nomorekaraoke | October 31st, 2006

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October 31st, 2006

Ahh, the late October evening air is crisp and sizzling with the bustle and excitement permeating 6th Street. Just an hour or two ago, the streets lay quiet and calm, like before a storm. And what a storm it is. Tonight is the biggest night of the year for Lorne - the only night he can go out with a bang (so to speak), and glam it up without having to worry about mobs and pitch forks and torches and all kinds of peer pressure. He can be lean and green and having a fabulous time. For any other demon with a sense of dignity, Halloween is the be all and ban all of faux pas-es. It's a night where silly wannabes co-mingle. It is just not done.

But Lorne will do it and do it well for every year he can muster. He'll be in his hundreds, old and wrinkly and hunchbacked, and he'll still come here for the big event.

***

And when the darkness has fallen over the city, and the parade lights up the city streets with eerie lights and chilled merriment in equal doses, Lorne dances down the line like it's 1999, all feathered up, glammed up and having a ball.

You never know who you'll bump into, and the best part? You can pop into a coffee shop or a restaurant on the way, get to know someone better anytime you want to. If he should be so lucky tonight, it would be the icing on the cake and the cherry on top.

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"It's not that cold," she protests -- but she's not pulling her hand away.

Part of that's a certain light-headed fatalism she's starting to feel about this whole encounter, a sense that if he means her harm, he's already had the chance a dozen times over. Part of it's the other thing she's starting to feel: a wary, reluctant liking for him.

After a pause: "So what do you know about the Watchers' Council?"

It goes both ways; if she wants his head on a platter (for anyone), she could have cut him down any time during their little boat ride up a certain creek. Except maybe for the subway ride.

Funny, though, it doesn't feel that bad, if only because Lorne's spent the better part of his life paddling his way to shore like his boat's about to sink. He's got paddles to spare.

Enough with the morbid analogies. There's a question that needs answering, and he isn't sure how. "Assumedly ancient organization helping Slayers to be Slayers since forever. They have droves of info on everything concerned with the world beyond the veil. Slayers, vampires, demons, secret societies, different dimensions, everything. Kind of like W&H, but without the lawyers and the Evil Agenda. ...though I can't say exactly what agenda they've got." Bastards.

He shrugs apologetically. There isn't really all that much he knows, and some of it, he is not about to tell just anyone. "I was head of the department of entertainment, way back when. The Watchers' Council never made my Top Ten list of entertaining stuff."

"All I know about their agenda," she says, "is that they want all the Slayers in the world working for them. And -- and someone said they want to wipe out everything else supernatural in the world. They tell it a little different."

With a tug, she reclaims her hands and folds them together in her lap, looking down at them.

"Doesn't make much difference in my case. I screwed them over, big."

"Yeah..." he agrees quietly. "Everyone sings a different tune, hard to decide which one to listen to."

No more rubbing hands? Fine by him. One rests casually over his knee, the other goes to his cigarette for a deeper drag and exhale, and flicking ashes off the tip.

"The Voyeurs screwed me and mine over, once. We hit Wolfram and Hart like the fist of an angry deity, and I don't mean that like the teenie queenies mean it."

...sharing is caring, obviously. Tit for tat, eye for eye and so on.

"The Voyeurs?" she asks, uncertainly.

"Watchers." He grins wryly. "Bad habit of mine; can't stop making up new names for anyone and anything."

"Oh." Tentatively: "They put you up to attacking Wolfram & Hart?"

"Nope. It's..." He considers how to word this particular can of hocrap, staring resolutely at the wisps of smoke rising skywards from the tip of his cancer stick.

"It's more complicated than that, sweetie. Me and my friends? We used to trust the Watchers' Council. Then we kind of got involved with the big double-u age crowd, and then they didn't trust us anymore."

He shrugs. "But why would they, really? So they screw us over, and one thing leads to another, and all of a sudden, we've decided to tear the place down and then some."

Heavy stuff, this. "And we did."

She draws up one knee, wraps her arms around it, tries not to shake.

Her voice is slow and unwilling. "When was this?"

Poor thing, Lorne muses, so on edge, like a little birdie fallen out of Momma's nest.

"Over a year ago, pumpkin. Not the local branch, of course, but you don't need to know more. Not from my lips, you don't."

Not the local branch. And over a year ago. So this ... doesn't have anything to do with the attack she saw. Not that she saw very much of it, from her vantage point of hiding under a desk and praying for it to be over soon.

Then we got involved with the big W-H crowd, and then they didn't trust us anymore.

"So," still slowly, "how do they feel about you now? The Watchers' Council?"

"As far as I know, all they know is that I left it all behind me. Everything." Everything from his precious little smashed up bar to his biggest mistake of all time. Everything.

"And I intend to keep it that way."

She swallows. "Yeah."

It's that same note of fellow-feeling, of right there with you, that started this whole conversation.

"You ... you got on the wrong side of both of them. How did you get them to leave you alone after that?"

How in the world does he even begin to answer that question? How does he even begin to recall it, lost and not-yet-found in the haze of his alcohol-soaked memories.

"Let's just leave it at 'I got connections and ain't afraid to use 'em'." Yes. Let's leave it at that.

"I brought my skills and my network, collected favors from people, the usual. Lots of hard work on a lot of people's behalves. Only lately, it looks as they might be on to me. Or, alternatively, they may find me while snoopin' around for someone else entirely. Not. Good."

"Connections."

She rests her chin on her upraised knee, staring at the pavement underfoot.

A touch bitterly: "Must be nice."

"Not really, no. It means you gotta put your trust in people, and from where I'm standing, that's the one thing you can't afford when you want to remain incognito. They're, whatchacallsits, 'a necessary evil'."

Yeah. As if evil could ever be necessary. It's just, yes, sometimes it can be, no matter how much you do not want.

"How 'bout you, sugar pie? How're you keeping yourself under the radar?"

A long sigh. "I dropped out of college. I don't go anywhere near my friends or family, or even any of the places I used to hang out. I don't try to touch my old bank account."

She looks up at him, and her eyes are still invisible behind the mask but there's apology in her voice. And something else; something like shame.

"I don't use my real name."

"Aw, honey." He smiles at the sound of her voice; and reaches out to pat her hand, whichever of the two are closest to him.

"Neither do I."

Come on, lighten up? Please? Pretty please?

It's more comforting than it has any right to be.

"So here I am," she says. "Here we are, I guess. What now?"

"Well..." He pauses, for drama and consideration in equal measure.

"This is where I give you my card, I do believe." Fetching a seemingly no-frills black card with black and gold trimmings. Okay, so the gold might count as a frill, but...

There's only the one word on it. Aequitas. Something the demon might seem a bit too pleased about, but then, he's quite fond of his charmed little business cards.

"If you wanna come find me, all you need is that card."

She takes the card, reads the one word on it, turns it over. Turns it over again.

Looks back up at him, puzzled.

"How do I ...?"

~~Of course, it's a green card with the above trimmings, so as to make some sort of aesthetic sense.~~

"You'll know where to go, when the time's right. Just keep an eye on that card every now and then."

He isn't being all mysterious for any other reason than it being so much fun. Besides, he's always been a tease at heart. Hopefully, it won't scare Emma far, far away.

"Maybe next time, you'll let me buy you a cup of coffee. It was very nice to meet you, Emma. All kinds of abrasive, rough-started goodness, but that's the way it goes, huh."

He holds out his hand for a shake buh-bye.

She studies the card a moment longer, then slides it into the pocket of her jeans.

In that moment she realizes she's decided to trust him.

"Thanks," she says, barely audible, and reaches to shake his hand. "For letting me talk."

"No problem, precious." He winks, shaking her hand warmly, gently as ever before getting up - making sure all his feathers are where they should be - and waves ta tah.

"No problem at all."

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October 31st, 2006

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