Topic: Dangerous Slide

Sid · Date: 2007-03-30 16:18 EST

I'm on a train, but there's no one at the helm And there's a demon in my brain who starts to overwhelm whelm whelm whelm whelm Ooh ooh, ooh ooh, ooh ooh And there it goes, my last chance for peace You lay me down, but I get no release, and I say I I try to keep awake, I try to swim beneath, I try to keep awake But I, I can feel this narcolepsy slide Into another nightmare " "Narcolepsy"-Third Eye Blind

She was ghosting, moving through WestEnd's night-dark streets without thought. A luminous sliver cloaked in road-dusted leather, slipping between shadows like the moon playing hide-and-seek behind a shrouded veil of vapor-wisp clouds.

Glamoured eyes were turned seeing and not to the black velvet of the skies, the nearly starless night a handful of diamond pinpricks tossed upon its surface. Beyond the scents of the Warehouse District wafted smells from the Docks and jackboots scrape over crumbling cobblestones heading for that beckoning call.

What was she seeking" Something. Breath' Breathe" Those eyes ate up the vast expanse of the heavens above. Needing" Breath. Breathe" Fingertips brush against a weight that hangs much heavier than the small lump within a pocket of rider-worn jeans, a sibilant whisper in the cold, deep corners of her mindscape a constant, unwelcome "guest' these late days.

She should seek distraction, hunt flesh through one means or another; anything to dull the cacophony of madness ringing and stinging, causing flesh to crawl. Behind her, to the east and the heart of this neighborhood's decay, peace lay for others but not for her. She'd left her Ebon Knight and Twin Stars breathing soundly in slumber; the bairns in innocence, Scottie in fitful, exhausted passes.

"I will not play second to a dragon and you will not leave our children motherless!"

Words from months ago, a veritable blink in the Ancient's existence, and yet this too ran roughshod about her swiss-cheesed brain in never-ending loop. Muscles jumping along a too-perfect jaw line, teeth become an audible grit. The mess that was emotion lay over her like stink, and she felt sorely in need of a scalding shower most times. Once more fingertips clutch touchstone against that pressing load contained in denim, that magic-hued gaze finally dropping from what was proving a futile search to the sights of the dockside.

Jackboots met the hollow sound of wooden planks, short nails on her right hand a continual oblivious torture at the skin of her left forearm, the muddy taint of torment flowing outwards into the gloom. A plea" A resignation' A call given up to the cosmos and whomever listened to one such as her" Shoulders slump and her gaze fogs again, blackened threads cracking through the summer's blue field of her eyes, feet marking a path without heed. "I dun care if'n mortals handle it. I jus?" Nae more. Please??

Sid · Date: 2007-03-30 22:37 EST

And there's a demon in my head who starts to play A nightmare tape loop of what went wrong yesterday And I hold my breath 'till it's more than I can take And I close my eyes I dream that I'm awake"

I try to keep awake I try to keep awake I try to keep awake, but I I can feel this Narcolepsy slide Into another nightmare. " "Narcolepsy"-Third Eye Blind

"Manon, do you not know what they are" They are not shame. They are not guilt. They are not duty. They are Change. They are Spring. They are Hope."

"Nae, nae, they be small an' they can break. I can put them to harm. I can lead them down a wrongness an' ne'er free them from wha' " wha' may come to them. I can be gettin" them killed."

"Without us they will die. Winter will come and all will be cold, Manon. I don't like the cold, Manon."

Figures slink in and out of shadowy depths at the edge of her vision, water's lapping a rhythmic forlorn heartbeat reverberating her frame. The sleeves of her leather pushed to elbows, hands hanging loose in well-worn pockets, uncaring she allows buttons to be pushed by one waiting in the wings.

It is the same song the White Dragon sings, new twists and stabs added from memories she cannot gain freely, or denies they exist.

Winter. First Winter. Glamoured blue eyes shine briefly, reflecting in the night with quicksilver spark before cracking more with darkened threads.

Before Mab had meddled in her and her mate's memories, when the Moon was lost to a thorny Thicket of Sorrows, and an Ebon Knight came on wing as messenger to bring the Moon down. To bring her down to fight another war. A war of her making. A war that destroyed tens of thousands she was protectorate of, tens of thousands she was...

"How many 'ave I brought to ruin, Jack" Would ye truly wish me as a mother?"

Silken fingertips slither over the silver casing of the straight razor, a comfort near as much as the pressured touch of the small lump hidden in tattered jeans. Away from halos of gaslight, she sits, folding the long, lank frame to the back of a bench in precarious perch. The metal gleams dully, turned over in those hands of strangely elegant design.

"How badly did it hurt to Fall so far?"

"Nae as badly as bein' Above an' worse than ye can imagine."

Above. It is all she remembers; the horrors of a Grace-less servitude, mass slaughter of kin tantamount to battle strategy. Dismemberment, mutilation, uncountable killing ways and continual rebirth only to revisit each terror anew, over and over, again and again.

"Your Architect is a story. The first One. The One who figured it all out. But who dreamed the mortals" I don't know, Manon. I don't know."

"God, as some call Him, be a story. A lie. I be....a lie, Jack?"

"No....no, Manon. You are real, flesh and blood. Real to everyone around you. The power in mortal dreams is that they do become real."

"But, Jack....The Architect formed the physical. There be nae mortals then. An'....An'....An'....Others, m'siblin's, they be created afore mortals. I...."

"He didn't, Manon. He lied to you."

"I ne'er be Graced, Jack. Ye know this!"

"Manon. The Moon was there before him."

"The moon be o' the physical, Jack."

"The Physical was there before your Architect. And you are a Crow's dream."

Finally, after wearing the weight for months in secreted space, she withdraws one of the small white jars and holds it in open palm, magic shattered gaze staring submissively at its seemingly innocuous package, matching the waves' pulse in tapping its cap softly with the closed flat of her blade.

Such alien sensations. Such' muck to slog through. The Spell. Ber. Blade in one hand, jar balanced feather light on the tips of pale fingers she chews over the hesitation. It had once been so easy, so' free. On it, off it, short times and long; what came of it, what touched others from her actions, these held no meaning, held no concern of consequence.

"Why play this game, Manon' You come back home to me and nothing bothers ever again. You know I speak truth. Just one little cut, one little touch. Sweet oblivion. You deserve this, after all. You didn't ask for this latest, take your out and be happy about it while you do."

The echo of Its whisper slimed across her mind. The White Dragon did have a point. She tosses the jar to the air, catching it easily as blade tucks against palm, fingers clawed to grip the top of the container.

"Shimmer, me li'l furnace,"

"Manon of the moons and suns."

"There used to be lights there, lon' an' lon' back. Sisters. They sang so sweetly."

"Know what I am now."

"An' mayhaps one day soonest I can be sayin' the same with conviction, sweetlin'. Happy to know ye found ye way to tha'."

But, what of the others" What of her children in the now, her love, the Bloods, Sylvia and her clan, Taneth, Guthorm and Lucien" Tass" She sighs, glancing upwards to ink-black skies, searching.

Then there was" Shimmer. Such inexplicable attachment. Memories jumbled chaos, just beyond grasp, as if they sat behind some mist. She could taste them, almost. Almost touch them, but still she knew them not.

"You know me.."

"Aye, I do know ye."

"I would give you Title, Manon.."

"Mayhaps it be nae time."

Her hand closes, restraining that which hungered to escape that tiny, unassuming pot. Hanging her head between upraised arms elflocks ringle like shattered glass, angry against concrete.

"Fall a bit, Gabriel?"

"Help her! You care for her too. Help her!"

"Ye canna touch them all....open!"

"You think I want to hurt her"! You know nothing!"

"Ye wan' her safe?"

And then there was" Him. Teeth gnash harshly, copper taste of blood filling her mouth disregarded as the growl loosed from thin lips. Slanted eyes narrowing in rage and confusion.

"Gabriel!?

Sid · Date: 2007-04-02 13:12 EST

I read dead Russian authors, Volumes at a time I write everything down except what?s on my mind 'Cause my greatest fear is the sucking sound And then I know I'll never get back out And there's a bone in my hand that connects to a drink In a crowded room where the glasses clink And I'll buy you a beer and we'll drink it deep Because that keeps me from falling asleep, I said How'd you like to be alone and drowning How'd you like to be alone and drowning How'd you like to be alone and drowning How'd you like to be alone and drowning Still I find this narcolepsy slide slide, Into another nightmare " "Narcolepsy"-Third Eye Blind

Comfort. Distraction. Obligation. Consequences. Love, yes definitely that. " Sympathy"

Perched on the back of the bench, alight there like some great bird of prey. The tail of her open jacket blowing in the wind off the docks, blade in one closed fist, the jar of peca in the other, it was as if she were weighing options. Fisted hands moving up and down in scale-like fashion, shadow-churned gaze barely registering the physical sights.

Words, she knew their definition, knew of them, but did she truly understand them. Since the spell, that had been the dilemma, the teeth gritting problem. How does one learn something one was never created to know"

Then again, had she been created at all in that manner" This, too, tumbled and struggled within her thoughts.

Gabriel. For all she could remember (and since Mab's meddling anything of memory was questionable), for her it had started with Gabriel. Father. Legions created, puppets meant to fight and die, rebirth and take up sword against their brethren anew. Angelic that were never given the Grace, the Word, the History; mindless soldiers, unwitting pawns in the Great Game. As far as she knew she had been the only one of those ranks to ever leave them.

And now" Now, it appears as if Gabriel, too, has taken a Fall. Still, this was Gabriel, and everything having to do with him was always suspect. So, why was it his alleged plight was eliciting in her what could only be called sympathy' His plea to her of a few days back seemed sincere, he genuinely appeared to care he was harming Viki. Of course, he was also seeking to kidnap the Seer, so again? This mode of thinking was all subject.

Sympathy for the Devil. All right, so not the actual Devil, but in her mind Gabriel was close enough. These emotions, this feeling Gabriel had stirred in her was stomach-turning; it made her wish to vomit, quite frankly. And why, by the Gods on High, could she not think of anything else since that incident!" Try as she might, reflections kept returning to Him!

"Arrrgh!!" Head still bowed, fists lifted and knuckles pressed in tight against her temples.

"Nae, nae now. I jus" needs" "

Distraction. It was a tool, the savior of many an Ancient. Distraction helped to still the madness, often. In her case the hunting of flesh in one form or another was a pleasant diversion when the small things did not suffice. And, she had been trying any and all of those for many months; drinking, flirting, reading, random sex, engine work. Hell, she had gone so far as to take Baby down to her most fundamental parts last spring.

Dark threaded eyes stared at the planks of the dockside. She was drowning, drowning in a sea of her own making, alone and powerless to stop it from happening. Hands opened, blade and jar falling to the bench between booted feet as fingers clawed and gripped to the sides of her head. From all sides she could feel the suffocating weight, stealing her breath and what little reason she still possessed.

"Just one little cut' Just' one?"

Elflocks rusty and dull clattered with the shaking of her head as her magic-shattered gaze focused on that tiny pot and silver blade.

Gabriel · Date: 2007-04-09 01:40 EST

(The following is rated M for Mature. SLV, which means: sex, language and violence. Thank you.)

Speak of the devil and he doth appear"

Out of seemingly nowhere, Gabriel appears, perched beside Sid on the back of the bench, somewhere along Rhy'Din's dockside. Still wounded from their last encounter Gabriel is aware that this situation could deteriorate quickly, but he has come seeking....something.

Something other than violence.

It had been difficult finding Sid, her scent is colored thickly with an unfamiliar chaos, but at last he's struck gold. He has no idea why she's wandering around the dockside in the dark, but by the fortuitist nature of whatever powers-that-be he had been able to find her.

Green eyes bleeding to black fix on the small tin that his "daughter" is holding, a sad, slow shake of his head.

"Before you indulge, might we take a moment to communicate?" His tone of voice is moderated, kept soft and low as unthreatening as possible.

Having picked up the fallen pot and blade, Sid drops them again as Gabriel appears, nearly unseating from her perch on the bench's back.

"Frellin' crap!" Twisting about to face him immediately, hands at the ready for anything he might attempt. "Communicate" Ha! Wha' a laugh. An' wha', by the Gods, do we 'ave to *communicate* about, Gabriel?"

She fairly spits his name, the venom and rage she feels for him clear. Yet, there is a taint of something else within that whiskey-tinged tone; a hint of something buffering that hatred. Glamoured blue eyes, shot through with darkened threads, hold his gaze, her form stiff and alert to any play he might try and pull. She does not trust him.

He notes her anger with a hint of a sneer. As if she has reason to be mad at him"! But just as his temper flared it dampened and died. He's not come to argue or accuse. He wants something else entirely.

He's come seeking understanding of what is happening between him and Viki.

His laughter is muted as he schools his expression to reflect amusement. He looks from the dropped "toys" to the clear effervescences of her blue, blue eyes before raising his hands in a gesture of wordless surrender.

"I came seeking you because of Viki, Sid." He hates using the name she's taken, and typically would have refused to, but he's attempting to be generous tonight.

Even as he struggles to put his reason to words, he finds himself unusually distracted. There is something indefinable about Sid; something that wraps around his mortal senses and beckons. This is unfamiliar territory for Gabriel and he drops his gaze from hers as he wrestles with understanding what the sensations mean.

Oddly, he has a compulsion to reach out and touch her which he fights valiantly. To put some distance between such tangents and himself, he looks out over the ocean, trying to find the right words through the disturbing call of unfathomable mortal needs.

"Shimmer be marked as me own. Ye do anythin'...." She stops, a long fingered hand waving the rest away as his sneer, his expression of amusement, the use of her name - much like Howe speaks it - makes part of her want to react as child to a disapproving parent. Still, another piece recognizes a familiar struggle and she clenches her jaw at the alien emotions this draws from her. What has happened to Gabriel" It would be prudent, would it not, to discover what she can always keeping to mind this is Gabriel with which she was speaking.

Quickly she gathers the pot and blade, stuffing them back to their rightful places as she extracts herself from his immediate vicinity. Distancing physically in hopes to control the feelings welling, the call of dark whispers in the cold corners of her mind using what It will to further Its own agenda.

"You know what has happened to me. You sensed it the other night. I know you hold no warmth for me, Sid, and I am not here to solicit any either. But it isn't my desire to harm the Seer. You must understand that she is much like an addiction to me as the contents of that jar is for you. I need help understanding Sid. This is not part of my nature."

Turning from him, her own eyes seek the calming of waves moving in and out in rhythmic pulse. Fists ball at her sides. "Aye, understandin'." Words are quiet, thoughtful, not how she means to come across, but there it is. Again, internally, she curses Lankyn.

"I..." Spring reigns supreme about the Ancient, it is part and parcel of her nature. Since the spell this has taken on a newly heightened factor for herself as well as those around her. She is....More. Feet move in tight pace before the bench, the scent of thunderstorms and universes, rich, heady wine wafting to the air as she moves like wind over water trying to find footing on unstable and unfamiliar ground. "Ye know wha' I will do to ye if'n these be lies ye speak." The threat is spoken, and there is weight behind it. Still, summer's blue eyes turn back to the male and there is understanding in her gaze.

"Nae, 'tis nae part o' mine, either. I know the fight."

Gabriel hates admitting any personal weakness to anyone; it is a huge step for him to confess what he already has, especially to one who's betrayed him. Sid had chosen to Fall, unlike himself. She had chosen to leave his Legion, his service, and yet it was he whom had given her life! (Or so Gabriel believes...) There is a part of him that wants to snatch her up and wring the life he gifted right out of her. But another emotion is beginning to bloom beneath his scorn and anger.

Something hot, something fluid; it is coursing through his blood, flickering over his flesh raw and savage. Sensations foreign and yet pleasurable, Gabriel has no experience in these waters and hence feels out of his depths; an uncomfortable place for him at best. The onslaught of Sid's energy rolls like waves over him, a ravaging sea bent on beating him down. Defenses begin to crumble but not in any way recognizable to the fallen angel, he is oblivious to the disintegration. Unbeknownst to him, he is falling under the spell of the Lady of the Moon.

Without conscious thought he springs to his feet stepping closer to her. He doesn't resist stealing a taste of her with his nose while his eyes, bleeding to reflective black, linger on the lines of her pale, perfect throat. He moves in close behind her. He can feel the warmth of her body like sunlight against his. The scent of Spring seems to hang suspended around them, heady and intoxicating. He can't remember what they were talking about. He can't seem to think beyond the growing desire to touch her.

"What is it about you, Sid that pulls me in like the tides?? a whispering caress of words to the shell of her ear as his hand rests on her upper arm. He makes no other moves, just the nearness and the casual seeming touch.

Yet the energy of her slams in to him like a speeding freight-train! Gabriel's eyes close as he sups on the delicious, rushing force. Unlike Viki, Sid's energy has a purely sexual tone that pulls at the mortal bonds of primitive needs, and Gabriel has never tasted anything like it.

He wants more.

Gabriel · Date: 2007-04-09 01:45 EST

"It be the Physical, Fa....Gabriel." Oh, she kicks herself for that near verbal misstep. His hand on her arm, warm words fluttering over sensitive flesh and she wants to flinch, she wants to....Deck him! But, her body reacts differently, unbidden by what her head wishes. It is Spring, after all.

Swallowing, silken fingertips brush lightly over the hand on her arm and she steps a pace away, moving down the pier to their left and taking up a casual lean against one of the hip high posts that mark its break from the dock walkway. Sid loathes this male, her creator. Whether real or imagined, she recalls vividly her time Above and all she wrought for him and his whims. But, there is something of the stray in Gabriel now. A lost look, a hopeless resignation to what he has become. Try as she might, she cannot deny the call of it though it crawls across her and leaves her in dire need of a boiling hot shower.

"Ye, in ye times within the Physical, 'ave ne'er taken the chance to know it, 'ave ye, Gabriel" Ne'er taken experience, only observation, aye' 'ave ye ne'er wanted to taste o' it, e'er?"

Moonlight falls over the Ancient, illuminating already luminescent skin to a glowing aura. The breeze off the water ringle elflocks in softly tinkling chimes. Long fingers of strangely elegant design lift to tuck a few back behind the point of her left ear, exposing the odd symbol beneath it. For a moment she looks upon him with the face of the Maiden, and then it is gone. Her eyes back to the ebb and flow of the bay's tides, her words but a breath on the air. "Wha' do ye wan' o' me?"

Feelings of rejection, something he'd have dismissed as trite and useless in his recent past, assail. A scowl is hidden as he turns away from Sid, pacing back and forth in mounting, unexpected agitation. "You ask if I have tasted lust, Sid"!" a short, harsh laugh as he nods. "Oh, I know the ways of the flesh, but never found such pastime at all as intense as the monkeys. Do you?" His question is rhetorical, not intended to be answered as he continues. "As for what I want of you?"

Here his words trail away as he turns to stare at her. What does he want of her" He's not sure now. He'd had a plan when coming, but his thoughts are fogged and far away. He frowns trying to pull the threads of his wavering attention back in to focus but the more he looks upon her, the harder the process becomes. "What is this trick, Sid" How do you do this?" It is all he can muster to say and even this is spoken in a half choking whisper.

Anger, want, confusion war inside the fallen angel as he debates silently with himself, he hates to admit it but he isn't sure at all right now what it is he wants. A few steps closer towards her, then briskly away, he is in conflict, and he doesn't even know how to give it voice.

"I want answers to the riddles of mortality, Sid. I want to return to the simplicity of my life Above. I want?" A strange, twisted realization dawns as black orbs fix pointedly on her. "You."

He isn't talking about forever, or even tomorrow; what he wants this moment may have nothing to do with later. Gabriel despises Sid for her betrayal and her association with Raphael. But what he hates the most about Sid is the abomination she has become. Yet right now he perceives the beauty and enticement of Spring and he wants to taste it fully.

Yes, she knows this now. Slanted eyes narrow shrewdly upon him as he speaks and flusters. Though his first query is rhetorical and she knows it, this is what she chooses to answer first. Slowly, drawn to the struggle even as she is repelled by the being himself, she pushes from her lean and moves closer as he moves away.

Loathe as she is to give it coherent thought, Gabriel and she share a similar fight and this pulls upon her very core despite fervent wishes it would not. Glamoured eyes morph to silver true, a hand reaching forward to brush touch against his cheek. "I dun speak o' lust, though tha' be a more'n pleasant sensation with which to lose oneself in, Gabriel."

Even at arm's length the heat off her body is palpable. Fingers running down his arm bring a searing to his flesh, but he doesn't pull or flinch away. She slips closer, moving behind him as he had done with her moments before. Heated breath courses along ear and neck in quiet whisper. "I wish to show ye somethin', may I do so?" Hands upon both shoulders are felt, nearly cupping his neck although without contact. "Will ye close ye eyes for me" If'n ye wish a vow that I willna seek to harm ye, I shall give one to ye."

Even closer she presses; the length of her form light against his back now, but Gabriel hasn't lost all his senses yet.

When asked to close his eyes, instead they snap open. Without warning he spins to face her, his arm moving to snake about her waist with a speed inhuman. He will not allow her the control, he will have what he wants and he plans to take it.

"No more games, Manon." His voice a low hiss heavy with something Sid well and truly recognizes; lust.

Gabriel · Date: 2007-04-09 16:52 EST

Gabriel has been struggling ever since his fall from grace. So much of the physical plane had never fully affected him before. Before he'd been forced to deal with it up close and personal that is. Food, creature comforts like beds and bathrooms have never been priorities for one such as him until now. Trapped in the physical, he's forced to cater to what he once considered trivial demands. He has managed to sidestep the more delicate of instinctual needs like sex simply by keeping his thoughts occupied with what he considered more pressing issues. However, the beast has been set loose and the hunger of it is vast and ferocious.

Sid had been stalling, trying to tamp down the growing need of her own hunger for this....this hated creature! Though, she truly had meant to show him something of the Physical, help him to experience more than perhaps he has ever known of it until now. A guiding hand, if you will.

His movements do not surprise her; Gabriel needs to be in control. It has always been thus. Arm about her waist, she is snugged up against him tight, a heated flush rising unbidden upwards along the paleness of her throat.

What is it the mortals say' There is a fine line between love and hate? Until this very moment Sid has never truly understood such a phrase. His speaking the name she took in Summer has always felt dirty somehow. If she once had a name Above, she remembers it not. She would love nothing more than to rip his eyes and heart from his shell, and, yet, the other sensations he is stirring within her set her on fire.

Like water falling over a cliff, the glamour spills from her; elflocks replaced by flowing spider-silk silver hair, she as she is in Summer. The Maiden.

Lips a breath from his own, silver eyes on black, her words are more felt against him than heard. "Nae more games, Gabriel."

As she gives yield to his demand, her body melding with his, Gabriel's energy rises to slam violently into hers. Intimate weavings of essence to essence, their nearness brings an odd mixture of levels that no mortals may ever conceive. For the Ancients are able to transport dimensions and bleed past singular boundaries designed by physics of the material worlds. Had Sid any doubts about Gabriel's angelic talents they are washed away in a tidal wave of knowledge. He still holds his gifts, yet, every inch of his body is corporeal, human flesh; a prison built of mortality.

He is in Sid's realm, fully and completely. The knowledge he retains his Angelic powers does not come as surprise to her. In fact, beyond the pull and draw of that which is part of her nature as a carnal being, beyond the struggle with self-loathing and guilt in giving into this dance of flesh with Gabriel of all beings, her thoughts turn to that which she commands and holds sway over.

Sid is Innocence, she is Joy, Beauty, Love, and Mistress of the Dance. She is also their opposites. Maiden, yes, but sly and cunning, clever and shrewd is she. His ferociousness, his demand fuels the well-spring within.

Her lips are captured by Gabriel's in a fierce assault of unrepentant passion. His need taking him past reason, beyond logic, in to a world of heat and craving. His hand tangles in wispy silver locks, brutally tugging her closer as anger and hatred mingle with an ever-increasing desire.

She can taste his need of her on his lips, laced upon his tongue as it dances to hers. His body is afire with it and radiates that heat as hips tease against hips. He isn't slow or measured (no shy lover of respectful doting); he is fierce and angry, demanding and controlling. He leaves her no room to argue.

Gabriel · Date: 2007-04-09 16:54 EST

Why had he come here" There had been a reason but it is lost to Gabriel as he drowns in this mortal sea of desire. Never has he felt anything so intense, so complex; the compulsion and drive behind the need is undeniable, insatiable. And like ambrosia, with every sip he finds he wants only more,

She lets him have his way with her; his fist in her hair arching her neck backwards just so. His need matched in equal strides by her own that he can feel with every taste, every touch, every tease, every movement of her body against his in raw, pure, unadulterated, unconfined passion. Manon frees herself totally, with an expertise unmatched by a being such as Gabriel who has no truck with the sensations of the Physical likened to the dance they dance now.

The scents and sounds of a warm spring evening rise about them, her hand snaking down his back and then up into his shirt to rake short nails across his flesh. A moan of pleasure surging into that fevered kiss. All around them, the dockside disappears. Flowing backwards to the ground, tugging him with her, they land in the soft, fragrant grass of some moon-swept meadow.

Arcing her body into his, one leg rises to ride high on his hip and bring him closer, calf winding about thigh as she thrusts up hard into his growing need. Energy entwining with energy, the dance of ethereal predators really, dining as they shift and swirl; Gabriel will be well charged from this event, sated and full. But for now he is riding the crest of her building.

Teeth nip his lower lip and fox light shines in those silver trues as she pulls her head back slightly, a daring smile offered up. "Ye sure ye wan' me, Gabriel?"

Her words bring him to some cohesion. Black eyes fix to silvered hues as he grants her a roguish grin. "You know the answer, you don't have to ask." He accents his words with a caress of body against body, no stronger indication of her impact on him needed.

Hands move over her as he begins investigating, intentionally seeking out hidden places of pleasure. Sadistically sweeping her deeper, wanting to bring her to the same heights of need as himself; he wants her to want him as badly and he won't stop until he's confident he's caught her. This may be her territory, but Gabriel refuses to hand over control. Surprisingly quick movements lay her bare beneath him and he proves he is no novice with such "toys". His fingers move the length of her, flicking in and out, swirling over the tenderest regions as black, reflective eyes bore into silver.

Truth to tell, she is being right schooled in that mortal phrase about where the fine line lies. Hate, too, is a passion; a lust as equally overwhelming as one based on more pleasurable aspects.

Breath quickens, the flush of desire staining pale flesh from toes to hairline. A shadow flickers across Sid's pale brow as something comes to the fore of her thoughts: She wants his sadism, his hatred; just as much as she wants the pleasure they will know together.

With speed and strength of otherworldly origins, Sid leans up and bites his neck, rolling over to straddle him, hands pinning down his shoulders as the wet heat of her grinds atop him. Her eyes solid on his own, breath becoming ragged, a growl to her voice, she suckles his bottom lip into her mouth. "Hate me, Gabriel. Show it to me."

Her words literally push him over the edge. Gone is the gentleness of moments before, he's fallen too deeply into the urge it is impossible to deny it any longer. Reason of any kind is gone. Roughly he repositions them, pushing Sid over on to her stomach as he kneels. He lifts her hips up and without warning plunges himself inside of her.

There is no tenderness, no fond intimacies, but rather a brutal taking of flesh.

As their energies coalesce and mingle, Gabriel doesn't hesitate to use Sid as his demanding need directs. No longer concerned about her pleasure he rides her hard and vicious, sparing her nothing akin to concern or consideration. She had asked him to show her his hatred and he is more than happy to oblige. His hand snags a fist of wispy silver hair, using it like reins on a horse, to pull and tug her as he wishes. Guiding her with a painful grip upon her full hip as well, he leaves her no room to move, he allows her no freedom from his savage thrusts.

Sid feels that hate she asked for, but gives it back a hundredfold over. What she remembers, what she wrought Above followed her to the Physical. She is as she believes she was made, by his hand. All the self-loathing, all the guilt, all the shame, all the sorrow for what she perceives she has done then and since she pours into the bestial sex.

Hips grind and thrust, breath growls and snarls, fingers claw and clutch at the soil beneath her. Sid wants what he brings, she deserves nothing less. And more, she wants what is building to a scorching explosion within her. She wants him. This, too, he can feel; the desperate urgency of needful desire. As Gabriel's urgency climbs he becomes increasingly more aggressive, ramming at her in ever quickening cruel strokes. Liquid heat surrounds him, squeezing and releasing, milking him to climax. Sid's pale flesh bruises under the onslaught of his pounding want; skin rents in bloody trails, screams are forced from her burning lungs as his hand tears viciously at her hair, roughly tugging her head painfully back.

Gabriel has never felt anything like this. The momentum of the act, the urgency, the nearing orgasm, is far beyond concepts he's ever contemplated. Anger and hate, his disdain of what she's become, mix with the force of the pleasure he feels, driving him up and up. It is as if he'll never reach the top and just as he feels this fully he's spiraling down into a fount of pleasure as it bursts free of him.

As his seed fires inside Sid, her own juices crashing like a monstrous tidal wave, the Maiden rips the Innocence of Ignorance out from under and she lets flow everything she feels for him through the link of energy.

She lets him taste what it was like Above for the Legion, for her; gives over the betrayal of first love at Mab's hand, the essence of all that occurred internally because of First Winter; lets him sense the loss after self-exile. She sends out her anger, her disillusionment, her hatred, of him and self. Guilt, remorse, shame....And, yes, Love. For, despite it all, she perceives he is her Creator, and this is a bond that cannot be denied or ever severed.

Within all destruction is creation, and in creation lies destruction. Worlds shatter to be reborn as stars, and she feels it all like molten rock thrums her very veins, collapsing beneath him in a shuddering, gaping heap.

Gabriel · Date: 2007-04-09 16:56 EST

Images of her time Above under his command in the Legion does not sit well or easily with him. None of what she 'showed" him does. He's never 'seen" things from that perspective, and in truth, he never wanted to. The Legion weren't created to feel or suffer, they were created to kill. Somewhere something had gone terribly wrong.

He growls as he pulls free of her, maliciously pushing Sid away from him. Hands already fumbling with his clothing, putting everything back in place as if what they had done could somehow be erased. He may never be able to explain why these feelings have any hold over him, but somehow they do. He can't accept the guilt so he turns it on her. Refusing to look Sid in the eyes as he stands, Gabriel's gaze sweeps over the meadow instead, ignoring all the things left unsaid between them. No apologies, no confessions, just his irritating disregard.

Perhaps this is simply all he knows"

Can you fault a soul for being what they've been created"

"Where in Michael's name are we?" His tone cold, cutting and dismissive it is almost as if he is blaming her for the entire event. "This doesn't mean anything, understand, bitch?"

And without waiting for her to respond, he vanishes. Unwilling or incapable of handling what has just happened and leaving the reason he came to begin with' unfinished.

In the brief moments of their exchange, a new addiction has formed, but Gabriel has yet to become aware. Having tasted the pleasures of flesh with someone like Sid isn't quite the same as experiencing it with mortals. This is something he will learn in time. For now, however, he is disgusted with himself but more so with her.

Left abruptly alone, Sid shouts hoarse words to the skies above her "Fuck ye, Gabriel!"

Without thought, without care, she, too, leaves the glade and banishes the sight from her mind's eye.

Appearing in the brownstone's third floor master suite, she steps into the shower and turns the water to scalding, falling to the corner of its confines and curling into a ball as sibilant whispers grow louder, and hot tears mingle with the stinging spray of the shower's flow.

This will never come clean.

Sid · Date: 2007-05-25 03:02 EST

I can't keep it all together. (Star, stuck underneath the moon.) I know I know I know I know I know I know I know I can't keep it all together. (Star, stuck underneath the moon.) And the siren's song that is your madness, Holds a truth I can't erase, All alone on your face. " "God of Wine"-Third Eye Blind

Her cracked gaze drifts about the empty Inn then down to the lower cabinet, fingers stuffing to the pockets of rider-worn denim, a sigh loosing into the silence.

No distractions.

She should go home.

A twitch of her neck sends elflocks to rattle like rusty bottle caps; fingertips on her left hand graze the slight chill of the small porcelain jar that simultaneously stems and exacerbates a growing darkness.

Guilt.

It is alien and new (so she presumes), like so many of these things called emotions, but still it is there in the look she gives the vacant commons before withdrawing the small white jar with its yellow lid.

Open palm, eyes swim with darkened threads and the sibilant whisper comes forward from the cold corners of her mindscape, murmuring of things past and present; Gabriel, the missing Shimmer, siblings Above and Below, First Winter, children lost and not, Dreams and the Dreamer, the Moon, obligations, responsibilities; pushing buttons hard and harsh.

Teeth grind, muscle jumping along faultless flesh of angular jaw line. Pushing from her lean, with one fluid motion her hands, the jar, and a closed silver straight blade meet the bar top. Palms brace on either side of the items, her head bowing as if in silent prayer. Oblivious to it, behind her in mirror's reflection the colors she flies with pride on leather's back fade like so much smoke, the reflective surface blank for but a moment before the sight of a white, scaly maw grins maliciously from its expanse.

Ye give too much creed to these feelings. They were not ye choice. What stops ye when before ye came to my arms so readily, so willingly' Do ye think any would have the same care for ye were the circumstances reversed" Return with me now, let this all go. It is not your battle.

Fingers curl in comfort about the silver casing, the grit of teeth audible in the stillness of the Inn. "Nae, they be nae me choice. But....But I 'ave come to them now, I only needs..."

Need what? They are not for one such as ye.

"Thin's change."

And ever they remain the same. Is that not what sent you from the 'Lands in the first place"

"This is..." A flick of her thumb pushes out the gleaming blade, cracked gaze drawn to the sight as her tongue drags almost feverishly across drying lips.

This is what? Different' Turmoil, strife, sorrow, obligation....Again I say ever things remain the same and ye are beyond such trivialities. Come. Find peace as ye have before. The door only awaits ye to open it.

The White Dragon has changed his tactic; the Heart at the center of the Dreaming fueling an aberration born from the Ancient's drugged delusions until he feels a life beyond, one he wants most definitely to taste. "Be this nae..." The metal's cold touch against luminescent flesh is likened to a drug all its own. Her chin lifts, eyes closed to the sight of the ceiling as she slides it across her wrist blunt side down.

What' Selfish' Again I ask, are ye not beyond such things" This spell was perpetrated without ye knowledge, ye did not ask for this. Had it been another time, such troubles would not touch ye. Peace, Manon. Peace and rest await ye. Ye have but to open my door.

Behind her the Dragon's eyes gleam with hunger and malevolence as the Trueblood lays down the blade and shrugs from the leather, laying it across the bar. Taking up a pace, leaving the implements of probable destruction, possible salvation, a bottle of rotgut marked with her name and skull and crossbones is snatched harshly from the shelves without looking. "Shimmer." That single name is like a plea, its own whispered prayer.

Movement is caged, animated and tense. Multi-colored elflocks swing about her lank form eerily silent; an eye to the skies beyond the ceiling's sight, there comes no answer from the Starling. She did not expect one, but there is something called hope she is having a passing acquaintance with lately. It tugs at what one might claim as her soul, sings forth in need and desperation.

The edge was close and the pit was dark. Bottle to mouth, leaning against the back counter, cracked gaze levels on the jar. The Dragon feels the edge, if manifest he would surely push her over himself, but at the moment this is not an option.

Peace, silence from alien feelings. Ye remember how things were in my den, Manon.

She steps for the bar, hand outstretched to take up the small pot and the elf materializes; the image of the White Dragon in mirror's reflection vanishing with a mental hiss to Its reluctant warden. Sid's eyes lift to Galeas, her hand swiftly tucking away jar and blade to secreted spots. "'ello, Galeas."

Distractions, denial, and a swiss-cheesed brain will soon push the thoughts of this moment from the forefront of her mind. With a little help they will soon be buried in cold, dark corners.