My Little Ventrue Pt. 09 Ch. 17

He wasn't lying, either. There were cameras in the corners of the room, and they moved a bit to follow Jessy as she paced around in the office. Cameraman were aiming them. Long trusted his employees quite a bit, if he was willing to give them a button that'd set the whole place on fire.

"Noted," Jack said. "You like fire a lot, for a vampire."

"It's a powerful tool." No accent, except for a pompous edge CEOs often seemed to have, like he was talking down to Jack.

"One mistake and it'll kill you."

"Yes, I am sure it would. " Long tapped his fingers on his big desk as he met Jack's eyes. Not afraid at all. Jack couldn't exactly Dominate the man without it being a little obvious, especially since the man kept tapping his fingers on the desk. If Jack jumped into his mind, he'd stop doing that. Did he really have them all sitting on explosives, under the control of someone else, who'd detonate them if Long stopped tapping his fingers? Crazy.

"The fire is a problem," Damien said.

Long chuckled. "For you."

Jessy shook her head. "For everyone. You're burning down the city."

"You mean Garry is burning down the city. And hardly. Three buildings does not qualify as burning down the city, not in Dolareido. Are you aware of how many kine live in this city, Miss Herrington? Over four million. Buildings burn down."

Jessy gave him the finger, but didn't say anything. Long wasn't wrong. It was true the Invictus and Carthians were causing property damage, but so far it hadn't reached a level where the Prince would feel the need to intervene. Yet.

"It's only going to get worse," Jack said. "These incendiary grenades of yours are a problem, and I want you to stop making them."

"No." More tapping.

"You don't think the Invictus could use fire, Mister Long? You don't think we have the tech to put together a similar weapon?"

"I think you do. But I also think you realize burning Carthian property is a waste of time. What possible property target do you have that could affect the Carthians in any way if it were lost?"

Jack gestured at the room around them. "Uh..."

"You think you can destroy this building, Mister Terry? I let you in because you are no threat. I don't care if you can summon a legion, and defend yourself from flame. You could not survive an inferno, and your legion is of no use here. If you tried, you would fail. And if you somehow succeeded, the damage you would cause to the Masquerade would be immense."

This man was simultaneously full of himself, and paranoid. He was practically an elder already.

"We could burn this building down without being in it, you know."

"I'd like to see you try." And there it was. The Gangrel part of him.

"And Joe? Did Garry give you permission to give him some of those grenades?"

Long's smile faded. "You killed Joe. Why should I tell you anything?"

"Joe killed Bruce. First, I might add."

"Such is war."

"That wasn't war. That was an idiot man with a fucking delusion. And someone gave him a deadly weapon."

"A molotov is just as deadly."

"Bullshit. A molotov just splatters and quickly burns. That shit was like napalm, and unlike a fucking molotov cocktail, it didn't come at me as a glass bottle with a burning rag attached to it. It was an innocuous little sphere."

"Not innocuous enough, evidently. Thank you for the feedback. I'll make sure future devices are less noticeable."

This guy. This fucking guy. Jack stared at the man hard, ready to shatter his mind and turn him into a mindless puppet. But the man held his gaze as he tapped his finger. The best poker player in the world, or he was telling the truth about his defense measures.

This was definitely the sort of man who'd use his teeth in a fist fight if he had to.

"Jeremy Long, I am warning you. If you continue to bring fire to these skirmishes, the Invictus will respond in kind."

"Then it's a good thing the Invictus are the ones on the defense. It's you who stands to lose territory."

"Not true. We'll take the Mirrden district back, but if we can't, Michael is prepared to cause permanent damage."

"Oh ho, permanent? Oh please, you have no leverage in this game."

Jack stepped up to the man's desk. Every thrall pointed their gun at him, and Jack ignored them.

"Xnomina has been in the business longer than Terra Den. The Invictus have been playing this game for a lot longer than you, or even Garry. You really think we can't beat you at this?"

"I think you're an old monster who's gone too long unchallenged. Now, you're fat, weak, and lazy, and the younger generation has to take you down."

Jack didn't know much about the Uratha, but that story sounded oddly familiar. Eric said something about it. Father Wolf?

"Long, I'm giving you a chance. Stop helping Garry with the tech, or we'll make you."

"No. Now, if that is all, get out."

Well, this was a waste of time, except to learn that Long was smarter and deadlier than he had any right to be. Garry sired well.

Jessy snarled, but when Damien turned to leave, she followed. Jack followed last.

"And Mister Terry," Long said. "Stop digging up Roland's family, would you? My sire does not appreciate you stirring up the past."

Old Jack would have worn his surprise on his face. But after years of bullshit and hard lessons, Jack kept his gaze cold and steady as he met Long's, before he walked out the door, and took the elevator down with his friends. The fuck was that about?

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"Roland's past?" Jessy asked once they were out on the street. "Like... Michael's childe before me, Roland?"

"Yeah. Been doing a little digging." But not into Roland's family. In fact, he didn't know a single thing about Roland's family. "Can't really talk about it."

Damien and Jessy blinked at each other.

"Uh, what?" Jessy asked.

"Really, can't talk about it. It's... a weird situation." The fuck were you up to, Antoinette?

Roland was Jack's best bet of getting Garry and Michael to trip up and make a mistake. It was the seed that had the two Gangrels hating each other so much, and if he could use it against them, he could maybe manipulate them with it. But if Antoinette was up to something that had people looking to Jack like he was up to something, that could very well bite him in the ass.

When in doubt, deny deny deny. Antoinette would tell him more when it made sense to.

Damien shrugged and pat Jessy on the shoulder. "If he says he can't talk about it, he can't talk about it."

"Ugh, fine." She gave him a sharp poke in the chest. "But make sure you call me if shit gets crazy, ok? You killed that fucker Joe and I wasn't even there to see it."

"Jessy, I nearly killed five other people. And I'm glad I didn't."

"What? Why? You don't think that fucking bitch Bella deserves it? She's been a thorn in my ass for decades, and I know a couple Invictus disappeared after a run-in with her."

Jack sighed. He was tempted to ask about her past, if she'd killed any Carthians in her fifty years, directly or indirectly. Sometimes the little brawls Invictus and Carthians got into weren't very gentle, and Julias told him plenty of stories about how they got pretty bad sometimes. Kindred died.

He stepped into a dark alley, and they followed.

"Jessy, I don't want anyone to die, ok? I... Christ, you think I'm happy I killed him?"

"A bit, yeah. Joe was a douchebag. World is better off without him."

Glaring, Jack snapped his eyes to Damien, but his friend shook his head dismissively.

"Jessy," Jack said, "the fuck would Julias say?"

"Julias?" She glared at him, but after a few seconds her anger broke, and her gaze fell. "He'd say stop making things worse, and look for a way to get everyone on the same page."

"Yeah, and that's what I'm trying to do. I didn't want to kill Joe, the fucking curse did. Bruce died too. Vivienne nearly died. And... christ, I'm just trying to get people to stop killing each other. Ok? This is the most stereotypical war hate shit I've ever seen. Garry isn't Hitler, and Carthians aren't nazis. Get me?"

"I get you I get you. But last I checked, the Carthians are coming at us hard, Jack, not the other way around."

"They thought differently, when we took the Mirrden district from them those years ago."

"No one died!"

"Jessy, I saw Joe's eyes before I killed him. He was utterly convinced the Invictus... and Viktor and me by extension, were evil and needed to die. I can guarantee you Joe has lost friends to Invictus. He..." Jack looked down. "Enough, ok? Enough."

Slowly, she nodded, and gave him a gentle tap on the shoulder. "Alright, I get you. Just, you kinda gave me the impression with Long that you were ready to go to war."

If Jack had to go to war, he wouldn't be Jack for very long. He be the fucking Ripper, drowning the whole city in blood and ashes.

His phone buzzed. A message from the Prince.

~Expect contact from Roland's family soon.~

Uh, what? Roland's family? Dude died a hundred years ago, why would--oh god, what was Antoinette up to? She sent him that text message on their personal channel too, which wasn't exactly secure. They avoided sending anything other than romantic stuff on it.

Ok, time to visit Antoinette and see what the hell this Roland business was about.

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~~Eric~~

He could be doing something else, instead of risking his life like this. He could be back in his fancy apartment with his girlfriend. He could be showering with her, touching her. He could be relaxing in the hot tub with her. He could be going out for a night on the town with her. He could be taking her back to her place after she'd fed on one -- or more -- humans, getting her randy as all hell, and he could be spending the night fucking her amazingly huge, athlete's ass, at her request. He could be living the dream.

Instead, here he sat in wolf form in the Hisil, him and a bunch of Avery's pack. Jessy wasn't with him. She had to deal with the Carthians, defend borders, fight off punks like Joe. Except Joe was dead, and now the Carthians and Invictus were willing to open up with lethal force from the get go.

Which meant, while Eric sat here, waiting for Red Tide to make its move, his girlfriend was in mortal danger. Not unusual. She'd been in mortal danger plenty of times. But now she was in heavy, real, could die at any moment to an explosive hidden in a car danger. That idea irked him. He knew the only reason Michael hadn't shown up at his door with a dozen Kindred and demanded Eric help them fight the Carthians was because of Jessy. If she died, Michael would probably drag his ass into the war.

Course, at that point, Eric would happily join. Kill the Carthians who killed the best thing to ever happen to him? Sure.

He growled, and forced the thoughts out of his mind. Focus. Him and the pack sat in the shadow of a building near the edge of the city, the outer edge of Devil's Corner, hidden in Natasha's Cloak. Some of the wolves like Art could hide themselves, and Sándor was somehow able to hold so perfectly still, he stop registering as a living entity to Eric's wolf senses. Gargoyle, yeah.

It was quiet. The strange sky, this far from the city's center, showed its beautiful stars and oddly colored clouds. Few spirits wandered out here, the edge of the city; they were drawn to where humans stirred chaos instead. Which meant it was strange to see the red wraiths and their massive claws floating about at the city's edge, guarding the glowing tear. They should have been in the city, guarding Black Blood's territory.

Which was why Sándor, and everyone else agreed it was important to examine the tear. It was either a very clever diversion by Black Blood, or legitimate.

Eric looked over to Clara. Her, Caleb, Noah, Matt and Art, Natasha, and Sándor were there with Eric. The rest of the pack were working with Red Tide, deeper in South Side, to stir up some sort of trouble. Avery didn't know what that trouble would be, which meant the rest of them could only sit here and--

The city erupted with noise. Everyone looked down the street toward South Side, but the winding road and tall buildings blocked their view. They could hear it though. Crashing, smashing, and roars.

They all looked up as a cloud of debris shot into the air, and spread, almost like a mushroom cloud, with bits of red mixed in.

"Holy sh-shit," Tash whispered. Props to her for keeping the Cloak up, because the sound rushed out to hit them, along with heavy vibration. A building had just collapsed.

Roars. Alien screams and shrieks. The oddly colorful sky over South Side darkened, and red splashed a quarter mile into the air. Clouds swirled and crashed down, disappearing behind the distant buildings, before sending another shock wave of vibration and sound their way.

Red Tide and Black Blood were fighting.

Well, if there was anyway Red Tide could create a distraction, this was it. It wasn't like the two hadn't fought before. Street-Tail King was happy to manipulate things from the shadows, and go for easy wins, but Red Tide was a big, angry, powerful spirit. Far as Eric knew, it rose up from the centuries of violence hidden in Dolareido, from even before Antoinette and her buddies showed up. Something to do with the blood, the way Dolareido attracted it, attracted vampires, attracted its weird, unspoken violence. Usually unspoken.

Sometimes it was easy to forget -- he'd been born and lived here his whole life after all -- Dolareido was a strange city. No wonder Luna took an interest.

Clara took two paw steps toward the noise, froze, growled, and looked back toward the tear they were scouting. Slowly, she looked to Eric, and the steady look in her eyes said it all: she wanted to help Avery.

Eric wanted to, too. They weren't even his pack, and he wanted to. He didn't know what Avery would do, now that Red Tide was causing a ruckus. Black Blood had made it clear she wasn't to interfere with his city, and if she did, he'd get his hands dirty. So the fuck was Avery going to do? She should have been here, with him and the others, in case shit hit the fan and they needed her.

That's what Clara was thinking, and it was quickly becoming what Eric was thinking. Say one thing for the bitch, Avery could get shit done.

The explosions grew closer. All six wolves and one vampire crouched low as a dust cloud rushed out onto the street, another crash of sound preceding it and slamming over the group with enough impact to have them shaking in its quake. Sándor didn't move an inch.

The explosions grew closer again, until enormous chunks of rubble flew into the air, and smashed into the street where they could see it. Still a ways away, but close enough it wasn't hidden by the winding street and buildings anymore.

They all froze until they looked like Sándor, as an enormous, black-tinted skeletal arm reached into the sky, body hidden by buildings, and slammed down. The city shook, and more rubble scattered skyward before raining down on everything within a hundred yards. Holy shit. But Black Blood's fury was met with an equally big, red tentacle, something that looked like it was made of blood and crimson leather, and it swept through the air before crashing down against a building out of their sight as well. Same effect. The whole city shook. Red Tide was not fooling around.

Eric had managed to avoid the giant kraken creature and its weird half-blood body in all his hunts. It didn't take many trips into the Hisil to learn that Black Blood and Red Tide were two juggernauts battling over the city the same way Godzilla might. Big, strong, and unstoppable. Avery was smart to avoid engaging them directly. With titans like them, you had to find out their bans and banes first, and smart assholes like Black Blood were good at hiding them.

Everyone in Dolareido either gave those two their room, or served them. Avery and her pack were the exception, because they were all apparently suicidal.

Sure enough, as the explosive battle loomed closer, the red wraiths circling the tear on the outskirts of the city headed toward them. Black Blood calling for reinforcements. Except one stayed behind.

Red wraiths spent a lot of time hovering around as wisps, clouds of red and black smoke. But when they needed to be involved and hands on, they solidified. Hissing creatures, they had human-like torsos, but no face, just a flat black mass with red demon eyes that glowed. Long arms with equally long claws, but no legs. They floated, like ghosts.

They were called red wraiths, or blood wraiths, cause each of the obsidian, hovering legless creature with claws, also looked like they were wearing a strange cloak or robe of dripping red. Literally dripping, as if they had wounds that never closed.

The gang expected this. Even had a plan on how to deal with it. Rush it while protected by Tash's cloak, and kill it. Avery's pack wasn't really good at subtlety.

All wolves looked to Tash, and she glanced back to Sándor. The man pushed off the wall of the building, and slowly, casually, got into a runner's stance. You didn't need Uratha senses to tell the man was calm, like this was just another Wednesday for him. No increase in heart rate, no jitters, nothing.

They took off in a dead sprint for the spirit. It was out in the open at the end of a street that merged into the desert, and they didn't know how effective the Cloak would be against it. Better to come out running.

Good thing they did. They still had fifty feet to go before the spirit turned its eyes to face them. They widened as realization set in, and it turned to flee.

And then it flew up.

Ok, kink in the plan, kink in the plan! The fuck were they supposed to do if the creature could fly? They--

Sándor swept past them, over them, and into the sky. A dark silhouette erupted from the man's back, utterly massive wings that looked colossal on his frame, and they spread to catch the air. They launched him with a single flap that sent the wind out in an explosion around them, and Sándor road the wind like he'd done this a million times before.

He came down on the spirit hands first, thirty feet in the air, and the two came crashing down with a heavy thud. Sándor landed on top, and for a single second, the silhouette of the gargoyle was visible again, its titanic limbs, and its huge claws. And he used them on the spirit.

It only took a single second for the crew to catch up once he landed, but by then, the spirit was already wounded and dying. It slashed out, but Eric bit into one wrist, Caleb bit into the other, and they ripped its hands off as it flailed. It died a few seconds later.

"Mission... s-successful?" Tash asked.

The wolves all looked around. Natasha quickly wrapped them in her Cloak again, but there was a lot of people in their group, and they'd literally just had a man fly through the air. It'd been quick thinking, but if anyone had been watching, they'd have seen the gargoyle, the pack, and the vampire.

But then, two giants were fighting in the city, not too far from where the group was. And considering the ridiculous amount of destruction Eric could hear, it was a safe bet all nearby spirits were either watching the destruction, or hiding for their lives.

"Get rid of the evidence," Sándor said, gesturing to the body. Not an order. The man simply asked in the most deadpan way possible. Caleb didn't hesitate, grabbed the spirit, and carted it off. It'd disperse into essence soon enough, or some rat bottom-feeder choir would find and devour it.

Clara and Eric hopped up onto the gas station, transformed back into human form, and stood near the tear that hovered at about head level. Sándor and Tash joined them. Noah, Matt, and Art backed off and returned to the city edge to hide in shadows. If someone else did spot them, hopefully they could do something, but even with Red Tide distracting the whole damn city, they probably only had minutes.