Can Anybody Find Me?

Lone stared at the empty bottle of liquor and wondered when they'd drank so much. She hated alcohol normally, but it had seemed.... appropriate somehow. She swayed even though she was seated and Rimmon laughed at her drunkeness. Neither him nor Gavin seemed as swilled as she did right now, though that figured. They weren't actually human.

"You know what really deserves a laugh?" Lone asked Rimmon, voice slurred.

"Oh and what's that?" The Demon asked, a smirk dancing around his lips. The Angel glared at him over Lone's head, eyes promising a painful and violent death. That only served to make the Demon want to provoke him more. So he ran a finger along her jaw, letting it trail down to her neck and slowly creep towards her... the Angel snatched his hand and threw it away from Lone's body and Rimmon laughed a deep, throaty sound. It didn't occur to him that the voices of his brethern were strangely subdued at the moment...

"The fact that you thnik I'm gonig with you to Hell." Lone replied. Then hiccuped, following the sound with a very girlish sounding giggle. Lone clamped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide with surprise that she made the sound.

Gavin slid his arm over her shoulders and pulled her away from the Demon. "He can't make you go with him, you have to choose to go. And you don't have to do that."

Rimmon allowed the Angel to pull his human away, knowing that he had solid hooks into her now. And they would only get stronger the more she let him touch her. "For once the Angel is right. I can't make any mortal go with me. But he seems to be forgetting that I can bring you there without permission because you're Branded." the Demon leaned forward, trapping Lone between him and the Guardian Angel. "But I won't do that unless you ask me to." the Angel reached forward to shove him away but Lone used the chance to slip off hte counch entirely.

The human stumbled a few steps until she caught herself on the island. With an unbalanced hop she managed to haul herself to sit on the island, away from them both. "Mr. Grabby Hands and Mr. Wandering Fingers, you're both wrong."

The Guardian Angel and the Demon Ambassador stared at her, amused and confused. Lone stared at them, waiting for them to figure it out on their own but they couldn't. She laughed to herself softly, drunk and careless because it occured to her that they wouldn't understand because she had never told them. "I'm not like normal girls. Or boys. But that's biology." she started to get off topic but then Gavin stood up from the couch.

She couldn't help staring at him, he really did draw the eyes. Tall, broad shoulders and she knew a set of abs that were drool worthy. Memories of how far she let things go between them flashed through her drunken mind, making her cheeks colour as she recalled the hotel room.... Rimmon cleared his throat and broke the temporary spell, Lone realizing that Gavin had walked over in front of her and she'd let him.

"I'm s'posed be mad at you both. You lied to me, used me and took parts of my soul." Lone cried out, the sullen anger in her gut finally overwhelming the drunk and confused hormones.

"To be fair we did replace them with pieces of our own." Rimmon called from the couch.

"Not helping." Gavin chided over his shoulder. The Demon hadn't known Lone as long as he had, he couldn't see the same warning signs that Gavin could. Her Guardian Angel had been watching her even in exile for her entire life, he knew her better than any mortal man ever could. Loved her more honestly than any mortal man would.

Lone looked up at Gavin's bright blue eyes and he saw the self loathing and confusion that they had all but forced on her. She didn't understand the irresistable pull of the marks they'd both put on her, and even if it wasn't her fault that her body was now responding to instincts that weren't natively her own, she felt responsible for it. The Guardian Angel wanted to kiss her and tell her he loved her. That there was nothing she could ever do that would make him stop loving her and most importantly that none of this was her fault. It never had been. From her mother's untimely death to now, it wasn't her responsibility to bear. It was his.

Rimmon felt his eyebrows shoot up in surprise when the Guardain Angel dropped to his knees in front of Lone. He felt a spike of fear for a moment but it died at the Angel's words. "I'm so sorry Lone. I hope one day to help you understand. Just please.... don't give up alright?" the Angel asked. Rimmon frowned and then really took at look at the mortal they'd been playing with.

He loved the strong line of her jaw and the arrogant confidence in her eyes that she could handle anything. But that fire wasn't there now, too many personal failures had snuffed that out. Some of them his own fault. The Demon felt a pang of guilt, an unfamiliar sensation after so many centuries without it. But it forced him off the couch as surly as it had the Angel and he joined his reluctant brethern in front of Lone. Though Rimmon refused to kneel.

"I apologize as well Lone. You didn't ask for any of this, but you have handled it amazingly." he stopped next to the Angel and was surprised when he could not physically move any closer to her. It was as if she had the strength to hold them both at bay.

"Go away. Both of you just go away." Lone closed her eyes and siad the words softly. She couldn't... why were they... too much she felt the tears threaten. She'd been trying to keep them away, to sheild her aura from being stained by theirs. It'd worked, mostly. The edges of her aura were stained with the hues of theirs, a swirling mix that tinted her world with their touch. But they didn't take over like they normally would have, burying her aura under theirs. It wasn't much but that small victory allowed her the space to breath, even if just for a moment. Because when she opened her eyes, both men were gone. Lone curled her knees to her chest and silently cried, biting her fist like so long ago to keep the sounds in.

####

The Demon and the Guardian Angel sat silently, waiting in awkward silence. It was humiliating and frustrating to be forced to sit there. "I can't believe she did that." Rimmon muttered.

"I can't believe she was ABLE to do that." Gavin countered, a proud feeling in his gut. She had Repelled them, forced them away. No normal mortal was supposed to be able to do that, but his Lone was.

"How do you think she was able to do it?" Rimmon asked, signalling the waitress that they could both use another coffee. Even though they had helped Lone drink her 40 of rum, neither one had gotten the least bit drunk. It simply wasn't possible unless they allowed it to happen. However, that didn't stop them from smelling like alcohol, so it was always better to drink some coffee and disguise the scent.

The Guardian Angel just shrugged, becoming impatient as they waited for Coyote to arrive. The Neutral had answers, both Angel and Demon knew that. So it fell to them to be patient enough hunters to stalk their prey. And since the man with the answers was Dumb Coyote, both men knew that it could be a while.

Coyote walked in and they knew it, feeling his presence subdue their own Otherness. It was getting to the point that Gavin was acutally getting used to feeling the bite of mortality in his veins. Perverse thought, that. Rimmon enjoyed a little perversity though, revelling in the wrongness of being human again after several lifetimes of not being that constrained.

"So what did you idiots do now?" Coyote demanded, sitting down at the same time thress coffees arrived. Coyote smiled and thanked the waitress, ignoring the surprised looks from Angel and Demon, not explaining to them how she'd known to bring 3 mugs instead of 2.

"We didn't do anythi-" Rimmon started to deny, face showing his surprise as his voice cut out, suddenly missing.

"Don't bother lying wretch." Coyote chided with a pleasant smile on his face.

"I think we put too much pressure on her. And she hates our marks." Gavin said the painful words out loud.

Coyote sighed, rubbing his eyes. "And let me guess, you've both been... encouraging her sexual respone to the marks." both men nodded. "There is something about Lone taht you both need to know before this goes any farther. It's her secret to share, and I am breaking her trust to tell you this, so treat it with seriousness. But if I don't do this, I risk letting you both destroy her." Coyote kept them in suspense while he sipped his coffee. Even though their Otherness was being surpressed, both felt it as Coyote stretched his influence out, keeping others from hearing this next part. "Lone is Spirit Touched. I do not know what term you each use for it, but she can see and manipulate the auras of people. Mostly she does it instinctively, but there are a few things I've taught her."

Gavin was frowning, he had heard of something like this before but hadn't paid attention to it. Rimmon looked horrified, as if Coyote had just told him that Lone was secretly the 8-headed Hydra. "She's Seelenheiler!" the Demon exclaimed, nearly jumping out of his seat to put space between him and the word.

"What exactly does this all mean for Lone?" Gavin asked, trying to hide his ignorance.

"It means that yours aren't the only souls she's affected by." Coyote stated with a sad sigh. "Anyone whom she comes into contact with, she takes a piece from. Most of the time it's harmless, the parts that touch are so small that they have no effect. But the stronger the aura she encounters, the stronger an effect it has on her so...."

"So if I take her with me to the Descended, she might become overwhelmed with someone else's... influence." Rimmon finished off.

"Wait, if that's the case, then how come we haven't had that kind of effect on her?" Gavin was still confused.

"Because a part of her wants to bear your Marks. Both of you hold something for her, and she accepts that into her without fighting, and thus makes it her own. I can't fully explain it to you because it's different for each person that experiences this. But she's supposed to be a Neutral like me. Instead, because you two have torn parts of her soul away and put in your own she's... something else. I suppress you both. She's supposed to as well. Instead, through the Marks, she amplifies you both. So as much as I would love for you two to both leave her alone, it's far too late for that now. Because I think I've discovered what this Twisted of yours is. And we need her if we're gonig to stop it before more people die." Coyote's voice was a low warning.

"And what exactly is this Twisted?" Rimmon and Gavin asked at the same time, glaring at each other across the table.

"Somehow, something has managed to Corrupt a Fallen Arc." Coyote stated.

"Does that actually mean anything to you?" Rimmon asked Gavin reluctantly.

The Guardian Angel nodded solemly, face pale. "It means we are absolutely screwed. Think Aarmageddon without the fun parties."

"Well at least it'll be epic." The Demon retorted.

"I'm going to go see Lone." Coyote stated, standing up from the table.

"You might want to give her some time." Gavin softly warned.

"Or some coffee to sober her up." Rimmon added in, needing to get the last word in.

"Why me?" Coyoted asked the ceiling.