faelans_folly | [Open - Area Around Irish Coffee After Midnight]

Entry tags:

open

[Open - Area Around Irish Coffee After Midnight]

I check all the locks and alarms again, even though I did that all on my last sweep. Routine is both an enemy and an ally. As long as I don't use the routine to become lazy and remain alert, it's my ally. Not that this place is a likely target but lack of vigilance is an enemy.

I can hear the training drilled into my head, even if I don't remember where and when it came from. Like everything else I know it's just there. No memory of how or why, just there.

I hear a sound, faint, but definitely there. No human could hear it, but then I'm not human. I don't know what I am, exactly, but I'm not human.

I sweep the flashlight back and forth, although I keep it on more to blind others than help me see. I can see perfectly in the dark, just like I can hear things a human shouldn't. I take a deep breath and I can smell that whatever it is, it's a human. Or at least smells similar to a human.

"Who's there?" I call out.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"People die," I say.

It's what I was created for. I don't know how or when or why but the sets of skills that I have only have one purpose. I'm supposed to be some sort of killing machine, essentially unstoppable. I don't know how true the unstoppable part is but I know I'm pretty hard to kill.

"Has that happened here?" Maggie didn't think it had, she hadn't heard of any mysterious deaths lately. At least, not of anyone that hadn't fully deserved a violent end.

"No," I say, shaking my head. I wouldn't admit to it even if there had been. I know how to clean up my messes if it comes to that. I'm not even sure if I would though. The training and instinct both tell me that I should if it happens, but another part of me says I should take whatever punishment comes. Even after several years I don't know what to call that part of me.

"I'm very careful. This is the closest I've come to losing control since I've been here. I don't know why."

"That's what matters. You try, and achieve control. You care whether or not you hurt others."

A wild, and very strange idea came over her. "Have you ever let the side you control loose? Whatever it is you fight to keep down, have you ever just...let it go?"

I aappreciate what she says, but it wouldn't make any difference to that kid if he had died if I had "tried" to control my instincts. He'd be dead all the same.

"About once a month I let go," I tell her, which is as close as I'll come to admitting to what I am, or what part of me is. "Go out into the woods and just let it out. Doesn't make it any easier to control other times though."

"But you did this alone, right? You've never done this with someone else? Another...person with you?"

Honestly, she didn't even know if the vampire would agree to this, but Maggie knew she had to at least try. First because she was worried about just what the town had brought in this time and two, because that much denial of self couldn't be good. Even a monthly eruption wasn't enough to hold that sort of tide at bay.

"I don't socialize."

It's not even that I don't socialize much, I just don't socialize at all. I don't know how to be normal around people. I know how to fake it to get what I want, but that's not the same.

"No one else knows I'm... different."

"I have someone I'd like you to meet if you're comfortable with it. If you spend time in the forest, there's a chance she already knows about you even if you haven't seen her. She lives in a cabin deep into the East side forest, a little cabin well off any known trailhead."

Maggie's mouth twisted into a smile. "Well, she did. Now she apparently sort of lives with my best friend."

"Ma'am, I'm not even real crazy about you knowing what I am. Not that I even know what I am."

Several years here and I've never blown my cover until now and now this woman wants to tell someone else. I don't like this at all. I glance at the door and think about just bolting. I can be out of here fast.

"It's Maggie, not ma'am," Maggie affirmed then squeezed the hands she held when confusion pushed past what she'd intended to say. "What do you mean you don't know what you are?"

"I don't know what I am," I tell her. I'm not sure how I can explain it better than that. Maybe I should just show her though. I know she can do magic so maybe she can tell me what I am. Or make it go away.

"I can show you though. If you want."

"Yes, I want," Maggie said and finally released his hands, but only to bring them up and cup his face in them. "I have magic enough to keep myself safe, and I think you need answers. My purpose here is to help the residents and I think this is the only way I can help you. If you're worried, and you think that worry would hinder this, I can call Bella." I smiled. "Between us, you wouldn't stand a chance."

I wouldn't be so sure about that, but I'm not going to hurt her. I'm still in control when I change, it's just a different kind of mindset, a different kind of control. As long as she doesn't act like prey or attack me she should be fine.

I stand back clear away a space in the middle of the floor, no use damaging the place. I peel off my shirt first, the silver ink of the tattoos catching the light. The symbols aren't any I'm familiar with or any language I've found here. Of course, I might not be asking the right people. Each one hurts like hell, weres being allergic to silver, but it's a pain I'm used to.

I strip off everything else too, not worried about modesty. The tattoos run all over my body, sigils and runes mishmashed all over me. I crouch down on the floor and I push.

The shift is painful, but like the tattoos it's a pain I'm used to. Bones snap, crack, and pop to rearrange and skin tears with a wet noise. I can make the shift happen fast, almost instant, if I need to but there's no rush. The wolf form comes first, it's easiest. It's big, more massive than I normally am, and I can make it bigger too. The puma comes next, jet black and sleek. A bear, a massive Kodiak is next, then I shift back to a human. I have more, but I'm tired and I think I made my point.

I'm sweating by the time I'm done and the tattoos are smoking a bit, not used to that much shifting so quick.

"If you have something to eat... that would be great."

It took her a minute to refocus after he stripped to skin in front of her. Impressive didn't begin to cover it and she felt a flash heat steal through her body to the point she had to pull a breeze around her to cool the flush on her skin. Then she forced herself to refocus.

Her eyes traveled over the markings on his body, surprised at the shimmer of metal in the ink, but she'd seen things like that before. Then the shifts started and she gasped audibly. Not because he was a shifter, but because the metal and the animal forms...it wasn't ever a good combination. Especially with the wolf form.

Her mind still reeling from it all, Maggie moved swiftly into the cold to-go case and pulled out two sandwiches, then pulled a Coke out as well, remembering his preference.

"Right here," she said and pressed the food into his hands before darting away.

She returned a moment later with a wet, clean cloth and started wiping the cool cloth over his face, and his arms, cooling the skin with a breeze she stirred into the air.

I try and eat the sandwiches slowly, but they're mostly gone by the time she returns and starts wiping me down. Her touch, even through the cloth, feels good. It's calming for the most part but every once in a while her skin brushes against mine and it sends a surge through me. I'm not very used to contact like that.

"You don't have to do that," I say, but since it's after I finished the food and she's got most of my back and arms it's a pretty empty comment.

"But thank you."

"Shhhh," Maggie said softly, calling more water from the sink to remoisten the cloth as she moves to his other arm and chest. "You went through the sandwiches fairly quickly. Are you still hungry?"

"I'm okay for now," I say, leaning back just a bit so she has better access to my chest. I don't want to admit it, but this feels really good, and not just because it's getting me cleaned up. Maybe just the fact that someone cares makes it nice.

"All right. Just let me know if that changes," Maggie nodded and finished with the cloth, draping it around his shoulders so the cool could continue to work against his heated skin.

Not wanting to move away just yet, she traced one of the runes she'd regcognized. "I counted three forms," she said softly. "Wolf, bear and a cat form. Is that the extent of your shifting or are there others as well?"

It's an effort to keep my breathing steady as she touches me and part of me wants to give a happy little growl at the sensation. I've got a lot of tattoos, maybe she'll touch them all.

"There's more," I admit. "I think some I don't even know about."

"It's not common for a were to have more than one form, but not unheard of," Maggie said softly, "I still think I should probably let Bella know just the same, especially the cat form. I think they're her favorite and I'd rather she didn't mistake you for a rogue."

Her fingers moved over kanu and laguz, the runes that spoke to her magic as well as a few others she recognized, though the metal in them jarred her. It wasn't pain, but it wasn't right, either. "Did you do these?"

"I've been fine so far," I tell her, but I'm not going to argue it. I know when someone is determined to do something and Maggie seems intent on looking out for me.

This time as she touches me I can't help the soft sigh that escapes me at how nice her touch feels.

"I don't know if I did. I don't think so. I don't have many memories from before I came here. I just... know things."

Maggie took that as tacit permission to talk to Bella, so she decided to not push the matter and risk a gag order of some kind. She did smile when he sighed, and tried to ignore why his warm skin under her fingertips felt as good as it did, to ignore the bass beat of her heart in her chest, and how much she liked both.

She tried to tell herself to move. And had about the same amount of luck.

"What things do you know?" She looked up, offered him a small smile, "and why do I get the feeling you don't mean driving cars or writing in cursive."

Her heartbeat is faster but she's not worried or scared, she seems... pleased. I guess she really likes helping people out? She doesn't take her hands off me either and I'm not going to remind her that they're there. She'll probably take them off eventually but until then I'm going to enjoy this.

"Know how to do that. Mostly... military things. How to fight, how to kill, how to infiltrate."

"A soldier of some sort then," Maggie guessed, "or something like it. But without anyone from your home to confirm or deny, we can both guess until we're blue and never come up with an answer. The best is that someone you know comes here, or your brain unlocks what's missing. Until then?" Maggie shrugged and blew out a breath. She hated being unable to fix what was wrong.

With a mental shake, she turned back to her resident, searching his face. "How're you feeling now? You don't seem as panicked as before."

"Better. Your touch was calming," I say, although I don't know why I admit that. Maybe because I hope she'll do more of it. I don't need it, but it's nice. Like I said, don't ever remember being touched like that.

"I guess I should get dressed and go," I add, but I don't move. Not yet. She's right, this is a safe place.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject