15903/The worst kinds of people gravitate here.

The worst kinds of people gravitate here.
Date of Scene:	20 December 2023
Location:	Upper East Side, Manhattan
Synopsis:	Dracula and Vampirella get into in while he tried to talk with her. He's innocent, really.
Cast of Characters:	Dracula, Vampirella

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Dracula has posed:
It is the height of arrogance, naming a club as such. He has passed through this city enough times that he always passes by just to watch the arrogance that comes and goes.

Dracula is obscured in an alley way for the moment. Not the usual lord of everywhere I step manner. He is far more clandestine, seeming to be studying those around the area, but especially those coming and going.

Vampirella has posed:
Vampirella's been to the Hellfire Club. Mostly, she finds it irritating. A good place to get laid if you want, and if you don't mind that the person laying you is probably the kind of repressed freak who's internalized so much sex-negativity that they need to create a demon-worshiping second personality to give themselves permission to just want to get a little mattress-top calisthenics on. You'd have to be chock-full of self-hatred to go to the Hellfire Club twice.

So why's she walking by it now? Shut up. She's definitely not looking for an excuse to give the place a second chance, and DEFINITELY definitely not harboring any kind of masochistic desire to validate her self-hate by inviting others to disrespect her.

'Shit,' Vampirella thinks. 'I need to kill someone.'

Dracula has posed:
Watching the comings and going, Dracula find new interest when he notices Vapirella passing by. A scowl creases his features for a moment, but then it smooths out. A time for all things.

He steps out of the shadows when he is able to walks behind her. He isn't trying to be overly quiet, but sometimes that just happens. Still, those she meets look past her and at the tall, imposing Lord of the Vampires.

He isn't trying to hide really. Without time taken to concentrate on the act, he just stands out.

Vampirella has posed:
A corpse is walking behind her.

Vampirella doesn't need to see him to know that's the case. If your hearing is sharp enough, you can tell the difference between live footsteps and undead ones. The lack of a pulse changes the resonance of the impacts; it's almost like the shoes are full of clay instead of flesh and bone.

So, a corpse who plans to jump her as soon as she gets alone. Vampirella thinks about it, and decides this doesn't worry her. If that's the best the corpse has, then she has nothing to fear.

She turns down a dark alley to await the inevitable attack from some vampire who thinks he's the one, he's got her number, he's gonna be vampire-famous because of all the people who've ever tried to kill her, none of them ever thought of walking behind her.

Dracula has posed:
Most that follow her don't have the good sense to know she is almost as much a predator as he is. In many ways she is, but his arrogance refuses to acknowledge she might be.

For his part he walks and doesn't make an aggressive attempt against her. He walks into he alley way, mindful she might turn on him since he knows of her existence.

Just into the alleyway, out of the sight of passers by, he comes to a halt and settles into a more defensive posture if it comes to that. Rather he just waits to see what she might do when his voice rumbles,"You are still beyond beautiful, but arrogant my dear."

Vampirella has posed:
'You're arrogant,' says the man who imagines Vampirella could possibly care whether he approves of her physical appearance or not. Part of her wants to take the time to point that out, but she frankly would lose a lot of self-respect if she sought the validation of having him support her appreciation of the irony.

So instead she hurls herself at him, fangs extended, claws out, leaping silently as a jungle cat pouncing on a deer. Whether claws or fangs find his throat first is a question she is very interested in discovering the answer to.

Dracula has posed:
Watching her body language and posture, the movements in her legs, and her over all presence in the world tells him everything he needs to know. The ferocity is impressive and he laughs and then switches to the Mist that she passes through.

He floats up and away from her for the moment and then floats back down to the alley again, taking corporeal form several feet away from her."Faster. More focused." he critiques in that arrogant prick way that only he can,"You need to learn to control your hips before you launch into that attack next time."

Vampirella has posed:
Vampirella smirks, lips pulling hard to the right. The expression would be hideous for the contempt it conveys, but a little bit of red lipstick goes a long way toward making even a sneer look pretty. That's as much reaction as she deigns to give him, though (and she doubts he understands the reason for her condescension anyway, if that would even matter). She circles a bit to his left, still silent; the toe of her right foot slides back, the heel lifts off the ground, and she hurls herself at him again, claws first.

If she misses him, that abandoned wooden pallet behind him should, with a hard kick, be a convenient source of flimsy but serviceable stakes.

Dracula has posed:
"Such a temper." he chides and shifts into the mist form again when she lunges. When she wastes the pallat, his mist shifts and wraps around her body. If they were lovers it might seem like affection.

Given they are far from that, it is almost pervserse. The mists sink into her ears, up her nose, and tickles her eyes. Whatever he is doing, few if any have ever spoke of him doing anything like this.

Vampirella has posed:
It is a poorly kept secret that Dracula enjoys entering women who do not consent to him doing so. A lot of ink has been spilled on the subject.

Vampirella isn't interested in spilling ink. The fury taking her almost drowns out conscious thought with its subarticulate need to kill: almost, but not quite. She growls in pain as the skin on her back splits open and her wings--their joints always tense and cramped from being concealed inside her, their membranes usually cold as the blood and fluid on them dries in the air--stretch out to their full, fourteen-foot span. They draw back and flap once, mightily, flinging her back several feet. Anyone less nimble than a vampire would have gone ass over teakettle from that move, and even Vampirella finds herself struggling less than gracefully to stay on her feet, but she manages; and it's worth the indignity just to beat the air that is currently Dracula and shove him away from her. Or at least, the majority of him, the bit not trying to tickle her lungs.

She hopes, very spitefully, that reconstituting his body after that kind of buffet is as nauseating as she imagines. Who knows? She might get lucky.

Dracula has posed:
The joys of an enemy that knows you so well. What he did, he did mostly to mess with her mind. The mist takes time to reform back together, but in a few moments, he reforms on a fire escape above her.

He nods to her and says,"You are adapting. Well thought out." Compliments? Surely it's a ploy of some kind. He crosses his arms and tells her,"I merely wanted to ask you about that dream. You realize there are several people other than you having it. What is connecting all of you?"

There are stories about the high ground and right now he has it. His eyes glow in the night, crimson stare at her.

Vampirella has posed:
Vampirella meets Dracula's eyes, refusing to worry about what he might be doing with them. Hypnosis is mostly for simple minds, and hers is not, as long as she doesn't let herself get complacent. Plus, right now, she has a lot to think about. Dracula knows better than to just tell her what to do--she'd refuse to do it out of principle--but this game he's playing? Where he tries to goad her into guessing his purpose so she can then try to thwart it, which itself might be the goal he intends her to chase? It bears some consideration.

Which admittedly is hard to do when she's still so furious at him for having found a new way to embody a metaphor for sexual violence. Her claws refuse to retract, and her wings are itching to fling her up at him.

"What's your escape strategy?" she wonders aloud, glaring up at him, eyes narrowed (in no small part because that wing flap stirred up a minor hurricane of trash in this reeking alley, the lighter bits of which are still wafting down and trying to find a home on her eyeballs). "You know I can wait until sunrise, and you know that when you run, I can follow you back to your lair to put a splinter in your chest. So what's the plan? Take a hostage you threaten to kill unless I let you escape, right?"

Dracula has posed:
He doesn't try to press that right now. The temptation is there of course. He's arrgant enough to try it, but for now he just watches her,"No one knows you better than an old enemy right?" he suggests.

"If I wanted to kill someone or if I wanted to take you, I wouldn't have spoken. I would have descended upon you and sank my fangs into your delectable flesh."

Crossing his arms he tells her,"I have interest in battling you tonight and more interest in your blood of course, but mostly I wanted to tell you. There is something behind those dreams that is bigger than you, the wizard, and older than me. I don't think any one of you really knows what those things are."

His smiles as she mentions the stake plans and curls one index finger towards him,"If we must battle so be it, but if you falter, I will drink from your throat like my chalice."

Vampirella has posed:
Sometimes, Vampirella wonders if guys like Dracula say things like that just to get her to roll her eyes so she'll miss their next move.

She doesn't roll her eyes, but it takes more willpower to not do than she'd be comfortable admitting. Maybe she IS arrogant.

And of course, this is exactly the time to engage in self-reflection, isn't it? Shit.

She restrains an urge to explain to him why he couldn't have descended on her--if he's forgotten any of her advantages, Vampirella sure won't be the one to recall them to his mind--and hears that her own voice is tight, an odd mixture of bored and annoyed, as it pronounces on her behalf, "You don't want to kill me, but you do want to fight and kill me. Fine. Do it, or run away to wherever your coffin is hidden. Maybe I'll pay a visit to the local church and borrow some of the Host."

Dracula has posed:
Shaking his head, disgusted with her,"So much to learn still." he replies,"There are those that watch over me, if you desire to try. I merely want you to think about what I said. If we are to come to that, I'd rather be the one to take."

His eyes glow and he tells her,"I am going now, follow me if you want and we'll see how that ends. Good evening Vampirella." A blast of magic and a flock of bats fly into the night. He flies away towards the sky so if she decides to take off after him, he's given her the opportunity. He wouldn't be baiting her would he?