The Enemy Within: Part Four

[x-juggernaut.livejournal.com]

While Cain is speaking to the assembled staff and students, Cyttorak takes the opportunity to appear to Wanda, and comments on someone they know in common.



It was probably a good thing Wanda had been in such good shape before all of the problems she’d run into in the last few months or else getting back up to that point would have taken forever. Taking some deep breaths to calm herself after her run, she draped herself over the porch railing to enjoy the sun and wind while not moving. The bottle of cold water next to her was almost empty but she paid it no mind, she’d refill it after a while.

"You lived," a voice said behind her, making the water bottle bounce as if a jet had passed overhead. "How very peculiar."

Startled, Wanda twirled around, pressing her back up against the banister. Finding herself face to face with an old man did nothing to alleviate the hairs on the back of her neck standing up. "Excuse me?" she started and then stopped to stare. "...do I know you?"

"In a manner of speaking," the old man said, leaning over the railing by Wanda. "You were very close to a... relative of mine. Very close."

His first two comments clicked with each other, along with the feeling of unease, and her eyes narrowed sharply. "Chthon," she supplied, not a guess at all.

"Ve-ry good!" the old man singsonged. "If I'd have known it was going to cause me this much annoyance, I'd have erased the Chaos-Bringer from existence instead of just killing him. But siblings, what will you do, huh?" He spread his hands in a gesture of bemused frustration. "Kill one fellow god, and they stick you in a little rock for eons. Chthon, on the other hand, gets to take his time to reform, little help from this emerging race of humanity here and there - I tell you, I have never seen any species so capable of sowing chaos without external interference. No wonder he was drawn to you."

Wanda stared for a couple of seconds more, the muscles in her back and arms unclenching as she realized that an attack was less likely than barbed conversation. And maybe she could get some information out of him, if he was who he said he was...though there was very little doubt in her mind about that.

"So I have you to thank for him being sent down here," she said slowly. "Why 'kill' him?"

"Why do anything?" the old man spread his arms again. "It's in our natures. You understand - you've looked into that abyss of chaos, you're one of the only humans alive who's seen even a glimpse of our level of reality and come back with half a measure of sanity remaining. Oh, please. Allow me to introduce myself -" he suddenly paused, his face frozen in a look of confusion, "I have this compulsion to identify myself as a man of wealth and taste, and I am not certain why. Too long sharing psychic space with that ... oaf, I suppose."

Wanda remembered, oh so briefly, that abyss he mentioned and shuddered, pushing it out of her mind. It was not something she ever wished to think on again and hated that mere words from this obviously insane person could bring it back. "You called Chthon your brother..."

"Inasmuch as your brain can comprehend the term, yes. Relatively equal aspects of the same force, your limited reality doesn't have the proper expression for what we are. Chaos. Destruction. Gods, you've called us. I rather enjoy that, you know."

Nothing that was said, it seemed, was said casually and she thought about those words. A part of her itched to open up her powers and look at him, really look, but something else told her that it was an idea that would do no good to pursue. "When I was in his prison, one of his Knights said that he was felled by the Destroyer," she breathed softly.

The old man laughed, clapping his hands together. "Felled! Oh, such an inadequate term! But well enough for the purposes. Regardless, I will soon regain my power and depart this place, perhaps to encounter dear Chthon again. Tell me, do you think he holds a grudge?"

Despite the unease and caution, an eyebrow quirked at that. "I think he was a little unhappy when I last encountered him, yes," Wanda responded wryly, not understanding why this man--being, she corrected, was here at all.

"Immaturity..." the strange visitor muttered. "I admit, it will feel so very good to stretch the legs again, as your people say. To take back the power from my human juggernaut and return to my rightful place. Do you think it fair, really? He walks around invulnerable, immensely strong, never aging. And what do I get, other than stuck in this fragile mortal body? Liver spots, an aching back, and a horribly encyclopedic memory for Jim Morrison songs."

It felt like a guessing game where Wanda only had part of the pieces. And...human juggernaut? Her eyes widened just a touch at that. Well, if that didn't explain more than a few things about Cain and her relationship...

"You're getting back your powers?"

"If my former vessel so agrees," he explained. "I regain what is mine, he regains what should be his, and I depart without any further time wasted on this fragile hunk of rock and dirt." He clenched his fists on the railing, knuckles cracking with a sound that sent leaves falling from trees and clouds of birds into the air. "It is a matter of inevitability," he explained, "he will give back what is mine, or he will eventually succumb to the influence such power brings, and visit upon your world a destruction never before seen. Either way, my will be done."

Almost all powerful people, Wanda thought weakly to herself, were insane. Normally because they did get their way or, in cases of intelligence, they did know all the answers. Not that it made it any less easier to take when it was directed at you. "Your and Chthon's paths differed, then, for it seemed like he wanted to gather his power but go out into our world."

The old man looked amused there. "Of course he did. Your people are rife with possibilities for chaos and disarray. What's the term - fox in a henhouse? He and I differ in our... aspects, you would say. He exists to bring things to their conclusion through chance, random entropy, corruption. I simply unmake them entirely - I am the Destroyer, the Omega, the end of all that is. You know my name, yet I notice you haven't spoken it."

At that a small smile came out. "Through my time here, I have learned in some circles that names have power," she explained. "I was not about to speak your name, Cyttorak, until I had watched for a little bit. I never asked for my connection to Cththon and it really wasn't my doing for him getting free, but I have learned to be more cautious."

Cyttorak smirked. "Names have power. Such a limited view you humans take. Ones such as Chthon and I, we do not have power -" He leaned in close to whisper in Wanda's ear.

"We ARE power."

And with that whisper, he was gone.

Wanda didn't dare to move for a couple of seconds and then sagged against the porch rail, heart pounding heavy and fast in her chest. "~May I live in interesting times indeed,~" she muttered to herself, grabbing the bottle of water. It was early still but she doubted that anyone would begrudge her a drink.