Scene III

            The Past pulled Future towards him, his flesh angry and bruising upon her willowy back.  The poison from his lips passed through hers, speeding her heart with danger and letting her artificially share his passion.  Strength was not her gift, but seduction.  Beauty and opportunity shone from her gleaming, faraway body and men threw their lives to her, never to receive anything.

            But, when it came to it, the past was stronger.  Muscles gifted by time rippled against her skin.  She didn't care, but pulled him closer. 

Perhaps she would die.

            Why fight the poison?  Why fight him? 

            Perhaps there was something to be gained from both.

            Stars whose light had long ago been lost to the past now shone future upon the earth and the gifted divined the drama, spread naked before them.  Within their casket, leaves whispered of what they had seen that even the most talented of others would not see for years…

            To the slow, they told the past and not the future.

            A crippling calm seemed to rest in his eyes and beat in the swish of his tail, but blood raced through his veins, intelligent and noble and magical.  Firenze, blessed with the mystic gift only centaurs receive, had seen it almost too late.  If I were to be warned…

            Only an icy calm responded. 

            Send evil minions of the past upon me, but don't take away my love. 

            "Thank you; I will be wary."

            "You must take every precaution."  Concerned eyes slanted with worry I did not want.

            "I know the past."

            "It comes differently!  History repeats itself and we do not notice it, not only because we've forgotten, but also because it wears a different mask, only to pull it off when we are unguarded."

            The stony ice shattered from within, an explosion of fire, hidden feelings afraid of the truth in what was without…

            "Fuck history!  Fuck the future!  I just want him here with me.  I'm so tired, but with him, I don't need sleep.  We can outrun fatigue…  Fuck prophecies— 

"We can outrun them too." 

The last pointed shard finally hit the ground, and the ice felt how ridiculously loud it had truly been in the cutting silence.

"Love," he whispered, afraid to fully permeate it, "is the noblest feeling in the world, but—"

"Fuck you, too."  Tears pulled my vision into distorted shapes and harlequin colors and clouded my eyes that knew he was right.

But…