SOL - Generation Four - Chapter Sixteen
I am so happy to get this out. We are so close to finishing this generation! In case you guys didn't see my last update, I have exams coming up so I'm not sure when the next chapter is going to be put out. It may be a few weeks wait, but fear not! I'm writing and taking the pictures for the next two or three chaps (however long I feel this huge shindig is gonna need) so they will be released in quick succession. Exciting stuff. I can't think of anything else to say, except that if you check out my tumblr (link on the sidebar because I'm lazy) then you can read Ven's side of the story! It's short and sweet, but you get a few nice extras there.
Last time...
It hadn’t taken long before Q had proclaimed that Fury was well enough to be up and about, and as soon as the fever and fragile nerves had disappeared he was happy to oblige. He took it easy at first, moving about and jogging lightly on the two old treadmills that had been hastily put in the large barn behind the house they were staying out, but soon enough he was up and sparring with everyone else.
There was, of course, something niggling at his mind. Someone. Autumn. He hadn’t meant to tell her - his cousins didn’t seem to be annoyed at him for blurting it out - and now he was worried what she and Keely would think.
Fury hadn’t a chance to talk to them since he’d been up, and Autumn certainly hadn’t come back to chat. That was probably a bad sign. It had upset him more than he thought it would.
It wasn’t until the fourth day after he’d been up and about (not that he was counting) that Autumn came to him, knocking quickly and barging in before Fury could splutter a reply.
She was about to say something when her eyes were drawn to his bare chest, and she raised an eyebrow.
“You didn’t give me time to reply!” he protested, running a hand through his still damp hair.
“My apologies.” Autumn paused and waited. Fury stood there, unsure what she wanted him to do. “Aren’t you going to put a shirt on?”
“Oh! Right,” he nodded, turning around and grabbing the first top he could find, hastily pulling it on. “Sorry.”
Autumn smirked at him and closed the door behind her, folding her arms and leaning against the wood. Eventually, she sighed. “I meant to talk to you days ago,” she confessed, “but I didn’t know how to word what I wanted to say.”
“Oh,” he said, sitting down on his bed. He gestured for her to sit next to him. To his surprise, she did. “And?”
“I still don’t know how to say it,” she said dryly. “But I thought you were probably sick of waiting for my response.”
Fury laughed a little. “You could say that.”
Autumn ran a hand through her hair. “I told Keely about it.” She turned to him. “Do you still have feelings for her?”
Fury tried to gauge what she wanted him to say, but her tone was completely indifferent. He sighed and shook his head. “I think a lot of it was teenage hormones,” he admitted. “I did want to be her friend. More than that, maybe. But Lust ruined it for both of us.”
Autumn nodded slowly. “She said that she always knew there was something like this up with your powers. I didn’t think she realised, but she’s smart. She can link the hazy memories and your secrecy about your talents.”
Fury took in a deep breath. “And her final thoughts are?”
“That she thinks you were right to break up with her. She’s still hurt, though. Give her time,” Autumn promised.
He nodded and looked at his hands, playing with each other nervously. “And what do you think?”
“She said that in every hazy memory she has, you never stayed with her,” Autumn said, almost grudgingly. “So she firmly believes that you were telling the truth when you said you weren’t taking advantage of her.”
“Of course,” Fury mumbled.
“In light of that,” Autumn began slowly. Fury glanced up. “I still think you were a total and complete idiot to go out with her.” She stood up, stretched, and walked to the door. Fury watched her, dumbfounded. He had hoped that she would have been more... forgiving.
Autumn glanced back when she reached the door, hand on the knob. “As much as I want to be mad at you, I can’t be. After what happened last week... we need to be able to work together.”
“So you forgive me?” Fury checked.
“No,” she snorted, quick to answer. “But I can. Elves are not forgiving creatures, Fury. Count yourself lucky.”
“Where does that leave me?” he groaned. “You’re so confusing.”
Autumn laughed at him. “I think we should get to know each other. Then maybe I’ll forgive you and maybe we can be friends.”
Fury sighed deeply. “That sounds like a lot of effort.”
She grinned - it must have been the first time that Fury had ever seen her smile so widely, and he sat up a little when he realised how beautiful it made her - and opened the door. “Then it’s a good thing that you’re prepared to put that effort in, isn’t it?
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Ven was back on his feet after one more bout from the werewolf serum that Q had managed to grab, but he was forbidden to do anything more than light exercise until he got his strength back and put the weight back on that he had used up in the healing process. Needless to say, the wolf wasn’t happy - and he was plenty fidgety.
“Just five minutes,” he pleaded.
Dova glanced up from where he was reading. “Did the stake somehow kill all your brain cells?” he asked, “because you seriously do not understand the word no. Or is that a dog thing?”
“Do, come on!” Ven tried again, sitting on the edge of his bed. “I need to run. I can’t stay here and do nothing! I’m a wolf, you don’t understand -“
Dova sighed and pushed the chair to wheel over to Ven. “You’re a wounded wolf.”
“Stop being a stubborn asshole,” he demanded, glaring at the half vampire.
Dova sighed and turned the corner down in his book, throwing it over to the desk. “You will only take longer to heal, Ven.”
Ven whined. “I can’t take staying still like this! Let me go run.”
“Hmm, let me think about that...”
“Asshole,” he swore. Dova chuckled, and Ven only glared more. “I swear to God, Dova, just let me mpfh-“
Dova smiled after he had shoved his hand over Ven’s mouth. “Ah, sweet silence.” Ven growled, low with warning, and snapped at Dova’s hand when he didn’t take it away. The half vampire flicked the wolf’s nose. “Bad dog.”
Ven launched himself up and paced to the door, trying to shoulder it open before realising it was locked. “Sonofabitch,” he swore. “You know I hate closed spaces.”
When Dova spoke again, it was softer - and free of all teasing. “I know, Ven,” he said, coming up behind him and slowly persuading him to turn away from the door. “But if you leave this room, you will find a way out of the house to the treadmills or even Shift - and that will mean you’ll go back to being bed bound,” he told Ven seriously, hand lightly over where the wound was almost healed. “You need to give it a couple more days.”
Ven groaned and closed his hand into a fist, fighting back the urge to let his claws out. His skin itched with the need to Shift, to stretch his legs and feel the burn in his muscles. He couldn’t sit still, couldn’t lie down, couldn’t be satisfied reading a book. He needed to move. He needed to do something productive.
“I’m not going to budge,” Dova warned, guessing Ven’s thoughts from the look on his face.
Ven eventually sighed and dropped down to sit on the floor. The coolness of the tile helped ease the heat of his skin. “I hate you,” he promised.
“No you don’t,” Dova snorted.
“I need to do something!” he said, claws shooting out with his sudden gesture. He huffed and drew his wolf side in. He looked up at Dova pensively. “C’mere.”
“Down there?” Dova asked, wrinkling up his nose. “I don’t - oof!” He landed over Ven when the wolf had jerked him down, and rubbed his nose that he must have bumped. “Some warning would have been nice.”
“That was what the c’mere was for. If you’re watching me you may as well be entertaining me too,” he reasoned.
“Oh?” Dova asked. “Maybe I don’t feel like -“ his words were cut off when Ven kissed him, hot and demanding, Ven’s lips and his hands chasing all other thoughts away.
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“What’s your favourite hobby?” Fury asked, glancing over to where Autumn was sprawled on a blanket that shehad laid out over the floor - she must have been uncomfortable, but she hadn’t yet complained.
“Drawing. Back with my family we used to watch the bird in the trees, though,” she added. “That was... nice.”
“Is it still difficult? Without them?”
“Sometimes,” she said quietly. “It was a large community. We were all one big family. It’s something you don’t completely get over.” She paused. “I guess you’ve never felt loss, then?”
“I’ve been very lucky,” Fury agreed. “My dad never really talked about his family, except saying that they were the reason he got into this human group designed to sabotage the council. My mum... She never got over the death of Korra’s father and the loss of her own parents. It’s weird. She doesn’t act like a mum at all, but I’m grateful for her all the same.”
“What’s she like?” Autumn asked, after a long pause. She glanced over to him. “Do you miss her?”
Fury nodded glumly. “I miss everyone. It’s not like we don’t chat or visit, and I’ve got used to... being away, I guess. But I still wish they could be here too.” He hesitated. “My mum... she’s the youngest of her siblings, but man she acts so much older. It’s creepy. There’s this awful look in her eyes that she gets when she thinks no one’s looking. I wish I could make it better for her,” he added softly, “but when I got older we didn’t.... I don’t know how to say it. We didn’t feel like mother and son anymore, I guess. We were close, but...” He trailed off.
“That’s... quite sad,” Autumn murmured.
Fury found himself shrugging. “I’m close to my dad. When we go back to visit we spar or go fishing. They still love each other like they did when I was young,” he smiled.
Autumn imitated his smile. “I want something like that,” she admitted. “But it’s not something an elf usually has. We’re not... Naturally, we’re not like that. I think I’ve only wished for that since I’ve been here and seen Law and Chase together, or the way Q looks when he mentions that special lady of his.”
“There’s still plenty of time to find something like that,” Fury teased.
Autumn rolled her eyes. “This may be true, but with six of us paired up already, how much longer do we have to wait?”
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It had been established for a month now that everyone except Finn’s power had been shared with the other teenagers - it hadn’t taken long for Arcadia and Briony to be filled in about the Sins, because the four cousins has realised that knowing about each other’s talents meant they could fight better.
Fury was now one of the best fighters the group had and his cousins were furiously working on their Sins to try and achieve the same. Only Risa seemed to have made a promising start.
Ven was fighting with the rest of the group, almost fully healed, and Briony wasn’t far behind. Q had encourage the group to forget about their school work - all of them were at the age where they could have chosen whether or not to legally drop out of school anyway - and focus on training.
The teenagers threw themselves into the training with a new determination, all aware of the dangers that the council presented but still deciding to stick with each other and see this through, no matter what might happen. They often practised in larger groups, one against two or more, and both Q and Law could see the huge improvement that they were going through.
Sometimes other trainers would come in - Jace, Q’s closest friend, had been in a few times to teach the teenagers about psychic protection and ways to resist the council’s ways - and Q himself had begun fighting with the teenagers now they were approaching a much higher level.
News of the other groups slowly filtered in; the computing group were so adept that they could hack into most systems without being traced, and they were steadily gaining information on everything about the council; the science group had designed special substances that would be affective against full vampires, poisons that would work like carbon monoxide, sleeping powders and anything else that could be classed as biological warfare; the back-ups were jacks of all trades.
It had got to the point that individuals of each group would contact each other through phones or computers - never face to face - and the cousins had become familiar with some names and voices from the other teams. They all had enthusiastically promised to meet up when this was all over, blatantly ignoring the fact that when this was over they might be too.
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“Wow, guys, you actually made me out of breath this time,” Q said, grinning, as he ran a hand through his damp hair, chest heaving. Four teenagers faced him - Arcadia, Tore, Korra and Briony - all more out of breath than him. It was still progress.
Ven and Dova watched from above one side and Risa and Xander at the other. Risa caught Dova’s eye and grinned. “Jump him,” she mouthed.
Dova exchanged a glance with Ven and flipped over the barrier in one smooth motion, closely followed by the other three.
Q ducked away from Dova and quickly tripped him when he landed, spinning away from Ven’s kick and then getting caught by Risa and Xander working together behind him.
He fell to the training mats with an oof, the air knocked out of his lungs. He rolled over quickly and flipped himself up, easily knocking Xander away and sending Ven flying.
It was about then that the other four joined in after cheering and whooping their friends on, and Q soon found himself at the bottom of the dog pile of eight teenagers.
“I call cheats,” he protested from somewhere underneath Risa and Korra. “You guys are heavy.”
“Nah, that’ll just be Ven,” Dova put in, and the wolf knocked him off where he was sitting on Q’s back.
Q chuckled. “Now now, behave. Are you going to let me up?”
“Cue for a joke,” Briony muttered, and Q smirked.
“Oh, it’s time for you to phone your lady friend, isn’t it?” Ven smirked.
“Lady friend?” Q repeated. “Wife, thank you very much. Move!”
“Make us,” Ven and Briony responded in unison.
Semi-familiar laughter came from the door. Dova turned around to see Jace leaning against the doorway and chuckling at his friend under the teenagers.
“Looks like they outsmarted you, Quinton. I have to admit, it’s not difficult.”
“Shut up, Jason,” Q grumbled.
“Is Quinton your full name?” Arcadia asked curiously, and Jace smirked.
“Yup,” he said, at the same time as Q groaned a no.
Dova shared a look with Jace. “Oh yeah, Quinton is definitely his full name,” he told the others, straight faced.
“I hate you,” Q grunted.
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Ven - who was the oldest of the group by eight months - was soon going to hit adulthood when Q came along and told them that the opportunity to finish the council had finally arose.
“I think you’re ready,” he stared off solemnly. “And we have the perfect opportunity to take out the twelve seats.”
There were a few moments of silence as it sank in. The thing they had been training for years for had finally arrived, and no one knew quite how to take it.
Ven leaned forward, completely serious. There was no trace of humour in his expression. “Details,” he demanded.
Q nodded. “The 12 often meet - this isn’t a new thing. But a lot of their chosen heirs are going along. It’s a traditional thing, done every decade or so, so that heirs get a taste of what they’re going to inherit. They’ve all been involved with council business. None of them are innocent.” He took a deep breath. “If we can kill the majority and let it be known that anyone who allies themselves with what’s left with the council will be targeted by us, then this whole thing can be more or less over.”
He cleared his throat and went on. “This isn’t going to be easy. I’m not going to lie. The chances are, someone here won’t make it out alive. I’ll do everything I can to stop that, and so will Law, but I can’t sugarcoat this. I’m giving each of you the chance to step back now. You don’t have to do this.” It was almost like he was begging them to drop out, but no one spoke. Q nodded slowly. “Alright then. We have information on the layout of the buildings, the security and the vampires themselves. None of you are going to be taking on a Seat yourselves. They’re old. Old enough to kick my ass. We’re leaving them up to the science guys. We have to play dirty to win.”
“So what do we do?”
“You guys are going to kill all the heirs and other vampires you can.”
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Wow I promise next gen's house will have effort put into it. The bad decor makes me cringe.
BUT HEY! This is what we've been waiting for! This is what we've been building up to since generation one with Lukas! Isn't that bizarre. And I've still got another 5 gens to go....
So yes, the next two - three chapters... we're taking on the council. I just hope I can pull it off, which is why I'm going to write and take the pics for all the chaps before I release them.