Buenas, buenas. Esto sigue siendo una historia en proceso. En este caso, y para evitar redundancias, he quitado la mitad de la historia ya escrita. Sin embargo, sigue siendo un poco reduntante, dado que decidi expandir un poco el último..."episodio"? en el cual quedó la actualización anterior a esta. Como siempre, feedback o opiniones son super apreciadas. No me gusta de a mucho que solo pongan estrellitas, pero también son apreciadas.

Enjoy.





Everything is possible in the dark. There are no prerogatives, no doubts, no limits. In the unyielding black of deepest night, the mind takes on a different quality and a different sense. The power of godhood comes to it, unbridled and unhinged, and it holds the mind hostage, enacting its will cruelly and savagely. It makes the wildest fantasies break through the psyche and it drags the deepest of fears up from the subconscious depths, bringing them dangerously close to the fragility of the waking self.

Lonely Louise, a cold snowflake resting on the windowsill of an empty house in a windless full-moon night, experienced this effect firsthand.

She was sitting, huddled against one of the corners of her tiny room. She had her eyes open as far as they could go but the tenacious black gave up no outline, no shape, nothing to guide them by. Outside, in the hallways, at least some residual light from the lit rooms scarcely bounced off the walls, making it possible, albeit very poorly, to see and make away through the endless maze. No such reflected light ever made its way inside the small room, the entrance of which was already tucked away in an already almost lightless corner of the hallways,

It had been a while now since she had stopped hearing the beast outside her room. The rustling fur and the growling were gone, but that didn't necessarily mean that the beast itself was gone. She remembered the first time she'd seen it. She'd been defenseless and yet the beast had bid its time instead of eating her. Instead of striking at the powerless bodies of the three sleeping girls, it had waited and only attacked once it was sure it would kill its prey. Furthermore, even when Darion had been incapacitated, even then it hadn't jumped on them. She hadn't realized it at the time, but the beast could've killed all of them at that point, if it had desired so. Yet, it retreated and waited, waited for the girls to follow it into the darkness.

So, there was no guarantee that now it wasn't waiting outside, keeping very still and very hungry, patiently waiting to snatch her up as soon as she left her refuge.

Tough shit.

Enough sitting. Louise took a deep breath, holding it in for as long as she could and then letting it out, slowly. Then, she stood up, back to the corner, and placed one hand on the walls to each side. She knew that the entrance to the room was to her left, so she began to follow the wall to the right. Slowly, her feet barely lifting of the ground, she made her away around the room. After taking five or so steps, her hand suddenly pushed against something round that was sticking out of the wall. Louise palmed it, unsure of what it was.

It had a roughly circular shape and was soft to the touch, like a polished brass doorknob. Could it really be? A doorknob? Here? Based on all that had happened, she wouldn't be surprised. Seeing no harm in it, Louise decided to try her luck and attempted to turn the thing on its side, hoping against all odds to hear the familiar sound of a lock clicking open. Instead, the thing simple dislodged itself from the wall. Well, there goes that hope.

Louise brought it as close as she could to her face but the darkness obscured it completely. Disappointed, she almost threw it to the side. However, she thought better of it, on account of the sound it would generate. She knelt down to quickly leave it on the floor but before she could do it she saw. Looking at the round thing, she noticed that she could see the outline of her fingers against and behind it, on account of it emitting a barely visible ocher yellow glow.

Light? She thought, and, as if responding to her thoughts, the stone lit up like a star, exploding in an abundance of clear and pure light, extremely white, temporarily blinding Louise. She blinked once, twice, bringing her left arm up to shield her eyes from the brightness emanating from her right hand. After her eyes had accustomed, she took a moment to examine her surroundings.

It seemed that the only thing that was small about the room was it entrance. Now she could see that she'd taken refuge inside a long rectangle, at least a hundred yards long and ten across. Its walls, while as polished and etched with designs as the ones outside, were covered here and there by small crystal growths, and its ceiling was nowhere to be seen, rising into darkness so high up that the bright light held by Louise couldn't reach it.

On the wall to her right was more crystal. It seemed to follow the bas-relief designs, travelling along the straight lines and only growing outwards from the wall in places where the designs circled around themselves. Some of the crystals sticking out had perfect geometrical shapes with several perfectly spaced sides, while others grew in a more relaxed manner, like balls of spun, billowed glass. On a whim, Louise reached out and broke off another hunk of crystal. As before, it remained barely incandescent until Louise thought of light, at which point it lit up in spectacular fashion. Convenient.

She proceeded to grab three chunks more. Keeping the one she'd originally found in her right hand, she coupled the other chunks into pairs and placed them safely inside the pockets of her coat. While placing them there, she noticed that while the crystals still emitted light once she wasn't holding them, the quality of the light they gave off did degrade slowly. Once she had her light crystals safely pocketed away, she looked all the way to the other end of the room. Just as she expected, there was a small rectangle of black at the other end, acting as another tiny entrance to the crystal room. She began to walk.

As she walked, she was surprised to find that her sleeve, and on further inspection all of her clothing, was covered in a very fine layer of snow that was being shaken off with every step. Had she been producing it all along, even while she was being chased by the beast? She briefly turned back to glance at the corner where she'd huddled down on the ground, terrified as the beast thrashed and growled, trying to fit its humongous body into the tiny door. Sure enough, there was a small patch of snow in the corner. Glancing at the small entrance, she realized that she had been truly lucky to find this place.

After Elena and Nicolle had abandoned her, going off to rescue some distant sound, not knowing what to do or which way to take in the dark, she'd just stood there, at a physical and mental crossroads. She hated to admit it to herself. She wasn't supposed to be like that anymore. Still, fear, fear of the dark and of the unknown, had won and her legs wouldn't listen. Even more, there was a part of her, a part that she would've liked to ignore, that was telling her that she'd made a mistake, that Elena was right and that she should have followed her, even if it was stupid. Maybe it was that she recognized the fact that their strength was in numbers and that being left alone would only single her out, leave her helpless against a foe she had no hopes of defeating. Or maybe, perhaps, maybe, just maybe, there was still a little bit of wide-eyed kid in her that wanted to be a hero, just like Elena had so brazenly declared. Yeah right, she said in her mind as soon as the thought crossed it.

The truth of the matter was that she had not been able to move since the girls left her, and it had saved her life. As she stood there, somehow, the beast had come from the hallway to her right and passed right by her.

She couldn't believe it. With her eyes straining to see in the dark she could barely distinguish it as a huge, ever-changing shape that stomped around with oddly soft footsteps, crossing the crossroads perpendicularly to her, walking barely a couple of steps in front of her face. Its paws weren't completely silent, but considering the fact that every time they came down they were followed by a small explosion of wind, Louise couldn't begin to figure out just how it was able to move around so quietly. As soon as she had felt the beast leave the crossroads, spurred on by the sheer unlikeliness of what had just happened and by a desire to get as far away as possible, she began to move as silently as possible in the direction that the beast had come, hoping to put as much space between it and herself as quickly as she could. However, as fickle as the turn of the coin, her luck shifted. Without seeing it, she kicked a pebble with her feet. It skidded noisily over the floor, barely producing bouncing one or two times as it soon came to a stop. However, it had been one bounce too many. With a spine-chilling fear, Louise had felt a new gust of wind come from her back. This time her legs did listen. Run.

There followed a crazy race in the penumbral dark. Louise didn't scream and the beast didn't roar. Instead, her running was punctuated by the ever-increasing blasts of wind the beast made as it half galloped, half leaped after her. Louise made turn after turn, hoping to use the maze against her pursuer, which, she had no doubt, would overtake her easily in a straight dash. After turning and turning, getting more and more lost into the maze, she'd finally run into a dead end. The weak lighting that her eyes had depended on to be able to make out her surroundings steadily disappeared, leaving only a black abyss in front of her. Still, she kept running. Still, the air behind her kept exploding towards her. Finally, she hit her shoulder against a wall but seemed to walk through it. She threw her arms around, desperate to know where to keep running, and felt the outline of the small door that would be her salvation, barely a meter across. Feeling a sliver of hope, she ran on, feeling both walls of the slight corridor that would turn out to be the entrance to the crystal room. One, two, three, four steps and she stopped feeling the narrow walls, stepping into safety. She threw herself to her right, into the first corner she could find, huddled down, and cried. Outside, there was a huge impact and a tremendous column of air passed through the narrow entrance hallway. After that, she only remembered crying and growling and that awful scratching sound.

Enough, she berated herself pulling herself of the all too recent memory as she came to the end of the room. You're not a child anymore. You're old enough to take care of yourself. You will make it out alive. You will survive. She reassured herself as she reached the room's other exit. Unlike the other one she had used, this one was not a narrow hallway but a normal doorway. Determined as she was, she crossed the threshold without even slowing her gait.

Even if you're alone, even if you're not a hero. You. Will. Survi-

Her thoughts were cut short by a terribly firm grasp in the back of her neck. She was pulled roughly to the side, as if she were a mere rag doll, turned around and slammed against the wall next to the door, pushing the air out her lungs. Her eyes unfocused, she fought to breathe, squirming under the heavy hold. However, her squirming quickly came to a halt, as she felt a cold blade push dangerously hard underneath her chin and against her throat. It moved upwards slowly, with a force she couldn't ignore, until she was on the tip of her toes, and then it stopped.

There was a beat of silence. Finally focusing, Louise found her eyes turned downward, toward the blade jammed against her airway. It was a long, wide, curved thing that she could barely make out, glowing a subdued dark blue. Looking beyond it and up, she saw a wide cleavage barely covered by a dirty tanktop which held aloft a strong neck, a sharp jawline, full lips crossed on the left by a badly healed scar, a broken nose, and confident, narrow, bird-of-prey eyes covered by the unruly dark hair of a mane that obscured the eyebrows and forehead of her captor.

Louise stared at that face and the stranger stared back. She smiled. It was not a kind smile.

Fuck.

"Seems we have a lucky doe:" The voice came from Louise's left, to the right of the smiling woman. It was a man's, somewhat old and rusty. With a quick glance, Louise saw him, standing somewhat slouched, illuminated by the lightstone that she still held in her right hand. He was probably in his late forties, or early fifties, and sported a grey face with drooping cheeks and deeply set eyes under bony eyebrows. He was balding heavily, his shiny scalp barely covered by a thin set of shining grey hairs. From the neck down and all the way to his shins, he was covered by what looked to be a rough spun cloak of some sort, brown and unrefined. "Bring 'er closer, Bee."

Bee, the Enhanced woman that pushed her onto the wall, raised her head and Louise saw that she had been almost completely bending down in order to look her in the eye. Standing upright, she was so tall that Louise's head barely reached the middle of her chest. She was incredibly fit, but in a way that suggested that she had actually trained beyond of just being Gifted with enhancement. Her arms, in particular, seemed like something you'd see on a bodybuilder with less than adamant morals about drug usage. Her blue weapon dissolved in a blink, it was one of those arms that she used to simply pull Louise forward as if she weighed nothing, placing her in front of the old man. She tried to struggle, the same way a mouse struggles against a snake.

"Well, what do we have here? Yes, indeed, quite the beautiful doe we've got ourselves tonight." Said the man, inspecting her. He placed a finger under her chin and brought her face upwards, so that she had to look at him.

"Who are you? Let me go!" Louise snarled and then shouted. The man grabbed her face with both hands forcefully, palms under her lower jaw, fingers pushing down on her cheekbones, keeping her mouth painfully closed.

"Shhh, shh, shhhhhhh." He cooed, looking down on her. "No shouting needed, my lovely fawn. All will be clear in time." He moved his thumbs down, until he covered her lips, as if to open them. Louise recoiled away in disgust, trying to move away her head, but the lumbering woman behind her pushed down on her shoulders like a stone wall, keeping her in place. However, the man did not try to pry open her mouth. Instead, he massaged her lips from side to side with his fingers, gently. "Ah, man, you gotta love brand new Dusties. The sight, the smell, the skin! You have skin like frozen milk, doe. Soft, white and, oh, so cold."

"There." He said. taking his thumbs away. "Better, no?" With horror, Louise found that she could not open her mouth now. Every time she tried, she felt as it were sewn shut with some sort of sticky thread. She tried to speak but all that came out were muffled moans and huffs. The man reached down and yanked the lightstone from her hands, "Ah, so considerate of you! It's been ages since anyone has gifted me anything."

"She's more in her coat pockets." Said Bee with a smooth, self-assured contralto voice somewhere behind and above Louise.

"Ooh, don't mind if I do." Answered the man jovially, as he patted her and took the stones. "These, these will fetch a good price, my pet, worry not." He looked her up and down. "So will the coat and the shirt. Bad thing that the pants are as ruined as they are, but you can't win 'em all, can you?" He smiled a green, rotten smile. "We should taken off right now, don't you think? Make sure they don't get any worse during the trip. Maybe we can salvage them." He asked, looking up and beyond Louise, to Bee. Louise panicked. She shook her head frantically from side to side, trying with all her strength to escape Bee's hold, but it was impossible. Bee simply lifted her off the ground by her neck, holding her aloft as she trashed helplessly.

"Worried about your clothes now?" Mocked the old man, laughing softly. "No need, no need at all, doe. You see, where we're going, these?" He pointed to the lightstones. "These sell fine. These?" He grabbed Louise's coat by the collar. "These also can sell good, depending. But these!" He cupped Louise's face with one hand. "And these and these and these and these." His hands moved swiflty as he spoke, grasping, from her face, to her hair, to her chest, her hips and ending on her thighs. "Those, those sell best!" He exclaimed triumphantly. "So, there's really no point in worrying about your clothes now. You won't keep them long. Besides, there's no buyer in the Market worth his sand who doesn't want to thoroughly inspect the merchandise before they buy it."

Void. A fall. Louise was falling into a pit of fear and cold that she'd never experienced before. She felt lost, powerless, dirty. An overwhelming desire to melt, disappear, to turn into sludge and fall through the crevices in the floor, down into endless darkness and non-existence, invaded her. Over the rush of her emotions rose Bee's voice, filled with definite threat.

"You done being a creepy old fuck?" The old man immediately retreated away from Louise, smiling still as if rejoicing in the insult.

"Well, you know me, Bee, you know what I always say: You gotta enjoy the business. Besides, I'm young and spry as a lamb still, considering. I can prove it to you any night of the year, you just have to ask." Turned to face away from the tall woman, Louise could not see her reaction.

"You wish. The girl keeps her pants. Finish her up and let's go. No more chit-chat."

The man did as told, raising his hands towards Louise again. She tried to move away but Bee kept her in place as the man made strange circular movements around her, his hands hovering very close to her but never actually touching her. After several seconds, the man stepped away and moved his hands backwards, as if pulling on something. Louise immediately felt pressure build on her body from all sides, as if the man had tied her entire body with invisible twine. No matter how she tried, using either her arms or legs, she was securely tied up and could not loosen her bonds. Bee hefted her over her shoulder, letting her rest there, while the old man, gathered all the lightstones, turning them all completely off and securing them somewhere underneath his cloak, leaving them in the twilight dark of the Pillar's natural lighting.

However, in the darkness, the high, shrill, androgynous but definitively human cry they heard, followed quickly by a shout of "Elena!" from a very female throat, easily stopped them from taking the first step. Louise felt Bee tense up, each muscle instantaneously ready for action. She turned to face the direction from which the sound had come, Louise precariously hanging from her broad shoulder. Somehow, even though she couldn't see her face, Louise could tell that Bee was smiling as she spoke.

"Friends of yours?"

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The beast was fast, incredibly so. It moved with sinuous purpose, fluid like a liquid until it suddenly turned strands of its fur into harsh spikes, rigid and fearsome. It would dodge and move its gargantuan body with grace, easily as if it weighed nothing, to then turn around and deliver a pulverizing tail blow in the blink of an eye.

Surprisingly, Elena found that she had no need to blink with her eyes. Surprising even herself, she found that she could keep up.

She was aware that not even a minute had passed since the beginning of the fight. She'd always seen or heard in martial arts movies and series how the perception of time of a warrior distorts and slows down as he fights for his life and now she found the fact to be true. She'd only dodged about 5 or 6 blows from the beast, missing her by half an inch, in such a little window of time. However, even if the beast gave no signs of slowing down, neither did Elena's enhanced body.

They fought on only one side of the room, the beast dominating it's entrance, quickly gaining ground, Elena dodging it's relentless barrage, jumping, running, crouching, doing all kind of acrobatics just to escape the mortal touch of its tail. She'd already felt it once, when she'd pushed Nicolle out of the way. Even though it had barely grazed her, that simple touch had been enough to tear off one sleeve of Nicolle's jacket and almost incapacitate her left arm. It had felt as if a river of sharp crystal chunks had tried to rip her arm off, and she was completely against feeling it again. The beast, on its end, only attacked using its tail, using it sometimes like a whip, other thrusting with it like a lance or sword. Even though it had a massive jaw with huge fangs and sharp claws at its disposal, it seemed content to sit back and watch Elena dance for her life.

As she fought, Elena had realized that there was a pattern to the beast's attacks. More than feel it, Elena's enhanced eyes could see it. She'd first seen it back when Darion had been still alive, and the raw bloodlust it transmitted had overwhelmed her. She'd seen it also when she'd saved Nicolle, not as shocking but still just as murderous. She saw it now. A motif of hate, a necessity for bloodshed, a wanton lust for destruction. It drove the beast to seek her out in ways that Elena could predict and prevent. It was the most likely reason as to what had kept her alive so long, what allowed her to dodge attacks that came at her extremely quickly and in repeated succession. She felt her blood boiling in her veins, her heart racing off at her ears, instinct she'd never felt before guiding her away from certain death. Her body had been enhanced up to the task. Her mind was quick enough. Her eyes glowed pink with effort and knowledge.

But it was all for naught, for her weapon was useless.

Frustrated. Elena had acknowledged it. Range. That was the one thing in which the beast ruled supreme. Its tail, meters long and capable of stretching however long and whenever necessary just to turn steel-hard and deathly as a missile in an instant, kept Elena completely checked. No matter how she tried to move around it, it would always push her further back than she'd started. No matter how she jumped or ran, what feints she tried to trick it with, what advantageous position she could predict based on what she saw, the tail would simply retract in a second and be ready to strike back in another. Compared to Elena's slim pink sword, barely an arm's length, it was a tremendously effective wall, keeping her away from getting closer to the beast's body. To add insult to injury, while Elena could predict attacks directed at her based on what preternatural hate she saw in the beast, she was completely unable to predict in which way the tail would retract to prepare its next whorl of death, thus making it impossible for her to strike at it and level the playing field. So far, she'd only been able to hit it once. Every other time she tried, her blade would end up only cut thin air, striking at the black ground around her in an explosion of pink sparks.

Slowly but steadily, the beast pushed her back, getting closer and closer to the corner in which a terrified Evan and a worried Nicolle watched the fight standing over fallen rubble.

"Oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck, oh fuck," Evan kept repeating. unable to move. When the beast had showed up, after Nicolle had been saved by Elena, he had tried to flee the room, prompting the beast to send its tail hurtling after him. It was Elena who saved him as well, with a prodigious jump and the one strike that had reached the tail. It had been a head on hit, but the blade had bounced off the steel-like fur, not strong enough to stop and only deviating instead. The tail had struck the ground barely half a meter away from the terrified boy, at which point he had ran away from it in the first direction he could, into the corner, stomping over the rubble he had been using to hide. Nicolle had followed soon after, the beast's attention now turned completely on Elena, seeing as it was the place furthest away from the fight. Listening to Evan run his mouth off in endless curses, standing there helpless while Elena was risking her life, she thought she could punch him.

"Argh, shut up!" She finally said, exasperated. "We have to do something before she gets killed!" She knelt, looking for pieces of rubble small enough for her to throw. "Come on, don't just stand there, help!"

"What?" Said Evan, momentarily pulled away from his mantra. "What-what could we possibly do? Look at them. She can barely dodge it!" He pointed to the pink smudge Elena's sword made as its owner moved to and fro, dodging and weaving. "Are you stupid? Do you want to die? What, are you gonna throw a fucking stone at it?"

Alright, that does it. Nicolle rose to her feet, standing a full head taller than Evan, and punched him straight in the face. The boy fell backwards onto the rubble, scratching his back on the edges of stone. Nicolle had planned to kick the guy in the ground, just for good measure but she found herself suddenly overcome by knowledge and feeling. She stared at the fist with which she'd punched Evan, trying to make sense of the rush of emotions she'd just felt, and beyond emotions, of the definitive feeling underlying all of it, something that she'd never felt before. There had been something there, something.... Something brushed the side of her leg, pulling her out of her haze. She looked down to see Evan crawling around in the rubble, trying to make his way to the open doorway again. Then she realized what she'd just done by punching him. She turned around and reached with her arm, grabbing the collar of his tanktop and pulling, strangling him and bringing him to his feet. She pushed him against the wall, pinning him against it.

"Let me go, you skank!" He cried, struggling.

"Shut up or I'll punch you again." Threatened Nicolle, trying to find the feeling again, to dive deep into Evan, disgusting as it sounded. However, the boy's squirming and cries made it very difficult.

"Oh, great, please give me more freaking reasons to like you already!" He exclaimed, sarcastic. Exasperated and all too aware of the rumbling of the fight behind her, Nicolle groaned and used her hand to cover his mouth, her fingers firmly grasping the sides of his face. The boy stopped moving for a second, as if surprised by the unorthodox move. Nicolle took advantage of it, closed her eyes, and focused on feeling.

Through her fingers, understanding awoke. She felt it, clearly. Skin. Bones.Teeth. Something wet. A connection.

Anger. Fear. Shame. A swirl of emotions, outrage, madness, panic. Then, deeper. Burning shame. Hate, inward flowing. Hope, very feebly twinkling. A need for acceptance, a longing for reassurance. Regret, fastened and fighting against its bonds.

Deeper still, underlying all emotion, pain. A pain deep and old, pain like an old friend, pain like an assured fate, an inescapable pain, very lonely, very certain of its existence. Pain.

This isn't it. I need to go deeper. She dived in, away from emotion and recognizable thought.

Deeper still, Nicolle found what she was looking for. It wasn't an emotion. It wasn't a thought. It was silver, shining chrome in the void of self, away from mind and self-perceived image. It was truth, the truth of someone else's soul, perceived for the first time, elegant and resolute in its simpleness. Nicolle found herself in awe of it, engulfed by how succinct and yet so terrible it was. She understood it, but at the same time, she intrinsically knew that she could never truly comprehend it, even using her gift. She tried to get closer to it, close enough to touch, close enough to understand. In that very moment, she suddenly felt as if being dragged by a great current, away from the void and the truth, up and up and up, into the light and the world.

Nicolle cane to her senses, staring at a wall. At some point, while she was searching for his soul, Evan had pushed her hands away. She turned to see him off the rubble, running toward the gaping gate. No, not now!

"Evan!" She called after him. No answer. Nicolle began to make her way off the rubble, chasing.

"Evan, please!" He briefly glanced back at her and stumbled, almost falling to the ground. Panic was written in his face and he didn't answer still, picking himself up and running. However, Nicolle had gained a lot of ground while he did, almost reaching him just outside the gate. Not surprisingly, Evan was a slow runner. He was just a couple of paces from reaching the welcoming darkness when she caught up with him. Running still, she knew what to do, and steeled herself for the impact. In one fluid motion, she reached around him with her arms and hugged him, making sure to press her entire body against his back.

Evan stopped dead in his tracks, as she'd predicted he would. Nicolle breathed in and pushed the sickening feeling blossoming in her throat deep, deep down. Whether if that disgust was born of hugging Evan or of what she was about to do, she couldn't tell. She lowered her head and whispered in his ear. "Evan. Please. Don't go. We.... I... I need you."

He tensed up in her arms. Nicolle swallowed, in preparation, and placed her hands delicately on his bare shoulders, turning him around to face her. "I'm sorry, ok? Please don't go."

He locked up at her, staring at her eyes in a mix of fear and surprise. "You're sorry?... But, you punched me..."

"I know and I shouldn't have done it. I was desperate and I took it out on you." She looked at him, making sure to not back away from his personal space and to maintain eye contact. He still couldn't believe what was happening. "And now... You want me to help you?"

"Yes! That's what I said earlier!" She said, maybe a little bit too harsh. He backed away in fear. Fuck, just how cowardly is this dude? Rhetoric question, she knew exactly how much now. "I-I mean... I feel useless. She's out there, fighting for us, and we can only watch as she slowly looses ground? I have to do something, I can't just stand there. But you're right, what am I gonna do throwing stones? I need help. I need you." Ugh, she groaned mentally, Evan's face changed from surprise into disbelief

"What... Why should I help you? You come into my room, you yell stuff at me, thinking I'm a weirdo and whatnot, and now you want me to risk my life against who knows what?"

"How many times do I have to say I'm sorry?!" She knew that she shouldn't get angry with him, it would only make him get angrier in response, but Evan happened to be exactly the kind of guy she couldn't stand, the kind that justified his flaws in the world surrounding him instead of doing something to fix them. She know understood why he was the way he was, the extreme loneliness and lack of support that had driven him to such coping mechanisms, but she couldn't stand it still. In the same way, she couldn't lose him either, which was proving to be very hard for her to avoid. The disgusted feeling created by manipulating him like this, sucking up to him like this, was almost too much. Almost.

"Look. Maybe, just maybe, I misjudged you. I'll admit that my experience with guys hasn't been the best. You're all just so.... ugh! But I've waiting, waiting for someone to prove me wrong. I've waiting for that one guy who would be a real gentleman, who would come save me when I'm helpless and don't know what to do." She made sure to stay inside his personal space and stare into his eyes. "To be honest, I'll admit that I never imagined that it would happen in situation like this, but it seems that you are that guy. You have to be. Otherwise, I don't know what I'll do. Evan. Please. Prove me wrong. Help me save my friend." The impact of the beast heavy tail crashing against the ground exploded behind her, as if punctuating his words. Worried as she was, Nicolle couldn't afford to stop looking at Evan now. Say something. Come on, you big, fat idiot, stop staring at me and say something!

Evan hesitated, glancing nervously at the battle unfolding behind Nicolle. She used her ability once more. Fear. Hope....Arousing? Nicolle quickly retreated away from that. Great, now she couldn't use her gift without having to feel how much she was turning Evan on. No choice but to play her ace. "... Besides, I'm not asking you to risk your life."

Surprise covered Evan's face again. "What do you mean?"

"Remember what I said earlier? About Gifts and superpowers? I wasn't lying. I have one, Elena has one. How do you think she's survived against that thing for so long? More importantly, you have one, Evan. A really strong superpower."

"How... how do you know that?" His voice was no longer offended, turning just the slightest tinge of curious. "That's my superpower: I touch stuff and I understand stuff about it. Back when I, well, punched you, I felt it. Your superpower, your Gift." She forced a smile, staring into his small eyes, and moved her hands from her shoulders, grasping his and bringing them up to eye level. " Trust me. Look at your fingers and think metal."

"Think metal?" - "Yes, metal, silver, shiny, chrome, metal, you know... Just... Trust me, please."

Evan gave her one final unbelieving look and focused on his fingers. He stared at them and then, maybe feeling something, closed his eyes, his brow furrowed in concentration. Then, like magic, gradually starting from the very tip of his fingertips and working its way downwards, his skin began to turn hard and reflective, as if someone were dropping a steady stream of quicksilver on his fingers.

"Evan! Look, open your eyes." He nearly jumped in surprise, pulling his hands away from Nicolle's. He stared at them and then proceeded to shake them, as if trying to flick off liquid. However, the metal look didn't leave his hands, didn't splatter on the ground. "You gotta be kidding me, man!" He exclaimed, smiling in wonder. Yes!, Nicolle thought.

"I told you, a super strong superpower." She said. "Based on what I felt , I'm pretty sure you can do that with your entire body.Try it!" She wasn't actually sure that he could turn his whole body to metal just like that, but she felt that she had to make him believe that he could. Evan nodded and closed his eyes without a second thought. In a second, Nicolle found herself facing a metal replica of Evan wearing his unchanged clothes, shiny down to the smallest details. He opened his eyes and examined his arms, turning them this way and that, seeing how the light now reflected off the chromed surface. Nicolle promptly slapped him across the face.

"Hey, no more hitting!" He cried, offended.

"Did you feel that? Did it hurt?" Asked Nicolle. Her hand was throbbing with pain and, even though she had slapped him as hard as she could, his silver face had barely budged. Evan brought one hand up and touched the cheek where Nicolle had slapped him. His eyebrows raised up in surprise. "Do it again." He said. Gladly, thought Nicolle, and complied. A sharp sound, like the ringing of a bell, arose on impact.

"I barely felt it" He exclaimed, exulted. "See? You can fight now! Please, help m..."

"Watch out!" Elena's shout reached Nicolle's ears a second before she felt the wave of air pressure that announced a tail was directed her way. Instinctively, she ducked, arms raised over her head. The tail collided directly with Evan, pushing him off his feet and straight into the dark. A powerful impact followed, as if a wrecking ball had collided with the walls. Beyond the gate, darkness was absolute.

The tail's dark shape melded perfectly with the dark beyond the gate, remaining in the air over Nicolle's head, who quickly scrambled out from under it, turning to glance at a sweaty and tired Elena, standing wobbly besides the room-dividing tail. Behind her, the beast flowed upon itself, neither advancing or retreating.

"Evan!" Elena shouted. She raised her sword and let it fall over the tail next to her. Once more, the blade bounced off to the side, failing to penetrate the hardened fur. "Again?!" Elena asked in frustration.

Still, the beast recognized the danger. The tail began to retract, stretching and stretching, until it suddenly stopped in mid-air, as if caught on something. Evan emerged from the dark, holding on to the tail with wide arms, smiling. His tanktop was ruined, hanging in tatters from his featureless silver belly, but he seemed unhurt. "You'll need way more strength than that to pull on me!" He cried.

"Yes!" Nicolle couldn't help but shout as well, relieved, even if she wasn't going to admit it.

As if answering, the beast turned its burnt-gold eyes to look at him. In one fluid movement, it spread its wide legs, lowering its body closer to the ground, anchoring its center of weight. It hissed, the first sound they'd heard it make ever since entering the room, and pulled. A single wave started on the tail, slowly as it began but accelerating in less than a second beyond what the normal eye could see. Evan was lifted off his feet with ease, as if he were a mere paperweight. The wave continued at tremendous speed and smashed him against the top of the doorway, only to immediately drop and drag him against the floor and back into the room, where it flung sideways, slamming him into the walls with constant ringing metal sounds. Nicolle's shouts of triumph were caught on her throat as easily as they had emerged.

"Are you ok? Is that Evan?" She hadn't realized it, watching as Evan had become the beast's personal bell, but Elena has jogged over to her, a worried look on her face. Nicolle stood up, motioning that she was fine.

"Yeah!" She could only say before Elena turned her back to her again.

"Evan! You have to let go!" She shouted at him, obviously worried. The beast was still banging him against the walls. Something in its posture told Elena's eyes that it was growing more and more annoyed.

"I!" Exclaimed Evan, between impacts. The wall came before he could continue. Bang.

"Am!" Bang.

"Not!" Bang. Again.

"Letting g-ough!" Bang, over and over again. The beast actually growled now, impatient to get rid of the silver kid that was weighing down its preferred weapon, the strength and volume of the blows definitely increasing. "I have to do something!" Elena exclaimed. She took off, but instead of running toward the tail, she ran toward the beast's body, now left unprotected.

As if it had waited for it all along, the beast corrected the tail's course immediately, quickly stepping on it with one of its gargantuan paws. The tremendous momentum of the thing, adding Evan's newly increased weight at it's end, accelerated it in a wide arc that missed the room's left wall and ceiling only by inches, coming down on Elena at a murderous slanted angle. Running as she was, her entire body pushed forwards in the interest of speed over maneuverability, Elena realized that even if she saw it coming she could not escape the blow. The tail rushed on, a black curtain quickly falling over Elena's life.

"LET GO, YOU IDIOT!" Screamed Nicolle, realizing all too late that Evan was meant to be a mace, not a bell. All too late too, Evan did let go, flying off like a silver bullet, dangerously towards Nicolle's general direction. He passed by her, not close enough to actually put her in danger, crashing in a mess of shiny limbs against the wall behind her. Nicolle didn't pay him any attention. She fell to her knees, all the strength gone out of them, unable to believe what she was seeing.

A chain, glowing a fierce blue, was wrapped around the middle of the tail, holding it in place. Beneath the tail, dangling from said chain, was a sort of small scythe, arm-sized and with a wicked curved blade on its top, also glowing blue. At the other end of the chain, standing at the top of the staircase that opened on the right of the room and anchoring the chain with muscled-bound arms, was a giant of a woman. She had pale skin and was wearing a simple white tanktop over black fabric pants, the top of her face covered by a wild mane of dark hair that fell over her shoulders and back, all the way to her strong hips. Behind her was a small old man, bald and with yellowing skin, wearing a big brown poncho. "Damn! There's three of them." He exclaimed. Elena, breathing hard, was splayed on the floor, the stopped tail a mere meter above her.

"Three little kids against one beast. Seems hardly fair." The big woman said, confidence dripping from her contralto voice. "Oscar, see to those two, I'll help pinkie out." She pulled on the chain, staying in place as the old man ducked behind her and ran down the stairs, hunched over. The beast, once more feeling something take control of its precious tail, yanked it back with extreme force, easily lifting the woman. However, unlike Evan, she let go once she had enough air to clear the rest of the stairs, her blue chain and sickle dissolving into nothingness. She fell in an arc and rolled when she touched the ground, coming to a stop close to Elena. Summoning blue sparks of light all around her, the chain materialized again wrapped around her left arm, while the connected sickle appeared in her right hand. "On your feet, pinkie. Good job holding on for this long, but that bastard is not gonna slay itself." Elena picked herself up clumsily, her body still reeling from its close encounter with the possibility of death.

"Who are you?" She asked, dumbfounded.

The big woman rolled her eyes. "What a dumb fucking question. Wanna do introductions now, when that thing is still alive?" She pointed with her scythe at the beast, a rolling wall of darkness before them, inspecting the new threats with cautious orange eyes.

"... Right." Answered Elena. Business first.

"This is how it's going down, pinkie." The sickle-woman turned to face the beast, flexing her knees. As she spoke, like the blossoming of a terrible flower, a fox-like smile appeared across her face. "I run left. You right. I get it's attention, you wait. It's gonna try to hit it me with that big tail. When it does, I'll use my chain to trap it. That's when you come in with your cutesy little sword and cut it off. Got it?"

"Got it." Said Elena, staring at the beast as it coiled upon itself in the corner. Out of the corner of her eye, sickle-woman took off running without a warning, a blue blur in movement. Elena followed a fraction of a second later, enhanced muscles following directions from super-enhanced eyes.

Oscar reached Nicolle. She was still on her knees, arms limply hanging on her sides. He snapped his fingers in front of her face. "Kiddo, you ok?" Nicolle glanced up at the little man, still not really seeing him. More snaps. "Hey, kiddo!" Slowly, his image came into focus, his face burrowed with worry, big old man eyes looking down at her. Snapped out of her reverie, she moved her head sideways quickly, trying to shake the image of almost dead Elena off her mind. "...Yeah." She finally answered.

"Good! Come, help me with your friend." He earnestly clasped her on the shoulder and pulled her up to her feet, then turned her around, facing towards where Evan was laying on the ground next to the wall. Suddenly realizing that Evan had crashed against that wall at top speed just moments ago, she ran over to him, followed closely by Oscar. Evan was laying on his back, fortunately still breathing, his wide belly rising and falling with troubled effort. It seemed that he had been still in his metal form when he had crashed against the wall, but he had dropped it now, his skin back to being a soft and rosy pink. Oscar and Nicolle sat down next to him, trying to ascertain the damage. However, even though he had been dragged along the hard stone floor and battered against the walls over and over, he seemed to be fine, without any bruises or apparent broken bones. Seeing them at the edges of his vision, Evan tried to get up. He failed quickly, flopping down onto his back again, still disoriented from his ride on the tail.

"Easy, easy there big guy." Said Oscar, trying to calm him down. Evan buckled, his entire torso rippling, and made a guttural sound from the back of his throat. Oscar barely managed to turn him on his side just before he threw up, the contents of his stomach very clearly unaffected by his Gift.

"Gotta... Gotta fight..." He mumbled between retches.He tried to get up again, holding on to Oscar for support.

"Fight?" Nicolle could barely believe him. Just some minutes ago this guy had been trying to run for his live and leave them to their fate and now he wanted to jump back in again? Had her words been that effective? "Evan, no! Look at yourself, you can't fight anymore." Evan shakily managed to stand up, his left arm clamped onto Oscar's shoulder, the small old man almost buckling under Evan's portly physique.

"I have to agree here. Evan? That your name? Congrats on your fighting spirit man, but you don't wanna go back in there. In this state you'll be close to useless." Evan tensed up suddenly, as if in response to Oscar's words. He tried to push the old man away, flabby arms waving here and there, without any real force behind them.

"No.. I have to... She said...." His knees buckled and he was taken by a coughing fit. Nicolle watched as he coughed his lungs out. Even if their previous inspection of Evan's body hadn't revealed any immediate injuries, it was becoming clearer and clearer that Evan hadn't survived his beastly battering unscathed. As he coughed, he went down on his knees, almost taking Oscar down with him. Evan held on to his brown poncho, pulling it tight over Oscar's yellow skin. A snarl of frustration on his face, a marble-like ringing coming from beneath his clothes, Oscar looked to Nicolle for help.

Nicolle, feeling some sort of guilt that she couldn't quite define and didn't want to acknowledge, knelt down next to Evan's face. Somehow, seeing him in this state, she regretted almost all of her recent actions towards the fat boy. "Evan." She said, softly. The cough had stopped and he was staring straight at the ground, catching his breath. "Listen..." She struggled to come up with something to say. Some part of her realized that she felt the need to apologize to him. The rest of her in contrast, felt disgusted by the very fact that the thought had even crossed her mind. Amidst all of that, she also found it that it was very hard for her to look at his face now.

"No... No. Have to....Have to prove her wrong... Have to... Fight..." Evan mumbled over his laborious breath. He turned his face, framed by strand of shiny black hair, and looked into Nicolle's eyes. His eyes, small and dark, were brilliant with repressed tears. "I'm not.... Useless..." He whispered, out of breath. Nicolle-s eyes widened. Feeling her own tears blossom, she remembered:

Deeper still, underlying all emotion, pain. A pain deep and old, pain like an old friend, pain like an assured fate, an inescapable pain, very lonely, very certain of its invincibility. Pain.

With a single sharp motion, Nicolle stood up. She looked away for a second, towards Elena and her savior. Blurry shapes and shiny colors filled her vision. Elena, again. The girl she'd just met. The girl who had declared she wanted to be a hero. The girl who had brought her to her knees just a moment ago. The girl Nicolle had decided to follow in a dark crossroad. Could she face Elena, if she just turned her back on someone asking for a chance, someone she had just tried to use for her own benefit, someone begging on their knees? She cleared her eyes with the back of her hand and turned back to the old man trying to support Evan's weight. "Oscar, right? What's the plan?"

Oscar struggled to keep his feet while giving an answer. "P-Plan? What the hell d'you mean?"

"The plan!" Nicolle pointed to the other side of the room urgently. "How do we kill the beast?"

Evan begun to raise and Oscar's voice was a series of grunts as he helped him get back on his feet. "We. Don't. Kill. It." He answered, matter-of-factly. Evan now on his feet, hands rubbing his face, Oscar's speech became more fluent.

"Leave the beast-hunting to the Enhanced. Right now, we have to give them as much space as we can and get you two out of here." He pointed to the staircase to their right and began to push Evan in that direction. "Move along now. The longer we stay inside this room, the more risk we're putting you young ones in. Listen to me girl, you never know what a beast may have under its sleeve, even if it's as young as that one." Grunting, Evan tried to shake the old man off but wasn't able to free himself from his grasp. With two long steps, Nicolle didn't fail to catch the little pebble of information. That is a young beast? She thought, thinking of how much trouble it had given Elena and how close it had come to killing her. Stowing that thought and its implications for some future time, she stepped in front of the old man.

"I'm afraid that won't do, Oscar."

She grabbed Evan and pulled. She struggled against Oscar's grip, as if his strength was much more than his shriveled muscles betrayed. Finally and somewhat reticently, his face surprisingly losing some of its old man naivete, Oscar let go. Suddenly released, Evan stumbled on to Nicolle's side.

"Evan says he wants to fight, and I'm not leaving my friend behind." Nicolle said. Of course, she was talking about Elena, although she also realized that the sentence could also apply to the chubby boy now holding onto her. Was Evan her friend now? Certainly, now she saw him in a completely different light. Somewhat startlingly, Nicolle realized that her Gift had fundamentally changed the way she thought of a person she'd only just met and a man at that. She didn't know how to feel about it. Furthermore, she didn't have to time to rationalize her feelings. Oscar was talking.

"And what do you wan't to do?" He asked, frustrated, with a very angry voice, his face contorting strangely, losing most of the "Nice old man" vibe. As soon as he asked, he sighed, and massaged his temple. "Oh, these youths will be the death of me, I swear. Look, I get it, but you'll be a burden fighting that thing. The best thing you can do is get out of the way and let the pros handle it." He smiled, as if talking to a little kid. For the first time, Nicolle noticed that his teeth were yellow and rotting.

"The pros? Elena is no pro! She arrived here same time as me, and she's out there fighting! Do you expect me to just watch from the sidelines as she risks her life?" Nicolle found her rage returning to her quickly. At least that hadn't been changed by her Gift. Why was it that talking to men always frustrated her so?

"Yeah, but she's enhanced!" Answered Oscar, as if it we're obvious. "I know you don't know what means but believe me, she was practically made to fight those things!" He came toward them and grabbed Evan again by the arm, while also attempting to catch Nicolle's wrist. Swiftly stepping aside, Nicolle answered. "I do know what it means." She exclaimed.

"Yeah right." Said Oscar, dismissing her out of hand and still trying to grab her. He finally succeeded, using Evan to keep her from stepping away. "Come on, let's go!" He pulled on both of them toward the stairs, still smiling.

"I do know! Darion told us!" Returned Nicolle, pulling in the opposite direction. Instead of feeling the opposite pull, Nicolle almost fell down when Oscar froze in place. Evan, finally returning to a somewhat normal state, looked up at him and was surprised to find his smile gone, the deep creases and wrinkles of his face accentuating his stare. He walked in closer to Nicolle and tightened his grasp on her wrist. The palm of his hand was very sweaty, almost sticky, and Nicolle could feel something being projected from his contact with her skin. She barely had to attune to him to feel his emotions. Greed. Frustration. Lust. Anger.

All of it combined. Danger.

"Darion who now?" He asked, his voice a deep, dog-like growl.