Four Days In The City
Monday:
Oz sits on the steps of the library -- yep, it's the library; the big marble lions are a dead giveaway -- and lights a fresh cigarette from the butt of the one winking and dying in his mouth. Watches the nicotine and tar give a soundless little burning scream, then replaces the first. Takes that one and presses it against his wrist. Ripples of heat make their way up his arm, proving that yes, his nerve endings are going to work today. He hadn't been too sure. It's always a little iffy, the morning after the Third Night.
There's no need for the capital letters, but there is, too. It is kind of momentous, after all. Not many people can boast that three nights a month they become something other than human.
Ok, no, not true. A lot of them can, actually, judging by the scents that pass by his nose on days like this. That guy over there, for example, the one in the twelve-hundred-dollar suit, reeks of resurrection magic. If he's a zombie, he's a really good one; there's no rot on him at all, no hint that he's anything other than human. Which is sort of the idea.
The girl who sat next to him on the subway this morning smelled like a shapeshifter -- a tiger, maybe, or a python. Her hair was brown and tipped pink. She listened to a Lords of Acid tape until her stop, then got off and promptly vanished into the crowd, bootheels clicking on the concrete. She didn't look anything other than human, either.
He wonders how he looks, sometimes. There's the obvious answer: short, with hair that's been dyed more times than is strictly necessary (this week it's red, just because, and because it's easier to get blood out of red hair), and just cool enough to not be cool for the sake of fashion. Entirely human, just like that girl there, the one with the spiky hair and tats and hey wait she's not human.
He thinks it like that, all one sentence. She's below, on the sidewalk, not anywhere near him, and he can't help but be glad. Her hair is dark blonde and short, spiky. She's wearing baggy khakis and fingerless gloves, a shirt with the sleeves cut off. Her boots look old and worn, but not falling apart. There's a tattoo of some unfamiliar design on her right arm. She smells like metal; there's piercings on her, somewhere, someplace he can't see from this angle. He doesn't see her eyes, but he doesn't need to. He knows predators when he sees them. The 'shifter on the subway has nothing on this girl.
She crosses at the light, moving easily, a little too smoothly to be human. Listlessly she chews gum, like she's looking for something to do. A few more years and she'll have a two-pack-a-day habit.
Oz wonders what she is. Not demon, not vampire -- not in the middle of the day -- and not werewolf. She stinks of pack, though, and he does mean "stink". There's black threaded through her scent. He recognizes the smell from the old days, when he thought he'd had a pack, back in Sunnydale. Veruca smelled that way, before he tore her throat out.
Betrayal. The girl reeks of it. It makes his eyes water, even over here. She betrayed her pack.
She's a threat, howls a wordless voice in the back of his mind. She's a threat, kill her, kill her, kill kill kill no one hurts the pack and lives --
But she's not a part of his pack. She's just a girl, heading across the street at midday. He's still that human, at least.
So he sits back, and watches her until she disappears around the corner. Then he tosses his dead cigarette aside and heads to get some lunch.
Tuesday:
The girl is here.
He spots her while he's in line for coffee at this little mom-and-pop shop on 34th Street. There's a Starbucks three blocks away from where he's been spending his nights, but he just can't do it. It's Starbucks. He's not Mr. Avoid All Brand Names or anything, but Starbucks coffee always tastes like molten brass. It's worse, now; he can taste the chemicals and the silvery tang of iron from the mechanical bag-packers, and it makes him nauseous. Besides, this place has fresh-baked banana bread every morning. Yum.
She's standing a few feet away, sipping what smells suspiciously like Tabasco-flavored Irish coffee. The combination makes him wince, but she's got this small smile on her face, and it looks genuine. She actually likes it. Huh.
Next to her, bumping arms every few seconds, is another guy, maybe a year or two younger than himself. He's got a mohawk, and the scariest sideburns Oz has ever seen. He's also got the same tat she has, with x's inside four ovals connected by a series of lines. The nose ring he's wearing does nothing to make him seem more menacing; she's scarier than he is, and all she's doing is standing there drinking coffee.
Oz gets his coffee and starts to walk away. He passes by the girl, brushing her arm with his. She turns and looks up at him, and for a moment, her eyes are so hot with anger he thinks his skin will be pink tomorrow. Like a mild sunburn, only from a person. Or not a person, as the case may be.
Then she smiles suddenly, and as scary as it is it's also beautiful. Puts Willow's smile to shame. It reminds him more of Veruca, grinning and urging him to run free.
"Sorry," he says, holding up a hand.
The guy with the mohawk glares at him, but she shoots him a look and keeps smiling at Oz. "No harm, no foul," she says. She's got an accent, a local one. "Just be more careful, huh?"
And he knows that she can see through him, pierce the veil of humanity and see the Wolf inside, the one that's still half-drowsing from its three nights of freedom. It doesn't scare her at all; he knows that, too. If anything, it excites her, gives her a little tingle way down low.
"Sure," he says, and turns away and keeps walking.
He doesn't stop walking until he's three blocks over and four down, and his coffee is cold.
He drinks it anyway.
Thursday:
Nighttime in the city is supposed to be scary. But then, none of these people have ever seen nighttime in Sunnydale. After that, muggers and robbers seem tame. Hard to take the Son of Sam as seriously after you've seen your mayor turn into a demon snake and try to eat your graduating class.
He's spent the better part of the night walking around, trying to wear himself down so that he'll fall asleep as soon as his head hits the pillow in the back of the van. He's had dreams all week, thick wet things that scream and beg for mercy and leave copper in the back of his throat. Wolf dreams. He fucking hates Wolf dreams. He's started to make a rough kind of peace with his other half, even embrace it to some extent. But not the dreams. His dreams are still supposed to be his. It makes him feel cheated.
His hand is on the latch when he smells it, thick and coppery and not too far away. Blood.
Except that it's not blood. It's like blood, yeah, but there's something else in there, too -- something summery and fresh, something he's never smelled before. He thinks about heading back to the van for a moment, but his feet are moving before he can tell them to stop.
It's coming from an alley a block over -- one of the really nasty ones, the ones even the gangs and the dealers have started to leave alone. There's filth and grime everywhere, and glittery things in the darkness. Some of the glitter is from jewelry. Most of it isn't.
Sprawled near the streetlight is the mohawked guy from the coffee shop. Or rather, what's left of him. There's a concave hole in the middle of his chest, like someone swung an axe and hit hollow. There's no iron-smell, though; nothing even remotely like an axe, or a weapon of any kind. Just strange blood and something a little like ozone, but too bitter.
There are shapes at the other end of the alley. Oz presses himself against the wall and moves closer, looking around some crates.
The girl is pressed flat against the opposite wall, blood trickling from one corner of her mouth. Her hands are fisted, her eyes sparking hate with every blink. "Fucker," she snarls, and spits fresh blood onto the ground. He can hardly see it over the grime. "You're supposed to be dead."
"That's the problem with you, Lonnie," says a soft voice, and the hand around her throat tightens a fraction. The voice is quiet and masculine, and utterly in control. A little mocking, too. "You never doublecheck your work."
It's the alpha, he realizes suddenly, and tries to flatten himself against the box. It's her pack leader, the one she betrayed. And judging by the way their scents mingle and taste alike, he's also related to her -- brother, maybe, or cousin.
"What are you going to do?" she sneers, and he can't help but feel a little impressed. Even now, bleeding, wounded, a dead body lying a few feet away, she's not cowed. "Kill me?"
"Yes," the other man says simply, and snaps her neck.
Oz jerks back at the sound and immediately berates himself for it. He's snapped necks before, mostly on deer or other small animals; he should be used to the noise of it. It also gives his position away. Amateur mistake.
The man lets her body drop and turns, looks Oz square in the eye. His own eyes are dark brown and completely emotionless. Oz recognizes this look, though; Buffy's worn it, once or twice. The eyes of someone doing what he has to do, not something he wants to do. Keeping order.
They stay that way for a few seconds, not saying a word, just staring.
Then the man turns and walks in the opposite direction. He climbs on top of the Dumpster and vaults over the brick wall as if it's not even there. No human moves that way. There are vampires who don't even move that way.
Oz stands there until his nose adapts to the smell of blood, however strange. Then he fishes his keys out of his pocket and heads back to the van.
Saturday:
He's thinking about leaving the city for the weekend, maybe; heading for Jersey or at least out of the city proper, going someplace quiet, someplace he can read and see if he's still capable of writing music. He's got plenty of cigarettes and a few clean changes of clothes before he needs to do laundry again, and more than a few images he needs to get out of his eyes before he can try to sleep again.
He's thinking so hard, he almost doesn't notice the guy sit down next to him. Said guy reaches over and taps out a cigarette with practiced ease, don't-mind-me-hey-can-I-bum-one-of-these?-thanks smooth. Rests it between cupped hands and pauses for a moment. The heat from the fire brushes Oz's cheek and makes him look over.
And of course it's the guy from the alley last night. Who else would it be? There's no animosity behind the thought, though, not really. Not even much fear. He's more tired than anything else. He wishes the guy would just kill him or disappear, because either way he needs to get a bagel and crash in someplace's place for about 26 hours. Give or take a couple. He could get by on 24, in a pinch.
"Hey," he says noncommittally, and drops his own cigarette to the ground, stubs it out. He's not in the mood for amateur theatrics today, his own or anyone else's. There was no sulphur smell when the guy lit his cigarette. It makes him annoyed, for some reason he can't quite figure.
"Hey," the guy says, and taps some ash away. In this light, Oz can see him better -- he's tall, and has spiky hair, and someone should probably explain to him that the last guy who wore a beard like that was Ming the Merciless, and it never did him any good. There are a couple of tattoos peeking out from his shirt; one of them looks just like the one the girl had, the ovals and x's. Doesn't look like a gang symbol, but it still makes part of Oz -- the human part, anyway, and maybe the Wolf too -- want to scoot a few feet over just in case. He's got silver around his neck and on a couple of his fingers, and he reeks of metal -- one in the eyebrow, two in one ear, three in the other. God knows what else or where it is. He smells a little like he's wounded, but they're old wounds, still healing. Nothing from last night.
Oz doesn't say anything, just stares across the street. A couple of girls, no older than 10, hold hands and cross at the light. They're wearing Catholic school uniforms. Probably go to St. Agnes or Sister Ignacius; they're the only two in walking distance.
The guy takes a long drag off his cigarette, then breathes out the smoke. Taps some more ash away. "Do I know you?" he finally asks, still not turning to look Oz in the eye.
"No," Oz says, and it's not a lie. Just because you watched him kill two people two nights ago doesn't mean you know him.
"Huh." The guy twirls the cigarette around in his fingers, seemingly not caring whether it's lit or not. "Sorry about that. Guess you've got that kind of face."
"Guess so." Back into laconic mode. It's safer. Less likely to get his neck snapped, or his chest caved in. The bodies were gone, when he checked this morning. No sign of them, no trace remaining. The cops could have picked them up, but he doesn't think so. It's like they just...vanished.
"Mmn." The guy takes a final drag off the cigarette and drops it to the ground, stubs it out. He rests his hands on his thighs and stands up, the motion so smooth Oz can't help but stare. People don't move like that. Buffy doesn't move like that. Suddenly he looks down at Oz and asks, so casually it can't be real, "You're not from around here, are you?"
Oz looks up at him and shakes his head. "No."
"Neither am I." Which is ridiculous, because he's got the same accent the girl had, but somehow Oz knows that's not what he means. "Good to know some of us ain't complete assholes." He nods his head in Oz's direction. Oz, who's been a lot of places but never to Europe or anyplace with honest-to-God monarchies, recognizes the nod immediately: a King bestowing his thanks.
Oz nods back, taps another cigarette out of the back. "One for the road?"
"Nah. I'm tryin' to quit. Somehow, I don't think New Mexico's nicotine-friendly." His teeth are white and perfect when he grins. Oz doesn't understand the statement, but he doesn't need to. Not his place. "But thanks."
"Anytime." Oz bends his head to light the cigarette, and when he looks up the guy's gone. The whole process takes maybe three seconds, four if there's a strong wind.
Maybe it's time for him to get out of New York. Head up north, maybe, to Canada. See if there are any shamans up there who can help him, or at least help him accept what he's becoming. It's worth a shot, anyway.
Oz stubs out his cigarette, unsmoked, and heads for the hostel to pack.