What They Appear

[holiday_pirner]

She had woken up late, still a little fuzzy headed from the night before. Her first task upon waking was to down a bottle of water, then flop in front of the television and try not to revisit previous events.

After a good amount of vegetating, Holly had made herself some dinner. The brunette was too lazy to change out of her pajamas, so she just pretended she had the confidence to make fuzzy bunnies fashionable. She lugged the full bag of garbage down three flights of stairs and out back.

"Shit, where do they keep the bins?"

This was her first time throwing out trash in her new apartment, and it was hard to orientate herself in the pitch darkness. She grabbed her lighter, flicking it to illuminate her way. It wasn't until after the black bag had been discarded when she heard the noise.

The scuffing of shoes against concrete as they neared her. Holly whirled around.

Comments

[birthright_npc]

There wasn't much light in the alley, but there was enough that he could see the girl who'd just come down the stairs. He'd been loitering on the sidewalk, sizing up the building and waiting for a meal to wander past. When he heard the trash bag make contact with its fellows, he pushed off of the wall and stepped out of the circle of light from the streetlamp.

"Hey, little girl."

His name was Max, and he'd been undead for three years. He'd never quite lost his babyface as an adult, and his eyes were a cold blue. The eyes of a serial killer. One pale hand snaked out, grabbed the mortal by her pajama top. His old sneakers made scuffing sounds on the concrete as he dragged her further into the alley, past the dumpster and more out of reach of the light from the sidewalk. His forehead was already ridged, his fangs out.

"Max is hungry..."

[holiday_pirner]

Holly barely had time to register the rapid sequence of events. The blood in her veins seemed to freeze when she recognized the familiar visage. She knew exactly what this was, and images of the dead woman at the hotel flashed in her mind.

A surge of adrenaline came to life within her, and she brought her knee up sharply against his groin.

I am NOT going to be eaten by someone who refers to himself in the third person.

[birthright_npc]

The shot to his balls hurt, and Max swore as he backhanded her with the hand not knotted into her top. He slapped her again, harder this time, and the sound of flesh on flesh echoed off the grimy walls of the alley. The second slap split her lip, and he could smell it when she started to bleed. The growl echoed louder than the sound of the blows.

"Be nice. It doesn't have to hurt."

He really didn't want to kill her first, because he hated feeding off corpses, even fresh ones. But if she tried kicking him in the sack again, he was going to use his fists next time. She wouldn't be so pretty when they found her if that happened.

"Don't squirm so fucking much," he said with a distorted chuckle. His unoccupied hand came up again, slapped her with the intent to stun.

[holiday_pirner]

She closed her eyes against the pain, her head tilting back. She tasted blood, and tears were stinging harshly. If she screamed, would someone hear her? Would someone care enough to leave their flat and come investigate?

Stakes. Sunlight. Holy water. Fire.

Holly still clutched the lighter in her hand.

"Fuck you," the brunette ground out, mostly in an attempt to disguise the sound of the metal as flame sprang to life. She held it against his torso.

[birthright_npc]

The burning sensation was a shock, and Max yelled with pain as the tail of his Grateful Dead t shirt started to smoke. His clutching hand relaxed, turned into a flat palm as he shoved her away from him so that she landed on her ass in a particularly dark pool of shadows. The vampire's expression was ugly with rage as he slapped at his shirt, putting out the spark before it could spread.

"I lied," he grated, and one meaty fist raised as he advanced on her. "It does have to hurt."

The man at the mouth of the alley hadn't been able to get a clear shot until the girl was safely out of the line of fire, and the crossbow in his hands emitted a soft ping as he fired. The bolt sailed into the murk beyond the white pool of light from the streetlamp, and there was a scream of outraged pain before the final burn. An odor like boiled gym socks wafted out towards the street. The human covered his mouth and nose. Foul stuff, that.

Should he check on her, make sure she was reasonably intact? He had orders to keep his distance, to just observe, but he'd never interrupted an assault on her before. Her associations were questionable, to say the least. He reached into his pocket for his cigarettes.

Ash was still swirling in the breeze as he approached. His black boots made imprints in the vampire's remains. "Get up, then," he said, having collapsed the crossbow and tucked it beneath his unseasonable coat. "Did he hurt you very badly?"

[holiday_pirner]

Holly crawled backward away from the vampire, but froze like a deer in headlights when he turned to...ash? dust? She wasn't quite sure what she had just seen.

She wiped at her mouth with her sleeve. "You're from the club." Her voice was slightly dazed.

"And the beach, right?"

The brunette stood slowly, brushing off her pants. "I thought slayers were only...girls."

[birthright_npc]

"Mmm."

He was lighting a cigarette as he made the noise, his features illuminated briefly in the orange light of the flame. The smell of burning tobacco joined the aroma of ash, softening it. The ember of the cigarette was like a tiny star in the gloom.

He withdrew a miniature flashlight from a pocket, held it up so he could examine her face. There would be bruises tomorrow, bruises and a badly swollen lower lip. At least he'd stopped the brute before he could begin to use his fists.

"And what would you be doing out here at this hour by your lonesome?"

[holiday_pirner]

Blinking against the light, she felt a flare of anger rising up like bile. It might have been severely misplaced -- this man had just saved her life -- but who else was there to rail against?

"I was chucking out the trash!" Holly blinked back tears now, and that made her even angrier. She crossed her arms tightly, shivering.

"Do you know how many times I've done this in London? Nothing bad ever happened to me there." The brunette tried to breathe.

[birthright_npc]

"I know. I watched you there too."

His voice was soft, the hint of an accent coloring his words. He took the cigarette out of his mouth, stepped closer to her. She was shaking so much that it was visible, and his free hand touched her shoulder in a gesture that might have been used to calm a terrified animal. He knew what shell shock looked like.

"Breathe through your nose," he advised her calmly. His fingers were still, but she would have been able to feel his warmth through the thin cloth of her pajamas. He'd talked comrades-in-arms out of this state before. He was fortunate she hadn't screamed. Even in this city, someone would have noticed.

"In through your nose, out through your mouth." It was a mantra, one with a mixtures of accents. "Let yourself count to ten."

[holiday_pirner]

"You watched me."

Her voice was flat. She closed her eyes, mentally and physically steadying herself. Ten seconds, and she was looking at him again.

"Who exactly are you?"

There begged the question why a stranger would be watching her, why he would be armed with a crossbow, and why he sounded stuck between an American and a British accent.

"Oh, god. You work for them, don't you?"

[birthright_npc]

"I don't work for the Council."

He said it without inflection. He had nothing against the Council, but their methods were not his methods. He took his hand away from her shoulder, put the cigarette back into his mouth. Bluish smoke escaped from his nostrils as he drew in smoke and then exhaled.

"I have a private party interested in your safety and well-being." Again, his voice was calm, nearly without tone. He had been a soldier for a long time, both professionally and privately. It tended to dull the emotions.

"I wasn't supposed to make contact, but I wanted to make sure he hadn't seriously injured you."

[holiday_pirner]

She shook her head, ponytail swishing over her neck. "Unbelievable. You've been 'watching' me for god knows how long, and I don't even get a name."

The secondhand smoke was sort of calming, at least. "Well, mine's Holly. You already know that, of course." The brunette touched her face.

"How bad is it? Am I deformed?"

[birthright_npc]

"You're fine. You should put some ice on that lip when you go back inside. It'll help with the swelling."

He didn't take offense at her querulous tone. The smell of burning vampire had faded. It wasn't within the parameters of his mission to accompany her inside, and so he didn't ask. He looked up at the dark sky, picked out the stars trying to struggle their way through the wispy cloud cover.

"Smoke?"

He held out the battered pack to her, an off-brand he preferred. It was one of his few bad habits. Out at the street, there was the sound of late traffic.

"I didn't want to wait as long as I did, but I couldn't get a clear target without being sure I wouldn't hit you. Even I'm not that good at close quarters."

[holiday_pirner]

Standing in uncharacteristic silence, Holly stared at him in disbelief before finally giving in and taking a cigarette. She gestured, exasperatedly, where her lighter lay in the spot the unceremoniously dispatched vampire once stood.

She waited for Mystery Man to light her up.

"No, of course not," Holly spoke up, her voice lightly lined with sarcasm. He was a cipher; he gave nothing back by way of reaction. That unnerved her. After years of being an only child of divorce, she had honed emotional manipulation into an art form.

She had never met anyone she couldn't goad into reacting some way.

"Thanks."

[birthright_npc]

He flicked the wheel on his Zippo, ignited the orange flame, and got her cigarette going. "I should quit, but even my doctor says I'm as healthy as a horse. Maybe I'll manage it in a few years."

In a far corner of the alley, something skittered, and he directed a sharp stare into the shadows, but it was only a rat. It would have been going too far to say his posture relaxed, but he didn't arm up either.

"My interested party is worried about you."

[holiday_pirner]

"Your interested party," she repeated, after taking a deep drag. "Don't suppose you'd tell me who that is, Secret Agent Man."

Holly ran through the candidates in her head. Who else was there left to care? Or could care enough to presumably hire someone to stalk her?

"Hang on, if you've been looking after me, then why didn't you help that lady in the room next to mine?" He was most definitely watching her that night, Holly knew, because he had been at Cottonwood Cove that morning.

[birthright_npc]

"That was unfortunate. I regret that you had to see that. But her death was out of my hands. Protecting her wasn't within the parameters of my mission. Protecting you is."

Smoke from his cigarette drifted upwards in a thin stream. He'd smoked his way through half of it. He would have one more, then keep his hand away from the pack. He might not quit smoking, but discipline was important.

"I did wonder why I was sent to watch a civilian. Now that I've trailed you for a while, I think I understand."

[holiday_pirner]

She nodded in feigned understanding. "I see. You didn't help her because you weren't told to. Gotcha." She looked away, exhaling a stream of blue-grey smoke.

She was quietly starting to put the pieces together. If her suspicions were correct, Holly had a long distance phone call to make.

"You know, you sound sort of like a robot when you speak. And understand what, exactly?"

[birthright_npc]

He might have smiled, or maybe it was just an illusion because of the lack of light. The hand without the cigarette in it ran over his military haircut, battle-hardened fingers touching brown strands. The tip of his cigarette smoldered on, and he took it out of his mouth again to keep the smoke out of his eyes.

"That you're determined to kill yourself, of course."

He wondered in some distant corner of his mind if anyone had said it to her so baldly before, if they'd pointed out her self-destructive streak. Soldiers grew reckless after long periods at war. This girl had never been at war, not really. He wondered where the urge had come from.

"Unfortunately, you're rather out of luck. My job is to stop that from happening."

[holiday_pirner]

"I am not suicidal." Holly knew for a fact she wasn't, because she had tested herself against the Beck's scale out of curiosity.

"How do you figure that? Because I smoke? Drink? Maybe sometimes use a little drugs?" The brunette realized she wasn't helping her own case. "Or do you mean because I fraternize with a, gasp, vampire?"

She swept her hands apart. "Because in case you hadn't noticed, he wasn't the one to attack me in a dark alleyway. Oh, and if you even think about hurting him, I'll...I'll...well, I don't know what yet, but it'll be bad."

[birthright_npc]

Now he did smile, just a bit, but the look in his eyes remained cool. "Who you fraternize with is your concern," he said calmly. "I find it questionable, but as long as you're not in danger, my hand will be stayed."

His index finger lifted in a gesture that said 'wait', and he dropped the spent smoke to the concrete and put it out with the toe of his boot. "However. Don't let him deceive you. He may behave as if his humanity's intact, but he's still a predator. If I believe your life is in peril because of him, I won't hesitate."

He shrugged when he finished speaking, the coat shifting on his shoulders. The cigarette pack made a second appearance, and he lit up with a thoughtful expression on his face. He'd spoken with her for too long. He should return to the shadows, out of sight. She could be aware of his presence, but his aim was not to socialize.

"Rhys."

[holiday_pirner]

Holly frowned at this appraisal. Daniel wasn't a predator. He was the guy who ordered her Chinese takeaway. Made her laugh. Some truths were too uncomfortable to handle. They threatened to blow everything open.

"Is that your name or your model ID? I'm sorry. Believe me when I say I really can't help it." She tossed her cigarette, too, watched it land among what remained of her attacker.

Is that what her father had felt like? Knowing it was the end, and she had been almost certain that it was hers. She shivered again.

"Do you ever get tired of me doing these things?" That was an odd notion to Holly, that her actions still, after nearly everyone in her life faded away, effected someone other than her.

[birthright_npc]

"You behave recklessly," Rhys said evenly, but there was no censure in his tone. "Like a child who doesn't know any better. But I have the feeling that you do know better. Why you don't seem to care is another matter, and not one I can help you with. I'm just here to protect you."

There was a noise from above on the fire escape, and metal stairs creaked as someone else began to make their way down. Did people usually wait until this hour to chuck their trash? If he had been the type to do so, he would have chuckled at the coincidence.

"You should go back inside. Put some ice on that lip. And make sure your windows are locked."

[holiday_pirner]

She bristled at being compared to a child, but kept it in check. There was no use going off again. She looked toward the source of the noise, still jumpy in her skin.

"Okay, Rhys. I'll do that."

Holly fished her keys out of her pocket. "Keep fighting the good fight." The brunette gave him an ironic smile before turning and heading inside.

[birthright_npc]

Rhys watched her disappear into the building, then looked placidly at the last of the ashes where they'd scattered. His coat flapped open briefly as he turned and began to walk towards the street, displaying the crossbow. He closed it with a smooth gesture, buttoned it shut.

He should catch a quick bite to eat, then a few hours of sleep. He would be back at his post later. In case she needed him again.