bigapplesauce | Something obscene, a piece in the long bright curve of space [open to multiple]

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Something obscene, a piece in the long bright curve of space [open to multiple]

She will rend them.

She will shatter their skulls, play glorious harmony with their spines, rip through skin and muscle to crush the beating hearts within, and if they lack hearts she will grind to dust their brains, and if they lack brains she will shred their miserable vermin bodies, and she will wreak beautiful destruction upon everything she sees.

She cares not of what or who she strikes and damages and destroys, only that she deliver destruction unto all of them for incurring her wrath. She may lack the grandeur of her true form and the full might of her true glory but she is still Illyria, God-King and regal chaos incarnate, and they have made her wrathful.

All of Hell has risen to meet them. Illyria will make memorable their reception. She wishes violence, she revels in it, she prides herself in her methodical infliction of it.

And despite it all, still she grieves.

She grieves.

Illyria is grieving.

It is an emotion, pathetically human, welling up from within her or the shell she occupies, she cannot tell, and it is so profoundly alien that she has no choice but to accept its presence. And seethe.

Thus far she finds the sensation of grief to be disagreeable. And no amount of violence seems to rectify it. She refuses to believe that it is not rectifiable. It is a taint, a sickness upon her shell, and sicknesses are rectifiable. All things are rectifiable. And if they are not Illyria makes them so.

She will administer pain and bloodshed until this also becomes so.

There is a shift of energy behind her but she pays it no heed; the energy here is ever-constant-changing and always has been, and if it has been more volatile on this day it is because the forces of Hell have been set slavering upon this world, so Illyria dismisses it. She will focus on her current work - namely, enticing a lowly demon to part ways with its spine. Forcefully.

She rips the inconsequentiality free with a glorious spray of blue-tinged gore - a truly neon specimen of demon, as would befit its Pit-origins - and stands, victorious, gruesome trophy in hand, and then her world changes.

It wrenches in her as it happens, the rip-burn of dimensional tearways screaming past the whole of the God-King’s being, and all she knows is that her world of violence is gone.

In its place is one of peace and clouds and rain, and Illyria can sense them, vermin, everywhere, crawling on every surface, tiny and mindless and simple and everywhere. They are still here, carrying themselves like a blight over the world that was once hers by right. Disgusting. Grating. Virulent.

She does not know where she is, nor does she care. She just wishes to return. But she is no longer the all-powerful and feared being she was, this universe no longer simply aligns to her, she cannot tear through the walls and barriers between dimensions so easily, the voids remain closed to her, and this world will not succumb to her will.

Illyria stands in imperious revulsion, gore-spattered and rain-drenched, disembodied spine dangling, and bitterly wishes a return to her world of Hell.

[ooc: if your character is running into Illyria after she's met Aziraphale, she will be significantly less bloody and scary-looking courtesy of unexpected angel deep-cleaning services]

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He hadn't been planning on going out, certainly not in all this bloody rain, but it's difficult to ignore that minor tremor in the park - another arrival, something big and scary, not so much as Lucifer, but reason enough to investigate. It's not too difficult to get away from the Base - recruitment is one of the encouraged activities of all Rebel members, even the ones who are technically part of the resource allocation department (Aziraphale had been quite convincing of his qualifications during the interview/makeshift CV process), and it's a simple matter to say one will look for newcomers instead of one will be seeking a particular newcomer who has already most certainly arrived. And on a day like today! Aziraphale, way to take one for the team, going out in this weather.

It doesn't take him long to find her. There are plenty of locals giving her a very wide berth, or gawking from a moderate distance. She's extremely noticeable¹, the strangely dominating blue of her, not to mention the blood, and the - is that a spine? What on earth.

He only needs to get a little closer before he stops short, the tiny motion causing little water droplets to fly up from the springs of his hair. No. No. It's her.

He seriously considers just turning around, maybe getting backup, at least, but of course it's too late - she's seen him.

¹ Which is so very delightfully ironic!

The rain is grating and not even a little tinged with the gore of her enemies. Illyria finds this unacceptable. She considers her trophy and how the fleeting, flickering mortal things that scurried in her world clung to such things in commemoration, though with their pitifully short lives Illyria cannot understand why they would bother trying to remember at all.

She is not like them. She casts the thing aside.

Everything here is different. Even the molecules. The air is charged, the very energy and fabric of this world abstracted. And everywhere, all over, there are vermin, scuttling in their tiny shells, unthinkably unaware of their God-King, and had she not made her promise she would be laying waste to this dimension right now and bringing it to its knees as she once did.

There is an encroaching energy, and she whips her shell around to face it. It dares approach her here and now and wrapped in its mortal shell. Illyria advances upon it, dark and wrathful, and halts when she sees the outline of its patterns. She knows it. She recognizes it.

"Principality." The word is iron, spat out, accusing. "You have brought me here."

Aziraphale takes an instinctive step back and raises his hands. Oh grand, she remembers him. Excellent.

"I - I most certainly have not," he counters, only somewhat indignant. "I don't have that kind of power. It's - there's a rift that brings all sorts of people and - entities - from different worlds, here. I was brought just like you were. And if I were able to bring you I certainly wouldn't!"

He shuts his mouth to prevent himself saying more things. She's still coming towards him and he really, really doesn't want to have another fight in Central Park.

She half-turns, raking the air with her gaze of judgment. Yes, she can feel it, the rift with its tearing dimensional energy, utterly unlike any portal of hers or anyone's making that she can recall in her eons of memories. What abomination created this? Is she meant to be trapped here? The very thought is distasteful, even laughable were that a thing a God-King could express; as if something of such raw and poor space-time construction could ever bind Illyria in one place.

The principality is making noises. She returns her attention to it. It lacks its worm. Perhaps he grew tired of its demands just as she did, she speculates with approval.

"You reek of fear," she observes flatly. A useful note. Creatures that fear Illyria are more likely to obey without question, though their previous encounter implies that this creature will not be so easily bowed. "How is it that I may return to my world?"

Her satisfying encounter with violence had been unjustly discontinued, and she wishes to correct that.

"I am not afraid of you," says Aziraphale irritably, lowering his hands hastily. "And you can't return. None of us can. We're trapped here. In Manhattan."

He really, really hopes she isn't going to try to destroy everything just like Lucifer did. He's had just about enough of that. Meanwhile, what is he to do with her? He can't very well bring her to the Rebels, but he doesn't want her out on her own, either. Why does everything around here always seem to fall on his shoulders? What a bloody bother.

Illyria considers this statement, allowing her shell's vision to drift in its analysis of the water droplets cascading from above. Does all the water of this world contain such foreign properties? She is uninterested in defining the abnormalities, however, so her vision snaps back to the principality, having completed her deliberation of its words.

"No."

It is a simple fact. Frayed aberrations in the torn edges of dimensions cannot hold her, and this should be obvious enough.

He waits, not afraid but on edge, for her response. He doubts she will accept it simply. Most people do not want to believe it right away, if ever, so he is braced for some sort of argument.

What he is not expecting is a blunt denial of the fact.

"What do you mean no?" he sputters, almost laughing incredulously. "Do you wish to try to get back through? I know some have, and it has been disasterous. Entities more powerful than you."

He's getting fraught, annoyed at being wet and being stuck in this conversation, and he suspects he's probably just provoking her now. He can imagine his python scolding him if she were present.

A dark swell of anger boils beneath her shell - this thing dares categorize her as an entity that somehow, inconceivably, is not the truly supreme and all-powerful being that she is? She wishes more than ever that she could strike at it, bring it to its knees as is its place, but she has made her oath and Illyria holds to her oaths.

"I have traversed many worlds such as this." The words bubble out in a darkened hiss and she prowls closer, noting the physical damage to the principality's shell. Unlike hers, largely, it appears that the thing's shell can be externally injured. It also seems unperturbed by the obvious display of its weaknesses, however, so she calls no attention to them. Yet.

"There was a time when I traveled the many dimensions with ease. This is no different." Perhaps not of the God-King's own volition, but this can be remedied. Illyria is certain; surely the fractured, rippling raw edges of energy in this place can be harnessed to her will. She will not consider the alternative. Such a thing would be unacceptable.

Aziraphale frowns with immense disapproval. Should he really try to stop such a violent, arrogant, dangerous being from throwing herself back into the rift? It's a vindictive thought, and as soon as he's had it he suffers a surge of panicked good will. Sighing internally, he says, "I promise you this is different. You will be hurt if you try to leave this place."

He pulls his overcoat closer around himself, briefly noting the continued presence of skittish-looking New Yorkers eyeing them from a distance. Oh, she's still covered in alien blood. For goodness' sake, he ought to have done something about that right away. The rain isn't washing it away fast enough, just taking some of it in swirling, discolored pools on the stone ground. He raises his hand and brushes it all away with a flick of the wrist, vanishing the discarded spine for good measure. Much better. She's still noticeably blue, but it is New York City. That's a lot less bothersome than being covered in blood.

She narrows her eyes at the principality's protests. It doubts her grandeur, as unthinkable as the concept may be. She evaluates it, the shell's head cocked to one side, and wonders if the exterior damage to its shell means that tearing the whole of its being to shreds would be an easier task. It seems likely, but simply killing it would be in violation to her oath and a dishonorable conclusion to their great and glorious conflict. Besides. It may prove to be useful, and she needs a new Qwa'ha Xahn.

The cold-bright sear of magic hums over her shell, and she feels the whole of her concentrated being tense in response. It has - cleaned her shell, purged it of her trophies and the external reminders of her glory.

Illyria glowers at the principality. This is a most unique and grievous form of betrayal. Surely it can understand, having engaged her in battle before, the honor of bearing such gruesome trophies upon herself?

"What have you done," she demands.

Oh, of course she finds fault with that. There's just no pleasing some people.

"I've made you presentable," he says irritably. "You can't just go around like that in public. You're alarming the locals."

What an inconceivably difficult being she is. He huffs out a sigh, growing increasingly weary of standing here in the rain trying to argue with her. "I need to know if you have any outstanding plans to hurt anyone," he says, stern and grumpy. "Because in that case I shall stop you. Otherwise I had best be getting on."

"They should be alarmed. I ruled this world once." She would think that would be obvious. Illyria lifts her chin, not remotely aggrieved, because to be aggrieved over something so simple and small would befit only the rats the crawl on this world's surface, and nothing so grand as she.

Upon the principality's frustration - how interesting its patterns, it peels away from him in great disgruntled waves - she looks upon it with disdain.

"I cannot," she informs it coolly. "An oath was made to my Qwa'ha Xahn. The vermin are to remain untouched."

She made the oath to her Qwa'ha Xahn. Her old Qwa'ha Xahn. To Wesley.

She misses Wesley.

She is getting distracted.

And she does not miss anyone.

That would be absurd.

"Oh," says Aziraphale, relaxing a little. He has no basis of comprehension of the word(s?) she's used except context, which might leave it anywhere between 'spouse' and 'consigliere', but an oath is good.

"By 'vermin' I assume you mean the humans," he says hesitantly, still frowning at her. "Very well."

He really wants to go. Back to the Base, or better yet, to his shop, where he can read and drink. And he ought to let Crowley know there's another of these things in town. Actually, he thinks with a start, what would happen if Lucifer found out about her? Would he try to destroy her, or try to use her? Neither option is very tolerable.

He sighs heavily. Blast his innate good intentions. "Is there anything you need?" he asks, his tone curt and skirting the edge of impatience. "Shelter? Food? There is some infrastructure in place, for those of us who've been displaced."

She eyes the principality with unparalleled contempt. Does it mean to imply that she would require such mortal forms of sustenance? The very notion is disgraceful. Clearly it has no conception of all that she is.

"I require nothing," the God-King replies dismissively, surveying the miserable world in which she stands and wondering when she will be able to return to her world of Hell and violence, "save the decapitated heads of my enemies, crushed beneath my heel."

She doubts the principality will be a useful commodity in obtaining such things. In contrast to their previous meeting, it seems disappointingly averse to engaging her in noble combat once more. Illyria would have liked to see the outcome of such a battle.

"Is that all," says Aziraphale dryly. "And who might they be? Your enemies?" That this remark should come on the heels of her supposed 'oath' not to hurt any humans doesn't make him feel very comforted. She may have to be dealt with, though he is in no rush to get there.

Finally, deciding he's not getting out of this weather any time soon, he miracles himself an umbrella and opens it over himself, drying himself off promptly with the other hand. He notably does not offer her the coverage.

She looks at the principality, her shell's head once again listing to one side. Was it not obvious from her shell's gruesome decoration?

"All of Hell."

And she returns to observing the tiny ephemera skittering their ways around this place, this mortal city. Tiny, she finds them, and distantly amusing in their rushes to escape the deluge, but mere distractions and no more. On the contrary, she discovers that the hum of celestial magic as the principality manifests some inconsequential object is infinitely more interesting. The principality seems overly concerned with keeping its shell and hers clean, but that is not what so draws her attention. It is the solid object, rather, the one that has made itself tangible and real not merely a construct. Interesting. Useless for anything besides mortal comfort, however, which Illyria would find perplexing were that a thing she deigned to care about. Which she does not, so she will make no comment upon it.

Aziraphale blinks. Well, that is not what he expected.

"Er," he says, "oh. That's, um, that's all right, then."

It's rather a relief. She may not have social graces or humility or a basic sense of decency, but at least she's on the approximate correct side of the fence. So long as she doesn't try to include Crowley in that.

He hesitates, studying her for a moment.

"Others will approach you," he says. "Some will want you to join their organizations. Most will be human."

There isn't really a question here; he's curious to know how she'll respond.

Organizations. The Wolf, the Ram, and the Hart, perhaps. And perhaps there is an Angel in this universe, the one of the vampiric variety. She remembers fighting along his lot well, without a care of what he or she or they represented, only caring that she be allowed her violence and her destruction.

"Small and fleeting things," replies Illyria with vague ennui. "Their foundations will crumble. What is mortal will fade, and weighs nothing to me."

Unless they can promise her allowance of her wrath, there is little an organization of human construct can offer her.

Aziraphale nods, marginally unimpressed but mostly unperturbed. It's probably for the best if she keeps to herself. He wouldn't want any humans to try to take responsibility for her and reap the possible consequences.

"ALl right," he says. "Well. Welcome, I suppose."

He hesitates - is he really going to just walk away? - but there's no much else he can offer. He slides his weight back to one foot, then pivots slowly and starts to walk back toward the Base.

What an odd creature. She has never met anything quite like it, a principality. Though any hopes of renewing their glorious conflict have died, she is curious as to its origins, for they are clouded to her. A being of genuine interest in this world of insects and vermin is a rarity.

For now, however, Illyria will wander. If this world is so different, then she wants to know its substance.

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Something obscene, a piece in the long bright curve of space [open to multiple]

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