The night is dark, framed in the glowing blue of a dim light around Lydia's periphery.

Her heart beats in her chest too fast, and it's when she looks at her own hands (why are they red?) that she realizes this is not her body. Her point of view is too high up, frame large and maybe a little cumbersome compared to her own slight body. Little details that add up to that feeling of wrongness -- out of body in a way different than usually implied. Her feet are heavy, skin like metal.

Suddenly, there's light -- impossibly bright. Hot, too hot, radiating out from another form. Momentarily, sight disappears and all that remains is pure adrenaline fighting pure fear. The instinct to choose: fight, flee, or freeze. A flash: an alley, a woman, the deepest grief for the sharpest loss as her body breaks. Are Lydia's eyes made of glass?

Anna. Not again. Felicity.

Warm hands grip and constrict Lydia's ability to breathe. The light is gone, broken glass impeding Lydia's view of the attacker. Gaunt and angry, his eyes are consumed by greed.

A voice fights the greedy man's. The words are muffled and garbled, detail lost in the constant access of the memory. But the feeling remains. Encouragement and belief. The fear begins to recede. Fear of failure, the flash of a blonde woman with a bright smile that warms Lydia's heart. Felicity. Combined with the encouraging male voice...

"Heroes do that, Ray."

Her frame may be awkward but Lydia's brain still works. Why had she forsaken it to try to fight this man, toe to toe? Her intelligence is the key to saving this city. She reaches out, fighting against all odds as the greedy man's eyes begin to fill with the impossible light again. She's not sure it will work, believes in part that maybe the white dwarf star matter will bend to the power of the plasma, but the need to try is too great.

A woman of science. A woman of good.

I can do this.