All Abandon Hope, Hellmouth Seal Thread #1

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i'll never see . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . any side of heaven
i l l . w a l k . f o r . M I L E S
t h r o u g h . a . b l a z e . i n . H E L L
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Willow? Close to raising hell? Now, wasn't that interesting. He never would have imagined the do-gooder witch that Dawn had described to him would have gone literally evil. Dawn had alluded to a time when she had gone to the dark side, but he imagined it just meant experimenting with black magic and dying her hair black to match her depressing outfits, not actually trying to raise hell. Good to know, but not something he responded to The First about.

The phrase 'little one' got quite the furrow of a brow from him, however. He was an old vampire, older than most he came across, and though this being claimed to be The First Evil -- which, by association, would mean it predated him -- there was nothing in him that felt young enough to be called 'little.' He didn't press the issue though, because his anticipation for seeing what would climb from that Hellmouth was greater than anything else. The ground trembled beneath his feet, the gateway to Hell awakened to offer light up toward the skies. The scent was horrid, reeking of sulfur and what seemed like stale blood, but he could get used to it if it meant seeing an army rise to take back the city. He watched eagerly as the gateway began to fold into itself, working on parting to allow its captives their freedom.

Meanwhile, The First went for round two of taunting. Sidelined questions from the werewolf/vampire hybrid were answered in very condescending tones by whoever this was The First was impersonating, presumably someone close to him. Still, its insistence that creatures like him, like this Tyler, would be welcomed brought a knot in his stomach. Not if I have anything to say about it, he thought to himself. Vampires were meant to rule this world. They were the mightiest, the most powerful. He would see to it that the likes of these werewolf and vampire mutts would be nothing more than servants in his kingdom, of that he was determined.

The young lady would then be taunted by someone of her past as well, he presumed. This 'Ms. Mercer' was slipping away, barely there as The First Evil rubbed salt in her metaphorical wounds. Not only was she freeing evil, but she was 'insignificant,' as this British form assured her. He found it hard not to crack a smirk.

But it didn't last much longer, because the non-corporeal figure hissed and spat out a name -- Illyria. He had said it before the first time he had taunted 'Ms. Mercer' while mentioning something about a god-king. It seemed like gibberish to him, but it became an immediate concern the moment The First Evil seemed a little perturbed by the idea of 'intruders.' This Illyria, this god-king, must have been close by. He let his ears focus on sounds, trying to listen for the intruders spoken of, but he couldn't find them. Not close by, anyway.

At least he was assured the Turok-Han would rise soon. But, also, there was an insinuation that he might not want to stick around. Killian Brandt was already two steps ahead.

"Guess I'm missing the fun."

An eye to Danika, unsure rather or not she was coming or staying. When he got the impression she'd be following behind, he looked back at The First Evil. "I'm assuming you'll be in touch?"

And then, in the blink of a human eye, he had run out of the basement in a blur, taking to the first level of the high school and going in the opposite direction of the sounds of commotion he had heard toward the side of the school. He presumed Danika could keep up if she was coming ... for her own sake, anyway.

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k i n g o f m y w o r l d !

hellmouth crew, CLOSED ! who;
king of my world by saliva ! lyrics;
an original by danny ! credit;

If only he could determine what was going on here; what purpose they had being strung up as sacrifices to how ghosts seemed to be shifting features the way that they did. If it was Mason (in which part of him wanted to beg it not to be, while the other was certain that there was no other explanation), he didn’t understand why he would have had anything to do with this. The last thing that he wanted was for his blood to be used to bring up some kind of beast. The thought alone was unsettling, but who knew how alive any of them were going to be at the end of this? For Tyler, dying how he was right now didn’t feel like an option. Now, it didn’t mean that he thought that there wouldn’t be an attempt, but he wasn’t going to die from bleeding out this way. The wounds would heal and he could survive it. He wasn’t human, after all. But it didn’t change that there was fear laced in there. As much as he tried to guard it and bury it with questions and struggling, he was afraid. He didn’t know what came next and he was afraid that he didn’t even want to hear what else needed to be said. Maybe he didn’t quite want answers to his questions. What he wanted most were answers to the how they were chosen. How the three of them came to be a part of this. He didn’t even know one of them and the second, well, he knew who she was but he didn’t know her personally. And the things that were being said to her didn’t click into any sort of familiarity. Only that she wasn’t quite the simple library worker that he would have guessed her to be. Then again, he probably wasn’t the regular high school student that anyone expected him to be either.

“They’re still my friends.” Tyler replied through gritted teeth. It wasn’t all a lost cause. Now, things definitely had changed, what with his loyalty to Klaus, but they would just have to understand that. He had been given a gift when he was changed. It was almost as if the curse itself had been lifted. There was no more changing every full moon and relinquishing that pain was something that he favored. But it didn’t mean that everyone was going to shun him. They wouldn’t. At least, he hoped that they wouldn’t, when at the end of the day, he could find reasons to believe in what Mason said. They made sense, although to hear of this world, he didn’t know how to feel about it. He couldn’t possibly feel good about it. “I’m not shunned.” Yet, who wouldn’t want to be welcomed? Not at the price of everyone else though; that wasn’t what he wanted. He didn’t want some sort of beast or some new world apart from the one that he already had. He quieted, eyes closing as his body worked to heal itself, listening to the ghost speak to the woman, taking in what was said, but with some level of confusion. And someone was coming, or so, the idea of intruders made it sound that way. Maybe there were people out there, ready to whisk in and do the rescuing thing. With his eyes closed, he could only imagine what was happening. It seemed like the vampires were taking off and he’d yet to determine how good or bad that was. Too much went through his head and frankly it was all more than a little perplexing.

Fury. True wrath – there were so few in this universe that could know what that was, what it was to be truly and righteously furious. To feel rage, more wholly than a human consciousness could conceive – it was freeing, in its own right, to feel it burning through her. Rage without fear, violence without mercy. These were the faces of Illyria. This is what she had once been. The tides were miniscule, now, a single Bringer, and then another, rather than the thousands in a gesture that it had been, once – but it was still pure. They had dared. They had taken from her. Their Master had bidden and they had obeyed, and it was not their will not was it their wish to suffer, to bleed and break, any more than it had been their will that had set them on the path that led her here, to this moment. They were merely servants, merely soldiers, lesser demons that served their Master with loyalty and blind faith. It was no matter to her. They stood between her, and what was hers, and they would pay with life and limb. Their deaths and the maiming of them would mean little, if anything at all, to their Master but she would relish them, for the brief seconds that they would be within her grasp. She could feel the agitation, the combative instincts of her human keeping close to her, and this brought some small degree of satisfaction to her thoughts, though it was miniscule in comparison to the anger that burned hot through her. She had known that her seneschal was trained, though she had not had the opportunity to fight with him, side by side, and she was pleased that in this, he was not found lacking. She did not wish to lose another ally to a needless death.

The swath they cut through the Bringers was incomplete, but sufficient, as she paused for but a moment at the chained door to the underground segment of the school, the chain shattering under her thrust and a swift kick to the door splintered the frame and send the door half askew and dangling inwards to give her purchase to the area beneath. Furnace, and storage racks lined the walls and filled the floor, but it was the grate to the back of the wall that she moved to, pulling the ventilation shaft entrance open, the slope gradual but clearly descending, tall enough that she barely needed to stoop, leading to the utility area beneath the school that had perhaps once been a shelter of some kind, now left bare and reeking of dust and blood. A pair of Bringers had been left to guard this entrance, the first one caught from behind as she barreled past it and into the wide cavern beyond. One gloved hand was pinned to the demon’s neck, the other to one of its arms, which came twisted up and snapped with a rapidity that was seconded as she wheeled it away, its face and head impacting with the stone wall that it had been standing watch at, a crunch and a thud following. She paid no attention to the second, confident in Alaric’s ability to deal with it, and any others, as her electric blue eyes scanned the interior of the cavern, her teeth bared in a hiss as she took in the sights that greeted her.

The scent of the ancient earth and blood, the hollow reverberation of the wind faint beneath them but all too eerily familiar. How long had she lain, without form or conscious thought, with nothing but such a sound to drum against the edge of her consciousness? This, this was not the Hollow Earth, the Deeper Well though this, this was darker, dank and blistering. This was the channel to Hell itself. A Hellmouth, rent open by the blood of – Her attention snapped upwards, the scurry of feet of those that fled agitating her, but her focus was latched onto the sight of those suspended above the Seal. The male, she did not know, though his hybrid blood burned, stinging in her nostrils. The redhead, she knew, a would be ally, who was slashed deep and on the verge of irreparable damage – and then the last, her Priestess, Evelyn, suspended, dangling, blood streaking along her chest and face and down her arms from the wound. Illyria felt the rage burn, seething and festering, as she stared at the injury, all too familiar to her, the same that had taken Wesley, here, now, the crimson stain and split skin taunting her.

She was moving, still, ripping the anchors of the chains from where they were attached to the circular edge of the seal, leveraging the two that were still suspended downwards until they rested on the ground beside the seal not far from the witch who breathed in ragged, shallow bursts. Illyria tugged, wrenching loose the manacles of the hybrid, leaving him to sort himself if he could, before her attention settled back again to that of her Priestess. She could feel the pain, the despair, the shock, the horror, things that would have pleased her once, now creating only the fire of rage and the tingling icy trickle of fear. The manacles were snapped, from wrist and ankles, as Illyria knelt, her porcelain features pale and rigid, as she pressed a palm against the wound, finding some hope in the fact that Evelyn lived, still – breathed, still. Illyria’s gloved fingers pressed to the wound, into the flesh, trying to spark the energy that resided within Evelyn, to heal and mend, to staunch the flow of blood, to replenish the life that was fading from the Qwa’ha’Xhan.

Her attention jerked upwards, towards Alaric, as she cradled the weightless form, from him, to the others, to Evelyn, and back to him, her tone as close to desperate as he may have ever heard from her, barring the occasion that she had reverted to the nature of the memories that resided within her. ”The Seal is broken,” she intoned, nostrils flaring. ”We must get them away before the demons rise,” She said, her words terse and agitated, as she scooped Evelyn into her arms as best as she could to draw her up. ”Gather the others, we must summon aide for them.” She insisted, her gaze turning back towards the hallway that she could hear the retreat of … others, her jaw working in agitation, wanting nothing more than to complete her vengeance. In time, she was certain, she would have it.

Illyria and Ric made it to the basement door and Illyria easily (and literally) broke in. Ric had never been in the school's basement, though he knew there was supposed to be bomb shelters down there, somewhere – Illyria wasted no time, continuing onwards somehow knowing exactly where to go. Ric followed as she proceeded to break open what looked like a ventilation grate, ducking his head. He didn't know where they were headed but obviously something was very wrong and it was right under the freaking school. Through the vents – whatever kind of tunnel they were in – Ric followed Illyria's blue form only to be met with another pair of Bringers, Illyria killing one of them, a grotesque crunch resounding in the confined space. The other Bringer had moved towards him, swinging a fist. Ric caught the punch with his free hand, elbow absorbing the jolt uncomfortably and slid the dagger upwards out of habit from staking vampires, under the Bringer's ribcage almost simultaneously. Ric retracted the dagger's bloody hilt and hurried to catch up with Illyria. He wasn't usually so ruthless but he was running on adrenaline, horror as to what the hell was going on at the goddamned school of all places, and it couldn't be made clearer to him that Bringers were the bad guys. There was almost a sense of indignation – 'cause it wasn't hard to assume that students were involved here and there was always a protective edge where it regarded the kids attending the high school. Washington High was much larger than Mystic Falls' school, but that really didn't change much for Ric.

They were in some sort of hollow now. Wherever this was, the school board probably didn't know about it... 'cause there was this huge, malevolent-looking emblem, smeared with blood – and people were bound, their blood dripping onto it. Eyes widening in horror, Ric arrived to see Illyria letting Tyler down, along with two others. Damn it, Tyler didn't look good. A quick glance around told him the kid was doing better than the two others, though – a red head and... Ms Mercer? Illyria concerned herself with the library assistant, Alaric quickly making the bizarre connection that Evelyn Mercer definitely was not who he woulda guessed. The God-King appeared to be taking care of her, though... Ric now stood between Tyler and the red haired stranger, brow creased in concern. Jeez, she didn't look good; or conscious, but it was hard to tell. No one here looked like they were fairing well... what was with evil-doers and creepy rituals, seriously? Not like Tyler didn't have enough on his plate, or that anyone at all deserved this. Ric let out a breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding, grimacing as he looked at all the blood covering the stranger's torso, streaked over her face.

“You gonna be okay?” Ric asked Tyler, offering an arm to help him up, figuring he should be at least a bit better off – though he definitely hadn't been spared in whatever sick, twisted thing had taken place here... that symbol on the floor bore ruins, he could see now – ruins and symbols that Alaric knew did not bode well. He had a bad feeling. They needed to get the hell out of there. The Bringers might not be the worst of their concern if whoever had done this had managed to finish whatever their plans were and Illyria's tone of voice when she next caught his attention made that much very clear. He couldn't help but sent a questioning look Tyler's way. A Seal? That's what the symbol was? But he looked back over to Illyria, knowing she wasn't finished... damn it all. Ric nodded, and put an arm around the red haired woman, hoisting her up and nodding to Illyria. Demons rising. Great. Definitely not what they needed. Alaric agreed whole-heartedly with Illyria, straightening and shifted so he could scoop up the woman's legs, worried they wouldn't be able to move too quickly if she was conscious enough to walk – it might just be faster if he carried her. There was Tyler to worry about, too. Sure, Tyler had the advantage of supernatural healing but the poor kid was in pain, it wasn't hard to tell. Illyria had Evelyn – her high priestess, he couldn't help but mentally correct himself uncomfortably – and he'd help this stranger, and Tyler if he needed it, but it might be more slow going than they could afford. His gaze strayed back over to the Seal, fear churning his stomach, but he managed to keep the depth of it from hindering his focus. First priority was to get Tyler and the stranger out of the school alive, alongside Illyria and Ms Mercer. That was it. They'd just need to run. It was stupid, how Alaric had seen so little of Tyler outside of school and now this was happening... one thing was sure and that judging by Illyria's tone and all his gut instincts, they had to start moving as soon as possible.

- - - - - M Y - - - - - - H O P E - - - - - - I S - - - - - - G O N E - - - - -

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . a l r e a d y . w a i t e d . t o o . l o n g . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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"I don't know, Elena," Bonnie said with a bit of obvious uncertainty, riddled with a level of disgust and disappointment, "It's Damon we're talking about. The same guy who snapped Jeremy's neck, who ripped into Alaric's neck and ripped into my neck. Oh, and should we just forget how he tried to turn you into a vampire to keep you around after Klaus' sacrifice?"

Bonnie gave her head a shake, stepping over from one computer to the next. Bonnie and Elena had stuck behind after the rest of the group had left, not only to clean up the classroom but to have a private one-on-one chat. Bonnie had admittedly been avoiding Elena since the incident at the manor with Damon during their slumber party, but when it came to their duties on the prom committee, the two couldn't avoid each other. Elena really only had to ask if she could speak with Bonnie before the young wiccan agreed and both elected to take the short straws for a late evening clean up.

They'd certainly stayed longer than they really should have, but their talk had been pretty long, hadn't it? Within the computer lab, all alone, they had had the privacy that neither of them could really find anywhere else. At Bonnie's, Lucy was always around somewhere. At Elena's, if you could avoid Jeremy, then you might run into Alaric -- or vice versa. Here, surprisingly at school where most teenagers were forced to be, these two hung around longer than any just because this was the one place they had felt safe. In all that had happened in their lives, school was one place where (usually) they were safer than anywhere else.

"I think you're just looking into things," Bonnie added, stepping up the the Mac computer and clicking on the Apple in the upper left of the screen. "Did you ever think that with Stefan gone you're, I don't know, maybe just lonely or something? I would never be having this conversation with you a year ago." Her long, dark hair pooled along the sides of her face in her lean as she dragged her mouse down the menu toward the Shut Down button. Only, before she even got there, the computer clicked off and faded to black.

"Huh?" she asked curiously, standing up straight with her hazel green eyes fixed on the black screen. She hadn't even shut the computer down, so how did it --

Then, all of the computers around them flickered on and off, even the ones she had already shut down. Bonnie stepped back in Elena's direction, eyeing the computers before her as the lights went back and forth between the screens. Then, the lights above them began to flicker as well. "Elena, what's happening?" She asked her friend, as if either of them would know the answer. The ground beneath their feet began to quake, the building shivering with something that frightened her right away.

"Elena!" screamed Bonnie in fear, as the lights went out completely in the school. Then, the shaking stopped. And after about fifteen seconds of silence, the lights flickered their way back on. The computers, however, stayed black as the night outside. Bonnie looked at her friend, face lined with the terror that plagued her.

Decidedly, she spoke. "We need to go." She grabbed her bag off of the table they'd been sitting at and headed toward the door of the lab, stepping out into the hallway. The lights there were on in some spots, flickering in others, yet off in most. One of the suspended fluorescent lights was dangling from the ceiling, knocking off its suspension by the earthquake. Seeing as this was New York, not California, Bonnie had a gut-wrenching assurance the earthquake was supernatural more than anything else. All the more reason to get out of here quick.

She moved deeper into the hallway, her wedge shoes smacking the floor in her pursuit of the front door. "I don't know what that was," she said to Elena in the heat of the silence, turning her head over her shoulder to look at her while walking forward, "But I know it wasn't good. We should -- "

Horror!

She could hear something step out in front of her, but with her head looking backward, she couldn't see it right away. By the time she whipped her head around, it was bound to frighten her regardless. But what she saw, what she actually saw, was enough to freeze her in place.

She'd never seen anything like it. The skin, so blotchy, so aged that it looked like a walking corpse. The teeth, sharp, vicious, frightening. Those eyes, so ferocious, so feral and intimidating. Those hands, sporting sharp black nails that looked as though they could pierce skin without much effort at all. She didn't even have time to gasp before the creature, whatever it was, grabbed her by her jacket, pulled her forward, and then launched her across the hallway three yards in the air before she slammed onto the floor in a bruised mess.

With Bonnie struggling to even get up off the floor, the creature charged Elena with a prehistoric roar.

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s h u t y o u r m o u t h . . .

hellmouth crew, elena gilbert, CLOSED ! who;
how soon is now? by love spit love ! lyrics;
an original by danny ! credit;

Willow had been in and out of that black void a few times now, with every passing second however, the bouts of consciousness were little and far between. The last time Willow was even aware of what was going on, the bringer that had so harshly cut her open like a fish, had just cut into one of the other people that were also held within this never ending nightmare. After that Willow had fallen back into that never ending void, where not even time had any meaning, a day or a year could have passed in the real world, and the near to death Willow wouldn't have been aware of a single second.

Never did Willow think that her life would end like this, kidnapped, gutted like a fish, and left to die in a room full of dirt, monsters and twisted evil beings that wanted to bring about the end of the world. Like everyone else Willow hoped above hope that she would die an old lady, with her friends and family circled around her, as the very last breath she breathed was expelled from her lungs. Willow even hoped that Tara would be there at the end, either by her bedside or there waiting for her on the other side, another side which at the moment didn't even seem to be real.

Where Willow kept going, it certainly wasn't heaven, and it didn't look anything like hell, it was just a void, an abyss that was as dark and as endless as space. Maybe it was limbo, the realm between worlds, between heaven and hell, if it was then again it wasn't like anything Willow had imagined. The red haired Wiccan always thought of Limbo as like a Doctors waiting room, only without the extremely clean smell, and people coughing their lungs up all over you. Willow even thought there might be old friends, or people from her families past might be there, waiting to inform their kin about what to expect within the afterlife.

But once again there was nothing at all like that, just a place where the entire world just stopped, and a place where Willow felt nothing but coldness, the next time Willow was aware of anything else, was when the rescue party came bursting in through the door, and took care of the remaining bringers. At that point Willow could see all that well, in fact her vision was so blurry, it hurt her eyes just to even focus on anything for more than a second. But from what Willow could make out of the would be rescuers that had come for everyone that had been kidnapped, was that it was a woman with long blue hair, and some tall looking guy, which looked as if he had been hitting the bottle hard within recent years of his life.

As Willow was picked up by the guy, she struggled and gasped for breath, only now feeling some kind of pain as she was moved. It was clear just by how heavy and limb Willow's body was that she was extremely close to death, in fact if anyone could tell about heart beats, and conditions of the skin. Then they would work out very quickly and easily that Willow maybe had about half an hour, or a full hour if she was lucky. Before Willow faded back into that void, she grabbed the collar of the man’s shirt, with her blood stained hand and tried to gasp some words out of lips.

"Evil....The....first.....evil.....others....hel....help...others....must save....o-o-o-others....be...before...first ev-ev..." Half way through her struggled plea, Willow's hand went limb, and fell back down by her side, while her head lulled downward and against the guys chest. Willow was very still now, and her breathing had stopped totally, her heartbeat couldn't be felt anywhere within her damaged body, and her blood has stopped flowing from her wounds, which wasn't a good sign, not a good sign at all.

Evelyn closed her eyes, ready to surrender to the darkness, but her mind remained active for a while longer, reeling from one idea to another so quickly that it escaped the weight that threatened to crush it. An insect... the object of a sacrifice meant to unleash Hell on Earth... No one told her, no one warned her that this was the ultimate goal of Illyria's Qwa'ha Xahn. Then again... did anyone know? Was it written in one of the many books on Illyria that, one day, the one serving her would have to spill its blood to help her bring her kingdom back? They said that her kingdom was gone and that the only connection to the past were the talismans that could help Illyria regain all of her primordial power, nothing about gruesome caves (was it a cave?), a weird symbol and strange men stabbing anyone to spill their blood and use it as the key towards the destruction of mankind. She would have never... Evelyn was human, one with a really unusual occupation but also one that loved the world and loved life and didn't want to see it all destroyed by anyone, not even by the one to whom she had sworn allegiance. She had been convinced that Illyria would never inquire about her powers and the way to regain them, that she had become more accustomed with humanity and with her place in it but...

… she had been wrong – one of the last coherent thoughts before Evelyn's mind surrendered and she slipped into a deep state of unconsciousness, her heart continuing to beat slowly in her chest, perhaps propelled only by the energy coming from the implants which Illyria had given her. The normal human body would have already been lifeless with the amount of blood that was lost and the internal damage caused by the blade. Evelyn's body, rendered a little above that of a normal human by the power of the small shards of crystal buried under the muscles at the back of her head, lasted longer, yet it was not far from its own limit. Darkness did not last for long. Slowly but surely it twisted and churned against itself, receiving shape, colours... nothing clear – an image watched through a shattered glass, foreign and familiar, ancient and present at the same time. Memory? Vision? Heaven or... the real Hell brought along at the cost of blood?

Before Evelyn could discern anything, she was blinded by an explosion of blue light, a surge of energy traveling through her body, giving it weight, self-awareness. A small cry of pain left her lips almost immediately, the wound in her side burning with pain, under the pressure of someone's fingers. The young woman's eyes snapped open and she left out a fearful whimper when she saw who was the one that was applying pressure to the wound. ”I-Illy...”, she tried to speak her name but she was cut off by the same rush of blood which she tried to hold back earlier. With a small cough, it came spilling down the corner of her lips and she cringed at the taste, eyes filling with tears at the thought of irreparable damage, of her life ticking away with each minute. The energy that snapped her out of her state of unconsciousness was slowly fading away, the power which was awakened in them working subtly and slowly to repair the damage done to the priestess' body. Evelyn felt herself slipping back to the state of unconsciousness, whimpering again as Illyria lifted her, trying – and failing – to lift a hand to push her away before she did something worse to her, such as throwing her into the pit that had opened. She looked at the Old One in utter fear for a couple of more moments, before slipping back into a state of unconsciousness, her body on the delicate edge between life and death.

It wasn’t rocket science to guess that they were meant to die here, at least, the other two who were human and easier to kill with a knife and through blood loss. And knowing that he wasn’t going to die that way and that he stood a chance above what they did wasn’t comforting in the least bit. This shouldn’t have happened to begin with and those people, he assumed, were as innocent as he was. The only one that he knew was Ms. Mercer and while he didn’t really know her personally, he had a hard time envisioning the librarian’s assistant to be anything other than an innocent person. He knew it probably didn’t have to be that way, but from what he saw, it wasn’t the sacrifices that were the bad guys. This was the last purpose that he wanted to be utilized for. So far, he couldn’t even fathom the reason behind why it had to be him. From what it looked like, Mason’s ghost had had something to do with it, but really? It felt unbelievable, even through all that they had been through and naturally, there was an intense denial that his uncle would have done that to him, even from beyond the grave. Putting it all together while he dangled there wasn’t going to work. And it especially wasn’t going to be affective when Mason’s words kept running through his head on a loop and where that wasn’t a problem, the effect of the cutting and the blood loss was. He felt weak, in pain, but lucid and well aware of the sound that broke through the basement door. Tyler’s eyes opened, in time to see a blue woman breaking through the chains to drop them back to the floor. Again, another stranger, but there was relief in seeing Ric was with her. It meant they were there to help.

He reached up at the offered hand and stood to his feet. He didn’t feel close to one hundred percent, but he was more freaked out by the ordeal than physically suffering. As a hybrid, he had the enhanced healing to deal with what happened, but that wasn’t going to help him from being impacted by what went down here. “I’ll be all right,” he assured, “I don’t know about them though.” And they were more of a concern right now. What he wanted was to get out of there before whatever was supposed to rise, did rise. He didn’t want to know what kind of beast they were helping bring up. Tyler could fight through the pain to get out of there. He could take it, just as long as it meant that they got out of there safely. A glance was spared towards Illyria and Evelyn; apparently it was someone that she knew. There was no doubt now that there was a lot more to that woman than first assumed. But, at the same time, he didn’t know if either of the other two were going to make it to find out what was so different about them. He hoped that they were. At the look from Ric, he looked back at the seal. “Someone said something about seeing a beast.” Tyler relayed, then paused, recalling what had also been given by Mason, but couldn’t bring himself to say that he had also been there. “And Hell rising up.” Right now wasn’t time to explain what he heard, not when it sounded urgent to get out of there. He looked back at Ric and the stranger in his arms, in time to hear the strangled words of the redhead. That was the most ominous dying plea he’d managed to hear yet. Then again, it wasn’t every day he heard someone making some kind of dying statement. He could count himself fortunate in that. And when she went still, the obvious fear filled his expression a moment. He didn’t ask the question out loud, but it resonated in his face that he meant to ask if she was even going to make it. There was something very chilling about being the last standing out of three that had been taken there.

It would not have required any preternatural sense for Illyria to judge that those escaped from the chains that had dangled them over the pit that led to the depths of the world were nearing death. It would have required very little more than the basest common sense, in fact. The shallow and bubbling breaths that escaped from the witch were filled with blood and air, frothing in her lungs, and despite the hybrid’s capacity to cope, even his healing functions required blood which his body could only reproduce and replace in a certain quantity. She could feel the ire and fury burning, grating across her thoughts like daggers, her expression cool and filled with icy wrath, as she looked down to the fragile life that was fluttering, a winged beast slipping free of its cage from within the veins of her Priestess, crimson liquid splashing against her fingers and slipping through them. Impotent, once more. She could feel it collecting under the gloved hand pressed to Evelyn’s side and spilling out, she could hear it in the lungs of the dark-haired priestess, just as it seemed to grow quiet in the fading breath of the witch. ”No.” She declared, hissing, at the girl, her nostril’s flaring in agitation as she hoisted her as easily as one might would a rag doll. Her gaze darted up towards the red-headed girl that Alaric cradled, a flare of fury at the sudden stillness and quiet, that moment of concern mirrored on each face left in the room. ”From beneath you it consumes,” She recited, the words rote and stiff, pulling herself to her feet as she turned her back on the chasm beneath them. ”There will be more of its servants – you must flee if you wish to survive,” she ordered to those left in the room as she herself wasted no time in following the path they had taken to get here, wasting no time in finding some place to regroup.

The first available room above ground that seemed somewhat defendable, she made her way into, a sweeping movement of her arm clearing off the equipment from the laboratory table with a series of crashes, uncaring, simply making sure that no fragments remained on the table before she set Evelyn onto it. One hand still pressed to the wound, she let her other hand slide up to rest at the nape of the priestess’ neck, curling and half tilting the girl up to press her palm flat against the nape of her neck and between her shoulder blades where she could feel the residual spark of her power, the crystal embedded beneath the girl’s flesh. ”You will not leave me,” She spoke, she commanded, she hissed, in the ancient language of her people, a spark of power surging from her, and to the crystal, sending a surge through the crystal, shattering it, melting it, sending it in a million atomized pieces to flow, to blend, to merge and seep into the fabric of the entire essence of the priestess. ”You will stay. Stay with me.” She commanded, she pleaded, her words most likely not understood by the others, but perhaps they did not need to be.

Her gaze snapped upwards, her nostrils flaring at the sound, at the flare of power at the edge of her senses, her gaze narrowing then, a low growl escaping as she flung her attention towards Tyler. ”Hold, here.” She ordered, indicating the wound that she reluctantly pulled her hand free of. ”Protect them, with your life.” She spoke to Alaric, sweeping past him, slipping the dagger from where he had held it, as she slid past them and out into the hallway beyond, to follow the scent of the ancient vampire and the all too familiar ping against her senses of the witch that it seemed, made a habit of being rescued.

((Sorry I left it there, I didn’t want to have Illyria charge in to the scene with Bonnie and Elena without Elena having a chance to write a proper reaction.))

[ooc: sorry about the wait - got a little messed up! my bad!]

Tyler let him know he’d be okay, and was more concerned about the others. Alaric, too. This red-haired woman he was holding – she was going, and going fast. Tyler didn’t have any good new about the Seal, either… what the hell kind’ve creep had one of those down here anyway? And if it wasn’t put here after the school built… why, why did they build the school around it? He didn’t want anyone involved in this kind’ve stuff, but right here, in the school? Hell rising, beasts coming from any kind of seal; they needed to get out and get out fast. Ric looked down at the stranger in his arms helplessly, unable to figure out what exactly he could do to help right away, a little afraid to move her too much without doing anything. The cuts were way too big to bandage here; she needed the hospital. He was surprised to say the least when she actually managed to grab his shirt, as he’d thought she was too out of it to do anything. She gasped out a few words. “Hey- hey, sh, try not to…” He didn’t want her trying to speak if it was too difficult but she passed out. … More than passed out. Ric blinked, noticing the utter stillness, the pallor creeping over her skin and not paying attention to whatever Illyria was saying to Tyler or Tyler’s questioning look. But they were moving again. Holding onto the woman tightly, but carefully, Alaric followed, glancing down at her face every few seconds and trying to keep from panicking.

The room Illyria had chosen was one of the science labs – his own classroom was just a few doors down. Ms Fergusson was not gonna be pleased to find all the equipment and students’ experiments on the floor, but Ric wasn’t concerned about that either. He set the red-haired woman on another table, elbowing the two labeled plants out of the way. Illyria left after instructing Tyler to hold Ms Mercer’s wound and for Ric to stay and watch them. Yeah, he didn’t need telling. But the woman – god, he couldn’t have her just die on him here!

“I’ll do that,” Ric said, not asking and already stepping towards Evelyn. No time for questions; the woman was out of time. It might already be too late. He moved over to take over, put pressure on the librarian’s assistant’s wounds. “She’s dying - needs blood. Just a little. I don’t even know –“ Alaric paused, shook his head. “ I don’t think she’s breathing; hybrid blood might just… keep her going till we can get her to a hospital.” Tyler was standing, he could probably afford it… they’d all been through hell but the woman couldn’t afford Ric to not be cut and dry with this.

This was just so....normal, it was almost laughable just how strange it felt. To be doing that, something normal and boring. The last thing of course you'd catch Elena Gilbert doing is actually complain about that. Perhaps it was an unpopular opinion but there was nothing wrong with normal, or even boring for that matter... Just another day at school, nothing special about it. Though she was quiet, she was still very much listening to Bonnie...on the other side of the room... Moving from one computer screen to the other, hitting the button in order to shut it down.... While doing all this her gaze would occasional lift to her best friend. "It's not that simple Bonnie..." Elena understood where her friend was coming from, but it was just never that black and white when it came to Damon Salvatore. "Sure he's done a lot of bad things...But who hasn't? And he really has done a lot to help us... He's my friend...." She explained....her tone even she   wasn't angry there was no way she'd get mad at her....But being honest...she owed her that much. 


The two of them were alone in the classroom and she honestly preferred it that way. They really did need to talk, just stop and finally get it all out in to the open... The brunette sighed under her breath as she focused once more on her task, she had briefly paused when she spoke...getting caught up within her thoughts. It was just...so complicated, all of it... That seemed to be the case with everything; but especially when it came to Damon.... Eve stuff aside, he truly was so much better....compared to the person they had all known when the Salvatore's had returned to Mystic Falls. He wasn't a bad person, it just seemed very few people could see that. He had his faults, but who didn't. Elena just wished Bonnie could see that, but who knew how she could get her to change her mind... That was a near impossible task if she had ever seen one. It wouldn't be easy, but she was stubborn, she wasn't going to just give up just because it would be hard. The people she cared for... They were easily everything to her....she certainly didn't want them hating one another. 


This task, what they were asked to do...Stay behind later in order to clean up... It had taken probably a lot longer than it should, not that she was Exactly surprised... There had been several pauses, moments in which they had done nothing more than talk. Something that they both truly needed, this was Bonnie! Her very best friend, the idea of things being wrong between them at all....there was nothing she hated more. So she continued with her task. Listening in silence as Bonnie spike once more....she did have a point...a very good one actually.. "I-- I honestly don't know I-" She cut off..the computer shutting off on it's own before she got the chance to even do anything. "Huh...that's really weird...." First to Bonnie....and then the computers she hasn't got to. They were all off now....  


But then they were on again, and she took an involuntary step back... On and off and on again....all the screens around them started to flash . Bonnie was just as startled as she....so Elena didn't even consider to ask it was her or her powers.... The ground started to shake, ahd the lights were out... "Bonnie?!" Elena called out, hearing her but for the moment...unable to see her or anything..What was happening?! It just stopped....just as suddenly as it started... Breathing heavily....heart racing, though she was trying to calm herself down. "Are you okay...." Elena asked, walking around the tables she was standing in front of...a few computers dangerously close to falling off... "Right..." She grasped her bag and followed her out of the classroom.... They didn't know what that was....but Elena had a feeling that she didn't want to find out.... Maybe it was just an earthquake.... She could feel the words on the tip of her tongue and yet somehow even without saying them it felt like a lie.   Elena was looking ahead, well towards Bonnie..but she was the first to see the creature....which was why she had been unable to reply to her friend... She had never seen anything like it, like a creature straight out of some kind of horror movie... Before she could react....it was on them..."Bonnie!" Elena screamed, she was so easily tossed to the side... Still frozen but then something kicked in and she tried to run to her... But two steps...that's all she got before it was on her. Her arm...claws easily slicing through her flesh...and it shoved her...body hitting the lockers behind her with a loud thud. 

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"Bonnie!" the wiccan had heard Elena cry while she was already midair. By the time she landed with a harsh thump! of bone and flesh meeting the floor, there was nothing she could do but wince at the pain that shot through every nerve of her body. The fire was paralyzing, surging from every inch of her. She gritted her teeth together just to try to cope, but she knew she had to get used to it sooner rather than later. Already, as she opened those green eyes, she could see the creature move to Elena and slam her into the lockers with a resonating BANG! that played to its strength.

No!

Her mind worked quickly to find some way to help Elena before she became a corpse on the floor. So, despite a bruised and pained body, Bonnie brought her left hand up and held it in the direction of the creature. Laid on her back, she focused her energy to her core, and searched her mind for the perfect spell.

Once she found one that would prove a lengthy distraction, long enough for Elena to get away, she began to chant.

"Spissior caeli, facere solidam," she managed to get out. Instantly, the creature was frozen in place, unable to move a muscle. Bonnie cringed as the pain of the spell tore through her harsher than the pain from being thrown. Yet, she knew she had to continue.

So, she finished. "Repellunt quod imminet, et nihil caperent eum in carcerem." Instantly, the creature was forced backward a couple of feet and frozen in place. She held her hand out toward it, keeping it encased in her invisible prison. While holding it there, however, a thin line of red poured from her left nostril..

"I can't hold it!" she screamed to Elena, who was now free from its grasps, "You need to go! Just go!"

The blood that poured from her nose caught the attention of the creature, as she felt its ghost white eyes look directly at the stream and seemingly salivate at the sight. The creature, with a new found enthusiasm, began to fight against Bonnie's spell. In doing so, it was actually starting to wriggle its claws, managing to even push its hands forward despite the spell which was supposed to entrap it from moving at all. Her strength was failing. Bonnie knew she'd just made herself a target, but she didn't care. As long as Elena got away, Bonnie would die fighting.

Again, to Elena, she urged, "Go!"

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s h u t y o u r m o u t h . . .

hellmouth crew, elena gilbert, CLOSED ! who;
how soon is now? by love spit love ! lyrics;
an original by danny ! credit;

[OOC: I only found out this week that I was expected to punch in a reply in this thread. Sorry!]

Whenever someone asked little Evelyn Mercer what she wanted to be when she grew up, she didn't miss a beat before replying that she wanted to be a doctor, just like her mommy and daddy. Many children went through the phase in which they wanted to become like their parents when they grew up – what made Evelyn fit into a narrower category was the fact that she didn't grow out of the phase. At first, when she was too small to understand too much about what it meant being a doctor, Evelyn had wanted it because she wanted to be liked and respected like her parents were. Later on, came along the understanding of the topics her parents dealt with and the fascination towards the science of medicine. If Evelyn grew up not wanting to become the type of woman her mother was, she wanted to become as good of a professional as she was, one day. Growing up, Evelyn understood the implications of what her parents, her father in particular, did: saving lives, changing the lives of patients and of their relatives and loved ones. From all her heart, Evelyn wished to do the same – she still did, even after changing her path in life.

In a circumstance like this one, Evelyn would have been the one that rushed between the injured, trying to give each one the attention they needed, to figure out what was the best thing to do in each case to make sure that there wouldn't be any casualties. She would have been the one applying pressure to the bleeding gashes and telling others what to do for the injured ones next to which she couldn't possibly be at the same time. Instead, when she was seventeen, Evelyn made a choice which turned the table one hundred and eighty degrees for her. Instead of being the one to help, the young was the one that needed immediate help – perhaps a true miracle – in order to survive. She could have used a professional as dedicated as the doctor she could have become had she not touched the sacraments that night. Unfortunately for her, there was no one like that in the room. After having taken a swan dive into the world of the supernatural, Evelyn was surrounded by others as deeply immersed into this world as she was. Fortunately for her, the Goddess she had chosen to follow had given her a gift that had helped her stay alive for as long as she did.

Deeply unconscious, Evelyn didn't know that Illyria moved her away from the cave whose floor her blood helped open or that she was now laying down on a table in one of the school laboratories. She was... sinking and the curious thing was that the more she sank, the more it seemed to her that darkness was becoming thinner instead of thicker. The voices of the ones around her were too faint for her to be able to discern anything that was being said, until... Five words stood out louder than others. She didn't immediately recognize their meaning, yet the language seemed familiar. Then she felt something – almost impossible to describe. It was as if something ripped through her entire being, shaking her to the core. Her eyes snapped open, revealing a vibrant shade of green, with a subtle blue tint on the rim of the iris. ”Your will shall bind me until the end of time, Goddess”, were words murmured into the same ancient language of the Old Ones which Illyria herself used. The unusual coloring of her eyes faded away as suddenly as it had been revealed and the High Priestess' eyes fell close once again. The ancient essence of the old demons, infused deeply in her body, was already working to repair what had been damaged. She was not going to disobey Illyria's command.

Illyria could only watch, as her priestess shuddered, struggled for breath and the will to live. To survive. She felt a sense of satisfaction, as the weakened human gasped, for breath, gasped with the recognition of Illyria’s words, of the surge of power that lanced through the Qwa’ha Xhan, felt in her flesh, reflected in her gaze as it latched upon those of her God-King. Her porcelain hued chin jutted outwards, somewhat, at the words, spoken in the ancient tongue of the Old Ones, Old before the beginning of time, the phrase familiar, echoing a pain in the hollowness inside of her that she could not begin to describe, nor could she afford to linger on. She merely acknowledged them, with a nod, laying the girl back down, moving to the door and beyond it, to those that awaited her deadly caress.

With her Qwa’ha Xhan left in the care of her bondsmen, Illyria would have to take it on faith that she would return to her priestesses side to find her alive, still, once her tasks were complete. It was strange to her to find herself in a position where she protected the humans … as short lived and unimportant as mayflies, she had called them, as numerous as cockroaches, and yet… here, she stood for them. She fought for them. Albeit, there was little in this world that posed a threat to her, even in her comparatively weakened state, but still, there was risk. She was vulnerable to harm, she was not the God-King she once had been, she was not all knowing, all powerful. She lacked her immortality, in its truest form, she lacked an army, servants, she was barely recognized or known, compared to the fear and awe and lust and envy that her name once aroused in those she towered over. She lacked her powers, many of them: distorting and controlling space and time, communicating and controlling the green of the earth and sky, to name a few. And yet, she stood, combating the threats to the humans of the world. Why?

When had this become the ‘norm’? She risked much, for the servitude of one man. The protection of his offspring, or those that he viewed as such, as she could provide, for his worship, his loyalty. There were others. Others that called her name, in fear, and ecstasy. She could feel them, the whispers of their prayers stirring in the back of her mind, when her eyes closed and she sought them, extending herself above and beyond the mortal coil in which she was bound, the human form of stick and straw instead of temporal and magnificent strength and beauty as she had once been. Perhaps it would be time, soon, to seek them out. To claim what was hers. To take what she was due. It was with these thoughts in the forefront of her mind that she strode through the halls of the school, her fists and fingers and feet finding purchase on the scurrying rune scarred servants of the things that called itself the First. They were fodder, they meant less to the First than they did to her, but they would serve their purpose well enough in her eyes. Their deaths were not meaningless, for every death was remarkable, in its own way. Their deaths were, however, easily forgotten. One among a billion that had fallen at her hands.

The surge of magic caught her attention. The feel of it was electric to her senses, intoxicating as always, a flare of power and the emotions of fear, defiance, pain, echoing, thrumming behind it. It was easy to follow, a light in the haze that was this world, and as she set eyes upon the scene at hand, it became understood. The witch, whom she had rescued once, in the graveyard, struggling to contain one of the ancients… the servants of darkness, the oldest and most powerful of the species themselves of the vampires, the forefathers of those weak blooded creatures that roamed this world. The Turok Han. Ancient, and hungry, it writhed against the invisible bonds that held it, even as the girl – one of her charges, Elena, the woman-child of her bondsman, struggled to regain her feet. Illyria moved, with alacrity, her gloved hands settling on the sides of the charge’s arms, pulling her upwards to her feet, and making the most minimal of assessments of her form. ”Do as the witch says. Run. Alaric and the others are that way,” she said, pointing in the direction from which she had come. ”Follow the corpses, and you will find him.” She said, before turning and stepping forward, her long fingers latching onto the jaw of the creature held prisoner by Bonnie’s spell. With a powerful motion, she twisted, the sound of the mewling of its death rattle and the snapping of bones within its neck and head simultaneous. ”Now you too, should run, witch.” She recommended, releasing the limp form of the creature. ”There will be more.”