy to buy your drinks?"