"I guess I can bite on my jacket, unless you have something else." Michael grabbed a piece of his grey coat with his teeth as an attempt to bite down on something. It tasted like dirt and dust and had he inhaled, he wold have choked on it. Fortunately his first breath exhaled, brushing off the majority and coating the rest with some steamy water vapor.
The sound of the crashing waves took the main attraction in Michael's mind as he tried to do anything but think about her setting the bone.

Feenai's mind bends under the force of Kasedja's words, but she grits her teeth and quickly takes stock of the situation as she stops the APC. "DANTE! STOP PLEASE!" Her mind and body were shaking from fear but she refused to back down again, knowing that Dante was likely in danger.

She slowly turned and looked at Dante eye to eye. "For now, please...let me do as he says. But thank you..." She placed a hand on his arm and smiled in what she hoped would be reassuring. Then she turned to Kasedja. "There were two people with us before, but they left to go their own way. Of the ones following us, I recognize one of them, but the other I do not. I did not know the one I met before had any intention of following us at all, I thought for sure both of them would go somewhere else when we parted company." Feenai tried not to but her voice shook as she spoke.

"All set?"

Without waiting for much of a nod, Dara placed her hands in position to re-align the man's shoulder and reconnect the spintered portion of bone. If he noticed that one of her hands felt a bit off she didn't see, thinking nothing of it herself, and said simply, "on two. One...two!"

She pressed hard.

Tension. Anger. Hate. The APC had gone from casket to boiling pot. The agitation that was building smelled like spent powder, of sulfur even. He had seen this before. Too many times. A madman comes in to control. A group suffers. They turn, they bite, they tear each other apart. But this creature was less than a man, although his power was more than Lev Gurevich could ever muster. It was if a child had found a gun and did not know that the people he shot didn't get up when playing games were over. This was not a situation that he possessed the tact for.

With a start he stood up, shoving his cleaning supplies away. He undid the back hatch to the APC, looking over his shoulder at Dante as he did.

"Don't shoot. He knows not what he does."

With that, he stepped back outside. A harsh wind slapped him across the face like the butt of a rifle. The sky once clear seemed to roil, the wasteland before them a mixture of bright and bland crags with darkened patches, spots where the sun was intercepted by dark and angry clouds in the distance.

He knows not what he does, Lev? You sound like my 'brother'.

Lev shrugged to no other person, speaking in to the wind.

"The Nephilim said the woman who threw us away is near, Butcher. I may not have value, but I am not trash to be thrown out. I have you, but I am my own man. If you eat anything, eat her. She understands what she does. She knows the consequences of burning bridges she still stands on."

You've become quite eloquent, Lev. Just never forget that I have you too.

With that Lev began to take cautious steps, stalking back the way they had came with his aging and beaten rifle. Rue was certainly going to feel her name after he finished with her.

With a snort, Dante backed up against the cabin wall and crossed his arms, the gun still in his hand. He glared through closed eyelids at that twisted glow still behind Feenai. He knows not what he does?

He hadn't caught her smile but had felt the supposedly reassuring touch that had done wonders to his temper.

Lev? Where is he going? Dante rolled his eyes in the Lion's general direction and caugh a glimpse of flickering auras before he disappeared. Internal conflict, much...but...where to? He had half a mind to chase after him, but doubted the old man would care too much about Feenai's well-being.

But...what if...? For starters, if Lev DID find Rue, Dante couldn't let Na'lsa kill her, much less eat her...

"Apologies, Fee...I need to go after Lev." Rue. "I'm worried about his mental state...and Michael might get caught in non-existent-as-of-yet crossfire." Lies. "Shout into my mind if...anything happens," he ended in a whisper.

What am I thinking...?! She can see through you, don't forget that, Dante!

Without a word to the nephilim, he disappeared out the back of the APC.

Michael took a larger mouthful of his jacket before trying to nod, but the woman moved quickly...An extreme pain went through his arm, back into him, as the arm seemed to connect into place all the way up to the nerve endings. Had he been able to think straightly, he would have admired her extreme potential for theurgic healing, but this was not the case...

Unguarded memories sprang back into mind as the pain from another one of his former victims, his sins of the past, jolted into his mind for the first time since he had left Corinth. Despite feeling physically healthy, he couldn't stop shaking as his mind subconsciously felt at the bends in reality that surrounded the wall of the cliff.

It was as though the very presence of the nephilim up above was bringing the auras of darkness and light into conflict. It was impressive, and dangerous...

As Michael finally stopped shivering, he opened his eyes as the girl's face appeared in front of her. It was mostly flawless despite what the dangers of travel could do. He blinked a few times before speaking:

"It isn't safe... we need to get out of here..."

He felt weaker than before, as well. It may have been just the climb or the loss of blood, but something gave him the feeling that his weakening state is not coincidental.

Lev slung low to the ground, stalking as if he were moving through tall grass. He moved methodically, retracing their movement back to their original stopping point in a slowly paced beeline. Noticing the ridge, he decided to take a look down below.

Dropping to his stomach, he crawled along the ground until he came to the ledge. The rocky terrain scratched against him, cutting him in places. No matter though. His eyes scanned the several dozen feet below him, instantly picking up two figures. One the man from before, the one who had attempted to replace him. The one who had succeeded. And a girl! It must be the one!

He brought his rifle up, taking aim down the ancient sights. He moved the rear sight up slightly, compensating for the distance. Index finger rested on the trigger, ready to fire. He steadied his rifle on the man. He would want to hear words out of her mouth before he gutted it.

Lev.

The rifle. The Mosin-Nagant. He had stared down those sights for years. He had held that rifle as a boy. His non-father had given it to him, him alone out of the seven other children his mother had been forced to birth before she died. At first he hated it, the rifle hurt him. But it became his companion, closest guarded friend. Over the years it had become so much more. An oar, a club, a tent pole. Fishing rod, a spear. Nearly firewood one particularly ugly winter. It had saved his life, nearly ended it, and taken the lives of hundreds of others. He had been taught to clean it. To respect it. The rifle was his life. More accurately, his way of life. But it had destroyed others. Countless others.

It is not her, Lev.

He hovered the sights over the man, preparing to fire. He had found a scope once. It was an honor, a blessed gift to have such a thing. It had taken him a long time to sight the precious accessory to his rifle. The first time it saw combat it took a bullet directly to the lens. Glass and lead had pelted Lev's face, scarring him for years. From then on he never mounted another. A blessed gift wasted by him meant he would never deserve another.

LEV.

Lev was suddenly a whirlwind of scrambling limbs as he tumbled over the ledge. A gust of wind had upset him enough that in his distracted state he failed to hold himself down. For a brief moment, he fell free. Then he caught the jagged rocks jutting out from the cliff face as he tumbled down. Cutting, breaking. smashing. His body was being beaten apart. But he clung still to his rifle. They would break together.

A sudden snap jerked him violently. He came to a stop, arms outstretched above him while his legs dangled beneath. About thirty feet from the ground he had came to a halt. Disoriented and in great pain, it took him a moment to realize why. He lifted his head upwards.

His rifle, the long beast that it was, had caught itself between two rocks. The aged steel and wood was somehow able to stand his weight, digging against the rock to hold him in place.

"Where is your infinite wisdom now?!"

Lev tried to shout, but it came out as a hoarse moan. Blood trickled down his body, nasty gashes spurting the red liquid mixed with the rocks and dirt that had caused them. Working his way closer to the rock face, he unhinged his rifle from the rock. He began to slowly make his way down the rock face while trying to size up his two former targets, who had obviously noticed him by now. In his current state though, he was unsure if they could administer more pain to his body than he was already experiencing.

Dante himself nearly fell off the edge of the cliff, and scrambled to get a good foothold. Leve was down there, he could tell, and Michael further down... A strange figure stood next to the artificer, though. And all three auras seemed unnatural.

Michael was hurt, that was easy enough to see. Lev...even as Dante watched, the aura settled down a bit. Must've fallen not too long ago... And the newcomer. It looked...weird.

I highly doubt they haven't seen Lev yet... Assuming the gunman had already been spotted, Dante yelled down to him from hundred of feet above: "...You okay?"

Why he was showing concern for this man was beyond him.

After setting the bones, Dara took time to strap the man's upper arm to his side and across his chest to his opposite shoulder with a splint around the break. She was about to respond to the man's comment when she heard a voice from above shouting.

"...you okay?"

Dara looked up to look for the source of the voice, but instead saw another man dangling from a rock ledge above them. "I think you should get up now" she said to the prone man at her feet.

Seemingly content to ignore Feenai now that she's done as he wished, Kasdeja glides down the length of the APC, pausing to glance down at Shealtiel.

"Get up." He demands. "You're coming, too."

Cracking open one eye and raising his head fractionally, the old necromancer croaks out a reply. "Or what?"

"That hoary heart of yours is such a frail thing, Shealtiel. So precarious. It would take oh-so-little to..." He reaches out with his mind, psychic fingers caressing the edge of an Atrium, sending a chill through Shealtiel, who shudders uncontrollably at the touch.

"You think... I hold any... reservation toward... dying?" He struggles to breathe, his vision swimming, tears trickling down his creased cheeks. "Death is... no great moving on. Not for me. Abaddon will never... let me rest. Do you... do you know him... the angel... of death? A more noble... creature than... than your father...." He can no longer speak, for the tightness in his chest. There is a pounding in his head, savage, pulsing.

Sensing that he has pushed the pathetic old man to the brink, Kasdeja relents, releasing his grip all at once. Though, he does feel a certain inclination to test Shealtiel's pretentious claims. Perhaps another time.

"You're still coming with me," he says, resuming his walk out of the APC.

Reluctantly, still shivering, Shealtiel climbs from his seat and makes to follow, if only to reign in the idiocy of his companions as the Nephilim invariably decides to test the limits of their patience once again.

Reaching the others, Kasdeja strides into their mist as though he owns the very ground they stand on. With contemptuous disdain, he walks past Michael and comes to a halt before Dara, looking down at her impassively for a long moment. When he finally speaks, he sounds almost solemn, like a young boy struggling to imitate an adult.

"He is not within you, is he? Not like me, no, no. You don't have the NAME imprinted in your soul. You weren't created to be a failure. I wonder... I wonder who you are."

"What the hell is going on?"

Lev sputtered over his own coughs and wheezes, wondering how everyone had caught up to him so easily. Apparently his time stalking at made him easy to catch up to. No matter.

He stood straight, ignoring the blood oozing from his body. He took a few cautious steps towards Michael and the stranger, eyeing them both up. The words that Kas had spoken seemed to drip with poisonous oil. At least, to Lev's ears. Just having him around made him stand on edge. He bit back a scathing remark.

Walking to the two, he turned around quickly and put both his arms around them. He pulled them in with a false hug, staring back at the Nephilim.

"You could know, you know. If you simply asked. This man is Michael, travels with Rue. I am to end her. This woman, I do not know."

He turned his head, looking at the girl. Something...put him off, about her. Something he couldn't quite place. She didn't look like much, but she was unnerving all the same. And out here, he had learned that looks don't count for much anymore. With a forced grin that looked more like hunger than anything, he addressed her.

"Our 'friend' here is a Nephilim. Do not give him your name. If horse has name, do not give him name either."

He looked back, noticing Michael's arm. He frowned, noting that it looked painful.

"Na'lsa will fix that, Michael. The next time he comes out, anyway."

Michael didn't respond to Lev, and probably wouldn't have even if the Nephilim didn't pass by him. The creature's presence almost grabbed at his very being and caused Michael to throw up a strong mental block in mental instinct.
By the time his arm was in the splint, Michael already felt as though he didn't need it. He stood up, albeit slowly as his weariness returned, and checked inventory. He lost a couple courage capsules, crushing them on impact, but otherwise, most of his things were in excellent shape, if not acceptable.
In the back of his mind, Lev sounded offensive, if not maniacally clever: "'Don't give your name!' he says, and immediately gives mine."
He had to lie; deceit being his only possible reprieve from the immediate threat, the Nephilim. Looking up to Lev, he called, "You have me mistaken for someone else. I am John, Johnathan Tailor. I was on my way to see my brother on the other side, and I was taking a short-cut. Who are you, might I ask?" Fear kept his mentality static towards any invader. Even the Nephilim would have a bit of trouble breaking through the lies.

Caught off guard by the apparently friendly adress, physical contact, and the hostilities she sensed within the group, Dara reflexively took a step back from the conversation, letting them sort out whatever was between them to sort out.

"I need to get my horse," she said quietly, and slipped away from the core of the conversation the few feet from where Michael John -she wasn't going to bother too much with which- had fallen to where her horse was standing half in a daze.

Without paying direct attention to her, those present might not have realized she had walked off at all, even though she hadn't gone far. She repacked the first aid kit and picked up the horse's reins. She walked him a little closer to where the three men stood standing slightly closer to "John" then either the man who 'introduced' herself and the Nephilim, whatever that was supposed to be. The figure was at once imposing and hideous as it felt familiar in a way Dara was not entirely sure she liked. However, since it had yet to attempt to tear her head off or eat her horse she placed it tentatively above the walking dead and a few people she had met as she wandered so far.

She hadn't a clue what the Nephilim had meant with his words and references to a name. At the moment neither of the newcomers seemed too savory.

Feenai had several emotions running through her. Fear. Hatred. Unhappiness. She took a moment to compose herself and find her own emotions. Then she sighed and looked at Jeanne. "Don't let anyone steal the APC, alright?" She opened the door and jumped out, making sure she had her grenades and laser with her. May as well pretend to be useful...

To reach where almost everyone is was, Dante had to find a safe path down. At least, safer than Lev's fall. Staying as far from the edge (or at least what seemed to be the edge; depth perception is impossible in a pitch-black field) as was practical, he made his way down the slope and nearly ran into Feenai in the process, then turned sharply when he was at the same level as the newcomer, barely hiding himself from sight behind some massive boulders. He'd almost slipped several times, and if he hadn't been as instinctively sneaky as he was, the grating of metal and rubber against sand would have been obvious.

Lev looked between the two, his face going dark for a moment. He spoke with the heaviness of a mourner at a funeral, trying to put weight in to his words.

"We have been recruited, as escort for this thing."

He pointed rudely towards the Nephilim, opening his hand as he talked.

"Involuntarily too. At this point it sees you, so you are its property."

Lev spoke the last words through gritted teeth. He had been property before.

"Do as it says, but don't let it command you. Corrosion comes from within."

He removed his arm from around Michael, breathing a bit heavier now. His many cuts and scrapes were taking a toll on him, with the pain being quite visible now. Letting out a large breath, he walked a few paces before settling down on an outcropping of rocks that were not sporting his blood. With leery eyes he watched the Nephilim. He knew it could destroy him within a moment, but he wondered about Na'lsa. If he fell once, he would get up twice. It was almost a risk he was willing to try.

"Property, my ass!" Michael thought, but took known outward action towards his words. His mental block was strong enough that he was more than confident enough to get away from the Nephilim mostly unscathed.
He turned to the pale-skinned person who was like a saint to him- she somehow appeared behind him while his focus was on Lev. Although he was not completely enthralled by her good deed, he felt the need to repay her. Had any sensible person walked by, they would have left him for dead, or taken his identity for their own purposes had they known him through the Amorpha.
"It seems as though I owe you my life, miss, and I cannot leave it to fate to repay you. Thus, I wish to travel with you in hope that I may do so in its stead. The world is a very cruel place to be traversing alone."
As Michael spoke he felt the familiar presence recurring from his memories. Jez'ebel had never been a fan of Nephilim, and his instinct told him to shoot it now and kill it before it could assimilate him into its grasp. He tightened his mental block so as to reassure himself.

Michael dropped the mental block instantly when he heard the Nephilim. It was pointless to him to guard thoughts when the Nephilim could easily by pass it. "So it's not as good as I hoped ...nevertheless..."
"I don't see what you need us for so much. Why not leave us be?"
He already had a general idea of the answer, but the urge within himself wanted him to negotiate with the creature. If it could get past him, it could certainly help to improve his block tremendously and perhaps could be a key factor in his research....
So he lifted the block again to try to deflect the psychic energy around him instead of just plain stopping it. A whirlpool of psychic energy might spin the energy 180 degrees. Of course it would drain him too fast if he put too much energy into it so he started slowly, only feeling only a hint of drainage...
But a jolt of pain from his splinted arm stopped him as he felt the place where his arm was put back loosen. "Now's not the time to experiment..."

"I've managed so far" Dara says in responce to Michael John, having not really settled on what to call him just yet. It was not a statement of defiance, but one of simple fact. She was travelling alone and she was not dead.

Dara looked quietly at the group, the humans, - or potential humans - and what they called the Nephilim. *Thing* was about closest word she could some to describe it. It had yet to do anything to give her room to make much of an opinion of it, aside from speak in a somewhat confusing way. The latesst words were not the least bit confusing though. She wasn't sure she wanted to travel with this group but she also didn't have any place particular to go, or reason to get anywhere.

After a few moments, she said to the nephilim, "you haven't said anything to me that I can answer." She paused where normally she would put a name. Lacking that she moved to the obvious question. "Where are you going?"

Crouching nearby, Dante felt a shiver run down his spine as that very-messed-up aura warped into something that made him glad he was blind. If the aura was this twisted, then what could the nephilim possibly look like...?

The oppressive scent of fear and disgust irritated Dante, as did the feral stench of Kasdeja. But now wasn't the time to try to kill him.

"Right. I go to APC now."

Lev stood up, suddenly wanting to be as far away from Kasdeja as he could be. What he had just seen chilled him, and he knew he could not let the creature affect him in any way. He began walking, passing the others. His eyes landed on where Dante's should have been. They lingered for a moment. After a few paces he stopped, turning his head over his shoulder to look back.

"Dante. Accompany me."

Why? Was her immediate thought but she didn't think about voicing it at this moment. If Dara was afraid, angry, worried, or having any other strong feeling about standing face to face with the nephilim, she didn't immediately show it on the outside. She stood, Lethe's reins in one hand, and after time responded simply, "that's a long way."

Hobbling on his cane, Shealtiel makes his way over to where Kasdeja has confronted the young woman. A cold fear grips him as he forces himself to approach, remembering the brush of the Nephilim's psychic fingers on his heart, the tightening of arteries... but he will not allow himself to think of the creature, not directly, knowing that it can sense his terror and the desperate threats that terror engenders in his mind.

"Do you know this creature?" he demands hoarsely as he draws near. Looking at her, he can plainly see that she doesn't. "What goes on here? Who are you?" he asks her, straining to soften his voice. "Has Kasdeja said anything to you?"

Though it's hard to take her gaze immediately away from the Nephilim, Dara spots the old man making his way over. She is not so much surprised at his questions as still addled from this whole encounter, and the new man's appearance is nothing out of the ordinary for the last few minutes.

"I'm...I'm crossing the pass here" she speaks in an overly soft voice. "He," pointing to the man who is either Michael or John, "had fallen. I stopped to help." She pauses again, eyes flicking back between the Nephilim and the old man and lastly to the path the other group membere had taken before starting tentatively, "Which one is Kasdeja?"

"This thing is Kasdeja," he says, glancing sidelong at the Nephilim, who stills watches Dara patiently, seemingly content to let Shealtiel carry the conversation. "It is a Nephilim, bastard child of the angel Semyaza, and a child truth, albeit with the psykosis of a god." Feeling a moment of pity for her, at how bewildered she must be to have been fallen upon by their group, he adds, "I will not ask for your trust, but if you will permit me some advice: do as Kasdeja asks." He does not allow himself to add a silent for now, knowing that Kasdeja is witness to his every thought.

Dara looked back and fourth between the two. Having a name didn't make the Nephilim seem much differetn except that she now had some idea of what to call it. She turned to the old man. "He said everyone was going to Eden." She momentarily forgot about Kasdeja's initial vague statements to her, not yet sure what to make of them herself. "I didn't think people could go there."

Dante was slightly irked at being told to do something, but since he found Lev much less revolting than the other monster some several yards away, he got to his feet and trailed the gunman. The strange auras were making him nauseous, and he'd rather deal with Lev's nearly-invisible one.

Lev slowed down a bit, letting Dante catch up to him. He walked in silence for a few minutes, letting the distance build between them and the group. After a while he spoke to the blinded man, eyes staring straight ahead as he did.

"Kasdeja confuses me. He acts on emotions. But has none. Kills. Does not know meaning of death. Like..."

He held his hands out, trying to fathom what exactly Kasdeja was like.

"Like dumb child who has gun, is pretending to play war with real bullets. Shoots real people, does not realize that they do not get back up. How teach that, when they are pointing gun at you?"

"You don't. You shoot him before he can shoot you. Simple as that."

Like a dumb child with a gun... That pretty much summed up governments, what with their blindly sending out soldiers like some inexhaustible resource, and exploiting that sense of patriotism that permeated among new recruits. That was why he hadn't joined in the rioting in his hometown, with his friends battling turf wars, and also why he hadn't been killed. The dogtags that bore his friend's name clinked lightly as he walked behind Lev. Besides nostalgia, they also served the dual purpose of hopefully protecting Dante's identity if he died.

When he died. In his line of work, it was considered lucky if you got to die of old age. Slightly less lucky if you got a bullet to your head, but that was better than being beaten, right?

Frankly, Dante didn't think Kasdeja cared about the people he slaughtered. He was sure the nephilim knew they were dead, and what death entailed, but as to his feelings for them, he probably had none.

By the time Dara had her finger on him, Michael had already started down the road. His mind felt heavy as he sifted through the clashing auras to try and find sanctuary. The world spun counterclockwise as the cliff on his left..or was it his right...began to wrap around him, and soon he was seeing rainbows of greens and yellows and he was tempted to try a courage capsule because of how lost he was. Suddenly losing balance, he grasped his hand on the first thing that he nearly fell on, and nearly read their mind.
"But how do you outpace a thing that can see your mind's eye before you act on it?" he asked the voice. A periwinkle sea stood out in the distance and he got on his hands and knees to barf. It felt terrible, but after cleaning himself up a little, he could more clearly see the men he was talking to, either Lev or Dante-Lucifer.

As the man she first met began to walk away Dara found herself no further along in understanding the dynamics of this group, or if they were a group at all. She began to wonder if she ought to consider the Nephilim's demands as something of a kidnapping. Having been on her own for so long and wandering about in whatver direction seemed safe at the time, having any kind of destination in mind felt strange and that in itself was more unnerving to her than travelling with the group in general would be.

"You cannot kill that thing. I try, there might not be anything left for Na'lsa to bring back."

Lev shrugged, as if the point was rather obvious.

"No matter though. Any idea why such a thing would want to go to Eden? I assume that it is not kind of garden where tomatoes will grow."

He sighed, whispering under his breath that he missed tomatoes. He looked rather downcast now, what with the fight gone out of him. He knew there was no fighting the Nephilim now. Not until they had something powerful enough to at least hold him at bay.

Dante turned, startled.

...oh. Just the artificer. "Then you run. Or ignore it. Or take pleasure in pummeling it with sarcasm." Which probably doesn't even reach through that think skin.

"To steal something for power, probably. Isn't that everyone's goal? To take something not theirs to better their own pathetic lives? I take other people's lives so that I can live. Soon, I swear I'll reclaim Gabe's soul. Somehow. And my friends'. Don't you dare tell me it's impossible. It isn't."

Lev shrugged again, beginning to lose interest in their conversation.

"How should I know? I am man with gun. The hell if I know where people go after they, you know-"

He put his hand to his head, imitating a gun with it as he pulled the trigger and made a gunshot noise. He let his hand fall to his side, Walking in silence for a moment as they finally came upon the APC. As it came in to sight, he opened his mouth again.

"The rest of them are retarded. Why walk that whole way, and leave APC here? Why not just drive thing? And if we bring odd lady, where do we put her horse? Na'lsa eat people, but it can't be helped if the horse gets eaten."

Dante sprinted a few paces; Lev's height granted him an advantage in terms of walking speed, and the bounty hunter was already skittish on sand and gravel. He focused: the outline of the APC was barely visible. Was he really that tired from the pressure? He ran ahead and through the hatch ("Just me, Jeanne,"), but not before yelling back, "How the hell should I know? I wasn't the bastard who invited her in the first place. Hell, why am I even with you fools?"

In the tense silence that follows, Shealtiel looks from Dara to the Nephilim, trying to think of something to say that will put her at ease, but failing -- there is no ease to be found in the creature's presence, and it's refusal to speak further becomes more unnerving by the minute.

Eventually, he forces himself to speak, saying softly, "Kasdeja, every moment spent here is another in which Eden awaits. If... if we tarry too long, the others may try to leave us behind."

Dragging on his silence for an insufferable moment longer, Kasdeja eventually answers Shealtiel, still staring at Dara as he says, "Good point. I'd have to punish them if they decided to do that, and we don't want that, do we?"

Not waiting for a response, he sets off back toward the APC. Psychically, he sends back to Dara in a slithery whisper, "You're coming, too. I'm going to figure out what you are."

Shaking her head, Feenai wonders why she didn't do as Lev said, and just drive the APC closer rather than walking to the cliff edge. It's not like I made a difference at all. I probably should have just waited with Jeanne. She trudged back to the APC following the others, and slid into the drivers seat dejectedly. Carefully placing her gear behind the seat, she waited for Kasdeja and the rest to return and tell her where to drive.

Lev let the conversation drop, leaning down as he stepped in to the APC. He unslung his beaten rifle from his shoulder, resting it gingerly against the wall. Taking a seat on the cool floor, he tried to rest and regain his composure before he had to face Kasdeja again. His walls had crumbled slightly, and he was trying to rebuild them.

I want out.

Lev recoiled slightly, head slightly dizzy from the frankness of Na'lsa.

"Then come out, demon."

I am a son of God! But I am not fully ascended. I...have difficulty with this body. I need a catalyst to assume control.

Lev nodded, smirking to himself. He knew he must look insane, conversing with himself. But truth be told he was more himself in this moment, his own man, than ever before.

"Then you will be you, and I will be me."