A Stranger I Remain (Nas/Closed/M)

[Painterlee]

"Inadvertently...so it seems." Adia's voice came, glaring right into the eyes of the other woman, "Like you wouldn't believe." The icy-eyed she-demon responded softly. They left yet another awkward pause. It seemed that despite it all, Adia was the initiator in their little battle. Belle wasn't very much shaken by her, and seemed, for the most part, to want to move on. The military like woman, however, seemed she had a chip on her shoulder. Igy adjusted his glasses after a few moments, not exactly sure how to handle the situation, taking the form back from 'Reymond' gladly, thanking him, looking over it a few times, nodding, seeing no issues right away. But then he paused, looking up at the devil with a curious eye. Apparently there was something in the file that had indeed caught his attention, but then decided it better not to say anything at that point. "Ah! Yes! The Commissioner! Right this way, if you'd be to kind as to follow me." Igy guested through the doors. Belle passed by Adia, with a knock to the shoulders that clearly irked her.

Following behind, Adia rounded the four of them into the corridor. Sorry, forgot to mention the whole name thing. Probably should have informed you about that little detail. Mephisto would hear her voice in his head, just so she didn't have to leave it. After all, it was likely she'd forget after this. They passed door after door in mostly silence, Igy being the only one trying to make conversation as Belle followed. "So, how's the family?" Her voice came, somewhat indifferent, trying to seem normal occasionally. Igy smiled a little, pushing up his glasses, and playing with a wedding band on his left hand. "Oh, well, good, excellent even. Anna starts back at school soon, it's hard to believe she's almost 7." Truth be told, Belle couldn't stand idle chit-chat. "She's beginning to really get a grip on her algorithms!" The she demon nodded, a not-sign that she was paying attention, but continued the conversation anyway. "Sorted everything out with your partner then?" Igy made a noise that resembled a disappointed sigh. "I suppose so. He still doesn't like all this work I do, but then, you've got to. I just want the best."

And at that, they came to room 3-0-6, and Igy announced their arrival to them, as if they couldn't read the numbers on the doors. He pressed a button on the doors intercom. "Kyla for you, Commissioner." There was a pause, and then the sound of locks coming undone. Igy pushed the door open for them as they all walked in. Belle nodded as she walked passed, Adia didn't so much as give him eye contact. Everyone else inside, he pulled a rather nervous face, taking a breath, and following them inside.

The room was clean, relatively large. A desk sat squarely in the middle, and a sofa off to the far left wall, accompanied by a water-cooler of all things. There was no water. There were no files, no cabinets. At the desk, was a man in a suit, like everyone else in the building. A fairly large man, but not fat by any means, he almost resembled Adia, expect fairer skin, darker eyes, and far less stern, but he did seem concerned. A holographic name plate at the desk read 'Commissioner Falkner Gray'. Belle stood before him, the other two worked standing back slightly. "So, good to see you finally rolled out of bed." He smiled a strangely charming smile. "I don't have the capacity to be angry at you, we all see you and Adia, it get's us nowhere, so I will let your lateness, and your 'friend' slide for now." Tapping the desk, where a flat-screen was inlaid into the 'wood', he pulled a file, holding it out to Belle, or Kyla, as he knew her. "This isn't going to be standard, I assure you. As you can tell, nothing about your..situation...i s standard at all." Taking the hologram, she read the screen, her expression didn't seem to change. She slid a finger across, moving onto the next tab, her profile. "You really don't need to tell me." Belle commented. Falkner chuckled, despite it all. "I'm sorry to tell you I might have to." He then turned his attention to Mephisto, getting up from his chair and walking towards him.

"I don't believe we've met." He held out a hand. "Friend of Kyla's? I hope you don't mind me inquiring into how long you've known each other? Doesn't often talk about her social life, so not really surprising that she hasn't spoken about you." Then he smiled warmly. He was both assessing him, and judging him while Belle read over whatever was on her screen. There was a problem in this system of his, and although Falkner at least knew Belle well as a co-worker of sorts, he wasn't entirely keen to trust her judgement so quickly. The current situation of things called for it. He was looking for something in particular. A detail that fit a puzzle. For now, Mephisto was simply a clue or not.

[Nascent]

M U S I C A L   S H I F T
A Man Who Can
from the Sherlock soundtrack

Ah, the long arm of the law... and with it, the lerry eye and the bloodhound nose. How long had it been since he'd found himself under scrutiny, even just passingly, like this? Yet the game, he knew well, was very different than five thousand years ago. In Connlaoth or Serendipity "law enforcement" was basically just soldiers looking for wanted men (sometimes women, too) and local authorities undertaking whatever acts based on whatever evidence (or lack of) they'd felt was appropriate. This wasn't that age anymore; EVERYTHING was information, and without a doubt that meant that leaving no trail was just as bad as leaving a foul one. If something painted him as suspect, or if any chink was to be found in his armor, then this man right here, who somehow combined the relaxed demeanor of a beaurocrat with the hungry stare of a waiting bulldog, would, Mephisto felt, be the one to expose it.

Yet the devil smiled warmly, relaxed, and took his hand without hesitation. For all the money he'd thrown into The Black Sapphire he had thrown more into creating a false history for himself, something suitably vague, generic, and hard to confirm yet altogether disarming and believable. He was a hobbyist historian who'd inherited part of a distant shipping business from his father and sold it to a firm that had subsequently run it into the ground, then used his money to move to Cancer and pursue enterprises that were just legitimate enough so as to not rouse suspicion or care from the local law. The club, "officially", was exactly that; less officially, it was a midway point for certain gray market items, mostly rare ore and biological samples going to and from various worlds, a simple import-export business. And then of course there was the business that the Sapphire really engaged in, which had the backing and protection of several reasonably well-established syndicates who were best served by keeping its secrets like they kept their own. And so Mephisto met the gaze of Commissioner Gray with relaxed confidence.

He had his bases covered.

"An old friend from many years back, during the days of my father's failed company." He quickly shot Belle a mental impression of his falsified history so they could be on the same page, and enjoy the inside joke of their mutual "father" and his "failures". "She heard about my enterprises here and we reconnected last night at my club's grand opening."

"I'm not sure how I can assist with, well, whatever it is that's going on, but Kyla thought it important I be here. It isn't a problem, I hope?"

[Painterlee]

With the image of his false history, Belle smiled to herself, looking over her shoulder with grin full of knowing. "It was...a touching reunion." Adia huffed in the back ground. "I don't doubt."

Falkner smiled, nodding, ignoring the two woman prodding each other, as many people who knew them were familiar with. "Not at all, not at all. Just want you to know that all of this is between only the people in this room. I will respect Kylas choice to have you here. It's the least I can do, giving she's done for us." And with that, he left him with a smile, and moved back towards his desk, sitting down, with his own information present.

The she-demon breathed deeply, looking Falkner in the eye as he sat down without a word, there was some hint of knowing in her eyes. "I'm sure you remember a few years back, we decided that, in case something posed a threat to your safety, you would be placed on the list of Sex Workers. That, after all, is one of the safest professions to be in these days for obvious reasons. The list even includes some of Cancers biggest business people. It's our form of a protection scheme." Belle moved the screens tab again. Then her expression changed. "Over the course of last night, a few bugs changed their little routines, and that's no good for anyone." He motioned towards the device she was holding. "Starting with you not bringing in your own catch. After that, pieces began to move, even within our own system." His eyes turned to Igy, who flailed a little with his own screen. "Oh, yes, well, it seems that some people of interest, linked to the accident five years ago, have been trying to converge on your location for the last 12 hours or so, but they lost you pretty quickly. They've even been looking into the details of your Ships whereabouts. Obviously, given your notoriety and our obligation to protect you, that's easier said then done." Falkner got up from his chair, pausing Igy mid flow.

"We don't pay you, and we've relied on what you do more than we should have, but we can't go back now. It's our job to protect our best, but I'm afraid that this time it might be a bit out of our hands." The tall man stood in front of Belle, not a hint of aggression so much as urgency in his voice and his eyes. "We need to know what happened. 5 years ago is still blank on our records, 6 bodies were found at the scene believed to be Thanatos Agents, and you have no idea how hard it was to cover that up. Now they're after you." He breathed. "We can only assume things. Given other details of information we know, this isn't just about Thanatos, either." Belle passed him the file back, crossing her arms. "I haven't noticed anything." Her voice came stern, but his came back more so. "Yes, but you've been busy the last few hours." His eyes met with Mephistos. "Let's just say I narrowed down the list of mole suspects to exclude just the people in this room."

"Kyla, you've become an enemy of one of the shadiest organizations and their pals in the last 24 hours, at least actively. Five years ago you came to us and changed your name, your address, everything. Five years ago, a handful of Thanatos agents wound up dead, and a good part of lower-Cancer slums destroyed. What do you, the accident five years ago, and Thanatos and friends, have in common? We need to know."

There was silence. The air around Belle was one of a person who has hastily buried something they needed to bury, ad forgot about it. But, in their haste, the job was half done, and the tracks lead straight back to them. Her eyes just met his with a knowing stare. Igy and Adia moved uncomfortably where they stood, not sure if having that strange man here was a good idea or not. "You've read every case-report from every dumbass I've dragged anywhere, yes?" Falkner nodded. "Then you know that some of it is pretty strange." He smiled and nodded again. "You assumed they were all just beaten out of their minds, none of you guys could find a trace of anything on me, but I can assure you, it's true." For a second, an almost shocked expression overtook Falkner. "Then why did you keep that information from us?”

“Because I didn't know if there was a Thanatos guy anywhere in the system, or at least, going through the files. It seems that they didn't agree with you passing my catches off as delusional. I'd had a suspicion for a while before the accident that they'd cottoned on to me. Thanatos is tied with some of the darker parts of Cancer. Organised Crime, Syndicates, everything along those lines, and I'm taking out their lackeys like flies. Didn't really put me in a good place, and I admit, I made a mistake not coming to you about it, but I'm a stubborn bitch so I wouldn't." She sighed. "When they finally caught up with me, they were...a bit more than I could handle. Turned out, at least a handful of the bounties I'd been chasing up in the previous few weeks had been Thanatos's attempts to track me. By that, I mean huge successes." Thee was a pause, her eyes dimmed.

"I don't remember an awful lot of that night, just that they almost had me. I'm running amok, clearly powerful, I have some kind of magic out of the gutter, for starters, I've been on the Bounty Hunters list since that list was made. They would want me. They almost had me but, they...didn't get me. I just remember feeling a massive power fluctuation that I couldn't control, and then, the Slums of Cancer doesn't exist. I wake up and don't know what to do. I fucked off quicker than a downtown escort for 100'000 credits an hour. I thought that changing my identity, laying low for a while, would throw them off of my case, think I'd died. But, that obviously hasn't worked. They knew me too well. I don't have that energy anymore, and they know it."

5 years ago. 5 year ago a massive fluctuation of power, a power no one could control. And then he, Mephisto, finds himself waking up in the ashes of a torn-down city. "Things went quiet, I slowed my work down, I stayed around Cancer more to avoid following any similar paths but I underestimated both Thanatos and the Syndicates massively." She looked up at Falkner, and though they wouldn't feel it, the source of her next question rested on the existence of a man she had thought was dead.

"I can't stay in Cancer anymore, can I?"

Falkner sighed, leaning back into his chair, almost as disappointed as she was. "I'm afraid it's unlikely you could stay for very long now, given the pace of these people. They'd either come down on you, come down on your ship, or cause more damage. We could try and protect you, but we can't do that forever. It's both a waste of our resources, which are thin enough, and a waste of time. They'd get passed it eventually. Especially so if my hunch about a mole is correct." Belle almost staggered back. She didn't imagine it would get this bad so fast. "Shit..." Falkner smiled, not in amusement, but some kind of grim understanding. "I know. But we can't do anything but tell you that this is going on without it being redundant in the long run." A pause. "I understand." Belle turned around, looking at Mephisto. There was a deep, crying loss in her eyes, a painful torture. "I suppose that's all then?" Falkner nodded, getting up from his chair again. "I'm afraid so. You are dismissed. It' been a pleasure." Belle smirked over her shoulder, now going to leave the room, gripping the door handle. "Too bad I can say the same."

And Belle left the room, leaving the group in silence behind her.

[Nascent]

Five years ago. Those three words echoed in his head as he nodded quietly to the officers and officials, then turned and left with her. Five years ago.

Five years ago.

It was impossible not to see the connection; he didn't need Belle or anyone in that room to spell it out for him. Somehow, something had happened when Belle had confronted those who'd been hunting her, something that had triggered his rebirth into this universe. He doubted it was intentional on her part. Perhaps it was wholly accidental... or perhaps the Thanatos agents had done something.

Thanatos. Once it had been a name applied to a nation of people who'd shunned elemental magic and embraced what arcana other cultures of the time had shunned -- the "islands of entropy" as some had called them back then. Now, ages later, the name had resurfaced, reputation far darker than its Earth-bound counterpart. Mephisto knew the reputation of Thanatos Inc well enough, enough to know they were natural enemies of him and his operations... to find out they'd been after Belle didn't especially shock him...

... but that things had gotten that far, that they had almost captured her, THAT shocked him. Belle's words about what humanity invariably did to demonic oppressors, words uttered five thousand years before, came back to him with crisp clear meaning. It seemed that didn't just apply to 'oppressors' anymore, though. In Thanatos' case, at least, coexistence was just the waiting room before the dissection table.

In the elevator, they were at last alone; even then he didn't speak aloud, choosing instead to convey what he wanted to say mentally. ~So that's how bad it is. I understand now why you wanted me to come along with you.~ He turned and looked at her. ~I know Thanatos by reputation -- you know them by experience. You have a much better idea of what you're dealing with here than I would.~ He paused, thinking things over for a minute. Either any Thanatos lackeys pursuing her had decided that trying to take her at the grand opening last night was too public, too risky, or else...

... or else the chain of events that had led  them to spend the night together had saved her from being found.

Worse, though, was the unpleasant thought that popped into his head immediately after -- that the soul transfer, and the powers they had just barely managed to keep in check, had been the beacon that restarted Thanatos' hunt for the demoness. Now, in a much lesser way, Mephisto understood what Belle had meant earlier about guilt -- if he had brought this tragedy back to bear on her then this was just as much his problem, his fault, as anything she had ever done.

And, from a purely practical standpoint, there was no reason they wouldn't come after him, too.

~What do you want to do, Belle?~ For sake of appearances -- because Mephisto was sure that in some way they were always being monitored in a place like this, he pulled out a small handheld electric tablet and pretended to read. It was the 'shopping list' he and Belle had recovered the previous day, the fateful stolen article of data that had reunited them. His eyes glanced back and forth between her and the screen, feigning interest in its contents. ~My resources are at your disposal. Just say the word and...~

Something on the screen had caught his attention; glimpsed just out of the corner of his eye at first, Mephisto did a double take...

M U S I C A L   S H I F T
Complexity
From the Frozen Synapse soundtrack

...stared hard at it for a second...

... and then dropped the small device with all the terror and urgency as if it had been a deadly serpent tangled around his arm. Belle wouldn't need to read his mind to know that he was shaken; it was plainly visible, but the maelstrom of thoughts going on beneath the surface was such that even Mephisto didn't rightly know what he was thinking.

"No... that's impossible." The demon muttered, trying to reassure himself. Hesitating just a moment, he reached down and scooped up the display, which now had a single thin crack running the length of the screen. Even so, the image there was plain to see:

A skull, segmented and almost mechanical looking in form, cast from what seemed a handful of different metals, staring at the screen with hollow eyes and set, bony jaw. With a dread urgency Mephisto tapped the image, revealing an array of other photographs taken from an assortment of angles. His mind spun, thoughts and emotions a jumble of shock, refusal to accept what he was seeing, and a veritable thunderstorm brew of dread and long-dormant, specific fury. Hastily he read the item's brief description... and the color drained from his face.

In the midst of it all, as he tried to regain his calm without much success, Belle would be able to pick one train of thought, loud and clear, out of his mind:

'There's only one person besides me who knew how that puzzle worked, and even I didn't know enough to build one. But he's DEAD.'

'I know he's dead.'

Taking a very slow, very deep breath, Mephisto looked over at Belle, voice just above a whisper but heavy-laden with concern. "...I think we may have one more problem. Both of us."

He held up the image for her to see, expression deadly serious.  ~That... that damn bastard. This is one of HIS designs. You know who I mean, Belle. And it shouldn't exist.~

~Because I destroyed the only one ever made.~

[Painterlee]

As the elevator lowered, so did Belles mood. She didn't reply to him, only watching the large building pass in front of her from behind the darkened glass, her eyes dead, fists held tight. He spoke, but said nothing. Everything he had found important back there applied only to him. Thanatos and the Accident five years ago. But he wasn't concerned about her, that she had to leave. Not a word, or a whisper, not a thought to help, nothing that would tell her that the anguish was shared. That he didn't want her to go. There was just an offer of things that hadn't helped her before. Like he hadn't even listened, or really seen into her eyes. Never listening. Her rope, it seemed, had suddenly become very, very short. When he showed the image, she didn't look, and when he spoke she didn't listen. Her eyes closed trying to calm down, but closing her eyes only focused her thoughts and-

"SHUT THE HELL UP!"

A fist came crashing through the screen of the device he held. There was more fury in her eyes than he'd ever seen, but there was a hopeless sense of loss there to. She could read his priorities in his thoughts, in his attempted conversations-"I don't give a shit about your lists, or your resources, because it wouldn't help, or whatever fucking ornaments are floating about that look familiar. I've had enough of dead men coming back at this point, so I don't care much for another." - And found she was not one of them. When all that occupied her mind was not Thanatos and their threat to her, but the prospect of leaving him, after all that had already happened between them, she felt betrayed and lied to. His panic was not at the idea of losing her, but at the idea of Thanatos coming after him.

 Her extended arm carried on, grabbing him by the throat and pushing him against the elevator wall with a crack that clawed at the glass. "Whatever that was, it's your issue and you won't be needing, or wanting, me. I don't have a choice in what I do now, Falkner, and the data he gave me, made that clear." The elevator binged when it reached the bottom, and the doors opened. Belle let go of him with a forceful push, going to exit the glass case. "I can't stay here anymore. Or did you fucking ignore that part because it wasn't relevant to you?"

"It's nice to see you finally have something important to focus on now, anyway." Her words were spat with all the spite of an angered god, she pulled a silver chain from her neck, and thrust it to his chest, before she headed forward, leaving him with his black sapphire. "Thanks for the food and the sex." Her voice came loud, not bothered about her surroundings, but obviously hurt all the same, back through the Atrium. She had places not to be, things she didn't want to see. A hurting heart to bury in alcohol and drugs, because no one else was going to help sooth it. Leaving was not just simply something she had to do. It was to protect Mephisto, protect all that he owned, and protect the people she knew. Last time, she barely managed to survive, and now, she was at a disadvantage. All she could do was run. 

Outside, Belle didn't go back towards to car. She took a moment to look around, and breathe as if she was any less inside than she had been in the building. It was better to get it over with. She might have lasted one more day in Cancer but she couldn't be sure. Surely it wasn't worth risking her life just to see how long she could last here. Once they had sights on her, that would be it. No getting away. Catching a tram full of people as it went passed, guided by electronic lines, heading towards the Docking Bays, she didn't have time to react, no time to lay a ruse, hide, or try to plan and take on Thanatos. It was only a 15 minute walk, but she wanted to be gone, and gone quick. Cover ground without showing to much of herself, give them time to see her. She was angry, and nervous, lonely, and shattered. It was likely Thanatos would come after Mephisto if she hung around for too long, and it would be better if he didn't know where she was going.

He had to stay there. He had ties. He had his business. Cancer was an open book for him and he'd do well not to abandon it for all it could offer him. And it could offer him someone to replace her, even if he didn't think so. She slumped herself in a seat between two people, and slipped right into their numb expressions, no more a person running for their life as the next. And for a moment, she felt as if she might even cry. Fucking oxytocins'. The thought came loud to her head. Her feelings towards Mephisto were messing with her body chemistry. She pressed a palm to her temple, almost trying to subdue whatever chemicals he had awoken in her brain.
He had made a human out of her, and she, ever the fool, had let him.

[Nascent]

Damnit.

Damnit damnit damnit!

It had happened again. After five thousand years one would think he wouldn't respond to the slightest hint of crisis with self-interested concern... but once again it had taken her rage and disappointment to put a mirror in front of his psyche and reveal the selfish creature he had resorted to.

He wanted her to stay, of course. After all they'd been through the previous night there was no denying that. He had just...

... just jumped to fix things, to address the problem, when his attention should have been on her. It was a classically male mistake... and, as he rubbed his neck and picked himself up off the floor, he realized that it should come as no surprise that she would react that way. Not only had Cancer become a home for her over the last five years... but, in a single night, they had both managed to forge something intimate, something... more.

And he'd been so focused on fixing everything that came his way, thinking it was for her sake, that he'd completely neglected her in the process of helping "her". The sting of the silver necklace as his fingers brushed it hurt more than it should have... an unpleasant reminder that, though it had seemed they were moving forward...

... he had just pushed them both back, perhaps further than ever.

"Damn it all..." He muttered as she was lost in the crowds. He couldn't track her -- part of him wanted to believe he could try, through some secondary method or another... but, teeth grit in anger towards himself, he let her go. He'd made a complete ass of himself when she needed him the most, and he felt it now.

She was running. She'd leave Cancer, and him, behind. But...

... but that didn't guarantee her escape, unfortunately. He cursed himself, wanting to run after her, to help... but knowing that his brand of 'help' would only make things worse now.

The devil paused, a thought coming to him. Maybe not...

'Whatever games you're playing will have to wait, old man.' He looked down at the shattered device, then straightened his coat and walked away. 'Assuming it's even you. You left your daughter exposed to the predations of the world, encouraged them in fact. And damn you to hell for it.'

'I refuse to be you.'

Approaching the nearest receptionist -- to the ire and protest of everyone he callously cut in line -- Mephisto spoke quickly and authoritatively. "I need you to take down a message for Commissioner Falkner Gray."

"Tell him Kyla wants to handle the investigation herself." The lie he was weaving would almost surely reach the mole, particularly with the fact he wasn't trying whatsoever to keep his voice hushed. He was, in fact, counting on it. "She's stormed off to where this all began -- he'll know what that means." And so, Mephisto was willing to bet, would any spy in the Cancer PD's ranks. "I'm going after her now; this is my cell number," He hastily scribbled the number for his most recent burner phone down and passed it to the paper-pusher. With that the Thanatos operatives hunting Belle would be able to track him, know exactly where he was at all times. It would be a lead they couldn't ignore; he would, so the ruse went, be leading them right to her in the ruins of the Cancer slums -- a place isolated, away from prying eyes, and perfect for laying an ambush.

Which, conveniently, was exactly what Mephisto himself had in mind.

"Tell him to call me directly if there are any new developments."

And with that, not giving time enough for a sputtering 'But sir, I--', the devil turned on his heels and headed for the doors... all the while issuing psychic orders to his employees like a general about to take the field. He might not be able to protect Belle indefinitely, but he could throw Thanatos off her trail long enough for her to leave Cancer space. And if doing so meant putting on one hell of a show and personally introducing any number of Thanatos secret agents to the afterlife, all the better. Without a word spoken he made his preparations. Weapons were purchased. Bribes were made. The area he had in mind was open and sprawling, a massive crater in the underbelly of the station that even the most desperate or most malignant tended to avoid if given the chance -- the epicenter of his rebirth, the place Belle had been ambushed and he, subsequently, had drawn his first breaths since five thousand years prior.

Mephisto paused briefly on the steps of the building. He would need someone to pose as Belle. Someone convincing. Someone who could work on short notice. Someone, ideally, who owed him a favor...

The devil grinned, then reached out with his mind. ~Corona, don't suppose you're free right now, by chance?~

~Vell vell, if it izn't ze devil himself! Vat good timing you have; I vas just about to be loking for any new vork. You have someting for me, da?~

Mephisto smiled, continuing to walk. He passed by the limo as if he didn't own it and hailed down a taxi instead. ~Indeed I do. A need a certain person to be at a certain place when in fact she is not. You still have that dermamorphic bodysuit I hope?~

~Zat I do. Whom shall I be impersonating, hm?~

Mephisto sent her a number of mental images of Belle including some rough estimates of her measurements and an impression of her voice and as quick of a summary of her personality and relation towards him as he could manage without revealing too many private details. ~Make it convincing, the best work you can do in thirty minutes or less. I'm laying a trap and you and I will be the bait.~

~A trap, he says? And whom, Mephistopheles, are we hunting?~

~Agents of Thanatos.~

He could almost feel the dozen or so curses that came into Corona's mind -- out of spite, not concern. Corona was nothing if not professional and had as much reason to hate Thanatos as any other 'gifted' individual. ~So business and pleasure, then. I think I vill enjoy this. But what if --~

~I already have a psionic camouflage field emitter, and it's being brought to the site right now. Knew I'd need it someday, just not for something like this.~

~Da, I understand. You have been thorough, d'yavol.~

~Corona, one more thing.~

~Da?~

Getting into the cab and throwing a hefty credit chit at the driver with a half-muttered instruction of "The lower levels. The cordon will be fine." Mephisto's diabolical grin widened. ~I want you to write me a symphony... and bring every instrument in the orchestra.~

~...This truly vill be a pleasure, then.~

The wheels now in motion, the devil scowled at the back of the driver's seat as the cab pulled out into traffic. He had no idea where Belle's ship was docked, which bay, or even what it was called. In all likelihood there was nothing he could do to get a message to her, let her know he would be covering her escape... possibly with his own life. The thought struck him as strange. Mephisto had never been the kind who subscribed to the whole 'knight in shining armor' nonsense, yet here he was, going into battle to ensure the well being of the one woman who'd ever really truly mattered to him... the one woman he'd ever loved. The devil playing hero, and rather stupidly at that. His hand found his forehead and ran fingers roughly up through his hair, half tempted to grab a fistful and rip it from his own scalp. He couldn't make up for ruining things so badly, for being so callous and short-sighted... but he could do this, at least. Give her a chance. Atone, after a fashion.

An atoning devil. What a joke. He couldn't help but laugh, grimly, at the comically deformed image of himself in his own mind. What a fool he'd become...

What a fool he'd been. A fool who now wanted to believe in redemption when he'd offered others no such hope. A fool who'd had the one thing that mattered and let it slip away while busily swatting at flies. In his own mind he damned himself, damned Faustus, damned Thanatos, damned everyone and everything that wasn't her. If today was to bring him his second death... then, in all likelihood, he deserved it.

Almost on impulse, Mephisto reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone -- not the disposable one who's number he'd left with the desk-sitter back at the PD, but his personal phone with all his contacts and important data. Yes... she'd given him her number. He checked; it was still there. She'd likely disposed of it already. Even if she hadn't, she wouldn't respond to a call from him. Even a text would likely be rebuffed...

... But he decided to try, even if she never saw it.

I'm sorry.
I love you.
Run.

Pushing send, he all but threw himself back against the seat, scowl deep-set on his face. The cab drove on... and fate spiraled towards a now-inevitable conflict.

------------------------------

Thirty minutes later, everything was in place.

What remained of the slums of Cancer was more like a dilapidated ghost town; scavengers frequented the area, along with those looking to dispose of bodies, but otherwise it was virtually forgotten. Even the most ramshackle parts of inhabited Cancer didn't approach how broken down and forsaken this place looked. It was like walking through a half melted down garbage dump; it would've been the perfect setting for one of those badly written space horror movies Mephisto had seen advertised from time to time. A faint sound echoed in the vast overhead ceiling, a scurrying, skittering sound like rats. Droplets of condensation fell at random; the atmospherics in this place were poorly attended at best, altogether broken or scavenged bare in other cases. Sometimes the air was impossibly dry like a desert, othertimes Mephisto found himself stepping around oily-looking puddles (not all of which seemed to be water), and in places frost sparkled on fallen metal beams and the air caused his breath to fog. Undeterred, the devil pressed on, his thoughts equally on the woman he'd wronged and the war he was now bringing down on himself to protect her. And here was where it would play out.

Up ahead, dimly illuminated by a hovertorch, "Belle" could be seen tapping away at a digital screen and running a handheld scanner over particularly ruined sections of their surroundings. Taking a deep breath he approached her... and, upon getting close enough, the demoness' doppleganger spun to face him, anger in her eyes and slapped him HARD across the face.

Mephisto recoiled, only partially pretending. He always forgot just how strong Corona really was, or how deeply she got into character when doing work like this. It was the chief reason Mephisto had turned to her, with another being that his corrupt power coursed through her in ample supply. Enough, he hoped, that she would pass for Belle on any scanners Thanatos might have.

"You have some nerve following me down here." The faux-Belle picked up a heavy piece of equipment and threw it into his chest, forcing him to catch and hold it. "If you're going to act like a lost puppy then put yourself to good use, at least. I assume you can work one of these?"

"I think I can manage it, yes." The device was nominally a deep-surface drilling sensor -- realistically it merely looked the part, serving another purpose altogether.

"Then do it and don't get in my way."

The stage was set, the actors in place. Mephisto kept his senses alert for the first sign of company. The Thanatos agents, when they took the bait, would be expecting to launch an ambush and take them both, likely through overwhelming force. They wouldn't count on being ambushed themselves, or on the shadowy businessman in "Belle's" company being able to sense them coming like lit torches in the dark. Already he began to feel souls creeping towards them in the dark.

'Run Belle...' He thought silently, scowling and looking down. He'd sworn not to fail her and promptly done so anyway. At least, in this, he could achieve something. 'I wish I could've done things differently... now and long ago...'

[Painterlee]

Somewhere in the glassy palace of the Police Department, a pair of eyes watched, and a pair of ears listened, grinning at the truly desperate scene before him. "So...It seems we have a deterrent. Someone is trying to cover our little demon's tracks. How...sad." A buzz of an intercom. "Relay the message to our dear Commissioner, nonetheless. Keep searching for Belle, and agree to this little performance of his. Under no circumstances drop your guard, even if you are convinced that what he says is the truth. If in doubt, you know her little secret."

"You know exactly where to push."

~~~~~~~~~~~

Belle was at her stop when the message came through. She stared intently at her phone, cold, as the tram passed on. He had...he had no idea. No idea how much they knew about her. How she worked. Whatever he was planning it was going to be an off note to end all other off notes. It would not be her. After all she had seen and lost in him, after every misdirected detail, every time he had looked into her eyes and missed her heart in them completely...he, and everything he thought he knew about her, would never be true to who she was. There wasn't anything about her heart he understood, and that was just him, with his pronoun, unwilling to change. He was a man, through and through, and he had not seen her when she had faced them.

There was no way in hell she would ever face them again. Even if it wounded her pride and tore at her, she would not risk facing them again.

She didn't need or want a hero.

She didn't need anyone to make a stand, or bare the brunt.

She didn't need money, or weapons, or 'resources'.

No.

She just needed...someone.  A reason she shouldn't just give them what they wanted in her, because it would be easier. It was as respectful a way to go as she knew she deserved, and she didn't deserve. No headstone, no plaque, no coffin in space, or urn of ashes. Just whatever of her they had left. Why, even when he knew that, even when it was obvious, did he do it anyway? What was there to prove? How much he loved her? How much he cared? There wasn't much a corpse or memory could do to provide the warmth or pleasure of a body. He was not willing to live, to be so that one day she might have someone to come back to. His pride would rather die, and leave her hopeless. Leave her with the memory of emotions, but no way to feel them. He would leave her with his memory, and her heart, his personal graveyard. "Why did it have to be you.." Her hand threatened to strangle that device until it broke, when a voice came from the Docking Bay Entrance. “Because you're a glutton for punishment.” Adia. She stopped a few paces from her, and folded her arms. “You never change.” Belle just stared at her. “Who ever the mole is, they know. Of course they know. They've been stabilizing on his location, but with absolutely no fire power. They know.” The she-demon scoffed. “Naturally. They aren't that stupid.” The heavy-eyed woman grinned. “No one is.” Belle had to agree.

Y O U N G  A N D  B E A U T I F U L
Lana Del Rey

The two women walked together, going gate through gate in silence, until they reached the demons dock, and her ship. Her pride, her joy, the nearest thing she had to a home. Belle revered it like some kind of angel. All of it's scars were her's. "So." Adia's voice echoing in the enormous hanger bay. "What will you do?" Belle shrugged, a heavy heart. "What can I do? That man is beyond insane. Beyond any real comprehensions of me." Adia kept smiling. "What about me?" Slowly, Belle turned her gaze to look at the woman who she'd known for quite some time, in mortal years. And smiled in return. "I am an enigma, Adia. I've existed on records for hundreds of years, my face has changed but my DNA records are consistently identical. I don't think I will ever, not in a million years, find someone who really unlocks me." It seemed Adia was not exactly satisfied with that response. "That's a bit pretentious, isn't it?" The blond-haired woman didn't react, a somber, almost calm, expression on her face. She had resigned herself to whatever fate lay ahead. All her efforts to detach herself from it had failed, fallen apart in a day.  She pulled out a cigarette, and lit it. Adia raised an eyebrow at her. “That's a little-” “I know.” Belle beat her to it, talking through the stick in her mouth. There wasn't enough left in her to care, taking a breath, and blowing toxic smoke into the air. “You must be the last person in existence to have that disgusting habit.” A laugh filled the air, as carefree as a laugh could get. "It honestly does nothing for me." It seemed Belle was an enigma.

A dark star, lost in a void. A place she wanted to be, but no way to get there. Her heart was empty, but then again, so was her soul.

"Igy...Igy wanted you to have this." Adia started after a minute or so just standing there together. Like at least one of them was normal. Her rough hand held out what appeared to be a -"A photo album?" There was a stunned silence, and Belle was almost touched. The military woman rolled her eyes a little as her not-friend took the thing. "Yup. Real photo's and everything. Cost him a lot to get that together. I think, somewhere, he always knew this day would come." Quickly, Belle scanned through the pages. Staff parties she didn't need to attend but did, birthdays and national holidays, festivals and carnivals, and every shot of her with a prize. Actual, printed photographs. Adia waved her hands at the realization at how stupid it was. "I know, I know. You're not very sentimental, but Igy is. You saw him at his wedding. The man barely made it down the isle. When they adopted their daughter no one in the office could escape the pictures for months." "God that was awful." Belle replied. "Just the worst." Despite it all, through all the gnashing teeth and vile words, it seemed the two woman saw eye-to-eye somewhat. Belle took the gift kindly with a nod. "Give him my thanks." A nod in return, Adia promised. Her eyes turned dark at the shorter woman, heavy, almost regretful. In the gaze, Adia shuffled on the spot uncomfortably. A genuine smile crossed the lips of the exhausted looking she-demon. "I almost wish I could have loved you." Then Belle flicked the burnt stub to the floor, crushing it under heel, her outfit beginning to change into that of a bounty hunter, as she climbed aboard The Black Scarab, and prepared for launch.

~~~~~~~~~Music End~~~~~~~~~

Mephisto and the unknown woman were stood in their place, ready to perform. It seemed Cancer really did have a replacement for Belle ready. In the dark, dank, almost unbearable conditions, not many lives roamed. Junkies and the homeless, the lost, and the diseased. It was a battle ground of sorts. A place that Cancers higher powers had forgotten, and would continue to, forget about, in it's rust. In the silence, occasionally broken by the sounds of deterioration, there was screaming in the distance. Howling and yelling. Like ghosts of the past, dead, and forgotten. In it all, the atmosphere of utter loss and desperation...Mephi sto's phone began to ring. The Commissioner. When, inevitably, he picked up, Falkners voice came panting, heavy, desperate, and rushed. "Get out of there, what were you thinking? They know, they know she's not there, do you hear me? They know it's not-" A loud, cracking, bursting noise broke the few seconds of rushed words. Panic.

Lights. One after another. Giant flood lights beamed right at Mephisto and his companion from almost every angle, out from the darkness. And then a loud voice, one he would not recognize, smooth, dark, experienced. "Nice try, Mr. Valor. But you don't fool us that easily." Thanatos had arrived, in all it's apparent force. They wanted him to know that he had indeed, not fooled anyone. They became surrounded by lower class agents holding nothing more than stun-guns. Obviously not there to kill or capture anyone, they were here for something else. "I won't bore you with the pretense, but I will say that one man with fancy tricks and a bleeding heart won't divert our forces from a target we have 10 years worth of information on, and a large sum of money promised for her safe return." A man came from the darkness, hands up above his head. "We have no intention to harm you or your friend, and should you give us the information we require, we shall harm neither your business nor your connections."

"We are ready to negotiate, self-proclaimed devil. She will not come for you now."

[Nascent]

"Yes... I know."

As the floodlights out of nowhere had hit, they had found Mephisto looking down, presumably at the "drill" doing it's "work". His eyes, for the moment, were lost in harsh shadow, a shadow that didn't quite seem right given the amount of light concentrated on him. His hands dropped away from the device and he turned his body angle towards the one who spoke on behalf of Thanatos, still not looking up. "Belle", to her credit, didn't budge an inch when the ambush was revealed. It was, after all, expected, even if the blowing of her cover wasn't.

"I know she won't. She has no reason to. I've disappointed her time and again... tried so hard and gotten so close, only to have petty things distract me from the truths she placed right in front of my nose."

He grit his teeth, taking no aggressive action but voice spitting with its own violence. "Do you know how MADDENING it is? Do you have any IDEA what it's like? To find someone that COMPLETES you..."

"... and be unable to fit them in turn? To fail with every success and know, KNOW it's because you CONSISTENTLY miss the obvious that they're trying SO damn hard to tell you?"

"To be willing to live and die for someone... and yet know, KNOW that it isn't good enough, because regardless of how perfectly you may match them at moments, you still miss the one thing they're looking for... even when you finally KNOW what it is??"

"Hmph..."

A heavy silence fell as Mephisto chose his words, then in a voice so low that the agents were forced to strain their ears, he spoke. "Yes, I know. You've made it perfectly clear just how effectively you could destroy everything I've built. How Thanatos, almost at a whim, could erase my paltry little business empire  from the face of existence. How they are, in fact, so damn powerful that I'm just a fly to be swatted away when he gets too close, a nuisance unworthy of any real concern or fear."

"You want to negotiate? Very well."

Slowly, very slowly, the darkness around the devil's eyes began to turn into light... hot, scorching, burning light that made the floodlights look dim by comparison. Recognizing the threat the Thanatos forces opened fire, hundreds of rounds sailing through the air... only to be blocked, stopped by a dome of energy that flared radiant colors from each impact it absorbed. Mephisto's device was in fact a portable forcefield generator, against which the stun guns of the operatives had exactly zero effect.

"You can negotiate exactly HOW MANY PIECES you want to be in when this is over, Thanatos scum." The devil spat. He gestured to Corona, who was already shedding her deceptive garb, pieces of the false image falling off like fragments of an eggshell. Underneath the guise of Belle was a heavily augmented woman with a distinctive red streak in her ebony hair, heavy brown combat boots, a midriff jacket...

... and her eyes turning up towards the ceiling.

Mephisto's eyes, for his part, returned to normal as he took a deep, calming breath. "So... here's how this is going to work. Listen carefully, as I don't like to repeat myself."

The sound of skittering far overhead could be heard again, this time somewhat closer and louder. "Up above your heads are a dozen Charon-class fire support robots, eight-legged wall-climbing cargo carriers fitted with two independent weapon mounts. You might be familiar with them; they were a Thanatos design that got leaked onto the black market many years back and have been reproduced in dozens of different variants ever since. A bit dated, but rugged and effective. The ones with us currently bear a mix of machine guns and plasma bolt launchers, meaning they can mow down infantry -- that'd be you, all of you -- and even damage main battle tanks if necessary. But more importantly, each one carries a selection of weaponry that my assistant here has hand selected, able to be launched out of the droid -- or, in this case, dropped from the ceiling -- upon command."

"You came to this little 'show' with pea shooters and promised not to hurt me if I comply -- I came with an arsenal of deadly force... and promise to let you live -- today-- IF you tell me EXACTLY what I want to know."

"And that is this:"

Mephisto straightened his collar and cuffs, trying to look 'businesslike as he walked to the edge of the forcefield.

"Explain your interest in the woman you know as 'Kyla', fully -- including Thanatos' intentions and any plans they have regarding her. Don't skimp, don't lie; I can read people VERY well and I am NOT in a good mood." The devil extended one hand in a particular direction, almost at random. "You can, of course, try to run. There's an old saying that, when chased by a bear you don't actually have to outrun the bear... just your slower friend. I'm not sure how true that is when the bears are machines with turreted weaponry, but you're welcome to try. Or you can try and fight," He looked up at the ceiling with a dull grin. "Good luck hitting targets aaaaaaaalll the way up there, though. Even your floodlights can't spot that clearly at extreme distances I'm sure."

His gaze traveled back down to the speaking Thanatos agents. "Your superiors sent you here to die, all of you. From what you've said it's clear they knew I was laying out a trap down here and sent you anyways. Ask yourselves: how do you plan to spend what Thanatos is paying you... if you're not alive to collect it? Do the smart thing."

"Throw down your weapons... and answer my damn questions."

[Painterlee]

The man, the agent, sighed, pressing his index and thumb to his temple. It was almost like he was disappointed rather than caught-out. Either way, the surrounding troops lowered their guns, not because they were told to, but because their job was about to take a different turn all together. The Thanatos agent met eyes with Mephisto, like he'd already seen this brand of crazy. Not so much in an army-wielding maniac, but a cheated spouse. "I can only tell you that our relationship to Belle, and you would have known that is how we know her if your skills at reading people were quite as sharp as you boast, is purely under business. I could tell you the in's and out's without detriment to anything. Our plans, our employers plans, our pay." He ran a hand through his hair, or what you could only imagine to be his hair. The man was mostly drowned out in back-light. Any features were gone, lost in the contrast.

He sniffed, as if he had a cold, and continued. "I'd tell you, but it'd be better to leave you to realize your efforts are, again, a waste of time, and your energy misplaced. For all you know, we already have Belle, because I wouldn't know either way. You took your eyes off of her for an hour. That's a looong time." Like Mephisto, he went to straighten his jacket. "Touching speech, really. But I'm not the person you should be telling that to, am I?" His posture straightened. "You really are an idiot. It's been a pleasure." It seemed, in that moment, everyone surrounding them, pressed a watch at their wrists, a button on a jacket. The lights shut off with a boom, leaving the sudden, blinding darkness. And, when eyes finally adjusted...

...there was not a soul to be seen. Thanatos was not in the business of making noise were it wasn't needed, and certainly not in the business of doing more than it had been asked. In such situations, they would much prefer to disappear.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The engines howled and screamed, Adia had left the chamber to see her off from the view bay, a string of glass along the side of the dock, where Igy maned the controls. They sat in silence as The Black Scarab warmed up it's engines, waiting for clearance, and building up it's FTL Drive. The pilot inside tried desperately not to think about what she was really doing. Saving her own life. She stared up, a one-way hatch, at the glass screen. Hoping, maybe, he would have used whatever powers he had to find her, rather than waste his time with the slippery agents of Thanatos. No. It was just another mission. Some ass out there in the wide Universe with money on his head, and painted on top, her sights. But she couldn't shake it. The truth.

Her hands tightened around the controls. The pressing horror in her chest returned, as if Mephisto's soul was still tight in her chest, but this was simply what was now. She had already done 5000 years with it. Damn her if she couldn't do another. ~Black Scarab you are clear for launch in 5 minutes!~ The Station Commanders voice came into her ships audio settings. "Copy that. Clear for launch." All she could do was stare at those colossal doors as the ever familiar hum of her ship echoed around her. FTL Drive at 75 percent. Oxygen at 99 percent. Internal Gravity Stable. All Engines at working capacity. Preparing for launch in 300 seconds. The ship spoke back to her. A sound that had once comforted her. Once it was the only thing that made her feel like she wasn't alone.

But now, now she had felt company. This? This was emptiness. When all you had to talk to was a ship's purring hull. Her knuckles went white. 'This is all you have to do, Belle. Leave, you have to. Just 5 more minutes, keep yourself together! Her breathing came heavy, repressed, physically having to hold herself back. Telling herself over and over, this is all you have. And a photo album in the space behind her. A space where once, another chair had sat. Just in case.

[Nascent]

"D'yavol?"

For a long time after they'd vanished Mephisto simply stood there in the dark, expression lost in shadows. Corona, cybernetic eyes long since adjusted, just stared at him, expression neutral... with, perhaps, just a touch of pity. With no one left to target the robots overhead had anchored and gone into standby... and, seemingly, so had the demonic man. The assassin repeated her questioning prod, getting at length a heavy sigh from him.

"We're done here, Corona. Unfortunately. Your payment will--"

"Vhy did you not tell me this vasn't just about Thanatos? Dis voman, she is de vone you spoke of vhen you saved me, da?"

"I am in no mood to--"

"Eedeeot." Now it was her turn to sigh, though with frustration and annoyance. "Vhat are you doink here?"

"She's gone, Nadezhda!" Mephisto shouted,... then almost wept. "Gone. Because I was too stupid to see--"

"Den go to her, eedeeot." With an irked air about her she walked up behind him and slapped the backside of his head, quite nearly bowling him over in the process. The devil recovered and spun around to glare at her but his gaze didn't deter her at all. "You have much power, but you vaste it fighting shadows? Go to her!"

"I CAN'T!" His fist slammed against the ground, and for a second everything around him shook. "I can't track her directly, and--"

"Excuses do not suit you, d'yavol." She folded her arms stubbornly. This was the nature of her family, of her particular "clan". Always to the point, always blunt and cold but only with purpose.Even when they'd first met, with both her arms blasted to bloody stumps and massive injuries she had clung to life, if only to spit in the faces of the mercenaries who'd tried to end her. "You must choose: vat is most important? To vrestle vith those who vill not give you vat you seek... or to pursue dis voman whom you vere villing to fight for?"

He was about to respond, to lash back in anger and frustration... but stopped.

"There isn't any time left. She may already be gone."

"Then you must make time. Go, eedeeot! For pity's sakes, GO!"

What was the alternative? To return to the Black Sapphire and sulk? He realized with chagrin that the assassin was right. Belle didn't need him to fight her battles or give her his assets. She wasn't looking for a hero or a warrior, not even for a devil. She had given back his soul, nearly at the cost of her own life.

She... just wanted him.

Urgency pressing in his mind, he knew he'd have to move fast. A command whispered to a mind miles and miles above them and he was on his way, whisking out of existence like a mirage blown away by the wind.

"Udači, d'yavol."




--------------------



"Our systems are experiencing unusually high traffic right now. Please try your call again--"

Mephisto cursed under his breath as he tore out the front entrance to The Black Sapphire like a bat out of hell, cell phone pressed against his ear. Of all the times! He didn't even know if she was still Cancer-side or even in local space -- for all he knew she could be well beyond the reach of the station's mobile phone system by now, but that didn't mean he could give up trying. Not for a moment did he accept the Thanatos agent's suspicion that they had narrowed in on and captured Belle. No... he just refused to. Even if he didn't hold out much more than a sliver of desperate hope for himself, she was another story.

Even by car the docks were too far away to reach quickly, and although he had 'business contacts' there none were under the sway of his powers. There was no shortcut, not this time. He cursed aloud and dialed again. If he couldn't reach her he'd try the Cancer PD -- they had no reason to trust him, of course, but if they had any idea where she might be going...

... damnation. How had he let everything spiral out of control like this?!

'Damn it all!' His mind spun in a hundred different directions, searching for purchase, for anything that offered him hope. Nothing came to him.

Nothing except her words. A bond. He had no idea how it worked, what it could do, what it even meant. But it seemed the only thing left. Somewhere deep inside he thought he could feel something, like a string being stretched taut, a line with impossible tension on it but no pull... whether that was the 'bond' or just his own stress-addled mind wishing it to be so was anyone's guess. As his phone tried again to reach hers and his blackened heart thundered in his chest, he realized it might be all he had.

A long shot at best. Another futile effort at worst. He didn't know. Couldn't know. But had to try.

~Belle!~ Focusing on her, every thought he had of her, in his mind and bending every ounce of willpower, he reached out blindly, the psychic channel grasping for connection just as much as the phone. ~I'm a FOOL. An IDIOT! I was WRONG! PLEASE!!~

~TAKE ME WITH YOU BELLE!~

[Painterlee]

~Black Scarab, Bay Doors opening, stand by for launch~ The Dock Controls voice came through to her again, as the doors indeed began to open, sharing her the secrets of a thousand stars. Launch in 180 seconds. All Systems Normal. As every beam of light, every star and starship, glistened in her eyes she felt that expanse singing to her with every rumble in the universe. Every exploding star, every crashing asteroid, every race at war. It was life. Truth and mystery rolled up into a single, fragile moment, held between two steady doors. The achievements of mortal kind, screaming from the void, in a single moment.

TEN THOUSAND YEARS WON'T SAVE YOUR LIFE
Hammock

"I want to hear about your first time going up into space-"

"-and whether you were afraid,"

" the first time a ship you were on got ready to jump beyond light speed,"

" that something would go wrong-"

"-and you'd become just a smear of starlight over the skies of some uncharted world."

"GOD DAMN YOU!" Her fist collided with the dash bored of her beloved spacecraft as she huddled over the controls, hair a curtain over her face, trying to stay in control of her thoughts again. Launch in 120 seconds. It spoke back to her. Once, these steel arms would have provided her with comfort, a sense of security. But now that wasn't the case. Like the automated voice, and the humming of an engine, it was just a reminder. "God damn you." Her voice came again, shaking, quiet, in a dark metal container. Defeated. Looking up back at the stars, they weren't as beautiful anymore. For a few hours, at least, she had known, what she could only assume, was love. She stayed there, in that dark silence, as the doors opened up fully with the sound of hydraulics. ~Bay Doors open. Launch in 60 seconds~ The ship began to move, as the dock station the ship was held on rose up, away from the platform, and outwards.

This routine was not unfamiliar to her, it had been something she had undertaken hundreds, if not thousands, of times, but she was scared. All it took was an ambush just beyond those doors to take her out, even if the chances of taking her alive vanished. She didn't know if they wanted her alive or dead anymore. Did it even matter? Resolve didn't burn in her eyes, nor the spirit of adventure that those beckoning stars promised, a promise she had always counted on them for. FTL Fully Charged. At the noise, Belle was shaken from a trance, brought to eye-down, with more terror than she could remember, the lever that began to engage the FTLE. ~30 Seconds until Launch Black Scarab, good luck out there~

She pulled it with force, in a moment of letting go.

FTL Engaged. Preparing for Faster-Than-Light Realization

She breathed out. She breathed in. She had no idea where she was going. What she was going to do. She couldn't just engage her FTL, hoping it'd spit her out somewhere in the known Universe. Or, that wasn't recommended. Right now, what she needed was somewhere unknown. ~20 seconds~. Everything had come down to this. She had underestimated her opponent, after years of pride. This idea of being untouchable. It had come to this. She was running away. Not just from her home, not just from the people she knew, not just from the people who wanted her out of the picture. ~10 seconds~ But from the only man she loved. And the only man her heart would ever allow her to love.

Then, out of her thoughts she was shaken, upon hearing ~Engage Launch Protocol!~ her hand pressed the trigger, and the dock released her, and her ship, with force, out into the void of space, leaving Cancer behind her. ~Safe sailing, Black Scarab, see you in the stars~ And her connection to the Stations Control Systems was shut off to the next. On the left side of her screen, two messages from the Dock. Adia and Igy. We'll be waiting, Bounty Hunter. Belle almost smiled. I know you will. Her small craft, and the lonely heart inside, burst through the nothing. Another light in a sea of lights. That was it then. This is it then. She left Cancers Zone, entering FTL-friendly space. Once again, she took the lever, and pushed it back up.  All Systems Preparing for Faster-Than-Light travel. 10 seconds and counting. And so, a counter appeared across the right hand side screen. Seconds and milliseconds. She closed her eyes, and braced herself.

And then she felt it, icy eyes shot open. It was-

~Belle!~

Her blood ran cold, her heart beat faster. Could it really be?

5 seconds

~I'm a FOOL. An IDIOT! I was WRONG! PLEASE!!~

4 seconds

~TAKE ME WITH YOU BELLE!~

3 seconds

2 seconds

FTL Engaged

"Okay."

Everything stopped. Pin pricks of blue and white light began to stream passed the ship slowly, as she closed her eyes, and focused on him, the way he focused on her. She pulled at him, clawing at him desperately. It had to be perfect, in the way they were not, or risk him being turned to nothing as the ship began to rocket through ether-space. She wanted nothing more. Nothing in the Universe, nothing in existence. Not even to be free of Thanatos. God she couldn't care less. Not if...not if...

...not if she had him. Her voice screaming out his name louder and louder. She needed him. Not to protect her. Not to defend her. Just to be there. So that she didn't have to be alone.

FTL Achieved.

When she re-established herself back into reality a few seconds later, she was burning all over, her nails dug into the flesh of her palm. Her breathing came in heavy panting, being lit up by the blue and white of stars as they were gone in an instant. Mephisto. The first though in her head, still dizzy. She woke up, realizing what that had meant. In her chest, her heart stopped, buckled over the controls, she bolted up into her seat. "Mephisto?" The chair spun around, looking into the compartment behind her, mostly used as a bed of some description, evidence of a chair long gone. "Please..." Her eyes searched the darkness as the light flew passed. Looking for the shadows to define a shape, and the glittering shine in his eyes. "Oh god please." She didn't even realize, the hot stream down her face, as she stared, she fell off of the chair, onto her knees, falling into a soft mattress.

And she cried.

"Please."

[Nascent]

"Okay."

For a second, when her voice echoed in his head, Mephisto wondered if he was losing his mind. It was something he'd always wondered about, quietly, far in the darkest recesses of his thoughts. How long could one stay alive, see the world change all around them, watch the cycle of birth, life, and death play out while remaining unchanged, untouched, unmarred and unbroken... without breaking in another fashion? People, Mephisto had learned long ago, were fragile things. They clung to comfort, to reassurance, to routine, finding in those things the illusion of continuance, of a continuity that even while they knew was ultimately false they embraced anyway. Anything to drive away the specter of the reaper.

But there were worse things than death... he had seen that, too. Burdens to great for a mind to bear. Pain too deep, loss too great, fear too strong. And in those moments of impossible weakness the mind reached out for relief in any way it could... and in those cases where vice and addiction failed, where devotion and regimented duty couldn't fill the void, where nothing in heaven or earth could offer succor, the mind became so very much like a dying star. It would explode, or else collapse in on itself. People didn't go mad because they'd been cursed -- the curse of living on became worse than madness, and the mind withdrew into itself.

And he had wanted for so long to believe he wasn't 'people'. Because he feared that he was.

Had he... had he finally stepped over that line? All his life he'd kept busy, some plan or scheme, some idea or deception, something, anything to avoid duldrum, to escape those moments of quiet contemplation where the only thoughts were memories and the only contemplation that of himself. How "great" Mephistopheles feared the dark, a grand irony if ever there was one... how he feared the darkness he saw within himself.

And then she came into his life -- change, radical, violent, illuminating change, forcing him to question everything, rearranging his priorities from the top of the list down. Belle had consistently challenged everything he had ever thought he knew, expanded his world and, sometimes through sheer force of will, taken his gaze off of himself and his web. If she had not... then one day the threads were guaranteed to snap and unfurl, becoming a noose around his neck. A fate worse than death.

Just another mad devil for mankind to dispose. She had seen it long before he had even given name to that deepest of fears. The fear he would destroy himself.

It had been a natural transition, really, to devote himself to her, even to the point of the absurd. Perhaps at the outset it had just been a thirst for distraction, the thrill of finding a diversion like no other. Maybe she had always seen in him that creeping dark fear that he tried so very hard to deny, even to himself; she had always known him better than he knew himself, so it was certainly possible. But as she in turn attracted and rebuffed him, as he experienced what it was to endure her honest reproach and scrutiny, forcing him to peel away his own layers as he sought to understand her... somewhere, somehow, something changed. There had always been attraction, from that first moment he saw her in the chapel, flower petals raining down in heavy clouds around them, her gloriously naked and unafraid to be so. But the more of him she chipped away, the more poisonous armor Mephisto was forced to shed...

... the more he realized just how much he needed her in his life. Not lust. Not desire. They were there, but something else grew to consume even those strong feelings. Deep down he feared her, the grasp she had on his life, his very being... but what scared him more was her absence, the idea of never seeing her again. Of losing that increasingly vital connection.

Of being alone in the world with the one person he truly couldn't stand.

Himself.

And the further she pushed him from himself the more he needed her. To pin down exactly when it became love would be like asking for the moment when the tides change. It was gradual. It snuck up on him. But once it was there he couldn't deny it. Still, old patterns stubbornly persisted -- even to the very day of their reunion, and perhaps afterward. Time alone would tell if he ever truly shed himself and learned to embrace her. He had been so, so close...

And then lost it. And then buried his chances of recovery still deeper. And only at the very last second, when everything seemed impossible, when he was convinced that his truest nightmare was about to begin, did Mephisto hear her voice. The one thing he most desperately wanted, held out to him.

His mind fought him. In that endless moment when he heard her a war raged within, split-seconds triggering tempests within the ancient devil. Madness or hope... madness or hope?

Madness.

Hope.

And as he felt an inescapable pull come with her voice, like what he imagined falling into a black hole would be like, a single chilling thought echoed in his skull.

Maybe they're the same thing.

And in the next instant, darkness claimed him. And he embraced it.

It felt like he fell through the dark for an impossible time, plummeting into an abyss without end at speeds without limit. Paralyzed, petrified, the darkness burned and seared the uttermost core of his being like it was raking his soul over hot coals. It bit deep like a thousand daggers of ice driven into body and mind. Without voice it scorned him, without words it whispered nameless and formless terrors to him. Without fingers it picked him apart, piece by infinitesimal piece, and threw him away. And with jaws of pure oblivion it devoured him thoroughly. In this moment, in this endless moment, death danced all around him, watching but not touching, providing no release and no hope of escape. He tried to scream, to let the nightmarish terror and anguish escape in some way, the only one that presented itself, and was denied.

There was no sound here.

No light here.

Even the darkness wasn't right in this place.

Only pain.

Only torture.

He would be sacrificed for his sins, endlessly sacrificed.

For an object to achieve the speed of light, it requires infinite energy in infinite supply. Even for a single moment. The only escape of this rule is to bend reality itself, to somehow establish a loophole by which either the accelerating object or the space around it is treated differently than physics normally allows. Even under such cases, the energy needed to create such a bypass under any method is extreme. And due to the laws of relativity, objects approaching the speed of light experience time dilation -- relatively speaking, the universe moves radically slower as the accelerated object moves faster. It is also stretched, theoretically, into an ever longer chain of atoms which are, themselves, stretched beyond what reason and sanity would seem to allow. This creates a three-fold boundary to practical space travel that science grappled with for a very, very long time.

For a space ship, these rules are obstacles. For a living person, without protection, the forces needed to achieve FTL are death in no uncertain terms.

For an unnatural, nearly immortal being it was a re-imagining of hell. From the standpoint of the objective universe Mephisto's torture only lasted the scant picoseconds it took to be warped from Cancer to on board Belle's ship, in quite nearly the very instant the FTL drive was engaged. For the devil, however, it was time almost without limit. The only reason he didn't die instantaneously was because his physical body was in a state other than conventional matter at the time.

And the only reason he didn't die the moment he arrived had more to do with straight-up dumb luck than anything else.

Mephisto didn't transition back into reality with some resounding thunder crack or flash of light. No light could've escaped the realm between existence and oblivion that Belle, impossibly, had pulled him out of. Darkness, of a warmer and less absolute variety than the timeless prison, greeted him when at last his eyes bolted open, the terrors of an untold darkness still written large across his horrified gaze. His body felt every sensation with terrifying intensity -- the soft thrum of the engines was an earthquake, the brush of clothing against his skin was sandpaper on a raw wound, the temperature controlled air that filled his lungs pressed down on him like a sea and made him feel like he was drowning in burning ice. Everything was blindingly bright if it had the slightest illumination, and shadows scraped and clawed at his eyes with thousands of needle-like talons. For the first few moments his body didn't even fully exist, little more than an unseen phantom overlaid on the canvas of reality. Slowly, veeeeeeery slowly, the rest of him caught up, bringing new fullness to every horrible sensation until, in one merciful moment, everything was suddenly whole again... and normal reality, alien as it now seemed, began to reassert itself for the scarred devil.

He lay there on the hard floor, shivering, trembling, weaker than a newborn babe and unable to cry out.

But he'd heard her. In the midst of it all he'd heard her in his mind, the words of her voice stretched over the experiential timeframe of thousands upon thousands of years. He had clung to those words, to each stretched sound and syllable, the whole time of his nightmare... literally hanging on every word she'd said. And as he drew breath -- real air, that didn't scorch the very fabric of his mind -- an unspoken voice, so soft and weak that even a whisper would be loud by comparison, would reach her mind.

~No gods here . . .  just me.~

~. . . Just barely.~

[Painterlee]

In the dark, she saw his shadows, slumped at the back of the compartment. His words, if they could be called that, drew a shocked, almost disgusted expression from the woman, that after all that, that was all he could manage. A stifled laugh, sounding almost like she was holding back tears instead, not in the slightest bit amused. Her eyes narrowed at him for a second "You're always so grateful." She sat back in her chair, and turned to face the passing lights. She felt like throwing in something about that, no matter how horrible the trip to make it here had been, none of that was on her. That was his fault. But he didn't exactly seem in the mind to listen. She sighed and pressed her head again her hands, leaning against the console. She didn't want to be wrong about letting him here. She didn't need his self-pity. He was alive. And she had made the choice that she had wanted him here, even if, on the outset, it didn't sound like he greatly cared. Against everything, his blindness, his deafness, his abandoning her to peruse something so obviously pointless. She had made what threatened to be the human mistake.

"Don't make me regret this." Her voice trailed, not even realizing she'd said it aloud, as she let the Universe past them by. This was it now, this was all she had. “Please don't make me regret this.” He was a fool, but so was she, and the still body in the back told her as much, wallowing in darkness, contemplated in sorrow. But she did regret it. She already regretted it. His presence made her so angry, and she had every right to be angry at him, but there was no point, in a hull this small. She wanted to make him hers all over again, and she wanted him to do the same with her.

Exiting FTL in 10 seconds.

The ships automated voice broke the silence, aggravating Belle more than was necessary. In the light of everything, she had become tender, sore, an open wound to everything. Nothing was brushing her right. She was confused and annoyed. The countdown ended, and the ship's loud purring quieted as the FTL Engine shut down, and instantly began to re-charge. The Universe came clear before them. Entering Sector Alpha. Belle sighed. Libra was the nearest port of call, and the large mass of a space-station loomed in the distance. While Belle preferred Space Stations to planets, did she really want to dock so quickly? That made her much to easy to track. It wasn't like she had an idea of where she was, where she was going, what she was doing other than running, and now she had Mephisto to worry about.

He certainly wasn't in an position to dock anywhere. This was already going horribly wrong, and she hadn't even encountered Thanatos yet. Once again, her head hit the console. She just wanted to curl up and forget everything. Thanatos, Mephisto, everything. Maybe she had expected too much of the devil, assumed too much. That he was ready for her at all. Ready for her and every crazy truck of baggage she had. All her life she'd been alone aside from the first few months they had spent together so many, many years ago. Maybe, it wasn't him. Maybe she wasn't ready. Belle wasn't the kind of person you pinned falling in love, and really, it had only been a day of realizing that truth. Would she ever be 'ready', in the conventional sense? Probably not. She was rejecting it violently, and she needed to be constantly reminded that he was willing to reciprocate until she was sure in her own mind.

Right now, he was everything other than someone who loved her. He was lonely, a nuisance, a freeloader. And she was just weak, human, and stupid.

[Nascent]

Mephisto didn't respond to her jab about his gratitude as he did his best to shake off the trauma from "moments" before. She had every right to be furious with him, and he had no right to question it.

"I'll try not to." He said meekly, slowly trying to pull himself upright. It wasn't working. All he managed was to slump into a sitting position... strangely familiar, that. Once more he was in her home, her refuge, a guest not truly welcome but tolerated anyway. More than he deserved, clearly. It felt like somewhere in the experience of the jump he had simply lost the ability to be proud... and maybe that was good.

"... I came to apologize. I know I don't have the right to expect anything from you, not after acting the way I did at such a horrible moment in your life." He rubbed his throat and coughed -- everything hurt, everything stung, and he wasn't fully convinced that all the pieces of him had actually made it. Realistically, none of that mattered all that much; if she shunted him out an airlock right now it would be more than he deserved. "You'd just lost everything, and I stupidly tried to fix it when it couldn't be fixed. I let things grab my attention when I should have been there for you."

He paused, drawing in much-needed breath. "You gave me a soul and then lost a home. You paid an impossible price twice over... and I was too preoccupied to see that I was only making it worse."

"I was wrong. And I know I still am. And asking you to make me right again isn't fair either. I've hurt you too much to deserve that."

"Belle, I'm sorry."

[Painterlee]

In the reflection of the fake glass, an illusion, she watched him, and she listened. She was a fool, truly. There was no way she could ever escape him, and she didn't know if he quite realized the extent of that small, but infinite, insanity. It would never matter how angry he made her. Constrained and tense, her hunting suit strangled her, changing back into what she had been wearing previously, forgoing the shorts completely, letting her body sit as it should, rather than crushed in against tight clothes made for anything but being hunched over a ship's controls. This was her ship, and she was on no mission like before. It would be the little freedoms that made her feel safe. Pulling off the heels, she placed them to the side of the chair.

"Belle, I'm sorry."

There was a pause, and the engine's rumble seemed to get just a little more intense, as Belle guided the ship away from the direct line of Libra, and out into deeper space. For now, she wanted to leave civilization be. She needed a few moments with the stars, a few moments to wait, and think. An hour must have passed as space flew by outside. Belle didn't reply, as if some kind of automaton, programmed to do a job before she could complete their interaction. She wanted to put some distance between anything clearly marked, understandably. The stress could be felt, it was tangible in the air. But as the hour went on, her anger began to wane, calming down best she could. The Universe was considered almost infinite, and sometimes, Belle simply relied on the Laws of Thermodynamics to calm herself. She would, given time, return to neutral. This expanse helped her to remember that.

Eventually, she let go of the controls, and she pressed a button to the side of the steering boom-arms. "Intelligent Auto Pilot activate. 5 hour course. Anti-Radar Shields up." IAP Activated. Shields up and stable. Oxygen at 99 percent, FTL at 50 percent. The ship responded, and Belle stretched, arms pressing against the roof of the cockpit. Driving in deep space was mind-numbing. Belle pressed her hands to her face, rubbing her eyes with her palms, sighing. "I won't deny your...blindness, Mephisto. Even with you, I cannot ignore what is true. Even after..." She took a moment, leaning back in her chair. "...even after last night, you still didn't realize all I wanted, needed, was you. Not anything you owned, not anything you had gotten. Just you, simply." Again, she paused, after a moment, pulling back a compartment under the console, reaching inside and pulling out what appeared to be a cup of instant noodles. Then the chair spun around, Belle sitting, legs crossed across the chair, as if she were on the floor, the belts of the suspender pulled, leaving a shadow where the four straps pressed into her thighs, his shirt draped over her, clearly too big. It didn't matter. She wanted to see if he followed at least some male impulses she could live with. Embrace, even.

Pressing of tight fabric against soft skin, where instead it could be his hands. She wore his shirt, hiding her, but a whispering of promise. I. Belong. To you.

 Holding out a hand, the scene played out, ever familiar. A bright-blue orb, pulled from existence. "I knew that I had failed very quickly." The words came in reference to his soul. "I still couldn't use these." It floated like a beckon across the relatively small space towards the hurting devil. She pulled a string from the base of the pot, and a hissing sound came, steam rising as she tore off the lid, taking the two chop sticks on the side of the cup. It had been almost three hours since they both had breakfast, and yet, everything that had happened just made her hungry. "Still have to eat to live." She smiled, somber, before she started on the, somewhat bland, noodles. Not that it mattered, not that she minded. For a while she didn't speak, just ate. The stress had taken in out of her, and it continued to eat away at her, clearly. Finished, she paused, before reaching over, shirt being pulled up to spy the belt resting at her waist, she put the now empty container into a separate box. Sitting back down, she willed the two containers back into the space below the panel, and the 'door' shut behind them. "Don't worry about losing me a home." Her eyes gazed into his. "You know I've never had one."

No matter what, she couldn't help, and chuckled, softly. "You know, you could do anything to me, and it'd never change how I felt. I guess that's why I get so angry at you. I don't hate you, I'm afraid of what's been." Those icy-eyes dimmed. "Afraid that you might use that against me, because you could, easily. Strip me of my use, dump me somewhere, beat me, leave me as good as dead, and I'd..." She had to pause, control what she felt. "I'd never feel any differently about you." Both her hands cradled together in her lap. Her shoulders fell low. Her hair fell in front of her face and she brushed it behind her ear just at quickly. He made her feel what people feel, pushed her senses to capacity. They were alone, but she was not alone. Then, it could be agreed, that to say they were alone, was not both a poor choice of words, but simply a lie.

[Nascent]

For a time, as they drifted further and further from the common lanes of space travel, the silence pressed on him. Like a child his first instinct was to think she was punishing him... but the silence wore on, and so did his thoughts. They had been and done so much in the last twenty four hours, each had their worlds turned upside-down, righted, and then upended once more. They had been painfully close and then painfully distant... after a while, he realized, that in its own way the silence was soothing. No pursuits. No plans. Even the anguished ache in his chest and head, more a symptom of heart than of body, dulled just a fraction. And not a soul anywhere within his ability to sense. Quiet... like he'd never known before. Ever. The sheer newness of it struck him, even as he wordlessly awaited her judgements of him. Judgements, he knew, that would be well deserved.

When the silence at last broke she spoke the truth he'd only realized at painful length. 'Just you, simply.' The irony struck him that, in truth, that was all he wanted, too, had from the moment he'd seen her round that corner and step back into his tangled mess of a life. Somehow, he'd thought he needed to earn that, to somehow prove that her faith in him wasn't as misplaced as it had surely seemed in a bygone age. Like a boy fumbling through a first date he'd tried to impress her with gifts and play the hero at the first sign of trouble, perhaps out of shame at the thought of how he'd once been... and then, in absurd irony, more-so when he'd clearly disappointed her. It was pathetic, and she knew it. A peacock displaying his plumage -- a thespian on the stage. Pretense and vain attempts to woo. All rubbish.

They should have been past all that. He should have been past all that. And for a precious sliver of time the night before, it seemed as though he had been.

It was time to set such things aside.

As the soul floated over to him he took it in one hand, eves still glued on her. It was an odd 'dinner date', certainly, a stark contrast from breakfast... and, in hindsight, a welcome and authentic one. As she ate so did he, the soul's vitality warming Mephisto from within not unlike hot soup or tea -- he hadn't realized just how cold he was until he'd swallowed it, the merciless chill of that terrible non-space still lingering within his being. His own soul, reacting and absorbing it, sent the renewed strength coursing through him in soothing waves. He had badly needed that.

When she mentioned never having a home, he almost cringed. He couldn't tell how much truth there was to those words -- he still remembered how numb she'd been after receiving the Commissioner's news, and how she'd reacted when he'd utterly missed the vital moment. Mephisto knew what it was to be a vagrant, certainly; those who could outlive the common ken of mortals by dozens of lifetimes or more didn't really have the option of putting down roots, at least not anywhere nice. Still... still, Cancer had meant something to her. Those people had meant something to her. They likely still did -- he'd noticed a conspicuous book earlier, during the hour-long silence, that would have indeed confirmed his suspicions had he the brass to have opened it.

Belle's soft chuckle brought just a touch of surprise to his expression... and what she said, even more-so. Did she... was all of that really true?? For a long moment all he could do was stare, disbelieving, her words running through his mind on a loop.

M U S I C . . .

'You could do anything to me...'

'I'm afraid of what's been.'

'...Because you could, easily.'

'I'd never feel any differently about you.'

Slowly, he stood. Walked over. Knelled in front of her. Placed his hands over hers and looked up into her eyes.

"...Then that makes two of us."

And it was true, utterly true. The two of them had already done frightful and terrible things to one another, both deliberately and through either careless disregard or misguided good intentions. The burden of his death weighed on her; the burden of his life weighed on him. In all truth, weren't they both equally guilty and worthy of the others' condemnation? She had been his betrayer and murderer, while he had been every selfish thing she had ever fought against ad nauseum. They both had the right to retaliate, to use or destroy the other utterly. Neither had the will to do so. It was just the opposite.

At last, Mephisto was really beginning to understand. It wasn't their differences that had been driving them apart. It was their similarities plus his ignorance. And now it all seemed to be so utterly clear... how had he not seen it before?? Again, himself. So wrapped up in himself. Even his attempted devotion to her had been choked by it.

No more, he resolved. No more.

The foolish man's hand reached up to her, running through her hair from her forehead to the level of her ear, a tender caress without urgency. He didn't speak -- for now enough had been said, and words would only complicate what really needed to be expressed. For the longest time he just lingered there, eyes exploring every incredible curve and angle of her face, the way those amazing eyes were framed, the way her hair fell and the ways it accentuated her features. The more he looked, the more he saw... and the more he wanted to see. She was beautiful, that was a given... but there was more, so much more to be found there than just physical beauty. She was utterly unique in all the cosmos... and for the moment, Mephisto was content to be fully entranced by that sole fact.

His hand in her hair traced downward, fingers softly gliding over the edge of her ear, the curve of her cheek, contour of her neck, slope of her shoulder, and on down the length of her arm until he gently took her hand in his, placing a lingering kiss on the back of it. It was a gentleman's kiss, almost a greeting...

...as though trying to make a first impression. As though trying to start over.

Rising somewhat, his hands still on hers, he leaned in and let their foreheads rest together, nose tips almost touching. Mephisto's eyes gazed into hers, not searching for clues or bearing any intent, merely drinking in the color, the pattern, the way that the starlight the view screen bounced into the cabin reflected therein. There was no haste or lust in his advances, nor was it necessarily 'romance' or 'seduction' in the more common senses. Now, away from everything, they could take their time. No meetings, no running, no preoccupations.

They were each others'. It was, finally, just as simple as that.

[Painterlee]

She didn't know what to say. There wasn't anything to be said. Her eyes held what could only be described as wonder, surprise without the shocking discomfort. Looking back at him, they were blue and red, ice and fire, a Y and X. Feeling his hand through her hair, lips on her skin, as he knelt, her pupils grew large. Unlike him, she was somewhat human, and though she saw in him that sense of more he saw in her, that feeling of a marvel, it was inescapable, the burning, twisting in the pit of her stomach, as the cross on her neck shot heat through her body. But she had the willingness to be slow. In his eyes, the stress of her overall situation almost dissipated. She would linger there, the pressure of the short day on her chest alleviated.

Eventually, she closed her eyes with an extended breath, holding her head forward as so their noses met, before falling slowly from her position on the chair. Her legs wrapped around his waist, arms holding at his neck, her face buried into his shoulder, just wanted to hold herself against another. Again, everything smelt of him. In turn, her hands tangled into his hair, feeling his chest push against hers as they breathed. There was silence. "Kneeling doesn't suit you." Her voice came, calm, almost a stab at his words previously, that guilt didn't suit her. Just a reminder of what they did to each other without realizing. Maybe, this time, she would let her explosion be a quiet one, eased into a critical mass, with kisses and attention needed, rather than forced, just because they knew how to melt down. For a moment, her grip held him tighter, before she pulled away slightly. Hands at his jaw, her hips pressing more to counterbalance. For a while, like him, she got lost in crimson eyes, both her hands moved to brush his hair away from both sides of his face.

For a moment, she scanned his features, and, in the end, she let herself go, gave in to the human heart.

Her lips pressed against his, in a moment not so much fueled by desire as sentiment, her arms moving back to support her weight, mostly suspended from him, and her legs pulled her closer. They were hidden, hidden like they hadn't been back on Cancer, in the void where there was nothing to find, and nothing to hide. The whole ceiling of the ships cabin began to reflect the stars above them. Usually, she switched between the front view and the panorama as needed. Though showy, it was what she wanted. To gaze at the two things she loved most. The stars, and all their promises, and Mephisto. She kissed him and she kissed him, genuinely, without a greedy hunger, but a necessary longing.

A laugh emitted from her throat, and she broke their kiss with a smile, laughing still. Resting her temple against his again, it was like she was human. A young, spirited one, with hope for the future she might build with him, ever aware of the one they might not even have. Placing a playful kiss on his lips again, her eyes flashed upwards momentarily. "I've never made love on a space cruiser before." Her words came amorously, amused, like it had never occurred to her before. Her eyes met his, biting her lip, once again like that young, spirit human. Someone she might have been. "If you want, we can..." In truth, and in honesty, Belle had only really 'made love' once before, with him. Every other time it was just sex. But she loved him, and she cared about him, so surely the more loving term, no matter how strange it felt for her to say was correct. There was a purposeful pause, her eyes deepened their gaze. "Unless, you'd rather not." A concept she had never voiced before, a choice in the matter.

And she was willing to make whatever compromise with him. Even if it meant forgoing what she wanted. She wanted what he could give her. But she didn't need it. Only him. After how he had been, she didn't know if he just wanted to rest. If so, she would let him.

[Nascent]

"As though I could ever not desire you." Came the devil's response, hands finding their way into her hair and running through it with deliberate slowness, as though savoring every moment. Somewhere in his mind he knew, felt really, the trauma and terror of the spaceless void... but no matter how his body ached and protested, it meant nothing. He had just felt like unto a thousand years apart from everything, with only the soundless echo of her pleading words ringing in his soul to latch onto.

Like hell he wanted to rest; what he wanted was to lose himself in her until the cold ache of that memory fizzled out of his being.

But there was no rush -- this wasn't about male need, not entirely. As the clothes began to come off, a silver and black-sapphire necklace clattering down out of his pocket, what he sought wasn't so much stimulation or excitement... just to touch her, be touched in return, and let that connection heat up slowly.

And it did.

Time quickly lost all meaning, the two ageless lovers losing themselves in each others' embrace and the pinpricks of starlight. The night before had been a frenzied, wild dance of passion and rapture... this, by contrast, was a waltz, slow and refined yet, in its own way, just as thrilling. He made sure to trace every curve of her body, feel and touch everything, not just the pleasure zones. For a while in fact the devil simply massaged her, easing sore muscles and doing his utmost to rid her of the stress he had so recklessly contributed to. It gave him another chance to just admire her, in all her glory. Starlight suited her skin remarkably well, he realized.




------------------------------




Strangely, sleep fled Mephisto, even long after they had both at length exhausted themselves in their passion. He was tired, a very good, well-spent sort of tired... but he also couldn't will himself to sleep. Maybe it was the lack of 'background noise' -- there had always been the cacaphony of human emotions at the edge of his senses, and now for the first time ever there wasn't. The starlight was soothing, and he enjoyed the simple absence of distraction. It was all so far away now... everything that had happened, everything that would happen, was far away, and he wished it would stay so for a long, long time.

He didn't want to think about Thanatos. He didn't want to think about that damn puzzle skull, an obvious message for, specifically, him. He didn't want to think about the one who sent it. Even if it was who he thought it was behind it -- impossible as that seemed -- was it really so critical? Not at all. There was only so much point in worrying over things he didn't know, things far away -- she was right here, with him, his arms wrapped around her and body pressed into his as they lay together. The rest of the cosmos didn't have the same importance. All those things vying for his attention were distant stars, and for now Mephisto was content to let them burn far, far away from him and just bask in the distance.

But they were still out there. And some part of him hated them for that simple fact.

Turning his gaze away from the ceiling, he placed a soft kiss on the shoulder of the most amazing woman he had ever encountered... and held her just a little bit tighter. He didn't want this to end. If this moment could last for eternity he would be content. He hated that it couldn't. That, by the sheer necessity of having only so much food, oxygen, and fuel on board, they would have to set a course.

This moment would have to end. And he reviled that idea, even as he forced himself to accept it.

Not now, though. For now he held her. For now he closed his eyes and just breathed in her scent. For now, the stars sung down on them in silence.

For now, they were untouchable.

For now.

[Painterlee]

In the hours that passed, she really did just let herself go, under his kisses and touches her body sang and moved against him. She let everything he did to her pull her down, drown out every nasty emotion until she was left only with her bliss, her pleasure, and her love. The grace and majesty of a four-poster bed discarded for a mattress, and a blanket. But they had swapped out the darkness for stars.

Once again he managed to pull her voice from her throat as if he'd spent those thousands of years away learning how to do so, learning to master her body down to the fine tuned motors of her nerves. He picked a key, and made her sing for him.

At her heights, she just gazed out into the void of space, wondering how such things could be felt in such a small space. And she would return all of his efforts in kind. For all the energy in the stars, all the brightness in the galaxies, they were not this.

Her toes would curl and her knuckles go white, as he took his time on her, making the most of his internal silence. Simmering her to her critical mass, and he would make her melt down. Over and over, until she could not tell the stars in the sky from the ones burning in her brain, and she swayed with the beat of the universe.

She held him, always wanting to make sure that she was still alive, and that this given moment of bliss and aliveness was not just some will of her mind as she died. All she wanted, all she needed. Him. It didn't matter, the whens, there wheres, the hows, the whys. He, in himself, had become enough.  And, if he payed enough attention to his other only, read her like a man should, he would find that her tattoos were more than marks, more than just an irreversible symbol of her ties, her love, her bond, to him. They were her overdrive. Under his touch, his kiss, they would melt her down before him, with fires to rival that of the largest star.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Belle had not slept either.

Her body wanted her to, but not more than she wanted to stretch this time out with him, the peace of a soft satisfaction. His kiss against her shoulder made her whole body tremble under him. The littlest but loudest sign of affection. She turned over with a contented hum, her head pressed against his chest, listening to his beating heart. Here lay two beings powerful enough to destroy each other in a second, and instead they loved with more passion than anyone would think sane for the things that they were. So stagnant in their feelings towards anything else that the image of them like this was impossible and possibly humorous. Mephisto would feel her smiling, her cheeks pressing against his skin. "I don't know how you keep managing to do this to me." The voice came with the slow tone of the morning. "Not that I'm complaining." Very rarely in her life, and through some fault of her own, had Belle ever fooled with a man who could really make her feel anything notable. The majority of the meetings that hit her spot were held by the very same man who's heart rung in her head.


Like him, she would not complain if somehow they could spend the rest of forever this way. A mess. Even just in the tone of his breathing, she loved the sound of his voice. Never more so than when he said her name. She let him pull her closer, breathing him in as he breathed in her. Eventually though, she did sit up from him, pulling her blanket, the excuse for a cover, over her, as she gazed out into the stars. As the moments passed she just left him in the relaxed, contented silence. Pulling her knees up, she rested her head. "I wish I could have shared all of this with you a long time ago." Her voice finally trailed through the semi-darkness, brushing her not-so-messy hair out of her face, over a shoulder. Giving a pause, she looked over her shoulder at the red-eyed devil. Forever, she would be happy just to look at him, watch him breathing. The knowledge that they could both be killed, that, while immortal, they were not infinite. Her eyes turned back towards the stars, the crosses on her neck on show, the curve of her back exposed.

Back here, she felt hidden, safe. With him now it felt shared. Now he had made himself a mark in her memories of this place, it felt more like a home. This was their escape from everything. The only place they really only had each other. She spied the dropped necklace from behind the discarded clothes. A smile, quickly, before she reached over the short distance, and admired it in her hands. It carried a weight with it now, and it's silver no longer bit her skin like it had. She showed it somewhat subtly to Mephisto, eyeing him, calmly, relaxed, back over her shoulder. And she asked him a favor. "Could you...?"

[Nascent]

"Certainly."

He didn't mind as he felt the fiery touch of the silver against his skin, pushing thoughts of pain aside as the thin chain burned its mark into his fingertips. The unpleasantness would pass in time, and like never before he found himself able to bend his full concentration onto one thing. He draped the necklace across her, carefully brushing her beautiful length of hair to one side. He could see the marks now, more clearly than ever before... one seemed to glow, radiating just faintly of colors without names -- a sight so strange he was at first convinced he had imagined it. That light was by no means natural... he almost felt it more than saw it.

The clasp fitted itself where it was meant to, the token of his unreserved affection for her once more around her neck. His fingers steamed from where they had touched the glittering metal, skin red and sore as though he'd just seared himself on a white-hot kitchen pan. The devil ignored it... and, out of equal parts curiosity and affection, planted a brief kiss on the back of her neck just above the markings.

Oh yes, there was power there. In no small amount. It jolted him slightly, like a shock of static electricity when he got close. The red-haired man stared at the 'tattoos' with earnest interest and just the slightest hint of concern... he couldn't help but wonder.

"...You don't have to answer if you don't want." He began, tentatively. "I'll certainly respect your privacy if you wish it. But... how did you get these? What are they exactly?"