He was here for her.

From the moment she'd heard the news she'd known. No, from the moment she'd seen him in the telescope she'd known. He'd seen her and whatever he'd seen had been enough to tear him from the stars. This was a gesture of enormous respect - [i]terrifying[/i] respect. It meant that Shamash was bringing his full attention and fury to her directly without any games. She was being treated as a once in a century threat by an alien god.

And now she had to earn it.

She's been half-dreaming of this moment. She choreographs the encounter in a hundred ways. He might move like this. He might speak like this. She writes him lines and writes herself responses like scripting a movie. She imagines the pain - for there will be pain. At night she lies awake in bed and imagines in vivid detail the breaking of her arm and how she'll fight on despite that. She needs to get this right. 

New techniques are called for.

She can't come at this through the physical world. She's too obvious, even veiled, to get through security of this level. So she walks through the border of the mirror realm, wrapped in the void of her own heart. She has never done this before and there is good reason for that. It seems as though she is walking through the real world but every mirrored surface glows, the source of a strange black light. Where this light touches it's not reality she sees but the other place - deepest night and occupied with more true incarnations of everything within it. The streets are slashed through with lines of mirrored darkness - every gleaming suit of armour, every fine pane of glass, every pool of water creates a puddle of alternate reality where everything is different. The rules change with every step between dark and light. 

She wonders if this whole idea is a mistake, and rather than solving her problems she's actually doubled them.

She wonders if the dark version of Shamash will be scarier than the light.