Anthony Quinn

                “Of course I was already up, you know I don’t like sleeping in.” She teased, moving to follow Quinn out the door. Illyssa never slept in if she could help it. Getting up early meant that she would give herself as much time as possible to do whatever it was she was planning on doing. No reason to waste time curled up in bed or loitering around with nothing to do. She kept herself busy and honestly Illyssa preferred it that way.

                    “We can stop for something if you’d like, tea for me though no coffee. It’s been centuries and I’m afraid I still can’t kick my tea habit.” She knew that Quinn was as uneasy as she was about this peace treaty. Especially now that the rumors that the hybrid was back. Everything seemed to be hanging on Vivian and Aleksander’s next move but neither leader was doing anything. Which just made everything feel that much more stressful. “Have you been in your office all night? Everyone calls me an overachiever but I think they should be looking at you.” She shook her head with a smile but they both knew that if Illyssa had her own office job she’d probably spend just as much time in her office as Quiin apparently did.

“I know you don’t like sleeping in.” He agreed. She was always up like him. Where he just worked himself into exhaustion, Illy seemed to just have everything perfectly planned. She slept the perfect amount. she got up at the perfect time. she seemed to have everything in perfect order. He wasn’t sure if it worked for her but the only stress she seemed to have was from the upcoming meeting and their leader’s next move. 

“Right, you didn’t even have smart phones back then… or the internet… or… anything. Seems like terrible times if you ask me. What did you do for like… fun?” Réjean had a hard time imagining it. He himself had grown up with technology all around him developing fast. You could almost call him addicted to social media and the attention gotten from strangers all around the world. It had been validating and he missed the clout he used to have. After running away from his father he had set all his profiles to private and not touched them since out of fear it would otherwise make it too easy for him to find him.

“your vernacular is... fun to listen to.” He mused quietly. Times were different and he had adapted but he would never again seem as young as Rejean was now. Never again. Rejean one day would lose that too, but Quinn hoped he would keep himself for as long as possible. Quinn didn’t know if he changed or if his views had just become old themselves. If he had changed or if everything about him had just sat and gathered dust, only left to remind him of his own youth. He hoped he was more than that. More than just a husk full of old memories. He hoped that Rejean wouldn’t grow bored of him.

He listens to Quinn talk about his debts and stops his search to look at him with his head crooked sideways. “Quinn, how much debt have you racked up?” He asks a strange mix of worry and amusement in his features. “You told me you’d quit a while ago.”

Quinn finally broke a smile. He had dug a hole that he would only dig deeper the more excuses he dished out. These excuses, Cain already knew, “I was! I always am. It is my main concern. That’s what drives me to gamble, how much effort I put into keeping your asses out of trouble. then it gets me in trouble.” He wadded up a receipt and tossed it at his friend’s heels.

He nods, pursing his lips, “Cain is probably my best friend. We have been close for some time now. I barely remember meeting him. It seems like he has always just been here. Then there is Illyssa. She is always there for me when I ask her to be. Our personalities match pretty well.” He taps his chin trying to think of more, “Miyu is really quiet but really nice and smart. I barely know the rest, if I’m being honest. I know them from training and being around the pack but that’s about it.”

“What’s your full name?” Réjean asked, purring, the usual mischevious glimmer in his eyes. “If you don’t mind.” Not everyone was fond of having old things dredged up and some names were quite simply dead, Réjean would know and didn’t want to cause Quinn pain or offend him. “You must have many interesting stories to tell then?” If Réjean was anything, it was curious. Where he came from, knowledge was power and he’d been a master of charming his way in. It had been his only weapon and continued to be one of the few. But he harbored no no interest in harming Quinn unless he gave him reason to.

His laugh shook his body as it rolled from his chest, “Yes, six hundred.” He wasn’t disappointed when Rejean stopped kissing his neck. He enjoyed his touch, his mind so focused on the movement that he could have almost fallen asleep under the vampire. He jolted awake, that word startling his basic instincts. He hoped it didn’t show because Rejean was the one person he didn’t want to see that side of him. Rejean seemed so young, mentally too. He gave new life to the old Lycan that he couldn’t yet explain. He wanted to take Rejean out, show him to his friends, go on dates. This had started as a one night stand and this was only their second time meeting. Quinn had ripped vampires apart before. He would have murdered this older version of himself. What happens if the treaty goes away? He imagined the bloody war and just before Rejean was placed in that image in his mind he woke himself up to meet his eyes in the dark office. 

Pushing himself up from the chair, he crossed the distance between them and patted Quinn’s shoulder, still chuckling. “It’s good to be back,” he said winking and leaned against the other side of the window, enjoying the view of the city one had from up here. “Really, Quinn, whoever beat you up, let me deal with it. You got me out of plenty trouble, let me repay it,” Cain said his voice serious again. “And the window, of course,” he adds rolling his eyes. Quinn put way too much effort into his human cover if you asked him but then again if he didn’t who would save his ass from that annoying little thing that was human laws?

He had sedated Cain for the moment. Vampires were no longer on the menu. That’s all Quinn could ask for, in all honesty. Cain had always been one of the most volatile of them all. Quinn watched him move, elbowing him, “Shut up. There were close to twenty of them and they didn’t get away without damage.” He realized this sounded pathetic, but a grin spread across his lips and laughter even mixed with Cain’s, “Shut up.” He muttered again, a little embarrassed now.

“Thank you, Cora.” He smiled. He liked the feel of her apartment. He had been contemplating his own apartment for some time. Especially now that he was entertaining the idea of being with a vampire. It was definitely more than a one night stand and he needed a place that they could be without putting the vampire in danger. He nodded to her question, “He is.” He pulled out a picture he had taken of Seph a few weeks back, “And he is technically part of this pack. The kid that joined three years ago.” He pulled out some more papers and sat them in front of her, “These I got illegally through some connections so I have to take them back but medical and college records. He goes to college around here. Three years ago he was injured and thought he wouldn’t cheer again but then he made almost a full recovery in a month. I believe he had been bitten about then. He lives both with the pack and on campus.”

◜.•° .•° .•°◞  ━━━━━━ || SIWOO REMAINS WARY of lycans, no matter their personalities or backgrounds or faces. that is all irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, because the vampire knows what they’re like. he knows the differences between their species; has researched far and wide into the beef between them to learn of why they would ever go as far as they did with him and with calus. eventually he comes to one simply conclusion – they’re complete asses. so it goes without saying that being in the presence of a lycan again is a less than satisfying experience. when he’s addressed, siwoo turns his head sharply towards the other. he could have ignored the fact that he fell (somewhat drunkenly) beside him, with his guard still up but not ready to fight without incentive. but then quinn has to speak, and siwoo’s eyes narrow dangerously, muscles tensing. “there’s a cart just down there.” siwoo gestures lightly with his head, gaze never leaving the lycan’s.

He let his hand drop after a moment, not wanting the touch to be deemed inapropriate or to make her uncomfortable, “ I think this summit might be a good thing. No one shares this opinion. It’s not an outcome many even consider. Everyone thinks just because we are there in a confined space together that there is going to be a bloodbath.” He pulled his hood up, it starting to get more chilly as they walked, “This could be good.”

He lifted his brows as Quinn said this, a disbelieving scoff leaving the back of his throat. “You have your own opinions, Quinn. i know you, and I know that you won’t always bend and break for everyone, so you’re spewing some bullshit right now.” Anger bubled up in his chest then, and he stepped impossibly close to Quinn, his gaze nery murderous. “Don’t you dare call me Child. you have no right to negate me or the way I am because I’m not as old as you. Keep your fucking opinion and your lies. I’m done here.” Wt that, Jareth turned on his heel and stalked off, ready to hide away for the rest of the night.

“Don’t air quote. This isn’t a competition about who had done better with vampires. I have just seen a lot more war than you. It’s hard to look someone you have fought for 600 years and just let it go. I’m scared of them, with good reason. I’m trying to warn you that there is good reason for my feelings. I am working with a vampire because my Alpha wants peace. How is that me being an asshat? I’m vigilant.” 

He snarled deep in his chest, watching the other lycan with burning anger, “What lies!? I told you that I’m working with him to keep the peace as my alpha asked!” He roared and grabbed a metal banister off someone’s porch, bending it until it snapped, the metal making a horrid twisting sound, “I wish I hadn’t come down there to find you. I don’t deserve this.”

“You don’t think they’re as amped up about tamping down their bloodlust as some of us are?” Isobel asks, her eyes blazing softly with irritation - it’s the look of someone who’s played every game thinking ten steps ahead, and who can’t understand why no one else is stuck in the present. “You don’t think a vampire-owned casino would be the perfect place to get rid of a few more lycans, without any slaps on the wrist from their elders, if for some reason you can’t pay them?” A sigh leaves her lips. “I know who runs what because information is currency. How else do you think I make enough money to support the pack? Secrets are costly.” Another sigh, this one more exhausted than angry, and she’s dropping her arms before leaning back against the bar. “Saying that you’re getting out is all well and good, but I’m not going to ease off until you’reactually out. Our world is too dangerous of a place right now to be messing with the wrong people.”

He nodded lightly as he listened, starting to walk with her again.  He understood that entirely. The fear that someone would jump before the race started and someone else would take advantage. Of course he worried about that too. His close friend Cain was one of those that would step the moment anyone else stepped. There was a time that Quinn was barely any better. He shook his head, “We wouldn’t do that. The leechers are disbanded but we follow Vivian. Her word is law. We are going to surprise you.” He put a hand on the middle of her back, rubbing it lightly, “I don’t think anyone wants to be branded as the one who broke the peace.”

“Yeah, that’s how how we’re playing. you’re standing here and telling me how all vampires are the cause of lycans nearly going extinct, but being a hypocrite because you’re willing to work with one. I can smell the lie on you, Quinn. I’m nice, tht doesn’t mean I’m a fucking moron.” Jareth rolled his eyes angrily and turned from Quinn, stalking back in the direction of the pack’s headquarters. “You let me know when you’re done lying to everyone and sputtering fake gospel and a species you know nothing about.”

“Jareth! What the fuck? Why are we fighting. I wasn’t saying you couldn’t have your views of vampires. I was saying that vampires killed my friends and family in the past and have taken advantage of the chances I have given. Every time I have given them. I didn’t say that you were incompetent. I was saying that when given the chance in the past vampires have taken advantage. In the past they ran us to extinction. They had us as slaves. Some of them in the coven in town here were part of that. You fought one war, I’ve been part of two. I’ve seen our people enslaved. People who give their enemy a chance get stabbed in the back. I’ve just been burned too many times to risk being as accepting as you.” He turned and met his angry glare.

“That,” Isobel states, her expression thoroughly unamused as she crosses her arms over her chest, “is one of the worst excuses I’ve heard from you, and I’ve heard a lot. Did it cross your mind that I know which places are run by whom? And not only that, but that it might even be information I was willing to share, if it means that we might not have to keep meeting like this?” It comes off as cold because it’s meant to, but Isobel wouldn’t make a fuss like this if she didn’t care about the outcome. When it comes down to it, she would prefer it if he came out of this unscathed. “You paying me back is not the problem. The problem is that it’s going to get out of hand: you’re going to have a debt I can’t pay, and then we’ll have to add another urn to the brownstone’s living room, or worse.”