Prose || nexus_crossings
Nov. 7th, 2019 02:38 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cotyledon“I distinctly remember you saying this would be easy,” Todd says as they pull up in front of the building. There are clearly guards at the front, enough shrubbery to hide several more armed men crouched in wait, and every floor but the sixth is dark. Abby peers out the car window with a little frown and hums softly. This place is a fortress.
“Actually, what I said was that Mr. Saentz thought this would be easy,” she reminds him reprovingly. “Just because Marov’s new in town. This is a lot of cash being thrown around, though. Those dark floors are probably crawling with security. Maybe electronic rather than living personnel, but honestly that’s even flashier.”
“Valet parking,” Larry, the other gunman with them, points out a woman in a pristine white suit coming toward them, gloved hands visible, clasped in front of her. “They’re gonna wanna move the car.”
In the front seat, their driver, Jackson, looks nervous.
“Oop! Change of plan,” Abby straightens, smiling at her companions. “Larry, you stick with Jack. Todd, you’re with me. I don’t want anyone waiting around on their own.”
“Are you sure?” Larry turns around to look at her, incredulous. “You wanna go in with that little backup?”
“Of course,” she says brightly. “This is supposed to be a friendly welcome to the neighborhood. It’s a show of good faith.”
Not really. What it is, is that there are already more layers of opposition here than they could fight through with the four of them, should the worst happen. There’s no point bringing backup. She could go in alone and it wouldn’t change anything. Boldness is the message that needs to be sent now. Boldness, without hubris. She doesn’t want anyone taking the car, rifling through it, or planting a listening device.
“Besides,” she adds, “this is a show they’re putting on for us. They wouldn’t have gone to this much effort and not let us live to tell the tale.”
With that, she steps out of the car and smooths down her skirt, straightens the ice-cream barrette in her hair, and smiles warmly at the valet.
——
As they wait for the elevator, flanked by Marov’s men, Todd is quiet, because he’s always quiet. He’s a little odd, quirky and subtly damaged, but she’s worked with him for four years now, and they can almost read one another’s minds at this point. Larry’s good, but he was turned in the early 50s, and he’s sort of old school. Todd is younger, more adaptable, and he’s Mr. Saentz’ current favorite. Abby knows who the boss is sleeping with. In a decade he’ll move on to someone else he can corrupt from fresh, but for now, Todd is valuable. Much more valuable than she is. Not only do they work well together, he’s a helpful insurance policy.
She wishes she didn’t have to think like that. The thing is, vampires aren’t nice, by and large. She can be the exception that proves the rule, but she has to be able to think not-nice, too, or else she’ll get chewed up and spat out into the gutter.
Neither she nor Todd speaks to the security guards on the elevator. There’s no need. Getting too friendly before meeting their master shows weakness and serves no purpose right now. They are meticulously polite--Abby says please and thank you and smiles warmly at them in turn--but chatter is unwise. Besides, the less she says, the more perplexed they get about who she is and why she’s here. Todd looks like a mafia heavy. He’s over 6 feet tall, broad-shouldered and handsome, with weary blue-grey eyes. Abby looks like an aspiring kindergarten teacher.
—
The room they are led into is a richly-decorated office, wth luxe furniture, original paintings on the walls, and antique knick-knacks dotting the shelves here and there. Abby smiles to herself, recognizing the surface-shine of New Money attempting to look like Old Money. Whether Marov has a patron or whether he’s just a clever up-and-coming player in the game, he hasn’t been at this long. “You know,” she says thoughtfully, “Totte Mannes usually leaves me cold, but I like that one there, with the pinks and golds. A little like the inside of a flower.”
“Ah,” says the man behind the desk, rising and coming to shake her hand. His hair is as white as a blank page, eyes dark and piercing, and he has a smile like a straight razor. There are no lines on his face despite the pallor of his hair; it’s the face of a twenty year old. “Miss Summers. I heard you were an amateur horticulturist. I’m so pleased you see something to suit your liking here.”
“Oh, gosh,” she grips his hand, matching the strength of his handshake carefully, but giving a bashful giggle. “Someone’s been doing research! I’m impressed.”
No one’s ever looked into her before. It strikes her as a bad, bad sign. She can tell from the way Todd catches her eye that he doesn’t like it, either. Usually when they walk into a room, their target speaks to him first, easily assuming he’s in charge. Then there’s a moment of confusion when she takes over, and she can sweep them under her feet before they recover. This is different, and that doesn’t bode well.
But she’s adaptable. Todd is adaptable. They’re agile, and they will not get swept.
“You know, this is a really pretty setup you have here,” she tells Marov, doggedly steering the conversation. “You’ve only been here, what, four months? That must have been a ton of work!”
“It really has been,” the man tells her, returning to his chair and gesturing toward the other seating invitingly. “Worth every second, of course, but I haven’t slept much in the interim.”
Sitting, she crosses her ankles demurely and rests her chin in her hand. “Wow, I know I couldn’t handle that timetable.” Weird thing for him to say, actually. Vampires don’t always have to sleep when the sun’s up, but most of them aren’t out and about, that’s for sure. Is he trying to imply he’s a daywalker? She’ll have to check into that later.
Daywalkers are trouble. She should know.
“So, listen,” she goes on, giving him a friendly smile. “We know you’ve got a big chunk of Kirkova’s territory, and honestly we’re just as glad. Mr. Kirkova is a very able businessman, of course, but he and Mr. Saentz don’t see eye to eye on many things, so we’re hoping we can all get along and play nicely together. But we’ve heard some sort of...disturbing reports, and Mr. Saentz did ask me to chat with you about them.”
There’s that razorblade smile again on Marov’s face. She doesn’t like that at all. “My dear, I am at your disposal for the next, hmm—” he checks his watch. “Well, until dawn, I suppose, really, although I think you may need to leave before then for your friend’s sake.”
That wasn’t subtle. Todd shifts in his seat, saying nothing but raising an eyebrow.
“How sweet!” Abby giggles. “Such hospitality. But no, this shouldn’t take that long. Tell me, Mr. Marov, do you have a good handle on all your people? I’m not trying to be nosy, only with you having gotten set up so fast, sometimes details slip through the cracks, you know?”
She’s obliquely insulted him, and he blinks for a second, a flutter of surprise, before the smile returns. “My goodness, Miss Summers. I don’t think anyone’s ever asked so bold a—”
“Well, the reason I ask,” she interrupts, “is because Mr. Saentz wanted me to let you know if you do need assistance we’d be happy to send over some of our people. We have a lot of good folks, you know, and they’re very experienced with keeping order.”
The smile drops again. Marov knows a threat when he hears it, even delivered from an aspiring kindergarten teacher.
“What we’ve been hearing,” she goes on blithely, “is there are some children running around in your territory, without parents or guidance. We’ve got some security camera footage from some of the gas stations in the area. Now, obviously, we don’t know if they’re your children, but I’m sure you understand Mr. Saentz’s position here. We don’t hunt children in New York, for any reason. It’s uncivilized, and it brings trouble on the entire community. It’s not our business if you’ve brought in child-vampires that were turned elsewhere, but we can’t help but be concerned.”
Concerned isn’t the half of it. There are a thousand reasons not to turn children. Ethics only make up a small percentage.
Todd reaches into his jacket pocket and removes a thumb drive, offering it to Marov. “We brought the camera footage for you, sir,” he says mildly. “In case you need it for confirmation purposes.”
There’s a moment’s hesitation, then Marov grins and accepts the drive. “My children,” he says with a warm sigh. “Yes, my children. Thank you for the information, my friends. It will be good to have these pictures on hand as they grow. Would you like to meet them? They have been, I admit, difficult to keep track of, but I think you will find I am the best man to handle them.”
Abby and Todd exchange glances. It’s very clear to her that Todd’s preference would be to cut and run. They’ve delivered their warning. Abby, on the other hand, isn’t done yet. She’s been studied, anticipated, and Marov has made his best effort to undermine her tonight. She can’t have that. Saentz can’t have that.
“I’d love to meet them,” she tells him. “Do you have many?”
“I have enough,” he laughs. “Like the old woman in the shoe.”
There’s a tap at the door and he turns in his chair, “Yes! Come in, pumpkin. Come meet daddy’s new friends.”
Todd grimaces, pushing down a flicker of revulsion, but whatever he’s responding to in Marov’s saccharine tone of voice, the emotion gets drowned and washed away with dread in the next second, because the door opens and a little girl comes in. She’s dressed neatly, in jeans, little blue sneakers, a shirt with PJ masks on it. She looks all of about four, but there’s something about the way she moves that isn’t quite right. She is pale, as white as a vampire child, skin so translucent the veins stand out from across the room.
“Hello,” she says, and it’s not a human voice, or anything that should be able to come from human vocal chords. It sounds like a recording run through synthesizers and played in a dark alley, echoing from the bottom of a coffee can. “It’s good to be friends. Let’s all be friends.”
Hair stands up all along the back of Abby’s neck, and she knows Todd feels it, too. He’s tense, the softest of growls throbbing in the back of his throat.
“This is Miss Abby, pumpkin,” Marov says. “And her friend Todd.”
“Abby and Todd,” Pumpkin says, and never in her life has Abby been so horrified by the sound of her own name. Todd’s body gives a little jolt, like he’s’ struggling with fight or flight instinct, and she clamps her hand down on his knee, pinching hard enough to bruise. Never run. Never, ever run from a predator.
She gets up, curling her toes inside her shoes to keep her knees from shaking, and takes a few steps toward Pumpkin, crouching a little to smile at her. “Aren’t you precious!” she says, and she’s pleased to find there’s no quiver in her voice. “Gosh, kiddo, I’m not gonna lie, I was pretty worried about you when I saw the footage of you and your friends running across Broadtop Road in the wee hours of the morning.”
And it’s not a lie. She didn’t know what she was looking at, and Saentz was more angry than worried, but she...well, she’s still a nice vampire. The exception that proves the rule.
Pumpkin giggles, and it sounds like some small animal dying, wedged in a chimney, crushed in a claustrophobic, dark corner somewhere. Bile rises in Abby’s throat, but she stands her ground.
A moment later she wishes she hadn’t. The little face tilts toward her and the girl smiles. Her eyes are black, jet black holes with no light reflected from them. “I like you,” Pumpkin says. “We can be friends now.”
--
The next few minutes are a blur. Abby watches everything happen from somewhere outside herself. She can hear her own voice, telling Pumpkin it’s been a pleasure meeting her. Telling Marov how nice it is to have him in the neighborhood, and she can’t wait to tell Mr. Saentz the problem with the children is under control.
She can hear Todd growling, relentless and unceasing; he can’t control it. He’s a second from snapping, and she can’t do anything but get them out of there. Marov is delighted. He makes a point of telling them the children all have rooms in the building, in the darkened lower floors.
That means they’ll be passing through them on the way down as they go.
“This has been such a productive conversation,” Abby tells Marov, and when she shakes his hand again, she squeezes harder. If he weren’t a vampire, himself, she’d have shattered his wrist.
She holds onto Todd just as tightly as they wave goodnight to Pumpkin, as they’re escorted down the hall by guards that pointedly do not look at the child. Neither of them will run. They will walk out of here with dignity, even at the risk of falling prey to unspeakable horror behind their backs. That’s their job.
Their car is already pulled around to the front for them. Jackson and Larry are both within, jumpy and too-alert, but she can tell from their faces that she and Todd look worse.
It might just be her mind playing tricks on her, but when the valet closes the car door for her, Abby thinks she sees her mouth the words: help me.
“Jackson,” Abby says faintly, “Please take the interstate to the north. We’re going to assume we’re being followed, and take the longest route possible.”
Todd shudders violently, probably at the thought of black-eyed children tailing them on unnaturally fast little feet.
The car pulls out, the men unquestioning. There is silence for a good ten minutes before Larry dares to speak: “Abby? What the fuck just happened?”
Todd makes a little moaning noise, and she puts her hand on his shoulder absently, trying to reassure him. “I’ll have to report to Mr. Saentz first,” she says. “But guys? Keep out of this territory for a while. There’s something big happening here.”
“Actually, what I said was that Mr. Saentz thought this would be easy,” she reminds him reprovingly. “Just because Marov’s new in town. This is a lot of cash being thrown around, though. Those dark floors are probably crawling with security. Maybe electronic rather than living personnel, but honestly that’s even flashier.”
“Valet parking,” Larry, the other gunman with them, points out a woman in a pristine white suit coming toward them, gloved hands visible, clasped in front of her. “They’re gonna wanna move the car.”
In the front seat, their driver, Jackson, looks nervous.
“Oop! Change of plan,” Abby straightens, smiling at her companions. “Larry, you stick with Jack. Todd, you’re with me. I don’t want anyone waiting around on their own.”
“Are you sure?” Larry turns around to look at her, incredulous. “You wanna go in with that little backup?”
“Of course,” she says brightly. “This is supposed to be a friendly welcome to the neighborhood. It’s a show of good faith.”
Not really. What it is, is that there are already more layers of opposition here than they could fight through with the four of them, should the worst happen. There’s no point bringing backup. She could go in alone and it wouldn’t change anything. Boldness is the message that needs to be sent now. Boldness, without hubris. She doesn’t want anyone taking the car, rifling through it, or planting a listening device.
“Besides,” she adds, “this is a show they’re putting on for us. They wouldn’t have gone to this much effort and not let us live to tell the tale.”
With that, she steps out of the car and smooths down her skirt, straightens the ice-cream barrette in her hair, and smiles warmly at the valet.
——
As they wait for the elevator, flanked by Marov’s men, Todd is quiet, because he’s always quiet. He’s a little odd, quirky and subtly damaged, but she’s worked with him for four years now, and they can almost read one another’s minds at this point. Larry’s good, but he was turned in the early 50s, and he’s sort of old school. Todd is younger, more adaptable, and he’s Mr. Saentz’ current favorite. Abby knows who the boss is sleeping with. In a decade he’ll move on to someone else he can corrupt from fresh, but for now, Todd is valuable. Much more valuable than she is. Not only do they work well together, he’s a helpful insurance policy.
She wishes she didn’t have to think like that. The thing is, vampires aren’t nice, by and large. She can be the exception that proves the rule, but she has to be able to think not-nice, too, or else she’ll get chewed up and spat out into the gutter.
Neither she nor Todd speaks to the security guards on the elevator. There’s no need. Getting too friendly before meeting their master shows weakness and serves no purpose right now. They are meticulously polite--Abby says please and thank you and smiles warmly at them in turn--but chatter is unwise. Besides, the less she says, the more perplexed they get about who she is and why she’s here. Todd looks like a mafia heavy. He’s over 6 feet tall, broad-shouldered and handsome, with weary blue-grey eyes. Abby looks like an aspiring kindergarten teacher.
—
The room they are led into is a richly-decorated office, wth luxe furniture, original paintings on the walls, and antique knick-knacks dotting the shelves here and there. Abby smiles to herself, recognizing the surface-shine of New Money attempting to look like Old Money. Whether Marov has a patron or whether he’s just a clever up-and-coming player in the game, he hasn’t been at this long. “You know,” she says thoughtfully, “Totte Mannes usually leaves me cold, but I like that one there, with the pinks and golds. A little like the inside of a flower.”
“Ah,” says the man behind the desk, rising and coming to shake her hand. His hair is as white as a blank page, eyes dark and piercing, and he has a smile like a straight razor. There are no lines on his face despite the pallor of his hair; it’s the face of a twenty year old. “Miss Summers. I heard you were an amateur horticulturist. I’m so pleased you see something to suit your liking here.”
“Oh, gosh,” she grips his hand, matching the strength of his handshake carefully, but giving a bashful giggle. “Someone’s been doing research! I’m impressed.”
No one’s ever looked into her before. It strikes her as a bad, bad sign. She can tell from the way Todd catches her eye that he doesn’t like it, either. Usually when they walk into a room, their target speaks to him first, easily assuming he’s in charge. Then there’s a moment of confusion when she takes over, and she can sweep them under her feet before they recover. This is different, and that doesn’t bode well.
But she’s adaptable. Todd is adaptable. They’re agile, and they will not get swept.
“You know, this is a really pretty setup you have here,” she tells Marov, doggedly steering the conversation. “You’ve only been here, what, four months? That must have been a ton of work!”
“It really has been,” the man tells her, returning to his chair and gesturing toward the other seating invitingly. “Worth every second, of course, but I haven’t slept much in the interim.”
Sitting, she crosses her ankles demurely and rests her chin in her hand. “Wow, I know I couldn’t handle that timetable.” Weird thing for him to say, actually. Vampires don’t always have to sleep when the sun’s up, but most of them aren’t out and about, that’s for sure. Is he trying to imply he’s a daywalker? She’ll have to check into that later.
Daywalkers are trouble. She should know.
“So, listen,” she goes on, giving him a friendly smile. “We know you’ve got a big chunk of Kirkova’s territory, and honestly we’re just as glad. Mr. Kirkova is a very able businessman, of course, but he and Mr. Saentz don’t see eye to eye on many things, so we’re hoping we can all get along and play nicely together. But we’ve heard some sort of...disturbing reports, and Mr. Saentz did ask me to chat with you about them.”
There’s that razorblade smile again on Marov’s face. She doesn’t like that at all. “My dear, I am at your disposal for the next, hmm—” he checks his watch. “Well, until dawn, I suppose, really, although I think you may need to leave before then for your friend’s sake.”
That wasn’t subtle. Todd shifts in his seat, saying nothing but raising an eyebrow.
“How sweet!” Abby giggles. “Such hospitality. But no, this shouldn’t take that long. Tell me, Mr. Marov, do you have a good handle on all your people? I’m not trying to be nosy, only with you having gotten set up so fast, sometimes details slip through the cracks, you know?”
She’s obliquely insulted him, and he blinks for a second, a flutter of surprise, before the smile returns. “My goodness, Miss Summers. I don’t think anyone’s ever asked so bold a—”
“Well, the reason I ask,” she interrupts, “is because Mr. Saentz wanted me to let you know if you do need assistance we’d be happy to send over some of our people. We have a lot of good folks, you know, and they’re very experienced with keeping order.”
The smile drops again. Marov knows a threat when he hears it, even delivered from an aspiring kindergarten teacher.
“What we’ve been hearing,” she goes on blithely, “is there are some children running around in your territory, without parents or guidance. We’ve got some security camera footage from some of the gas stations in the area. Now, obviously, we don’t know if they’re your children, but I’m sure you understand Mr. Saentz’s position here. We don’t hunt children in New York, for any reason. It’s uncivilized, and it brings trouble on the entire community. It’s not our business if you’ve brought in child-vampires that were turned elsewhere, but we can’t help but be concerned.”
Concerned isn’t the half of it. There are a thousand reasons not to turn children. Ethics only make up a small percentage.
Todd reaches into his jacket pocket and removes a thumb drive, offering it to Marov. “We brought the camera footage for you, sir,” he says mildly. “In case you need it for confirmation purposes.”
There’s a moment’s hesitation, then Marov grins and accepts the drive. “My children,” he says with a warm sigh. “Yes, my children. Thank you for the information, my friends. It will be good to have these pictures on hand as they grow. Would you like to meet them? They have been, I admit, difficult to keep track of, but I think you will find I am the best man to handle them.”
Abby and Todd exchange glances. It’s very clear to her that Todd’s preference would be to cut and run. They’ve delivered their warning. Abby, on the other hand, isn’t done yet. She’s been studied, anticipated, and Marov has made his best effort to undermine her tonight. She can’t have that. Saentz can’t have that.
“I’d love to meet them,” she tells him. “Do you have many?”
“I have enough,” he laughs. “Like the old woman in the shoe.”
There’s a tap at the door and he turns in his chair, “Yes! Come in, pumpkin. Come meet daddy’s new friends.”
Todd grimaces, pushing down a flicker of revulsion, but whatever he’s responding to in Marov’s saccharine tone of voice, the emotion gets drowned and washed away with dread in the next second, because the door opens and a little girl comes in. She’s dressed neatly, in jeans, little blue sneakers, a shirt with PJ masks on it. She looks all of about four, but there’s something about the way she moves that isn’t quite right. She is pale, as white as a vampire child, skin so translucent the veins stand out from across the room.
“Hello,” she says, and it’s not a human voice, or anything that should be able to come from human vocal chords. It sounds like a recording run through synthesizers and played in a dark alley, echoing from the bottom of a coffee can. “It’s good to be friends. Let’s all be friends.”
Hair stands up all along the back of Abby’s neck, and she knows Todd feels it, too. He’s tense, the softest of growls throbbing in the back of his throat.
“This is Miss Abby, pumpkin,” Marov says. “And her friend Todd.”
“Abby and Todd,” Pumpkin says, and never in her life has Abby been so horrified by the sound of her own name. Todd’s body gives a little jolt, like he’s’ struggling with fight or flight instinct, and she clamps her hand down on his knee, pinching hard enough to bruise. Never run. Never, ever run from a predator.
She gets up, curling her toes inside her shoes to keep her knees from shaking, and takes a few steps toward Pumpkin, crouching a little to smile at her. “Aren’t you precious!” she says, and she’s pleased to find there’s no quiver in her voice. “Gosh, kiddo, I’m not gonna lie, I was pretty worried about you when I saw the footage of you and your friends running across Broadtop Road in the wee hours of the morning.”
And it’s not a lie. She didn’t know what she was looking at, and Saentz was more angry than worried, but she...well, she’s still a nice vampire. The exception that proves the rule.
Pumpkin giggles, and it sounds like some small animal dying, wedged in a chimney, crushed in a claustrophobic, dark corner somewhere. Bile rises in Abby’s throat, but she stands her ground.
A moment later she wishes she hadn’t. The little face tilts toward her and the girl smiles. Her eyes are black, jet black holes with no light reflected from them. “I like you,” Pumpkin says. “We can be friends now.”
--
The next few minutes are a blur. Abby watches everything happen from somewhere outside herself. She can hear her own voice, telling Pumpkin it’s been a pleasure meeting her. Telling Marov how nice it is to have him in the neighborhood, and she can’t wait to tell Mr. Saentz the problem with the children is under control.
She can hear Todd growling, relentless and unceasing; he can’t control it. He’s a second from snapping, and she can’t do anything but get them out of there. Marov is delighted. He makes a point of telling them the children all have rooms in the building, in the darkened lower floors.
That means they’ll be passing through them on the way down as they go.
“This has been such a productive conversation,” Abby tells Marov, and when she shakes his hand again, she squeezes harder. If he weren’t a vampire, himself, she’d have shattered his wrist.
She holds onto Todd just as tightly as they wave goodnight to Pumpkin, as they’re escorted down the hall by guards that pointedly do not look at the child. Neither of them will run. They will walk out of here with dignity, even at the risk of falling prey to unspeakable horror behind their backs. That’s their job.
Their car is already pulled around to the front for them. Jackson and Larry are both within, jumpy and too-alert, but she can tell from their faces that she and Todd look worse.
It might just be her mind playing tricks on her, but when the valet closes the car door for her, Abby thinks she sees her mouth the words: help me.
“Jackson,” Abby says faintly, “Please take the interstate to the north. We’re going to assume we’re being followed, and take the longest route possible.”
Todd shudders violently, probably at the thought of black-eyed children tailing them on unnaturally fast little feet.
The car pulls out, the men unquestioning. There is silence for a good ten minutes before Larry dares to speak: “Abby? What the fuck just happened?”
Todd makes a little moaning noise, and she puts her hand on his shoulder absently, trying to reassure him. “I’ll have to report to Mr. Saentz first,” she says. “But guys? Keep out of this territory for a while. There’s something big happening here.”
