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fic: Man on Fire: blow up the outside world, R
disclaimer: not mine
fandom: Man on Fire (does this film even have a fandom?)
character: Pita, her mother
set: covering part of the movie, then the future
length: 1300
rating: R, adult situations, suggested child prostitution, violence, drugs
notes: It's not my fault that I caught the tail end (the Criminal Intent episode opposite was utter shit), and even though I then watched Bones, I got hit with Man on Fire fic instead. *shrugs* My brain works in strange ways. Title from the Soundgarden song which is partially what caused the words to explode in my head. Sigh.
blow up the outside world
by ALC Punk!
When Pita is a little girl, she has a friend. He doesn't let her call him a friend, but she knows. Just like she knows her mama loves her, and her papa... Creasy isn't her papa, Creasy is just Creasy, and she understands him.
Papa hires him to watch out for her, his little princess in her gilded castle, though it's not made out of gold.
I'm not here to be your friend, Creasy claims, but a part of her knows better. He's here to keep her safe, and that's almost the same thing, she convinces herself.
But Creasy can't keep her safe, he can't even keep himself safe.
There's chaos, bullets, broken glass and she skins her knees trying to get away. They shove her in a car, they lock her in a trunk and she screams and no one comes forever and ever. Eventually, they move her again, only this time, they put a bag over her head and one of them whispers things to her, things that she only half-understands and doesn't want to.
Locked behind a gate, she's free to move, but there's barely ten feet to move up and back and seven other girls sharing the space. One disppears, and Pita wonders if she's going to scream. The others are all so silent that she's silent, too.
Huddled under a blanket, four other girls sharing the bed with her, Pita thinks about her mama, thinks about Creasy. She's not sure there's anyone coming for her, but she knows one thing: Creasy will try.
It's faith in Creasy that makes it ok to walk when they blindfold her. The plastic ties cut into her wrists, but she doesn't cry out. She can smell gasoline from the car, and when they roll the windows down and wait, there's grass.
The light blinds her when they let her go, and she can't see. They tell her to walk, and she walks, even though it's nothing but a blur. Then, like a camera flash, it clears.
Creasy.
Faith blooms, hope explodes and she runs.
He smells like blood and death, and even while she's happy, she feels worry.
"Go," he says. Don't look back.
She wants to protest, but he's in earnest and so she goes. She doesn't look back until she's wrapped in Mama's arms.
Creasy is gone, and Pita wonders how long he has to live.
Afterwards there are policemen, asking questions. Where were you? How did you get there? Who kidnaped you? The questions and faces swirl round and round until all she can remember is scratchy wool blankets and the smell of blood mixed with the sobs of the girl next to her.
Mama takes her home after that, curls up in bed with her. The sheets are clean and starchy against her skin.
"We'll be all right," Mama whispers.
Lying there, Pita hopes she's right.
Papa, Mama explains days later, Papa is gone. Pita tries to miss him, but the ache of Creasy is worse. Knowing he'll never be there, driving her, knowing she won't catch his unguarded look. Knowing he won't ever smile for her again...
They survive. Mama gets a job, Mama has money, or Mama knows things. Pita isn't entirely sure which. But whatever it is, they move from their castle. They hole up in a tiny apartment and Pita does the shopping. Sometimes, there's not enough money for food, other times, there's too much (she never asks where it comes from). Washing their own clothes in the coin laundry is a luxury, but they both insist upon it.
"I have family," Mama tells her. She tries to smile, but the look in her eyes is distant. "Over the border. We could live there."
Creasy came from over the border. Pita considers living in another city, like this one, with the gangs and the streets, the dirt under her fingernails. She shakes her head and leans into her mother's side. "Here is good," she whispers.
They both know here. Better than they might want to.
-
When Pita is fourteen, she cocks a gun and learns to pull the trigger. It's not the first time she's held a gun. Her friends all have them, all joke about them, show them off like they're a badge.
That's how Mama decides it's time she learned. For a moment, there's a flash of terror in her eyes. Then it's gone.
Her mother shows her the care, safety, aim, trigger. How to clean and maintain her weapon. There's a hard edge to Mama now, one that Creasy would have noticed, one that would have set both their hackles up. Pita understands more things about men and women now. More than she wants to, maybe.
"You be safe," Mama scolds, letting her out the door, gun tucked in a place that's accessible but concealed.
Carrying concealed ain't a law, it's a privilege. Pita gets that, as easily as she gets the trick of saying no, foot in a man's crotch, fist in his face. Most of 'em are too drunk to fight back. Those that aren't get her gun under their chin. She don't put out.
Once upon a time, Pita knew correct grammar, understood the way words flowed together.
Now she can talk trash with the best of them. She excels at it, turning a phrase like it's a ten-thousand word essay written in iambic pentameter.
Two days later, her best friend is shot during a police raid, and Pita learns to remember fear. She spends an hour cowering under the stairs, arms around her head, flashing back to rough sheets and stale sweat. This will become your life, and you'll learn to like it, little girl...
It's only when Mama comes home that she comes out from under the stairs. Take me away from here. But it's not that easy, it's never been that easy.
At the end of the week, they move again, this time into an apartment with bigger windows and the smell of the ocean breezes coming from a candle on the mantel. Salt is more bitter, Pita thinks. But she never says, the strain around Mama's eyes silencing her comments.
She still goes out with a gun, and a knife in her boot. But now she goes to school again, learning a different culture and more language. She blends easily, just another blonde teenager with a grin and hard eyes.
-
When Pita is nineteen, she kills her first target.
The contract was accidental, almost. An old contact from half a dozen lifetimes ago. I knew your father, the man says. I can help your mother return... Mama doesn't want his help, and Pita doesn't either, really. But the money is good. And the man she kills is just another mark on the tally of her life.
She doesn't think Creasy would be proud, but she's surviving, and she's got Mama to look out for, now. Just like Mama looked out for her all those years.
Curling up in bed that night, her hand finds a tattered little book under her pillow, and she clenches her fingers tight around it. In the morning, she'll be up again, off to college to mingle and learn more words and books that won't ever get her nowhere. Mama paid for her schooling with money she'd saved, so Pita's a dutiful daughter.
She used to hear her mother crying herself to sleep. Lost castles, lost princes, and lost innocence left Mama raw. She's blunted now.
Look after your Mama.
She will. And she'll go to school, even if it doesn't matter. She'll learn and then she'll take another job, maybe it'll be another hit, maybe she'll get in worse before she gets out. And she'll keep on doing it until she finds a friend like Creasy, one her own age who'll take her for all that she is and not just what's on her chest and between her legs.
-f-
fandom: Man on Fire (does this film even have a fandom?)
character: Pita, her mother
set: covering part of the movie, then the future
length: 1300
rating: R, adult situations, suggested child prostitution, violence, drugs
notes: It's not my fault that I caught the tail end (the Criminal Intent episode opposite was utter shit), and even though I then watched Bones, I got hit with Man on Fire fic instead. *shrugs* My brain works in strange ways. Title from the Soundgarden song which is partially what caused the words to explode in my head. Sigh.
blow up the outside world
by ALC Punk!
When Pita is a little girl, she has a friend. He doesn't let her call him a friend, but she knows. Just like she knows her mama loves her, and her papa... Creasy isn't her papa, Creasy is just Creasy, and she understands him.
Papa hires him to watch out for her, his little princess in her gilded castle, though it's not made out of gold.
I'm not here to be your friend, Creasy claims, but a part of her knows better. He's here to keep her safe, and that's almost the same thing, she convinces herself.
But Creasy can't keep her safe, he can't even keep himself safe.
There's chaos, bullets, broken glass and she skins her knees trying to get away. They shove her in a car, they lock her in a trunk and she screams and no one comes forever and ever. Eventually, they move her again, only this time, they put a bag over her head and one of them whispers things to her, things that she only half-understands and doesn't want to.
Locked behind a gate, she's free to move, but there's barely ten feet to move up and back and seven other girls sharing the space. One disppears, and Pita wonders if she's going to scream. The others are all so silent that she's silent, too.
Huddled under a blanket, four other girls sharing the bed with her, Pita thinks about her mama, thinks about Creasy. She's not sure there's anyone coming for her, but she knows one thing: Creasy will try.
It's faith in Creasy that makes it ok to walk when they blindfold her. The plastic ties cut into her wrists, but she doesn't cry out. She can smell gasoline from the car, and when they roll the windows down and wait, there's grass.
The light blinds her when they let her go, and she can't see. They tell her to walk, and she walks, even though it's nothing but a blur. Then, like a camera flash, it clears.
Creasy.
Faith blooms, hope explodes and she runs.
He smells like blood and death, and even while she's happy, she feels worry.
"Go," he says. Don't look back.
She wants to protest, but he's in earnest and so she goes. She doesn't look back until she's wrapped in Mama's arms.
Creasy is gone, and Pita wonders how long he has to live.
Afterwards there are policemen, asking questions. Where were you? How did you get there? Who kidnaped you? The questions and faces swirl round and round until all she can remember is scratchy wool blankets and the smell of blood mixed with the sobs of the girl next to her.
Mama takes her home after that, curls up in bed with her. The sheets are clean and starchy against her skin.
"We'll be all right," Mama whispers.
Lying there, Pita hopes she's right.
Papa, Mama explains days later, Papa is gone. Pita tries to miss him, but the ache of Creasy is worse. Knowing he'll never be there, driving her, knowing she won't catch his unguarded look. Knowing he won't ever smile for her again...
They survive. Mama gets a job, Mama has money, or Mama knows things. Pita isn't entirely sure which. But whatever it is, they move from their castle. They hole up in a tiny apartment and Pita does the shopping. Sometimes, there's not enough money for food, other times, there's too much (she never asks where it comes from). Washing their own clothes in the coin laundry is a luxury, but they both insist upon it.
"I have family," Mama tells her. She tries to smile, but the look in her eyes is distant. "Over the border. We could live there."
Creasy came from over the border. Pita considers living in another city, like this one, with the gangs and the streets, the dirt under her fingernails. She shakes her head and leans into her mother's side. "Here is good," she whispers.
They both know here. Better than they might want to.
-
When Pita is fourteen, she cocks a gun and learns to pull the trigger. It's not the first time she's held a gun. Her friends all have them, all joke about them, show them off like they're a badge.
That's how Mama decides it's time she learned. For a moment, there's a flash of terror in her eyes. Then it's gone.
Her mother shows her the care, safety, aim, trigger. How to clean and maintain her weapon. There's a hard edge to Mama now, one that Creasy would have noticed, one that would have set both their hackles up. Pita understands more things about men and women now. More than she wants to, maybe.
"You be safe," Mama scolds, letting her out the door, gun tucked in a place that's accessible but concealed.
Carrying concealed ain't a law, it's a privilege. Pita gets that, as easily as she gets the trick of saying no, foot in a man's crotch, fist in his face. Most of 'em are too drunk to fight back. Those that aren't get her gun under their chin. She don't put out.
Once upon a time, Pita knew correct grammar, understood the way words flowed together.
Now she can talk trash with the best of them. She excels at it, turning a phrase like it's a ten-thousand word essay written in iambic pentameter.
Two days later, her best friend is shot during a police raid, and Pita learns to remember fear. She spends an hour cowering under the stairs, arms around her head, flashing back to rough sheets and stale sweat. This will become your life, and you'll learn to like it, little girl...
It's only when Mama comes home that she comes out from under the stairs. Take me away from here. But it's not that easy, it's never been that easy.
At the end of the week, they move again, this time into an apartment with bigger windows and the smell of the ocean breezes coming from a candle on the mantel. Salt is more bitter, Pita thinks. But she never says, the strain around Mama's eyes silencing her comments.
She still goes out with a gun, and a knife in her boot. But now she goes to school again, learning a different culture and more language. She blends easily, just another blonde teenager with a grin and hard eyes.
-
When Pita is nineteen, she kills her first target.
The contract was accidental, almost. An old contact from half a dozen lifetimes ago. I knew your father, the man says. I can help your mother return... Mama doesn't want his help, and Pita doesn't either, really. But the money is good. And the man she kills is just another mark on the tally of her life.
She doesn't think Creasy would be proud, but she's surviving, and she's got Mama to look out for, now. Just like Mama looked out for her all those years.
Curling up in bed that night, her hand finds a tattered little book under her pillow, and she clenches her fingers tight around it. In the morning, she'll be up again, off to college to mingle and learn more words and books that won't ever get her nowhere. Mama paid for her schooling with money she'd saved, so Pita's a dutiful daughter.
She used to hear her mother crying herself to sleep. Lost castles, lost princes, and lost innocence left Mama raw. She's blunted now.
Look after your Mama.
She will. And she'll go to school, even if it doesn't matter. She'll learn and then she'll take another job, maybe it'll be another hit, maybe she'll get in worse before she gets out. And she'll keep on doing it until she finds a friend like Creasy, one her own age who'll take her for all that she is and not just what's on her chest and between her legs.
-f-
no subject
no subject
The cinematography and pacing are just gorgeous to behold.
And thank you. =)
I didn't want to frighten, but I don't think many good things come of a movie like Man on Fire