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Title: Full of Grace.
Author:![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fenderlove
Character: Original Slayer.
Setting: New York City, New York. March 25th, 1911.
Summary: Fifteen year old Rosaria Cammarata fled to America to escape the dangers of being the Slayer. How could she know of the everyday danger that awaited her?
Notes: The prompt was "OC Slayer, NYC Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, By that which no man fears more."
Written for...
"There was a long line of girls before Buffy. They were once the Chosen Ones of their generation. Let's tell their stories."
Full of Grace
It started with smoke, a foul acrid smoke that burned the eyes and the nose. Little did anyone realize that by the time the first shouts of "Fire! Fire!" arose that it was already too late for them. The women, mostly young, mostly new to America, tripped over one another, pushing over row after row of sewing tables and chairs as they dashed for the exits. The screams and shouts were deafening as the mad rush reached the main exit from the ninth floor.
Rosaria heard an frightened cry in Italian, "My God! The elevators have gone out!" as the first exit became choked from bodies piling up around the boxes of fabric as they struggled to flee from the flames that had reached the doorframe.
The fifteen year old had just gathered her basket of embroidery, a special gift for her mother she had been working on during her lunch, to prepare to go home when the panic had set in. Had they not been on strike in weeks prior to make sure fires did not occur? Why weren't the sprinklers working?
It was the terrified screams in her mother-tongue that snapped Rosaria to action. Instead of the main exit, they could try the door to the stairwell. She climbed onto her chair and sprinted over the sewing stations, having had much practice at unsteady navigation while running about the crumbling cemeteries in her village. She grabbed the door handle and pushed. Nothing. She pushed harder against the metal door with all her Slayer strength. She kicked and cursed and punched at the door, but it would not budge.
The flames were about the room, spreading across the floor, engulfing women in a fiery dance as they spun, their dresses and hair alight in a horrible orange-gold glow. The workers had no where to go but to take to the windows as the smoke grew thicker and the fire closer. They struggled to open the windows, waving franticly down to the firefighters below.
"The ladders are going up!" came an almost hopeful shout, and then desperate screams of disappointment when those closest to the windows realized that the firemen's ladders could not reach their floor.
Rosaria squeezed forward with the rest, wanting air and rescue. She had faced vampires, but never felt the same fear as she did, huddled like a caged animal amongst the sobbing, cringing mass of people. Was this what she had come to America for? She had wanted to be safe, to live an ordinary life, to be free of her Watcher and her destiny. She wanted to save enough money for her mother and father to move to America with her. She wanted to learn the name of the young man who swept up the scraps from the floor, find out what part of Italy he was from, to see if perhaps they had ever been neighbors.
Nearly two dozen women stepped out to the fire escape though it was terribly rusted and not very sturdy. A earsplitting wrenching noise followed by screams sent a chill through the furnace-like room. It was then that some ran back towards the fire and others towards the locked stairwell door, insane from fear and panic and hopelessness.
"Ida, come back! Don't do it!"
Rosaria stared, stricken, as Ida, a Russian girl who worked three chairs down from hers, stepped onto the sash of the window they crowded around.
Ida turned to her friends, who clutched at her skirts and apron to try to pull her back inside, and with tear-filled eyes said, "It's all right. I'll reach the ladder."
And she jumped, trying to catch hold of the ladder some three floors below theirs. Ida's body made a dreadful sound as it hit the pavement.
People were shouting from the street as the firefighters tried to ready a life net. Seeing the netting, more girls found the courage to jump. The weight of them all and the speed of them spilling down through the air was too much, and the repetition of bone-against-concrete gave way to screams of horror from the on-lookers.
As the flames were mere feet from the trapped mass of bodies pressed against the walls, the women broke apart, running to all the windows of that corner. They began to step outside, into the air, into a world where the crumpled bodies of their friends lay tangled on the street below. Then, they stepped into nothingness.
Rosaria saw the Sweeper Boy helping women out the window, chivalrously holding their hands as they leapt. She was finally close enough to know that she had but one decision to make- the fire or the jump. Restraining her tears, she flung her arms around the Sweeper Boy's neck and kissed him. Her first kiss, her only kiss.
And then Rosaria jumped.
And she prayed.
"Ave Maria, piena di grazia..."
She felt like she was flying, somehow turned on her back, the contents of her embroidery basket sailing by her head, colourful spoons of thread unwinding before her eyes, the gift her mother would never receive. Above her, the Sweeper Boy stepped out into the air, his coat billowing out around him, like wings. Rosaria wished she had known his name, but perhaps she would see him again.
"il Signore è con te..."
More women were leaping, their bodies lapped by flames as they went, turning to cinders, flesh charring even in the cold, bitter wind. The exclamations of the firemen and the spectators were so much louder as Rosaria shut her eyes. She would be free, safe at last, just not in this world.
"Tu sei benedetta fra le donne..."
Amen.
Author:
fenderloveCharacter: Original Slayer.
Setting: New York City, New York. March 25th, 1911.
Summary: Fifteen year old Rosaria Cammarata fled to America to escape the dangers of being the Slayer. How could she know of the everyday danger that awaited her?
Notes: The prompt was "OC Slayer, NYC Triangle Shirtwaist Fire, By that which no man fears more."
Written for...
"There was a long line of girls before Buffy. They were once the Chosen Ones of their generation. Let's tell their stories."
Full of Grace
It started with smoke, a foul acrid smoke that burned the eyes and the nose. Little did anyone realize that by the time the first shouts of "Fire! Fire!" arose that it was already too late for them. The women, mostly young, mostly new to America, tripped over one another, pushing over row after row of sewing tables and chairs as they dashed for the exits. The screams and shouts were deafening as the mad rush reached the main exit from the ninth floor.
Rosaria heard an frightened cry in Italian, "My God! The elevators have gone out!" as the first exit became choked from bodies piling up around the boxes of fabric as they struggled to flee from the flames that had reached the doorframe.
The fifteen year old had just gathered her basket of embroidery, a special gift for her mother she had been working on during her lunch, to prepare to go home when the panic had set in. Had they not been on strike in weeks prior to make sure fires did not occur? Why weren't the sprinklers working?
It was the terrified screams in her mother-tongue that snapped Rosaria to action. Instead of the main exit, they could try the door to the stairwell. She climbed onto her chair and sprinted over the sewing stations, having had much practice at unsteady navigation while running about the crumbling cemeteries in her village. She grabbed the door handle and pushed. Nothing. She pushed harder against the metal door with all her Slayer strength. She kicked and cursed and punched at the door, but it would not budge.
The flames were about the room, spreading across the floor, engulfing women in a fiery dance as they spun, their dresses and hair alight in a horrible orange-gold glow. The workers had no where to go but to take to the windows as the smoke grew thicker and the fire closer. They struggled to open the windows, waving franticly down to the firefighters below.
"The ladders are going up!" came an almost hopeful shout, and then desperate screams of disappointment when those closest to the windows realized that the firemen's ladders could not reach their floor.
Rosaria squeezed forward with the rest, wanting air and rescue. She had faced vampires, but never felt the same fear as she did, huddled like a caged animal amongst the sobbing, cringing mass of people. Was this what she had come to America for? She had wanted to be safe, to live an ordinary life, to be free of her Watcher and her destiny. She wanted to save enough money for her mother and father to move to America with her. She wanted to learn the name of the young man who swept up the scraps from the floor, find out what part of Italy he was from, to see if perhaps they had ever been neighbors.
Nearly two dozen women stepped out to the fire escape though it was terribly rusted and not very sturdy. A earsplitting wrenching noise followed by screams sent a chill through the furnace-like room. It was then that some ran back towards the fire and others towards the locked stairwell door, insane from fear and panic and hopelessness.
"Ida, come back! Don't do it!"
Rosaria stared, stricken, as Ida, a Russian girl who worked three chairs down from hers, stepped onto the sash of the window they crowded around.
Ida turned to her friends, who clutched at her skirts and apron to try to pull her back inside, and with tear-filled eyes said, "It's all right. I'll reach the ladder."
And she jumped, trying to catch hold of the ladder some three floors below theirs. Ida's body made a dreadful sound as it hit the pavement.
People were shouting from the street as the firefighters tried to ready a life net. Seeing the netting, more girls found the courage to jump. The weight of them all and the speed of them spilling down through the air was too much, and the repetition of bone-against-concrete gave way to screams of horror from the on-lookers.
As the flames were mere feet from the trapped mass of bodies pressed against the walls, the women broke apart, running to all the windows of that corner. They began to step outside, into the air, into a world where the crumpled bodies of their friends lay tangled on the street below. Then, they stepped into nothingness.
Rosaria saw the Sweeper Boy helping women out the window, chivalrously holding their hands as they leapt. She was finally close enough to know that she had but one decision to make- the fire or the jump. Restraining her tears, she flung her arms around the Sweeper Boy's neck and kissed him. Her first kiss, her only kiss.
And then Rosaria jumped.
And she prayed.
"Ave Maria, piena di grazia..."
She felt like she was flying, somehow turned on her back, the contents of her embroidery basket sailing by her head, colourful spoons of thread unwinding before her eyes, the gift her mother would never receive. Above her, the Sweeper Boy stepped out into the air, his coat billowing out around him, like wings. Rosaria wished she had known his name, but perhaps she would see him again.
"il Signore è con te..."
More women were leaping, their bodies lapped by flames as they went, turning to cinders, flesh charring even in the cold, bitter wind. The exclamations of the firemen and the spectators were so much louder as Rosaria shut her eyes. She would be free, safe at last, just not in this world.
"Tu sei benedetta fra le donne..."
Amen.
