The Universe's Mixer

The instructions were so simple.

The paper should be folded thus, and thus... and it would create a shape. Once that shape took form, he was to make a wish. His heart, the directions said, would make it for him.

That was no longer a wish to be human. He'd been there and done that. Raglan James had ruined it for him, and it had cost David Talbot his life. Lestat was aware, very aware, of the thorns this process had. And that he would likely bleed. His heart's greatest desire? Depending on the moment or the day, that could be anything. An antique chair could appear. He could end up standing in the foyer of his apartment facing Gabrielle. Lestat did not, himself, know what he wanted.

Ever.

It was a main reason why he was such a pain.

He sat at the small table in his hallway, listening to the clock tick. He folded the paper into what became the flower of a rose. And then he shut his eyes.

He felt wind behind him, movement, footsteps. But they were the kind of footsteps that did not belong to anything as clumsy as a human. He felt a hand on his shoulder, cold, dead. He heard the mouth begin to open, to speak or draw blood.

And he smashed the rose. Picked it up and tore it.

It all stopped.

With a sweep of his arm, Lestat knocked the contents off of the table and onto the floor, then stood up and flipped over the stool he had been sitting on.

He would not allow the City that insight and entertainment. He could not abide it.

And now he knew the answer, anyway. He would not allow it to go wrong, for his house to burn down again, to be maimed again and thrown into a swamp again, to be left in favor of the whole world, to be abandoned again.

He knew what it was he was looking for.

Lestat did not want to be alone. He never had. He never would.

He'd have to do something about this.

When Veronica got home from the ball, she looked at the little box that they'd given her. The instructions said to fold the paper... and a wish would be revealed.

After the weird time-and-space travel-filled evening she'd had, Veronica was okay with a free wish.

She sat down on her bed, high heels off, now, still in her beautiful green dress. And she started folding.

The paper made a tiny cup, and when she finished folding it, words appeared on the side.

I Got Baked in Ensenada


Veronica smiled. Lilly.

She'd missed Lilly all night, too. She'd have loved the masquerade. She'd have been the belle of the ball. She picked the paper cup up, turning it in her hand, completely focused on it.

"I thought I told you you were red satin."

Veronica blinked. Her focus shifted.

Standing in her bedroom, dead center, stood Lilly Kane. "I mean, the green's nice. Very... sleek. But I think you're more of a red."

Veronica couldn't do anything but blink and stare.

"Is that all you got?" Lilly pushed her long hair behind her ears and sat on the bed next to Veronica. "Really? No, 'oh it's great to see you? No 'I missed you?' No--"

Before Lilly could finish Veronica was hugging her. She was real. She was real and she was here and she was alive. And Veronica was crying quietly into her shoulder.

Lilly hugged her back. "So what's been going on?" She pushed Veronica away gently, with a slight smile. "I mean, since I died I'm not really up on everything."

"Uh." Logan. She couldn't tell Lilly about Logan.

"Do you have anything to drink?" Lilly was up and heading to the kitchen.

And Veronica thought she was either dreaming or still in the asylum. There were cupboard noises, and pouring noises.

Her dead best friend, the girl whose death had changed Veronica's life completely, was standing in the kitchen, getting glasses of wine.

Veronica followed her. "Lilly. How...?"

"You wished me here. You wished, I'm here. I don't know how it works, really."

Veronica gulped. "Is it permanent?"

Lilly made a face, twisting her lips, thinking. "I'm not really sure. I know... I was somewhere. I was resting... and now I'm..." The face turned a little pained. "I'm here."

Lestat arched an eyebrow at the young woman behind the bar. She told him the the proprietor of this club was currently busy, and he would have to return.

Fangtasia--a name which gave Lestat paroxysms of annoyance--was not yet open. The girl at the bar had let Lestat in because he'd been quite persuasive with her, and quite flirtatious. He'd also used the Mind Gift on her and told her exactly what she wanted to hear in order to be allowed in.

"Well. I'll wait, then. Perhaps you could ask after him?" He arched an eyebrow, looking from the woman's face to the decor of the place.

Lestat preferred the vampire bars of his world, even if they contained threats against him almost across the board. Dracula's Daughter was just so much classier than this.

The girl looked skeptical, and said something about she'd see what she could do, before vanishing off behind doors that said STAFF ONLY. She left him a bottle that said Tru-Blood on it, and, with a melodic, seriously amused laugh, Lestat inspected the bottle.

Synthetic. Blood.

"This is horrifying," he said. He sat slightly straighter on the stool, boots resting on the rungs of it, legs covered in jeans tucked up. His hair was pulled back with a black elastic band, and he wasn't dressed in a showy way. Not today. He wore a button-down black shirt, and a worn leather jacket on top of it.

He toyed with the idea of throwing the bottle to destroy it, but realized that would simply make a mess. The existence of the beverage irritated him--as did the idea that this man was flaunting his vampirism for all to see. There were rules. There were rules so they could continue existing without things like villagers and pitchforks.

And only he got to break those rules. Didn't everyone know that?

[to be continued in comments]

After seeing Wendell the Dog jump through the magic mirror, Wolf approached it with some caution. The image was wavering like water, but he could see trees and a night sky. Lights burning a thousand times brighter than stars lined the buildings behind the trees. That worried him a bit, but the goal was the dog. The Queen wanted the dog, so Wolf would fetch him. He'd given his word, his will.

Before he could run off, tail between his legs, Wolf stepped through the mirror. Everything blurred in that moment, shifted and stretched. When he could see again, it was daytime. The shapes of the buildings had changed, though there was still grass and trees in front of him. With a frown, Wolf sniffed at the air. There was a lot of smells, but the dog-smell of Wendell was not among them. Not even faintly, as if Wolf had simply arrived the morning after the prince had crossed into the mirror. A scent could linger for days on the open ground. Weeks, in the wintertime.

Wolf bent at the knees, getting closer to the ground. His nostrils flared as he sniffed again. Dogs, more dogs, and -- a growl rose in his throat, one corner of his lip curling -- a few cats. No prince. Staying low, Wolf began to work his way downwind to the treeline. ( It might work, if the dog had crossed over there. )