The reward doesn't seem like a reward at first. It seems like my soul getting yanked out.

Moira's hurt. I don't remember it's a dream anymore. I lost that hours ago in my anger. I was running so hard and fast, all those mornings of working out paying off as I carry that sample back to safety. My arm is busted bad, my sword arm. I only have my katana still because Louis rescued it when I dropped it. Bone's poking through and Cloud is muttering about surgery.

But Moira's hurt. Bad. The baby's not going to make it.

And none of it's fair. I don't even know what she needs to learn from this but all I can see is the pain and terror in a girl that has given so much already and I press myself flat to the floor and I pray and pray and pray. And still she's whimpering and moaning in pain.

Susan's ring.
Ann's little stuffed animal.

"What the fuck good is being an angel if you can't help anyone!" the cabin closes in on me and I can't breathe with the walls around me. I need the air and the starlight and the pinpoints of hope and the fire. I hit the ground outside and if I could dig myself into the ground to bow lower I would.

help her, help her, help her The prayer is fervent and whispered and it rocks my body and I can't pour it out fast enough. Don't take this child from her. Not in this dream, not her. She's hurt so much. She's finally coming back from it, starting to smile again, finding happiness. She gives and gives and gives and she has to learn but this is too much. Let me protect her. let me. Let me keep her safe. Let me take it for her. Put the abuse on me, the bruises on me. Let her learn but don't take this baby from her because it will kill her in ways that have nothing to do with body and blood.


It's Ace that hugs me and tells me she needs me. I crawl into the cabin and I wrap myself around her and I pray as hard as I've ever prayed to save any of them.

Paladin tries. Praying, summoning, calling, begging. His hand grips Moira. He's nearly died tonight and still he is here, trying what I am trying and leaving it all to the one person we know can do anything - God. The faith in the room is so thick it's hard to breathe. Ace is there and he doesn't have a religion but it doesn't matter. Cloud even is hovering on the verge of belief. She whimpers in my arms. marcella's kicks get weaker and weaker.

What good is being an angel if I can't help her? I try and wrap metaphysical wings around her, I pour it all out in that huge, gripping hug, the same one that I tried to bind her to body and earth with when she saved Tampa. She saved a city. Save her child. I reach, reach, reach for heaven and can't feel it, not here, not in the dream but I know God and I know he's watching. He always watches.

Free fall.

Trust yourself.

Let go. I have you. I always have you.

The room goes dark. Everything is silent and then there's white light so bright I can't see anything, searing through my vision and my heart soars. I know that light. I know, peripherally, it's a dream and that this is a manifestation of dream. I know that. My head knows that.

My heart knows better. My heart knows my namesake. My heart knows the angel of fire and protection. My heart was bound in that light, my faith and my fate were bound in it, my destiny carried in it. My heart knows what my head sometimes questions and I give into it and let it do what it will.

When the lights come back on, she is still and Marcella is kicking gently against my hand. My broken arm is crushed and the bone's come out and I'm bleeding but who cares? Life stirs under my hand and I'm sobbing into Moira's shoulder.

Life. Faith. Love. Freedom. Cloud patches me up again but even he doesn't have the heart to curse me out. We gather Paladin up and set him to rights. Moira presses the rosary back into my hand and smiles a little. Whatever else she's found, whatever mechanics of faith she follows, I see something in her eyes i"ve been trying to get her to see for years.

She believes.

And that's worth all of the blood and sobbing and prayer. He's caught me again. he always does. And even if he didn't, it would be his will. Gabriel's even quiet and I tell him the irony of it all and for the first time, I see in him a belief as well, that he may be better than he believes himself to be, that he is not alone.

I'm in shock from pain. I let Cloud give me morphine. I relax the grip on the pistol when Solomon comes out of the darkness and carresses my hair and I know I'm safe. God's little gift, ironic and funny there.

When I awake from the dream, the little doll Ann dropped in the woods is next to me and I clutch it, crying. Life beneath my fingers in Moira's body. Choices to make in the future and a belief in myself that I had lost.

Trust yourself. Find your faith. Believe that you are better than worthless. Save the world because you can and when you can, even when you can't save them all.

These are the things my consilium and family and order learns in the middle of a zombie apocalypse.

God, I love them all so much it hurts to breathe.

I get it, but it's not the way that the wizard wanted me to get it. I hope he understands that because really, despite how completely and totally pissed off I am, I realize that it's necessary for us to be pushed sometimes, tested, questioned, or just plain reaffirmed.

He definitly did that this time. Not all of them appreciate it but I guess my whole life's been so full of challenges to my beliefs that I appreciate this. It's real for me. I forget I'm in a dream most of the time and that's probably how it should be. For me at least.

So no shit, there I was surrounded by zombies with Zoe, Bill, Francis, and Louis. Who knew? It would be funny except that let me tell you, real witches and smokers and hunters are not funny. They're scary as shit. For all that Zoe is saying how calm we are, I know my people and I know they're all freaked out. Some of them resolve it with humor; some of them just muscle through it. I know that I've never been as happy to see friendly faces as after that drive, surrounded by silence and dead bodies, where I want to roll the window up to keep away from them and when I want to keep it down because the claustrophobia of the car makes me want to panic.

The camp ground in the dream is in Pennsylvania. Promised Land state park. It's beautiful and I always wanted to see the Poconos - but not when it's infested by zombies. it must be hell on the property values. Weaver and Marrow are there. Half of Orlando is there. Ace is there. And so are a crap ton of zombies. By crap ton I mean - huge shambling hordes and they're scary and gross and gooey.

Joy.

We fight. I mean that's not surprising. We're pretty good at team tactics, setting up patrols with the four, protecting the sleepers that have taken refuge in the park, the usual for a zombie apocalypse dream. The Wizard's not playing nice this time though, hitting harder, shoving the hurts at us to make us cringe. There's a little girl missing and I see the look on Noel's face, on Moira's, on all of us when we find the bloodied doll and the shoe, and later when they find her ripped in half. I spend time at the water spigot, scrubbing, trying to get the blood out of the doll before I go back to the mother and try to tell her that her daughter wandering off got her killed. I want to shake this dream woman and tell her to be a better mother but I can't do it when she's sobbing hysterically. I just catch her and put her back in the tent and hold her hand until she passes out.

I scrub and scrub because I can see that little girl out there in the woods, holding onto this little stuffed dog, hoping it will be her friend and keep her safe and it doesn't. I can see this little thing as her only shield against some horror and I can't help but think of the other dreams, of other children and of the little girl growing in Moira's body, or the twins that Noel privately mourns. I can't get all the blood out.

The world is full of horrific things. You can't save them all.

I know. But I can try. I will always try to save everyone I can. You know that.

Yes, I know.

Of course there's a cure. Of course there's something to fight for. The horror's amped up - but so is the benefit. We scour the island looking for it. They're amazingly good at working together this time. That little girl's shoe...Ann's shoe... galvanizes them. They're forgetting it's a dream now. They're pushing harder like they need to. I hope they're learning but frankly I know better than to be the teacher here. Here, I'm a student too.

Night falls. We're all injured. Some of us are worse than others and Weaver, Cloud, and I bench them from going out again. Broken ribs are still workable. Loss of blood and concussions are not. Internal bleeding is not. We increase the patrols but the hope's starting to falter, trying to find a plan to find the cure and get all these people to safety. The details aren't important, just that we keep trying.

And miracle of miracles, we actually find it - in the most zombie infested and dangerous part of the entire park. There are hundreds of them, feasting off the dead bodies of the military unit that was transporting the serum to NASA. Of course. Never easy. And that's when the shit hits the fan for me. Part of me is detached and observant but the rest of me is just wound up in what Bill suggests.

Pincer move, but not in the classic sense. One group will get the serum, while another group draws off the hordes. Suicide group, that second one. And Bill and Zoe look me in the eye and tell me I have to choose who dies.

Wait, what?

Choose who dies?

It's the job of a leader. I sit, staring at the flames, thinking about this. There's not a day I get up out of bed that I do not know how hard being a leader is, that I have to make choices that affect people and that doing so alters lives. There's not a day I don't wrestle with hubris and agonize over all of it. But I make those choices. I've sent minutemen off to their deaths on missions I was sure wouldn't succeed. I've been lucky in that they did but I've lost a lot of sleep knowing how many times I've asked my order to go throw themselves on one pyre or another and they listened. I condemned my friends in Tampa to possible death, not moving when I knew that a military reaction would kill them. I get it. No one but no one needs to reimpress upon me that sometimes leaders have to make shitty decisions and hard decisions.

So it's why I get angry. I'm yelling at Bill and Zoe and telling them precisely where they can shove it because tonight is not one of those nights. I know my people. I know them like I know myself and I know if I -ask- they'll go. But I know they'll also choose their own destinies. I know which ones I can vet out and which ones will be poor choices, but I know I can -ask-. Bill thinks I'm undermining myself. Zoe is appalled that we might fail because I've got this crazy idea in my head that leaders don't just send people off to die.

But I ain't budging.

Because I get the lesson, just not in the way the wizard likely anticipated.

For months and months and months, ever since Fee and I had our screaming match about judging people, I've been second guessing myself. For a year I guess. I've been not just analyzing my actions and choices, but over-analyzing, barely sleeping, half-killing myself scraping together every possible angle and every possible permutation of every action and parsing it through again and again and again. I've driven myself half-mad and Solomon's been trying to get me to stop doing it for weeks and weeks. I can't though. I've tried. I've prayed. I've spent time on my knees, scourging myself for some sort of answer to just make this burden make sense.

But tonight I get it. I'm staring at the fire and I get it. I get what the wizard's saying and what I need to do.

So I ask for volunteers because while that's what he thought I should probably not do, it's not me. Tonight's not one of those far-away nights where my "volunteers" are distant and trusting me to choose the right path for them. Tonight they're right here, flesh and blood and able to choose their own destinies and so I let them, vetting out the ones too hurt to go and too incapable. They know fully what they're getting into. We all accept taht.

And then I stick to my guns because I know a few things now.

One of them is that my ideals are what have made me a good leader, my ability to ask when I can and choose wisely and carefully, my respect for their choice and their lives - even when I -know- they trust me to make the choice for them if I need to.

The second of them is that I won't be what the wizard knows I can be, what God knows I should be, and what I'm always going to be searching for, if I give up my vision. If I'm willing to, tonight when I have another option, send men off to die without their consent, I'm no better than what I fight. Those decisions need to be made, but this isn't one of those times and my gut and heart tell me what my head needs to know.

And the third is really the most important and it's the one when moira asks later, I can't articulate to her. Because the Wizard seems to want me to get this idea that leaders have to make hard decisions.

So I do.

I trust myself.

I tell the questions and the hurt to shut the fuck up, the uncertainty to take a hike, and Bill and Zoe to can it. Because this is my choice and my decision and right or wrong it's hard and it hurts and that's part of being a leader. So I am a leader. Not in the way the wizard thinks i need to be, not in the way the Silver Ladder would say, but in the way that I am. And in that, that's probably the hardest choice I could make because in trusting myself I'm trusting that if I fuck this up, it's everyone that suffers.

But I don't let that stop me. I make a choice because I have to, because that's my burden. It's not the same choice they wanted - but it's a choice and it's harder by far than asking people to charge off to battle at my whim. It's harder because it means my ideals are called into question again and I'm going to stand up for them even if they don't understand.

Ask my people. Have faith that they can do what we've trained and practiced for. Form the teams. And then save the fucking world because I'm too stubborn to let it die even if it is a dream. If I have to figure out a way for my dismembered hand to crawl back with that sample, my people and I will get it out.

I make the choice to trust myself. Not the wizard, not the city, not my order, but me. Because I wouldn't be in this position if I wasn't doing something right. I wouldn't be in this position if I didn't make hard choices and understand that sometimes I don't get to ask but that sometimes I do.

I'm terrified when I step off that mental cliff and back into the unknown free fall of being who I am.

And as always, it's God that catches me. No matter what the Wizard wanted, I get the point, and the reward is bitter and sweet all at once. I watch them march off into the darkness with my eyes dry and my hand on my sword because we all have work to do.

She opened the back of Blackhall's book, the empty pages that he'd left for her to fill. She wasn't the most eloquent or cultured person. She wasn't the best schooled. Her voice didn't match the pages and pages of inspiration that he'd left her.

She had no inscription to add that could match him calling her daughter.

But she picked up the pen and wrote anyway not because she should as an admired member of her order, but because the words needed to be said.

"The Free Council isn't simply about destruction. Revolution is a destructive force by nature. No change is ever accomplished without the demolition of certain held beliefs. The longer held that belief, the more difficult it is to demolish, the more painful and frightening the change. Revolution is part of us, in all of the various ways that we follow it, because it is necessary.

With destruction, change, and revolution, must also come something new, however. The Free Council, about revolution, must also be about building, rebirth, and progress in its truest sense. War's opposition is not peace and stasis, but creation. If we as an order are to thrive, we must remind the Awakened world of this as often as we can. It is in our vision that the tradition of the Atlantean orders can be aimed to greater heights, not of hubris and pride, but of service and innovation, of applying their vast power and ability to bettering themselves and teaching a world to better itself in the process.

It is not for the Free Council to solely and alone inspire this. It is to guide the path, the proverbial light in the dark, to make the hide bound and tradition bound see that their light is as immense and reachable as the supernal and that wisdom and growth are the birthrights we strive to. We cannot simply do it for them, but must guide and instruct. When necessary, we must fight and yell. Words. Swords. Blood. Weapons. All of these are our tools, but they are not tools that should only be born for the sake of bearing them, but to show others a path they may not have otherwise envisioned for themselves.

This is the Free Council's responsibility. Not only to revolutionize, but to create, to test new waters, and to not shirk from the fear and risk of that newness. We are the order that will listen to those that have no voice. We are the order that will see those who have lost their visage. We are the order that will hold out a hand to those who cannot see beyond their past to the future they might have, and the one that will hold out a hand to those who are so mired in darkness they have forgotten the light - because you cannot ever go back, only forward, ever forward.

It would be erroneous of us to ignore this path. It would be the height of selfishness to ignore this path. It would also be a tragedy and a failing of our duties to the pentacle, but also to our order, for in creation we fight stagnation and darkness, in creation and forging ahead, we fight the lie. If we fear this, we have come to fear our own purpose and our own selves. We have become too afraid to take steps that are not born of hostile bloodshed and have not thought enough outside our own conceptions of our oppression. It is not for the order to charge in blindly or accept all change easily, but it is for the order to test the boundaries that others will not and in doing so, open alternatives that may not have previously been considered.

It is that that we as an order must grow beyond, even if they try to push it back upon us.

The only people who can truly oppress us, are ourselves."

She sat for a moment. Not as long as his work but it would do. She hoped they understood in time, put the book back on the shelf since she knew the others liked to read it from time to time, and went to the dojo. Her temper she kept in check for now, burning brilliant and hot inside her. She wanted to scream at them. But she wouldn't. If she was going to ask them to change, she would have to show them how in some ways and that was the first step.

The only people who can truly oppress us, are ourselves.

The field is quiet, hot, baking in Indian noon-day sun that sinks right through the caramel color of my skin and makes me strip off all the nice silk sari and down to jeans and a sports bra and I don't care who stares. I dump a bottle of water over my head and the water leaves rivulets down my dust stained back, rinsing little trails along the angel wings on my back.

I don't let the heat or the water distract me from the field of vision in front of me. If I move my eyes away, I'll lose the range of vision and I'll miss something. The imago builds in my head, my fingers spinning on the wheel of the ipod, faster and faster. Circle circle tap tap tap. Layer upon layer, a slightly curved pilon of forces and prime magic. I've set several. They're a storm break, hoping to disrupt the flow of the waves when the tower falls.

When. Not if.

There's a stillness. The time is running out. We can all feel it. The casting has become more urgent. The protection team stays near at all times. Sam's focusing on that knot and I want to tell her know but both our parts are dangerous, holding the lines for eachother. The attack is going off and the fireworks show of magic rips the silence of the morning. We watch in grim horror. Beings that warp the worlds with their mind and I watch their power funneled into this with a sense of grief and heartache I can't find words for. Heart sick, papa would've called it. I pray Payday's cabal knows what they're doing stirring this hornet nest.

Then I hear it. I don't think the sleepers do. But I do. It's a crack. A high-pitched creak.

I lay the last row of magic along the top of the pilon. I know what's next.

"Now," I say. It's not a loud word but it echos, hushing into the ears of the awakened close to me. I feel Brigade tense with a feral smile. I feel Calque's head turn to look. We have a half a moment to pause and to marvel at the supernal structure reaching up to the heavens. It was so close. It makes me want to throw rocks at it, tear it down, scream and rage that no one should aspire to heaven that God hasn't called up there himself.

But close is never close enough and hubris is always strong enough. This isn't God punishing us. This is us punishing ourselves with our own stupidity.

There's silence. Another crack that resounds over the magical battle raging on the island itself.

Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven...God save them.

And then the world explodes.

I don't think. There is no thinking. I don't even react because there's no time to react. There is only "do."

My hands move up to brace even though there's no physical anything to brace against. I throw all my weight, supernal and real into it. I feel my nimbus flare, fire racing along my skin, angel wings ripping from my back and blazoning high. I hope the damned cherubim can see it and understand what angels are supposed to do.

Make me brave... make me brave ... make me brave

There is nothing but pain and fire and blistering skin and blood streaming from my eyes and nose and my scream not of agony but of strength. Don't let it win, don't let it win. If you let this fall, they'll fall. The wall of magic beneath my fingers trembles and vibrates and I turn deaf ear to the paradox lashing at me, to the sound of fighting and screams and mages screaming. I call out orders to the mages around me, things to dispel, things to turn, things to weave into the shields to contain and break the rush of magic. I take the paradox from my own magic and I do what I always do with it, wrapping it inside me until ribs break and blood vessels burst and the pain is almost as big as my will.

If I was meant to reach the supernal, God would tell me.

That's what I told them.

Insh'allah

It takes every ounce of my strength to do this. All of it. All of it is poured into this like Moira poured herself into the strands of the city. It rips at my body, rips at my muscles, at years of training. It rips at my magic. It starts to pull at my soul but there the line stops and I hold it, gripping tightly. That it cannot have. That this power can not obliterate. Soul and will and nothing much else. I grip to that. I hang on.

"There comes a point in training where you have to transcend the physical pain. Where everything you work for falls down to instinct and strength of will." Solomon and Ethan's and Blackhall's voices echo in my mind.

And I wonder if maybe today is the day I'm supposed to meet the supernal. Because it's hubris to build a ladder to heaven. And it's hubris to think you can withstand the fall of heaven on your head. I'm not smart enough to stop trying though. And I'm too wise to think I'll win.

I think of Solomon, of Orlando, of home, of my siblings and cousins, of Blackhall's kind eyes and Fee's laughter and the feel of the wind in my hair as I ride my bike. They're falling over all around me now. Some of us had more to give than others. I take all those thoughts and memories and I shove them at the wall of spells. Hold. Just a little longer. But even angels or the people who get called angels don't have that much strength. The last of my consciousness fades and I fall to the ground.

-----------------------------

I'm surprised when I actually wake up, blood dripping from my eyes, vision blurry. A hand twitches against mine and I look over and see Brigade smiling at me. Holy shit we're alive.

"That's what it feels like when the heavens fall on your head?" We help eachother up this time, hobbling back toward camp, eyes already scanning for our family, for our order-mates. I barely manage to get there without passing out. "Sam Cole, Weaver, Null, Terrabytes..." I list off the names of friends around the blood in my mouth. my order. my family of choice. -mine.- "Where the fuck are -my- Free Council?"

And then I have to sit down with the scary feeling that the strength in my limbs isn't what it was and I can't stand anymore and I grip onto Brigade's hand as tightly as I can to not think about that fear for now.

Just hang on.

My arms are wrapped around her waist. I'm telling her everything I can think of about her life that she's ever told me. The bad and good.

Just hang on. Anchor her here. Don't let her go. Don't let any of them go.

The threads of the city are snapping and she's anchoring them with herself and her soul and her heart and all her supernal power and it's killing her.

But I won't let her go.

So I hang on and I know there's hell to pay for this later. I saw it in Raging Dragon's eyes. Welcome back Hoodwink - I guess you're getting what you want stringing them along, telling them it's a bad idea that we follow her path.

Because so very few of them see the woman she has become. Despite the mistakes we all make, she's grown up and she's a good person and they taught her well.

But they don't trust their own training or her.

I just hang on. Just live. We can do the rest later. Just live. Just stay here with me, little sister.

.....

Just hang on. I stare at the masses of people around the base of where they're building a ladder to heaven and my heart lurches. They want to try and take it down but I know the collateral damage will be just as bad as the ladder falling naturally. I didn't come here to kill more people. I didn't come here to rip down the ladder that will fall anyway.

I came here to keep people safe.

Just hang on.

I'm running out of things to hang onto. I'm too far away from Orlando. I can feel my city calling, pulling. I want to be back in her. Away from the politics, away from this.

But the path that is easy is rarely the one that I'm on. So I tromp down the beach with the knowledge of what Ace has told me about Moira, with the knowledge of what Tampa is doing to my order, and I go to find Remus.

Because all of that desire for home and husband and family and peace is inconsequential when you sit on the brink of the door of heaven and wait for the world to end.

I'll come back if I can, loves. But if I don't, hang on, keep fighting, remember me.

All she could think of, as the outside mirrored some sort of calm Obrimos zen she didn't know she had, was "holy god they're going to kill me."

She had no idea what she was doing as the silver ladder ceded the floor, going off to presumably execute a man she wasn't sure was going to have a trial - she wasn't even sure if the execution was public like Remus had wanted.

All she knew was that her arm itched where the golden treble cleff was tatooed and her destiny was screaming at her and her ideals were about ready to choke the air out of her throat if she didn't just -speak-.

So she spoke.

"Magisters, would it be permissable, as the floor has been yielded to the Free Council, if my order put the gentleman in question on trial?"

She could have heard a pin drop. Everyone stopped. The Moira, bless her, who'd paved the way by demanding a trial as Harlequin, leapt in. She could see Asha's eyes light up with the chance she was looking for to somehow turn around this political train wreck.

And so suddenly she was the defense lawyer for a seer and Calliel was prosecuter and the entire order had mobilized in fifteen minutes into a trial with the non-participants holding their formal Free Council speech ideas (handily come up with in advance unlike some orders) in the main room.

And all she could think about, as she bargained for the life of a seer who was not quite yet a seer, as Legion showed him what path he had almost taken, and as her destiny screamed to life saying "Yes he can be saved!" was

Holy god what the fuck am I doing?

Fuck I don't want to do this one. I don't want to judge this man. I don't because I'm biased and I have to understand that and move on and pretend I"m not to make this decision. I hate trials. They're a necessary evil but half the time no one gets what the "evil" part is. They're just the nicer way, the kinder way, the more fair way of dealing with what we as mortal and human creatures don't have rights to much around in.

Zaroff wants a trial. Part of me is overjoyed at that because it means he didn't choose the suicidal death and fall to the path of hubris option. There's a spark in there now that wasn't there before. Something that sees wrong was done.

The other part of me is terrified because this one's not so clear cut. Justice is messy and she demands recompense for the blood spilled, my father's blood, but there's a place in there for mercy to temper it too.

Because whatever wrong's he's done, he sees another way now and I know it's not my right to deny him that path.

I'll be relying so heavily on the council this time, on the city, to question to probe, to dig, to examine their own bias and their own questions because without their input there's just no way I can make a choice on this one.

And this choice I have to make. He either dies by my hand - or lives by it. Or maybe it's better to say that I'm just the one signing whatever proclamation the city puts forth.

And God help me but I know that's not supposed to be a choice anyone but God makes.

So I hope that God's in my city on Friday. I hope he's watching over all of us and nudging them in the way they should go. I hope all the wisdom I've been trying to shove into them for the past two years sticks this time and that they see the stirrings of change for the chance they are. I don't just hope, I pray.

And pray and pray and pray that they're all as good and wonderful and wise as I know they can be and that in their wisdom they recognize hope and compassion and also the folly of anyone choosing the life of another being. That's really the only choice in the end - to realize that even as we make it - and must make it - it's hubris to think that our decisions are anything but attempts to understand what we may never understand. It was hubris for him to make the decision to take lives to begin with and like all unwise things, it touches all of us in some way.

It's always okay to stumble. Everyone stumbles. But it's important to know you're stumbling.

And yet I know someone on friday will have to make that choice and it will be me, and I will either let the man that killed my father walk and learn and live, or die by my sword. But either way I'll make that decision knowing that I have so very little right to. Question everything. Question every decision. Question every moment to remind yourself that you are humble and here and unknowing of whatever greater plan the universe has in store for you. I will never forget the accusation in Fee's eyes. They still rip me apart in my sleep. Judgement. I judged. I judge every day. I choose every day. We all do.

I wish I could tell her I still don't know where that line is and I don't always have the answers. I know that I don't have a right to judge sometimes and I do anyway. I know also that part of being human is judging and God expects that too. Where the two concepts meet are mysteries to those of greater wisdom than I. I can't find it in myself to be the observing monk on the mountain, watching forever, removed. That's not living either. And so here I am, human, and stumbling along with this burden and no answers.

I am destined they say to keep people on the path of wisdom.

Very few people realize what toll that takes on my own mental process. Solomon calls it beating myself up.

He's right.

I'm harder on myself in these questions than my step-father's fists ever could have been and I won't sleep much this week as I start to wrestle with this, as it comes nearer and nearer.

I have no right to make this choice save that they've elected me here and asked me to keep the safe and in some measure to lead them. No right. Some say that would give me the right - because you hopefully choose leaders that are wise and good and try to make the best choices. I would say that their choice in me means I have to scrape myself to the core, examine it over and over and question each step I take until I'm left raw and bleeding but at least satisfied that I've done the best I can.

No right to make this choice. And I have to anyway. For the safety of my city. For the safety of Zaroff. For the laws of Awakened. My only salvation may lie in that I know I'm not God and I beg his forgivness for presiding over this.

Sweet God, be with us. Please.

He was coming.

She could feel it. The shift of the floorboards beneath her worn jeans and the subtle creak of the door swinging open in the kitchen. She would have bolted but she couldn't get out of the closet that he double locked from the outside. This was where he put them when they'd been bad. After he punished them of course. She could hear Dierdre's footsteps as they passed the tiny broom closet.

Her mother did not stop to open it. Gabriella did not expect that she would.

He was still coming. There was the pause. The waiting. Then the agonizingly slow slide of one lock, two locks, three locks. Then there was blinding light flooding in from the kitchen. She was ready. She had her eyes shut and kicked out with both feet, catching him in the knee. She scrabbled up, bolted past him and ran. She could already hear Cat and Chris whimpering upstairs. If she kept him busy long enough he might leave them alone tonight.

She bolted for the yard, breathe ragged, knowing the man behind her would catch her and hurt her and that there was nothing she could do to stop him. Breathe came ragged, burned in lungs, pin pricks of pain as blood returned to limbs she'd sat on too long locked in the tiny closet. She could feel him gaining, superior height and strength. Her feet slipped in the pine needles and moss and she hit the ground hard. Metallic blood in her mouth where teeth grazed tongue.

He was on her in an instant, his weight baring down, cold air on her skin as her thin t-shirt was ripped away, knees forced apart and the heavy grunting of his breath and the pain so incongruous with the cold, New Hampshire night. Her fists beat at him ineffectually.

He spat on her after and he rose and the gaze he gave the house, the windows upstairs, was hungry.

Still hungry.

She kicked him again, levering herself up bleeding and dripping with his sweat and semen and her fists clenched so hard that nails left half moons in the palms of her hands. His rage sparked, turned and settled on her and she accepted the fists gladly, fighting back as much as she could until one last swing sent her into unconciousness, triumphant blackness.

Because upstairs her siblings stayed away from him for another night.

Help me.

Gypsy sat up in the bed, gasping for air, hands clawing at the thin silk sheets - their one concession to luxury in otherwise simplistic lives - and she half-fell out of the bed and to the window, throwing it wide to breathe. The city throbbed around her, Rosa's fear so similar and the same to old memories.

She too had been hunted once.

Hands much stronger than they used to be gripped the window sill. Her body stilled, letting cold night air evaporate the sweat away from muscles that could have easily thrown off her step-father now. Never again. She had promised herself never again would she be that helpless and every day was a battle and push to make that promise to herself come true. The past few nights those old memories were strong, the tie to the city, the feeling the City Mother had of being hunted waking old feelings and old dreams that she had long since laid to rest.

She could almost hear Rosa.

Help me.

She remembered the other dream, Orlando, her home, her city, in flames and desolate and the sleepers destroying one another, desolate. Death.

Over her dead body.

"I'll do everyhing I can sweetie," Gypsy whispered. "I promise. You and me, we're tied together. This is my -home-" There was force, bond, tie in that word for her. The spirit stilled. The sensation dulled for the moment. They were both waiting, city spirit, city heirarch.

Just like her step-father, Gypsy planned on stopping whatever was coming - even if it meant kicking it in the shins until it turned its hunger on her.

Bullets are always interrupting my perfectly good evenings.

This one turns my night into hell. It's like slow motion rapport, hearing the glass shatter, ducking for those who aren't protected by forces fields, knowing I'm too slow.

I watch it hit Fee. I watch the blood pour out of her abdomen - thick and slow. gut wound. Painful way to go if you can't stop it. I watch the ward - strongest ward I've ever seen - go up around her. Then I'm clawing at it with magic and hands, banging at it, unable to get through the thick forcefield keeping me from her. Kellin's screaming and groaning, sharing her pain, the consilium that once called her "it" scrambles in a mad dash to keep her safe.

It's a game. That soon becomes clear. The voice box, the taunts of a female voice so quiet and smooth. We play by the rules, or Fee dies. A series of tests, a series of gems to break the ward, a series of choices. Majior. I've heard that name before and I wish Papa were here to tell me what he remembered. I wish the cabal had had the foresight to put a note with one of the damned soul stones to not move them so they'd remain bound. Seems like the old bitch is up and about again and right now we're on her rules.

Her rules.

But when the game ends I've got cards up my sleeve and a lot of dirty romanii tricks for the gadje bitch that put a bullet in my sisters stomach. All that royal righteous god-given fury boils in me, hot and molten and caged by the boundaries of justice and wisdom.

It's women only for the first challenge. Libra and I go, convince our way into the top floor restaurant where even the bus boys are in tuxedos. My jeans and metallic jacket are sticking out like a sore thumb. A man beckons us over. There's an envelope on the table with him. Mister somethingorother. I don't catch his name. I'm considering sliding the envelope away with sleight of hand but I think it's breaking the rules and I think about Fee bleeding and I don't.

"I have something for you. In exchange, I get an ... interlude."

My gut clenches.

"Interlude?"

"Come now you're not that naive."

Just hoping for a different answer.

Libra's about to stand but I put an arm on her shoulder. My mind's already shutting off. Not so much different between this and Randolph. Not so much difference between the hands and grunting mouth of a stranger and my stepfather. Not much difference between stepping in here to save a bleeding, dieing young woman whose mother saved my father and stepping between my younger sibs and the man intent on hurting them. Libra doesn't have my issues.

And she never should.

So I follow him down to the limo and I climb in the back and I disrobe when he asks me to. It's not really me though. It's my body, but I'm lost up in that blackness that I haven't felt in so long I thought it was really gone this time. I'm swallowed up in that thick foggy blanket and I'm vaguely aware he isn't abusing me. I'm vaguely aware that there's no pain beyond the fact that my body is unaccepting and unwilling toward this disgusting man and his heavy hands and the mouth and thrusting and grunting. When it's done and I draw my clothes back on over sweat and dampness, he drops the stone into my hands. I pull all my weapons back on and I walk back to Libra without turning.

Her gaze gives him that look like she'll kill him but I take her arm and we go back.

Fee's still hurting. I keep her talking along with Kellin, tell her stories, tell her anything I can to keep her awake. The missions go and come. Breach tells me that I should get my act together but he doesn't understand that this is my family, this crazy city, and they'll understand. he doesn't understand that distance in my eyes isn't because Fee is hurt.

Fee won't die. I refuse to accept any other possibility and so does my consilium. She is not an It - even though the voice box tries to tell her this - she is my sister. She is our heart. She makes us smile. And for that alone we'd kill for her - and not kill for her.

The distance is there because if I let myself feel my body right now I'll go mad. I'm sticky, aching, hurt in places I haven't been hurt in in a long time. I am Mahrime. Unclean.

They get all the gems. Of course they do. They're tests are simple and hard. Testing and yet they're all clever. Gainesville helps, bless them. Clever my city. Family. Together. Something that gadge bitch won't ever understand.

The ward drops. The healers dive for Fee. The shadow thing that appears roars back. And bless them all my city does what it does best and kicks the ass of the darkness from here to Alaska. I'm still not feeling my body. Not feeling the pain from the creature's claws and the dox backlash as the godfire surges along the katana.

Sun-lit wanderer. Kara's body protected my father's once. Now mine steps in to protect Fee. Favors returned. Favors returned. Why did she give my Papa the bracelet? Why did Papa give it to me? I clasp it around Fee's wrist to keep it. It's hers and I think she should hold it and I'll figure out the mystery of it later.

"I miss all the fun." Solomon's voice makes my stomach lurch. I don't want to tell him this, how I broke our marriage vows to save my sister. I don't want his touch on my unclean skin, on the filth inside and outside me, contaminating me.

I avoid him and I see the frown and I see Libra talk to him and keep my secret. We are mother and daughter at times and tonight she holds my burden away from him.

Papa's arms are solid. Fee's arms are solid. Papa doesn't understand why I"m clinging to him like gravity holds to earth. But he lets me anyway. I won't tell him this. Won't tell him I'm a whore, that I've been used, that I offered to be used. I wish I could but I'm too afraid he'll never understand and let me near him again.

Instead I hit my briefings with the consilium officers. I hug Fee again. I set up appointments and set them on the tasks that will help us start to unravel this new threat. And then I get on my bike and I head home.

I let the water of the shower soak into me, scrub every inch of my body as hard as I can, wash my hair so many times I lose track. Keep doing it and keep praying all the while, feeling so much younger, so much like the old self before the suicide scars and with my step-father's seed still tainting my body. Solomon knows something's wrong. Waits, patient, watching, giving me the out to not talk about it.

He touches my shoulder and I jerk away.

"I'm mahrime," I whisper.

"You've been in graveyards again?" it's half joke, half serious - he knows the taboos about being near death.

"No."

There's silence. Then a sizzle, the air vibrating. Every mirror in the apartment shatters. Every lightbulb breaks with the force of his rage and my heart feels like it's breaking with it. Sobbing - god I hate crying, I never cry - I shove the ring at him. Tainted. Unclean. The price for my sister's life is set and worth it but no less painful.

But then his arms are around me and he's rocking me and he's pushing the ring back on my finger and he's smoothing my hair. "You aren't unclean. You didn't do anything wrong and I'm not angry with you. You took something on that most of them have no idea you did and won't know and they won't know how much it cost you."

"Doesn't matter."

"It does to me." And he kisses my temple and reassures me I'm his wife and not unclean and in the darkness, when I usually save him, this time he saves me, a little bit of God's kindness given back.

My sister is alive. My sister is alive. My sister is alive. Amazingly, I sleep, knowing that Fee is alive and that Solomon is next to me and some of the ache of not being in my own body going away with the solid noise of his breathing as he guards me.

Chibi Gypsy



chibi solomon

I stand there in the middle of a street that I'm pretty sure if I don't do something is going to explode. Two abyssal entities and Jack Death smirking his fool awakened head off because he kept unleashing the paradox that drew them, the ghost whipping my brother, the two blocks worth of property damage that I've no idea how I'm going to cover. I can imagine Cameron Michaels crusading on this city in about two hours.

My concillium is about to die because some fancy pants death master didn't have the sense to stay to his banishment and didn't have the common sense on the abyss that God gave a bunny rabbit with brain damage.

There's that moment where time stops for me, where all the problems are clear, and I know that I"m over my head; we all are.

Normally at this point - they're rarer than you'd think - I'd go to church and meditate it out for a bit, get myself recentered, come up with a plan. There's no time for that.

My fingers wrap around the hilt of the katana. I close my eyes. Kensai am I ready? He said I'd know. Solomon said it was a matter of honor.

Papa your cabal gave your lives to defend this city. You left me a legacy. Right now between you and God I could use a little help to keep carrying it, to keep them safe. The prayer is rapid and quick and I feel the weight of the sword sing free as it slides out and balances into my hand. I slide into the stance like I've always known how.

I don't remember clearly what happens, or what I feel, just the sense that I'm me but I'm not, that I'm in control, but I'm not. Something steps out of me, glowing and bright and I'd recognize that messy pony tail even if I were blind. There's armor on him and my nimbus is flaring gold fire and wings and the smell of his smoke. The apparition - he's not there, I know he's not - swings out his own sword and for a moment we're just mirrors of each other. There's a choking in my throat, a feeling that every step I take is planned and meant, that I'm supposed to be here, right now, right then.

The form of my father steps into the cloud of darkness around that first abyssal entity and there's a flare of light and a howl and the thing falls in half. The spirit-apparation steps out, looking ragged and tired but as it falls to its knees and starts to dissaparate back into my sword, it smiles at me and there's a slow wink.

I'm running then, the katana out, aiming for the ghost that's on my brother, aiming for the enemies of my city, of my concillium. The sword sings and flashes and all the training - even though I've a ways to go still - takes hold.

In the end we're all standing there, beaten and bruised but alive. Jack Death's body lays dead in the twilight. The abyssal entities are gone. The hole Jack ripped in the twilight is closed. The ghost is dead. Tampa has, miraculously, managed to piece the damage back together and wipe the minds of the sleepers that were there.

I carefully wipe the blade clean and put it back in the scabbard and stand there numb.

Until I realize my leg's on fire and I should probably go put that out.

The blade is perfectly balanced, sitting, sheathed across my palms. I can feel the laquer and the wrapping on the scabbard, the criss crossing lines of thread weave and the turn of the pattern against my skin. It doesn't look complex but I'd have no idea how to weave it myself. When Solomon looked for the maker's mark it read "Sensei" and the kanjii on the blade gave way to Romanii and left us both confused because the traditions weren't so traditional for this blade.

Sunlit wanderer.

When you were handed to my papa what did he say? Did he act surprised - I'd bet he was because he wasn't the sort who ever expected gifts, nevermind ones with honor attached. But he probably didn't say anything. I think in my mind's eye, as I make up this memory, that he took it and bowed deeply to a fellow warrior and an old friend.

I have never drawn this blade in battle, only a handful of times to inspect it and try to understand it before my thumb creased along the edge to stain it, then clean it, slide it back home. I know enough to listen to my teachers and I'm not far enough long to fight with it yet; the matter of honor hasn't been strong enough.

But I do keep it with me. I guess it confuses some folks. The romanii with the Japanese sword. I don't really mind. It's a little piece of him I can carry with me. I'm not sure if that makes any sense - I mean it's an object and not my father. I get that. But it's part of him, part of his story - a part I never really got to hear - and when it comes down to it I'm walking his path. Maybe not in his footsteps, but I took up the obligations and the honor he left and I'll keep carrying it as long as I can.

Since it's working again...

http://freecouncil.cam-wiki.org/index.php?title=Gypsy

Post a (screened for your safety) comment with a one-word subject and one of my characters. They will post their thoughts and/or rants on said topic.

Opinions voiced are fair game to be known as IC statements.

Characters allowed to be asked are:

Gypsy, (Mage)
Arabella Evengii (Requiem)
Edria Meredith (Lost)

Note... I do reserve the right to not disclose some things. I also reserve the right to be as slow as hell responding

Oh God, Elle. Not Elle.

What did you want it to be Solomon?

But Not Elle. Why not me? Why not? Why wasn't I there, why didn't I go?

And I listen to Solomon recount the story with as much accuracy and professional decorum as he can muster, as he grimaces when I unleash the spell that Ruktis had left on me that heals the rest of his wounds. I listen.

But I don't really hear.

I'm hearing her laughter and feeling the tight snug of arms around me as she leaps on me when I tell her I need her on Halloween night.

I'm hearing all the times she told me to stop being hard on myself.

I'm hearing the giddiness in her voice when she got back from a date with Havoc.

I'm hearing the tiredness when she talked about the Guardians, or when she didn't talk about them.

I'm hearing the care and exasperation in her voice at Moira's latest escapade.

I'm hearing all these things, trying to hang on to them because the only other thing to hear is that my friend, my best friend, is dead.

Somehow I get Solomon to bed. Somehow I make it down to the bike and I'm tearing out of the garage at EPIC with no care for the speed limit or how late it is. I just need to feel that engine running hard to red-line and the wind battering me making it too hard to cry. I have to get there. Now. Now. Now. Because I can't let anyone else tell him. I can't.

Pound. Pound. Pound. My fist on the door of the Tampa Free Council safehouse. Lights go on upstairs, running of feet, waking up the entire cabal and it's Havoc that opens the door and looks confused at me out of sleepiness. And then the confusion turns to worry and then I see it turn to quiet resignation that he doesn't voice yet. So strong. Did she ever tell you that you were so strong? Did you know how happy you made her? I never heard her laugh like that.

He stands there as I tell him and finally the only thing I can do is hold out that Star of David in my hand.

I wait then. Wait for the moment when his temper will break. Wait for the realization that I'm the one that killed her by letting her go, by putting all these restrictions on her. I wait for it.

And once long ago I made a promise that I would never let anyone do what my step-father did to me again. I would fight.

But I wait for Havoc to throw the first punch and to take it. My body remembers how to recoil and roll with it. I wait for it, expecting it, and I'll let him do it because I don't deserve anything else in that moment, standing there with a man who might as well be a brother, telling him about the death of the woman he loved.

The punch never comes. The pain never comes. Just a slide of arms around me in a hug so tight I can barely breath and I'm sobbing against his shoulder, shaking and obliterated by grief and guilt that neither of us understand.

"She can't go back like this," Gadget says quietly. There's a touch on my mind, something soft and gentle like Papa's lullabyes, and I fall over and am lifted and then there's nothing but darkness.

Elle... oh God I'm so sorry.

One. Light it. Two. Light it. Three. Light it. Four. Light it. Five. Light it.

Arrange them in a circle, feel the heat curling on fingers calloused and hard, like a kiss, a reminder.

"A light to guide them on, a light to guide us on. A light to remind them to look back and find us even as we remember." The words are soft, Romanii, no one hears them. He used to do this and I never knew why.

I know tonight.

He lit candles for his fallen comrades. I light them tonight for ours. I'm not arrow, the only one in the bar still that isn't, but I don't feel out of place here because I'm my father's daughter.

I carry his honor, even though he is gone. Just like they'll carry Black Arrows. I think for a moment, maybe they knew eachother. And maybe they didn't, but I don't ask, just watch the candles.

Elle. Shadow. Nightstick. Papa. And one for those whose names I didn't know.

"I either go after Mal or the Guardians kill me," she spits and I look at this woman that I've known since I was a kid. We used to set fire to things together, her and I, watch the paper burn and smoke and curl up. Two little pyros hidng from our step-fathers.

"And what are you gonna do?" I ask. The fight's all mental, all in our heads but anyone can tell from the way our bodies are tense, from the glare, what's going on behind our eyes.

"Kill her."

I've got a choice now. I can trust Elle, the woman I know, to do the right thing, to follow the lex magica the cabal heads wrote up which equates death as a serious thing and only levied by me.

But as I look at her and the hard steel in her eyes, I don't see Elle Davenhurst. I see a Guardian of the Veil and I wonder not for the first time what they did to my friend.

"Not in this city."

Even against her, of all people, against Sol, against any of them, our line is drawn. The cities will be run by the lex magica, not the whim of an order, not the desire for vengance, but by law. And it hurts like poison spitting that at her.

"If I don't, they'll kill me."

"If you do I'll have to push for the law."

"Then you'll kill me."

"I didn't say that."

But I know that if she's committing murder without the permission of the lex and the counsel and me, I know that if she takes this step she's doomed. Because I've seen them all fall down it, the Guardians, sacrificing their souls so the rest of us are supposedly better off.

But they forget that their souls help keep us better off. Elle's talked me through more shit than anyone and without her...

"Not. In. My. City."

And I can feel myself put down Gypsy, put down Gabriella, and the Romanii and the past and the old friendship and pick up being heirarch. I can feel it like I can see her be the Guardian. I can feel it when the Libertine slides into me and I know that my people wanted these laws and so I have to uphold them, and I can feel it when God touches my hand and the wings flare and I know that I either draw a line or I never will.

She cuts the mental link but a few minutes later I'm holding her star of david and a note that says "I'll do as you ask." But it doesn't make me feel better. I pace, I wait, I pace, I wait. Solomon and she are both out there making sure Mal is gone or dead.

and deep inside I know one of them isn't coming back.

The plan was going better than I could have expected. They, inexplicably, gathered up to listen to me and I passed the mechanics to Shadow who clarified on the more specific portions of what the combat would bring. We divided up the healers, the occultists, the warriors and off we went.

Overall, it went better than expected. They didn't take the bait on the soul stones but I had to try. I had to try and keep the numbers down, the casualties down, the number of dead bodies my hands were responsible lessened.

I wasn't expecting the entire pilon to have killed itself off before we got there and at the first squish beneath my boots i had to stop and retake stock. It was disgusting and a blood bath and the bar was full of dead seers. We all paused for a second, wondering, but then a roar of rage pushed into action.

There's a moment of decision between "I'll talk this out" and "I'll fight this out" for me. When there's a seer running at you full tilt you stop talking and start fighting. The shot gun kicked like a mule but I held it steady and watched the bullet hit him, spin him with the force of impact. Just shoot, Gypsy girl. He won't stop until he'd down.

I didn't want to kill him though. My order says to, I know it. Destroy followers of the lie. But the other parts of my order say that Heirarchy fosters the lie and killing even seers outright violates the democracy and the order of my city. There will be time for trials and executions later, time for me to weigh my own soul in judgement before I make that decision.

Shadow's not waiting though. His knife glides quick and smooth and the seers behind us are left dead on the floor. There's no time to argue with him, not if we're going to live. I can see the blood lust in his eyes though. He's not fighting anymore. He's destroying. It's not justice and I can feel the spirit in the katana stir, can feel the angel wings flare in fire. That's not justice.

We fight onward, Shadow's moving too quick to stop and that last room... that last room is Mal bent over the broken body of her husband and I hear myself yelling "stop" before I know why. Maybe it's because I can see myself and Sol there for a second. Maybe it's because I don't understand anything going on here and the sudden need for some answers is required before I can procede.

But then Shadow's squaring a circle, snarling that Mal should get out of the city.

I have two thoughts: "When did his conscience come back?" and "who the fuck squares a circle with a seer?"

They're in there though, swinging at each other with magic and he's powerful but she's better and she's beating him. I wait for him to step out but he never does. That rage is back in his eyes.

This is what it's like when you die for your order, when you die for your pride, and a set of beliefs. I can't tell if I agree with what he's dieing for but he wants to now. He's going to stay there until one or the other of them drops.

It's him that goes first, despite all the recent alliance and all the banter and the training, Shadow is dead. I didn't like him. But I certainly respected him. I barely even notice the body port out and Elle port in. I barely notice that Libra and I are now toe to toe with Mal and that the death's head she wears is flaming and the angel wings on my back are lit up like heaven's with me.

"Get. Out. Of. My. City."

The Libertines might say I went easy on her, that I should have destroyed her but I know the people at my back and this woman's power and I know we'd lose more of us in this fight. I know that Shadow snarling get out was my cue and so I follow it. My free-council self ain't happy even though my wisdom is.

I watch her slip away, melting away in a portal and I can feel Elle glaring at me and I know there's another fight on.

oc: bored and awake. Thus an entry for Charisma.

I wonder what will happen to them sometimes, dream up their futures when I wait for the next attack, when I draw the sword, when I fire the guns. Am I really protecting them or should I be there with them to protect them?

Is it being a father when you can't hold your daughters and you can't see your sons wrestle in the yard? There are days I think I shouldn't have married and shouldn't have had children with the life I must lead and the calling I've taken, but when I see them again I can't imagine a world without them.

Sensei, for all his gruffness, understands and yet doesn't approve. It is our one point of contention. My need for family and his for disavowing those ties. He has his own connections but he says the risks are too great. Then again he also calls me an uneducated idiot and I think he's been at the Saki again but neither of us is counting. We're arrow and the flippancy of battle has nothing to do with true feelings; its the armor we put up to survive.

I hope my children go to college someday. I'm insisting on it for them as they get older. We'll find a way to pay for it and the cabal has always worked with eachother to make certain our children are provided for. They're so smart in their own ways, all of them, and I want them to have more choices than I did. I'm a construction grunt but I can see them being doctors and scientists and lawyers and artists. Happy really. I want them to be happy, to not remember the poverty or the rejections, and to embrace the possibility and the chance of something better.

They may awaken. Mythos says theirs a strong chance for that all things considered. They may not. They'd make good mages, my lot. They'd stick together and they'd do the right thing not because I raised them well but because they actually care about things unlike so many of us.

With a little luck I'll get to see it all happen. I don't subscribe to the school of arrows die young and I have to prove mother wrong anyway.
It is perfectly acceptable to sit on the porch with a shotgun and a sniper rifle for your daughter's dates.

(not sure when this happens - some time back actually. It was sorta a fun idea that Jake and I cooked up with no specific time/date set. Just for giggles)

I just hit town and the patrol tonight was quiet. When Sol suggests Cowboys for some cheap beer, I grin and agree. I mean really a few hours of being normal right? It's not the best side of town. It's not the best bar. But it is the sort of place two shit-kickers can sorta blend in without much issue.

I am not a pretty woman. Sometimes I manage a passable cute or vaguely attractive with some effort and polish. But my brothers and sister got all the looks in this family. My features in the neon lit mirror are too harsh, too strong, lips a little too thin, nose a little too hawkish, and years of fighting and street living give me more lines around my eyes on a thirty-year old face and make me look a little more mid-thirties than younger. I like my eyes though. I don't mind on the rest. My ego isn't bolstered by my appearance and I'm glad that when something goes for my face in a fight I don't freak out. Besides, tough guy over there seems to find me cute enough and it works.

It's why, however, I can't figure out what alcohol does to men. That old saying that beer makes all women attractive must be true because in bars, it's always someone else hitting on me. Must be the red hair, not real sure. Most likely it's the alcohol. We're three beers in to our own drinking and asshole #3 is sidling up giving me the eye.

I judge by what she's wearing
Just how many heads I'm tearing
Off of assholes coming on to her
Each night seems like it's getting worse
And I wish she'd take the night off
So I don't have to fight off
Every asshole coming on to her
It happens every night she works

I don't really know what to do with guys hitting on me. I can take a little compliment here and there - I mean I'm still a girl. But after that it either confuses me or makes me really uncomfortable. This guys edging into my personal space in a way that is going to get him injured.

They'll go and ask the DJ
Find out just what would she say
If they all tried coming on to her
Don't they know it's never going to work
They think they'll get inside her
With every drink they buy her
As they all try coming on to her
This time somebody's getting hurt

Here comes the next contestant

"No I really don't want a chardon-whatever-the-heck you offered. Thanks though."

"Are you sur-"

Whatever he's about to leer at me gets cut off by Solomon's fist.

"Was that really necessary?"

"Yup." He growls around his cigar and I can see the anger in his eyes. No bonehead, this is just all miri ves'tacha being his lovable arrow self. Great.

Is that your hand on my girlfriend?
Is that your hand?
I wish you'd do it again
I'll watch you leave here limping
I wish you'd do it again
I'll watch you leave here limping
There goes the next contestant



"No not really." I duck an incoming fist in return aimed for him and he steps back quickly enough to avoid it. I shift my weight as my fist swings around, connecting with asshole #3's nose. Again.

"See I can do it myself." The guy who was hitting on me is now laying on the floor groaning. I hit harder than Sol. The bar has now officially ground to a halt in that moment before chaos breaks loose. I look around and spot a few of his friends advancing on us. Six to two. Decent odds.

I even fear the ladies
They're cool but twice as crazy
Just as bad for coming on to her
Don't they know it's never going to work
Each time she bats an eyelash
Somebody's grabbing her ass
Everyone keeps coming on to her
This time somebody's getting hurt

Here comes the next contestant

"This really wasn't necessary. I keep telling you that," I shoot back. His back is to mine and we're facing a circle now. Half the bar has fled. Gun fights aren't team sports - bar fights are.

"He was bothering you."

"I'm a big girl."

"Yup. And I can handle myself." Fists fly, a few bottles. This crew is woefully unprepared for us. No magic, just hitting and swinging and ducking and the occasional leg thrown out from under some of them. I'm not really hurting folks - neither is he - no permanant damage done here tonight. Just adrenaline and some good old fashioned "get your hands off my SO" kinda fun.

I'm hating what she's wearing
Everybody here keeps staring
Can't wait 'til they get what they deserve
This time somebody's getting hurt

Here comes the next contestant

"This is your fault!" I shout as a chair wings by our heads. Crap they've gotten to the throwing furniture stage.

"No it isn't! You were sitting over there letting them!"

"I was fine! Your fault!"

"Yours!'

"Actually both of you-" Someone I don't even know interjects and he gets two fists in his face for the effort.

"No one asked you." We both spit back.

Is that your hand on my girlfriend?
Is that your hand?
I wish you'd do it again
I'll watch you leave here limping
I wish you'd do it again
I'll watch you leave here limping
There goes the next contestant


In the end, they've either run or are lolling half concious on the floor and I've got a nice bruise on my jaw and Sol's limping a bit. We're still standing though. I hear a soft whir of sirens in the distance.

"Shit."

"Huh?"

"Now we go."

"You think anyone will notice us?"

"Nope." Because the occultation tends to cover this stuff and I shorted the surveillance out when we came in the place, not to mention the blurring affects I tossed on the bikes' plates. Sol and I both are non-descript enough to slide under the radar and ain't no red neck worth his salt going to admit getting pummeled by a scrawny little woman. Let's say living with men all my life I've got an idea of what sets them off and i cover my bases.

"That was kinda..."

"Fun?" We share a grin. "You still d-"

"Gypsy? Shut up."

By the time the cops arrive we're on the other side of town having another guiness. In the apartment this time. No sense in taking another risk

I wish you'd do it again
Each night seems like it's getting worse
I wish you'd do it again
This time somebody's getting hurt

There goes the next contestant