Listening to: My paper heart - All-American Rejects.

Disclaimer: This is a pretty poor interpretation of a dream I was told about by a very dear friend, which starred me. I started it a few months ago, and I stopped, for some reason. I guess I finally finished it.

You know how the earth smells just after it rains? Like soil, mold and decay, of living things roiling beneath the dirt, and how you could always be certain of the steady drop of rain water off the leaves, of the unerring stillness that came with the storm? That same surety presided within me now. If my dreams could categorized at all, I was sure as hell this wasn't a nightmare, or even a fable concocted from an addled, tired mind.

That same unshakeable certainty told me this was about her, as I had taught myself to assimilate thunderstorms and the musty smell of yellowed pages with.

It was so surreal. Unnatural even, as if I wasn't really there and nothing around me actually existed except within the boundaries of my state of unconsciousness. Somehow, at a subatomic level, I knew if I acknowledged the fact I was asleep and dreaming, everything would fade and dissolve through my fingers like a washed out watercolour painting.

And I wasn't finished, I didn't want to return to reality just yet. One more night. I just needed one more night. Flitting and phantasmagorical as these exploits are. Fanciful as it sounds, I needed this reprieve. Needed to be holding her and never letting her go on this astral plane before the thought of waking would seem remotely bearable.

If I woke up now, I'd lose it all.

I walked down the corridor, obliviously lost. Blissfully. The corridor was a miasma of green, yellow and gold. Despite its austere touch, I could tell it was a dormitory. Plain wooden doors were set into the walls at intervals, each with designated number plates. I could hear the faint laughter and music carrying down the corridor. My feet moved on their own accord. I walked down a flight of stairs, my light, surreptitious tread made the floorboards creak like the joints of an old woman or the protestant squeek of a rocking chair in a house. The music got louder, it thumped through the walls and I felt it through my feet.

I seemed to accelerate suddenly. The wooden stairs beneath my feet slipped out from under me, and I felt a peculiar, vertiginous sense of falling. The doors on either side of me rushed past in a blur. Snatches of conversation echoed all around me; some sounded far off, muffled, as if I were eavesdropping from another room, others would reign such authenticity as to be actual conversations held within earshot. Abruptly I stopped and all sound came flooding back to me at once, laughter, music, drunken slander, my feet were no longer standing on wood, but on lush, rich red carpeting. Furniture was scattered all over the enormous space like islands. A fire burned in the hearth. I was in a common room, filled with college kids and there was a party going on.

I made my way through the crush of gyrating bodies, no faces stood out to me, not one particular voice. I kept looking, eyes roaming and... A slender girl with long black hair stood with her back to the wall. She was clutching a plastic cup in one hand, sipping the cherry red liquid furtively. Her lips were stained pink. She was laughing, though I couldn't make out with who. Everything else bent and distorted in her presence. She was beautiful, clad in black shorts that made her milky skin stand out whiter and a white tank top. When her gaze caught mine I had to fight not to gasp aloud. She smiled, shyly, timidly, 'Hello.' Her voice dripped like warm honey.

'Hi.' I murmured, suddenly awkward. The silence stretched though it must have only been three seconds. 'I know your face. I've seen you before. I know you.' It all came out in a rush, like word vomit. I blushed. She appeared nonplussed, 'This is the first time we've met.' She smiled, apologetically at me and shrugged.

I am about to protest but then she turns her attention elsewhere, toward a boy sauntering toward her. She beams at him, and I feel my heart sink. Unlike the other silhouettes, I see him in vivid detail; shock of messy brown hair, skinny frame, tall, scruffy - a certified musician, bespectacled. His grin is lopsided, and as he places a hand around her waist, I physically take a step back. He kisses her forehead, leads her away. And with a cold dread that fills me apathetically, I watch. Helpless, she doesn't turn around, not once. She is swallowed by the crowd, and I lose her.

Something fundamental breaks and shatters and splitters inside me. I feel as if my guts have been pulled out and shredded and used to string across guitars, taut. I am standing in ice water, drenched, numb. The room starts spinning rapidly, colours melt, diffuse, warp, she is gone, and I am standing in infinite darkness. I wake up.

SIEG

'By birth, by blood, by right and by name - I am entitled to shatter every bone in your body,' His voice seethe venomously in my ear, the steel in his voice evident, as smooth as velvet. I could feel his sweet breath hot on my neck, almost as palpable as the sharp pain of his Seraph blade digging into the small of my back. I didn't move. I couldn't.

'In the name of her Demonic Majesty, you will do no such thing,' I kept my voice low and threatening, still it came out a pained whisper.

'There is no conviction, I hear none on your tongue....' With mercurial finesse, his fingers twisted phantom-like into my hair, he yanked violently, forcing me to face him. The blade in his hand seemed to hum in satisfaction as it finally pierced my skin and drew blood. I heard the cut of white-metal on fragile flesh before I felt the kiss of it sting. My eyes darkened with discomfort. I glared at him, meeting his piercing grey eyes, all my loathing, all my regret, all my agony. An unintelligible hiss escaped, he didn't slacken his grip. Smirking, he titled his head right and brought his mouth as if to nuzzle my ear. The light of the setting sun illuminated his golden mane, blinding, immobilizing me. '... And I see none in your eyes, harbinger of devastation.'

He exhaled on the sensitive flesh at the hollow of my neck, and bit. 'Pray, tell me, what would you have me do instead?'

'Release me, Leo,' My voice faltered, barely above a murmur, a silent, almost plea, and I found myself being inexorably drawn closer to him just to be heard. Just a hair's breath away. His mouth was drawn in a grim, tight line. I let my eyes go half-mast, he almost seemed to coruscate. 'You and I both know you will do no such thing.' Rage flashed across his fierce, dignified features, his lips parted to raise a tempest. I eliminated the distance between us, and pressed my mouth to his.

At that moment, I knew. Whether I lived or died lay in his hands. All the machinations and devices of Hell couldn't keep me away - Lilith's wrath be damned.

-
LEO

There is something to be said about the art of subterfuge. As delicate as the threads that hold it are, you can never tell when subtle deception ends and the truth starts. Its treachery runs red, it runs deep. It is the worst kind of betrayal. A double edged blade.

I had fallen for it: hook, line and sinker. Disgraced, I demanded penance. I sought revenge. I wanted blood - and I was so close. I wanted to destroy the man I now clutched so vehemently to my chest. I wanted to break him, make him beg, to cry out my name, to plead for mercy. I wanted to offer him salvation, then take it away just as swiftly.

And I hated it. But not as much as I hated myself for being so weak, so fallible. So... So... Mortal.

The realization left an acrid taste in my mouth.

I tightened my grip on Azrael, my Seraph blade, my knuckles turned white with the strain. I felt the blood-lust rear hungrily, driven by more than just mere anger. The cavity in my chest yawned open like a gaping maw, the ache made me yank his head back harder. His black hair had streaks of red in it; they looked like ruptured veins against my stark white fist. I felt my blade cut deeper than I intented it to, as if it had a taste for death like the Angel of Destruction himself.

He gasped.

I faltered.

The hurt displayed so clearly on his face and in his eyes nearly brought me to my knees.

Nearly, but not quite.

No, never again. Enough.

I snarled and sank my teeth into the tender flesh below his jugular. His breathing audibly shallowed. I could sense the race of blood beneath skin, felt it congeal under the mark I left as my teeth abraised and bruised.

'Release me, Leo.'

My name on his cold, dead lips.

'... You will do no such thing.'

There was a note of finality in his tone. I paused. Before I knew it, those same lips crashed into mine with a fierceness I didn't know he possessed. I dropped Azrael. In some distant part of my mind, I heard the blade clang onto the concrete. Found myself pushing to trap him between the wall and my iron grip. Felt the thread snap clean in two.

I wasn't clinging onto sanity, not anymore. It was something else holding me up.

A doubtful voice murmured in my ear.

Or was it dragging me down?

Listening to: Falling down - Space Cowboy Feat Paradiso Girls.

Disclaimer: I seriously need to start writing again.

I grabbed his wrist, the contact of his bare skin on mine almost caused me to flinch and let go. It was icy cold. I tightened my grip, and felt his hand enclose and clench but he didn't pull away. I whispered, 'Sammie, please.' My voice sounded small and injured, even to my own ears in that wide space. The use of his childhood name made him turn his dark gaze on me. Even in the moonlight, I could tell he was shooting daggers at me. His eyes were inscrutable, immense. They held secrets I no longer had a place in. His hair shone like silver mercury, his features were contorted in fury. His brass knuckle gleamed hungrily as he raised it to strike. He was beautiful, and cruel. And at that moment, I truly believed that I could not save his humanity. I shut my eyes, and waited for a starburst of pain, hoping it would bring salvation. 'Fuck it.' His fist sunk into the bark instead, 'FUCK!' Cold ice ran down my spine and rooted me to the ground. A gust of wind startled the fallen leaves, but otherwise the park was deathly silent. We seemed to stand there, me with my back to the sentinel of trees and him, poised and unmoving. How did things come to this? 'Don't go where I can't follow.'

'What do you expect me to do, Alexis?' He hissed torturedly, teeth clenched tight, his eyes darkened even further. 'Huh? I don't belong in your world.' He turned and wrenched his hand out of mine. Frustration, anger, fear - radiated from him in waves. Automatically I took a step back and pressed against the bark, wishing to hide, to disappear. Immediately I regretted it. Samuel flinched, and his paroxysm dissolved into undisguised hurt. 'Are you afraid of me, Lexy?' I shook my head. 'Liar. I can sense your fear. Or had it slipped your mind, Lexy? I'm a darkling now. I can't stay, I won't.' He whispered, so softly, like death that pads steathily into a room and settles amongst its occupants, with finality, with conviction. He placed a palm on my cheek, long, slender fingers danced across my skin. I expect you to fight, I screamed in my head, but I knew he wouldn't and he knew that I knew that too, even before I could say a word. He shook his head slowly, as if shaking off cobwebs or the dredges of a deep dream. He pressed his lips to my forehead, and released me. He stepped away from the cover of the trees, into the direct path of moonlight.

A turbulent gust of wind seemed to gather as his feet, shifting the leaves on the ground, his worn jeans, his leather jacket, his hair. A nimbus as dense as molasses and as dark as night enveloped him. He smiled, but it came out as a lopsided grimace. The wind was a gale storm now, circling only around him, the ground split open, gaping like the maw of a hideous creature with a sound like cracking whips. Vaporous tendrils seemed to caress his legs, crawling higher, kissing his flesh. 'No. No...' The tendrils materialized, and pulled. Samuel disappeared. And the hole in the ground converged, leaving behind black scorch marks. But not a trace of him. He was gone. 'NONONONONO. Sammiesammiesammie.' My vision blurred. The world tilted sharply, and for just a second I was suspended in air. For a fraction of a second, I flew, and I saw the canopy of leaves above, the scattering of stars. Then I fell, and the curtain drew velvet and heavy against my eyelids. I welcomed the darkness.

Listening to: A little piece of heaven - Avenged Sevenfold.

Listening to: Die in your arms - Crash Romeo.