[Christine] Unsatisfying
Ooc: I got a bit under four hours of sleep and was trying to rectify that as I wrote the end. I'm sure it shows. Will review sometime I am not on a screen where I have four lines of text. Good night!
Ic: A hundred years ago there had been a coterie. She recalled it with the filter of a time fondly looked at, but acknowledged that was back before her memory had been perfect. Still hunting had been a pleasure - back when the forests and alleys were filled with evil spirits that could work food up without the exposure of streetlights and quick safety of cell phones.
The little pack had lasted a decade and dissolved. She had not gone back to the idea of it until now.
The two of them walked next to one another, falling naturally into step. It was one of the little pleasures she recalled from a century before.
They met a third, as she had been the one to suggest the hunt, and they traded hunting preferences. Hunting at a mall, Christine wrote off most chance of her enjoying the hunt itself, but she could watch the others.
The first warning whisper came when he proposed a solution that would suit the three of them, an elaborate scenario that involved a chase and several victims around the area outside.
She walked off with the third to find someone to chase. lj user="juliuscarver"> was not interested in the pursuit, and would meet them later. As she moved, watching, a target down an alley caught Christine's eye - wearing a blue polo shirt and khakis he appeared to be a seller at one of the retail stores, but one would not satisfy all of them. However he carried the hair-trigger air of the unloved retailer who held his rage in and she knew he would fight back. Her fangs pricked at her tongue.
Brianne knew the area better, she allowed, and they moved to a doorway to watch a strip where people avoided paying to park.
She settled to wait, still. Brianne fidgeted and paced, and Christine recognized that Brianne was not here to hunt. She remembered gritted teeth when the Mekhet left the apartment before and could predict what was coming.
"What's the deal with Julius?" the twitchy little Carthian asked. It took only a few words for Brianne to back off, but Christine's appetite for the hunt had instantly soured. Carver had not named her earlier because she would not understand the man and the beast as he and Christine did, and now her skin itched with the desire to walk away from the Carthian who wanted to position herself closer to Julius rather than to HUNT.
But a memory warmed her chest and throat, clear and vibrant - taking down one hiker and then another, plowing into a cluster of warm fleshy screams and accompanied by brethren who genuinely felt right with her. It was a raw, visceral, RIGHT sensation. She remained, unwilling to give up the chance at satisfaction, however fleeting.
A couple arrived and parked. Brianne targeted them. Two for three.
When Brianne then asked what they should do, Christine decided the honest hunt and chase was out. Brianne wanted to stalk people and they needed to go somewhere that Carver could meet them. Christine could hope for a fight when she went at it, but starting one now was an invitation for disaster. She almost went back and faced the fellow in the alley and left these to Brianne to deal with luring and the traffic and the lights and the cell phones and preventing them from seeking refuge with the populated mall.
Except she really hated the idea, especially now, of being the one to show up with Dinner for One.
The couple were not smart and thought she was a dog, in the shadows. Maybe she had puppies. Oh how cute she was. Normally a perfect deception was its own joy; in this instance she had the nagging feeling that she was feeding helpless cubs who couldn't feed themselves, bringing food to the nest.
Brianne might have called Carver back. Christine did not know. But he showed up.
The dance that followed was unsatisfying. Neither of the targets were fighters. She wondered if Brianne had picked that intentionally, but expected that the Mekhet would not recognize a fighter to avoid it and likely it had not been intentional.
It was unsatisfying to Julius too, which only aggravated further. Only Brianne took her fill, playing with her food and letting it scream, attract attention, be seen, bleeding out. Christine called attention to the concerned citizen with a cell phone until Brianne had to go off and fix the mistake.
Julius had tried to interest her in the meal (just as she had tried to give it to him) but their hearts were not in it. The girl was just not interesting and even though she was enchanted with the Daeva it was not time to propose something that would be exciting.
Carver offered that she could go, but she remained. To leave him to clean up a feeding mess hours after they had come to their agreement would show poorly, and he was bound to remain to make sure the breach was cleaned. The imagined sour taste in her throat keeping her company.
After it was over the three of them walked a block away, Brianne smothering Julius about how he hadn't eaten, why did they hunt if they weren't hungry, they could get Julius something, what did he want?
If she remained, Christine risked forcing Carver to choose between her and a Covenant mate. Likely it would go poorly for her just on his perceived principles, and she elected to bow out before she did something that would make this more agonizing.
She excused herself to go see if the fighter she had seen before was still to be found, without much honest hope. Before she did she met eyes with Julius, and knew the same expression she saw in them was in her own. Hunger, lack of satisfaction, restlessness from something deeper than the night's events alone could explain.
She left, wanting to ask more and unable to.
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