WELCOME!

[nmiss]

Desjardines Home. It was listed on the city's tourist trap location list - otherwise known as the 'historic registry', was rummored to be the most prestigious house in the city back in its day, has some impressive gabled windows and what must have been lovely stone work once upon a time ... and it was one of the buildings that Jeff had never allowed her to set foot.

"I swear, Brittany," he twin had threatened when he caught her admiring the outside of the house one day, "if I ever catch you going into that house I will whip you so hard you'll"

"Alright, alright," she had replied moodily, "I was just thinking of painting it and I don't even have to go inside for that."

"You stay away from that place, period! Do you understand?"

Most people may have just blown him off and gone into the spooky building just to spite him, but Jeff's threats of whippings were never idle and Brittany had the scars on her lower back to prove it. There were a few buildings he had made her promise to stay away from. Most of them were businesses belonging to one supernatural species or another or were Clan or Bloodline houses - but he seemed to take this house to the extreme; making her cross the street over to the church if his quarry had escaped inside the house while he followed them in, or even if they had to just walk past the building. She knew that he went hunting there, durring the rare occasions that he didn't take her along, because she sometimes heard he and Rice talking about it when they thought she was asleep.

Now here she was, her easel with a freshly prepaired canvas set up before her and several tubes of paint in her hands as she tried to decided which she should mix together to match the gloomy exterior of the house. Jeff had been gone for almost a year now but she still found herself looking about nervously from time to time afraid that he would catch her disobeying a dirrect order. Yet she really had no choice - a customer had ordered a painting of the house and she had signed a legal contract promising to paint it. At least they had asked for the setting to be in daylight - even if it was only a small comfort.

Habbit caused her to take another look around, to make sure she was safe from being caught there, before she sqeezed a little brick brown and dark grey onto her pallet and began to mix them together with her mixing trowel.

[comatose]

Andrew liked old buildings.

They were filled with long lost secrets and emotions. There was a deeper connection to be had and found if he could sense something from an object centuries old. They were also less likely to be crowded, so he could mope in solitude for a bit.

Andrew had already visited the Desjardines Homes a couple times before, but he had hardly managed to reveal all the secrets. There was a story to this place and it was going to take a long time to completely unravel it.

He had been in here since the morning and it as time to take a break. Andrew pressed open the heavy door and as he stepped outside, the wood floor of the entrance wished him farewell with a familiar groan.

Andrew was about t head down the steps when he noticed a person sitting not too far off. He jumped a little at first; the girl looked a lot like some lycan bitch who had been bothering him not too long ago, but upon looking closely, Andrew confirmed it wasn’t her. The girl was much more… well. She looked a lot nicer.

It occurred to him then, however, that no matter how nice she was, this might still look a lot like a break in or something. After all, it sort of was... Andrew could do a decent job of pretending he belonged somewhere, though.

“Hey”, he greeted with a polite nod as he stepped closer, his hands in his jean pockets. Andrew peered at her easel, but there was not much there yet.

“You’ve start kind of late in the day, don’t you think?”, he asked, “I mean, doesn’t the sun go down in a couple hours?”

Andrew casually tapped on the mixing of paints, sighing as he lifted up some emotions like they were fingerprints. Scared…. Worried…. Sad.

Well, that described just about everyone n this city, didn’t it?

“I don’t think I’ve seen you around here before…Uh. I’m Andrew”, he said, holding out the hand from the mixing trowel.

[nmiss]

The house had more than one story to tell. Infact it had several, some happy, some sad, some terrifying and each adding it's on unique twist to the legend of the place. Brittany knew a few herself, mostly by word of mouth, and wasn't sure if she wanted to know more or not. The place scared her as it did most mortals. There was just something about it that made even the most ungifted of people think there might be something off, something evil, about this place.

As she added a bit more grey to the mixture of paint she heard the door creaking open and jumped in fright. Almost expecting to see the Slayer stomping down the steps and bearing down on her for disobeying a direct order. Instead what she saw was another boy who looked nothing like her brother. Sure they both had light hair but Jeff's had been more golden while this boy had more of a reddish tint to it and while Jeff's eyes had carried that storm gray color this boy's were blue - and sad, very sad.

But there was one thing similar, perhaps identical, about them that she noticed as he approached her - and that was a certain look in their eyes. It was that little something, that could only be seen if one knew what to look for, that said 'I am different'. But that was were the similarity in the look ended for this boy didn't carry the haughty look of assumed superiority that Jeff often had. No this boy's eyes seemed almost ... kind. Still habit ensured that she remained wary as she knew that many creatures of the night were opportunistic and some had perfected displays of harmlessness in order to lure their victims into a false sense of security.

She returned his nod and tried to make it look like she was more interested in painting than she was in him. He was very curious to her since few ever went into Desjardines Home except Hunters, Creatures of the Night and Dare Devels. Was he a Hunter? She wondered. What about a creature of the night? A Dare Devil? And if he was the later did he have any idea of that was actually inside that house? And, more importantly, had anything followed him out? Was anything hiding in the gathering shadows waiting for its perfect opportunity to show him exactly what it meant to be prey. Jeff would have known. But Jeff wasn't there anymore.

"I like this time of day," she replied to his comment about the sun going down in a few hours. It was both the truth and an excuse. She was still used to being awake for the entire night, as she had to be for her brother to take her hunting with him, and to being asleep during the day - and it was in these middle hours that she caught the few rays of sunlight she would see in a day - at least on days when she had to come out of her seclusion, like now.

She watched as he tapped her paint. Most painters would have become upset at such an invasive action but Brittany remained placid - knowing that if he were some Lycan or Demon, or worse yet some Hunter, that there would be nothing she could do about it.

"B-Brittany," she answered nervously, wondering if she ought to be looking for an escape route, then added in, "P-pleased to, to me-meet you Andrew." reminding herself that it was more polite and normal than turning tail and running as she was used to. Then she noticed the hand extended to her and raised her own hand to shake it. His palm was warm - but that didn't mean anything as the palms of slayers, lycans and most demons were warm, as she knew first hand, and most vampires would be turning to ash anyway if they ventured out at this time of day. "S-sorry," she said with a faint smile "I, I don't, don't get out much." Then she noticed that she had forgotten to put down the trowel and had gotten paint all over his forearm. "Oops! S-sorry," she gasped, terrified that he would be the kind of person to lash out at her for such an oversight, and grabbed for a cloth to wipe it off of him.

[comatose]

(sorry it's so short. i've been sort of getting used to a little more... bare style of writing ;-;)

A lot of people mistook the dead expression that held to Andrew’s eyes as sadness. It was not. If any at all, it might be disgust because the look had been there since he was a child and it had nothing to do with lost.

It was the magic in him, or so Andrew liked to believe. He was not one to mope around too much if he could help it. The only time anything close to a soft side emerged was when he was with close friends, and even then, it was a struggle to not keep up is usual barriers. He felt comfortable hiding like he did, rather than risking anything in opening up.

Andrew watched her in silence for a few moments as curiosity won him over with questions. Most people could keep a sense of fear for this old place, and they likely had reasons to do so. Andrew was no longer afraid just because he knew better than to let fear get the better of him. still, it was a bit spring to find any else here. it almost felt like an invasion of privacy. He liked coming here because he could be alone with ghosts’ thoughts and brutal memories.

Finding something living utterly wrecked that serene feeling of being alone. Especially since he could see that she was afraid (and likely not of him), but still was painting this place.

“So, this is sort of an odd location to practice landscapes… any reason why you’re out here painting?” he asked, “Do you know the… owners?” He doubted the building had any owners any more. He doubted it could even really be called a home anymore, but what else was there for conversation?

He smiled a little in faint sympathy as Brittany stuttered. Andrew nodded his head slowly and shook her hand without thought of the paint.

“What’re you so scared of? If I might ask. All those ghost stories are just bull shit, you know”, he said with a friendly laugh.

Andrew frowned for a moment as he noted the now ruined sleeve, but shrugged it off. “Eh, don’t worry about it. This is an old shirt”, he said, smiling, “And it sort of makes it look… grunge.

You certainly apologize a lot, Brittany.”

[nmiss]

It wasn't the ghosts she was afraid of. Ghosts were, in her experience, rather nice for the most part. Sure they could scare you something fierce if they wanted to most never did anything beyond a harmless prank - though you did get the occasional escapee from Hell. No it was the possibility of other 'things' lurking in there stalking either her, him or both of them. And it didn't help when she considered that if anyone, or anything, was watching they might recognize her and connect her with her brother. As much as she wanted to that was a part of her past that she would never be able to fully get away from.

"I, I think, I think it be-belongs to the, the ci-city" she stammared nervously as she held the rag to clean his shirt off, "and I, I, I'm not, I'm not practice, practicing, I'm, I'm, I'm wor-working. I make, make my, my money from my, my pain-paintings." It was true, she made enough to maintain herself and that little apartment of hers from year to year. And while she had more money, a fortune infact, that she had inherited from her parents and brother, both from their life insurances and from the bouties they had collected from being Slayers, she didn't like the thought of even touching it. No, she saw it all as blood money - Murder Money. And there was no way she could get rid of it safely - no coffer to dump silver in groups of twenty into.

A look of confusion crossed her face as he refused her offer to clean the shirt off for him. She had never met anyone who actually wanted painte on their nice shirts. Sure sher already had paint all over her own smock - but it was a smock and was meant to be covered in paint. But he seemed to like it - something about something called Grung.

"I, I , I, I'm, I'm sorry," she replied to his accusation that she appoligized a lot. Then realizing she was doing just that quickly added, "I mean, do I? I'm sor.... I mean, what's, what't grunge?" It was a terrifying and unusual experience for her to actually have some one actually strike up a conversation with her. And even more unusual for her to actually stick around for it. She had the sneaking suspision that she should be proud of herself. But that would have to wait until she wasn't scared and confused anymore.

"But, what, what, what are, are you, you doing, doing he-here?" she asked still curious about that, "are you some sort of a Hun..." she stopped herself short, "Never, never min-mind. I'm, I'm sure, sure you, you have, have your, your rea-reasons." She begain to apply paint nervously to her canvas looking very much as if she expected him to strike her for her last comment.

[comatose]

Maybe she had a speech impediment. Andrew winced slightly at the thought; great, now he could add being an asshole to people who couldn’t help themselves, too. With silent dismissal, Andrew resolved to not mention or tease her about it again.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right”, he agreed with a nervous shrug, “So you paint for a living? That’s pretty cool… but who would want a painting of this place? I mean, of all the historical landmarks here, this one does not really seem all that dazzling. If anything, it’s one of the creepiest.”

A tense feeling was still knotting its way into his neck and Andrew could only fidget it away so much. He glared accusingly at the paint trough he had previously brushed his fingers against and moved a little ways away from the objects. Fingers searched his jean pockets until they retrieve a lighter and a pack of cancer sticks.

“You don’t look like you smoke, but… uh, it’s almost polite to offer, or so Mommy says”, he said as he held an extra cigarette between his fingers. That ought to help the stress a bit.

He examined the paint on his shirt sleeve for another moment, but still seemed to not care much. After all, with the kind of money he was making, what was the point of fretting over a ruined shirt?

“Grunge is…. the nineties fashion and music movement. Uh, you know, like Kurt Cobain and Smashing Pumpkins”, he said, now utterly amused. She was very nervous, but he liked her nonetheless. There was something… almost wise there. He could just faintly sense it.

She’d seen some terrible things.

Andrew just shrugged off her inquiries about why he was stalking around a haunted house like he had never heard of the phrase “breaking and entering”.

“I seem like a what? Oh, Hunter? Er, no. Though, I do seem to give a lot of…people that impression”, he said, laughing, “I was just here for the sights, I come pretty often, actually. It’s a very interesting place if you can learn its secrets.

There is a story in that place and I want to learn it all.”

[nmiss]

She could tell that he was thinking she was some sort of retard and it probably didn't help that she had never managed to get over her perpensity to stutter when she was nervous. That habit had always annoyed her - along with her tendency to cringe whenever she thought she might be in the presence of a hunter but she couldn't seem to break herselp of them.

Knowing she would just make a mess of trying to explain it she made a show of shrugging off his comment about anyone wanting a painting of this place and continued to apply the paint. She was forming the bottom layer of what would be the body of the house. Then she would also add in the basic shape for the roof, the yard and garden and the wispy clouds behind it. Once those were dry she would add additional thin layers to bring out the detail and the shadowing then she would gently blend it all together to make it look natural and realistic. All in all the job would take her about a week to complete.

"No, I, I don-don't," she replied to his offer of a cigaret, "Thanks, thanks for, for as-asking though. Your, your mom sound, sounds like, like a, a smart, smart wo-woman." She wondered for a moment what it would have been like to have a mother like that instead of one who was just as obsessed with killing supernaturals as her father and brother had been. She found herself smiling faintly and shrugged back a tear - it was no use crying over spilt milk and besides she had hardly known the woman at all when she was alive.

"Oh, you, you mea-mean like a, like a cross, cross be-between pu-punk and, and go-goth?" she said when he described what he meant by 'grunge' "Sorry, I, I sort, sort of, of had my, my nose stuck, stuck to a, a canvas dur-during the nine-nineties." She was trying to not be so nervous but the possibility that she might be in the presence of a hunter - that he might be sizing her up and considering using her to bait his prey the way that her family had. That fear might have seemed silly to others, had they known about it, but it had been a terrifying reality for her and she was still scared that it might happen again. She would rather face a whole room of vampires than one Hunter - that's how scared she was of them.

She listened as he laughed over the suggestion that he might have been a hunter and she found herself relaxing when he told her he wasn't one himself. Something about him told her he was telling the truth - for one thing he wasn't carrying an arsenal.

"You're not a hunter?" she asked in a combination of surprise, wonderment and relief, her voice not stammering because she was no longer afraid of him, "Wait how do you know what a hunter i..." she stopped her self short and studdied him for a moment. "Are you a ... no you'd be dust in this light if you were ... Are you um, I hope you don't mind me asking but ... are you human?"

Of course it didn't matter if he was a supernatural - except maybe for the fact that she was constantly looking for a way to make amends for the things her family had done - she found she had no fear of the supernatural, she saw them as victims of over zelous hunters. At least she had no fear anymore - not since her enounter with Deleon.

"Not many of us know about the other world," she commented - Meaning mortals when she said 'us'. Then she smiled, her face gleaming in the red light of the sunset that had just started and the physical beauty that had made her so successful as a hunters bait for all those years became unmistakable, "It's very good to meet you indeed Andrew." She was excited at the possiblilty of an actuall chance to make friends with someone that she could actually talk to. She hadn't been this happy in years and she almost felt guilty for it.

[comatose]

Maybe he needed a tan.

The way she was looking at him, Andrew was beginning to think she expected him to bite her or something. it was not like he was a scary, dark and tall man in a scarier trench coat. He did not carry any weapons. All that was in his pocket was a cell phone and his cigarettes. His money was crumbled somewhere in his shoe.

He was not a very formidable looking guy, even compared to the doll-like girl in front of him.

Andrew shrugged off most of what she was saying. It was really nothing of consequence, and… well, he didn’t want to bother with boring subjects. He nodded when appropriate but that was about it.

He did, however, smile and sort of laugh when he saw the relief wash over her face. That turned into true guffaws at the next round of questions.

“Oh, god. Yes, I’m human!” he assured her with a big, (normal) toothy grin, “All twenty three pairs of chromosomes in the flesh. Yeah… how about you?” He was still giggling a little but finally pulled a hand to his mouth and sort of coughed into the ending of his amusement.

“Sorry, I uh… do you ask everyone that?” he asked with a small smile, “Hell, that would actually make a pretty good pick up line, wouldn’t it?”

It only occurred to him this much later that he might actually not have those aforementioned twenty three pairs. After all, not everyone Is… uh, psychic. Brittany probably did not need to know that quite yet.

She was talking again. He raised an eyebrow as the use of the word “us”.

“I don’t think of it as another world,” he admitted with a shrug, “I mean, there’s Sangre and then there is reality. This place feels pretty… night- well no, dreamlike. The whole city is a cult.”

Andrew eyed at her for a moment, noting how the sunset’s natural lighting was making her outstandingly beautiful. She was really, really pretty… and that was coming from a guy who didn’t even like looking at girls that way.

She would be awesome in a photoshoot. Not that Andrew would ask right this moment, but it might be a good thing to keep in mind, if Brittany did have any interest in modeling or just making money. Virgin Records needed some more girly looking advertisements as it was.

“Again, nice to meet you Brittany, “ he agreed with a slight bow of his head, “Now, since your sun is going away and it is bloody cold, want to go inside?”
sorry this took so long. life has been petty chaotic.

[nmiss]

She attempted to sniffle the laugh that exhumed itself when he suggested that asking if someone was human would be a good pick up line by slapping her hand over her mouth for a moment.

"I'm, I'm sorry," she giggled, "I wasn't, um, trying to pick you up. Besides," she tilted her head a bit and eyed him carefully, "I hope you won't be insulted if I tell you that you don't look like the type who would want a woman to try and pick him up."

listening as he compared Sangre to being dreamlike compared to the rest of the world and called the whole place a cult she found herself sobered. Looking to her easel, then to the old house, then about nervously in the approaching darkness and finally back at Andrew again. "I um, I don't, I don't know," she told him as she wrapped her arms around herself as if trying to ward off a chill, though the night was warm, "all my life it's been, I mean I've never, I mean everywhere,"

She was having a hard time finding words for what she meant. After all what if Sangre was the first place this guy had ever encountered supernatural beings and had no idea that they also lurked in the shadows of other cities. Fortunately though he interrupted her with a suggestion that they go inside since it was starting to get dark.

"Inside there?" she replied slowly as if wrapping her mind around the concept, "Inside Desjardines home? At night?" She looked nervously at the old mansion once again. Sure one was probably more likely to run into a junkie than a vampire but the odds were still rather high. She stared at Andrew for a moment wondering if she was brave enough to spend a night inside those cursed walls - and half hoping that he would laugh and tell her he meant they should go inside somewhere else, somewhere less 'haunted'.

[comatose]

Andrew smirked at her observation and nodded. “I don’t? Good, because I am not interested in girls,” he says with a laugh and then added to be polite, “ er, no offense.” He was surprisingly himself, really, with how nice he was being. Usually, he would have been teasing someone who said anything like that for a hell of a while.

But… there was something damaged about Brittany. He didn’t see any reason to pull that rip open anymore, so he was being far more polite than he ever was –even with big clients-.

He looked at her expectantly, hoping that she would finish her sentence, but there was no complete idea or explanation to be had. Andrew let the conversation move on without any further resistance.

“Sure inside there,” Andrew said with another nod, “It’ll be warmer. Come on, I can promise you that nothing even slightly living has been in there in a while. Well, besides me. Trust me on that, okay?”

There had not been a fresh memory to touch the building in at least a month, perhaps longer. For all it was worth, it seemed the people of Sangre could be in far more interesting places rather than some rotting historical building.

Andrew started his way into the house, tossing his head one way to beckon Brittany along. “Come on, it’s not really haunted or anything like that. There is nothing to be afraid of. And… besides, for the most part, the beasties of this city have actually been pretty okay,” he said with a light smile, “As long as you leave them alone, they tend to leave you alone.”

[nmiss]

"Yes," she replied sadly as she looked about with a haunted look on her face, "if you leave them alone." But she gave no expination for what she had said, simply wrapped her dirty brush with plastic so that it could be used or cleaned later and to protect the other brushes from it. "I'll be there in a moment," she told him as she gathered the rest of her painting supplies up.

They were cumbersom and they hurt her shoulders but she had carried them from her apartment and she didn't feel safe leaving them outside for fear of theives and the weather. Once she had them she walked nervously to the opened door of the mansion and peeked inside.

The foyer was rather barren, infact it was barren with nothing but dust and cobwebs covering its naked floor and walls. She could see where a set of foot prints had walked about the room and where a hand print had distrbed the filth on the wall from time to time. Andrews? She wondered. This particular room seemed pretty safe - nothing could hide in here but a shadow demon or a dust demon. But what of the other rooms? What if things that had been sleeping durring the day - things that andrew might just not have noticed - were just now waking up from their hidding places within the house and were looking for breakfast?

Standing there, unable to move farther away from the entry way and terrified to move in she asked him nervously, "how can you be certain. I mean if you really aren't a hunter. I mean how do you know there isn't any thing lurking in there."

[comatose]

Andrew did not like this room as much, simple because it was so… empty. It was like a defense on his search to finish the stories and he really wanted to keep moving into somewhere more interesting. Still, he waited to make sure that Brittany was at least calmed down a bit. god knows why she was this afraid of any place in Sangre, especially an old house with a few cheesy ghost stories, but he was going to be patient.

He slinked forward at a sluggish place and only smiled at her question. “You don’t have to be a slayer to know a thing or two,” he remarked with a shrug, “It’s not like they all have…uh, gifts, anyways.

At any rate, I just know things like that. I mean, I have been spending a hell of a lot of time here as it is, right? So don’t worry about it.”

[nmiss]

"The one I knew did," she replied in that same haunted tone as she looked about the room - taking in the look of the colors and the textures. There was something so sad about the way this room looked.

She was about to start peaking into the one open door when she noticed an inconsistency in one of the cobweb covered walls. Her curiosity and artistic inclination winning out over her fear she approached what seemed to be a painting covered by time and cleared the cobwebs from it - but hung her head and sighed sadly when she saw that the frame held nothing.

"I wonder what was in here," she said as she fingered the remains of the canvas that had been cut out of it - with a small pocket knife and without much care by the look of it, "what if it was a masterpiece? Shame it was destroyed."

[comatose]

Andrew looked back with a shrug. It did look fairly miserable, though, to have a barren group of walls and a stripped painting. He gently brushed his fingers across the frame, shaking his head. People do not touch paintings and if there is any feeling to be found, it is usually in the paint of the actual canvas. Now it was just as empty as the rest of the room.

“It is a pretty terrible thing to do. I mean, you would think one would just remove the painting from the wall…,” he said and sighed.
“I wonder what would compel anyone to cut the painting right out of the frame. It seems like a statement they were trying to make or something. Weird.”

He started walking again, abandoning the destroyed painting in favor of a richer looking room. He liked this one; there was a fascinating piano in the corner that seemed full of so many different emotions… he loved trying to sort through them in private.

“So, who was the slayer you knew? What could he do that was so special?” Even if Andrew did not take to seeking out others like him, he still liked thinking about them and knowing he was not alone with them out there, too.

[nmiss]

The room reminded her of one she had seen before. But that was part of her past and she probably would never see any part of that house again - not that she would want to. Its master was sadistic to say the least. She felt a smile come to her lips when she remembered some of its other residents of that strange underground place. It had been hard being of only a few humans there and not entirely welcomed but she had made a few friends there. She wondered what had become of them - though at least one she knew had been slain only a week before he himself was killed.

"So who was this slayer you knew? What could you do that was so special?"

"Oh he was my twi ...," she caught herself before she gave too much information away, "I'd rather not talk about them if you wouldn't mind." Then, in an attempt to draw his mind from it she pointed to a winding staircase on the other side of the sitting room, "I wonder where that leads."

[comatose]

Her… what? Andrew frowned in curiosity. But could not decipher what the end of that word might have been. Brittany didn’t seem all that eager to share, but that was fine. It didn’t really matter that much to Andrew anyways.

He allowed his attention to change subjects and smile. “It goes to a really interesting study area. The curtains are ripped up, though, but other than that it seems eerily normal. Whoever owned it seemed to have a real thing for old paintings and mythology… pretty cool,” he said, smiling, “If you wanna go up, I think it’s best we go one at a time; I do admit that I am not completely trusting of the staircase, as pretty as it is to look at.”


Well, it at least seemed like she was relaxing Andrew could see that she was not jumping at every sound and Brittany had also gotten past her stuttering.

[nmiss]

Paintings? Mythology? That sounded like her kind of person. Now she really wanted to see the upstairs. Even if Andrew had told her that the floor was likely to colapse out from under them if they went up there she would still want to risk it. She was begining to wonder if Jeff had kept her away from here not because of the beings they might have run accross inside but rather because of the objects. That or he was secretly seeing lovers here. He never saw a reason to hide from his homosexuality but some of his boyfriends might have.

Had he ever been in this room? She wondered - but then she saw something that shoved all doubt from her mind. It was a stake that had been rammed with a great deal of force into the wall right next to them. She recognized it as one of her brothers - it was carved in the same signature style in which he had carved all his stakes. She shuddered in visible terror when she saw it. It didn't matter that it had probably been in there for about a year or that she knew there was no chance of them bumping into its owner while they were there the sight of it still frightened her.

"Oh I, I love, love paintings," she said tearing her eyes from the stake. Well, that had been an understatement - of course she loved paintings.

[comatose]

Andrew looked around the room carefully once he has ascended after her. he fixed his gaze immediately on the stake and without hardly any hesitation, he made his way to it and pressing his index finger against the carefully carved object. It hummed with different emotions and he closed his eyes, trying to find its starting point.

Hard work and determination. Well, Andrew supposed that was a given.

“Whoever threw this, I don’t think they got whatever they were looking for,” he murmured as he released the object and shrugged back at Brittany.

[nmiss]

"It wasn't thrown," she replied in a hollow voice as she spied one of the paintings and glided toward it, "he never threw one of his stakes."

It didn't take longer than a glance to realize what its subject was. "Bachae," she whispered looking at the still image of the mad blood covered women. Then she noticed the victim at the center of them and the lyre clutched tightly in his hand and added, "Orpheous". Next to this was a painting depicting a young woman who was completely naked except for the crown of flowers on her head walking into a cave with a river going through it where a decrepit looking man waited to carry her away on a boat for her while a similarly naked woman who had a basket of corn under one arm watched helplessly from the entrance.

"It's sad to see these here," she said as she studied them, "hidden away where hardly anyone will ever see."

[comatose]

Andrew frowned. “How would you know?,” he asked curiously. Was this the stake of the slayer Brittany had known, then? She seemed a little unnerved and upset, almost distant. There was something a bit off about this girl, Andrew could see that. He liked and all, but there was still something wrong, even if she refused to say.

He could not help but wonder what she had seen to make her like this.

He examined the paintings from a distance and sighed. “The myths are all so sad… I mean, even the ones not from that area. Even the simple, more… broad ones, right? Firebirds and flood myths; they all seem pretty depressing,” he said with a frown. He ventured toward the bookcase and brushed away the dust with his fingers to read the titles.

“These books look interesting, but I am afraid that if I open them, they might break or something.”

[nmiss]

She decided the best thing to do would be to ignore his question about the slayer and focused instead on his comment about how depressing myths were. "The. Myths weren't meant to be entertaining," she replied to him they were meant to teach a lesson. But the stories have been romantisized - changed from stories meant for adults to bedtime stories for little kids. Like the story of the tortis and the hair. Its original message had nothing to do with perserverance but rather its moral was that it was okay to cheat if that's what it takes to win. Not exactly something that would go over well in todays society."

She looked over the books with reverence as well, "they do look delicate and neglected. Oh look. Plutarcs Lives. 'I am not of the noble Grecian race, I'm poor Abrotonon, and born in Trace; Let the Greek women scorn me, if they please, I was the mother of Themistocles'."

[comatose]

She disregarded his question. Andrew shrugged. All well, he really should just let the matter drop, I supposed.

“I have a copy of that—uh, obviously not as beautifully embellished, at home,” he remarked with a smile, “It ended up being really useful. We put passages from it on the spread for one of Virgin’s ad campaigns. A Bible for Heroes.. I am still rather proud of that shoot—oh, that’s…uh that’s what I do, I guess. I am an advertising exec. for Virgin Mega.”

He really did like his job, it was probably the only thing in Andrew’s arsenal really was proud of. he did not really care so much if it sounded like he was bragging. After all, he had worked for his position, had he not? He deserved or gloat over it every now and then.

[nmiss]

"Spread? Shoot?" His use of these words were unfamiliar to her as she had never taken any advertising or photography classes when she was attending art school. Furthermore, her disintreat in magazines and their perpensity to worship celebrities kept her from wandering down that particular section of the bookstore.

"Virgin Mega? I've never heard of that." She shrugged, "so there really are huge advertising companies who sell things for other companies with lots of money, huh? What's it like being an advertising exec? What sort of things do you do?"

[comatose]

“Uh… let’s see, sorry. My translation would be… A long series of pictures from a photoshoot that got put in a magazine?,” he said, nervously laughing, “sorry, Britt, I get used to being around ‘my own kind’.” Andrew gave her a lopsided grin before shrugging.

“You might have heard of the smaller chains; Virgin Airlines, for example. Virgin Megastore’s another one if you have ever been to LA or New York. And Virgin Records… though that one is more only if you are super into music labels.. It’s all owned by Richard Branson. Who I really want to meet someday, he sounds like a real nutcase.”

Andre stretched out as he made his way across the room. He blew away the dust from a window and smeared it off the rest with his already paint covered sleeve. “It’s pretty nice, I guess, but being an executive at my age… I get a lot of shit from all the other frumpy old guys who are working there. And it is uh, a little weird getting hit on by older women who don’t really get the whole ‘gay thing’”, he said, laughing to himself, “But I would rather be doing some free lance stuff like you. not that I can pain, but I think I do alright with advertising and stuff.

It must be nice not having a boss, though, right? You get to say no to stupid assignments if you really want to.”

[nmiss]

"Oh, sorry," replied Brittany with an understanding nod, "I guess I don't pay that much attention to magazines. Especially not fashion ones. As you can see," she motioned to her department store outfit, "I don't know the first thing about fashion."

"Ah yes," she smiled when he mentioned some of his company's other endeavors, "in LA my brother and I used to walk by Virgin Mega when he took me hunt...," again she caught herself. She was becoming too comfortable around this guy. With most other people there was the very high probability that they would either laugh at her or try to have her committed and that acted as a safety barrier to keep her from telling them the real truth about herself. The fact that he was already aware of the existence of the other world took away that safety buffer though and she was having a hard time not telling him other things about herself. And rightfully so to. The few people who she had ever told of how her brother had used her to bait the creatures he killed treated her as if they either believed she was lying or as if it were her own fault and she should have been able to just walk out of it herself. She wasn't sure if she was ready to take a chance that he wouldn't be like them. She placed her hand gently over the locket that hung about her neck and said, "I took a fight on Virgin Airlines once," as if the previous sentence had never been uttered. And it wasn't a lie either. Virgin Airlines had carried her and her brothers body back to Italy and from there a boat had taken them back to Sangre.

She laughed a little and joined him at the windowsill, "I don't see why they should be. I mean you earned your possition didn't you? So you deserve just as much respect as they do. And if you want to do freelance then you should. Its easy really - getting your foot into one of those places is what's hard. I know I once tried to apply for a job at one of those places and the first thing they asked me was who my manager was. What ever that means. When the guy realized I not only didn't have that so called manager he ran to another room. Probably to ask his boss if I should even be allowed to interview. I realized then that such employment was out of my league and left before he came back. So if you can get into a company like you're in you can do anything. But there is one thing about freelance though. You may not have one boss but sometimes you have dozens. And I've often had to find new buyers for paintings when the person who originally ordered them either decided they didn't want them after all or were no longer willing to pay the agreed upon price when they were finished." She smiled as she looked out into the night below, "I'd like to do more than just paint buildngs though. If I could afford, heck if I knew how much it cost or even how or where to get one, I'd hire a model and paint some scenes using them. What about you," she asked turning back to him, "you're a good looking guy and you seem to know your business well. If I wanted you to pose for some of my paintings, how would I get you and how much would it cost me?"