♠ DIES IRAE

[Cyrus (DELETED 9729)]

Code: Select all

Tagged: Alexandrea

18A Lytton Avenue,
Stag Heath District

Beware the fury of a patient man.
— John Dryden

Sweat and blood pooled into his mouth with every heaving breath. Copper. Salt. He spat, but the bitterness remained. Spit dribbled down his chin; he didn’t bother wiping it. Every inhale amplified the pounding of blood in his ears. The headache intensified.

Sweat dripped past his eyebrows, stinging his eyes. Wiping his brow was no help, his fists glistening from effort. Everything felt wet. Everything hurt. His knuckles hurt the most from repeated impact. The blood on them could have been his or Dylan’s — it didn’t matter. All that mattered that was that Dylan was still standing.

Lunging forward, Cyrus was blind to his own sluggishness. Adrenaline worked against him. When he swung his fist, it missed. His aim faltered twice more before he struck the other’s flank. In turn, he was hit. Blood surged from his gut, washing over his teeth and out his mouth. As he stumbled backwards for stability, he spat at Dylan.

Beaten and bloody, both men staggered. The momentum was all but gone, but surges of energy and rage kept it going. Her pleads for them to stop only fanned the fire in his chest. If he’d been ignorant as to her feelings, blind to her deceit, then he might have listened. Cyrus had no reason to stop. It was his love for her, and it alone, that kept him from striking her down instead.

Yelling, he threw his weight forward. The landing was intercepted, forcing his body to contort. He shoved his elbow backwards, plunging it into the soft fold of Dylan’s stomach. He did it once, twice — enough times for the other to release him. Staggering forward, he didn’t feel his shirt rip in the other’s grasp. He was free and it was all that mattered.

It didn’t stop him from another assault, which he waited but a second to deploy.
This time, he knocked Dylan to the ground.

Cyrus stumbled to his knees and brought the full weight of his descent onto the other’s chest. His knuckles were nearly numb from the pain, but he continued to strike with them. Left, right, left right. His shoulders hurt. His spine ached. His blood pounded across his face. Sweat and tears blurred his vision, but his muscles needn’t visual direction to retrace the same path over and over.

Something cracked, but he didn’t stop.

“You’re killing him! Stop! Cyrus!”

He was deaf to Claire’s words.
If anything, her presence acerbated the situation.
If he’d not found them together, perhaps he’d have reacted differently.

Pain ravaged his body. It throbbed at different intensities throughout. As a professional stuntman he was no stranger to the aches and breaks, but the sting that transpierced him was novel. Cyrus heard the shot before he felt it for what it was.

The bullet lodged itself between his ribs, collapsing a lung. He heaved for breath, like a dying man would before slumping forward. He used Dylan’s shoulders to hold himself up before his trembling arms caved. When he fell to the side, it was both gravity that drew him and Claire that pushed him off her lover.

Darkness descended upon him fast.

Cyrus watched as she stepped into his field of vision. He tried to blink the blurriness away, but the sweat only drew more tears. He recognised those boots. They were a ridiculous shade: the brightest ochre he’d ever seen. Italy, that’s where she’d gotten them. That’s where he’d thought of taking her on their honeymoon.

The ringing in his ears grew louder as the pressure in his arteries petered out. He couldn’t make out the hushed words, but he understood them not to be aimed at him. Claire’s attention was elsewhere, where it had been all this time.

The paralysing effect took hold, numbness and cold spreading from his extremities. It dawned on him then that this wasn’t how it usually happened. He’d weathered all manner of injuries over the past fifteen years, but never had the blackness begun to close in on him as it was now.

“C-c-cl-”

Cyrus could barely utter a syllable, the sharp pain in his chest restricting his air. He gaped for breath like a fish out of water. Bloodied fingernails sunk into the carpet as he sought to anchor himself, to turn onto his side. It was easier saving others than saving oneself. His lungs filled with blood instead of air, and he did his best to spit it out. His heaving only worsened the pain, interrupted the soothing wave of numbness that was taking over.

Turning onto his side was a Herculean feat.
He gasped for breath as blood and spit leaked from his mouth.

The carpeted floor undulated. He felt as if his brain was rattling against skull. Everything was spinning and there was nothing he could control. Bloodied eyes searched his immediate vicinity, but they were gone. She was gone.

“Cl—”

Her name was too hard to pronounce. His tongue felt heavy and airway tight. There’d surely been someone who’d heard the shot. Everyone in these townhouses were so quick to stick their nose into another’s business. He wondered how many of them had known. How many of their neighbours had smiled at them and thought him a fool.

Anger rattled inside his chest, momentarily eclipsing the pain. If this was it for him, then he wasn’t going to let her name be last word to fall from his lips. No, he wasn’t going to waste another moment, however short, on her. He wasn’t going to let her take anymore from him than she already had.

“H—.”

This wouldn’t be the last word to fall from his lips.

“He—p.”

Cyrus closed his eyes as he recalled what’d led to this moment.
He focused his thoughts on the fury that it fuelled.
He wouldn’t let the descending darkness and cold put out that fire.
Forcing a cough, he cleared his airways as best he could before shakily filling his lungs.

“Help!”

It didn’t matter that it wasn’t loud enough.
He’d try again, and again, until the liquid in his lungs drowned his last breath.

[Alexandrea]

Mitzi and Kitty exchanged a look when the mouthful of pins Alex’s had been holding between her teeth were cleanly bitten in half, the top end making a small tinkling noise as they danced over the imported marble floor. The truth about vampires had been out in Harper Rock for a year now but that hadn’t mattered to most of Alexandrea’s regular customers. Most.

Lolita Robinson would have to be one of the few exceptions. That didn’t mean that she discontinued using (abusing?) Mz Quartermaine’s services, however. It just meant she had something personal on the Allurist now to torture her with. And all her ‘needling’ of the vampire was always done with one of the older woman’s fake tittering laughs as if to imply that she was ‘only jesting’.

If it hadn’t been that, though… it would have just been something else. Lolita Robinson was, quite simply, a *****. And a spoiled rotten one at that. If she looked any further down her nose at people, she would end up looking up her own *** hole. But she always paid on time and she spent a lot of money. So, discreetly, Alex spit out the other ends of the pins into her hand and placed them into her sewing kit’s lid. She would dispose of them later. They really weren’t needed anyway, the habit of holding them between her teeth was one the blonde had cultivated solely for the purpose of helping her to keep her mouth shut.

The widow Robinson hadn’t noticed, of course. Nor did she pay any attention as Kitty stooped to gather up the top half of the pins that had tumbled over the floor tiles. She just kept droning on and on. With her ludicrous forced laughter every few minutes grating on everyone’s nerves. Alex couldn’t help but wonder at what it was that keep Mitzi around as Lolita’s treatment of her friends wasn’t any better than her treatment of ‘the riff-raff’.

It was with the greatest of relief that the last fitting, for yet another over the top dress, was complete. And while Kitty helped Alexandrea to put away her supplies, Mitzi helped Lolita take off her newest ball gown. It had to be admitted that no matter what one might say about Lolita Robinson, no one could say she didn’t have a great body. And not just for a woman of her years, either.

The widow strutted around posing like a peacock as she took her sweet time with putting on her dressing gown, clearly wanting to show off. With a roll of her eyes as she looked in the other direction, Alexandrea gave the older woman what she wanted.

“My goodness, Mrs Robinson! Have you been working out more? You really look great! And I’m sure you’ve lost weight. Try not to lose too much now, or your new dress will just slide right off of you!”

“Why thank you darling! But I dare say that my date wouldn’t mind *too* much if that were to happen, now would he?” More false laughter as Lolita looked around to make sure that everyone was nodding in agreement.

Thankfully the Widow’s phone beeped at her just then and the older woman was soon busy texting back to someone, her thumbs flying as expertly as any teenage girl’s. Alex gave Mitzi a look of sympathy when she took the dress from the human woman who would be stuck staying behind, and hurried with Kitty out the door and into the street of the cul de sac where her car was parked.

It wasn’t the sort of neighbourhood where one might expect the Widow Robinson to live, although it was nice enough. What the outside of the modest townhouse lacked in excess, the inside of Lolita’s home more than made up for. Alex suspected the neighbourhood association was to thank for the lack of pretentiousness and took a second glance at the sweet little homes that were all pretty much carbon copies of each other.

Normally the lack of individuality wouldn’t appeal to Alexandrea but after Lolita Robinson’s ostentatious interior, the Allurist could do with a visual palate cleanser.

“Go ahead without me, Kitty. I’m going to take a walk to clear my head and take a look around. Odds are that I’ll beat you back to the shop anyways.”

The young woman gave a nod and got into the driver’s seat. Alex watched as she pulled away from the curb and gave her a wave. Kitty was a much better driver than Alexandrea, so she didn’t wave back, keeping her eyes on the road and both hands on the wheel. Either that or the human just didn’t see her.

It was a glorious late summer evening. The soft twilight fading away as the stars began to shine clearly, appearing much more numerous even this meager distance from the more brightly lighted downtown area where Alex usually spent most of her time. It was the sort of night where you felt as if you had all the time in the world. And so long as a vampire didn't do something stupid, a vampire could indeed have all the time in the world. The thought brought a huge grin to Alexandrea’s face, she fully appreciated being a vampire. Despite people like Lolita Robinson and the other, more vehement, haters.

Her mood had improved by leaps and bounds when the unmistakable pop of a gun went off a few blocks south of the cul de sac, in the direction that Alexandrea had already been walking.

The few other people out of the street looked up briefly, unsure of what they had heard. Most dismissed the sound as a car backfiring and quickly went back to minding their own business, unalarmed. The only one besides the Allurist who recognised the sound for what it was, was an older beat cop who knew Alexandrea.

They nodded to each other from across the street as they made their way to the source of the gunshot, both arriving in time to see a man and a woman rushing together out of the building and into a parked car, both appeared to be human and the male was bleeding badly. The female… was carrying a gun that Alex could smell had just been fired.

She left the two for the cop, it seemed like he was heading in that direction first and the woman must have thought so as well, as she spotted him heading her way and gunned it. The car flew into reverse and into another parked car before the human woman corrected herself and pulled away from the curb and down the street, Harper Rock’s trigger-happy finest firing shots as they sped away.

~Harry~ Alexandrea sent into her thrall’s head. ~send a unit to the corner of Lytton Avenue and North Ontario Boulevard. There’s been a shooting in one of the houses and one of your boys in blue is firing off his gun in the middle of a family neighbourhood.~ A clear image of the attractive dark haired female and her very bloody male companion was also sent, although the Police Commissioner would probably ask her to make a sketch of them as well later.

“Help........”

The blonde looked up at the doorway from where the couple had emerged. Had she really heard someone? It was so faint, even to her vampire ears, that she couldn’t be sure. But she had to check. She had to see if there really was someone inside who might need help.

Alex entered the townhouse cautiously. The door had been left ajar, which made things much easier. But she had no way to know if there was anyone else still inside besides whoever might have called for help, or if there were any other guns in play. The scent of blood drew her into the room where Cyrus was laying in a pool of blood. She could tell right away that his heart was still beating, although it certainly wouldn’t be for long.

“Oh you poor man…” she said softly, sitting beside him on the floor. “I’m so sorry. But it looks like your time is about up.”

The words were said in a very kind way, despite how matter of fact they were. She considered calling an ambulance for only a brief moment. It wouldn’t arrive in time regardless.

“Would you mind if I read your memories? My kind can do that you know. And it will help the police later on to know as much as possible about who did this to you, and why.”

There was a soft throw on the floor near his feet, and Alex pulled it on to him and up to his chin. He would be feeling very cold soon, if he wasn’t already. She wished there was more she could do to ease his suffering and make him more comfortable as he passed from this world to the next.

A part of the vampire was tempted by the sight and smell of so much fresh blood, but Alexandrea simply stroked the fallen man’s face gently, wiping the hair and the sweat out of his eyes. She wondered if he might like to be a vampire…

but she had no idea what sort of person he was, besides the the obvious. That someone had just tried to murder him.

Still, the thought stayed in the forefront of her mind as she debated whether or not to offer. If only he would look her in the eyes, she could tell so much more about him then.

[Cyrus (DELETED 9729)]

“Mmpphftm—!”

Cyrus’ initial response was but a scrambled exclamation of letters. Surprise and desperation surged simultaneously from his aching chest without process; the rasp of words triggered a short coughing spell. It furthered his discomfort, highlighted the difficulty with which he was breathing. No lungful was enough.

Exsanguination wouldn’t be the end of him.
Asphyxiation might.

Her words didn’t alleviate his suffering. The human glanced up with squinted eyes, brow furrowed as agony contorted his bloodied visage. Death had announced itself by way of the cold creeping up his extremities and the fog descending upon his thoughts.

Her kind?

When her hand touched his face, he failed to react to its lack of warmth. His impulses were thwarted by the dwindling oxygen in what remained of his blood. He made little sense of her movements, able only to take comfort in the pressure. Cyrus grunted intelligibly as he sought to move his limbs.

What did she mean by her kind?

It was impossible to get a good look at her from where he’d slumped, yet he poured the little energy he had into craning his neck. The awkward angle made every fibre in his back strain, and if it weren’t for the blanketing numbness quick on pain’s heels, he’d surely feel the muscles split apart like a woven basket.

“...not gonna,” he announced, though the words took time to come out whole, and were slurred once spoken.

Only a miracle or accident could knock him off the unrelenting one-way path towards death. He’d always pictured himself careening towards his end, no doubt by way of an accident on set, a stunt gone wrong. He’d never desired, nor would wish upon anyone, the slow, agonising end he was coming to. This wasn’t how he’d pictured it; this wasn’t how he was going to go. Too much had come to an end tonight.

Teeth chattering, Cyrus glanced up at her through damp, thick lashes. He heaved repeatedly, panicking as breath lodged itself in his throat. The angle he’d twisted his neck into did little to alleviate his difficulties, but he wanted to see her clearly. If he’d had the strength to, he’d have reached towards her and shown her — as she’d asked — the determination that’d lived within him since childhood.

“...don’t wanna,” he pleaded with her. Every breath was a struggle, and the words were weakly uttered, interrupted by the loud gulp of a drowning man trying to clear his airway. The pain itself had relented, but the discomfort remained. He cleared his throat, or tried to.

Do whatever you have to, he thought, gaze sliding to the side. The effort of holding his head in that position was taking its toll, and he didn’t want to keep fighting if there was no one in his corner of the rink supporting him. The carpet, once uncomfortably itchy, provided the stability he needed.

“P-puh-lease…” he sighed quietly, relieved to find some give in his throat. He closed his eyes, unwilling to face his own mortality. Whatever she had to do, whatever mind reading, biting, or mercy killing that could alleviate his agony, would be welcome. After all, it wasn’t the pain that made his suffer, but the realisation that there would soon be nothing. The absence of everything frightened him.

Cyrus opened his eyes with a gasp, scared of the dark behind them.
Blurry as she looked out the corner of his eye, she was a welcome sight amidst the spreading blackness taking over his sight.

[Alexandrea]

At first, Alexandrea was sure that she had only made things worse. The man seemed to just be quietly dying alone until she pointed it out to him. That was when the fear seemed to overwhelm him. With a sigh, Alex took hold of one of his hands and gave it a gentle squeeze.

"Shhh. It won't be much longer now."

He didn't want to die, that much was plain. And as his eyes opened wide searching for her, Alexandrea made up her mind. It was his 'please' that did it.

The Allurist hummed quietly as she stroked the dying man's hair, searching his thoughts with her mind for the right time. But in the end, it was due to her empathy that she knew he was ready. The darkness and the cold were pressing down around him from all sides now.

The blonde pulled out one of the many knives she carried hidden on her at all times and used it to slice open her own wrist, placing the bleeding wound at Cyrus's lips.

"It's going to be alright. Just drink."

She continued to hum and stroke his hair with her free non-bleeding hand. All she could do now was wait with him. For the moment of death... was about to arrive.

Either he would drink or he wouldn't and either his turning would take... or it wouldn't.

She rather hoped that this was going to be one of those time that it did.

[Cyrus (DELETED 9729)]

Cyrus understood her, but he lacked the ability to express his comprehension.

He couldn’t see past the choice he had to make, but he knew a choice to make.

Death was not an option.

Breathing was difficult, more so now with her wrist pressing against his lips.

Closing his eyes, he attempted to take what was given.

To be willing to drink blood from a stranger’s vein required such desperation. It wasn’t a thought that crossed his mind; little did, in fact. Metallic and cold, her blood trickled past his teeth; they no longer chattered, his body resigned to its fate. Heavy and uncoordinated, his tongue mopped the bottom of his mouth. Swallowing was near impossible, and the effort drained him. Exhausted of whatever strength and resolve he’d had, Cyrus caved to the darkness with a hitched breath.

His jaw slackened, and the tension he’d held in his neck dissipated.

The final breath escaped his body as life deserted him.
Like a dead tendril coming undone, warmth fell away.

The shadow his body cast on the floor beneath it began to recede.

Distorted, life returned to his limbs.
His foot was the first thing to move.

[Alexandrea]

She held her hand against his mouth as gently as it was possible to do so, chewing on her own bottom lip while her blood ran down the sides of the young human's face. Just when she was about to give up, she felt him draw in his first sip.

Alexandrea relaxed, despite the sounds outside that announced the arrival of more police. Closing her eyes, she focused on seeing through her thrall Harry's gaze and was pleased to see the door to the very building she was in.

~keep everyone out until I give the word if you please, Harry~ The Allurist spoke into the old cop's head.

It didn't really matter what he pleased, he would do as she asked. Even if he wasn't enthralled, Alex knew that the less paperwork he had to do the better he liked it.

Her soft humming continued as Cyrus tugged at her wrist with his lips, barely sucking up any blood at first but soon the pull on her skin grew stronger and more consistent. And just as the suction seemed to become steady, his body suddenly just went limp.

Had it been enough? Was the timing right? Turning another never did seem to be an exact science.

But regardless of whether or not he would rise again, she couldn't leave his body here with her own blood all over his face. This was the moment where Alexandrea always felt the most helpless. To move his body or let it be? She started to wash her blood off of his face with the edge of the throw that was still covering him and a wee bit of spit.

If he was really dead and gone, taking him away from the crime scene wouldn't do him any favours. It could be enough to let his attackers walk away from his murder scott free.

But if he were to wake up after she had left, here or in the morgue? Alone? Yeah, that would be unforgivable. Alex would never leave one of her childer to wake up the first time alone and abandoned as her own sire had done to her.

And then she saw his foot move and she started to work faster, excited now and already planning on where to take the newest of her little vampire family to recover.

Once Cyrus's face was as clean as it could be, Alex leaned his limp body up into a sitting position and wrapped the blanket around his shoulders, tucking the bloodstained corner under his arm. It covered most of the mess, and it would just simply... have to do. Then standing him up slowly, Alexandrea concentrated on her private farmhouse.

Teleporting them both right outside, she looked around to see if anyone was around who might have spotted them. A soft moo from one of the neighbour's cows greeted them, the only witness to their arrival.

After a brief struggle with the door, both were soon safe inside and heading for the guest room. Alex let Harry know the coast was clear as she let Cyrus's body fall onto the four-poster bed, then pulled one of the numerous brightly coloured quilts over him and up to his chin.

"You'll be safe here."

The Alluriust whispered to him softly. She stepped away then and sat down in the rocking chair nearest the window, getting comfortable. Prepared to wait no matter how long it might take for him to awake.

[Cyrus (DELETED 9729)]

Cyrus had experienced few out-of-body moments throughout his life. As such, it was hard to process what he was experiencing. He had no recollection of the times following a surgery, when the anaesthesia was wearing off and the orderlies and nurses manhandled him back to his room. These were not memories that he’d consciously retained, but somehow his body remembered.

While not present, he was inexplicably present. Out of service. Prisoner to a body he did not physically feel or have any particular attachment to. Cyrus simply was, somehow. Whatever he was, he was being made to do things he had no control over or understanding of. There was no emotion to accompany the experience, nothing but an apathetic acceptance of the circumstances.

It was only the pain that flared from within that revealed a physical form to him. Like late summer lightning flashing distantly through the clouds, the jarred nerves flashed hot and white, causing a wave to ripple through him. Pain rumbled through a physical space that was gaining density, becoming tangible. Each movement he was subjected to triggered a wave, which lapped at where his body ended. Cyrus felt himself coming together, both from above — lulling softly, slowly — and from within — quick-fire crackles of violent energy like gravity, pulling it all together.

Everything leading up to the moment Cyrus fell into the mattress had been discordant. The moment his body bounced on the bed, it came together. The weight of his body became tangible, the press of the bedding beneath him a hard, continuous surface. Above him, the press of quilts defined the space he occupied. This was where his body begun and ended. It filled up the space between both, entirety.

Like sediment slowly sinking to the bottom, clearing the water above, the newborn began to make sense of it all. There was a voice, and a presence other than his own. It had been there for a while, but until he’d made sense of himself, nothing around could. Yet, as he lay there, getting his bearings, he couldn’t entirely detach himself from the presence. There was a part of it, however foreign it felt, that remained tethered to him. It was an extension of him. No, no, no. He was an extension of it.

Never before had he felt something so… Intrusive wasn’t the word he’d use, but it was the closest to what he felt. It wasn’t discomforting in the least. On the contrary, amidst the overwhelming surroundings, it was a comfort, a semblance of a safety net. Cyrus wouldn’t know the word to describe it until it was taught, but he felt intrinsically connected to the force radiating from somewhere in the room. Blood of my blood.

Curious.

Intrigued, Cyrus peered through thick lashes, and inhaled for the first time as a vampire. Immediately, he grimaced. Aside from the avalanche of smells that made him suddenly dizzy, his chest burned. The bullet’s trajectory remained fresh, unhealed, and the filling of his useless lungs only served to acerbate. Unbeknownst to him, to be born a shadow meant he’d carry the pain with him for many days.

He attempted to reach for pain’s source, only to find fabric in his path.
It was not what he’d expected.
His fingers hooked into the quilt.
This was where his body ended, but that did not feel like his body.

“What the--”

[Alexandrea]

Alexandrea was unaware of the fact that she had been rocking in her chair with one of the barn cats in her lap for unknown hours. She was unaware of the time, of the cat, of the rocker... and even of Cyrus. All she was focused on was the last book in the series she had been finally reading for the first time, Harry Potter. When she got the part *SPOILERS* where Hedwig died, she blew a gasket and sobbed so loudly the cat took off like a bolt of lightning, leaving the blonde wondering how long it had been there for.

Continuing to sniffle, tears still pouring down her face, the emotional Allurist went back to her book with hardly a glance towards her newest childer. The moon and the stars were shining brightly outside the window but after all her crying, just the light from her phone was no longer enough to read by so Alex turned on the nearest lamp, noticing a change in Cyrus as she did so. It wasn't much, but there had been a difference in how he laid upon the bed. It was enough to give the vampire faith that the turning had worked. Now if there could be some kind of miracle for Hedwig... she buried her nose again in the story, hoping with every page she turned that there would be a surprise twist that would bring back the owl.

It was the fluttering of his eyelashes she heard first. Then the sensation of another of her kind being close at hand. And not just her kind but of her blood. She smiled through her tears, closing the reading app on her phone and set it aside to go and stand by her childe's bedside in time to watch his hand moving over the bedding.

At the sound of Cyrus's voice, she sat gently on the edge of the bed and put her hand on top of his.

"Well, welcome back you sleepy head! Glad you decided to join us! How are you feeling?"

Her tone was light and playful and her smile was soft and kind. Everyone reacted differently to "waking up" that first time, and Alexandrea didn't want to overwhelm him. Yet. There would be plenty of time for that soon enough. First, he would have questions. Loads of them, she was quite sure.

[Cyrus (DELETED 9729)]

The gravitational pull he felt increased as she moved closer to him, and it pulled him away from himself in a very weird, weird way. The shifting mattress beneath him and unfamiliar weight upon his hand only furthered his disorientation. Disjointed. Gaseous. Ingressive. Egressive. There were so many and so few ways to describe what he felt. There was pain. There was lightheadedness. There were boundaries and yet he felt boundless.

The blood he leaked didn’t saturate the bedding; it didn’t dissipate through the quilt and into the air.
He felt the loss — sensed something get away from him. He felt the thrum of pain, but he couldn’t comprehend it.

Her voice was silvery and delicate, noticeably different from the dense darkness he was rising from. Cyrus sought her out the corner of his eye. When he turned his head to better see her, the hiss of messy hair moving against the pillow was loud in his ear.

“Weird. I feel weird.”

A dense fog clouded his thoughts. It danced around him like a living shadow when he attempted to wade through it and refused to yield. Unbeknownst to him, an impermeable veil had descended upon his memories for his own protection. In doing so, he was robbed of any recollection he might have had from the past few hours.

He turned his wrist so his palm could align itself with hers. An anchor amidst the rocky reality he was finding himself in. More confusing yet, was how still everything felt. The storm he weathered was internal. He tightened his grip on her hand, widening his eyes as he studied her features.

There was nothing familiar about her face, which was distressing considering how right it felt to hold her hand. Whoever she was, Cyrus needed her to help him. The smile didn’t seem insincere, and so he didn’t relinquish her hand, only adjusting his grip as not to crush her fingers.

“What’s happening right now?”

The smells. The sounds. The details. The pain. The strength. The connectedness. The pull he felt.
He needed context if he was ever going to make sense of it all.

[Alexandrea]

“Weird. I feel weird.”

The Allurist nodded sympathetically, she wished she could tell him that it would pass but there wasn't any guarantee that it would. He would either adjust to being a Vampire or he wouldn't and Alex had long given up trying to predict which way a fledgeling would go. She was about to remove her hand when she felt Cyrus turning his own so that their palms met and so she gently entwined her fingers with his, giving a very light squeeze. The strength with which he squeezed her own hand, made her grin. Encouraged that he was doing well.

“What’s happening right now?”

"Night is falling as the moon rises and as the day turns into night, all manner of creatures come out to play." The blonde's eyes twinkled mischievously.

"If you listen carefully, you will hear the sound of the wings of the moths as they fly by our window, seeking the lamp's light. When you close your eyes, you will surely hear the bats as they soar over the house, the sweet little chirping calls guide their path more accurately than their own eyes ever could. And even more faintly... the sound of their tiny beating hearts."

Her words were spoken matter-of-factly, in a voice so soft that most human ears wouldn't hear have caught a word.

"But what you will not hear, ever again, is the beat of your own heart. Nor will I. Because we are not alive anymore. Yet we aren't dead either, and I've enjoyed my life far more these last few years than I ever did when I was human."

"What's happening right now, my Childe?" Alex chuckled warmly, giving his hand a stronger squeeze back. "What's happening right now is that you are waking up to a brand new life. One where, if you play your cards right, anything and everything can be possible."