Harry Dresden (i_wizard) wrote in we_coexist, @ 2011-02-28 19:01:00 |
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Entry tags: | dinah lance, harry dresden |
Maybe Not So Bad... [Log]
[backdated to Valentine's Day]
At the end of a long and profitable day at the Sherwood Florist, Dinah relished flipping the sign to closed. Half an hour later, she had finished up the paperwork that she could concentrate on and headed upstairs. She paused as she got in the door, looking at the empty apartment. Despite the busy work day, she wasn't quite ready for bed, but wasn't sure if she was ready for patrolling again. She retrieved her smartphone and glanced at the message indicator. It was beeping yet again.
Dinah rolled her eyes and hoped that the City would stop sending these her way when Valentine's Day was over. She set about trying to clear the messages out, including the ones she'd briefly listened to that morning. She paused at the message from 'Bob' as she recognized a voice in the background, and definitely recognized that spell.
Once she cleared out the messages, she hung up and dialed Harry's house phone number, knowing that his cell phone was most likely out of order again.
Harry had left the stupid cell phone in the lab after it had been going off all morning long. The most ridiculous calls, too! He'd been hoping that the latent magical energies down there would make it short out again.
Then he'd spotted the newspaper ads. It wasn't hard to discern his own amidst the classified ads, and Harry had immediately suspected Bob. He wasn't sure how the spirit would pull it off, but he'd opened the trapdoor to ask. Only to find Bob using the cell phone.
Well. It was shorted out now. Bob had denied placing the ad, but was certainly appreciative of the other ads.
Harry didn't want to know how many more messages were in the blasted thing. When his home phone rang, he gave it a wary glare before answering, in his best grumpy wizard voice, "What?"
Dinah winced at the gruff answer, but it was too late to hang up and call back later at this point. At least, not without breaching the phone etiquette that had been drilled into her when she was younger.
“Harry? It’s Dinah. Is this a bad time? Sorry, I could always call back,” Dinah apologized.
Harry's voice softened immediately. "Sorry, Dinah. It's just been... I've been getting a lot of really weird calls today. I was afraid this was another one." The wince was detectable in his voice. "Are you okay?"
“You too?” Dinah asked. She unfolded the personal ad spread that was sitting on her coffee table and scanned them. “I’m fine. Actually, one of the calls I got-from someone named Bob-anyway, it sounded like your voice in the background. I was just calling to ask if that was from your phone?”
Professional wizard seeking female companionship... That had to be Harry’s, though she supposed she didn’t actually know for sure if those interests all fit him or not, but it was the only ad that fit with Harry. Dinah decided it was better to let Harry tell her about the ad rather than to assume or guess incorrectly.
There was a thunk on the other end of the phone as Harry dropped his head against the coffee table. "Hell's bells," Harry muttered. "Goddamn... Bob." After a moment, he put the phone back to his ear. "Yeah," he said, groaning slightly. "That was my... assistant. He's a lecherous little cretin. I'm sorry. The paper... there were all these articles, classified ads, and I kinda left my phone somewhere, and he got to it." The thunk came again as Harry lifted his head and dropped it back against the wooden tabletop.
Dinah winced as she heard the thunking sound of what was most likely a head colliding with another surface.
“I’m pretty sure the classified ads were yet another of the City’s practical jokes,” Dinah said with a sigh. “Harry, you don’t have to apologize. I was just…”
Just what? Using Bob’s bizarre message as an excuse to call? No, that was ridiculous, she told herself.
“Just curious. I didn’t realize you had an assistant. Anyway, trust me, Bob’s message was only the…” Dinah took a moment to mentally run through the worst of the messages in her head. “Fourth most offensive message I received today. I guess something about the mention of fishnets sets some guys off,” Dinah said with a laugh.
"Is that the case?" Harry grunted, not thrilled with the reveal. "Because this City knows a few things that I'd rather it didn't."
He sighed again. Glanced at the trapdoor. Then at his dog.
"Wanna go grab a beer?"
“I’m afraid the City knows a lot more than we’d all like to think,” Dinah said darkly, remembering for a moment that the City had somehow managed to figure out just about everyone’s abilities and how to medicate them to suppress their abilities while in Arkham.
Dinah couldn’t help but smile at the invitation. Now there was a way to unwind after a long day after the shop that sounded much better than just camping out in front of the TV, or going out on patrol right away.
“I’d love to. Have somewhere in mind? If not, there’s a bar called Mickey’s that is currently across the street from my shop. If the view from my window is any indication, it seems pretty much untouched by this Hallmark holiday, so we should be safe there.”
"That sounds good," he said. Valentines Day. Just another reason to make him miss home. Not because of the day itself, but the birthday he was missing once again. A drink sounded like a good idea right now. "I'll be there in a few minutes. Of however long it takes for the City to let me get there."
“Of course,” Dinah agreed, knowing that, with the City’s interference it could take anywhere from five minutes to several hours. She was just going to have the hope the City was cooperative tonight.
After a quick change into a baby blue sweater and jeans, Dinah brushed on some make-up and left her hair fall in loose waves to cover the wound from the vampire bite, which was still healing. It was nice to be going out for something other than business or patrolling, and so nice to wear something else in her closet besides work clothes or fishnets. Dinah definitely still had a girlie side that liked dressing up, doing hair and make-up, and she hadn’t had many reasons to do any of those things lately. So, she took her chances to do so where she could. Not that she was dressed to the nines or anything, but the effect was a little bit more than just an ordinary work day.
Mickey’s was still across the street when she stepped outside. Dinah hurried across the street before it decided to move and slipped inside. Luckily, she had beat Harry to the bar, so she took the opportunity to order the first round of drinks. Harry had yet to allow her to pay for drinks or anything else, so she could at least sneak this first round in.
Dinah settled into a booth in the back corner of the bar. As the bar was rather small, she still had a good view of the door-something that was best in any situation, but luckily the corner booth was shielded from the pleasant buzz of conversation that accompanied the end of happy hour.
Harry was trying to make sense of one of the better pieces of information Bob had turned out. The skull seemed to think the City responded to will and desire. Harry, as a wizard, had a lifetime's experience in harnessing his will.
Dressed in his usual jeans, a clean t-shirt, and his trenchcoat, Harry started down the street. Mouse, he left behind to make sure Bob didn't get on the phone again. Two turns, Harry saw the bar she'd been talking about and entered, The neon light announcing the place open died quietly and without fanfare, simply softening until the bulb was black.
He didn't see Dinah immediately upon entering, but when he checked the corners, he could see her looking at the door. With a nod, he maneuvered his way over. The bar wasn't crowded, and he'd had experience at navigating small spaces with a staff, so he got to the booth fairly quickly. "Hope you weren't waiting long," he said, sliding in across from her.
Dinah slid the untouched beer bottle over to Harry with a welcoming grin. She took another drink from her own beer, which was only halfway finished by the time Harry arrived.
“Not long at all. The City must be in a relatively good mood. Or perhaps it’s just done enough messing about with people’s lives for the day.”
Harry took the beer and had a long pull. It was cold, which was good. He liked cold beer. "Seems to interfere less when you make your destination an act of will. Or so my assistant tells me. He might have been right, since I got here this fast. On foot, even." He wasn't going to take the Beetle out on the streets when there was going to be drinking.
"So," he said. "Bow and arrow? You like... archers?"
Dinah’s cheeks flushed, though she hoped that the dim lighting in the bar masked that. She took a longer drink of her beer.
“Oh. You read that. Uh, my ex-husband is an archer. He had a bow, dead-on aim and a lot of trick arrows. That’s probably where the City got that whole ‘emotionally unavailable’ thing too.”
Dinah finished her beer and pushed the bottle aside. Emotionally unavailable was pretty much the understatement of the year regarding Ollie and everything that had gone wrong with them, but that didn’t mean she needed to burden Harry with the details.
“Sorry if it’s weird that I didn’t mention being divorced. It’s just not one of those things that generally comes up in conversation.”
She genuinely meant the apology. After everything Harry had confided in her, she realized that she hadn’t told him all that much about her life. At the very least, they could have commiserated over lost love when he’d told her about Susan. However, that relationship was lost due to circumstances outside of both of their control, whereas her marriage had ended because Oliver never really had wanted to share his life with her.
"It was on my breakfast table. My eyes kinda met it. And then couldn't look away." He blushed himself. "I had to try and see what Bob had been doing. If at least to apologize. But when I fried the phone, I couldn't see what numbers he'd called."
He waved away her apology. "You have no reason to apologize. It didn't exactly come up. And it's sorta private. People just don't go talking about private things without reason."
“Was private,” Dinah emphasized. “The City fixed that for me. So Bob, your assistant… you said he thinks that the City responds to will? I wonder whose will it was to play cupid for all of us unlucky lonely hearts souls.” Dinah cracked a small smile. “Though, if the rumors I heard today are true-we got off easy. Apparently last year there was some trouble with a rogue Cupid running around putting everyone under some sort of love spell.”
Dinah caught the eye of a passing cocktail waitress, who thankfully brought out the second round of beers. She took a sip of the fresh bottle and glanced up at Harry again.
“So, who is Bob anyway? I didn’t realize you had an assistant.”
Harry picked up a pillar of salt from the table and immediately poured it out in his right hand, making a circle around their table that he was careful not to disrupt. He kept Dinah from moving with a look and a "Trust me." Once the circle was complete, Harry pricked the tip of his finger with a small knife, and added an effort of will and blood, closing the circle around them.
He felt the effect immediately. They were cut off from any electrical energies around the room, any magical ones as well. The music from the speakers sounded muffled as it passed through the barrier. Harry's cell phone was still back at the apartment, but if Dinah had hers, it might have let out a squeak or two of protest before failing.
"Now that no one can listen in..." He let out a breath. "Bob isn't a person. He's a spirit. A spirit of knowledge and air, and he's still a dirty old man. He's supposed to be destroyed, but he's useful. I can't keep a computer, obviously, but Bob can remember more about magic and spells than I could ever learn in a lifetime. And I can forget things. Bob can't. And you can't tell anyone about him."
Dinah watched in surprise as Harry spread the salt around the table and pricked himself, but she stayed still. Luckily, she’d left her cell phone at her apartment, as the ringing had started to grate on her nerves.
She took a moment to turn over the new information about Bob.
“Wow. That’s… handy. And a bit disturbing. Who knew spirits could be dirty old men too?” she said, her lips quirked into a small smile. “And I won’t tell anyone,” she promised.
Dinah glanced around them and then leaned in slightly.
“Since we can’t be heard, I want to warn you about something. Remember how I mentioned that the City seems to bring in enemies for each person it sucks in? Well, I’m pretty sure that at least one of the criminals that used to give us a lot of trouble in Gotham is here, most likely two. They’re… human, if you can call it that. But he’s psychotic, relentless, and endlessly creative.” A light shudder passed through her shoulders. “And once he fixates on someone, he won’t stop until he’s tortured everyone in their vicinity. I might be considered a part of that vicinity, which might mean you are too. Anyway, if you run into anyone calling himself the Joker, or Harley Quinn, I want you to promise me you’ll stay as far away as you can.”
Dinah met Harry’s eyes, trying to communicate just how bad this particular mortal was. Sure, he might not be a demon or a vampire or anything else that should only exist in nightmares, but the fact that he was human only complicated things. It wasn’t as cut and dry as killing him to stop him.
“He might look like a clown, but he’s… evil. He’s an example of the absolute worst things a human being is capable of.”
That made Harry blink. The Joker? Harley Quinn? Some part of him reminded Dresden that he had met this woman in an insane asylum... but then he remembered that the place had been called Arkham.
She wasn't lying. He knew that. She completely believed what she was telling him. A soulgaze was no lie detector, but it could tell a lot about a person. The simple look in her eyes now told Harry that she was being honest with him. They would be hard-pressed to lie to one another at this point in any case.
"The Joker," Harry repeated, his voice tinged with concern and disbelief. And shock. "You mean, the real Joker. Laugh gas, pale face, green hair, Batman's arch nemesis, the Joker." Harry knew his comic books. His car was titled the Blue Beetle for christsake. Knowing that vampires were real was one thing. Even faeries, Harry knew from personal experience. But... comic books? Hell's bells, somewhere there had to be a line!
“Arch nemesis? That’s one way to put it, I guess,” Dinah raised an eyebrow at Harry’s tone.
“Wait, how do you know about Batman and the Joker?” she asked. “I thought you said you didn’t have costumed heroes where you come from. Unless… have you run into them here already?”
Something didn’t add up. Something hadn’t added up since Dinah’s arrival in the City. From Fred knowing that Barbara was Batgirl without saying why, and even the way the other woman had mentioned Bruce Wayne and Batman in the same breath, as if she knew about his secret identity.
Harry hesitated, wondering how to put it. "We... don't have costumed heroes ourselves," he said. "But we have stories about them. Like... well, I guess it's stupid of me not to think they existed, since faeries exist and vampires and werewolves exist, but I know about those from lore and centuries of mythos. Not from comic books and movies."
He winced. "I've read comics about Batman and Superman and the Justice League of America. I mean, I call my car the Blue Beetle. I didn't really make the connection with Arkham and Gotham until you mentioned the joker."
Now, he felt awkward. Like he was telling her that she didn't really exist. Except that Harry was entirely, certainly, and completely assured that she did exist. There wouldn't have been a soulgaze otherwise.
Dinah blinked in surprise. That… well, that wasn’t what she’d expected at all. She looked away, trying to collect her thoughts. Comic books. About the Justice League, Batman, Superman… How much of their lives had been presented as fiction in other worlds?
It reminded her of something that had happened with some of the other members of the League a few years back.
Dinah took a deep breath and glanced up at Harry again.
“It’s not stupid at all. When something is presented as fiction, we just sort of accept that it’s fiction unless we’re given reason to believe otherwise.” She shrugged. “A few teammates of mine ran into a world with characters that were in our comic books once. Their theory was that the writers and creative types on our world must have been somehow psychically linked to that world’s heroes. Most likely they didn’t even realize that they were seeing into another world, and just translated it the best way they could.”
There had been something else in his voice at first. Concern. Perhaps that she was delusional? Dinah studied Harry for any sign of that concern.
“Of course, the other two alternatives are that I’m a figment of your imagination. Or that I’m delusional. I’ve told you before that I don’t feel crazy, but,” she spread her hands out in a semi-shrug. “I suppose anything’s possible.”
She remained mostly calm. She knew in her heart what she believed to be true. She couldn’t change how anyone else saw it, nor could she blame Harry for being skeptical of everything from her truthfulness to her sanity.
Harry chuckled. "You're not crazy. I probably got more out of the soulgaze than you did, but I've had more experience. I can accept this. It'll probably be the first time I have the advantage with some villains. I'll have to watch out about people's secret identities, though." A flash of memory made him laugh. "Oh man. You talked about Buffy. A girl named Buffy, killing vampires. That's how I taught my apprentice to kill Black Court vampires - go Buffy on them." The memory made him laugh harder.
"I guess it's only logical to assume I might be getting written somewhere. Unless the White Council publishes my case files one day, like they did with Bram Stoker's book on Dracula. It's possible, I guess."
Dinah breathed a small sigh of relief as Harry pronounced her ‘not crazy.’ While she wasn’t worried that she was crazy, it was nice that Harry didn’t think she was. She raised an eyebrow as he laughed about Buffy. Though, the idea made sense.
“Huh. I wonder if everyone here is fiction in someone’s world. Maybe that’s the link between all of us.”
The secret identities comment hit her then. She chewed her lip thoughtfully.
“I’ll have to warn Batman… though, being Batman, he probably already knows about this. And if anyone else with a secret identity shows up, well, they won’t do much good here will they?”
Dinah settled back into her chair, feeling a little more at ease now.
“Well, if you’ve been reading about everyone, then I guess I won’t have to give you the rundown of what to expect. And we’re both just going to have to hope that none of Superman’s enemies show up without him. Because quite honestly, I don’t think anyone in this City could stand up to them.”
It was a sobering thought, but there was no use in worrying about something that they couldn't control. If it came down to it, Dinah would fight to the death to defend these people. She'd just have to hope that they weren't thrown into a losing battle with someone like Darkseid or Doomsday.
Harry shrugged. "I guess it's possible. I thought about having a secret identity, but it kind of negates the effect by advertising in the Yellow Pages." He let the idea stew in his mind for a bit. "It's probably best to assume everyone's identity is compromised. I mean, not all hard-core geeks like me are prudent enough to keep their mouth shut when they announce that Batman is-- a name I won't go and say and prove myself the ass I'm trying not to be."
He took a long drink from his beer. "Watching out for new arrivals would be a start, letting them know that things might be an open book. It'd be better coming from someone they know, rather than some guy they met in a looney bin." Suddenly, a stricken expression crossed Harry's face, and he covered it with his hand, groaning. "Doctor Stephen Strange, Sorcerer Supreme. Man, am I an idiot. I'm gonna have to turn in my geek pe-- err... badge. Geek badge."
Dinah quirked an eyebrow, her lips twitching in slight amusement at the near-slip.
“Well, I won’t tell if you don’t,” she said, leaning in conspiratorially.
She frowned, searching her memories for any sign of that name.
“Dr. Strange.... doesn’t ring a bell. I hope he’s on our side?”
Dinah slid aside her third finished beer and sighed. The alcohol had gone slightly to her head, so she was pleasantly warm and relaxed. At the very least, she was no longer dwelling on Valentine’s Days past, which might have been as much of a side effect of the company as the drink. Unfortunately, she was also not going to be patrolling the City any time soon.
The waitress circled back to their table and stopped to ask if they wanted more beers. Dinah shook her head, then glanced at Harry.
“No more for me. Do you need another one?” she asked him.
“Yeah,” said Harry. “I’ll take one more.” When the waitress nodded and left to get it, Harry looked back at Dinah. “Well... see, your lot was published by DC/Vertigo comics. Doctor Strange was a Marvel guy.” Then he blinked, and a look of wonderment came over his face. “Wow, if the City keeps pulling in all different sorts, I’ll get to see some really interesting cross-universe matches. Like, Wonder Woman versus Jean Grey. Or Superman versus Captain America.” Then he frowned. “Though they probably wouldn’t fight each other. I guess you could say they were on the same side, in different universes.”
Still. It was something. “Hell’s bells, I hope this doesn’t end up like that time with the fetches. You can only fight off so many xenomorphs before one ends up bursting out of your chest.”
Dinah shook her head ever so slightly, trying to follow the explanation of DC and Marvel and getting lost on the unfamiliar names.
“I’m sorry, the time with the what and the what?” she asked, an eyebrow raised. “And what type of name is ‘Captain America’ anyway?”
The idea of comic books detailing the lives of the Justice League members was still a bizarre thought. The idea of other universes with entirely different heroes and villains that might be a match, or stronger than, the Leaguers was somewhat of a concern. If everyone ended up walled into the City, how long before a difference in opinion would result in demolishing an entire section of the City? Or worse?
Harry blinked, and then raised an eyebrow. “They don’t have the Aliens movies where you’re from?” The very idea of it was appalling. “Oh, we are definitely having a movie night.” It was a little disappointing when his witty pop-culture references went flat.
“Fetches. They’re part of Faerie, and they feed off of fear. The ones that were showing up were taking shapes from horror movies and killing people. That was the last time I ran across something that was otherwise fictional.” He realized what he’d said, and hurriedly added, “Um. Fictional where I’m from, at least. Besides, that’s not the case here, because fetches inspire fear. They don’t really get on the fishnet-wearing crime-fighting florist bandwagon.” A shrug. “More the pity. That would have been a lot more fun to deal with.”
Also, and this part he left out, because fetches were aligned with Winter. Harry hoped that if Mab was planning something like that, her Winter Knight would be part of the plan. But Mab never consulted anyone on anything, let alone give a mortal some glimpse of her schemes.
“To be honest, I didn’t get to many movies where I”m from. So I guess we’ll have to find a drive-in movie theater that’s playing the Aliens movies,” Dinah said with a grin. She colored slightly and ducked her head after a moment. “Sorry, couldn’t resist,” she apologized. Then again, he’d referred to her ad, so turnaround was only fair.
At the description of the Fetches, Dinah suppressed a shiver, trying not to think about the things she might see if confronted with something like that.
“It’s good to know that fishnet-wearing crime-fighting florists aren’t on your list of phobias,” Dinah said with a laugh.
With that, it was Harry’s turn to grin bashfully. “Well, drive-in movies are kind of a necessity,” he said a bit awkwardly, avoiding looking at her while he fiddled with his new beer bottle. “I tend to short-out any television after about forty minutes of any decent flick. Usually just when things are getting interesting. Which is why I know more about comic books than TV shows. Although there was this really great coffee shop right across the street from some electronics warehouse back home. They used to show stuff all day long, and most of the bigger sets in the windows had closed-captioning. I could sit across the street, have some coffee, and catch up on my pop-culture at the same time.”
At least she hadn’t referenced the bit about sex being one of his interests. It was true, but would have been far more awkward to brush off.
“My phobias are pretty specific at this point,” he said. “Plenty of things scare the shit out of me, but most of the time that’s pretty useful. Fear is just an emotion, when you get down to it, and emotion is the best fuel for magic.”
Dinah nodded.
“That makes sense. I suppose anger, rage, desperation... all of those would be useful, wouldn’t they?” She rested her chin on her hand, thinking. “Martial arts works in quite the opposite way, of course. You have to remain calm, use control. Not always my strong point, particularly when it comes to some of the things I’ve seen. Criminals using kids, for instance...” she glanced away for a second. There was a topic that didn’t need to be discussed at length. “At least I’m usually able to use my anger to fuel my punches and kicks for the most part.”
Then again, fears didn’t need to be discussed either. Dinah had very specific fears and the less time she spent thinking of them, the better. She didn’t have many fictional phobias. She’d seen enough in real life to feed her fears, and she wasn’t itching to relive any of it.
“The faeries... do you think they can get to the City? That they’re strong enough to get around whatever magic draws us in and keeps us here?”
That question made Harry’s gut twist unpleasantly. “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “The Queens probably could. They’re pretty much the most powerful beings I’ve ever encountered. And if they can make their way here, they can let any of their followers come along. I would assume the Nevernever is right there, where it always is, and Faerie is only a small part of that. The borders between here and there might even be thinner in the City.”
It wasn’t a theory Harry particularly wanted to test. The Ways through the Nevernever were often brutal, guarded by things outside the realm of human experience. The stone his mother had left him gave plenty of safe passages through the Ways, but Harry suspected that kind of knowledge would be pretty useless here.
Tingles ran up the back of Dinah’s neck at the thought.
“Well, I guess Buffy wasn’t kidding. You never do know what to expect in the City, and there’s no way to prepare.” It was a glum thought, but it was also freeing in a sense. There was no sense in spending energy worrying about and fearing the unknown. “What is the Nevernever?”
The more questions she asked, the more she was pretty sure she wouldn’t like the answers, but she had to know. While there was no sense in fearing the unknown, there was absolute sense in learning as much as she could learn.
“I’m sorry,” Dinah apologized. “This really isn’t your light ‘over drinks’ conversation, is it?”
Once again, Harry waved off the apology. “My own fault for talking about things like you’d know about them.” He took another sip of beer, thinking over how to answer. “The Nevernever is... just outside of this reality. That’s where the ghosts live, where the Faerie live. Demons and monsters and all those sorts of things that don’t exactly belong in reality. Plenty of things can cross over - most supernatural beings have half a foot in there already. Wizards can access it, too. We use it a lot to cheat. There’s too much risk for me to take a plane safely, but if I cross through the Nevernever, I can make it to Scotland in about half an hour. It’s connected to our world, but it fits a little differently.”
“So could you use it to get out of the City, do you think?” Dinah asked thoughtfully. It certainly didn’t sound like something that any person would willingly enter without taking precautions, but she couldn’t help but consider any way out of this City.
“No, I don’t suppose you could,” she answered herself. “It seems like any sensible way out of the City is blocked. Did you know that there’s a wall around the City that’s hundreds of feet high? And at the top of the wall, there’s apparently an invisible forcefield. If whomever or whatever is behind the City can somehow build a wall that’s inhumanly tall like that, complete with a forcefield at the top, then I suppose they would have any other exit route covered.” She gave Harry a small half-smile. “Still, I suppose the City has its good points. The company isn’t too bad, if you discount the vampires that is.”
“Not sure. I’ve been a little reluctant to try, honestly. The Nevernever tends to mimic whatever environment it’s linked to, and with this place changing so much, it could open up literally anywhere. There’s plenty of things in the Nevernever that want to kill me for one reason or another.” He shrugged. “Just the kind of charmed life I lead.”
He nearly choked on his beer when she mentioned the wall. Harry coughed, recovered slightly, and stared at her. “Stars and stones, are you serious? That’s a hell of a lot of effort.” He was starting to wonder about more basic things, like what this City was, exactly. How did it’s sun operate? The weather? Was it all magically-based, or some reality-creating power that this insanely powerful entity possessed? And why had it brought them here?
The small smile she gave took a moment for Harry to process, and when it did, he nearly blushed again. “I’m not about to complain. I haven’t met any of these vampires yet, but the people I keep running into... yeah, I could get used to it.”
Dinah nodded. “Yes, I’m serious.” She wasn’t going to relay exactly how she had made it to the top of the wall unless pressed. Haku deserved his privacy in that matter. She was pretty sure he didn’t go around telling everyone that he was a river spirit or that he could change into a dragon.
“But I suppose that maybe it’s for the best. After all, if we’re all here with no apparent means of escape, maybe there’s a very good reason for it. Just because it’s not visible doesn’t mean that there’s not a greater purpose at work.”
“That’s more than a little disturbing,” Harry added, finishing his beer. “For the best or not, we’re effectively locked in here with things like vampires and... who knows what else. Anything. Cthulu might drop out of the sky, for all we know.”
Harry regretted saying the name as soon as it left his lips. Thinking of Elderitch Horrors too quickly reminded him of He That Walks Behind, which had haunted Harry’s memories for far, far too long.
Hell’s bells, he’d probably have nightmares again. He let out a sigh and took a long drink for his beer, finishing it off. “I’d better get going, before Bob figures out how to use the house line. I told Mouse to keep an eye on him, but...” He shrugged, but Harry wasn’t particularly worried. Mouse could keep Bob in place, even if the dog deferred to Mister. Thoughts of vampires, demons, and Outsiders were running through his mind, and those were no good in the dark.
He looked over at Dinah. “Can I walk you home?”
Dinah considered for a moment as they moved towards the door. “Well, I am just...” She glanced both ways and didn’t spot the Sherwood Florist immediately, though she was pretty sure she could see it at the end of the street. “Down the street now apparently. So yes, you can walk me home.”
“You know,” Dinah said as they started to move towards her building, “With all due respect to your friend Murphy, I don’t think you’re a chauvinist. Chauvinists tend to have no respect or regard for women, and you’re exactly the opposite.”
The chilly February air nipped at her nose and cheeks, and Dinah drew in a breath and pulled her coat tighter.
“I would call it chivalry actually. You’re more of a whi-” Dinah bit her tongue before the words ‘white knight type’ escaped, suddenly remembering her personal ad. She looked away, hoping that the pink flush that was now spreading over her cheeks could be attributed to the cold. “More of a nice guy type,” she finished quickly.
Well, that potentially complicated things, though Dinah did her best to shove that thought to the back of her mind
“But, I expect that whole chivalrous streak tends to cause a lot of problems for you,” Dinah continued. “Especially when you underestimate the wrong women. Which reminds me-the whole holding doors open and pulling out chairs thing is fine with me, but the next time you get hurt protecting me from something I can handle on my own, I will kick your ass.”
Dinah stopped as they reached the patch of sidewalk outside her building and grinned up at Harry.
She considered things for a moment, and then stood on her tiptoes and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, placing a light kiss on his cheek. She lingered on the hug for just a moment and then released him.
“Well, good night, Harry,” she said.
The kiss on the cheek hadn’t been at all unpleasant. The hug was nice as well. Harry caught one of her hands in his, looking into her eyes, and pressed a light kiss against the backs of her fingers. “Good night, Dinah,” he said, giving her a smile. A little thrill churned within him as he did, and Harry felt his smile widening. “I look forward to the next time you get a chance to kick my ass.”
A wink followed that, and then Harry turned, walking away quickly so she wouldn’t see how he was still grinning like an idiot.
Valentine’s Day, he thought to himself. Maybe it’s not the stupidest holiday in the world.