My Little Ventrue Pt. 04 Ch. 12

He reached up with his hands to try and grab him, to pin the wrist to his mouth, to devour him, to absorb his life and sate the beast in his gut that was roaring for more. But he had no hands, and the attempt to squeeze filled Jack with pain. No, just lie down, lie down and relax and drink as much as this man is willing to give you. This strange man, and the strange, amazing blood he was giving you. So good, so fucking good. Was it because he was starving? Near death? It was so damn good.

"This... feels... weird," Eric said.

Triss laughed, the gunfire getting quieter and quieter behind them. "Just wait till Jessy does it the right way. Won't be weird, just fucking awesome."

"... terrifying."

"Ha," she said. The car started to slow down, and Jack felt parts of him relax as both fresh blood entered his punctured body, but also the fear of dying horribly in a flaming ball of metal death abated somewhat. "I called Julias, kid. He's got a bunch of vamps on the way over, and a bunch of thralls and shit. They'll clean up the mess, maybe catch some of the hunters. Maybe get that girl's body and get some answers."

"Christ, I'm getting lightheaded here." Eric pulled his wrist away from Jack's mouth. Or at least he tried, but Jack had bitten down, and the man had to put his other hand against Jack's head and force it back to pry his wrist loose.

"... s-sorry," Jack said.

"... yeah." Eric, on his knees in the leg space, crammed and twisted, looked at his wrist and the holes Jack's teeth had made. Didn't have the time to lick them closed. Didn't have the energy. "You lost your hands."

Jack groaned. Triss laughed.

"He'll regrow them with a night or two's sleep and a few meals," she said.

"Regrowing limbs... you people are fucking insane."

"As insane as nightmare jungles and a giant spider lady and floating death angel monster."

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~~Julias~~

"Julias!"

"Triss?"

"No time to talk, on Azamel's phone. Jack might be at the old prison. Heading there now."

It took ten seconds to finish the conversation with Triss. It took thirty seconds to send out the message to his nearest Kindred and a host of thralls and ghouls, and have them begin moving to the location. Another fives minutes to double check that the occupied prison was running as usual, to confirm it was the old abandoned prison that Triss meant. An hour to beginning cleaning up the mess, and another hour to finish.

Police were directed elsewhere easily enough, and records adjusted to make sure no mention of gunfire in that section of the city existed. Thralls and ghouls poured over the scene, cleaning up blood stains, removing bullet casings, and cleaning out the abandoned prison. No bodies though, despite Jack's testimony. For the hunters that had died, the blood traces suggested their bodies were taken away. But the body of the hunter hit by the car, the blood pattern suggested she got up, or was picked up, and managed to move some distance before a vehicle took her away.

Supposedly this woman, Angela according to Jack, had been stabbed through the back out the stomach, and then hit by a car moving at a decent speed. He also said she was immune to his mind control, and had a glass eye. A strange woman, the sort that just refused to die. So, maybe she was alive. Or maybe they just read the blood patterns incorrectly, and she was in fact dead. Either way, when his troops arrived only minutes after Triss left with Jack, there was no sign of any hunters, no bodies, and most of the cars around the prison Jack reported were gone, the van too.

What did remain was the bodies of rats.

The phone call hadn't done the situation justice. The kid had sounded horrible, voice hoarse and quiet on the phone, like he was nearly dead, but he'd managed to get across the details, about being captured by some hunters who wanted details about Azamel. He told Julias about Angela, about Jeremiah, told him about the torture, told him about the threats Angela had made, the suggestions that a lot more hunters were in the city, told him about their plans to cleanse all of Dolareido. And, he'd told Julias about how he escaped.

The cuffs weren't there. The hunters must have removed them from the chair before leaving; made sense if Jack was right and they were special in some way. But there were two withered, bony, disgusting hands, smashed against the wall like someone had kicked them aside, the two hands Jack had told his dominated prey to cut off so he could escape. Quick thinking, rational thinking. He could have hesitated, and looked for another way out. But that could have easily backfired, or cost him precious seconds. No, he'd made the correct call, getting out of the cuffs and chair ASAP so he could react to the situation from a position of power.

But, damn, it took some cold logic and will to make a move like that. Very impressive, very Ventrue. And it would have made Julias smile with pride, if not for Maria's stories about Viktor's hobbies in their last conversation.

Looking around at the hundreds of dead rats, Julias sighed and brushed back his hair with his fingers. A truly horrible sight. Jack had sounded quite sad about their deaths on the phone, but his words hadn't prepared Julias for the amount Jack had summoned, and sacrificed.

Julias would have trouble summoning this many rats.

"Holy shit." Jessy came up to him, stepping around the dead rats in the hallway of the prison. Thralls and ghouls were about, and a few of the younger Invictus Kindred as well, cleaning up the rats and such with harsh chemicals and garbage bags. "Jack fucking did this?"

"... apparently."

"I mean... god damn. He's certainly your childe, Julias."

"... or Viktor's."

"His childe's childe then?" she said. He frowned, but she pat him on the shoulder and smirked her jackass smirk. "Viktor was fucking deadly for his age, we all know that. So are you. And Jack is... um... well, this is pretty nuts." She gestured around to the bodies of burned and squashed flesh as the two of them walked into the prisoner lobby, past the thralls cleaning it up, and then to toward the civilian lobby.

Woman had a way with words. Triss would have been as blunt, but purposefully so. Jessy was so blunt because she was oblivious to how direct she was being about a sensitive topic. Made him smile; like old times.

"Did you see him?" he said, "when Triss drove by?"

"Yeah. God damn that kid was wrecked. Really, really, really wrecked. What's the plan with him?"

"Triss said she'd already got him a quick meal, and now she's on the way to let him sleep in my mansion stronghold."

"Trusting a witch with your childe?"

"Trusting my lover with my childe, Jessy. Don't push it."

She shrugged, like usual, and walked beside him as the two of them made their way for the prison entrance. The smell of chemicals was in the air, but buried by the smell of burned flesh and hair. So much death surrounded him, he had to wince as he looked around and tried to piece together the insanity. Jack had done his best to recount the tale on the phone, but like with the rats, the exhausted boy couldn't do justice to the madness. Shards of glass were all around, and the bullet holes or marks were everywhere. He'd mentioned a flamethrower too. Damn.

"What's the footage on Azamel's tunnel show?" Jessy said. "You said Triss used Azamel's phone?"

"Triss left the tunnels with the Begotten Mark, and a man I do not recognize. She called me, gave Mark back the phone, and then ran off toward the street. Far as I know, she caused quite a stir on the street. Used her cloak of night enough to keep her teeth hidden, but otherwise caused some mayhem as she and this Eric fellow stole a car from some kine hopping out of it."

"Eric... black dude? Average height? Shaves his head?"

"Yeah. Know him?"

Jessy grinned a pretty damn big grin, and rubbed her hands together. "I think I might just."

"I'll let you follow up on him then. I have work to do."

"Yeah, deal. And... I mean, you should be proud, right? Your childe is barely a year embraced, and he's taken down a bunch of hunters and pulled some pretty hardcore animalism shit here." She crouched down next to a pile of the dead rats, and whistled. Gangrels were naturals at animalism in much the same way Ventrue were, though with them, it was more a question of being more in tune with their beasts, rather than a Ventrue's natural affinity for dominating the minds of others. Still, she knew what she was talking about. "I remember Viktor had some pretty impressive stories about when he was younger, and summoning a bunch of animals and shit to his side to wreak some havoc."

"Yeah... that's what scares me."

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~~Author's Note~~

Sorry for those who were hoping Jack would become the ultimate badass in this part of the series. He's still very young and has lot of growing to do. :3

Sorry for those who were hoping to see Eric unlock his change in this part of the series. I have plans for him, big plans. :3