wesley took a level in badass (prycepaid) wrote in welcomethreads, @ 2013-07-27 22:39:00 |
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Entry tags: | illyria, wesley wyndam-pryce |
Who: Illyria and Wesley Wyndam-Pryce
What: Illyria shows up, Wes talks her down.
Where: Storybrooke, edge of town.
When: Saturday morning, July 27th
Ratings/Warnings: PG for mild violence. Usual Illyria fare.
Status: Complete!
The rain had stopped its downfall, but the streets were still damp with water that ran red from the blood mingled with it. The battle was nearly won and nearly lost at the same time. Illyria gripped the massive axe she'd taken from a demon and looked up as above them the dragon roared in challenge, Angel near enough to it that its claws could likely rend the vampire in two. There were bodies of fallen enemies piled around her. Further away she saw Gunn, not moving. She doubted he was still alive. In the din and clamor, she had lost track of Spike, didn't know if he was near enough to aid Angel.
It was likely a losing battle, but this whole exercise had been thus. Illyria twisted the axe, slicing a small, loud demon's head neatly from his body and then she leapt for Angel and the dragon that was rapidly moving to attack him.
Illyria knew magic and portals, had felt it times without counting. This was nothing of her doing though. One moment she was moving, and the next there was a flash of something, a shimmer of air and magic and she was dropping to a crouch in another place. The blood and damp she'd worn was gone and there was no sign of the rotting city around her, or the battle she'd been in. Even the weapon in her hand was taken from her. Instead she was dry, in bright sunlight, surrounded by trees she couldn't hear the song of and a narrow paved road.
Blue eyes narrowed and Illyria focused, lifting a hand to try to part the dimension around her, find where the portal was. But whether it was her own much-diminished power or the magic that had brought her here, she could find no seam in the reality, no ready path back to where she had come from.
She turned a slow circle finally, taking in the calm, the stillness. It was open and that should have been welcome after the city. But she was. . . disquieted by not only the sudden journey, but by the lack of those who had last been with her. She did not know what would become of them. It bothered her.
Illyria paced the length of what she could feel as the barrier holding her in this place and found no limit she could break through. Instead she followed the paved street inward.
It was early, and there were few humans about when she came into sight of others. But one caught sight of her and hurried over. He started to greet her, but he was clearly a minion - no power and nothing to offer her. She had no desire to listen to the babble of strange mortals who smelled of tobacco. She reached out instead, closing a hand in the collar of his shirt and lifting him off of the ground, dangling him as high as her tragically short human shell could lift. "Where is the creature that has brought me here?" she demanded.
The mortal she held yelped, dropping some kind of device and packet of papers to the ground and squirming to free himself without success. She tightened her grip and gave him a little shake. "Speak," she ordered. There were others starting to take notice, and Illyria paid them only enough attention to judge if they were a threat. None were, as of yet.
Wesley went into automatic pilot after his first meeting with Angel when he found out about his fate. He thought perhaps he should feel something. Regret? Anger? Grief? Or there was not much left in him for any of those, so instead he kept himself busy. There was always work to be done, and this situation was no different. He researched with Giles and pooled together their knowledge. It didn’t get them anywhere so far, but it was a start. The closest he came to feeling again was when he saw Cordelia, and after that initial high he plummeted back low to the level he existed at now.
It was early, too early really since Wesley spent at least half of his time hungover or drunk these days, but he dragged himself out of bed. His healthy diet of whiskey didn’t sustain for very long, and he didn’t bother with groceries when he first got there. That was a mistake. He was more or less sober now, carrying brown bags from the market with enough food he could lock himself back up again comfortably. No, Wesley was dragging himself around, barely alive really, until he heard a familiar voice. It was a constant reminder of what Illyria was; a stranger using Fred’s body. He knew the sound of her voice; he was certain he could hear it from far away and over any noise. But it was strange and alien and cold. Not Fred. Illyria.
It brought him out of the fog he was slogging through. “Illyria, put him down.” Wes moved over to where she was and put out a hand. Not toward her, of course, but toward the other people who might start to panic. She was an intimidating figure after all. “It’s fine, I know who she is, I can handle it.” The last thing they needed was more trouble. It stunned him to realize he missed her. Any of his feelings regarding Illyria came along with anger and guilt and pain, so he shuffled that to the side and focused. “He doesn’t have an answer for you, he’s not useful.”
Illyria believed herself unemotional, but it had never been true. She was merciless, violent, and alien. But there was a bone-deep core of anger in her, and the longer she'd spent as human the more she felt other, weak, human things. Isolation, fear, wariness, betrayal. And grief. Grief was a live thing that made her feel strange and weak and lost and only the rush of battle and violence had done anything to dull it - and that had been temporary and unsatisfying, even as it was happening. With the yelping human held aloft her temper was already starting to spark.
The voice, however, broke her out of it. Illyria dropped the stranger just that quickly, tossing him aside like a spent stack and whirling to face the voice. She froze in place for the space of a heartbeat, staring. Wesley's voice, Wesley's form. Even the tiredness of his eyes was familiar. But it couldn't be Wesley. Wesley was dead.
She went from frozen to a blur of motion and was on top of Wesley hand at his throat and fury in her expression. "You wear a shape that is not yours. Whatever you are, I will rip your limbs from your body until your true shape shows and then feed you the rent flesh. You have no right."
Wesley was surprised with the look on Illyria’s face at first. He knew intellectually that she had emotions, she showed them from time to time, although she denied them existing. It was both comforting and annoying for him. Knowing she felt something was reassuring, but it also made it more difficult to distance himself from her. And when she stared at him that way, despite the blue and the cold gaze, it still hurt him to see that face. He wondered if there would ever be a time where he thought of Fred without agonizing pain. Apparently not, back in their time, since he died with the wound still raw and bleeding. This was emotion in Illyria, but not anger or arrogance. He remembered then that she was the one who saw him die.
He realized that about two seconds before she approached him, and before he could say something she was taking her fury out on him. Why did everyone go for his throat? Was there something about his throat that appealed to hostile people? It was sensitive, both because of the faint scar and due to his psychological trauma from it being slit. “Illyria,” he rasped around her grip, his own hand closing in on her wrist. It was futile, he couldn’t force her to loosen it, so he’d have to try and talk anyway. “The portal took me before I died. It’s time discrepancy. It’s me.”
Illyria's grip tightened painfully for an instant, and then she dropped him as suddenly as she'd hefted him, retreating half a step before seeming to catch herself and step up again. It sounded like Wesley, looked like him. She didn't believe it, but it was . . . difficult to strike at his form. She paced around him instead, trying to circle him, see through to whatever it was he truly was. "A portal," she repeated flatly. "You claim you are Wesley. Wesley is dead. I watched his heart stop and his breath give out."
She seemed to be half speaking aloud to herself, working it through. Portals could move through time. She had seen her own timeline splintered, before her lessening. But this was no fractured timeline, she would feel it if it were so. "Prove it, if you are Wesley," she demanded. "This is no place I have knowledge of. Someone has trapped me here, ripped me from battle to this pointless place. How do I know it was not you who did so?"
Once she released him, Wesley rubbed his neck and stayed in place. He saw her start to circle and pace, like a wild beast surrounding its prey, and so he waited for her to process what he was saying. “Yes, Angel told me I died with you.” And that seemed right. If he had to die, at least let it be with that face in front of him, cold and twisted though it was now. He noticed she had trouble harming him, from the very beginning. He knew now that she still had Fred’s memories and could shift into her, meaning that some of Fred’s weaknesses did carry over. And Wesley was a big weakness.
That led him to pick the most obvious memory to prove it was him. One only the two of them shared. “My last night alive I spent with you, helping you after your fight with Hamilton. You asked me if I wanted you to lie to me, for only the night, and I said no.” Wesley’s throat tightened, and he swallowed through it, stepping closer to her. He held her gaze, wondering how someone so beautiful could mean so many ugly things a the same time. “When it happened, did I ….” Just like that, he started to truly think about his death. Not only intellectually, but emotionally. “Did you lie to me?”
She stopped again, standing braced and ready, the predatory edge of her still there. Illyria had gone from grieving to fighting with nothing in between, the one bleeding into the other. She had yet to process what she was feeling and it was easy for her to slip between emotions - even if she barely understood what she was feeling. She was just human enough that grief and uncertainty made her more volatile. A human would have cried, or hit, or broken down. She didn't have that in her. Not yet, not now. Maybe not ever. So she threatened and hovered.
But her head cocked and her stillness. . . shifted, somehow. Less a knife edge of threat and more something smaller and more contained. "You did not plan to die. You would have no lies to live with," she said, slow and a little soft, if still the curious flat tone Illyria's voice had always held.
Her eyes flicked over him again, taking him in, lingering where last she'd seen bright red blood leaking from inside his skin before finding his face again. "Yes," she told him. "I had finished the fight I was sent into. You were wounded, when I found you. You could not be saved. You wanted the lie, at the last."
"I do not understand. Your presence undoes time. It alters what was. The world should be fracturing around you. Spider cracks in the glass of time until it shatters. But I feel none of that. What is this place? How are you Wesley? Who has done this? What game do they play? The Wolf, Ram, and Hart have grown arrogant if they think I will allow-" she cut off, head tilting and arms curling in around herself for a second, a gesture more Fred's than her own, before she caught it and straightened her arms again. "You were gone. I avenged your death and felt no joy in it." Because it hadn't changed that he was gone.
“It was good of you to come,” Wesley said softly, unknowingly echoing his own sentiment when he lay dying. She finished her fight and her first instinct was to come find him. What did that mean? It meant many things. It was best not to overthink sometimes. “I did not plan on dying, but I cannot be surprised that I did.” They were going into a final battle. If he didn’t die then, he would’ve afterward. From what Angel said, the war they lept into next was unwinnable. “Thank you, for offering. The night before and during.” He would say it was kind of her, but she’d take it the wrong way. Kindness was probably a weakness in her eyes.
“You know time better than I do, but if I were to guess, I’d say we will not remember this when we go back. If I’m from the night before, I would have told Angel about this place. Or perhaps we are running parallel, we are there and here.” Wesley was the closest thing to a magic user they had in their group, but he did not know everything about the subject. He did know that the impossible usually turned out to be possible. “I have no real answers for you. It’s beyond me.” And it was beyond her too. It must be frustrating for a god to be in a mortal body, and not have any more answers than him. Wesley’s smile was small when she talked about avenging him. “I understand. I felt the same way after I killed Knox.” It was necessary, but he got no satisfaction from it. The love of his life was dead. The only person she came to care about after her rebirth was dead too. Or as close as she came to caring.
“I told the people here if you showed up to let me know. They must be behind.” There were a lot of refugees coming in, and Wesley should have warned them how dangerous she could be. He did it to protect them. And maybe her too. “I was given an apartment.”
The echoed sentiment made Illyria's too-steady eyes blink, her gaze drop just for a second. Her hands clenched and unclenched once on empty air. "It was a useless fight. A gambit with no odds of victory on the other side. You were too weak, compared to your foe." She paused, hesitation a second too long for comfort before she altered her statement, hint of chagrined reluctance in the words. "We were too weak. Had I been as I was, the battle would have been won before it was fought." Her head tilted, blue-brown hair spilling over her shoulder. "But were I myself, I would have annihilated you all without thought." Her arrogance, at least, was unchanged.
"Angel was drawn here as well. Perhaps the enemies we fought will follow," Illyria said. "Or perhaps they are already here, hiding amongst the inane." She gave the watching faces a look of deep disdain before training her gaze back on Wesley. "And if I do not wish to forget?" she knew he had no answer to that anymore than he had the rest. But it galled her. Wesley was here. The notion of having even the memory of it taken from her, altered . . . the idea rested uneasy on her shoulders.
"It has not been long since I was wrenched here. The mortal I released when you approached was the first I had seen," she explained. "An apartment. You have been here long enough to have residence?" Her eyes stayed clear and unblinking, but her nose twitched, just a little, close to Fred's wrinkled-nose when she was surprised. "I dislike this ambiguity. This has been done to us. The purpose should be made clear. Games and ignorance - they are acts of cowardice." From anyone else, it would have sounded like disgruntled complaining. Even from her, it still sounded a little like it.
“Some fights are worth fighting, even against impossible odds. We knew it was most likely a suicide mission, but it was just.” He hesitated a moment before adding with a wry smile. “A victory would have been nice.” They might have used all their luck when the Slayers survived Sunnydale and stopped that Apocalypse. It did occur to him after Angel explained what happened that the Los Angeles they left behind was in grave danger. If they instigated a fight of that magnitude, was it safer for the city if they’d done nothing? At the time Wesley was certain they were making the right decision. Clearly they hadn’t been making good decisions for a long time. “I know losing your power hurt you, but I cannot regret it. And not only because you would have killed us.” She wouldn’t be part of the team. She wouldn’t care enough to come avenge him.
“I think we sufficiently angered them and they wouldn’t bother hiding right now. For now, they haven’t come through the same portals. We should be careful in case they do.” Wesley wondered if any truly dangerous people were there yet. He would venture a guess there was. They hopefully had come to a decision about what to do in that case, but they seemed very inexperienced. “It might be best if we did forget. In my experience, trying to stop something from happening leads to more trouble.” Fred wouldn’t have wanted many people to die in her place, like Angel was offered. Neither would Wesley.
He noticed the nose twitch, and his heart ached. It was easier when Illyria acted completely different from Fred. Those small habits in common were constant daggers. How much of Fred was in there? “I doubt anyone is playing a game, they seem as unhappy with this situation as we are.” Although the wheels in his head were turning. Someone caused this to happen, and it seemed the Mayor and Sheriff may be the ones to look to. It was foolish to use uncontrollable magic. If he told Illyria this, she’d probably go stomping off to threaten both of them. “I have a second bedroom. You can stay with me until we sort out the situation here.”
Illyria wouldn't agree that she was glad her power was stripped from her. She was not glad. She missed it as you would miss a limb - something vital and core to you ripped away, leaving her forever trying to compensate, forever aware of what had been there that now was not and never would be again. It was galling and painful and she chafed at her weakness. Illyria would once have ripped this place in two and gutted every living thing within it for daring to try to cage it. Now she was helpless to do anything but react.
But there were. . . aspects she did not regret. This moment, perhaps, was one.
She acknowledged it only by not arguing otherwise, instead of admitting to anything.
"Is there a common entry point? If so we should set ranks there, slay them as they come through," Illyria said.
Illyria turned her head, looking around slowly, memorizing the layout perhaps, or just staring. It was difficult to tell. "Someone had purpose. The insects just would not know the reasoning of those greater than them." There were always purposes. Sometimes the purpose was as simple as the whim of an Old One, but it was still a reason. Neither Illyria nor Fred liked coincidence or accident. Fred had always looked for the science and reason beneath the magic and madness. Illyria didn't think the same way, but there was a certain shared trait. Neither of them liked ignorance. They just reacted in very different ways.
She turned back to Wesley, thoughtful for a long moment and then nodded, finally. "I will go with you." For now, until she had more knowledge.
And if she also didn't particularly want to let Wesley out of her sight, could still smell the copper tang of his blood like it might still seep out from beneath his skin when she looked away. . . she didn't need to say such aloud.
Wesley knew Illyria, as well as anyone was capable, so he knew her lack of argument meant agreement. He smiled at her wearily, and almost said he was glad to see her. That if he was stuck, he didn’t regret her being there too. It was too sentimental for them. He was going to try and figure out the mystery of how they got there and how to return. It was the right thing to do. What if that meant he had no choice but to go back to his death? He’d have to mull over that privately, and he could not speak to her of it yet. Because with that in mind, she might try to stop them from solving it.
He leaned down to pick up the groceries he dropped when she grabbed his neck, and luckily nothing was broken. “Angel and Spike are here, as well as Cordelia. We’ll speak to them after we get this handled.”