He wasn¡¦t alone when he woke up, and of all people, he didn¡¦t expect to find who he did in his room, staring at him with a distant and stoic expression, her body wedged onto the narrow windowsill, one knee up and the other leg hanging down.

It must have been his exhaustion that kept him from waking at her arrival. It scared him that he had been left so defenseless by the previous night¡¦s events.

He sat up slowly, the black body suit from the night before still on but peeled down to the waist. He pushed himself up with his arms, back against the headboard, and as he did, he was surprised to feel no pain.

Bending his right arm, flexing the muscles under the covers, he tested its strength, never taking his eyes off his guest. But no matter what he did, he couldn¡¦t make it hurt, couldn¡¦t find the weakness and injury he knew must be there.

It was as if his arm had somehow healed overnight.

Swallowing hard, he pushed the topic away, forcing himself to deal with the present situation.

"Good mornin¡¦ Sarah, nice of you to drop by." He couldn¡¦t manage the humor and the smirk that should have accompanied the comment, too tired and cockiness requiring too much energy.

Her eyes slowly focused on him, her expression not changing, only becoming slightly less distant. She almost seemed surprised that he was awake and talking to her. She didn¡¦t say anything, only stared with those haunting, unforgettable eyes of hers. The red hair was growing out now, some strands hanging down across her face and in the dim light of the rising sun she almost looked pretty.

He tilted his head slightly. "Not like y¡¦ to be so quiet, chere."

For long dragging moments she didn¡¦t say anything, leaving the room in awkward silence. He waited, aware of everything, the bone poking through her forearm that her hand was resting on, the chair in the corner with his trenchcoat thrown over it and the cards in the pockets, the dresser on the other side of the closed door from the bed with his laptop on it, across from the window. The upper half of his body was cold, sitting up above the dark red comforter bundled around his waist.

And then, suddenly, she blurted: "I hate you." But there was a strange slur to the words that he had never heard out of her before. Not the fire or the confidence or the disgust that they should have held. Her somewhere-else eyes met his and he thought that she was questioning the statement, saying it just to see how it would sound to her, to try it on and see if it fit.

He wasn¡¦t sure how to respond, or if he should at all. The decision was made for him and words began pouring out of her.

"I came here to kill you," she said calmly, all her words so falsely indifferent, so carefully constructed, "I came here to kill you while you slept, defenseless and exhausted from being out late doing whatever keeps a traitor happy." A pause. "Calisto died last night, an infection from a battle eating its way to her heart, and so I came here to kill you and have vengeance for all the pain you caused her in life." She stopped then. It was like she was under some spell, talking without really being aware of the words.

"But I¡¦m still alive," he said gently. Always master of the obvious.

She glared at him, the spell broken. "Well, aren¡¦t we the observant one." The sarcasm was more her character than anything that had come before.

"I try." A pause, then: "So, why is it I¡¦m not dead?"

She looked away then. Her voice was quiet. "I don¡¦t know."

"Oh."

And then she cursed him. She stood and she cursed him and he thought he could see streaks of dried tears on her cheeks.

More silence. She seemed like she wanted to leave but didn¡¦t know how, trapped in her own inward thoughts, her own silent pain.

"I¡¦m sorry, Sarah." He thought he meant about Callisto, and then realized he meant a lot more.

Anger flared behind her eyes. "Don¡¦t call me that." And then she took a step forward. "You were in the tunnels the other day. Why?"

He should have expected that she would have known. The place had been her home for all her memory and she would be aware of any disturbance, any intruder. "To resolve the past. To move on."

The effect of the words was rage, and seeing the frenzy on the face, he thought she might just decide that she would murder him after all. "Do you think you can just leave it all behind? Just bury it in the past?!" she shrieked.

"Oui, dat¡¦s exactly what I think."

"Traitor," she hissed, her voice low and threatening. "Do you really think I would let you forget what you¡¦ve done?"

He shook his head. "No, not forget, never. But it¡¦s time to stop living in the past. It¡¦s time to use the lessons we¡¦ve learned and apply them to the future." He was surprise at how philosophical and calm he sounded. It must be the lack of sleep.

She didn¡¦t seem to know what to do with that, standing frozen and trying to decide how she wanted to react. The impulses she had depended on her whole life were suddenly failing her.

"Why didn¡¦t you kill me?" He almost added "Sarah" at the end, then decided against it.

There was a bone dagger in her hand, pulled free from her forearm now, and she gripped it with deathly white knuckles. "I don¡¦t know," she said fiercely.

"Yes, you do," he chanced.

"What do you care?" she yelled, and then seemed to realize how stupid that sounded. "I don¡¦t owe you anything!"

He thought maybe she was telling herself this more than him. Carefully, cautiously, he unfolded the walls of his mind to barely touch her thoughts, careful not to go too deep, his skittish conscience suddenly telling him not to invade her privacy. She was a mass of confusion, pain and blind rage, he presumed spurred by Calisto¡¦s death, mixing up everything into a heterogeneous soup.

"Non, you don¡¦t," he agreed. "I owe you." He let the statement fall, as if to say, You had every right to kill me, so why didn¡¦t you?

She stared at him, and then she did something he didn¡¦t expect. She took the bone dagger and stabbed her palm, shaking as the blood flowed free, and then squeezing it shut to let the red liquid drip out onto the wooden floor.

She snarled at him, then closed her eyes, letting the pain clear her head. When she opened them again, there was a little less madness there. "I hate you," she growled, and then she was gone, out the door without a sound.

He almost believed her.

*******

He spent that morning in the Danger Room, testing and straining and re-testing his arm, over and over again. And when it was over, when there was sweat dripping off his brow, air heaving quickly in and out of his lungs, and a scattering of droids around him in tiny burnt piles on the metal floor, he was forced to come to the conclusion that his arm was completely healed.

He stood, dizzy from the excessive exercise that his body was used to, and stared down at the diamond shaped scar on the back of his hand. What did it really mean? Was the Green Ghost Lady really telling him the truth when she said she had no connection to Sinister? He found it hard to displace his paranoia.

And then he was still no closer to understanding the¡¦ thing that lived inside of him. He hadn¡¦t felt her presence since last night, his mental walls too high.

He wouldn¡¦t take them down again. He couldn¡¦t. He¡¦d barely risk lowering them enough to use his powers, but to pull them low enough to see her over the top?¡¦that was a mistake he wouldn¡¦t make again.

Flexing his arm, he gazed down at it. No pain. There was only one possible reason why. But why would she heal him? Why had she ever healed him in the past? A mercy gesture? Guilt? The face of the girl lying on the stone cold pavement, hysterical and tear-stained glanced up at his mind¡¦s eye as a crowd of mutant-haters closed in with obscene phrases and threats of violence.

His thoughts were interrupted by Jean relaying a message from Scott, telling him that, if he was done in the Danger Room, the fearless leader would meet him in the medlab after his checkup.

*Get out of m¡¦ head!*

Then she was gone, leaving him alone with his thoughts again. He decided he was tired of thinking, as tired of thinking as he was of fighting. Glancing at the remnants of a one-man battle scattered across the floor, he ordered the Danger Room to clean up and cycle down before he walked out the door, aiming for a shower before his checkup.

She hated cages. She had an inherent need to be free, and ever since she¡¦d gotten here the confinement had slowly been eating away at her.

It was strange. Sometimes she felt like she was slowly drifting apart, diffusing into a entropy-rich mist and there would be a certain calm, a certain peace. A certain freedom.

And then she¡¦d realize what was happening to her and force herself back together, rope in the spreading mist to be remolded into her female figure. The experience was terrifying. And it was happening more and more.

She¡¦d never stayed in a person¡¦s body more than a few hours before Remy. And even then it had been short bursts of action, usually healing some disease by directly controlling the body¡¦s responses and submolecular activities, the thing that the Witness had centered her training around. She¡¦d never understood why exactly he¡¦d wanted her to learn how to heal. Somewhere, in her fantasies, she had always suspected that he was dying from some horrible disease and that eventually, when she was ready, he would ask her to heal him. And then, in the same fantasy, she would see herself refusing and him falling to the floor in fear and terror.

He never asked her to heal him. But then, she¡¦d never given him the chance, had she? She¡¦d left before he could. She was being escorted to a meeting with him when she had escaped, running blindly until she crashed into a man with an XSE logo across his right chest, someone who said he knew the man with the scar.

But even in her short training with him, she¡¦d never practiced staying in someone¡¦s mind for too long. It was the emptiness that got her the most, and the spaces between action. Then there had been some lesson to learn and her mind was focused on some task that was part of her training, after which, she would promptly leave the host. But now? There were long stretches of time when she just hung in space, wondering how she could possibly be saving the world by sitting in this blackness diffusing slowly into the night¡¦

And sometimes, with no one to hear, she would cry.

His walls had never been so strong before. She was only able to heal his arm while he was sleeping, with his guard only slightly relaxed. Now, she couldn¡¦t even feel his higher mind through the cage he had effectively put her in. The silence was decibels too loud.

Healing. That¡¦s what she did. That was what she had been trained to do. She¡¦d left Remy injured so that he would be humbled, so that he would know pain and never be able to forget it. So that he would be distracted, unable to be the solid, omnipotent Witness that she knew. But then, he¡¦d tried to save a girl from being hit by a car, and her minor torture of leaving his arm injured had almost caused that girl her death. Remy had tried to be a hero and she¡¦d almost stopped that.

Could ghosts feel guilt?

Remy. She wondered when she had started thinking of him that way. He was the Witness, or the prerequisite to the Witness at least. She had to remember that, couldn¡¦t let herself forget what he¡¦d done.

Digging up memories never too far away, she forced herself to watch her parents¡¦ death all over again.

She had to remember. And in the dark of nothingness, she shivered, bodiless, because she was afraid she was forgetting. Maybe her hate was slowly diffusing like her sense of self. She tried to gather it up around her, to use it to bind her goals, her mission, together.

She wondered what the date was. How much time did she have left? It was hard to tell when there was no sun to mark days. Was the transaction last night the key to it all? She¡¦d tried to stop it and had failed. He was getting stronger, stronger than she had realized and it worried her. Her existence used to be contained on a plane that he wasn¡¦t more than dimly aware of, but now that he knew it was there, he was learning how to use his psionic form, to manipulate the world that she lived in.

Maybe it was already too late. Maybe last night had been the key and now it was over. She had failed. There was no way to be sure. New Son was somehow linked to the events that spurred her future, was this transaction how?

Everything she had come back for, her mission, her purpose might have been lost. She might have condemned her parents to die all over again.

And somewhere, her nonexistent heart ached with the possibility.

And she sobbed, deep and wracking, without eyes or tears.

*******

Harry¡¦s was starting to fill-up for the lunch hour, groups of people coming in twos and threes. Remy and Scott were sitting in the corner affectionately dubbed the "X-corner". The X-Men came here often enough that they had their own little table reserved. It was out of the way, set back from most of the others, and Remy sometimes wondered if they were always encouraged to sit there because they were frequent visitors, or because they were from that freak school down the road.

He put his elbows up on the glossy wood tabletop and stared at the stained menu that he probably could recite from memory. He glanced up at Scott. The dark raybans covering his eyes made the man¡¦s face show in unnatural shadows. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust and filter out the dark. Scott looked up from his menu and met his gaze.

"Are you ready to order?"

"Been ready. Waitin¡¦ on you, mon ami," he replied lightly.

Scott smiled. "Well, it¡¦s so hard to choose. There are so many choices."

Remy chuckled and felt some of the tension ease out. There was no reason for him to be hostile here. On guard, yes. But hostile? He¡¦d had enough of that the last few days.

"De waitress is starin¡¦ at you. I t¡¦ink she likes you."

"Or maybe she¡¦s just wondering why we both refuse to take off our sunglasses."

"Maybe." Remy smirked. "I bet dat¡¦s why she has dat dreamy look on her face."

Scott blushed and then tried to hide it by holding up the menu to study it.

Remy watched him for a second longer before turning away. He rarely let himself see the man this way, just an ordinary guy in ordinary, yellow-less, spandex-less clothes, in an ordinary place. Somehow, leaving the X-Mansion and stepping outside had cast him in a new light.

It was also easier for Remy to see Scott as something more than a controlling authority figure without all the anxiety and tension Remy usually felt. As long as the walls stayed up in his head, he could almost relax. And for a moment, sitting here in Harry¡¦s Hideaway with a fellow mutant, he almost felt good. The Danger Room session, overall, had done a lot to release his stress. And the whole New Son thing was finally over, for better or for worse. Without any pain in his arm, he could almost forget anything had happened. He could almost feel normal. ¡¦Normal¡¦ being a relative term, of course.

Just as long as Scott played nice-nice, and didn¡¦t decide to prod for information, life was good.

"Are you ready to order?" came the overly sweet and sugarcoated voice. The waitress looked down at them over black-rimmed glasses. She was young, a little heavy, with black hair thrown up in a messy pony tale.

They both muttered that they were, and there was that moment of confusion where nobody knows who should order first before she solved the problem by focusing her stare on Scott.

They ordered, she scribbled on her pad, told them "thank you" and that she would be back soon with their drinks, and was gone.

"So, how have you been lately, Remy?" Scott leaned back in the chair.

"Been better. Times are hard." He shrugged, the answer not really saying much definitively.

Scott nodded. "Yeah. They are." And for a moment Remy could see the tiredness creasing the edges of his eyes as his mind slipped into troubled thoughts and stress. He sighed. "It¡¦s getting harder and harder to be¡¦" he paused, seeming to realize that there were people all around in earshot, "¡¦ what we are, these days."

Remy tilted his head, surprised at the admission. "It¡¦s never been easy." He said.

"No, it hasn¡¦t."

Remy raised his eyebrows at the man. "I t¡¦ink you¡¦re stealing my job of pessimist. I t¡¦ought I was the thief here. You tryin¡¦ to beat me out o¡¦ my profession, Scotty?"

Scott smiled distantly, "No, of course not."

Remy shrugged and also leaned back comfortably in his chair. He caught a girl from another table staring out of the corner of his eye and winked at her. She didn¡¦t react. He remembered that he was wearing dark sunglasses and looked away, embarrassed.

"What?" Scott asked, noticing Remy¡¦s momentary loss of coolness.

"Nothing. Guess it¡¦s just easy to forget sometimes."

Somehow Scott knew exactly what he meant without questioning him.

"You¡¦ve been in and out of the mansion a lot lately," Scott commented casually.

Here it came. He had to expect the questioning to come eventually; he could almost feel white, hot lights shining down and accusing him. "So?"

"Look Remy, I¡¦m not trying to force information out of you, but as your team leader, I need to make sure things are okay. You¡¦ve been through a lot."

"Things are fine."

Scott gazed at him for a moment, then nodded. "Okay. If you say so¡¦ I need to trust you." It took a lot for him to say that, Remy could feel it. "But I also needed to ask."

Remy avoided Scott¡¦s eyes. He couldn¡¦t explain why, but he suddenly felt extremely uncomfortable. Trust¡¦ being offered to him? It felt wrong, unnatural, surprising. It was all he¡¦d ever really wanted and everything he¡¦d never really expected to have.

The waitress came, set the drinks on the table. She asked if they needed anything. Remy didn¡¦t look up. Scott said that everything was fine. She left.

"So, how t¡¦ings been around the mansion lately?" Remy finally said to saturate the silence. "Like y¡¦ said. I¡¦ve been in and out a lot."

Scott shifted in his chair, resting a forearm across the table. He seemed so much less rigid here, not straight backed and ever-tense, like in the mansion, and Remy could see the visible change without the stress that must weigh on the man¡¦s back whenever in his role as leader. "Well, I guess relatively quiet, all things considered. We expected more situations to arise with the Mutant Registration vote approaching. I think everybody is just waiting though, waiting to see what happens."

"And then?" Remy took a sip of his Dr. Pepper.

Scott looked down at his hands, and then looked up again when he failed to find the answers there. "I don¡¦t know. I guess I¡¦m waiting too."

But Remy could see, even with his empathy locked behind walls, that Scott knew what would happen. If Registration passed, it could severely hamper the dream. He wondered when it was that dreams strained enough to shatter.

"Other than that," Scott started up suddenly from his thoughts, "Betsy has been calling a lot lately. She says that she has been having some strange feelings¡¦anxiety attacks, or something like them. She thinks it has something to do with the Shadow King. Jean is going to run a Cerebro check for him this evening. Cerebro has been set on an automatic search pattern for the professor since we got back, and Jean has been reluctant to interrupt it to search for a villain who is pretty much MIA."

"How¡¦s Warren?" Remy tried to sound like he didn¡¦t really care.

"They only just got up to the cabin yesterday, but he says he already feels better, like he can stretch out and be free."

The waitress came and set their food down before them. They had both ended up with hamburgers, Remy¡¦s with the works and Scott¡¦s traditional style. She was gone again.

Remy took a big bite and when his mouth was empty enough to speak: "So is dat it? No juicy gossip, homme?"

"Not really. Or at least, nothing that you need to hear." Scott grinned with a slyness that Remy hadn¡¦t expected from him, and then the expression died. "But, you know, there has been this strange draft in the kitchen lately." He didn¡¦t smile, probably being careful to at least halfway play the leader and not make light of blowing a hole in the wall.

"Dat¡¦s pretty strange. Maybe one o¡¦ de windows has a leak in de insulation."

Scott kept his face straight. "I want that fixed. You did say you would pay for it."

Remy made a show of scratching his fuzzy head. "Wow. Y¡¦ know, my memory is really goin¡¦ dese days. Maybe I been hit ov¡¦r de head one too many times. I really don¡¦t recall offering to pay¡¦" He gave an innocent look. He should have known by now, that such an expression was nearly impossible with his features, but at least he had the sunglasses hiding his eyes.

"That¡¦s why I¡¦m here to remind you. Fix it. Before it snows again."

"Relax, Scotty, consider it done."

Scott gave him a look. "Why does that not comfort me."

Remy grinned and went on eating his sandwich. He couldn¡¦t remember the last time he had just sat down and had lunch, passing jibes with another person. Hopefully, it would happen more frequently.

But of course, things never worked out the way he hoped.

*******

"I don¡¦ like dis game," Remy complained, staring at the monopoly board set up on the coffee table in the den. He, Rogue, and Storm were sitting around it on the floor, enjoying an afternoon relaxing. Scott had retreated to the boathouse with Jean. They really had two homes now: one room in the mansion, and the boathouse. They took turns between the two, using the mansion when they needed to be near the team and the boathouse when they wanted to get away for a bit. Remy could only imagine what they were doing there together now.

"Why not, sugah?" Rogue asked innocently, raising her eyebrows. She was wearing a clingy green shirt that showed off her figure nicely and drawstring pants. Her hair was in pigtails, not a usual style for her, and the effect was a girlish appeal.

"I believe," Storm said playing along, "that it may have something to do with him being a sore loser." The two women look at each other knowingly.

"Am not," Remy interjected playfully. "It¡¦s not fair t¡¦ough. You knew de shoe was bad luck. That¡¦s why you gave it to me."

Rogue gave him a berating look. "Remy, you picked the shoe yourself."

"Only ¡¦cause you an¡¦ Storm already took all the good pieces."

"Remy, stop being a baby and roll." Storm handed him two dice.

He took them sulkily and soon forgot his annoyance as he became caught up in a series of luck-bringing rituals, from rubbing to blowing to kissing (Rogue made a face and started coughing sporadically then) and finally urging the dice with words. He ended up landing on Storm¡¦s boardwalk with the red shiny hotel on it.

"See, what did I tell y¡¦!"

Rogue waved a dismissing hand. "Would ya hush up and pay?"

He did. And he was left with one measly dollar. He stared at it sorely. Then he glared at Storm.

Ororo tilted her head and raised her eyebrows. "It would appear that I have wiped you dry."

Remy didn¡¦t say anything. He was pouting, and for once there were no smart remarks to make.

Rogue laughed. "I think the swamp rat is stuck down a river without a paddle."

He let them exhaust themselves with laughing at his predicament and then he got up carefully, walked over to the couch and took two cushions in his hands. He turned and smiled calmly at the ladies and as the realization hit their expressions and the "Don¡¦t you dare!" started to form on their lips, he pegged them each.

He sat down satisfied, sneaking a fifty from the bank as he did so, the women too distracted with fixing their hair and yelling at him to notice.

"I believe it¡¦s your roll, Rogue."

"Remy, I promise, when I¡¦m through with you, the only thing your gonna believe is that I ain¡¦t a gal to mess with." She punched her hand with her fist to emphasize the threat.

Remy smirked. "Do y¡¦ really promise?" he asked in an excited tone.

Rogue answered with a frustrated noise and then took up the dice to roll.

He watched, and couldn¡¦t help the content expression that he knew he must be wearing. Overall, it had been a good day thus far. Judging by yesterday¡¦s events, he¡¦d woken up believing that today would be hard pressed to be worse. Thankfully, that theory hadn¡¦t been tested. Even he and Scott had had a good lunch together without any fighting. And now, here he was, with the two women he was closest to, just having a good time. A drop of water hit him on the head, interrupting his thoughts. He frowned, blinking and wondering if he had just imagined it. But then he felt it again and he looked up to see a small rain cloud directly overhead, happily pouring out its contents on his fuzzy scalp. His gaze shot to Storm where she was sitting trying to hide a smirk and failing slightly, her eyes glazed over with white.

His eyes narrowed mischievously and he grinned lopsidedly. Two could play at that game. He got up. The storm cloud followed. It dissipated abruptly as he came to where she was sitting to avoid getting her wet. She looked up at him, both innocence and curiosity playing on her perfect features. And then, he lowered his head and ran a hand though his fuzz of hair toward her. Tiny droplets of water sprayed down at her and she winced. He sat down again.

"Oh no, you moistened my skin. I think I shall melt now." Sarcasm was rare for Storm, but when she used it, it had an amusing effect if for its abnormality.

He winked. "I seen stranger t¡¦inks happen."

Rogue finished giggling at the scenario and noticed Remy¡¦s additional assets. "Remy, where did that fifty come from?"

"Uhh¡¦ I was sittin¡¦ on it."

"You were sitting on it?"

"Yeah."

"Why?"

"For safe keepin¡¦. You never know what thieves dere are lurking around." He looked markedly at Storm.

"Nice try. Hand it over, Remy." Rogue held out a gloved hand.

Remy smirked devilishly. "Make me."

Her green eyes flared gloriously in fake anger. "Gladly," she snarled. She glanced at Storm and the two women nodded conspiratorially to each other.

They were both on him before he could get away, tickling him until he couldn¡¦t breathe. And then they sat on his stomach side by side talking about something totally unrelated and ignoring the fact that their chair was a human being as he gasped to catch his breath.

"You ladies are very cruel," he commented darkly when he could.

Rogue held up the fifty and waved it in front of him. "But we know how to get what we want."

"And you," he went on, pointing a finger at Storm, "I¡¦d expect dis from Rogue here, but not from you."

Storm shrugged and leaned back to look at him. "I don¡¦t enjoy being called a thief."

They were still sitting on him and the pressure was starting to weigh down heavily on his abdomen. Carefully, he started to charge the seats of their pants through his shirt. He had to fight a chuckle as he did so, to keep from giving his plan away. Storm was wearing some sort of thin translucent material, and it gathered kinetic energy much faster than Rogue¡¦s cotton pants. Plus, Rogue had the special resistance and resilience of her skin to save her, so Storm was the one to jump up suddenly shouting about hot pants.

"Why yes, Storm, you do have very hot pants," Remy commented.

She blushed and then scowled, going to sit back where she had been earlier during the game. "I suggest you be careful the next few days. You may wake up in the middle of a monsoon tomorrow."

Remy chuckled. Rogue looked confused throughout the whole thing until she finally seemed to notice her warming pants and muttered an "oooooooh," and then she shrugged and stayed where she was. "It feels kinda nice to me. Toasty."

He considered blowing up her pants completely to try to get a rise out of her and then decided that her anger might be a little more than he wanted to try to handle. He was really very happy with the way his face was arranged right now and didn¡¦t want to challenge her into changing it. He also considered stopping the kinetic energy all together, but if she was enjoying it, he might as well continue. So he did.

The monopoly game seemed to have been abandoned. They had been playing for about an hour and the game getting boring now. So they just talked about random, unimportant things, as he lay there, warming the tush of the woman he thought he loved. Sometimes, on rare occasions, life really could be quite good.

*******

The bed was nice and comfortable. He¡¦d only meant to lay down and relax for a little while before he checked his email and the messages on his cell phone.

He hadn¡¦t even realized he was falling asleep until he was already walking in his dreams, reliving last night over and over in endless torture. The girl was there, staring up at him, always staring, as the vehicle came racing towards her, his mind embellishing and changing things to make his worst nightmares true for a dream¡¦s length of eternity. In his dreams, she died, his fears personified, and as she lay there, he thought he saw a green mist float up around her body.

He was running before he realized he was doing it, unaware in his delirium that he was forming the psionic version of himself as he did so, the memory driven image of himself metamorphosing into a being of blue and sparking light. He didn¡¦t know where he was going, but the darkness seemed safe. Yes, the darkness, the place in his mind where nothing was, where nothing could hurt him, where he could be alone.

He¡¦d forgotten that he could never be alone in his mind now.

She was huddled in a ball when he saw her and he almost jumped back as he was struck by the memory of her presence. It was hard to believe that he had forgotten, that he¡¦d really expected this place to be empty.

Her head snapped up as he skidded to a stop and on her face was birthed a twin expression of his own surprise. There were crystals on her cheeks, slowly sliding down and he thought the illusion must be a representation of tears.

She stood suddenly. "Get out!" she yelled. Her body was all jagged edges, reflecting her mood.

Did she remember that it was his mind? He didn¡¦t move, didn¡¦t say anything, still not sure of his bearings.

Her voice was horse, raspy, and he could see that she was desperately trying to collect herself. "Didn¡¦t you hear me!" The yell was too loud in the empty darkness.

He wasn¡¦t sure what made him do it, but he took a step closer to her, trying to be as non-threatening as possible. Maybe it was wrought out of having no better reaction.

"Leave me! Why won¡¦t you just leave me alone?!" She looked like she might charge him and hit him.

"I can¡¦t," he stuttered out, wondering why that was the first answer that came to mind.

Her eyes were tumbled emeralds. "You can," came the quiet snarl.

"Never been able to escape my mind before, no matter how hard I¡¦ve tried."

She looked up at him, vicious anger driven by desperation in her face. "That didn¡¦t seem to stop you from walling this part off for the last day."

He didn¡¦t know how to answer that. Of course he could leave¡¦ but then he couldn¡¦t. Something kept him there, rooted to the illusionary ground and forcing him to face this intruder in his mind. Forcing him to wonder what could bring her to tears when last time he¡¦d faced her she had appeared to be carved out of vibrant, brilliant, solid stone.

Perhaps it was really glass.

Her image was sharpening before him, and as the blackness around him brightened, he realized that the whole place had been doused in a greenish halo earlier. But now, the crystal tears had shattered and her composure was returning and the moment of weakness that he¡¦d walked in on was gone.

The emeralds had narrowed to slits. "I am still in control here. I can kill you without a second thought."

He recognized the threat, and its purpose to change the subject, for what it was. It was a familiar tactic. "Then why haven¡¦t you." It was time to face his ghosts.

"I¡¦ve been merciful."

"Have you?"

"Yes."

He captured her eyes with his own. It was time to get some answers. He knew from last night that she wasn¡¦t invincible. She couldn¡¦t take over his mind unchallenged. "Why?"

"Are you asking me not to be?" She managed a wicked little smile.

He tilted his head, took a deep breath, kept his expression controlled. "Non, I¡¦m asking you why you are."

The smile faded a bit. Nothing for a moment, and then: "Because I¡¦m not like you."

It was his turn to narrow his eyes. "What do you know about what I¡¦m like?"

She giggled, a very strangled sound. "How do I know what you¡¦re like? I know you better than you know yourself¡¦" She came very close to him, her head reaching his shoulders and she looked up directly into his eyes. He could feel her presence in the form of a breeze and it tingled across his body like electricity. "¡¦Witness," she breathed.

"I¡¦m not de Witness." He resisted the urge to step back.

Her voice was falsely sweet, every action designed to recreate the illusion of power that she had lost. "No¡¦ but you will be."

"I¡¦m not de Witness," he repeated, a little more forcefully.

They were standing so close and he could feel the cool breeze of her mist upon his face and he suddenly felt the urge to touch her, to make sure she was real. "Sorry to disappoint you." He lifted her chin with his hand, to force her to keep eye contact with him.

And she immediately jumped back, touching the place he had and acting as if she had been burned.

But the brief contact had been enough and he could still feel the residual shadow of her in his mind from the joining the touch had brought. For a moment, he had been inside her. For a moment he had been her. It was completely unexpected and it was¡¦ exhilarating and terrifying all at the same time.

He was trembling.

"Don¡¦t ever touch me again." Her voice was hardened lava rock.

His was a whisper: "What was that?"

"The same thing that lets you live my memories."

He was staring at the hand that had touched her. He looked up. "How does dat happen?"

She looked away, then looked back. "When two minds touch intimately enough, they merge into one."

"Intimately enough?"

She glared directly at him. "You rape my mind."

She was angry¡¦ and hurt. The distance between them was noticeable, and her shadow had faded from his mind. "It¡¦s not rape if you¡¦re willing."

And that was the comment that ignited her, a ticking bomb set when he had interrupted her emotional release, an explosive whose fuse had just run out. "I¡¦ve never been willing! I did what I did because I had to. Because it was the only way I thought I could stop the future." She looked down, green strands of hair falling over her face to shadow it. A curse slipped from her lips, muttered to the ground.

He knew she was completely off balance, that she¡¦d never quite been on balance since he¡¦d come here. This was the time to find out as much as he could. "What is de future?"

She was on her knees now, arms wrapped around herself, and then, she slowly looked up, hair hanging around her features and obscuring them. "I can still kill you. I can end it now, save my parents, save everyone. I was stupid to let you live."

He shook his head. "I ain¡¦t buyin¡¦ dat act anymore, all you ever done is heal me. If you¡¦re so eager to kill me, dan you would have done it by now if you could." He was taking a gamble. He hoped it would pay off.

"I made a mistake. Horrible, horrible, mistake. I was too soft, thought I could change you, thought you were changed. It might be too late now, but I have to try. I have to try to make it better." She was standing now.

"I ain¡¦t the Witness, and I ain¡¦t gonna be." There was doubt somewhere in him as the words left his mouth. He wasn¡¦t sure where it came from.

She was despondent for a moment, as if she wasn¡¦t there with him, hearing him or seeing him. And then she was suddenly present again, gasping suddenly. Her head shook back and forth forcefully. "No! I won¡¦t let it happen again! I can¡¦t let them die again!" A choked sob. "I can¡¦t see them die again! No!"

And as he watched, eyes widening in the sudden realization that he may have just lost his bet, she rose up and spread her arms, suddenly becoming crystal sharp and defined, before her body seemed to explode as green light shot out from her in all directions. He had a moment to think about putting up his shields but not the extra moment to actually do it. The wave of light hit him, knocking the nonexistent air out of his lungs and flipping him over, carrying him and strangling him and it ripped him across the jagged edges of his mind and unraveled him, his psionic coat snagging on edges and unwinding until the psionic plane was only a dim touch on his mind. He saw the tunnel of light approach and was hurled through it¡¦

¡¦Into consciousness. He gasped for a desperate breath of air as his eyes snapped open and he saw the reality of his room. He had to try a couple of times before the air would go in and he realized he was freezing and that his eyes were tearing.

He tried to wipe them.

He couldn¡¦t.

He tried again. And again. And again.

But he couldn¡¦t.

He couldn¡¦t move anything, not even his lips to scream.

And in its cage of paralysis, his heart cried out, beating against the walls around it for freedom.

He had taken a gamble. He had lost.