From Russia With Love

Mina paced as she waited for Devon outside. The side entrance was for employees only so at least she didn’t have to deal with many humans coming and going. 

She still held the locket in her hand, rubbing it between her fingers as if the simple act would bring her peace. Of course, it didn’t. There was only one thing in her mind that would bring her peace. The truth. No matter how painful or how difficult she needed to know what had happened that night.

Marya was a child the last time Mina saw her. It was understandable that she wouldn’t recognize her sister, but Mina still couldn’t forgive herself for passing up this opportunity before. However, tonight she’d fix her mistake. Devon wouldn’t leave here until Mina had her answers. The first step in getting her revenge. Revenge that had been the main motivator to her move. Mina knew that she would never accomplish anything living in those caves with her father. Despite what he said justice needed to be serve by those closest to Nila. What better person then her beloved daughter? The child that she had such promise for but could never seem to live up to her expectations. That changed tonight.

When the door finally opened and Devon walked through Mina’s eyes narrowed into a steely glare. “Masha. How?” It wasn’t at all what she intended to say, but it was all she could choke out in that moment.

How. How what? How was she dancing? How was she moving? How did she breathe or speak or sing or live? How did she find the woman -- this very stranger, who wasn't so strange -- in a bar in New York City. How did she find her here again? This woman. This creature. This Original. 

Her eyes scanned the woman quickly. Without softening. Without curiosity. With steeled brown eyes and careful breathing. Like a snake before it struck. Like she was waiting for a sudden movement. A gasp for breath. A reason to strike. 

And then she saw it. Her locket in the woman's hands. Her eyes narrowed. There were very few things that Marya Volkonova -- now Devon McGinty -- had carried with her from the old world. From a time before elections and Tsars and any world war. From before the People, the Bourgeoisie. Before Nyen became Saint Petersburg became Petrograd became Leningrad became Saint Petersburg again. That locket was one of them. A token from her mother. From her family. Her father.

Her sister. 

When she arrived Melody was happy to see the girl. She went to the door and opened it. “Thank you for arrive on time.” She smiled. “Come in please. I believe you never been in my home right?” Melody walked to the living room. She was seeing in this the opportunity to create a better relationship.

The man didn't seem to be the regular type to come to a place like this, but then, Devon had learned not to be too shocked. She had seen so much. Seen too much. Learned not to expect too much of anyone. 

The Crimson Apple was interesting. Nothing as the real burlesque in 1920 but he could see the effort to maintain the tradition and at the same time, be modern. Jack decided to be in the bar and see the show since that point. The blonde what danced that night was extraordinary. Not because Jack thought only in her beauty: she knows what she is doing, a real dancer.

She had already been buzzed up. Her hands were shoved neatly into her leather jacket. Devon was comfortably aware of the weight of the gun in her purse, just to stay on the safe side every time. A hand slipped out of her pocket to knock on the door.

"You have no idea what’s going on here. There’s so much more than just some bullshit death wish. Believe it or not, this truce has kept us at peace for months now. It’s not much, but it’s fucking something. I’m not at all confidant in it, but I get to sleep at night.” He groaned and stepped back, not sure how to take a woman like this. Elizabeth had been instantly relieved to know she was not alone, and that made their friendship easy to swallow.

"Go. No one is keeping you here. That’s one less person whose back I have to watch, so I’m thinking that would be beneficial to everyone. I’m not going to sit here and try to convince a woman who attacked me, for doing absolutely nothing but fixing a wall socket I might add, that she should stay close by. But at the same time, there’s millions of people here. What makes you think you can’t just blend right back in and go unnoticed? You really that paranoid?"

Everything he said, this stranger, this Hybrid, this fool. Everything made her skin crawl. He was right. He was wrong. His treaty was -- as all things were -- temporary. Oh, but didn't it sound like a relief? Her legs were tired. Her eyes were weary. A Hybrid. Just like her. She walked carefully into the kitchen, opening the freezer and pulling out a bottle of vodka. Without much thought, she unscrewed the top and took a slug. Opening her cabinet and pulling out two of three glasses and setting them down on the counter. She poured a gracious portion -- too gracious, perhaps -- into the glasses and walked over to offer him one. Her expression read a belligerent: my apologies. 

"Don't be so sore, a stranger with a block in a strange city? I didn't attack you because you were fixing a socket, I attacked you because in my experience people with blocks like to -- historically speaking -- you know, shoot at me first," her voice seemed to ask if he could really fault her for that. For reacting to a pattern.

Regimes fell everyday. 

"You know," she continued in Russian, "the last thing you need, is often the first thing you find. Maybe not something you'll find from me, but no one likes a compromise. And that's all a truce is, Original."

It was time to investigate the woman’s emotions. But there it was. A block. Some sort of resistance. Devon stayed very still. Her breathing maintained. Her drink was near enough empty to finish off. This city was nothing but bad luck for her. 

She tried again to be sure. Nothing.

"No need to go so soon." She couldn’t help herself. her curiosity out weighed any fear she should have had. Of course, it was easy to be unafraid when they were in Vincent’s club and she could feel her mate’s presence upstairs in his office. One word from her would bring him to her defense. 

"A hybrid? You must be mistaken. I am Russian, if that's what you're asking."She drained the rest of her drink and set it down silently, her eyes not moving from the woman.

Call it a trust issue. Call it anything.

But if her interaction with her landlord had taught her anything, it was that this city was not nearly as safe as she had imagined it to be.

Robert held something of his own, but it wasn’t tangible. He knew it, too. He had wanted Elizabeth to rid him of the baggage the weighed him down so far that he could feel his shoulders drooping when he walked. He didn’t have enough room for his thoughts when it was so full of guilt. Things had changed, but Robert could still feel his old self creeping back in. 

What he carried wasn’t something necessarily forced on him, not anymore. He walked around followed by the ghosts of the lives he had taken, the dozen Originals that had fallen by his hand. He walked with his mother whispering his name over and over just behind his ear, much like a siren’s lullaby. It made him sick. He wanted out of his own head, but it seemed that the more he tried to live, the louder they got. He had the Chinese man who had been his first kill constantly holding a hand on his shoulder. He felt so tense all the time, he didn’t know how to relax.

Elizabeth had pushed him to forget, but the emotions were still there. There was more room in his head, but it now felt like there was more room for doubt… more room for ghosts to creep their way in and tantalize and twist his mind however they wanted to play. It was sickening, and he wanted nothing more than to curl up and sleep off the noise.

Truce. Safety. Jokes. That's what it they were. Jokes. If history was any show, neither would last long enough for her to skip town again. And maybe it was time for that already. Maybe -- like most other things, it seemed -- this had been a mistake. She laid with her back against the cold, hard ground. Her hand rested over her eyes as she took heavy breaths, trying to find her footing again. Everything throbbed. She could already feel bruises forming on her body. It was a good thing that, in a profession like hers, not too many people would think to ask questions. 

"You have to be kidding. This has to be some fucking joke," she couldn't contain herself. She laughed. "A truce?"

Devon pushed herself up, a mess of blonde hair obscured half of her face until she swept it away with her arm. 

"A truce. Oh yeah? You and what lightning hands?" 

She dabbed at her broken lip with her sleeve. None of this could be serious. There was no way she could believe it. No way it could be real. The Originals came after the Hybrids. The Hybrids ran or died. She had known that all her life, or most of it, anyway. Hybrids didn't fight, and if they did, they were fools. The odds of finding someone like this. One of her own. Like this. The impossibility of it overwhelmed her. She shook her head. She laughed. She closed her eyes. 

It was time to investigate the woman's emotions. But there it was. A block. Some sort of resistance. Devon stayed very still. Her breathing maintained. Her drink was near enough empty to finish off. This city was nothing but bad luck for her. 

She tried again to be sure. Nothing.

He swiped her arm and twisted it, forcing his jaw free. His chest ached from the blow from her knee, but he wasn’t worried about it. He had plenty of time to recuperated. Flipping her backward, he twisted her arm behind her back, so tight that it was close to its breaking point. It had to have been painful; Robert knew firsthand. 

"My name is Robert. I own this building. And it’s none of your business what I am. I suggest you tell me what you are considering if you were one of the Originals, you’d have slaughtered me by now if I gave you the chance. If you are one, then you’re worthless. I don’t see why they’d send a weakling like you out here. You don’t seem like one of the Second Generation either, so my only assumption here is that we’re one of the same kind."

"Hybrid," she spat the word out through gasps. Her cheek pressed hard against the floor, she dug her nails into his wrist. Again, her English was wrapped around lost Russian words that clawed their way out of her throat. "If you are going to kill me, then do it before I get loose. For your own sake." 

In all her years, Devon had known all sorts of people. They had all carried different things, different ideas. All these things were determined by a sort of necessity. The different things had varying weights. Some carried trinkets -- lockets, watches, bibles -- others carried feelings -- love, lust, loss -- and some people carried poses. Poses of themselves, mostly. 

Determined by a certain amount of superstition. A fear of God, of the unknown, of the known. Good luck pebbles, a rabbit foot, a tooth that had fallen from the mouth of a loved one. Though admittedly, it had been centuries since Devon had seen anything so gruesome as the last one. 

They carried lighters and lights and lamps. They carried memories. When someone carried a load that was too heavy, they left things behind for others to find in their wake. Pieces of themselves. Of their identity. The heavy things. The not so heavy things. The things they had no need or want to part with, but would part with anyway. If only to spare themselves the pain that came with shouldering the same thing for too long. Often, she had seen people carry each other. People who were too weak to stand. She had thought it kind. Gentle. Weak. 

For the most part, Devon prided herself with carrying nothing. Or -- more accurately -- little to nothing. She carried poise, dignity, wistful resignation. She carried pride and a stiff demeanour. She carried the fear of dying, but even more than that, she carried the fear to show her fear. To show her weakness. To show her desperation. She no longer imagined the world in black and white or even grey. She imagined shades of red and blue and varying shades of gold. 

She used the sharp tongue and bitter indignation that she carried with her to hide a terrible softness inside of her. It wasn't so much cruelty or callous as it was a pretence. Devon was, and would always be, something of an actor. Something of a liar. A deceiver. Vain and fickle. Flighty, above all else. When she found herself lost or losing, she decided it seemed too predictable. Too scripted to be real. Her lines were memorised, the dance rehearsed with tragic irony. A dance to disguise the truth, as if to encyst and destroy reality altogether until she found the world she desired. 

Devon felt the heavy weight of a woman who might have died long ago. Grief, terror, longing. Acts of cowardliness, acts of shame, the fear of blushing too fiercely. The fear of everything. She carried too many things on the inside. Too many things she wanted to let go, if only she knew how. (All she had done in the wake of her failures was dispense the feeling of love. A wildly overrated emotion, in her own opinion.)