Darkfall (closed for ImbibedFantasy1)

[RedTimberWolf]

Neon grinned wolfishly at her. "You're a cautious one, aren't you? Still, I applaud your care, even if your options are limited. Myself, I prefer to jump in both feet and see where the next steps take me. But you, you want to know there'll be a tomorrow that will still have space for a Marie."

Behind him, a bell sounded and a green light pulsed over a chromed hatch cover. He raised a finger, pausing his flow, "Food. Let me just get that."

From the hatch, a dumb waiter by the looks of it, he withdrew a lavishly laid tray of all manner of bite-sized snacks: chicken pieces coated in honey and spices; sticks of bell pepper, celery, carrot and cucumber with a variety of dips; a bowl of crispy onion balls smelling of curry; succulent bites of steak on skewers with a bowl of satay sauce; a basket of warm breads; and more and more besides. More food than even a hungry party of six could possibly need. He unloaded the tray between them, loosely corralled but with no discernible pattern, then topped off her glass once more before tucking into the steak skewers, liberally dipped in the spicy peanut sauce.

"Delicious!" He smacked his lips for effect, grinning with the pure pleasure of the taste. He gestured over the food, "Help yourself. There's plenty more if you should fancy. I particularly recommend the crab balls there, but be a little cautious for they are really very hot."

He spent a few minutes picking over different dishes, trying a little of this, then a bite of that, each taste given time and careful consideration before moving to the next. Indeed, it began to seem that he might have given up their conversation entirely but he picked up a warm roll like one might hold an apple and leant back against the wall behind the bar, finding his flow again.

"You ask about cost but you do not know what you are buying, nor why. So this isn't so much a question of whether you want help, merely whether you're prepared to pony up the asking price." He nodded slowly, took a bite from the bread and munched it thoughtfully.

"This may best be addressed with a little better understanding of what it is you're facing." He dropped the part eaten bread back on the bar and rounded the bar, approaching her, then passing, heading towards the wall with the door by which she entered. For a moment, it looked like he was heading to the door itself, but he stopped short and tugged at a blackout curtain just to the right to reveal a small window overlooking the alley.

Looking back to her, he waved her over, "Come. Look." Intense, even serious, his words were less an invitation than an instruction.

Out, in the alley, darkness. For a short while, it seemed as though there was nothing to see. Then, visible more by the patches of city light occluded more than the objects themselves, shapes became apparent. Prowling shapes, the size of lions, pacing the alley, and beyond the figure of a girl, pitch black on the graphite grey of night, an umbrella twirling on one shoulder. All waiting patiently. All ready. For her.

His voice lowered, conspiratorial. "You hardly need to see them again, do you? That's the shape of your adversary. That one out there at the back, you will come to know her as Parasol. She'll be there 'til dawn, now. What you did to attract her attention is quite some other matter. But that you have her attention is unfortunate because, of all those who might want you, she will not ever forget your scent." A long finger picked out the hell cats, "Those will come for you relentlessly, as they've hunted many others before. To my knowledge, they have always brought their prey to ground. Prey stronger than you, I might add, at least as you are now."

His hand found her shoulder, gently but none the less firmly keeping her there. "And Parasol, she's just one, but her kindred are many. The Dark know you now. Your old life is over, even in tatters as it was. Time to choose a new path, dear Marie. But in choosing, you choose whole heartedly, both feet forward, body and soul. The old you is, in a manner of speaking, out there dead in that alley. Food for the darkness that hunted you. The new you? Well, that's your choice, but I offer you a way to turn the tide. For yourself. Perhaps even for others too."

He stayed there, just to the side of the window, for a few moments longer, letting the sense of what might have been sink in. Then, unhurriedly, he slid the curtain closed. "At what price this new you, hmm? At what price the chance to turn your bravery into strength, and that strength into a fighting chance for you and others like you?" He left her side, heading back towards the bar, motioning her to follow. The bar between them once more, he took up one of the crab balls he recommended earlier, brandishing it at her in mild amusement, "What price would you say was fair for that?"

 

[ImbibedFantasy1]

Marie hung on every word, anxiety creasing her brow as he turned away for the hatch. She understandably wasn't very hungry, the burning vodka in her stomach regretful enough. Suppose food would help-but to Marie, it might as well had been sand right now.

When he picked up the thread of things again, she had the maddening feeling he just liked to hear himself talk. "Right-" She started when he spoke of price-only to fall back into silence once he swallowed the bite of bread-following after him with some hesitation. Did he mean to shove her out the door?

Warily approaching the window he thankfully revealed and gestured to instead, Marie looked out. "I don't see any-oh." The oh laced with a quiet sort of fearful reverence, widened dark eyes watching the patient teenaged girl, the tense and pacing panthers. Neon's voice spoke into the sudden stillness Marie felt, a swallow. Doomed.

At least she had sent her story, but who would believe it?

Marie dared to turn her head slightly, forced to look up at the much taller man as he spoke about her "old life". A chance to turn the tide? An opportunity to -fight-? He closed the curtain and she didn't stop him, the sight of the prowlers somehow making her feel...childishly afraid. Like if she just somehow made it back home, crawled into bed and hid beneath the covers-she might find solace or peace.

Marie swallowed again, backed off of the window. No sense in that. She wasn't the type, and she banished the thought with a shake of her head, moving back to the bar, taking a seat-small hands fisted against her lap. Deals with the devil had always seemed so obviously foolish to her before-the old fables and stories populated with, in her opinion, idiots.

And yet here she was, dealing not with the devil but some sort of...questionably powerful being, working out some sort of deal. Marie watched him, those dark eyes surprisingly direct. "You're aware I don't have anything to offer." She stated rather than asked, smoothing her skirt against her thighs, eyes on the arrangement of food he had ordered, shifting to the ghost like dancers. What did he want?

"...you want me to work or...or serve you? That it?" She thought about the panthers. She thought about the written piece she'd sent out, the warning. Marie chewed on that a moment, watching Neon again, gears turning. "...what stake do you have, if any Neon?" She said, a hand coming up to gesture vaguely, the question casual-though she watched him closely.

"Why give me...or anyone a chance to fight?"

But...

"I'm not sure what choice I even have, really." She ran her fingers through her hair, removing the bowed headband, tired, slightly inebriated-and unsure. "But. I do want to fight." Eyes reconnect with his, if he were looking at her. "At any cost. Someone -has- to."

 

[RedTimberWolf]

Neon leaned back against the closed hatch of the dumb waiter, watching her closely as she talked herself from nothing to everything in just a handful of minutes. As he watched, he left the food abandoned on the bar top, his chief interest sat on a stool behind, and all the while he held a small, predatory smile, his arms loosely folded across his perfectly smooth and toned bare chest.

He let her reach the end of her reasoning, listening in silence. Then, gently, "At last we get to why. Why me? Why you? Why should any of us bother? These are good questions, and your knack for good questions is at least part of the reason why." He raised a finger, forestalling any immediate return. "Let me explain, give you a little context perhaps. Then we can get to why."

Straightening, he stepped forward and leaned on the bar, fingers splayed on its surface. "You have a sense that the world is more than you know, and that sense is entirely correct. There are beings that inhabit this world beyond your usual understanding, and most certainly not what you would describe as human."

He gestured at her with a finger, "You, a human, come from a line that is young and new, mere babes on the stage of this world. Many came before you, and many will come after you. But this world is big enough and complex enough that humans need not be on stage alone. It's a peculiar arrogance of the human race to think otherwise." He waved away a perceived objection, "No, no, I understand that not all think that way, that some are more open minded than others, but think for the masses here. Humans are all important to them."

"But to those who came before, humans upset the balance. They build, they destroy, but most of all they think really of no one except themselves. The balance is what kept the peace. The balance disrupted, it was inevitable that this would be corrected."

He inclined his head, back to the window, the door, the alley outside. "Parasol, out there, is an instrument of that correction. She -- and bear in mind that I use 'she' in quite loose terms here -- she is an embodiment of the need for balance and, from one perspective, she is simply righting that which humans have made wrong."

He pulled himself upright and smiled at Marie, shrugging almost apologetically, "From one perspective."

"So, I guess that brings us to 'why me'. Quite simply, I have a different perspective. I guess, if you look at it that sort of way, Parasol and I are opposite sides of the same coin. Imagine, for a moment, holding a dollar coin up so that it faced the sun." He grasped a tortilla chip, demonstrating against a spot light so that Marie could also see. A finger snaked round to the side lit by the light. "That side, facing the sun, that would be me." The same finger moved, now pointing to the nearer face, "And this side, in darkness, would be Parasol and her ilk."

"She is Dark. I am Light. You are human. All would be well in the world, but humans weren't content to live in caves and keep the night at bay with just a single fire. You grew, you expanded, and you learned how to bring light to even the darkest places. And therein is the problem, from their perspective. You took away their darkness. They want it back."

He munched the tortilla chip in one swift bite, as if that were humanity's fate enacted in small scale. Sucking salt and spice from his fingers, he reiterated, "But that's a matter of perspective, and not one I share. To your benefit, I believe. So, what do I want? I want you to live, love and dance in this light you have made. But you can't do that alone. That's why you need me."

He stretched, flexing his arms upwards as though all this talking needed his muscles to be limber, then settled his palms back on the bar, focused towards her. "As for you, Marie, it happens that I like you. I like your cautiousness. I like your bravery. I like your energy, your spark, that little je ne sais quoi. And I like your body, compact and dynamic, a little street chic. You are, altogether, just too... alluring to let Parasol dismember." His wolfish grin returned. "I think we could do great things together, you and I."

He quirked a brow, quizzically, "So, how's your 'at any cost' now?"

 

[ImbibedFantasy1]

And then he was talking, -really- talking, and Marie found herself watching those vibrant blue eyes, hanging on his every word, absorbing this new knowledge like a sponge. There was a sort of...earnestness to the young woman, as if learning somehow made her feel better, as if his knowing and will to share made him more important than his apparant role as her savior from the panthers.

A building excitement if you will. Pieces of a clouded puzzle finally coming together in her head, even as she internally rallied against the injustice of it. The arrogance of the dark beings for thinking humans were pests to be wiped out.

He crunched the chip, and Marie sat back slightly, the mildly inebriated woman bringing her hand to her forehead at humanity's death sentence. But ah-Neon wasn't part of that condemnation, was he? Marie wondered if he acted independently, or if there were others like him. Was there hope?

Was there any chance at all?

The swirl of questions and anxieties ebbed away beneath the haze of vodka and the bright eyes of the strange being across from her. He spoke about his choosing of her, Marie's hand lowering, dark eyes staring, that same faint embarrassment as she looked away, his wolfish grin making her wonder. Quietly, she studied the display of bar food, plucking up a fried mushroom with the provided pick.

Great things?

She chewed, swallowed. Dark eyes slipped up to Neon once more. "Well. It beats the panthers." She commented in a slightly joking tone, more at ease, in the very least. At last, she knew something of what was going on. At last, she had some -help-. Someone was offering knowledge and the tools to use that knowledge.

Marie didn't feel like it was such a hard decision, now.

 

[RedTimberWolf]

Neon inclined his head, "Well, indeed. It beats, as you say, the panthers. I like your term for them, by the by. Quite apt, even if their relationship to the larger felines is more tenuous than your own."

He straightened and rounded the bar to her side, briefly perching atop the bar stool next to her. He caught her eyes, held them, "Even so, you still seem to be hedging. Who am I really, you might ask. What do I really want?"

He smiled disarmingly, "That's fine. Understandable, even. But I think I have a solution, a way to help you gather some confidence to commit not merely because you see no other option."

Off the bar stool again, he offered her a hand. "Come with me, Marie, and I'll let you talk to another I've helped. One who helped bring you here, in fact. Then you two can talk while I attend to some other business."

Her acquiescence assumed, he led her from the bar to a door clearly marked 'Private - No Admittance' and up a flight of stairs to where the beats and music of the dance floor were just a distant thrum, felt more than heard. Another door, locked with a biometric thumbprint scanner to the side. Neon pressed his left thumb against the plate and a small peep preceded a loud click as the door unbolted to admit them.

The door opened onto a wide hall, plushly carpeted in a shock of bright colours, with five doors leading from it: two left, two right, and one straight ahead. Neon motioned to the nearest one on the right, "There's a bathroom should you wish to freshen up. There's fresh towels and even a shower, if you fancy, but I imagine that'll wait. Eric is in the room at the end of the hall, doubtless plugged into his computer and in a world of his own." He grinned, "Try not to scare the wits out of him when you go in."

"When you've asked your questions and learned your fill, come see me." And with that, he left her standing as he glided down the hall and through the last door on the left, closing it behind him.

~

Task-less, for the moment, Eric sat in a corner of the room atop piled pillows. There was a desk and plush chair, but he'd grown up making do and it made him feel better, more like he was still at home with his mother. He pushed that thought aside; thinking about his mother pained him too much.

Instead, he focused on the 'net through the panels and devices arrayed on the screen in front of him. Information washed over him and he walked through it with ease, letting it push away the sense of place and time. In his ears through white ear buds, harsh beats thrashed machine gun tempo but he felt only the data. Bare feet out of loose moleskin combats scrunched the carpet, absently enjoying the sensation. He shifted and the reflection of a flaming skull on his black t-shirt caught in the high gloss of the screen, then he shifted again 'til it was gone. Just the data, the constant flow. He lost himself for a while.