Julie was sad to see Pietro go. He had come over a couple of nights before he left for Genosha with his sisters. Something had been building between them for months, ever since that night they had worked together to help rescue the victims of the Fangtasia fire. They had been friends for awhile with him visiting her and her giving him her unsolicited advice and leftover junk that she couldn’t bear to part with. For the first time in a long time Julie realized she was having romantic feelings for someone with whom she did not share a codependent relationship. It was strange. Her and Maxx had relied too heavily on each other for everything that she eventually had to leave The City just to free them both.
Was she free now? She was doing the same thing, burying herself in her work, in the problems of others. If people were leaving, Julie wasn’t noticing because she still had an apartment building full of addicts and drifters to look after. She still had a clinic to watch out for downstairs. Sure, Meredith was a good doctor but it took more than a doctor to make a clinic run. There were administrative tasks and the mental health of patients to review and Julie helped in both of those areas. Julie would always bury herself in her work but this time she wasn’t burying herself in somebody else. Her goodbye with Pietro had been bittersweet. They had kissed and he had held her and then he had left promising to return sometime in the future to visit. She hoped he would but if he didn’t, she knew she would be okay.
She had things to do, plenty of things to take up her attention. All day she went back and forth between her office upstairs and the clinic downstairs. She saw clients, some who were new and needed a place to stay and some who were old and haggard looking, a little dead behind the eyes but with hearts still beating. Julie helped whoever she could and hoped that Selene would never be truly right about her ending up in a vampire’s kitchen. Why would vampires have kitchens anyway? She knew that the projects were dangerous but Julie also knew how to use a shotgun and if danger really came running at her she would just open a portal and disappear into The Outback. Danger could follow her if it tried but it would also find more danger waiting for it on the other side.
It was the weekend but there was no rest for the wicked. Julie had already seen a young girl earlier in the day. She had been sleeping when she heard the pounding on her office door. Her apartment was right next to her office but she was thinking about knocking the wall down between them. She planned to try and recruit Dante for the task. That way she wouldn’t have to shuffle out into the hallway in her pajamas and with eyes half open struggle to unlock and open her office door so she could listen to this girl rant on and on about how her vampire boyfriend had kicked her out. Julie tried not to think too hard about the visible bite marks all over the girl’s body. This was the reality of the world they lived in.
Julie pulled her thick blonde hair into a ponytail deciding to take a break and find a portal to crawl through. She wanted to run through The Outback freely with the leopards and let herself be wild for a little bit so she could come back to Everett and help it’s citizens in the projects where help was most sorely needed. She was just leaving her office because Julie never opened portals in her apartment or her office or in the building if she could help it. Isz always followed her back and she hated chasing those little buggers through the projects.
She opened the door and was surprised to see Dante standing there.
“Hey,” she said with a smile. “Come on in.” Even though she was just about to head out she couldn’t very well go portal jumping now that she had company.
"Hey," he said right back while digging his hands into his pockets. Dante bounced slightly on his heels as he looked over Julie's shoulder to see if she was with anyone, or busy. "Bad time?"
“No. I was going to head out for a walk but it can wait. What brings you by?” She held the door open so he could come in and then shut it behind him.
Obviously stalling, paced around the office leisurely once he was let in. He jammed his hands even further into his pockets. He was taking count of all of Julie's stuff, looking to see what was missing and what was new, but that wasn't really the reason he was scowling, and it wasn't the reason why he was avoiding looking at Julie. "I wanted to stop by before I left. Looks like I'm leaving town for a little while."
She couldn’t help but let disappointment show on her face. Dante was the first friend Julie had made in Everett. He was always good for favors and he helped with the general sense of security around the building. Dante was great to have around and he would definitely be missed.
“Where are you going?” she asked him.
After Dante saw Julie’s expression, his own changed. Even the way he carried himself shifted as he whimsically spun to face her, now with a crooked excuse of a smile. “Oh, long ways South. I guess you could say it’s a family trip.” Dante was obviously trying to lighten the mood, but it didn’t seem to be working. Once that sunk in, he furrowed his brow and rubbed at the back of his neck. “Lucien’s planning a hostile takeover of Hell. He asked me to come with him. Figured it’s right up my alley, you know? I kind of.. have some unfinished business to take care of there.”
“Hell?!” Julie’s blonde eyebrows shot up in surprise. She knew that Dante wasn’t like the other boys on the block but she didn’t think that this was even a possibility for him. “Hostile takeover? really?” She wasn’t sure why she was surprised considering all of the crazy and insane things she had seen in her life and here in Everett. Going to hell on a field trip didn’t sound that crazy. “Wow. How long will you be gone?”
“Time moves a lot differently there. A lot slower,” he finally forced himself to stop fidgeting as he planted himself in front of Julie. “So.. if everything goes according to plan? I’ll be back before you know it.” For all of Dante’s bravado and sarcasm, he looked uncertain. It was possible that he was apprehensive about saddling up for a coup, but not all that likely. “It’s no big deal. It really is right up my alley. It’ll be like old times.”
“It doesn’t sound like no big deal. Taking over hell? That sounds like a pretty big deal to me.” She smiled at him uncertainly because things like heaven and hell were a little beyond a social worker with a portal to her own subconscious.
If Dante realized that the chuckle he let out sounded nervous, he didn’t make it known. The edges of his eyes and smile softened slightly and he paused. “I’m.. not really going for the takeover. I’m there to cover Lucien’s ass, but I already told him that there’s someone I’m going to bring topside with me once we break through. He doesn’t want me working under him anyway. Too much of a pain in the ass, and not so much an office type. I don’t know how you do it.”
“Office type in hell?” Julie smiled a little. She had to keep an office because her clients needed a place to find her but her’s was not a typical office job. She didn’t think those existed anymore. “Who are you bringing topside?” She couldn’t help but ask. It seemed an important point.
“Whatever, you know what I mean. Fire and brimstone isn’t my thing.” For all the bitching and moaning that Dante did, he had grown attached to Everett, and he even found a place or two in the strange town. But Julie was right, it was an important point, but Dante was trying to play it off as anything but. It was a topic he didn’t like to talk about, not even with Kat, Mal, or even Azazeal. “My dad. Lucien said that if we pull this off, he’ll have access to him.”
She nodded slowly. This made a lot more sense now. Why else would he go to hell to stage a hostile takeover? That wasn’t just another Sunday afternoon, that was a big deal despite how he was trying to downplay it. But he was doing it for his father, to let him out. Julie had to admit she was a little bit curious about who had contributed to the gene pool of Dante. He was an interesting guy. She gave him a crooked smile.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” she asked.
Dante’s shoulders slumped with relief that was even clear on his face when Julie didn’t press for details. He just smiled thinly and shook his head. “Nope. Just don’t get into too much trouble while I’m gone, alright?” He pointed for emphasis. “I’ll be really fucking pissed if I find out you went and got yourself killed or something shitty like that. Kat’s staying here, and I don’t care if you’re buddies now, she’ll totally dime you out because I’m fucking adorable.”
“You’re not that adorable,” she teased him. There was only so much room Julie had to judge anyone when she frequently jumped into portals and ran around in a leopard print bikini with wild animals through a fictional Australia. “I’ll keep an eye on Kat while you’re gone. How’s that?” She hugged him quickly. “And you don’t get yourself killed.” She pulled away. “Deal?”
He let out another chuckle nodded. “Thanks, and deal. I uh.. I suck at goodbyes, but is there anything you want me to do before I bail? Asses to kick, furniture to move, shit to break?”
“Well, since you brought it up.” She grinned at him and pressed her hand against the wall in the living room of her office. “What do you think about this wall? Because I was sort of hoping you would just get rid of it.” Since he was offering to do favors before he left she figured she ought to take advantage of it now. He said he wouldn’t be gone long but a trip to hell didn’t exactly sound like it would be a short one.
Dante turned to give it a good look, top to bottom, side to side. He flashed her a toothy grin at the prospect of getting to do some good old fashion damage.. it sounded a lot cooler than ‘renovating’. “Sure thing. I got just the thing for the job,” he cracked his knuckles ominously and turned to walk out the door. “I’ll be right back. Try not to miss me too much.”
“I’ll try.” She rolled her eyes but she smiling at him as he turned and left the apartment. She didn’t expect him to be gone long so she perched on the edge of the sofa and looked out the window, waiting for him to return.
True to his word, Dante came back. He wasn’t holding anything, but he was wearing an oversized pair of gloves.. that just happened to be glowing and on fire. “Yeah, I know, they look like fucked up Hulk hands, shut up,” he joked as he punched his fists together. He sized up the wall, and side-stepped a couple times back and forth to make sure he was standing right where he needed to be, before pulling his punch and obliterating the wall with a single swing. There was barely even any rubble, most of it burned up too fast. He quickly scraped off what was left of the edges of sheet rock before turning to Julie and taking a bow.
She knew better than to say anything and just watched him as he took the wall down. She didn’t ask him about how he managed stuff like this and he continued to do favors like this for her and they worked just fine that way. She even applauded him when he was done since he had bowed and everything. When it was time for him to leave she made it a point to hug him again and say that she would see him later and not to say goodbye. She knew that Dante leaving for hell was a bigger deal than he made it out to be but it was just easier for her to be caught up in his attitude towards it. If he wasn’t worried, she wouldn’t worry. Dante was strong. He would be back. She would be here doing what she did and hopefully not getting eaten by anything.
After Dante left it was later in the evening but that didn’t bother Julie at all. Soon it wouldn’t matter what time of day it was here because the sun was shining brightly in The Outback. Her uncle Artie aka the serial killer Mr. Gone had once told her that he believed that The Outback was true reality and that this, the city was a figment of Julie’s broken imagination. She had left The City to prove that theory wrong but how could you ever prove something like that? Maybe this all was just part of Julie’s damaged little mind.
She would probably never truly know the answer to that question. Mr. Gone’s words to her would haunt her through an eternity, she feared. Even if she was scared, it only made her more determined to help the people who needed it here in Everett. That was what she was meant to do, to help other people. Some might leave but others would come and more and more of them would seek refuge in the run down old apartment buildings referred to as “The Projects” because they had power and wasn’t that what everyone wanted?
Creating a portal was easy once she had learned how to do it on the road from The City to Everett. She jumped inside, leaving the woes of Everett behind her for the moment. Tomorrow morning she would return to be the voice of the people of The Projects. Tomorrow she would return to the job that she had signed up for, the responsibility that she had claimed. Tomorrow she would be Julie Winters but for tonight she was The Jungle Queen.
The brave and mighty Leopard Queen stood atop her perch looking over Pangea where whales floated overhead like blimps and the carnivorous flowers ate small helpless creatures. A place where mountains were gods and Julie Winters ran wild through the mighty plains with the leopards far far away from the real world of Everett, Washington.