Description: At first it was a single, clear voice of purpose. Then the serpent was let into Eden... but rather than his dark whispers providing direction, they only deepened Farah's confusion. Now as she stands among the remnants of the ancient world, the young psion once again encounters dark temptation, and gains her resolve again... but will it last in the face of such doubt?
Say what you will about crises of faith and intent, but they are in many ways a first world problem. In a more reflective state of mind, Farah might consider the importance of that. When you're starving, when you have no shelter, philosophy becomes very simple indeed: you take what you need, and handle the ethical consequences later. As it is, she instead can only think that regardless of money or security, when there is something you singlemindedly want, the method of pursuit is the same: you do whatever is necessary, and to hell with the consequences. The real question, the unasked question, is which of those men can justify their actions. The starving man can say, I stole this bread, but without it I would die.
Can Farah say that, without overcoming the fighters that have plagued her, she would die?
First world problems, though, often have first world solutions. Farah has money, money to spare on trips like this. Her first, however many moons ago, took her to her native Egypt to get in touch with her feelings. A second, to Rome. A third, to Africa, where she encountered the strange eastern European weaponmaster. This latest trip to places of reflection finds her in the ancient city of Petra, deep in southern Jordan.
Normally, during the daytime, this place is full of tourists baking under the hot sun, milling around the rose-red sandstone reminder of a civilization long passed. Now, though? Now it is night, under a gibbous but waning moon, the silver-white light of it overhead turning the red sand into pale white-blue instead. True to form, the heat of the desert day has given way to the almost unnatural chill of the desert night.
She herself stands amid the ruins and thinks carefully. Glancing up at the doors to the Treasury, the well-read young woman finds words coming to her head unbidden, spoken aloud to comfort herself with a presence in this lonely place: "'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair!' Nothing beside remains. Round the decay of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, the lone and level sands stretch far away."
"Indeed, the boastful prattlings of a fallible mortal."
As a fellow seeker of overreaching domination, Vega is no stranger to the ways of kings long dead. A kindred desire, a common spark, fuels the lust for conquest across the years, moving from leader to leader in a sort of irreparable cancer upon society. Wherever there is civilization, there will be someone to yearn for control it.
The words that meet Farah's recitation are ghostly, detatched from any sort of physical source. In the pale of the obscured moon, the shimmers of violet that peel away like discarded veils is nothing short of brilliant. A beautiful color, never settling on one particular shade, nor any predetermined brightness. The Shadaloo lord's head forms from that mass of chaotic energies, ether giving way to actual matter. Black hair: as raven-colored as the night, slicked back and yet reflect off of them soft lines of diffused moonlight. Lines form into a strong jaw and emotionless visage, eyes hidden by the simple fact that the man is 'stepping' into existance some few feet ahead of the troubled young woman. The tail of his coal-colored cloak flips as it's brought into being swishing dangerously close to the dirty floor beneath.
"Of a...lesser, less gifted man."
Clouded as her mind is...
"You..."
The power in Farah's heart has not changed.
Vega is a being that distorts part of the world around him merely by his presence; he has the same effect on peoples' senses, supernatural or no, simply by being in the room. You cannot ignore him, cannot pretend he isn't there. The only way not to notice him is if he quite specifically doesn't want you to. For someone like Farah, he might as well be a fifty foot gorilla. Never mind the fact that even if her heart is in conflict, deep down, Farah's abilities are set against Vega's in the grand scheme of things. She's primed to notice him.
She thinks long and hard about what he has said, and the implications of it. The meaning of 'Ozymandias' is relatively plain, even for a young person to understand. Power and glory are as ephemeral as existence; presumably, every conqueror eventually ends up a hollow memorial, swallowed by the sands of time. What this man is arguing, in the dark voice that she recognizes as the one that has whispered in her proverbial ear all this time, is that a sufficiently powerful person may even conquer that. He did, after all, use the word 'mortal'.
She tries to find words, and fails for many moments, until ultimately she gives in to the obvious and states it: "Even the most powerful people can't conquer death."
A grin. Wide, toothy, smug. From her position, Farah should be able to just make out the wrinkling of his cheek, the ripples that indicate mirth. His teeth, perlescent and flawless, dominate nearly half of his face as he turns to look at his newest toy of a fighter.
"Can't they?"
He lets the implication is left lingering in the chilly air, his only motions now are that of his cloak touched by errand wisps of desert wind. When he finally steps across the stretch of floor before Farah, it's like a painted statue finally coming to life, a direct opposition to the perfect stillness that he held. With each step, there's the sound of metal creaking against itself, the scuff of boots crushing sand and dust against ancient stone. "Yes, those very words have exonerated man for eons, letting them suffer effortlessly in their invisible bonds." His steps take him closer toward the well-worn carvings in the enormous rock face. A hand, exposed to the elements now, lifts itself and strokes away a layer of dust from the attraction's surface. "And yet, here I am, returned from the depths of oblivion itself. People like us need not fear such trifling concepts."
It's quite a boast. But for him, it's true; he's been destroyed once, his body decimated, and yet his soul--or what twisted effervescence that has taken its place--remains. But how? How could he possibly have done such a thing? The details, the possibilities? No, he'll not explain anything yet. The line needs a little more slack, the bait dangled a bit further.
'People like us.'
It's a phrase that's perfectly poised to cut at the heart of the matter, for Farah, and his way of stating it makes Farah's violet eyes go wide, even though she's not looking at Vega... in fact she doesn't seem to be looking at any one particular thing at all. People like us. It drives home her persistent fear and albatross, that Farah and those like her, people with a similar power, are apart from the rest of humanity... separated by an impassable gulf. On the other hand, Vega's carefully-chosen words and tone spin that in a different way... that they are better, more evolved. Their potential is limitless, unlike the everyday mundanities about her.
Her thoughts search out memories. Denji's power over nature, Wang's chi seemingly drawn from pure adolescent fury. Most recently -- and most powerfully -- she remembers the 'Dragon's Breath,' the misty power that Amy Johnson deployed against her. Her words to Amy echo in her ears: 'You could *never* be like me.' It had been as much a sorrowful declaration as it had been an insult.
But to conquer death...?
"I don't want to be bound by... anything," Farah says at last. Perverted as it is, this is still the core of her wish: to rise above and beyond, to shine as brightly as possible, to surpass limitations one after another. If Death is the greatest limitation of them all, why NOT circumvent it? Why not push it aside?
Ah, that's more like it. Farah's words bring another grin to his face, hidden as he's staring down the multitude of imperfections in the carved rock before him. This, he thinks, is a delicate matter. It's easy enough to simply brainwash somebody, of course. Controlling them with a forceful, external hand is nothing. But this woman, hers is not the emotion-fueled power that matches his own. It's more...altruistic. 'Positive'.
Sickening.
How easily, how thoroughly, can such a force be perverted? It's an important step, one that few besides the Psycho Master could safely experiment with. At least, safely for /him/.
"Then don't be!" The increase in volume is a palpable thing. The air just feels thicker, and it's only through strict concentration that the usual dread and malice that surrounds Vega isn't seeping out of him. Guards upon guards do their best to keep his full nature in check...but some exertion is necessary. He was gentle before--too much so, perhaps. He'd left the realm of possibility to Farah's imagination. Now, he openly display his dominance over the very laws of man and nature! When he turns to face the woman, his arm is extended, fingers curled with his palms up. A violet coating of writhing flame dances upon his skin, through the thicker air seems to prevent its brilliance from reflecting on anything further away than his own arm. He steps forward...or appears to. The touch of his boot against the floor suddenly finds his body a number of feet to the left, and yet closer. The effect repeats itself with the next few steps, each one leaving him in a shimmer of royal purple that folds into space in one spot and instantly reverse itself another. "Why should you hold yourself to the limits of man? Theirs is a flawed, fleeting strength! Only might such as ours allows us the freedom we desire, the ability to spit in the face of Fate and chart our own courses!"
The disorienting effect of his reality-distorting might comes to a sudden and jarring halt when he's but a foot before the Egyptian, his back hunched slight as he's leaned over to look at her with that nigh-fanatical smile, his dull white eyes outlined and colored by the rings of potent psychic energies that leak from the obscured windows to his soul. "No matter who, or what, may try to keep you from realizing your potential." Potential, not destiny, as some would say. Destiny is a filthy word. It implies compulsion, bending to a will that is not one's own. It is...beneath someone like Farah, is it not?
'Theirs is a flawed, fleeting strength!'
That's what she'd said to Amy, wasn't it? That Farah wouldn't lose to so commonplace, so baseborn a power as whatever that energy the Templar was using. That anyone, it seemed, could harness that energy... except Farah, of course. That dark, silky voice told her that she was special, and with a superior power had no need of it. But more than the do-gooding voice inside, the one that tells her she might be doing wrong, there's the one that is... a young woman who feels so little connection to others, when her power should be bringing her close to them. It is as fundamentally a selfish impulse, no altruism, yet it is at war with that voice. Problematically, the more impulses, the more voices, that emerge, the worse and worse Farah feels.
What she'd really like is to be happy, for a few moments.
Her eyes track Vega's movements, or as close to doing so as she can come as his erratic, showy toying with physics allows. Her eyes glaze over somewhat as she looks back down at her hand. It all seems amazing. She really wants to buy in. She'd really like to reach her full potential.
There is a question.
Her gaze turns up to Vega's, and her face is earnest, as she asks: "And then what?"
If anyone knows what it means to give in to Psycho Power, it's Vega himself. It's an obsession for him, to shed the cruft and only keep whatever made him stronger. After all, that's how Rose came into being, isn't it? Nothing but a brazen sack of hope and goodwill dragging him down. Pathetic.
But now, he has a chance to see if he can salvage something from that previously-discarded waste, to see if there truly is some way of twisting it about to something more useful. He feels that he's close, but the line is so fine! He straightens his posture slowly, his hand curling up before pulling back into the dark confines of his cloak. His grin is gone, instead replaced by something of a thoughtful frown--or at least, that's how it's meant to appear. It's not a face that he's used to making for others, you see. His decisions are quick and decisive in front of his men. There is no place for moments of insecurity.
"And then?" Usually, it's an excellent question, but that's what it is: a question. Is it one yearning for a steady hand to direct the young woman's path, or is it a moment of doubt threatening to pull her back and undo his work? He attempts to extend his senses, to glean little bits of the thoughts that flit across her consciousness. The temptation to quash whatever voice is trying to draw his toy back to the light is great, but he manages to suppress it. The urge, that is. Instead, he draws in a deep breath, his dull eyes closing completely. As those lids slide down, it feels as though that heavy air lightens, returning the state of the world to how it was previously.
"And then, you make of yourself whatever you wish. It's all in the desire. The important thing is that you act upon your feelings."
It might be a dangerous gamble, letting her decide what to do on her own, but he knows: to give oneself to the power only helps to feed it; it becomes increasingly difficult to stop from going down that slippery slope. So long as she believes that giving in to her baser nature, the yearning to draw from its black depths will come naturally.
"My... feelings..."
When Vega first came to slowly insinuate his influence into Farah's heart and mind, it was actually quite easy. Farah's desire has always been to better herself, to constantly push her limits. What she was doing that FOR was to encourage others to reach her heights, but it's very easy to pervert that, make it about being the best and the brightest simply for its own sake. Now, though, Farah is confused and in the dark because there are so many conflicting desires. She's been beaten down, despite being 'special', and she wants to show those people her power, to prove her dominance. She wants to prove to her 'teammates' that she isn't dead weight, nor just some trophy for them to fight over, but a force to be reckoned with, a threat. And secretly, she wants to plumb the depths of her power and see what heights she can take it to. Perhaps what this man is really offering her is that she can do all of those and still accomplish her mission. The higher she soars, the more she is accomplishing ALL of those things.
Yet in the end it is her loneliness that speaks. It's the voice in between the heroic impulse and the dark and selfish impulse. It doesn't care about anyone but Farah, but it wants things to be... better.
She clenches a fist. Around it, there springs up an aura of psychic energy. At base, it is Farah's unique energy, that cobalt blue like a dusk sky, shot through with points of starry light. But surrounding it is hazy purple-black flame, a color familiar indeed to Vega, a manifestation of his will twining around hers.
"I just want them to understand," she intones. After a moment of silence, she adds, "I want to MAKE them understand. But so far..."
She can't bring herself to talk of her own failures.
Ah, yes... The failures. It's no coincidence that Vega found this poor young woman. Where to find her, when to find her, the turmoil going on just beneath the surface. Why should her recent defeats be any different? Hell, the Psycho Master himself probably knew of her losses even before she did. It's a very, very frightening thought. Therefore, it's a wonder that she hadn't once asked him who he was. What sort of person would honestly help someone grow stronger like this, and for what reasons? Could it truly be a bond of kinship?
Once again, Vega's hand reaches out slowly, pressing itself to the top of Farah's head. For most, it's a sign of comfort, of warmth. For him, an indication of domination. Christ, girls are so complicated in their emotions. It's even worse when they're in full possession of them. "Miserable, lost child. Do you know the contents of a book before reading it? Have you any way to know the breadth of the ocean before crossing it?" Well, nowadays, you can, but that's irrelevant. He's trying so very hard to keep his temper in check, and it may show through strained words. The sight of that corrupted power creeping up around the woman's hand, however, helps reign in his own emotions. It's progress. "You've but recently learned of what you MAY accomplish that you're obsessed with the end result."
His hand slips away, and now he takes to walking about the Egyptian, taking slow paces in a wide circle as he speaks. "But you can USE that! Take all of that helplessness, your self-pity, your rage, and embrace it! The only thing that you lack is the effort and focus. Seek out powerful foes, make them bow before your ability, take the anguish of defeat into the next battle and let it fuel your power! And then...!" He's really working himself up now, once again bringing about that heavy air. Anger and rage and anguish all roil in an unfathomable tempest with him, leaking out in the form of an ever-swelling black-and-violet aura. As soon as he's worked his words up into a fevered pitch...he stops, mouth open for a moment before it releases from it a deep, soul-venting sigh, and with it, his presence regresses once more.
"Then...you will be happy. You will be strong, the object of your friends' adoration." Such an awful, terrible lie. There's no way that anything good can come of poor Farah throwing herself to the darkness. But it's an olive branch offered to one already drowning in her own misery.
For all that Farah Tenjou sincerely and truly dedicated herself to her dream of helping others find their potential, from minute one it was a flawed dream. It was built on the premise that she could be perfectly happy with that as her aim, and with her own needs and desires pushed to the side. The truth is that nobody, no matter how selfless, how dedicated they are to the happiness of others, can go through life alone, totally subsuming their own needs. When she tried to force that feeling up, fighting Amy, it felt like fingers closing around her heart, a physically palpable tightness in her chest. It may be that this well-intentioned but foolhardy martyr's desire is what has made her such putty in Vega's hands. Perhaps she hasn't questioned what he's said to her because in truth, she wants to believe that everything he says is true.
'The object of their adoration.' Violet eyes turn to the heavens, away from the bone-white ruins of Petra and toward the moon up above. For a moment, she glances at the stars and notices their formations, constellations and asterisms. Patterns in the sky that the ancients claimed were images, pictures. Connections that are as imaginary as they are common. In truth, stars shine alone. Only human imaginings put them in any sort of intelligble order.
If this man is right, truly right, then she can make them recognize her by being the brightest. The constellations will form *around her*.
She hardly notices the dark tendrils gripping her spirit a second time, nor the sudden swell of Vega's malicious energy. Though she does think, in one final moment, to turn to him and finally ask, "Who are you? Why are you helping me?"
Vega stands straight, but impatiently. Beneath his cloak, his fingers flex, balling into tight fists. His toes curl in his boots and an ankle twists to scrape the heel into the stone beneath him. His ability to reign himself in is really stretched quiet thin; he simply does not have the capacity to suffer a beleaguered girl and her trifling problems. If he didn't notice the spark of Soul in her, she would have never had to suffer his touch. He'd have never had to come out here, alone, to pamper and coddle a bruised psyche into something useful for little reason beyond being his guinea pig.
But he's close. He can FEEL it. Yet, there is also a third party to this, now. In the thin desert air, it's easy to hear the repetitive thudding of a helicopter in the distance. It's about time...it already feels like he's been prattling here for far too long as it is! When she looks skyward, his eyes remain on her, fixed and unwavering. He's going to have to make a decision shortly: exert his powers in a more invasive manner or just scratch the experiment off as simply not being worth it.
And then, she asks the identity of her glorious benefactor. The man's lips spread once more into a wicked smile, open and unashamed. "I," he starts, and even as he speaks, the chopping sound grows ever louder. It's not at all long before the black bird is visible over the canyon walls, stopping overhead. A long rope ladder is dropped, the bottom rungs clattering harmlessly upon the ground next to the dictator. The presence of it draws a look of scorn skyward; somebody is going to be beaten for it. A mundane method of leaving, when he would have simply preferred to disappear as he had come? It kind of ruins the effect, just a little bit. Still, the aircraft lends some measure of success to the man's name; he's certainly not alone, if he has people willing to fly out here just to pick him up.
"I am someone beyond the purview of the world of man, here to aid a kindred spirit. Nothing more." And indeed, he has never asked anything of Farah but to better herself, has he? Without offering a name or any further explanation, he reaches up and takes hold of a high rung, slipping the edge of his boot atop another. Once he's secure, the chopper lifts up, leaving the girl to merely watch him get hauled away, his cloak rustling in his wake.
Log created on 14:26:51 01/04/2011 by Farah, and last modified on 23:43:02 01/04/2011.