no such thing as an escape

[Cerverous]

with the estate destroyed Cerverous decided to take up residence in one of the more high class suites at the hotel, though it had been destroyed with the rest of the city. he had found himself standing next to its ruins one day watching as his power over reality recreated it flawlessly. the task had weakened his mind severely, and now he slept with the appearance of an outward peacefulness. inside however he was standing alone in a dark forest unable to even see beyond the trees most immediately next to him, and it was void of sound.

he began to walk but got no further than one step when his body burst into blood that instantely disappeared and reformed in a world of darkness with a very lackluster startled raising of a single eyebrow.

"come now" said the darkness "arent you glad to see-"
"no" Cerverous was already facing the other way and walking.

the air began to converge in a single spot and quickly formed a very demonic looking version of his sister. other than the face down to the abdomen she was more stone and scale than skin, eyes blacker than the air around he, she wore no clothes and stood with one hand on a cocked hip as the other played with the spine tail that wrapped around it, her rose red lips sat in a wicked smirk. "oh dont be that way"

she disappeared and reappeared with arms hung over his shoulders. she wrappe her arms around his neck and pulled in close, rubbing slowly against him, and whispered in his ear "you know i can give you everything you ever wanted"

he stood motionless at this for a very few seconds before a blade shot form the ground and ripped her in half followed quickly by a burst of black wind more forceful than an explosion that sent the remains reeling through the air only to reform into the demon.

"now that wasnt very nice of you" she pouted
"fuck off, bitch" was his response as he was already walking away again "why dont you go get your own form rather than slutting up my sisters body"

[Cerverous]

The Abyssal smiled at this and burst into the darkness. what returned was not the same thing. directly in Cerverous' path appeared, from the darkness, his sister, no scales, no demon. she was naked and shivering curled up in a ball on the floor. he caught his breath, frozen and two deep purple tear soaked eye turned up to him and she whimpered. her hand came shakily out from around her reached slowly up to him. "h-help me.. Luke. please-"

he stood with white knuckles staring down at her and shaking, what from could not be told. his own hand, the right, wrapped in tape, still shaking and just as slowly, reached for hers. when he took her she gave him a soft smile which soon vanished just as the tape and sleeve on him arm exploded away to reveal a solid black claw up the the shoulder. before the debris even fully cleared his arm the color had already spread to her and she was screaming in extreme pain. a moment later her arm crumbled away entirely into dust and she lay there panting and staring up at him in horror. he stared down at her in hatred. he popped the fingers of his hand open and small streams of darkness shot around her neck then jerked her up to his hand. she grunted, and yelped appropriately even as he lifted her to his eye height, her feet hanging limp beneath her as his gripped tightened so hard you could hear it rip the soft flesh beneath and through clenched teeth he said. "you. bitch!! fuck you!!!"

she grunted again and tried uselessly to escape and struggle with her one hand "Lu-. p-plea- i can- b. breath-" it was but a choked off croak as his grip boar even harder "shut up." up into the air above his head she went "shut up" his body caught ablaze in a white fire "shut up!!" the flame erupted into a pillar the consumed both of them and everything in both vertical directions "SHUT UUUUUUUUUU-!!!!!"

the scene was destroyed and he stood screaming in room of the hotel that he had remade. a black energy was spreading from him as he did. tentacles, spawned from his body, stabbed into everything they could find, the world cracked around him, and then the explosion. it came, blacker than the night sky and destroyed the building from ceiling to floor. he fell, with the remains, from the second to top floor, and hit the ground with all possible force beneath the rubble and unconscious.

[Xiomara]

Xiomara had been wandering the park like a lost child when the place disappeared and was replaced with another horrific scene. Her breathing became ragged and her hands reached up to clutch at her head, dropping to her knees. "Stop.. stop... stop...." Rocking back and forth she tried to close her eyes against what she saw, Cerverous held his sister aloft in the air, her feet kicked and he screamed with murderous rage. Each panted breath only made the scene more vivid through his eyes, she knew this was happening because it had happened once before. Struggling to her feet she walked blindly, though somehow able to sense where the man was from the darkness they shared. Was it the Abyssal that was leading her to him? She hated that creature more than anything, hated it for taunting her on the nights she couldn't stay awake, dangling something she knew she would never have.

Then the sight broke and she was snapped back to her own sight, seeing that she stood near a pile of rubble, the cloud of dust signified that the building had just collapsed. Coughing, her lungs tried to clear themselves of the foreign matter and she searched frantically for signs of Cerverous. "God dammit you idiot! Now I have to save you? Why couldn't you just leave me the hell enough alone!" She shouted at the debris, knowing she couldn't turn her back on the man. The stripes of darkness littered her body and from around her feet a pool of darkness came to life, she'd pay the price of using the Abyssal's gift later. The thought made her skin crawl but she got to work, moving large chunks out of the way, crushing others with the tentacles that slid from her shadow and her arms, knowing exactly where to dig until they found and hoisted Cerverous out of the wreckage. Gently she laid him down on the ground and promptly began to check for vital signs and broken bones. "Wake up old man... If I can't die, then neither can you. WAKE UP!"

[Cerverous]

there was no response from for a good minute before his eyes suddenly shot open, bringing a wave of black wind with it that cleared the smoke and dust indefinitely. "Xio...!" he croaked through broken ribs and a cracked jaw line. along with a shattered right foot and one of the bones in his let forearm protruded from the flesh. 'a slew of minor injuries' he would say. "what? how?" he looked around frantically and, seeing where he was, relaxed slightly. "fan-fucking!-tastic"

[Xiomara]

That's still my name... Do you have to break everything you come into contact with?" Smiled slightly, her face paling at the state he was in, but she'd seen him in worse. "Can you move at all? I'd like to get you out of the rubble before attempting to save your mangled ass." Light with her mood despite the situation she began to shift Cerverous' body, mindful of a building having fallen on top of him. Before she would help move him out of the rubble she grabbed his left arm and pulled the already broken bones; snapping them back into place. The sound made her cringe but it was better than seeing it jutting out of his skin.

[Cerverous]

"it comes with the job" with his head laid back he looked up at the sky before his eyes slid to her "no need." a spiral of dark energy formed around them at the floor. after a bit of charging, it shot out in a shock-wave, dispersing the ruble as if it were a fan to balled up paper. this was followed immediately by a shield orb around them that shot out for a follow-up hit. "hah! ah-" this and a jerk was his reaction to her pulling the bone back into his arm. "dam girl. be gentle. im not that invincible" inside his arm the spilled blood was casing the entirety of the wound and quick-repairing it.

[Xiomara]

"Stop being such a baby, you can handle more than this pain." Shook her head with a roll of her eyes and sat back to watch him heal. The dark aura he exuded no longer freaked her out, she had come to terms with this along with everything else a long time ago. Though she did have to wonder....."Cerverous, what happened? Why did you level the entire building?! You normally don't do such a thing unless...It was her, wasn't it?"

[Cerverous]

he stopped squirming and laid still, even pouted a little. "whats ur point? im not a baby" at her second statement he fell silent, no more pouting, a seriously distant and angry face was there instead "of course it was her. its always her. when isnt it her? that bitch"

[Xiomara]

Shook her head before helping him to his feet, messing up his hair affectionately before releasing him altogether. She'd just let him heal himself and not get in his way. The shadows around her subsided and the stripes upon her skin disappeared altogether. "Of course it was her... What did she want now?" Along her inspection of the area and the mess she'd created, she pulled the knife from her boot and sliced at her hair; intent on keeping it short and letting the stray strands waft away in the wind.

[Cerverous]

he sat up and laid a still taped right arm over its corresponding propped up knee. this inevitably caused him to face slightly toward her. he watched in silence as the strands of her hair cut hair flew away and his blood did its work to almost invisibly fix his body, speaking only when the hair was gone. "nothing. in particular really. just, ya know, The Abyssal being The Abyssal"

[Xiomara]

"Meaning she's back and torturing you even more with images of your sister....Just dandy.... I have to listen to the bitch gloat later tonight." Mumbled under her breath, already beginning to feel the pull of that dark and hideous place. Shivering she sheathed the knife so as not to cut herself and picked her way through the rubble. Smoothing out the short tresses she sighed and looked anywhere but at him. "Guess some things never change. And I guess you'll know that my suggestion is to launch another attack on her. Do Abyssals have souls? Maybe we can trap her in the athame....maybe not. That might not be such a good idea." The thought of having the Abyssal at such close proximity and with the easy access to her soul made her stomach quesy. Maybe they should talk about the weather.

[Cerverous]

"its not really that shes using my sister form her physical form but more that whatever shes working towards, its not good for anyone and no matter how hard i try i cant do anything to really stop her" he ported himself into a standing position and lifted a small pebble into the air. it floated around his hand and he played with it like a pet bee, intentionally looking away from her, mainly because she was looking away from him. "they do, but that would just make things worse. shed have a much easier time of breaking the dagger and its enchantment to escape here than she would those stopping her from leaving her world."

[Xiomara]

"There has to be some way to break away from all of this. I'd like to be able to sleep again." Shoved hands into her pockets turning to look at him and the pebble that floated around his hand. Head tilted to the side, eyes shadowed by her bangs. They became half-lidded while continuing to watch the rotation of the pebble, round and round it went. It was almost hypnotizing, and as she continued to watch it, the whites of her eyes began to turn black. Spreading out through the small veins until they devoured every inch of color, including that of her irises. When speaking next, the voice was slightly slurred though monotone, yet still her own. "Don't be such a downer, Luke. I could always take over the little tiger's body and work through her as well. Much has happened since you've both been separated, yet always connected."

[Cerverous]

"it seems your self superiority has finally come to bite you in the ass, bitch" the stone stopped its spin and he stepped around toward her, outstretching his arm and shooting the small black pebble at Xio like a bullet. just before it hit her square in the forehead all time stopped, and the world held a white shine to it. a thin mist seemed to descend from nowhere and cover everything, like someone holding a light over dry ice. the rock vibrated violently just before it finished its crushing advance and upon impact it hit not Xio but the black soul within, shattering and disappearing from physicality as if never there. the effect: The Abyssal's soul was torn out like a loose scab, nothing more than a loosely shaped black mass and the instability of his power causing Xio's soul to fall to the ground at her body's feet, donned in a simple dress of white . Next came his own soul. it melted out of position, took one step into a run and was on the black mass as if there the whole time. he wore nothing more than a pair of white jeans and the entirety of his right arm was uninterrupted black, stopping after the shoulder.

this arm was raised up and quickly found itself impaling the black soul through what could be perceived as her chest. the resulting bellow was hideous: both man and monster, male and female and everything in between, but one thing could be told from it. unlike many of The Abyssals previous acts, this one held true pain behind it. the soul exploded and the shrapnel became mist as it tried to disappear, to no avail. Cerverous brought his left hand flat to his chest then shot it down as he pulled the right up, crossed past the left, then back over his shoulder. As if he were playing puppet master this pulled The Abyssal together and then brought her down on a massive black spike that spawned from the ground just to catch her through the stomach. "you're fucked"

[Xiomara]

Xiomara tentatively grabbed at what would be her pounding head only it didn't feel quite as real as she thought it would. Raising her gaze she caught the open and lifeless eyes of her body, the pupils hideously widened and her mouth slack. It was all a hallucination, it had to be. She hadn't been out of her body since.... that night. "It's okay, its a dream. The Abyssal has you by the throat and is making you see this...." she murmured, her specter's hand shaking as it reached out to touch her own body. It went through it though not without shooting a bolt of recognition through her arm and causing the painful warmth to spread throughout her body. She hadn't noticed the fight yet and was only dimly aware that it was going on. The ghostly hand caught her attention and she brought it to her face, seeing through it and about to scream at the top of her lungs when Cerverous voice broke through the hazy fog of panic. Tearing her horrified gaze from her body's empty eyes she saw the Abyssal being tossed and jerked around like a puppet on a string.

Her own body's muscles spasmed in reaction to the creature's useless battle against Cerverous but there was no damage being done to her own self. It was hard to focus on Cerverous and her eyes turned slowly towards another presence just behind the Abyssal which caused her to reach for the Athame, forgetting that in this form she would be drawn in. Her ghostly fingers touched the blade and she yelped at being cut. Actual blood poured from her fingers, raw and red and moving towards the blade sheathed at her ankle. "Cerverous! Put me back in my body!" Mackie was approaching, the Obeahman is bigger than she remembers. His legs seem longer, and there are more bends to his back. It's like seeing him through a fun-house mirror, elongated and unnatural and coming straight for her. Mackie had come with the Abyssal's arrival, drawing on her power then feeding on Xiomara's fear to keep him in this world while the Abyssal had her ass handed to her. "Put me back, put me back....."