John Abbott (john_abbott) wrote in low_tide, @ 2009-12-17 09:37:00 |
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Entry tags: | john abbott, katherine williams |
Rude Awakening
Ow...
Rolling over, Katherine was not yet ready to wake up. Light was filtering through the drapes and the vampiress wanted nothing to do with it. Every so often, a brain decided to get more of a head start on things than the body was prepared for, like it wanted to sabotage its own internal clock. It was especially upsetting for those, like her, who were forced to rely on nocturnal hours. So it was that with fingers curling into the sheets, Katherine promptly decided to show the rays of the sun her backside and-
Wait, those weren't sheets. It was... Dirt. Squinting eyelids, dark locks of black hair were brushed away from face and... Who was cooking bacon?
With a sudden woof of flame, Katherine realised the 'who' of it was the sky and the 'bacon' was, well, her.
Rolling herself along the ground like a rattlesnake with Alzheimer's, the vampiress cursed aloud in a frantic attempt to put herself out. Since when had she taken up the habit of sleeping in back yards?! She hadn't been that drunk! Scraping herself out of the partial cover of vegetation, a sudden rush was made for the back door and limited shadow of wooden overhang. Fist banged on the frame with a desperate call of, "LEMME' IN!"
"Mmmmuuuuhhh-ff." The response was perhaps better suited for a mummy than John Abbott, but that was the sound he made. The nocturnal creature rooted his head of messy black curls deeper into the pillows, where he slept face-down while the sun baked the island to a crisp. The drapes were pulled tight and layered double on the French doors in his bedroom, which protected his toes from nuisance shafts of sunlight, if he woke a bit early and stumbled to the bathroom. They did little to block out sound, however.
Whomever darkened his doorstep would realize they had the wrong apartment, sooner or later. If there was a breaking and entering, well, he'd simply have to eat them.
He tried to doze again, but a second round of banging interrupted. With hazel eyes squeezed shut, he reached blindly for an object on his nightstand to toss at the glass doors, hoping the crash would dissuade the intruder. The object was a book of poetry, and its pages fluttered like bird wings as it hit the pane. "Oh, fuck off, will you?!"
Private residences... Katherine hated how an invitation was such a necessity for these things. One of those little reminders of how she was more of a thing suited for myth and legend than predator with a few supernatural... 'Extras'. Reaching down to grab a rock, Katherine hissed at the stinging sensation of heat as smoke began to rise from exposed skin, then hurled it through the nearest external window, making sure to get the attention of whomever had responded inside.
"YOUR MOM!"
Yes, it was immature, but Katherine was in a hurry! In dire need of shelter from the encroaching sunlight, lashing out with violence was what she defaulted to. Vandalism caused most people to sit up and take notice, which meant they would hopefully come outside to confront her. Then it was just a matter of grabbing them for either a kill or to call out whoever else was still inside.
Damn it, hair! Stop smoking!
John was as groggy and brassed off as a bear awoken in hibernation.
Snarling in that feral way of all vampires, he got onto his knees and crawled across the mattress, a dreadlock of sheets still wrapped around his legs. He went to the window in his pajama pants. Calculating the building's shadow outside the window to provide partial protection, he punched through the remaining pieces of glass and reached outside. Fingers closed around the woman's neck. He curled his arm and hauled her up to eye level, his mouth open wide.
If he had to drain her with feet dangling above the grass, so be it.
The scent of charred flesh brought him up short. Blink, blink...
For a moment, Katherine flailed in mid-air, hands latching onto the stranger's wrist and forearm the moment he deigned to strangle her. But rather than scramble out of lack of oxygen, her expression was more one of annoyance. The need for air only mattered if you wanted to speak and she wanted to do an awful lot more than that.
Something which would have to be decided in the next few seconds, because she could feel those deadly shards of sunlight warming less than an inch away from her back.
Unable to look down, Katherine just had to aim her knee where she hoped it would be most painful to contact at groin and try to punch him in the face, for good measure. Her own now contorted into vampiric crest and fangs.
"Ooof!" Doubling over, John let go of the other vampire, which meant Katherine landed on her belly on the windowsill, half-in and half-out, with her ass in the air. "I think that was uncalled for!" he shouted, bending over. He held onto his kneecaps. It had been many years since he felt winded by the pain of anything, but a good knock to the testicles could do it to anyone. He shook his head to get the speckles out of his vision.
By now, it was obvious that the intruder was a demon. Even in his cloud of masculine pain, John understood her urgent need to get inside. Reaching out, he grabbed Katherine by the belt of her pants and tugged her the rest of the way into the apartment. "Well? What the bloody hell were you doing outside? Are you new?" A piece of glass crunched under his bare foot. That word 'new', as spoken by him, was tantamount to being called a moron.
The anatomy of typical male forms was such that if she had managed to secure even a moderate hit to where he was most sensitive, there was going to be an utter lack of interest in, well, just about anything... Swiftly followed by an extreme and lengthy bout of nausea. Katherine, for her part, was vindictive enough to hope that was, indeed, the case: She could be an evil shit and proud of it.
"Hey! Hey! Hey! Hands off the merchandise, slick!" She berated, slapping his forearm away. Had half a mind to simply launch into an attack, but his line of questioning and the absence of hearing anything like a beating heart was leading to an obvious conclusion of not a human being. "And no, I'm not 'new'!" Came the retort, fingered quotation marks and all. Katherine sweeping a hand back through a mane of dark hair, as she shook face free of vampirism. "So far as I know, I fell to sleep indoors... Never sleep-walked for my first century and I've no plan to start now."
John's face screwed up. As if he was even thinking about her merchandise after she nailed him in the balls! "Obviously something went wrong," he said, palm up and gesturing at the broken window. "And you're welcome, by the way." It still pained him to stand upright, but he reached up and pulled a curtain over the window, then hobbled back across the bedroom. At the foot of his mattress, he rubbed his face and pushed his fingers into his hair. It sat there looking comfortable, cocoon-like, but going back to sleep now was impossible, what with the shooting pain in his groin and the house guest. How long had he been out? Judging by the digital clock, three hours at the most.
Had he ever fallen asleep outside? John thought back over the 120-odd years since he was bitten. Once, he concluded. He passed out in a pile of rubbish behind the Royal Oak tavern. But that hardly counted, since he was not only inebriated at the time, but punched in the face. So much for public romps with the wives of other men.
"Yeah, whatever," grumbled the evidently unhappy vampiress, already in the process of removing denim jacket and patting herself down for smoke and already-healing skin damage. "Damn it... If God wanted me to get burnt up, Slayers'd never been invented..."
With that taken care of, her crudeness and arrogant manner was now clearly at odds with his more gentlemanly conduct. Not that it had been her way in life, but that was another story... After making sure she didn't smell like the undead version of baked potato, a short trip to the bathroom was made for an application of water to face. No correction of hair in mirror, of course - such was the reserve of creatures with reflections. Finally, the brunette wandering by his door, hands were placed on hips and shoulders rolled. It had been a rude awakening, after all and Katherine's body demanded a stretch of spine. She debated saying nothing, but it was late afternoon. If she even found somewhere to hunker down and let laziness overtake her, she'd wake up too late to get any proper hunting done.
Besides, the thought of waking up, itself? That was now tinged with worries of where she might end up.
"Maybe I ate a warlock's little brother or sister... Saw someone teleport, once. Except for their legs, anyway. Wasn't too pretty to look at."
While she was making herself at home in his bathroom, John traded his pajama bottoms for actual pants, hurriedly stuffing his legs into them. He pulled a shirt down over his stomach as Katherine re-emerged. "No, I'd imagine not," he said, walking past her into the living area. "I hope the amenities are to your liking. Hopefully, you helped yourself to a bar of soap while you were pillaging." He scratched the bridge of his nose. Gentlemanly conduct was one thing, but having had his sleep disrupted, window broken, testicles bruised, and bathroom borrowed, he was in less than positive spirits. Given the old-world accent and lyrical quality of his voice, even insults sounded like he was paying her a compliment.
He opened his refrigerator. Artificial light bathed his features in bluish-white.
"I'd play duck-and-cover with a sheet, but it'll be dark in a while. Besides which, I have no idea where 'here' even is."
Fortunately, Katherine had slept in her clothes. While the alternative might have been a good sight more entertaining to look at, the previous night's activities had left her feeling too lazy to take them off. Planning, instead, for a change of the same upon waking and a hot bath or shower. With tiredness still very much planted in her mental rear-view mirror, the vampiress yawned, not quite having the energy to make it noisy, although at least having the good graces to raise a half-balled fist to mouth. Her next port of call was about to be the kitchen sink, where a glass of water could be poured out and swallowed, for the sake of cleaning mouth.
"This place temporary?"
John poured himself something out of a pitcher. He paused, the glass hovering at his mouth, and looked at the bare walls. "I'm not sure," he said. His forehead crested and he took a few swallows of butcher's blood. It wasn't delicious - sort-of the Lean Cuisine of meals for vampires - but it kept his stomach from growling when he'd had a bad night out, which was true of the previous evening. The island was crawling with police. He probably had something to do with that. Well, apparently him and another vampire leaving puncture wounds behind. Somehow, he doubted this one took particular care with her leavings.
He took another glass from the cabinet and set it on the counter, halfway between the pitcher and the sink. A signal to help herself, though he wasn't about to act the part of a proper host and serve it to her. "I've only been here a month. I didn't intend to stay more than two or three nights, but someone convinced me to. Apparently, paranormal activity's about to go through the roof. Who wouldn't want to miss that?" There was a touch of sarcasm on the question. John put his back to the pantry door and leaned on it. He crossed his ankles.
The blood didn't do a huge amount for Katherine. Perked her senses up, but she was old enough to be wise to the scent of human and possessive enough to take what she wanted by force, if failing by other means. Hunger was something she rarely had to endure. No, she was content with water, for the moment. Wouldn't quench the kind of thirst she could have, but it was fine for the purposes of cleaning.
"Paranormal activity, huh?" She echoed, repeating the phrase slowly, in such a way that it was difficult to figure out if she was deriding his use of it or simply testing it out for verbal size. It was likely too formal for Katherine's usual vocabulary. "Ghosts and mermaids and all that shit? Maybe even a couple of vampires..." She added, giving an upwards nod and a smile. Hand supporting weight with a lean against the counter. "And, uh... Where'd you hear that nugget from?"
"Oh. You think I should tell you, do you?" He crossed his arms. There was amusement in his eyes, a kind of golden glow along with it, subtle enough to be natural or super. "I don't think that's a wise idea. After all, I hardly know you and she was a powerful one. A... what'd you call it? A teleporter?" John smiled into his glass, a bit of tit for tat there. As surely as she thought him too refined, he thought her boorish. One didn't have to be mannerless to be a monster. He drank the rest of his blood and put the pitcher in the refrigerator.
He wiped a thumb on the corner of his mouth. "You needn't worry. I feel sure she wasn't talking about you."
"S'OK," she waved off. "I know the type. The theatrical ones... Show up on your doorstep and get gone in the blink of an eye. Whatever happened to a good ole' taxi ride?"
As of right now, regardless of his species, the guy was striking her as more of a domesticated fellow. The ambiguity of not knowing how long he'd be here for, together with an apparent disinterest in making her pay for the window, caused her to reason he was either a squatter or had killed whoever previously lived there. Given his appetite for plasma, she was guessing the latter.
So far, with its strange mix of socio-economic problems and tropical backdrop, Key West reminded her of a version of Cuba where the government actually allowed you to own things. Like a home or... Cooking utensils.
"Katherine, with a 'K'," she introduced and held out a hand for shaking.
He took it. Hers was warmer than his from being outside, or maybe from the near combustion. "John. With an H." And then, just to mess with her a bit, he bent down and kissed her knuckles, a gesture that had gone out of favor long ago, but if she'd been alive as long as she claimed, she'd remember when it was run of the mill. A brief squeeze of fingertips and he let go, walking around the furniture to find a seat in the living room. The couch was beige and leather, an odd choice for the local climate. He collapsed comfortably and pulled a bare foot onto his knee. "So, you sleep outside, you break into vampires' homes... How did someone as... Carefree as you survive an entire century?" He asked. The local paper was on the next cushion over. He picked it up and took up looking where he'd left off the day previous. Hardbound volumes of poetry, print newspapers, a man of the modern times he was not.
Eyebrows raised, but she made no attempt to comment on the gesture. It was remembered, although rare to come by, these days.
Heck, rare since almost 1902... Katherine had been reborn to darkness with cold vengeance in her heart. While speech patterns had taken a while to shift and change, the beginnings of that steely determination and poisonous animosity had firmly taken root, save for what was shown towards her new maker. Gone were the days of lacewear, frilly dresses and concern for manners. She might not have knowingly chosen unlife, but it had given her something her half-dead human self could never have attained, as it was.
Retribution.
"No, I sleep inside and break into just about anywhere with something I wanna' take. Sometimes including vampires..." A certain undertone to it, which might or might not be picked up: Katherine was just as happy to make the odd demon scream out for entertainment, as a human being. It was just that the latter tasted a lot better. "And believe me, I'm more security-minded than I seem. Or smell, right now, come to that," she added with a look of distaste. A slight, charcoal-like whiff still lingering around her, just strong enough for a vampiric nose to pick up on. "My unliving? Made in doing what we do best. By which, I don't mean being supper for a vacuum cleaner, before you say it. As for you... I'm guessing either property or something educational."
John's eyebrows drew together. "I was a professor of literature," he said, looking up from his paper. How she had figured out his 19th century career, he wasn't sure. It wasn't as if John hung about the apartment in suspenders with his sleeves rolled up and chalk on his hands. It had been suggested he kept the mannerisms over the years. Something about the way he leaned on things like they were a desk. Nowadays, with the abundance of night courses, it was reasonable to believe he could teach again, but he had yet to decide if he could manage it without eating a student.
"I'm sorry. Ah..." He put a fingertip to the end of his nose, signaling he was thinking. "Just a moment ago, when you said you like to break into places and take anything you want, including vampires... Was that a threat or an invitation? Really, it could be taken either way, and I want to be sure I've caught your drift." He rolled up the paper and tapped it against his thigh. He was bullshitting; John thought he knew exactly what she meant, and it wasn't nearly as pleasant as it could be. A shame, too. If one got a genuine look at the vampire, she had a certain appeal.
"Depends if you wanna' keep your fingers unbroken," she drawled, although, with the resulting grin, it was hard to say if she truly meant the sentiment or not. Even with Katherine, there was a time and place for making with the bullshit. Especially with her sense of humour. "But if you must know, there's a field trip for business-types in town. Not too sure about the quality of their innards, but the credit card allowance... Can you say 'cash withdrawal'?"
Not as bountiful as some of her other scams, but it certainly gave the vampiress a good source of regular income. Flush or transfer as much as possible out of the accounts and live - or unlive, as the case might be - off the proceeds. Without a victim left alive to report it, the resulting theft would go unnoticed for a very long time. Wasn't as if she needed an outlay of cash to spend on food and drink.
"You're welcome to tag along, if you like. Always gets messy when you have to deal with a bunch of live ones by yourself."
John crossed his arms and studied her. The newspaper crinkled between his fingers. "How many of them are you planning to kill?" he asked. Generally speaking, he was not a sadistic vampire. He took what he wanted and continued on, wherever impetus took him. It wasn't a matter of a guilty conscience. He chose whom to drink (long ago, someone in his circle had referred to them as 'patrons') based on fascination, most times, and that lost its shine once their heart stopped. Afterwards, he felt vaguely maudlin, like he'd plucked a flower and it wouldn't be around to admire the next day, should he start to miss it. But if he set about it for the sole purpose of collecting money, well... that was different. There was nothing to miss.
"And how do I know you wouldn't simply," he swept his hand through the air, "Kick me in the balls afterwards and take it all for yourself?" he asked. The corners of his mouth twitched upward.
One eyebrow quirked and, on the the same side as her half-grin, Katherine moved around him with a confident pat on the shoulder. "Think of it like a mystery adventure," the cocky vampiress enthused, widening eyes with dark humour. "If you want a serious answer, though, think of it as payment for me not going up in smoke. Never know when I might need ya', again..."
Winking, the differences in mannerism and choice of wording could be no clearer. He was thoughtful, where she was callous. Gentlemanly, where she was tomboyish. Ole worlde, where she was just plain Wild West. But where they met in the middle was in experience. Two upper echelon predators, self-assured and capable with the experience of long preserved years.
"And no more than ten. It's a heads-of-the-board type thing - or something like it. I'm gonna' go watch 'Jerry Springer'," she thumbed in the direction of television. "Watching two sets of folks bash one another over the head, over who got whose hermaphrodite neighbour pregnant's always good for waking up to."
"Indeed," he said. "One never knows."
Would he accompany Katherine on her money-making scheme? Probably. There was a chance they'd get caught, of course, and so it wasn't without its perils, but he hadn't stayed in Key West for the landscape or the everyday taking. More was meant to come of it. Her plan seemed as good a place as any to begin, especially if it netted him the income to stay on longer.
"Help yourself to the television. I haven't got much of a taste for it." After a few idle turns of newspaper page, he tossed it in a basket and went into his bedroom to get ready for sunset. Short of sleep or not, John wouldn't spend an evening making up the difference.