Who: Shen
With: Stacy X
When: Mid-morning
Where: The Lake

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Warning: Some minor sexual content, profanity

Shen couldn't get Stacy out of his mind. Had the black hole which was his brain consumed part of her or was it being consumed? He didn't know which and he didn't care to find out. After Stacy had left him, he had decided to go get a breath of fresh air. Fate had again lead him to be near her, but she did not see him, nor he her. He was on the other side of a small hedge and he was laying down, his head placed on the grass and his body sprawled out.

Shen had never been of the world of the flesh. He had never been tempted to be part of it. Stacy did not make him want to be part of it, but she did arouse certain emotions Shen had not previously been aware of or that had long sense been burried in his mind. Shen just exhaled and let the world above him pass. He sought to find shapes in the clouds, something he had not done since he had been a young boy in Tibet. It was one of the last things that he and Li had done together before the Chinese army had kidnapped both of them.

"Why?" Shen asked himself aloud. It was far from the most simple of all questions. What kind of God had let Shen live and allowed Li to die? What kind of God had given Shen his immense power but no means to control that power? Shen just exhaled softly and thought for a moment. He saw the clouds and thought one looked like a heart. Perhaps there was some sort of sympathy in the world after all.

Shen sat slowly and moved to the water's edge. He took off his simple sandles and placed his feet in the cool lake water. He let out a simple sigh of relief, of comfort. He just basked in the sensation of the cold, the world of the physical his temporary meditation. He knew the fringes of his long pants would be soaked by the water, but he just didn't give a damn at this point. Shen stood slowly and not bother to sense around him, began to levitate, not himself, but the water.

He took time to find his center, his place of being in the universe. Once he got close to that center, he pushed from it out unto the outer world. The water lapping at his feet began to rise, slowly at first, but then at a more gradual rate. Shen just let the collumns of water begin to form around him and he stared into them, letting himself see the refracted sunlight as any normal person might see it. Making a slow gesture with one of his hands he severed the collumns of water and was surrounded by floating spheres of liquid. If he had lips, he would have smiled.

"I'll wish fer my memory to be wiped."

Hearing Stacy's voice shoked Shen out of his silence. The spheres of water crashed back to the lake and Shen was hit by some of the spray. His gray tunic was now soaked as well as his pants. He said nothing at first, only stood in mute shock at the state of his wet clothing. He then turned to Stacy slowly, the darkness which were his eyes seeing everything yet apparently seeing nothing. He stood there, on the water's edge, looking at her and contemplating her wish.

"I hope I am not the cause of your wish," Shen said slowly. It was true. He didn't want Stacy to forget everything because of him. She had probably been thinking of something else, but since Shen had heard it, he had no idea for the context. Even if he wasn't the context for the wish to forget, Shen didn't want Stacy to forget. Her memories helped to define who she was, and Shen cared very deeply for that person.

Who: Shen
With: Stacy X
When: Late-Morning
Where: The Lake

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"I'd like ta see where ya grew up...maybe someday I can show ya Ne' Orleans or summat. Ya might like it."

"I've actually been to New Orleans, though I didn't see much of it. When I was released to the United States, one of the first safe houses I lived in was near New Orleans. I didn't stay there long and I don't remember much, I was on pain killers at the time," Shen explained. The painkillers had been necessary at the time. Even though he was tortured less after his mutation emerged, he was still tortured. Some of the scars were still recent when Amnesty International had gotten him released and had managed to get him on a UN cargo plane to the United States. It wasn't a story that Shen felt like sharing at the moment, he would rather just bask in this natural feeling of ease, which he guessed might be similiar to a drug high.

"I'll make sure it stays safe...even if it kills me."

"I will do most everything in my power to keep you alive," Shen responded. Li had been responsible for Shen when they were younger as Li had was slightly more mature than Shen before they had been abducted. Shen wondered what his brother would think of him now that Shen had become almost a recluse and quite solemn. Shen had felt partly responsible for his brother's death. Shen's actions had led to Li's powers manifesting when they did, thus attracting the notice of the government. Shen would not let anything like that happen to Stacy, she was...dear to him.

"Okay, I'll call ya tha' next time I'm on my period. Ya can come levitate tha' pain away."

"I don't know if my power will relieve that sort of cramp as I've never experienced that kind of cramp personally," Shen said as calmly as possible. He could regulate the flushing some by altering his breathing patterns and manipulating his focus slightly. He showed no signs of being embarassed and he had delivered the statement in a deadpan voice. There was silence for a second before he started to chuckle slightly. He had a sense of humor, albeit an odd one.

"If yer in pain, I give pretty good massages. I cen relax yer muscles with my powers...sometime I'll show ya."

"I thank you for the offer, but pain is only a passing illusion that can be overcome, this is one of the lessons I managed to learn from the Chinese Prison Camps," Shen stated. He wasn't scorning her offer, he just didn't know what would happen if they had that sort of sensual contact. He didn't know what Stacy's powers were and he didn't know if his own power could expand. It had been kept in check by the mask in part, but his own emotions also had to be kept in check, as the black hole's intensity seemed to have limited connection to his emotions. Shen just didn't want to risk having the black hole expand and consume Stacy. If that happened, Shen didn't know what he would do.

"Yer tha special one...there's so much ya can do. So much ya overcame. Yer very special ta me."

Shen just remained silent after Stacy's comment, noticing her flush in the infrared spectrum. He too could feel himself beginning to flush. He silently reached for one of her hands with both of his. He brought it slowly to the "mouth" of his mask and placed her knuckles against the "mouth". It would have been a kiss to her hand, had Shen had lips. "You are the special one, you survivied in a world where most die within, but you still have that spark. You survivied people using you as nothing more than a tool, but you still have a soul," Shen said slowly, and as he did so, he removed her hand from the "mouth" of the mask.

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Tags: Stacy