SUE VS SUE
Jul. 7th, 2013 02:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
a_sporking_ratFirstly, I would like to deeply apologize for my terrible portrayal of Cockney with Wander that you're about to endure. I'm so, so crappy with accents and regional slang.
Secondly, someone once suggested that back in the day, Dragon looked like Xena, and that today she looks more like Joan Jett. That has forever been my headcanon since, just thought I'd throw that out there.
Thirdly, credits:
Wander and Ghislaine belong to wanderingworlds
Nan belongs to nanoquill
Cefyn belongs to evilgrayson
Astrid, Edgar, and Sig all belong to cygnusrex
Tung belongs to tungsten monk
Fell belongs to ladyfellshot
Mitria belongs to mitrian
Hank belongs to writtenelision
All other non-canon characters mentioned in this segment belong to me
SUE VS SUE
"So, where are you from?" Mephisto (that was what Wander had decided to call him, forget this 'Dev for Devil' nonsense) had asked a routine question, but Wander had to scramble for an answer. She remembered that Hank had told her that according to him, Wander was just passing through St. Louis on her way to another Rodere. What trek could bring her on that route?
"Ah...well, originally as you can tell Oi ain't from 'merricuh but Oi been residin' in, er..." Where was Ghislaine from again? "The bayou, in, uh, you know, Cajun country, and right now Oi'm on me way to..." What was north?" "Canada, a Rodere in Canada. Gettin' a transfer, see. They felt they needed someone wit' my skills up there.
"Oh? What are your skills?" Mephisto did not seem to have noticed or been made suspcious by her multiple pauses. This was because her Cockney accent was so thick he was assuming she was struggling to find words he would understand, which was also true.
"Oh I love blowing up--" She caught herself just in time to realize she probably shouldn't tell him she's a demolitions expert "--"balloons! Oimma party planner by profession, see. Can't have a Moriarty without me!"
"A...what?"
"Moriarty, party, a bash, you know."
"Moriarty...means party?"
"And Damien Hirst means first! Gettin' it now?"
"I think,"
"So,'nuff about me," Seeing as how it was clearly a risky subject."What 'bout you? Whatta you do, whatta you like to do?"
"No job but I like to play games on the computer," said Mephisto. To most people that would have sounded so nerdy, no job and computer games, like some basement dwelling stereotype, but he hadn't been out enough in the world to even know that, so he said it without shame. "I try to practice the moves in games during training, always a fun challenge, even if some are impossible."
It was hard for the wererat not to look sad as she thought about this. Mephisto had not told Wander his past, but Wander knew from Lucy, even though she couldn't tell him that. She could just imagine how he must have been all cooped up most of the time, with only the computer as the main window to reality outside, his only escape from being a Harlequin pet.
"So, uh...what kind o' games you play on the ol' box'o'bits, eh?"
If he liked games where you blew things up, then that was a good start for common ground!
***
Lucille looked mostly calm, mildly irritated. She didn't like having her shopping trip ruined before it even happened! The first thing she did was reach to each of her earlobes, remove her earrings, and toss them to Nan. "Hold these for me, honey, will you?"
The second thing she did was take all the Padma-line power she had and send it in one big push against the therians. Nearly all of them spasmed and fell, toppling on to the vampires and the few unaffected of their number. A great many dropped their weapons, but Rafael was among those who did not. He fired his instead. Lucille's enhanced senses let her eyes see his finger move on the trigger, and her enhanced speed and reflexes let her hurl herself out of the way, grabbing Nan as she did, so that the grand staircase behind her that Nan came down earlier had the bottom three steps blow to smithereens instead of her head.
During the moment of the blast, no one of course moved forward, and that gave her a moment to do something else: Have a nice, clear thought, and send it to Cornelius with instruction to send it to everyone else. A message of what was happening, for those who could fight to come and do so, for those at the Circus to get out before word of their betrayal spread to its inhabitants. An additional message of what to do was not necessary; Lucille had, of course, a plan in place for what to do at half a dozen locations they all might be at if they were discovered by Jean-Claude's crew. They'd run drills for each. This meant that everyone in the hotel, rather than going to pieces at the surprise, should instead jump exactly into battle mode as they had been trained for such an event.
Dropping Nan, who took cover behind the receptionist desk, Lucille took advantage of the recoil from the gun knocking Rafael back just a bit and tried to kick the gun from his grasp. Unfortunately for her, while she accounted for the fact that therians have better balance in general than humans, she did account for the fact that Rafael was a rat and therefore had even better balance than most therians. Real rats, though they are less well-known for it than felines, have a most splendid sense of balance that a tightrope-walker would envy, and Rafael not only stayed perfectly on his feet, he kept his gun and deflected her blow, grabbing her ankle and slamming her to marble floor. Her other leg, however, was free, and knocked his out from under him. This time even he started to fall, and she leaped to pounce upon him on the way down. The moment she touched him, however, the rest of the St. Louis monster army had begun to push in through the door-shaped hole in the hotel as the staff scattered to press alarms and call police.
The door-shaped hole was large, as big grand lovely double doors had once been there, allowing plenty enough in at a time to surround Lucille swiftly. However, they all seemed to instantly forget that they were carrying guns, allowing Lucille to engage them in combat. She did not forget that she had a gun, which she drew from her fabulous designer hand-crafted handbag and began putting to use, along with the balisong from her bra. She also found a split second during the melee to press one of the jewels in her bracelet, which caused blades to spring out from the fronts of her shoes so that her kick was a stab. Stiletto heels indeed!
As for Rafael below her, she'd knocked him out by grabbing him by the hair and ramming his head against the floor. Because the uber-healing of therians meant that they ran on movie-rules when it came to prolonged unconsciousness and blows to the head, he'd be fine later, which was exactly what she wanted. He could be persuaded yet. For now though, violence was the only language his troops were speaking. Luckily, Lucille was fluent in it.
There were shattering sounds from above outside. Cefyn and Astrid had leaped out of the third story windows, breaking the glass on the way out. This is not as harmless as movies, which use fake glass made of sugar-pane, suggest. Going through a glass window will cut you up...which was exactly what the pair, now studded with glass shards on every bit of their exposed skin, were counting on. Astrid butted her face, with glass shards galore poking out of it in spikes, against the faces of her opponents, puncturing eyes and slicing cheeks. Cefyn lashed out with her arms, which were similarly shard-studded. Removing the glass later would hurt, especially since they'd have healed around the shards by then, but that just meant that Lucille would get to have the treat of doing that for them. Lucy liked pain, liked to hurt others, and she would enjoy that they screamed instead of recoiling from the job like others might. The only danger was that she'd probably draw it out excruciatingly for that exact reason..
Sig and Klaus appeared at the top of the stairs. Klaus jumped from it, shifting fangs into his mouth and claws on to his hands on the way down. Sig stayed where he was, tossed Lucille a machete and a machine gun, and then drew a pair of pistols from his suit-coat pockets. They were beautiful antiques, but clearly in top working condition, as evident by the fact he started firing into the fray with steely eyes and startling precision. When the mob started trying to climb the stairs, he kicked them back with his long stork legs. Klaus was a student of kickboxing himself, and he made use of that as he slashed, tore, and bit his way through the opponents, who now had not only forgotten they were armed, but had ceased to be armed at all. The guns had simply disappeared, and no one remembered that they had been there, not even Lucille herself. They had inconvenienced her, made it likely that she would lose, and so reality had simply written them out. Later, they would be baffled as to how and why they wouldn't have thought to bring guns when it was the most sensible thing in the world to do and they had plenty of them...if they were even able to think of it at all. Sometimes being out the vicinity of things like Lucille and Anita could clear the heads of those they had affected, sometimes not.
Ghislaine entered the fray now from the elevator. First she covered Nan so that the clairvoyant could get away out the evacuation route with the rest of the non-combatants, then she went to Lucy's side and rotted into her corpse form. Immediately, and quite on purpose, Lucille cut Ghislaine's head off with a single blow from the machete. Her head landed on the floor and, as if it had a set of legs beneath it, sped off and started attacking everyone it could get its teeth into, while her body not only remained standing, it attacked too, using its arms to take hold of and strangle anyone it touched, heedless of all flesh wounds it endured. Ghislaine's head was not the only nasty thing crawling around either; Sati was in cobra form, slithering around swiftly as well, delivering nasty bites of nastier venom. Naturally, of course, everyone on Lucille's side had been given a nice little immunity shot ahead of time, so getting one of her friends by mistake would do no harm to them beyond simply the pain of her teeth.
Tung launched herself into things next, and Lucille in turn launched a thought to Cornelius, who launched it to Tung: Don't shift! Whatever you do, don't shift! Don't let them know what you are!
Tung, Fell, and Mitria were like the plague and the anti-venom: from the labs of Ruthven Strongmore, Oliver's man in England. Lucille did not want to reveal their capbilities to the enemy at this early stage. In fact, she felt that far too many of her fighters had shown themselves already, and sent the message to Cornelius that all no more combatants were to enter the fight. As it turned out, Tung, being an expert in South Asian weaponry, didn't need to shift to fight, and started having about as fun a time with her kukri as Lucille was with her machete.
But even with all this, St. Louis still had the advantage in numbers. And each and every one of those numbers had super-strength, super-speed, and super-reflexes. Yes, so did everyone fighting on Lucille's side, but it was still eight against a number that was at least in the twenties, if not more. Lucille, however, was not fighting to win. She was fighting to allow everyone to evacuate. The moment she got the mental beep from Cornelius that everyone was out, she called out a single word, a name, "Nicole!"
A cloud of blackness blocked out the moon...and then swept downwards, cawing and shrieking. Owls, nightjars, whippoorwills, all of them were suddenly attacking the forces of St. Louis, pecking and clawing and tearing ferociously. A woman stepped forward from behind the curtain of beating wings and flashing beaks. She was not dressed for combat, in her long skirt and with her shoulder-length brown hair loose, nor did she look particularly intimidating. Just a normal woman. Yet the moment they looked upon her or came too near, everyone, therian or vampire, regardless of their side, felt fear, horrible fear, icy and curling around their hearts, panicking their brains. Nicole Shafir, Lucille's fear vampire.
The birds swirled around her again, and then there was nothing but birds, birds everywhere, obscuring everything else from sight...and then they were gone. the St. Louis supernaturals looked around for their foes.
Nicole had vanished. So had Lucille, everyone on her side...and Rafael.
***
The date was going alright. Meph was lacking in some social skills due to his isolation, but so was Wander just by being herself. Like Envy, he didn't avoid his background, since it was no longer a secret like the Harlequin had once kept it, but he also didn't see any reason to bring it up either, and Wander avoided it like the plague (okay, maybe not the best simile for a wererat...) so they never talked about it. What they did talk about was TF2, Call of Duty, robots, potato guns, rodents of unusual size, various examples of English cuisine that America sorely needed introduced to its menus, and, unfortunately, Anita.
It was odd, actually, how Anita kept coming up. There was no rhyme or reason to it, and often he'd just bring her her out of blue, then go back to whatever else he was saying. Like she would just pop into his head if he hadn't mentioned her after a certain about of time. He didn't even seem to realize it at all, either. Wander had been told what the ardeur could do to your head, but cor blimey this was bloomin' creepy! Just as Wander was about to say something about it, Lucille's message from Cornelius hits her like a ton of Micah-size dicks.
Aw, Tom Tit!, she thought. Time to make as discreet a getaway as she could before Meph got a call from his people about his blind date; given that they had been set-up by Hank, there was no way they wouldn't see it as suspicious now that they knew the truth about the New Yorkers.
"'Ey, Mephisto, I've 'ad a right brill time wit' you tonight, really up for it, but you know when you get one 'o those metaphysical heebie-jeebies crawlin' up yer spine from your pitch'n'toss that says something's wrong back at 'ome base? Just got one 'o' those from me Rat King, I gotta clear off quick. Sorry for any grief. Don't worry, I ain't no lint, I'll be leavin' you some bread so it can be Dutch when the bill comes, wouldn't do this if it weren't no emergency--"
She was almost out the door when she heard Meph answer his phone, "Hello? No, I'm fine...I'm at that all-night sandwich place, the one where Anita claimed she got bad service from the blonde waitress...no, the OTHER place where that happened...uh, her name's Wander, she was just leaving, actually. Said there was something going on with her Rodere, felt the call from her King, so, you know, duty calls, and...what?"
A split-second later, Meph had tackled her from behind. “Oof! ‘Ey, I think yer takin’ the cat and rat thing a bit too literally!”
Meph had pinned her arms, but he had not, understandably, thought to do anything about her toes. Nor could he have, since they were inside a pair of sturdy boots. Within these boots, Wander crossed her right big toe over the toe next to it, pressing on the jewel in her toe ring. Wander did not normally wear toe rings, but this one was a special one. One designed to, when that jewel was pressed, release a bunch of tiny rockets from her pockets, disguised as tubes of chapstick and lip liner and mascara and other things she had no use for (but did not look down at other women for using, ANITA), which flew a reasonable distance from her before exploding. Not, alas, into flames and shrapnel, but smoke, sparks, and very loud noises.
Meph refused to be distracted, and continued to keep his hold on the enemy agent. If the enemy agent had been anything but a wererat, he might have kept his hold. But rats have collapsible skeletons, and while this does not translate fully to the human forms of their therian counterparts, it did enough for Wander to squeeze out his grasp and disappear (“Raincheck, Mephisto! Gotta bunk, let’s do it again sometime!”) by the time the smoke had cleared. Meph rushed outside, and attempted to sniff out where she had gone, but the smoke had been laced with a special something to clog even a therian’s sense of smell. He was forced to call back the Circus on his phone, “No good. She got away.”
In Meph’s defense, if a car were not parked over it, he might have considered the sewer grate.
***
Max was working out with Kelly when she got the message from Cornelius in her head. Well, she thought, That explains where the guards are. Usually she joined them in the gym. Her next thought was, of course, to get the hell out of dodge. She ran to the double doors of the gym, just as an announcement came over the intercom in the gym, one of many throughout the Circus, ordering everyone to grab the New Yorkers and not to let them get away, to kill them if necessary but leave some alive for questioning, that they were enemy agents. Kelly looked at Max, stunned, giving Max time to get out the door. In a few more seconds, though, a gigantic lioness was pursuing her down the hall. In an enclosed space like this, however, a rat was the beast with the real advantage. Max was able to take the twists and turns and corners way better, even in human form, but unfortunately she couldn't lose Kelly; even if she were out of her sight, her scent still left a trail. Sooner or later, Kelly would find her, assuming someone else didn't first.
Eva was hanging out in the rec room with Crispin, whom she had made friends with, just friends thank you, when the message hit her, same time as it did Max. Which, of course, was within the same damn second that Cornelius sent it out in. His telepathy was the instant kind, why bother with any other sort? Unfortunately that means that the same intercom message came at the same moment too. Crispin looked even more stunned than Kelly, but Eva made the mistake of trying to say something to him instead of just using the time to escape. He in turn tried to convince her to stay...which included him grabbing her by the arms. He might not have said anything aggressive to her, but his actions erased his words for Eva, who automatically kneed him in the gut. His gripped loosened, but he did not let go, and anger started to enter his face alongside the surprise.
"I'm sorry, Crispin!" she shouted as she jammed the heel of her hand under his chin, trying to make him release her. "You'll understand!"
"I understand that you're a--" He didn't get to finish his sentence, as they began to really grapple with each other. Eva fought harder than he did; she wasn't necessarily a better fighter, but she was battling for her life, since she knew she could well be killed if she didn't get away. Crispin, on the other hand, faced no such threat if he failed to hold her. She got loose from him and ran from the room, grabbing a pool cue from the pool table as she went, just in case she ran into more opposition on the way out.
She met up with Max, who was also on the run, still with Kelly hot behind her.
"We've got to find the others! At least Hank and MJ! They'll have the worst time getting out!"
"Yeah, but we can't lead Kelly to them! That'll just put them in more danger!"
They both skidded to a stop. It was time to turn around and fight, then. The great tawny beast that was Kelly rounded a corner, and seeing them standing there ready and waiting, roared out a battle cry of challenge. She leaped, and Eva thrust out the pool cue, catching her under the chin. Kelly's own weight drove it through her skin into her mouth. Meanwhile Max had dove underneath her as she had leaped, and grabbed her by the tail, using her supernatural strength to tug her back so she and her great slashing claws didn't fall on Eva. A spray of foam hit the back of Eva's head and the front of Kelly's face. The latter turned to see Hank and Mikey Joe behind her, holding a fire extinguisher.
"Glad we brought Fidget along with us," said Hank, "Otherwise I wouldn't have thought to pack this!"
Now Kelly's nose was clogged up by the white foam along with her eyes, but she could still hear, and she lunged towards their voices. They scattered, but Max jumped on to her great golden back and plunged her fingers deep, deep into her ears fast, destroying the drums. Kelly was blind, deaf, and...whatever you called it when you couldn't smell. Like Eva, Max did leave her with an apology before she left her to yowl and writhe, but also like Eva, she thought it wasn't going to mean much, and not just because her friend was unable to actually hear it.
"Edgar helped us while he was 'escaping' from Melanie," explained Hank as they raced through the halls as the intercom alarm played on repeat. "He got out, but we had to find you."
Eva grabbed Hank in a hug around the neck even though they were both running, causing him to trip over his own feet (less from a balance issue, more from blushing), but luckily Max grabbed him by the back of his shirt collar and put him back upright again.
Then, at a cross-shaped intersection of halls just in front of them, Crispin ran out. He pointed right at them, "There they are!"
He wasn't alone. Most of the guards had gone with Rafael to the hotel, but enough had been left at the Circus to handle Lucille's plants. Some were human with guns in hand, some were shifted into animal form and ready to pounce.
Then the wererat quarter realized that all of them were hyenas.
No one needed to say anything. Both parties knew they'd need to put on a really good show for Crispin and the security cameras in order to make the hyenas still seem to be in allegiance with Anita & Co., but the rats were in no real danger.
Armel, who was on the other side of the Circus, might be though. He'd made his way through the therian guards just fine, all it had taken was him using his Padma-line powers to tell their beasts to back off and run from him, but now he was being confronted by vampire guards, with Meng Die at the head of the bunch. He gulped, taking a step back. She grinned, taking a step forward.
"Now, hey, look, Miss Meng Die, I can offer you an in on a pretty good deal..."
"Oh?" She cocked her head to the side in mock-interest. "Better than a top tier spot with the Kiss that rules not only St. Louis, but all its shifters? Whose Master boasts a human servant that calls every tiger in the world? You have a better set of coattails for me to ride?"
"Actually, y--"
Meng Die sprang. Under different circumstances, she might have listened, but she knew better than to trust the word of a cornered man. They always lied to save their hides, and even they were telling the truth it was impossible to tell because their fear, anxiety, and desperation produced the same bodily reactions of a lie and then some. She'd have clawed his heart out if she'd made contact, but Armel rolled out of the way. The stone floor splintered slightly where the force of Meng Die's blow hit instead. In the fraction of a second it took her to turn her head to see where he had gone, the vampire guards had already gotten him. He barely even struggled; he knew he wasn't getting out of this hold.
"Need some help there, Mr. Daube?"
Oh sweet Mother of Darkness, it was Pryderi "Fidget" Smith. Worse yet, he was smiling. Armel almost had felt safer when it was just him and the vampires.
***
"I swear, this better not be fucking Moon Moon's fault!"
Lucille was understandably not happy at all. Everyone had made it just fine (if, in Armel's case, slightly singed and more than slightly shaken) to Narcissus' club, but she was pissed they'd had to flee there at all. Someone had leaked the plan, and she was going to find out who!
Speaking of Narcissus in Chains, it might not seem like a good hiding place at first consideration, but Jean-Claude's people would be scouring everywhere in the city, which they doubtless knew far better than the New Yorkers. The only places they weren't likely to cover were their own bases, the meeting places of the vampires, leopards, wolves, rats...and hyenas. As the New Yorkers were led by the werehyenas there to the secret rooms beneath the club where they would reside and Lucille's complaints faded away down the hall, Narcissus was left with his thoughts.
Though Lucille would have plenty of items here on hand to help with her interrogations, the club, by the way, was not run how Anita had been led to believe. That had only been under the corrupt run of Chimera. If Narci had half those things going on on a regular basis, or, well, ever, he'd have been shut down in an instant by the law. He'd only managed to avoid that after the Chimera incident through some help from Jean-Claude involving vampire psychic abilities on the cops, a very big favor from the Master of St.Louis considering that the penalty for that was death. Marvelous, wasn't it, how humans still failed to account for any way to fight those? That was how he came to be in league with Jean-Claude in the first place. And as for who he was in league with now...he knew that his hyenas were only on board with all this not just because they were sick of Anita, but also so that they would have a new Oba. They had felt betrayed by how he had let in Chimera, but they couldn't depose him themselves because if they did, someone would replace him, and that would spell action from Anita--if it were a woman, she'd destroy her, if it were another man, she'd take him, either as a harem member, or, since hyenas not attractive animal, just rape him once and all of them through him like she did with Rafael and Donovan
Given that, it was safest to keep Narcissus on-board as their current Oba. He'd be too woman for Anita to fuck, but too man for her to want to kill. He knew this. He also knew that in helping Lucille, he was also helping his own downfall. And he was fine with that. Fine with leaving the Cackle forever. He'd go with Asher, leave the group. He'd become leader only because of what he'd always been trying to get away from--being born in the body of a female. But he'd made the best of it despite the bitter taste it left in his mouth that he only had it for being seen as female by the others, and he'd he'd milked it for all it was worth, even doing everything he could to prolong it as much as possible by instituting his males-only policy, knowing that while just having a vagina might let him dominate them, real women, those with female minds and spirits to match their bodies, wouldn't be fooled by biology alone. Yes, he'd taken all he could from his queenship, but now that the cow was dry, time to get the hell out of the pasture before the real heifers came in.
After a certain one was slaughtered, of course. One very full of bull.
Yes, that was what he wanted. To get his vengeance, then go out on his own terms. Like a boss. Like a queen. Like a man.
***
Miles and miles away in her own stronghold, Belle gloated to herself. How ridiculous of Padma (and Oliver too, it turned out, what a surprise that had been!) to think they could keep this from her. No, the real challenge had been getting word to St. Louis about their little coup-in-planning. All attempts at sending warnings to JC through supernatural means or supernatural messengers all been thwarted, as well as technological ones.
So she'd found a mortal messenger instead. A mortal with some magic, yes, but not one that was connected in any way to her, or to vampires or therians at all. He was, however, connected to Lucille. A human family member of hers. The most sweet, sympathetic, and downright easy one that she had; Belle could barely believed they shared blood.
She had sent Musette to him looking all beat up and helpless, blaming the arrival of Lucille in St.Louis, begging for his aid before she did worse to more people. The only word of truth from her honeyed lips had been why they didn't have any other means to send a message to the Master of the City, how they didn't want to risk an innocent human like him but he was their only hope, and so on. Tugging on his heartstrings, playing to his desires for heroism and his innate belief in the fragile nature of women (you'd think a relation like Lucille would knock that idea right out of him, but it seemed to come from his mother, according to info gathered on him), it had all been too easy. Sometimes magical ability could give one slight immunity against vampire mental abilities, as with animators, but the mind of this boy was weak. Not that Musette had needed to use such wiles; he was putty in her hands without the slightest telepathic push.
And so he was sent on his way to St. Louis, thinking he was saving innocent lives when in fact he was just maintaining the status quo in her favor. She would be Council Head, she would use Anita through Jean-Claude to do it, and some little blonde upstart from Padma and post-mortem-mortem Oliver who thought she was the Mother's chosen was NOT going to get in the way of that!
***
Also far away, three other Council members (well, one technically wasn't a Council member, but she'd been offered a seat before) were having thoughts of their own on this turn of events, word having reached them swiftly of Lucille's exposure.
"They don't know about Lucille herself, nor Padma and Oliver's involvement, only just that there was a group of supernaturals, mostly from New York, with designs of usurpation on St. Louis," said Morte D'Amour. "The pawns may have been discovered, but the queen, kings, and plan are still concealed."
He was wrong, though no one in the room knew it. All any of them knew was that Jean-Claude had realized that the New Yorkers were not visiting peacefully as they had pretended, and stormed their hotel, though all had thankfully escaped. They did not know, nor did Padma or Oliver or Lucille, how Jean-Claude had known this, let alone that he had been clued-in by a messenger from Belle Morte, whom they all still believed ignorant of the whole thing.
"Yes. I believe our chances of victory are still high," said The Dragon. "The battles will simply happen sooner than intended, so the advantage of that disease having set in will be gone, meaning the St. Louis side will still have greater numbers. However, the fact that every single member of our little ragtag bunch evaded capture or casualty speaks to just how much good numbers do against something like Lucille."
"And what about something like Anita?" asked the Moroven, "She is, after all, something like Lucille. They are sisters in species. What if Anita had been apart of this siege? How then do you think it would have gone, Dragon, great queen of war and knower of its ways that you are?"
"It is not a matter of who wins, in truth," said The Dragon, "It is a matter of what is then done with the winner. Tell me...we've sided with Padma and our dearly returned Oliver because we wish to stop Anita Blake and her rise to power, so that she does not come to rule us or allow her fountainhead, Belle Morte, to do so. If Lucille does indeed topple her, then what is to stop Padma and Oliver from using her as Belle does Anita, to subdue us and make themselves the new kings of our Council?"
"You suggest we kill the winner," Morte D'Amour licked his lips.
"Lucille is an asset for now, yes, and we will lend our people to her as her allies," said The Dragon. "But once she completes her task, she will instantly become a threat to us instead, and our soldiers shall become her executioners."
"What if their minds fall to her as the minds of others have fallen to Anita?" questioned the Moroven.
"Then," answered The Dragon, "We come for her ourselves."
Secondly, someone once suggested that back in the day, Dragon looked like Xena, and that today she looks more like Joan Jett. That has forever been my headcanon since, just thought I'd throw that out there.
Thirdly, credits:
Wander and Ghislaine belong to wanderingworlds
Nan belongs to nanoquill
Cefyn belongs to evilgrayson
Astrid, Edgar, and Sig all belong to cygnusrex
Tung belongs to tungsten monk
Fell belongs to ladyfellshot
Mitria belongs to mitrian
Hank belongs to writtenelision
All other non-canon characters mentioned in this segment belong to me
SUE VS SUE
"So, where are you from?" Mephisto (that was what Wander had decided to call him, forget this 'Dev for Devil' nonsense) had asked a routine question, but Wander had to scramble for an answer. She remembered that Hank had told her that according to him, Wander was just passing through St. Louis on her way to another Rodere. What trek could bring her on that route?
"Ah...well, originally as you can tell Oi ain't from 'merricuh but Oi been residin' in, er..." Where was Ghislaine from again? "The bayou, in, uh, you know, Cajun country, and right now Oi'm on me way to..." What was north?" "Canada, a Rodere in Canada. Gettin' a transfer, see. They felt they needed someone wit' my skills up there.
"Oh? What are your skills?" Mephisto did not seem to have noticed or been made suspcious by her multiple pauses. This was because her Cockney accent was so thick he was assuming she was struggling to find words he would understand, which was also true.
"Oh I love blowing up--" She caught herself just in time to realize she probably shouldn't tell him she's a demolitions expert "--"balloons! Oimma party planner by profession, see. Can't have a Moriarty without me!"
"A...what?"
"Moriarty, party, a bash, you know."
"Moriarty...means party?"
"And Damien Hirst means first! Gettin' it now?"
"I think,"
"So,'nuff about me," Seeing as how it was clearly a risky subject."What 'bout you? Whatta you do, whatta you like to do?"
"No job but I like to play games on the computer," said Mephisto. To most people that would have sounded so nerdy, no job and computer games, like some basement dwelling stereotype, but he hadn't been out enough in the world to even know that, so he said it without shame. "I try to practice the moves in games during training, always a fun challenge, even if some are impossible."
It was hard for the wererat not to look sad as she thought about this. Mephisto had not told Wander his past, but Wander knew from Lucy, even though she couldn't tell him that. She could just imagine how he must have been all cooped up most of the time, with only the computer as the main window to reality outside, his only escape from being a Harlequin pet.
"So, uh...what kind o' games you play on the ol' box'o'bits, eh?"
If he liked games where you blew things up, then that was a good start for common ground!
***
Lucille looked mostly calm, mildly irritated. She didn't like having her shopping trip ruined before it even happened! The first thing she did was reach to each of her earlobes, remove her earrings, and toss them to Nan. "Hold these for me, honey, will you?"
The second thing she did was take all the Padma-line power she had and send it in one big push against the therians. Nearly all of them spasmed and fell, toppling on to the vampires and the few unaffected of their number. A great many dropped their weapons, but Rafael was among those who did not. He fired his instead. Lucille's enhanced senses let her eyes see his finger move on the trigger, and her enhanced speed and reflexes let her hurl herself out of the way, grabbing Nan as she did, so that the grand staircase behind her that Nan came down earlier had the bottom three steps blow to smithereens instead of her head.
During the moment of the blast, no one of course moved forward, and that gave her a moment to do something else: Have a nice, clear thought, and send it to Cornelius with instruction to send it to everyone else. A message of what was happening, for those who could fight to come and do so, for those at the Circus to get out before word of their betrayal spread to its inhabitants. An additional message of what to do was not necessary; Lucille had, of course, a plan in place for what to do at half a dozen locations they all might be at if they were discovered by Jean-Claude's crew. They'd run drills for each. This meant that everyone in the hotel, rather than going to pieces at the surprise, should instead jump exactly into battle mode as they had been trained for such an event.
Dropping Nan, who took cover behind the receptionist desk, Lucille took advantage of the recoil from the gun knocking Rafael back just a bit and tried to kick the gun from his grasp. Unfortunately for her, while she accounted for the fact that therians have better balance in general than humans, she did account for the fact that Rafael was a rat and therefore had even better balance than most therians. Real rats, though they are less well-known for it than felines, have a most splendid sense of balance that a tightrope-walker would envy, and Rafael not only stayed perfectly on his feet, he kept his gun and deflected her blow, grabbing her ankle and slamming her to marble floor. Her other leg, however, was free, and knocked his out from under him. This time even he started to fall, and she leaped to pounce upon him on the way down. The moment she touched him, however, the rest of the St. Louis monster army had begun to push in through the door-shaped hole in the hotel as the staff scattered to press alarms and call police.
The door-shaped hole was large, as big grand lovely double doors had once been there, allowing plenty enough in at a time to surround Lucille swiftly. However, they all seemed to instantly forget that they were carrying guns, allowing Lucille to engage them in combat. She did not forget that she had a gun, which she drew from her fabulous designer hand-crafted handbag and began putting to use, along with the balisong from her bra. She also found a split second during the melee to press one of the jewels in her bracelet, which caused blades to spring out from the fronts of her shoes so that her kick was a stab. Stiletto heels indeed!
As for Rafael below her, she'd knocked him out by grabbing him by the hair and ramming his head against the floor. Because the uber-healing of therians meant that they ran on movie-rules when it came to prolonged unconsciousness and blows to the head, he'd be fine later, which was exactly what she wanted. He could be persuaded yet. For now though, violence was the only language his troops were speaking. Luckily, Lucille was fluent in it.
There were shattering sounds from above outside. Cefyn and Astrid had leaped out of the third story windows, breaking the glass on the way out. This is not as harmless as movies, which use fake glass made of sugar-pane, suggest. Going through a glass window will cut you up...which was exactly what the pair, now studded with glass shards on every bit of their exposed skin, were counting on. Astrid butted her face, with glass shards galore poking out of it in spikes, against the faces of her opponents, puncturing eyes and slicing cheeks. Cefyn lashed out with her arms, which were similarly shard-studded. Removing the glass later would hurt, especially since they'd have healed around the shards by then, but that just meant that Lucille would get to have the treat of doing that for them. Lucy liked pain, liked to hurt others, and she would enjoy that they screamed instead of recoiling from the job like others might. The only danger was that she'd probably draw it out excruciatingly for that exact reason..
Sig and Klaus appeared at the top of the stairs. Klaus jumped from it, shifting fangs into his mouth and claws on to his hands on the way down. Sig stayed where he was, tossed Lucille a machete and a machine gun, and then drew a pair of pistols from his suit-coat pockets. They were beautiful antiques, but clearly in top working condition, as evident by the fact he started firing into the fray with steely eyes and startling precision. When the mob started trying to climb the stairs, he kicked them back with his long stork legs. Klaus was a student of kickboxing himself, and he made use of that as he slashed, tore, and bit his way through the opponents, who now had not only forgotten they were armed, but had ceased to be armed at all. The guns had simply disappeared, and no one remembered that they had been there, not even Lucille herself. They had inconvenienced her, made it likely that she would lose, and so reality had simply written them out. Later, they would be baffled as to how and why they wouldn't have thought to bring guns when it was the most sensible thing in the world to do and they had plenty of them...if they were even able to think of it at all. Sometimes being out the vicinity of things like Lucille and Anita could clear the heads of those they had affected, sometimes not.
Ghislaine entered the fray now from the elevator. First she covered Nan so that the clairvoyant could get away out the evacuation route with the rest of the non-combatants, then she went to Lucy's side and rotted into her corpse form. Immediately, and quite on purpose, Lucille cut Ghislaine's head off with a single blow from the machete. Her head landed on the floor and, as if it had a set of legs beneath it, sped off and started attacking everyone it could get its teeth into, while her body not only remained standing, it attacked too, using its arms to take hold of and strangle anyone it touched, heedless of all flesh wounds it endured. Ghislaine's head was not the only nasty thing crawling around either; Sati was in cobra form, slithering around swiftly as well, delivering nasty bites of nastier venom. Naturally, of course, everyone on Lucille's side had been given a nice little immunity shot ahead of time, so getting one of her friends by mistake would do no harm to them beyond simply the pain of her teeth.
Tung launched herself into things next, and Lucille in turn launched a thought to Cornelius, who launched it to Tung: Don't shift! Whatever you do, don't shift! Don't let them know what you are!
Tung, Fell, and Mitria were like the plague and the anti-venom: from the labs of Ruthven Strongmore, Oliver's man in England. Lucille did not want to reveal their capbilities to the enemy at this early stage. In fact, she felt that far too many of her fighters had shown themselves already, and sent the message to Cornelius that all no more combatants were to enter the fight. As it turned out, Tung, being an expert in South Asian weaponry, didn't need to shift to fight, and started having about as fun a time with her kukri as Lucille was with her machete.
But even with all this, St. Louis still had the advantage in numbers. And each and every one of those numbers had super-strength, super-speed, and super-reflexes. Yes, so did everyone fighting on Lucille's side, but it was still eight against a number that was at least in the twenties, if not more. Lucille, however, was not fighting to win. She was fighting to allow everyone to evacuate. The moment she got the mental beep from Cornelius that everyone was out, she called out a single word, a name, "Nicole!"
A cloud of blackness blocked out the moon...and then swept downwards, cawing and shrieking. Owls, nightjars, whippoorwills, all of them were suddenly attacking the forces of St. Louis, pecking and clawing and tearing ferociously. A woman stepped forward from behind the curtain of beating wings and flashing beaks. She was not dressed for combat, in her long skirt and with her shoulder-length brown hair loose, nor did she look particularly intimidating. Just a normal woman. Yet the moment they looked upon her or came too near, everyone, therian or vampire, regardless of their side, felt fear, horrible fear, icy and curling around their hearts, panicking their brains. Nicole Shafir, Lucille's fear vampire.
The birds swirled around her again, and then there was nothing but birds, birds everywhere, obscuring everything else from sight...and then they were gone. the St. Louis supernaturals looked around for their foes.
Nicole had vanished. So had Lucille, everyone on her side...and Rafael.
***
The date was going alright. Meph was lacking in some social skills due to his isolation, but so was Wander just by being herself. Like Envy, he didn't avoid his background, since it was no longer a secret like the Harlequin had once kept it, but he also didn't see any reason to bring it up either, and Wander avoided it like the plague (okay, maybe not the best simile for a wererat...) so they never talked about it. What they did talk about was TF2, Call of Duty, robots, potato guns, rodents of unusual size, various examples of English cuisine that America sorely needed introduced to its menus, and, unfortunately, Anita.
It was odd, actually, how Anita kept coming up. There was no rhyme or reason to it, and often he'd just bring her her out of blue, then go back to whatever else he was saying. Like she would just pop into his head if he hadn't mentioned her after a certain about of time. He didn't even seem to realize it at all, either. Wander had been told what the ardeur could do to your head, but cor blimey this was bloomin' creepy! Just as Wander was about to say something about it, Lucille's message from Cornelius hits her like a ton of Micah-size dicks.
Aw, Tom Tit!, she thought. Time to make as discreet a getaway as she could before Meph got a call from his people about his blind date; given that they had been set-up by Hank, there was no way they wouldn't see it as suspicious now that they knew the truth about the New Yorkers.
"'Ey, Mephisto, I've 'ad a right brill time wit' you tonight, really up for it, but you know when you get one 'o those metaphysical heebie-jeebies crawlin' up yer spine from your pitch'n'toss that says something's wrong back at 'ome base? Just got one 'o' those from me Rat King, I gotta clear off quick. Sorry for any grief. Don't worry, I ain't no lint, I'll be leavin' you some bread so it can be Dutch when the bill comes, wouldn't do this if it weren't no emergency--"
She was almost out the door when she heard Meph answer his phone, "Hello? No, I'm fine...I'm at that all-night sandwich place, the one where Anita claimed she got bad service from the blonde waitress...no, the OTHER place where that happened...uh, her name's Wander, she was just leaving, actually. Said there was something going on with her Rodere, felt the call from her King, so, you know, duty calls, and...what?"
A split-second later, Meph had tackled her from behind. “Oof! ‘Ey, I think yer takin’ the cat and rat thing a bit too literally!”
Meph had pinned her arms, but he had not, understandably, thought to do anything about her toes. Nor could he have, since they were inside a pair of sturdy boots. Within these boots, Wander crossed her right big toe over the toe next to it, pressing on the jewel in her toe ring. Wander did not normally wear toe rings, but this one was a special one. One designed to, when that jewel was pressed, release a bunch of tiny rockets from her pockets, disguised as tubes of chapstick and lip liner and mascara and other things she had no use for (but did not look down at other women for using, ANITA), which flew a reasonable distance from her before exploding. Not, alas, into flames and shrapnel, but smoke, sparks, and very loud noises.
Meph refused to be distracted, and continued to keep his hold on the enemy agent. If the enemy agent had been anything but a wererat, he might have kept his hold. But rats have collapsible skeletons, and while this does not translate fully to the human forms of their therian counterparts, it did enough for Wander to squeeze out his grasp and disappear (“Raincheck, Mephisto! Gotta bunk, let’s do it again sometime!”) by the time the smoke had cleared. Meph rushed outside, and attempted to sniff out where she had gone, but the smoke had been laced with a special something to clog even a therian’s sense of smell. He was forced to call back the Circus on his phone, “No good. She got away.”
In Meph’s defense, if a car were not parked over it, he might have considered the sewer grate.
***
Max was working out with Kelly when she got the message from Cornelius in her head. Well, she thought, That explains where the guards are. Usually she joined them in the gym. Her next thought was, of course, to get the hell out of dodge. She ran to the double doors of the gym, just as an announcement came over the intercom in the gym, one of many throughout the Circus, ordering everyone to grab the New Yorkers and not to let them get away, to kill them if necessary but leave some alive for questioning, that they were enemy agents. Kelly looked at Max, stunned, giving Max time to get out the door. In a few more seconds, though, a gigantic lioness was pursuing her down the hall. In an enclosed space like this, however, a rat was the beast with the real advantage. Max was able to take the twists and turns and corners way better, even in human form, but unfortunately she couldn't lose Kelly; even if she were out of her sight, her scent still left a trail. Sooner or later, Kelly would find her, assuming someone else didn't first.
Eva was hanging out in the rec room with Crispin, whom she had made friends with, just friends thank you, when the message hit her, same time as it did Max. Which, of course, was within the same damn second that Cornelius sent it out in. His telepathy was the instant kind, why bother with any other sort? Unfortunately that means that the same intercom message came at the same moment too. Crispin looked even more stunned than Kelly, but Eva made the mistake of trying to say something to him instead of just using the time to escape. He in turn tried to convince her to stay...which included him grabbing her by the arms. He might not have said anything aggressive to her, but his actions erased his words for Eva, who automatically kneed him in the gut. His gripped loosened, but he did not let go, and anger started to enter his face alongside the surprise.
"I'm sorry, Crispin!" she shouted as she jammed the heel of her hand under his chin, trying to make him release her. "You'll understand!"
"I understand that you're a--" He didn't get to finish his sentence, as they began to really grapple with each other. Eva fought harder than he did; she wasn't necessarily a better fighter, but she was battling for her life, since she knew she could well be killed if she didn't get away. Crispin, on the other hand, faced no such threat if he failed to hold her. She got loose from him and ran from the room, grabbing a pool cue from the pool table as she went, just in case she ran into more opposition on the way out.
She met up with Max, who was also on the run, still with Kelly hot behind her.
"We've got to find the others! At least Hank and MJ! They'll have the worst time getting out!"
"Yeah, but we can't lead Kelly to them! That'll just put them in more danger!"
They both skidded to a stop. It was time to turn around and fight, then. The great tawny beast that was Kelly rounded a corner, and seeing them standing there ready and waiting, roared out a battle cry of challenge. She leaped, and Eva thrust out the pool cue, catching her under the chin. Kelly's own weight drove it through her skin into her mouth. Meanwhile Max had dove underneath her as she had leaped, and grabbed her by the tail, using her supernatural strength to tug her back so she and her great slashing claws didn't fall on Eva. A spray of foam hit the back of Eva's head and the front of Kelly's face. The latter turned to see Hank and Mikey Joe behind her, holding a fire extinguisher.
"Glad we brought Fidget along with us," said Hank, "Otherwise I wouldn't have thought to pack this!"
Now Kelly's nose was clogged up by the white foam along with her eyes, but she could still hear, and she lunged towards their voices. They scattered, but Max jumped on to her great golden back and plunged her fingers deep, deep into her ears fast, destroying the drums. Kelly was blind, deaf, and...whatever you called it when you couldn't smell. Like Eva, Max did leave her with an apology before she left her to yowl and writhe, but also like Eva, she thought it wasn't going to mean much, and not just because her friend was unable to actually hear it.
"Edgar helped us while he was 'escaping' from Melanie," explained Hank as they raced through the halls as the intercom alarm played on repeat. "He got out, but we had to find you."
Eva grabbed Hank in a hug around the neck even though they were both running, causing him to trip over his own feet (less from a balance issue, more from blushing), but luckily Max grabbed him by the back of his shirt collar and put him back upright again.
Then, at a cross-shaped intersection of halls just in front of them, Crispin ran out. He pointed right at them, "There they are!"
He wasn't alone. Most of the guards had gone with Rafael to the hotel, but enough had been left at the Circus to handle Lucille's plants. Some were human with guns in hand, some were shifted into animal form and ready to pounce.
Then the wererat quarter realized that all of them were hyenas.
No one needed to say anything. Both parties knew they'd need to put on a really good show for Crispin and the security cameras in order to make the hyenas still seem to be in allegiance with Anita & Co., but the rats were in no real danger.
Armel, who was on the other side of the Circus, might be though. He'd made his way through the therian guards just fine, all it had taken was him using his Padma-line powers to tell their beasts to back off and run from him, but now he was being confronted by vampire guards, with Meng Die at the head of the bunch. He gulped, taking a step back. She grinned, taking a step forward.
"Now, hey, look, Miss Meng Die, I can offer you an in on a pretty good deal..."
"Oh?" She cocked her head to the side in mock-interest. "Better than a top tier spot with the Kiss that rules not only St. Louis, but all its shifters? Whose Master boasts a human servant that calls every tiger in the world? You have a better set of coattails for me to ride?"
"Actually, y--"
Meng Die sprang. Under different circumstances, she might have listened, but she knew better than to trust the word of a cornered man. They always lied to save their hides, and even they were telling the truth it was impossible to tell because their fear, anxiety, and desperation produced the same bodily reactions of a lie and then some. She'd have clawed his heart out if she'd made contact, but Armel rolled out of the way. The stone floor splintered slightly where the force of Meng Die's blow hit instead. In the fraction of a second it took her to turn her head to see where he had gone, the vampire guards had already gotten him. He barely even struggled; he knew he wasn't getting out of this hold.
"Need some help there, Mr. Daube?"
Oh sweet Mother of Darkness, it was Pryderi "Fidget" Smith. Worse yet, he was smiling. Armel almost had felt safer when it was just him and the vampires.
***
"I swear, this better not be fucking Moon Moon's fault!"
Lucille was understandably not happy at all. Everyone had made it just fine (if, in Armel's case, slightly singed and more than slightly shaken) to Narcissus' club, but she was pissed they'd had to flee there at all. Someone had leaked the plan, and she was going to find out who!
Speaking of Narcissus in Chains, it might not seem like a good hiding place at first consideration, but Jean-Claude's people would be scouring everywhere in the city, which they doubtless knew far better than the New Yorkers. The only places they weren't likely to cover were their own bases, the meeting places of the vampires, leopards, wolves, rats...and hyenas. As the New Yorkers were led by the werehyenas there to the secret rooms beneath the club where they would reside and Lucille's complaints faded away down the hall, Narcissus was left with his thoughts.
Though Lucille would have plenty of items here on hand to help with her interrogations, the club, by the way, was not run how Anita had been led to believe. That had only been under the corrupt run of Chimera. If Narci had half those things going on on a regular basis, or, well, ever, he'd have been shut down in an instant by the law. He'd only managed to avoid that after the Chimera incident through some help from Jean-Claude involving vampire psychic abilities on the cops, a very big favor from the Master of St.Louis considering that the penalty for that was death. Marvelous, wasn't it, how humans still failed to account for any way to fight those? That was how he came to be in league with Jean-Claude in the first place. And as for who he was in league with now...he knew that his hyenas were only on board with all this not just because they were sick of Anita, but also so that they would have a new Oba. They had felt betrayed by how he had let in Chimera, but they couldn't depose him themselves because if they did, someone would replace him, and that would spell action from Anita--if it were a woman, she'd destroy her, if it were another man, she'd take him, either as a harem member, or, since hyenas not attractive animal, just rape him once and all of them through him like she did with Rafael and Donovan
Given that, it was safest to keep Narcissus on-board as their current Oba. He'd be too woman for Anita to fuck, but too man for her to want to kill. He knew this. He also knew that in helping Lucille, he was also helping his own downfall. And he was fine with that. Fine with leaving the Cackle forever. He'd go with Asher, leave the group. He'd become leader only because of what he'd always been trying to get away from--being born in the body of a female. But he'd made the best of it despite the bitter taste it left in his mouth that he only had it for being seen as female by the others, and he'd he'd milked it for all it was worth, even doing everything he could to prolong it as much as possible by instituting his males-only policy, knowing that while just having a vagina might let him dominate them, real women, those with female minds and spirits to match their bodies, wouldn't be fooled by biology alone. Yes, he'd taken all he could from his queenship, but now that the cow was dry, time to get the hell out of the pasture before the real heifers came in.
After a certain one was slaughtered, of course. One very full of bull.
Yes, that was what he wanted. To get his vengeance, then go out on his own terms. Like a boss. Like a queen. Like a man.
***
Miles and miles away in her own stronghold, Belle gloated to herself. How ridiculous of Padma (and Oliver too, it turned out, what a surprise that had been!) to think they could keep this from her. No, the real challenge had been getting word to St. Louis about their little coup-in-planning. All attempts at sending warnings to JC through supernatural means or supernatural messengers all been thwarted, as well as technological ones.
So she'd found a mortal messenger instead. A mortal with some magic, yes, but not one that was connected in any way to her, or to vampires or therians at all. He was, however, connected to Lucille. A human family member of hers. The most sweet, sympathetic, and downright easy one that she had; Belle could barely believed they shared blood.
She had sent Musette to him looking all beat up and helpless, blaming the arrival of Lucille in St.Louis, begging for his aid before she did worse to more people. The only word of truth from her honeyed lips had been why they didn't have any other means to send a message to the Master of the City, how they didn't want to risk an innocent human like him but he was their only hope, and so on. Tugging on his heartstrings, playing to his desires for heroism and his innate belief in the fragile nature of women (you'd think a relation like Lucille would knock that idea right out of him, but it seemed to come from his mother, according to info gathered on him), it had all been too easy. Sometimes magical ability could give one slight immunity against vampire mental abilities, as with animators, but the mind of this boy was weak. Not that Musette had needed to use such wiles; he was putty in her hands without the slightest telepathic push.
And so he was sent on his way to St. Louis, thinking he was saving innocent lives when in fact he was just maintaining the status quo in her favor. She would be Council Head, she would use Anita through Jean-Claude to do it, and some little blonde upstart from Padma and post-mortem-mortem Oliver who thought she was the Mother's chosen was NOT going to get in the way of that!
***
Also far away, three other Council members (well, one technically wasn't a Council member, but she'd been offered a seat before) were having thoughts of their own on this turn of events, word having reached them swiftly of Lucille's exposure.
"They don't know about Lucille herself, nor Padma and Oliver's involvement, only just that there was a group of supernaturals, mostly from New York, with designs of usurpation on St. Louis," said Morte D'Amour. "The pawns may have been discovered, but the queen, kings, and plan are still concealed."
He was wrong, though no one in the room knew it. All any of them knew was that Jean-Claude had realized that the New Yorkers were not visiting peacefully as they had pretended, and stormed their hotel, though all had thankfully escaped. They did not know, nor did Padma or Oliver or Lucille, how Jean-Claude had known this, let alone that he had been clued-in by a messenger from Belle Morte, whom they all still believed ignorant of the whole thing.
"Yes. I believe our chances of victory are still high," said The Dragon. "The battles will simply happen sooner than intended, so the advantage of that disease having set in will be gone, meaning the St. Louis side will still have greater numbers. However, the fact that every single member of our little ragtag bunch evaded capture or casualty speaks to just how much good numbers do against something like Lucille."
"And what about something like Anita?" asked the Moroven, "She is, after all, something like Lucille. They are sisters in species. What if Anita had been apart of this siege? How then do you think it would have gone, Dragon, great queen of war and knower of its ways that you are?"
"It is not a matter of who wins, in truth," said The Dragon, "It is a matter of what is then done with the winner. Tell me...we've sided with Padma and our dearly returned Oliver because we wish to stop Anita Blake and her rise to power, so that she does not come to rule us or allow her fountainhead, Belle Morte, to do so. If Lucille does indeed topple her, then what is to stop Padma and Oliver from using her as Belle does Anita, to subdue us and make themselves the new kings of our Council?"
"You suggest we kill the winner," Morte D'Amour licked his lips.
"Lucille is an asset for now, yes, and we will lend our people to her as her allies," said The Dragon. "But once she completes her task, she will instantly become a threat to us instead, and our soldiers shall become her executioners."
"What if their minds fall to her as the minds of others have fallen to Anita?" questioned the Moroven.
"Then," answered The Dragon, "We come for her ourselves."
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2013-07-07 10:08 pm (UTC)Yeah, the idea of "golden tiger life with the Harlequin" really intrigues me, and I want to play on that a little in the golden tigers interactions with others (Max with Envy, Meph with Wander, etc.). And I hope to reunite Meph and Wander! Along with introducing Wander to Shang-Da and Graham who shall be her own little harem per her creator's request =D
AHAHAHA YES I NEED TO INCLUDE A SCENE OF JUST THAT EXACTLY
Although the guns disappearing had me slightly confused; was Lucille using her Sue powers to rewrite reality, the way Anita does?
It's less Lucille doing it and more reality doing it on its own to suit Lucille. Anita never consciously seems to make the universe bend to her will, it just does and she doesn't question it, so it does the same for Lucille.
Thank you so much! I hope to deliver more soon too!
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Date: 2013-07-08 11:47 pm (UTC)OMG SHE'S GOING TO MEET SHANG-DA AND GRAHAM TOO? EEEE.
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Date: 2013-07-09 01:06 am (UTC)OF COURSE! WANDER IS TOTES GETTING HER HAREM 8D Just...I have no clue when or how because I am totally making this up as I go.
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Date: 2013-07-09 01:27 am (UTC)THAT'S SO ADORABLE I LOVE YOU 8D That's cool. I had no idea and I love surprises.
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Date: 2013-07-09 03:01 am (UTC)No, seriously, that was my justification to myself for doing the entire thing in a way that will doubtless be rife with plot holes and continuity errors. Along with "oh well, if they can't keep track of 70 billion characters and/or said abundance of characters ends up not relevant to plot at all, at least that's how it is in the books so it's just sticking to canon!"
Because I can't resist some meta.
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Date: 2013-07-08 11:44 pm (UTC)I can just imagine her phone call to Hong Shik/Shane. "Non, i' was fine. Go' Nan ou'a ta way and t'en Mizz Lucy chopped mah head off--" Pauses for Shane to exclaim in equal parts "WTF(in Cajun:"Go to bed!")" and "HOLY FUCK THAT'S SO COOL". "--and yah, t'en Nicole came and we go' out. Mais (Well), I wis' ya was 'ere ta, cher... bu' I don' really wan' ya anyw'ere near t'at t'ing Mizz Lucy be fightin'." Then she has to go hang up because that's about when Lucille is having her fit about whoever gave shit away.
That accent literally took me forever. It kept sounding Cockney to me.And and WTF OMG Wander and Mephisto are SO AWKWARD AND CUTE D: She's all "can't say this" and he's all homeschooled-kid awkward that doesn't know better. AND IT'S SO CUTE. GAH. And they dork over VIDEOGAMES and IT'S SO CUTE.
Also, she totally didn't hurt him with her sparkly rockets and smoke screen, so that should earn her points. "Oi jus' wanted to get away, y'sees?" all fidgety. AND I DON'T KNOW WHY IT IS SO BADASS SHE ESCAPED UNDER THE CAR BUT IT IS.
Wander will want to give him like a PS3 as a "I'm sorry" present so they can play online games because she's a nerd and I'm a PS console elitist.
AND EVERYONE ELSE WAS BRILLIANT AND THEY HAD FIGHT SCENES AND WHY WOULD YOU TEASE US WITH TUNG AND THEM BEING SPECIAL?! OMG THEY'RE BLACK SWANS. OR SOMETHING. Be that. I'm watching you.
no subject
Date: 2013-07-09 01:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-07-09 01:29 am (UTC)All of them did. Yes. <3