The Universe's Mixer

"I hurt people."

"He hurts people more."

"Darling, you need more than that."

"Darling? You have changed."

"Have I?"

"Please. If not for me, and the others, for him. I have shown you that he needs help."

The crone stared into the small slim box, watching the images play again. The City had asked for her help, and it had done so at its own risk. Its body was very temporary, not meant for a long stay, and it was showing signs before the conversation was half way over. It wasn't meant to last long; the City had learned.

The City had also come prepared. How it had captured the images, she hadn't ask. She was not one to bother with tech; she knew it existed, knew how to use it in the basics, and that was all she needed to know. But, what she'd seen there was horrendous, even though she knew before a few nights ago, she would have enjoyed it so much more.

The techniques to aid had been twisted. What she understood. This man meant to heal had gone bad. She understood this as well. Or perhaps he'd always been bad - she didn't have all of his story. She'd need to get closer, and at the moment she didn't have time for that.

It wasn't until the City said the last bit that she'd felt the urge to get involved. Help. She knew she could fight it off, that feeling. Granted, fighting instinct was a little harder now, but she could do it. Yet...

She asked for one other thing from the City, and it didn't need to deliver the request itself. She received a vial of the man's blood, where all three of these beings existed. Sure, she could have asked for the City to attempt to get a bit of the man's brain, but the blood would do. She'd use it all - she could get more, she supposed.

It took a few more nights, arranging with the City - she gave it simple commands to move this way or that, provide this weather or that - and finally she was ready.

The spell was spoken in soft words, nothing more than a murmur. There had been those who had died or remained forever scarred from this spell, so it was considered more of a curse. An until the "victim" learned or became whole type of curse.

"Locked away with the darkness and fears. The pieces of you will fight. Until you return to the sole being, you shall not see true light." Her nose wrinkled at the last bit. She didn't care for the rhyming conventions, but it often made the spell more palatable to whatever nudged it along.

"There will be those who you have hurt and loved. They will move you along. Or they will be your undoing. It is your choice, Jonathan Crane. Make of this what you will, but should you not move through what comes, you shall never be free to live your life. Dreaming always." This was how she preferred to cast, but a little bit of both never hurt.

Her first spell as the Crone in so very long a time. She glanced at her face in the mirror then around at her cabin.

"This ought to be interesting."