Path of the Vampire forum

Charles walked up to the building ready to get right in, that part was easy. He glanced over his shoulder just making sure no one had seen him. Unfortunately, it wasn't who was there now that he should have been worried about. Charles took one step inside and he knew the mistake he'd made. He glanced a security camera, and more importantly, he saw the explosion erupt from a proximity mine as he got to close, in haste he got out of the way stepping a bit too close to another trap which he narrowly avoided.

He breathed heavily and winced, cursing under his breath. "Well, this was a terrible idea apparently." he grumbled angrily as he looked around quickly for anyone who might have seen or heard what just happened. Good. Nobody's here. I gotta get out of here, if they have any other traps around I'm absolutely screwed. He carefully moved trying to get out without setting off anything else. Unfortunately, it was far too late to escape the security camera. It was more a matter of getting out of here while he was still in one piece, even if a burned piece.


He rushed outside and into the streets, heading away as fast as he could. There were a few places he thought about going, Qaurtermine Custom creations he knew wouldn't be too bad a place to head to, or perhaps an internet cafe, heck anywhere but nearby that house just in case someone came back to it. They wouldn't even need footage, he was covered in burns and their proximity mine had gone off, what other evidence was needed? He just hoped he'd be able to keep out of their way until they forgot about it and the burns wore off, not that that would happen nearly as soon as he'd like.

Boom. Crash. Scream. Clo sat on the living-room sofa and watched the soldier blown to pieces struggle to reassemble his lower half. He scraped at his innards, as if scooping them all back up would save him. In the end, he died. They always died. She loved war movies and scary movies. She loved the graphics, the animation, the screams -- Clo loved to compare real life to fantasy. If it weren’t for the movie ending, she might have missed her phone chirping at her. She might have missed the distant sound of an explosion. But she heard. Her mind instantly took her back into the past, as if she were a soldier being thrust back into an old war, and she froze. Clover waited for another explosion, another loud boom, but none came. Her phone kept chirping at her, and that noise broke her from her trance-like state.

She had to mentally coach herself, to remind herself that it was October, that the past was in the past. They weren’t under attack again. They weren’t being infiltrated again. Clo couldn’t stop her hands from shaking, not even as she tried to hold her phone. The security camera had caught an image, but it wasn’t of a person she recognized. He was alone, she noted, and he looked like the one that set the explosion off, for she noted his appearance both before the explosion and after the explosion. Without thinking, she grabbed her blazer she’d discarded on the arm of the couch and raced around to grab her shoes. Every move took her far too long. He had to have gotten away, one part of her argued. He couldn’t have gotten far, another part of her reassured.

Clo took the elevator to the ground level and she left that way. June stayed ahead of her, scouting the area as far as possible, but she couldn’t locate the man she’d seen on the camera footage. She had her phone in one hand, the video playing on loop, while her other hand remained near the belt loop on her jeans, ready to grab for her handgun. She’d taken too long. He’d gotten away. He’d gotten away. Clo felt like ripping her hair out by the roots; she felt like stopping at the nearest intersection and slaughtering everyone in sight. And then she saw him. He looked like the guy on the footage. He looked like the guy that had been snooping around her home. She didn’t ask questions. She walked up to him, pulled her gun, and waited for him to acknowledge her. God, she wanted him to say something to her.

Things had been going fine for awhile, no one had shown up to come after him, but unfortunately that wasn't going to keep up. And while he had escaped the scene, he hadn't escaped danger. Evidence by the fact he now found himself facing a gun, there wasn't a huge chance of bluffing his way out, not like this. Maybe if he hadn't been burned so badly he could think hard enough to find a way, but the burns he still had just took up too much attention.

Charles just looked at it for a moment, he knew just how much this might end up hurting. He looked straight at her, refusing to allow that to show. Instead, he just smiled. He wasn't entirely sure why he did that, it probably didn't help the situation, heck it might make it worse. Perhaps it was the same reason people would laugh sometimes when they stubbed their toe.

"Is that really necessary?" He asked simply, waiting to see her response. He didn't make any counter move, if he did he'd get shot, that he knew. Unless she put her guard down or just decided against it, he knew he was going to get shot.

Well. Let's just hope this doesn't end up killing me. He thought accepting his fate. He'd been sent to a hospital before because of a much more serious situation, hopefully though this wouldn't get that bad.

He wanted to die. He wanted a bullet lodged in his skull. He wanted to bleed out on the ground. Clo went through the vital points on his body, just ready to shoot him and call everything even. Breaking and entering? Bullet to the brain. The ambulance would arrive just in time, a Godsend for the man, and he’d pull through. Some of them just had that sort of luck; some of them just had life in spades. Others didn’t. She wanted him to die there, right there, just to prove a point, but she hesitated. His words egged her on, but she hesitated.

“You broke into my house,” she stated, eyeing him. He didn’t look dangerous. He didn’t look as if he were part of some gang, part of some group of paladins. But looks were deceiving. Looks were misleading. “You broke into my house, destroyed my traps -- you left a mess in your wake. You’re asking me if it’s necessary to keep you at gunpoint. Yes, sir,” she said, mockingly, “it is.” She didn’t know what else to say then, so she simply stared at him, her thoughts overtaking her mind. Why had he picked Circle? Why had he gone alone? What had he hoped to accomplish? Did he know the layout of the building? Did he expect to follow along the routes and surprise them all?

She didn’t know. She didn’t know. The fact ate at her insides. Something told her to ask him questions, but she didn’t want to waste time asking him tons of questions. She didn’t want to stand there and expect him to tell the truth, not at gunpoint, not after she’d shown him the weapon. He was a liar, more than likely. He probably had a collection of lies tucked up both sleeves, just ones to fall back onto. He’d entered the wrong house. He’d gotten the directions wrong. He could have sworn he had the right house. He could have sworn he had the right directions.

Shoot him.

Just shoot him.

But she paused. She gave him the benefit of the doubt. “Explain yourself and I might not shoot you.” Honesty. Clo actually meant her words. If he told the truth, if his words satisfied her curiosity, if she decided he wasn’t a threat, she meant to walk away and leave him alone. He really wasn’t worth the time or effort, but he’d crossed the line. That made the difference. It wasn't up to Jesse to decide what happened. It wasn't up to Jesse to work things out. Clo had been the one to make the split-second decision, to give chase.

Charles looked at her for a moment, not changing his expression until he looked up to his left before speaking, "I didn't know what I was getting into." He said simply with a shrug, "The place was so easy to get into in the first place. Had the mine not been there I might have just kept on going." There wasn't much point in lying at this point. Of course outright saying, 'I walked in to find stuff' would have been blunt and not exactly a good choice. At the same time, there was no reason to hide all that much either.

He blinked slowly, allowing himself to maintain a cool composure so he could think properly. If he got shot he wanted every ability to think about what to do about it. And getting too worried in these circumstances was just not something he wanted to do. It was a waste of energy, and could only make things worse.

Even with all the thoughts of staying calm and avoiding conflict on his mind, so was the idea of if he would be able to fight back. He had weapons and he had powers, and if she tried to kill him and he thought she'd do it again then he'd think about fighting back. But every moment that thought entered his mind he forced himself to shove it to the side so he could focus on avoiding taking an action that would get him shot, like moving suddenly or in any form of aggressive manner.

Be careful with every action. Angry people will almost always use any excuse to engage in conflict if they can, particularly if that involves causing you pain. He thought, Remaining calm, and moving slowly, is the best choice of action.

Her finger still on the trigger, she lowered the gun a fraction of an inch. They were both being honest with one another, as far as she could tell. Lowering the gun didn’t mean a thing, in the grand scheme. She only needed a second or two to raise the gun, to press on the trigger, to blow his head wide open. “Are you acting alone, or should I expect more company?” Clo didn’t know why she bothered to ask, but she did, as if he’d just open his mouth and spill his guts. They weren’t building a rapport. She still held him at gunpoint. Clo didn’t know if he had something up his sleeve, so she did her best to remain alert, but she began to think of him as nothing more than a common thief. He’d picked a building. He’d entered said building. He’d been met with a security system. He’d run for his life. Clo had been there and done that. She’d played the part of a thief far too many times.

“And if I let you go, what’s to say you’ve learned your lesson? I really don’t need you breaking into my house every night just to vandalize **** and piss me off.” Clo eyed him then, as if she were judging the quality of a piece of meat. He didn’t have the appeal of a fine cut, but he seemed well enough to make the menu. “How about I shoot you and we call it even, mister...?” Clover raised her brows, a clear indication that she expected him to provide her with a name. “It’ll be a non-vital point. You’ll hardly notice.”

The second question was not one so simple, "No, technically, I suppose I'm not entirely alone. But I was the only one who broke in." He responded thoughtfully "But unless you're a vampire or I'm particularly injured I doubt you'd have to worry about them." The response was entirely true, the Legion of Steel was an anti vampire group, and although he thought maybe if he asked, and under the right circumstances, they might help him out against someone, for the most part it was just vampires they were after.

Charles looked at the gun and clinched his teeth, as her second and third question came about, "It's Charles Crafter. And honestly I'd rather you not. I've had quite enough of being attacked for awhile."
"As for going there again, I probably won't if I remember. Stepping on proximity mines isn't exactly the most enjoyable thing out there."

Clover dismissed all of his words and focused right there, right on the word vampire, as if she were following a beacon. She didn’t need humans snooping around her home, but she definitely didn’t need paladins or sorcerers, or whatever new enemy breed had stepped forth from the abyss. She didn’t need the attention. She only needed to deliver a solid reminder. That was her final decision. Making sure the safety was off, Clo fired two shots, one directed at the man’s throat and another at a spot just next to the man’s foot. No, not just some man. Charles, Charles Crafter.

“Stay away from my house, Charles.” Even as she said those words, she sounded tired. Tired of chasing people. Tired of defending her house. Tired, in general. “Just,” she began again, “stop.” Once she’d fired the second shot, she’d lowered her weapon. Something told her not to turn her back though. They weren’t exactly in a deserted area, though nor were they in an overpopulated area. Her gunshots attracted attention, a good thing for Charles, but a bad thing for Clover. She wanted to keep talking to him, but their words would have gone around and around. Shooting him became the only way to stop the nonsense, to break the cycle. She could have explained her paranoia to him; she could have opened up to him. Instead, she chose to simply back away, to let the paranoia consume her entirely, body and soul. Maybe she’d never see him again. Maybe they’d meet again numerous times. She didn't know.

Charles gripped his throat as the shots were fired and stepped back furrowing his brow in pain. His eyes locked onto her narrowing, her reaction to vampire was less then promising. But it wasn't something he wanted to test around with. Even if he convinced the order of steel to go after her, he would probably also have a target on his back because of it. Which didn't exactly seem the best choice in his opinion. He rushed backwards into the crowd as it drew in, smiling and giving assurance to those worried that he was alright and just needed needed to get it patched up a bit. No reason to explain to them why he was shot, especially as being in pain meant people would feel bad for asking as it might cause more pain.

I'll remember this woman. Whether or not I actually act on it. Maybe I'll get you to explain to me what was up with that, maybe not. But anyone who puts a mine in their house has to have something interesting to tell. He thought as he rushed away.