These characters are Tmer Jesby and Nyssa Amblerash, from the Amber Chronicles Alternate Universe of PatternfallMUSH, which was an online RPG. The Amber Chronicles of course is Roger Zelazny's. The alternate character development of Tmer is mine and the original player's. Nyssa Amblerash is an original RPG character created by a friend of mine for the game.

Lyrics to "Someday" by the band Nickelback.

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"Someday, somehow
I'm gonna make it all right but not right now
I know you're wondering when
You're the only one who knows that"

--"Someday", Nickelback

29 August,

I am the stupidest man I have had the misfortune to meet in my three-thousand-plus years of existence.

Of course, I only think this when the depression gets bad enough for me to contemplate jumping off the East Bridge.

I'm living in New York now. Sometimes I am entirely baffled as to why the hell I'm here and others, I'm too involved in living from day to day to remember that I'm not human and most certainly not from New York.

You'd think I'd be kicking back in some penthouse apartment somewhere, rich and comfortable.

You'd be wrong.

I'm not doing half as bad as some of these bastards that walk the streets, but I'm certainly not living in the manner to which I've become accustomed, either. At least I managed to get an apartment and have a job. Yeah, the apartment is crap and the job sucks but at least I've got that.

And the Desert Eagle.

No one notices me. Nobody has any idea who the hell I am.

For the first time since I was a kid, this is my preferred state of existence.

Without my Logrus abilities, I'd much rather no one know who I am.

Everyone is far too involved with their own petty lives to contemplate that the big, grubby blonde man with the washed out looking blue eyes driving the cab is in fact, a deposed Chaosian Duke who used to be the Chief Interrogator to the King of Chaos, a man who was feared, loathed and respected in his field, a Logrus Master and Master Torturer named Tmer Jesby.

No.

I keep the Desert Eagle hidden inside my coat and I drive, and no one asks any questions.

I've been here going on eight years now. I've got no idea how long it has been back home since I've been gone. They think I'm dead. Which is about all I know.

28 September,

For a while, I didn't remember who I was or where I came from.

I woke up in an alley, my brain completely blank, dressed in the tattered remains of the clothing I'd been wearing before the confrontation in the Cathedral: a white swordsman's shirt and black leather pants and boots, smelling of cheap liquor and feeling as though a boulder had been dropped on my head. I had no idea how I'd gotten there.

It was only when I stumbled out into the street that I realised that wherever it was I'd come from, I was definitely not anywhere near that place any longer.

Slowly, my memories filtered back and by the time they'd returned entirely, it had been two years and in order to avoid the meanest of existences, I'd had to construct an alternate identity for myself.

My name here is Gareth Jones.

Not entirely original, I know. Television and phone books provided me with a name, and a quick assessment of my environment told me that I needed to blend in, figure out a way to make some money and that crime wasn't the best way to do that.

My profession isn't exactly in demand here.

Thus the driving job.

1 October,

I've had six years to think about my life, particularly about the mistakes I've made and things I could have done differently.

Which is what has had me considering the black void of cold below the icy pavement of the East River bridge at two o'clock in the morning; the smooth silver and the black hollow that conceals a quick and easy death down the barrel of my Desert Eagle.

I am not a man to run away from his problems though, only in the interest of self-preservation have I ever backed off and certainly, never considered taking myself out of the picture. Not until I found myself, powerless, poor and alone in the middle of an alien city in an alien world that I never really liked much anyway and possibly at the mercy of any number of enemies that could really fuck my day up if they got wind of my living, my helplessness and my location.

Why had the Serpent dumped me here?

Why had he stripped me of my powers and left me to die on the streets of one of the most populated, cold and horrible cities in this pitiful shadow? Any number of Sawall or Jesby's Hells couldn't be any worse.

So I continue to drive. And I think.

There seem to be more dogs on the streets lately.

14 October,

Six years of doing the same thing has begun to affect me.

I finally understand the mistake.

I changed. I forced myself to change. Deprived of my status, my House, I felt at odds with Chaos, unprotected.

How could I move on when I had changed into something I didn't recognise as myself, when I had allowed the change, even encouraged it? When the vicissitudes of my existence were manipulated and forced, against my true will?

I believe I understand the Serpent's reasoning.

I could not, in that state, become a representative of the Serpent. Not when my own identity was in crisis. Not when I was lost to the Logrus, to the essence of Chaos.

Since this became clear to me, I've spent my evenings writing everything down.

And the more I write, the more I understand what it was that is missing. What it is that I had needed to do then, and what I have to do now to change this misery of an existence.

The dogs gather beneath my apartment window to bay at the moon and I find comfort in their cries, when the world around me curses them.

And that alone makes me smile.

31 October,

She has visited my dreams nightly, for the entire eight years, even before I regained my memory. It was her face that drew my reticent memory from me, when a large part of me wanted to keep it in the depths of my unconscious.

At first it was only a flash of her large eyes wide, the horror and shock on her face, the tensing of her young body as though to spring, her soft lips forming my name as my world spun away from me and I fell into the depths of blackness, fear and despair before it finally took me and I knew no more.

The world around me seems somehow delusory today. Slightly unreal.

Gray.

October 31, New York City, 8:40 pm.

The door closed and I glanced into the rear view. I'd never expected anyone of Blood.

The entire time I'd been in New York, I'd never met another one.

I knew however, from the moment my eyes met hers, what she was. But it took me a longer moment to recognise her. She didn't exactly look like she had the last I'd seen her, you see. Our kind does have something of a habit of adopting disguises, though more of whim or fashion rather than a real desire to keep our identities secret.

Her hair was darker, longer, possibly a chestnut color, though it was difficult to tell in the twilight. She was wearing a dark jacket and skirt which looked as though it might be tweed and I automatically knew it was a shade of green. Indeed, her silk blouse was mint green and clung to her in a way I found entirely too unsettling, a feeling that both annoyed and enticed me, for I felt more alive in the few short seconds it had taken her to climb into the car than I had in eight long years of exile.

The door slammed closed and I shoved my way into traffic.

"Wait," she said, her voice soft and sibilant, sending chills through my blood and I smiled, keeping my head ducked, never turning to acknowledge her, though I kept her image in the corner of my vision.

"I haven't told you where to go--" she gasped softly and her voice trailed off, but not before I caught the slight tremble in it.

She knew. She felt me.

And that meant something. Something rather significant. I squinted into the dark, icy rain pelting my windshield and tried to figure it out. My blood burned with the sheer nearness of her, with the scent of her Logrus-charged blood and the sudden deep, powerful memories of another existence her presence stirred within me.

"Who are you?" she finally asked, as though she'd been struggling with it. "Where are you taking me?"

I debated answering her. My voice was a dead give-away and I found myself not wanting to reveal my identity to her just yet, particularly if she didn't realise a dead man drove her cab.

"I want to go to the airport," she said in a slightly stronger voice, "and..." she swallowed hard, "I can defend myself."

I couldn't help a snicker. Of course she could, and the barely perceptible twinge in her voice was as clear to me as though she'd said it outright. She was a Logrus Master and she was willing to use it if she felt threatened.

I ought to know.

I trained her.

In the mirror, I saw her flinch.

Oh what the hell.

"Sweeting," I said softly, "harming you is the very last thing on my mind..."

She tensed and went the loveliest shade of bone white I'd seen on a living being.

"Though if you'd like me to, I'd be more than happy--"

She hissed.

Entirely appropriate, actually. She was a snake in her Chaos-form.

I chuckled, directing the car through the inner-city traffic as effortlessly as I used to manipulate Shadow, not in any particular direction and certainly not towards any airport. If she wanted to catch a plane, she could consider it after I had finished with her. Smirking slightly, I eyed her in the rear-view.

She wasn't entirely certain yet. I suppose that made sense, after all she did see me die. Or at least what she thought was my death.

"What kind of sick joke is this?" she said finally, her soft voice hard, a tone I'd rarely heard from her in the entire time we'd known each other. "Who are youreally?"

I snickered and considered driving off Long Island. Perhaps to Jersey. I knew of one or two places we could have a long conversation without being disturbed. The only problem was that one or two of the Amber Royal Family were known to have residences in and around that area, and I wasn't sure dragging a known Logrus Master into their territory was such a good idea. I could get away with it, since my powers were still at an ebb, but she was broadcasting loud and clear, particularly now, when she was nervous and vibrating with barely contained fear.

I figured at least one thing had passed through her mind.

Perhaps I was Gaston.

Or Chaise.

Or worse.

She'd never entirely believed Gaston's death was real. And she'd never cared much for Chaise, who was known to be nearly as twisted as Gaston had been. I chuckled again, softly and headed for the Turnpike.

"I am who you are afraid I am, sweeting," I said simply. "Death is an illusion to our kind, you see."

Why not screw with her head a little?

She frowned intently. "Not true," she said softly. "I don't believe that."

I glanced back, through the bullet-proof plastic screen, at her.

She shifted uncomfortably but was caught by my eyes, and held. She frowned.

"No," she insisted weakly, "I don't believe that."

I shrugged and turned back around.

We drove in silence a long time. She was silent as I paid the toll and silent as we crossed the river, and silent as we finally reached the Jersey shore.

The Amberite risk was worth it, I'd decided. I was driven by a need to get her off of Manhattan for some reason. And I had long since learned never to deny such a need,especially now.

As we drove, I felt a stirring within.

And she remained silent, stiff and nervous, in the back of my cab, the only sound the click of the meter as it continued to tick off her mounting fare.

I brought the car to a stop outside a dingy clapboard building with a plain white lit signboard advertising: Happy Hour 4-6pm and a crumpled black and neon orange paperboard "OPEN" sign crammed into the corner of the dirty window.

She grumbled something under her breath.

I smiled at her discomfiture.

"Where the--?"

"We're going to have a drink and a talk," I said simply, shoving open the cab door with a grunt. "Out."

She flashed a set of glittering dark eyes at me as I opened the back passenger door, but she did get out, eyeing the place I'd selected with clear distaste.

"We won't be bothered here," I said coolly, "believe me."

My hand closed around her elbow and I felt the hard shiver that went through her at my touch. Her head snapped around and those large eyes widened even more.

I think it was at that particular moment that reality finally chose to sink in.

"Serpent," she breathed, staring at me, "it's true..."

With only the slightest of smirks, I strode towards the door, pulling her along with me.

The bar was as dingy on the inside as the outside.

Thick with smoke and the scent of stale bear and sweat, it was relatively full for a weeknight, and the patrons ran the gamut from the weirdos that seemed to crawl out of the cracks every Halloween to the dull, lifeless regulars that were as dingy as the place itself, and no one paid us any attention as we took a table in the back.

She was not happy to be here, but she was numb for the most part, and would probably have gone anywhere I pointed her, at least at the moment.

I ordered for the both of us and started immediately on the mug of beer the barmaid set down in front of me, producing a cigar and lighting it, all very mundanely, though she didn't seem to notice.

"Nyssa," I said finally, after a couple of drags off the cigar and some healthy swallows of beer, "did you really believe I was dead?"

She blinked slowly and looked at me. Her eyes seemed to refocus and she leaned back, relaxing slightly, but not enough. She was still wary. "What else was I supposed to believe?"

I shrugged.

"What are you doing here? Why didn't you come back?"

I smirked slightly. "Would you have, if you were me?"

She frowned. "Tmer, you don't belong here."

I snorted. "You think I don'tknow that?"

"If not Chaos, then somewhere else. Schattenheim, perhaps? You should have at least let someone know you were alive."

I looked at her a long time. I wasn't entirely sure if I was pleased or not that she didn't appear to know I hadn't my Logrus powers, nor access to Trumps. And I wasn't entirely sure I wanted her to know the truth.

Snorting again, I took a long drink.

Her frown deepened. "Tmer, this isn't like you."

It felt good to hear my name spoken, particularly in her lovely, lilting voice. I drew a deep breath and considered her.

"No," I said after a moment, sucking on my cigar, "you're right. It isn't."

I leaned back slightly in my chair, stretching and shifting just enough to give her a flash of the silver butt of the Desert Eagle in its shoulder holster inside my leather flight jacket.

Nyssa's brows tightened. "A gun?" she whispered. "Why are you--?"

I raised one eyebrow and looked right at her.

Her own eyes widened and she gasped softly, quickly covering it with a discrete cough into one slim, long-fingered hand.

"Oh, no," she breathed.

I gave a slight shrug and continued to smoke. "Shit happens."

She began to reach into her purse. "I should tell someone--"

"NO!" I hissed tightly. "I won't have it known in Chaos that I'm easy game, especially to any ambitious Amberite or Hendrake that might get it into their head to come and take me out-- permanently."

"But--"

"Is Vintir still King? Or did they finally take care of him as well, Nyssa?"

She blinked, and her mouth worked soundlessly a moment.

I frowned, eyes narrowed. "Well?"

"I-I've not been back in a long while," she said finally.

"Then you see my problem," I said. "I can't leave, and I'm a target while I'm here."

Nyssa looked at me a long time. "If you were able to walk the Logrus again..." she said quietly, thoughtfully.

A hot and powerful need flared within me at that. My teeth ground together, but I forced that reaction down, keeping my voice calm, cool and steady as I said, "of course. But how would I get there? Certainly you're not offering an escort?"

She swallowed hard. "I could." She took a sip of the beer in the glass in front of her, winced, and pushed it away, folding her hands tightly in her lap. "I'm not saying I would though. What would you do if you did get the chance to return?"

I snorted. "I'm not altogether certain I wish to return to Chaos, if it is still as I remember it. I've no desire to watch Garamond destroy my father's House, nor have I any desire to live under your Grandfather's thumb. If Vintir has survived this long, I am not certain he would want to have much to do with me either." I frowned. "Not that I blame him." Looking again at her, I considered. "No, I would most likely return to Schattenheim and keep my distance. I've no desire for Chaos to know that I still live, for now."

"And Chaos? I find it difficult to believe you'd leave it be."

I smirked. "Well, we'll see."

She shook her head. "I see you building a power base in Schattenheim, Tmer. You've never been content to sit by and let life continue unfettered. You've never been content with anything. You're too dynamic. Too changeable." She drew a deep breath and added, "Too unwilling to commit."

My smile faded as she began to frown.

"I think this conversation is at an end," she said, rising. "I don't think I want to help you, after all."

A soft growl rose deep in my throat as an entirely uncomfortable twinge of panic squeezed my gut.

Her eyes narrowed.

"You don't think I don't know I'm your last, and probably only chance to escape this Shadow, Tmer?" she whispered as she stood, stepping closer to me. I could smell her perfume, a soft, powdery scent of rain dampened flowers, jasmine possibly. "That if I walk out this door, all hope of your leaving this Shadow goes with me? That if I can find you here, others might be able to now as well?"

I ground my teeth.

She was right.