the Luminary

I… I don't know! way to put me on the spot!

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the Luminary

Post by Kimra »

Restarted, check next post. :P
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Re: the Luminary

Post by smiley_cow »

Good start. I like the sense of atmosphere at the club. You mentioned this is a story about vampires so am I right in assuming that the stain Gwen's trying to get out is blood?
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Kimra »

The Luminary


When working Gwen moved with precision. Heavy black doc’s laced tight around feet that hardly understood what grace was meant to mean danced around the trumming bodies of the club with easy. If anyone looked she would stand out, her long black skirt stopped short of her ankles, barely, and her tight bonds shirt circled close to her neck. Only her ghostly arms, alabaster under the strobe of ultraviolet lights escaped the shroud of black. She wore no earrings, or fanfare of any kind, only a watch crisp black and silver was strapped down to her wrist for utilitarian purpose.

Around her bodies pulsed, limbs moved, and a hundred over druged, over sexed people shifted as one. She side stepped a grinding couple, repulsed by their (oposit of voyerism), and moved deeper into the grind. Peronsally she hated the place, the noise that bore down on you, trying to pick you up and clasp you into a frenzy of movement that had no purpose and made no sense. People who couldn’t hear each other acting like there were connections been made. Sloppy heartless connections that would last a night, maybe longer, until they all fell apart. It made her feel bitter and old, and reminded her of how much she was not a part of it. She wished she was part of it.

In the crush of bodies that was the dance floor Gwen was pushed and pulled just like everyone else, and she moved with it. She lilted and twined and worked through the sweety throng with only one purpose in mind; the wall. Walls were good, she had found, walls were a safe area against the masses, walls were the place where she could breath in the stale club air and look out into the crowd to find what she was after.

A female body pushed into her and she, in turn, fell into someone on her left. She caught a bicep before she fell further, caught an eye and flashed an apology. Whoever he was, he just grinned a goofy smile in reply until something else drew his attention away.

Gwen bit down on her bitter response to the dismissal and straightened, her fingers taking a little longer to slide away and off the hard muscle. Some things were all to tempting, but she could live without it.

Once she was away from the dancers, deeper into the club and blended with the shadows where strobes did not bother to penetrate she found her wall and she took her position. Her eyes adjusted slowly to the dark around her, continueously interrupted by the flash flash of whatever light the house felt needed to be used to keep people hypnotised, to keep people there.

In her dark recess, watching the shift of the dancers, the people who lingered on the edge of the floor with drinks and friends and the queue to reach and purchase alcohol she felt safer. Safe enough to lean back on her wall and and fold her arms across her chest. Coocooned in the secreted corner, she waited out the night and the inevitable.



Her corner, it seemed, wasn’t that secret. She had been there for over two hours, thirsty but unwilling to trapease through the dancefloor again unless she was making for the exit. Two hours of the same song playing over and over, or at least it felt like the same song. She wasn’t sure if anyone in the club but her was event listening to anything but the bass that poured into the ground and made the whole building shake.

People have come and gone around her. Taking a breather, shouting to be heard amongst groups of friends. None of them looked at her, and she was glad her and her bored expression, none of them were supposed to.

She redubed it the skeezy secreted corner, when the fourth couple pulled up beside her to make out. She paid them just as much attention as she did everyone else in the club, she looked them over once and turned away.

Her watch said it was 1am, her brain told her it was time to sleep, both of them she ignored. She would sleep later, and the time was irrelevent, Adam had told her to come, and she would stay until they pushed her out of there bodily.

The man beside her groaned, and the tone twigged something in her responses that had her looked straight at him before remembering decency. She noticed what was happening and then tried not to, her head snapping back to the dance floor so fast something in her neck twinged. She felt awkward just knowing what those fumbled hurried movements had been, but she was aware of it now and she could hear their movements as clearly as her own.

She saw him when he entered the club, he did not belong to the crowd. Maybe it was his leather jacket, cut to the thighs and well tailored, or the open collared white dress shirt. Maybe it was just his face, the well defined cheekbones and vivid blue eyes. Gwen wasn’t sure, but there was something about him made him look richer and more dangerous than the rest of the crowd.

She tracked him as he moved inot the crowd, watching him slide through the pulsating mass of people, occasionally touching but never mingling with them. It barely took him a minute to reach the bar, and she watched the automatic response of the staff as they moved to please, a drink at his shoulder and one of the girls leaning over the counter to answer the questions he asked of her. He lounged agains the end of the bar, the queue melting away from him and leaning in the other direciton in seconds, and he looked out over the floor at his pickings.

Gwen made herself look away before he caught her eyes on him, she wasn’t inconspicous, but she slouched down a little lower into her dark corner of debarchary. She knew what she had to know, now she could leave, but not until he’d turned his eyes away from their scan. She didn’t have to be bleedingly obvious.

He did eventually turn away from the crowd and the drink at his elbow, disapearing through an employes door she had earlier noticed beside the bar. She took that as her cue and headed for the exit in as straight a line as possible while navigating the dancefloor.

It was later in the night, hands grabbed at her as much as they hit her, bodies pressed, gyrated, and pushed. She was tired, too tired to side step it all, her feet trod like heavy cloded bricks and she didn’t care. She’d done her job, she didn’t care what happened now. All that mattered was she got to curl up under her thick donna and pretend the world no longer existed for a few more hours.



She sucked in the cold night air, letting it chill and wake her from the lungs out. It was beautiful and a relief to be free of the opressive feeling of the club. Outside it’s doors only the feeling of the beat seeped through the heavy double doors, and she knew in half a block even that would be gone.

She was about to move, invigorated by the thought, when she caught sight of another stranger. He was all angles and height, dressed in khaki slacks and a white muscle shirt, a silver pendent chain around his neck. He was watching her, leaning against the club wall with a girl hanging off his arm. Her clothes were fantastically slutty, an animal print dress and spiked stilletoes. Her face was completely blank and her skin a sickly white, even compared to Gwens.

She decided the direct approach was needed. “Is she okay?” As she aksed the girl swayed slightly towards him, and he pushed her back from him, his smile for Gwen.

“Drunk as a skunk.”

Gwen was half turned towards them still, divided between leaving and staying, one option was the right option, but she longed for her bed. She forced the words out, “Do you need help?”

“I do, but she’ll be fine.” He angled the girl away from him, and Gwen winced in sympathy over the crack of a head against the wall. Apparently undazed the girl only giggled lightly, her eyes slipping closed. Gwen didn’t want to leave the girl out in the open street, unprotected and vulnerable but when he caught her eyes Gwen knew she had to. “What’s your name?” His voice was slippery, not unpleasent, but it had a sound she recognised as coercion.

“Lexus.” She’d always wanted one of them.

He stepped away from the dazed girl and towards her, “How do you feel?”

She frowned not sure how she was supposed to feel but a glance at the girl on the floor she tried her luck with ‘dizzy’. Apparently it was the right reply, because he beckoned her forward and she followed.

She was worried he would try to make a move right in front of the club but he only caught a hold of her upper arms, his thumbs rubbing across the muscles. She let her head list to the side, her eyes half hooded as she considered what to do. Here was not an option, here was too busy and noisy and here there was another one of them inside.

“I have a car.” She turned a little to motion in it’s direction and that was enough, apparently, for him.

[WC 1,602]
I promise not to rewrite anything else now I'm started. Sorry about that anyone who read it. And yeah, Smiley, blood.
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Jiro
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Jiro »

At least you restarted early on. Don't get to like the 12th and go "hang on I'm not havin' this" because then you face a longer and treacherouser road.

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Re: the Luminary

Post by smiley_cow »

Indeed, the urge to rewrite things can be a dangerous trap to fall into if you want to finish Nano. I remember last year what I did was start a file where I jotted down everything I wanted to change and rewrite. And then promptly never got to any of it after Nano had finished. >_>

I think the new opening is stronger, though. I'm curious to see what's next.
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Apocalyptus »

I'm interested to see what Gwen's motivations are. Intriguing so far.
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Kimra »

She had been there too long, dirt under her nails and the echo of a summer nights in her ears, but she didn’t rise. She barely even moved, only the shallow jerking breaths that forced themselves through her lungs proving that she was anything but stone.

She was on a precipace, one she had stood on many times before, and she was clinging desperatly to this moment of stability, before reality came back to her and the world would try and crush her all over again. Sitting in the midst of watchful trees, dirt under her knees and nobody to tell her to move. She felt dead and was bitterly glad for it. Dead was easy, dead made sense. Dead was where she belonged. People like her didn’t deserve chances.

With a sneer she realised she’d toppled back down into life and lost her hold on the moment. She was Gwen again, and Gwen was kneeling in dirt, in the middle of the bush, with creaking trees and calling wildlife, and only the smallest light to lead the way back to the car.

She forced herself to rise, then kicked her hand impressions out of the dirt absently. Not only her nails, but her body was covered in a layer of fine dirt that had become rivlets of mud where her sweat rolled and mingled with it. It was a fine dirt, that clogged her pores and sucking out all the mosture in her skin like some vicious parasite.

She flicked her shirt out to shake the worst of it off, and took in a lungful when it plummed out around her. It dried out her mouth and throat on contact, making her chocke and cough to remove the intrusion. Her eyes watered against the fit, and she hacked what she could of the spit minged garbage out of her system.

Her expression scrunched up, and she felt her barriers crumbled. Idiot, she knew, she was an idiot and she should have known it would happen. It always happened, and she couldn’t even learn something that simple.

Her eye prickled and she pulled her expression hard against the feeling creeping through her defenses, she couldn’t do this here. Not tonight, and not here. Six breaths to calm, another six to be sure, and she clicked on the little led and found the path back to the car. At least there was water in the car, at least she could wash some of this mess away.



It was humid, the cool chill from the previous night burnt away with the afternoon sun and the breeze was gone. Gwen hated summer, and she hated being tired, and both of them where overwhelming as she scrubed at spots on the passanger seat of her car furiously.

The gararge was small and cramped, her car barely fit at the best of times but it was full of Bens uncountable boxes today, and she had to work from the drivers seat side, half perched on the seat in an awkward angling of limbs that made her look like some sort of akimbo duck. She didn’t care about that, because her focus was on the speckling she hadn’t seen last night. Speckling that had to come off but didn’t seem to, even in the face of grade-a bleach.

She hated blood and it’s tenacity, she hated that there was blood in her car, and that all she could smell was the caustic pinch of bleach burning it’s way through her nose and down her throat. At least her cuts were hidden, a long sleeved shirt and almost everything was hidden. Only her split eyebrow hinted at anything violent, and she already had that excuse planned out. Her flatmates would get the blunt of disdain from anyone who asked, if anyone asked. If Stuart or Ben asked she just wouldn’t tell them, let them make their own stories up.

A new spot caught her eye, barely a pin prick of it, but she dunked her toothbursh in the bleach and started to scrub it as well, adding to the fadded patchs her chair was being decorated with today. She shifted to get closer, one leg over the gear stick the other folded on the drivers seat and her body contorted.

She wasn’t sure how long she’d been out here, but each time she felt she was near the end of the task she found another spot that had masked itself from her awareness until that moment. She entertained the idea that they were breeding and it was so depressing to consider that she droped the fancy just as quickly as it had come.

She had sweated through her shirt almost as soon as she’d put it on, but the more she worked, tired and dizzy from the fumes the stickier her body became, the shirt gluing itself to her in wretched clumps. She tried to ignore it, but even her jeans felt damp from the exertion. Jeans had no right to feel that uncomfortable.

“Nice view.”

Gwen dropped the brush, sloshed bleach and turned to face the sudden intruder. Stuart was waiting for eye contact and wiggled his brows at her suggestively when he had all her attention.

“You scared me.” She admonished, the bleach clutched a little too close and the toothbrush... where had it gone? She turned her back to him and quested out the little damnable tool. She needed it still, she could already see spots she hadn’t seen.

“Chicha, is that bleach?” He sounded concerned, and apparently she didn’t need to answer, because he had the gararge door open before she’d managed to reach her hand under the chair and touch on the brush. She scrapped her fingers, trying to reach a little further in and skittled it back an inch. She cursed. “Hey come on chicha, lets get you out of there.”

“It’s fine.” She gritted back, lowering herself down closer to the passengers leg area so she could reach further under the stupid contraptoin of a chair. She hooked the brush with her index finger and, pleased, brought it out of it’s hiding place.

“This stuffs not good for you. Come on, we’ll go out the front and have a smoke.”

“I don’t smoke.” She grunted and pushed herself up from the awkward angle.

“You can watch me.”

“You don’t smoke.” She retaliated when she was sitting up.

“Humour me.” His false accent lost its shine for a second and she considered doing just that, becaue he wasn’t a bad person all around, but there were other things to do.

She was done with the car for now, a few spots shouldn’t be too bad if left until later, besides the fumes really were making her head spin. “I can’t, I’ve got work at three.”

From the gararge door Stuart made a sympathetic sound, and she turned quickly to face him in surprise. What could possibly- “It’s four already, chicha.”

She was dead, completely and utterly dead.

[WC 2,768]
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Kimra »

“-never in my entire time here have I seen such careless disreguard-“

It sounded like the same speech he always made, she wondered how he handled been so predicatable. So far the word ‘fired’ hadn’t snuck in so she was accepting it with a contrite expression. She was, in fact, contrite. She would have apologised if he wasn’t such an arse, as it was he had attacked her the second she entered the crew room, and hadn’t stopped shouting for the last ten minutes. Apparently her presense wasn’t that life threatening, or she’d be out there doing her work.

“Are you listening?”

Her shoulders slumped in the face of the rage, her eyes trained on the floor, because that’s what was expected of her. Her eyes stung. If he was anyone important to her, if he was anyone at all, she knew she would be crying right now. She hated that she would be crying, and only hr clentched fist and the chating ringing through her head kept it from happening.

They were not worth it. He was not worth it. He was nothing.

“Are you listening Gwen?”

She didn’t want to answer, she scrunched her face for a second in rebelion then slumped down some more, she could only hurt herself by being stubborn.

“Yes.”

“And what did I say?” It was a teacher question, the kind of question she had met with fierce eyes and a hard glare, she barely skipped her eyes to his face.

“If I’m late again, I’m fired.” She spoke with a monotone, the only contrition he required to justify his own position.

“This company doesn’t need a layabout like you. There’s a job shortage you know!” He was jesturing broadly now, as if it made him more authorative. “You do know that don’t you Gwen?” As if her attention was at all needed for his triad.

“Yes sir.” She nodded her head for extra effect, watching his overpolished black work shoes. She glanced at her own docs and wondered when the last time she’d looked after them was. Maybe a year ago? She remembered bothering to polish them once, that’s for sure. When he took a breath she tested the waters with a quick, “It wont happen again, sir.”

He stilled.

“I’m really very sorry.” She used the most pitious tone she could manage, soft and dull just like he expected. Social norms were strange.

He breathed heavily through his nose, and she knew they’d be flaring, because they always flared when he was angry with other people. “One more time-“ But he wasn’t up for shouting anymore, she’d broken his stride, “Get your till and go do your job.”

“Yes sir.” She shuffled past him the moment she could, uncurling her nails from her palm and biting back on the loathing she felt for the man. Today was just another day, and she had to get through it, making as few bumps as possible.



Gwen hated working in this shit hole, she thought it was some sort of cosmic joke on her for not having applied to go to university. Half her co-workers had gotten in, and were just making money on the side for partying. Some of them were trying to live off what they made while studying. She didn’t think she could be that sort of person. School was over at least, but there was no time for university in her life, even if she’d had the marks for it.

“How are you today?” She managed to ask when the next customer stepped in before her, they were overweight, obesely so, and in their trolly were two little troll kids who were equally as obese. Gwen frowned as she started scanning the items. The hag could be as fat as she wanted, but letting your children get fat was against the grain.

“What?” The beach ball demanded, hand half stuck in her wallet as she fiddled through for some magic money.

“I asked you how you are today, ma’am.” Politeness was encouraged in all staff. They’d had a whole day’s training on how to address people in a politically correct way. Gwen was pretty sure ma’am hadn’t been on the list.

“How do you think it’s been?” The lady demanded, chubby fingers rummaging still, a brat tugging at her sleeve from within the trolly and a pile of sugary treats going across the scanner in a methodical process that Gwen had numbed out weeks ago. Apparently the womans day hadn’t been good. Gwen couldn’t care less. She looked to check how long she’d be doing this, and noticed that the convayer belt was piled high. It was disheartening to realise she was stuck with the shrew, and she redoubled her efforts to get the lady off her line. If she lingered there was a danger of shouting, and she didn’t want to hangle that today, not after the boss had said his piece.

“Can’t you go any faster? Ah, here it is.” The woman was shoving something at her insistantly, and Gwen was forced to stop scanning to figure out what the little slip of paper was about. A parking ticket apparently. She took it, stamped it and tried to hand it back, but the woman was already fussing over the child in the childs seat his eyes almost swollon over with fat.

“Ma’am?” She checked the queue and noted that there was a second customer. “Ma’am?” She tried a little louder. If she put it down she’d forget, and then she’d hear it from the parking managers as well. She’d done that once and that was enough. “Ma’am? Your ticket?” It was tempting to poke the beast, but fortunatly before such drastic measures could be taken the woman deemed her worthy enough to pay attention to once again. With a grunt the woman sntached the ticket and waved it at the child in front of her.

“Some people have no paitece do they honey?” She cojouled.

“Cake!” Was the stout reply.

Gwen ignored the jibe because staring at her hand she became aware of something that had escaped her notice before now. She hadn’t had time to shower after working in the car, it should have been fine she’d already showered at breakfast, and she’d been working with bleach, not paint. But her nails were dirty, flakes of red clung to their underside, and horrified Gwen knew it was dry blood. She wasn’t even sure how it had happened, she hadn’t touched the blood. Only the toothbrush had, and- she needed to wash her hands.

She was shaking as she ran the final items through for the transaction, and processed the card. When the woman huffed off, Gwen could only stare at the pile of groceries belonging to the next customer. She looked up, ready to ask if she could just be a minute, but the words never escaped the tight trap of the throat and she forced herself to smile instead, just like she was supposed to. “How are you today?”



Gwen blocked the hit coming at her with a surprised jolt. Her partner, Ruby, found an opening and struck into Gwens exposed stomach. Gwen gasped and Ruby caught her surprise written all over the delicate features.

“Oh man, are you okay?”

Gwen did not reply, folded over with her hands clenched around the abused part of her. The only compensation she felt at the moment was that she hadn’t thrown up, and her partner was rubbing soothing circles against her back.

“I thought you’d block.” Ruby confessed concern lacing her every word. “I’d never have hit so hard-“

“It’s fine.” Gwen coughed it out and sounded ruder than she wanted to. But she’d just had a fist in her stomach, so there was no helping that.

“I’ll call the instructor-“

“No!” Gwen responded to slowly, and Ruby was already half across the room signalling one of the instructors over to Gwens side. Gwen cringed, and forced herself to stand straight, these where the parts she hated the most.

She watched Ruby talk. Ruby was easily the smallest person in the training room, she was only fifteen if Gwen remembered right. Fifteen already better than Gwen was. But what the girl lacked in age, she made up for in deception. She petiet, looked like a strong wind could blow her over and had features that could get her mistaken for a fairy. Gwen didn’t think there was any justice in the world when she saw people that pretty.

Nor did she like the justice there was when the man Ruby was talking to turned to look in her direction. He nodded whenever Ruby said something, and spoke back at all the right intervals. Then he turned her towards one of the groups of three and Ruby went as bid. That left the instructor to deal with her and Gwen momentarily closed her eyes to brace herself for what was to come. Her heart was palpitating, her limbs tense and the churning she’d felt all day in her stomach seemed to be bubbling up into her throat. She swollowed that feeling down, and waited for the instructor to make it across the room.

“Ruby struck you?” The disapointment was palpable.

“Yes, sir.” She stood feet apart, hands behind her back looked him in the eye. It was how she was always meant to face the instructors when they addressed her.

“Why didn’t you block?” He was taller than her, a good head taller, and his hair was tied back into a little pony tail at the back of his neck. At least he was dressed like the rest of them, the black pants and half robe that they were expected to keep in perfect condition at all times, but there was always something about instructors besides the markings on their sleeves that made them seem more intimidating. Gwen didn’t like the instructors, she found them demanding and rude, and she found the disapointment in their voices whenever they spoke to her chipped away at her self esteem far too effectively.

“I didn’t see it, sir.”

“So you’re fine with being dead?”

Yes. “No.”

“What block should you have used?”

Gwen showed him the crossed wrist stomach block they’d taught her last week, one she hadn’t known before that, and he nodded absently in agreement with her position.

“Go into the next room and practice that five hundred times. Five hundred upper blocks as well. One then the other.” And he turned back to his little spot on the edge of the mats to watch over them all.

Gwen lowered her head the moment she could, spoting the figures of the other trainies in the corner of her eyes and knowing that they ahd heard it too. It rankled her that they all seemed to have picked up the new moves easily, like a well oiled machine that knew how to do it already. She slumped her shoulders in and made her retreat as quickly as she could. Knowing she’d disapointed them all, not just the instructor, knowing she’d never be as good as they were.

Her eyes prickled at the though, and she tensed the muscles in her face to hold back the emotion that wanted to spill over. She managed to grab her bag, and go through to a personal practice room before the tears broke through the barrier, and then she flicked them away as quickly and carelessly as she could. Anyone could walk in at any time and she didn’t think she could explain how any of it.

She set her bag to the side, faced the mirror. She wasn’t short at least, her mother had always taught her to be proud of her height and so she was. To a point where it irked her when she encountered women taller than her, at 180cm she didn’t have to worry about that too much. Her body though, despite training three days a week for the last three months, was anything but athletic. She was round in the middle and the rest of her had followed the trend. Not ‘fat’ she’d been told countless times by the people around her, but she knew fat, and so did the doctor who told her as much.

She took the proper stance, took a deep breath and made the first block. Her positioning was off, she corrected it and tried again. Then a upper block, wrists crossed and head covered. Lower then upper, and the rhythem set in while she counted. At a hundred she realised she was distracted and she forced herself to fix the angle of her hands so they were protected during the block, and raise the upper block so she wasn’t just saving her forehead if she ever used it. Then she locked eyes with her reflection and focused.



Adam found her after she passed six hundred. He slunk into the room and stood behind her, a little to the left, his hair wet and combed back off his face, dressed in training gear. She slowed down at his appearance, and when he quirked a grin at her she stopped on the lower block.

“You took that hit well.”

She flinched with embarrasement, she hadn’t known he was in the room. “I’m tired.” Which was true, she wasn’t even sure how much sleep she’d managed last night. Once she’d gotten home she’d had to shower, she’d refused to look at the alarm when she curled in under her blankets. It would have been far too sad to see.

“How was last night?” His voice was pitched low for secrecy and she couldn’t help glancing towards the door in fear of being heard.

“Long.” She sighed and dropped her stance. Her arm muscles were sore from the drills they’d already done.

“And?” Adam walked across the room to her, and they were completely invisible to the outside world, even with the mirrors reflections. He stood right near her, closer than she was used to.

She wet her lips, suddenly aware of how thirsty she was but concentrated on her answer. “There was one.”

“One?”

She frowned, “Two.” Shaking her head she met his eyes, they were a soft blue that reminded her a bit too much of summer skies. Sometimes she wondered if that was the real colour of his eyes, but in the middle of all his pale skin and blonde hair it was quite possible.

“Which means there are probably more.”

“That’s what the Guardians say.” She was so busy trying to dredge up the knowledge they had been pounding into her skull since the day they arrived at her doorstep that she didn’t see Adam move until his face was an inch away from her own, eyes locked and serious, fingers gripping her chin firmly incase she tried to look away. She wasn’t going to try.

“What have I told you? Only what I say matters.” His voice was firm but there was anger there too. She froze with a tiny gasp until the little half smile broke his expression. “Those old book bound morons don’t know anything.” He ran his fingers through his loose hair and stepped back, looking sheepish.

Breathless she assued him, “I know.”

“I know you do.” He was still close so he ran the pads of his fingers down the side of her face reverntly. “I just worry about you.”

“I know.” Her smile quivered, but his smile echoed back vibrantly.

“You’ll come back after training and tell me about last night? We’ll make our plans then.” He left before she could reply, sneaking out the way he had come in and she took a few more moments to steady her breathing before she made her way back under the supervision of the instructors.

[WC 5,405]
Nearly at the end of the introduction. Well done me.
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Re: the Luminary

Post by smiley_cow »

Well this suddenly got more interesting. Some kind of vampire slaying group?
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Apocalyptus »

That sounds like a pretty hardcore Karate class! Gwen is quite the interesting character so far. Check out chick by day, vampire hunter by night?
Kimra wrote:Next they'll be denying us the right to say "We'll rape your arse if you don't come to this fucken country."

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Kimra
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Kimra »

I've already realised I've been too vague with the start. So yeah she killed the guy thing and buried it in the middle of some forest. Refusing to rewrite it though! Onwards!
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Kimra
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Kimra »

Adam was sitting at his desk, two glasses of burbon decandet and waiting at each chair. She came in tired, muscles aching and stretched, and glad to be out of training. The others would mingle for some time still, and although she enjoyed being part of that mingling it was the only time she and Adam had found that she could split away from the group.

Adam smiled when she entered and motioned for her to lock the door. His room wasn’t an office so much as a study, and it was as old as the rest of the building. Fine hard woods and soft leather furniture. The room made Gwen relax on instinct, it was imposible to be anything but comfortable in a room that smelt of books and looked just that little bit worn enough to be comfortable. The first time, though, she had been terrified by the room and why he had called her out to speak with him.

“How’d it go?” He motioned to the burbon and she picked it up and sipped out of obligation, the stuff really did taste terrible. He followed suit with his own drink.

“Josh clipped my shoulder, but at least he didn’t call an instructor over.” She shrugged with the sore shoulder and cringed when the blooming bruise pulled.

“You need to work harder on that.” He lent back into the large chair, and the thoughtful frown he had made her feel a stab of guilt. He had been going out on a limb for her from the beginning, and she couldn’t even hold up her end of the bargain.

“I know.” She sighed with resignation, falling back onto the large chair at the back of the small room, the other chair at his desk made her feel like she was at school, this chair made her feel like she was at a psych office, but it was perferable to memories of school.

Adam proped his bare feet onto the tables surface, kicking a pen off the table in the process. They both watched it roll across the floor before stilling. “It doesn’t matter.” He took another sip and Gwen set hers aside. Alcohol was vile, and she didn’t understand it’s purpose in life. “You’re doing your best,” he looked momentarily doubtful, “aren’t you?”

“Yes!” That she knew. There was no more of her to put into any of this, the bits she had felt like they were breaking apart as it was.

“Then that’s enough.” His doubt was gone, and instead he smiled encouragement. “We can’t ask more of you than that.”

She didn’t reply, wished she hadn’t put the drink on the ground and found her eyes jumping about the room, trying to read the titles on the spines of the books shelved against every wall surface of the room. Many of htem were in languages she didn’t even recognise the script for.

Adam ran his tongue across the tip of his upper teeth tasting the brandy and watching her. She could feel the weight of his eyes and was careful to slow the frantic movement of her own. She didn’t want to appear nervous. He hissed a soft breath out, “There were two last night?”

“Yes!” She sat up straighter at the prompt and met his eyes squarely. He was waiting for more information. “I went in early and waited, I saw only one inside. Like we discussed I went to leave, and outside I ran into another.”

“Alone?”

“I checked.”

“Did you kill it?”

She nodded enthusiastically, her stomach clamping at the memory of blood spray and torn flesh. He had fought back, and she had hesitated. “I cleaned up.”

“Good girl.”

That made her glare and he checked his smile.

“You are good Gwen, you did what has to be done.”

She nodded again. The Guardians had taken her in at the beginning of the year and had been training her ever since. Since that day she’d known what had to be done, when they’d told her about things that bumped in the night and took what they wanted. Most of the other ‘recruits’ had been younger, some only 14, and she had been a bit of an oddity amongst their numbers. She wasn’t the oldest, but it was clear what they thought of the older recruits.

Adam had shown up on her doorstep after the second month, he wasn’t sure why he had shown up or how, but he had and that’s when he told her what she already knew: there were evil things in the world and despite everything she was supposed to help kill it. She wasn’t sure why he’d chosen her to help him, but she was thankful for it when he took her aside and let her in on all his secrets. Nobody had ever trusted her as much as he did.

The one over whelming rule had been made clear: they had to be killed. When someone had asked what had to be killed the Guardians had looked disgruntled and spat out a word none of them could understand, one of the younger ones had offered an easier to understand word; Vampires. Some of the recruits had laughed, they hadn’t laughed for long.

“You’ll go back tonight?”

Gwen glanced at her watch, it was 10pm, the recruits would leave soon, and she’d go too. She wanted to ask for a night off, but leaning back in his chair Adam watched her and she found she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She decided she had tomorrow off work, she’d catch up on her sleep then, if she could. “Yeah.”

“Keep it subtle, if there are more, which there are likely to be, we don’t want to alert them.” His smile was wolfish then, and she tried to return in, but all she could think of was dried blood under her nails and missed sleep.



The car was parked half a block from the club and Gwen rested in her seat. It was too early to go in, but there hadn’t been enough time to go home. She’d locked the doors, wound the windows up and fallen asleep on the drivers set, her foot on the pedels and her keys in a firm grip incase something unexpected happened.

The street was empty, occassionally a stranger would walk down the sidewalk, but it was too late for workers, and too early for revelers. The street lamps worked perfectly, but they were well spaced out so there was more dark than light on the street. Some shops flashed neon lights onto the sidewalk, but they were locked and bolted against intruders.

Gwen was parked next to one of those shops, and the flicker of light over her closed eyelids continued to interupt her light doze. She pulled her arm over her eyes and tilted her seat back a little more, if she could get an hours sleep in she would be able to handle the night, at least that’s what she told herself. If she could just get that one hour.

Something tapped on the window by her head. Gwen nearly jumped out of her skin, and managed to drop the keys into her lap. She looked and found a man standing beside the drivers door looking concerned.

Tense Gwen picked the keys up again, and smiled politely at the man. He did seem rather worried. When he motioned for her to wind the window down, she cracked it open a little.

“What?” Her voice cracked and his concerned smile became amused.

“Did I wake you?” The patronising tone irked her but too her parents had taught her to be polite and she didn’t shut the window, even if she was planning how to start the car and get out of there with minimal effort if he did anything threatening.

“It’s been a long day.” She ground out.

He titled his head to the right, watching her through the crack and his smile was still pleasant when he told her, “You killed my friend.”

Her eyes widened, her pulse jumped and she took a practiced breath. The scenet as she inhaled was mostly bleach, which was telling enough, but under that she could detect the blood, blood she hadn’t managed to clean out properly. She tallied her options, the door wouldn’t hurt him much if she managed to unlock it and open it forcefully before he moved. And getting away… there was a reason she was still alive, and it had nothing to do with being infamous.

“I don’t know what your talking about.”

He scoffed. “You couldn’t have paniced more if you’d had a gun at your head.”

She wanted to tell him she could very well have, but bit the desire to do so down. She had a stranger standing by her car, the same one as the night before she realised now she was looking, and he knew what she looked like. He knew what she’d done. Adam was going to roast her if any of them found out what she looked like. The recruits animinity was their greatest power.

Stuff it, she decided with annoyance. “I’m sure I could have.”

This time it was a half laugh. “Sure,” he agreed, “I reckon you could have.” His smile was patronising and something else she couldn’t pin down. “Want to wind your window down a bit?”

“So you can bite me?” Her tone was asking if he thought she was that stupid, but she did it anyway, delaying the time she had to make a choice. If he lunged into the car she’d deal with it then.

“You do look tasty.” He was still smiling, but the tone changed and suddenly she was terrified that the window had been opened properly.

She had a personal war, panic setting in and her limbs beginning to show the effect of it with a soft treamor she despised. Her heart was palpitating at a dangerous rate and she could feel the sheen of sweat start to break out. But the choices were simple, encourage him and get him in the car, or get out of there and destory what Adam was working for.

She tried to smile, but from the bemused expression on the things face she failed.

“Don’t try so hard.” He suggested, and leant his hip against the car frame as if he owned it.

“Go fuck yourself.” She snapped in defense, and regreted it with a twinge. He seemed more amused.

“What would you do if I got in the car?” He tested, and she wondered if he was a complete idiot. She’d killed one of his kind, he could taste it in the air as much as any creature with hightened senses would manage, and he wanted to sit in the same seat? He wanted to lock himself in a car with her. The confussion must have shown on her face, much to her cargin. “I don’t think you’d do anything.” He reached in through the window, reached down and unlocked the door. The entire car unlocked automatically and she reacted to the clicking sound by reaching up to lock it all over again.

His hand blocked her efforts effectively, and she noticed he was warm. She knew they were warm, she’d killed enough of them to know that there was blood in their veins and it did it’s job, but it was strange to feel his hand in a motion that was completely unrelated to violance.

She realised she had frozen, touching him and she pulled back in shock.

“Don’t move.” He instructed, as if she could, and he walked around the car to the passanger side sliding into the car without the slightest hesitation. She stared at him gobsmacked, there was nothing violent in his behavior, nothing that suggested she was facing someone that could kill her all to easily and he wasn’t using one of his tricks. One of the tricks that didn’t work on her but she always recognised.

“What are you doing?” She found herself asking, shock and awe battling over which should predominate nad stealing her ability to respond in any other way. This monster was supposed to kill her- not put on seatbelts and wind down the window.

“I was going to let you decide on that.” He didn’t look at her then, just sat back the seat and scrunched his nose a little at something and waited for her to recover.


[WC 7,485]

At last I kind of like the story again. I was worried I'd write dry crap the whole time. I enjoy writing conversation, why don't I just skip to that normally? Fool me.
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Re: the Luminary

Post by GUTCHUCKER »

Wamphyri!
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Apocalyptus
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Re: the Luminary

Post by Apocalyptus »

Looking forward to hearing more of the mythology.
Kimra wrote:Next they'll be denying us the right to say "We'll rape your arse if you don't come to this fucken country."

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Re: the Luminary

Post by carbonstealer »

I don't trust this Adam guy, but then again that may just be his taste in clothing
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