undergrounds | March open post

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March open post

I. The Department Store [OPEN]
Waltham Forest, Morning

A relaxed morning in bed with a cup of tea had turned into a trip to the store to buy a new set of sheets. The mattress was dry now, at least, even if it would probably smell like tea forever, but she'd somehow managed to scrub a hole right through one of the sheets so she'd need a new set of those. The new sheets came with new pillowcases, and she decided she might as well get new blankets too, because her blankets had also fallen victim to the tea disaster, and before she knew it the three hundred pounds she had left in the world became less than two hundred and fifty.

Loaded down with new linens, she headed for the cafe and bought a sandwich and a cup of coffee, ruefully counting out her change. She was so preoccupied with that, hoping that maybe the barista had miscalculated and maybe coffee and a sandwich wasn't really that expensive, that she failed to notice when she nearly walked right into someone, only barely stopping herself spilling coffee all over them.

"I'm so sorry," she said quickly, immediately readjusting her grip on the coffee.

II. The Mansion [OPEN]
Westminster, Night

Alex needed the money. Badly. And it wasn't like she was robbing an orphanage or a bunch of nuns or something. She did research. The guy whose house she was breaking into in the middle of the night was filthy rich and not very nice, and if the contents of his safe happened to go missing, well, that sucked for him. Getting into the mansion was easy, and cracking the safe wasn't much harder. There was some cash and a small bag of diamonds, which she took, and a lot of papers, which she left.

Before tonight, she'd figured out how many guards there were, and had so, so carefully avoided all of them. So it came as a huge surprise when she heard a floorboard creak and whirled around to find a guard pointing his gun at her.

A short fight later, Alex was running full speed towards the outside fence. She'd been shot in the shoulder and her hands were slick with blood from digging the bullet out, which made climbing the fence a lot more difficult. Some other guard must have heard the gunshot, because as her hand finally gripped the top of the fence, all the outside lights turned on, lighting the yard up as bright as day. She felt someone grabbing at her ankle, kicked out as hard as she could, and hauled herself over the fence onto the sidewalk. She almost landed square on somebody's head.

III. The Bus Stop [OPEN]
City of London, Early Afternoon

The bus was late. This bus was always late, and Alex knew its exact schedule because Edith rode this bus every week. She had to buy cat food, and it had to be specialty cat food from a specialty store in the City. Alex hadn't believed that at first, because an 85 year old werewolf who was obsessed with cats didn't seem like it could possibly be real. And yet, here she was, carrying around a thirty pound bag of cat food for Edith for the third week in a row.

She didn't hate it as much as she thought she would have. Cleaning dentures was gross, and doing the dishes and laundry and changing beds was tedious. But helping the elderly members of the pack generally felt kind of... good. Which was a weird feeling.

Alex was snapped out of her reverie by someone barreling past her, snatching Edith's purse as he went. Alex did the first thing that came to mind: she hurled the bag of cat food at the thief. It hit him square in the back, broke, and sent its contents showering over a near passerby. She ran over, picked Edith's purse up, and kicked the thief onto his back. He was out cold.

"Are you okay?" she demanded of the passerby.

IV. The Diner [CLOSED to Illya] (backdated to a couple weeks ago)
Camden, Evening

Three weeks to the day that Illya made his deal, Alex waited for him in a small diner near the British Museum. She'd scraped together a few thousand pounds and had it converted to rubles, so she would be able to buy weapons and transportation once she got into Russia. She'd mapped Pinksy Forest, partially from memory and partially by bothering immigrants in Little Russia, and she had some ideas of where the pack's new den might be. All she needed was a way into the country, and Illya, she hoped, would have one for her.

She was too excited to eat. If this worked out, she might be only weeks or even days away from going... not home, exactly, Russia wasn't home anymore. Back to where she started. To finally get closure for everything that had happened to her in the past six years. But she ordered some eggs and sausage for the appearance and sat, picking at them while she watched the minutes tick away on her phone, waiting for him to show.

V. The Confrontation [CLOSED to Kyle] (backdated to late February)

After Lupercalia, Alex spent days worrying that she had ruined whatever relationship she had with Kyle and wondering whether it would be easier to simply pretend she had never met him and move on. But he was a hunter, or at least somehow involved with the supernatural. And even if he'd never directly lied to her, he'd concealed the truth, and in her eyes that was just as bad. She wanted an explanation. Before long, she had worked up enough anger to storm all the way to his place with every intention of confronting him.

There were no obvious signs of life there. Maybe he was out. She raised her hand to bang on the door when she remembered that even if Kyle was a liar, his aunt and uncle might be clueless and innocent, and she didn't want to get them involved. If they came to the door, she would have to exchange pleasantries and possibly pretend to be there for some innocuous reason when all she wanted to do was shout at Kyle.

Instead of knocking, she yanked out her phone and called him. If he didn't answer, then she'd knock.

VI. Choose Your Own Adventure! [OPEN]
Anywhere, Any Time

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"I got brownies." Kyle was all but determined to plow his way through this potentially awkward situation like in his good ol' football days: with broad strokes and blunt force. Although he could be serious when he tried, he wasn't great at it and it always set him more on edge and brought about more lingering symptoms than if he could keep things light.

With the same friendly manner, "Did you get the key?"

If Kyle wasn't going to bring up the kiss, neither was Alex. It might be better to pretend it never happened and get back to being friends. Everything would be much less confusing and awkward that way.

She went over to the coffee table and grabbed the duplicate key. "Promise me," she said as she came back to him, not holding the key out yet, "that you won't use it while the moon's up."

Kyle moved to take hold of her hand holding the key, strategically moving to position Alex between himself and the counter behind her. He offered the same smile as he closed most of the distance between them, his voice dropping to be jokingly seductive. "I can't promise that. I can only promise I won't use it while this full moon is out."

Alex's stomach did a flip when he stepped closer to her. Whether it was nerves or attraction or both, she couldn't tell.

She clamped her hand down on the key, refusing to let go of it. "No full moon, ever, or I'm not giving it to you."

Kyle's fingers tried gently to slip beneath hers, finding it impossible. He did his best to maintain his pseudo suave attitude in the face of crushing defeat, determined not to give up. "Then I guess I'll break the door down. I hope your neighbors like you."

He leaned in to a close proximity, resisting the urge to kiss her right then only because his attention was on the key and trying to take it from her hand. Promises weren't cheap and he had no intention of making one he couldn't keep. Not unless absolutely necessary to protect her.

Alex wrenched her hand away from his. She did it as gently as possible, knowing she was preternaturally strong and he wasn't, and she didn't want to hurt him. But she wasn't giving up the key until he swore he wouldn't use it to do anything stupid.

"I'm serious. The wolf is dangerous, it could kill you." She wasn't impressed by the faux sauveness, but she was touched by the fact that he wanted to be with her during the full moon, even if it was stupidly dangerous.

"I'm used to being around things that can kill me," he replied without missing a beat.

Kyle dropped his hand away and withdrew entirely, sighing as he turned back toward the counter. He moved to open the box of mix, distracting himself from his frustration with her the only way he really knew how. It frustrated him that she never let him in, even while claiming that she trusted him. But it was something he could live with.

"I promise you I won't use it to come in while this full moon is up, and I won't come in during any other full moon without your permission. Unless it's to save your life." He glanced up at her before his attention shifted to rifling through her cabinets for a large bowl. "Take it or leave it. Either way, we're still making the damn brownies."

"Fine." Alex put the key onto the counter and pushed it over to him. That was all she wanted, really, to know that he wouldn't use it while she was wolfed out. She wouldn't be giving her permission, ever.

She walked around him to turn the oven on, focusing on that rather than on him and whatever might or might not be between them.

Kyle set the bowl on the counter, looking up first to the key, then to the frustrated woman walking beside him. He turned around to lean back against the counter, reaching out to try to take her hand in his. While he wasn't entirely sure what he wanted right now, he knew that he didn't want her to be upset, or angry with him. He knew he wanted to be close to her and comfort her and make things alright again.

"Hey," he said as he tried gently to pull her back to him. "I'm not stupid. I won't put myself in danger without a damn good reason. But I also don't want to make a promise that I don't know I can keep and forever is a long-ass time."

Alex let him take her hand and pull her in. She really didn't want to fight with him, especially since he was actually being very sweet. But she couldn't handle the thought of him getting hurt or killed, and the thought of that happening because of her was even worse.

"Okay, I get it." She didn't think he was incompetent. If he'd spent all that time fighting vampires and was still alive, obviously he could take care of himself. But he'd never encountered a wolf before, and she couldn't help but worry. "I'm not saying you're stupid." She might have thought it once or twice, but she wasn't saying it out loud. "I-- You think I could live with myself if I woke up in the morning and I'd killed you? Just don't let that happen, okay?"

"I promise I won't let you kill me," he offered, twisting his hand around to interlace their fingers together. Kyle gave her a wide smile, as if it really was just that easy. And maybe it was, with how well he was trained and her only changing on the full moon. Or maybe it was a million times worse than he imagined. But he could handle it.

Alex didn't think it was that easy, but she knew that would have to be enough. He wouldn't come over during the full moon without permission, which she wouldn't give. She didn't think she could argue it any further than that.

"Good." A thought occurred to her. With her free hand, she reached up under the hood of the stove and pulled out the gun she kept hidden there. She still didn't use the stovetop often enough to have moved it. "Just in case, this is there."

She'd rather he shoot her if he had to than get eaten by the wolf.

As soon as Kyle saw the gun, he dropped Alex's hand and took a step back, confused as to whether he should be surrendering or preparing to fight. After a moment, he slowly caught on that she was making him aware of it in case he needed it, but there was still a giant middle ground she had leapt over to get there.

"What the hell, Alex? You have a gun?" That would be unusual enough in America. In England, it was more than a rarity. "Why do you have a gun? Is that the only one?"

Alex immediately held the gun up flat between them, the barrel pointed at the ceiling. She wasn't trying to frighten him at all and she wanted to make that clear.

"To protect myself," she snapped. "And yeah, it's the only one." She released the clip and held it up so he could see the wooden tips on the bullets. "They work great against vampires, but they'll hurt the wolf as much as a regular bullet." Which wasn't much, but it was better than nothing.

Kyle frowned at her, finding himself a little envious of her possession while simultaneously worried for her having it. He made a mental note to work on his own arsenal, or lack thereof, in the near future. Apparently he was a part of this world whether he wanted to be or not.

"Protect yourself from who? Or what?" He understood in the general sense, wanting protection. He'd started carrying a stake around with him most of the time. But a gun meant business, and was usually reserved for people either professionally trained or absolutely terrified, or both. The memory of her attacking him in the grocery store flashed through his mind.

"Vampires." Once again, that was only a partial truth. Alex hated lying to him, but she knew the truth would put him in danger, and explaining that she was very well-trained in firearms meant she'd have to explain her history with Nikita. He probably wouldn't approve of some of the things she'd done. Their relationship was already rocky enough.

"You know how it is, vampires and werewolves, mortal enemies." She tried to play it off somewhat lightly.

She slammed the clip back into the gun and stuck the gun back under the hood.

He wasn't really the type to pry generally. There was a reason he hadn't tried asking about her training and her past again, hadn't tried finding out more about why she didn't seem certain about wanting a moon necklace or how she'd found the pack so quickly after moving here from America. But he had a hard time when he felt like people were lying to his face without understanding why they might do that.

"Yeah," he replied tersely. Abigail had told him about some kind of political alliance and James Memon was angry about the information in a way that made it seem secretive but true. And Kyle didn't really care that much in general, except that it made Alex's excuse sound like a blatant lie. At least it quashed his desire to kiss her.

Maybe, in hindsight, whipping out the gun had been a bad idea. Alex knew she had upset him somehow but not exactly what she'd done.

"What, you're pissed at me for having a gun?" She didn't think that was it, but she couldn't figure out what else it would be. "My life isn't safe, Kyle!"

"I'm not pissed at you for having a gun," he replied immediately, holding up a hand to try to stop her before she got too far down the line of defensive reasoning. The irritation returned to his voice, more upset with the fact that they were already fighting again than with the idea of her lying to him. He didn't know what he was thinking, coming over here, pretending they could work. As much as he wanted it, he was too damn broken and she was too damn secretive and the easy parts that were so easy were punctuated by fights that were hard and stressful.

Kyle ran a hand through his hair before leaning back against the counter, arms crossed. If he skipped over the whole relationship delusion, this wasn't so bad. So he forced a smile as he looked at her again, erasing all signs of anger. "Promise me you won't get arrested for illegal possession."

"Then what? You're obviously pissed about something." She said it at the same time that he spoke again, and she tilted her head at him, jaw locking in frustration. She didn't want to just pretend everything was okay when it obviously wasn't. Being with him made her happier than she'd felt in a long time, but when he got like this it was frustrating as hell.

She knew it would be a bad idea to start anything romantic with him, but how could they even be friends if he wouldn't talk to her? "Whatever it is, just tell me!"

"I don't have all the information." He shrugged as if it didn't matter. Which it did, or he wouldn't have shrugged like that. "Look, I get that you have secrets and you don't want to tell me about whatever it is. That's fine with me. Really. I just didn't take you for someone to be packing heat. I mean, you're hot, but different kind of heat."

Still trying to make things lighter, still trying to keep things from devolving into anxiety again. Kyle's grin faded to a light smile, equal parts genuine and active effort.

For a moment, Alex had to look away, upset and frustrated with both him and with all the things she couldn't tell him, and all the things she'd done that she didn't want to tell him. Finally, she looked back, shaking her head in response to his smile. She kind of loved that he could smile like that even at a time like this, but she couldn't.

"I can't tell you," she said helplessly. "It has nothing to do with what I want. If I told you, you'd be in danger." She really wanted him to understand that most of her secrets she was keeping for his safety. Almost all of her secrets. All but the handful that she was keeping out of shame for what she'd done, and Nikita, who she simply wasn't ready to talk about. "You knew I had training. Having a gun doesn't change anything about me."

"Okay," he conceded about her protecting him, even though it was a crock of shit. He was always in danger, more than she knew, and he hated the idea of her coddling him or thinking he couldn't handle himself. But hey, she knew shit that he didn't and maybe, just maybe, she was right. Right or wrong, it was obvious she believed that to be the truth and so, for now, he wouldn't push her on it. At the latter, however, his smile faltered and he fell back into annoyance.

"It means your training isn't some distant part of your past that you don't want to talk about. It's here and now. It's- Are you a hunter?" Hunter. He'd been called one several times, in spite of not exactly being one, including by Alex herself. It was easy enough to understand the concept, even if he had only met a couple in passing and never asked the details of their professions.

The leap from her owning a gun to her being a hunter was one she didn't quite follow. "No, I'm not a hunter." This was perilously close to telling him exactly what she couldn't tell him.

"I was trained to kill vampires. Other werewolves, if I have to. Anything supernatural. I was never a hunter, though. I never--" She frowned at him. She felt she was watching their relationship fall apart and she wasn't even entirely sure why.

"Do you trust me?" Less than twenty-four hours ago, he'd told her, completely unprompted, that he did. She was getting the impression that that had changed.

"Of course I trust you." The reply was without pause or hesitation, as if she was asking if the sky was blue. She could lie to his face right now, with him absolutely knowing it to be true, and he'd still trust her. That didn't prevent him from being annoyed though, or from wanting to know why she had a gun in her apartment. The fact that she seemed to think it was normal spoke more to her character than even having the weapon, not that he thought as much on that. "This has nothing to do with whether I trust you or not."

It wasn't all that far removed from his military unit, in a way. Absolute trust, regardless of circumstances, unless unequivocally proven otherwise. But they sure as hell fought and argued within that, as much as they could while following the chain of command and sometimes even beyond. There was no commanding officer here and he knew Alex wasn't a brother-in-arms, but he learned to separate trust from disagreements.

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