Celeste

who the fuck is he?

oh. oh. she was one of those vampire-jesus freaks, wasn’t she? dracula’s witness, as he’d dubbed them. gwen had mentioned something to him about them. he wasn’t really paying much attention though. things were starting to get a bit too charles-mansony for his tastes, so he kind of just… tuned out.

but no, to plainly answer her question, he doesn’t know her. he assumes she is some elvira, queen of the darkness type of girl by the way she speaks – self-aggrandizing and all –, but he fears that if he tells her that, she will probably slit his throat right open. and, as much as the ideation of her hands on his neck is very entertaining to him, he doesn’t feel like choking on his own blood… again.

wait, did she just call him dust? did she just call the guy pet? he was pretty sure the rest of the sentence was something in french – which he hated. a language full of made-up sounds that don't exist and that don't make sense. but that was absolutely besides the point. but she did just call him 'pet', did she not?

what the hell is this thing with nicknames? he kind of hates it. but he also assumes that’s kind of the whole point.

but then, after he’s done being annoyed by the whole nickname thing,  he traces back to what she said about deciding whether he lives or dies.

“listen, lady. i didn’t know there was some sort of test for this.” nor does he want to undergo any tests. “or that I had to work on my resumé before applying for the position.” his voice cracks a bit under the pressure of her nails. “but it’s unfair of you to say i have no accomplishments.” it doesn’t bother him, by any means, though. he knows he hasn’t contributed to anything but his own maintenance over the course of his life. he also doesn’t give a shit. still, he offers, “i dealt drugs for five years and i only got caught once.” like it’s some big accomplishment, more for his own amusement than anything else.

her nails dig deeper into his skin, he can feel cold blood tracing rivers down his neck now. he lets out a moan of pain before he speaks again, “look, I don’t want to do anything. i’m not very talented, as you yourself said. so why don’t you just go ahead and tell me what you want me to do, and we can get it over with?”

Maybe, if he was anywhere else than Salem, she'd have left someone else to deal with him. Each time this infant opened his mouth, there were fewer and fewer reasons given to her for reasons to make him stay alive. This was not who they were, nor what they represented. If anything, he was already presenting himself to be an abomination to their clan.

His little jokes and all.

Celeste tucked on his flesh, so his head would draw back closer to her. "Respect." The words were uttered quietly but with an order that echoed the centuries she had lived. "If you want to stay alive, that is." That, made her lips curve into a smile. "If not, well, why am I wasting my breath?" She would gladly tear his head from his body, gladly would colour the walls her favourite color - organ and flesh chunks and all.

"Getting caught once is a failure. Getting caught once means you weren't careful. Either you have no trust instincts, no IQ, no EQ, no strategic thinking, no thinking out of the box, no development plans, no sweet talking skills, and so on and on and on. If you escaped prison maybe then I would have been impressed." The fact that he didn't understand who he was talking to, infuriated her.

Why was she keeping him alive, again? A glance at Guillaume told her he was thinking the same thing. "Get it over?" Her fangs came out as she repeated his words. "You're getting a degree. I don't care how - you get that. And I want you to secure the rights to the Walhalla corporation." It was a big chemical producer through Massachusetts.

"You have six months."

Perhaps, had he not endured the past few centuries of those exact low blows, he'd have thought her comment was rather cruel. He'd claim that too much time had passed for him to truly miss them. He has lived longer without them than with them. Memories alone force him to seek the bottom of a bottle. So, his eyes glaze over, though the muscles in his jaw tense slightly

"Ah, Celeste. Your age is really starting to show." A hand is placed over his chest in mock sympathy. "It hurts me to see you this way," he says sarcastically. She could pretend to forget their names but he knew she hadn't forgotten how their bodies had turned into ash, eliminating any chance of resurrection.

"You must be nervous," he says indolently, "Yapping away like this. I hear Dracula is supposed to wake up soon." A crooked smirk. "Is this you, enjoying your last few days of walking around without your leash?"

Now blood, the whole aspect of ripping her teeth through flesh, getting her fangs to rip into a still throbbing artery? There was nothing that could compare to its ecstasy, certainly not a much of grains cooked into a dough. "If you think that layer of fat you put on by stuffing yourself on that is going to make me stop from ripping into flesh..." The vampire clicked her tongue before slowly licking her bottom lip.

"Your insults are still those of a five-year-old." She continued to comment. Yet, his comments about her age made her laugh. He must have spent a lot of times with humans to think she would ever worry about her age. Without the wrinkles of her skin, without the promise of each breath taking her to her grave... Age was the best thing to have. Celeste gathered centuries of experience and experiences. "Didn't know you cared for me that much."

If anything, she was waiting for Dracula to wake up, after all, he was her life companion and the time without him seemed just a little more dull. "You've been counting?" She asked. "Did you miss our dear old friend? Or are you ready to try again?" Kill them, that was. He'd been wanting to for so long, in any case. Or was it his own death that he wanted more? Not something she was ever going to grant him. Any witch who would try, would die by her hands before they even open the book of spells.

sure, the calling-him-mr.-davenport thing was hot, the comparison with ash, the insult… all things he very much enjoyed. not to mention the aura she exuded. of someone who could sever his head at literally any second. pretty hot, if you asked him. that is if he didn’t fear she might actually sever his head at any second…

there was also the issue of the guy she had brought which, frankly, asher wouldn’t mind, even if he hadn’t tried anything with any guys before – besides that thing one day with the boys in the band, but that is a story for another time. but, even if he was willing to try it out, he knew that her intentions were very distant from his weird midnight fantasies.

and then there was this whole conversation about rising like a phoenix and he started getting confused, because didn’t vampires die if they were lit on fire? Well, maybe she was just being poetic…

“uhh… okay.” he said, finally, eyes darting to the silent guy who had come in with her, expecting some reaction, but his dead stare revealed absolutely nothing. “i’m asher,” he quipped, repeating something she had already said, sarcasm as sharp as their eight (twelve?) joint fangs. “what’s your name?”

There was one thing to turn utter nothing, save a life, but it was another thing not to educate. That was strike two of three, for Elizabeth. Did she really want to use her last wish like that, did she really want to give up her life, her power for the sake of this... Good for nothing grain of dirt?

Her eyes settled on him, as she still had not said a word, Guillaume, however, stood still at the door, not knowing what was to come. True, not always was she predictable, not always did he know how things were going to turn out. Mostly, he probably just didn't want to end up cleaning the blood off the walls.

Especially when it was those little bits of flesh which he had to scrape.

Ah, Guillaume, they were all servants once. This too, shall pass.

"So... You do not know who I am, yet you're using his gift?" She asked, finally. No, it would never be his sire's gift, for all gifts came from Dracula. No, he should not hold gratitude to the woman who saved him, but devote his life to his clan.

Celeste moved through the room like the wind, settling herself behind Asher, as she gripped the back of his neck with her hands, her nails digging into his skin as the blood ran down his flesh, like a river of all things evil.

Yet, how tainted with mundane it was.

"This isn't a friendly visit, dust." She'd given him a nickname simply because he still existed in her presence. "This is who decides whether you are worthy of a life that was so carelessly given to you." Her nails only dug in deeper, while her servant, a French man from the 18th century, closed the door.

"Beau boulot, pet." She said to him, not even sparing a glance. She never spoke to him anything other than his mother tongue. It's how she kept him close and obedient to her, as he was grateful for his life, thus he put his life entirely in her hands. Such a good pet.

"You have nothing, you know. Nothing of interest which you could offer me or your master." Dracula, of course. "Your life has no achievements, no triumphs and it's been an embarrassment. Really, you should have died, and yet... Even your death... Pathetic as your life had been."

Celeste breathed in, her nails digging deeper into his flesh. "What are you willing to do for your life, dust? What are you willing to do for all that was bestowed on you?

Even now, as he could hear the radio being blasted from a nearby car, his ears bled from the manufactured and synthetic sounds people these days call music. Express Yourself? No, please, do less. Little, if anything, scared Victor these days, but people's enthusiasm when radios were installed into cars made him fear for the future of humanity. To willingly let someone talk to you when they were nowhere in your vicinity, to feel joy from it... they were heading into the dark ages.

Something he couldn't complain about was Cinnamon Toast Crunch. A family box in one hand, he eats out of the other like an obedient dog. The last piece is thrown into his mouth when he spots Celeste walking towards him. Victor had been accustomed to seeing her under the glow of the midnight moon or a dull lamp. The neon lights from street signs illuminating her features made her an all the more unpleasant sight.

"No thanks, I just washed mine." Slurred words, from an evening of finishing a bottle of whiskey in the ever-exciting confines of the motel reception desk. The Draculas and The Borgias could tear each other apart, for all he cared. Their blood was no longer his to spill.

"Are you on a diet?" He asks, in a lazy drawl, referencing the human she'd simply allowed to keep walking, as he takes slow and relaxed steps to approach her. "That's very unlike you."

Where was class these days? The older the world turn, the worse it got. IT seemed like manners were completely lost and the scum of the earth walked as if they were one of them. It was why she was proud of the Dracula corporations. There was class there and power and etiquette. There were rules which had to be followed. There was a structure in it that others very much lacked.

"Unlike some, I have taste." As if she would sink as low as to drink from someone who couldn't get the proper words out. Let alone have a rich enough dictionary to string together a proper sentence. No, she would not let the lower class touch her lips.

"Seems like you're drowning sorrows. Again." Such a pitty Victor lost those he loved so much. She was sure there was no one left, but because he was in town, she might pick up that file once more. Couldn't have someone like him having a happy life, now could she?. Not after what he poorly attempted to do. "Missing your loved ones, Vicky? Visit their graves yet? Did you find... Of what was her name... The name had a nice ring to it..."