19-Apr-2001
Note: The arc is currently under a massive revision, and will be under revision for at least another four to six months, so there will be some discontinuities until I can get everything fixed.
Author: Dan
Genre: epic AU
Pairings: NA
Disclaimer: not mine, don't sue.
Warnings: AU, a positive plethra of OCS, high
supernatural and yech factor, angst
Further Note: terms from such literary gems as Laurel
K. Hamilton are used and then twisted beyond all
recognition.
There were simple pleasures in being a lycanthrope. One of them, for me, was standing on my balcony at night and feeling--smelling--the wind play. It brought me whispers of the millions of people living their lives without a thought. It brought me hints of a world that had always been just out of my reach. I stood there with a beer dangling loosely in one hand, acting like the coward that I am.
Duo had managed to sweet-talk Heero into bringing over four pizzas. How he had managed to find our pizzas at three o' clock in the morning was something that didn't bear thinking about. Sometimes you just don't want to know how Heero is able to do what he does. Duo, the sneaky bastard, had managed to bring his lover in on our little adventure, and I really did not want to face either of them--or more to the point, I did want to see them together. It was one thing to know that they were together, and more in love than I could understand, but quite another to watch them.
It wasn't so much jealousy over Heero, but envy over what they had. As much as I would like to deny it, there was something between them, something that throbbed like a pulse on the tip of my tongue. I didn't want to know that something like that existed in this world. I did not want to know, and then ache for it for the rest of my life. Because who in their right mind would have me? A cursed shapeshifter with no control over her power. I sneered at the darkness in self-disgust.
"That's a pretty face to be making." The amused tenor made me tense, the muscles of my neck twitching as I fought not to turn my head. I could feel Duo's power like a chill wind dancing across my arms. Hating him would be so much easier, but I couldn't, and it made me irritable. He leaned that long, rangy body against the railing and watched me. "There a reason why you split on us?"
"There a reason that you care?"
"Aidan's baiting Dorothy--or vice versa--and I'd rather not get caught in the backlash."
"You've got enough power to hold your own."
"Power doesn't mean shit when you don't know how to use it." He gave me a significant look.
"Don't play word games with me."
"You've changed. Once upon a time all you would ever do was play word games with me." His voice told me that he didn't think the change was a bad one. He searched my face for a moment. I snarled at him, which only made him laugh. "You don't thank me for the observation."
"I wasn't capable of casual cruelty before." He made a snide little sound. "Or at least physical cruelty," I sneered at him. "I am now." I stared resolutely out at the skyline. "I use it, and I never would have before. I would never have thought myself possible, but my beast--that thing lurking inside me--knows how to use it, and does."
"Kill or be killed."
"Something like that."
"You do what you have to do to stay alive. Where's the problem in that?"
"You would see it that way."
Duo laughed at me, bitter and harsh like broken glass. "What the hell do you think it was like being a gundam pilot? You do what you have to do to stay alive, and you have to stay alive."
I shot him a sideways glance. "It's not the same."
"Isn't it? You die, so does your pack. So will I, and," He gave me a sly little grin. "So will Dorothy."
"Damn you to hell."
"They wouldn't have me." I tried to keep my scowl, but ended up laughing at Duo's smug tone. That was one of the things that I hated about him the most; I could never stay angry with him. I hated that he was always able to sneak around my defenses. "Hard, isn't it? Knowing that you're able and willing to do what most people think is abominable."
"Goes against everything I'm supposed to be."
"Still believe that bullshit?"
I just looked at him until he rolled his eyes.
"Maybe in the beginning people needed you to be Little Miss Perfect, but not any more. "
I gave a derisive snort.
"Christ on a fucking crutch, you have to be the most stubborn woman I know."
"Just now starting to notice that?"
"Look, I just wanted to come out here and tell you that I know it ain't easy realizing that you're perfectly capable of killing someone simply because it makes good sense. I didn't want to fight with you."
"That would be a first."
"Would you shut up and listen to me, you little bitch?" There was no bite in his words, just exhausted frustration, as if he had been banging his head against the wall. I'd been told before that talking to me could be like that. I mimicked zipping my lips closed. "Thank you. It's not as bad as you're making it out to be. It's scary as hell, yeah, but you can live with it. As much as it gripes my ass to admit this, you're strong enough that you're not going to run screaming or go insane from realizing that you've got a darker part of you."
That said, he finished his beer and marched back inside. I stared at the stars, which seemed more intense since I became a werewolf. I think I liked it better when he wasn't eloquent, liked it better when I could just blow off what he said as idle chatter meant to be nothing more than an anti-social shield. I swirled the last of my beer in the bottom of the bottle as I tried to figure out what the hell I should do.
"Pretty night to be watching the stars. You don't have to wish upon one of those to have me, you know." Aidan slipped one arm around my waist, and I stiffened just a little. I hadn't sensed him come out onto the balcony, hadn't smelled him. He exuded the scent of pack that comforted me the way a mother's perfume would comfort a sick child. For a second I let myself sag against him, borrowing some of his strength. It seems that I always need to do that; lean on someone else's strength. It shames me.
"I was wishing on one to get rid of you," I replied glibly, with more careless energy that I felt.
He chuckled, and I could feel it through my back. I didn't really know what to do about his arm around my waist. He was the only one who ever touched me like this, casually. Everyone else held his or her distance as if I was made of crystal. "Why are you standing out in the cold, Geri?"
I sighed. "I just don't want to go in."
"Don't want to watch the old flame, or are you trying not to get burned by a new one?" I pulled a face at his tone. It was bad enough that I'd been glaringly obvious about Heero, but the thought that I might be the same with Dorothy was a blow to my already limping pride. Aidan laughed again, and I realized with a jolt that I liked it. "If it's not love between you and the elegant blonde, it's certainly lust. The two of you are putting out enough pheromones to start a perfume factory."
I blinked. I'd forgotten that we could smell things like that. I could see his point, but it was still embarrassing. "A little bit of both."
"So you're out here hiding." His voice held that tone that men sometimes get when I'm doing something girlish and cute. I hate it.
"Thinking," I corrected him coldly.
"You think too much, Geri."
"One of us has to think," I told him.
He looked mildly offended. "Saying that I don't?"
I arched an eyebrow at him.
"I think in the now of things, Geri. Dwelling on the past, well it doesn't do much for you, does it? And the future will figure itself out; it's the present that's going to reach out and take a big fat chomp outta your ass." He grinned unrepentantly when I snorted softly and shook my head. We stared out at the burning city lights, and the dull red glow they gave off, in a rather companionable silence. He had an unmistakable point, one that my wolf agreed with whole-heartedly.
"So what are we going to do about the present?"
"The vamps?"
"Un. And the humans. They really don't understand what they've gotten themselves into."
"I think they do. Just because they're human doesn't mean that they don't fully understand what's going on." He breathed out in one exasperated breath, frustrated with the world. "Humans can be just as evil as any of us monsters--maybe not as downright scary, but just as evil."
I tilted my head back against his shoulder so I could look up at him. "Hn."
"I thought Heero was the one who pulled that monosyllabic shit all the time." Aidan put enough mock whine into his voice to make me laugh. "Your humans will survive this, if we survive at all."
"That is the trick, isn't it?" I let myself relax against him slowly, muscle by muscle. Touching was something the pack just did. It wasn't a matter of sex, or not just sex, but comfort. We touched one another to establish our bonds with each other, and that was something Aidan was teaching me to do in a rather backhanded manner. "Rogue vampires and their mysterious allies, political plots, and all the rest." I laughed at the absurdity of it all. "It's like a plot from a cheap mystery novel."
"Doesn't necessarily have to be political."
"Why else attack me?"
"Now that's the million-dollar question." Aidan rested his head on top of mine, companionable and unthinking. "And one that will be answered with time only." He let a hissing breath of frustration. "Perhaps it's not such a bad idea to go see the Master of the City."
"Do we really want to do that?"
"Don't think we have much choice. There is no link between the vamps and the lycanthropes in this city; only way to find out what's going on in their camp is to ask." Aidan sounded resigned, but unafraid. I took that for a good sign.
"Is there normally a link between the vamps and the lycanthropes?"
"Every once and a while you meet a master vamp who can call some particular animal, including wereanimals. Not all, but most."
"Master vamp?"
"Like an alpha in the vamp hierarchy."
Ah.
"This Master of the City can't call an animal?" That was an interesting bit of information.
"If he can, he's never done it before. But that doesn't mean much with these vamps. Only," that disconcertingly intelligent look bled into his green eyes. "They like to show off their power, and he's only lately come into his power."
A cold chill crept down my spine like an ice cube down my back. "How recently?"
"He showed up just after the Eve Wars and set about taking over the city with a vengeance, but for all that the vamps seem to think him a kind master." He gave me a curious look. "Why?"
Treize's body had never been found, and for the life of me I could never remember seeing him in full daylight, only in the twilight shadows, or the distant light of early dawn. I tried to shake off the sneaking suspicion, but that sweet sad knowledge in his eyes. That could be explained, if he was what I thought he was. "Do you know his name?"
"Renada. I think it's Renada, but I've never met him." Aidan stared back at me in curiosity. "What?"
I couldn't find my voice. I wasn't sure if the shock or the pure twist of terror had stolen it away. Once, I had been offered everything I could possibly dream and the time to do it in for one very small price: my life. Once, I had been given a sweet promise with a perfect rose. And I was afraid then as I was now.
'Creatura bona atque parva. If you remember one thing about this day, Creatura, remember that life feeds upon life.'
End Part 10
(:./dan/wolf10)
