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When he moves to hold her, there's no way that Alex doesn't respond by wrapping her arms around him entirely, holding him to her in a hug. She doesn't know what to say for a long moment, instead glancing around the room. She knows that Richard's not acting right, but she doesn't know what to do about all of this.

Some of the color just leeches from her cheeks and she just adds softly: "I don't know. I think..." She pauses, and Alex wonders for a moment if it even makes any sense that she's trying to put logical assumptions to a Chaotic goddess, but here she is trying to do it anyway. "I think she did what I asked that she do, give us some time to talk about this without her, to make sure that this is actually want you want."

Just in case the goddess is listening, Alex keeps her voice low and near his ear. "But what she said about being born for her and bred for her and everything else doesn't mean that you have to become her vessel, Richard. You're allowed to have a choice in this. Everyone seems to forget it, but you do. Is this a choice you're making because you want what she's offering to you? Or is this a choice you're making because you don't think you have another option?"

He inhales her scent. She feels so good. Small and soft against him and he feels taller and more alive than he ever has and...

He stares at her before kissing her, hungrily. His hands slide beneath her top and he holds it there. His eyes swim. They're blue stars.

"...It's hard to think. I don't know if I can...I don't know if I can go far from her."

He clenches her shoulders, tight and angry for a moment. IT may cause her pain, "That's not right. I know that's not right. I'm still me. I'm Richie. I'm sitll Richie I'm Richard I'm...I'm..."

His star blue eyes fill with tears before he clings to her.

"I don't know if I can leave. You should go."

When he kisses her like that, Alex is surprised but she kisses him back. For all of their playacting kisses before at the Club, this feels different. There's some sort of element in it that feels almost like a hello and a goodbye all at once. It makes her want to cry and Alex is speechless for a moment as she just stares into the blue of his eyes. Letting out a small sound when he grips her so tightly, she doesn't know what to do.

What does one do when someone you love is entirely invaded by his enemy and he both seems to want it but also to not want it? Alex doesn't know: there's no playbook for this, nothing written out anywhere and there's no experience that she can ever compare it to. But her eyes well up when he speaks, she can't help it. Alex just cries without making a noise, the lines of her makeup unwavering thanks to the type that Amalia had used.

"Richard," her hand just strokes across his face and her eyes don't slip from the looking of the starry blue of his eyes. "I'm not going to leave you here."

Edited 2020-05-19 15:00 (UTC)

"Why should you?"

Tiamat is dressed in flowing white and Richard rises, pulling away from Alex to her. His feet freeze and Tiamat flinches - visibly hurt by his reluctance.

Something seems to set in her face and she turns her full attention on Alex, pacing to her slowly. Richard doesn't fade but he does move to the closet that is surprisingly full of male clothing, removing his shirt and undressing.

"Alex."

Tiamat's voice.

"He'll be right back Alex. He's just going to shower. Don't panic. Come." Tiamat is unnaturally warm as she reaches her hand for the reporter, "Come on. Let's talk. God to Girl. So to speak."

She meets her gaze and looks decidedly human.

"I think you think, that I am a jealous and vengeful god. and you'd be right." her laugh is high and clear, "But I am not above rewarding those who are loyal to me. And you have protected Richard. I've been watching you Alex Reagan. Simon..."

She chuckles.

"...simon. That poor sweet boy."

Alex Reagan has always had a weakness for charismatic (and of course enigmatic) people. Tiamat has both of them in spades. So she finds herself being pulled towards the woman and her outstretched hand. She looks to Richard in the closet over her shoulder before she lets the Goddess takes her hand and for a moment Alex is uncharacteristically silent just watching the Goddess. She wonders if Tiamat is going to smite her. She wonders if the Goddess wants too.

If she does want to, Alex knows why she won’t: Richard wouldn’t let her. For all of everything between Alex and Richard that may or may not have changed tonight, Alex knows that Richard cares for her at least. And because he cares about her, killing her is dangerous. Both Alex and Tiamat know what Richard Strand is like when he loses someone he cares for and it wouldn’t be beneficial to the Goddess or her plans for him to be wounded in that way.

But what she says about Simon makes Alex frown and she breaks her silence at last, meeting the woman’s (the Goddess’) sea and star eyes. “Simon? What about Simon? What do you mean?”

"Alex...what do you think my plan is specifically?"

The Goddess leans back, "What do you really think I intend to do when I take my new vessel. Honestly?"

There are two glasses of wine then. One in her hand and one in Alex's even if she didn't want it. The sound of a shower running can be heard and Tiamat purrs.

"I have taken children, I have given them power. I have made power...what do you think comes of this? Simon is a loyal ...loyal servant."

"I don't know. Everything I've seen with the Axis Mundae and everything else seems like you just rip open the sky, let the shadow demons in and then everyone dies or is tormented." Alex doesn't want the wine, she just keeps holding onto it, as she watches the goddess. She's glorious, and she can see what Warren sees in her form like this. And she can also see, and is frightened of the power that rests below it, and beneath.

But the mention of children makes Alex's chin rise, and she thinks about the kids, just the ones that they've met who have been 'given power'. She thinks of Simon talking about how his parents kept opening the door and how he needed to stop them, about Maddie Frank's hanging body and the Brother's of the Mount that he'd killed in order to save the children. "If Simon is such a 'loyal servant' then why has he gone around killing people who were opening the doors for them? Why does he want a normal life, and a normal world so badly? It doesn't make sense!"

A pause, and then Alex just frowns and shakes her head. "I don't even know what I'm supposed to call you."

"All is according to my design."

Tiamat's age shows then. Ancient and terrible and torn asunder. Richard, showering, clutches at his chest and clings to the wall for dear life. He can feel it. Feel the mother of the skies and the seas. I've always known.

The one thing-

No. Two things.

His father beat skepticism into him to save him. He sees that now. There were other ways but he understands the bastard did what he did to try.

Alex though. Alex was more warm and real and he thought about her while Tiamat - outside - twisted and purred in thought. Her plan is people going out of control. Of taking over.

She stops swirling her wine.

"When I take my new form you'll call me Richard. I will be him. For all intensive purposes. As I am her."

She draws a hand up her body before reaching for Alex.

"Listen to me. You cannot stop this. All is according to my design. It is simpler to be here. So he gives himself willingly. Heart and body and mind and soul my love."

It's his voice when she says that.

Alex just frowns at the woman, and when Tiamat reaches for her and speaks in his voice, she can't stop herself from taking a large step backwards. She doesn't want Tiamat to touch her, for some reason she thinks that it would be a terrible idea if that happened. She takes a deep and shuddering breath for a moment, but the anger in Alex is palpable, hot and quick in the way that Alex always is.

"You want to keep me here as a hostage for him doing this, isn't it? As much as you've bred him and trained him and whatever, you don't control him. Not entirely. Not where he is that counts. Richard won't let you do what you want to him, and to the world if I'm not... If he can't have me safe too. That's it, isn't it. I'm like. A hostage and a reward." Alex's voice is hot, and she just shakes her head. "You can plan every part of his life, Tiamat, but you can't plan who he actually is. And you definitely didn't plan for me."

No. She didn't.

Tiamat does not get Scared but she does know what confusion looks like. She does know what fear looks like and this...this is strange. Richard did not have this planned. He was supposed to take the path of the scythe. He was supposed to be willing to embrace her. To reign fire on his enemies.

Instead he is solving crimes and playing with this...thing and this thing has power in her own right.

"...Alex?"

Richard is wearing a dark red shirt and a pair of pants, the shirt unbuttoned at the collar to reveal an expanse of chest. He's still wearing glasses but his hair is curled and has lost it's normally reserved look.

Instead he just looks puzzled.

"Alex what's going on are you okay? Why are you arguing with me."

He blinks. Very confused.

"...Us. Her. Why are you arguing with her? Is - did she say something?"

Alex just looks at Richard, and she can't remember when she's ever seen him in such a bright and vivid color. It suits him, honestly, but it also doesn't quite feel like him, particularly when his hair isn't tamed in the way that it normally is. In some ways, it reminds Alex of the wild and unmoored way that he looked when he was trying to find Coralee, but she doesn't say that. Instead she just looks to the Goddess who looks confused.

For a moment, his phrasing just bothers her more than she can say, and there's no denying the accusation that's in her eyes when she looks back at the goddess. Alex Reagan is someone who will always fight for the people that she loves, no matter what may stand against her and before it. Even if it's a confused Goddess who Alex is fairly certain that she's about to make angry when she speaks to Richard again.

"She wants me to stay, Richard." Alex doesn't look at her when she says it, instead her attention focused on Richard himself. "She wants me to be like a hostage for her ability to get your love and you to give in. Is that what you want? Do you want me to stay and be a tool so that she can sinks her claws into you even further?" With that, Alex does look at the Goddess. "She knows that if I'm not you're going to fight her. Which means you can fight Tiamat, if that's what you want."

Fight?

Why would he want to (She's going to destroy everything.) When Tiamat is right here? When he should have been with her all this time? Gone with his father. He was her mantle.

Tiamat, for her part, is placid staring at him. He wants to take her in his arms because they should be together. Then the ceremony would happen (She's going to destroy the world.) and they would be together. But then Alex is there and Alex is...

Laughing at the Pacific Northwest Halloween Party at something Nick said.

Pouring over his tapes, rewinding with an eye for detail that'd be the envy of any researcher.

He doesn't know if he can go back. And that scares the hell out of him. Tiamat is looking at him with all the love in the world and it's like looking into a mirror...but Alex is looking at him and it's like looking at piece he's been missing...

Turning to Tiamat he shoves at her, them, it. He can feel the punch in his chest as he grabs Alex's hand to run - moving to bolt out the door.

Get her out. Richard mutters, Get her out and go back. And I...I...

He won't stop. He won't stop pulling her looking determined.

Alex doesn't know what to do. She doesn't know what to do and she has no idea where the hell they are or anything like that. But she can see the affection and love between the two of them and it scares Alex. It scares Alex more than anything with Coralee ever did. These were the answers that they were always working toward and now they had them, thanks to Amalia's insistence that Alex attend the club (god she hopes Amalia is okay but it's not like she can check right now) and it's kind of more than a little bit terrifying.

When Richard punches Tiamat, it almost feels like the world is in slow motion again, and she just stares over her shoulder as he grabs her hand and pulls her along. Alex is a runner, it's something that she does every day, but no one is a runner in heels like this, not really. Adding in the fact that Richard's legs are longer than hers and she needs to hurry to keep up with him when they're walking together, this entire thing seems more than a little perilous.

As if the running from a goddess herself wasn't perilous enough.

"Where are we going? Do you even know where the hell we are right now, Richard?" It's instinct for Alex to reach for her phone, but it's in the tiny purse that she'd left in the club when Richard had ordered her onto the table, and so she doesn't even have that. But she keeps looking over her shoulder to see if they're being followed.

"I have to get you out of here."

His voice sounds different, it's impossibly deep and it's pure damn luck as he leans against the wall to clutch his throat for a moment before shaking it off, "...I have to make sure you're safe. Then...Then...We just have to get out."

You can't leave Richard. You know you aren't going to leave me.

Leave her alone.

The voice in his head is petulant.

No.

He throws a hug at Alex, desperate, clutching her tightly as people pound toward them.

"I love you." Meeting her gaze his eyes shine, "But you have to get you out."

Alex just stares at him before he hugs her, and she wraps her arms around him automatically. Those were words that she'd never thought that she'd ever hear him say, honestly. Yes, she desperately wanted him to say it, but she'd never thought that they'd get past his lips. But maybe that's what happens at the end of the world: you say the things that you'd always meant to, that you'd thought that you'd get around to doing.

"I love you, Richard Strand." Alex's voice is a fierce whisper, and she ignores the sound of people coming towards them, she ignores the way that his eyes shine at her. She ignores knowing that Tiamat is inside his head and listening to them as she says the words. And of course, she also ignores how he says that she's got to get out. "I love you. Who you are. Not who Tiamat wants you to be, Richard. I love you."

The words come once more and she just reaches up and touches his cheek. "But I'm not leaving you. Don't you get that? You and me, right? We're in this together." Alex is loyal, always so loyal, even as her eyes are shining, liquid with tears as she watches him. "I love you." It's funny how she fought so hard not to say it, and now all she can do is to say it.

Oh Alex

He cups her cheek and kisses her hard before stroking her hair. There are guards with guns coming in their direction.

"If you want me to be me. Then you have to understand - I have to let you go-"before he can kiss her again his hands jerk and he pulls away. It feels like his chest is on fire.

And Tiamat is there. She's right there, warm and beautiful and he falls to his knees writhing for a moment before she strokes his hair and he...

Eases.

"Don't make me hurt him Alex." Her voice is soft, deadly and dangerous, "I will have to, and it will be by hurting you. You're not in his mind like I am. I am him. And He is me. And you brought him to me. As I wanted."

Richard is on his feet, towering over her but focused wholly on her.

"So. Chose. Join me, and keep him from pain. Or leave. Save the world. Save Nic. Save your interns, your mother, your father. Tomorrow..."

Tiamat cups Richard's cheek with a purr before kissing him, "I know you're scared Richard. I know she'll say yes."

Damn you.
Don't fight me on this.

He looks back at Alex and - out of desperation - thinks at her.

Run Alex. Run I'mnotworthit its not worthit Alex please please alexplease-!

But he wraps Tiamat in his arms, staring down at Alex dispassionately.

For a moment, Alex just looks torn, and she frowns when she can hear Richard in her head. Her voice is soft and wavering, but there's a certainity in it. "Yes, yes you are. You are to me." Because he is. Richard has been worth all of the monsters, and he's worth this. He's worth this.

But that doesn't mean that she's going to go easily. Even as she's shaking, the fine tremor working through her body, Alex raises her chin and she looks at both of them, but she's addressing Tiamat when she does so. "I want..." It's hard for her to say at first and Alex has always thought that she was a better person than this. She'd thought that she'd willingly watch him be hurt and in pain, that she'd willingly watch anyone be hurt or in pain in order to save the world. But it turns out she's not any better than anyone else and that hurts her. It's like a knife in her side. But she can't watch this happen to him.

There's a fleeting thought that Simon would be so disappointed in her, and Alex doesn't blame him in the slightest.

And she doesn't stop. "I want assurances, if I stay. I want you to make sure that my family and Nic and the interns and Simon and Charlie and the other kids are free and safe. My definition of safe. Not yours."

Interesting. Interesting.

It's not time yet for Richard and she to become one. That happens tomorrow but Alex is so willing to throw away reality for him?

"...Just them."

For now.

It's Richard who flickers for a moment but it's very easy for Tiamat to reach into his mind, "Just them? Out of everything and everyone. You trust me that much."

She's not delusional but she can sense the love out of Alex in waves. Leaving Richard to the side, she cups the other woman's cheeks.

"My sweet girl."

Warren doesn't look happy when he appears. He's been dragged from somewhere and his hair is askew. When he sees Tiamat however he falls to his knees.

"Leave Alex's family and loved ones alone." She keeps her hands on Alex, "And the children...we haven't taken yet alone."

Alex might feel a clench around her heart.

"The other ones are me. To have them stay free and safe? They must stay with me. With us."

Richard Strand is both horrified and hurt by all of this, and some of his resolve has waivered. Some part of his resistance breaks down. He returns to her, arm around her shoulders, before he glares at Warren.

"Did you misunderstand -" the word is said in ancient sumarian, "She means now. As in this moment."

His hand reaches for Alex to draw her close to the two of them.

Alex can't believe she's doing this. She really can't. But Alex Reagan isn't someone who backpedals on her mistakes. She's only done it once, and that was because there was something that had been entirely too important to her on the line: her relationship with Richard. Personally, professionally and in every way that it counted, if Alex hadn't apologized to him in that car, she doesn't know what would have happened but her gut told her that she would lose him.

Her gut is strangely silent on this and Alex just supposes that it means that there isn't a good decision here. Just bad ones.

"Ruby. Richard's loved ones too. Cheryl. Her family." Alex says after Tiamat gives the order to Warren. "I thought that went without saying but..." But Tiamat had already threatened to hurt her to hurt him--she doesn't want to give the Goddess the same idea. But she looks into Tiamat's eyes as she says it and then she lets Richard draw her closer to them, because her decision is made. "And I stay."

Richard is so disappointed. He had counted on Alex to lead a resistance but also...

Also maybe this was building it. I've dragged her down. He feels his heart crack and more of his resolve slip. Looking at Warren it's hard to not feel a degree of satisfaction. He knows it's their feeling.

I was not aware that my servants had been animals in such a way. That they had threatened you and Alex in such a fashion.

We'll whip them into shape.

"You heard her. You heard them." Her voice is soft as she reaches a hand out for Alex, "We'll be upstairs in my room to prepare for the ceremony." She pulled Alex toward her, toward the there of them, "Alex is now mine. You will treat her with the same respect you treat me."

"My lad-"

It's sudden. And it's not Warren. Warren freezes as one of the soldier's heads ...pops.

It just does. Blood splatters the wall.

Richard doesn't bat an eye and Tiamat shrugs before looking to Alex, "Come. I will take care of you and Richard tonight. Won't I?"

She says another word in Sumerian and Richard moves to hold her before looking at Alex.

If he is ever himself and he presses on her, Alex would tell Richard that there wasn’t going to be a way of leading the resistance because either Tiamat or Warren would have killed her. Maybe not with him standing there (though if Tiamat needed to hurt him enough probably with her making him wield the knife) but definitely not long enough to have any ability to stop them. But it doesn’t matter now, her choice is made.

That said, Alex Reagan doesn’t scream. She didn’t scream when she found Maddie, she didn’t scream when they received the video of Brother Lewis’ murder, and she doesn’t scream now. Instead her gasp is loud and strangled as the body hits the floor and Alex has a vindictive moment of wishing it was Warren as she pales.

But she comes forward at Tiamat’s beckoning, skewing over the blood pool on the floor.

Edited 2020-05-20 21:10 (UTC)

It's Richard who embraces her, kissing the top of her head and staring at nothing, eyes glassy. His hands squeeze her shoulders and he leans against her. Tiamat looking back at them and smiling.

Warren, for his part, rises slowly and shoots both Alex and Richard a look of absolute loathing before he bows and leaves. There's a pull and the three of them are back in their chamber.

Tiamat's features are expressionless. Blank and ice cold for a moment before her features brighten and she takes Alex's hands.

Richard, for his part, leaves, moving over to a bar that may or may not have been noticed.

"...Your hands." Tiamat feels them,features focused, "I love them. Richard does too. But he likes your voice the best."

She plays with them, feeling the fingers and tracing them slowly, "It's fascinating. I have had this body for so long I...have forgotten how things feel."

She smiles, unnaturally bright and inhuman, "...I can't wait to feel again."

Alex doesn’t miss the look on Warren’s face and she wonders if Tiamat has any idea of Warren's dangerousness and just how much he hates them. Alex is never going to let down her guard around him. Ever.

But she does look a little lost when they’re in the red room once more, and when Richard walks away from the two of them. Alex knows him, she does and she knows that he’s not happy with this at all. She tries to press down the guilt at that and she looks to the Goddess instead, watching her as she traces her hands against Alex’s. Her frown changes then, because if there’s something that Alex Reagan always has it’s a bleeding heart and burning questions. “If you can’t feel then what was going on with Warren at the club?”

"...Just because I do not feel does not mean that others do. Warren adores me."

Her gaze goes cold and her hands grip Alex's - painfully - before she pulls her hands back. Staring at nothing.

"It is not the act of blessing. It is the worship. He feels blessed. And I am worshipped.

But I do not feel...touch. The nerve endings in this body are dead."

Alex just winces at the way that Tiamat is holding her hands, and she frowns all the more hard at that. It's difficult not to be sympathetic at the way that the woman is saying. The Goddess is saying. She know she needs to remember that this woman isn't a woman, and that she's going to destroy the world, but it's hard when she looks that sad and Alex has never been good at ignoring someone's sadness.

She means it when she says, "I'm sorry. That must be awful. I can't even imagine." And somewhat reflexively, Alex leans forward and brushes her hand against Tiamat's cheek.