Open Your Eyes [OPEN]

[desree (DELETED 8310)]

[ OOC: Please note, I am looking for someone willing to teach me how to use the grid, will be active with roleplaying and growth. I will have some time off for personal reasons which I am happy to discuss in PM. Thank you ]

----

There was the hint of salt in the air as the waves crashed on the shore below, wind swept her up as she took in the scene around her. She knew this would be the last sunset she was about to watch, her clock was ticking and time was certainly running out.

Her mind began to wonder if what she was told six months ago was really going to happen. Desree hadn't been one to listen to the words of a Seer but everything she has been told so far had come to pass. She escaped the world of Orange County, California for some quiet alone time. Leaving only a note to her closest and only family member explaining what had happened, how she felt and why she needed to leave.

Life had become pretty complicated when she arrived home that evening after visiting the Seer. Desree was happily living with her fiance of three years, planning her wedding was the most important thing she had been doing as of late and she was excited to become Mrs Waygood. Brushing her hair from her face, Desree carried on looking out into the distance wondering if she could escape this fate.

Turning around she began to make her way back to her black Volkswagen Beetle. She had no idea when her time would come but she could already feel it was sooner rather than later and she asked herself if going back to the hotel room she had been renting for the last few months was even a good idea. All her belongings, well a small green suitcase and handbag were already in the boot of the car and the bill had been paid up until this day.

“Maybe if you go a different direction fate will not step in.” She asked herself. “But then fate stepped in when you tried to leave Matthew so there’s really no point in hiding from it any longer.”

Opening the driver’s side door, she slumped in miserably and turned on the ignition, closing the door as she put on her seat belt. The images rushed through her mind as she knew what would happen next but she did as fate had foreseen it and put on her driving playlist and began to sing quietly along to the words to a song she didn’t really care for. Driving off she left the beautiful scene in her rear view mirror and shot off down the road and it was only minutes later when she felt her car jig and lose control as she turned a corner a bit too fast racing off the side of the cliff as if she had control herself, her car almost flew into the sky and down.

Rearing off she felt the thud of the car as it landed and rolled no more than 20km from the top of the cliff and head first into a tree. This was where the car stopped, puffing out radiator heat and everything else left in the engine. By the time the impact happened Desree was knocked unconscious when the steering wheel met her forehead. The world went dark and from there on to anyone looking would believe her to be dead.

[Cosimo Alessi (DELETED 6612)]

Thinking. That’s what Cosimo had told Juniper he’d been doing: thinking. It wasn’t a hard thing to do, but it was something that Cosimo wasn’t all that accustomed to. Life had a way of tumbling him along, a piece of tumbleweed gently bouncing down a hillside (though sometimes hitting a sharp rock or three).

Therein lay the problem. Cosimo was too accustomed to just letting life make the decisions for him; he waited around until something happened to force his hand, or until something was offered to him which was superior to what he already had. Vampirism and an exponential amount of power and energy, for example, was better than homelessness with a Canadian Winter on the way. Although there were some nights that the Italian regretted his choices, most of the time he had no regrets. There were those who saw him and his kind as monsters, but Cosimo knew that he was not a monster. Maybe he could convince the world of that, one soul at a time, but until then they had no business judging him.

Ahead, the trees waved to him as a gentle breeze rustled through their branches. A twig snapped somewhere behind him and he was reminded that the wilderness was not a great place for vampire-kind. The Fae were not fans, and Cosimo did not fancy having a limb torn off by creatures far stronger and scarier than himself. He wasn’t too far out; close enough to the road and to civilization that he believed the Fae would not come so close. But he kept moving anyway, just to be on the safe side. The silence and peace of the outdoors, away from the bustle of the city, had provided Cosimo the time and the space to really put his thoughts together.

It was time to stop being so devoted to a sire who’d left. It was time, instead, to be a good sire himself; he had those that depended on him. He could not let them down. He needed to be able to provide, even if they did not expect him to. It was his responsibility; it gave him purpose, a cause. And that was all that he ever needed. The tumbleweed had found a path.

As he came up over the next rise that would eventually lead him into the city, he witnessed the scene down below; the car swerving and careening off the road, over the edge of a small cliff. There were no explosions, but Cosimo reminded himself that this was not an action film. Of course there were no explosions. Muttering foreign expletives, Cosimo tumbled and crashed through the undergrowth before he found the path which took him back to the road. He looked left, then right and saw the skid marks on the asphalt. Jogging toward them, he looked down; the taillights of the car glowed red in the darkness. It was these that Cosimo focused on. One second he was on the road, the next he was regaining his balance next to the car, his hands slapping the boot as he twisted his ankle upon landing. Teleportation – this was one he had to work on.

Carefully he eased his way toward the driver’s seat; the smell of blood hit him, reminding him of what he was, and what he had to eat to survive. He shoved the thirst away and instead focused on the woman inside. Was she dead? With two, three hard yanks Cosimo had the door open, the metal creaking in the relative silence. He reached inside, pushing hair away from the woman’s neck so he could look for a pulse.

”Hey, hey. Wake up…” he said. Anything. Something, to break into her consciousness. If she had any. Cold fingers pressed against clammy skin, searching for any signs of life.

[desree (DELETED 8310)]

Life has a funny way of sneaking up on you and reminding you that you are only human and you will die at any given moment. No matter how much you try and avoid your impending death, we all have to die sometime. Was she dead? Or simply unconscious? Was she nearing deaths door or was she simply waiting for death to collect her?

She could hear white noise all around her, it felt as though she was having an outer body experience by the time she managed to open her eyes. A man was looking at her, his eyes filled with concern but she couldn't move her mouth or utter a single word. Her eyes felt heavy and her body limp and lifeless, was this how it felt when you were immobilized? Unable to speak, move or do anything other then watch the world go by? She tried to open her mouth to utter a single word but all that came out was a mumble.

Her mind shook from the shock that was coming in waves, she could feel herself slipping away as the blood from her wounds under the steeling wheel began to ease. This was not a good sign, once the pain began to stop she knew it would be time for her to leave this world. She felt a trickle of something slide down her face but that was the only real feeling she had. She looked at the man with her dark brown eyes, almost praying he could understand what she was saying. She closed her eyes again, this time unsure if they were going to reopen.

[Cosimo Alessi (DELETED 6612)]

The front of the car was mauled. It was completely wrecked, the steal and machinery mangled and in the entirely wrong place. The scent of blood only grew stronger. The woman was alive, but when she came around, it was only a fleeting glimpse of life. There was a look in her eye, a desperation. A question, even. She may as well have been a doe who’d been caught under the wheels of the car, rather than the driver who’d been behind the wheel. Cosimo deciphered that look in her eye as confusion. Why did it have to be her? And why could she not still live?

Maybe he was projecting. Loss of life was not something that Cosimo could abide. At least, he felt it was hard to abide by it, especially when he was the keeper of an elixir that could keep death at bay – indefinitely. He hissed as he stepped back and away, shaking his cold hand, boots crunching in the undergrowth. A flurry of Italian queries bubbled from his lips; should he, could he? Kit was so new. And Athena had been so adamant – no women. No girls. No females. The last time he had brought home a female progeny, it had almost spelled the last of their relationship. That childe was no longer around.

Athena would have to accept it, he decided. If she hated him for this, then so be it. He would charm her back, eventually. The woman wanted to marry him. That had to count for something.

When Cosimo turned back to the car, it was with a new determination. The engine ticked, the hot metal cooling. Time was of the essence. Reaching into car, he gently did his best to extract the woman, to carry her body over to a clear patch of grass. It was dirty, and dewy. But she was covered in blood. And dying. He didn’t think she would care. There was nothing for it. He lifted his hand to his mouth, ripping into his own wrist with his lengthened canines – the scent of the blood had naturally brought them to the fore.

Muttering under his breath, he held the bleeding wrist to the girl’s mouth, thumb pressed to her chin to hold her lips open. She was unconscious. But hopefully, the tongue would still swallow by instinct.