Fun and Games

[Abderus]

Violence it was then. Amery couldn’t have said he was surprised. In fact he had been expecting it.

wanting it… no. maybe

It was barely a second and Amery was staring up at the vampire’s crotch, with a rubber tread pressing bits of grit into his neck. The pressure wasn’t exactly pleasant either. The metal groaned underneath Amery as the already dented exterior attempted to distribute the weight of the two of them, failing, and instead another small dent was formed on the hood near the red-head’s foot. The one that wasn’t suffocating Amery.

You can’t suffocate; you’re dead you dumbass, you don’t even have to breathe…

Once Amery stopped trying to breathe, although the pain in his neck was substantial, a certain mental discomfort was lifted. He didn’t have to breathe. He didn’t require air, not really. And he was flushed with blood, anything the vampire could inflict on him... well, maybe not anything. More than a man, but less than a god. And Amery knew that it wasn’t beyond the red-head’s ability to play dirty, even if he did compensate for it in the end. So he was not beyond the capacity of fear. Amery might have gone just a little too far… this time, like all times.

But then there was nothing.
An eerie quiet, with the only sounds being that the occasional squeak from the Mustang. Prone, entirely vulnerable, and staring up the red head, Amery just managed to croak out
“do it”
though he wasn’t sure if he meant it. He didn’t think the other would do it, but there was always a chance. His hands had instinctively gone to the vampire’s foot when it slammed down on his neck, but there was little his (although formidable, of course) strength could do. He let go of the fancy boot he’d recently mocked, taking more than a bit of willpower to do so, moving his hands away palm-down along the hood of the car, even though doing so further increased the pressure on his neck. He could feel the blood pound in his head.

I still don’t understand.

[Existentially Odd]

Tom stood there - hovered there - for another age, peering at the glinting eyes of the boy below him, feeling an odd connection to him despite the fact that he hated him purely right then.
 
hate\'s an emotion borne from passion... sure you hate him
 
He was practically shuddering with anger but couldn\'t bring himself to finish the annoying little fuck off (as he had so many other annoying fucks in his existence) and he didn\'t know why and that was when he realised the fury was directed at himself and it was quiet and the bitch was goading him with his eyes and his whispered little words and he didn\'t know what the fuck to do, except that he had to follow through with what he\'d been doing and leave.
 
"As if I\'ll ever fucking do what you want, bitch," he snapped and withdrew his boot, thinking about spitting in the boy\'s face but managing to hold back.  He stood to his full height and merely sneered down at him instead.  "Wipe your chin.  The shit you talk is gonna\' leave a stain," he advised gruffly, glowering at the stranger when really his thoughts were turned completely inward and he was examining his own emotions yet again.  Why the fuck did this kid get him so riled up that he couldn\'t seem to walk away?  Couldn\'t keep his head, couldn\'t even fucking think straight either, so far... and made him feel bad enough about a victory that he went and made amends.
 
What was wrong with him?  And why the fuck couldn\'t he stop this BULLSHIT INTROSPECTION?!?!
 
He spun on his wooden heel and stepped gracefully off the car, like any normal man would step off a gutter (unless the kid did something like grab him, of course).  this time... this time... he would walk away, could see his bike and was making a beeline for it, nothing would stop him, no matter what the little cunt spouted off, nothing...

[Abderus]

Pinned by a boot and a formidable glare, Amery could do nothing but stare back. And wait. Not his favorite options in any circumstances. But somehow, this time….it was okay?

maybe

Amery, though he tried not to, couldn’t help but cough when the boot was removed from his throat. He couldn’t say anything for a moment, as the tubes and muscles and ligament things all shifted back into their appropriate place in his neck. The pressure removed, he half rolled onto his side, a very instinctively mortal move, allowing the unneeded air to rush into his lungs at greater velocity. He wasn\'t gasping, of course, but he was making a slight display of unnecessary actions. It would take him more than a year to break a survival instinct millions of years in the making and after 19 years of required practice.

He heard the click of the heel on the cement, and the shifting of the mustang as one of its oddly positioned passengers climbed out... off. He looked up to the vampire, his body repaired, all aches and even the slightest pains disappeared, and watched still with a strange feeling in his gut as the red-head withdrew.

You’re a weird fuck, you know that?

He couldn’t say it out loud. He couldn’t say anything out loud. Nothing was... good enough. The red-head says: “As if I\'ll ever fucking do what you want, bitch” and what would he say? You already did—maybe? That wouldn’t fly. “Wipe your chin. The shit you talk is gonna\' leave a stain” and then what? Nothing worth saying came to mind. Though for this one, at least, he probably should have been able to think of something.

Shifting his body on the car top, he hung his head over the side above one of the front tires, watched the now upside-down/sideways-tilted vampire recede. It occurred to him that, when this was all done, he would probably just steal the black mustang and drive it off a cliff. Or something. Maybe into the sea. End its misery.

Go diving. Swim down to where it was so dark that he couldn’t see and the pressure so intense that he couldn’t breathe with his ears threatening to pop their drums, muscles smashed into bone and bones prodding at internal organs smashed in to close. A plan for the evening.

"You breakin up with me, Indiana?"

Amery took a deep breathe of the polluted city air, mingling with those fresh sea breezes that managed to make it inland without being strangled by gaseous debris. His hair stood on end, head upside down, smile looking more like a frown, a slightly visible boot mark on his neck and ghost of a blood streak down his throat and around his nose

"because I really thought we had something here."

pulling up one knee he imitated the voice of a whiney sixteen year old girl

"You bastard!"

and managed to keep a mostly serious face. Mostly.

[Existentially Odd]

It took gritting his teeth until a muscle jumped in his jaw and balling his hands into fists to do it, but he eventually got to his bike.  He kept his back to the idiot while he pulled on his helmet, checked his jacket and withdrew gloves from his pocket to put on.  He swung a gallant leg over the machine and sat upon it in a pose that was unconsciously sexy (though he\'d done it often enough to know how it looked) while he got his gloves on, flexed his leather-clad fingers and started the bike.

Triumphantly, he realised he was just about home free as he revved the engine and rolled forward... until he was level with where the young vampire\'s head was hanging

oh... no.... no... uh... nonononofuckingNO!  Don\'t stop now!  Just go!  Little prick\'s trying to keep you talking, just flip him the bird and

over the edge of the car, looking

get the fuck out of here.  Clean and jerk, buddy, clean away from the jerk and you won\'t be sorry!

in his direction.  He paused again, coolly flicking the visor on his helmet up with

what the fuck did you go do that for??  He\'ll just suck you in further, drag you down and make you regret it... Christ you\'re a moron

his left hand, while his right held the bike at a steady purr and smirked condescendingly at the other undead (though it likely didn\'t carry as more than a squint to his eyes, given how his head was mashed into a helmet).

"You\'re headed for a fall, bitch.  A sharp one.  It\'ll make you look fondly back on \'what we had\' and wish you could relive it a hundred times over, instead of what the Oligarchy\'s gonna\' do to you once they get the smell of your crap.  Don\'t say I didn\'t warn you when you\'re up to your neck and in need of rescuing.  Find me at sixty-six Pandenning Court when that night comes; I\'m not saying I\'ll help you but it\'ll sure as fuck give me something to laugh at," he snickered before flicking down the visor and pulling out of the car park with a roar.

You stupid cunt.  You just gave him your address.
What
the
fuck.

[Abderus]

The bike looked very strange upside down. Like a metal praying mantis… on wheels… kind of.

Amery’s mind had already begun to drift away. He’d won, hadn’t he? More or less? So what more did he have to think about the red-head? What did he care if he got in his motorcycle and rumbled off into the oblivion that was the nighttime city—what…did he care?

Did he care?

meh…yeah. No. I dunno.

He watched the visor flick down, the practiced motions, the way the vampire was more part of the bike than he was separate from it. At least upside down.

What the fuck is the oligar—

But the momentary question was thrown away as his mind latched onto a new bit of information

sixty-six Pandenning Court

and lolled the address around in his brain with rapt attention, but lacking an idea what to do with it. Where to put it, store it, remember it or hide it? What an interesting turn of events, all in all, and now it was over with a roar of the motorbike and an empty parking lot, and it wasn’t over because

sixty-six Pandenning Court

there is another chapter. Maybe. If Amery decided... needed? Rescuing, he said. No. Maybe mischief… maybe. Boredom. Need… no. maybe.

For another hour or so he hung over the tire of the dented black mustang. He wondered why the kid who owned the car had never returned. He wondered if he was in a bathroom somewhere, fucking some chick, or maybe in a gutter because he ran into someone like Amery or just another punk kid looking for a fight. Someone like Amery... then.

He didn’t actually care. And that didn’t bother him. He found it amusing in fact how he cared more about the fate of a piece of metal and rubber and upholstery than he did for a flesh and blood human being. What did that mean—what did that make him? To care about the inanimate and the undead and not about the living.

Fuck if he cared. Why the fuck was he even thinking about it.

He swung his legs over the side of the car and got to his feet, yanking open the already lopsided door and forcing it shut awkwardly behind him. He fiddled for a minute with the old wiring, teasing the engine until it shuddered awake. Amery rooted around in the glove compartment, back seat, looking...yup.

He pulled out a nearly empty pack of cigarettes, packed them in, pulled one out, and lit it with an anarchy stickered lighter. He took a deep drag, rolling down three of the windows and knocking out the rest of the one he’d already cracked.

Watching the smoke curl out into the night air, Amery eased the car out of the lot, turning in the opposite direction as the motorcycle, and then took off down the coastal road, speed ever increasing, displaced metal and fiberglass rattling, and Amery waiting, holding steady, turn and straightway after turn, watching the numbers go from 40 to 50 to 60 to 70 to 80, waiting, looking for that one turn that would take him from the pavement to the sea…