Control. All he had ever wanted was control. Control of everyone else, possibly by fear and possibly by terror, and possibly secured by other means. Now, all he wanted was control of himself.

It was all very much like a bad dream. When the FAYZ wall had gone up, that had been good. It meant freedom and that he didn't have to worry about the ever-nagging, ever-controlling adults. He hated them. All of them. Everything they tell you ends up being a lie that can't be avoided in the real world, even amongst themselves. They tell you not to fight, but then they fight amongst themselves very loudly and obviously and obscenely. They tell you not to lie, but half the things they say are lies. They tell you to smile, but spend most of their time frowning. They tell you they're alright with any grades in school as long as you tried, but they yell at you for bad ones. In short, they were cruel, apathetic hypocrites. So the beginning of the FAYZ had been a blessing. It all was in the beginning, anyway.

In the beginning, he was just a subordinate. A high-level subordinate, but a subordinate, who wanted for himself the same thing his leader wanted. A subordinate, who wanted to become his own leader, and control everything else in the FAYZ. Just like his leader. His past leader, anyway. He had done it, eventually. He had broken himself free of Caine's leadership. He was stronger than Caine after that. Stronger than Cane and Diana and Taylor and Dekka and Brianna and the rest of the freaks. That was good. So where had it all gone so south?

The Gaiaphage. When he had gotten involved with the Gaiaphage, it was . Sure, it had given him power, but it had manipulated him too well, too finely, and stuck him in the pile of manure that it had him create. When it all came down to it, it locked him in his mind. He couldn't take control of himself now. When Brittney was in control, whether the Gaiaphage was in control, it didn't matter. The Gaiaphage had completely taken over his conscious and locked him out of it. He was just a spectator to his own life now.

When it had started, Drake was sure he'd appreciate the Phage's artistry. In fact, he did at times. But over time... Over time his opinion had partially morphed. The Gaiaphage had reached him through his more psychopathic, sadistic, power-starved self. It was that that it had taken over. It was that part of him that was gone. The rest of the boy Drake, the boy Drake had been so long ago, before the first bout of violence, that was all he was now. A gentler Drake, although few that knew Drake would ever guess that he had ever been gentle or that he could be.

It didn't matter what people thought, it mattered what was and what wasn't. And that most certainly was.

Control. All he had ever wanted was control. The Gaiaphage, he who had had the power to control had dangled the bait right in front of his face. The promise of control. The only thing that had been missing was promise of its continuation. That was what he had missed. A lot for a short period of time, like someone on heroin, instead of a little over time, like someone on cigarettes. Both would eventually kill, but control was a deadly drug. The heroin addict reached higher highs, but could die only days after they try it, or even minutes. Cigarette addicts often had many years to live, and the fewer they had the healthier they were.

Control. Control was his drug. And he had taken to it as heroin, not cigarettes. Now he had come down from his high and died. His drug had killed him as dead as any other.

Or not quite dead, since he was still alive, of a sort. He had died, alright, but he still lived. He just saw out of the Gaiaphage's eyes when it was in control. He had mused once about why he could see the world then. He had postulated idly that it was that he still had that part of him in control of the Gaiaphage, and that that was how the Gaiaphage kept its ability to use his side of Brittney and his shared second life and body.

Once Drake might have loved what he saw now. No, he was sure he would have. The bodies of people who were whipped to death or nearly so. The pain of his victims as they struggled. Their lifeblood on the ground. The fear the sight of him struck into everyone. The fights. The shouts of pain as 'heroes' tried to fight him while everyone knew it was a hopeless proposition, that he was incapable of death, partly because it was the Gaiaphage's will and partly because he was dead already. Now he was pretty repulsed by it.

He opened his eyes. Or rather, the Gaiaphage did and he saw its reflection. He didn't know if the Darkness knew he was still here, still watching. If it did, it probably didn't care. After all, he had no control now. He couldn't interfere with any plans. It could only inflict psychological trauma on him. Great. Because all he needed was more psychological trauma.

No. When he looked, they were in a tree. The forest? It had to be. Where else could you find big, leafy trees in the FAYZ? Where in the forest were they? It covered a large portion of the areas of land still left to them. It didn't matter, Drake decided. It wasn't like there was anything he could do, anyway. What could he have ever done? He spent his life falling in pit trap after pit trap. It was only going to be so long until he ended up in a hole he couldn't climb out of.

A blur passed through his vision. Gaiaphage-Drake blinked his eyes, and it was gone. They relaxed, unconcerned, but Drake did not. Was that Brianna, the Breeze? It had to be. She really could be fast when she tried to be. Her power was extremely useful that way, and seemed to be one of those that benefited from the Practice Effect. The Practice Effect was something that ended up meaning that things get better with practice. It was something that he remembered his mom talking about in the old days. He thought it was from a book she read once, back when she was alive. Back when she was smiling, before Dad started going crazy. Back before Dad killed her, and ended up in an asylum for his troubles.

He had escaped once, and taught a dubious Drake about guns and control. Encouraged him to try shooting at his neighbor's dog, just for giggles. What he had really meant was try a taste of control. And it had been like sweetest candy. Drake decided that his father was just trying to get him to understand him, to teach him what he knew like any father might. What he had done was create a monster. Or, at least, the monstrous part of Drake that had become the Drake the Gaiaphage now controlled...

The Drake that was the only thing he had now had been forced out of his conscious, back into the recesses of his mind, when he took that first shot at another human being and surrendered to a craving for more. It had been continually tortured with all the things that that Drake had done, until it had come to have some half-dazed appreciation of it. But here, now, he was removed enough from it that he had lost the daze.

He was like a little child now, because this part of him had never had the opportunity to mature until recently. Then it had been a good thing that everyone grows up quickly in the FAYZ. The big difference between him and that Drake, though, was that he still had a few naive parts, like morals and right and wrong.

The blur had definitely been Brianna, because several voices that he recognized from the dazed state came within range. He put names to them. Sam. Dekka. Edilio. Three voices, but six footsteps. Three of Edilio's soldiers, maybe? Then Blur-Brianna flew across his vision again, towards the voices. The figures came over the rise and around the bend, into view. It was indeed Sam, with Edilio, Dekka, Brianna, and three people that he didn't recognize, but they carried guns. "Drake." Sam said, staring into his eyes so intensely that Drake was sure that Sam could see him too, and see straight through him to the greenness beyond.

"Sam." The voice of Gaiaphage-Drake was Drake's voice, but quite menacingly challenging and taunting. Not like Drake would have used it to speak. Even less like how he liked to hear it. Something he wouldn't like was going to happen, he was sure of it. Drake tried to put his hands in his ears and close his eyes to avoid it, but the sights appeared on the back of his eyelids like they didn't exist and went through his hands into his ears. Four guns, one Bowie knife, and two sets of hands were leveled at him, threatening him with a whole lot of nothing. Horror shook through Drake, turning to revulsion that set his stomach curdling as he heard Gaiaphage-Drake's laugh and realized his foul intentions. "Do you really think that you can touch me, Bright Hands?"

Sam's eyes flickered, but with what Drake wasn't quite able to name. "We can at least try."

Drake held his nonexistent breath. He marveled at a moment at the sound of GaiaDrake, as he had just now dubbed his other half, snapping the whip hand in front of him with a loud, reverberating crack. He was ready to fight them too. The gentler, unseen Drake didn't want to see these people, people who had not given up, get hurt. GaiaDrake couldn't get hurt but these people, these heroes and heroines, would risk their lives to protect their friends from GaiaDrake. And they would undoubtedly not leave unscathed.

They would most likely die for their troubles. Drake watched as the black girl whose name he couldn't really remember due to the haze that covered 'his' days at Coates was hurled into a tree, next to an already-injured pasty-white Caucasian boy with blackish-brown eyes he had assumed was one of Edilio's soldiers. He watched, sickened, as he was cut into five pieces by a blur with wire, only to be put back together again. He watched as GaiaDrake led that blur to a tree, stepped in front of her, and whipped her three times-an X over her chest and once on the head to knock her out. He heard the edge of its thought-she would always be good for later-and that sickened him.

One by one they came to come up against GaiaDrake on their own as friends struggled to rise and help them, and one by one they fell. Drake couldn't count the number of injuries GaiaDrake had received, only that he was yet unhurt by any of them, recovering in seconds or minutes from any injury dealt out. He should have died over a dozen times by now, Drake thought dizzily. He was already dead, came the countervailing thought. Drake managed to ignore both by focusing more on the fight he had so dearly wanted to ignore.

There were two people still conscious at this point. GaiaDrake was one of them, obviously. The other was the auburn-haired boy he remembered as Sam. School Bus Sam. The hero that was a hero before the FAYZ. He was checking the cartoid artery of one of the girls on the ground for a pulse. Another laugh brought Sam's head and hands flinging up, even though he was still kneeling on the ground. His countenance showed his fury, but also betrayed his fear before he regained control of it, and his face furrowed into a glare. A glare that was pretty ineffectual as a glare, at that. Suddenly, Drake felt very bad for this hero. His heart went out to him, wrenching, although he could do nothing.

A few slashes of the whip hand sent Sam sprawling, clutching his chest. Another brought a yelp of pain, which turned into a long groan after a fifth stroke. A sixth. Seven. Eight. GaiaDrake touched the artery in his neck. Sam shivered, still breathing hard. Then, obviously deciding himself the victor of this fight, GaiaDrake turned up his head, and turned away.

As GaiaDrake turned around from the scene and walked away, Drake fought his first meaningful battle for control with GaiaDrake. He failed, but it was a start. The sound of screaming reached his ears in the distance before he closed his eyes and Brittney took over. The last thing he managed to see was a glint of greenish light before it seared the edge of now-Brittney's body.

It was another day, another annoying day. Drake kept his 'head' resting on the palm of his 'hand', which was on his 'knees', which were curled up next to the rest of his nonexistent, imaginary body. He was in an irritable mood, annoyed at everything from the stench of pollen in the spring-filled forest to GaiaDrake's pace, although he didn't dare say anything to GaiaDrake. He didn't want anything to do with GaiaDrake. He just wanted GaiaDrake to be gone.

Then the pace suddenly slowed to a stop and Drake was jolted into a grumbling wakefulness. Then he listened to what GaiaDrake was saying. "Sam, back for more so soon?"

His 'ears' perked up, but only slightly. Sam. The name of one of the people who tried to kill GaiaDrake time and time again. He wasn't sure if it was because he and GaiaDrake had hurt him and that he wanted retribution, or if it was just because they were the bad guys, and he was the good guy, and good and evil always fight. He didn't care much, but was curious. He had little to do these days anyway.

He missed Sam's reply, but the laugh that escaped GaiaDrake's lips was unmistakably evil. Nothing else was said and Drake got bored. It died away not too much later, and even the small number of bright flashes and general white noise did not grab his attention. Soon enough, the chase after the fleeing auburn-headed boy was broken off and GaiaDrake drifted off to 'sleep', taking Drake's conscious with him.

Drake closed his 'eyes' against the bright light of the morning and yawned hugely. The yawn was fake, of course, since he never actually slept. Still, it was comforting as a semblance of normality. Not that anything was normal now. Not that it had been for a long time, since he had done his Dad's bidding and learned his lessons.

His mother had never been a part of his life, mainly because she had died in childbirth, of what would have been his little sister when he was a little over two years old. Neither his mother or his sister survived. It had scarred his Dad, forcing him to turn to drugs and, eventually, a huge power trip filled with sadism. When he had gotten depressed, he had apparently lost his marbles and decided that everyone should feel his pain. Drake almost felt sorry for him, until he remembered who created the part of Drake that had ruled him these last few years and who the Gaiaphage was controlling.

In that moment he hated his Dad so very much.

In that moment, he also realized that hating his Dad or not wouldn't solve anything. He didn't care. Nothing he did these days would solve anything. Nothing he did these days had any affect on anyone or anything, least of all himself. Anger reared its ugly head. But then guilt boiled up within him, and he released both emotions with a sigh. He was right. There was nothing he could do.

Nothing he could do ever.

Nothing to hurt the plague that had taken over the part of himself he hated most. Nothing to hurt the Gaiaphage. Nothing to help himself. And, perhaps most notable because it made it into his thoughts at all, nothing to help that hero that seemed bent on opposing the Phage, no matter the cost to himself.

That stupid, ugly, determined, self-sacrificing dimwit.

That dimwit who had opposed GaiaDrake twice and more, all of them not unlike the last encounter that he remembered off-hand. The dimwit that had always left wounded, with Drake without a scratch, as was usual. The dimwit that didn't cower in fear and run at the sight of the whip arm that Drake so despised and GaiaDrake loved. Ever. The dimwit that had Drake worried for his sanity, as usual. The dimwit who, despite his powerlessness, gave Drake a tiny sliver of hope in this world fraught with and enshrouded by Darkness.

And, as it turns out, Drake got to add 'the dimwit that should have died' to the mental list of 'Things about Sam' in his mind..

GaiaDrake had tracked Sam to the cliff overlooking the sea, Mary's cliff. Sam didn't seem to be doing much of anything, just sitting there, gazing down at the slow-moving mass of blueness that used to be part of the Pacific once upon a FAYZ. Drake couldn't see the ocean, but what else was down there? It seemed that GaiaDrake had also reached the conclusion that Sam was daydreaming. Although, Drake had no clue how he had found the time to, based off rumors he had heard from Caine once upon a time. The grapevine said that the town kept Sam inexplicably busy with all of its conflicts (that couldn't be taken care of by a couple random kids?) and possibly because they didn't want a bored or frustrated four bar with time on his hands.

GaiaDrake snuck up behind the auburn-headed boy soundlessly, not alerting Sam to the presence of the monster behind him. Then he pushed out at Sam with both hand and whip, sending him flying to the rocks below. GaiaDrake turned back, satisfied with his work, as Drake tried to work through his guilty revulsion at what had just happened. However, when there wasn't more than a short shout as a scream, GaiaDrake went back to the ledge and looked down dubiously.

Drake shivered despite himself as his grey eyes met the distant blue ones. The black girl from Coates...what-was-her-name (Drake's memories were slightly impaired because it had been the part of 'Drake' that was now 'GaiaDrake' that controlled his days at Coates, not him) ...ah, Dekka, was beside him, glaring from down on the sandy beach. GaiaDrake turned away as two pairs of hands came up, grinding his teeth.

Sam would die another day, it would seem.

One day, as they stalked aimlessly through the woods (well, ambled would be more like it, due to the thick underbrush) Drake caught sight of Sam ahead, through some foliage that was turning early for autumn. Drake panicked, hoping that GaiaDrake hadn't noticed him. Then he felt like facepalming as he realized that if he was seeing Sam, then GaiaDrake had definitely seen him. After all, they shared the five senses, even if Drake had absolutely no control over any of them.

Then he hit his 'head' again. He had opened his 'mouth' to scream at Sam, to warn him of their being there and to tell him to run. Impulsively, he had decided that Sam ought to be warned. It didn't matter, because Drake had forgotten that he did not possess his mouth or vocal cords. There was nothing he could do except watch. No choice on his part to be made, not ever.

And so, Sam was surprised by GaiaDrake's appearance.

And the aftermath wasn't pretty, not at all.

Sam was leaning forward over something, with a young girl pointing to it from the other side of it. Closer inspection didn't yield any information. It was just another clump of plants. Maybe it was one of those plants? If it was, the object of their attentions wasn't going to be there much longer. GaiaDrake made his presence known by ripping up the plants and tossing them somewhere into the copse of assorted trees on their left.

Two pairs of eyes came up, along with two hands and a belt studded with tacks and nails, some glued on and some just stuck through and taped in place. Sam stood, angling his body in front of the young girl. She seemed to be about eight, although she lacked that age's usual innocence. The unknown girl lowered her weapon-if she struck now, she would hit Sam. Sam, her leader, would protect her. Of that, she was sure. She had heard the stories, after all.

"What do you want, Drake?" The voice that said it sounded bored and almost tired, much to the girl's and Drake's surprise.

"You." GaiaDrake said, grinning.

"Me, huh." Sam tentatively leaned back on a nearby tree trunk, still angled in front of the girl. "And how do you plan on getting me?"

"Like this." Suddenly Drake's whip hand slashed out, grabbing the girl by the neck before she or Sam could react. Rapidly, her face began to purple. "You or she dies."

Sam sighed and nodded to Drake. "Just let the girl live."

The girl was thrown down onto the ground, and she picked up her weapon once again. Not that it would do any good against Drake. It just felt good to be back on the ground and armed. The eyes that had snapped to Drake's smile-deformed face didn't waver until she felt the hand on her shoulder. She looked up at Sam. He held out his hand to her, but she scrambled up on her own. "Go back to Tramonto. Get some help." Sam met her eyes for a fleeting moment, and, seeing the flinty seriousness in Sam's aqua eyes, the girl stumbled into a run, supposedly towards town.

Sam was in trouble, and it was her fault, all her fault.

Sam didn't watch her go, but kept his ears open. He and GaiaDrake analyzed each other minutely for a short moment. Obviously, especially around Merwin, these moments didn't last. The next thing Sam knew, he was on the ground and Drake's whip hand was just in the same spot his head had been in moments before. He rolled up onto one knee as Drake turned to meet him. Light flew up at him, burning a hole through Drake's chest. It regrew as if there had been no wound, a few minutes later.

In those minutes a couple dozen trees gained new scratches and slashes in their collective bark as Sam dodged around, using trees for cover against Drake's whip hand. Even so, all dances come to an end. This one did as Sam's luck tripped up, literally, as Sam's foot caught on a particularly gnarled tree root and he fell, twisting his ankle. He slowed considerably, and eventually made a turn only to find himself inches from Drake's face with its manic expression.

"Caught You."

Sam took a step back, onto his bad foot. His face twisted into a momentary grimace as he took another step backwards. GaiaDrake manipulated his feet to follow, one agonizedly fearful and precious step at a time. Drake was now ranting and raving inside his head, beating at the invisible barrier between him and his own mind for the first time in a very long time. He didn't get anywhere, but he felt GaiaDrake's curious probe into 'his' mind like the touch of vermin, and shrank away from it.

Even so, he may have saved Sam with his rash actions. Sam soon had backed himself up into a tree, not being able to spare the second to look away from Drake to look back and make sure he didn't hit any trees. GaiaDrake smirked and let his whip hand curl lightly around the groove of Sam's chin, stroking his cheeks softly, playfully. Sam's eyes widened and he gasped, radiating delicious fear, as pressure was applied to the angle of his jaw.

But it wasn't Sam that was preoccupying his mind right now. No. GaiaDrake was curiously probing Drake, and had almost forgotten about Sam. Turning back to him, GaiaDrake curled the whip around Sam's ear, lightly stroking the ticklish area behind it. Sam's eyes widened even more as his legs gave out from the effort of not laughing. Then GaiaDrake pushed him aside, and Sam was flung into a tree. He only threatened "We will finish this later, Sammy-boy, don't think we won't." as he walked away.

Drake felt a twinge of satisfaction despite having to deal with the viciousness of GaiaDrake, who noticed him for once. The two of them tussled for a long time later, but at the end of it Drake was still Drake, and powerless, and Sam was alive. All in all, it had been a decent day. Maybe. No, not really, but still. He wasn't dead yet.

Ever since that day, GaiaDrake had kept a tighter leash on Drake's conscious. Some changes were in order and long coming. For example, where Drake had been able to manipulate his 'body' before, it took a great deal of concentration and energy to do so now. He was constantly parrying the Gaiaphage's attempts to knife and force its way into the depths of this Drake's mind as well, in the process doing away with this pesky conscious and gaining even more power and control over Drake.

Control. They key to it all was control.

So if the key to this world was control, didn't that mean that if he wrested control from the Gaiaphage of the rest of his conscious (no matter how much he wanted to do away with that heathen thing), that he could once again control himself?

He wasn't sure. He didn't know. But, he thought with a heart of heavy bricks, I won't find out until I either succeed, or more likely, fail and end up with my conscious and self torn to shreds, and those shreds torn into the tiniest of pieces. He was scared of what would happen if he tried, especially if he failed. And what would happen on the off chance that he succeeded? Fear. His fear was another thing he so desperately wanted control over.

He needed somehow to gain that control, or else both him and Sam would be over.

...And why did he think of Sam? Images of the hero flashed through his head quickly, each image passing out as quickly as it came. The hero standing over the fallen girl, bargaining for her life with the possibility of losing his own. Him when he stood up to Drake alone, one of the short, intermittent meetings of theirs in the wood. Him still fighting, still sending light at Drake even after he was down. Images of Sam's glares and looks of determination and fear, and the fewer shaky grins he sent at his friends. Images of Sam, Sam, Sam, Sam, Sam. What was that emotion? Drake didn't know, but it appeared when he thought of Sam.

Sam. He thought about all the things Sam had done: the people he helped and saved, the burden he had come to bear, the leadership role no one wanted, the fights with Drake, the physical pain he felt to keep others from feeling it, and all the rest. His name appeared in his mind, and it gave him strength. After all, if Sam could stand up to the Gaiaphage, then so could he.

It had been nearly three weeks since the last attack, and people, including Drake, were getting restless. Surely GaiaDrake would have made his move by now!

It had been pouring buckets of rain that day, outside of the FAYZ barrier. The roads were soggy, the people were soggy, and the mud was a soft, sloshy mush. Umbrellas were nothing against that rain. However, not a bit of that made it into the FAYZ. Instead it was one of the hottest, most humid, and worst weather-wise days in the FAYZ. People had stripped to the waist, and, in some cases, just stripped. You did what you had to to escape the heat. These were not pre-FAYZ days of ice cubes and ice packs and ice and air conditioners and the like. When the weather got bad, you dealt with it like you dealt with anything else. When the going got tough, the tough got going.

Patches of shade were fought over, and water was consumed and dripping off in the form of sweat only minutes later. It was a day with the weather of Hell. Only one person was actually not sweating their eyeballs off. The Gaiaphage's cave was always cool, after all. GaiaDrake had brought them there, in the hopes that proximity to the Gaiaphage would somehow multiply its effects on Drake. Or something. Although, Drake was sure it was because GaiaDrake wanted out of the scorching heat.

Or something of that sort. Even so, GaiaDrake was unfortunately right about what the proximity to the Gaiaphage might do to him. Drake pitted his mind against his enemies, hopelessly outclasses. In fact, the only reason he was yet alive was because he had the sense not to try an offensive against them. Such would only end in his total death, of every part of Drake besides the part taken over by the Darkness.

Drake kept his mind on 'happy things'. He remembered a particularly pretty sunset when he sat together with Mom and a few friends during his ninth, or was it his tenth? birthday party. He remembered the smell of spring, of pollen, and the bees buzzing happily around them, pollinating them into what would become beautiful flowers. He had watched clouds for hours, and thought of what the sky looked like back then, when they had clouds. He thought of butterflies and rainbows after a long rain, in which he danced. He thought of everything and everything and all the cheesy stuff, anything but the depression GaiaDrake wanted to foist on him.

But when the biggest attacks came, the ones that should have unseated him and torn him away from himself, he thought of Sam. What a strange thing to think of, he thought as the spasm (or 'wave', both were equally appropriate) passed and the beginnings of his awareness faded away to admit Brittney, much to the growling dissent of GaiaDrake.

It had been about a month since the attack. Drake had eventually given up, and taken up an impregnable defensive position within his own 'body' that he had created for himself in those months of idleness. Indeed, they withstood GaiaDrake's attacks. After GaiaDrake decided that expending more energy on him was pointless, he reasserted his dominance and control in all the areas that mattered at all in the real body. At least, for the time being, he was leaving things how they were before the attack. Drake's 'forehead' rested in the 'palm' of his 'hand', arced between his 'thumb' and 'pointer' to avoid slippage. One of the normal positions of no hope he had. Though in this one he was looking down, he could still see all that GaiaDrake saw.

He was shaken yet, and still trembling from the power behind GaiaDrake's blows. He would have to be much stronger, or it much weaker, before he attacked again. If he ever attacked again. He had never been more scared in his life, clinging to his precious childhood and the comfort the thoughts of the hero had brought. He didn't know why thoughts of the hero helped him, or even why he thought of the hero in the first place, but he thanked him.

The hero had given him an example to live up to and something to believe in for the good of the world amongst GaiaDrake's personal aura of evilness worn by him like a dark cloak or cowl.

Drake may not have gained control of GaiaDrake or his body, but he gave up no ground to GaiaDrake either. GaiaDrake's weapon of choice had been that cold evilness. But even that could not displace the warmth and comfortableness of Sam in his heart. He realized he yearned to see him again, even if it was for a fight with GaiaDrake. He hoped to thank him, to tell him...to tell him what? Drake blushed, the words on the tip of his tongue, but that tongue was twisted and the words couldn't find a way through the knot.

Drake could only hope that by the next time he saw the person whose face graced his thoughts so he learned how to unravel that knot...and control that blush!

A smile was on his face at the thought, the first in ages. For him he would smile. He was too good for anything less.

No matter how hard Drake tried, he could not shut his eyes to the sight in front of him, nor his ears to the "Mmmmmngh!" of the poor child who was being choked to death. Another two children-a seven year old girl and a nine year old boy, by his guess- lay dead already in the grass. This last one, the ten year old boy who led the small berry-gathering party with the misfortune to come across GaiaDrake, was the most stubborn of the four by far. And the hardest to kill, or he'd be dead already. It would be soon, judging by the lessening of the flailing of his poor bony limbs.

The fourth had escaped, and GaiaDrake was too bored to go after him. If he wanted to run like the yellow coward he way, then let him run. Drake, however hoped and prayed both that he did and that he didn't go to Sam with the sob-story. Because he knew that if Sam heard, he would be out here pronto. It would break his spirit if he lost Sam. Although Sam isn't really your Sam, Drake thought, and despite himself a smile came unbidden.

"Put him down." Drake didn't need the eyes of GaiaDrake to know that it was Sam. His heart leapt with joy, but pounded with fear and his eyes filled with tears of joy and of frustration. It was such a jumbled swirl of opposite and competing emotions that it drowned Drake, who watched the battle unfold with inexplicable raptness.

When Drake got his first look at Sam, Sam's countenance was impassive, and his voice had sounded almost bored. To an inexperienced ear, that is. On the other hand, experienced by watching the other fights, Drake had caught the underlying tenseness, and a trace of somewhat-suppressed fear. It was quite a tone to take up with someone you were scared of, Drake marveled.

"What?" GaiaDrake sounded equally bored. And he was. There was no sport in already-dead and very-very-very-close to dead people anymore, and he needed no food or any other sort of supply to keep him going.

"I said, put the boy down." Sam looked Drake straight in the eye again.

"Why? Because you said so?" GaiaDrake sneered, meeting Sam's eyes with a fiery glare. Fear, mixed with adrenaline washed through Drake's system. No. No. This wasn't happening. This wasn't real. No. It couldn't be!

Sam said nothing, only brought up his hands a wee bit, in a threatening manner. His voice was cooler now than before, and when he spoke his tone was just as firm. "Let go of the boy. He hasn't done anything to you. If you want to pick on someone, choose someone your own size. Or does your yellow self gain satisfaction in killing little kids?" The hands raised another fraction.

GaiaDrake smiled at the hands' stealthy movements, amused. The fire could not hurt him for long, and he felt no pain to begin with. Sam was not a threat, for all that he was one of the most powerful freaks alive. "Do you take satisfaction in picking fights?" GaiaDrake taunted, bringing his whip hand to bear in front of him, ready to strike at Sam the instant he came within range.

Sam did not step forward, any only lowered his hands. Drake was confused. Why wouldn't Sam defend himself? Or, better yet, attack GaiaDrake? Didn't Sam know that GaiaDrake was evil? That he would not hesitate to hurt him? That if he was hurt by GaiaDrake, that he would forever feel guilty?

Yes, he did. GaiaDrake had fought him, had hurt him before. Of course he did. That much was obvious. And that's about all that was. So the million dollar question was: Why did Sam lower his only weapon?

GaiaDrake must have known, although Drake couldn't catch the thought. He dropped the boy. He landed on the ground on his side with an ummph and started crawling backwards, eyes wide and pupils dilated with fear. He slowed as he got a few feet away, but then Sam broke the silence. "Go." He said it with all the authority of the person in charge, and the boy rolled over, pushed himself up, and started running. He disappeared in a rustle of leaves and crushed seedlings and weeds.

During that time, GaiaDrake had wrapped his whip hand around Sam's throat. Drake hardly dared to breathe as Sam set his hands, palms open and ready to fire, on each side of Drake's head. The message was clear. You kill me, and I'll take you with me. It was sent both ways, and both of them stared at each other, tense, waiting for something to happen.

Then GaiaDrake made his move. In an instant, he wrenched Sam to the side, switching hands so that his human hand was holding Sam's throat. Sam fired, but the sharp jerk had affected his aim. That misdirected blast left deep smoking gashes in the barks of several trees and scorched a little of the ground matter and underbrush in front of them. Luckily, it was all too wet with water recently regained from dew to catch fire immediately. Sam didn't have the chance to make a second, more aimed shot because Drake's whip arm had wound around Sam's torso, pinning his arms down.

Content with his temporary hold, GaiaDrake let go of Sam's neck and pulled some used Mylar from his pocket. He quickly put it on Sam's hands, despite his struggles, and held it down with the whip. His hand went back around Sam's neck, but it didn't squeeze. Instead, Drake watched in sick fascination as GaiaDrake sought out Sam's cartoid vein. Finding it, he caressed it gently with the tip of the whip before leaning forward and biting into it.

Sam had been actively struggling, although most of it had subsided after the mylar. His hair had hung into his face, sweat running into his eyes as he kept his head down. Now, he scrunched his head down, trying to hide it in his shoulders. Damned Mylar. He stopped all movement, however, as GaiaDrake picked out the vein, and ran it between his teeth. Sam's lifeblood ran through that vein. If he bit it too hard, Sam could bleed to death. Sam could die.

GaiaDrake rolled it again, and Sam felt fear like a pulsing being in his chest, burying a cry that had risen up from its depths. So this is how he would die. Well, it was as good a death as any. Sam shut his eyes and drew a shuddering breath. He wasn't at all sure he would ever open those eyes again.

Drake felt the pulse of fear as well, but for not quite the same reason. After all, if he was dead he could not die. But Sam could. And, for some reason near and dear to his heart, he didn't want to see Sam die. He felt he couldn't. The hero was... He was... A symbol of hope and goodness in the world of the Darkness's evil? True, but that wasn't what was bugging him so much. Sam was...

No.

Yes.

No.

Maybe. Yes. No. Was he? Was Sam...? Drake tried to block out the world around him, to find that elusive pause button. If only the world would stop for a few seconds to let Drake take stock of the situation, it would not regret. But the world was not in the habit of granting wishes, human or other, and even if it was it could not grant that which it was against its inherent nature to do.

Luckily for Sam, GaiaDrake hadn't quite crushed the artery. He still held it nearly shut, though, so only enough to keep Sam alive and conscious ran through his veins. Sam should have died, will die. But first GaiaDrake would have his revenge. He learned that it couldn't be for too long, or he would have to surround himself with enemies of the children. Otherwise, the children would just come and save Sam, ruining his fun. So he chose the second option.

An unfortunate girl he didn't recognize, presumably on the road from Perdido Beach to Lake Tramonto, had gotten stuck in the midst of greenies. The bugs had consumed her and grown quickly, and though they were tiny, barely larger than a pea, since there were many of them from the numerous hits on her body. And the orange-eyed bugs had been growing, feeding on plants, wildlife, and the occasional kid. He could surround himself with them, as all the bugs were obedient to his master, and him while he was in good favor. Which he was. Well, they would feast. The kids wouldn't just let their top guy, their hero die, now would they? No, of course not. He was their protection after all. If he died, then who would die next time in his place? No one wanted it to be themselves, of course.

But they wouldn't want to die saving him, either. They were selfish, as all humans are, and far from altruistic. They might not think of the consequences of their actions until they were faced with tangible evidence from the consequences of their decisions. In that case, many of them would die, if not all. In that case, Sam would die now, this very day and hour.

Drake started to pound his fists at his prison, flailing his arms forward with more anger and frustration and grief than thought. Emotions are more powerful than reason, but using reason to plan and shape and use emotion to your advantage is the strongest of all. But Drake was too emotional to think, and strong, overpowering emotion trumps logic of any kind. The gist of what was running through Drake's mind was: Sam is NOT allowed to die by my hands.

The orange-eyed bugs poured out from the woods at GaiaDrake's call. Drake heard distant yells and felt the vibrations of many feet hitting the forest ground. The kid had made it back home, and brought help. Help that was going to die for their trouble. Drake pressed on harder, to no avail. As the children became visible, Sam was raised into the air, choking and gasping, and the bugs bared their teeth. The children stopped in their tracks, scared.

GaiaDrake shook Sam around like a rag doll, and grinned as Sam let out a sort of strangled cry-sob. His pulse was beating out of control and GaiaDrake was squeezing a little too hard. Some of the kids took a step back. Others took half a step forward. But those were fewer and farther between, and they either stepped back immediately, or didn't move more than a small step or so forward. It wasn't cowardly-it would just be a stupid to get in killing range of either Drake or the bugs. Deadly stupid.

And so small group of freaks put their hands up, while the rest either went for guns or some other sort of weapon-most of the spiky variety. And so the bugs attacked the group of weary but angry children. And, in the dust from the fight that followed, GaiaDrake disappeared, taking Sam with him. And so, Sam fell unconscious, neck still clenched by Drake. It was an absence all the more notable because no one noticed it until the dust cleared.

Sam's life went abruptly from his mom serving pancakes for breakfast on a day off from school and smiles and ponies and rainbows to bright green tiling in eerie light. He tried to move his hand, the one that had had the fork in its palm, reaching towards those scrumptious looking pancakes, but found he was unable to. He tested it, and realized that it was stuck under him, and not budging. Neither was the rest of his body responding, for that matter. He couldn't control any of it anymore, it seemed. Strange.

Then he noticed the cracks in the odd green tilework. They looked irregular. Why would tiling be irregular? It didn't look like that was the design, although he knew little about tiling. Then again, he couldn't see too well in this light, so he couldn't be certain of even that which he did know. Strange. This whole situation was strange. Wait, where was he? He barely realized the thought when he, still oddly bemused and half-unconscious, never having fully woken up, fell unconscious once again. Strange.

Everything was strange.

Why?

Drake watched, unable to look away from Sam. To be fair, it wasn't exactly his fault. He would look at whatever the Gaiaphage took upon itself to look at. And, at that moment, the object of its foul attentions was Sam. And Drake was pretty sure he wouldn't like what would happen, didn't like it now, but what could he do about it? Think? What good would that be? An idea has little power in and of itself. It's the people who meld the world to the shape of their ideas, people who control the world to the extent any human can.

That control...another thing he lacked. Because of his careless indulging, he had lost the ability to control even that much. Heroin was illegal for a reason, after all. Cigarettes, like those that most humans use, were only frowned upon, and often gone unnoticed. Sam...had a cigarette pushed into his hand, and really wasn't too much stuck on the nicotine. There are many types of cigarettes out there-some with more, and some with less of a kick.

Drake had tried a cigarette once, a real one. Mom always smoked a little when she thought no one was looking. So, one day Drake took a half-stubbed out cigarette his mother didn't finish or have time to completely stub out without making it obvious that she had been using it and breathed in the smoke. He had immediately started to choke, and the back of his throat and the skin on his the pads of his fingers felt like they were on fire. But he held on to the cigarette, and tried again. He never really liked it, but every once in a awhile, usually every couple of months, Drake would have a cigarette. Sam, he was sure, would never have tried the cigarette, much less continued using it.

But there were many differences between him and Sam, and not just violent ones and previous incidents. Sam was the good guy, and Drake was a monster. A devil unworthy to be in the presence of the angel, one who tore him to bits without a word-most likely without even knowing it. Sam, the naive angel, would not have made any sort of decision so detrimental to anyone. He most certainly would not. That wouldn't be like Sam. And even if he made a bad decision, he would fix it and make it up right away. That was Sam. That was not and would never be Drake.

Maybe once, back before GaiaDrake, he could have become that person. But a lot of things had happened since those carefree times. And, frankly, his experience with that part of himself and with GaiaDrake had not left the rest of him unscathed. He had his own issues, ones he would not foist upon poor Sam, who ought to have broken long before now. Upon Sam, who was now, and had been for a few days, sitting just a few feet away from the physical representation of the Darkness.

The Darkness's power was metaphysical. In fact, most of its power was in its affect on people. It's physical form was meaningless in light of that. Even so, the closer to the physical body you were, the more of its mental 'radiation' could hit you. And affect you. After all, Drake was like this, had this GaiaDrake to deal with, because of the Darkness. Because he got too close to it.

Because, the side of him that appealed to power sensed the power of the Gaiaphage and left itself open to it on purpose. Stupid GaiaDrake, in hindsight. Although, he supposed, it might not seem like such a bad trade-off to GaiaDrake. Especially in light of what part of him GaiaDrake had sprung from. As they say, hindsight is 20-20. Or as they used to say. Or maybe it's wrong entirely. It doesn't matter. Everything is wrong in the FAYZ, especially with people like him and Sam.

Sam, who was only now stirring on the ground covered by green-glowing Gaiaphage. He stopped moving again, not having come fully awake yet again, and fell back asleep. Drake just leaned up against a pillar of Phage and watched and waited. Most of the time it was a pretty dull job. It was just more sitting around, so Drake barely noticed the days' passing.

Sam went back to sleeping. A false alarm. Drake settled back, and hunkered down for another long wait. When would that idiot tree-hugger wake up?

A week and more later, he still had no answer. Four more times there were false alarms. Drake had sat by as GaiaDrake roughly force-fed Sam some oatmeal from a stash he had kept. It was part of the haul from the raid on the Townies food supply months ago. He hadn't brought all of it to Coates for Caine. He kept some, mostly stuff that would stay good longer than he would live, so that should he need it he could be self-reliant. Water came from water bottles, refilled from a small but clear stream in the forest.

Sam had yet to stay awake more than a handful of seconds. Part of Drake was glad for it, that Sam be spared this harsh reality awhile. Another part of him was angry. Angry at Sam, for not getting up and doing something about it. Another part of him was angry at himself for thinking all of this, and for not doing more to step in himself, and to open the path for th Phage in the first place.

Sam's eyes fluttered and blinked. GaiaDrake smirked. When he tried to turn his head in an effort to look around, GaiaDrake pushed himself off of the cave wall, walking in Sam's direction. Their eyes met, bemused steely grey at confused childlike blue. It was so unfair, Drake thought, so totally and irrevocably unfair. And yet, there was nothing he could do to go against it.

Sam didn't move. He stayed where he was, not giving GaiaDrake the satisfaction of hunting his quarry. It would do nothing but tire him out, anyway, and this would confuse and possibly frustrate the Darkness if it cared enough to think. Sam hoped it did. It wouldn't matter anyway. He just had to try not to die. Or become like Drake.

Drake was standing in front of him now, his human hand forcing his head high. Sam struggled not to wince as Drake drove his fingers into the ground with his feet. He held some of the remaining oatmeal, soppy and slimy, in the bowl he had made it in. A spoon was in his other hand.

"Say Ah." The command was quiet and had a nasty undertone, but Sam didn't hear it. Couldn't over the blood suddenly pounding in his ears. He seemed to have ignored the command entirely, from GaiaDrake's point of view. Drake watched in fascination as GaiaDrake spun, still standing on Sam's toes, and stepped off. Sam inhaled sharply, refusing to look at Drake. He ruffled around in his belongings until he found the old toolbox from the custodial office in Coates. Opening it, he took out a hammer the size of his forearm, a wooden handle with a hard dull metal head. Drake screamed as GaiaDrake brought it down on Sam's hand.

Sam let out some sort of strangled cry-moan at the pain. He snatched his hands up off the ground, and put them back again. He was so disoriented that he could hardly balance, let alone stand. He scooted a few feet away from Drake, but he followed, grabbing Sam's face again and smirking. "I asked you to open your mouth, didn't I?"

Fear was evident in all of Sam's manner-supressed, but still present. He had yet to figure out much of anything. About a minute ago, he had been still tarrying in that sweet oblivion. The tiles still confused him, and he hadn't had any time to think about it because of Drake. His hands throbbed, clenching at the ground yet finding no purchase on the smooth floor. He had no idea where he was, when, why Drake was there, or what Drake planned to do. That was perhaps the scariest part. But he wasn't dead yet. Sam could only wonder what was keeping Drake in that respect.

Drake's eyes dilated with surprise. So did Sam's when a second later GaiaDrake decided Sam's current level of fear at its peak, about to turn into confusion. He was pulled closer to the maniac, perhaps two inches from his face, and GaiaDrake kissed him harshly. A combined effort of GaiaDrake's surprising ministrations and another hammer to the hand led Sam to gasp against his will. He was backed up into the wall with nowhere to run and nowhere to hide, and a frustrated, greedy GaiaDrake in front of him.

For a moment, Drake envied GaiaDrake. Ever since the revelation, he had wanted to kiss Sam, just to see how it would be. Then he decided he wasn't. This was obviously hurting Sam, who obviously did not want to be kissed this way. He didn't want to hurt Sam. Sam had enough troubles to worry about without him.

And what GaiaDrake was doing was just wrong. On so many levels that Drake dared not to count them.

A few seconds later, GaiaDrake pulled away and put some of the oatmeal in his mouth. Drake grimaced. It tasted like Cheerios did when you left them in an extremely large bowl of milk for a few hours. Except more milk than Cheerios. And not childlike or innocent or happy-making at all. The next thing GaiaDrake did was take advantage of the fact that Sam was still reeling and pushed his mouth against his again. The oatmeal was pushed into Sam's mouth with Drake's tongue.

GaiaDrake pulled away, and left a stupefied Sam slumped against the wall. He made as if to spit out the oatmeal when GaiaDrake turned back to him. "If you don't eat that, then you won't be getting any more. You can starve to death for all I care. Because, honestly, I don't." The tone was cross and reprimanding, the words disgusting, intimidating, and teasing. GaiaDrake smirked at Sam's obvious discomfort as the slimier mix of soggy oatmeal and foreign spit slid down his throat. He fought against gag reflex, and after a few seconds won.

Sam wanted to move, wanted desperately to get out of here (wherever here was) and to get away from Drake. He succeeded in none of them. His legs felt like jelly and his entire body was engulfed in weakness. It was a dull ache, sapping his strength and his will. As it was, it was a wonder that either Sam or Drake was still sane (ish) three hours later when Sam was let to sleep considering the extended oatmeal and water feeding that GaiaDrake had done, most of it like the first one.

Poor Sam. Poor Sam indeed.

"You're lucky you're not a girl, you know." GaiaDrake had not done anything to Sam, not even moved, after the boy woke. He had been lying mostly on his side, slightly curled up around himself, hands threaded in deeply tousled hair. Sam had curled up, but GaiaDrake had not moved. He sat up against the wall now, and Drake hadn't twitched. "I hate girls."

"Really now." The response was out of Sam's mouth before he could stop it. GaiaDrake twitched, but stilled and stowed his twitchy hand.

"Yeah. If you were, you'd probably be dead by now. Forget the Darkness. Girls, though. Damn things are too damn emotional and too damn trying. "

"And too manipulative." Sam said in a soft voice to himself, thinking a bit of Astrid. She was trying and manipulative, but she wasn't that emotional, though. Was she? She probably hid some kind of emotional side. Wouldn't surprise him one bit. Everyone had a secret or something to hide in the FAYZ.

It didn't matter. Astrid wasn't here. He didn't even know why he thought of her, and pushed the thought away. Pointless. Useless. Here there was only Drake. Drake and his whip hand. And, remembering what had come before, Sam fell silent and turned his thoughts to that. What the hell had that been? Drake...kissing him?

As if sensing that odd thought, he shifted. Drake turned, eyes hooded and glinting dangerously. Sam tried to stand, but found that his legs were stiff and wobbly from the rock and lack of use, and were unable to hold him up. He toppled to the ground, and braced himself against the hard fall sure to follow.

His legs crashed to the ground like logs, as did his arms, but his head was stopped just before it did. Sam blinked against tears at the feel of his scalp being pulled off of his cranium and the sound of tearing hair. But his head did not fall. Another searing pain came as Drake pulled him a couple feet off the floor, and held him by the hair until he regained his footing. A few seconds passed. A minute. Sam caught his breath. "Why?"

GaiaDrake grinned. It was not a pretty sight. "Because, if we are to use you, then your body must be whole. If you are concussed or worse, you are even more useless to us than if you were out there with your friends or just plain dead. And if you are useless to us, then you will become just plain dead. Very quickly."

Sam swallowed. What could he say to that? After waking up to the ever-awake and ever-alert Drake once again, he knew that getting out on his own was going to be trouble. Possibly more so than he could handle. Now that was a sobering thought. What would happen to him if he couldn't escape this dark prison? Would he be forced or, worse, seduced into following the Darkness? How long would it take for his resolve to crack? Even if not, then how long would it take before he went mad? Just plain loopy?

Sam shivered, and the Darkness spread over him like a warm, soothing blanket. His hands pressed into his head as Sam leaned forward, straining to keep the Darkness from touching him. If the Darkness touched his soul and left a mark, it would all be over. It would be death.

No. Drake thought desperately at the now-depressed Sam. It's worse. Worse than death itself.

But it didn't work that way. Drake had seen Sam's slumping body language and come to his own conclusions about what he was thinking. However, just because he could see and react to Sam, that didn't mean that Sam couldn't see or understand him.

Nothing happened for a while and eventually Sam yawned and fell back asleep, and Drake turned to watch him until he was replaced by Brittney.

And so the cycle went. Sam would wake up, eat some, stretch, and possibly Drake would kiss him or more-or not. Because that is what it was. He never said Drake could kiss him, but there was nothing he could do to stop him. He was perpetually pressed under a pressure he could not define, but only recognize as the aura of the power of the Gaiaphage. He had held it back so far, but if he managed even one slip up, he would be its.

That was something to be avoided at any and all costs.

He would not be controlled by the Gaiaphage. It was a promise to himself he had made months before, when Caine had gotten the fuel rod under the direction of the Gaiaphage and all the things that had happened around it. All the people who had nearly died. All the other crises that could not be dealt with because the 'heroes' were so busy dealing with Caine and his. Like Zil and the Human Crew, or later Orsay, or people who were going to commit suicide and take the poof.

Even so, no matter how hard he fought, he felt it slip a little bit more into him. It felt disgusting and his mind rejected the intrusion, but it could not withstand the pure power and force behind the attacks. Moreover, he didn't have much longer to fight. He was exhausted now. One of these days, he would lose and there would be nothing he could do to stop it. That was what he feared the most.

The passage of time was meaningless to him now. He had lost track ages ago, and didn't bother now. All of his leftover energy went to fighting the Darkness. He didn't even move his body.

Then, he slipped up.

It was a great tumble of power and will, accumulated like greasy grime in a square corner over time. It was leftover from the attacks. The Gaiaphage found his opening, and used the tremendous energy to pop open Sam's mind like a peanut shell under a stiletto heel. And so, that was as far as Sam went. Sam died.

Well, not quite. Drake utilized that moment to take his stand next to Sam, pouring energy of his own to attempt to keep the Gaiaphage at bay. It must have done something, because the Darkness slipped away, yowling, as his power touched him. Sam and Drake both were breathing hard. Once they got their breathing under control, Sam asked one question. "Why?"

Drake didn't answer for a long moment, looking away from those captivating blue eyes. "Who knows?" He replied softly. "I just did."

"I don't believe you." Sam's tone was challenging. Drake repressed a shudder out of something other than fear and threw it out of his system.

"Then believe this." Drake's tone tried for mischievous but fell short, betraying his nervousness. He quickly leaned forward, before Sam could process his nuance, and put his lips to the other boy's. Sam stiffened, eyes wide. He did not push Drake off, but that may have been acquired behavior from GaiaDrake. They did look the same, having shared the same body. Drake broke the kiss, and looked away.

His body was entirely the Gaiaphage's creature, especially now that he was living symbiotically in Sam's body. That could only be temporary, though, since the Gaiaphage had already taken over much of the body. He pressed his lips once again to Sam's, and worked up some courage. "I-"

Drake's final words would have been 'I love you'. We don't know and can't even begin to guess what Sam would have said to that.

It didn't matter. They were both thrown from Sam's body into an extremely premature death. If they hadn't been... Well, that opens up a whole realm of possibility. Although, I'll trust your imagination this time. After all, if that's what you saw, then I'm sure it happened that way.

Control. Sam finally lost that little bit of control he had hung on to for so long.

AN: So, not how I meant for this to come out at all. Well, whatever. My stories write themselves. They just use my fingers as a bucket, brought sloshingly full of water from the river to the cups of the readers. Hoped you liked it! I wrote most of this before I read Fear, though.