[tCotR] - Oliver Chadwick

[Lancaster]

When victim to the ferocious frenzy of battle, Elliot became less aware of his vaster surroundings. He became a creature trained only to kill; he focused only on what he needed to focus on in order to come out on top. In this case, he lost sight of Pi as he instead preoccupied himself with the three minions, hellbent on beheading him and/or burning him on a pyre. He wouldn’t put it past them. They were zealots, blinded to all else but their own deluded cause. Or was that the Paladins? It didn’t matter who was who. They were all miscreants, to the vampire’s mind. In this moment, in this place, they attacked Elliot with all they had. And Elliot attacked back, because it’s what he had to do.

Power built and billowed from him in practiced, precise waves. Where he parried and danced with his sword, slashing and hacking and stabbing—even breaking one skull with the mere force of his swing—he also confused the men. He addled their focus. He used bursts of celerity to dodge their attacks. He summoned swarms of insects to distract them, to sting them and bite them and cause them agony while he applied finishing blows.

Of course Elliot didn’t get out of the fray unscathed, but in the grand dance of it he was not aware of the pain; of the bullet lodged in thigh and shoulder, of the gash that ran from ear to jaw and the blood that tricked through the stubble, down his neck. But he did not stop until all three men were dead—and the one that remained was hardly conscious, the one that Pi had thrown against the wall.

Elliot heaved when the job was done. A ripple ran the length of his spine as he assessed the little of corpses—the ones that he had created. That shame and guilt clawed in that sensitive spot in one’s chest—not where the heart lies, but just to the right of it, in that crevice where the diaphragm once had an important job to do. A flutter, supressed and flattened.

Pi had Oliver in hand. Elliot, looking to all the world like a man gone mad, approached.

”You want to end up like them, Oliver? You want to align yourself with scum, because you’re a stubborn ****** who won’t admit he’d be dead otherwise, and just be ******* thankful for what he’s got? And stick to the simple ******* rules?” Elliot asked. He had no idea why he was asking. Why he was still talking. Why he was delaying the inevitable – maybe hoping Pi would step in and do the dirty deed before Oliver had a chance to respond. Maybe just venting fury that Oliver couldn’t just be what Elliot wanted him to be. Because that’s what it was, in a way.

So many had Elliot brought into this world. So many who were not thankful. So many who were, but who didn’t stick around. That flutter in his chest keened for what could be, but which was not. A yearning for something… something more. And he hated Oliver in that moment. Hated him for being a splinter in a wavering optimism. A blemish on the face of a hope that Elliot was slowly losing his grip on. He hated Oliver, but he still keened, hoping that death was not the final answer.

Roxette was still awake, against the wall. Her eyes were bleary and red, and she remained still and unstirring. Her bottom lip quivered, wetness spilled over her lashes.

[Pi dArtois]

‹Pi dArtois› There was blood and no rain to wash it away. There were bodies and no good way to get rid of those either. There was a witness and Pi wasn’t entirely sure what she should do with her and she figured Elliot wouldn’t be too keen on her instinct to make quick work of the woman’s sobbing and throw her onto the pile as if the whole incident was a drug bust gone wrong of a pimp and whore scenario. No, she knew better than that, instead she left the woman to sob into the hard concrete cradling her broken arm. It is then that Pi saw Roxi’s face and the stark expression there. It seemed even there, in the face of a woman who had been an ancillary part of the family, the awful knowledge of what had to come next.

Oliver had fallen to the hard surface of packed tarseal and concrete. For a moment he back crawled before gaining his feet and standing with his chin raised at an arrogant angle. God, he was a good looking man she observed abstractly. Someone had taken the red haired freckled boy next door and bottled him into this over slick version of the generalisation, with his tailored suit paid for Pi had no doubt with money he’d stolen or blackmailed off those stupid enough to believe the veneer.

Pi walked forward coming to stand beside the man she loved, laying a soft hand on his arm. It wasn’t to calm him to to comfort but an acknowledgement she was there. This was the moment, the choice she would need to make and the moment she needed to push the soulful musician to make the hard choice or take that choice away from him completely, him and his red haired childe with the face writ with the arrogant assumption he could talk himself out of this one as well.

“We have no more choices, his bounty is too much, this… scene too public. He has to be taken care of and we are the ones who will need to do it or we need to stand to the side and let… others do it for us.” She said finally giving words again to the thing she knew he didn’t want to her. She pushed the envelope again, putting in front him the untenable choice he had been trying so damn hard not to make. “It’s us Elliot.. we do it, you do it… or someone else will. He must pay the price.”

“Well, I don’t want to end up like you!” Oliver spat back at Elliot, finally righting himself and taking the offensive. “Who the hell are you to tell me what is right and wrong. You just killed three people. Is that any worse than what I’ve done? No. So you can take your rules and your masquerade and your stupid restrictions and you can shove them up your ***.” His eyes burned with his anger, spearing the tall musician that was his sire with a gaze that could cut. “As for you! You stupid *****. Don’t ever touch me again.” Misogyny came in all different shapes and sizes and for Oliver a woman faster, stronger and more adept than him pissed him the hell off and with those words he dismissed Pi and the threat he didn’t believe she was.

‹Elliot dArtois› The hand on his shoulder didn’t do much to comfort him. The words that Pi spoke comforted him much less. Every word was right and he knew it, but they only acted as ropes wrapped tight around his heart, tightening with each further utterance. He wanted to argue with Pi, right there, right in the middle of it. Wanted to turn around and tell her that he had faith in giving second chances, that people could prove themselves worthy, if only they wanted to.

All of this, he opened his mouth to argue. All this, surged from some place deep within, desperate, hollow, and weak. He was cut off my Oliver, however. He accused Elliot of killing three people, those words more a knife than that arrogant glare could be. Oliver had no idea who Elliot was, or what he stood for. But he was right, too. Elliot had just killed three people in a fit of rage. Oliver was using it against him. Elliot’s grip tightened around his sword, the weapon slim and slick—inconspicuous in its deadliness, just as Elliot was.

It was only when Oliver swore at Pi that Elliot lunged forward. Only when Oliver spat his disrespect at the woman he loved did Elliot drop to one knee, crowded over Oliver, tip of his sword nudged up under Oliver’s chin. It drew blood. “Why? Just tell me why? You were dying. You would be dead. Roxette – she cared so much for you she came to me to request the one thing, the one thing that would save your life. And I did it, because I care about her, and didn’t want the world to take from her someone she loved. She loves you, like ******* brother, and THIS is how you repay her? What kind of a ******* rat are you?” he asked, words quavering, eyes bright.

‹Pi dArtois› Oliver pressed down on the blade at his neck, feeling the sharp blade cut a shallow grove under his chin and she hissed back. “Because you don’t get to make my choices for me! I’d rather die by my own rules than have to live another ******* second living your sad shallow ******* life. It’s not living unless I have control and if I don’t have control you can ******* eat ME!” Oliver yelled in Elliot’s face, belligerence clear in every fierce line. “And not you, not Roxi, not anyone gets to dictate to me what I am. You had no right to take my choices away from me! No right at all!”

Pi listened and winced at the younger man’s words, watching the emotions in Oliver’s visage and then back to Elliot. She could no more get in the middle of this moment than she ever could. She realised then that her earlier words had been redundant and unnecessary. Elliot hadn’t needed to hear them to know what he needed to do and as much as Pi would have liked to delude herself into thinking it was merely her influence that helped him get to this place, she wasn’t really so sure. It seemed they were all destined to head here in some shape or form. Oliver especially.

[Lancaster]

--The following was a live chat roleplay--

‹Pi dArtois› There was no changing what would happen next and Pi merely moved silently to flank the younger male. This would be Elliot’s moment but she moved around the two men so she stood on the other side of the younger vampire, facing Elliot, her expression calm. Below the surface thoughts and feelings raced through her mind, small fears about whether this was even necessary. If they could spare him and then spare Elliot all of it. The fears were quickly discarded along with the unrealistic hope and as soon as that one fled another took its place. One where Elliot blamed her for where this led and what he would be forced to do. That the final nail in the coffin that held his struggling humanity would be sealed shut with this last act. But there was no going back, or changing what needed to be. She had been forced into circumstances that changed her forever and tonight, either for good or ill, was Elliot’s. Elliot’s and Oliver’s.

Oliver ripped out of Elliot's grasp, flailing backwards, his hand, vampire fast coming up to strike at Elliot, pushing the other vampire back and trying to escape. Oliver might not want to live by anyone's rules but his own, but by god he wanted to live... and he realised, too late, that he might not make it out of this alley with the certainty he'd see another one.

‹Elliot dArtois› Elliot could feel the rage pouring from the young man. Could feel it as if it were his own. But he knew it was not his own. His own rage was fueled by despair, guilt, and shame. His own rage had a base of purity, even as monstrous as he believed himself to be. The rage that billowed from Oliver was crass and dry. It was unadulterated and vicious. In it, there was no hint of sympathy. Elliot pressed further, extra senses delving into the ether, searching Oliver for signs deserving of mercy.

There was nothing. Elliot couldn’t fathom how any person could be this. It was as if Oliver were a gaping black hole, and he would destroy everything in his path only to become bigger, more powerful. This whole charade was not just a little rebellion. It was only the beginning. Elliot didn’t believe it before—he’d believed that Pi was merely being the pessimist he knew she could be. It was only now that Elliot knew that she’d been right. Oliver was a leech. The worst of the worst.

Oliver lashed out and pushed Elliot away. Elliot let him think he could escape, to begin with. Even toyed, momentarily, with letting him escape. Of letting someone else deal with him, like he knew they would. Tytonidae, from what he could tell, was a well-oiled machine. They would find Oliver within nights, if not hours. And he would be dead. But Elliot, too, was home to his own fury. He’d killed those three men because the vampire inside had willed him to. He’d enjoyed it. And he hadn’t completely returned to his normal self.

Oliver stood, with the intention of running. Elliot stood, too. One long loping step forward, and he lifted his blade high, and brought it down in one strong, sweeping swoop. The stripped from shoulder to thigh, a long gash that opened the pink flesh like a hot knife through butter. Elliot had intended to behead the guy, but Oliver was faster than he had reckoned. Oliver screamed and fell to his knees. Elliot closed the distance. In order to quiet him, Elliot grasped Oliver’s red hair, formerly well-kept but now a disheveled mess. With a knee against Oliver’s back, Elliot rested the edge of his blade against the neck. He then hacked, back and forth, three times until the head was completely severed. An ugly grimace had etched itself into Elliot’s brow, his mouth down turned at the corners, the gleam all but gone from his blue eyes.

‹Pi dArtois› Pi winced as Elliot hacked at Oliver’s neck. Such a gruesome way to die, such a bloody way to kill. There was no easy way to decapitate a person. It wasn’t like the movies where one swing and hack with a blade and the head rolled neatly off a person’s shoulders. In the real world you had to get past the neck bones, tendons and spinal cord and it always, always, took more than one slash of a sharp sword to do the deed. Watching it was no easier. Pi had been trained in weapons, mostly firearms and guns allowed for a sanitised distance that you couldn’t pretend when you sliced someone’s head off, or watched it happen.

But Oliver was an allurist and in the end the path dictated the end. Pi felt a pang of regret that it had ended like this. She might be the most pragmatic of creatures but she had found (since Elliot) that somewhere hidden deep inside her was an overwhelming optimism. A hope that this would all make some sense to them one day and the trials they were put through, that they put themselves through would all click in that cosmic jigsaw puzzle.

Tonight though there was dead strewn from one end of the alley way to the other. Oliver’s body ashed. They grey dust falling from Elliot’s clenched fingers to fall in a wash of burned out intention. She stood as still as she could, letting the silence eat the awkward stillness as the enormity of what they had done sunk in. There was only one left, one woman, one witness, one last string dangling haphazardly from the ball of twine her and Elliot had worked so hard this night to stop from unraveling. Silently, Pi pulled her Sig, palming the weapon in her small hand, pointed and shot, the percussion from the weapon echoing in the enclosed space. The woman slumped, her arm to longer cradled, no longer hurting and her lips slowly slack as her body went into auto shut down, grey matter oozing out of the exit wound on the back side of her head.

Stepping quickly forward, through the ash at his feet Pi ignored the gasp of shock from Roxi. The human still huddled on the step, tears now streaming down her face as she stared shocked at the pile of dust that was all that was left of the boy she had grown up with. Raising a soft hand Pi stroked Elliot cheek then stepped into his personal space, invading him and pressing herself to him, her small arms reaching around his lean body. “Je suis desolate mon amour. Je suis desolate.”

[Lancaster]

There was no reason as to why Elliot should be so harsh or gruesome in this act of murder. By all rights, he ought to have been merciful, as he was known to be—as he was in every other aspect of his life. But something had gone awry in his head and heart. The vampiric darkness had staked its hold upon him, thrusting the shaft of the claiming flag into the fleshy part of his soul. That part of himself that he so struggled to accept had thrown open the doors of its cage and had claimed its freedom. This should not have been a bad thing. In fact, it was a good thing—the two parts of himself needed to mingle, to become intertwined, so that the both could exist in serenity, and amiability.

There was something of a stubborn mule in Elliot, however. This was something that he knew he had to do, but he was doing it against his will. And when forced to do something against his will, he did so with ferocious intent. So ferocious that normally the result was not what the other party expected or desired. When forced to do something against his will, Elliot would attempt to make the other party regret forcing him to begin with.

Only in this situation, there was no other party but himself. Reason, perhaps, forced him to do this against his will. A reason that Pi had wielded with adept prowess. It was easy, to blame Pi. Easy to punish her, and throw his own ferocious intent in her face, a dagger to her heart. To become a monster, and blame her for it. But he would not. He’d done that before. They’d got well past that, and he no longer considered himself only a monster. There were things that he needed to come to terms with, and Pi was helping, in her own fashion.

But that did not mean that Elliot wished to be consoled by her. She pressed herself up against him, her body a soft sigh against his. He remained standing, still, the sword still clutched too-tight in his fingers. Her fingers fluttered against his skin and he turned his face away; but now, when he opened his eyes, he could see Roxxy in the corner, her platinum blonde hair a beacon in the dark alleyway. The French was like music in Elliot’s ears, and Roxxy’s sob a discord. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, Elliot knew what Pi was trying to say. As much as he hated it when she spoke to him in the language that he did not understand, she did it often enough that he had started to pick up on the key phrases.

But still. That one word. Desolate. Desolate, indeed. A cold, dark, vast emptiness…

…there was no emptiness, however. His heart was not dark, as if there was no one home. It was a raging inferno of fear and guilt and even glee. In that raging darkness there was enjoyment in what he had just done. There was relief, that it was over with, and that life could now go on without that particular weight upon his shoulders. His head bowed—Roxxy still sobbed. That weight still remained. The girl had lost her friend—it didn’t matter that Elliot had tried to save him, and that it wasn’t Oliver’s death that had taken him away from her. He’d been lost to Roxxy before death knocked on his door. But Elliot couldn’t help but feel implicated. Couldn’t help but know it was partly his fault. He was not the desolate one. She was.

Elliot could console himself, could bury himself in own darkness in order to cure his maladies. Pi could come to him later, and though he might not talk about it, he was sure that she would understand. He needed to be alone, just for a little while. And so his lips found Pi’s forehead. He shook his head, and pulled away.

”Please take her home,” he said, gesturing to Roxxy.

And then he walked away, making sure to sheath his weapon before exiting the alleyway and joining the bustling world beyond.

[Pi dArtois]

Pi nodded, letting her hands drop and stepping away so Elliot could leave.

She had been here before, in how many dark alleys with nameless strangers lying at awkward angles drowning in pools of their own blood. Three men, one woman but too many anomalies to make the crime scene logical. Police would find this scene, cordon it off and pick apart the forensic evidence searching for the reasons why and how. They would take photos of blood splatter and attempt to recreate a scenario that would make these bodies make sense. Where would their minds turn, what would they conclude. No, the question she had to ask, the more pertinent decision was what did she want them to assume. At the moment it was just a scene piled with death and no connecting structure. They would question bouncers and they would piece together small parts to form a whole and Pi needed to leave them a trail that would grow cold in this alley. A logical gruesome coup de gras.

Pulling her weapon she wiped it down, her soft shirt wrapping around sight, slide and hammer before scooping inside to clean the trigger and magazine body until she had carefully, methodically eradicated her own prints. Just as intentionally she placed the weapon into the rapidly cooling hand of the big guy whose head was half sheered off. She ignored the grisly remains of the man whose slack limbs and loose bowels dictated he’d moved from man to corpse.

It took little effort to wrap unresisting fingers around her hand gun and pragmatism that saw her turn the weapon on the two other males. The retort of the handgun echoed loudly in the high walled back entrance. People would come and soon. The steady beat of the club beyond the door would protect them for only so long. People would come out this door. Cleaners needing to clear refuse. Drunk men with drunker women intent on a quick moment to grope and feel too much against alley walls. One bullet each for the men and with a face blank and eyes drawn a clear blue by the ugly business she fired two more shots into the woman. The victim. The sorry innocent caught in the cross fire of a gang war. Maybe the police would think her a gang groupie or a poor ******** in the wrong place at the wrong time, or a bone the men had fought over.

She was a star now, the poor woman. She would be a front page testament to the growing crime rate in a city prone to gangs and underbelly night life. Somewhere a boyfriend waited up, somewhere a wife wondered when her husband would come home. And even sooner than those mysteries would be solved by a midnight visit by a blank faced boy in blue detectives would begin the grisly task of piecing together the woman’s story, her last minutes and spare hours.

In none of those scenarios would the police fall to the thought vampires moved in their city and in a world where the supernatural was the movie to be watched on television and a story cleverly created by plot thick scenarios of talented screenwriters they would attempt to couch this ugliness in terms of monstrous humanity.

This is what Pi was good at. She could sit outside the gruesome act and understand the necessity and see it done.

She left a story in that alley. She left the police a tale they could understand without thoughts of vampires and sword carrying musicians with tortured blue eyes and wavy dark hair falling into his face like an fallen angel hiding his face. His visage grim and terrible, an angel ousted from his own heaven to fall upon the earth with ferocious vengeance.

Reaching Roxi Pi crouched in front of the bereft woman, her hand reaching forward to rest on Roxi’s knee. She sat low, her hand subconsciously stroking the woman’s knee to comfort and calm as the human’s keening filled the deathly silent alley. “I’m sorry Roxi, for this, for Oliver.” Squeezing gently Pi urged Elliot’s thrall to look at her, to turn those terribly sad eyes to her. Tears spiked long lashes and red rimmed her eyes, trails of unabated tears glistening over her cheeks and chin.

“We need to go now…I need to get you somewhere safe, away from here. Okay.”

Pi wasn’t sure Roxi heard her, or processed what they needed to do. She was unresponsive, Roxi’s slim body a heavy weight in the French woman’s arms as Pi wrapped a steadying arm around her shoulders and pulled her up to guided her carefully out of this place. She would move them faster when they reached the mouth of the dark alley, using her vampire speed to ensure they would not be seen and she would take Roxi to Elliot’s, a private place to clean up and change, to hide and to cry and to mourn. Pi would sit with her and let her cry out her terror and her grief.

And it was proof of Elliot’s influence that Pi would feel the same and take on board the same grief for the loss and she would stick for however long Roxi needed her to. And it was just as much a testament to how far they had come that Pi would not worry about Elliot or his dark moods and inherent humanity. She had felt them evolving, her and her musician, merging and melding their strengths together.

He would come home when he was ready and they would talk as they always did, not always easily, not always in agreement but always together.

[Pi dArtois]

--The following transcript was a live chat roleplay--

‹Pi dArtois› She'd left Roxi alone because the women needed time to process and after Pi had settled her into the soft comfort of Elliot's couch she used the tome to come back to the portal room and up to the other floor, where she could reach the Crypt. She needed solitude and a space she knew others rarely went. And the crypt was their space, the place they had begun and where they came back to when they needed time for just.. them. She used the bath, soaking so long her skin puckered and pinked and her hair was still damp when she made it to the couch with a book and a light throw, curled herself in the corner her head pillowed comfortably. And she waited.

‹Elliot dArtois› Normally, when Elliot was in a mood, he'd seek out a raid. He'd go to the catacombs. He'd go down into the sewers. He'd slaughter things, mindlessly, with ease. But he didn't want to do that now. Didn't want to be mindless. Didn't want to be a violent beast. He'd sliced through Oliver's neck without having to look at his face--had he done that on purpose, so he wouldn't have to see the fear and accusation there? Or had he done it without thinking, without knowing, just because he could? He'd pulled the jacket tight around himself, had crossed his arms over his chest--had walked, and walked, until he'd reached the boathouse. It was hardly furnished, but underneath, down below, it was light tight. And that was where he slept, overnight, away from anyone and everyone. Away from Pi, because he wasn't ready, just yet, to discuss his feelings. <c>

It was the next night that he tomed home again--tomed home, and as if following a scent, traced the path to the door to the crypt. He lingered in the doorway for a few seconds--watching, waiting to see if she was home.

‹Pi dArtois› Sleep came as it did to their kind and even with her power to walk in the light she felt sleep pull her under, taking her deep until consciousness faded. She hadn’t had time to move to the bed, hadn’t thought to change locations as she felt the pull of the day time sleep take her and instead it came there on the couch, the light blanket covering her from hip to shoulder her body curved around the section couch in a comfortable sprawl. She looked like a woman who had fallen asleep reading a book her cheek resting on her palm the book wedged under her chest. But no breath moved her body, despite what she looked like she was as unmoving as the dead, her breath ruffled her hair, her position didn’t change or her limb shift to find a more comfortable position. All animation had fled her limbs leaving her weak and vulnerable. Pi woke slowly, eyes first, then limbs, immediately infused with the power to move that night brought, a reanimation of mind and body in an instant waking.

She’d slept longer than she usually did. Her body pulling out of its slumber leaving her wondering what time it was. But she knew he didn’t come home and she felt an twinge of worry that he hadn’t and then soothed it away wondering if she wouldn’t have sought solitude after such a night. Standing with a long stretch she moved into the bedroom, pulling off her bed clothes and replacing them with well worn camel slacks and a long sleeved shirt in a soft winter white. Around her neck she pulled a muted ochre scarf with slashes of festive red and orange. Her hair she left to fall around her face with a careless shake. She’d check on Lancaster’s first, make sure things were okay there not knowing when Elliot would come in and then…. Well, later if she needed, she’d go find him.

She was placing her gun into the holster on her back and pulling on her jacket when she reached for the door and opened it coming face to face with her blue eyed Australian with the pale skin and dark hair of the black Irish. Her expression softened. "Elliot."

‹Elliot dArtois› He still wasn't sure whether he was ready. In fact, was entirely sure he didn't feel like talking about it at all. He was a man who didn't have much trouble talking about his emotions, or showing them - but most of the time he showed them via his music. Even after a night of death-like sleep, he still felt as if his soul were twisted in dark knots--knots made of barbed wire. And yet, he didn't want to talk about it. He gave Pi a smile, and as he shifted past her he kissed her lightly, briefly on the forehead. "Pi," he greeted her, before heading toward the shower. He hadn't showered yet. He could still smell Oliver's blood, old and cracked, sunk into his clothes. He began to peel away his jacket as he walked, slowly, taking pains to not look as if he were running away.

‹Pi dArtois› He seemed so hollow and sad and Pi ached for him. But she had no good idea what to do about that. She wasn’t good at this part of what they were, she was getting better but she still found these roadblocks of indecision where she stood on a precipice of indecision. Someone should have invented her a roadmap of what to do for certain situations. She knew enough that she didn’t talk or try to pull him into conversation. She wanted to reach out to him but her hand clenched at her side instead. Sighing she followed him, helping him with his jacket, pulling it off his arms and tossing it onto the floor of the bathroom. It wasn’t that he couldn’t undress himself but she knew he didn’t want to talk and she didn’t want to leave him just yet. When he shrugged himself out of his shirt she took it and threw that to the pile and as he took care of the rest she turned on the shower making sure she didn’t get wet. She had no intention of joining him and instead moved to pick up the clothes he discarded.

‹Elliot dArtois› There was this thing Elliot had recently discovered that he could do. At first he'd thought he was imagining it, but slowly realised he wasn't. He could pick up on the emotions of others, as if they were emitting them in wavelengths, discernible only to his ear. Pi helped him with his clothes, and he wanted to tell her he wasn't a child. That she didn't have to pick up after him like she was his mother--but he didn't. Because he knew, instinctually, by those miniscule wavelengths, that that wasn't her intention. The whole scenario reminded him of the first night they'd really spent together, as a couple. That night had started in this very bathroom. But they couldn't be any more removed from those sentiments. He could only mumble, under his breath, before he climbed into the shower: "It's okay, Pi. You don't have to worry about me." He said 'it's' instead of 'I'm', because he couldn't lie. Wouldn't lie.

[Lancaster]

--The following transcript was a live chat roleplay—

‹Pi dArtois› She bent to pick up the clothes he had discarded and turned to him her smile soft and she nodded. “I know Elliot, it just… I do.” And she walked out, throwing his clothes into the hamper so the cleaners would take them to return them later laundered and folded, no questions asked because they were paid to keep their mouths shut and she went into the tall cupboard and pulled out a bath sheet, taking it back into the bathroom and hanging it over the rail for him to use when he got out. It was quietly domestic, the routine of it. It’s what couples did, the silent communication and instinctive knowledge of what was needed for the other and with the other. She puttered because it helped her to be doing something and he needed to wash off last night and she didn’t want to go the Lancaster’s and leave him alone. The bathroom was full of steam when she went back in, the cubicle he was in fogged out and all she saw was his silhouette, his head hanging in the hot spray of water. “I’ll wait in the living room and then we can go to Lancaster’s together.” She said, quietly closing the door behind her.

‹Elliot dArtois› It couldn't be any more obvious that there was an elephant in the room--a large, cumbersome thing that neither of them would address. And Elliot wouldn't address it, not with Pi, and not because he didn't care for her opinion - but because he cared too much. Now that he'd calmed down, and had had time to think about it, he knew that she was right all along - that this should have been done months ago. But that didn't mean he didn't like it any less. And he didn't want Pi to know exactly how torn up he felt about the whole thing, because she might blame herself. He'd blamed her in the past, and though that bridge was now mended, it wouldn't do to remind her that it had once been burned. He was as mindful of other people's emotions as he was of his own. And he couldn't do it to her. <c>

She left him to shower on his own, and he revelled in the water, allowed it to wash away all his sins. His fingers splayed against the wall as he allowed the hot water to beat down over his body, head bowed as he closed his eyes, as he slowly massaged at the knots in his own soul. He felt only slightly better as he got out of the shower, dried himself, sprayed only a small amount of cologne, and exited into the bedroom to dress - old jeans, old brown leather shoes, red and black plaid button-up shirt, sleeves rolled up to the elbows. He then wandered out into the living room, again trying that smile upon his lips, the corners twisting upward. "Ready?" He had no idea why this sudden plan to go to Lancaster's together - but why not?

‹Pi dArtois› So many things they didn’t say, moving through the motions of their life as if continuity would fill the gap with normalcy and make it alright. And they let it, although they were both subdued and their smiles a little cautious. Pi was no more inclined to talk about the night they had just experienced than he was. She didn’t feel like giving him the ‘I told you so’ statement as if her premonition of what was to happen last night gave her the upper hand the night afterwards. She had no urge to win this moment. No one had won last night. Not her, not Elliot or Roxi and definitely not Oliver. There was hope he would return from the fade, smarter, wiser but there was no guarantee he would return at all, some souls didn’t. And if he did, there was no guarantee he would change either, for so few did that either.

She’d waited on the couch, like she had last night, staring at the pages of a book she didn’t really read and watched him out of the corner of her eye as he moved through past her from bathroom to bedroom to dress. Standing she nodded, leading the way out the door then using the tome to portal and stepping quietly into the one made just for the bar they had built together. Their place, but Elliot’s space, his creative centre and where she knew he felt so much at home. It was quiet, the bar barely opened and no patrons. The day manager was handing over and barely looked up as they entered. Pi sighed and moved to sit by the fire, throwing a log into the hearth and then another, settling in her place in the chair she used for her, tucking her legs under her.

‹Elliot dArtois› The pub was a good idea. As soon as the atmosphere swelled around Elliot, he found the cogs in his brain shifting, that fog of shame and guilt slowly receding, like a cloud pulling back into the mountains as soon as the sun creeps into the sky. Surrounded by the smell of beer, and the general cacophony of revelers, Elliot was able to switch gears. He was a businessman. This was his establishment. Here, he could find distractions, and that smile became a little bit more genuine. Pi wandered off to the fireside, and Elliot remained behind the counter, to get up to date with the proceedings of the day. As soon as that was done, he joined Pi, taking the armchair opposite, perched on the edge, leaning forward like an inquisitive stick insect, the hair falling over his eyes. "Feel like a serenade, my love?"

‹Pi dArtois› And she smiled then, feeling the shift in him, the shackled he’d wrapped around his emotions falling away in this place. It was this she hoped he would find if she brought him here and this she hoped she would see. She imagined leaning forward, her hand touching along his jaw in a gentle caress to run through the hair above his ear and pressing her lips to his. Instead, she let her eyes trace the intimate path her imagingings took and her smile to tell the story of her thoughts. Her voice was soft as she settled into her place by the fire, her chair already turned (as it always was) to look at the stage where the piano sat, her view unimpeded. “Always.” She replied softly.

‹Elliot dArtois› Reading everything in that expression of hers, and in those tendrils of emotion that stretched across the space between them, Elliot leaned forward where Pi did not. He was almost on his knees when he kissed her, gentle and warm, upon the lips. More and more, as each day passed, he gathered around him an aura of humanity - like he could pass for one, regardless of who was looking. Could even warm his skin like one, even if he was not so conscious of it, himself. His palm rested on Pi's knee as he lingered, a few seconds, before retreating, weaving through the crowd to the stage - he disengaged the juke box, plugged in his acoustic. Didn't even introduce himself before he started playing - the first song, a newer one. The rest, mostly covers, interspersed with old stuff. He played on a whim, mostly subject to his emotions, and whatever song would help him to smooth them out and release them, in the least violent way possible.

The Song