Exchanging Unpleasantries

[realworldweirdo]

{Location/time - Near Sticks & Stakes Pool Hall/early night time}

Conner sidled behind a dumpster and watched the Valkyries and a single Idisi pass the alley he was in, holding the limp human corpse he had been about to drop. It was probably a good thing he\'d just fed, as he was terrible at cloaking his presence from the brunette servants of Freyja; their mental abilities sometimes far outstripped his own. His free hand went to his waist, to ensure that the enhanced tow chain was there, hidden by the tail of his untucked black cotton button down shirt.

His Zippo and a small squeeze bottle of lighter fluid were in his battered old leather jacket, along with a blood-soaked metal snap bracelet that he\'d enchanted to hide his presence. He wasn\'t wearing it now because it also muted his psychic senses, and he found it to be rather like walking around blindfolded.

The gang of humans following the Valkyries finally passed, leaving him in peace. Which was fortunate, because the dead man\'s shirt ripped at that moment, letting the limp body fall to the pavement....

....and knock over a recycling can. Really? Who kept a fucking recycling bin full of aluminum cans next to a goddamn dumpster?

So much for his luck; Conner felt the humans in the rear take pause, and heard the voice of a woman coming from ahead of the group. Not taking the time to figure out if they were coming for him or not, Conner whipped the snap bracelet out of his jacket pocket and brought it down on his right wrist. The metal instantly stuck to his flesh as though glued, and his awareness of the energies and minds around him vanished.

Summoning his celerity, he darted in the opposite direction of the gang, pausing only to light a cigarette for a steady source of fire. The other end of the alley was a good distance away, and he was distracted, so he couldn\'t even see who he ran into as he emerged from the other side.

[Black Philip]

This little shit bag.

Lisa-Joe choked a human cultist. He\'d been a bad boy. She\'d been on a little stroll, and out of know where this bitch had stuck a metal pike into her side. He\'d been screaming "For the dark lady!" In a flash of speed, the pike had been removed, the mortal\'s wrist had been slit, and Lisa-Joe had fed. After draining just enough to heal her wound, she\'d healed his wrist, and then strung him up by his neck.

"You ruined my sweater!" she cursed into the cold night. "It\'s a Balenciaga!"

The cultist was unable to speak, but tried in effort to curse his vampire captor.

"It\'s a one of a kind item, and now I can never wear it again! Fucking moron. You know, I\'m not even mad that you stabbed me. That just shows what an idiot you are. Killing vampires with a metal pike? Didn\'t your Dark Lady tell you anything?! I should kill you right now right here."

By now, the human was magenta. He began to fall asleep, when Lisa-Joe dropped him to the ground. He gasped for breath, while Lisa-Joe pulled out a compact from her purse, and began applying lipstick. The human then vomited. The whole time Lisa-Joe didn\'t bat an eyelash.

"Let\'s be clear," Lisa-Joe informed. "I\'m not scared of your cheeply dressed queen. I\'m leaving you alive so you can tell her Lisa-Joe said that. I\'m Brujah. Hear me fucking roar."

She put away the compact. She turned and focused her full attention on her attacker. He looked painfully normal. Although Lisa-Joe hadn\'t admitted it, she\'d really spared him because she knew it wasn\'t his fault. He was enslaved.

"I\'d run if I were you," she advised. "I can\'t do super speed in pumps, but I\'m willing to take off these four inch heels to run you down and rip out your spinal cord."

The man ran into the night. All was well. Lisa-Joe examined the sweater. It was totaled. Her skin tight black jeans were okay, and her red hair hadn\'t moved an inch. She\'d hair sprayed it to the point of flammable to keep it that way. The night was quiet. There was eyeliner that needed to be applied. She took out her compact again and pulled out a pencil from her small black purse. She took the time to do her eyes just right. She smiled at herself in the mirror.

"Per-----!!!!!!!"

Slam. Lisa-Joe was knocked to the ground.

[realworldweirdo]

Conner hit someone very solid and ricocheted off of them, bouncing into the street while losing skin and dignity the whole way. He managed to stop himself only one lane into the street, and fortunately there were no cars coming. Rolling to his feet in a crouched position, hand moving to his waist to grab his preferred weapon, he regarded the undead obstacle and recognized her aura.

Crap, his psychic senses were back. The bracelet must have come off, and he could neither see it nor feel it. Its aura was indistinguishable from normal energy, even to him. For all he knew, it had gone down a storm drain.

"Lisa-Joe, we have incoming, and there are two of the blond bitches and a dark haired douche heading the pack," he stated bluntly. "My apologies for running into you."

Now that the bracelet was off, he could feel the humans hurrying down the alley behind him and the more intense energies of the Valkyries following. He unwound the chain from his waist with a practiced move and walked over, holding it out. He would have thrown it, but it would have collided with her hand with the force of a twenty pound sledgehammer.

"M\'lady," he said politely, seeing that she was unarmed.

[Black Philip]

MY HAIR IS RUINED!!!!!

Lisa-Joe was fucking furious. She sea-sawed to her feet, and shot out her favorite weapons. Two pointed fangs now glistened in the night. Her perfect hair was now all discombobulated and someone was going to pay for it. Conner.

No, not him. The people he\'s running from.

Lisa-Joe saw Conner was mostly unharmed, but heard his severe message. When he held out the chain, she grunted a little. Normally she would have laughed, but now that her hair was messed up, this was serious.

"Keep your fucking chain. I want to eat these bitch\'s faces," she snarled. "I may even rip off their scalps for this insult."

She pointed to the mess that was her perfect hair.

[realworldweirdo]

"Have it your way," he said simply, biting his tongue and spitting a gob of blood onto the chain. His tongue finished healing at the same time his scrapes and bruises did, and he was aware of the energy in his blood being absorbed by the chain\'s enchantment.

Gorge yourself, he commanded the chain mentally, and the enchantment responded to his command. Only his control of the enchantment kept it from drawing out energy from his hand. When it struck, its blessing would be minutely strengthened. Normally, when it struck, a tiny portion of its strength was used up.

He wanted the spirits of those Valkyries trapped in his weapon. Those, he could use to do some powerful things. All he had to do was kill one of them with it and saturate it in her blood before her spirit passed from her body.

Then there was a trio of humans running out of the alley\'s mouth, screaming devotions to Freyja and slurs against the Oligarchy.

So much for secrecy.

The chain whipped around and ripped the head off the first human, a woman that Conner took no further note of as he focused his mind on a second, who was wielding a gun. Bullets hurt, so he bore his own mind down on the middle-aged man\'s and showed him real

PAIN

The man buckled and seized, screaming like an animal and foaming at the mouth even though Conner had only maintained the assault for a moment. He would have waded further into the battle, but he didn\'t have any fire.

So he took a moment to light a cigarette to replace the one he\'d lost in the collision, casually punching a human in the temple and dropping them with a sick, wet crunch. A bullet ripped off his right ear at the same time he got the miniature, overly-sweet cigarello lit.

The initial puff of smoke met the air as a long and furious stream of German profanity, and the rest of what were easily thirty humans came rushing out of the alley as he clapped his free hand to the side of his head.

[Black Philip]

Snap! Lisa-Joe was snapping human necks at lightning speed. She didn\'t like to kill, but these gun-totten mother fuckers were giving her no choice. A bullet breezed by her shoulder. She turned to see the human she\'d let go only a few moments earlier firing the weapon. She zoomed up to him in a quarter of a second, and half a second later he\'d been ripped in half.

"That brought me more pleasure than you could ever know baby," Lisa-Joe chuckled. "Was it good for you too?" she asked the torso and head.

Her purse was discarded. Her nails were being used like razors, and her mouth was covered in human blood. This was a God damn revolution in Lisa-Joe\'s eyes. She loved the carnage. Just when she\'d killed more humans than she\'d been hoping too, a punch of supernatural strength knocked Lisa-Joe into a nearby brick wall. The impact dazed the Brujah for only a moment. She stood up to see two Valkyries chanting over an Idisi. The humans were backing off. Her attacker was a tall, proud looking woman with dark hair and even darker eyes. She looked at Lisa-Joe with a look of total contempt. This bitch knew who she was dealing with.

"Conner, take the blondes," Lisa-Joe barked. "I want the brunette! You\'re dinner sweetie!"

With that Lisa-Joe rushed headlong into a fight against a much more powerful foe.

[realworldweirdo]

The blood stopped oozing from the torn stump of his ear almost immediately, but it didn\'t start growing back. That wouldn\'t happen until he\'d fed, and would probably take a couple of days even then.

"Now I\'m pissed," he grumbled, noticing that the surviving humans had backed away as the Idisi stepped forward. The Valkyries continued their stream of energy to empower the brunette combatant, who had just dealt Lisa-Joe a ferocious blow. He\'d seen them use this tactic before. The Valkyries were potent foes, but not as dangerous as the Idisi they were helping. He was grateful for Lisa-Joe\'s distraction at this point, because it gave him time to yank his bottle of lighter fluid out of his jacket and tear it open, spilling the liquid on the ground.

Chances were they wouldn\'t notice that the puddle was sliding along the ground near his feet, staying within easy range of his hydrokinetic ability.

He approached the Valkyries slowly, whirling his enhanced chain around him as one might when using a sectional staff. His celerity, while not a power he excelled at, turned the spinning chain into a howling disc of destruction. His cigarette puffed out smoke that was whisked away by the chain\'s breeze. He had the Valkyries\' attention now, that was for certain, but he didn\'t dare look to see how Lisa-Joe was faring. He needed to ensure the Idisi would lose the Valkyries\' support, so he did something very dramatic.

Lighter fluid streamed up from the puddle that had crept along the ground by his feet, soaking the outer half of the chain. Fire blossomed from his cigarette, catching the fluid on fire and turning the already-lethal weapon into a spinning wheel of screaming fire, sustained partially by his own energy.

This display was costing him more energy than he\'d like, but it certainly seemed effective. The Valkyries were fully focused on him, and closing in. The stream of energy going to the Idisi was attenuated, but not gone.

"You have no idea who you\'re fucking with," he yelled furiously around his cigarette. "Get the hell out of my city!"

Conner charged the blondes at full speed in a halo of fire and steel, fangs gleaming red in the firelight.

[Black Philip]

Smack! Lisa-Joe was flung like a rag doll into the nearest brick wall. She fell with a thud, but was up quicker than the attacking party would have liked. The two women were locked in a combat so fast, that even Conner\'s eyes would have had difficulty focusing if he\'d been looking. Lisa-Joe was not faring well. This Idisi had terrible strength and even more terrible speed. Every blow the Brujah through was deflected and countered. Hair was ripped from both women as their fists, and bare feet met contact with the other\'s body. Lisa-Joe\'s heels were broken into pieces on the nearby ground. Suddenly Lisa-Joe was hosted up and heard the terrible sound of her spine being cracked. The Idisi tossed her into the wall again. This time Lisa-Joe took much longer to get up.

"Pathetic fool," the Idisi heckled. "My maidens empower me. They make me stronger than you could ever hope to become." Lisa-Joe made a fast rush but was deflected, and now held in a choke.

"My mistress\'s blood has granted us power beyond that of your demi-mortal comprehension. Her blood flows through my veins and is now mine. You vampires think yourself Gods when your barley above the pawn scum you gain substance from" Lisa-Joe kicked the Idisi in the gut, making her let go off the choke.

Lisa-Joe panted a bit away. "Can you think of the one word you shouldn\'t have said?"

The Idisi\'s confusion gave Lisa-Joe the time to enact her plan. She leaped onto the Idisi and sunk her fangs deep into her neck. The scream of pain was heard by all. Lisa-Joe drank. She was hanging on for dear life, as the Idisi tried desperately to remove her. After a few moments, Lisa-Joe was thrown off. She landed on her feet, and wiped her mouth clean.

"You\'re right bitch," Lisa-Joe mocked. "This is some good shit. I\'d say we\'re a bit more evenly matched now."

The temporary buff of blood was enough to help even the scales.

[realworldweirdo]

Conner was distracted when Lisa-Joe was thrown into the wall the second time; he\'d heard the familiar sound of bones snapping. Glancing over, he saw that his compatriot had somehow managed to get up, sink her fangs into the enemy\'s neck, and was feeding. He didn\'t know if she\'d regenerate from that feeding fast enough to continue to fight, but he couldn\'t spare her any more attention at the moment.

The Valkyries had noticed that he was distracted and had taken advantage. One, with strawberry blond hair in ringlets hanging around her shoulders, had taken up a position behind him. The other, with straight sun-bleached blond hair pulled into a short ponytail, was coming at him from the front.

He danced out of their way, flaming chain spinning protectively around him as they closed. They were faster than he anticipated, and he was forced to attack with his weapon; they skittered just outside its range, barely evading being badly wounded. Another gunshot rang through the night, and pain blossomed in his torso underneath his sternum. Had he been human, that would have been a lethal shot. As it was, it was painful and distracting.

Distracting enough to allow Strawberry to seize him from behind, dragging his arms behind his back. The chain\'s fire, cooled by the velocity of its spin and sustained only by his concentration, winked out as his weapon struck the old asphalt of the alley, gouging out a chunk of eroded pavement with a loud sound of clashing metal. He struggled to get free of the surprisingly powerful Valkyrie\'s grip, then realized that the energy flow from Ponytail had been diverted to his would-be captor.

Conner drew fire from his cigarette and unleashed it in a blossom of heat behind Strawberry\'s back, catching her hair ablaze. As planned, her grip slackened and Conner\'s now-free arm shot forward, spinning the enhanced chain at Ponytail\'s neck as fast as he could.

[Black Philip]

The battle was currently a stalemate. The blood buff had given Lisa-Joe the strength to recover, and to even the scales. However, it was not enough to overpower the mighty Idisi. The two women were locked in a violent combat, that kept them both on their toes. The Idisi\'s taunts were now gone. She needed that energy in order to deflect Lisa-Joe\'s punches. Lisa-Joe could feel her opponent\'s anger, and although this should have filled her with pleasure it actually filled her with fear. The anger gave her power, and the Idisi was hitting to kill. There would be no more throws into walls. If caught by the throat, the gentlewoman knew she\'d be dust. The counterpoint was that the Idisi had the same fear, and fought more defensively than before. This lost aggression proved useful to Lisa-Joe. Her mind was focused like a laser, and so she didn\'t see her friend be chocked by the valkyrie. Had she, Lisa-Joe would have dashed to intercept. She and Conner were not great friends by any means, but these last few years had drawn all who fought the Goddess into a thieves\' friendship. They were loyal and true to each other for the cause, but weren\'t exactly personable about much else. Lisa-Joe spun her claw-like nails towards the neck of the Idisi. She missed the jugular, but caught the breast. The Idisi screamed in pain. The terrifying creature bled blood. It was not a lethal wound, but an embarrassing one. The monster fought with new vigor against her vampire opponent. Unless Conner killed the valkyries, this was a battle that could only be won through attrition.

[realworldweirdo]

His attack worked.

The chain, thrown with vampire strength and sped on its way by celerity, slapped itself around Ponytail\'s neck with several times the force it rightfully should have had. The sound of flesh being crushed and bones snapping like twigs was audible even to human ears. She dropped instantly, the chain looped loosely around her ruined and crushed neck. Blood oozed from her ears and nose from the sudden spike in blood pressure.

The energy and the spirit that had inhabited her fled the corpse instantly. So much for trapping one; he\'d need a new plan for that.

Sensing the Valkyrie behind him approach rapidly, he guessed where her head would be and spun, lashing out with the heel of his palm for where he guessed her nose would be. Blinded by fury and vengeance, the enemy failed to anticipate his acute psychic senses.

The bones in Scorched Strawberry\'s nose and face crunched wetly under the combined force of her supernaturally accelerated charge and his celerity-enhanced flat palm. She rose off the ground, going horizontal before crashing to the asphalt of the alleyway. Conner\'s boot met her temple a half-second later just before he dove down to feed, desperate to restore his nearly exhausted resources of blood and magic.

There was nothing neat about this; he intended to kill her anyway. Conner tore her neck open with his teeth and drank as quickly as possible, aware that not all the humans had scattered yet and that Lisa-Joe was still fighting the Idisi. Still, she hadn\'t asked for his help, so the prudent choice was to restore his strength first.

[Black Philip]

Lisa-Joe found the fight slowly tipping in her favor. The Idisi was having a much harder time keeping up with her blows, and Lisa-Joe could sense her fear increase. Lisa-Joe gave her opponent a powerful kick to the gut, and sent her flying to the other side of the alley. This brief pause was just enough time for her to see Conner drinking the blood of one off the valkyries. Her lips curved into a sinister smile. Now that her battery backs were gone, the Idisi was no longer enhanced. She was still a powerful foe on her own, but no longer a challenge to Lisa-Joe.  

The brunette attacked the redhead at full force, screaming a rage filled war cry. Her speed was now pathetic, and her rage weakened her further. Lisa-Joe waited and just as the Idisi came within grabbing distance, she ripped out her throat. The Idisi fell to the street with a thud. Large pieces of her neck flesh were now in Lisa-Joe Hampton\'s delicate hands. She was dead, and Lisa-Joe was not at all sad she\'d killed her. She turned to face Conner.

"Now what," she said.

[realworldweirdo]

"Now we clean ourselves up," Conner pointed out, raising his head from the dead Valkyrie\'s neck. His feeding was far from neat, and there was blood around his mouth and dripping down his chin; he\'d used up a lot of energy in the fight, and would probably drain the corpse dry. Besides which, the savage part of him was running hot after the clash, and he wasn\'t inclined to restrain himself overmuch. "We look far from our best."

The humans had scattered when the battle tipped in the vampires\' favor, leaving a few bodies but little evidence otherwise. He frowned at the mess before going back to the dripping neck of his kill. Too many bodies to take to a safe haven for disposal on their own; they\'d need to contact an Oligarchy team for cleanup.

The blood wasn\'t coming easily anymore, and he gave up on his morbid sustenance by conventional means. Instead, he swept a hand over the body, pulling the fluids behind it. He had to be careful not to seize the liquid too hard, or else he\'d get a disgusting mix of bodily fluids that were unpalatable. As it was, he got a decent sized orb of blood to gush out of the gaping hole in the former Valkyrie\'s neck and hover just over the palm of his hand.

He sucked on it as one might in zero gravity, which took more focus on his part than it appeared. Even by supernatural standards, it was a bizarre sight.

"I\'ll call Jake for a cleanup crew," he added as an afterthought. "Unless you have facilities we can use to dispose of the bodies."

[Black Philip]

Lisa-Joe was busying pulling guts out of her hair. Her outfit was ruined, her night was done for. Lisa-Joe liked a good fight as much as any other person in her clan, but afterwords she looked at blood the way most people viewed cum. It\'s hot when it first comes out, but then it\'s just gross and sticky. She turned and responded to Conner\'s question.

"No, I\'ll call Jake." She looked for her purse on the street and picked it up. The bag was fine, save for some dirt. She reached in and pulled out her iphone. She scanned her contacts and found Jake near the top. She smirked at Conner. For him this would have been a thirty minute affair, which is why Lisa-Joe had offered.

The phone rang and then went to voicemail. Hi this is Jake, please leave a message after the beep. BEEP!

"Jake it\'s Lisa-Joe, we have a stage four wipe near the pool hall. No witnesses, just a ton of bodies. It\'s me and Conner. Call me back. Love ya bye."

She hung up the phone. "Now I guess we wait, and keep humans from discovering this. Any ideas?"