Red rover red rover send Gavin back over.  Shawn knew he probably wouldn't get this crystal clear shot at this piece of shit again.  By the looks of things he was pretty well protected by his gang of assholes.  Shawn was no different.  He was protected by the fools.  Where Gavin had a circus big top flying as his banner Shawn had leather and reapers to show his true colors.  "Fine."  Shawn finally said.  He was about to show Gavin what he could do.  A little taste of his potential as his shadow on the ground behind him began to bend and change.  It was no trick of the light it was Shawn through and through.  

When he was just a little boy it scared the living fuck out of him.  He saw shadows that moved on their own.  Turning and changing into horrible monsters.  Every little boy's nightmare.  The monsters were of his own making.  His fucked up HBO fueled imagination and the kiss of a shadow tampering ability created some therapist producing freak out motherfucking nightmares.  It was what first gave Shawn a fear of the dark.  The shadows and the things that creeped around in them.  His hand sunk into his pocket as his eyes flicked to his mother.  She didn't remember him.  Good thing she never had to watch her baby boy grow up to be a fuck up.  His fingers tingled as they wrapped around the light switch in his pocket.  That shield against the darkness.  The thing his mother gave him to comabat the shadow monsters and scare them away with the light.  "You really want to see what I'm capable of?" He said grimly.  

Shawn's shadow changed into the shape of a tiger.  It's feline tail waving back and forth furiously against the soft wet grass.  He was ready to attack the piece of shit when Andromeda did it for him.  What the fuck are you thinking? Seriously why couldn't you just let me handle this?!?!?  He was desperately calling out to her with his thoughts but he couldn't tell if she was tuning into this particularly pissed off frequency.  She would do that to the man she considered her own father.  Shawn felt what she felt.  A powerful wave of light so strong it could end the dark dimension in a shatter of broken ideals.  She could be the light that kept his darkness terminal.  But would he allow it?  Could he dig deep into his fucked up sensibilities and allow himself happiness?  Shawn couldn't risk letting her get herself killed.  He would never find out.    She begged him to run.  To turn tail and 86 this roadside madhouse.

Fools rush in.  They didn't leave people behind.  Least of all people they gave a shit about.  No, they went by the name the Fools because they did every dumb fucking thing imaginable to stay loyal.  It didn't matter if a brother was in a burning building.  You ran in after them.  It didn't matter if you were facing 30 gun barrels and you were down to your last clip you reloaded and stepped up for your brother.  What you were willing to do for your Queen was even more.  Shawn's fist clinched as he waited for what was going to happen to happen.

The tension was un-fucking-bearable.  He might have wrote the book on bad ideas.... But Andi was definitely quoting from it.  A puff of smoke, a whisper of sound.  Shawn teleported himself.  Moving through the shadow dimension and reappearing in front of his mother.  She screamed.  She god damned screamed he frightened her so bad.  Broke his heart.  But there was no time for that shit.  Wrapping his arms around her they bled into smoke and were gone as he took her to the sunken place.  Shawn wasn't leaving Andromeda behind.  Not when he had just found her.  He had to get his mother out first though.  Andi had powers.   She could hold Gavin off.  He prayed that he was right.

Leaving his mother in a hellish confusion of soundless silence and monochrome delusion; Shawn shot back out into the world of color and sound.  He was so anxious.  He didn't realize that he had turned his back when he teleported.  Shawn reappeared in the field between Gavin and Andi.  Close enough to touch her, but unfortunately his back was to Gavin.  A sharp pain in his shoulder made him wince and groan.  Shawn Grabbed Andi's hand and bled away into smoke and destiny.  They were back in the shadow plain.  Next to his mother.  Shawn dropped to his knees and clutched at his shoulder.  His mother, though soundless screamed bloody murder.  Shawn bared his teeth rolled around in the grass trying to get the knife out of his shoulder.  The connection to crusher was broken.  Around them dark shadows of the others that were just in the field with them moved.  

They were still in the same space though unable to perceive them anymore.  Natalie Silverman got up and ran away screaming.  Not knowing what else to do Shawn lashed her to a tree with a sparing shadow before the knife buried deep in his shoulder her made him get woozy.  He fell back.  His head resting against the ashy grass in this world of quiet reflection.  Staring up at the stars as they got blurrier; He saw Andi's smile and that was enough for him.  "I did it.  I walked away." He assured her.  He was so proud of his composure.  Usually he would blow his fucking top.  Shawn was never known for his patience he had a short fuse and everyone knew it, but somehow... For her he managed to push the darkness down.  Her light gave him strength.

It was far from the worst pain in the world.  A Johnny Rome party hurt worse than this the morning after.  Still, that asshole had tried to hill him, and he wasn't sure that he wasn't already planning revenge.  It wasn't in Shawn's nature to be forgiving and he sure as hell couldn't show back up at the Fool's Dice Club with a knife wound and say "Ya know what....I think I'ma just let this one sliiiiiide."  Operations didn't work that way.  Blood for blood and by the bucketful.  Shawn watched the panic seize Andromeda's face and he couldn't be mad in the moment.  She panicked over him and it felt good.  It felt good to have someone actually in his life that gave a shit about weather he lived or died that wasn't wearing the same cut.  

The Fools were family but this was something more.  Something indescribable.  Telekinetic fuckery and there was a searing pain in his shoulder.  His mouth opened and screamed but no sound spilled out.  His cheeks shook with the vibrational force of howling pain.  Nothing filling the air with nothing and quiet ruled the night.  Tears spilled down his face as he rolled over and buried his face in the grass.  Partly because he didn't want Andromeda to see him cry.  Yeah they might've been best friends and the only person to truly understand him, but it was hard to show weakness in front of her.  When he had built this image of power and respect.  He wasn't even sure if that's how he wanted her to see him.  A thug with bruised knuckles and a reputation for being merciless.  It wasn't the little kid that she remembered.  He grew up to be a very different man.

A large part of him was terrified.  Terrified about her finding that side of himself and turning away from it in disgust.  Shawn pushed himself out of the grass with a limping shoulder.  His injured arm hung limp as he staggered to his feet.  Protect the image.  Conceal the fact that you're still that same scared little boy who worries about the things that go bump in the night.  First order of business.  Second order of business was to figure out next steps.   Shawn turned back to his mother who was now sleeping thanks to the psychic touch of his girlfriend.  "Can you do something for her?  Make her forget about the circus......I don't want her to see me.  I don't want her to see the man I grew up to be.  She'd be disappointed.  Just give her good memories and send her away."    It wasn't an outright admission of his criminal shit but it was teetering on the edge.  Shawn had pulled herhere but he didn't have the heart to show her his true light.

Shawn was a killer from way back.  His first good clean kill came as a child when he pushed his father down the stairs for beating his mother.  It was the first time the darkness had ever really seeped through the cracks.  That childhood innocence had protected Shawn from the darkness like a warm shroud, could only hide the true nature for so long.  Wrapping him in honest potential and making sure no festering dark could ever touch his light.  Though years and experience had mad him cynical.  He was born to be this way.  Hardened and forged in the trauma of all the shit he had caused.     No one ever really changes. 

Our lives are mapped out from the very fucking beginning by destiny.  Since that day as a kid Shawn had killed many more.  He chose too.  He was a thug and a criminal and the blood on his hands wasn't going to stain Andromeda's innocence.  Or what little actual memories he had of his mother.  Fuck.  This was so fucking bad.  He couldn't just stay here the whole time and being here made it impossible to hide what he was really scared about from Andromeda.  This wanted to be on his mind but he was doing everything he could to shield her from his thoughts.  He didn't want her seeing him in a darker light. 

Not until he had time to explain about the fools.  It didn't matter if she accepted it, it was about how she looked at him and he didn't want that to change.  Because she looked at him like he was the start of life.  Like he was her second chance to get away from terrible people.  When she looked at him she saw hope for a normal life with children and reading stories and white picket fences.  Shawn wasn't sure if that was ever really on the table.  He wanted those things, but he only knew loyalty and he would do what the club wanted him to do.  They were the only ones who ever really gave a shit about him when he had nobody.  He would never turn his back on the fools.

What made him even more nervous on top of that was telling Lulu and finding out weather or not she would accept Andromeda into the fold.  It didn't always happen.  Lulu had to believe that she could trust you and that was important.  Lulu was the final word in relationships around the fools.  Up until now it had never been a problem.  Silver shadow never really connected with anyone after Andromeda.  Lulu never had to worry about any of Shawn's flings sticking around more than a day or two.  Even though he couldn't remember her; because his memories were erased.... He had always sensed that his heart already belonged to someone.  That's why no one ever measured up.  Shawn stood there. Holding his shoulder and trying to think about baseball.  "7th inning stretch.  Jack Maldonado is down to his last strike.  And big bad Mike Mussina came in with the knuckle curveball.  Strike three motherfucker. Yankees win the series.  Damn that was a good game." He was running out of random shit to fill his thoughts with, in case Andi was listening.  "Eggs. Milk. Maybe a couple of steaks.  I need fabric softener.  Kyle Kidrich was the best damn rodeo clown Pasadena had ever seen..."   Including his fucking grocery list Shawn's mind was a short wave of non seneschal bullshit.

He was trying everything he could to keep the static flowing.  To jam up the airwaves with shit she couldn't decode but it was giving him a fucking migraine.  His shoulder hurt.  Eventually he just stumbled back against the very tree his mother was tied to by shadows.  Reaching into his jacket with his good arm, his bad arm still dangled awkwardly.  He pulled out a cigarette and stuck it between his chapped lips.  Chuckling in his head for Andi to hear him he shook his head and the smoke spilled out into the air.  "I'm an asshole Andromeda." He had given up all pretenses.  She was going to find out either way.  "I'm a two bit criminal and a thug.  No better than your father.  I kill people.  Killed a lot of them.  And for no better reason than it fed the bottom line.  I'm not your father.  I'm not here to hold you against you will.  I love you Andromeda.  But I need you to know that being with me.....Your conscience won't sleep any lighter.  I don't think I exist without you.  But I haven't existed for a long time so what's the difference?"  


His words were quiet and chosen carefully.  He wasn't trying to guilt her into staying, but he had to lay all his cards on the table.  She deserved that.  Everything she had done to spare him.  Everything she had endured to make sure that he had a life and he wasn't sure if it wasn't all wasted in her eyes.  He gave her the truth and prayed for mercy.  You can be a lot of things in this world.  Tough guy.  Badass.  Untouchable.....It didn't mean jack shit if you were broken at the knees and starving on a last chance at love with the only thing you ever wanted in life.  Shawn continued to lean against the tree.  His legs stretch out and the ash from his cigarette piling up on his lips as smoke continued to rise from it.  He took a puff and blew out a nervous breath as he wanted for the shoe to drop.