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Sneaking into the Metropolitan is easier than it should be, and part of Vivienne is angry. She wants the hunt, wants the chase, wants the fierce pressure on her back, unrelenting and unyielding, guiding her like an arrow. But only part of her--mostly she wants for this job to be over. She's already fucked it up once, playing with her kill and letting him scream, just once--who would have thought that would bring anyone running, in the city? Her knuckles are still throbbing haphazard with pain, sore from the effort of wrenching her claws in and out of a concrete wall to slide out of sight in time as the patter of footsteps drew ever closer.
Her second mistake had been assuming he would die of his injuries anyway. Claws to the gut, to the ribcage; that's a messy, painful death, and he was a mere human, a stupid waker magi who had gotten involved with the wrong people, and pissed off someone who wanted him dead as a lesson. But he hadn't, and he's here now, and she's got a reputation to uphold. So despite the likelihood of him dying in this shithole hospital even without her aid, she's got something to do.
Shelling out for the illusion spell had been annoying, another tick in the long list of grievances of this annoying hit, but necessary now that she was on sleeper ground. It doesn't feel safe though. Her hand keeps rising to her neck, touching the small jade stone nervously. The witch said it would foil the cameras, and any sleepers who saw her, but don't count past that. Whatever. It doesn't matter, as long as she can get to his room. No cameras in hospital rooms, praise be to HIPAA and hallowed their name. The clipboard she stole says JOHN DOE, ROOM 225 and oh how lovely, the closest door says ROOM 215.
Vivienne walks steadily the rest of the distance, the stride of a woman who belongs where she is. The door to 225 slips open with barely a squeal of complaint from the hinges, and she hesitates in the doorway for a moment. Not out of doubt, just; appreciation for the moment, maybe. It's nearing midnight, and this room doesn't have a window. If she closes her eyes, she can only smell stale air, antiseptics, the cheap taste of plastic in the back of her throat. Her target is sleeping fitfully in his bed. She can see the lines of his bandages under his gown when his arms tense and quiver.
Those weren't any old lacerations that the man had suffered; that was the first thing that ran through Csasiel's head when he wrapped the tourniquet around his torso. It looked as if an animal had gotten to him, something big with teeth and claws. The police had said it was an animal attack and immediately had him vaccinated for rabies as a precaution, but that wasn't what Cassiel had seen. He'd gripped the man's limp fingers tightly, saw that it was no animal, but instead, a woman with pale hair. That wasn't ordinary at all, though Cassiel of all "people" should not have been surprised by that.
As he turned the corner, he saw the door to room 225 swing open. It was well past visitation hours, so Cassiel vaguely suspected it was just the regular check-up. Most never occurred well past afternoon though, and if he remembered correctly, this John Doe was off-limits for people to see (if there were people out there whose heart hurt for his injuries). He quickened his pace, and his fingers found themselves curled around the doorknob. It sent a jolt through his fingertips as he saw pale fingertips wrap around them, and he felt that he'd somehow seen these fingers before.
That put a dent in his plans if there was a witness in the room. If he was going to help this man, he had to help him now. He'd already gone through with checking if the room had security cameras installed. It was a stroke of luck for John, because if he was going to do it, he had to do it now. Cassiel leaned his weight against the door, and this time, it made a little more noise than it had for Vivienne. Stealth was not his goal, and there was no reason to hide from Vivienne. She could probably smell him from outside the door anyways, as long as the strong stench of antiseptics weren't interfering with her nose.
"It's past visitation hours, Ma'am," he said in a controlled voice, yet his face appeared to assert that he wanted her to leave. "You will have to excuse us to perform a regular check-up on the patient." He slipped over to the man's side, fingertips already pressed against the man's torso. She must have had her reasons; they all did, had a job to do, like how Cassiel's job was to make sure that this human lived.
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Last Edit: Dec 20, 2012 20:56:19 GMT -5 by CASSIEL VERIOR
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He smells like feathers and medicine, this man who interrupted her. He makes a spot between her shoulder blades itch like she's being watched, even though he looks human. Not for the first time, she wishes she were stronger. If she had her mother's power, she could smell him out easily, but she'd have to go tiger for that kind of sensory detail, and that's just not an option, not anymore. Her hand rises to the pendant again, magnetic. At least he doesn't know what she truly looks like, she consoles herself. The realization jerks her out of her reverie. She can still finish this, escape with her identity intact.
Her claws pop out silently except for the slight rip of skin. So faint that even Vivienne barely notices. "I think it's quite some time past scheduled check-ups as well," she says. "This can be very easy for both of us. I would prefer for it to be very easy for both of us, trust me. I would rather me in bed right now than finishing my job. But you have other patients, and I have only this one. It would be a shame if your--interference affected anyone else on this hall."
He knows that she's dangerous, but he also wonders if she realizes that not even ripping his own gut out would be enough to kill him. Cassiel's eyes are glued to the woman's hands, watching one rise to something around her throat. He knew that there was something different about her, not necessarily because of the way she looked, but because of what he had felt at the doorknob and when he had touched the man's wounds. But there was another thing, that he was also aware the man lying in the bed was a Waker, of all things, and if he didn't have a Sleeper as an assassin, there must have been something gone terribly awry. Cassiel's work didn't end once he'd brought a person, Sleeper or Waker, to the hospital; it began there. After all, he did not suspect that most patients survived their stay.
Cassiel's facial expression had yet to change. "Tell me this then," he said in a hushed voice. "I don't suspect your clients explain themselves to you, but what has this man done?" If the Waker had gone astray, Cassiel felt that he should be the one to either set him onto the right path or off him with his own hands as a last resort. He refused to watch another life slip through his fingers, not while he was on-duty. It was a shepherd's job to protect the flock.
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Well--that's slightly a problem. There's no way she can kill a Watcher, which is unfortunate. There's a pretty substantial check riding on this death. She shifts from one foot to the other. A Watcher. He can probably kill her, or at least try. Why hasn't he yet? A moral code? He is in this shit hole of a hospital, after all.
"It doesn't matter why my client want him dead," she answers. "I don't really care about the reasons myself. What matters is that I got paid money to go after him, and I'm going to get paid more money to kill him, and I have a reputation to keep up."
She tried to contort her facial expression into something resembling doe-eyed emotion.
Immortality had its perks, and while Cassiel wasn't exactly well off, he had plenty of time to accumulate a little bit of money. He also wasn't very sure how well a hired hand could put on the facade of vulnerability. If anything, it should be used as a mask to get what they needed. If he could lay a hand on her, it would have been easier to make the decisions, but instead, he shook his head. "If it is wealth you need, I can provide," he explained stubbornly.
He'd already begun his work. A soft, blue glow channeled its way into the Watcher's fingertips, into the bandages that were wrapped around the Waker's torso. The quivering of his chest slowly steadied, until the man had melted into a more peaceful sleep. The breaths were deeper, more controlled, and Cassiel's breathing had hitched slightly instead. A slow red spread across his own stomach, but he appeared unconcerned. It was nothing that his body would not heal in time. He was already moving his hands to the man's side.
"I have a reputation to save as well," Cassiel responded, as the glow returned, and more red spread across his own side. "I assure you, I will match the difference that you will lose by sparing this man."
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”You're a healer,” she said lightly, watching him tend to his patient. ”That's your power. Could you even hurt me if I decided I didn't want to talk with you about it anymore, if I just made my choice?” Hesitating, weighing her options. If she can get away with it, why not? Watchers are immortal, he wouldn't die. Oh, he'd probably be angry, but he wouldn't be dead. Her target would be though. She hasn't failed on a hit since she started this business up—it's one of her points of pride when courting new clients.
A Watcher though, a goddamn angel. And her father's voice echoing off the inside of her skull like a stupid pop song she couldn't get out of her head.
She scrubbed a hand through her hair in frustration. ”Fine,” she gritted out. ”But only because you're so pretty. And I expect that difference in cash, no checks that will bounce and when I turn back up here, you're long gone and the hospital says no one with your description ever worked here. Cash, or I find this idiot in the bed on the streets again and he won't live past the ambulance ride a second time. I promise that.”
He had other powers too, but Cassiel nodded anyways since it was the most useful to both his job in the hospital and as a Watcher. "No, I could not," he responded flatly. There were plenty of sharp objects lying about in the private ward, though he doubted any would do real damage to Vivienne if she was of a supernatural existence. He didn't want to cut her up anyways, not while there was a tense truce between the two of them.
Cassiel pauses for a moment, as if running thoughts through his head. Vivienne has given him no reason to distrust her, though she also gave him no reason to trust her. He pressed a hand against his stomach, unfazed by the bleeding. "Come with me," he said to her. "You can collect the difference where I keep all that I have accumulated over the centuries." And it was true. There was a safe locked up behind a wall of the abandoned chapel he frequented. Oddly enough, no city official had swung by to declare it for demolition, and no one bothered him there either. He had begun to cloak it anyways, just in case.
"If you trust me enough, that is."
He wondered if there was more he could do to help those extra "mouths" that Vivienne had to feed.
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He's honest at least, though Vivienne isn't certain if it's courage or stupidity to admit to a possible attacker that you can't defend yourself. She imagines it must the be human equivalent of rolling over with your throat exposed, claws sheathed. Normally she'd take such a gesture as a compliment, but she highly suspects that since he's a Watcher squandering his immortality on hanging out in hospitals nursing mortals, it's less him conceding to her superiority and more him being some awfully annoying do-gooder type. How dismal. She taps her fingers against her lip and considers his offer.
”I don't trust you,” she says quite frankly. Hey, no one said she wasn't honest either. Her hands might be a tad more bloody than his—or at least bloody for different reasons—but it isn't as if he has the moral high ground under a monopoly. ”I don't trust you at all, and there's a thirty percent chance that this might even be a trap, but I suppose I'll go with you anyway, for two reasons: first, that I want my money back more than I balk at the idea of risking a trap and second, I'm quite sure that I'm more than equal to whatever pedestrian trap you could come up with, no offense. You don't maintain a steady line of income in this line of work without being good.”
Vivienne steps away from the bed, finally dragging her gaze from her former prey, and offers a sardonic curtsy, left arm sweeping out for the Watcher to step through the door ahead of her. ”Age before beauty,” she chirps cheerfully.
HIDDEN in plain sight is a modern-day supernatural noir game set in New York City and sprawling the rest of America. Magic is real, and so are angels, ghosts, gods, vampires, and witches. It doesn't matter if you believe in them, because they're coming for you either way.
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