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october-writes · 6 months ago

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Icarus sneak peek...

Okay, so I'm being super generous with this sneak peek because I have no idea when I'll be ready to post the whole fic. Pandora!Verse Leon has a long, bittersweet backstory and I love it, but it's a lot to get down especially when all I want to do is cry and hug him. 😫

Thank you for your patience. Any likes/comments here or on Pandora are the fuel that keeps the fic engine running.

‘Is this really where you grew up?’ she asked, her voice light with surprise.

He turned in time to see her cringe at the question. She’d been quiet since the drive away from the motel and the scene with Russ and his posse. No, scratch that. Ada had kept to herself because he’d asked her to and he’d been kicking himself for that ever since.

His stomach flipped whenever Ada asked him about himself; one part excitement, one part terror. He wanted to tell her everything and, in turn, he wanted to know her as well as he knew his deepest desires. But he was scared of the guy in those stories. Steadfast, optimistic, stable, responsible. He was sure that version of him had died on a forest floor. Now he was trying to live up to his own ghost.

Leon swallowed before replying glibly, ‘Nope! I grew up in a house.’

‘You know what I meant, Leon.’

God, he loved the way Ada said his name; like she owned the word, like no one had ever called him that but her.

‘Okay. I spent a lot of time here too,’ he conceded, nodding at the front facade of the church and the flawless circle of its Gothic stained glass window, ‘One Easter when I was fourteen, me and the chaplain’s son changed the sign out front to read: “Honk if you love Jesus”.’

She spluttered on a laugh, ‘You did what?’

‘You could barely hear mom’s sermon ‘cause of the car horns. I would’ve been grounded ‘til Christmas, but lucky for me she has a sense of humour! Damn. I was such a little asshole when I wanted to be.’

Ada bit her bottom lip until it shone pearlescent pink and he couldn’t look away from her mouth.

‘I could show you around,’ he offered suddenly, ‘If there was time.’

‘Really? And where would you take me?’

Her eyes glinted like a dare. He’d reignited her interest in him and they were back there again, at the edge of something beautiful and dangerous.

Go ahead. Impress me, rookie.

‘Well, um... there’s the Boott Cotton Mills Museum just across the canal,’ he suggested weakly, his throat suddenly dry, ‘I uh... I wrote an essay on it in High School.’

Her eyebrows twitched, ‘High School...?’

‘Yeah, it was on child labour reforms during the Industrial Revolution. I got an A minus.’

Oh for the love of- Shut up, shut up, shut up!

Ada blinked at him before turning away, ‘Interesting. Maybe some other time.’

Her eyes went dull, the glint of challenge extinguished. They were left beneath the cool light of the street lamp looking at everything but each other.

‘Come on. We should get going before I’m recognised,’ he said, leading her across the street, ‘We’ll check out the back lot.’

Leon remembered the first time Sarah had taken him to First Presbyterian to help out the day crew, officially as penance for his reckless escape attempt on his first night under her roof. He hadn’t been due to start school for another week and, while he’d been sincerely forgiven for his antics, he’d still been grounded.

The church ran a Day Centre from Monday to Friday, the doors opening at eight on the dot come rain or shine or biblical levels of snow. Refreshments, clean clothes and pastoral counselling were available no questions asked and, in the evenings, volunteers served hot meals alongside a rotating programme of art therapy, sign language classes, and addicts anonymous meetings.

Sarah had started the programme during her first few months in Lowell. The way some locals liked to tell it, Sarah had crashed into town on a wave of radical ideas. The Day Centre hadn’t been popular with everyone, bringing ‘undesirables’ and addicts from the fringes into the centre of town where they were harder to ignore.

‘I’ve brought the poor and the sick to Jesus’ doorstep, just like he instructed,’ she’d retorted, knowing the Bible was her home turf and she’d arrived ready to fight dirty, ‘If you’ve got a problem, take it up with him!’

‘I’m on a first name basis with the Mayor’s office,’ Sarah had boasted as they’d carried boxes of donated clothing through the back of the church, ‘Mayor Wiggins reminds me every time I stop by that I shouldn’t let it go to my head! I think he preferred the old pastor, Reverend Dawson. But Wiggy knows I’m better at getting things done. He’d rather boil his own head in lard than admit it though, so I’m not holding my breath for the key to the city!’

Young Leon had tipped his head back to take in the building’s decadent red brick and stained glass, its silver spire bouncing the sun towards every corner of Lowell.

‘Is all this yours?’ he’d asked.

He’d lingered at the threshold, a deep breath ballooning his stomach as he’d prepared himself to enter. The air had smelled apple-crisp, the pavement sun-dappled and warming the tops of his sneakers. It had stirred something familiar inside of him. But he hadn’t been inside a church since... since they’d buried his mom.

Sarah had chuckled, bumping the backdoor open with her behind, ‘Oh, no! Frannie belongs to everyone. But I am humbly responsible for her, like a sheepdog with her flock.’

She knew the church well enough that she could walk through it backwards without knocking into anything. All the better to keep her eye on Leon so she could read her new foster son’s lips.

‘What does that make me?’ he’d wondered as he’d followed her, ‘Like... a stray puppy or something?’

She’d hooted at that.

‘I don’t tell people who they are, Leon. But if I am to be completely honest, which under his roof is essential,’ she’d thrown the box of donated winter coats onto a nearby table and had turned to relieve him of the ones he’d carried, ‘I am sincerely looking forward to meeting the man you’ll become some day.’

Leon hadn’t known what to say to that.

Old foster parents, social workers, even a cop once; they’d all warned him that who he was becoming was someone he should be afraid of, ashamed of. But Sarah had greeted all sides of him like they’d known and loved each other for years.

The Day Centre had become a fixture of Leon’s teenage years from that day on. He’d never been much for the services, the singing, the prayer. But he’d helped out with the art classes and he’d learned how to cook in the community kitchen. He’d taken sign language classes after school and pulled weeds from the community garden across the street. He’d done his homework in Sarah’s study, her day sermons sailing in through the open window like a warm breeze.

When he’d turned fifteen and grown a foot taller in what had felt like a week, Leon had begun captaining one of the local street hockey teams. Their casual league had been run out of the back lot of the church.

He remembered long afternoons three times a week, two dozen kids howling like wild animals after sunset, and sweating even when it was so cold he could see his breath. Rhonda in the goal, as reliable as rain in September. She’d used the church to escape her alcoholic dad for a few hours a day. And Marty, a formerly homeless teen, playing offense and doing a backflip every time he scored. The slap of hockey sticks, rollerblades tearing up the tarmac, a puck smacking off a brick wall, his heart in his throat as a shot narrowly missed a car window.

There was still a dent in a lamp post from where one of Leon’s shots had gone wide. It had struck the post so hard the bulb had gone out. They’d played the rest of the night by the light of the church’s silver steeple and it had felt like an incredible dream.

It had been yesterday and forever ago. But as Leon walked the lot with Ada now, a part of him was convinced he’d be back here tomorrow, hockey stick in hand with his skates tied at the laces and slung over his shoulder.

‘The Day Centre closes early Thursdays,’ he told Ada as they lingered at the edge of the lot, ‘It shouldn’t be this busy.’

The lights were on and the church shimmered from every window. The front of the building was still bustling, so they’d given it a wide berth. Though Leon had his cap down, he’d grown up inside these walls. There was no way he’d make it to the rectory without being recognised.

Ada was getting restless. Her face was hidden by her hood, but Leon could see the tense line her shoulders made beneath her sweater.

‘Maybe things have changed,’ she muttered.

‘She’ll be here,’ he replied, ‘That much’ll be the same. I know it will.’

Minutes later the backdoor to the church opened and Pastor Sarah stepped into the warm summer night.

Her dark hair had regrown in gentle waves, softer and less curly than before her illness and now tinged with grey. She wore a thick cardigan, unbuttoned and showing off a baggy Guns and Roses tour t-shirt that Leon had stolen from her closet about a hundred times before it had stopped fitting him.

Leon muffled a quiet laugh into the collar of his jacket, but deep down he felt like sinking to his knees.

He knew Lowell’s streets. He knew there was a house a few blocks away where his old bed waited and his sketchbooks tumbled out of the wardrobe in an avalanche of memories. But ‘home’ was a complicated concept for a guy who’d had so many. A one bedroom in Chicago snuggled safe between his mom and dad, Buchanan with its dreams unfulfilled, in shady motels forever awake in front of a TV with the sound as low as it would go, and finally seven foster homes; a number that made ‘normal’ people from ‘normal’ families wince so he’d stopped repeating it until he could almost imagine that his early childhood had happened to someone else.

For Leon, ‘home’ had eventually come to mean Sarah reminding him to be back by ten. Home was the leftover casserole in the fridge with his name on it. It was about not being alone at the kitchen table because Sarah would always wait up and ask him how his game went. She’d even pretended to understand the rules.

Someone Leon didn’t recognise stepped out with Sarah. It was an older woman in a long cotton dress. She and Sarah shared a quick hug before the woman left for her car. Sarah stood in the doorway and waved goodbye. Then she slid back into the church, disappearing like a dream at sunrise.

Ada was watching Leon. Her gaze passed up and down his face, mapping the angle of his nose and the cleft of his chin like they’d just met. Leon knew what she was thinking.

He and Sarah sang off-key to the same songs, they ate their eggs over-easy with too much Tabasco sauce, and they both thought cilantro tasted like soap. But they didn’t look even a little bit alike.

‘I’m adopted,’ he explained.

She frowned, surprised, ‘Oh. I see. I’m sorry.’

‘I’m not.’

‘I didn’t mean... I just didn’t know.’

‘But you knew my mom was a pastor?’

‘It was in your obituary.’

Leon did a double-take, ‘My... what? I have a damned obituary?’

‘Of course you do! You died,’ Ada replied sardonically, ‘Your colleagues had some interesting things to say about you.’

‘Yeah, I bet,’ he winced, and his mind raced to suss out exactly what Ada knew about the old him as filtered through the eyes of his peers. They’d treated Leon like he was fresh out of school and an old man at the same time, ‘Come on. It’s now or never.’

The back of the church held Sarah’s office, a common room for the staff, and a library that smelled like cold coffee and chocolate. Leon opened the door quietly and checked it was empty before ushering Ada inside.

They heard voices echoing from the church hall beyond the big wooden doors:

‘Has anyone seen Pastor Sarah? We’re running low on baby formula!’

‘She’s in her study. Don’t trouble her. I’ll call the supplier first thing tomorrow.’

‘I’ve barely seen her all day, Lucille. Is this ‘cause of that silly protest outside the Governor’s office? I told her to take it easy!’

‘She’s tired, Frank. Let her be.’

Sarah’s office door was ajar. Leon could see her shadow spilling over the desk and onto the carpet. He could smell her hand lotion, its residue on the doorknob. His eyes drifted shut as his hands formed a tight claw around the knob like he’d forgotten how doors worked.

Maybe this was a mistake. A panicked sensation surged inside his chest. Ada was right. Umbrella could be monitoring Sarah. He could put her in danger just be showing his face around town. He should go, shouldn’t he? Right now, just go and leave her be. He could think of another way to track down Jill and Chris.

And what was he going to say to her? How could he explain what had happened to him? She’d thought he was dead for nearly two years, but at least her ignorance had kept her safe.

Leon tensed when he felt a pressure on his forearm. He looked back to find Ada gently peeling him away from the door.

‘I’ll go first,’ she whispered, her dark eyes trained on his face, ‘I’ll make sure she’s alone.’

He nodded but Ada was already slipping past. She opened the door just enough to squeeze through.

‘Pastor Morris?’

A chair scraped the floor as Sarah stood.

‘Yes?’ her voice sounded jittery like she’d just woken from a nap, ‘Hold on... Let me just...’

There was a long pause. Leon guessed Sarah was fumbling with her cochlear implant.

‘Could you come closer, honey?’ Sarah said breathlessly, ‘I can’t quite hear you all the way over there. Are you here about tomorrow’s charity drive?’

‘No. No, I’m...’

Leon swayed on his feet, his ears ringing. He’d been so nervous, he’d forgotten to warn Ada that Sarah was deaf. He mentally kicked himself.

Then Ada raised her voice and when she spoke, she filled all corners of the little study, her voice lifting its high ceiling and rustling the pages of every tome. Like a fair summer wind, she was the little lift he needed to make it home.

‘I’m a friend of your son.’

Then it was as if they were the only three people in the building. A silence enveloped them, as dense and safe as stone. Leon didn’t feel himself move, but he felt Ada’s hand, warm and insistent around his wrist as she pulled him through the doorway and into his mother’s study.

Sarah, to her credit, didn’t cry out. She didn’t seem to be breathing either.

‘Mom?’

Her hands flew to her mouth. Her eyes turned red to signal an oncoming wave of tears. But when her hand fell, Leon saw she was smiling like it was the first time he’d ever called her that. It wasn’t, not by a long shot.

Leon took a step towards her. Then he stopped, realising that Ada was still holding his wrist. Her grip was loose, almost reassuring. Not too much pressure, just enough; like a whispered phrase he felt all the way up his arm to straight to his heart: ‘I’m right here’.

When his hand slipped from hers, Leon still felt her warmth; that fair wind driving him forward.

Sarah whined softly. She rubbed at her throat like the words had gotten tangled up in there and she needed pry them away from each other. Her fingers were trembling and he realised she was too overwhelmed to sign to him.

He stepped towards her and raised his hands to tell her:

I’ll explain everything. I promise.

I’m so sorry, mom. I’m sorry...

He made a fist with his thumb extended and scored circles with it deep into the centre of his chest. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.

Sarah dove forward and latched both her hands over his fist. Then she tugged him forward and threw her arms around his shoulders. She clung to her son like the grave could snatch him back. She buried her wet nose into the crook of his neck. Then she keened against his shoulder, a wordless cry of grief and joy combined that shook his core.

‘I love you so much. Okay? I love you,’ Leon murmured into the crown of her head where his tears were already soaking her hair. He hoped she could feel the raw honesty in his voice even if she couldn’t make out the words, ‘I missed you. I did! I missed you, mom.’

Who knows how long they huddled in the centre of her study? Long enough that his face was still pink but finally dry when they parted. Long enough that Sarah could stand to let him go so she could snatch a tissue from the box on her desk while laughing at how terrifying and strange and wonderful this was.

And long enough that when Leon looked over his shoulder, he saw that Ada had disappeared.

🥲

To be continued...

#fic: icarus #resident evil fanfiction #leon s kennedy #ada wong #aeon #leon x ada #ada x leon #scientist ada x test subject leon #for clarification: leon's foster mother is deaf #and leon started to learn american sign language when he went to live with her

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veryballoonartisan · 2 days ago

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Hiking to the Summit of Mount Washington in New Hampshire

Many New Hampshire hikers and climbers aim to summit the state’s 4,000-foot-plus mountains, such as the Northeast’s highest peak, Mount Washington. It encompasses a 60.3-acre state park, and an expansive 750,000-acre White Mountain National Forest surrounds it. The 6,288-foot high summit provides panoramic views extending as far as Vermont, Maine, Quebec, and the Atlantic Ocean.

The easiest approach to Mount Washington’s summit is from the west using the Jewell Trail, which starts at the Marshfield Base Station parking lot. There, passengers embark on the first mountain-climbing cog railway ever built, some 150 years ago. With an average grade of 25 percent and maxing out at 38 percent, the railway runs on powerful, custom-designed biodiesel locomotives. In addition, visitors may see a pair of legacy working coal-fired steam engines, with all train components maintained on-site.

Hikers eschew this convenient option and traverse a trail that gains a relatively moderate 4,000 feet of elevation across 5.2 miles. One distinct feature of this well-trafficked route is giant steps that cut through granite boulders across much of the section above the tree line. Hikers get a close-up glimpse of the cog railroad train at several points as it chugs up the mountain.

The shortest routes approach the summit along a ravine from the east. The Tuckerman Ravine Trail and Lion Head Trail start at Pinkham Notch and measure 4.2 miles one way. With the Tuckerman Ravine Trail more strenuous, it also provides better views, and some hikers create a loop using the two trails, tackling Tuckerman on the descent.

The 5.4-mile Boott Spur Trail is similar in orientation to the Tuckerman Ravine and Lion Head Trails but traverses the other side of the ravine. It breaks through treeline sooner than its counterparts, thus offering more extended views. It is also less traveled and ideal for those in search of solitude.

However, the Great Gulf Trail serves as the most challenging approach to Mount Washington. It starts off Route 16 at the Great Gulf Wilderness parking area. Clocking in at 7.4 miles one way, most embark on two-day wilderness backpacking excursions since they can access designated backcountry campsites. The trail follows the Peabody River for its initial section, sometimes hugging it tightly and others meandering uphill through the forest.

After around 2.5 miles, hikers reach The Bluff, which offers a dramatic view of the looming mountains. It appears as a semicircular wall, like a stage set. Beyond the bluff, hikers traverse a suspension bridge across the West Branch and surmount slippery wet ledges alongside rushing cascades, including Weetamoo Cascade.

At the 6.5-mile mark, hikers arrive at a small, picturesque mountain tarn. Spaulding Lake sits at the head of the glacially carved, amphitheater-shaped Great Gulf valley. Above it rises the rocky headwall, with hikers ascending 1,600 feet in under a mile. This steep section requires careful attention, as snow may wash away the trail markings and cause unstable footing.

From the top of the headwall, hikers ascend the last 0.4 miles using the Gulfside Trail and Trinity Heights Connector. The summit features the historic stone Tip Top House, constructed in 1853 as a hotel that remains closed to the public during renovations.

#Doug Stevenson

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