Reinforcements arrive

[melodymagic]

The car trip to the alley Cian had told them about was a little longer than usual, a roadblock having been set up and the closed-off street full of vehicles with flashing lights and police. Melody strained to see what the commotion was and it looked like there were screens raised in the middle of the pavement outside a bar or club or something. As she settled back into her seat she saw Jazz sniffing at the open window of the car, the witch's face crinkled in concentration.

Her eyes narrowed and her foot pressed a little harder on the accelerator once they were clear of the traffic around the scene. "That must be the market he was talking about," Mel said, pointing at the E-Zmart's lights, "and there's the alley." She was almost out of the vehicle by the time Jazz parked, the older witch puzzled by the young woman's keenness to get to the alley.

Mel had the backpack on her shoulder as she stepped off the kerb and looked down into the dark alley, eyes taking a moment to adjust after the lights of the market.

"Daniel? Are you here?" she called out, one hand on the corner of the wall, head tilted to one side as she took a step past the phone box.

Comments

Re: Reinforcements arrive

[justjazz]

Jazz paused and looked up at where Daniel was perched, his curiosity and question a little bemusing. 'Perhaps he really is as naive as he puts out,' the old witch thought to herself. "It helps anchor the shield," she replied in a normal speaking voice, "and is cheaper and less likely to get pinched than a whole lot of other crystals," she added as she walked down to stand in front of the opening.

She stared into it, allowing her mind to reach inside it, aware that at any second anything could appear in it, come through and require being dealt with in any number of fashions. "Why isn't it ever to another realm such as our own," she muttered under her breath. "Always has to be some realm of demonic nastiness or nutters. Just once it would be a nice change to have something come through that wasn't about to maim, dismember, gouge or destroy all in their reach." She let out a sigh and looked up the alley to where Melody was finishing the line of salt on the ground.

Re: Reinforcements arrive

[daniel_stacy]

“Huh.” Daniel rubbed his jaw and looked out across the city, enjoying the slightly elevated perspective his perch allowed. His shoes swung idly. “Wonder if there’s a world that feels the same way about us. Some utopian place where there’s interspecies cooperation and everybody meditates all the time.”

Didn’t sound like the kind of place he’d like to go. Boring as shit. But from a human point of view, he could see the appeal.

He scooted to the side and jumped off the roof, coming to rest a meter or so from Jazz.

Re: Reinforcements arrive

[justjazz]

Jazz inclined her head, studying him for a brief moment as he straightened next to her.

"Only in the innocent dreams of those who haven't lived, I'm guessing," she replied, giving him a wry smile. "Can't say I'd fancy a world like that, but I wouldn't mind one time having a portal to somewhere just as inadequately equipped to deal with realms of the less co-operative, and as blind-sided by it all as we are." She huffed a small laugh. "Or as most of the world is."

She'd said for years that the ability of people to ignore the bloody obvious and put it down to 'one of those things' still staggered her. "Do you ever think of how it would be not having to hide what you are?" Her question was asked with sincerity, clearly having been something she had sought the answer to herself on more than a few occasions.

Re: Reinforcements arrive

[daniel_stacy]

Daniel, hands in his pants pockets, raised his shoulders. “I think about it. Truthfully I don’t do a good job of hiding it anyway.”

Case in point, he was standing there with two women he barely knew and both of them realized he was a vampire. He had accidentally shown Holly, just cruising along in vamp face on accident.

“I think you could get away within anything in Vegas. Maybe L.A., too. New York…” he trailed off. In other words, places where people were accustomed to absurdity. Los Angeles for its Hollywood blasé lifestyle, and New York for the characters riding on its subway system. But on principle she was right. Those people didn’t really believe in vampires; they had just learned to tune out the world.