Who: J. Harker & Leliana What: A deal beneficial to them both is struck When: Thursday night Where: Outside a seedy motel at first, then at the park with the crater Rating/Warnings: Mentions of killing people, vampirism. The stuff rainbows are made of. Status: Complete!
It was actually surprising, how many different types of establishments remained open for twenty-four hours. Or were open late. Helpful, for creatures of the night who did not sleep until the sun began to peek out over the horizon, bright and deadly for someone like him. Jonathan didn’t have a special ring or any sort of other protection from the debilitating rays - he had to sleep inside, blackout curtains drawn, listening to the tug and pull of dawn approaching which told him that he was meant to ease into slumber now. Functioning during the day was difficult anyway, since he was just not meant to be awake then, and he’d fallen into a nocturnal schedule.
Bowling alleys, laundromats, convenience stores. Any place, lurking in the alleyways near, you’d be sure to find questionable activity in the dark - because when the sun set, that was a sense of freedom for certain types - but right now, he stuck to a hotel he’d been watching. Researching. It was rumored that the place was a human trafficking hotspot, victims forced to work long hours in thankless jobs, against their will with no pay - and the trafficker in question was a broker who subcontracted with the hotel to provide a convenient labor supply.
This man would be Jonathan’s next victim, and surely it would come as no surprise to anyone who knew him that he was a meticulous hunter. He tracked his kills for a good number of days before he sunk his fangs into their throat - right now, as it stood, he couldn’t bear to pluck someone random off of the street. The unanswered questions of who are they, do they have a family, what’s their day to day like would ring in his head and bleed out his ears - if he was going to feed at all (and he had to, lest he wish to shrivel up and die), he’d prefer to take the lives of those who wouldn’t necessarily be missed. It was a decision he made, something he promised himself, something that was a macabre medium between finding hapless victims, potential pillars of society, and copping out by drinking from a blood bag.
It also was the only way he knew of, to help him adjust, to maintain a connection to the dutiful scholar he’d been before - sweet, endearing, he felt guilty about slaying even demons in Zelda’s former diner. Now he was a killer - a vigilante type, maybe, but still a killer. Hard for him to reconcile and come to terms with, especially when the dark beast within was so pleased each time he drained a victim of their blood completely. Luckily, he wouldn’t have to very often. Once a month or so, when he settled into it, like Vlad did. But doing the research and stalking next potential victims took time.
The last one had been someone involved in shady dealings too, not necessarily human trafficking but his own scandal - Jonathan had disposed of that body cleanly and efficiently. Then he began the task of tracking the next. Was even outside the hotel now, listening, waiting, watching keenly - his ears could pick up everything in the vicinity too, conversations and the shuffle of debris on the ground, cars purring, heartbeats.
And one particular heartbeat had been following him. How odd.
He turned, green eyes that were catlike glowing like a beacon in the dark, and out of instinct his tongue touched the tip of one fang that was always present. Always there, to remind him what he was now.
Taming clusterfucks was sort of Leliana’s thing, with her calculating demeanor and subtle smile sharpened by deceit. If it’d taken a toll on her, she handled it well - considering she had many things to balance, such as Gale’s safety, the illusion of proceeding with a quasi-normal life while mourning her supposedly deceased lover, maintaining a facade to those she and he held dear, and at the same time discreetly pulling a couple strings in the shadows to take a certain vengeful bitch down, along with her traitorous lackeys. It took organization and planning, but emergencies of this calibre were not Nightingale’s first rodeo.
It came with the territory of being professional.
Sometimes there were wrinkles in a plan, you see, where things didn’t go quite as expected. Such as someone else unrelated to the entire fiasco taking down a person of interest she had all intentions of interrogating and then murdering without blinking those mascara-plump lashes of hers. Whoever this person was, his methods were different. Leliana had observed in the darkness at a safe distance, tiny ocular equipment giving her a ‘special close up’ of him, and my oh my.
How curious.
Then the days proceeded with research, digging into any specific dirt (there wasn’t much, aside that the man in question had been a target of millionaire with secrets buried so deep they were in Narnia), but lo and behold he’d been a frequent patron of the network. Jonathan Harker, a friend of the blonde heiress (like she wouldn’t know, Leliana liked her gossip) that had been under her baby bird’s charge.
It was time to talk now, and she didn’t bother making her presence illusive. Rather, she approached very casually with two biodegradable cups of black cherry chai. Ever since the announcement of Gale’s ‘death,’ she’d worn black. Black lacy cardigan with rose patterns, a black top, black yoga pants, and, gasp - black boots, casual and comfortable.
“Hello,” she greeted, then offered him a cup. “It’s not blood, but I felt it’d be rude to approach you without some sort of warming gift.”
Now, approaching a vampire like Vlad in the dead of night, with his eerie unblinking demeanor and stoic, chiseled features would surely invoke a different reaction as opposed to approaching a vampire like Meeeeester Haaaaaarkar. For Jonathan? He did blink. A few times, however unnecessary it was. Confusion flickering across his features, a pallor that seemed to accentuate the sharpness of his cheekbones, looking like they could cut diamonds.
The spiced contents of the cup were easily discernible to his sensitive nose from here, and nothing untoward had been added to it (not that it would matter anyway). So he took it, but he didn’t drink from it yet. Coffee and tea in general tasted differently, he’d discovered, though he continued to appreciate the whole sociality of it.
However, he wasn’t sure what to expect from a woman who approached him so casually while he was hunting. Though she did look familiar...
“You work with Zelda,” he said, more like a statement than a question. “At the shoe store.” Yes, she did, the redhead who rolled around in the piles of shoes like they were fluffy clouds of joy and rapture. Intriguing.
Ah, so he did recognize her. Good eye. “It is a part-time sort of thing,” chuckled Nightingale, taking a small sip from her drink. Still piping hot, but it did well against the chilly October nights in such a dry climate like California’s. “Society thanks you for your choice of victims, by the way. I’ve seen your work.”
Business disguised as a social call. But business nonetheless, and she was sure the lawyer could find the devil in the details. “You ate one of my targets, if I am to be precise.” Another sip, a little pleasant hum because berry-infused chais were her absolute favorite - why not enjoy the little things when they’re presented to you? “I had every intention of smashing every finger and every toe with a hammer until they told me what I needed to know,” she continued, silky voice caressed in that ghost of an accent, cold eyes unblinking. “Then you came and beat me to the punchline. I’d consider it rude if I hadn’t been so impressed.”
“My...work?” Jonathan repeated, because he wasn’t exactly used to hearing that. Or if he was, it was in reference to his impressive legal research skills, potentially even his ability to rattle off fluent sentences in multiple languages. No one had ever complimented his ability to pierce a throat, drain a human of blood rendering them a shell of a person, stiff and cold, before ditching the body in an appropriate location.
Granted, that was a talent that was new to him as well. He wasn’t certain he even wanted to be complemented, in that regard.
But he still accepted the words for what they were, head ducking bashfully as he lifted the cup to his lips to take a drink. Or that could have been because he could have felt guilty about encroaching on someone else’s territory. A silly thing to feel guilty over, but there you had it. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know you had plans for him,” he apologized. “Is this one - “ A motion to the hotel, and the din inside; mostly it was quiet, and still, not much activity. But the shuffling and hushed voices, he zeroed in on. “Yours as well?”
“Oh, Maker,” Leliana huffed a laugh, shaking her head. “No, no, this one is not mine - don’t let me interrupt, your meal, Mr. Harker.” Merely, she wanted to make her presence known and then usher him in for a chat somewhere. It was a lovely night, blanket of stars glittering in the darkness, the fall breeze coming in - such a divine time to talk, after murder. “Though I had a proposition for you, should you be interested. A kind of negotiation that…”
A smile crept, like slow poison. “A negotiation that benefits the both of us. I am in a bit of a tiff, you see, and have no choice but to put my trust in those I hardly know.” These stretchy pants lacked the luxury of pockets, so she pulled a folded up note from the confines of her bra. “Address to a park. The one with the crater, to be precise. Meet me there after your dinner.”
The park with the crater. Right then. Nowhere else would that make sense, but in Orange County? Jonathan could recall with perfect clarity the news story and the subsequent YouTube videos that had been spawned after the creation of the aforementioned crater. “Of course,” he agreed, taking the paper from the mysterious woman. He still hadn’t gotten her name, but he imagined that was how she had intended it to go. Still, he was curious, and he had nothing better to do after taking care of needs so he fully planned to show up. “I won’t be long.”
And he wasn’t. Once Leliana was gone, he bided his time, waiting a little longer until the victim he’d tracked here came out to have a cancer stick. The scent of tobacco, of nicotine, was poignant and a reminder of his own habits - he allowed himself to appreciate the curl of smoke into the air before a pale hand shot out and grabbed the man, dragging him into the small alley behind the hotel. So quickly, so deadly, the crush of the bones in his throat prevented him from screaming - weak gasping sounds at most - and the last thing he saw was red, the eyes of a vampire in true bestial form, giving in to that nature.
Body disposed of, nary a drop of blood on his suit, it was really that simple. Maybe Jonathan could have gone longer without feeding, but he was still new at this - he didn’t have centuries of control transferring over into this life, the way Vlad did. In Jonathan’s own dreams, he barely had any time as a vampire before he was staked out of pity. Hunting was instinct, mostly, but he would have to learn to make his meals last. He would have to learn a lot of things.
To the park he went, heading for the site of the crater. It was creepy out here, he wouldn’t deny that. Lamps blinked occasionally. An old fountain was the resting place for a few birds, perched there like dark shadows. Cats fought, somewhere in the distance, Screech, howl.
He waited patiently.
The park with a crater. It was abandoned, of course - even at night, people strayed away from it. Nothing left but old debris from swings and jungle gyms, and some of the benches were still scorched black. Projects would likely roll forward with reconstructing it back to its former glory, but the destruction with the hint of residual magic gave it a good, ominous sort of feel. It hadn’t bothered Leliana.
Destruction by magic was what her dreams were composed of, anyway.
“That did not take you long,” was her statement in greeting, stepping forth from a throng of trees that were barely left standing. A decoy car was parked several yards away. A clunky thing, much like what Gale used to rig into an explosive. The memory was bittersweet, and surfaced another layer of resolve. “You’re efficient. Quick. With a sense of morals, no less. Is that difficult for you?”
Again, she didn’t approach him empty handed. A folder with paperwork was tucked under her arm.
Hm, that was a question. Jonathan chuckled dryly, rubbing the sharp angle of his jaw. “It has its trying moments,” he said, but then added, “I don’t mind so much, however.” The battle waged, the tug of war, the back and forth - those he took as signs of comfort, as positive things whereas perhaps others wouldn’t, but to him it was simple. If he was still struggling then that meant the human aspects of him continued to remain and hadn’t been washed away in a mudslide - they were there, those instincts, perhaps hidden under darker ones. He hadn’t lost sight of himself - not with his keen vision, his stubborn nature, and Vlad had promised he wouldn’t let that happen anyway. Jonathan believed him, even if at first his very stoic partner questioned his ability to be a reminder of humanity.
There were his other friends too. Moral compasses, of a sort. He wouldn’t fool himself into thinking he would remain exactly the same as he had been, he would acknowledge that he had changed and wouldn’t force himself to be something he wasn’t, but with support and his own tenacity he felt like he’d eventually settle into a new skin.
“You wanted to talk about a negotiation?” he asked, bright eyes flitting toward the folder and then back up at Leliana’s face. “Something about a tiff you’re in.”
Ah, yes. The tiff. “My person of interest that you so ravenously drank from was on my payroll, actually,” Leliana began, then motioned him over to come sit with her on the bench that sustained the least damage. Meaning it was still fairly in tact, and wouldn’t collapse under their weight. Knees crossed, folder on her lap, she interlocked her fingers and kept it resting on the paperwork. “An agent of mine. Or, was. I stepped down from my career temporarily due to some dream complications.” Something he wasn’t a stranger to, clearly - he was a vampire. “And it turns out, my second in command had been looking for a chance for old revenge, sent my lover on an assignment purposefully rigged, and had him killed.”
All candy sweetness from her velveteen voice was gone. That seething, dripping rage wasn’t an act despite the lie. Someone had still messed with Gale, purposefully put him in a situation with an attempt to orchestrate his death - Nightingale was going to make sure their blood rained.
“That agent was one of the many other traitors that was in on the whole plan, you see.” Now came the importance of the folder, which she passed onto him. Paperwork of those on her ‘hit list.’ There were quite a few, all of them within the state, some outside Orange County limits but still not far. Leliana’s eyes remained ahead, tightly narrowed, posture straight and tense. “I planned on killing them all myself, but that takes time, and eventually would let them know that I know what they’re up to. You’ve information in there, about all of them. Patterns, different aliases. Verify if you’d like. But that entire folder holds a buffet lined up just for you, Mr. Harker.”
Jonathan sat, carefully, listening to the explanation. He couldn’t stop the sympathetic wince from flickering across his features; he would always be a bit of a bleeding heart, no pun intended. “I’m sorry...about your lover, I mean,” he spoke sincerely and if it had been him in that situation, he doubted he’d be feeling very forgiving too. Likely he’d be ready to bathe in their blood, and he wasn’t even...
Well. Normally he’d say he wasn’t the violent sort, but he was currently accepting a folder chock-full of details about where to find his next meals. And from what it sounded like, they in their traitorous ways had been racking up the bad karma for awhile. Seemed a messy affair overall, a messy line of work.
“And I thought being a lawyer meant fraternizing with scum,” he quipped, leafing through the information - of course he could read everything in the dark, no need for a light, but it was more a perfunctory glance anyway; he’d look in more detail later. “So you want all of them disposed of? I...” He paused, considering. “It’s sustenance for me, but what would you want in return, for providing that?”
I’m sorry about your lover. Leliana couldn’t help but snort - even smirk - a bit bitterly. Gale was off the radar elsewhere in the company of one Baron Plucky, the most intimidating of her messenger ravens. He shouldn’t be gone to begin with, but unfortunately messes like these do not clean themselves up.
“Satisfaction,” she explained plainly. It was the truth. The whole point of taking a step back so her right hand could take the reins temporarily was to decompress, so she wouldn’t become the ruthless Spymaster she’d become for the Inquisition in Thedas. All of it now seemed like a self-fulfilling prophecy, and now she had returned to the jaws of the beast prepared to lose herself if it meant her soldier’s safety. Nightingale peered at him. “What I get in return is simple, yet plentiful. You remove the extras from my way, and it makes the path to my supposed right hand that much quicker and easier. Maybe then, I’ll be a step closer to sleep.”
Vengeance kept one up at night, you see. Research, calculation, dissecting every motive, outlining every move. The sooner she could end this, the sooner she could bring Gale back home. No one else would have to mourn through deceit.
“So with the right hand out of the way, the path cleared, I’m guessing that this will be more than a brief ‘stepping back from the career’ type of situation?” Jonathan asked, though he didn’t necessarily expect details. It all seemed to be a last hurrah. A way to close the chapter and if she had no choice but to put her trust in people she barely knew, to help pull the curtains on everything for good, then he would do his best.
It didn’t seem like he wanted to be on her bad side anyway. Maybe no one would, regardless of who they were.
He drummed his fingertips on the folder, gently. “We’ll keep in touch, then.” Obviously, they would have to - and he assumed that she already knew how to find him. Knew that they both were on that circus of a network; it wouldn’t be hard to maintain contact. “And I’ll space it out a little. Switch it up. So it doesn’t look like you sent someone to take them out all in a domino effect. That way your right hand will have no idea you know what happened, and were planning to retaliate,” he said, and was already formulating a schedule in his mind. Quick thinking at work, like always.
Good catch there, esquire. “A last hoorah, yes,” she confirmed, sky-tinted eyes now cast to him. Nightingale’s last grand game. The risks weren’t worth it anymore, not when she had someone she could lose because of this intricately woven web of bullshit. Part of her regretted ever letting Gale involved, but perhaps he was exactly what she needed to realize that it was time to put this to rest. Her ledger would never be clean, and there’d be a re-visit of certain aspects of this life (even when you’re out, you are never completely out), but for the most part - it’d be over.
Leliana rose from the bench, inhaling a deep breath of midnight air. “Thank you. I know accepting something like this from a stranger is a bit...odd, but this very place is the definition of it, no?” The smile formed was a tired one. “I’m Leliana, though those agents…” A motion to the folder under his arm. “Will refer to me as Nightingale. Make sure they know that I know what they have done, would you? I will give them the courtesy of at least letting them know why this is happening to them.”
“Odd is one way to put it,” Jonathan smiled wryly, and he too rose from the bench - tall as a watchtower, in the dark he looked nearly like a vulture when he rolled his shoulders. Funny that now, in a way, he sort of was. Still, he tucked the folder inside his jacket for safekeeping and extended his hand for a businesslike shake that would feel chilly, but he meant it with a certain degree of warmth. He didn’t know her well, but the news that this would be an end to washing her hands in blood was something he would be glad for, for her sake - since he could catch the weariness behind that smile; it was probably time to retire anyway. “Jonathan Harker, as you already know. But it’s a pleasure, Leliana. And I’ll be sure to let them know.”
Before eating them, that is. Not the sort of deal he had expected to strike in the dead of night, here in a shadowy park that had been engulfed in flames, but as she said - where they chose to call home was simply the definition of bizarre. And he’d become surprisingly adaptive to rolling with the punches.
“Perhaps I’ll even see you around. At the shoestore.”
“Oh, you will,” giggled the redhead, mischief glittering her eyes. It was a promise; it’d be rude to act like he didn’t exist after all this was said and done, and once the mayhem subsided, she’d want to properly thank him for his assistance. Though she didn’t think a ‘thank you’ fruit basket would suffice for someone of his appetite - Leliana would have to get creative.
Perhaps Pinterest had a ‘what to gifts to give a vampire’ section?