He had been concerned the moment he found her missing, something deep within him that was still alien to him stirring in response to whatever was causing Gabriella's disappearance. He had half a mind to go searching for her, something within him telling him that he'd be able to find her no matter how far it was that she ran from him. They were inevitable together, and he certainly felt a connection to her that he couldn't explain. One that had nothing to do with the eldritch horror in his body that had connected itself to him from her body.

That connection was between them now, flaring brightly in his minds eye as he examined her for injuries. The act was impulsive, and what he saw? Had his jaw tightening considerably, to a point the muscle jumps beneath his ruined skin. He was learning how to use glamor to hide his appearance, but it wasn't something he felt he had to keep up now. She had seen the worst of him, and still she stayed.

"Who says I'm saying this without meaning it? You know damn well I don't say shit that I don't mean-" he did, but rarely over something as important as this. Though he falls silent as she begins to speak, her words nearly tumbling over themselves with as quickly as she was talking.

Stepping closer to her as she lets out the humorless laugh, Blue reaches up and gently lets his fingers ghost across her cheek, his gaze soft and understanding as she speaks of not being any good at what she was saying now. "You don't have to be good at this, Gabriella. And you're not going to talk me out of adoring you-" not love... not quite yet. He wasn't ready for that big of a leap. "-you could never be a punishment in my life, you could never be something that I feel I'm owed. You're Gabriella, my Gabs... and nothing you say could change that."

Leaning into her touch at his jaw, despite the fact that the featherlight touch would hurt the ruined skin she touched, he didn't seem to give a shit. His own hand flattens, cupping the side of her face tenderly, an act that may be surprising from a man so prone to violence. Listening to her finish her little speech, he can't help but to smile, reaching up with his other hand to cup the other side of her face...

And closed the distance between them.

HIs lips slanted over hers, kissing her with a fierce passion that had nothing to do with the desperation he felt when she was gone, and everything to do with the desire he felt for her in this moment. A promise sealed, that he would spend his life with her, that he would spend it with her for as long as she would have him around for. Because Blue didn't leave people... people left Blue.

"I want that difference too-" he spoke once he pulled away from her, leaning his forehead against her own as he breaths out a heavy breath. "I'll do whatever it takes to be with you, Gabriella... that I can promise you."

@malafxde \\ continued

"There's something off about her," says Gō Koga, Jin's right hand man and fellow creature of the night, seated across from them on this auspicious nighttime voyage that was currently taking them down the coast of Japan. "If I can feel it, then I know damn well that you can, too, and it makes me wonder why she's here with us."

Jin, letting out an unbothered chuckle, looks out a nearby window, watching the dark waves and the moonlit clouds far above them, and the plethora of stars even further beyond both.

"Everyone on this ship has something 'off' about them, Gō," Jin replies offhand, "please try and lighten up."

Gō sighs deeply and then points a finger at Jin. "That's not what I mean and you know it. Her ꜱᴏᴜʟ, Jin, her ᴇʏᴇꜱ, the ꜱᴛʀᴀɴɢᴇ ꜱᴘɪʀɪᴛᴜᴀʟ ᴘʀᴇꜱꜱᴜʀᴇ that follows her, something's more than ᴡʀᴏɴɢ with her, she's--"

Jin turns away from the window nearest him and looks toward Gō Koga, smirking as he interrupts, "she's a ᴡɪᴛᴄʜ, and not one of those 𝘱𝘰𝘰𝘳 𝘪𝘮𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘵𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 running around the Soul Society's Western Branch either, she's the 𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘂𝗶𝗻𝗲 𝖺𝗋𝗍𝗂𝖼𝗅𝖾 through and through; what else would you expect from her?"

The look on Gō's face becomes a mix of worry and anger, and it's reflected in their voice when they loudly say, "she's a what?" Gō is nearly fuming. "You're consorting with a Witch? An actual damned Witch? Jin you can't be serious, you know as well as me that's a fools errand. If you're so keen on meeting death and throwing away lifetimes worth of planning, you-- "

There was a brief, dark shadow in Jin's face,  in his eyes, and for a moment it was in his voice, too, when he firmly interrupts Gō again, "don't be so negative and small minded, it's unbecoming of you."

Jin slowly stands, rising with an almost stately grace as he adds, "after all, it's rude to talk about someone who's listening."

Jin then gestures toward and looks in the direction of his cabin's lower entrance where Gabriella stood, where she had stood for the last few minutes, insofar as Jin had been aware, unbeknownst only to Gō Koga (who was now silent in shock as they, too, turned to look).

"Last night's meal has given you a certain glow, Gabriella, it's marvelous," Jin started off, his tone lightening somewhat, and his strong crimson eyes gazing eagerly in Gabriella's direction, "you're practically ɢʟᴇᴀᴍɪɴɢ," like the blade of sharp, yet finely decorated knife catching the light, Jin thought.

"If only my kindred could see you a fraction of the way I do."

Jin then steps away from Gō Koga, moving closer to Gabriella though not quite, only enough to position himself between the two here in this room.

"Outside of the odd word here and there, like our poorly spoken Gō, I trust none of them have been giving you any trouble?"

Gō Koga scoffs at that last remark, and they stare fiercely at Gabriella, as a bear might stare down a pack of wolves, but they.... say nothing, at least for now.

Nezumi stood in the kitchen. It was dark outside, the cars were honking, stuck in a traffic jam. People were going home after a long day at work. Going back to their families, to their loved ones. They continued to live an ordinary life undisturbed by the horrors of the night. Perhaps, and Nezumi knew how arrogant it was to think, but perhaps some of them were safer because of what he had done. And what Gabriella had now done alongside him.

Vampires, Nezumi had come to learn, weren't exceptionally cruel. They were still human; they had their humanity lodged inside them like a bullet in a war veteran's brain, making them do unforgivable things, painful things, but human things nonetheless. The moral idea of good and evil was a fairytale concept. Very few people who did evil thought of themselves as such. And everyone who had hurt someone else believed themselves to be in the right. The world wasn't black and white.

Nezumi let Gabriella go on, talking herself in circles until she reached a conclusion that she was happy with. She would do this, he knew now, and if he kept his mouth shut long enough, she would eventually unwrap herself from whatever despair her thoughts had led her to. All she needed was someone to be there; someone to look at her and hear her words because, Nezumi guessed, it felt more real when the words she was speaking reached someone's ears and that someone quietly agreed with her.

When all was said and done, Nezumi put aside his cup, already empty, drank while the tea inside was still steaming, took a slow breath, and shrugged.

"Just because some people say some things, or you see them follow an ideology doesn't mean they are in the right and you are not. You have the power to choose what you want to believe in and what you don't. What we don't get to control is how other people see us or what they think of us. That isn't feasible," he waved a dismissive hand. "But you know this."

"We only ever get to be in charge of our own actions and our own life. And the thing about people is — whether we've died and become something else or died and came back, or we didn't die at all — we aren't divided into groups and one is good and one is evil. There are no two sides that are battling against each other, that's some Bible bullshit stuff that isn't even — it's made up."

"Heaven and hell. Good and evil. We, us, humans, people, made all that up, same as we create other fictional stories, some of it to justify hurting one another, some of it to guide us, some of it because we were curious. But all of that pain and anger that you say you have, those people have it too. Everyone has been through some kind of suffering. Everyone feels things. The same things. And everyone does in the world such that they think is right by them and those they love. Or they are desperate and want to protect someone. Or they are scared and want to protect themselves."

"If you don't want all of the things you said and, instead, you want something else. Then you're already doing it. You're already wanting the things you want and having them. It isn't rocket science. It's conviction."

A blatant and utter lie but it beats the whole breaking into a party full of demons as a way to gather intelligence for a case. However the train of thought was broken the moment he heard her mentioning that she needs to see what she’s working with. Which is a fair question but damn he didn’t think this far ahead. “uhhh…”Alright it’s time to think up of a dance so he could at the very least receive lessons.

Okay, he starts freestyling..it started clunky at first. “This is somethin’ I remembered someone doin’ once.” Soon enough his talent for copying movements he’s spotted came up on the surface as the movement with his legs, arms and hips became soo much smoother until he had gotten himself in the groove. “Heh..not bad for somethin’ I never tried til now right??”

--- " What are you dressing up as for Halloween? " The question came after a passing silence had blanketed the duo, their hands continuing to work busily away at the dough on the flour-coated countertop ; it was one of their standard sleepovers tonight, though this time they were baking an assortment of SPOOKY cookies. The witch treasured moments such as this, especially as she rejoiced in experiencing them with Gabriella -- who deserved EVERY shred of happiness that came her way.

Her dear companion had been through far too much in her life -- & still had to endure the horror that followed from those hardships.

ྀི◟‎𓏵 ׁ₍ꕤᐢ..ᐢ₎ . . ❝ I-I don't think - ❞ Ears were flopping about HAPHAZARDLY as she pitched forward to rest hands on her knees ; heaving gasps escaping as the bunny attempted to catch her breath. ❝ - I'm built for that kinda dancing! ❞ EVERYWHERE was sore. Her arms ached from lifting her own body weight, her thighs were BURNING from both the pole & the fact she had been clenching the muscles with such force ( primarily from panic, she hadn't wanted to fall off ).

❝ You make it look so easy! I look like a floundering fish! ❞

Moving across rooftops with the wind at his back and a starry, moonlit sky above him, Jin thinks back to his and Gabriella's last encounter, to the many things he had seen while their minds were connected….

Jin had been thinking about those scenes quite a bit these last few days, about the loneliness, isolation, pain, and anguish he saw within them, especially when it came to the horrid betrayal that was thrust upon Gabriella, and the climactic bloodbath that followed. The darkness, too, that mysterious, craven force that followed Gabriella and pervaded every moment within those memories he looked upon, Jin kept going back to it in his head, ever morbidly curious about it...

There was something else, though, that had caught Jin's attention. What Jin saw in those memories of Gabriella's, the locale, Salem, it had reminded Jin of a time long ago, of a moment from his own life, and it had spurred within him the urge to seek her out tonight.

The search, strung along by traces of Gabriella's Spiritual Power that Jin had managed to pick up, led him to the building he now stood atop, a massive, well-off hotel here in the heart of Karakura Town. From here, Jin tried to discern Gabriella's location further, but something was obscuring her exact location from him (a barrier of some sort he assumed), and so he would concentrate and call out to Gabriella through his mind.

"Gabriella," Jin's psychic voice, haunting yet smooth, inviting, would be broadcast across the immediate area, able to be heard by anyone who was sensitive enough to such phenomena, though surely detectable by Gabriella herself, "where are you? I hope its not too early for us to speak again."