O.D. 7.25.2001 [1:26 p.m.]

(another Griffin scene with Tab, a mortal hooker who ended up ghouled to Griff. Alas, I never got to play with the player again...)

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 16:20 EDT *yawning, she reaches out and slaps the alarm silent before swinging her bare legs stiffly off the side of the beat up mattress. One slim hand goes to her mouth as even that small movement wakes up her nausea, and she grabs for the filthy trashcan that sits by the head of the bed...*

[Tab]

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Wed 16:29 EDT *...swiping one hand over her mouth, she makes a grimace of disgust as she sets the trashcan down, and stands, although shakily. Once on her feet, she stretches, every angle of her bony body exposed, then relaxes, with a shudder. Walking over to the smile pile of clothing thrown over a plastic chair, the only other furniture in the room, she carefully selects a particularly provacative outfit, examining each piece carefully for damage from the previous night*

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 16:41 EDT *finding a rip in the tights, she frowns, and pulls out a small bottle of nail-polish, carefully coating the edges and examining the results...satisfied, she slips into the outfit, and walks to the floor-length mirror on the wall. Turning to the wig hanging on the wall next to the mirror, she places it carefully over her own hacked short hair, adjusting it until it looks almost natural, then examining the total look in the mirror...*

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 17:10 EDT *shaking her head, but deciding to leave bad enough alone, she reaches for her small clutch purse and straps on her stilt heels before turning to the door*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 17:14 EDT So it's another night.

So it's another street.

So it's another dead body.

But it's the same beautiful monster.

And he is beautiful, in the way dangerous creatures always are. Flawless, really, and symmetrical, chiseled, sculpted. Literally.

It's an trash-littered alleyway he comes out of, stepping through the gout of steam rising from the rusty sewer-grate which clanks behind his feet. If there was blood on his mouth, and there must've been a drop or two, they are wiped away in an insolent, loose gesture of one hand as he crosses the street, lean, muscular body moving in a certain slouching, slinking manner that reminds one of predators and demons, big cats are black magic. He's looking down the street, eyes a little narrowed, lashes shadowing the color of the irises beneath. He's lingering on the curb, studying a bum in a doorway with uncaring curiosity, and then turning away to walk the other direction.

He has eyes like amber

And a smile

like razorblades

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 17:17 EDT *key in hand, she listens at the door for a second before quickly swinging it open and stepping through, and almost as quickly it is locked and the key is back in whatever depths of outfit she pulled it from. Face tight with disgust, she steps over the usual occupants of the hall, stumbling a bit as a stray hand gets underfoot...*

[Tab]

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Wed 17:23 EDT *heading downstairs and out the door, quickly bypassing the dragon-lady in her cage...but not quick enough...a harsh croak of a voice follows her out the door...* "Hey! You! You gonna have m'money t'nite, aintcha? Hey? Hey?" *ignoring the voice, she hurries down the darkened alley toward the better lit main streets, and her nights work...*

[Megara]

61|64.199.30.234

Wed 17:27 EDT Nose wrinkling while rubbing the tip with the pack of one hand. Looking over the edge of that hand to the street beyond. Dark eyes glittering with reflected light from passing vehicles, sometimes white, sometimes the red glow of tailights.

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 17:27 EDT The cracked pavement passes underfoot silently. His slacks, which are dark and loose and belted low on his slim hips, whispers softly against itself as he moves: an athletic sort of stride. Powerful, and somehow inquisitive, he turns his head to look into alleyways and doors as he passes, a flat curiosity that moves from one denizen of this particular netherworld to the next.

Prey. All of them. And he knows they know that. That's why rheumy eyes follow him, and hoarse, nervous coughs rumble in his passing. Like gazelle leaping to alert one another of the lion's passage. Like baboons calling to warn of the leopard's approach.

There's a beauty, too, in the movement of the broad long muscles in back and arm and neck beneath the closer-fitting, matte material of his sleeveless shirt. In the way the sick yellow glow of the streetlights illuminates and outlines the moving, flexing flesh beneath cloth. There's a beauty and a vitality to him, which is ironic, because he is not alive in the way humans understand...

And is ironic, because he seems more alive than the others of this blasted wasteland of a city.

[Trek]

50|216.78.2.86

Wed 17:30 EDT Oh yes, it's another night, and the things that go bump within are without and about.

Like the darkly clad, small, but muscular man with the pale hair that pilots a purring blacked out (no chrome) Harley, the C4 Knight, through the streets of one of his Fave areas.

He's just finished a short surveilance of a certain building and cruises through the streets, more information to be passed...

More secrets to be shared...

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 17:31 EDT *stepping out under the lights, she pastes a calculatedly sultry look on her dark features, a look probably borrowed from some porn star on an old, yellowed poster pasted to the cracked glass of a store with no name...*

[Megara]

61|64.199.30.234

Wed 17:32 EDT Stepping out of the shadows of the alley's mouth to saunter down the street. Svelte movements, senses alert for possible danger. Long midnight tresses swaying with each step, brushing across the sweep of hips. Tongue tip drifting across crismon glossed lips.

[Trek]

50|216.78.2.86

Wed 17:36 EDT Another corner turned, and another street cruised, pale blue sweeps not only left to right, but up and down as well. Danger can come from any quarter...

Unless you see the danger and head straight for it...

Like the unmistakeable saunter of a certain Cousin just up the block on the right...

A glimpse of the future plays through his mind as he speeds up slightly...

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 17:38 EDT Eons ago, his ancestors ate the apple of knowledge. Eons ago, their son killed his brother, and gave birth to his race. The sons of the victim called it a sin. (They always do.) The sons of the murderer...they called it many things. Among them, evolution.

They say monsters are ugly things with wide maws and crooked claws. I say the worst of the monsters are the beautiful ones

and evil

is seductive

He might go right past the hooker on the streetcorner. (Would it surprise her to know he might've been young, as young as he still is, when that porn star of old was in her prime?) She didn't look healthy, and he had just fed. He might, but he doesn't.

Low words, laced with a sort of scornful humor, "How much?"

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 17:45 EDT *her eyes widen for a moment, then quickly the mask is back, and she eyes him, as if the choice is truly hers...as if he isn't so much more than she was expecting, a tasty bone thrown to a starving dog...but like that dog, distrust is part and parcel of her life...maybe...too good? Her thoughts take only as long as it takes her to stand away from the wall and step toward him, one skinny hand reaching for his arm as she speaks, her voice low and practiced...* $75 and I'll do ya right, baby...anything ya want for a hunnerd...ya got a place?

[Trek]

50|216.78.2.86

Wed 17:51 EDT And like the dark mystery she is, his Cousin, his favorite cousin steps into the shadows of yet another alley, and is swallowed by the night...

Well that puts a pisser of a damper on things, now doesn't it? Hell's Bells.

Trek cruises the bike to the point where Megara left his sight, and watches, waits... things to tell, things to say, promises to keep...

vows to make...

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 17:56 EDT God bless consumerism. Love for sale. It's fake, but then again, how many people alive today can tell?

There's a tattoo on the arm she takes: a feather ablaze in green-laced black flames. Like some sigil of angels fallen...and his eyes, which are golden - truly, unbelievably golden - flicker down the street, and he nods. "Come on."

Simple as that. There's not much conversation. Maybe he doesn't think it's necessary. He takes her down the street and around the corner, walks another four blocks to a shoddy downtrodden apartment complex. There's a Corvette parked out front, but he ignores it, taking her up the stairs instead.

[Trek]

50|216.78.2.86

Wed 17:59 EDT It would seem his cousin will not be forth coming from the darkness anytime soon. He shakes his head, whispering uner his breath, "We Need speaks, cousin. Soon. Very soon."

He rev's the engine then barks the back tire as he takes off, accelerating to the corner, turning it, then zipping down that street, casting a glance to one side as a familiar form moves into a hovel of an apartment complex just on the other side of the Corvette parked on the street...

Oh, what have you there, Griff? Have fun... enjoy. He smirks and continues on his way...

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 18:02 EDT *Conversation...even if she had expected it, she'd be grateful for its absence...too much talk and he might hear the shivers that filled her skinny body, might hear the fear mixed with hate that ate its way through her every waking moment...following silently at his side, she shows no sign of the thoughts that fill her mind...*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 18:06 EDT Stopping at the door, 2B, he digs through his pockets for keys. There are two sets, and the one that comes out first he holds between his teeth as he unlocks the door with a key off the second ring and kicks it open with a half-bow.

"Ladies first." Oh, the irony. He follows her inside, shucking his shoes as he goes, knocking the door shut behind him. A look at her - too skinny, dark circles under the eyes, probably dead in a month - and he knows what he could probably smell coming off her if he bothered to try.

"Crack?" Both key rings are dropped back into his pockets. He leans back against the door, lights off, arms folded, and studies her. "Heroin?"

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 18:12 EDT W-what?? *a beat, and she has reswallowed her heart, and turned to try to focus on him, there in the dark...her mask down in the temporary security of the dark, her face is a mix of fear and resignation* I don'know what you're talkin'bout...

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 18:20 EDT ...but there are some who can see through the darkness.

His eyes aren't human. No human ever had eyes that color, and certainly not of that sharpness. No animal, either. He lifts gently from the door and crosses to a bag in the corner, takes out a syringe (dirty needles...AIDS...does it even matter to her anymore? It doesn't to him) and a small vial of clear liquid.

Heroin, morphine, opium.

The things man creates to keep the pain away.

The things he creates to keep the monsters away.

He fills the syringe and walks to her. "Can you do it yourself?" He holds it out, plunger first. "Or should I do it?"

Close enough to touch her, back to the only window in the room, he's lost in shadow.

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 18:25 EDT *her eyes lock on his hand, with its burden of temporary sanity, and the shivers that were internal seem to have taken over her scrawny body...her voice, when she speaks, is shaky with need...* I-I can...*the sound of a dry tongue licking chapped lips is loud in the silence*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 18:31 EDT The drugs aren't his. The apartment isn't, either, but the owner of both had sadly overdosed. A delightful coincidence. It would be weeks before anyone cares to find out, and by then Griffin would've found another place, another hideout in North Charleston.

These aren't his favorite havens by far, but they will do.

Silently, he hands her the needle and brushes past her to let her indulge her inner demons alone. He goes to the kitchen, which looks out into the dark living room, and the light from the refrigerator casts his shadow long and dark on the wall behind him for a moment before winking out.

He comes back with a glass of water, which he sets on the dusty coffee table before sitting down on the sagging sofa.

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 18:41 EDT *the soft clink of a needle falling from nerveless fingers is lost in the sound of the refrigerator door closing, and by the time he returns to the darkened living room, the look on her face has relaxed into a tight smile of pure bliss...only the eyes tell the real story, the windows behind which the lost girl sits, screaming at the darkness that spreads from nerve to nerve...trapping her, once again, one more night in its cold grasp...*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 18:50 EDT It's got to be the strangest trick she's ever turned. Maybe she thinks it's a dream [nightmare]; maybe she's beyond thinking. Addiction is a monster (doesn't he know it), and a seductive one, and when it takes over...

He bends and picks up the needle and tosses it into the trashcan. There was a little more left in the vial, and a baggie of pot, a bit of what was almost certainly 'dust left in the bag. The most prized possessions of a dead man. Lifting the glass of cool water, he holds it to her lips.

"Go on." Heroin dries its victims out...makes them weak. Weak-willed. "Drink it."

His free arm, the one without the tattoo, comes around her waist: strong and steady. He folds her back against him. Almost gentle, almost caring, almost - and not quite.

"How does it feel to be addicted?" he murmurs in her ear. "You like it?"

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 18:56 EDT *mindlessly, she drinks, not choking by some casual act of an uncaring god...if she answers him, it is in the form of a wordless sound, as her lost eyes track invisible somethings in the darkness, and her body shudders against his...*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 19:05 EDT It's answer enough. He tilts the glass a little, and a little more, and what she can swallow, she does; what she can't trickles down to wet his arm, which is wrapped around her shoulders, and then to dampen her shirt.

When she's drunk all that she will, or can, or all that there is, his grasp on her has tightened to a firm embrace, and the cool glass presses against her heroin-flushed skin. Like an anaconda, slow and methodical; like a constrictor, like the serpent every daughter of Eve remembers in primordial memory, he murmurs to her.

"I have something that might help you.

"It doesn't fuck you up. Doesn't fry your brain. Doesn't make you weak. It makes you stronger. It makes you tougher.

"I'll give it to you, and your $100. Then you can go get better. Get a real job.

"No more whoring.

"No more dependency."

He kisses her: behind the jaw, below the ear, the tender soft spot (...where you can kill a man with a well-placed strike). And he continues, softer still,

"All I want back from you is the name of your pimp. What he looks like. Where I can find him.

"Do you want to try?"

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 19:13 EDT *her voice is a soft murmur as well, but more from weakness than from any wish for quiet...* N-no such thing...*the confusion mixed with disbelief mixed with fear in her voice is clear*...no way out...

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 19:15 EDT "Hush," he says, immediate and low and soothing; his lips drift a little lower, a little forward, and then his teeth nicks her ear. Draws blood.

He sips for a second, perhaps two, and everything is red haze, for him, for her, for that moment.

Then, again, "Hush. Try. What have you to lose?"

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 19:21 EDT *the inherent truth in that is clear enough for even her drug-fogged mind to grasp...so if it's just another drug...so if it's another trick...so if it ends in death...so what? While there may be no way out, the fact remains that there is no way further down, either...closing her eyes against the dark unknown, she nods, softly, trusting him to understand...*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 19:27 EDT And he just lets her go - picks up the glass and returns to the kitchen to fill it again, not water but wine this time, cheap $2-a-bottle wine that he found in the fridge. When the fluid reaches the halfway mark he stops. The rest he fills with

What's this...?

...call it a Bloody Mary.

something else.

Coming back, he stops just out of reach, waiting. "The name," he says, patiently but so coolly. There is no true cruelty in him...but no mercy, either. "The man who hires you to whore for him. I need his name. And what he looks like. And where I can find him."

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 19:40 EDT *when he withdraws his support, she remains standing, barely. Her eyes watch his back as he walks away with something of the look she gave the needle, before...when he returns, she frowns, slightly, her eyes flashing to the glass in his hand, then back to his face...what she can see in the dark, that is...mainly those eyes...her voice, when it comes, is shaky, but determined, with just a hint of satisfaction, as she puts her life in his hands...*

...names Checker...he works outta the club...he's a short fuck, with ratty hair, wears denim, and a ugly old cap... *her voice takes on a spiteful cast as she describes her previous master, making certain to provide enough info to make finding him a sure thing...then she stops, and watches, her eyes wary, but expectant...*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 19:46 EDT He hands the glass to her, nodding, filing the information away. "Don't drink that yet." Back to the bag - his stash? Maybe he was a pusher...a dealer...maybe he was

an angel/

a devil

just an addict that got lucky. There's light coming in the window, just a bit of it, not enough to make out tracks or the lack thereof, but enough to see him come back with some pills. Aspirin or Advil or something like that, probably, but it would do to keep the charade going. He drops it into the (blood) wine, and maybe somewhere, subconsciously or not-so-subconsciously, she smells blood under the wine, and she smells truth the masque and lies under the truth. Prey's sixth sense.

He touches her hand, the one that holds the glass, and tilts it up toward her.

"All at once, now."

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 19:51 EDT *her eyes locked on his (inhuman!) beautiful eyes, somewhere in her mind a tiny voice screams in panic and fear...but she is of necessity much practiced at stifling it, and she does...and, with a deep shudder, she drinks...*

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 19:57 EDT He returns her stare, and maybe she notices it... he doesn't seem to blink.

Ever.

But then it's swallowed. A little thick, a little tangy and coppery, a little bitter and a little rough on the throat, bad alcohol and blood, vitae, and some painkillers make their way down. He takes the glass from her before she can drop it, and he lets her down on the sofa, kneeling before her, hands on her forearms, looking up at her with something that she might almost think, or wish, was concern, caring.

"It'll take a while to work," he soothes. "It's like medicine. You'll have to take it again tomorrow, and the day after, and maybe a few days after that, too, before it can do its job. In the meantime, you'll go through some withdrawal. It will be bad, but not as bad as it would be otherwise. You'll pull through. If it gets so that you can't handle it, call me. I'll leave you my number.

"You can leave, or you can stay here for the time being, if you like. There's food in the fridge and a key under the doormat outside. But I need to see you tomorrow night, back here.

"Do you understand?"

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 20:05 EDT *almost reflexively she nods, then almost immediately shakes her head, her eyes confused...* I mean...*she seems to pull up the last shreds of her courage for this one act*...what ARE you? Are you a cop? *immediately, she drops her eyes, totally submissive, her eyes showing her terror at perhaps overreaching herself, in this new situation* I'm sorry...don't tell me...I don't wanna know...I...I'll be here...

[Griffin]

13|132.239.1.231

Wed 20:11 EDT "It's best that you don't ask," he agrees, and presses his cool lips to her knuckles. "You should try to get some rest. I'll be back tomorrow night. And, it might be wise if you stay away from - " the memory eludes him for a moment, then returns, " - from Checker for a few days."

And, as though that were some sort of farewell, he stands. Whatever made him gift her, or curse her, depending on how you looked at it - whim or plan, or some dovetailing of both - it was done now.

One addiction for another.

One master for another.

In some ways, she's better off.

In others...

He shuts the door lightly behind himself, locking it for her, and then leaves the key under the mat. Never having even asked her name, he climbs into the '67 Corvette parked out front, and drives off.

[Tab]

26|208.14.202.83

Wed 20:15 EDT *never lifting her eyes until he turns toward the door, she simply nods...and watches his back, as he leaves, and the door, after it closes, for an undetermined time, her face a study in confusion, resignation, and...worship?*