My Little Ventrue Pt. 05 Ch. 05

Someone was stalking him.

Why did that hit him so much harder than anything else? He'd fought monsters, survived explosions, and had managed to withstand torture. Why did this get his skin crawling, run ice down his spine, have him trembling. It was a Kindred instinct to remain hidden, to never let anyone have a piece of evidence proving you were there, that you existed. Someone had a very, very accurate portrait of him, done in fucking pencil. It sent that part of him into hysterics, and he took long, hard blinks trying to reset his mind.

The fact that he was in a room where a human had probably been cut up, dismembered, blood used for painting and bones used for a ceiling decoration, wasn't helping.

"How d-did you find this?" Tash said. The next moment, she was behind Jack, patting his back. He didn't have the heart to tell her he would prefer to not be touched right now.

"... I can't share the details. Sorry." Daniel, not sharing details with his subordinate. Strange.

Jack forced himself to stand up again, gulped on nothing, and turned to face the two Mekhets. "I imagine you're... you're investigating... the unknown threat."

"Unknown threat?" Tash blinked at him, but with time, her eyes settled, and she looked down.

"... yes." Daniel nodded and adjusted his glasses, glove to the bridge over his nose, as his dull eyes remained fixed on the skeleton above. "But we should not speak of it. With anyone."

Just as Jack suspected. It wasn't just him keeping an eye open for stranger, dark things, miscellaneous things, things that would lead to Azamel warning him. Daniel was keeping an eye open too, and considering how often the man vanished, it was probably his full time job now, hunting down whatever the fuck it was that had Azamel so spooked. Did it have Jacob or Antoinette spooked too? Did they know anything about it? Antoinette must have, if Daniel was looking into it.

Jack sighed as he forced himself to look back up at the skeleton on the ceiling. His face. His god damn face, eyes closed, headphones on, and a serene smile. It was tilted on its side, but whether that was the paper or the angle of the portrait, he couldn't tell. The picture showed a fraction of his neck, but not enough for him to be able to tell anything else, except that he was probably sitting or lying down for it.

"D-Do you... listen to your music with your curtains open?" Tash said.

"Rarely." It was the portrait that was getting him so nauseated, and overwhelmed. The skeleton, the blood symbols, the blatant occult work surrounding him, all of that was blasé, dull, compared to the god damn bit of graphite on thin white paper with his face on it.

The tiny Mekhet sighed, a tiny, mouse-like sound, and reached out for her sire. "Should... should we... t-t-take it down?"

"It's been here for a couple months," the sheriff said. "I think we're safe to do that. I've already completed my investigation; what I can accomplish from here, anyway."

Jack looked around, and groaned as the horrible smell took on a new meaning. "Couple months? So... they... they did this before they kidnapped me."

"Correct." Daniel pulled a small knife out of his sleeve — what a place to store a knife — and cut the string holding the skeleton's right arm to the ceiling. And then another string, and then another. What flesh remaining between the joints keeping the thing together tore under the disturbance, and soon Daniel didn't have to do much to make skeleton come down and apart. With quick, snapping hands, he grabbed the bones as they fell, like a professional juggler, setting each bone down to the floor in the same position they'd been in when above. Fast hands, very fast.

With the skeleton reconstructed on the concrete beneath them, Daniel held the picture of Jack in his gloved hands, and rotated it around.

"... here. Give this back before you leave." The sheriff nodded, and handed him the picture.

"Shouldn't I keep it?" Jack said. "The Invictus might—"

"We'll be keeping it, for evidence, and to help with the investigation." Daniel adjusted his glasses again, and began to walk the perimeter of the small room once more, one hand in a pocket while the other touched the tables and symbols. Not a request, a demand. He was the sheriff, he got to make demands, and everyone else had to listen. But, Jack had to bite his tongue to keep from saying something anyway. It was him, god damn it. Him in that picture.

"D-Do you have any theories, sheriff?" Tash said, following after him and taking pictures of the symbols with her phone.

The tall, lanky man came back to the skeleton, now on the floor face up, and he squatted down beside it. Him and his childe investigated the place like a duo, detective and the rookie. Amanda would have done the same thing. Mekhet were like that, and he was glad to have some helping him, especially now.

But, Jack could see, the sheriff didn't want to share details. If the man was trying to keep details from the Ventrue about what he'd been doing during his recent disappearances, Jack could understand. Hell, if the man was keeping secrets from Tash, just to spare her from having to know things she didn't need to know, he could understand that too. Jack didn't tell Jessy or Damien about having Mulder and Scully shadowing him twenty-four/seven now, for the same reason.

Couldn't even be honest with your partners. The Danse Macabre was such a lovely bed fellow.

"... if I had to guess... someone used this man's body—"

Jack stepped in closer. "Man?"

The sheriff nodded and gestured to the waist. "Shape of the pelvis."

"... right." Breathing deep, trying to stop the pin pricks dancing up and down his spine, he looked down at the portrait, and stared at his face. A portrait of him, a beautiful one, done in pencil and with such a delightful hand, was awe inspiring. And terrifying. The juxtaposition was a cheese grater on the soft matter of his brain, tearing it apart and shredding it into bits until he felt the weight of its remains hit his feet.

Pull yourself together. You're a Ventrue. And this, this is nothing more than a threat to be dealt with. Right? Right.

"I believe someone used this man's body as part of the ritual." Daniel gestured around to the symbols, especially to the giant circle beneath them. "They wanted information. If this occurred before Jack's kidnapping, we must presume that whatever they learned from this was directly involved in the kidnapping, and perhaps the cause of."

Jack sighed, but nodded. "From how they were talking to me, I got the impression they knew a lot about us. Not just Kindred covenants or blood clans, but about how our covenants are set up here in Dolareido, about us, and about the Prince." They certainly had information, no doubt about that.

"Then... w-we should... look for more of these?" Tash said, gesturing around the room. "If this is some way for the hunters t... t-to get information, or a location, or... or anything, they'll p-probably do it again."

Nodding, the sheriff got up, and folded his arms across his chest as he stared down. "I'll check missing persons, and see if there are any other kine who've vanished."

"How are you going to be able to separate random missing people from the other death and whatnot?" Jack said. Much as Dolareido was a safe place for kine, it wasn't perfect. People died, were killed, sometimes by vampires with a motive, sometimes by vampires who got lazy. As long as the Masquerade was not damaged, Kindred were allowed to kill kine, and that made tracking down shit like this oddly complicated.

"I'm sheriff for a reason, Jack Terry." Daniel didn't shrug, didn't roll his eyes, didn't smirk or anything. He stared at the skeleton, and held out his hand to Jack, for the picture. "I'm good at what I do."

Jack sighed, nodded, and handed the picture back to him. A picture of him. Of Jack.

Christ.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

He wasn't going to go back to his apartment, not yet. No fucking way.

Not being able to go anywhere outside central South Side without a companion was a pain in the ass. He didn't think it would be, considering he didn't really go anywhere, but tonight he wanted to put a little distance between him and his apparently spied-on den. He also didn't want to go back to the Elysium tower, and start dumping all these troubles onto his love's lap.

But, he knew that was because he was an idiot. The night before, she'd asked him to start doing just that. More than just that, she wanted him to talk to her about things as an equal, not simply him dropping his woes onto her so she could soothe his pain. Actually talk about shit, actual real shit. If they weren't vampires, it'd be the sort of thing two people looking to spend the rest of their lives together would do. It was the step up from enjoying chemistry, to establishing compatibility. Marrying Antoinette was an image he enjoyed, but it wasn't how Kindred did things. Normally.

"What did you want to talk about?" Damien said. The two Kindred sat upon one of the man's secret tower hideouts, way up high, an old radio tower. He had a telescope up here, and Jack looked through it with intrigue. You could see so many things up here, and he was sure Damien had probably looked at him in the past, spied on him, or some such.

"You any good with a pencil, Damien?"

"I am, actually. Had a lot of time to practice, hiding all those years."

"... ever draw a picture of me?"

"No. A strange question." He tilted his head to the side, eyebrow raised as he looked at him.

Jack, sighing and shrugging, sat down on the small tower roof. Only six feet wide, with a radio tower of rusted metal above them, and some concrete bench-like walls the tower stood from. Perfect for two Kindred to sit and talk about the scary shit coming their way.

He didn't suspect Damien, but it seemed prudent to poke about the topic a little. Later though. He'd ask about it later. The moment he steered the conversation into the direction of dark rituals, a stalker's portrait of him, and all the weird implications it brought, that's all the conversation would be about. But there were two reasons he wanted Damien with him.

"Damien, you ever worry about your sire?" Nice and quick, like a bandaid, one of the strong ones that rips out all the arm hair with it. How ladies could ever stand to wax their legs, let alone other body parts, he'd never be able to comprehend.

"... worry about him? You killed him, Jack."

"I... that's not what I mean."

"You mean whether or not your grand sire's reputation will re-manifest itself in you." Blunt and on point. Jack appreciated that, or would at least, if it didn't hit so hard right now.

"... yeah." Jack sighed, leaned back, and looked up at the sky. In the South Side of Dolareido, the stars were invisible, lost to the night lights of the city. The natural stars of the universe were distant and weak, compared to the nearby lights of bars, casinos, clubs, and everything in between.

"I assume you've already talked with Julias and the Prince about this."

"Julias, yes. With Antoinette? ... not so much."

"May I ask why?"

Jack brought his head back up, and raised a brow, mirroring Damien. Surprising, for Damien to be so forward with a question about personal stuff. He wasn't the man he used to be, whatever that meant, but it was plain to see in his body language and vernacular that the man wasn't dripping with brooding hate, like he was when Jack met him. For a question about the sire Jack had killed to not faze him, was a better outcome than Jack could have hoped for.

"I assume you read my report about my escape."

"I have."

"And I assume you've acquired more details about it, from Jessy or Maria or elsewhere."

"... I have."

"I... had to—"

"If you're going to tell me you had to become the Alder Viktor Honors to escape the confines of torturous kine bent on killing us and our friends, and that you're worried such a mental state will follow you home, then I'm going to have to insist that you're being paranoid." The Mekhet shook his head, leaned back, and looked up at the sky, same as Jack had been. "How familiar are you with psychology?"

"... more than most, but not enough to call myself anything more than an interested amateur." Where was he going with this?

"Then I assume you're aware that it's human nature to look back at our past to explain our present. And that, our past often manifests in our present because humans are drawn to the familiar."

"Absent father leads to daughter who grows up to become more interested in emotionally unavailable men. Yeah, I get that." As usual with psychology, the theory — hypothesis, really — was soft science, filled with examples but with no way to prove direct causation.

"Your father died when you were younger, yes?"

"... yeah." Jack didn't think about his dad much. But, it was true, the old man was a void to be filled.

"So now you look for him. You look for him in yourself, and your sire, and your grand sire." Damien shrugged, like Jack would shrug after giving a simple explanation, before he leaned forward again, and set his knees to his elbows, eyes on Jack. "But, if you're thinking that maybe there's something more going on, something specific to Kindred, something in the blood, then I'm afraid there are few examples to back that up. In all likelihood, your ability to handle that situation the way you did, as brutally as you did, was you being you, Jack. Viktor's bloodline is strong, but that's it."

If there was anyone who knew what it was like to be on the receiving end of desperate Jack, it was Damien, Jack supposed.

"... I'm not sure I like that explanation any more."

Damien managed a smile. A small thing, the sort of smile Jack might have expected to find on Daniel, if the cold man ever heard something that tickled his funny bone in just the right way.

"Lucas was a powerful Kindred as you know, Jack. And, an unusual one. A Mekhet with... Ventrue tendencies, I suppose is the kindest way to put it. Controlling others, ruling others." The assassin wiped the definition aside, old dust on a tome. "From the moment I awakened him from his long slumber, I could tell that he and I could not be more different. I followed his lead, convinced myself it was the correct thing to do, blinding myself with a delusion... be careful you don't do the same. You're you, you control you, and you can change you."

Jack leaned in, mirror to mirror. "You've changed more than I give you credit for."

"It's easier to change, when you've hit rock bottom and have nothing to hold on to."

Jack laughed. Ok, there was some wisdom in that, he supposed. Very Buddhist. Also very Fight Club.

And the man had a point. Jack was so convinced that his newfound desire to crush people was some carry-over from Viktor, and not just him being him. Was that better, or worse? No idea, but he felt a bit better about it, at least. If it was him being him, he had control of it, or at least more control than he did if it was Viktor's ghost coming to haunt him.

"Course, I could just be making a mountain out of a mole hill," Jack said. "Could all just be in my head, and I'm spiraling my brain down into a pit with this reductive reasoning."

"Better that you think about things, than to not."

"Jessy would disagree."

They both started laughing. This was good, this was fun, this was growth. It'd been a while since the whole Lucas incident, and Damien was quickly becoming a Kindred he could trust with his life. From enemies to friends. Straight out of a romance novel, heh.

"Seen Fiona around?" Jack said.

"Not yet."

"Julias said I should visit Azamel, to see what's going on, where the Begotten have been. And since we've both been to the nightmare, we're supposed to be working on that... project?" Determining what that project entailed was difficult. Maria wanted them to consolidate their knowledge, but they'd already tried that. They knew fuck all.

"Then I suggest we pay them a visit." Another smile sneaked its way onto his face. Jack was sure the man liked Fiona, but he wasn't sure if Damien knew he liked her. And he knew that he was the last person on Earth to be giving relationship advice.

Maybe this was that stereotype, that everyone in a relationship felt the need to get everyone else they knew into a relationship, or give relationship advice in general? His life was becoming some sort of weird, dark comedy sitcom. Queue dropping a chainsaw on a naked hooker's head from a stairway balcony. Queue laugh track.

"Alright. I have to call in a shit show first." He sighed, pulled out his phone, and looked around for Mulder and Scully. Sure enough, they were there, sitting on a nearby building. They'd come closer if Jack asked, but he wanted them to stay at a distance for now, keep an eye on things.

"Shit show?"

"Long story. I can tell you about it on the way to Azamel's hole in the wall."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"... did you suspect me?" Damien said. "The question about my drawing ability suggests you did."

"No, but I won't let that bias affect decisions. Just cause I trust you doesn't mean you might not be secretly planning to stab me in the back."

"True."

They chuckled again as the two of them walked the tunnels. Same night he learned he was being stalked by some sort of deadly ritual, and he was already laughing. Jaded, or growing accustomed to the life of a vampire, he didn't know.

The lights were working, and many repairs were already completed; not that those tunnels were the tunnels they were currently working through, but still, it was nice to know that the tunnels were being maintained, even if they looked like they weren't. The dingy, flickering old lights, the dust and dirt and rats and everything in between, it all screamed abandoned tunnels. And they were abandoned, as far as the populace knew, so he supposed it fit the disguise. Just in case a kine managed to get into the abandoned tunnels by accident.

"I don't recognize your description of the ritual," Damien continued. "It sounds like... it sounds strange, in a cliche sort of way. The symbols you describe are classic symbols used in witchcraft, known by kine across the world. But, real... supernatural things, rituals, sorcery, we know they don't bend to such bastardizations."

"If they're bastardizations. Just because they're popular today, used in media and shit, doesn't mean they never worked in the past."

Again the Mekhet nodded. "That is a valid point. The pentagram, upside down or what have you, in the circle, in the triangle, in the circle, with the symbols, definitely sounds like a ritual circle. The sheriff's presumption is probably correct. What surprises me more is the presence of a skeleton."

"... not the portrait of me?" Cause dealing with the dead was a not-uncommon act for Kindred.

"The portrait could be explained through multiple avenues. Did they use it during the ritual to learn about you, or did the ritual inform them about you, leading to the drawing? Did the ritual create the drawing? As much as the portrait is... strange, a body being used is what surprises me more. A sacrifice is extreme."

"I guess it is."

It'd only taken them ten minutes to put some distance under their heels, deep under the city streets. So easy to get into the tunnels through the Invictus half of South Side, especially near the HQ Xnomina like Damien and Jack were. A casual stroll, two Kindred, two right hands of the Invictus, wandering around in the poorly lit tunnels. Dangerous, but not terribly. Invictus and Carthians used the tunnels regularly, and with the buddy system going, it was unlikely the hunters would risk getting caught in them. They'd get collapsed on from all sides once the Kindred found out. No, the hunters would likely remain topside, where they could hide in the thousands of buildings and alleys. Like cockroaches.