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Right on the heels of that last post, but I really wanted to try Tesla -_-; Heh. That vampire is something else, and after rewatching that episode ...
Title: Tour de Force
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Sanctuary
Continuity: Coda to 3x04 Trail of Blood
Characters/Pairings: Nikola Tesla. Mentions of the Five, Johnnie and Helen in particular. Gen
Summary: His fingertip paused a centimeter from the wire
Wordcount: 1703
Spoilers/Warnings: up to 3x04. First ever Sanctuary fic, so probably shaky -_-;
Disclaimer: Not mine
Title: Tour de Force
Rating: PG-13
Fandom: Sanctuary
Continuity: Coda to 3x04 Trail of Blood
Characters/Pairings: Nikola Tesla. Mentions of the Five, Johnnie and Helen in particular. Gen
Summary: His fingertip paused a centimeter from the wire
Wordcount: 1703
Spoilers/Warnings: up to 3x04. First ever Sanctuary fic, so probably shaky -_-;
Disclaimer: Not mine
Tour de Force
His fingertip paused a centimeter from the wire. His soft, round fingertip, millimeters from live current. His oh-so-human flesh, so fragile now, and weak, a centimeter from what had given him life and joy and purpose for over a century. A centimeter away.
And no further. Not now. Not anymore.
Snarling silently, Nikola tugged back his hand, curled it furiously into a useless fist. Soft. Soft, and useless. No good anymore even for his 'parlour tricks', as Helen called them. Oh, sure. Magnetism. A continuation from another angle of the same power, an aspect of the same coin. As electromagnetic as ever, even if the focus had shifted. But the flesh. His flesh, his body, his form. That had carried him through decades. Lost. Gone. Stolen away, just like that, and only himself to blame.
Well, and Helen. And those children, those ignorant, useless fools. All the power of the vampire in their hands, all the chances they'd had, the knowledge they'd almost shown themselves to possess, and they'd thrown it away. They'd cast it aside. And forced him to do the same.
And now, here he was, hand so close to majesty, to force, to power ... and forced to stand away. Forced to stay safe. Because fragile flesh could no longer bear the coursing of real power. Because human hands couldn't hold the lightning.
With a growl, he turned away, stalked to the other side of the lab.
He remembered this. This rich, savage frustration, this desperate longing. He remembered it. The thunderstorms of his youth, watching them roll across the land, knowing what would happen if he stood under that screaming sky. Knowing it. And wanting to anyway. Wanting, for just one second, to taste the power of it. To touch the lightning, to hold it in his hands. For only a moment. Just one.
He remembered machines. Remembered the joy, the glory, the aligning of knowledge in his head, the rich, heady rush of knowing, knowing, that he could finally hold it. Finally hold the lightning. Not in his hands, no. Too fragile still. But in metal and magnetic fields, in copper and glass and the sound of the generator. Knowing he could call it, could make it, could induce it. Could channel it. Could build a world around it, if he had to. Not yet, that. Not then. But later ...
Oh, but later. Later there was the Blood. The Source Blood. Later, he found his ancestry, and his destiny, and his first true taste of power. Physical power, at first. The rush of blood in his veins, the strength of clawed hands, the surge of lust in his belly. Blood lust.
They'd stopped that. Caged that. Never fully, never completely, but they'd caged it. Better living through chemistry, and it had been in his interests at the time. He'd so many better things to be doing than playing in the mud and the blood, tidying up bodies and hiding his face from Helen, from James' watchful gaze. He'd had no time for that sort of thing, no time to be worrying. There was science waiting, a world to build, and the power in his hand. He couldn't afford to be a mindless animal.
And John had only proven that, later. As spectacularly as only Montague John Druitt could. Jack the Ripper had watched them all fall.
Watching them fall apart, watching the Five crumble ... Nikola had understood then, truly, that a modicum of self control was always in one's best interests. A modicum of intelligent thought at all times, and an understanding of consequence. In one fell swoop, John had lost everything, lost Helen, lost the Five, lost his world. Destroyed them all in their turn, or nearly so. Fracturing everything they'd built. All for bloodlust. All for the loss of control.
In retrospect, Nikola could almost begin to sympathise, now. Considering the past few years. Almost.
But he hadn't been sympathetic then. To be perfectly honest, he hadn't been all that concerned, either. Not with Johnnie's little extra-curricular activities, anyway. With Helen, yes, with the effect it had on her, on all of them, but that was later. At the time ...
He'd tasted power. True power. He'd learned, finally, what it was like to hold the lightning in his hands. In his hands. Learned what it was like to feel it coursing through him, what it was like to be part, fully part, of this fundamental force, this thing that could build worlds, and destroy them just as easily. An accident, the first time. An experiment gone ever-so-slightly wrong, and alright, quite possibly his knowledge of his new nature might have made him a little overconfident, but ...
He'd taken the full force of the generator's output. Enough electricity to kill a man, probably ten times over, and he'd taken it full in the chest and side, blasting him across the room. He'd felt it surge through him, felt the agony ... and something more.
He'd felt some fundamental thing inside him aligning, singing, an almost ecstasy, better than the satisfaction of any bloodlust. He'd felt the lightning sing inside him, felt his body, his new, wonderful body, the vampire's body, sing in tune with it, felt the power coursing in his veins, and all he'd been able to do was laugh. Breathless, stunned, reeking of ozone, and he'd laughed. Like the child he'd once been, running wild under the storms. From the sheer, magnificent joy of it. The sheer rush of power.
He'd built a century on that power. He'd built the twentieth century, from the ground up, with the lightning in his hands and with his own genius. He'd taken it, held it in his hands, wrung it and channelled it and sold it, made it invisible, made it pervasive, and filled all the world with it. Not for profit. Not for the petty aims of the likes of Edison and the others. But for the science of it. For the glory of it. For the knowledge that he had taken the lightning, and he had tamed it. Him. Nikola Tesla. He had touched the heart of the storm inside all things, and he had built a world from it.
And if, later, he'd realised that the people who inhabited that world weren't worthy of it? If he'd realised that all they were going to do was mess it up, play games in the mud and the blood like the animals so many of them were, forget self-control, forget power, forget science? If he'd realised that they would take the world he'd given them, take his science, and use it for nothing but money-mongering and war? If he'd realised that the world at large could fall apart as easily as the Five had, fifty years earlier, and for all the same reasons? Wasn't he right, then, to try and fix them? Wasn't he right to try and set them straight, and keep them straight, as his ancestors had for millennia before? Wasn't he right? He'd inherited a world, and rebuilt it entirely on his own merit. Wasn't it his right to try and rule it? Just to keep it from the mud?
No, according to Helen. Never. Not his right. Not their right. Not anyone's right. When she stole the pupae from him, when she destroyed the nest, when she took his chance at a return to glory from his hands. She said it was not his right, as it hadn't been the Cabal's before him.
And maybe he understood that. Maybe, seeing the World Wars, seeing the Cabal, seeing what one person could do with power, what damage they could wreak ... maybe he understood. But Helen didn't. Helen didn't understand that what made him different was that he was him. He was Nikola Tesla. And all he'd ever wanted was to give people the world they deserved, and keep it safe, from themselves and everything else.
And he could have done it. He could have done it. Oh, he'd made his mistakes here or there, but he'd learned from them. His plan ... it had almost been perfect. One tiny oversight, one unexpected variable. He'd have done better next time. He could have done it. He could have made that world.
That's what had been taken from him. That's what he'd lost, at the hands of those stupid children and his own damn weapon. Not the monster Helen seemed to think he'd been. Not the claws, or the teeth, or the immortality, or the madness she thought ran in a vampire's veins. Not them.
He'd lost his place. He'd lost his power. He'd lost the lightning, lost the touch of that fundamental thing, lost his place inside it. Lost his ancestry, lost his legacy. Lost his world, and all it could have been. All he could have made of it.
He'd lost everything. Like Johnnie and the Five before him, he'd lost it all. He'd lost it all.
And now his hand rested, centimeters from glory, and could go no further. Now the touch of all he'd once held would only destroy him, once again. Now, the lightning sang, a centimeter away, and he could not touch it. He couldn't hold it.
But ... he could use it.
He frowned, thoughtful. Moved back, reaching out, a centimeter from the wire. The soft play of fingers, a lazy curl of power. Electromagnetic. And there were things, so many things, that the ability to generate and manipulate magnetic fields could accomplish. No-one knew that better than him. Everything he'd done, everything he'd built, a whole world ... He was still Nikola Tesla, after all. Fragile again, mortal again, but he was still a genius. He was still him.
He'd starting building his world long before the Blood. He'd channelled the lightning before that, bound it in metal and magnets and the currents of the world, built the machines, built the technology, understood the science. Made the science. He'd been a genius before he'd been a vampire, and he was still a genius now.
It's not what you have, but how you use it. Helen may have taken this chance from him, but he'd have another. He'd make another. He'd touch the lightning again. He'd hold it again. He'd be it again. He'd make sure of it.
And in the meantime, well. He was Nikola Tesla. He could probably think of something ...
His fingertip paused a centimeter from the wire. His soft, round fingertip, millimeters from live current. His oh-so-human flesh, so fragile now, and weak, a centimeter from what had given him life and joy and purpose for over a century. A centimeter away.
And no further. Not now. Not anymore.
Snarling silently, Nikola tugged back his hand, curled it furiously into a useless fist. Soft. Soft, and useless. No good anymore even for his 'parlour tricks', as Helen called them. Oh, sure. Magnetism. A continuation from another angle of the same power, an aspect of the same coin. As electromagnetic as ever, even if the focus had shifted. But the flesh. His flesh, his body, his form. That had carried him through decades. Lost. Gone. Stolen away, just like that, and only himself to blame.
Well, and Helen. And those children, those ignorant, useless fools. All the power of the vampire in their hands, all the chances they'd had, the knowledge they'd almost shown themselves to possess, and they'd thrown it away. They'd cast it aside. And forced him to do the same.
And now, here he was, hand so close to majesty, to force, to power ... and forced to stand away. Forced to stay safe. Because fragile flesh could no longer bear the coursing of real power. Because human hands couldn't hold the lightning.
With a growl, he turned away, stalked to the other side of the lab.
He remembered this. This rich, savage frustration, this desperate longing. He remembered it. The thunderstorms of his youth, watching them roll across the land, knowing what would happen if he stood under that screaming sky. Knowing it. And wanting to anyway. Wanting, for just one second, to taste the power of it. To touch the lightning, to hold it in his hands. For only a moment. Just one.
He remembered machines. Remembered the joy, the glory, the aligning of knowledge in his head, the rich, heady rush of knowing, knowing, that he could finally hold it. Finally hold the lightning. Not in his hands, no. Too fragile still. But in metal and magnetic fields, in copper and glass and the sound of the generator. Knowing he could call it, could make it, could induce it. Could channel it. Could build a world around it, if he had to. Not yet, that. Not then. But later ...
Oh, but later. Later there was the Blood. The Source Blood. Later, he found his ancestry, and his destiny, and his first true taste of power. Physical power, at first. The rush of blood in his veins, the strength of clawed hands, the surge of lust in his belly. Blood lust.
They'd stopped that. Caged that. Never fully, never completely, but they'd caged it. Better living through chemistry, and it had been in his interests at the time. He'd so many better things to be doing than playing in the mud and the blood, tidying up bodies and hiding his face from Helen, from James' watchful gaze. He'd had no time for that sort of thing, no time to be worrying. There was science waiting, a world to build, and the power in his hand. He couldn't afford to be a mindless animal.
And John had only proven that, later. As spectacularly as only Montague John Druitt could. Jack the Ripper had watched them all fall.
Watching them fall apart, watching the Five crumble ... Nikola had understood then, truly, that a modicum of self control was always in one's best interests. A modicum of intelligent thought at all times, and an understanding of consequence. In one fell swoop, John had lost everything, lost Helen, lost the Five, lost his world. Destroyed them all in their turn, or nearly so. Fracturing everything they'd built. All for bloodlust. All for the loss of control.
In retrospect, Nikola could almost begin to sympathise, now. Considering the past few years. Almost.
But he hadn't been sympathetic then. To be perfectly honest, he hadn't been all that concerned, either. Not with Johnnie's little extra-curricular activities, anyway. With Helen, yes, with the effect it had on her, on all of them, but that was later. At the time ...
He'd tasted power. True power. He'd learned, finally, what it was like to hold the lightning in his hands. In his hands. Learned what it was like to feel it coursing through him, what it was like to be part, fully part, of this fundamental force, this thing that could build worlds, and destroy them just as easily. An accident, the first time. An experiment gone ever-so-slightly wrong, and alright, quite possibly his knowledge of his new nature might have made him a little overconfident, but ...
He'd taken the full force of the generator's output. Enough electricity to kill a man, probably ten times over, and he'd taken it full in the chest and side, blasting him across the room. He'd felt it surge through him, felt the agony ... and something more.
He'd felt some fundamental thing inside him aligning, singing, an almost ecstasy, better than the satisfaction of any bloodlust. He'd felt the lightning sing inside him, felt his body, his new, wonderful body, the vampire's body, sing in tune with it, felt the power coursing in his veins, and all he'd been able to do was laugh. Breathless, stunned, reeking of ozone, and he'd laughed. Like the child he'd once been, running wild under the storms. From the sheer, magnificent joy of it. The sheer rush of power.
He'd built a century on that power. He'd built the twentieth century, from the ground up, with the lightning in his hands and with his own genius. He'd taken it, held it in his hands, wrung it and channelled it and sold it, made it invisible, made it pervasive, and filled all the world with it. Not for profit. Not for the petty aims of the likes of Edison and the others. But for the science of it. For the glory of it. For the knowledge that he had taken the lightning, and he had tamed it. Him. Nikola Tesla. He had touched the heart of the storm inside all things, and he had built a world from it.
And if, later, he'd realised that the people who inhabited that world weren't worthy of it? If he'd realised that all they were going to do was mess it up, play games in the mud and the blood like the animals so many of them were, forget self-control, forget power, forget science? If he'd realised that they would take the world he'd given them, take his science, and use it for nothing but money-mongering and war? If he'd realised that the world at large could fall apart as easily as the Five had, fifty years earlier, and for all the same reasons? Wasn't he right, then, to try and fix them? Wasn't he right to try and set them straight, and keep them straight, as his ancestors had for millennia before? Wasn't he right? He'd inherited a world, and rebuilt it entirely on his own merit. Wasn't it his right to try and rule it? Just to keep it from the mud?
No, according to Helen. Never. Not his right. Not their right. Not anyone's right. When she stole the pupae from him, when she destroyed the nest, when she took his chance at a return to glory from his hands. She said it was not his right, as it hadn't been the Cabal's before him.
And maybe he understood that. Maybe, seeing the World Wars, seeing the Cabal, seeing what one person could do with power, what damage they could wreak ... maybe he understood. But Helen didn't. Helen didn't understand that what made him different was that he was him. He was Nikola Tesla. And all he'd ever wanted was to give people the world they deserved, and keep it safe, from themselves and everything else.
And he could have done it. He could have done it. Oh, he'd made his mistakes here or there, but he'd learned from them. His plan ... it had almost been perfect. One tiny oversight, one unexpected variable. He'd have done better next time. He could have done it. He could have made that world.
That's what had been taken from him. That's what he'd lost, at the hands of those stupid children and his own damn weapon. Not the monster Helen seemed to think he'd been. Not the claws, or the teeth, or the immortality, or the madness she thought ran in a vampire's veins. Not them.
He'd lost his place. He'd lost his power. He'd lost the lightning, lost the touch of that fundamental thing, lost his place inside it. Lost his ancestry, lost his legacy. Lost his world, and all it could have been. All he could have made of it.
He'd lost everything. Like Johnnie and the Five before him, he'd lost it all. He'd lost it all.
And now his hand rested, centimeters from glory, and could go no further. Now the touch of all he'd once held would only destroy him, once again. Now, the lightning sang, a centimeter away, and he could not touch it. He couldn't hold it.
But ... he could use it.
He frowned, thoughtful. Moved back, reaching out, a centimeter from the wire. The soft play of fingers, a lazy curl of power. Electromagnetic. And there were things, so many things, that the ability to generate and manipulate magnetic fields could accomplish. No-one knew that better than him. Everything he'd done, everything he'd built, a whole world ... He was still Nikola Tesla, after all. Fragile again, mortal again, but he was still a genius. He was still him.
He'd starting building his world long before the Blood. He'd channelled the lightning before that, bound it in metal and magnets and the currents of the world, built the machines, built the technology, understood the science. Made the science. He'd been a genius before he'd been a vampire, and he was still a genius now.
It's not what you have, but how you use it. Helen may have taken this chance from him, but he'd have another. He'd make another. He'd touch the lightning again. He'd hold it again. He'd be it again. He'd make sure of it.
And in the meantime, well. He was Nikola Tesla. He could probably think of something ...
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