Body arching off the bed, Clarice woke with a gasp, her gaze snapping straight to the window. The Tear was still hovering above them, smaller now and fading, but still an ugly, alien bruise across the sky. Letting out a soft sigh, her hand settled on the woman beside her, fingers carding absently through red hair. The Heart was bound, but the rest must have moved on, still working to counter the imbalance that caused all this. Saving the day, being the heroes.

Another sigh, low and hurt.

When the Excalibur's call had come she'd thought she would be among them, that she'd play a hero yet again, not...not herself. Eyes squeezing shut, Clarice couldn't even bring herself to say that wasn't her, that those weren't the choices and actions she would make, given time. Opening them again, she traced a hand down Clerise's side, the memory of staring impassively down at a small figure dwarfed by the walls Paranoia had built around her world. So fragile and new, but unafraid and so very eager to simply throw herself on the pyre of the goddess's madness. Something to be protected, cherished, and used. There had been no hesitation to demand and take from those she'd once loved, the people she had stripped and corrupted the world in order to just hold on to them.

She curled around the sleeping woman's body, whispering hoarsely, "I'm sorry." When Clerise woke up, she'd make it up to her. She'd explain...

They saw.

Eyes wide and jaw tight, she gripped Clerise hard enough to bruise as realization dawned. Everything seemed to freeze with it and it was several moments before she released the other woman and jumped out of the bed. Pacing in a furious swirl of satin and lace, breath growing short, Clarice fought to stay calm. Distantly, she could hear Raeg talking, but it was too soft, too quiet to...

They saw.

They would know.

The hand of panic wrapped itself around her chest and squeezed tight. She sat down, restless fingers brushing mindlessly down her face to her lips. When they came back they would know what she had done and what she was capable of doing and there would be no going back to this point where she had the trust of her superiors and peers. Of...

The people who loved you once will now know better.

It was all going be over. Oh god, they had seen. The dread and panic couldn't quite overwhelm the feeling of being stripped, skinned, and broken open for all to see. Exposed. She'd always tried to be better than her trauma, stronger than her loss, but now they'd all know.

Biting down on her fist, Clarice rocked forward, tears beginning to stream down her face. She wanted to scream as the picture of her world collapsing presented itself, but all she could manage was a tight, broken groan into knuckles scraped raw. What was she going to do? Would she be executed or simply watched and secured while her work was gone over, taken apart, and then what...

Your work will be perverted or abandoned. Everything you have done will be wasted.

It would be wasted, especially now.

Now that she had Paranoia's knowledge, bringing her years ahead of her current studies. Now that she knew where she had gone wrong. She had underestimated Insanity's ability to mutate, to adapt, and under-utilized Distortion to counter the issue and...

You could do it.

Maybe she should just run, while everyone is still out of it. Maybe they wouldn't find her and she could...

Live a life of fear, paranoia, and crushing loneliness.

No, her life was here. With these people. She needed them more than she needed whatever safety running could bring. She'd fight if she had to, she'd...

You could prove it to them. The importance of your work and what you've learned.

She'd prove it to them. They needed her and her work because...

There's a war coming.

This is only the beginning of something terrible, and they'd need all the weapons they could handle.

Breath growing even, Clarice stood as resolve formed and firmed within her. Leaning down, she brushed her lips against Clerise's forehead and apologized, "I'm sorry, you...it should have been enough," but the other woman had just made her want to hold on tighter. "I'm going to fix this though...Red, I promise." She smiled down, ignoring the tears that still streamed down and the sense of finality that had yet to lift from her shoulders. Dressing with quick efficiency, Clarice stood at her door and turned for one last glance at red hair pooled against white cotton.

Despite her promises the click of her door echoed with a hollow sort of goodbye.

You'll have to hurry.

She'd have to hurry, time was moving oddly between the Legacies and this world; she'd have to move the equipment herself, set up, and create a ******** wonder all before the others woke up. But strangely, nothing appeared to trip her up or delay things. Every piece simply slid into place with an ease that left her startled and staring around her as she looked up from her computer to find everything down in the caves, set and ready. Blinking she tried to recall how she had managed to so swiftly but...

The saturated blue glow of the sword, Excalibur, dimmed slightly even as Merlin's darkness intensified around the staff. Moments later the sword became a beacon, but soon grew weak. The distortion was imbalanced, far from a reliable power source, maybe if she just waited until...

There isn't time.

There's no time left.

Steady, graceful hands slid Ben's USB drive into the laptop, modifications and additions speeding across the screen as Clarice rewrote the incomplete, unsatisfactory code with her new knowledge. The sword's power surged again, but in its brilliant light, Clarice was wearing the expression of the distant goddess, focused and driven beyond noticing things outside of her own mania. It wasn't until she initiated the golem program and the cave's light balanced back to some semblance of normal that she finally came back to her senses.

A terrible darkness flooded the chamber, bringing with it a choking malevolence. From the table a man groaned softly. "The back-up it is then."

This was not the perfected Ben replica, the golem that would prove her worth to Deus. For the first time in a long time, there was clarity. Terrible, gut-wrenching clarity. "No. Oh no, what have I..."

The clatter of a keyboard followed swiftly on the heels of realization. Fortunately golems, even this one had a programmed remote destruct and...it didn't do a damn thing. It was there and it did...nothing. "s**t, s**t, s**t." What, exactly, had she altered for it to completely disregard the remote command?

The man continued to ignore her in favour of reaching through Excalibur's barrier and plucking the staff out, like it was nothing. Hefting the weapon, he gave the sword a measuring look before apparently thinking the better of it and moving to leave.

"Put the staff down," Clarice's voice was firm as she stepped away from the console and readied herself to summon Raeg. The blanks were filling in and she was, quite frankly, on verge of self-destruction. But she could do this much. Breaking things and people, the Clarice Sinclaire Special. Flicking her wrist just so, she gave him a crooked smile and willed-

A burning brand of a hand gripped hers, disrupting the weapon summons. The man stared down at her with bleak disinterest before flinging her across the room like she was nothing. A fly to be batted away. By the time she was back on her feet again, both man and staff were gone.

Merlin was gone and for the first time in over a thousand years he had a body. One that she had made him.

The flesh of the hand he'd grabbed began to blacken and slough to reveal more blackened muscle and tissue, the damage spreading in a slow but steady advance. Clarice stared down at it and knew she was going to die, that soon everyone she cared for, that she loved, were going to die. Her shoulders began to shake and the loud, helpless sobs that had been threatening ever since waking finally erupted, wracking her entire body.

Balance.

At first she could barely hear him, but steady persistence had always been one of the defining characteristics of the hunters' guardian. Excalibur's voice was calm, but there was an insistence to it that had her choking back tears and sitting up.

There must be a balance.

Inhaling deeply she nodded silently.

If he moves within this world, so too must I.

"But we need you here!" She gasped, horrified at what this would mean, "Without you we...they..."

Your people have their own strength; you would have done better to trust in it.

The reprimand is gentle but it has her standing back up and moving to the lab equipment. This would make things worse, for a long time, but maybe they at least wouldn't die. Please let them not die, please let him fix this. Please...

A blinding blue light soon filled the chamber, leaving a blonde woman blinking furiously until her vision cleared. A man was sitting up naked on a table and stalking toward a glowing sword. When he lifted it, there was something triumphant and hopeful that filled her. Overhead, emergency lights turned on, and a woman's voice sounded clearly throughout the island, "The Crystal Caves have been breached. Secure all exits and portals. The Crystal Caves have been breached. Advanced hunters are needed secure the Caves. The Crystal Caves have been breached. Emergency generators are in use. The Crystal Caves have..."

The voice droned on, giving the woman a feeling of anxiety. Something was wrong. She stared down at her hands in confusion as the painful decay spread past her wrist. "I'm dying, aren't I?" She asked nobody in particular, but the man still turned back, mild surprise crossing his features as if only now remembering her.

"You are." He bent over her and took her other hand, a cool, soothing sensation spreading over it. "It is not within my power to heal this; it took too much simply to be here. But there is mercy, and such I can grant you."

Above there's a clamour; the cave entrances burst open and the man dropped her hand, its skin still cooling and paling to a light, nearly white, blue. He turned away and walked into the caves shadows, disappearing from her sight just as people in various states of dress, many in white coats, race down to find only a pale wreck of a woman and lab equipment melted into slag.

"I'm sorry," her voice was rough but rang clearly through the chamber. She gazed out at them without recognizing a single one, not even herself. It's all gone except for this one thing. "I'm sorry."