Midsommer's Night Run

[cian_oneill]

It was almost as regular as clockwork, heading up to Searchlight on a Wednesday night for a few beers and a game or two. Cian went to the Golden Nugget, probably the most regular watering hole, for someone who didn't have regular places. Sometimes he went all the way to Vegas, but usually didn't bother. The noise of the big casinos usually hurt his ears, and the smell of fumes on the strip was something he could do without.

Like this Wednesday, when he just went up to the bar and ordered himself a beer, taking it over to a table and sitting down. After taking a long swig he leaned back in his chair, legs stretched out in front of him, as he continued to survey the other occupants of the place.

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[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon held her position and gazed up at the golden creature. “You’re beautiful,” she said. Perhaps ‘handsome’ would have been the better descriptor. The aesthetic appeal of musculature and smooth coat aside, she responded most to the animal’s fluidity of motion and stealth. Any good hunter possessed some feline traits, but in Cian’s case, he became one with them. The likelihood of seeing another cougar on a hunt was minuscule, but Rhiannon doubted she would mistake him for another anyway. She did not look at his eyes directly, as that might be considered a challenge.

After a moment, she sat on a low rock beneath Cian and waited.

[cian_oneill]

Siofra's chin lifted, eyelids lowering slightly as a slight shift on the breeze brought a new range of scents to the sensitive olfactory senses, reporting on the state of the nation surrounding the two. Detecting nothing that carried a warning the head lowered again, front legs relaxing as a large tongue was exposed and a yawn issued. It could have appeared as if the animal was requiring more air than had been taken in during the run, or simply a message of relaxation, or even more so a way of tasting the surrounding scents. Whichever it was, when it was completed, bared teeth again concealed, the front shoulders lowered and the body stretched out in the dark, the faint light of the partial moon tricking the eyes into thinking the form was that of a large cat, but the figure in fact shifting back into that of a naked human.

"So, y' c'n run then?"

[rhiannon_lee]

Rhiannon clasped her fingers behind her back. A mane of dark, glossy hair slipped over one shoulder as she tilted her head. "I can do a lot more than run." Her vision wasn't anything to sniff at, and she could see the bare expanse of Cian's neck and torso.
Good Lord.

"Sure hope you can find your pants in the dark. It would be a shame if you couldn't."

[cian_oneill]

Cian chuckled, completely confident in both his forms. As a young lad he'd sometimes been accused of being too proud of his body, but he'd figured as a young man if he didn't take care of it, who would, and it would be the only one he had.

Little did he know back then.

Now it was still as important to him, but for different reasons. And he had no misplaced coyness, leaving that for others who had whatever reason they had to behave that way. While he no longer flaunted it, he also didn't make a fuss.

He lightly tapped the side of his nose as he grinned in the faint light. "Tend t' be able to relocate 'em w'thout too much bother," he told her.

[rhiannon_lee]

"More's the pity," she teased.

Rhiannon walked underneath the rock outcrop, palms brushing against her jeans. She jumped and wrapped her fingers around the ledge, which she used to heft herself up. Lean arms flexed as she emerged at eye level with Cian and climbed to sit beside him. Her legs swung in the open air. She didn't gawk at his nudity, instead focusing on the town beyond them.

"I think you're okay."

[cian_oneill]

"Glad t' hear it," he answered simply, head turning from watching her look out at the town till he was doing the same.

"So what brings you to this shiny bustling hubbub of humanity?" he asked, curious as to what a Slayer would have to keep her in this dusty, desolate place when there were cities nearby that could probably be in need of her skills.

[rhiannon_lee]

"Escape," she said, and then kindly, "Isn't it obvious?"

The slayer tucked her hands between her knees. Even without the Council's unwanted intrusions, there were things Rhiannon had wanted out of: the state of Pennsylvania, an emotional funk, her last relationship.

"But there's no such thing. Not really. I've seen more supernatural creatures in Searchlight than some towns see in a year."

[cian_oneill]

"Been a few," Cian agreed, his nose having twitched more than a time or two when walking the streets during the day, or of an afternoon, when he'd come into town for things needed at the resort.

"Y' didn't bring y' work with you now, did y'?" he teased, the grin on his face evident in his voice.

[rhiannon_lee]

“Maybe. I’m told I have a magnetic personality,” she said drolly. The moment of sarcasm passed and Rhiannon looked up at the sky. It was clear and the heavens were speckled with more stars than she’d ever seen, like salt and pepper scattered on a black velvet background. The moon waned. “Let me see your arm,” she said on a whim. “Please.” No random grabbing this time. It would be weird, considering the man had shed his clothes 500 yards back.

[cian_oneill]

Even though his curiosity was piqued Cian obliged, extending his right arm to her until it was hovering over her lap.

"Still got a pulse, have I?" he asked, a light tease in his tone.

[rhiannon_lee]

“I’m way past that.” Rhiannon took his arm by the wrist. Her fingertips brushed up and down the light covering of hair on his forearm. It must have been golden like his animal fur because she couldn’t see the hair in the low light. It felt normal, a man’s pelt. The experimentation done, she released his arm.

“I’m just wondering how much like a cat you really are,” she said. “If I scratched your spine, would it follow my fingers?” She smiled thinking about a childhood pet, a black cat named Talia whose back arched whenever she was petted.

[cian_oneill]

Everything was heightened when he'd shifted, and the light trailing of her fingers against his skin had sent sparks shooting through his limb. A shoulder lifted nonchalantly. "Welcome to find out f' y'self," he replied, voice a little lower, a hint of a challenge in his voice.

[rhiannon_lee]

“Hm.” Rhiannon had noticed his tendency to answer questions not in affirmatives or negatives, but by issuing challenges to her, daring her to try things. She wondered when he became a take charge kind of guy, or if this was his subtle way of doing so.

She reached behind his head, but didn’t immediately touch him. Just watched his face and flicked her fingers in the air, as if working a kink from the muscles. Her index finger descended on him first. It drew a soft, slow line down the center of his back. Her hand returned to the apex of his spine. On the second pass, all of her nails made contact with warm flesh and gently scratched downward.