Senkha & Llew: January 31

You smile at Wheaton.
Senkha says: Hey.

Wheaton pats her on the head and flops down with a grunt.
Wheaton says: Hey.

Senkha says: How're you holding up?

Wheaton shrugs, nodding his head side to side in an indecisive motion. "Could be better. Could be worse. You?"

Senkha laughs, actually sounding genuinely amused. "Kind of just waiting for the shit to fly, you know? I spent all of last night assigning things away for 'just in case.'"

Wheaton 's thick brows knit a bit as he looks at her. Sadly he knows exactly what she means. "Just in case," he repeats softly, and shakes his head. "Man. What the fuck happened to us. Things used to be so simple." He looks out across the water, back toward the city.

Senkha chuckles weakly, shaking her head. "Things weren't ever really simple. It was just easy to imagine they were when there was a circus and trees to climb and a mother to hate."

Wheaton can't help but chuckle at that as well. "Y'ain't supposed to be the one bustin' my bubble, kid."

Senkha grins sheepishly, shrugging. "Sorry, Llew. Can't quite help it these days. How are things going with..." She taps the side of his head. "...you know, that."

Wheaton sighs and leans forward, elbows on his knees. One of his hands runs over his face, rubbing slightly. "Tiresome," he murmurs. "Better'n it was. Thanks to you.. but things started gettin' a little tense again last night."

Senkha says: What happened last night?

Wheaton says: Dreams. Started out alright. Didn't end up so much that way.

Senkha says: Tell me about them. The more I know, the more prepared I'll be to help you end them.

Wheaton says: Same old shit, y'know. You, pop. Em.
Wheaton glances over at Senkha, his expression weary now that it's just the two of them.
Wheaton says: Dizzy really got hold of my thoughts of her real good.

Senkha shakes her head. "Not Dizzy. Dizzy's the scared little girl trapped in her mind, just like she tried to trap you."
Senkha says: Ariadine is her name.

Wheaton frowns. "Yeah, I know. I know." His eyes turn back to the water. "She told me.. s'just hard to think of her like that. Hard to let go of a little girl."

Senkha sighs and also looks out at the water. "I have to keep reminding myself that it's not Dizzy in that body right now. If I don't think of that...if she ever comes back to me, I won't be able to be her mother anymore."
Senkha says: I'm not strong enough to do that. I'm pretty weak in that regard.

Wheaton reaches over to take her hand and grip it gently. "You ain't weak, babygirl. Far from it. Nothin' about this easy. I ain't gonna pretend like I really know how it feels, but you ain't weak. At all."

Senkha smiles faintly, curling her fingers around Llew's hand. "Thanks, Llew. And...for what it's worth, you're not weak either. And...if you're ready, I'll prove it to you."

Wheaton smiles a bit. "How you gonna do that?"

Senkha says: I'm going to find your inner strength and teach it to destroy what's threatening to destroy you. You've got the same strength in you that I have in me...I know, you're the one who taught me it was there.

Wheaton shakes his head a bit. "Nah. You found that on your own, kiddo. I only taught you how to stab somebody." He grins crookedly.

Senkha wraps her arms around Llew's shoulders. "Without you, I would've thought I was worthless. Nobody. Just like they wanted me to think. You helped me escape."
Senkha says: I wish I could put into words what you did for me.

Wheaton leans his head over against her a bit, and pats her knee. "I tried to do for you what I wished someone would do for me, kid. I needed you as much as you did me. I still do."

Senkha hugs Llew more tightly to her. "You'll always have me. Promise. No matter what happens."
Senkha says: ...this whole thing is probably going to be kind of uncomfortable. I'm going to have to bring out some nasty stuff for it to work, but I promise, I won't hurt you.

Wheaton takes a deep breath and nods. "I trust ya."

Senkha smiles gently and lets go of Llew's shoulders. "Okay. Try to relax. I've...never tried this on someone else before, just remembering what Marius did for me when what Blightreaver left in my mind was tearing me apart."

Wheaton does as she says. He tries to relax. It's easier to do when it's just the two of them. When Bryn isn't expecting him to do something. When there isn't a whole company of people listening. When he doesn't have to think so hard to stay focused. His breath expels slowly and he draws his hand back to his own lap, which he folds with the other. His eyes focus on the water.

Senkha closes her eyes and takes a few deep, calming breaths. As before, Llew would soon feel her presence entering his mind, though it has more of an edge to it this time, an edge that grows with each passing moment. It's not malicious or seeking to hurt him and, though terrifying, it clearly seeks to protect him. If he looked over at Senkha now, he'd probably see her all bald, emaciated, and emanating red light all over. As it is, her mind sort of wraps around his, probing and searching. Looking for anger. Hatred. Malice. Fear. Violence. Where are they?

Wheaton doesn't look. He's almost afraid to look. His eyes drift closed again, and though for a moment he continues to see the sparkling of the water reflecting the sunlight on wave tips, there is indeed something dark lurking below the surface. A looming shadow always just out of reach. Waiting and watching.

Senkha 's presence seeks out that shadow, beckoning to it, calling to it, almost enticingly. Don't you want to rip, to tear, to kill? Don't you want to be set free? Let me help you. Let me teach you. Beside Llew, Senkha has taken on an off-kilter sort of grin. Her hands tap the hilts of her daggers almost subconsciously, though she doesn't draw them.

Wheaton can hear the watery sound of his own voice, though his lips aren't moving. "No," the voice says, echoing in on itself. "Can't let it out." On the outside, he remains still, his expression faltering to a slight frown. Inside, the sunlit sparkling fades, leaving only dimness, and that lurking shadow.

Senkha moves confidently towards the shadow, not fearing, not faltering. "Trust me, Llew," she says outwardly, and the sense of control pervades within as well. "You can control it. I will teach you."

Wheaton 's shadow lengthens. It grows, rising over her, solidifying. But always staying a step away, shrouded in blackness. It almost seems to gesture as his voice echoes in his mind. "That man scares me, Sennie."

Senkha laughs softly; it's neither a loving nor a loveless sound, just a sound of amusement. "We've all got someone like that inside of us. It's time to stop fearing yourself and start using what's within you to make you strong." Her voice is firm, though, not harsh; honest. She reaches out for the shadow, trying to twirl toward it, almost playfully. "When it's done what it needs to do, I will teach you to bind it, make it do your bidding."

Wheaton outwardly makes a small growling sound. Internally that shadow moves toward her. Hulking and eyeless it is drawn to that playful twirl, to the innocence and naivety such dancing suggests. To protect it, to take it. To own it. That's where those other emotions hide. Jealousy. Deprecation. Loneliness. The yearning to control. It reaches toward her.

Senkha laughs outwardly, almost a delighted sound, though not without a tinge of wickedness. She takes hold of the shadow, pulling it towards her, against her, into the dance. The world around them is peppered with memories of violence--murders committed, fights danced through, red and black and blue. Without speaking, she addresses the shadow: you taught me to be this way. I remember you. Dance with me.

That shadow goes to her willingly. It remembers her. My Girl, it growls. For a moment those shadows shift, displaying blurry facial features that never quite come into focus. The body solidifies, the hulking creature compacts into the shape of a man, though flickering. The tattered edges flap in an unseen wind, and come off of him like mist. My Girl.

Senkha flickers in and out of her normal appearance--growing paler and redder, then back to normal, then back again. She takes the shadow man by hte hands and pulls him close to her, laughing. Always your Girl. Always.

Wheaton smiles at her. The expression shows on that shadowy face. The hands grasp at hers, twiling her again and again. Dancing and grinning. "Bad things happen when I come out to play, girl," he growls at her, despite that smile.

The pseudo-Senkha fades from any appearance of real Senkha, now taking on her entirely wicked Guardian form. Bald. Emaciated. Bare. Screaming red from all of her old wounds and her eyes. "Bad things happen when I come out to play, too. Remember?"

"I remember, little sister," he says. "I remember how we used to be. I remember when I used to be free. I remember when I used to be in control."

She pulls him closer, whispering in his ear, not quite sensually. "I am here to set you free. You know that you have a purpose now. To be free always. To protect always."

"Help me get out. Make him let me out. He'll die without us."

She runs her hand along his shoulders, his chest, drawing him forward. "Don't you feel it? My brother, my love, you're -free-. Follow me. There's something we must do."

The shadow looms over her, pressing forward. The flapping of the tattered edges grows frantic and excited. "Take me," he growls.

The pseudo Senkha takes his hands, pulling him deeper into the recesses of Llew's mind. They're searching for something, someone, and she knows exactly where to start--the place where the memories were lost. "Come out, come out, whereever you are..."

It is that lilting statement that catches him. The shadow suddenly seizes her, gripping the back of her neck. Squeezing, propelling her forward rapidly. Two weeks of sleepless nights fly past. Images, flashes of dreams. Alcohol. Sex. His family. It extends further, to days before he returned to Stormwind. A hundred women's faces. A hundred different inns. Knives coated in blood. His smiling face luring unsuspecting people into a mugging, or simply into tossing a couple more gold for a parlor trick. Them as children. Her first smoke. Her first drink. Him arguing with her parents. And then suddenly back. A little dark-haired girl frowning up at him. "Why don't you love me, daddy?" she cries. And then there they are, standing behind Ariadine, looking over the girl's shoulder at Llew lashed to a chair with tears running down his face. "He is weak," the shadow growls. "He grew weak."

She purrs at this place, looking over to Ariadine, putting her hands on the girl's shoulders. "And that is why you are strong. You are here to -end her- and remind him of -who he is-. Just as I have done for Senkha. No sweet mothling. No bit of light. No sparkling. -You- are his Guardian. -You- are the one who can beat this and -save his life- and your own." She brushes a finger along Ariadine's cheek. "And have done with it."

The shadow draws away from her and leans over Llew. "He looks so old," it says in a deep rasp. Turning, his eyes fall on her, and on Ariadine. "But we will end this. We will end her and her puppeteers. My Girl will live. And so will you."

The pseudo-Senkha draws her claws across Ariadine's throat, laughing softly, wickedly. "She will fight you. Don't let his weakness stop you." As if in acknowledgement of this, Ariadine begins to move, her voice echoing, "Your guardian sucks."

The shadow grins and reaches out to brush his wisping fingers along Ariadine's cheek. "Poor little thing... she has no idea what's coming for her."

The vision of Ariadine looks up at the shadow and shrieks, leaping for it, trying to dig her teeth into its neck and tear it apart. The pseudo-Senkha stands behind, watching.

The shadow explodes, like wind cutting suddenly and sharply through a heavy mist, and then reforms behind Ariadine. A crooked smile blurry on his shifting face, he reaches out to grasp the girl by the back of her hair, forcing her face first into the rock wall Llew's poor moth had been perched on. "I will wipe your guts on your master's robe, girl," he growls.

The imprint shrieks and screams, fighting against the mist, against the grasp. "Hhhhhhe's damaged goodsssss...nothhhhhhing you do can change thhhhhhat."

"Damaged. And easier to break, yes?" he rasps in the girl's ear. "Nothing to live for. Everything to die for. Three people he will die to save. Thank you for reminding him he's willing to do that."

The imprint struggles still, growing weaker, trying to claw at the shadowy hands. "Thhhhis isn't overrrr..." she rasps. "Sssstill broken....stiiillll..."

He bears down on her, forcing her to her knees. "You don't know the meaning of broken, girl," the shadow hisses.

The imprint snarls and struggles weakly. From further in the shadows, the pseudo-Senkha whispers, "Don't just crush her. TEAR her. Annihilate her."

The shadow roars, eager to please the owner of that whisper. My Girl. He jerks Ariadine up, grasping her head in both hands. Wrenching it suddenly to one side, her neck snaps. And turns completely around, tearing from her body in a spray of blood.

The pseudo-Senkha roars with absolute joy, shaking the very foundations of his mind. "ANY MORE OF YOU!" she bellows. "ANY MORE COME OUT AND YOUR FATE WILL BE KINDER." She is such a liar.

Shadow-Llew rises, Ariadine's body drops limply to the cold stone floor. Her head hanging in his hand, hair tangled between his wavering fingers, he turns. That great beastly creature, the one with the hiss, the glowing hand. Apophan. Tormentor. The shadow tosses the head at him.

Pseudo-Senkha takes particular note of this creature, as if taking in its movements and existence to use against it later. "Show me what you've got, love. Show your Girl what you've got."

The great Tauren comes forward, shifting seamlessly through many forms. Human. Worgen. Human. Tauren. A serpentine tongue. A glowing hand. Tauren. Hooved human. Evil. The shadow moves toward it, eager to please his Girl.

A constant stream of strength and binding flows from the pseudo-Senkha to shadow-Llew, feeding into his malice and violence, empowering him, binding his form more firmly into being. She crouches in the shadows herself, the red of her eyes and old injuries the only indication that she's still there.

"I will enjoy tearing your cousin apart," Apophan snarls. -

Remember, she is safe. She has me. Destroy him.

The shadow springs forward, exploding into mist again, shadow-stepping behind the Tauren. Materializing again before him. In one sudden, solid punch his arm shoves through the thick, muscled body, and tears outward, wrenching forth a dark, still-beating heart. The shadow smiles at Aphophan as it squeezes his heart. Apophan roars, flames rising around him, but the shadow moves quickly again, shoving that heart into the creature's throat. While he chokes, Shadow-Llew grasps the serpentine tongue housed inside the great mouth and tears it free, standing back with a smile while the wicked beast falls to its knees, voiceless and heartless.

From the shadows, the pseudo-Senkha roars in delight, not at all unlike a lynx or other great cat. "Finish him, finish him!" she chants.

The shadow does as his girl cheers. With a foot pressing onto the choking creature's throat, he grasps a horn and tears it free. With a roar he suddenly descends, stabbing Apophan's face into mush with the tip of his own horn. Over and over again the shadow impales him, stopping only ones the skull is caved and the face sunken to an unrecognizable mass. Flicking madly, the shadow rises, blood-dripping horn in hand.

"Beautiful, beautiful," the pseudo-Senkha coos, reaching out into the darkness for any more imprints. Any of them. Bring them on, she seems to say silently, and we will destroy them all.

Indeed there are more lingering in the shadows. Llew's father, growling his disappointment, his failure. Llew's daughter saying she's better off without him. Both of them weaker than the rest, he makes quick work of them, and tears into every weak, sad or disappointing memory, freeing Llew's mind from all the sorrow and the heaviness. Freeing him of the weight he's carried over the years, the depression Ariadine built upon. Killing it, slaughtering it. A ll of it.

"Well done, Mine..." The pseudo-Senkha wraps her arms around the shadow's waist. She rests her cheek on his back a moment before say, "We must retreat now. It is what we are made for."

The shadow flings the horn at Apophan, retreating into the arms of his girl. He turns, the shadow flickering around her as his hand moves tenderly over her head. The form flickers more, losing solidity.

She clings to the shadows a moment longer, almost longingly. "We will dance again, I swear it." And then, gently but still firmly, she sends him to the subconscious again, to lie in wait until needed again, where she goes as well.

Senkha opens her eyes slowly and immediately inhales sharply. She grasps the dock, steadying herself and shaking, not looking at Llew for a moment.

Wheaton takes a deep breath. His eyes also slowly open. The daylight gone, the moon rising behind them and casting his long shadow on the water. It wavers on the waves. He isn't sure what to say.

Senkha starts to bring shaky hands up to her daggers and then forces them down, holding onto the dock firmly, still breathing hard, like she's just run a marathon.

Wheaton 's hand snakes back over to her, seeking her out for maybe a bit of reassurance. For himself, for her. His eyes slowly turn to her.

Senkha lets go of the dock enough to scoot over and rest her head on Llew's shoulder, hands seeking his, almost for some sort of bracing effect.

Wheaton takes both of her hands into one of his. His other arm curls around her, sheltering her now, like he used to. "Everything's going to be okay," he says quietly.

Senkha 's breathing steadies and calms, relaxing against Llew's familiar form, at his familiar scent. "I know. I know. You're going to be okay, too," she whispers hoarsely.

Wheaton lays his cheek over against her head, watching the water. "Yes I am. I'm going to be just fine. And I'm going do everything in my power to help you right this."

Senkha nods, sighing quietly and holding more tightly to Llew's hands. "I know you will. And this will be righted, in time." After a moment, she adds, almost awkwardly, "...doing that takes a lot out of me."

Wheaton curls around her tighter. "I will be strong for you," he says softly. "I only wish I had a way to push it into you."

Senkha turns towards Llew, resting her head now more against his chest than his shoulder, letting him hold her. "You need your own strength. I've ten thousand years of strength given to me. I've got you and Oliver and Marius and Dad all pulling for me..."

Senkha says: I'm not afraid of him. Not anymore.

Wheaton shifts as she does, cradling her more and more. "Good. Because we aren't just pulling for you. We're pushing you forward. And holding you up. I know you're going to beat this."

Senkha says: What d'you suppose he wants with me, Llew? No one's been able to figure that out yet.

Wheaton shakes his head, letting out a quiet sigh. "I wish I knew, babe. But I'm guessing he thinks you've got something inside you worth tearing apart."

Senkha says: He can fuck off, then. He won't get at any part of me, no matter what he does.

Wheaton squeezes her gently. "No, he won't. You're a lot stronger than he thinks. And with us there to support you... ain't nothin' he can do gonna hurt you."