<div align="center"><strong>Meta-Conjecture</strong></div><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Spoiler: Click to Show/Hide</div><div class="spoiler_body">Allow me, my dear friends, a moment to comment on the nature of Dean and Donovan’s bond. You see, Donovan is the key: Glory, white hot and noble, fills the man’s generous and utterly selfless spirit (okay, maybe not totally selfless). It is the *shadow* thrown by that Glory that empowers Dean (hence the term “Shadow”). Now, in all sorts of “normal” circumstances, the Glory loop is closed. The only power that gets added or subtracted comes from one of the duo; the magical devices they acquired could, for example, affect the bond between the duo only by working *through* that connection. <br/><br/>Because of the nature of their “closed” loop, Donovan acts as the control valve; he opens the Glory and fuels himself and Dean alike. Donovan’s brightness to Dean’s midnight. This essentially means that Dean’s active, normal state is that of a wide-open receptacle to power – if it’s available for him to use, he uses it, otherwise Donovan might shut the power down before he has a chance to. We’ll ignore the small “leakage” that gets through to sustain them both at abnormal levels most of the time other than to say it exists. <br/><br/>Follow the logic here: falling through the air, Dean – a wide open factory for transforming one type of power into another – suddenly surrounded by a pocket of energy sufficient enough to fuel the creation of not one, but multiple *BLACK HOLES.* Yeah. Consequences. </div></div><br/>A football field of space around the falling group suddenly bunched up, the shadows deepening into a supernatural presence every bit as palpable as fog. Dean’s body, the extension of his ego, simmered like a pot on the boil, and the Shadow’s exuberant cry of pleasure and power was a silent, non-sound thing that pealed through the air like a struck bell, felt more than heard. The jerking stop-and-go motions of the Drow’s power didn’t seem to phase the man, whose handsome face had taken on an expression of intense focus. For the first time *ever* he could sense the power that fueled him outmatching the power that fueled Donovan, could sense the normally one-way flow pushing the opposite direction.<br/><br/>Then they landed, Dean coming to an effortless crouch, his body limned in licking shadows that highlighted and enhanced his virile masculinity. The arrogant creature was a solid seven feet tall now, his gear somehow swelling to match his exaggerated proportions. Yet with that height and with that power came a gravitas, an alluring *pull* all too similar to the power the drow had used – only raw and physical. When he moved, it was with a boneless lithe sensuality that seemed utterly divorced from anything resembling a normal human man.<br/><br/>Yet, oddly enough, as empowered as he was, bright blue pinpricks of light interrupted Dean’s otherwise obsidian eyes. His voice, deep, but gentle, came out in oddly optimistic tones entirely lacking the lust he normally conveyed. “Donovan. I feel a little…odd.” Indeed, although the power granted by the dog-thing was leaking out through his very pours, Dean did feel odd – like somehow the nature of the Glory that bound him and his Knight was trying to rebalance the equation.<br/><br/>Looking at Donovan, Dean murmured, “Guards and Zozo. I can feel her awareness nearby. Scrying. We will need to run.” If he was put-out or worried, it didn’t show on his too-handsome face. In fact, he seemed calmer than he had the entire night. He didn’t even look for cleavage.<br/><br/>