I guess you were lost
When I met you
Still there were tears in your eyes
So out of trust
And I knew
No more than mysteries and lies
There you were
Wild and free
Reaching out like you needed me
A helping hand
To make it right
I am holding you all through the night
I'll be the one
Who will make all your sorrows undone
I'll be the light
When you feel like there's nowhere to run
I'll be the one
To hold you
And make sure that you'll be all right
My fear is gone
And I want to
Take you from darkness to light
There you are
Wild and free
Reaching out like you needed me
A helping hand
To make it right
I am holding you all through the night
I'll be the one
Who will make all your sorrows undone
I'll be the light
When you feel like there's nowhere to run
I'll be the one
To hold you
And make sure that you'll be all right
My fear is gone
And I want to
Take you from darkness to light
Maj had been up all night, on the wall, looking out forlornly at the surrounding wilderness, staring out into the emptiness. It was dawn now, morning was breaking, the sky brilliant and orange-pink in the early glow of rising sun. His commander had not returned. His commander might be dead.
He closed his eyes for a moment, tried to imagine what he would do, how he could possibly take so great a man's place when he himself knew that he was unfit for the job. There was so much more responsibility...it would break him. He cut back the urge to howl, lament to the fading moon his predicament, lest he wake the men, who were battle-weary enough without having to wake up at such an ungodly hour to his own personal dirge. His thought turned painful when he realized if he had broken into song at this time of day, Doyle would have threatened to cut of one body part or another of his and turn it into an article of clothing.
**Knowin' Doy, he probably offered a trade for her and got double-crossed by the bastard,** he mused.
At the sound of flapping wings, he turned around, to see Tauri, hovering in the air behind him. "Colonel, sir." He saluted.
"Mornin' Taur. What can I do you for?" he asked, eye still trained on the countryside.
"News from the Supreme Command, sir. They uh… they noted that if the General is not returned by noontide that you will be promoted and…" he trailed off, let Maj finish the statement in his head.
The Colonel sighed. "That happens, and we're doomed, Taur."
Alighting beside him on the wall, Tauri folded his wings around him like a cape, looked out with hawkish eyes over what Maj was so intent on. He studied it keenly, every detail, every spot of the area he'd grown to memorize for prudence's sake. They stood like that for the better part of a half hour, the suns rays growing stronger, brightening the world around them. Seeing movement, the Captain quirked his head owlishly. After a moment, he turned back to Maj. "Perhaps he is well."
"He rode off on his own to Saeryth's encampment, Taur. If he's well Saer's been slipping as he ages," Maj responded dryly.
"The General Saeryth has appeared to have slipped then," Tauri responded seriously, eyes turning back to the woodland as concentrated on one spot in particular. "I see movement."
"You're shittin' me…" Maj hopped up onto his hind legs and propped him self up on the wall, peering over. "I don't see a thing." He craned his neck.
"Your vision is not as well as mine," Tauri responded simply, unfolding his wings and rising into the air for a better view. After studying the distance for a relatively secure answer, he floated back down to inform his superior. "They are well, sir."
The Colonel looked unbelieving. "This isn't a joke, is it, Taur?"
The Captain raised an eyebrow, face all passivity and calmness. "No, sir, it is not."
Maj laughed out loud, with relief, with disbelief. "That bastard has more tricks than a whore in a rich man's bed," he whooped, everything vulgar and delightful in his character on display. "Go on, Taur," he nudged his friend with hi shoulder, "wake up the cooks a little early, get them started on breakfast…I'm going out to meet 'em, anyone else that wants to come has five minutes to join me at the gate!" With those last orders given, Maj gave an exuberant laugh and jumped off the wall towards the grounds below, a 30-foot drop of mind numbing liberation before landing lithely, sharing his joy with the night guards by laughing at them and running circles around their watch-weary legs. "He's back!!"
~~~~~~~~
Doyle looked up blearily at the sound of wolf-call in the early sunrise woods, the noise sending a flock of resting birds to the air. The sound likewise woke Cordelia, whom he'd perched in the front of the saddle so that she may lean back and sleep against him. "What was that?" she groaned, eyes peeling open, then shutting quickly as the first rays of sun blinded her momentarily. She groaned.
"That, was Maj," Doyle responded, some relief finally evident in his voice, though he did not smile. He was too tired to smile.
She laid her head back against his shoulder and yawned. "Oh."
"We'll be back within the hour," he murmured into her ear. He dared a look over his shoulder at his own horse, which limped determinedly on behind them. Surprisingly, the animal had been in the exact spot he'd left him, none the worse for wear.
"Mmm… I need a bath…and a big, comfy bed," Cordelia stated dreamily, finally beginning to wake up from the uncomfortable slumber riding a horse could allow. She blinked a bit. "We are safe now, right?"
He nodded. "Yeah, Princess, you're safe," he replied.
She was about to question him on the glaring omission, but a voice loud enough to shake the leaves on the trees greeted them as they cleared the edge of the woods. "General! You bastard, you gave me the scare of my life!!" Maj called out, breaking into a sprint towards them, causing their horse to dance nervously. Doyle steadied it and offered a weak smile at Maj as he flew over the distance of the field towards them.
"Mornin', Colonel… or did they make ya General already?" Doyle asked, by way of greeting once Maj had stopped in front of them.
"Still Colonel, General…think the Supreme Command wanted to put off promoting me as long as possible," the wolf responded good-naturedly. "And I can see that you were successful. I don't know how, you old bastard, but I'm glad you found her."
Cordelia offered a smile at the Colonel's excitement. "Hey, Maj. I'm glad he found me too."
"I want all the details once we're inside, and once we've gotten some food in you," Maj instructed. "I'm curious as to how the Gen here got you out unscathed."
Doyle shook his head. "Not much to tell, she sorta rescued herself."
The Colonel erupted into a string of raucous laughter, intermingled with the occasional curse. "Damn, Doyle, you know how to pick 'em. You know how to pick 'em. Bet she's a dab hand with a broadsword too, eh?"
~~~~~~~
After said hot meal and a disclosure of the details Doyle and Cordelia weren't too weary to relate, Gwyn threw a disapproving glance at the Colonel for his probing and quite brusquely told him to shut up and let them get some rest. They were exhausted.
Appreciative of the Major's bluntness, Cordelia gratefully threw herself into the bath that Gwyn had ordered drawn for her, relaxing tense muscles and trying to forget all that she'd been subjected to in the last few days. Relaxing in the pleasantly warm, rose scented water, she laid her head back against the brim of the tub and closed her eyes, let the clean aroma of blossoms and perfumed soap rise up to her nostrils from within the water's steam.
But even as she tried to rest, something bothered her; something itched at the base of her skull like a particularly irritating bug bite that she was unable to quite reach. There still niggled in her brain, the fact that her mission was as incomplete as before she'd known quite what it was, and that in itself was deeply unsatisfying. To be given a job and no idea where to even begin was not taken, nor had it ever been kindly by a Chase, especially Cordelia. Not only was it inconvenient and deeply inconsiderate, it made her feel grossly ineffectual, which was something she'd been taught to loathe at an early age. Chases were never inconsequential. They took the initiative always, they got things done, they did it well, and damn it all, they looked good while doing it. Some impressions of her upbringing would never be washed away. This was one of them.
She laughed at herself a little, realizing how different she and Doyle were in that respect. He was one that was forced into the limelight, into the public eye while truly; he would rather be completely negligible, when he would much prefer an inconspicuous existence rather than owning a starring role…the staring role, in the ongoing melodrama that engulfed this dimension. Yet here he was, one of the greatest, one of the most renowned leaders (according to her sources) and he wanted no part of it. If last night had been any indication, he was so sick of expectations and fighting that there wasn't even room left for him to inspire any feeling other than disillusionment.
She scrubbed at her skin with the soap, recalled how all he'd done after killing Breia was wipe his sword and tell her they had to leave. That had seemed unlike him.
They didn't have shampoo, so she washed her hair out with soap, knowing that there would be hell to pay on her follicles for such folly later, but too tired to whine to herself, even mentally. Too tired to do much of anything, really. She lingered in the bath for another quarter hour before realizing that falling asleep was becoming a greater threat as she let herself stagnate here along with the water, and with great force of effort, rose up and grabbed a towel, drying herself off. Once groomed, she gratefully slipped on the extra set of clothing one of the maids had left her and crawled under the covers of her bed, never feeling anything as heavenly as the comfort of sleep as it settled over her and drew her away from this world, from her problems.
~~~~~~~~~~~
Doyle, after obligatorily indulging Maj and Gwyn by eating something, had trudged off to his office. He was exhausted, sore, red-eyed and haggard, but there remained work to be done. There had still been a battle; there had still been casualties, death. He was tempted to even write a note to Saeryth to tell him of his lover's condition, but whether that would be just plain cruel or inconsequential, he couldn't decide.
Slipping into the small reception area outside of his office, he let the door slam closed behind him of his own volition, giving his secretary a start. She looked up from behind a stack of paperwork, hand to her heart. "Doyle! I though you were gonna go get some rest. Word is you had a rough night," she tsk-tsked upon seeing who it was.
"Got work to do, Seez. Rest later," he responded in monotone, walking past her and into his office. She watched him go, a small frown marring her silver-toned face. When he disappeared behind his great big oaken doors, she shook her head and went back to her paperwork.
~~~~~~~
Cordelia was walking through the battlefield; the very one she'd traversed before her kidnap. There were bodies stacked six feet high left and right, the rotten stench of decaying flesh stirred by the wind and dust, the sound of scraping maggots devouring the rancid cadavers echoing in the background, so close that she could hear them hatching, but far enough away that it could have been an illusion, could have been her mind playing tricks on her. Skulls with empty eye sockets stared back at her, skeletons of soldiers with their armor still on, with the weapons that had imparted the fatal blow still lodged into their bodies. Their maws gaped, their rusty chain mail clattered against their sun bleached bones
She wanted to close her eyes, to look away, but they wouldn't let her, moved by the wind so it seemed as if they were speaking to her, the sounds of the maggots their voice trying to speak to her.
She continued walking through, stomach churning at the scene, the stench, the same thing over and over for miles. Looking forward, there rose from the ground a mountainous pile of remains; they came up out of the ground as if they'd grown from the bowels of the earth itself, a volcanic eruption of cadavers, overflowing like lava. She stumbled backwards, blindly, tripped and fell against a pile of bones, their clatter burning her ears. The pile stopped growing, the corpses stopped coming eventually, and she looked up, up to the top, where a figure stood, a body in its own right, but possessed of voice.
It raised its hands to the sky. "I am the queen of his dead!" she shouted, to the sulfur-colored heavens.
Cordelia stood up, shoved away the bones that wanted to drag her down…the familiarity of the figure haunting. "Breia?"
At the sound of her voice, the corpse's eyes shot directly to her. It pointed a green-tinted finger. "You have no business here!"
The booming echo of voice made Cordelia want to cover her ears. Instead, she stood transfixed, as Breia's zombie slid down the body-mount where she had played Queen of the Hill, finger still outstretched in her direction. As she drew closer, she could see the blood stained mouth, the hole where his sword had punctured her crawling with hatchling fly larvae, the blood roses still stained on her tunic. "Why have you come?" she demanded. "There's no grey on your skin."
"I come to take the blood," Cordelia responded, automatically, not of her own volition.
Breia smiled, though her gums had already begun to recede, pieces of thin pink-flesh flapping against her molars. "Then you are here for these…" She waved an arm around her, gesturing to all the piled bodies. The wind blew and rattled their bones, the sound like haunted applause.
She shook her head. "No, I didn't mean that. There's too many."
Breia laughed. "There will be more. And I am their queen."
Cordelia looked out across the horizon. "You have a lot of subjects." "You want to take them."
She shook her head. "They're hideous."
"They're his creations!" Breia protested, and the bones rattled again.
Cordelia paled. "These are all the people he's killed?"
"They bow before me."
"Why?"
"I am his murder."
"He didn't murder you!" Cordelia protested. "He didn't know."
"He didn't care."
"It was his job."
"He doesn't care."
"He's a General!" Cordelia protested hotly.
"He's an idiosyncrasy."
Cordy's brow furrowed. "What is that?"
"Exactly." Breia turned back to the bodies. "Do you want them or not?"
"What happens if I don't want them?"
"Then they pile up. And he'll take them with him in the end."
"Doyle will?"
"They are his subjects."
"I thought you were the queen of his dead."
"And you are the queen of his life," Breia responded, eyes not quite seeing when she looked at this valley of dead.
Cordelia shook her head, felt the beginnings of a headache pounding at the nape of her neck. "I don't want them," she muttered.
"Then he will have them. And he will reign as king."
"It's so dark here though. I don't think he'd like it. Don't kings like bright colors?"
"Bright and dark…it doesn't matter, not to a king of bodies. The cracks are still the same, will still cause shatter."
"And if I take them?"
The wind stopped blowing. The bones stopped rattling. Breia looked at her. "Nothing."
The silence seemed infinitely better than the chatter of wind-chimed skeletons. "Nothing?"
The carcasses disappeared. "Nothing," Breia reiterated, looking over miles and miles of trampled tan dirt.
Cordelia turned in a slow circle. There was nothing left, just the ground, just the sky, the wind. She breathed a sigh of relief, turned back to where Breia had been standing, where she was no more. Instead she saw Doyle, kneeling in front of her on his knees, hands folded into a cup.
"Doyle?" she asked, walking towards him.
"Shhhh," he hushed, eyes trained on his hands.
"What are you doing?" she whispered.
"I have to hold it in," he responded softly. He gave a start when his hands began to fill, clear liquid water beginning to rise against the walls of his palms. "It's here!" he cheered, much louder than before, loud enough to make her start.
"Water?"
He ignored her question, kept looking at the liquid. Soon, it began to overflow. "Too much," he muttered. "They won't stop giving it to me."
She stood, transfixed, as the water poured over his hands and onto his lap, onto the ground underneath him. Before long, the clear liquid turned thick and red, dripping slime and juice all over him.
Startled, she drew in a breath. "It's blood."
He nodded. "My cup runeth over," he quipped, hands still folded.
She watched him there for a while, the blood continuing to overflow the cup of his hands, dropping onto his body in thick, viscous splotches.
"It's staining your shirt," she droned, monotone.
"And my pants, and my shoes, and my skin," he responded, listless, eyes glued to the blood in his hands. "It keeps coming. I can't hold it without a new cup."
She nodded. "Can you find one big enough?"
He looked at her, eyes boring into her. "Can you bring me one?"
She shook her head. "I didn't bring one with me."
He looked defeated, then slowly let his hands part, the blood exploding into a geyser, spraying down on his face and neck. "It's easier this way," he murmured, opening his mouth to catch brick-red droplets on his tongue.
She watched him, playing in the blood. "Doesn't it bother you?" she asked, edging away from the geyser.
He put his face into it and shook his head, soaking his hair. "Does it bother you?"
She nodded. "It's not right."
He shrugged and gathered some on his fingertips before flicking them at her, staining the white of her clothes. "You're too clean," he stated offhandedly. "It's hard to stay clean when everything else is messy."
"I don't like to be dirty," she replied, looking down as the blood he'd gotten on her began to spread over the thin cloth in a flower-pattern.
"You're not supposed to be all white," he offered.
"You're not supposed to be all red," she snapped in response, trying to dab out the stains with her sleeve to keep them from spreading any further.
"So fix it," he responded with a sneer. "Or is there too much?"
"You shouldn't have cracked your first cup anyway," she told him irritably.
He continued washing himself in the blood-fountain. "If it bothers you, get me one," he said simply, cupping another handful of the liquid and bringing it to his face. A thin stream continued to leak out from the space between his hands. "I can't hold it all."
"Did you even try?"
He nodded, unclasped his hands and began stripping off his saturated clothes. "For a while. But it was too hard. Now I just let it fall."
She studied him, naked from the torso up, taking blood paint and drawing across his chest and stomach.
"It'll stain your skin," she warned.
"Why didn't it stain yours?" he asked, pointing to her.
She looked down. Her shirt was white again, completely clean. "I'm different," she stated by way of explanation.
"So am I," he retorted, continuing his artwork up and down his arms. "I'm a General."
"A leader."
He shook his head. "Saeryth is a leader."
"You're a General."
He yawned. "I'm tired."
"You should rest then," she replied, practically.
He nodded. " But I can't sleep."
"Why not?"
"I'm a General." He stopped playing with the blood for a moment. "Aren't I?"
She laughed. "You're weird."
"Yeah." He frowned comically and continued concentrating on drawing a picture on his torso.
"What are you drawing?" she asked, craning her neck to see him. "What's that?"
He pointed to a rich stain over his heart. "That's my blood," he explained, smearing it with his hands and offering it to her.
"You're bleeding?" she knelt down next to him, concerned, the small blood geyser forgotten, staining her pants, the hem of her shirt. Sure enough, a jagged cut appeared on his chest, a hemorrhage from nothing. She put her hand over the cut; felt his lifeblood pouring out of the wound and onto her arms.
"I always bleed a little bit," he responded, trying to knock her hands away. "There's nothing you can do about it. It doesn't hurt much anymore."
"You'll die," she chastised, firmly keeping her hands in place.
He slapped her hands away again. "I won't. I always bleed a little bit."
"A little bit becomes a lot."
"Never enough."
She stubbornly persisted, tore a strip from her shirt and pushed it down to staunch the flow. "What do you mean, never enough? This is a lot!"
He laughed. "I'll still wake up."
"Are you saying you're asleep now?"
"I can't sleep." He gave up struggling and let her push down on his cut, looking down at it. "There's too much to stop," he noted, without a hint of concern.
"I'll stop it," she promised him. "You be quiet. I thought you were tired."
"I'm always a little tired."
She put more pressure on the wound.
"That feels nice," he managed, reluctantly.
"I knew it would."
With her words, his body went into convulsions underneath her, his face stretching like human clay in every which direction, molding, bending. His back arched beneath him, hands clenching sporadically. He screamed, closing his eyes; face remolding, reshaping, hair growing shorter, growing lighter, body lengthening, hands enlarging. He snarled again, and shook, turned into Saeryth below her hands.
She gasped. "Doyle?"
Saeryth's eyes snapped open, wide, angry looking orbs of azure diamond. "Don't touch me!" he demanded, struggling to dislodge her touch.
She pushed down harder. "I'm trying to help!"
"You failed!" Saeryth shot back, eyes uncharacteristically feral. He looked down at the blood, still flowing unhindered despite her efforts, and sighed with relief. "You cannot."
"You'll die!" she warned him.
He laughed at her. "I'll live forever."
She looked at him oddly. "No one lives forever. Especially if they bleed this much."
"You have to stop fighting it," Saeryth intoned, pushing her hands away from his chest and sitting up. He continued to bleed, stuck his finger in the hole in his chest and wriggled it around. "You let it come, and glory awaits."
Disgusted, Cordelia turned her head from him. "What did you do with Doyle?"
Saeryth withdrew his finger and put his hand over his heart in a mock-salute. "We are one in the same."
"You two don't even look alike!" Cordelia protested.
The General's cobalt eyes glittered. "We look exactly the same."
"He's different!" she retorted. "He's shorter."
"He's taller!" Saeryth shot back. "Not much longer." He laughed, a hollow, wicked sounding noise. "Well be brothers and I will give him my hat to wear."
"He doesn't want your hat!" Cordelia retorted, crossing her arms.
"It will protect his head," Saeryth responded. "From the sun."
"The sun can't hurt him."
"It will destroy him." He looked up at the angry orange-yellow sky, scowled at it. "It will swallow him up."
"The sun is healthy! It gives you a good tan!" Cordelia retaliated hotly.
"Cancer," Saeryth responded without elaborating.
"Well, yeah, it can give you cancer," she conceded.
"Malignant… it'll eat away your insides."
"I don't understand you," she huffed, watching as the blood continued streaming down his chest.
"Then you don't understand him either!" the General's voice boomed, before he jerked, a full body spasm in much the same way Doyle had earlier, skin and flesh contorting and moving of it's own volition. Cordelia watched, transfixed, as Doyle was returned to her.
"Doyle?"
"I was gone for a while," he muttered strangely. "It was quiet."
"Saeryth was here."
Doyle's head spun to look at her. "Where? I'll kill him!"
"He was you."
"He's not me!" Doyle avowed, eyes like flint.
"You turned into him."
"You should have killed me…" he muttered, hand going to the bleeding wound on his chest. "It hasn't stopped."
"He wouldn't let me stop it."
"I always bleed a little."
She growled. "You already said that."
"If I let go, do you think it will stop?"
"If you let go you'll die."
"I wonder what that's like," he murmured curiously, laying down on his back and looking at the yellow-red sky. "Like a dream." He closed his eyes.
She sat beside him and watched him for a while. She looked at his hand, folded under his head, the bleeding wound gushing down his side, down his chest. "Does it feel any better?" she asked, eyes trained on the gash.
"Not yet," he said. A minute longer and he sat up. "I've not got the patience," he told her, opening his eyes.
She gasped when he looked at her, the cerulean verdant of his eyes uniform coal. "Doyle! Your eyes!" likewise, his skin began fading, black spots appearing, forming pinprick holes in his skin, falling like dust around him.
"Damn! It's dark! I can't see anything!" he shouted desperately; face melting under a myriad attack of miniscule black dots, like he was fading to black before her.
She latched onto him, hands holding him by the shoulders, shaking him lightly. "I'm here, Doyle! The sun is shining! The birds are singing? Can't you see? Can't you hear?"
He put his hands out in front of him. "I can't… I can't… it keeps shifting out of the dish, my left side feels heavy. Did you know there was this much dirt in me, Delia? Isn't it funny? I thought…I thought I took a bath yesterday, but I can't scrub it away. Will you help me, Cordy? Why won't you help me? It's just a little dirt. I guess…I guess It's hard ta see in the dark like this…it keeps getting harder…" His eyes, black, blind orbs of obsidian glass, looked up at her, looked through her, pockmarked hands reaching up towards her. "Where did the light go? I can't get clean in this."
"Doyle, you're disappearing," she cried, feeling the wet sting of tears against her cheek, standing there, frozen and unable to aid him as he called out to her.
"Cordy! Cordelia…it's like sand in an' hourglass…all runnin' out…" he wheezed, overcome by his bizarre disease, melting into grains in her arms, turning to black dirt in her hands. "Yes," he muttered.
"Doyle, the dark isn't safe! Wild animals could eat you!" she begged, trying to get him to hold on.
"It's quiet here," he rambled, eyes melting backwards, falling away into crystallized granules of opaque glass. "It's so quiet in the dark," he murmured. "I just have to stop fightin' it."
She watched, horrified, as his last words caused him to explode in her hands, into a fine black powder, falling between the cracks of her fingertips.
Overhead, the sky turned black.
~~~~~~~~~~
She woke up with a start, flying to a sitting position, hands clutched at her pulse-exploding heart. "Oh God," she muttered, breathing heavily. "Doyle. Doyle!" Sweat-stained and dream-shocked, she sat in her bed a while longer, until her breathing evened out, until she could swallow without feeling like she was asphyxiating herself in the attempt. "God, what a nightmare," she whispered to herself, easing out of the bed and padding over to the dresser, where a pitcher of tepid water waited, next to an unassuming earthen mug. She poured herself a glass, watched as the water tipped out of the pitcher's lip and into the mug. Her mind flashed back to the dream, to Doyle's haunted voice…
~~~~~~~
"Too much. They won't stop giving it to me."
~~~~~~~
She jumped when she overflowed the cup, when water ran off the sides of the narrow dresser-top and touched the edge of her shirt, causing the skin underneath to jump on contact.
~~~~~~~
"It's staining your shirt."
"And my pants, and my shoes, and my skin. It keeps coming. I can't hold it without a new cup."
~~~~~~~
Hand shaking, she grasped the mug, brought it to her lips. Had it been a dream? Maybe it had been a vision. Doyle's voice echoed inside her head…
~~~~~~~~
"You're not supposed to be all white."
"You're not supposed to be all red."
"So fix it."
~~~~~~~~
She placed the cup back onto the table, beside the pitcher, took a deep breath. What crazy dreams.
~~~~~~~~
"I'm a General."
"A leader."
~~~~~~~~
Something nagged at her about those words. Disoriented, she moved to sit at the vanity, brought up a brush to comb her hair. **What a weirdo-mundo dream…** she thought absently.
**Wait a minute…** Something finally clicked in her brain.
~~~~~~~~
"There are two types of people here that make the world move. You've got your big bads; you've got your heroes. The thing they've all got in common is: they're visionaries. They're unique."
~~~~~~~~
Whistler. What he'd told her in the tent, it matched…
~~~~~~~~
"He's an idiosyncrasy."
~~~~~~~~
The dream. She closed her eyes, tried to remember all the words, tried to see what they were telling her. Phrases and lines mixed in her head, colors and images and blood and water…
~~~~~~~~
"The problem in Kaylorin is we've got these players, these movers, and for a while, things have been shifting out of balance."
~~~~~~~~
"What did you do with Doyle?"
"We are one in the same."
~~~~~~~~~
"Out of balance" she muttered to herself.
~~~~~~~~~
"What we need from you is to find one of the kings who's out of sorts with all the other players, and patch him up a little."
~~~~~~~~~
"You're a General."
"I'm tired."
"You should rest then."
"I can't sleep."
"Why not?"
"I'm a General."
~~~~~~~~~
Was a General the same as a king?
~~~~~~~~~
"You see, it's like this. There are rules the PTBs operate by sometimes. Not fixed, mind you, they can change whenever fate's feeling particularly capricious. But they are there."
~~~~~~~~~
"You're not supposed to be all white."
"You're not supposed to be all red."
"So fix it."
~~~~~~~~~
"You are the queen of his life."
~~~~~~~~~
"Doyle, you're disappearing!"
~~~~~~~~~
"You are the queen of his life."
~~~~~~~~~
"You find the key, you win the war."
~~~~~~~~~
"What did you do with Doyle?"
"We are one in the same."
~~~~~~~~~
"There are two types of people here that make the world move. You've got your big bads; you've got your heroes. The thing they've all got in common is: they're visionaries. They're unique."
~~~~~~~~~
Her eyes opened, and she stared into the vanity mirror, her expression as lucid as ever. "Doyle."
I guess you were lost
When I met you
Still there were tears in your eyes
So out of trust
And I knew
No more than mysteries and lies
There you were
Wild and free
Reaching out like you needed me
A helping hand
To make it right
I am holding you all through the night
I'll be the one
Who will make all your sorrows undone
I'll be the light
When you feel like there's nowhere to run
I'll be the one
To hold you
And make sure that you'll be all right
My fear is gone
And I want to
Take you from darkness to light
There you are
Wild and free
Reaching out like you needed me
A helping hand
To make it right
I am holding you all through the night
I'll be the one
Who will make all your sorrows undone
I'll be the light
When you feel like there's nowhere to run
I'll be the one
To hold you
And make sure that you'll be all right
My fear is gone
And I want to
Take you from darkness to light