Title: Bright as a Beacon, Chapter 4

Author: digitalruki

Rating: PG

Pairing: Glitch/DG

Summary: Sequel to "Headcase". Scenes in-between scenes of Tin Man.

Author's Note & Disclaimer: I don't own Tin Man. Any feedback on this fic would be awesome. SO SORRY for sparse updates. I know, It's bad. This story is like, the thing I get to do after I finish with everything else, or when I have so much to do I just want to escape. Your kind reviews have kept me on this story. Thanks so much, everyone!

Note2: So, is it really so bad that I changed the tense? I mean, I know it's like one of those things you should never do. But this chapter wasn't working, and changing the tense made it so much easier. I originally started with present-tense because Glitch was the kind of character who was only thinking in the present, at first. But he's grown a lot! So I'll either start writing DG's chapters in past-tense or just write the rest like this. And maybe change the other chapters to past-tense? Except the first one, because I love it?

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DG wasn't happy with the series of events that had strung her along ever since the storm. She had never asked to be a princess, or the savior of a dying world. She hadn't asked to run until almost collapsing from exhaustion, or for any of these new...feelings.

Then again, what she'd originally wanted was to throw herself onto her bike and ride somewhere far away. After this nightmare, she found herself wanting that more than ever. To ride until she could forget what she'd seen in the O.Z. She wanted to run away from it, and hope they could sort everything out themselves. It wasn't her problem, and she didn't want any part of it.

Or, that's what she'd kept telling herself, all the way from her apparently-fake-mother's last embrace to the cold, smoky Bliss of the Mystic Man's dressing room. It was the mantra that was playing through the static in DeMilo's van, as Mr. Cain drove them through that horrible blizzard to the Northern Island. Screaming at her, trying to hold her steady in a rocky world, even as she began to question it.

But when she saw the Mystic Man sacrifice himself, heard Mr. Cain yelling at them to run, and felt Glitch's hand tugging her through the dark hallways of the palace, she wondered who would save these people. Who would be left to help them when she closed her eyes and left the nightmare to vanish like dewey smoke?

"Run!", Mr. Cain had said, and she had felt his big hand shove her towards the bedroom doors. It was enough to get her to start running, but not enough to keep the momentum. She couldn't run. Because that mantra was wearing thin and those men had guns. And if she didn't stop, and turn, and try to help...

She felt Glitch's tattery gloved hand snake into hers and pull. She looked at him, wanting him to tell her to run, to give her a reason to follow, but he was only staring forward--and it wasn't enough. Even the small warmth in his fingers wasn't enough to make her move on her own. He was only protecting her as he was supposed to. It was his duty, after all. They all protected her and helped her because that was their duty, but not their desire.

"Wait!--Glitch," she gasped, yanking hard to get him to stop. They'd turned a corner somewhere and she'd heard the longcoats pass them. They were safe, at least for the moment. Raw stopped, too, ran back, and put his arm around her shoulders. She could feel his concern, and his fear. She tried to share some of her courage with him.

Raw was touching both of them, and through his touch she could almost feel a different emotion, similar to Raw's but more erratic. Surging in and out like a heartbeat. Glitch had turned halfway, still pulling at her arm. They stumbled slowly toward a dark corner that led to a doorway.

"We have to go back," she whispered. Glitch shook his head, but he was looking at her now. Even in the dark, she could see him. Weird. When had she gotten night vision?

She wondered if he knew she could see the strange face he was pulling. "We have to get out of here, right now!" he hissed. "You should go ahead of us."

"No, I won't--" she almost yelled, but felt a furry hand cover her lips. And there was that erratic feeling again. It was warm, pulsing into her, feeding her.

Was it Glitch?

Even though Raw's hand was on her face, it was Glitch's brow that furrowed, his head that pulled in close to hers. He touched Raw's arm lightly, and pulled it away. Took her head in his hands and whispered harshly.

"You need to get out of this alive, because...You need to--" He was glitching. She cut him off.

"Because I'm the princess. Because I'm the savior."

Glitch tensed, and she could see his eyes widen. Scared. "No!" he cried. Even as a whisper, it echoed in the dark.

Then his voice became soft, and so hushed it was impossible to hear. "For me. You need to live...for me."

She heard him. Not because he was close enough. It was because Raw was touching them, connecting them.

Long after they broke apart, the connection lingered.

She ran. She seemed to know her way instinctively back to the main hall, even though her mind was blank. She didn't see where the flying monkeys came from, or what they did to Raw and Glitch. And even as Glitch's words were still ringing, silent as screams in her ear, she felt her feet lift off the ground and the sickening feeling of being in flight.

As the monkeys carried her away, she thought she might have seen him laying unconscious somewhere. She thought she might have seen the zipper on his head had been pulled open, the shadowy crevice inside peering up at her like a dark, empty eye. She remembered yelling his name.

Then the Queen was there--no, not there really. She was in DG's mind. Young and beautiful, and trying to tell her something important. DG tried to listen, tried to take in each word as the person she apparently was. A princess, a savior. But it had all been so long ago...did her mother really expect her to be the same obedient child?

Just because she'd sacrificed herself to save DG's life? Supposedly?

And then DG woke up. In her bed, in her attic room. The morning light streamed in, soft and quiet, through the window.

She was still wearing her biking jacket. And it seemed to be the morning after the storm. Outside her window, debris was strewn across the fields. So, had it really been a nightmare? Or was this a trick? Creeping down her staircase, listening to each step creaking in familiarity, she picked up the voices of Mom and Pops. Peering through the crack in the porch door, yes, she could see them standing out on the porch, just talking.

They beckoned to her, offered her breakfast, and even apologized to her. It was weird, but part of her was so happy to see the farm again that it wasn't listening to the other part of her that could still see the faces of her comrades, Mr. Cain, Raw...and Glitch. The dark eye boring into her, like a spot in her vision. Telling her something was wrong.

She was surprised how foggy the memory of the O.Z. already was. It was too easy to forget. To believe that the life she'd always known was still the real one. That all the suffering and destruction she'd witnessed was the dream.

She had asked for an escape, for a different life, so...when it came right down to it, this wasn't what she wanted to hear.

None of it was. Nothing anyone had said in the past few days, since the ticket from the friendly policeman, to her mother and the Guild and all the strange characters who had been dragging her from square one all the way to their own destruction had been even a bit of what she wanted to hear. Not until this morning.

And just her luck, even that was a fucking lie.

The illusion lifted around her like a glare fading into a sunset. She saw Azkadehlia standing there, watched as her mom and pop walked over to the sorceress. Smiling exactly like they used to with her. "Sorry, baby girl," cooed the old man.

Where was the person who was going to apologize to her?

Where was Glitch? She thought. Dead, came the answer, swiftly to her like a cold breeze. But that couldn't be true. Because when he'd been that close to her, in the shadowy hall, she could have sworn she'd felt his heartbeat. And she kept feeling it inside her, like he was right next to her, this whole time. It was slow, deathly slow, but still beating. Murmuring.

She felt herself reach for him, in her mind, reaching out across countless miles to lift him up and pour her life into him. He'd said he needed her to live. Had it just been that mind-connection thing? He needed her to be around, because she helped him think?

Did she even care?

Hands on her shoulders. Azkadehlia was trying to make a deal with her. She was still holding him, somewhere far off, as she felt her evil sister try to squeeze into her, and pull her away. But she was tired of being pulled.

She was tired of all this talk. Tired of riddles, of people toying with her, biding for her help. And she was tired of people getting hurt. She wasn't a fragile maiden who would just crumple when Azkadehlia took everything she loved away. Princess or whatever, if no-one else was left who was going to fix this world, then it might as well be up to her. Even if it was just to piss Azkadehlia off.

It could be worse. She could be dead...and part of her wished that she was. But as long as she wasn't, she was going to keep fighting. Because now, at least, she had nothing left to lose.

She was alive, and she was going to keep it that way, because there was someone who needed her to be, more than anything else.