Because it's better than answering this week's topic

[abetterlie]

From Cordy:

Please leave a one-word comment that you think best describes me. It can only be
one word.

No more.

Then copy & paste this in your journal so that I may leave a word about you. (If you want.)

Comments

[pixie_viscera]

Sparkly.

[abetterlie]

*warily*

That's... interesting. Who are you? There is something familiar about you, but I'm pretty sure we never met.

[pixie_viscera]

You've all sorts of sparkling bits. Pretty.

...Why, I'm a sister.

[abetterlie]

Drusilla was after Holtz' time, and so Connor knows nothing of her or her story with Angel and Darla, though he has seen the name mentioned in a few livejournals. But one doesn't have to be a genius to figure out what she might mean with "sister". He's repelled and fascinated by the idea at the same time.

"Which one of them made you?"

[pixie_viscera]

"Daddy did, silly."

Little boy was awfully silly. Not little boy. He was an uncle of sorts, after all.

[abetterlie]

He thinks of his other sister, twice-sister, the daughter of Daniel Holtz that either Angelus or Darla turned into a vampire, thus forcing Holtz to kill her, and feels a moment of fierce pity with the unknown vampiress. At the same time, a lifetime of training tells him that if he ever meets her, he has to dust her at the first opportunity. That was what he was made for.

"I'm sorry."

[pixie_viscera]

Dru is more preoccupied with his eyes. Pretty blue eyes.

"You've Grandmummy's eyes."

She reaches for them.

[abetterlie]

So much for feeling sorry for one of them. Even if Angel did the same thing to her he did to Holtz' family. She's lucky he doesn't have a stake with him right now, but he blocks her move with his right arm and uses his left hand to grab her throat in order to pin her against the next wall, with a speed that matches a vampire's.

"Don't touch me."

[pixie_viscera]

Feisty.

Honestly, Dru enjoys it a bit more than she ought to. It was more and more difficult to find a nice boy willing to play these games.

Beginning to giggle is probably not the sanest reaction, but the wall does feel lovely and rough against her back.

[abetterlie]

Okay. This is officially the weirdest vampire he ever met. More like a giddy school girl, but that has to be an act. He tries not to recall that, the entire horrible confusing mess of hate and love aside, he enjoyed sparring with Angel on a purely physical level and smiled and even laughed the first time they did this. Unfortunately, determinedly not thinking of Angel makes him think of Darla and the expression in her eyes when she saw him fight and kill, which is even worse place to go. And then there is the fact this unknown yet oddly familiar vampire, sharing a bizarre kind of lineage with him, whom he's standing incredibly close to happens to be a very beautiful woman, something that only now registers

[pixie_viscera]

Dru has no intention of attacking. This one isn't hers to attack.

Instead, she runs her hands up and down the fabric of her dress in what may be considered a provocative manner.

"Do you like my dress?"

[abetterlie]

This is where artificial Connor Riley memories come in handy. They provide one with a sense of the absurd and pop culture references even when the rest of one can't decide whether to be repelled or attracted.

"Are you trying to seduce me, Mrs Robinson?"

Yes. Cling to the Riley part of yourself. Don't think about family and dreams that had to be nightmares and vampires and fantasies. If you can't do what Stephen would have done right away, dust her even if she doesn't attack you, do what Connor Riley would have done before the mindwipe. Be amused and impressed but safe from any connection.

"Sorry. I'm already taken."

And suddenly he feels guilty, as if not destroying the creature is a worse betrayal of Justine than letting himself be touched by her would have been.

[pixie_viscera]

Dru simply smiles.

"Is she yours?"

[abetterlie]

Which is a truly nasty hit. As he never met a psychic before, Lorne and his empathy skills aside, he assumes Dru has been spying on him, or is just guessing.

"She belongs to herself."

A fine PC attitude, an inner voice which sounds exactly like Angelus mocks him. But you don't really believe that. What you do believe is that you've never been able to keep a single woman you fell for. Not Cordy, and she was possessed to begin with, not Tracy who might never have fallen for you anyway if not for the mindwipe, and you know you won't keep Justine. Even if she had sex with you straight after finding out he's alive. You know what that was? A pity fuck. A nice way to say goodbye.

Except that Justine isn't nice, Connor thinks, and stares at the vampire in front of him. Many things, but not nice. Not his, but not his father's, either.

"And whose are you?"

And he doesn't know where that came from.

[pixie_viscera]

Dru has been with quite a few men and women. But she belongs to only one of them. Even if he isn't hers.

"I'm Daddy's."

It all makes perfect sense in her mind.

[abetterlie]

Figures. You are my true father, a memory whispers in him, and that strange encounter, when they were trading vicious barbs and he was so full of hate and excitement that it almost felt like something else. The memory of walking towards the cage, in order to do he didn't know what, until Cordelia stopped him. His left hand wanders to his throat, where he has a thin scar. A reminder from the day at the mall, when Angel killed him and made him anew.

"He's good at collecting people he doesn't want, isn't he?"

he says, brutally, because he resents her for bringing all this back to him, and then is ashamed a moment later. That's not the son of Daniel Holtz talking, who was taught to hunt the beasts, true, but not to take joy in hurting them. Only the son of Darla and Angel would be capable of that.