Ghosts of Averoigne

Kara started to roll her eyes at him… but then something stopped her. A nagging, sing-songy voice went off, somewhere in the back of her head.

Maybe you’re being a bit of an asshole?

The little voice admonished her harshly. It always had. Kara tended to disagree with it mostly, but in the end, the voice almost always ended up being right.

Lighten up.

She took a deep breath and let it out slowly. That always seemed to do the trick. But here, in the elevator… this close to Logan…

SQUEEEEEEAK!

The elevator shrieked loudly as it approached the second floor. Kara could feel the gears grinding to a halt, and then…

“Whoa!”

The car dropped. First an inch, then a whole foot. The two of them looked at each other, just as—

“OH!”

It let go all at once — the entire glass elevator! With the brakes disengaged the car fell stra

ight down, free-falling back to the lobby…

Kara remembered bracing herself against the glass walls, then just as quickly yanking her hands away. She imagined deep slashes across her wrists and fingers as the entire car shattered into a million glittering pieces.

Then, suddenly, darkness. She was enveloped in something hard yet soft. The car bumped hard against the floor, slowed only by the screech of metal on metal, and then everything was still again. She opened her eyes.

She was in Logan’s arms.

Sometime during the fall, he’d wrapped his whole body around her. Kara sniffed, inhaling the smell of leather and oil and steel. It was a familiar smell. One that her nineteen-year old self had always thought was—

“Are you alright?”

The elevator was on a slight angle now, and Kara pushed herself to an upright position. Logan’s arms were even stronger than she remembered them. She twisted away from the security of his leather jacket and brushed herself off.

“I think so.”

“Good.”

His body had protected her, but Logan himself had taken the brunt of the impact. A small trickle of blood streamed down from above his left eye.

“You’re bleeding.”

Kara reached out and brushed the hair back from his forehead. It was a small cut. Small enough that she regretted the movement.

“It’s nothing,” said Logan.

One after another, they stepped out of the ruined elevator. The frame was intact, but two of the glass panes were now spider-webbed with a series of oddly beautiful cracks.

“OH MY GOD!”

The voice belonged to Mr. Radcliffe, who’d come rushing up from out of nowhere. He looked a lot more awake now than he did just minutes ago.

“What happened?”

“Your elevator tried to kill us?” Kara remarked snidely.

“That’s not our elevator!” Radcliffe declared. He pointed to a small alcove on the other side of the lobby. “That’s the elevator! This thing hasn’t work since… since…”