Blurred outlines, fuzzy shapes.

Glass...glass shards blinking and winking over everything, the floor, the bedside table, the bed. Rain slanting through the jagged hole, wind howling and moaning like a forsaken soul in torment. And amidst it all, frighteningly real, the creature from hell that has tormented her dreams.

Every amorphous line of the grotesquely distorted form she knows so well, every undulating movement...God no no nonononono this isn't real this can't be real I'm dreaming I'm dreaming ohgodnonono...her mind screams in frozen numbness, shattering every coherent thought attempting to jostle its way through.

A stranger's voice lets out a choked scream. In some oddly detached corner of her brain she realizes that it's her voice, distorted and cracked...

A hard jerk on her arm snaps her abruptly into reality. A man's voice hisses sharply, "What the hell...!!"

Gabriel. She has forgotten even him in the shock of facing this her deepest nightmare. Even in the midst of her fear she marvels that her instinct is to want to turn to him.

Something cold scrapes against her palm. Her eight sided mirror. She cannot remember snatching it from her dresser. A cold splatter of raindrops shocks her from the temporary numbness; somehow she has leapt some 3 feet from Gabriel to crouch defensively by the window.

The thing if it could be called a thing glides towards her purposefully. The eyes cavernous, hideous, devoid of any form of human emotion bore into her own with relentless intent. I've met you in my dreams.. I know you, you hell-spawned beast...Her hands clench on the mirror till her knuckles are white.

Time is a figment of the imagination. It cannot be more than a few seconds since she first laid eyes on the creature, yet it seems eternity and beyond. Predator and prey. Hunter and hunted.

It seems to know her mind. She can hear each hiss taking the shape and form of words in her thoughts; malignant, evil, intense. I have watched you...I have waited...you are mine....mental tentacles reach into the recesses of her brain, trying to choke sanity from her.

Suddenly she is flung aside roughly. "Back, Bronx. And stay back." Gabriel's voice grates harsh in her ears, his tall form shielding her.

Thunder. Lightning streaks the sky, sparked white phosphorent trails. Shadows and light. Shadows and light. Over the elements she hears the creature gloat with each hiss. He is mine too, fool...as are you...

It happens too fast, yet the details are indelibly etched onto her consciousness. Gabriel lunges for the creature. A blur of movement and he is flung back against the dresser sharply by one of the serpentine limbs. Another dry, malicious, chuckling hiss. You are mine, as is he, foolish one....

The mirror flashes in her hand as she brings it up, sudden cold fury taking hold of her. "You'll have no part of me...nor him, hell-spawn!" she screams defiantly over the raging elements.

She does not notice Gabriel stumble to his feet; his hand clamps around her arm like a steel vice. She shakes him off with strength born of anger, hatred for this creature of darkness and decay.

The stink of rotting earth in her nostrils, the hiss of all the legions of Hades ringing in her ears. Out she springs, towards this hateful embodiment of malice. The mirror flashes with a sudden vengeful gleam, bright white and almost blinding.

An unearthly howl and a hiss of pure hate; dimly she hears Gabriel shouting her name frantically, then sudden sharp pain as she is slammed against the window ledge. Another even sharper pain as her head hits something hard.

Shadows and light. Shadows and light. The last thing she sees as the world abruptly goes black...