drinks all around (finished)

[Idoya Maresol]

Idoya loved the nightlife -- la marcha. She couldn't believe how lucky she was to work at a club, being able to see the scene coming to life after dark, right in front of her eyes. The multicolored lights that swirled and blinked on and off filled the club, the music was always upbeat and pumped up the crowd, and the way people would dance through the blinking lights was hypnotizing to her. Intoxicating.

She longed to join them. As great as it was to sit back and stare at the spectacle swell around her, it was even more gratifying to be part of it. And it never took long for the dancing, eating, drinking and socializing to turn from a satisfying sight into a taunting one for Idoya.

"Mierda."She grumbled, looking up at the clock and tapping her finger against the cool surface of the counter impatiently. "That clock must be broken, I fuckin' swear por Dios." She had been glancing up at the grimy clock for the majority of her shift, counting down the seconds till her ten minutes of freedom. It wasn't like there was anything else to do. All the people dancing around had already gotten their fair share of booze (at least for now) and all of her coworkers were either using their ten minutes to party or had already called it a night, leaving Idoya in the dust.

God, she needed a drink.

She backed up to the rack of drinks behind her, looked around the bar and slowly wrapped her fingers around a bottle of vodka, hoping no one would catch her. Her gaze landed on a lone patron at the end of the bar and she sighed, setting the bottle back down and putting her hand on her hip. Great, now a customer decided to show up.

But her frustration suddenly turned into amusement after she saw the customer topple over and smack their face against the counter, either out of exhaustion, shame of some sort, or from pure drunkenness.

"Ay, you look like you've had a rough night." She said as she sashayed her way to her newcomer. She smirked at her teasing remark but made her smile into an empathetic one once she was in front of her guest. She leaned against the counter and cocked her head to the side so her hair would fall away from her eyes. "What'll it be, hon?"

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

*La marcha - spaniard slang for "The Nightlife";; Mierda - Shit;; Por Dios - To God

[Gideon Hellkelson]

Gideon half-stumbled into some random non-descript building, massaging the third and fourth rib on his left side. They seemed to have properly aligned themselves already, but the genuine discomfort brought about by having a werewolf ripping out a large chunk of his abdomen still hung around like a bad dream. Gideon had the ability to regenerate from virtually any injury, in his colorful career ever since this power had first manifested he had so far been decapitated, incinerated, torn in half, dropped in acid, and even eaten alive. None of those experiences had been particularly enjoyable. Gideon could regenerate indefinitely, but whoever decided to give him his powers, obviously wanted to have a little laugh and not spare him from the pain. That was what pissed Gideon off in a major way; he always had to deal with the phantom pain afterwards. Vampires could feel pain as well, but it was always said that they got over it quickly. Unfortunately, he didn’t. Sometimes the pain stuck on for hours, other times a shadow of it remained for days. Gideon suspected it may just be something psychological, but there was no real way for him to address that. He had approached a couple of hypnosis-experts and telepaths, but apparently his brain regenerated psychic-scars as well. That virtually made his mind impossible to be tampered with, even though he was totally open to the idea.

He hated engaging different supernaturals for different reasons. Mages were always a pain because they could kill you in so many different and creative ways. Gideon was actually quite jumpy-now whenever his pastor would suddenly switch into Latin during service, he half expected hot-lead to run through his bone-marrow again or something. Vampires were the most sadistic ones out there, they enjoyed playing with their food and always dragged out the process, and obviously for Gideon that process usually got dragged out pretty long. And then there were the werewolves, those over-eager bastards. A werewolf didn’t always understand right away that their basic power-through tactic didn’t work on Gideon, but they would keep on trying and the more frustrated they got, the more violent their attempts became. And that was why he was here now; the werewolf he just went toe-to-toe with just didn’t get the fact that Gideon’s arms grew back whenever they were ripped off. The fight lasted about forty minutes before the werewolf finally let the arm thing go. That was all that Gideon really needed though, his arms so that he could reach into his belt and replace his magazine with the one with the silver rounds and shoot that shmuck.

"Ay, you look like you've had a rough night. What'll it be, hon?" asked a distinctly female voice, with a Spanish accent. Gideon was face down on the counter, clutching his side from the ghost pain. He managed to lift his head, and look at the person talking to him. “Waddya want?” he asked in a very thick Boston accent. He realized that she was a bartender, and looking around he apparently had stumbled into a bar or club of some sort. With a little bit of effort he straightened himself up. “Oh, I’m in a bar am I? Just gimme whatever’s the strongest thing you have here and enough of it to kill me with alcohol poisoning.” said Gideon sardonically. Obviously he couldn’t die from alcohol poisoning. His body actually prevented all toxins and poisons from affecting him, which included getting drunk. But there was little else he could do; the only way he could really get rid of the pain was if 250 mm of morphine was pumped into his system every second. Besides, drunk or not alcohol had a certain nostalgic sense about it.

[Idoya Maresol]

"Waddya want?" asked the disheveled blond man, almost on instinct. She just chuckled under her breath and waited for him to cool down. She had encountered people with a strong attitude many a time in the club, mostly when they had come already with problems flying around in their head and after they had a drink, becoming the fighting type when buzzed. Luckily she had been in this line of work long enough to know how to handle a situation like this and knew when to intervene, or to take a step back so they could sort themselves out on their own.

Idoya could tell this particular man wasn't drunk. Just looked like he was in some type of pain, like he recently got out of a scuffle and was trying to walk it off before wandering in the bustling club. The weird thing about him was that there wasn't any real signs of damage. She figured by the way he was grimacing that his body would look like all kinds of fucked up, but she couldn't even see one measly scratch on him. Still, she felt bad for the guy. It was obvious that he had been beaten up badly, bruised or not.

"Just gimme whatever’s the strongest thing you have here and enough of it to kill me with alcohol poisoning." Her smile grew. She had a feeling she was going to like this guy.

"Well I can't promise you that since I don't want a dead man on my hands," She joked, unaware of how truly unlikely it was for him to die. "But tell you what, the first couple of shots are on the house if you let Lupe here join you." She said, pointing to herself with one hand while she leaned back and held up the previous bottle of vodka with the other. She rested the bottle in front of him and quickly took out two shot glasses, gently setting them down before looking back at him. "Complimentary if you keep mum about me drinking. Comprende, amigo?" She said, reaching under and ready to pull out the stool from under her counter. It really didn't matter if he said yes or no because she was going to sit down anyways, but it didn't hurt to be polite in front of her customers. Of course his answer did matter if he wanted to actually pay for his drinks or not.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

*Comprende, amigo? - Understand, my friend?

[Kaigen Korrick]

Keeping his head down, hands stuffed in his pockets, Kaigen quietly headed down the street. He didn't want to attract too much attention to himself right now, especially since he had just robbed a clothing store.

Arriving some time earlier this morning, Kaigen had been on the move. The house he'd left from had a few old clothes which he'd picked up. Nothing fit, the shoes had been small and hurt his feet but they would do. Better then to draw attention to his half naked self. It did not have running water, so on all he could do was wash his hands and face off from the rain water collection of a tire swing. He could smell the blood on himself.

As he had entered the city, he got the strangest feeling but ignored it.

The first clothing store he'd found did not fit his taste at all, but it was something. The girl at the counter, pretty little thing bless her heart, would not take her eyes off of him. Something about his presence just seemed to radiate 'trouble'. It was a while before she was distracted enough with another customer for him to make his move. As soon as he had a few articles, he'd beat it out of there like a bomb was about to blow. This was certainly not the first raid of his life.

A red and black patterned shirt that stretched tightly across his broad shoulders but fit otherwise, some blue jeans that were comfortable enough, and some cheap ass Reebok's but he wasn't trying to go for style here. The next store he went to, he changed in the restroom. He couldn't risk rinsing off at a sink, if anyone saw how bloody he was, they would call 911 for sure. On the way out, he swiped a pair of dark reflective sunglasses.

Back on the streets, his gaze lifted slightly, checking the location of the sun. It was just creeping over the top of the tallest building. He estimated that he had about four more hours of daylight. He'd have to find someplace to sleep tonight. He didn't want to be out here after dark.

He also did not want to spend another night with an empty stomach. It had been part of the reason why he even decided to come into this city. He'd been avoiding big towns ever since Chicago.

The noise from the club drew his attention over the rest of the city. An idea occured to him and he just shook his head at himself. He must really be desperate... Still, it woukd be better than dumpster diving, which he refused to do.

As he entered, the din and flashing lights, even with his shades on, disoriented him. Taking a few seconds to adjust, he began moving along the row of tables. When he felt noone was looking, he would grab tip money, if there was food on a plate he would take the plate. One of the tables had an open togo box which he filled up with his findings. With everyone dancing and talking, drunk ans laughing, he managed to earn 7 dollars and a box of assorted foods. He even snatched a glass of water which he tucked in the crook of his elbow and strode for the door.

[Gideon Hellkelson]

"Well I can't promise you that since I don't want a dead man on my hands. But tell you what; the first couple of shots are on the house if you let Lupe here join you." She brought out bottles of vodka and placed them in front of him. The clear liquid brought back fond memories of missions with Marie-Claire in Russia. They were times spent in a hastily pitched tent in the middle of the Siberian Dessert, with nothing but the strong drink and each other to keep warm. It started out happy, but then quickly became sad. Losing Mac was one of the terrible things he’d ever experienced in his life. Actually, it was painful enough for him to wish he had just died, it was just a shame really that his body didn’t decide the same.

"Complimentary if you keep mum about me drinking. Comprende, amigo?" her voice pulled him back to reality, and with the practiced action of a man trained to give out nothing during an interrogation, he cleared his smoothed out his expression. He let it ease though, she was just a bartender nice enough to have a little chat with him, she wasn’t about to ram foot long iron spikes underneath his fingernails.

“Are you kidding? With a teacher’s salary, I’d be a fool to pass up anything free.” he answered with a smile. She seemed to take it as a good sign and she poured the first round for the both of them. He took the shot glass and tipped it slightly towards her before downing all its contents. The alcohol rushed down his gullet full of concentrated heat. It quickly rushed through his bones, traveling the highways and byways of his body and filling it with warmth. Unfortunately, it only lasted for a few blissful moments moment his damn powers took effect and immediately broke down the alcohol into tame and harmless water. All the sensations that went with the vodka disappeared as well. It was anti-climactic to say the least, and Gideon placed the shot glass back down on the table.

“How many free shots do I get again?” asked Gideon, he looked at the entire bottle of vodka and twenty of it wouldn’t put him out, so what would a few little shot glasses do? It was a pretty negative train of thought, until for the first time he realized that the phantom pain had left his body completely. Well, at least something was going his way tonight. Or at least that’s what Gideon thought.

Being trained as an expert soldier provided Gideon with a certain set of skills; a certain set of skills that made him a very dangerous man. Such a skill was to be aware of your environment at every crucial moment and be on the lookout for what was out of the ordinary. If you were once a man expected to get in and out of places that were supposed to be impenetrable, you tended to need it. From the corner of his eye, Gideon watched as a shady individual made his way around the club pilfering whatever he could get his grimy hands on. He even went for the tip jar, which Gideon had previously been able to count as containing about seven dollars. He could only imagine how minimally important that amount was to this nice bartender lady. But for what it was worth, Gideon just didn’t agree to the idea of something being stolen from her after she was so nice to him.

He raised the little shot glass in front of his face before talking to her. “How much do you think this shot glass costs? A dollar? Dollar fifty? Either way, what I’m about to although it seems quite rash but I think you’d rather use that small amount than seven dollars.” With that, he immediately spun around his chair and hurled the shot glass as powerfully as he could.

The throw had been superb, the type that would shame a baseball all star. Gideon wound up his arm feeling the muscles and tendons on his chest and shoulder stretch until them were painful, then the electric jolt from his mind traveled in a split second and every single muscle fiber tensed and contracted launching the shot glass from a human slingshot. His muscles and tendons contracted so fast that they tore from the stress. The human body was superb, when pushed to its limits it could perform insane feats, but usually at a cost. Gideon didn’t have to pay that cost though, so he didn’t fear to keep on pushing. By the time that the glass left Gideon’s fingertips, his body had already repaired itself. But the shot glass was traveled fast, with enough force behind it to knock a man off his feet. That same glass smashed at the back of the thief’s head though.

[Kaigen Korrick]

Many men, many, many, many, many men
Wish death 'pon me
Lord I don't cry no more
Don't look to the sky no more
Have mercy on me

Thus was the song that slowly trickled through Kaigen's groggy head as he slowly rolled his face off of the door. He blinked a bit and lifting a hand, lightly touched the back of his head, knocking a few shards out of his hair. It felt like he had been shot in the back of the head. The sound of shattering glass could have been a gunshot as the missile connected. There were even still a few of the larger pieces of glass actually embedded in his scalp. And something was wrong with his nose...

Very slowly, Kaigen sat up. His head was spinning, and the flashing strobe lights and blaring music were not helping his headache. As if on cue, the lights came on and the music stopped as people realized someone had just been shot, though several people who were closer to Kaigen, pointed out the glass. His ability to heal was slowly, painfully, pushing the glass out of his head as the wound closed itself, having worked from inside his head, out. Getting your noggin knocked against a door was not good for the brain. Finally, his nose fixed itself with an audible crack. Someone was going to die today.

With a guttural roar that did not sound remotely human, Kaigen was on his feet. His voice boomed as he bellowed for half the city to hear. "WHO!? Who is the goddamn mother fuckin..." What followed was a very long, and colorful narration of all of the things Kaigen was going to do to whoever threw the glass. Their mom was going to gain a few new holes...their gramma was going to find her missing teeth shoved up somewhere...someone's head was going to be rearranged... This monologue is of course, not appropriate to be properly expressed but was every bit as expressive as it sounds. Several people learned some new words, and everyone's ears were burning.

A path had opened up while Kaigen was spewing out his obscenities as all non-guilty parties stepped away from him, everyone looking at each other and around them, and moving out of the way until the culprit, Gideon, was the only one left.

"You?"He was on his feet and advancing menacingly, staring down his new chew toy. If he had known what he was, he would have shifted then. As it were, his wolf was not quite desperate enough to force a change as it would take a lot of effort and energy. Kaigen was half starved, and it would only be a few more days before his wolf took over to force him to eat, as he had the night before on the full moon. This time though, when he changed back, there wouldn't be anything in his stomach to throw up. Nor would there be any people left in the city... "You did this," holding up his bloody fingers, pointing at the back of his head, "just because a nigga wanted to get some"...more colorful words..."food?" Hell, they were just going to throw it away anyway. He just saved himself the disgrace of digging in the dumpster for it.

It was at this moment that he realized what had just happened. He reached up again and touched the back of his head, finding the wound almost completely closed. Suddenly very confused, he frowned and rubbed his head as if looking for where the wound had been. He turned back around, looking at the mess behind him, even the blood spot on the door where his nose had been, then back around. A lot of people were also looking rather alarmed and confused.

He growled then, another inhuman sound that also surprised himself, but he covered it well this time. Whatever he was, he liked it. "You are going to die now mudda fucker." Reaching behind his back, for a gun that was not there...which no one in front of him knew wasn't, which caused a whole lot of screaming and running while Kaigen froze for a moment while his hand groped for a weapon that was not there...feeling rather foolish. At any rate, he used the ensuing chaos of everyone running and ducking- to make a beat for the door. He even went to grab what food he could, he had very much earned it, stuffing it back in his box. The tip-jar had been held as well as the food, and had shattered when he dropped everything so he just grabbed a fistful of dollars and stuffed them in a pocket. Then reaching for his shades, found them broken. This raised a few more very choice curses from him. He had liked those. There were a few people who had been behind him against the wall, who knew he had nothing. One of the not so intelligent men started snickering.

With a vicious snarl, Kaigen grabbed the water glass that had managed not to break because it was a slightly thicker form of plastic, and threw it with all of his own considerable strength. The results were similar, though not quite. The cup shattered in the man's face, made a lot of blood and lots of cuts, but nothing stuck. And since this guy wasn't a werewolf and wouldn't heal half as fast, he was probably going to need stitches. This of course riled up the rest of the stupid people and Kaigen went for the door again.

[Gideon Hellkelson]

Temper, temper, Gideon usually had a pretty good reign on his own, but it may have been the general bullshit fest of the day that made him particularly cranky. He really shouldn’t have hurled that shot glass; it was crass and violent, not at all the type of deed he’d want his students to emulate. But either way it was done but the situation was far from finished. As soon as it was clear that the crook didn’t go down for the count, despite getting hit at the base of his skull with enough force to tip over a bull, Gideon knew something was up. A normal human, no matter how tough would have been sprawled all over the ground by now, in fact that was Gideon’s intention. If he had been human then things would have been over and done with now, but obviously he wasn’t. Spending the last couple of years in Arc, the fact that this guy was a supernatural didn’t surprise Gideon anymore. It seemed that every other guy around the corner was. He gave an internal sigh before he stood up ready to engage whatever it was. Before he moved though, he reached into his back-pocket though and pulled out a couple of bills halving his already meager public school teacher salary. He placed it down on the counter and spoke to the woman, who he had barely enough time to even call an acquaintance.

“Thanks for the drink; I hope this’ll cover the damages.” Who was he kidding? What he placed down would barely cover anything, but he needed to eat too didn’t he? The meager sum would deal with a little bit at least. The man made a sound like a low growl and at once Gideon knew what he was up against, another friggin werewolf. He hated the mutts, if that wasn’t clear enough. They all had to be put down in Gideon’s opinion and he knew no better dog catcher in the world than him. He walked forward, easy steps but his long legs covered the distance quickly. It was obvious that the guy was having a rage fit, but what made it really blatant was when he suddenly threw a hard plastic glass at one of the other patrons and messed up his face. The barefaced act of violence was enough to send the rest of the club into a panicked frenzy as everybody tried to bolt away from the foreseeable brawl as quickly as they could. The man, No…the mutt, took advantage of everybody running for the exit and did the same. Gideon could have let it alone, but it was too late. He hated werewolves enough to want to see all of them dead, and this one seemed to give him all the more reason get aggressive.

He pushed his way across the throng of people, throwing his weight around because being polite was simply out of the question already. He pushed the guy ahead of him, his strong arms causing about three more people up ahead to fall on their faces. Without even thinking, Gideon leapt over them like some half-crazed professional athlete and ran after the werewolf. He saw the guy just at the edge of the street and Gideon pushed his legs to their limit. He was a perfect specimen of human development and conditioning, further more his body produced no fatigue toxins and his muscles knitted themselves up whenever they were over exerted. Building up speed, he began running fast enough to be clocked at 78 kph. The distance between him and the guy was closing quickly, and Gideon knew that the melee was going to be inevitable. So with the momentum brought on by his berserker charge, Gideon bent forward readied his shoulder and went for one of the most powerful full-body tackles he ever performed in his life.

He felt his collar bone shatter and his arm dislocate. The pain was crazy but both he and the werewolf pitched forward from the collision. Gideon remembered all his training, not just from the army but those two years of college where he was a line backer for the university football team. Before hitting the ground, he curled his body as tightly as he could and rolled across the face down werewolf into an upright position. Once again, training got the better of him, using flowing momentum from all that movement Gideon spun around, flailing his leg until the back of his heel made contact with the side of the werewolf’s jaw. Gideon felt his heel shatter just as his collar bone and arm mended themselves. He fought through the pain, werewolves didn’t go down easy, but they had their own soft underbellies. Still in the same spin, he wound up his fist before slamming it straight into the werewolf’s solar plexus. More bones broke, but the werewolf would have been thrown back against the wall. Gideon slowly stepped forward; only one step caused him to limp because by the next one his foot was fall better. His knuckles followed not too long after, and they were fixed enough for him to hold out his hand towards the mutt.

“Fork up the cash snoopy. I’m going to be taking them from you either way.” He said. He didn’t have his guns or his wasp knife, but Gideon wasn’t scared. What did an immortal man have to be afraid of anyway?

[Kaigen Korrick]

Kaigen watched the man coming for a moment as he stood at the door before he shook his head and bolted down the street. Something was seriously wrong with this guy, and he'd rather put some distance between them. Unfortunately, someone must have pumped some steroids in his green smoothie this morning because the next time Kaigen glanced over his shoulder, the guy was running like his ass was on fire and the next instant, Kaigen was face on the ground, all the wind knocked out of his chest, his to-go plate full of half eaten munchies was scattered in an artful array down the street. Mother fucker...

No sooner had his head lifted up, than he was sent flipping over with his jaw dislocating, and then slammed against the wall with lights sparkling in his eyes from the solar plexus shot. He had never been hit there before. For a whole two minutes he couldn't breathe or move, and had taken to a knee. He felt like he might be sick, if he hadn't thrown everything up this morning. Finally, his body recovered, healing the worst problems first, his jaw snapping back into place with excruciating pain that he could not gasp because he could not breathe yet. A lesser man would have started whimpering and begging for his life right then and there, but Kaigen was no stranger to getting a beating, but never had he met someone with so much force. Nor had his body ever been able to snap a jaw back into place. For the last time, what the HELL was going on?

“Fork up the cash snoopy. I’m going to be taking them from you either way.”

Now, Kaigen had done this before. Back when he was like...what...17...bullying a 13 year old for their lunch money? Kaigen glanced around but didnt see any little kids. Slowly he stood up, not making any sudden movements. He had to take several breaths, a hand against the wall to steady himself. This guy was off his rocker or something, and he didn't want to provoke him anymore. Not only did gettin hit hurt, the recovery right after hurt more. He looked the man in the eye and glared, but soon dropped his gaze. Human's played dominance games just as much as any wolf. It was often what decided who got the promotion, or who ruled the house, the parent or the child. He had never been aware of it before, but now that the subtle suggestion seemed instinctual to do it, he could recall other people had avoided his glares in the past. He didn't feel like pushing his position. This guy knew more about what he was capable of than he did. He would have to figure out what was going on and soon.

"Man I thought you white ass crackers had evolved from the stone ages when a black guy couldn't ride the bus. Last time I checked, 10 year olds stoled tip money and no-body ever tried to kill them for it. You can call the police if you want and make sure, but I don't think I broke no damn law. You the freak commitin assault. I just want some food if it all the same to you. Let me walk off and I'll go to Subway and get me a foot long tuna melt and be a happy guy or we can continue this, somebody gonna get dead and for what? You wanna play super hero or somethin? Did you drink too much chemical X this morning, Bubbles? Man go save a baby from a house fire if you wanna be a hero nobody give a damn 'bout no 7 dollars."

Kaigen was acting as cool as he could be with all the brovado of someone in complete control of a situation. He knew he was frontin because his heart was hammering a mile a minute. No normal person could do what this one just did. He hoped he could talk the guy into a rational mind and get out of there. They weren't exactly alone either, they were in the middle of the street. Given, most of the people were already in the bars and food stops, but there were still a few passers-by who were staring at them now but probably hadn't seen what happened. Surely someone from the Club had called the police by now too. Maybe if he could stall long enough...he didn't think he would be in too much trouble for his part. No one would believe assault either though because from what he could tell, he was fine now. Except that he had a record...and there were a lot of unsolved murders that could be linked to him...

Normally, he would have been fighting for all he was worth, but he did not know what he was dealing with, and if he just kept healing like he did, it seemed like it would just be one long painful fight. If the guy wanted to push it, fine, he would give up the 7 stupid dollars they weren't worth this. But he better pray Kaigen didn't find him later when he knew what he was.

[Gideon Hellkelson]

Gideon raised an eyebrow at the mutt. What the hell was he talking about? It was like he didn’t know what the hell he was and what the hell this entire city was about. He thought it was a white supremacy issue, which Gideon honestly found quite laughable. From all his years as a Black Ops agent, he found out that whether the people he was up against were White, Black, Asian, or Hispanic it didn’t really matter. The only thing that mattered was how much slower their trigger fingers were than when compared to his. But those days were gone. They went with Glen Iver, while this new life where vampires, werewolves, witches, and demons ran amuck was where Gideon Hellkelson scraped through day after day. High school Algebra teacher by day, Supernatural Hunter by night, or sometimes early afternoon. It wasn’t a pretty life, but circumstances forced Gideon into it, and this mutt over here was totally out of the loop. Was he from some magical rainbow land where the all supernaturals weren’t at war? That place would have to be so naïve if this mutt didn’t automatically think that his being a werewolf was enough cause for Gideon to want to kill him…unless he didn’t know he was a werewolf. But really, how dense did somebody have to be not to know they were a werewolf? It was a pretty obvious change wasn’t it? Gideon couldn’t help but let out loud belting guffaws.

He didn’t know how long he was laughing, probably a minute at least, but when he finally managed to calm himself down, all seriousness returned to his face and he spoke. “Listen you Whoah-monga,“ began Gideon, the derogatory Boston insult may have been lost to the mutt but Gideon didn’t care and merely continued.”This isn’t a racial thing…Okay, technically it is, but not the kind of race thing you’re thinking off. You see, I hate frickin werewolves, along with vampires, mages and the restuv’yah. It’s pretty much mah thing going around and killing whoever I find. This isn’t even about the 7 dollars you budged; it was just a matter of principle that I don’t get any blood on them when I give them back to the nice lady at the bar.”

That was really the meat of Gideon’s motivations. Werewolves and Vampires took everything from him. They took his team, they took the woman he loved, and they took his life. What other reason was there that would spark such a deep-seated and burning hatred inside a man? His hate for the supernatural creatures was what fueled his personal vendetta. There were times when that was the only reason that Gideon even got up in the morning. He wasn’t really going to rough up this guy, especially not for stealing seven dollars. But when he saw this guy regenerate, and when he heard this guy growl, the decision to kill had more or less been made for him.

Gideon cracked his neck before he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out what appeared to knuckle dusters lined with big silver studs; yeah a couple of silver bullets between the eyes would finish this right away but Gideon felt like this mutt needed a more personal death for being so loud-mouthed. Gideon didn’t appreciate any of that smack about him saving a baby from a burning house and all. This werewolf really had to understand that some humans weren’t just snacks, and some of them could really bring down a lot of pain. He had a precious few minutes to finish this fool before the police got here, so he needed to finish quick. There was no problem there; the knuckle duster would make sure the werewolf didn’t regenerate while Gideon thrashed him to a pulp.

Gideon slowly stepped forward, winding his arm around to loosen his shoulder. “Do you have anything you want to say werewolf? I’mma gonna go for your jaw first, after all.” said Gideon. He was confident that even with the warning he would be able to dislocate the mutt’s jaw.

[Kaigen Korrick]

Kaigen could only frown a little as the guy started laughing his ass off. What? Was it that weird that he hadn’t figured out what he was yet? It had only been two months…He remembered bits of it, but the Wolf had been in complete control and it didn’t matter what Kaigen could do, he wasn’t in the picture. His mind had blocked out a lot of it, and he refused to think about the rest. He would rather it stay that way. He knew he couldn’t go on forever in the dark, sooner or later he would have to figure it out and accept it, but for now, he was pretty clueless. Ok, maybe not entirely clueless, but he had never really knowingly dealt with any of the supernatural before. Some people just go their whole lives never facing one on one a real supernatural. Or at least, not that they were aware of.

Watching the guy as he finished catching his breath, Kaigen shook his head a bit. He was starting to get angry, and it wasn’t just a normal human angry. He grunted a little, and when the guy finally sobered up and started talking, Kaigen listened. He was about to get to the meat of the story, he could tell.

“Listen you Whoah-monga,“ Yea, the term was mostly lost on Kaigen, but he knew an insult when he heard one. His eyebrows narrowed, but he listened. ”This isn’t a racial thing…Okay, technically it is, but not the kind of race thing you’re thinking off. You see, I hate frickin werewolves, along with vampires, mages and the restuv’yah. It’s pretty much mah thing going around and killing whoever I find. This isn’t even about the 7 dollars you budged; it was just a matter of principle that I don’t get any blood on them when I give them back to the nice lady at the bar.”


A werewolf? So that was what this was all about? Kaigen started laughing himself. Laughing to cover the fresh wave of fear at the man’s words. His laughter wasn’t quite as heartfelt as Gideon’s had been, it was more a nervous laugh but it worked none the less. He did not like the threat the man promised. He knew what the man could do, sort of, and he was not looking forward to experienceing that again. Still, his words belied his true feelings as he tried to keep a brave facade up. It would not do for the man to know how trully worried he was.

“Look jamook.” Chicago had its own insults. “I think you’re crazy. Psycho-psychotic-neurotic-cockaddict that’s what you are. Now…get up off me man I’m tired of playing your games…”

Kaigen made to wave him away, turning as he started to walk off, but stopped as he caught in the corner of the eye, the man reaching for something from his pocket. He turned slightly, to look at it better. Kaigen started to laugh, but something inside him cowered. It made him nervous that he would suddenly feel that way about the dusters. It wasn’t something he’d seen a lot of, but people came up with all kinds of hand to hand weapons. Kaigen knew this guy could pack a punch, that was not a revelation, but the Wolf inside him seemed to see something about them that had it freaking out. Kaigen eyed the silver studs. The idea of getting beat to death did not appeal to him. He really needed to get away from this guy…

“Do you have anything you want to say werewolf? I’mma gonna go for your jaw first, after all.”

Kaigen blinked at the man. Backing up against the wall, it was clear he was really starting to get scared. He watched the man putting on the dusters and gulped. “L...Look man…take the money...just take the money ok?” He reached in his back pocket; pulling out the small wad and…practically threw it at him. ““Let me go, I don’t want trouble man, I’m just trying to live like every other sorry-ass. I ain’t from ‘round here you can probably tell. If I was a werewolf, I think I would know. He did know, that was the problem. Normal people didn’t heal that fast, nor did they black out and wake up blood covered. What the guy said answered a few questions, but it also seemed to be a death sentence. He must be one lucky bastard to have pissed off a Hunter his first day in the city.

[Gideon Hellkelson]

Gideon’s slow advance inspired such fear in Kaigen, it was observable in the other man’s eyes and in his bearing. Whatever allowed him to hold his head up high was now all but gone. He was cowering in the corner, his inner werewolf instinctively fearing the polished silver studs that lined the knuckle-duster. The thrill of the kill pumped a lot of adrenalin through Gideon's system and his entire body felt like a tightly coiled spring ready to be released. To some degree he seemed to enjoy this. It was rare that he got to ease up on a kill, rare that he truly got to relish the damage he put into the creatures that destroyed his life. It was usually BAM BAM BAM!! Over as soon as it began. The opportunity that presented itself before him was practically mouth-watering for his hunger for revenge. But to delay his gratification had a strangely twisted sort of high to it.

Gideon’s eyes focused towards the werewolf in front of him, and he stopped winding his arm around only to have his arm tense up his biceps bulging. His fist tightened into a ball, heavy and dense like the head of a sledgehammer. The muscles on his shoulder and arms tensed, this position was a familiar and the muscle memory seemed to tingle beneath his skin in the excitement. He was close enough now, and he pulled his arm back ready to snap it forward and take the werewolf by the jaw. First strike was to spasm, second one was to shatter the hinge, and the third one would dislocate it completely. But the beating wouldn’t stop there; the jaw was only to make sure that should a shift occur there would be no biting. Gideon already perfected how to systematically bring down a werewolf. Strike at the pelvis would destroy mobility; dislocating shoulders would address the issue of the claws.

Gideon’s arm finally moved like a piston, Gideon felt something hit his chest with a smack, but he ignored it and continued on. It had been the seven dollars, which now lay on the ground unnoticed. Perhaps later Gideon would remember them later. The beating was about to be administered like a brutal pop quiz, but then the other man practically shouted something in panic.

“Let me go, I don’t want trouble man, I’m just trying to live like every other sorry-ass. I ain’t from ‘round here you can probably tell. If I was a werewolf, I think I would know.”

To Gideon it felt like one of those record-scratching moments on old T.V. shows. His fist halted about half-way through the punch, and it dropped to his side while one of his eye brows reflexively rose in question. He straightened up and moved a little bit away from the werewolf. At first, there was no change of expression on his face, but then the corner of his mouth began to spasm. One would have thought that Gideon was having a mild seizure or something, but soon the quirking of his lips turned into outright laughter. Laughter may not have even been the most appropriate word. It was one of those boisterous, obnoxious guffaws that would make it seem as if Gideon was laughing at Kaigen’s very existence.

Gideon continued laughing for a good long minute or so before he finally stopped. He wiped a tear from the corner of his eye and clutched to his abdomen. He hadn’t laughed like that in such a long time, in fact he probably had been a hair’s breadth away from actually rolling across the floor from laughter.

“You really have no idea that you’re a werewolf? So all this time what did you think was happening to you? Hormones?!” he still let out a few more uncontrolled giggles.

“That’s rich, that’s just plain hilarious.” Gideon observably relaxed his stance and proceeded to take off the knuckle dusters and return them to his pocket.”I can’t kill you! You’re barely a werewolf at all!” he explained, but the mocking tone in his voice was as obvious as a slap to the face. But then suddenly his face darkened, and in an action that radiated deadliness he moved forward andd took Kaigen by the collar of his shirt. With an arm as strong as before he yanked Kaigen up so that they were both level with each other. The glee in his face had dissipated away and his expression seemed to be darkening even more by the second.

“Listen here, I’m going to let you live for today.” he began. “But what I want you to do is get strong, get vicious. Turn into something that’s worth my time trying to kill. Because when we meet each other again, I am going to kill you.” He tapped Kaigens’ cheek twice before unclenching his fist from the other man’s shirt.

[Kaigen Korrick]

Kaigen's hands came up around his face in a defensive posture, hands clenched in fists. There was anger in his eyes yes, but the wolf inside of him knew true fear, staring at the silver on the dusters. Kaigen was confused, he had been in numerous fights, this was no different, but his wolf was cowering. Kaigen's voice was embarrassingly high, affected by the fear in the wolf. He should have shifted, but he didn't have the control to do it, and he had a firm hold on his emotions so that there was no weakness for the wolf to exploit and force the change.

To his credit, even as the fist came flying in, despite the quaver of his voice he didn't flinch, he was prepared to defend himself, his fist lifting, arm turning so that he would deflect the blow, but it stopped upon barely even touching his arm. He growled, his other hand coming down for an uppercut to the guys gut but Gideon backed away and started laughing at him instead. Glaring at him, Kaigen seemed to visibly relax as the dusters came off, the wolf within him sinking back down. His eyes, which had taken on a yellow hue, dimmed. Of course he was well aware, he just wouldn't admit it to himself, least of all to this man, and that seemed to be what let him off. For now.

He didn't even bother to get miffed at the obvious insult to his insignificance as a new werewolf. He just continued to glare at Gideon, his face otherwise neutral. His arms dropped, and he seemed relaxed even though every muscle was tense and on edge. Here was a very dangerous man in front of him.

Gideon moved so fast, he had no time to react, the fist curling around his shirt and bodily lifting him to meet the man's eyes. Surprise replaced the glare, and Kaigen blinked back at him lamely. “Listen here, I’m going to let you live for today. But what I want you to do is get strong, get vicious. Turn into something that’s worth my time trying to kill. Because when we meet each other again, I am going to kill you.” Kaigen could feel the power and truth in the mans words, and the threat lain on him was thick and heavy. Oh he would get strong alright. He would figure all of this out, and he would be a force to be reckoned with.

His nerve was back, but "Yea...we'll see..." was all he said. He moved then, side stepping, his shoulder knocking against the other man's practically walking right through the guy in his way, an almost silent, "Freak..." whispered under his breath. He strolled casually over to the plastic container with the food everywhere, lifting the lid to see if there was anything left in the damn thing. There wasn't, so he straightened, kicked it into the street, shoved his fists in his pockets and stomped off, whether he'd been dismissed or not, he was through with this guy, and he wasn't coward enough to run for him, or even bother to look back at him to see if he was following.

And Gideon could keep the six dollars because there was still one in his pocket. Maybe he could buy a candy bar or something later...

[Gideon Hellkelson]

"Yea...we'll see..." replied the mutt before proceeding to shoulder check him. Gideon let out another chuckle at that, but let it go. It was a good start, a very good start. The guy seemed to understand that Gideon didn’t enjoy killing clueless idiots; there was something inherently wrong with it in Gideon’s own personal opinion. Afterall, you didn’t go around beating the crap out of mentally challenged people because they didn’t know that it was bad manners to look up a lady’s skirt. That was downright inhumane! Gideon paused at the thought; did he really just consider killing a werewolf inhumane? He mentally shrugged, it didn’t matter. His decision had been made, this mutt would get a second chance at life and he better make the best out of it.

The seed of vengeance had been planted, and Gideon knew that seed could grow into a relentlessly vicious plant. He knew because he was cultivating an entire garden of it inside of himself. The mutt would hate him now, and the mutt would get strong, get vicious and one day their paths would cross again. When that day would come, Gideon expected to find a true challenge. He watched as the mutt scooped up the plastic container with the leftovers, he waited to see if the money would be touched and expectedly they weren’t. The money was really what started this entire mess for the guy, there was probably a stigma of sorts to those seven dollars now. The mutt finally got up and walked away before disappearing around the corner of the street.

Gideon would have stayed longer, but suddenly the police sirens echoed from a few blocks ahead. It would be stupid to hang around here and get connected to the situation. Despite being a hunter, he still had his much needed day job. A highschool teacher called in for disturbing the peace would make headlines for sure, and Gideon wasn’t eager to have his face on the paper. He made a quick motion to collect the bills from the floor before running the opposite direction from where the mutt had headed. He flipped through the bills and counted but wait…

One…two…three…four…five…six

…just six?

“Mother fucker!” exclaimed Gideon.

---

FINISHED