Ties

[Saiketsu]

Reserved for rainshadowCK

He was smoking a cigarette loosely and had his feet up on Camille\'s dashboard. The night was clear and completely cloudless as the two vampire sped through the streets of the city, running red lights as if they were green. Pierre was cursing in French under his breath as he hit a pothole going sixty, a sound that the other vampire really enjoyed.

"Flick those ashes, Nick."
"Fuck off," Nikolai said absently, still enrapt in his own thoughts.
"No, I\'m serious. I don\'t want them on her floors."
And Nikolai flicked the cigarette, which was now half ashes, into Camille\'s little ashtray near the stereo which was blasting a mixed CD of AFI, Marilyn Manson, Korn, and Kanye West. It was typical for their car rides.
"You must get a hard-on from being a prick, huh?" It was good-natured and Nikolai enjoyed the sound of his voice as always.
"I\'m thinking about cutting my hair again," Nikolai said, completely and purposely changing the topic while eyeing the black-blonde hair that was hanging over one side of his face. The cigarette dangled from his fingers which was slung over his raised knee. "Cutting. Dyeing. I\'m not sure yet."
"You know it won\'t grow back." Pierre\'s eyes were glued to the road as he took a wide corner going fifty-five miles per hour.
"Yeah I know. That\'s why I\'m still debating." He took an empty drag on his pointless cigarette and flung it out the open window. "I need to know someone else\'s opinion."
"Well what\'s wrong with it now?"
"I dunno. Maybe I just need a change."
"Well I\'d suggest keeping it this way for as long as you like it. I think it looks fine just as it is."
If he had had the capability, Nikolai might have blushed bright like a fucking schoolgirl. Alas, all the warm blood had been drained from him about sixty-eight years ago along with the ability to flush red with it. Thank fucking God, Judas mused darkly.

The temptation to throw an arm around the back if the blonde\'s seat was strong, but not stronger than his determination to remain unknown to this beautiful French god. Pierre had no idea of Nikolai\'s feelings towards him -- and that was the way it needed to stay until the Frenchman enjoyed the sight of another man\'s dick nearing any part of his body. Nikolai sighed inaudiably. Pierre was hopeless and yet there he was again, craving his attention silently from the passenger seat. The younger vampire fiddled with the volume knob until Camille shook with the steady bass of "Total Immortal" by AFI.

His mind was completely occupied this night as the two vampires shot the shit for the car ride. It had been months since he had seen that prick of a mortal who called himself Laurent, and yet the horrid babysitters of Nikolai\'s mind still sat their with their painful hooks sunk into the soft flesh of his thoughts and memories. It was aggravating to say the least.

But what was worse was the event that he would force to transpire tonight, all due to self-preservation. Tonight, Nikolai and Pierre were on their way to go see Damien to get orders or something. Storm, that bitch of a cunt, would be there: exactly what Laurent wanted to see. He would penetrate Damien\'s castle and fuck them all over. Including Pierre.

Without meaning to, Nikolai threw a glance over at his closest friend, a look without emotion piercing his green, made-up eyes. It wasn\'t something that he wanted to do to him, but what else could be done?

"What the hell is up with you tonight? God, every time we go see Damien you start acting all fucking trippy on me." Pierre\'s face was smiling, and as the two pulled into a parking lot (going at a much lesser speed than before, "for fear of Damien\'s criticisms and concerns", Pierre had said with a smirk), Nikolai simply wanted to at least look at him in the way he couldn\'t for perhaps the last time. And without admitting it to even himself, he saw an image of himself kissing Pierre deeply. And Pierre kissing back. But he pushed it away as he got out of Camille, closing the door more gently than he would have for anyone else\'s car.

And still he didn\'t answer the question.

[The Cedar Witch]

Storm tapped the blank page of her sketchbook absently with the eraser end of a pencil, searching her mind for something to draw. She was anxious, to say the least, wishing with every fiber of her being that she was anywhere but at the apartment in this instant. The girl sighed under her breath, returning her gaze to the blank sheet of paper before her. Slow spirals formed beneath the tip of the pencil, varying in width and shade.

Damien had told her that Pierre was to be over in less then ten minutes. Pierre and that Prick, Nikolai. Not that she could have cared less about the younger one. Anger churned darkly within her, causing the lines under the pencil to darken substantially. As far as she was concerned, there was nothing valuable or good about him, and he was therefore disposable. Apparently Damien thought otherwise. What else is new.

The only occasions she had to deal with Nikolai, the two were at each other\'s throats. Twice was enough for her; the Akari wasn\'t in the mood for another fight. Not tonight. Especially not in the apartment. She was feeling unusually self-conscious, her drawings all over the walls and her back to the door. More then anything, she wished she had washed the walls of her artwork sooner. The last person she wanted looking at them was Nikolai.

If it had just been Pierre stopping by, maybe the girl would have put a bit more effort into her appearance. Since he was not coming alone, and it was only to discuss business, Storm didn\'t see much of a point. She wore the usual dark-pants-black-shirt-black-hoodie combo that she did on any other day. No makeup, she couldn\'t really stand the stuff. Anyway, Damien would have noticed she was trying to look nice for Pierre. Wouldn\'t want to make him angry over something stupid again.

Sooner then expected, she could feel the two exit the elevator and approach the door. Her eyes flickered black and she made an obvious effort to immerse herself in the spiral-tree drawing and ignore whoever was entering the apartment. The girl didn\'t turn around, even when Pierre stepped inside. She didn\'t have to turn to know that Nikolai had followed, she could feel him where he was standing.

The pencil scrawling stopped abruptly and the shadows that had been dormant until this point flared up violently inside of her, although making no outward indication. It was now that she turned slowly, eyes hiding her thoughts, to face the two guests. The urge to fight was powerful, multiplied by the newly awakened shadows who seemed to recognize the familiar threatening presence of the shadows of another. Laurent. It was his first. She was barely trembling.

Even as she greeted Pierre, her gaze remained locked on Nikolai, filled with black. What the fuck is going on?

[Saiketsu]

The inside of the elevator filled with Pierre\'s scent which Nikolai took the time to enjoy as the little room rose numerous stories. It was too short, however; before he was ready for it, the doors opened and his precious Jean-Luc stepped out into the hallway. For a brief moment Nikolai watched his completely-straight body move and sighed under his breath, just out of earshot for the other. Nikolai followed as if nothing had happened.

They arrived at a door which opened easily enough to Pierre\'s rapping at the door. Damien took his hand and welcomed his first fledgling into a brotherly hug. Nikolai, being the youngest and the only non-bloodline vampire in the branch of the regime, knew enough not to interfer or say anything until Damien offered his hand. The two shook hands of course, Damien\'s formal greeting as close to that cunt, whose scent was permeating through the room, as he ever wanted to be again.

Oh yes, of course he could see her, but refused to look at her, even as he noticed with some amusement that Damien\'s scent wasn\'t strong on her or vise versa. So maybe she wasn\'t the King\'s whore. The idea still made him smile.

And then suddenly, something lurched inside of his mind, the leeches drilling into his nerves. He stifled a groan, and ignored the wave of hot, displaced, confused anger that washed through him. Green eyes landed on black ones and the two caught each other in a stare down as they both realized that they both had the same shadows, more or less.

Nikolai felt that surge of concern pass through him as the shadows gathered and tore a fresh hole in his chest. As if he couldn\'t fight his own battles. He hadn\'t expected this, had never realized that the fuck would do the same thing to him that he had done to the cunt. He was having a hard time stifling a hiss, his lips parting into a sneer that opened his senses wider. The blackness was taking over his mind.



"Nikolai." He knew just how to keep his voice commanding, having centuries of practice with his unruly fledglings. "Is there a problem here, Nikolai?" Of course there was that slice of edge as Damien\'s silver eyes bore into Pierre\'s newest aquantaince. What an insolent whelp, he thought as those angry green eyes landed back on Damien\'s. He looked feral, as if there was something more animalistic in him now, several months after they had all just met. Damien could only shrug it off.

"Children," he murmured under his breath so only Pierre could hear. With a smile Damien watched as the Frenchman fetched his younger companion by the shoulders and directed him back to business.

On the agenda for tonight, Damien discussed his plans to move as slightly more than hypothetical, the gathering of younger forces to be trained, as well as money movement and some of the events which had occurred. Standard and dry.

Yet there was something that Damien simply couldn\'t put his finger on, something about Nikolai. It could have been the way that he kept his eye on Storm as if she were something that needed to be disposed of, it could have been the disturbing and unexplained difference Damien felt in his aura, it could have been his lack of attention to anything at all. He simply couldn\'t put a finger on it.

[The Cedar Witch]

The Akari did not avert her eyes. She scarcely heard anything that Damien and Pierre were discussing, and to be frank, it wasn\'t important enough at the moment. Storm had to press her lengthening fingernails into the palms of her hands to keep hers at bay. They gathered into something bigger and more threatening, an automatic defense that she had developed. The monster pushed waves of threatening anger across the room: a message intended for his alone, to stay the fuck away.

Traitor, she hissed inside, shadows lurching and begging to attack. He reeked of the Zalmric, even if the scent was older then she had expected. From his shadows alone she could almost see the memory of their last encounter. Flickers of it anyway. Visions that her own shadows had the ability to pick up because they were derived of the same material that his were fashioned from. It was enough to make her own memories surface, and the mere thought of any contact with Laurent again made her nearly gag.

It was astounding to her that anyone had even trusted Nikolai enough to let him this close to begin with. Especially Damien. Couldn\'t he feel that there was something going on, too? It didn\'t matter now. It was already too late. Surely Nikolai was to go running back to Laurent, like the good slave the Captain made of him, and tell him exactly where Storm was hiding. Why else would he be here then to act as a spy? Any information he would need to know could be learned through Pierre. Nikolai had no real reason to be here at all.

"I swear to fucking god," her telepathic message came vibrant and violent as she struggled to contain the shadows that were aching to breach the distance and destroy him. "If you are planning anything with him..." She couldn\'t finish the sentence with words, instead only finding it appropriate to transmit several strong feelings and images of pain and punishment, similar but not the same to what Laurent was capable of doing with his shadows.

[Saiketsu]

Nikolai smirked and Judas rumbled inside of his cage, banging on the bars with anxious expectations now that he saw the girl was there. "What?" He responded with a sly, seductive control that the leeches aided with. Laurent, somewhere perhaps miles away, was listening now, looking in on her. It made Nikolai, himself, sick. But being held against his will for the umpteenth time, Nikolai continued with his mental taunt with a pointed and deliberate pace. "What will you do, Princess? Will you tell your King on me when you two lie in bed together? Will you tell your Daddy that his son\'s best friend is being mean and making you cry." Nikolai smirked wider. "Go ahead. And I promise that I will bring him to you firsthand." He winked at her with that last glimmer of the Zalmric\'s pride, the blackness swelling in his mind.

Laurent was force-feeding him images of the cunt\'s rape, which filtered through the telepathic connection. The black hole in his chest widened with a bit of agony as Laurent smiled at the girl with Nikolai\'s mouth.



His eyes happened to flash up while his Sire spoke and landed on his friend. "Nick!" When the vampire finally looked at him, Pierre signalled for him to come back down to earth for his own sake. Pierre might not have had the preternatural abilities that Damien or Nikolai had, but he was close enough to his sire to know when he was getting pissed off with someone. And apparently Nikolai did not.

With some apparent reluctance, Nikolai returned back to the conversation, an angry look in his eyes. Pierre watched as Damien\'s eyes darkened on the youngest vampire, and Pierre frowned. If Nikolai didn\'t cool it, there would be a fight with Nikolai as the loser.

"What have you found, Nikolai?"
His eyes were still filled with hate, though controlled much more now. "There\'s been a recent rise of the Sacrement coven. I\'m not sure what they\'re about, what they\'re attentions are, but word down at Risk is that they\'re ancients that have been pulling strings in the city for decades, hidden or masked by the Oligarchy. Word on the street is that they\'re really the ones that own the city.

"So if you want anything done in this city, look at them." He paused for a moment. "You really willing to start a war with these types of people, Ace? I mean the city\'s run by ancients mostly, not even including the Oligarchy. How exactly do you plan to get by all of them?"

Pierre\'s eyes looked upon Damien as the vampire smiled wryly. "That\'s my business, Judas. Nothing to be concerned with as of yet. I can\'t make a move as of yet anyway."

And the conversation went back and forth, in perfect English for the sake of Nikolai. All three of them contributed information gathered, but Nikolai had the most to offer. Talk of money and how easily it could be gathered and moved. Orders were given and Pierre took a mental note of the things Damien wanted: stocks of guns, of bomb-making materials, of blood, or fledglings. He told Pierre to awaken all his fledglings and preepare them for training. Pierre had since lost track of the dozens of fledglings he had made. His mind fluttered onto one of his younger females, Ariel, with the dark blonde hair and shirts with low cuts. She was only fifteen years dead and she had the skill of a lioness when she hunted. He hadn\'t seen her in a few months and the thought had Pierre frowning. As Damien began to wrap up.

[The Cedar Witch]

How dare he, The comments Nikolai threw out at her were nearly enough to make her rip into a full transformation from pure rage. Especially the one relating her to Damien in ways that could never be more incorrect. She was far from crying, and being degraded to that of a child wasn\'t anything that she could take lightly. Not from anyone. And as much as she wanted to fire back a string of insults involving his lustful encounter with him, she could not. No words could form sentences in her mind, nothing but rage, hatred, and bitterness.

His threats did not fall on deaf ears. The last thing Storm wanted was for Laurent to be brought to her. That slightest hint of fear was enough to keep her silent. Damien couldn\'t know anything until they moved. She didn\'t want to see Laurent again. Not now, not ever. Feeling him move in her skin, through the shadows, was enough torture to last a lifetime and then some. All Nikolai had done was stirred up the monsters that she had tried ridding herself of in the first place. Nothing that would cause any immediate problem. At least, she hoped not.

The fangs that shifted into her mouth pierced the side of her cheek, drawing blood and causing a tinge of pain that wasn\'t as distracting as Storm would have liked it to be. She could feel the faint shifting of wings beneath her skin, and the shadows that pulled at the edges of her mind were not helping in the least bit. She was silently thankful that her skin hadn\'t begun to tint. That would have sparked a conflict for sure.

The girl wasn\'t blind. She could see Laurent watching through his eyes, feel him smile. It made her shiver in revulsion. Before he turned away to speak with the others, Storm sent one last, threateningly strong wave of blackness in his direction, just in case he missed how capable she was of doing significant damage. After all, he taught her how to use the shadows firsthand. And it was she who had nearly destroyed everything using them, once-upon-a-time.

The sketchbook became more of a distraction, though the only thing she found herself drawing were bloodied and mangled corpses. Things that lay in her dreams. Shadows that could not be contained edged their way out through her fingertips, wrapping around the pencil and guiding its movement. What they drew made her sick and she couldn\'t look at it anymore.

Relax. They\'re about to leave. Storm looked up, pitch black eyes watching the group as she listened intently to the ending of the conversation. The sooner Nikolai was gone, the sooner she could regain control of herself.

[Saiketsu]

The silent conversation that went on between Storm and Nikolai didn\'t go unnoticed. While he couldn\'t penetrate either of their minds unnoticed or even intercept a message, a quick glance over at Storm told him that they weren\'t discussing the weather. Something inside Damien sent up the red flag, and an uncanny feeling of defensiveness washed over him in regards to Storm\'s well-being. He eyed Nikolai with great intensity.

The two of them had, more or less, explained that there was bad blood between them. It had something to do with an encounter that they had had, where push came to shove and Nikolai’s throat ended up on the ground. Nothing about this knowledge soothed Damien’s mind; he needed both Storm and Nikolai on his side, on the same side. It was bothersome to try to keep the two of them separated, but he’d be damned if he let someone else’s brat of a fledgling warp any of his well-laid plans.

“Just get us out of here as soon as possible,” Pierre said in perfect old French, so that no one would understand even if they could speak the modern tongue. It had been a while since he had heard his natural language, and the sentence made Damien peer over at his first-born. Pierre’s blue eyes were serious as he showed his age and maturity, well above Nikolai’s. It made his anger subside the smallest bit. Pierre could read him well, and if he were anyone else, Damien would have been extremely disturbed by the idea. To both Nikolai’s and Storm’s dismay, the elder whispered a string of Old French (which sounded part Latin and unromantic) under his breath to his son, who only nodded in understanding.

“So, I want to know the name of every fledgling we have in our numbers and vice versa. Nikolai,” his mouth went somewhat dry as he spoke, as if he didn’t even want to think about what he might be asking, “if you’d like, as you are not under pressure to do so, you may include your fledglings in our—“

“I don’t have any anymore.” It was short and crisp, tinged with reluctant respect and attitude to boot. It seemed like a lie, but Damien couldn’t be certain.

Damien gave a short nod. “Alright. There you are, gentlemen. If anything else arises, you’ll be hearing from me. Enjoy the night, oh and Nikolai,” he said as the two of them were turning to leave. Judas turned slowly, a wry look on his face as his eyes flickered back from Storm, “keep your phone on.” It was a command, not a request and Damien took no effort to hide it.

[The Cedar Witch]

She didn\'t even strain her ears to attempt to catch the whispered French exchange between the elder vampires. Her attention was solely on trying to control the shadows that were racing through her mind. The girl silently allowed her mind to follow the pair as they made a move to leave, making no effort to acknowledge their departure--no, not even to Pierre. Her aura still sparked with anger as she sent one last pulse to Nikolai, as a warning or even a threat, but also as an acknowledgment: she would say nothing to Damien so long as her location was kept from Laurent. No words were exchanged between the two, but she followed them in her mind\'s eye until they had left the building.

Unconsciously Storm breathed a heavy sigh of relief, eyes still swimming in black and body still on high defense. She was so close to being free of him, Laurent, that she had led herself to believe that there was no way he could possibly penetrate the peace that had settled in her current living situation. Apparently, unannounced to her, the Captain had been hard at work attempting to infiltrate without her knowledge. Maybe Nikolai was a part of the fun. Stirring things up a little and falling behind the lines again. Waiting. Always waiting. Constantly watching.

Warily, the Akari threw an uneasy look toward the door, pencil still suspended between two fingers which were vaguely encased in a thin layer of shadow. The last thing she wanted to do was go through the rigorous removal again. Maybe it wouldn\'t come to that. She frowned, as though deep in thought, and affixed her attention to the sketchbook filled with drawings penned by something more sinister then herself.

[Saiketsu]

"Will do, Captain." Pierre saw that smug smirk and salute to Damien and felt as though he had done it now. The elder of the pair rolled his eyes and put a hand on his buddy\'s shoulder and pushed him out the door. Damien followed him with a string of curses which no one had to translate in order to understand before Pierre looked back at his irate master.

Pierre said his goodbyes to the other pair as Nikolai stood impatiently in the hall, but Damien acknowledged him with little more than a grunt of frustration while his \'sister\' didn\'t even seem to notice. The vampire sighed and left, noting how the door locked behind him.

"You know," Pierre\'s own voice was tainted with aggravation, "you keep that shit up, he\'s going to end up killing you." The younger vampire said nothing and perhaps it was better that way.

Nikolai had always been an upstart and he knew that better than anyone. In fact, Nikolai\'s wild nature was part of the reason that Pierre was initially drawn to him almost a year back. But what was a revolution without the Patriots? So Pierre had gotten to know him, and liked quickly what he saw, despite the attitude. Nikolai was passionate, if not crazed, about anything he found out. He was a good explorer and had the strings to pull. Sure he was rough around the edges, but it was those kinds of men that made an army: the ones who weren\'t afraid to get the blood on their hands.

And while nobody, including himself, wanted to see a fledgling army entirely compiled of Nikolai-esque soldiers march upon the city in order to start that revolution, Pierre was never opposed to a few upstarts in that army. Nikolai simply was higher up on the food chain than most would have ever dreamed of.

But as much of a pain in the derriere as Nikolai was, Pierre never found it easy to get too angry with him. Recently the two of them had been as close as brothers and he liked that. Sure, there were some aspects about the younger that Pierre couldn\'t understand or agree with, but he was able to overlook them enough to see the genius behind the make-up.

The younger was brilliant, even if he was a prick most days. There was something about him that was simply addicting to be around. Perhaps it was his freedom, his constant reinvention of the same wheel. Or maybe it was simply because he was the only fledgling he had met where blood wasn\'t on the top of his to-do list (though, Jesus, Almighty, did that kid gorge and fight for his dinner!).

The two of them had ridden the elevator in silence and were out in the lobby before Pierre knew what he was doing, Camille\'s keys in his pocket. His powerful ears picked up the sound of the car clicking even over the normal racket of the street.

"What\'s up?" It was the younger vampire, his green eyes looking at him intently under blue eye shadow, thickened liner and fake lashes. And Pierre used to think it was weird to look in his intense eyes. "Did I do something wrong here?" The prick smiled and stepped gracefully into the car like a chick.

"You know damn right you did, Nick." But he was smiling again, despite the bone he had to pick with him. "Now c\'mon. Let\'s go get us some chicks." Nikolai howled with delight, literally and Pierre found himself laughing as well. What a creep, he thought with a toothy smile.



If he had had anything in the direct proximity of his iron grip, Damien would have most likely thrown it at the youngest fledgling, or snapped it in half. "C\'est un vrai con, Pierre!" He said, pointing a finger at Nikolai as he left the apartment. That was what he really thought of his son\'s new friend, but the door was closed before he knew it and the two were gone.

The vampire sighed to himself, cursing in a mixture of French, Latin, and English, whichever word came out the fastest. He was so fed up with Nikolai\'s insolence and was on the border of calling Pierre up to tell him never to bring Nikolai back if he were going to act up again. Rubbing his face to ward off anymore frustration he took a seat on the nearby love seat.

"You ready to go out?" He asked after a moment, his head reclined back on the fabric. He had not forgotten that Storm needed to go out to the forests again to soak up the energy or however she did it. He\'d need to have her wakeful throughout the night. Hell, while they were out, he had decided only a few minutes ago, he may as well go talk to someone about that new headquarters.

"I\'ll assume it wasn\'t a particularly nice conversation the two of you were having. Should I even bother asking if you\'re alright? You do seem a bit... ruffled." His hands were off his face and genuine concern filled his features as he looked over at her. Her mood had changed completely, filling the small apartment with a feeling of hate and her own personal mix of heaviness that Damien could exactly differ at the present time. "What was he saying to you?"

He sounded nosy, and felt it too, but there was something in him that wouldn\'t let him get away without hearing the answer. It was peculiar to him, but what wasn\'t in this new life of discoveries?

[The Cedar Witch]

Storm glared. Not at him, but in his direction. She was having a great deal of difficulty trying to contain small threads of shadow that were leaking from her aura, fueled by the anger and hatred that radiated from her form. Technically, Nikolai hadn\'t said anything important. It was what she felt from him that mattered. The stench of Laurent that she should have smelled down the hallway before he even set foot into the apartment. Even now, she scolded herself mercilessly for not seeing it coming earlier. Not that it would have made any significant difference.

"Nothing worth repeating," her mouth barely parted as she forced the words through her teeth, clenching her fists tightly. The Akari could still feel that echo of filth in her mind, the faintest feel of his voice in her head. The stickiness of his aura sickened her. He had been with him not long ago. But it was what he had insinuated was going on between Damien and herself that drew the most anger from him. The fact that he was fucking around with Laurent only made her worried.

"Besides, he suggested I not mention it to you," there was heavy bitterness in her voice but she did not avert her eyes from the vampire.

[Saiketsu]

His eyes connected with hers and his casual nature had immediately dissipated. His tinge of Thirst was held at bay as his body went rigid as he stood. "And what would that be, Storm?"

Damien was furious; beyond it. How dare some brat of an immortal walk into his house and make demands of anyone, let alone Storm, the Lady incarnate. The nerve of this prick. His eyes, without meaning to, bore into Storm\'s due to the waves of anger and need for that fuck to atone for his trespasses.

[The Cedar Witch]

The girl met his eyes with demonic-ferocity, her mind already reacting to his tone as if calling a threat. Whereas she knew he meant her no harm, the shadows assumed otherwise, gathering at-the-ready at her fingertips. Damien\'s anger merely served to fuel her own, and perhaps loosen her tongue just enough to get her to talk with a bit less prodding then usual.

"What, don\'t tell me you couldn\'t feel it the minute he walked in?" there was a tone of accusation in her voice, something that wasn\'t meant for the vampire at all, but rather what derived from the rage that Nikolai had sparked. Yes, she was surprised how little Damien had felt from him, but it wasn\'t as obvious to others as it was to her. After all, her own had reacted, alerting her to what lay beneath his own skin.

"We need to relocate as soon as possible. Nikolai cannot be trusted." there was command in her voice that she scarcely recognized, not that she was trying to boss him around. Laurent would not upset this balance. Not after things were beginning to go so well. Her eyes began to soften with worry, lightening in color. Still, the Akari would not go into excruciating detail as far as the exact words that had been exchanged between the two. He did not need to suffer the same insult as she had.

[Saiketsu]

The look on his face was too commanding to be called an expression at all. His eyes had hardened and his mouth was set gravely. Of course he had felt something from the brat, but what it was he couldn\'t tell. It had only been his second time meeting Nikolai and Pierre had said nothing about it.

"Tell me just what the fuck is going on here, Storm." His voice was on edge. Several ideas were running through his mind, none of which made sense if Nikolai had followed orders just like Pierre had said he would.

Pierre had been plucking away at human life to gather his share to the empire for more than five hundred years. Never had he plucked a bad seed. Pierre was thorough in everything that he did in building the army, trained by Damien himself. So it didn\'t make sense to Damien just how the fuck Nikolai, who had been hand-picked, though not fledged, by Pierre himself, could possibly been a traitor to any sort of cause. Never ha he had a traitor in his ranks: his orders were clear to the \'T\' and traitors were given their second death. What was going so wrong that Storm could sense something and he, nor Pierre could not.

"I need to know what was said here. Now." His anger was building and his senses were becoming sharper, the pupils shrinking as he approached the island where Storm sat, face her. "Now," he repeated with his jaw set firm. "You accuse one of my men, you had damned-well have a good reason."



He didn\'t understand, not one bit.

The anger and wave of hatred that seeped through his veins at being so close to the bitch had melted away instantly once he was outside of the building. It was as if Laurent had released the anger, but kept the leeches there, still strapped to his mind and soul. "I gave you what you wanted, you fuck, now back off. Get these out of me."

No response, save for a slithering hiss of confirmation that the leeches were still there.

He had shown him the face of the building, the address hanging on the bricks of the foundation, the number of Damien\'s floor and the fucking girl inside of the apartment building. Where was the fucking reciprocation here? There was still the echo of the black hole in his chest, that leering smile, and that disgusting image of that bitch\'s rape, over and over and over again. It made him irate, to say the least.

He had done it: betrayed Damien, his fucking whore, and his best friend. So when was this going to happen? He had made it extremely clear to the vampire that all he wanted was a quick fuck and the girl. Now he had both of what he wanted, and Nikolai had nothing. He had betrayed Pierre. And for what? The echo of a black hole? Fuck that.

Fuck it all. His feet were back up on the dashboard and he even managed a smile as Pierre sang out loudly and off-key to Kanye West\'s "Homecoming", which Nikolai found absolutely darling. What a geek.

[The Cedar Witch]

Storm fell helplessly silent for a moment, watching his anger flair and surface in ways that she had become familiar with. And for whatever reason she felt completely secure, in that instant. As if fearing anything under his watch was a foolish notion to begin with. There was still a significant amount of anger in her eyes, barely under control. Slowly she raised her hand to show him, extending the shadows in a way that would make it visible to him.

"Do you have any idea what these are?" she asked softly, gazing at the things herself with morbid fascination. "It was once something that Laurent used as a method of control," she retracted the shadows with a look of disgust, and looked back to the vampire. The girl could still see the firm strength in his face, something that inexplicably made her relax further.

"Obviously," she continued in a softer voice, "I have taken control of them myself, to an extent. But by nature they react to any new shadows coming from an outside souse. They take it as a threat." Storm paused, as if unwilling to fully explain this him. "They reacted violently the second Nikolai walked in, and I could tell things were stirring in him.

"I spoke to him first. I told him that he better not be planning anything with...with him. And he said," her throat went dry, and she cleared it, deciding it best that she neglected to mention the name calling and rude insinuations. Through clenched teeth, the girl continued. "He said that if I told you, that he would take Laurent here himself.

"But I know that he could see. The shadows allow this...connection..." she shuddered, unwilling to explain the vision she saw in Nikolai\'s mind.

[Saiketsu]

Over the few months that Storm had been living in Damien\'s apartment, the two had come to talk of many things. She knew somewhat of his life with Lucretia. He knew partially of her years with Laurent. Yet there were some things that they did not speak of. Anything relating to Laurent was taboo unless Storm implied it, especially his name. But she never said his name, period. It was too strong to be pronounced in the apartment, too frightful to remember while within the walls of the small apartment.

But, unless his supernaturally strong ears were deceiving him, she had just said that unspoken name. This alone was enough to make Damien\'s hair stand on end, a hiss breaking through his lips. The vampire\'s hands curled into taloned fists and the eyes sharpened and glared at her in frustration.

Laurent Craiton. That embarrassment of a creature. No one could rightly call him a person, a mortal, a creature. He was an epitome of what Damien considered evil. The thought or inference of Storm being his... anything at all ...was sickening to the point of nausea. No, he was something that Damien accepted as part of her past, just as Lucretia had been part of his.

But Laurent wasn\'t simply a part of her past. He was her hunter, her captor who, by some miracle, lost his prey. And from what he was beginning to understand first-hand was that that fuck was relentless.

There were orders sent down the line, given to every single elder to pass on to everything single fledgling by fear of death straight from Damien or Pierre himself. Laurent Craiton, or Adam, was not to be touched, spoken over, spoken with, or ignored. Sightings of this beast (and he was given enough publicity their telepathic messages transcribed by both Storm and Damien down the telepathic networks) were to be immediately reported to the elder  vampires, for fear of this exact thing.

So, if it were at all possible, Damien would have grown pale. For a long vampire\'s moment, he froze. The blood inside his veins felt like ice as the pieces fell into place. Laurent was inside of Nikolai. Nikolai was inside of this apartment. Storm and Laurent...

He knows where she is.

Damien was speechlessly horrified. He had spent four months sheltering Storm from the forces of her past which seemed to be forever invading both of their plans of freedom. And now that was all at risk. Laurent, the thorn in all of their sides even if Storm didn\'t remain in Damien\'s possession, knew about where Storm was, and only God knew what else. Nikolai was going to pay for this. "Fuck," Damien hissed through grit teeth. Single handedly, this one mortal could destroy the entire army, the entire movement that Damien had helped to build more than nine hundred years ago.

There was no way he would let that happen, not now, not after everything that he had been through to build, to lose Lucretia, to find her again in Storm. There was no way he\'d lose her to another man\'s lust for power and property. Not Storm.

His cell phone was in his hand faster than he had ever grabbed it.

[The Cedar Witch]

"Wait," Storm paled, watching the phone seem to appear in Damien\'s hand. "What are you doing? Didn\'t you hear what I just said?" She stood suddenly, feeling helpless to prevent the dialing of whatever number the vampire planned on calling in a speed too fast for her to see.

"He\'s going to bring him here if he knows that I told you." There was desperation leaking into her voice, as if the weight of the situation had suddenly settled on her. No way was she going to be captured by him. Not again. But Storm made no move to separate the cell phone from its owner, instead watching helplessly from afar.

[Saiketsu]

Hard eyes glared at her while the ringing lapped against his ears, too slowly for his liking. "I know," was his response, deliberate and impatient.



He was much better at singing (or screaming, depending upon how you listened to music) than Pierre could have ever hoped to be. In fact, it had always amused Poerre how musically inclined a person, but especially Nikolai, could be. His voice could reach notes that he never imagined existed within any guys\'s vocal range. And scream just like they did on the mixed tape. So when Nikolai took the stage, Pierre knew enough to get off.

"Why do you always fucking stop?"

"Stop what?" He threw a glance over at the younger vampire, who still had his feet up on Camille\'s polished dashboards.

"Don\'t fuck with me, you dick." Nikolai was smiling with a row of perfectly straight and sharp teeth, giving Pierre a confonded glare. "You always stop singing as soon as I start. It drives me nuts." There was that faint faggy lisp that few cold hear, less pronounced than Pierre\'s own accent; Pierre almost didn\'t notice it anymore.

With his eyes still on the road, his hands upon Camille\'s wheels, the two vampires sped through the inner city streets at fifty-five, Camille\'s engine purring under Pierre\'s talented hands. The vampire shifted that stick and Camille moaned for them. "I don\'t know. Maybe I just don\'t want to look like an idiot."

"Because you won\'t sing?" Nikolai scoffed at the notion of insulting him. "C\'mon Pierre."

"Whatever, man." They were both smiling now.

"What? You think I\'d show you up or something?" There was that cocky smirk on his face which was so easily picked up around this young vampire. It was hard for Pierre to be a gentleman with Nikolai around. He was rude, crass, obbnoxious, and probably the best friend to go out and have some fun with.

"Yeah, something like that."

"Fuck you, dude." The younger one pushed Pierre\'s arm which had no effect on the car.

The streets were brighter than usual tonight, twilight having faded merely an hour or so ago. The city was teaming with human life simply begging to be shared, and put plainly, Pierre was ecstatic that Damien didn\'t need him yet. He and Nikolai were going out for Drinks, maybe to get lucky on a game of pool or with the ladies, and a night out with his close friend was precisely how he wanted to spend the night off.

"So you remember that girl I was telling you about?"
"Yeah, that red Justine?"
"Yeah, that\'s the one." Pierre smirked in memory. The girl was a fox, a human with an immortal body. And rode better than Camille. "Turns out she\'s got AIDS."
"No kidding?"
"Nah, but she\'s a junky. And lemme tell you: that shit\'s strong. Got a crazy bite to it. Oof." Pierre shivered at the memory of her blood in his throat. It almost kicked the shit out of him.
"No, I know it. Mad money on the street, though, and excellent for a nice toke."
"Yeah, well, she took it pretty rough. Asked me to change her. Practically begged me."
"And what ch\'you say?"
"Fuck that, man," Pierre said with a thoughtfully doubtful expression. "She\'s a local kid. I don\'t wanna get mixed up with the Oligarchy. They\'d come straight up after me. Not to mention that Ace would have my head and I tend to like it just where it is, thanks."
"So what are you you going to do?" The younger\'s voice shifted somewhat. Pierre couldn\'t put his finger on it so he simply went on.
"Well I\'m thinking about redirecting her to someone else if she\'s so interested in dying. I\'ll tell you one thing though: she\'ll never be my fledgling. She\'s a walking fucking disaster. She\'d prolly kill three on her first night and ruin everything. Fuck it, I\'m not taking that on me."
There was a pause between the two vampires before Nikolai broke it with a sly comment. "Bet you wish you could though, huh? Just for a little fun." That smirk.
"You have no idea, Nick." They both shared a laugh.

Unbeknownst to Pierre, his cell phone had been ringing for a solid two minutes straight, drowned by the bumping bass and the blaring music. It was only when he happened to glance down at the dashboard did he see the screen light up. Damien\'s number was flashing there. Pierre strayed from Camille for a moment to flip open the phone and turn down the music (getting resistance from Nikolai, of course).

"Ahlo?"



There had been no change, of course, and part of him had already accepted that fact. Sure, he wanted to be able to fuck whomever without worrying about some prick looking in on his thrusts, but he wasn\'t expecting such consideration. He was still waiting for some kind of magic to happen in one way or another.

But, for the most part, Nikolai was content. The betrayal didn\'t weigh on his mind yet; he was refusing to think of it. It was only Pierre and him tonight, out on the town and even though he didn\'t want to get just anyone for his bed, he wasn\'t about to complain about being in Pierre\'s company.

Until his phone rang.

Damien, of course. And then it began to hit him, the gravity of what was done. A heavy, sinking feeling that the leeches had been waiting for all this time. Nikolai felt himself grow slightly angry, nausea rising in pathetically small waves. Of course he made no outward notion of his discomfort. Self-preservation, Judas breathed in his ear. Something smiled behind the leeches, cynical and evil.

Nikolai pushed the thoughts away, even as a chain of Old French filtered through the earpiece. What could he do anyway? He wasn\'t Damien\'s kid, so he couldn\'t be killed by Damien or anyone in his army, and besides that, he didn\'t know exactly what was being discussed. The two vampires conversed in versions of French all the time and none of it had ever bothered Nikolai.

So he sat there, letting the leeches eat his thoughts and emotions. Manson made his grotesque appearance on the radio three times before Pierre flipped his phone shut.

For the first time in his after life, Nikolai felt the fear of a vampire\'s face. He didn\'t even look over at Pierre as he ended the conversation. Through the edges of vision, he saw his love with that frigid expression of rigidity. Camille pushed up to eighty, straight-shot. Nikolai didn\'t have to ask. But he did.

"What did he say?"

It was only when Nikolai\'s head hit the dashboard did he realize that Pierre was stopping the car. Against the forces of gravity, Nikolai sat back up straight and watched as Camille swerved all across the road with a piercing screech. By the time she stopped, Pierre still hadn\'t moved.

"What the fuck was that for?"

Pierre\'s expression didn\'t change as he turned his head towards Nikolai. "Get the fuck out. Now, you fuck."

"What?" Shock overtook him and his dead heart filled his throat.

While Pierre was known for being one of the slowest vampires in Damien\'s army, he was more well known for his strength, which could easily taken off a man\'s head with one sweep of a fist. So even though Nikolai saw the fist coming and connecting to his lower mandible, he couldn\'t avoid it. His head shattered the glass of the passenger side window.

[The Cedar Witch]

Storm stood completely at a loss for words. "And what, that\'s it?" She watched as he turned from her, waiting for Pierre (at least, she assumed it was Pierre) to pick up the phone. Pierre was with Nikolai. And wherever Nikolai was, he was watching through his eyes, no doubt listening too. And the instant either of them realizes what exactly Storm confessed to, as soon as his \'prey\' was on the move, he would move in to strike.

"Do you even care?" fear etched its way deeply into the girl\'s voice. She found the last word caught in her throat, making her accusation sound pathetically weak to say the least. But her intense eyes, flickering an array of hues, followed the vampire as he paced the floor. Back and fourth. Although he did not speak, Storm could feel the anger radiating from him like heat from the sun. None of this deterred her.

"Are you even listening to me?" She was approaching hysterics, though only minuet amounts leaked into her voice. Everything inside of her screamed Get Out While You Still Have The Time, but the Akari was frozen in place. After an agonizing, dozen or so rings, Pierre still did not pick up. Thousands of scenarios ran through her mind, most involving him intercepting the two on their drive to god-knew-where, and some fight ensuing.

The fast, nearly unbroken, angry stream of French caused her to jump. So Pierre wasn\'t in the midst of a battle. That thought brought her less comfort then she would have liked. The language that she had grown to love, no matter how sparingly it was spoken over the course of the four months she spent in Damien\'s company, now caused her to tremble in anxiety. It frustrated her that she didn\'t know what was being said, and she didn\'t know how to brace her mind for what was to come.

The conversation seemed endless, and the girl\'s mind traced back through unpleasant memories, as if reminding her of what may occur if she didn\'t get the fuck out. Now. The trembling that had begun in her hands crept slowly through her body, something she was hoping Damien wouldn\'t notice because she was feeling weak enough as it is. There was no way in hell she was going back. No fucking way in hell.

[Saiketsu]

The phone flipped shut and Damien tried to relax, cold blood that desperately now needed to be refreshed rushing sluggishly through his veins. He couldn\'t think too much. Damien was getting a headache as all the images of his purpose and life flooded his mind.

Of course he had heard her. Of course he cared. Of course he could feel her fear pulsing in his veins. Or was that his own? "Of course I am," he said finally through his masked anger. The vampire looked up at her with intense, unreadible eyes.

"But I need to ask something. Are you ready to go out now?"



Black flowers bloomed over his vision, but he wasted no time. "Get out!" But he never listened in the first place. Without checking his injuries, the younger vampire threw a a fist around at the blonde, watching as it connected with his cheekbone. In the time it took for Pierre to recover, Nikolai was out of the car in a wild, Judas-inspired rage.

Nausea complicated the situation as Nikolai waited for Pierre to recover, black blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. His scalp felt wet and sticky as Pierre stepped out of the car. The Judas tried to take hold of the reins, but never did he imagine that he\'d be fighting Pierre, his precious Jean-Luc.

But the blonde was on a rampage, filled with utter hatred for him that wasn\'t misplaced. And when he approached the sidewalk on which Nikolai stood, there would be no stopping him. His jaw felt like rubber; if he weren\'t already dead a blow like that would have killed him intantaneously. Nikolai couldn\'t tell if that was a good or a bad thing.

"What have you done!" Pierre\'s expression ran feral as he grabbed Nikolai by the collar without much effort. How could he fight him? Jean-Luc. Self-preservation.

"I did what I had to do," Nikolai spat, struggling to free himself from the elder\'s iron grip. "I don\'t expect you to understand."

"Damn right I don\'t. What the fuck is wrong with you?" The elder released him with a hard shove that left Nikolai degraded and on his ass.

"Me!? What the fuck is wrong with you!? Go ahead Pierre, follow Damien around like a blind fucking dog. That\'s all you\'ll ever be to him anyway." His mouth was on fire: it could speak all the anger he had held back from the blonde and his undying committment to Damien and Damien alone. Still it couldn\'t find the fire to tell him what had happened, or his feelings, or anything at all.

"You little prick." Pierre had grabbed him by the collar and followed it up by picking him off the ground as if he weighed nothing in the first place. A brick wall of the alley that the pair was in found Nikolai\'s back hard enough to make his own personal dent. "How dare you speak of things you have no idea about!" He made sure that Nikolai\'s head cracked against the brick. The white flash that passed through his head at that moment churned the nausea he had in the first place.

Nikolai fought, of course. His leg bent up to knee the frenchman in the chin, knocking himself loose. The vampire slid down the wall roughly, unaccompanied by either Judas or the leeches.

The leeches. They were in his mind, he could feel them there. Could feel them holding back strength and motivation. He heard a laugh and began to understand as Pierre recovered. Laurent was there, alright. He was leaving Nikolai to finally fight his own battles, acting as a spectator from the front row. Smiling.

"You prick," he said outloud. This was what he wanted, wasn\'t it? If it were at all possible, Nikolai\'s heart would have broke as Pierre made that last charge in his direction.

As much as he may have liked being with Pierre, there was no possible way he\'d let himself resist this battle. Pierre would wreck him, wring him out and leaving him to dry in the sun. It was expected and inevitable. He would fight even if it killed him. If his precious Jean-Luc would kill him.

Nikolai let out a hiss as the elder vampire threw a kick into his ribcage, breaking them easily. Pain flared up in his dead organs, somewhat like fire in his body. Another kick. And another, until the younger reached out and grabbed Pierre\'s lega dn toppled him. The two wrestled on the ground, arms swinging and landing with bone-breaking intensity. They were a hissing, searing mess of limbs.

The two separated via visicious shoves on either side, each vampire licking wounds and shooting daggers at the other.

"Do you even know what you\'ve done!? Laurent knows where we are now, all of us! You\'ve put the entire empire in danger, you fuck!" Pierre gasped between thick, weary breaths. "Me, Storm, Damien --"

"Oh fuck Damien for a minute, Pierre and think for yourself!" Nikolai saw the wounded expression, wide-eyed shock of his best friend, his love, his precious Jean-Luc. But that mouth kept running out of pure frustration and hatred from Damien. It hurt to say it, but it just flowed from his mouth. "You might as well let him fuck you, you pussy. He\'s got you so wrapped around that little finger of his that you might as well as be his bitch. You\'re his pussy, Pierre. Fucking think for yourself for the first time in your life!" There. It was out. Nausea swept over him again.

The shock and injury turned to pure rage. His hand shot out and wrapped around Nikolai\'s throat. This is it, he thought, the hand squeezing hard, nails digging holes. "You faggot. Go back to Laurent so he can give you what you\'re so begging for, to get what\'s coming to you. I hope he makes a rag out of you and that ass of yours, you faggot." Pierre shoved him back down on his ass, laying in the dirt. "You\'re lucky I can\'t kill you, you fucking faggot."

Without another word and only a look of disgust given to the vampire on the ground, Pierre stood and got back into Camille, burning out as he left.

Faggot. It was a degradation and that was the only thing he felt as he lay in the earth. Nikolai only watched Camille leave with half-open eyes. The leeches retreated with a cackle that made Nikolai want to heave up all the blood that he had ever consumed.

He was all alone in some muddy alley. No Judas. No fucking Laurent. No Pierre.

I love you, he wanted to say. I\'m sorry, he wanted to say. I never wanted to betray you, he wanted to say. But they don\'t call me Judas for nothing.

[The Cedar Witch]

Helplessness. Total helplessness. She didn\'t feel heard, even if he had claimed that he was indeed listening to her. If he had listened, he wouldn\'t have called, alerting Nikolai, alerting him. The control over the whole predator-prey situation had quietly slipped from her hands, and the game was on a whole new playing field. Short-lived peace. Go out? When he could be waiting outside as they spoke? Waiting to strike at their most vulnerable, when confusion had swept them into a frantic state? And then what?

"I\'m still--"

And then something hit her in the back of the head, nothing hard enough to give her any large amounts of pain, but enough to alert her attention. The girl spun around suddenly, searching wildly for the cause, finding nothing. The Akari\'s eyes flickered with renewed fear, and she turned back to Damien with a puzzled, terrified expression. "What\'s--"

Again, pain came flooding into her abdomen, momentarily paralyzing her lungs. Breathe. Wild panic seized her in that moment of suffocation, tears pooling at the corners of her eyes. Her mind was thrown into a frenzy as the shadows moved to mentally protect themselves from any attack. But there was nothing. Inhale. With her lungs suddenly freed, she gasped, sputtering an exhale before she had any time to savor the air that had been finally taken in. The girl could feel the skin on her abdomen beginning to bruise. Already. And suddenly the thought occurred to her.

"Nikolai was attacked," she managed to sputter, inhaling and exhaling too fast for her to recover from the initial blow. It was all too real now. Everything she had suspected in Nikolai had just been verified. There were strong ties between the three of them, and he had the vampire wrapped around his finger, doing his dirty work. It was already too late for her, Storm was sure of it. Fuck. Dry-heaves nearly overtook her, labored coughs echoing through the apartment.

Shakily she walked over to the couch, trembling with more panic then before she had even felt anything physical as she sat. Never before, not in the beginning, had she ever felt this much fear for the Zalmric. Not when he had taken her that first time into his bed. Not when he commanded her to kill without emotion. Not when she had killed without emotion. Nothing. Nothing but a dull numbness that called for her to preform her duty as his. But it was different now. Now she had punishment to suffer. The consequences of acting outside of strict orders, destroying everything he had invested his time into, and taking off for god-knew-how-long.

Storm tried to control her breathing with every calming technique known to man, but nothing took the reins from Fear. He was coming for her, she could nearly feel it. The shadows dancing just below her skin devoured her fear, growing stronger, causing disgust to posses her mind alongside of the initial panic.

"He\'s going to find me," the girl whispered, unable to control the tremor in her voice. Above everything she wanted to be rid of the shadows, the memories, and the fear.

[Saiketsu]

He had almost forgotten how warm living flesh could be when fear and panic took over. He was on his knee in front of her as her eyes flickered wild colors of reds, browns, and shades of blacks, and his cold hands were on her shoulders. Her gaze was vacant and here breaths were painful enough for even Damien to feel as he looked upon her. The panic was palpable and partially contagious.

Storm. Nikolai. Laurent. They were all connected now, and Storm was feeling the results of it. The thought made his jaw rigid with anger.

"Nikolai was attacked," she had said. It didn\'t take Damien much time to guess who may have done that. Good, he thought, enjoying the fact that Nikolai wasn\'t getting out of this without some kind of punishment from his end of the stick. That little fuck deserved to have the shit kicked out of him, and there was no one better to do it than Pierre. If Damien had his way, Nikolai would have been burned for his treason against the crown, just like it was supposed to be, but the last thing he needed was the Oligarchy wandering into his own business while the empire was still weakened. Damien\'s own reputation was already murky enough and he didn\'t need some vampire\'s blood on his hands. Nikolai wasn\'t even worth that much to him.

He had lost his researcher, his most clever vampire in losing Nikolai, but he was expendable if Damien grit his teeth. There was nothing, Damien decided as he looked up into Storm\'s face, that could ever redeem Nikolai. God save him once this city is mine.

"No, he\'s not, Storm." His grip was strong and determined, but the girl didn\'t look up at him still. Damien tried to get her attention, but she refused him, he eyes pointed down and out, avoiding anymore connection. He said her name and, without thinking, place his hands on both sides of her face, something he had down several time before to a similar woman centuries ago. Storm yielded to him, allowing that connection through. "No one is going to find you because we\'re not staying here." His voice was calm and even as he looked into her eyes, certain memories filing out of her clouded eyes. There, Laurent smiled through memory, and Storm reacted with a flood of new panic.

"Do you trust me?" It was a problem they had constantly had from the beginning: trust. It was a hard thing to do when all you knew was dishonesty. He had felt it himself ages ago, felt it towards his youngest descendants who had not yet proved loyalty to their Father. But to feel it from Storm... that was.. different.

[The Cedar Witch]

"I\'m trying," Storm softly answered, the tremors running through her body lessening to a degree. His calm and even voice was much comfort to her, though she couldn\'t recognize it at first. It wasn\'t an instant flood of peace, but something she felt as though she could lean on, if only for a moment to regain her footing. Funny, she didn\'t mind his attempts to calm her now when before she would have flinched away from his touch.

It was the trust factor that the Akari was having difficulty with, as always. Their relationship wasn\'t nearly as abrasive as it once had been, four months prior to everything. Whether it was genuine on her part, or simply her habit of falling into a pattern of expectations, she found it easier to deal with Damien. He wasn\'t as frightening or intimidating as he had been back when everything was completely new. She didn\'t dread his company, to say the least.

But trust? That was something a bit more complicated, even with the friendship. Sure, he knew a hell of a lot about what had happened to her, but she never really went into much detail (mostly for her own sake). But would she risk leaving the safety of the apartment (or what safety remained) and venture out in the open, with nothing but Damien to keep her from recapture? Yes.

"I do not want to go back," the girl expressed firmly through her teeth, fingernails digging into the palms of her hands. The colors had settled on flickering from gray to red, and Storm hadn\'t even noticed that she had relaxed enough for this to occur. She looked at him with an expression of hesitation mixed with distant hope. She wanted to leave.

[Saiketsu]

He pulled her into his chest, a motion he was becoming used to while she was panicking. He had done it out at the Lighthouse when she had awaken from a dream months ago. But he held her there, trying to take her worry into his hollowed chest.

She didn\'t trust him, and while he understood completely as to why she couldn\'t, it didn\'t make things easier for either of them in this mess of joint existence. It frustrated him, but it wasn\'t anything he wasn\'t unaccustomed to after these past few months. Damien had a heart -- however dead it may have been -- and he could give her the benefit of the doubt here, but he couldn\'t help but wonder how long her mistrust would last.

It was odd to be so close to her. She was warmer than typical, emotion flooding her skin. Her head lay just below his collar bone and he could smell her easily, which didn\'t help his welling Thirst or the need to kill. Nonetheless, he felt oddly comforted by having Storm there, his arms wrapped around her, holding her fast. He tried not to question it, but thoughts flooded his mind about a life once had versus a life that was lived currently. And, as if it were a catalyst of some sort, her emotions mingled with his own and the discomfort or confusion of holding her, of protecting her and securing her and her sanity faded. It was simply an embrace of a friend, of Storm, whose mind was so utterly entranced with chaos this was the only possible help he could offer.

He couldn\'t have said exactly how long he held her, but it became less of a problem the longer he did it, something that would disturb him later. Something hot and wet nearly seared his skin as he continued to hold her; she was crying silently.

Storm never cried, something for which Damien was thankful for. He hated to see a girl cry; it pulled at him somewhere when they did, making him feel guilty about something he did, like claiming them as a child or killing their lover or family. It was something that his sister had instilled in him long ago, back in France. But he had only seen Storm cry once, that night she had awoken from her sleep. Tonight, he said nothing to her and just let her have her time, trying to remain as unmoving as he could. He felt no guilt for this. None.

[The Cedar Witch]

She sighed and relaxed almost immediately with the sudden rush of physical contact. This was the flood Storm subconsciously was waiting for. But in that instant that the damn of tension broke free, she felt as though everything were falling apart. The peace she had become so accustomed to for the past for months, no matter how short that seemed. She had allowed herself to become so comfortable without hardly thinking of him at all, letting her guard down enough to let Damien, just a little bit. It was routine, and the Akari had been so completely fine with it.

But Nikolai had thrown everything off balance for her. From that second meeting, she had suspected that something was going on behind the scenes, but made no indication of her concern. The girl was kicking herself for it now. But it was too late now, there would be no going back in time to make changes. The sanctuary from her years of wandering was actually falling apart, slipping through her fingers.

She was hardly aware of the fact that she was crying, her attention acutely focused on how comfortable she felt in his arms. Even if he wasn\'t living and warm. For a second Storm found herself back at the Lighthouse, back when she had that last encounter with him in her dreams, back when she panicked. It was different this time, the embrace more effective and felt with a completely different attitude. And no, she did not feel like a tool.

No noise escaped her lips, no sobs caused her shoulders to shake. The only movement was her uneven breathing and occasional hiccup of tears. Eventually, when the flow of hot, salty emotion slowed, she found her rhythmic breathing again. She made no initial move to pull away from him, finding his strong presence enough reassurance for her to actually trust him this time. Still she was silent, waiting for him to make a move.

[Saiketsu]

He had hardly noticed her tension ebb as she sat there in his arms. He was enjoying her scent. He was enjoying her mortal flesh and its glorious heat. It almost made him miss being human. So he hardly noticed that his arms were comfortable or that she had stopped crying until the heat withdrew somewhat. A type of simple embarrassment flooded him. It was unlike him to space out so much, to become that openly physical with anyone.

With soft ease, Damien pulled himself away from Storm, keeping the attention of the now-focusing eyes of the girl on his own. "Listen to me," he spoke softly, a rare gentleness in his expression. His hands were on her shoulders again, something which ordinarily would have felt too personal for him. "You\'re safe with me. Nothing is going to happen. You and I are simply going to relocate from now on. We need to go out. You need to go into the woods to do your own thing before you... you know. I\'m going to set something up involving somewhere to stay tomorrow. Just relax." And then a smirk appeared on his face. "I\'ve got a small army of near-indestructible vampires at my fingertips. What makes you think you\'re in danger?"